Amy's grin slowly grew as Lauren narrated her first encounter with all of them, particularly Ben's experience with her in the arena. Her arm stretched out to her right, her hand joining Ben's in ruffling their teammate's hair. She let it drop as Ben stepped forward to offer his hand to Costa.

The woman's gaze falling on her earlier had suddenly made her very self-conscious, for the first time in a long while. She was acutely aware of the fact that she was wearing Lauren's clothing, as Lauren was wearing Ben's--but Costa recognized the jacket against her bare, ivory flesh. It was the way it seemed to be intended to be worn, with nothing between it and the wearer, but...

Costa was Lauren's mother, after all. That kinda heightened the awkwardness, just a little.

"We are quite a motley crew, though. She's not wrong."

"I see you're still stealing the hearts of those around you en masse, beloved," Lauren's mother replied in an accented drawl. Lauren, beaming, perked up with an "Mhm!" as Costa Negasi took Ben's hand gently, shaking once--

"WEEEEEEEEE!"

--before yanking him into an exuberant hug, Costa's arms reaching around him to grip her only daughter tightly. Lauren crowed and stretched her arms out to return the favor, while Ben squirmed in the center helplessly.

"And she's usually a fairly good judge of character, so however motley you may be, I'm glad she's brightened your lives the way she brightens mine."

Lauren made an illegible, fawning "ugguawwshucksuguu" noise before dropping down off of Ben's back and yanking her captain away from her mother to embrace her without the middleman, sparing Cap only a brief glare as though it had been his idea to feel up her mom.

"So," she said hopefully, "did, uh...did Pops roll around?"

Costa looked at the rest of the team, then Lauren with a note of chagrin in her warm eyes, mouth quirked down sympathetically. Lauren seemed to deflate a little bit at the look.

"Beloved...he wanted to be the first one to see you at Beacon, believe me..."

Lauren was quiet for a second, and then shrugged.

"Ehhh, he's probably out on the grind, I guess. I'll just give him a--"

"--but we opted for a two-pronged assault," Costa continued, an all too familiar mischievous twinkle gleaming in her eyes. A sinister giggle grew in the back of her throat. "i'm sure you're familiar with the tactic. A pretty face out front for distraction..."

"...while the handyman tinkers in the back?" Lauren finished incredulously, before her eyes widened in horror. "Oh...oh, fuck! Mooooooms!"

Lauren whined loudly. Costa was beaming.

"That's not cooooooool! That's our dorm!"

"If you haven't been robbing people, there will be nothing for him to find, will there, beloved?"

Lauren's mother reached out and ruffled her daughter's hair, just as her team had moments before. This time, Lauren looked positively paralyzed at the touch.

For Lauren had, in fact, taken possession of ten thousand lien, a designer purse, a custom tonfa, a series of clothes, and a promissory note claiming Ben's virginity by graduation - just in her first week of school. And somehow, no doubt through virtue of having raised Bastille's hellion themselves, the Negasis had figured it out in no time.

Schwarzes and Such

"Have fun, then." I replied, letting her leave with little more than a smile and a short wave as I rose myself. While meeting up with family was indeed on my own agenda, I had one thing I wanted to at least get done beforehand. Something I didn't need to drag anyone else off into, too trivial and hopefully too quick.

Well, probably not as quick as it'd be for most other people.

Even so, it was early. Not even eight yet. I didn't even know if they'd arrived as of yet.

I had time... Probably.

"Better make it snappy."

Just a quick jaunt in and out of the Armory to take a look at one or two things, that was all I really needed to do for right now.

---

"Column A and Column B, as it were!" came the cheery response from the taller girl. "I assume it transforms out from that suitcase— Hey, Dawn-chan?" she called, craning her neck over her shoulder to check on her little sister.

And she was met with a smirk and the hand signal that could only mean "OK" or "money", as the smaller of the two had retrieved a pencil and notepad from somewhere within her voluminous sleeves. "Primed and ready for notation!"

"Awesome, sis!"

April threw her a back a thumbs-up in appreciation. They hadn't really delegated out the task yet, but it was common knowledge amongst the entirety of the surviving family tree that April's handwriting was bad in the same way that a dumpster fire could be called hot garbage. Dawn stepping up and logging the information meant that they would both be able to use it for their reports later.

Plus, it let April ask the questions and look at things up close!

"Basically, what we need to get an idea of is what it does and how it does it. Then we need to infer on our own how we could use them in situations outside the norm-- basically, what makes them unique as Hunting Weapons compared to normal stuff. You don't need to go wrecking the whole place, but a little demonstration won't hurt!"

@HereComesTheSnow@Suku

Mindaro Mondays - Galla

The demonstration was already beginning in earnest. She didn't particularly care about the functions of Cian's weapon, but the two other girls who had chosen to follow after the huntress were intent on observing it in action. Galla turned her gaze over to the pair. They had a notepad and writing implement out already to record everything they saw. Being able to see a weapon up close was something they really desired.

She looked back at Cian. It wasn't her desire.

It was nearing the time for her to rendezvous with her parents and greet her big sister.

She would wait here until then.

It was always a treat to see night pass through in the city of Atlas.

Lights of pale gold and bright blue, criss-crossed the skyline below Team HJNS' balcony in a xenon honeycomb. The streets were packed with people gaping up in awe, filing in and out of massive restaurants, malls, and theatres, posing with Atlesian Knights for selfies. Faint screams and the sounds of loud music from the scrolling advertisements and monolithic attractions were audible even to Jericho Piper, perched on the railing of his team's deck. He looked down at the people of his home city with golden eyes that had gone soft at the tail end of a long weekend, already packed full of stressful interaction with buoyant people. This was different than a cruise ship, though. This was a true metropolis, the central processing unit of all Remnant, hundreds of thousands of people all desperate to visit the brushed-titanium brain of Atlas and stand amidst its flaring neurons.

The young knight took a long drink of his beer and sighed.

"I should report you," noted a wry voice. "Atlas Academy's substance policy doesn't end when you walk off campus. We pay for the condo, you play by the rules."

Jer hmmphed dismissively.

"So when you were here with your team, you guys channel-surfed and drank black coffee all day?"

"It's a hardy way of life," Troy Piper deadpanned. "A couple of princesses like you and Babs would never understand."

The corners of Jericho's mouth rose begrudgingly.

"You're probably right. You having one?"

"If you're offering."

"I was." Of course, Troy Piper already had one in his hands; the offer was merely belated courtesy, and if Jericho hadn't wanted to sacrifice one of his team's precious brewskis, he would be told to go fuck himself. Part of Jericho's upbringing had been a series of lessons in obfuscating, blatant hypocrisy. Trust your instincts, until it's time follow your orders. Never show mercy, but don't forget to touch base with your heart. Get a haircut, you gender-bender...but careful never to nick your rune. Above all, only one thing had remained consistent: Jericho's life belonged to Atlas. So did his father's.

