It was a warm summer day in 1998 when I said goodbye to her, The first thing I saw when I looked at her face for the last time was first her tears and then her eyes looking up at me in quiet desperation like she was trying to burn my face into her memories for the last time.

Pyrrha, the first girl I ever called a girlfriend, she was a full head shorter than me, her hair was cut into a short shoulder length bob, and she was able to rock a pair of glasses like no girl I had ever met. She leans up on her tip toes and kisses me.

"I love you, you know that right?" Pyrrha said holding both of my hands together to her chest.

I don't have the words to speak, in a hour my mother and I would be in our car driving away to a new town, and a new school. I hated the idea, I didn't want to leave, I was tried of moving so damn much but I knew the mom had to relocate for her job often, it was just the two of us after all, All we had was each other for the longest time.

Then two years ago we moved here, and suddenly I had friends for the first time in my life. I had people outside of my mother that cared about me, and I was able to care about.

I stared into her eyes, and wished I could see them the way others did, I'm told she had the most brilliant green eyes anyone had ever seen, but I only saw the world in shades of Grey.

I managed to free one hand from her grip, I wish I had the words to tell her how much I loved her, and after high school I would find my way back to her.

With my free hand I finger signed out a single sentence. [I love you too]

I've been mute since the age of 3...

She smiles sadly, and lets me hands go, honestly that was the only sign language she ever managed to learn in the two years we've known each other, I pull out the more familiar notepad we used to communicate with, I wrote out what I wanted to tell her the best I could with my hands shaking as bad as they were. "Hey, Nothing has to change Pyrrha, My mom said the internet at our new home will be up in a few days, and I know it's not the fastest was to talk, but we can still email back and forth, and Ren has me messing around with that New AIM program to talk over our computers."

I tore off the note and handed it to her, she read it and looked at me and said "I know Jaune, but... It's going really suck not having you here to hug and be with you know?"

My Attention is grabbed as hear a car horn near by and glance over to see Pyrrha's parents waiting to pick her up. I quickly write a note out "I know we wanted to go to high school together, and I promise I will find a way back to you. But please don't think of this as goodbye!." and handed it to her.

I watch her face as she reads the note, she looks at me and smiles a sad smile "I'll try not to Jaune... But, part of me feels like it is." is all she can say.

I pull her into my arms one last time, give her one last kiss, as she exits my life. What I didn't know then, was this was the last time I was going to see the girl that I love, Pyrrha Nikos, Alive.

The Truth is, my mom and I wasn't even moving that far. Just across the mountains to the other side of the state, but when your 15, that might was well have been us moving to the other side of the Atlantic ocean. the drive barely took us a day really, and that was only because my mom tried to make the best of it by stopping and sight seeing every chance we got, we took the roundabout route to our new home. Not worried about the gas. We stopped in a city that was fashioned after some, I think Danish Architecture. but it was all lost on me to be honest.

My mother at least was trying to get my mind off of it, the fact I leaving my life behind.. again.

My thoughts drifted to all the times I got to stand in front of a class, while a teacher read out an introduction for me "Hi, My name is Jaune Arc, I'm originally from Northern California, but I've been all over the country since then, I look forward to getting to know all of you, but I am also mute, so I ask that you want to talk to me, to please patient while I write out my responses to you."

It was all bullshit, the kids in the three elementary schools I went to never had the patience to wait and read what I was writing, and the kids in Middle School were all at that age where being different was somehow bad.

I learned when I was seven not to tell people about my color blindness... Well Ren thought it was cool, he said that it was awesome that I saw the world in such a different way from everyone else... Nora would just tease me asking it I could guess what color something was...

I let out a noiseless sigh at the thought of them, what I was loosing, and just stareed out the window until my mom interrupted my brooding "Hey tiger, you getting hungry over there?"

Without even looking I sign out [I guess I am getting hungry yeah.]

"Well that's good, I'm pretty hungry already, if we stop and eat here we can still make it over the mountain pass in time to get to a hotel for the night." My Mom said.

I nod at her in agreement as she pulls our beat up old Station Wagon into the parking lot of a nearby burger shop, the fast food place had the same sort of European architecture that the rest of this town was presenting, it was a real touristy kind of thing if you cared about that sort of thing, which I didn't. We went in and quickly established what we wanted to eat, when my mom asked me what I wanted I signed out a burger and fries to her and found us a seat.

As I saw down I looked around at the crowd in the dining area with us. Very few people paid us any mind, but I noticed a small child pointing at me while talking to their parent, I heard the mother mutter something to the kid about not being rude and staring but I picked up pretty quick that the kid saw me sign my order to my mother.

"It doesn't mater if the kid is different than us, that's no excuse to be rude.." I heard the mom say to her child. I held back a laugh, where the hell was that mom when I was in the 4th grade and that girl from class would bully the shit out of me because I couldn't speak.

Mom sat down with our food a few minutes later and we both ate in silence...

We made it to our new home the next day, the rest of our trip went uneventfully, and when the moving van arrived we helped the movers unload our few possessions into our new home. It was small two bedroom home with two bathrooms, at least I got my own toilet I guess, real step up for me.

