//------------------------------// // Homo-what now? Pt. 2 (edit count: 1) // Story: RWBY: Darkness and Harmony // by The P Co //------------------------------// Quick note, thanks again for all the support, and the 419 favorites I'm seeing as I write this, I love you all in the most heterosexual/homosexual way possible, also, David = Agent Washington, the other character the VA for Ozpin voices, in case nobody picked that up, now let's get to the story. Ren was running through the streets of Ponyville, his Jade Dragons were out and set to Taser, he was fretting over the situation in his head. "Gotta find Nora, gotta find Nora, gotta find Nora, gotta find." his mind was racing, "NORA, NORAAAA!" he shouted, hoping to catch her attention. She always came to him when he used his angry voice. "Come on, where is she, I hope none of the ponies found her first, no telling what kind of trouble she'd get in." his thoughts turned morbid as he imagined his redheaded companion getting caught by the law, then escaping prison with a washcloth, a tube of toothpaste, a fermented piece of fruit, a wire brush, a coat hanger, and a TV screen. He had the unfortunate experience to know that she had done so before, and in the exact same way. "Where could she be, let's think, Sweet Apple Acres, no, Applejack was at the library, Carousal Boutique, I don't even know where that is, the Librar-that's just stupid Ren, you just came from there, what about that cloud house Rainbow Dash was talking to Yang about? Wait...." he looked up into the sky. He could see the cloud house from here, and it was right where he expected it to be... Among the clouds, at least five hundred meters into the air. He knew that even while Rocket Jumping, Nora could only reach one hundred meters, or three hundred twenty eight feet, as she claimed, but Ren didn't believe in SI units, only metric. "Okay, not there, so where? Fluttershy is staying at the cloud house too, with that Rainbow Dash guy, I wonder if they're together.... Ren get focused, you could run headfirst into a pole or something if you get distracted like that, come on, think, who was that pony who was missing, Pinkie Pie, oh hell, she had a grenade launcher too. This is bad, this is bad, this is very not good. What am I going to do." Ren stopped when he heard a screaming coming from above. "WHEEEEEEEEE-" he looked up, seeing a ball made up of various shades of pink falling down towards him. He moved to the side, the ball move to the side. He kept running, the ball of pink was chasing him while falling. He was too preoccupied trying to avoid the pink cannonball, and as a result tripped over the town square fountain's rim, sending him sailing over the broken centerpiece and landing hard on his back, head dipping down into the water. Attempting to right himself, or at least get into a more comfortable position, he quickly conjured up some soul energy to un-injure his spinal cord. Brushing the dust off of his back as he stood up, the green ninja looked up. To his horror, the pink ball was still above him, he flared up an aura shield to protect himself. He braced for impact, and.... "Nice moves." Pinkie congratulated, landing softly onto the platform/aura shield. "Where's Nora?" he interrogated, getting straight to the point was one of his fortes, dispelling the shield and catching the pink pony in his arms, he held onto her tight to make sure she didn't get away. Pinkie merely climbed into his shirt, reappearing a few feet away. "What the? Intradimensional space slipping?" he half-asked, confused and turning to face the escaped mare. "I guess so. Well, Nora is hiding, but she asked me to tell you to roll this." Pinkie hoofed over a twenty sided dice to the easterner, Ren caught it with ease. "Okay then," Ren tossed the icosahedron to the ground, looking at it, "It's caught on a crack," he tapped it with his foot, causing it to roll over to a twenty, "Now what?" "NORA, HE ROLLED A NATURAL TWENTY, NOW WHAT?" Pinkie shouted to the empty streets, "Is this town abandoned or something, I swear there should be more ponies here." the black and pink haired boy began scratching his head in confusion. He was really concerned, had his and Nora's presence scared all the ponies off? Well, mainly Nora's presence... Okay, it was entirely Nora's fault, he hated to blame her for anything, since she couldn't help it, but there was no way around it. This was her fault. "She says you have to call out to her to make her appear." the master of ceremonies informed, looking up at the exasperated Huntsman-in-training. "Are you kidding me?" he looked to the windows, alleyways, and doors, no sign of his childhood friend, "NORA DON'T MAKE ME DO THIS." Ren was disappointed, he really didn't want to have to do what he was sure he had to do No response. "Fine," Ren took in a deep breath, "KOERRRRRAAAA, KOERRRRRAAAA." he made the call of what Nora believed to be a sloth. Nora jumped out of the broken fountain centerpiece. "YOU REMEMBERED THE SLOTH CALL!" she shouted cheerily as she glomped her black haired friend. "Nora, please, don't ever run off like that again." his voice was weary, but wizened, he knew she would disobey his advice soon enough, but he still bothered to give it. "Alright, I'm sorry, I followed Pinkie because she