Well, the front half of this month was a hell of a lot busier than I had been expecting. Didn't get as much writing time in as I usually do, so we're down to just one update for July it looks like. Back to two a month for August though, I promise.

As usual, I don't own RWBY or Highschool DxD and don't make a penny off this. Hope everyone enjoys!

The next few days are, thankfully, uneventful. Classes, cramming for the last few finals, training, trying to form contracts, Coco bodily dragging Sandy and Verdus off of each other when it started to look like an hour long make-out session on one of the common rooms couches was about to escalate into, more. Of course, Jaune laments as his team and Rubys eat lunch together on Wednesday, all good things come to an end. "I still don't see why Professor Port only offered the extra credit to your team, Cardinal and team Cloud." Weiss grumps.

Pyrrha shrugs in between bites of her hoagie "I think our team and Cardinal are because of the new TA. Rojoa seems, interested, in Cardins team and ours."

Ruby nods "And I think that team Cloud got the offer because of the Headmaster or Professor Goodwitch. They are really close to getting moved up to Group One in combat class, and with team Cardinal on the bubble because their grades are so bad..."

"But its a one letter grade boost!" Weiss whines, actually slamming one of her fists on the table and pouting. It really is kind of adorable.

Yang shoves Weiss shoulder "Weiss Cream, you and Ruby are both getting A's in that class, even if you bomb your final on Friday. The worst Blake could end up with is a B, and I'm pretty sure I'll have an A minus or a B plus. We don't need that extra credit."

"But-"

"I still don't see how it's possible your doing better than I am in half of our classes Yang." Blake cuts Weiss off, the desiccated remains of the grilled tuna that had been her lunch on the plate in front of her along with half a glass of apple juice.

Smirking, Nora quips "Maybe if you spent less time reading Ninjas of Love, and more time studying she wouldn't be, Blakey." Pyrrha covers her mouth at that, but no one believes there is anything other than a grin under the hand. Ren shoots his partner a half-hearted, admonishing glare, but holds his peace.

"You can't prove that's what I was reading." Blake whisper shouts at Nora, bow twitching and hair flailing as she whips her head around to glare daggers at Nora.

Pyrrha, still hiding her smirk, now with a napkin, sandwich finished, interjects "But, you just did by denying that's what you were reading so vehemently." The raven haired faunus in disguise turns to direct a betrayed, blushing pout at Pyrrha. After a few moments, she wavers, and offers a rather pitiful "I'm sorry."

The two teams, meal finished, stand, collect their trays and head towards the steam-shrouded tray return. "So, now that we've gone over why my team is taking the extra credit that was so graciously offered to us again, that's why we cant have another movie night tonight. Even with the rest of tomorrows Grimm Studies class an optional review session, we need to be there, and can't afford to over-sleep." Jaune explains as he sets his tray on the greasy, lurching conveyor.

Pouting, Ruby gripes "I still think its bogus that 'the TA is curios' works as an excuse for you guys to get singled out for something like this." She turns to make a beeline for the mound of cookies at the end of the desert line, only for Weiss to catch her by her hood and drag her along with the rest of the teens as they make their way towards their next class.

Ren shrugs "I'd venture that Rojoa justified having us singled out with the other teams by pointing out our grades in Ports class were all as good as you guys" he gestures vaguely at team RWBY at that "at the semesters start."

"I suppose that makes sense. And with Cardins team close to failing out, I can understand trying to give promising students a second chance. But why do you all think that the Teachers Assistant is behind whose getting the extra help?" Weiss presses, grumpy about more than just missing out on extra credit she doesn't need now.

Ren casts a dry glance at the heiress' "Professor Port hides the meat of his class behind ridiculous tall tales most students probably write off as bluster and age. Do you really think that he loses any sleep over students who cant find the hidden wisdom failing out?"

An uncomfortable silence falls over the group at that. Especially, Jaune thinks, if any of the others realize that from Ports perspective, students failing out due to bad grades is merciful. After all, before the Academy system, it fell to individual Huntsmen and Huntresses to train the next generation. From what he has read about the history of hunters since coming to Beacon in an attempt to catch up, the mortality rate was even higher, and fallback careers for those who couldn't make the cut, or who wanted to retire before they died was thinner to the point of nonexistence. A foundation education goes a good distance further than martial prowess after your body starts to buckle under the pressure of a life of do or die battles, and the constant pressure of humanities survival pressing down on your shoulders.

Classes are, well, classes. Studying and reviews. Extra free periods where classes had been now that their respective final exams had been taken. The day goes quickly, and before long, team JNPR find themselves waiting at the faculties reserved Bullhead dock in their full combat regalia, along with team CLDD, who are all awkwardly trying to break the ice with the two Group One teams, and team CRDL, who are doing their best to stay away from the eight other teens.

Port and Rojoa saunter up to the waiting pair of transports, with a trio of familiar faces, to Jaune, at least, behind them. "Alright students. I'm going to keep this quick." Port opens as soon as he is in earshot. "Today is one of the bi-seasonal expositions that Beacon Academy, the VSPRD and Valean Auric Commandos put on for our kingdoms Combat Schools. It is our Academies turn to keep the grimm we will be slaying for the expo secured until they are needed." He doesn't break his stride towards the further off Bullhead, passing through the teams without sparing any of them a glance. "You all will be tasked with making sure no-one and nothing aside from approved personnel leave or enter the chamber housing our captive grimm. Each team should be able to handle a containment breach on their own. We're only using boarbatusks, creeps, and beowolves after all. That said, as this is extra credit coursework, each team will be assigned a professional huntsman or huntress to oversee your efforts."

