Ownership:

RWBY is owned by creator Monty Oum, God rest his soul, and Rooster Teeth Productions.

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes is owned by 20th Century Fox, Chenrin Entertainment, and TSG Entertainment.

I, the humble author of this fan-work, own absolutely nothing, gain no profit whatsoever, and wish only to express my writing and love for these fandoms artistically.

Alright I'm pretty late but I TOLD YOU DIDN'T I? I POSTED IT TONIGHT!
Also I don't know shit about mining.

Chapter 10: Unforeseen Conflicts, Part 2: Powerful Beasts

Though the sky was still as gray as ever over West Dragon, with some sunlight breaking through, today was quite strange for the apes, as the sky was filled with more than just clouds. The world above them was filled with, what looked like to many of them, a swarm of flying metal birds. Many of the apes had never really seen the flying vehicles of Remnant before, until now.

Weiss contacted her family company, and her father sent a fleet of ships their way. The Schnee Dust Company employed several kinds of vessels for their profession. Transports to carry their workers, storage ships for carrying several loads of Dust, personal vehicles for the more important personnel of the SDC, and many more. All manner of the SDC's aircrafts were approaching West Dragon, heading specifically for the Dust Spires' location.

The apes looked on in amazement at such flying things, some of them never having seen such manner of transport before. The hunters-in-training looked in amazement too, seeing the company's work force come in such grand fashion.

Ruby pointed out to them in excitement, "That's them!" she exclaimed.

"I'm surprised they came so quickly," Ren observed.

"Well of course they did!" Weiss asserted. "My company's always adept to timely arrivals."

While the student hunters looked on with elation or wonderment, the apes gazed with wariness. Caesar especially watched the incoming aircrafts from atop his steed, without a hint of positivity towards the sight. Humans were more aggressive and biased than Faunus, he knew that, but both species were still arrogant and destructive. If members of both races were coming, the apes' discomfort may be stirred, and that worried him.

Next to his left were Maurice and Rocket, while Blue Eyes was to his right. They were cautious of their visitors as well. Maurice was a more welcoming and open minded towards these workers but still wary, while Rocket was more so following Caesar's orders than actually wanting humans and Faunus in ape territory. Blue Eyes was definitely close minded, his inexperience with either humanoid inhibiting a more tolerant view of them.

Here they come… signed Maurice, the flying ships coming closer and closer.

Let's hope they're friendly, said Rocket, not wanting any conflicts among the apes with them.

How will they take those giant crystals? Asked Blue Eyes to his father. He was actually curious of how they would take such massive structures with them.

I don't know, Caesar answered. They must have special tools.

With that, they kept on gazing. Though they were coming closer, the workers' ships looked almost like a swarm of flies in the sky.

Caesar turned his attention to another ape, his eye catching Koba in a terrible mood. The scarred ape looked very scornful of the incoming aircrafts. Caesar sighed, knowing that he would eventually have to do something about Koba's stance on humans.

The SDC's aircrafts landed, the large ships setting foot on the earthy ground from which the Spires grew. Some vehicles were carrying massive shipping containers, and dropped them to the ground before the ships themselves landed. Once their engines turned off and cooled, their crews of several miners exited the vehicles.

As they did so, the large troupe of Grimm Apes marched out of their forest and into the field of Dust Spires, ready to meet with the workers face to face. The students came with them, nervous of how the workforce of the SDC would react to the army of sentient Grimm. Surprisingly it was mild, as they were more focused on unloading their equipment, though some looked up to see the apes in astonishment.

How will they be different than Hunters? Maurice asked Caesar, as the apes kept marching forward.

Never met miners, Caesar admitted. Doesn't mean they will like us.

"M-Mister Caesar!"

Caesar looked behind him, and saw four of the young hunters running towards him. The one who called to him, the red caped girl called "Ruby Rose," was accompanied by three of her allies. They stopped running once they caught up and kept pace with his horse.

"Hi again," she greeted, "um, Mister Caesar sir, I think that we–!"

"Just Caesar," he told her. He didn't have any honorifics, nor needed them. Calling him "mister" was just unnecessary.

"Oh, sorry uh, Caesar," she corrected herself, "but I think me and my team should do the talking with them." He was a little surprised by her request, but didn't show any of it. He just stared at neutrally, waiting for a reason why.

"… Uhm, if that's okay…?" she asked anxiously, almost breaking to his silence.

"I must agree with her," one of her friends interjected, another girl with white hair, tied into a side ponytail, and a scar over her left eye.

"These people work for my com – I mean, my father's company, so I would be their superior," she continued, supporting her red caped friend's request. To Caesar, this girl had a more serious atmosphere, but there a snide element to her as well. He then looked to the other two with them: one with black hair and the bow atop her head, and the other with voluminous yellow hair.

"And them?" Caesar asked Ruby, referring to those two and what they wanted.

Ruby attempted to speak for them, "Um–!" but the yellow haired girl interjected.

"We're a team through and through," she proclaimed. "Where these three go, I'm coming with!" To the ape king, this girl seemed outgoing and headstrong. Caesar wasn't entirely sure if she would be a problem with the other apes or not.

He looked to the last girl with black hair, who was nervous under his glance. "… It's… the same for me," she said, sounding rather timid.

Incidentally, Caesar thought that this approach would be most appropriate. He wanted to make these miners understand they were welcome here, but had to comply to the apes' laws. However, if he let the hunters speak to them, it may make for easier negotiations. Acknowledging that, he nodded in approval of Ruby and her friends' request, to their joy.

They ran in front of them, heading off to the miners. Caesar halted the march of his apes, keeping them in place, while he would go to meet with the miners as well. He took a few apes alongside him as his guard, including Blue Eyes and Maurice. Before they went off though, Koba rode up to Caesar.

Caesar, I should come with you, he signed firmly. He didn't trust these miners; they were just more Humans and Faunus to him and wouldn't let his king come near them without proper defense.

I'll be fine Koba, Caesar told him. Humans won't attack. With that he trotted forward with his personal troupe, leaving a dissatisfied Koba with the rest of the apes.

They soon caught up with the girls, who were just about to meet with the miners' leader for this mission. The mining leader, holding the rank of captain, was distinguished by a darker colored hard hat and the insignia of his rank sown into his uniform.

"Morning, Ms. Schnee," the captain greeted the white-haired girl first. "Your father's sent at least forty-five men for you to command," he informed.

"Splendid," she said, now known as "Ms. Schnee" to the apes listening. "But have you really brought enough workers?"

"Don't worry ma'am, Herr Schnee has given you enough man power," he declared. "The real work is gonna be with our tools."

"Great!" Ruby Rose exclaimed. "Then we should all get to work on the–!"

She stopped midsentence when they saw the miners carrying large crates. Caesar and his troop looked towards the crates themselves, seeing how they were chalk full of weapons. The four Huntresses and the apes saw several rifles, shotguns, and even a few pistols. Caesar was almost furious. He had a feeling they'd bring their own defenses, but was livid they weren't told ahead of time not to do so. He nor the apes will not approve any of these guns in their vicinity.

"… What are all of those?" Ruby asked of the mining captain.

"… They're our guns," he answered, as if it was obvious. "Herr Schnee ordered us to carry more than enough armament for protection."

The girls looked at each other in worry, then to the apes. Ruby saw that each of them were visibly displeased. Caesar looked angrier than the others, glaring directly at Ruby. She knew just from that expression that if she didn't do something about this immediately, there would be hell to pay.

She turned back to the captain, "… Yeah, about that…"

As soon as the miners gathered all of the weapons they brought, the Grimm Apes took them away very quickly. Some of them would take as much as they could to the village to dismantle them, smash them with stones until they weren't usable anymore. Others would just break them on the spot, to the workers' dismay.

Despite complying to the heiress' orders, the mining captain wasn't pleased with this. "Is this really smart?" he asked skeptically.

"It's necessary, captain," Weiss proclaimed. "The apes have a great disdain for weapons like these. We had to deconstruct are own just to lay foot in their territory."

"But what if there's a Grimm attack?" he questioned. "Hell ,what if the monkeys decide to attack–!"

"You should watch what you're saying," Blake warned him. "They can understand you."

Confused, he looked to the apes taking the weapons. Surely enough, they were staring back at him, not a single one sparing a harsh glare in his direction.

"You know, if they really do stab us in the back, then they'd probably have a real good reason to," Yang forewarned the captain, clearly implying that he could easily nullify the current relations. He gulped at the prospect of the apes turning on humanity because of his actions.

"… Fine," he relented, "we'll continue handing over all of our weapons to them."

