The Second Step
More than 450, I'm going to say that it has finally happened, I have lost track of how many favorites I have, but I'll say it's about 450.
On with the show.
Luna stood in front of the four tightly packed gravestones, giving a sigh.
For the past week, she had been visiting the graves of team VOID, their death did not hit the group lightly.
While Ozpin was somewhat proud that they at least died in a dignified manner, Glynda and Qrow were decent enough to frown at the bad news.
Respects had been paid, and the bodies were buried.
She and the medics had done their best to restore some semblance of aesthetic pleasantness to the corpses, but it was difficult, due to how they died.
Oscar had been eaten, Ivan and Daniel had been crushed, and Vermillion had burned to death.
She recalled the not-so-recent induction of a second army force, not the HUNTER Legion, they were Spec Ops, no, she was referring to the Soldiers.
It had taken a while, Celestia claimed, to gather them up and organize the new policy, there were two forces of the military, and their division was simple.
The Guards would stay posted at their locations, such as Canterlot, Neigh York, or Ponyville.
The Soldiers would be sent out of their post to other locations, like a Ponyville soldier coming to Canterlot, or a Neigh York soldier going to Bearussia.
This meant that there would always be protection for these few, last remaining locations of hope and peace, and that a shift in protection would never leave a place undefended.
It also cut down on paperwork, about five or so documents were needed to transfer a single guard, and more than one would require even more paperwork.
A whole battalion soldier could be reassigned with a single list and a few signatures.
She thought back to team VOID, she remembered that she had made sure that each of them were dressed in custom made attire.
Vermillion wore armor like the Lunar Watch, Oscar wore a lightweight armor-fabric suit like the Soldiers, Ivan wore a golden armor suit like the Solar Guard, and Daniel wore a simple black robe.
She gave another sigh, her thoughts and mourning done with, the princess of the night went back to the training grounds.
<cutaway>
Ozpin smiled at the crowd of guards, he was happy to deal with such people.
None of them were prestigious, at least in his sense of the word.
Each and every guard had the whole field of all weapons to learn about, none of them had prestige or specialization in any particular weapon, they were average all across the board. This was good, as it meant that their main strength would be their lack of weakness.
"Attention, EVERYPONY ATTENTION!" he shouted, causing all the guards to look in his direction, "You are all here, under my rule, because frankly, you SUCK! I say this because you have a lack of specialization, but don't worry, this is good. This means that you will be trained with every weapon in the Equestrian arsenal, from axes and swords, to bows and pikes, to rifles and pistols, along with everything in between, now, you're not here to get good at A weapon, you're here to get good at ALL weapons. Now, let's begin, I hope everypony brought a writing utensil." he started by descending from his balcony and walking over to a conveniently placed desk, picking up a large pile of papers.
"Here's your first test in training, an AKS test, or 'Assessment of Knowledge and Skills' test, you each have two hours to complete the test. You shall start when it is confirmed that everypony has one." the teacher inside of him was cackling like a madman, he loved this part.
Most of the guards merely shed their armor, sat down, and began the test.
Ozpin was hopeful, what would it say about the system, about the country and its rulers, if the guards couldn't pass a simple weapon anatomy test?
It would say a metric fuck-tonne about everything, and maybe reveal why the guards couldn't defend the land when they outnumber every enemy by a ratio of ten to one.
The old man heard giggling, like little schoolgirls, or something of the sort, he turned and saw a trio of retreating forms.
"My my, methinks there be intruders, I'll deal with these younglings." he said quietly, walking in the direction of the retreating ponies.
<cutaway>
The other ten warrior were charged with taking their own specialized skills and teaching the other guards and soldiers the more advanced maneuvers and techniques that they knew.
At least none of the guards or soldiers had to take written tests.
Jaune was disappointed, though, as almost every one of his 'students' surpassed him within a few minutes, leaving him at the bottom of the barrel in both the fields of swordsmanship and shield usage.
With nothing else to do, he walked to training field C, as Ozpin had taken A with the jack-of-all-trades guards, and B was where the specialists were.
Alone in the field, Jaune pulled out the controller that was given to him.
It was a simple device, though it had a lot of buttons, changing the training field setting to C, he pressed a button.
A simple training dummy was summoned, formed out of magic.
He smiled, maybe he could do this for a while.
About five more were summoned, and Jaune was about to charge, when all six heads exploded.
He looked to the side to see a pair of stallions sitting like humans against the wall and watching him, one had a sniper rifle, the other had a sword.
He ran over to the others, sitting down with them.
"Hey, I'm Jaune, and you are?" he asked, trying his best to be friendly.
"I'm Lieutenant Evening Warden, from the Lunar Watch, and this is my buddy Lieutenant Jeering Mareon, also from the Lunar Watch. By the way, I just rolled a natural twenty on my snipe." the somewhat stout stallion introduced the duo with a proud voice.
"Oooooh boooooy, it's so exciting, you rolled a ten on every stat on that 'character sheet' of yours, you are practically the definition of average." the other stallion had a nice voice, even when he was, well, jeering someone.
Evening Warden had a light scarlet coat, cold and calculating hazel eyes, and a dark blue mane, his armor was slightly customized with dimly glowing runes, probably protection magic or something.
Jeering Mareon had a tan-brown coat, warm and friendly brown eyes, and a short cut black mane with a little crest in the front, his armor was black, probably his own work, it had a glassy sheen, like obsidian.
