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Chapter 26 - Stepping Forward


"So, we're finally going to stick it to the humies that are keeping us down," a tall, slender, and fashionably dressed squirrel-faunus boy chirped to a glasses wearing woman with fluffy white raccoon ears capping her head, as he waited to enter the White Fang intake event.

"You sure don't look oppressed," the female faunus immediately replied with the vapid and absentminded vibe of a dyed-in-the-wool airhead. "Aren't the shoes that you're wearing.. like… three hundred Lien?"

By the time the squirrel boy's face finished flushing a bright red, the raccoon girl had turned her empty-headed smile back towards the surly looking man at her side, who sported a fluffy black tail that swished slowly at his back.

"Your bimbo act is strong," the wolf Faunus whispered, his wavy black hair mostly concealing the glasses he was wearing.

"Not my first rodeo," the raccoon whispered back without ever losing her shallow and superficial smile. "Stay in character, Moon…"

"Moon," the disaffected and angry looking wolf faunus, or rather, Sun in an extremely elaborate disguise, scoffed along with a sigh of long-suffering. "Tell me, Whitney… Why oh why is everyone so obsessed with irony these days?..."

Blake Belladonna, in her disguise as Whitney the racoon faunus, grinned just the tiniest little bit, as she panned the holo-camera concealed inside of her pink rimmed glasses around the venue and all of the faunus civilians that were milling around the entrance… "I wish you'd lighten up, Moon," she called out in a voice pitched to carry all around the alleyway. "After joining the Fang, we'll help exterminate all of the humans, and then we'll live picture perfect lives… Simple as that…"

The way Whitney said such cold, brutal and unrealistic words in such a casual, innocent and straightforward fashion, only served to underscore to everybody standing at her sides just how absurd the White Fang's newest ultra-violent mindset actually was.

Quite a few of the faunus inhabiting the lineup started fidgetting where they stood at the very idea that they'd be expected to kill innocent people, let along commit genocide on an international scale, and several small groups of people quietly slipped away to head somewhere less… radical.

Of course, since causing exactly this reaction was what 'Whitney' intended all along, she made sure to maintain her ultra-bubbly and naive smile as she hopped in place and slapped Moon's back.

At exactly the same time, behind Whitney's fluffed up white wig, stylish pink glasses and endlessly sunny demeanor, Blake Belladonna's mind was coldly calculating and focused in the extreme… Growing with every moment that passed, she could feel that something was wrong with this meeting… Something felt… off, or rather, several aspects of this meeting were just downright wrong…

The first and most obvious problem with the intake that they were attending was that the security was completely atrocious. Standing at the door to the warehouse, a pair of badger faunus bouncers were patting people down and making sure that everyone was actually a faunus, but that was it… Just the two of them, operating as if they were bouncing at a nightclub, rather than a highly illegal terrorist orientation. What's more, Blake saw that these two men weren't even being all that thorough in their pat-checks and identity confirmations.

Which was both really good news, and really bad news at exactly the same time…

In the past, when Blake helped organize the recruitment process over in Atlas, these intake events had several rings of different security, including squads of Fang members stationed around the meeting location's perimeter, utilizing their advanced senses to sniff out potential trouble.

But not here… Not now…

None of the precautions that used to be considered standard operating procedure at these events were currently in effect, which to Blake, meant one of two things.

The White Fang either changed the way that their security team operates over the last half a year, which was an exceedingly unlikely outcome, or this venue was unique somehow, and it was being neglected for a specific purpose…

With a smile on her face and the music app on her scroll opened, Blake started playing a club-song called Rat Trap Parade, and she started bopping from side to side on her toes as if she couldn't sit still for a single moment longer. Of course, the song was real, but it was also a pre-arranged warning, a code meant to convey to her Platoon-mates that this rally wasn't what it appeared.

Ruby, Pyrrha, Nora, and Ren were camped out atop a building a little under half a kilometer away, where they were watching the holo-footage streaming through her and Sun's glasses… And now, with her warning playing through the recording equipment built into the frame of her glasses, Blake had no doubt that her four Platoon-mates would be moving to a closer building with as much stealth as possible.

Armed with that knowledge, Whitney the raccoon faunus stepped up to take her turn with the badger bouncers, handed over the fake ID that Penny's father fabricated for her, and then raised both of her arms so that the boys could pat her down.

At Whitney's back, Moon gave the two badgers an openly murderous look, fulfilling his role of the jealous boyfriend type so that the bouncers wouldn't get too… enthusiastic… in their searching. His reaction was planned in advance, yes, but it was executed flawlessly because of personal interest.

Needless to say, Blake actually was carrying a concealed weapon upon her body. While she wasn't in possession of Gambol Shroud at the moment (a fact that bothered her to no end), affixed to the small of her back was a pair of folding katanas that could mechashift into their full length with the squeeze of a single button.

As planned, the badgers saw the black-haired wolf faunus staring violent death at them from within the depths of his hood, leading the left-side bouncer to efficiently drag his palms up and down Blake's sides without straying too far off the beaten path… Soon enough, Whitney was standing just inside the threshold of the meeting, where she saw Moon receive a similar pat down with exactly the same results. Neither of them were even looked at twice, despite the fact they were brand new faces, with no contacts within the organization…

Something was definitely off. Something big.

As the song Rat Trap Parade came to an end, Blake cued up another song in her playlist called Gory Story, and then scanned the warehouse she was walking into, along with the seventy-plus civilians that were crammed within its walls.

It was in that moment that Blake finally realized just what it was that felt so very off about the people standing all around the vast open space. They all looked and felt completely… harmless… With just a single glance around the room full of pensieve, anxious, maybe even frightened looking faces, Blake could tell that these people were convenience store clerks and car salesmen, taxi drivers and bookstore owners.

What these people were not, were aura-using martial artists…

Of that variety of people, there was a rather obvious and suspicious absence.

By the point Blake finished recognizing the fact that the intake she was attending was populated by F-grade combatants or lower, Whitney and Moon were moving further into the room, and she was whispering a warning into Sun's ear. She needed him to change his character ASAP. She needed him to hunch over, exude less confidence, look less capable.

She needed him to blend in.