Rojoa, just behind and to the right of Port, a slightly bulky rapier that probably mechashifts into, something, resting on the TA's left hip snaps out "Cardinal, with Port, Cobalt and I. Mike, Indigo, go with teams Juniper and Cloud on the second transport."

The gathered trainee teams and smattering of professionals and professors split apart, and, as soon as they are fully on-board the transports the doors slide shut and they are airborne. After a few awkward minutes of silence, save for the wind whipping past the Bullhead, Jaune makes an effort to break it. "So, either of you feel like telling the rest of us what the plan is?" looking directly at the two members of his older sisters team, though mostly lingering on the hulking, burly, dour faced beast of a man that will be his brother in law in a few months.

The hulking, pale skinned man shrugs, his spiked, dark brown bangs jiggling as he does so. "Each student team gets a licensed adviser, and waits out the entirety of the exposition at the mid-point of one of the three hallways connecting the main stage storage unit with the rest of the amphitheaters staff and support rooms. I'll be with your team, Indi is with team Cloud, and, for some gods-awful reason, Cobalt requested team Cardinal. Cant see anything good coming from that racists team being paired with my teams resident hothead, but Rojoa approved it, so there you have it. Anything else?"

Nora, shooting her hand into the air asks, without waiting for the older huntsman to acknowledge her "Yea, what kind of name is Mike?"

Nearly pinning her to the side of the transport with a sharp glance from his piercing, vibrantly green eyes, twin maces clattering on his hips as he turns to do so, he replies "Michael Olive. The eyes are a family thing, ended up a family name at some point." Though, while his gaze is piercing, the rest of his face is smoothed over into a mask of long-suffering placidity that would be right at home on Ren. "Anything else?" Jaune shoots the older man a look of his own at that. Michael sighs, but Jaune holds his ground. "Anything else not related to family matters?"

When no one speaks up, Jaune steps in closer to the older, bigger huntsman, getting as much privacy as he can manage on the nearly over-full transport. "So, you and my sister. She seems happy, so I don't want to cause any trouble between the two of you, but, well, I never really got it."

Michaels mouth twitches into a wry half-smirk and he replies "I'm surprised none of the other men in the Arc family have cornered me with questions like this before. Well, aside from your dad when Aurora first brought me home."

Jaune shrugs "Only ever got to see you at family get togethers and holidays. Mom gave us all a pretty pointed behave lecture before all of them. This is my first chance to get some straight answers out of you without that looming over my head."

Shaking his head with a chuckle, Mike replies "Well, once I figured out that Aurora wasn't trying to get under my skin and treats everyone the way I thought she was trying to bug me with, things between us, escalated."

"Quickly, after you decided to do something about what she does to you.", his raven haired, combat-dress clad teammate deadpans, the purple and black diamond pattern of her garment glinting in the half-light of the transport as she shuffles closer to the two of them. "Cobalt and I didn't sleep with face-masks and ear plugs before they got together either."

Still grinning, as Jaune slowly goes green at the insight to his sisters love life, Michael continues "If Cobalt were on our transport I'm sure she'd have some sarcastic quip about me being too cautious, but, thankfully, she isn't." Chuckling, he adds "And as stern of a lecture as I'm sure your mom gave you and your sisters about behaving at family gatherings, Aurora always gave me one I'd bet was twice as stern along the same lines, with an added dose of where my hands were to stay until we left before each of them."

Jaune starts waving the older man off at that, quickly interjecting "Speaking of Aurora, where is she, that its just the three of you, not the whole team minding us lowly trainees?"

Indigo shrugs "She was going to be posted in the storage unit with the grimm, then Rojoa took over that spot. Amber and Terra are in Vale, something for Terras work up in Argus, so they're visiting for some pre-marraige sister time."

Nora pokes her head into the mostly closed triangle Jaune and the two older hunters had formed to chirp "If the three of you are done talking about family stuff, the Bullheads gonna land any-" with a loud thump, and a violent shift of the floor beneath them that nearly spills the over-balanced teen to the ground, their transport touches down. "Now. It's landing now." Ren pulls his partner, who he had had to catch to keep on her feet, back up to a standing position. At least she has the good graces to look sheepish for needing help with that.

The group of huntsmen and huntresses pile off of the transports onto the amphitheaters rooftop landing pads. The open space is otherwise abandoned save for a smattering of other airships. Closest to them is a pair of bigger, powered down freight airships bearing Beacons crest. Landed more than a few feet beyond those is a single blacked-out, heavily militarized bullhead with the spread-winged eagle clutching a baton and handcuffs over an elongated kite shield that is the VSPRD badge picked out in silver on its fuselage.

The final transport on the landing pad, well, all Jaune can really tell about it is that its a military vehicle. And that it had landed as close to the edge of the building as was possible. Possessing harsher, more angled lines than the ubiquitous bullhead, its shorter, broader engines are connected to the main air-frame by thicker, segmented and peaked struts, each bearing a pair of pylons that could, presumably, be used to mount ordnance. Under the olive drab green transports cockpit is a heavy canon, and Jaune can see what look to be machine gun barrels inside the crew compartment through the narrow view-slits cut into the closed sliding doors. A grinning skull is painted on the fuselage above the twinned axes of Vales flag, albeit crossed at a harsh enough angle to from a shallow oval instead of imply a circle. The skull is wearing a blue beret as vibrant as the rest of the sigil, which is in the same lurid hue of green that is Vales flag. The tail is as long as that of a bullhead, but far bulkier and more armored.

