Interlude 1 Chapter 6: Meet the Family

AN: So… it's about an hour before this chapter goes up, I'm still putting the final touches on the wording, I've got a pot of pasta on the boil, and there's a solid half inch of ice on everything unfortunate enough to have gotten caught outside. At least classes got cancelled for the day.

Anyway, action's over for a good while. It's time for RWKY to deal with the aftermath of the Battle of Patch. And don't worry, I've made sure the next few chapters will be sufficiently fluffed.

(Perspective: Kassidy)

"What do you mean you aren't staying?!"

Ruby's rather loud whine brought Kassidy back from bandaging her arm – Seriously, what is with this planet's fascination with my arm? If it's not my stomach, it's my arm. Always my right arm, too. – and focused her attention at her team leader pleading to Weiss.

Weiss sighed, and her shoulders sank slightly. "Look, I understand that your village is throwing a small party for us, and I do appreciate it, and I'd rather be here. But Father wants me in Atlas before the day turns over, and that means Winter and I need to leave now."

"Probably means I'm stuck on my own for a ride back, huh?" Kassidy called over. Weiss nodded, while Ruby tilted her head in confusion.

"A ride back to where?"

"Back to Beacon. Got nowhere to stay in Vale, so I'm bunking in our dorms for the summer."

"What?" Yang's voice sounded over her shoulder, close enough to make Kassidy jump. Her partner bounded around into her view while finishing off a water bottle. "Aren't ya gonna get lonely there, K?"

Kassidy shrugged. "I'm sure I'll manage. Besides, Ren and Nora are staying on campus too, so it's not like I'll be entirely without friends."

Yang visibly deflated at that. "Yeah, I guess. Still doesn't feel right just leaving you all alone up there for three weeks." She was about to wander off to Ruby and Weiss, but then seemed to notice something and looked closely at Kassidy's head before her eyes widened. "Dust, K, have you been bleeding from your head this whole time?!"

"What?" Yang reached out to her head and wiped her forehead, pulling back with a red streak on her hand. "Oh, crap, I guess I have been. That's not good. Need to fix that once I finish with my arm here."

"Nope, take a seat. I got this." Kassidy tried to wave her off, but Yang was having none of it. "I said I got this K. Relax, it's not like I'm gonna mess it up any more than it already is. Have some faith in me."

Kassidy would have argued more, but then her breath hitched as Yang leaned in, their faces mere inches apart as her partner took a closer look at her head wound. She had to swallow as it felt like her own salivary glands were trying to drown her, and her body seemed to get warmer by a few degrees. Well, Yang's Semblance makes her a walking furnace pretty much, but this still isn't right. Am I coming down with something? Might want to check with Bob next chance I get. Thankfully, she noticed Weiss walking over with Ruby in tow, and she shifted her focus.

Weiss stopped in front of her and curtseyed. "Good job fighting out there, Kassidy. I'm sorry I can't provide a lift back to our dorms, but I must leave now. Take care."

"You take care also, Weiss. See ya in a few weeks. And don't worry about it, I'll find a way back to Beacon." Kassidy raised her hand and shot off a two-fingered salute, before shifting her attention and doing the same for Winter, who replied with a full salute before the two Schnees boarded their airship.

"Well, it was nice to see Weiss again." Ruby had visibly deflated, her voice depressed, before she suddenly bounded back up. "But Kass is still here! You're gonna love it here, the guys here are throwing a party for us since we helped fight off the Grimm and the food's gonna be awesome and there's gonna be live music and-"

"Ruby, you're rambling again." Taiyang walked up to the girls, and Ruby turned around to face her father. He smiled and ruffled her hair, then turned to Kassidy. "She's not wrong, though. The island's throwing a party tonight, and you're welcome to join us."

"Ooh, wait! Didn't you say that you were staying at Beacon by yourself all summer? You shouldn't do that! You can stay with us! That'd be fine, right, Dad? Right?" Ruby was jumping up and down, before finally sitting still and gave what Kassidy could only assume was The Pout to her father.

