50

Chapter 50 – Curse of Pirate un-death

Jaune scowled as he pulled his furry body among the other bears on display, being careful to only move when people weren't looking. His target was hanging around with Ruby, who would have been able to recognise him with ease if it hadn't been for Blake's… creative disguise.

He refused to call it clever. Nothing about this plan was that. Instead she'd gone and quickly won a different bear from some kind of shooting game, divested it of much of its costume and pulled it over him. Just his luck that it had been a bloody pirate costume because he was now stuck in a stupid black hat, with one eye-patch and some fabric baggy trousers around his waist.

He couldn't feel any of them, of course. But that didn't mean it wasn't awkward. They kept getting snagged on other toys, or the strings that criss-crossed in front of him.

"Why didn't Ruby choose a game with shooting?" Jaune shouted out, getting a shrug from the distant form of Blake. Her job was to distract their target at the last second so he could make the switch, but that would only happen if he could figure out which string she was going to pull and make sure he was on the end of it.

It was a stupid game and one that relied on luck. You pulled a string and got what was on the end. Naturally most had a whole heap of nothing on, but they were often carefully arranged in a way that you couldn't tell what you might get. That also meant he couldn't tell which they were going to pull either, or where it would reach.

Ruby probably thought it would be `unfair` to win a toy at a game she's good at. Jaune rolled his eyes at that, as though these people weren't scam enough.

"I'm not really interested in winning a toy," he heard the girl say. Ruby whispered something back but he couldn't make out what thanks to the distance. Either way, the green-haired student sighed and that was probably sign enough that she'd given in. "Alright fine, three strings please."

Blake held up three fingers to Jaune, to which he could only assume she somehow thought he might have misheard what was said literally in front of his face. He would have shown some in return if he actually had any, but all he had was one finger, which was also his hand and arm – and right now it ended in a cheap-ass plastic hook anyway.

With more concentration than he'd ever spent on a fair stall before, Jaune peeked out over the rows of other toys, as Ruby clapped and the green-haired girl selected her first string and gave it an experimental tug. He traced the vibrations up the string, to where they congregated with at least a hundred other white strings. That then fanned out once more, connecting to a number of toys along with sweets and loose ends.

It was around about that time Jaune recalled that he wasn't some kind of spider faunus and that the task was pretty much impossible.

"Oh, no luck on your first one," the overweight man said, with far more cheer than someone announcing a defeat should have.

"Two more," Ruby tried to cheer greenie up, even though the girl looked like she couldn't have cared less. "You can do it Emerald!"

"This is harder than it looks!" Jaune shouted out to Blake, just in case she was giving him annoyed looks. He couldn't really tell from where he was. "I have to figure out which string goes where. It's pretty much as hard as trying to win a specific prize!"

Except that Emerald could take a minute or two to think if she really cared to. He had the time between her selection and when she drew the string to find out where it went and get on the end of it.

"Oh poor luck," the man said again – shocking Jaune as he realised she'd gone and pulled another and he hadn't even noticed. Once again she hadn't won anything, not that she would in most cases. With a panicked look he realised she wasn't even waiting for the last time, but had instead reached for another string.

It snagged on something.

"Oh -oh!" Ruby shouted, clapping her hands. Jaune pushed his way through the toys on the shelf, hoping the rattling would be mistaken for the strings knocking against one another. He could see a squat and ugly little thing jittering left and right, a white string around its leg pulled taut, but also stuck on another.

"Got you!" he cried, reaching out for the string before noticing he didn't exactly have any means to hold onto it. "Oh whatever," he put his arm against it and twirled it around a few times, effectively tangling himself in it.

But what would happen if she won two prizes?

"Nothing… personal…" Jaune grunted, kicking his feet against the other teddy bear. "Your time will come eventually, I'm sure." The sad-looking thing stared back at him, forlorn and alone. It might have stirred some pity in his heart if it wasn't for the size of it, and the fact that it honestly looked a little terrifying.

He knew bears could move, since he was one doing just that. And it was a little more intimidating when you were less than a foot tall.

"Sorry!" Jaune called as it was finally knocked off the string, and the shelf entirely. He lurched back a second later, drawn in with the string as tight fingers wrapped around his midsection.

"I won." Emerald said, with all the joy of road kill.

"Argh, I'm a pirate!" Jaune said, making sure not to move a muscle. "Tell me ya secrets so I can be away."

"Oooh good job Emerald," Ruby cheered, as though through the act of pulling string the girl had shown some great aptitude. "I've never been able to win at these things."