"Thank you," said Ruby, appreciative of their cooperation. "Now, let's get started on those Dust Spires!"

With all of their new guns taken, the miners prepared their tools and finally went to work. Mining didn't have a worldwide view as an organized profession, but miners were very discrete with their roles. Whatever unit they were assigned to, whatever job they were given, they would fulfill their work to the letter.

If they didn't, it would cause all kinds of problems for their coworkers, often leading to disastrous outcomes. Miners were to especially follow the orders of their commander. In this case, it was Weiss Schnee, who took priority as the heiress of the very company over the captain. However, she wasn't going to be the only one governing them.

"Everyone, please listen" she announced. "You will not only be taking directions or receiving help from just me. All nine of us will be supervising you, as we make sure everything here runs smoothly. The apes have allowed you all to work on their land for as long as possible, so they will be treated respectfully when they help. Is that clear?"

""Yes ma'am!"" the workers exclaimed in unison.

"Good. Tend to your duties immediately, and we will assist whenever it is necessary. Now disperse!" she commanded, and they all did so.

The plan was for the students to watch over the miners as much as possible. Whether there would be some kind of disagreement between the miners and the apes, they would have resolved that conflict immediately. If a worker disrespected the apes, for example, then action would likely have to be taken against then.

The teams of hunters-in-training couldn't just be overseers though. It would be awkward for younger people to watch over others seasoned in a different work. So of course they wanted to help the miners in any way they could, hopefully to speed up the process as well and complete mining the Spires. Besides, how hard could it be?

As Ruby had witnessed, mining was rather difficult. It was so challenging, that the miners were having an incredible amount of trouble with their work. Their pickaxes would barely leave scratches, their other tools could only crack miniscule shards, and not even of the advanced laser-cutting equipment could truly affect the Dust Spires.

If Ruby had ever believed that what she heard about the Schnee Dust Company wasn't true – doubting that it has treated its labor force like worthless expendable drones – than she cast that thought away. The sheer amount of force the workers were putting themselves through to work on these Spires was a shock to her, as if it was the only way they knew how to work. It was obvious that mining Dust was a difficult process..

Worried over the workers she was watching over, seeing them push themselves to the limit, she wandered over to them for a check up on their work condition.

Ruby approached them with concern. "Everything alright here?" she asked.

"These damn things are too thick to cut," claimed one of the workers.

"I've seen Dust crystals that were tough, but this is a whole new level," said another.

This was quite the problem. As she'd heard from others along the field, the Dust Spires were incredibly durable. Ruby never how difficult it was to cut Dust out of a mine, but it seemed to pale in comparison to the Spires. If this was going to continue, then they'd lose too much time in order to restore Vale's energy supplies.

"Hmm… that's not good," she stated, then had a thought. "Maybe we need stronger people?"

With that in mind, she looked around to see several of the Grimm Apes wandering over the ground. Most of them were watching the workers with mild interest, while very few were actually helping them. These apes, for several reasons, were not trustful of her, her friends, or the workers. Ruby couldn't blame them, knowing how they were doing their work on their land. However, she wished that more of the apes could help.

So with a little optimism she decided to ask for it personally, hoping that they would if she did. She left her group of miners back to their work, and went up to wherever an ape would be. The first few her eye caught was a trio of apes, tending to themselves only, and she walked over to them.

"Excuse me," she addressed them, and they turned to her. "Could you guys help us out here?" They didn't speak nor hesitate to answer her; they just turned and walked away from her. She couldn't stop them to reconsider.

"Wait…! Okay then…" with that failure, she went to another group of apes that weren't helping anyone.

"Hey, can you give us a hand–!" Again she was rebuffed with silence, and the apes wandered away from her quickly. Pouting in frustration, she again looked for support from them. This time she came upon a large ape, likely of the Beringel variant, who had its back turned to her.

"Could you please help–!" the ape turned to her in response, and his appearance stopped her midsentence. She recognized him as the same gorilla whom confronted her when she first entered the apes' village. He stared at her with particular sternness.

"Oh… hi again!" she greeted, trying to be on friendly terms, but the ape didn't respond. Instead the beast turned to face Ruby completely, standing at his full height and standing over her.

"Um… I'll just go somewhere else…" intimidated by the ape's stature, she quickly turned away from him. With no success in getting aide, Ruby was worried for the future of this mission.

Koba wasn't pleased. Not a single part of him felt at ease; his entire body was tense, cautious, and fueled by rage. He hated each human or Faunus he saw here, walking over the apes' land without a thought other than for themselves and their work. He wasn't pleased Caesar allowed these filthy things to come here, and he was even less content with his orders to watch over these "miners."

Caesar wanted this operation to go smoothly and quickly, so he wanted the apes to make sure it gone that way. Koba understood that was what the king thought, but it still displeased Koba to be among these several men. However, if Koba saw any of these arrogant creatures acted in a way Caesar didn't approve, Koba would at least be happy to put them in their place.

So while he wandered among the crowd, he'd direct apes what to do and where to go, and tell them to not help the miners. The apes trusted Koba's word, so many complied with him to his pleasure. This was the Humans and Faunus' work and theirs alone, so there was no reason for the apes to involve themselves in it, Koba thought.

"Why can't you use your pickaxes?" Koba heard someone nearby and turned in the voice's direction. It was one of the young hunters, a large girl with blonde hair, conversing with some of those miners. He saw the nine hunters disperse earlier, and they gone to different groups of miners to watch over them.

Koba disliked the few hunters-in-training much more than the several miners. The humans and Faunus who would hunt down the Grimm would be the most biased towards the apes, which Koba perceived. They'd think of apes as nothing more than the monsters that feast on humankind. The scarred ape was certain that was how all of the hunters present thought of the apes now, only keeping their single-minded beliefs to themselves so that the apes would help them in their present condition.

And that particular yellow-haired girl looked especially full of herself. She appeared to be so guilt-free and aloof, having no real cares about the world around. She was the kind of person that made Koba sick to his stomach, the exact type would look down on him and his fellow apes. Nothing would please him more than to put that girl in her place, to make her understand how truly inferior she was to the apes. And he would do just that.

With nothing else on his mind, Koba wandered over to where that girl was stationed. He'd find a little amusement in knocking her down a peg.

"I told you, the Spires are too tough! None of our tools are getting through right now!" the miner exclaimed to Yang.

She was finding all of this delay in work frustrating. Everyone was stressed with the hardness of the Spires and some were already overworking themselves. Yang admittedly knew little to nothing to mining, especially in regard to the Schnee Dust Company. Even though she was naïve in the profession of mining, she at least thought she could offer some strong suggestions. She wasn't just watching over these people, she was making sure the job was getting done.

Another problem was dealing with her lingering anger. She was still very miffed over Cardin's intrusiveness and apathy, regretting that she didn't beat him down for it. Though she tried to calm down, she was aggravated by the workers snapping at her. It didn't appear that all of them wanted to be watched over by the young hunters. Keeping it all to herself though, Yang tried to contribute as much as she could to this dilemma.

"The most progress we've made the last few minutes are just cracks and a couple of useless shards," added another of the miners.

"Oh come on boys, put your backs into it! I'm sure you guys can do it!" she loudly encouraged, but they all groaned in response.

"Heck, if we have to," she continued, "I can use my fists to crack some pieces off for ya."

One of the workers stared at her with sheer skepticism. "Your… fists," he repeated questionably.

"Yeah!" she confirmed. Yang was confident in her strength, especially when it was increased by her abilities. "My semblance boosts my strength, so it should be–!"

"Stupid." Everyone turned to the interruption, seeing an ape wander over to them.

It was one of the "Hominidon" Grimm, whether it was the larger or smaller breed they couldn't tell, who rode atop a great black horse. Though it was similar in appearance to many of the other apes, the one feature that caught everyone's attention was the scar grafting the left side of his face. Many of the men were intimidated by the imposing ape, but Yang stood her ground when facing him.

"What?" asked Yang for clarification, perplexed by this ape's intrusion.

"Stupid," the ape repeated, condescendingly. "Break crystal with hands? Stupid. Humans… weak." Yang didn't like the way he spoke down to her.

"Hey, I've broken a lot of hard stuff before," she defended, the ape's last remark leaving her miffed. "I'm pretty strong."

"… Haven't broken apes," the scarred ape claimed. "Apes stronger… than petty humans."

With that the ape turned his horse to tread away, having a satisfied and smug look plastered on his grievous face. Yang felt even more irritated by the ape than she did with the miners, finding the will to keep her rage suppressed all the more testing. However, she wouldn't let him go without having the last hurrah.

