NOVEL NEXT Chapter 16: Pyrrha Nikos Pt. 2
Hm, as much as Indi had been making bedroom eyes for the past month, Jaune had to admit… she just wasn’t that interesting. It maybe wasn’t the kindest thing to say about a person, but then in all fairness to him, he wasn’t SAYING it, he was thinking it. And quite frankly, after spending the past couple years living with the Queen of the Grimm, a blind MILF of a huntress, and Salem’s protégé Cinder, Jaune’s standards were a fair bit higher.
Which was why it was as much a surprise to him as it likely would be anyone else who knew him that Lieutenant Pyrrha Nikos met those standards. There was just something about her that drew his eye. Well, you know what they said. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Making his way over to the bar, Jaune orders a drink and ignores the gobsmacked expression from the bartender when he asks for it to be sent over to the table with all the soldiers at it. As soon as he’s done paying, he meanders his way over to that corner, smiling brightly and welcomingly, even as his presence draws their attention. Their cold, frosty, unwelcoming attention.
Indeed, the Mistralian Soldiers who have come to defend Shion had been all smiles and even quite talkative, but upon his approach, they shut down, all of their eyes turning unfriendly as they look to him and stare. Jaune supposes if he were someone else, he might have been promptly cowed and backed off, but in truth, he only has eyes for one of them at the moment… Lieutenant Pyrrha Nikos.
The green-eyed red head looks surprised to see him again so soon, sitting up straight in her seat as she blinks owlishly at his smile and nod.
“Lieutenant Nikos. Good to see you again! Mind if I have a seat?”
He’s one hundred percent trying to override her subordinates by putting the ball in her court before they can get a word in edgewise. Unfortunately, he’s not sure Pyrrha recognizes that fact… nor is she quick enough on the draw to answer him before one of her soldiers does. No, she’s too caught off guard, which in all fairness, is probably his fault.
“Excuse me, who hell are you?”
As one of the Mistralian soldiers rises from the table and gets in his face, Jaune… does something at least a little inadvisable. He gives the man a grin and the same opening line he gave Pyrrha, even as he holds out his hand to shake.
“The name’s Jaune Arc. Short, sweet, and rolls of the tongue. Ladies love it.”
The soldier’s eyes bulge out of his head in outrage at Jaune’s audacity. He looks down at Jaune’s hand like it’s a snake about to bite him, and like Jaune himself is scum beneath his boot. He opens his mouth to speak, but whatever he’s about to say never comes out because…
“Heh!”
In the silence that’s ensued at Jaune’s approach of the soldier’s corner, a sudden snicker erupts and breaks it. All eyes turn towards its source, as Lieutenant Pyrrha Nikos covers her treacherous mouth, face aflame with embarrassment. His little repeat joke had gotten her in a way it’d gotten no one else, and Jaune can’t help but feel a burst of pride that he made her laugh, as small as that laugh may have been.
To her credit, as soon as she realizes all eyes are on her, the Lieutenant lowers her hand and straightens her back, squaring her shoulders as she looks at her soldier and Jaune.
“Private Cole, this is Jaune Arc, assistant to the local shopkeeper. He helped me greatly in securing the platoon’s supplies for the next month earlier today.”
Jaune watches carefully, as Pyrrha’s words wash over the entire platoon. Private Cole in particular looks like he’s swallowed a sour lemon, while several of the other soldiers are looking to Jaune with a newfound appreciation. It’s clear, if nothing else, that the Lieutenant’s word means a lot to her soldiers. They respect her, quite a bit, in spite of her awkwardness when it comes to leadership.
Looking back to Jaune, Private Cole stiffens when he realizes Jaune is still holding out his hand to shake. At this point, snubbing Jaune would be the same as snubbing Lieutenant Nikos. In the end, the private has no choice. Reaching forward, he grabs Jaune’s hand, enveloping it in his own, the equivalent of a bearpaw. Private Cole is a big guy, though from a cursory glance, not faunus… just big.
Regardless, he does his level best to do what men have been doing since the dawn of diplomacy and tries to crush Jaune’s hand under the guise of a ‘friendly’ handshake. Maybe Jaune should let it happen, maybe he should feign pain or discomfort… but he can’t help himself. He’s been holding back ever since he came to Mistral, and while he expects to continue holding back for some time to come… here and now, in this moment, feigning pain from an unfriendly handshake just isn’t something he feels he should have to put up with.