Port, at the head of the Beacon delegation, shakes his head "At least the VAC recruiters left the missile pods off their Kingfisher this time." as he leads the group towards the staff entrance near the back of the landing pads. He flashes his ID, and the pair of bored looking men in tan shorts and bright yellow t-shirts with 'SECURITY' scrawled across their backs. Both of them have what look like stun guns in holsters at their hips, along with walkie-talkies. Not enough to stop serious criminals, but, theoretically, enough to raise the alarm.

Deciding not to tempt fate and ask Port about what he had said about the military transport, he walks with the group in silence through the staff only portion of the massive building the expo is being put on in. The hallways are narrow and plain, gray concrete walls and equally unpainted concrete floors making them seem to stretch on forever, and likely very easy to get lost in. Mostly abandoned, the sound of their footsteps don't quite echo, but do seem louder than is usual.

Cardin is sneering at Cobalt, Port, the other trainees, and any event staff they pass as the large group makes their way towards the stairway. Suriel, still wearing Skys skin looks distantly disinterested, though he moves more like a young nobleman than a huntsman in training. Russel and Dove both look nervous, edgy even, and aren't doing a particularly good job at hiding it.

All of team CLDD, well short and shaggy blonde Louis, trim and timid Sandy with her curtain of auburn hair swishing at the backs of her knees; and darkly hair Verdus with his spikey lime green hair bouncing with each step, are all giddy, barely restrained excitement. Their short, olive skinned leader, Coklat at least is able to mask his own excitement and present a mostly calm image in imitation of the leaders of the two more higher ranked trainee teams.

At least until they reach the main staff stairwell and the groups footsteps actually start echoing. A sound only punctuated by the less than healthy whirring of Coklats prosthetic right leg as the group descends. Wincing in discomfort and embarrassment isn't exactly a good look for a leader, and Jaune is most certainly not going to turn that bit of judgment back on himself anytime soon. Nope. Taking the stairs twelve levels down isn't exactly a pleasant experience, but being huntsmen and huntresses, or in training to be such no one is breathing particularly heavily.

They reach the ground floor, and Port slows to a halt to consult a map for a moment. Then he presses onwards, leading the group through a veritable warren of hallways, crisscrossed and angled in an almost maze-like fashion. Cleaning closets, security rooms, prep chambers and utility rooms. Eventually they spill out onto a wide hallway with yellow paint lining the top and bottom of the walls. A forklift zips past, barely honking before passing the next intersection along its path. They walk down the wide hallway, being careful to stay within the pedestrian walk denoted by white paint on the floor. Being run over by a forklift would be a mortifying way to die or end up failing out of Beacon thanks to the medical complications. Eventaully Rojoa breaks the silence "Indigo, team Cloud, this is your access route to the main storage to mind. You're closest to the freight docks, which will be to your left if your looking towards the main service hallway." he announces, pointing to a wider hallway across from the main service route from them.

The team and huntress in question nod and turn to head down the indicated hallway. CLDD really is doing an admirable job of keeping their excitement in check by now. Opportunities like this are normally reserved for the more advanced, Group One Combat Class teams, which they aren't, and its a good sign for them to have been able to reign in their emotions to act professional at all.

A good thirty feet later, Rojoa speaks up again, pointing to another hallway across the wide hallway "Mike, Juniper, this is you. Most of the utility hub is directly across from you. The buildings subway access point is opposite the freight docks. If anything goes wrong in either direction, be ready to move to support." Jaune, his team, and his future brother in law turn and walk about halfway down the twenty foot, plain hallway before picking spots of wall to lean or sit against and wait out their assignment.

_-*R-DxD*-_

Lacey is sitting at the outermost edge of Serpent Strike Combat Schools section of bleachers desperately hoping something will finally go right for her today. Mr. Laurent had managed to get his budding combat school two dozen seats, which he had mostly filled with the most recent additions to his student body. Namely, the kids young enough to be training for their first attempt to enroll in a Huntsman Academy, or take a second pass at Initiation if they had they failed their first. The fact that there are enough of those now to actually fill every seat here he had secured is largely thanks to her. Well, mostly. It is also the only reason she is here in the black gi, an adder raised up to strike emblazoned in gold over her heart and on her back – the schools uniform – and not moping about her circumstances in the tiny studio apartment under Club Fahrenheit that Crimm is still letting her stay in.

Winning a tournament will do that for a girl. Not a big enough tournament to put Serpent Strike on the radar of the major Huntsman Academies, but big enough to help the school along that path. It took years of sending multiple promising students to those Academies for a Combat School to even get noticed by the Academies administration. Beyond that, it takes at least a generation or two of contributing big percentages of said Academies incoming freshmen to gain the sort of favor and partnerships with the Academies that say, Pharos or Signal have with Beacon. What a single tournament winner, well, there were Serpents at third, fifth and seventh place as well in the right age group, but gold had been hers; did for a Combat School was get teens and pre-teens enrolling in the School. That, Jaundice – Mr. Laurent, his given name isn't one he likes – had explained to her, is where the real money and prestige comes from.

Street toughs looking for an edge only ever pay for single, occasional courses and sessions when they are feeling motivated or like they have spare lien. Grown adults whose jobs take them outside the Kingdoms walls normally sign up for once or twice a week courses that fit their busy, fluctuating schedules. They pay better than the thugs, and cause less trouble; have less of a chance of catching the school up in a scandal as well, but don't tend to bring in any more students either. They are only interested in having a better chance at getting back on the safe side of the Kingdoms walls should the worst happen.

