Emerald and Mercury tailed the spy all the way down the street and up a hill, with Mercury gaining on him steadily.
He caught up right outside a tavern and threw the guy into the wall.
Emerald was a little later, but she finally jumped over a roof and down the other side. [Pause to note that they could do cool stuff like that in Volume 2, and I miss it in animation.]
But before Mercury could even really question the spy, two other people in purple shirts appeared out of the window and door holding guns.
"Let 'em go," one woman said.
"Now," said the other, a man.
Mercury gave them an unimpressed look.
"Guns? That's cute," he said. "I don't know who you are, but you were watching us, and that means trouble."
"They were with her," the spy Mercury had been chasing said.
"Shut up." Mercury shoved him again.
"I said let him go," the girl said, cocking her gun more.
"What's going on out here?" a very different voice said.
A plump woman also in purple appeared in the door and scrutinized them.
Emerald frowned at her.
"Briggs picked himself up a tail, ma'am." The woman nodded at them.
"I see," the plump one said.
Emerald suddenly realized where they were.
"Miss...Malachite?" she said.
"Yes?" Miss Malachite said, not happy.
"Better just let him go, Mercury," Emerald said at once.
"Why? I'm not scared of her," Mercury said. "Bunch of second rate punks with guns are no match for us."
"Maybe not, but there's no reason to start any unnecessary trouble," Emerald hissed.
"Wait, I know you." Miss Malachite put her hand on her chin. "Sustrai? Yes, you started that little charity in Argus, didn't you? A special operative? All right, stand down." She waved off the two guns.
"Ma'am?" the guy said, puzzled.
"The last thing we need is to give the military, such as it is, a reason to come here," Miss Malachite said. "Besides, they aren't spies. Too visible."
"But, ma'am, they were with her," the other spy said.
"I see. You two wouldn't mind stepping in, would you?" Miss Malachite said.
"I would mind," Mercury said.
"Can't we just talk out here?" Emerald was wary also.
"Anyone could see or hear you out here," Miss Malachite said. "I think we can handle this in a more civilized way, don't you? No need to come to blows."
"You just said if you touch us, you'll get in big trouble," Mercury said. "I know who you are, lady. You run the information ring in this city. Great for you, but we're a little too well known for that. If we disappear, everyone's gonna know and you won't be safe here anymore. So how about you let us go, and we get an explanation for why you were watching our group, and maybe we won't let our superiors know about this."
"Is that a threat?" Miss Malachite held up her fan in a way that Emerald thought was itself a threat.
"It might be." Mercury wasn't backing down.
Emerald wanted to strangle him but was afraid she'd make it worse if she argued now. She just looked nervously at the spies.
Miss Malachite sized Mercury up.
Her henchmen still had their guns out, even if they weren't up.
"Briggs, tell these fine people why you were watching them," Miss Malachite finally said, pretty nonchalantly considering she was basically giving in.
Briggs looked surprised at her, but then he said suddenly, "I was just walking around and I spotted Fall. She attacked one of us a few days ago, which I bet you knew."
"Yeah, you already stirred up trouble with us," the other girl said, tightly.
Emerald, a bit more attentive than Mercury was to people's expressions, slowly realized they were scared.
Sure, Miss Malachite might rule this city as far as crime went, but the full force of the huntsmen would still be a problem for her if they busted her ring. They had better weapons and better fighters. Her whole key to business success was not ever doing anything bad enough to get the attention of the council. If that changed, well, they already knew where to find her.
But that might make her do something desperate if they pushed her buttons.
Slowly, she came up and grabbed Mercury's shoulder.
"All right, let him go," she said.
"Why?" Mercury asked her.
"They lowered their weapons. Come on, just do it," Emerald said.
He stepped back from Briggs, sourly.
"We're not here for you," Emerald told Miss Malachite. "And we didn't know about the other thing till later. I'm sorry about that. Cinder is...still inclined to use methods that are a little rougher, but they never meant to really hurt that woman. They just wanted info."
"Yes, it didn't show the most trust," Miss Malachite said.
"You sold her out once before," Mercury said, frowning. "Seems to me you're just mad she might have learned not to take your promises at face value."
Her henchmen glared at him hostilely.
