Author's Notes
Another day, another roll of the die saying to upload a fluffy chapter. One more before we end this interlude.
You know, I'm pretty good at giving software demos. It's what secured my job back in my first job. But ugh, just had to give a demo for my freelance project. Went very well, but it was exhausting.
Interlude 27.73: Ballad to Blue
Patch was cozy. That's the word Mytyl is going with; cozy. The island consisted of one town of the same name that served as the island's main hub, with smaller communities and residences dotted across the landmass, connected by dirt roads. If someone ventured away from the beaten path, they would be met with a rich flora and fauna.
And the occasional Grimm. However, given the high numbers of retired Hunters that took residence in Patch and the presence of Signal Academy, the Grimm population was continuously culled. As long as you stuck to the roads, the chances of being attacked were nearly nonexistent; at least no more than living in any other settlement.
Making their way towards the town's main plaza, Mytyl couldn't help but give Weiss a smug smirk. The action didn't go unnoticed by the heiress, who turned up her nose and blushing cheeks, and huffed in equal parts mild annoyance and embarrassment. In the end, Weiss opted to wear the one-piece swimsuit, currently using it as the top of her ensemble while a pair of jean shorts and a jacket not dissimilar to her regular bolero one provided a semblance of cover.
After Weiss finished dressing, the teasing and prodding began. A smirk here, a waggle of eyebrows there, a nudge towards Copen after; Mytyl had been relentless on the whole journey to Patch.
For his part, Copen was apathetic, either unaware or unwilling to get roped into whatever his sister was doing. His summer attire was a simple affair: regular gray shorts, a V-neck white t-shirt, and a red hooded jacket that Mytyl suspected would, by the end of the trip, belong to Ruby despite there being nothing between her brother and the red reaper. He also chose running shoes over the sandals she and Weiss were wearing. To bring together the painful tourist look, he was tasked with being a mule for his and Mytyl's stuff: a pair of backpacks with their stuff and an armament of water guns, a beach umbrella Mytyl insisted on bringing, and plain sunglasses with a black frame.
For her part, Mytyl was wearing her summer dress and sunhat, her orange swimsuit visible through the white fabric. Her hair hung loose on her back, opting against her regular hair ornaments; both the butterfly bow and the silver bell. She also sported a pair of orange-framed sunglasses and, in lieu of carrying her own backpack, the case for her synthesizer hung from her shoulder by a strap.
She was a bit surprised people in Patch didn't give them a second look despite their weaponry. They did glance at Lumen and Lola, who were wearing a pair of caps with embroidered stylized wings – butterfly's for Lumen and a bird's for Lola – that Nori had sent to them for some reason. But they were an odd sight on the best of days, so that was expected. When it came to her Divider and Copen's Border – the rest of their equipment stored safely at Beacon – or Weiss's Myrtenaster, people in Patch acted pretty blasé. Maybe because of both the high Hunter population and Signal's presence. The combat school was currently entering finals' week, so chances were they, correctly, guessed they were Beacon students.
They arrived at Patch's main plaza. A quick look over revealed they were the first to arrive. Or at least the only ones in the meeting spot. The plan was simple: meet with the those who stayed at Beacon in the plaza, then wait until Ruby and/or Yang, who would take them to the beach they had in mind, arrived to pick them up.
Making her way to the fountain in the middle, Mytyl let her synth rest on the ground as she took a seat by the fountain's edge, stretching to get rid of the stiffness cause by carrying the somewhat heavy instrument. Carrying a heavy object… what an odd thought. Copen's little episode with the photograph brought back memories of when such a simple action would have only been possible in her wildest dreams. And now she was halfway into her first year in Beacon. Had she been told this was going to be her four years ago… she had always been an optimist, but even this would have been a hard pill to swallow.
A finger poked her cheeks. "Remnant to Mytyl, are you there?"
Realizing she was staring unfocused towards nothing in particular, Mytyl was brought back to reality and paid attention to Weiss, who was attempting her best interpretation of smug. Too bad Weiss couldn't do smug. She could do haughty perfectly, though. A quick glance to the side revealed Copen was trying his best to bask on the sunlight. Trying was the keyword. Copen wasn't a 'sun and beach' person. Truth be told, neither was her. She had been to the beach once before, back during their visit to Vale. She liked the experience, but not because she found it particularly enjoyable. It was more the novelty of it all.
There were a few novel things she could probably salvage from this trip to Patch. Things like dipping into the sea or a bonfire. She looked forward to the new experiences for their own sake, but she wasn't keeping high hopes that salty water would be the answer to life or even the evening.
"So…" Weiss 'smugness' started to verbalize itself, "what got you looking into the distance? Perhaps the thoughts of tall, blonde, and scraggly shirtless?" Weiss, bless her soul, tried to waggle her eyebrows.
'Huh… so this is how it feels to be on the other end of this line of thought,' Mytyl thought with amusement in regard to Weiss's awkward attempt at a salacious facial expression. Only the gods knew how many times Copen and Nori thought 'bless her' whenever she tried to appear stronger than she was and failed spectacularly.
"There are two kind of people," Mytyl responded, "those who tease, and those who get teased. I suppose there are three, those who do both, but they are so rare that counting them isn't worthwhile. You, Weiss, are meant to be teased. Just like Copen and Lola."
"I can tease!" the pod overheard and responded.
Weiss pouted and proved Mytyl right in doing so. "I can tease too!" she lied to herself.
"That's nice." To make her point, Mytyl patted Weiss head in a condescending fashion. The pouting gained companionship in a pair of crossed arms.
"I was thinking about the past and the beach," Mytyl answered truthfully. "I'm looking forward to hanging out with all of you, but I don't think I'm a big on the locale."
Weiss sighed, propping her elbows on top of her thighs and leaning her chin into her hands. "I can relate. This," she gestured at herself, "milky white complexion was not meant for direct sunlight. Even with Aura, I need to cover myself in sunscreen to keep away my lobster ancestry."
"Haha, likewise," Mytyl agreed with glee. Before sending her own smug look at Weiss. Maybe the heiress can learn a thing or two. "You know, I can convince Copen to spread sunscreen on you."
Without missing a beat, Weiss excitedly added, "Yes! And you can have Jaune do the same for you. And I'm sure we can convince GV to do Ruby and Blake at the same time." Weiss sighed wistfully. "Tough luck for Yang and Pyrrha, though. Maybe they can work on each other, being partners and all, but I have a feeling Pyrrha might challenge you to gladiatorial combat for Arc's innocence. To the death, of course."
Mytyl was left speechless as Weiss managed to successfully say all of that without stuttering. And follow it up with an actual smug smirk. There was only one proper answer to that.
She mockingly wiped away an imaginary tear. "They grow up so fast."
"Yo!"
"Speak of… the devil…" Weiss trailed off.
Looking in the direction of Weiss's gaze, Mytyl observed many things happen at once. The first thing that caught her attention was Jaune, waving as he walked towards them, stupid grin on his face. Jaune opted against his normally baggy clothing in favor of a more form-fitting brown t-shirt. Pumpkin Pete themed, of course, but that didn't detract from his physique. Given today's activities, he opted for simple white boardshorts, instead of his usual jeans, and walking sandals. A pair of blue aviator sunglasses rested on top of his head and a backpack behind him. And, of all things, a guitar hung at his side. All in all, it was nothing special, but just the fact the clothes fit Jaune's body better than his usual attire did wonders for his looks.
Also, nearly six months of Beacon's training were showing. Weiss might need to reconsider her choice of words. And Crocea Mors sheathed in a holster by his hip didn't hurt, either.
Jaune, of course, wasn't alone, and Mytyl's eyes naturally transitioned to take in Jaune's partner, Blake, who the boy was dragging by the hand. Almost literally, as Blake kept her eyes glued to the book she was holding on the other. The cat girl's regular clothes were pretty flashy as expected of a Huntress, and her current summer outfit didn't slack one bit. A black button-up shirt tied to show her navel and unbuttoned just enough to give a glimpse of the stylish black bikini underneath. A black and white sarong that reached her knees served to cover the accompanying black bikini bottom. And, as if providing proof that Blake had allowed someone to play dress-up with her, she wore a white sunhat with holes from which her cat ears poked out. From the looks of it, the cat girl resigned to being there, leaving Jaune to literally drag her around. Not to be caught unarmed, Gambol Shroud hung behind her.
