Disclaimer: I do not own RWBY or its characters. All rights go to Roosterteeth.
A/N: Hello everyone. I am excited to say that this is my very first fanfic. I had the idea in my head for a while now, but I am happy to finally post it. This is actually part one of my first chapter so hopefully expect the second part tomorrow. Anyways I do appreciate constructive criticism, and if you have any ideas for the story, I am willing to look into them.
Life is an interesting phenomenon. It affects everyone in differently. While some choose to embrace it and live it to the fullest, others reject and take it away. Some choose to commit to the service of others by assisting them in any way, but there are still those who suffer in silence, who commit their time to destroying life. The world is not divided into good and evil, there are just different stories. They can be the most feared person in the world or the most respected, but even they have a story, a reason, for their ideals.
The night air above the city of Vale was cold. The lights of buildings that flooded the street turned dark as the bustling shops closed for the day. Dust and smoke blew across the roads as the frigid air swept through the city. The city once said to be the most "beautiful and lively city in all of Vytal" has become a depressed, scarred land. And it was all because of 'him', the very monster who stalked through the night, slaying the innocent for an unknown purpose. But still, Vale continued to prosper and its people remained strong for the past six months.
They prayed for something, something that could save them from this ill fate. Those prayers may have been answered.
At noon, reports of a large, black dust crystal flooded the Vale Network. Dust has many capabilities. Claimed to be 'nature's wrath', human beings manipulated its properties and used them to their own advantage. This black crystal was thought to merely be a legend. Stories spoke of black dust crystals whose properties equaled to aura itself. The discovery of was enough to raise the spirits of the people, who hoped to heal the wounded and put an end to the menace that terrorized them.
The officials knew that the crystal needed to be guarded and studied. And so throughout the dark streets, light quickly flooded through as the roar of engines broke the quiet atmosphere. A convoy of ten or more truck, all heavily armed, raced through the streets in hope of reaching their destination: the Vale Science Facility, located on the outskirts of the towering buildings.
Finally after several minutes, the trucks filed through the gate of the large infrastructure. The convoy proceeded around the back of the facility near the storage depot. A scientist stood there waiting for the convoy to halt. He was a burly man, tall and distinguishable by his bald head, short black and gray beard and oval glasses. One by one armed men filed out of the truck, readying weapons for any incoming danger. In the transport vehicle, a large crate was pulled out by two other men. The scientist took notice of the number on the crate: 718. He would have to remember that number for later when the other scientists fetch its containments. He then noticed more movement in the back of the truck and was surprised at what came out.
Exiting the vehicle were four girls, teens by the look of it. Taking notice of each one, he realized that each one was carrying a weapon or device of some sort. A grin formed on his face as he realized that they must be the huntresses he requested for assistance in guarding the cargo. What he did not expect was the how young they were. Still, huntresses and hunters outmatched simple officers any day.
"Ah, welcome ladies to the Vale Science Facility." the scientist said with a grin, "I am Professor Jonas, the head scientist of this facility. You must be the huntresses from Beacon that I requested. Am I correct?" The four nodded in approval and Jonas continued, "Splendid. I have heard great things about you all from Professor Ozpin. But, enough said, if you would follow me please, I can fill you in on the situation." He may have been smart, but even he could not contradict the wisdom of Professor Ozpin.
As they entered the facility, he looked at the girls' shocked expressions. They were all staring blankly at the main lobby of the facility and were impressed with the bright, shining interior of the facility. Jonas smiled to himself at the reactions of the girls. They were clearly impressed with the facility. The group then proceeded to the main study room. The room itself was quite spacious for its large number of desks and computers, not to mention the vast number of scientists communicating and working on classified projects.
"So girls, once again I must thank you for your time in helping me tonight." Jonas said with happiness. "Now as you can see, we already have scientists working on the contents of the cargo you guarded. Today at noon, miners apparently discovered this mysterious black crystal in one of the nearby mines. They claimed that the crystal was the one of the black crystals in the old stories, so they sent a sample of it to us. Much to our astonishment, the energy from the sample matched its description in the stories. It was believe that these black dust crystals were able to give unusual strength to its user, as well as cure any illness and heal any wound. To have found such a thing is an accomplishment on its own."