Miss Malachite laughed. It was not a nice laugh. "Indeed, how clever.... So what do you expect us to do now? You don't just attack my employees."
"Didn't you almost kill our friend? That's not enough for you?" Mercury said.
"Look, we're sorry about that," Emerald said.
"Who cares about apologies?" the woman henchgirl said.
Miss Malachite gave her a warning look not to speak out of turn.
Emerald thought fast. She needed to find a way to get them to drop their guard.
She reached slowly into her belt pouch, though they tensed.
"Here," she said, pulling out a stack of lien. "Take this for the trouble, or whatever."
She tossed it at the henchgirl, who caught it and then glanced at it then handed it to Miss Malachite questioningly.
"My, my, that's a lot of lien," Miss Malachite said. "They pay you well in Argus."
"I don't spend a lot of my salary." Emerald shrugged. "If it helps, I don't mind."
"Don't be such a pushover," Mercury hissed at her. "You're basically saying they can walk all over us."
"We hurt one of them when we were trying to use their help. We can't just ignore that," Emerald replied.
"So what? They're crooked."
"And that changes what? So were we."
"You've gotta stop using that as an excuse to take everyone's crap."
"You've gotta learn to take a hit to the ego sometimes if you want people to trust you," Emerald shot back.
"You two want to finish this someplace else?" Miss Malachite interrupted, more loudly. "I don't like to stay outside too much. If you're really not here for us, I suggest you get a move on."
Emerald was about to say they should do that, but then she thought better of it.
"Wait," she said.
She held up her scroll and flipped to the image of the Aura-zapping device that she'd, of course, been sent later by Cinder.
"Do you recognize this?" she asked.
Miss Malachite's smile disappeared finally.
"Because I want information on this," Emerald said. "Where did you get it from? And I have a feeling you're the person who's the direct source this time. I'll pay for it."
"You'll pay for it, all right, if you poke your nose into this business," Miss Malachite said. "I don't normally say this, but take some free advice and get a move on now."
The others nodded.
"I can't do that," Emerald said. "It's important. Bigger than just me."
"Em, I don't know about this." Mercury was starting to get a bad feeling.
She just shrugged at him.
"Sorry to disappoint you, darlin', but I was told not to speak of it," Miss Malachite said. "And I don't break confidentiality for my own suppliers."
Emerald felt her hands getting sweaty. This was making her nervous.
She didn't like the way the henchmen were looking at her now.
But she swallowed her fear.
"Okay," she said evenly. "Cards on the table then? Your suppliers of that, they're scamming you. We know that for a fact. If we don't stop them, they're going to take a lot more from you than just money."
The henchmen laughed.
"What's so funny, a--h---s?" Mercury asked, and they shut up.
"It's just that that was a very quaint attempt to intimidate us," Miss Malachite said. "But you don't exactly seem like the type to know about this."
"I used to live around here," Emerald said. "Maybe not here exactly, but I know plenty about skinflints and people like you. But people like the ones making these..." She shook the scroll. "...they're nothing like I've seen before except from one person: Salem."
That got their attention; everyone knew who that was by now.
"The witch?" said the man with the gun.
"Oh yeah," Mercury said.
He questioned the wisdom of this but figured they had to commit to it now.
"And we know the person who made the original version of this weapon," Emerald added. "Whatever you bought, it's a knock off, but the people making them, they're bugging them in some way."
"What?" Miss Malachite said. Then she lowered her voice. "Inside."
She ducked inside.
The others followed her.
"Great, now you've done it," Mercury said.
"Can you just stop complaining for once and back me up?" Emerald hissed. "Can't stop now. Besides, they should know what's going on. They're still people."
"You can't save everyone."
"Maybe I could save someone," she tossed over her shoulder, going inside.
Mercury sighed and followed her.
* * *
Miss Malachite sent half the people in the room out once she was seated again. Presumably she kept the ones who likely were her more trusted spies.
"Now what was that about bugging?" she said, taking a drink from one other henchgirls.
"I don't have a picture of it," Emerald said. "But the Aura-zapping device, or the.... There's ones that do other things, but we're not sure if they're all bugged, or just the really special ones. I can't explain it all. It's classified, but basically, there's Grimm that...follow some of those devices."