I set up the bare essentials of my new bedroom. I got my bed in a corner that looked about right for where I wanted to keep my bed, set up my Tv and laptop computer I used to chat with friends online against a wall facing outside so the light wouldn't shine on my back when I was watching something., and waited for that promised day when the cable people would set everything up and I could pick back up where I left off with my friends.

It took almost two weeks for them to get our TV, phones and internet set up. It was pure hell for me, I wanted to get online so I could tell Pyrrha, Ren and Nora I made it here safely, I was bored to tears watching the same handful of cassette tapes I had around the house, mostly movies my mom Pirated off of HBO in the 80's when the Idea of a VCR that could record tv was a new and amazing concept.

I mean don't get me wrong, I like watching the old War of the worlds movie from 1953 as much as anyone else, hell it's one of my favorite movies. but it goes old quickly when that, reading my dog eared copy of the Dungeon Fantasy core rule book, and playing old Nintendo games are all I have to stave off boredom and that sense of dread I was constantly fighting when I thought about Pyrrha...

I needed to tell her I was okay, I needed to tell her we made it across the state safe.

When we finally got our phone and internet set up my mom laughed at me, watching how quick I was to get my computer up and running to get online and to finally be able to get in touch with everyone again...

I logged on to AIM, and... no one was online.

Mom saw my confusion immediately "Something up?"

I looked at her and signed out. [Well no one is online. You don't think they wrote me off for not being online to talk to them do you?]

"Your being silly Jaune, their your friends, you probably just caught them off doing stuff." Mom's tone changed "Like, for example, Not being cooped up in their bedrooms being all mopey!"

I put on my best hurt puppy dog face and signed out to her. [I've been waiting for weeks for this, I'm worried Pyrrha will be mad at me for not being in contact with them, I mean I didn't have an email waiting for me from her.]

Mom mom rolled her eyes. "While I do fully believe your going to make new friends here, I understand how important it is for you to stay in touch with your friends back home, I been meaning to give Samantha (Nikos) a call to give her our new number, I'll see if I can't get her to tell her daughter to get online after our call so you can talk for a while."

[Thanks mom] I signed to her as I followed her into the kitchen.

I watched mom pick up our phone and dial out to Pyrrha's home. My mom gave me the thumbs up when someone answered "Hi Samantha! It's Mina how are you?" My mom said in an upbeat tone of voice.

I saw my mom's voice scrunch up in confusion "Yeah, are you okay you sound upset, did I call at a bad time?" My mom shot a glance at me and shook her head in confusion, I felt my entire body tense up.

"No, we just got our phone and internet set up today, the damn phone company took their time setting us up here in our new home." Mom said to Pyrrha's mom "So your the first person I've spoken to.. is something wrong?"

My mom leaned back against the counter and folding her free arm across her chest, I just stared at her watching the tension in her body grow "Ye-yeah Jaune is right here, Sam, what happened?"

I watch my mom's face turn from confusion, to shock to sorrow in the course of a few moments "Oh god... I'm so sorry Sam..." I saw mom look at me as she started to tear up...

I sign out a frantic [What's wrong, what happened!] to her. I prayed that what I feared was happening wasn't, I begged god to not let what was I about to hear come out of my mothers mouth be true.

"A car accident... Jesus Sam... Yeah, I'll let Jaune know... I'm so sorry..." My mom said to Ms Nikos as she rubbed tears out of her eyes...

I felt a pressure in my chest, my emotions swirled, as my mom set down the phone, the dam finally burst and she pulled me into a tight hug as she tearfully said "I'm so sorry Jaune..."

If I had a voice, I'd imagine that the scream I let out would of been loud enough to have been heard in the next state, that Ren and Nora would hear it from home, that aliens in space would pick up up despite the lack of air in space... If I had a voice...

Instead, all that came out was a raspy exhale of anguish as my whole body shook my mom's arms. the girl I loved, the first girl I have ever really loved, the girl who was my best friend for 2 years and one of four people in my life counting my mom, to honestly put out the effort to learn how to communicate with me. Pyrrha Nikos, was dead. I learned it was a pointless random death, a car accident that took her.

And I didn't know how I was going to move forward...

So welcome to the first chapter of a new story, I really wanted to try and do things a bit different here, I know my other story "Dust Eater" is still going strong, but this was a story idea that, while I could have ran with this as a non Rwby story kinda easily, I felt like I didn't have the confidence to write it as it's own story. But it was an idea in my head that begged to get put on paper. I know this is about as far removed from a RWBY story as it could get, taking place in late 90's America, but I think you'll be surprised how I managed to work some characters in and try to stay true to the characters themselves. I went with the late 90's here and not say, modern day, Because that was honestly the time in my life that I went to highschool, and it's allways better to write what you know, especially when your writing elements that are completely alien to you. The story is Called "A Quiet and Monochrome World" but since Jaune isn't deaf, the world is not quiet for him, so who is the world quiet for? Well keep reading as I work on this and you might see pretty quickly.

Until Next time.