Her eyes then shifted to her own partner, GV, who in a twist of fate was dressed similar to her brother. Instead of a red jacket, GV's was gray blue and instead of gray shorts with a black and red swim jammer underneath, GV opted for blue and white boardshorts and walking sandals similar to Jaune's. He wore his glasses instead of his contacts, the black tint on them indicating they were sensitive to sunlight. As a result, the entire ensemble made him look years younger and more 'boyish'. The backpack he was carrying had Dart Leader holster in a side pocket along a couple of water guns clinging to it, not helping his 'boyishness'.
And bringing up the rear of the group…
…
Mytyl burst into hysterics. Weiss blinked in a futile attempt to reboot after a fatal crash to her internal operating system, and Copen did his best to prove he wasn't related to Mytyl, to limited success as his lips twitched and came dangerously close to curling upward.
"Lumen?"
"Yes, Lola?"
"My readings say Pyrrha, but my optics say a walking, skinny watermelon."
Mytyl guffawed harder, bending over as her stomach began to cramp.
Bringing up the rear was 'Pyrrha', in the most over-the-top disguise she could muster. Her hair was dyed completely into two shades of green and tied into a braid, the occasional strand of her natural red hair peeking through. As Lola aptly put it, she looked like a watermelon. And with the insides of watermelons being red, her disguise didn't disappoint. It was a garish red pencil dress with black polka dots and very high, very black wedge heels. It was out of place in the beach, in Patch, in Vale, and, honestly, Mytyl couldn't envision any scenario where such a dress would be acceptable outside a Halloween party. The only thing that hinted at the final destination was the red strings of a swimsuit top peeking out of the dress. Not that it mattered, since that minute detail was overtaken by the equally garish, emerald green fur coat accompanying the dress. But 'Pyrrha' apparently hadn't been satisfied at leaving it like that. Of course not, leaving any opening ran the risk of someone recognizing the famous Pyrrha Nikos, so she had to go all out. How? By wearing enough makeup to make a clown jealous. Her face was caked in base, powder, blush and a generous amount of lipstick splattered on her lips. But that still wasn't enough. Gigantic, reflective, round sunglasses – which followed the watermelon motif by being green with red trims – obscured her eyes. An to top it all off, a red fedora, because why not?
Credit where credit is due: nobody would associate the polite to a fault and even meek Pyrrha Nikos to the monstrosity gracing them. Even if it was painfully obvious it was a disguise – or a dare gone wrong – surely Pyrrha Nikos wouldn't go to this extent, right?
"I haz no ideah who diz 'Pyrra Neeko' iz. Ma' name iz Pishe Moneen"
Mytyl fell to the ground, desperately gasping for air, her laughter refusing to end. She had never been so wrong in her entire life. She thought Pyrrha wouldn't be able to surpass her disguise. Lo and behold, all she needed to do was open her mouth and butcher Yang's 'P-Money' nickname.
SchneeOS finally rebooted. Crossing her arms and leaning backward, as if hoping people looking in wouldn't mistake her as knowing the new group, she was at a loss for words, but tried anyways. "Seems like you had… fun?"
To her surprise, Blake responded, looking up from her book. "Believe it or not, we actually did. GV picked our clothes. And he was the one to disguise 'Pishe Moneen'," Blake said, air quoting the alias.
Copen attention shifted to GV, appraising his unassuming teammate. "Even the makeup and dye job?"
Blake retrieved her hand from Jaune and pulled Jaune, or to be more precise his backpack, in order to store her book. "Especially the makeup and dye job."
Curious eyes converged on GV. Mytyl, managing to pick herself up, lead the charge. "I could understand Jaune, but you? Something you want to tell us, my dear partner?"
GV scratched his head, clearly weighing his options. Mytyl's heart leapt a bit. His glasses truly made GV look like a completely different person.
"I picked fashion and makeup from… my old roommate… and a common… friend. More like they bullied me into learning." GV gave a sheepish laugh. "For a mission, we had to disguise ourselves to infiltrate a… gentlemen's club."
"Nooooooo," Mytyl exclaimed, seeing where this was going.
"Yeah," GV said in defeat. "At least I had the consolation of being the prettiest girl in the building. Both of my friends never forgave me for that." GV smiled nostalgically at the events. "I think there's a trophy somewhere…"
"Yesh, yesh, Jeeves iz quite the surprizing stylizt," Pishe Moneen said as she pulled a pipe and proceeded to 'smoke', bubbles popping out of it.
"That disguise cannot possibly work," Weiss finally said.
"Better than expected," Blake said. "I was similarly skeptical, but once we were in Vale… sure, we got weird looks, but the disguise is so ridiculous that anybody who even entertained the idea of Pyrrha being Pyrrha-"
"Pishe Moneen!"
Blake gave Pishe a deadpan look. "Right, sorry. Like I was saying, people dismissed the obvious. It's so ridiculous in loops back to being genius."
"You made it!"
In a flurry of petals, Weiss was tackled to the floor as Ruby rubbed cheeks to cheek in an attempt to scrub the haughtiness out of the heiress.
"Unhand me, you dolt!"
"NO! Yang woke me up way too early and I've been in our beach spot all day dealing with sun, sand, salt, and one very mean crab!" Ruby, wearing a red and black hooded jacket with an athletic two-piece black swimsuit, clung to Weiss like a limpet, despite the heiress best attempt to pry off her team leader.
"Rubeen, dear, itz bin too lon'!"
"Oh, hi Pishe Moneen."
Weiss groaned in defeat. "I deserve this for wanting a life beyond Atlas. I could have had a normal team. But no, I got a celebrity with a fame-phobia."
"I haz no idea wat you talkin' aboot."
"A blonde bimbo with more hair than brains."
"That does sound like Yang," Ruby conceded.
"And a child picking fights with sea creatures!" Weiss growled towards Ruby.
Ruby, in turn, hugged Weiss harder and coddle her more. "I love you too, Weiss!"
"Ruby," GV spoke, catching the attention of the redhead enough for her to look at him but, to Weiss chagrin, not enough to break the iron grip that bonded them together, "why have you been in the beach all morning?"
Finally releasing Weiss, who sought refuge behind Mytyl, Ruby groaned in frustration. "Ever since we got our grades, Yang has been going on and on about being 'out-survivaled', whatever that means, by Jaune. She's been trying to set up camp all this morning to varying degrees of success."
"Varying degrees of success?" Blake asked hesitantly.
"She gets a B+ for effort."
"And I'm guessing she also got a B+ from Goodwitch," Mytyl quipped.
"And I foolishly told her Jaune got an A. Has been raving about the inhumanity of it all. She woke me up at four in the morning. FOUR!"
"Oh, Ruby, hearing that pains my soul," Copen said in a rare flash of compassion.
With watery eyes, Ruby ambled towards Copen and hugged him, burying her head in his jacket. "Big Bro Copen! I knew you would understand," she cried.
Copen stood frozen with wide eyes, not expecting things to escalate to physical contact. He sent his sister a confused look. Mytyl shrugged, equally surprised. Awkwardly, Copen consoled Ruby with stilted pats to the back.
"This jacket feels as nice as it looks…"
Copen eyes widened, gently trying to pry Ruby off his priced jacket. She didn't budge.
-o-
The walk to their beach spot was spent mostly catching up with what each of them had done during their break so far. Despite only being one week, it hadn't been entirely uneventful. Be it GV's and Jaune's joint-venture, featuring Pyrrha, to keep Blake from going on a one-woman crusade against the White Fang, Ruby's tales of Yang's slipping sanity at being bested by Jaune in Combat class (albeit in a roundabout way that didn't involve combat), or that one time Copen jumped from the 13th floor of the hotel just so he didn't have to hear Mytyl's and Weiss's, but especially Mytyl's, girl talk; there was enough topics to catch up to for the walk to become effortless, with time flying by.
