AN: This is an idea me and a friend, (PFCDontKnow) had a while back. Basicly introducing the concept of the Witcher into the RWBYverse if you will. Dom't expect this to have regular updates, as me and PFCDontKnow are rather busy with other projects. Anyways, enjoy!
Blake Belladonna didn't move for the longest time as the fog swallowed up the rest of the train, hiding the betrayal on Adam's rapidly shrinking face better than any mask. The day had been mild, and the sky clear - a perfect day, really - but still she shivered. This is what she'd wanted, wasn't it? To leave the White Fang behind, to bring an end to the fighting, even if it was only for herself? So why did she feel so...torn?
The White Fang had been her home for as long as she could remember. Their goals, their methods were hers, and she worked towards them gratefully, content in the knowledge that she was furthering the cause of Faunus rights. It felt right. Even after the change in leadership, and in doctrine, that hadn't changed, not for a while. She excused it, as being deserved, as necessary, as justice. But as the White Fang's actions grew more bold, more rampant, her justifications started to sound more and more hollow. She couldn't take it anymore; the cruelty, the indiscriminate violence...the thrill.
The Faunus shivered again. The rush of combat, the pride of knowing she was better, the elation in defeating her enemies through force of arms, their lives hers to decide. It sickened her to think she could take such joy in it, and horrified her how others could be corrupted by it, so bent on causing destruction they sought greater and more terrible methods of it. Was it only a matter of time before she, too, was consumed by the seeming need for conflict?
The painful screech of the brakes broke her from her thoughts. Looking up towards the front of the train, she stood up, not remembering when she'd slumped against one of the tied-down crates on this car. Fear at being found out warred with a desire to see what was going on as she remained rooted in place. Curiosity had barely won and she had barely taken a step forward when the answer leapt up onto the far end of her car.
She blanched at the sight of the leonine body, its fur a liquid black so dense as to seem like the yawning maw of the abyss, a long, prehensile tail flicking leisurely around almost absent-mindedly. Small bone-white spines formed a swept-back ridge along its backbone, separate pairs of larger spines sprouting from its shoulders, and a spike grew from each of its legs, its paws ending in sharp claws several inches long. The ever-present bone-white mask was patterned with red that streaked away from its nose, just underneath its burning red eyes, and a crescent in the center of its head. Long, serrated fangs grew out of the upper portion of its mouth, hanging past its jaw, even as it bared the remainder of its near-unnaturally sharp teeth.
A pack of Beowolves she could handle easily. A few Ursai would pose little problem. But this was a Direcat. Direcats were a notoriously vicious species of Grimm, unbelievably fast and incredibly agile. They possessed a heightened level of animalistic cunning usually found in older Grimm and a worrying habit of sharpening their claws on the Tiger Oak tree, whose sap acted as an anticoagulant. And that was just a single Direcat. And where there was one, there were always more, ranging in prides of anywhere from a dozen upwards.
Praying desperately to Oum that it hadn't noticed her yet, Blake bolted for the trees, just as she heard the Direcat open its mouth and roar. Risking a glance over her shoulder, she watched in growing terror as a dozen of the beasts peeled off from their assault on the engine and came after her. Pouring on as much speed as she could, she tore through Forever Fall.
It still wasn't enough. Only her heightened senses, enhanced even further by the adrenaline and fear pumping through her, gave her enough warning to dodge the swipe with a last-second use of her Semblance that threw herself forward and up far enough away from the Grimm to turn and properly face them, Gambol Shroud clutched so tightly in her hand her knuckles began to turn white. She couldn't run, and she wasn't sure she could beat them. But she had to try.
The Direcats paused as their hated prey turned to face them. The fear rolling off of it was palpable, and yet it still readied itself to fight. The youngest of the pride, in the center, leapt at the prey, roaring as it descended, claws outstretched to rend.
Blake cocked her arm back and threw Gambol Shroud, manipulating the elastic ribbon affixed to it as it fired, the blade arcing through the Direcat's neck, letting it carry onwards for a moment before snapping back the other way, the recoil adding momentum as the point of the sword impaled the skull of a second. Tugging on the ribbon to bring her weapon back to her, she grasped her sheath even as her pistol shifted back into its melee mode, and another Direcat leapt forward, its already-bloodied maw bared in furious challenge.
She jumped, swinging the sharpened edge of Gambol Shroud's sheath around to bite into the Direcat's neck as it landed where she'd been not a moment before. The Grimm yowled in pain and collapsed, even as she landed on one knee and thrust her blade out and up, piercing the roof of a fourth's mouth. A short roar was her only warning before she caught movement on the edge of her vision and she barely manage to block the fifth's swipe.
Blake cried out in pain as what felt like fire tore its way across her back, her Aura - already low after the fight with the Knights, and so much use of her Semblance - finally failing, bloody furrows gouged out by the Direcat's claws. She collapsed hard on her elbows, a look over her shoulders revealing the pair that had flanked her. Weakly, she managed to crawl a short distance away, the Grimm content now to play with their prey.
