The engine of the vehicle purred loudly as it rumbled down the streets of Vale, streets that were still lit by the light of the lampposts at every corner whilst just barely lit by the slowly rising sun. It was around six o'clock, last Aero had checked, and she knew that by now she was only about halfway to her destination.

As she came to a stop at one of the many stoplights located in Vale, her right forearm slowly began to vibrate. Not by her own choice, but rather by the choice of Ace to notify her of an incoming call.

Removing her left hand for just a moment from the wheel as she flicked her gaze to her right wrist, she tapped gingerly upon her right forearm, which gave Ace the simple instruction to accept the call.

"Hello?" the redhead asked, her voice filling the cabin of the truck with a fair degree of certainty.

"Aye, Aero!" a distinctly masculine voice responded, though it was still rather soft as far as overall tone.

"Oh hey, Rusty," Aero responded with a chuckle as the squirrel-ears atop her head perked up a bit upon hearing her friend's voice, and as Aero started looking back up at the light, it turned green. With a slight abandon of care, she again began to accelerate and carry the vehicle forward, moving herself down the road further.

"How are you?" chirp back her conversational partner.

"I'm good, how about yourself?" Aero chimed back with a chuckle, a soft smirk rising on her face.

"I'm just fine, though, Aero, ya left your fancy-pants pistol at the PD again," stated Rusty back, and Aero heard the faintly audible chortle that he gave from his own amusement.

Immediately, the squirrel-Faunus began to blush from embarrassment, despite the fact that no one would be able to see her. Here she was, all prepared and ready, only to be set back by a mistake she'd made previously. Lucky, Rusty seemed to be in a good mood as he continued on, stating, "I brought it with me, though, so the captain wouldn't notice."

With a thankful sigh, Aero responded, "You're a life saver, Rusty."

"I know I am, buuuuuut I do need something in return," taunted the voice over the Scroll.

"Another ride, or something different for once?" Aero asked back, rolling her eyes as she took a brief glance away from the road ahead of her as she mentally attempted to formulate another route in her head.

"Another ride. Car's still FUBAR'd, and unless you want to head out with drinks with us tonight-"

"You already know that I don't, Rusty, in case you forgot last time I went out with you guys and knocked out someone who insulted me for being a Faunus. I'll be there in a few minutes, alright?"

"You don't need to remind me about that, though that guy had it coming. Understood though, shorty. See ya then." With a methodical click, the connection fell silent, and Aero chuckled as she adjusted her course to begin her new route.

For a good silence, the vehicle purred along to little discomfort of the singular passenger, though it didn't last for all too long before the redhead inside flicked on the radio.

"My soul's corrooooded," began to sing a duet, serving to start another line of lyrics and to signal that she'd interrupted the middle of a song. Her hand didn't move to flip away, seeing as how this was her own vehicle and that this was exactly the station she wanted to be on.

"My heart's explodeeeed," the duet continued, and Aero scanned along the sides of the road as they did so. Nothing to her left, and nothing to her right, though she knew that shortly enough, she'd find a solitary figure of a slender man, maybe just six feet tall and with wireframe glasses upon his face that were almost hidden by shaggy brown hair.

"And I'm ready baby for yooooooou," sang the duet as Aero finally spotted the friend that she was driving to pick up. With a soft sigh, she turned the radio back off almost as quickly as she had turned it on, and then proceeded to lift her foot off of the accelerator to coast the vehicle to a soft stop. With a soft hum, she waited for the passenger door on her right to click open as she watched the sky start to open up with a light drizzle of rain. Drop after drop of rain was softly tapping down onto the windshield, but Aero directed her eyes away as she made eye contact with her passenger while the squirrel-ears atop her head flattened out in an almost-dejected manner.

"Looks like you arrived in the nick of time," Rusty commented with a deliberate snarking tone, giving a soft chuckle as he raised an eyebrow at Aero whilst also offering out a simple, white rectangle. With a roll of her eyes, Aero shook her head as she directed her eyes back to the road and started to accelerate off, motioning for Rusty to set the object down somewhere where she could grab it.

"Just get buckled up already," she commanded with a tone of friendship, chuckling herself as she did so.

A soft click confirmed that Rusty did, indeed, buckle up, and as if Aero needed further confirmation, he commented, "Aye aye, capp'n." His teasing vocal jab was met with ahard elbow to his side, an action which insured his silence for the remained of the trip.

The police station was quite visible from a distance, a large marble building that fit well within the elegant scenery of downtown Vale. It was lengthy enough to take up most of a city block, and at its highest it was three stories tall, though that height was not even throughout the building. It's design harkened upon equal parts of looking history whilst also appearing modern, and one of the many modern facilities it had was an underground parking garage that Aero navigated into upon her approach of her workplace.