"You're my daughters' teammate, right? Well, if she wants to, I don't see why not. She did fight with us, after all, and you two seem to like her enough."

"Awesome, sounds like a plan! How about it, K?" Yang drew Kassidy's attention back to herself as she leaned back from finishing her patch job. "How does spending a few weeks with me and Rubes sound?"

Kassidy, who had previously been spectator to a rapid-fire conversation between the three members of the Xiao Long household, suddenly found herself the focus of attention. "Uh… look, guys, I don't wanna impose on your vacation at all. You get enough of me back at Beacon. Besides, I probably shouldn't even stick around for this party of yours. I'm willing to bet that if I wait until after the fact I won't be able to catch a ride to the dorms before the airships stop flying for the night. And you know how much I hate being the center of attention."

"But K, you're going to be a Huntress. You're going to be the center of attention just because of the career path you chose." Yang sat next to her on the bench. "Besides, as awesome as you are, what with saving kids from a Grimm-infested forest and helping save the island, why wouldn't you get the center of attention. Why wouldn't you want it, for that matter? It's not like they're gonna try to kill you or anything."

"You wouldn't be imposing on us either, I promise!"

Kassidy sighed and leaned back, hands pressed against her face. Well, I mean, it's not that I don't want to, but…

"Please?" When Kassidy removed her hands, she saw Ruby giving her The Pout. Alright, yeah, that seals my answer.

"Okay, now I have to say no out of principle." Kassidy stood up, squeezed her eyes shut, and faced away from Ruby before it was too late. "You need to learn you can't get whatever you want just by giving people that face." She could hear Taiyang chuckle for a bit, and it was apparent that Ruby was trying to keep The Pout focused on her for a few seconds longer.

"Fine! Just remember, you made me do this." Oh thank god that ended. I'm still convinced that much cuteness needs to be illegal. "She's all yours, Yang."

"Wait, what?!" Panicking at the words, Kassidy's eyes flew open as she spun around, trying desperately to prepare for what her partner had in store for her. But there was no preparing for this.

Kassidy saw Yang with her head bowed slightly, lilac eyes shining and looking up into her own. Her arms were clasped together in front of her, and in short she looked like the spitting image of a kicked puppy.

"W-wait, y-you can do The Pout, Y-Yang?"

Instead of answering the question, Yang leaned in a little closer and fluttered her eyelashes, before speaking in a higher voice laced with sweetness, looking all the part like a little girl asking nicely for candy at the thrift store. "It would mean a lot to us if you spent the summer out in Patch with my family. It would mean a lot to me. Could you pretty please stay with us? I don't want you to be all lonely." Holy shit. She's actually cuter than Ruby is. This shouldn't be physically possible.

"I – you – eh – uh – yes, of course – uh – ugh…" Kassidy continued sputtering as she slowly sat back down on the bench and stared at the distance. Yang pumped her fist and Ruby cheered, but quickly became concerned when Kassidy didn't stop.

Ruby poked Kassidy's shoulder. "Uh… are you okay, Kass?"

"I think her central nervous system is rebooting," Bob informed. "Either that, or she's gone catatonic. Fifty-fifty on that one, really."

"Ugh. Bob, whatever I just did, remind me never to do that again." Kassidy suddenly came back to the world, just in time to receive a painful headache. Leaning forward and cradling her head with her hands, she completely missed the looks Taiyang and Qrow were shooting each other. This must be what Bob feels like whenever he gets a compiler error. I should probably do a better job debugging myself before trying to get him to compile new code.

A water bottle manifested in her vision. Looking up, she saw a portly man wearing a bloody butcher's apron before her. "Ya doing alright, Huntress?"

Yang cut her off. "Yeah, we just broke her a little bit, nothing major. Still doing okay, Brian?"

"Hah! Now that the village is safe and I'm barbecuing more beef than I know what to do with, never better! Can't wait to see how that famous Xiao Long appetite has fared at Beacon!"

While Yang, Ruby, and Taiyang were busy talking with this Brian the Butcher character, Kassidy noticed Qrow had made his way over to her. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

Qrow took a long drag from his flask. "Well, considering that I need to go have a chat with some friends of mine up in Vale about what happened here, and considering that my nieces guilt-tripped you into staying for the summer-"

"Wait, that happened? I never said yes!"

