//------------------------------//
// The Changing World (New) 
// Story: SAPR 
// by Scipio Smith 
//------------------------------//


The Changing World


“Salutations!” Penny cried, waving eagerly from the other side of the scroll. 
“Hi, Penny!” Ruby called out from where she sat on a chair, waving back. “You’re okay!”
“And so are you!” Penny yelled. “I’m sorry I couldn’t call sooner, I would have as soon as you woke up, except that I couldn’t because I was too badly damaged to move or speak.”
Ruby giggled. “It’s fine, Penny, I understand. I’m just glad that you’re better now.”
Penny smiled. “And are you better now too, Ruby?” she asked.
“Yep!” Ruby declared. “I’m one hundred percent combat ready and raring to go!”
“Where are you going?”
“Well, nowhere right now,” Ruby admitted. “But if I need to go anywhere, then nothing will stop me.”
“Ah, I understand,” Penny said. “I too am once more fully capable of autonomous motion, but have no destination to proceed to for now.”
Pyrrha laughed from where she stood at Ruby’s side and had to bend over in order for her face to be seen. “It’s wonderful to hear your voice again, Penny.”
“And it’s great to see you up and about too,” Jaune added; he was stood on the other side of Ruby, and likewise had to bend quite a bit in order to make himself seen by her.
“Thank you,” Penny replied. “It feels good to hear my own voice again as well. I was glad to be able to talk to people, but it was weird not sounding like me.”
“So how does it feel to be back on your feet?” Sunset asked. She was standing over Ruby and didn’t have to bend down quite as much as the other two in order to place her head just above that of Ruby herself. 
“It feels…” Penny thought about that for a moment. “It feels back to normal,” she concluded, “but better.”
“'Better,' eh?” Sunset asked. “That sounds promising.”
“Did they give you some upgrades while they were making the repairs?” Jaune asked.
“No,” Penny said. “I still possess all my previous capabilities.”
“Really?” Sunset couldn’t keep the surprise out of her voice. “Even after what happened? You’d have thought that they would have changed up some stuff. Even if it was only giving you new wires that were resistant to shocks.”
“I haven’t asked, because I don’t really know how to ask,” Penny said, “but I think that it may be hard to make changes to me, either practically or because my father would need to get approval first. And besides, I’m not sure that I’d want to be given a lot of upgrades while I was damaged and unable to move or respond. This is my body, and myself, and even though it isn’t perfect, it’s still mine. Having someone change it, replace parts of me, even to make them better, it would be like someone cutting your hand off to give you a prosthetic — even if the functionality was superior, you wouldn’t like it.”
Sunset winced. “You’ve got a good point there,” she muttered. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s alright, Sunset; I know what you meant,” Penny assured her. “And to be honest, I wouldn’t mind changing myself, but I want that to be my choice, and not something that anyone else decided for me, even if they had my best interests at heart.”
Pyrrha had a smile upon her face as she asked, “So what did you mean, Penny, when you said that you felt better than before?”
Penny was silent for a moment. “I feel as though Rainbow Dash and Ciel have been trying to understand me better,” she said. “To be honest, I’m still not sure Ciel actually does understand me, but she’s trying, and I think she might even end up understanding herself a little better too. I’m glad; I mean I’m glad that they’re trying, even if they don’t always succeed. I think they both understand that I don’t want what my father does, or General Ironwood, or the people who authorised my creation; I want what I want. I think they both realise that, even if Ciel doesn’t agree with it.”
“Doesn’t agree how?” demanded Ruby. “Does she think that you should do what other people want? Be what they want?”
“It’s not that bad,” Penny replied. “Well … maybe it is, but she doesn’t mean to be. She doesn’t think that I’ll be able to be anything other than what I am, and she doesn’t want me to be hurt.”
“And will you?” Sunset asked. “I mean, will you be allowed to be anything else?”
Penny paused for a moment. “I hope so,” she said quietly, her voice acquiring a touch of solemnity about it. “But even if I can’t, I’m still going to try!”
“I, for one, think that you’ll do it, Penny,” Pyrrha said.
“And if you need any help, you can always just ask us anytime,” Ruby added.
