RWBY Through Worlds

77: Shadow's Over You

After that, a couple days went by of following this plan.

Theo put up a fight about Watts, as expected, and Qrow really probably would have given up--if he didn't have everyone pressuring him to carry the point.

Shine didn't bother to talk to Watts until then. Let him sweat.

Mercury got settled in...sort of.

He told them that he'd decided to stick around after hearing the whole story, because why bother going back after that?

He didn't act particularly enthusiastic about it, but Mercury never acted that enthusiastic about anything. They figured he wasn't going to let on if he was nervous.

Raven remained suspicious, while Emerald and Hazel thought him turning only made sense, and, if anything, they were just relieved it had been so simple.

That maybe should have clued them in that it was a little too easy, but with Salem's forces consisting of only two people at the moment, it was hard to see how much backlash could have happened without them exposing themselves.

Still, Mercury wasn't let in on anything really major for those couple days.

The only big thing on the agenda so far was that little rendezvous with Victoria Kanap that they wanted to set up.

Taiyang, who was still around, got filled in on more by his daughters, but he was kind of still processing what happened.

Somehow, now that things had slowed down, Vacuo didn't feel quite as hostile...not that it still wasn't, in many ways, but there was a softening. With the Grimm attacking much less, and Wally getting some people to help them out more, the mood of the city was a bit different.

Emerald avoided going out, however, not wanting a repeat of the other day. She thought she could take being inside for a while over that.

She hung out with Oscar, who was busy studying and training by turns. It was nice for him to get a break from being in charge.

They all knew they were just waiting, though. The quiet wouldn't last forever.

Penny reported that she hadn't seen the strange cyborg kid around since the other day, and they wondered if he'd gotten caught.

To pass the time, Neo snuck into Theo's office to try to find anything on the people they were suspecting.

While she was poking around that, she found out that the slot for the key to the Vault was under his "No Place Like Home" plaque.

"Isn't that kind of obvious?" Wally said when she told them.

"Maybe that's the idea," Shine said. "No one would think he'd be that obvious. Well...clever."

"It's no good without the key," Qrow said. "How do you plan to get that?"

"Why would we get it?" Shine asked.

"Because if we find the Maiden, it might be important," he said.

"If you mean Theo couldn't get into the Vault without her, don't you think he probably has a backup key?" Shine asked. "I mean, who wouldn't have that, in Vacuo, where anything can get stolen?"

 "Why not just steal that?" Raven suggested. "If we could find it."

"Come to think of it, no one has thought of checking his room." Shine said.

"The thing is, he's hardly in it," Raven said. "I'm not sure he sleeps. But if you think it might be important..."

"I doubt he'd hide that much in there," Shine said. "I mean, easiest place for someone to to look for it other than his office. We're looking at this all wrong. Theo can't be that sloppy. He leaves all the time--he has to be going somewhere."