"C'mon Adam!" Blake pulled at the older boy's wrist impatiently. "The Ferry's arriving any minute!"
"The Ferry stops in every week." Adam argued, rubbing the sleep from his one eye, the other covered by a wide black cloth eyepatch. He didn't often take that off for good reason. "It'll get here when it gets here."
Blake huffed.
The older eleven year old boy, the leader of most of the kids around their age in their side of Menagerie, disliked taking things at any pace but his own. Still Adam was a hard worker and participated in White Fang work just as much if not more than Blake herself.
As his senior in the Fang, despite being younger, she'd taken it upon herself to be his friend and keep him company, tagging along and making sure that he didn't get into any trouble on his own. He'd had a tendency to let his temper get the better of him on occasion, getting into angry arguments if left to his own devices.
Still he was handsome and passionate, which was why most of the girls in the settlement were crushing on him, their jealousy often turning on Blake because of their closeness. Thank the gods Illia didn't seem to be into him like that too.
It really wasn't like that. Papa Ghira just often looked after any orphans and so she'd tag along and spend plenty of time with Adam and other former SDC child workers as a result of Atlas's mediation of the Fang and the SDC.
Adam just was one of the few orphans from that group that took that experience to drive him to fight for a better tomorrow instead of wallowing in it or trying to experience being a kid proper. She supposed that was what drew her to be his friend. She liked passionate people.
He had been planning a revolt and escape plan alongside his fellow miners before the Fang had been able to save them with the mediation of the Atlas military. Crazy, but the miners might have pulled it off from the sounds of what they'd managed to smuggle and put together under the noses of their SDC overlords.
Sometimes Adam still talked about the nights where he and the older miners planned their escape. Like it was a shame they couldn't pull it off, bitter that the older miners were left behind.
He and Blake didn't blame any of the other orphan miners for not fighting for the Fang. Peaceful protest was hard.
Harder still because you could never swing back. It was a thing that even Adam had problems with even if it was clear he wanted to hit them.
He was lucky to have Aura to defend himself though. Blake still wasn't allowed to have Aura. Apparently unlocking Aura too early was dangerous because kids were more prone to fear and fearful Aura drew Grimm even more than normal.
She was jealous, but he had unlocked it in a really sad way and it made her pity him.
She didn't get why some of the older girls swooned over his eyepatch and claimed that 'they could fix him'.
Blake dreaded the thought of puberty.
"Still, there's no reason we can't go and wait by the docks! We can wait by the cafe and get some hot chocolate~" Blake laid the bait.
Adam grunted, his baby blue eye narrowing as it weighed the sweet treat versus his desire to be in control of his life.
"You really want to see this penpal of yours that badly, huh?"
Blake felt her cheeks flush indignantly in the early morning wind. The windchill was a bit more intense because it was December and they were close to the coast! She wasn't that excited. Adam teased too much.
"It's not quite like that. Jaune's so smart that scientists in Atlas have been clamoring for his assistance. He's been talking with Papa Ghira about setting up something to let us be less dependent on trading for Dust."
That caught Adam's attention, the spark of contemplation in his eye glimmering.
"Huh. That'd suck for SDC. Ok I'm in. Let's go get hot chocolate."
Blake rolled her eyes.
She didn't blame him for it, but when it came to the SDC Adam could be so single minded.
Cafe Cornucopia was designed like a large open tropical hut with some slightly tacky overhang made of fake giant tropical leaves. There were a few Faunus about grabbing an early meal or coffee as they waited for the Ferry. Some would inevitably be outbound to find work in the Kingdoms to send money back to their families, others were waiting for friends and family to come visiting in.
Blake pulled a few crumpled green hundred Lien bills from her pockets alongside a slightly crisper yellow five hundred Lien bill and placed them on the counter.
"Two small hot chocolates please!" She called out, tip toeing over the counter, her ears twitching at the smell of warm breakfast foods, coffee, and chocolate.
The barista at the counter smiled warmly, the smile stretching to his deer ears. A white button pinned to his green apron with the cool blue symbol of the White Fang displayed proudly.