"Except you did," Qrow remarked with a grin. "Happened while you were having your little mental breakdown.

Kassidy sighed lightly, before shrugging. "Well, I guess worse things can happen."

"Indeed. Anyway, I need to make a stop at Beacon, and I was curious if you needed me to pick anything up for ya. I doubt you packed for an extended stay in that bag of yours."

"You're willing to do that?"

Qrow shrugged. "Who knows? Could be fun. Plus my nieces don't seem to have a problem with ya. Whether I do is a bit up for debate still, but that's neither here nor there."

"Uh… yeah. Basically some changes of clothes and Bob's charger are all I need, really. I tend to pack light. If you're willing to grab them, that is."

"Bob's your computer thing, right? Yeah, sure, I'll keep my eyes open. Well, I better get going, so enjoy yourself. I'm sure I'll be seeing you around at some point."

"Hey, K! Come try this out, the chips and dip are amazing!" Yang's holler got Kassidy's attention, and after a quick farewell with Qrow, got up and made her way over. I got the feeling I've got a long night ahead of me.

"So then I thought Yang had sabotaged Kass' gift, so I chased her around campus and we wrestled a bit. But then I found out that Yang didn't do that, and Kass set the whole thing up from the beginning to make me go after Yang. I was kinda mad at first, but I did get to chase Yang around and make her eat mud, so it all sorta balanced out in the end."

Kassidy chuckled with Yang and Taiyang at Ruby's recounting of the April Fool's pranks a few months ago. Indeed, the youngest of the girls had spent most of the trip back to the Xiao Long household after the party telling of the team's various escapades throughout the semester.

Yang suddenly slipped an arm over her shoulder, pulling her in with a shit-eating grin plastered over her face. "You still haven't told us your awesome new gun's name yet, partner."

"OH MY OUM I ALMOST FORGOT CAN I SEE YOUR GUN?!" Ruby had instantly teleported right in front of Kassidy, rose petals falling around the group as her silver eyes were as wide as they could get.

Kassidy could only facepalm at first. "Damnit Yang, I was kinda hoping we'd at least get to your house before I had to deal with your weapons dork of a sister. But yes, Ruby, you can see it."

"Ooh…" And there's Ruby taken care of for the next few days, as she's distracted by the shiny new firearm. "What did you name it?" And I take that back.

"I don't really name my firearms."

"What about 'Garand'?"

"The M1 Garand was the model name of that rifle; it wasn't something that I personally gave it."

"Well, now sounds like the perfect opportunity to give that bad boy a name. Every badass Huntress needs a badass weapon, and a weapon isn't badass until it has a name."

Kassidy groaned. "Mr. Xiao Long, save me from your daughters. Please."

"Oh no," Taiyang chuckled. "First off, just Taiyang, please. Second off, I'm just glad I get to watch someone else suffer the combined attention of my two devils."

"Sadist," Kassidy accused. "Alright, fine, just give me a bit."

"Oh, how about-"

"My gun, my name, Ruby. That's gonna be a rule right now." Kassidy mulled it over for a bit. Something that means a lot to me, obviously. Something from back home? A little slice of Earth here on Remnant? Alright, good start, but what… Ah, I've got it! "Rogue."

"Huh?"

"Well, the gun's gonna be Rogue. And since the sword doesn't have a name yet either, it's gonna be my Baton."

Yang hid her snicker behind her hand. "You're going to go walking in to fight the Grimm while swinging a baton around?"

Kassidy smirked at her partner. "Something like that. But also, Baton Rouge was the town I grew up in. So, Baton and Rogue."

"Ohhhh. That's neat." Ruby seemed to be deep in thought for a moment, but then perked up as they passed through the treeline. "Hey, we're home!" That got everyone to perk up, and Kassidy's jaw dropped at the sight of the biggest single-family house she's ever seen. Sure, she's seen big public buildings, and Beacon just might be the single biggest thing she's encountered, but the thought of this two story log mansion housing just three people was mind-boggling.