So underneath the mild banter, Jer knew that Dad was a little icy on his decision.

"Did you bring the paperwork?" Jericho continued mildly, still perched on his balcony like a falcon. "Nicole said they'd been working on it since yesterday. By now it should be done."

"You're in a hurry," his father said evasively. "You've only been back a few hours. Was there something in the water on that ship? Something that made you forget the one and only ambition you've been carrying a torch for since you could walk?"

"I wouldn't leave if I didn't think Atlas would keep ticking without me. I have--"

"--responsibilities?" His father's eye was on his arm.

"Responsibilities," Jer agreed. He was quiet for a second, almost sullen. His trust had been pricked.

"Captain, I'm not a time bomb."

"Dad," Troy Piper corrected with a hint of reproach. "Sometimes I think we did too good a job on you, kid."

"Not too late for me to be a pop idol. Babs and I could be the next Osmonds."

"Maybe Sonny and Cher."

"They were married, and Sonny died young."

"Doing something stupid and unnecessary, yeah."

"Be serious."

"I am. Amateurs on a double black diamond are the worst."

Jericho rolled his eyes and sighed. His father had begun bantering with him and treating him more like an equal as the years went on, and having spent so much time around a twin sister and a team like HJNS, it was...quaint, in a small way, to have a relationship with the man who had given birth to him. Even his rune was faintly pulsing, matching the three pulsing maroon stripes shaved into one side of his father's crew cut. But sometimes, he wished for the prolific, one-note specialist who had raised him and his sister. He was less frustrating to talk to. More direct. Direction was something that the young Gold Stripe needed more than ever after having made his decision on the flight back from Sleipnir.

"...My gut's telling me to do this," Jer admitted. "I may have a lead on the Fiordilatte girl, and I hate leaving that...business unfinished. The White Fang in Vale was completely annihilated almost overnight by some Phantom Force that I've never heard of. And these kids from Haven, or Beacon, or wherever, they're all right in the middle of it. I feel like I could do some good here. For Atlas...and for myself. Maybe...I need to learn to function outside of Atlas."

Part of giving your life to Atlas was leading the most well-rounded life imaginable. Captain Troy Piper knew that as well as anyone...and Jer, unlike his precocious twin sister, had always been comfortable remaining within the borders of the military world. A trip to Vale would do him some good, as long as the people didn't break him.

"Be honest: did you meet somebody?"

"No."

Enormous orbs of light, like guileless blue eyes in the sky, shone the light of truth over Jericho's lie. The onyx of the night sky between those lights was unnervingly still.

"But I think Vale is where I need to be if I want to find...myself."

Troy Piper sighed and took a long drink from his beer.

"The paperwork's done," he confirmed, after a long, hard look into his son. "I left it on the coffee table; there's a holiday at Beacon tomorrow, so you can start courses there with a team on Tuesday after a talk with Ozpin. General Ironwood should have vouched for you by then."

"Thanks, Dad." Jericho's gloved hand closed around the balcony, and he looked towards his father with a brief softness to the archangelic cast of his face. "...Do you want me to call for a pizza?"

His dad looked taken aback.

"Should you be taking a red-eye on a full stomach?" Troy challenged.

Jericho shrugged.

"Better than flying on empty."

"You may throw up."

"I have a strong stomach," Jer replied coldly, gloved fingers twitching on the railing. "I just need the right seatmates."



Lieutenant Jericho Piper, Atlas Academy Gold Stripe-on-sabbatical, would have carpet-bombed a whole peninsula for another pair of seatmates.

"It's been super long since we've flown, right Chérie?" said a moustachioed middle-aged man to his left.

"Nearly a decade! We went and saw the Vytal Festival, remember?" replied the pretty middle-aged woman to his right.

"How could I forget? Buying that lottery ticket was probably one of the best decisions I've ever made!"

"A frivolous purchase with little chance of a sizable return?"

"Gotta admit that we got to have lots of fun right? And don't worry, it definitely wasn't a better choice than marrying you."

"Oh darling, you know exactly what to say."

As was the case with most of the ills that had befallen Jericho over the course of his life, his current predicament was rooted in one of his only true psychological weaknesses - not being able to truly commit to being heartless around certain people. When a benevolent pair of forty-something sweethearts had parked themselves on either side of him and started promptly fawning over each other like young sweethearts, plumbing the depths of middle school infatuation, Jericho had listened to them swoon for a couple minutes and silently indulged them for a couple minutes.

Then, with one of his faint, calm smiles that he sometimes allowed on his face around people he knew he would never see again, he offered to let the man closest to the aisle have his center seat, allowing Jer to get out from the romantic two-front war he was trapped in and allowing them to schmooze to their hearts content. Apparently, there was something heartrendingly reluctant enough about Jer's politeness and generosity that they had decided to smother him in thanks for a few minutes. By then, he was starting to grow a headache and a couple regrets, so he had politely excused himself from the love-fest and put on a pair of headphones Babylon had bequeathed him for his birthday.

It was all going well for a while until that evil pretzel merchant came and gave all three of them a small little snack baggie. Jericho had taken his headphones off long enough to hand down the pretzels to the happy couple - which, as it turned out, had been two seconds too long. He was instantly asked what he had been listening to for the last couple hours and, figuring the question was harmless enough, answered truthfully.

Nina Simone. The unique songbird of her generation.

It turned out that, with that answer, the unfortunate knight had crossed the Rubicon via Tunnel of Love.

Instantly, they had perked up at the name, rambling on about their daughter and what a fan she was of the music of generations prior. It was, apparently, their daughter who they were coming to see - a young girl, about his age, actually, who was attending Beacon Academy and was having a special family day they were being flown out to.

It was here that Jer started to study the faces of his seatmates closely, as his stomach began to sink. Sure enough, the name came a second later.

[͎̕i̱͎̮̺]҉͇̮̙G͏̼͈̱̗ͅ ̕҉̪r̬̝̻̼ ̷̶͉̤̠̳͚͉͟a͈̟͚̱̞͘͠ ̫͍̰͟͝t̨̘͓͓̝̪͔͈̰̟͞ ̯͕̪̭̜͚̞̗͜͝i͕̩̜̝̳͙̘̘͝ ̧͕͝ą̨̣̜͉̮͈̙͇̖̩.̢̛̛̤̹̬̰̞̻[҉̴̰̟̱̙̕/̯̝̝́ͅi̯͇͉͚]̲̺̣̣̫̗͙͝ͅ

He had tried clamming up, but to no avail; it was all he could do not to go dead inside as he listened politely to their stories about Gratia, the knot in his stomach tightening as they regaled him of stories with their precious older daughter (and, apparently, a sister, seated in the aisle in front of him and blissfully ambivalent to everything going on around her; Jer envied her for her inner Zen) and their shared interests. Finally, as they were telling their twentieth high fructose story about their precious daughter, Jer couldn't stand it any longer.

