"Do you think they have any idea what they'll go through before they graduate?"
Ozpin looked up from his scroll to see Glynda staring out across the forest below them, fingers hovering over the screen of her tablet as if the thought had come quite suddenly to her. His brow furrowed.
"Some of them, perhaps." He took a step closer to her and bumped his shoulder to hers before he followed her line of sight over the treeline. Smoke curled from somewhere beneath the canopy, but other than that it was quiet. Lost in her own thoughts, then. "We can only prepare them to the best of our ability." Every year they had the same conversation, even if the location changed. He felt the same silent weariness deep to his core. How many of these kids would live to see twenty-five? Thirty? For those that went into the field to combat the Grimm directly the odds were never good.
Somehow he figured it was best to not think too hard on the statistics there.
"I wonder if we're not hard enough on them."
"You know that's not true." Ozpin tilted his head towards her, waiting for her to finally look away from the forest and meet his eyes. Her expression was tense, but when he reached his free hand to gently touch his fingers to her lower back he felt her relax the tiniest bit.
After a stretch of silence, she let out a quiet sigh.
"You're right," she replied, her voice almost a whisper. Glynda cleared her throat. "We just teach them everything that we can." His only reply was to splay his fingers across the small of her back and lean against her. The students weren't their kids- they never would be- but they'd been placed under their protection for their training and it was more than just a matter of pride to see them grow and succeed.
The moment had passed, however, and Glynda's gaze dropped back down to her screen. She had managed to remove the last traces of her doubts from her face, but Ozpin could see it lingering in her eyes.
"Coffee?" he offered, gesturing to the path winding back to campus, "We have time to grab a cup before they finish." She made a soft noise of agreement- the distraction welcome- and turned with him to walk back toward Beacon.
