The first thing Ecru noticed when he woke up was that something was amiss, he was sure that the sky wasn't supposed to be as dark as It was, being filled with smoke, and he was also definitely sure he wasn't supposed to be waking up on the ground.

He was also hoping he wasn't supposed to be surrounded by burning houses and shopping stalls, and shouldn't have felt like he was just tossed through a window, and just what the hell that annoying glint of metal doing there, speeding...towards...him...

Oh...

He picked himself up off the ground, rolling to the side and twisting his body so that he could get his feet under him, regaining his senses just as the halberd wielded by an opposing soldier carved a piece of street out of the spot he was just lying in a couple seconds ago, noticeably chipping the blade of the halberd

Said soldier looked absolutely livid when he noticed previously mentioned halberd had been damaged by the carving of said street, tends to happen when the ground is made out of cobblestone.

He ripped the halberds blade out of the ground, dirt and stone falling from the blade as he rose it high, "DIE OBITUSIAN FILTH."

Ecru narrowed his eyes, "Good morning to you too."

Already, there was two problems that he had, the first being that as far as he could tell, he was unarmed, and the second being at the current moment he had exactly no recollection of why his city was on fire or why he was currently suffering from a case of memory loss.

The blood that dripped from this forehead and trailed down his face and neck actually was enough for him to piece together that last part. 'I hope this isn't permanent, I can still recall that I was supposed to be doing something really important right n-'

Another swing of a halberd from the raging soldier interrupted his train of thought, 'Aren't you a rude bastard.'

He smirked as the soldier made yet another telegraphed swing towards his head. Ducking forwards under the swing, he reached for the shaft of the weapon, proceeding to rip it out of the other man's grip.

The soldier's expression turned from one of rage to one of surprise, and then to one of having a metal plated gauntlet buried into his face as Ecru slugged him in the nose, throwing his shoulder and shifting his weight into the punch. It sent the soldier flying a good few feet away, laying him sprawled out against the ground, knocked out.

Ecru gave himself a once over, taking notice multiple gouges in his armor, another hint, it was coming back to him slowly, but it was too slow, but something kept nagging at his mind…

He had to get to the castle, and with that in mind, he broke into a sprint, swiping a sword off of one of the fallen as he sprinted down the street, he was a bit of a show-off that much he remembered.

The blade was surprisingly fresh, likely forged in preparation for the invasion ravaging the streets of the kingdom, the blade was still sharp and the virgin gleam of the blade looked like it had yet to take a stab at another person. The blades virginity would be taken soon enough.

Ecru took the time as he dashed down the street to take in his surroundings, his view was mostly blocked thanks to his elevation and so all he could really see was rising smoke pillars on the horizon the scorched city around him provided, he was becoming increasingly worried, most people's days didn't consist of waking up, nearly getting your head chopped down the middle while you tried to wake up and rushing through a burning city, and while he was forgetting some important details, he knew that what was happening, most definitely should not be occurring, yet at the same time, he felt his mind was running into a brick wall. Ecru's thoughts came back to reality as he came upon a turn in the street, he slowed himself and approached the wall, he was glad he did, he heard voices and the tell-tale clanging of metal against metal, there was no telling how it would've gone had he rushed around the corner and was immediately seen.

As Ecru turned the corner. There was seven soldiers this time, all wearing heavy plated armor, a bright white in color. The heavy armor would pose a problem if he were to engage, each of them were clad in a strangely familiar thick looking armor, all of them cradling blocky looking weapons he was sure he had never seen before, yet he was oddly familiar with them, he rubbed his temples 'I'm just overthinking things.'

He shook off the thought, one of the soldiers had glanced his way, and he ducked behind the wall he was hiding behind, and began to hug it tightly, as if it would somehow make him immune to sight.

He waited…

…

And waited

…

Ecru didn't realize he had been holding his breath, he gasped and took in a lungful of air, but it was then he heard the shuffling of metal plates, and he tightened his grip on his sword.