Penny’s smile lit up her eyes. “Thanks, girls. Thank you so much. I can’t believe how lucky I was to meet all of you.” She glanced at Sunset. “Sunset, do you know when—?”
“I haven’t heard back that that’s ready yet,” Sunset told her. “But I’ll pass on to Princess Twilight that you’re ready to go, and maybe I’ll get a response on where she is with getting the portal to work.”
“I can’t believe that Penny is getting to visit your home before we do,” Ruby groused mildly. “Not that I’m not happy for you, Penny, it’s just that—”
“It would feel really weird if you went to Equestria without me,” Sunset said. “Penny and Blake … it doesn’t feel as weird.”
“You know that the obvious thing there is for you to come with us, right?” Jaune pointed out.
“Sure,” Sunset murmured. “I’m just … not there yet.”
Silence greeted this particular pronouncement. Pyrrha reached out and awkwardly patted Sunset on the shoulder.
Sunset rolled her eyes. “Well, that killed the mood, didn’t it?”
“What do you mean?” Penny asked.
“Well, if you notice the way that—”
“What do you mean about not going back?” Penny explained impatiently. “Is something wrong?”
“With Equestria? No, you’re going to love it,” Sunset said quickly. “But I … would rather not talk about it.” She glanced left and right, as though she could see more of the room in which Penny stood than was currently visible in the scroll. “Are you on your own in there?”
“For now,” Penny said. “Rainbow and Ciel are getting ready.”
“Ready for what?” Pyrrha asked.
“Rainbow’s friends are holding a welcome home party,” Penny explained. “And Blake’s going too, even though she’s never been here before.”
“That sounds lovely,” Pyrrha said. “But don’t you need to get ready yourself? We wouldn’t want to keep you.”
“Oh, I was given a thorough cleaning as part of my repairs,” Penny declared. 
“I see,” Pyrrha murmured. “But perhaps you want to change into something different from usual?”
Penny was quiet for a moment. “That is a very good point,” she allowed. “I should probably do that. I’ll talk to you guys later!”
They all called out their goodbyes, the words mingling with one another, forming a morass of kindly sentiments and good wishes, before Penny hung up on her end, and Ruby’s scroll turned to black. 
Ruby snapped the device shut. “It’s good to know that she’s okay, isn’t it?”
“Not just okay,” Jaune reminded her. “Better.”
Ruby nodded. “Yeah, it’s good that … it’s good that they can recognise that they need to treat Penny … better than they did before.” 
For some reason she glanced at Sunset, and then at Pyrrha too. 
“Is everything okay?” Sunset asked.
Ruby hesitated for a moment. “Yeah,” she said. “Everything’s fine.”
“Are you sure?” inquired Pyrrha, her voice gentle.
Ruby looked down at the floor. She licked her lips. “Why did you cut me off in the city, with Arslan? You took her side over mine.”
Pyrrha took a step backwards from Ruby. She folded her arms, then seemed to realise what she was doing and consciously unfold them again. “That was not what I thought I was doing.”
“What did you think you were doing?”
“I was sparing you a duel,” Pyrrha explained. “Arslan told you herself that she would not have tolerated too much insult to her pride.”
“Is that what you thought I was doing? Insulting her?”
“It matters little what I thought you were doing,” Pyrrha pointed out. “Arslan found your words … too sharp.”
“I was surprised,” Sunset said. “You didn’t go for my jugular when you found out that I only came to Beacon for the … for the fame, the glory.” Celestia, what a fool I was.
Ruby shuffled uncomfortably on her seat. “That’s … different.”
One of Sunset’s eyebrows rose. “Different how?”
“You were still going to be a huntress,” Ruby pointed out. “Maybe not for the best reasons, but helping people is helping people, right? You weren’t going to spend four years here and then walk away at the end.” She frowned. “Do you think that I was right about Arslan, or not?”
“Does that matter?” Sunset asked. “It’s over and done with now.”
“It matters,” Ruby insisted. “Do you agree with me?”
“Yes,” Pyrrha said quietly, as if she feared that Arslan might hear her. “Arslan’s reasons for going to Haven are — or were, at least — rather selfish, and, to speak true, they verged upon the unworthy. I told her so myself, once.”
