Chapter Text
Jaune let out a yawn before taking a sip of his coffee.
“Are you okay Jaune?” asked his partner.
He smiled reassuringly. “Yeah, just didn’t get much sleep last night. I have trouble sleeping in new places. Don’t worry, this usually doesn’t take too long.”
“If you have trouble sleeping, I know several tea herbs that can help with that,” Ren supplied helpfully.
“Thanks, but like I said, it’s not a big deal. It’ll pass.”
It’ll pass when I take Belladonna out.
He watched his Scroll the whole night for something to happen, but the undercover Fanus didn’t even stir.
Why didn’t she do anything? Did she get orders from HQ? Is she going to take Schnee hostage? I have to get my hands on her Scroll.
“Good morning guys!” Ruby said with a cheery smile, her team behind her.
“Sorry for not staying with you guys yesterday. We overslept and after the classes, we were beat. I guess we still haven’t got used to school,” said Yang.
“Don’t worry about it, I get it,” the undercover assassin said with a tired smile.
“You too?”
“Yep. But that’s why coffee exists,” he said and took another sip.
“Right-o!” the blond brawler said and took a sip of her mug.
Jaune glanced at Blake who was seemingly absorbed in her book, but he knew better. He knew she was paying attention to everything they said.
You brought your porn book to the breakfast table?! Come on, Ruby is next to you!
“So, since we didn’t get the chance to know each other yesterday and we were too busy not dying during Initiation, why don’t we start now?” Jaune proposed.
“Man, the Initiation was wild. That’s one way to start the year with a Yang, eh?” the blonde girl said, looking around the table expecting laughter, but all she got was deadpan stares.
Her sister groaned. “I forgot to warn you guys that my sister makes awful jokes.”
“Hey! My jokes are funny!”
“If you’re over eighty, yeah,” Jaune fired back.
Yang put her hand over her heart and bent over in mock pain, while JNPR and Ruby laughed. Weiss didn’t partake in the joke, but Jaune saw the corners of her mouth twitch, while Blake still looked like she only paid attention to her book. Jaune found himself genuinely laughing. Except for the disguised Fanus, he had learned where everyone came from. Additionally, he also learned that Ruby and Yang’s father and uncle are professional Huntsmen.
“What about your mother?” Jaune asked.
The sisters' happy disposition dropped, both looking sad
“I’m sorry,” the undercover assassin said. He didn’t mean to upset the girls, but it was in his nature to know everything there was about the people around him.
“No, no, it’s fine,” Ruby said quickly. “It’s just that…”
“We miss her,” supplied Yang.
“Yeah. That’s why I wanted to be Huntress,” the young reaper said with pride.
“I know you will be a great one, Ruby. So, will you Yang,” Jaune said with a smile.
Ruby blushed. “Thank you, Jaune.”
“You know how to make a girl feel better Lady Killer,” said with a flirtatious smirk to which Jaune returned the gesture.
I’m definitely taping Yang before I leave.
“So, you have the same goal as Ruby, Yang?” asked Pyrrha suddenly and Jaune couldn’t help but notice that her tone was off.
“Sort of. I’m just doing it for the fun. You?”
“It’s my duty to be Huntress. I’ve been given this power for a reason, I cannot image being something else,” replied the champion with conviction.
“That’s very noble of you Pyrrha,” Jaune said with pride and his partner beamed.
“As expected of the Mistral Champion,” said Weiss. “I want to be Huntress because I wanted to prove…myself.”
Jaune figured there was something more but said nothing.
“I- “Ren began and then looked at Nora before continuing. “We want to be Hunters because there is something we must do.”
Take revenge on Grimm? That’s stupid. Grimm are animals and everywhere. You could spend your whole life killing Grimm and you wouldn’t make a dent.
“What about you Blake?” Jaune asked innocently. “Where are you from? And what made you become a Huntress?”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” came the swift reply.
Yang sighed exasperated, but Jaune expected such a response.
Not that it matters. I already contacted the Agency to get your file. I’ll learn everything there is to know about you before lunch.
“The reason I wanted to be Huntress is because there is too much inequality in the world, too much internal strife and racism. I want to change that,” Blake said, surprising everyone.
So, terrorism is the way to go to make the world a better place? You don’t even see that your methods are making things worse. Self-righteous bitch.
“What about you Jaune? Why do you want to be a Huntsman?” Ruby asked innocently.
For a moment Jaune thought about what he should say and decided to answer as close to the truth as possible. Sometimes a good undercover story needs some truth in it, to make it more authentic.
“Just like Yang, I do this for fun. Also, the money helps.”