One of the girls wearing a red cloak presented a question to another girl in an icy dress and white coat, "Have you heard any stories like this Weiss?" The girl named Weiss pondered for a moment before replying, "Yes, but, I never thought or considered the stories as true… at least until now."
The red cloaked girl then sent another question to Jonas. "Professor Jonas, if you don't mind me asking, when do you plan on continuing your studies on the crystal."
"An excellent question Miss-"he paused for a moment waiting for a reply. "Ruby, Ruby Rose" "Ah, yes, an excellent question Miss Rose. We are actually going to commence with our studies in a couple of hours. Right now we are preparing everything we might need to examine this excellent find."
Meanwhile, outside of the facility several men stood around the convoy. They kept their watch, frequently marching around the perimeter for any sign of contact. Everything so far seemed quiet, too quiet. One of the soldiers marched back towards the parked convoy. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but everything was just too quiet for his liking.
However, before he could finish his thought, he was lifted off his feet and thrown back against the earth. His vision was blurred; all he could make out through the closing fog was the spot where the convoy was parked. But there was no convoy. All he could see was colors of orange and yellow dancing in the spot where the trucks were. As he tried to get up, he felt pain in his chest and collapsed once more. He looked down and was horrified at what he saw. Lodged in his chest was a large shard of metal from one of the trucks that exploded.
Suddenly he began coughing horrendously; he could taste blood in his mouth. The coughing quickly got worse, staining his uniform with more of his own blood. White spots flickered in his blurred vision. All he could hear was the sound of an alarm and the shouts of his fellow men. Then, everything went white.
Chaos erupted in the facility. All of the scientists had ducked under the desks they were working at. Just a moment ago, a loud crash was heard and the building shook. In the corner of her eye she could see a faint orange glow protruding from one of the windows. She quickly ran over to the window and gasped at the sight. Over in the distance near the storage facility, a large column of smoke could be seen rising into the sky.
Professor Jonas frantically yelled into a comm piece he was wearing on his ear. "What's going on out there. What happened?!"
Static came out of the ear piece before one of the soldiers responded. "There was an explosion near the Storage Building. The convoy is gone. We have wounded!" Jonas cursed under his breath. 'How could he have gotten here already.' He knew that they only had a short time to reach the crystal. "Girls, I need you to go to the storage facility and get the crystal. It's in crate 718 in Section 22. Please hurry."
"You got it Professor," Ruby replied, "Weiss, Blake, Yang, let's go quickly." "Right" the other three girls replied in unison. Jonas watched as the four girls sprinted toward the storage area. "May God help us all".
Four men with pistols were quickly patrolling the storage area. The flashlights on their weapons illuminated the darkened room. One of them kept complaining, "Great, an explosion followed by a power outage. Talk about eerie ". "Dude, Matt, shut up. You're creepin' me out" one angrily replied.
The head of the patrol stopped, searching the spaces between boxes. He could have sworn that he saw something moving. "What's up, why did we stop?" another one asked. His reply was faint, "I thought I saw something moving in the shadows. We need to spread out more John, you're with me. Matt, Phillip you two search back where we came."
Not wanting to hear Matt complain the two moved up ahead. "Come on Matt." Phillip said in annoyance. Matt, however stood where he was, grumbling under his breath. He was distracted enough to not notice the blade that had come out of the shadows behind him. What appeared to be in the shape of a sickle went around his neck. Before Matt could react the blade was swiftly pulled to the right, and his body fell to the ground.
Phillip continued ahead, failing to notice Matt's absence. When he turned around to make sure Matt was following him, all he could see was an empty pathway with no sign of him. "Matt," he called out worriedly. A loud sound of metal tools falling to the ground startled him. "I swear to God, Matt, if that's you. This isn't funny!"