"Grimm? Here? In the city?" Miss Malachite said.
"We literally just saw some," Emerald said. "Attacking a house. It'll be on the news later, probably."
"They're real." Mercury folded his arms and frowned. "And they're deadly."
"It's been popping up for months," Emerald said. "But it's getting more often. We were looking for one of the people involved in it. That's why we were here. And we found them. They bugged one of our own people and almost got her killed. We stopped it in time, but we don't know what they could have put on those weapons they sold to you. It's not noticeable at first, but then people start acting strange, maybe a little irrational even, and then the Grimm just attack."
All of them looked unnerved. These were people who, by dint of living in a huge city, probably had rarely even seen a Grimm other than the plagues that Salem had sent years ago. It was the one benefit to being in the big city even if you were poor.
So one attacking them was hardly small game in their minds.
"How bad are they?" Miss Malachite asked.
"Bad," Emerald said. "As far as we know, only we can stop them. We have...special skills."
"I've heard of that, though I assume it was exaggerated," Miss Malachite said dryly.
"Not completely," Mercury said.
"Why would you warn us if this was true?" the guard woman said.
"Well--uh, what's your name?" Emerald asked.
The woman frowned at her. "Cinnamon Plum."
"Catchy," Mercury said.
"What kind of name is Mercury?" Cinnamon shot back.
"Did I give you my name?" Mercury said.
"Oh, please, Sugar, we're not stupid. You're infamous," Miss Malachite said casually. "In fact, weren't you the son of some Marcus Black? Now there was a scoundrel. Even by my standards."
"I thought he was a Grimm slaying machine or something," said Briggs.
"Nevermind that." MIss Malachite didn't care. "What about Plum's question?"
"I'm warning you because I don't think anyone deserves this," Emerald said. "We both know what kind of people you are, but you're still just people. Grimm aren't anything I want to increase. And you're all especially susceptible to this kind. They feed off of greed, lust, selfishness."
"Lust?" Briggs said.
"Not that kind," Emerald said. "Like...for power or something."
"Mind Grimm? I've heard about those," Miss Malachite said. "That Pine fellow's articles."
"Yeah, we know him," Mercury said. "So you know we're not making this s--- up. We saw them in person when we went on our adventure. They're dangerous. And no one is immune to them forever. People like you aren't immune at all usually. Unless you're all gonna stand there and lie to me about not being greedy cutthroats."
"Strong language for one who has a criminal record himself." Miss Malachite wasn't just going to take that.
"I'm not judging you," Emerald spoke before he could. "Not that long ago, I'd be right here doing the same thing. But that was then. I don't even want to know what you guys really do here--it's not my priority--but if you want to keep doing it, and not lose it all, you can't allow these things around you. The hustlers? They sell them to people and then they attack. They probably just want you to run them and then end up suckered later. They could use you for information, right? Then when they have what they want, it's over. It's always that way. We picked up a guy just last week who had that happen. We were almost too late that time. How long have you had these weapons?"
Miss Malachite seemed to consider not telling them the truth, but after finding no reason to doubt their story, she leaned on her hand. "The first time they brought them to us was a couple months ago. I was skeptical at first, you can imagine, but we tried it. It worked. They were pricey, so we didn't use them a lot.... Actually I was about ready to take the hide off Sally for using it on your little circus freak."
Sally, who was in the background, winced.
"We don't have many now," Miss Malachite said. "They're for emergencies, they said. People who'd be looking for them, I assume. They promised more if we kept them informed. We do business with anyone who pays for it. The weapons were just a bonus...but they say you should never trust anything that looks a little too good. Suppose we should have seen that twist coming."
"Can you give us the ones you still have?" Emerald said.
"How do I know you're not lying about this?" Miss Malachite said. "Maybe these ones are fine."
Mercury leaned in and scowled at her. "Do you really want to take that chance?" he asked.
Silence ensued.
Miss Malachite waved her fan. "Cinnamon, bring the cases."
Cinnamon gave her a wary look, but she went down a hall and came back a few seconds later carrying a stack of cases bound together that would usually be the right size for dust capsules.
She put them on the table and opened them.
Inside were the Aura-draining weapons, just like the ones Neo had taken photos of.
Emerald picked one up gingerly and tried to sense it.