At exactly the same time, everybody present was gathering closer to a stage that was erected on the far side of the brick walled room, where a tall, thin, gangly looking deer faunus woman with dull red hair, a turquoise t-shirt and a pale white Grimm mask covering her eyes was motioning for their attention.

"Hello, everybody... My alias among the White Fang is Deery, and I'm here to welcome you all into the ranks of the Vale-side chapter Fang, where we will help bring about the liberation of all faunus-kind," the newly named Deery began with a proud smile lighting up the parts of her face that you could see... "If you're present here tonight, then you've already met with one of our agents at one of our many recruitment rallies, where you were provided the time, place and opportunity to undergo tonight's intake process… Over the next several hours, I will explain the division of labor among new recruits, the locations, call-signs and codes that we use to conceal our movements, and finally, we'll discuss the tattoos that you'll all be receiving….."

As Deery continued to describe the veritable treasure trove of highly classified information that she was apparently ordered to pass on to a gathering of people that were vetted by contract bouncers in an unsecured warehouse, Blake started scanning the walls, the ceiling and the windows, looking for something, anything out of the ordinary, because… no.

The white Fang simply do not operate this way…

Sizzle, sizz, sizz, sizz, sizz…. BOOOOM!

Instantly and dramatically, a series of gigantic, bright-blue laser-swords burned their way through the brick wall directly behind Deery's back, dicing the wall into checkerboard sized segments with a robotic series of angular sweeps. A split second later, the entire span of wall exploded into the densely populated warehouse in a hailstorm of flying debris, revealing not one, not two, but four Atlesian Paladins filing into the room upon gigantic, pneumatically-powered, metal feet.

Deery, who was visibly shocked by the sudden destruction, only had the time to scream out the words "the Atlesians," before taking a high-speed, suitcase-sized slab of brick to the side of her head, blowing her ragdolling body clear off the stage and into the newly panicked audience. Any defense that the aura capable deer faunus may have provided for those people under her charge was abruptly cut off, as she landed within the boiling mass of people and was lost under the feet of the newly boiling mob.

On the other side of the warehouse, the large, garage bay doors that everyone entered through suddenly slammed closed, before locking with a heavy bang, trapping everyone inside.

Unless an aura-unlocked martial artist intervened, all of the scared senseless civilian faunus within the building were going to get mowed down like grass…

And without even thinking about it, Blake knew that she intended to be that intervention.

Interposing herself between the lead Paladin standing in the hole and the civilians that were desperately scrambling away from the stage, Blake drew the hidden katanas from her back, mecha-shifted them into blades as she slid around in a circle, and then cut down a wide swath of flying bricks, even as she yelled back towards the man moving at her back... "Sun! You need to help everyone get free! Not one of these people are aura users!"

"No sweat," Sun called back, even as he slid behind a concrete pillar halfway across the room, adopted a meditative stance, released four clones, and then dropped to a knee as aura strain was heaped upon his shoulders. Sun's body was now defenseless. The man's clones, on the other hand, immediately became a blur of frenetic movement, picking people up, ushering them away, and throwing broken down machinery in between the Paladins and the crowd, all while moving towards the newly locked garage bay door.

"It is futile to resist, faunus scum," a heavily modulated and robotic male voice called out from the lead Paladin, as its closer foot stomped down directly through the wooden stage to the warehouse floor below, and it aimed a series of laser guided gatling guns directly at Blake's forehead. "The Atlesian military will now cull the faunus population of all their malcontents…"

"Bullshit! The Atlas military doesn't operate in foreign countries without permission," Blake snapped, ripping off her white wig to reveal her real identity, and hopefully buy Sun more time.

"But we do have permission, Blake Belladonna," the unknown man replied with over-embellished amusement leaking through the voice modulation device he was using. "We have Vale's permission to root out and destroy the Fang. Their permission to subjugate all the filthy faunus we encounter in the process."

"This whole intake meeting was a trap, planned and executed in advance, and it wasn't the Atlesians who put it together," Blake screamed back, even as she flashed out of sight again and again to dodge and deflect a hailstorm of red and black Dust rounds.

"Young Lord Arc really has collared you to our side if you truly believe in nonsense like that," the Paladin pilot laughed out as he barrelled forwards, swept his gigantic metal arm in Blake's direction, swept his blade through nothing but a flash of white light, and then released a wave of red Dust flames in every direction from holes riddled throughout his metal exoskeleton

After flashing through the air several times, Blake crashed down onto the floor next to Sun's meditating form, where she rolled several times to smother a rash of fire on the surface of her armored clothing. Then she launched herself in the way of another sweeping laser-sword, because the lead Paladin was attacking Sun's newly discovered body.

With a shearing grinding, cracking sound, Blake managed to deflect aside the gigantic downward chop that likely would've cut Sun in half, but a second Paladin at the leader's right shoulder was already performing a sideways slash, and Blake didn't have the time to perform a perfect deflection. She only had the time required to pull her katanas up into this second attack's path at an upwards angle above her head.

Shriek crack slam!

Blake's loaner blades were never meant to take the abuse that they received in that moment, but they did survive until the vast majority of the Paladin's attack slid over her head, which meant she was sent flying across the room in one piece rather than two when her weapons bit the dust.

Less than a second later, when Blake crashed back first into a nearby wall, cratering a spider web of cracks into its solid clay surface, she was left holding two bladeless sword-hilts in her hands, leaving her completely disarmed. At exactly the same time, Sun was forced to dispel his clones so that he could retreat from the Paladins' melee range, and the two Paladins that couldn't immediately enter the fight finished pressing through the hole in the wall.

All four Paladins trained their weapons at Sun now, as he was standing in front of the civilians with his two unfolding katanas in hand…

Things weren't looking good.

Blake gave Sun a meaningful glance… and then she started moving.

With a snarl of feline aggression, Blake aura-dashed off the cracked apart wall with enough force to blast a hole in its side, launching her in the direction of the stage, and the lineup of giant mechs that were advancing on the fleeing civilians.

And Sun Wukong, having recognized Blake's intentions, threw one of his blades like a throwing knife into Blake's projected path.

Seemingly in slow motion, Blake sprinted towards the enemy, keeping an eye on the sword careening in her direction the entire time, even as she Semblance-flashed right and left to avoid gatling gun fire from the first two Paladins.

