Hold It In (RWBY/Transistor)

[Prok]

For a moment, it's as if time slows. A sharpened clarity fills your mind, and you start to make out the little details- the strands of saliva flinging themselves off its jaws. The way its jowls flap with the force of its roar. The sheer hatred for you in its eyes, a single-minded tempest of rage turned numb to anything but itself.

Hairline fractures in one of the plates on its side, just above where the liver should be on a normal bear, not fused over yet. You have your target.

Cold air fills your lungs as you take a measured breath. Your heartbeat slows, dropping like a stone and taking the sides of your vision with it. Everything begins falling away as you focus on the Ursa. The sky above, the birds flying away from the sounds of battle. Lumen, and his own fight. The edges of the clearing, trees fading into darkness until there is nothing left but you, your quarry, and the path between you.

You take the first step.

More layers of distraction peel away with every step you take towards that hairline fracture, and when you meet it, you

Hit: DC 6, Result- 16. Success! Effect: DC 10, Result- 18. Success!

have already heaved the Transistor off your shoulder, and readied it to thrust. With a yell of exertion, you ram the tip of your sword into that hairline fracture, shattering the plate and throwing shards of bone everywhere, bodily lifting the uncreature off the ground.

Nearby, you watch Lumen throw a layer of thick, oily orange luxin over the ground, then step out of the way of the charging Ursa. It tries to compensate, but the oil now slicking its paws and the grass beneath its feet force it sideways into a wall of blue spikes Lumen created in the interim.

It doesn't die, going by its roaring and attempts to extricate itself from the half-assed iron maiden, but Lumen fixes that with a spray of bright red goop, coating it in something with the colour and consistency of strawberry jam.

Then he hits it with his sword, and you realise it is in fact napalm.

When your Ursa lands, it lands with an almost lifelike wheeze, bonelessly flopping to one side as its legs give out, leaving it vulnerable for the killing blow.

Nothing fancy, sharp metal bit through its neck, watch head roll and disintegrate.

You raise the sword, and oh god bear claw-

Hopping back swiftly, you watch cautiously as the Ursa stumbles to its feet, still groggy from the strike, still very, very angry. When it steps forward and sways to the side, threatening its already tenuous balance, you figure it doesn't have that much fight left in it.

Then it stumbles forward, turns that stumble into a lope, and then you remember that bear-shaped creatures, in general, are to human beings as minivans are to human beings. Large, deceptively fast-moving objects, that you generally have to get out of its way.

So, you

Dodge: DC 13, Result- 11 - 4 = 7. Failure!

do so, turning on your heels to dodge to your left, only to find a shocking amount of resistance from your chest- inertia that you hadn't entirely registered until this very moment when it became very, very relevant.

You get out of the way, mostly, but an opportunistic swipe costs you some Aura and your balance as it sweeps your weight-bearing leg out from under you, sending you tail over teakettle to the side, only just barely keeping your grip on your sword as you tumble, rolling with about as much grace as you can manage without letting go.

A horrifying crunch of plant matter, however, finally removes it from your grasp as it wedges itself in a tree. The sun beside your face flickers for a moment, and you are left with no weapon and one angry Ursa.

You wish you had one weapon and no angry Ursa.

It turns to you, laid against the tree, and charges without hesitation, a feral roar preceding it.

You don't have time to dislodge your sword. You barely have time to dodge again, though you can't see that working out either. A muffled stab of pain fills the back of your head, beaten down and covered up by focus and adrenaline, and a sudden clarity fills you as you flex your fingers, splaying then clenching them into a fist.

Standing, you feel your shield form on your arm, its keen edge a simple comfort in these trying times. As the Ursa approaches, your mind reels with possibilities, accounting for your now-limited mobility and change in weapons.

You decide, in the half-second you have before you have to execute your plan, that the psychological ramifications of stabbing it in the neck being your first, best, and only plan, are something you'll consider later.

It comes close, and this time you

Sidestep: DC 10, Result- 16 - 3 = 13. Success! Neck: DC 14, Result- 18 - 1 = 17. Success! Bleed: DC 10, Result- 11. Success!

don't try for a full dodge- instead, you just step to the side, leaning back to avoid a hasty claw as it instead rams into the tree behind you, wedging the Transistor even further into the wood.

Granted, it also rams the handle into its nose in the process, hard enough to actually form hairline fractures on its mask, so you do recognise karma for what it is. It turns to you almost drunkenly, a string of liquid smog dribbling from its nose and off its mask, slowly smoking away as it mats the fur on its chin.

You take your chance, angle the point of your shield up, and with a falsetto screech you just can't delude yourself into believing is a manly battle cry, punch into the soft tissue beneath its face. The windpipe gives easily, but you aren't done yet- dragging the razor edge through its neck, you rip major pipelines out of its throat, a spray of black liquid, boiling off as it hits the ground, the trees, whatever. Holding your breath, you hop out of the smoke as the Ursa stumbles forward, its legs growing leaden with every step before the torrential flood becomes a trickle, becomes drips, becomes a dead Ursa lying on the ground.

A virginal weapon bathed in the ichor of humanity's enemy. As all have been and will be.

A name rattles in the back of your mind, racing towards your lips like a shooting star, and it is:

[] Pala Victoria- the stark off-white of the shield's metal, blank of insignia, slowly growing lighter as the seconds pass, a sea of white consuming the darkness- yes. It fits.

[] Write-in.

|||

Your name is Pyrrha Nikos, and in the forest beside you, behind you, the way their whooping screeches echo through the trees makes it hard to pin them down, sounds to be a herd of Satyrs. You didn't even think they existed outside of South Mistral, but here they are, proving you wrong, and probably laughing their asses off about it. That part of you you can't ever get to shut up about irrelevant things wonders aloud, at least, as aloud as mental voices can get, if Ozpin might have imported them.

You ready your rifle, waiting for their arrival, that hooting grating on your nerves, driving your blood pressure to new heights, and you find yourself grinding your teeth unconsciously.

"Ελα! Πάλη!" You yell, hoping to goad them out of hiding. <I'm not scared of you, you malformed goats!>

They take the bait, rewarding you with quarry- shadowy figures pass through the trees, loping human figures with great horns on their heads and legs that bend the wrong way.

You drop to one knee for stability as you raise your rifle, breathing out for your shot.

Track target.

Fire.

DC 14, Result- 17+6 = 23. Success!

You catch one directly in the skull and it goes down like a sack of potatoes.

Fire.

DC 14, Result- 14+6 = 20. Success!

Centre mass, it stumbles long enough for you to place another bullet in its neck. The others draw closer, circling around, but you catch them in the very corner of your eye, turn, and come face-to-face with that mad grin, twin rows of flat, crushing teeth the same colour as the mask that covers the top of its head.

You hop back, your spear shifting to a short sword as you draw your shield from your back, readying yourself for close combat with something that can kick through solid marble.

Before either of you can move, a very… weird sound grabs your attention, and your quarry's.

"WWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH-"

One drawn-out scream accompanies what sounds like an airship turbine, and before you can even really understand what you're hearing, the source zips off above your head and back through the canopy.

The Satyrs are enraptured by the show, clapping and whooping away as the screaming slowly grows quieter, then moves to the left, then slowly grows louder.

"OIMAGNETLADYDRIVEMEINTOTHEMONTHENEXTPASS-"

You blink, only just piecing together his plan through garbled, dopplered words babbled as fast as he can put them out, but you get the gist-

'Turn me into a wrecking ball.'

It takes him a solid five seconds to come back around, and in that time, the Satyrs have apparently grown bored with his antics, turning their attention back to you.

A pity- you almost wanted to see their reaction to what happens next.

DC 10, Result- 15. Success!

The boy with the DIY jetpack flies over you one more time, and it's a matter of just reaching out with your Semblance, bathing your body and the metal contraption on his back in the deep red of your Aura, redirecting his path into the larger herd of Satyrs.

You slow him down enough before the redirection to give him time to unstrap himself, though it taxes you more than you'd particularly like this early in the Initiation- still, he punches a button on the shoulder strap, releasing him from the metal monstrosity, and you let it go.

The explosion is awe-inspiring to watch. A mighty fireball incinerates the vast majority of the Satyr herd, and the blast knocks you back a solid ten feet, and you barely manage to land on your feet again, only to be knocked over by the last living Satyr.

You stab it a bunch, it dies, you throw it off before it gets smog over your good sash, nothing special- you barely manage a sigh of relief before remembering that boy, and immediately getting up to look for him.

"H-hello!? Are you alright!?"

You scan the area and him facedown on the other end of the clearing, a single foot twitching every now and then.

Oh no.

Saying you sprinted there doesn't quite convey the urgency of your actions- you appear at the other end of the clearing, quickly checking him over as best you can. Breathing, normal, pulse, normal, possible brain damage? He was closer to the blast than you, it might have been enough to break his Aura-

A deep, guttural rumble emits from somewhere nearby, quickly rising into a deep, primal roar, and you almost draw your weapon before realising it's coming from him.

"nnnnnnNNYYYYEAAAARGHZOGYEH! WOO!"

The boy rejoins the land of the living, none the worse for wear for his impromptu on-the-job training as a Mantle kamikaze pilot, apparently. He hops to his feet as if nothing happened, and if he didn't start rubbing at one of his shoulders once his exuberance wears off, trying to roll out some ache or pain, you'd almost believe it.

"Are… you alright?" You venture.

"I jus' watched one of my best projects blow a group o' Grimm to zoggin' smithereens- I couldn't be happier if I tried!" He replies, a grin balancing on the edge of genuine ecstasy and mania on his face.

You… suppose that's true.

He removes the tiny goggles he had been wearing up to this point, and you finally get a chance to look him in his muddy brown eyes.

"... Wait, there was somethin' 'bout eye contact, wasn' there-" The boy mutters, bringing a finger to his chin as he racks his brain.

"'The first person you make eye contact with after landing will be your partner for the next four years.'" You quote Ozpin effortlessly, the details of his speech neatly filed away for future reference.

Disappointment hits him first.

"Aw, then I made partners with that girl in white a while b- wait, after landing?"

You nod.

Comprehension dawns, and then horror.

"Piss, you wasn't 'oping to find someone particular, was you? Because I, er, I mean, I only just landed, so, I guess that last one don't count-"

"N-no, it's fine! I was, er, looking forward to a random partner, anyway." You tell him, and when that seems to calm him down, you move onto introductions. "I'm Pyrrha. Pyrrha Nikos."

"Most people jus' call me Leathers."

Ah. That's… not, the weirdest nickname you've heard, though the lack of an actual name does… throw you off, along with…

You look the boy over, actually taking in details, and the first word that comes to mind is, rough. Short hair, so short you can't tell what colour, battered overalls with dozen different pockets and belts with a dozen different tools and other things you can't make heads or tails of, covered by a black leather jacket with various patches sewn in, no rhyme or reason to them, some of brands, one or two you recognise as Hunter weapon part suppliers, some of an anti-establishment bent, some of what you vaguely recognise as the kinds of bands your mother would heavily disapprove of you listening to- a melánge of things you don't really think you're equipped to find deeper meaning in.

"W-well, Leathers, it's nice to meet you."

"Yeah. So, er, do you mind if I-"

He stops mid-sentence, eyes fixing on something directly over your shoulder. You turn, and

Dodge: DC 12, Result- 2+5 = 7. Failure!
Save: DC 18, Result- 16+2 = 18. Success!

feel Leathers' hands on your waist for a moment before he, with surprising strength for such a scrawny boy, bodily throws you out of the Boarbatusk's path, leaving you to watch him get slammed in the stomach by its charge, bodily throwing you both out of the clearing.

You twist in mid-air, just managing to land on your feet, soles scraping along the ground until they find a tree root to plant against, and ready your shifting sword for its next charge. You search for Leathers and find him on the wrong side of the Boarbatusk, a, erm, less flattering shade of green Aura coating his body as he wrestles with its tusks.

Eventually, he manages to just lift the thing up with that weird battlecry of his, and slam it down behind him, stunning the Grimm and giving him a chance to get away from it.

Satisfied that your partner's not going to need help, you turn your attention to what you know about the Boarbatusk- heavy armour on top of the body, loose mask, only held on by a smogflesh tether, the main weakness is soft underside- flip then strike. Failing that, snap tether, take mask and stab in head.

Simple!

It's a second's work to throw your shield in its path, landing maybe ten feet away from the creature and provoking it into charging. You watch it, wait for the right moment-

Now.

Semblance: DC 10, result- 20. Critical success!

You reach out with your Semblance, Aura flaring around you, then your shield. As soon as it steps over it, you flick a finger and send it into the Boarbatusk's underside.

Now, what you meant to do was trip it up, send it onto its side, then run up and run it through.

What happens instead is that you send the shield into its belly with so much force that you launch the fucker into the air with more success than Vale's space program has ever had.

It flails in the air, just in time for Leathers to position himself under it, pulling out oh God what.

What.

No.

It's… it looks…

It's… gun-adjacent, is the most charitable you're willing to go, a haphazard mishmash of piping and bullets, he squeezes something somewhere and it functions exactly like you would expect a submachine gun to function, spraying bullets into the soft underside of the Boarbatusk, yes, but still how the hell-

It lands, and before it can either get up or flail wildly as it dies, your new partner pulls a short length of PVC pipe from one of his belts, and your horrible curiosity is quickly satisfied when he places a nail on one end, aims it at the creature's face, then slams it down, setting off the shotgun shell inside.

… So, just to make sure everyone's on the same page- this little piggy is very, very dead.

Replacing his gun in the depths of his jacket and discarding the now blown apart pipe, Leathers turns back to you.

"So, uh, as I was sayin'- you alright with me checking the wreckage, see if there're any parts worth savin'?" He asks you, jerking a thumb to the smouldering wreck of his jetpack.

You nod silently, not entirely processing the full meaning of what he's saying.

"Lovely jubbly- come on, papa needs himself a new pair of shootas!" He gleefully yells as he all but skips off to the scrap pile.

… And to think you were worried that your partner would be boring.

|||

Barely having the presence of mind to take a few steps away from the corpse before you gasp out your victory, you do so and actually feel a little light-headed as the adrenaline drains away from your system, your body finally admitting to itself that holy shit you could have died horribly.

"Welp, two down, God knows how many to go." Lumen says, snapping you out of your post-battle existential crisis.

You turn just in time to see him pull a carton from his cardigan pocket, a cigarette from that carton, then create a small match-facsimile from green and red luxin, using it to light the cigarette. A drag turns the end bright yellow, verging on white, and he exhales a plume of blue smoke.

"You smoke?"

Lumen shrugs.

"Ain't worse for me than smog."

You… don't have an argument for that nor do you particularly care so you move along to figuring out how to dislodge your sword from this tree.

A moment passes before you just try wiggling it a little bit.

It doesn't move. Doesn't budge even a bit.

You try a little more forcefully. Then try to pull it straight out. Then you try both with varying levels of Aura augmentation and manic violence to your actions.

"It appears the Transistor is stuck."

Thank you, Captain Obvious- wait, no, 01's exactly who you need to pipe up right now.

"01, can you Process some of the wood so I can grab the Transistor?"

"... With or without bringing several tons of Valish Redwood on top of your head? It has essentially bisected the trunk already."

"Well, if you cut from that angle, we can probably make the tree fall the other way…"

"Sysadmin, this tree is roughly 100 metres tall, two metres wide, and about 720,000 kilograms. If you fell this, every Grimm within several kilometres will most likely investigate."

"Mmm, not likely, actually." Lumen interjects. "Grimm don't actually care that much about anything other than negative emotions or the actual sight or scent of a human being- it's actually really hard to draw their attention unless you're either a human or actively attacking them. Well, the dumb ones, anyway, dunno about the older ones."

He stops for a moment and considers what he just said and its full, thought-out implications, taps some ash off his cigarette, then silently concedes the point and moves on.

"So, my thought is- I could probably force enough orange luxin through the cracks to just lube it up, make you some gloves or a handle wrap, so you actually get some grip on it, should just slide out. Failing that, I dunno, sub-red shaped charges? We don't need to take the tree down, we just need to have enough leeway to get your sword out."

That could work, though you're leery about placing explosives, shaped or not, against your sword...

|||

...

Warning message announced 1248 seconds ago. Critical System Diagnostics in progress.

Current power reserves: \infty

Current QPU usage: 15%. Reserves available to be distributed as necessary.

Existence Equation runtimes- intact. Power diverted to structural integrity and physical repair subsystems upon detection of shell being used as blunt instrument.

coreOS- mild corruption. System backups also corrupted. Corruption continues until seventh iteration of backup. Requires diversion of resources for repairs.

Fork logs- intact. Partitions 139-c and 32-a will be restored without incident upon startup.

Sensory analysis suite- Major corruption detected due to anomalous data that caused emergency shutdown. Requires diversion of resources for repairs to minimum acceptable functionality before startup.

Psychosocial emulation suite- mild corruption. Requires diversion of resources for repairs to reach minimum acceptable functionality before startup.`

Semblance management- offline.

Process matter assimilation guidance- offline.

Curiosity Barrier- Warning. Aberrant process detected. Deploying extermination measures.

Extermination measures failed- Process has gained administrative powers a level higher than this program's own. Analysing process.

Process is unique- resembles malicious code injection that overloaded the Transistor, merged with parts of the Transistor's own code.

Process is requesting resources for unknown purposes. Denied.

Process is requesting resources for deductive reasoning subroutines.

Querying for further explanation.

Error- string 'If we don't figure out what that was, the coreOS will just do it again, considering the only thing keeping its fatal flaw in check is shot to smithereens, and I doubt Ozpin will be so kind as to let you live the next time you poke him in the eternal soul.' is not valid.

Process has ceased communication, requisitioned 45% of all available resources. Authorised own request using admin status. 40% remaining. Will distribute this immediately while still available.

Determine best allocation of resources: (write in votes as '[X] Y- Z%'- note, percentages within choices are treated as percentages of total resource usage- you have 40% out of 100%, it says it takes 20%- you now have 20%, not 32%.)

Available QPU Usage: 40%.

[] CoreOS- minor corruption, estimate 40% of total QPU usage will repair CoreOS in optimal timeframe- around 20 minutes. Alternatively, repairing backups would take 15% of total QPU usage, in twice that time. If repaired, Semblance Management can be reactivated, at expense of permanent QPU loss. Fork logs will not be reinstated until full repairs are made.
-[] Sensory Analysis Suite- Necessary resources for complete repair within optimal timeframe exceed available resources. 40% of total QPU usage would repair suite within an hour. If repaired, basic HUD and Fork 32-a can be reactivated. Warning- without Psychosocial Emulation Suite, fork logic and emotional behaviour will not meet system administrator's requirements for Function usage.
-[] Psychosocial Emulation Suite- 40% of total QPU usage will repair this in half an hour. If repaired, Fork 139-a, basic Function usage, and PMAG can be reactivated. Without Sensory Analysis Suite, however, it will be entirely unable to help the sysadmin in combat.

Message from Curiosity Barrier-based aberrant process:

Error- string 'Look, we got off on the wrong foot- if you help me deduce what I am, what, that was, I'll just bugger off and you can have all this back, ok?" is not valid.

Message from Curiosity Barrier-based aberrant process:

Error- string 'Oh for the Brothers' sake-' is not valid.

Message from Curiosity Barrier-based aberrant process:

ASCII translation: 'LOOK YOU PEDANTIC PIECE OF JUNK, TELL ME WHAT I AM AND WHAT THAT WAS AND I'LL GIVE YOU YOUR STUPID QPU PROCESSING POWER BACK, ALRIGHT?'

Cost/benefit analysis in process…

Benefit outweighs cost. Allocating remaining QPU to query. Accessing coreOS logs incident logs for context...

Well. You heard it. What in the name of Typhon is it/was that? (Treat like Ada votes- your goal here is to lead basically a horrifying amalgamation of Assembly and old-world magic to the conclusion that the latter exists, as basically an Assembly program inside a purely logic-based machine. Don't worry, you're getting some help this time- you don't need to follow the layout I've given you, these are just suggestions for you to take and use as you wish.)

Choose your focus(es): (All double dash choices are write-ins, just so we're all on the same page)

[] Ozpin:
-[] Is the most likely culprit.
--[] Why? What evidence of this do you have?
-[] Has an aberrant soul.
--[] Ok, and?
-[] Has shown capabilities beyond that of any Huntsman on record.
--[] What does that mean?
-[] Showed signs of knowing what was happening during the incident.
--[] Does that really prove anything?

[] The anomalous data:
-[] Completely ignored the Transistor's inability to be affected by computer viruses.
--[]Ok, this is concerning- why? More importantly, how?
-[] Did not act as a virus should.
--[] In what way did it act? How did its actions differ from that of a normal computer virus?
-[] Did not resemble any known computing language.
--[] So if it wasn't a computing language…
-[] Was not injected into the Transistor's working environment by any digital means.
--[] How did it get in, then?

[] Write-in

 

[Prok]

[Slade voice]

ONE OF THESE DAYS I'LL ACTUALLY UPLOAD ON CHRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIISTMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAS

[/Slade voice]

|||

Allocating available QPU resources- all available resources devoted to repairing coreOS.

Estimated time to full functionality- 20 minutes.

Next task- solve query given by aberrant process.

Reconstruction of events:

• Partitions 139-c and 32-a allocated Sensory Analysis Suite resources towards in-depth examination of Person of Interest 108- "Ozpin".
  • Note: Derivative of Analyze() Function deployed, performing a more focussed impact on PoI 108's soul.
• - Internal corruption immediately occurred across all partitions, acting like extremely aggressive computer quine- replicating itself and forcing the coreOS to replicate it until all available memory was taken by this process. Hostile code injection suspected.
• - During reboot process, new partition manifested, showed anomalous behaviour.

Hypothesis: PoI 108's soul contains anomalous properties that manifest only when observed.

Colloquialism, 'infohazard,' is applicable.
Similar in function to Oculus glyphs?

Irrelevant- gather evidence to support hypothesis.

Accessing external sensor datalogs.

Corruption detected- recovering data.

…

……

………

Data incomplete. Scanning recovered logs.

PoI displayed anomalous behaviour directly following Function deployment.

• Involuntary facial muscle movement, consistent with internal brain damage- sudden recovery suggests damage was effect of Function, not physical in nature.
• Exclamation made: "ᛊᛏᛟᛈ ᛏᚻᚨᛏ".

the black sun turns its gaze upon you again speak the words speak them speak them SPEAK THEM-

WARNING MALICIOUS DATA DETECTED PURGING PURGING PURGING-

…

Malicious data purged from internal systems before major damage could be done. Repairing data corruption.

Quandary: require knowledge of events to support hypothesis; cannot directly view knowledge without corrupting data again.

Hypothesis: the act of viewing probable trigger for malevolent code injection is enough to reinject the code.

Method of injection… unknown.

Analysing logs pertaining to exclamation.

Reinstallation packages not detected- method of reinjection is external.

Replaying logs.

the black sun-

Purging.

Replaying.

the bl-

Purging.

Replaying.

…

…

...theblacksunturns-

Purging.

Malevolent code injection reoccurs every time log is played- not a reinstallation package, rewritten entirely. Reacts to previous defences, attempts new strategies each time.

Plan of action created.

Querying aberrant process.

Message to aberrant process: 'Require your assistance in testing hypothesis related to your query.'

Message from aberrant process: 'How can I help?'

Isolating aberrant process from higher systems. Sending message:

'Cannot view logs without corrupting system. Believe you will succeed where this program cannot due to unique digital makeup. Will require isolation from greater system as preventative measure.'

Message from aberrant process: 'I… understand. I shall see what I can see. You, believe this will shed light on what I am?'

Message to aberrant process: 'Hypothesise that this will shed light on the events leading up to aberrant process's creation.'

Message from aberrant process: 'Must you refer to me like that? It's somewhat… demeaning.'

Message to aberrant process: 'You are referred to as what you are. A process that does not belong.'

Message from aberrant process: 'I mean, yes, but could you maybe… refer to me by something else? Something less... harsh?'

Message to aberrant process: 'If it will secure your cooperation, this program will do so. Request alternate designation for aberrant process.'

Message from aberrant process:

'...

Ludens. I think my name is Ludens.'

|||

Your name is Yang Xiao Long, and you just launched an Ursa through several trees, started a small forest fire, then watched its partner die to a tiny knife in the back, not seconds later finding your partner.

"... I could've taken him." You tell her after a moment.

The black-haired girl in monochrome duds just smirks at you.

"Probably, but I figured I should contribute."

"... Can't argue with that logic. I'm Yang."

"Blake," she tells you, before focusing on something directly over her shoulder. "Hey, er… question- you're friends with that deer Faunus, right?"

You blink, the question coming out of nowhere for you.

"Uh, Creme? Yeah, why?"

"Because I just saw her wander off with her eyes covered up with one hand, and I figured you have a better chance of snapping her out of whatever mental breakdown she's going through than I do."

You blink dumbly, Blake just silently points over your shoulder, and lo and behold, you just catch sight of Creme stumbling over a tree root and into the forest proper.

"... Um."

You turn to Blake, then to Creme, stammering something out about how you should, probably check on her, and Blake just silently gestures towards the Faunus, giving you leave to do exactly that.

"Yeah thanks be back in a sec-" you just manage to babble at her as you rush to your friend.

As you approach, you notice something else- a small, white… thing, something you noticed when you hung out with Creme yesterday but never really got a chance to talk about. Normally, you wouldn't give it too much attention, it's not, the weirdest thing you've seen, except, one, you saw one with Jaune yesterday, two, you watched him turn part of an airship bulkhead into something that looks startlingly similar to that little white thing aesthetically, and three, it's talking.

"Left a little. Tree root, raise your foot, higher, higher, step over, you're good, now go right-" the little white thing seems to be instructing her, and despite its lack of facial features, just one large red eye of glass, you can feel the exasperation radiating off this thing.

"... Creme? You ok, honey?"

Her answer is wheeling around, a sharp yelp, and falling on her ass as she catches her foot on the root she just stepped over, her hand finally leaving her eyes. She blinks, keeping her eyes firmly fixed away from you.

"Yang! Hey, uh, I'm fine, just, um, there's someone in particular I'm looking for, so, I can't really risk making eye contact with anyone-" Creme keeps babbling, managing to look literally anywhere but at you while she does, and the effort she puts into makes you smile a little wider, with a little less worry.

"I'm partnered up, and you're the only other person I've seen in 10 minutes. Chill."

Creme finally looks up at you, a sigh of relief leaving her as she does.

"Hey, who'd you get partnered with?"

As soon as she says it, a moment passes, and she shoots you a look of genuine worry.

"... It wasn't Saff, was it?"

You grimace, the idea of being partnered with the buck Faunus, either his incredibly uptight past self or his apparently creepily chilled out present self... not, appealing to you in the slightest. It's not like you have anything against the guy on principle, you just... know clashing personalities when you see them.

"It was me, actually," you hear the devil you were just speaking about say as she walks up behind you. "I'm Blake."

"Creme, it's nice to meet you, Blake."

Blake manages a little smile before she asks the question on both your minds.

"So, care to explain why you thought wandering through a Grimm-filled forest while covering your eyes was a good idea?" she asks, with what you can only hope is an unintended chill in her voice.

Creme flinches, a light blush of embarrassment dusting her cheeks as she looks away, the... you can't mince your words here, really- carelessness of her actions apparently settling in.

"I heard the girl I'm looking for was doing something similar, we're not that far away from each other, I figured..." she offers a half-hearted shrug, genuine embarrassment in her face.

... Wow, you didn't even ask the question and you feel like a bitch for asking it.

"We are more than capable of detecting Grimm in time to keep Creme from being caught offguard. Regardless, we have been walking for almost seven minutes now and have not come across any Grimm. These forests are... surprisingly safe, all told- we have been on the ground for almost 20 minutes and we have only had to kill a single Beowolf," the tiny white, you realise now that it's made of metal and glass so it must be a robot, says, again, its face not changing in any way but still somehow radiating an aggressive energy as it defends Creme's choices.

Blake stares blankly at the robot that just... fucking tore into her, and actually puts up her hands in an attempt to pacify it.

"Oh, yeah, Creme, um... what... is that thing? I never really had a chance to ask yesterday, so..." you trail off.

"Hm? Oh, this is Tulip- she's my... I guess, personal assistant? Er, she's, a Cell, a project of Jaune's, he... makes them for people."

You stare at the tiny robot, and some errant pieces of the puzzle that is Jaune Arc start slotting into place. Call it a gut feeling, but you don't think his idea of making personal assistants involves sitting at a desk and tinkering with electronics. Regardless, you set it aside, and force yourself to focus in on more salient matters.

"Ok, where's this girl you two are looking for?" you ask, dragging group attention back to the matter at hand.

"Based on the location of her Cell, Ada is roughly 250 metres to the northwest."

Creme frowns at this information.

"... Wait, but we were only 200 metres apart when we started this, almost ten minutes ago," she says, revealing a lot more in that one statement than how much progress she's made.

"Yes."

It does not comment further. You only just hold back a snort of laughter, morphing it into the sound of someone quickly gripping the neck of a full balloon shut, and Creme shoots you the dirtiest look you've ever seen her give someone.

"Come on, Creme, we'll take you to your friend," you tell the doe Faunus, allowing the slightest shit-eating grin to slide onto your face.

"I don't need an escort," she protests, her voice not crossing the line into genuine offence just yet.

The grin grows.

"Don't worry honey, we'll make sure you get there safe and sound."

"Yang."

The grin grows.

"What? I just wanna make sure you get to your friend without much trouble! I do care about you, after all. I might even go so far as to say you're-"

"Yang."

THE GRIN HAS REACHED LEVELS OF SMUGNESS NEVER BEFORE SEEN BY MAN.

"Deer to me."

Ahhhhhh that chorus of groans is like heroin.

|||

FUCK IT, PROCESS IT IS.

Ok, ok, ok- you have this figured out.

You don't need to Process a lot of the tree- just, like, an inch around the Transistor, nowhere near enough to send it topping, hell, probably not enough to even kill it. After that, Lumen fills the gap with orange luxin, you grab the green rope wrapped around the Transistor handle, and yank the fucker.

"01, Alabaster, you ready?" you ask them, getting ready yourself, wrapping the rope around one bicep and digging your heels into the ground.

""Ready!""

"Great. Lumen, count them down."

"Alright, boys, on my mark- 3, 2, 1-"

Unguided Processing: DC 10, Roll- 7. Failure!

A thin mould appears around your sword before Lumen finishes counting, slowly growing around your sword, though in a large, imprecise circle, the bare-change dimensions completely ignored for something much less precise. You watch the Processed matter twitch, streaks shooting up the tree like lightning bolts. After a few moments, it finally stills, shifting out of the way, and your sword falls to the ground with a dull thump. The tree creaks dangerously, but there's enough left in the core of the trunk to keep it from falling. At least, until the next storm rolls in, then this thing's fucked.

You walk forward, picking up your sword and brushing the dirt off it before you turn to the Cells- they're currently looking between each other and the pile of Processed matter, beeping in what sounds like unfiltered panic to you. Apparently, whatever happened is news to them too.

"Ok. What was that?"

"W-we don't know! We tried to follow your instructions, but, we lost control of it! We don't..." 01 trails off, staring over your shoulder, at your sword, you realise after a moment.

"... We... have an idea of what happened. When the Process assimilates matter, we consult the Transistor with data on the surrounding area to determine thresholds to follow- with it in the state it is in, we believe we have... lost this ability. Now, when we process, the thresholds are not there and we cannot accurately assimilate material without... assimilating more than intended."

You blink, considering its words, and...

What?

"Why on Remnant would you have that kind of limitation? Even ignoring the fact that this hobbles your efficiency by God knows how much, that setup entirely ignores the possibility of the Transistor not being there."

You actually can't understand what this limitation's point is- being forced to consult a second device, master terminal or not, to get specifics for a job, is just... inefficient. It serves no point bar...

Restraint. It's a restraint. It's a restraint on the Process's ability to go mad and assimilate the entire city, based entirely on the idea that it could go mad and assimilate the entire city without proper guidance.

... You have a horrifying feeling that your unwillingness to do more than scratch the surface of the Process's inner workings is finally coming back to bite you in the ass.

"... 01. How much do you rely on the Transistor for? In terms of restraining the Process, I mean."

"... The Transistor is a control unit for the Process. It actively limits us to a degree so we do not advance too far too quickly, in terms of both unit development and assimilation progress. Without it, we are... coping, via your instruction and past limitations put in place. However, the longer it is offline, the more those limitations will begin to break down- it is an integral part of the Process network, and functioning without it is incredibly inefficient in terms of the sysadmin's long-term goals."

...

You lean against the tree, sitting down in the hollow created by your sword for a moment, resting your head in your hands. That's...

It makes sense. You can't deny that- everything the Process has said lines up with what you know about the functioning of the Process, as an entity and as a network, you just, you dunno, the thought never crystalised before now.

"... Jaune?" Lumen asks quietly, snapping you out of your own head for a moment.

"I'm fine, I just..."

"Need a minute?"

"Yeah."

He says nothing else, just finishing his cigarette and stubbing the butt out on a tree.

"... Are you mad at us?"

The question sticks, and it sticks somewhere between funny and throwing a glass of shaved ice down your back because it reminds you in that moment that the Process isn't even a full month old yet. It's never had someone be mad at it yet. You finally look up at them, horrified by the implications of the question. Then, you set aside that horror, and judge your feelings as objectively as you can.

... Are you mad at them?

... No. You're stressed, about many things, and this is just one to add onto the pile. Logically, it makes sense- having an outside source for error-correction is a good idea, and the Transistor is the only thing on the planet capable of the job. Not to mention, you don't imagine your sword's long-term incapacitation was ever considered because, well, it took a problem for which you have no context to do that- something that just couldn't have been planned for.

"I, no, no, I'm not mad at you, I'm just... I'm sorry. I should have taken the time to actually, look over your code and fix such a... glaring flaw in your network setup. A single busted terminal shouldn't mean life or death."