“But you didn’t want me to tell her the same thing?”
Pyrrha glanced away. “You … your tongue … you can be quite sharp when it comes to this sort of thing. I feared you would not be gentle with her. Arslan may not live up to — or have lived up to in the past — the standards of a true huntress, but at the same time … what point is there in telling her so now, as she is starting to change? Is it not enough that she is rethinking all of her past attitudes and considering committing herself properly to the path of a huntress?”
“What’s this about, Ruby?” demanded Sunset. “Why does it matter that Pyrrha stopped you from reaming Arslan out the way that you’d have liked?”
Ruby looked from Pyrrha to Sunset, then back again, then back to Sunset. She folded her arms and didn’t look at either of them, choosing to pout at the dorm room door instead. “I wish you guys would treat me like an equal, is all.”
“We don’t—” Sunset began, then stopped as Ruby looked at her. “Okay, yes, I do, and I will even admit that I do it on purpose, sometimes. In my defence, you are younger than me.”
“Not that much younger,” Ruby insisted. “And if I want to say something that gets Arslan so worked up she challenges me to a duel, that’s my business.”
Sunset raised one eyebrow. “You are aware of how childish it is to say ‘I’ll get beaten up if I want to,’ right?”
“I might win!” Ruby insisted. “You could both stand to have some faith in me as well.”
“I have a lot of faith in you, in certain situations,” Sunset declared. “But single combat against a Mistralian gladiator isn’t one of them.”
“You may not want to hear it, Ruby, but Sunset is right,” Pyrrha murmured. “You are a little deficient in fighting against other people, as opposed to grimm, whereas it is in fighting other people that Arslan excels. She would destroy you.”
“It should still be my choice,” Ruby muttered.
“Are we not allowed our care?” Pyrrha asked.
“You’re not allowed to take it as far as you like without reference to the people that you say that you care for,” Jaune declared, putting a hand on Ruby’s shoulder.
Pyrrha blinked. “That I ‘say’ I care for?”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Jaune said hastily. “I know how you feel, and so does Ruby, but that doesn’t change the fact that…” He trailed off for a moment. “I love you, and I know that I can always count on you if I’m in trouble,” he added to Sunset, looking at her over his shoulder. “But that doesn’t change the fact that this team is divided into two halves: people who do, and people who have things done to them. I know that we’ve already talked about this, Pyrrha, but the fact is that it applies to Ruby just like it applies to me.”
“I have promised to make my best endeavours in that regard,” Sunset declared defensively. “And the fact is that Ruby has also—”
“And we’ll hold Ruby to that, me included,” Jaune said. He glanced down at Ruby. “Sorry I can’t be one hundred percent on your side, but I’d hate to lose you either.”
Ruby let out half a sigh. “It’s okay,” she murmured. “I’ll take what I can get.”
“I think you’re being very melodramatic about this to describe yourselves as people who are done to,” Sunset said. “When have either of you really been done to by us?”
“Well…” Pyrrha said, her shamefacedness clear despite the softness of her tone as she began to play with her crimson sash with both hands. 
Sunset rolled her eyes. “Okay, when have I done things to you?”
“I can think of at least one example,” Jaune said heavily, his eyes fixed on Sunset.
Right. The Velvet thing. Sunset cleared her throat. “Well… that was in your best interests.”
“It’s always in our best interests — according to you, but we don’t get to make the decision for ourselves. And I think you know that I have a point as well; you just don’t like it.” Jaune said.
Sunset sucked in a sharp intake of breath. Of course there was an example of Sunset doing to Ruby and Jaune — and to Pyrrha as well, in this particular instance — it was just that Jaune — and Ruby, and Pyrrha — were unaware of it. 
“At times,” Pyrrha said, “I fear we love not wisely but too well.”
“And that’s one of the things that I love about you, you have such a good heart,” Jaune said. “A strong heart, in so many ways. But the fact that your feelings are so much stronger than ours doesn’t mean that ours don’t count or that you can just roll over ours and bury them beneath your own.”
