Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Yang learned long ago that their family wasn't normal. It wasn't the fact that Uncle Qrow, Mom and Dad were all Hunstmen, even if Dad was retired and taught at Signal. Nor it was the fact that she looked nothing like her baby sister Ruby, due to the fact that they had two moms. It wasn't even the fact that Uncle Qrow was regularly absent, or an alcoholic, or how Dad never really got over Summer and Raven. But ever since she was old enough to see through Dad's and Qrow's excuses, she could tell they were a magnet for trouble.

Weird things just kept happening, and it all couldn't be explained away by Qrow's semblance. Like how sometimes she swore she heard sounds of a brawl outside and the growls of some kind of monster, but whenever she checked Dad was there watering the plants looking like nothing happened. Except she could tell things had happened. He had his gauntlets off to the side and his shirt had a stain she knew wasn't there before, but he'd just wave it off as a dirt stain from gardening. Or how sometimes Qrow's weapon seemed to almost be attracted to him magnetically. His excuse of trying out Gravity Dust was bullshit because she knew he did not have enough money left after using his paycheck on paying his tab to buy dust that rare.

It didn't help that Qrow's senses seemed sharper than an average Hunstman. She knew Qrow was already a top-tier fighter, he worked directly under one of the Headmasters of course, but sometimes it seemed he could tell if she entered the room just by smelling the air.

She soon learned to tuck it under "things they clearly won't tell me ever" and to ignore it when it happened. Still, she couldn't help but notice that when Dad reorganized stuff in the basement, the boxes sometimes glowed and made sounds that definitely did not belong to household items. She suspected it had something to do with Raven, but anytime she asked about her Dad would clam up and get that sad look in his eyes that reminded her of when Summer went missing. Supposedly Raven ran away right after she was born and Yang wanted to find her, if only to ask why she ran, why she didn't come back when her husband was clearly hurting, but she learned not to lose herself to that. Almost dying to Beowolves tended to leave a very strong lesson.

At least that meant that her surprise at Ruby being accepted into Beacon early wasn't very strong. She was ecstatic at the opportunity her little sister got, but naturally, as all big sisters do, worried about how she might fare. Yang was loud, extroverted and easy to get along with. Ruby was quiet, nervous, mumbled a lot and did not like crowds of people. Or new people in general. She spent more time with Crescent Rose than with her classmates. Not that there was anything wrong with that mind you! Her sister is a perfect little angel, she's just got a few rough edges.

At the very least Yang would be there for her, just like it always has been. She sighed. All this self-reflection in the middle of packing for the school of their dreams would do no good. She came up here to take her mind off things, not get lost in it damn it! She ran a hand through her hair and decided some fresh air would do her some good.

Exiting her room and going down the stairs, she heard Ruby talking to Dad yet again about possible modifications to Crescent Rose, when Uncle Qrow would be back, what Beacon was like for him, things like that. She went out the door into their backyard and looked up at the sky. The sun was setting and there were no clouds at all, which gave a picture straight out of an artist's canvas. The sombre orange light washed over Yang and she took a deep breath, closing her eyes and just feeling the wind around her. She could hear the rustling of bushes and trees, the movement of nearby woodland critters and the sounds of civilization coming from the more urban areas of Patch.

After standing around for a few more minutes, Yang opened her eyes and saw that dusk had advanced even further, the skies painted a bright red color, the shattered moon hanging in the sky. Her spur-of-the-moment meditation session now over, Yang decided to walk back in and found Ruby and Dad in the living room still talking about his Beacon days. Smiling, she walked over and ruffled her sister's hair.

"Yang!" she exclaimed. "You're interrupting Dad's story about their first mission!"

Dad just chuckled and waved to Yang, beckoning her to sit down while she shot back a smirk.

"First mission huh? What did you guys do then?"

"Oh nothing much really, just had to go into a cave to clear out some Grimm while shadowing a huntsman, typical stuff really," Dad replied.

Yang raised an eyebrow and moved to speak, but Ruby beat her to it.

"Clearly something happened! Didn't you tell us how your team was the most dysfunctional of the year?"

Dad snorted before continuing. "Oh yeah, you should've seen all the wild things your Uncle Qrow got up to while drunk. But I'm getting side-tracked, as I was saying-"

Yang just looked fondly at Ruby and Dad, not really paying much attention to the story, something about Raven getting stuck on a Grimm Mom petrified and Uncle Qrow getting chewed out by Dad, she felt like she was ten years old again. Just sitting, at peace, listening to Dad's or Uncle Qrow's dumb stories and not worrying about all the weird things that happen to her family, how Ruby's and her wounds would recover just a smidge faster, enough to be abnormal compared to others with aura, the fact she was attending Beacon with her sister or how her family still kept secrets from her. She sighed at her treacherous mind ruining the moment, before excusing herself, not before ruffling Ruby's hair a bit more, and going back to her room to finish packing and clock in early.

Tomorrow was another day after all, and maybe at Beacon, she could leave all this behind.

Tai sighed and ran a hand over his head. The girls had just gone to bed and left him alone in the living room, only the sounds of animals outside to accompany him. He should be in bed right now and getting up early tomorrow to see his two daughters off to Beacon, but he couldn't. There was too much going on in his mind right now and the stories from Beacon brought memories.

Memories of her

He really should stop with the late-night reminiscing of Summer and Raven, but he couldn't help himself. It also didn't help all the guilt he felt at lying to the girls. Saying that Raven ran away, while partly true, would imply that she was still alive. Still here and that she could come back at any moment. But Tai knew that wasn't the truth. Maybe in another universe, it was, maybe Summer would still be here and not MIA, hell, maybe in that universe Yang would have her actual mom present.

But not here. He could still see Raven's face, scrunched up in agony, before being covered by the helmet of that atrocious armour. If he closed his eyes, he could see Qrow crying on the ground, Summer comforting both him and Qrow, as they realized that the demon knight they just killed was their teammate. It had to be done, he knew that, but the guilt would never go away. Tai understood why Qrow drank, it was his way of coping with it all. He sighed, pushing away the temptation of drinking the night away. He wasn't Qrow and his girls needed him tomorrow.

He noticed Zwei at the foot of his chair, sensing his emotional state and whining. Tai's lips turned upwards a bit and he picked up Zwei and let the dog rest on his lap as he rubbed Zwei's head. Tomorrow was another day, and at least with the girls gone, he wouldn't need to hide so much stuff anymore. Sighing again, he put Zwei back down on the floor and went into his room. Insomnia be damned he would get sleep tonight and be up bright and early for his daughter's big day tomorrow.

Entering his room, he crouched down at the foot of his bed and pulled out the box which contained his trusty gauntlets and greaves he used since before his Beacon days. They didn't see much use now, their yellow paint and dragon motif on it wearing away with all the years of idleness, but if what Qrow told him last time he was here was to be believed they would see action soon.

Maybe he would even pick up Beowolf again. Ironic how he might use a weapon with the name of a Grimm to kill Grimm. Putting the box back underneath his bed, he changed into his sleepwear, picked up a leather-bound book with a huge R engraved on it, and began reading on his bed next to the night light.

"Sound the Flute! Now it's mute. Birds delight, Day and Night..."

Chapter Text

The drive to the Bullhead docks wasn't anything remarkable. Not that Yang expected it to be, but with Ruby bouncing so much with enthusiasm that she could probably power half the city of Vale she expected something to happen. They pulled into the docks quickly enough and said their goodbyes. Dad went on and on about how proud he was of them, how he'd miss them, the whole shtick. It'd be adorable if it wasn't so embarrassing that he was doing it in public with people staring at them.

She did notice something weird, which was Dad's lack of puns, and his outfit. Along with his usual tan dress shirt and brown vest, he was wearing a brown long coat with holsters for guns on the back of it. Dad never used guns, at least outside of the ones in his gauntlets and greaves. Apart from that, his metal spaulder and his red bandana were now worn over the coat, both sleeves were unrolled, his leather vambrace and glove surely under his right sleeve, and he was wearing long brown cargo pants instead of the usual shorts, and overall it looked like he was going to do something important, like a meeting.

Yang didn't question it too much. The coat could've been Qrow's or Mom's and he's just borrowing it. Besides his teaching job had him go to meetings every month at least, this wasn't out of the ordinary. Were it not for the fact that when he thought she wasn't looking he had an anxious look on his face she would've brushed it off.

Well, no sense in worrying about that. She had Beacon to attend to and a little sister to tease and gush over until she died of embarrassment. Waving their goodbyes to Dad, the sisters got their luggage and went aboard the Bullhead to head to Vale and then Beacon. Ruby's excitement already died down thanks to her social anxiety and fear of being treated differently for getting in early, but Yang was just getting started. No matter what she'd be there for Ruby, although a little encouragement to make friends might not hurt her too much.

Qrow cursed his semblance, not for the first time and certainly not for the last. He was just waiting in a forest clearing for Tai in order and kill some demons and Grimm, a relaxing job by all means. But nooooo! Turns out a horde of Grimm just happened to be migrating right where he was waiting and instead of being able to kick back, relax and see his brother-in-law he had to cut through several beowolves, ursai and creeps, and that's not counting for the fact all the empusai that decided to show up too! It's not like it was hard to cut down the bug-like demons, just incredibly annoying and time-consuming considering they kept falling back behind the Grimm like the cowards they were. The sound of a car engine in the distance at least brought his mood up. "Finally," he muttered, before switching Harbinger into its scythe form again and began carving through the horde of black and grey like a hurricane of death, slashing through white bone and insectoid limbs alike.

Before long Tai's car pulled up, stained with demon blood and Grimm remains as it ran through the horde before Tai himself got out, tripping up an eager beowolf before crushing its skull with a stomp.

"Looks like I'm late to the party, can't believe you started without me Qrow!" Tai said as he kicked an ursa high into the air.

"Well you know what they say, the early bird and all that," Qrow replied sharply as Harbinger swapped back to its sword mode and he blasted a demon's head off with its shotgun.

Looking at Tai again, he noticed that instead of his usual weapons, he was using Beowulf. One of Raven's weapons

"What, you feel nostalgic today?" He scoffed

"What can I say? I felt like being fancy on this date of ours," Tai chuckled before replying while he caved an empusa's head in with a hammer blow.

Qrow saw out of the corner of his eyes as the animalistic Devil Arm tore through the horde. The gauntlets were black iron with white glowing lines ending in wolf faces where Tai's fists would be, the greaves made of a similar material but having claws where the feet would be which tore through Grimm armor like paper.

Qrow wasn't slacking off by any means either, and soon enough the horde was basically non-existent, the only traces of there being one all the damage caused by the battle. He could tell they weren't done yet though. He could smell the presence of a more powerful demon nearby and he could tell Tai felt it too. It didn't take long for the demon to reveal itself, stomping through the tree line. It was tall, like most major demons, easily towering over Qrow and Tai. It was humanoid from the waist up, with great curls of hair and a long beard, wearing some sort of blue-greenish toga with drills attached to its arms. From the waist down, it had the body of a lion, the wings of a bird and a scorpion tail, along with some kind of saws attached to its four legs, reflecting the glow of the sun.

Overall it wasn't anything that impressive. Sure he was big and looked menacing and all, but honestly he'd seen worse during his time as a devil hunter. Like Tai when he got caught teaching Ruby how to wield a scythe at the young age of 8 years old. He chuckled. Good times, that one.

"I am Gilgamesh! I sense the blood of warriors here! Who dares intrude in my kingdom?!" the demon bellowed, and Qrow mockingly waved his hand over his nose at the demon's smell.

"Sheesh buddy, ya couldn't have taken a bath in the Underworld before coming here?" Qrow replied and Tai snorted at the jab.

Gilgamesh lowered his body, inspecting the two brazen humans daring to mock him. Qrow looked back at Tai, rolling his eyes with a "can you believe this guy" attitude.

While Gilgamesh kept his eyes on them, Tai walked up to Qrow and pointed at the demon.

"So who's turn is it now?" Tai asked

"I think it should be mine, with you being so rusty I don't want your joints to break" Qrow replied

"Oh haha, very funny, but I think I'll take this one, you being in bird form all the time I wouldn't want you to peck the demon accidentally thinking you're still a bird," Tai shot back. "Although, considering how thick your head is it might work," he added.

Qrow cackled while the two of them continued to bicker, unaware of the demon's drills spinning and his arm cocking back for a punch, ready to decimate the pair, who decided the best way to resolve their argument was by playing rock, paper, scissors. Just as Gilgamesh's fist would've hit the two, they were in the air, with Qrow pulling out scissors and Tai paper.

"Ha! Take that you ancient reptile!' Qrow yelled out

"Ancient? You look like you're pushing sixty you damn crow!" Tai laughed before jumping onto the demon's back and punching the lionine body.

Qrow meanwhile changed into his bird form and flew into Gilgamesh's face before morphing back and bringing out Harbinger in sword form, slashing downwards and leaving a great gash through the front of its body. The demon yelled in pain before rearing back its other arm, looking to pierce Qrow with the drill. Qrow jumped back before dashing towards its arm and running up it, Harbinger in scythe form as he slashed all over the armored limb

Tai meanwhile was busy dodging the demon's scorpion tail while punching and kicking its lower body. The tail tried to pierce him again, but Tai grabbed it and stabbed it into Gilgamesh, making the demon yell out in pain. He then charged up Beowulf before delivering a downward punch into the tail, causing a white explosion and making it sink deeper into the demon's body.

Gilgamesh flapped his wings, seeking to throw off the irritating human, but before he could Qrow was on him again, slashing, stabbing and shooting with Harbinger up high while Tai brought more devastating punches and kicks directly into its legs. Gilgamesh roared in fury and brought a fist to bear against Qrow, seeking again to stab him with the drill. As its body regenerated, Tai ran around and jumped up, aiming carefully before descending into a dive kick straight into its arm while Qrow was in the air, diverting the punch and bringing it crashing down. Gilgamesh roared again and stomped the ground, creating a shockwave to make some space and push back the pair.

Qrow used some demon energy to create a Trickster platform to jump on before turning into a bird again and flying away, while Tai went into a stance and made as if to block the attack, a yellow shield shimmering for a moment and keeping Tai safe. This was Royal Guard. The pair reconvened while Gilgamesh flapped his wings and backed away, circling the two like a lion waiting to pounce on upon its prey.

"Think we need to Trigger for this guy?" Tai asked.

"Maybe you do, but I'm fresh as ever," Qrow replied.

"With all that alcohol in your bloodstream I doubt it," Tai shot back

Qrow laughed at that and the two of them charged back in, Gilgamesh moving in response and readying its fists and tail. Tai looked at him and nodded, pointing to himself and one of his gauntlets, making an uppercut motion. Qrow returned the nod and moved to distract the demon. He moved all around, shifting from bird to human and being a general nuisance while the demon growled in frustration. He decided some taunting was in order, after all being mad does tend to make you lose focus.

"Come on big guy! I can see all your moves coming a mile away! This all you got?" Qrow mockingly asked.

"I am the great king Gilgamesh! I will not be mocked like this!" the demon roared in response.

"With that beard? You look more homeless than I do," Qrow smirked, before jumping onto its head and aiming Harbinger's shotgun at it, "In fact, here's a haircut, free of charge," he said before blasting him full of lead. It wouldn't do much damage, he knew, but that wasn't his job. That was Tai's.

Tai stood right underneath Gilgamesh, his right arm cocked back and bursting with energy, the black iron being overwhelmed by a white glow. Tai felt the old familiar sensation of his demonic powers, however small they were now, tugging at him, and he decided. Why not? It had been a while since he went on a hunt, might as well enjoy himself. Deciding to at least limit himself a bit, Tai only let some power through, not enough for a full Devil Trigger, but enough to start transforming him. A yellow glow enveloped him as a golden tail suddenly sprouted, scales of the same color spreading through his skin, his hair glowing and two great horns sprouting from his temple. Beowulf began influencing the transformation now, black armor with white lines appearing on his chest and head, making him look like some kind of draconic knight.

Grinning, he shot upward, his fist tearing through the demon's flesh before hitting its chin, momentarily stopping before continuing as nothing was there in the first place, slamming Gilgamesh's head back as he reached the peak of his uppercut. Qrow, ever the kill-stealer that he was, hooked his scythe on the demon's torso before spinning and rending a great wound on its side. It was over.

Gilgamesh fell to the ground and began dissolving, leaving a small glowing green orb. Qrow grabbed it and it transformed into a Devil Arm. It was a pair of gauntlets and greaves, similar to Beowulf, but a more silvery metallic color with blue and red highlights all around it. Along with that, there were small iron wings on Qrow's back and a mask on his face, both sporting a similar design as the rest of the Devil Arm. The final touch were the drills on the gauntlets and two pairs of circular saws on each heel, definitely for inflicting extra pain.

"Not more of these, we have enough gauntlets and boots in the house already," Qrow groaned.

Tai chuckled, "You can keep those, I'm not a big fan of the drill or the saws, seem more like your style," Qrow rolled his eyes and unsummoned the Devil Arm, bringing Harbinger back into his hand.

"Well, that was a good workout, definitely needed that,'' Tai stretched his arms before walking back to his car, Qrow alongside him, chatting about his mission to Oz. It was just like the good old days.

If only that thought didn't bring a pang of pain in his chest at the thought of what was missing.

Chapter Text

The sun rose early that morning, much to the dismay of many of Beacon’s students, wanting to sleep in after a hectic and adrenaline-filled initiation the day before.

Ruby Rose was one of the only souls bright and early, along with Blake and Yang, ready to receive the day and be the best team leader ever! Sure, she had her anxieties, fussing over if Ozpin made the right choice and if Weiss would cooperate, but surely the headmaster knew what he was doing! And Weiss even said she would try to be more patient and less of an Ice Queen, right? She had nothing to worry about! Right?

Stuffing those pesky anxieties down, Ruby pulled out a whistle from her skirt pocket, noticing that Weiss was just getting up. Oh well, she already had it out and Weiss did still look a bit groggy. Blowing on it as hard as she could, Weiss jumped out of bed and fell into the floor most ungracefully. Ignoring her "what in the world is wrong with you," Ruby clasped her hands behind her back and got to work.

"Now that everyone is awake, we can officially start with our first order of business!" Ruby said.

"Excuse me? Weiss replied.

"Decorating!" Yang exclaimed, holding several posters, paint cans and other miscellaneous items related to making a room as chaotic as possible.

"What?!" Weiss said, both confused and irritated. Blake got out her suitcase and looked at Weiss.

"We still have to unpack," she said, before said suitcase opening, dropping all its contents on the floor, "And clean," she added.

Weiss' irritation only seemed to grow by the minute. Considering Ruby blew the whistle in her face again, Ruby thought it'd be more appropriate to change from minutes to seconds. She decided to quickly follow up on her words and lead the decorating so at least Weiss's wrath would be directed elsewhere or culled.

"All right!" she exclaimed. "Weiss, Blake, Yang and their fearless leader Ruby begin their first mission!" She raised her fist up and yelled, "Banzai!" to which Blake and Yang also joined, Weiss giving them a deadpan look that communicated "this is probably culturally insensitive somewhere, but I don't know enough to know for sure" before sighing in exasperation.

Everyone got to work quickly setting up their own spaces and marking it with appropriate decorations. Yang put up posters of her favorite boybands, which caused Ruby to put on a look of mock disgust, earning her a lighthearted ruffling of her hair, Weiss hung beautiful paintings depicting stunning landscapes which surely had some deep life-changing meaning according to her, Blake just put up her book collection on a shelf. Wow did that girl have a lot of books; Ruby was pretty sure she packed more books than clothes! Ruby herself was trying to hang some red curtains from home. Emphasis on trying, because she accidentally sliced one in half. Oops, she hoped Dad wasn't coming before she could get that fixed.

The quartet stepped back and admired their work for roughly five seconds before realizing a crucial detail, which was the fact they had to bunch up all their beds to fit everyone's stuff.

"This...isn't going to work," Weiss said, wincing a bit as one of the beds slid off and almost crashed into a wall.

"It is a bit cramped," Blake replied.

"Maybe we should ditch some of our stuff?" Yang suggested, glaring at Ruby to shut down her idea of burning her boyband posters.

"Or we could ditch the beds and replace them with bunk beds!" Ruby exclaimed, putting her arms out in excitement.

"Sounds incredibly dangerous," Weiss said, hoping to snap some reason into the young brunette.

"And super awesome!" Yang cut in, pumping her fist into the air.

"It does seem efficient," Blake argued, trying to appeal to the heiress' pragmatic nature.

Weiss sighed reluctantly, seeing how she was outvoted, and the four of them got to work on their bunk beds that definitely violated several building codes. Using a combination of Weiss' glyphs, Blake's ribbon and books along with some rope Yang found and Ruby's engineering knowledge from reading too many weapon magazines, they managed to rig up a precarious and frankly life-threatening bunk bed set. Just as they finished hooking up Ruby's bed on the ceiling and placing the book supports, there was a knock on the door.

"Come in!" Ruby yelled, tying the final rope into a hook they placed on the wall. A mop of blond hair accompanied by a bright red mane tied into a ponytail told her who it was immediately, "Jaune! Pyrrha! What do you think of our room?" she asked. Pyrrha clicked her tongue, clearly trying to convey her words without sounding like Weiss but red while Jaune looked around the room, flabbergasted that the beds remained standing after team RWBY stopped supporting them. He shook his head before seemingly remembering that they two of them came here to tell the team something.

"Where were you during breakfast?" Pyrrha asked, her hands behind her back as she watched all of RWBY tilt their heads quizzically.

"Breakfast?" Yang asked. Jaune nodded.

"Yeah, breakfast was at eight and class starts at nine," he said.

"Did you say nine 'o'clock?!" Weiss shrieked. Ruby nodded, "Yeah he did, what's up with that?" she asked.

"It's eight-fifty-five you dunce!" she yelled out, quickly exiting her room and running towards the exit. The rest of RWBY along with Jaune and Pyrrha quickly followed, with Ren and Nora right behind them. They passed by Beacon's fountain and Headmaster Ozpin and Deputy Headmistress Glynda. Ruby winced. She really hoped they didn't know the time and that they had only minutes to spare before arriving on time. A quick glance at Professor Goodwitch checking her watch shattered her hopes and she picked up speed, trying not to arrive late on the first day.

"Monsters! Demons! Creatures of the night! These and more are just some of the many names we call the Grimm, but I-" 

Tai chuckled as he passed by Port's class and him giving a lecture. Those poor souls had no idea what they were in for. Walking down the hallways of Beacon, Tai left the main building and headed towards the CCT tower. Entering the lobby and then the elevator, he hit the button for the highest floor and waited with his thoughts. It was curious how Ozpin insisted on a physical meeting instead of just calling him on his scroll, but considering Ozpin knew how limiting his schedule as teacher was, it must've been important that he both had to call him and meet with him in his office.

The elevator doors opened, and he walked in. Ozpin's office was just like how he remembered it from his team STRQ days. Ozpin was sitting in his same wide desk with a view of Beacon's campus behind him, a kitchenette to the side where the headmaster made his brew of hot cocoa every day, and the same giant clocktower gears were above Tai, moving slowly and giving a grave, ambient sound when they turned. Ozpin was wearing a shirt and vest, both green, over which was worn an unzipped black suit, accompanied by a green cowl and dark-green pants. Next to his desk sat his cane, the Long Memory, and his left hand was holding his mug of cocoa. Glynda wasn't accompanying him, but that wasn't all that strange considering it was the first day of classes, she probably couldn't make it.

"Ah, Tai, good to see you," Ozpin said, putting his mug on his desk and pushing the paperwork he was working on aside, hands folding over the hard, reflecting surface.

Tai got one of the chairs in the room and sat down in front of him before replying, "Good to see you to Ozpin, and that your sense of interior decorating hasn't changed a bit these last few years," as Ozpin chuckled in response.

"Well, you know me, I do appreciate good clockwork," he said, right as one of the giant gears up top spun alongside the smaller ones, as if to accentuate his joke. Tai snorted. As good as it was to interchange banter with the old headmaster, he did come here for a reason.

"So, what did you need me for Oz? You know I'm retired and if you need an active field agent you have Qrow," Tai asked, leaning forward and clasping his hands on the desk, as if they were undergoing a business transaction.

"I had hoped I could let you enjoy your retirement in peace, but circumstances in recent years have changed and I fear I need you active again," Ozpin sighed, taking another drink from his mug before looking at Tai with his piercing brown eyes, "I believe you went on a hunt with Qrow two days ago while he was in Patch, and there you found a major demon correct?" he asked.

Tai nodded, leaning back, before replying, "You got that right. He wasn't much trouble with me and Qrow on the scene, but I'm guessing my visit has something to do with this, right?".

"Unfortunately, yes. While I am aware that demons can cross the veil between our world and theirs in small numbers, it still worries me that a major one came through, even if he was dealt with," he said, moving to the kitchenette to brew some more cocoa, offering some to Tai.

"I get what you're saying. With Qrow on this secret mission you've got him on, you don't have a lot of people left that can handle a demon like that, not without suffering grievous losses and injuries," he replied, declining the offer with a wave of his hand while twisting his body to look at him.

"Correct, I also worry about the increasing frequency of demons crossing over, as I'm sure Qrow must've told you," he said, sitting back down in his chair and sipping from his mug again. Tai raised an eyebrow; he must be really stressed about this if he's fidgeting this much.

"That being said however," he continued, "I respect your wish to not go back into active duty, so instead, from one teacher to another, I give you another offer instead," he finished. Tai looked curiously at him. He had an idea at what Ozpin was playing at, but he kept silent, hearing the old headmaster out.

"First, I would like you to come and give optional classes to certain teams on demon hunting. This would allow us to prepare a future generation of huntsmen that can both deal with Grimm and Demon. I can talk with the headmaster at Signal so we can work out a schedule in the case you do accept," he said. Tai put his hand on his chin. While it was certainly a good idea, there was a reason he became a teacher at Signal and not Beacon, it brought too many memories. Ozpin continued, "Second, I would appreciate if you could try and keep a look out for any increase in demonic activity. You don't even have to leave Vale, you could just investigate in Forever Fall and the Emerald Forest, along with the woodlands all around Patch," he said, leaning in before finishing, "Your answer doesn't have to be now, I'd rather you think this through, I don't want to pressure you into doing anything you don't want to. I know that this is a painful place for you to be in,"

Tai sighed and leaned back in his chair. On the one hand, if Qrow and Oz were to be believed, something's helping demons crossover to this side more frequently, and that was a worrying possibility. Did the Underworld have a new top dog? Or was there a group of people smart enough to know how to summon them but stupid enough to think they could control them? On the other hand, there's a reason he stepped away from Oz's secret war after what happened with Raven. It was a miracle Qrow was even still working under Oz after all that, but he always did look up to him, and Qrow did tend to lose himself a lot in his work. Maybe that's why. He really did need to have a talk with that dusty old bird. Ozpin was right in saying he needed time to think, this was a hard decision.

"Well then, I'll be sure to keep that in mind then," he said, shaking hands with the old headmaster before turning around and leaving, "I'll message you when I have my answer alright?" Ozpin hummed in confirmation. They both headed to the elevator and went towards Professor Port's class. Tai just raised an eyebrow but shrugged it off. Ozpin was a very down to earth headmaster and he probably wanted to check on his students. He hoped the girls were doing alright, although nothing compared to his first day with the rest of team STRQ

"Weiss! Wait up!" Ruby called out to her Atlesian teammate, rushing to catch up to her after Professor Port's class, who turned around fuming and responded, "What?" 

"What's wrong with you? Why are you being-" she started, before Weiss cut her off.

"What's wrong with me? What's wrong with you?! You're supposed to be a leader, but all you've been so far is a nuisance!" she yelled, her irritation having boiled over.

Ruby snorted, "What did I do?" she asked in response.

Weiss stomped her foot and pointed at Ruby, "That's just it! You've done nothing to earn it! Back in the forest you acted like a child and you've only continued to do so!" she yelled, Ruby looking down during her rant.

"Weiss, where is this coming from? What happened to working together and acting as a team?" she ask, confused and hurt over Weiss' behavior.

"Not a team led by you. Ozpin made a mistake," Weiss said, turning around and walking away, leaving Ruby to stew in her own thoughts.

"Hmm, well that didn't seem to go very well,"

Ruby turned around at the sound of a new voice and found Ozpin behind her with his cane and mug of cocoa, along with-

"Dad?! What're you doing here?!" Ruby said, Tai chuckling at her reaction.

"Just taking care of some business with Oz here kiddo. But that's not important, what's important is your problem," Tai said, pointing at Ruby while Ozpin walked away, trusting Tai to handle this better than he could.

"Is she right?" Ruby began, "Did Ozpin really make a mistake?"

"Ruby, it's only the first day with teams. Can you really say that just because you all don't get along at the start means that Ozpin made a mistake making you a leader? Which I'm proud of, by the way," Tai said, putting his hand on Ruby's shoulder to reassure her. "Professor Ozpin has made a lot of mistakes in his life, but I sincerely doubt you leading a team is one of them, do you?" he asked to which Ruby merely kept looking at him with doubt. Tai sighed, the girl's anxieties really are getting to her huh?

"You know, Summer also had trouble being a leader," he said, making Ruby look up. Dad rarely talked about Mom directly these days, neither did Qrow. "But she didn't give up or renounce her title. it's not who she was. She instead did her best to make the people who thought she was a poor choice think otherwise, and I'm proud to say she was successful," he finished, giving Ruby a smile while she looked at him with curious eyes.

"If there's anything you got from your mother that weren't her hair and eyes, it's that stubbornness she had and her willingness to come to an agreement with those people. I think you could win over that Weiss girl by showing her you are here because of your skills and your determination to learn from your mistakes. Being a leader means being responsible and stepping up, doing your best, and I know you're capable of that just as much, if not more, than anyone here," Ruby smiled at Tai as he finished his speech and hugged him, expelling the air from his lungs at the unexpected embrace.

"Thanks Dad, I'll go and resolve things with Weiss right now! Will you visit again?" she asked, her silver eyes piercing Dad's blue. Dad seemed lost in thought for a moment, a sad look on his face, but he smiled again and ruffled her hair gently.

"I'll see if I got time kiddo, but when I do I'll take you and Yang into Vale for an afternoon, maybe you can bring your team too," he said

Ruby broke the hug, said goodbye and rushed towards the dorm to brainstorm a way to win Weiss over while Tai looked at her with a nostalgic look in his eyes. He saw Ozpin on the other end of the hall and mumbled to himself.

"Maybe I will take up your offer Oz"

Chapter Text

Sweat filled his brow, making his hair cling to his forehead uncomfortably. His muscles ached with exhaustion, adrenaline and Aura forcing them to keep moving. The mace came again. He blocked with his shield, the impact ringing through his arm and threatening to tear it off without the power of his soul reinforcing it. He tried to counter-attack with a stab from his sword, but he hit armor and the opponent took full advantage, punching him in his stomach before sending him flying with his mace, crashing into the other side of the arena. Jaune tried to get up, to show that wasn't enough to take him out, but Goodwitch's voice rang out, making it clear in his head the result.

"Mister Arc's aura is in the red, this match is over," she called out, bringing the fight to a close. Jaune groaned as he got up, his body hurting all over and his Aura working overtime to fix all the bruising he obtained from yet another match with Cardin. Cardin himself put his mace away and looked at Jaune with that same cocky grin he always wore. Goodwitch spoke up again to give the standard feedback after each match.

"Mister Winchester, while you have great strength and use it to your advantage, your swings leave you wide open and were you fighting an opponent other than Mister Arc you would have lost handily," Cardin crossed his arms and grunted at that, but didn't do more out of fear of Goodwitch's riding crop, for good reason. Jaune didn't get to enjoy his opponent getting knocked down a peg for long though, as Professor Goodwitch quickly turned her head and leveled her ever-present stern face full force on him, "As for you Mister Arc, you haven't shown an ounce of improvement in the few weeks you've been in this class. May I remind you that your grades also affect your teammate's and that the Vytal Festival is coming soon. For the sake of your team, I hope you motivate yourself better or else you will not make it far in this profession," her scolding tone making him wince with every word. "Both of you are dismissed," she finished.

Jaune sighed as he returned Crocea Mors to his locker and went back up to the stands to meet his team. He dreaded already the pitying looks he knew they were going to give him, for losing. For not being good enough and for being such an atrocious leader. He ran a hand through his shaggy blonde hair as he stepped back, overlooking the arena. Ren and some other first-year were fighting right now, most of his friends paying attention on the action and not on his latest screw up. Unfortunately for him and his self-deprecating thoughts, Pyrrha quickly locked eyes with him and gave him that smile she always gave when he messed up or did anything in general wrong and she was trying to comfort him. She looked like she was going to say something, but Ruby spoke first

"Don't listen to her Jaune, you don't need to be good at fighting to be good for your team!"

Yes, I do Ruby, he thought, all of you are so far ahead of me and I'd just be piggybacking off of your efforts and that's not fair to you all.

"Yeah! Don't you worry Jaune, even if you fail this class, you'll still be our Fearless Leader!" Nora exclaimed, her infectious bubbly enthusiasm managing to bring a smirk to his face and, accompanied by hanging out with his friends, helped him forget that he didn't belong here at all, that he was a fraud and just a burden to everyone. He needed to get stronger, to train harder so he could catch up. He can't keep dragging everyone down like this.

Pyrrha could tell Jaune was hiding something. Years of practicing fake smiles and having to constantly read people who were hiding the fact they only wanted her for her fame made Pyrrha an expert in knowing when someone was lying or keeping something from her. She had a vague idea of what it was, but she thought it better Jaune admitted to it himself than her having to drag it out of him kicking and screaming. They're in the cafeteria now, eating together with their team and team RWBY, but she knows Jaune isn't all there. He has that look he always has when he's lost in his thoughts, like when he's thinking up of a new team attack or, like now, probably mulling and overthinking his defeat. Weiss is talking to her, but she isn't paying much attention. Nothing against the girl, once you get past her crabby exterior, she was nice to hang out with, but she still put her on a pedestal like most people here did. Really the only people who didn't were her team and the BY of team RWBY. At least she could excuse Ruby, the girl was still young after all, but Weiss just seemed to expect her to have an answer to everything. It made her uncomfortable, to say the least. She shook her head. She was getting distracted, she had to help her partner get out of his funk.

"Jaune, are you alright?"

Her voice snaps him out of his thoughts, bringing him back to reality. She noticed her comment brought the attention of both teams onto him and she winced internally. It would be harder to get Jaune to tell her what was wrong if six other people were also looking at him expectantly.

"Is this about you losing another match to Cardin? Don't be so down about that, it's only the one fight," Ruby said, probably trying to cheer him up but only reminding him that he hasn't won a single time against him.

"I'm fine guys really, don't worry about me! I'll get over it soon," he said, putting his hands up in a reassuring manner and chuckling, obviously trying to placate everyone so they wouldn't worry about him. It worked for the most part, Blake returned to her book and Yang continued exchanging wild stories with Nora while Weiss futilely tried to debunk how much of it was fiction. Pyrrha wondered just how much patience Ren had in order to have been with her for basically his whole life. Speaking of, him, Ruby and Pyrrha herself were yet to be deterred from helping Jaune, who seemed to shrink under their combined gazes. A commotion in the other side of the cafeteria regrettably gave Jaune and out, and he pointed it out.

Everyone's gazes turned towards said commotion, where Cardin was busy pulling on the ears of a rabbit faunus, a second year if Pyrrha remembered correctly.

"Hey look, they ARE real!" Cardin said mockingly, laughing and tugging at her ears.

"Please stop," replied the rabbit faunus, clearly tired with the younger boy's attempt at bullying.

"What're you gonna do? Kick me?" Pyrrha could tell that was the final nail in Cardin's coffin.

The faunus girl immediately followed up on Cardin's excellent advice and hit him. Right in his, uh, sensitive part, as Pyrrha would've described. Half of the cafeteria winced and groaned at the hit as Cardin hit the floor, his voice having left him while the second year left to join her team no doubt. Jaune and Ren clearly sympathized with the man, if only briefly, at the critical hit to his vital region.