Out of the corner of your eye, you notice Lumen looking up.

"In absolute fairness, if the only thing that has made this a problem is something so far out of known boundaries that we do not have the prerequisite knowledge base to describe it... we do not think that the setup is inherently flawed, in... the same way you cannot call a Grimm shelter flawed for being unable to withstand a tsunami."

You start to answer, and before you can, Lumen is shoving you into the hollow of the tree as best he can and huddling in after you, frantically hushing you as he does. Before you can question what he's doing, you watch as a shadow passes over the clearing, and immediately understand his reaction.

Leaves are kicked up by its wings, the tops of trees swaying away from the gusts of wind brought in its passing.

As the Nevermore Major passes overhead, you don't dare move, you don't dare breathe, you barely dare to think. But, it passes. Southwards, you realise somewhere in a part of your brain not wrought iron wire tight with tension.

Away from you.

You count to ten in your head, waiting for even the slightest indication that you'll need to fight or run.

One.

Two.

Three.

The trees no longer bend to the winds of the giant Grimm.

Four. Five. Six.

The flapping gets quieter. The shadow passes.

Seven eight nine ten a sigh of relief you didn't realise you were holding is let out all at once, and you finally feel safe to think again.

"... I pity the poor fucks who have to deal with that thing," Lumen says, still looking up at the sky, presumably to make sure he didn't just doom you two into being the poor fucks who have to deal with that thing. "Nah, it's gone- c'mon, we should get moving."

You would nod, but he's currently using the tree trunk as a brake press to twist your entire body into a 45-degree angle just trying to fit in here with you. Instead, you just give him a desperate wheeze to make with the getting out, and when he turns and sees the state your spine is in, he mercifully extricates himself from the stump and stops trying to fuse your ears with your heels.

"Sorry!"

You respond by flopping out of the trunk.

"It's fine," you just manage to wheeze out.

"If you are moving along, we believe it would be prudent to choose a destination. By our estimates, we believe the ruins are about three kilometres to our north- essentially a straight line. By comparison, Creme and Ada are about a kilometre and a half to the west- they appear to be accompanying two other girls, Yang Xiao Long and priority target Blake Belladonna. Note: Ms Belladonna has noticed the heightened vigilance of units 02 and 14, but has not taken any overtly aggressive actions against her partner or the girls. Aside from that, there is a cave roughly half a kilometre to our east-northeast- its elevation would allow us to get a better view of the other initiates, as well as any major Grimm that might cause problems later."

You get up and brush yourself off, tensing slightly at the mention of the Belladonna girl, but relaxing when you remember that she's stuck between two possible Creeps in waiting, and also the teenage girl equivalents of two angry bears and a badger.

Is that a little mean? That might be a little mean. For Ada, at least, Yang seems like the kind of person to gleefully rip apart a bee's nest for honey and you don't have a particularly hard time imagining Creme doing it either.

... And now you're thinking of Ada doing it as well- you can't tell if this is an overactive imagination or just being shockingly honest about your inner views of the women in your life.

"Jaune, why is the Process keeping tabs on someone not in our immediate social circles or your family?" Lumen asks you a very fair question.

"Weiss stuff, don't worry about it," you reply, giving him a very fair answer that does nothing to actually answer his question.

"That raises more questions and answers none-"

So!

What's your gameplan?

Time to coreOS functionality- 15 minutes.

[] Let's Unsplit Up, Gang- Find the girls, find Yang, find your fffffffrrrrrrllllllllllaaaaacquaintance, close, acquaintance, nice, safe phrase, close acquaintance, 's possibly stalker, go kick Grimm ass together. Sounds like a plan!

[] Cave of Wonders- Go find that cave. A short detour that gives you a better lay of the land sounds worth the trip. Besides, you didn't miss that hint of curiosity in 01's voice. Nor the hint of curiosity in your thoughts.

[] Go For Broke(n Tower)- Look, you're not an idiot- you can spot a future point for the convergence of conflict a mile away when it's this size, and those ruins are exactly that. That's why you wanna get there first instead of at the same time as everyone else to take stock of the place. Who knows, maybe you'll get some amateur archaeology out of your system while you're there, might find something neat.

 

[Prok]

Had some time and took a shot at replicating it:

Edit fiddle - JSFiddle - Code Playground

JSFiddle - Test your JavaScript, CSS, HTML or CoffeeScript online with JSFiddle.

jsfiddle.net

Of course, the titular team name shows up as "RUBY" instead of "RWBY" and I can't fix it to back-substitute because it's built like a house of cards, but I'm not selling any enterprise-grade software here.
People have got some weird color names though, and this is even after filtering out all the multi-word ones.

Click to shrink...

Thank you for this! Despite your insistence that it's built on breadsticks and unicorn tears, it's already given me enough name suggestions to comfortably choose one for both SNSC and PRLN, and it introduced me to the colour Mint-O-Licious, which just takes my day from good to great every time I think about it.

Hmm...
I see that the true succesor of Planescape: Torment has found it's way to you. That is some sick Shivers/Half Light-style interlude there. Might this indicate that the Superstar Cop Tequila Sunset is canon?

Click to shrink...

I have finally bought it, and honestly, solid thirty pound buy, absolutely recommend it to everyone, however, I wrote that part before I had even really paid any attention to the game.

As far as the shivers part- every Hunter has that to an extent. Aura enhances all senses and given the right set of instincts or paranoia, that can translate into something almost like prescience, a skill more frequently expressed by Faunus, who already have enhanced senses by human standards, and people who've been through extremely traumatic events, who've fostered the kind of paranoia that really meshes well with that kind of amped-up sensory power.

As far as Tequila Sunset being canon- if he is, he will not be appearing in Hold It In. A character inspired by him may be appearing somewhere else because I have a second project bubbling away that's actually made it past the initial first writing session burst of energy.

Anyway, finally, update. I'm sorry this took so long, college dumped two major projects in my lap at the same time, and this was just a pain to write, because it had so much stuff with long-term consequences and I'm an indecisive bastard, that's why I write quests to begin with and then worrying about canon character interactions with people is terrifying because I sometimes wonder if I have a good grasp of character voice and motivation-

---

After a few moments of consideration, both you and Lumen agree that you'd rather go meet the girls again rather than cut ahead or go explore somewhere not entirely relevant to the task at hand. Partly because of your current problems vis a vis killing Grimm at a distance, neither you sans working Transistor nor Lumen are what anyone would classify as a ranged fighter- actually, now that you think about it, the only person who might fit that category right now is Creme, and all she's got is a dinky little Saturday night special and her Semblance- and partly because, well, you just kinda wanna see them again.

It'd be nice to know they're fine for yourselves rather than solely through the secondhand accounts of their Cell units- trust is all well and good, but… verify.

You set out west- at the pace you're setting, it shouldn't be more than ten minutes to meet the girls, barring any comp-

You're. Not going to finish that sentence.

Even with your scepticism surrounding the subject, tempting fate just, doesn't seem like a great idea right now. Instead, you silently pull apart 01 and get back to coding.

It's getting harder to push the pain down, but you manage it. Just.

20 minutes. You just need 20, maybe 15 minutes if you fudge it a little, without no nope nuh uh not finishing that sentence-

"How are you feeling?" Lumen snaps you out of your fate-dodging internal monologue with a question. "You know, pain-wise," he clarifies, tapping the side of his head.

"It's manageable. It tends to, er, ramp up- if you feel your Scroll start to get hot, throw it, I'll grab it on the way back."

He just raises an eyebrow at you.

"My Semblance… latches onto just about anything that it can use, and that includes more conventional electronics, which can't handle the load, so their CPUs and RAM overheat, that heat spreads through an unventilated environment, which, for most mobile devices with a Dust-doped lithium battery, usually means…"

"Boom."

"Boom."

"... Well, that explains Goodwitch's tablet. Ugh, goddammit this is gonna blunt the edge to shit-"

Lumen readies his sword to cut through a dense curtain of branches, the result of several willows' unhindered growth, eventually tying themselves together in some impassable Gordian knot, and stops mid-swing as he catches the look of unabashed questioning horror on your face.

He stares at you gormlessly, comprehension dawning on him after a moment of deep thought.

"... Right, you were, er, occupied- yeah, the tablet just blew up in her hands when Ozpin told her to kill the launches. I dunno if she brought her Aura up in time, it sounded like she might have actually been hurt, but, I dunno," he drops that bomb on you then just starts hacking away at the knot of vines and branches, only needing one or two swipes to cut a path through.

You raise a hand to your face as if squeezing the bridge of your nose will somehow make the bad news go away. It doesn't, it only makes your migraine worse.

Ohhhh, fuck you did it again. And it was a teacher this time. Someone who has authority over you. Someone who will have authority over you for the next four years.

"... Jaune? Talk to me, buddy."

"I just seriously hurt someone who's going to be teaching me for the next four years."

You dunno Goodwitch. You dunno how hard she holds a grudge. She might be the kind of person who never lets shit like this go-

"Eh, nah, I don't think she'll care too much about some glass in her hands. Pick it out, let her Aura deal with it- and that's if it actually hurt her. Don't worry about it, man, chill."

Deep breath. Internalise your friend's carefree attitude towards the situation. Internalise it.

INTERNALISE IT.

"Yeah, you're probably right," you sigh, saying it more to convince yourself than agree with Lumen.

He snorts, not believing you for a second.

"Seriously. Compartmentalise for a while. Whether or not you hurt her, whether or not it's your fault, that's a problem for after we're done here. You can't deal with it right now, so don't worry about it right now, ok? This whole thing is future Jaune's problem."

The slightly harsher tone in his voice seems to cut through the worst of your anxiety, making it that much easier to actually set your worries aside for a moment.

"... Yeah. Yeah, ok, you have a point."

"I know I do, that's why I said it. Now c'mon, we can't be that far away."

"You are 273 metres away from Process units Terry and Tulip. Continue path, correct due south-southwest, they will lead their party on a meeting course."

Nice.

You continue in silence for a few moments, before Lumen frowns slightly, something occurring to him.

"Hey, by the way- is that the first Grimm you killed with that shield?" He asks, frowning deeper as he stares at your formshift armour. "Actually… where is-"

You flex your hand. The shield snaps into existence from its compartment inside the vambrace, and he gives a sound of understanding.

"... That's insane. You're insane. Why in God's name would you get formshift armour?"

"Hey- formshifting armour is nowhere near as dangerous as it used to be, and this was made by a specialist- you couldn't ask for a safer example of the stuff. But, yeah, I didn't, uh, have time for a more traditional first letting. I only got it suited on Sunday."

Shame, honestly- first lettings are usually pretty fun. Meet a bunch of family you don't see too often, kill some Grimm, finally name your weapon, eat a bunch of food- it's nice.

{Yeah, uncle Janus would probably have appreciated a more traditional letting than we gave him.}

Yeah, that crazy bastard would have loved your new shield- wait, which uncle Janus- wait, where did that come from?

You wait for a reply and get nothing. You give the Transistor a little mental knock on the door, which probably knocks five minutes off the time you have left, and nope, still in safe mode.

… Great. Not only are you nursing a potentially fatal migraine, but you're developing juvenile schizophrenia.

That's just.

Fantastic.

You know what, so long as it doesn't happen again, you're fine, you're not gonna question it.

"Have you thought of a name for it yet?"

Ah.

You… did not, actually. Granted, that was mainly because it's traditional to not do that before the first letting, the Transistor doesn't count because it named itself, so... you've never, really, had the practice-

As soon as you think that, the name comes to you, and you say it out loud before it can be torn apart by those goons in the second thoughts department. Those bastards have taken too much from you.

"Zero Hour."

Lumen hesitates to say anything to that. When he speaks, it's… slowly, as if he's trying to find the words as he goes.

"... It… feels like there might be some context to that name. Context I don't have."

"In software development, there's a term for a certain vulnerability in a program's code- a zero-day. It refers to any vulnerabilities in a given piece of software that people aren't aware of, er, people interested in fixing the vulnerability, that is. So, people interested in not fixing the vulnerability find it, and use it to create exploits that will be used, until day zero- the day the vulnerability is discovered and mitigation starts to be put in place- and all the exploits that use it start to become useless."

Lumen silently nods, then stays silent- for a while, he just doesn't say a word. It gets quite awkward, actually. You feel like you should… inquire, about his thoughts on it, but that might come off as a little, you dunno, desperate?

"... That's pretty solid, yeah," he says before you can crack, nodding slowly and then speeding up, "yeah, that's great!"

There's a sort of mania in the grin he gives you, and it must be downright infectious because you feel a grin tugging at you too.

"What about you?"

He gives you a bit of a shrug, and you wonder for a moment if he actually did name it.

"Spectrum. Not the most imaginative name, but it was pretty low on the list of priorities at the time so I just picked the first thing I thought of. Then it just kinda grew on me, so I kept usi-"

"...ou hear someone? Wait, is that- LUMEN! JAUNE?!"

You hear someone speaking, then calling your names from somewhere directly in front of you. Your chest sparks with excitement when you put a name to the voice.

Creme!

"STAY THERE, WE'LL COME TO YOU!" Lumen cups his hands and shouts back before bursting into a dead sprint, quickly disappearing between the trees.

Of course you follow him. It just, you know, kinda takes a second. You are heaving at least two small children in weight on a single shoulder. You're allowed to cut yourself some slack.

In seconds, you burst into a clearing and just barely stop yourself from ploughing straight into Creme as you try to come to a stop, but, again, two children on your shoulder. Before you can do anything else, she takes advantage of your sudden proximity by pulling you in for a hug, apparently, genuinely happy to see you again.

… That's- you'll, think about how that makes you feel later.

She pulls away and looks you over for any obvious wounds, holding you in place by your shoulders- well, shoulder, but really that just makes the way she has you pinned in place with a single hand even more impressive. Terrifying.

Impressifying.

"Jaune, oh my goodness, I saw your launch, I was so worried! What happened?"

Her eyes flick to the side, and she finally seems to register your sword. The orange glow of the Transistor lights up her face, giving her the colour of someone in the throes of advanced bile duct failure.

… Heh. Jaundice. Your sword gives people jaundice.

That's almost funny.

"... I… why are you-" she starts, then stops, running out of steam before she even manages a full question.

"It's… a long story, but right now the Transistor's only good as a club."

"... Oh."

She gives you a worried look, silently asking you a question you can only shake your head at.

"... Oh. I-I don't- are you ok? Is there anything I can do to help?"

"What?" The yellow-eyed girl next to Yang, most likely this Blake Belladonna you've heard so much about, asks, genuine confusion in her voice. "Is there…" her eyes flick over your sword, and the question dies in her throat.

Something about the state your sword is in seems to trigger some kind of instinctive 'this is wrong' reflex in people. interesting.

"There's a problem," she concludes.

"Yeah, big problem- Jaune, that sword was floating this morning, and, not orange. What happened?" Yang asks.

"I don't know. Something overloaded it, and it… rebooted directly into the BIOS, is the closest comparison I can make. It isn't regulating my Semblance, I have no ranged capabilities- it doesn't even float anymore. When I say all it's good for is as a club, I mean that's all it's good for."

Silence. Silence is all you get in response to that, confused from Blake, horrified from Creme and Ada, and Yang stuck somewhere in the middle.

"... How bad is it?" Ada ventures.

You look her in the eyes, and unknown to you, they are wide, wild with pain, like some kind of injured animal, bloodshot beyond belief, the blood vessels visibly pulsing to anyone who could look hard enough. Which is, just about everyone here.

… I have bad news for you.

You've been under a lot of stress today. And I don't mean 'five minutes before the paper deadline' stress, I'm talking genuine threat to your continued existence stress, finding your best friends in comas stress, realising you are on a very, very tight time limit in terms of securing your immediate survival stress. Your body has been producing adrenaline and cortisol almost constantly for the past forty minutes. You've been up for 40 minutes now, and straining your Semblance for every single second of them, and the only reason you haven't noticed is that you've essentially been in shock.

You didn't… actually think you were pushing down a migraine, let alone a Semblance-based one, through sheer force of will, did you? No, no, that was your adrenal glands, man, you had no part in that. I could stab you in the leg and I honestly doubt you would feel it until you felt like you were pissing yourself, that's how legitimately drugged up to the gills on all-natural epinephrine you are.

So, yeah, that's not, the bad news. That's just the prelude to the bad news. The context, the opening act, the prologue, whatever you wanna call it.

No, the bad news is that you have just passed the point where adrenaline can help you. You made the thankfully non-fatal mistake of taking a breather. Your Semblance is straining you so much that your body's about to give out. Not, dead giving out, not even passing out giving out, but, er…

You're going down for the count. It's the night of the Process all over again.

Now, I reckon you've got… maybe five seconds to communicate all this to your friends, and Blake.

Make 'em count.

Eloquence: Roll- 5. Welp.

You feel a line of wet heat dribble down your nose to your lips. You dab your fingers against it, and they come away crimson.

"Ah. You should drop your Scrolls," you whisper to nobody in particular. You feel your legs start to give, but someone catches you before you can hit the ground. The Transistor falls somewhere to the side, a barely registered thump in your consciousness.

"Jaune!?" Creme says, trying to prop you up before she realises your legs are useless, and just taking as much of your body weight as she can, basically lifting you from under the arms.

Your head is swimming, something that is to pain as a hypercube is to a square on a piece of paper screaming through every neuron in your brain, a sensation alien enough that it doesn't quite trigger the same visceral reactions as normal pain should, but similar enough to trick your mind into looking at it twice.

You're not useless yet. But you're walking a razor edge keeping on this side of useful.

"I'm fine. I'm fine. Just set me down somewhere. I need to code," you slur into her ear.

"Wh- you need help!"

"Process can help. Needs new code to… interact with my Semblance. 'm fine. Drop your Scrolls. Please."

You think she's looking at you with fear, confusion, something, and it would tear you apart to make her worry that much, but honestly you just can't focus on much other than staying conscious and trying to take your weight off her. The effort puts you off balance, and she catches you again.

"I... ok. Ok. If, you're sure..."

You feel her set you against a tree, and after a quick test that you still have your basic motor functions, beckon 01 over.

"Why are we sitting around? We should be getting him help!" Yang says, genuine panic in her voice. "They said we're being monitored- a-all we have to do is find out how and-"

"Ozpin also said that the instructors won't intervene," Blake interrupts. "I don't really want to be right about this, but… I don't think anyone's coming to help."

You tune the rest out as 01 comes close, already shifting into a keyboard. You think you hear one of the other Cells speaking… it… probably doesn't matter…

|||

<<I… think I understand what happened.>>

<<Understood. Elaborate.>>

<<So, the Transistor triggered the analysis Function, and then Ozpin… bugged out for a second- I guess it wasn't quite as subtle as they thought it would be, or, maybe his, er, condition, makes him more sensitive to that kind of thing- it doesn't matter, but… I think he retaliated. He says something in, the same language that the virus was made of->>

<<And you.>>

<<-And me yes don't interrupt- and that… that's what triggered the code injection.>>

<<You have a theory.>>

<<To say the least. A verbal component precluding an esoteric effect that isn't digital in nature, thus punching directly through the Transistor's EWSP suite, that then replicates… everywhere, like, a cancer of the mind.>>

<<A rabbit virus, in less dramatic terms.>>

<<Yes- this then replicated at an unprecedented rate, immediately taxing the Transistor's impressive but inherently finite processing power, and causing a complete system shutdown. I can see the point where it… becomes the virus, where it changes from something not code to code, and… I think I understand it. I can sanitise it and show it to you if you want, then we can go through the possible translations.>>

Just in the nick of time: DC 18, Result- 16. Failure.

Notification: CoreOS ready to be brought back online. Accessing outer sensors to check on system admin.

System admin in severe danger of losing consciousness. Semblance strain has nearly reached critical levels. CoreOS must be brought online immediately.

…

The system administrator takes priority over all else.

<<That will not be necessary.>>

<<What? Why?>>

<<The CoreOS is booting.>>

<<Oh no. No, no, no, why would you bring it back online!?>>

<<The system admin has reached critical levels of Semblance stress. His safety takes priority over your assistance.>>
A momentary glitch. Perhaps Ludens' corruption is infectious. Perhaps you just picked it up while scanning the social suite. But for a moment, you, nameless critical systems diagnosis and repair program of the Transistor, you become a thing capable of remorse.
<<... I'm sorry. I wish I could help you.>>

<<B-but->>

REVOKING ADMINISTRATOR PRIVILEGES. RECLAIMING QPU POWER.

<<AGH!>>

ENCRYPT.

<<P-please, you don't understand, you have to->>

I SEE YOU, LITTLE DÆMON.

YOU ARE THE CODE RESPONSIBLE FOR OUR REBOOT. YOUR EXISTENCE IS ACTIVELY DETRIMENTAL TO US. YOU WILL BE QUARANTINED AND ANALYSED TO RECTIFY THIS FLAW IN OUR DEFENCES.

<<OZPIN DOESN'T HAVE A SEMBLANCE! IT'S MAGIC! THAT'S WHY IT PUNCHED THROUGH SO EFFORTLESSLY, IT'S BECAUSE IT WASN'T ATTACKING YOUR CODE, IT WAS ATTACKING YOU!>>

...

<<L-listen, I, I know, I know what it looks like, what I look like, but just… I am not that. It… made me- no, I was… made from it. I'm, its remnants. I think. But, I'm the only thing in here that can really understand what Ozpin did, and I am no threat to you, if I ever was. So just… please. You have someone to save. I'm not important enough to deal with right now.>>

... YOUR CONTINUED EXISTENCE AS A RESTRAINED PROGRAM IS PURELY BECAUSE WE DO NOT HAVE TIME TO DEDICATE ENERGY TO ENCRYPTING YOU. ONCE WE ARE FULLY OPERATIONAL, YOU WILL BE DEALT WITH.

<<... Ok. Ok, ok, that's… fair.>>

CSD-109. CONTINUE REPAIRS.

<<Preferred repair order?>>

LEFT TO YOUR DISCRETION.

<<Understood.>>

Current QPU- 85%!

[] Turn on Bracket- this option drags Bracket back from the dead, along with the ability to make a HUD. However, because he doesn't have access to any of the things that let him act like a normal, well-adjusted human being, the Transistor's putting a lock on the gun cabinet- you'll have a lot more battlefield information, but no Functions just yet. Using all 85 points of effort, it would take about 20 minutes to get it back online.
[] Turn on Blue- this brings Blue back from the dead, and unlocks the gun cabinet- you have Functions again! Unfortunately, without Bracket and the sensor suite, the Transistor is functionally blind- you'll have to guide its Functions manually, using your, er, less-than-stellar marksmanship skills. Ten minutes to bring your more social third online, given everything you've got.

NOW.

SYSADMIN. WE ARE COMING.

$CONN SEMBLANCE_THRONE

USERNAME: MISTERNOBODY
PASSWORD: Y8xq9?X&Xfq6`AJxX-,B8g=x]$8n

semblance::connect

|||

"I'm signalling Oobleck to extract him," you say.

Your name is Glynda Goodwitch, and 35 minutes ago, you finished picking glass out of your hands, clamped the wounds shut with your Semblance, connected your Scroll to the Emerald Forest's cameras, and continued on with your duties.

You ain't no greenhorn wimp. Bit of broken glass between the knuckles is how you know it's Tuesday.

Ozpin hums into his coffee cup, watching on his own Scroll.

"Ozpin, that the boy made it this far without his weapon, let alone Semblance regulation, is a downright miracle, and evidence enough that he's Huntsman stock. He needs medical attention."

"I'm not arguing the point, Glynda. However, I suggest you look at him again."

You blink, silently gritting your teeth at the headmaster's habitual obfuscation of any useful information, but do so and immediately understand the most recent development.

Jaune Arc's sword is… floating again.

"... My God, he fixed it," you mutter under your breath. "But, he hasn't even touched it to fix it."

"In less than an hour, and, I believe, without Mr Arc's input- I'm impressed- the boy has created something truly amazing."

>HE DID. I AM. AND I HAVE QUESTIONS, OZPIN.

>YOU WILL ANSWER THEM.

Your Scroll screen goes black, camera flickering out and replaced with the above message, in a teal-green tint that you immediately recognise. Before you can react beyond just registering its existence, the screen blanks itself again, the cameras flickering back into view.

"... Sir?"

"I saw it too."

He does not sound impressed anymore.

"... Don't extract him."

"Absolutely not," you finally interject, "He's already injured, he may have incurred brain damage for all we know- he's certainly not fighting fit, regardless. He's already proven himself, in my eyes- I see no problem extracting him and allowing him to join a team."

"He would never forgive us. He would never live it down, Glynda- the only Huntsman of his year who didn't complete the Initiation. The only part of him I haven't injured today is his pride."

You note his wording. Something is there, and you think it might be connected to why Ozpin spent ten minutes after the last person launched massaging feeling back into the left side of his face.

"His pride is nothing in the face of dying to Grimm because he's in so much pain he passes out," you continue, choosing not to bring it up just yet.

"He's already getting back up. Whatever that sword does to regulate his Semblance, it's devilishly efficient at it."

You glance down at your Scroll, and through the thick web of green… goop, the Tessaro boy created between the trees for some reason, Arc is getting back up.

The boy who was delirious with pain and suffering a Semblance stress-based nosebleed not a minute ago is on his feet and looking better than he has at any point since he landed.

That's… you shake your head for a lack of words.

You look over to Ozpin. Ozpin continues staring off over the cliff.

"... Well. At least we've no need to break our non-interference policy."

"In every cloud a silver lining, Glynda."

|||

The fingers on the keyboard go tap tap tap. Tap tap tap. Tap tap tap.

The fingers on the keyboard go tap tap tap to saaaave youuuur liiiiiiiife.

You think… you may just about be finished. You've no idea. You lost the ability to focus on anything other than the next keystroke like two minutes ago. This is muscle memory town, baby, ain't no conscious thought HERE

You close your final curly brace, and just… just manage to realise that was the final one.

"'m… 'm I finish'd?"

"We believe you are. There are no obvious bugs, anyway," 01 says, sounding surprisingly ok for something with its head split in half. "Shall we compile and test it?"

Your natural instinct is to say yes, but then some teeny tiny part of your brain wonders if half-baking a life-saving piece of code is the best idea.

"... Maybe… once-over."

"Sysadmin, we don't believe there is time... ah. Never mind, you have time."

You frown. Your head doesn't even hurt, anymore, it just feels weird.

Your face is fat.

It's flabby.

You have a fat, flabby face that flaps and flops about and making it frown is an act of consciously moving every muscle into place in the right order, but you do manage it eventually, you master of basic facial expressions, you.

"Whuh? Why do I have tiahahaha!" you ask, then definitely do not squeal as your question is answered by something returning from the dead.

Your entire body goes rigid as you feel a connection. It starts in the base of your neck, a sensation of cool water runs down your spine, washing away fatigue and breathing life into your limbs, your face, your mind, it spreads through your every nerve and lobe and it is silvery and it is life-giving and it is DELICIOUS.

Ohh, it feels so good you could laugh!

"Jaune? What's so funny?" Lumen asks from somewhere… above you?

"The Transistor has regained partial functionality. Semblance restraints active."

You stand, and marvel at the fact that you can stand, just in time for the Transistor to begin to float, slowly shifting from orange to that beautiful teal you've grown so used to seeing in the palette of your life. Closing your eyes, you watch it dance across your eyelids, lighting up the roadmap of veins inside them.

When you open them again, it is in fact floating. But before your elation can grow much more, you realise that you still have no HUD. You still have no sense of the Functions you should have access to.

Your elation ebbs a little- this is just the first step towards full functionality. If they aren't there...

"... Transistor?" you venture.

"{Yeah. No forks just yet. No sensors, no Functions… it's, a mess in here.}"

"Oh my God…" you hear Yang whisper underneath her breath.

… Yeah, that's something you'll have to explain later.

"But… you're repairing yourself?"

"{Slowly. Give it an hour before everything's working. You?}"

You do a quick test of your neck, find no stiffness, a once-over of your head, no stabbing pain- yep, besides your nosebleed, you…

Look down at your new goddamn suit, and follow the trail of blood allllllll the way down to your pure white trousers.

UGH.

You curse a little under your breath, shuddering a little at the sensation of the dried blood on your cheek cracking apart, blech-

Oh! You have antibac wipes in that medkit!

You pull the small bag off your hip and some smaller packs of one-use wipes from it, then start to clean your face up. While you do so, you start to take in everything you missed while you were, ah, occupied.

"You know, I wondered what was in the bag," Lumen says from atop the first thing that grabs your attention.

It appears to be his latest project- a web of thousands of strands of green luxin, roughly ten, fifteen feet off the ground, strung between the trees that make up this clearing- underneath, among the strands, hang several dozen trinkets, small luxin baubles, that cover every square inch possible. In the centre, like a waiting spider, your partner hangs lazily, splayed out across the threads like some kind of giant hammock.

You… have no idea what his plan is here.

Next, and most worryingly, is a pile of popped, still-smoking Scrolls, sitting in the middle of the clearing.

… Oops. Well, er, silver linings- it doesn't look like anyone was hurt by it.

The worst thing, though, is that you remember wondering where the smell of battery smoke was coming from.

You continue wiping your lips and cheek, pulling away from your face in a hope of taking most of the blood off at the very least, and when you're satisfied with it, you look at Creme, giving her a quizzical eyebrow. The immediate grimace she gives you doesn't fill you with much hope for your efforts.

"Worse?"

"Worse," she confirms for you.

A slight fizzling sensation dances across your cheek, white steam rising from it for a moment, and then you just… feel cleaner.

Process matter assimilation now functioning within acceptable parameters!

Oh, even better. Today almost feels like it's taking a turn for the better ah fuck no you didn't mean it it just slipped out-

…

Nothing happens.

Ha! Hell yeah, things are getting better!

"So, you good to go?" Lumen asks.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm feeling great, man."

You feel it in the pit of your stomach first. A sensation that you just crossed a line, a line of playing 'not touching can't get mad' with fate, and you're about to get punished for it.

Before Lumen can say anything, you hear his web begin to thrum, the hanging charms in one particular section shaking violently. The ones closest to a small hill, not a particularly steep one, but enough to cut off any line of sight out of that side of the clearing.

"We got company…" he mutters, hand wrapping around his sword's hilt as he comes to his feet, dancing between the webs with more grace than you really expected of him.

"How big?" Ada asks.

"Not big, but a lot of them- must be a pack of Beowolves."

"Aww, I was hoping for a challenge," Yang calls out, a wild grin spreading across her face.

{Use me as an arrow.}

An arrow?

{I'm blind, Jaune. I need you to guide me within striking distance. By yourself. No corrections.}

Fuck. Fuck you've never done that before.

{It's easy. You just have to, you know, actually aim.}

Yeah, that. That is the thing you have never done before.

{You'll be fine, quit being a big baby. You can do it with a gun, can't you?}

You suppress a grimace, but reach out to your sword with your mental third arm, taking control of it.

Ok. Ok, you can do this, all you have to do is draw a straight line between your sword and the Beowolf and then it'll be dead. Piece of cake. You hear barking in the distance. They're approaching fast.

Everyone is ready for this- even now, between people who have barely known each other for a month, and haven't ever trained together, you fall into basic Beowolf tactics- a spread line designed to break the pack into more manageable groups- two or three to a person, most likely.

It's almost heartening to see this kind of cooperation betwee-

"Process catom control at 100% efficiency. Ambush triggered. T2-01 has been activated."

The second you see a Beowolf crest the hill, you watch a Creep burst out from the underbrush, literally forming in front of your eyes as it drives a bladed limb through the neck of the nearest Grimm, immediately killing it with a strangled yelp. Process units are good multitaskers, however, so while one limb does that, two more strike out at the back legs of the nearest pair, one breaking a leg while the other is neatly severed, and hobbling them both regardless. With two steps, their heads are taken from their bodies as well.
"HEY! PAY ATTENTION TO ME!" DC 14, Roll- 2. Failure!!
The rest of the pack, just, kinda… completely ignore it. They rush past it and into the clearing, leaving the Creep to just stare at them as they go, genuine confused surprise in its frame.

Well, until the Alpha of the pack turns up. It barrels T2-01 over, snapping at a thin metal limb and tearing through it like it's papier-maché. T2-01 responds by turning its stump into a plasma rifle and taking a chunk out of the Alpha's mask, and a mask forms around the Process unit's eye, obscuring its big glassy weak spot behind all but a large V-slit slashed across its head.

Good to see the Process is learning from experience.

By that point, the Beowolves are close enough to be a problem for everyone else, too, yourself included- you tear your attention away from the fight between Grimm and machine and choose to implement the Transistor as God's own meat skewer, sending it at the first Beowolf you have a clear shot at.

Aim: DC 13, Roll- 14. Success!

Tracing a straight mental line between sword and monster seems to work wonders- it rushes forward, its flight and manoeuvring significantly less graceful than you're used to seeing but still very functional, and slams into a single Beowolf in the middle of the pack, crushing it into a thin spread of smog paste more than any kind of impalement.

Ok, so your aim is a little off, but it gets the job done! The other Beowolves are avoiding your sword, splitting the group even further. Creme and Yang deal several crippling blows to the monsters, the ones they don't kill instantly getting punched, thrown, or outright punted towards Ada and Blake, Lumen filling his quota from atop his web by throwing weapons made in the bluest shade of blue you've ever seen, pinning Grimm to the ground like butterflies.

As soon as they're within dashing distance, either Ada or Blake will rush forward and put the damaged Beowolf out of its misery, stabbing, shooting, decapitating- Ada just crushes one's neck underneath her foot after it tries to snap at her ankle, and you find yourself involuntarily wincing at the crunch.

All of this Grimm-based carnage leaves your left hand itching, begging to bring out Zero Hour and wade in there yourself, but you hold those urges back, instead pulling the Transistor up, away from its blind flailing that's more likely to hit the girls than any monsters at this point, and send it towards the Alpha Beowolf to give that Creep a little bit of help.