Unfortunately for Blake, after blowing the sword that Sun just threw in their direction right out of the air, the second and third Paladins also trained their machine gun fire down on her rapidly moving body, the mass of red and black Dust rounds flying in her direction thickened in the extreme, and she knew she was about to absorb way too much damage while closing the distance.

The bullets drew closer, Blake slipped and slid through the leading mass, she turned and twisted in the air to slip through a gap, she finally ran out of room, a solid wall of advancing Dust rounds left her no room to move, to flash, to dodge, to do anything at all.

The Dust rounds arrived… and a wave of blackness overtook Blake's vision.


Four minutes earlier…

"It's so surreal seeing Blake act all bubbly and energetic like that," Ruby whispered to Pyrrha, as the two of them sat on an air conditioning unit and stared at the holo-footage that Sun's glasses were feeding their scrolls.

Pyrrha nodded right away, because she did have to agree, but more than anything else… she was impressed. Two days earlier, when Blake Belladonna explained to the Platoon that she was an ex-Fang terrorist, insurgent and spy… Pyrrha found herself wondering just how someone as outstanding as Blake could infiltrate normal society and have them actually believe she was… ordinary, run-of-the-mill, mundane…

Well, now Pyrrha knew… Blake was an extremely capable young actress, and she was neck deep in her role.

"Very cool," Pyrrha finally breathed out just loud enough for Ruby to hear. "I'll have to ask Blake and Jaune to teach me how they adopt a character like that…"

"You're not good at acting," Ruby asked, her head cocked to the side. "Sorry for prying, it's just, you're, like, the only person I know who's actually been in a commercial, and I thought you were really cool in it."

"The ten second segment of holo-video that actually features me speaking to a camera, took me over fifteen takes to accomplish, and I'm fairly certain the producer photoshopped the blush from my face," Pyrrha admitted with a sigh.

"I like it when we have things in common," Ruby quietly gushed while leaning into her teammate's side. "You're just so… excellent… It feels special when we share similar struggles."

If the two of them were back at Housing arrangement number seven, studying or watching a movie, Pyrrha definitely would've lifted Ruby up onto her lap and hugged her like a teddy bear… As things were, she merely smiled, and watched carefully as Blake lifted her scroll in front of the camera, and queued up the song Rat Trap Parade…

And then they knew.

"Trap," Ruby breathed out, before bouncing up to her feet and prepping Crescent Rose.

"Trap," Pyrrha repeated loud enough for Ren and Nora to hear, as the two of them were currently maintaining a perimeter at the edges of the building.

"Righteo," Nora chirped back as she abandoned her side of the building, picked up Gambol Shroud from the rooftop at Pyrrha's feet, strapped it to her yellow Dust rig, and then sprinted to Ren's side.

Ren merely waited for everyone to join him, as by some fluke, he was already standing where they were going to depart from.

Ruby and Pyrrha loped up to flank Nora and Ren, their eyes on the holo-footage, their attention on the music coming through the speakers on their scrolls.

Then it happened.

The song "Gory Story" started playing next, and everyone standing at the edge of the roof knew exactly what it meant.

"Blake thinks things are going to get violent, so it's time to move both quickly and quietly," Pyrrha announced, even as she aura-leapt from the roof to a shorter building nearby, and the four of them started sneaking in the direction of the target.

For the next half minute, the only sounds anyone in Platoon Number One heard was the rush of the wind in their ears and the soft scuffing of their feet on the rooftops…

Then a cacophonous boom launched a wave of dust into the air on the other side of the warehouse, and Pyrrha gave up on stealth altogether… "Move move move! Ruby, you know what to do!"

Ruby instantly nodded her understanding, before she and Ren leapt to the left atop the next building, and started dropping down towards ground level and the warehouse's front door. Ruby, as the clear fastest of them all, would break open the most expected entrance, while Ren would locate an obscure window that they'd caught sight of in the holo-footage.

A split second after Ruby and Ren zipped away, Nora unclipped a football sized capsule from the left side of her Dust rig, threw it in Pyrrha's direction, and then smiled aggressively when she easily snatched it from the air… Then Nora was leaping to the right, heading in the direction of the debris cloud rising from the back side of the warehouse, and Pyrrha was dropping onto the roof, where a skylight would offer her maximum surprise.

It was time to road-test the applicability of Jaune's newest idea.

Turning the canister that Nora handed her upside down, Pyrrha opened its lid with the press of a button, and allowed a very warm, bright and shiny liquid to flow out, before it abruptly turned a pitch black color under the influence of her magnetism semblance and floated in the air.

Back on Saturday morning, when Jaune and Pyrrha spent several hours talking on the lawn, discussing their likes, dislikes, strengths and weaknesses, Jaune ended up describing his technical background, and how he fully intended to maximize his offensive strengths via science and engineering. Of course, the complete confidence in Jaune's voice led Pyrrha to jokingly ask the man to do the same for her

And Jaune's response was… typical.

As it turns out, the man already had several different ideas in mind for her, as well as a wide array of different questions, including but not limited to, the following:

-How aura costly is it for Pyrrha to use her Semblance, and how much time can it be used

-How much metal can she control at a time

-How fine is her control of the metal she manipulates

-What kinds of metal can she manipulate, and which ones are exempt

-Can she sense and move trace metals such as the metal in a human's body or within the ground below her feet

-Has she thought of using metals as weapons outside of her sword shield and body armor

-many, many more…

By the time Jaune was finished rattling off a great number of questions, Pyrrha found herself revealing far more about both her upbringing and her abilities than she ever imagined possible, but the man was just so engaging, so interested in her, and not in her fame, she simply couldn't help herself…

It was an outcome that was going to cause Pyrrha problems in the future, as sooner or later Jaune was definitely going to end up standing in front of her in Glynda Goodwitch's combat class.

And now, the man knew… everything.

While sitting shoulder to shoulder against a tree, Pyrrha explained to Jaune that she could quite easily manipulate the metal in her armor in quick bursts for hours and hours on end, but more concerted efforts of magnesis (magnetic telekinesis) decreased her stamina accordingly. She explained how, when she was young, she trained the strength of her Semblance by holding a half ton iron ball up in the air, and then, when she grew used to that effort, she did the exact same thing with even more weight while practicing her spearmanship. She explained that she could levitate a metric ton of metal for a single minute while moving it at ponderous speeds, or she could move one third that weight ten times as fast for ten times as long.