"Since this spot is not by any road, it's mostly Signal students who use it," Ruby explained as she assured totally-not-Pyrrha that there would be no issues with fans.
"And wouldn't we run the risk of finding Signal students?" Mytyl asked.
"Nah," Ruby dismissed the concern. "Dad will join us later. He wants to meet the lot of you. And trust me, no Signal student wants Taiyang Xiao Long to find them slacking when they should be preparing for his test on Monday."
"So, Jaune," Mytyl changed subject, "what's with the guitar? Do you know how to play it?"
Picking up the instrument, Jaune pluck at a succession of strings. "I can string a few chords together."
"That's great," Ruby said. Before her smiled ended abruptly. "Now repeat that exact sentence in front of Yang and I'll show you the less than noble skills my Uncle taught me."
Jaune took a few steps away from the suddenly scary Ruby. "You mean skills as in figh-"
Ruby narrowed her eyes. "Nobody will find your body."
Jaune gulped.
"Cool," Mytyl said excitedly. "If you survive until night, we can play something together." She tapped the case of her synth. "It'll be awesome. You at the guitar, me at the keyboard, and Weiss can be our vocalist!"
"You could be the vocalist too, sis."
"Yeah, but then Weiss would be left out."
"I don't mind being left out," Weiss was quick to inform.
"Be more tactful, Copen. No lady likes feeling like they are useless. You'll make Weiss cry."
"I'm heartbroken," Weiss deadpanned. "How you learned the guitar, anyways?"
At that, Jaune sheepishly scratched his head. "Well… you see, I told my parents I wanted to learn to play a guitar and they got me one. I picked up a thing or two… but..."
"Let me guess," Mytyl ventured as she closed the distance to Jaune and gave the self-conscious boy a sly smirk, "you tried to woo a girl with your mad guitar skills."
Jaune's fidgeting all but confirmed it.
"Seriously, Arc?" Weiss pinched the bridge of her nose. "That has to be the most shallow and pathetic flirting attempt I've heard a boy make."
Mytyl sent Weiss an exasperated and disapproving look, before consoling Jaune. "Well, I think it's cute. Might not be the most well thought out idea, but it wasn't a bad one." Mytyl gave a theatrical sigh. "Only the gods know how many girls in my singing class became putty when Flynt started playing the trumpet."
"I can attest to at least three other cases of girls liking boys that can play instruments," GV chipped in.
"I can attest to one," Copen said, before suddenly pointing at Mytyl. "There she is!"
Mytyl gave Copen a flat look but didn't deny the accusation.
"I can attest to eight," Jaune, of all people, informed. No wonder he thought it was a good idea.
"I volunteer az tribut'," still-not-Pyrrha blurted out.
"Yang does have a poster of The Achieve Men in the dorm." Ruby didn't help Weiss's case.
"Nora hung one on our door, too," Blake, not one to miss a chance to contradict Weiss, happily piled upon the evidence against the heiress.
"Fine," Weiss relented, arms in the air. "All girls like good bad boys that can play an instrument and get along with their friends!"
"Without being attracted to any of them?" Mytyl singsong and asked.
"Ruby, please say we're there," Weiss pleaded.
"We actually are! Rejoice, Weiss, you are about to become only the second most miserable person in our group!"
The vegetation cleared to a pristine beach. At a distance, across the glittering water, they could see the public section of the coast that thankfully they avoided. The spot was beautiful, but it was marred by one thing.
"Jaune!" Yang rose from where she was attempting to set up a campfire with a modicum of success. Coolers, grilling gear, food, beach equipment, and more laid about the ground, enticing people to help themselves into a relaxing day at the beach. In the grand scheme of things, the camp was serviceable, but still a far cry from the outstanding job Team JNBR and KVKC did back at Forever Fall.
Approaching the group, the blonde bombshell, dressed in an orange bikini with short shorts over the bottom piece, seemed on the verge of an existential crisis as she pushed an object into Jaune's face.
"Please tell me you know how to cook crab!" Indeed, Yang was shoving an angry crustacean at Jaune's face. It was only the reflexes he had developed during Beacon that saved him from being pinched by the crab's pincer.
Ruby, hiding behind Copen and gripping his jacket with worrying intensity, hissed at the evil arthropod while sending the creature a death glare.
"Huh… that is one very mean crab," Weiss said, astonished that her partner hadn't been exaggerating.
Jaune blinked at the eclectic clapping of the crab's pincers as the animal attempted to murder him. He idly wondered if the thing was a type of Grimm. Well, he doubted Yang would purposely let the aquatic hell spawn loose, so he gave the campsite a quick overview. It was a sorry sight, not worthy of providing refuge to a descendant of the most noble house of Arc. Those had been his father's words when he first attempted to set up a tent by himself.
Well there is definitely work to be done, but first things first.
"Yang, just yeet that thing as far away as possible."
The blonde Huntress didn't need to be told twice, as she turned and threw the crab deep into the ocean in an impressive show of athleticism.
And through all of it Jaune could have sworn the crab angrily hissed its promise of vengeance at them.
-o-
Pyrrha – shedding her guise of Pishe Moneen and sporting a, of all things, red and black polka dot bikini that still made her look like a watermelon or a ladybug, albeit a sexy one – stretched her arms upwards as far as she could. Wearing that pencil dress and the fur coat in this climate had been murder.
A quick peek to the assembled group of friends revealed that none of them spared her a quick peek while she stretched. Not even Jaune, who was taking a crash course on musical composition, under an umbrella, next to Mytyl and a close by, albeit reluctant, Weiss. And standing way too close to the former. Or maybe the former was standing too close to him. She wasn't jealous and anyone saying otherwise was trying to sell something. Her eyes were naturally green, thank you very much.
A small part of her was disappointed at that. Speaking of Jaune, she had to admit; the boy truly was a small miracle worker when it came to miscellaneous oddities, in this case camping. In record time he had taken Yang's serviceable, but still miserable, camp and turned it into the coziest beach spot Pyrrha had ever seen. Those carefully constructed photography sets on beaches had nothing on Jaune's camp.
Treating herself to a can of soda, she made her way to where her partner was fighting against a portable grill in order to get a barbecue going.
"Everything alright?"
Yang scowled in concentration. "Nothing has exploded or caught fire, myself included, so I have that going for me. What about you? I still think Nora-ing your hair like that is an overkill."
Pyrrha curled a clump of her currently green hair around her finger, inspecting it with an amused smile. "It has grown on me. I feel a… connection to it."
Yang blinked. "You feel a connection… to watermelons?"
"Yes! It's like if they are my spirit fruit or something."
"I was told once my spirit fruit is the tomato." GV chipped in. "People find me in fruit salads and feel immense disappointment."
Yang stared blankly at the still unlit portable grill. "I feel immense disappointment in regards this conversation."
"I thought tomatoes were vegetables."
"And my disappointment only grows," Yang said hauntingly in response to Copen's words.
"Maybe your spirit fruit are raisins, disappointment all around in cookies," Ruby added, looking up from the book she was reading next to Blake. Yang sent her sister a sneer for her trouble.
"Anything I can help with?" Pyrrha offered at the grumbling blonde.
"Yeah, if you can fast forward time and get dad here, that'd be great. Stupid grill and its stupid arcane instructions. Yo, Tiger, can you lend me a hand here?"
Copen looked up from where he was tinkering with GV's repertoire of water-based weaponry. "Have you tried turning it off and on?"
Yang raised her arms. "Gah! What's the point of a stupid doctorate if you cannot even light a grill!"
"Not a doctor."
"I give up! We go hungry until dad gets here."
"Probably for the best," Copen encouraged. "Learn your place in the grand cosmic scheme of things." He threw water gun at the blonde. "You're with me."
Yang inspected the toy gun. "I didn't know they made toy water shotguns."
"They don't. I just built it."