What was odd was that Jeering was a pegasus, and Evening was a unicorn, but their cutie marks were practically switched.
Evening's cutie mark thing was a black lightning bolt coming out a white star.
Jeering's cutie mark thing was a red-outlined yellow circle with an S made of red sparkles.
"So, what was your name again? John or something?" Evening rolled his twenty sided dice again, and got a ten.
"It's Jaune, Jaune Arc, nice to meet you, what's that packet?" the blonde man noticed the packets of paper to the sides of the two stallions.
"Oh, we're with Ozpin's group, but he gave everypony a test, and we didn't want to take the test is field A, so we came here to C." Jeering explained, looking at Evening's watch.
"Well, lucky you, I have to train others, and they're already better than me." the swordsman sighed, he felt awful.
"How are they better than you? I though you were part of the HUNTER Legion?" Evening interrogated, rolling his twenty side again, it landed on a sixteen, "Did you lie your way to your position?" he asked the armor-piercing question.
"*sigh* Yes, actually, I did." Jaune gave up, he couldn't keep up the ruse any longer.
"Oh damn, that's bad, how'd you do it?" the black maned stallion asked.
"I got some fake transcripts, and they said I'm a forceful fighter, that I usurp the battlefield into my ownership, and that I'm a good tactician too." Jaune recited the untrue words.
"Why did you put that on your transcript? Why did you even get fake transcripts in the first place?" Jeering pressed on with his hard questions.
"I thought it was something I could try to do, and be alright at, enough to keep up the lie, but I failed. I got into Beacon, the school for warriors, because I'm the only man in my family who isn't a revered fighter. I was tired of being the one who can't even land a strike without calling upon god or some ancestor to help me out. Tired of being picked on, and ridiculed, and mocked, and bullied, and sucking at what I do, and, just, EVERYTHING! I can't do anything right." Jaune laid back flat on the ground.
Jeering and Evening stood up and walked over to where Jaune's face now lay, sitting down on their haunches and looking down at him.
"Yo Jaune, y'alright?" Jeering asked in a casual tone.
"No, I want to just go home, not just back to Vytal, but back to my family. Actually, now that I think about it, they probably wouldn't let me stay because I'm such a failure.
"Don't say that, at the very least you're a decent liar, and you've got more muscle than me and Jeering combined." Evening tried to reassure Jaune of something good, he was good at reassuring ponies of things, he had gotten a lot of practice with his sister, "You just need proper form, like this." he rolled his twenty side yet again.
He suddenly pulled a face like both princesses had offered to be his sex slaves, or something else equally impossible and insanely amazing.
Jaune looked at the small dice, it had landed on the twenty side.
Evening jumped into the air, pulling himself into a sitting position, he then promptly started floating five feet off the ground, going all over the stone field at a medium velocity,
Jeering and Jaune looked at him with, not sure if this was actually happening.
Evening finally landed back in front of the J-named pair.
"It's as simple as that, but proper form for swordsmanship is probably harder than just rolling a natural twenty." the runic armored knight said, looking down at Jaune again.
"You're a lot like my little sister, like ol' mom and dad say, she just needs proper form, and she'd be flying like the wind." Evening said, looking up at the sky and smiling.
"I'm not really understanding this whole setup here, Jeering is a pegasus with a magic cutie mark, you're a unicorn with a flying cutie mark, and you have a pegasus sister?" the blonde man's head hurt with all of this conflicting information.
"My cutie mark is about white and black magic, I'm a star at white magic, the magic of defense, and I'm like a bolt of lightning at black magic, the magic of offense. My dad was a pegasus, and my mom was a unicorn. When my sister was born when I was about ten years old, I was already doing magical spells and wanting to be in the military like my dad, since he was in the navy. I did my best, and here I am today, a lieutenant with my buddy Sparkles over here, everypony called him Sparkles because his special talent is being a Sparkle of positivity when morale is low, as well as being bright minded with good morals." Evening explained, reminiscing his old memories brought him joy.
"Well, that explains it all, and he's still no older than twenty two, but he joined up at sixteen, anyways, we should probably get going." Jeering looked at Evening's hoof-watch again.
"Oh, your," the scarlet coated stallion checked his watch, "...right, our time here is done, thanks for the nice conversation Jaune, I hope to see you again soon." Evening gave the farewell as the stallions put their helmets back on.
Magic activated and turned their coats gray and their eyes yellow as they trotted back to their post, it was the standard for the Lunar Watch to have certain colors. Jeering's red rimmed sunglasses were obviously not under protocol, though, nor was Evening's twenty sided dice.
Jaune, for the most part, was slightly surprised, the helmets must have had illusion magic, it was probably the most efficient method, or something.
He wasn't sure, he had memory problems, like when he forgot his locker number.
Bringing up more training dummies, he got ready to attack.
It was time to finally develop some skill.
<cutaway>
Ozpin was now fully running after the small ponies that were trying to evade him.
Finally, after some time, they stopped running, tired of either moving or not letting him catch up.
Huffing and puffing, Ozpin leaned down, grabbed the three ponies, and came to a stuttering stop outside into the light.
A small courtyard was their current location, and the probably dying old man set the ponies down gently, sitting in front of them with his lungs ravenously breathing in more air.