"I can't tell," she said to Mercury.
He took it and examined it.
"Not on the device," he said. "But that's too hard to control. I'd check the boxes themselves."
"The boxes?" Briggs said.
"They've just been sitting in your lair here, right?" Mercury said.
"Saloon." Miss Malachite took offense to the word "lair".
"Same difference. If they wanted to give you a little Grimm encouragement , I'm guessing they'd count on you keeping the cases handy more than the devices." He took one and turned it over.
Aura shimmered over his hand for a moment.
Suddenly black dots appeared on the lining of the box. They'd never have been noticeable if you didn't look right at them and know what to look for. They look just like dirt, but darker.
When Mercury touched them, they started to grow out like vines.
"Ah!" Emerald jumped and covered her mouth. "Gross!"
"What the--"?" The henchmen jumped back, and even Miss Malachite looked startled.
Mercury just stomped on the vines and shot dust through his boot. "Die already," he said angrily.
The vines turned to smoke abruptly.
Everyone looked at him.
"They weren't growing yet," Mercury noted, as if this was normal. "I wonder why they only started with Aura."
"Maybe they have to be set off by emotions or something," Emerald said. "Or it was just that you were close to them. That was creepy as frick."
"Get those out of here." Briggs had gone white as a ghost.
"Well...looks like you were telling the truth." Miss Malachite was not so composed now. "I do not like being suckered."
"Tell us who sold these to you," Emerald pressed. "Come on, there's no honor among thieves, and they already tricked you."
"Well, normally I'd agree that that's a reason to turn them over, sugar, but the truth is, I don't know their names," Miss Malachite said. "Not many people evade my scrutiny, but no one seemed to know who these ones were."
"Not Edwin Teach, Anne Bonny, Jack Calico, or Mary Leer?" Mercury rattled off, to Emerald's surprise.
"You mean the...well, not to name names..." Miss Malachite paused. "But no, not them. They delivered some things to us, but we actually passed weapons on to them. We had a certain cut, and then they got the rest. The people who gave them to us were outsiders. I don't ask too many questions in those cases."
"Bandits," Emerald said to Mercury in a low voice. "Who else would be an outsider enough not to be recognized?"
"But bandits don't come in big cities like that," Mercury said.
"Not normally, but if it wasn't to steal, it was just to help the pirates..." Emerald mused. "They might. But why? Why do anything that complicated?"
"Yeah, just for a hustle over dust and supplies? This doesn't make any sense," Mercury muttered darkly.
They looked up.
"Do you know when they'll be back?" Emerald asked.
"I don't know that they will be. It wasn't exactly a scheduled set up," Miss Malachite said. "But if they knew you found us already, they wouldn't come back at all."
"They probably won't, though, after the others got away," Mercury guessed. "This is another dead end."
"There's nothing else you could tell us?" Emerald asked.
"For a price, maybe," Miss Malachite said.
"We just helped you!" Mercury said.
"Which is nice of you, but that was just as much for you as for us, and I'm not terribly concerned about catching them," Miss Malachite said.
"Hundreds of people could die if we don't," Emerald said.
"That's not my problem," Miss Malachite said.
"Why, you selfish, self centered, greedy b--" Mercury began, and the hench people pulled out their weapons again.
"Don't you take that tone with me," Miss Malachite said. "This is still my place of business."
"Yeah, cool your jets," Emerald told Mercury, though secretly she was a little surprised that he got that worked up. Wasn't it something he'd have said not that long ago himself?
"What he means is," Emerald said, "that we're in a hurry, so we can't just pay you unless you really do have information. Do you?"
"I always keep an eye on people who appear new in town," Miss Malachite said. "I don't have names, but I can tell you the Faunus who dropped off the stuff that first time. They had horns like a bull and a tail like one too."
"Oh, that's funny," Mercury said. "Faunus only have one animal trait. We know that. Do you think we're idiots?"
"Believe what you will," Miss Malachite said. "But they did. And they left town using the train, not the bay."
"Dawkins came in on the train," Emerald said to Mercury. "They're going to the same place then. That means something.... Do you think we could find out who bought that ticket?"
"Was it months ago?" Mercury asked Miss Malachite.