"Well if it isn't little miss Belladonna. We don't see you out here very often. Don't worry about it, that'll be on the house."
Blake shook her head as she pushed the bills towards the barista.
"Papa always says you need to pay for what you're given." She insisted.
Citrine, the name displayed on his apron sighed, "Well, Chieftain Ghira certainly would know best eh?"
He took her money and asked her to take a seat as she and Adam walked off to grab a table.
"So any idea what your friend's plan is to get us to cut down on Dust consumption?"
"Something called solar power and bigger and better batteries. It's part of why Papa's been getting people to try to mine lithium and cobalt."
Adam's nose scrunched with doubt.
"Batteries don't do much." He scoffed, "They barely keep Scrolls running long enough. That's why the recent ones from Vacuo let you pour in some refined Lightning Dust Powder to keep them going longer, only switching to batteries to prevent the fuel pods from igniting the Dust as it's poured in. Are you sure this isn't a scam?"
"Atlas didn't think so. The reason we've been getting one of their ships every other month has been because they've actually been buying up lithium from us in bulk because there isn't too much in Atlas. Papa Ghira's had a headache trying to keep the mining in house instead of letting an Atlas company muscle in."
"Chief does good work" Adam grinned, "Atlas can stay off Menagerie."
Blake rolled her eyes.
"Either way, Jaune's batteries are already being used in a bunch of new civilian and military tech over in Atlas now, apparently. It's why we've been able to afford to start expanding our sewage systems." Blake explained excitedly, gazing towards the horizon, trying to spot the Siren Ferry's approach. "Papa says the Atlas military's been cutting down on purchasing Lightning Dust by ten percent and it's driving the cost of it down a little too."
Adam let out a short bark of laughter.
"Alright. Cool. Sounds like he's hurting the SDC the one place it hurts. Ten percent doesn't sound like a lot though."
"It's a lot." Blake argued, although she was now just repeating the same explanation her Papa had given to her, "Ten percent of a hundred is just ten, but ten percent of a thousand is a hundred. And the Atlas military doesn't purchase thousands, they purchase tens if not hundreds of thousands units of Dust. Lithium batteries apparently can hold a lot more power and stretches out the use of Lightning dust for much longer and can actually be reused unlike Dust, even if they're heavier than Dust. The only thing holding them back is that they don't have enough lithium."
Adam's next sentence or question was cut off when two large cups of hot chocolate were brought to their table.
Blake's ears flattened against her head in some slight frustration.
"I ordered two small cups." She protested.
"Sorry about that little miss Belladonna!" Citrine quickly walked away after dropping by with their order, "Honest mistake. I'll be better next time, promise!"
"I can SEE you crossing your fingers!" She accused.
"Haven't got a clue about what you mean, miss!"
Adam just chuckled lightly into his cup of hot chocolate.
"What, Adam." She scowled, reaching for her own cup.
"Nothing. Just seeing you like that's cute."
Her scowl deepened as she began to sip at her own hot chocolate, feeling her cheeks redden slightly. Blake wasn't used to being complimented like that. She could feel her ears flatten against her head further.
"I-"
Her ears perked as she popped to her feet, a droplet of hot chocolate splashed up onto the tip of her nose.
"I see the Ferry!"
It was a blip in the distance, but it'd only be about an hour longer before it arrived into port from Oniyuri.
There was a second blip next to it, bigger and clean, a white angular one.
"Odd." She mumbled, "We had an Atlas cargo ship just two weeks ago."
Adam slowly nursed his hot chocolate as he stood next to her, his finger reaching out to wipe the droplet of chocolate from her nose as she sputtered in embarrassment.
His lone eye narrowed towards the horizon over her, a small relief.
"That one looks more armored. Not SDC. Military."
Blake thought for a moment.
"Maybe they're here to keep Jaune safe? Apparently he's really important."
"Important enough for a battleship?"
"I guess?" Blake wasn't sure.
Jaune's messages made it clear he'd returned to his family in Mistral. The fact he'd run away from home once and somehow ended up in Vale was crazy. Weider that his temporarily adoptive family of Huntsmen then brought him to Atlas because he was a genius.