"That doesn't sound like the Gratia I kn-"

His gloved hand clenched on the armrest so hard that the laminated wood paneling cracked. He wanted to strangle himself. But instead of wondering what the Gratia he knew was actually like, they seemed to have focused on the second half of his sentence entirely. Both looked fifteen years younger at the news that their daughter had an acquaintance; especially, Jer realized with a sick lurch in his chest, one as handsome and well-behaved as him.

From then on, he had become the unwilling victim of these two adults - both of whom had long since milked him for any stories he had of he and Gratia's antics (censored to protect them from the classified particulars of the last 72 hours) and had, once off the airship, pleaded with him to come along on their shopping trip and help carry things for them while they went on their first spin through Vale in a decade.

Jericho, damning himself for surrendering to the faint plucking of his coal-coated heartstrings, had agreed through his teeth. It had been a disaster; not for them, they were having the time of their lives, but for Jericho, holding bags in both hands, and his own wallet between his teeth, it was a circle of hell even a remorseless, unrepentant sociopath such as he didn't merit.

At least he could slightly move his jaw again. To be polite - and perhaps because, after a couple hours of shopping with them, he had gotten the sense that they didn't get to treat themselves very often - Jericho had bought Gratia's mother a king-size chocolate wafer bar for she and her husband to split. His act of generosity had been a bear trap; they had insisted on breaking off one of the long, enormous wafers for his own consumption, out of a sense of some pure-hearted chivalry he could only hope to possess as a knight one day, and left with no other alternatives Jericho had taken a bite.

He hated chocolate. He had weaned himself off it early in childhood and had rarely, if ever, strayed from his restrictive path. The first bite of chocolate he'd taken a reluctant bite of had reminded him why; instantly, the rich sweetness of the milky chocolate had stiffened his jaw, the crack of the wafer between his teeth rang in his ears like a point-blank gunshot, and the sudden hybrid sensation had driven tears into his eyes. But the parents had misinterpreted his discomfort as a sensory overload of emotion, not of putting pure junk into his finely-tuned body.

Somehow, Mother Mindaro had gotten it into the idea as Jer hurriedly wiped at his eyes that he had been somehow neglected as a kid, and had lacked for sweets and the basic affection that most children craved. His quick, fervent attempts to dissuade her had only cemented her conclusion.

She had since redoubled her efforts to coddle him. Jericho wanted to die.

"Nnnngh," the Gold Stripe grumbled absently, teeth still clenched around the corner of the black leather wallet.

"We're really sorry for imposing on you like this," said Severa Mindaro apologetically, turning away from a display of luxury chocolates to address Jericho. Her soft features were very much like her older daughter's, but the expression of concern (and a slight amount of guilt) present on her face was rarely one that was found on Gratia. "Are you sure you don't want any more chocolate, Jericho?"

"You're free to take as much as you want, yaknow?" agreed Valentinian Mindaro with a nod. "A garçon like you should enjoy the most of his youth! And that means eating lots of chocolate without worrying about fattening up like me!"

"I would have noticed if we had any snacks for you to fatten up on, dear."

An expression of mock disappointment found its way onto the male Mindaro patriarch dad father papa. "Not denying that I'm not fat? Tu me fais du mal!"

"Oh don't be silly, Val. I wouldn't care at all if you were fat or not."

You probably should. It could probably add fifteen years to this saccharine nightmare of a marriage.

All this sweetness plus too much fat could spell a very quick end to any storybook. But Jericho didn't say that. They seemed like good people.

After three syllables' worth of trying and failing to speak with a Mistralian leather billfold in his mouth, Jericho released his jaw's iron grip on the wallet and quickly brought up his left leg into an L-shape to kick the wallet back into the air like a footbag. Bending forward slightly, the Atlesian caught the wallet in the full palm of his left hand and wrapped his gloved fingertips around it as capably as possible with all the shopping bags in his hand.

"I'm alright, Madame Mindaro. I have nowhere to be, except for the same place you're going." He managed to wedge the wallet halfway into his left pants pocket and then brought himself back up to his full height, scarlet strand of hair pulsing slightly and almost seeming to burrow for cover in the nape of his neck. "And I ate before my red-eye. Honest."

"Well if you say so." There was a grudging tone in the mother's voice. While she had acquiesced to his refusal of chocolate, it was quite clear that she was still of the thought that he needed to take some more for his own, especially with all the help he had provided them. "Oh, speaking of places to go, Galla's waiting for us on campus! The Family Day activities are starting soon, aren't they?"

"First one's at 9.40," recited Valentinian, who had pulled out the brochure that Beacon Academy had so kindly provided to them.

Severa turned back to the rune-haired boy. "We should head back. You must be wanting to see your new school too, right Jericho?"

"Yeah, I'm excited."

He had been ten years old on his first day of school. The Bastion Gauntlet had been a two-and-a-half square kilometer hell of cold water, barbed wire, five-story vertical climbs, and swinging cattle prods - all prefaced by a six mile run in the famous Solitan winter.

For the bastard son of a secret agent, a mother's disapproving glare was something that could be weathered easily.

"I miss sitting in a good lecture."

Nerd.

Valentinian chuckled. "Keep up the good work! Don't let that enthusiasm die too quickly, you hear me?"

His wife quickly nodded in agreement. "Do your best, okay Jericho? Now, let's get going. Galla must be sick and tired of waiting for us. I'll send her a text on the ride back."

Jericho nodded, albeit with a somewhat distracted, pensive look on his face. The love and encouragement these people doled out like candy (literally) was...rewarding, in a small way. He wasn't unhappy with his own upbringing; he and his father got along, though perhaps more as colleagues than as family, and without his presence there as a solid, impenetrable figure throughout his youth Jericho would have never gotten as far as he did at Atlas.

Still. He supposed this...bizarre swooping sensation in his gut...if indeed it was affection...

Could be tolerated.

The Atlesian stepped out slightly and lifted up one bag-laden arm like Liberty, bearing her torch; after a couple brief hails, each growing progressively more direct and forceful, a cab had pulled over on the curb nearest to the Mindaros, and Jer waited for them to crawl in and arrange their bags comfortably before he sidled in behind them.

Severa shifted slightly to the side, giving the boy some more room to properly sit down. "Thanks again for all the help, Jericho. I don't believe we could've bought all these things without it."

"You're enabling her choco dépendance too," added Valentinian.

"It's not an addiction!"

"Is obssession fine?"

The male Mindaro found himself being lightly elbowed by his wife, who was already pulling out her old phone to write up a text.

"I was happy to help, Madame Mindaro. Mall crawls are nothing new or unpleasant for me."

