The rat-at-tat of a machine gun had her rolling behind a goon who did the gentlemanly thing and took a few rounds for her before she folded him like one of those chairs they had at the school plays her mom never attended.
There was just something so primal about beating the stuffing out of two-bit goons.
She ducked under a swing from a baseball bat, stepped aside as some other twit tried the knock her back, then took one step forwards that placed her entire weight into a right straight that ended somewhere six inches behind a goon’s nose.
The crack as his head bounced off the dance floor sent a shiver down her spine. She had to resist the urge to lick her lips.
She heard a scuff behind her and spun in time to avoid the swing of a goon’s sword that nearly, nearly nicked her hair.
“Head in the game, Yang,” she muttered to herself before using the momentum of her dodge and a shot from Ember Celica to spin around in mid-air and deliver an elbow to sword-dude’s chin that had him flat on his back a moment later.
She fired at the ground between a pair of goons to make them lose their footing, used the recoil to fly backwards and spun in the air to kick the back of another goon’s head with enough force to send him crashing into one of his buddies.
Jumping up, she caught some lucky boy between her thighs and made his two seconds of heaven end with a bang as she slugged him right between his very wide eyes
As soon as she was back on her feet, she sprinted towards the DJ booth, Ember Celica exploding out behind her with a twin ‘crack’ that sounded like what Ruby would call explosive poetry. She landed a knee in the DJ’s face, rolled, grabbed the huge bear mask and slammed him down onto the recording equipment with a blow so hard it made the digital track skip.
She flung the DJ onto the dance floor where he landed with a thud, rolled, then groaned. He was probably going to call in sick with a nasty case of disco fever tomorrow.
“Melanie, who is that?” the most grating voice she had ever heard said. She winced as it brought up memories of catty bitches who didn’t get enough stitches. Maybe if she had a proper female role model in life she would fix her problems with words and bad innuendo instead of shotgun punches and puns and also bad innuendo.
“I don’t know, Militia, but we should teach her a lesson,” another equally horrid voice said. She looked over the music console and found two girls dressed like they had robbed a Goodwill bin the morning after a costume party.
She jumped over, fully intending to hit them until they shut up, when a low, thrumming voice sounded out across the room. “You will stop.”
There was no give, no doubt that whoever had given the order expected it to be obeyed in full. And if the way the twin bimbo’s eyes widened was any indication they had the same impression Yang just did.
One of the broken gantry lights gave off a final squeal before it crashed to the ground with a thud not two feet from a woman standing tall and proud in a white cloak. She didn’t even flinch.
“A pair of twins and a girl in a bad ghost costume walk into a bar,” Yang said as she took a moment to reload Ember Celica. “Sounds like the start of a bad joke.” Her shotguns cracked shut. “Let me get to the punch line.”
“I recognize you,” the white one with the creepy voice said. “Is your name Yang?”
Yang paused, arms still up in a guard position and legs still tensed to jump over and let loose a few quick jabs. “Uh, yeah, that’s me?” she said. Did whitey know about Raven? And if so, was that why she was somehow familiar.
“Girls, go get Junior, make sure he’s okay,” the girl in the cloak said. “And help these men up, some look genuinely injured.”
“You’re not our boss,” the girl in red said. The white hood turned her way and all the blood drained from red’s face. “I mean, yes ma’am, right away ma’am!”
Yang lowered her arms as the twins scampered off like their asses were on fire. “So, you know Raven?” Yang asked.
“Who?”
Yang growled and brought her fists back up. “Do I have to beat it out of you?” she asked.
“Could you wait a few minutes before doing that?” Hood asked.
“Wait for what?” Yang asked.
“The police. I’m sure someone has called them by now.”
“Ah,” Yang said. She looked around The Club, eyes going from torn apart pillars to the dance floor that was covered in craters and bloodstains. The music chose that moment to kick back on with a remix of the Achieve Men song ‘Bad Girls.’ She bit her lower lip. “Oops?”
The girl in the hood sighed, a hand coming up and disappearing within her hood. “Okay, follow me,” she said. “You can hide upstairs. It’s where all the cool criminals are.”
“What?” Yang said, but she found herself following after the girl anyway. “So, how did you know my name?”
“Ruby told me,” the girl said as they reached the far end of the club where a corridor with a stairwell waited. It was also where half the guys she had beaten to a pulp were gathered, some of them limping, others staring off to the ceiling in a daze. One of them was hunched over crying over a broken pair of sunglasses.