But Pyrrha didn't stop her explanation there, because Jaune was hanging off of her every word, and he was smiling at her as if she was the most wonderful thing that he'd ever seen in his life.

Eventually, Pyrrha described the most rewarding training exercise that she ever adopted, which was when she started wearing heavy metal armor without any straps by keeping it affixed to her body using her Semblance. She recounted how this new form of training taught her how to manipulate her armor to act as a speed and strength boost, as well as a way to maximize her mobility while careening through the air.

Finally, Pyrrha admitted that, no, she never thought of manipulating metals outside of her armor beyond the odd object that she picks up off the floor, because she was a martial artist with a useful Semblance, rather than the other way around, and she desired to keep her true abilities a secret to maintain her competitive edge.

It was only during this last part that Jaune's irrepressible smile dimmed, and he started looking quite thoughtful instead. According to Jaune, Pyrrha's secret was preventing her from achieving the true potential of her Semblance, by preventing her from attempting anything that would be visible to the eye… For instance, Pyrrha could straight up FLY by using her Semblance on her armor, but she never practiced prolonged flight because doing so would reveal her secret. She could also maintain a series of orbiting projectiles, with which she could distract or even straight up attack her enemies.

After pointing all of that out, Jaune suddenly turned to face Pyrrha with a manic look in his eyes, and then he asked her about trying out a variety of material she'd never even heard of before…

Back in the present, Pyrrha momentarily stared at the shiny liquid metal that she was forming into a series of pitch-black, softball sized spheres floating above her head, as she remembered the properties of the metal that she was currently manipulating... Pure elemental Gallium is a non-toxic metal that melts from a solid into a liquid form when warmed to just above room temperature, is quite dense, will stick to whatever surface it coats, has the highest surface tension of any liquid, and swells in size whenever it retains additional heat. These properties make Gallium an extremely versatile tool for her because it can conform to a wide array of different shapes and sizes on the fly, it can merge together into a shield or a dome that can absorb almost any variety of attack, and when used to land a blunt force impact, its high density lends more power to the blow.

And now, as Pyrrha looked down through the skylight and saw four Atlesian Paladins unleashing a point-blank barrage of gatling gun fire at Blake Belladonna, she recognized the fact that Jaune Freeman was right.

Pyrrha's undefeated record in the Mistral Grand Arena wasn't going to save any lives in the oncoming Grimm War…

But her Semblance definitely would.

In less time than it took to wave her right hand, Pyrrha sent all six of her metallic orbs careening down through a cracked open window in the skylight, where they encircled Blake's body and then expanded into a seamless dome that surrounded her on every side.

Tak ping ping ping tak tak tak ping…

Just in the nick of time, Pyrrha's pitch black shield grew into place, and a hailstorm of Dust rounds slammed into the dome, before deflecting to the sides with a rapid series of snare-drum-like sounds. For several moments in a row, the Paladins continued to rain down an enormous amount of machine gun fire on the dome, unable, or perhaps unwilling to recognize that their efforts were getting them nowhere… and a feral smile developed clear across Pyrrha's face, as she felt her aura trickle down into the magnesis she was casting… The fact that the Gallium easily affixed itself to the floor around Blake's body, paired with the metal's extremely powerful surface tension, made maintaining the dome so much easier than she'd ever imagined possible

Long explanation short, deflecting the four Paladins' barrage of gatling gun fire barely felt like a strain…. And just like Jaune described back when he suggested she adopt this tactic, it was extraordinarily distracting to her enemies.

And now, it was time to take advantage.

With a series of whirling rifle-spear slashes delivered faster than the eye could see, Pyrrha cut the skylight window free from its setting, and then followed the doomed collection of window panes down into the room below. In the timeless moment that followed, as her body grew flush with aura and her reaction speeds accelerated, Pyrrha saw the laser sights that were trained upon her dome-shield begin swiveling up in her direction, she saw the thick stream of machine gun fire begin rising towards her body, and then she made sure it missed her by a mile when she abruptly redirected her course in the air.

For just a split second, Pyrrha anchored the metallic soles of her boots in place in the air, allowing her to leap up and forward off of nothing at all, and then blur through the air directly towards the leading Paladin's highly tinted cockpit. For the very first time in her Huntress career, Pyrrha didn't conceal or try to mask the use of her semblance, but rather, she optimized it to hit the enemy before they could even react.

And it worked.

Less than three seconds after dropping down into the warehouse, Pyrrha's feet crashed down atop the lead Paladin's right shoulder, where she started raining an intense flurry of slashes and Dust rounds into its highly fortified cockpit that started cutting a hole in its armored casing. Then she was forced to hurl herself into a powerful backflip because the other three Paladins began pounding Dust rounds directly into their own teammate's mech.

"Blake's right," Pyrrha yelled out as she flew backwards through the air, landed in a crouch next to her Gallium dome, manipulated the metal into a shield in front of her body, and then drew Blake up to her side. "Whoever is piloting these Paladins would rather destroy each other than allow their identities to be revealed. There's just no way these guys are Atlesian soldiers!"

After nodding her agreement, Blake gratefully caught Gambol Shroud, when Nora bounced across the room to their side and then cheerfully lobbed it in her direction. At exactly the same time, the garage bay door of the warehouse was severed free from its assembly by Ruby's Crescent Rose, and all of the civilians started sprinting towards the gap left behind.

But not all of the faunus were physically capable of running away, as several civilians were hit by debris or the odd Dust round or were trampled on when the crowd panicked and ran. These injured people were all laid out behind whatever machinery Sun could find, along with Deery, who was slowly returning to consciousness.

With the entry of Platoon Number One, the entire situation was completely flipped on its head, the Paladin pilots were left on their back feet, and they were scrambling to catch up. The two Paladins flanking the leaders immediately started burning across the warehouse in the direction of the ponderously slow moving, non-aura bolstered civilians, the wheels lining the soles of their metal feet driving them forward at automobile traffic speeds…

Only to find that doing so was a mistake.

