The cafeteria shook with the voices of hundreds of students, each shouting to be heard over the last. Something had them all captivated, and it certainly wasn't the visit from their families the day before. Words floated around from student to student. Words such as 'Beowolf', 'monster', and 'howling' rang out frequently, but no one truly understood what they were talking about as none of the stories matched up.

Team ARTS, with the addition of Turf, sat at the end of one of the long tables towards one corner of the cafeteria by themselves. No one really knew what to say with Turf being shunned by half of his own team and all, until Sepia, as usual, decided to break the silence.

'So you like sausage, huh?' Sepia texted while staring at the positively massive stack of sausages on Turf's tray.

"A little. I've been trying to cut back," Turf's ears perked up, "and I've been only eating the cooked stuff for a long time now. After that bad case with heartworms…" he trailed off.

"I feel ya, man. I've gotten sick from raw oysters countless times. That's why I only get the farm raised ones nowadays," Roland laughed. It was nice to see that other Faunus had the same types of quirks, or it was for him at least.

Arty held his fork out and gestured to the rest of the group, "Okay, eating habits aside, anyone else hearing about the talk of Beowolves on campus?" He looked around at the people surrounding him as they talked about it.

Before anyone else could answer, a chipper voice rang out behind him, "I couldn't help but overhear. You guys seriously haven't heard yet?!"

The five students turned to find Rime standing there with a big grin on her face.

"Oh you guys have missed out!" She grabbed a seat between Arty and Turf. She stopped and looked at the group with bewilderment, "Did you guys seriously not hear anything last night?"

Timbre shrugged, "We have no idea what you're talking about."

Arty cut in, "We were pretty exhausted after yesterday… and the day before."

Rime crouched to hold on to the corner of their end of the table, "Oh boy. I don't know how you didn't hear. So, around midnight last night, one of our favorite people went out for a walk for who knows what reason. Nobody saw it happen, but she says that, out there in the dark, a huge beast attacked her. She couldn't tell what exactly it was, but she says it could only have been a huge Beowolf."

"Who was it?" Turf asked.

Rime raised an eyebrow at him, "You should know, Turf. She's your partner."

Turf's eyes widened. "Alice?!"

Roland grunted, "Serves her right."

Timbre glared at him, "She might be a… disagreeable person, but she doesn't deserve to get mauled by a Grimm, Roland."

"Says you," he grumbled back.

Arty ignored them, "What's a Beowolf doing on Beacon's campus? Why hasn't anyone killed it yet?" he asked Rime, "I mean, this is a Huntsman Academy…"

She shrugged, "Alice said that Team GLXY showed up while it was attacking her and chased it into the forest nearby. Gavin carried her back to the school," she looked around, "and speaking of which... You guys are pretty buddy-buddy with them right? I was wondering if you know where they are. Frost and I wanted to ask them about what happened, but nobody I've talked to has seen them all morning."

"We haven't had any contact with them since we got back from our mission, actually," Timbre set a fork with a bit of skewered scrambled eggs on her tray and looked around the room. She didn't see the familiar faces that she was looking for. No shining armor, wolf ears or, thankfully, purple ponytails were in the room as far as she could tell, "They might just be doing their own thing for breakfast. After our mission, I wouldn't be surprised if they needed some time away from all these people… and us for that matter."

"Got that right," Arty agreed, "That Kokonatsu ordeal wasn't fun by anyone's standards."

"No kidding…" Roland muttered underneath his breath, "Anyway, is Alice stable, or…?"

Rime nodded, though a bit taken back by his apparent concern. She wasn't convinced it was real. Roland probably just wanted a chance to punch her out before she died, "Yeah, but they're keeping her in the infirmary until her aura's back up to snuff."

'So, the Beowolf,' Sepia texted out, 'I think I've heard about that before. On nights when the moon looks whole, a silver Beowolf attacks students and faculty that go outside. I heard it in passing, but I also heard that the occurrences stopped at the beginning of last semester,' she pondered the significance of what was going on. Was it really a special type of Grimm on Beacon grounds? Her thoughts on this were kept to herself, but her mind still raced with the dozens of possibilities.

