Alice sat calmly in her room, reading a book. It was one that Blake had lent her, and she found it quite appalling, yet she couldn't put it down. The various love-addled, lust-impaired harebrained ideas and plotlines grabbed at her in a way she couldn't explain, and she had ripped through Blake's book collection in the span of almost three days. Blake herself was having trouble believing it.

"Are you reading that smut again?" Absolem asked, laughing. "Never woulda pegged you for that kind of reading, Alice."

"Hush. Things are getting interesting." Alice said as she turned a page.

Absolem stayed put for a few moments before sidling up next to Alice. "What's it about?"

"It's supposed to be a love triangle, but it isn't. It's more of a love line segment with one very ambitious point. Our heroine is smitten with this boy, who she apparently loves very much and he loves her. But this other boy follows her around like an obsessive puppy, and is quite obviously jealous of the other boy."

"Huh."

"Also, he's a vampire."

"Wait, what? Which one?"

"The first one. The other is a werewolf."

"What?!"

The duo read side by side as Chessur and Nevins watched from the other end of the room, their eyes wide.

"Am I dreaming or are Alice and Absol getting along?" Nevins whispered.

"I don't know." Chessur muttered back. "I think that while we were sleeping, the real Alice and Absol were abducted and replaced with these…things."

"So what do we do?" Nevins whispered.

"We wait and see what they do. They must have some sort of goal."

The two boys whispered conspiratorially as the girls kept reading, and Alice got Absolem caught up on all the various details of the book.

…

A few hours later, they arrived on the training fields to meet up with Team RWBY and Team JNPR for a training session. They noticed that there was no other teacher or student present, and Alice lifted an inquiring eyebrow at Ruby.

"Apparently you're trustworthy now." Ruby said, shrugging. "Anyway, we want to see you guys fight as a team today. So you're going to fight Team JNPR. Neither of you has seen the other fight, and anything you know about each other is only what you have spoken of."

Alice nodded her understanding. "Ground rules?"

"When your Aura is near dangerous levels or you receive a would-be lethal blow, play dead. First team to be all dead wins." Weiss spoke up, settling down on a bench.

Absolem grinned. "Do we get a moment to discuss strategy?"

Ruby looked questioningly at Jaune and Pyrrha, who nodded. "Yeah. Five minutes. Go."

The two teams huddled at opposite ends of the training field, and it was a much larger one than before. It also had a few obstacles on it, large boulders and bushes and so forth. But there was a clear line straight down the middle so the two teams could see each other at the starting positions.

Weiss noticed that Absolem talked much more than Alice during the huddle, with her only putting in a few words here and there. After three minutes they nodded and stood in a formation with Nevins unsheathing Slicing Maelstrom and changing it to its disc form, Alice held the Vorpal Blade loosely at her side, and Absolem unslung Heartseeker from her shoulder and notched an arrow.

Team JNPR was similarly ready, and Yang called the match.

Immediately, Chessur dissipated into a cloud of purple smoke, causing Pyrrha to curse under her breath. A loose Dust Mage was nothing to trifle with. But they went with their battle plan, splitting off into teams of two. Jaune and Ren darted off to the left side going from cover to cover, with Pyrrha and Nora mirroring them on the right.

Alice flew off towards Pyrrha, her semblance taking her across the battlefield in a short amount of time. Absolem had leapt behind a rock and was aiming Heartseeker over it, looking for an ideal target. Nevins had also disappeared, and none of Team RWBY had caught him leaving.

There were a few minutes of silence before Absolem caught Ren darting out from behind a bush. She loosed the arrow notched to Heartseeker, and it struck the ground in front of him, releasing an explosion of ice. Making the ground slick underneath him, it caused him to slip and crash to the ground.

This wouldn't have been so bad if Slicing Maelstrom hadn't come spinning out of nowhere aimed directly at his chest. Jaune darted in front of Ren, shield up, and took the brunt of the hit. The disc bounced off the shield and flew off into a cluster of bushes.

Ren took this opportunity to jump up, and as a duo, he and Jaune rushed the bush. Nevins was waiting for them, Slicing Maelstrom in its full extended form. Ren unleashed a flurry of shots from his dual pistols, but they struck a suddenly appearing wall of ice.

They looked around, confused, only to see a wisp of purple smoke dissipating away from behind them. When they turned, Nevins had similarly disappeared, using his small size to great effect.

Meanwhile, Absolem was taking pot shots at the two of them, and they had to dodge and weave to escape the flurry of arrowy death. She would have kept firing had her Aura-increased senses not picked up a rustling behind her, and a huge metal hammer descended upon her.