He steeled himself 'If I need to fight my way through a wall of metal, so be it, dying here is not something I plan on doing today.'

He took another peek around the corner, and exhaled in relief as he saw the soldiers had their backs turned to him, leaving in the opposite direction., he waited until they disappeared and took off in the same direction, he had the gut feeling that this was the way the castle, and as he ventured down the roads, the burnt out husks of wooden houses and ruined stalls turned into intricate stone buildings with more mechanical designs, even the roads themselves gradually became more decorated and complex in appearance, with occasional craters, deep gashes, and long scorch marks, but that soon gave way to more destructive scenery.

Ecru turned a final corner after making his way through the burnt out husks and rubble that used to be the stalls and shops of the market district of Obitus, In front of him, the plaza, and just beyond, the castle. Now that he was closer, he was able to take a better look at the castle, he felt a pang of sadness as he looked upon it, it was not untouched by the ravaging of the kingdom as he had hoped, like the rest of the city the castle resided in, it was damaged and slowly crumbling, the fires raging below bathed it in a light that seemed to be scorching the castle itself, the sight made him tremble.

Yet it made him all the more determined, he knew his time was running out and he forced out his distress and looked at the picture more objectively, he ignored the butchering of the land and focused on his goal.

He surveyed the area of the city in-front of him, taking a moment to calm himself and think, in the distance he heard the rapid snapping of what he assumed to be cannon fire. But... he never remembered cannon fire being so quick, or the blasts sounding so short, he leaned against a nearby wall, rubbing his temples in thought. So many things were swimming through his mind, all of them contradicting eachother.

'Wait, no.'

Ecru shook his head, forcing the train of thought to shut down. For all he knew someone out there was messing with his mind. Was it possible they knew about him? About his goal, then again, what exactly was his goal. He tried to remember, scouring his mindscape for answers, and he got…nothing.

"Argh, damnit, what the hell am I doing" Ecru scolded himself "I should be making my way to the castle, not screwing around trying to remember things that I can't recall." He felt himself drawn into thought again at his last few words, but he shook himself out of it.

He Had to get moving, the more time spent trying to recall memories trying to rationalize what he was doing, the more likely it was he would find himself blocked off from his goal. Whatever it was that is.

Ecru got back to his feet, observing the area, it was then he noticed the sun was up, and that everything was a lot greener than he recalled, suddenly the city around him was smoking nearly as much as he recalled, the temperature wasn't nearly as high as it was a moment ago, the buildings around him looked significantly more weathered and old, the scorch marks in the ground seemed faded, and the gouges ripping through the ground seemed also to be softer, as if it happened a long time ago. He snarled and shook his head again 'Damnit, don't think, just do!'

He started hearing the sounds of earlier, closer this time, accented this time by clanging metal and oddly familiar mechanical whirring sounds he was running out of time, if he spent any longer dilly-dallying around he would find himself cut off by Atlesian Knights.

Ecru paused "Wait….what?" he groaned, gripping his head. 'what the hell are Atlesian Knights, and why do I keep…Damnit Ecru, MOVE!'

Ecru broke into a sprint, gritting his teeth, the more he idled the more likely it was he'd fall victim to whoever was putting these thoughts into his head.

Oh if only he knew.

"There you are little bird. Come here to your cage, or maybe you're more like the lamb to a slaughter."

Roman paused. "Wow when did I become so morbid."

Roman Torchwick chuckled, scoping in on the distraught and confused Atlas soldier running towards their little base of operations. He considered taking a pot-shot at the man for some entertainment, mainly because he was god awfully bored. He'd been camping out with another group of White Fang in some old ruined kingdom called Obitus, Cinder had gone on about on a lecture about the stinking place, while she had actually explained to him part of her plan for once, which in itself was a big surprise considering how much information she normally gave him at any other time. When he'd questioned her about the sudden change of heart, he'd gotten yet another one of her annoyingly redundant responses.