"That must have been...I think it was the end of August," Miss Malachite said.
"That was close to when the twins were born," Emerald said. "That was right after they found Cinder--Cinder! The town."
"You think they're going through a town near that?" Mercury said. "S---, that would make a lot of sense."
"Duh, how did we not think of that before? How stupid are we?" Emerald hit herself in the head. "We have to go...and we need to take this stuff and destroy it before it infects the place."
"Take it then," Miss Malachite said. "But you owe me."
Emerald held up more lien. "Look, if you want more, just keep an eye out for that guy, or any of them. If they come back, get in touch with the Belladonnas. They'll know what to do about it.... I'll tell them to reward you generously for it if you do. Actually...Dawkins might know more about this. You know him?"
"Not by sight," Miss Malachite said. "We tracked him down just like your friends asked, which I know you knew already or I wouldn't tell it to you for free--but only some of my workers know him by sight. I never remember meeting the man."
"I've seen him." Briggs looked up. "I found him before. Why do you think I was hitting the streets near the house?"
"Maybe you could tell us if he was one of the ones who delivered that stuff," Emerald said.
"I wasn't there that day," Briggs said.
"I was," Cinnamon said. "I remember them all. I could tell you."
"We'll tip you if you come confirm that for us," Emerald offered.
Cinnamon looked at Miss Malachite.
"As long as she doesn't have to do anything dangeous," Miss Malachite said. "I like my employees in working condition."
"I just need her to look at him." Emerald held up her hands. "No contact required. It just saves us time trying to figure this out the long way."
"Fine," Cinnamon said. "But the tip better be worth it. I don't work cheap."
"I'll go too," Briggs said. "Might as well make sure it's really him."
They all knew it was, but Emerald took that to mean he didn't fully trust them.
But she didn't care about that as long as this worked.
Though carrying the boxes of weapons was the unpleasant part, they put them in a large sack so as not to touch them and hopefully not set them off, but it was still creepy as all get out to be that close to the Grimm powder.
* * *
In all this time, the others had Dawkins tied up securely in a different house that the Fang used for meetings.
Blake and Gira had managed to kill the Grimm infecting Dawkins' house with some good old fashioned father-daughter bonding strategy and some help from Kali--who was trapped inside it, but the claws weren't actually touching her.
It was still scary for Blake to see it all, but finally the vines vanished as they hacked off their roots, and the house went mostly back to normal, though the air seemed heavy.
Yang and Neptune had rushed back to help them, just in time to barely do anything besides take some off the outside, but at least it was over.
The other Fang members had been useless against the Grimm, so they were guarding Dawkins, who was not happy at all about it.
Carmine was being watched by Royal, as he was just waiting for the others.
Cinder was watching the windows of the place.
Carmine was annoying her by crying off and on. "Are you going to take my daddy away?" she would say.
Royal couldn't exactly say no.
"It's complicated, kid," he said. "We need to ask him some questions."
That just led to more crying.
Cinder gritted her teeth. She knew it was hardly okay to get mad at a child in this circumstance, but she hated sniffling, and normally she would have gotten mad at her anyway, but that wouldn't go over well...
The Fang, she noticed, were rolling their eyes.
"Guy had it coming for what he did to Kali," one of them muttered.
"Think that stuff is contagious?" said the other. "What if the kid has it too?"
They suddenly cast glances at her.
They were in the sitting room of the house, with Dawkins, while Royal was more in the front of it with Carmine, and Cinder was in the foyer--it wasn't that big of a house, and they could all see each other, if they looked around the corner far enough.
Dawkins glanced up. "Leave her alone," he said.
"Shut up, you cur," said one of the guards. "I can't believe you betrayed us like this."
"Bad enough you have that half breed brat at all," said one of the others. "But now you actually work with the human scum. The worst kind of Faunus."
"Faunus like you are why I prefer the humans," Dawkins said, very unwisely.
"Oh, is that it?" they said dangeously, smacking him.
"Dad!" Carmine heard them and rushed forward before Royal could react and into that room.
"Don't hurt him!" she said.
"D--- it, she shouldn't be here," Royal muttered, following. "But nowhere else to send her right now. Listen, kid, just stay in here."
"No, I don't want to! Let us go!" Carmine said.