Yang gave Copen a flat look. "You are capable of building complex artificial intelligence… and you take time to make a water shotgun. Why not use some of that genius of yours and help me start the barbecue?"
Copen arched an eyebrow. "And risk a beach fire? I prefer we start our water war. You, Ruby, and I versus Pyrrha and Volt."
"Yeah!" Ruby jumped up, picking the water sniper rifle and raising it above her head. "The plucky faux underdogs against the Invincible Girl and Determinator Boy. Mytyl, Jaune, we need battle music."
At her behest, battle music started playing, with Jaune providing a simple but effective a loop of strings while Mytyl improvised an elaborated piano piece to serve as the main melody.
Yang sighed, cocking the shotgun. "Sure, whatever. As long as GV doesn't try to dye my hair, I'm in." She pointed two fingers at her eyes, then at GV. "I'm keeping my eyes on you, buzz boy."
Not even looking up from where he was messing with his water pistol, GV managed to send Yang an unimpressed stare. "Don't be a drama queen. The dye is perfectly removable with water and properly applied lightning Dust. Doesn't even damage the hair."
Silence followed his statement.
Yang, in disbelief, said what everyone was thinking. "So, Nora-"
"Could, at any time, remove her dye. She doesn't even have to worry about zapping herself with the Dust." The smirk GV sported was vicious. "I also gave Ren some parting words of wisdom. With any luck, he'll get lucky."
"It's the reason I allowed GV to dye my hair," Pyrrha informed.
"How do you know so much about hair dyes?" Weiss asked GV.
"It's the same brand I use."
Ten pair of eyes or optics, robots included, roved GV's hair, ultimately focusing on the blue tip of his braided ponytail.
"Almost six months and I never questioned what was up with that," Mytyl said incredulously. Murmurs of agreement echoed across the campsite.
"I thought it was natural. Like my hair," Ruby said.
-o-
Taiyang Xiao Long had to admit he was a bit curious. For all of her eldest daughter's claims to social stardom, she never was one to mix her home life with it. The only reason he knew about her old friends is because he was a teacher at Signal. He had to try not to know who she hung out with. It was for that reason that when she and Ruby insisted on having their friends from Beacon over for what basically amounted to a camping trip, he was surprised. And it wasn't only their team, but also the better halves of two other, according to Ruby.
'I wonder if I'll need to have a talk of with some of the boys…'
He quickly shook off those idle thoughts. After Summer's death and his subsequent shutdown, it had taken him years to earn the trusts of his daughters. Or at least Yang's, but it wasn't like his relationship with Ruby was spotless. Hell, even to this date, he sometimes felt Qrow was more of a father to Ruby than he was. And the guy was always drunk and never around. That's depressing. Point is, he was not about to fan the flames unnecessarily by being overprotective.
No. He was going to look at these boys directly into their eyes, close enough to identify every single blood vessel in the white of them, to smell their inadequate mouth hygiene and general inadequacy, and feel their uncomfortable perspiration at the presence of a real man through a firm, but inviting, handshake. And just as their chihuahua-esque jittery achieved peak oscillation, he would say: 'Hey. Taiyang Xiao Long. Huntsman. Yang's and Ruby's dad. Do you want to hear about the time I brought down a drug empire with my bare fists?'
Then he would tell the story. That should endear him to the jittery rascals.
The beach spot where he was told to meet with his daughters and their friends came into view, accompanied with a few of them sitting across the campsite. But not his daughters…
'Wait, why do I here boss music?'
"Dad! Duck!"
You might take the Huntsman out of the hunt, but not the hunt out of the Huntsman. Taiyang might not have the greatest of records as a Huntsman given his spotty availability between two marriages and two kids, but he still had enough field experience to duck when told to duck. Especially when the order came from a voice he trusted with his life and for which he would give his life in a heartbeat.
He did as Ruby told him without second guessing, only for Ruby to burst out of her Semblance, in front of him, a second later. And vaulted over him before settling back to back in a crouch position.
"Rubes, what are you-"
An inflatable frisbee bounced off his head.
"Sorry," an overly polite voice said in the distance.
Taiyang blinked. This felt familiar. And he knew why. These were a bunch of Beacon kids unable to allow a trip to the beach to remain a trip to the beach. It was nostalgic in a way. Reminded him of the same type of shenanigans Team STRQ, especially Qrow and Raven, would get into.
A sniper rifle – a water sniper rifle he corrected himself – gained support on his shoulders, as the marksman proceeded to pelt water bullets at the opposing force.
"Grrrrr," said marksman growled, uncharacteristically given her normally awkward and positive demeanor, as well as her small frame. "Dad, we need to close distance. Move forward on my count. One. Two. One. Two."
Taiyang followed her daughter's instructions and started to waddle forward into the battlefield, slowly but surely, cutting right through the camp. The spectators to the gunfight looked towards the daughter and impromptu sniper nest pair with owlish eyes. He couldn't blame them. They probably look goofy. But as far as he was concerned, this was just proof that Ruby Rose was, indeed, the daughter of Summer Rose. Never mind the fact that the girl looked just like her mother.
"Lumen! You're with me. Lock me to Jaune," Ruby said as they passed by a boy with a guitar, a girl with a keyboard, and another girl who didn't look like she wanted to be there. But neither of them responded to Ruby's orders. Instead, a white and blue, floating sphere hovered towards Ruby and stopped midway. What appeared to be its face looked between Ruby and the keyboardist, who shrugged and gesture free reign to the object.
Switching to a red and white color scheme, the sphere bumped into Ruby, causing an arc sigil to appear on her. Smaller orbs seemed to connect his daughter to the guitarist.
"Jaune, juice me up. Dad, after ten steps, I'll Semblance myself back to Team RYC. You get back to cover with the civvies and enjoy my victory lap. Now move it! One, two, three, four-"
Yep. Definitely Summer's daughter. She would be so proud.
Ten steps passed in no time and his daughter burst into her Semblance and back into her group, faster than Taiyang had ever seen her. The smaller orbs were quick to rush pass him as they rejoined the bigger one. Guess that's his queue to go back and enjoy the waterworks…
-o-
"Copen!"
"Ruby."
"Producer."
"Lumen"
"Sis!"
"Yang!"
"Other Sis!"
"Lola."
"So, with introductions out of the way," Copen took reign of the spiraling greetings, "why is Lumen here?"
Ruby sported the most self-important, prideful grin she could muster. Not even the water bullet that wheezed pass her after taking a chunk out of their makeshift sand cover deterred her. "I have a plan," she proudly proclaimed as another chunk of their sand barrier was sacrificed in the name of their continued existence.
"We cannot continue just defending indefinitely," Yang said, flinching as yet another bullet tore through their defenses, "we need to attack and, as much as I hate to admit it, anything other than water and inflatables would go against the spirit of all of this."
"Right, right," Ruby agreed, eyes close, hand on chin, and head nodding. "If only we knew of someone with a water Semblance. And if only we had thirty-six records times two, including two firsthand experiences, from which we could pull a copy."
…
Lola changed configuration to a blue color scheme, her holographs shaping to resemble shark's fins.
"Aquakinesis," Copen facepalmed, having completely forgotten about their classmate's Semblance. They had managed to recreate the Semblances of quite a few of their year. Not the entire class, though. Between lack of Semblances, not easily observable ones, or Semblances which for one reason or another their copy wasn't worth the memory and physical space they took inside the pods, they had managed to cull the numbers to less than twenty. But still, enough for not all of them to be readily available.
"Here are the plan's details," Ruby said with, apparently, warranted confidence.
-o-
It wasn't a fair fight. Even without the full might of his Azure Striker, GV was still a force to be reckoned. And it's not like he was completely locked out of his Semblance's benefits. He couldn't use the most overt, and powerful, abilities. He could, however, use the subtler ones, like increasing his speed and reflexes, giving his bullets a bit of extra sting, and even manifest his Flashfield for an instance if the incoming bullets didn't threaten to overheat him.
Pyrrha was in the same boat. She couldn't properly use her Polarity. Big whoops. She was still a championship fighter and it showed. They had been dominating the fight from the start.