But having enough kids her age or younger enroll in the comprehensive, five class a week - worked around their traditional primary schools schedule of course – regime that he needs to run one group before and one after classes? That, he had explained to her, was well worth letting her keep training at his school, despite her being flat broke, jobless, and unable to pay her tuition to stay in said intensive classes. With both groups. He still jokes that all the kids who dropped out after the first week after her win paid her tuition until the end of next year sometimes. That, however, is just about the only thing that has gone well for her since she had pre-empted her eviction to live in a tiny studio apartment under a nightclub for Faunus fleeing persecution, or, possibly, the legal repercussions of having joined the White Fang.

Nearly half of the businesses looking to hire have 'faunus need not apply' in their help wanted ads. Well, half of the ones she is qualified to try for at least. Maybe a third of her interviews start with the interviewers features shuttering over as soon as they see her second set of ears, and, big as her vole ears are on her head, she cant exactly hide them. Those interviews rarely last more than ten minutes.

So, here she sits, Lacey Fields, rising star of Serpent Strike Combat School, living off of hand-outs and charity. Dodging as many concerned scroll calls from her family as she answers. Sure, they never outright say she should give in, come back home, start her last year of highschool and accept that a normal, civilian life is all she will ever have. But they certainly don't make any attempts to hide or gentle that being implied when they ask when she's coming home either.

That said, Beacon doesn't ask for any payment until after you pass Initiation, and more than a few scholarships, full ride's included, are handed out the morning after you get assigned a team. If she throws everything she has into training, by the time next year starts she's sure she'll make it at Beacon, and not have to pay a dime for it.

But right now, Sergeant Johnson from the Valean Auric Commandos is having an exhibition match against Investigator Callahan from the VSPRD. Everyone knows that Investigators and VAC officers are easily the equals of huntsmen and huntresses, many of them being retired from the profession, or Academy drop-outs forged into something different but equal over their careers. The pair of veteran fighters are easily living up to that reputation, twin hatchets rebounding off of the Investigators armored right gauntlet, his hand-cannon taking chunks off the soldiers aura with every exchange.

Above and around the Combat School seats, the bleachers are packed with high-schoolers, Jr. High students and kids in grade school still. Some of them are on their schools boxing, wrestling or fencing teams as an extra curricular. Others go to after class combat schools, but just aren't committed enough to be brought as a part of that school. Still others have parents who are huntsmen or huntresses that are trying to get their kids to take up the life, others still lost friends or family to grimm. They are all here, presumably, to have the lifestyle made to look cool, to be romanticized, or otherwise seem like the right life choice for the kids to pursue. For that spark to be lit in their soul that leads to another person taking the plunge to have their Aura unlocked, to stand up and do their part and help keep humanity alive.

Like Lacey had half a decade ago, much to her parents terrified anger.

Professor Port, an actual member of Beacons staff strides onto the arena, and the officer and soldier, who had seemed to be implacable foes seconds ago, almost seamlessly shift to working together against the portly elder huntsman. The gaggle of kids can all watch the fight, mostly on the massive screen hanging above the arena. But the Combat School students, they are all close enough to pick out form and combat style with their own eyes. To watch weapons mecha-shift and catch glimpses of what might be semblances in action, not just bright flashes. Lacey can barely contain her excitement, watching one of Vales top experts on grimm, and most storied defenders effortlessly handle two men half his age. Avoiding their strikes with sliding half steps and shifts of his weight. Sending them flying or tumbling to the ground with wrist-flicks setting his weapons axe into motion, or twitches of a blunderbuss shot.

At the entrances to the amphitheater, cold, empty-eyed elders and grizzled, scarred huntsman and huntresses lounge, somewhere between bored and expectant. Every now and then one or two of the civilian students make their way to those hard, empty-eyed heroes to stand still while a hand is rested on their shoulder for a span of heartbeats, only to light up some new color for a moment before scampering back to their friends. The first step towards leaving those friends behind, to becoming something more already taken. Once this duel is finished, the VSPRD officers and VAC soldiers will be putting on a mock skirmish. After that, grimm will be brought out out onto the stage, ostensibly to allow the smaller combat schools a chance to get some of their more promising students experience against grimm.

Of course, actually seeing the monsters lurking outside the safety of the walls might convince just a few more people to take on the path of a huntsman or huntress. Mr Laurent had told her if Serpent Strike gets called, she'll be their representative to face one down. Grinning, she loosens Resonant Chord in the black leather sheathe resting across her back. Not that the civilians will see the grimm all that well in the higher, safer, seats. All of the combat school students are nearly on top of the stage. Serpent Strikes students are nearly at ground level. Not so well thought of to be sitting in the folding chairs on the ground with the professional huntsmen and huntresses waiting for the grimm slaying portion of the expo along with the Signal, Pharos and other high profile combat school students, but close.

Living in a tiny studio apartment that she doesn't even own? Not much worse than sharing a dorm with three other students really. Living off of instant ramen, the protein shakes offered free after each combat class and supermarket free samples? May as well be cafeteria food. Not visiting with her family for a year for fear that they might not let her leave to get back to her training? Well, Beacon is a boarding school, she wont see much more of them after she gets in than she is right now anyways. When she passes Initiation, when she actually gets to start her training for her life as a huntress, this will all be worth it. It has to be.

_-*R-DxD*-_

Suriel leans against the wall of the hallway, thoughts wandering freely. For the most part. Given his current situation, he thinks it more than justified that he is dwelling on how the last few months have played out, and how it has accelerated some of his plans, and atrophied others. Cardin, the leader of what was supposed to be his personal cadre of elite warriors is glaring at the wall near the faunus woman who he will either end up being murdered by or fornicating with by the years end. Hopefully it will be the latter. Racism is a flaw with very few constructively useful means for manipulation, and Suriel believes that the faunus woman is correct in her assumption that Cardins bigotry is learned from his father, rather than the boys own experiences.