taught me that in-a-dime-convention telephone thing you said, watch!" the explosives expert front flipped into the ground, disappearing and walking out of a nearby door. "See? It's so COOL!" she cheered, as Pinkie joined her in a series of consecutive teleportations. Ren chose that this was a good time to repeatedly bang his head on the rim of the fountain. The whole of team RWBY, team VOID, the JP of JNPR, Qrow, Glynda, and four of the Mane Six, along with the princesses, were now on a trip to Town Hall, it was time to introduce Ponyville's new residents Jaune, Pyrrha, and Daniel were tasked with finding Ren, Nora, and Pinkie. It was easy enough, town square was the first place to check, and it was also the last. Ren rolled over, his head laying on the rim of the fountain. He brought out one of the Jade Dragons and held it up to the trio frame-first. "Guys, please help me, I want you to take the blade, and jam it right here," he pointed to his throat, "Don't hold back, just kill me already." he sounded more exhausted than usual, like he was really trying to give up on life, maybe even will himself to death. "Ren, you're going to have to try harder if you want to kill yourself with your mind, you have to really want to do it, and unlock certain things in your mind, and then you have to think of three things all at once, then you die... like.... Orange Monkey Eagle!" Jaune faked having a brain hemorrhage to help his humor, but no matter how hard he tried to lighten the mood, Ren's sadness was too heavy and too dark to be touched by the enlightenment. "....... Well then, if you insist." Daniel suddenly said, taking the bladed machine pistol and raising it high, bringing it down towards Ren's neck. "Daniel NO, he wasn't serious, he's just depressed." Pyrrha caught Daniel's wrist and took the weapon from his hand. "Aw, that's no fun." Dan replied, sounding unnervingly sincere. "Jaune, could you help me up please." the blonde's muscular gloved hand grabbed the ninja's own slender one, pulling him up with little effort. He could feel energy flowing through his body again. After dusting himself off and fixing his clothes, he turned to his teammates. "Alright, is there someplace to be?" he sounded better, but still a bit quiet. "Yes, town hall, everyone is being introduced by the princesses, so you should get be there." Pyrrha informed, turning to find Nora standing in front of a nearby window. Ren followed the gaze and shouted to his companion, "NORAAA!" he used his angry voice. It was a voice that he always had on standby one that always made her appear and sometimes beg for forgiveness, even when she hadn't actually done anything wrong. "COMING REN!" the pink-loving, somewhat scatterbrained girl called back, jumping into a window and appearing beside him. "I think I have this in-a-dime thing down." she praised herself. "Just... follow us, we're going to get introduced by the princesses." Pyrrha and Ren said at the same time. Team JNPR was on their way. "Hello, everypony, thank you for coming out, I am sorry that the initial impression of our guests was... less than reputable, but I am here to explain." Celestia spoke diplomatically into the microphone, she could tell the tension was being offset, "For the past year, we have been experiencing an unprecedented time of war and death, my sister and I believe that by acquiring help, we can tip the scale to our favor, the Sin have all but extinguished many points of life in our world, but a new hope has been summoned, quite literally so, and we have 15 beings with unbelievable combat experience and records of victory, I would like to introduce, the..." she looked at the paper that was written for her by Pyrrha and Glynda, "Human Union of Nefariousness Termination and Equus Revival Legion, or HUNTER Legion for short." the crowd was still silent. Ruby, Weiss, Blake, and Yang all came out on stage and took stood at the designated position, which was their letter painted on the floor of the stage. Jaune, Nora, Pyrrha, and Ren all came out and took their positions. Vermillion, Oscar, Ivan, and Daniel came out and took positions. Qrow, Glynda, and Ozpin stood at their positions, which were much closer to the podium. "Now, I will let Qrow, Glynda, and Ozpin take the spotlight." Celestia announced, moving to the side and allowing Qrow to come up first. "Well, look at all of you, a world once so lush and full of life, now on the brink of destruction, unfortunate, but we're here to make it better. We are here to inspire hope and confidence in you all, so that you may also fight this darkness. The world of Equus may seem hopeless, but my own world, Vytal, seems the same way, but I haven't stopped fighting yet, and I will do so until I am completely incapable of it. I will now allow my former teammates to speak." Qrow gave his speech and stepped away from the microphone. "Hello, my name is Glynda Goodwitch, as my companion Qrow has said, we are here to fight with you, not against you, all we request is acceptance, and we can do our job, I thank you in advance for such assistance, as we cannot help you if you do not let us. All will be well eventually, and when the time comes, you will be able to ride the metaphorical bicycle by yourself. We may not seem like much, but with our