The Spear

"So this is everything?" Arthur asked as he stared at the workbench covered with various gears, cogs, metal pieces, his two spear heads as well as two curved metal rods to make the handle and a large sniper rifle that he would be using in the weapon.

"Right; this should be everything you need to put it together into a workable state, making it pretty comes later" professor Mulberry explained, "Well, as I said, this is your problem, I'm going to work on my own projects, let me know when you're done and I'll give you those dust lances" he said also looking around the room, "By the way, where's Ruby? I remember her saying she wanted to give you some tips"

"Sleeping, apparently two days of work has gotten to her" he chuckled getting a sigh from Mulberry.

"Aye, she'll get used to it after a year, I don't know any good huntress who cant's stay half a week awake without collapsing" he muttered, "Well, I'll let you get to it, piece of advice, keep the handle and blade apart until they're both built, just save yourself the pain"

"Got it" he replied, taking his seat at the head of the workbench in front of the blueprint which had all the numerous parts overlaid on top of it, with extremely rough guidelines on how to put it together.

"So, what should I start with?" He muttered, not expecting to get an answer but did anyways as his tome appeared across the table from him Ashe on screen pinching her chin, "I'd say the hinge between the blade and the shaft, we can ignore the third mode for now, I'd say focus on getting the first shift under control, then handle get the wiring in that done and get it able to extend properly then the blade" she nodded.

"Right, simple enough" he said, completely unsure if it was actually as simple as he thought. Looking across the various part on the workbench Arthur first picked up a large metal piece, well as large as it was about the size of his hand when held open, on one end it had two openings in the top and bottom of it where the handle and barrel of the rifle would go for the pistol mode as well as another smaller section for any wires or tubes.

On the other side it two circular plates each separated from each other with enough space that the blade could fit into it tight enough that it didn't wobble but not so that became unmovable, these two circular parts also having a large holes in the centre of them where he could rivet them onto the blade.

"Okay, so… where the hell do I even start?" he mumbled, reading over the diagram and instructions for the rotating point, seeing that most of what he could do with it required him to have the rifle already prepped and for the barrel to be inserted through it into the handle.

"Oh, guess I'm starting with the gun" he placed the piece down and pulled the large rifle over placing it atop the workbench, "and now I have to disassemble this…" he mumbled gawking at the incredibly large barret anti-material rifle like what Ruby had used for Crescent Rose.

"You really went for the biggest thing huh" Ashe chuckled

"Well, when you see Crescent in all her glory and SilverLight, this is small, like mini compared to those two, "And as far as I'm aware this should be .30 cal, not .50 BMG like Ruby… or, maybe I just don't know cartridge sizes because this looks just as big as Summer's…" he mumbled staring at the hand sized bullet in his hand that he pulled from the magazine of the rifle.

"God this thing's gonna have some kick" he mumbled, beginning to disassemble the rifle while making extra sure to keep the various parts in some form of order and after having made sure he emptied the chamber, just in case.

"You know, they always say never look down the barrel of a gun, they never said anything about when the barrel wasn't attached to anything" Ashe commented as she watched Arthur stare down the barrel of the unattached gun.

"Oh shut up" he sighed, grabbing both the metal socket he would feed the barrel trough and the first of the handle parts where the ammo would be fed as well as where the main firing mechanisms would be held.

Once he had gotten the barrel through the first of the holes he tightened it in with some screws in the metal hinge as only wiring would be going through the other holes in it, "That fits at least", he pulled the first part of the handle guiding it over the barrel until it fit snugly.

"I should only need to add the firing pin and some smaller parts and this should be done" he spoke to himself.

"Seems awfully simplified, doesn't it?" Ashe commented

"Hey I'm not complaining, I'm no mechanical engineer, this is so far out of my field I have no idea how I would even describe this" he retorted

"I feel like this falls into more than just 'mechanical engeneering' she added.

"Once again, don't care, not my specialty" he replied, a 'click' filling the room as he pushed the barret magazine into the gun and pulled back the lever to test if anything actually entered the barrel, "Oh thank god it actually worked" he muttered pulling the lever back again to eject the empty bullet and replace it with another as he continued to test it until it let out a satisfying 'Ping!' once everything was gone.

"Oi, no, this is not a Garand it should not make that sound!" Ashe squealed in excitement, as she nearly had an eargasm.

