King: Before we get started, a quick word. I'm going to be taking a week off from the fic. It's not burn out or lack of ideas, something's come up in life and this needs to be lowered a bit on the priority scale. If you're reading this after say... August 8th or 9th, you can ignore it and read on. Don't expect any chapters until then, however.

Inspiration: Far Cry 3

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Everyone was more or less on board to just move on from the last world, so King spared them the time to let it stew any longer. This proved to be a double-edged sword.

The screen returned to life with a tropical scene. The sun beamed down on the world as a group of seagulls flew by.

Nora grinned in her usual way, "Beach episode!"

Weiss looked at her like Nora had a second head, "A what?"

Ren sighed. "Nora noticed a pattern with some of the programs she frequents, this one in particular being the beach-centric episode."

Nora giggled, "It's a fanservice thing. You know: swimsuits, fun in the sun, the usual stuff you think of with the beach~"

Pyrrha and Velvet blushed at the implications. Would they get to see Jaune in a swimsuit?

A group of glasses rose in from below the camera in a toast. The camera moved down to show a group of Atlas students and one from the military personnel all celebrating. Weiss stood with a glass and smile on her face as her sister proudly wrapped an arm around Weiss's shoulders. Holding the camera was one Whitely Schnee.

Qrow whistled in surprise, "Never thought I'd see that day… The Ice Queen isn't so cold in this one?"

Winter's eye twitched. She wanted to smack him. But he was too far away from her to do so without standing. However, what really got her was that Whitely seemed to not be so antagonistic toward her and Weiss.

Winter raised a glass again, "To Weiss! For being accepted into the huntress training program!" Everyone cheers around the two. Smiles spread over everyone's faces. It was a celebration, after all.

The screen seemed to quickly fade into more scenes. A montage of everything they did on their vacation/celebration: shopping, drinking, a party or two, and skydiving.

Yang smiled, "Damn! Weiss needs to invite me to that when we graduate~!"

Weiss folded her arms and rolled her eyes.

Weiss jumped from the plane with her parachute and pal white sky suit. As her parachute burst open, she called out to the sister not far from her, "This is crazy!"

Weiss sighed, "I agree completely…"

The screen seemed to flicker and distort. A message temporarily appearing on the screen, [Did I ever tell you the definition of insanity?]. It didn't last more than half a second. A pause symbol appeared on the screen.

Yang looked up to the screen, annoyed, "Seriously?! It was getting good!"

The image pulled back to reveal itself to have been a scroll.

Yang blinked, "Um… never mind?"

A hand held the scroll toward the audience. The hand moved as a voice spoke, "You think you're crazy, huh?"

Nora smiled, "There's Jaune!"

Weiss, however, was concerned. "Why is he holding the scroll like that? And… talking like that?"

The screen showed Jaune's arm as he swung the scroll like a leaf in the wind, "Jumping out of airplanes… Flying, like birds." The scroll pulled away to show a Jaune very unlike any they'd seen. He seemed standard enough, but his attire and borderline buzzcut hair made it clear something was up. He dressed in a blue tank top and black cargo pants. A belt across his torso held something over his right thigh. A pair of dirty combat boots accenting the whole form. And tying it all together? A heavy caliber pistol holstered on his leg.

Jaune turned the scroll to look at it. "Fuck, that is crazy…"

This got a few reactions of chuckles and shocks. Jaune never cursed. Or if he did, they never heard it. It was kind of interesting to hear from his lips.

Weiss, however, was going cold. She saw what few seemed to notice.

In front of Jaune was a bamboo cage, and Jaune was addressing someone in the cage. Someone from the video.

This got everyone to pause. Ruby shook a little, "Oh no…"

Jaune chuckled, "I like this scroll. This is a nice fuckin' scroll." Jaune stood up and pulled a pair of cards from his back pocket. "So! Let's see… What've we got here? We've got…" He pointed with one finger while still holding the card, "Winter."

The screen moved slightly to show Winter Schnee bound to the cage and gagged with a cloth. A nasty bruise had formed over her right eye.

Winter was shocked to see herself having been captured. The bruise denoted either she fought back, or they didn't give her the chance.

