Volume 2 Chapter 20: Unearthing the Past

AN: So, welcome to the first part where I truly start diverging some from canon. I'll let you guess as to what exactly I change.

At any rate, I've got a bit on my plate at the moment, so in lieu of a more informative Author's Note, have the second-longest chapter to date.

(Perspective: Kassidy)

Kassidy dropped to a roll as she jumped out of the Bullhead, Rogue instantly flying out of its holster and into her hands as she scanned their landing area. For as much as they've been able to practice, none of the girls even needed to think about things. Yang and Weiss were on the ground a heartbeat later, shells being chambered into Ember Celica, while the telltale crisp notes that typically came with ice Dust being channeled into Myrtenaster's blade could be heard. Ruby remained in the Bullhead for several seconds longer, searching through Crescent Rose's scope to serve as a more precise pair of eyes to Kassidy's own. After she confirmed the all-clear, their leader leapt down to join them.

Amidst all their careful preparations and routine, Doctor Bartholomew Oobleck simply dropped to the ground right next to them, out in the open, without a care in the world. The man took a sip from his thermos, raised an eyebrow at them, and took a scan of the area so brief that it couldn't possibly have been thorough. "Excellent work, girls, your coordination has certainly improved since we've last had the opportunity to work together." Opting to take a more hushed and serious tone, he continued, "Now, you still may be students, but as of this moment your first mission as Hunters has begun. From this point forward, you must do exactly as I say. Do you understand?" They all shared glances with each other, but were interrupted from an actual response when Oobleck called out, "Ruby, Kassidy! I thought I told you to leave all your bags back at school!"

After a bit of stammering, Ruby answered, "Eh, but, uh, you hadn't told us to listen to you yet! So… I didn't."

Kassidy barely resisted facepalming; out of the corners of her vision, she saw both Weiss and Yang on the verge of doing the same. What didn't help matters was Oobleck muttering, "Well, she's not wrong." Apparently having come to a decision, he announced, "Very well. Girls, leave your bags here; we can pick them up upon our return."

Ruby evidently didn't like this idea. "But, I, uh –"

"Young lady!" Oobleck demanded, "What in the world could possibly be in that bag that could be so important to bring with –"

The history professor was interrupted when her bag moved. An instant later, a familiar fur-covered black and white head poked out of said bag. Kassidy could feel her jaw drop, and it only dropped further when Ruby whispered, "Get back in the bag." Almost as if they hadn't just seen Zwei poke his head out.

"We are here," Oobleck began slowly, "to investigate an abandoned urban jungle teeming with death and hostility, and you brought… a dog?"

"I, uh…"

"Genius!" Suddenly, Oobleck raced past all of them to grab Zwei out of Ruby's bag. "Canines are historically known for their perceptive noses and heightened sense of hearing, making them excellent companions for hunts such as ours!"

Kassidy could feel her left eye begin to twitch, and she made no move to stop it. Just when things couldn't get any stranger, Ruby suddenly exclaimed, "I'm a genius!" If the team leader said anything more, it was drowned out by three distinct slapping sounds that originated from a flawlessly executed triple facepalm.

"Miss Smith, I don't suppose you brought a dog as well in your bag?"

What the hell even is this mission anymore, if that was a question that was asked without a shred of sarcasm? Still, seeking to reinstate some modicum of reality back into this situation, Kassidy explained, "No, doctor. Just Bob's sensors, communications, and other auxiliary modules, his spare battery, night vision goggles, field surgery and first aid kit, Dust, extra ammunition… and maybe one or two pieces of high explosives."

"Hmm, I see. Very well, I suppose it can stay as well." Suddenly dropping the dog (which made all the girls panic briefly before Zwei got back up with nary a complaint), Oobleck said, "Now, as you've been informed, the southeast area has been marked as a recent hotspot for Grimm activity. Now, there are several plausible for this phenomenon, one of which being – Grimm."

Kassidy was about to join the others in openly questioning him, but just barely managed to pick up a rock being knocked over. She softly called out, "Six o'clock!" and spun around while dropping to a knee, bringing Rogue up to bear on a Beowolf. She heard the other members of the team bring their weapons to bear on the threat as well.

"Stop!" Oobleck whisper-shouted. By way of explanation, he offered, "There are a number of reasons why a Grimm would congregate in this particular area, the most likely of which being their attraction to negativity. Sadness, envy, loneliness… hatred. All qualities that are likely held by our hidden group harboring ill intent."

Unable to keep the impatience out of her voice, Ruby asked, "So, what now?"