"*huff* Please don't *huff* make me run *huff* like that, I'm rather *huff* old, I may be *huff* fast, but my *huff* cardiovascular health *huff* isn't what it *huff* used to be." Ozpin managed to speak, but only barely.
As his lungs greedily drank in more air and were slowly satisfied, he looked at the three fillies that were staring at him in amazement.
They were probably no older than twelve years, had no cutie marks, and seemed somewhat familiar, like he had seen somepony like them before.
"Hi, I'm Applebloom." the pale yellow one introduced.
"I'm Scootaloo." the orange one said with pride.
"I'm Sweetie Belle, nice to meet you mister Pinhead." the white one greeted.
"It's Ozpin, not Pinhead, I have no idea how you came to that conclusion, so, why did you tear me away from my duties?" the green clad Huntsman queried, now sitting in a looser version of the fetal position, with his arms resting on his knees rather than wrapped around them.
"We saw that awesome stuff that you did, and I got my brother to get us tickets to the portal to Canterlot." Scootaloo proclaimed.
Ozpin was about to ask what she meant by awesome stuff, but was silenced by Pinkie Pie, who jumped out of the cracks in the stone.
"Look at the flashback." she instructed, pointing off in some random direction.
Somehow, the images of Ozpin's fight with the wolves, dog-men, and the Ursa Minor showed up in a quick, sight filling montage.
"Oh, that, right, so, you wanted to talk to me?" Ozpin asked, sounding as nice as he could, he liked young children, they had an osmosis effect with their youth, it made him feel younger.
"We want to be," they each took in a deep breath, Ozpin braced for ear-based impact, "CUTIE MARK CRUSADER MONSTER HUNTERS, YAAAAAAY!" they shouted in unison, the force of their brief yet powerful verbal assault rang in the old man's ears.
"I wanted to go as long as possible without needing a hearing aid, and I fear that you may have forced it, but enough of my woes, you want to become Huntresses?" the CMC nodded in unison, "Do you have weapons?" he was sure they would fail this part.
Low and behold, as Celestia doubted the humans, and they proved themselves, so did he doubt the CMC, and, well, actually, only Scootaloo had a weapon, due to her connections in the military.
Scootaloo had a S&W500, attached to the barrel was a Japonese Tanto dagger blade. It was a simple revolver knife.
"I am surprised you can even hold those, very well, I am a man of my word, the next requisite is, do you have training?" Ozpin wasn't sure about this, he could never live it down if he let a child join his personal army and they got hurt, or worse.
"Yep!" the little pegasus said with cheer.
"Well, then, let's prove it, shall we?" Ozpin stood up and stretched his tired bones and muscles, walking back to Training Field A.
On the way there, the three fillies were chatting nonstop about how they would get their cutie marks in hunting monsters.
The professor gave a smile at their cheer, he couldn't put enough emphasis on it, he loved children, such energy, such joy, such innocence, in fact, if Ruby had been any younger, he would have kept her out of Beacon to protect her from the corruption of war.
His body may have been weakened by age, but he was still quite healthy, and being around young people helped him stay awake and active.
His thoughts became deep, he had the health of man half his age, but when younglings were around, about the perfect age of seventeen to twenty four, when they were at their physical peak and their minds were ready to compete, he loved joining them, if only to feel better about himself.
He had made more mistakes than any man, woman, or child in all of Vytal, even with everyone else combined, they looked nearly perfect when compared to him.
So much loss, so much pain, so much conflict, so much stupidity, and weakness, and damn it all he hated himself for the things he'd done. He felt unfortunate that he wasn't dead yet, but relieved that he had time to make up for some of his errors, maybe have a heroic net gain by the time he finally metaphorically kicked the proverbial bucket.
Only time would tell.
<cutaway>
Every one of the trainers was having a surprisingly easy time, within a few hours they were ready to move on to more advanced things.
Blake had dismissed her troops for the day, choosing instead practicing her ninja skills. She felt she needed to keep them as fresh as possible.
Pyrrha had done the same, the maroon haired young woman had quite a knack for conveying information. Noticing Blake departing, she decided to follow, maybe converse for a bit.
"Hello Blake, I can see your knights have completed their tasks for today, no?" Pyrrha wasn't actually sure why the yellow eyed swordswoman had begun to leave.
"Yes, actually, they were quick learners, I'm heading to field C, to train for a while." Blake tried to be nice, she and Pyrrha had exchanged words a few times before, so their friendship was still relatively new.
"That sounds like a great idea, hey, how about we spar?" the spear wielder offered, such a training event would be a lot more effective than simple target practice.
"Are you sure? I'm still working on how to use this thing." Blake brought up the Moon's Eye and Stargaze, Vermillion's rifle-scabbard/vibro-sword.
"Did you steal that?" the young veteran combatant put on a more patronizing tone.
"No, it was the only thing left of Team VOID, besides their, uh, corpses." Blake was starting to back away now, wanting to escape the sudden harsh gaze.
"I see, well, is there any reason why you chose to take it?" the green eyed girl softened her gaze, noticing how Blake had become tense and slightly afraid from the intensity of her piercing glare.
"It reminded me of an old.... friend, my one and only friend before coming to Beacon." Blake walked away as soon as she was finished, training was now the last thing on her mind.
Pyrrha frowned a bit, but decided to let the black haired ninja go, she had more important things to do right now, and someone else on team RWBY could comfort the saddened sword wielder.
