“...and our return to Atlas was completely unobstructed.”

In James Ironwood’s office stood a group of individuals at attention in a line in front of the general’s desk. All of them were wearing Atlas officer uniforms, though each outfit did have some slight alterations to the standard outfit, five of them having obvious additions in the color red. These individuals were the Ace Ops, Atlas’ top team of huntsmen and huntresses. Though, there was one big difference to the usual squad.

This difference was the fact that there was one extra person standing alongside them. This person was a man by the name Jaune Arc, the newest addition to the once five-man squad.

He stood at rigid attention at the end of the line next to Marrow, someone he’d gotten along with on the team right out of the gate pretty much, aside from the fact that he forgot his name several times after their first meeting. Him meeting the rest of the team.... had been different than Marrow.

“Excellent work. If there is nothing further for you to add to, you’re all dismissed for the rest of the day. Report to my office tomorrow at 0800 for any top priority mission there might be for you.”

“Yes general!” Six voices chorused out at once. However, as they all turned to leave, the general called out to them to stop.

“Clover, stay behind for a moment. Along with you Arc. I wish to speak with you.”

And just like that, Jaune shot back to rigid attention. The other members continued to leave, though Jaune missed the looks that they sent his way. Clover also stood back at attention, but was obviously more relaxed about it than Jaune.

Clover thankfully broke the silence after only a few seconds. “What did you want to discuss with us sir?”

Ironwood propped his elbows on his desk and interlaced his fingers, looking over them at the two of them. “It’s time for Mr. Arc’s final evaluation.”

Clover’s eyes blinked a bit in surprise, but reeled it in quickly. “Understood sir.”

The general shifted his gaze directly on Jaune, who simply kept looking straight ahead over the general and out the window. “Arc, it has been three months since I put you with the Ace Ops at the request and personal favor to your father and grandfather. I had many doubts about you, both adding you to a team that already worked excellently together and towards you personally with your age and experience, but I think those thoughts were misguided. You spent time with each member individually and in different groupings to see how well you functioned with each member, and how they functioned with you. All around success there.” Ironwood took a breath, still noticing Jaune’s nervous posture. “You have passed all of the tests, assignments, and missions with the team that you have been given. And this last mission I have decided would be your final test. Clover,” The man in question answered with a quick ‘yes sir’ before Ironwood continued, “what is your assessment of Jaune Arc’s performance during the last operation with your team?”

Clover cast a glance to his newest subordinate, finding it hard not to chuckle at his beyond nervous posture. “Yes general. Rookie Jaune Arc performed to the best of his capabilities, following each order exceptionally and was always willing to provide support to each member, both physically and with his semblance. On the flight back he even went around to each member of the team and asked if they were injured in any way or wished to have their aura’s replenished with the use of his semblance.” Clover let the seriousness in his demeanor drop and smiled and Jaune, then back to Ironwood. “I fully believe that Jaune has been a great asset to the team and I would personally ask to keep him as an official member of the Ace Ops, deeming him an invaluable addition to us.”

Jaune couldn’t deny he was absolutely touched by what Clover said. It seemed that Ironwood was also a tad surprised with Clover’s words. Taking a deep breath, he spoke once again. “Alright then. Arc, it’s finally official. You are now a certified member of the Ace Ops. Congratulations.”

Jaune’s posture waivered a little. He wanted to let out just a sigh of pure relief hearing what the General said, but he held back. Instead, all he did was saluted and said, “Thank you General Ironwood sir!”

Ironwood nodded to him and unlaced his fingers to reach down and pull out a scroll. After a couple seconds of button tapping and entering a few codes, he looked back up to the two Ace Ops. “Your credentials have been updated. You’ll need to report to the armory to get your uniform updated as soon as you’re available.”

That last part confused Jaune. “U-update my uniform sir?”

“He means you’re getting your red kid.” Clover smiled and thumbed the red inside of his own uniform. “You’re a member of the Ace Ops now. That means you get something to show for it. You’ll get to choose what it is and where you wear it.”

“O-oh.”

“That is all you two. You are now dismissed until 0800 tomorrow.”

With one more salute from the two of them, they both moved towards the door. 

“Oh, and Arc?”

Jaune pivoted on the spot and turned to face Ironwood at attention again. “Yes sir?”

“You don’t need to turn your spin into a pole like that when you address me, it’ll start to hurt your back eventually.” A faint smile twitched at Ironwood’s lips before vanishing. “You also don’t need to act like I’m an Ursa Major ready to eat you. I promise you that I wouldn’t find you to be very appetizing.”

Jaune’s face burned at that and Clover was happy he was still facing away from them so he didn’t have to hide his wide smile or his silent chuckles. “O-of course sir. M-my apologizes.”

Ironwood nodded, “As you were.”

Jaune quickly got out of the room to avoid anymore interactions with the general. When he stepped into the hallway and heard the door close behind him, he slouched forward immediately, his back definitely was hurting. Laughter beside him got him to look over at Clover. “What’s so funny?”