The air around them chilled. Zero stood behind Rime, but none of the students even noticed him walk up. His voice was quiet enough already, but it was nearly impossible to hear him with the scarf over his mouth.

"The scarf, Z," Rime covered her mouth with her hand and lowered it, demonstrating for Zero a way to actually be heard.

Zero pulled his scarf down below his chin, exposing his mouth. Apparently, he kept the piece of fabric over his mouth so often that the flesh below the bridge of his nose was notably lighter despite him already having an incredibly pale complexion. He spoke with a soft, unassuming voice that certainly didn't seem to belong to the urban ninja of Team FREZ, "I saw a bit of what happened, but it moved faster than I could react to."

"He speaks!" Roland shouted and threw up his arms.

"No way…" Arty looked up at Zero as he remembered how fast Zero had moved during the fight between him and Ebon at the beginning of the semester. He'd seen Zero in action a couple of times since. The guy's reflexes were insane, and that was an understatement. "It was faster than you?"

"I was surprised, too," Zero looked down. He seemed almost embarrassed that he couldn't keep up with the monster that attacked Alice, "Contrary to the rumors, I don't think that it was a Beowolf. It was much larger. It seemed more like a huge timber wolf, not a Grimm."

"That'd make more sense than a Beowolf wandering into Beacon, but your run of the mill wolves and coyotes are pretty skittish," Roland pointed out, "I took a wilderness survival class back at Sanctum, just in case I didn't have an inn or anything to stay in when I got out into the world. I remember the instructor telling us that most animals, including wolves, can be scared off if you make yourself look big and intimidating, and that bigger animals, such as wolves or bears, don't come around populated areas for any reason other than to scavenge for food."

"I know," Zero began to pull his scarf up again, "It's really strange."

"Ooooo," Rime grinned widely clapped her hands together, "Isn't it exciting?! Our very own urban legend! We had some weird stuff happen back home in Hilfjall-Yama, but nothing like this," she looked around the table, "Hey, whaddya guys say we work together and figure out what's going on? Solve a mystery or two?"

Arty raised an eyebrow, "You want us to help you find a giant wolf that almost killed Alice?" he looked to his team, "You think putting ourselves in a dangerous situation would get us in more trouble with Alabaster?"

"Probably," Roland muttered.

"Most definitely," Timbre said quickly, "But… it sounds like it could be fun, and it would help prevent anyone else from getting hurt!" she looked over to Turf, who was looking nervously off into space, his dog ears drooping.

"You okay, Turf?" she put a hand on his shoulder.

He jumped and almost fell out of his chair, "Oh… yeah. I'm fine. It's just… I can't help but feel like this might be better left to the upperclassmen and the teachers."

"C'moooooon Turf!" Rime whined. Her eyes suddenly drifted to the top of Turf's head, "Wait… Turf…? Are you…?"

"A Faunus? Yeah," he poked the remaining sausages on his plate around with his fork, "don't remind me…"

"Awwwwww!" Rime squealed, "Your ears are so cute! Why'd you hide them for so long?"

Before the conversation could get any more awkward, another Faunus boy with pointed dog ears in a red leather jacket planted an arm around Turf's shoulder, "Cuz the Queen of Mean is super prejudiced towards Faunus like us, eh cuz?"

Arty hadn't seen much of Team Ashes during the semester since he met Anubis and Hati their first week of class, especially since it seemed that their team was stuck in detention every other day or off on some mission. He guessed that it was most likely to keep the troublemakers away for a while. The funny thing was, Arty and most of the other first-years had never seen all four at one time. He'd only met Yamuna's brothers, Anubis and Hati, once, and he hadn't talked to them much since, "Oh, hey, Anubis. Nice jacket. Is it new?"

The boy inclined his head back and looked over Arty with his golden eyes, "Uh, sorry bud. But uh, one, we've never met before and two," he laughed, "I'm not Anubis."

It was Turf's turn to laugh, "Hey, Set. Leave him alone. You can't blame him for getting confused with how little you guys are around to help the first years."

"Wait what?" Timbre expressed her confusion.

"Yeah," a calmer voice said, "He likes to trick people into thinking he's me and I'm him sometimes…" What seemed to be a double of the Faunus boy wearing black rather than red stood next to him.

Rime looked like she had seen a ghost, "Why are there… two of you?"