Phillip slowly guided his flashlight along the wall, but the thing that made him stop was the black hooded figure wearing a metal mask that suddenly appeared in his line of sight. The light of the flashlight reflected off his mask and Phillip could see the blood red eyes glaring underneath. He barely had time to yell before the figure charged at him.
On the other side of the area, John and the leader could hear the scream. A look of worry appeared on their faces as they recognized the source of the screaming. Without hesitation, they immediately sprinted towards the source. It took only less than a minute for a wave of disgust to crash on them.
In the middle of the floor lied Phillip's unmoving body. His body was covered in red slash marks, topped off by a few stab wounds on the side of his neck and in his chest. Surrounding his body was a large pool of his own blood. The leader recoiled at the sight, while John backed away, nearly vomiting at the sight.
The leader, noticing the movements in the corner of his eye, unloaded his magazine on the top of several containers. The black figure quickly jumped off the crates and returned fire. The leader dived out of the way, narrowly avoiding the bullets from what appeared to be two silenced sub-machine guns. John was not as lucky and was gunned down as the figure landed.
The leader managed to shoot one of the weapons out of his hand, but the assailant sped toward him and grabbed him by the back of his collar. The leader attempted to shoot him, but he was hastily thrown against a steel container, causing him to drop his weapon. He attempted to get up, but a gloved hand quickly grabbed his throat and lifted him up.
As he slowly lost his breath, he stared into the black eye slits in his attacker's metal mask. He could clearly see the flaring red eyes staring through him. The feeling alone made him close his eyes again. "Where's the container?" the masked man demanded dully.
"I don't know what you're talking about" the leader quickly replied.
"You know very well what I'm talking about."
"Screw you!" The masked man's red eyes squinted in anger as he reached for his waist and pointed the silenced weapon to the leader's head. "You are not in any position to sound tough, so I would suggest that you choose your words carefully and tell me WHERE THE CONTAINER IS!"
There was no way he would survive, so he might as well go out making him angry. "Very well then, go to hell."
Before he knew it, the masked man pulled the trigger and threw the now lifeless body to the side. He was about to walk away, until he heard a grunt from the other one.
John was seeing spots. He could not think straight. All he remembered was that the leader open fired and that someone landed behind him. John decided to try and crawl away, but he felt a boot press into his wound, causing him to scream in pain.
The person holding him down rolled John over so that he could face him. "And what about you?"
John was confused at his statement, "What about me?" he timidly asked.
"You seem to be in a lot of pain." He was right. Johns back and right side were burning in agony. The man continued, "I could end the pain right now. I can relieve you of this stress, but only, if you tell me where the crystal is."
John could say no, but the pain was becoming unbearable. Perhaps he was telling the truth. "Section 22, Crate 718", he said weakly. The man got up and pulled out his weapon. "See, now that wasn't so hard was it. Well, a deal's a deal." Before John could question him, the man fired a round into John's head, quickly ending his pain.
The masked man flashed through the areas before arriving at Section 22. Scanning the crate numbers he caught crate 718 with his trained eyes sitting at the top of a large stack. The man pulled out his two sub-machine guns and pressed the convert button on both of them. In seconds, the guns transformed into two sharp sickles.
Crouching down, he pushed himself up into the air. The two sickles immediately penetrated the thin crates before he pulled himself up. Landing on top of the crates, he regained his composure and picked up 718, placing it down next to him.
He flipped the sickles around and lodged them between the crate and the cover. With little effort, the sickles acted as a pry bar and broke off the top of the crate. Inside was a glass container with a glowing black crystal. The masked man smashed the top of the container and picked up the crystal.
"Finally" He muttered to himself before storing it under his black cloak. Now with his job done he could finally leave. This thought was caught short however. As he began walking across the top of the crates, a red cloaked figure appeared in front of him holding a giant scythe. He glared at the figure until he heard a female voice come from it. "Now where do you think you're going."