skills, abilities, and knowledge, we will beat back the Sin until they are gone." Glynda's voice was calm and gentle, when she was done, she stepped back, she saw Celestia look at her doubtfully, she pretended like she didn't notice. Ozpin stepped up next, clearing his throat. "I'll... keep this first speech brief. You all must be feeling well, like your knights in shining armor have come to save you, but when I look to you all, from the ponies to my subordinates, all I see is wasted effort. You think that we can save you, but in the end, only you can save you, we are here to help you with the first step." the gray haired man stepped away from the microphone. Ozpin gave a small, knowledgeable smile at seeing the fresh wave of humbleness he had sent through the crowd, he took a sip of his coffee and waited for his next turn. "Um... fillies and gentlecolts, do not despair, they are, after all, here to help, now I would like the younger members of the HUNTER Legion to introduce themselves." Celestia waved over team RWBY. "Hello ponies, I'm Ruby, the leader of TEEEEAM RWBY, as leader, I will do my best to fight off these Sin things, can I get a CHEER!" Ruby shouted, everypony liked her energy, and they threw their hooves into the air and cheered. "Right, I'm Weiss, Weiss Schnee, and as an invaluable member of team RWBY, I'm going to be fighting alongside my comrades in defeating this Sin menace. I'm sure you all are afraid of them, they are monsters, demons, yes I'm sure they have many names, but to me, they are only prey. A wise old man once said that to me, and I will use his words as my own." Weiss recited Professor Port's claims. She always felt he was a boisterous man, but he had a good heart and was nice enough. Plus his 'when I was young' stories were at the very least entertaining. "Um, hi, my name is Blake, Blake Belladonna, there's not much to me, but I'm on your side, so don't be hostile, okay?" Blake was, even as a little girl, always shy around new people, but she opened up quick. "Sup, I'm Yang, Ruby's older sister, I'm here to, pardon my Sanctum, but I'm here to kick some ass and take some names. Delivering a beat down to the Sin and back home in time for... whatever I feel like doing in the afternoon. I'm going to turn the mic over to ol' Celestia now, see ya later." the charismatic blond received a very good reception from her intro speech, a few ponies even cheered and some whistled. "Right, that was team RWBY, one of three teams of the HUNTER Legion ready to kill the enemy, now I would like to introduce team JNPR." Celestia stepped back from the microphone. Jaune was the first up, he stood in front of the microphone and tapped it, "Um, is... uh.... is this thing on?" he could hear himself echoing from the speakers, "I guess so, uh, hello, ponies, my name is Jaune, Jaune Arc, I'm here with my team to..." he turned and whispered to Celestia "What was I supposed to say?" Celestia facehoofed and whispered back, "You're here to fight the Sin." "Oh right," Jaune recalled his appointed task, "I'm here with my team to fight the Sin things, and um, that's pretty much it, Selena and Lily here summoned us, but that's all there is to say." Jaune felt like he had gotten the princesses' names wrong, but he simply stepped away from the microphone, scratching his head. His mind blanked again, he kept forgetting snippets of memory, but he didn't know how or why. "Hello hello hello, I'm NORA, NORA VALKYRIE, I love this place so far, all the buildings and the sights and all you ponies, ooh you're all so cute I could just hug you all day, I'm gonna fight some monsters, YEAH, this is gonna be REALLY FUN! WOOHOO!" the redhead cartwheeled away from the podium, taking her place between Jaune and Pyrrha. "*ahem* Hello, my name is Pyrrha Nikos, I graduated top of my class at Sanctum, so I would say that I am fairly skilled at what I do, which is protect people from monsters, normally I fight things in a much bigger environment, but I feel like this might be easier. I will fight for freedom and honor, thank you." Pyrrha gave a kind smile to the crowd before stepping away. "Right, I'm Lie Ren, surname first, so just call me Ren, I don't talk much, but I do my job, that is all." Ren sounded tense, he didn't like speaking in front of so many of what he still saw as strange creatures. "Okay, that was team JNPR, now for team VOID." Celestia announced, not even stepping behind the podium for this one. "Hello, I'm Vermillion, I'm here on Luna's command, seeing as how she was the one who thought of getting help, there's not much to say other than the obvious 'I'm going to fight the Sin', since if I wasn't, I wouldn't be here, now would I?" Vermillion walked backwards away from the podium, narrowly avoiding bumping into Oscar. "Private Oscar reporting for duty. It is my honor to serve alongside my fellow men and women on the field of battle, I will do everything in my power to send every single Sin creature possible, directly to the Gates of Hell." the blue schemed soldier marched away from the podium. Ivan stepped up to the podium, lighting a cigarette and taking a drag, breathing out a cloud of smoke, "Ah, I love that cigarette. Hi, I'm Ivan, I'm with these guys and we're here to kill some monsters, it's literally no change from what