"There was a sudden change of plans dear Roman, that's all."

He inwardly groaned, he was seriously starting to regret working for the woman, but he was too far in to back out now, and besides, if this whole thing went off without any further disturbances, he'd be free to do whatever he wanted again, he'd walk away with a very fat wallet, in fact he would more or less be able to fill a large swimming pool with all the dough he'd be getting out of this. His mouth watered just thinking about it.

'All those zeroes' he snickered to himself, it was too good to be true. In fact, it was in a way, here he was, a master thief, a criminal mastermind. Playing Lookout on the top of what was essentially a fancy looking pile of rocks.

He'd spent about four days camping out in the pile of run down rubble and stones, sure they'd already built a facility into the ruins of a decrepit castle by the time he had arrived, no way in hell he would live like a squatter in the outdoors, he liked having plumbing thank you very much. But that didn't make the place any less of a bore to be in. he took a moment to glance around, taking his eye off the scope of Melodic Cudgel for a moment. The entire place looked like it had gone through hell, around five-hundred years ago or something, the place looked absolutely ancient, and on top of that, completely destroyed. On the flight in when he'd initially arrived, the outside of the ruins looked a lot like a village that the Grimm decided they would pay a visit to. Something he saw a lot of a few years back when he was a hunter. Except in this case it was more akin to how Vale's suburbs would look if it was overrun, and if they were built around the large wall keeping the Grimm out instead of inside, he shuddered, he may have been a criminal but he wasn't too keen on destroying civilizations, or causing the wholesale slaughter of civillians. He actually enjoyed a functioning economy. 'Where else would I get my cash from' he thought.

But it was strange, behind the wall of the village, it looked like the Grimm hadn't bothered, despite the massive gap where he assumed the gate to the city used to be. Rather, the entire place looked more akin to what he'd imagine a place would look like if an invading army had decided to invade, the buildings looked like they'd been hit with explosives rather than rammed and torn into by Grimm. It was a pretty weird notion. 'I thought we were supposed to have been all buddy-buddy forever, hand in hand, against the darkness.' Roman shrugged, he chalked it up to human nature, if there was one thing he knew, humanity sure loved to fight, and he guessed the Grimm couldn't have always been the massive issue the current generations knew them for. Right?

He sighed, 'maybe I should've actually listened to her….' He couldn't say he wasn't at least a little bit interested in the history of this place...

He grinned inwardly laughing "Naaaaah."

He lifted Melodic Cudgel again, peering through the scope of the Cane-Cannon. the Atlas soldier from earlier looked pretty confused, looking up at the castle as if he expected something else. He could defnitely relate. 'Get used to disappointment, because this'll probably be the best you'll get buddy.'

Cinder was doing who-knows-what in the main room, she had very annoying habit of not telling him what she was up to, she just trusted him to collect dust, speaking of which. If all went well, Roman wouldn't need to bother going around Vale stealing all the dust again, he could be his own, free, semi-retired criminal mastermind, no more crazy girls with giant scythes, swords, lasers, or monkeys with shotgun-nunchuks. He frowned, recalling the absurd weapons the monkey faunus wielded 'How do those things even work.'

He was taken out of his thoughts by the sound of the radio he had hooked to his jacket going off "Oh Roooooman." Cinder cooed.

Roman blinked 'Did she just coo?!, something's certainly got her in a good mood. Roman only knew far too well how much of a rarity that was whenever he was aorund.

"Our guest has arrived, would you kindly let him in for me?"

Roman took a look down at the main entrance to the castle, "The Soldier from Atlas?" he said, raising a brow, a little miffed he wasn't told about it.

Cinder scoffed "Yes, now open the door."

The radio beeped a second time. "Oh and do make sure to watch out for any more Atlesians, they've picked up on our trail and are getting too close for comfort, I've also received reports of some multi-colored hunters in the area too."