"That was dirty. Effective, but dirty," Ren said, his face again a calm visage.

"Yup! Although I still think she should've broken his legs" Nora said, nodding rapidly and grinning at her suggestion.

"Nora, you always say that," Ren replied.

"It's a good idea! Not my fault everybody else can't appreciate my genius."

As the second half of her team continued their usual back and forth with Ren being the straight man, Pyrrha noticed Jaune getting up and sneaking away while everyone else was distracted by Cardin's attempt at bullying. She frowned. Again, he was neglecting his friend's attempts to reach out and help him. Why was he so stubborn? She stood up to follow him, ignoring Weiss' questions about where she was going. She could listen to the heiress another time, her partner needed her, even if he didn't know it.

Finding Jaune was easy. He was probably going to either the dorm or the training room. All she had to do was navigate Beacon's huge and maze-like hallways. Were like Weiss, who had a non-existent sense of direction, she'd be helplessly lost and needing to pull out her scroll to use its map function, but Pyrrha could easily find her way around. Maybe it was because her Semblance always told her which way was north, which while neat, was a bit weird, or just the fact that having to navigate balls and parties for the rich to meet sponsors and the like wasn't any different, Pyrrha got to Jaune in no time.

She found the scraggly blonde tiring himself out and with a book on swordsmanship on a bench, probably trying to imitate the forms and moves found within but failing miserably. She frowned at his clumsy movements, constantly over-extending himself and telegraphing his attacks too heavily. He collapsed onto the floor, filled with sweat, his lungs greedy for every ounce of oxygen as he panted heavily. She walked over, Jaune still not noticing her, and tapped his shoulder to bring his attention. He whipped his head around, looking like a panicked animal and Pyrrha again wondered why he was so stubborn on doing this on his own. He was only needlessly tiring himself out without learning anything, if he continued like this Professor Goodwitch's warnings might actually come true.

"Pyrrha," he gasped out, struggling to catch his breath. "What're you doing here?"

"I couldn't help but notice you running off from the cafeteria," she said, her emerald eyes locking with his frayed and tired blue orbs, "If you wanted to train, you could've just said so."

"Yeah, probably should've done that huh?" he said, chuckling and hiding it as just the thought slipping from his mind.

She would've continued the conversation, but the ring of the bell signaling the end of their free period cut her off. Jaune looked relieved, getting up with Pyrrha's help and again acting as if he wasn't being the most stubborn man on Remnant. They headed to class and Pyrrha resolved to talk to him at the end of the day no matter what.

Ozpin's class was probably one of Ren's favorites. Unlike Port, who you had to sit through his endless stories to find miniscule nuggets of information, or Oobleck, who gave too much information too fast, Ozpin had a nice balance between the two, giving entertaining lectures while still teaching you something. It helped that this was one of his favorite subjects. While some may see fairy tales as childish, Ren thought they imparted some important lessons, and besides, it helped keep him and Nora entertained in the dead of night while they were on the road. Ozpin clearly agreed on the value they carried, considering he's teaching a whole class about it.

"Today we're covering the legend of the Dark Knight, Sparda. I assume some of you in class are familiar with it?" Ozpin asked, his brown eyes sweeping through the lecture hall. It clearly caught the attention of most of the students who were previously messing around. Ren himself was vaguely familiar with the tale, so he raised his hand, accompanied by at the very least half the class.

"That's good. I myself greatly enjoy the tale; it shows us that even that which we may view as inhuman can fight against their perceived nature. It's a subversion of the typical hero's journey, where instead of finding strength the hero, Sparda, finds compassion and human traits within himself that lead him to betray his whole race in defense of humanity," he continued, sipping his mug of hot cocoa as he walked around the classroom. "Although our analyses of the story can wait, we must first learn about it. Who here can give me a brief summary of the legend?" Ozpin asked, less hands going up this time. Ozpin seemed to mull it over before turning toward Ren's sister team RWBY. "Miss Xiao-Long, I was not aware you appreciated these types of stories, but do tell," he said, smirking as Yang got up, slightly nervous but steeling herself before speaking.

"The version I know, according to my dad and uncle at least, is that Sparda belonged to a race of otherworldly creatures known as demons. He was supposedly one of the generals of the Underworld's army, the realm where demons are from, and they invaded our world ages ago. Sparda however, was different from other demons and stood up for humans and Faunus. He defeated the King of the Underworld and split away our world and the Underworld to ensure such a large-scale invasion could never happen again. However, there were still remnants of demons in our realm which eventually formed the Creatures of Grimm, while Sparda eventually married a human woman and protected the world until his death," Yang said, the words coming out naturally as if it were ingrained into her very brain. Ren didn't find it that strange, she did say her dad and uncle told her the story after all, probably as a bedtime story. Ozpin nodded his head and continued the lecture, while Yang sat back down.

"Very good Miss Xiao-Long, your version of events isn't far from the most commonly accepted version of the story. As we can see, Sparda was unique individual amongst his kind, not too dissimilar to the people behind the Color Revolution after the Great War. Like them, he stood up against what he perceived as injustice and protected the weak, like any Huntsman should. There are many lessons to take away from his tale, but I think the most important is that the greatest of heroes can come from anywhere. Even being part of a race seen as monstrous, Sparda stood up for our world and continued to do so until his death," Ozpin said, only stopping to answer the odd question or two that came up.

Class passed by quickly, but Ren couldn't help but notice Jaune had that look in his eyes again. Not that daydreaming look he often had, but one of intense focus and resolve that he rarely saw, but Ren knew it meant he was deep in thought. He couldn't help but inwardly worry about his team leader. His recent losses against Cardin and lack of combat skills really seemed to be getting to him. He saw Pyrrha looking at him, and knew she was worried too. She was probably going to do something about it soon, and Ren decided he'd back her up along with Nora if necessary. Ozpin's voice cut through his thoughts, sighing as class came to an end.

"That's all the time we have for today. For our next class I want all of you to being writing an essay on your thoughts on the story, mainly the themes you believe it is trying to convey and what kind of people might have imagined such a story and what values they might have held," Ozpin finished, grabbing his mug, papers and cane before exiting the classroom, surely to return to his tower. The students weren't far behind, Ren feeling his scroll vibrate and reading the message Pyrrha sent to him.

"Wait outside the rooftop after dinner, I'm going to talk to Jaune." Ren showed the message to Nora and she nodded, resolving to help their Fearless Leader out whether he wanted to or not.

"Pyrrha, I know I'm going through a hard time right now, but I'm not THAT depressed,"

Pyrrha almost chocked at the comment, looking down and realizing they were in fact, high enough for Jaune to do such a morbid thing. She quickly brought Jaune away from the ledge and began to speak her mind.

"No! That's not why I brought you here! Jaune, I know you're having a difficult time in class and you're not the strongest of us, so..." she trailed off, breathing in and keeping herself going, "I want to help you! We can train up here after class where no one can bother us!" she said, gauging Jaune's reaction to her suggestion.

"You think I need help?" he looked down and brought his hand up to his head.

"N-no! That's not what I meant,"

"But you said it,"

Pyrrha sighed before continuing, "Jaune, everyone needs a little push from time to time, it doesn't make you any different or worse than us. You made it to Beacon and passed initiation! That alone says you deserve to be here with us and be our leader!" she said, hoping that would tip him over.

"You're wrong Pyrrha, I don't belong here,"

"Of course you do! You-"

Jaune cut her off. "You're wrong! I don't deserve to be here Pyr! I'm a fraud!" Jaune walked to the rooftop entrance at that, leaving Pyrrha stunned while he walked down the stairs. She recovered and went after Jaune.

"Jaune wait!" she called out, the boy turning around right at the entrance to the hallway. She managed to catch up, but before she could convince him that he wasn't any of those things, he spoke up.

"I faked my way into Beacon Pyrrha. I didn't go to combat school! I didn't take any tests! I didn't earn my spot here! I lied because I'm just a stupid kid who wants to be a hero like the rest of my family, like Sparda!"

"Then let me help you!"

"I don't want help! I'm tired of being a burden, of dragging everyone else down while they fight for their lives! If I can't stand on my own, then what good am I?"

Pyrrha tried reaching out, to prove him wrong, but he backed away a step, now into the hallway proper, with both Ren and Nora looking at him in shock at the declaration.

"Just, leave me alone," he said, left hand grabbing his right elbow.

"If that's what you think is best," Pyrrha walked away, and motioned for Ren and Nora to follow her.

Jaune watched his team leave, filled with sudden regret, wanting to call out to his partner, to his team, to say sorry, but he couldn't. How could he? After rejecting them so coldly they must hate him, rightfully, both for faking his way into Beacon and dragging them down, and for declining their help so forcefully. He leaned against a wall and slowly sunk to the floor, hands in his head as he realized that now he was truly alone.

Chapter Text

It was early morning over the island of Fortuna. Being much like Patch, in the sense that the waters help it isolate it from most Grimm more dangerous than the occasional Alpha, but much more urban than the other isle, it stood as one of Vale's more archaic cities. Combining a mix of Western Mistralian and Central Valish architecture, it managed to give off the impression that it was older than it actually was. It didn't change the fact that it was a popular tourist destination or a much-needed rest stop for vessels going from Vale to Mistral. One spot its inhabitants always steered clear of was Fortuna Castle, the former bastion against Grimm now abandoned and feared by the locals.

Most of the island had a warm, temperate climate typical to that of Southern Vale, in the north of the city, where the castle lay, the temperatures would change suddenly into something much colder, snow blanketing most of the ground and bringing an uncomfortable chill. It was the perfect temperature for one Agnus Goldstein, chief Alchemist and researcher of the Order of The Sword. He always enjoyed the colder temperatures in Remnant. It helped bring him comfort and focus on his work, which was crucial when one was experimenting with what he was. Several long, agonizingly slow years of testing and research have culminated in this moment. He stood in an observation room, clad in his white Alchemist's uniform, his monocle over the tanned skin of his left eye and his brown hair tied back into a ponytail, high above a wide, circular testing chamber. Behind him were numerous consoles and a long containment tube that glowed a faint mix of blue and red. Beside him was his co-worker, an elderly man with disheveled grey hair wearing a light grey jacket over a red shirt, his own left eye robotic with claw marks over it accompanied by the occasional clinking sounds of his mechanical right arm.

Agnus did not respect many people. He often looked down on many of his fellow Humans and Faunus, even his fellow compatriots in the Order of The Sword, but Dr. Merlot was truly a kindred soul. Few people appreciated his genius. Fewer still understood the need of his studies, the need for humanity to advance in the face of the Grimm, but Merlot was one of those few people. While his research took him more into the scientific, experimenting on Grimm, Agnus' was more, esoteric. Demons, thought by many to be a myth made by ancient civilizations, was Agnus' subject of fascination. And the ones contained in his testing chamber all the more, for they were the fruits of his efforts. The Bianco Angelos. Truly, his life's work and each one a masterpiece to behold. Inanimate demonic suits of armour, each one was bound to his will and that of his leader Sanctus, one of the only other people who ever appreciated him, and that Agnus respected.

He blessed the day he woke up to find that mysterious suit of black armour after Mallet Island mysteriously sunk below the sea. What he dubbed as the Black Angel provided the perfect blueprints for his dream, an army of heavenly soldiers that would protect the world and spread the word of the Savior. Of course, he wouldn't stop just there. The stronger and smarter Alto Angelos would serve as the perfect commanders of this brigade of angel knights. It had cost many resources and lives, human, faunus and demon lives, but they were ready for His Holiness' plan. All that was left was to perfect the Ascension Ceremony, and for him and Merlot to finish the byproduct of their experiments. It was a testament to Merlot's twisted mind that he not only managed to fuse metal and Grimm, but to enhance and even control the vile creatures, opening up untold possibilities. Agnus could not even begin to imagine the results if they managed to fuse the Angelos with Merlot's Grimm. But that would come another time, it was time for them to drop a surprise onto Beacon Academy.

Jaune sighed as he exited the Bullhead and took in the scenery. Proud, brown trees with orange leaves surrounded him, giving the forest of Forever Fall its name. They were here on a field trip, supervised by Professor Goodwitch, collecting sap for Professor Peach to study, something about the effects it has on Aura and Grimm, he wasn't really paying attention, his training sessions left him too exhausted to stay awake during the morning classes.

As soon as Professor Goodwitch finished her explanation, Jaune quickly grabbed a couple jars and walked away to collect the sap on his own. Ever since his argument with Pyrrha he had been avoiding his team, only interacting by necessity. He desperately wanted to apologize, to admit he was wrong and to be back in his team's good graces, but he couldn't. He was sure his team hated him, wanted nothing to do with him, and he wasn't even sure how to word the apology or how they might take it. 'Hey! Sorry I was prick to you all for the past week and being a horrible leader, but I'm over that now' isn't exactly the best way to say sorry.

He managed to find a spot that was secluded enough from the main group and began tapping the bark with his sword and waited as the sap slowly filled his first jar. It wasn't the fastest thing in the world, Jaune was pretty sure the only thing more boring than waiting for the red liquid to trickle down was watching paint dry, but there really wasn't anything else to do except try and go looking for Grimm to kill, which wasn't the point of the assignment, so he powered through. Unknown to him though, Forever Fall had other visitors apart from Beacon students. And as he filled his first jar, eyes in the dark observed their prey in anticipation.

Tai sighed as he finally arrived at Beacon. He forgot just how much early morning traffic in the city sucked, and as he stepped out of the Bullhead onto the school's campus, he took a deep breath of air to freshen himself up. Suitcase in hand, he made his way onto Beacon Tower, walking through the recently cut grass and taking in the scenery from when he was a student here. He could remember that time when he asked Raven out on a date for the dance.

It was like it happened yesterday. He remembered that Raven didn't know how to dance, so the two of them stood, Tai teaching a reluctant but soon eager Branwen all the steps and soon they moved in sync as if they practiced for all their lives. Saying it was magical would sound like one of those dumb teenage romances he and Yang would watch when they were bored out of their minds, but it was. He shook his head and chuckled. If he was here reminiscing about Raven barely five minutes in Beacon, after already having visited it several times, then he really was getting old.

As with his first visit, he was inside Beacon Tower in no time and in Ozpin's office. The man himself sat as he always did, mug of cocoa, cane, paperwork, all that jazz as Qrow would say. The old headmaster greeted him with a smile, grateful at the break the man's presence provided, quickly pushing the stack of reports, tests, essays and others to the side.

"Hello again Tai," he said, leaning forward with his hands folded beneath his chin, "You brought it as I asked?".

"Yep," Tai replied, hefting the briefcase and placing it on the desk, before opening it and revealing Gilgamesh. Ozpin's eyes widened as gazed upon Tai's latest Devil Arm, before looking back at the blonde.

"This is what remains of the demon?" he asked, inspecting the pair of gauntlets and greaves accompanied by the mask and small steel wings.

"Yep."

Ozpin raised an eyebrow. "Feeling conversational today aren't we?"

"Yep," Tai said, shit-eating grin threatening to break his face, Ozpin chuckling at the man's antics.

They did need to return to the business at hand, however. Ozpin cast one final cursory look at the Devil Arm, before turning his gaze back onto Tai, leaving the playful tone behind and speaking fully serious now.

"This would mark the third demon attack this month. We've never had demons crossing over in such a frecuency in years, not since, well, that"

Tai winced a bit at that. Raven's attempt at raising the Temen-Ni-Gru was the last time so many demons had crossed over to the other side, especially major demons. The demonic tower was host to a great number of them, many of them now under lock and key as Devil Arms, but it was still worrying. It implied either that a new top dog in the Underworld was testing the waters, or that there were people who managed to manually bring demons over without becoming free dinner for the things. If that was the case, what did they have to gain from this?

Jaune let out a huff of relief as his final jar was filled. It took a couple of hours, but being relatively alone let him access more trees and gather sap faster than the other students. He was close enough to hear his classmates talking, but about what he couldn't tell you. He put sheathed Crocea Mors after cleaning it of any leftover sap, and put all his jars together. Now he had to figure out how to carry them all. He could carry them in pairs, but there was the possibility of him not finding his way back to the clearing. Maybe he could leave a trail, or something to mark the way he came through so he wouldn't have to carry all six and risk them breaking? He was broken out of his thoughts by a yell in the forest, followed by the sounds of fighting. Jaune looked towards the trees, trying to figure out where the sound came from. It took him but a moment to discern the direction of the scuffle before he took off.

It didn't take long for Jaune to find the source, another clearing in the forest with team CRDL fighting off a trio of Ursae, the group of dissolving corpses indicating that they had been fighting for some time now. However, the three Grimm clearly were much fresher than CRDL, and the Huntsman-in-training were quickly being worn down. Cardin himself got pushed onto the ground by one of the Ursae tackling him, then bringing its claws to finish the leader off. Jaune moved, Crocea Mors' sheathe already shifting into its shield form as the offending limbs crashed into the metal of Jaune's weapon, threatening to topple Jaune were it not for his massive amounts of Aura. Cardin looked at the blonde in shock, forgetting they were in the middle of a battle.

"Go! Get out of here!" Jaune yelled at his fellow team leader, the man quickly picking his mace up and getting his team, who managed to kill one of the remaining Grimm.

The Ursa roared from before in rage and again tried to smash Jaune's shield aside, its claws failing to pierce the metal. Jaune took the opening and plunged Crocea Mors hilt deep with all his strength into the monster's neck, dying instantly. The remaining Ursa charged at Jaune before he could recover his sword, forcing him to brace himself with his shield, but as its shoulder hit him, the added momentum meant it had much more force than Jaune's previous opponent, knocking the blonde onto the ground, the air exiting his lungs and leaving him disoriented. He managed to put his shield up as the Ursa pounced, but the massive beast had the advantage in position and weight. Jaune tried kicking its underside, to channel his Aura through his legs and do something, not die fighting against just two measly Grimm.

After what felt like ages underneath the Ursa's claws, one of his legs glowed the white of his Aura and managed to stun the Grimm. Jaune bashed in the head with his shield and stood up, using the edges of the shield as an improvised weapon until he caved its head in, the body of the bear-like Grimm beginning to disintegrate. He stood there, panting and waiting for the adrenaline to fade away, his sword on the ground as the neck of the dead Ursa disappeared. He moved to pick up Crocea Mors and sheathe it, but several howls broke him out of his thoughts. A pack of Beowolves slinked out of the forest and into the clearing, having been waiting for Jaune to exhaust himself with the Ursae before pouncing and finishing him off. Despair filled him as he put his shield up. He barely managed a pair of Grimm, a pack of them would tear him to shreds. He mentally beat himself up for thinking he could do this. He came here on fake transcripts and only survived by piggybacking off of his team's back. It wasn't fair to them, but what did it matter? They wouldn't save him now, not after he pushed them away and burnt his bridges like that. Nora probably could've had the Grimm disperse with her grenades and wide reach with that hammer. Ren would've been distracting them, slashing and shooting and whittling them down while Pyrrha attracted their attention.

In fact, he could see it now. An explosion shook him out of his reverie, and he realized his teammates were here. Nora was spinning around with her hammer, knocking away any Grimm foolish enough to approach, the explosions tearing their armor to shreds. Ren ran through the pack, StormFlower's guns roaring as he cut away limbs and slashed at vital parts to weaken them while Pyrrha dancedaround the Grimm, easily avoiding their attacks and finishing them off with barely any effort. Within minutes the pack had been eviscerated. Jaune just stared, mouth gaping at his teammates.

"W-why did you guys save me?" he asked, disbelief showing clearly through his tone. All of his team turned to look at him, expressions neutral.

"Of course we did ya big dummy! You're our Fearless Leader and it's a Huntsman's job to save people!" Nora exclaimed, hefting her hammer over her shoulders and leaning over Jaune.

"Besides," Pyrrha said, helping Jaune up, "we're your team. We wouldn't be ideal teammates if we left you to die."

"But, don't you hate me for what I said?"

Pyrrha smacked Jaune upside the head. As he nursed the hit, Pyrrha continued talking.

"Obviously not Jaune. I understand that you didn't mean what you said and were lashing out. That said, an apology would be nice."

"Sorry..."Man can she be scary.

"You aren't a burden for needing help nor do you drag us down. Nobody is born perfect, and every leader has their faults. As long as you work to fix them, then that doesn't mean you're a horrible leader," Pyrrha said, extending her hand out, "so I say again, would you like me to train you Jaune?"

Jaune stared at Pyrrha's hand. A part of him, the one from back at the rooftop, was demanding he decline for the sake of his pride, that he insists he does this on his own without dragging anyone down. But there was another part of him that told the first one to shut up and listen to his team for once. What kind of a prick would he be if he declined the help they were offering at zero cost but their own? Well, probably the same prick who did do that back at the rooftop. He shook his head and smiled back at his partner, the one who was doing so much for him and even now offering a hand despite the fact he declined earlier. What did he do to deserve a team like this? He took the extended hand and shook it, his eyes meeting Nora's blueish green and Ren's pink before settling on Pyrrha's emerald orbs. Pyrrha smiled back, her face seeming to light up the whole clearing.

Next to them, where team RWBY had shown up a bit too late to finish of the Grimm, Nora whispered to Yang.

"50 lien they confess at the dance."

"60 lien it's after the Vytal Festival"

"Oh you're on

As the sister teams were enjoying themselves, Jaune saw how Yang suddenly covered up her nose. Did it smell bad? But Grimm corpses didn't smell, so what could it have been?

The otherworldly shriek from the edge of the clearing gave Jaune his answer, as macabre, skeleton like monsters with scythe blades on their limbs and panthers that looked like they were made of shadow pounced.

Chapter Text

Yang didn't know what the hell happened. One moment they were all standing in a clearing, happy that JNPR managed to resolve their leadership problems when Yang smelled something atrocious, and the next, they were all attacked by some weird scarecrows with blades on their limbs and shadow panther monsters. Yang wanted to say they were probably a new variant of Grimm, but rationally she knew they weren't. The shadows maybe, they were pitch black with red eyes, but considering they could change their shape it might be stretching it. The scarecrows definitely weren't Grimm. They had multicolored fabric stitched over their bodies and the scythe blades weren't bone white as one might expect of a Grimm using such tools.

She didn't have time to dwell on that, however. She managed to dodge a swing from one of the scarecrows, moving to counter and clocking it right in the head, the humanoid stumbling backwards and waving its scythe blade wildly, preventing Yang from following up. She waited for it regain its balance before she went for it again, jabbing it in the chest a few times, grabbing the limb fused to the blade and throwing it to the ground and stomping it on its head, killing it. They weren't Grimm, but they disintegrated on death just like them. Just what was going on?

She looked around the battlefield at her team and JNPR, seeing who needed help. Blake and Ren were dancing around the monsters, using hit-and-run tactics and wearing them down. Ruby and Nora were both whirlwinds of death, smashing or slicing apart any who came near, while Weiss was speeding along the clearing with her glyphs, running interference on any of the beasts that were giving them trouble while Pyrrha worked to finish them off with Jaune. She noticed one of the shadow panthers move to pounce at Nora and she quickly dashed to intercept and punch it aside. Nora gave her a smile before turning back towards her opponents, a group of scarecrows with blades on their arms and legs. Yang quickly returned her attention to the panther, which jumped up and turned into a giant black saw, rapidly spinning towards her. Unable to dodge, she crossed her arms over her and blocked the hit, the blade eating through her aura and Ember Celica's paintjob. She pushed the shadow away with a yell, uncrossing her arms and moving towards the beast as it formed back into a panther. She cocked her fist back and hit its face with an uppercut, shooting at the same time, before doing a follow up punch dead in its center and firing her shotgun again, killing it.

Meanwhile, Blake was having trouble herself with one of the panthers. It seemed to catch onto her strategy and was determined to hunt her down. As it moved to pounce on her, instead of leaping its whole body turned into a mass of barbed whips, cracking along the air and shredding the ground as it rapidly advanced on Blake's position. She dashed back and shot at it with Gambol Shroud's pistol, not using her clones in order to conserve her Aura. The shadowy blob was undeterred, and dashed back towards Blake, its left paw extended and expanding in size enough to rival an Ursa's. She wrapped her ribbon around the limb, pulling it and making the monster lose its balance. She exploited the opening and made to kill it with an overhead swing from her cleaver but the panther pulled back enough that only its frontal leg was severed. Its tail moved up and turned into a needle, stabbing the ground where Blake was. She sidestepped and dashed, stabbing her sword hilt deep into its head, its body evaporating near instantly.

The two teams of Hunters-in-training quickly regrouped, sensing a lull in the fighting as the monsters backed off. The eight of them formed up back-to-back, still being surrounded by enemies but taking the chance to catch their breath. Yang checked their Aura's on her scroll and saw that most of them were down to half at most by now. Nora and herself especially were running low, mostly from tanking the hits instead of dodging them like Ren or Ruby did. The unknown beasts were joined by figures with a shape similar to a Geist, mask and all, but wielding pairs of huge scissors as weapons, on their masks blank and featureless faces, yet there was a sadistic cackling coming from them. Yang grit her teeth as he reloaded Ember Celica, cocking the shotgun-gauntlets and putting up a boxer's stance. They just had to hold out until the professors came with backup. Still, she couldn't help but doubt it. They should've been here by now, what could be causing them to take this long? Yang shuddered at the intrusive thought that maybe they got ambushed too and were doing worse than them. She shoved down her worries. All that mattered now is that they live through this next wave and get back to someone from Beacon.

Ozpin's scroll rang, cutting through their conversation. Oz quickly picked up, Tai catching a glimpse of Glynda's caller ID on the device before he put it on his ear. Immediately he could tell they weren't good news, as Ozpin's mask of calm shattered. He couldn't discern what the Deputy Headmistress was saying, but for it to rattle Oz like that then it must've been something bad.

"Got it, we're on our way," Ozpin said as he hung up and Tai closed the briefcase containing Gilgamesh as the man looked him dead in the eyes. "Tai, I need you to be calm while I explain the situation."

"What is it Oz?" He hoped it wasn't his girls in trouble. He knew they could handle themselves, but he couldn't help but worry for their safety. Ozpin looked away for a moment before taking a deep breath and continued.

"Glynda's excursion in Forever Fall has been attacked. We aren't sure, but from what she could say in the middle of the fighting, they're being assailed by demons.

Tai didn't hear anything after that. His world was reduced to just him in the chair, his breathing quickly turning irregular. He quickly shot up and ran to the elevator, briefcase in hand, Ozpin cursing and running behind him. They quickly arrived at the lobby and Tai broke into a sprint, dropping the briefcase as he rushed to the nearest bullhead. Why was this happening? Why the hell was this happening? He made sure that any demons that would've had an interest in going after him didn't know he had a daughter or were killed and busy reforming in the Underworld. So why? He had to get there, had to protect them, had to do something to prevent them from turning out like Raven-

A firm hand on his shoulder prevented him from getting any closer to the Bullhead docks. He turned back to see Ozpin holding him, his brown eyes staring at him, breathing irregular as he had to sprint to catch up to the man.

"Tai, you need to listen to me. We can help them, but not if you go in there rushing in blind. I need you to work with me to get the students out of Forever Fall alive, alright?"

Tai's hands balled into fists, his knuckles white and fingernails digging into his palm. He took a deep breath, counted to 3, and looked at Ozpin's eyes, nodding slowly. Ozpin took that as a sign to continue.

"We're going to send some teachers to clear out a landing zone and get the students the Bullheads safely. The best I can do for you is have them drop off near Miss Xiao Long and Miss Rose, but you need to prioritize the lives of all of the other students, and your own, alright?"

Tai nodded again as he headed towards the closest Bullhead, taking deep breaths to center himself and slow his heartbeat. The why or the how don't matter anymore. All that mattered is getting everyone safe, everything else can come after. As the airship took off, Tai realized he had dropped the suitcase containing Gilgamesh. He shook that out of his head. Again, it didn't matter right now and Ozpin would take care of it. He cracked his knuckles and felt his Aura out. Now was the time for his old bones to be back in action.

Yang panted as she punched away another one of the scarecrows. The arrival of those scissor ghost things had severely complicated things. While they were very fragile, going down in at most two hits, those scissors they used were not. Unusually durable and sharp, they blocked almost every blow with them and moved to counter, taking chunks of Aura with just a few cuts. The fact they could phase through objects like a Geist made them even more annoying. Thankfully, after what felt like hours of fighting, Yang realized as she killed a scarecrow that the battlefield was devoid of the monsters now. Only their rapidly disintegrating remains stood while her team and JNPR worked to catch their breath. Yang by her part, was glad it was over. She loved fighting, don't get her wrong, but with how annoying these guys were to fight it was a miracle she didn't burn through all her Aura in anger.

As Yang took in the state of their group, she smelled that foul stench again, but even stronger than last time. She was tired, her Aura was essentially running on fumes by now, not even getting into Jaune's, Ren's and Blake's Auras, which had been completely broken, but she forced her exhausted muscles to shift into a stance as the smell got stronger. She looked around for the source of it, eyes darting all across the treeline. Where was it coming from? There, she spotted movement near the trees and shifted towards it. The ground and trees seemed to move towards a point, forming a whirlpool of dirt, wood and grass, before a large sphere popped up, a single purple eye carved into it.

The whirlpool pushed the sphere up, quickly forming a body for it, large arms made of the trees' bark and legs made of compacted soil. The red leaves of Forever Fall covered almost all of it in its entirety along with a black, tar-like sludge, the purple eye on top of it all, being what Yang supposed was its head. It looked down upon the group of Hunters-in-training and made to roar, a deep, grave sound that made Yang dizzy and lose her balance. Another roaring sound filled her ears, but instead of the screech given off by their newest foe it was the familiar sound of Bullhead engines. She looked up and saw the familiar airship right over the clearing, wind blowing through the whole forest as its turbines were pointed downwards as it began to descent. On its sides she saw one of the doors open and saw a blonde figure that looked hell of a lot like her-

"DAD?!" Yang yelled out, surprise taking over for a moment and making her forget the enormous behemoth in front of her.

"Yang! Ruby! All of you, get in the Bullhead now!" Tai yelled out, jumping off of the airship and diving straight for the one-eyed beast.

They couldn't help but watch as the older Huntsman kicked the monster right in the eye, sending it stumbling backwards, while Tai swung onto one of its arms and ran back towards its head. It tried to swat him away, but Tai merely activated his semblance, a shockwave emanating from his arm and redirecting him towards the beast's other side, making it miss its swing entirely. His left arm behind him, he blasted back towards it, grabbing onto its head and beginning a barrage of Aura-infused punches and blasts from his shockwave, driving it towards the ground. As it fell, Tai blasted upwards before putting his feet together, sent out one last shockwave above him, and stomped dead center in its eye, destroying it. It didn't even have time for a death screech, as its body melted away entirely leaving only a mess of dirt, wood and orange-red leaves. Tai dusted himself off and looked towards teams JNPR and RWBY, who were staring in shock at their elder. Tai motioned back towards the Bullhead, as if saying 'well go on,' and the students complied, all heading towards the ship.

Yang looked at her dad as he followed them, seemingly sniffing the air one last time before running towards them. As they took off, Yang wondered just what he was doing here. She was grateful, sure, but she couldn't help but wonder. He'd rarely visited Beacon before, but now, he was visiting at least once every two weeks, always seeing Ozpin and she couldn't help but ask herself if it was related to all that he was hiding from them. Ever since Ruby got accepted into the school, she noticed how he always seemed lost in thought, not quite but close to the sad smile he wore when something reminded him of Mom. Just what was he hiding, and what did Ozpin have to do with it?

Tai sighed as he ran a hand through his hair. It didn't take long for him to regroup with Glynda and for them to take care of the remaining demons and get the rest of the students onto a Bullhead to Beacon. He was standing now in the auditorium with the rest of the professors, the students that were in Forever Fall being attended by the school's medical staff. By some miracle no one got seriously injured, just a few scratches, bruises and broken Auras along with an occasional stab wound. All in all, it was the best-case scenario. He spotted Ozpin walking up to him, his cane in hand and a grim expression on his face.

"Tai, while you were gone, it seems someone," he looked around before leaning in and whispering," someone stole Gilgamesh."

Tai looked at Ozpin, concern in his eyes. "What do you mean someone stole it?"

"When you ran off you dropped the suitcase containing it, I was too busy trying to prevent you from doing something rash that it left my mind. When I came back to where you left it, it and I assume the Devil Arm as well was gone. I suspect someone orchestrated this attack, as a cover in order to take Gilgamesh."

Tai frowned. This changed things. Were it just a relatively ordinary demonic incursion, Tai would've just thought it was just demons being demons or trying to get back on him, but this meant someone planned this. Someone planned an attack on his girls and they were going to pay. But he couldn't just leave them alone, after all if they managed to send demons to Forever Fall what's stopping them from sending them somewhere else when the students aren't near Beacon? Tai looked at Ozpin, determination in his blue eyes and spoke.

"I think I'll take your offer in the end Ozpin. When do we start?"

Ozpin nodded before responding. "I believe next semester, when we start getting students from the other academies would be ideal. Is that alright with you?"

"Sure," he said, turning back to look at Yang and Ruby talking to their friends. He could worry about payback later, he wasn't very good at all that information gathering stuff anyway, that was more up Qrow's and Raven's alley. For now, he had a class to prepare.

Ilia sighed as she entered the safehouse. Today was nerve-wracking. She still didn't know why their new employers needed them to steal a suitcase from Beacon Academy, but if it meant helping the cause then she'd do it. Still, the case gave her an odd feeling. It felt like there was somethingthere that demanded it be let out and to wreak havoc, but that couldn't be real, it's just a briefcase from some Huntsman in Beacon, right? She shook her head and looked up as Banesaw walked up to her, hand outstretched. She obliged and passed the package to him, his other hand busy calling someone on his scroll. One, two rings before they picked up, Ilia catching a glimpse of a brown-skinned man with a monocle and white robes looking at her superior.

"We got the package Agnus." Banesaw said, looking back the man, gruff tone conveying his annoyance.

"Yes, g-good, v-v-very good," Agnus said excitedly, seemingly elated at their success. "S-secure it in a s-safe pl-place, d-do not let anyone else a-a-access it until my associate picks it up."

Banesaw hung up and moved to lock away the suitcase while Ilia looked uncomfortably at the whole exchange. She'd do anything for the cause of Faunus liberation, but there was something about that man and whatever the suitcase contained that just unsettled her. It left her wondering, just what had Adam gotten them into?"

Chapter Text

Agnus hung up the call with the White Fang lieutenant, looked around the room and upon seeing it empty, began cackling in delight. It worked! His machinations to advance the schemes of his Holiness worked! All thanks to his newly unlocked semblance. The Ascension Ceremony he designed brought with it many benefits, but one unexpected side effect was it unlocking his Aura. Agnus supposed the immense physical and mental trauma involved could help light the spark in one's soul to ignite their Aura, but he didn't expect it to come with a Semblance as well. At first it was disappointing. Creating little insects in his demonic image did not sound like the idea of a useful Semblance. But when he figured he could see and hear everything they did, the possibilities were endless. One of the major hurdles in the Order of The Sword's plans and Agnus' research was a concerning lack of demonic test subjects and ways to acquire them.

Their solution was Hellgates, with one minor obstacle, the lack of a power source. Devil Arms were one such way to power them, but again the problem lay in acquiring them. His insects, oh his insects, proved to be his ultimate solution. It took him a while to be able to summon just one, living most of an adult life without such powers does that to you, but once he did, he immediately sent it to scout out demon hunters, and most importantly, the Spawn of Sparda. Being made of a mix of his Aura and demonic energies acquired from the Ascension Ceremony made it difficult to detect if one didn't know what to look for. Truly, they were most marvelous! They were efficient! They were the Agnees!

The name was still a work in progress.