The rain had picked up as Aero drew closer to the police station, and it most certainly would have been arm-numbingly freezing to walk through had their police department not opted for the underground garage. With a swift movement, Aero moved and picked up the white rectangle as she left her vehicle. Continuing her arm's motion, she placed the white box, her weapon, on her side. Despite Rusty having called it a pistol earlier, in its current state it was a far cry from even appearing similar to the ones the cops and gangsters of Vale oh-so-commonly used.

With the weapon affixed to her side, right above her hip, Aero gave a brief glance down at both the box and at Ace, the grey-eyed girl affixed her eyes upon the sleeve on her right forearm. Quite quickly after her eyes fell upon the device the time popped up into display. It was just a hair before half-past six, so Aero put on a soft smirk and looked away from the holographic display as she continued to walk through the police station that she worked in.

It took her a few moments to get to where she needed to be in the station, as it appeared that life didn't want her to head to her desk today. An aging man, with frazzled hair, stopped her as she walked through the rather expansive building. Had it been anyone else, Aero likely would have pushed on past the and dealt with the reaction to her actions later, that wouldn't be possible with the oldish man in front of her else she risk her entire job in disobeying her commanding officer.

"Whilsht I hayte to stawp yew, Missh Devoye," the aged man began with a deep, thick accent that required most of your attention to be able to decipher. His voice's decipherability was most certainly not helped in the slightest by the constant lip-smacking, either. "I'm afraaid that the payparwark will have ta wait for now. There hash beean a shitewatieon at shome clawb, or rat'er der hawd beean one lasht naight. Yew ahnd Rushtay are gunna hava ta go thar. I shent the ahdresh to ya Scrawl," concluded her captain.

Aero understood exactly half of what the man had said to her, and a look of slight confusion and sheer failure to understand what had just been said hung upon her face for a few judgemental seconds as she wished failure and dismay upon her superior in front of her. It was a running joke with her and some of her colleagues that he'd gotten to where he was simply because everyone else had retired when he kept working, and that he was the living example of bureaucracy that made some of the cops in the city so negligent with their jobs. This conversation, even if she'd said nothing, had only further made that seem like a reality, and with a sigh Aero shook her head before nodding. "Understood, sir," and so she began to make her way to seek out Rusty as the brief similarities to her bosses face and her nightmare connected for a moment in her head.

Finding Rusty took only a hair over ten seconds, given that the taller, slimmer figure was just a bit ahead of her as her boss walked off behind her. Rusty had turned and begun to walk towards her, and noticing that, Aero shoved the connection that she had just made out of her mind and attempted her best at a smile as she looked up at Rusty. "So, I guess we get to do something interesting for once, eh?" the copper-haired, grey-eyed girl commented as she brushed a stray hair out of her face, her attempt at a smile turning into an attempt at a smirk as she did so.

"It appears that way, though I think we've got some time before we need to head out," responds Rusty, looking down at the shorter Aero as he spoke.

"So, range time?" suggested back Aero with her smirk growing just a faint more teasing as her facial muscles moved.

Her smirk was responded with an almost judgemental one on Rusty, a raised eyebrow questioning Aero's idea. "Really? You want to spend more time at the range than you do pursuing a case? Are you sure you're the Aero that I was working with just last week?"

"Ah, shaddup Rusty," Aero responds as she punched the man in his side, beginning to walk off. The footsteps that paced up behind her confirmed that the taller boy was following her, and she gave a chuckle. "So we're listening to my idea, then?"

"No other option here, really," chimed back Rusty, a soft chuckle echoing out after he finished his short statement. "As I don't think taking a squad car to where we're going would be the wisest idea, and a bit of training wouldn't hurt here."

"Well, don't just say that," Aero began with an annoyed tone, showing just how annoyed she was with the fact that Rusty decided that it would've been a wiser idea to assume that she'd already known where they were heading rather than telling her. "Where are we heading?" she prompted in an attempt to finally get Rusty to speak up about the plan for the job that their captain had sent them out to do.

"Well, to one of the shadier districts, to say the least. You know that guy the the captain's been trying to catch, but no one can find any evidence on? Hei Xiong?" Rusty starts to explain, awaiting Aero's acknowledgement of his question. The young woman gave a short nod as she continued to walk, and Rusty continued to speak, "Well, apparently someone trashed the place. He didn't report it, though, but boss still wants us to head over there and see what happened."

"So, we're heading into the hornet's nest, then?" asks back Aero.

"Yeah. Which is why we'll be taking the hog, and why some range time may actually be a good idea," states Rusty flatly.

Sorry about the somewhat-short chapter and cliff-hangerish ending, but it's all I had time for. Thanks for reading!