Chapter 39: The Watch on Vale
After their punishments were handed out to them, team RWBY headed to their dorm room with their heads down in defeat. When Glynda suggested they be barred from leaving the school itself, they objected to the idea in favor of something else.
Glynda offered an alternative, they would be given a part of Glynda's workload and they would have to do extra schoolwork which team RWBY accepted quickly to the surprise of Glynda.
For team RWBY it didn't matter they would have to do extra work, they could always help each other out in their studies anyways. They were more concerned about being able to leave the school.
It had just been a few hours after they promised Hanns they would help out in stopping Cinder. So not being able to leave was a definite no-no to the team.
It was already dark in the halls of Beacon, the ambient noise of silence accompanying the empty passages.
Team RWBY was fast asleep in their dorm, tired from the whole day of fighting inside a tank and receiving an earful from Glynda. Each crashed on their respective beds as soon as they entered their room.
The room was quiet, the four members were sleeping calmly throughout the night. An audible click escapes from the lock on their door. The handle twists letting the latch retract and release.
The wooden door slowly swings inward making the hinges let out an eerie creak as it reveals the darkness seeping from the halls.
What waited behind the doorway was… nothing. Silence still kept its hold over the now wide-open door.
A pair of feline ears flicked and twitched as Blake tossed around from her sleep.
The door closes with a slight thud and a click from the latch re-engaged. A pair of amber eyes cracked open upon hearing the disturbance. Careful not to shoot up in surprise and fear.
'What was that?'
Blake was tense, a door closing shut in the room where they slept was not the most comfortable situation. The entrance to their dorm was locked and there was no way that it must have been the wind.
She didn't know who would wander into their dorm late this night. Her mind took in various thoughts.
She remembers what Torchwick said, perhaps he was right in thinking that someone wanted to keep close tabs on her team.
There's also the possibility that someone wanted them out of the picture, had they snuck into Beacon? She thought.
Similar ideas kept on coming to her but she shook them aside to try and take a look.
Blake turns towards the door, creeping her eyelid up slightly for just a moment.
'No ones there!'
She frantically opens her eyes and fully sits up from her slumber to scan the area.
"Who's there?"
There was no reply, only the moonlight shining through the small splits from the curtains answering her call.
Blake stands up, she assured herself that it was nothing but in the end her vigilance and paranoia made her try to at least find out if something happened.
She wanders around checking every corner and underneath the beds. There was nothing in sight for her to notice any differences.
Her hand touches the doorknob and turns it, feeling that it was unlocked. She sighed deeply before opening it and peeking into the empty hallways.
She saw no one waiting or any signs of intrusion, she closed it and made sure it was locked before going back to her bed. She relaxes since she couldn't find anything out of the ordinary.
'Maybe we just forgot, I hope.'
Blake turned away from the door after looking at it for the last time and shut her eyes.
A sudden sharp blow of air rushed into her ears as she shot up from her attempt at sleeping to immediately looked at the room.
Blake clutched her ears which felt the rush of air and narrowed her eyes at the area around her. She stands up and walks right in the middle of the room while constantly looking around.
She felt something press on the back of her head and color left her skin at the pressure.
A hand made its way onto her shoulders as she gets turned around to see a familiar set of mismatched eyes. She opens her mouth to speak before getting silenced by Neo, who slapped her hand against Blake's mouth.
She visibly relaxes from the horror she felt the whole time that was created by Neo while she found her way into Beacon. Neo makes a zipping motion before letting go of Blake.
Blake let out a breath she had been keeping.
Neo gives a grin while imitating a laugh as she fully removes the illusion created by her semblance. Tiny shards of glass trickle away from her and a disguised Neo shows herself.
Blake wakes the other team members still sleeping soundly in their beds.
"Wuh?" Ruby lazily responded, drool escaping from her mouth as she did so.
Weiss was nudged but in reflex, she slaps Blake's hand away as she tried to go back to sleep. Blake sighed at the action and secured Weiss' hands and yanked her, forcefully making her sit up.
Yang was poked on her exposed stomach, giggling at it before waking up in a laughing fit.
They all complain about being woken up but see Neo in the middle of their room with her umbrella open and gesturing for them to pay attention. Now wide awake, team RWBY listens, or more accurately looks, at the pantomiming Neo before handing them a piece of paper.
Ruby tries to flip it over but gets stopped by Neo who looks at her and puts a finger to her lips.
Ruby does a zipping motion on her mouth while tilting her head, asking Neo if they needed to be quiet about it.
Neo nodded and winked before disappearing under the illusions of her semblance while leaving the room undetected.
Apart from Blake, they all question the intense secrecy before remembering their conversations with both Torchwick and Ozpin. Torchwick didn't want to take chances that could be avoided. Team RWBY would need to decide where to read it.
Blake opened the curtains and point at the moon while signing to the rest of the team if they wanted to deal with it tomorrow.
The team looks at each other before nodding in agreement. Soon after their short wordless conversation they restlessly tried to sleep.
It was going to happen, everyone knew that if Neo was sent, it meant that Torchwick already had a guess on where they would be able to find robberies that Torchwick predicted those working under Cinder would perform next.
