Ruby, Blake, Weiss and Yang all walked back towards Beacon from the Vital festival. They were tired, but upbeat nether the less for having walked and played around in the streets for seemingly the whole day with her team on this holiday. Ruby now with sore feet decided even if they were closing in on the school grounds she need to sit and sit now.
"Hey, why don't we take a break over at the bench there," Ruby pointed to a small wooden bench that could just barley seat four if they tired from the look of it at the far side of a small park like area with trees and walk ways on the east side of the grounds to the school.
"Awe, but we're almost there, lets just get to our dorm we can poop out there," Yang complained as she trotted a bit ahead of the group.
Blake looked to Ruby and then back to the school in the distance. "Lets take a quick break to catch our breaths and then we can get to the dorm." She finished in a thoughtful muse sound in her voice.
"Fine, whatever," Yang said shrugging and with deflated care in her tone.
They walked over and three sat down. Weiss decide to lean against the back of the bench, just tall enough to get her rump onto it and half way sit/lean against the top of it. She turned her head slightly to watch Ruby take off her left boot and start rubbing her foot and a relaxed moan coming from the younger girls lips. Weiss let her eyes become unfocused and started to scan area.
By now it was a very familiar site, where the four girls and trained and played and even fought real battles here at this place. She couldn't believe all four of them were going to be graduating at the end of the month. Hard to believe that the school was almost destroyed by Cinder and Ironwood nearly 2 years ago along with most of the City of Vale still reconstructing. Buildings destroyed, shops that held her favorite sweets or cloths that see liked wondering around in had just disappeared in the blink of an eye when the war had started. However as she had grown as a huntress she had also grown as a person. Where she would have complained to no end before, war changes you and your forced to grow up in ways you could never have imagined before hand. Sure she missed a lot of the material things that were gone, but most of all she missed the the people that were in them. Like the shop keeper where she and Neptune used to visit to eat sometimes on dates, or that dust shop where she would buy cartridges for her weapon. The buildings could be replaced however not the people in them.
Weiss showed a small smirk as an old memory popping up into her head as she remembered Neptune taking her for noodles for the first time and she complained the all date about how cheap and dirty the place was. A small tear formed in her eye. What she wouldn't give to just go back to those wonderful, wonderful days now. She slowly blinked and turned her head around for the others not to see the face she was making and started to look out over the sun set.
"Beautiful," escaped her lips in a soft whisper.
"It really is, isn't it." Blake proclaimed with a small all knowing smirk as the girl in white jumping a fraction as she didn't think anyone would have heard the murmur. 'darn her hearing' Weiss pouting insider herself, even though really she wasn't bothered at all by it.
Blake had turned her body while a leg still in front seated position on the bench the over curled up to her chest with her foot on the bench and her upper half now lay over the back of the bench with her elbows resting on the top and her chain in her palms. Right beside her While clad friend and teammate.
The blue now turning to a soft pink and yellow in the sky with few clouds to obstruct the view, made the evening quite relaxing, but somehow her teammate had a somber frown on her face seemingly lost in thought. The faunus gently elbowed her in the side just hard enough for the white haired girl to look down questioningly at her cat eared friend. Blake leaned her head against the girls hip and brought one hand from under her chin to rub the girls lower back. Blake couldn't see the small smile that formed to Weiss' lips but knew it was there anyway.
Yang wasn't paying attention at all to any of her three teammates. She had plopped down on the far end of the bench on the right, watching the cat sit beside her and her little sis taking the opposite end. Yang closed her eyes and started to swish her feet back and fourth just above the ground in front of her. Finally after a few minutes of hearing her little sis mumbling about her feet feeling like they were now in heaven, she shot her eyes open and leaned a bit forward to see the Red hooded leader since Blake was in between them partially blocking the view, "Hey we ready to go, I wanna actually fall asleep in my own bed tonight," Yang rolled her eyes as Ruby let out a sigh.
"But Yang... my feet," the silver eyed girl complained exasperatedly as she pointed down to her bootless toes that were at the moment only covered by a pair of long black and red stripped socks up to here knees. Yang got up and shrugged, "Sorry sis but I don't feel like waiting while you take your time to baby your feet to no end."
The yellow haired girl walked over in front of her sister and twirled around with a smile and squatted down. "Here," she put her arms to her sides and opened her hands. "Hop on, it'll be faster this way."
