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IMPORTANT AUTHOR'S NOTE

This fic has undergone a decent amount of editing, with chapters 1 to 13 being re-uploaded with various little fixes and additions (such as, for Volume 0, a clear indicator as to when the heck anything specific is actually happening in this narrative relative to everything else.

- - vol. 0: anomaly - -

"Everybody is identical in their secret unspoken belief that way deep down they are different from everyone else."
― David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest

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that stumble where the syllables combine

take depositions from a stranger's face

paint every insignificance a sign

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the weakerthans - (manifest)

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RWBY

30 days prior to Beacon

Thirty days! Just thirty more days until you start at Beacon Academy, for real, in your actual life! And yeah, maybe Cane Guy got away – somehow – but the police can deal with that stuff. You get to deal with being way, way too excited, wandering around Vale in the middle of the night trying to burn off the equivalent of a massive sugar high, which is fine by you. Part of you almost hopes another crazy thing will happen, like maybe you can stop two robberies in one night, or run into some other kind of stereotypical thugs menacing some innocent civilian! Okay, you're technically a civilian too, but only technically as far as you're concerned.

It's crazy how much of the city is well-lit at night, it's nothing like Patch at all. Where there would have been occasional streetlamps with their little pools of light, there are super bright holographic posts everywhere! You'd have to duck into a creepy alley to actually get anywhere properly dark. The only sad part is that it's kind of hard to see the stars, but you like to think that inside the kingdom's walls, the stars just line the streets instead of filling the whole sky.

That's what's still going through your mind – hey, it sounded cool to you once you had the thought, you're going to cling to that – when the last thing you actually expected to happen... well... happens! Or at least, it mostly happens; it's just that rather than a bunch of faceless goons menacing some innocent civilian, you've got some uncomfortably normal looking people doing it. Good thing you were keeping an eye on the alleys, you guess!

"Ummmm, I'm sorry? I don't actually know what that means, I just wanted to ask a few –"

"Oh, sure. Weird little mutt creeping around in the dark in this part of town? You getting ready to mug somebody, or what?"

"Yeah, that or rootin' around eating out of the trash. My dog back home does it all the time."

Whoa! Okay, time to maybe break things up here. You really aren't getting a good feeling from these guys, and the girl they're all three ganging up on – who's mugging who here, exactly? – just... she looks so tired and confused and nervous, big puppy ears slanted down and back, which you think probably means the same thing for her type of faunus as it does for Zwei. What kind of dog is she? Is that how it works? You don't actually know. She's definitely not a corgi, though. ...Dad had better be taking good care of him. He needs it without you there to sneak him cookies under the table.

It feels like this is a good time to dramatically clear your throat. This isn't as intimidating coming from you as you wish it was, but you have something else to take care of that angle, plus if things get serious you're still pretty much exploding with energy! Wait, maybe this actually is a sugar rush? You did eat, like, a bunch of cookies pretty recently. Oh, that's probably why you have cookies on your mind! That makes sense.

The guys turn around fast, and with a little more light cast on them you notice again that they're just kids like you, sort of, except probably a little older. With the way they move, though, like... wow, talk about wasted motion? Sixteen or seventeen years old is a lot younger than fifteen years old plus combat school! Other than that, though, if you saw them hanging around Signal, you wouldn't bat an eye. Somehow that makes you feel kind of gross and crawly inside. It sucks that jerks don't have to wear badges or uniforms or something, that would make life a lot easier. Maybe the badge could have a big frowny face on it? That's too simple, though, you're gonna have to get a pencil and some paper and brainstorm something later.

"What, you got a problem?" Aww, he thinks he's a threat! Civilians are like angry little crabs, sometimes. They're all snappy and they have claws but somehow they can't tell they fit in the palm of your hand and the worst they can do is pinch you a little. Wait, civilians don't actually have claws. No, double wait, some of them probably do have claws! Ooh, can you tell that stuff just by looking? If you could you think you would've by now, but then again, maybe not. There weren't really very many faunus living in Patch, and you were always busy paying attention to bullets and other not-alive stuff.