“Nice. I figured you were up for a fight. Can’t wait to spar with you in class,” Yang said.
“Why wait until then? We can go somewhere and…wrestle,” he responded with a flirty smirk and a wink.
Yang was surprised for a moment but quickly returned the smirk. Before she could respond Ruby butted it, sticking her tongue out. “Eww, gross!”
“For once, I agree with Ruby,” said Weiss.
“Aww, are you two still at the age where you still don’t like boys?” teased Yang.
“It’s not that I don’t like boys,” Ruby said, giving Jaune a side glance that confused the undercover assassin. “But I like other things better like cookies, comics, video games, and Crescent Rose.”
“I happen to like boys, but I preferred more refined and suave boys. Actually, refined and suave men are more my type,” the heiress replied.
“Hmm, so you’re into older guys?” asked Jaune.
The effect was immediate. “W-W-W-What are you saying?! Stuttered Weiss, her face red to the ears as a tomato. “I don’t like older men! Not that I have something against them, it’s just- “she stopped when she paid attention to everyone at the table.
Blake and Ren were blank-faced so she didn’t know what they were thinking. Ruby was confused, not understanding what was going on. Jaune, Nora, and Yang were barely holding in their laughter. Even Pyrrha was having trouble keeping a straight face.
“I’ll make you pay for this,” Weiss promised Jaune.
And that’s when the whole table roared with laughter and made Weiss sink into her spot in embarrassment while Ruby did her best to comfort her.
“Sorry, Weiss. It’s just that you are so cute when you’re embarrassed.”
Weiss once again blushed, but this time Jaune was prepared and took a picture of her face. During the remainder of the breakfast, Weiss was trying desperately to get Jaune’s phone while Ruby tried to calm her down.
“And for the final match of the day: Blake Belladonna and Jaune Arc, please come to the stage,” Professor Goodwitch said.
I couldn’t ask for a better opportunity. Now I’ll get a feel of her fighting style.
His handler came through as usual, however even after he explained the situation, she wasn’t too pleased. He had acted without orders and most importantly, he went behind the Agency’s back. Such actions would result in termination. Fortunately, they decided to cut him some slack because of the potential threat to Vale and the fact that he was one of the best agents they had. They sent him the file on Belladonna and promised to keep looking for Taurus and provide additional support when possible.
Her Semblance creates a shadow that lets her avoid getting hit; the cooldown time is 6 seconds. She can also infuse her clones with Dust, turning them into traps. Her weapon is a combination of sword, pistol, and sickle with the sheath acting like a cleaver, making her a melee and medium-range fighter. Medium aura level.
“Are you both ready?” Goodwitch asked and both combatants nodded. “Then begin.”
The undercover assassin moved first, charging at his opponent. Blake prepared herself to take the hit and leave behind an explosive clone. What she didn’t expect however was Jaune sliding between her legs and because she let herself be distracted, she stopped focusing on creating a clone and Jaune managed to slice her back making her fall forward.
Looks like my intuition was right. I can trick her by making her think I will strike her and then pull back at the last second, breaking her focus and attacking while she is distracted.
Jaune allowed his opponent to regain her footing, content with letting her make the move this time. Blake was still shocked by his surprise attack, but quickly shook it off. Switching her weapon into sickle mode she swung at it at the young man, who parried and dodged every attack. After he dodged a strike, Blake charged at him with her cleaver. The combatants fell into a dance of blades, each strike was parried with pinpoint accuracy, neither giving ground. Such a stalemate didn’t last forever as Jaune showed himself to be the superior swordsman when he batted Blake’s cleaver away from her hand and brought his sword down on hers, forcing her on one knee. Blake prepared herself to use her Semblance knowing his next strike was going to connect and sure enough Jaune aimed a slash at her midriff. However, just like before, the attack never came leaving her confused. Jaune swept her legs and just before Blake hit the ground, he hit her with the pommel of his sword with enough force to knock her out.
He waited a moment before speaking with convincing uncertainty. “Blake?”
He kneeled beside her in what looked like trying to see if she was okay, but in reality, the undercover assassin quickly swiped her scroll.
“Make way mister Arc,” the Deputy Headmistress said before checking on the unconscious student. “Miss Belladonna is unconscious, the winner is Jaune Arc. Mister Arc, please see me after I have taken Miss Belladonna to the infirmary.”
“Is she going to be okay?” he asked feigning concern.
“I am no doctor but from what I have seen, there doesn’t appear to be any real damage. Her Aura protected from the worst of it.”
“Thank goodness,” he breathed out in relief.
“You may leave now, I will summon you later,” the teacher said while carrying her unconscious student.