"You'll listen to the human if you know what's good for you, girl," said one of the other guards. "We don't like people who betray the Belladonnas. I wonder if you were in on the whole thing. Sometimes they start young."
"Carmine, just go back in the other room," Dawkins said tightly.
"But they're hurting you." Carmine didn't understand still. "Why?"
"Because he's a scoundrel, and you're just his half breed kid who's probably gonna end up just like him," said the one who was especially nasty from the sound of it. Suddenly he shoved her so that she lurched back.
"Hey!" Royal jumped forward to grab her. "That is not okay!"
"Stay out of it, human," said the Faunus. "You're not on our good side either. It's your fault that Kali was even involved, I take it."
"Look, say what you want about me, but she's a kid. Leave her alone." Royal shoved him away, which was not calculated to defuse the situation.
"Don't touch me," the Faunus said, shoving him back.
Cinder didn't like this. The Grimm might appear any moment if they were around Dawkins, and the others kept acting like idiots.
Carmine tackled the leg of the bully Fang member after he shoved at Royal, perhaps thinking she was helping.
One of the others rushed to yank her off, roughly.
Having enough of this, Cinder leapt forward much faster than them and grabbed their arms just as they were taking the girl's and yanked it off of her.
"That is enough!" she said in a low snarl.
Then she pulled a glass sword out of thin air and pointed it at the Fang members before they could do anything to her.
"Fall?" they said.
Cinder thought they might be one of Adam's old hires.
She raised an eyebrow like "try me."
They backed up. They all knew not to mess with her.... They probably still remembered her, Emerald, and Mercury laying waste to one of their encampments.
"The tables turn, huh?" the third one, who hadn't gotten violent but was not happy either, muttered.
The bully one backed off too.
Carmine was shaking.
"Thanks," Royal said to Cinder, taking Carmine's hand. "Listen, let's just go away from these guys. They won't do anything to your dad while the scary lady with the sword is here."
Carmine seemed to buy that after what just happened, so she followed him.
"Fall, did you say?" Dawkins looked up at Cinder. "Interesting.... What's your first name again?"
"Cinder," one of the Fang supplied.
"What?" Dawkins blinked, then he narrowed his eyes at her and looked her up and down. "No... but there is a strange resemblance. I can't believe it. Cinder? Really?"
Something about the way he said that name made Cinder suddenly have a sense of deja vu.
She squinted at Dawkins, then she almost dropped her sword. "Johnny Bones? No, it's not possible."
"So you do remember me," Dawkins said. "I go by Jack now. Johnny wasn't catchy enough for the pirates (well, really I go by Dodger now). I unlocked my Semblance finally.... Was that sword thing yours? What was that, black stone?"
"Glass," Cinder said, still reeling. "This is unreal."
"Small world, I guess," Dawkins said.
"You know this guy?" Royal had heard all of this and paused.
Carmine went ahead anyway and hid in a corner.
"Yes...once," Cinder said. "I mean, not well. He...was one of the other kids at the orphanage I was at...for a while."
"Yeah, you remember," Dawkins said. "I wasn't there for too long before you left, but I'm not going to forget the girl who beat me and the big kid both up."
"He started it." Cinder frowned. "Every time."
"Not how I remember it. You were quite the little b---h back then," Dawkins said.
Royal frowned. "Watch it."
"Oh, she knows," Dawkins said. "Not that most of us were much better. I remember, it was the old guy, Bumble or something, that gave the nicknames out mostly. Cheerful fellow, he was, named us all after the things they found us with when we came in. I was with nothing but bones. I went back to my real name as soon as I chucked that hell house. But you didn't, I see, unless you've got an alias now."
"None you need to know." Cinder wasn't about to tell him. "I can't believe it. I thought you'd be one of the ones stuck there forever."
"Because I was a Faunus." Dawkins frowned at her. "Yeah, not many Atlesians wanted a Faunus for a slave, even if they saw us all as scum. They think we're rabble. I ran away. Got picked up by the SDC for a while, then finally the Fang raised and I joined them. Here we are now. Not a new story. What happened to you?"
"I ran too." Cinder left out the part where she'd murdered four people. "You probably know the rest."
"Not exactly," Dawkins said.