Weiss and Blake had now turned around to face them and both were almost at a giggle at the site. "I can't believe your offering your sister a piggy back ride," Blake snickered as Weiss exclaimed in her voice how silly she thought it was. While Blake would have agreed, it just so fit her two teammates she really couldn't mock them.
As Ruby hopped into Yang's arms and stood; so did Blake and picked up her team leaders combat boots as the blonde had started walking without a moments hesitation forward to the school. Weiss trotted to catch up and slowed to a peaceful walking speed when she evened with Blake who was off to the left and a few strides behind the two sisters that seemed to be sharing a mumble here and there along with a giggle from the other.
Yang started to turn west to head up to along the side of the building to get to the front entrance. "Hey, why not take through the arena side building?" Weiss inquired, it would be a bit shorter distance to cover overall.
"Oh, they finished the wing? Last time I tried going through the hall to the dorms from that end was blocked off still," Yang slowed to a stop and turned so she could fully hear the other girls as one of her ears was blocked by Ruby's check at the moment and couldn't hear well otherwise.
"Yeah, it's open. I took it as a short cut after coming back from that extended solo hunt Processor Port had me doing last week." Blake twitched her ears at the memory. She hated solo missions now, but knew why they were needed, at least for schooling reasons. She promised herself to try and avoid them ounce she became a huntress. She had Yang and Sun now, and knew she didn't need to be alone anymore.
The group started trotting to the side building that was directly connected to the dorms right across from it. The school had decided when the war had ended that expanding the school and not just rebuilding it would be wise. So the east side of the school which had taken the most damaged in the finally push of the war was actually fully torn down and expanded. Closed off a portion of the grounds and direct access to the dorms from that side at the time, but it was worth it in the end with new facilities. Too bad the group was not going to be around long enough to really use them. A full new training area was built and funded from someone close to Ozpin, but no one quite knew who the person was. Ozpin himself while he had been quite open about his past with the girls in his time of need, didn't ever mention anything about this however.
The girls got in sight of the door to the new east wing when about halfway between them and it stood what seemed to be a small court yard with a fountain in the middle, no more then 10 feet wide. The walk way the team was on went right pasted it. While it looked nice and quaint, it wasn't really interesting in anyway. It was all made of concrete. Very simple design and with a mouth in the middle that jutted out of the water and tipped back down at the top for the steam of clear liquid to flow back down from. They all started to walked pasted it, but then Ruby started to wiggle in Yang's arms.
"Let me down," Ruby shifted her weight and tried to straighten her legs from Yang's hands on her thighs.
"Wooh sis, settle down," She dropped her sister as had been instructed and turned round to see what the fuss was about. "Whats wrong Ruby?" Yang asked as she watched her walk in her socked feet over to the fountain and stare down at, then bent over on her knees right in front of it.
Almost in a whisper, "There's something written here, but I can't quite make out what it says." She took her hood off as it was casting a shadow over part of the wording now that the sun was in the midst of setting. "Here lies the soul of one never to be forgotten. R.I.P. Monty Oum. The Man Who Created Us." Ruby read. She felt ever eerie as she finished.
"Who created us? What does that mean?" Yang asked seemingly to anyone in the open air.
"No idea, though the name does sound familiar," Blake said as she pondered it.
The three girls stood behind their leader as she continued to kneel beside the letters etched into the small rimmed outside of the fountains lip before it curved into the water. They pondered for a moment, then two, however with no seeming answer coming to them, Ruby got up and dusted her knees. "Lets go inside, I'm sure we can figure this out another time." She stated every bit aware of how tired she was becoming. Knowing this would still be here after a good nights sleep.
They reached the door and went in, Blake still pondering almost to herself more then anyone, "That is part of the new grounds, but if it's an old name as a memorial to the school then you'd think we would have heard about it before now..." She let out a sigh that started to turn into a yawn.
….
Ruby was snoozing in her bed when she felt her shoulder shake. She kept she eyes closed. It shook again. Eyes closed tighter now. "Hey, Ruby awake up!" it was Weiss in an exasperated whisper.
The girl in she canopy floating bed opened her eyes to find her teammate staring inches from her face. She jerked forward out of reflex and the bumped foreheads.