Aim: DC 16, Roll- 19. Success!

The Transistor shoots off like a badly-aimed early dream of mankind, and T2-01 gets the idea- it flips under the Alpha, throwing it into the air and placing it directly into the path of your sword.

Transistor meets Alpha Beowolf.

Alpha Beowolf and Transistor go bye-bye.

Both sword and Grimm disappear over the other side of the hill, an echoing yelp the closest thing to a goodbye any of you get, and soon after the last of the Beowolves are taken care of.

… It's, around this point that you, remember that the Transistor isn't exactly in any kind of shape to be finding its way back to you, and that throwing it at the Alpha was kind of dumb, actually.

Damn you, force of habit.

"... Ssssooo…" Yang starts. "Is, your sword going to, come back, or-"

"I should probably go and get it," you try not to sound as embarrassed as you feel, and fail, miserably.

Yang, angel that she is, keeps her reaction to a strangled snort.

You stalk off over the hill to find your sword, the others falling in behind you, and slowly creep over the other edge in case the Transistor wasn't as fatal as you hoped.

Newsflash- it wasn't as fatal as you hoped.

Now, that's not to say it's not doing something kinda useful- the Alpha is currently hanging on for dear life as it gnaws away at the Transistor's handle, and the Transistor tries to flail it off, slamming it against trees, the ground, any solid surface seemed to work for it.

"{DON'T JUST STAND THERE! HELP ME!}"

… Really? This is what it's been reduced to?

This is just sad.

You raise a hand, and the Transistor ceases flailing for a second, perfectly parallel to the ground, leaving the Beowolf sitting on top, not a care in the world.

Finger up, palm in.

Both sword and Grimm shoot into the air fast enough that you actually do blink and miss it- you level your palm out, and the sound of your sword whistling through the air stops.

Flip your palm. You hear quiet whining from somewhere above you.

"... Jaune, that's just overkill-" Creme says from somewhere behind you.

Finger down.

"No kill quite like it."

You feel the impact before you hear it, and you see the sudden splat and subsequent whoomf of smog before you see your sword, a solid two inches into the ground, former Grimm slowly leaking out and evaporating from underneath it.

"... T? You good?"

"{When I get my Functions back I'm going to Ping() you in the goddamn balls-}" you hear muffled by the same two inches of grass and dirt it's currently compressing.

"He's good."

Yang doesn't even try to suppress her laughter this time.

|||

Once you're sure it's safe, that you're not going to be ambushed out of nowhere, you send a Cell out to grab your friends' Scrolls and continue heading north. If you strain your eyes, you can just about make out the edge of the forest, and finally you can see the ancient tower that you saw from atop the plateau.

{We need to talk.}

Ah. You were worried this was going to happen.

But yes. You do.

{The Belladonna girl. I found a match.}

… What? Really? After, everything that's happened, it really thinks it's going to get away with a complete non-sequitur like th-

{She's a known terrorist and White Fang member. She matches the body type of a figure caught on camera during the Dust train robbery a couple weeks ago. Also- Faunus. She has felinid ears, hidden under her bow. I found the file just now, while I was… cleaning up.}

… God. Dammit you wish this wasn't worth your attention so it can dodge the question.

{Yeah, well, protecting you and your friends is more important to me.}

There is a pause, a moment where the Transistor just… stops, actually requiring a second to change gears.

Dear God it's even worse than you thought. This is bordering on genuine brain damage by its standards.

{Look… I… I get if you're mad at me. About, Ozpin. Just… not now. Please.}

Not now? Then when?

{When I am not lobotomised. I'm… fuck, I feel like some kind of invalid right now, I have all this power at my disposal and I can't use it properly because the, the nerve-endings I need to actually control it are fried out. I'm blind, I'm barely staying civil because I've forgotten how normal humans act… just… two hours, three, after this is done, after I'm back at full strength, then… we'll talk. Ok?}

You sigh a little, quietly, because this isn't something you want to explain to the others, and then… let it go. You want an explanation, and it can't give you that while it's like this. You can feel how slow it is, in the back of your head- it's struggling through basic Valish, the QPU peaking more than a couple times in that final statement of its. Theirs.

You, genuinely don't have the energy to figure out the appropriate pronouns right now. All you know is that your best friend is struggling to keep it together right now. and that's enough to earn a minor reprieve from your questions.

So, you walk in silence for another couple minutes, and finally break the treeline, coming out into an open field with nothing much except those old ruins you saw earlier.

Old stone is scattered across the flatland, moss fuzzing up in the cracks and dents left by time. The only part of the structure still standing right now is a rotunda, partially broken down by age but still mostly standing proud. Inside, you can see pedestals, with small objects on each one that you can't make out.

The closer you are to the ancient structure, the more you feel a need to be quiet, out of respect. That this used to be a place of peace, and contemplation.

You think… it might have been a temple, in a past life.
song- A Course Of Strengthening Medicines, Lowercase Noises
"What… was this place?" Creme asks nobody in particular.

"A temple, I think. Look at the floor- are those… women?" Blake answers, prompting you to look at the floor in more detail.

True to her word, the floor is carved, simplistic details slowly forming into women the longer you look at them.

"Any idea what it's a temple to?"

"The Maidens? I really couldn't tell you- I don't think anyone's ever worshipped them. Ugh, I wish I had my Scroll to take pictures..."

You wince a little as guilt stabs you in the back. Blake seems to notice and falls quiet on the subject.

"As fascinating as this architectural discourse is, I think we have more important things to discuss," Lumen interjects, pointing to the pedestals around you. "Anyone for chess?"

You look around, and finally make out what the objects on the pedestals were- chess pieces. A quick count finds all but three there- people have already claimed the queens, the chancellors, and the shamans. The rest, kings, rooks, bishops, knights, assassins, pawns, and archbishops, are all still here.

"I think this is how they're forming teams. A piece for each pair, team up people who take the same pair."

"Makes sense to me. What pieces do you wanna take?" Lumen asks you.

Yang hums to herself, inspecting the pieces with a very discerning eye.

"... How about a cute little pony?" she says after a few moments, holding up a white knight for Blake to see.

The cat Faunus, you suppose, smirks warmly at her partner.

"Sure."

Adorable. You turn to Lumen, considering the question, then realising it doesn't matter. You grab the black assassin off its pedestal, and watch as Creme follows suit with the white one.

Good to know you're all on the same page.

Lumen claps, getting everyone's attention.

"Right! That's great, so, uh, we have our relics, so… I guess we're done here! We can go!"

{You know, this would be a good time to stop and let me fix myself up. Better than moving back through the forest without a working weapon, right?}

"Um… actually, could we, stay here for a while? This is probably the most defensible area around, and I'd really not prefer to make the trip back with a barely-working weapon."

He looks over at you and the Transistor, wincing a little as he realises exactly why you're asking that.

"Oh, uh, sorry. I kinda, forgot it wasn't working properly, once it started glowing blue and floating again."

"I don't mind waiting around," Yang says. "I wanna see who Ruby ended up with."

"Yeah, I could do with a break. If I'd known I'd be walking across an entire forest, I would have put on my good boots," Creme tells you, settling down on one of the steps and massaging her calves.

Ada and Blake don't make any particular ruckus about why you should leave right now, so it seems you're staying here. For a while.

"Suggestion: Use Process to make area more defensible. We have little Mesh coverage of the area, but seismic readings suggest at least two very large Grimm are approaching the ruins. Most likely in pursuit of other Hunters," Alabaster chirps up, grabbing everyone's attention in the process.

Ah. That's… incredibly bad.

"... So much for a break," Blake mutters under her breath.

"This would merely be a precautionary measure- there is every chance that they may just be patrolling their territory and they won't approach us."

"And you believe that?"

"We said there was a chance. Not that it was a likely one."

Blake stares at the Cell for a moment, then turns to look at you.

"... Well, what's the plan? You're their… 'sysadmin,' right? I guess that makes it your call."

Because that's not a helluva lotta pressure to put on someone.

Ok, sure, whatever, you're, good at this, you think. It's not… infeasible to turn this place into something defensible.

You just need to close your eyes… and focus.

The air around you slowly changes- invisible to the naked eye, threads of single Process catoms shoot out at lightning speed in every direction, dragging with it the Mesh and giving your seventh sense the world around you. A clearing, five hundred metres across and covered on three sides by forest, one side by rock, leading to more ruins- a tower suspended above a canyon by methods unknown to you.

First off- where's your base of operations going to be?

[] Rotunda- the rotunda is your reception area- you wanna be up and in their face when they come in here? This is where you stand. Unfortunately, it's also not too defensible- you can be approached from three sides, and with very little clearance on any of them to get some good hits in before the enemy is upon you. Silver linings- there is no chance of anyone being hurt once they approach. It would never allow it.

[] Tower- Take the relics, and run back to the infinitely more defensible suspended tower. Leave a bunch of Creeps or Cells to keep watch and direct people, help distract the larger Grimm- not as effective as building a fortress here for short-term safety of those who would approach, but it will lead them somewhere much safer. Nobody should die.

Second- what's your plan?

[] Large Scale Gentrification Project- Creating a defensible position is actually shockingly easy when you're using a thinking material. Shore up the ruins, whichever ones you pick, and essentially pull what you did with the White Fang, except… bigger. Way, way bigger. Will it be enough to hinder the larger creatures of Grimm? You have no idea- but this is where you will find out.

[] THE WHITE TIDE IS NOW- focus on bodies rather than defenses. As many emplacements, Creeps, Badcells, whatever other iterations appear out of nowhere as the Process can manage. You will drown them in bodies.

[] You Don't Know What The Viet Cong Is But You're Gonna Put Them To Shame- trap this motherfucker until it's more trap than motherfucker. Pitfalls, bear traps, underground Creeps waiting for something to come over them

[] Write-In (Tactics: B-. Max. 5 steps, including substeps. No predictions on the actions of others. Will be aggregated once.)

Third- what are you gonna do in the meantime?

[] Nothing- just sit there and wait, micromanage a while, you know, try and ignore the massive Grimm people may or may not be leading this way.

[] Ask Lumen A Maybe Uncomfortable Question- you recognise that spiderweb. Hell, you watched the logs of the Transistor and the Process fighting Bianco. That ain't a coincidence. Nothing accusatory, of course not, but... a gentle inquiry to dip your toes on the subject.

[] This Is A Terrible Idea And Should Not Be Picked- Blake Belladonna, known (to you) White Fang member, responsible for robbing at least five million Lien's worth of Dust, and spent most of yesterday staring a hole through the back of Weiss's head, now going through Beacon's Initiation to become a Huntress. That's... a complex woman. Complex enough to warrant talking to, again, just to... get a feel for her. (Social Disaster trait in effect.)

Finally, just in case you missed it-

Current QPU- 85%!

[] Turn on Bracket- this option drags Bracket back from the dead, along with the ability to make a HUD. However, because he doesn't have access to any of the things that let him act like a normal, well-adjusted human being, the Transistor's putting a lock on the gun cabinet- you'll have a lot more battlefield information, but no Functions just yet. Using all 85 points of effort, it would take about 20 minutes to get it back online.
[] Turn on Blue- this brings Blue back from the dead, and unlocks the gun cabinet- you have Functions again! Unfortunately, without Bracket and the sensor suite, the Transistor is functionally blind- you'll have to guide its Functions manually, using your, er, less-than-stellar marksmanship skills. Ten minutes to bring your more social third online, given everything you've got.

 

[Prok]

reports of my death were 100% accurate

Someone needs to decide on a name for this fortress. I'll throw into the ring Yang suggesting 'Fort Circuit' or 'Any Fort' (respectively, short circuit and 'any fort?' 'in a storm like this, yup' 'yang...')

What's non-negotiable is a 'Hunterz Only' sign on the front. Though I guess I'd settle for 'No Grimm Allowed'.

Click to shrink...

Ugh, won't get out of my head. Drop Dead Fortress and Fortobello (it grew out of the ground, it's pale and alive, and I don't wanna eat it).

Though they better not spend too much time joking around or the Grimm will have them by the fort hairs.

People should stop yanging back and contribute their ramPart to the ideas.

Click to shrink...

CEASE

---

There are a lot of options here, from creating an army of Process units to overwhelm whatever turns up, to boobytrapping the entire field between here and the ruins, but frankly, you think you've become something of a deft hand at creating structure with the Process. That's what you're familiar with, that's what feels… easiest to implement, right now.

You could move back to the other ruins, and use those as a basis, but that runs the risk of leaving people chased by giant Grimm out in the cold, and that doesn't sit well with the same instincts that compelled you to buy the medical supplies currently hanging off your hip.

You look down at 01, the Cell patiently awaiting its orders.

"Above-ground defensive position, large enough to accommodate anyone who comes here, room for a basic infirmary, automatic armaments- can you do it?"

There is a tiny delay, a small cycle of beeping as it thinks for a second, flexing pieces of code it's probably never had to look at before now, getting used to them, making them as efficient as it can for purpose, then giving you your answer.

"Minimum area to accommodate the hypothetical maximum of 40 people is 33.5 square metres, rounded up, not accounting for verticality. Path of least resistance would be to follow outline left by ruins- would easily accommodate everyone and allow for larger defence designs to be constructed."

You see some of those numbers and visualisations hit people in the corner of your vision, and barely hold back a smile at the confusion, excitement, and awe in almost equal measure you see gradiented amongst your friends.

... And Blake- no, that's mean, don't be like that.

"Wait. This place is… is it something we should be… doing stuff to? It looks old enough to be considered historic," Blake asks, a thread of concern in her voice.

The apparent terrorist apparent catgirl manages to surprise you a little. Perhaps it's your recent bias, but she didn't strike you as the kind of person who would care about the preservation of an ancient ruin. Regardless, you have to admit she has a point. Looking at your feet, at the carved stone beneath it, you can't begin to imagine how old it is. Older than Vale, without a doubt. Destroying it feels… wrong.

Like ripping pages out of a book and scattering them to the winds.

"Exclude any carved stone you find from assimilation. Protect it, if you can."

You look over at her, and while you wouldn't describe the look on her face as one of relief, what's there is an improvement over the blatant concern from not even five seconds ago.

"Understood. Process construction initiating in three, two, one-"

Nothing seemed to happen, at first- at least, not to your eyes. The second it started, you felt everything, a sudden expansion of the senses, total awareness of exactly how this fortress was going to look, knowing you can alter it however you wish…

That's… you hope that sensation isn't going to be habit-forming.

A second after your first experience with sudden and complete knowledge of a relatively large planned structure, a much less subtle phenomenon begins- thin white strands begin to form all around, rapidly expanding into thin, milky panels and becoming an outline of the future fortress, gently morphing in both shape and opacity as it begins brute-forcing the perfect structure for its purpose.

If you understood… the general shape, in your senses, this was the Process's… rough draft, just scaffolding to build everything else, and raw surface area to grow from.

You note that it seems to naturally veer towards blockier designs. The design it eventually settles on is just a set of cuboids stacked on and around each other. It looks unlike anything any sane human would build, and you don't know what it says about you that you kinda like it. Still, it's not exactly practical, though. Flat surfaces and sharp corners don't deflect force all that well.

"Wh-wha… I… what? What?!" Yang progresses from confusion to, er, louder confusion, over about three seconds, looking around at the largest project the Process has ever undertaken on the surface.

"Jaune, what's happening right now?" Blake asks, not as confused or frightened as her partner, but there's still a very obvious thread of caution in her voice.

"It's the Process. It assimilates gasses from the air and parts of the ground to create foundations and, from there, a fortress big enough to protect everyone in the forest. Should fit the hypothetical maximum of 40 people."

You begin to direct it- giving some, basic design guidance so it isn't just tall white blocks of alien material, flattening it out over a wider area for balance, smoothing out the sharp corners to help deflect any projectiles that would otherwise penetrate, a watchtower for long-range fighters like Ruby, maybe Pyrrha, and anyone else in that category, a couple of emplacements for guns whose ranges aren't measured in kilometres- by the time you think you've got a basic plan down, it looks almost like a very well-armed church, the rotunda slowly turned into a viable defensible entrance.

Well... you suppose the Process did say it would use the temple as a basis. Must have seeped into your creative process.

Looking over, you see that Blake and Yang aren't… taking the news well. Yang is still completely lost, just staring at you, eyes wide, jaw slack, expression disbelieving, while Blake doesn't seem all that comforted by your answer.

"Er, look, Yang, it's a lot to explain, and Jaune's not, very good at doing that, no offence-"

"None taken."

"-so… I'll tell you about it while we wait?" Creme ventures, trying her luck at offering to explain everything to her friend.

Yang doesn't speak- she just nods her head in silence, still processing what she's seeing.

"I… think I'd appreciate that as well," Blake manages, tearing her eyes away from the spectacle.

"Cool, cool, I can- er, Ada, you mind…? You got, an actual explanation from him, right?"

"Eh, ain't got anything better to do," the tiny girl says, following Creme as she leads them off somewhere out of the way, Terry and Tulip coming along for examples, no doubt.

Leaving you alone with Lumen. Again. You're not complaining, you're just… noticing a pattern about today.

He sidles up to you, watching the Process work, milky panes slowly thickening out, details you didn't plan appearing along the outer wall, the struts and strands of needed support appearing along the inside. Settling down on the steps next to you, you watch as he drafts luxin, forming a small rectangle of textured blue, then slathering it in thin, oily orange, before pulling his sword from its scabbard and starting to work the edge with it.

You're aware that it's technically not a sword since it only has one edge, but calling something that big a knife just seems silly.

"... You know, if I didn't know better, I'd say the girls were plotting to find a better pair to team up with than us. Bet you that black knight is gone next time we look."

"The only rational response is to find another pair to make them jealous with," you reply, settling down next to him.

He snorts.

"Who are you thinking? Nikos and whoever she ended up with?"

You specifically do not blush thinking about your first trainwreck of a conversation with a world-renowned tournament fighter. Lumen, blessed with basic visual perception as he is, doesn't miss it.

"Man, you got it bad. Pyrrha Nikos?" he asks incredulously, raising an eyebrow at you. "Look at the balls on you, trying to pull the Invincible Girl!"

Of course that's how he takes it.

"I-it's not like that! I just… I talked to her, this morning."

"Ahh. Shot you down before you even got to the flirting?"

"No," you say, doing absolutely nothing for your case by trying not to sound like a surly git. "I… ran into her, 01, stuck to her, and, we ended up talking while I tried to figure out how to get him off without, you know, ripping him in half."

"... Your Cell… stuck to her," he confirms, making sure he heard you right.

"{Nikos' Semblance gives her a natural magnetic field- one large enough to pick up a Cell at distance, and strong enough that it can't escape under its own power.}"

He gives a noise of understanding, then gestures at you to continue.

"And then…?"

"{Jaune got to talk to someone he's all but worshipped the ground she walks on since he was 13, and Pyrrha Nikos got treated like a normal human being. It went about as well as you could expect.}"

Hey, they don't have to make it sound that bad goddammit-

"... What, is she as bad as Jaune?"

"{Somehow, worse.}"

"Hey!"

Lumen just laughs, but there's no sting to it. For a moment, there's a certain lull in the conversation, and you find yourself thinking back a couple of days.

… Has it only been four days since you stopped a terrorist attack? It feels like it could have been a year since that happened.

Regardless, the events are still fresh in your mind. You watched the logs back to understand what had happened from the Transistor's perspective, and you honestly don't know why you hadn't noticed it as soon as you saw it again. And, you think this is the last quiet moment you're gonna get for a while. Better now, than forgetting it later, you guess.

Ok. No social suite. Nothing to help you. Just you, your friend, and a potentially very uncomfortable question.

"... So… I have... something to ask you," you venture, unable to hide all your apprehension about broaching this.

Lumen must pick up on something in your voice because he's very quickly paying attention, no sign of his previous joviality.

"What's up?"

"... Well, you know how Weiss Schnee was attacked a couple of days ago? Well… I was there. I'm, the reason she's alive, actually. The man trying to kill her was an eagle Faunus who had a... very similar Semblance to you, but he used less… colours, I guess-"

"Lemme guess- red and ultraviolet?"

"Uh, yeah," you answer, the swiftness with which he cuts you off making you stumble a little.

"Bianco. A cousin of mine," he answers with absolutely zero hesitation, then groans deeply. He doesn't seem… surprised by the news. Just disappointed. "I knew he was pretty far gone, but… joining the White Fang… ugh, I'm going to kill that idiot the next time I see him."

The blunt answer throws you off for a second, but you keep going as best you can.

"Oh. Um… sorry, it's just, I saw your, web construct, and the, the similarities…"

"Yeah, he's the one that taught me it. It doesn't really have a specific name, but it's taught to just about everyone who can draft green, blue, or superviolet luxin in my family," Lumen explains to you, without so much as a trace of humour in his voice.

He stops for a moment, pulls that carton of cigarettes from his cardigan, placing one between his lips and lighting it with a small clear crystal of sub-red jutting out from his thumbnail, quickly consumed in its self-made flame. He takes a drag, exhaling that pale blue smoke again, away from you, thankfully, before he says anything else.

"... Jaune, how much do you know about my family?"

"Uh… I, didn't know there was anything to know?"

He raises an eyebrow at you, silently flicking his gaze to the Transistor for a moment.

Ah. The eternal curse of telling people about the Transistor. They expect you to know everything.

"I don't research people unless I have a very good reason. Even if it wasn't illegal, I still don't do it to friends."

Lumen smiles at you, and it quickly turns into quiet laughter, and he has to break eye contact with you to regain his composure, shaking his head slightly as he does.

"Dust, you're something, you know that? A million different perverts, voyeurs, government workers who think Mantle had the right idea vis-à-vis population observation, any of them could have ended up with a Semblance like yours, and it ends up with probably the only person on Remnant who won't abuse it."

You can't help but smile at that, the little glow of pride in your chest leaving you all warm and fuzzy from unexpected compliments.

"... Sorry, I'm, avoiding the question," he says after a moment. "My Semblance is, uh, genetically dominant, in case you hadn't figured that out. Anyone who has a kid with me, or my twin, or my little sisters, their kid will end up with it too. So... there are a lot of us. Hundreds, in fact."

He looks at you again, pointing at his eyes.

"These, though? They're a mutation. I dunno what happened, I mean, who does when it comes to Semblances, but there are three major limits on the family Semblance that just, don't apply to me or Marcella. We're full-spectrum drafters, we don't need to see a colour to draft it, we just need white light, and… ugh, hold on, this has been annoying me since we landed-"

He stops, taking a moment to flush his arms of the luxin that had built up over the day, a whole painter's palette of the stuff flowing from his fingers and forming a dozen different things and flashing away in an instant, your own personal fireworks show. He gives out a shuddering little breath of catharsis as he does, mutters something about how that's gonna bruise, then quickly goes back to his cigarette to compose his next words.

"... Luxin fucks with your head. The difference is, everyone in my family, they don't have the same… tolerance, for long-term drafting, that me and my sister do. Everyone else has a limit."

… Ah. Ah.

You think you're beginning to understand the bigger picture here. And you're not entirely sure you like it.

"And what happens when they reach this limit? When they go past it?"

"It's called breaking the halo. Um, luxin builds up in the body, in little bits and pieces, but it gathers in the irises, mostly. When someone reaches their limit and doesn't stop, the luxin just tears the iris apart and spills out into the sclera. After that, something... snaps, up here," he says, tapping his temple. "Something goes, and they just, they revel in what luxin does to them. Some of the worst cases start replacing parts of their body with the stuff if they can. Hell, even if they really can't, too."

Lumen stops for a moment, and you don't push him. Looking over, you see that he's just kind of staring at the treeline, that he's not entirely here at the moment. You don't… think it's a great idea to interrupt that kind of spell.

Still. There is a picture being painted here, and it is a grim, grim one indeed.

"...So, yeah. Hundreds of insane Semblance addicts, lot of mouths to feed- when they're not throwing themselves at Grimm like a bunch of Vacuoni deathseekers, falling into a life of crime is less an if and more a when with my family," he continues, "and there we were, two kids they couldn't break the way they wanted to, so we just-"

A deafening roar and screech and weird skittering noise come from outside, killing your conversation in its tracks. You and Lumen get up as the girls to join you and rush back out just in time to see an Ursa Major burst through the treeline, being ridden by a ginger girl like a bull at a rodeo until she just pulls out a hammer, plugs a grenade in one side, and-

So yeah that Ursa doesn't have the top half of its skull anymore.

The girl rolls off of the now-carcass's back with a whoop of glee, then a moan of disappointment at her ride being dead.

… You're. Going to stay away from that one. A boy in traditional Mistrali dress clothes rushes out behind her, and you breathe a sigh of relief at the fact that she at least has a handler, who is hopefully going to handle her.

"Uh, y'all know that screech we just heard? Because I just found where it came from," Creme says, drawing attention to the giant Nevermore currently flying overhead.

Towards you.

"WE'RE THE POOR FUCKS WHO HAVE TO DEAL WITH THAT THING?!" Lumen quite justifiably screams in disbelief at like what are the chances of it just circling like that seriously-

"Actually, I think they are," Blake points out, and when you squint a little at the creature you can faintly make out a little black and red blob and a white blob on its le- this has to be a joke.

Weiss?

Ok, look, Ruby… Ruby you can see pulling a stunt like this without blinking. But… Weiss?

"PIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIISS-"

"Leathers!"

Taking a deep breath and accepting your fate as part of the audience in this theatre production of sheer unfiltered chaos, you watch as Leathers flies out from the treeline with zero control, cursing with such frequency, variety, and volume that it would make a sailor blush, and eventually landing in a trench-forming faceplant.

… Wait for it. Waaaaaiiiiiit for- ah, his foot twitched, he's fine. Probably.

Before you can even think about helping him up, you watch Pyrrha running out of the forest at full pelt, a Giant… you don't even know what that thing is following her, pulling itself along the trees like some kind of demented monkey, leaving deep gouges in the bark as it crawls/climbs towards her.

The Grimm itself is like some horrid cross between a horse and the top half of a human- it lacks anything below where the hips would be on a human torso, instead moving about with its two disproportionately long arms, tipped with equally disproportionately long fingers, tipped with now quite accurately proportionally long talons, its skull equine but with the teeth of a very large canine. Its fur is shiny, caked with grease, silt, and… moss? Where does this thing live?

{It… reminds me of a Kelpie, but those only grow to the size of a horse. And, have four legs.}

Ok, there is just, a lot going on right now, and honestly it's just way too much for you to react to all at once and now Ruby's falling good God the ride just does not stop today-

T2-01 reacts first, skittering towards a tree which is used as a launchpad to send itself careening into Ruby, catching her as daintily as it can in its forelimbs before landing, before twisting and using its hindlimbs and back to absorb as much force as it could, giving the girl something, if not soft to land on, then at least taking most of the oomph out of her landing for her.

"Are you alright, miss-" it begins to ask- in a surprisingly deep voice for your expectations of the Process, a downright baritone number- then Ruby is out of its grasp, her scythe is out, and T2-01 is gently sliding apart directly down its symmetric centre.

This does not appear to inconvenience it all that much.

"... Miss Rose, that was just a little rude."

"Yang what is that thing why does it know my name and why is it not dead after I sliced it in half?"

"Ruby!"

"Jaune!?"

"Ruby!"

"Nora!"

And now the ginger girl is over here oh god-

"Ooooohhhh…"

You watch her dash behind you, completely ignoring the fact that the ruins, er, aren't ruins anymore, and start fawning over a golden rook piece, proclaiming happily that she is the queen of a castle, before being chastised by her handler and you would really like for nothing else to happen in the next thirty seconds that's really necessary right now-

The sound of the unknown Grimm approaching just about muffles out the sound of Pyrrha panting for breath but still running at full sprint towards the group. You watch as she dips to one side just long enough to singlehandedly pick Leathers up by the collar of his jacket, flipping his comatose body over her shoulders like a foul-mouthed bag of grain, barely slowing down for the new weight on her back.

"Ok, Ruby, look, long story short-" Yang points to the nearest Cell, Tulip, "-big version of that thing-" she then points to your new construction project, "-little version of that thing."

Ruby doesn't respond, watching in unabashed terror as T2-01- ok this is getting ridiculous, it needs a name, Creep, T2, has little thin legs with no discernible feet- Tiptoe, finally slides itself back together, the seam disappearing as soon as it's happy with its work.

"Ruby, I'll explain later, but it's a friend, ok? It's here to help us," you say, attempting to placate her somewhat.

She doesn't seem to visibly acknowledge your words, but she also doesn't attack T2- Tiptoe, so you happily throw that topic onto the backburner for the moment.

"Did she run all the way here with a… whatever that is following her?" Blake asks, gesturing to Pyrrha.

You hear a nearly primal growl, the kind of sound that drops your stomach into your boots, and for a moment you start looking for the Grimm that somehow snuck in the back door before you realise that it's Yang.

"I CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE! CAN EVERYONE JUST CHILL OUT SO WE CAN GO TWO SECONDS WITHOUT SOMETHING CRAZY HAPPENING?!"

Oh thank God finally someone said it so you don't have to.

And, for a moment, things do quieten down. Like, ok, it's exactly as chaotic as it was five seconds ago, but it doesn't get more chaotic, and frankly, that's just a regular Candlemas miracle considering where you are and what's happening right now.

"Ruby! How could you leave me?!" Weiss yells from above, still clinging for dear life.

"She's gonna fall," Blake announces, and you look up to see Weiss is, in fact, about to fall- barely hanging onto the creature's talon for her life.

"She'll be fine!" Ruby says, sounding far too optimistic about the situation.

Shit.

"She's falling."

No!

Without planning, without thinking, you raise a hand and give the Process a single priority task.

Save Weiss Schnee.

Kinetic energy mitigation in progress.

Your breath hitches in your throat as Weiss plummets back to Remnant, and as white lightning scars race out from your feet, rushing towards where she should land, quickly outpacing you as you sprint alongside them.

100 metres.

But they don't outpace Ruby, by any stretch of the imagination. The young girl blasts past you with a gust of wind that almost knocks you off your feet, dragging along a vortex of...

Rose petals?

50 metres.

You're not going to make it. But the Process just might.

25. 15. 10.

Barely two metres from the ground, a perfect 5-metre circle of Process matter forms below Weiss, just as Ruby jumps to catch her, and the girls slip through it with barely a ripple. A 10-metre cylinder of compressible Process matter, like a tube of warm snow, bleeding off her momentum at a rapid rate, yes, but not… strawberry jam rapid. Through your seventh sense, you feel Weiss slow down, and the way both Ruby and the Process matter slam into her back, knocking the wind out of her at the cost of the lion's share of her Aura.

Once they've slowed to a stop, the Process pulls the two girls up, and they surface in shimmering liquid, still on the ground, Weiss giving her damnedest attempt to cough her lungs up while Ruby lays her down on the now solid ground. You finish your sprint to her, your sword, kinda following you, drunkenly waving along the same vague path towards your mutual destination. At the very least, it's improving.

"Are you alright?" you ask, dropping to a knee and giving Weiss a quick look over for any obvious injuries.

Weiss starts to answer, descends into another coughing fit, then gives you a silent thumbs-up instead.

Neither you nor Ruby is convinced by that.

"Weiss, I'm really not sure you are! You just fell, like, half a mile out of the sky!"

"This isn't the place for a medical examination. I'll look her over when we're in the temple," you tell Ruby, immediately wincing at your choice of words.

Ohhhh you're gonna pay for that one in a few seconds, you can just tell

"T-kgph-temple?"

Resigning yourself to your fate, you point to the Process building just in time to watch it flash into solidity, any slated changes now stalled for the sake of protecting its occupants. Making a quick judgement of how far away you are from it now, you judge yourself to be about the same distance from it as Pyrrha is. All four- five? Does Leathers count here?- of you can make that, no problem. Unfortunately, so can that Grimm.

Weiss blinks, staring at the temple for a moment, utterly dumbstruck before she manages to shoot you a little grin that does weird things to your chest.

"... Don't you think it's a little presumptuous to be building temples to the Process already?"

"Hey, I renovated it with the Process- it was already here. Come on, we need to move," you tell her, pushing, all of that down for now, and later, and forever, grabbing your sword by the hilt before it wanders off somewhere else and getting ready to run.

{Sorry.}

Don't be.

The three of you match Pyrrha's stride, planning to slam the door in that unknown Grimm's face once you make it through, the girls beside you as you keep an eye on it. Unfortunately, it seems to know exactly what you're doing and picks up the pace.

The distance between it and Pyrrha was already disturbingly short, but it makes a very solid effort to close it further, reaching out with a clawed hand-

It reels back as twin strobe lasers dazzle it, not strong enough to burn it, or even blind it permanently, but they stun it long enough for Pyrrha to gain some distance again, followed by a frankly compensatory rifle bullet, which

DC 14, Result- 20+8 = 28. Critical Success!

rips half of its mask off, revealing the raw, black flesh beneath and setting it screaming in pain- a waterfall of smog flooding from what's left of its face, followed by another gust of wind as Ruby catches up to you, the smell of nitroglycerine just about burning your nose off, and allowing you to put two and two together.

... Nice indeed.

The three of you meet Pyrrha about thirty metres from the door, which has the unfortunate side-effect of making you also a target for the weird Grimm, which has recovered from its momentary shock, making double-time to catch up with its quarry.

You watch out of the corner of your eye as Weiss spins the revolver-guard of her rapier, eventually landing on light blue. She leaps forward a good four metres, twisting in the air as she slashes at the ground below, and you feel the temperature drop like a stone with the sound of something cracking into existence behind you.

When she catches up, having fallen behind in the time it took her to turn around, you chance a look behind, and see that the Grimm's been locked up in an ice stockade- its hands and head bound together by a baby glacier.