They didn't know if Ozpin was watching them as Torchwick suggested but it's not too much to be cautious. They were sheltering the existence of a sentient weapon after all.
The hours passed and they eventually got up to start a new school day. They went through their normal early classes until lunch came around. The noisy cafeteria drew most of the attention away from anyone since their chatter will be drowned out by the masses of students.
They sat at the table they frequently eat at before discussing how they should go on about pursuing Cinder and her faction.
Hidden under a book was a folded piece of paper that hung securely in between the pages of a random novel. Blake held on tightly while the rest of the team scooched over towards Blake.
They casually eat to avoid suspicion while Blake opened the note for her to see. An address was written in black ink and a series of instructions followed.
Torchwick wanted them to leave late at night and on the bottom was a note saying to burn the note after preparing to leave.
The address was in the middle of the commercial district where Torchwick set up his base under the guise of an ice cream store.
The members of team RWBY looked at each other as they quietly conversed making sure that the conversation only reached their own teammates.
"If we leave tonight how can we get back? I doubt Miss Goodwitch will let us go a second time." Ruby shudders at the thought of facing off against the stern professor.
It was a certainty that Glynda would ban their exit from the school once they all got caught again arriving late at night.
"That is a problem, there would be no way for us to exit school ground without letting the cameras all over Beacon see us while we leave." Blake was getting concerned.
There were times when she snuck out but nobody looks at the dozens of cameras around campus all day. So the few moments she exited and came back were going to be unnoticed since nobody was staring at a monitor 24/7.
Now that they did that whole commotion when trying to get to Mountain Glenn there was now a big risk for them. They had brought attention to themselves which was a heavy blow to their abilities to fight against Cinder.
"Maybe, we should just let them see us leaving," Yang said.
The others looked at her as if she was crazy.
"I mean think about it, if the headmaster was already suspecting us of something why don't we attribute it to something else? If we pull out the vigilante card maybe Ozpin can focus on that part instead of asking questions about our literal partners in crime?"
They all let Yang's idea sink in before Blake responded.
"Still, that would be pretty risky, but it's not like we have many choices. We could always ask Neo but our scrolls are probably being monitored for messages since it was issued by the school when we entered."
They did not know for sure if that was the case but it would make sense. The school does have access to the CCT directly so it wouldn't be a far-off guess.
"Alright team, we leave our entry back into the dorm by leaving our window open and we sleep as if nothing happened after. If we get caught then we pray, if not then hurray." Ruby declares.
The rest of the team nodded at each other before Blake closed the book she was reading. They would burn the note later but for now, they had to make it through the rest of the day.
Hours later…
It was time for them to sneak out.
The plan was in motion, they cracked the window open while securing a piece of makeshift rope and looping it for later. They were already wearing their combat outfits and were finishing their last preparations.
"Are we going?" Yang asks as she equipped herself with her gauntlets, Ember Celica.
"Let's go." Ruby simply orders.
One by one they leap off from the window and tucked inwards hitting the ground with a roll, the solid floors sound as footsteps land on the pavement. They start running towards the path they all knew well from the early days of chasing around Blake.
They dash through bushes and leaves, before coming across the steep cliff. They run and jump right as they all reached the edge. The members saw the ground coming closer as they used the landing strategies they used.
Ruby stuck her scythe in the walls of the cliff, Weiss used her glyphs to jump off and onto, Yang used Ember Celica to slow her fall while Blake used a tree to swing around on and land on the floor.
After a few more minutes of navigating through the city of Vale, they reached the ice cream store. They knock on the back door and whisper a few words while they idled around the inactive streets.
A clack from the door was made and the door opened to reveal Neo letting them in.
Inside was an average break room dimly lit by the lights above. A table was set nearby with a board filled with meticulously arranged information hung from the wall. Roman Torchwick was leaning on his cane while lighting another cigar. He took one look at the group and walked toward the board while signaling them to come closer.
"Alright, kiddies it's time to execute our little operation."
Ruby excitedly raises her hand. "Oh! Oh!" She jumps around while Torchwick looked at the girl disappointingly.
Torchwick sighed "What is it Red?"
"Can we have codenames and stuff? Maybe even the name for the operation we're doing?"
Torchwick looked at the team leader bouncing from her excitement. "Kid, I don't think you know how serious this is."
"We are serious, we need codenames Torchwick it's basically a requirement for anything related to sneaking around. It's only half as cool if we don't have them." Ruby answered.
"Fine, you kids can think of your own nicknames later on. I already have my own thank you very much."
"What about the operation name?" Ruby asks.
Torchwick rubbed his temples in frustration "You are really not making this any more serious than it should be. Any name would do, suit yourself, I'd like us to be done with this." Torchwick thought to himself.
'At least these brats are actually motivated to work unlike those animals Cinder pushed into service.'
A pause settled in the room while the rest of the team considered a fitting name. A thought instantly crosses their mind the moment they felt two words that were given to them automatically by a mysterious force influencing them.
Everyone said it together.
"Operation Barbarossa"
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