While Pyrrha didn't have the Semblance strength to lift a ten ton Paladin off of the ground, that didn't mean she didn't have enough power to upset their balance when they move at high speeds, and that's exactly what she did. With a mighty flex of her aura, the right foot of both mechs suddenly turned an inky black color, before the wheels on their sides stopped rotating on a dime, forcing both Paladins into a tight spin followed by a roll.

With the hiss of sparks and the shearing of metal armor from their arms and their side, both Paladins crashed to the warehouse floor, allowing Nora and Ren the opening that they were waiting for…

"Wait," Blake yelled, as she gestured at the fallen Paladins. "The mechs have an AOE fire attack that they can release from within their bodies!"

"Then what can we do," Nora asked as she slid to a stop with her hammer raised above her head.

"Destroy or remove their limbs to decrease their mobility without getting too close, and then crack open the cockpits," Ruby suggested, even as she delivered an impossibly fast tornado of sickle slices into the right arm of the left side Paladin, removing its right forearm at the elbow even as it staggered to its feet. Then she bounced backwards in a blur of rose petals just in time to avoid a fiery conflagration that burst free from the mech's hull, and she was skidding to a stop next to Blake.

Pyrrha smiled and nodded at her co-squad leader, because the red-tinted girl's judgment was sound and her demonstration was superb. But then all four Paladins started dashing towards their newly gathered formation, and her focus returned to defending her team. Her six metal orbs split apart and reshaped themselves into eight wide but thin shields that she attempted to keep in front of the four mech's gatling gun fire, even as she whirled her spear in her hand and leapt towards the leading Paladin.

The Paladins, in turn, recognized the fact that a series of surprisingly annoying metal barriers were interfering with their ballistic weapons fire, and they immediately moved in to break past their enemies via melee combat in a bid to get at the civilians.

"The leading Paladin has a cracked open cockpit, so it can't fire its AOE attack anymore," Pyrrha pointed out, even as she slipped aside the downward slice of its gigantic laser-sword, hurled herself up towards the offending mech, and carved her spear through the hole into the cockpit behind. Then a gigantic metal hand suddenly curled around her right ankle to throw her into the ground... but it couldn't… Instead, its entire hand was pitch black in color and its fingers were curling backwards around its knuckle joints with the shriek of tearing metal.

Pyrrha Nikos wasn't playing around. She couldn't allow any of these Paladins access to the civilians, which was a problem because under normal circumstances, it would take everyone on her team working together to fight evenly with just one…

Which is why she intended to make up the difference.

With a quiet grunt of metaphysical effort, Pyrrha transformed the eight metal disks that she was maintaining between her platoon and the Paladins' machine guns into eight needle sharp spears that she launched into the gunbays of the enemy mechs. Then, when all of the shoulder mounted gatling guns finished tearing themselves to pieces around her metal spears, she brought them all back to her side, and she glanced aside at her team.

Now that the Paladins didn't have any projectile weapons to rely on beyond their self defense AOE attacks, it was time for Platoon number one to pour on the speed, which is why the following things happened in less than two and a half seconds.

Ruby Rose mechashifted Crescent Rose into its sniper mode, and aimed its muzzle behind her back to compliment her radical acceleration.

Ren mechashifted free the segmented chains that allowed his dual pistol scythes, AKA Stormflower, to act as grappling hooks.

Blake, likewise, mechashifted the sheath of her katana, Gambol Shroud, into a cleaver, while unfurling the ribbon that combined her weapons into a chain sickle assembly.

Nora depressed a switch on her yellow Dust rig, discharging a powerful current of electricity directly into her body, and her eyes started glowing with crackling pink energy.

Sun Wukong aura-dashed towards the garage-bay door just behind the fleeing civilians (Monty Oum they were slow), where he resumed his meditative pose and released another three clones.

At which point, all four Paladins power slid into melee range, their laser-swords blurred down towards their bodies in a burning line of blue light, and Platoon number one exploded into movement.

Pyrrha cast out with her Semblance to push, to pull, to destabilize all four Paladins, slowing them down and throwing off their balance while her Galium spears tore into their hulls.

Ruby's body was a rose petal strewn blur of swinging scythe cuts that tore vast rents into the thickly armored legs of their attackers, Ren was a squirrel on their backs, cutting tubes and wires as he rapidly leapt from one to the next, Blake released entire clips of Dust rounds into IR sensors, cameras, and LiDAR rigs, with the intention of blinding their foes, and Nora spun as she ran with a bizarre form of grace in order to slam her maul into a Paladin's knee joint, and she squealed in satisfaction when it shattered into a cloud of metal splinters.

Amidst all of this, the Paladin just behind the leader initiated a pair of rocket thrusters couched behind its metal ribs, and it jettisoned itself over Platoon Number One in the direction of the civilians… Only for Pyrrha Nikos, the Goddess Of Victory, to float up into the air directly in its path, telekinetically hurl a half dozen metal spears towards its cockpit with armor piercing force, and then land upon the glass to finish the job. With a downwards stab of her spear that completely shattered the window, Pyrrha slammed the Paladin's pilot back in their seat, pulled its control stick towards herself to steer the machine into a nosedive, and then rode the mech to the floor with her spear stabbing all the while…

Crash, skreeeeeeech, booom!

When the Paladin finally skidded to a stop just a meter away from Sun's meditating body, the cockpit was wide open for anyone to look into… but the civilians were either gone or seriously injured, so there was no one left to look…

Except one.

Deery the deer faunus, Vale's most angry and passionate new White Fang member, gaped in surprise as Trifa the Red Tat assassin attempted to cut at Pyrrha's extended arm, only to have her weapon slammed aside by one of the redhead's floating orbs.

And the holo-scroll that Deery was aiming towards the fighting started shaking

atop a newly trembling forearm as she abruptly realized she was live-streaming the Fang's betrayal of their own community…

And yet she didn't turn off the recording.

No one, no one, was allowed to victimize the faunus community… Not the Atlesians, not the Vale government…

Not the Fang.

No one.

Deery continued recording as Trifa struggled to leap free from the shredded cockpit of her mech, only for a mass of pitch-black liquid metal to coat every last inch of her body, before solidifying and holding her in place. At exactly the same time, in the background, Ruby finished cutting the legs out from under the first Paladin to enter the scene, Blake and Ren did the same with a second, and Nora cheerfully crushed the last mech's remaining kneecap with hammer blow after hammer blow after hammer blow…

None of the remaining mechs could use their defensive AOE anymore since their cockpits were all either cracked or shattered, which is why the pilots ejected free of their mechs, their seats bursting outwards before splintering apart.