He was like the protagonist of his own story. He was a puzzle and an interesting ball of threads to pick apart.
But why would Atlas be here if he'd been back in Mistral now? They weren't exactly allied like they were with Vale.
Blake swished the warm chocolate milk in her mouth, enjoying the taste of the sweet liquid over her tastebuds.
She had a lot of questions and Jaune answered everything she ever asked.
Her heart beat faintly faster as she gazed at the approaching ships.
She'd have her answers soon.
Yang and Nora were terrible friends to witness, Juniper noted.
Not in that they were bad people, of course. Even in his version of history the two girls were almost family. Sort of extended family now, even if not by blood, and they weren't bad people either in this lifetime.
Nora slammed her Revolver-LightMaul Magnhildr down, the rubber training rounds exploding against the now slightly dented metal deck as it bounced back up and knocked Yang back, who blocked with the crossed arms of her heavy armored gauntlets made of a utilitarian black alloy with yellow bolts and rivets.
He looked down to see that Jaune watched, half in horror, as Ruby hung off his back, snuggled into his neck, as Ren quietly cheered Nora on in her spar against Yang.
The girls were terrible at holding back, especially since they were younger, causing small but visible damage to the metal deck of the Atlasean guard-ship as they slammed into and at each other.
Yang's hair smoldered like sunfire. A sharp one-two jab slammed into the haft of Nora's weapon, making the orange haired girl slide back, her sneakers leaving a black trail skidding on the floor.
Thanks to Raven leaping from deck to deck and setting up a portal link (how was it moving along the ship?) they'd been shifted over to the deck of the Defiant Blue, the dual purpose aquatic capable Light Guardian Class armored Atlasean airship, after they'd received permission from the captain to allow the young Huntresses in training to have a spar.
Juniper had missed what had made the two girls agree to spar with one another, having been in his state of pseudo-rest figuring nothing could go wrong with Jaune's real family and his adoptive sort-of moms/aunts family meeting.
He really should have known better.
Raven was 'accompanying' as a 'hired guard' of the family from Patch, dressed in her new mercenary company, Parabellum's uniform, crafted by Jaune to emulate a Commander's uniform from the ARK.
It was a smart and classy looking dark gray-black military officer's uniform from Earth, which looked very different from Atlas but equally fashionable, but with crimson trimmings instead of the original gold and some additional colored fabric for the cover of buttoned pockets and the inside linings and lapel.
Raven, however, casually treated the ballistic armor underlined coat as more of a shoulder cape as she wore her normal kimono top underneath. A pair of well pressed gray-black military slacks clung to her shapely legs tucked into calf length laced steel-toed boots.
A peaked cap in the same military style with a red brim with the three tomoe circle symbol of the Branwen Crest lazily sat utop her head at a slant, though she'd constantly use it as a shield to hide her extended make out sessions with her wife Summer who currently was cheering on Yang instead of being lip-locked with her wife.
Sadly Qrow was off doing missions for Ozpin and Taiyang was staying at home, busy with work setting up for the final year of Patch students final exams.
A bit of a shame, as Jaune (and Juniper himself) liked the older men. They somehow managed to be more stable influences than the women of Team STRQ. He wasn't suicidal enough to say that out loud ever though in case Jaune would repeat his words and get a Raven-induced punishment.
His mother Noelle (god he wished he could even speak with his mother) was holding onto the shoulders of Farbiglas as she took dozens of photos on her Scroll of everything on the ship. And of course cheering on her adopted daughter Nora.
Nora grinned excitedly at Noelle's encouragement, slapping a button on an armored case housing Jaune-manufactured batteries on the side of her belt, injecting her with a small burst of controlled electricity, amping up her Semblance, letting her swing with faster speed and strength.
Juniper could see that Yang was no push over though, and thanks to the Yanxia pill she'd taken months ago, her base Burn state was barely faster than Nora even in her lightning enhanced High Voltage empowerment, dodging with a leaning half backstep to a side swing, Magnhild grazing across the child sized armored coat in the same design as her mother Raven's, though her's was trimmed in yellow instead of crimson.