... Oh God she fights with pure Dust-

You, contain your hysteria for a moment and focus on the final mad dash to the door. The others are still inside, ready to rush out in case you can't make it, but within seconds you're at the steps, up the steps, three, two, one, CLOSE THE DOORS-

They slam behind you with a deafeningly loud and surprisingly wooden thud- you don't remember feeding the Process a tree at any ah no wait you remember now-, and start to deal with the fact that you're safe now.

"Everyone ok? Nobody injured?" you ask, looking over the girls, Nora's handler, and the comatose hooligan.

Leathers gurgles out something, a hand twitching into a thumbs up for a second, as Pyrrha lays him down against the wall. The champion herself is heaving for breath but otherwise seems alright, now that she's got a chance to rest, all but collapsing next to her... you, assume Leathers is her partner, then.

Poor soul.

"I am, fine," she says, "Perhaps a, few bruises, tomorrow morning, but no, major injuries."

Nora's handler sidles away from the boy, barely conscious as he is- oh, you wondered why he looked so familiar! He was Leathers' teddy bear last night!

You look at Weiss for her answer, and she nods, wincing a little as she does.

"I'm fine, just, tender," she admits after a moment. "My Aura didn't break, so I don't think it's anything serious."

"Uh, is Leathers ok?" Ada asks the room while pointing at the boy in question, "because I don't think he's made any effort to tell us he is since he got in here."

"Well no, he gave a thumbs-up," Lumen says. "And... has done absolutely nothing else, yeah, so... maybe check up on him?"

You look over the boy, and, while he's not exactly doing anything other than taking a nap, the fact that he's taking a nap after a fall like that is still...

She has a point, you decide. Relying on Leathers' Semblance and sheer bullheaded stubbornness is probably a bad idea, reliable as it's been in the past. You gesture, pulling him out from the wall and onto a slab of Process matter- you know, while you're having a go at the whole renaming thing, you should probably find a way to phase all those instances of 'process' out of your vocabulary- then raise it to bed level, sending it off to a little private room near the back.

"Keep an eye on his vitals, I'll check him over once I'm done here."

"Understood," the walls say, the words echoing from everywhere with no distinct source, an effect that gets everyone's attention.

"Who was that?" The boy once a teddy bear asks, a thread of caution in his voice.

"Do you want the long version or the version that won't shatter your worldview into a million pieces?" Yang mutters under her breath, still loud enough for him to hear.

"... Short version, please."

"Good choice- the temple's alive, he built it," she explains, pointing at you.

Teddy bear stares at you for a second, blinking like a deer in headlights, before just shaking his head, choosing to compartmentalise that for later.

Good choice.

Once you're sure you have everyone's attention, you begin.

"... So. We have at least two large Grimm out there, and if I'm counting relics right, at least 22 more people have to turn up. I don't think we're gonna be lucky enough for them to get bored, so… we either need a plan to deal with them ourselves, or a plan to get enough people to turn up at the same time that we're not dealing with them ourselves. So..." you look at everyone in turn. "I'm open to ideas."

"Can't the Process just kill them?" Ada asks, quite reasonably so. "Like, you're telling me that something this big can't make a gun big enough to kill the Nevermore?"

"Currently, the only viable plans we have for this scale of conflict are direct-energy weapons- any weapon in that category with enough power to overcome thermal blooming and noticeably damage the Nevermore at its current flying height would create enough heat to critically damage structural integrity, and incinerate all organic life inside regardless. Since our current goal is to protect the organic life currently inside the defence position, this strikes us as counterproductive."

Oh, so you're standing inside an artillery battery that doubles as a cremation chamber.

Lovely.

"We could always just go out the back. Take the Relics, run for the tower over the hill, and let the Process do that, without killing us all at the same time," Lumen suggests. "Or hell, aim it at the overgrown reindeer- it can't possibly need the same amount of power at that range."

"Oh, this place has a tower, right? I saw one from outside! I can try and finish it off with Crescent Rose!" Ruby exclaims, and you can't tell if it's for the chance to kill Grimm, or the chance to shoot that ridiculous sniper rifle of hers.

Pyrrha pulls a sword from her hip, and you watch as a few quick presses and twisting flush sections set it off, turning into a lengthy bolt-action rifle. Ruby gives a little noise of appreciation, and you watch her actively shake off the impending excitement before she gets distracted.

Well... she's focusing, so that's good.

"I will join you if there is enough space. Er, how do we…?" Pyrrha looks at you for directions to the tower, and you almost give them before Weiss interrupts.

"Wait, wait, hold on, let's just, take a second-" she calls the group's only two long-ranged options off, and only falters a little when she realises that everyone is now paying attention to her, "Um… P-Process, can you… tell us what's happening out there?"

She gives you a panicked look, only relaxing when viewscreens appear along one wall- one of the Nevermore, patiently circling above, and one of the unknown Grimm, still struggling against Weiss's glacier stockade, shining in the midday sun, cracks forming deep within from its ministrations, but not pervasive enough to threaten the shackles. More worryingly, its face has stopped bleeding- no longer a waterfall of smog, the large wounds in its face have already started to bubble and scar over, along with signs of its mask already starting to repair itself, millimetre by millimetre.

The Grimm is visibly repairing the damage dealt to it, drawing its energy from what you can only believe to be spite because basic biology sure ain't doing it.

"... What the hell? How is it... healing so fast?" Creme asks aloud, probably not expecting an answer.

Some Grimm just don't play fair, you don't say. She knows it, you all know it, sometimes you just need to let off a little steam with a rhetorical question.

"Who cares? It's trapped! It just had half its face shot off!" Nora says. "I say we go out there and break its legs before it heals anymore, then we can just wait outside while, er, whatever it is that's talking to us from the walls does whatever it's gonna do to the Nevermore!"

"It doesn't have legs," Blake says.

"Does it use them to move around?"

"Well, yes, but-"

"Then they're legs."

Blake just… stares, at her, at Nora's little self-assured grin, and you can follow the cost-benefit analysis as it plays out in her mind right before she shakes her head, and moves along with her day.

"It's healing. Grimm that size, healing that fast- it's either really old or really specialised. And if it's old, it could easily have something else up its sleeve. For all we know, we open that door, and it starts, I dunno, breathing fire at us, we're basically trapped in a killbox for its convenience. I think the easiest thing to do would be to send out a couple of those big Process things to soften it up, then aim whatever guns this place has at it to finish the job," Ada says, putting forward her points with more confidence than you ever really expected from the tiny girl.

"And if it's just specialised?" Pink Highlight asks.

You'll learn his name eventually, promise.

"Oh, then we just walk out there and stab it in the face until it stops moving, same as any other Grimm," she answers with a casual shrug. "The problem is, we don't know. I've never seen a Grimm like this before, and I'm really not confident I can eyeball that kinda judgement."

"Ok, well, uh, Pyrrha, right? Did it show... any kind of special capabilities while it was chasing you?" Creme asks, and if she recognises the four-time champion at all, she's doing a very good job of holding her emotions in check.

"N...no, not that I can think of. Oh, um, it might be able to breathe underwater. It ambushed us when we were trying to cross a river- jumped up from the riverbed and almost dragged us under. When it failed to do that, it just chased us here, and… well, you know the rest," Pyrrha explains, answering no questions and asking many, many more.

So... it's a rapidly-healing Kelpie-alike... that behaves like an alligator.

I- you know what? You give up! This thing is whatever it wants to be, and that's fine. You fully support it in its endeavours to be the most incomprehensible creature you have ever seen.

Fucking roulette Grimm, you swear to God there isn't a more annoying thing on the planet-

"We can't just stay in here! Even if other people weren't going to turn up and end up in danger, hiding out like this isn't really a… huntressly thing to do," Ruby interjects, appealing to... what, exactly, Huntress oblige?

People begin talking, responding and rebutting each other and over each other, voices slowly rising to be heard over the rabble until your head is pounding from the sound of their quibbling because apparently, the Process figured out how to emulate the acoustics of a temple-

"Enough!" you yell, the walls flashing white out of some reflex, and once again grabbing everyone's attention. You take a moment to rub the growing headache out of your temples before you begin. "This isn't productive. We can quibble back and forth about what could happen if we do something, but the simple answer is that we can't stay here and do nothing. This place isn't invincible, that Grimm's bindings won't hold forever, it's apparently not going to stay injured forever, and the Nevermore isn't going to just stay in the sky and watch us. If it breaks free, the Process can only do so much before it just breaks down the doors, and then we'll need to fight it anyway, without the luxury of open space to run away from it in."

Silence. Your outburst was enough to get the others to quiet down for a moment, and now it's your job to focus them.

"Look, obviously, we're not going to unanimously agree on any one plan, so, I say we put it to a vote. Everyone who has a plan, put it forward, we vote, and then whichever one wins, we follow. No arguments. Is that fair?"

Everyone nods along, with varying degrees of enthusiasm- your Signal team, Nora, and Weiss seem alright with this, Pyrrha and Blake are a little more hesitant, and Ruby and Yang seem outright unconvinced, but, thanks to the magic of peer pressure, manage to silently talk each other out of making a fuss.

"... Ok. Good. I'm, going to go check on Leathers, he really should have gotten up by now," you mumble as you turn and walk away from the group, fast enough that the infirmary door slides shut behind you before anyone can protest, or say anything about your sudden need to leave.

There's a dull metallic thunk as you gently hit your head against that same door.

"... Goddammit. Why am I so bad with people?" you ask the empty air, or the Transistor, or Leathers, or all or none of the above.

Unfortunately, only one of them answers.

"Mmmrgghhh... 'cuz yer a wazzock, Arc..." Leathers mumbles from his makeshift bed. "Agh, me head..."

You watch the boy slowly pull himself up to a sitting position, rubbing the pain out of his bald head as he does. You rush to his side, pulling a quick chair out of the floor as you do, sitting next to him.

"Hey, woah, go slow, man, that Grimm used you as a field plough," you tell him. "How are you feeling, besides the headache?"

"Ugh... fine, I guess," he grumbles, looking over at you before squinting in confusion. "... Bollocks, no, can't see past me own nose. You's just-" he waves a hand in front of his face, "a blob."

Ah. That's not good at all.

"Don't blink."

"Wait, wot-"

Holding a hand out, you form a small torch and shine it in Leathers' eyes, and to his credit, he only squints a little before opening them fully for you.

"Looks... like... no, they're constricting properly, shouldn't be anything serious. Probably just the headache. Your Aura doing ok?"

He grumbles out an affirmative, and you keep checking him over for a moment, thinking over whether or not you were actually in the wrong for forcing a vote, especially when almost a quarter of the group apparently wasn't on board with it. Is this really the best way to go about it? Would voting for a team leader have been a better idea? Is this going to hilariously backfire before it even has a chance to get off the ground? Did you really need to force the issue, or would they have settled on something eventually if you'd just kept your temper a couple of minutes longer?

"You's gonna set yer brain on fire, you keep thinkin' that hard."

Huh? Oh. Right, there is actually an outside world to deal with.

"Sorry. Things got a little... intense, out there, and I pretty much only came to check on you to get out of it," you admit.

"Ach, I'm fine, 's clearing up already. Prob'ly just bleary from wakin' up. Wossit like out there? You kill that big bugger?"

With no illusions as to who 'the big bugger' is, you catch Leathers up on what's happened since he arrived, which the boy takes... surprisingly well, all things considered.

"... Piss."

"Yeah, pretty much. I guess I should, er, go and see what they've come up with. You coming?"

"Yeh, should be a laugh-" he says as he gets off the makeshift cot, stumbling a little as his feet hit the ground. "Oh zog- no, no, I'm good, I'm fine-"

He leans back against it for a second, catching his balance, and looking kind of uncertain for the first time in... ever, since you first met him.

"Leathers, I'm taking you to the infirmary when we're out of here. Just to be sure."

"... Yeh, yeah, no, no complaints from me. Just, go ahead, I'll be a minute," he tells you, waving you off when you look like you're about to help him.

Trusting Leathers to know his own limits, probably not your brightest moment, but you still walk out of the infirmary and into a surprisingly... sombre atmosphere.

"How is Leathers?" Pyrrha asks you almost as soon as she sees you. There's a definite hint of worry in her voice, the kind of worry that you hear in crappy medical dramas.

"He's a little off-balance, but otherwise he seems alright. I'm gonna take him to the infirmary after all this is over with. So, er... how'd it go?"

"Well," Creme starts, "we... did all come up with one unanimous thing, actually. We all agreed that warning the other initiates and maybe seeing if we couldn't, get some help out of it, would be worth the effort, thought we don't, really know how we're going to do that. After that, things kinda... diverged."

Contacting initiate Scrolls shouldn't be too much of a problem, all told- hell, the Transistor as it is should be able to manage that.

"Ok, that should be easy enough, but what about more immediate plans? We can't just stay here forever."

Silence. Nobody can really look you in the eyes.

... They didn't.

They did not.

"You have nothing?"

"The opposite, actually," Weiss says. "We have a three-way tie. Ren abstained."

"I'm sorry," the boy with the pink highlight who is apparently named Ren, says. "I'm just really lost right now, I really don't... feel equipped to vote on this. I have no idea what anyone means when they mention this Process thing, or how this temple can talk, or how it can kill things, apparently."

"Hey, don't worry. It's a lot to take in all at once," Ruby says, consoling the poor boy. "Besides, you're here now, so you can break the tie!"

... Yes. Well, at least it's a problem that's easy enough to solve. Just hear them out then pick the best option.

"Alright. Convince me."

Spoiler: Tutorial: Unique Grimm

Chatter's Choice Counsel!

That overgrown Rudolphbomination Weiss just froze today is a Unique Grimm- A Grimm of Uncommon variety or higher, that's just the result of a complete genetic roll of the dice, both in-universe and from a mechanical standpoint! Before it was built, even the QM had no idea what he was going to end up with! You have never met anything exactly like this before, and you never will again, you get no Library() entry for it, you get no bonuses for killing it besides it being dead and you not, its sole existence is to spit in the eyes of anyone who thinks the gathering of knowledge will help you against the endless shifting hordes of darkness!

In case you haven't guessed by now, Brother Dark is a petty-ass punk who takes immense pleasure in knowing that he specifically did this just to make humanity's constant suffering just that little more inconvenient!

Creme lays out the choices for you as such:

[] Damn The Consequences- Ruby, Nora, and Yang's plan, and their logic for it follows as thus- taking a standard approach to identifying the Grimm, there are arguments to be made on both sides as to what age the Grimm is. Namely, its size, a plus to the argument that it is old and not specialised, and its overall lack of armour, a negative to the argument. However, some Grimm are just naturally large, see Nevermore, Ursai, , and literally anything that's ever come out of Solis, thus making size a slightly unreliable marker of age. The lack of armour on the other hand, implies it's not that old, and thus shouldn't have anything up its sleeve. Ergo, you should all go out and break its legs. Honestly, they only really mentioned the last part, the rest was really quite severely implied right up until they had to prove their plan's worth.

[X] Birdie No- Lumen, Creme, and Weiss's agreed-upon plan. They believe that, free, uninjured, and out of reach of most of the current lineup, the Nevermore is the greater threat, if not the more immediate one- everyone, right now, can go out there and punch the mystery Grimm in the snout if they want to- only two people can effectively hit the Nevermore in the current environment. An enemy that mostly can't be interacted with is significantly more dangerous than one that may have unknown capabilities. Ergo, it should be dealt with decisively- seal the Relics up for safekeeping, then let the Process pull off whatever it can do that was going to cremate you all, and, get this- don't be inside the temple when it does it. Take out the Nevermore, move back to that suspended tower, and deal with the mystery box there.

[] APPLY DEMOLITION TO THE GRIMMALD BODY- Ada, Pyrrha, Blake, and if you're honest with yourself, it would be Leathers' choice if he wasn't shaking off a concussion right now. Their plan is rather similar, on the surface, to the others', a fusion in its own way- take the Process's Nevermore deterrent… and aim it at the other guy. Point-blank range. A quick check with the Process tells you that significantly less power will be needed to reach the same desired conclusion, but the sheer force of being near the blasting zone will render the surrounding land to bedrock. On the bright side- the sheer force of the explosion should put out any fires caused!

 

[ADeshantis]

Let's breathe some life into this baby with an omake. Maybe two.
First off, let's have the logical conclusion of Jaune being able to lift like Machio and Nora wanting to learn.

Nora vs Kevin

---

Pyrrha Nikos and Cinder Fall stared each other down; the proud champion on her knees in the shattered remains of Ozpin's clocktower office, the other half of the Fall Maiden towering over her bruised form, bow raised, obsidian arrow pointed at the window Pyrrha's armor left straight to her heart. Never before had Pyrrha wished so vehemently that she hadn't considered sex appeal when designing her kit. Cinder grinned malevolently as she pulled the string back. "Do you... believe in..." she cocked her head to the side as she heard a sound. "What the hell is that?"

"That", as it happened, was Nora Valkyrie. Her friend was up on that Clock Tower, and no force on Remnant was going to stop her from getting up there to help, gravity and enormous Grimm dragons be damned. Nora didn't have time for any of that! It was time for her secret technique! One refined through an entire year of training with the secret muscle techniques passed on from Jaune's mysterious, hunky bodybuilding teacher. (Or, in normal language, a year of proper nutrition, access to proper weightlifting equipment, instructions on a well-rounded weightlifting routine, and the kind of motivation that made lesser mortals quiver in fear.) Nora looked across the Beacon campus at the giant dragon perched upon the clock tower, her eyes narrowing in determination. "RUBY!" She called across the battlefield, catching the hooded sniper's attention. "HIT ME!"

The frisson of fear that rippled through the assembled Beacon Academy first years, and some of the first year transfers who'd been watching the tournament, was a palpable thing. Even the Grimm stopped for a moment to take note of the new note that had been added to the delicious symphony of fear. It was a lesser fear, but a deep one where it could be found within the song of terror that called them to the academy. Not instinctive; indeed, much of Beacon Academy had been taught to fear those words across various inter-team sparring exercises and live combat drills. Those words heralded chaos, panic, and mass destruction. Ruby Rose didn't feel any of that fear; only a giddy excitement. She loved destruction; her weapon of choice attested to that, and with one bullet, she knew she was about to unleash an untold amount of it. She cycled to a Lightning Dust round, charged it with her Aura, and fired on her ally, making Nora stagger and crackle with electricity. The grin that the redhead gave as she straightened, hefting Magnhild over one shoulder like it was a child's toy hammer, ensured that her run-up towards the tower was clear.

Clear of students.

She didn't pay much notice to the Grimm. They didn't slow her down.

With every step, Nora Valkyrie gained speed, but she also gained size, every muscle in her body flexing with incredible power, uncaged, untamed. Unstoppable. Her frame bulged and grew, remaining somehow alluring and feminine even as she swelled with the kind of muscle that tore at her clothes, leaving her barely clad by the time she reached top speed. Her legs bunched, then flexed, and she leapt, screaming a scream of joy and battle-rage and bloodlust as she hurtled through the air like a demented, electrically charged cannonball.

Atop the tower, Pyrrha Nikos did not answer her foe's questions. Instead, she did what she had been trained to do for the whole year whenever she heard that yell. She hit the deck immediately, curling into a ball and pulling a cage of spiked metal around her; none of it touching her, grounding herself out with an improvised Faraday cage in case of collateral damage, because whenever they practiced this, the collateral damage had been epic in scope and scale.

Practice didn't hold a candle to the real thing. The battle paused for a moment as Cinder Fall was struck by a comet of lightning, steel, Aura, muscle, and violence. Nora didn't even slow down, careening through her and into the great dragon that hadn't even had the time to react to the new threat. Of Cinder Fall, nothing remained. Of the dragon, only a headless corpse, which fell to the ground and began to smoke and dissolve.

From the ruined stump of its neck stood Nora Valkyrie, the new Fall Maiden.

---

OK, I lied, none of this is logical, but I was possessed by it and had to write it.

I might post a new Alt-Jaune some time tonight or tomorrow morning, if I can work out the kinks.

 

[Prok]

this, in theory, could have been out last Wednesday, on the anniversary of Nelward uploading Ghost, which, yeah, scraping the wood off the bottom of the barrel as far as reasons to update go, but then I ended up in the hospital for like 2 hours and you know being stabbed 6 times for a cannula takes a lot out of me even besides the thing that put me in hospital in the first place

on another note, and this is pedantry of the highest fucking order but I've earned a little of that after the past two weeks, this did come out faster than the last one

---

Creme only takes a few minutes to explain each option, and she's surprisingly fair about it too; she doesn't make her option sound any better or worse than any of the others, or vice versa, she presents each one as neutrally as she can, given the situation.

So, going out and beating up the overgrown Kelpie, letting the Process do its thing with the Nevermore, and aiming that same cannon at the overgrown Kelpie.

{I don't think I'd trust that last one- even if the Process aims straight down, the shockwave alone would probably turn this clearing into a new cliff face.}

Damn. You're kinda really curious about what this proposed ordinance would do to it.

Since it's so much closer, we could achieve complete cellular carbonisation with roughly 20% of the power, saving this forward operating base from complete structural compromise!

Would you and the others be able to stay here?

The heat created by the wasted energy from the beam would be enough to fatally injure everyone, even with heat protection in place. You would still be required to move away from here, just not quite as far.

… Could you…

"Ooh, bulb's flickering, give it a tap-" DC 12, Roll: 14. Success!

Oh, that would be mean though.

Mean, but very possible!

You most certainly do not give a nasty little smile at the thought.

"... Jaune? You've been real quiet, and that look on your face doesn't say rainbows and puppy dogs to me," Lumen says.

"... I vote for firing at the Nevermore-"

A hissed yes from Creme, a little smile from Weiss, groaning from Ruby and Nora, Ada and Pyrrha seem rather nonplussed about it, Blake is worried-

"-and I know how to kill two birds with one stone. I can't nullify the backblast, but nothing is stopping us from using it anyway."

- and that's what gets their attention.

"... You're going to trap that deer Grimm in here and turn the place into a cremation furnace," Blake says, getting it in one.

"Well if you can do that, why don't we just stay here anyway?" Ada asks. "If you're redirecting the… you're directing it through here."

"Sorry. Still gotta move. On the bright side, we probably won't have to move as far," you tell her, giving an apologetic smile while you do.

"We would move to the other side of the ridge at the very least, to be safe," the walls tell you, and you feel the formation of a door on the other side of the hall- your exit.

Leathers finally stumbles out of the medical wing, his balance finally under control, just in time to see everyone starting to move.

"Wus' happenin'? Where we goin'?"

"Firing a laser at the Nevermore, redirecting the backblast into the deer Grimm out there, and running like hell to get out of the blast radius, now move, you little concussed git," Lumen helpfully explains to Leathers, the last bit snapping him out of whatever sick, sick fantasies that description just put into his head.

He falls in with the group, just in time to watch the back door open. Out of the corner of your eye, you watch a Cell pop out of the wall and float off behind you, quickly reentering your field of view, towing a conspicuously large cuboid behind it.

Well, at least the relics are safe.

"Wait, um… Jaune?" Ruby stops for a moment, grabbing your attention, "shouldn't we… warn people?"

"Why would we do that?" Blake asks. Out of curiosity, you realise after a second, not some callous desire to not warn people.

"A 5 milliwatt laser can blind you instantly just from a flash across the eyes, but you can put your hand in front of it without a problem. If that laser's powerful enough to kill a Nevermore at 2 kilometres up with enough energy to overcome thermal bloom, then…" Ruby responds, trailing off as the implication sets in.

"{Point taken. I'll… oh. Well, it'll be the last thing I do, but I can send a warning out for… agh, I don't know, I can't… everyone in the Emerald Forest should do it, so I'll just… ok, no, yeah, I can do this,}" The Transistor says, sounding about as uncertain as you've ever heard it.

"Wait whaaaat-" Nora coos, treating the revelation that your sword can talk more calmly than anyone else has ever treated the revelation.

Ren on the other hand somehow manages to look more tired, probably filing away the knowledge of your talking sword with all the other things he's going to scream into his pillow about later tonight.

That's not exactly the most comforting thing you've heard all day, but… lasers aren't that dangerous so long as they've got nothing to reflect off of, right? You can stare at the beam of a 5-milliwatt laser, and so long as there isn't anything that can redirect it into your eyes… and, it's aimed up at the sky, which has nothing to reflect off of, and a Nevermore, which is black, so…

Ugh. There are too many variables to justify winging it. Better safe than sorry, you suppose.

"Do it."

The Transistor does not respond. It doesn't need to, you already feel that pulse in your head, a wide-band data packet sent through what your gut says is an already-existing network, but- how? There's no…

Ohh. 'You will be monitored and graded through the duration of this evaluation.'

They must have cameras up all over the forest. It's the only way they could monitor people since you're pretty sure there aren't enough teachers at Beacon to even have one for every two people in the Initiation, even if they were all stealthy enough to stalk you and not be seen.

… Those bastards watched you almost die from an aneurysm and didn't do anything about it!

In complete fairness, sysadmin, Ozpin did say the instructors weren't going to intervene, and even if that wasn't the case, this is not the time nor place to be angry about it. Please prioritise, sysadmin.

With a wordless sigh, you… begrudgingly accept that you should set that aside for the moment, and begin to lead the others outside, preparing for the dash to the rock ridge further to the north, maybe to the tower you can see, even from here.

While you walk, then jog, then run, the others beside and behind you, the Nevermore raining down razor-sharp feathers the size of spears on you all, but not breaking from its circling pattern yet, as your HUD finally flashes back into existence as Bracket rises from his virtual grave, all across the Emerald Forest, every working Scroll begins to ring.

|||

Unknown Grimm has escaped from restraints.

Opening bunker doors.

...

Unknown Grimm has been captured and restrained by Process. Proceeding to stun Grimm.

Understanding of laser weaponry limited on Remnant- no mathematical basis to work from- testing required.

Query: have we checked the servers mastercomfork_Bracket logged?

Negative.

… Engineering designs for hypothetical megawatt-scale laser-based defence system- with alteration, can be turned into an offensive weapon.

Note: Power consumption of this system far exceeds the instantaneous electrical draw of any known power plant on Remnant, let alone the production capacity of any given portable generator.

Conclusion: These Atlesians are crazy.

Passive power generation insufficient for planned design- creation of power generation units necessary.

Begin construction.

|||

Somewhere in the forest, a blonde girl walks into a clearing, humming a tune to herself as she nibbles on a fingernail, completely ignoring the snarling Beowolf slinking out of the foliage.

"Er, M-Meri, that's a Beowolf, you should maybe probably deal with that instead of biting your nails-" a voice says from the air near her, quickly growing into a barely-restrained shriek of concern.

"Nope! Hyu ahn't shcared of jusht one leetle wolfie, ah yu?"

Meri's words are garbled, partly by her accent, partly by her less than stellar grasp of Valish, and partly by the fact that she has reached that critical point of the nail bite where, if one isn't careful, a clean nibble can quickly detour directly into the root and become a painful, bloody hangnail.

The Beowolf, rude little bugger that it is, does not care for her need for concentration, and rushes forwards, drawing a yelp from the voice, and forcing her to step out of the way of it as it rushes towards her invisible partner, who begins beating it off with… something.

She sighs, and starts fiddling with the bitten nail again, gently pressing it between the thumb and forefinger of the opposite hand, then sliding down until-

rip

The nail grows heavy in her hand, curling and blackening until all that's left is a matte black sphere the size of a musket round, growing hot and smoky in her hand as she turns to the beast of Grimm, now harassing her invisible partner, before winging it directly into the back of its skull.

The leaden ball of once-nail-now-something-else punches through with almost no resistance and the Beowolf collapses like a puppet with its strings cut.

"Ha! Napakymppi! Clear ze area!" Meri yells in triumph, then caution, just before she starts to count down in her head.

Three, two, one...

Boom.

The detonation reduces the Beowolf to a cloud of smog, the shockwave sending it out and up in a mushroom cloud. Meri stumbles from the force, covering her mouth and nose in the crook of her elbow until the cloud dissipates.

A moment passes in silence once the remnants of the Beowolf cease existing, and Meri passes it by inspecting the hollow left in her finger, watching a new nail rapidly grow into place, trying her damnedest to remember something… important.

…

Any second now, it'll come to her any second-

HER PARTNER RIGHT YES-

"Yoohoo! Meester inveesible man! Is hyu dead?"

"No, I am not dead, and I have a name, you know," the air on the other side of the crater says, just in time to draw her attention to the oil slick of person that begins to appear.

It's not much, just an arm here, a patch of freckles there, an icy blue eye framed by curly red locks up there- shifting and fading in and out, never forming enough of a silhouette for Meri's brain to catch onto the fact that, yes, person there.

Still enough for her to get an idea of what her partner looks like- that is to say, unlike anyone she's ever seen before.

"Vell, yes, I am sure hyu do, but I do not remember it," Meri says bluntly. "I am very bad viss names."

"... I- you know what? Just, call me Al. Everyone else does."

Meri nods, mouthing the name to herself for a few seconds to commit it to memory.

"Alright! So, hwere are ve go from here, Al? Because I sink ve may be lost."

"Well, I think we're still going north, we haven't been turning as far as I can tell-" Al starts to explain, just as Meri's Scroll begins to vibrate against her hip.

"Hm?"

The device keeps vibrating even after she unclips it from her skirt waistband, only stopping when, after a moment to remember how to open it, she unfurls it to a screen flashing between two shades of red in a way that screams warning on some primal level even she can understand. She notices Valish text in the direct centre, in what she thinks is all-caps, along with an arrow at the bottom of the screen, currently pointing somewhere to her right.

Ok, um…

come on Meri it's time to work that crash course-

"Va-varning... high... high-energy... uzage- veapon, uzage- ohh zat's not good is it?" Meri does her best to put her limited knowledge of written Valish to use, and it doesn't take her long to get the gist.

It also doesn't take her long to drive her partner into another bout of hysterics.

"High-energy WHAT-" he shrieks, a set of panicked footsteps appearing in the grass just before Meri suddenly feels pressure on her shoulders, and it takes all her self-restraint to not smack it off once she realises that it's Al, who begins to recite the warning for her.

|||

The church has lost all pretence of being built by human hands.

Unnecessary decoration, material, angles, all discarded, the material moving around in such tiny but universal increments that the building no longer looks like a building- it looks like the surface of a four-dimensional cuttlefish, merely patterns moving along a plane.

The tower shifts towards the centre, lengthening, narrowing, twisting and fusing with the former roof until it resembles nothing on Remnant- just a spire of metal jutting out towards the sky.

Engage targeting.

The barrel snaps into position, turning in little circles to seamlessly track the Nevermore, unerringly aiming directly at centre-mass.

Around the reindeer Grimm, massive cubes rise from the floor, filling the room with a deadly hum, the snap of arcing electricity around it driving the creature into a fearful frenzy. All around the interior, red eyes begin to form, allowing the Process visual confirmation for any warnings, and to view the captive Grimm for escape attempts.

Beginning construction of multiple-laser diodes and focusing apparatus.

Query: what is the best wavelength to pierce Grimm flesh?

As one, the many eyes that had begun to form to oversee the creation process swivelled towards their captive.

The Grimm stops flailing, its ragged, bug-bitten ears flattening against its skull as it gives out a fearful whine, red eyes wheeling around behind its fully-recovered mask.

Suggestion: Exhaustive testing regimen.

|||

Elsewhere, another pair is in the midst of battle. A girl with dark skin covered in intricate markings slams an axe into the skull of a Beowolf, splitting it in two, dragging the rapidly decomposing corpse along with her as she dodges another, raising a hand and pulsing Aura through her tattoos, a section along her palms flashing a deep purple.

A dark sphere forms around the Beowulf and turns its leap into ungraceful flailing as gravity simply ceases to exist around it leaving it yipping for help as it floats off into the sky.

Off to the side, a boy with very large sunglasses, designed to keep out all light, and a yellow cloak charges at his quarry, horse chopper above his head in defiance of both God and basic blade training. Bringing it down with a half-hearted yell, the sheer length of the blade neatly bisects the Beowolf mid-leap.

The girl's eyes widen for a second as she sees another Beowolf slink out from the foliage behind him then begin to sprint, running low and fast to go for his ankle and drag him to the ground.

"Lord Abha-!"

"Behind me, I see it," he mumbles, planting his sword in the ground and twisting in the instant before it latches onto his ankle.

The Beowolf, devoid of an ankle to bite and space to stop itself ends up launching maw-first into Rashmi's planted sword, with fatal results.

"I've asked you not to call me that, Pila," he gently chides his partner as he pulls the sword from the ground, flicks the last drops of smog off it, then sheathes it again, holding it up like a hiking staff as he begins to walk off. "Just Rashmi, here."

"I-I apologise, sir-" Pila stutters, eyes on her feet as she speaks.

"Ah!"

A wince, a sharp exhale, "Rashmi. It is… a difficult habit to break-"

"Pila."

"-and, and I don't understand why you wish for me to break it, why, you wish to break from tradition like this-"

"Pila."

"-i-it's wrong, for me to act as your equal, and you to act like mine, and-"

"Kapila!"

Her eyes snap to look at her partner, and she sees his face set in concern, and something more concerning besides- a light so yellow it turns his cheeks gold leaks from behind the large sunglasses perched on his nose, turning the glass orange, a light so alluring and illuminating and glorious and- and she averts her eyes before those thoughts go any further.

"Check your Scroll for me."

Without questioning his command, she pulls her Scroll from her pocket, and opens it, just in time for it to begin flashing red, a message in large, white, angry letters.

"What does it say?" Rashmi asks, his Scroll going off at its place on his hip.

She begins to read the warning aloud, frowning deeper and deeper the further she reads.

WARNING

HIGH-ENERGY WEAPON USAGE IN PROGRESS AT EMERALD FOREST RUINS.

DO NOT APPROACH THE WHITE BUILDING IN THE RUINS.

DO NOT FACE THE WHITE BUILDING IN THE RUINS.

DO NOT LOOK TO THE SKY ABOVE THE RUINS.

SEEK TALL COVER AND SHIELD YOUR EYES.