Her vision was swimming now, her breath starting to come in tired, short gasps. She felt woozy, light-headed. Her elbows gave out on her, the dead foliage on the ground partially obscuring her vision as she lay her head down.
'I guess…this is it…then…' she lamented as her vision blurred and faded even more, the wet warmth of her blood seeping into the clothes on her back. Her ears – both sets of them – barely twitched when the sharp crack like a thunderclap echoed through the clearing, the boneplate on one of the Direcats' head shattering as a half-inch-wide lead ball tore through it.
The remaining Grimm turned as one to stare in the originating direction of the noise, and it took them several moments to determine its source: a humanoid figure a couple hundred meters off, ramming a steel rod down the barrel of a gun. Replacing the rod in a slot under the barrel, he cocked a lever towards the rear of the weapon before taking aim and firing again, the roiling crack drowning out the sharp snap as the boneplate of yet Direcat shattered, the infernal glow of its eyes dimming as it slumped bonelessly to the ground.
The last half-dozen Grimm snarled as they launched themselves at this newcomer, who launched himself forward as well, a flick of his hand shooting an orb of light away from him in a wave, blowing them off balance and impacting the lead Grimm hard enough to snap its neck.
Slinging the rifled musket tight against his back, he removed a sword sheathed in an unadorned red scabbard from the same shoulder. The blade shone like silver as he drew it from the sheath, orange-red runes alighting along the blade and cross-guard. Blake's pain-hazed mind barely registered the figure as he cut down the remaining Direcats with effortless ease, almost as if he were dancing. Her last sight – and thought – was that his eyes seemed to glimmer a familiar cat-yellow from the depths of his hood…
PAIN.
A grating scream tore its way out of her mouth as her eyes tried and failed to open to find out where the PAIN was coming from. She shivered violently as she tried to push herself up, only for a warm hand to press her back down against the soft material that definitely wasn't the forest floor. Her chest felt tight and her back was burning and in painpainsomuchpain. Bleary eyes cracked open just enough to see a small bottle of greenish liquid being held near her mouth.
"Drink," a deep voice rumbled, "You're going into shock."
Blake didn't even try to fight as the figure moved the vial the last inch and began to pour it down her throat. He kept speaking, but his words blurred together in an incoherent mess. She was already fading back into oblivion before the vial was even empty…
"Wolves asleep amidst the trees…"
The crackling of a fire and the chirping of crickets was the first thing Blake's mind registered as consciousness slowly returned. She blinked a few times, clearing her eyes without making any other movements – less out of design to still appear asleep, but because she felt that drained.
"Bats all a-swayin' in the breeze…"
The shattered moon filled her view against the dark expanse of the night sky, the red leaves on the trees at the edges of her vision highlighted by the light of the fire to her right. The cold crispness of the air, the spacing between the trees she could see…Blake wagered she'd been moved higher up out of the valley. But which way; towards the city, or away?
"But one soul lies anxious wide awake…"
The low baritone notes finally registered in the Faunus's exhausted mind as words, and she turned her head to see the singer. It wasn't any song she recognized, and when she would reflect on it later, it sounded like a fairly macabre lullaby.
"Fearing all manner of ghouls hags and wraiths…"
The singer was an older man, maybe in his fifties, with a tanned, weathered face, salt-and-pepper hair cut short, and a close-trimmed beard the same color as his hair. A brown overcoat was worn over an untucked green shirt. A dirty white sash was belted about his waist, above black pants and tall leather boots, and leather fingerless gloves adorned his hands as he watched a small pot that was suspended over the fire.
"For your dolly Polly sleep has flown…"
The song trailed off as slate-grey eyes locked gazes with hazel as he looked up from the pot he was stirring. Without a word, he picked up a wooden bowl beside him on the log he was seated on, ladling what looked like some kind of stew into it.
"You're awake," he stated simply, rising from the log with a smoothness that belied his apparent age. Blake sat up and the soft wool cover she'd been under slipped off her shoulders, her eyes widening slightly as she realized she didn't feel any kind of pain in her back.
"How–" she started to ask before the bowl and a spoon was held out before her.
"Eat," the old man cut her off, "You need your strength, after that debacle."
Blake's cheeks flamed red at the blunt criticism of her fight with the Direcats, shifting from straight embarrassment to awkward humility as he threw over his shoulder,
"Didn't do half bad, though," as he made his way back to his seat. Picking up a thin branch, he began poking at the fire as he asked, "When you're done, you can tell me just what the bloody hell you're doing out here."
Blake tensed for a number of reasons. One was she was trying not to spontaneously inhale the bowl as a veritable wave of hunger crashed against her as she put the first spoonful of stew in her mouth. The other was that his casually-stated question caught her off-guard, which – in retrospect – really shouldn't have.
She swallowed a little too quickly, the stew burning its way down her throat. "I..." her eyes flickered over their surroundings, looking for something anything that could keep her from answering the question. "Where are we?" she decided on.
The look he gave her over the fire revealed exactly how unimpressed he was. "South side of Forever Fall; 'bout six, seven klicks north of Vale proper, as the crow flies. Don't dodge the question, girl."