When Ruby dragged Mister Xiao Long into the mix, GV feared for a second that his friend would enlist her dad into their ranks. A professional Huntsman could tip the scales in their favors. Thankfully, Ruby didn't take that nuclear option, content to use her dad as a walking sniper nest before picking Lumen and rejoining her comrades. Lumen was a concerning wildcard, but GV was more ok with the pod's involvement.
He regretted feeling like that. The makeshift sand cover exploded outwards, raining sand – ugh – in their direction. He didn't hesitate in using his Flashfield just to keep the sand out of his and Pyrrha's… everything.
As the sand cleared, Ruby stood in the middle of the chaos, a toothy smirk with pronounced fangs radiating on her face. It made GV idly wonder if the girl had some wolf faunus ancestry. Ruby's confidence was worrisome. Her extended arm, as if ordering a forward attack, a little more so.
Lumen, floating behind her with white and pale blue color scheme, her holographic projector in the form of a distressingly familiar snowflake sigil floating behind her, and the P-bits arranged in front of Ruby in an octagonal formation… that was infinitely more troubling.
"Fire!" Pyrrha said, raising her water rifle and wasting no time. GV followed the champion's lead with his own pistol.
"Lumen! Glyph!"
Encased inside the P-bits, a red glyph was brought into existence. Rather than the snowflake theme most of Weiss's glyphs seemed to favor, Ruby's had, to no one's surprise, a rose motif, with an overhead view of the flower bringing up the center and scattered petals adorning the rest of the glyph. The water bullets splattered harmlessly into the glyph. Maybe if they had been metal bullets. But water? There was no way they are breaking through the glyph before Ruby runs out of aura to keep it up.
"Copen, now!"
A burst of X's shot above and beyond the safety of Ruby's glyph, soon dispersing to reveal Copen and a red hooded Lola… GV made to shoot Copen, but his sight was blocked as a rose glyph broke line of sight and served as a steppingstone.
"Target Ruby!" Pyrrha commanded as she resumed to attack the other redhead. With the glyph currently housing Copen, Ruby was left undefended. Or so they thought, as Yang stood in front of her sister and block the bullets to the best of her capabilities with her water shotgun.
"Yeah!" Yang yelled. "Morpho-bae, give us finishing music."
"Oh, I got just the thing," the robotic voice of Lumen said before Mytyl could respond.
A guitar riff started playing from the pod.
"~Come at me / And you'll see / I'm more than meet the eyes~"
Yang's face lightened like a holiday tree.
-o-
"Oh, you have got to be kidding," Weiss massaged her forehead. "So, you finished the thing?"
Mytyl nodded with excitement.
Taiyang listened to the song further. "Is that… is a that a theme song for Yang?"
-o-
Pyrrha and GV renewed their shooting vigorously, desperately attempting to break through Yang's defenses.
"The song is powering her!"
And it was. Her Semblance flared up from the cheer hype she was getting out of it and Yang effortlessly bat away any attempt to breach her defenses.
Copen continued making way towards them, riding on the glyph Ruby was fueling with her Aura and Lumen's help. With a final Aura Burst – the name stuck after they discovered Ruby's copied Semblance didn't produce petals – Copen took position right above them. GV made to aim at him. There was no way Copen could defeat them with his water gun.
Little did he know that Copen was bringing a firefighter's water hose to an overcompensating water gun fight. Lola grew dark blue and shark fins. Huh… that looks just like-
"Oh no," Pyrrha muttered beside him. "Clear!"
He moved. Or tried, but his feet refused to unglue from the floor and it almost caused him to fall. Looking down, GV's eyes widened as a now familiar glyph kept him in place."
Soon enough, they were washed away, never to be seen again. Maybe.
-o-
Taiyang whistled at the explosive watery finisher. Yep, turning a water fight into that was definitely a very Beacon thing to do. It would take a couple of minutes before they picked up the pieces of the losers that scattered across the beach, so he had time to familiarize himself with the other locals.
Turning towards the blond guitarist, he walked up to him and settle by his side. Placing a friendly hand on his shoulder, a hand that managed to calm even the most hysterics during times of crisis, Taiyang gave the boy his trademarked 'Beacon's Most Precious Smile (four years in a row)'.
"Hey there, champ. I'm Taiyang. So, you're my daughter's friends, right?"
Why was the boy paling?
-o-
As his shoulder's bones creaked under the man's grip, Jaune looked with horror at the face of the man that ominously approached and sat next to him. The man's face sent shivers down Jaune's spine. His eyes were a little too intense and observed him a little too widely. His grin showed too many teeth. And when he spoke, he gritted his words through them
"Hey there, punk. I'm Ruby's and Yang's Huntsman father. What are you to my daughters?"
-o-
Hmm, maybe too forward? He has a story to break the ice. Giving a soft and inviting backslap at the boy, he chuckled.
"Hey, wanna hear some Huntsman's tales? I got this hilarious one of how I busted a drug operation. Not to preen my own feathers, but I was called kind of a hero."
The boy paled further.
-o-
That hit on the back threatened to make Jaune cough out his lungs. The man cackled.
"Want to listen how a real Huntsman like me once brought a drug empire to its knees? The screams of terror of those poor bastards were hilarious. They didn't even give a fight as I methodically dismantled those villainous punk. Last I heard the survivors still wake up in cold sweat every night."
Jaune gave a low whine in response. Why him? He wasn't trying anything with Ruby or Yang. Yang wasn't his type. Now, he wouldn't say no if she made a move, but she was way out of his league. 'Hall of Fame vs baby's first game' levels of difference. There were calmer ponds for him to fish on.
And while Ruby was, admittedly, more his type, he had never seen her like that. And even then, there were a plethora of reasons he steered away from that particular exit so hard he ended up swerving into the incoming traffic.
Salvation and damnation in equal measure came in the form of a lavender-haired fallen angel.
"Hi, Mister Xiao Long," Mytyl greeted him candidly. "I'm Mytyl and this is my very good friend, Jaune. And grumpy cat over there ("HEY!") is Weiss ("Oh… carry on" "HEY!"). And dark, brooding and mysterious over there is Blake ("Hey- Actually, guilty as charged.")"
Jaune was conflicted. On one hand, he was thankful. Mytyl served as the perfect deflection from Mr. Xiao Long's suspicions. She was a guardian angel from the highest echelons of paradise, sent to this sinful Remnant to save him from the wrath of a protective father.
On the other hand… she had grabbed his arm and pushed herself, specifically her chest, into close proximity. And by close proximity Jaune meant his arm was currently buried between her breasts. And it was not only her chest, as her head nestled into his neck. He knew why she did it: make Taiyang think Jaune is not in the market; dispel any thought of some illicit dalliance with Ruby or Yang. Profit.
He gets it. He truly does…
But damnit, Mytyl! His body was not getting the memo and it wouldn't be long before all of it was on high alert.
A soft giggle. An evil giggle that knew exactly what was happening. Mytyl was a guardian angel. A fallen guardian angel. A devilish demon by another name and she knew it. But it worked, as the manic gleam in Ruby's and Yang's father's eyes subsided and his Cheshire grin became genial.
"Please, Mister Xiao Long makes me sound old. Call me Tai. Or Taiyang, if that's too informal."
"Dad!" A red projectile clung to Taiyang's back. Another distraction Jaune was grateful for.
"Hey there, Rubesicle," Rubesicle's father reached to ruffle the redhead's hair. Ruby giggled adorably as only she could manage, basking on the attention.
Jaune narrowed his eyes. Ruby was preparing for something. He could see it in his fellow team leader's eyes. And the sly grin she sported. And definitely in her overt action of rushing to Copen, grabbing the boy's jacket, and leaning into him.
"Dad, meet my very good friend. Copen!"
Jaune could see the moment Copen's eyes widened in abject horror, Ruby's cherubic face took an ever-so-slightly turn for vicious. Taiyang's expression regained its wooden, manic quality. Besides him, Mytyl hid her face on his arm, trembling as a laugh threaten to burst out.