"Well you know what?" she yelled at the ape. "At least I'm putting some effort in here! Unlike you, I'm not… monkeying around!"

The ape stopped his horse in its tracks, turning very slowly towards her. His face wore a neutral expression, not a shred of anger present, not even its eyes (or the one good eye) showing any discontent. Yang, on the other hand, had a cheeky grin spread across her face, while the miners groaned at the awful pun. It was so indubitably terrible to the point of almost making them sick to their stomachs.

"Eh? Eh~? It's not my best pun, but I'd say if fits here!" she proclaimed to the scarred ape. Surely the apes had some sense of humor, so this one could at least find it in himself to smile at her wordplay.

"… You're… not… funny."

That was all the ape said, then turned back and continued to tread. Yang was surprised, left with nothing to retort. She was aware of the general discomfort her friends and peers would feel with her jokes, but that was the amusement of telling bad puns. No one ever told her she wasn't funny though; that at least meant people found her humorous to an extent (in her mind at least). Today felt like a blow to her ego, and she didn't like that at all.

So with that, Yang came to understand something: this ape wasn't a nice person. That ape came to her and those miners only to mock them, to look down on them. He did so quite literally too, since he sat atop a horse. Knowing that, she realized that she would have to spend an uncertain amount of time, possibly a few days, on this continent with that particular ape.

"… Oh yeah, we are not gonna get along," surmised Yang with a sour grimace.

Blake watched the miners with a neutral expression, overseeing how they toiled over the hardened Spires. It was barely a profession she had any care for, one that was associated with a company she looked down on. The Faunus workers of the Schnee Dust Company were some of the worst to be treated in the entire working class. Though she didn't see many Faunus among the miners here, she imagined that Herr Schnee still kept them working in unethical conditions. It was for this reason she thought that the company's only saving grace was that Weiss was its heiress and future CEO.

Still, she witnessed how the men here were struggling now. The Spires may have been more difficult than imagined, but they were pushing themselves like there was no easier way. The sweat dripping from their brow, the strain showing in their bodies, the pain from their aching burdens; Dust mining was a dangerous profession, not just for the Faunus. Blake felt the pangs of sympathy for the workers here today.

What weighed more on her mind, however, were the apes roaming the area alongside herself and her peers. She could feel the eyes of several of them glancing at her, making her all the more nervous. Although, she wasn't confronted by a single ape as of yet over what she did. She struggled to understand why none of the apes reacted negatively to her presence. It shouldn't have been possible that they didn't recognized her; she wounded one of their kind. Were they that much forgiving, or were they simply more tolerant than she thought they'd be?

Nevertheless, she was thankful that nothing happened as of yet. She was doing her best to avoid any personal encounters, which could have contributed to their overall ignorance of her. It was also best that no confrontation occurred either, as the mission at hand was too important to throw it all for vendettas.

Blake continued to watch over the miners. All of a sudden, she saw that one of them thrust their pickaxe into the giant Dust, unintentionally shattering the tool upon impact.

The worker stared at his broken instrument with worry and frustration. "Crap, …this isn't good," he declared miserably.

Seeing the plight, Blake seized the opportunity to assist. "Hang on, I'll get you another one," she proclaimed to him.

"Thanks, they're in the farthest crate to the left," said the worker graciously. Blake nodded at his direction, then headed off there.

She gotten to the crate she was directed to, on the left end of the line crates established in front of the transport ships. She peeked to see a whole pile of pickaxes messily stacked within, making her wonder why they'd set up their reserved tools so clumsily. Blake grabbed one of the axes at the top and turned back to the miners.

She stopped in her tracks, however, when a particular thought came to mind. "I never thought I'd be a part of this company's work," she pondered.

Obviously, as a Faunus, she opposed the conditions her people faced within the SDC. She never imagined herself to ever support such a company for those reasons and yet… here she was. Helping the low-ranked workers of the institution she loathed, all to save the Kingdom she lived in. She couldn't tell exactly how she felt about it: Repulsed? Hypocritical? Was it for the greater good? This conflict of interests and opinions was a bit of a new experience to her.

"… I suppose it doesn't matter," she thought in conclusion. What mattered was getting the Dust to Vale, not wasting time on her personal beliefs. With invigoration, she headed off to give the new pickaxe to the miner – only to suddenly trip on a stone embedded into the earth.

She uttered a gasp in surprise, falling to her knees and forearms to protect herself from getting hurt. The pickaxe itself manage to fly out of her hands in the confusion and land a few feet away from her. She didn't notice, yet, that the tool landed at the feet of an ape who looked down at it in surprise.

"Stupid…!" Blake scolded to herself. She quickly righted herself by standing up and brushing off any dirt that clung to her clothes. She looked around to see where the pickaxe went off to; once she did, she looked up to see who was standing before it. She immediately froze in place.

This ape, one of the Hominidon, was large, aged, and muscular. It shared all the other physical features of the other apes, black skin with white colorations, protruding boney shoulder plates and elbow-spikes, and bright green eyes with tiny red flecks. What was really noticeable about this one was the distinct lack of hair on its body, making it appear to be bald all over. Though nothing seemed entirely special about this ape, Blake came to a realization when she saw him – she recognized that ape.

On the day she and Yang encountered the first two apes, after she shot one of them and a large number of them appeared in response, one of them came to the aide of the two she encountered. This ape was extremely distressed at the wounding of one of them, shouting in loud and pained pant-hoots. It was that exact same ape, as bald as ever, who was standing before her now. Blake immediately knew she was in trouble; she prepared to disappear in an instant before it could–!

The ape looked up, Blake being the first thing he saw. His eyes widened in shock; clearly the ape knew who she was. Blake couldn't move while she was the object of the beast's gaze. Internally, she cursed whatever external forces or misfortune that led her to this moment. This was exactly the kind of encounter with the apes she was desperately trying to avoid. Alas, in the end, it was inevitable that it would happened to her.

Soon, the ape's expression hardened into a stern glare. Fearful thoughts of the mission being jeopardized came into Blake's head, fearing that everything would fall apart because of her. This was why she feared going to West Dragon in the first place. The ape suddenly looked down to her confusion, picked up the fallen tool, then stepped towards her.

They were now only a foot away from each other, face to face, and the ape glared at her relentlessly. Blake could only gaze back with fear and anxiety, a drop of sweat rolling down the side of her face. The creature's next action, however, was what really surprised her: he lifted the pickaxe up to her. Before she really knew what she was doing, Blake glanced down at it and took the instrument into her own hands. The bald ape turned, scoffed, and walked away.

Blake was utterly astonished. There were no words of hate, no bouts of rage, no move to violently attack her at all. All he did was stare her down, gave her back the tool, then went the other direction. She was more than expecting a good thrashing from the ape for what she did to his comrade. But why didn't she receive any of that? Was it forgiveness? … No, the ape was too curt to show any sign of that. Perhaps he was letting her go because he knew her team's mission couldn't be thrown away at his behest. Maybe it knew something along the lines of that.

Despite her immense puzzlement, she was relieved that nothing altercated into anything serious. She shook her head to clear her thoughts and headed off to where the miner was eagerly waiting for his new pickaxe. In the end, Blake realized she was going to be here for a long time. Though she hoped that nothing else would happen, she feared another confrontation would happen.

Jaune viewed the mining work with growing concern. He never really understood how Dust was attained by companies like the Schnee Dust Company. Seeing how the miners were working, thinking it was how they worked any other day, made him glad that he wasn't in the profession. However, his unease came from how little their work was producing; the Spires were unexpectedly tougher than they all thought, the men had to strain themselves to even get a single shard off each spire, and the apes were doing very little if not nothing to help them.

He wasn't sure if this was going to work. Too many thoughts of doubt crossed his mind, worrying that Vale could fall in a matter of days if they did not resupply Dust to the city. Maybe if there were more men, maybe if they had better tools, or maybe the apes would actually help… he didn't know what could help their situation. Right now it looked like it was hopeless.

As he continued to supervise his group of miners, Pyrrha walked up to him to check up on their current status. Similarly to her team leader, she saw how the miners were having little success with producing Dust shards.

Jaune took notice of his partner coming up to him. "This is going slower than I thought," he told her. To hear the lack of production from him was personally disheartening to Pyrrha.

"Yes," she sadly agreed, "… I suppose we should've known they would be harder to cut than regular Dust crystals."

"Huh… who could've guessed," Jaune pondered humorlessly.

"Oh SHIT!" The two young hunters turned to the miner shouting, as they also heard a hard thud hit the ground.

Jaune and Pyrrha looked in shock to see a large piece of the Spire had cracked and fell off. It was about a meter long and a foot and a half thick, and several bright neon colors shined from the large shard. The colors seemed to be swimming within the crystal, eventually dulling out to a single translucent shade of cyan.