Weiss was not ready to see that. And she wasn't ready for what was about to happen.

Jaune made a whistling sound and pointed toward the second captive with his arm arced over his head, "And Weiss."

The screen showed Weiss in a similar boat to her sister. Neither were ready for Jaune's attack to say the least. They were there for a vacation, not to get abducted by pirates!

Nora's face temporarily froze in an exaggerated grin. Ren sighed as she jumped up, a false black beard and black tricorn suddenly on her head, "PIRATES!"

Jaune looked back over the ID cards, "From Atlas! Huh?" He started to turn away from the cage, "Well, I hope your mom and dad really, really love you. Cause you two look very expensive. And that's good, 'cause I like expensive things."

Weiss went into a fit, "He's ransoming us?!"

Nora's shouting reminded her of Jaune's situation in this reality, "He's a pirate!"

Weiss groaned and placed her head in her hands.

Winter couldn't help but ask, "Where's Whitely?" Both Schnee sisters looked back up toward the screen in shock. He was nowhere to be seen… What could've happened?

Winter tried to say something from under her gag, causing Jaune to turn back toward them. "Hmm? I'm sorry. Did you say something?"

Winter's 'speech' picked up volume.

"What did you say?"

Winter tried again to speak in defiance.

Jaune knelt down at eye level with Winter and suddenly went into a fit of yelling, "Do you want me to slice you open, like I did your friend?!"

This got everyone, including the villainous groups, to jump a little. Jaune had been speaking perfectly calm and he suddenly went into a fit in the blink of an eye.

Yang chuckled nervously, "Okay… This Jaune has anger issues…"

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" Jaune started to calm a little again. "I'm the one with the fucking dick here!"

Yang tried to cover Ruby's ears when that happened. Nora and Roman both went into a fit of laughter from either side of the room.

Winter defiantly tried to speak again.

"HEY!" Jaune was getting anger again. "Look at me. Look me in the fucking eye." When Winter failed to turn her head toward him, he jumped up and placed his head between some of the bamboo bars, "Hey! YOU FUCK! Look me in the eye!"

Roman never stopped laughing, "This guy is the best kind of villain!"

Emerald looked to Roman, confused, "Seriously? He's hardly mastermind material. He's a violent nut case."

"But he's funny. Therefore, the best kind."

After a moment of silence and Winter looking up toward Jaune with a glare, he continued, "You're my bitch."

Winter sputtered, choking on nothing. "The fuck did he just call me?!"

Weiss looked over toward her sister in shock, "Winter!"

Qrow just started to laugh at it all.

"I rule this fucking kingdom. Shut the fuck up, or you die." Jaune glanced over toward Weiss. He moved to the other side of the cage and knelt next to her as he spoke. "What's wrong Weiss? Why aren't you laughing like you were up there? Is this not fun anymore? Have I failed to entertain you?!"

Roman chuckled again, "Fast talking and snarky! I love this guy!"

"You see… up there? You thought you had a chance! Way up there in the fucking sky, you thought you had it all! That you had your hands on the realm of gods!" Jaune dug his hand into the dirt/sand combo beneath them, picking some up. "But down here?" He started to let the sand fall. "Down here…" He paused until all of the sand had fallen. "You hit the ground."

Jaune smiled. "It's okay! I'm gonna chill. It's all good, cause you," he pointed to Weiss, "Moi," a geture toward himself, "and your tough-guy sister are going to have fun while we wait for the money to…"

"Jaune!" A figure in the background called out to Jaune, "Stop antagonizing the hostages!" The voice was familiar to the observers. "I need you to take care of the rejects!"

They couldn't see him, but the voice was too recognizable. Roman smirked, "And there's your mastermind. Yours truly!"

Jaune stood back up and smiled, "Guess we'll have to get back to this later. Catch you around Ice Queen."

Weiss's eye twitched, "I swear to God…!"

Jaune made a move toward one of his soldiers. When he flinched, Jaune laughed, "Gets you every time."

They all watched as Winter started to pull her restraints to loosen them enough to free herself. She removed her gag and moved toward Weiss to free her. "Stay quiet. We can get out of this."