"Haha!" Set laughed, "I did better than I thought! I didn't even need to try this time!"

"Set, shut up," Anubis glared at him, "Unfortunately, we're twin brothers, but I think that's pretty obvious."

Roland looked amazed, "That's crazy. I've known plenty of other Faunus in my life, but I've never met any that were twins. Makes sense, though."

"Well, we're not the only ones in our family," Anubis responded curtly, "Hati's twin Sköll is in Team ASHS, too."

"So that means Yamuna has more brothers?!" Timbre exclaimed.

Anubis rolled his eyes at her, "Yamuna's the youngest of seven kids. Set, here, and Sköll are the biggest troublemakers in all of Beacon. It's probably why you've only seen Hati and I, as they virtually live in Professor Alabaster's office."

"Awwww! Thanks bro. I'm glad you think that of me," Set said with a fake tone of gratitude, which prompted Anubis to pinch the bridge of his nose.

"Back to the issue at hand," Anubis suddenly slammed his hands on the table, "We happened to hear all of you talking about investigating rumors," he pointed one at a time to everyone at the table, "Don't even think about getting involved. The girl that got attacked could've easily died had Team GLXY not shown up."

"What if she wasn't prepared for a fight?" Rime retorted, "Maybe that's why she got hurt so bad?"

"That doesn't matter." The leader of Team ASHS stood back, "Just. Ignore. It. The second and third years are working with Alabaster and the other professors to find a solution."

"Why don't you start a hunt for this thing?" Zero asked, which caused the others to look to him. Hearing him speak so readily was still just as shocking, "I mean, if it's this dangerous, why not have everyone in the schoo-"

Anubis slammed his hand on the table again, a slight snarl curling his upper lip, forcing Zero to revert back to his usual quiet self. "I. Said. Ignore. It."

Zero's expression didn't change, but Rime watched as his fists curled up. She knew a fight was about to break out. She stood up in front of Zero and pushed him back. His hoodie was cold to the touch, "Zero, don't-"

There was a crackling as the loudspeaker buzzed to life. The voice of Professor Alabaster began to come through the speakers, "Will the members of Team GLXY and Team ASHS please meet me in my office? Team GLXY and Team ASHS, please come to my office."

Anubis turned on his heel and began marching out of the hall, "Come on, Set."

Set began walking backwards, pointing at the table, "Oooooo. You guys really pissed him off!" He gave them two thumbs up and winked before spinning on his heels and following after his twin brother.

"Why would Alabaster want to talk to Team ASHS?" Timbre asked absentmindedly, "I mean, Anubis seems responsible enough… but the rest of his team?..."

"Okay," Roland stood, "that settles it. We're going to solve this thing first."

Arty shook his head, "Roland. You heard Anubis and Alabaster. Besides, if the headmaster is involved, then this is way more serious than it seems."

"All the more reason, then," Rime said slyly, "The seven of us don't have a code to stick to, which means work can get done faster. If the school doesn't know what we're up to, then we'll be fine."

"Since when were you such a rebel?" Roland jeered.

"Eh," She rested her head on her hand, "Things have been kinda boring for us. Frost is a great leader and all, but she runs a tight ship and is the Queen of No-Nonsense."

"We're already done with our essays for McGouran's class… weeks ahead of schedule…" Zero added.

"Yeah, so we need something new to do other than study and… meditate," Rime stood up to leave. She put her fist with her thumb and pinky out next to her ear like a scroll, "give us a shout if you're up for putting an end to an urban legend." Shortly after, the two members of Team FREZ were gone.

"So…" Arty began, "do you guys really want to do this? After all the trouble we've already gotten in this semester?"

Roland and Sepia just looked at him.

Arty gestured for them to answer.

"Oh," Roland acted surprised, "you actually wanted us to answer that question with the blatantly obvious response?"

Arty let out an exasperated sigh, "Why can't I be an effective leader like Frost and Anubis…?" he mumbled to himself, "Well, I'm obviously outnumbered. Looks like we're probably going out tonight..."

There was no discussion on the matter on the part of Rime and Zero, however. Rime looked forward to the adventure and thrill of settling this campus mystery, especially if it meant getting away from Frost for a while. Zero felt more confused than anything. Not many things were faster than him, especially not some wolf.