"Wow!" the miner exclaimed, "We're making progress!" With that the group of miners quickly celebrated their first true success today, congratulating each other for the sudden progress, then returned to work with delight in their expressions. Jaune and Pyrrha, however were still gazing at the large crystal, never expecting to see a Dust shard of this size today.

"Woah… how did that happen?!" Jaune questioned with wide eyes.

"I don't know…!" said Pyrrha, equally shocked.

Word spread across the field of the sudden achievement, along with a sense of hope among the student hunters and the miners. The good news made the prospects of the mission all the brighter. With rising excitement, the miners continued working as diligently as they could. Though only more and more shavings were produced, eventually there would come bigger rewards for their excavation.

To allow the miners more time to work, teams RWBY and JNPR, and Cardin, would carry over the numbers of shards carved from the Spires into storage units. Jaune and Pyrrha carrying over another large Dust shard, currently totaling up to at least five decently large crystals. They observed how the huge pieces stuck out among the piles of miniscule shards.

"So shards of this size can be broken off…" Pyrrha observed with slight wonder. "This is incredible."

"Yeah… maybe we'll get through this quicker now!" Jaune agreed, feeling exuberant at the idea of finishing the mission. Pyrrha however, in response to his words, looked to the ground somberly and released a heavy sigh.

"Yes… we could finish faster than expected, hopefully," she stated, uncharacteristically somber and sullen.

Her blonde and usually dense partner took notice of her mood. "Pyrrha? Everything okay?" he asked her.

"Hmm?" she was caught off guard by his inquiry. "Oh, yes, everything's fine! It's just… well… it's just…"

From what Jaune saw, over the time he got to know his champion of a teammate, he considered that almost nothing could upset Pyrrha Nikos. She was always so optimistic, so vibrant and outgoing, it would have to take a massive tragedy to put a damper on her attitude. It seemed, though, that there was indeed something that made her sad. Unfortunately, Jaune had an idea of what was wrong.

"… From last night, what Cardin said…" he began slowly, hoping not to upset her any more than she was now. "… It's still bothering you, huh?"

"… I suppose it is," she quietly admitted.

"… I… didn't know you had a brother."

"… Yes. I did."

At first, he couldn't believe what he heard that night, coming from the bully's mouth no less. It may have been true that Jaune only knew of Pyrrha via appearance on cereal boxes at first, but he gotten the time to know more about her exploits as a huntress in Mistral. But it never came up that she had a brother. Never, not once. He of course assumed she was an only child.

To learn she had a brother, who died at the fall of Mt. Glenn, was nothing less than an extreme shock to him. She never opened up about something like this, though it was obviously too painful for her to even mention. Jaune didn't want to believe in it, thinking it was some sort of cruel taunt on Cardin's part. Pyrrha's mood, however, only proved that there was some kind of weight to his words. And to hear her confirm the claim too was enough to dishearten Jaune further than he'd have liked.

Now knowing that it was all true, Jaune's stomach felt as if it was twisted in a painful knot. He was quite certain that she didn't want to have any sore memories brought up like that. To hear it brought up by an outsider so carelessly and tauntingly made it all the more painful. Now, Jaune was certain Pyrrha was more upset now that he brought it up. Having never intended to make her feel this way, Jaune opted to back off on the subject.

"… I-I'm sorry," he stammered, "if you don't want to talk about it, i-it's fine." Jaune made an attempt to move on with the mission, going to oversee the miners.

"He was born in Vale, when our parents visited the city at the time," said Pyrrha. So sudden was her revelation, Jaune stopped in his tracks and turned to his partner.

It seemed that she didn't want to drop the topic, but to talk about it instead. She wanted someone to listen to her, and Jaune was the only one who truly could. Jaune returned to her side, standing before her as she continued.

"It was his first home, until they moved back to Mistral, then I came into the picture. I looked up to him so much," she paused for a moment, reminiscing on her memories of her older sibling. "When he heard about Vale's expansion, he wanted to take part in it so badly. I didn't want him to go, but he promised me he would return one day.

"I heard he was hired by the police force in Mt. Glenn. The city wasn't fully connected to the CCT system, so he'd write letters to us every chance he'd get."

As she continued, Pyrrha began to list some of the many virtuous qualities she claimed to have defined her brother. Jaune listened to her in amazement, in awe of the way she spoke about this person. He hadn't heard her speak in such way, in such fascination and admiration for an individual. He never considered that she was capable to praising someone like this.

However, her mood returned to somberness, as she reached to a conclusion. "He was there for three years; I was seven when Mt. Glenn fell ten years ago. I knew that he didn't make it… the letters had stopped coming by then."

There was now a silence between them, the conclusion to her tale of her brother leaving them both melancholic. Jaune saw that tears were forming at the corners of her eyes. "… What was his name?" he asked, hoping that talking would distract her from crying.

"… Ulysses," she stated, her voice rather weak.

"… I'm really sorry," Jaune condoled, hoping that would offer her some closure.

Pyrrha looked up to him in surprise, then smiled at his kindness. She allowed one tear to fall from her eyes, but quickly wiped them away.

"It's alright…" she assured him. "I have our team now. … I have you."

"… Yeah." Jaune smiled back at her, and they gazed into each other, a sense of warmth and comfort emerging in both of them.

With the need of taking part in the mission, however, both moved to work with the miners. As they did, Jaune gazed at Pyrrha in a way he never had before. He felt incredibly glad to have her as his partner… though he wasn't sure why he came to that realization now instead of sooner.

Cardin was in an unpleasant mood. He didn't want to be an overseer to the miners, as he saw it as nothing more than standing around and doing nothing (though he was supposed to be helping them maintain tools and store the Dust). He was quite certain that this mission would go smoothly and quick but, to him, the workers were lazy and whining too much. Really, how hard could it be to mine these Spires? Weren't they just Dust crystals but bigger? He didn't really understand the work behind Dust mining but presumed it was easy enough to pull off. Thus his impatience grew with the work producing few results.

While he stood around doing nothing, barely supervising the miners, he had witnessed the interaction between Jaune and Pyrrha. Their seemingly important conversation, with the way they looked at each other at the end, put him in a fouler mood. When he brought up Pyrrha's brother last night, he was admittedly skeptical of it himself. When the champion's fame was still growing, it was rumored that her older brother lost his life at the fall of Mt. Glenn. Her reaction that night seemed to confirm it, but it didn't seem to stop her from opening up to 'Jauney boy.'

Speaking of whom, he was somewhat uncomfortable to work with the blonde knight again. Despite the fact Jaune saved his life on that trip in Forever Fall forest, he wasn't one hundred percent grateful for it. He saw himself as humiliated that day, overpowered by a simple Ursa and having to be saved by someone who was lesser than him. He was especially angry that Jaune warned him to never harm his friends again… and that he complied. To feel that he had no control over getting back at his rivals irked him greatly, almost making him feel in denial.

Despite his disdain for them, he still kept staring at the two from a distance as they talked. Eventually, the two star members of team JNPR dispersed and returned to helping the miners with their work. Seeing them go, he uttered a grunt of displeasure.

"You don't seem like a happy fella," said a miner observingly, walking up to the bully of Beacon.

Caught off guard, Cardin looked at the man surprised; he was a skinny, lightly-tanned man with a shady expression. Unsure of why this individual came up to him, of all people, he stared at the miner with hesitance. However, thinking that no harm would come from a conversation with him, he nevertheless replied.

"Why the hell would I be?" he questioned with a scoff, "I never wanted to get sent here."

"I get ya," said the SDC worker. "None of us here like this damn job, but it's all we got."

Cardin grunted in agreement. "Yeah, I bet it sucks. Have to be surrounded by a lot of fucking Grimm too."

"Right?! They're just a bunch of Grimm bastards, that's all they are! "Grimm Apes" my ass!"

"My point exactly!" Cardin proclaimed. So far, he was having fun speaking to this kindred spirit. "All the others are fucking stupid to not see it, and those damn animals convinced them to hand over our weapons!"

The miner looked at the young man in surprise, eyes wide and gawking. "You gave them your weapons?"

"Yeah, and it sucks," Cardin lamented irately. "A huntsmen without his weapon, it just doesn't sound right. Feels like I'm up shit creek without a paddle."

Reminded of us supposed defenselessness, Cardin ended that conversation with a grumble. As he heard, the miners had to give their weapons to the apes as the first condition of working here. He was certain that miner could relate to him, but Cardin didn't think he could really understand. A huntsmen's career, reputation, and personality could be represented by their signature weapon, always at their side through thick and thin.