Kassidy was knocked out of her trance when a rough hand clapped onto her shoulder. Its owner was obvious when Taiyang spoke up. "Well, it's not much, kid, but welcome to the Xiao Long household."

"Not much? This has to be, like, twice the size of the house I grew up in! Damn. Ruby, Yang, you two have it nice."

"You're gonna love it here, K. C'mon, let's give ya the grand tour." Without waiting, Yang grabbed Kassidy's wrist and drug her along, Ruby keeping up with them effortlessly. Kassidy got an uneasy feeling that someone was glaring at the back of her head. However, all thoughts immediately fled from her mind at the sight that greeted her after the front door opened.

Ruby and Yang whirled around at Kassidy's gasp. Their teammate's eyes were the size of saucers, all color had left her face, her hands were clamped over her mouth, and she was trembling. Yang waved a hand in front of her face. "You okay there, partner? What got ya like this?"

"Oh no." Ruby's simple declaration made Yang whip her head back around. Standing just inside the front door was a black and white corgi, looking up with its head cocked at Kassidy. "You're not afraid of dogs, are you, Kass?"

"I... actually don't know. This kind of situation's never come up before, at least according to my memory banks." The situation was perplexing Bob as much as it was everyone else.

Kassidy could only watch with wide eyes as the dog waddled up, took a sniff at her boots, and sat down. When it barked cheerfully at her and started panting, there was only one logical course of action.

If Ruby and Yang hadn't known that Kassidy was completely incapable of using her Aura, then they would've swore that Kassidy's Semblance was speed as well, as their teammate dove and scooped up the corgi in her arms as she squealed.

"OH MY GOD IT'S A DOG! IT'S SO CUTE! What's its name? Is it a boy or a girl? Oh, wait, it's a boy, never mind. Does he know any tricks? How old is he? Do you have more dogs? How long have you had him? AHH!"

Yang had to lean over and whisper to her sister, "Uh, who's this girl that replaced Kassidy?" Ruby could only shrug her shoulders. Sure, Kassidy had been getting better with enjoying herself lately, but it was still inconceivable that their teammate was giggling like a schoolgirl with a smile that could rival Ruby's on a trip to the bakery, while the dog licked her face. Finally, they found something that could make Kassidy forget she was a Huntress-in-training that needed to be all serious all the time, and instead remember that she's still just a fifteen year old girl.

"I'll take this to mean you're not scared of dogs, K." Yang's jaw was hanging limply at the sight before her. "K, meet Zwei. Zwei, meet K."

"Looks like Zwei likes you as much as you like him," Taiyang declared as he made his way to the front of the group. "Alright, it's starting to get late, and I'm sure you're just as tired as I am." Playfully glaring at his daughters with a smile on his face, Taiyang forced, "It's about time for my two girls to go get their beauty sleep, am I right?"

Ruby whined as Yang levelled her best fake glare at her dad. "Ugh, dad! We can't even show our teammate around?"

"You can tomorrow. Now scram, you troublemakers. I'll be with you shortly." Taiyang ruffled Ruby's and Yang's hair in turn before sending them upstairs. Kassidy reluctantly put Zwei down and followed him upstairs also. He led her into a cozy room occupied by a dresser, a nightstand, and what looked to be a luxurious bed piled high with a mound of blankets. Dear Oum, and I thought the beds back at Beacon looked comfortable. Wait, did I just say 'dear Oum'? Geez, apparently their vernacular's finally started to rub off.

"Bathroom's straight across the hall if you need it. If you need anything else, don't hesitate to ask."

"Well, as long as the offer's open…" Kassidy put her pack at the foot of the bed and turned around with a smirk. "I could do with some tips for dealing with your daughters. Seriously, now that Yang's figured out how to do The Pout, it's physically impossible to say no to them."

Taiyang laughed hard at that one. "Yeah, I can imagine. Never had a problem with that myself, seeing as I had plenty of time to build up an immunity to the puppy eyes treatment with my teammates at Beacon."