Roman almost choked "What?!"

"Have fun Roman."

Cinder couldn't help but smile, she'd caught a lucky break, finding out about the ruins a good few months ago, and an even luckier break upon discovering what was inside. She was no fool though, some things were too good to be true, and if the information she gathered about Obitus was correct, there was going to be issues, the news of Hunters and the Atlesian military in the area to top it off wasn't improving the situation.

But despite that, she couldn't help but be happy, the solution to all her problems was almost right in-front of her. The Dawngate. A majestic artifact, which was essentially a dust generator, quite literally creating dust out of thin air, how exactly It performed something like this, she didn't know, and she wasn't concerned with how. She was so close to achieving a significant portion of her plan, she couldn't help but feel absolutely Joyous, if she didn't have an image to keep, she would probably be giggling like a school girl. She gazed longingly at the ancient mechanical sphere planted in the stone floor of the castle, It took up at least half of the room, and all along it, ancient intricate glyphs and carvings decorated it, they looked familiar to the runes pure Dust users used in order to cast spells, but at the same time, looked like the glyphs of the more advanced refined dust users, history and knowledge was in those carvings, and within the sphere, came the power.

One of the White Fang members approached her "Ma'am, "Knight" has arrived."

She smiled, things were almost going too well, "Lets do as we planned." She gripped the dagger behind her back, 'just a few more steps, and I'll be virtually unstoppable.'

Things were fitting together like a jigsaw puzzle, the Dawngate required a sacrifice, or rather, a soul. Or so the legends said, one of valiance and courage, a soul of innocence and potential. And as the door opened, the final piece of the puzzle was revealed to her in the form of a rather confused Atlesian soldier, she'd observed him for a while, among his peers, he was a natural, good at most everything, unreasonably brave, hopelessly naïve, perfect for the job.

Though she couldn't say she was expecting things to go perfectly.

Not even 10 seconds after the Soldier entered, and already her little trick was wearing off.

"My que-" the soldier paused mid-sentence, mouth gaping at the state of the throne room, it probably didn't help that there was computer terminals, wires, and multiple faunus wearing Grimm masks taking up the space. She had to move quickly.

"You must be Ecru yes?" she asked the soldier, she had to keep up the façade for as long as possible, her trick consisted of Deception, a hard to make intoxicant that worked with some psychological conditioning, in other words, brainwashing. The intoxicant worked in a few layers, if one performed well enough, the victim would be subject to false memories, realistic hallucinations, many things that allowed one to more or less play the poor victim like a puppet.

"Yes, what's going on majesty?" he asked, worry and confusion were laced in his voice, unfortunately the hallucinations were wearing off. "Who are these people, what are those devices surrounding the-" He trailed off, his brainwashing didn't include the Dawngate. The more things that didn't play around to the fantasy implanted in the mind of the victim of Deception, the faster the illusion broke.

A few of the white fang in the room snickered, others stared on, amused by the hapless soldier in the room.

Cinder sighed, she would admit, she was a little miffed, she thought she did a better job, evidently she wasn't very talented in the brainwashing department. The realization hurt her pride.

She was going to have to work quick, she didn't want to start chasing the soldier around the room once he became fully aware and comprehensive of the situation he was in. "Close your eyes." She ordered, to her relief, he did just that.

Without skipping a beat, she twirled the dagger in her hand, she glanced at it, the dagger itself matched the Dawngate like a set piece, the markings and carvings in the handle and the engravings in the blade looked the same, albeit smaller and rather neat. The artistic side of her sighed as she buried the blade hilt-deep into the neck of the man who was once known as Ecru.

Ecru's eyes shot open, in pain, disbelief, and relative shock. He had a blade buried into his neck, cutting off his ability to breath, and choking up his airways with blood, he managed to croak out "Why" as if it would solve much of anything.