She dodged out of the way, slinging Heartseeker across her back and unsheathing Mekkei-Mai and Mekkei-Maru with quick precision, holding the two up in an X to block the swing from Pyrrha's sword. Spinning the blades so she held then pointing down, she began fighting strictly on the defensive, using the extreme durability of the blades to her advantage, narrowly blocking strikes from Milo and Magnhild, with her tanto.

Pyrrha could sense she was wearing down when she saw a hint of blue smoke and an azure butterfly flutter in next to her, and in an instant Alice was bearing down upon her, fire in her eyes. She barely raised Akouo to block the Blade's strike, and the impact jarred her arm. She turned from Absolem to fight this new threat, making sure to not let the Blade touch her, which made going on the offensive a pretty difficult deal.

Absolem, sensing that the fight was now even, began going offensive on Nora, darting in with Mekkei-Mai and Maru, slicing crosswise across Nora's midriff, burning a chunk of her Aura off. But Nora was quick, and slammed Magnhild on top of Absols back, and fired off an explosion, slamming her into the ground.

Pyrrha considered the fight won then, but then a bolt of lightning shredded through her aura, striking her in the back. She gasped and turned, seeing Chessur standing a few feet behind her, his hand raised with his index and middle finger pointed at her, electricity crackling across his glove. He let out a soft laugh as she charged at him, knowing that if she didn't nail him now he'd dissipate off and become a loose threat again.

Swinging Milo down on his chest, she knew he wouldn't have time to teleport away, but she forgot about her previous opponent in the heat of combat and her eagerness to rid the fight of the Dust Mage, and Alice appeared in front of Chessur in a flurry of butterflies and blue smoke her expression cold as ice, blocking Milo with the Blade.

One last swing of the Blade took Pyrrha out of the fight as its natural Aura-shredding ability tore away the last bits of her Aura left remaining from Chessur's previous lightning bolt.

Nora realized she was suddenly in a two versus one fight, and darted off to go find her teammates. Which would have succeeded, but Slicing Maelstrom emerged from the bushes and buzzed in front of her, cutting her off.

She readied Magnhild to blast the first enemy she saw, but Ren appeared and pressed his back to hers.

"Jaune?" she asked breathlessly.

"Separated. Little one is evasive."

Nora nodded and looked out, ready for the wisp of smoke that denoted the arrival of either Chessur or Alice, or the telltale buzz of Slicing Maelstrom.

It was eerily quiet. After a few more moments, Ren realized they were probably hunting down Jaune and bolted, Nora following.

They found Jaune barely holding off Alice, blocking slash after slash of the Vorpal Blade with his shield, concentrating fully on defense. Nora flanked from behind and blasted off a few grenades, which struck empty ground as Alice dissipated away to the right, leaving a trail of smoke.

Nora was about to run after her when Ren stopped her. "It's a trap. They have cover, we don't."

"What do we do? We lost Pyrrha." Jaune said breathlessly. "And no offense Nora, but you aren't that good in enclosed combat like this."

Nora nodded grimly, looking around nervously.

"Absolem is down as well, and she's most definitely their most skilled melee fighter. The problem is-" Ren was interrupted by a blaze of a lightning bolt cutting through their group, narrowly missing them. "That."

Chessur stood about ten feet away from him, purple smoke emanating from him and his hands extended. He was flanked by Alice and Nevins, the Blade gleaming and Maelstrom buzzing.

There was no more speaking as Team JNPR slid into action, flanking Nora as she fired off grenade after grenade. Chessur shot most of them down out of the air and Slicing Maelstrom took care of a few, but eventually a few of them stuck, blasting Team ANAC apart.

Ren and Jaune moved in, Jaune swinging his sword and Ren firing off round after round into Chessur's chest, and he stumbled and collapsed, Aura drained. Nora screeched in shock as Alice dissipated behind her and slashed across her back, putting her out of the fight with one deadly blow.

The remaining duo of Team JNPR realized they were flanked in between one very deadly blade and another very deadly girl.

"Ren what the fuck do we do…" Jaune muttered as he raised his shield, keeping an eye on Nevins, who reverted Maelstrom to its katana form.

Ren shrugged. "Go out with dignity?"

Jaune didn't have time to agree as two things happened simultaneously. First, Nevins charged at Ren, ducking underneath Jaune's shield as he swung at Ren's legs. And as Jaune turned to try and block the swing, Alice appeared in front of him, the Blade pressed against his throat.

