Beyond Vytal

by s15945

After the battle of Vytal, Yang is struggling to find a new normal, and realises that it won't be found in Patch, so packs up Bumblebee and heads back to Vale, though not to rejoin Beacon.

1. Picking up the pieces

Professor Port said, "Miss Xiao Long If you don't mind me asking, why haven't you put on that arm that General Ironwood sent you? not everybody can gain access to Atlas Tech."

Yang sighed and said, "Mostly it's because all it's doing right now is reminding me that I lost a part of me.

"Maybe if you try it on that feeling will go away, at least a little, and you can regain a sense of normalcy."

Yang frowned as her eyes turned red as she demanded, "Didn't you hear me? I just said that I lost a part of me, and it's never coming back!" Yang punctuated her last word by slamming her hand on the wall next to her. "I'm sick of people telling me to act like I normally would," Yang held her arm up as she said, "this is what is normal now!"

Professor Oobleck sighed said, "Maybe so, Miss Xiao Long, but normal is only ever what you make of it."

Yang sighed and hopped off of the bench as she said, "I'll…think on it. For now, I'm tired," and went back to her room and lay down on her bed in the dark, not even trying to sleep, knowing that it would be pointless.

XXXXX

The next day, when Yang woke up she quickly dressed in her cargo pants and orange shirt and went downstairs, tying her hair back into a ponytail, to see her father with breakfast set. When they had finished, Taiyang asked, "So, did you think on what Barty said while you were staring at the ceiling."

Yang said, "I did, yes."

"Annndddd?"

Yang sighed and said, "I realised that sticking around moping won't do me any good. Or you for that matter."

"So, you've decided to put the arm on then?"

"Hmnn…not exactl-!" they were interrupted by the door ringing.

Taiyang blinked, not expecting anyone. Yang was. She said, "Ah! They're here," as she stood up.

Taiyang exclaimed, "They're here? Who are 'they'…exactly?"

Yang ignored him and went to the door. When she was there, she opened it and said, "Hi, you're the tow guy that I booked, right?"

As the man at the door agreed, Taiyang demanded, "Tow-guy?! Yang! What is this about?"

"Like I said, nothing good will come of me staying here. Also…if I want to prevent this…" said yang as she raised her missing hand. "…from ever happening again, putting that arm on won't help. I thank you for everything that you've done…and had to put up with…but I need to move forward, and that arm…will do nothing but hold me back. At least for now."

The tow guy said, "Where's your vehicle?"

Yang said, "It's the bike in the garage."

The tow guy glanced at Yang's missing hand and figured out exactly why she'd need the tow. He asked, "You comin' with?"

Yang said, "If that's alright."

"Sure. 's'not often we get requests to disaster zones. Huntresses are always welcome…even if they can't function at full capacity."

Yang smiled sadly and said, "Well…I haven't got my license yet, but I'll do what I can."

As the tow guy went to retrieve Yang's bike, Taiyang exclaimed, "You're going to Beacon?!"

"No. Beacon Academy was destroyed, you know that."

"Then what are you going there for?"

"Don't worry so much. There's someone that I know that lives there that will be able to help me get stronger. Strong enough so that something like this never happens again."

"You know that what happened wasn't your fault, right?"

Yang smiled regretfully and said, "I know. But that's not what I meant, and you know it."

"Well, so long as you know it, it's fine. Just…try not to do something that you'll eventually regret."

Yang looked at her father and shrugged as she said, "Hey, you know me, right?"

Taiyang emphatically said, "Yes, I do!" as Yang went back upstairs to get the bag that she'd packed during the night.

When Yang was back downstairs, the tow guy was waiting by the door. He asked, "You ready?"

"Yeah," Yang said. She then looked to her father and tried to wave, but he had somehow moved behind her and hugged her tightly to him. She smiled as she hugged him back and said, "I'll call you when I get settled in, alright?"

"Sure," Taiyang said. "I would say good luck, but you seem to be as lucky as your Uncle recently."

Yang smiled and said, "Who knows, maybe that's all about to change."

Taiyang thought, 'Well, it certainly can't get any worse!' and went to the phone to call Signal Academy.

XXXXX

It took them about three hours to reach the port to the mainland. The driver stopped at the entrance and said, "Sorry 'bout this, but this is as far as I can take you."

Yang smiled wanly at him and said, "Yeah. Thanks." As she got off and waited at the end of the truck as he unloaded Bumblebee.

"Now, that'll be $350."

Yang raised her eyebrows and said, "Really? That much?" and shook her head in disbelief. She muttered, "I should have just walked it here," as she rummaged around in one of her tank bags to find her purse. When she had it, she sat on her bike, opened the purse, set it on her leg and got the money out. She then held it out to him.