Zero flattened his scarf against his mouth to tidy it up a little, then ran his fingers through his bangs. For the first time in a while, he felt anxious. His eyes flicked over at Rime, "If the faculty is concerned, then this is serious. I'll watch your back closely, so you do the same for me."

"Right," Rime looked over to the hooded boy. When they were first teamed up together, she thought he was weird. She still thought that he was, but they'd grown to know each other much better. Even Everest had grown to like him, which said a lot to Rime. Now that they were friends, they didn't mind getting into trouble together, "So, what're you thinking we should do now? I mean, nobody's gonna stop us from sneaking out of the dorm tonight, but we might as well be informed, right?"

"Well, let's go to the CCT tower. I'll sneak into the meeting that ASHS and GLXY are having with Professor Alabaster and record what I can." Zero looked ahead as they walked out of the dining hall towards the central courtyard, "They're in his office. I can't take the elevator, but… It sounds cliche, but I should be able to sneak up through the vents."

"You know, if anyone else said that to me, I'd say 'you shouldn't do that', but since it's you," She looked over to him and playfully punched him on the shoulder, "you should totally do that."

They walked up the flight of stairs to the massive tower as other students milled around them. As they entered the door, he grabbed Rime's arm and pulled her ear close to his mouth.

"Just pretend you're lost," Zero said quietly, "ask the receptionist some questions and keep her distracted while I get into that side hall over there," he gestured to a small seating area, empty except for some seats and tables.

Rime chuckled, "I feel like I'm in a spy movie or something!"

She made her way to the desk where the blue hologram of a smiling woman sat at the terminal typing away. Rime leaned against the counter, "Hi, um… This is really embarrassing, but… um," she put on the ditsiest voice she could, "I'm taking an extra credit lesson in the weapons workshop, but, I don't know where that is… could you point me in the right direction please?"

She glanced over to Zero, who gave her a thumbs up, before launching himself off of one of the tables towards the vent. Within seconds, it was open and shut without any sign that he was ever there. Rime turned back to the receptionist, who was pointing on a holographic map where the building was. Rime felt bad for tricking her, but she could never tell if the CCT holograms were actually projections of people from somewhere else or just computer programs…

It was easy for Zero to find the way up to Alabaster's office, as finding a vent that went straight up for about one-hundred-and-thirty stories was enough to give him an idea as to where it would let out. This is great… he thought. He began his climb upwards using the sides of the vent. Only a dozen feet up, he decided that taking the vents might not have been the best way to do things. Assuming that the vent ran parallel to the elevator shaft, he listened for the running of cables. After deducing where the elevator was, he took the nearest vent.

So much for not taking the elevator… He gazed down at the ascending elevator, and jumped on top of it at the last moment. Had it been anyone else jumping onto the car, those inside would have heard them land on the roof of the elevator on its way up to the office, but Zero knew full well how to take a fall.

The elevator stopped just a few feet shy of the top of the elevator shaft, and the fear of it not stopping was enough for Zero to quickly say his prayers. He might have let out some sign of relief, but he had to stay focused. He had a job to do. After slipping into the air vent that ran around the circumference of the office, he held his scroll up to the opening to catch whatever he could from the meeting.

He couldn't be bothered to actually listen to the conversation at hand. He just recorded it for Rime and Team ARTS's plan to get to the bottom of the legend spreading around campus. Thinking back to the excitement in Rime's eyes when the whole ordeal started, he couldn't help but smile underneath his scarf. It felt good to help a friend like this.

While Zero was distracted by his thoughts of making his teammate happy, he was quickly broken away from his daydreaming when he heard a feminine voice pose a question to the occupants of the office.

"Why is it so cold in here…? Is the stupid AC screwing up again?" she asked the group.

Damnit! Zero thought. He immediately made his way back out of the vent. Another vent adjacent to the one that he entered from. Sadly, it was the vent that he originally considered going up. He looked down it, groaned, then decided to bite the bullet and began his shimmy down.

