Chapter 162: 64
Chapter 64 – Let the right Jaune in
"It's… it's actually there…" Jaune's eyes were wide and filled with surprise, though a cynical part of Blake couldn't say she disagreed with it. In the glass tube before them stood the six-foot figure of Jaune Arc, looking as real as he did to her – but visible to others too. Blake, as always, repeated his messages to the other two in the room.
"Did you expect otherwise?"
"Honestly… yeah. I thought this would be sixteen inches tall or something." Blake snorted, imagining it with a little smile. "That or I'd have obvious metal skin, an antennae or red laser eyes."
"That would somewhat defeat the point of my research," Doctor Polendina adjusted his glasses. They'd been aligned perfectly before, but now he played with them until one was hanging off, nodding his head as though all was well. "Unless a person was to wound you, or maybe try to lay underneath you, they would not easily discover the truth. Naturally this body is a little heavier than a human's." He gave them a queer look, "You might want to keep that in mind for you two."
Keep that in mind? What did he mean by that?
"Ah," Jaune flushed and glanced away, "Blake and I aren't actually going to use this for sex…"
"What!?" Blake snapped, not sending on that message but instead turning to the doctor, hands on hips. "I'm doing this for my friend," she said, "Not because I'm hot to trot with a robot!"
"Of course, of course," the way the old man waved his hands made it clear he didn't really believe them. "Just so you both know, the Jaune Mk2.0 comes with an internal power source which matches that of my darling daughter, capable of creating artificial aura. Clearly, there's no semblance installed, but I'm curious to see if you can discover and retain your own from life. You are nothing more than a soul at the moment, as parasitical as that may be."
"I wish he would stop using that word…" Jaune complained. Blake patted the space where his arm lay distractedly.
"That's all well and good," she said, "But how are we supposed to explain this? Won't it be a little unusual if a dead person comes back to life."
"It would be."
"And…?" Blake gave the man a questioning look, arms open.
"And what?" Doctor Polendina looked curious.
"How are we supposed to explain it away?" Blake sighed, "This is going to be so obvious that everyone's going to want to ask about it. What are we meant to do?"
"Ah, my apologies," the elderly man said, "I was under the impression I'd – oh I don't know – built an entire artificial robot body for your friend in less than a month, or something."
Blake coughed and looked away, only to find Jaune doing the same.
"Make your own excuses up," the doctor sighed, "Really, teenagers these days. Think that everything is going to be handled for them, good lord."
"Worry not father!" Penny stepped forward, "I will never be an ungrateful teenager like friend-Blake and parasite-Jaune." Both Blake and Jaune flinched. "I shall always appreciate your intellect, charity and the hard work you put in to bui-"
"Okay, okay," Blake waved her hands before it could go on any further, "We get it. I'm sorry for trying to put everything on you. Thank you for building this Doctor Polendina. Is there any way we can repay you?"
"You could call me father."
"No."
"Hell no."
The doctor shrugged, leaving the two of them to inspect Jaune's future body. He floated beside her as she stepped closer, running her fingers across the skin. "It feels real," she whispered, marvelling at the texture. If she pushed harder there was an unyielding quality not quite present in humans, but it would be easily missed if someone wasn't looking for it.
"He got my height and figure right too," Jaune whispered, "Do you think they hacked my records for that?"
"Maybe…" He'd been little more than a figure in a onesie and then a corpse when she'd seen his real body, but his spectral form was good for comparison. It was impressive, especially since Doctor Polendina didn't have that reference material. It was like seeing a second Jaune, except that this one was asleep.
With this he could finally have a body of his own… he could live and sustain himself separate from her. That was a good thing… she had to remember that.
It was a good thing…
"How soon can he use it?" Blake asked, swallowing her reluctance. "Can he wield it now?"
"There's still some calibration that needs to be done," the man said, "Before, your friend's problem was that he didn't understand the intricacies of computing, nor which gears, servos or pistons to activate or deactivate in order to simulate human movement. Penny has to use each and every part of her body like a human's muscular system, except that none of it moves on instinct."
Penny waved a hand at them, and Blake had to marvel at how simple she made it look. Even something like that involved tensing and relaxing muscles up and down the arm, in a very specific pattern. Little wonder Jaune had struggled before.
"So what's changed?" Jaune asked, floating over and into the machine. He didn't possess it; she could tell because his legs and arms were still visible poking out of its chest. "I don't see anything different. It's bright in here though."
"I've had to install a few other computers alongside the main one," Doctor Polendina said once she'd relayed the question. "These are all tightly wound into the central CPU and are tasked solely with calculating and handling the movements for you. It will be as instinctual as movement in a real body… once you're properly hooked up, that is."
"And how long will that take?"