The elder Winchesters hatred is understandable even without Suriels centuries of life experience. The man had been expecting to see his first child born, and been presented with his human soon-to-be-ex-wives tusked child of infidelity at the tender young age of nineteen. Hatred of an entire race due to the actions of two may not be logical, and the sentiment far from fair or ideal of a sentiment for a man to hold, but understandable. The first and only child of said bitter mans second and final marriage learning a diluted version of that hatred is equally understandable, and even less desirable.

The father could reliably be called upon to commit heinous acts in the name of his hatred if necessary, and would typically do so without remorse. Cardin however, would more likely than not flinch well short of any commands that would do more than further socially stigmatize him for the sake of his own racism. Meaning that, on top of his existing plans to kill and supplant his bitch of a superior Sanvi, a need to fake his own death so that his Huntsman cadre can be brought back to full strength, and the need to see the devils infecting Beacon killed or captured, he had to find a way to either push Cardins bigotry over the edge to something usable, or purge it from the boy.

"Umm, Huntress Roi, not that I'm questioning the extra credit or Beacon staff, but, how is it we are able to be helping out here? This feels more like the sort of mission shadowing we arents supposed to get to do until the end of our next semester, not extra classwork." Dove, the simpering simpleton asks, the fist person in their small guard detail to venture any words since Cardin and Cobalt had ceased their incessant verbal sparring.

The blonde wolf faunus, bushy tail idly swishing back and forth, casts a considering gaze at the stocky brunette swordsman, sea green eyes picking the youth apart as she does so. The younger of the two goes still at her gaze, his own eyes remaining firmly on her face, despite her provocative garb. Granted, her dark denim jacket, crimson tube top, black leather short shorts and knee high combat boots, while revealing more than a few strips of bare flesh and hugging her form pleasantly evoke more of a sense of danger than eroticism when combined with her aggressive demeanor and a body more tone muscles than soft curves.

The fact that she has a lance resting across her lap, and looks ready to spring into violent action while sitting cross-legged in the middle of the hallway certainly helps the image. "Just Cobalt, please. And you kids are able to tag along to save your grades because of a weird mix of insurance laws. The stadium is covered for any event involving live grimm as long as the right ratio for huntsman or huntresses to grimm is reached for the security detail. Trainees and apprentice hunters are covered just like civilians as far as the corporations are concerned. The newer laws from after the Academy system was started cover the Academy for any field exercise or class so long as no trainee teams are left without a professional minder."

Russel hums, left hand idly toying with one of his blades, right scratching his chin. "So, a legal gray area is the only reason we won't flunk out of the advanced group for our year. Great." Curse that damn interloping fallen for not only recognizing the potential Inquisitor that had been sitting under Suriels nose for months now. And curse Rojoa a second time for starting passively training and subverting the youth out from under his nose.

Cobalt nods, her ear-like, spikey and messy side ponytails bobbing from the energy behind the motion as she replies "A legal gray area that every headmaster from all four major Academies have quietly kept that way since it became clear the Academies were here to stay. It's a useful gray area." Her smirk turns just a touch predatory "Giving the four of you the wonderful opportunity to waste an evening in a plain concrete hallway instead of studying for the rest of your finals like you should be."

Suriel tunes out the asinine banter, having the information he needs. The rest of his flunkies can worry about their scholastic futures and hormones all they want, he has no current need of them. Suriel fears the coming Friday for an entirely different reason. Friday will be his monthly review. The itch of his second set of wings once again driving him half mad as they press through his skin, even hidden by magic and the illusion disguising him, he can feel their press. Wings that he, a mere Warrior of the Myriad is forbidden to possess.

Sanvi would see them, of course. She would chastise him for aspiring above his rank, and present him with the same strip of leather to bite down on she does every month while she retrieves her pliers. His budding, second set of wings will, once again, by ripped from his back, the gaping wound cauterized shut with a white-hot length of iron. Then, once his breathing normalizes – a short time with how rote this ritual torture has become – she will chastise him for several other, false, breaches of conduct to be added to his service record. He could just become her sycophant, another spineless lickspittle dancing to her will and doing her bidding even after being promoted above her station.

Wallowing in his rage and hatred, he allows his mind to wander. The first time she had found budding wings beyond the pair he had been born with, half a millennia gone now, he hadn't known her intent. At the tender young age of twenty, he didn't know the politics of the Myriad. Barely knew a thing of the world outside their city of EbonHold. Had not yet inserted himself into the flow of gossip and secret trading of his race beyond that of his childhood friends. He had honestly believed her honeyed words as the vestigial limbs were rent from his back. The second time she had maimed him and stymied his growth, he knew the rumors, but thought it was the norm, how all of the officers of the Myriad behaved. A needed check on the covetous and ambitious nature of their proud race.

For a time, every decade or so the process would repeat, and still he remained ignorant, and became increasingly defiant. By the time his second set of wings being torn from his flesh had become an annual occurrence, he knew the truth of his situation, his personal hell. He had watched her break two other Fallen under her command by them. Seen the prideful, commanding warriors with centuries of experience beyond his meager two hundred years worthy of looking up to and emulating first try to cover up a series of messy mental breakdowns. Then watched as they stopped caring whom in Sanvis squad saw them. And finally, borne witness to them devolving to mindless, unthinking sycophancy.

Suriel had more pride, a more powerful of a sense of self-worth and too great of goals to allow that to be his fate. To come crawling back to a bitter, spiteful, shortsighted simpleton for orders. Even once they had six, or even eight wings, the fools came crawling back, looking for praise and asking for orders. Sanvi, despite her malice and desires, he had eventually learned, was one of the original members of the Myriad who left Earth for Remnant with Lord Dummah. She grew her second set of wings a millennia after that momentous day. Over the many millennia after her second set of wings had fully formed, she hadn't felt so much as a bump or an itch beyond the outer pair of wings. So she had sought other means to gain power and influence. Breaking her subordinates so completely that even once they outstripped her own power by orders of magnitude they answered to her.