Turning to the still-lit hallway that led to the C field, she navigated her way outside.
Jaune was there, attacking some targets.
Silently joining him, the suddenly-formed duo took down the ten targets in less than half a minute.
"Gah! Pyrrha, w-w-what are you doing here?" the blond was nervously stuttering now, confused by the seemingly causeless arrival of his subordinate.
"I chose to train as well, and I could see that you were doing poorly, very poorly actually." the armored huntress-in-training tapped her chin in thought, "Wait, Jaune, what are you doing out here?"
Jaune stopped moving, the armor piercing question had come sooner than he anticipated, "I was training, you said it yourself." he was bluffing.
The maroon haired warrior wasn't buying it, "I could see that Jaune, but usually one does not take two minutes to destroy twelve stationary targets." the second round of armor piercing question came like a bolt of lightning.
"Ah hehe, hehehe, aw I give up, it was actually twenty targets in about ten minutes, I'm a terrible fighter, I'm awful, I'm lousy, I'm every type of low-quality in the book. I don't deserve to be the leader of team JNPR, I don't even deserve to have any team, or even be a part of a team at all, aw hell, I don't deserve to even be at Beacon, or here, for that matter." Jaune just let his negativity flood out, hoping that Pyrrha would do her 'Pyrrha Thing' and make him feel better.
"Jaune, you got into Beacon academy because you were good enough to get in, that says a lot about your skills, it says that you have what it takes to be a great defender of the land." reassuring green eyes met suddenly cold blue eyes, Jaune was about to protest, and he was going to protest hard.
"No it doesn't, Pyrrha, I don't know if you've noticed, but I am the worst person in the school, the only one who isn't better at fighting than me is the janitor, if even him! I didn't get into Beacon because of my skills, I got into Beacon because I faked my transcripts, I made them up, I put down lies on official documents that sealed my fate to being a meal, a meal waiting to be eaten, Cardin was right, I'm just a loser, a loser who's family precedes him. My dad, my grandfather, my great grandfather, and my great great grandfather, who's sword I now carry," Jaune pulled out his sword and shield, "They were all heroes, I'm not. I'm sick and tired of being the damsel in distress pinned in some way to a tree, while my supposed 'subordinates' go to fight the enemy without my help, and they do better for it. I'm TIRED, OF ALL OF THESE EXPECTATIONS!" Jaune was glowing white now, something serious was going down as his soul activated, "OF ALL THE PEOPLE WHO EXPECT ME TO BE GOOD BECAUSE 'the blood runs through my veins', well it DOESN'T, and I'm sick of PEOPLE KNOWING ME FOR MY FAMILY, not for ME, Jaune Arc the Fifth, the latest in a line of great warriors who own the battlefield and banish others from it with an unprejudiced blade of force. I just want to be ME! GRRRAAAAAAAAAAARGH!" Jaune was overtaken by rage, his soul aura glowing bright white.
The aura was five times brighter than other auras, like the other men of his family had added their souls to his own.
His sword glowed with an ivory light, the metal coating insufficient to contain the full glowing power of the force dust crystal underneath.
It had been forged out of one of the largest force dust crystals ever found, the crystal was cut down to size, then coated with steel to protect it from expending or shattering.
The now uninhibited warrior unleashed another hatred filled roar of a battle cry, followed by a powerful whirlwind swing that shattered the training dummies..
Pyrrha was lucky enough to have ducked beforehand.
Crying angry tears of liquid gold, Jaune absolutely annihilated the next forty targets that he had summoned.
Large, distance eating steps were taken, his shield was raised, it's own dust activated, a minor transformation adding a small blade sticking out of the front.
Smashing another target to pieces, forcefully slicing his way through another, and blowing one of them to pieces with a powerful stab, he was unstoppable.
Jaune Arc the Fifth was gone, replaced by a lord of the battlefield, he was only Jaune Arc, and with five souls compacted into one, this beast was not stopping anytime soon.
Pyrrha stared in slight fear, slowly preparing to pin the unchained fighter to a nearby wall.
Throwing the Milo in spear form using the shot-speed throw mechanism, she did not anticipate what would happen next.
Jaune whipped around, catching it with his shield, but the result was the same, he calmed down when he saw what had happened.
Letting out a groan of pain, Jaune quickly put away his sword and shield, looking at Pyrrha with suddenly bleary eyes.
"Thanks, I lost control there, I just don't know what went wrong." he picked up the Milo, looking at his friend again, she looked... proud.
"Jaune, if a bit frightening, that was amazing, your form, your stance, your moves, everything. At first I thought I might wet myself in shock, but after seeing what you could do, I'm proud of you, you're not a failure, you just have to get angry to get your warrior instincts to kick in." the huntress-in-training was beaming a huge, bright smile, almost happy enough to rival Nora
"Why thank you for the compliment, and I'm sorry about that, but if what you say is true, then I shouldn't have to worry." he readied to throw the Milo, pulling the trigger to activate the shot-speed throw mechanism, though accelerating from a speed of zero gave it quite the slow-down.
Pyrrha caught it with ease, her expert fingers grabbing it from the air and putting onto her back again. "Nice throw." she commented.
"I guess everything is coming up Jaune!" Jaune walked with pride, though he stepped in slightly-the-wrong-way, pressing a button on the remote in his pocket.
The button caused a training dummy to shoot up from the ground under him, its head giving him a head-butt in the... well... the butt.
