Vale. Friday night.

The back door to the Dust shop From Dust Till Dawn swung open and four members of the Red Face gang came running out with a bag of cash. The small business was being robbed again. It wasn't a huge take, but it was enough to satisfy the street thugs.

Once they'd gotten far enough, they all stopped to count up their reward and high five each other.

"Hey, boys!" a voice called out from down the alley. Yang Xiao Long walked into their view. "Whatcha got there?"

The delinquents were immediately entranced by the sway in her walk along with her exposed legs and midriff. "I've got anything you want, baby!" one of them called out to her. Their "leader" immediately punched him in the arm. "Hey! What the hell, Andy?"

The leader of the gang ignored him and asked the blonde girl, "What's it to ya'?"

From behind them, they heard another voice. "That money doesn't belong to you." They turned to see Blake Belladonna walking up. She paced around them until she was at her partner's side. "We'd really like to see it returned."

The gangsters were realizing their situation. They started to pull out their bats, knives, and other weapons.

"You ladies must not know who you're dealin' with," the head gangster threatened them. "I suggest you two turn your pretty little asses around and forget you ever saw any of us."

"So does that mean you won't be turning yourselves in quietly?" the blonde brawler quizzically asked.

"Bitch, beat it or I will f*** you up!"

The two girls looked to each other and smiled. Yang turned back to the thugs and laughed. "Well, I was gonna take it easy on you guys. But after hearing that," she punched into her hand, "now we're gonna have some real fun."

It was a Friday night and Ruby and Weiss had nothing to do. The other two were out for the evening and they just sitting quietly on opposite sides of the room. Weiss was getting started on the next week's readings to be one step ahead. Ruby was lying on her bed playing with a small rubber ball and bouncing it off the ceiling over and over.

She was bored out of her mind. Her sister was usually the one with all of the activity ideas and she was gone. Zwei was out cold for the night already. And Weiss was… Weiss. For the entire time Ruby was lying there playing with her ball, she was trying to come up with the best approach to asking Weiss to do something.

Turns out, the Ice Queen beat her to it. "So would you like to go out and do something tonight?"

"Oh my god, yes!" the hooded girl shouted in joy. "I've been soooooo bored!"

"I could tell," Weiss said, closing her textbook and getting up to get her things. "And I don't think I could've withstood another minute of you sighing to yourself and bouncing that ball like that."

Ruby hopped down from her bunk. "So whaddaya wanna do?"

"Well, there's this orchestral symphony that I've been wanting to go to tonight," the heiress suggested.

The younger girl stuck her tongue out and made a spitting noise to voice her disapproval.

Weiss rolled her eyes at Ruby's childishness. "Or we could go see that new Surgeons in Space movie."

"Oh! I've wanted to see that movie so bad! The effects look so awesome!"

"Alright, calm down. Get your things and let's go. It's already late so there probably won't be too many showings left tonight."

Ruby put on her boots and followed her teammate out the door, throwing her arms into the air with joy.

Blake followed Yang up the fire escape and onto the roof, listening to her going on about the fight they'd just won. The blonde girl was still kind of against the idea of fighting crime at the beginning of the night, but it didn't take long at all for her to come around. And seeing Yang happy made Blake happy. She was smiling more than she had in awhile.

They both sat at the edge of the apartment building they had climbed up to catch their breath for a moment.

Yang sighed. "God, I've missed this."

"It didn't take long for you to change your stance on the matter," Blake noted.

"What can I say?" Yang shrugged. "I love being on the kicking side of an ass-kicking."

"So now do you approve of what I've been doing?" Blake asked her.

"Approve of you doing this every night alone? No," she answered. " Approve of you doing this sometimes with my help? I'm getting there."

"Would it mean anything to you if I told you I've been wanting to take on the Red Faces for a while, but waited for you to help me before trying?"

"Maybe a little."

"I'm glad you came with me, Yang," Blake said.

Yang turned to her partner and smiled. "I'm glad you invited me along. And that you're letting me in. The lone-wolf act was getting old. It's good to see you allying yourself with the rest of humanity."