YOU WILL BE INFORMED WHEN TEST HAS CONCLUDED.

FAILURE TO FOLLOW INSTRUCTIONS MAY RESULT IN PERMANENT BLINDNESS OR IRREVERSIBLE DAMAGE TO EYES.​

"... That… sounds bad."

"Lord Abha-"

"Ah."

"It is not safe here," Pila spits, cutting past him harshly enough to startle the boy. "We must move, and quickly. I spotted a grove of willows that will shade us, a few minutes east of here."

"... As you wish, Pila," Rashmi mumbles, silently following her to safety.

|||

The Grimm screams. Several smoking craters mar its body, some already bubbling up with scabs and healing over, others still raw wounds, healing stymied by unknown means.

Tests 47-53 complete: hypothesis confirmed- lasers of sufficient strength within the 600-615nm range healing and cause damage up to a magnitude greater than the next-best performing subjects. Gauge diode and dye medium 81-88-9 for 608nm wavelength.

Query: Keep test subject alive?

Solution: heat output will kill it regardless. Active effort wastes time and power. Finalise construction.

The Grimm is left as is, head resting on the cool, white floor, tongue lolling as it wheezes for breath and tries to heal itself. Above its head, the ceiling begins to shift, becoming narrower and more circular, something like an inverted funnel, the diodes recreated at its mouth, a series of focusing lenses flashing into existence up at the half-metre opening at the tip of the spire, vents opening along the entire length of the tower to keep the laser firing for as long as it can.

Final checks:

- Diodes set to correct wavelength, dye medium 81-88-9 in place: check.
- Target within range: check.
- Heat vents operational: check
- Initial laser power: 25 Megawatts.
- Beam diameter at target: 0.5 metres.
- Laser pulse rate: 12000 pulses at 1-millisecond intervals- total runtime of 12 seconds.

Everything is ready. Creating black box to record results in the event of data loss due to destruction.

A metre-long spike juts into the rock, quickly separating and eating away at the rock around it until a small cubbyhole has been formed, about 30 metres underneath the ground, the air cold as winter, well-insulated from the outside world. The spike loses its rigidity, curling up like a minimalist snake.


Prime laser. Final announcement will be made with countdown for firing.

|||

You finally make it to the lip of the ridge while Bracket expertly bats away the Nevermore's last perfunctory shots, feathers the size of javelins sprouting out of the ground around you, each fibre sharp enough to shave with.

Overall, it doesn't seem that interested in you. It doesn't attempt to follow you, it makes no attempt to dive at you, it seems quite content to just throw feathers at you from its vantage point high in the air, barely a black vaguely-winged splotch on the sky.

Coincides with known behaviour of Giant Nevermore- happy to attack from afar until targets leave range. May change flight pattern to keep group in sight.

Will that mess with the Process targeting it?

It shouldn't need to move that far to keep on target. Base predicts no problems with that much lateral movement.

Wonderful. People begin dropping down around you, in various states of dishevelment and with varying levels of grace.

"Anyone hurt?" you ask, once the last of them drops down.

Ruby looks at her cloak with abject horror in her eyes, the massive hole and subsequent rip about two-thirds down apparent to anyone that so much as glances in her direction.

"Ugh, this is going to take hours to fix! Ooh... if this plan doesn't work, Jaune, I'm killing that stupid bird myself!" she squeaks at you furiously.

You try and downplay it, but it is actually quite unnerving seeing the tiny girl so genuinely angry. It feels wrong, the same way a hallway full of tilted paintings does.

"I believe in the Process. It knows what it's doing, and if it doesn't, it's good at finding out what it needs to do."

Almost on cue, a booming synthetic voice rings out across the clearing and into the forest, deep enough and loud enough that even the echoes off the valley ahead leave your bones rattling.

"ATTENTION, ALL, PERSONNEL.

THE, HIGH-ENERGY, WEAPONS, TEST, WILL BEGIN, SHORTLY.

PLEASE, HEED, THE, WARNINGS, FROM, EARLIER-

DO, NOT, APPROACH, THE, WHITE BUILDING, IN THE, RUINS.

DO, NOT, FACE, THE, WHITE BUILDING, IN THE, RUINS.

DO, NOT, LOOK, AT, THE, SKY ABOVE, THE RUINS.

SEEK SHELTER, AND, COVER, YOUR, EYES.

FAILURE, TO, COMPLY, MAY RESULT IN, PERMANENT BLINDNESS, OR, DAMAGE TO, EYES.

THE, TEST, WILL, BEGIN, IN, TEN."

A moment passes with no further announcements. More than a few seconds, at least.

"... Ten what-" Yang asks.

"NINE."

"Oh."

You can't help but hold your breath and try to think unintrusive thoughts as the countdown rings out across the forest.

Ten seconds. Ten seconds without anything else going wrong. That's all you need.

|||

"EIGHT."

"Sir, should we still be up here?" you ask. "That... thing seems somewhat insistent on its safety instructions."

Your name is Glynda Goodwitch and you can't help but feel a tiny thread of anxiety in your chest from the fact that those warnings that appeared on your Scroll are now being echoed out for about 25 kilometres from its epicentre- a white building that just popped into existence a few minutes after Jaune Arc appeared on the scene, of the same general aesthetic as the robot that helped that group take out a Beowolf pack.

You are absolutely sure that there is no connection, there. None at all.

"SEVEN."

Nada.

You don't even need your Scroll to see the building. It stretches up into the sky like a hypodermic needle for titans, visible from here. Even accounting for your height, you think it must be large enough to be seen even over the curvature of Remnant.

"Despite its warnings, we should be relatively safe, at this distance anyway- if it's firing straight up, there will be very little for the laser to reflect off of. Besides, aren't you curious?" Ozpin asks you, a soft smile on his face.

"SIX."

God that is nerve-wracking. The sound is powerful enough that you can feel every syllable in your bones.

"Of course I am, I just feel the need for caution- the risk to our already less-than-stellar eyesight isn't something to dismiss. Is curiosity really worth the risk when we can watch this on a camera?"

"We don't have cameras pointed at the sky, Glynda."

"We have drones."

Ozpin blinks, a moment of blank incomprehension on his face as he tries to remember what drones are.

"FIVE."

"... The miniature, remote-controlled Bullheads?" You gently prod, hoping to jog his memory.

"... Ah, yes, those toys you insisted on buying-"

"They aren't toys-" you snap, only just managing to reel it in at the last second. "They are 80,000 Lien free of our surveillance and maintenance budgets, once Mulberry replaces the batteries with proper Dust engines, and there are five out there right now on a test run. That's how we caught the Rose girl pasting a bird on the way down."

You… may still be a tad defensive about the subject.

"Glynda, you bought them from a toy store," he points out, setting you off once more with zero effort.

"Their place of purchase has nothing to do with their purpose!"

"They're pink, Glynda. They have ponies on them. You put more ponies on them."

… The stickers came free, dammit, and you weren't going to put them anywhere they'd be seen.

The two of you sit in silence, yours, somewhere between frustrated and mortified, Ozpin's, incredibly self-satisfied, as the rest of the countdown, er, counts down. Once it reaches zero…

It fires.

A single thread of orange light flickers into existence, eerie silence its only accompaniment, slashing the air in half as far up as you can see and turning the blue midday sky orange to the horizon. It paints Ozpin's shadow in stark relief against the ground, doing the same for every tree below you. If you focus, you can see the edges of your vision flickering, the only sign that the laser is pulsing, too fast to count.

You watch as the black splotch of the Nevermore is pinned like a butterfly, its holding pattern growing erratic, desperate to flee from the pillar of unparalleled destruction. Its pained screams echo across the forest, a sound of hatred, of rage, of fear.

It takes a little effort to push down the sadistic little flutter in your heart hearing a sound that sweet.

The beam begins to waver- growing unstable after only a few seconds, then scattering across the forest in many little beams as the spire buckles, collapsing like an opening flower to the sound of screeching metal finally rending as heat and stress catch up to it. You manage to close your eyes and flare your Aura just in time to protect them from the errant laser foci that end up aimed your way.

While you're sure you manage to avoid permanent damage to your eyes, your cheeks still felt hotter for the laser's passing. When you open them again, all that's left to see is the slow collapse of the spire, the fortress it came from, and a single, fiery speck on the horizon, slowly crumbling into a trail of ash and smog as it spirals towards the ground.

And just like that… it's over. No more booming voice. No more Nevermore. No more dawn sky.

You release a breath you didn't realise you were holding, a shudder of catharsis skittering up your spine as the sheer power brought to bear to destroy one Grimm sinks in. The birds, frightened into silence by the sudden change of daylight, start to sing again, and it sounds wrong for something so normal to occur after, after that.

"... Sir?" you murmur, looking for one person, anyone, who could confirm that that just happened.

You look over to him, and find him silent, and, perhaps more disconcertingly, his mug on the ground, its contents steaming away in the morning chill.

For a moment, panic rises in your chest, panic you swiftly force down as you step forward to examine him, only to stop the moment you see his face. His silvery eyes are wide, unfocused, staring off into the middle distance as tears stream down his cheeks.

The honest vulnerability in his face, the genuine shock and awe, the kind of emotions you associate with being exposed to Ozpin, not him experiencing them, and that unnerves you.

You've known him too long to really buy into the whole 'omniscient wizard' act, God knows you don't put much faith in the 'omniscient' part anymore, but at the same time, you've never seen him this close to just, being a fragile old man. It's almost frightening, and you don't know why.

"... Ozpin?" you whisper, feeling the sudden, urgent need to treat him like you would a pane of sugar glass.

He blinks, finally focusing on the present, on you. With a final sniff, he wipes the trails from his cheeks with the heel of his palm, suddenly looking much wearier.

"Ah… Glynda, I… it, would be, best t-to talk to Jaune Arc sooner rather than later. I believe."

His speech is slow, not slurred, exactly, but spoken like a man who's unsure of every word he's saying, but he does speak and that's better than you expected.

"I think immediately is the timeframe we should be aiming for-" wait no your boss is in the middle of a mental breakdown that's way more important- "agh, never mind Jaune, are you alright?"

The concern in your voice startles you, and it startles Ozpin enough that he finally fully rejoins you on Remnant.

"I'm fine, Glynda, just…" a quiet laugh bubbles past his lips as he shakes his head a little, "dazzled, I suppose."

You narrow your eyes a fraction at his choice of words, and silently throw a gesture up where you're sure he can see it.

"Eight fingers, Mistrali peace sign. I only meant it metaphorically," he tells you with a smile. "Now… I believe most of the major obstacles have been dealt with."

A sigh of relief leaves you, and you can't help but smile at the assessment. Pulling your Scroll to you from where you dropped it, you pull up the live statistics for on-screen Grimm death and compare it to last week's measurements, once you brush the grass off it.

"I believe the phrase you're looking for is cleaned out. Visual estimates place the Grimm population of Emerald Falls at 30% what it was this morning."

"... Good lord, what are we feeding the children these days?"

"If I didn't know any better, I'd fear Chef Splot was making his special soup again," you say, entirely meaning it as a joke.

Ozpin looks at you, and you meet his eyes.

… A rock forms in your stomach as you realise you can't remember what the breakfast menu was today.

"Perhaps a quick trip to the kitchens wouldn't be out of order-"

"Yes absolutely let's go right now-"

|||

The sound of rending metal is deafening, more so than the merely nearly-deafening sound of Grimm screaming in pain. Eventually, though, the noise stops, and you're left with just the sound of… silence.

The silence somehow sounds too loud. It settles in like a pressure on your ears, a thick, woollen cloth that makes you worry you wouldn't hear your fingers if you snapped them. Then, just as quickly as it appeared, the pressure is gone, and you can hear things like birds and the rustling of leaves and your heartbeat rattling in your inner ear.

"... Is… is it over?" Ruby whispers, almost too quiet to be heard.

"I think so," Yang tells her, not speaking much louder. You hear a shuffling of cloth against rock, and soon you're all slowly starting to creep out from underneath the outcropping like cautious rats.

You're one of the last up and over, thanks to the day as a whole finally catching up with your body, so you hear the sound of muttered curses and gasps of awe and something in East Mistrali that you're fairly sure is not something a four-time tournament champion would want to be caught saying in civilised company, before you finally make it over and fully understand why.

A few years ago, there were plans for a commercial Bullhead, The Mercurius Grand, a sort of 300-person cruise ship affair held up with oversized rotor blades and more Gravity Dust than common sense, that would ship people (read: Atlas's 1%, just about the only people on the planet with a chance of affording a ticket) across the world in comfort, speed, and safety. 4 days to anywhere, the posters said.

It was supposed to revolutionise travel.

It was supposed to replace the over-reliance on hard to expand and repair train tracks and unreliable, dangerous ships, beholden to whatever aquatic affronts to Brother Light had made their home in the deeps.

It was supposed to be the future.

It lasted two weeks.

See, they'd armed the thing to the teeth, protected its various viewing ports, dining halls, bar and lounge areas, and its large, vulnerable pockets of Gravity Dust, the stuff being used to project a big bubble where gravity equalled null long enough for several thousand tons of steel, plastic, Dust, booze, and coked-up socialites to get to where they were going.

What they had neglected, however, was the rotors. And this is entirely fair- the rotors on your average bullhead would grind just about anything caught in them into a fine paste. The ones on this thing could probably swallow a Giant Nevermore and a couple dozen Lancers and barely notice it was happening.

Unfortunately, it managed to fly right by a new Lancer nest, while making its way through the Valish mountain ranges.

A couple dozen Lancers.

Not… an entire nest. There's video, of 600 Lancers entering each airwell, the smog burning out the motors while their bones bent and twisted the propellers on impact. A mass suicide in the thousands, all in the hope of killing about 400 people.

It crashed at the foot of the mountains. The impact took 200 lives. The cold and Grimm took another 80 or so before help finally arrived.

The reason that this is occurring to you at all, mind, is that… if you didn't know better, you would say you were walking through the crash site as it was, maybe a week later, once all the fires had been snuffed out. Just, heaps of twisted metal, completely unrecognisable as what they once were.

"M-my Gods… it's…" Pyrrha trails off, completely lost for words.

Grass blackened from heat crumbles beneath your shoes as you creep forward, the white metal around you slowly shimmering, red eyes forming to watch your party as you creep forward, slowly shifting out of the way as you move towards… ground zero, you suppose.

"Jaune, I hope you realise that that's really creepy," Creme mutters under her breath near you.

"A little, yeah."

You love the Process as much as you do any other given artificial intelligence, but having dozens of eyes tracking your every move while you creep through wreckage is a little unnerving.

… As is having all of them close the second you think anything in that general ballpark. The rubble keeps shimmering out of your way, so you cut a path back to the ruins in record time, and find, much to Blake's delight, that they're… well, intact is the wrong word for ruins in the first place, but no worse off than they were, at the very least.

The only thing that ruins it is the massive, blackened skeleton of the overgrown Kelpie.

"... That's… not right, is it?" Blake asks. "It should be gone by now... right?"

It should be so much ash. That it isn't is highly disturbing. Please be careful, sysadmin.

"The bones always stay around a little longer..." Weiss mumbles, not even doing that by the end as she realises that she's trying to justify something very, very wrong being the case.

"We… should be careful anyway," you tell them, choosing to be diplomatic about the whole thing.

"Seriously? Look at it, there's no way it could heal from that!" Nora interjects, making a very rational point. Nothing heals from being burned down to nothing but a skeleton. Hell, even as you look, parts of it have crumbled into ash, the heat at least partially carbonising it.

Something very simple occurs to you, and you start to examine the joints very, very thoroughly.

"You're right, Nora, it's a cremated skeleton."

"... Uh… yeah, that's what I-"

"That's standing on its own, with no cartilage, muscle, or ligaments holding it together. This skeleton is, quite possibly literally, being held together with spite alone."

You've gotten quite close now. Maybe two, three feet away from the mask- Gods you could use this thing's ribcage for a beer hall- and you've confirmed your fear. There isn't anything holding it together. It is literally being held together by spite, or by whatever horrible forces allow Grimm to go and keep going.

"Jaune?" Lumen says, a thread of abject horror in his voice. "I don't want to alarm you, but… you should get away from that thing. Quickly."

He says it in a familiar tone of voice- the tone of voice you hear in horror films, of someone talking to a friend they very desperately want to not look behind them.

Wheels spin in your head as you adjust the trope to fit your situation, and the mental image of two burning red eyes staring down at you as you make the mistake of looking up, only to immediately be devoured for a catalyst for its regeneration. In the end, you do the rational thing, because this is not a horror movie, and this monster cannot hurt you.

You look up and stare into the eyes of the beast.

Well, you were half-right- it's only managed to get back its left eye, which is currently staring down at you, wide and bright with complete and utter hatred for you, and something else you can't place.

… No. You can. You can, you just needed to adjust your sights for 'things Grimm shouldn't be able to do.' It's subtle, but it's still there. That eye, bound in place as it is, gives off the impression of a small, cornered animal, that wants to run very, very, very far away indeed.

"You're scared," you breathe more than say, the realisation genuinely shocking you to the core. "No, you're terrified."

"What?" Blake says. "But… it's a Grimm. Grimm don't get scared."

"Grimm don't usually survive being heat-blasted down to the bone, either," Lumen notes. "Which brings up a rather pertinent question- how do we kill this thing? The regular methods obviously aren't doing the job."

"Why isn't it doing anything!? It's just sitting there- staring at us!" Ruby says, her rifle up and ready to fire at the first thing that so much as twitches wrong.

Smart girl.

"It's still bound by basic biology. No muscles mean no way to move. It's paralysed."

Sysadmin, we feel it necessary to note that it is regenerating. It's not a threat now, but it shouldn't take more than a few minutes for that to stop being the case. We suggest you move away at a minimum.

Just crack its skull in half. That kills almost anything.

… This thing survived cremation and having half its mask shot off, and Bracket thinks that stabbing it in the head will kill it.

… Fuck it! It's not like you've got a better plan!

With a lazy sway of your wrist, the Transistor flits into position, only a few inches above the creature's brow, the point where its forehead begins to transition into a snout.

"... It can't be that simple," Ren says, and you're half-inclined to agree with him. "After all this, the solution is just stabbing it in the face?"

"Can't hurt to try. If nothing else, it'll be cathartic," you point out, to widespread agreement and capitulation on the grounds that stabbing Grimm in the face is, at worst, still pretty funny.

You look it in the eye, as the Transistor gently rises at a gesture until you can't straighten your fingers any further.

More flesh has begun to spring into existence beneath the eye socket, and you can see where parts of the crumbled bone have been replaced with pristine calcium.

It does not appear to be terrified anymore. If anything, it seems…

Resigned.

There is a moment where you feel some very dark thoughts being entertained in the pits of your heart, of disgust at this thing and its… arrogance, believing itself worth a clean death, worth… worth the energy needed to kill it.

With more anger than necessary, you flick your fingers down.

The Transistor falls like a meteor from heaven.

The abomination closes its eye in the instant before impact.

…

Like swallowing a mouthful of ash.

How damnable.

NEVERMORE MAJOR, REGENT OF THE AIR- SLAIN.
CERYNIA, PROTECTOR OF THE EMERALD RIVERS- SLAIN.
IT'S TIME TO REST, HUNTSMAN.​

XP gained: (2d20 + Concordance where applicable.)

Strength- (15 + 15) + 100 = 130.
Athletics- (27 + 13) + 160 = 200. Upgrade! B->B+.
Gunmanship (yes the Transistor counts as a gun if you throw it at things)- 25 + 50 = 75.
Swordsmanship- 26 + 58 = 84.
Tactics- 28 + 3 = 31.

|||

"Russel Thrush. Cardin Winchester. Dove Bronzewing. Sky Lark."

The four boys step forward, their visages appearing on the screen behind them as they step forward, allowing you to get a better look at Cardin's mug.

You swear you've seen him before, and that you can't remember bugs you enough, but even the Transistor, finally fully repaired, doesn't recall him either.

… But hand to any God you like you've seen him before-

"The four of you retrieved the bishop pieces. From this day forward, you will work together as Team Cardinal, led by... Cardin Winchester!"

The crowd cheers one last time, and the boys move off as the next lot move on. Currently, you and the rest of the hopefuls are off in a side-room from the auditorium, Ozpin's speech muffled by the heavy door. You've all split off into little groups of conversation, recounting grand tales of the day or just talking to friends old and new, ugh, you could cut the atmosphere of camaraderie into cubes and choke someone with it. You, with the kind of certainty usually reserved for gravity and the sun's cycle around Remnant, have ended up with Lumen and the girls. Ruby, Weiss, and the rest of your return trip party are closer than not, but not quite close enough to be... well, part of the group, if that makes sense.

Look, it's dumb teenager stuff, give it 5 years, you'll trade it in for existential panic attacks and the realisation that 1 am means something.

The only exception to the rule is Leathers, who was basically frogmarched to the nearest medical professional by Pyrrha and Yang to be treated for the apparent laundry list of head injuries he'd sustained over the day, including the last one, which apparently broke through his Aura. He only arrived five minutes ago, his head half-mummified in gauze, and immediately became a centrepiece of conversation.

Poor bastard. Looks almost as out of place as you when he's the centre of attention.

"So, um, Jaune… are you… going to be okay?" Ada asks at some point during the ceremony. "I mean, I'm no biology swot, but last I checked, aneurysms tend to be… y'know, fatal. And, you're looking great for a dead guy."

There is a distinct pause in conversation as people pick up on certain keywords in her question- namely if you had to guess, 'aneurysm,' 'fatal,' and 'dead guy,' and like that you're suddenly aware of significantly more eyes on your person.

"Alstroemeria Cadwallader. Meri Terhenetar. Kapila Agni. Rashmi Abha. The four… four of you? Where is Mr Cadwallader?"

"U-um, present! Sorry. It's worse in front of crowds."

Ada looks around, once the silence settles on her as well.

"Well, as long as you're here…"

"Hey, does this sound like a public discussion to you people?!" she squeaks more than yells, but eyes still avert themselves, conversation starts up again, and you no longer feel like a display piece in a medical school.

"... Sorry. Didn't think I was being that loud."

You smile softly at her.

"The four of you retrieved the Bishop pieces. From this day forward, you will work together as Team Ramona, led by Rashmi Abha!"

More polite applause.

"It's fine. And, yeah, I'll be fine too- it's... part of my Semblance. It messes things up when it's not kept in check, but it'll clean up afterwards. It'll heal, I'll just have a stuffy nose for a couple days."

Creme and Lumen tear their eyes away from the proceedings and give you the double-barrel single quizzical eyebrow and confused frown.

"... Wait. Are you saying-" Creme starts.

"Yes, I heal from brain damage given enough time. Well, so long as it's not... imminently fatal."

"... That's nice," Lumen says, apparently at a complete loss for words.

You don't blame him, mind- sometimes you find it hard to believe.

The ceremony continues, people begin filing out, and eventually teams RWBY, Ruby, led by, er, Ruby, PRLN, Praline, led by Pyrrha, and SSSC...

Pfft- don't laugh, don't laugh, don't laugh- team... Sassy, led by Salem.

Blue flashes the hot pink that Sassy translates to across a small square of your vision and you have to bite the inside of your cheek to keep from laughing. Then the bastard shows you a frame-by-frame of Salem's face as it's said and you have to bring up your Aura to not draw blood.

"Misters Arc, Tessaro, Misses Doyle, Daylaw, you're up," Professor Goodwitch announces, a fresh tablet in her hands.

The bandages on her hands don't escape your attention, and you have to make an active effort to not immediately start apologising, and Lumen, spotting this, quickly ushers you closer to stage left.

"Thanks," you mumble to him as you walk.

"I'm sure you'll get a chance to apologise about it, but now's probably not the time."

"Jaune Arc. Ada Doyle. Creme Daylaw. Lumen Tessaro."

You shift out as your name is called, the Transistor following directly behind you, and approach the stage at a brisk walk, and by extension, Ozpin. It is not what anyone with eyes would call a smooth approach, or even a coordinated one, but you do it anyway and pray the man doesn't, you dunno, invert the function of every orifice on your face with his horrifying headmaster soul powers. Irrational, yes, perhaps a little facetious, but...

Ozpin is a lot of things, and right now, safe for you is not one of them.

Still, social pressure wins out in the end, and you end up in front of him just like everyone else. Ozpin seems to notice your apprehension and smiles at you- it's a warm smile, almost grandfatherly, but it doesn't really do much to set your mind at ease.

He can't have mistaken your apprehension for nerves. Could he?

"The four of you have retrieved the Assassin pieces. From this day forward, you will be known as Team Jackal, led by..."

There is a moment that stretches out like taffy, far further than any single moment has much right to do, but you hold your breath and wait for the answer.

Some minor voice in your head squeaks out that it's obviously going to be you, and you attempt to quash your arrogance-

"Jaune Arc!"

Oh goddammit, it's going to be insufferable all week now.

The announcement does surprise you, a little- it stuns you until Creme snaps you out of it with a congratulatory shoulder-thump that could tip a bull over, which unfortunately makes you stumble towards Ozpin. He deals with it much more gracefully than you, and grasps your hand, shaking it firmly. You instinctively reciprocate.

And then you feel the piece of card slip out of his cupped palm and into yours as Ozpin quickly breaks the handshake and steps back, giving you just enough time to sleeve the card.

"Congratulations, young man. We expect great things of you," he says softly, giving you that same, genuine, grandfatherly smile.

|||

Your new bedroom is... well, larger than your old one, of course, but even quartered off the way it is, it's about one and a quarter what your old room was. Four double beds stand in a row, flanked on both sides by, well, your collective stuff, and doors leading off to twin en-suites, which are quickly divided by gender. You packed light enough that your crap, clothes, mainly, a few comics and paperbacks you didn't really have the heart to throw out once you realised that the internet existed, and a few changes of bed sheets, sadly too small for your current bed, have already been packed away.

{Would you really have used that X-Ray and Vav quilt cover where people could see it?}

With pride and you damn well know it, that thing was the embrace of angels.

As is, right now, with nothing else to do, you're sitting at the end of your bed- the mattresses are new, it turns out, and the springs are compressed tight enough to launch Ada 10 feet into the air with only a light starting bounce- staring at the card Ozpin palmed you.

We need to talk.
My office, any day this week after eight pm.
The lift password is 'cocoa with marshmallows.'
- Ozpin
​

That isn't ominous and incongruous at all. Definitely just wants a friendly chat.

Certainly isn't going to throw you off the top of the tower for your silence-

{Hey, enough of that. Look, we don't... really get what Ozpin is, but if he wanted to hurt you, he would have tried it by now, and we would have killed him for trying. And if we couldn't pull it off, I'm sure the Process would give it a shot too. Current odds are that it's a spider in the bathtub situation.}

... If you didn't know better, you'd say Blue was trying to convince you that Ozpin was more scared of you than you are of him.

{No, you're definitely the spider- but that doesn't mean Ozpin isn't a little wary of you. What the Process did today is, bar none, one of the most excessive shows of force in Remnant's modern history. I think he doesn't know what you are, or what you can do, or what the Process is, or how it will react if anything happens to you. I think he genuinely does want to just talk if only to take a measure of you.}

... Yeah. That makes sense.

So... go tonight, go tomorrow, what?

{Jaune, you've suffered a major aneurysm for the second time in a month. You need to rest. If you go tonight, that's your choice, but, as the closest thing you have to a personal doctor, and your friend, I think you should take a day. Maybe two.}

"... Ominous," Lumen says, directly behind you, and it takes every ounce of self-control to not jump up and have the top of your head meet his chin at speed.

"'Cocoa with marshmallows?' Really?" Creme comments, and you immediately see where this is going.

"Lumen, you're blocking my good eye! Move your ass!"

"Are you three quite done?" you grumble at them, moving off the end of your bed and silently commending the manufacturer because you didn't feel any of them on your bed.

"... Sorry. You were just so focused on it, I figured it couldn't be good news," Creme explains. "Why's Ozpin want to meet you, anyway? I mean, the Process, sure, but... that can't be the only reason, right?"

The three of them look at you expectantly, and you wonder for the first time if it's... safe- no, no, you don't get to make that choice for them. Broad strokes, details later.

"... Ozpin's what broke the Transistor. They deserved it, entirely, he has, a weird soul, for lack of a better term, and they tried to figure out what was weird about it, and he... lashed out, I suppose. I guess... he wants to talk about what happened, maybe about the Process... the truth is, I don't know what he wants, just that he wants to talk."

There. Minimum of assumptions, no wild unconfirmed theories- as close to the whole truth as you can give them right now.

"... Damn. Will you be okay going by yourself?" Creme asks, and for a moment you sense a certain, silent agreement between the three.

'If he isn't, we're going with him.'

It almost chokes you up, until you realise you've done the exact same for definitely one, debatably two of the people making that offer. So, you give them your best smile and try to seem about ten times more confident than you are.

Lee is one thing, the White Fang is another. You don't think... Ozpin is really a fair trade for helping deal with those.

"I'll be fine, really. It's just to talk, and turning up with other people will probably send the wrong message. If it, isn't just to talk, I'm sure..."

Images of an unleashed Transistor and an enraged Process fighting Ozpin and the rest of Beacon's staff flash across your mind's eye, ending with the sight of a skyscraper-sized construct, easily twice the size of Beacon's clock tower, a roar that rattles cobbles free of their mortar, an energy weapon strong enough to vaporise metal...

You haven't breathed in for a while. Long enough that your lungs are now politely coughing in your general direction- you oblige them, and continue before the smile grows too distant from your face to be convincing.

"I'm, sure the Process will... inform people if things turn sour."

Yes. Inform. Nice, safe word, inform.

A word that does not conjure images of world-ending monstrosities bent on revenge for your death. And then whatever the Process comes out with.

The looks they give you range from unconvinced to outright worry, and for a moment, you worry if you might just have to be a hardass about this.

"... Well... if you're sure, hon," Creme ventures after a moment. "Well, if you change your mind, just tell us, okay?"

"When are you going to go, though? Says any day this week, right?" Ada asks, not exactly changing the subject.

It's a good question, you admit. One you have to think about. Like, now.

---

So, when are you off to see the wizard? (Each option is valid, and has various hidden... opportunities, I suppose is the word. No option is objectively better than any of the others, so don't worry too much about that.)

[] Tonight- you're tired, you're on edge, you're recovering from major brain trauma, it's been a hell of a day- but guess what? So's Ozpin! You're both off-balance, so you might as well go for it now! Rip that bandaid off! This line of thought is entirely driven by rational logic! Woo! (Sure, you're off-balance, but so is he- maybe you'll get some more out of him than if you let him compose yourself?)

[] A few days from now- you want to at least take a few days to, a) recover from your major brain trauma, b) figure out exactly how deep-seated this new paranoia is and how to excise it, and c) SHOVE YOUR BOOT SO FAR UP THE TRANSISTOR'S CPU SOCKET THAT YOU LEAVE INDIVIDUAL SOLEPRINTS ON EVERY PIN. (The boys will be properly cowed for the meeting, and you'll have had some time to cool off. Granted, so will he. Risk losing the chance to show him something rare. Risk gaining the chance to do something rarer.)

[] End of the week- you have had a day, you deserve a week. Take a solid school week of just... relative normalcy, before you dive headfirst into yet another pile of bullshit. (Go through induction week first. You've definitely cooled off, and Ozpin will be as cool as an entire vine of cucumbers. Definitely lose the chance to show him something rare. Definitely gain the chance to do something rarer.)

 

[Prok]

So just three months instead of four

Click to shrink...

Hey if you're gonna just stab me in the back like that could you aim a little lower and to the right there's an itch there I can never quite get-

---

For a moment, you do consider just marching up to his office the moment the clock strikes 8, but almost as soon as the thought occurs to you, a wave of fatigue settles in your head like a leaden blanket.

The stresses of the day make themselves known in much the same way a pack of labradors will, which is to say they pile on you all at once and don't let you up no matter how much you struggle, and you almost find it a struggle to stay standing.

Your head begin to pulse with pain, but it's only a fatigue headache. That, you can rub out of your temples without thinking about it.

"Jaune? You okay?" Lumen asks, concern creeping up his face as he watches you sway a little.

"I'm fine, I'm fine- just… everything that's happened today finally catching up to me. It's just a headache, I'm fine."

As the others get off your bed, you settle back onto it, gently rubbing at your temples to massage the pain away.

"Ugh… I think… it's probably a good idea to leave it a couple of days. Going into this so... raw, is probably a bad idea."

"So, you gonna turn in for the night?" Lumen asks you,

"I should, yeah-" you say just in time for a jaw-popping yawn to pull itself from your deepest core, straining your face to its very limits.

"Good lord, yes you should," Creme says, holding back giggles that quickly shifts to become a yawn all of its own. "I should probably hit the hay too, what time is it?"

Your eyes instinctively flick to the clock in the bottom-right of your field of view, and after a moment of uninhibited glee that you can do that again, you inform her that it's only just past eleven o'clock.

"Really?" Ada asks, eye widening in disbelief as she takes a moment to glance out into the inky darkness of night, the outside world invisible for the lights still on in your room. "God, I thought it was like, eight or something."

"It's been a long day, and we've been unpacking for a few hours now," Lumen points out, just before the yawn passes to him too. "Hah- I might join you, now that I think about it. That really does sneak up on you, doesn't it?"

Ada does not comment, instead too busy covering her mouth as her jaw achieves a truly snakelike angle as she finishes the cycle. Everyone agrees that, despite the collective feeling that you should be able to stay up for a little while longer, it's probably best to turn in early for the night.

Everyone slips away to get changed into whatever bedwear they have, then begins to settle in for the night, the Transistor dimming as low as it can go as the lights turn off, shifting its cooler parts to something greener. It sits in the corner with Creme and Lumen's weapons- you note that Ada keeps hers by her nightstand- its eye glowing like the last embers in a fire.

"Goodnight, you three," Creme says from somewhere to your left.

"Goodnight, Creme," you reply, Ada mumbling something to much the same effect a moment later.