"Your very good friend, Copen!" Taiyang echoed cheerfully. Too cheerfully.
"Yep," Ruby popped the 'p'. "He's also the boy who beat Yang in a fight. Taught her quite the rough lesson. She was sore for days!" Ruby stressed all the wrong (or right?) words.
"You don't say." Taiyang voice started to sound hysterical.
Yang, arriving to the scene shortly after, shuffled away from her sister and whatever she was hoping to achieve. She didn't even mind when she bumped into the wet-as-a-cat GV and Pyrrha, who were too busy sulking and drying up from their defeat to pay attention to Ruby's antics.
"Yep," once more, the word popped. "Yang likes it rough, but he is much more gentle with me."
A chortle escaped from Mytyl, unable to hold it any longer. She wasn't the only one to react to Ruby's thick double entendres. Copen had the face of a dead man walking. Jaune betted Yang's eyes weren't red only because Ruby made sure to throw her name into the middle of that sentence. Instead, she opted to choke on her own saliva. Blake had closed her book, set it aside, and was intently looking at the spectacle unfold. Weiss gaped in an unrefined manner. And the pods shifted their optics from Copen and Ruby, repeatedly.
And Taiyang… his muscles visibly tensed. GV and Pyrrha still didn't care much, but at least they were not completely ignoring the conversation now.
"I have no idea who this girl is," Copen attempted to salvage the situation.
Ruby sent the white-haired boy the look of a puppy who have been on the rain for hours after his family abandoned it and Copen came and kick it. It did Copen no favors.
"But Copen, you said you wanted me to be Ruby Kamizono."
...she wasn't wrong. Copen did say that, didn't he? Even if not in that context or with the intention Ruby was suggesting. And it showed on his face.
Two hands settled on Copen shoulder.
"Boy, thanks for taking care of my daughters." Taiyang's words didn't match his tone. "You and I are going to get along splendidly." Not in the least.
-o-
The night was almost upon them. For Mytyl, the rest of the afternoon went by in a rush. At some point all students went to enjoy the water; some voluntarily, others like GV, Blake, and Weiss against their will. Mytyl figured she wanted to try the experience to see if she liked it or not. It was fun, but as she suspected, it was the kind of fun she could have in a pool without the sand, salt, and evil crab – which came back for revenge and pinched Yang before the berserker punt the thing with a Semblance-powered kick.
After that the group divided once more. Some, like Team RWPY minus W and Jaune, opted to stay in the water some more. Others, more in tune with their landlocked ancestry, opted to entertain themselves in the camp while Taiyang finished preparing the barbecue.
Mytyl decided to finish programming the ensemble of instruments for GV's song. At some point Jaune joined her, practicing the notes she taught him. And his singing…
"With your diaphragm, Jaune. Sing with your diaphragm. Otherwise you sound nasally. Also, try a deeper voice."
Jaune tried but wasn't quite there. But he was making progress. Mytyl felt pride in that.
"Food is here!" Ruby happily interjected, sitting at the other side of Jaune and offering them a plate of meat skewers.
Copen, sitting opposite of Ruby at the other side of the flickering campfire, grumbled, wearing his white T-shirt sans hooded jacket. Said jacket now belonged to one Ruby Rose, as an offering to make her stop throwing red Dust into the raging inferno that was her father.
The red reaper, now wearing two sets of jackets, happily munched on her food, blissfully unaware of the glare sent her way.
"This food is great, Mr. Xiao Long," GV called from his spot between Blake and Yang.
A round of agreement coursed through the group. Some vocally, like Mytyl's and Jaune's, other silently, like Blake's and Weiss's.
"Nothing of that. AS I said, call me Tai or Taiyang," the older blond responded easily. Too easily. "But since you're so talkative, why don't you tell me about yourself and your relationship to my daughters… er…."
"Dad, GV is not fair game," Ruby warned.
"What!" Copen said in indignation. "And why am I fair game?"
"Pfft, Copen, you silly duck. You had a cool, red hood," Ruby explained like if that was the most obvious thing in the world.
Copen sulked. Feeling pity for the boy, Yang decided to throw him a bone. She literally threw him a bone, catching his attention and scowl. "You know, Dad, GV is short for Gun Volt. Get it? Gun. Ruby Rose is a friend who is also a girl with a boy called Gun!"
Taiyang's head snapped in GV's direction, freezing the boy midway to the next bite of his skewer.
"That is interesting!"
"Dad!"
"You know, the name Gun Rose has a certain appeal to it," Weiss teased her team leader while simultaneously enabling some petty revenge on Copen's behalf.
"Not you too, Weiss!"
"Sounds like a rock band," Jaune chipped in, to which Mytyl nodded in agreement.
GV refused to be dragged into this, so he brought out the big guns… damnit Yang. "Speaking of music. Mytyl, that song you were practicing earlier. That's the one I asked for, right?"
Mytyl blinked at her partner, not even noticing the deft change in topic. "Y-yeah, it is."
"You asked Mytyl for a theme song too?" Yang asked in surprise.
"Not quite," GV answered, setting down his plate before bringing her attention back to Mytyl. "Can I hear what you have?"
"I…" could he? Strictly speaking, he could. She felt confident playing it. But it still was not the kind of song she normally played and sang, so there still was some hesitation. If it had only been GV, sure, she could do it. She was composing it for him after all. But there was an entire audience present. This was, as far as she was concerned, a legit live performance. And the song wasn't exactly a campfire jingle. A bit of trepidation crept in.
"I can help you with it," Jaune said from her side, strumming on his guitar the melody she spent the early afternoon teaching to him. He was a surprisingly quick learner.
She felt some of her confidence come back. Giving Jaune a thankful nod, she reached for her keyboard. "S-sure, I can try. It's not 100% complete, but maybe I can gather some feedback from all of you."
Jaune played a few experiment chords, getting into the right mindset, while Mytyl prepare the rest of the synthesized track. The song was mainly percussion and string. An acoustic guitar, in fact. Jaune's base skills and his ability to quickly pick up a song, even if not quite understanding the theory behind it, was more of a blessing than the boy realized.
Ultimately, it left Mytyl to worry only about the piano and the vocals themselves.
'The vocals. Only the most important part of the song. No pressure.'
She forced herself to stop that line of thinking. She could do this. Looking at the audience, everyone, even Blake, were eagerly waiting for the duo to begin their impromptu performance.
Taking a few deep breathes to psyche herself, she wordlessly signaled Jaune the start of the song at the count of three, starting the prerecorded synthesize track upon the end of counting.
As Jaune's guitar kicked off the song, she mentally counted the seven before the singing began.
And with her time up, she sang.
-o-
~ As sound itself seems to be falling apart ~
~ in this world void of any color, ~
~ a flash of light brought strength to my beating heart, ~
~ you came and rescued me, my dear love. ~
~ But you know, it gives me, a tiny bit of fright, ~
~ that I don't know what it's in store for us in the future. ~
~ But you know, I have faith, that it will be very bright. ~
~ You are here holding me right now; it'll be fine for sure. ~
~ But you know, it gives me, a tiny bit of fright, ~
~ that I don't know what it's in store for us in the future. ~
~ But you know, I have faith, that it will be very bright. ~
~ You are here holding me right now; it'll be fine for sure. ~
~ All up to now sounds like an unreal part ~
~ of this world, dripping with much color. ~
~ A flash of light brings strength to your beating heart, ~
~ I live forth, within you, my dear love. ~
~I will live forth, within you, my love. ~
-o-
As the music died, Mytyl remained with her eyes fixed on the keyboard. There wasn't a single applause, or compliment, to be heard. The trepidation she felt at the start creeped back into the forefront. Didn't they like the song? Wasn't it to their taste? Or maybe she messed up and she couldn't pick it up due to her familiarity with it.
This and another dozens of thoughts filtered through the mind before a soft nudge to her side caught her attention. Shyly looking up, Jaune's eyes met hers. Alongside a small smile and a tilt of his head, inviting her to look at the others. Taking a second to gather her wits, she faced the music… so to speak.
