7

When Winter finally arrived at her room where she had lived from the time she moved from her...

Home.

She breathed out deeply as she supported herself against the closed doors.

"Mother and General?" A whisper left her mouth as she tried to get her bearings back. It was just too surreal...

Her mother, the woman who drank herself to darkness every day for past years, the woman that gave up on everything...

But then...

Winter wouldn't lie. She still had memories of better times, or better yet, exactly of times when her mother did try, when she still didn't drink other than one glass at mealtime and one before bed...

Winter didn't remember when her mother changed. What she remembered that is was in a time when she and her father had a lot of disagreements that most often resulted in screaming matches, making Winter of that time hiding under her bed covers.

Of the times when her mother came to her room, her make-up fully destroyed from tears, and she laid herself behind the shaking little herself, taking her into a hug as mother buried her head into her hair...

Most than then than not, whispering that she is 'sorry' when Winter played that she slept...

It became worse when her mother stopped going into her room at night, rather starting to drink wine on more occasions, those times the shouting matches became bigger...

Winter didn't know what they were shouting at each other, but now that she thought of it, and after three months of investigation, she understood now that the shouting mostly began when her father took the reins of SDC company, buying even mother's share of the company, and started with his changes...

First, he changed some policies her grandfather made. Now that Winter thought of it, it was probably one of the biggest reasons her father and mother were shouting at each other...

As Winter was preparing her tea to calm her nerves and thoughts, one memory jumped into her mind.

Quickly forgetting the kettle with hot water, Winter ran to her closet, where she hid one of her more rare and personal possessions, a box...

"Where is it? I know it should be here." She took that box with her when she left home, fearing that her father would destroy it from spite or her mother would spill her wine on it when she looked at it in one of her more messy drinking bouts.

"Here!" Winter quickly looked at the photo she found in the box full of her's, Weiss, and Whitley's childhood photos, one special one that was taken when Weiss was mere two years old, and the hatred between father and mother was one of the biggest ones, at that time Winter could overhear one of their shouting matches...

One where father blamed mother that he had no male heirs of his own, but that was just one of many reasons they fought against each other, and yet one of most blaring ones...

Interestingly, these shouting matches stopped when Whitley was born. In truth, it seemed that her father no longer even visited her mother's room...

It was one of the rare photos where the mother still smiled at her and Weiss, not the mocking or drunken smile or that one where she was clearly in her memories and thoughts. No, this was still a time when her mother truly smiled at her and Weiss...

Pained, sad, but loving smile...

"Ironwood tree..." Winter whispered in shock...

Because on the photo was her mother, her and little Weiss, but what was now striking, and most obvious, was something Winter didn't realize...

Was that her mother wore a simple necklace, one that was glaringly simple, a long stretch from these ones elaborated or clearly simple yet costly made accessories her mother or other wealthy people wore to show their wealth...

No, this one was simple, crude, and like a punch in the face...

The necklace shows an Ironwood tree that was fully covered in snow, with snowflakes falling all around in the form of a Schnee family symbol...

"Oh, mother..." Winter painfully whispered...

"Just now, you started to regret it truly, or was it much before?" The funny thing to Winter was that she could remember that there was some love between her father and mother, but when he started to change SDC and dye his hair white, Winter could guess that was the breaking point...

Just the sound of the kettle hissing awakened Winter from her thoughts of her mother as she hurried back to the simply made kitchen...

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"And these?" General asked, and Winter held herself from saying anything. She had questions, a lot of them, especially about the thing General said when she came this morning...

That he confided to her that his previous day's reminiscing and elaborating about the past wasn't truly fair to both her mother and father...

That he, after years, again remembered the pain he felt at that time made his words unfair to all parties and made himself seem as the sole good guy in the story, and that if she wanted to again speak of it, she could ask, and he would truly try to speak objectively, and not through the tinted colored glass...

Winter wanted to ask, but then miss Moon came into the office to say that they had an appointment for an R&D department update, and Winter shoved her personal problems back. She understood that they had duties to do before any personal problem they could have.

"These are additions we made. After numerous tests, we learned that even if our prediction algorithm was able to somehow, with a 90% of success, guess a standard Grimms and 65% guess an intelligent Grimms or humanoid enemies, next position, our testers weren't capable of keeping up with their speed, rather needing to already aim to where the system showed them the enemy would by." One of the leading scientists said, making Winter nod. Even if that was less than she wanted, or what General surely wanted, Winter could guess that this was already a great success with how short a time span they made it...

Winter wondered what they could already have if they had more time, but with how things progressed, she knew that General would want to pursue this project's advances, maybe even adding more personnel and lien into it...

Winter wasn't surprised that the numbers fell down when the enemy was thinking and an intelligent being that could change their tactics or actions and directions pattern on the move.

Young Grimms were easy to predict, and older ones were hard and ancient. Even Winter sometimes had problems predicting or keeping track of their movements.

In these cases, Winter was glad for her dilation or slowing glyphs but understood that most didn't have such luxury.