"We wait. We track. If this specimen leads us to its pack, that pack may subsequently lead us to our prey."

Kassidy could all but hear Yang sigh next to her. Her girlfriend followed up with, "How long do we wait?"

Oobleck hummed in thought. "It's uncertain. Hours, days, weeks." Kassidy could feel her spirits sink ever lower with each new time period, each significantly longer than the last. The doctor continued, "Why, lone Grimm have been known to stay isolated from their pack for months – and there's the whole pack."

Kassidy had seen them before Oobleck, naturally. Though… it was a rather small pack, all things considered. This should be easy if they didn't let the Grimm on to their presence until it was too late. A plan that was quickly ruined by Weiss exclaiming, "What?"

"And now they've seen us," Oobleck said.

"What?!" Weiss asked again.

"And now they've seen us!" Oobleck practically shouted at her.

"What's the plan, doc?" Yang asked.

Oobleck took his lovely freaking time sipping from his thermos, before muttering, "Show me what you're capable of."

The four girls felt adrenaline course through them, finally having something they can fight. Letting routine come back into play immediately, Ruby started issuing orders. "Kassidy, get down that side street, see if you can't split them up. Yang, you and I will be up front to meet them. Weiss, pick off any stragglers and make sure Kassidy doesn't get overrun."

They all ran off to take care of their part of the plan. Kassidy considered sending bullets downrange to draw attention and thin their numbers, and was about to pull their trigger when she thought otherwise. Honestly, these were just Beowolves, and not even old ones by the looks of it. Sure, they were seven foot tall, several hundred pound murder machines that would've made the news for weeks, if not months, back on Earth. But it was amazing, the kinds of things you got used to at Beacon. So, rather than waste the bullets, Kassidy holstered Rogue and brought her left hand to over her shoulder, resting on Baton's hilt in its sheath. She shot a grin over to Yang beside her, and offered, "Whoever kills less Grimm today has to buy dinner next time we go out?"

"You're on," Yang said, returning with just as big a grin.

Kassidy smirked, then split off down the side street while Yang met the majority of the pack in battle. She only had a moment to appreciate the sight that was Yang Xiao Long beating the stuffing out of a Beowolf before she needed to divert her attention to a trio of Beowolves that had chased after her. Her grip tightened on Baton as she waited for the perfect moment. When the first Grimm leapt at her, she effortlessly slid to the side and drew her sword, getting a clean decapitation for her trouble. A rising slash caught the second Beowolf across the chest, spilling what passed for guts and making it fall to the ground beside her. She sidestepped it, ducked under the third Grimm's claws, and neatly slid her sword between its ribs. Even though the Grimm didn't have anything analogous to a heart, stabbing them where they should have had one seemed to do the job well enough. By the time she'd finished wiping the black ichor-like substance off her blade on some nearby weeds, Crescent Rose had fallen silent and they had all gathered again in front of Oobleck. They all seemed excited, but Kassidy didn't allow herself to share in it. Today, and every day they were out here, would not be a sprint. They were all in a marathon.

Kassidy swore and threw herself backwards as the door burst open, a small swarm of baby Nevermore flying through and trying to make a break for it. Before it was too late, she'd replaced her existing magazine of inert rounds for one of fire Dust ammunition, aimed up, and fired once – just once. A cloud of flame shot up, cooking the whole swarm in one go and causing charred and dissolving corpses to come raining down around her. The smell was terrible, confirming that cooked Grimm probably didn't taste very good, but Kassidy ignored it in favor of stepping into the ruined house. She'd found something a few houses back, something that made her want to check this one out over its neighbors.

Ruby, Weiss, Yang, and Oobleck had all been left behind to find somewhere to set up camp. As the minutes turned into hours, and hours turned into the whole day long, Kassidy found herself shouldering more and more of the workload as her teammates' staminas were pushed too far. Even Kassidy was starting to feel the effects of a day spent on her feet, killing Grimm left and right and searching the ruins for signs of terrorist activity.

As she stepped further into the building, she couldn't help but marvel at how well-preserved it was. Sure, the walls crumbled, the paint peeled, and in general it showed the signs of not having been maintained for the past several decades at least, but it was little more than the passage of time. There was no fire damage, no shattered walls from the Grimm rampaging through – even some of the furniture was still intact, if encased in a layer of dirt and grime several inches thick. Poking around what she guessed was the living room showed that all signs pointed towards this being what she thought it was. She spied what had to be a picture album of some kind, and took a step towards it.