Something clicked in Yang’s mind and she finally made the connection. “Wait, you’re that...” she paused for a moment and reined in her voice. “You’re the Grimm girl?”
“Akelarre, my name’s Akelarre,” she said.
“Ah, yeah, Ruby won’t shu-- stop talking about you,” Yang said. Now she was growing suspicious. While Ruby had nothing but good things to say about Akelarre, her dad and Uncle Qrow sure as hell didn’t agree. More Uncle Qrow, actually.
“Really? She hardly mentioned you at all.”
Yang almost tripped on a step, both hands clamped over her chest. “What? My little baby sister didn’t mention me? Does she not think I’m the coolest anymore?”
Akelarre paused then gently patted Yang on the shoulder. “It’s okay? I’m sure Ruby still loves you. She is a very nice person.”
Yang straightened a little, her smile facing away as she took in the girl that stood one step above her. “Yeah, she is. Look, I didn’t come here to talk about Ruby, but since you’re here, you know that I’m going to have to give you the third degree, right?”
“The what?” Akelarre asked.
“You’ve started dating my baby sister. It’s my obligation as best big sis ever to tell you that if you hurt her feelings, I will literally burn you.”
Akelarre tilted her head to one side in the same way Zwei did when she told the pup something confusing. “I’m... dating your sister?”
“You didn’t know,” Yang said, her voice flatter than Akelarre’s chest. It worked to embarrass the girl because a red tint started to spread across what she could see of Akelarre’s cheeks.
“Well, she was pretty clear that our last day out together wasn’t a date. She said so. Repeatedly.”
Yang pressed a hand to her face and tried to hold back a sigh. “That sounds so much like Ruby. Let me guess. She then told you that there would be absolutely no hand holding the entire time?”
“Uh, no? We held hands. I didn’t want to let go of her in case she got lost. Ruby moves very fast.”
“Ruby moves... fast,” Yang repeated faintly. “Oh my god, my little sis is becoming a woman.”
“I think you might be reading into this a bit too much. Ruby and I are just friends.” Akelarre shook her head as she turned back towards the stairs and continued climbing. “Come on, we can sit down and have a chat about your actions.”
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“You sounds like my dad,” she accused.
“And I might just call him if I feel like your reasons to trash Junior’s bar aren’t good enough.”
Yang paused mid-step. “Wait, you’ll call my dad?”
“Obviously?” Akelarre said as she reached the top and Yang sped up to catch up.
“Aren’t you a Grimm? Like, you eat people. Why would you care?”
“Because Junior has been nothing but cordial and nice so far and The Club is neutral grounds. That means no fighting here,” Akelarre explained. “Also, I don’t eat people.” She paused before a door, knocked twice and slid inside.
Curious and just a little apprehensive, Yang followed her into the room and tried to take it all in. There was a fancy couch off to one side before a wide screen television, a little bar sat in one corner and there was a card table off in another corner were the players could see the dance floor through a floor to ceiling window that overlooked the dance floor. There were two people in the room, one a little girl in a white, pink and brown outfit who was laying back on the card table, legs kicking out in time with each other and a man in a snazzy outfit who was lounging on the sofa.
“Ah, my favourite terror! And you brought the blond. Fantastic. I really needed more chaos in my life,” the man said.
She blinked at him as recognition flashed through her mind. “You’re Roman Torchwick!” she accused.
Roman bowed from his seat. “Pleasure to meet you, blondie. Always nice to meet a fan.”
“You’re a criminal!” Yang said.
“And you just signed up for... about ten assualt and battery charges, as well as destruction of private property. Maybe sexual assault if the look on Junior’s face when your grabbed him by the jewels meant anything. I, on the other hand, am a gentleman thief. I just redistribute wealth. Mostly from the pockets of the wealthy to my own pockets. No one gets hurt. No one gets their balls crushed.”
Yang made a noise that might have been a choked off protest. She wasn’t really sure of what was going on anymore.
Akelarre grabbed one of the seats by the table, waved at the little girl, and turned it around to straddle it backwards as she faced Yang. “So, why did you do that to Junior anyway?” she asked.
“Wait, before we get into that, why are you hanging around with him?” she asked while pointing at Roman.
“Well screw you too, blondie,” Roman shot back.
“Because Roman knows a lot about the criminal underworld and I plan on taking it over.”
“What, just like that?”