"Ow ow ow,"
"Ouch! Geez, watch it dunce." They both rubbed their faces before after a moment Weiss leaned back in. Almost the full top half of her now laying in Ruby's bed as she leaned in as to not have to raise her voice any louder then needed for her leaders ear.
"Well, sorry-y, you should know not to do that," Ruby exclaimed squinting trying to let her eyes adjust to fully see the details of her partners face.
Weiss frowned for a moment then moved on as quickly as it had come. "Well I was in the library digging around a bit, and couldn't find anything so I went into Ozpin's study with the key he gave me before he took off after the war and found a book on this guy. You wouldn't believe it, it's crazy, he made the school!" She finished with big hand gestures to show the impacted she wanted without raising her voice to much. Didn't help though, Ruby looked confused still. The dunce.
"Um, Weiss I have no idea what your talking about... you know that right?" Ruby tried to say as gently as possible, not to upset her teammates enthusiasm.
"Oh, geez... the guy... you know, Monty Oum, the one in the side of the fountain," While she sounded more annoyed then anything Weiss just wanting Ruby to get what see was saying.
"Y-yeah?" Ruby asked more then said as her brain started to turn on for the first time since waking up digging around the memories of the night before.
"Well something was bugging me about it, 'The man who created us' it said, I couldn't get it out of my head. Something just didn't sound right. How would someone 'create' someone." she used air quotes with her fingers, "So I didn't think they meant literally so I went to check..."
"Of course they didn't," The younger leader rolled her eyes of how silly this girl could taking something like that literally. A giggle escaped her lips. Weiss growled and Ruby suddenly stopped.
She paused a moment then started up again just as enthusiastically, "As I was saying," The girl with while hair that flowed like silk only let down out of her french braid cause she was getting ready for bed, cleared her throat, "Seems this Monty really did it, he created us. I mean hunters and huntresses anyway. He's the founder of the school.
Ruby looked confused, "But I thought we read about that, wasn't it..." She had learned all about the history of Grim and the founding of not only this school but all the major training schools in their second year at Beacon. This was not at all it. It wasn't one person that did it, but the government it's self along with the Kingdom of Atlas that decided they would make a force dedicated to battling Grim and how they decided to create a schooling systems for children that wanted to start young. Also the people famous for that was not this Monty, but some king named Author or whatever of Atlas and the president of Vale at that time.
Weiss cut her off and while she did, put a hand over one of Ruby's as to gesture just to listen, "I know, I know, that's why it's not in the library. Seems this guy was the main reason for the schools to get up and running, but past away tragically right after this school was built. He left it all to his one and only son." She breathed and deep breath, "It was Ozpin."
Ruby's eyes widened. That was, that was impossible, she thought, her mind racing. "But how?" was all she could mutter out.
"I don't know. Seems Ozpin has been alive even longer then we thought. However what really gets me is why the cover up on the schools' founding. Why would they do that?" Weiss' face turned to a frown as asked the open aired question knowing Ruby didn't have an answer for her. However Ruby face just turned into a great big warm smile and put her hand that wasn't in Weiss' onto her shoulder, "Its fine, we'll just have to ask our former principle himself when he comes back. I'm sure he'd be happy to tell us. I'm mean he's never lied to us before now, I'm sure he had good reason from keeping it secret.
The smile of her leaders was infectious and found it's way onto her face as well. Slowly she let out a deep breath she didn't know she had been holding in. "Fine your right, your always right. We can asked him when he gets back." Weiss slowly started to slide back down off the top bed of their bunk beds. As she did she saw Ruby reach out with the hand that had been on her shoulder and rustle her hair. Weiss surprised, fell off the rest of the way to the floor with a thud and an "Ouch" landing on her bottom. Pride more then anything else hurt. She heard Ruby giggle from her bed.
A/N:
R.I.P. Monty Oum. You past too young and will be greatly missed forever and always.
I couldn't think of what if anything to say, and I never had a pleasure to meet him in person, but Monty was an inspiration to me, like so many others I'm sure so I created this instead of saying how sad I am right now.
I suck and writing but I thought this may be the best way to say 'Thank you' for being you, to Monty. I think he would want us to keep creating and trying for whatever our dreams are. So that's what I will do, and I hope all of you do too.
My Prayers go out to all his family and friends, along with all of Rooster Teeth.