Blake rolled her eyes. "Okay, Professor Ozpin. Am I going to get another lecture about it now?"

Yang giggled. "Oh sorry. I don't wanna take someone else's schtick."

Blake feigned irritation. "Seriously, though. Does he ever have those kinds of talks with any of you guys?"

"I don't think so. Goodwitch has gotten on me a couple times for various things. And Oobleck is always on about something. But I've never been called in for a- Oh wait! Nevermind. He did question me about Deathstroke."

Blake felt that wound creak open a little bit. Despite her best efforts to conceal it, her partner noticed that it bothered her.

"Sorry I brought that up. I forgot how much more personal that was for you than the rest of us."

"It's fine." she responded in her usual, closed up fashion.

Yang noticed that, too. "Look, Blake, you don't have to do that with me. I can understand it with Ozpin or Sun or JNPR. I can even understand it if you don't wanna spill everything to Ruby and Weiss. But you can talk to me about this kind of stuff. You don't have to keep it bottled inside. It's not good for you."

Blake instinctively looked away and avoided eye contact. But then she thought about what Yang said. After a moment she turned back to her partner and gave her a thankful smile.

Yang laughed a bit. "I guess you still got your Ozpin lecture for the night."

Blake chuckled. "You do it better than he does. Thanks, Yang."

"I do what I can," she said back. "So… anything you need to get out of your system?"

Blake opened her mouth to speak when her Faunus ears picked up a disturbances. From down in the streets below, she heard the signs of a mugging: "You look like a couple o' ladies who've got change to spare. What say you hand over your bags and jewelry so me and my boy here don't have to start taking things ourselves."

Blake looked to Yang. "Did you-"

"Yep."

"Raincheck on our talk?"

"I'll hold you to it."

The two huntresses got to their feet, drew their weapons, and dropped down to the streets below.

The two followed the sound of the disturbance into an alley near the closest movie theatre. They rounded the corner and were greeted with the sight of two muggers being held sideways six feet off the ground with the tops of their heads touching. They were encased in ice from their shoulders down and attached to the opposite facing walls of the alley.

"I'm sorry. What?" Yang exclaimed.

"Blake? Yang?" The two looked past the shivering criminals to see Ruby and Weiss standing there.

"Oh. Hey guys," Yang greeted them. Blake gave them a wave.

"What're you guys doing here?" Her younger sister asked them.

"Y'know. Just strollin' around," Yang explained.

"Looked more like sprinting to me," Weiss pointed out. "For a night on the town, you two sure are armed to the teeth." Blake and Yang hadn't even noticed they still had their weapons drawn and ready.

"You're telling us?" Blake motioned to the two iced muggers.

Weiss pointed up at them. "That was an act of self defense. We were just trying to go see a movie when these degenerates attacked us."

"Hey! Who you callin' degen-" one of the thugs said before getting a sheet of Ice Dust frozen over his mouth.

"Hush you," Weiss said to him before turning back to her teammates. "So what were you two doing?"

Yang quickly made up an alibi. "We were just having a night on the town and about to go get dinner when we heard the sounds of trouble. So, like the brave huntresses we are, we burst into action only to find that the troublemakers were the real ones in trouble." It was a good enough story for the Ice Queen to buy it.

"Where were you going to eat?" Ruby asked curiously.

Blake answered with the first place that came to mind. "A Simple Wok."

Ruby suddenly gasped. "Guys, I got the greatest idea. What if we combine our plans and have a team night? We go eat at Simple Wok as a team. And then we go see Surgeons in Space as a team. It'll be awesome."

Blake and Yang locked eyes for a moment before the latter answered for the both of them. "Sounds great, sis. We'd love to."

Blake, still with her mind focused on Vale's criminals, tried to stop her partner. But Yang just turned to her and gave her a look saying: I told you, Ruby doesn't learn about us fighting crime.

"Sounds like fun. Right, Blake?"

Blake accepted defeat. "Yeah. Sounds like fun."

