D-Don't Think Too Hard
Summary: The world around Dandy Lionel is as mysterious to her as the inside of her head is to everyone else. Waking from a daydream to find she was accepted for Huntress training at the prestigious academy of Skylight was only the third-weirdest experience she had this week.
A/N: These are the three OCs I can write intros for. As for Obsidian, the O in ROAD, FierceDeityMask is his sole creator. If he comes up with an intro for his darker and edgier OC, I'll favorite it so any readers can find it on my profile.
If I make an overarching story with Team ROAD as the main characters, I'll switch the capital letter string I use as my scene breaks in my current stories (see below) to reflect the point of view of the next scene.
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Dandy Lionel was alone in a crowd, as usual. Part of it was her heritage as a bear Faunus. She had round, brown ears sticking up out of her half white, half yellow hair, and she'd never found a way to comfortably conceal them without making the deception obvious. The ears broke the illusion created by her white jacket, green pants, and yellow ponytail, which made her look a little like the puffy weed that was her namesake when viewed at a distance without glasses.
The other part of her strangeness, the part that prevented the people of Atlas from jeering and throwing things at her as they did to most other Faunus, was also why she couldn't really care about the crowd in the first place. As she wandered down a busy road on a meandering path that somehow avoided any oncoming cars, people would take one look at her glazed, brown eyes and get the sense that the girl "wasn't all there," creating a sense of uneasiness that kept all but the most bigoted offenders away. Those that remained soon left in disappointment when she didn't react "appropriately" to the abuse.
Simply put, Dandy frequently fell out of touch with reality, paying attention to something in her thoughts instead. She referred to it as "daydreaming," and she continued to move and act in surprisingly complex ways while doing so. She often "woke up" to find herself in a completely unfamiliar location, and she'd gotten used to it after about five years of constant daydreaming.
Today saw her climbing a mountain without being aware of it, which led her to Skylight Academy's campus. There were guards, of course. The perimeter of the campus was guarded by human soldiers, since robots might not be able to distinguish an incoming airship as being either an enemy fighter or a tourist airbus.
Once the guards caught sight of Dandy, they left their posts to interrogate her. "Hey, little girl. What are you doing on Skylight campus?" No reply, but Dandy frowned a bit. "Hey, we're talking to you!" A small tilt of Dandy's head was the only answer.
"Hey," said the other guard. "She's a Faunus. Maybe she just has an animal's brain as well."
There was giggling after the racist "humor," but it didn't come from the first guard. Dandy bent over almost double, laughing uncontrollably. The guards were understandably confused at this reaction.
"Is she all right in the head? Even the dumbest Faunus I've ever heard of would get riled up over that, not laugh with me." The guard began to get suspicious. Perhaps the girl was more dangerous than her simple appearance let on, so she was laughing off the threat?
"Well, if she's nuts, we have to either get her off campus or restrain her for further investigation," the first guard paraphrased from his bookmark in the Employee Handbook (which was actually titled The Employee Handbook for Generic Guards). "Load your stun ammo." He swapped a cartridge of red Dust for diluted yellow and took aim at the girl, who hadn't moved from the spot where they'd found her yet. "Unidentified Faunus! If you can understand me, stand down."
Dandy abruptly stopped giggling and stared straight ahead in open-mouthed horror. "Yeah, the gun is scary, isn't it? Now come quietly and-" Dandy broke into a run... Directly toward the guards, mouth wide open in a silent scream. To his credit, the guard instantly snapped off a stunning shot at the first sudden move, but the bullet never struck the girl, despite being aimed right at her chest. Instead, the air in front of Dandy wavered and fizzled, and the bullet disappeared into the distortion. A split second later, an identical anomaly formed behind her back (while she was still running forward), and the same bullet flew straight out, leaving Dandy unharmed as it streaked into the distance. "What kind of freaky Semblance is that?!"
Rather than getting an answer, the guard found himself pushed aside by a sudden, hurricane-force gust of wind. As he tumbled end over end, he caught a glimpse of the girl's weapon: a folding fan made of blades, with holes at varying distances up each sharp fold that probably shot Dust rounds. Everything doubled as a gun in the world of Remnant, after all. Dandy waved a second identical fan as she continued running like the end of the world was behind her, scattering a group of reinforcements that responded to the automatic alarm from the first shot being fired.
Her mad dash continued straight to the gates, unhindered by the scores of guards in standard issue gear that lined her path and tried to bar her way. All the contenders were blown into walls by wind blasts, or knocked unconscious by the (currently) non-lethal, shadow-elemental Dust rounds that fired in a scattered pattern from her fans when she spun them around her hands. Robots, guns, and soldiers lay in heaps behind her, with any who managed to fire a return shot being forced to miss thanks to her phasing Semblance. She ended up on an elevator headed to the top floor of the executive wing. At this point, she suddenly stopped silently screaming in favor of whistling a cheerful tune, which unnerved a fellow passenger getting off on a closer floor, but at least the whistling didn't smash them into the wall.
When the elevator dinged to announce it's arrival at the top floor, Dandy meandered down the impressive corridor to the large office door at the end. A couple more decorated guards stood on either side of the door, supposedly the last line of defense for General Ironwood's office. (In reality, if the school weren't currently on break after the end of the last semester, an intruder would have to contend with dozens of potential Huntsmen and Huntresses before getting anywhere close to here. The timing of this security fiasco couldn't have been worse... Or better, from certain points of view.)