And so, instead of the grimace that Private Cole is no doubt expecting, Jaune smiles widely and pumps the private’s hand up and down a few times, taking complete control of the handshake with an ease that speaks a little bit to his true statement. The baffled surprise on the big Mistralian soldier’s face is a treat to be sure, even as Jaune’s drink arrives a moment later and Jaune takes it from Indi with his free hand.
Smiling brightly around the table as he finally lets Private Cole’s hand go, Jaune ultimately locks eyes with Pyrrha.
“Mind if I sit with you all, Lieutenant?”
Some shuffling from the soldiers at that, and Private Cole continues to look sour as he retakes his seat, but after a moment of surprise and collecting herself, Pyrrha nods… and even offers what Jaune notes is a genuine smile to him.
“Feel free, Jaune.”
And so Jaune finds himself sitting down with a platoon of Mistral’s not-so-finest and making small talk with them. This was at least part of why he was here in Mistral in general and Shion in specific, after all. To get a better perspective on the war that was breaking out between the human Kingdoms. What better perspective then an up close and personal look at the soldiers of the aggressor Kingdom?
So far, what Jaune saw… it made him feel a little queasy if he was being honest. This platoon… they were kids. And sure, he was a kid too if one wanted to quibble over details. But he was also millions of years old, if people wanted to go there. He had MILLIONS of Grimm experiences in his head, all condensed down. Memories of war and battle and violence to be called upon.
… Not so much in the social department, given that was JUST his memories as Jaune Arc, and Jaune Arc had been pretty young when he and his father had died, but all the same… he wasn’t a child, for all that he looked the same age as these soldiers.
On the other hand, Lieutenant Nikos and her troops seemed so far out of their league it wasn’t even funny. If these were the kind of people that Mistral was fielding, Jaune had to wonder if the war would really go in their favor.
Except no, he knew better than that. Mistral’s true strength lay not in quality, but in quantity. This platoon was… one of hundreds, possibly even thousands. There was a reason Mistral was playing at going up against the technologically advanced Atlas, after all. Well two reasons from what Glynda had told him. One, aura and semblances could be the great equalizer. And two… Mistral’s population was enormous, compared to the cold weather nation of Atlas.
That didn’t make it any easier for Jaune to imagine Lieutenant Nikos and her soldiers, even the sourpuss Private Cole, going into battle against Atlesian Mechs and dying all so some Mistralian Councilor could claim more land for themselves. No, it didn’t make it any easier at all…
Eventually, the Mistralian soldiers begin to relax a bit more around Jaune. Until one of them snickers and nudges the blond boy with his elbow.
“Tell it to us straight then, shopkeeper’s assistant Jaune Arc. You really came over here because you wanted to bask in the presence of the great and mighty Champion Nikos some more, didn’t you? Heh, didn’t get enough of her back at your store, hm?”
He’s not talking quietly, this new soldier, but when Jaune glances to the Lieutenant, she’s hiding her blush behind a mug, looking dreadfully embarrassed but not speaking up. And indeed, the other soldiers are all nodding their agreement, like it’s obvious that’s exactly what Jaune was doing. Hm, maybe he should have gone along with it… but lying didn’t feel like it would get him the information he was after, especially when he didn’t actually know what they were talking about.
“Sorry, I’m not sure what you mean. Champion Nikos? I thought she was a Lieutenant?”
Another hush falls over the platoon, as even Pyrrha looks at him with wide, relieved eyes. Indeed, glancing at the red head, she peers at him searchingly for a moment… and then actually looks grateful that he doesn’t know who she is. Really? What’s up with that? Meanwhile, the baffled soldier who tried to rib him shakes his head and furrows his brow, suddenly looking more serious.
“Excuse me? Are you saying you don’t know THE Pyrrha Nikos? Winner of the Mistral Regional Tournament four years in a row? She’s a Champion! She’d still be competing, if not for this damn conscription!”
Jaune can tell that the soldier is getting worked up here, and so he does his best to placate him, letting out a sheepish laugh as he raises his hands in defeat.