"Ah, there you are, Miss Smith!" a voice called behind her, and Kassidy couldn't fully bite down the growl. Forget Crescent Rose – Oobleck's shouting would alert the White Fang that they'd been had far sooner. She was about to turn around to him when he suddenly asked, "What about you?"

Nearly stunned by the sudden change in tone, she asked, "What about me?"

"You seem to carry yourself with a sense of purpose," Oobleck explained. "So, what are your reasons for being a Huntress?"

Kassidy thought about how best to explain it for a few minutes, before deciding that a direct approach would not yield the results she was looking for. Instead, she asked, "Take a look at this building, this little cul-de-sac. What do you see?"

Oobleck hummed and nodded, probably already guessing where this was going. "I see a tragedy that could have been prevented, had things gone differently. I see lives that could have been saved."

The way his voice dropped piqued Kassidy's curiosity, but she shelved it for the time being. "I see numbers," she admitted. "Rounds expended, Grimm slain, Lien in damages… lives lost. Of course, that's only on the surface; if you look closer, a new story emerges." Stepping towards one of the other doorways, she started piecing together the scene before her. "A family that was caught in their home when the city fell. A father who had some form of protection, and dashed out to the city to try and buy his loved ones some time."

Doctor Oobleck's gaze followed the faint gouges in the drywall and floorboards she pointed to, which led out the front door. He took just a step outside, still close enough to be heard, and solemnly said, "He didn't make it long. Though he might have had a weapon of some kind, he was not a Huntsman, and the Grimm did not take long to strike him down."

"Meanwhile, inside the house," Kassidy continued, bringing the doctor's attention back to her, "a mother went to collect her infant child. A daughter, to be precise. While her soon-to-be-late husband bought her what time he could, the woman made her way to the picture window. She opened… no, it looks like it jammed. She broke the window herself. From there, she sadly did not make it much longer than her husband. An… Ursa, it looks like, caught up to her and carved her up, leaving her on the ground, with her daughter in her arms, and bleeding out." She was curious as to the remainder of the scene that she saw, but her answers were confirmed by seeing the gouged up concrete a short ways away. "Then someone came to her rescue, though. They fought the Ursa, appeared to have won, and… ah, that's how the daughter escaped. The mother handed her off, and our Good Samaritan took her away from here."

"Your eyes are very good indeed, Miss Smith; I'm surprised you noticed all that," Oobleck praised.

Kassidy snorted. "You don't survive what I have by not paying attention to things."

"There were, however, a few facts that you got wrong," Oobleck then condemned.

"Such as?" Kassidy prompted, head tilted.

Doctor Oobleck walked up to her with a small, sad smile on his face. He didn't even take a look at the scene before he said, "It was an Alpha Beowolf, not an Ursa; a fairly large Alpha at that." After a moment's pause, he added, "And the two were not married. Not yet, anyway; they were actually due to be wed in a week's time."

Kassidy raised an eyebrow to complement her tilted head. "How did you figure that out?"

Oobleck removed his glasses, pinched his nose, and heaved a great sigh. When his head raised, a fallen face was what greeted her. "Because I was the young Huntsman that the woman handed her child off to." When Kassidy's jaw dropped, Oobleck smiled sadly before explaining, "It has been many, many years since that fateful day. It was my third year at Beacon; our mission entailed beefing up the patrols on Mountain Glenn's walls, considering that the Grimm had become more active lately. We were in the evening of our fourth day in a weeklong mission; our assigned patrol time had ended, and so we were unwinding for the day. This building's residents, you see, had offered to house us for the duration of our mission.

"The four of us were on our way back from making a grocery run for the new family when the alarms sounded. Naturally, we dropped everything and began making our way to our position on the walls, which happened to be in the opposite direction to this house. We had made it several blocks before we realized how badly the situation had turned. Nobody knows how, even to this day, but before we knew it the Grimm were inside the walls and had made significant headway into the city itself. My three teammates rushed to engage the beasts and buy the civilians as much time as they could, but I was sent back to rescue the family that had taken us in so kindly.

"I ran as quickly as I could, but I was still too late: the Alpha Beowolf had attacked the poor woman, and was at the moment of finishing her off. It took a burst of speed I didn't know I had at the time, but I managed to slay the beast before it could reach her – and her child. I returned to the house to try and find her boyfriend, but he had already passed by the time I arrived. She begged me to take her child and leave her behind. With no other option… I did."

