A/N: Surprise! Ha, well, I just wanna thank miner249er for commissioning this chapter of Damsel in Distress! I hope y'all enjoy :)

A nervous pit formed in Emerald's stomach, eating away at her, even when her face seemed set in stone. She stood, back straight as she looked at the door in front of her, preparing herself for when it opened. On the other hand as well as the other side of the room, Mercury lounged on one of the beds, fingers flicking through his scroll as he made various sounds as loud as he possibly could, probably to annoy her, his chuckles, sighs, and gasps sounding like they were going through a megaphone. She didn't let it show that it got to her though, except for her clenched fists, and her clenched teeth, and her clenched... well, everything else.

Okay, so maybe she's not being as subtle about it as she thought she was.

Her movements stilled as the door slid open, revealing her leader and savior, Cinder Fall.

Clasping her hands in front of her, Emerald bowed respectfully.

"Mistress." The word was short, but filled with reverence. There wasn't any doubt in Emerald's body that the person in front of her was the most important person in her world. The woman slid past Emerald's still bowed form, brushing her skirt and sitting on her bed, crossing her legs elegantly. Taking that as a silent signal to rise from her bow, Emerald turned, body stiff and at attention. Mercury on the other hand simply sat up on his bed, putting away his scroll, but not standing up.

Cinder ignored the both of them for a second, in deep thought about something that was no doubt important, Emerald was sure. Out of respect, the green-haired girl didn't say a word, patiently waiting for her leader to speak. When the beautiful woman didn't, Mercury decided to do so, ignoring his place in the team.

"How did everything go?" The tall boy asked rudely, ignoring Emerald's pointed glare. Cinder tilted her head to face him, eyes dancing with a mysterious light.

"It went." She said shortly, before shaking her head and letting out a remorseful sigh. "Unfortunately, making... 'friends' with the teams are harder than expected, with there being two teams and all. I decided to choose between the two." Her gaze sharpened as she turned her head to regard the other two in the room. "Which means that I need someone else to look into the team JNPR."

There wasn't even a second's pause between Cinder's last word and Emerald's first as the girl stepped forward, head raised high as she did so.

"I would be honored to do that for you." Mercury relaxed a little with the words, only having a second to prepare to stand up. It didn't really matter to him anyways, so long as the job was done. The same sentiment shared by Cinder, who nodded.

"Very well. I need you to earn their entire confidence." She pulled out a scroll, opening it up and pulling out JNPR's roster, looking through the people listed. Jaune Arc, Nora Valkyrie, Pyrrha Nikos, and Lie Ren. Considering the options carefully, Cinder was quick to draw lines through Pyrrha and Ren.

It wouldn't do any good for Emerald to approach the red-haired champion. She had to move with some caution, and becoming fast friends with the potential Fall Maiden candidate would attract the wrong type of eyes, defeating any purpose of getting close to the team. Ren also seemed very closed off, and not the type to talk to strangers, which would make it too suspicious for her subordinate to strike up a friendship out of the blue.

"Start with either Jaune Arc, or Nora Valkyrie." Cinder decided, turning the scroll around to display their faces. "Approaching them will garner the least amount of suspicion. You may choose which."

Emerald was quick to nod, kneeling down. "Of course. I'll make contact with them today." That earned a nod from the woman sitting in front of her.

"Very well. Make sure to report everything you find."

And with that, Cinder stood up, circling around the still kneeling girl and opened the door before pausing for a second, hand on the frame.

"Emerald." The name was almost a question, but more of a statement that made Emerald raise her head.

"Yes Mistress?"

"Do not disappoint me." Without waiting for a confirmation, Cinder drifted out, the door sliding behind her. Mercury slumped back down as her presence disappeared, pulling out his scroll and pulling up whatever he had been looking at before their leader had walked in, making a small noise of amusement. Emerald rose from her spot, her lips forming a thin line as she looked at her 'partner', thinking about the flippant attitude that he had while Cinder was in the room. It didn't last long before Emerald shook her head, brushing the irritation away. It didn't matter to her how Mercury acted. After all, it would only serve to push Cinder away from him, and closer towards finding favor with herself, which gave Emerald a slight thrill down her spine. With earning Cinder's favor in mind, Emerald decided that now was just as good of a time as any to work on infiltrating team JNPR. The earlier the better, and it would definitely be better than staying in here and getting into an inevitable shouting match with the idiot in the room.