Having to disassemble his favored mace and giving them away to "sentient" Grimm was rather appalling to Cardin. He hadn't really felt so out of control like that before, to give his weapon to the beasts he swore to slay. All in the name of peace no less. It was ludicrous, impertinent and idiotic, and it all happened nonetheless. And he couldn't do a thing about it.

"Kid, you're obviously the smart one among those dumbasses," spoke the miner, regaining Cardin's attention. "So you need this more than me."

Cardin looked at him in puzzlement. "Huh? Need what?"

The miner looked to all directions around them, left, right, in front and behind. He then hastily moved to a toolkit he had next to other equipment near the Dust Spire he mined. He then brought it up to Cardin. Doing his best to obstruct it from anyone else's view but their own, the worker cautiously opened the kit to reveal its contents.

"What…?" questioned Cardin, as he gazed with shock at what he saw.

Inside of the metal box was a small, concealable shotgun. Cardin stared wide-eyed at the short-ranged weapon while feeling excitement and uncertainty at the same time.

"They made us hand over all of our weapons, but I'm not a fucking idiot," the miner began to explain. "But you're gonna be closer to those things, so you should protect yourself."

Cardin looked back at the miner, his hesitance overtaking his mild glee. "… Look, if I take it and they all find out, even I know that everything's gonna go to shit," he reasoned.

"Then you better not get caught," the miner ordered, "use it when those Grimm monkeys finally turn on us and prove everyone wrong. You'll pretty much be their hero."

At that, Cardin's interest and imagination perked up. A chance to be seen as some kind of 'hero' among the others didn't sound so bad. If it somehow turned out like this, then he wouldn't mind if his peers looked up to him and asked his forgiveness for their doubting him. What was more important, though, was that he would he have the means to defend himself and others against those apes. He would have the power to do it. He'd take control.

"… Alright then. I just won't get caught," he said with a sly grin, cocksure of himself. The miner closed the toolkit and Cardin took into his hand. The miner looked rather proud of him, thinking he made the best decision possible.

"I was right about you kid, you're the smart one," the miner proclaimed, then moved on to continue working on the Spire. Cardin nodded in response and headed back to the students' campsite, hoping to hide his toolkit with no one noticing.

Caesar watched the humans & Faunus work vigorously, using their tools to ram or cut through the giant crystals. He saw that despite their diligence, not much was being produced save for a few noticeable crystals here and there. All the humans were able to get off of the Spires were mere shards, some of them only a needle's length. Though the ape king wasn't sure if this lack of productivity was commonplace for them, he felt some sympathy for their struggles.

As wandered around the field riding his horse, he saw that many of his apes would also watch the miners at work. It was like a show to many of them, having never seen human and Faunus activity like this before or any human work at all. Of course, none of the apes were helping the miners with their work either. Caesar didn't blame any of them for it, since there was very little trust built between them and the humans. However, though he did think that offering their assistance would speed up the work, he would not force his subjects to anything they were not willing to partake.

Still, Caesar did nothing more than observe the humans struggle through their work, all with a neutrally stern expression. Riding beside him were Maurice and Blue Eyes, viewing the humans with their own reactions. Caesar's close friend looked to the miners with some worry, seeing how they were pushing themselves to produce more. One the other hand, Caesar's son gazed at the humans with confusion, knowing little to nothing about how their Dust actually worked and caring little for their plight.

They seem to be having trouble, Maurice signed to Caesar.

Caesar acknowledged his advisor. These crystals must be harder than they look, he presumed form observation.

How are they fuel for humans and Faunus? Blue Eyes asked.

I'm not sure, Maurice answered, then turned to his leader. Caesar? Blue Eyes looked to his father to hear his own response.

Caesar took a moment to think, then responded. Where I grew up, I've seen crystals like these. Very small though. I didn't know how they used them.

As he remembered from his youth, he saw several humans and Faunus have those crystals in hand, much like the ones they see today. But he never saw what they used them for. Even when he saw him use those crystals, he never saw what he did with them. He didn't have interest in them back then. Now that he saw the humans present here need those crystals, he pondered just how much this 'Dust' meant to them.

That was one reason why he allowed the young hunters to bring the miners here. He wanted to know what these crystals could do, what the humans and Faunus did with them, and why they needed them as if they depended on them for survival. But Caesar restrained himself from outright looking into it. He thought that the humans would be irritated if he did so, and may be provoked by his investigations. And there was the chance he might not like what they did with Dust, if he already knew they used it for weapons.

Putting his peaked interest aside, Caesar simply allowed the humans to work on these Spires. If they needed Dust to thrive, then who was he to prevent them their chance live. Besides, the apes did not rely on those crystals for their own energy, they do not need it. It would have been selfish to keep it away from them.

Maurice and Blue Eyes didn't inquire any more of him about the Dust, so Caesar continued his ride around the field to observe the many miners working. Maurice was in tow right next to him, while Blue Eyes followed not too far behind.

Suddenly, something caught Blue Eyes attention. Just outside the field of Dust Spires was a line of trees surrounding them, a circular border between the Spires and the forest. There was a distance of at least twenty five yards between the Spires and the forest, leaving an open patch of dirt and soil in between. Blue Eyes could've sword that he saw something move within those trees. Blue Eyes had his horse change direction, slowly advancing towards the forest.

As Caesar and Maurice continued without the adolescent ape, the latter stopped his horse without warning. All of a sudden, Maurice gripped his head and closed his eyes tightly. To an outsider it would look like he was having a migraine just out of the blue. But as Caesar and some other apes knew, this wasn't a simple migraine.

This was a symptom of his powers activating.

Caesar moved his steed up to Maurice, concerned for his friend's wellbeing. "Maurice?" he called to him.

Blue Eyes kept advancing towards the forest line, curious of whether he saw something or not. Despite the distance he moved forward cautiously, he could see the forest fine from where he was. However, he couldn't see much behind the trees. In fact, he couldn't see other trees behind those in front of him to his puzzlement.

The pain in Maurice's head seemed to lessen, his tense expression loosening to that which showed focus more than anything else. Only a few five seconds passed, the wise focusing to make sense of a vision he received. Then Maurice opened his eyes widely and gasped in apparent shock.

Maurice turned to his king. Caesar, we have to get everyone out of here! He warned him anxiously.

Caesar took this very seriously. Knowing how his close friend's powers worked, he realized that something was yet to come. What is it? Did you see something? He asked in concern.

Must move now! They're coming! Maurice pressed.

If his friend's foresight was of something to come soon, very soon, then everyone here was in trouble. And if Maurice was speaking of what he thought he meant, then it was certainly all the more serious. Caesar felt a sense of dread creep up on him. With time not on his side, Caesar thought of several plans to evacuate the apes from the field. But he couldn't just leave the humans to their own devices, so he had to help them evacuate as well.

And thus, Ruby came to mind. As far as Caesar could tell, she was the closest to being the leader of these humans. Needing to warn her of the coming storm, Caesar and Maurice rode out to her position, hoping to reach her before it was too late.

Meanwhile, Blue Eyes still advanced towards the forest line, wanting – no, needing to make sure he wasn't seeing things. Unfortunately, once he was close enough, he realized why he couldn't see many of the trees. Most of them were obscured by large, black shapes.

As the work continued, much more advancement was being slowly made. As of now, there was least eight Dust crystals that were five feet in length, three that were one to one-in-a-half feet long, and the rest was a pile of miniscule shards. Though the mining of the Dust Spires weren't going very much faster, the work was accumulating more rewards. The young hunters were especially happy about their progress.

Yang and Ruby were carrying one of the latest and largest pieces yet, and dropped it into the one of the few crates storing Dust. The red caped girl couldn't carry the piece her team of miners excavated, so she got her stronger sister to help.

"OOF!" Ruby uttered, feeling relieved of the heavy crystal as she let go of it. Doing so, she had a big grin on her face. "All right, we're making more progress!"

Yang shared her sister's enthusiasm, but still had doubts in her mind. "It's not enough though, Rubes. We don't have a lot yet."

"Well, we've only started today," Ruby reasoned. "Maybe we'll break more of them off the Spires?"

"I don't know… it just looks like everything's going slow," Yang observed correctly.

Ruby was a little saddened to hear this, knowing that Yang was right. "… Yeah, I guess so… maybe we won't make enough for Vale in time."

"We'll just need to stay as long as possible, Ruby," Yang assured her. "We'll make enough Dust shards to take back home."

"I really hope so Yang," Ruby yearned. Nevertheless, they continued to keep working.