"A few hours at least." The man shrugged, making Blake sigh. "It's going to run off of the minute changes in his aura, that being the only thing Jaune has left. As such, it's going to take a while to program it to recognise his aura, which is what I'll need him alone for."
"I'm sorry?" Blake felt a chill run down her spine, "What do you mean by alone?" She didn't like the sound of that, especially since it would leave her undefended if something went wrong.
"The process will take a few hours like I said. A good eight or so, all things considered. Unless you intend to sit here for all of that, without raising suspicion, then the two of you will need to split up for a little while. The best time for me to do this would be when there's no chance of interruption. And we might as well start as soon as possible. Tomorrow would be convenient on both accounts."
Blake sighed. Tomorrow was the next set of fights, the continued semi-finals which she had already passed by defeating Mercury Black.
"What about the distance factor?" Jaune's face was filled with worry, "Won't that put Blake in danger?"
"It shouldn't," the man shrugged. "From what you've told me, the two of you have gone apart before without incidence. The difference between the ship we would be doing this on and Amity Colosseum would be much less than Beacon to Mountain Glenn. It would be no different from one side of Beacon to the other. There's no real risk."
"It's your call, Blake," he whispered into her ear.
"He'll be there."
/-/
After their meeting with the doctor, Blake hadn't felt like returning to their form, no matter how late it was. Her team didn't believe her story. The fact still left her bitter, enough so that she couldn't bear to face them. Instead the two of them retreated to the sanctity of the library, which while dimly illuminated as the evening wore on, was still open for late night studying. With the Vytal Festival in full swing, it was completely abandoned.
It gave her the peace she needed. Team RWBY would all be asleep when she returned, and maybe in the morning it would be easier to forgive them. But for now, other things assailed her mind.
"What will you do when you get your body back?" she asked, turning the page. Jaune was back in his bear, sat in her lap with his paws resting on her wrists. Once upon a time she would have rebelled against that, but his perverted tendencies had seemed to weaken. She had a suspicion they'd never existed in the first place… that he'd simply done it to gain attention from her.
"What do you mean?" He didn't look up to her, too engrossed in the text.
"Well you'll be able to move about and do your own thing again. Isn't there anything you want to do?"
"I should explain things to my family… that will be the first big thing for sure."
"Hm." Blake nodded, flipping the page once more. His family… would they be pleased? She expected so, after they'd been properly convinced. He was still dead, there was no changing that, but he was… less dead than most people were. At least they could still interact with him. "What about after that?" she pressed.
"I… I don't know. I had loads of dreams I've just given up on now. To hear I've suddenly got a chance again… I wasn't prepared for it."
"You'll have every option in the world." she said.
"I guess so." Jaune smiled at the thought, but her heart twisted in her chest.
"I won't."
"What?"
Blake looked away when his teddy head turned to her. She kept her gaze as neutral as she could, as though simply looking at something else.
"You can go wherever you wish," she said, "Do whatever you want. You could travel the world or even go home to your family. But I don't have that freedom. I'll be here in Beacon."
Alone.
She would have her team, that wouldn't change. And she did love them… even with the current frustration and bad feeling between them. They were her best friends, her family.
But Jaune was a part of her.
And she wasn't sure she was ready to give that up. He had been a nuisance, an idiot and a pervert… she'd wanted rid of him more times than she dared count. And yet, at the same time, he'd always been there for her – even if it wasn't by choice. He'd put up with her obsessive desire to see the White Fang put away. He'd listened to her problems, run away from Team RWBY with her, offered to stay with her even if they never accepted her back.
And now it felt like that was being taken away.
It's for the best, her mind raged. The best for him! Don't you want what will make him happy? Are you so selfish that you'd trap him as a spirit with you forever?
She wasn't. She knew she wasn't and never could be… that was why she'd promised the doctor he would be there. That was why she wouldn't hesitate, even now. But none of that did anything to stop the cold pit that opened up in her stomach.
None of it stopped the way her breath quickened, her throat dried or how she dreaded to go back to their dorm, just because it would mean the night ended. Their last night together?
"I don't know what I want to do," Jaune said softly, looking back to the book. She hadn't turned the page in minutes. He hadn't asked her to. They were both of them pretending. "I think I'll need some time to decide… to get used to things."
"That… that makes sense."
"Until I decide… could I stay here a little while longer?"
"I suppose you can," Blake sighed, shoulders relaxing, breath coming out in a rush. "I've put up with you this long," she added, "What's a little bit longer?"
"Heh… thanks."
He must have noticed how her arms tightened around him. In fact, who was she kidding? He had been able to see through her petty lies. He'd known her long enough. But he also knew better than to point it out. What was the point, when they both knew the truth? Her golden eyes drifted shut as she pressed her face into the top of his head. Her words came out in a whisper.
"Thank you."
Weekly Power Status
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