That tidbit of information got Kassidy's attention. "You trained at Beacon also?"

"Yup. Team STRQ, the coolest cool kids to ever come out of the school." The two spent a few minutes trading stories of the school and of their respective teams, before Taiyang leaned forward with a more serious expression. "So how have you been getting along with my daughters?"

Kassidy was caught a bit off guard by the comment. "Well… Ruby's a great team leader. She can be a little hyperactive at times, sure, but she makes sure everyone gets along well, she puts in a ton of work with everything, and she's a great fighter to boot. A lot of fun too, once you get past her awkwardness. But she's not even that awkward."

"Mhmm," Taiyang grunted. "And how about Yang?"

"Best partner I could've asked for," was the instant reply. "She's a superb fighter, great teammate, we've got damn near the same sense of humor, she helps out whenever I get too stressed and I try to return the favor whenever I can. Hell, if I didn't know any better I'd think she was my long lost big sister for as similar she is with the folks I did my growing up with. Great example to live up to, also." Leaning back slightly, Kassidy met Taiyang's eye. "I'm sure you get it a lot, but you did a hell of a job raising those two."

"I most certainly tried. Those two troublemakers didn't make it easy, though." Kassidy and Taiyang chuckled, but then the man turned deadly serious, leaned forward, and glared at her as though he were gazing into her heavily damaged soul. "I can tell they mean a lot to you, and I know you mean a lot to them, so I'm only going to say this once. You hurt either of my girls on purpose, especially Yang, and you better pray to whatever gods you believe in that I don't find you."

"Umm… okay, that wasn't expected." Kassidy let out a breath as she looked at the ceiling. "Don't worry about it. I wouldn't hurt them."

"You better not." Suddenly, Taiyang clapped his hands and stood up from the chair he was seated at. "Alright, enough for casual death threats. I gotta go see my girls again before they go down. Sleep well."

Kassidy's ear twitched when she heard a twig snap in the distance. Six o'clock in the morning found her in the Xiao Long's front yard, going through a basic workout regimen. The sun had just started peeking over the horizon, but the woods surrounding the property still blocked most of it. Still, there was just enough light out that, whenever she stopped and stood up, she could just see a humanoid figure with a large pack heading towards the house. Who would be coming to this place at six in the morning? Deciding not to wait around and find out, Kassidy tucked around the wall, drew her pistol, and waited as she strained her ears to listen for the footsteps that would surely come.

"Y'know, if you're going to try to be sneaky around someone like me, you're gonna need to try an awful lot harder than that." The sudden voice made Kassidy jump; dropping to a knee as she spun around, she almost brought her gun up against Qrow, who had his hands shoved in his pockets and a smug grin across his face.

Kassidy stood back up, let out a breath, and reholstered her pistol. "Ah, just you. Wow, that's not a good sign if I completely missed you AND you saw me. Didn't realize I've gotten so rusty."

"Eh, you're not bad, but from what I gather you're used to sneaking around people not quite at the caliber of your typical Huntsman. And even then, I'm not your typical Huntsman. By the way, here's your stuff. Weren't kidding when you said you travelled light."

Qrow dumped the bag at her feet, and Kassidy opened the top and checked to see if it was indeed her stuff. "Wow, thanks, man. I guess I owe ya for this." Walking around the front of the house, she set the pack by the front door. She was about to return to her exercises when she caught out of the corner of her eye that Qrow had not moved from his former posture as he simply watched her. "There something I can help you with?"

"Not really, but there was a couple things I want to talk to you about real quick." Sauntering forward, he leaned against the wall of the house. "You cool if I'm honest with ya? Brutally honest?"

"I prefer it that way."

"Good. Gotta admit, when I first saw ya, something about you definitely rubbed me the wrong way. And now that I've had my little chat with Ozpin… well, let's just say that you haven't stopped rubbing me the wrong way."

Kassidy's legs tensed as she crossed her arms. "May I be so bold as to ask what Ozpin told you about me?"