No words passed between them as Emerald left the room, the door closing silently behind her.

Finding her targets was easy enough.

Pausing briefly as Emerald walked into the lunch room, her vision lasered towards her targets, finding team JNPR sitting together with team RWBY, all of them chatting amicably. Walking towards the lunch line, the girl barely paid any attention to the lunch ladies, grabbing some food and sitting slightly close to the teams, having found an empty spot. Almost robotically, Emerald began to eat as she listened in on the two teams' conversations.

"-And then there's the Vytal Tournament, which is kind of cool!" One of the girls from the other team said, a small brunette that looked a little younger than everyone else on the team. Ruby Rose, if Emerald was remembering the name correctly. "What do you think Jaune? You guys going to fight in the tournament?"

Jaune Arc, a blond, scraggly looking boy with what looked like no sense of confidence raised his head up from his lunch, which looked to be a number of chicken nuggets, as well as some chocolate milk. Emerald couldn't help but shake her head in derision at the juvenile choices.

"O-of course we are Rubes." Jaune nodded, looking uncertainly at his partner, who smiled encouragingly at him. "And with Pyrrha, we're probably going to go pretty far." Ruby snorted, crossing her arms smugly.

"Well, Pyrrha's only one person. Team RWBY's going to win it all!" The girl's blonde teammate grinned nodded along with her.

"That's right Vomit Boy. You better pray you guys don't meet us in the tournament." The blonde, who was Yang, Emerald reminded herself, punched her hand, a fire lighting in her eyes. "We'd make quick work of you."

Another round of teasing caused Jaune to sink in his seat a little lower, trying to fold into himself. Again Emerald shook her head at the pathetic display.

"Come on guys, don't be so mean on Jauney." Nora stood up, speaking loudly. "He may not be the strongest of Huntsman, but he's our Supreme Leader, and you know what that means?" No one said anything, sure that Nora was going to answer her own question. "It means that we'll knock the socks off of you guys!"

Emerald wasn't sure how those two things were linked to each other, but brushed it away as she continued to profile the short girl. She exuded confidence, hands placed on her hips as she tilted backwards, her head thrown upwards as she let out a roaring laugh. Yang was quick to rise to the bait, challenging her on how what she had just said made any sense. The two of them went back and forth at each other until the bell for the end of lunch rang, signaling that it was time to go to the next class.

With all the evidence gathered, Emerald made an easy decision on which to approach first.

From what others had said, Emerald made her way towards the library later that day, pretending to browse for a book on the shelves as she made her way closer and closer towards the table that her target was sitting in.

Blonde hair was the first thing that Emerald saw, ruffling as the person leaned back quickly, a laugh leaving them. Another quick perusal of the shelf in front of her allowed Emerald to move onto the next shelf, granting her clear vision of the table.

Nora leaned close to Yang, eyes narrowed, a huge grin on her face as she did so.

"I don't believe you."

The blonde girl leaned back casually, hands crossed underneath her head. "Believe it, sister. Ursa, Beowulf, psh." Yang waved a hand around. "I can match them, punch for punch."

Nora rolled her eyes. "Ursa can't punch, silly. But that's not the point!" She leaned even closer, her feet almost completely off of the floor. "There's no way that you're stronger than me." Yang leaned in closer, until both of their noses were a hair away from touching.

"Believe it."

Emerald smiled at the scene, knowing that she had made a good choice. The fact that Nora was so strong, along with the fact that it was probably going to be easier for her to talk to a girl made the choice way easier than talking to the limp noodle that was team JNPR's leader.

"How could you possibly think that?!" Nora grabbed her weapon off her back, unfolding it into an intimidating hammer that was bigger than the girl holding it. She waved it around with a casual strength that would've intimidated Emerald, if she could actually be intimidated by these children. "You don't even use a smash-y weapon like mine! You barely need any strength to use something that's attached to you." Nora said dismissively, sitting back down, the hammer staying in its form as she leaned it against her leg, chair, arm, and body.