we've been doing for the past two months back at Beacon Academy, if I wasn't going to kill some shit, I wouldn't be here, now would I?" he asked, looking at the crowd with an agreement provoking expression on his face, "I'm part of Team VOID, as you could tell by Celestia's announcement, that's all there is to say about me, I'll turn the mic over to my friend Daniel now." Ivan jogged back to his spot, on the way he did a front-flip, both for style and because he could. "I AM HERE TO KILL EVERYTHING, THE STREETS SHALL BECOME RAGING RIVERS, AND THE BLOOD OF OUR ENEMIES SHALL BE THE WATERS, THIS I SWEAR!" Daniel shouted a lot louder than necessary, everypony looked disturbed by his enthusiasm for killing. "I hear a lot of claims of fighting, but I don't see much potential, I am starting to feel like this 'help call' was a waste of time." Celestia whispered to Ozpin. Ozpin did a quarter turn to face the sun goddess, "Don't be too hasty, Celestia, you can't doubt us so quickly, if I'm not mistaken, then we haven't even been here for a full hour. I wouldn't be at the position of authority I am today if I wasn't the greatest fighter I could be, nor would any of these bright young minds be under my responsibility if they did not possess the skills to defeat creatures many times their size and strength. Trust me, when the time comes, you're going to see some shit." Ozpin lectured the mare of many millennia with a wizening tone. "And that shit is going to be awesome!" Qrow added, despite his age he still acted like he was a first year Huntsman-in-Training. It was his way of fighting aging, by resisting to be old. Their old team was a mish-mash of ages before regulations were put into place. Ozpin was in his early seventies, Port was in his sixties, Glynda was in her late fifties, and Qrow had recently entered his fifties. Despite their slowly withering bodies, the long-standing Huntsmen and Huntress team had the abilities of people half their age. "*ahem* I am back at the microphone because I have no doubt that you all have many questions, you want to get to know us as people, luckily for you, Miss Twilight Sparkle compiled a list of questions that I have already written the answers to, and now I shall read off what was put down." the list was brandished, straightened out, and read. What are you? (species) We are humans, similar to primates but with more intelligence and less hair. Where did you come from? The world of Vytal, humans were born from the dust of creation, and we fight for our lives every day. Do humans have magic? No, not really magic, but our souls can be used as an aura, to protect our bodies and shield our minds. Are there multiple types of humans? While the soul varies from person to person, there is only 1 variation of the humans, the faunus, just like humans, but they also have animalistic traits, most often irregular hair growth and animal ears. How are you able to walk on two legs? The physiological structure of our skeletons allow it. Do you have cutie marks? What the hell is a 'cutie mark'? A physical symbol depicting your special talent, like doing magic or building things. In that case, no, we do not have cutie marks. What are some advancements recently made by humankind, I ask this as a way to establish a technology level comparison. I will say that we have recently made advancements in gunpowder and firearms, you have seen some of our latest models for weapons first-hoof. The commercialization of ornithopters, the highly compressed storage methods and devices for Dust, and some new firearm thresholds are all advancements that have been made in the past century. What is this 'dust' stuff? A crystalline substance that comes in full crystals or powder, there are many different elemental variations of Dust, another note is that full crystals are more stable, but weaker, while powder is more volatile, but more potent. What was your career back on Vytal? I am the headmaster of a school made to train Huntsmen and Huntresses, I gained my position through my own power and ability at the task of slaying the Grimm and leading my fellowmen and women. How long will you be staying in Equestria? As long as it takes to get the job done. Will you be staying overtime? No, we will be leaving at the soonest possible chance once our mission is complete. You're not giving me much of a base for a trustful alliance, how can I know that you all can handle the job? Ozpin paused, then cleared his throat to continue, "....This one took a while to answer, but I will say this now," the professor cleared his throat again, "We poison the air and water to weed out the weak, we set off fission bombs in our only biosphere, we NAILED A GOD TO A STICK! Don't doubt us, we will unleash terrors and violence the likes of which will drive even demons to madness, and don't cross us, or you'll end up far worse than dead." David Ozpin, a usually calm man, had a vicious and poisonous enough expression painted across his face to make many ponies faint in fear. He took a drink of his coffee, then stepped off the stage, a thin trail of a blacker-than-black smoke following him, causing the podium to rot and the microphone to rust. The old man could easily imagine watching the world burn, and he didn't care if that was what it would come to.