The honor guards drew actual beam swords (the latest Atlesian advancement in futuristic technology for stabbing and burning things at the same time), causing the hilts to ignite in two-foot lines of yellow and red respectively, to indicate the type of Dust crystal powering each blade. They didn't bother with negotiations, since no unscheduled visitors ever came up here with friendly intentions. Moving as a synchronized unit, they brought their blades down on Dandy's head, only to fall prey to her Semblance directly, finding themselves behind her and off-balance from the aborted cuts. Before either guard could get his bearings, Dandy walked straight into the large, impressively-carved, and definitely-closed wooden door leading into General Ironwood's office, and promptly fell on her back.
General Ironwood was just about to conclude an interview with a promising candidate for the academy when he heard something run into his door. His office was soundproofed to keep private conversations inside the office from getting out, but that had also kept local alarms in the armor of the guards and the sounds of accidental carnage outside from getting in. Ironwood hung up on the previous conversation, which was already finished bar the formalities, and opened his door to investigate. Immediately he was made aware of the various alarms blaring, as well as radio chatter from the guards' scrolls yelling things like "Is she even real?" "We've got wounded!" and other such indicators of an armed intruder. The teenage Faunus girl sprawled in front of the doorway didn't exactly look the part, but then again, who did look as tough as they were? As Ironwood watched, the girl shook her head and suddenly bolted upright, then groaned in exasperation.
"Aw, wasps! I caused another scene! Wait, where is this?" This was the first time she'd audibly spoken since her arrival, barring the unprovoked giggles and wordless whistles earlier. She looked up with an uncertain smile, and saw the most important military official in Atlas looming over her. "Oh, dear. Did I bust into Skylight while I was daydreaming? Usually I end up in tamer places, like the bank vault. I'm very sorry, General Ironwood, sir! Dandy Lionel, at your service, at least until I zone out again!" Dandy jumped to her feet and tried a salute, still smiling.
General Ironwood assessed the risks and potential rewards of the plan that he found leaking into his head. He really shouldn't do this. Professor Ozpin might thrive on "bending the rules" for obtuse and flimsy rationalizations, but Ironwood had founded his whole career by the books, and the books said to lock this girl up and throw away the key. On the other hand, incarcerating her in a jail or asylum would be an enormous waste of her immense destructive potential, an energy that could be beneficial to all of mankind if given purpose and direction rather than limitations. Ugh, now even Ironwood's inner dialogue mirrored Ozpin's speech rehearsal for this year's arrivals at Beacon. (He'd heard it when Ozpin was running late for a strategy meeting a few weeks ago. He seemed to flout his lack of discipline like an honor badge, but Ironwood couldn't shake the feeling that it was all an act.) Once again, Ironwood was forced to admit that Ozpin often had a strong point to his dramatic ramblings, even if the intended point remained difficult to grasp until much later on, and the gist of it was never telling anyone to "follow protocol." Ironwood made up his mind.
"Well, Dandy Lionel, you have saved me the trouble of going out there myself..."
"Oh dear, I'm in trouble now, aren't I?"
"...And searching for one last talented candidate to attend Skylight Academy this semester. Would you like the spot?"
"Um, sure, why not? It might be nice to wake up in the same place twice in a row. Do I need to sign forms, or register my 'Wind-Winner' war fan set somewhere?" Dandy tried to peer past Ironwood's impressive suit at the stack of paperwork on his desk.
"Not to worry. I'll handle the paperwork. I'll upload a map to your scroll; be at the main hall at 1800 hours." Dandy's scroll beeped in her pocket.
"Yes, sir!" the girl turned around, yellow ponytail swishing behind her. As she left earshot, Ironwood heard her muse to herself, "This is still only the second-weirdest place I've woken up this week."
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Author's Notes and Assumptions: I'm not sure if Semblances have individual names, or even if "Semblance" is spelled with a capital S. Just in case, I have prepared names for Rust's Semblance, "Juggernaut," and Dandy's ability, "Heedless." Her Semblance is a passive ability that can activate without her knowledge, though only from the front. If she's aware of an attack, she can use Heedless to phase through assaults from any direction, though that requires her to be aware that she's in combat in the first place. If she's daydreaming, only attacks that come at her head-on will be subject to the effect. Her pool of Aura to draw on for her Semblance is somewhat higher than average.
Not an Assumption One: Racism and discrimination against the Faunus is present throughout Remnant, not just in Vale. Obviously, since Atlas is the seat of the Schnee Dust Company, an infamous source of racist policies, the practices that the White Fang continually protest and fight against are particularly common in that country.
Iffy Assumption Two: Some small villages have been established and destroyed in the most recent generation. Dandy hails from one of these failed colonial efforts.
Foolish Assumption Three: Cinder's grandiose yet mysterious plan is mostly focused on Vale right now, meaning students in Atlas aren't likely to come into contact with her operations directly. However, the Atlesian economy is suffering from poor trade with other nations, due to all that Dust getting stolen, resulting in a tense social atmosphere and people being generally crabby.
Silly Rabbit, Assumptions are Four Kids! The team assignment/examination event at Skylight is identical to the process at Beacon, and indeed the same as every Academy. The difference is what gets used for the "relics," and the specific Grimm species inhabiting the wilderness between the students and their goal.
Rather than do another Legally Useless Disclaimer, I'll merely ask you readers to remember what every single disclaimer you've ever seen looks like, and reproduce that image with a footnote that disclaimers aren't worth anything in court.
