Prologue
Or
What Qualifies as a Hero Anyways?

Every semblance is unique. This is something everyone is taught, from the earliest part of their education on aura. While this is generally true barring several famous exceptions (I'm looking at you, Schnees) it does not mean that every semblance is useful. For every person who can supercharge with electricity, there is somebody who can communicate with goldfish (terrible conversationalists, by the way). Some gain power when their aura takes hits, and others can find spelling errors incredibly quickly (which is great for papers, but pointing out an incorrect use of "hurt" in future indicative will hardly slow down a charging beowulf). People like that don't generally become hunters in the first place, and prefer to join civilian jobs, marry cute civilians, and live humble civilian lives, which is a perfectly valid choice if your greatest defense was your PhD thesis and not some valiant action on a grimm-filled battlefield.

Some, however, have the hunter life thrust upon them, and must rise to the occasion while surrounded by peers who can wield god-like abilities purely due to a genetic fluke. They still benefit from a trained aura, and are much faster and stronger than any civilian, but without a trump-card they could be doomed to a gruesome death when their training fails them.

This is their story.

Fawn woke up early from a fitful sleep. It wasn't due to Umber's snoring (though it definitely contributed); instead he was nervous. This was the last night he would spend in Haven Academy, and he didn't feel ready to leave yet. He and his team, FUNK, had just graduated yesterday, and were expected to sally forth into the wild world of Remnant to protect life and uphold the values of hunter-dom.

Plus he assumed women would love hunters, those dashing heroes whose stories thrilled pubs and spawned free drinks across the globe.

Fawn's partner, Umbra, snored softly on a bed to his right. The man was far too large for the bed, and his dark feet stuck out a solid foot past the edge of the mattress. Umbra was large, strong, and friendly which was the ideal combination to hold their team together (both literally and figuratively—he was quite strong). His semblance, like all of theirs, was completely useless, though after four years they had learned to adapt to situations, and became fairly well-rounded combatants, unlike those who relied on their OP semblances like a crutch.

At least that was what got them to sleep at night. Truth be told, they had never been strong contenders for the Vytal Tournament, aside from one time, their first year, the story of which will be told later.

Anyways, Umbra's semblance was body-hair growth. Thrilling, definitely, and the man could grow some amazing eyelashes in a flash—but fluttering one's eyelashes at a woman swinging a hammer at head height will at best result in a lighter concussion. At worst, the girl's boyfriend will hit you harder, as Umbra had painfully learned. His weapon was a massive claymore sword, which only he could use effectively, due to its immense weight.

Fawn heard Navy turn over in his bed, mumbling. Navy, who called himself "Nightraven", stuck out as an odd character on a team that could already (extremely) generously be referred to as "quirky". His semblance was to turn any clothes he wore slowly and inevitably black (though how much that was accelerated due to mixing darks and lights in the washer was up to guesswork). Because of this, the man had adopted a personality one could call "edgy", and wore his black clothes with pride. He also, to Fawn's regret, wore a trenchcoat and fingerless gloves with pride, and had only recently ceased to wear sunglasses indoors.

Ah well, small progress was some progress, and Navy wasn't a bad guy, despite his appearance (half of which wasn't his fault anyways). He consistently annoyed the professors for "ignoring the dresscode", when the grey trim of his uniform inexorably blackened (or, more reasonably, when he wore his trenchcoat in class), and as team leader, Fawn was well accustomed to defending his friend and teammate in the headmaster's office. Navy's weapons were dual katanas with room for dust charges, and he actually wasn't half bad with them. He was the team's most dexterous member, and Fawn had personally seen him dance around a frustrated attacker, etching away at the opponent's strong aura while taking no hits himself (until he parked himself in place to deliver a stunningly ill-timed taunt, and got knocked into the next month).

The final member was Keppel, a weedy man with fiery-orange hair (which made him look not-dissimilar to a lit match at long distances), whose semblance meant he always knew the exact time—in Atlas standard. Surprisingly, this actually offered the most utility among the mix that composed FUNK, since he could also act as an alarm clock. He was also by far the smartest member of the team, and was definitely the only reason FUNK placed in the top 3 academically all four years at Haven. Keppel was also a master at inventing new ways to use dust to get his entire team nearly expelled, and if Fawn had to guess, he'd say that Haven now hosted an additional nine or ten new rules and restrictions as a result of his friend's efforts.

Keppel's weapon was incredibly Spartan for a hunter, just a shotgun (with a bayonet, added after a girl brought up "use in melee" as a critique). The weapon itself, however, wasn't the special component. What rocketed FUNK into Vytal that one fateful year, was instead the ammunition Keppel spend hours and hours of his day agonizing over.

The Rise and Fall of FUNK
Or
The story of how a bunch of nobodies qualified for the Vytal Tournament

The day before Haven hosted its qualifying tournament, Keppel strode into FUNK's room, and announced that this year was their year to win the Vytal Games.

Navy immediately dismissed his friend as having inhaled too much of the mixing chemicals, and told him to lie down and rest, but Umbra was intrigued and inquired as to Keppel's reasoning.

Keppel, with dying sun glinting maniacally off his glasses, proffered vials to his teammates, each of which glowed purple in the sunset darkness. He giggled, and explained that within these was their hopes and dreams (he eventually got to the important component, gravity dust), and insisted yet again that these were the key to victory.

His plan was simple: most of their enemies were much more dangerous than they were due to completely broken abilities. When is it hardest to use those abilities? When you're being pushed face-down into the floor, with the effective weight of a mountain sitting on your back. The gravity dust in the vials were only a small fraction of what he'd managed to obtain (nobody asked him exactly how he'd obtained it, and really nobody wanted to know), with the rest imbued into shells for his weapon, and grenades for the rest of FUNK to use.