Faceplanting immediately afterwards, he resigned to never say something like that again, and stood up, turning around and punching the target's head off to dismiss it.
"Okay, I don't like everything coming up Jaune." the swordsman groaned, earning a laugh from Pyrrha.
The pair walked through the halls, finding their way to the dining hall.
It was a massive room, the whole castle was surprisingly gigantic on the inside, especially the training fields, which were about a quarter mile across, and dodecagonal in shape.
The three tables could sit about one hundred ponies on both sides, and two on each end, with a smaller table for the princesses and twenty four of their chosen dinner-mates, if they had any, that is.
Six hundred and twelve soldiers of all shapes and sizes sat in the dining hall, the other nine humans sat at the princesses' personal 'two dozen' table.
Along with team RWBY, the N and R of team JNPR, Qrow, Glynda, and Ozpin, the element bearers were there, and a young orange pegasus as well, speaking lividly to Ozpin.
"It's kind of sad that Applebloom and Sweetie Belle didn't get to stay, but maybe the next time they see me, I'll have an awesome cutie mark to show them." Scootaloo gave a bright, flashy smile, so happy at the simple thoughts.
"Well, they lacked armaments and training, they did not have the requisites to join us, but don't worry, I'll make sure you can write to them or something." Ozpin had a small smile, to him, Scootaloo was just so dang cute.
"Right, I'm lucky then, my brother is in the army, part of the Lunar Watch, and he sent me pieces of my weapon, he called it the Archangel's Smite, because it has a cool magic thing in it." Scootaloo hit a tiny button on the large revolver, the metal seemed to ice over, the silver finish looking like pearl when it was done. It was charged with a rune that activated holy magic, smiting her foes with bolts of divine retribution.
"So *nom*, speaking of *nom* your brother, is he *nom* in the room?" Ozpin asked between bites of the delicious, hearty meal prepared by the castle chefs. He looked at the revolver closer, seeing that the handle was made of a violet colored wood.
"Yeah, he's sitting over there, next to his friend Sparkles, my bro's name is Evening Warden." Scootaloo pointed out the scarlet coated stallion with the blue mane, putting away her weapon into it's saddlebag-style-holster.
"Funny, those two were the only ones to pass the weapons knowledge test, do you know how?" the professor asked in a kind tone, leaning down to eye level with the filly.
"My brother plays a lot of those tabletop games, like Temples and Terrors, and stuff, so he learned about a lot of stuff having to do with weapons, so he could play his games better." the pegasus reminisced her old memories, thinking about some of the stuff that the knight had sent her, a few diagrams of various weapons, poems, songs, some money, and more recently, parts of her own personal weapon.
"EVENING WARDEN, SPARKLES, FRONT AND CENTER!" the green clad man suddenly commanded, feeling that shouting was necessary.
A flash of light signaled the teleportation of the two soldiers to the front and center position.
"Lieutenant Evening Star reporting for duty, sir." the jack-of-all-trades of a unicorn said in a formal tone.
"Lieutenant Jeering Mareon, AKA Sparkles, reporting for duty, sir." the black maned pegasus gave the standard quote.
"Well, Lieutenants, you're both promoted to the rank of Captain, Sparkles, dismissed." the wise elder gave the order as strictly as he could.
"Evening, your little sister has been inducted into my legion of huntsmen and huntresses, she will be fighting as a soldier from now on." Ozpin drank some of his coffee.
"Scoots! Hey sis, how've you been?" the newly-promoted captain broke stature to greet his younger sibling.
"I've been good, bro. Hey, I got your gift, both of them." the orange pegasus brandished the revolver knife and the portal ticket.
"That's good, I made that just for you, an awesome weapon for an awesome little sister, rolled a natural twenty on my crafting check." the orange unicorn revealed, giving Scootaloo a nudge and sliding over a box labeled 'S&W500' and a book labeled 'Basics of Flying'.
"I would normally be reprimanding you for fraternizing with a citizen, but this moment is just really nice and I don't want to interrupt it." the veteran huntsman whispered.
"Ozpin, we need to talk." Glynda grabbed the old man and dragged him to the side of the room.
"Why did you have to rip me away from that, I was enjoying the moment." Ozpin reprimanded.
"Listen, you cannot seriously want to sign up a child for learning to become a huntress, that's insane, I could understand Miss Rose, because she showed great skill and potential, but this Scootaloo has shown us nothing, and she's even younger, explain to me exactly why you've made this decision and maybe I won't make you revoke it." Glynda put up with a lot from her old team leader, but this was what crossed the line.
"She shot a one and a half inch pattern with a fifty caliber revolver loaded with six shots at a distance of twenty meters in a time of ten seconds, at the age of twelve, imagine how much of a sharp shooter she will be when she gets older, and has more muscle and more resistance to the kickback of the firearm, I would say that she shows plenty of potential, potential that needs to be chiseled away at until it reveals the statue of prodigal skill." the Jagermeister explained in as much detail as he felt he was obligated to give.
"When she gets older?. David, how long do you plan on being here? You said it yourself, we would be here just long enough to complete our mission of destroying the source of the Sin as quickly as possible. Do you think that will take a long time? Long enough to watch a young, inexperienced pony bloom into a not-so-young and much more experienced pony? I thought you hated it here." Glynda used Ozpin's own words against him, so appalled that she even used his first name.