“I have already given you my word,” Pyrrha whispered.
“I know,” Jaune said, with almost equal softness. “But perhaps you need to make a promise to Ruby as well.”
Pyrrha nodded stiffly, then bowed her head. “Forgive me, Ruby; it was not my place to intervene between you and Arslan, and I shall be more conscious of what is my place in regards to you in future.”
“You don’t have to be so formal about it,” Ruby said. “But … thanks. That would be great. I appreciate that you want to look out for me, I just … it doesn’t have to be so … all the time, you know?”
Pyrrha chuckled. “I think I do, yes. I will bear it in mind.” She looked at Jaune. “It is a flaw that has been pointed out to me already as one to correct. Hopefully, the future will show that I have done so.”
Ruby and Jaune both looked at Sunset, the latter turning around and the former twisting in her seat. 
“I’m trying my best!” Sunset squawked loudly. “I’m not going to say that I’ll change when I…” She took a deep breath, her chest rising and falling. “When I don’t know that I’ll be able to. I’ll try, but I make no promises, because I’d rather disappoint you now than break my word later. I know that it’s not the answer that you want, but … you know, one reason I’m not going to promise is that I don’t want you to feel exonerated from coming to meet me a little as well.” She ran one hand over her face and into her fiery hair. “If that sounded too defensive on my part, I apologise.” She retreated across the room and sat down heavily upon her bed. 
“Are you okay?” Ruby asked.
“I’m fine,” Sunset informed her, for all that it was not entirely true. “I am fine. I’m well enough. I’m doing okay.”
“That doesn’t sound like something someone okay would say,” Jaune said.
Sunset let out a little bark of laughter. “When did you become so perceptive?”
“This doesn’t really need a huge amount of perception,” Jaune replied.
“Sunset,” Pyrrha said. “Still…?”
Sunset smiled a smile which reached her eyes but sparked no joy in them, a sad smile, and a little wan. “For the moment yet, I’m afraid,” she said.
Pyrrha frowned, but before she could say anything else, both her and Sunset’s scrolls began to buzz at once. 
Sunset got out her scroll, which identified the caller as Lady Nikos. 
“My mother?” Pyrrha asked.
Sunset looked up at her. “You too?”
“Indeed,” Pyrrha replied. 
They both answered at once — and at the same time.
“Mother,” Pyrrha said.
“My lady,” Sunset said, getting up off the bed.
“Pyrrha, Miss Shimmer,” Lady Nikos replied, inclining her head to them both from out of the screen. “I hope that I am not disturbing you.”
“No, my lady, you are not,” Sunset said quickly, grateful for any disturbance that had, in fact, occurred.
Jaune stepped delicately, and with some tremor of nervousness in his step, over to Pyrrha’s side. He cleared his throat. “Uh, good afternoon, my lady.”
“It is presently my evening, Mister Arc, but never mind,” Lady Nikos said. She pursed her lips for a moment. “I spoke with Lord Rutulus today, at court,” she announced.
“Indeed,” Pyrrha replied coolly. “What did you say to one another?”
“He described you as demeaning yourself, and I rebuked him in consequence,” Lady Nikos said.
Pyrrha was quiet for a moment. “I see,” she said softly. “Thank you, Mother, for defending me. For defending us.”
“Yes, thank you, my lady,” Jaune added.
“Do you think that I would stand by and see you insulted?” Lady Nikos demanded. “Nevertheless, you are aware that there will be more of this the longer things go on.”
“I care not, Mother,” Pyrrha insisted. “My happiness is dearer to me than the good opinion of all the lords in Mistral.”
Lady Nikos was silent for a moment. “It will be hard for you, when you come home,” she said. “It will be hard on both of you.”
“Nevertheless,” Pyrrha murmured, but she could not stop her eyes from glancing uncertainly towards Jaune. 
Jaune took her free hand in his. “It may not be easy, my lady,” he said, “but I’ve found a lot of things don’t come easy to me since I started at Beacon, and I haven’t given up on any of them yet. It may not be easy, but it will be worth it.”
A faint blush of colour rose to Pyrrha’s cheeks, and a smile played upon her lips. 