Rime was reading a magazine full of images of weapons. If she wasn't purely a Dust-user, she might've considered making one like some of them. She was torn away from a fascinating picture of a pair of clawed gauntlets when she heard a series of rhythmic metallic thuds coming from above her. As she looked up towards the air vent, flecks of dust and debris fell into her eyes.

"Oh crap…" she muttered to herself as the sounds drew closer. She stood up and pointed towards the back of the room, behind the receptionist desk, and shrieked as loud as she could, "Rat! Rat! There's a rat behind you!" She jumped up on the chair and pretended to be scared.

As soon as the receptionist hologram turned around, the vent exploded open and Zero fell down into the chair, covered in dust. Before he could speak, Rime grabbed him by the collar of his hoodie and dragged him away from the small crowd of people looking for her imaginary rodent, "Couldn't you have, you know, not fallen through the ceiling?"

"Right, because I chose to fall down the ventilation shaft…" Zero groaned and held up his scroll, "but I did get about five minutes of the meeting… just audio, though," he looked eye to eye with his teammate and forced himself to stand up straight. Though he was embarrassed from the fall, it was pretty nice to know that he could sneak into the CCT tower without anyone noticing. It was an ego-boost for a guy like him, "So, are you going to keep complaining, or are we good…?"

She chuckled, "Depends what info you recorded all the way up there."

Zero hit play on the recording, and Rime's eyes lit up.

.

In the Beacon library, Team ARTS was seated around a circular table. Each had a book in front of them, but not all of them were studying.

Roland was leaning back in his chair, hat over his face and arms folded behind his head. He used his tail to keep himself stable. The giant stack of books in front of him were closed, each had been read down to the last word between then and breakfast.

Arty was absentmindedly sketching in the orange pocket sketchbook his sister had given him during her and her mom's visit.

Timbre dropped her book down, "Guys… I'm bored. We've been studying for hours…"

Arty glanced up with glazy eyes, "One can only study the weak points of the various creatures of Grimm for so long… I've drawn… easily… twenty different monsters in my notes…"

"You guys need a fresh set of notes to look over?" Roland asked from underneath his hat. He wagged a finger at the spiral notebook next to the books, "My handwriting is worse than Writer's Block's typeface, but it should at least be legible."

After the notebook flipped open, Arty and Timbre looked at the writing in amazement.

"Roland…" Timbre said, not looking up from the book, "this… is handwriting?!"

"Yeah, it's not my best…" Roland shrugged, "I was trying out writing in Comic Sans, but it just pissed me off more. If it seems rushed, that's why. It's also hard to italicize things when writing in Comic Sans."

The two of them looked at him in shock.

"This looks like you typed it…." Arty said stunned before looking to Sepia. "You're not surprised by this?"

Sepia looked up from her book, looked at Roland's notes, shrugged, and returned to her reading.

"What's the big deal?" Roland looked up from under his hat, "Isn't this the same guy who can draw photo-realistic pictures like nobody's business?"

Arty looked down at his book and then back to Roland, "you got me there, dude."

Team ARTS was thrown into a mess of books and paper as a flurry of white and grey flew onto their table.

Timbre covered her head as Roland's stack of books fell on her. "Ugh, Rime!"

Timbre was shut up by a loud echoing shushing from the others in the room.

"Sorry…" Timbre said meekly before returning to the small girl lying on her stomach on the table, "Rime, what in the world are you doing?!"

"Guys! Guys!" She whispered loudly, "you need to hear what Zero's got here. It's gonna make it a lot more enticing to go out hunting tonight!" She threw her arm behind her and pointed to the boy in the black hoodie as he rounded the corner holding his scroll up.

"Let me clean up first…" Roland waved a hand, and all of the books and notes that were previously on the table returned to their spots, though some had to move to make space for Rime. He looked around at his team and Rime, "There. Now don't go damaging these books, or there will be consequences."

Arty scoffed, "C'mon, Roland. I get that books are important, but there's no way you could know that every single one in here is worth keeping around. There are plenty in here you either hate or haven't read yet."