“Sorry, sorry! I’m new to the area, you see, so I don’t know things that you locals would know. But… I know now. Pleasure to meet your acquaintance properly, Champion Nikos.”
For a moment, Pyrrha’s face falls at the address, but he makes sure to catch her eye without anyone else noticing and winks. The red head flushes at that, looking taken aback for a second, before smiling shyly and nodding almost imperceptibly. Jaune figures that it’ll be laid to rest at that… but not quite, unfortunately.
“New to the area? New to Shion… or new to Mistral?”
Blinking, suddenly feeling like he’s being given the third degree by the suspicious soldier, Jaune shrugs and answers honestly.
It strikes him a moment later, as a dark shadow passes over the soldier’s face, that admitting to not being a Mistralian Native might have been a bad idea, in hindsight. Whoops. However, before the dour mood can take a turn for the worst, Pyrrha speaks up again, once more breaching the quiet and calm.
“Enough. Drop it, Private Alister.”
Immediately, the second soldier he’s inadvertently pissed off today pulls back, grimacing as he looks to his Lieutenant.
“Ma’am, I-!”
But Pyrrha’s frosty voice overrides him, the red head sounding downright icy.
“I said, drop it.”
Conversation from that point on has a tense undercurrent to it all the same, and eventually… eventually Jaune bows out, taking his leave and heading back to his lodgings for the evening. He didn’t quite find out as much as he might have wanted, though he also found out more than he thought he might. Still, Pyrrha Nikos was an interesting character to say the least. Deeply uncomfortable with leadership, and yet also deeply respected by her soldiers. All thanks to a fame she almost didn’t seem like she wanted to have.
It was all very intriguing. Jaune would have to wait and see what happened next in the small town of Shion.
-x-X-x-
“I’m telling you, Lieutenant, he’s a spy! We should take him into custody and question him at the very least!”
Pyrrha Nikos raises a hand to her forehead and rubs it tiredly. This… she really just wanted to go to bed. But a leader’s work was never done. And the moment they’d gotten back from the tavern, her soldiers had started in on this. Private Alister was leading the charge with Private Cole backing him up… but if it were just the two of them, Pyrrha would have silenced them already. Unfortunately, it’s not.
“I-I think he’s right, ma’am. This Jaune Arc character… he doesn’t know who you are. He admitted to being new to Mistral…”
One of the platoon’s female soldiers, a Private Lorelei, licks her lips as she nervously expresses her agreement. And as Pyrrha looks at the rest of her platoon, she sees them nodding as well.
“He… he could just be what he says though? A world traveler?”
Grim-faced, Private Alister shakes his head, arms crossed over his chest.
“Why would he approach us then? Why would he cozy up to us and get all nice and close? He doesn’t know who you are… but he knows who we are, what we all represent. He’s a spy, ma’am. I don’t want it to be true anymore than you do, but he’s clearly trying to find information. And…”
Here, Private Alister looks distraught, like he really doesn’t want to say what he has to say. When Pyrrha hears his next words, she understands why… he hates having to disparage her.
“He already has a list of our supplies, doesn’t he ma’am? That… we need to get on top of this, before he can get that or any other information to whoever he’s working for.”
Pyrrha blanches. It… she didn’t want to believe it to be true. Jaune Arc had seemed so sweet, and kind. But the more she thought about it, the more she knew her soldiers had a point. It WAS odd to run into someone here in Mistral who didn’t recognize her by name, if not on sight. It was even odder to run into a self-proclaimed ‘world traveler’ out here in a backwater town like Shion.
And… if Jaune was a spy, he DID have information about them, didn’t he? Information that SHE had given him when she’d stopped by the town general store to pick up their supplies. It wasn’t… she didn’t think the supplies were tainted or anything like that, but still. Still… could she really afford to risk it?
Pyrrha’s instincts were at war with each other. On the one hand, she wanted to tell her troops to just drop it and let it go, to tell them that there was no threat in Jaune Arc. But on the other… if they were right and she did that, she would never forgive herself. Still, if she did let them take Jaune into custody, could she really allow her soldiers to be the one to interrogate him? No… it would have to be her, wouldn’t it?
Trying to keep her anxiety from showing in every fiber of her being, Pyrrha focuses, thinking hard about the choice she’s about to make and just who’s life she might be about to ruin…