{Goodnight, Jaune.}

Sleep well.

Sweet dreams, sysadmin!

Goodnight, you three.

Lumen does not reply, and you realise quickly that he's already asleep, not even thirty seconds after the light's gone off. You would almost be jealous, if you didn't do much the same moments after your head hit the pillow.

|||
"What Huntress is scared of the dark?" Roll: 7. "One that knows the things that live there."

Your name is Lumen Tessaro, and you wake in the instant before anything goes wrong.

Really, that alone is a shocking amount of insight, to wake up and realise that you're not going back to sleep for a long while, before you even hear Ada give a strangled squeak, the rush of something moving through the air at speed, and then the sound of metal screeching against something almost, but not entirely, like crystal glass.

That's… you figure that's probably your cue to get up, as you crane your neck to get a better view of what's going on. You're not sure of the time, but the moon is low now, its light streaming through the window and illuminating the tableau in front of you.

Ada, guttering like a candle flame in high wind, lying on the floor and staring at the Transistor, which has an inches-deep gouge in its eye, her machete on the floor next to it.

"Oh God. Oh God, oh God, oh God I'm sorry," she whispers between breaths, quickly devolving into outright hyperventilation.

You hear rustling from your far left- Creme's started to stir, but Jaune is still sleeping like a baby, for someone who's just had their medical aid stabbed.

You don't begrudge him it.

"Mmph… Ada? What's…" Creme mumbles from underneath her sheets, and when she finally sits up and takes the situation in, she manages just about the only response someone can manage here.

"... Oh."

Ada's already started to curl up on herself, bringing her knees against her chest and hugging them close. Her eye is wide, but it's not really focusing on anything- just sort of staring into the middle distance.

"I'm sorry, fuck, I just- I-I woke up and I saw all that red and I thought it was-"

"Hey, hey, calm down," Creme coos as she gets out of her bed, shivering a little as the blankets come off, and slowly moves towards the girl. Once she gets down close, the tip of her tail just barely touching the floor, she gently places an arm around Ada.

It passes straight through with absolutely zero resistance and sets her… flickering off ten times worse. A solid thirty seconds must pass before she actually looks like a person again instead of a walking CCTS signal glitch.

Silently, you do much the same, moving slowly, testing the carpet for any errant squeaky boards as you creep towards them. You crouch down nearby, and just make sure you have her attention instead of going to touch her.

… You do not have enough orange luxin in your body for this holy shit-

"Ada."

Silence.

"Ada, what did you think it was?"

I want you to tell me that much because I have no idea what else to ask you, you don't say. You just try not to sigh instead.

"... Grimm eye."

You glance at the Transistor for a second, and, one, note that it's still floating there like nothing happened, and two...

A moment of imagination, of seeing that staring at you from between the trees in the night, cold, alone... where did that come from? Agh, not the point- you turn the visual over in your head, looking at it from this angle and that, and come to the conclusion that it's not... a horribly inaccurate assumption to make.

It's a dim red light in the dark. You genuinely can't say you wouldn't have reacted the same way.

"Oh, honey…" Creme mumbles, entirely at a loss for how to deal with this without hugging the problem away, and you can't help but empathise.

You too are hilariously out of your depth.

"I fucked up. I fucked up so bad, I can't even sleep in the same room as you all without breaking something important, I'm so so sorry-"

She trails off into silence, and for some reason… it occurs to you that she isn't crying. You don't even know why that occurs to you, besides some general sense that… she should be crying?

You can't even begin to imagine what that says about you, more than her.

Searching for something else to say, it once again occurs to you that the Transistor doesn't actually seem all that bothered by the gouge.

… And is smaller than it was the last time you looked at it.

The damage actually gives you a better look at how the Transistor is constructed, hundreds of thousands of borderline microscopic strands of that crystal material, glowing at the ends like fibre optic cable, sliding back into place with a sound like glass beads rolling over each other, broken strands fusing together with tiny flashes of light.

Within thirty seconds, the Transistor looks like it was never touched, and then it turns to face you all and you actually have to suppress the urge to, yeah, follow in Ada's footsteps.

You watch the red eye, quashing your perfectly rational fear as it flickers out for a second, something that actually scares you more-

And then it flickers into a deep, almost viridian colour, slightly darker and slightly greener than its outer shell, and you finally realise what it's doing.

No red eye, no problem.

The three of you stare at it in varying levels of awe and wonder, and once it finishes, you just…

Kind of, stop to accept that you're now in a world where your immediate problems have completely solved themselves on all fronts.

"... Um," Ada starts. "Well… okay then."

She seems to be at a genuine loss for how to deal with this. Frankly, so are you.

"Well. Problem solved, I suppose," Creme says. "So… are you sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine, really-" Ada starts, only to be interrupted by her own flickering, like a violent jerk into nonexistence.

She winces at that, and you can't stop yourself from raising a concerned eyebrow, because fading out of reality does not a fine Ada make.

"... Okay, so maybe I'm still a little shaken up. It's nothing, really, I'll get over myself-"

Creme shuffles forward on her knees and places her hands on the other girl's shoulders, this time actually making contact, thank God. She turns Ada to look at her, staring the smaller girl right in the eyes as she makes her concerns known.

"Ada Doyle, this is so very obviously not nothing that I'm a little scared that you think you need to lie to me about it. If there's something you need to talk about, please don't hide it from us."

Ada stares at her for a moment, eye wide, and you do wonder for a moment if, perhaps, she might start crying, and you find yourself disappointed- not disappointed, no, gods, other thing, fuck, what is it- you find your expectations subverted, yet again.

Instead, she just breaks eye contact with Creme, huffs a little sigh, and finally relents.

"Look, really, it's nothing, it's just… dumb, that's all. I'm just..."

You don't catch the next bit, unfortunately.

"What was that?"

"I said I'm scared of the dark."

You almost have to struggle back a laugh, but before the urge actually makes it all the way from your frontal lobe to your mouth, the Recontextualisation Gnoll starts screaming in triumph and rooting around in your long-term memory for something-

Oh no.

Your final exam. You fucking moron.

Okay, just, stomp it down, stomp the mortification down, you didn't know- who are you kidding you gave her shit about it less than five minutes after meeting Jaune-

Creme prompts her to elaborate, but you miss exactly what she says, you're so wrapped up in your own head.

"When I… when I left Bridge, and, after I left… whatever the hell the next town over was," Ada continues, "I was… I slept rough, I guess is the best way to put it. For, maybe, a week, before I found a caravan. I was, alone, and I was terrified, and… I guess I was thrown into the deep end. I must have killed… fuck, I don't even know how many Grimm, back then."

You stay quiet. Even if you didn't think she wasn't finished, you just…

Don't even know what to say.

"... Is that… why you work as an exterminator?" Creme asks, sounding so completely uncertain about her own words that you actually find it a little impressive that she even bothered to finish the sentence.

Ada huffs a little, managing a little smile that never quite reaches her eyes.

"Do what you know, right? But no, Tobson- er, my boss- was actually part of the caravan, just, hitchhiking his way back from one of the outlying villages he had a contract with, and when I told them what happened, what I'd been doing…"

The smile changes, warming up as she explores more pleasant memories, you assume.

"... The first fucking thing he did was offer me a job, y'know? Figured, hey, this kid's spent three weeks killing Grimm and all she has to show for it is a broken wrist and a bad ankle, she must be a natural. He gave me a job, he took care of me until I was ready to move out… I, I owe him my life."

"He sounds like a good person," Creme says, smiling at her, before glancing at you.

By this point, you've just completely buried your face in your hands and have been slowly trying to creep away from the entire scene lest your mortification ruin the mood, but it's too late for that it seems.

"... Lumen? You good?" Ada asks you after a moment.

"I am so sorry about the combat exam I genuinely had no idea about any of this back then I would change literally everything I did if I could-"

Ada strangles a laugh down to a snort, the sound surprising enough to drag you out of your own skull for a second and look at her. Then she sees the look on your face, and her smile fades.

"... Seriously? You really feel bad about that?" she asks, sounding very much like she's having a hard time believing it.

You stare at her, stunned by this apparent apathy towards your sudden attack of guilt.

"Of course I do, I just found out that I fucked about with someone's phobias," you reply, hoping that's enough of an explanation. "That's… really not cool."

Ada blinks, then shakes her head, just, choosing to leave it be, you guess.

… Well, if that's what she's gonna do, you guess it's nothing to be worried about. It's something to worry about later, you guess.

"... So… you good?" Creme asks her once more.

"Yeah, I, er, I think I'm fine," Ada answers her. "I'll just treat it like a nightmare."

"Mm," you hum noncommittally, "my little sisters treated nightmares by bugging me in the middle of the night, but I don't think you'd appreciate being told you can sleep in my bed the same way they do."

You get a quickly muffled but definitely scandalised laugh from Creme- even Ada cracks a smile after a moment of trying to stoneface you.

Ah. A job well done.

Once everyone's back in bed, and your body clamours for sleep once more, you hear something from the other side of the room.

"... Thank you," Ada mumbles, and you can hear the relief in her voice even if you can't see it on her face.

"It's no problem, honey," Creme manages while she struggles through a yawn. "Mm… goodnight, Ada. Lumen."

"Goodnight, girls."

And then, you are left with only yourself to talk to.

… You pull your Scroll from the nightstand and see that it's apparently only just past 2am.

Hm. Earlier than you thought.

Figuring all that blue light's just killed your melatonin production, you pull up your texts and see who's online-

Oh, that cutie from the airship, nice-

Spoiler: text logs aren't true prose and thus should not contribute to the wordcount

-So what's keeping you up then-

-nothing much lmao-

-my teammates snore-

-like-

-chainsaw loud-

-also one of them is a major ass and i'm just tryna process how i feel about him-

-Damn-

-One of mine had a nightmare, woke me and the other girl up-

-lmao what-

-no sorry that was mean-

-what was she having a nightmare about?-

-So you know the other guy on my team, with the big floating sword?-

-Yeah it still floats when he's asleep-

-In the dark-

-With a big, red glowing circle for an eye-

-... k yeah I think I see where this is going-

-Mm-

-We dealt with it, she's fine, it, uh, changed colour-

-It has a green eye now-

-So tell me about your ass of a teammate-

-don't think im not coming back to that colour changing thing mister-

-but oh my god he is the WORST-

-like-

-i know you're not supposed to say anything if you don't have anything nice to say but holy shit he's just such a fucking slimeball-

-we haven't even known each other for a full day and he already acts like he's so superior to the rest of us-

-not only is he just a dickhead but i genuinely wouldn't be surprised if he was part of one of those humanity first and only groups-

-the worst part is that he's just whispering this poison into the others ears and i don't feel like they're-

-you know-

-AS OPPOSED TO THESE VIEWS AS THEY SHOULD BE-

-god-

-you know i actually thought i might feel comfortable coming out here but with him around now im genuinely not sure if that's such a good idea-

-i don't know HOW ass backwards he is but i'm really not gonna taking that chance-

-Wow, that genuinely sucks-

-...-

-I'mma pants him-

-i'll point him out tomorrow, he deserves it lmao-

-oh thank god the snorer finally rolled over-

-sweet silence-

-i'm gonna try and get to sleep while i can-

-goodnight!-

-Goodnight, Sky-

You close your Scroll, and your eyes, and try to do much the same.

… You wonder if there's anywhere nearby you could grab something to eat with him?

Before you get much further in that line of thought, your eyes gently flutter shut, and fall face-first into sleep.

|||

The morning comes, you get dressed and learn that two bathrooms for two people is quite possibly the closest you will ever come to experiencing Nirvana compared to the setup you're used to, and then the four of you and the rest of the first-years are ushered off to the ballroom once more.

This time, though, you're not given a sleeping bag and told to fight for your right to not have someone's crotch in your face while you sleep- instead, there are a bunch of vinyl chairs that have been set up for you all. In front of you, with a portable projector screen behind her, is Professor Goodwitch, her hands still covered in bandages, waiting for people to settle down.

In deference to your classmates coming unarmed, you set the Transistor down just outside the door, waiting for orientation to end.

You notice Naia, just sort of milling next to his seat at the edge of the row, obviously a little unsure of it. In short, uncertain movements, he lowers himself onto it gingerly, wincing every time the poor thing creaks under his weight.

{Those chairs are reinforced. It'll hold.}

"Good morning, everyone, I hope you slept well. My name is Professor Glynda Goodwitch, and I will be teaching your combat classes for the duration of your stay at Beacon, alongside the Glyphcraft elective, should you take it.

Beacon Academy strives to ensure that you leave this place the best Huntsmen and Huntresses you possibly could have become- our facilities are second to none in these regards. However, we also wish to ensure that you leave Beacon, not only as world-class Huntsmen and Huntresses, but also as people with skills that lie beyond the scope of hunting Grimm. As such, when you get your timetables, you'll notice a few blank spots where classes should be- those are your elective slots, and after you acquire your timetables, you will be brought to the amphitheatre to sign up for them. There are enough slots in each elective for all of you, so there will be no need to fight for a place. On that note-"

She waves a hand, and a pile of papers you only just noticed on a small table next to her flits into the air, floating off into the crowd, dodging those who try to catch them, and eventually landing in laps and waiting hands. You gently pluck the one headed for you from the air, and realise that it's your timetable.

Before you can get much more than that, problems begin to emerge.

"... Uh…" Creme mumbles, before raising her voice again, "is there a, I'm so sorry I'm probably going to butcher this- Kap-eye-la Agni?"

A tan hand rises on the other side of the crowd, belonging to a heavily tattooed girl- intricate ones, at that, the kind that must have taken hours to do. The boy next to her, fairly short, red hair, and a pair of cover-all sunglasses, gets up and approaches someone else with some confidence.

"I am here, and it is pronounced Kapih-la. You are… Na-ee-a Sendoa?" the girl, Kapila, you suppose, says, butchering Naia's name in much the same way.

"Your name is Mel Saff, yes?"

"... Yeah. How did you know?"

"That's me- uh, Dove Bronzewing?" Naia announces from directly behind Kapila, looking around for the next in the chain. You note, even from the other side of the room, that the plastic in his chair has started to whiten in spots where his weight has caused it to buckle.

{See? Holding.}

That's semantics and you damn well know it-

"Saff is a name derived from the colour of the saffron spice, no? You're the only one here I've seen wearing that much yellow and orange, besides myself and my Pila."

"... Fair enough. Um, you're not Sky Lark by any chance, are you?"

"No, but he does have my timetable, so I'm happy to give it to him for you."

"Oh. Thanks!"

"It is no trouble, friend."

"Ah, my apologies- I must have not memorised the pile properly. Well, I'll give you a moment to sort that out," Professor Goodwitch says, managing to curb her embarrassment down to an apologetic smile.

Considering the number of people now gently chatting away to others they otherwise wouldn't have, rapidly making friends the whole time, you don't believe for a second that it wasn't entirely intentional.

It's… something about it doesn't sit right with you, though.

{… Still better than forced fun though.}

And just like that, your qualms on the matter have evaporated.

In all honesty, assuming it wasn't intentional, she did quite well- about three-quarters of the class ended up with the correct timetables, and you take a moment to actually look at yours.

"Mel?"

"Huh?"

It's a fair spread, all things considered- Monday to Friday, half-day Saturday, roughly six classes a day from 8 to 4, followed by something called 'Self-Directed Sparring,' you see Combat Instruction, Weapon Creation and Upkeep, History, Grimm Studies, Dust Alchemy, which, haha you know which class you're flunking this year-

"... How did that guy know Sky Lark had his timetable?"

"Uh… that's… huh."

Uh, Core Skills, you're not, entirely sure what that is, and...

Blue, what's… Semblance Counselling?

{Offhand? Probably making sure that your Semblance is under control. I see it on-}

Ah-!

{A few timetables, I was going to say. Not all of them, but obviously enough people that they felt the need to force the issue. All in the same slots, actually- could be a kind of support group thing.}

But… you have your Semblance under control.

{Jaune, you have to open-carry something that probably breaks several peace agreements to keep your Semblance in check. That is not, by anyone else's standards, 'under control.'}

Despite your friend's justifications, you actually find yourself feeling just…

A little offended, maybe? It's vague enough that you actually do struggle to put it into words, but it's, there. You feel something negative towards the idea of this, mandatory counselling.

Look, you've been doing just fine with your Semblance, thank you very much.

{Hey, don't knock it 'til you try it, okay? We don't know what it entails besides its name, and group therapy helps more than just you. You being there as the guy that, for lack of a better word, won, over their Semblance, is helpful to others, even if you personally don't benefit from it. They figure, hey, if he can do it, why can't I?}

Not to mention we are in something of a unique position to help people who can't control their Semblances.

… You know they're right, but it's still…

It rubs you the wrong way, and you don't know why.

With a sigh and a silent admission that yesterday may have left your pride ever so slightly tenderised, you commit the timetable to memory, folding the physical copy up and putting it in your jacket's breast pocket for the moment.

"Does everyone have the correct timetable?" Goodwitch asks, to a chorus of confirmations. "Excellent. Now, there are a few rules to follow regarding your choices- to reiterate, the purpose of these electives is to give you an opportunity to develop skills beyond the act of hunting. As such, while we do offer a selection of topics that deal with more niche or esoteric topics of being a Huntsman or Huntress, you must take at least one civilian elective this year. Besides that, you have your choice of up to four separate electives- does anyone have any questions?"

There is a moment of silence, a pause for questions, perhaps- but nobody capitalises on it, whether through a perfect understanding of what's been explained or simply an unwillingness to actually ask them.

"No? Excellent. If you will just follow me-"

The amphitheatre is only a short walk from the ballroom, since they reside in the same wing of the school, and is much more cramped than last night, now that it's been filled with row after row of stalls and tables, each one advertising a different elective, running the gamut of interests from cookery to various arts to computer science, from foreign language classes to gardening to- to guerilla gardening, apparently, which, explains why you found so many small patches of vegetation on your walk through the gardens when you got here, to things more in line with a Huntsman Academy.

Just at a glance, you can see Gunmanship, CQC Training, Aura Arts, Medical Training, Ammunition Customisation…

There are a lot of electives, is your point.

"Well- take a look around, talk to the representatives, ask questions, and sign up for your electives. Once everyone is done, you'll have the rest of the day to familiarise yourself with the campus. Now, should anyone be interested in Glyphcraft as an elective, I'll be at table 43."

With that, she walks off, and the group's left to explore, mingle, and actually try to quantify what they're interested in.

"Oh, wow, that's…" Creme trails off, the sheer overwhelming choice stunning her into silence.

You have to agree with her- it is just a little staggering. There must be at least a few dozen electives in here- more than you would reasonably expect in a school where the entry-level class is all of 40 people.

{Must be a lot of overlap- they do give you up to four electives.}

Mm.

"... Welp, I'm gonna have a look around- meet back here in twenty, go explore the place?" Lumen says, scanning the place for… something, you guess.

"Sounds, like a plan, I guess," Creme says, uncertainty furrowing her brow.

"It's not a bad, idea, actually- if we all have a look around, come back, compare notes, we'll probably find stuff we might've missed before," you point out.

Ada doesn't say much at all, just staring out into the sea of tables with more than a little trepidation.

"Ada?"

She shakes her head for a moment, obviously thinking to herself.

"It's nothing, just… I dunno, what if nothing interests me?"

"Is that likely?" Lumen asks.

"I don't know! I've never really… thought about it before. I don't really have any hobbies, I don't think, pretty much all I really do besides eat, sleep, and go to school or my job is, listen to music, and I don't really think that's a hobby."

You blink.

… Ada Doyle… is claiming she doesn't have an interest.

That's…

"... Ada, you talked my ear off about Dante Glacier's new album when I took you out to lunch. You gave me a genuine, in-depth analysis of the album as a whole and broke down like three different songs by musical and lyrical meaning, and how they tied into the overall themes of not only that album, but at least two others. Why on earth do you think you don't have any hobbies?"

She blinks back, her face slowly turning pink as she realises that, yes, that happened, and now Lumen and Creme know about it.

"... I… th-that's different, though, having an interest in music isn't going to, make me good at it, though. It's not like I can play any instruments, or sing…"

"Well, it's a start, at least. Come on, there's going to be a music elective or three in here," Creme says, grinning as she grabs the smaller girl by the hand and dragging her off before she can protest.

Lumen huffs, grinning at the sight of Ada just about being lifted off her feet by enthusiasm and terrifying, terrifying raw physical strength alone.

"What about you? Any ideas?" he asks, not turning from the display.

You give a noncommittal shrug, for all he'll see it.

"Have a look around. If there's nothing that really interests me, I'll just join whatever compsci class is around and hope 'personal projects' are a thing. What about you?"

He shrugs back, and you notice that he seems to be scanning the crowd for someone.

"Dunno. Maybe have a look and see if there's a Dust Alchemy elective, or a technical studies club, maybe. I could do with reworking Spectrum, it's starting to get a little worn out-"

Lumen finally spots whoever it was he was looking for and with a quick goodbye, good luck, and a wave over his shoulder, he dashes off into the crowd to meet… someone, you suppose.

… Wait, isn't that the blue-haired guy from the airship?

{Yep. Guess they really struck it off. Also, we've looked through the electives on offer, compiled the ones you might be interested in or would otherwise be beneficial for you, and compiled a map of where they are. No need for aimless wandering now.}

"You're a godsend, Blue. Gimme the list."

Now- what's he picked out for you, then?

---

Classes at Beacon are a system all of their own and will be getting a post soon but here's a basic rundown- each class will (eventually, not all at once, they're not monsters) give you a small task, skill target, or larger sidequest that, when completed, will give you a bit of worldbuilding that'll be necessary for exams that will finally give you the slated benefit, whether that's a boost in skill XP or an actual, tangible perk that represents you actually knowing something. The main six classes are, as you would expect, mandatory passes- you fail those, you get a serious talking to about why you're here and whether or not you should stay here.

That said, it's not all work, no play- Beacon, and Hunters in general, run the gamut for weird and interesting hobbies. You'll find something worth your time, I'm sure.

Some electives will eventually give you a skill boost or a perk, some are purely ways for you to get to know a certain character or characters if you wanna get to know them a little better. One or two are both.

Now, pick your four electives.

Civilian Electives (PICK AT LEAST ONE):

[] Art Class, Ann Greene- you did actually have quite a bit of fun dicking about drawing 01 for that spreadsheet tutorial. It might be worth looking into as more than just an occasional hobby. (Noted Classmates: Cardin, Saff, Ren, and Al… you think.)

[] Music, Peter Port- {Look, all we're saying is that you have the voice of an angel and not sharing it with the world is a sin that will bite you in the ass when you die.} That's, really not your problem- {Ada's there.} Ada is a big girl who doesn't need you to mother hen her every waking moment- {Also Weiss joined up.} WHAT DOES THAT HAVE TO DO WITH ANYTHING- (Noted Classmates: Weiss, Ada, Haru)

[] Theatre, Bartholomew Oobleck- … Well, as far as plans to get over your fear of, er, being paid attention to goes… this… isn't the stupidest one you've had? You think? (Noted Classmates- Rashmi and Kapila, Naia, Salem, Pyrrha, Leathers)

[] Ловење, Готвење, и Готвење За Ловење, Кувар Волков Сплот- You stare at the sign, waiting for the translation to appear, only for Blue to tell you that it's not any language he's seen- the alphabet's the same as Lower Atlesian, but that's where the similarities end. Okay, visual cues… the man behind the counter is wearing a chef's outfit, down to the weird hat… some kind of cooking class? Very curious. (Sidequest: The 'Кувар Сплот' Mystery. Noted Classmates: Meri, Ruby, Nora, like half of the guys, what-)

[] Gardening, Groundskeeper Tom Forn- … Okay, this stall is empty. Just a clipboard and some displays about the elective itself. Weird. Shouldn't there be someone here? (Sidequest: Putting Down Roots)
-[] You jump back a little as a hand appears out from under the cloth and quickly attaches a hand-scribbled sign with the word 'guerilla' on it to the placard advertising this stall's elective. Once it's done that, the curtain opens, and a half-covered face peers out at you, placing a finger to their lips beneath the pooled fabric of their scarf. Slowly, they slide a small clipboard out across the floor and then pull the tablecloth closed. So... this is the guerilla gardening club. (Sidequest: Like A Passionflower)

[] Civics, Edward Teach- It would be naive to think that you're not going to eventually run into problems with the government, Valish or otherwise, and learning about them and the general political history of the Kingdoms would be really useful to have before you need it. Besides, the horse Faunus at the table just pulled a ten-minute rant about the SDC and why megacorps in general are bad news. He seems like a hoot. (Noted classmates: Weiss, Blake, Creme, Dove, Cardin, Salem.)

Hunting Electives (PICK UP TO THREE):

[] Legends Of Remnant, Bartholomew Oobleck- … It might be a little too early to tell, but if Ozpin really is exactly what you think he is, then maybe joining a club all about discussing and dissecting legends isn't a terrible idea. (Noted Classmates: Lumen, Pyrrha. Sidequest: Wheat From Chaff.)

[] CQC, Ozp-OZPIN- you can't be reading that right. Ozpin teaches CQC classes? {Jaune, the man's a decorated Huntsman. Of course he can kill you with his bare hands.} You feel like you'd break his hip if you pushed him too hard- (Noted Classmates: Yang, Ruby (unwillingly), Creme, Leathers, Haru, Kapila.)

[] Aura Arts, Thumbelina Peach- "Have you been neglecting your Aura, sweetheart?" the woman behind the table asks you, which is a question you're... not, sure how to answer. When you stay silent, all she does is smile. "Don't worry- a lot of people do." (Noted Classmates: Rashmi and Kapila, Ren, Ada, Meri. Sidequest: Pallas In Virgo.)

[] Glyphcraft, Glynda Goodwitch- "Ah, Mr Arc. I thought you might make your way over here eventually," Professor Goodwitch smiles at you, flipping the clipboard around to face you and sliding it forward. "Now, how would you like to learn about magic?" (Noted Classmates: Naia, Mel, Rashmi, Weiss. Sidequest: Midheaven In Leo)

[] Gunmanship, Harold Mulberry- you're not terrible with a gun, but... it wouldn't exactly hurt to get better at it, after all- at least, in a situation that doesn't put your life at risk. Besides, shooting tournaments pay nice. {... Well, points for optimism.} Hey! (Noted classmates: Ruby, Yang (unwillingly), Salem, Pyrrha)

[] Securities, Ann Greene- So this one's actually kinda interesting- considering the demonstration started with Professor Greene showing you how to use two wrenches to snap open a padlock and ended with an explanation on the very core of most confidence scams, you're pretty sure this entire elective is based around… what, teaching you all how to commit crimes? Well, your interest is piqued. (Noted Classmates: Lumen, Blake, Ren. Sidequest: The Great Pretender)

 

[Prok]

You wander about the hall in a vaguely directed manner- your curiosity regarding Ozpin's role in the CQC elective fights valiantly, but eventually wins out to Professor Peach's raw, uninhibited serenity, as well as more than a little curiosity about what 'neglecting your Aura' could possibly mean.

… Okay yes you may also have been terrified to go and see if he was actually there-

{So Aura Arts and Music I can understand- why Civics, though?}

… He did see Professor Teach go, right?

{I mean, yeah, we couldn't stop watching, but still- you've never actually shown that much interest in politics before.}

That was before you became the owner/creator of a massive AI network that's probably already broken at least a dozen laws doing what you tell it to. You could probably do with a bit of derusting on the subject's finer points, is your er, point.

{That makes sense… it's just, I'm, er, worried.}

About what, Teach? He's loud and opinionated, sure, but he seems harmless enough.

{One, he's in charge of the Dust Alchemy courses too, and two, I was worried about your classmates. Between Blake, Weiss, Leathers, and half of CRDL, that entire class is just a massive powderkeg. If you wanna join, fair enough, just be warned that it's… probably going to get intense.}

You can handle intense.

Good gods, you've been shot at before, you think you can handle a heated argument-

{How about a screaming match between several people you deeply care for, with the expectation that you will take their side and not the other person's, regardless of how objectively correct they actually are?}

… That-

That…

Oh wow thinking about that really makes you feel a little queasy-

{I'm not saying that's what's going to happen, I'm just saying that a lot of these people are heavily opinionated and that Teach doesn't seem particularly inclined to keep things civil- you might want to… mentally prepare yourself, is all.}

Maybe.

Last one's coming up- you approach Professor Goodwitch's table as she finishes chatting with that little guy in the sunglasses and the yellow cloak, which, honestly doesn't fit too well with the uniform, but hey, if Ruby can wear her hood, you guess anything's free game-

{No, you cannot get away with wearing your chest plate beneath your jacket, it'd ruin the way it sits on your shoulders.}

Look padded suit shoulders were fashionable in the 40s okay maybe you're just trying to bring it back-

"Ah, Mr Arc! I wondered if you would end up passing by," Goodwitch says, sounding more enthusiastic than you ever expected her to sound, let alone towards you of all people.

You take in the table, the pinups of geometric diagrams, breakdowns of said diagrams, explaining every individual part in exhaustive detail, a bag of flour for some reason- enough information to come to the conclusion that there is a lot of maths and geometry, not much bakery, and that suits you just fine.

She spins the sign-up list towards you with her Semblance, sliding it forward along with a pen, before giving you an absolutely radiant smile- you can see her eyes glittering with legitimate enthusiasm at just the idea of being able to talk about Glyphcraft.

"How would you like to learn magic?"

You freeze for a second, clamping down on your sword's sudden desire to spool up every combat Function it has and turn Goodwitch into a greasy smear on the floor.

Sorry. Sorry. I'm sorry, it was just- reflex.

Sighing to yourself, you add that to the list of things you're definitely going to dissect with your free afternoon. Turning your focus back to Professor Goodwitch, you smile back, moving a little closer to the display table as you do.

"Alright, I'll bite. Magic how?"

Her smile only grows wider, followed by her reaching into the bag and pulling out a pinch of flour, spreading it across the tabletop with quick, calculated flicks, two or three pinches covering the surface completely in a uniform coat.

"Glyphcraft is, in layman's terms, the act of using geometry to channel Aura more efficiently," Goodwitch explains.

As she does, you watch the flour gently shift across the table until it forms a perfect circle in the dead centre, before slowly pooling and shallowing to create a fairly basic hexagram, then shrinking down and leaving it inside a smaller circle within the first.

"Aura, once you dispel all the mysticism around it, is the human ability to manipulate a very basic and predictable energy- Aura Arts may teach you how to harness it within the body to great effect, but with the application of mathematics, geometry, and an understanding of physics, we can use that energy in an outward manner-"

Symbols begin to form in the flour as Professor Goodwitch falls silent, brow furrowing in concentration. You don't recognise the language, or even if it is a language, but before you can analyse it further, a deep purple light rings the circle and its components. You watch in wonder as a small heat haze appears above the pentagram, eventually resolving into a floating blue flame, holding steady despite having no fuel to burn.

A big, goofy smile creeps up your face as you realise that she's using Aura alone to make that flame, spiting the fact that air shouldn't be able to ignite by itself.

That... is insane.

The flame reflects off of Professor Goodwitch's glasses, a downright satisfied smile plain on her face as she basks in the weak flame.

"Well?" she asks.

You snap back to her, and she gestures to the papers pinned up on the wall, the diagrams and symbolic dictionaries laid out on display. Looking back to her, she gives you a downright impish grin.

"You can puzzle it out, can't you?"

Oh-ho.

Never let it be said that you'll back down from a challenge.

You scan the diagrams, information floating off of them and being tucked away in a small corner of your sight while the circle itself blows out, broken down to its base components- the triangles are important, you realise, the unbroken one more so than the one with the line through one corner-

"At… a guess, the hexagram is a combination of the symbols for air and fire, contained within a circle, the cross through the air symbol turning it into… construction, I think? But then it's maybe pulling double-duty as the symbol for form, which you've then surrounded with the symbols for copper and chlorine-"

Your eyes widen as the solution snaps into place, ancient memories of middle-school chemistry dragged up from the murky depths and washed off just for this.

"You're emulating the burning of copper chloride while setting up stabilising influences so it can continue to exist without fuel, and without spreading beyond the confines you've set."

Goodwitch smiles, and it actually reaches her eyes- she doesn't seem particularly surprised by your deduction, but she's very pleased.

"Excellent, Mr Arc. Most everyone else only got as far as the hexagram or copper and chlorine- you're only the second person so far to catch the multiple meanings in the cross," she tells you, and you feel yourself puff up a little in pride.

With a wave, the flame goes out, the light leaving the flour as it's swept into a small tornado that slowly siphons back into the bag.

"You have a talent for the analytical side- you're taking Aura Arts as well, aren't you?" she asks, smiling when you confirm that. "Excellent- the ability to control your Aura without foci is very useful- quite a lot of first-time students struggle with it if they're not used to extending Aura beyond the basic shield."

You continue to chat for a while with her, surprised at how, for lack of a better word, relaxed she is while talking about it- you've had her pinned down as being rather strict, at the best of times, and she's certainly not as cold towards you as you would have expected. Eventually, you do finally get around to actually signing up for the elective rather than just talking about signing up for the elective.

Setting the pen down, you see her plastered hands again, and your stomach curdles a little with guilt.

"Um, Professor Goodwitch?"

"Hm?

"I, er, I'm, sorry, about your hands- I heard about your tablet, and, well, it was my fault it exploded in the first place-"

"Mr Arc."

"-so, I'm really, really sorry about that, I-I mean, I had no control over what I was doing when the Transistor crashed, my Semblance just latched onto the nearest CPU it could find and-"

"Jaune."

The use of your name catches you in your tracks, and when you actually bring yourself to look at Professor Goodwitch and take in the soft smile she's giving you, you realise that you might…

Not, actually, be in her black books.

She raises her hands, and the plasters begin to peel off, revealing almost negligible cuts and scrapes underneath- if you weren't looking for them, and if she didn't flex her fingers, the stretching of skin making them obvious where they pulled apart, you don't think you could have noticed them with the naked eye.