"Plenty that I hate, but none that I haven't read." Roland pointed at one of the bookshelves, "There is a book titled Nights of Our Days. It's on the third row, fourth section, fourteenth book on that row of that section. Starting on page 345 and going all of the way to page 378 is a relatively explicit scene involving a Huntress and the man that she just saved. It starts with the words 'we could hear the howls of the Beowolves in the night, calling for our flesh while we too longed for the flesh of one another' and then the whole scene ends with the words 'when all was said and done, we laid beneath the glittering blanket of stars and watched as the shattered moon traversed the sky'," he looked over to Timbre, "Would you be so kind as to go grab that book for Arty to inspect?"

Rime groaned as she slammed her forehead against the table, "you guys need to hear this…."

Ignoring her, Timbre hesitantly got out of her chair and walked away. She came back holding a black book with red stitching and handed it to Arty.

Arty opened the book and flipped to the page Roland had quoted. With wide eyes he read, "we could hear the howls of the Beowolves in the night, calling for our flesh and oh my god Roland you actually know every book in this library..."

"The word 'the' has been doubled in the paragraph beneath the one that you just began to read out. It's line 34 where this happens, five words in. I don't want to recite them, but word six is 'the' and word seven is also 'the'. That means that this is the first edition of this book, and the third printing. You can see if that's true on the back of the front cover." Roland put all four legs of his chair back onto the ground and grinned. This brought him back to the days where his father's friends would bet on the bits of literature that he knew from memory. His father won a lot of money that way.

The group just looked at him in shock besides Sepia, who fully understood and accepted his memory and Semblance.

"Okay, okay, we get it," Rime tried to speed things up, "that's awesome. Roland has every edition of some really weird erotica we have hidden away in the depths of our library. Cool," she added sarcastically, "Will you please listen to the meeting while we have time before the sun sets and we're put under curfew which we will all end up sneaking out of later to find that wolf?"

"Oh my, Tyrius! It's too much! I have not been with a man in years! The Grimm have been my only companions for far too long!" Roland recited, "Page 356, beginning on line 16, ending on line 18 on the third word." This trick also served as a great tool to annoy people.

"Stooooooooop," Rime whined.

Before Roland could continue, Sepia reached over, gently lifted Roland's hat off of his head, grabbed him by the back of his head, and slammed it onto the table. She carefully placed the hat back onto his head while he gripped his nose in pain.

Arty, Timbre, and Rime tried their hardest not to laugh. Zero and Sepia's faces were expressionless.

Sepia rolled her hand in circles while looking at Zero, telling him to play the recording.

.

"Professor Alabaster, sir," Gavin's voice was the first to come from the scroll.

"It's fine, Mr. Quasar, do not fuss over formalities," Professor Alabaster's voice seemed full of concern and dread, "Do we have any leads as to Ms. Luna's location? I don't like having a missing student to worry about."

"Well…" Gavin continued, "no, we don't, but we're working on it."

"Every second that we don't know that she's safe, it brings down the probability of us finding her…" Xannie's voice was not full of optimism and excitement as it usually was.

"Don't you dare act like our teammate is unable to be saved, sis. We'll get Yamuna back in the same condition that we last saw her. We'll fix this. It will be okay," Lurida's voice seemed stressed, and even fearful.

"She shouldn't be the only one we worry about you two," Gavin continued, "Alice Crims could have died last night. Who knows who could be next?"

"If they follow the temporary curfew, they'll be fine," Alabaster said calmly. The sounds of clacking loafers suggested he was pacing.

"Yeah, but that'll be an issue knowing the first years. They seem to have problems when it comes to following orders," Gavin growled.

"Still ticked over what Timbre did?" Lurida scoffed, "Dude, I got over it yesterday. You were the one who stopped me from beating the snot out of her and teaching her a lesson, but you put on a happy face and told her that everything was okay."

"Well he didn't want to scare her off, or the rest of ARTS for that matter!" Xannie stomped her boot, "But that doesn't matter right now! We have to find Yamuna, and if any more of the first years get hurt, then so be it. Yamuna takes priority here."

"You're right…" Lurida murmured, "Has Team ASHS found anything? Anything at all? Any updates via text?"

"No, they haven't as far as I know," the sounds of Gavin tapping and opening his scroll could be heard, "They were supposed to get here about twenty minutes ago. Figures."

Xannie could be heard making nervous whines, "If her own brothers can't even find her… Is it possible she's not even on the campus anymore?"