It was a half-true statement, give or take a little falsehood. In truth, his seven years at Bastion Academy had subjected Jer to an endless procession of weekend shopping trips at the hands of his teammates, Babs, and whatever other girl Speer had brought along. That girl inevitably brought around a few single friends of her own, which inevitably led to the other Atlesian boys being picked at like an unfamiliar dish at a restaurant for hints of dating potential.

The Mindaros, on the other hand, had so far proven to be so nauseatingly devoted to each other that any marital infidelity for his sake seemed like a statistical impossibility. That removed any reason he may have had to seek refuge in one of the bookstore coffeehouses or hide in the densely packed EMAX theatres - and they had, thankfully, proven easier to chaperone than Babylon around Rich.

The presence of people with only one degree of separation from the word 'normal' made shopping a... nice tolerable net positive? experience.

"And neither is enabling the quirks of those around me," he added, turned towards the cab window, so that the teasing edge to the tiny smile on his face only reflected off the glass. "The chocolate was bought for you. Go wild."

Discord was evident on Severa's face over whether or not to succumb to her gluttony (and thus preventing the helpful and charming boy she viewed Jericho as to eat his own fairly-earned share of the chocoloate), but charity quickly fell to desire, particularly with an explicit approval to 'go wild' on the sweets, and soon enough the mother had handed her phone over to the very much bemused Valentinian so that she could open up a box. While one would expect her greed to turn her into a ravenous hellbeast intent on scourging the world of its cocoa, the manner in which she retrieved the chocolates from its container was surprisingly efficient, devoid of any wasted movement that did not contribute to the single-minded purpose of 'getting the choco'.

Indeed, it was almost at a record-breaking speed that a piece of milk chocolate found its way into Gratia's mother's mouth, and more rapidly followed, like sacrifices to a sacred fire.

"This is what I mean by dépendance," Valentinian mock-whispered conspiratorially. "Les chocolats? Ils ont ses favoris."

"Don't give him any wrong ideas, I'll save some for Gratia and Galla too!" protested his wife, who had paused in the consumption of the chocolates to continue writing the text to her younger daughter. "And we rarely ever get a chance to consume chocolate, thus you cannot refer to it as an addiction in any form!"

Jericho, for obvious reasons, hadn't wasted any thought on the financial situation of the Mindaro family before now. He looked to Severa Mindaro, a gentle, loving woman by anyone's standards, savoring each of her sweets, and thought of Gratia's attitude towards the cruise they'd taken together over the weekend.

His hand clenched reflexively, and Jer silently hoped that she wouldn't try to speak to him again until they reached Beacon. That the couple, for the first time, would just focus on themselves.

Including him within the moment would have killed it for certain.

---

When they arrived at Beacon Academy, Jericho once again took up the brunt of the family's bags in his left hand, his glove bearing the weight of the family's Herculean purchase history without any complaint. Gripping as many bags as possible in his free hand, Jericho led the way out of the cab, imperceptibly arcing his back behind him in a stretch as he was freed from the cramped confines of the taxi. While the Mindaros 'oohed' and 'ahhed' behind him, Jericho surveyed the docks instinctively, searching for any threats (an old habit) and looking around at students reuniting with their happy families. The docks of Beacon were cluttered with civilian airliners or taxis dropping off Valian clans, but Jer noted with approval that an Atlesian assault ship had docked here too, no doubt carrying the weapons he had been unable to on his flight. He hoped it wouldn't stay long, for appearance's sake, but it felt somewhat nice to have a sendoff from home. He wondered who'd organized it.

Probably Bright; he had the most naval contacts. Or maybe Dad.

He would ask Professor Ozpin later on where his personal effects had been taken, when he was getting his briefing on what team he was to be attached to during his study abroad period. In the meantime, he would need to shepherd the Mindaro family into a reunion. Somehow, he doubted he would have much trouble mistaking Gratia - even from within a crowded academy like Beacon.

Bianca Nuit or the boy with the antenna head were also viable leads.

"Do you need any more help with the bags?" Jericho asked curtly, turning over his shoulder to look at the Mindaro parents. His right hand outstretched slightly, proffering the Atlesian knight's fingertips to the purchase-carrying effort helpfully. "It's no trouble for me."

From what he knew of the two adults he was escorting, it was highly likely they would want the arm space to squeeze the life from Gratia in an awkward, smothering hug. That was a sight he wouldn't miss for the world.

I just need enough room in one hand to record it...

Mindaro Mondays

"Are you sure?" asked Valentinian, the Mindaro patriarch turning his steel-coloured gaze away from a student demonstration to focus on Jericho. "You don't need to do so much for us! If you're getting tired, just give a yell."

"He always offered to carry my things on our dates," added Severa with a light chuckle, poking her husband in the cheek teasingly. "He would act tough, never complaining even when it began to pile on."

The man gave her a faux-frown. "I didn't know you'd go so far to put weights in your bag then!"

"I couldn't help myself, you were so cute!" she replied immediately, a grin finding its way onto her pretty face. She leaned closer to Jericho, hand raised closer to her mouth as if to whisper. "Gratia acts quite similarily, you know?"

@Plank Sinatra

@Plank Sinatra @Kaithas @NarayanK

Oh the Schadenfreude was truly delicious.

The look on Lauren’s face was one Ben had become quite familiar with since she joined BASL. Seeing Lauren express it herself…

Well, Schadenfreude about covered it.

Getting yanked into a hug by Lauren’s Mom wasn’t exactly expected but it was perfectly predictable as soon as it happened. Like mother like daughter. Being pulled away again by Lauren was completely expected, on the other hand, and he didn’t resist whatsoever instead using the force to gracefully retreat a few places while Lauren inquired about her Dad. His face initially fell almost at the same time as hers, once he saw the look on her face, but turned to a huge grin and a soft laugh he just couldn’t hide at the new look on her face.

“I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about, babe.” Ben commented, hiding his amusement behind a bright, cheery smile. “What could he possibly find?”

I don’t even care if he goes through my stuff, this is worth it.

"Ah."

"Schwarz, heal him. Nuit, if he resists, punch him."

"Yeah. She definitely does."

The scarlet ends of his hair began to creep up, hot cherry strands alight like coals on a forge. The nonplussed Atlesian boy did his level best to turn his attention towards Gratia's elders, thus hiding the offending hair rune and any unnecessary questions about its function or the timing of its luminescence. It would take too long to explain its function or origins, and was a conversation best avoided.

Golden eyes closed hastily, but opened languidly, completely in control.

"I can certainly see where she gets it from," Jericho said evenly, turning his attention back to the front of the school. "Do you know where her team's dorm is?"

Then again, she's probably an early riser. She may be eating already. Or pacing the fields, feasting on a lamb's heart.