“Well, no. I could just take it over by force. Or, if I wanted, I could provide better education and give support to charities that help people avoid crime while doing my best to decrease the number of criminal youth in Vale. Then I’d just have to wait for the current generation to die off. Long term investments take on a whole new meaning when you’re kinda immortal.”
“You know, the more I talk to you the less certain I am about you dating my sister,” Yang said.
The girl next to Akelarre sat up with all the speed and suddenness of a mouse trap going off. Yang found herself the centre of attention of a brown and pink eye.
“I’m not dating Ruby,” Akelarre said. “We just went weapons shopping, got some creep arrested, and then went out for ice cream and cookies.”
The girl turned her gaze onto the back of Akelarre’s head, eyes narrowing while her cheeks puffed out in a pout that would have been cute if she didn’t look murderous. Then she paused, a thought seeming to occur to her, before her expression morphed into a leer.
“Uh huh,” Yang said as she dragged her eyes back to Akelarre. “So can I go now?”
“You haven’t told me why you were here yet,” Akelarre said.
Yang sighed and pulled out her scroll, flicking it open with a swipe of her thumb. She turned it around to show Akelarre a picture of her mom. “I’m looking for this woman. Her name is Raven Branwen.”
Akelarre leaned forward and looked at the picture for a while. “Never heard of her before, sorry,” she finally said. “Why are you looking for her?”
“She’s my mom,” Yang said.
Akelarre’s glowing red eyes blinked beneath her hood. “So... you walked into a random bar, asked if anyone had seen her... and then beat up the owner when he said no?”
Yang felt a little warmth climbing up her neck. “I also ordered a drink.”
Roman snorted. “And that makes it so much better.”
The girl on the table hopped off and walked around Akelarre before she hugged the Grimm girl from behind and rested her head on Akelarre’s shoulder. ‘Mine’ she mouthed the word to Yang.
And Yang decided not to touch that entire situation with a ten foot pole. “So can I go now?”
Akelarre turned a gentle smile towards Yang and she felt herself tensing up. “Of course. After you apologize to Junior.”
“What makes you think that I’ll apologize?” Yang asked.
Red eyes met hers, two deep wells, so similar to her own Semblance-empowered eyes, but darker, more cunning and on the very cusp of being feral, like the eyes of an Alpha Beowolf that just stumbled across an injured child. “If you don’t, I’ll know.”
Yang swallowed.
***
Akelarre watched Yang stomp out of the room, fists balled by her side and face set in a pout that belied her age. “That was fun,” she said.
“You think she’s actually going to do it?” Roman asked.
She tried to shrug one shoulder, but Neo was still leaning against her back. The diminutive girl must have thought Akelarre was trying to shake her off because she wrapped both arms around her chest and gave her a tight squeeze. Akelarre giggled, flushing as the sound escaped her. “Thanks Neo,” she said.
Roman, the no fun thief, rolled his eyes. “Do you two want me to leave? Because I really don’t want to watch.”
“No, you can stay,” Akelarre said. “I just came to ask you if you had all the data on those criminals I asked for.”
Roman perked up a little at that and pulled out a scroll from his inner pocket. “I do indeed, terrifying little lady. All the suspected location of just about every gang in Vale, from Dager’s Boys to the Caw Caw Criminals. Those are all members of the Knights, in case you were wondering.”
Akelarre reached out to grab the scroll Roman held out. It made Neo shift a little and by the time she was sitting straight again she felt a bit of a blush creeping up her cheeks. “Thanks Roman. And, uh, Neo, you’re accidentally grabbing my boob.”
Neo’s hand squeezed as if to confirm the fact, then she placed a hand before her mouth to hide her shock.
“It’s okay,” she said. “Just an accident.” She smiled at Neo, then her shirt started to wiggle. “You should be more careful, I’m covered in all sorts of venomous insects. I don’t know what half of their bits would do to you if you touched them in the wrong place. It would be a shame if you lost an arm to a little bite.”
Neo nodded solemnly.
Looking down at the scroll, she realized that she didn’t actually know where most of the locations on the map were. “A-actually, Neo. Do you know where these places are?”
Neo leaned forwards until her chin was in the crook of Akelarre’s neck and scanned the list for a moment. She nodded.
“Huh. Would it be too much trouble to ask you to show me around? I’ll pay for your lunch if you come.”
Neo gasped and hugged Akelarre tighter.
“I’ll take that as a yes!”