With a symphony of clicks and clanks and one sharp thump from puncturing the alley's concrete floor, Crescent Rose answers for you. Everyone freezes. You give them a few seconds to let it sink in, and when the guy in front just takes one slow step back, you chamber a round and let the unmistakable chh-chhk! noise do the rest of the talking. It turns out to be a really short conversation! Maybe you should solve more situations with weaponry. No, that probably only works if you're Uncle Qrow, he always seems to get away with stuff he shouldn't. Would that work if he was there with you, though? Whenever he's around, you start getting away with a little more, too... Once you can't see any of the jerks anymore, you just let the scythe fold back up and slot her comfortably behind your back. The faunus girl is watching you, bright green eyes all wide in the dark.

"Uh... hi! Those guys didn't like, hurt you or anything, did they?" She shakes her head and goes right back to staring, although you sort of feel like she's looking through you and not at you. It's kind of awkward, which is fine! You're pretty used to awkward... buuuut actually the look in her eyes is making it super awkward, so you try to fill the weird silence as fast as possible. "Um... my name's Ruby! How about... you?" Oh man, you are soterrible at this.

"... what caliber is the gun part oh, um! Sorry, I mean... I'm Jade! Nice to meet you."

".50 caliber jacketed with a high-impact propellant ratio and um – I mean..." oh god you are such a nerd, how does this always happen... wait, but didn't she just ask? Nobody does that! Well, a few times at school, sure, but people at Signal never seem to take things seriously enough. You barely have time to process this when she steps in way too close and –

"And the rifling?!" Holy cow okay personal space would be great right about now but –

"Aaah cold-forged octagonal! I mean I know it's like, more expensive when I can't really fall back on lead-based ammo but I always carry a lot of rounds anyway, and what if I'm out in the field for a long time or, or, you know, plus it just helps with the whole high-impact idea which is kind of important to my whole fighting style –"

"Ugh, yes," she says, and you feel like an even bigger dork until she finishes the sentence, "and sometimes you don't exactly have a great opportunity to clean out the barrel, let alone deal with basic maintenance! It's one thing if you're broke, nothing you can do there, but with a scope like that I'm thinking sniper rifle so you really –"

"Need to keep things set up for minimum accuracy loss over time, I mean, I'm usually a sort of close range fighter but she's a rifle for a reason and when you're making a really tough shot you can't really afford any more deviation than whatever else you're putting up with, exactly!"

Silence. Oh man, you're tired, too, just blabbering away... And, oh hey, she's so close now you can actually just barely feel her breath reach your face. That's not uncomfortable at all, which is to say that it's incredibly uncomfortable but you're just going to let it slide unless things get even weirder. She doesn't have doggy breath, though! Just regular breath you don't really want to get breathed on by right now. Wait wait wasn't something important going on here?

"Oh jeez I'm sorry I'm a huge weapons nerd, that's really not important right now –"

"Oh jeez I'm sorry I just get super excited about this kind of thing, I guess it's not really relevant –"

If anyone asked, you'd tell them that you and this girl started giggling at the same time, but you're pretty sure the truth is you were ahead by at least a whole quarter of a second. Does that mean you win or lose? Can you win and lose at that? If everybody is laughing together, does that mean you'd all win by default? Oof, your eyes are starting to ache. She can probably see fine, but it's a little bit of a strain for you and you're all tired and stuff anyway.

"So... you want to maybe, not be standing in a dark alley anymore?" Jade – wait, was that her name? You think that was it, you weren't really paying attention – looks around as if she's only just noticed how bizarre this situation is, shrugs, and follows you out onto the street when you clear the way. In the white-blue glow you can finally see her properly and oh wow her outfit is cute, kind of a sparkly hooded black dress dealy (somebody else appreciates hoods, eat that, Yang) with a neat white spiral thingy on the front and striped stockings and actually she's kind of dressed super nice? Maybe that's just her thing, but it feels like she's halfway between 'good fashion sense' and 'thinks she's at a party.' Which is fine! It's a thing, is all. You are so far off track right now you're not even sure what the track was in the first place. That saying doesn't even make sense, if a train gets derailed it's pretty much gonna flip out and crash, right, but a conversation can get back on track pretty easy. That saying is about trains, isn't it? You always just assumed it was. What other stuff has tracks no no no wait this is exactly what you were trying to not do.