Yuma of the Fang and two badger faunus wearing Grimm masks, crashed to the ground in a roll, before dashing to each other's sides and raising their weapons.

Platoon Number One encircled their prey and started moving in with their weapons slicing through the air.

At which point Yuma and his two cohorts exploded into a million shattered pieces, only to step out into the hole in the wall from the alleyway beyond… Where they were joined by two familiar faces.

Roman Torchwick smiled amiably next to an equally happy looking pink and brown themed woman with an umbrella twirling in her hand.

"My my my, Yuma… You really are quite the failure aren't you," Roman pointed out, large amounts of both amusement and satisfaction laced in his voice. "It's SNAFU's such as this one that keep me an honest criminal, rather than a… whatever it is you think that you are…"

Yuma looked like he wanted to attack Roman right then and there… but he didn't, likely because the man just pulled his ass from the fire.

Unconcerned with the two men's squabbling, Blake and Ruby both started aura-dashing towards the two of them, the blades of their weapons arcing through the air.

Then Roman, Yuma, the pink woman, and the two masked faunus shattered into millions of glass shards again via some kind of illusion Semblance… and the scream of a VTOL's Dust jets could be heard somewhere off in the distance.

And Blake was left, standing in the hole in the wall, Ruby Rose's hand on her waist in a conciliatory fashion.

"It was a psyop," Blake breathed out, as if to herself. "This warehouse's camera system, Deery's scroll, the Fang would've dispersed holo-footage of Atlesian Paladins slaughtering Vale faunus with the Vale government's permission… The footage collected here would've driven the local faunus into a blind fit of rage, rioting in the streets, setting fires, creating anarchy, joining the Fang…"

"We stopped it Blake," Ruby pointed out while leaning close to look up into her teammate's eyes. "We made a difference. Most of the civilians got away, and we'll make sure the rest get help."

Sure enough, even as Ruby said that, Nora, Ren and Sun started moving all of the injured and unconscious civilians into a single area, so that they could begin triaging their various injuries.

"With a nod and then a small but warm smile at her friends, Blake started jogging towards the warehouse's office area, intending to collect the holo-footage that would exonerate the Vale government.

With the shriek of whirring Dust jets, a hover-cycle carrying a hastily uncostumed Jaune and Yang suddenly careened into the room before swerving to a stop and settling down on the ground.

"We came as fast as possible," Jaune called out, after leaping from his bike, grabbing a med-kit and several bottles of Dust regen medicine from a compartment in its chassis, throwing half of the medical equipment at Sun and Ren's feet, and then making a beeline towards the injured civilians. "I'm sorry I was too late to help…"

"But you did help us," Pyrrha interrupted, as she levitated a tightly restrained Trifa across the vast room within a skin-tight cocoon of black metal. "You made the plan, you arranged the costumes and the call-signs, and you showed me how I can become more than merely an arena fighter."

After catching sight of the spider faunus encased within a body suit of pitch-black liquid metal, Jaune quickly smiled up at Pyrrha, before returning all of his focus to the healing he was performing on a bloody Dust round hole… "I really am proud of you, Pyrrha. You made the right decision for all of the right reasons. Now all we need to do is figure out how to incorporate the Gallium into your pre-existing armor…"

Pyrrha smiled in return, even as she joined Ruby, Yang, Ren, Sun and Nora wrapping up wounds and feeding Dust regen medicine to some of the more injured civilians.

"Trifa won't talk, you know," Blake suddenly called out, as she ran back from the warehouse office, a data drive held in her hand. "We won't gain any intel from her…"

After glancing aside at Ren and then nodding in Deery's direction, Jaune nodded his thanks when the boy turned off Deery's scroll, bringing an end to her livestream… "Yes, well… Trifa won't talk, and it's unlikely this deer faunus woman knows much at all… However… Since Atlesian Paladins contain built-in GPS hardware, I suspect Penny will be able to provide us with everything we need."

As if summoned by Jaune's words, Penny suddenly dropped into the building through the destroyed skylight with Weiss held princess style in her arms. Then, it became clear that her senses were far more than human, when she nodded her agreement with Jaune's words, deposited Weiss on her feet, and then ran over to the closest Paladin with a pair of brightly glowing green eyes.

"Jaune and I just tricked Vale's entire criminal underworld into betraying the Fang at the black market, and it was badass," Yang suddenly blurted out as if she could no longer contain herself.

"I've amassed a lot of information over the last hour, but if the Fang realize that their Paladins are about to compromise their location, they might try to relocate," Jaune mused. "It all depends on how tech savvy they are…"

"Very," Blake immediately offered. "They routinely abduct world leading scientists to work for them 'voluntarily'…"

"It's safe to assume that the Fang will spend the night relocating then," Jaune mused even as he finished closing the bullet wound that he was healing and moved on to a crushed foot. "At the same time, it's extremely difficult to move whole operations without making a lot of noise in the process, and I imagine we can persuade the Vale military to look in that direct…"

Abruptly, Jaune's words were cut off, when a rail-thin, red-headed deer faunus started groaning and headbutting her masked forehead down into the ground.

"The… humans… they need to see that the faunus have teeth, they need to feel it, or they'll never learn," Deery choked out, her voice haggard, harsh, and filled with bottomless desperation. "How dare they… the Red Tats… destroy my faith, my hope, my one and only path…"

After kneeling down next to Deery, Blake pulled the woman's face up off the floor, dropped her Grimm mask to the side, stared into her eyes, and then spoke in a very calm and soothing voice... "I don't know what variety of injustice brought you here. I'm sure you have your reasons. But I'm going to repeat something that a great man once told me… To seek equality by mirroring the very worst behaviors and attitudes of the people oppressing you, is worse than merely counterproductive, it's catastrophic… it's an abomination… The goal shouldn't be to oppress your oppressors, but rather to achieve true civil-rights for all…"

Off to the side, without ever pulling his glowing hands away from the broken collarbone that he was repairing, Jaune quickly glanced in Sun's direction, at which point, he was relieved that the boy had such a powerful crush on Blake. The holo-footage that Sun was currently gathering via his glasses was going to do far more for the faunus community than any of the heroics that his Platoon just performed…

And outside the garage bay door, a parade of lights and sirens grew more pronounced by the second. Vale's emergency responders were arriving on the scene, which meant things were about to get… bureaucratic.