He took it and said, "Hmmm…you know what…"

Yang said, "No, what?" as he stuffed the money into his pocket.

He took out a yellow, leather bifold wallet and emptied it of his cards and cash. He held it out to her and said, "Here, this might be easier for now."

Yang looked at it and smiled sadly. She said, "Thanks…" then in a slightly happier tone, "…it's certainly my colour." And set about transferring her cards and cash to it as the tow truck driver went back to the driver's cabin and drove off.

Yang tried to walk Bumblebee the rest of the way to the ferry, but ended up having to idle it to the ramp, but needed someone to help her get it up there. When she was finally on, a crewmember came up to her and said, "I'm uhhh…sorry…but I'm going to have to ask you to walk that the rest of the way to the front of the boat."

Yang nodded as she gave the guy a half-hearted smile, understanding exactly why he was asking her to do so. She sighed before idling it the rest of the way. When she was done, she walked around the side of the ferry, hearing hushed whispers and catching people pointing at her. After fifteen minutes of it, she snapped when she heard another hushed whisper and rounded on them and angrily demanded, "If you've got something to say, just say it!" only to see a young girl, who appeared to be around a mere eight years old, gasp and fearfully duck behind what must have been her mother's leg and grasp it tightly.

The mother angrily said, "What the hell is your problem blondie!? My daughter was just asking me if she could get some hot chips!"

Yang sighed, a guilty look on her face, which was immediately replaced with an apologetic one as she ducked down in front of her and said, "I'm sorry, ummm…little one." She smiled sheepishly as she said, "I've been hearing whispers ever since I got on and something happe ned recently that's got me acting a bit more self-consciously than I would have been.

"What does…self-contiously mean?"

"Hmmm…hyper aware is probably the best way that I can describe it."

"Oh. That's pretty weird, Big Sis'."

Yang smiled as brightly as she could manage and said, "I guess so."

The mother sighed and said, "Well what do you know."

Yang looked up at her and asked, "What do you know about what?"

"Normally Amelia doesn't really get along with strangers very well, and with the way you acted just now, I would have expected her to be clutching my leg for a week."

Amelia, blushing, exclaimed, "Mu-uummm! You're embarrassing me!"

"Oh calm down Ami. I'm sure she doesn't mind."

"Of course not," Yang said. She said, "If you want to go and get those chips, I could look after Amy for a bit."

"You'd do that?"

"Of course. Heh, I had to help dad raise my little sis'. That might have something to do with it."

"Oh! I see. Alright then. Thank you."

When the mother was gone, Yang hefted Amelia up onto her shoulder and asked, "This better?"

Amelia laughingly said, "Yes! Thanks Big Sis," as she wrapped a hand around Yang's head.

"Hey, Do you think your mother would mind if I took you over to my bike for a second? I need to check on something."

"Where is it?"

"It's just at the entrance."

"Then it shouldn't be a problem."

"Great!"

Amelia nervously said, "I uhh…do have a question though."

"What is it Amy?"

"You're like…an adult…right?"

"Well, technically, yes. Some would say otherwise."

"I see."

"So, anything else?"

"Well…adults drive cars, so why do you still use a push bike?"

"Ah…" Yang laughed.

Amelia blushed as she desperately asked, "Wh-why are you laughing?" unsure if she should be embarrassed or not.

"You'll see." Yang then went to her bike, leaving Amelia on her shoulder until she got to Bumblebee. When she was in front of it, she said, "She, is Bumblebee."

"That's a bike?"

"Yeah. She's my motorbike."

"Oh! Right. I thought you were talking about something like the mountain bikes that my friends and I got for our birthdays last year."

"You've got a mountain bike already?! You must be pretty good. We didn't get them until we were 12…although that could have just been dad being overprotective…which is pretty fair, all things considered."

"What's that?"

"Well, my mother, and my half-sister's mother were both huntresses and Ruby and I were already expressing an interest in going into the field. He probably just didn't want to add on extra potential methods of injury."

"Oh. I see. Wait! You're a huntress?!"

"Well, a huntress-in-training anyway. The Vytal Battle happened before I could finish my training."

"Say, do you think that I could be a huntress?"

"I don't see why not, though you would need to attend one of the combat schools first." Yang held up her arm as she said, "I built my Ember Celica at Signal Academy in my hometown of Patch." She ran her hand along bumblebee as she said, "Actually, I built this girl at the same time."

"Really?"

"Yep. She's the fastest bike in Patch."

"Is there a lot of bikes there?"

"Well, technically is should be 'are' there a lot of bikes there, but no. There is however a race that bikers from around the region come to take part in and I won the last three races…well…" Yang's voice took on a sad tone as she said, "…not that that's likely to happen again any time soon."