KALI FUCKING MAAAAAAAAAAAAAA, YOU FUCKERRRRRR

"Or the cafeteria?"

@Crimmy

Luke Schwarz: Armory, Not As Early Morning

My head was pretty much abuzz with thought and speculation by the time I stepped through the armory doorway and into the single largest concentration of firepower I had witnessed since Dad had taken me to the Police Department's indoor range on Marksmanship testing day, or however they called it.

Well, that was overselling it a little, considering we didn't have firearms lining the walls or anything, but the campus kept the guns somewhere and it tended to like having them near the melee weaponry.

It made sense, given how often the two mixed together in the kinds of experimental nonsense you would consider best left to an anime aimed at eleven year-olds. After all, it was practically blasphemous for a Hunter or Huntress to have a weapon that didn't do something crazy.

Speaking of somethings: Has something gotten into me today?

Well, anyways, though it didn't look it, I intellectually knew it, and since I'm the type of person where space for things to be intellectually known is at a premium, I made sure it paid rent and reminded me about it.

"Morning." I said to the lilac-haired, twintailed girl across from me as I plopped down at one of the many empty workbenches. She was short, cute, and...

That was funny. I looked back up at her as I commanded my watch to shift roles from "timekeeper" to "hand protection" to "hand protection as designed by a tunneling enthousiast".

And familiar.

Had I seen this girl before?

I frowned to myself, but looked back down as I pried my hand out of the watch-turned-weapon and tried to shrug it off. It was impolite to stare, for one. For two, I had seen more cute girls than I could ever hope to count whilst roaming Beacon's halls, and while I had to admit that she was more familiar than "random blonde with drills drillier than the thing I'm disassembling #37", that could be because of any number of reasons.

We shared a class. Or a dorm wing. Or a habit of circumstantially being in the same place a lot. That'd even explain the distinct sense of recency that came with her being so familiar.

There was no way in hell she had relived being a Berserk fan with Jericho, Bianca, Gratia, Beryl, and I this weekend. That would be a ridiculous coincidence that even I, notorious dullard, would not buy for a second.

It was simply Deja Vu.

I'd just been in this place before.

HIGHER ON THE STREET,

AND I KNOW IT'S MY TIME TO GO~

As if on automatic, my palms come up to lightly smack focus back into my mind, using my own temples as conduits. It was a trick Tanner had taught me, the sort of which was a lot simpler than he actually explained it. What had he said? Something about minding your head when using your hands? I didn't remember, and I honestly didn't really care to. He was family and I loved him, but he was also the vaguest bastard I had ever met, in a list that included Jericho Piper before he judged me as worthy of mission info.

...I couldn't help but worry that this was coming from something deep-seeded (or seated? I'm not good with words) within the psyche.

Brain problems after, what, a week? Two? Man, I bet I still spoiled a wager back home.

...Well, it was a Hunting Academy I was in. We probably all needed some sort of help. Psychologically, not just with keeping up with on-level course curriculum like me. I'm a bit special in that regard. Yay~

I shoved those thoughts aside and got to work, fishing out allen wrenches and screwdrivers of various types from the meticulously organized shelves before turning them upon my own weapon with a singular purpose: take the whole thing apart. Wanton destruction, which undoubtedly would have happened had my mother not seen fit to teach me anything, wasn't the goal. Rather, I was doing a little deconstruction. It was very different and much more on-purpose than the former. One thing in particular I wanted to get a distinct understanding of before I moved forward with the Great Schwarz Re-armament Plan.

...

...

...

I put down the wrench and brought a hand to my chin, words flowing out of my mouth in unbidden, stream-of-consciousness thought.

"Huh. I'm planning things."

It was as if a lightbulb had gone off and shown me A Starry Night where before I had assumed there to be a baby picture.

"I should eat breakfast more often."

The part of me that was still the same old conscientious and self-aware Luke felt sorry for the poor girl on the other side of the room. I must have been making things horrendously embarrassing. I promise, lady, I'm not usually this weird.

Just the normal amount.

Shaking my head, I shut myself up and got back to work, carefully removing a layer of plate armor that rested above the mechanism I was looking for. If I wanted to go forward with this plan, I needed to make sure I understood a crucial aspect of what I had here that could make or break my choice in weaponry for later.

... Didn't that girl have something long and polearmy with her? If she stuck around, I'd have to ask her about her thoughts on what I was thinking of.

Now then, to put my head to good use for a change—

How exactly did this drill work?

@HereComesTheSnow

Teàrlag Cirsium - "Student Counselor", Armoury

It basically came to me as I left the office that it'dve probably been weird for the kids to receive a visit from the counselor (that of course being yours truly) on a day for chumming their folks around and generally just lazing about, so instead of rocking up just to be dingied, I decided that with all the brats out on campus, there'd be nobody around to get in the way of me doing weapons maintenance. And it was definitely, one-hundred-percent what I was thinking of doing in the first place, so you don't need to worry at all about the fact that I was dressed up all-professional for teaching or that I'd gone back into the office to grab Lonnbeimnech. Being a teacher means that everything I do can be thought to have a purpose, and none of the brats who might've been around to see me can call me out on it.

That's a flagrant abuse of authority, right? How could you, Teàrlag! How could you be so petty despite being a twenty-seven year old woman whose job involves being a role model for impressionable brats one pamphlet away from filling their social media accounts with half-baked rhetoric? Well I'm not going to hide the fact that I'm a pretty petty person, but it certainly isn't in the top ten of flagrant abuses of authority, you know? People will naturally try and take advantage of their privileges, especially if it's convenient for them to do so. Sure, we claim to be honest, upright citizens and all, but we're always going to take the chance to chib away at loopholes or sneak some extra bikkies if the opportunity presents itself. You'd be a real div not to start feeling all the pressure of society at some point; it's cutthroat, and you'll never know if there's some nasty bizzo around the corner. Of course you'd want a break sometime, and if it's just something like dodging the bus fare when the driver ain't looking or using my job to make my actions seem more legit so nobody can judge me for seeming like a bit of a nincompoop, it's something you can probably expect from everyone.

I guess that's what they call argumentum ad populum, trying to fallaciously justify my behaviour by saying every other bugger's guilty of it too. Except the genuine fact in the end is that I'm just another selfish human trying to misdirect attention from even the smallest of my bugger-ups. A shame, isn't it? You'd expect a teacher to be more of a moral paragon or something, but keeping this game of charades up's important, you know? Folks want to know that those teaching their brats know what they're doing, and if you even make a bugger out of yourself once, that's going to stick on you. People are superficial, they're going to judge based on impressions, and it takes a real lotta effort to fix those impressions once they've stuck; more effort that cleaning some boggin' gum off the bottom of tables. I don't want to be stuck as that counselor who can't read the mood, you know?!

Anyway, Lonnbeimnech.