Three Hours Later

For the second time in less than a week, Jaune found himself standing in front of Headmaster Ozpin and Glynda Goodwitch, with the rest of Platoon number one standing at his sides, along with Sun and Neptune. Considering his actions thus far that evening, Jaune figured he was fortunate not to be sitting in the Police station, but then, many many civilians saw Blake moving to save their lives, and the ones that remained were quite happy to vouch for them all.

Across the desk, Ozpin's eyes were flitting back and forth across the intel that Penny compiled after sifting through Jaune's Dr. Devol emails, and the Paladins' computers…

Then the man's eyes stopped moving, his eyelids closed, he drew in a very deep breath, and he addressed the teenagers in front of him.

"Young Ms. Deery isn't talking much as of yet, as upset as she is, and Trifa… she never will, but from what I'm looking at, the White Fang's true base of operations is somewhere in the South-East," Ozpin conceded with a rather tired sigh. "This, of course, means that I need to focus my resources in THAT direction, rather than towards the unusually gigantic Grimm swarm amassing in the West…"

"Sounds like a bad situation," Jaune conceded in return.

"Indeed," Ozpin drawled before lapsing into silence and steepling his hands atop his desk… "While the mission report that I'm reading has done an adequate job of implying that you weren't actively looking to fight and subdue B rank White Fang agents, the results of your investigatory skills, as well as your negation of a particularly evil psyop have shown you all to be excellent Officers. Everyone in this room will be receiving commendations on their military records, which will reflect upon your future rank… Please keep in mind, I will not be removing anyone from Mr. Freeman's Platoon or Ms. Goodwitch's future Company unless you express a desire that I do so..."

Ozpin's words basically meant that Sun and Neptune were the only two people among them that might assume a leadership position due to their elevation in rank, but no one in Platoon Number One looked especially bothered.

"On Saturday night, Beacon will be hosting the Vytal Festival Ball, and I desire that this event be as big a success as possible," Ozpin continued, completely throwing everyone off with the random direction of his thoughts.

"If I may ask, why is this dance so important," Jaune ventured, when everyone looked to him for answers.

"In the hours since Deery live-streamed the Red Tats attacking White Fang initiates and the release of Vale News Network's amassed holo-footage, the White Fang Terrorist group has completely pulled out of Vale," Ozpin slowly replied. "At exactly the same time, the Grimm swarm on the West side of Vale continent suddenly scattered until its population peppered approximately two thousand square miles of forest, and then it started migrating in the direction of Vale Colony. It is currently our belief that the Grimm have spread out to avoid aerial bombardment, but that they are moving in this direction at the same speed as the slowest Grimm among their numbers."

Looking aside to Penny, Jaune sought out the answers that he didn't have the data to calculate. "How long would it take a Mammoth Grimm to travel here from the coordinates we looked at earlier today?"

"Five and a half or six days depending on weather, terrain, or other unforeseen conditions," Penny immediately replied.

"And how many satellite colonies are sitting in their path," Jaune continued.

"Two, both about a hundred Miles West of Vale Colony," Penny breathed out.

"To answer your question," Ozpin interjected while nodding knowingly at Jaune and Penny. "I want the Vytal Ball to be a rousing success… because the very next day, all of the Platoons will be sent on their very first mission, and I don't want them to miss out on such an enjoyable tradition."

For several moments in a row, no one said a word.

The Grimm war… It was starting.

"Did we put Vale in danger with our actions tonight," Pyrrha asked, her eyes downcast, her expression apologetic.

"No, Ms. Nikos. No you didn't," Ozpin immediately responded. "What you did… is destroy the White Fang's ability to build a widespread insurgent population within Vale Colony, and you prevented them from blindsiding us from an unexpected direction… The Grimm would've attacked us all eventually, because that's what they do. You merely prevented them from acting as a decoy in the meantime…"

"You also saved all of those people's lives," Jaune added, with a meaningful look at both Pyrrha and Blake.

"I was used as a spokesperson without my permission," Blake bit out in return, her face set in a tight little scowl. "That footage of me referencing my father was personal. It was…"

"Important," Jaune suddenly interrupted, his voice serious, and brooking no argument. "Your words back in that warehouse were important, Blake. They were sincere, they were passionate, they were moral, and they called for the right variety of leadership for the faunus of Vale… Which is why I made sure that you, Blake Belladonna, daughter of Ghira Belladonna, were highlighted on the news… The disenfranchised faunus of Vale need a community that they can rally behind, but it must not be the Fang… In time, I expect these faunus will reach out to you… and with all of our support, I expect you to do what you can…"

By the time Jaune finished speaking, Blake was marching from the room, her hands bunched up at her sides, her ears straight up in the air. A moment later, the door to the office swung closed, the ravenette was gone, and Sun Wukong was moving to catch up…"

In the wake of Blake's exit, Jaune also walked towards the door, where he turned around to look at everyone, and then drew in a very deep breath. "I know I hurt Blake just now, but this situation is so much bigger than us…"

"You did what needed doing," Ozpin agreed when Jaune's words trailed to a stop. "Blake's words did need to be shared…"

For some reason, the fact that Ozpin was endorsing his actions only served to make Jaune feel worse... Either way, he nodded his head, before turning around, moving out the door, and seeking out his friend.

And in the wake of Jaune's exit, Yang Xiao Long found herself following his lead, by waving a casual goodbye to everyone before sliding out the door.


Ever since school started two weeks earlier, Yang Xiao Long and Blake Belladonna spent nearly every waking moment together, as they sorted out how they gelled as partners and friends, and… whatever else it was they were… In the meantime, Yang Xiao Long and Blake asked each other hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of inconsequential questions, amassing huge amounts of knowledge about each other's favorites, habits, preferences, pet peeves and tendencies.