“You have a silver tongue, Mister Arc,” Lady Nikos declared, in a voice that was one part exasperated but at the same time sounded one part almost amused. “I pray it does not lose its lustre. Miss Shimmer?”
“Yes, my lady?” Sunset asked.
“I understand that you have been very busy recently … forgive me, Miss Shimmer, Pyrrha; forgive me all of you; how is Miss Rose?”
“I’m okay,” Ruby called as she moved quickly to stand by Sunset, who lowered the scroll so that Lady Nikos could see Ruby’s face in it. 
“I’m awake, my lady, thank you for asking. I have been for a little while now.”
“My apologies, my lady; I should have thought to—”
“No apology is required, Miss Shimmer; I have no doubt that Miss Rose’s awakening was a moment of great feeling for you,” Lady Nikos said. “Too great to bear me in mind, I’m sure.” The corner of her lip twitched upwards. “Had it been Pyrrha in the hospital bed, I would not be so forgiving.”
Sunset chuckled. “Nor I have been so dilatory, my lady.”
Lady Nikos nodded. “Miss Rose, I am glad to see you recovered, and fully recovered by the looks of you.”
“Yes, my lady,” Ruby replied. “I feel fine now.”
“I am delighted to hear it,” Lady Nikos said. “The world into which you have embarked is perilous, but your line shows valour, passed from your mother to yourself, and it would be a great tragedy for Vale, I deem, if that line were to end with you because you perished too young.”
Ruby hesitated, her mouth opening and then closing again. She played with her hands, turning her fingers over one another. “Nobody has ever put it quite like that before, my lady.”
“That does not surprise me; you are all rather young to think of such things,” Lady Nikos replied. “Although if the young were to give more thought to such considerations, that might be no bad thing. In any case, I think it will do you no ill to remember my words, Miss Rose, and to ask yourself whether you wish to be the last flowering of your name, however brilliant that flowering might be, or whether you wish to bequeath Vale a garden of Roses to follow in your footsteps, as you have followed in those of your mother.” She paused for a moment. “In any event, I am glad to see you well. As I was saying, Miss Shimmer.”
“Yes, my lady?”
“I am not unmindful of the fact that you have been preoccupied recently,” Lady Nikos said, “and yet, now that the semester is over and there is some time before the Vytal Festival, it would be of great use if you could find some information regarding Mister Arc’s lineage.”
“Still, Mother?” Pyrrha exclaimed. “Haven’t you—?”
“No longer for the sake of my pride, but for your comfort,” Lady Nikos interrupted. “As I said, it will not be easy for you, but it will be easier if you can present Mister Arc as something more than … well, more.”
“I understand, and I apologise for the lack of progress upon this front, my lady, just as I thank you for your understanding,” Sunset murmured. She licked her lips. “May I ask … to what level of scrutiny must any claims we make hold up?”
Lady Nikos’ jade eyes narrowed. “Are you suggesting that Pyrrha, and Mister Arc, and even myself should lie to Mistral, Miss Shimmer?”
“I take it that is a no, my lady,” Sunset murmured.
“In truth, that is my surprise that you would suggest such a thing,” Lady Nikos replied, with amusement very close at hand within her voice.
“I would never have deceived you, my lady,” Sunset lied.
“Hmm,” Lady Nikos said, leaving Sunset in some doubt as to whether she was believed or not. “I think it would need to be a deception of the highest quality in order to deceive all who would need to be taken in by it. Have you given up hope of finding any actual evidence?”
“No, my lady, I merely … you know that the chance of Jaune turning out to be something other than what he is are slim.” Sunset looked up from her scroll. “But Jaune is going home soon, so perhaps you could ask some questions about your family history while you’re there.”
“Uh, yeah,” Jaune said, although he didn’t sound very sure about it. “Yeah, I guess I could. We Arcs have lived there for a few years, so maybe something will turn up. No harm in trying, I suppose.”
“Thank you, Mister Arc; that seems to be the least you can do,” Lady Nikos said.
“Mother,” Pyrrha said reproachfully.
