Ten years had passed since the Fall of Beacon and while the world had been saved by no small effort made by his friends and himself Jaune feels lost in the new world. He wanted to be a Huntsman to help those in need and while he still found his career satisfying he knew something was missing from his life.
Jaune's eye's opened to the familiar sight of his bedroom ceiling, boring white paint and a single light fixture in the center. With a casual roll, he reached for his alarm clock and turned off the alarm before it had a chance to activate and jar him from his more relaxed awakening.
He wasn't sure why he even bothered with the alarm clock anymore it had been years since he actually needed it, always waking up minutes before it activated and turning it off before it could do anything, setting it back on his dresser he pulled himself from his bed and entered the adjacent bathroom quickly going through his morning routine, teeth brushed, shower, and still trying with futility to organize his hair into something that looked intentional.
After ten minutes of trying and failing with his hair like every morning, he gave up and got dressed before heading to what passed for a kitchen in his tiny apartment, pulling out an assortment of cookware and ingredients he set himself to begin preparing breakfast for the day while casually turning on the morning news.
"It's sound's like we will be having another beautiful day here in Vale, Sunny with without a cloud in the sky, temperatures expecting to reach a record high today so if you are working outside be prepared for a hot day. Next up is market news and for the now the eighth consecutive month the Schnee Dust Company stock prices have hit a new record low. While at the same time Remnant Free Trade Dust Corporation stock has been climbing steadily week after week."
He smiled at the news report glad to hear that the SDC was still taking a solid beating and would likely never recover. Weiss and Blake had come together to end the company. Weiss had tried for many years to try and achieve that from the inside but after so many years she knew the task was useless and came up with another way.
He still remembered the day the lawsuits had started, Weiss had gathered a huge amount of evidence on her families company and with the help of Blake had spread it around to everyone who had a legitimate grudge with the company.
That was four years ago and for a very long time Jacque Schnee had been able to suppress the lawsuits and keep his company running smoothly but gradually cracks began to form and the news got out, the Schnee company name had been dragged through the mud many times through its existence but this time it had been truly damning and the company began to spiral out of control, few if any knew the mastermind behind the downfall was Weiss Schnee and fewer knew still that she was also the head of the newly formed RFTDC.
Finished with breakfast and with a quick cleaning of his dishes he donned his gear and stepped out of his small, out of the way apartment, and hit the streets of Vale making his way to the main Huntsman office to see what was available for work today, not entirely sure what he was looking for simply hoping something interesting would show up today, weeks of Grimm clean-up missions had left him desiring something a bit more substantial, not that he minded cleaning out Grimm Dens just that he wanted a change of pace.
He slowed his pace as he heard in the distance the roar of a familiar engine in the distance and knew it wouldn't be long before he had company. Stopping by the entrance to a parking garage he watched as the vehicle he recognized pull into the compound and moments later his fellow blonde appeared from inside.
"Morning Yang."
"Heya Jauney. How's life without me been treating you?"
"The twelve hours have passed much the same as the previous twelve hours and the same as the ones before that." He smiled to himself as he continued his walk to the Huntsman office his companion stepping in beside him.
"Think there will be anything interesting today, I think I have seen enough Beowulf and Ursa this past month to last a lifetime, and that coming from one of us means something, am I right?" Yang elbowed him in the side all smiles today.
The smiles made him wary of Yang, she wasn't and had never been a morning person, not really hitting her stride until around mid morning and the fact that she appeared happy and upbeat before then meant something was up he simply had to figure out what and how much it was going to upset his day. "Yeah I feel the same might just take it easy and sign up for wall duty for the week, take it easy." he discretely looked towards Yang seeing if she reacted to his idea of taking the most boring job a Huntsman could.
"Bleh, are you trying to commit suicide by boredom, I remember my last time in the rotation for the wall, that week felt like it lasted forever."
He rolled his eyes, Yang was prone to exaggerate things and while he might agree the wall was boring but it you planned for it it wasn't as bad as she and many others made it out to be. "You just need something to occupy your time up there. Something other than draining your Scrolls battery in record time." He cut off Yang's response that she used her scroll to pass the time.
"I'm hurt that you think the only way I know to pass time is to stare at my scroll, I know all kinds of ways to pass the time." Yang got in close to try and get a rise out of him but through years of dealing with her he didn't so much as budge at the innuendo, Yang had teased him for years and after enough time he was immune to the less subtle variations of it, he couldn't say he was never caught off guard but this was simply a morning routine at this point and had been ever since they had started working together.
He simply rolled his eye's, he had long since given up trying to find a satisfying response and instead simply moved onto the next topic. "So how long do you think it will be until Weiss comes forward as the head of the company that's rapidly killing her father's legacy?"