It was then that FUNK gained the hope that they could compete in the tournament, and each congratulated their friend on his incredible efforts, before descending into dreams of glorious victory.

The day of the qualifiers came, and their new gear performed as-advertised. None of their opponents could fight back against the technological superiority, and FUNK quickly rose as the dark-horse qualifiers for Haven. They were lauded by their classmates (or at least those not still bitter about the questionable tactics) as the ones who could claim victory for their school and kingdom. So, with great fanfare, they and the other qualifiers were shipped off to Atlas for the Vytal Tournament. It was a dream come true for the underdogs, and they sailed effortlessly through the first round, pinning all four opponents to the ground, where they could be hit by FUNK's weapons until they were finally ejected from the match.

Until those fateful words: "Those were the last grenades, guys."

The disbelief in their quarters could be tasted. Keppel merely shrugged and continued "that shit's expensive. I had to take out a loan and everything to buy the components, so I could only make that many. I was hoping to use our winnings to pay off the debt."

In the next round, Keppel and Fawn were crushed by a team consisting of somebody who could summon fireballs from the skies, and somebody who could teleport. And thus, FUNK returned, dejected.

Now that that's out of the way, we can return to Fawn himself. He wielded a shield and pistol (which he only added to his arsenal after realizing that he couldn't really do anything with just a shield), and blamed his poor choice on the fact that hunters were made to choose weapons at the age of 12, instead of when they had matured enough to stop idolizing fictional characters. His semblance was to always smell vaguely of strawberries. It wasn't a bad semblance, per se, and in fact he saved quite a bit of money on deodorant. Unfortunately, it didn't help much in combat, as they had never once encountered somebody who was allergic. Fawn stood at average height, and hosted brown hair and some dark purple eyes, which several of the women in the neighbouring dorms were fans of. One night, in their second year, a cute deer faunus finally approached him at a party, and they had retired to his bed. Unfortunately for him, UNK were irked by the sock dangling on the doorknob, and proceeded to listen at the door to clap and cheer immediately after Fawn had finished, prompting the girl to run off crying back to her room. Fawn managed to salvage the relationship, however they would always use her room instead from then on, much to her team's chagrin.

Umbra was immensely popular with certain types of women, and always found a way to get laid wherever he went (at the Vytal Tournament he was chased out of a female Vacuan competitor's room by an angry coach, barely escaping with his life). Unfortunately, he hadn't found his type yet, and was well on his way to becoming a cynical hopeless romantic, though he'd like to argue that his star-crossed trajectory began long before he first came to Haven.

His first impression was anything but, however, and he had enthused with Fawn about the wide array of "dating opportunities" that awaited them over their time at Haven. Navy's first impression wasn't great, but he made up for it by saving their lives during the entrance examination. Fawn hoped that the other schools were kinder to their inductees, and didn't throw them into a grimm-infested forest alone to form teams naturally like Haven did. Keppel had been the last person accreted into team FUNK, and had also coined their preferred alternate label, FKUP, or "fuckup" using Navy's last name. When confronted by the argument that there is no colour corresponding to "fuckup", he responded that it was quite colourful, and that for a society based off individuality, their freedom was being suppressed to an incredible degree. This immediately got him into the good graces of the rest of the team, though it certainly did a lot of damage to their reputation with the Haven establishment.

As Fawn lay awake in bed, memories danced through his mind, both good and bad. He remembered all the fun they had in this room, and wondered if the next occupants would be able to feel some connection to them, or if all traces of their existence would be brushed away with the dust and dirt over the summer. His poetic reverie was broken when Keppel sat straight up in bed and yelled.

"Hey, it's 6! Time to be up!"

This announcement was met with grumbled complaints, but everybody left the warm confines of their beds because today was going to be the start of a new adventure for FUNK.

After the Vytal incident, they had spent the summer working hard to repay the debts incurred by Keppel's ingenuity, and in the process had been given a shitty old car to make deliveries with. By the end of the summer, what was owed had been payed, and the source of employment had been raided by the police (FUNK had never looked too far into the details of the investigation). Fawn reasoned that the team might as well keep the car, however it sat idle in Haven's garage due to the exorbitant cost of the refined fire dust used as fuel. Finally, in their last year, Umbra had suggested that the team take a big road trip, off into the world, and had placated Navy's fears about money by suggesting that the team take on jobs as hunters during their foray. Navy begrudgingly accepted this, and the plan was hatched (though Fawn had a hell of a time explaining to his girlfriend, who was planning to go skiing with her team in Atlas, why he'd be out in the middle of nowhere fighting grimm right after graduation).

It only took them an hour to pack their final bags, and make their way down to the garage where the shitty old yellow car was waiting faithfully for them. They piled in, with Fawn behind the wheel (he'd drawn the short straw the night before), and started blasting the loudest music they could find from the tinny radio. The car rumbled loudly as they drove off, and as Fawn adjusted the mirror, he caught his last look at Haven Academy. Umbra, in the seat beside him, was dancing in place to the music, and occasionally he would sing along in an off-key baritone. Keppel was sitting just behind, with his unnaturally upright posture, and was staring out the window at the mountainside scenery. Finally, there was Navy, who was trying his utmost to catch a bit more sleep, the volume of his snoring rose and fell with that of the music suspiciously enough that Fawn suspected he wasn't really asleep.

They were finally off to be adventurers. And it felt right.