And she was met with the speechless eyes of eight other people. Ten if she counted Lumen and Lola, who hovered close by, their optics zeroing on her. They didn't need words for her to know what they were thinking. They were astonished. In a good way. They got sucked into the vortex of feelings that was the short song and were still trying to get back on their feet.
She could tell they all liked the song. Except for one unreadable face.
"G-GV?" Mytyl stuttered. The one person that was supposed to like the song and she couldn't quite tell what his thoughts were. It unnerved her more than she cared to admit.
Some of her doubts must have come through, since GV flashed her a small, if not entirely sincere, smile. "I like it… I need some time."
Without so much as a second glance, GV stood and walked away from the camp, alongside the coast. Mytyl shoulders dropped and she couldn't prevent the crestfallen look that came after.
"Well, I liked it," Ruby proclaimed, the attempt at cheering her blatantly transparent.
"I agree with Rubes," Yang added. "Not my cup of tea as far as genres go, but damn girl, you can sing with the best of them! In fact, when you sing you leave the rest of us without voice of our own."
Ruby groaned at that and Mytyl, with an amused scoff, gave the brawler a silent, thankful nod.
"Chin up," Taiyang commanded and Mytyl, unprepared, obeyed and met the older man's stare. "First, you have a beautiful singing voice and amazing skill. Second, I like the song. And third…" he looked in the direction GV had gone. The boy wasn't out of sight, but he clearly wanted some semblance of privacy as he stared vacantly at the night sea. "Third, you said he asked you to write this song, right?"
Mytyl nodded. In return, Taiyang took another look at the distant GV. "I think you just dug up some old, and painful, memories. He was enthralled during your performance. Guess the past caught up to him once he stopped moving."
Looking at her partner, Mytyl started wondering. Now that she thought about it, GV didn't strike her as the type to particularly like music, so the request had come from the left field. Thinking back, he was hesitant to even make it. He gave her quite a lot of liberty on how to tackle the song outside the main melody… like if the song was never truly finished and he lacked anything to complete it.
Mytyl steeled her nerves as she looked at Taiyang. "Tai… could I have a plate of whatever food is left in the grill?"
-o-
GV stared listlessly at the sea. His eyes focused on the reflection of the moon that lingered on the calm water. A pair of feet softly crunched on the sand, making their way towards him. GV didn't look to see who it was, but he figured it could only be one of four people.
"Meat skewer?"
So, it was his partner. He gave Mytyl a quick look over. The girl was holding a plate with a handful of neatly assembled skewers resting on it. She herself was chewing on some, with a skewer resting in her other hand. Her eyes were firmly looking at him.
Seems like she recovered from his less than stellar reaction to the song.
Accepting some of the food, they fell into silence as they both observed the horizon. It wasn't an awkward silence, but it wasn't entirely comfortable either. There was a bit of tension, waiting to snap, for one of them to break it with their words.
It turns out, Mytyl, naturally adept at being social, was the first to speak. "Did you like the song?"
He had already answered that before, hadn't he? Seems like the girl wanted confirmation. GV saw her looking at him intently, prepared to confront him at the slightest glimpse of a lie. He opted to be truthful. She was his partner. He wasn't fully comfortable bringing up the topic, but he had dragged her into this when he asked for the song. Worst, multiple times he had slipped and Mytyl called him out on it. It was only a matter of time before she found the pieces and started putting them together. Might as well provide some of them so she would not rush forward and blindside him.
"I do like the song. It just… it was… too real."
Mytyl gave him a pitying look. She had written a love song and surely knew about the bittersweet undertones of her lyrics.
"H-how hard… did I hit the nail on the head?" Mytyl struggled to meet his eyes, always flickering away to anything else interesting. The lull of the waves, the food on her hand, the evil crab making its way back to camp…
Ok, they were both stalling now. And Yang can deal with that last problem.
His hand instinctively reached for the pendant hidden beneath his shirt. Noticing Mytyl's eyes widened in understanding, he sighed and pull it out to show it her. It wasn't like she hadn't seen in before, considering they shared a room. But it was the first time she was able to take a good look at it. It was an almost flat, diamond-shaped pendant, the top side of it protruding with a slight curve and seven miniature gemstones of varying colors incrusted in it, all of them exhibiting the same odd specked blue pattern. The metal was stainless steel. Other than shaping the metal, the thing was basically handcrafted.
For some reason, it felt nostalgic.
"You hit the nail so hard you splintered the wood," GV explained with a brittle smile as he raised the pendant. "This belonged to my old roommate… although I suppose she would kick my butt if I continue referring to her like that instead of what she actually was," he explained, lazily rotating the jewelry, letting the moon shine on the gems. "Technically this belonged to me even then. Cyan crafted it, then gifted it to me. She was the one who wrote the melody. She said it was supposed to be a love song… you got that right."
Looking up from the pendant and at Mytyl, GV grimaced. Noticing her reaction to his involuntary expression, he was quick to explain himself. "You remind me so much of her."
"O-oh," Mytyl, lacking for words, attempted to respond. She blushed at the intense look GV was sending her way. "W-well, if we both wrote songs… I suppose-"
"No," GV cut her off. "I mean you look so much like her. Same build, hair color, eye color, face… she had short hair, but I can easily imagine if she had let it grow, it would look like yours. When I first looked at you, when we became partners, I was taken aback by how uncannily similar you look." GV paused, before adding. "After getting to know you, I realized you just look like her. Personality wise… Cyan was more… taciturn. And soft-spoken. And infinitely less sassy. She still had her moments though."
Mytyl shifted uncomfortably. "GV, you look pained. You don't have to force yourself to talk if you don't want to."
GV nodded, his eyes returning to the pendant. "I know. But it has been almost three years already. I promised myself, and her memory, to move on. Just a pendant and a dyed ponytail as mementos. I won't forget her, but I cannot lose myself in the memories like I did my last two years in the White Fang. She would have hated that."
Hiding the pendant back under his shirt, GV gave Mytyl a sincere smile. "Thanks. I think I needed this talk."
Mytyl nodded. "Any time, partner."
A scream from the camp caught both of their attention, as they witnessed the last seconds of Yang using the toy sniper rifle Copen built as an improvised golf club to send the murderous crab back to whatever depth of hell it crawled out from.
That served to ebb away the last tension between the two partners, as both GV and Mytyl chuckled. Mytyl brought up the plate of food still in her hand. "Skewer?"
GV gladly accepted. Food in hand, they both enjoyed the now comfortable silent that fell between them.
"Have you named the song?"
Mytyl looked at her partner questioningly. "I haven't."
"Can I?"
Mytyl lips quirked upward and nodded. "Be my guest. What do you have in mind?"
GV shuddered, in equal measure by the cold night and his next words.
"Cyanotype."
Author's Notes
Ooof, the shivers from this. Second part of the RWPY, KV_C, and J_B_ Summer Chronicles.
A few of you kind of wrote off the big reveal of this chapter prematurely, assuming Joule wasn't a thing. But… no. Joule is very much a thing.
But I digress. There's a lot to unpack here, especially towards the end, so let's do a rundown.
BEWARE GUNVOLT SPOILERS! ALSO, TWO LAST POINTS ARE THE INTERESTING ONE. AND THERE'S A TAIYANG RANT IN THERE TOO.
Swimsuits: The ASG cast's swimsuits are mostly based on their one summer art. Ruby's and Yang's are based on the cover for that one book. I didn't really like the Blake's and Weiss's swimsuit there, so I ignored those. As for Pyrrha's… I just continued poking fun at the watermelon motif. Speaking of…
Pishe Moneen: The name is just a bastardization of the P-Money moniker. I just thought it hilarious if Pyrrha went above and beyond the call of duty just to not be noticed. Yang wouldn't allow Pyrrha to just not come to the beach because of her fears of being recognized.
Taiyang: *Sigh* Let's talk about this guy. Intellectually, I know he is Ruby's father. And I accept that… in the same way I accept that Rinoa Heartilly from Final Fantasy 8 is not Ultimecia because that theory was debunked by Word of God. Intellectually I accept it… I just ignore it because I think it makes things less interesting and canon fails to address it properly.