Although everything was going at the pace as it was, everyone was determined to keep working and produce as much as they could. However, maybe the mining would go faster if the apes actually started helping them.

Yet she wasn't sure how to actually get the apes to help them. What would it take for the apes to willingly assist them in carrying Dust or handing out tools? Should she ask them as politely as possible? Beg if she had to? Ruby understood that the apes were hesitant to help a species they didn't trust, due to current relations between mankind and Grimm. But if they didn't finish their mission, then Vale could come onto the verge of falling.

Then again, there was also the problem of the Spires themselves. No one knows how a Dust Spire is different from normal Dust crystals, besides size obviously, because they were thought to have never existed. If the events of today told her anything though, it was that the Dust Spires were tougher than regular Dust.

"Do you think everything's going slow because they're not normal Dusts?" She asked her yellow-haired sister, wondering if she shared the same sentiments.

Yang thought for a moment before answering, "Maybe. The bigger they are, the harder they break I guess."

Before anymore could be said, the whinnies of an approaching horse caught their attention. As if they were leaping out of the crowd of workers and apes, two jet black steeds rode up to Yang and Ruby, surprising the teenaged girls. Atop the first horse was the ape king Caesar, and on the other was a Grimm Orangutan, whose name was unknown to either huntress.

"Woah!" Ruby exclaimed in shock. Caesar jumped off his horse and approached the two girls. His expression seemed to be sterner than it was originally remembered.

"Leave," said the ape, practically sounding like he was giving an order. "Everyone must go."

Ruby and Yang were stunned, almost to the point of silence. What did he mean leave? Was he telling them to get off the continent? They were permitted to work here! What happened to have made things go south so suddenly? Neither of them saw any of the workers trying to harass an ape or vice versa, so what could have made them change their mind without warning?

"W-What?" unable to make sense of his words, Ruby tried to plead with him. "But you said–!"

"Not that," Caesar clarified, confusing the two all the more. "Too dangerous here. Everyone must leave."

"Why? What's going on?" Yang queried.

Caesar donned a grim expression in response. "Horde coming. Go to village, safe there." With that, the amount of shock seemed to be never-ending for the sisters. If he meant what they thought he meant, then there was trouble.

"A horde…?" Ruby questioned, wanting to clarify what he meant. "Wait, you don't mean–!"

An ape's panicked voice cried out among the crowds. The four of them turned in direction of the ape calling out in fright. Soon that ape rode up to them on horseback. Ruby saw that it was the ape with blue eyes and large scars across its chest; the ape who was disgusted with her affection for Crescent Rose. The young ape was terrified as he approached Caesar anxiously.

The ape hastily made hand gestures at Caesar, who exhaled stressfully in response. Ruby and Yang wasn't sure what they were communicating but assumed it was akin to sign language, which they assumed when they first saw an ape make hand gestures like that. Suddenly, more apes were calling out, catching the attention of the miners and the other students. None of them knew what was wrong with the apes, many of them panicky and tense.

Eyes were now drawn to the forest line, as loud sounds of rustling could be heard. The trampling of heavy feet could be heard, alongside what sounded like distant growls. It was not any more apes who were approaching, nor a wild herd of elk.

"Grimm," Caesar rumbled in displeasure, confirming Ruby and Yang's fears.

The forest line broke as several Creatures of Grimm came rushing out. Several types were charging towards the field of Dust Spires. Fearsome Beowolves; massive Ursa; ravenous Boarbatusks and ugly Creeps. All of them were the normal Grimm many were familiar with, as they sported the sharp bony armor and masks that the Grimm Apes lacked. Though they were only common types, there were several of the black-hided beasts and each of them had their sights on the miners.

The captain of the SDC miners called out, "Grimm! GRIMM! I'TS A CODE RED! CODE RED!"

All of the workers were scared half to death. Although there was always a chance of a Grimm attack during work, none of them had truly seen a horde this big gunning for them. Almost immediately, everyone dropped what they were doing, discarding any tool they had in hand, and began to run for dear life. The horde of Grimm was approaching fast, with each beast wanting and craving to lock their jaws on human flesh.

"Grimm?!" Weiss exclaimed in shocked appalment, seeing the horde approaching fast. "Why is this happening now?!"

"They must've been attracted to everyone's scent!" Blake rationalized in response. "We have to go!"

As the workers were evacuating as clumsily as ever, the students of Beacon managed to gather together in the confusion. The two teams made sure the miners had the room and maneuverability to escape, without tripping on any equipment and falling prey to any of the Grimm.

"I thought there weren't any more Grimm here?!" Jaune questioned. Despite the absolute terror he felt in this situation, he remembered distinctly that the Grimm infestation had decreased in West Dragon, save for the Grimm Apes.

"Grimm populations had decreased," Ren confirmed, "but they didn't disappear! They still have a presence here!" to hear that made Jaune all the more frightened.

Though many were running as fast as they could, rushing to the vehicles they were transported in or heading for the apes' village, the horde was still approaching quick. Teams RWBY and JNPR feared that the Grimm would be upon them before all of the workers evacuated.

"This is a really bad time to not have our weapons!" Nora proclaimed.

"I couldn't agree more!" Weiss responded.

Nevertheless, everyone was doing their best to get to safety. As the student hunters tended to the miners, the apes focused on their own survival. With all of the chaos surrounding them, Ruby didn't feel confident that anyone could get to the apes' village in time. Even when trying to help them, the workers cared only for themselves, pushing aside their own colleagues to gain leverage.

One miner suddenly fell to the ground as he tripped over a large mechanical tool, meant to cut through larger pieces of Dust, that was dropped carelessly. He didn't have enough time to get up, as he became the first victim; a Beowolf leapt upon, slashing his legs with its thick claws. Immobilized, the Grimm sank its teeth into his back, tearing off a huge portion of clothes, skin, and flesh. The man screamed in agony as the beast ate him alive.

Ruby watched from afar with horror. She wanted to avert her eyes, to so desperately move forward, but she just couldn't. This was what happened when lives were not saved, when the Grimm would get their way. Even though all of her functions felt like they were going to cease, prevent her from moving, she forced herself to keep going. The Grimm had entered the field of Dust Spires, and there were still more lives to protect. She had to keep up with the others and make sure the miners were safe.

Suddenly, she heard an eerie noise grumble from the forest. It sounded like a sickening, clicking growl – something that an insectoid could make. Ruby looked to the forest line and saw a large, hideous Death Stalker slowly emerge. The scorpion Grimm had its several eyes set on the evacuation, to the red caped girl's fright.

Caesar and his council took it upon themselves to guide their apes to safety. Roughly over forty of them were there to watch the miners work on the Dust Spires. They could easily end up as prey to the oncoming Grimm. Caesar, Maurice, Rocket, Luca, and Koba guided their kindred to the village, with Blue Eyes swiftly leading them along.

The relationship between Grimm and Grimm Ape was problematic, as Caesar had observed over the years. Because of their relation to a common ancestor, the Creatures of Grimm didn't bother any of the apes. However, that shared ancestry didn't make them completely immune to a Grimm, when one was desperate. When the apes first came to this continent, they had to ward off and exterminate many of the Grimm there; the beasts hadn't partaken in pleasure of eating humans and Faunus for so long that they saw an opportunity in the apes.

But the Grimm Apes were as strong and resilient as any human settler. They fought off their attackers, driven them to the outskirts of the landmass, and successfully established their large colony. So over the ten years they've lived here, their encounters with the wild Grimm had become sparse and rare. Any attacks on the apes were even rarer.

Thus Caesar was confused as to why this was happening. There were no sightings of this many Grimm around the continent as of late, nor was there anything as large as that Death Stalker found. The fact that a horde was amassed to attack the apes here and now, when the miners had come to their land, as deeply concerning. Though he wanted to ponder more on this, there wasn't any time.

Caesar regrouped with his council, his closest friends. As they looked to him for a plan, Caesar realized that the Grimm wouldn't just stop at this field. They'd keep going until every living thing with a soul was eaten.

We must fend them off, the ape king declared. Grimm will follow us all. Each of the four apes present agreed with that statement.

I'll gather apes, said Rocket. We'll fight them.

I'll bring the gorilla guard, Luca proudly announced. Show them our might!

With their plans in mind, Rocket rushed off directly to the village with Maurice following suit, and Luca headed to the village gate where the guards were stationed. Koba, however, appeared to be quite a conflict with what action to take. Caesar looked to him, wanting to know what was wrong.

This makes me sick, said Koba dismayingly. I don't want to fight for humans' sake.