Anyway, the Agnees (name not final) let him discover the Xiao Long's massive Devil Arm collection. The perfect batteries for the Hellgates, human blood not even required this time! All that was needed was the perfect opportunity to a few for his experiments. He already had one Hellgate active thanks to Pandora, so using it he released some demons onto the forests of Vale to attract his attention. Unfortunately, one of them was that Gilgamesh fellow and thus ran off before he could strike a deal with him. Once Branwen and Xiao Long took the demon down, he formulated another plan. It stood to reason that the appearance of a major demon, one that could turn into a Devil Arm, would be worrying to the Hunters, and they'd undoubtedly keep it and even transport it to try and identify its origin. As a scientist, Agnus understood all too well. Therefore, he predicted he'd bring the weapon to Beacon's Headmaster considering his recent visits to the authority figure, and summoned a few more demons to attack the students as a distraction. Xiao Long, being what one would call a "good person" would rush to help and in their distraction, they'd steal Gilgamesh along with other Devil Arms from his home. Unfortunately, that only brought their number of the demonic weaponry to three, but they'd be enough for the Order's plans.

He had to laugh and congratulate himself again. None of this could have been possible without the use of his Agnees and his genius for predicting the behavior of those shackled by the moral scruples he learned to leave long ago. He exited the room and began collecting his papers along with some of the Angelos. It pained him, but he had to leave his comrade Merlot behind for a few months in order to move the new Hellgates onto the mainland of Sanus and construct a new research facility, hidden by a new church of the Order of The Sword. Now he had to refine the Ascension Ceremony so the Angelos would have commanders to lead them, and some cannon fodder when the ceremony inevitably rejected some individuals. At the least he could confide in Merlot being able to advance the Swordmaster project by himself and continue to modify the Grimm in his capture for their joint venture. Oh, how he looked forward to finish it!

Yang stood in Beacon's auditorium with her team and JNPR, the doctors having already finished checking their wounds. Overall, one could say everything was fine. Nobody died or had been seriously injured, the most they had to nurse were a few scratches, bruises, broken auras and some egos. And yet Yang still felt down about it, she had no idea why but it was bothering her. She didn't understand, the whole incident was essentially Initiation with a few more nasty surprises and her dad showing up, and yet it felt like it was something more than that, something more important. She felt satisfied, more than usual after killing Grimm or winning a fight. She tried to brush it off as just left over adrenaline, but it still bothered her. It felt like something bigger than just an adrenaline high. Her Her thoughts were interrupted by Nora speaking up while they started to leave the auditorium.

"Man, what a fight that we had! Kinda boring how your dad made us run though, I reaaaally wanted to smash that thing's head in!" Nora said, walking backwards in front of the group with her hands behind her, a huge grin on her face.

"I do wonder what kind of Grimm those things were. I haven't ever seen a Grimm that could take the form of a scarecrow or change shape like that." Ren replied, humoring his partner as usual. Yang still couldn't figure out if the two were a couple or not, considering how many mixed signals Nora kept sending.

"I don't think those were Grimm at all." Blake spoke up, her amber eyes looking at the duo before back at the rest of the group. "I don't know how, but they weren't."

"I mean it doesn't really take a genius." Jaune said, nursing a wound on his side while Pyrrha looked at him with a worried expression. "Have you ever heard of Grimm that could change shape? Or that weren't a mass of black skin and white bones?"

Blake frowned. "It's not just that. Call it a hunch, gut feeling, whatever, but those things felt different. Unnatural if I had to put a word to it."

Ruby spoke up. "Don't be down like that! We managed to beat them and get out before it got too bad, and now we know about them and how to fight them!"

Yang smiled at her sister's enthusiasm. That girl always knew how to light up a room, even with Blake being Blake and doing her best to bring the mood down.

"I'm not trying to be down; I'm just saying we shouldn't brush this off as easily as we did Initiation. I mean, how often do academy students get attacked by some mysterious creatures that aren't grimm yet act like them?"

Yang shrugged and put her hand on Blake's shoulder. "I'm sure the teachers have it under control. If it was something to worry about, then they'd have said something don't you think?"

Blake still looked uncertain, but seemed to think better of continuing the conversation, shrugged and returned to her book which Yang was pretty sure right now was pure smut. Yang herself shared Blake's thoughts, that this was something bigger than just a coincidence, but she didn't want to bring the atmosphere down. Besides, looking on the bright side, she at least got to see dad kick some serious ass. He'd been holding back on her. As soon as she saw him she was going to demand another sparring session, she needed to get better. Today was too close of a call for her liking, she needed to be stronger for her team and Ruby.

Dusk had arrived on Patch. The sun was setting signifying the end of a very long day for Taiyang as he checked his stockpile of Devil Arms in the basement. It consisted mainly of all the major demons he and Qrow slew over the years along with a few artificial ones. All of them were right where he left them, in their own little corners and sealed with wards just in case anyone got any funny ideas. All but one. Camazotz, one of the many Devil Arms Qrow dumped on him from time to time, was missing. It lined up with what his conclusions back at Beacon. Someone planned this for a while, enough to know where most of his collection was. He sighed before locking the door and going back up the stairs. He ruffled Zwei's hair a bit before sitting down in one of the living room chairs and closing his eyes. Breathing in and out, he focused on his surroundings for anything out of the ordinary. One couldn't pull off a heist like that without some sort of way to keep tabs on him and his house.

Everything was normal. There wasn't a sign of anything that wasn't there before. Wait. There. In the corner of the room, he sensed just the tiniest amount of demonic energy overlayed with aura. A Semblance then. He recognized it as some kind of insect, a mix between a wasp and a bee. It had grey skin like rock with yellow and red accents and its head was some sort of horned one-eyed demon with a slash across where its other eye would be. The insect buzzed around innocently, edging closer to him. When it was close enough, Tai snatched it out of the air and crushed it in his palm. The bee/wasp thing immediately began disintegrating upon its death, leaving no trace of its existence except for specks of dust. Tai sighed as he dropped the dust into a trash can and grabbed his scroll. It was time to inform Qrow about his decision and the events of today. He really wasn't looking forward to it, considering the man was always drunk or busy he might not pick up at all.

It took four calls for him to pick up. Judging how he sounded, Tai supposed he was waking up from a drinking spree and was nursing a hangover.

"Heyya Tai, wazzzzup?"

Clearly he was still half-drunk

"Qrow, I have some news. Beacon was attacked."

He heard some rustling, probably Qrow sitting up and grabbing his stuff, before the man replied.

"By who?"

"Demons. They attacked some first-years on a field trip in Forever Fall with Glynda. Nobody was seriously harmed and the girls are all right, but I still thought I should let you know."

"Oh, thanks." Tai imagined if Qrow was in front of him he'd probably just be standing dumbfounded, wondering what he was going to do with his morning now.

"One other thing." Tai said, taking a deep breath as he prepared himself. "I'm going back to Ozpin. I'll be teaching classes at Beacon two days a week."

Silence. Absolute silence from the other end of the line. Tai would've thought Qrow hung up if it weren't for the indistinct sounds that came from the other side, probably coming from whatever bar Qrow was holed up in. After a few minutes, Qrow spoke up again, worry in his tone.

"Are you sure about this Tai? What if you shut down again-"

"I'll be fine Qrow, I'm not like back then anymore. I can handle a few memories about Raven."

Qrow made to say something again, but he cut himself off in a huff before speaking. "Fine, if you think you can handle then fine. Watch the girls for me yeah?"

"That reminds me, where are you right now Qrow? Shouldn't you be done with Ozpin's errand by now?"

Another silence, more deafening than the last. It took another few minutes for Qrow to speak up, his tone deeper and more serious.

"It's nothing. I'm just tying up some loose ends."

Tai knew immediately when Qrow was lying. If he was staying in some place longer than normal, then that could only mean one thing.

"Qrow, is this about Summer?"

"I said it's nothing, don't worry about it."

"Qrow, it's been years! We've looked everywhere, followed every lead and it got us nowhere!"

"You don't know that! She could still be out there for all you know!"

"For all you know you're just wasting your time!"

"You don't get it Tai, Ruby needs her mom!"

"And what about her father huh? What about her father she's calling an uncle because he's too much of a worthless drunk huh?"

"...I'll see you soon Tai."

The line was completely silent now and Tai mentally punched himself. He was supposed to be calm and rational, not letting his anger get the better of him. But no, instead he had to go ahead and hit Qrow right where it hurts didn't he? Nothing he could do about it now except apologize when he talks to him again. Tai found himself wondering if this was how STRQ would end, half the team gone and the other half trying and failing at being the parents the girls needed. He sighed as he sat down in a chair and began working on a lesson plan. Yang always called it unhealthy how he would bury himself in work anytime things like these happened, but it's not like he had anything better to do. This was the only way he knew how to get his mind off of the memories, just how drinking was the only way Qrow knew how. How'd things end up like this?

Chapter Text

Ruby sat in her team’s dorm room on one of the bunk beds. The room hadn’t changed much from their hasty modifications done the few hours before class, apart from making sure that their setup for the beds would hold past the first night. Blake as usual sat on her bed reading, although what it was Ruby couldn’t say. Every time she asked Blake would always turn slightly red and change the subject while Yang laughed like a hyena. She was pretty sure the book contained some spicy stuff as her sister would say, but that was no reason for Blake to be embarrassed! Surely it wasn’t that bad? Aside from that her partner was busy studying on one of the room's desks for one of Oobleck's tests while her sister goofed off on her scroll. All in all, everyone was busy doing something.

Except her! She was bored! What was she supposed to do? She already studied, tore through her weapon magazine and comics collection, and did all the maintenance she physically could on Crescent Rose! Her baby was so polished that Ruby was pretty sure she could use the reflection of the sun in the blade to burn Grimm to death! Actually, that's a pretty good idea, she should go write that down. Wait, she's getting distracted, this was about her being bored!

"Yaaaaaaaang," she called out, rolling over her bed and looking down at her sister. "I'm boooooooored! Let's do something together!"

"Gimme a sec sis," the blonde replied, closing her scroll before looking up at her sibling. "Whaddya wanna do?"

"I don't know, something!" she said, flailing her arms around for emphasis.

"Well that new Devil Tears movie came out, you want to see it?"

"Oh my god yes! I've been waiting forever since they released the third one! What do the reviews say?"

"Well it's all pretty mixed so far," Yang said, showing Ruby on her scroll a movie review website.

"Surely it isn't as bad as the second one?" Ruby said, reading people's thoughts on the new movie.

"I thought the second one was alright."

"Yang, how dare you!" Ruby gasped, jumping down and pointing at her sister. "Devil Tears 2 is one of the worst movies sequels ever made that completely changed the tone of the series and stripped the main character of all that made him loved! It's a miracle that the director managed to salvage the franchise at all!" Ruby was exaggeratedly moving her arms while Yang smirked at her sister's passionate outburst over what she thought were just some corny action movies.

"Will you keep it down?" Weiss said, spinning in her chair to face the duo. "Some of us are trying to study."

"Don't be like that Weiss-cream!" Yang said, putting her hand on the heiress' shoulder. "It's the weekend! It's time for having fun and relaxing, not more studying! Try to unwind!"

Weiss merely scoffed and crossed her arms. "Unlike you, I don't waste my time with such useless endeavors."

"Come on Weiss!" Ruby said, putting on her best pleading face and kneeling in front of her partner. "Think of it as a team exercise to build unity! We can't study forever and it's good to take a break every now and again."

Weiss put her hands in the air, giving to Ruby's puppy dog eyes.

"Alright fine! But what about Blake, why aren't you two pestering her?"

"I already agreed." Blake said, standing next to Yang with her book now hidden away.

Weiss sputtered. "When?!"

"While Ruby was emotionally manipulating you."

Weiss sighed before standing up and brushing her skirt to rid it of pencil casings.

"FIne then. I'll watch this Devil Tears 4 you two seemed obsessed with."

"Wait no! You have to watch the first one otherwise nothing will make sense!"

A knock on the dorm room's door interrupted Ruby and hopefully would save Weiss from having to watch at the very least three 'corny action flicks' as Yang would say.

"Come in!"

The mop of blonde hair that peaked through the door shattered any illusion of Weiss escaping from the clutches of her leader's plans. Jaune waved hello to all the members of team RWBY before turning to Ruby.

"Heya Ruby, I was thinking of inviting you guys for a movie night over in our room." He waved some DVD cartridges in the air for a bit, putting them back into a pile in his arms before anyone could tell the titles. "I got some horror, romcom and a bunch of others from Pyrrha's collection"

Weiss raised an eyebrow at that. "Pyrrha collects movies?"

Jaune nodded. "Apparently since she couldn't go to cinemas without being harassed by fans she instead collected DVD's."

"Really?" Yang said, walking over to Jaune to look at the boxes. "What's she got?"

"A lot of turn-your-brain off type of movies and surprisingly a lot of good ones. She's even got the special edition for Devil Tears 3"

Ruby gasped and dashed towards the two blondes, squealing in excitement.

"This is perfect! We were just talking about watching the new one with Weiss and Blake. But since they don't know anything about it, we were gonna watch it from scratch, but now we can do it with you guys!"

Weiss' protests were cut out by sounds of agreement from Blake and Yang while Jaune smiled. "Great! I'll ask my team if they're cool with that." As their sister team's leader left Weiss couldn't help but sigh exasperatedly at the situation. Now there was no hope of her getting any work done today. At the very least she'll be able to get closer to Pyrrha.

Ruby herself was essentially vibrating with how excited she was, huge goofy grin plastered on her face as she looked through her candy stash to find appropriate snacks for the occasion. Yang was talking to Blake about her own thoughts on the series while Blake nodded to show she was still paying attention to her partner. Resolving to try and get something done today, Weiss returned to her desk and her notes for Professor-sorry-Doctor Oobleck's class.

Jaune came back soon after with the thumbs up from his team, cutting Weiss' time short. Reluctantly, she got up and put on appropiate clothes for the occasion like the rest of her team, pajamas for the most part, and entered JNPR's dorm room. Two of the beds seemed to have been moved together to form one huge massive bed, which Weiss assumed must be Ren and Nora's, while the other two were left in their original spots. The room had a more ordered look to it that Weiss wished applied to her own, something that was bound to change with the amount of snacks Ruby and Nora would surely eat throughout the course of the night.

JNPR was set up on one side of the room in front of a TV they managed to bring and stacks of DVD boxes. Ren sat on one of the beds cross-legged while Nora sat on his lap, the ginger girl trying and failing to reach for the popcorn bucket in Ren's hands, who held it up above his head to ensure their safety from the diminutive menace. Pyrrha sat in front one of the beds, leaning against it as she watched Jaune mess with the TV in order to play the movie. She still wore her bronze circlet, but her hair was down. She wore a white shirt underneath a red cardigan sweater with black track pants, while Jaune wore his usual Pumpkin Pete hoodie and grey pajama pants.

Ruby and Yang set on the bed where Nora and Ren sat while Blake chose the spot where the bed met the wall. Weiss sat down on Pyrrha's left while Jaune sat on her right, bowl of popcorn in his lap and TV remote in his hands. He hit the button and the movie started, showing a building with a pool table, jukebox, desk and a scroll accompanied by the sounds of someone showering in the next room

Dante walked down the steps of the demonic structure, surrounded by stone gargoyles and hooded figures with spiked collars around them. He opened the great doors, leading to a clearing where his brother stood, water raining down all around him as he observed the lower layers of the inverse tower. His brother, clad in his blue coat, katana sheath in his hands, turned to face him, stern expression on his face.

"You showed up." He said, while Dante twirled Ivory in his hands. He pointed it at his brother before replying.

"You sure know how to throw a party! No food, no drinks, and the only babe just left."

"My sincerest apologies brother. I was so eager to see you, I couldn't concentrate on the preparations for the bash."

Dante scoffed. "Whatever," he said, pacing around the stone floor. "At any rate, it's been a whole year since we last met." He spread his arms mockingly, as if asking for a hug. "How about a kiss from your little brother? Or better yet." He twirled Ivory in his arms and aimed it straight at his brother. "How about a kiss from this?"

The two siblings face each other, no movement nor sound coming from them except for that of the raindrops hitting their red and blue coats, respectively. Vergil maintained a stoic stare while Dante had an annoyed, almost angry look.

"So, this is what they call a heartwarming family reunion, eh?" Dante said.

"You got that right," replied the older sibling, thumb slightly removing the katana from his sheath as he moved to-

"Waitwaitwait pause! I have to use the bathroom."

Everyone collectively groaned as Ruby dashed to JNPR's bathroom while Jaune paused the movie with the remote. Right when it was getting good too! Even Weiss and Blake seemed into it, which if you ask anyone present, is a huge surprise. Yang lied down on the bed, watching the other observants of the room. Nora was talking Ren's head off as usual, the box of popcorn expectedly empty thanks to the dangerous stomach of the ginger, Blake seemed to be reading a book, but kept covering up the title, while Jaune, Pyrrha and Weiss were talking to each other. Well, talking wasn't exactly the right word. It was more Jaune and Pyrrha talking while Weiss listened and spoke when she could. If Yang didn't know any better, she'd think the heiress had a crush on the redheaded champion, and if that was the case, Weiss would be so far in the closet she'd be going to a fantastical magical world with a talking lion and an evil ice witch. Wait, that sounds like one of Blake's books, what was it called again? She was getting distracted. She moved closer to try to salvage Weiss' poor attempts at getting closer to Pyrrha.

"Soo, Pyr, never took you for the type to like these kinds of movies."

Pyrrha looked up and chuckled slightly. "I never was one for those high-class movies that have some deep meaning. Besides, I find fun in watching 'bad' movies anyway."

"Watch it because it's so bad it's good and also to turn your brain off a bit right?" Jaune said. Pyrrha nodded in agreement.

"What about you Weissy? What do you think of the entertainment of the lower classes?"

"It's alright, it's not as braindead as Father led me to believe."

"Oh?" Yang raised an eyebrow, scooting over to be closer to her teammate. "Did I hear that right? Weiss Schnee, heiress of the SDC, enjoys movies of this caliber?"

"I'm more surprised that you can formulate a sentence that long," Weiss shot back, her grin betraying her supposed annoyance at the blonde.

"Hey! I'm just saying, I didn't think you'd like something this corny."

"And she's right to!" Ruby exclaimed, shooting out of the bathroom and into the bed with an energy that rivaled Nora's. "Dare I say, Devil Tears 3 is the best one of the series! Not only did it bring the franchise back from disaster, but it also helped expand on Dante's character and show us his journey into the person he is in the original!"

Yang chuckled at her sister's outburst and ruffled her hair to her dismay. "You know I keep wondering how such a dumb action flick matters to you that much."

Ruby humphed, crossed her arms and did her best imitation of Weiss. "Maybe it's just that good? Perhaps you should listen to my words and not your treacherous thoughts?"

"I do not sound like that!"

Everyone laughed as Jaune got the remote and they resumed the movie.

Weiss had to admit, as the movie ended, it wasn't as bad as she thought. Sure, like Yang said the movie was very corny, especially with the taunts and stunts the main character pulled off, but it also had a certain charm to it. If she had to describe it in a sentence, she might liken it to a diamond that has been covered by layers of dust. On first glance it may seem worthless and a waste of time but upon digging deeper you find something more than an action flick. The relationship between Dante and Vergil was one she related to a lot. She often felt her sister to be far too cold and aloof and could do with a bit more emotion, but she also understood why that was. She especially enjoyed Vergil's character, his desire to not have his loved ones or himself hurt like that again. It was very compelling.

She understood now why Ruby liked it a lot. Maybe she should watch a few more movies. She hadn't gone to an actual cinema before, so maybe they could make an outing out of that? Perhaps she could invite Pyrrha even and discuss the movie in detail later like they were doing right now.

"So, what'd you think of it in the end Weiss?" Ruby asked, tilting her head at her partner.

"I...admit that I may have been wrong in thinking this to be a waste. I must confess that I quite enjoyed the movie and would like to see the next one." Everyone's looks of shock slightly annoyed her, but she brushed it off. She can enjoy things not unique to the upper classes!

"I'd hate to rain on our parade, but it is getting pretty late, and I'd like to get up early tomorrow." Blake said, standing up and brushing her pants off of any residual crumbs of the food she ate.

"If Blake's leaving, we may as well leave too, it isn't the same without all eight of us." Yang noted, before putting a hand to her mouth and yawning. "Besides, I'm kinda sleepy too."

Jaune put the DVD back in its box and smiled at RWBY. "Don't worry about it! We can always do another one next Friday and watch the first one, and if I manage to snag the DVD, the new one too."

"I may be able to help with that, I heard of some stores in Vale that sell movies that I'd like to check out."

Jaune nodded before JNPR waved their goodbyes to RWBY. As Weiss got back into her bed, she couldn't help but notice the pang of jealousy at the idea of Jaune hanging out with Pyrrha and not her. She frowned. She didn't have anything against the blonde except for a very poor first impression, and Pyrrha was his partner, so it'd be natural for them to do stuff together. What was this feeling? It didn't help that Yang grinned at her like she knew something the heiress didn't, but anytime she asked she'd just say 'Nothing' and leave her exactly how she started. She ignored it, trying to go to sleep. It was probably at the fact that she didn't really do much to get closer to the champion today, too enraptured by the movie to engage in much conversation. Yeah, surely that was it.

She ignored the weird feeling in her chest at that thought.

Chapter Text

Blake, true to her word, woke up early today. Granted, she woke up later than on a school day, but waking up at nine in the morning on a weekend was very early according to most people. She took a quick shower and got dressed, careful not to wake her sleeping teammates. She put on a short-sleeved white shirt, pairing it with black slacks, brown boots and a black long-sleeved jacket that cut off above her belly button. Simple and casual. She got her scroll, lien and ensured her bow was on tight over her head before leaving the dorm, taking care not to make too much noise. She walked through the halls of Beacon, quickly making her way to the docks without getting lost within the sheer size of the campus. Blake didn't have to wait long for the airbus she needed to take to arrive, and she quickly found herself enjoying the city skyline as the airship descended. While the view was one she was used to by now, it still didn't make it any less impressive. She watched below cars and people heading in different directions and going on with their day, buildings of different colors and statures occasionally blocking her view .

Once the airship arrived at her stop, she got off quickly and walked towards where the main street of this district lay. While not as prosperous or nice as most of Vale, Blake would still call this neighborhood pretty, if only because the architecture was so familiar. Mistralian-styled houses were the dominant force here, with some Vacuan and Mantleite architecture sprinkled in. It wasn't big enough to get its own unique name that set it apart like Mistral Town or Mini Mantle, but it still contained a sizable amount of people whose origins lay as refugees from the Great War.

She turned to the right and found herself on the street where most of the shops lay. Her eyes locked onto Tukson's bookshop, but they also noticed the cafe across it. A familiar pair of rabbit ears entered her vision and made her realize just what caught her attention. Her upperclassman, Velvet if she remembered correctly, wearing a waiter's attire, was serving a pair of customers their order outside, a smile on her face. She didn't know she worked part-time down here in Vale, but it she also wasn't very surprised. She heard from Beacon's rumor mill that the rabbit faunus' fighting style relied on expensive hard light dust, which her student stipend probably wasn't enough to cover all her expenses. She shrugged and continued on her way. People did what they had to, and if Velvet had to serve a few copies to be an effective huntress, who was she to judge?

Pushing the thoughts out of her mind, she walked towards the bookshop and opened the door. The store wasn't big by any means, but it certainly had space. Bookshelves lined the walls along with smaller furniture containing more books along with creating aisles to walk through. On the far wall opposite to the entrance sat a currently vacant counter but which Blake knew was where Tukson usually was, along with a door to the back of the shop, which was where Tukson probably was right now.

She decided to browse a bit while she waited for him to finish up and to expand her horizons a bit. She had been binging Ninjas of Love and thus hadn't found time for other books like the one she was reading back at her first day at Beacon. She quite enjoyed The Man with Two Souls and looking for books that weren't shameless smut would go a long way to reducing the amount of teasing she received from Yang. A familiar voice cut through her thoughts.

"Ah Blake! You're early, give me a moment and I'll be right there with you." Tukson said from the entrance of the shop, a pair of boxes in his hands as he headed towards the back of the shop.

Blake nodded in response before she continued browsing. The man was probably running inventory and making sure his shop lived up to its moniker of 'Every book under the sun'.

"Hello Blake,"

The new voice startled Blake and mad her let out a girly 'eep' as she turned around and found Ren beside her, also browsing the bookshelves.

"Ren," she said, taking a moment to figure out what to actually say before continuing. "How long have you been standing there?"

"I have mastered the art of moving so slowly that I appear to be invisible."

Blake stared at Ren while he let out a mild chuckle.

"That was a joke. My apologies if I scared you with my greeting," he said as he inspected a book with a brown leather cover and yellow lettering.

Blake put down a book she was looking over as she turned to face Ren completely. He was wearing a simple green shirt and blue jeans, an outfit she did not expect to see on him. She noticed a lack of his partner and decided to pry just a bit.

"It's fine, you just caught me off guard. What are you doing here?"

"Is it not obvious?" Ren replied. "I'm here looking for books that suit my tastes just like you."

"You go to this store too?"

"No, this is my first time here. It's not often I've gotten the chance to go down into Vale by myself and thus decided spending my time here is as good as anything."

Blake raised an eyebrow. "What about Nora?"

Ren suppressed a shudder as he looked at Blake with the eyes of a broken man. "Let us not speak of that matter. Just rest assured I've got it under control."

Blake's scroll buzzed at just that moment. She pulled it out of her pocket and saw her contact with Yang bombarded by messages all with variations of 'send help' and a picture of Nora chasing Ruby with Magnhild in her hands. She looked up at Ren who just shrugged.

"They'll manage," he said, turning back to the bookshelf. Then he turned his head back towards Blake. "Actually, tell them to make pancakes, that usually buys at least 5 minutes of calm."

Blake snorted at that, shooting Yang a text with the life-saving information before turning back to the bookshelf like Ren. She turned to the counter when Tukson called out her name, walking over and leaning over it as Tukson took out a book from one of the boxes.

"Got you the book you wanted, took a while but I managed to snag it from a contact in Mistral. Hope you enjoy."

"Thank you Tukson." Blake said, quickly snatching the book before Ren could spy its title.

"'Ninjas of Love Volume 4' huh? I did not think you read this type of literature Blake." Clearly, he was faster.

Tukson laughed at her expense while Blake blushed furiously and clutched the book to her chest.

"It's a good series! I read it for the plot!" Blake exclaimed, Ren raising an eyebrow at her claims.

"Then you won't mind if I read the summary then?" His hand was outstretched, asking for the book.

"Read the one of the first volume kid less you get spoiled, it's over there." Tukson said, pointing to a bookshelf next to the counter.

Blake turned around and hissed. "Traitor." Tukson laughed again while Blake shrunk her shoulders, ready for Ren's reaction. The ninja of JNPR picked out the first volume of the series and quietly read the back cover, eyes scanning over the text while Blake braced herself for more teasing. Ren turned the book around and flipped through the pages slowly, Blake's death by teasing coming ever closer with each paragraph read. Blake didn't know how much time passed, but eventually Ren closed the book with a thump. His back was to Blake, so she couldn't tell his reaction to the filth contained within the pages. Ren looked up, a small wind somehow entering the shop and moving his hair and shirt. Blake came closer, about to ask what was wrong, when Ren spoke up.

"This...truly is peak fiction," he said, tears in his eyes and a smile on his face, making him look like a character from a play. He turned to Blake, bowing slightly. "Blake, I have severely misjudged you. I implore you to forgive me and share the series with me. I cannot believe I've gone all this time without knowing such incredible writing existed."

Tukson was cackling like a madman while Blake was absolutely flabbergasted at this defiance of her expectations. She quickly forgave Ren as to have him quit bowing and paid for the book quickly. Tukson turned to Ren as soon as he placed the lien cards within the cash register.

"Will you be buying anything here young man? Or are you just here to get inducted into Blake's smutty book series obsession?"

"It's not an obsession!"

Tukson sniggered as Ren looked at him and nodded. "Yes actually, thank you sir. If you'll give me a moment,"

Ren turned away and walked to one of the bookshelves at the entrance, picking out a few books and comics, while Blake and Tukson watched. Tukson leaned in over the counter to talk with Blake, who put away her "novel" in a plastic bag.

"He's a nice lad, where'd you know him from?"

"His team lives next to ours at Beacon. I haven't really talked to him much outside of today, but like you said, he's nice."

Tukson hummed in response. "And how's Beacon treating you?"

"It's...nice, to not have to worry about things like a raid on the SDC and instead about more normal things, like a school test, you know?"

He nodded. "I get ya. I've been thinking myself of leaving and hiding away in Vacuo, get away from all this business with the White Fang."

Blake smirked. "And what? Not have access to every book under the sun?"

Tukson laughed, but it was more bitter than the times before.

"You're right Blake. The Fang's getting worse and there's rumors of Adam working with-"

"Tukson, don't." Blake held a hand out, breathing in before speaking. "I came to Beacon to get away from all of it for a bit, not worry about it even more. Just let me live this life a little longer."

"Right, sorry."

Ren came at that moment to pay for his books, lien cards on the counter. Blake looked at his bag and saw a few books of varying genres, some of which she was sure were banned in Atlas and Mistral for "corrupting the youth", along with a couple of comic books which she assumed were for Nora and Jaune. After Ren was done paying, the two of them left the shop and Ren turned to her.

"I know we do not know each other very well, but I think a coffee at the nearby cafe would be pleasant, don't you think?"

Blake nodded. She didn't really mind getting to know Ren, considering they were both cut from much the same 'quiet and reserved' cloth. They both sat down on one of the outside tables and waited until a waiter came to ask for their drinks. Ren asked for ginger tea while Blake asked for a simple cappuccino with two sugars. After their drinks arrived, Ren spoke up.

"For the future, I'd prefer if you referred to me with gender-neutral pronouns. I'm fine with masculine pronouns, but I thought it best to tell you rather than have you find out."

"Oh, you're non-binary?"

"Yes, I believe that is the term. Most of the tongues in Mistral don't really have a word for it, ignoring the fact that it is mainly frowned upon to identify as a gender different than the one assigned to you."

Blake nodded. She wasn't really surprised by Ren's statement. Mistral wasn't exactly renowned for its tolerance of faunus, who said it wasn't the same for queer or trans people?

"Was there anything else you wanted to tell me?" She asked, sipping her coffee while she watched Ren think of their response.

"Ah yes. I wanted to talk to you about the incident at Forever Fall. Mainly that I agree with you."

Blake raised an eyebrow. "In what sense?"

"Don't be dense Blake, that would be Jaune's job you're taking."

Blake stifled a laugh as Ren calmly sipped their tea, waiting for her in order to continue.

"But yes, I do agree that that wasn't an ordinary grimm attack or a coincidence. I've traveled many places with Nora, and while I'm not as familiar with the grimm here in Vale I am familiar enough to confidentally say that what we saw that day wasn't normal."

"I'm glad someone thinks the same. I was worried I was being paranoid."

"I also saw Ozpin and Yang and Ruby's father whispering to each other after the attack. I do not wish to instill paranoia, but I believe you when you say something bigger may be going on here."

Blake shrugged. "Well, thanks. But it's not like we can do anything about it. If Beacon's faculty won't tell us anything, what can we do with such a lack of information?"

Ren hummed in agreement as the two continued to slowly sip their drinks in companionable silence.

"I should probably get back to Beacon and ensure Nora doesn't cause too much damage."

Blake smiled at that, and the pair left as they paid for their orders.

Jaune and Pyrrha walked down the streets of Vale together, on the hunt for DVD stores. Jaune wanted to make good on his promise to Ruby on getting the DVD-release of Devil Tears 4, and an Arc never goes back on his word. Pyrrha was there to accompany him, and to escape Nora's onslaught caused by a lack of pancakes. Jaune was wearing a white t-shirt with yellow accents and jeans, while Pyrrha wore sunglasses, a straw hat, black sweatpants and a red long-sleeved shirt.

"Y'know, I'm surprised people aren't recognizing you that much." Jaune said, looking around the streets and seeing a zero amount of people interested in the duo. Pyrrha smiled.

"It isn't too hard. Once you remove or hide your most recognizable aspects it can be difficult to see a celebrity in the streets at a first or second glance."

"That explains the hat I guess," Jaune said, pointing at said accessory while Pyrrha just giggled.

"I do have to say Jaune, I wonder why you didn't recognize me back during Initiation?"

Jaune scratched his head sheepishly. "There's not much to it. My village didn't really have an abundance of TV's and I didn't read a whole lot of magazines, so I pretty much only saw you when you did that sponsorship deal with Pumpkin Pete's."

"They're really not good for you though."

The two of them laughed as they continued their walk. They soon found a small DVD-store and went in. On the right side of the entrance stood the counter with the cashier, while the rest of the walls had shelves littered with DVD boxes, containing both recent movies and movies Pyrrha was sure her mother watched when she was her age. She trusted Jaune to find the DVD they were looking for, so she just browsed casually. A lot of these she already had in her collection, like Omegaman, Rings, King of the Crowns, but there were others she still had to get, like Shapeshifter. She always wondered why that one had been banned in Mistral, from what she could gleam it was just a harmless movie about a shapeshifting girl and a disgraced knight trying to find the murderer of the queen. By all means it should be fine for the censors.

Pyrrha shrugged and grabbed it. She may as well watch it to find out. She looked back to see Jaune comparing the prices between to different movie boxes of the same movie, except that one had director's commentary while the other one had deleted scenes, not noticing another box on the shelf that had both and at just a mildly higher price. Pyrrha stifled a giggle as she walked over and showed Jaune the box, his look of surprise bringing a smile on her face, along with a weird feeling on her chest.

As they went to pay, she frowned as she thought. Ever since the Forever Fall incident she'd been having these weird pangs whenever she was with Jaune, and it drove her crazy. Was she having cardiovascular problems? It would be normal after a stressful situation like that in Forever Fall to be more nervous, but not a week or so later. She'd have to see a doctor, maybe cut down on sweets. After all, her sponsors and agents wouldn't be happy that as soon as she was free of their overbearing insight she'd lost her "perfect figure".

"Pyr? Are you alright?" Jaune asked, worry in his face.

Pyrrha noticed that they'd already left the store with their purchases, the new Devil Tears movie included, and smiled at Jaune.

"It's fine Jaune, I was just thinking again." Another pang in her chest which she fought to keep down.

"Well, if you say so," he said, putting his hand on her shoulder, then grinned. "Just don't be like me and hide it away while rejecting help from your friends the whole time."

Pyrrha chuckled slightly at that. "I'm alright, but thanks for worrying."

"Hey, what kind of partner would I be if I didn't look out for you?" Jaune squeezed her shoulder and grinned. "Forever Fall taught me some things, mainly to tell my pride to shut up, but also that I don't need to be strong to be a good leader. If you need anything at all, you can just ask."

Pyrrha couldn't contain her smile at his words, mainly fueled by the feeling of butterflies in her stomach and that of her heart running a thousand miles a minute. "Thank you Jaune."

His smile could light up the whole world if you asked Pyrrha. As the two walked back towards the docks, Pyrrha felt nothing else but sheer happiness at being with her partner. Is this what having friends, real friends, feels like? If so, it was most wonderful, even with that weird feeling in her chest somehow making her even happier but also nervous. Seriously, what was up with her?

Chapter Text

Today was sunny. Vale was receiving a healthy dose of vitamin D for all its inhabitants, revolutionaries included. Ilia raised a hand to block out the sun as its rays hit her eyes directly while she walked through the streets. The early morning was vacant of a lot of people, mainly being a Sunday and thus the average person was either sleeping in, spending time with family, going to church or to your friendly neighborhood meeting with crazy people, all that jazz. Just a normal part of everyday life for Ilia Amitola ever since she got moved from the Menagerie branch to the Vale chapter of the White Fang. She sighed as she remembered the sequence of events that lead the White Fang to work with people like Cinder Fall, Roman Torchwick and Dr.Merlot. One was the smuggest pyromaniac on Remnant, another was an unbearably annoying 'gentleman thief' and the third was just downright insane.

Speaking of insane, Ilia really wasn't looking forward to meeting this 'Agnus' fellow and his Order of the Sword buddies. She didn't have anything against religion, people can do what they want, but there was something about those guys that made Ilia uncomfortable. Especially the ones in armor that were eerily quiet and barely made a sound that wasn't caused by their metal plates clinking. Not to mention that Agnus gave off huge mad scientist vibes, which just added into her list of reasons to not interact with any of them for any reason ever. Not like she had a choice, since Banesaw was busy with robbing Dust at the moment, she was the closest to a second-in-command present and thus had to attend the meeting.

