"You two… know him?"
Jaune turned toward the boy behind him. He stood with his arms still crossed, but now his posture was a little more tighter, more alert. His gaze flicked between Jaune, Ren, and Nora, his freckled face pinched with suspicion.
Ren said nothing at first. He remained locked in a wordless, incredulous stare with Jaune, eyes dark and unreadable.
Nora, usually the first to blurt sothing out, was quiet too. She was… confused, to say the least. There was no grin, spark, or glint of mischief behind her eyes. Just this flat seriousness that made Jaune's chest tighten.
He hadn't seen her like this before.
Not once.
The boy glanced at both of them again. "Guys?"
Still nothing.
Even Nora—who had swung a war hamr into a nightmare creature like it was an unfortunate piñata monts ago—seed unsure now. Her hands tightened slightly around the haft of her weapon. Her armor let out a whirring hiss when she walked, as if there were chanical chanisms that were aiding her movents.
Jaune's stomach twisted. This wasn't just simple shock. They looked… haunted, perhaps. Or maybe just morbidly curious?
"Who is he?" he asked again. "Is he one of us?"
Ren finally blinked from him stare. Slowly, then spoke.
"Oscar," he said, calm but firm, "we need to speak to our friend. Alone."
The boy—Oscar—blinked in confusion. "Your… friend?" He looked back at Jaune again. "Wait, what do you an—?"
"Please," Ren repeated, his tone gentler now, but with weight behind it. "Give us a mont."
The younger boy hesitated, then let out a quiet sigh. "Okay. Sure."
He turned and walked away, his boots crunching over cracked asphalt, eventually standing on the other side of the street where the massive scorpion had been killed. The shadows swallowed his silhouette like ink.
Now it was just the three of them.
Jaune swallowed, throat dry.
"I," he said, breaking the silence almost casually, "You both... what are you two doing here?"
Ren and Nora exchanged a look again—brief, but intense. They didn't answer right away.
Then Ren stepped forward. "We're on patrol right now, performing our nightly duties." he explained simply.
"…Nightly duties?" Jaune echoed.
"Yeah. Jaune, you didn't tell us you were awakened too." Nora spoke, a little softly. "Why didn't anyone introduce you to us, at beacon? If you were going to transfer from Ansel, he should have inford us, least. Well, more importantly, how co you're still at rank 0?"
"Why am I at rank 0? That's what, Raymond said too..." Jaune spoke his thoughts out loud.
"Raymond?"
"He was... soone I t in Ansel, but he—we—were attacked by so other guy that was around the sa level of strength that he was. At least, I think he was."
"Attacked? In Ansel? Was Raymond a Rank 1 operative or...?"
"Yeah... he said that he was, but I don't…" Jaune frowned and trailed off, thinking about what to say to his friends that he had just found in this place. Jaune didn't really know how to address them. They were like him?
It was quite a surreal experience
"Honestly guys, I don't really know what you are talking about. What are ranks and transfers? I wasn't... 'awakened,' like you either. I just started appearing here. Last week."
Nora didn't seem to comprehend his words. "Last week?"
"Yeah," Jaune said. "I've been stuck in this place every night since. I fought a werewolf-thing—a Beowolf—my first ti, and practically almost died but I survived, sohow. Since then it's been a dented pig thing called a Boarbatusk, then an entire pack of Beowolves, a bear-Ursa monster, and… well, that big scorpion just now, that probably isn't even called a scorpion."
"Its called a Death Stalker." Nora's expression flickered with both curiosity and awe across her face. "You fought all of that alone? At rank 0?"
Jaune nodded. "Yeah... it was either fight or die."
Ren's gaze sharpened. "You're sixteen, right?"
"Yeah," Jaune said, confused. "Why?"
Ren's brow furrowed. "This circumstance that you are referring to is simply impossible, Jaune."
"What is? fighting and surviving? Co on, it was hard... and yeah, I almost died but I'm a lot stronger now... so, not that impossible, eh?"
"While fighting the creatures of grimm at rank 0, without training and miraculously surviving is... really aweso, that's not what he ant. At your age, Jaune... well, you're not supposed to be here," Nora remarked. "No one over the age of fourteen, awakens."
"Awakens… like, enters this Dream Realm?"
Ren nodded. "Exactly, on their fourteenth birthday. That's how it works. Not earlier or later."
"There's never been a case of soone awakening at your age, sixteen." Nora added. "Not once. We've trained with veterans, researchers and all sorts of observers. This kind of thing doesn't happen."