Jaune made his way towards his classmates. As he approached, he saw that they were upset with him, Yang looking downright angry.
“I didn’t mean to hurt her. It was an accident,” he said, putting his best guilty face.
Surprisingly it was Weiss who defended him first. “Accidents can happen in training,” she said, her fingers ghosting over the scar on her face.
“Indeed, I too accidentally knocked out a few of my opponents during my tournaments,” his partner soon followed with Ren nodding in agreement.
“Will Blake be alright?” asked Ruby, a little at ease, but still worried about her teammate.
“Prof. Goodwitch said that it didn’t appear to be anything serious,” the undercover assassin replied, making the girl completely relax.
Finally, Yang let out a sigh. “You guys are right, it was just an accident.”
Jaune extended his hand. “No hard feeling?”
The brawler took it applying a little too much force than it was necessary, but Jaune showed nothing on his face. “No hard feelings. But you should ask Blake the same question.”
“I will, don’t worry.”
“Well, now that’s settled let’s go grab a bite to eat,” said Nora who was back to her joyful self.
“You guys go ahead. I have to talk to Goodwitch,” Jaune said.
The others left, Ren putting his hand on his shoulder and Pyrrha touching his arm gently, smiling at him, to which he returned. He went to the professor’s office and after sitting through her lecture on responsibility, holding back, and other crap, he was finally free to go. He quickly went to his room and took out his laptop to connect Blake’s scroll to it. In a second he bypassed security and went to search its files. Unfortunately, that didn’t take long as the Scroll was mostly empty. The only emails and messages were from Blake’s team. There were no photos and only a few songs that he quickly listened to, but nothing about them stood out. And the only contacts on the phone were her team’s. Finally, he searched for deleted files in hopes of finding something, but even that turned fruitless. With a frustrated sigh, he disconnected the scroll and hid his laptop before contemplating the information he had now.
Blake Belladonna is the daughter of the founder of White Fang and it has been reported that Adam Tarus was her partner, but so far, I’ve found no evidence to support a connection between her and the terrorist organization. What I gathered is that she is Fanus who is concealing her identity from everyone, almost as if…she is trying to stay hidden.
He looked at Blake’s scroll again. It looked clean, new even and the lack of anything on it further supports that.
Could it be that she’s hiding from White Fang? It does make sense when you think about it: what other places are more secure than a Hunstman academy? Not to mention, is the last place authorities would look for a runaway terrorist. It appears this lead was a waste of time.
He sighed as he closed his laptop. From the outside, he heard that team RWBY entered their dorm, which was good since he could get this over with. He put the laptop away, not wanting Nora to poke her nose where it didn’t belong before making his way to the other dorm. He knocked on the door and Ruby opened it.
“Hey, is this a good time?” he asked.
“Uhm,” the other team leader began unsure, and turned to look behind her at Blake.
“It’s fine,” her teammate said and Ruby allowed him to enter.
He entered and pretended to be surprised at the ridiculous way they set up their beds.
It looks stupider every time I see it.
“Hey Blake,” he began, looking guilt-ridden. “I-I’m really sorry about our match, I never meant to hurt you.”
“It’s alright. It didn’t cause any permanent damage and I was told it was an accident,” she said reassuringly from her bed
The undercover assassin frowned. “You don’t remember?”
“No. The last thing I remember was when we were crossing swords.”
Jaune looked even more guilty. “Sorry…”
Blake waved a hand dismissively. “Like I said it’s fine. It was an accident.”
“So…we’re cool?” he asked sounding hopeful
“Yeah, we’re cool.”
“Great! Thank you, Blake!” he said looking relieved. “And before I forget, here,” he handed her Scroll. “I found it in the arena after our fight.”
“I see, thank you Jaune.”
“No problem. I’ll let you get some rest and again I’m sorry,” he finished with a smile before leaving.
“Are you sure you’re okay Blake?” her team leader asked after the blonde young man left the room.
“Yes, I’m fine Ruby, don’t worry.”
“And-and is everything okay with Jaune?” she asked looking hopeful and afraid at the same time.
Blake understood where she was going with this. Jaune was Ruby’s best friend (according to her, he didn’t know how Jaune viewed their friendship or if he considered them friends) and she would be put in a difficult situation if Blake and Jaune didn’t get along.
“Don’t worry Ruby. Everything is fine,” she said to calm the young reaper.
Ruby visibly relaxed and the tense atmosphere in the room was lifted. Afterward, the rest of the team started going on about their business. Ruby was reading her weapons magazine, Weiss, being the diligent student that she is was doing her homework, and Yang was looking at her scroll while Blake was brooding.
Seeing her partner sitting there looking gloomy, Yang decided to speak. “You okay Blake? You look a little down.”