"Then let's not waste a second more," Ruby directed them. "We haven't a moment to spare. Team RWBY, onwards to noodles!" She darted ahead of them in excitement, then suddenly stopped and turned to her teammates. "I have no idea how to get to this place."

Yang couldn't help but laugh. "Don't worry, Rubes. I'll lead the way."

As they were walking to their destination, Blake's cat ears suddenly picked something up. She stopped in her tracks to listen in more closely. Her friends noticed and turned to see what was up.

"Blake? Why are you stopping?" Ruby asked her. "I told we haven't a moment to-"

Blake raised her finger to silence her for a moment. She listened and heard, "Get off of me! Let me go!" She looked in the direction of the disturbance.

"Blake," Yang prodded her, "what's wrong?"

Blake looked her in the eyes and she immediately knew what was the matter. She subtly shook her head 'no,' pleading her with her eyes not to do this now. Not with Ruby here. Blake's eyes looked down apologetically, and she turned and ran across the street towards the source of the sounds.

"Blake!" Yang shouted as she bolted after her. The cat may be out of the bag, (Haha. Good one, Yang.) but I'll be damned if I let her go off alone again.

Ruby and Weiss naturally followed, neither knowing the context of Blake running off like that. The three caught up to the her as she ran down an alleyway.

"Blake. Yang," Weiss demanded. " What is going on?"

"I'll explain later," Blake promised, not slowing down at all for her teammates.

"Yeah, we're all going to have to have a talk after this," Yang said.

Well, Blake thought to herself, I'm in trouble.

"Where is he, Machin?!"

"Get off of me! Let me go!" shouted Lonnie Machin (AKA Anarky) as he was held up by his collar against the alley wall.

Batman leaned in close. "Where is Joker? All leads led me to you. Tell me where he is."

Anarky laughed. "Your detective skills are impressive, dark knight. He was right when he said you were good at what you do. But what makes you think I'm just going to give up his location to you? There's still so much we have to do first."

"What're you planning with him?"

"We're going to send a message," Lonnie started to preach. "We're going to set Vale free. The Council. The military. The huntsman academy. I'm going to relieve this kingdom's people of these overbearing forces. The Joker is just the means to that end."

"You think you can control him? You can't! You aren't! He's controlling you!"

"You don't get it, Batman. No one else understands. No one else can see that the bureaucracy is cheating them. They're all indoctrinated. But not him. He escaped. He broke Atlas's control over him. He sees the things I see. And together, we'll show the people of Vale that there's a better way of living. We'll bring down the symbols of the government's control and set the people free to live their lives whichever way they wish."

"Listen to me. The Joker doesn't care about the kingdom's political state. He doesn't care about your crusade. He exists only to bring chaos."

"That's the idea. For chaos is the way to achieve true, unrestrained freedom. That's what I'm here to bring. I'm going to set the common people free to live their lives whichever way they wish. No overlords to decide their fates. No made up laws to keep them in line with the plans of those in charge. Vale will embrace total anarchy!"

"People will die, Lonnie!" The dark knight shouted. "Lives will be lost if the Joker is not stopped!"

Anarky looked into his eyes. "That is regrettable and I will carry that for the rest of my life. But sometimes, sacrifices must be made in the name of revolution."

Batman stared back. "Well you won't have to worry about carrying that burden, because I'm not going to give you the chance."

"Put him down!" they suddenly heard from their right. Batman turned to see four young girls confronting him, all armed to the teeth.

"Looks like the indoctrinated child-warriors have arrived," Machin remarked. "I think I'll let you take this one, dark knight." As he said those words, he pulled out the stun gun he kept in his pocket.

Bruce realized what he was doing fast enough to block his initial attack, knocking his arm back. Anarky dropped the stun gun into his other hand and thrust it just under the vigilante's ribcage. Batman groaned in pain as his muscles began to contract, but was able to push through enough to deliver a headbutt to the bridge of his nose.