"So the problem now rests mainly in hand-to-eye coordination and natural soldiers' speed to keep their weapons on the target. Am I right?" General Ironwood asked, and one of the technicians nodded his head as he showed another image by clicking on the scroll, projecting schemas on...

Was this a shoulder gun and multiple different traps? Winter didn't let her mouth fall open, but these images were far from the graceful and sleek designs Atlas military used. Maybe it was just because it was so early in development?

"Yes, that was our precise thoughts, and with collaboration from the department of weapon production, we gained these experimental weapons. They didn't build them because at that time they lacked sufficient understanding of complex programming, but with our new progress in enemy/friend tagging, we are capable of testing their usefulness." Winter looked at the gun that was supposed to be on a soldier's shoulders. It looked...

Bulky...

"Hm? This gun... It doesn't shoot standard ammunition, does it, a laser?" General asked. Winter could almost see the interest and curiosity in his eyes shone, so rare...

Winter knew of the General's Semblance. These past few months, Winter saw General utilizing it every time he had to make hard decisions, mostly in cases when they had little information and there were high chances of deaths on these missions for the soldiers.

"Yes! You have a good eye, General! This gun isn't a standard gun that shoot's some slugs nor energy like a laser. This gun's projectile isn't visible, at least not to the normal eye. This prototype utilizes a gravity Dust as what it shoots is a Gravitational beam that slows the things in the area it hits." The scientist, one quite petite woman, said, a grin stretched on her face. She was a mouse faunus, no matter what most said. Winter, with her own eyes, saw a lot of faunus in Atlas military, with most of them being accepted, as the sense of comradely of brother in the arms had its effects on the soldiers...

If this was the case in more of Atlas, Winter wasn't so sure, but she knew that Atlas military mostly treated everyone equally, at least from the time General Ironwood became both General and Headmaster...

"So with the combination of this gravity gun and our aim algorithm, the battlefield would balance for our soldiers." Winter simply asked and gained few looks from the people present as this was the first time she spoke...

Winter could see the cold look the mouse scientist briefly had before it quickly passed away as she looked at her...

But then, Winter mostly gained a lot of such looks from the faunus in Academy and later in the military...

"Specialist Schnee asked you for something." The quietness was broken as a few people shook themselves from their thoughts, and the lead scientist nodded his head.

"Yes, as Specialist Schnee pointed out, this is just one of our many ideas for using our prediction algorithm. Of course, we have many more." At this, the images showed weapons and other projects and devices that would be supposedly helpful to our Altas' soldiers...

From the images of automatic defense turrets that could keep up with the enemy's quick movement to a normal-looking weapon on the soldier's shoulders that shoots normal ammunition and not some Gravitational beam...

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"The inspection, what is the progress?" The General asked once they were back in his office, making Winter straighten herself as she took out her scroll and read the reports.

"It's... As you guessed, Sir, all of the already inspected mines and processing plants had abysmal working conditions, just ranging from the more sympathetic overseers to those who are absolutely racist or wish to gain the most profits no matter how many lives they should ruin." Winter held back her seething emotions at what she read.

She knew it would be like this. She told herself that she was prepared to face the truth, but this?

Winter wanted to...

Wanted to...

Winter didn't know what, but and thought of striking her own father didn't sound so bad in her mind just right now...

"Why they didn't revolt... Specialist, what were SDC's security measures in these places?" General Ironwood asked, his face set in a thoughtful frown. Winter blinked at his words but read the report.

"Mostly automatic defenses and squads of AKs, rarely with any other... There were some huntsmen mercenaries on the sites, and from what the inspector said, there were more of them, but with the knowledge of inspection coming in, they fled. Just the slower ones were taken to custody after trying to flee or fighting the inspectors' security teams." Did they dare to attack the Council inspectors?

What were they thinking? Were they in for so long in power that they thought they could run with the attack on Atlas envoys without repercussions?

What was her father thinking in employing these people?!

"...Hm... The Council will have no other way than to punish Jacques and the entire SDC leading board of members if they don't wish to invite riots and Grimm hordes after this news comes out..." Winter gulped, the negative amount of emotions that would be born of this if the Atlas Council tried to protect SDC board members...

It would be a catastrophe...

"Winter, I know that you already made your view clear, but are you sure you wish to be part of this?" General Ironwood once again asked, and when Winter looked, she could see the concern for her well-being clear in his eyes...

Her father never showed anything like this to her...

Even her mother stopped when she was becoming older...

It... Made her feel safe...

"Yes, Sir... I need to do this. It's my duty as both Atlas Specialist and member of the Schnee family." Winter resolutely said, she didn't gulp as General Ironwood judged her face for a few moments, and she tried to push down the warmth it brought her when he nodded at her and tried to ignore and not see the brief upward movement of General's lips.

And the feeling of accomplishment she didn't feel in such a long time.

I'm sorry, Weiss, Whitley... It seems I will hurt you again, but I will make it up to you after the father is dealt with...

Winter sadly thought about her siblings and mother but made up her mind. Most of their problems came because of their father, but if he is gone, then maybe they could mend their broken family back...

Winter would try...

She didn't desire to see what could happen if she failed...

Mother...