"Why's that?"

Yang said, "See those handlebars there?"

"No. I'm a bit small, so I can only see the side."

"Ah. Then here," yang said, holding her arm out. "Hold on."

Amelia reached up and clasped onto Yang's arm as she lifted her up onto the bike. When she was sitting on the seat, she said, "Oh yeah, now I do. What about the…ohh…I'm sorry! I didn't mean to…" as she saw Yang hold her missing arm up.

Yang said, "No. It's fine. You didn't do anything wrong. That was all him!" Suddenly, Yang flinched and backed away, as she saw an image of Adam and screamed out, "No! Get away from me!" and fell down.

Then, Yang shook her head as the image disappeared to see Amelia standing over her with a concerned look on her face as she asked, "Are you alright, Big Sis'?"

Yang sighed and said, "No. I'm no-!"

Yang was cut off by Amelia's mother demanding, "Get away from that brute Amelia!"

Yang sighed and said, "So, I was right then."

"Yes. You were!" and quickly hurried over to her daughter and grabbed her hand. She viscously said, "I hope you get your just desserts for what you did to that poor boy! Or maybe you already did!"

"That 'poor boy' you're talking about, was walking around just fine later that day! So he probably had a prosthetic. And, despite what that video showed, I saw him attacking me! Actually…it could have been a Semblance."

"A what now?"

"Semblances are developed from a person's Aura and typically helps in battle against Grimm. Semblances are different between people and usually cover some weakness that they have, or aid them in whatever style of combat that they have decided to pursue. For example, my super strength. When I take damage, when I've activated my semblance, it increases my strength exponentially."

The mother sighed and said, "Regardless, you might want to stay on the boat when it docks, because you're not going to be getting the fondest welcome when you arrive."

"Heh, believe me, I wouldn't be coming back if I had any other choice. Hopefully I'm not here too long, but it'll all depend on how a meeting goes with a friend."

"Oh? Well, good luck with that. Just…be careful…the Malachite Mafia has recently moved in and are causing real problems with the safety of the citizenry in some areas. Given your…recent injury…you might need to be extra careful, even with your 'semblance'."

Yang sighed and said, "Well, thanks for the warning," and nodded at Amelia, saying, "Who knows, I might see you around sometime."

"I hope so, Big Sis'," and smiled and waved at Yang as her mother lead her away.

Yang stayed with Bumblebee for the rest of the trip and idled off of the ferry after all of the other vehicles had driven off. She moved it up to the sidewalk and called a tow truck. When it was there, she asked the driver to take her to a garage with a lock-up, and he took her there. When Bumblebee was offloaded, she paid the driver and watched him drive off just under the speed limit. She shook her head as she sighed before going into the building and went up to the desk. When she was there, the guy at the desk didn't look up as he asked, "What can I do you for?"

"I need somewhere to store my bike for a week."

"Alright. It's pay in advance though, and no refunds."

Yang said, "That's fine. I'm probably going to be here for a while anyway."

"Well, if you say so hon'."

Yang grunted and her lips downturned as she said, "How much," in an irritated voice.

"For a week? It''ll be 275 lien."

"Okay, sure," Yang said, taking out the yellow wallet that the tow driver had given her and handed over her card, saying, "Here you go," and tapped it on the machine. She then took the key for 'garage 11' and idled Bumblebee to it and locked the roller door behind her before calling a cap and giving him the address for Junior's club. She was told in no uncertain terms that she'd be driven to two blocks away from her destination and would need to walk the rest of the way. Having no other choice, Yang accepted the condition and the ride quickly passed in silence.

When she was let off, she made her way to Junior's bar faster than she'd thought she would, but, when she checked her watch, she saw that it had taken exactly as long as she'd been expecting it to take, so blinked and shook her head thinking, 'Damn girl! Get your head into the game! That Malachite Mafia or whatever isn't a concern of yours…not yet anyway.' She strode up to the door and knocked on it regularly.

Inside the bar though, everything was in chaos as a subordinate rushed into the bar, exclaiming, "She's BACK! That blondie's back! Get your guns! She's going to destroy tha' place again!" causing the other gang members to start rushing about to get their weapons and extra ammo for the onslaught that they knew was oncoming. Junior sighed and said, "And we just fixed that door too." After a couple of minutes of nothing happening, they heard another, regular, knock on the door. Junior said, "Hmmm…odd? She'd burst through the doors the last two times by this point." He slung his weapon in its club form over his shoulder as he went to the door. When he'd opened it, he said, "Heya blond-. Oh." He stepped aside and cocked his head into the club and said, "Come on in."