It didn't take long for Ilia to navigate the many alleyways into an abandoned warehouse district perfect for criminals to set up shop in. Or in this case the White Fang. She waved to the two grunts standing guard before she entered and made her way to the one of the walkways up top that lead to what would be the supervisor's office if the building was still in use. Inside was Adam, in his usual attire of pants, shirt and coat all colored with pure black with his rose emblem and White Fang mask along with his sword in his scabbard. She'd call him an edge-lord if her filter was any looser or she had a desire to die an early death. On the other side of the table in the small room stood Agnus, clad in typical mad scientist attire of pure white with some gold highlights, accompanied by two of the 'Angelos' as Agnus called them. They were easily two meters tall, maybe even a bit taller than that, clad entirely in white and blue armor. Their helmets had sharp edges, small wings on the top and two long slits spanning the front of it, working as visors. They had lances and shields as tall as Ilia was, both having a design that she'd describe as 'angelic'. The rest of their armor followed a similar pattern, mainly white being accented by the occasional blue, and a 'holy' feel to it. Say what you want, but these guys committed to the bit at least.

Leaning on the wall was Torchwick and that short stack he always brought with him, Neo if Ilia remembered correctly, both looking at the other two groups with smiles that radiated smugness. If that word was a person, Ilia was sure it'd be Roman and Neo. Wait, that'd be two people. Eh, whatever. Finally, a scroll on the table projected two screens, one containing Agnus' equally mad companion (and Ilia was sure the two were lovers), Dr. Merlot, and the leader of this whole operation. Cinder Fall.

Ilia couldn't tell much of where Cinder was, considering the background of her screen was black, as if to make her more mysterious or some shit like that. Her long black hair covered one of her amber eyes, leaving the other to glow ominously, did she think she was part of an emo band or something? She shook her head, dispelling any and all sarcastic comments, be they mental or not. Apart from her questionable hair-cut, Cinder wore the same red dress with gold highlights and infused with fire dust, her face plastered with a cock-sure smirk.

"Good, everyone's here," she said, making a show of looking over the room slowly as if she were scanning it for the first time.

Ilia walked up next to Adam, who merely nodded at her to acknowledge her presence but nothing more. She turned her attention back to the meeting, seeing that everyone was looking at Cinder sans Merlot, who seemed to be hunched over working on what seemed to be an Atlesian robot, one of their Knights to be exact. It looked heavily modified though, for one its usual white paint was replaced by a yellow and grey paint usually seen on construction vehicles, its body was much bulkier than a standard AK-130 and it seemed to have a sword on its left hand.

Cinder cleared her throat, bringing everyone's attention back to her.

"I want a status report on all fronts. Agnus and Merlot, how far along are you?"

"C-c-construction's moving along s-smoothly, a-a-and the devil hu-n-nters have no clue of their e-e-existence." Agnus responded, his stutter slowing down the conversation slightly.

Merlot piped up. "With all the materials you've given me mistress, we've managed to reach phase two of the Swordmaster project."

Swordmaster? Is that what he was doing to those AKs? Ilia looked back at the screen, trying to get a better look at the robot. She swore she saw some kind of black tar moving around the modified AK, but with Merlot's body blocking most of the screen she couldn't be sure. She clamped down on her curiosity and looked at Cinder's screen again, not wanting to be caught not paying attention.

Cinder nodded, before looking at Roman and Adam, her gaze making both tense.

"And how go our efforts in Vale? Have we been acquiring Dust at the rates I've set for you?"

Roman inhaled a bit from his cigar before replying. "We've managed to snag quite the load these past few months, ignoring that one setback with Red." He put the cigar away from his mouth, blowing a puff of smoke into the air, before continuing. "What I want to know is just what exactly is the plan here. You're having us steal enough dust for an army, along with whatever is in those suitcases your friend Agnus has collected."

Agnus bristled at that, looking at Torchwick with an irritated glance, the thief just raising an eyebrow at the scientist. Adam had moved so he presented the side of his body instead of his front and Merlot, having turned his back to all of them, had returned to working on the 'Swordmaster'.

"I-I wo-wouldn't expect a s-simpleton like you to unders-stand!" Agnus yelled out, scowling at Roman. "Inferior beings such as yours-selves could not comprehend the importance of my work!"

"Are you calling me an animal, human?"

Adam's hand went to his sword and slightly unsheathed it. Immediately Roman his cane and the two Angelos with Agnus raised their lances at the two. Ilia put her hand on her sword and she saw Neo doing the same with her parasol. Agnus retreated behind the Angelos, muttering something about 'not appreciating his work', while Roman dropped his cigar, a focused look on the criminal's face.

"Gentlemen, please," Cinder said in a mildly exasperated tone, "We are all friends in this endeavour, aren't we? Must we fight amongst ourselves like this?"

Adam sneered but moved his hand away from his sword. Ilia saw that he was still tense, his hands bunched up into fists, but he seemed to have let it go.

"As long as the stuttering human can remember who he's working with, or else I'll cut his life and work short."

Agnus seemed ready to go into another rant at Adam's comment, but a quick glare from Cinder discouraged him.

"Let him be Agnus, remember that Adam and the White Fang are our allies here for our objective in Vale."

"Which reminds me again, what exactly are we working towards here lady?" Roman called out. Ilia thought he was being a bit too insistent for his own good, but then again if he was gone that'd make this whole deal a hell of a lot more tolerable. Cinder didn't seem too angered by it though, just slightly annoyed.

"Does it really matter Roman? I promised you all the riches of Vale and I make good on my promises, as Adam and Agnus could tell you."

Roman scoffed but left it alone. Ilia raised an eyebrow at Agnus. Cinder had promised the White Fang equality for the faunus if they just worked with her, but what could the goal for Agnus and his church buddies be? She was pretty sure criminal acts weren't how one got people into their religion, so surely they were up to something.

Not much more of note happened during the meeting, at least what Ilia could tell. She was lost in her thoughts, swirling around in her mind like wind, whispering doubts into her ear. Soon Cinder hung up her scroll, ending the meeting as all three groups went outside the room. Ilia noticed that Merlot seemed so focused on his robot that he still had his scroll on even while they were leaving. She swore that she saw more of that black tar again, but the door soon closed and she followed Adam.

Ilia looked up at Adam. He still seemed tense from the meeting but much more calm than before. That was good, great even. After trying to voice doubts to Adam while he was mad was a death wish if you're in the Fang. She moved in front of him and stared resolutely, trying not to crumble under his gaze.

"Adam, I don't think working with these people is a good idea."

Adam raised an eyebrow but didn't do anything else, so she took that as a sign to continue.

"I know that we're doing this for equality, to get back at the humans, but I don't think this is the way to go about it. Roman Torchwick, the Order of The Sword and especially Merlot, they're all humans and I don't think they have our best interests at heart like Cinder says she does. Hell, I'm pretty sure if we weren't working together, Agnus would call us so many slurs that would make an Atlesian blush."

Adam just watched, unmoving, before he took a deep breath once Ilia finished. She fidgeted as she waited for his response, but he just put a hand on her shoulder.

"Trust me Sister Amitola, your concerns are valid and I share most of them. But this is a unique opportunity to finally strike back against our oppressors, and show them that they're right to fear the faunus. We may not get a chance like this again."

Ilia nodded, still having doubts but reassured. He was right, this was a golden opportunity and they'd be fools to squander it. Still, she couldn't help but suppress a shiver as she looked at the Angelos leaving with Agnus in tow, their shields replaced by two suitcases. They just radiated a wrongness that set off alarm bells in her head and made her sick. Agnus especially, the man had an unnatural aura about him, as if he wasn't fully human. She waved it off. Of course, he wasn't, he was a mad scientist! Surely all his experiments fucked up his biology in some way. It had to be that.

Adam's hand left her shoulder as he smiled at her reassuringly before he left, leaving Ilia to stew. She observed Agnus for a bit more until he left her sight, the man hunched over and mumbling over himself. She noticed a golden glow in his hands and a faint yellow flicker over his body. His Aura, the man was using his semblance then?

She sighed and went to a secluded room in the warehouse. She shut the door and released her hair from its ponytail, letting it run free and ran a hand through it to release some of her stress. Things were so much more complicated now. Ever since Blake left things weren't the same. Stealing from huntsmen, working with humans, it all seemed wrong and not like the White Fang she believed in. Maybe Blake was right, maybe things have changed. A buzzing sound filled her ears, similar to that of a bee. She ignored it, sitting down in one of the small room's chairs and took out her scroll. She opened her contact with Blake, the last message having been sent days ago, but an actual response from Blake missing. It's been months since their argument when Blake was saying they were too violent and that the White Fang was going down the wrong path. She was wrong, of course, Ilia was sure of that back then and she was now. But that treacherous voice in her mind, the one that filled it with doubt, was not so sure. It's not like she could do anything about it. She was stuck here, and you don't leave the Fang like Blake did, not anymore. Adam made sure of that.

The buzzing sound stopped, but she didn't notice the source of the noise leaving. A small little bee with grey stone-like wings and horns, observing them all from afar.

Chapter Text

The sun shone above his head, bringing heat and sweat to his temple. The wind bristled against his body, ruffling his feathers. Qrow blinked the weariness out of his eyes as he scanned his surroundings. The Vacuoan desert surrounded him, the occasional mesa off in the distance. Craters were blasted into the sand, smoke still poring from the holes in the ground as cracked glass filled the bottom. He was sitting on something. Looking down, he saw the disintegrating corpse of a Behemoth Grimm. Four apartment stories tall, the Behemoth was a humanoid giant with arms that reached down to its legs, bone spikes doting its body along with red armour plating on its hands and maw. They normally cut an imposing figure and were quite troublesome to take down thanks to their sheer strength and endurance, it'd usually take a full team of Hunters to kill one.

This Behemoth, however, was absolutely mutilated. Several of its spikes had either been broken or shattered completely, its corpse having been impaled by many of them, used as improvised spears. Its lower jaw and eyeless face mask had been decimated, the armoured portions and horns laying in pieces over the Behemoth's torso. One arm had been ripped off completely and had almost finished disintegrating, while the other one had been pinned to the ground by more spikes and its stomach had been blown out.

All in all, it looked like the Behemoth had been shredded to pieces by an even bigger monster. One look at Qrow would reveal exactly who that monster was. Qrow sighed as he realized he'd gone away again and half-triggered into his Devil form. His forearms were bony but robust claws with feathers on them, he had wings on his back that folded into a facsimile of his usual red cape and grey jacket, and his torso was now avian in nature, his ribs showing slightly through the black skin as reptilian scales and a dim red glow covered the area where his heart would be.

He sighed as he stood up from the carcass and stepped down, reverting to human as he hit the soft sand. Qrow craned his head and drank a swig from his flask, ignoring his significant hangover from yesterday. Stretching some of his muscles, he dismissed his growing stubble as he made to shift into bird form and fly back to the closest sign of civilization.

He liked it when he was a crow. Turning into a completely different animal that was also smaller than he was normally meant that his brain was more focused on other things. It helped to keep the bad thoughts away, all the hateful things about himself he thought constantly.

Deadbeat. Failure. Weak.

He shook his head as he focused on flying. It helped to keep the bad thoughts away, and prevented from him shutting down like before and going on autopilot. Really, it had been severe overkill that he even half triggered against a Behemoth, but he couldn't say if it was just against the Behemoth. His mind was always fuzzy and drew up blanks when he tried to remember what happened when he blanked out and went berserk.

It didn't matter. He was all the way out in the desert and a storm would cover the craters with sand. Nobody would find out, he was safe.

He focused back on what he was doing before. What was it? Right, a lead on Summer. He saw a village up ahead and sped up, hoping to pick up where he left off.

I know you're not dead Sum, I'll find you and bring you back and Ruby will have a mother again.

I'll fix my mistake no matter what.

Ruby stifled a yawn as she and her team walked down the streets of Vale into the docks. It was past midday and Weiss had dragged them all out of sleep's wonderful home into wakefulness, for today was a special day. They'd just had their end-of-semester exams, which meant this would be the time people from the other Hunter academies would now begin arriving at Beacon for the Vytal Festival. Thus, Weiss leading three-fourths of a sleep-deprived RWBY down the street, talking excitedly about the Vytal Festival.

"Weissssss," Ruby complained, taking her snow-haired partner's attention off her ramblings about the importance of such an event. "Did you have to wake us up this early for this?"

Weiss turned around and pointed at Ruby's forehead, which at least helped wake her up a little bit.

"Of course I had to you dolt! This is but one of the many days in which students from all over the world will be arriving for the Vytal Festival. It is our duty as Beacon students to welcome them to Vale and ensure they get a good impression of us."

"And to also spy on the competition." Blake mumbled, loud enough for Weiss to hear, which had her sputtering and briefly losing her 'respectable rich young woman' mask.

"I must admit," she said, waiting for Ruby to stop giggling at the heiress' attempts to defend herself, "that Blake is not entirely wrong. I have been quite busy with my studies recently and haven't had enough time to gather information about the Vytal tournament."

"Quite busy staring at Pyrrha's tits more like," Yang whispered to Ruby, which had her yell out to her sister and punch her, flustered at how blunt and inappropriate she was being. It hadn't taken long for everyone in RWBY except Weiss herself to figure out the heiress was head over heels for Pyrrha, even if it did take Ruby the longest to notice. Still, that didn't mean Yang could be so blunt about her partner's attraction, or what her attention focused on!

Ruby left the issue at that, however, not wanting the heiress to notice who was the subject of the sister's fight. They continued walking the street to the docks in a pleasant but slightly awkward silence that left Ruby slightly uncomfortable. They turned the corner and Ruby suppressed a gasp at the scene. Down the street was a dust shop she frequented when out in Vale and she needed to restock her special ammunition magazines. It was normally idyllic and the place helped her relax, but it was the complete opposite now. All of its windows had been smashed, yellow tape pitifully covering up the giant holes left behind. She saw two police officers in front of the crime scene, talking to the store's owner, a small woman her shoulders hunched, probably giving the cops a witness report. Ruby tried to take a peak inside and found it similar to the outside, completely trashed, with paper, dust and rubble all over the floor, the shelves having been knocked over.

One of the officers noticed Ruby trying to peak in and scowled. Ruby ducked her head and apologized, returning to her team who had stayed behind the yellow tape. Yang and Weiss both shot her a look that had Ruby hunching her shoulders. It wasn't she was so curious! Besides, they really should have more than two cops if they didn't want anyone tampering with the crime scene. The officers finished interrogating the store owner and waved her off, muttering to themselves. Well, muttering was the wrong word for it, considering Ruby could hear them all the way on the other side of the street, where her team was.

"Second store to be hit this week, seems they left all the money again" said one of the officers, an older man with glasses holding a standard issue VPD pistol. "It just don't make a lick of sense, who needs all that dust?" Ruby perked up at that, reminded of when she foiled Torchwick's robbery all those months ago. I could just be grasping at straws, but Torchwick also only wanted dust back then. What would he even use it for?

"I dunno, ya know what I mean?" said the officer's partner, a younger man with his arms crossed, one hand holding a pen and pocket notebook.

"You think it's the White Fang?"

"I'm thinking that we don't get paid enough"

The older man rolled his eyes at his partner's antics and the two of them walked away. Weiss scoffed and lifted her nose in the air like a snobbish noble from a play.

"Hmph, the White Fang, what an awful bunch of degenerates." Weiss said, her tone full of disdain.

"What's your problem?" Blake said, putting a hand on her hip and raising an eyebrow. Yang and Ruby looked at each other mildly nervous, sensing another argument between the two coming.

"My problem? I simply do not care for the criminally insane."

"The White Fang are more than just a bunch of psychopaths. They're just misguided and angry faunus." Blake replied, anger seeping into her tone.

"Misguided? They want nothing but to see humanity wiped off the face of Remnant!"

"Fitting that someone like you sees it that way. It also doesn't explain why they'd rub a dust shop in the middle of Vale anyway."

"Of course it does, it's to make bombs. Also, what do you mean by someone like me?" Weiss said, an eyebrow raised, her tone turning into what Ruby calls her 'Ice Queen' mode.

Ruby intervened before things could get really heated. "Blake's got a point, on the robbing a dust shop in downtown Vale, not the other one," she said, shutting down Weiss' attempt to cut in. "Besides, the police never really caught that Torchwick guy I ran into a few months ago. Maybe he's the one behind this?"

Weiss calmed down a bit, which Ruby would've marked as a success in defusing arguments for her, but then she crossed her arms, determined to get one last point in. "Still, that does not change the fact that the White Fang are a bunch of scum. Those faunus only know how to lie, cheat and steal."

Ruby was sure that if someone caught that on video it'd cause the biggest scandal of the year, and it seemed Yang and Blake agreed. "That isn't necessarily true," her sister said, probably in an effort to not make Weiss, or at least their team, look like huge racists.

A cry from over at the docks brought Ruby's attention to where some dock workers were chasing after a young man, probably Yang or Blake's age. He had short wild blond hair and an open white jacket that showed off his torso, his chest covered by bandages and a necklace with a gold coin dangling around his neck. He had red gauntlets with fingerless gloves that reached up to his elbows along with rolled-up jeans that had seen better days with a chain hanging from his hip, accompanied by black and gold sneakers and more bandages around his shins.

Another cry from the workers, something along the lines of 'stop that faunus' helped Ruby notice that he also had a blonde monkey's tail, that had just thrown a banana peel at one of the faunus' pursuers. The monkey faunus and the two dock workers quickly passed them by.

"Well Weiss, you wanted to see the competition? There it goes." Yang said. Weiss was quick to snap out of their stupor and spur them to action.

"Quick! We must observe him!"

Yang shrugged at Ruby as the four of them chased after the faunus, having left in the dust the dock workers but not the two police officers chasing him. Ruby considered using her speed semblance to get in front of him and slow him down, but it was brought to a halt as they turned a corner and Weiss crashed into a person, leaving them behind as the monkey faunus leapt onto a dumpster and jumped onto the building's fire escape, losing the cops in the rooftops.

"No! He got away..." Weiss exclaimed, getting up and dusting herself off."

Ruby noticed the victim of the heiress' mad dash was still on the ground and was worried they were hurt, but Yang beat her to the punch.

"Uh, Weiss...?" she said, pointing at the orange-haired girl underneath Weiss. Weiss spluttered and made a rather undignified sound as she got up and away from the girl, which Ruby thought a bit unfair.

Now that she got a good look at her without Weiss obstructing the view, Ruby thought she was actually kind of pretty. She had green eyes like Pyrrha, but unlike Pyrrha these were a lighter emerald and Ruby found herself staring at the odd way her pupils seemed to dilate and move.

She pushed that thought away and scanned the girl's outfit, a 'drip check' as Yang might say. The girl had a pink bow behind her curly orange hair and an old-fashioned off-white blouse with frill cuffs and detailed trim along with a grey pinafore dress with two light green stalagmite stripes on the front, along with black thigh-highs that had long green lines up the sides and some black shoes. Ruby would've said she was cute, pretty even, but was distracted by the fact that the girl was still on the ground.

Weiss made an undignified sound and quickly backed away, looking down at the girl who just smiled and waved.

"Salutations!" she said, voice filled with excitement. Not knowing how to react, Ruby.exe decided to the default response any person would have at talking to someone lying down on the ground.

"Um...hello"

"Are you...okay?" Ruby thanked her sister for asking the question no one really wanted to ask.

"I am wonderful! Thank you for asking."

RWBY looked at each other mildly baffled before turning back towards the girl

"Do you...wanna get up?" Once again, Yang proved herself the bravest of the four by continuing the increasingly awkward interaction.

The girl blinked as if that was something entirely new she hadn't thought of. "Yes!" she finally decided, pulling her legs back and hopping up in one smooth motion. RWBY took a collective step back.

"My name is Penny, it's a pleasure to meet you!" the girl said, looking over the group and taking in their outfits.

Now that they were back in a more familiar but still mildly stressing realm of socializing for Ruby, i.e introductions, she smiled and replied.

"Hi Penny, I'm Ruby"

"I'm Weiss"

"Blake"

"Are you sure you didn't hit your head?"

A sound suspiciously similar to that of Blake uncrossing her arms and hitting Yang in the ribs reached Ruby's ears, and Yang quickly made to correct herself.

"Err, I mean, I'm Yang"

"It's a pleasure to meet you!"

"You already said that" Weiss said, raising an eyebrow.

Penny blinked for a moment as if to process the statement. "So I did!"

It seemed that was enough for the four of them, as Weiss moved to leave and the others followed. "Well, sorry for running into you." Ruby smiled at that, glad that her partner at least apologised this time. She was getting better! Not wanting to be rude however, Ruby waved back towards Penny in a 'goodbye' gesture.

"Take care, friend!" she called out, leaving Penny on the sidewalk as they walked to where Weiss was taking them.

"She was...weird" Yang called out, which Ruby thought a bit unfair. Sure the girl seemed a bit quirky and out of it but she was probably socially awkward and didn't know what to do!

"No matter," Weiss said, looking around the streets and peering into a couple of alleyways. "Where did that faunus riffraff run off to?"

"What did you call me?" Penny's voice rang out, right in front of Weiss.

Weiss spluttered and panicked while Yang tried to explain how she didn't think she heard them or how it wasn't exactly what she meant. Whether she was talking about Weiss or herself, Ruby didn't know, because Penny decided to interrupt the two.

"Not you," she walked past towards Ruby. "You!"

"Me?!" Ruby said surprised, stumbling over her words with those emerald eyes looking at her. "I don't, I-what? I- uhm, I"

"You called me friend. Am I really your friend?"

Ruby looked at her team for advice, all of whom were vigorously shaking their heads or waving their hands in an 'X' motion.

"Uhh, sure, why not?"

Blake, Weiss and Yang proceeded to comically fall to the ground while Penny looked like someone just told her she won the lottery.

"Sen-sational! We can try out clothes, paint our nails and talk about cute boys together!"

Ruby looked at her partner as the heiress dusted herself off for the second time that day. "Was I really this bad?"

"No, she seems much more controlled."

"What're you doing here in Vale?" Yang asked, eager to change the subject. "Sorry for assuming, but you just don't seem to be from around here."

"I am here to fight in the tournament!" Penny exclaimed eagerly.

"Really?" Weiss asked.

"I'm combat ready!" she replied, doing a military salute with her right arm.

"Forgive me, but you don't look the part," Weiss said, raising an eyebrow.

"Says the girl wearing a skirt," Blake shot back.

"It's a combat skirt!"

"Yeah!" Ruby rushed in with her semblance and low-fived Weiss over their mutual agreement.

They talked only a bit more after that, Ruby exchanging her scroll number with Penny before Weiss' insistence on leaving finally had some success and they walked down one of the many streets of Vale. If she was being honest, Penny wasn't that bad. Sure she seemed weird and calling the girl quirky would be an understatement, but Ruby could empathise with the poor girl. After all, she wasn't much better back when they arrived at Beacon earlier this year. Penny probably just had trouble socialising which was why she seemed so off-putting. Probably sheltered. She was snapped out of her thoughts by Weiss' voice and the heiress facepalming herself.

"Gah! I forgot to ask her if she had seen that faunus criminal!"

"Will you stop calling him that?" Blake said, stepping towards Weiss.

"Calling him what?"

"That! Degenerate, riffraff, criminal-"

"Oh, I'm sorry, would you like me to stop calling this trashcan a trashcan or this lamppost a lamppost?" Weiss scoffed, pointing at several items in the city as if to accentuate her argument.

"It's dehumanising! For all you know, he was innocent!"

Weiss snorted. "Why would the innocent run from the police? If he truly had done no wrong, then shouldn't he have cooperated?"

"Yeah and then what? Get searched and even arrested for doing nothing?"

"Hardly. If he did nothing then he shouldn't fear being approached by cops."

"How are you this naive?!" Blake practically yelled out. She pointed a finger at Weiss' chest, her tan skin contrasting with the heiress' pale tone. "When a faunus sees cops approaching them, of course, they're going to run even if they did nothing! Do you even know what racial profiling is? How humiliating it feels to be put in cuffs when all you were doing is exist?"

Weiss swatted Blake's finger away. "I don't see why you care so much for a criminal like him who will no doubt join the White Fang soon enough. After all criminals and murderers attract criminals and murderers."

"Because I have basic empathy! Because it's not all black and white! Because I'm one of them!" Blake screamed that last part out, breathing heavily and looking at Weiss as if she dared her to say anything.

The heiress had a shocked look on her face, which quickly morphed into outrage as she quietly asked. "What do you mean you're one of them, Blake?"

Blake's eyes widened as she moved to step back, and Ruby swore her bow flattened into her hair, but Weiss was faster and reached out, grabbing the fabric and tearing it, revealing a pair of black, fluffy cat ears. Blake hunched over as she took several steps back, fight or flight response activated.

"Blake, wait-" Yang called out, reaching with her hand but all she hit was smoke as Blake's semblance kicked in and shot her backwards. Blake turned and dashed into an alleyway, using another clone to climb up and away, leaving Ruby, Weiss and Yang behind on the street.

Everyone was silent, not a single sound penetrating the lull left behind after Blake's reveal. Ruby was internally panicking. This wasn't anything like Dad's or Uncle Qrow's stories! Their team didn't have a huge fight where a rift the size of the ocean separating Sanus and Solitas appeared because one of their members was a stuck up racist and the other a faunus! Even if it was a hyper-specific situation that rarely happened to most teams!

Weiss began murmuring to herself. "A member of the White Fang, right underneath our noses..." Ruby decided to jump in, trying to defuse anymore arguments.

"We don't know for sure if she is or not. What I do know is that we'll only find out if we find Blake and hear her out."

"Are you deaf? She outright said she's 'one of them'! How else can you interpret that?"

"I can interpret in the sense that Blake made mistakes in the past she's trying to make up for." Ruby replied. Seeing how Weiss' unapproving stare didn't budge, she continued. "Think about it, if she was really still in the White Fang, why waste all this time? Wouldn't having direct access to a Schnee mean they act quickly and kidnap you within the first month? Why wait so long?"

"You never know with them. They could've been planning to wait months to be friends with me and I invite Blake to my home in Atlas and then they strike."

Yang interjected. "I dunno Weiss-cream, seems to me it'd be easier kidnapping just you and demanding a ransom rather than waiting potentially years for an attack."

"You think I know how the Fang operate?!" Weiss screamed out, the emotional stress having her go into fight-or-flight much like Blake. "Do you think I know why those terrorists kidnapped whole families and posted the photos of their corpses for the world to see?! Do you think I know why they'd kidnap and traumatize children just because they were associated with me?!" Ruby shrunk back but stood her ground, letting Weiss continue to vent.

"My entire life I've had to deal with my father cutting me off from other families because of the White Fang, because they merely talked with me or my family, they saw it justifiable that those families suffer."

Weiss was on the verge of tears now, even if she refused to show it, turning away from Yang and Ruby trying to hide her sniffles. Ruby looked at Yang and nodded at her, who stepped towards Weiss to hug her. The heiress froze up at the contact, unused to such open affection, but loosened quickly as Yang made comforting motions. Once she judged Weiss to be stable enough, Ruby spoke up again.

"Weiss, first off, I want you to know that however this works out, we'll be there to help you, no matter how you and Blake decide to resolve this." she said, trying to be comforting to the heiress while at the same time show that she wasn't budging her stance on Blake being a good person. "I still think Blake is innocent, or at the very least, is trying to be better. You were hurt by the Fang so it's natural to lash out against them, but it's wrong to assume all faunus are White Fang or that all White Fang are evil kidnappers and terrorists." Ruby joined the hug this time, the three of them standing quietly for a moment to let Weiss compose herself. Once she was calm, Ruby turned to her partner and sister.

"We'll find Blake. It's still the afternoon so she's gotta be somewhere around here. We'll search until we have to go back to Beacon, and if we don't find her then we can try asking JNPR for help. I know you probably don't have the best opinion on Blake right now Weiss, but I want you to promise me to give her a chance." Weiss' eyes darted away from Ruby's silver, her left hand rubbing her right elbow.

"Weiss?"

Weiss took a deep breath before speaking. "Alright, fine. I don't have high hopes for her, but I'll give her a shot. I trust you Ruby."

Ruby tried not to squeal at that, there were more important matters. Blake was still missing, but she managed to comfort Weiss and convince her to not be so racist! At least to Blake, but a step was a step! She nodded at her two team mates and they discussed how to search around Vale. They were going to find Blake even if she didn't want to be found.

Blake's legs felt like they were going to give out, but she still didn't stop running. She didn't know how much time had passed, or how much she ran, all she knew was that it was over. Her life in Beacon was done, Weiss would out her as a terrorist and she'd run away. Again.

Stupid, stupid, stupid! Why did she think any of this would last? She didn't deserve any of it, the friends at Beacon or having a new life away from the Fang. She was a coward and as soon as things got difficult she ran. She held back the tears that threatened to overwhelm her. Where would she even go now? Once word reached Beacon and eventually the Valish government of her real identity then it'd be over. She'd be hunted worldwide for being a terrorist and she'd always be on the run. It was over.

She suddenly bumped against someone and fell on her ass, reflexively backing away as her panic and emotional distress overrode all logic. She felt a hand reaching out and she shrunk on her shoulders, expecting the worst. But the hand just rubbed her shoulder back and forth, as if to comfort her, not hurt her like she thought it would. Blake managed to get her breathing and emotions under control to look up at the stranger. She was surprised that it was the monkey faunus from earlier, but now he seemed to have some friends behind him. She couldn't tell what they were saying, but the monkey faunus was standing over her more to shield her rather than to harm her. His head turned and he smiled at her.

"Heya, my name's Sun. Need some help?"

Chapter Text

The next day Ruby woke up bright and early along with Weiss and Yang. Blake's absence from the dorm made yesterday hurt all the more and Ruby steeled her resolve to find her. They'd get a quick breakfast at Beacon and head out into Vale as soon as possible to get started. The three of them rushed out of their room and into the school's cafeteria, being one of the few crazy people up before midday on a holiday.

Getting some food into her stomach, food being copious amounts of cookies and strawberries, let Ruby hash out a plan. She supposed it'd be more effective if they split up and covered more ground that way. The places to look would definitely be either the crowded places or the bad parts of town. Blake had to have stayed at a hotel or something similar, since she didn't come back to Beacon, but it can't have been too expensive either.

She was so lost in thought she didn't notice who sat down in front of her until they snapped their fingers in front of Ruby. She blinked and looked at Jaune and the rest of his team looking at hers with worried faces.

"Is everything alright Ruby? You and your team seem a little down today." Pyrrha asked, her frown making Ruby nervous about even attempting to lie. She couldn't help it! Pyrrha just looked at her like a worried or disappointed parent and that made it hard to lie!

She still tried to. "Everything's fine! Just didn't sleep right last night and we're all feeling a bit tired." The raised eyebrow of three quarters of JNPR showed how blatant the lie was.

"Where is Blake?" Ren asked. Yang, Ruby and Weiss suddenly found the food to be quite the interesting sight.

Ruby look at Yang and moved her head towards JNPR. Yang shook hers.

'You talk to them!

'I can't!' Ruby put up her best pleading eyes. Yang somehow resisted and Ruby let out a sigh. Surely they wouldn't think that bad about Blake running off. Teams had their problems all the time! Except those problems typically weren't a huge an issue as this. It'd be fine, Ruby reassured herself. Jaune was cool, Pyrrha was awesome, and pretty, and kind and a whole lot more. She didn't talk to Nora and Ren much but she was sure they were also cool, right?

"So, uhh, yesterday, we might've had a bit of a small fight...?" Her unsure tone made it so that even Jaune caught on to the fact she was hiding stuff. "It's not a huge problem, just that Weiss may or may not have said some really mean things and Blake may or may not have run off and not come back to Beacon during the entire time. And she may or may not be ignoring our texts, or any method of reaching her, and we may or may not need help." She started mumbling right after, fidgeting with her fingers and looking anywhere but JNPR.

Pyrrha's hand touched her shoulder and she looked up to see the red-haired girl smiling at her along with the rest of the team.

"We'll help you out Ruby, don't worry about it." Jaune said, joining his partner in comforting the smaller girl. Ruby relaxed a bit and managed to calm down. This is fine, they didn't judge her and even if others do, it'd be stupid to refuse help, right? And she technically didn't directly ask for it, so it wasn't like she was less of a leader for it. So there! Now they had four more people who could help search for Blake and cover more area.

"I do hope you have a plan though," Ren said after occupying his partner with a hefty amount of pancakes. "Even if there's seven of us searching, Vale is still a big city."

"Well, obviously I was thinking we split up. I think it's best I go alone since if Weiss is alone Blake would probably panic and Yang is her partner so she'd be able to calm her down, probably better than me," Ruby explained, waiting for everyone to nod before continuing. "Since you guys are helping us as well, I was thinking Jaune and Pyrrha search one area and Ren and Nora go for another. We were thinking of looking around some of the shiftier parts of town, since Blake didn't come back she must've slept in a hotel and a cheap one, but she could be anywhere, which is why we're splitting up."

Everyone seemed in agreement, but Ren raised his hand.

"May I make a suggestion?" Ruby let him go ahead. "I believe I know a place where we could get some information. There's this bookshop in downtown that I saw Blake at one day and she seemed to be friends with the owner. Perhaps he could help us?"

Ruby grinned. This was good! "Great! I think Weiss and Yang should go, because even if Blake isn't there we could pass on a message, and you two can go where I meant to send them in the first place." Operation Find Blake was coming along nicely! Of course, that still left the matter of what they'd actually do once Blake was found, but she'd figure it out! It shouldn't be too complicated, right?

Blake wondered just what god she had slighted for her life to be like this. How does one go from a member of an, admittedly, controversial civil rights organization that dabbled in a bit of terrorism to having tea in the middle of Vale after she had just outed herself as White Fang in front of her team and a Schnee? To add on, Sun's team was, quirky, to say the least.

She didn't have a low opinion of them, just that she could see they had their own problems. Sun himself was fine, if a little dorky and pushy, but she could tell he had a good heart. Neptune was clearly one who fashioned himself a ladies man, but did seem to know when to shut up, which was good. Then there was Scarlet, who seemed to be like Weiss, in the sense that he was pushing to take over as team leader and clearly didn't have a high opinion on Sun, and like Weiss, was really gay, and also out of the closet, unlike Weiss. Which explained why he also seemed really cuddly with Sage, the final member of Team SSSN. Why did the academy headmasters feel it necessary to name a team after their leader? First RWBY led by Ruby and now SSSN led by Sun? What's next? Team CMEN led by- actually, no, she didn't want to go there.

Anyway, Sage was probably the one she liked the most, mainly because he seemed as exasperated with his team's antics as she was. He mainly kept to himself, but he did let Scarlet be all lovey-dovey with him so maybe he liked being the passive one. Blake sipped her cup of coffee and looked up at Sun, the leader, and then to his team in which Scarlet was arguing with Neptune over some inane thing, she hadn't been paying attention, and Sage looked at her with a face that screamed 'yeah, this is normal for them' and Sun just shrugged at her raised eyebrow.

"Don't worry about them, I'm pretty sure this is just Scarlet failing to try and induct Neptune into his harem."

Scarlet's indignant 'Hey!' and Neptune stuttering as he caught his leader's words had Blake giggling a bit. Only a bit, she could admit she found it funny. She set her cup down and cleared her throat to speak, bringing the attention of the four onto her.

"I suppose I should tell you how I got into this mess in the first place," she said, looking at Sun's grey eyes. He nodded and she continued, taking a deep breath to center herself. She told them about how she was in the White Fang ever since she was little, back when it was peaceful and the worst they did was put a store or some other place out of business for being racist.

Then came when five years ago, her parents stepped down from leading the Fang and those who were more for violent action took over. At first Blake agreed wholeheartedly with them, seeing the peaceful actions of the previous leadership to be too pacifistic and tame. This went until Blake finally realized that what they were doing was too much for her.