"Maybe it's a glitch," Jaune offered, weakly. "So kind of mistake?"
Ren shook his head. "The Nightmare realm doesn't simply make mistakes. The Relic sees everything. Technically, nothing in the world should be able to hide from it. No matter what."
"The what now?"
"Are you aware of what Rune skills are?" Ren asked.
"Sort of... I've seen them been used before, I think. From that masked man and Raymond."
"Raymond... right. I don't know who that is but, in any case... there are four Relics in this world. They are dubbed as Relics because their functions go beyond what a Rune skill is typically able to do. These Relics, are also known as Great Runes. The specific Relic which should have detected you, The Rune of Knowledge, has been repurposed by us to function like a mix between a surveillance system and a living database. We repurposed it so that it tracks all awakenings and monitors energy signatures worldwide. It's how our organization finds us. Brings us in and trains us. Prepares us."
Ren folded his arms. "But apparently... it never picked up your presence."
Jaune stepped back, blinking. "I didn't even know what any of this was until you showed up. I've been stumbling around in the dark. Just… surviving. You know?"
Nora let out a long breath and finally sat on a cracked ledge nearby. "Okay, this is… wow."
"I don't understand," Jaune said, growing frustrated. "Why does it matter if I'm sixteen? Why can't soone older be here?"
Ren looked at him carefully. "We do not know. However, it is an absolute law of this realm. Like how gravity pulls or how fire is hot. It's a rule of sorts which has never been broken before..." Ren paused, and Jaune saw so hint of an unknown emotion flash across his eyes, before he continued. "Until you, apparently."
"People who awaken are also super rare. Only one in every ten thousand or so people can awaken. It's like getting struck by lightning during a solar eclipse. Which ans... your existence is rare even among those who are super rare. Like rare-ception or sothing."
Jaune cracked a smile at the last part. This was the Nora he knew, not the overtly serious one he had just witnessed.
"And even then," Ren continued, "Awakened are guided. We're picked up by the Relic and assigned to squads. ntors. We don't just wake up in the middle of this nightmare, unprepared."
Jaune lowered his voice. "But I did."
That silenced both of them.
For a long mont, the wind howled faintly through the alleyway.
Ren eventually broke the silence again. "Tell us everything. From the beginning."
So Jaune did. He told them about the first night—the shock, the cold. The Beowolf that appeared. The way he'd almost died and been killed and only using sothing called the Dream Authority exit from the system to escape. Then the next encounter. And the next.
He told them about Raymond and the masked man, who had also ntioned organizations. The train station—the mist. How he thought the dream realm was just so kind of purgatory he was stuck in. Alone.
When he finished, Nora's expression had shifted again. Now there was… a spark. A light behind her eyes.
"Okay, yeah, this is super not normal," she said, hopping up. "But also kind of cool. You're like so glitch in the matrix. A ghost file! But that information about Raymond Red, and a Masked man... that's quite important. You said this happened in Ansel?"
Jaune nodded.
"Interesting. We are going to have to report this information. In any case, since your situation is unique enough that Ozpin might want to talk to you." Ren muttered the last part under his breath.
Jaune blinked. "What?"
Ren shook his head. "Nothing."
Jaune looked between them. "So, you guys part of an organization or sothing? Like a dream army?"
"Of sorts," Nora humd. "We train, do missions, neutralize Nightmares and help new Awakened adjust. It's dangerous but it's also aweso."
"And sotis," Ren added, "Things go wrong. Which is why we can't let you stay out here alone."
"What do you an?"
Ren turned toward the alley's end. "We're going to escort you to find a creature of Grimm. You'll kill it, and that will open the Dream Authority exit. You'll wake up. Then we'll talk—for real—in the waking world."
"Oh." Jaune rubbed his forehead. "Alright yeah... for sure."
Their words made sense. However, he was still a little shocked that Ren and Nora of all people were a part of this dream realm. Truly, there was more to everyone than t the eye.
In any case, this was a chance for Jaune to finally receive answers. Answers about the dream, the weird organization, the system, the dream creatures and everything else.
"Don't worry Jauney. You're not alone," Nora said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "Not anymore."
He exhaled a deep breath. Those words felt nice to hear.
"…Okay... I guess, let's get out of here, then."
Ren nodded. "This way."
The three turned and stepped to join the other boy, Oscar.
Perhaps for the first ti, Jaune didn't feel like he was running blind.
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