Well technically, Lonnbeimnech Taranaich, but the latter part of that real hackit of a word (according to folks who aren't from the Valic Highlands like me) is sitting comfortably on my wrists, so this cold, heavy thing I'm holding is just Lonnbeimnech. It's what they call a lochaber axe, and I've actually had it since I was a wee lass of fourteen, because granda wanted to see what all the "new dang-fangled tech the brats had these days" could make out of a traditional Highland weapon, and with a bit of dosh thrown at some bloke who knew what he was doing, blammo, a fancy combining whatever got dropped right into my lap. Helped me barely coast through Shade's curriculum, and helped keep me from getting chow-ed on by Grimm while I worked to pay for my teaching degree. Real pain on the spondoolies when you gotta go in for repairs, but that's why regular maintenance is a must. You'd be a daft bugger not to keep your weapon in shipshape and Bristol fashion, especially when your life depends on it!

Also if you keep getting your stuff turned into bing, you'd certainly be pretty brassic soon.

I'd actually misjudged there being nobody around in the Armoury, because not long after I'd settled down to do some work on Lonnbeimnech, some brat pinged my radar by coming into the place with a pair of gauntlets. By radar, I meant that the steel he had on him got electricity tingling on me - not as much as Atlesian steel did, because those buggers certainly knew their way around a forge, but it was pretty easy to feel, especially after he plopped down on the workbench in front of mine. He looked a bit familiar, with the long black hair and prominent cowlick, which was probably because he was one of the students around here. What other teenager would be using the Armoury to fix up their weapons, unless we've suddenly decided to let in random brats off the street?

Oi brat, just because you're a student here doesn't mean you should bump your gums off so much while working. It might be a holiday for everyone to meet with their folks and all, but that doesn't mean you're all alone. People are going to judge you, you know, and maybe they might think you've got your own Tyler Durden or something and are stark-raving mad. I'm, unfortunately, judging you right now to be a kid who must have been really happy with your breakfast. And that's distracting me from making sure Lonnbeimnech isn't breaking on me too.

I guess it's my job as a teacher to make sure you're actually just energised, not crazy or anything.

"You look like you're thinking hard," I say. On second thought it sounds weirder than the boy's self-mutterings, because who says things like that to start conversations? Teachers, I guess, which actually makes it less weird. Go figure.

@Crimmy

Luke Schwarz: Armory, Not As Early Morning

Thankfully, it didn't appear to be the case that my muttering to myself had put the lilac-haired and well-dressed girl off in any way. I supposed I should be thankful too, because if she was willing to go so far as to dress up all professionally to see greet her family, well...

It's presumptuous of me to insinuate it, but weirdos you ran into earlier in the morning tended to be great conversation points when catching up with people. Any high schooler or former high schooler, such as myself, can at least understand that principle. Yeah, even me, who was so socially distant you could say I was the local Martian, understood how that sort of thing could go down.

But that's all beside the point. It seemed I'd lucked out and ran into someone understanding, or at least not-immediately-judgmental.

"Just a bit."

I looked up to her for a moment— and it turned out I was right. That was one sizable axe she was casually toting around in here. The me of two years ago would have probably scoffed at the notion of seeing people pick big things up so effortlessly, but he was a bit of an idiot even compared to the me of right now.

I figured explaining what I was in the middle of couldn't hurt. It would only be polite.

"I'm trying to figure out how the drill mechanism in this guy here works— It's a hand-me-down, so I've never really taken it apart and taken a good hard with it before until about now. Just kept it clean and all that."

That was pretty much the long and short of my experience with the drillfists outside of punching things, yeah. Stick around, girl, you're witnessing something rare— Lucas Schwarz using his brain.

"If I'm lucky and it's simple enough for even a dim guy like me to work out, I'm thinking I'll integrate a drill bit into the replacement I'm cooking up right now. Which'll, now that I think about it, probably turn out a little like yours."

I looked between her youthful face and gnarly weapon, wondering if there wasn't some sort of god of dissonance that all small girls in this school prayed to, before continuing on with a question that would be pretty pertinent if I was to spend more time here and potentially grill her as the more experienced party when it came to implements of death upon sticks.

"Anyways, I'm Luke, and your name is..?"

I can't just call her "that girl with the purpley hair and the suit" forever.

In the midst of everyone's conversations, Apophis leaned over and whispered to Sangue, "I'm hungry. I'll eat when I find the cafeteria."

When the young snake turned to him with her idle expression, she nodded, prompting Apophis to leave the room without another word. He did not bother to say anything else to the people around him. He did get what he wanted- a quick look at Sangue's team. And he wasn't about to skip food over something so simple.

Sangue, on the other hand, remained with her team, glancing between everyone.

Costa... was a good mother. Sangue knew she wasn't one to judge people's characters reliably, but the way Costa actively spent time with her daughter was pleasant.

Soon, an odd thought entered her head.



She knew what they looked like when she was a baby. A picture had been left behind, only to be torn apart and disfigured when she encountered the first person directly hostile towards her. In the smudged picture, she could not recall the color of their eyes. Her mother had long hair flowing beautifully behind her, and her father's sunset hair, while not standing out, was easy to remember.

But those features weren't what caught Sangue's attention.

Their smiles did.

It left a bittersweet feeling in her heart. To not know anything of her parents, who could have known the most about her. They could have known her real name, the whereabouts of her sister who was nowhere to be found... She had no reason to smile back at them, for she knew so little about them. And until they ever met again, that would remain so.

Although she continued to stay quiet about her thoughts on her team, it was almost obvious to her as to why she held them close to her heart.

They taught and gave her reasons to smile.

That was all she could ask for.

As Amy grinned, and as Ben smiled, and as Lauren let her mother ruffle her hair, Sangue's heart warmed.

Though...

Now that she thought about it, everyone seemed to be ruffling Lauren's hair.

She never touched someone's head before.

And suddenly, she got curious. To see what it felt like to pat someone's head.

...Should... I...?

Second thoughts initially flooded into Sangue's head, but she quietly approached Lauren anyway. Looking up at the Negasi, she did nothing for a few seconds before she slowly lifted her human hand. It rose slowly, and it soon lifted above Sangue's head.

She then let the hand descend just as slowly as it had ascended. Letting her palm rest against Lauren's head awkwardly, she shook her hand to mimic how everyone ruffled Lauren's hair, her expression remaining as idle as ever.

It was a strange feeling, but ruffling Lauren's hair felt nice.

She pulled away shortly afterward with the thought of not annoying Lauren by ruffling her hair too much. Sangue's soft gaze remained set on Lauren's hair.