"Don't ever call me David. I have changed my mind, we may quite a while to go before we can clip this deadly flower at the metaphorical stem. I'm starting to like these ponies, so maybe I don't want to rush our departure? I say that when you hurry through life, you only get to the end faster. If you'll excuse me, Glynda, I still have some food on my plate, and I'm going to eat it." with that, the cane-wielding huntsman walked away from the wand-wielding huntress, back to his seat to finish his dinner.
Blake and Yang were making a bit of small talk, though it mainly Yang's monologue rather than a proper conversation.
"So, all those brawlers were really good, they're technique was a bit odd, but they looked really good..." Yang had finally stopped her half-monologue-half-rant about the troops, and now daydreamed about said ponies.
".... Yang, are you really thinking what I think you're thinking? Because if so, that's just not right, and you should stop making me think that you're thinking about that." Blake pulled off the semi-tongue-twister with ease, looking at Yang with a mildly disgusted expression on her face.
"Did you say something Blake?" Yang asked, snapping out of her intense thought.
"Never mind." the ninja replied, choosing to drop the subject rather than push on.
Pyrrha and Celestia were discussing tactics, they had become a bit close from all of the discussions they had.
"So, I've confirmed what Jaune's skills are." Celestia widened her eyes at Pyrrha's words, motioning for her to continue, "Brutal, unprejudiced destruction of the enemy, he even blocked Milo, however, he can only do it when he gets really angry."
"It's like the Hulk, or some other emotion based superpower." Qrow piped in from above, flying upside down. The maneuver was easy for ponies, but hard for him, due to bipedalism and the structure of his bones because of such.
"I saw you two, that shit was awesome, especially when he went all like, RAWR, and started breaking the dummies, breaking them, not cutting, breaking, like he was using a hammer, and that whirlwind that exploded some of them, and then you were like 'oh no, Jaune's out of control, I need to get him to stop, aaaahhhhhh I'm scared.' and you threw your spear like 'HIYAH, BANG' and Jaune was like 'You want to pin me to a wall? Not today.' and blocked it, but he still calmed down, and that is what mattered." Qrow paused from his childlike rant for a small wheeze.
Taking in another large breath, he began again "Oh man, Celestia you should have seen it. It reminded me of a training exercise that Port made up, he may not look like it, but he's a fucking genius. So basically, he said, 'LLLLLLLLET'S TRADE!' and Glynda was like 'What do you mean trade?', and Port said 'We should take some time to train with eachother's weapons, doing so while we're all still alive, so if one of us should be KIA, as it were, then a perfectly good piece of war-machinery won't go to waste', and I was like 'That is one goddamn good idea', and so we traded weapons. Celestia, you should see our weapons. Ozpin's got the Brewler, the idea is that his coffee mug turns into a mix of a warhammer and a poleaxe. That is smart, that is really smart, for real, Glynda's magic wand of a riding crop is called the 'Disciplinary Action-Scene', that's just really a really clever name, Port's weapon is a blunderbuss and a battle axe, so it was called the 'Buster Axe', like the legendary hero Claude's 'Buster Sword', and my weapon, is the Grimm Reaper." Qrow spun his staff around, opening the slot for the button, and turned on the laser blade. He held it in plain sight.
"Are you flying upside down?" Celestia asked, reacting to the most minor thing that the black-clad faunus was doing.
"Yes I am, thank you for noticing." the scythe wielder thanked, turning his weapon off and turning upside up again.
With everyone seated, the conversations were all over the place, from how magic works to the plans of where and when would be the best places and times to strike against the Sin, to more simple things like the weather and how good the day was for some people.
The past week since the humans arrived had been a tough one.
So much planning, so much paperwork, and the introductions, oh dear faust the introductions.
A very sensitive issue to start with, it only became harder, seeing as how they had many beings to introduce themselves to, including television broadcasts sent to Neigh York and Bearussia, a massive gathering for a speech in Canterlot, Ponyville had already been informed, messengers were sent to Vulcan Hold because the dragons were invaluable allies, and it was all very difficult to arrange.
The Sin had been quiet for the time being, which was good, as it allowed the bringers of the light to plan and calculate what they would do and by what means it would be accomplished with.
The candles flickered for a moment, before becoming brighter than before.
Nobody noticed this, even when they magnified to about five times the normal luminosity.
Weiss was the first one finished with her meal, and chose to excuse herself and retire to the quarters that were assigned to team RWBY.
<cutaway>
The heiress walked through the halls, which were lit by light crystals.
The crystals grew stronger and brighter when she entered, a resource management system that had been installed, when the light was below a certain level, and there was living beings inside the hall, they would light up brighter, through this method, magical energy waste would be minimized.
The crystals grew even brighter, however, to the point where they hurt her eyes, and they became brighter still, until it was blinding.
When the light faded to tolerable levels, the white clad fencer found herself standing on a flat cloud platform, surrounded by golden sky and the cleanest, healthiest air she ever breathed.
"Doppelganger transformation, Weiss Schnee, hello." a fancy, dignified, and very masculine voice greeted suddenly.
She whipped around to face a strange man, his eyes were red, his hair was bleach blond, his skin was a healthy tan, and his clothing was a fancy black tuxedo with a blood red tie. The oddest parts about him were the markings covering his hands and the dead-gray wings on his back, like an angel.