"You saw that report as well then I take it." Yang cradled her hands behind her head as she thought. "You know maybe never, Ren is good for a strong public image and he surprisingly has the charisma needed to pull off the act. Weiss might be popular but the Schnee name and global companies have a less than great track record."
"I suppose so, and Ren is doing a great job, Weiss definitely picked the right person for the job, imagine if she chose any of us for that."
"What is that supposed to mean. Yang Xiao Long could have done twice the job of Lie Ren, hell I could have done a better job than Weiss."
"Of course Yang, my mistake in forgetting that you were infallible." With a smile, he pushed open the door of the Huntsman Office and held it for Yang once inside they both made their way to a familiar desk bypassing a wall filled with the general request's, both hoping that there would be something greater to do today.
Finding the desk was easy even from across the room, Neptune's distinctive Blue hair made him easily visible from anywhere in the room and both blondes approached his desk and claimed the empty seats in front of it.
"Jaune, Yang, how are two of my favorite blondes doing today."
"I'm doing wonderfully and Jaune's being boring, as usual." Yang said with a wry smile.
"So nothing really new then." Neptune smiled back, his less wry and more openly joking.
"Got anything good today Blue Boy?" Yang leaned forward trying to sneak a peek at Neptune's console screen hoping to find a juicy mission.
"Not really, everything is pretty mundane, got some requests for security for some of the new settlements." Neptune looked past his monitor, he was certain neither Blonde wanted a job like that and by the way they both shook their heads was right and quickly skipped forward. "What else, what else, oh I almost forgot about this one, a new security detail for a new Dust mine that's in the formation stages, the automated security is still a couple weeks from being fully online and they need a few Huntsmen in the mean time, RFTDC contract, pretty big money to be made." Neptune looked up again seeing if this one had garnered any more interest, both blondes had shown great interest in working cheap for the new dust company and this contract would mean a solid return on the jobs they worked for pretty much free at one point.
"How long is the contract for?"
"Uh... two to three weeks, basically enough time to setup the security system and test it out. Pay's a solid thousand Lien a day." Neptune knew he had both of them then and there, Jaune lived pretty much in a hole in a wall apartment constantly saving money for some reason and Yang was near perpetually broke.
"When does it start and how many spots does it have to fill?" Jaune asked his mind going over the practical aspects.
"Say's here a team of Four and you would be leaving this weekend so two days from now."
"Jaune and I will take the job." Yang decided for the both of them.
Neptune looked at Jaune and smiled when he nodded.
"Great I'll find two more for it and send the details to your Scroll's when the team is setup."
"Thank's Neptune. I'll see you in a couple days then Jaune." Yang stood from the desk and made her way from the building leaving Jaune behind, another normal occurrence.
"So whats the deal with the lucrative Contract, normally they get picked up immediately." Jaune stared at Neptune and watched as his feeble facade crumbled around himself, Neptune was a good friend to have but not a good one to keep a secret.
"Alright fine you got me, Sun's been having a bad run of luck recently and I pulled this contract off the public boards figuring he could use an easy job that paid well as well as give him some down time."
"Is he still having issue's, it's been almost eight years."
"Man, I know that, and trust me every member of SSSN has tried to help him or get him to do something or anything else but nothing has worked, he's hung up on Blake and I don't think that's ever going to change." Neptune slouched back in his chair.
"Might help if anyone besides the two of them knew the details on why they broke up to begin with. One day they were happily dating even rumor's of marriage and then the next Sun was back in Vacuo and Blake pretends like nothing was wrong. Eight years and I don't think I have seen the two even be in the same room together again." Jaune stood from the desk and stretched, his mind remembering the odd break up the two had and that neither of them talks about it. The topic actually had a fairly large wager on it about the reason why the two split up, the wager was probably going to be unresolved forever but the friends enjoyed talking about it from time to time. "Anyways so Sun's joining us do you have a fourth lined up yet or are you still looking?"
"Nothing yet, Scarlet's due back soon I was going to see if he was available. Why do you have any suggestions?"
"How about Coco? She hasn't been too busy since Velvet took that job teaching at Beacon I'm sure she would enjoy the work."
"That's not a bad idea, I'll ask Scarlet first and if he's not available I'll give Coco a call." Neptune turned to his console and was lost to his work immediately.
Jaune smiled as he excused himself, Neptune was a strange one, he had been the cool guy for so many years and now a lot of that was gone. He was one of the first from their generation that had stopped being a Huntsman and settled into a more civilian lifestyle, he still kept himself fit but a bit of a belly was beginning to form due to long days of sitting at a desk filing paperwork and helping the Hunter world run more smoothly than it had in years past.