As Anarky recoiled in pain, he dropped his weapon and clutched his bleeding nose. Batman released his grip and dropped him to the ground as he took a second to recover. He turned to the sound of a gun cocking before he was blasted off of his feet.

The caped crusader was launched down the alley with a single shot. Yang expelled the empty shell from her gauntlet and readied the next shot. She looked to the boy he was attacking, unaware of the kind of person Lonnie Machin is. "Now's your chance, guy. We'll take it from here."

Anarky assumed the role of the victim of a random attack. "Thank you so very much," he acted as ran in down the alley in the direction away from the team. "It's a good thing you huntresses showed up." Just enough innocent praise to keep them from questioning the situation. He left them behind to clean up his mess.

Batman picked himself up off the ground in time to see his best lead to the Joker's location escaping. He started to give chase until several shots were fired at his feet from behind him.

"Those were warning shots!" Blake shouted. "You're not going to just get away with assaulting that kid!"

"If you had any idea who he is or what you're getting in the middle of," the dark knight argued back, "you'd know enough not to get in my way."

Ruby retorted with: "Well, if you had any idea who we are or what you're in the middle of now, then you'd know enough not to… do whatever it is you were doing… jerk."

The Ice Queen rolled her eyes. "Nice comeback."

"Shut up, Weiss."

I don't have time for this. In the blink of an eye, Batman pulled two batarangs from his belt, turned, and threw them at the team of huntresses. The batarangs stuck into the ground approximately two feet in front of the girls. They took a second to question the vigilante's aim until the bat-shaped weapons suddenly glowed red with Fire Dust.

Blake noticed this and, a fraction of a second before they exploded, used her semblance to lunge backwards and leave a shadow clone to take the blast in her place. She landed on her feet and saw that the rest of her team reacted too late and were thrown to the ground. She looked up to see the caped crusader pulling a grapnel gun from his belt and aiming up to the rooftops above.

Blake darted forward as he fired his grapnel upwards. It caught the ledge above and began to pull him up. He was halfway up the building when the Faunus girl rushed into the air, severed his line with her sword, and brought him back down to the ground.

Batman got up first, only to find that the rest of her team had recovered. Before he could react, Yang was on him and landed an explosive punch square in his chest, sending him backwards again. He was recovering when she dropped down to a knee. The dark knight looked up to see Ruby behind her taking aim with Crescent Rose. He rolled out of the way of her first shot and threw another batarang at her. The batarang flew right at the hooded girl, but was suddenly blocked by a large shielding glyph that had suddenly been conjured up.

Weiss dropped the glyph and began charging up her next attack. Yang used her gauntlets to blast herself back to her other teammates while Blake leaped up and grabbed onto a fire escape above. Based on the blue glyphs being conjured up, Bruce knew what was coming, but had no way of avoiding it. He crouched down and held his cape up in front of himself to try and take the blast just before Weiss released a huge wave of frozen Dust, coating everything in front of her in a sheet of ice and a cloud of cold fog.

The opportunity was too good. Yang couldn't pass it up. "That's what I call kicking some ice."

"Really?" Weiss said. "Ice puns?"

"How could I not?" She had another one in the chamber. "Just chill out, Weiss."

"Wow," Ruby added. "Normally I like your puns, sis. But even I have to admit that was pretty bad."

She wasn't done. "Wow. Talk about giving' me the cold shoulder, guys."

"Oh god! No more!" Weiss and Ruby collectively pleaded.

The fog cleared to reveal their opponent's current status. Batman's cape had shielded most of his body from the attack, but he was still restrained by the ice. With his hand at his belt, he pulled out another batarang and activated the Fire Dust infused with it. The Dust burned hot enough to immediately start melting the ice, but not too hot for his gloves and suit to withstand. He then proceeded to jab the edge of the batarang into the ground and trace out a circle of Fire Dust around him to melt the immediate area around him. With his icy restraints melted, he rose to his full height… and was immediately thrown back by a shot from Crescent Rose.

"Ice shot, sis," Yang continued to pun away, evoking a groan from her teammates.