"Then have it." Emerald held him out, and Jaune's eyes widened.

"You won it," Blake said, coming to his defence, if only for her own plans. "You should keep it." Ruby agreed a second later, making the green-haired girl sigh as she tucked him beneath one arm.

"Blake's really serious about teddy bears," Ruby whispered – though not quietly enough if the twitch of Blake's eye was any indication. "It's so cute though! Look at its little hook hand."

"I am not cute. I am a cunning spy."

It didn't take long for Jaune to realise just how boring that could be. Emerald stuck together with Ruby and Blake for the most part, and she obviously wasn't going to start revealing why she was spying on them in that kind of situation. Blake seemed to realise that a few minutes in and make repeated suggestions that they call it a day and return to Beacon.

To be fair to her it wasn't even out of character, since she could be a real sourpuss at the best of times anyway, not that he would dare admit that in her hearing range.

Everyone had their faults. Some were big, some were small. Blake was just unlucky (or lucky if you wanted it that way) that her faults weren't nice and easy things like being unhygienic, stupid, snoring or not being able to put the toilet seat down. No, she had to be a terrorist, have a stubborn death-wish and an inability to plan things through in a way that didn't involve one or both of them being in mortal peril.

Beginning to wonder what the good points are to balance that out!

But Blake was Blake, and that was all he needed really. He couldn't imagine life without her at this point, even if that statement came with all sorts of clauses and confusion considering that not only was he not alive, but that if the Doctor was right, he literally could not exist without her.

"Hey guys," Yang called as the rest of the party met up with them once more. His current owner's partner was among them, and spared an amused glance for Jaune. Now that he thought about it, it suddenly made sense as to why these two had split up, namely to keep an eye on both parties at once.

Just needed to figure out what the reason for that was, not that Jaune thought it anything bigger than a festival advantage. They probably just wanted to win, and hey-ho, they'd heard about the two strongest teams in Beacon and wanted to get some info on them. Made sense to him. It might have made sense to Blake too, if not for her paranoia. Though, to be fair, given her messed up past, paranoia had probably saved her life once or twice.

"Could have used a little of it myself," Jaune mumbled, getting a confused look from Blake.

"What should we go on this time?" Neptune asked, leaning on Sun's shoulder with a bright smile. "If you're about to say that god-damned roller coaster one more time I'll snap. We're at an amusement park. It consists of more than one ride."

"Merry-go-round?" Weiss offered, getting disgusted groans and boos from those around her. The heiress huffed a little.

"Oh I know," Sun cooed, and Jaune didn't miss how the guy's arms were firmly fixed on Blake. Back off buster. She's off-limits. "Why don't we go on the tunnel of love?"

"Maybe because none of us are in relationships?" Yang raised one brow, only to be bowled aside.

"We should totally!" Nora cheered, taking the place Yang had once occupied as the blonde extricated herself from a nearby hedge. "It doesn't have to be love. It could be friendship too, yeah, totally!"

"It's the tunnel of love… it's just about romance."

"I'll go with Ren," the ginger girl continued. "As a friend, of course. We're together, but not toge-"

"Take him and stop," Blake sighed, pushing the young man from behind and sacrificing him to the great Nora god. Jaune thought he caught a betrayed look on Ren's face as he flew into her arms, before that look was replaced with nothing but horror and pain.

Love was scary.

"You'd better not be reading into this," Emerald growled, voice angrier than Jaune had heard it ever since they'd arrived.

"I don't need to read into this," Mercury said, "I know you want me."

"Close. Try inserting a few things between want and me. Maybe things like to kill."

"You need to inject some variety into your game Em," the guy laughed. "You can't play hard to get forever. It gets old eventually."

"Ha fucking ha. You are a single metric unit of hilarity." The hand on Jaune's back loosened a little, allowing him to subtly turn over so that he could see up at the two, and the environment through which they travelled.

Ye gods, it was terrible.

The walls were a florescent pink that seemed to drain his will to un-live. There were badly cut-out swans hung from the ceiling, along with the tinny sound of what might have been a romantic tune had the speaker not been salvaged from some beaten-up car. He could even still hear the sounds of the amusement park outside. About the loudest thing was the water their swan-shaped boat floated through, and the way the girl above him ground her teeth together.

"Oh calm down babe," the apparently suicidal man chuckled. "You sound like you've had a hard day. I had to go on the same damn ride over ten times. I'm about ready to throw chunks."