"It's not about the size, sweetheart." Yang said lazily, unfolding her gauntlets and casually checking the weapons. "It's about how you use them." She grinned at the girl sitting across from her. "You couldn't handle Ember Celica if you tried."

"You wanna bet?"

There was a pause as the two of them stared unblinkingly at each other, before Yang carefully removed Ember and laid them on the table, sliding them over to the ginger girl. A grin spread across Nora's face as she grabbed the two weapons, fiddling with the clasps and sliding them onto her wrists, raising them up afterwards and inspecting them closely. Yang sat there waiting impatiently for Nora to do something.

Emerald decided that now was a good time to introduce herself, taking a step towards them before Nora jumped out of her seat, the chair clattering to the ground as she let out a mad cackle.

"Ha ha! You've fallen into my trap!" Nora declared, grabbing Magnhild and placing another hand on her hips. Yang made a confused sound.

"What're you talking about—Oh shoot." A blast echoed through the room as Nora let out a shotgun blast from Ember Celica, Yang's Aura flaring as she flew across the library. Another cackle escaped Nora's mouth as she hefted her giant hammer, holding it above her head with both hands.

"Ultimate POWER!" The insane girl screamed, before chasing her quarry.

Emerald just watched as the library fell apart in front of her eyes, blinking stupidly as the sight in front of her.

Without another word, the mint-haired girl twirled around and headed out of the half destroyed library.

Emerald growled under her breath, having just seen that her first choice of a target was absolutely bonkers. It sent her back to the drawing board, and with the sight of the sunset, Emerald knew that the only information she would be able to give to her leader was that the N of team JNPR was insane.

That wasn't viable information. That wasn't even helpful to Cinder. And that meant that Emerald was going to have to suffer the woman's look of disappointment, something that the orphan always hated seeing. She wanted to impress Cinder. Make her proud of Emerald.

That thought alone kept Emerald from going back to the team room, instead wandering through the halls of Beacon, her mind swirling, trying to find some way to recoup this to the woman who was probably waiting for Emerald to report some sort of success to her.

Before she knew it, Emerald found her way on the roof of Beacon, surrounded by stars and the broken moon above. She looked up, a small smile forming on her face. She loved the stars. Growing up afraid and alone meant that they were the only company she ever had, which wasn't the worst company to have, really. At least the stars weren't abusive and manipulative, like everyone else Emerald had ever met.

"They're pretty, aren't they?"

The girl turned, surprised that someone else was on the roof with her. Red eyes met blue as Emerald found herself in the company of her second target.

"Yeah, they are." She said the words calmly, hiding the delight in her voice of finding him. Destiny had given her a second chance.

Jaune smiled before turning away from her, walking towards one of the rails, leaning on it as he looked out towards the horizon. A second of hesitation passed before Emerald followed him, hanging a little further back, trying to think of something to say to him. Instead, it was the blond noodle that spoke first, catching her off guard once again.

"Looking at the sky's always been a good way for me to get my mind off of things." Jaune said, a tinge of angst in his voice. "Just looking at... at how vast the sky is makes all your problems feel so small, don't you think?"

Emerald thought that sounded idiotic, to be honest. But that wasn't going to help her make friends with the boy, so instead she nodded, as genuine of a smile as she could muster appearing on her face.

"Yeah. It's pretty cool."

She didn't know if it was how she phrased it, or if she had accidently let out her true thoughts with her tone of voice, but Jaune's shoulders bunched up, the boy turning around to look at Emerald sheepishly.

"Sorry. You probably just want to be left alone, don't you?"

"No." Emerald was quick to correct him, not wanting him to leave. "No, I... I think it's nice to have someone around." Jaune nodded, a relieved smile on his face as he turned back around.

"So what's bothering you?" The boy asked, making sure that it came across as a polite question, and something that Emerald could decline to answer if she wanted to. That wasn't really going to help her though, so her mind raced to think of something.

"I want to impress my team leader." She blurted out, deciding that a bit of truth in her lies was going to be the safest bet. It always was, and it always helped to keep her lies straight. "And she expects a lot out of me." She turned to look at the stars again. "I grew up alone, only having myself to take care of, to depend on." She looked down at the railing. "Sometimes it's nice to be away from her, if only for a little while." She found what she said to be true, to her own surprise.