Blake blinked. “Yes, I’m fine. Just thinking about my fight with Jaune.”
“He is truly a skilled fighter. I mean no disrespect Blake, but you were thoroughly defeated,” commented Weiss.
“Is that what’s bothering you?” the brawler asked her partner who remained silent. “You shouldn’t let that eat at you. It’s still the beginning of the year, there’s plenty of time for you to get strong and get even with Lover Boy.”
“I really wish you’d stop calling him that…” grumbled Weiss
“Can’t deny that he’s charming when he wants to be. I’m sure Pyrrha would agree,” the blonde girl said with a smirk.
“The only thing I’ll admit is that he is a strong opponent. A worthy partner to Pyrrha Nikos.”
“Yeah, he’s strong. Can’t wait to fight him!”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” said Blake.
“What do you mean?” asked her partner.
“He’s too strong. I couldn’t land a hit on him.”
“Hey, I’m strong too, you know? I’m sure I can land more than a hit on him!” Yang replied annoyed.
Blake opened her mouth to say something but decided against it. “Forget it,” she said and turned away.
Yang looked angry, but rather than saying something she just waved a hand dismissively at her partner’s back.
She doesn’t get it. She didn’t see what I saw. Blake thought
She recalled how handily beaten she was against the blond knight. Every strike was parried or blocked with pinpoint accuracy. While all her blocks and parries were barely on time he slowed down his attacks just so she could protect herself in time. Blake had sparred with people who were more skilled than her. Adam had always slowed down his attacks to not hurt her and she could always tell when that was the case. And she knew that Jaune did the same thing. His objective was never to defeat her, but it was something else. She looked at her Scroll, who was in perfect condition.
He said he found it in the arena. If it had fallen from my pocket why is it in such good shape? Sure, Huntsman-issued scrolls are sturdier than the ones for commercial use, but they’re not that sturdy. There isn’t a scratch on it like it never fell from my pocket.
And then realization hit her. Jaune’s true objective was to get his hands on her scroll. And with the way he pulled back his attack at the last second as if he knew what kind of Semblance she has. But it shouldn’t be possible. He couldn’t have seen it in the Initiation and it’s not like she was advertising it. Hell, she was sure even her teammates weren’t aware of it. There is only one explanation and it made dread form in her stomach like a knot.
He knows who I am!
Jaune sat on his bed reviewing the information he had on this job he had taken from Roman. Which wasn’t a lot, either the man didn’t know or held some of it back. Roman and Neo got ‘recruited’ by a woman named Cinder Fall into stealing all the dust in Vale. She also allied with White Fang, a terrorist organization that hates humanity and they plan to destroy Vale by using the dust to create a big enough hole for the Grimm to enter from below. He could understand why White Fang would be involved, they would see it, in their twisted way, that they would be striking a blow for Fanus kind, not understanding that there are Fanus who live good lives in Vale with almost no prejudice. But what he didn’t was what was Cinder Fall after. Why would she want to destroy Vale? Is this a play for a position in the Council? But there must be a better strategy than destroying the kingdom. Is she working for someone? So many questions with no answers.
“Yahoo! Are you here Fearless Leader?” Nora burst into the room, cutting off his train of thought.
He smiled. Out of everyone in their group, Nora was the funniest of them all, and thanks to Ren, she didn’t cross into annoying territory. “What’s up, Nora?”
“Uhm, have you finished the essay for the History class?” she asked in a bashful way.
“Essay?” Jaune asked, confused.
“Yeah, you know the essay conflicts that shaped the history of Remnant. You haven’t started it, have you?”
He shook his head, keeping his cool. He had been so focused on finding a lead to Tarus that he had forgotten that at school the students are given homework. “When is it due?”
“Tomorrow,” replied Ren.
Without another word, Jaune darted from the room.
“Wait Jaune- “Pyrrha began, but the undercover assassin had already less. “I was wondering if you need any help with it,” she finished lamely.
“Why don’t you go after him?” asked Ren.
“I don’t want to disturb him,” said Pyrrha with a pout.
“If you don’t do something, he will slip away. You saw how he flirted with Yang,” Nora reminded her.
“But what if we ruin our friendship?” the champion asked as this was the last thing, she wanted to happen
Nora said nothing, understanding her friend’s fear better than anyone else.
“I don’t think that will happen,” Ren said, surprising his two teammates. “Jaune looks like a mature man, I’m sure he wouldn’t think less of you. Just talk to him.
Easier said than done, thought Pyrrha bitterly. He had no problem facing Grimm or another person in combat, but when it came to talking to open herself up to others she always froze.