I admit, I'm in the Dad!Qrow camp. You don't have to worry about that in this story. Unless I write a comedy or a story where the entire premise revolves around Qrow being Ruby's father as the nail that loses the war, I won't bother diving into exploring that.
That said, Taiyang is, at best, a negligent father and, at worst, a horrible father to Ruby (he's slightly better to Yang). His interactions with Ruby in the main show are basically 1) Mailing Zwei to her and Yang and 2) A short conversation, one minute and fifty seconds long, before Qrow kicks him out of the room (on a side note, lol at the look he gives Qrow). Why is the man staying put in his home when BOTH his daughters are gallivanting across Remnant fighting the almost literal mother of all evil? To put it simple, the show itself has shown Qrow act more like a father to Ruby than Tai. And Ruby reciprocates by acting more like a daughter to Qrow than to Tai. Hell, Qrow is closer to Ruby than Yang. Please remember that Yang is Qrow's actual blood-related niece. Not Ruby. Qrow closeness to Ruby is even true in the backstory. Ruby learns to fight from Qrow, not Tai. She dresses like Qrow (dress to his suit, red cape), not Tai. Her mannerism (a.k.a. the popped 'Yep' and 'Nope') are Qrow's, not Tai's.
I don't know, it just infuriates me a bit that we are told Tai is Ruby's father, but we are shown another thing entirely. Granted, I don't really watch RWBY for its stellar storytelling, and I don't think I can do better. I might be writing fanfiction, but that doesn't mean I believe myself a better writer, just a big fan.
All that said, I loved writing Tai as trying to appear friendly, but his self-perception varying wildly from how he actually comes across, to the point of delusional.
Water fight: This was inspired by how Copen and GV are having one in the summer wallpaper.
Evil enemy crab: Hit its weak point for massive damage.
Relationships: Friendly reminder that no pair is written in stone. Or written at all. These are just me poking fun at the fact that we ARE dealing with seventeen years old with pesky hormones here, give or take two years.
Good bad boys: Reference to comedy song "Lower Your Expectations" by Bo Burnham. Pretty catchy and funny song.
Green-eyes Pyrrha: Kind of nice of Pyrrha to have green eyes. Makes the "green-eyed monster' (a.k.a. jealousy) allusion an easy one to make.
Gun Strife: Rest assured; he was the prettiest girl in Don Corneo's mansion. Can you guess the two lucky ladies that played Aerith and Tifa to his Cloud?
Cyanotype: The biggest, and most daunting, thing in this chapter. If you want, you can go ahead and Youtube this (Japanese) ASG song. It's from one of the Drama CDs.
What's shown in this chapter is a localization loosely based on the translation that appears in the wiki.
I wanted the English lyrics to be something that can be sung alongside the music, so I tried my "good enough" to achieve a couple of things. Note that I'm about to get somewhat technical:
1) The meaning of the song has to remain close to the translation. This trumped everything else.
2) The length (syllables) of the verses must match the original or be VERY close. Plus/minus one syllable. I think there was just one odd verse where the Japanese pronunciation acted up.
3) The rhyme must, at least, weakly adhere across the localization. To explain this further:
The original Japanese song could, if you're generous, be given the following rhyme scheme:
ABAB / ABAA / ABAA / ACBA / A
Note that I'm not being picky about the specific syllables. As long as the verse ends with an -u, -a, or the one -i sound, the rhyme is A, B, and C respectively. For my version, the rhyme scheme became:
ABAC / DEDE / DEDE / ABAC / C
Originally the first and fourth stanza were ABAB, but the word 'lover' bothered me, due to the connotations attached to it. So, I swallowed my pride, switched to 'love', and changed the rhyme scheme to ABAC.
I took some liberties with the lyrics too (again, noting I used the translation in the wiki). The two most notable examples are:
1) The third and fourth verse of the first and fourth stanza. I added a lot to these verses because I needed to hit eleven and nine syllables with nothing. This localized into adding the phrase about 'strength to beating hearts' for the third verses and 'my dear love' to the fourth verses. The former is a stretch, but the latter I'm justifying in this fic.
2) The first verse of the fourth stanza. Since the rest of the stanza mirrors the first stanza, I decided to also change the verse to reference the concept of sound (which I do recognize as the word 'oto' in the Japanese song)
3) In the original Japanese, the last verse is a repetition of the next-to-last. I switched the last verse a bit to better fit the cadence of the song. It's still the same meaning but worded differently.
Finally, Cyanotype is a photographing printing process that produces, get this, a cyan-colored print. In fact, the word 'blueprint' originates from this, since cyanotype was the process by which blueprints were produced. Frankly, this is fascinating and, given my next item, hauntingly beautiful.
Cyan: This is the 'Ooof' at the beginning of this kilometric author's note.
Cyan, also known as Joule, is a pivotal character in ASG. We're talking Mytyl-levels of spoilers here. Fitting, since Cyan/Joule look just like Mytyl and/or Lumen, depending on the day. A couple of reviews just assumed Joule wasn't a thing in this story and I'm not sure why. I've been hinting for quite some time that GV finds something about Mytyl's looks odd and considering Mytyl and Joule are identical strangers…
Joule is the localized English name. Cyan (or Shian if you type out the Romaji) is her original Japanese name. For this fic, I opted to use Cyan as her name for two reasons: 1) Cyan sounds cooler than Joule and B) This IS a RWBY fic. I am not going to ignore a name as perfect as Cyan given the color naming convention. That said, for the purpose of this fic her full name is Cyan Joule, because why not? It will probably never be important, anyways.
Cyanotype is actually a in-universe character song for her. She writes in the hope of singing it to GV. The song itself is a vocal version of her leitmotif. Due to the T rating and Cyan being a Japanese girl with Japanese sensibilities, the original song is tamer. That's not the case here, with her love for GV being much more overt. He is, after all, her dear love. Plus, she didn't have Lumen to make lewd comments about GV for her. Girl had to take the initiative.
The pendant GV wears is analogue to the pendant Cyan crafts for him in the first game after you find the seven hidden Chaos Emeralds- I mean, jewels. Only in this fic, it never broke. And its story is slightly different. We never get a good view (or any view) of the thing, so I just based it, more or less, on the plain pendant GV wears out of uniform, with a smattering of jewels encrusted in it for good measure. I say more or less because while we DO get a view of this pendant… is not a good one. There's a lot of guessing involved.
Finally, GV's dyed ponytail is, in the games, a side effect of Joule's Septima. Originally, for this fic, it was a fashion choice on GV's (and my) part. But a review very early on asked if it was due to something similar to canon. So now it's a memento for Cyan. A fashion choice made by her that GV decided to keep in her honor.
Let's end on a lighter note:
Weiss's copied Semblance: Just like Ruby's, the default glyph each character shows would be different. Just like last time, Kohaku's hints at her semblance. You can assume the colors are more or less the colors their aura. These are:
- Ruby: An overhead Rose with a scattering of rose petals
- Weiss: Snowflakes… of course
- Pyrrha: Akoúo̱, with three Miló forming a vertically bisected X.
- Yang: Her heart emblem, with flickers of flame across the glyph.
- Jaune: His arc emblem. It shines even brighter than the other glyphs
- Nora: Eight copies of her hammer emblem arranged in a circle to form an asterisk.
- Blake: A more symmetrical, more fractal-ish version of her belladonna emblem.
- Ren: An overhead lotus flower. Thank you, Ren, for having a sensible emblem.
- Mytyl: …This one is actually a bit of a spoiler, so I'll just leave it at it involves her butterfly motif.
- GV: Angel wings, swords, chains, and the whole thing encased in Astrasphere.
- Kohaku: A bunch of interconnected gears
- Copen: His X sigil... lol.
Reviews
The Walt: Glad you liked the fic so far. I like those chapters. Personally, I'm fond of Out of Hand (the one with Blake's and Weiss's fight) and Vale is Smoldering (aftermath of the docks).