He was big, almost nine feet tall, and carried himself with enough dignity and pride to put a politician to shame.
In his right hand, he held a wine glass, which, despite him taking a large drink from it, never got any emptier.
"You are wondering who I am, well, some call me a demon, some call me a monster, but I am the bringer of light, the light that will burn the land to cinders, the light of the high heavens brought down to Equus, by the way, this human form is quite odd, but these fingers will be useful." the behemoth, angelic, humanlike creature answered her unasked question.
He had apparently satisfied his thirst, as he transformed his wine glass into a glass rapier with a very wide basket hilt.
"What is a man? A woman? What is any sentient creature? A miserable little pile of secrets and ambitions, of evils and goods. The most powerful weapon you have is choice. My choice is that I am done speaking, so ENOUGH TALK, HAVE AT YOU!" his voice turned demonic for this part, as his glass rapier filled with wine again.
Weiss brought out Myrtenaster, checking the dust capsules, they were all full, but no telling what this other rapier would do.
He was a demon of light, and he wielded the Blood of the Damned.
<battle time>
He was the perfect example of the idea that Light was not Good.
His weapon, a blood-filled rapier made of glass, was waved around, sloshing around the fluids inside with every sudden movement.
The pair started fencing, both attempting to strike the other while deflecting the other's sword, which was hard.
The glass blade broadened, becoming a Zweihander of a sort, with a blade almost as tall as the light-bringer himself, and about as wide as his shoulders.
Weiss stumbled, this was too familiar.
"Do you fear the dark, Weiss? Do you?" the demon taunted, swinging at her with impossible velocity, his broadsword might as well have still been a rapier with how fast he could maneuver it.
"So what if I do?" she countered, getting in close.
She stabbed him. Releasing a dust shockwave of wind, she removed her blade and used her skating skills to strike him with several slashes, causing massive amounts of bleeding.
"Hehe, those who fear the dark have never seen what the light can do!" the tall blond shouted, and brought up his hand.
Weiss backed off, trying to prepare a shield or some sort of spell, but she couldn't.
Clouds formed above, turning into pure light and striking down like bolts of divine retribution.
The white haired huntress-in-training decided one thing, she needed Sir Vacantus for this. Conjuring runes, she attempted to dodge both the rain of lightning-like beams and the slashes from the massive sword.
She failed, and was struck across the stomach, her soul almost depleted, she received a large, shallow cut. It wasn't very serious, but she soon began bleeding, and that was bad.
Her spell hadn't cancelled, so she continued it quickly, the symbols forming fast, it was almost completed.
A body length mirror formed, coming up from the ground and going past her, for a brief moment, she could see the suit of armor worn by Sir Vacantus.
It was a powerful spell, the Form of Truth spell, and it summoned one's inner demons.
And so came forth, Sir Vacantus.
He was practically empty inside, a layer of skin supported by nothing and protected by a hard, cold outer shell. His sword skills were sloppy, but he was very strong and quite nimble, despite his gargantuan stature.
The embodiment of Weiss's negativity and inner demons.
He swung his sword around, easily breaking through the light bringer's defenses and striking him, following up with a punch to the face and a grapple.
Punching the creature that was half his size repeatedly, only to be blocked by a hard-light shield that greatly damaged the metal fist.
Weiss went into action, slashing at her opponent rapidly, her knight pinning him by pinching his shoulders.
The unnamed blonde warrior did a front flip that practically oozed style, using his powerful legs to lodge his feet into Vacantus's eye holes on his helmet.
With a great display of core, arm, and leg strength, he compressed his form, and his feet ripped Vacantus's helmet off, severing the thin, black, leathery skin of his neck. Even though his body was a skin filled with emptiness and covered with armor, he was still as liable to die as a normal human.
Weiss watched in horror as her ally fell, his form crumbling to dust as a sign of her own hidden weaknesses.
Her soul went into overdrive, she sped up, slicing her foe almost a hundred times in twenty seconds, and finishing him off with a armored fist punch to the face, lacerating a large patch of skin down across his right eye and a final stroke-slash.
Said stroke-slash made her blade pass through his body like she had sliced through thin air.
He smiled, coughing a few times before turning to her.
"Well done, but I'm not dying until there's no way for me to live, you were simply divine in your for-AGH!" he cried out in pain as the blood caught up to his head wound.
Wiping away the orange, bile-like substance, his visage turned to one of rage.
"My face, my beautiful, unmarred face is unmarred no longer, you will pay for this, Weiss Schnee, you will pay justly and with great pain, I shall take your eye as you have taken mine, for I am the true king of the land, and I will burn everything that stands in my way with my holy light!" the prideful bastard flew off, his wings functional despite their ragged, rotting appearance.
The cloud arena faded, leaving Weiss in the hallway, holding onto her stomach as she bled from the large, horizontal wound.
Sparkles, the newly promoted Captain, happened to be walking down the hall at the time, and he turned around as he heard her hit the ground.
"Oh dear son of Celestia, that's bad, that's really bad, don't worry, just try to stay still and calm and I'll get you to the medical bay." the black maned stallion assured, getting a bit frazzled and panicked at her wounds.
He picked her up bridal style and flew as fast as he could to the medical ward.
<battle end>
Weiss had been bandaged up and administered some morphine to ease the pain.
When she finally woke up the next morning, the pale skinned girl looked around, the smell of antiseptics and metal tools immediately told her where she was.