Clover worked himself down to just a light chuckle. “Just how absolutely terrified you were in there. Seriously I thought your back was gonna break with how rigid you were.”

Jaune stood up and crossed his arms, but totally wasn’t pouting. “It’s not my fault he’s so intimidating. Sorry that I’m not use to talking to one of the most important people in Atlas on a regular basis.”

“Aaaahh come on. I’m just messing with you. Although maybe you wouldn’t be so nervous still if you hadn’t questioned his strategy a few weeks ago.”

“I didn’t mean anything by it! It just didn’t sound like the best course of action for our mission!”

“And believe it or not, I think that’s why Ironwood likes you.”

“Heh, yeah right.”

Clover just laughed again before walking off, waving backwards at Jaune. “Well either way, I’m happy you’re on the team. Congrats, I look forward to working with you in the future Jaune. And to how you’ll look with a little red on ya.”

Jaune watched as Clover walked away down the hall. As he reached and started going down the stairs, Jaune sighed and started walking himself. It was still only mid afternoon, perhaps he could speak with the people at the armory today about his uniform.

A few minutes into his walk, Jaune was walking past some of Atlas Academy’s classrooms. He was thinking deeply about what red updates he wanted. So deeply in fact that he was completely caught off guard when a hand shot out from a doorway to a dark classroom and grabbed him by the collar of his uniform. Jaune hadn’t even noticed the door open.

Before Jaune fully snapped out of his thoughts, the arm effortlessly yanked him off his feet and into the dark classroom, the metal door shutting behind him.

Jaune landed on his feet again and was pushed back against a wall. He finally started to struggle against the grip on him, instinctively lashing out in front of him with a fist. He connected with something, but that soon was discovered to be a hand as he felt what he hit grab his wrist and pin it to the wall above his head. His other wrist soon followed and was pinned under the same hand.

His next plan was to call out for help, but a hand covered his mouth. This was when Jaune really started to feel panic setting. His hands struggled but he was nowhere close to being strong enough to free himself from his captor.

That’s when he heard the laughter. Soft but very boisterous laughter coming from the person in front of him. That was when the person spoke, “Nice try Little Knight, but you’re still a few years and a couple hundred bench presses away before you’d be able to match me~.“ 

That laughter, voice, AND nickname all sounded very familiar to Jaune. “ELM!?” Jaune exclaimed into the hand over his mouth, the volume being muffled but still very understandable. Jaune tried focusing his eyes upwards a bit.

The classroom was dark true, but some light was seeping in through the windows and Jaune’s eyes slowly adjusted to the low light. His exclamation was soon proven to be as the silhouette restraining him slowly became more detailed, showing it was indeed the aforementioned Ace Op. 

Elm was smiling widely and with plenty of confidence. “Bingo Little Knight. So, I heard your talk with the general went pretty great, considering your on the team now. I bet a little red will fit you nicely~.” She lowered her hand from his mouth, but gave his cheek two soft, playful pats before fully leaving his face.

Jaune’s shock was replaced by confusion. “How did you find out already?”

“Your credentials getting updated notified the whole team, and we all got a message from Clover too. I wanted to say congrats.”

“So you ambushed me!?”

Elm’s smile didn’t even waiver. “Hey, not my fault you made it so easy. You should always be on guard.”

Jaune nodded along sarcastically. “Yeah yeah, thanks and I’ll be more careful in the future. Now can you let me go.” Jaune moved to get free, expecting Elm to release his hands and let him leave.

That is not what happened. Jaune took one step away from the wall before being shoved back into it by Elm aggressively pressing her body into his. Her grip on his wrists didn’t budge either. “E-Elm?”

“Ya know I’m pretty happy that I’m gonna get to see you a lot more often now~.” Jaune’s eyes meet Elm’s. She still had her confident smile, but now there was something going with her amusement in her eyes. It looked like a very deep want to Jaune. Almost.... hungry in a way. “Since you’re on the team now, I won’t need to worry that I’d be wasting my time with you.”

Elm’s tone was starting to make him really nervous now. “U-uuuum, w-what are you talking about exactly?!”

Elm’s eyes glance up and down Jaune. “I think it’s safe to say that you caught my interest Little Knight. Ain’t many people like you here in Atlas, or Mantle. You’d be hard pressed to find a guy as good as you.”

“T-thaaaanks?”

Elm raised her free hand back up to put her curled index finger under Jaune’s chin to keep it raised and also raised her right knee up between Jaune’s legs, placing it against the wall and just barely brushing up against his crotch. “Now you’re all mine.” Her voice was barely a whisper, one so quiet that Jaune barely heard anything.

There was silence between the two of them for a bit, both of them just looking at each other. Elm was still smiling joyfully and Jaune’s face was turning more red every second. Then she leaned her head forward, and Jaune was thoroughly confused at this point. Sure Elm had been pretty friendly to him when he first met the team, offering help and to be a workout or training partner with him. And yeah she made some...flattering offhanded comments about him, but when had she felt like this!? Wasn’t it just her way of messing with him?!