Ren was on the ground with the tip of Nevins' katana pressed against his collarbone, and Alice had Jaune beat. They both sighed and raised their hands to surrender.

Team RWBY walked in, clapping slowly. "That…was impressive. I'm surprised you managed to deal with Pyrrha."

"With her semblance, she's weak to a Dust Mage." Chessur rumbled as he picked himself up. "Which is why it was vital that I make myself scarce as soon as possible, make her nervous. It worked, as soon as I blasted her I had her full attention. I was the most threatening thing to her at the time, which let Alice get a strike in with the Blade."

"And that thing is far more powerful than I gave it credit for." Pyrrha said grimly as she emerged into the clearing, pulling leaves from her hair. "Your bolt and one slash from the Blade drained almost my entire Aura."

Alice shrugged. "You noticed I don't really have a fighting style, other than simply going at it. That is why. If my opponent doesn't go completely defensive, I can simply do more damage per second than they can."

Pyrrha nodded. "But how come my semblance didn't work on the Blade? I tried to stop it from hitting me, but it didn't work."

"That was me." Nevins said, raising his hand. "After giving Jaune and Ren the slip, I made my way over to Alice and Absol. I saw Chessur appear, and since I already knew our strat, I basically altered your perception of time. You thought you dashed over to Chess and used your semblance on Alice's Blade when she showed up, but you were too slow, because I fucked up your perception."

Blinking, Pyrrha got a look of admiration on her face, which didn't happen often. "So you didn't beat me because I screwed up, you simply outsmarted me. I'm not sure whether that makes me feel better or worse."

Alice shrugged. "I would feel worse. If I had lost because of a simple mistake, I would be able to rectify that mistake next time. But if I lose through sheer difference of skill, it becomes much different. Now I have to make sure I am smarter, stronger, and better than my opponent next time, instead of simply fixing a mistake."

Pyrrha huffed. "The question was rhetorical, Alice."

"Doesn't mean I can't answer it."

Pyrrha tried to find an answer to that, but couldn't come up with anything. "You're really frustrating sometimes, you know that?"

Alice grinned.

"She knows." Absolem grunted as she appeared, rubbing her back. "Damn Nora, that hammer hurts."

Nora giggled. "Yep. You went boom."

Sighing, Absolem walked over to Jaune and punched his arm. "You did good. Those were good reflexes, blocking Slicing Maelstrom the way you did."

"Uhm…thanks?" Jaune said, rubbing the back of his head. "I just kinda moved. It was automatic."

"That's good. If you can do that kind of stuff without really thinking, that just means you're one step closer to being a really good fighter." Absolem said, grinning. "But…the rest of your fighting could use some work."

"Yeah, I know. Pyrrha's trying to teach me, but I learn pretty slow."

"Oh! I can help you if you want! Having two teachers has gotta be better than one, right? And I can teach you when she has classes, since I'm not technically a student here yet."

Jaune considered it, then shrugged. "Sure, why not. It can't exactly hurt anything, can it?"

Pyrrha opened her mouth to protest, but Absolem was already leading Jaune away. "Hey, come over here. I wanna show you a few things. How do you guys usually warm up?"

"Warm up?"

"Oh jeez."

…

Pyrrha was fuming as she walked back to the dorms with Team RWBY and the rest of Teams ANAC and JNPR. Yang fell back to walk beside her.

"You okay?"

"NO. Jaune is a thick, dull, clueless idiot!" she said, seething.

"That's certainly true." Yang commented. "But I don't think he sees Absol in that way."

"Oh really? He certainly was getting all flirty during lunch the other day."

"Pyrrha, you're more obvious about liking him than Ruby about liking sweets. If he isn't picking up on that, he certainly isn't going to pick up anything Absol is putting out. You feel me?"

Pyrrha sighed. "I guess you're right. But what the hell do I do?"

"You could try just walking up to him and kissing him. That should do it."

Pyrrha punched Yang. "I'm not doing that! That's…that's…"

"Perfect. I think you're just nervous."

"I'm not nervous!" Pyrrha said, blushing furiously.

"Riiiight."

Up in front, Ruby bounced next to Alice, giving her a play-by-play of the fight, Ruby-style. "And then Chessur was all like poof! ZAP! And Pyrrha turned around all like 'holy shit' and then got all funky looking, like she was in slow motion. And then you were like ZOOM right in front of-"

"Ruby! I was there. I get it." Alice said, smiling slightly.

"Awh. Fine."

"Anyway, I'm excited to try that sort of thing against your team. It'd probably be much more of a challenge." Alice said.

