This takes place in an AU where Cinder and her group never entered the Vytal Festival and therefore never attempted to sabotage it, meaning another genuine team from Haven fought. The story starts after the Vytal Festival is over and lives have continued as normal - starting roughly around the end of the third/start of the fourth semester in that academic year. Cinder's gang is still around, but they're doing much more low-level crime stuff than the grandeur we've seen them pull in canon.

In this AU Penny won the Vytal Festival, because I said so (it doesn't factor into the story).

Cover Image: Commission from FJ+Tikoriko. Check them out on DeviantArt tikoriko dot deviantart dot com (no spaces). All credit to the original artist

This story is dedicated to user Status-Endless, the only other person on this site to have written any Orange Sorbet [Neo x Fox] centric FanFic. (Seriously, search for Fox and Neo stories on here and there are FOUR - all by her)

This one's for you, mon amie!

'In dreams we enter a world that's entirely our own.' Fox remembered that from when his Mother used to read him books before bed. The third Harry Potter book, if he recalled correctly. It was his favourite quote from all the books he'd had read to him. He'd never made it past the fourth book when he was younger due to timing and the fact the books started to get really dark, but he hung onto the fact that he would finish them before Beacon was out. And he hung to that quote too, like a lifeline.

Like everyone else who could, Fox dreamed. He had good dreams, like the time he dreamt he saw his family - Mother and Father and his two siblings, and his teammates all gathered round a table feasting and laughing and being merry; and he had bad dreams, like the time he dreamt he saw his family - Mother and Father and his two siblings, and his teammates all killed before his eyes by the vicious and ravenous Nothing, their screams echoing through his mind as if they were right beside him.

For Fox, tonight was a bad dream night. The copper haired boy threw himself up screaming, the sound frightening the shy Faunus girl with acute hearing awake and their team leader as well. The scream also woke Yatsuhashi, but he knew that when Coco heard his partner scream and went to console him his input would not be needed. Coco was a brilliant leader, she could handle it.

"Whoa whoa, Fox, easy. Easy now." Having had plenty of practice and experience dealing with not only his but her own partner's insecurities, the still sleepy fashionista rested one hand on Fox's exposed and scarred back, the second grabbing his hand and holding it to his own heart so that he could feel it racing. "Feel it?" Though still breathing sporadically, he nodded. "Fix it." One tactic she often used to calm him was to make him feel how hard his heart was beating and thus make him realise his state and force him to calm down via his own means, usually through low-level meditation as taught by Yatsuhashi over their break between first and second semester in Year One. Fox focussed on his breathing; he held his own hand closer to his chest to feel the speed of his heart and matched his intakes and releases of breaths with each pump. After perfectly matching, he slowed his breaths down and as a result brought his heartrate down as well. It was simple, but so effective. His heart rested much closer to its normal bpm before Coco asked him the mandatory question. "So, what was it this time? The Nothing again?" Fox named the beast of his nightmares The Nothing, as that is what he imagined true blindness felt like - a void that consumed all that he held dear. Most people knew him to be blind; all medical experts he spoke to would agree and by their own words he was technically and medically blind. But he was not sightless, not 'truly blind' per se. He could see, in more ways than one.

For starters, when he opened his eyes there was a distinction between the two states. He saw light. That was about the only thing he saw. The only time he could see anything else was when it was right up in front of his face. If Fox balled his hand to a fist, then placed the second knuckle of his thumb on the tip of his nose, then raised his little finger upwards, his finger would be blurry near beyond recognition and anything past that was just a giant wad of not-dark; he didn't really know colours but he knew it wasn't dark. He was so short sighted that no lenses would be powerful enough to fix his vision even as a child, and as time went on his vision worsened because when you don't use anything for a long time, your body stops trying to get you to use it. As Fox wasn't using his eyes, why focus on trying to make them better? The second reason was because of his semblance. Whether it was always going to manifest itself like this or whether it was pure coincidence he did not know, but his semblance allows him to see around him by bursting his Aura into the ground and having things bounce back to him; kind of like echo location. Fox saw what everyone's Aura looked like and how it moved inside and around them. Yatsuhashi's Aura flowed peacefully around his body like an olive green river, Coco's caramel coloured Aura danced around her body normally, but much like Velvet's deep scarlet Aura, calmed and pulsated in unison whenever the two were around each other. Creatures of Grimm were easy to identify as well; they bounced back darkness. Not exactly a void, but an area of darkness nonetheless.