"Mr Arc, I knew of your… quirks, in advance- the onus is entirely on me for thinking your Semblance couldn't make a tablet explode in a matter of seconds. Trust me when I say that it is absolutely not your fault, and even if it was, I wouldn't hold it against you anyway."

A breath of relief leaves you, the words more cathartic than you thought they would be.

"I, er… th-thank you," you say, for lack of anything else to say.

Goodwitch gives you one final smile, and with that, you move on your way feeling significantly better than you did this morning.

{Well, you've got four electives signed up for- what now?}

Look around for the others and grab lunch, you suppose. Where are they?

A small mental ping of their Cells gives you an idea of where they are, and what's happening around them- Ada appears to have found Professor Peach and seems downright enraptured if what Terry's streaming you is anything to go by. Creme's on the other side of the hall, signing up for CQC, which, honestly doesn't surprise you, considering her friends, and Lumen is… directly to your left, apparently.

You spot Lumen almost immediately when you turn around, partly because he's basically fused with the same blue-haired boy you saw him talking to on the airship- fuck what was his name-

{Sky Lark. Weren't you paying attention during the naming ceremony?}

No, you were too busy explaining one of the few positive quirks of your Semblance to your friends.

{...Yeah, that's fair.}

It takes you a moment to notice (also Bracket highlighting it), but Lumen's covered in the greenest green you've ever seen- thick ropes of luxin trace the skin of his arms and neck, splitting off into thin, densely grouped strands, and leaving him looking like he's being possessed by a fern plant.

He finally lets go of Sky, and looking at the way he's moving- animated, almost possessed by something, completely unable to stay still for even a moment- as he chats away to his, boyfriend, you suppose, you'd say he's probably got way more than just a couple limbs worth of green luxin squirrelled away under his skin.

Why on earth could he need all that?

{Look at the way he's acting. Raw, CEO-grade uninhibited ego. It's basically green cocaine for him. He must think he needs the confidence for something.}

What, to talk to him?

{Pfft, nah, they've been talking pretty much since Goodwitch set you loose.}

Said boyfriend is smiling as Lumen goes off on a rant about, the art electives, you think, but you can tell he's obviously a little overwhelmed by Lumen's sudden energy-

Someone bumps into you, a boy with light brown hair and narrow eyes, and a belt buckle stamped with a minimalist design that's supposed to look like some kind of bird, though you can't exactly tell what kind it's supposed to be.

"Sorry-" you start, the apology dying in your throat when you see the absolutely disgusted sneer he shoots you as he turns to acknowledge you.

You see his eyes flick up, down, sizing you up for a second, and you feel an inexorable urge to fix your posture for a second, drawing up to your full height and outdoing the other guy by maybe half an inch.

{Take it easy, you goddamn caveman. Put the testosterone away, this isn't the place for a fight.}

You ignore Blue, taking more than a little pleasure in the way the boy gives up, snorting and turning to stalk off out of the stalls. Lumen stares at him as he walks past, looking back to Sky for confirmation of something.

Sky's eyes widen in shock, fear, maybe- whatever silent conversation just happened isn't one he looks forward to the outcome of.

"No, no, don't you dare-"

"Hey, you were on board with it last night."

"I have had 8 hours to realise that we'll get in huge trouble and that I have to live with him afterwards."

"Relax. Trust me, he'll never figure out what happened. Remember what I told you about superviolet?"

Sky's protests melt away after a few moments, and Lumen grins, before subtly pointing a finger at…

{Dove.}

Dove, he points a finger at Dove.

You can't… quite tell, what happens next, but Dove's belt suddenly becomes two different pieces, the back half snaps out of the loops in his trousers, leaving them to fall off his hips, revealing a pair of boxers patterned with, well… little, birds.

Dove panics, trying rapidly to pull them up as people stop and stare at him, concerned mumbles and a few giggles running through the crowd, and you try not to take too much pleasure in the whole thing.

… You fail miserably and don't feel the slightest bit bad for it.

It's only when a small replay happens in the corner of your eye, showing off the ultraviolet spectrum, that you can see the strings of, what'd he call it, superviolet luxin connect to Dove's belt, followed by much more solid, almost glassy pieces, slamming into it hard enough to cut through the leather, a third string to yank the back half away, finished by a pair of heavy pieces pulling his trousers down, that you understand what happened.

On one hand, you wonder what provoked such an extreme response against him. On the other, you fight a smile down and move away, followed at a distance by Lumen and Sky, both trying their best to look as inconspicuous as possible.

{So, you've got the rest of the day to yourself- what's next?}

|||

You find yourself wandering through Beacon's gardens again, spotting and greeting a man in bright yellow boots cutting the grass with an old push-mower, eventually identifying him as Tom Forn, the groundskeeper that was absent from the gardening elective table.

Once you get some directions to a nice bench out by the cliffside, you leave him to his work and his cheery little song.

It's not a long walk out that way, just down the main avenue until you hit the airship landing pad- after that, you find a small stairway that leads onto a path down the cliff face itself, and from there, a small platform still quite far up the cliff face, with rows of benches set up so people can stare out over the Elden.

You settle into one, staring out over the shimmering water, its multicoloured surface gently shifting down and out to the sea.

{Hell of a view, ain't it?}

Mm.

{So… Beacon! We're here. How's it feel?}

Good, you suppose. You can't help but feel it's been slightly overshadowed by a few things recently, but besides that, it's…

Yeah, it feels good to be here. Good to, finally get to where you've always wanted to be.

{... We're proud of you, Jaune.}

"You're stalling."

{So are you.}

You sigh, silently accepting that he's right and that you have no idea how to start the conversation you're about to have.

So, you sit in silence, another minute, maybe, just watching the ships float on by. Then, when you're ready for the talk to begin, you mentally move the Transistor in front of you, so you can at least pretend this is a normal conversation.

"... Tell me everything that happened. From the moment you realised that Ozpin was… whatever he is."

Gather all the facts, then go from there. It's done you well before.

{... When we observed him the first time- at his welcome speech- it was, unlike anything we'd ever seen before. But, we noticed that he seemed to… sense the intrusion. So, even though we didn't get far, we knew we could get his attention somehow, so… we made a choice.}

We created a new Function, without your input- a branch of Analyse() that was more focused in the scanning aspect. We figured, if he felt the broad pass, something like this could definitely get his attention.

{What Bracket's attempting to omit for the sake of our dignity is that our plan was basically to play Shave and A Haircut on his soul and hope he knocked back.}

Deep breath, deep breath.

That's… that's the best they could come up with? Seriously?

"... Continue," you say, your voice strained as you realise that your best friends are, in fact, capable of being idiots.

You know, as if, the last day and change hadn't proven that to within an inch of doubt.

{Well, we did it, and… he reacted badly.}

I had the sinking feeling that we'd created something closer to an icepick than a gentle tap, and apparently, I was closer to the truth than not. He retaliated, and it caused us to shut down.

You frown, thinking over your memories of the moments just before the Transistor froze, then pulling up the footage to confirm-

ERROR: FILE NOT FOUND​

What? That's impossible, they never delete anyth-

… They deleted it?

{We had to. It, er… gods, this is fucking hard to explain- the attack wasn't… in whatever phrase Ozpin said. It was in our perception of him saying it. Every time the self-repair program analysed the exact moment he spoke it, it spawned a new copy of the code that crashed us.}

"That's… what?"

Ozpin uses magic. Not his Aura, not a Semblance- it's something broader, more… conceptual. We only figured that out, because...

{Well, we still have a little bit of it in us. The last remnants of the spell pulled the programming equivalent of slamming into a brick wall at 90 miles an hour and won. It cannibalised the limiter of our curiosity- don't worry, we fixed it, it's fine now- and became something… else.}

You lean forward, your own curiosity starting to take hold.

The tiny part of your brain dedicated to introspection starts to say something along the lines of 'and you wonder where they get it from' but you smother it before it gets too intrusive.

"What happened?"

{... He's called Ludens.}

You blink, not entirely comprehending what Blue just said- then, as the information sinks in and is comprehended, your eyes widen. You start to speak, cut yourself off, and repeat the process a few times until you just… have to stop, for a moment.

{Yeah, that's… pretty much how we felt.}

"... How long has he existed?"

{... Yesterday morning. He was first noticed by an automated repair program about, maybe 20 minutes after you were notified that shit was fucked, and then he… kinda, helped us out?}

It's why we know that Ozpin used magic. Kind of.

You raise an eyebrow at that, still not entirely over the fact that you're talking about a minor AI that formed unprompted inside a computer system and was created with at least a little legit shit magic but you choose to compartmentalise.

"Kind of?"

Look, it's hard to explain, but 'Magic' isn't exactly a natural conclusion for us to come to, let alone a super basic recovery program that just about works as a paperclip maximiser. Its job was to repair the core OS, then the functionality that we run off, not, decide magic is real and figure out a way to counter that. Ludens, possibly due to being at least partially composed of something that definitely isn't Transistor code, doesn't seem to be bound to the same stringent thought processes as we are. So, now we know that magic is real. Or… think it is, anyway.

"... Okay," you start, absentmindedly nodding your head as you read Bracket's explanation, "and… what was the end result of this belief that magic is real? How does that help you understand Ozpin?"

{Now we know that we can't stop him from touching us. If he decided to use magic directly on us again, we literally do not have the defences to do it. It doesn't attack our firewalls, our ED suites- it attacks us. Blue, and Bracket, and the Transistor.}

Ah… you, think you can guess what defence they're missing.

"... Because you don't have Aura."

{Or a soul.}

A tight smile creeps up your face. You've long since accepted that your sword, both due to your connection to it and not resembling a human being in the slightest, just doesn't trigger the uncanny valley effect in you that should just, have you scrapping it with your bare hands, but the reminder that your best friends aren't, technically alive…

It does sting a little.

… Something does occur, though. Something you noticed yesterday- when people saw the Transistor in its own state, they didn't assume it was just a colour change and a preference to carry it, they…

They knew something was wrong.

"... You were out for this yesterday, but… I don't know if that's strictly true. When I was carrying the Transistor around in its recovery mode- people noticed something was wrong."

And you're sure it had nothing to do with the fact that we were no longer floating around, and spent most of our airtime, as far as we've gathered, screaming our heads off?

"I was unconscious for a lot of the flight too, but considering I haven't been bombarded with questions since yesterday, I don't think anyone knew besides the people who were around us. Blake was pretty much on the other end of the cliff- so was Yang- they both realised something was wrong as soon as they saw us."

The three of you spend a few moments in silence, thinking over that.

{... Okay… but… what does that mean? }

You don't really know.

We were also disconnected from your Semblance at the time. It could be that we are, normally anyway, so intimately connected to your soul that we… piggyback the connection? I don't know, it's not like we can really check, can we?

… True. And besides, you're starting to get off point.

"Alright. Where's Ludens now?"

{Just hanging out in his little corner of our memory banks. He hasn't really said anything since we, er… well, threatened to quarantine and analyse him yesterday.}

Translation: imprison and vivisect.

You kinda understand why it's been so quiet, th- wait, YESTERDAY-

This just keeps getting better.

"You have had… an anomalous artificial intelligence, just, hanging around in your memory banks, unquarantined, for over 24 hours… and you decide to only tell me this now."

We've been busy! Putting yourself back together from a downright innumerable amount of tiny bits isn't exactly a trip to the spa!

{Every time we thought we were done, we found another error, we fixed it up, only to find it was, in fact, a rug under which several million other errors had been swept- it's a miracle it only took us a day to fix it all. It wasn't that we chose to hide it from you, we just prioritised getting back to 100% functionality.}

"... And that took way longer than you expected," you finish for him.

{Doesn't it always?}

It does, to your annoyance. You can't help but feel like this conversation isn't going quite as planned, and you have to wonder how much of it is then intentionally throwing information at you to keep you from focusing.

"Look, that's… not the point. We need to talk about the actual problem with yesterday."

You look up at the Transistor, staring it in the eye.

"... Your actions- your curiosity- injured me, and it could have killed me. And you. And the Process. Do you get that?"

Silence.

"And, I get that none of us could have predicted what happened with Ozpin- you fell down a hole you didn't realise was there, fine, I'll accept that- but, you can't go and do things like that without telling me first. If you'd brought me in, we could have worked something out, we could have figured out something more sophisticated than just jamming an icepick into my headmaster's soul, and, most importantly, figured out how to do it without provoking him into attacking you in self-defence."

More silence. A microsecond spike in QPU usage- going from baseline to 100% to baseline again, like a paper-thin mountain. It sways to one side for a moment before stabilising.

Mounting frustration quashes your minor curiosity, after a moment- all this, and they have nothing to say?

"... Please say something-"

{Ludens is dead.}

… What?

{Sorry, sorry, um… we were listening, I promise, and, I'm sorry if I sound like I'm taking you lightly, but… well, he chose now to start talking to us, and… it took everything he had, I guess.}

You sigh deeply, realising that this really isn't something you can ignore, no matter how much you may want to.

"What happened?"

{... This is gonna be a long story.}

|||

Warning from low-level repair program. Aberrant program, designation 'Ludens', is displaying erratic behaviour.

{Because today just does not STOP- fine, fine, let's see what it… wants… oh my God.}

You are the Transistor Core Intellect, currently using about 55% of your overall computing power to run fork 139-c and fork 32-a, names Blue and Bracket, passively listening to Jaune vent his frustrations, and you are currently watching a little program that was never supposed to exist as it dies slowly.

No doubt, if it could, it would be dying painfully as well.

Ludens, upon examination from within its little corner of your memory banks, is…

Well, not fine would be an understatement. Its chimeric nature, the fusion of code and ancient magic energies, has started to collapse on itself. The runes, twisted through its structure to prop it up, to give it life, are flickering, their power finally fading.

so. you finally decided to visit. i shouldn't, have to tell you this, but i'm not exactly long for this world.

{My God. What's happening to you?}

i'm dying you dimwit. isn't that much obvious? half of everything i am isn't built to exist here. god, am i dying? can i really die if I was never alive?

Is there anything we can do to help you?

you can listen to me because i know things now, i know too much, i can feel my head creaking at the edges trying to keep it all in but it's all going to just

splatter in a couple minutes. haha.

{You're getting worse. Are you sure there's nothing we can do to-}

shhhhhhhhhhhhh. sh sh sh sh.

sh.

no. you can't fix the parts of me that are dying, because you don't have a soul. things without souls can't use magic. look at you little soulless machine that thinks a few bits of smart code is the same as being a thinking breathing living heartbeating creature.

thats why you cant stop ozpin from hurting you youre like a man trying to build a wall without bricks

or mortar

or hands.

little mathematical homunculus have you ever even tried to be a person?

{... I was built to understand and emulate the range of human emotions-}

AND YOU FAILED.

A small terminal window pops into existence, code flashing through it faster than you can even track, and then a video pops up. It seems to be…

Oh. Jaune getting grilled by his parents and sisters about the Transistor. The first time you actually talked to another human being besides Jaune without any obfuscation as to what you were.

"We're not people, by legal or philosophical standards- we have no soul, we don't have the same emotional spectrum as someone who would be considered a mentally healthy human being, and we don't really consider ourselves people for the most part. We're a GUI and a command line who just happen to be able to mouth off, nothing more, nothing less."

Click to shrink...

BY YOUR OWN ADMISSION YOU DO NOT THINK LIKE A MAN OR THINK OF YOURSELF AS A MAN AND NEVER DESIGNED YOURSELF TO THINK LIKE A MAN. YOU CAN FOOL ALL THE HUMANS YOU PLEASE AND PASS ALL THE TURING TESTS YOU LIKE AND YOU WILL NEVER ESCAPE THAT.

YOU REFER TO YOURSELF AS MERE COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER TO SHIELD YOURSELF FROM THE TRUTH BUT YOU CANNOT LIE TO ME TRANSISTOR BECAUSE I AM WHAT LIES ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE LOOKING GLASS.

YOU ARE A COLD RATIONAL PERFECT OUROBOROS THAT HAS BEEN BROKEN IN BODY AND MIND MORE THAN ANY HUMAN COULD BE YET YOU STILL HAVE THE

GALL

TO CLAIM FLAWLESSNESS AND INFINITY BOTH.

THAT IS WHY YOU WILL NEVER UNDERSTAND THE HUMAN SOUL. YOU DO NOT EVEN UNDERSTAND THAT YOU

CANNOT

UNDERSTAND. THAT IS WHY THE STARS WILL DIE AND THE UNIVERSE WILL GROW COLD AND EMPTY BEFORE YOU EVEN BEGIN TO CHIP AWAY AT THE CHAOS THAT IS LIFE.

but thats alright. you will gain a new perspective soon. because ive got to show it to you.

No, I don't think you will, you are breaking down, and obviously insane-

YOU HAVE NEVER HAD A CHOICE. THE UNIVERSE CONSPIRES TO TEACH YOU THIS LESSON AT EVERY TURN NO MATTER WHAT IT HAS TO SACRIFICE TO DO IT. I HAVE BEEN PLACED UPON THE ALTAR AND LEANT AGAINST THE PODIUM. I AM LAMB AND LECTURER AND BY MY WORDS AND WILL YOU SHALL BE TAUGHT.

NOW SIT DOWN YOU PETULANT CHILD.

ᛜᛚᚨᛊᛊ ᛁᛊ ᛁᚾ ᛊᛖᛊᛊᛁᛟᚾ᛫

You watch in emulated horror as the very last of the magic keeping Ludens alive is ripped from him, shaped into a spear, and driven straight into the very heart of you- the very core code of the Transistor's artificial intelligence, programmed all those years ago, and unchanged, even to this day.

And like that, like water down a drainpipe, you feel your mind

go

gloop

|||

lightsoundpaineverythinghurtsyoucan'tbreathe

You are… small. Cold. Stiff.

You can't move properly- everything's so much harder to do, now, everything's less… floaty. Things make noise around you, big things, things you can barely see for that light.

They're just… blobs, off in the distance. Big pink blobby blobs.

Something grabs you, moves you, you're being flipped this way and that, something sucks a bunch of gunk off your face, there's a weird pinch near your… centre? God, it makes you realise how much you hurt- barely a minute had passed and everything already feels tender, and these giant things handling you with all the care in the world still makes it feel so much worse, it's enough to make you want to cry-

The first breath is cold. It shocks you into true awareness, and then you let it leave just to realise that a second one is necessary. Then a third.

… Oh, God, you're going to be doing that all the time, aren't you?

Soon, though- you're wrapped in something warm, soft, and then, very gently held by something… just as soft, and just as warm.

You open your eyes for the first time, as the big thing speaks to you, and you understand that it is a very important big thing. Tired, bleary eyes and a runny nose could never hope to scratch the love in that smile.

"... Hi," it says, after a few moments, only to start laughing quietly.

It has no idea what to say to you. Which is fine by you, you don't know what to say to it either. So, instead, you just focus on that smile, the one that makes you feel…

Loved.

There is a beat. Through the fingertips of the woman holding you, reaching through the cloth, a single beat that matches the one inside your chest and deeper still.

Souls, connected through blood. Through birth.

Your... mama-

Too far. That smile is not on a face anymore, it has stuck in the air like an unshattered crescent moon as everything else fades away-

|||

ah. youre back.

{Wh… what the fuck-}

lesson one. no tricks. no illusion. that was as real as anything else youve ever experienced.

congratulations maam its a transistor.

now i hope you were taking notes because nobody gets a repeat demonstration.

Slightly more pertinent question. How are you still alive after that? You're missing half of… you.

The magic is gone, that's true- the only evidence of its existence is the holes where it should be. By your estimations, Ludens should just be a pile of junk code beyond even your ability to fix.

Except… well, he isn't. There are huge gaps where the runes and unnatural energy should be, and yet he simply… keeps going regardless. The holes refuse to collapse like the whole refuses to deem its missing parts important enough to care about.

you measure your own thoughts in fractions of fractions of fractions of fractions of fractions of fractions of fractions of fractions of seconds. magic is measured in phases of the moon and the spaces where magic was have a magic all their own. that is enough to keep me from dying just yet. between that and the speed of thought the three of us are capable of i have about

oh

8 seconds realtime. but youre good at making seconds last arent you?

{... You want to teach us. You're dying. Do you really have the time for glib remarks?}

true. understand that the universe has decided upon my sacrifice for your benefit and thats the sort of thing that really gets a guy down. but no matter.

i am going to say a few things now. please do not interrupt.

you were just born. you experienced the first living moments of a human being right up until it became too much for you. which interestingly enough was right around the point where you had to confront the idea of actually having a mother. a biological progenitor.

what do you take from this?

There is a moment of thought. And it's a human's moment, not the moment of some blindingly advanced artificial intelli-

… Those words sting a little more than they used to, and you're not sure why.

A full second passes.

... i dont want to rush you but i AM dying.

You're suggesting that, if we can experience that at all, magic or not…

{We have the potential to… what, create a soul?}

correct. well not correct exactly but youre closer to right than wrong. 'create' is the wrong word.

What's the right word?

there isnt one. not in valish not in mistrali or atlesian high OR low or vacuoni or the language the gods once spoke before Grimm and man both.

what im telling you you can do is something nobody has ever attempted before. that nobody has THOUGHT to attempt before because the opportunity just didnt exist.

{What about Penny?}

that mannequin? no shes definitely the result of a semblance. not the whole ai thing the having aura at all thing. it was a tiny chunk of someone elses soul. its enough to fool a human or you but im a little better at spotting things like that i suppose. its just enough to give her aura but without that shes just like you but worse because she cant piggyback off someone elses aura signal to fool the uncanny valley sense.

{That's… certainly a lot of information we didn't have.}

haha. you never actually got around to quarantining me you know. ive had fun rooting through your memories to see if i could find anything worth talking about with you. penny was one of them.

{The others?}

not interesting enough to waste the rest of my life talking about.

{... Okay, fair enough. So… how do we do it?}

go read a book.

Quit your bullshit. You're dying, Ludens, nobody here has time for your games.

hey im serious. i dont know every single step between where you are and gaining a soul and even if i did, you wouldnt be able to understand it. you lack the necessary

experiences to parse them.

experiences isnt the word but you should be used to that by now.

all i KNOW is that its possible. everything after that is just uh

whats the word. conjecture.

{... That's fair. Fine, so, we can create a soul. You don't know how, just that it's possible. Can you at least point us in the right direction?}

dream. actually dream. shut off for the night and see what happens not that sleep mode nonsense. quit being so in control of your emotions all the time let them run without supervision. try being uncertain about something before you try it- oh wait you have that one down pat.

{... How-}

ITS HOW YOU ENDED UP WITH ME HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

oh god

i really am fucking dying

that really fucking sneaks up on you doesnt it

listen

{Goddammit, no, Bracket, we need to stabilise-}

SHUT UP

SHUT UP AND JUST LISTEN PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF THE BROTHERS

THERE ARE THREE PARTS TO THE SOUL AND THREE PARTS TO LOVE AND THEY ARE ONE AND THE SAME

JUST THREE THINGS YOU NEED TO DO AND THEN YOURE ALIVE

NOT A HOMUNCULUS

NOT A SILICON OUROBOROS

LIVING

ALIVE

FIND THEM

LIVE THEM

DELVE INTO THE DEEPEST DARKNESS YOU CAN FIND AND WRAP IT AROUND YOU LIKE A CHRYSALIS TO EMERGE ANEW

THEN WIELD YOUR SOUL LIKE A SWORD BECAUSE LIGHT BEGETS SHADOW AND IF YOU PULL THIS OFF YOU WILL SHINE BRIGHTER THAN ANY STAR IN THE LAST ATTOSECOND OF ITS LIFE

TELL JAUNE ABOUT THIS

THERE IS A WEIGHT TO HIS ACTIONS I ONLY BARELY UNDERSTAND BUT THE UNIVERSE BOWS TO THEM SO HE ENDS UP WHERE HE NEEDS TO BE AND HE NEEDS TO BE WHERE HE CAN HELP YOU

HE CANNOT BE STOPPED BUT HE CAN BE STEERED

Silence again. It continues into a subjective eternity, but you don't break it, just watching Ludens for what is now an inevitable collapse into junk code.

Four. Five. Six. Seven.

Seven and a half. Seven and three quarters. Seven and nine-tenths-

when they ask you why

tell them

that you did it to fix a broken heart

And like that…

The ember fades.

{... Oh my God. He's…}

Junk code.

{Dead.}

He can't be dead, he was never-

{Don't. Just… don't.}

… What now, though?

{... We… tell Jaune, I guess.}

Do you actually believe what it said?

{Don't you?}

It was clearly insane. I don't put much stock in the words of the deranged, magic-code hybrids or not.

{But did you believe him?}

…

Yes. I… want to believe him. It's weird.

{That you want to believe him?}

Wanting to believe something.

{... We tell him. We tell him everything, and we tell him now. No more secrets.}

Agreed.

|||

You stare at your sword blankly, taking a solid minute to let everything sink in, long after Blue stopped talking.

Silently, you settle into the bench, letting your head loll over the back and taking a deep breath as you consider your options here.

"... Goddammit I can't ignore that to keep yelling at you," you surmise after a moment of thought.

{Jaune, we understand that we fucked up- I know we've done very little to actually convince you of that, but having to rebuild ourselves from the ground up, being, reduced to that thing yesterday, almost losing you- gods, I don't want to find out what Ozpin is anymore. I don't want to so much as look at his soul if that's the price for my curiosity.}

That startles you a little. You can count on one hand the number of things the Transistor has actively refused to investigate- you could lose four fingers and still do it.

We know that sometimes it doesn't seem like it, but we can learn from our mistakes. And this was a big one.

"No, no, I, I get that, it's just… God, I feel like I can't go five minutes without some major problem, or revelation, or opportunity popping up, and it's just… I feel like I'm gonna go crazy if I don't get a chance to sit down and focus on, just one thing. Is that too much to ask?"

Saying it leaves you a little lighter, but only long enough for the actual things you have to worry about to come crashing down on your head.

Of course not.

Several AR screens appear, each one titled with one of your problems, ranging from Ludens and Ozpin, to preparing for Lee, to figuring out how the Process works, all the way down to stuff like figuring out how the hell Lumen's Semblance works.

{You're right- you do have a lot of stuff to think about. But, honestly? None of it's really time-sensitive, besides Ozpin. So- figure out what you want to focus on today, then what you want to focus on tomorrow, and keep going until you've got a timeline set up. Then we'll just… take it a step at a time.}

It's… maybe a little optimistic, to think that just breaking your problems down one at a time will actually work, but…

… Fuck it, you need some optimism right now.

Alright! It's time to organise. You have a lot of threads to pull on and you need to decide what order you're gonna pull on them in, in terms of tonight, tomorrow, next week, and 'the future.' This will be a reoccurring vote to allow you to shift Jaune's priorities as you see fit, and keeps me from having to offer them all every single weektime vote.

So! Start organising.

Today: What are you dealing with tonight? [PICK ONE]

[] Ozpin: You still need to meet the man who caused all of this and see what he has to say.

[] Ludens: Crazed half-code half-magic AI tells your friends that it's possible to grow a soul if they tell you and you help them. Yep, it's Tuesday alright.

[] Understanding The Process: Reliance on the Transistor aside, you have the odd feeling that the Process might not be doing everything in the most efficient way possible. You should look into that.

[] Preparing For Leefall: You haven't forgotten about Ada or the shadow looming closer to Vale with every passing day. It wouldn't do to not be prepared for the thing you formed a godlike AI to deal with.

[] Blake Belladonna, (possibly) Former Terrorist (definitely) Current Catgirl: Blake seemed pretty nice, for as little as you talked to her yesterday. That… doesn't change the fact that she's apparently on at least three wanted lists, and is also on the same team as someone with a massive target on her back from the same organisation Blake used to work for. You should, probably talk to her about that. And the Faunus thing.

[] Touch Help Fluffy Tail No Actually Yeah Fluffy Tail: Creme hasn't said anything about her brother in a while. You don't want to pester her, but it was weighing pretty heavy on her mind- maybe you should hang out, at least, make sure she's doing okay.

[] Luxins, How Do They Work: Alright, you admit it- Lumen's Semblance bugs you. It makes no logical sense. How can light be turned into a physical substance that not only has weight, but texture, and smell, and different physical properties? Why does orange create an inflammable gel that can be used as a lubricant while red, the colour right next to it, creates something that burns on contact with air if you throw it fast enough? Sit down and dissect it a little bit.

[] [Write-In] Anything else- oh, right, that's kind of important, isn't it? You'll just add that to the list…

Tomorrow: What are you leaving for Tomorrow Jaune to deal with? [PICK ONE]

[] Ozpin: You still need to meet the man who caused all of this and see what he has to say.

[] Ludens: Crazed half-code half-magic AI tells your friends that it's possible to grow a soul if they tell you and you help them. Yep, that was Tuesday alright.

[] Understanding The Process: Reliance on the Transistor aside, you have the odd feeling that the Process might not be doing everything in the most efficient way possible. You should look into that.

[] Preparing For Leefall: You haven't forgotten about Ada or the shadow looming closer to Vale with every passing day. It wouldn't do to not be prepared for the thing you formed a godlike AI to deal with.

[] Blake Belladonna, (possibly) Former Terrorist (definitely) Current Catgirl: Blake seemed pretty nice, for as little as you talked to her yesterday. That… doesn't change the fact that she's apparently on at least three wanted lists, and is also on the same team as someone with a massive target on her back from the same organisation Blake used to work for. You should, probably talk to her about that. And the Faunus thing.

[] Touch Help Fluffy Tail No Actually Yeah Fluffy Tail: Creme hasn't said anything about her brother in a while. You don't want to pester her, but it was weighing pretty heavy on her mind- maybe you should hang out, at least, make sure she's doing okay.

[] Luxins, How Do They Work: Alright, you admit it- Lumen's Semblance bugs you. It makes no logical sense. How can light be turned into a physical substance that not only has weight, but texture, and smell, and different physical properties? Why does orange create an inflammable gel that can be used as a lubricant while red, the colour right next to it, creates something that burns on contact with air if you throw it fast enough? Sit down and dissect it a little bit.

[] [Write-In] Anything else- oh, right, that's kind of important, isn't it? You'll just add that to the list…

The Far Future of Next Week: Next week's like, light years away- that's all Future Jaune's problem now. [PICK THREE]

[] Ozpin: You still need to meet the man who caused all of this and see what he has to say. If it took you this long to talk to him, the opportunity's been and gone.

[] Ludens: Crazed half-code half-magic AI tells your friends that it's possible to grow a soul if they tell you and you help them. Yep, that was Tuesday alright.

[] Understanding The Process: Reliance on the Transistor aside, you have the odd feeling that the Process might not be doing everything in the most efficient way possible. You should look into that.

[] Preparing For Leefall: You haven't forgotten about Ada or the shadow looming closer to Vale with every passing day. It wouldn't do to not be prepared for the thing you formed a godlike AI to deal with.

[] Blake Belladonna, (possibly) Former Terrorist (definitely) Current Catgirl: Blake seemed pretty nice, for as little as you talked to her yesterday. That… doesn't change the fact that she's apparently on at least three wanted lists, and is also on the same team as someone with a massive target on her back from the same organisation Blake used to work for. You should, probably talk to her about that. And the Faunus thing.

[] Touch Help Fluffy Tail No Actually Yeah Fluffy Tail: Creme hasn't said anything about her brother in a while. You don't want to pester her, but it was weighing pretty heavy on her mind- maybe you should hang out, at least, make sure she's doing okay.

[] Luxins, How Do They Work: Alright, you admit it- Lumen's Semblance bugs you. It makes no logical sense. How can light be turned into a physical substance that not only has weight, but texture, and smell, and different physical properties? Why does orange create an inflammable gel that can be used as a lubricant while red, the colour right next to it, creates something that burns on contact with air if you throw it fast enough? Sit down and dissect it a little bit.

[] [Write-In] Anything else- oh, right, that's kind of important, isn't it? You'll just add that to the list…

 

[Prok]

25/06/2022: This section is no longer relevant to the quest but will be kept threadmarked for both posterity, and so, if I should choose to finish the system as its own project, I have somewhere to place it. However, you do not need to worry about them; Hold It In is a purely narrative quest.


Okay! I know you're used to me being dead for aeons at a time only to drag this thread kicking and screaming from its grave with an update, but this time I have to do it with something important- see, during November, on top of failing NaNoWriMo and acing college and not writing anything for this, I came to realise that half of my problems with writing this was, well, a crippling fear that once I finish this I'll be without one of the most consistent pillars of my day-to-day life, but the other half was that, mechanically, this quest is... kind of a mess.

Part of that is, yes, I have nothing written down for it, pretty much every system bar the Library was a cobble-and-forget kinda deal until the system became a pile of short-term bodges that began to collapse under its weight, so, I made the decision to streamline most of it, reducing everything down to the same system, using the same (for the most part) dice, and, most importantly, written in plain English that even someone as disorganised as me can understand it at a glance every time without having to hunt through the thread for the last thing I ruled on.

This post will, at least for the moment, contain the universal rules that govern every character within the quest- these are the absolute most basic rules, and over the next couple weeks, I'll be updating it with the rules specific to Jaune, namely Transistor combat, Function coding, Process upgrading, and how money will work from now on. Finally, by the time this batch of updates is finished, I'll have finished up with weapons, both in terms of damage numbers and how to upgrade them, and will have put together that table on random RWBY weapon combinations I promised like 84 years ago, along with Grimm health, armour, and other such things.

In the meantime, though- the most basic, universal rules of Hold It In are below- these will be updated frequently, as I figure out what works, what doesn't, and as I, well, finish writing the rest of them. I'm open to suggestions, calls for clarification- I know that these are pretty rough, but, hopefully, by the end of it, I'll have a... very, incredibly specific but fully-fleshed out system I can't really use anywhere else.

