"I need you to take Miss Braun to the Vault. I'd prefer not to have someone walking around with a Relic right now, so either keep the Flute there or keep her there with it, I don't care. Just get it done."

"Yes sir." Clover said, then closed his scroll. "Marrow, Vine, come with me. Elm, Harriet, stay here until we get back."

The three Ace Ops men stepped onto the elevator that lifted them up out of the vault. Their teammates stood below them with the Cradle, receding as they ascended. Then they were out, and the elevator door opened. Clover opened his scroll again, checking the profile of the woman they were looking for. He knew Ironwood's orders sounded a bit harsh, but in reality it was obviously not that extreme. With reason and tact, they could convince Miss Braun to leave the Flute down in the vault. They'd decided that all the Relics they retrieved would be best kept down there, and a special research division would be formed to study them and contain them if need be. Miss Braun and her Flute could be a part of that, even, if she cooperated in these early stages.

Using his special permissions granted as the leader of the Ace Ops, Clover ran Piper Braun's face through a facial recognition program looking through the live security camera footage across all of Atlas. It may technically have been intended for emergency uses, but it expedited a process that would have taken a lot longer, since the general hadn't told him exactly where to find her. She was still in the academy, so it found her pretty quickly. She was in the cafeteria with some of the other odds and ends sort of people. That promised to make the whole process easier, as people put up less of a fuss in front of people they were getting along with, and you don't eat at the cafeteria with people you don't get along with typically.

The three men entered the cafeteria, with Vine staying by the door as Clover and Marrow made their way over to the table occupied by Piper and a few others. Clover spoke up from behind her, aware that he was interrupting a conversation. "Miss Braun, is it?"

The conversation stopped, and Piper turned around. "Piper is fine. And you are?"

He held out his hand for her to shake. "I'm Clover. This is Marrow."

Marrow gave an awkward wave. "Hello again."

"Anyway, if you wouldn't mind, could you follow us for a more proper debriefing. You've brought something to our attention that we need to properly deal with. This shouldn't take long."

She paused for a moment, then shook his still-waiting hand. "I appreciate it, but a debriefing won't work. I don't wear briefs."

"I'm sorry?"

"It's an underwear joke, don't think too hard about it."

"Oh. Right." Clover took his hand back, then turned to the side, motioning for her to go ahead. "If you please, then."

"Very well." She got up and turned back to the others at the table apologetically. "We'll continue later, ladies."

Robyn sighed and got up as well. "I should be heading back down to Mantle. I've been away too long as it is."

"And I actually need to see a doctor about my being Human." Jinn added.

Pelka looked around at everyone present, then shrugged. "I'll go with Robyn. Sure, why not?"

"Okay, just remember that thing we talked about with classified information." Clover said, reminding her not to talk about gods and magic with the Happy Huntresses. He hoped Robyn would be smart enough not to do that either, but telling her wouldn't change anything at this point. He just returned his attention to Piper and led her away.

They weren't long in returning to the vault, which opened up before them as the elevator descended into the chasmic chamber. The silent 'wow' from Piper was enough to tell Clover that they weren't dealing with someone who was used to all of this. She was just a normal person who had chanced upon the Relic. With it out of her hands and her life, she would be able to return to normalcy. The only problem would be if she wanted to keep it, but he wasn't opposed to granting her some position on a research team. He did have to wonder what sort of qualifications she might have other than raw experience with the one Relic.

Clover pointed down to where Elm and Harriet were waiting for them, singling out the Cradle. "See that? That's the Relic we just acquired in the far north. The Cradle of Deliverance. It has the ability to preserve or heal any person placed inside, but also to seal them away. It might be possible to trap Salem inside, or maybe one of her more annoying servants. They'll be in perfect fighting condition when it's opened again, but all we need to do is make sure that doesn't happen. If we just bury it at that point, it will have served its purpose. The only problem is getting someone inside, and the price of using the Cradle."

Piper looked at him questioningly. "Price?"

He nodded. "When you close someone inside, the Cradle uses your lifeforce to sustain them. So it consumes you. A life for a life. So when Pelka went in and her brother closed it up, he died to keep her alive. No one else was there to open the Cradle afterwards, so she waited in there for thousands of years. Then we showed up."

"I see... It sounds like you need a better Relic." She quipped.

"Yeah, probably. But, given the opportunity to use it to trap Salem, I'd do it." He shrugged, moving past that grim prospect. "Ironwood has ordered it to be contained except for in the event of an extreme emergency. Like if Salem were to show up on our doorstep. I have to wonder, if she were to close someone inside the Cradle, would Salem be consumed just like anyone else? It would be difficult to find out, but maybe we could trick her into it." Clover laughed at the thought of that seemingly possible outcome.

Marrow added his thoughts. "I'm really worried about someone accidentally triggering it, but I think so long as no one gets inside then it shouldn't happen. At least, that's what it sounded like when Jinn described it."

"The way to find that out would be to close it while there's no one inside, right?" Piper grinned teasingly at Marrow. She sobered up quickly. "But you guys didn't invite me down here to talk about that Relic, did you?"