"But if you know him, and you work with the Fang, how did you not meet before?" one of the other Faunus said.
"Not the same group, I guess." Cinder didn't really care.
"I suppose I can't ask you to let me go for sentimental reasons," Dawkins said.
"Sentimental? You put frogs in my mattress," Cinder said.
"I wasn't the only one. Come on, that was ages ago. We're the same kind of person, Cinder. You're really going to let those Atlas snobs, like that prick right there--" He meant Royal. "--take me in? What happened to not taking up with them? Didn't they treat us like dirt? Did you sell out just for comfort? I'd have thought it of some of the others, but not someone like you. You knew what you were even then, didn't you?"
Cinder frowned.
"Come to think of it, you always did act a little high and mighty," Dawkins reflected. "Is that it? Above us scum now? This is just ironic."
Cinder finally got a grip.
"If I were you, Johnny, I'd be more worried about what I'm going to do to you once the questioning starts and we yank the Grimm out of your Aura," she said tightly.
Dawkins flinched at that, though even he seemed confused as to why.
"Until then, I suggest you shut up and focus on whatever excuse you're going to give the Belladonnas for betraying them. This has nothing to do with me now." She backed up. "Watch him." She told the others.
"We don't take orders from you," said one.
Cinder frowned at them. "Should I tell Gira that you tried to attack a child while I was watching you?"
They must have known what he'd say to that.
"We could tell him who you really are," said the bully.
"He already knows," Cinder said smugly. "But by all means, dig that hole deeper." She smiled unsettlingly.
They all shut up right way.
She backed up.
Btu she was reeling. Another enemy from the long past...was just strange.
"You okay?" Royal must have read it in her expression.
"Fine," she said crisply.
But, glancing at Carmine, she frowned to herself.
"She'll end up like we were," she said, in a low voice. "I know what the Faunus think of half breeds. If he gets arrested, no one cares about what happens."
"I can't see Emerald or the Belladonnas letting that happen." Royal was serious. "It's different now.... Half breed is such an ugly word. I didn't even know humans and Faunus..."
Cinder gave him a look of disbelief.
"Well, of course, they can, just.... Give me a break, it wasn't the kind of thing they talked about in my sphere of society. I never thought about it much. But why would they blame her for that?"
"Are you really that sheltered?" Cinder said. "That's what they do."
"But the Faunus are already treated differently than humans," Royal said.
"Prejudice goes both ways. Faunus don't like humans either, some of them. The ones in the Fang are more likely than the others to act on it."
"I thought the Fang reformed."
"Obviously not completely." Cinder jerked her head at Dawkins.
Royal sighed. "Things are always so complicated. I wish people would just leave each other alone if they aren't going to be friendly. Going out of your way to hurt someone..."
Given who he was talking to, an interesting statement to make as if it was unusual.
Just then Yang and Neptune came back.
"They're finishing up," Yang said, "but we cleared out that weird death tree thing. It didn't really fight us, it just spread. Must have been some kind of trap. Robyn's on her way. We've got to question him before he's missed."
"You've gotta take the girl somewhere else," Royal said. "She shouldn't have to see it if you...find the weird Grimm thing on him."
"I agree," Neptune said. "No kid should have to see that. I wish she wasn't mixed up in this."
"Well, sometimes your parents aren't perfect and you've just gotta deal with it." Yang shook her head. "This is another level though. I can take her somewhere else, but I can't promise she'll cooperate. What is she, like 7? That's old enough to know this isn't good for her dad."
"She's well aware," Cinder said. "But you can't leave her here. Besides, those ever gracious White Fang members you left guarding us don't take so well to half-Faunus or the kids of traitors."
"Did they do something?" Neptune frowned.
Cinder shrugged.
"What? How dare they! She's just a kid!" Yang made a fist. "I'll teach them--"
"Maybe de-escalating the situation might be better when we've got a Grimm to deal with," Royal cut in. "Please, Miss Xiao-Long--or is it Mrs. Vasilius? How do you go?"
"Either or is fine. We don't really care that much about it." Yang shrugged. "Fine, I'll deal with them later then, if they give any more crap.... Where's Emerald and Mercury?"
"They're still not out there?" Royal said.
"Nope," Neptune said. "Crap..."