This literally just popped into my head.
Everyone thought Qrow drank because of Summer.
Now, to be clear, Summer's death did, in fact, royally fuck him up. Not as bad as Tai, but he wasn't married to her.
No, he drank because…
Well, it was a long story.
It was shortly after the four of them split up.
Raven and Tai still made googly eyes at each other, but a Grimm could see the abyss growing between them.
Summer… hell; she disappeared for a few months. At the time, Qrow figured she had some mission, but now…
At any rate, he wound up on a milk run to Vacuo. Job was simple; guard a caravan heading to Shade, and pass a message to the headmaster.
Simple stuff.
Then the bandits struck.
Huge group, with actual pointy sticks. They were confident, experienced, clearly done this a thousand times.
He cut through a few dozen before he hit a snag.
He saw the tail a while off, but with all the sand and gunfire he couldn't tell what it was until he was locking blades.
What he assumed was fur or skin was scales. Hard, thick scales that hurt when they slammed into your ankle while you were dodging a sword strike.
He spat a swear into the ground, but grinned. About time they gave him a fight.
His plan was simple. He flipped over, dug his sword against the base of the tail, and pulled, shedding muscle and scale just as easy as that ice cream monster Tai always loved. Qrow didn't really want the guy dead. Just scared.
It worked too, but then the leader of their little caravan insisted they carried the bandits with them. Headmaster whatever would want to see them, he insisted.
So, later that night, Qrow got a front row seat to the… lovely sight and smell of a regrowing tail. He watched as the slime coated muscle inched forward, followed by a burst of bone that sprayed god knows what all over his clothes, and then saw the skin ooze over everything.
All. Night. Long.
The caravan had enough whisky to service an entire ship's shore leave.
It was gone in an hour.
"And that," Qrow said, slamming his glass on the table, "Is why I started drinking."
His two nieces stared at him. Ruby looked ill, although that might've been the booze, while Yang just looked… bored.
He eyed her for a long moment.
"Blake coughed up a hair ball once," she said, and went to buy more drinks.