A Rabbit Among Wolves

Chapter 18

If there was one small benefit of being the leader of an operation like the White Fang, it was that he didn't have to get his hands dirty. He had minions for that. Employees sounded better, but he wasn't paying them, while recruits didn't fit because they had a fresh batch of those. Adam suggested compatriots in his dreams, but that hinted a little too close to Jaune being an actual terrorist, so they – and by they he meant he – decided to call them minions.

Ilia didn't care for it.

Yuma thought it hilarious.

His minions were currently handling the initial training of the new White Fang recruits – those that had stuck around. To the surprise of only Jaune, everyone else said it was common, only about half the people who 'joined up' with them the night before showed today. Cold feet, Ilia said. A sudden case of the nerves, Trifa called it. Pussies, Yuma called them.

Jaune called them smart. The others didn't get it.

Still, those that remained – around twenty in all – were the more loyal and dedicated of the bunch, which directly translated to fanatical and therefore dangerous. Whipping them into shape had been the obvious choice, though not, as one might have thought, in the conventional sense.

"You come across an elderly human lady crossing the street," Sun barked. "What do you do?"

"Make an example of her!" Fenris roared. "For the Fang! Arooooo!"

"Wrong! Twenty push-ups!"

"Ignore her?" another tried.

"Wrong! Ten push-ups!"

"Ask her if she's single."

"Wrong. And ewww! Five laps of the warehouse. You help the old lady. Do you understand? We're trying to improve our reputation, not kill it. You help the old lady across the street." Sun wiped the back of his hand over his forehead. "Am I understood?"

"Yes Solar Flare!"

Jaune sighed and approached. "Sun-"

"Ah." Sun stopped him. "Solar Flare. It's my codename."

"Sun, no one uses codenames."

"Really? You tellin' me 'Banesaw' is his real name?"

"Yes."

Sun blinked. "Huh. Well we should use codenames. What's the point of masks to hide our identity if we're going to call one another by name?"

"If you want to disguise yourself you should wear a shirt."

"I am wearing a shirt."

Jaune glanced down at the wide-open scrap of white cloth bravely clinging to Sun's shoulders and little else. It was a battle he wasn't sure he wanted to get into – and one he wasn't convinced any of the female recruits of the White Fang would thank him for. Other than Ilia. Aside from being not interested in Sun for obvious reasons, she'd developed something of a hate for him for entirely unrelated ones.

"Solar Flare?" she sniped. "That's practically the same as Sun. I guess I shouldn't expect vast intellect from someone like you."

"Ilia," he returned. "You're looking green today."

Her eyes narrowed. "I'm not using my chameleon abilities."

Sun grinned. "I meant the jealousy."

"Pft. As if I could be jealous of anything you have." Tossing her head, she turned to him. "Jaune, I really don't think it's a good idea to let this idiot into the leadership of the organisation. We were doing perfectly fine with just the few of us."