Stepping out into the street the day was still in its beginning stages, regular business's had only just begun to open for the day.
"I guess Shopping is next, gonna need some extra gear and equipment if I'm going to be gone for three weeks." He turned down the street heading to a store that offered good deals to Huntsmen.
Blake watched he former partner weave her way through the cluster of tables and people before finally ending up occupying the chair across from herself all the while wearing an enormous grin. "What's got you so happy?"
"What I can't just simply be this happy to see you? You're barely around anymore, off saving the world one bigot at a time." Yang's lilac eyes danced playfully with the words her smile growing ever so slightly when Blake cracked a small grin herself and both women shared a small laugh. "If you must know, I just landed an easy job with a pretty big payoff, three weeks of camping at a thousand Lien a day."
"Okay, that's a pretty good reason to be smiling."
"I know right? Plus Jaune's coming so I don't have to even worry about cooking, it's gonna be a blast."
"You do know you could learn to cook right?"
"Sure I could but why bother when someone else is there to do it for me." Yang paused mentally basking in her life of ease before bringing herself back to the moment. "Enough about me, what brings you to Vale, you haven't left Menagerie in years aside from the times Ruby practically drags you to Vale for the reunions. Wait, is there a reunion happening right now that I forgot about?" Yang hastily pulled out her scroll intent on checking the date to see if she missed something.
"No Yang, I'm not here for a Reunion I'm actually done with the Fang and am moving here to Vale." Blake said this as calmly and nonchalant as possible not wanting to make a big deal of it.
"You... done with the Fang?" Yang's mind stalled, the sentence made no sense to her, for as long as she knew Blake her life had been tied to the Fang in one way or another. "How can you be done with the Fang, you are their de facto leader, how is that going to work?"
"It's quite simple actually, I promoted someone who deserved the position and then I left after making the announcement."
Yang stared at Blake in disbelief, Blake without the Fang was like her without her hair it just didn't make sense.
Blake watched as Yang's mind seemed to stall at the news and smiled to herself. "It really isn't that big a deal Yang, I haven't really done much for the organization in years, the last major thing was to help Weiss with her project and even that was handled more by others than myself. Right now just felt like the right time to step down."
"Alright, cool. I mean I still can't really wrap my head around it but that's not really important is it." Yang leaned back in her chair and picked up a coffee that had just arrived at the table. "SO, what are your plan's then, I mean aside from moving to Vale."
"Well, I actually plan to put my Huntsman training to practical use and kind of just see what life has in store for me."
"So you really have no idea what your doing do you?" Yang grinned ear to ear.
"Not a damn clue, but I had to get away from my Mother, It got so bad that I'm certain I would have woken up one day married with no recollection of how it had happened." Blake's Faunus ears twitched at the thought.
"I could see Kali doing that and being convincing enough even to get Ghira to help."
"And now you understand why I had to get away from there, my future depended on it."
"I don't know, your mother had a pretty good eye for men, I'm sure she would have set you up with someone nice, definitely nicer than anyone you will find in Vale, the Bachelor scene in this city is awful. The civilians are limp noodles and pretty much ever huntsman in our age group is spoken for." Yang slumped forward onto the table depressed at the thought of just how boring her social life had been recently.
"The situation can't be that bad."
"It probably wouldn't be if I was a normal Huntress but you will notice what I'm talking about eventually, damn Hero worship, bad enough with the civilians doing it but having Huntsmen treat you like your something untouchable losses its appeal quickly too, girl can't have a regular relationship because everyone in existence know's who we are."
"Well we did kind of save the world in a big way, the fact that some of us are managing to live relatively normal lives is surprising enough."
"Yeah normal, Weiss secretly runs a company that's running her father's into the ground, Ren is the public figurehead of the same company mostly because Weiss is afraid of the public image attached to her name, Nora, well Nora has a pretty normal life, Married to Ren and trying to reign in three children that luckily two of the three take after Ren in Personality." Yang took a drink from her coffee. "Then there is Ruby, Remnants sweetheart, trapped in a celebrity role she can't escape and wishing for nothing more than to be able to pull out Cresent Rose and lop off a few Grimm heads."
"Come on out of the four you just mentioned only two of those aren't normal for the people, Weiss was always going into Business the way it ended up might not be normal but still it is how Weiss would want to spend her life, and like you said Nora has her dream life and that's only strange because it's so normal. Also, don't think that I missed noticing you excluded the two of us and Jaune from your little comparisons to a normal life."