He hadn't realized that she used the same strip of leather for each subordinate until well after his maimings had become a monthly ordeal just over a century ago. She had tittered out her usual, empty-headed, superior laugh when he bit his clean in half after his first new wing had been fully torn out. Joked how he was one of a dozen to go through two leather bits, before presenting him with a new one to bite into as she finished her task. Suriel is ashamed to admit that, until Arc revealed himself, he had been close to breaking. The knowledge that he would have four wings in under a year, perhaps six or even eight by the decades end were he to escape his sadistic, tyrannical superiors grasp completely and ambition will only carry a man so far, after all.

That said, he knows that Sanvi either had not believed or passed on his reports of devils living and acting openly in Vale. She is too much of a coward to risk her own meager standing and direct influence to be the bearer of such disastrous news. Lord Dummah is close mouthed on his plans for Remnant, but Sanvi, at some point, had decided that his plans involve remaining well and truly clear of the Three Way War, or its victor should it have ended in the millennia since the Myraid came here. Surely, they would have sent forces back along the gateway that brought them here since if Dummah did not want to remain separate from that quagmire, she had reasoned to him and her other subordinates and servants over the years.

Suriel pulls his-Sky's, actually, scroll half out of his pocket to check the time. Soon, the penultimate step of the plan he had formulated the day after Cardin had reported bumping into a devil at the beginning of Beacons initiation ceremony will begin. One of his Peers, Atheed, the only other Fallen in Vale anywhere close to growing his second set of wings had been personally slighted by one Peter Port over a decade ago. Half of his mortal followers had been killed or arrested in the fight, and the older Fallen had a deep, blinding hatred for the old man. Atheed is also Sanvis current favorite. When Arc kills him before she can have him promoted, she is certain to act directly against him. A fight she will lose. Badly. Then, and only then, will he finally be able to seize that which he deserves and desires.

Whats one more peer dead compared to finally realizing the smallest of his goals and dreams? With how long delayed his ascension to power has been, by the time his personal cadre is finished with their training, he wont just be the man who revealed the presence of devils on Remnant to Lord Dummah, he will be the one who purged their taint from the world. Clearing the way for Lord Dummahs designs on the world he found, that he will be the sole god of, should the Myriad serve well and faithfully, Suriel thinks. He will meet his master soon, for this, and then, he will know.

_-*R-DxD*-_

Jaune shifts from his place leaning against the wall when his scroll starts buzzing in his pocket. He half-skims the angry, well, angry for Ruby anyways, rant and looks over the trio of blueprints she had sent him. "Mind sharing with the class, Jaune?" Pyrrha asks. He glances over to where the girls of team JNPR had been idly chattering to see both of them, as well as Ren, looking at him curiously.

He shrugs "The three of you know that Ruby has been helping me work out something for a ranged weapon, right?" The three of them nod, Ren shifting out of his meditative pose to sit leaning against the wall on the opposite side of Nora from Pyrrha. "Well, she just sent me the finalized blueprints for the three ideas we've been working on."

Mike, leaning on the wall opposite him finally takes an interest in the conversation. "Mind telling me what it is your adding to your arsenal?" A posture hinting at mild curiosity and a gentle disposition seems out of place on a man with the build of a heavyweight boxer, but Jaunes more or less grown used to it since Aurora started bringing him to holidays and family gatherings years ago.

Jaune looks at the three blueprints again. The smallest option, reminds him of a slimmer Ember Celica, but, with his left hand occupied with a shield he would only be able to wear one on his right wrist, and would need to fumble through reloads frequently. The largest, which had been mostly Rubys brain-child was a rather ridiculous backpack and over-the-shoulder anti-material rifle combination. He chuckles at it, and how frequently the prodigy admits to going overboard with Crescent Rose and moves on to the one most in line with what he had had in mind when he first approached Ruby for help with this project.

An elongated gauntlet segmented at the wrist, but otherwise in the same style as the rest of his armor, with its tip ending just past where his elbow would be. The outside edge possessing a raised peak that a blade could easily be affixed to, and the inside clear and mostly smooth, making an ideal space to affix additional gear or weapons too. The top of the piece of armor is far bulkier than most would expect, as that is where the dart launchers are housed. A quartet of raised ridges extends back from just behind the wrist to the elbow in a pattern that vaguely resembles a tilled field. The central ridges will line up more or less with his middle and third fingers, while the outer pair are just to the outside of where his pinky and index finger will be in the gauntlet. He tosses his scroll to the professional huntsman, who languidly reaches out to snap it from the air with his right hand, angling the screen towards his face as he pulls his arm back towards his body.

"Dart launcher worked into a gauntlet." Jaune explains, not really having much of a clue how Ruby had managed to come up with a system that will allow him to have a dozen darts loaded into magazines above the linear accelerators that will fire them, but the prodigy weapons fanatic had managed just that. "Dust tipped and infused to pack enough punch to be worth using." She'd also worked a ring into the base of the gauntlets index finger for fire control that he could use entirely with his thumb, and the lightning dust battery will slot into the underside of the piece of armor near his elbow where the chances of the power source taking any damage is negligible on top of the rest of the features she had crammed into it for him. All told, it would be an impressive weapon, even more so after he adds his own runic magic to the darts. Jaune's looking into gourmet bakeries to buy some cookies for his friend as a thank you gift on top of plotting out a way to pay her for what she insisted remain a favor between friends, she really went above and beyond in helping him out with this.