Raven had specifically asked for it when Jaune had been fabricating uniforms for her newly militarized tribe and the boy hadn't had an issue with it.
Sneaking members of the Branwen tribe into the rear shed with the second Multi-Fabricator without Farbiglas finding them out (being the only member of the family that was attempting to learn how to use the machines) had been the hardest part. Vernal especially had been weirdly clingy wanting a spar before she left, though Raven disallowed it, to the girl's disappointment.
His father was not present on the Defiant Blue however, as he was back at home with the rest of his and Jaune's sisters, helping finalize this year of harvest and winemaking. Despite being a Huntsman, wine crafts were a true passion for him.
Yang then leaned in, purposefully taking a blow from the solid metal haft of Magnhild across her left shoulder and gritting through the pain, letting the blow jumpstart the power of her own Semblance Burn (which the girl had apparently awakened at the end of the summer in Atlas) as she slammed an air-ripping straight thrust into Nora, sending the orangette flying back with a yelp, her bright pink nailed fingers flying away from her weapon as she rolled and tumbled head over ass out of the square training arena marked by a bit of water soluble paint.
"Ring out!" Specialist Noire announced, having come to accompany Jaune on their trip to Menagerie.
Officially it was because she was acting as an additional liaison to the growing Atlas-Menagerie cooperation from the Faunus not-yet-Kingdom's rare metal mining efforts, but Juniper was pretty sure it was more of Ironwood's ploys to earn goodwill with Jaune.
Neither Juniper or Jaune could complain as the Defiant Blue would serve the next month as their home away from home at Menagerie as even though the Belladonna estate would be large, it likely couldn't host both families. Especially since originally the entire cast of Arc sisters wanted to come with, but even Noelle couldn't keep an eye on every one of her now eight daughters. No matter how much of a Huntress super-mom she was.
"That's Yang XiaoLong-Branwen's victory by terms of combat! Good match you two."
The Specialist nodded approvingly at the two girl's spar, pointedly ignoring the Defiant Blue's captain giving her a despairing look from the unnecessary damage to the deck of his vessel. Mostly cosmetic, but it didn't change the fact that a pair of seven year old girls had messed up the surface of his vaunted vessel.
"Aww!" Nora groaned as she got up. "I almost had that."
Yang grinned with her pretty white teeth. Pretty but slightly more crooked than Juniper remembered. Had Yang gotten braces at some point? Huh. Juniper had never known that. Well, a girl like Yang would have never advertised such a fact, so that made sense.
"Yeah that was close." She good-naturedly replied, although Juniper could see the girl almost bouncing on the tips of her toes as Raven sent her a proud look. He was pretty sure she was only being quite so sportswomanly because she'd been the one to win. "You might get me next time. What was that electric thing? Your Semblance?"
"Yup! Jauney calls it High Voltage!"
Yang's smile faltered ever so slightly at the pet name, her lilac eyes still slightly aglow as she tugged at the ribbon tied around her neck in a sideways bow with an armored finger.
"O-oh. So that thing on your belt gives you a boost?"
"Yeah!" Nora smiled brilliantly as she pat it, "It's called Strumvindr! It's just an armored battery core that juices me up! Jauney made it for me."
Yang's eyes reddened a bit in jealousy.
Juniper laughed as she stormed over to Jaune, a cute huff erupting from her puffed cheeks.
"Jaune!" Yang whined, grabbing onto one of his wrists, "M-make me something too!"
Ah great. Pseudo-sibling rivalry.
Jaune's eyes flickered up to him and Juniper just shrugged.
"You don't need to ask for my permission." Juniper chuckled.
"I already made your coat, didn't I?" Jaune replied confusedly.
"Make her something, brat." Raven just called over from place by Summer's side, her hand resting on her white haired wife's waist, thumb rubbing gentle circles over her wife's red and white sundress. "She's just gonna hound you until you do."
"Rae." Summer scolded as Noelle narrowed her eyes at the woman calling her son a brat. "Be polite. Jaune's mother is here."