"I excluded myself cause I am living a normal life the only abnormal thing is I can't manage to get a date to satisfy me, your excluded because you are in between major parts of your life and Jaune well I really don't know whats up with Jaune." Yang paused for a moment deep in thought. "He doesn't do anything anymore, he lives in a tiny Apartment has no social life outside of work and spends next to no Lien, I mean like none."
"Maybe he's just saving up for something or just doesn't want to be a part of your social life, ever consider that?" Blake replied with a simple grin, she had missed these sort of conversations, she just didn't realize how much until now.
Yang sat quietly and stewed at that comment for a moment, far longer than Blake expected her too.
"Yang, I'm sorry that was insensitive."
"No, it's alright Blake I understand I'm not everyone's favorite person but I really feel like I should know more about Jaune at this point, we have been partners for almost four years now and I feel like I barely know anything about him aside from the things I learned ages ago."
"To be fair to your friend making skill's it is surprising that you haven't manage to break him yet, It took you less than a year to figure out most of my teenage bullshit not that it stopped me from making some stupid decisions still but that aside you are good at finding things out about other people even if your strategy isn't the most graceful at times." Blake grinned and was glad to see that Yang's mood appeared slightly improved. "Now let's get off these boring topics, you said you have a job coming up, when do you leave?"
"This weekends so I have a few days if your needing help with anything."
"Actually I'm am looking for one thing... I need a job."
"What do you mean you need a job? You moved her without having something lined up?"
"You do remember what I said earlier about my mother right?"
"Geez, okay so what do you have to work with right now?"
"Gambol Shroud, a couple hundred Lien and the clothes on my back." Blake responded sheepishly, embarrassed at her situation.
"Okay, I will call ahead to Neptune and reserve a spot on the job if there is still an open spot then we should head down to the offices and get you registered, the money will get you on your feet in no time and you can stay with me until the day we leave."
"Thanks, Yang I owe you one."
"Hey, think nothing of it, what are friends for anyways right!"
Neptune stared at the two women sitting across from him for a moment thinking his eyes were playing a trick on him. "Yang, what... what are you doing back so soon..."
"Well it's like I told you on the call, I found someone for the job," Yang motioned to Blake who Neptune looked at in fear, not of her but of something else. "And since she isn't setup in the system we needed to come down here and get her credentials in the system right away." Yang had noticed the panicked look in Neptunes eyes, it was hard to miss if she had been honest but she didn't understand it.
"Are... are you sure you want to go on this job Blake?" Neptune shifted in his chair uncomfortably under the now scrutinizing gazes of the two women. "I mean you just got to Vale, maybe take some time to relax, see the sights, that sort of thing." He could tell his words were wasted simply by their shared expression of scrutiny.
"He's not always like this now is he Yang?" Blake asked, never taking her eyes off Neptune.
"Not unless he adopted this trait in the past couple hours, no." Yang responded leaning threateningly across the desk. "Neptune," Yang's mechanical arm's fingers drummed heavily on the wooden piece of furniture. "why exactly do you not want Blake taking this job?" Lilac eyes glinted red for a fraction of a second just enough that Yang conveyed she wanted the real reason and not a hastily concocted lie.
Neptune's shoulders slumped, mentally cursing his terrible luck today for trying to do a favor for a buddy. "Okay fine, the truth then. With Blake your team would be complete, I had already signed up Sun this morning before you and Jaune arrived."
"Oh..." Yang immediately understood why Neptune had been hesitant moments earlier.
"I don't understand what the problem is? So what is Sun is already signed up?" Blake's expression was impassive to her two companions who both looked at her mildly confused.
"Um... so there would be no problem for you to sign up then?" Neptune asked, unsure of what direction the conversation had taken.
"I don't know, is there a problem?" Blake's amber eyes glared at the hesitant Neptune who looked utterly confused.
"Nope. No problem at all," Neptune stood up and turned frantically to a filing cabinet behind himself nearly running into it and knocking it over in the process as he fought to open a drawer and pull out a sheaf of papers. "Here let's get you started on that paperwork to get you signed up and official." Neptune sat down and with several stops and starts finally managed to get the process started which he breathed a sigh of relief when Blake became focused on her task allowing him a moment to look at Yang almost expectantly with a pleading expression. He, however, was unsure of what to make of Yang's newest expression, she seemed slightly too happy about something and that had Neptune very, very afraid.
What's this a new story!
Yep, it is.
Been having a serious case of writer's block with my other works at the moment and nothing was helping, yet this story flowed almost naturally as I sat down to write it. Probably a lot to do with the other stories all having very serious plots, death and war, all that together I think put me in a funk towards them and unable to sit down and write for them.
So that's where this story came from, A nice little slice of life after all the heroics and battles are over and how their lives are now.