Rebuilding.
Summary: After 10 years, the War is almost over. It's time they look up into the future. After-the-War-AU.
Disclaimer: RWBY belongs to Rooster Teeth and the departed Monty Oum, may the gods bless his soul and may he finds all the UNLIMITED DDR-MACHINES in a better place.
Chapter 01: Jaune Arc - or kinda a Prologue
[12km from Mountain Glenn, field in front of an abandoned Dust mine. 11:23]
Jaune Arc had seen better day.
He dashed forward, diving under the swipe. The stone construct's arm narrowly missing his hair by a scant centimeter, instead hitting the ground behind him with a quaking smash, cutting a deep gash onto it. Using his own momentum, he rolled back onto his feets, just next to the Vargeist's forward leg.
Despite being only in his late-twenties, none would ever thought so at first glance. He didn't have the spring in his feets that many others at his age did, nor that spark of hopeful light in his eyes.
The motors in his right arm whirred audibly as he clutched Crocea Mors' hilt tightly, cleaving at the knee joint of the beast. He gritted his teeth as to prevent a snarl from escaping his lips. Without being reinforced by his semblance, the relic blade only dug a deep gash behind the golem's knee cap, failing to cut through completely.
The War had taken much from him, he knew. A fact that was reminded to him every day in more ways than just the bio-mechanical replacement of his arm.
The Vargeist growled in anger as it attempted to crush him with it's legs. The golem was deceptively agile for it's huge and clumsy look, yet he was quicker. Just as the beast's foot came down again, he had rolled sideway...
He was tired, but it didn't mean he was out, no. The fire of determination still burnt bright within him, enduring and unceased.
...And sheathed Crocea Mors into his shield. With a press of the button they folded into a greatsword. He grinned. The motors in his right arm heated as it went into overdrive again while his own muscles burnt with exhaustion, he swung the greatsword as hard as he could right at the gash he had created earlier.
The effect was much more noticeable this time. The Grimm roared in pain as Crocea Mors cleaved through completely, sending sparks and bits of stone flying everywhere. With it's leg servered from the knee-cap down, the golem lost it's balance and fell forward, crushed by it's own weight. Before it could attempt to repair itself or at least shield it's face, Crocea Mors thrusted down, banishing the Vargeist from existance. It's dying shriek hurt his ear, but it wasn't something he wasn't used to.
Standing next to the golem's cracking body victoriously, he still didn't let his guard down. If his experiences had taught him at least something, that was never to do so. For the moment, he settled with taking deep and steady breaths to regain some of his stamina. Now that the battle was over, the little adrenaline left in his blood stream quickly dissipated away, leaving him alone with the exhaustion.
"Ouch..." he groaned, stretching his limbs. The little bruises and sore spots he had gained during the last few days still hurt, and his vision admittedly had become a bit blurry. He glanced at his tac-scroll. His aura was almost completely empty - just like it had been for quite a while.
"Shit..." he swore. It might not had been the best idea to take on his tenth field mission in a row after all.
He looked to the mineshaft entrance behind him. This was one of those mines, part of the failed Glenn expansion project and thus was abandoned when the city fell and became infested with Spawners. Having recaptured Mt. Glenn last week, they were now securing the nearby areas, and clearing these hives was on top of that list, thus his personal accompanies of these missions. That, and him wanting to get away from paperworks. Still, after his tenth in a row he had felt a bit... winded, and had stayed behind to guard the entrance, making sure nothing can sneak in behind the team coming in - and damn lucky well he did so.
He pressed on his earpiece.
"B-13 come in." Some garbled statics came through his end. "I repeat. B-13, come in."
Still nothing - wait, what the-!
The earth suddenly shook under his feets, and a single second later from the tunnel entrance out came the hunter team. They sprinted like madmen possessed - and as soon as the last one cleared a massive explosion came from the tunnel, pushing that huntsman face first forward into the huntress in front of him, knocking them both to the ground.
"Holy shit! That was awesome!" The fallen huntsman - Braun, the team leader cracked up laughing. Only a second later did he realize who he was lying on. Or perhaps, what.
"Braun, my...!" Triste shrieked, blushing while the aforementioned huntsman turned beet red as he scrambled away.
Well, maybe with an added smack upside the head.