Raven grunted.
"Sorry." She surprisingly did apologize, although only at her wife's insistence and not at all sorry, "It's something of a pet name is all."
"Literally only Summer or Taiyang could ever make you vaguely personable Raven Branwen." Noelle's eyes were cold chips of hazel. "How Team STRQ ever even graduated with you on board is beyond me."
Raven shrugged.
"I've no clue either." She admitted. "But strength opens doors."
Juniper still wondered over seeing Raven Branwen being civil. If she'd been even half as personable in his timeline maybe things could have been different.
The loss of Summer must have truly broken her beyond repair. And Ruby really did get her mediating nature from her mother.
Nora giggled something into Ren's ear as she leaned into him from behind, getting the Mistralian boy to smile as they both gazed at Yang shaking Jaune back and forth, jostling Ruby on his back as well as the messenger bag on his side.
"What do you even want me to make Yang?"
"Something. Anything!"
Jaune threw his hands in the air.
"Narrow it down!"
"I said anything, didn't I?"
"That's not narrowing anything down!"
"Land ho!" The captain of the Defiant Blue called out in irritation clearly not wanting to hear children to continue having an inane argument on his deck as he left to return to the captain's deck. "Menagerie approaching! Estimated thirty minutes!"
Captain Ral Tai of the Defiant Blue walked away complaining about how his ass itched.
"Welcome to Menagerie!" Blake gave a small bow as she saw Adam grunt next to her, clearly a bit nonplussed to see so many humans.
He didn't actually have any issues with humans, but Summer Rose's white hair made her look a bit Schnee-adjacent and she knew that didn't buy any points with the older boy.
She quietly stepped on his toes, getting the older boy to hunch over in pain, looking close enough to a bow, as his red Aura flashed like smoldering embers and earth.
"Blake!" Jaune bounced towards her happily, the familiar form of his not-actual-sister-but-close Ruby Rose-XiaoLong on his back like a backpack. The small girl with silver eyes also waved excitedly, but a bit shy in a new and unfamiliar environment. "How have you been?"
She straightened up with a smile, feeling her ears perk at the sound of his voice.
"I've been good. But you should already know that from our messages."
"Still not the same as seeing each other face to face." The kind-of-cute blond genius argued with a pout as he leaned in for a hug, stopping right before Adam's reaching arm could stop him. "Hmm?"
"Calm down, kid." Adam snorted. "You've barely said ten words to each other."
Blake rolled her eyes. Adam was protective of all the kids their age. In fairness he was kind of a communal big brother. He just had a rough exterior.
She leaned under his arm and gave Jaune a quick hug, feeling his Aura warm with the scent of juniper berries. Spicy but sweet. She wanted to linger in it a bit longer, but pulled away politely.
"Sup, kitty-cat?" Yang's voice called from behind, her arms crossed behind her head with a lazy grin.
She had a new pretty cool looking coat that hung open to her favorite oversized orange shirt.
Oddly clashing with her human friend's personality, it looked almost militant, but not Atlasean, Blake noted.
While her's was yellow-coded, the taller black haired woman in the back that Blake only recalled seeing once during her time in Atlas that looked like an older Yang had a red-coded version with a single gold pin with the black words 'Big Boss' engraved on it where normally military ribbons should go above the left breast pocket.
Yang's biological mother, she recalled, though she didn't know her name.
That weirdly made sense from what Blake had figured out from Yang's personality. Like mother, like daughter, she guessed.
"Hi Yang." Blake tried not to roll her eyes, failing to do so. "Good morning to you too."
Yang stepped in to give Blake a slightly tight hug as she giggled, Blake couldn't help but to laugh slightly too at her friend's eager nature. Despite their opposite personalities, the two girls had kept in touch as well, getting on weirdly well.
Yang's Aura felt like raw sunlight and smooth scales and gems.
"You smell like chocolate." Yang mumbled into the hug, squeezing Blake fondly.
Blake laughed.
"I had some hot chocolate while Adam and I were waiting."