As Jaune’s mind raced, Elm got ever closer. She was stopped however when the metal door to the classroom ‘swished’ open, bathing the both of them in brighter light and getting them both to look over at it.

“Well well. What a sight this is.” Harriet Bree, the smallest member of the Ace Ops was standing in the open doorway, backlit by the hallway lights. “Elm, leave the kid alone, it looks like you’ve scared him enough.”

“Hahahaha aaah come on Hare, I wasn’t doing anything bad.” Elm’s happy nature wasn’t deterred, but she still released Jaune all the same, taking her knee away and stepping back, letting go of his wrists with her hand last. Jaune fell forward, realizing that Elm’s grip had been supporting him greatly without him realizing it. He caught his footing, but not before his face bounced off of Elm’s chest. Jaune shot back with a yelp, but no visible difference seeing as his face couldn’t be any redder at this point. All Elm did was laugh loudly. “Hahaha! See! The boy knows what he wants.” After a little more chuckling, the mountain of a woman looked to Harriet. “So what are you doing here Hare?”

Harriet narrowed her eyes up at her. “I was gonna congratulate Jaune on making the team, so I looked up where he was on the trackers that he convinced us to get on our scrolls for missions. I saw you were both together in this classroom, even though classes aren’t in session. So I decided to come find out why. I have to say I wasn’t expecting what I walked in on.”

Elm should have known. After all that’s how she found Jaune herself and planned her ambush. “Yeah. I bet you weren’t.”

Harriet ignored the slightly annoyed tone in Elm’s voice and turned to face Jaune. “Hey Arc, congrats on making the team. Ya might wanna go get your uniform updated ASAP. You have to look the part for your missions with us from now on.”

“R-r-right. I-I’ll go do that. T-talk to you two tomorrow!” Jaune sprinted out of the classroom leaving a dust cloud shaped like him in his place.

Both Elm and Harriet leaned out of the doorway to watch Jaune running away. Both were quiet, but that was soon changed by Elm. “I’m gonna devour that boy~.”

Harriet spun around with her semblance, facing her teammate in the blink of an eye. Elm was still biting her lower lip and staring after Jaune, so Harriet shoved her. She hardly moved the tree, but got her attention. “The hell Elm! I walk in on you practically ready to rip his clothes off and do him right there!”

Elm let out a small sigh, her mind imagining just that now. “Boy that would have been great.”

Harriet was almost ready to punch her again, but contained herself. “Seriously! That’s messed up!”

“Oh come Hare. Our agreement was to wait and see if he made it on the team first. I know you’re really just upset  because I got to him first. And I thought you were the one with the speed semblance. Try and keep up Hare.” Elm finished her taunt with a cheeky grin.

Harriet let out a short growl at her. “We’ll see who needs to catch up Elm. After that stunt Jaune’s probably gonna want to steer clear of you for a while.”

Elm was all too happy to point something out though. “That doesn’t mean I’ll ‘steer clear’ of him though.”

Harriet just grit her teeth and turned away to leave. “Just keep yapping Elm. I haven’t even gotten serious yet.”

“Sure sure.”

Harriet walked away without acknowledging Elm’s dismissive response. She left the tall woman just standing outside the empty classroom, still wearing that cheeky smile.

‘Keep being all happy and cocky Elm. You had your little attempt, now it’s my turn. Jaune’s going to be mine.‘

........................

Jaune ran down the halls of Atlas and away from what just happened to him. He wasn’t even trying to get to the armory for his uniform anymore as much as he was just trying to put distance between him and that classroom. 

He was still running full speed when someone appeared from another hall right in front of him. He only managed to just start slowing down his run when the person decided to help him out.

By grabbing his speeding body and flipping him over her shoulder onto the floor to stop him.

As Jaune was dizzy and attempting to get up, a voice spoke down to him. “Mr. Arc, while you are probably in a rush to get your uniform updated, you shall still conduct yourself in a manner befitting that of an elite Atlas Huntsman.” The authoritative voice was an instant give away to Jaune.

He quickly scrambled back to his feet and saluted. “Yes Ms. Schnee! Of course Ms. Schnee!”

Winter’s unimpressed face didn’t change. However she did nod to him. “Good. Now I trust you will be able to make it to the armory without having to act like a buffoon?”

“Y-yes ma’am.”

“As you were then.” 

Jaune turned and continued down the hall, no longer running, but still with some speed in his step. As he quickly walked down the hallway, he didn’t notice Winter was staring after him.

Or more specifically his ass in those tight, navy blue pants. 

After a few seconds of staring, Winter seemed to catch what she was doing and looked away with a quiet awkward cough into her fist. She looked around quickly to see if anyone saw her, and sighed in relief when she saw that she was by herself in the hallway intersection. Winter composed herself and continued on with what she was doing before bumping into Jaune, but the Arc’s behind still prevalent in her thoughts.