"So, that's my story," Blake ended, looking up from her cup of tea to gauge SSSN's reaction. Sun was just watching intently while the other members of his team were in various states of shock. Really, she was more surprised by Sun's lack of a reaction more than anything. Blake did have to admit she was slightly lying to them. She didn't tell them about Adam, nor did she think she could. It still felt too soon to try and unpack all that, so, she ran and left it well enough alone.

"Are we going to ignore she basically admitted to being a terrorist?" Neptune said, earning an elbow to the ribs courtesy of Sun. Blake tried not to flinch at the blunt statement.

"I actually have to give Neptune a point here. You yourself said you took part in the White Fang's more militant moves, so aren't you as guilty as the rest of them?" Scarlet said, pointing a finger at Blake while Sage remained quiet.

"It's not like that!" Sun intervened, coming to Blake's defense. "She said she's trying to leave that stuff behind her. Hell, what better way to turn over a new leaf than trying to be a Huntsman?"

"It is not as simple as saying 'sorry' and forgetting about it Sun," Scarlet chastised, taking a harsher tone against his leader. "She is still guilty of several crimes, no matter how noble or misguided she is. She has to face responsibility for her actions and not just run away from the consequences."

The words hurt, but she knew Scarlet was right. What was the point of being a Huntress to fix injustice when she ran away from her mistakes? She knew the White Fang couldn't have stolen all that dust, it didn't fit with their M.O, but if she was to own up to her actions, she may as well uncover the truth.

"Scarlet's right," she cut in, ending the argument between Sun and his team mates. They all looked to her, waiting for her to continue. "I can't run and pretend I'm not just as responsible as others for how the Fang is today," She looked at SSSN, most of all catching Sun's look of encouragement and Sage's silent pride in his eyes. "And I know where we can start"

Ruby's stomach ached. Her legs hurt from walking all around Vale. She probably should've had lunch by now, but what if she missed Blake coming by this spot? No, she had to keep going, for Blake's sake and the team's. She can't let such a measly thing like needing to eat to function stop her! Although, judging by how often she stumbled, and how much her stomach grumbled, that might be a little difficult. She bumped into another person and mumbled out a 'sorry', but upon seeing orange hair she had to do a double take.

"Penny?!" Ruby cried out, almost tripping again.

"Salutations Friend Ruby!" Penny replied, her cheery demeanor managing to infect Ruby and bring a smile to her face, even if it was ruined quickly by another growl from the stomach.

"It seems your stomach is quite upset Ruby! Do you need any medication?" Penny leaned in, her green eyes scanning over Ruby, who just waved both her hands.

"It's fine Penny, I'm just hungry is all, I haven't had lunch yet."

"Oh!" Penny exclaimed, moving back and giving Ruby some personal space back. "Well, perhaps you should eat something. Lunch is one of the most important meals of the day after all!"

Ruby bit her lip, but decided she couldn't really search for Blake effectively on an empty stomach. So the two of them walked to the nearest fast food place and ended up with Ruby eating a burger and fries while Penny just sat there, happy to be with Ruby at all. Ruby quickly wolfed down her food at a rate matched only when cookies were on her plate, before she looked at Penny.

"Sho..." she said, quickly swallowing the last bit of a burger. "What brings you to this part of Vale Penny?"

"Well, I was simply continuing my exploration of the city from yesterday. After meeting you and your team my Father had called me back to, uh, aid in the maintenance of my weapons." Ruby noticed Penny had a mild hiccup at saying that, but thought nothing of it and instead turned her mind to Penny's weapons.

"That's awesome! I personally maintain Crescent Rose by myself, but that makes me wonder, what kind of weapons DO you have?" Being from Atlas, Ruby guessed she probably had something at the very least on the more rare side of things in terms of tech, but probably not too out of the norm. Atlas was known for being strict after all, just look at Weiss! Penny meanwhile seemed to be thinking about the question for a moment, but she quickly had an answer.

"I'd rather not spoil the surprise just yet, that, and Father doesn't want me telling too many people about it." Penny said nervously, poking her fingers in a way that reminded Ruby of herself. She was mildly disappointed about the answer, but that didn't matter. She didn't say anything about not showing it to her in detail, so maybe she still had a chance to look at a possibly cool weapon!

"What about you Ruby?" Penny said, ending her fidgeting and changing the subject. "Why are you in the Vale docks again today?"

It was Ruby's turn to act nervous and mildly suspicious, twirling her short hair with one of her fingers while looking off to the side.

"Well, do you remember Weiss and Blake?" Penny nodded. "Yeah so they had a really big fight after we met you and we found out some things about Blake..." Ruby would've continued, but Penny cut in with a gasp.

"Is she a man?"

Ruby stifled a laugh but only half-succeeded, giggling a bit. Penny tilted her head, confused at what was so funny before Ruby clarified.

"No, nothing like that, it's just that Blake was actually a Faunus and, well, Weiss being a Schnee, you can probably guess how that would turn out."

Penny again tilted her head in confusion and Ruby had to explain why exactly an argument between a Faunus and a Schnee might be so explosive.

"I see," she said, rapidly nodding her head. "But if she is White Fang, shouldn't she be reported to the proper authorities?"

"We don't know for sure that she is White Fang, just that she's a Faunus. We're trying to find her and talk to her so that's why I'm here."

"I see," Penny said, smiling at Ruby. "Then, as your friend, I shall help you in anyway possible to find Blake!"

Ruby beamed at securing Penny's support and the two of them were back on the streets, asking people if they had seen Blake. After and hour or so they reconvened and Ruby decided that a change in strategy was in order.

"We should probably change our plans. We've been asking for an our and nobody's seen her, so either she's better at hiding than I thought or she's not here."

"May I make a suggestion?" Penny asked and Ruby remained silent to let her explain. "If the current theory is that Blake is at the very least affiliated to the White Fang, and she believes the White Fang are not behind the dust robberies, should we not stake them out?" Ruby let out a 'huh' noise, asking Penny to elaborate a bit more. "There is an SDC shipment of dust that arrived yesterday, I saw it before I met you. If Blake thinks that the White Fang is innocent, then wouldn't she observe the docks to in fact verify it?"

"Penny you're a genius!" Ruby exclaimed, tightly hugging Penny before retreating quickly. They had technically just met, even if the two girls got on like cookie dough and chocolate chips. Penny beamed at the praise and the two ran toward where the warehouses next to the docks, determined to find Blake.

Yang sat by a bench in the street, exhausted by the day. She'd been searching with Weiss like everyone else and, like everyone else, nothing turned up. Weiss sat down next to her and Yang moved over, both to give the heiress space and to prevent Yang from blowing up at her. To say she was cranky would be an understatement. And unfortunately, that meant most of that anger was aimed at Weiss. She didn't really mean it, but her anger needed something to focus on, and unfortunately it focused on Weiss, which made her even angrier.

"I know you're mad Yang." Weiss' voice cut through Yang's thoughts, fully turning her attention on the girl as she sat on the bench, head lowered and eyes looking at the ground. "You have a right to be and I don't blame you for it."

Yang tried to play it off. "Pff, mad? At you Weiss-cream? Never."

"You're a horrible liar Yang." The two of them were quiet at that, Weiss stewing in her thoughts and Yang collecting hers, trying to think of what to say. "We should move on, maybe ask that book shop owner again. It's clear Blake isn't here."

"Weiss wait-" Weiss made to stand up, but Yang grabbed her arm.

"What, Yang?" she said exasperatedly.

"Look, I'm sorry. I'm in a bad mood and it's hard to keep it all in."

"Yes well you're not the only one that's all cranky. But since Blake is sooo important we all have to put everything aside and look for her."

Yang stood up. "Is this about her being White Fang again? We told you, we don't know that for sure."

"Her saying 'because I'm one of them' didn't make it clear enough for you?"

Yang's eyes flashed red and she pointed a finger at the heiress. "She was extremely emotional and not in her right mind, all because of you being such a stuck up little princess! You just couldn't comprehend what would drive someone to join the White Fang or the fact that not even all its members are terrorist, because that would against the perfect version of Atlas and the SDC you convinced yourself existed! News flash Weiss! In the real world, the White Fang has actual genuine grievances and aren't just violent psychopaths! Is it right for them to commit terrorism? Of course not, but they sure as hell justified seeing how most of the world seems to ignore them and treats them less than human, and you're no better! You paint all Faunus with the same brush you paint the Fang because you're a racist, spoiled, bitch!"

Weiss stayed silent for a moment after Yang's rant, staring at the blonde's lilac eyes with an unreadable expression before she raised her hand and slapped Yang's cheek. It wasn't a strong hit by any means, Dad's love taps hit harder, but it caught Yang off-guard and she stumbled a bit.

"...Do you think I don't know that?" Weiss asked quietly, her voice and body trembling. "I know not all faunus are like that, not all of them are Fang or even willing to murder, but still..." She clenched her fist and took a deep breath. "Logically, I know the White Fang doesn't represent the entirety of all faunus, but do you think that makes it any easier? Imagine being told that you can no longer hang out with your friends, because they'll be used as hostages, or that some of the workers you befriend were fired for being suspected White Fang, being told your entire life that faunus are dangerous, do you think that makes it any easy to reconcile?" Weiss shook her head and looked at Yang straight in the eye, tears threatening to spill out of her blue irises. "I don't WANT to hate the faunus! I want to believe both them and the White Fang have good intentions! I know how much of a princess I am and how my father exploits his workers in the mines! And yet I feel fear towards faunus! I feel anger and disgust and I hate myself for it! I hate feeling like this, like the rich stuck up heiress everyone assumes I am when I don't want to be! I want to change my grandfather's company and for the better, but how can I when I feel such vile things for faunus?"

Weiss broke down after that, her tears spilling and she fell to her knees, desperately trying to hold onto her composure. Yang's anger evaporated at seeing Weiss like this and she rushed to hug the poor girl. She was still upset over Weiss' behavior against Blake, but she could she why. Really, who could blame her? Growing up like that must've been hell. She didn't know how long they had been sitting there on the sidewalk, but eventually Weiss calmed down enough for her to stand up and the two of them to go to a nearby cafe for the heiress to clean up. Yang stood outside, leaning against the wall and brushing her hair with her left hand while her right was on her scroll, checking up on everybody else. JNPR had nothing to report and Ruby said she was checking the docks again, but nothing about Blake.

She sighed and put the device in her pocket along with her hands. These last two days had been nothing but a rollercoaster and Yang didn't even know where to being to unpack all her emotions. Sympathy for both Blake and Weiss, anger at the SDC, the White Fang and Weiss also, it was a mess. She saw Weiss leaving the cafe, her eyes still puffy, but otherwise no mark of the crying or her breakdown remained. She looked at Yang and briefly looked away before facing her and clearing her throat.

"Well, shall we continue?"

Ah, the 'let us never speak of this again' approach. She could work with that.

"Sure," Yang replied, but not before putting a hand on Weiss' shoulder. She flinched at the contact and Yang quickly retreated, but the heiress shaked her head and let her. "Look, I'm sorry for being an ass. I was angry and not in my right mind. If you want to talk about this-"

"Yang, don't. I appreciate it, but I don't want to nor do I feel ready to have that conversation. Please, just leave it."

Yang complied and backed away. She looked up and noticed that the sun had basically set now. She checked the time and saw a bright nine'o'clock on her scroll.

"We should get moving. It's nine already and the last bullhead to Beacon is at midnight." Yang said.

"Yes, we should," Weiss agreed, but a distant boom, like that of an explosion or a lightning bolt startled them. Yang turned towards the direction of the sound, the docks, a part of her mind noted, and barely managed to spot the smoke in the distance, covered by the night sky. Her eyes widened as she realized who was in the docks.

"Ruby!"

Yang took off running towards the docks, leaving a startled Weiss who chased the blonde as she raced to the docks. She didn't know if Ruby was even still at the docks, but Yang wasn't risking it. Not again. The two blitzed through the streets of Vale onto the rising plumes of smoke, as police sirens wailed out throughout the city.

Chapter Text

Blake thanked that at least whatever gods where out there gave her the small mercy of Tukson being willing to sell out the White Fang to Blake. They came in just a little while after lunch and Tukson told them of the SDC shipment delivered yesterday, which was aimed at resupplying the city after the string of dust robberies, but would probably be a prime target for the perpetrators of such crimes. They managed to snag a good spot on a warehouse roof, right on top of where most of the SDC's dust was stored, the rest on large containers close to the water. Definitely enough dust to resupply half the city of Vale, and certainly overkill for the White Fang.

Unfortunately, she was still stuck with SSSN, which meant she could hear them bicker over the smallest thing imaginable. Sage was fine though, he was quiet and did seem genuinely sorry for how much Scarlet argued with Neptune and Sun. Speaking of, Sage had walked over to the edge of the roof where Blake was, observing the waterfront for anything out of the ordinary. The sun was almost done setting, leaving a purple glow in the sky as the light reflected over the water, making for a pretty view.

Sage sat down, legs crossed in a way Blake had seen Ren do a few times during movie night, and stayed like that for a bit. She wondered if he came here for something else or to purely get away from his team a bit. After another minute or two he spoke up.

"Try not to let Scarlet's words get to you too much. I'll be the first to admit he can be overtly critical at times, especially when it comes to anything related to Sun."

"I would think you would try to defend your boyfriend at least a little no?" Blake asked with a raised eyebrow and Sage shrugged.

"Is it unnatural to say your lover has faults of their own? Just because we're dating doesn't mean I cannot say when Scarlet is in the wrong," Blake find it in her to disagree. Just how long had she lived under the delusion that Adam had been perfect until that day? It wasn't healthy to say the least, and neither was her shooing away those thoughts, but she wasn't ready. Not yet.

"I suppose you have a point," Blake said finally, her mind still mostly focused on observing the ground below.

"But don't tell him I said any of that," Sage replied, in a tone that made Blake unsure if he was joking or not, but his small smile gave it away.

Blake looked back to see the red-haired boy stabbing his finger into Sun's bandaged chest in a manner that reminded her of Weiss and Ruby. She smiled at the thought of her old team but quickly shook it away. They wouldn't want me know that they know how long I've been lying to them, especially that stuck up Schnee. What's done is done. She didn't know what to do after tonight, but going back to Beacon was out of the question. Maybe she could go with Tukson to Vacuo? Better than going back to Menagerie and facing her parents. They must hate her after all these years.

Blake noticed a pair of eyes on her and turned her head to see Sage looking at her with a curious expression on his face, eyebrows scrunched together in thought. She was going to ask him what was wrong, but he just stood up and made to leave, but not before speaking.

"For what it's worth, I think your sense of justice is something worth admiring. I can see just exactly why Sun likes you. Just don't let it make you forget what's truly important," Sage said, before walking back to his team and hugging Scarlet from behind, defusing the current argument.

Blake just stared mildly confused at Sage's statement. What did he mean by that? Was he trying to live up to his name by giving advice that sounded vaguely sagely or something? It did remind her mildly of Ren, and another pang of melancholy hit her as she realized the two of them would probably never talk about books or which Ninjas of Love volume was the best, but she shook her head and focused again on the task at hand.

It was remarkably easy for Blake to hone in at the task at hand, for her head to block out everything else, almost like a soldier. She scanned over the waterfront, once, twice, three times, and almost gave up, were it not for a distant hum she heard. In the now dark dockyard, she couldn't tell, but she swore it was the sound of bullhead engines. She focused on it, having all four of her ears searching for the source, as it got closer and closer. After a minute she saw the bullheads fly over her, slowing down and then landing right in front of the warehouse they were up top. What Blake saw next confirmed her worst fears.

Faunus in White Fang uniforms, all of them. They all wore a variety of clothes, but the white hood and mask designed like that of a Grimm marked who they were. She couldn't believe. She was gone for only half a year and yet they somehow had acquired three whole airships? She scanned the group again. There must've been a clue, a sign, maybe they got new funding? Then, she spotted him.

Roman Torchwick's, Vale's newest Most Wanted, stood right there in the front, barking orders to all the Fang members, along with a few insults thrown in. Blake would have expected them to be angry and even talk back, but not a single one showed anything beyond slight reluctance, and fanned out across the dock, attaching cables to the SDC dust containers.

None of it made sense. She could maybe understand the bullheads, maybe they had a really great heist as impossible as that was, but they would never steal dust this brazenly or work with a human like Torchwick, especially when he berated them so often. Something was up here, and it took all of Blake's focus to not just run out into the open and yell at all the White Fang to come to their senses. She looked to her sides to see Sun and his team next to her, all of them staring down at the theft in progress. Blake stood up and unsheathed Gambol Shroud, before jumping off the warehouse, aura cushioning the impact as she rolled to the side and into the shadows. Sun just stared at her and then back to his team, quickly coming up with a plan.

"Neptune, you stay up here and give us range support with Scarlet, who'll be our back up if you see anyone in trouble. Me and Sage will go down to make sure Blake is fine," Sun quickly rattled off, and before anyone could complain, ran to the side of the warehouse and jumped, landing on a dumpster and then rolling off. Sage looked at Scarlet, shrugged, and followed his leader off the warehouse, using the ladder to avoid making too much noise.

Scarlet looked back at Neptune, who already had his glaive in its rifle form, gave him a 'what can you do' look and crouched, getting ready to provide fire support. Scarlet just scoffed but got out his sword and hook, getting to his knees next to Neptune, ready to jump off at a moment's notice.

Roman tapped his cane against the ground as he watched the White Fang working, moving crates of dust onto the bullheads once they had attached the cables to some of the bigger containers. They wouldn't be making off with all the dust, at most one-quarter of it, but it would still be a huge haul, and enough to satisfy that bitch of a woman Roman now had to call his boss. Cinder was very demanding, and the fact that the subtle threat of death by fire was always present, made for an unpleasant experience hard to escape from. Especially now that she was in Vale proper again and could much more easily get to Roman.

But, as Roman himself liked to say, it is what it is. Roman prided himself on being a survivor, and survive he will. Even if things looked rough right now, Roman knew how to play a bad hand, even if his opponents knew what his ace was and promptly stole it from him. Neopolitan was his best fighter, his partner and, even if he'd never admit it, a daughter to him, and Cinder knew it. Without Neo's illusions it was significantly harder to get away from Cinder and evade any people she sends after him.

He took a his cigar out of his mouth and huffed, tapping it to get the ashes off. No use in wallowing around in self-pity, right now he had a job to do. He checked his wrist watch and frowned. Only a few minutes until the cops got here, considering the fact that bullheads weren't exactly quiet vehicles, they had a time limit. He moved to bark out more orders and to start getting back to the airships, but then he felt himself be tugged back and a blade pressed against his throat. Great.

"Brothers and sisters of the White Fang!" Roman heard the person behind him call out, the girl's voice reverberating throughout the dockyard. The White Fang came like the little obedient animals they were and froze upon seeing Roman and the girl behind him. He looked back and scowled. Judging from her looks, she had to at least be seventeen or eighteen, so that would make to huntresses-in-training that decided to rain on his parade. He sighed. Just what god did he piss of in a past life to deserve this?

The girl made to speak up again, but she gasped and stared at one of the Fang members. Roman followed her eyes and saw that the girl was staring at that one chameleon girl, Illiad or something like that, who seemed to be in a similar state to the girl holding him hostage. Roman tried to use the momentary distraction to break free, but the huntress-in-training caught on, tightened her grip and moved the blade closer to his neck with a snarl. Well, shit.

Finally, the Fang girl found her tongue. "Blake? What are you doing here?".

"I should ask you the same thing!" 'Blake' responded. So, these two knew each other. That complicated things. Roman's train of thought was interrupted by Blake speaking up again. "Stealing dust, working with Roman Torchwick of all people, what exactly is the White Fang planning Illia?"

"As if a traitor like you could understand," Chameleon Girl spat out, taking a combat stance. Blake just moved her blade ever closer to Roman's throat, almost resting it upon his jugular and threating to cut it at a moment's notice.

"You're spot on. I don't understand. How does any of this advance our cause? Stealing SDC dust, yeah, but not from half of Vale. You know what that makes us? Common criminals, thieves, and proves us no better than the humans."

Chameleon Girl paused, but shook her head. "You don't get it Blake, this is the exactly the opportunity we've been waiting for," she said, but it sounded like she didn't really believe it herself. Roman decided to take action before the cognitive dissonance hit the poor girl like a truck. He aimed his cane downwards and flicked the top open, and before anyone caught on, fired, hoping his aura would tank the blast.

Sun heard the explosion nearby and cursed, jumping between the shipping containers as his body was lit up by the fireball, alerting the Fang to his presence. He dashed and jumped down, narrowly avoiding the rifle rounds screaming from the faunus' rifles. He found the source of the explosion, where Blake lied on the end of a crater disoriented while that Torchwick guy and another Fang member were already recovering. He cursed as he saw more Fang raise their guns at Blake and quickly jumped in front of her, twirling his staff to deflect the incoming bullet storm.

Torchwick aimed his cane at him and Sun grimaced. Bullets he could block, but Fire Dust explosives would definitely impact his aura, enough to maybe even break it. He braced himself, but it was thankfully unnecessary as Sage tackled the criminal to the ground and taking the White Fang's attention away from Blake and Sun. Blake seemed to have regained her bearings and stood up now, both Gambol Shroud's sword and cleaver held in her hands as she nodded at Sun.

"Torchwick's mine," is all she said as Blake ran off to chase the criminal while Sage and Scarlet, who had used his semblance to glide down and attack the squad of Fang from behind, knocked out his goons. As the rush of displaced air behind Sun told him however, they weren't done yet, as the Fang girl from earlier attacked him with her sword in a stabbing motion. Sun ducked to the side and deflected it with his staff, using his momentum to hit the girl in the chin with the butt of his weapon, knocking away her mask, giving him a good look at her.

The hate-filled expression on her face was definitely a shock, as she looked at him with piercing blue eyes, she got into a combat stance, and muttered a single sentence.

"Death to traitors."

Sun grimaced as her sword turned into a whip crackling with Lightning Dust as he split his staff into its twin nunchaku form, Ruyi Bang and Jingu Bang. He briefly wondered just how a person could have such a hateful face and mentality, but had to push it away as he desperately tried to block and parry the girl's whip with his weapons, adrenaline taking over and pushing out any pitying thoughts for how the girl ended up that way.

Chapter Text

Sparda...

The creature stalked across the woods, crouching to keep a low profile as it approached the human city. He came to this world to kill, rend its inhabitants apart and feast on their flesh, but he had been separated from his comrades and was now alone. Despite its massive frame, he managed to stealthily kill some of the forest animals, but his hunger was still unsatiated. It took great care to not flare his demonic power, as he sensed the blood of demons more powerful than him nearby.

Sparda...

However, now was his stroke of luck. He approached the fireball that appeared over the water near the city in mild curiosity at first, but upon smelling the blood of Sparda it took everything within him to not go wild and rampage. It was diluted, much like how he colauld sense traces of his kind within the black werewolf creatures he killed earlier that interrupted his hunt, but both were definitely demonic, and thus, a chance for the creature to satisfy his bloodlust against a powerful combatant. He snorted out air as he hefted his giant hammer before charging towards the sea and turning towards the direction of the smell.

I will slaughter you, blood of Sparda!

At first, Ruby and Penny's investigation of the docks yielded much of the same results as before. That is, a whole lot of no Blake, and more searching. However, Penny suggested they try to climb a warehouse roof to have a vantage point, and so they did, coming across two boys leaning over the rooftop and towards the docks, where, Ruby noticed, were three bullheads and a lot of faunus in white robes and Grimm masks. One of the boys, one with red hair a shade darker than Ruby's and using what seemed to be a cutlass and a flintlock pistol, turned towards them and his eyes widened in alarm.

He raised his sword and Ruby squaked, quickly waving her arms around to show they meant no harm while Penny stood there with a curious look on her face. The red-haired boy slightly lowered his sword but not his guard, raising an eyebrow at Ruby. She decided it was faster to just explain without asking questions and the interfere in the (possible) criminal act in progress.

However, any words to be exchanged were cut short as a fireball in front of the warehouse and near the bullheads illuminated the night, casting the White Fang in an eerie glow as they began firing at their assailants. Ruby only had one thought on her mind, that there were people and maybe even Blake in danger and she needed to help. The red-haired boy looked back at them for a moment before nodding towards his blue-haired companion and jumped off the building, somehow gliding towards where the explosion was and landing in the midst of the White Fang, attacking swiftly before they recovered.

The blue-haired boy, meanwhile, was using his rifle to shoot at the White Fang, Ruby noticing with relief that he was using stun rounds and not live bullets. Ruby made to pull out Crescent Rose, but then remembered that Penny was there, and she was also moving to join the fight.

"Penny don't! You don't have any weapons!" Ruby cried out, right as Penny reached the side of the blue-haired boy, who looked up at the ginger-haired girl. Penny turned her head towards Ruby and smiled.

"Don't worry Friend Ruby! I am combat ready!" she exclaimed, before her backpack opened up, revealing at first a floating short-sword which then split into twelve blades, all with growing green lines and, Ruby noticed, attached to Penny's backpack (which was infinitely cooler than simple telekinesis in Ruby's opinion).

Penny then crouched and jumped off the roof, landing on the floor with a heavy thud and instantly bringing the White Fang's attention upon her. The grunts turned the rifles upon her, but their shots were deflected as Penny's swords floated and moved in a circle in front of her, shots pinging of the blades as two split off and shot towards the closest Fang grunts, knocking their guns away. Then, Penny was upon them, and woah was the only apt word Ruby could think of. The girl moved like a dancer, her swords following the movement of her arms as they slashed, stabbed, tripped and knocked out all of the nearby White Fang grunts. Ruby had to restrain herself from rushing in and inspecting every part of Penny's weapons and gush over them as if she was in love. Instead, she pulled out Crescent Rose, nodded to the boy she just met, and jumped, firing a shot on the ground to lower her momentum before rolling and running towards Penny to help her out.

However, she was intercepted by more White Fang grunts shooting at her from the side. Ruby ducked into cover and made to shoot back, but hesitated. She didn't know if these guys had aura and even if they did, their control was probably abysmal, enough so that a normal round from Crescent Rose would come out clean the other side having blown off whatever limb it had hit. Ruby grimaced at the mental image and shook her head, calmly replacing her magazine with lower caliber Lightning Dust rounds as bullets pinged off the container she was hiding behind.

She used a burst of her Semblance to move to the top of the container before firing at the group of Fang, aiming for non-vital spots just in case. Thankfully, they all seemed to have aura, even if it broke easily as they ran for cover from Ruby's bullets. Ruby then aimed her scythe backwards and fired, using the recoil to boost herself this time as she dashed towards the grunts, knocking them down with the back of her scythe and the spear point on the end of her weapon's haft.

Ruby looked around for Penny, who had finished dispatching her group of grunts and quickly ran to her. The girl seemed to be patting the head of one of the faunus as a sort of apology while the man groaned. Penny looked up and waved at Ruby who joined her side. Another explosion rang out and the sounds of fighting intensified. Ruby was worried, both for the red-haired boy, Blake and anybody caught in the explosion, but her worries were washed away as she looked at Penny and the two girls nodded to each other. Ruby felt that if she was with Penny, then she could do anything, and it left her feeling warm in her chest for some reason. The two of them began sprinting towards the source of the gunfire, leaving as the blue-haired boy moved to catch up.

This, Blake and Sun realized at the same time, was a bad idea. At first it well as well as it could've, Blake had Torchwick hostage and thus all the Fang grunts immobilized by indecision, and even when Torchwick had broken out with an, admittedly, unexpected Fire Dust round at the ground, Scarlet and Sage took care of all the mooks while Blake and Sun took on Torchwick and Ilia respectively. However, once their enemies recovered from their shock, the tides started turning once two other Fang specialists like Ilia joined the fight. Blake didn't get a good look at them, other than the fact that one was a snake and the other a wolverine faunus, considering Torchwick took up most of her attention. The man was good, Blake knew this, but until she was actually fighting the criminal did she realize that there was a difference between knowing it and experiencing it. Torchwick had evaded the authorities for years, mostly through bribes and running away before things got heated, but the man knew how to fight. If it were a trained Hunter, Torchwick would probably struggle, but against Blake? It was clear who the more skilled opponent was, even if Blake had more training than her peers.

Case in point, she had to use a shadow clone to move out of the way of Torchwick's overhead strike, then moving in to counter attack with Gambol Shroud but Torchwick parried her main-hand blade and struck Blake in the nose, making her step backwards to avoid a follow-up hit. She shifted her sword to its pistol mode and began shooting at Torchwick, who dove behind a red container and Blake held her fire, worried that it might be filled with Dust. She looked over at Sun, who was fighting her old friend Ilia and her Lightning Dust whip. Sun was managing admirably against it, but the electrical burns in his exposed body parts showed that Ilia was getting through. Sun looked at her and nodded, at first confusing Blake, but his call out made her move swiftly.

"Blake! Switch!" Sun exlaimed, barely ducking under one of Ilia's swipes as he ran toward Torchwick and she towards Ilia.

Ilia was surprised but she recovered quickly, dashing in to stab at Blake. Blake parried it with her blade and retaliated with the cleaver in her off-hand, slicing across the chest before striking her on the stomach with her sword's pommel, making the chameleon faunus gasp as the air in her lungs was forcefully expelled. She quickly retreated and lashed out with her whip, preventing Blake from following up. Ilia caught her breath while Blake circled hesitantly, not wanting to hurt her old friend but at the same time recognizing the threat she posed.

"Ilia, you don't have to do this-" Blake tried to say, trying to appeal to Ilia's reason but the girl cut her off.

"The time for talk has past, traitor" Ilia spat out, before shifting her whip back into its rapier form and dashing towards Blake, trying to use her weapon's longer reach to her advantage.

Blake used her sword to parry Ilia's strikes while her cleaver hung back as she waited for an opening. Ilia would occasionally use her rapier's whip function to extend her range without fully shifting, giving Blake a few nasty burns that got through her Aura. Still, Ilia herself wasn't looking much better, a few slashes from Gambol Shroud slipping past her guard and Aura wearing her down, which lead to the two of them separating to recover and think their next moves.

Blake took advantage of the lull in the fighting to see how Sun and his team were doing. Sage and Scarlet were busy taking care of the other two White Fang specialists that arrived after Ilia, but it seemed like they weren't much better off, as the wolverine faunus seemed to be overwhelming Scarlet with his brute force and the snake faunus was too fast for Sage to consistently hit. She winced as the wolverine faunus hit Scarlet into the wall of a nearby container while the snake faunus used his sai's to get in Sage's guard and prevent him from helping his partner. Blake never knew these guys, but they seemed to be good fighters and a bad match-up for the two, able to keep Sage and Scarlet away from each other to prevent a switch like she and Sun did.

Speaking of, the monkey faunus, while certainly not winning, was able to hold his own better than when Blake went up against Torchwick. His staff had more range than Torchwick's, but more importantly, it split into nunchaku with shotguns, which, while having much more limited range, allowed Sun to get right inside Torchwick's guard and force him to dodge, duck and weave through Sun's barrage of strikes punctuated by shotgun shots, letting him keep Torchwick on the back foot. Even so, Torchwick managed to slip a punch past Sun's offense and elbowed him in the face, stunning him before he tripped him up with his cane's hook and aiming straight into the monkey faunus' head.

"Hope your aura's good enough to hold against Fire Dust little chimp," Torchwick snarled. Blake yelled out, but Ilia chose that moment then and there to get back in the fight and wrapped her whip around Blake's leg before activating the Lighting Dust. Blake's throat was hoarse from her scream as the electricity arced around her body, burning through her body. Ilia quickly de-activated the Lightning Dust mechanism, but the damage was done. Blake slumped to the floor as her body went numb, limbs twitching. Ilia looked horrified at what she'd done, but Torchwick's voice cut through her thoughts.

"Nicely done chameleon girl, now I can kill two birds with one stone!" Torchwick kicked Sun towards Blake, the faunus coughing as the hit drove all the air out of his lungs and left him breathing roughly. Sun tried to get up, but Torchwick slammed the butt of his cane into his head, before tutting like a parent would to a child. "Stay nice and quiet there with your girlfriend little chimp, and you might just get out of this alive."

Blake tried to look up from the ground and met Sun's fog-grey pupils. She tried to mouth out an apology for getting them into this mess, for hurting them just like he said she always does but Sun shook his head and smiled at her. He moved his eyes to the side and Blake had to struggle not to react, as she saw Neptune sneaking up on the snake faunus tying down Sage. He quickly pelted the snake faunus with Lighting Dust rounds, stunning him momentarily as Sage roared and pushed him off, before rushing the wolverine faunus that was holding an unconscious Scarlet against the ground.

Torchwick and Ilia turned at the sound, but before Sun could react, green lasers shot the ground where they stood, as Penny dashed in with, were those floating swords? Behind Penny was Ruby, who activated her Semblance and got in front of Torchwick before he could threaten Blake and Sun, leaving Ilia to fight against Penny and the snake faunus to fight against Neptune.

However, to call it a fight would be lying. It would be more accurate to say that Penny completely overwhelmed Ilia within a minute and had her on the ground, disarmed, with her swords floating in the air as they aimed at Ilia, who growled but was unable to do anything without getting shot. Penny turned around to Blake and Sun, saluting with a smile on her face while Blake just stared incredulously at how fast the ginger girl was able to take down Ilia.

Sun helped her stand up and quickly came to her aid when her legs collapsed. Her limbs still felt numb from the electricity, but she could at least move, even if for now she needed Sun's help. Penny went off after Torchwick, switching in with Ruby who quickly Semblance'd her way towards Blake in a blur, asking her a bunch of rapid-fire questions.

"Ruby, please slow down." Blake said, prompting the reaper to stop and blush before she took a breath and started all over.

"Are you okay Blake? Do you have any idea how worried we were when you didn't come back yesterday? Yang was about ready to trash all of Vale to find you!" Ruby said, fretting over Blake's injuries while Sun looked at Blake and raised an eyebrow.

"This the team that would hate you after finding out you were a faunus?" Sun asked, and Blake blushed in embarrassment, looking away from Ruby and Sun's gazes.

"We could never hate you Blake," Ruby said in a hurt tone, before hugging the cat faunus. "You're part of the team, extra bits and all." Blake did her best to not spill out all her bottled up feelings, closing her eyes and focusing on her breathing. She heard sirens in the distance and looked over the aftermath of the battle. Sun's team managed to knock out the pair of faunus specialists and Penny managed to wrap up with Torchwick just like she did with Ilia, keeping now the both of them pinned under her swords as she waved at Ruby.

They were safe now. So why did Blake still feel like she was in danger?

She stiffened as her instincts screamed at her, seeing Sun do the same as his tail shot up ram-rod straight. Blake's ears folded back, like a cat threatened into its fight or flight response, and she hunched over, while Ruby looked at her worried. Her eyes shot all through the docks, trying to find whatever was causing the alarm bells in her head. Was it a grimm? More White Fang? Then, she heard it.

To call it a roar would be incorrect. It sounded more like a horn that reverberated all through the docks, threatening to blast Blake's eardrums. She barely heard the sounds of something crashing through the containers before it crashed to one close to Sun's team, sending them scrambling for cover as Dust and debris flew. Then, the thing stopped, its feet skidding through the concrete.

It was big, easily towering over them and the White Fang airships, being 5 meters tall at least. It had huge, cable-like muscles on its arms, its left arm holding a bleach white stone hammer that was twice Blake's size. Its right arm was used to support itself as it got a footing, showing comparatively small legs that were inverted and hoof-like, but still huge. Most of its skin was blood-red, with white armor on its head, back and arms, exposing most of its torso. Finally, the head was that of a bull, but bigger. Its horns looked like it could easily impale people and the underside of the jaw showed more skin. But, the thing that unnerved Blake, was its eyes. Red, like a grimm's, full of madness and bloodlust. It roared again somehow, despite its mouth being sealed shut by its armor, and charged at them. Ruby used her Semblance to get away while Blake used a shadow clone to push herself and Sun away from the beast.