Kassidy could hardly find the words to comment on it. Something like this… other than the destruction of Chicago and maybe New York, even the collapse of American society didn't have such a tragic story occur in an eight-hour time period. She eventually stammered out, "H-how did it end?"

"Returning the child to safety was the move that saved my life," Oobleck said. "By the time I had taken her to the safe zone, Vale's forces had already made the decision to abandon the Mountain Glenn territory. I manned the safe zone, trying to buy the evacuations as much time as I could, but in the span of only a few hours our defenses had been overrun. Exhausted from the fighting, the soldiers didn't even give me a choice as they hauled me on one of the last craft out of the city. After that… all flights, whether to evacuate civilians or deliver reinforcements, stopped. They blew the tunnels leading back to the kingdom proper, sealed off the territory, and condemned the people remaining to die in an effort to keep the Grimm from becoming a danger to Vale itself. I was… I was the only member of my team to leave this place alive."

While Kassidy mulled over his words, Oobleck led her back to the inside of the house. Suddenly, he asked, "Have you figured out, yet, who the inhabitants of this house were?"

"I have an idea," Kassidy answered. Without waiting for more words, she returned to where she'd spied the picture album. The old, leather-bound tome was heavy with dust, but wiping away the front cover told her what she'd already figured out. "Marcus, Ebony, and Summer Rose," she read. "A Family in the Making."

"You can probably imagine my surprise," Oobleck mentioned, "when, seventeen years later, I would teach history to the then-orphan that I had initially carried out of this disaster."

Kassidy opened the scrapbook to the first page, to see a weary yet happy Ebony Rose holding her newborn child. Looking at the picture, she reflected, "When my home fell… it wasn't to Grimm. It was to a multitude of groups, not unlike the White Fang. It was slow, over several years. People argued and fought over who was right, while the people who just wanted to survive slowly ran out of safe places to run to. And I didn't do anything to help them. Even, at the end, when I finally tried to help, I couldn't. I wasn't strong enough to stop it… and what should have been our salvation, instead only heralded our annihilation." Softly closing the book, she looked up to Doctor Oobleck, and at that moment felt the burden of everyone that had gotten left behind. "You ask me for the reasons I have for being a Huntress? I can give you eleven billion of them, and I left them all behind on a lifeless, radioactive rock once called Earth."

"Did you manage to bring a history of some kind with you, when you left?" Oobleck asked. When Kassidy nodded, Oobleck smiled bleakly. "Whenever we get back, I would very much like to examine it, if you don't mind. Such stories should not be forgotten. We owe them that much."

"We do," Kassidy agreed.

Life suddenly coming back to him, Oobleck pointed towards the book she held. "In the meantime, what do you plan to do with that?"

"Return it to its rightful owners, of course," Kassidy stated bluntly. "Summer has next-of-kin, and it will be delivered accordingly."

"And what of our mission?"

"What about it?" Kassidy shot back, more harshly than she intended. "I can operate just fine without sleep – for a couple days, anyway. I have equipment and experience necessary to operate in the nighttime. I can continue the search while the rest of you recuperate over the course of the night, and come morning I should have at minimum figured out a few places we shouldn't bother looking."

"Be careful that you do not let your vengeance consume you, Miss Smith," Oobleck warned. When Kassidy whirled around and made to argue, he cut her off. "I have seen how you've thrown yourself at this mission, and I know about your… extracurricular activities, let's call them. I know you feel guilty about what happened to your home. I know that you take your aggression out on the White Fang, since you can do so no longer to the gangs that infested where you came from. You must keep in mind that our goal here is not to punish the White Fang, but to protect people from whatever harm may befall them."

The man left before Kassidy could get a word in, leaving her standing with a leather scrapbook in her hands and a scowl on her face. She shook her head and made her way out of the house. She wasn't in this for vengeance. Oobleck didn't understand… she had to do this. She would not let the White Fang bring Vale to ruin. She would not make the same mistakes she'd made so many times in the past. She would not sit back and let countless innocent people die just to make her own existence easier.

But, that would be for later tonight. For right now, she had a delivery to make.

Hazel eyes blinked open suddenly, and the rest of Kassidy was right behind them in awakening. Immediately assuming the worst, she tried to jump up and deal with an imminent threat. Tried being the keyword, as Yang's arm remained firmly locked around her waist, and Rogue fell out of her hands in her haste. Once the brief moment of panic had subsided and she confirmed that she wasn't in the middle of being horribly murdered, Kassidy calmed her breathing and focused on her hearing. There were Grimm out, yes, but none anywhere near them, and none that had seemed to be aware of them. Weiss remained at watch, evidently unaware of the minor fit she'd just had. Despite her insistence in working through the night, her teammates were just as adamant that Kassidy rest as well, and in the end she lost that particular argument, thus leading to her current position in Yang's arms.