"No. This was different. It was new." Her eyebrows arched as she sat on the side of her teammate's bed; Fox seldom had 'new' nightmares, it always came back to The Nothing in some way, shape or form.

"How was it different Fox?" Velvet sleepily shifted her weight in her bed as well, listening to the conversation.

"I saw us together. We were in a large space, not outside. It felt new, but old at the same time. I sensed all of the Kingdoms in this place but never any people. Just us. We were all together when I felt a sharp pain. Unimaginable, almost indescribable. Suddenly I saw more figures. Another team maybe? One of them held something, I couldn't make out what but it was small. I remember dying. I heard my name called in a voice I've never heard before. And that's when I woke up." The team leader shot her girlfriend a look making sure she didn't look terrified at the story - as much as she loved her, she was scared very easily and sometimes it was a little difficult to calm both her and Fox down at once. Fortunately, she appeared to be more curious than scared.

"Fox, it was just a bad dream. You know this."

"But it felt so real. That voice sounded new and so real..."

"I know buddy, I know." She gave the scarred boy a quick hug before standing. "Try to get back to sleep, we'll work through it in the morning." The boy nodded and lay back down to rest once again. He heard Coco wander over to Velvet's bunk and kiss her before going back to her own bed. Milky white eyes shifted away from the scene he didn't see. Deep down in his heart he wanted something like that; someone to love who loved him back in the way Coco and Velvet loved one another. But who could love this? Yatsuhashi had always said, "Never fall asleep feeling negative emotions, your dreams will reflect your state of mind" - wise words, but ultimately fruitless in this case. Fox slept feeling disheartened at what he didn't have. But then he recalled that voice. It was soft and new; a voice unlike any other. It sounded worn down, and the cry felt like one of desperation. Who was that? He decided to dwell on that thought no longer, and closed his eyes once more for (hopefully) a much more uneventful rest of the night.

When discussing evil plans, there are often a few things that need to be thought out: What the goal is. Who's going to do what. How much time do you have to complete the task. Interference, what would you do if and when it comes. Back-up Plans. All that sort of thing. But most importantly, it's how the 'team' is going to communicate throughout the mission that doesn't result in compromise.

The key word there being 'communicate'.

As much as she enjoyed doing this thing with her "friends", Neo wasn't a huge fan of having to have a babysitter throughout the entire mission due to her inability to speak. Hands down, she was the second most capable person in the entire room when it came to fighting and planning, second only to Cinder herself. But because she herself couldn't communicate to anyone she needed to be with someone so that the rest of the group could know when their side of things were over. Fortunately for her 'team', she was much more of a do-er than a talker anyway, but that didn't mean she wasn't much of a thinker. It also made her feel like a child. It was scary to think how often she was made to feel like less of a person than the rest. Roman often called her throwaway names like 'kiddo'. Cinder detested being with her at all. Emerald and Mercury had both on separate occasions tried accidently forgetting about her or losing her on the mission so that she wouldn't come back with them. Honestly, she wished that she could leave them all. But because of everything she had done with these people she was a wanted woman and there were very few places on Remnant she could go without being recognised and arrested - this was her life now.

The petite woman sat on a crate away from everyone else as the plan was discussed in detail.

"So, it should be arriving in the next few minutes. We don't want to strike for the next day or two because they always have measures for that." Cinder Fall was highly experienced in this sort of thing, she knew how security was handled. Roman, who also had years of experience over the three younger members, added his own information to the table.

"After two days of high level security, numbers drop off steadily to free staff up for jobs elsewhere. Day five or six is probably when they're at equal parts most comfortable and lowest numbers and that's when we ought to strike. These guys are idiots."