"And I had to put up with that stupid brat," Emerald snarled. Jaune's eyes narrowed (or would have, had he any). Ruby could be a bit much at time, but she'd said that with more hate than he had honestly expected and it annoyed him. She was his friend, even if she didn't know it – or rather thought him dead. And if she hated them all this much, then why not just call her little task off? "They're just so… so nice. It's honestly sickening."

"Tell me about it. Oh, go on the tunnel of love you two," Mercury mimicked, doing a pretty poor impression of Ruby. "Ye gods, is she expecting us to come out kissing? Should we come out having sex, just to scar her for life?"

"Nice attempt, but even raining on her parade isn't enough to make me want to sleep with you. B for effort, though. You think we can call this off yet?"

"Unlikely," he sighed, suddenly more serious. "Got to keep an eye on that Nikos chick and she seems pretty close to little red. She's also been the one to get in the way of Torchwick all the time."

"Torchwick…?" Jaune mumbled, "Why would that be a problem?"

"Well nothing bad came of that," Emerald shrugged. "He was a dick anyway, besides, he's where he's meant to be."

"True. Just something worth keeping an eye on, far as the boss is concerned. So don't expect that you'll be able to dump red and peppy anytime soon."

"Just my luck…"

God damn it… Blake just had to be right, didn't she? It wasn't enough to make anything of, but even the mere mention of Torchwick's name was enough to have Blake's ears perking up faster than Ruby when Weiss mentioned weapon maintenance. He could feel his chances of getting out of this without a conspiracy dwindling. No, screw that. They were now firmly at less than zero.

"What's with the bear anyway?" Mercury asked, making Jaune go completely still. Laying on his back, looking up at them, he could see the two stare down at him. The green-haired girl – who looked really stupid now that he could see up her nose – sighed heavily.

"Won it at a stupid game she made me play. Can't get rid of it since she'll notice and probably burst out crying."

Mercury snorted, "Ugly little thing."

"Yeah, well screw you too."

"Cheap crap," Emerald dismissed. Jaune growled and made a mental note to sneak into their room and do something unpleasant the next time Blake wasn't looking. She grinned and picked him up, holding him before her face as she smiled. "And whoops, I dropped him."

"Arghhh!" Jaune cried as he sailed through the air, the words ending as he splashed into the water. He hacked and coughed, fighting to keep his head above the surface as the white swan drifted away. "Bear overboard, bear overb-splurghll!" Swimming when you had no feet, no hands and not much else was a particularly difficult task, as he quickly found out.

Thankfully he didn't have to, as a hand reached down to snatch him from the water.

"I've got you," the familiar voice of his partner calmed him down. A brief look showed him she was with Penny, and thus he was okay to move about. Placed on her lap, he shook like a dog. "Jaune! You're getting me wet."

"I'm filled with pity," he snarked. "Let me just get over nearly drowning then I can feel bad for you being damp."

"You don't even need to breathe," Blake sighed, making him freeze. Oh right, yeah… "Did you forget that?"

"No… I was just… you know, embracing my life-side. A bit of roleplaying." Damn instincts, making him act without thinking about it. He could have just sunk to the bottom and waded his way out, though he supposed being picked up by Blake saved him the effort. "Hi penny," he waved, knowing she couldn't hear him but that she'd understand the gesture.

"Hello friend-Jaune," the robotic girl cheered, not at all concerned with the water splashing on her. "Blake invited me on the tunnel of love. I believe I am approaching first base."

"I told you it's the tunnel of platonic friendship," Blake sighed.

Penny tilted her head to the side, "Didn't Yang call it the tunnel of cock-block?"

"That would be when I ignored Sun's invitation and dragged you in with me."

"Heh, nice work."

"I already have enough blond men in my life." Blake rolled her eyes and patted his head. For some reason it made him feel inordinately pleased. Her comment that was, not the patting – which made him feel like some kind of domesticated animal.

"Aw, that's sweet Blake. I feel like I have enough ex-terrorist, cat-girls with paranoia problems in my life too."

She glared at him, despite that he'd actually meant it as a compliment. All you needed was confidence… if he ever did get a real body the first thing he would do after apologising to his parents, hugging them all and crying a little, would be to punch his father in the face.

"Well what about my paranoia?" Blake asked. "Did it pay off?"

Jaune glowered, plopping himself down on her lap and tearing the stupid disguise off one piece at a time. The little bits of plastic made sploshing sounds as they hit the water. Blake sighed loudly, rubbing a hand down her face in frustration.

"My paranoia paid off," she sighed, "didn't it?"

"About as well as it always does."

"God damn it…"