“You must allow me some prickliness, Pyrrha; I cannot make my peace wholeheartedly with this so swiftly,” Lady Nikos insisted. “But I will let the matter lie, for now, and hope that that will satisfy you. I did not, as it happens, call in order to badger Mister Arc nor to praise him, but because the court of Mistral met today, and I thought that you might be interested to learn what was decided there.”
“Thank you, my lady,” Sunset said. “As you can imagine, we are on tenterhooks to know whether Pyrrha will still be with us for the Vytal Festival.”
“Sunset,” Pyrrha said. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“But you might be pressed to go somewhere, and it would be as well if you were not,” Sunset replied.
“No one will be pressing Pyrrha to go anywhere,” Lady Nikos said. “Nor any Haven student, or indeed any student of Mistralian birth. The lords and ladies took the view that it would seem ridiculous, and perhaps cowardly also, to bring our students home when the danger was passed when we had left them there when the danger was real and present. Whatever one thinks about the wisdom of that, the choice was made and cannot be changed or unmade now. I believe it helped that nobody truly wished to see Haven pull out of the Vytal Tournament. Nobody expects Haven to win — or at least, nobody would dare to say so in my presence — but there is some chatter around Arslan Altan and some hope for a better showing than in recent years.”
Sunset grinned. “And of course, Pyrrha’s glory will be taken to shine on Mistral, my lady, for all that she be a Beacon student.”
“Of course, Miss Shimmer,” Lady Nikos said, a smile of her own playing upon her aged features. “Ought it be any other way?”
“Not at all, my lady.”
“What is Mistral going to do about its security, Mother?” Pyrrha asked. “Lady Terri-Belle seemed concerned, or at least concerned enough to ask me to come home to Mistral not as a student, but as a huntress.”
“That was also a subject of discussion,” Lady Nikos said. “It pains me to confess it, but our situation is not as one might desire. Many huntsmen have set out on missions and failed to return; it is said that if the Breach had occurred in Mistral, then we would not have been able to withstand the grimm, short of the Atlesian assistance you possessed in Vale.”
“I … can see why some think that,” Pyrrha said softly. “I do not wish to believe it either, but when I think back to what we encountered there … I am forced to agree.”
“There is no way that Mistral could have been breached as Vale was,” Sunset pointed out.
“And yet, if a horde of grimm even approached the walls, what then?” Pyrrha asked.
“What are you going to do about it?” Ruby asked.
“Many things, which may or may not make a difference,” Lady Nikos said. “Lord Rutulus is reaching out to the SDC on behalf of Mistral to purchase combat androids; there is talk of raising an army, although that will take time and will be small in number at first, and we are going to sell our mothballed warships to Vale and use the money to buy newer, more impressive models.”
“Surely it would be better to put your airships in the air, my lady,” Sunset said. “Better to have something flying than something better in the yard.”
“It could be argued so,” Lady Nikos conceded. “Perhaps the Steward doesn’t feel the situation is quite that urgent.”
“Do you think it is?” Jaune asked. “That urgent, I mean?”
Lady Nikos did not immediately reply. “This business of our disappearing huntsmen is worrying,” she said. “Especially considering the wave of attacks that our villages endured during your vacation in Mistral. There is, as yet, no sign that it is developing into anything more, but … your father, Pyrrha, always told me that the grimm were mindless beasts, and yet, at present, there are times when it seems that it is not so.”
“Father told you the truth, as he understood it,” Pyrrha replied delicately. “But there is so much that we don’t know about the grimm; our professors can study them for years and still only scratch the surface.”
“A worrying thought,” Lady Nikos murmured. “As I say, it is troubling, and yet, if it were not so, then I would not be concerned, for there are no other clouds on the horizon.”
“Do you think that the right decisions have been made, my lady?” Sunset asked.
“That remains to be seen, Miss Shimmer; I am not a prophet,” Lady Nikos replied. “And yet I have trouble seeing how other decisions could have been made.” She paused. “I feel as though I may have said too much; I would not want to distract you from the upcoming tournament, Pyrrha.”
“Mother, with everything that has happened, I am not sure there is anything you could say or not say that would distract me more than I already am.”
“That will not do,” Lady Nikos said, her voice sharpening. “There will be no victory without focus.”