"The shipment contains only a single item, an artefact. But that item is essential for the plan - I will not be leaving that place without it." That was all Neo believed she needed to hear, so she zoned out from that point onwards.

"So, what is it? You hadn't told any of us what it is before and frankly, I don't want to be risking my life for some trivial gift shop statue." Cinder smirked at Emerald's comment, willing to share the information with her colleague.

"I did not mention it due to the level of importance that item to everything we do from this point out. Had I told any of you and the information was to make its way to the authorities, to Huntsmen, to Ozpin, then the entire thing is ruined. Call it 'Need to Know Information'. Until now, you had no need." The tattooed woman grabbed one of the scrolls from the floor and unravelled it to show a sketch of the artefact, various small Polaroid photos spilling out as well. "The item is said to be from a time before humanity as we know it. The Parchment of Volentes."

"Never heard of it" Mercury scoffed.

"With good reason. The Parchment of Volentes only ever materialises in this world every century or so but it can do amazing things. That's why archaeological groups from all over Remnant were so keen to keep it under wraps. Unfortunately for them - and fortunately for us - the curator, along with people in high places on the governing body, won the argument and it's being stored in a museum with heavy security and round the clock surveillance so that no one could misuse it."

"Yeah, but what does it do?" The silver grey haired boy snapped at his boss' waffling. Fiery eyes and tattoos glowed as the woman snapped back.

"Keep quiet and I might tell you!" Her tone struck fear into the boy. Emerald held his arm with her own, comforting him but mostly to steady herself. "The artefact can grant the one who possesses it a wish. There are-"

"What like a Genie?" Emerald lowered her head immediately, realising that she had voiced her own thoughts aloud when they were meant to be in her head. "Sorry..."

"As I was saying, there are a handful of documented wishes that can never be granted. The second ever wish from the Parchment was the wish for eternal life. That man perished instantly and his remains along with the artefact itself vanished from existence for centuries. The second un-grantable wish was for infinite power, which frustrated me when I first saw that but I have figured a work around which I will explain later. The third is duplicating the Parchment of Volentes itself. This has only..."

The Faction had been planning this heist for ages now, ever since an anonymous tip-off about it some months prior. And from the get go, Neo seemed uninterested. Why would they want to steal a new artefact? There were plenty of museums that they could rob right now and steal from. It'd take far less planning and it could be done right now. Heck, with how often she was ignored in this place, she could have very easily slipped away and stolen something for them now. Or at the very least, it was something to do to preoccupy herself. She instead sat on the crate alone with her thoughts.

'What would you even do if you left here? Where would you go?' Basic questions she asked herself on a regular basis yet never found the time or energy to either answer them in her mind or bite the bullet and leave to figure out the answers in real life. She was... wait, what?! There was something that the group beside her had just mentioned that she felt a strong urge to listen to. She clapped once to draw attention to herself, a signal the four people around the table turned to. She wasn't sure if what she heard was right or whether she had interpreted it based on her train of thought, so she simply signed to the group one word;

"Repeat."

"Thank you for actually paying attention for once Neo" Cinder hissed. "I'm not repeating everything so I'll be brief; this artefact is said to grant any user a wish of their choice, with a few documented exceptions. If we get this, there would be nothing to stop us from fulfilling our goal. Did you hear it that time?" Semi-sheepishly, Neo nodded and shuffled back onto her box.

'This is it Neo. Your chance. You can escape this madness and live your life.' The ice cream themed girl smiled a genuine smile and focussed in on the plan - this was the first time in years that she actively listened to the plan as it was being revealed, rather than figuring it out or being spoon fed it as it went along. This was maybe the one and only opportunity to be free, and you bet she was going to grab that opportunity by the horns.

Hey guys!

So I'm back and I've got this story for y'all to enjoy. It may be very tricky as no one has ever done one of this length with Fox and Neo as the central pair. And as this is the hook to get you interested, I'm feeling nice. Expect Chapter 2 of Senseless tomorrow morning.

As always, feedback - good or bad - is much appreciated