Blake responded by taking another, more careful, bite of stew. The old man just snorted and went back to poking the fire.
"Alright, I'll play along." Pointing the glowing end of his branch down the valley, he spoke up again. "That was a SDC rail, know that much certain. No man alive foolish enough to try a hijacking way out here; means you weren't after the Dust it was carrying."
Blake tried not to shuffle nervously in her seat on the bedroll as she steadily worked her way through the bowl, eyeing the pot when her spoon scraped bottom. The old man saw the look she was giving it and smirked, holding out his hand for the bowl.
Taking it as she handed it back, he filled it again before passing it to her once more, commenting as he did so, "Means you were making a statement. I'm guessing you an' your boyfriend there were White Fang."
"He's not my boyfriend," Blake responded instantly, embarrassment and a small measure of disgust coloring her cheeks red. Adam was like her brother, for Oum's sake. The look on the old man's face made it blatantly clear he wasn't buying it, but he wasn't going to call her on it.
"The other theory is it's the Kingdoms you got a bone with, an' you were trying to make a quick supply run." Not getting a response from the teenager, he sighed. "Girl, if I'm right about that, you don't need to hide it. I haven't lived in Vale in a long, long time."
Blake hesitated, vacillating between telling him the truth or hiding it, when the full weight of his statement hit her. "Wait, are you saying you live outside the Kingdoms? How are you still alive? Not even the White Fang could survive long in the Wilds!"
The old man smirked smugly, and the air of superiority he momentarily projected more than answered her question. "Some call me Argus, now that we're actually talking to each other," he said, returning to poking the fire.
"Blake," she replied as she finished making her way through a second bowl of stew and starting on a third, "Blake Belladonna."
Several minutes of silence filled the air between them. Blake found herself consumed by her internal thoughts as Argus took the now-empty pot – he'd jumped in to help finish it off – and cleaned it out in a nearby stream. The old hunter came back to find the cat Faunus scraping the spoon idly across the bottom of the bowl, her brow furrowed. Grunting, he threw a couple branches onto the fire as he sat back down on the log.
"You can throw those on the fire," he said, gesturing to the utensils, "I'll carve more if I need 'em." He lapsed back into silence for a moment as she did just that, the both of them watching the carved wood glow and begin to burn. "So what's eatin' you now?"
"I don't know…" Blake mumbled, running her hands up and down her arms, "I just…I'm not…I don't know what to do…"
Argus hummed noncommittally, grabbing a hand-and-a-half sword in a plain red sheath from where it rested by a musket of all things, drawing the silvered blade and removing a whetstone from a pouch on his chest. "I was right earlier, 'bout you being White Fang?" he asked, drawing the whetstone across the blade.
"Was…" the brunette corrected, "I can't go back. Not even if I wanted to. Not after I sabotaged the job."
"Oh?" The scrape of stone over enchanted silver stopped as Argus fully stared at the young woman seated across the fire from him. "And what would bring you to do that?"
"Because…" the Faunus started, "Because I couldn't live with the hatred anymore…because I couldn't help but think that there had to be a better way to be recognized as equals." She stared into the fire unseeing. "Now, I don't know what to think."
"Yeah…" Argus muttered so quietly the Faunus almost missed it, drawing the whetstone across his sword blade again, "I know that feeling all too well…" Louder, he asked, "You scared, girl?"
Blake just nodded, no point in false bravado.
"Clever girl. Overconfidence'll kill you faster than any Grimm." Drawing the whetstone down the blade one last time, the old hunter looked up at the slowly-lightening sky. "Dawn's coming. Think you're up for walking?"
Blake nodded again, rising to her feet with a barely noticeable wobble.
Argus nodded with a grunt, sheathing the sword before slinging both it and the musket over his shoulder. "Best get started. We got a ways to go if we want to reach Caed Tor by nightfall."
They packed up their temporary camp, doused the fire, and moved on. Blake wasn't sure how long they'd been traveling – an hour, at least – when Argus spoke again.
"You wanna make a difference, right?" He looked over his shoulder at her. "Wanna do something with your life, 'stead of just moving through it like a drone?"
Blake nodded. "I want to show people that Faunus can be just as good as Humans; that we're not second-class."
A brief flash of disappointment crossed the older man's face so fast, she was fairly sure she'd imagined it. He nodded and turned back to face the trail. "I got a couple calls to make when we get to Caed Tor, then."
She couldn't help the curiosity. "What for?"
"One's to get you papers into the city," he replied, counting off on his fingers, "Well, two if Brewster's still drunk as a fish." This last was grumbled under his breath. "The other's to get your application into Beacon, seein' as the registration date's already past for the year."
Blake nearly stumbled at that, amber eyes widening. "Beacon?" she sputtered, "Beacon Academy?"
Argus shrugged easily, like he wasn't aware of the hugeness of what he'd just said, though the smile in his eyes gave him away. "I know a gal there. Blonde lady, nice figure, legs for miles."
She almost couldn't believe her ears. "Someone at Beacon Academy owes you a favor." It sounded insane.
"I wouldn't say favor so much as proof of embarrassing indiscretions on her part…"