"Sure," Qrow shrugged. "He told me about a girl that got dealt a raw hand, decided she was fed up with playing the game, and made her own way in life, everyone else be damned. He told me it's the same girl who's using what morality she has left and a healthy helping of survivor's guilt to turn into quite the budding Huntress-in-training."

"I've got plenty of morality," she defended. "I just tend to pick and choose where I apply it."

"So I've noticed. Anyway, I also found out this girl took a liking to my nieces, and unsurprisingly my nieces took a liking to her. So, Ozpin trusts ya, the girls trust ya, Taiyang obviously trusts ya or else you wouldn't still be here."

Kassidy tentatively asked, "So where does that leave us?"

"Well, I don't trust you quite yet, but I do trust them, so that'll have to do. I imagine Taiyang's already said his piece and threatened ya a bit, so I'm not going to waste breath saying something you've already heard. Besides, from what I gathered, you're not one to leave those you get close to high and dry."

"It'll have to do indeed. Not exactly keen on pissing off my best friends' uncle." Kassidy and Qrow shared a chuckle, before she raised her voice again. "If you don't mind me asking, I get the impression you're not around a lot. You in between jobs?"

Qrow looked slightly above Kassidy for a few moments as he seemed to be weighing his options. Well, probably just asked a question that I shouldn't have asked. So much for not pissing him off. To her surprise, he answered in as more or less an honest fashion as she could ask. "You could say that. My last lead ran out, waiting on a new one now. Figured I'd spend that time waiting with my family."

"I'd be hard pressed to find someone that would blame you."

Suddenly, the front door to the house opened to a shirtless Taiyang. Well, it's easy to guess where Yang got her strength and build from. "Thought I heard some voices out here. You two alright?"

"Just fine," Kassidy supplied. "Always was an early riser, so I came out here a while ago to get a small workout in without waking everyone up. Mr. Branwen showed up a few minutes ago."

"Please, just Qrow."

"Yeah, this old fart's not gentlemanly enough to be called a mister," Taiyang jabbed. Qrow glared at him, and he chuckled. "How about coming in? You could probably use a break; I heard Yang talking about taking you through her old stomping grounds when she was growing up while Ruby and Qrow headed to Signal for the day. I got a pot of coffee started if you drink it."

Kassidy sighed, "Great, Yang made plans. I'm screwed." All three of them laughed at that. "And I'll have to pass on the coffee. Don't really drink anything other than water."

AN 2: Well, there's a whole lot of nothing going on here at the moment. You know what they say, no news is good news. See y'all later for Monday's chapter.

Coming up next: Yang's plans.

Matt Cyr: Fight's over. Yeah, the other Grimm aren't exactly keen on getting near Hunter-Killers, and the HK's in turn aren't keen on sharing space with the other Grimm.

AgentDraakis: Zwei uses Adorable Face! It's super effective! And yeah, she's getting some bad vibes from somewhere, and she's probably assuming that somewhere is Tai and Qrow's general vicinities.

AndJrew76: Actually, I had that written up a couple weeks ago; in fact, I'm trying to keep all my chapters written about two weeks ahead of time to kaiju has time to proofread them. But I definitely got a laugh with your expectations of someone getting hurt, because I knew exactly what was going to happen.

James: I have indeed determined what Kassidy's Semblance will be. And that's all you're getting out of me.

mcd3424: Eh, university's what it is, and the edumacation helps out on occasion too from what I hear. Still, I'm in the grind with ya too. Hope your semester goes well.

Tykene: Damn… sucks about your apartment. Hope everything gets cleaned up soon on that end. I can understand where you're coming from; rereading it myself, I can tell I didn't add enough descriptiveness to the conversation to show you how they were feeling about the situation. Glad to hear you liked these past two chapters a lot, I certainly tried to channel Winter's essence into the writing (which mostly consisted of writing while I was outside - it was COLD then!). Yeah, I took a clue from V4E3 with Kassidy and Yang's interactions on that front. Fan art? Not that I've heard of, and I'm definitely not brave enough to give it a go of my own - I've flunked every art class I've ever taken, to give you an idea about my artistic creativity. Thanks for the high praises, man, I will definitely do my best to keep it up.