I literally crawled from a Grimm pool to write this story. It's been a minute but I am having a TON of fun with this!

In keeping with the spirt of the show, I've tried to stick to its style and tone as much as possible, give or take a few flourishes for drama and fun here and there. This is going to be a pretty standard origin story. Team-bonding, lots of one-liners, plenty of RWBY-esque angst, younger?!Ozpin, and absolutely bonkers action scenes.


After Beacon

The feathers were the first thing she noticed.

They came down achingly slow. Black against the red of the sky around her. She bowed her head as they lit on the ground, her fingers slipping on the hilt of her sword. Beads of sweat lacquered her forehead.

There was nothing they could do.

She looked up at the beasts that labored along the field of stone. At the jagged peaks that rose in the distance they circled; at the pools of shadow their claws slipped out from, grappling for purchase on the bone-dry ground. She shook. Not just her hands. All of her. She thought of fire and the memory of it offered a warmth that did not spread far.

All of this had been so simple once.

Someone shouted but she ignored the sound and stared ahead at the army of black that was descending on them. Hopeless. All of it. She'd let the seeds of that doubt spread long ago. It had been blooming in her for years. And now she was here to reap the harvest.

"Raven!" She did not turn. "We have to go!"

She almost laughed. It didn't matter anymore, did it? None of it did. There had never been an escape. There had only ever been running.

And her wings would never take her far enough.


Beacon Academy stood taller than either of them expected. Its spires rose against the nearly cloudless sky, surrounded by a series of curling walkways under which stood groups of students thick with gossip and laughter and anticipation. There was an ease in the air.

Raven hated it.

She regarded the students with the same irritation she reserved for the more incompetent members of her tribe. And, often enough, her brother.

"Kinda…sprawling, eh?" Qrow came to stand at her side, leaning back with hands clasped behind his head. Raven quickly smacked an arm back to snap into his stomach.

"Stand straight. We're supposed to be proper huntresses."

Qrow gave a soft "oomph" at the impact and side-eyed her, exhaling. "Right. But we're still kids. Better we fit in acting like that. Too much effort and we'll look like we're trying too hard. Slippery slope, and all that."

"I don't think that's what that means."

"Eh." Qrow shrugged and stepped forward, hands re-clasped behind his head. Raven watched him walk towards a group of students with a casualness she found hard to understand. She did not follow him. Raven had spent plenty of time researching Beacon's teachers, its history, its rules, its heroes and well-regarded alumni. Qrow had showed little to no interest in understanding such things. His art of learning, as he put it, was to "infiltrate through camaraderie."

She studied the towers of the Academy, noting the designs she'd learned about, the additional wings constructed as enrollment had increased, the architectural flourishes that attempted be more welcoming for prospective students. It was easy to see this as simply a school. It was also easy to see it as more. She broke her focus on the towers and strode towards Qrow. He had made the group react to something and one of them—a girl in uniform—buckled over in laughter. He joined in before catching sight of Raven lurking behind. He nodded a farewell to the students and joined her.

"What'd they have to say?" Raven looked down at her bitten nails.

Qrow sighed as they moved along the road, hands slipping into his pockets. "Nothing. Asked where we came from. What school we attended."

"The basics. Let's keep a lower profile, Qrow. The less attention on us, the better."

"I dunno…" He glanced over his shoulder with a wry smile. "I think this'll be fun."

Raven stopped. She exhaled a long-held breath and turned to her brother. His easy smile fell away. "We aren't here to make friends. We aren't here to have fun. We're here to learn and to fight."

Qrow studied her. "Rae, we're allowed to play this how we want to, right? So let me handle things how I handle things, and you can handle things like you handle things. We agreed on that much. Besides," he thumbed over at the group he had just left, "they'll give more information when they like you."

"You're handling this like a joke."

Qrow snickered. "Because it is."

Raven shook her head and strode forward, ignoring him. They'd had this very argument on the way here. Multiple times. They'd had this argument with the Elders, at least he had, and Raven had had to shut him up before he'd earned himself, or both of them, a lesson in disobedience. He thought this entire mission pointless, the Elders thought it essential, and Raven thought it…unusual. It wasn't as if huntsmen and huntresses were entirely responsible for the tribe's raiding failures. But it was always better to go along with the Elders than not. Always.

Qrow gave a whistle at her side, looking up as they neared the massive statue outside of the Academy. A huntsman and huntress atop a boulder, the former raising a sword in proud victory. An ursa hung beneath, claws extended and mouth open. "Impressive." Qrow noted, arms crossed before his chest. He watched two students pass them, talking softly as they eyed the twins with uncertainty. Raven glowered at them and they quickly moved on ahead. Qrow shook his head with a small chuckle. "You're going to scare everyone away."

"That's the point."

He shrugged and walked on. Raven remained studying the statue. Carved almost a century ago by a somewhat unknown artist who had been commissioned by the headmaster at the time to accurately represent the Academy's mission. It showed its age in only minuscule manners, with some blackened edges and a slightly chipped leg of a Grimm. She moved closer to the plaques that circumvented it, all bearing the names of huntresses and huntsmen who had fallen in battle. The best the school had produced. Ranks she had no doubts she and Qrow could join, hopefully without the dying clause.

"Hey!" Qrow shouted. He held a hand out to beckon her forward. "Or did you just want to brood in front of that thing all day?"

She shot him a glare but ignored the jab and turned back to the statue. Huntsmen and huntresses. Heralded as the only ones standing between humanity and total annihilation at the claws of the Grimm.

Weak. All of them. Coddled in academies and knowing nothing of the world that had raised Raven and her brother. Realizing all too late that true darkness didn't lay within the Grimm.

It was here her brother and her would become heroes.

And it was here they'd learn how to kill them.