Akashic

"Arthur, nice of you to join us. Winter, it has been awhile, Military life has been treating you well" Ozpin said, his chin resting atop his hands as he sat at his desk, Glynda and Qrow to his right while Ironwood stood to his left, Ironwood's gaze quickly running over Arthur to assess him, his eyes lingering particularly long on Arthur's right hand. All whilst Winter began to argue with Glynda about Qrow and his constant drunkedness.

Arthur noticed this, having kept his eyes on Ironwood since the moment he entered the room, already on guard against the direct approach oriented general who he wouldn't put it against would happily have Arthur dissected to discover what made him tick, and maybe even try to get rid of him on the spot if Arthur proved to be a danger if he was unable to apprehend him.

"So this is the boy I have heard so much about" Ironwood said walking up to Arthur, his eyes locking with Arthur, continuing in his attempt to inspect him before he raised his right hand for a hand shake, "There aren't many men around who would do something as brave as you did nowadays, I hope you can be an inspiration for generations to come Arthur" Ironwood in a proud voice.

Ironwood's friendly display hardly did anything to ease Arthur's concern about the general as he already knew of his arrogance and punch it till it works mentality. Taking Ironwood's hand Arthur gave it a quick shake, before trying to let go only for Ironwood to clench hard and lean forward, "I don't know what Jacques Schnee wants with you, but be very, very careful boy, Jacques is no good man" Ironwood whispered to him before straightening himself out and releasing Arthur, who's eyes sharpened as Ironwood's words solidified his assumption that Jacques was the master who the butler was working for.

"Winter, please head to the combat hall and introduce yourself to the students and begin their training" Ironwood ordered turning around and walked to Ozpin's desk.

"Yes sir" Winter saluted and turned on a dime, beginning to take disciplined steps towards the elevator but not before giving Qrow one last dirty look.

"Arthur" Ozpin said as he stood from his desk, "What we are about to show you is something only a select few know about, those now in this room being the majority of those, as I'm sure you already know" Ozpin walked around his desk and towards the elevator.

"I still advise against this Ozpin, this boy is nothing but a risk to everything we have achieved and a danger, he could just as easily assassinate the maiden, not save her" Ironwood voiced, having returned to his regular, not forced demeanour.

"Yes, and if he can save her? Do something not even you could do with your assets and researchers? Then what? Even just the transference process is a maybe, we are still searching for a trustworthy host, we have few in consideration but it is too early for that, but if we can save a life without risking another then that is what I shall choose" Ozpin explained.

"As much as I agree with Jimmy, I'm siding with Oz on this one, the people who did this are near, I can just feel it, the longer she stays like that the longer they have to get stronger and plan, and we wouldn't want that, now would we" Qrow's surprisingly accurate speech left the room silent for a moment as he took another sip from his flask causing Glynda's cheek to twitch in annoyance.

"Fine, but I will be keeping an eye on you" Ironwood upholstered his revolver holding it at his side as he walked past Ozpin, standing next to it whilst waiting for Arthur to enter.

"That's jimmy for ya, cold, hard, an ass" Qrow chuckled as he walked past Arthur tripping slightly but catching himself by grabbing Arthur's shoulder, "I find out you did anything to Ruby last night, and I will END you" he whispered before entering the elevator and leant against the wall with his arms and legs crossed.

'Like Ruby would let you' Arthur thought, causing himself to chuckle as he imagined Ruby hunting Qrow down for trying to kill him, though this was quickly followed by a scene where Ruby never learnt that Qrow had made him disappear, 'Yeah, let's hope he doesn't figure anything out' Arthur quickly corrected himself.

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"Who keeps poking me!" Qrow shouted as he slapped the air around him trying to find out what kept poking him, getting weird stares from Ironwood, Glynda and Ozpin while Arthur was holding in a laugh.

"He's finally lost it" Glynda sighed, massaging her temple.

'Sorry to say, but he hasn't' Arthur quickly corrected in his head, chuckling as he watched the invisible siren floating around Qrow constantly poking him and causing him an unending amount of irritation.

As they kept walking down the dimly lit hallway of the vault deep beneath the ground under Beacon, Arthur saw two pods silently laying at the end of the hallway, beeping coming from the lit blue screen on the left hand pod where Arthur could see a figure sleeping peacefully, this figure being that of Amber, the current Fall maiden.

"It's a lot worse in person…" Arthur's body shivered as he couldn't help but compare her current situation to his own, except Amber was instead in confined for her own health and not because some insane man wanted to experiment on her.

Once they had arrived beside the pod Arthur looked down upon Amber, her skin a pale brown having lost its l.u.s.tre when her powers were taken from her, a large spider web like mark covering a majority of her face. Arthur placed his hand atop the pod, looking down at Amber with sympathy, Ozpin and the others silently watching his actions.