"Really?" Ruby asked, her eyebrows arching.

"The only thing we were really worried about for their team was Pyrrha, and Nevins and Chessur took care of her easily. Your entire team, on the other hand, is pretty strong."

"Huh." Ruby said, thinking.

"Anyway, I think I need to retire for a bit. I'm tired." Alice said shortly as she turned off and walked to the dorm.

"Alright! Meet ya later?" Ruby asked. Alice gave no response as she flitted off down the halls.

Ruby looked to her other side and discovered Chessur was gone, a wisp of purple smoke taking his place.

…

"Are you alright, Alice?" Chessur rumbled as Alice walked into her room to find him standing by the window.

"I'm seventeen, Chess. I don't need you hanging over me like an overprotective father." Alice said curtly, sitting down on her bed.

"Be that as it may, I still worry."

"Don't. I can handle myself."

"Alice, we both know that isn't exactly true right now."

Alice stayed silent for a few moments longer before speaking up. "Have you caught any other sign of her?"

"She's definitely here, I can tell you that. Where exactly is going to be more difficult, seeing as it's hard in the first place picking out her scent amongst the thousands of others littering this place."

Alice brought her knees up to her chest. "Keep looking. They're bound to stumble at some point, they always do…"

"He's here too."

Jerking up, Alice jumped out of bed and walked up to him. "What?"

"That man, the one you spoke of before. I smelled him earlier, around the training field."

Alice backed off a few steps, shock evident on her face. "Why is Qrow here?"

"You know he's interested in your progress. He could be just checking in on you."

Alice shook her head. "Not likely. What ties could he have to Beacon? He's a teacher at Signal…"

…

Later that night, Chessur found himself on top of the roof, watching the night sky. He was daydreaming when a familiar scent caught his attention.

"Hello now…" he muttered. Crouching down, he tried to figure out where it was coming from, and slowly moved after it.

After about thirty minutes, he found a group of three people standing in the hall, talking about something. One of them had green hair and was female, the other gray hair and male. He was taller than the first girl and the other woman with them, a raven-haired girl.

Chessur hissed under his breath as he heard the silky voice that had haunted him for a while now.

"So the girl is here?" the raven-haired woman asked the two.

"Positive. She's under the wing of that Team RWBY though, which is going to be annoying."

"Hmm….Are you sure it's her?"

"Alice Liddell, leader of Team Anarchy. Never see her alone, she always has that cursed cat clinging to her, or that bothersome Ruby girl."

"That's her…..so she did come to Beacon. What's Ozpin up to?"

Shrugging, the boy spoke up. "Who cares? Let's just kidnap her and make a break for it."

"Mercury you idiot, we can't do that." The woman said in a scathing tone. "There needs to be some measure of thought going into this. We need to get rid of the cat at the very least, along with that Ruby girl."

"I can deal with the girl." The girl spoke up, grinning. "She doesn't seem too hard to deal with."

"Very well. You two stay away from the cat. We have an old score to settle…" the woman muttered as she walked off, not noticing the gentle wisp of purple smoke dissipating in the corner…

…

Chessur stood in the center of the room, his hands clenched into fists. Alice was awake and staring at him with bright eyes.

"What? What is it?" Alice asked sharply, getting out of bed.

"I just saw her."

Alice blanched. "What?"

"They are here for you. And we're all in danger. You, me, that Ruby girl. All of us."

As soon as Chessur mentioned Ruby, Alice hardened. "Alice?" Chessur asked as she snarled.

"They should keep her out of this. She has done nothing wrong."

Chessur blinked. Alice? Thinking of other people? This wasn't like her.

"You cannot control that. Alice, we should leave, soon." Chessur said, gripping Alice's shoulder.

"No."

"….no?"

"I will not abandon them to the mercy of that witch." Alice hissed. "I must protect them."

Her mind raged as she thought of the situation. She knew that if she was to leave, Ruby would suffer. She couldn't put a finger on why she felt so angry at that thought, but she didn't really care.

I will protect her. She will not fall to the same thing that befelled my family.

You will burn in hell, Cinder Fall, for the crime you did to my family.

YOU WILL BURN!

Author's Note

Things are heating up (heh) as Alice discovers the identity of someone she apparently has some kind of history with is still on her tail. Duhn duhn DUHHH!

Plot, ahoy! As the tournament nears, so does the White Fang, closing in tighter and tighter. Let's see how Alice and Co. deal with this, eh?

Please remember to leave a review, as it helps out a lot!

Enjoy Chapter 3 – An Enemy Returns, and have a wonderful day.

Spike