Weiss was freaking out. She's never trained to fight people! She'd sparred, but not without a weapon!

Winter looked over toward the guard, who still had his back turned. She thought a moment and nodded. "Call the guard over."

"What?"

"What?!" Weiss looked at her sister like she was insane.

Winter got back into position, as thought she never escaped. "Just do it."

Weiss took a breath and looked toward the guard. "Hey! Hey guard!"

The guard turned around, not expecting to hear someone speak. "How the fuck did you…"

He was cut off when Winter lunged up and grabbed him by his collar. She slammed his head into the cage several times, blood starting to pool from his broken, trauma riddled face.

Each impact made the students jump a bit. It was brutal, to put it mildly.

The Weiss on screen shared the sentiment. "Oh my god… He's… He's dead…"

Winter grabbed the keys form the corpse. "That's what they teach you in the army." She picked up a knife from the man's belt as they moved.

Winter looked up to the screen a little saddened. True, she could kill a man easily thanks to her military training, but she never wanted to. She joined the Atlas military to help and defend the citizens…

They all watched on as Winter led Weiss through the bushes. They snuck passed several pirates and toward a hut. When a sleeping guard started to wake, Winter moved like the wind and silently killed the man to protect her sister. As they kept moving the two entered a nearby hut. Winter took a breath and looked over to a table. "Weiss, grab a map and the radio. We can use those to stay ahead of them."

Ironwood shook his head. "Who would leave something that important just out like that?"

Nora jumped up again, "PIRATES!"

Once Weiss picked up the map and radio, they left the hut slowly and in the shadows. They moved low and under a small bridge. Baggage was strewn about and people were forced to walk along the bridge. After a few moments of silent movement, the two dropped down and toward the tree line.

Weiss turned toward her sister, "Winter… We need to find Whitely and the others."

"I know, Weiss. Check the map, it might have something to work with." Winter saw the pain in Weiss's eyes. She moved closer and placed her hands on Weiss's shoulders. "Hey. We're going to find them and get out of here."

A loud gunshot followed.

Weiss gasped with her hands over her mouth.

Weiss's world was ringing. She looked on as her sister fell to the ground, a bullet hole in her neck. Weiss charged forward to try to stop the bleeding. Hoping that could somehow help. But it was all for naught. Her throat was torn apart from the inside. Winter died soon after.

Winter shivered a bit. Seeing herself die would be a very jarring experience. Seeing her die like that… with Weiss crying over her trying desperately to help her? That just hurt.

The ringing started to fade out, revealing Jaune had been both the shooter and ranting since Winter fell. "…TO DISRESPECT ME WITH YOUR DIMWIT SISTER?! YOU WANT TO FUCK WITH ME?! EH?! YOU WANT TO FUCK WITH ME!" His tone swapped again to his calmer, but still threatening version. "I like that. No! I respect that! I'm gonna give you 30 seconds. If the jungle doesn't eat you alive, then I will! Go!"

Ruby groaned, "I don't like this Jaune…"

Nora had given up the pirate schtick when Jaune shot Weiss's sister, "No kidding…"

Weiss was frozen in fear. She couldn't move if she tried. Her own sister just died in front of her! How was she supposed to fight back now?!

Jaune glared down at Weiss, "What?! ARE YOU FUCKING DEAF?! I SAID GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE YOU CHICKEN FUCK!" He waved his arms as if to will her to move, "Run, Forrest! RUN!"

Weiss scrambled backward on the ground before flipping herself around to escape. She couldn't fight him. She did the only think she could. Run. Run off into the jungle. Jaune's goons would give chase, but the desperate Schnee would escape that day. She'd live on to fight back.

Mercury sighed and shook his head, "He should have killed her then. Now she'll just come back for revenge."

Roman turned his head toward Cinder's lacky, "You clearly don't get it."

When he made it clear he didn't, it was Cinder who enlightened him. "Why waste resources when the world can handle it for you? The older sister was the threat, not the middle child."

Ozpin took a mental note of how Cinder and her group acted, looked, and spoke. He had a feeling he'd have to deal with them in the future…