Caesar sighed internally, realizing that Koba's misgivings with humans and Faunus would turn up even in this situation. From Caesar's own experiences, the humans and Faunus both could either be loving friends or hateful abusers, yet all of them could be hard to trust. Caesar didn't blame his scarred friend for his displeasure, but he didn't share Koba's sentiments of hate.

This was bigger than the humans and Faunus though. The apes were very much in danger as the miners and hunters were. Koba couldn't just put his personal feelings before his species; it should be beneath him. However Caesar also considered Koba like a brother, so he cared for how the scarred ape was feeling at the moment. But he wanted him to see that resentment could always come before their people.

If he had to protect the miners in order to protect the apes, then that was how it should be. Wishing him to realize this, Caesar stepped up to Koba and placed his hand firmly on his shoulder. Koba looked up to him in surprise.

"No," said Caesar. "Fight for apes. Apes… together… strong."

Those three words, few and simple that defined the bond between all apes, was enough to make Koba's eyes widen with realization. The apes would come first before anything and anyone. With a newfound understanding and determination, Koba nodded to his king and headed off to the village, prepping for battle. Caesar watched him go, hoping that they would all be ready for the upcoming skirmish.

"Come on, everybody!" Ruby encouraged to the miners. "We gotta get out of here!"

"Let's go! Go, go, go!" ordered Yang.

Almost all of the apes and miners were out of the field, just barely escaping from the Grimm. Many of them were taking the route back to the village, while others chose to hide within the apparent sanctity of their transport vehicles. They must have thought that the SDC ships would keep them safe from the soulless man eaters, and may be planning to make a hasty escape in them. The hunters-in-training did their best to keep directing the workers to safety while avoiding the Grimm.

Ruby was alarmed at the events unfolding before her. Despite her questions as to why there were so many Grimm, why there were still that many on West Dragon, she had to put aside looking for answers. Despite the terrible murder she just witnessed, making her want to vomit and wail, she had to act now in order to save the miners from the horde. However, she was also worried for her team and friends; they were defenseless against the Grimm without their weapons. Though they were distracting and evading them to keep the apes and miners out of the monsters' reach, it would only be a matter of time before the beasts would actually capture them.

And what were the apes going to do? Practically none of them were in the field any more, having retreated to their village. Would the Grimm leave the apes alone? Did the apes not care for the fate of the miners? Of her team and hers? She didn't know enough about the apes to understand whether the normal Grimm treated them any differently from humans and Faunus. Frustration crept up in Ruby's mind, thinking that her group was all on their own.

At this point, the miners were safely evacuated from the field of Dust Spires. Ruby and the others prepared to head off to safety on their own, hoping that the village wouldn't be closed off to them. They couldn't get inside the miners' vehicles as their entry ways were closed off; opening them again would risk an opportunity for the Grimm to attack.

Suddenly, Ruby heard a sound different from the Grimm's roars or the workers' panics. Turning around, she saw an ape struggling for dear life against a Beowolf. She was surprised to see the scene take place, having some questions about the apes answered; he Grimm didn't treat the apes any different when it came to prey. She was the Beowolf bit down hard onto the ape's torso as it cried out in miserable pain.

"Oh no…!" she muttered in horror, believing she was witnessing another killing take place. However, this time she wasn't going to just stand and watch.

She felt no conflict about saving a Grimm Ape. She already knew they were a sentient people like humans and Faunus, so it was no different from saving a typical civilian in danger. Activating her semblance, Ruby rushed off to the scene, startling her teammates.

"Ruby?! Where are you going?!" Weiss called out to her leader, failing to get her back.

Before the Beowolf could land a fatal strike on the ape, Ruby launched herself feet first into the beast. With the force of her speed she kicked the Grimm hard in the face, managing to throw it a few feet away from the ape. Landing onto the ground, she quickly came to the ape's side.

Ruby raised him up as best as she could, gently as possible. "Come on, we have to go," she told the ape. Though he groaned in pain, the bleeding ape complied. They were about to move out, until Ruby heard growling to her left. The Beowolf she kicked had regained its bearings, now glaring at two victims instead of one.

"Uh… oh…" Ruby muttered fearfully.

"RUBY!" Yang called out, unable to reach in time.

The Grimm leapt at them. Ruby couldn't move with the weight of the wounded restricting her, along with the fear overtaking her higher functions. She was very certain that she was going to die today.

Until something crashed ridiculously hard into the Grimm, bringing Ruby back to reality. She was stunned by what she was looking at – a huge, thick tendril-like vine, mossy in color and texture. She looked up to see the vine raise the Beowolf high up in the sky, with two whip-like appendages tied around the Grimm's upper body and legs. The appendages then pulled in the opposite directions and eventually ripped the beast in half, its black blood spraying out in the air. Its body soon dissipated afterward.

Ruby blinked a few times, trying to process what just transpired. She was absolutely certain that there was no kind of plant that was so huge, that could move so quickly, and could slaughter a Beowolf in seconds. It was impossible for such a thing to exist on Remnant, yet here it was before. She was absolutely stunned, as were the other students watching. She turned to the source of this vine, seeing that it grew from where a tree once stood. Standing next to the vine's base, however, left Ruby even more speechless.

Right beside that giant vine stalk was none other than Caesar the ape, his hand outstretched and his expression more serious and focused than ever. What was more noticeable about the ape king though, was that his hand was glowing. A bright shade of green emanated from his being. This wasn't a glow that was unknown to Ruby. This was the glow of one who activated an ability that was rather common on Remnant.

"Wait… could that have been… aura?" She thought in shocking realization. If Caesar, of all creatures, had an actual legitimate aura… and that giant vine appeared out of nowhere to kill that Grimm… then that meant one thing…

Before she could really put the pieces together, Ruby heard the oncoming pant-hoots of several pant-hoots from the forest. Soon, an entire army of apes emerged from the trees, many of them armed with their wooden spears. Ruby, Weiss, Blake, Yang, and team JNPR watched in awe as the apes charged into the horde of Grimm.

It was almost immediately a violent clash, the apes running at the Grimm with their fists clenched or their spears at the ready. The spears shouldn't have been able to do much, as a Grimm's hide was too tough for a mere caveman's weapon. Astonishingly though, they were used effectively; a few apes would gang up on a Grimm, stabbing at its joints to weaken it. Once a Grimm was on its knees, the apes would use their own inhuman strength to push their spears forcefully enough to impale it, somehow without breaking the spear itself. Those tactics were working wonders, as the apes brought down many of Grimm at once.

Other apes, particularly the gorillas, were only using brute strength to slaughter their enemies. They had enough power to crack open a Grimm's own hard skull. Each gorilla tackled a Grimm to the ground, thrashing it about and beating it down till they were thoroughly smashed. One gorilla who lead the others (Luca) encountered an Ursa almost twice his size. They exchanged blows, the demonic bear swiping its claws while the great ape smashing his fists at it. Eventually, the ape threw the Ursa to the ground and grabbed ahold of its maw. The Grimm Gorilla pulled open its lower jaw and ripped it off with incredible force, killing it almost instantly.

"My God…!" Weiss exclaimed in disgusted fascination, as the great ape roared in victory and continued onward.

Among them was also the bald ape (Rocket), leading the front lines and running his spear forcefully through as many Grimm as he could. He came upon another of the Beowolves; before he pierce it through the stomach, the monster swiped the weapon out of his hands. It seemed the Beowolf had the upper hand on that ape. But that wasn't going to be the end of this fight. The bald ape suddenly glowed in a dark grey color, then activated its power.

He let out a great deafening shout, blasting the Grimm with an incredible force of sound. The sheer volume of it was enough to make everything in the vicinity to lose their hearing for a precious few moments. The power of it was enough to severely damage the Beowolf, which was just only three feet in front of the ape. Its skull cracked in several places, and blood oozed from its eyes, nose, ears, and mouth. It fell over, deceased and dissipated, and he continued his advance against the Grimm.

"Incredible…!" proclaimed Blake, utterly stunned by the bald ape's power.

All eyes were now brought to the scarred ape (Koba), who clashed with a large Alpha Beowolf. The superior member of the soulless wolves slashed at him, while he blocked each blow with his bare hands. As the Grimm reared its claws back to deliver a fatal strike, he reared his own fist to throw a devastating attack. The ape's arm then glowed a bright white, his fist apparently shaking with the energy building up. Both combatants swung at the same time, their fists connecting to each other. However, it was the ape who overpowered the beast.

From his arm the aura buildup burst, emitting a great and loud shockwave produced from his own attack. The shockwave demolished the Beowolf's arm, tearing the limb apart into a bloody pulp. The wolf howled in extreme agony, while the ape charged his aura into the other arm. He threw an uppercut into the Beowolf's jaw and released another shockwave. Its jaw was obliterated while the head was split vertically in half, killing it instantly. The ape roared in furious victory.