"She won't…" Lurida began, but stopped, "Why is it so cold in here…? Is the stupid AC screwing up again?" she asked the group.

Zero's hands could be heard shuffling around. Then the recording ended.

.

The group looked at Zero's scroll in stunned silence.

Rime looked around to gauge the response, "Well?"

Arty ran a hand through his hair, "That thing… that thing took Yamuna?"

Timbre held her hands over her mouth. She looked somewhat scared before a look of annoyance flashed across her face, "They told me that other people were priority over your teammates… how can they be so hypocritical…?"

"Regardless of what Alabaster and Team GLXY have to say," Rime stood up, "We're going to help find Yamuna and take this thing down," she looked to the leader of Team ARTS, "with or without you. We're not just looking into some rumor anymore. So, you in?"

Arty's eyes flicked around as he processed what he had heard. "What else can we do, Rime? Of course we're going to help her," he looked to his teammates, "Right guys?"

"Got that right," Roland agreed, "If she needs rescuing, then the more hands on deck the better. In the case that we get hurt… well…" he still rubbed the bridge of his nose from Sepia's suggestion to quiet down, "if the Kokonatsu couldn't kill us, then neither can this thing."

Sepia nodded quickly in agreement. If looks could kill, she would have glared the monster to death already.

Rime smiled, "So it's settled then." She looked to Timbre. "Any word from Turf yet?"

Timbre looked down to her scroll, "He messaged earlier asking where we were. I told him we were in the library. I'd imagine he's on his way. Now that we know that it has Yamuna, he's got to be on board with this. She's his cousin, after all."

"Well," Rime tapped her foot, "now that we know he's a Faunus with, I'm assuming here, excellent hearing, he'll be perfect to help us find Yamuna. Like you just said, he's even related to our missing person. He'd be an essential asset in finding Yamuna and the monster tonight."

'I'll send out some video orbs when it comes to it. That will give us some eyes in the sky, as well as everywhere else.' Sepia texted out, 'I just need someone to stay with me. I am blind as far as my real eyes go when I send those things out. Same goes for my hearing,' seeing as Timbre was her partner, she figured that the one guarding her would be her.

"How about we just use the buddy system across the board?" Roland piped up, "That would be safer with something that we know can take us on. Sepia and Timbre, Arty and I, Rime and Zero, and Turf can go with Timbre and Sepia since Sepia'll be blind as an Echo out there," he suggested to the group.

"If Turf wants to go," Timbre added quickly.

"I want to go."

The group turned to find the boy they were just talking about standing towards the center aisle of the library. He was leaning against the bookshelf, out of breath, his eyes wide in anxiety.

"About time you showed up!" Rime said happily.

"Turf!" Timbre got up and walked over to him, "Are you okay? What's wrong?"

"This whole mess is just weird, and it keeps getting weirder…" Turf groaned, "Look, I wanted to catch up with you guys as quickly as possible to tell you all that we need to capture the monster, not kill it," he straightened himself up and took a seat with Team ARTS.

Arty looked to him, "Turf… I don't know where this is coming from, but, I don't know if you've heard, but…" he looked to his teammates, "this thing has Yamuna…"

"Yeah, that's why we can't kill it," Turf retorted, "Listen, this thing is not safe for us to be around. This is a bad idea in the first place, but someone has to do something. I need you all to promise me that you won't kill it, otherwise we won't be able to get Yamuna back."

Rime and Zero seemed like they were about to question him further, but Timbre stepped up. She didn't really understand why Turf was so adamant, but she could understand his concern, "He's right. We can't kill it. Team ASHS is having enough trouble finding her. Wouldn't it make sense that we could use the thing to lead us back to wherever it has her?"

"If she's still alive," Zero said harshly.

Rime looked at him with an expression of insult, "Zero! How could you say that?!"

"You have to keep it as a possibility. You heard about what happened to Alice."

"She's not dead!" Turf nearly yelled, "She's alive and we need this thing to lead us to… wherever it has her, got it?!" he shook with anger, "I'm only going to help you guys if you promise not to kill it."

Rime leaned over to whisper to Zero, "He would be really helpful, Z."

"Fine, then we don't kill it, but we do whatever is necessary to capture it," Zero crossed his arms. At this point, he just wanted to prove himself against the beast. He didn't like being outdone when it came to speed and agility, whether it be human, Faunus, Grimm, or animal.