As it turns out, Jaune was right. It was unreasonable to expect to effortlessly bond on a spiritual level with a complete stranger. What Yang and Blake did instead, was carve out a place in each other's lives, seemingly in record time… which is why Yang knew where Blake would be hanging out, without even needing to think about it.

After a half an hour flight to Vale Colony, Yang walked down the commercial district's food stall sector, where she found a ramen stall that specializes in seafood…. Blake Belladonna was a health nut under normal circumstances, but when she was upset, her body demanded MSG, salt and carbs (and the fact that Blake had an obsession for fish wasn't a topic that they discussed).

Sure enough, when Yang pushed aside the flap of decorative leather that was concealing the stall's bar style seating arrangement, she found her partner curled forward over a bowl of sea bream ramen with a side of fried rice.

What Yang didn't see, was either Jaune or Sun, which was a good thing because their absence made everything far less complicated.

"Heya," Yang quietly offered while sliding into the seat on Blake's right hand side, her hand just barely grazing the woman's waist as she brushed by her body.

"Hi," Blake replied, her face still downcast but her ears perking up.

"You managed to shake off Sun," Yang ventured, keeping to safe territory.

"I flashed from sight while leaping atop a moving bus," Blake explained.

Yang nodded her appreciation. Blake tipped her head in return.

For several minutes, Yang sat quietly with Blake, watching her carbo-load from the sidelines until her presence was all but forgotten. Then she suddenly asked a very trivial question, as was their tradition. "Other than the e-book app, what app on your scroll is your favorite?"

"Internet," Blake immediately responded. "I like light novels and free lit sites, and I watch the news back in Menagerie… And you?"

"I like a video game called Robo-babe Boss Rush right now, but I'm kind of a flash game connoisseur so my tastes change with time," Yang replied with a satisfied smile. "Does staying informed make you feel more connected to your home town?"

"Not really, no," Blake slowly admitted. "All I see is the struggle…"

The struggle," Yang repeated, hoping to draw her partner out.

"My dad, Ghira, is actually the chieftain of Menagerie… and he struggles every single day to make sure that his people have what they need… and yet I called him a joke, because seizing power from the humans in Atlas wasn't his top priority." Along with her words, Blake's ears drooped flat against her head again…

Yang swayed in her seat, as she desperately struggled not to hug the woman sitting at her side. Now wasn't the time. Instead, she did her very best to keep her friend talking… "So… The main problem with getting caught quoting your dad is…?"

"I'm a hypocrite… and now my dad will see my hypocrisy broadcast on the news," Blake concluded.

"Well, I mean, you didn't claim that anything you said were your own words or anything… You said, a great man once told me," Yang hedged, hopeful that Blake's compliment to her dad might smooth over some of the awkwardness and tension that the woman was feeling… Only to flinch when Blake suddenly pressed her forehead down into the countertop and covered her head with her arms…

"Sooo embarrassing," Blake moaned.

This time, Yang failed to keep herself to herself, as Blake Belladonna was far, far too adorable, so she rubbed a hand up Blake's back to rest gently between her shoulder-blades.

"Jaune didn't consult me before maneuvering me politically," Blake continued without ever lifting her forehead from the bar…

Yang merely nodded, as there was nothing she could add that would be the slightest bit useful.

"On the other hand, the man invited us to take part in all of his plans today because he's figured me out, "Blake continued. "He knows how determined I am to help my people, he knows how reckless I am…"

Once again, Yang remained silent, but this time, she rubbed her hand gently up and down Blake's back.

"He also knows the stakes," Blake finally added. "The cost of failure… He knows we're at risk of a civil war at the worst possible time. For that reason, he knows I'll do whatever is required of me, but he didn't ask me first, so now I'm completely furious with him…"

"Sounds complicated," Yang agreed in a carefully neutral voice.

Finally rising from the bar, Blake nodded her agreement as she straightened on her stool. "Yes. Complicated…"

"You're her, aren't you," a high-pitched voice suddenly called out from the doorway, where a young cat faunus girl was standing with an older version of herself. "You're Blake. Menagerie's princess…"

From her spot sitting next to Blake, Yang saw her partner shiver from her tailbone up to the crown of her head, but when the ravenette swiveled on her stool to face the young girl in the doorway, her expression was calm, her posture neat. "Menagerie actually has a chieftain rather than a king, so princess isn't quite the right word… I'm a Huntress, a Beacon trainee."

By the time Blake finished her explanation, the little girl was bouncing up to her side, hauling her mother across the room by sheer force of her enthusiasm. "My name's Lime, and I saw you and your friends fight those giant robots on the holoscreen," She cheered with her free fist pressed tightly to her chest. "I even drew a picture of you!"

Low and behold, the newly named Lime dug through her tiny green backpack to produce a colorful crayon drawing of a black haired stick figure with a pair of swords in hand, standing in front of a mass of huddling stick men. "Here! You can have it!"

"My daughter's been like this ever since she caught sight of the six Pm news," Lime's mother offered with an apologetic smile. "Her father will be jealous of us as well, as he was a Fang member under your father, back when it was quite… different, and he appreciated your words."

Even as Blake nodded at Lime's mother, the crayon drawing was foisted into her hands by an over-eager six year old, and she dropped to a crouch at her side. "Thank you, Lime. This means a lot to me…"

The smile that slipped onto Yang's face as she watched the young cat faunus tightly hug her partner would've lit up the entire room, but it didn't, because she wasn't the main character of this scene. Instead, she watched from the sidelines, as faunus people all around the long, thin room, took notice of Blake and started moving in her direction.


Just outside of the ramen shop, Jaune leaned back against a wall, listening to the murmured conversations within with a look of growing contentment on his face… Blake was smart, she knew what he was about, and while he still owed her a massive apology, he would have to do so later.

Right now, Blake was getting so much more from Yang and that adorable little girl than anything he could do or say, so Jaune started walking back towards the air-bus terminal while enjoying the evening breeze.


To Be Continued


Author's Note:

I stretched science to suit my needs a bit in this chapter, as elemental gallium isn't actually a very magnetic metal. It can be magnetized to a certain extent when in its liquid form, but it doesn't respond when its in a solid state. I plan on ignoring this reality for convenience's sake.


Author's Note 2:

If you like my writing, want to check on my release schedule + want to help support me, consider visiting my P-a-t-r-e-o-n page

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