"Think you can do anything kid?" Qrow asked sloshing the liquid in his flask around while his head looked around the room searching for whatever kept annoying him. The siren now floating above his head while giggling to itself.

"I don't know, I told you before, I've healed physical wounds and sicknesses before, I could probably awaken her but even then we'd have no idea how her aura or the maidenhood would respond" He answered, 'Plus, she'll awaken on her own eventually… if she's kept safe' he added remembering a scene just before her death where she had begun to awaken, only to die when Cinder shot her with an arrow killing her.

"Great, we're dealing with uncertainties now, Ozpin, this is idiotic, we've seen him save a single child, and not even in person, what is giving you such confidence in a child that you'd risk everything?" Ironwood asked, his finger inching closer to the trigger of his revolver the closer Arthur got to Amber.

"Ah, but that is where you are wrong James, we have seen it in person, Glynda here was there when he saved that child" Ozpin corrected, letting Glynda speak.

"yes, it was quiet a marvellous sight albeit worrying, Arthur, do not risk yourself for this, from what we've heard this ability of yours is a double edged sword, this may be a highly important scenario we are putting you in, but I will not have a student of mine risking their lives for something we've already solved" she said, her voice more concerned and lacking her usual stern attitude.

Smilling at Glynda's concern Arthur calmly responded as a small warm feeling filled his body, "You don't have to worry about that, I don't think I can even use it on her, if I even think about using it on her it feels like something's missing" He explained as he turned his head back to Amber.

"Do you think you could open the pod?" He requested looking to Ozpin who contemplated for a moment before walking to the console.

"Ozpin! He just said can't use whatever it is on her, don't risk it, she's stable now, we have no idea how she'll react if we open it up" Ironwood once again tried to bring some of his own sense into the conversation, but was only left seething when the pod Amber was in hissed and raised up letting her body once again experience fresh air after who knows how long.

"Thank you" Arthur muttered and closed his eyes to focus himself before bring his hands over Amber's body, a slight 'click' in the background as Ironwood raised his revolver and pointed it at Arthur, ready to fire if he did anything he deemed dangerous, getting him annoyed glares from Glynda who pulled out her riding crop to stop him if he did do anything.

Taking a deep breath Arthur opened his eyes, letting both his auras appear around his body, letting both the mist and the light particles fall onto Amber's unconscious body, only the particles seeming to disappear into her body whilst the mist began to fall over her body like incense in a holder before dissipating and disappearing.

Seeing this Arthur quickly changed to only letting his white aura not wanting to possibly leave himself deprived of all his aura, luckily he had learnt previously that if he only used one of his auras that he'd at most lose half of his actual reserves and not all of it.

Arthur also pulled out his scroll opening it to the section that showed him his current aura levels, finding that it was steadily beginning to decrease albeit quite slowly as he only let his aura leak out and not actively putting any effort into pushing it out.

Deciding to now actively begin letting his aura out Arthur placed his scroll on the other side of the pod so that he could keep an eye on his levels whilst his hand returned to hovering just above Amber's body, his white aura now pouring from his hand in a steady stream.

After nearly five minutes of feeding his aura to Amber Arthur began to note that Amber's body began to become lighter, as in it was beginning to glow a slight white light whilst his aura level dropped by about ten percent.

After ten Ambers body began to glow even brighter now casting a light across her surroundings, whilst Arthur began to feel a tugging sensation in the back of his head that forced him to move his hands to hovering just above her head and heart, whilst his aura continued to steadily drop to seventy five percent.

At the twentieth minute mark Arthur felt his eyes grow heavy forcing him to close them, soon feeling them begin to heat up, if he could see himself he would have noticed that his eyelids had almost become see-through as behind them a light began to shine through turning his eyelids a light orange and revealed the veins within, like if you shone a flash light through the tips of your finger.

The same thing happening with Amber but in her case the light flickered and moved like that of a flame while a tiny sputter of orange fire appeared at the edges of her eyes.

Five minutes after this had happened Arthur felt his entire body pulsate or what he thought was his body as his entire world suddenly turned from the darkness of his eyelids to pure white that began to dim down as it was blended with a light orange light.

Looking around the area he'd found himself in Arthur felt his body was weightless, as he inspected his body he came to realize all his clothing had disappeared whilst his body seemed almost translucent at the centre of both his palms two swirling vortexes of black and white that crawled up his arms, "Is this my soul?" he said as he felt a strange feeling of emptiness on his c.h.e.s.t causing him to trail one of his finger over it feeling a small indentation at the centre of his c.h.e.s.t, "A key hole?" he muttered, feeling the small keyhole shaped depression in his skin.

"Who?" a feminine voice filled the empty space causing Arthur to lift his head, his eyes locking with a woman he didn't recognize.

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Alternate Chapter names: [Keyhole] [A light orange tint] [FIRST I GO DEAF NOW MY EYES ARE ON FIRE] [Pokey Birdy: Round two] [You can't see me]

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