Rime nodded, "After the sun goes down, curfew starts. We'll have to sneak out and grab our weapons. Think you all can do that without getting caught?"

Everyone nodded back.

"Good, then we'll all meet back up here. Sound like a plan?" Arty told the group, "And we can't get caught, so let's all stay on our toes."

The group then dispersed and left the library.

That night, Team ARTS, along with Turf, snuck out of the dorm. Being on the fourth floor, getting out was a challenge as the halls were being monitored by some of the staff who came by pretty regularly on their patrols. The halls weren't a viable route of escape. Timbre's wires would have been perfect had her gloves not been in her locker.

"I've got this." Roland pulled a dictionary from underneath his bed and lobbed it out of the window. A second later, a pop came from outside, and two tendrils of ink and paper latched onto the windowsill, "I made a ladder, but we need to be quick. I can't hold this up for too long, and we'll have to jump from about ten feet up. Come on," Roland bounded through the window and began descending the ladder with the rest of Team ARTS and Turf close behind.

They hit the ground and, after a minute to catch their breaths, ran to meet up with the other three.

"About time you guys got here!" Rime whispered harshly from the side of the door to the locker room. She pushed the door open slowly, having already picked it open before they got there.

"Hey," Arty said, "not our fault it took us a while to figure out how to get out."

Rime tilted her head as she let them inside, "Well… I guess it does help that Zero already sleeps in the tree outside Team FREZ's window."

This prompted an odd look from Timbre, who turned to Zero, "you sleep in a tree?"

"What?" he mumbled from behind his scarf, "I have a hammock…"

It was eerie being in the main building when it was dark and abandoned. There wasn't any patrol since nobody expected any students to actually be able to get out of the dorms.

Arty and Roland went to their lockers to retrieve their weapons and gear up, but an odd air hung around the room. Something didn't quite feel right for either of them.

"I don't like this," Roland tightened the straps on his weapon. A chill shot down his spine when Turf arrived, and now that feeling of dread stuck around, "It's all a little strange, isn't it? It's even surreal, but not in a good way."

Arty grabbed a few tubes of paintballs and clipped them to his belt, "Yeah, I think I get what you mean. Earlier this morning this was just some… strange rumor. Now look at us. We're going out and hunting the equivalent of a fairytale."

"That's not what I mean," Roland shot back, seemingly agitated, "I'm talking about the nature of this thing. It left Alice, albeit with GLXY chasing it off. So why did it take Yamuna? If GLXY saved Alice, then they would have certainly saved Yamuna."

Arty could only shake his head, "I don't know, man. You heard Zero, this thing's fast. Maybe when GLXY chased it off, it circled around and separated Yamuna from the group."

"Right, because Yamuna gets separated so easily. She sticks as close to Gavin as possible," Roland shot back and began typing. Sadly, the only thing that he could think to type was the smut that he recited earlier. Had he not made the performance earlier, then maybe he could have thought of something else. He had played himself in the end.

"Well, Gavin was busy carrying Alice to the infirmary, wasn't he? Maybe that's why she got separated from her partner." Arty was about to close his locker when he stopped himself. Deciding it best that he be armed to the teeth against such a mysterious beast, he grabbed a few spare tubes of paintballs. There were too many questions and not near enough answers. "What are we doing?..." he muttered as he shut his locker and went to meet up with everyone else.

"Figuring this out," Roland formed his trail of paper into a bladed hook, similar to what he used back in the Emerald Forest against the first pack of Beowolves, "Being a Huntsman isn't just about fighting, right? It's about a whole lot of things." He thought back to Professor Alabaster's speech during the team-naming ceremony. He had mentioned something about Team ARTS being grouped up due to their shared sense of situational awareness… or something like that, "One of those things is being able to think through situations. We can logic this out, but we'll have to investigate more to do that."

Arty went to load Palette's hopper with red paintballs, but remembered what Turf said about capturing the monster. He returned to tube to his belt and quickly filled the gun with dark blue paint instead.

"Well, shall we be going?" he asked Roland as they went to meet with the others outside. He could already tell they had a long night ahead of them.