Cinder decided to humor him "Because, you were very valuable." She pecked him on the cheek, and withdrew the dagger, eliciting a warm spray of blood to coat her wrist as he gargled and choked on his own life as it seeped away onto the floor, the blade itself started to glow, a trail of light emitted from the slowly dying body of Ecru, slowly being absorbed into the blade.

The glyphs and markings all over the blade glowed a brilliant blue, everyone in the room was transfixed.

The blade started to shake, trying to get free of Cinder's grasp, she smile and pointed it blade first towards the Dawngate, and let it go, watching as it satisfyingly buried itself into the sphere.

The sight that followed was utterly majestic, the entire room shook briefly as the sphere lifted itself out of the stone floor, wrenching free years worth of build-up as a result from ages of inactivity, dust and dirt rolled off the ball, forming a temporary curtain of dirt as it spun and began to glow, the glyphs and runes coating the massive sphere pulsing and glowing with a soft red light. Everything was perfect, she was so close, nothing could go wrong now.

"Nice light-show."

Except for the moment being ruined.

Cinder sighed in exasperation, that man had no tact "Roman what do you think you're doing." Her voice was dripping with malice, "Why aren't you keeping lookout on the roof."

He nervously laughed. "Er, yeah, about that. There might've been a little problem."

OOMPH

Everyone in the room twirled to the source of the sudden disturbance, looking at a group of shadows coughing in sudden cloud of kicked up dust.

"Damnit Yang, get your fat ass out of my face!"

Someone gasped in mock pique.

"I'll have you know that my ass is perfect, not that you would know anything about having an ass."

"Um guys, I don't think now is the best time."

Roman groaned. "Oh look it's Red and friends." Cinder whirled on him, glaring. If looks could kill, Roman would be going into cardiac arrest. "Got it, shutting up now."

"Um" One of the white fang near the gate entrance raised a hand "Anyone else hear that sound?"

Roman's eyes widened as he picked up on an audible but muffled beeping sound echoing throughout the room. "I'm just going to step on over heeeere."

The white fang member who valiantly sacrificed himself to warn his superiors was sent flying by a few pounds of stone door to the face, sending him, the door, and anyone else that was unfortunate enough to be nearby sent several meters across the room. Cinder winced as some of the debris from the blast bounced off the Dawngate. She exhaled deeply as the dust trailing in the wake of the doors parted to reveal that the Dawngate was completely undamaged.

A group of Atlesian soldiers and knights piled into the room, guns and arms clicking as they were brought to bear.

General Ironwood trotted into the room, a confident smirk on his face. "Feel free to give up now, you're completely surrounded."

One of the other white fang in the room sighed "Well at least it can't get any worse, Ow! What the fuck was that for."

On cue, the Dawngate itself pulsed a deeper more deadly shade of red, bathing the room in a red light, emitting a glowing red cloud from its inside as it split down the middle, finally opening after ages of being dormant and inert.

A bright cyan eye blinked into existence in the middle of the mist, making a sound that echoed throughout the chamber.

"Guardian: Initiated." A hooded wiry figure rose from the clouds, the silhouette within suddenly emitting a low hum as two bright cyan blades sprouted from what appeared to be it's arms. Roman was suddenly feeling very uncomfortable as the singular "eye" temporarily rested on him as it scanned the room.

The white fang that had hit the other groaned. "You just had to fucking say it didn't you dumbass."

A/N:

WHEW.

Can i just say, wow.

I can gladly say that this is my first real try at a fanfiction, and I'm not nervous to say that I think it's pretty good, it's nothing like what I had originally, it used to be around 7k words, but then I hit a brick wall as I realized there was a damn good reason people actually plan out their chapters, though i think I might've rushed it a little bit towards the end. Hope your excited for whats next.

I mean that and the original renedition of what you just read was really crap and full of contrived garbage.

(Some reviews would be great, motivation and all)

Second chapter should be up sometime in the next...er..4 days? (maybe sooner if i get a review) *Wink wink nudge nudge*