On the table next to her, she saw a plate with a few cookies on it, with a note on top.
Picking up the note, she was surprised when the paper started speaking.
Hey Weiss, I got you some cookies to help you feel better. I'm sorry about what happened, even though it wasn't my fault, but don't worry, you have us, and we'll find the jerk who did this and BREAK HIS LEGS!!!!, sorry, Nora tried to get in on my note, I should stop speaking out loud when I write, but like I said, don't worry. We have your back, so you're not alone on this. - Ruby and Nora
Weiss read the note a few more times, her eyes kept drifting to the three words that seemed to stand out the most.
"You're not alone." she looked forward blankly, then up to the ceiling, then down to the floor.
She smiled, she wasn't alone.
She wasn't alone anymore.
She could feel Sir Vacantus inside her soul, the demon of a knight weakened as she felt better about herself.
Standing up, she walked with a more honest pride than before, leaving the medical bay to see her teammates.
No, they were more than her teammates...
...They were her friends.
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Yes, a 12 year old filly who has only recently learned how to fly is wielding the most powerful production-line handgun in the world and is going to help fight monsters, this is not a joke.
She's also guarding the peace for this chapter.
She's excited, she's got her flight goggles, her sunglasses, her wings are preened and ready to soar.
fc07.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2012/221/9/d/grown_up_scootaloo_by_asdflove-d5ag47d.png
allmystery.de/i/t3509a0_scootaloo___deal_with_it_by_austiniousi-.png
images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130321182954/mlp/es/images/thumb/e/e9/Scootaloo_needs_to_practice_more_by_splintered_pencil-d4g4xt9.png/500px-Scootaloo_needs_to_practice_more_by_splintered_pencil-d4g4xt9.png
And to top it off, she's got this thing, which is chambered in .500S&W.
lki.ru/Txt2/105/Weapon/Main/knife_pistol_2.jpg
I'm just sending this chapter out, I hope it didn't have too many errors or poor portions that I might not have noticed or thought about.
I remember coming up with that as a quote in my yearbook, except I used "take shortcuts in" instead of "hurry through". Whadda coinkidink.
If someone DOESN'T get this reference, you probably either have too much of a life, or not enough of one.
3330119 this chapter is filled with references, though some are less obvious than others.
Like David, David is the first name of Agent Washington, the VA for Wash is also the VA for Ozpin, so I put that in, 'cause I can.
3329455 Holy shit, gunblades actually exist.
3329971 3330119 you 2, I like you 2, you commented about the chapter, now if only others would do the same.........
Impressive, the chapter has a bit of a nice backstory to it, plus including a small bit of the White trailer's opponent. Then you have the reference... a... very famous vampire reference.... why, just why....
Scootlaoo's in? Sweet, plus we now have a fighting force ready to kick ass and take names. DJ, HIT THE MUSIC!
3333819 because I CAN! that's why. and Sir Vacantus (my name for the giant armor, in case you couldn't tell) is now her ally, after she learned to embrace her imperfections and let them lead her to improvement.
With every lesson learned, with every step taken, Vacantus grows weaker, as he is an inner demon being drained of power.
3334996 join the veterans and make.... like....... team DOGS? .......... holy shit that sounds cool, that's my idea, the oldies get their team back together, and add in the youngster, making it team DOGS. David Ozpin, Orchid Qrow, Glynda Goodwitch, and Scootaloo
small spoiler, next chapter has a bit of weapon switch-up.
I know the creater o Rwby and I know he would love this fic I'm honestly surprized that monty himself didn't write this
3337280 you......... you..................... your praise, I.........
I just, I have one request.............
01.wir.skyrock.net/wir/v1/resize/?c=isi&im=%2F7408%2F75567408%2Fpics%2F3169752005_1_31_UlUh6IlY.gif&w=405
in the words of Parton: "aye laddie, yer words go straight to me heart"
My Little Faces When you said that;
3343196 That... that was perfect. I mean there really couldn't have been a better video for that.
Thank you.
This was the only chapter I had an issue with.
First off:
Why did they just now realize anger was Jaune's weapon when that was the exact thing that he used last chapter?
And if he even faked his transcripts, then that whole first battle against VOID is a lie to his skills.
Overall not the best chapter
3345804 in the first battle against VOID, the others were too busy getting attacked to notice much, and he doesn't really seem like the kind of guy to use anger as a weapon.
in fact, he doesn't really seem like a guy who gets angry at all, and plus nobody was informed of this secret strength of rage
he faked his transcripts, yes, but he ALONE lacks the skills to back up said documents
there is more to his fury than meets the eye, more to Jaune Arc the Fifth than Jaune Arc the Fifth
3353420
how so?
3354974 I'm trying my best here, but it's hard to do a big story like this, even though I have an idea of where I want to go.
I shall use my pony shield to keep the troll feelings at bay.
fc07.deviantart.net/fs71/i/2013/208/1/5/rwby__ruby_rose_pony_by_theunluckycat-d6fibhq.png
3356884 no hard feelings, here, have a Monty joke
images.wikia.com/rwby/images/2/28/Montyrwby.png
While I'm at it, here's another with crows
fc01.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2013/152/1/5/monty_oum_rwby_poster_by_overlordflinx-d67gucs.jpg
3356869 That is a GOOD pic of Ruby as a pony.