Mike quirks an eyebrow, than tosses the scroll back at Jaune. "Darts, though? Not much for range, unless you plan to have them made more from gravity dust than metal. As it is I don't think you'll be hitting anything further than across a street or a small room room reliably. Powstanie and Uderzak" He motions to the pair of flanged maces hanging from his belt "have enough chain inside the hilts that I can get the heads to the far side of a city block in a pinch."

"Ruby and I have plans for getting around that. We were gonna meet up after classes today to make some final tweaks to the loadout and design then get started on construction." Jaune scratches at the back of his head awkwardly. "She, kinda thinks that my team and I taking this extra credit work is my way of blowing her off."

That earns a sigh from Ren "It's simple academic responsibility. We let our grades slip, and-" The quintet of huntsmen and huntresses go silent moments after Ren cuts himself off. Gunfire. Michael is the first to react, twinned maces drawn from the thick belt they had been hanging from, olive drab green greatcoat flaring out capelike behind him as he strides down the hallway.

He pokes his head out into the main hallway, only to yank it back as a handful of bullets ricochet off the unpainted concrete. "Looks like a bunch of thugs, leaders some sort of bird faunus in a suit. Probably after whatever they can get from the supply rooms. Lets go."

Jaune and his team spring into action, weapons being drawn as they jog down the long hallway to confront the unexpected threat. They round the corner to find team CLDD and their professional overseer already brawling with a dozen or so street thugs. Tall, short, fat or fit, all of them are wearing clothes that are at least a little dirty or tattered, the only thing unifying the rabble being a vibrant scrap of purple and gold cloth tied to their bodies seemingly at random. Lois, tan cargo shorts and pale blue tank-top splattered with blood despite the fact that his naginata is bouncing off the flesh of the thugs is doing his best to support Indigo, their professional minder, as she does her best to fend off the gang-bangers apparent leader, a gap in her shield that is a perfect inverse of the tonfa she is trying to beat the apparent faunus leader back with.

Jaune, and his team, know better. They can all feel the influx of magical energy gathering around the thuggish looking leader. All four of them readily recognizing the sunset hued bearded axe in the suit clad, crimson eyed mans hand as one of pure light, not a hard-light construct stolen or bought hot, like the rest of their group likely assume it is. "We're only here for Port! Let us have our revenge and none of you need to die today!" the sharply dressed, fallen angel roars, his buzz cut and scarred, cleanly shaven face making him look more thuggish than his followers despite his choice of clothes. Michael responds with a roaring charge into the fray, the purple gravity dust crystals in his mace's heads flaring with every blow, throwing unconscious criminals back.

If a big guy like Mike charging them down isn't enough to break the aura enhanced thugs resolve, Jaune had figured him and Ren backing his soon to be brother-in-law up would do it. The criminals eclectic mix of knives, pipes, crow bars, bats and handguns is beyond a terrible match-up for the caliber of weapon that huntsmen and huntresses – in training or otherwise – bring to the table, after all. The disparity in skill and fitness only compounding that fact.

As the pair of team JNPRs men make their presence known, passing a nervous looking Coklat who is kneeling over Verdus and doing his best to dress a gaping wound in the taller teens leg, the familiar crack of Milós rifle form and the bass whumping of Magnhilds grenade launcher form begin sounding off behind them. The gang of criminals shift back. "Reg, stop fretting and help clear the tugs out. I'll be fine." The downed member of team CLDD gripes up at his leader, reminding Jaune that his fellow leader, understandably, dislikes his first name. And the thugs fall back

A stray after-thought realizing that of the other young mans given and family names – Coklat Regum – Reg is the only readily available way to call him by barring the sort of story a team so recently reformed from others ashes isn't likely to have. At least that isn't in some way shape or form worse or more embarrassing than what his parents had saddled him with. A crowbar bouncing off of his aura and skull brings Jaunes focus back to the battle at hand.

Jaune catches a follow-up pipe swing on his shield, twisting his left arm around so that he can wrench the improvised melee weapon from its wielders hand, then knocks the thug out with a cross-punch from his right. To either side of him Ren and Mike are flowing through the crowd of criminals, though Ren is more dodging around and flipping over the attacks aimed at him than the older huntsman, who is catching nearly half of the attempts to harm him on his vambraces. Still, that the larger and bulkier huntsman is even approaching the lithe and quick Lie Rens mobility is impressive enough on its own.

With a banshee wail, Cobalt leads team CRDL into the melee, Rhongomynyad twirling over her head in its lance form until she scythes it down into one of the thugs shoulders with a sickening, squelching pop on the heals of a shattering flare of maroon light. The criminals are pushed further back as the final student team joins the melee.

Cardin, Dove and Russel are hot on the professional huntress' heels. They probably would have turned the tide of the skirmish right there, if another dozen thugs hadn't rushed through the wispy clouds of Nora's recently crafted tear-gas grenades intent on helping out their flagging friends. Jaune lets an almost impressive hit from a metal baseball bat send him into a spin, intending to return the hit with interest. Halfway thorugh the maneuver he is presented with the sight of Suriel smugly smirking at the fight in front of him. The disguised fallen angel is making a very lazy attempt at helping the rest of the law abiding citizens next to Louis, the amulet allowing him to impersonate the now long-dead Sky having bounced out from under his shirt at some point.