_{@Kaithas@Krayzikk@Plank Sinatra}

@Crimmy@HereComesTheSnow



Without a word Cian quickly went to work and with a practiced motion she activated Byakko rifle was long with a handle up top and three large gash like marks on the blades on either side. Cian took aim as she exhaled and pressed the trigger a large noise sounded as the bullet hit the metal target. "Byakko has three main forms this one is the rifle mode with the blades being able to cover for close range attacks should it become needed." Cian stated as she changed forms once more. The new look was more compact and light weight without a large butt on the rifle. "This is the second form of byakko it's machine gun form its meant for quick bursts and is mainly used for crowd control should it be needed." Cian once more stated as she quickly turned byakko to its third form. Its size was about in between the rifle and the machine gun mode. Yet it had a large butt on the stock and a large scope could be seen near the front sight. "This is the final form the sniper mode. It boasts the largest penetration and recoil of the three forms yet is also the slowest in preparing for a shot." She said and quickly took a knee her breathing stilled as wind passed through before she exhaled and took the shot. The furthest target collapsed as like all the others but if one were to look dead center was a small dent from where the bullet hit. "Anymore questions?" Cian asked as she hefted the sniper rifle over her shoulder a small smirk on her face since she always did love the sheer excitement the sniper mode brought her.

@Suku@HereComesTheSnow@Plank Sinatra

Mindaro Mondays

From the pocket of Valentinian Mindaro emerged a folded-up piece of paper, which, upon being unfurled to its maximum girth, revealed itself to be a map of the Beacon Academy campus. However, unlike most standard maps of a place of education, the map being held within his hands was in fact annotated with numerous notes and points of consideration in neat and tidy handwriting (and also with a numbering system to further increase legibility). The elder daughter, it appeared, had sent them easily understandable details on everything in the school, including directions to her dorm and other areas of importance.

"We should riiiight about ..." He scanned the paper for the location. "... now. It doesn't look like it's in a hard-to-reach place."

"It's far likelier that she would be there than eating breakfast," added Severa, squishing up next to her husband to snuggle get a better view of the map. "She tends to eat breakfast quite early!"

"Or she's doing something else on campus," noted the Mindaro patriarch thoughtfully. "Hope she ain't being troublesome."

---

"Can you actually use it properly?"

Gratia Mindaro approached the assembled group of girls (and one older man, but the specifics of the gender distribution were utterly irrelevant to her purpose here), her strong and toneless voice still clearly audible over the din of the training ground. With her breakfast complete and Luke's issues having been addressed for the given moment, the Mistralese teenager had made her way onto the Beacon grounds in search of her family. That quest had, much to her pleasant surprise, reached its objective quite rapidly, as it seemed that in the very moment she left the chittering masses in the hallways behind, she had located one member. The only one in the area that she had any particular affection for.

"Galla, you look good," she noted impassively, redirecting her onyx eyes towards the aforementioned sibling as she halted before the group. "Have you been eating well?"

The younger Mindaro's flat gaze met hers evenly. "We can afford pork now."

"All the money transferred properly then? No fuckups?"

Galla shook her head. "There aren't any problems."

"That's good to hear." Relief, despite the flat tone of her voice, was immediately evident. "I'll send over more next week."

"Despite what mother and father said?" asked Galla, her voice utterly devoid of anything that could be construed as emotion.

Gratia's expression didn't change, but she did cross her arms, right pointer finger tapping once against her upper arm. "They can say all they want, but it's fucking ridiculous to not give you a buffer if things get shitty."

"They think you're too generous, Big Sis."

"Too bad, I'm not budging a fucking inch," replied the girl bluntly. She paused for a moment, before switching tracks. "They're here today too right?"

"Yes."

Gratia nodded in acknowledgement, keeping the news in mind. It was an expected fact, but having express confirmation from her little sister was ... reassuring. Having them present on campus, even for a day, was a comfort that she would need to thank Ozpin for facilitating. An ocean of distance between Beacon and her home was one that had not been so easily crossed as it had been when she was still at Haven.

"So how are you finding this shitty place?"

"With a map."

"Less literal."

"7/10."

Schwarzes and Such

April's answer to that question came in the form of another question.

"Depends! Dawn, you got all that?"

"Rifle with Bayonets, LMG, and Sniper. Yep, those are the three! Just one thing I'd ask is what the maximum effective range is on the Sniper form, I suppose." she said thoughtfully, tapping the eraser end of the pencil to her chin.

"Can you actually use it properly?" asked a new, flat, and practically bored voice that nonetheless managed to carry into the conversation easily, even in spite of the ambient training ground noises.

"That's another good one, gotta be honest."

"I mean, we'd hope that's the case though, right?"

There was a rare note of concern in April's voice, as the normally carefree girl frowned at the obvious implication of Cian not knowing what she was doing. Seriously, how did you get into Beacon Academy if you couldn't at least understand how to use a gun?

Then again, Saeva-sensei had been saying for a while now that the entrance requirements were all jacked up...

What's more, this woman's tone, as faint as it was, couldn't help but suggest that there was backstory to that question of hers.

"Hey sis," April murmured idly to the notepad-wielding member of the pair, as both watched the emergent back-and-forth between Galla and her newly arrived elder sister. "Y'don't think we overprepared nii-chan for this school, did we?"

"Well, I look at it like this," Dawn's calm, sagely reply began. "If we did, that means he's either doing just fine with all the work everyone put him through, or he's made up for lost time after the whole 'cancelling combat school' thing, right?"

April's brow furrowed and her face mixed up into an adorably unsure expression.

"I guess..."

"And if we didn't, he's certainly better off than if we just let him go in blind, that's for sure."

"Oh, yeah. De-fin-ite-ly!"

This time the taller girl's nod is vigorous. That's easily the most agreeable and plainly true way of looking at things, from any perspective. Even their brother would be forced to agree with that.

And to speak of their brother, Galla's numeric rating system sparks some interest in Dawn.

"You have a grading scale for straight-manning, Galla? We've got to introduce you to our brother when he shows up!"

He, being a lazy young adult with a habit of procrastination, was almost definitely slacking off.

@HereComesTheSnow@Crimmy@Suku

Now what was today... Family day? He wasn't sure what to do with today, should he treat it like a day off? Or spend some time out? Fact is he's never had any family, so this entire day slipped his mind. He was always off on his own someplace on his own, and only appeared to eat or do a mission, he's kept his grades and such up. Today he was seeing a lot of happy families, and he felt uncharacteristically moody as a result. He can't lie to himself, the closest to family he's had was his mentor and the street urchins he hung around.

As he stepped through the hallways along the training halls, he spotted Cian giving what appeared to be a lesson on her weapon, as well as a few others also explaining their weapons, two two what appeared to be sisters, but who's? Didn't matter, he changed his course towards the group,

"Yo, Cian, and... Gratia?", based on the dialogue he'd just heard, these two girls were the younger set of sisters to someone here, and the other was Gratia's younger sister.