Of course, the far most obvious source of noise was the corgi whining near her face, poking her with his snout. Kassidy opened her eyes in time for Zwei to poke her in the forehead with his nose, letting loose another soft, keening whine as he then buried his snout under his front paws. She took a quick look around, still long enough to see Weiss still leaning against the edge of the crumbled wall, Ruby still sound asleep while clutching her grandmother's scrapbook like her life depended on it, and Oobleck still snoring on a platform above them. Upon Zwei poking her yet again, Kassidy groaned, "What is it, boy? It's way too early for this stuff, even for me."

Zwei yipped at her quietly, before trotting over to what served as a door. Kassidy groaned, "Seriously? You can't move all of five feet to go to the bathroom on your own? Ugh, fine, give me a second." She tried to twist out of Yang's grip, but gasped as her girlfriend's arm tightened on her stomach, inadvertently forcing the air from her lungs. Kassidy took a few shallow breaths, grumbled to herself, and decided to employ her new trick that thus far has never failed to let her extricate herself from Yang's clutches. Twisting her arm back, she aimed for that one spot right between Yang's fourth and fifth ribs, and dug her fingers in lightly. Yang gave a half-giggle, half-snort, before shifting her grip off of Kassidy to protect from the slight tickle attack and promptly resuming her own snoring.

By the time Kassidy had returned her gun to its holster and slung her sword's sheath on her back, Zwei had already made his way across the street to relieve himself on one of the nearby pillars. She followed the dog out, only for him to finish quickly and come trotting across the street towards her. Kassidy rolled her eyes and was about to make a sarcastic and rather rude remark about Zwei not being able to do that on his own, but a sudden bark prompted an unknown and dangerously close voice to question, "What was that?"

In one fluid motion, Kassidy rolled forward behind a pillar, collected Zwei under one arm, and drew a knife with her free hand. The dog was quivering violently at the sudden change in the situation, and Kassidy had to keep her own nerves calm as a second voice asked, "What was what?"

Kassidy dared to lean her head out, and found a pair of White Fang grunts wandering through the street, and paying surprisingly little attention to their surroundings given their current position in a Grimm-infested ruin. The first guy answered, "I dunno, I thought I heard a Beowolf or something."

She estimated how far away they were, and scowled, before another thought hit her and her scowl deepened. About thirty feet away; they were probably too far away for her to take them both down without alerting anyone else. Not to mention that, if they had Aura, a quick and silent kill was all but impossible for her. The two grunts turned around and mentioned something about finishing their patrol, but everyone, Kassidy included, froze when a certain blonde brawler whisper-shouted, "K! What are you doing?"

Kassidy whipped her head around long enough to determine the situation: Yang, who for some reason was completely unarmed, had wandered out and was looking right at her. Of course, both of the girls' attentions were quickly drawn to the two White Fang guys swearing and getting ready to shoot at her. Grumbling under her breath, Kassidy took a gamble and leapt out.

Her knife had gone flying out of her hands towards the furthest grunt. It miraculously landed blade-first, and the fact that it buried itself in his breast confirmed that neither had Aura. The other guy, nearest her, was so shocked by the appearance of a second assailant that he fumbled his rifle; this bought enough time for Kassidy to draw her sword close the gap. A quick decapitation ended his life, and a coup de grace on the prone and bleeding out form of the downed grunt ended any possibility of the remainder of the White Fang being alerted.

"Oh Oum…" a voice breathed from behind her. Kassidy turned from wiping off the blood of her sword on the corpses to see Yang wide-eyed and paling. Yang looked from the bodies to her, and stammered, "I'm so sorry, K, I didn't see… you killed them."

Kassidy nodded. "They would've alerted the others if I didn't."

"Yeah, I know," Yang muttered. "I just… fuck. This is it, isn't it? This is really real."

"Yup," Kassidy answered lamely. Sheathing her blade, she fetched her knife and asked, "Did I wake you?"

Yang nodded, but waved the problem away whenever Kassidy started apologizing. Instead, she walked up to Kassidy and offered, "So, what now?"