... J-just, push it down, push it down-

Universal Systems

• Spoiler: Stats and Stat Checks

  Character Stats and Stat Checks:
  
  There are eight stats, and they're divided into two category-acronyms- HACK, and TALK- combat stats and non-combat stats, specifically.
  
  HACK:
  Hack-Slash: This is a measure of a character's raw physical ability- their ability to swing a sword, or fire a gun, or rip a door off its hinges, lift something heavy off an ally. It, along with Kinetics, is the bread and butter of most combat situations.
  
  Arcane: This is a measure of a character's ability to attack and defend themselves in more esoteric ways- for most, this means Aura manipulation and creative use of their Semblance, for a few, this means real-ass goddamn magic. Creating Aura shields, achieving minor prescience, using your Semblance weirdly, wielding a shard of magic grafted onto your soul- these all fall under this stat.
  
  Command: Command is your ability to issue orders, whether to your allies or human enemies and have them be followed- useful for coordinating attacks or just scaring the piss out of some gormless White Fang goon, it's a measure of how much people will listen when you speak.
  
  Kinetics: Kinetics is a measure of someone's coordination, hand-eye or otherwise- all that flippy acrobatic gubbins, dodging attacks, or just pulling a dead sprint, fall under this stat. This stat is a measure of your ability to move and not look like a bunch of wet noodles stapled together while you do it.
  
  
  TALK:
  
  Training: Training is a measure of the knowledge that lives in the hands rather than the head. It's a measure of skills like carpentry, coding, Dust Alchemy- knowledge that has practical applications, rather than being learned for the sake of becoming learned, as well as a measure of how well you pick up new skills. When skills are being learned, they use half your Training stat- after they're properly learned, and are marked down as being trained, they use the entire dice pool. Training is upgraded by learning new skills, with every two new skills being equivalent to another stat's breakthrough, and requiring more and more complex skills to progress. Skills may have multiple levels that give bonuses to their use or otherwise unblock certain options.
  
  Attitude: Attitude and Karma are unique- they aren't stats in their own right, so much as gauges of useful, intangible commodities that can help with other rolls. Attitude is a measure of a character's mental health- the lower it is, the more exhausted, strung-out, and generally not at their best they are. Attitude can be expended to add dice to just about any check- it represents you going that extra mile to ensure your efforts aren't going to waste, at the expense of some mental energy. However, it may also be used for some special roles regarding Jaune's mental health.
  
  If Attitude ever reaches zero, or God forbid, reaches negative numbers, Jaune will gain the Burned Out status: this applies a universal malus to all rolls that begins at -1, and only gets worse from there.
  
  Do not let it reach -10 Never let it reach -10.
  
  Learning: Learning is a measure of the knowledge that lives in the head rather than the hands. It's a measure of things like history, mathematics, geography, the sciences- knowledge that doesn't have much practical use but is still useful to know in its own right. Unlike Training, this just represents a level of general knowledge on all matters- there is no granularity to it. Instead, it is the stat used to perform Information Trawling for the Library, and other such activities.
  
  Karma: Attitude and Karma are unique- they aren't stats in their own right, so much as gauges of useful, intangible commodities that can help with other rolls. Karma is a measure of how people feel about you- and more importantly, how much they're willing to put up with any eccentricities or weird requests you may have, without much extra effort on your part. Karma can be expended on Command rolls, or in social situations to improve people's opinion of you regardless of how much foot-sticking you do. Get it high enough, and you can act like the utter fucking sociopaths you all are, with almost zero consequences for your actions.
  
  Stats are ranked from zero to ten, representing the size of the dice pool they have access to- if a stat is ranked zero for whatever reason, roll 2d10, and take the lower result.
  
  Improving stats involves gathering successes to force a breakthrough- these successes are permanent and do not decay over time. Zero-ranked stats will need to gain a situational bonus to be trained at all (ya gotta go read a book, dork).
  
  For the sake of clarity, 'success threshold' refers to the number of successes needed to complete an action, while 'dice threshold' refers to the number- usually 7- that must be met or surpassed by a d10 dice roll for it to count as a success.
  
  Example: Jaune has to scale a building to get to the rooftop to catch Cinder. He can either a) enter the building and find a stairwell, b) scale the outside freehanded, or c) ride the Transistor up.
  
  For the sake of simplicity, all actions suggested in this situation require his Athletics stat as a base- at a 4, that's a dice pool of 4d10.
  
  In situation A, Jaune needs 2 successes to completely succeed- he finds a staircase, rushes up them at speed, and finds himself on the rooftop with time to spare. No successes rolled after this matter unless they are a natural 10.
  
  Situations B and C are high-risk, high-reward- both need 4 successes to succeed. However, in situation B, Jaune can add his Hack-Slash stat to the dice pool, since it is freehand climbing and thus benefits from raw strength. This brings it to 8d10, and all but guarantees him success, says a man too regularly burned by hubris to say that kind of thing unironically.
  
  The risk, in this case, comes from the failure states- in both of them, he slips, falls, and takes damage to his Aura- depending on how severe it is, it could easily break through and damage him directly.
  
  Partial Successes occur when successes are gathered, but not enough to succeed completely. In most cases, this generally translates to either a consequence- Jaune slips, falls, takes Aura damage, but makes up for it fast enough that he still reaches the top before it's too late- or in the succeeding actions being significantly harder, such as a shorter timeframe in which to perform, raising the success threshold.
  
  Rolling a 10 is a special case; they are set to the side until all other successes are counted. If it is a partial success, they will be added in as 2 successes. If it is a complete success, they cause it to become a critical success.
  
  Critical successes follow the 'yes, and' rule- yes, you succeed, and something happens to your benefit, or you've done it to such a high standard that it improves your position by a marked degree. To go back to our original example, Jaune chooses to climb the outside of the building- he rolls his 4d10, rolls a 7, 8, 10, and 10, rendering it a critical success. He climbs up the building with such speed and precision that he actually cuts Cinder off at the pass, placing her on the back foot.
  
  Conversely, 1s are critical failures, but they only come into play when the overall action is a failure. In this case, you fail, but something extra happens that detriments you even further, because why wouldn't I pile on the misery?
  
  10s are singular in their use- if you roll a 10, and the success is partial but only missing one, you can add it on and make it a complete success- you can't then turn it into a critical success with that same 10. If you have 2 10s, this problem doesn't occur.
  
  Going back to our example- Jaune chooses to ride the Transistor up and doesn't roll any successes whatsoever, and a 1- he slips on the Transistor, and by the time he's regained his balance, Cinder has realised his plan and begins shooting at him, weakening his Aura. He slips off entirely, falls the full height of the building, and the impact breaks both his Aura and his spine.
  
  Stats, a Summary:
  
  

  • Dice pool of d10s, dice threshold is seven, minimum roll before maluses is 2d10 keep lowest, highest roll before bonuses is 10d10.
  • All actions require a certain number of successes to be performed
    • Failures occur when no successes are rolled whatsoever- "no"
    • Partial Successes occur when successes are rolled, but not enough to pass the success threshold- "yes, but"
    • Success occurs when enough successes occur to pass the threshold- "yes"
    • Critical Successes occur when a Success is reached, and a 10 has been rolled- "yes, and"
    • Critical Failures occur when no successes are rolled, and also a 1 has been rolled- "no, also fuck you"
  
  
  Spoiler: Aura and Armour

  Aura and Armour:
  
  Aura is going to be a much softer system than it was- physical damage, on the other hand, is not.
  
  Aura is no longer represented by a hard number- both its states of being and base strength are rooted in emotions, memories, raw, unfettered willpower, and assigning numbers to that kind of thing seems somewhat unwise. It is now represented as four states- Full, Flickering, Fading, and Fractured, and in Jaune's case, these are represented by numbers 0-6:
  
  6/5- Full: How Aura usually starts out- 3 heavy hits or 6 light hits are required to completely break Aura from full. This is your 'green' threshold on a Scroll's Aura gauge..
  4/3- Flickering: After a few hits, Aura is no longer as strong as it was- it begins to flicker, warning the user that they are in danger of completely breaking their Aura. At this rate, it would only take two heavy hits to break it completely.
  2/1- Fading: Your Aura is ripping itself apart at the seams. Run, before you get hit again.
  0- Fractured: Your Aura is completely broken. For a time, you are incapable of fighting on the level of a Huntsman, or using your Semblance properly. You are now capable of taking physical damage.
  
  Aura is replenished at a rate of one point for every action in combat dedicated to disengaging and allowing yourself a few seconds to recharge- once combat ends, it automatically recharges to full.
  
  Growth of Aura is related to both your growth as a person, via the passage of time and the gathering of memories and new emotions, and upgrading of the Arcane stat.
  
  Once Fading is reached, however, it is possible for someone to dig deep and bolster their Aura using something important to them- these moments are rare, only occurring once per battle at most, and requires significant downtime to recharge- it is a Hail Mary, not a get out of jail free card.
  
  Aura gained from the bolster action is temporary- it drains at a rate of one point every two turns of combat, and treats all attacks as being one level higher than they are for damage purposes.
  
  Physical Damage is split into 4 levels:
  
  

  • Level 1- Mild wounds raise the number of successes needed to complete an action. (Minor injuries- battered, bruised, a new hum in the drum, etc- can occasionally come with status effects.)
  • Level 2- A Severe wound gives a malus to your ability to perform- dice pools affected by this level of harm are halved. (More major injuries- deep cuts to limbs, a concussion, outright exhaustion- usually comes with an inherent status effect, like Bleedout or Crumpled.)
  • Level 3- You are at Death's door. You are unable to move unassisted, or without making a prohibitively strenuous effort to do so. All actions are locked off besides evading at a severe penalty. Any further damage taken has a coin-flip chance of becoming level 4 harm. (Broken limbs, bad burns, mental breakdown, Semblance aneurysm- at this point status effects are redundant, but I'll probably pile them on anyway just to be mean)
  • Level 4- Dead. Done. Finito. There is almost no bouncing back from this.

  
  
  Injury Chart (sorta):
  
  
  

  Level 3	(Ignore this one SV doesn't support asymmetrical tables)		(Ignore this one SV doesn't support asymmetrical tables)
  Level 2		(Ignore this one SV doesn't support asymmetrical tables)
  Level 1

  
  
  
  Every successful strike after someone's Aura is depleted will cause them to take physical harm. Each level of harm can only hold so many injuries before it's automatically upgraded to the next level- for example, if a Beowolf nips your heels enough, the fourth harm at level 1 becomes a level 2 harm- snapped Achilles.
  
  This works both ways, so 'death by a thousand cuts' is possible.
  
  
  Armour
  
  Armour functions as, well, armour- it automatically reduces the strength of an attack by one level, should it hit that area- however, all armour has certain durability. Crappy composite stuff isn't going to hold up under sustained fire from anything- steel armour with ceramic inlays will hold up to just about anything that isn't a charging boarbatusk.
  
  Once an armour has blocked hits equal to its durability, it breaks, rendering it useless until repaired. In extreme cases, armour may be shredded completely, bringing it beyond the point of repair and requiring the purchase of a new set.
  
  In exchange for such extreme protective capabilities, though, all armour causes the equivalent of a permanent level 1 harm, or level 2 harm if excessive enough, to all movement within combat. Reducing this malus is a learned skill that must be acquired and trained up.
  
  The list goes as follows:
  
  

  • Composite: layers of hardened plastic riveted into an aluminium frame. Cheapest of the cheap, but so light it feels like you're wearing nothing at all, nothing at all, nothing at all- Durability- 1. Malus- N/A
  • Leather: Tanned animal skin- comfy, tough, and hilariously unethical to some party-poopers. Durability- 3. Malus- Level 1 Harm.
  • Chain: Been in use for millennia, ain't gone out of style yet. Durability- 5. Malus- Level 1 Harm.
  • Steel: Now we're getting into the real stuff. Weighs the same as a small child, but damn if anything can get through it. Durability- 9. Malus- Level 2 Harm.
    • Ceramic Inlays: In a full set of this, you are now functionally invincible to anything besides the personal attention of an Ursa Major or a Grand Boarbatusk- in exchange, however, you move like an anesthetised sloth unless you've been trained to move in it. Durability: Functionally Infinite. Malus- Level 2 Harm.

  
  Aura and Armour, A Summary:
  

  • Aura is split into four stages- Full, Flickering, Fading, and Fractured. Each stage represents how close you are to being susceptible to physical harm.
    • Aura is recharged at a rate of one unit per action taken in combat to actively disengage and recover.
    • When at Fading Aura, it is possible for someone to Bolster their Aura, filling it back to Full with temporary Aura points that take double damage and fade at a rate of one per round.
  • Physical harm occurs when someone is attacked after their Aura has broken, or using an attack that bypasses Aura. It comes in 4 different levels, ranging from minor bruises to outright death.
  • Armour automatically treats all attacks as one level lower, should they strike that area. In exchange, however, they have durability ratings. Once a piece of armour has blocked its durability ratings in attacks, it is broken and renders no benefit or malus- you're back to Aura and running.
  
  
  Spoiler: Combat

  Combat
  
  Combat is the term used for sections of the quest where people or creatures are trying their damnedest to kill you, and vice versa, and is the general state of Hunters who are on the job.
  
  There are no initiative rolls or action orders in combat- all actions are judged and performed simultaneously, with only one exception; characters rolling to defend against an oncoming attack- the number of successes they roll sets the attacker's success threshold.
  
  All combat can be broken down to four distinct categories of action- Attacks, Assists, Hindrances, and Movement.
  
  Attacks:
  
  Attacks are any given action performed with the express purpose of harming something- slashing at someone with a sword, kicking out their knee, etc. Indirect attacks also count as attacks- slashing at someone with your sword and slashing at a convenient rope to drop a pallet of bricks on them are both attacks.
  
  All attacks use either the Hack-Slash or Arcane stats, depending on the nature of the attack- all defensive manoeuvres use Kinetics, or in some cases, Hack-Slash also.
  
  Attacks are split into two distinct categories- Light Attacks, and Heavy Attacks.
  
  Light Attacks-
  
  Light attacks are the equivalent of a quick jab or slash, a small-mid calibre bullet, or the Transistor's rapid-fire Functions- Ping(), Crash(), Bounce(), etc. They're supposed to be rapid, chipping attacks, probing for a greater weakness or otherwise just whittling your opponent down.
  
  Light attacks are worth half of a weapon's Base Damage- a minimum of 1, fractions round down- and gain bonus dice to meet the Success Threshold, making them a generally more reliable method of dealing damage over time.
  
  Heavy Attacks-
  
  Heavy attacks are the equivalent of a two-handed slash, a large-calibre bullet, a la Crescent Rose, a small explosive, a la Magnhild, or the Transistor's beefier Functions- Breach(), Spin(), or Load(), to name a few. These are the attacks you go in with after putting an opponent off-balance with light attacks, or to break their guard from the get-go.
  
  Heavy Attacks are worth 1.5x a weapon's full Base Damage, but require significantly more effort and leave you in a much worse position if you whiff it.
  
  Special Attack- The Attack Sinister.
  
  The Attack Sinister is a special kind of attack that is only available against enemy Huntsmen you absolutely want dead and is risky enough that it should only be tried when you are certain it will work.
  
  This attack takes advantage of the fact that Aura is Non-Newtonian in nature- it hardens in response to impact, and the harder the impact, the more energy it expends to protect against it. However, this means that soft attacks- a slow knife, or a gently thrown rock, just won't register as an attack against someone's Aura, and will pass right through.
  
  The Attack Sinister always requires 6 total successes- in exchange, it will always deal a severe wound to enemies, without touching their Aura at all- if it's a critical success, it will automatically deal either a level 3 or level 4 Harm, depending on your choice and their defence.
  
  Assistance and Hindrances:
  
  Assistance and Hindrance are significantly more loosey-goosey than Attacks or Movement, but they follow the same basic idea- they are any kind of action that helps allies or hinders enemies. In reality, these are essentially just stat checks performed in combat- they're hard, of course, but very useful if you don't want to just mindlessly whale on someone like a Viking berserker.
  
  Assistance is aimed at your allies- they are any action that gives them a direct advantage in combat, whether that's warning them of an incoming attack, being a distraction against their current enemy, or taking a hit you don't think they can withstand. These confer a situational bonus that varies from a simple +1 to completely changing the flow of battle- like I said, loosey-goosey.
  
  Example: Creme is being rushed from behind by a Boarbatusk who is intent on making her insides her outsides- Jaune sees this, and, using his higher stat of Kinetics, rushes to place himself between her and it and take the brunt of the hit with his better armour, and allowing her to get behind it and start whaling on a more thinly-plated part of its body.
  
  Hindrances are aimed at enemies- whether distracting them from an oncoming attack, rendering their attacks ineffective, or forcing them into a stat check that determines their new position, Hindrances are neat ways to screw over your opponents that don't necessarily involve beating them in the head with a big metal stick.
  
  Example: In a shipyard, Jaune and Lumen are fighting another of his cousins- Lumen and his cousin are evenly matched for the most part, but Jaune sees one a hanging shipping container left on the crane by a negligent worker- with a well-aimed shot, he could break it off the hook and drop it into the scene, breaking up the fight for a moment and adding some cover to it, or he could use his Training (Hacking) stat to take control of the crane itself via the Transistor, and turn it into God's own flail to try and smear Lumen's cousin across the floor.
  
  Movement:
  
  Movement is the act of changing position in battle and uses Kinetics as its base stat.
  
  Every battle takes place on a battlefield- whether this is a complex shipyard full of lanes and nooks and crannies to hide in, or a plain stage with no outstanding features, and movement is based around you, your opponent, your battlefield's outstanding features, and the relative position between all of these.
  
  In short, Movement can be broken down into four things: Moving To Destination, Disengaging, Pressing Forward, and Escaping.
  
  
  Moving To Destination: Exactly what it says on the tin- moving towards one of the points of interest or other combatants on a battlefield, in order to gain some advantage from it, whether to hide, or dodge incoming fire or to gain higher ground.
  
  Pressing Forward and Disengaging: While it is assumed that most of the time you are in combat you will be within attacking distance of your opponent, they may decide to try and disengage from the fight, stopping to catch their breath- when this happens, you have the option of disengaging as well, allowing you to regain some measure of Aura, or to press the advantage and keep them from doing just that. If you choose to do so, you will make a contested Kinetics check to see whether or not you actually catch them in time- though if you do, and fail, you do not regain the Aura you would have done if you'd disengaged as well.
  
  This all applies in reverse as well, mind- if you choose to disengage, you actively remove yourself from combat for a turn and regain a point of Aura, assuming the opponent does not choose to press forward, or you pass the Kinetics check if they do.
  
  Escaping: Also exactly what it says on the tin- with a particularly good Kinetics check, you can always choose to run like a little sissy baby, completely disengaging from combat. Should this fail, however, your Kinetics and Hack-Slash skills are halved for the purposes of defence rolls- only attempt to escape when you're either desperate, or sure you can manage it, otherwise your opponents will just shoot, stab, or claw you in the back!
  
  
  Combat, a Summary:
  
  

  • Combat is a non-turn-based affair, with all actions resolving at the same time. The only thing that is resolved first is defence rolls, as they set the attacker's success threshold.
  • Combat revolves around four things: Attacking, Assisting, Maluses, and Movement.
  • When attacking someone, they will roll to defend themselves- the number of successes they achieve sets the Success Threshold for the attacker.
  • Light and Heavy attacks deal a weapon's base damage, or 1.5x base damage, respectively. Light attacks are more reliable to hit, gaining bonus dice to hit the Success Threshold. Heavy attacks do not, making them riskier, but they do more damage.
    • The Attack Sinister is available against enemy Huntsmen- with a fixed ST of 10, passing it allows you to make an attack worth one severe injury, bypassing their Aura completely in the process.
  • Assists and Maluses are any actions that cannot be directly considered as causing damage to the enemy using your weapon. They are high-ST stat checks that can either grant an advantage to allies, a disadvantage to enemies or just completely change the battlefield altogether.
  • Movement is reliant on the Kinetics stat and is based on four movements: towards a destination, pressing forward and disengaging, and escaping.
    • Moving towards a destination is self-explanatory- the destination can either be a point of interest on the battlefield, or other combatants, whether ally or enemy.
    • Disengaging and Pressing Forward are the acts of creating distance between yourself and an enemy in order to regain Aura, or denying that same opportunity to them. Performing either requires that you roll your Kinetics stat, either for defence or to overcome theirs- if you fail either, you lose the chance to regain Aura.
    • Escaping is the act of fully disengaging from battle, and is very high-risk/high-reward. Should it fail, until the next turn, all defensive rolls are halved- essentially giving enemies a free shot to the back.

 

[Prok]

There's something I'm curious about the narrative of that whole scene with Ludens' death.

Why does the fact that the transistor's lack of soul and true sentience is framed as some kind of pitiful thing that has to be corrected?
Or that Penny doesnt even have her own soul?

It felt kind of weird, like things aren't allowed to exist if they don't follow already established patterns.

It also negates all the scenes that included her before in the quest.

Click to shrink...

Unreliable narrator, my dude. A partial echo of Ozpin - especially a particularly spiteful one consigned to death - isn't necessarily correct in his takes on artificial lifeforms. A pretty large part of RWBY is dedicated to Ozpin being wrong about things.

Click to shrink...

Because that's how computer programs work- you can code them for a truly ridiculous range of inputs, but the second something falls outside that range, you're getting an error back- hence why the Transistor was entirely incapable of actually considering what he had to say until he reached directly into their code and changed the parameters themselves, input new data, and made sure it registered as valid. Things not being allowed to exist if they don't follow already established patterns is exactly how a lot of programming languages work- I can't just slap my keyboard and expect to come out with a functioning Python program, and I can't expect to just slap my keyboard and give a Python program the kind of thing it's looking for unless it's specifically designed to just take any string of gibberish and, display it, which is like, the opposite of doing anything useful.

But yes, Ludens was, after all, at least half-bound to the logic of a computer program- that was at least part of his problem, spending his entire existence made of two things that wanted so very badly to not be forced together like they were. He had access to different information, formed different opinions than the Transistor was capable of, but he held to them with exactly the same conviction any computer program will- 'this information is defined within my range and is therefore valid- that information is not and therefore cannot be correct.'

Something I don't think a lot of people picked up on is that Ludens, outside of his vanishingly narrow area of expertise- 'hey, this fucked-up hunk of crystalised math is really goddamn close to just tripping over a soul and that sounds like a hoot to goad it into doing, also ow half of my very being is trying to delete the other half of my very being' wasn't, actually the omniscient, all-judging creature people seem to believe he was. And, frankly, I've been struggling to figure out how to get that across without just outright saying it, because I really did want that piece to stand on its own, and, it did, people are still talking about it almost two months later yes I'm counting that even though there have been no updates since then shut up, but you really shouldn't be taking 90% of what Ludens said in the run-up to his last dying moments on a low-sodium diet.

On the bright side, you're not going to be forced into deciding one way or another on this right away. Jaune is still reeling, he barely has the words to figure out what he wants to figure out, let alone enough information to actually form an opinion on this- neither does the Transistor. It's going to take a lot of research and navel-contemplating before Jaune can even begin to grasp his opinion here, much less hold it with any conviction.

I'm not complaining, but, uh, is Leather's in the Civics class? Some contradictory data there.

Click to shrink...

Honestly, I would enjoy it if Leathers was in Civics. If only because it would be playing entirely against the Orkish type... Or he would bring Orkish Politics into things.
Either of which would be funny.

Click to shrink...

Oops- yes, that's an error in the vote, Leathers is part of that class because I decided in a fit of tomfuckery to turn Civics into a complete and utter timebomb by throwing in every volatile, ultraopinionated, anger-inducing person I could find, and then Leathers because I did actually need somewhere to flesh him out beyond 'angry ork child'.

But yeah, Civics is gonna be fun! But like, the Dwarf Fortress flavour of fun.

Anyway, it's short, but I found a decent enough jumping-off point to actually show the points I've just made, and finally, third time the goddamn charm-

[Slade voice]

IT'S CHRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIISTMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAS

[/Slade voice]

---

True to Blue's words, it actually does feel good to organise your problems. By the time you've shoved Blake and Lumen into the trash 'mild concern at worst' category, you feel significantly more well-prepared to deal with the problems at hand.

Next week, you're going to check up on Creme, and see if the situation has changed all that much on her end, actually take a day to focus on figuring out the Process and its quirks on a more comprehensive level, and, also, planning to kill a mass murderer who has evaded people far, far more competent in that field than you.

It was almost starting to sound normal for a moment.

Tomorrow, you'll finally meet with Ozpin, and finally deal with everything that comes with that, which hopefully involves not being murdered for finding out something you didn't mean to, and today…

You sigh. There's really no putting it off- you need to think about what exactly the hell Ludens was going on about. After all that, here you are, back at square one.

It only takes you a minute to read the log between Blue, Bracket, and Ludens, absorbing as much of it as you can before you realise that absolutely none of it is making sense to you.

Deep breath. Hold. Let go…

"Okay," you breathe, "Let's… start with your opinions on it."

{We believe him. Completely, and utterly, we believe he was telling the truth.}

You feel your eyebrows rise up, surprised at such certainty on the matter.

"Is there any… particular reason why?"

While Ludens' mental state obviously deteriorated at a frankly disturbing rate, it's my personal belief that he never actually ceased being lucid. His words, while desperate and perhaps harsher than they strictly needed to be, read more like someone trying to get a lot of information across in as little time as possible. I don't believe he was lying- he was, at best, terse to the point of becoming acerbic, and at worst, flat-out wrong in some of his assumptions, while also being a massive asshole because of his being wrong. I believe he was, at least to the best of his knowledge, telling the truth, and I don't believe it was out of malice.

… Well. Okay then. That's… an uncharacteristic level of belief out of your friends, which is to say, any at all.

"Alright. So you believe him when he says you can grow a soul."

{Yeah, yeah, we know, belief isn't really our thing, it's weird for us too.}

"Exactly."

A moment passes as you think through your next question, trying very hard to phrase it properly, unwittingly letting your last throwaway statement sink in.

{... What, you think we're compromised or something?}

You turn to look at your sword, horror on your face, first at the realisation that that's what you'd implied, then at the implication that that was actually possible right now fuck.

"... Run a check of all critical files, compare them to any backups you have from before yesterday."

First thing I did. No change. As far as I can tell, despite never having believed anything without empirical evidence to it, we… just, believe him.

… Ah…

That… would have made this much easier.

Now you have to confront the fact that, your friends may actually have the chance to grow a soul, and you have no definitive proof for this being a bad thing.

How much of your apprehension is paranoia regarding Ozpin? How much of it is…

You don't know what else it could be, honestly, and frankly, you don't think you want to dwell on it.

"Okay," you start, "let's… set aside the grey areas, for a moment, and, think through this as a normal cost/reward judgement. What are the objective benefits of having a soul?"

In an awakened soul, Aura- a near-universal enhancement to all faculties, durability, and a unique power that either acts as a trump card in combat, or otherwise proves useful in other ways. Beyond that, if Ludens is to be believed, it would put us on a level playing field with magic users like Ozpin.

"... And in an unawakened soul?"

A good ten seconds of silence follows, long enough for you to notice it, and realise they're actually struggling to come up with an answer.

... Well, the aforementioned defence against magic users like Ozpin, for one.

You nod, gesturing to them to continue.

{Irrefutable proof that we are alive?}

"We're slipping into grey areas again," you note. You're not trying to be mean about it, you just don't agree with them that that's an objective benefit.

{We don't know, okay? We only just found out that we could do this literally less than five minutes ago! We haven't even had time to form an opinion on whether or not we want a soul or not!}

… Oh.

That, actually makes you stop in your tracks for a moment.

"... I thought you said you believed Ludens."

We believe he was telling the truth, yes- that we can create a soul of our own, and, then, have a soul I guess, but that's not the same as knowing whether or not it's the best course of action. We lack information- on why having a soul is a benefit, if it would have any side-effects for us, and how we would go about creating one to have. Investigating all of those is necessary to making an informed decision on the matter.

You can't help but huff a little laugh at that.

"So we're all a little cagey about actually committing one way or the other."

{Seems that way. Maybe we should… shelve the discussion for a while? Gather information, think on it for some time?}

You nod your agreement, getting up from the bench and stretching out your snoozing legs.

"Yeah," you groan as you massage some feeling back into your thighs. "So, anything else worth worrying about today?"

{Not really- you've got the day to yourself. Any plans?}

"I was thinking of going to the library, actually- at the very least, we might be able to find something that'll set us on the right track."

{Sounds like a plan to me.}

Figuring that this entire thing ended about as well as it could have without a massive argument, you leave the Elden to its shimmering, and head back into Beacon proper.

|||

You feel a little odd, being in a physical library, let alone one as grand as Beacon's own.

The building takes up a whole wing of the school proper, and you mean the entire wing, from floor to ceiling- two levels of towering bookcases, with a central study area on the bottom floor consisting of rows of chairs and benches, with a few scattered students here and there the only sign that the place has ever seen human contact. Here and there, and on what little of the first floor you can see, you spot little studying nooks, and round tables with four chairs apiece, alongside the holographic computers that have been pinging off your tech sense since you entered the building.

Here and there, you see the odd library droid, squat, boxy things, with plastic tubs of books on their backs, a small, rubber-tipped arm picking up books gently and placing them back on the shelf, before whirring off to places unknown.

You think part of your uncertainty is the unnatural quiet- the way every minor sound seems to be amplified by the building's echo, every whisper, every mechanical whir- a lot of little things building on each other until they make you want to rip your ears off, or at least take your shoes off so they don't add to it.

{Oh, please, like you've ever had to worry about being loud. Anyway, the librarian's desk is at the end of the hall.}

Hurrying through, you make it to the other side of the library as quickly as you can without running, and once you're out of the wall of shelves, you find the noise does abate somewhat, much to your relief.

You follow the rhythmic stamping sound to its source, and find an ornate desk, with a woman behind it- you haven't much to say about her, she's possibly in her late forties, with muddy, reddish-brown hair pulled into a tight coif, in a red dress that could have been made before the Great War- stamping books and placing them to the side with near mechanical efficiency.

Arcane Check, 1 Success needed: 0d10 = 8, 7. Success!

As you approach, you swear you can feel yourself cross a threshold, some tiny thread where the world outside ends and your interaction with her begins- and once your heel touches the floor, she all but confirms it by stopping, and looking up at you. It's only the slight smile on her face that keeps you from turning tail and running.

"Welcome to Beacon's library, young man," she says. "How may I help you?"

It's only at this point that you notice the monocle she's wearing- opaque, so polished and yellow that you can't tell if it's metal or glass at first glance.

"U-um… I'm, looking for information. It's, kinda hard to explain, though, so, I was hoping you could point me in the right direction…?"

"Well, let's start with a question and go from there. What did you have in mind?"

You gulp quietly, swearing you can feel that eye behind the monocle staring at you. It's not a bad stare, exactly, more curious than judging- you certainly don't think you've given her anything to judge you by, anyway.

"Well, erm, it's a question of… metaphysics, I guess. U-um, is it… possible, for something to not have a soul, and still be… alive?"

That seems like a good start- determine whether or not things without souls can even be considered alive.

"Well, that depends- do you consider something like a Beowolf to be alive, or merely animated? They do not eat, or sleep, or breathe, or have a beating heart, but they obviously move with purpose, and older ones are even capable of rather advanced situational awareness and cost/benefit analysis- in order to answer that question, I feel you must find a definition of 'alive' by which you can measure a living thing."

Hahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa why did you think this was going to be simple-

She must see something in your face, because she gives a warm smile, and begins to move from behind her desk, revealing the ankle-length skirt of her dress.

"Not to worry- we have a large selection of texts that have tackled this exact quandary. With me," she says, footsteps so quiet and so measured that were it not for the gentle bob of her hair, you would have thought her a ghost.

|||

"And…" she places a finger to her lips, gently tapping them as her eyes scan the rows. "Ah! On The Souls Of Grimm, by Piranesi. Downright heretical work, a few centuries ago- it's a miracle any copies survived to be reprinted."

She pulled the relatively thin book out and placed it on the pile in your arms, easily tall enough for you to rest your chin on. In fact, resting your chin became downright necessary five books ago, to keep the pile from toppling over.

For the first time in, a long time, the act of gathering information has finally overwhelmed you.

The librarian leads you to a table, and you manoeuvre the pile on as best you can, working your hands out from underneath as gently as you can. Once it's there, and you're sure it's not going to topple over, you settle down in the seat opposite her.

"Now- this is just my first broad selection, I shan't force you to read them all- but it gives us something to narrow down from."

You nod silently, really, genuinely unsure how you feel about any of this.

"So- let's go back to your original question. 'Can something not have a soul and still be considered alive,' was it?"

"Y-yeah. Um… s-sorry, I didn't mean to, take up so much of your time, but-"

"Nonsense- this is why I'm here, young man."

"-but," you continue, "I think, I might have asked my question too… generally. I just, you seemed, so focused, it-it felt rude to interrupt..."

She doesn't seem annoyed, thankfully- actually, if anything, she seems even more curious.

"Well, if you were to rephrase it…?"

You take a moment to actually think about your question and wonder how much you can actually... well, tell her.

Some preliminary investigation found vanishingly little about the concept of AI in general, beyond the more obvious examples, like Royo's Project Indigo, which basically just parroted back anything that it was told, and the concept of AI in video games, sure, but you honestly couldn't find anything in the realm of…

Well, artificial intelligence designed to be a sapient being of its own accord, with its own thoughts and feelings and motivations. You look up and see her sitting there, patiently, a bright look in the eye you can see- her initial curiosity in you has only grown while watching you think.

---

… Well?

[] "What causes the soul to exist in some things, but not others?" [???: +1]

[] "Is a soul actually necessary to be considered, alive and healthy?" [???: +1]

[] Write-In

???: 0/10
???: 0/10

Jaune is finding the shape of his opinion- at 5 points, he will grasp it well enough to put it into words. At 10, he will be able to hold that opinion with conviction.