It easily tore through the Earth Dust she used for her clone, sending rocks their way. Penny managed to shoot most of them, but some still hit her and Sun, bringing down their Auras. She prepared herself for the monster to attack them again, but it seemed to ignore Neptune, Scarlet, Sun and Penny firing at it, their bullets pinging against the white carapace of its back as it faced Ruby. The beast swung its hammer one handed, but Ruby jumped over it and zipped around the bull, slashing mainly at its legs and torso, staining the ground red with blood.

However, Blake knew it wouldn't be enough. The cuts were superficial and seemed to be annoying the bull more than anything, and none of their attacks seemed to faze it. Blake grimaced as she heard the police sirens come closer. Just what could they do to kill such a thing?

Yang was panicking. She was panicking and she knew it. Ruby was probably in danger and she could not, and would not, lose her. Not after what losing Mom did to Dad and Uncle Qrow. Distantly, she could hear Weiss shouting at her to slow down, but it didn't register with her, drowned out in her adrenaline-filled mind. She just kept running, brushing past any passerby's and vaulting over any obstacles. They were at the docks, having arrived just before the police, and the entire place was a mess. Faunus wearing White Fang masks all laid on the floor, knocked out thankfully, but no sign of Ruby. Yang heard more sounds of fighting and sprinted in, throwing caution to the wind and causing Weiss to curse as she chased after the blonde.

The first thing she saw was Ruby, followed by Penny, Blake, that monkey faunus from yesterday, and three other boys all shooting at a giant bull monster covered in white armor and wielding a giant hammer. Yang would've pegged it as a Grimm where it not for the fact that it had red skin rather than black fur. It didn't matter to Yang, who yelled out while activating Ember Celica, her shotgun gauntlets boosting her towards the minotaur-grimm-thing. The monster turned and quickly moved up an arm as Yang's punch hit the bone-white carapace in its forearm. The bull tried to swipe at Yang with its hammer but she recoil-boosted far from its range. Instead of following up, however, the thing hunched over on all its limbs, as sickening cracks rang out, which, Yang realized, came from the bull itself, and its mask.

The mask shattered, freeing its mouth as it roared, stunning Yang as the beast quickly charged towards her on all fours, its hammer trailing behind it. Yang threw herself out of the way, just in time as the bull reared the hammer up and slammed it down on where Yang was. It snarled, turning towards Yang again, but before it could do anything, shots from Crescent Rose pelted its head, taking its attention towards Ruby. The monster looked at Yang, giving her an uncanny human-like smirk, before it charged towards Ruby. Yang's eyes widened as the minotaur closed the gap swiftly, chasing Ruby down as her sister tried to flee from the bull.

Yang yelled out, recoil-boosting again to reach Ruby, but the minotaur saw her coming and shot its right arm out, clotheslining Yang and sending her to the ground, her Aura flickering but holding. The bull seemed to laugh, lifting its hammer to smash Yang into paste, but Ruby came in and sliced its torso, boosting her speed with her sniper's recoil, leaving a deep gash in the monster's torso. Before it could try and punish Ruby for the interaction, Penny shoot a storm of lasers into the wound, causing it to step back and retreat. A black glyph appeared under its feet, restraining its movement as Weiss moved in with her glyphs, quickly slashing at the exposed skin along with Ruby and Penny.

Yang managed to get up and saw from the corner of her vision Blake being restrained by that monkey faunus and his team, who were trying to retreat. Given the state of their wounds, Yang couldn't blame them, but she pushed it away, reloading Ember Celica and recoil-boosting towards the monster, cocking her fist back as she got up over its head and punched down, sending it to the ground, its body leaving a crater.

The minotaur tried to get up, but a hammer blow from Yang and Penny's swords embedding themselves into the bull's skin kept it down, one final roar of pain escaping its jaws before it slumped over, seemingly unconscious. Yang immediately rushed over to Ruby, fretting over her. Her sister tried to push her away, but in the face of Yang's superior strength it was no use. Ruby had found her savior, in the form of Weiss tackling Yang, bringing her attention to the heiress.

"Don't ever run off like that again Yang," Weiss muttered, her pale face red and looking to the side. Yang felt guilty over leaving the heiress like that, and she would apologize, but there were more important things right now.

"Speaking of running away," Yang said out-loud, making Blake flinch as she limped over with the monkey faunus and his friends.

"I'm sorry," Blake mumbled, acting in a manner not too dissimilar to Weiss, who, to their surprise, was the first to approach the cat faunus. The white-haired girl took a second to collect her words, before, unexpectedly, she bowed to Blake and spoke.

"This may not mean much to you, but I apologize as well Blake. I can recognize the impact my family's company has had on faunus," Weiss said, surprising Blake, but before she could respond, Weiss continued. "That doesn't mean I forgive the White Fang. Just because is just does not excuse their actions, even if it was done by independents such events should be condemned." Blake could only nod at that, swallowing before replying.

"Y-you don't hate me?" Blake asked meekly, almost begging, in a way.

"No, I thought I did but I don't. Your actions here prove you are at the very least. trying to be better." Weiss said, shaking her head. Yang and Ruby joined her and Blake looked to be on the brink of tears but she held it back. Ruby put her hands on her hips and leaned forward, acting almost like how Mom did when she would scold Yang or Ruby.

"This doesn't mean you get off scot free missy! We will be having words when we're back at Beacon!" Ruby said, and Blake laughed. It was almost hysterical, but she calmed down and gazed fondly at her team.

"Back at Beacon, huh? I guess I am," Blake said, having a dumb smile on her face.

She quickly hissed like a cat and her ears perked up. Yang acted fast, turning around and seeing the minotaur getting back up, a purple aura now surrounding it as it roared. Penny was the first to recover and attack, moving her swords like a sawblade but the bull swung its hammer into the ground, knocking Penny off-balance, before a swing from its head sent her flying. It rushed towards RWBY and Yang quickly stepped in front of her team, her arms up to block the beast's backhand from its right arm, knocking her into a container wall and denting the metal. Weiss and Ruby managed to move out of the monster's immediate range while Blake retreated with the monkey faunus again, using Gambol Shroud's pistol configuration to shoot at the rapidly healing scythe wound on its torso.

Yang tried to get up, but she winced as her Aura flickered and she fell to one knee from the pain. She wheezed, her lungs greedily sucking air. That hit definitely cracked a rib or two, and Yang was left wondering just how the minotaur managed to get a second wind, nevermind one that made it so it hit even harder. She looked up and saw Weiss and Ruby zipping around the bull like before, but she could tell it was taking much more effort now. Neither could stay still for long due to the beast's hammer swinging around, denying space and keeping both of them away, and worst of all, unlike before, where attacking its skin or breaking its armor managed to stun it for a moment, now it was almost impossible as it seemed to be brushing off any attack as if were sticks and stones thrown at it rather than high-caliber sniper ammunition and Schnee-quality dust.

It was clear neither could keep up such high agility for long though, as Weiss was visibly sweating with effort while Ruby was knocked to the ground by the minotaur using the butt of its hammer in a surprisingly human way, using both hands to shove it into Ruby's face and have her on the ground. Weiss moved to help her teammate, but the bull read her like a book, already swinging the hammer and striking her directly, sending her towards Blake, her Aura shattering as it absorbed the impact. The beast snorted and moved to finish Ruby off, who still hadn't recovered, and Yang moved

Her Semblance activated, hair igniting as flames surround her body and her eyes turned from their usual lilac to red like her mother's, helping her push through the pain and get closer and closer to the beast. The world felt like it was in slow-motion as she approached the minotaur, who was reaching for Ruby with its right hand, right as her sister defiantly aimed Crescent Rose at its head. Even still, Yang knew it wouldn't be enough, nothing she did would. Even if her punch managed to somehow blow the thing's arm off, what then? Her Aura would surely break after that, and with everyone but Ruby down for the count, the bull would probably kill them all. If only she had been stronger, faster, better then maybe they wouldn't be in this situation.

In the midst of her thoughts, a voice rang out in Yang's head, sounding familiar in the way a mother's voice would be to a child, and yet different, as if something was wrong with her or she was far, far away.

Power....

I need...more...power!

Yang screamed, as she felt her right arm overflowing with her Semblance's power, close, so close to the minotaur, but she was helpless as it grabbed Ruby, her sister letting out a gasp of pain as the beast constricted her in its grip. She felt her hand grab something and she squeezed automatically, surprised when she heard the bull roar in pain. Her arm hurt so much, but she pushed past it and looked at the beast's right arm, and gasped.

Extended from her own right arm, was a huge, glowing golden limb, looking like a cross between a dragon and a bear's arm, with sharp reptilian claws and scales accompanied by bulging muscles and ethereal fur. Underneath its hand was the minotaur's crushed limb, the formerly impenetrable white armor reduced to pieces, some piercing its red skin as blood now flowed freely. The beast roared again, trying to pull its arm free but Yang's was stronger, and she pulled back before thinking, a horrible fleshy sound coming from its shoulder as she ripped the arm off entirely. The monster screamed, a deafening roar as it clutched the stump of its arm. Yang would've gone and reared back for another punch, but another wave of pain had her dropping to her knees and dropping her right arm, the golden limb coming from it disappearing.

She looked up to see Ruby had picked up Crescent Rose again and swung it at it's other arm. Yang noticed a red aura pulsing through the scythe blade as it carved out a chunk of the bull's left arm, causing it to retreat further. Yang looked at her sister and thought she was glowing, as a red glow enveloped her, similar to her Aura but different. Her eyes were occasionally flashing, silver lights, stunning the bull as she moved to finish it off. The minotaur seemed to be panicking, but in one swift, ruthless motion, Crescent Rose flashed, and its head rolled on the ground in front of Yang, as its now lifeless body crashed to the ground.

Ruby quickly crashed after that, her body going limp in exhaustion and Penny, having recovered, rushed over to hold her. Yang herself felt heavy, her limbs numb as she slumped over, holding her arm, closing her eyes, falling into the ocean of unconsciousness, the last thing she sees being Weiss and Blake rushing over to her.

Chapter Text

Taiyang stood in his kitchen, doing typical home-alone househusband things, like washing the dishes, feeding the dog, walking the dog, obscene amounts of paperwork, all of that. The monotony of the last few days without his girls was starting to get to him, and to be honest, he would've liked for something interesting to happen. However, interesting, as Tai quickly remembered, didn't always mean good news, so maybe a little monotony would be fine.

One of the plates shattered on the ground. Tai looked down, wondering how it could've fallen, but then he looked at his hand shaking uncontrollably. His breathing quickened, and he grabbed his hand with the other to make it stop. It didn't, and Tai knew why. He desperately wanted to deny it, lie to himself, say that it was a false alarm, but he knew he couldn't. He rushed out the door, getting inside his car and speeding off towards the Bullhead docks in Patch. Even if it was night time, there were still airships available and hoped he didn't miss it. He couldn't miss it. After all, if he could sense Yang and Ruby's demonic energy...

Then that meant something happened that awakened it. And he would die before he lost his girls.

Qrow didn't know how long he had been sitting by the campfire. One minute he was busy preparing the meat he hunted earlier for eating, and the next his back was to a tree, his flask in one of his hands as the other twitched. His eyes were always drawn to fire for some reason. It felt calming, and helped him center himself, or at least Go Away in a way which wouldn't end in massive collateral damage. His hand twitched again, and he held his flask tighter, taking in a deep breath, focusing again on the fire. His throat felt dry, his skin itchy as he felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise. He felt a stinging pain in his hand. He looked down and saw that he crushed his metal flask into bits, the pieces piercing his skin and the alcohol flowing through his hand.

No, no, no nonono it can't be happening now whynow?.

His pupils dilated as he felt feathers grow on his arms. He quickly got up, kicking dust at the campfire to extinguish it, grabbing Harbinger before frantically shifting into a crow, flapping his wings as fast as possible. He can't be too far from Vale, he couldn't be. He can't let it happen again. Not after Raven. He didn't know what he'd do with himself if what happened with her happened with Yang or Ruby, so flew, breaching the treeline and reaching the night sky, the shattered moon hanging ominously in the air.

Weiss had never been in a hospital before. At least, in the traditional sense of 'someone I care about got hurt/I got hurt bad'. Since Father always took her and Whitley to the charities funded by the SDC, that meant being in a lot of hospitals, but always feeling out of place, undeserving, even. After all, it was all an act to drum up support for the SDC and for the average person to think that Jacques Schnee wasn't the giant manipulative bastard that he was, so, like most things, Weiss never really counted it as part of her experiences.

With this experience, however, she decided that being in a hospital waiting room sucked. Not because the room was poorly designed or anything, in fact the seats were comfortable. No, it was the wait itself. It had been an hour since she and Blake got here along with that monkey faunus and his team (Sun, his name was Sun), three of which had been also taken by the doctors alon with Blake, leaving her with the only other fairly uninjured people here, which was Penny and Neptune. None of them talked, considering the atmosphere was so charged with tension Weiss could've mistaken it for being back in Atlas with Father, so they all waited.

Weiss didn't know what was worse, the uncertainty of how her team was or the waiting. Her foot tapped against the floor as she tried to show the picture of calm, but her attempts were frustratingly futile as the nervous energy in Weiss' body leaked out. Neptune was looking at her but whenever she brought her gaze to him he suddenly grew an appreciation of the floor. Not that Weiss could blame him, she wasn't called Ice Queen at Beacon for nothing.

Even if she resented it, and found the title inaccurate and insulting, she could admit that her glare was Goodwitch levels of icy. That didn't mean she was all stern and cold like that all the time, she was capable of cutting loose! Weiss mentally shook her head at that and brought her attention back to the present, her eyes now roaming all across the room as she submitted to her boredom. She saw Penny sitting still, but Weiss could spot that the girl was trying to hide her nervousness just like the heiress was, her fingers frantically drumming over her lap. Neptune didn't bother to hide his worry, his foot bouncing energetically while he fidgeted with his jacket.

None of them seemed willing to speak, and neither was Weiss, considering her own nerves were shot. At first it was from chasing Yang and preventing her from running down any poor civilian caught in the blonde's path, and then from fighting that, thing at the docks. When Yang had been knocked away by the beast and Weiss saw her Aura flicker, she was worried, but when Yang just passed out after tearing out the bull's arm, she feared the worst. Even more when Ruby also collapsed upon killing the minotaur, so much so that she didn't even question the events until now.

Just how had Yang manifested that golden arm? A new aspect of her Semblance? It wasn't unheard of for Semblances to evolve in the middle of combat, even if the evolution didn't make much sense, such as Weiss' glyphs and her also being able to summon, even if progress was slow on that front. That still didn't explain Ruby's own boost of power, being able to slice and hack apart the previously impervious armor of the minotaur, especially so once it had that purple aura, which brought her to her third, and probably most important question.

What in Dust's name was that?

It can't have been a Grimm, despite the fact it had white armor like most Grimm, the red skin quickly showed it wasn't one of Remnant's vile scourge of dark. But if not a Grimm, then what? Some kind of bull mutated by dust? It wasn't unheard of for animals living near unstable Dust to be negatively affected by it, but not to that extent. The question ate away at Weiss' mind, helping her forget her present worries by focusing on less present but still concerning ones, as she tried to rationalize an excuse for the monster's existence. A new Grimm variant was all she could come up with, and yet still unsatisfactory. Grimm didn't use weapons, not like how the minotaur used that hammer, and they certainly didn't get a purple aura that made them significantly harder to kill.

Her inner investigation was broken as the door to the waiting room opened. Weiss immediately stood up, expecting the nurses, but instead Team JNPR filled the room, worried looks upon their faces. Weiss remembered how they had messaged their sister team about their situation before quickly running to the hospital, which must've left them all worried. Jaune was the first to break the silence.

"Where's everybody?"

"Yang, Ruby and Blake are being treated by the doctors right now," Weiss responded, frowning as she saw Jaune and Pyrrha grimace.

"What happened?" Ren asked, for once not being forced to wrangle his partner as Nora looked just as worried as the rest of her team.

Weiss, along with Neptune and Penny after they introduced themselves, told the tale to JNPR about the fight in the docks, Neptune and Penny filling in the blanks Weiss had, such as how Blake's plan got them into the mess in the first place. Then, came the part with the bull.

"It was unnatural," Weiss said, her breath hitching as she remembered the sheer terror she felt upon seeing the beast open its sealed mouth and roar, her bones shaking with fear.

"You got that right," Neptune added, before looking at JNPR. "I really doubt that thing was a Grimm with how smart it seemed to be, but I don't know what else to call it. It's like nothing I've seen."

"I am inclined to agree," Penny said, looking less haunted than Weiss or Neptune, more perplexed if anything. "Floating Array should've been able to at the very least put a chink in its armor, along with being very painful, but once it gained that purple aura it seemed impervious to pain." She looked like a scientist, Weiss noted, curious at how she had been nearly powerless rather than horrified. Maybe she was bottling it in? It wasn't the healthiest of responses, but Weiss would be a hypocrite if she said she knew better, so she kept it to herself.

"Well, we are still in training," Jaune said, his voice cutting through her thoughts. "There's still lots to see and four more years of training, so it isn't a big surprise you were outmatched by it."

"Perhaps it really is just a new type of Grimm. They are known to evolve with age," Ren added to his leader's comment, but Weiss shook her head.

"I think we would have heard of by now if Grimm were wielding weapons or had a skin and fur color other than black" Pyrrha said, taking the words out of Weiss' mouth as Yang would say.

"I think maybe we should drop it for now," Weiss said, looking to the side bashfully as her eyes met Pyrrha's. "This conversation's going in circles and speculation will lead us to nowhere." She looked at Jaune and Ren, who nodded in understanding. She really didn't want to talk about it right now any more than necessary. Unpacking all that she felt and is still feeling after fighting, that thing wasn't something she was ready for, if ever.

The doors opened again but this time Sun and Blake came through, both looking rough but patched up, with Sun having more bandages than usual and Blake having a few around her leg and arms. Neptune immediately stood up and crushed Sun in a bear hug to rival Nora's and Yang's

"Sun!"

"Neptune...can't...breathe...crushing...me," Sun wheezed out, frantically tapping his friend's back to signal his distress. Neptune quickly let go and looked over his teammate's shoulder curiously.

"Where's Sage and Scarlet?" Neptune asked.

"They're waiting outside and sent me in to pick you up from the daycare," Sun replied, earning a shove from Neptune as the two laughed. Blake looked fondly at them, but with guilt in her eyes, Weiss noted, as Neptune made sure his leader was alright while Sun waved him off.

"Hey, you go on and tell Sage and Scarlet I'm coming, I gotta do something first," Sun said, Neptune giving him a concerned look, but the monkey faunus insisted and so he relented, leaving the room after waving goodbye to everyone. Sun turned around to face Blake, who nervously looked to the side. She cringed when she heard him walk closer but he just tapped her shoulder and smiled.

"Hey, good on you for proving them wrong," Sun said, Blake turning to face him.

"Y-you aren't mad at me?" Blake asked, her now uncovered ears folding over as she looked ready to bolt.

"Why would why? Sure me and the boys got a bit banged up but we came out fine. Plus, we foiled the Fang's little heist, so what's there to be mad about?" Sun replied.

"Still-" Blake began, but Sun cut her off and waved his hand.

"Don't worry about none of that. It wasn't like you forced us to come with you, we wanted to help. You're better than you think you are Blake."

Light pink dusted Blake's cheeks as she looked away, this time in embarrassment instead of guilt, and mumbled out a 'thanks', Sun laughing at how bashfully she was acting. "Well, gotta go. See you guys when classes start!" Sun said, walking away and leaving an embarrassed Blake and a very confused JNPR, Weiss and Penny.

"What does he mean by that? Don't tell me that-" Weiss quickly cut herself off, not trusting her filter to not let slip by words Weiss would've happily used mere days ago. "Don't tell me he's going to be at Beacon?"

"They're a team from Haven Academy so yeah. Got a problem Weiss?" Blake said, a little defensively which surprised Weiss, who quickly looked away.

"Not at all," Weiss said, and she hated how it sounded so forced. Like it took her physical effort to say nothing was wrong with a faunus coming to Beacon. She hated it. She hated that her mind conjured up all sorts of ways to explain why it was bad for her to be so close to a faunus, especially one she slept with. It made her feel sick, and it took all of Weiss' concentration to not let that show. She looked at Blake. Blake looked at her, then looked away before Weiss could. Damn it. Things were going to be tense for a few days, and Weiss knew it would be mainly her fault.

Weiss heard the alert sound of somebody's scroll and Penny gasp. The ginger quickly got up and turned to them. "I am really sorry, I would love to stay but I must go, my father is worried sick about me." And just like that she ran off, literally, running past the doors and outside the hospital. Everyone looked at her with an eyebrow raised, before Nora chipped in.

"Who was she again?"

"Nora, that was-wait I actually don't know either," Ren replied, looking to Weiss and Blake for context.

"She's a friend of Ruby's, really similar to her in fact. Lack of social skills and all." Weiss said, Jaune immediately getting it, being friends with Ruby while the other members of JNPR took a bit longer to understand.

Another minute passed, to Weiss being an eternity, but finally, the doctor walked through the door. He looked at Blake, Weiss and JNPR and nodded, all of whom immediately stood up.

"How are they sir?" Jaune asked, beating Weiss to the punch. The doctor grimaced slightly, sighing before looking at his clipboard and back to them.

"Well, it's hard to say really...do any of you know the sister's parents?"

Parents? Weiss wasn't sure why they'd be needed here. Was it that bad? If so then what could they do? Yang and Ruby weren't exactly cagey about their own life, but they weren't open to sharing either. All she knew was that they lived on Patch and had an uncle and a father, but no mother. The reason why, again, wasn't divulged but with how Ruby gushed about how her mom was a great Huntress, she could take a guess at what happened.

"We do not sir," Weiss replied, "We've only been a team for a few months, so all we know is that their father lives on Patch and is a retired huntsman."

"Well, guess I gotta break the news then," The doctor said, looking at all the teenagers in the room with worried looks. "Miss Xiao Long has a few fractured ribs and Miss Rose seems to have a concussion. Now, don't worry, both of them will live, their Auras have recovered and already begun accelerating the healing process."

"Then what's the holdup?" Blake asked, desperate to see her team. The doctor continued.

"Nothing, really. Just that the two of them are still out cold, which is par for the course. The two of them had a stressful night and their bodies are probably taking the opportunity to rest." He turned back around to the door, still facing JNPR, Weiss and Blake. "You can go see them, of course, but don't take too long. I don't want Headmaster Ozpin calling me and asking why six of his students are still unaccounted for."

The doctor let them be and Jaune turned to Weiss and Blake. "You guys go on and see them. You're a team, and I think you'll need it if half the stuff you told us happened. We can go and take one of the nightly Bullheads to go to Beacon."

"Just try not to miss one, they only pass every hour," Pyrrha added, Weiss and Blake nodding at her, Weiss slightly flushed at Pyrrha's concern. JNPR quickly left after that, leaving Weiss and Blake to go see the other half of their team.

Weiss looked over at Blake, grimacing at all the bandages she had over her limbs. She really wanted to make sure she was alright, but on the other hand she didn't know how the girl would take it. She wasn't as close to Blake like Yang was, and in this instance she desperately wanted to know what was going on in Belladonna's head. She needed to know, what if she was planning to kindap-

Weiss angrily buried the intrusive thought, frustration boiling as her treacherous mind again labeled Blake as one of them, like it always did with any faunus. And if it wasn't that, it'd label it as a criminal just waiting for the opportunity to join the Fang, full of murderers and terrorists. She shook her head of the hateful things her mind conjured up, entering the room Yang and Ruby were at with Blake.

The two sisters were in beds next to each other, with a single nurse attending to the both of them, who looked up at Weiss and Blake with a friendly but tired smile.

"Don't worry about visiting schedules, the two of them will be transferred to Beacon's infirmary as soon we are sure they are stable."

Weiss looked at the nurse mildly surprised, who just laughed a bit and waved off Weiss' unspoken comment.

"I've been a nurse for a few years kids, I know when someone's worried about visiting hours."

The nurse quickly left to give the two of them some privacy, as Blake sat in front of Ruby and Weiss in front of Yang. Totally not because Weiss didn't want to talk to Blake or anything, or because she was worried about that dolt Yang. She moved her seat to be next to the blonde, her chest rising and falling in time with her slow breaths. Weiss brushed some hair out of Yang's face, showing her closed eyes and surprisingly calm expression. Weiss sighed, glancing at Blake from the corner of her eyes mumbling something to an unconscious Ruby, who had a similar expression to her sister.

Weiss didn't know how long she sat there, just looking at Yang and Ruby's sleeping forms, occasionally glancing at Blake, who stopped mumbling to their team leader but looked like the equivalent of a miserable wet ally cat. Especially since her faunus ears were drooping down like a cat's, her face hidden by her hair. Weiss desperately wanted to speak to Blake, to make her feel better and assure the girl none of this was her fault, but her limbs would not move. What could she say that would make Blake better? No, better leave that to people like Ruby, Pyrrha or Yang, not spoiled, rich, racist Weiss. Eventually, the nurse from before came to tell them that they had to leave. Weiss reluctantly left, not before squeezing Yang's hand, silently walking with Blake to the nearest airship station. A scroll message from Jaune showed that they got to Beacon alright, and that if they hurried they could catch the next one.

Weiss looked at Blake again, looking away when the cat faunus looked back. Her body was tense and her nerves were shot, not just because of the fight at the docks, the awkward atmosphere with Blake and half her team being out cold, but because of something she deeply despised. She hated herself for feeling like this around Blake, her team mate and yet her body acted as if she was an enemy. She absolutely hated it, and Weiss desperately wanted to talk with someone, anyone about this, but who would? She wasn't all that close to JNPR despite her wishes, and she doubted Pyrrha would grace Weiss with the time to listen to her vent in such an undignified manner. She wished Yang was awake, or Ruby, or that Winter were here.

Weiss was on the verge of a breakdown, but she refused to give in until they were in the (relative) safety of her room, with her team mate (is she really?) and she could cry without anyone to witness such un-Schnee like behavior. Weiss looked up at the shattered moon hanging in the night sky, giving light to the streets of Vale along with the multiple street lamps, and yet all Weiss felt was yearning and a need to prove herself. Not to Father, Winter, the population of Remnant, SDC investors or the faunus.

To prove herself a good person, capable of bringing the change she wanted. And yet, how could she, with such disgusting thoughts about faunus clawing at the back of her mind? Weiss didn't know, and she wished that somebody would give her an answer.

Chapter Text

When Yang woke up she expected light. Why not? After all, hospitals had those bright white lights on the ceiling that blinded you when you looked at them. But light was not what Yang saw. She saw an inky blackness that covered her vision and the sensation that she was floating. She tried to move, and saw that she had Ember Celica on her left arm like normal, along with her usual attire. That wasn't what had her freaked out however. What freaked her out was her right arm. A reptilian claw with gold and grey scales replaced her hand, while her fore arm had yellow bear fur all over it. The space not taken by scales or fur was instead taken by skin which glowed an eerie blue tinge. For some reason, Yang shook her arm as if that would change anything, but the freaky arm stayed like that, so she slumped in defeat.

Yang looked over the freaky arm one more time and shook her head, deciding to chalk it up to weird dream nonsense. She was in a dream, right? She couldn't be dead, could she? Because if this was Hell then it was hell of a lot more boring than she thought. Suddenly she felt an increasing warmth behind her, and turning around, saw flames. An entire encampment alight with fire hungrily burning away at the wooden walls and the primitive tents, jumping towards the trees and spreading itself. Yang should've been scared or running in to save anyone caught in it, but she found that her limbs couldn't move, and her eyes fixated on the inferno, almost mesmerized. A section of the wall falling brought Yang back to her senses and that was when she noticed the figure in front of her.

At first she'd have pegged them as a person, but the horns upon their head and the slightly uncanny look made Yang think otherwise. They certainly looked humanoid, with a coat made of black feathers covering most of their body, with red, grey and silver scales taking the place of skin that were shown. There were spots of skin that glowed blue, much like Yang's right arm, the glow occasionally shifting to red like a party light. One of its arms had a sheath which contained a katana attached to it, which Yang felt drawn to for some reason. The legs had more scales and glowing skin but instead of ending with reptilian talons it had bird-like claws for feet. The head had the aforementioned horns with a face that while not ugly per say, definitely saw better days, with yellow eyes, rough skin and a mouth that looked to be set in a perpetual snarl. Finally, its chest was covered in much the same scales and light as the rest of it, along with what Yang would describe as "assets" that although not as big as hers were definitely impressive.

The figure walked out of the ruined camp like it was no biggie before stopping four meters in front of Yang, its yellow eyes looking straight at Yang's lilac orbs. It, or she, Yang guessed, considering its bust size, tilted her head curiously, turning slightly to look at the fire and then at Yang. They stared stared for a moment and then she nodded, and before Yang could ask her who she was or what was happening, she felt her knees grow weak as her head began to hurt, and a voice spoke through her mind.

"Tell me, child, what do you seek?"

"Wha...what do you mean?" Yang whimpered out, as the headache threatened to overwhelm her.

"You wished for power, did you not? Are you ready for the burdens such power will grant?"

Power? Yang thought, trying to fight the headache to form a coherent response. She supposed she did. When that bull monster was about to smash Ruby, Yang desperately wanted the strength to fight it, to kill it in order to protect her sister. The two of them got lucky, and Yang would not let chance decide the fate of her family, and leave it unfix able. So she looked up at the figure and practically growled.

"Yeah, I did. Are you gonna give it to me?"

"Are you sure? This is not a path taken lightly," the figure warned, shaking her head. Yang clenched her left arm into a fist, taking a deep breath before looking at the figure.

"Are you deaf? I said yes, so give me power, now," Yang growled, her eyes flashing red along with the glowing skin on her right arm. The figure seemed to sigh before she held a hand out, one claw touching Yang's forehead.

"Your choice is made. I can only hope you do not commit the mistakes I did, little dragon," Yang wondered at how the figure knew her Dad's nickname for her, but then her claw pressed deeper into her forehead.

And then the world turned white.

Ruby wasn't having fun. She was floating, surrounded by a black void. She guessed she was in a dream, since if this was Hell or any afterlife or whatever there would be people there to judge her or something, or more people, but she was lone, fidgeting and groaning in boredom. Wasn't the point of lucid dreaming that you could control how the dream went? But no matter how hard she thought of things like cookies, or being with Yang and her Dad and Uncle Tai, wait, Tai? She meant Uncle Qrow! Anyway, with them in their house on Patch having fun or with Jaune nerding out or lying on the grass with Penny, or just anyone to have something to do!

She flapped her arms to demonstrate her frustration, to who she didn't know, but like most of her efforts, it was for naught, only slightly changing her body's momentum. Suddenly, she saw a shape moving across her vision. Ruby frantically tried to follow it, but it was always out of sight, black feathers falling in front of her eyes. Wait, feathers? Ruby blinked, and suddenly she was in the cliffs near her house in Patch, the forest of the island surrounding her on one side and the drop-off from the cliffs in the other.

However, her mom's memorial plaque was missing. Ruby's eyes bulged at the sight. In its place, was a pure black abyss that filled Ruby with dread, making her back away. She felt her back bumped into something and turned around, involuntarily gasping.

At first she thought it was man, but upon closer look it was clearly not human nor faunus, even if it was humanoid. He had a cloak made of black, sharp feathers, forming a hood which obscured most of his head. The cloak ended at the shoulders, the left one having a crow's skull over it as a pauldron, showing gray and red scales over his arms, his forearms having some feathers on the front along with orange spiral patterns all across the skin. His legs were digitigrade, transitioning from scale to skin as they ended in bird like claws. Ruby couldn't see his face, but that changed when he tilted his head up, showing his yellow eyes and mouth set in a snarl, horns flowing downwards from his temple. It all felt familiar to Ruby somehow, as if she had seen him before.

The man/demon/bird thing's eyes seemed to widen at seeing Ruby, and he reached a clawed hand out, cupping Ruby's cheek. Ruby strangely didn't feel scared at all by the act, instead she felt comforted as a familiar sensation washed over her body. The man retracted its hand, not before patting Ruby on the head as if she was just a child (she was fifteen!) which made Ruby pout. He seemed to chuckle, but as he gazed at the hole that took her Mom's plaque his demeanor shifted, taking a much tenser stance with stiff shoulders.

Ruby tilted her head, confused, but the demon put his hand on her shoulder and looked at her as if asking something. Ruby looked at the abyss and looked back at the demon, who nodded. She didn't know why, but she walked towards the edge, looking down again at the pitch darkness in place of Mom's plaque, feeling mounting dread, but also, curiously, determination. She felt weirdly assured by the demon's presence, as if him being here would make all the bad stuff go away, and so she stared down at the object of her fear, looked back at the demon, who moved his head in affirmation, motioning her to go on.

Ruby took a deep breath, before stepping forward and dropping, the world fading into pure black.

Yang didn't know for how long she was seeing white, only that it felt like an eternity before she could blink the blindness out of her eyes. She was standing in a wide courtyard of what seemed to be the ruins of a castle, with vines growing over the architecture and pieces of the wall in front of her lying in the grass. The thing that caught her attention, however, was the floating katana in front of her. It was split into three shards, the one with the hilt being the longest one, with two other sections of the blade floating close and yet not uniting with the rest of the body.

For some reason, Yang felt sad at seeing the sword. She felt a sense of anguish, like she lost a part of herself and thus is crying out in pain for whatever she lost to come back. Yang reached out, she didn't know why, but she felt like comforting the sword somehow, either that or it was simple curiosity moving her right hand. Once her hand grasped the hilt however, she felt another flash of pain burn through her right arm, like a thousand thorns lashed across her skin, ripping apart the tissue. Yang screamed, but bit down on the urge to let go. For some reason, she felt that this was part of what the figure from before said, a test maybe, to see if she was actually worth it.

Yang roared again, grabbing the hilt with her other hand. The pain spread to her left arm, but it lessened in her right, which helped her concentrate slightly. She still fell to her knees however, feeling her arms grow weak as the feeling of thorns slashing her skin was joined by that of daggers digging straight through and into her bones, but still she pressed on, her hair igniting as her eyes turned blood-red. Yang roared, clutching the hilt tighter in stubborn determination even as the pain threatened to overwhelm her entirely.

Suddenly, the pain disappeared entirely, and Yang saw how the shards of the sword turned into blue specters, rising into the sky and out of Yang's grasp. The three pieces of the katana then flew away, leaving only a single small piece the size of a claw that floated down towards Yang. Yang moved her arms a bit to regain feeling with her limbs before reaching out with her hands to cup the shard. The claw dissolved in Yang's grasp, flowing into her skin like water, seeping into her very being, soothing Yang's exhaustion and hurt from grabbing the sword.

Yang rubbed the wrist of her freaky right arm, feeling the power of the claw-shaped shard spread throughout her, and leave one word in her mind.

Fortuna

She turned around, facing the figure once again, who looked to be slightly proud at Yang's determination, nodding at her as she recuperated from the ordeal. The figure spoke again, mouth moving slightly and yet the words were clear in Yang's head.

"Only one last trial for you to go through," the figure said, making Yang tilt her head in confusion.

"One more?" she asked, and it was all the words she got out before she felt a powerful force push her back, making her close her eyes. And once she opened them again, it was to pure agony in her right arm.

Ruby didn't know how long she was falling, feeling the wind rushing past her ears and her cloak fluttering behind her with only the blackness of the hole being present in her vision, but soon enough, it opened up into a wide sky, with her falling right onto a tall, ancient tower overlooking a small city in ruins. She was about to pull out Crescent Rose and use the recoil to slow her fall, but it was unneeded as the man from before swooped in and grabbed her, his cloak fully unfolded to reveal massive crow's wings, gently setting her down on the tower's roof.

Ruby looked at the man, nodding in thanks who only motioned his head towards her front in response. Ruby turned towards the direction and saw a shadowy figure standing there, a grey cloak draped over them and two silver sickles clutched in their hands. She felt a hand clasp her shoulder and looked back to see the man nudging her towards her figure. His other hand was making a punching gesture.