"Ooh~" Yang teased, "You and Adam huh?"
Blake snorted as she shoved her friend off of her lightly.
"You know it's not like that."
Yang grinned cheekily.
"I donno~"
"Thank you for receiving us, Miss Belladonna." The familiar figure of Specialist Noire stepped forward with a diplomatic smile.
So Atlas did send someone just because of Jaune.
That made her kind of proud for some reason. Just one Faunus was important enough for the military of Atlas to take action.
"No, thank you for coming. I didn't know that Atlas would be coming though."
"Just precautionary, Miss Belladonna." Specialist Noire smiled, "And rest assured. The Defiant Blue is a pure diplomatic vessel. Only Hard-Light shields and no weaponry aside from a few Hull-Shock systems to shake off Grimm."
Blake could hear Adam give an impressed whistle as she nodded.
"Thank you. That will help everyone feel more safe." She admitted.
That meant the Ferry was technically more dangerous combat-wise than the Atlasean vessel, as the technically Mistralian vessel actually had some small but powerful turrets and harpoons built in to fight off and scare aquatic Grimm.
"I'll make sure to tell my father." She replied happily.
"So is mister Ghira like the leader of Menagerie and the White Fang?" Jaune asked curiously.
Adam frowned.
"Yeah, obviously. How don't you know that?"
Jaune flinched a bit, making Yang, an orange haired girl, and a black haired Mistralian boy with a pink streak in his hair and eyes level a bit of a glare at the older boy who didn't seem to be bothered by his own gruffness.
Blake didn't recognize the last two. They didn't look like Jaune at all. Extended cousins, maybe? Otherwise why would they be here? She did recognize Jaune's sister Farbiglas and his mother Noelle from a few pictures from Jaune, though.
"Uh. I-I was born in a human family. We have some recessive Faunus heritage. The rest of my siblings are humans."
Adam gazed over Jaune with his one eye somewhat suspiciously.
"How do you have two different traits?"
"Adam!" Blake was mortified. "I already explained about Jaune!"
"It's different seeing it with my own eye." Adam argued back, not seeing how he might be making the younger boy uncomfortable. "Just making conversation."
Actually that singular designation did catch Jaune's notice. Especially since Adam's eyepatch wasn't exactly hard to miss.
"Uh. Well, it's fine. You can feel them if you want. They're both real. I don't really get why I have two traits either." Jaune offered peacefully before getting to his own curiosity of the other boy, "Uh, what happened to your eye?"
Adam wasn't one bit offended, having been more than used to such questions at this point and naturally thick skinned.
"Mining accident." He simplified. He didn't like bringing more attention to it than necessary most times. He would sometimes if it got him something he wanted though.
"Oh. I'm sorry."
"Don't be, man." Adam shrugged. "You weren't responsible."
"Do you want a replacement? A new eye?"
Adam looked at Jaune like he was an idiot.
"Huh?"
Jaune's fingers flickered as a few certifications and licenses from Atlas appeared in his hands.
"I'm qualified to perform prosthetic, cosmetic, and battlefield surgery. And I have a few spare prosthetic NIKKE eyes at the moment. I can replace any scar tissue and skin too."
Adam turned to Blake with a disbelieving and confused look.
Blake was a bit confused too. She knew Jaune knew and dealt with technology, not surgery.
Specialist Noire stepped up with a knowing smile.
"The Little Professor was the one who personally replaced the whole of General Ironwood's prosthetics last summer. I'd take his offer if I were you. There are rich citizens of Atlas that can't even be so lucky."
In the corner of her vision, Blake noticed a tall thin man turn vaguely in their direction, his face hard to distinguish due to a thick pair of shades and an equally if not more thick mustache on his face. His Faunus features hidden somewhere under his long coat. Or high collar. Or both. His short black hair had a blue tint over it that didn't match his black facial hair.
But her attention was brought back to the face of a disbelieving Adam as Jaune began to delve into his nerdy techno-babble as he tried to sell the older boy on accepting a new prosthetic eye, giving her a giggle, forgetting the strange man at Cafe Cornucopia.