Kassidy thought for a moment before walking back to camp; if she was to investigate anything right now, she'd need her night-vision goggles. "I'm gonna grab –"

She froze when the ground under her started to crack. Kassidy spun around to meet Yang's wide eyes with her own, before the concrete fell out from under both of them. She was in freefall for but a moment, before her girlfriend managed to grab her wrist. Kassidy looked up to find Yang gripping onto the rapidly crumbling road for all she was worth. Yang kept switching her gaze between the ground above them, and the woman that was preventing her from falling to certain doom. When Yang met her eyes again, there was a certain hardness that Kassidy knew she didn't like; this conclusion was all but confirmed when Yang said, "I'm sorry, K."

Kassidy didn't get to verbalize her confusion when Yang hauled for what she was worth, sending Kassidy flying over the ledge and onto solid ground. Kassidy hadn't even hit the ground when the slab that Yang was holding onto crumbled and fell, as well. Her heart dropped, and she scrambled as close to the edge as she dared. The sight she got nearly made her cry out, as Yang landed with a heavy thud and didn't get up. Kassidy whipped out her pistol, trying to find something that would help, before more voices could be heard. She strained herself to just barely hear, "Where the hell did she come from?"

"Dunno," another voice, female, answered. "Think she's dead?"

Kassidy had to bite down a growl when one of the White Fang soldiers kicked Yang over, but nearly gasped in relief when he said, "Nah, still breathing." Her relief faded, however, when he then asked, "Should we do something about it?"

"Torchwick's gonna want to know about this, and I do not want to get on that guy's bad side. If you want to, be my guest."

"Alright, alright, I hear ya. Let's go get this bimbo over to him and get this done."

Kassidy slid away from the lip of the hole and stood up, forcing herself to consider facts. Yang was alive, but in enemy hands. The White Fang knew something was up, but didn't know what exactly, so they still had some element of surprise. That wouldn't last long, though, if she didn't act now. No matter what, at this moment in the present, time was against them.

She stormed back to base camp. She needed to act now, but she couldn't do this alone; she wasn't quite that arrogant. She needed supplies, weaponry, and backup. And once she had those… the White Fang was here, Torchwick was here, and Yang was being held captive. This was her duty. This was what she needed to do. But more than that, they would not take her love from her. She would not allow that which was hers to be taken from her. Not again.

Never again.

AN 2: So, everyone who said something voted for the "weird" option. Alright… don't say I didn't warn you. Still, I'm excited regardless for the directions I can take this fic with that. Also, this chapter was not the weirdness I was talking about.

Coming up next: the Breach, part 1: Battle of Mountain Glenn. Nobody puts Yang in the corner without Kassidy getting a say about it.

march4fun: Consider the weirdness brought on. Glad you enjoyed the chapter; here's to hoping that this one is at least as good.

AgentDraakis: You shall have your weird fluff, good sir!

RagingKey: Well, I guess if it's worked thus far… let's hope the weird keeps on working.

Tykene: Yeah, rewriting canon while still getting canon results is definitely awkward at times. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on your perspective), we're finally getting to the point where I can start diverging from canon somewhat.

EWR115: Always have time, my friend. Come, let us bask in the glory that is eternity. /cultmode

Captain marvel 36: More weird it is, then. As for Kassidy spotting out Merc? A combination of slight tells that RT didn't animate in, a healthy helping of creative license, and a large dose of out-and-out paranoia. Fortunately for Kassidy, it's not actually paranoia if they actually are out to get you.

Also… CONGRATS ON BEING THE FOUR HUNDREDTH REVIEW!

autumskiess: Unintentional puns, best puns. Err, I mean… of course it was intentional! Why wouldn't it be? More weirdness incoming. Also more fluff, but mostly more weirdness.

FloriteFlower: Sorry, bud, you've gotta wait just like everyone else. If it makes you feel any better, I can promise one hell of a ride on the way there. Weiss' short was pretty good, even if I cringe every time she straight up chops a Beowolf's arm off with a goddamn rapier. At least she finally used it for stabbing things… but, eh, Rule of Cool, I guess. And to be frank, I wouldn't be surprised if Neo is just swept under the rug (or down the trade winds, as my personal theory goes). She didn't have much of a presence in the show that didn't involve Roman.

serioushugsies: Ugh, tax accounting. Haven't gone through it myself, but I'm pretty familiar with the math behind it, so please let me express my condolences. As for Bob, he would have… if it weren't for getting kidnapped by Vale (or was it Atlas?) and having to fend off nonstop attempts to breach his security. More weirdness it is!

FiveShadows: I'm glad you think so, and TBH I'm starting to think it's high time she start using it.