The sheer force behind the round sent him flying and he tumbled into a small parking lot connected to the alley in which their encounter had been taking place. The girls jogged over to the alley's entrance to the small lot. Blake jumped down from the fire escape she had perched herself on to escape the ice wave and joined her teammates.

Batman was slower to get up this time. The bullet hit him in the center of his chest, where his armor is strongest. I wear a giant target there for a reason. It didn't pierce his suit, but it still hurt like getting hit by a car. Now, what have we learned?

He went through his observations of his opponents in his mind. Just based on what he'd seen so far, he was already getting an idea of each girl's style and tactics. The blonde is a brawler packing a lot of force behind each punch. The brunette is far faster in both speed and reflexes. The girl in white and the one in the hood are primarily range based. One uses Dust while the other resorts to her weapon, a weapon that could undoubtedly be devastating at closer range but is too large to be very fast. Their best advantage is their coordination with each other. They know exactly what to do and exactly when to do it. I'm impressed. I'll have to accommodate for that.

Bruce assessed each analysis and developed a countering tactic for each one. He rose to his feet and assumed a ready stance. The blonde will attack first.
As predicted, Yang acted first. "Looks like someone hasn't quite cooled down yet. How 'bout we bring the heat instead?" She cocked Ember Celica and charged forward.

She reared her fist back and swung at the vigilante's head, but she never made contact. He had quickly leaned away from the punch and reached out to grab her extended arm. Holding her arm, he kicked her legs out from under her and forced her down to the ground. And now the one in black.

Blake was close behind her partner and rushed the dark knight when he brought Yang down. He turned with a high kick, but she used her semblance to fall back and go in for a second attempt. Batman sidestepped her subsequent strike and allowed her momentum to carry her past him. He then pulled a bola from his belt and threw it at her. The bola wrapped itself around her and restrained her arms to her midsection. And now the one in the hood will take a few shots.

"Weiss!" Ruby turned to her partner. "Lemme at him."

Weiss conjured a black Acceleration glyph in front of her leader. Ruby aimed Crescent Rose behind her and fired. The recoil sent her flying through the glyph. The glyph amplified her velocity and launched her at her target.

Bruce's eyes widened for a moment as he dropped flat to the floor as the scythe wielder careened over his head. Didn't quite expect that. He jumped back up to his feet and realized his current position. The girls weren't so much as attacking as they were tactically positioning themselves. Weiss remained in her original position in front of him. Ruby had sailed over and landed behind him. Yang had picked herself back up and was circling around to his left, and Blake had freed herself from her restraints and circled around to his right.

Their leader called the order. "Team RWBY, kick his butt!"

They all charged the Bat at the same time. Just as they neared him, he dropped a handful of smoke pellets at his feet. They exploded and shrouded him in smoke. Yang proceeded to viciously blast into the cloud with her gauntlets.

A shot exploded over Blake's shoulder. "Yang, stop firing! You're shooting at me!"

The brawler ceased fire. "Where'd he-"

"Weiss!" Ruby called.

"Already on it." Weiss charged up her next move, swung her blade, and sent a Dust-charged force through the cloud that effectively cut through and dispersed the smoke.

The smoke cleared to reveal Batman leaping several feet into the air in the middle of the girls. In air, he threw out four Fire-charged batarangs. Each one found its mark and hit the huntresses directly. They were thrown to the ground as he landed.

Thanks to her Semblance, that amount of force was enough to reenergize Yang. She was quick to return to her feet and charge the dark knight again. He was ready though. He leaped backwards, away from her swing, and threw another batarang at her. It stuck itself into her gauntlet and then glowed blue. The batarang exploded outward and completely encased Yang in ice.

Bruce looked upon the girl frozen in a block of ice, pulled a batarang from his belt, and stalked toward her. He raised the bladed weapon over her. She won't be able to breathe in there. He activated the batarang's Fire-Dust charge, jabbed the tip into the ice, and carved a circle around the blonde girl's head. The ice in that area instantly started melting. Her head will be freed enough to get air in twenty seconds. Her friends should be back on their feet in ten. I will be gone in five.