"You complaining?" he chuckled picking up a metal saw of the bench and procedding to cut off the excess barrel from above the hinge which he would replace with the barrel in the centre of the blade with some form of dust sealant.

"Good god no! I think I'm in love! Again..." she mumbled, feeling slightly lonely in her not so solitary confinement but unable to really touch anything else.

Arthur sighed, feeling just as sorry for her, "You sure you can't just give me a quest or something to get you out of there, or me in there?" he asked for what felt like the umpteenth time.

"No… I wish I could, but I can't just make quests and decide the reward, it depends on you… it's mostly automatic, at most I can define some parameters for quests but nothing like a reward or what you get, so please… just find something, I really want to hug you again" she mumbled, her arms crossing over her knees as she rested her chin atop them.

"I know, but hey, we at least have a start with Siri, that's some form of summoning, maybe we can do something related to that if I just find out how" he answered, his mind also wandering about which wires he should use in the handle, the red or the blue one?

"I guess, but that's a contract thing, she's a Curatrix, she's a guardian, she should be able to just come and go whenever she's needed" she huffed.

"Any idea why you can't do that yourself?" he asked, now testing the two wires to see if they caused the desired rotation on the hinge, only for it to go backwards, the complete opposite of what he needed.

"I think it has something to do with the record, something like a limit, you can't just summon someone in a world where that is impossible" she said.

"Yet I can summon a bed out of nowhere" he retorted.

"That's different, a bed is just that, a bed, it doesn't have a soul it doesn't have a heart, but I do… as far as I know. So that's it, you can't just create life out of nothing, even your semblance, when you used it on that sapling, it didn't just create life out of nothing, you nurtured it and it grew, you can't do that for me" she sighed

"I'll find a way Ashe, you know I will" he replied, pushing a third button that was now connected to the handle which caused another rod to burst out of the bottom of it doubling the length of the handle whilst also causing some mechanisms in the rotator joint to shift as thing began to mechashift into place.

"I know, I just hope it's sooner rather than later"

Arthur remained silent, not knowing how he would respond, he didn't want to give her false hope and she knew that, they both knew that things were much more complicated, "You know, somehow our love life is a royal mess you know that?" she snorted.

"First I die… nearly die, get kissed by the boy I love, before he saves me then after he saves and disintegrates leaving me clutching a pile of empty clothing, leaving me alone for five years before I die in a plane crash get turned into what essentially mounts as a coder for a book that doesn't like me touching stuff whilst my boyfriend travels around free to touch anything… and anyone" she growled slightly, "Not that I'm complaining, but why is it that you die and suddenly you're a chick magnet! I mean come on! Sure you're good looking, but not that good looking!" she threw her hands up.

"What can I say…" Arthur smirked, "I'm not doing it intentionally, I just treat them all kindly and somehow, things escalate, I mean look at Coco, somehow I am now publically dating her AND Ruby because she decided to hold my hand during the interview, and Velvet, she's still shy around me but Coco's been getting her to open up more" he began to mumble to himself.

"Oh, and lets not forget Yang who is quite literally yearning for you, at some point she's going to just push you down whether you like it or not right?" she asked him.

"Yeah…" he felt a shiver down his back causing him to turn around only to see a bright yellow strand of hair disappear behind the door.

"Well, I advise you to keep your door locked tonight, maybe reinforce your windows, or y'know, sleep in the forest full of flesh hungry monsters that she can most definitely slaughter her way through" Ashe began to cackle, as she watched Arthur repeatedly shiver and dart his head to one of the numerous directions, every time only catching glimpses of lilac, browns and gold.

"Yang! What are you doing?" Arthur heard the voice of Blake from behind the door to Professor Mulberry's workshop.

"O-oh heeeeyyy Blake, nothing I'm doing absolutely nothing" Yang replied, doing her best to hide the ropes and gag behind her back.

"Right" Blake gave her a doubting nod.

"So uh, what are you doing here?" She nervously asked her.

"I'm her to clean Gambol and replace the ribbon, maintenance" Blake replied, her nose slightly picking up the familiar scent of Arthur, causing her to flush slightly, not going unnoticed by Yang who began to grin, an idea forming in her head.

"Tell me, do you like Arthur?" Yang asked, hooking her arm over Blake's shoulder, not letting her escape.

"Wha? N-no, we're just friends" she tried to sound convincing.

"Yes, so that's why I got those envious stare yesterday and why you always seem to smile around him" Yang began to list 'Well, at least not a frown' she corrected in her head.