Cinder had been her savior, and Emerald owed her life to the woman. But she was all work and no play, and worked both her and Mercury to the bone. It was worth it sometimes, but most of the time... Most of the time it was good to have some time to relax.

A laugh interrupted her train of thought, making her turn to her present company, who had a small smile on his face.

"What's so funny?" She demanded, her eyebrows drawing together, frustration building as she realized that she had inadvertently let herself to vulnerable, even if it was only for a second. Jaune shook his head, holding out his hands in a small gesture to ask for forgiveness.

"Sorry, I just think it's funny to find someone who came up here to be alone... but have the complete opposite background as me." Jaune said, making Emerald blink at the information. "I grew up with seven sisters." Jaune explained, making the girl recoil backwards at the number. "Yeah, that's most people's reaction." Jaune let out another laugh. "So it's just really nice to find a place to be alone, away from all of the... company. Present company excluded, of course."

Emerald chuckled at that, finding herself amused, something that she hadn't expected.

"Seven sisters huh? That must've been fun." Emerald said, deciding that it would be good enough of an icebreaker.

"You have no idea." Jaune shook his head. "Do you know how hard it is to get new clothes instead of my sisters' hand-me-downs? It wasn't fun, let me tell you."

"Hand-me-downs? Like... blouses? And skirts?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. All of that stuff. But hey, I rocked every single outfit." Jaune struck a pose, getting another laugh from Emerald. "But what about you? I know you said you were alone, but did you have any clothing fiascos?"

Emerald's laughter died a little as he reminded her of her past. The night alone. Hungry. Paranoid that someone would kill her, just to rob what little she had, or to free up some space on the streets, or just because they could.

"I'm sorry."

The words cut her away from her thoughts, and she found herself looking at a concerned Jaune. The look sent a bolt through her heart, making her uncomfortable as she backed away.

"About what?" Emerald didn't mean for it to sound so harsh, but she was caught off guard by the face that the noodle was making. Jaune shook his head, turning away.

"Sorry. I just saw how hurt you looked and I thought that I should apologize for stepping on a sensitive subject."

Emerald was annoyed. Yes, annoyance. That was a safer emotion than whatever she had felt a second before.

"Don't be. It was a harmless question."

"It didn't seem harmless to me."

"Well it was!" Emerald shouted out, Jaune's mouth clicking shut. The green-haired girl drew in a breath, releasing it slowly, shakily.

"Sorry. Look, it doesn't really matter, okay? Besides, the past is the past, and I'm in a better place now, thanks to my leader."

Jaune was quiet, eyes flickering with something that Emerald couldn't place, and wasn't sure she wanted to place even if she could. In the end, Jaune decided on finding the safest subject to broach.

"Your leader sounds amazing."

Emerald nodded, happy that they were on a less touchy subject. "She is. She's the greatest. It's why I want to make sure I do what I can to make her happy."

Jaune let out a small noise of understanding, nodding to himself before turning to look at the twinkling stars again. "And what can you do to make her happy?"

Thoughts swirled around as she tried to find the best answer.

"She's happy when... when I find friends, I guess." Emerald said, feeling awkward saying it out loud. The half-lie worked though, making Jaune turn hopefully towards her.

"Well, maybe she'll be happy to know that you've made a new friend?"

Tilting her head, Emerald crossed her arms, smirking a little as she found delight in finally getting the conversation headed the way she wanted it to.

"What, are you talking about you?" Jaune nodded, the light flickering doubtfully in his eyes, her words causing worry to worm into him. Emerald let him squirm for a bit as she pursed her lips, tapping her chin thoughtfully. "I don't know about that, I mean, I don't even know your name. And you don't even know mine!" She snapped her fingers, as if she just came across the fact.

"My name's Jaune. Jaune Arc. Sweet, short, rolls off the tongue. Ladies love it." Jaune raised his hand, offering her a handshake.

Emerald raised an eyebrow at him. "I'm sure they do. Emerald Sustrai." She gripped his hand tightly.