He deactivated the batarang and put it back in its compartment on his belt, pulled his secondary grapnel gun from its holster to replace the one Blake had severed, and fired its claw to the rooftop above. The moment before he shot upwards, Bruce looked around to the temporarily incapacitated girls around him. A waste of my time.

Blake was picking herself up in time to see the dark knight disappear above them.

"Lemme guess," Ruby said while she remained lying on her back. "He got away."

"Yes," Blake groaned, fully on her feet now.

"You win this round, creepy-bat-guy. But Team RWBY will have vengeance!" She pointed up to the sky dramatically, and immediately pulled her arm back in pain. "Ow ow ow. Explosions hurt."

"You don't say." Weiss, also on her feet now, said sarcastically as she brushed herself off.

"Hey guys," they heard from Yang. They all looked up to see her body trapped in a slowly melting hunk of ice. "Sorry I couldn't stop him. Guess I got cold feet."

Her teammates gave her blank expressions for a solid three seconds, and then completely ignored her. Ruby diverted her gaze back to the sky and Blake and Weiss both sat back down on the ground.

"Seriously though, guys," The blonde-on-ice said, all jokes aside, "could you help me out here? I'm freezing."

"No," Weiss answered.

"Not until you're sorry for what you did," Ruby added.

"Come on, guys. Don't be so cold-hearted."

"So Weiss," Blake inquired of her teammate, "tell me about the first time you discovered your semblance."

"Guys, I'm starting to lose feeling in my toes."

"Well that's a long story," Weiss warned them.

"I'm gonna get hypothermia if you don't help me."

"Oh I'm sure we've got time to hear it," Blake told her.

"I could get frostbite if you're not quick."

"Well it was about nine years ago..." the heiress started her tale.

Professor Ozpin took one last look out over his campus for the night. It was a Friday, so many of his students were undoubtedly out and about in the city this evening. Tomorrow morning would start a lot slower and a lot later than most days of the week. With no classes, there will be an abundance of late sleepers.

Well, I can't afford to be one of them, the headmaster thought as he turned from the window and back to his desk. I will still have an academy to run in the morning. He shut off the lights in his office, grabbed his cane and coffee mug, and proceeded to the elevator. He stepped in and pressed the ground floor button. The doors closed and the elevator began to move.

It went down a few floors and suddenly halted. Must be another of my staff retiring for the night. Ozpin waited for the doors to open to let someone on, but it never did. He impatiently tapped his cane on the ground three times as if encouraging the elevator to move. "Reminder to self: have elevator checked and fixed."

He reached over to a panel on the wall and unlocked the door lock override switch with his Scroll. The panel scanned his Scroll, waited a moment, and flashed a red light.

"What?" He tried it again and again got the red refusal light. "What is-"

"You've gotta be patient, Ozzy," he heard an unfamiliar voice say from over the intercom system in the elevator. "Stop trying to take control so much. Just let go."

That's not one of my staff. I'd recognize his voice. "Who are you? How did you gain access to the elevator systems?"

"So many questions. So little time. And quite frankly, I don't think you have the time to hear the answers."

"And why is that?"

"Oh you'll see. Hee hee hee."

As the laughing continued, plumes of green gas began to seep through the crack in the elevator's doors. Ozpin reached to pull his scarf over his nose and mouth in a futile attempt to protect himself from inhaling it, but he was too late. In the time it took to do that, enough gas had already entered his system to make his muscles relax and his vision fade. His knees buckled and he collapsed to the floor. All while this happened, all he could hear was his attacker singing.

"I could while away the hours,

While you're busy pushin' flowers,

And I'm laughin' in the rain."

The last thing Professor Ozpin saw before losing consciousness was the doors opening to reveal a man in a janitor's uniform with bleach white skin and bright green hair. He was shutting off a modified fog machine and walked over to finish his song with a huge smile on his face.

"I could kill and be merry,

Your death'll be legendary,

If I only had a brain. HAHAHAHA!"