"You see, Arthur has this terrible, terrible habit of leaving us high and dry, why don't you join me in getting a little revenge?" She said holding the rope up in front of her, Blake gulping as the thought seemed slightly appealing at first but quickly shook the thought off.

"No, I'm sorry but no, I am not ready for anything like that, and I don't exactly intend to force anyone into anything" she said, the slight crack in her voice ad blush in her cheeks showing something else.

"But you would do it with him if it wasn't forced?" Yang grinned.

"N-no! look Yang, I can't I just can't get involved in this not yet, the breaks coming up soon and I'm heading home for a bit to clear my head up, my feelings on Arthur being one of those, so please just-just let it go" Blake's bow began to wilt as her ear flopped under them.

Yang went silent, "Really, what happened between you two? You weren't like this beforeyou two went to the infirmary together, what happened?" she questioned.

"Traditions… I like my traditions… now can I please get to work?" She explained, not wanting to further the conversation anylonger.

"Yeah, yeah, go ahead, sorry for being so nosey, I'm just starting to worry about you, you've been avoiding him for a while now, I think he's also noticed" Yang said, letting Blake quickly run off to a workbench in the corner where less people were working.

"…" Arthur had long stopped working on the spear head as he listened to the two talk but soon letting out a sigh as he frowned and tried to continue working, but could only place the spear head down on the table as he held his head.

"I wonder if they knew you could hear them" Ashe said breaking the near five minute silence, her eyes locking on Yang who was watching Arthur intently, but not making any actions from behind the door frame.

"God I'm sorry Blake" he mumbled to himself, berating himself for allowing the faunus traditions he had learnt just earlier in the day to wind up at the back of his mind before he listened to Blake's woes and attempted to calm her.

"I'm sure she'll be fine, once she clears her head she'll calm down, and her mom's probably going to be a pain in her butt when she gets home" Ashe began to chuckle.

"Yeah…" Arthur took a deep breath and slapped his cheeks, "Ow, no that does not work, just hurts…" and immediately began to rub his now sore cheeks.

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"Well, would ya look at that, it actually works" Professor Mulberry began to stroke his beard as he inspected the finished spear, having taken Arthur the good part of seven hours just to figure everything out.

"You sound like you didn't expect it to" Arthur chuckled.

"Oh no, I fully expected it to work, it's not exactly the most complex weapon I've seen, but I was unsure of how the gears would work, but they seem to be doing just fine" he chuckled looking through a small hole in the casing to the inner mechanisms of the spear, numerous small gears and wires overlaid atop each other still and silent waiting to be awakened at a moments notice.

"Well, as I promised, here are the dust javelins, open her up and let's get these in, I'm actually quite interested in how these'll work, never done anything like em before" He said, getting more excited as he pulled out two loaded long, thin dust 'javelins' as he called them, filled with burst dust.

"You don't need to worry about them, I've already tested them myself with a different mechanism before you came these should be able to stay in one piece so long as you don't decide to drop a bomb on it"

"Aren't these literally bombs?" Arthur retorted.

"Yes, but theres a difference, this is directed fire, and as you said it's injecting the dust into the grimm, you sure as hell ain't getting out of there in time but the combined defence of the explosion happening inside something that ain't them should keep them in one piece" Mulberry explained, "but in the field you can just swap them out on the fly, that's what that little opening under the blades for, just push the new ones in and the others will pop out the top" he demonstrated by pushing the filled javelin in and forcing the empty one out through the gun barrel on the top of the blade.

"Well, there you have it, give er a test" he couldn't hide his excitement as he activated a large ursa dummy in the centre of the field.

"Wait for me!" Ruby shouted quickly running into the field, much more perkier after her day long power nap.

"Nice of you to join us!" Mulberry happily said, "Now go stab the grimm" He ordered Arthur who was holding the curved glaive transformation of his spear, the pommel on the ground causing the blade to reach well over his head.

The blade having split apart down the centre revealing the two glowing dust javelins within. "Well, here goes nothing" he muttered, tightening his grasp on the shaft of the spear, taking steps towards the grimm dummy, before bolstering it up with both hands the tip inches away from the chest of the hard light Ursa, excitement appearing on his face as he thrust the spear head into it.

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Alternate Chapter names: [Yes, I cliffhangered the spear, bite me] [I am no engineer, I made so much up, hopefully it at least makes sense]

Okay, suggest names for the glove and spear

Words: 2990

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