"… That… was stupidly wicked," spoke Yang dumbfounded, somewhat disliking her admission of admiring the hateful ape's incredible power.

Ruby was amazed at the showcasing of the apes incredible power. "All of that… it couldn't have been… was that really–!"

She was interrupted again before she came to conclusions. The Death Stalker, angered at its Grimm brethren losing to the apes, screamed a shrill and insidious roar. The insectoid Grimm moved at a faster pace, charging towards the Grimm Apes.

Caesar saw the giant scorpion make its move; he had to make his own. He yelled a rallying cry, and the apes gathered to charge the Death Stalker head on. Despite strong intent to take it down, the monster was too strong for the many apes. Its massive pincers swiped them or way or crushed them in its grip, and its stinger impaled many.

The ape king grimaced at the increasing casualties. However, he came up with a plan to defeat their insectoid foe. Caesar called to the gorilla leader, instructing him on what to do. Understanding his orders, the Grimm Gorilla headed towards the Death Stalker. Managing to get behind it, he grabbed onto the scorpion's stinger, using his weight to bring it down. Startled, the Death Stalker tried to shake him off, but the great ape had a strong grip to hold it down.

Caesar subsequently called upon his power once more. His hands glowed green, and the trees surrounding the Grimm responded. Several branches suddenly grew to incredible lengths and reached for the Death Stalker. Distracted by its apprehended tail, the long branches tied themselves around its legs and pincers. Its tail too was soon entangled and constricted, allowing the gorilla to escape safely.

The scorpion was now held in place, unable to move. As the Grimm struggled and roared in defiance, Caesar ordered the bald and scarred apes to finish it off. Once it was within a close distance, the bald ape activated his power, roaring an extreme bellow in the monster's face and again causing temporary deafness. A moment agter, the Death Stalker's skull mask had cracked. It was far too durable to completely shatter, but the shout was really intended to disorient it. Successful, the scarred ape moved forward to strike.

Charging his aura once more, the ape yelled as he struck his fist into the Death Stalker's face. The shockwave emanating from the blow smashed its skull inward, crushing its brain (if Grimm had such an organ) and killing it instantly. Its body dropped to the ground, unmoving, and finally dissipated. The battle was over. Any Grimm that remained were shocked at the outcome, and quickly fled to escape the apes' wrath. With this, the apes cheered. Several pant-hoots roared out into the sky, the apes celebrating their incredible victory.

Ruby, her team and friends, and any of the miners still around were completely voiceless at the spectacle. They would never thought to have seen a battle of Grimm against Grimm. Yet that was what happened, the army of Grimm Apes decimating a horde of normal Grimm.

With the chaos now dying out, Ruby finally realized what she saw. The powers those three particular apes exhibited; Caesar's power to control the plants; the bald ape's deafening bellows; the scarred ape's immense shockwaves. It all came to her.

"No way… they have semblances?!" she uttered in shock.

It shouldn't have been possible for a Grimm to have a semblance, let alone aura. They were soulless creatures that ate humans and Faunus, nothing more than that. However, as she realized the past few days, the Grimm Apes were more than just Grimm. Despite the impossibilities, the evidence was there; despite the implausibility, she had witnessed the entire battle; despite everything she's learned telling her that it shouldn't be true, it was indeed.

In her shock, she had forgotten about the wounded ape in her arms until it groaned. Brought back to the situation, she made sure that her next move was to get him help. She was about to move with the ape as gently as possible, until she felt a hand grip her shoulder. Ruby turned around to see none other than Caesar. While she looked at him with wide eyes, the ape king stared at her with an expression softer than his trademark sternness.

Caesar called to a few gorillas closest to them, and they immediately rushed over. They took the wounded out of Ruby's arms and carried him out into the forest. The apes made their way back to the village, ready to rest from their ordeal. Caesar turned to leave, but stopped to look at Ruby once more, still gazing at him in shock.

"… You saved ape," he said to her. Ruby slowly nodded, admitting that she did. She wasn't sure how he was going to respond.

"… Thank you."

With that, the ape king turned and headed out. Ruby wasn't expecting the sudden gratitude, making her gaze at him in further wonderment as he disappeared into the forest. However, as the shock of the apes' powers and the horrors of the battle she had witnessed came crashing to her, Ruby collapsed in exhaustion. Her team quickly rushed to her side, Yang helping her tired sister up.

As everything was over, Ruby pondered if the story about the Grimm Apes originating from Mt. Glenn wasn't so farfetched now as she thought.

Cardin had put away the shotgun unnoticed at the campsite, hiding it in his personal tent so that no one could find it. He felt confident having done so, believing that it would come in handy when those apes did turn on them. As he headed back to the field of Dust Spires, he was shocked and puzzled to come to what he saw. Many of the apes were gathered in the field, shouting and hooting in what seemed like elated joy, all while his peers were just standing there in shock.

And he also happened to see a few corpses lying around, some of them being miners and others being apes.

"… The fuck just happened here?" he exclaimed questioningly.

Unbeknownst to anyone, there was one last Grimm remaining in the field. Perched on a tree was a single Nevermore, a young one about the size of a raven. Its purpose was not to take part in the battle in any way, unlike its larger and older kin, but to observe how it would turn out. And, to be earnest, it didn't expect to end in the apes' favor like it did.

But its role as an observer was fulfilled. With everything it had seen, the small Nevermore flew off on to a new course. It had to report its findings to its master.

Author's note, 1/25/19:

This was a doozy! As previously stated, Chapter 10 the second part to Chapter 9, as it was previously intended to be one chapter. Of course, there was a lot to read all at once, so I decided to cut it in two for an easier reading experience.

Now, we got some pretty important interactions! Yang and Koba already don't like each other, and Blake's on thin ice with Rocket. I really want to set up some dynamics between the RWBY and POTA characters, as interactions are what I enjoy most about crossovers.. I'm not totally sure how many other Ape & RWBY interactions I'm gonna write out, but there's gonna be some serious "discourse" between Yang & Koba.

Next, we have the Dust Spires. For the sake of plot, I made the Spires to be more than just abnormally sized Dust crystals. Everyone's will stay a long while on West Dragon if they're gonna get enough Dust to restock Vale. I wanted to portray them as some sort of supernatural force, with some kind of element of fickleness to the work. Also, Cardin's got a gun now… what's gonna happen…?

Finally, let's get on to the Apes' "powers," or better known as their semblances. As many may have noticed over the course of this story, the apes have auras and semblances. But now we're getting a look at what some of their semblances are! Not every ape has a semblance though, but the ones that do have some pretty powerful ones. As with the power of the apes are revealed, we're getting closer to answers on what the Grimm Apes truly are.

So here are what some Ape Semblances are so far:

Caesar: Semblance – Plant Manipulation (any plant matter can be controlled by his will; he can make them grow to enormous sizes or shrink to microscopic form. Plants can move and grow faster through his will).

Maurice: Semblance – Telepathic insight (can see from ten to thirty seconds into the future, gets slight headache to migraine as a warning of his semblance activating).

Rocket: Semblance – Super Shouts (a single yell can be heard over a distance of 8 miles away; used up-close can cause others to go deaf, or cause one to bleed out from their ears if closer. Rocket's shouts are capable of moderately tearing flesh and cracking bones).

Koba: Semblance – Shockwave Emission (charges aura to release energy bursts that create shockwaves. When activated, actions such as punching, kicking, even clapping can emit shockwaves and cause severe damage to opponents; can transfer shockwaves through weapons like swords, spears, even guns; Koba can use these shockwaves defensively as well, blocking all manner of attacks).

Grey: Semblance – Mist-Form (Grey can transform into a gray mist, can transform others when holding onto them. He travels faster and can stay in this form for long periods of time).

And those are it so far. Koba's semblance may seem a bit… over powered, but I figured it was a cool power to write about. It's like when a shockwave made from two opponents clash with each other in anime & cartoons, only that Koba can do it several times & more than once. However, Koba does have a severe drawback/weakness with his semblance, which will be revealed in later chapters. There will be one more semblance revealed in story, but that won't be for a while (and I'm not saying who's semblance it is yet).

Alright, that's all I got. I have to go to college again, hopefully for the last time. I'm not sure when Team JGJO chapter 3 or any new stories will be up yet. I may try to update once a month from February to May, but I can't make a promise on that. Laters.

P.S. I did update my story ideas section in my bio, so go check out my bio page to see what's there. Everything is still subject to change, but for now the story ideas currently there will stay.