"No, we didn't." Clover confirmed. "Though I think we can come to a good arrangement." The elevator stopped and the doors opened. Stepping out, Clover explained further. "The vault here is going to be converted to a more extensive facility for all the Relics we collect. None of them should leave here without a specific reason. That includes the Flute you have there. So that leads me to my offer."

She reached into her pocket where she was keeping the Flute. "What kind of offer?"

"We could all make this difficult by asking you to part with it and send you on your way, we could even squabble over it like children, but I think there's a better option for everyone. One where you take charge of the Relic Research Division. What do you say?"

"Research... Uh, I'm not really good at that. I don't know..."

"It's not like technology." Harriet explained, patting the Cradle. "There are no experts besides maybe Ozpin. You should give it a go at least."

Slowly, slightly, Piper's grip on the Flute softened. "Down here... in the vault." She shook her head. "I want the freedom to go outside and take the Flute with me. Just the Flute, no other Relic. Promise me that, and I'll accept your offer."

Clover thought for a second, then nodded. "You'll need to have an armed guard for that, for the Relic's safety, but agreed."

"Then I accept your offer."

"Are you nervous?" Qrow asked Ruby.

She looked back up at her uncle. "Nervous? I literally just spend a week with General Ironwood. Why would I be nervous?"

"Because this is about grades."

"Ah. Right. And I've never gotten good grades before, so this sudden change has you concerned that I might be suffering early onset dementia."

"I never said that." He reassured her. Then added, "But now that you mention it, I have noticed-"

"It was a joke." She held up her hands to stop him. "Just a joke."

"Then why are you afraid of the punchline?"

"You know why it's called a punchline? Cause it's the line that gets you punched."

"Wow. You stole that from Weiss." Blake said, walking up to the two as they were waiting outside Ironwood's office. She approached Ruby and hugged her quickly. "I didn't get an opportunity to say hi when you got back. I'm glad everything went well on your mission."

"Yeah, it was... an experience." Ruby remarked. They separated, and Ruby looked around awkwardly. "I'm here because my grades are apparently really good. You?"

"Same, actually." She narrowed her yellow eyes at Qrow. "I have my suspicions as to why we both got called here."

Qrow looked around innocently, then pointed at himself questioningly. "You think I had something to do with it?"

"You were in charge of grading the year end test. I took the liberty of checking, and found out that the last time someone's year end grades got them called to Ironwood's office, it was Winter, and before that was Marrow. I know what this is about." Blake explained matter-of-factly.

"Well, that's real encouraging!" Blake almost jumped, whirling around to see the girl who had apparently snuck up behind her. Smiling happily, the girl held out her hand towards Blake, or Ruby, whichever took it first. "Hi, I'm Amy! Nice to meet you, future teammates!"

Ruby shook her hand right away. "Hello, Amy! I'm Ruby! Want to hang out? We can shop for school supplies together!"

Getting a good look at Ruby, Amy's eyes sparkled with joy. "Oh my gosh, you are so pretty I can't believe you're real!" She shook Ruby's hand enthusiastically, both hands clasped around Ruby's one. "I so look forward to all the time we're going to spend together! We can paint each other's weapons and talk about cute guns!"

Regaining her composure, Blake coughed to get their attention. "First of all, you're deviating from the script. Secondly, we should go in now, if we're all here."

"That's a good idea." Qrow added. "Best not to keep the headmaster and general waiting too long. You can socialize later."

The three girls took an extra minute to smooth out their clothes and prepare to meet Ironwood. Qrow opened the door and they walked in, stopping and standing at attention halfway between the door and the general's desk. He stood up and stepped around the desk, standing in front of them with his arms crossed behind his back. He looked over the three students now standing before him. Somehow, he had a feeling Ruby would be here, once he'd learned that Qrow had taken care of the grading. He was surprised to find Blake present, rather than Yang, but Weiss' absence was also conspicuous. The third girl was not even from that group at all, just some student who had done well enough to garner top marks from Qrow.

"I won't waste your time with an excessive speech. Just know that you are here because you have proven yourselves to be the best of your class. Over the next year, you will take part in a special course of classes. You will be trained as Specialists, and in time, you will earn your spot among Atlas' most elite soldiers in the Ace Ops. Ruby Rose, Blake Belladonna, Amaranth Perpetua, congratulations. I expect great things from all of you going forward."

"Thank you, sir! We won't let you down!" Amy, or Amaranth said, giving a salute that was utterly overflowing with excitement.

Ruby also saluted, her own special salute. "Thank you, General."

Blake just nodded firmly.

"That will be all. I'm sure you have plenty you need to do to prepare, so you are all dismissed." He gave a proper salute, and the three of them left the room.

The door closed behind them, and Blake immediately turned to Ruby. "Is this a good idea? We have other things we need to be focusing on, don't we?"

Ruby shrugged. "Ace Ops training. It puts us in an even better position to help. I see this as an absolute win."

Amaranth got behind the two of them and scooped them both up in a big hug. "This is going to be epic! We're going to be the best of friends, I can tell!"

"Yeah..." Ruby laughed awkwardly. "Best of friends."