Yang smiled and said, "Thanks, Hei."

As they walked in, Hei asked, "So, mind tellin' me how you learned that name, blondie? It's not something that everyone knows. Heck, even now, most of my crew call me Junior, and my old man's been dead for over a decade now."

Yang smiled and said, "Girl's gotta have her secrets, right? And it's Yang."

"Yeah. I know. We saw the broadcast of the festival."

"Yeah. That," Yang frowned, her eyes changing colour to red as she thought of what had been done to her match against Mercury. She closed her eyes and sighed. When she reopened them, they were back to normal.

As they sat down at the bar, Hei said, "So, mind telling me why you came back? You're not exactly going to have the best reception by most of the residents hereabouts.

Yang sighed and said, "If the reactions that I was getting on the ferry over are any indication, I'd say that that's understating things."

Hei shrugged as he said, "Well, how about that Strawberry Sunrise? You're eighteen now, right?"

"Yeah, heh, though I wasn't really in a celebrating mood on the day of."

"I bet." He indicated to the bartender and said, "Sunrise, on the house. Two umbrella's."

The bartender said, "Coming right up sir!" and set about making the drink.

Yang said, "Thanks, but you don't have to do that."

"We all need a handou…uhh…assist…at some point."

"Mmm…" Yang said. "Speaking of which. There's a reason that I came here."

"I thought that there would be, though I can't for the life of me figure out what that is."

Yang lifted her severed arm and said, "This brought me here."

"Well, thanks, but I don't think that even our doctors can attach a replacement arm to it now that it's all healed up, even if we could source one that your body would accept."

"That's not why I'm here…well…it is, but not in that way."

"Oh?"

"I've actually got a prosthetic. It was a 'gift' from General Ironwood, though in his mind it's probably more of an apology for not taking me seriously when I told him that I saw Mercury attacking me after I'd put an end to our match."

"Thenn…"

"I've got no intention of putting it on. At least, not yet anyway."

"Why not?"

"Because, all it does right now, is remind me what I've lost. Also, even if I put it on now and could fight again without any problems, nothing would have changed and I'd be looking at losing another limb somewhere along the way."

"Hmm…I see your point. But I don't know what we can do about it, unless your intention is to go back to Beacon now that it's set to open up again and need to find some place to stay."

"No. Beacon is part of the problem in this situation. While I was there, they put my younger sister in charge of our team. She was too young, too inexperienced to get that role, and our reliance on her for strategies, which all came down ultimately to 'lets work together and we can do anything', contributed to my current…issues." Yang sighed. "No. Going back to Beacon would only ever be a step backwards. Going forwards, I need to be a more complete fighter. To do that means that I need to be able to make use of all of my limbs in a fight. So, if it's alright, I would like Melanie, to teach me her style."

"Hmm…I don't know…hmm…tell you what. If you join the Xiong Family, I'll agree to it."

"Hmm…I understand why you'd ask that…but at the same time, I really don't want to join a crime family."

"Then I'm sorry, but the answer is no."

"Hmm…" Yang sighed and swivelled in her seat. Looking around, she saw that most of the weapons that his crew had, were ones that could be bought in a store. She spun back around and said, "I've got a better deal for you."

"Oh? How's that?"

"I could join your gang, orr…"

"Orrr…what?"

"Orrrr…I could upgrade all of your men's weapons into Huntsman weapons."

Junior frowned and said, "You could do that? How? Even our armourers can't do that."

"I made my Ember Celica during my time in Signal Academy. The students there all design and build our own weapons. So really, upgrading them into dust weapons will be easy enough. If they want extras though, it'd take a bit more time."

"So, quid pro quo then, huh?"

"Exactly."

Junior shrugged and said, "Alright then," and, in a louder voice, called out to the bartender, "Hey! Bring the rest of that sunrise over here."

The bartender said, "Yes boss," and poured it into a tumbler.

When he had brought the tumbler over to them, Hei said, "Now, I know that this may seem a little quaint or something, but my old man was a fan of traditions. One of them, was sealing a deal like this one by drinking from the same cup. Normally we'd use a sakazuki for it, but we don't have any of them lying about, so this'll have to do."

He brought it up to his lips and held it out to yang, who threw the rest back in tone shot. She extended her left hand to Junior and said, "Deal."

Junior clasped Yang's hand in his and said, "Right. For the rest of the night, your drinks are on the house."

Yang gave a genuine smile for the first time in what seemed like months as she said, "Thanks...Boss."

XXXXXXX

A/N

Hi. I'm getting a little concerned at the number of readers that drop this after the first chapter. If you're about to, could you please DM me with the reason why? I would like to remedy whatever it is that is causing you to do so.