"So, um..." Well, crap. Now you have no idea what to say. Again. "It kind of seemed like they were picking on you for... y'know..." Where were you going with this there is no non-terrible way to say whatever you're trying to say, "the whole, being a, um. I'm really sorry that... I mean..." Why did you keep going anyway, awesome, Ruby. Perfect. You can tell just by her face that she's totally baffled by how you even exist.

"It's okay!", she says, and wow, her eyes almost look like they glow in the dark, no wonder her name is Jade, that's one of the most crazy intense eye colors you've seen. It's like when Yang's get all red, except you think Jade's eyes are in shiny mode 24/7. "I don't really even know what that was all about, to be honest! All I did was try to ask a question. But thank you for helping out! I kind of... don't have my rifle anymore?" She sounds so sad about that, like, really sad. Then again, you don't even want to imagine losing Crescent Rose, maybe it's not so weird. Plus maybe it was special in some other way too? Or not. Maybe. You'll settle on 'maybe.' "I'm sure it would've been okay somehow," you're not sure about that, personally, "but it was definitely nice to meet somebody... nice!" She thinks you're nice! Did you just make a new friend?

"Oh, it was no big deal! I'm just glad I was in the right place at the right time, you know?" You sort of laugh, but it all comes out shaky and embarrassed. "Speaking of that stuff, how come you're out here in the middle of the night? I mean I know why I am but I'm, well, me? I do weird stuff all the time, you know how it is." Ugh, of course she doesn't know how it is, she doesn't even know you.

"About that, actually..." she fidgets, her faunus ears letting a lot more anxiety slip than the fidgeting, you should have stuffed a few cookies in your pocket for later, then you could have given her one because she looks like she could really use a cookie right now, "could you tell me where we are? I'm not really from around here. I guess I'm super lost, to be totally honest!"

"Well, we're not really anywhere in particular, just kind of somewhere in the middle of Vale? I could maybe give directions somewhere if you want!" Wait, yeah, where are you? Maybe it wasn't the best idea to start walking in a random direction for no reason. No, that's always a good idea, look what happened this time! You just should have paid more attention on the way, is all.

She turns her head down a little, sort of staring at the ground, and you almost wish you didn't have a dog you love enough to have learned some stuff about canine body language, because her heritage is still just screaming 'lost and scared' and it's really really sad. She looks like a sad puppy and you just want to give her a hug because puppies aren't allowed to be sad! If you ever accidentally rule the world, you're making that a law. Jade finally looks you in the eye, like she just made up her mind about something.

"If it's not too much trouble, um... could you tell me what Vale actually is?"

... Oh. That raises some questions, honestly!

It must be obvious how shocked you are, because she almost instantly shrugs and smiles in a completely earnest way that makes you feel like a huge jerk even though you didn't really do anything bad, kind of like when Dad guilt trips you, except he does it a little bit on purpose and Jade probably just thinks you think she's crazy. Like, she might be crazy, you're not actually sure? But you're kind of crazy, too, so you wouldn't know, unless that means you would know. It's okay to be crazy, anyway. Yang's super crazy and she makes it work. Do you make it work? You really hope you make it work.

"... Don't worry about it, I'll figure things out! You've helped me out a lot already, anyway." And then she starts to walk away, and you kind of hate yourself just a little bit for not knowing how to react. You start to move to do, well, something, you haven't thought it through, but all of a sudden she stops again on her own, which is good because sometimes when you're not sure what to do but someone feels bad you just instinctively hug them and make everything all weird. "Actually, um, can you think of any places around here where I could sleep? Maybe a park nobody goes to, or... well, whatever works, I'm not picky!" She gives you a big smile, like she didn't just break your heart into a billion pieces, and welp, there you go. It takes you at most half a second to decide what to do.

You really hope Yang won't mind you bringing home a new short-term roommate, because it is totally happening.