"Do you...want me to fight them?" Ruby asked, and the man nodded encouragingly. She reached for Crescent Rose, mecha-shifting to its scythe form as she analyzed the figure. The shadow didn't move their head up, but they did change into a low stance, one sickle held in front of them ready to block while the other was held back to their side. The figure suddenly dashed forward, grey cloak billowing behind them as they moved towards Ruby. Ruby waited until the last moment before she used her Semblance to move away, the figure missing their strike and leaving them open. In a burst of petals, Ruby was there, stabbing with the spearhead on her scythe before slashing, the strike aimed at the figure's head.

The figure moved both sickles up, clashing with Ruby's scythe before they redirected the blow to the side, pulling Ruby with them, kicking her in the stomach. Ruby tried to bring her scythe up to block but the figure was inside her guard and sent a series of devastating slashes into her chest. Ruby managed to deflect one sickle with the haft of her weapon, giving her time to use her Semblance and fly away, leaving cut rose petals behind. She moved a few meters away from the figure, planting her scythe on the ground and shooting at it.

The figure ran towards Ruby, dodging or blocking most of her shots. One bullet did manage to hit the figure in the leg, making them stumble. Ruby immediately capitalized, shooting them three more times before she used her Semblance again. While the figure was busy blocking the additional shots, it left her open for Ruby to dash past her in a trail of petals before exiting her Semblance, Ruby behind them and her scythe blade right over their stomach. The figure didn't move, and as Ruby noticed, they were looking at her, the grey hood of their cloak now pulled back. The figure's face was made of pure black like the rest of their body, but Ruby noticed it had short hair covering one side of its face, while the other revealed one, singular silver eye.

Ruby gasped, while the figure nodded proudly at Ruby, slowly unraveling as the strands that made it up drifted away, leaving two sickles clattering on the ground and a grey cloak sent flying by the wind.

...Mom? Ruby thought, but before she could feel any of the complicated bundle of emotions she had for Mom, the man clasped her on the shoulder again. She looked at him, who seemed to be on the verge of tears. Ruby didn't know why, but she hugged the man, who at first didn't return it, probably because of how sudden it was, but he quickly put an arm over her and another on her head, making Ruby pout again.

They separated from the hug and the man pointed to something behind Ruby. She turned and saw another figure, but this one made of glowing gold and hunched over in pain, looking eerily similar to Yang. Ruby looked at the man and he nodded, moving his mouth to speak.

"The two of you must be strong together. Go. Help her."

Ruby nodded, but before she could move, she felt her vision swim. The world was spinning and she closed her eyes, trying to dull out the dizziness. She found herself in front of Yang's hunched over form, but as she blinked she saw her sister was not glowing anymore, nor where they on-top of the tower. No, they were in white hospital beds and Yang had her back arched screaming in pain as she clutched her right arm. Ruby immediately sat up, ignoring everything in favor of helping her sister.

Her eyes hurt but she didn't care. Yang was in pain and she needed help, so Ruby hopped off the bed and dashed towards Yang's, not hearing the cries of anyone present. She reached the bed, but before she could do anything, she felt the pain in her eyes flare up, and the world flashed silver, ending the screams, and Ruby collapsed soon after.

Chapter Text

Penny walked into the Atlas embassy with no issue, the guards already recognizing her and letting her in. White walls, similar to that of the hospital were they not outlined with blue, greeted her as she moved past the front desk and towards the elevator. She lacked her usual cheery and friendly disposition to all the employees in the building, which most found odd but were glad that they wouldn't be bothered at such a late hour.

Penny however, was far from glad. Father and General Ironwood had called her ever since they heard about incident at the docks, worried sick about her condition. Penny understood perfectly, but she still found herself nervous about facing the General and Father after not only getting into trouble but coming home late. Granted, both were to help her new friends but she wasn't sure if General Ironwood would approve of putting herself in such a risk, especially against a foe such as that bull monster.

It intrigued her, in a way a scientist might be intrigued by an anomaly in the laboratory. That would be an apt word for the creature, an anomaly. It acted with more intelligence than that displayed by common Grimm, wielding a weapon along with targeting specific people instead of everyone present at the docks, along with its much sturdier armor, hide, and that purple aura it obtained after they had seemingly finished it off.

But despite the difficulties in killing it, it was still a beast in the end, one that while it might have bested her in the docks, she could take the lessons learned here and apply them next time fighting it. Therefore, what really had her interested was the end of that fight.

Ruby Rose. An average huntress-in-training to most, but her early admittance into Beacon implied advanced skills that would mark her as a prodigy. And apparently, the ability to supercharge her Aura and cut a thought to be impervious foe in half with one swing. At least, that was Penny's working theory for now, considering she lacked both information and a conscious Ruby to explain what she did exactly. Penny would've liked to spend more time with her, both to learn the specifics of her ability and because she was her first friend in Vale, the giddy feelings Penny got from thinking about that helped to lessen her nerves a little.

The elevator doors opened and Penny took a deep breath before exiting and walking down the hallway to the General's office. She found the motion calming, even if she didn't have a respiratory system that would clam up from her anxiety like most people. Penny knocked on the white door with the General's nameplate, waiting for approximately 2.345 seconds before she heard someone inside say 'Come in'.

Penny opened the door and walked inside the small office. The General sat behind a sparsely decorated wooden desk, stacks of paperwork laid on the table which were quickly put to the side. Father was sitting in his mechanical chair next to the chair, greeting Penny with a warm smile that contrasted the spartan and stiff coldness of the room. Penny quickly saluted to General Ironwood, even if it was unnecessary.

"Penny. Glad you could join us." Ironwood said briskly. Father clearly wanted to say something as well, but a look from the General told him to wait for now, and thus Father quickly exited to wait outside, despite his reluctant look. "Could you explain the incident in detail and why you refused to return initially as we said?"

"Of course," Penny replied. "Initially I was using my allotted free time to explore Vale like yesterday per your's and Father's recommendations, when I met a friend I made the day before. She enlisted my help in looking for one of her teammates, when in our search we stumbled upon the White Fang burglarizing the docks. Since innocents were in danger, we had stepped in to minimize the damage and managed to successfully neutralize the White Fang with the aid of my friend and her teammates."

"That can't be the whole story. The damage at the docks indicated of something larger than just a mere skirmish, and no White Fang were apprehended other than a few grunts."

"That is correct, sir. After we had apprehended the White Fang, we were attacked by a Grimm." Ironwood raised an eyebrow.

"One single Grimm did all of that?" The General was clearly at the very least incredulous, but not disbelieving of Penny, considering her lack of a hiccup. "Was it an Alpha or an Elder Grimm even?"

"My apologies, I used Grimm for it was the closest word that could match the being I fought at the docks." Penny saw Ironwood's stance noticeably shift, his back less straight along with him looking much more attentive than usual.

"Elaborate," He said sternly, and Penny obliged.

"While it had bone-white armor like all Grimm, the flesh covering it was a bright red instead of a Grimm's black fur or hide. Its form also did not match any of the ones in my records, having taken the shape of a two-legged bull monster along with carrying a massive war hammer. Furthermore, once we had seemingly killed it, it rose back up and gained a purple aura which made it seemingly impervious to damage until we managed to put it down for good."

The General looked worried, a frown now decorating his face, but his eyes twinkled with something Penny couldn't identify. Before she could dedicate resources to her processors to figure it out, Ironwood spoke again.

"But you did manage to kill it in the end, yes?" He asked.

Penny didn't understand the point of the question, if they didn't kill it then either she would not be here or there would be a monster rampaging throughout Vale, but she made to answer.

"Correct, my friend from before, Ruby Rose, cut it in half with the help of what I believe to be her Semblance." That twinkle in his eyes again, just as brief as before as he leaned back into his chair, his metallic hand drumming against the desk, seemingly lost in thought. Penny stood slightly anxious, unsure of what was going on in the General's head as he hummed quietly.

"You've given me a lot to think about tonight Penny," Ironwood said finally, confusing Penny in that it was not what she expected him to say at all. He continued. "While originally both me and your father were upset at your breaking of protocol, upon listening to your story I've changed my mind on your original punishment." Penny gulped as she waited for the General to announce his decision.

"While your actions were reckless, instead of jumping in you should've called me or Vale authorities, I must admit that you have given me valuable information today. This friend of yours seems to be a good influence on you. In fact, I think it'd be for the best if you keep, 'hanging out' as they say, with her. What did you say her name was again?"

Penny would've jumped for joy were it not for the General's question, which she answered quickly before silently squealing to herself. This was practically the best case scenario for her! She managed to help people and still be able to hang out with her friend! She made to leave in order to talk with Father, but remembered that Ironwood still had not granted her permission to exit. He waved her off before she could ask, which Penny found odd but she ignored in favor of hugging her Father and telling him all about her day.

Ironwood, however, remained in his office, now looking over the shutters and windows towards Vale, and specifically, Beacon.

"Ruby Rose...Just what kind of prodigy do you have now, Ozpin?"

If it were any other situation, Taiyang would've found it mildly funny how it was twice now that he was rushing to Beacon because of his girls getting themselves into trouble. As it stood, he found it more mortifying than anything, consider the nature of the trouble they got themselves into this time. He was much more calm than he was back at Patch, especially after Ozpin called him to let him know they'd been moved from a hospital to Beacon's infirmary.

He tried to stay calm as he found himself pacing on the Bullhead docks waiting for Ozpin. Considering it was what Qrow would call 'ass 'o' clock' in the morning, and him technically not being Beacon staff, he had to wait for one of the teachers to come and let him in. His fingers twitched erratically, trying to expel some of his nervous energy while he did his best to prevent his muscles from getting too tight and giving him a cramp. Port came in, none of his usual bluster present at the moment as he sensed the mood Taiyang was in.

The two of them walked in silence through Beacon's hallways, Tai because he was wound up like a coiled spring and Port for fear of setting off the blond man's mood. After what felt like an eternity walking to Tai, they finally arrived at the infirmary entrance, Ozpin waiting for him with a mug of cocoa in his hand and a tired look in his eyes. Port excused himself quickly, leaving the two standing in front of the door.

"How are they?" Tai asked, his throat hoarse and tone strained.

"Perhaps its better if you see them first," Ozpin started, but Tai cut him off.

"Don't play games with me Oz, I want to know. How are they?"

"Well, initially, Miss Xiao Long had some damage inflicted upon her rib cage while Miss Rose seemed to be concussed and suffered lacerations across her body, along with broken Auras, but it wasn't anything a day in bed wouldn't heal with Aura."

"You said initially Oz. What do you mean by that?" Tai asked, not liking the look on Ozpin's face.

"Well, after the sister's were transferred to Beacon's infirmary, Miss Xiao Long had some, complications, let's just say-"

"Ozpin," Tai said in a warning tone, hiding the immense worry behind it. "Don't tell me..."

"If the notes you, Qrow and Raven gave me line up correctly, then yes, it's exactly what you think it is."

Tai had to bite his lip in order to maintain his composure. He can't be losing it. Not here. Not now. He instead turned and opened the infirmary door, slowly, almost fearfully. Ozpin let him be this time, either because he told the man what he needed to know or because he knew he couldn't stop Taiyang. Whatever the reason, he didn't care, for all that mattered now were his girls.

The first thing he noticed was Yang and Ruby lying down on the same bed, the nurse having apparently decided it to be better for the sisters to rest together. That, or Ruby's grip was too strong, which was the more likely answer. However, what immediately caught his eye was Yang's right arm, making him grimace as the reality of the situation set in. Her entire forearm was covered in brown with yellow accented fur similar to that of a bear, accompanied by patches of golden scales and skin that pulsed with a blue glow. Her hand was in a similar state, now being a dragon-like claw with much of the same scales that now accented the gold with grey and red.

It hung limply by her side, almost as if the bones had been broken, which Tai knew they had to be in order to form the new limb. Ozpin probably didn't have them put a cast on her yet, either because the process had just finished or because he thought better to wait until the experts were in. So, Taiyang or Qrow. Other than that, Ruby was curled up over Yang, almost protectively in a way which Tai would've found cute were this any other situation. He walked over to the bed, sitting on the edge and putting a hand on Ruby's and then Yang's head, caressing them affectionately with a hint of melancholy.

He had really been hoping for the two of them to at least be able to spend their days at Beacon in relative peace, much like he did, but it seemed fate had other plans. The awakening had to come, sooner or later, but as it inevitable as he knew it was Tai couldn't help but feel guilt. Guilt over not being enough, that he wasn't there with them where the process could've been less painful and scarring and so much more, but he did his best to push it away.

There was nothing to be done now. All he could do was what he has always done, be there for the two of them and guide them along as best he can. He tucked a strand of hair on Yang's face behind her ear, her face calm in a way only people deep in unconsciousness could be. He looked back towards the door and found Ozpin looking at him, asking silently if they could put on a cast for Yang's arm. Tai nodded and made to leave as to not interrupt the process. Ozpin tried to stop him as he left, but Tai just sighed and looked at the headmaster with tired eyes.

"We'll talk later, Oz" Was all he said before leaving Oz in the infirmary's entrance, who looked at the retreating parent with eyes that recognized what the man was going through.

"If only we didn't have to talk at all..."

Chapter Text

Blake shifted around in her bed. She looked at the time on her scroll. 6:03 AM. She sighed and got up, silently walking to the bathroom as to not wake Weiss. She shut the door and turned on the light, meeting her amber orbs on the mirror. To put it in Yang terms, she looked like shit. Her black hair was frazzled and disheveled, her cat ears twitching erratically while her eyes had light bags under them, making her look like the face of exhaustion.

She leaned on the sink and tried to calm her nerves. Her stress was through the roof ever since the docks, first over getting Sun and his team in danger and then over Yang and Ruby ending up hurt by that bull thing (why did it remind her of him) and she hadn't been able to sleep well. It was a miracle she got any rest at all, but at this point she'd take it, however short it was.

Blake didn't know how long she stood there against the sink, but once she heard a crack from the bowl and looked down, her hands gripping the ceramic as if her life depended on it, she knew she spent enough time in the bathroom. She needed to move, burn off all the energy and adrenaline. As tired as her bones felt, her mind was running a mile a minute and she needed to calm down. She found herself outside her dorm now, walking down the hallways yet to be illuminated by the dawn's early light. Her frazzled nerves made it hard to think, but as soon as she stood outside a door painted a clinical white, she knew where she was.

The entrance to the infirmary would've been seen as welcoming to most, but to Blake it made the storm inside her worsen, her emotions acting up and making it even harder to process the things around her. She was frozen in place, unsure of what to do now. She should leave, go back to the dorm, to a place where she can't endanger her team with her stupid recklessness, but something compelled her to enter. She took a deep, calming breath, before putting a hand on the door and opening it slowly, peaking her head inside. The curtains were half drawn, covering some of the morning light as to not disturb the patients within. There wasn't anyone on the beds, all of them tidy and made. Except for one.

Yang and Ruby lied in the same bed, for what reason Blake didn't know, but their peaceful faces as they slept made Blake feel conflicting emotions. She was happy, overjoyed even, to find the two of them find and resting, but another part of her felt a crushing guilt. Guilt over leaving her team, guilt over being so reckless at the docks, guilt over not being able to help against that monster, it all threatened to overwhelm Blake. She took a calming breath as to not hyperventilate, and walked over to the sisters.

Ruby laid draped over Yang, hugging her sister tightly while the blond had one hand on her sister's hair, the other covered in a cast. Huh, that was weird, wasn't her arm fine back at the hospital? Before Blake could continue to pursue that line of thought, something caught her eye. Outside the window some black feathers drifting in the wind, one of them landing right in front of the glass. She would've gone to investigate, but someone put a hand on her shoulder and she froze.

Blake couldn't move, couldn't turn around to face the stranger. Something kept her in place, even if the grip on her was light. No, it was the overwhelming feeling of bloodlust and rage present in the air, that reminded her so much of him when he would come back (sword covered in blood) that made her tremble in fear. She distantly heard someone talking, but she couldn't process the words as she felt herself start to hyperventilate and-

She blinked, and found herself crouching down with her back to the wall, shoulders hunched and hands grabbing her arms. She looked up and saw two men she didn't recognize. One of them had a haggard look to him, with unkempt black hair that seemed to be starting to grey out, along with a messy, scraggly beard and eyes that spoke of several sleepless nights in a row. He had a folded up great sword strapped to his back and what looked to be faded claw and bite marks on his arms. The other one had blonde hair and looked to be scolding the first, but it seemed he was finishing by the time Blake stopped hyperventilating.

The blond man looked back at Blake, making her flinch unconsciously. He frowned, but more out of worry than anything, and spoke up.

"Heya kid. Blake, right?" Blake couldn't find her voice, so she hugged her knees and nodded, pink dusting her cheeks in embarrasment.

"You gave us quite the scare. Are you alright?" Blake nodded again, a little shakily this time, but the man didn't pry. "Sorry about Qrow, the old bird's just needing a bit of a cleanup is all." The other man snorted before leaving his place in the wall and walking up to Blake, slowly as to not startle her.

"Sorry about that kid," The other man said, who Blake assumed to be Qrow, in a raspy but kind tone contrasting his menacing appearance. "Didn't know who you were and I tend to be overprotective of my family."

Family? Did he mean Ruby and Yang? Come to think of it, he did look a bit similar to Ruby, mainly in the face structure and all. His name sounded familiar too, and now that she thought about it, she thought she also recognized the blond man.

"You're...Mister Xiao Long, Ruby and Yang's dad, right?" Blake thought Xiao Long glanced quickly at Qrow when she said 'dad', but it was so fast and his eyes were back on her she must've imagined it.

"Call me Tai, but yeah that's me, and the knucklehead over there as you can assume is Qrow," The man in question waved at his name being mentioned, much more friendly looking but still having a tired air around him.

"Right...Ruby always talked about how awesome and strong her Uncle Qrow is, how you always brought them gifts whenever you came back from a mission and that you taught her how to use the scythe."

"Yep" Qrow said, popping the 'p' much like Ruby and Yang. "That's me, cool Uncle Qrow showing up the girls' father," Tai shoved him lightly with his shoulder and Qrow laughed, bringing a smile to Blake's face, reminded of the way that Yang and Ruby would bicker and banter at times. Speaking of.

She stood up and looked back towards the sisters lying in bed, their sleep undisturbed by the presence of their family in the room. She noticed the cast on Yang's arm again, but her eyes darted to Tai when she heard him move.

"You're worried about them?" Blake nodded. "Don't be, the two of them are much tougher cookies than they look, I should know." Blake raised an eyebrow which made Tai chuckle. "Trust me, Ruby and Yang are very tough cookies. I would know, I raised them." That got an uncharacteristic snort out of Blake. It was very much a dad joke, one she didn't expect to find humorous, but it helped her chase the storm from her mind, at least for now.

"Thank you for this, but I should probably go now, give you two some alone time." She turned to Qrow and Tai and bowed slightly, just like how she used to back in Menagerie, and left the room. Neither men made any move to stop her, even though it looked like Tai wanted to make sure she was really alright. Blake closed the door behind her and let out a breath she didn't know she was holding. She didn't know why, but she always felt on edge whenever Yang and Ruby's father visited. It wasn't a lot mind you, but she always had a distinct feeling of wariness when she saw him, her faunus instincts letting out a sort of warning, as if this was someone she should not trifle with.

However, with Qrow, the atmosphere felt downright oppressive, especially at the beginning when he scared her. Blake didn't know why her senses went haywire and crazy when they were in the room. She hated it. It reminded her so much of when she was with Adam a few weeks before leaving the Fang. She felt tense, coiled up like a spring, as if she was a rabbit in the forest who heard a branch snap and is now frantically scanning the area in order to spot its hunter. She didn't understand why this was. From what she could see, both Qrow and Mr. Xiao Long were nice, albeit quirky, huntsmen who had their little odd bits as anyone in the profession would.

Blake opened her eyes after taking in another deep breath, and met face to face with Weiss and JNPR, who were staring at her like a pack of deer caught in the middle of the highway. Weiss spluttered and made to speak first.

"Blake! I didn't expect to see you here-"

"WE WEREN'T EAVESDROPPING I SWEAR!" Nora practically yelled out, making Ren sigh dejectedly and Weiss' train of thought crash and burn into the ground. Pyrrha stifled a giggle with her hand while Jaune walked up to Blake, slightly moving Weiss back so she could restart her brain.

"How are Ruby and Yang?" He asked, face filled with a mix of worry and curiosity.

"They're fine, from what I saw. There wasn't exactly any nurses around to ask, which I assume is because their Dad and uncle are there." Blake replied, slightly shrugging. Now that she thought about it, she never really did get a chance to ask about Yang's arm.

"They got here in less than a day? That's, wow, ok..." Jaune seemed a little bit shocked at that, Pyrrha patting his shoulder slightly. Blake did find it odd they arrived at Beacon that fast, but she brushed the thought away. Tai lived on Patch and Qrow still seemed to be an active Huntsman, so it wasn't that unlikely that the two were close to Vale. Even if it seemed to take Qrow less than a day to reach Beacon from wherever he was.

Weiss finally recovered and pushed Jaune away to talk to Blake. The two of them stared into each other's eyes, Blake bracing herself for whatever Weiss would say. Then, Weiss did sighed and closed her eyes before looking back at Blake.

"You could have at least waited until I woke up to see them. I'm worried too, you know?"

Blake quickly hid her surprise, but judging from the looks JNPR sent her way, not fast enough. She quickly cleared her throat and replied.

"I didn't want to bother you, you had a rough night yesterday," Blake said, but Weiss crossed her arms and frowned.

"And you didn't?" Weiss shook her head before continuing. "Come on Belladonna, we're getting you some beauty sleep whether you like it or not." She promptly took Blake's hand and dragged her away from the infirmary door, leaving a very confused JNPR staring at the two. Blake tried to look at them for answers, but they all unhelpfully shrugged which made her silently grumble.

"Will we be seeing you later?" Pyrrha asked, probably out of politeness. Weiss blushed slightly before turning back and replying.

"At lunch perhaps we could all gather and make a proper visit to the infirmary, right Belladonna?" Weiss gripped Blake's wrist tightly, which thanks to her Aura was only mildly uncomfortable, but she got the message.

"Yeah, sure, I'd be glad to."

"Excellent! We'll see you later then, Pyrrha." Weiss chirped happily before promptly continuing to tug on Blake's hand back towards their dorm.

If you told Blake a few months she'd be getting forcefully dragged into bed by a Schnee, one who was her team mate and worried about her no less, she would have laughed at whoever thought up of such a ridiculous idea. Clearly, reality was stranger than fiction. She expected Weiss to be angry at her, call her names and such, but she was acting as if yesterday never happened, and slightly less haughty and cold than usual. Did she not hate her? All those things she said, Blake knew they happened yes, but she always assumed it was some other fringe group that did it, not the White Fang itself. That was, until yesterday.

Just how far had the Fang she knew fallen, breaking apart right in front of her eyes while she willfully kept up the illusion of a just cause in her head? Just what had it done while Blake was going off, thinking she was leading a revolution? How foolish had she been? In that moment, lying in bed with the room's curtains closed and Weiss also making as if to continue sleeping, Blake found herself more lost than ever, and let sleep take her in a vain attempt to escape, if only for a moment.

Qrow ran a hand through his hair as he saw the Belladonna girl leave the infirmary. He pointedly ignored the very loud denial of eavesdropping coming from one of her friends and the following conversation, choosing instead to focus on Tai. Now that the girl had left, seemingly better than when Qrow startled her, his weariness finally showed. His shoulders drooped and his eyes gained a tired expression not unlike what Qrow probably had on his face right now.

He spoke, more to get over the whole awkwardness than anything. "So, lay it on me Tai, what do we got?"

Taiyang frowned slightly, but he looked at the girls, sighed and replied. "Been searching these past few weeks and not a lot has come up, but I do got a few. Most are probably a bust if I'm being honest, but there's a few promising leads here. I'll send it to you via scroll along with any other things I scrounge up." He turned towards Qrow and grinned. "Morrison says hi, by the way. You should probably pay your bar tab for him at least."

Qrow stifled a groan, which made Tai chuckle at his expense. Morrison was a great friend, but quite the insistent debt-collector. Especially for one who tended to frequent the bottle as much as Qrow did. He shook the thought out of his head before he got too sidetracked, looking back towards Tai.

"Anything else?" He asked, more to make sure than anything else.

"Hmm, nope," Tai replied, popping the 'p'. "The girls are doing fine, by the way."

Qrow grimaced. He got so hyper-focused on the whole incident he forgot about the fact that his girls were at Beacon. And on the same team no less. He tucked some strands of hair behind Ruby's ear, whose serene expression morphed into a small smile at his touch. "Sorry," he said, but it felt hollow even to him. He knew that he should spend more time with them, especially now that they're taking the next step into being a Huntress, but he couldn't. He was too much of a curse, both because of his Semblance and of who he was.

"So, that Belladonna girl a part of their team?" He says, more to change the subject. Tai sees through him immediately, but he plays along.

"Yeah, she actually kind of reminds me of you back in the day," Tai replied. Qrow raised an eyebrow.

"Does she now?"

"Yeah, all broody and guilty. She has a lot on her shoulders, I can tell."

"Probably just feels bad about this whole thing is all. Although Belladonna does sound pretty familiar..."

"It should. Ghira Belladonna, chieftain of Menagerie ring any bells?"

Qrow snapped his finger and clacked his tongue. "Right, that. What's she doing here?"

"Well, she is former White Fang, according to Ozpin, and considering what happened yesterday..."

Qrow only nodded. "I see.." He stood in silence in front of the bed for a few more seconds, before letting out a sigh. "We're not telling them, Tai."

"Qrow, they got ambushed by a demon just yesterday and awakened to their powers. You know what this means. They deserve to know the truth."

He moved in front of Qrow, but the other man pushed him aside and opened the window, jumping onto the sill. He looked back towards his best friend, a dead look in his eyes, before shaking his head.

"They deserve you Tai. Not a failure like me."

Black feathers were all that remained on the windowsill as Tai was left to stand vigil over his daughter and niece.

Chapter Text

Church was boring. Immensely so. Everyone just sort of sat down in benches and listened to some old fart talk about a 'Saviour' or whatever for half the day, occasionally standing up to repeat what he said like some cult. Although, now that Mercury thought about it, weren't all religions just cults? He shrugged mentally. It wasn't his job to make that distinction, and honestly, he didn't care enough to. His legged bounced up and down, the heel of his boot on occasion hitting the marble tile of the floor while he looked the picture of boredom. He received a nudge in his side, making him wince slightly as he looked to the offender.

Emerald sat next to him and was giving him a not so subtle stink eye. He raised an eyebrow and she mouthed out something along the lines of 'pay attention', which made him roll his eyes. He didn't really understand the thief's insistence on doing everything Cinder says to the letter and worshiping the very ground she walks on, especially when Cinder just told them to wait while she talked shop with some affiliates in the church's newly built basement. Apparently, Emerald interpreted that as 'listen to this five hour sermon that serves no purpose whatsoever'.

The only mildly interesting bit about it was that the whole head honcho of the cult was giving the sermon, which made Mercury wonder just who Cinder was talking to then, but again, not his job, not his problem. Just because he was the big boss or whatever didn't mean he had to listen to his preaching, which by now was getting more annoying than boring. He looked around the pews. Everyone that wasn't him or Emerald were in some form of hooded robes, those that didn't had military wear that looked to be from around two-hundred million years ago or something, with swords at their sides. Probably the church's militia, but what they were doing here he didn't know. And again, didn't care enough.

Most important, however, was that everyone was focused on the old fart and his speech. He could probably get up and leave and no one would give shit. Except Emerald, but she couldn't risk making too much of a fuss or else Cindy might slightly disapprove and she'd be crushed into tiny pieces. So, he got up.

Emerald grabbed his sleeve and tugged on it, mouthing out a 'what the fuck are you doing' through gritted teeth. "I'm leaving idiot what does it look like I'm doing?" Mercury replied, but still quiet, not wanting to attract too much attention yet. It was just then that the old man began to pray, everyone in the church following suit, clasping their hands together and leaning forwards. Mercury noticed that one of the militia standing next to the priest was giving him a stink eye, but didn't move to do anything. Emerald noticed his look and grimaced, while Mercury just shrugged.

He took advantage of Emerald's momentary distraction to escape her grip and began walking towards the door. Cinder surely wouldn't mind, and it wasn't as if he really leave Fortuna and them behind. Suddenly however, his instincts started screaming at him and he turned, just in time to catch a figure crashing through the stained glass window on the ceiling, a red coat billowing out and covering most of his features. The figure landed in front of the priest, who looked shocked at his appearance and stumbled backwards.

Everyone stood still for what was probably only a second but which felt like an eternity to Mercury. Then, quick as a snake, the cloaked man whipped out a silver pistol, and blasted the priest in the head. The shot broke everyone out of their stupor and the churchgoers immediately panicked, a mass of people heading towards the exit. The militia moved immediately, drawing their swords and moving towards the assassin, a few moving towards the priest's body.

The assassin immediately jumped of his perch and pulled out a second, ebony black pistol, shooting in tandem with the other at the militia. Their relatively weak Aura had blocked it, but it got quickly torn apart as the assassin pulled out a great sword from his back, slicing completely through one before running it through another. He then lifted up the sword, the man still impaled, and swung widely, knocking back the outmatched men of the Order.

He then turned towards the pair that were carrying the priest away, before gunshots from the pews forced him to turn his sword and block the bullets. This left an opening for Mercury to run in and dropkick the blade, shooting off before the assassin could retaliate. Curse Emerald and her need to seem useful to Cinder. Mercury knew already that they were up against someone that was Huntsman level at the very least. His strikes were efficient, with no wasted energy between them, and the fact he was proficient with multiple weapons made Mercury think that this wasn't a newbie assassin either, but a professional.

The assassin sheathed the sword in his back, the few moments of relative calm letting Mercury finally get a good look at the man. The sword from before wasn't anything like he'd seen before, a steel and black blade that seemed to have feathers and a crow's face on the hilt with a skull on the pommel. The pistols were definitely made by a top-tier gunsmith, but they didn't seem to have any mechashift capabilities as far as he could tell. As for the clothing he wore, his red coat was unstained by the blood he spilt, and had several pockets which doubtless held more of the man's tools. Underneath it he had a simple dress shirt and black leather pants with brown boots. His left hand had two rings upon his fingers and finally, his face, was obscured by a crow's mask similar to a medieval Valish doctor's, with a few feathers around his neck forming a hood of sorts.

The man seemed to analyze Mercury and Emerald, before holstering his pistols and rushing Mercury immediately. Mercury redirected the punch sent his way and was sent into a series of frantic dodges and backsteps as the assassin assaulted him with a flurry of blows. One of his punches left him wide open, Mercury recognizing that it was probably because of Emerald's Semblance, and he immediately kicked the man in the face, blasting his mask with Wind Dust from his boot. The man's head snapped back, but he grabbed Mercury's leg and threw him over his shoulder, slamming him into the ground.

Mercury's aura flickered, but he let out another shot of Wind Dust and escaped the man's grip, doing a back flip to gain some space. The man rushed in, pulling out his great sword and seeking to run Mercury through with it, but with the help of Emerald's semblance, he sidestepped and kneed him in the gut, striking him in the chest with his fists one, two, three times, before sending out another kick which had the assassin flying into one of the pews. He crashed into the wooden bench, the furniture creaking as it leaned back, then back towards its original position as the man sat down, one leg crossed and his sword planted on the ground, the pose radiating smugness.

Mercury braced himself for another attack, the man kicking off the pew and dashing towards him, but he realized his mistake as instead of going for him, the masked man rushed down Emerald, who barely put her kamas up in time to block the sword. Mercury ran in, aiming a dropkick at the man's head, but he quickly disengaged his sword and brought it to his back, the metal clanging against Mercury's boots. Emerald aimed her pistols at him, but he was faster and shot her with his own in his off hand. Mercury kicked off from the sword and rushed back in, low to the ground as he aimed a sweep at the man's legs.

The man then unexpectedly flipped, as if he read Mercury's actions like a book, extending both his hands to fire a barrage down at the silver-haired youth with both his guns. Mercury could only raise his arms and have his Aura tank the shots. The man landed on the ground, but he was assaulted by one of the remaining militia man, the one that gave Mercury the stink eye earlier, which made Mercury look back at where the priest was and see that they managed to escort his body out.

The man parried one of the militia's blows, knocking him aside from the force of the blow and immediately rushing for Emerald again in that stinger move he did earlier. Emerald frantically put up another illusion, but he saw right through it and hit Emerald dead center in her gut, following it up with several lighting fast stabs before stabbing one more time, sending her flying towards the back where a statue stood. She hit the ground hard, and that seemed to be what did her in, as her Aura shattered soon after. Mercury grimaced. This guy was on a whole different level than all of them, the only reason he hadn't been taken out was because of Emerald bailing him out, the man being smug while also focusing on Emerald. His Aura wasn't looking good however, being at less than half while the man's was probably not even a quarter down.

The militia guy from earlier joined Mercury's side, holding a sword in his right hand that he aimed at the assassin, who looked back at them casually, as if they weren't a threat. He was playing with his food, now that he took out what would be the most troublesome part of the equation, he was having fun now it seemed. Mercury grit his teeth and went back into stance, ready to engage again. The assassin pulled out his great sword again, dragging it slowly on the ground and walking slowly towards the pair.

Suddenly, however, he seemed to change his mind as his head whipped towards the back, where the priest had been dragged to. Mercury at first didn't know why, but as he strained his ear he heard the distant sound of rapid, armored footsteps and the clacking of glass heels. The door burst open with a raging inferno, and the man jumped back as the flames lapped hungrily at his coat. Cinder walked out of the doorway, a slightly annoyed frown on her face as she held her bow in one hand and an arrow in the other. Behind her flooded in two pairs of the Order's Angelos, their lances pointed at the assassin.

Mercury couldn't get a read on the man's expression thanks to his crow mask, but his posture spoke of frustration, his fists clenched as he looked upon the Order's reinforcements. Cinder nocked her arrow and fired, the assassin firing back with his pistols. The arrow split itself into glass shards before reforming, superheating once it touched the ground near the man and exploding. The blast sent the man upward, and the Angelos capitalized, immediately jumping up to spear him with their lances. In response, he pulled out a shotgun from his coat, giving one Angelo a new paint job as the recoil propelled him to the side, into the path of another lance.

He twisted, landing feet first onto the metal of the weapon and jumping onto another Angelo's back, hopping off and onto the roof. The Angelos tried to give chase, but he pulled out his sword again and, swinging it like a bat, brought it down upon the armored knights, sending them crashing to the ground. One of them fell right next to Mercury, landing with a loud clank as the Angelo struggled to get back up. The assassin reached the hole he initially made on the roof, grabbing onto the ledge and flipping onto the outside world. Cinder fired another explosive arrow, but the man learned his lesson from last time and waited until the arrow reformed from his first shot before firing with his second pistol, making the projectile fling out of its intended path and clattering onto the floor.

The assassin spared them one final look, making Mercury freeze up as he felt the weight of the man's eyes upon him, but it was gone just as fast, as he turned and jumped, leaving the roof and their line of sight. Cinder scoffed and looked around at the carnage inflicted by the man, before looking at the militia man and Mercury.

"Report, now" Straight to business it would seem then.

"What can I say? Big guy came down from the stained glass, shot the priest and wiped the floor with all of us before he decided to retreat." Mercury replied. His immense shortening of events and lack of detail made Cinder frown, but she let out a sigh.

"Get yourself and Emerald patched up of anything you might have and then meet me in the basement." She turned and walked back the way she came, the Angelos following behind with not even a word. What a bunch of introverts. He looked back at the militia man.

"Guess I'll see you downstairs then," He said, more to fill in the silence before walking towards Emerald's body and crouching. The man said nothing as he observed Mercury's excellent first-aid skills, those being slapping Emerald on the cheek and shaking her shoulders.

This was going to be a long day, he just knew it.

There once was a legend that told of a pair of twins, born to a bloodline filled with power. Their father was a great man who had slain many a monster, and their mother was a kind soul who endeavored for her children to not only be strong, but intelligent and wise as well. However, an unfortunate tragedy struck the family, as a great and terrible horde of beasts assailed their home. For as strong as the father was, there is only so much one man can do against an unending tide of hate and malevolence, and thus the mob of darkness slaughtered the mother of the twins cruelly, setting a blazing inferno in their abode.