The fallen angel leading the thugs chooses this moment to throw his right hand back, dispelling the light axe he had been holding as he does so, shifting his feet perpendicular to the service hallways walls as he raises his left fist in the general direction of the student and professional hunters. The open palm splays open as the gathering magic surrounding the fallen reaches a crescendo. With a blinding flash, power lines of varying thicknesses and ages tear free from the walls ceilings and floors. Wire insulation melting as often as it it incinerates or atomizes to lay bare the varied aluminum, gold silver and copper wires feeding one of Vales most storied venues in a chaotic blend capable of making even the most seasoned of electricians refuse contract work for the building and only offer the phrase 'grandfather clause' for a reason.

Not that Jaune, or any other members of the group working to fend off the angry criminals recognize much past wiring tearing free from concrete, and power flickering as alternate intake sources and emergency generators follow their programming and do their best to keep the massive structure running. Blinding light followed by the immediate area around them dropping into powerless darkness is all any of them can truly make out at first. For a few moments, jagged arcs of electricity arc from twitching, writhing, burning cords snapping towards the fallen angel until the buildings breakers, fuses and emergency systems cut power to the stretch of hallway the skirmish has frozen in.

The last dregs of electricity flow into the hostile fallen angels form, and, smirking, opens the fist his left hand had been clenched into as widely as he can as he drops his right arm to hang loosely at his side. Dozens of orbs of electricity spring from the open palm, ricocheting off of each other, or exploding into insane spider-webs of lightning bolts when they strike anything else. The consecutive, violent, loud and blinding explosions spill everyone in the access corridor to their feet. Probably breaking more than a few auras and shorting out most of the surveillance equipment.

Not that Jaune can discern any of that as a fact, all he can see is a blinding white nothingness, and the only sound he can discern is a high-pitched and painful tonal screech. He shakes his head, pinches his eyes shut and works a burst of, what he hopes, is healing magic, through his body. Looking up, he can see a confused looking fallen angel, unarmed and rooted in place; and Nora Valkyrie, pink arcs of lightning skittering across her body, eyes all but glowing with the same energy.

Magnhild shifts, and with a crack and a shout, Nora closes the distance between herself and the fallen angel who had thought he could end the growing battle in a single fell swing on the wings of an explosion. Stunned, the fallen angel stays rooted in place at the sight of a girl who was stronger after receiving the brunt of his attack, instead of laid low. Flowing with instinct and muscle memory, Noras body shifts her body mid-air so that her warhammer would land perfectly to knock out any aura-enhanced fighter with a swift painless blow to the head.

Magnhild craters the concrete wall behind the space Atheeds head had occupied with a deafening crack. The fallen angels corpse crumples to the ground, ending in a mangled wreck where a neck had once existed.

Seconds later, Noras weapon clatters to the concrete as the chipper girl shifts from blankly staring at the patch of wall painted with red tinged grayish pink strands of viscera, accented with shards of white and dark hairs. Idly, Jaune notices both Dove and Coklat sliding down the walls to rest bonelessly on the ground, manic lightshows of shattered auras skittering across their bodies, chests rising and falling in the gentle rhythm of unconsciousness.

Jaune, along with the rest of the students and professionals that had been fighting off the unexpected assualt are all in the process of pushing themselves back to their feet and checking themselves over for injury as well as how much of their aura is left, as a quartet of huntsmen and VSPRD squad sprint past them. A handful of the reinforcements stop to start cuffing the still downed criminals, the rest rushing ahead, probably hoping to catch more members of whatever gang had been manipulated into this assault, or, more likely, deemed an acceptable sacrifice. Jaune spares a glance for Suriel, doing his best to keep his expression as he makes his way over to where Ren had intercepted his partner and best friends panicky backwards crawl away from the corpse she had just created.

Jaune knows that Ren is murmuring, something, into Noras ear but cant hear it as Rojoas crisp, clear and confident voice fills the otherwise eerily silent hallway. "I need a Police Van, and a trauma team to the freight entrance as soon as possible. We have two students unconscious and likely badly concussed, a third with an open leg wound and a fourth..." their TA trails off, searching for words, then continues "A fourth who did her kingdom a great service today, and will need someone to talk to to come to terms with that."

"Great service?" Jaune asks Rojoa as he ambles over to the one, probably, responsible for this mission disguised as an extra credit opportunity.

The TA nods. "Sal Crest. Led a splinter group of the Branwen Tribe down to Vale twenty years ago. Then led the bandits into the city when the grimm nearly wiped his people out. One of the bloodiest, most heavy-handed street gangs Vale has seen in generations. What your teammate did is probably going to lead to the end of that gang before the month is over." Rojoa glances first to where the trio of professional hunters that had been minding the trainees were helping to cuff the still mostly down and dazed criminals. Then over to where Coklat and Verdus are being fussed over by their healthy teammates, and finally to where Cardin and Russel are doing the same for Dove, 'Sky' hovering nearby doing his best to look worried, but barely managing indifference. "I know Nora needs support right now, but, with you being the only team leader not out cold or with a wounded teammate to worry about..."

Jaune looks over to where Pyrrha had joined Ren in trying to comfort Nora, gently coaxing her away from the puddle of vomit on the concrete next to her, the typically chipper girls partner still half hugging her, half rubbing her back. "I didn't see everything, but I can fill you in on what I did see." He answers, knowing full well that this is as much part of being a leader as calling the shots in battle or keeping up a solid training regimen. If he cooperates, he can keep it quick, and get to where he wants to be right now quicker.

I had planned to have one morse scene in this chapter, but it just didnt seem right after the last one finished, so it'll end up at the start of chapter 20. Things are gonna get more hectic pretty quickly as we move into Volume 2 RWBY territory, so I hope all of you are ready for a wild ride!

Love it? Hate it? Forgot to grab your gun and body armor before leaving home and have an awkward injury and weird illness now? Drop a review, I love those things!