"I'm sure enough who she's related to, but who did you two mean when you said 'older brother'?", he asked. Based on the way they looked, he had some feeling he knew who it would be.

@HereComesTheSnow

Teàrlag Cirsium - "Student Counselor", Armoury

There isn't much that I can really say about the lad's drills. None my weapons ever did drills, you know, so I really left anything drill-related up to Umeko's department to grab back when we worked together. Getting to know your weapon inside-out, however, is something that's real tekul for every Huntsman out there, and because I'm a teacher and all, I'm pretty much contractually obligated to make sure all the kids do regular maintenance and inspections and what-not. It's expected that we just can't be buggered sometimes to handle this kinda stuff, but that doesn't mean you should act like a dunderhead and avoid doing it, no matter how bloody annoying it might be. You'll never know when your stuff might break on you, and suddenly that Grimm you were playing around with's gotten all-serious and is eyeing you up for its afternoon tea instead.

It's usually carelessness that shafts us. The lucky fellas live to the see the next sunrise, humbled by all the kerfuffle. The unlucky ones? Those buggers are gone. And the world will move on, because in the end, after everyone's finished grieving, they'll just be another corpse for the graveyard. A poor sod that nobody's gonna care about, and one day, even their folks will stop caring too.

So I guess it's cannie of the lad to get to work on his stuff, though if he's planning on upgrading, I guess it's almost compulsory that he checks out how those gauntlets of his work. You can't expect to just shove a drill in a spear and expect it to be the same, kenspeckle old thing you were using before. Just because an RPG might class their damage types as the same thing doesn't mean that they'll work the same. And why are you even putting a drill in a spear there Simon? That'll be killer on your wrists you know! If you don't wanna keep on being a 'dim guy' then you'd best stay away from that path!

"Teàrlag," I reply. Going to have to keep the boy's name in mind in case he rocks up to my door or something. "Nice to meet you, Luke."

There were few prospects that sounded as unappealing to Jericho as discovering where it was that Gratia recouped the energy it took to be such a heinous bitch all the time. Right now, he was torn between imagining her dorm as a blood-colored hall of horrors, with Mistralian nationalist posters slapped with clinical precision onto the walls...or as a completely generic cell, a bland grey cube with a bed akin to solitary confinement. He wondered if Gratia's dorm had a window. She probably hated sunlight.

...Why am I wasting thought on this?

He would be seeing it in a minute anyway. There was no point in fantasizing about the room of a person he could best describe as an unwanted, yet marginally useful acquaintance at the most relaxed of times, but to put in the effort on imagining what a destination would look like was the height of needless chicanery.

There's something in the air here.

Or perhaps it was the Mindaro parents growing on him.

Jer repressed a shudder.

"I don't know if I got her number," Jericho deflected, although for what reason he didn't know. Maybe just so Severa didn't get the idea that her daughter had exchanged numbers with a boy she met over a cruise line in a brief flight of fancy. Gratia's mother seemed like a sweet woman (shut up she made me eat chocolate) but somehow Jer doubted any amount of explanation of his mission aboard the Sleipnir would sway her from the idea that her oldest daughter had found a soulmate. It seemed like the idea was calcifying in her head already.

There was no point in throwing fuel on a fire around such a breezy woman.

"Maybe she went with Bianca," Jer suggested instead. "Or she could be looking for you. Your other daughter came ahead of us; they may have run into each other."

Schwarzes and Such

"Ah," they say in stereo after a short pause, carrying the somewhat worrisome implication that they hadn't considered the idea of people not being able to figure out on their own, or were mislead to believe that such things would otherwise be outside of their jurisdiction of responsibility.

Whichever of such fears arose in their audience, however, they were quickly allayed by their follow-up exchange.

"See," April said, nudging a grimacing Dawn with her elbow. "I told you he was overselling the whole 'Beacon people have a hair obsession' thing."

"Don't rub it in, nee-san." came the reply out of the shorter sister's half-pouting mouth. Fishing a couple of 25-lien notes out of her wallet, safely contained within the obi sash of her traditional dress, she grumbled out a half-hearted defense. "I thought it was one of those things where it was too stupid to be made up."

"You and I both know that we should never underestimate Luke." the fighter reminded the archer, gleefully accepting her payout on the wager.

"Anyways, yeah, we're Luke's little sisters, if you know him."

"Oh, don't gripe."

"M'not griping." Dawn griped, staring a hole through a nearby bush.

Tanner was a veteran Hunter, and knew not to mistake his surrogate niece glaring off at the world as him being caught. His camouflage skills are superb for a man who wears a garish Aloha shirt on a daily basis.

Or perhaps, they are so because of it.

---

"Likewise, Teàrlag,"

I made sure not to forget the pronunciation on that A in there. While I'm not the most worldly guy by any means, the combination of that name and the burr to her words told me that this girl was from the Valic Highlands. It's not as ridiculously overplayed as it was on pop culture pieces like Samurai Jack, or Limmy's Show, but it was distinct enough for me to recognize.

Hopefully her dialect didn't involve a lot of slang, though. That was where I checked out on regionalisms...

"Your parents making the trip up here, today?"

It was an innocent enough question. Just so long as I could keep the conversation flowing while I worked, it would probably make both easier. The human brain is strange like that sometimes.

@HereComesTheSnow

Teàrlag Cirsium - "Student Counselor", Armoury

Parents?

Oi mate, just because I'm short doesn't mean I'm a student at this place. And I'll have you know that no, none of my parents are here today. They're redding-up with some complicated bizzo back in Vacuo right now, and even if they weren't, us teachers are poor sods who don't get to enjoy Family Day like you, so I couldn't have called them over even if I'd wanted to. Having youthful looks might seem like a nice thing, but they stop being worth it after the fifteenth time somebody assumes that you're just some peedy lil' quine barely out of their diapers. We humans are really superficial beings; that first, surface-level impression is what we assume to be the correct one, and sometimes even if we're given the truth, we'll stubbornly cling to our mistaken, outdated views like a beached whale to air. I've gotten used to it, I guess, but it doesn't stop the mistaken age thing from being real annoying.

At least because he's still a brat, he won't not take me seriously just because I look like a young lass.

"No," I reply, fixing my eyes on him. I might be glaring slightly, but hopefully I don't look too irritated at the guy. I can count on one hand the amount of times people haven't thought I was just some brat, so it's not right if I keep shooting beady stares at the buggers who get it wrong. It'd just be scaffy of me, and it's not like they've pooched it that hard. It's just human nature at work again, forcing us to take things in only upfront. I'm not going to throw a stone at their door just 'cos of that. "We teachers don't get to call them up, Luke."

And that means that while you brats can tyne time with your da and ma, we have to keep working. Or, in some cases, skiving. Even adults like procrastinating their work, you know. We're immature and human just like the kids we have to care for.