This was not the end for the twins, however, for a roaming tribe had found them and took them in. This did not mean the end of their troubles, for the tribe was full of cruel souls with black hearts that sought to plunder the belongings of the innocent, and the children were ostracized for inheriting their father's power, as the tribesmen feared that which they did not understand. Still, the siblings became some of the best fighters in the tribe and adopted its ideals, that of the rule of the strong.

But then, in one of the tribes many raids, they had come across a silver-haired Emerald Wizard, who despite being only human compared to the sibling's demonic heritage, had managed to best them and single-handedly turn the raid back, although not without great effort on his part. The tribesmen returned defeated to the elder, who was curious about the Wizard's capabilities. He thus sent the siblings into the Emerald Wizard's tower in the center of civilization to learn his ways, come back and teach them to the tribe, making them stronger.

The siblings thus came to learn, but the Wizard knew of their intentions and sought to teach them not just combat, but many other things such as art, history, and more importantly, the value of life, one that was more than just simple raiding and plundering.

The twins were initially cold to the team assigned to them at the Emerald Wizard's tower, for they thought themselves as superior to the rest and saw them as weak pathetic children. They had no respect for the dragon nor the silver-eyed warrior that lied amongst them, and the sister of the two frequently tried to make herself the leader of the team.

They had underestimated their compatriots, however, and the silver-eyed warrior soon proved herself to the sister, taking down the raven with great skill and strategy. This was the start of the twins' opening up to those around them, and their discoveries of the simple joys to be found in things that were not combat. These would be some of their happiest years. The raven and the crow found themselves unwilling to leave this life behind and return to the tribe, and thus stayed. When the tribe elder learnt of this, he became as furious as a Mistralian rainstorm and sought other ways to power. Ways that are left better off alone and unsaid, forgotten in the annals of history.

Nevertheless, soon the group of four had graduated from the Emerald Wizard's academy and inducted into his secret war against the darkness, against the terrible and feared Black Queen. They had joined the fight wholeheartedly, taking down many of her beasts and pawns, and found happiness between themselves, with the crow and raven coming to love the silver-eyed warrior and the dragon.

Soon a little sunny dragon was born, and the Raven found herself to be happy for the first time in what seemed to be ages. But even the most beautiful of spring flowers whither, and the Raven was visited by her old tribe elder. He had grown old, and yet despite his age his body was still going on strongly in stubborn determination and unnatural youthfulness. It was unknown what was discussed between the two of them, only that the Raven left the conversation with a troubled mind and heart.

The Crow, meanwhile, had become a dutiful agent to the Emerald Wizard along with the Silver-Eyed Warrior, being gifted with the ability to transform into a corvid to serve as the Wizard's eye over the lands, same as his sister. It was during one of their flights that the Raven found the location of their old tribe. The Crow had wanted to continue their mission and leave the tribe behind them, but the Raven's heart had been overtaken by a cruel and malignant desire, forged from all their years spent as the outsiders of the tribe and reignited in her meeting with the elder.

And thus, all that was left of the tribe was a blazing inferno, and the cackles of demons.

After the incident, the Raven grew distant and fearful of the Black Queen and of the beasts that assailed her home. Thus she sought after power and searched for ancient tomes that would grant her desire. Soon she found the help of a Silver-eyed Hermit, who had great stores of forbidden knowledge, but no way to use it, unlike the Raven, who contained one of the keys to their objective.

Thus the two raised a great, hellish tower, with the goal of claiming the power the Raven's father once wielded. The Crow, Dragon and Silver-eyed Warrior immediately began the process of ascending the tower in order to confront the Raven and hopefully snap her out of the dark storm that clouded her mind. The twins did battle many times in the tower, unlocking the potential of their heritage that once laid dormant.

However, the Raven would be deceived by the Silver-eyed Hermit, who betrayed her and took up her father's power for himself. Thus the four teamed up once again and defeated the Hermit in a great battle upon the bottom of the tower. However, the Raven chose to remain behind for reasons unknown to her twin, only promising to him that they would meet again. And thus the great tower was sealed back from whence it came, with the Raven following suit and leaving her team and her daughter behind her.

Thus while the Crow, Dragon and Warrior went still on many adventures, nothing could ever fill the whole left behind by the Raven's departure. Some say she is still present as her namesake, observing her family from the great beyond. Others that she is still alive and teaching those willing and powerful enough to be worthy of her attention. But as of now, her tale ends here, as bloody and violent as it was.

Chapter Text

When she woke, Yang felt like she had been run over by a Bullhead. Or will it be aired over in this case? Whatever the correct term was, she groaned as she slowly opened her eyes, having to raise her arm to block the near blinding amounts of light present in the room. She tried to remember how she got here, but her mind was blank, which left her to groggily get up and try to have a better look at her surroundings.

At least, she would have, if not for feeling a weight stirring on top of her. She looked down and saw Ruby's sleeping form lying curled up on her chest and preventing her from moving too much or else she might wake up. Yang sighed as she lightly stroked Ruby's head, her sister smiling happily and mumbling something she couldn't quite make out.

"Heya little dragon, finally awake huh?"

She looked up at the voice and almost choked. "Dad?!" Yang spluttered, hitting her chest while her dad chuckled at her reaction.

"How's it Yanging?" Dad said, making Yang snort at the horrible pun. "Been around a day since you came here all tuckered out, so how ya feeling?"

"My head feels like it got hit by a hammer," Yang said, moving her right arm before noticing it was encased in a cast and supported by a sling.

"Yeah, that sounds about right." Yang was about to ask what happened to her arm, but Dad beat her to the punch. "Don't worry about your arm. You overexerted yourself and your Aura, so the doctors are keeping it nice and wrapped up for a while, okay?" She nodded, flexing her fingers a bit as she got used to the sensation of her arm in a cast. Dad walked up to the bed and sat down on a stool. "So, what happened?"

Yang immediately began sweating, but Dad just put his hand on her shoulder and smiled. "Hey. I'm not mad, I just need you to tell me what you know so Oz can fill out the paperwork and all that."

Yang nodded and started talking. "If you've talked to Blake already then there isn't much I can tell you." She frowned, trying to remember the events of that night. "When me and Weiss got there, they already finished with the White Fang but some giant minotaur Grimm came in and was attacking them, so I rushed in and we knocked it out for a second when it got a second wind and punched me into a wall. Then I saw it about to kill Ruby...And something just snapped."

"Snapped how?" Tai asked, leaning closer. Yang looked down at her arm in thought.

"It's...Hard. Hard to explain. I wanted to desperately reach Ruby, at any cost, and then this golden arm came outta my right one and crushed the bull's arm completely. And then I pulled my arm back and ripped it off entirely. I felt like I was on top of the world and at the same time like my whole body was on fire."

Tai nodded, looking down at Ruby. "Get any dreams while on your nap?"

"Dreams?" Yang asked, meeting his gaze. "I mean, sorta? It felt a bit too real to be one though..."

"Do you remember what happened? In the dream, I mean." Yang chuckled lightly at the accidental rhyme before she continued.

"I was in this forest during the night, and behind me was a bunch of fire. When I turned around, this camp site was entirely ablaze and walking out of it was a person. She seemed strangely familiar? Like I knew who she was right then and there. She asked me a few questions I can't really remember, then I was in this ruined courtyard with a weird blue sword and it felt like my arm was getting torn off, and that's about it..." Yang frowned. It felt like she was missing something important, something key to the whole thing.

Tai stood up and walked over to the window, bringing a hand up to his forehead and digging his fingers into his short, blonde hair. He sighed and turned towards Yang and Ruby. "Guess I have no choice but to tell you the story then." Yang perked up. Was he finally telling her about Raven? About Mom? Dad looked down at Ruby and then back at Yang. "This involves the two of you, so until Ruby's awake and the Beacon doctor gives us the all clear, I'm gonna have to keep you in the dark a bit." Tai started walking towards the door, before looking back at Yang with a small smile. "In the meantime, I think you'll be overjoyed to hear what your team's been up to."

He opened the door, and JNPR, Weiss and Blake all crashed down on the floor in front of him. The noise made Ruby blearily open her eyes and look up at Yang confused.

"Yang, Ruby! You're awake!" Nora cried out.

"Whazzat?" Is all Ruby got out before the sisters almost got tackle-hugged by the red-head, were it not for the intervention of Taiyang. Ren gave Tai a slight nod of thanks while Tai just gave them a thumbs up.

"Yang, Ruby. I trust you are well?" Weiss asked, trying and failing to hide the immense amount of worry she felt for the two. Ruby sat up from the bed and wobbled slightly, having moved too fast, but she quickly regained her balance, upon which she was immediately brought back down towards the bed as Blake and Weiss hugged her, eliciting an 'oof' from Yang as they landed on her stomach.

"Guys...Air...Please..." Yang wheezed out, the three members of her team quickly standing up again with Ruby a little dizzy from how fast they had all moved. "But to answer your question Weissy, I'm all fine and dandy!" Blake raised and eyebrow and pointed at her right arm to which Yang just scoffed.

"What about you Ruby?" Blake asked, already used to Yang's bravado.

"I'm fine..? Sorta? My head hurts a bit, and I kind of just want to not do anything for a while." Yang sat up and patted her sister on the back.

"I'm sure it'll be fine sis! You're not the one to let stuff like that keep you down! What's a headache in the face of taking care of your beloved Crescent Rose?" Yang knew her attempt at lifting the mood succeeded as her team and JNPR smiled at the little joke, soon evolving into a whole conversation. They were all relieved at seeing Yang and Ruby alright, with the exception of Yang's arm, and thus they all exchanged playful jabs and jokes just like normal.

Tai stood on the corner and looked at them fondly, remembering his own time with STRQ, but quickly shaked the thought away, not wanting to get caught reminiscing in front of his kids. He caught Ruby looking at him, and deciding this to be the best time to question her, motioned to leave the room with him. Ruby followed discreetly, using her headache as an excuse to get some air.

They emerged into the hallway that led into Beacon's infirmary. With most of the students away on vacation, missions or just sleeping in, it was a pretty good space for a private talk between the two of them.

"How ya feeling Ruby? Apart from the headache that is." Tai asked. Ruby hummed to herself, grabbing her right arm with her left hand, shuffling about for a bit.

"I don't know. I just feel all woozy and tired but also ready to go run laps around Beacon for hours." Ruby said, sighing and deflating a bit like a balloon.

Tai chuckled at her antics and ruffled her hair, making her pout. "Did you sleep well at least? Get any dreams?"

"Oh yeah! It was pretty weird though. I was in front of Mom's memorial but the plaque wasn't there which was weird, and then this weird guy with a cloak and horns showed up and he told me to jump in the hole where the plaque was, which then dropped me in this reaaaally tall tower and there was this shadow person that for some reason had mom's cloak? Anyway I managed to beat it and then the horns guy told me to help Yang and it stops there." Tai nodded, just one more question left.

"Do you remember what you did after waking up? After the dream, not right now."

"Huh?" Ruby asked, tilting her head. "I didn't wake up after that, at least I don't think so. I do remember my eyes hurting a bit after waking up, but that's it."

Tai smiled sadly, leaning against the wall. "That's all. Go and have fun with your friends, gotta appreciate these four years with them." Ruby felt that he was speaking from his own experience with STRQ and nodded. He made to leave, but seemed to remember something and turned towards Ruby. "By the way, can you do me a favour Rubes? Tell Yang to pack some of her things, we're going to Patch tomorrow."

Ruby would've jumped for joy were it not for her headache. "We are?!" She exclaimed, zipping to her dad and bouncing excitedly. "Can Weiss and Blake come too? Oooh, maybe Jaune and the others can come too! But that could probably be too many people in one house, so maybe not? Oh, they could come visit at least! They're going to love-" Tai raised a hand and put it on Ruby's shoulder, ceasing her admittedly cute rant for the moment.

"How about you talk it over with your team first, hm? I have to do some stuff for Ozpin so I'll see you girls tomorrow morning at the docks, alright?" Ruby zipped off back towards the infirmary, giving new life to the conversation while Tai chuckled to himself at the girl's energy. He turned and started walking to the little office Ozpin gave him for the next Beacon semester. He needed to start filling out the appropriate forms for his half-transfer to Beacon and what days he could be available at Signal.

He groaned. If there was one thing he hated as much as Qrow did, it was paperwork.

Ozpin looked at his scroll with great interest, the words 'Queen has pawns' written on the screen from an unknown number, which he knew was Qrow from the fact that the message came only minutes after he received reports of a 'rogue Huntsman' attacking a church in Fortuna. The description matched what Qrow would wear when he wanted to hide his identity, and, more importantly, hunt demons. He sighed and closed the chat, turning back to his computer and, more importantly, towards General Ironwood.

"Explain to me again, James, just why you're holding what is essentially an Atlesian weapons project test in the middle of Vale?" Ozpin asked, not quite incredulous but annoyed at James' actions.

"It wasn't meant to be long-term." Ironwood explained. "Circumstances from the event at the docks however made it prudent to hold Dr. Polendina's project at the embassy for a few days."

"I get that," Ozpin replied, leaning forwards. "I want to know why you want Miss Polendina at Beacon. I expect a patriotic man like you to keep such a card close to his chest, or Atlas' in this case, and I doubt the council there would be happy."

"Yes, well, Penny is quite the curious soul. It would be better to let her indulge now freely rather than later with restrictions." Ozpin frowned. This smelled of something much more than what James' was willing to spill. He sighed. He would've accepted the girl either way, after all he used to be a teacher, and there is no greater joy than seeing the wonder in a student's eyes, but sometimes James' actions were much more than they seemed. Like now.

"Very well then old friend, I'll take her in." Ironwood smiled slightly on the screen.

"Thank you Ozpin, truly. Penny is a wonderful girl constrained by her origins. Dr. Polendina and Penny herself will be rejoicing at these new I'm sure." Ironwood made to hang up, but Ozpin raised his hand to signal him to wait.

"James, I understand you have your secrets, we all do so I won't pry, but I must ask you to be prudent. Acting rashly with the opponent we face can result in disastrous consequences."

Ironwood nodded. "I understand Ozpin" was all he said before they exchanged goodbyes and hung up.

Ozpin sighed and leaned back in his chair, rubbing his forehead with one hand while the other rested in the chair's armrest. James was a good friend and an ally, but Ozpin had to admit he tended to jump the gun and be infuriating to the other members of his circle at times. However, the man was a great friend and an even greater ally. Ozpin never regretted inducting him into the conspiracy, for all his faults and disagreements between the two, James had proven himself and Ozpin saw no reason to be paranoid over what he was doing. Unless he was bringing an entire battle group of the Atlesian army into Vale with the Vytal Festival coming up, Ozpin would let him be.

Ironwood walked down the white walls of the Atlesian embassy calmly, heading towards the basement where Dr. Polendina's makeshift lab had been set up. While outwardly he didn't show it, inwardly one might describe his mood as giddy, excited, even. Penny would go to Beacon, and more importantly, get closer to the Rose girl. While Ozpin had made him aware of the existence of demons, along with the Branwen twin's lineage, research on them was frustratingly lacking. Here was an enemy close, maybe even greater than the Grimm and yet Ozpin had told him to ignore them. Such foolishness cost entire countries their existence, and Ironwood would not allow Remnant that mistake.

He opened the door to the lab and was met with Penny sitting on a chair next to a wide variety of electronic devices, with Pietro operating a computer that showed the girl's diagnostics. Penny smiled immediately upon seeing the General walk in, and upon receiving permission from her father, jumped off the chair and saluted him in her characteristically bright manner.

"Salutations General Ironwood! What brings you down here today?"

Ironwood smiled. "Hello Penny, Pietro. I bring some good news for you. Ozpin has accepted to let you into Beacon in order to compete in the Vytal Festival tournament. I'll have to move around some students from Atlas, but I believe we have the team for you ready." Penny's smile widened even more, and she quickly hugged the General.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you! Oh this is just sens-sational!" She turned back towards Pietro and began talking about all the things she had planned to do at the festival, with Pietro chuckling at her daughter's antics. Ironwood cleared his throat, bringing their attention onto him.

"That will be all for now. I would like to stay, but duty waits for no one, as they say." Pietro waved Ironwood off.

"Don't worry about that James, I won't keep you." Ironwood nodded and left the room, leaving the two to continue talking about the Vytal Festival.

He walked back up to the embassy, towards the landing pad on the roof. An Atlesian Manta was waiting for him, the soldiers inside standing at attention except for one that stepped out to greet Ironwood. She was tall, wearing the uniform standard to an Atlesian Specialist with her white haired tied in a bun and a saber sheathed at her side. She immediately saluted, her posture perfect as she greeted her superior.

"General Ironwood, sir."

"Specialist Schnee, status report."

Winter followed Ironwood as they both entered the Manta, the airship quickly taking off soon after. "We managed to track down a former White Fang safe house. It was abandoned as soon as we got there, but the occupants left a lot of equipment and materials, along with some other things."

"Other, things, Specialist Schnee?" Ironwood raised an eyebrow.

She cleared her throat. "We found some strange sigils primarily in the form of a sword painted in some of the rooms, along with several others, and parts of the safe house looked to have been torn apart by Grimm"

"Grimm? Or was it something else?" James asked. Winter nodded glumly.

"We managed to track the beast towards the northern coast of Vale, close to the island of Vytal. I've ordered the men to form a quarantine zone, and Specialist Tortuga has arrived also. I found it prudent that we wait until you were informed for further action, since the monster has kept quiet."

The General nodded. "You did good Schnee, wiping out that horde. Don't blame yourself for letting one escape, it was smarter than most." It was a good thing Winter didn't know about the docks incident and how her sister had been involved, or else she might be blaming herself even more.

"It was still my responsibility sir-" Winter started, but James cut her off.

"Don't worry. You'll be able to make up for it." He grabbed Due Process from its holster, checking that both guns were fully loaded before turning towards the soldiers behind him.

"Because tonight, we go hunting."

Chapter Text

Fast, rapid footsteps thundered out all through the forest floor. Bronze hooves, frigid claws and all other manner of limbs trampled through grass, bushes and spring flowers in bloom, leaving behind blazing marks and shards of ice embedded into the ground. Lizards covered in frost and bulls whose skin was a smoldering copper ran, the trees giving way to dirt and then sand, as the pack exited onto an empty beach.

The bulls turned around first, watching the beach surroundings like hawks while the bipedal lizards crouched and spread ice to their already sharp claws. The fire from the bulls' footsteps had spread to the treeline from where they came from, the smoke obscuring their vision. However, they could still sense their chasers, the humans that had corralled them into this place. One of the lizard's heads snapped towards the left, growling immediately as its instincts screamed for it to pounce.

A shadow of a man stepped onto the sand, and the lizard lunged immediately, arms and claws outstretched as it sought to gut him like a fish. Its victorious screech quickly turned into a confused gargle as a gun was pressed into its throat. Immediately, the weapon fired, making the lizard recoil back. Another hand cannon blasted the creature's chest, sending it flying into a group of its fellows. Ironwood allowed a small smirk onto his face as the lizard knocked over two pairs of bulls and lizards like a ball in a bowling alley.

He quickly backed up as one of the bovine monstrosities charged, seeking to gore his chest out with its flaming horns. He needn't have, for Specialist Tortuga jumped in front of him from where she stood behind the forest clearing, her shield out to block the brunt of the attack. The bull, not expecting for its attack to be blocked, bounced off the hard metal of the shield, disoriented. Tortuga followed up immediately by bashing its head in, knocking it back further. Ironwood then jumped onto Tortuga's shoulders and then off, shooting at the bull twice with Due Process until it finally died, its bronze body beginning to dissolve like acid.

Specialist Winter, meanwhile, was a storm of fury, both of her blades in her hands as she danced with her glyphs summoning a duo of snow-white Beowolves that immediately pounced on the lizards. One of the frost-covered reptiles jumped up, ice shards at the ready to impale Winter, but a gravity glyph and Specialist Tortuga's swift execution by using her shield as a make-shift guillotine put a stop to it. The beach quickly became a battlefield, with Ironwood, Winter and Tortuga working in tandem to cover each other and to eliminate the other-worldly interlopers.

Ironwood blasted one of the lizard's arms off, frowning as the demon retreated and covered its injury in ice, the limb slowly reforming. He shot it again, breaking the ice and stunning it. He dashed forwards, flipping Due Process and bashing the monster in the jaw, before grabbing it and slamming it towards the ground, making a sizable crater that knocked a nearby bull and another lizard off balance. Winter, amplified by a lightning glyph, impaled both on her saber and then threw both off of it and into two other bulls, crashing into the pair and killing the lizard. Tortuga followed it up with another slam from her shield, crushing the three bulls and ending their lives as well.

She had to hastily raise it again to block, however, as two lizards barraged her shield with ice shards, freezing the metal and the ground it stood upon, along with Tortuga's legs. Tortuga's eyes widened as the frost spread to her knees, immobilizing her further and leaving her wide open. The lizards capitalized immediately, rushing in with a speed comparable to a huntsman's, claws ready to pounce and their mouths salivating at tearing the Specialist apart.

A flock of white Nevermores tried to intercept them, but the lizards made short work of them, only buying a few seconds for the Specialist. Winter's Beowolves pounced at the lizards, but in their already injured state they were no match for the frosty reptilians, white slashing into white before those summons also dissolved. Tortuga managed to free her shield, granting her some defense, but her legs were still frozen and the frost didn't slow down, reaching up to her waist.

One of the lizards screeched triumphantly, mouth salivating to feast on the Specialist's blood, but it quickly turned into a sound of confusion as it bit down on metal. Ironwood wrenched his metal arm away, dragging the lizard face-first into Due Process, getting blasted in the face by the General's gun, knocking it on its ass before getting stomped down on its neck, killing it. Tortuga managed to break the ice in one leg, letting her pivot and smash the second lizard's face in with her shield before Ironwood killed it with a few more shots from his pistols.

"Ahh, I didn't know what I would've done if you weren't there General, thanks for the save!"

Ironwood nodded, a small smile on his lips. "It's no problem Specialist."

The three Atlesians made short work of the remaining demons, eliminating them quickly and efficiently. Soon, they stood alone in the quiet clearing as the bodies rapidly disintegrated, leaving nothing but ash on the wind.

Tortuga planted her shield on the ground and leaned on it, taking a few deep breaths to recuperate. "Wow, General. From what you told me, I thought these little ones would be wayyy more dangerous."

Winter stared at her co-worker with a raised eyebrow. "That wasn't dangerous enough for you?" Tortuga shrugged.

"You know me Schnee, always enjoy a good scrap and all that." Ironwood looked at his two Specialists with a small smile. Tortuga was clearly trying to lighten the mood and brush off how she got pinned by the demons for a bit. If he had to compare them to grimm, most of these were at the very least close to the level of an Alpha. All the more reason why they should focus on eradicating them and those fools who summon them for their own ends.

Ironwood looked up at his two subordinates, who were still trying to catch their breath. This was, according to the intelligence report, the last pack of demons in the quarantine zone. They'd been herding them here for weeks until they were able to wipe them out in one fell swoop such as this, so Ironwood decided to let them rest for a bit. Schnee was clearly tired from organizing the entire operation while Tortuga was busy keeping the demons in check and making sure they didn't cross the perimeter.

It was good to let them rest, for the constant vigilance required to fight against the forces that sought to bring them down was exhausting for any person, even one such as Ironwood, the 'Tin Man' of Atlas. After all, who knew when they'd get a break like this again?

Patch didn't really change a lot from the last time she saw it. Ruby didn't know why, but she was expecting for there to be a new store or some new people moving in, but nope! Same old Patch, just as she left it a few months ago. Has it really been that long? It didn't really feel like it, but Dad did always say time flies by when you're having fun or something like that.

They were driving through the forest close to their house now, Ruby in the front seat next to Dad while her sister sat in the back with Blake and Weiss. All three of them looked to be deep in thought and Ruby looked at her father worriedly, who only raised an eyebrow, turning and slowing the car down until it stopped completely. He took the key out and clapped his hands, bringing everyone's attention to him.

He opens the car door and exits dramatically with a flair to his step, spreading out his arms as he strikes a pose, mimicking one of those old musicians that he liked.

"Ladies! I welcome you, one and all!" He exclaimed, putting on a cheap top hat that he got from...somewhere, Ruby wasn't sure.

Dad then ran up a tree and leaned on a branch like a circus performer. "To the grand and luxurious, Patch's own!" He jumped down, doing a twirl in mid-air and landing on his feet, flipping one and two times before standing up with all his limbs splayed out.

"Xiao-Long Rose house!" Ruby stifled a groan of embarrassment while Yang was snickering to herself, leaving Weiss to look at Taiyang slightly confused. Blake had to rub her eyes as she swore she saw confetti and fireworks shoot out from behind the man.

Taiyang opened the door and walked inside, turning on the lights and heading immediately towards the kitchen. Ruby and Yang followed with Blake and Weiss trailing behind them. However, Blake soon backed away upon seeing what awaited them. Weiss looked at her confused, before looking down and squealing.

"Get that thing away from me!" Blake yelled

"Get that thing closer to me!" Weiss responded, running over to Zwei and rubbing his ears, making the dog pant in glee.

Blake had retreated into the nearest corner, hissing at Zwei whenever he got close, getting a raised eyebrow from her partner.

"What's up Blakey, don't like dogs?" She said in a teasing tone. Blake shook her head, taking deep breaths to calm herself from the scare Zwei gave her.

"Not a whole lot. Kind of hard for me to get used to them still." Yang found the implications of that statement disturbing and stood there, not really knowing how to alleviate the mood. Thankfully, her dad came to the rescue.

He already put an apron on, with the words 'Kiss the Chef' on it and a spatula in hand, ready to cook lunch. "Hey you two. Any specific requests or are you fine with anything? Can't let a guest of mine go unsatisfied with their meal after all."

Yang shook her head, noticing that Blake seemingly wanted to say something but stayed quiet. "Blake likes dishes with fish."

"Ah, no it's fine! I don't mind it, really, and I wouldn't want to impose." Taiyang waved his hand as if brushing off Blake's sentence.

"Nonsense, I'm the host. It's my job to make sure you're comfortable." He walked to the kitchen and opened the fridge, looking at what he had in stock. "Want any fish in particular?"

"...Tuna's fine..." Blake mumbled out, awkwardly fidgeting in place. Tai looked back inside the fridge and sent her a thumbs up.

"Alright! I'll have a feast whipped up for you girls in no time! You might want to take Zwei out for a walk though, he's been a bit antsy."

With that, Taiyang shooed the two away from the kitchen, effectively kicking them out like a wise master would to his students in a dojo. Yang wasn't sure why she thought of that particular metaphor. Must've been all the comics Ruby bought recently. She motioned for Blake to follow her and they walked to the living room, where both Weiss and Ruby busied themselves in showering Zwei with enough affection to last a lifetime.

Blake froze up again, less noticeable this time, and looked at Yang with a face that screamed 'what are you doing'.

"You said you don't have the best experience with dogs, right?" She pointed to Zwei, who was panting happily from Weiss' belly rubs. "So, let's help you with that."

Blake took a deep breath and flexed her hands. "Yang, is this really necessary?"

She shook her head. "Not if you don't want to. All I'm asking is for you to try."

Blake looked nervously at Zwei, biting her lip. She took another deep breath and a step forward, stretching her hand out, but ultimately retreating. She looked down miserably. "I can't. I'm scared Yang. Do you know how many times I've seen police dogs at White Fang rallies? Do you know how it felt to have one of those sink its teeth into your arm?" She suppressed a shiver as the images came to her mind.

Yang put a hand on her shoulder and shook it, jolting Blake out of the painful memories. "Hey. It's okay. Like I said, you don't have to do this if you don't want to." She motioned towards Zwei again. "He'll be there for you when you want to try again. Zwei is a service dog, he's friendly and doesn't bite." Yang shook her head. "I know that doesn't help right know, but I want you to remember it. Just like how Weiss isn't like her family, Zwei isn't like those dogs." Blake raised an eyebrow. Yang took that as a sign to continue. "You two need to talk about it, Blake."

"And I will." She looked at Weiss and Ruby bickering over something while Zwei panted, gleefully waiting for another round of belly rubs. "Just...not now."

"If not now, then when?"

Blake didn't have an answer for that.

Lunch was a lively affair. While the atmosphere between the team was still tense, Taiyang managed to defuse it expertly by pulling out the patented 'dad mode', in which he cracked jokes and goofed around. Just like the good old days. They ate a nice serving of steak with rice, Blake eating tuna instead, and quickly cleaned up. While washing the dishes, Taiyang slid on over next to Yang and bumped her shoulder.

"What's on your mind firecracker? "

Yang sighed as she put a plate away. "Nothing. Just team trouble is all."

Tai frowned. "You know better than to lie to me like that. Come on, what's up?"

"I've been trying to get Blake to open up more, ever since the docks incident." Yang grabbed another plate and started scrubbing. "And get her and Weiss to actually talk to each other as well. But it feels like I'm talking to a brick wall sometimes, it's infuriating!" The plate was already clean, but Yang kept scrubbing it, now more violently. Tai put a hand on her shoulder to calm her down, noticing the telltale signs of Yang's anger boiling over.

"They need time, Yang. It's not easy having a conversation like that."

Yang put the plate away and took a deep breath. "I know, I know. It's just frustrating watching them meander around and be unnecessarily awkward. Seriously, if I didn't know better, you'd think they were crushing on each other!" She reached for another plate, but Tai put a hand on her wrist.

"Here's an idea," He said, grabbing the dirty plate and washing it instead of Yang. "I'll finish things up here and you can take Zwei on a relaxing walk with Weiss while Ruby and Blake stay here. That way you can try talking to Weiss and Ruby can try reaching out to Blake. Sometimes, you gotta try a different approach firecracker."

Yang sighed, running a hand through her hair. "Yeah...Maybe you're right." She walked out of the kitchen and into the living room, where Ruby, Blake and Weiss were currently setting up a game of Monopoly on the table. Ruby noticed her first and smiled, waving at her to come over.

"Yang! We were just about to start! Come on, sit!" Ruby exclaimed, eager to try yet again to prove her superiority at board games. Yang smiled at her antics and walked over.

"Sure, but I gotta talk to you for a sec." Curious, Ruby got up and followed Yang to the hall, leaving Blake and Weiss to sit in yet another awkward silence.

"What's up sis?" Ruby asked. Yang leaned over conspicuously.

"Listen, Dad asked me to take Zwei out with Weiss and talk to her a bit." She raised an eyebrow at that, but soon nodded.

"Right, and I try to reach through to Blake?"

"That's the plan. 'Try' being the key word here. Don't pressure her too much." The siblings walked back into the living room, noticing the tension in the air. Yang immediately decided to resolve it.

"Hey so, you guys can get started on the game. Dad asked me to take Zwei on a walk so-" Weiss immediately shot up at the mention of the dog and Yang smirked. Hook, line and sinker. Weiss seemed to deliberate a bit before speaking up.

"May I join you, Yang?" She smiled.

"Of course Weiss-cream! Come on, I'll show you the usual route." The two of them soon walked out with Zwei gleefully trotting behind them, leaving Blake and Ruby in the living room.

"Soooo..." Ruby said, unsure on how to breach the topic. Blake raised an eyebrow but otherwise said nothing. "Want me to show you around?"

"Sure, might as well, no?" Blake replied, getting up from the table and quickly putting the game away with Ruby. "So, what're you showing me first?"

Ruby put a fist under her chin and closed her eyes in thought. "Hmm, we already gave you and Weiss a tour of the house...Oh! We didn't show you the basement!" Blake was sure that Ruby knew why most people don't go showing off their basements on a first visit, but laughed anyway at her enthusiasm.

The pair walked down the stairs, Ruby quickly opening the door with a 'ta-da!' and showing her inside. It was like most basements, with boxes and furniture covered by sheets and dust decorating the room. One of the desks had a toolbox on top, stained by grease and yet still standing proud. Ruby walked over to it and placed a hand on the box, caressing it fondly.

"Is this where you made Crescent Rose?" Blake asked, looking over some gun parts that were in one of the desk drawers.

"No, I made it in Signal. But this is where I designed it. Down here I spent so many hours tinkering and testing." She sighed. "Aw man, now I feel old saying that."

"You feel old?" Blake asked. "Try thinking how we feel then."

Ruby snorted, letting go of the toolbox and wiping her hand off of any dust or grime. She looked up at Blake again, slightly nervous, but she steeled herself. "So, how're you holding up Blake?"

"Me? Ruby, I should be asking that to you! You were unconscious for two whole days after the docks!"

"Blake, please." Ruby said. "I know I'm fine, you know I'm fine." She poked Blake's chest. "This is about you." Blake sighed, sitting down on one of the nearby crates while Ruby took a seat on the chair next to the desk.

"I don't know. Ever since the docks I've been constantly thinking about what the White Fang are doing with Torchwick and what's changed. I'm scared, I'm nervous and I feel like things are out of my control." Blake said, hands on her lap as her bow-covered ears twitched. Ruby noticed and made an untying motion on top of her head, giving Blake the go ahead to let her ears out of their cloth prison.

"And what about Weiss? Have you talked things out with her?" Ruby asked. Blake let out a noise of frustration.

"It's not that easy Ruby. I wish it was, but I just can't bring myself to talk to her." Blake replied.

"Ok, then why?" At Blake's look, Ruby continued. "Why can't you bring yourself to talk to her?" Blake's fingers dug into the wood of the crate. Her shoulders hunched up and she looked to the side in shame.

"Because...I'm a coward. Listening to Weiss talk about the friends she lost due to the White Fang made me scared. Scared that what I had been doing for most of my life, the group and people I grew up with, would condone such things in the name of the cause. And the docks just confirmed it even more. So I'm scared of talking to Weiss, because doing so might just mean that the White Fang was never what it was and...I don't want that."

Ruby looked at Blake with sympathy in her eyes, unsure of how to respond to her admission. After a few moments of silence, Ruby spoke up again.

"Does it have to be though?" Blake looked up.

"What? What do you mean?"

"I mean, does it really have to be like that? Even if the White Fang took some very unsavory actions and are very different than what you remember, that doesn't change the fact that you did good."

"But I was still a part of that White Fang who would kidnap innocent people just to send a message."

"You didn't know they did that though. And, now that you do, you can work on changing it. Sure, right now, things might seem bad, but I know you Blake. You're strong, determined and smart, and if anybody can reform the White Fang to its roots, then that's you." Ruby stood up and extended a hand out for Blake. "We're a team Blake, and I know that for all your faults, you're not a bad person or a coward. You're just you."

"I'm...just me." Blake repeated, and chuckled dryly. "God, that sounds so cheesy." Ruby pouted, but smiled as Blake took her hand. "Thanks Ruby. I'll be sure to keep that in mind." The two of them started walking back up and out of the basement.

"No problem Blake! You're my teammate, and as leader, it's my job to help all of you out. Besides, that's what friends are for."

"Friends huh..." Blake muttered, smiling at the thought. Maybe things would be alright after all.

Chapter Text

So, important announcement.

I'm sort of abandoning this fic. I don't have the motivation to continue it at this current point and I'd rather be honest instead of going on a 4+ month hiatus after every chapter and lead the people reading this on. I also am not too proud or happy with some of the decisions I took while writing this and I really don't consider this some of my best work so I'd rather not have this be the impression people have on my writing. I could probably go more in-depth with my reasons, but I'd just be yapping endlessly and we'd never get to the point.

Will I ever come back to this? Maybe, but definitely not any time soon. And if I do, it's probably going to be a separate "rewrite" version because again, I'm not too happy with how a lot of things here came out. This doesn't mean I'll stop writing fanfiction entirely, I'll definitely keep on posting. Just not with this fic, I don't enjoy writing it anymore and forcing myself to go through it doesn't help.

So yeah, that's it for now. I'll see you next time I decide to visit this again or if you decide to check out some of the other stuff I've posted or will post. Have a good one.