"Ouch!" "Perv!" "..." "Wha?"
Still, they soon all joined in mirthful laughter together. More like a quiet smile for the guy in pink, but still.
And... Well, except for him.
"...Do I need to know what happened?"
This seemed to freeze them right up.
"Oh-! Commander Arc, sir!" Braun hastily leapt to his feet and saluted him. "We found a... um... small cache of explosives that we utilized to level the hive...?"
Jaune simply gave them an unamused look.
Braun scratched his head nervously, while the other three awkwardly coughed.
"And, uh... we might have set off a dust vein. Or two."
He rolled his eyes.
"Think of something convincing to file in the reports when we return." He chuckled, in which they were only more than willing to nod.
Time to return to base.
The march back home was a lot less eventful, with only a few occasional wandering Grimm that were quickly dispatched. He walked a bit behind, content with watching them laugh, cracking jokes and bicker over the slightest details.
It brought a nostalgic smile on to his face. This was one of those 'green' teams, he could easily tell. Aside from the fact that he had their backgrounds, that they were still this carefree, and not just out of battle either, was a dead give away.
Something, regretably, might change soon.
A twinge of sadness coiled in his gut.
His eyes hardened. Only more the reasons for him to finish this war, so that the past wouldn't come to repeat again.
[The reclaimed city of Mt. Glenn, Glenn military base. 12:49]
Soon, they were back at the military base in Glenn, the team returning to their posts while he continued on back to the Command Centre.
He sighed. Time to get back to work. Logistics ain't taking care of themselves, even if he had the greatest team anybody could ask for.
Well, not that he needed the sleep anyway. Nor could. Too much idleness than he'd like to deal with.
"Commander," came a feminine voice through his earpiece, his lieutenant. "Someone is demanding to see you, sir. Saying it's urgent."
"Thank you, Miha, just... not now. I still have a few hundred forms to fill out by 15:00, 2 more missions by 17:00 and a Council briefing from 18:00 and I just don't have the time for another of those interviews."
"It's someone from your old team sir."
He sighed, massaging his temples "If it's Neptune or Cardin, tell them I will meet them later in my room."
"No sir, it's-"
He heard a small cracking sound of displaced air behind him.
"-your partner, Ruby Rose."
He froze solid.
Someone tapped his shoulder from behind.
"Copy that, lieutenant. Thank you."
"She found you, huh?" The grin on her face was palpable even through the link, before she cut off.
A shiver crept up his spine. Slowly, very slowly, he turned around.
"Hello, Jaune!"
And there stood Ruby, Crescent Rose strapped onto her back, her lips smiling a smile promising utter misfortune to the recipient...
"Would you care to elaborate to me the reason Cardin had to phone me -again- that you had been skipping rest?" She said sweetly, saccharine-like.
...as in, him.
"Eh..."
"Even if I had, explicitly, warned you not to?" The smile was yet to leave her face, if anything, it only seemed even more terrifying than a few seconds ago.
"..." he stepped backward, a nervous sweat forming on his forehead.
"..." she stepped forward. Her left eye twitched.
"..." he stepped backward.
"..." she stepped forward. Her hand closed up into a fist, a vein comically pulsing on her forehead.
"..." he stepped backward.
"..." she - her fist met his face.
'F**k you Cardin!' Was his last thoughts before he was knocked out like a light.
"Jaune?!"
A/N:
So... Yeah, that's the first chapter of this story (more like a prologue tho.) I've been gathering my courage to write this for quite a while (half a year...) and, finally, here it is. Yay! :)
Also, something else I want to say about this story is, it is going to be serious. Comical, humourous (hopefully :) ) at times, but serious. Not too dark, but it won't be easy sailing for the cast either. And already things seems to not bode well for Jaune at all. Exhaustion? Getting nailed in the face by *gasp* Ruby? And actually getting knocked out? Wha?
Well, for what happens next, please await chapter 2: Waking up.
See you all next time. And Cheerios!
-P
References:
+Miha: adapted from Czech, 'Mlha' meaning 'mist'.
+Triste: French for dark blue.
+Braun: German for brown.
Greatest thanks to Sandiiitos96 and PotNpaN for helping me write this story.
Edit: just realized uploading messed up the formating.