“Does it matter, now?” Pyrrha demanded. “I know that you have dreamed of this, I know that you want me to win the tournament on your behalf, but with everything else that’s going on—”
“What else is going on?” Lady Nikos inquired. “The battle is over, is it not?”
Pyrrha hesitated. “Yes,” she said, after a moment. “But at the same time … it makes tournaments and triumphs seem a little irrelevant, don’t you think?”
“Then when will they be relevant?” Lady Nikos shot back. “There will always be battles, there will always be threats, there will always be things besides which the Vytal Festival pales by comparison, and yet, it goes on nonetheless, and is accorded value in the eyes of men.”
“We must live,” Sunset murmured.
Pyrrha looked at her, a touch of sharpness in her emerald eyes.
“You said it first, not me,” Sunset said. “But if you really believe this, then I’ll tell you what I told Skystar when she started to feel that way: it’s after big things have gone on that people need to escape from their lot the most. They need to see a show to make them feel better, and they deserve the best show in town, and right now, that’s you, Pyrrha Nikos, the Invincible Girl and everything else besides.” She smiled. “Think of it as a duty that you owe, Shepherd of the People.” Her smile turned into something almost vicious. “And besides, are you really telling me that the thought of winning the greatest tournament in the whole of Remnant doesn’t appeal to you?”
Pyrrha drew in a breath. “The thought of victory does appeal to me,” she admitted. “I am not free from vanity or pride.”
“And we wouldn’t have it any other way,” Sunset assured her. “Trust me, my lady, when I say that we shall deliver Pyrrha into the one on one; you may depend on us.”
“I have,” Lady Nikos said. “And I shall continue to do so. Goodnight, Miss Shimmer; goodnight, Pyrrha; goodnight, all of you.”
“Goodnight, Mother.”
“Goodnight, my lady,” Sunset said as Lady Nikos hung up on them.
Sunset shut her scroll, and put it away. “So,” she said. “That … was some news.”
“Sunset’s right,” Jaune said. “Even if you were never going to leave, it’s good that you won’t have to put up with anyone telling you that you ought to go.”
“I suppose that is some comfort,” Pyrrha conceded. “But more to me is this news of Mistral raising an army.”
“Atlas has an army,” Ruby pointed out. “And so does Vale, even if it doesn’t seem to be very good at the moment. Vacuo doesn’t, but Vacuo … well, it’s Vacuo, isn’t it? But there’s no reason why Mistral shouldn’t have an army, is there?”
“No, I suppose not,” Pyrrha admitted. “But we have done without for nearly seventy years; ever since the end of the Faunus Rights Revolution, there has been no need for an army. The huntsmen have always been sufficient to keep Mistral safe, despite the vastness of its territories.”
“Or because of them?” Ruby suggested. “Maybe they’ll find out that their soldiers aren’t very good at protecting the outlying villages and towns, because they can’t work alone or in small groups the way that a huntsman can.”
“Perhaps,” Pyrrha murmured. She drifted away from Jaune, walking to the window seat and sitting down upon it, looking out of the window across the school grounds. 
A sigh escaped her.
Sunset began to walk around the beds towards her. “What are you thinking?”
“Vale is looking to strengthen its forces,” Pyrrha said. “And now Mistral as well? What if this was Cinder’s plan all along?”
Sunset folded her arms. “You’re giving her too much credit.”
Pyrrha glanced back at her. “What makes you so sure?”
“Because she’s an impulsive idiot who isn’t half as smart as she thinks she is,” Sunset said. We have that in common, too. “She isn’t capable of thinking that many moves ahead, or of predicting the outcomes like that.”
“Salem might be,” Pyrrha pointed out.
“But why?” Jaune asked. “What would either of them get out of it? How does it help Salem if the kingdoms are stronger?”
“I … don’t know,” Pyrrha admitted. “Perhaps I simply don’t like the fact that the world is changing.”
“But we can’t stop the change; we just have to live with it,” Ruby said. “Things change, and we just have to accept them and move on.”
Pyrrha smiled at her. “I know,” she said softly. “I just,” — she looked out of the window once more — “wish we knew what was coming next.”