AN:

Chapter Title: A religion apart
Arc 1: Bubbles of Futility Chapters

"Damn it!" I cursed, clutching my sides as my body wracked itself with pain.

"That's what you get for trying to force yourself up without taking a moment to realise what's happening around you." The familiar voice of Serqet said from my left as I turned to see her dressed in the standard Nurse uniform all the school's medical staff wore.

There might have been a level of eroticism in seeing my girlfriend dressed in her work clothes if not for the fact that I felt like everything was broken, well that and I didn't actually find her outfit all that attractive since it was just navy blue scrubs and black slip-on canvas shoes.

Anyway, back to complaining about how much my body hurts right now.

"If you think too hard you might burst a blood vessel, so as your doctor I say you should go back to sleep before you hurt yourself more." She commented with a lidded expression while reducing her Scroll from its pad form to its phone form.

"Doctors order then." I replied with a yawn before wincing and laying back in the hospital bed.

Closing my eyes I managed to fall asleep after twenty minutes of laying in silence listening to the ambience of the room and all the machines as well as the sounds of people walking in the nearby hall and rooms. In that time I had to think and listen to the ambience. I did wonder where my team was and what day it was for that matter.

But my questions went unanswered when I finally went off to the land of nod.

Normally I wasn't one to remember my dreams and I was never really sure why that was the case, but it just made the times that I did remember them more prominent for that. The dream that took over my mind this time was a recreation of my childhood-

I walked slowly through the pathless enormous forest distracted by every little thing that moved or made sound, there was a cacophony of things to interest me as I wandered alone passing by familiar plants and trees amongst the hundreds of different types of foliage.

Seeing a particularly large oak tree with red leaves the colour of garnets, its leaves were this way year round and had become known locally as 'The Everfall Tree'. Standing in front of it I looked up at its enormous form wanting to fly up into its highest branches and watch the world from that position, but when I attempted to flap my wings they could barely create even a twentieth of the lift they normally did.

When I looked at my wings I found them so much smaller than I remembered, making me wonder what had happened to them, seeing no other option I decided to climb the tree with my bare hands. Before I began the ascent I took stock of my clothes to make sure I wasn't in something new so that Mum wouldn't yell at me when I got home for ruining a good pair of clothes, but they were an old pair. I was in brown shorts, a grey t-shirt but no shoes.

My bare feet were caked in mud and dirt from walking around the forest, as I began climbing the trunk I heard a sound behind me. It sounded like something rustling the leaves of the bushes I had clambered through to get here.

As I went to look to where the sounds were coming from-

"BOO!" a voice yelled.

"AH!" I screamed with fright as I let go of the tree in terror and fell-

"Omph!" The voice sounded familiar as I opened my eyes to see my sister looming over me as I hadn't hit the hard ground but she had caught me.

"'Cilla?" I asked, wondering why she was here. She didn't play with me in the forest often because she was always training to go to one of those Huntsman academies.

"Az." she said back, setting me down on my feet. "Why're you out here alone? You know Mum said you weren't allowed in the forest alone in case something happened and there was Grimm or you got hurt."

"I- I… " My voice trailed off not knowing how to respond to my sister as she looked at me with those blue eyes.

"Don't worry about it, I won't tell mum." She assured me before I was picked up by her and put on her shoulders.

She was ten and she was already as tall as our mother, looking almost identical except for her voice. She had always had a really flexible voicebox, able to change and imitate almost any voice or sound. I remember the trouble we got in when she flexed it to convince adults to let us have or do stuff around Valor.

The ears on her head stood on end and her skin bristled as her body tensed-

Before I knew what was happening we were running, I was on the ground again somehow being dragged along by Priscilla as she and I ran for our lives from something I couldn't tell what exactly. Every time I tried to look back there was nothing but an all encompassing void consuming the world around us as we were pushed to our limits.

We ran for what felt like hours before finally reaching an opening-

"Azrael no!" I heard my sister's voice scream in horror as I failed to stop myself before going over the edge of a cliff.

As I slipped and the sensation of falling enveloped me with fear, the sea I fell towards changed and morphed from the greenish blue waves into a distant whirling twisting and turning void or purples, blues and blacks.

[Dreaming]

I woke up falling.

Again.

"AH!" I yelled as I hit the bed.

As my heart slowed down to a normal rate I looked around the hospital room finding that there wasn't anyone in the room. Sighing I slumped into the mattress and sheets resting my head against the pillow.

"Ow..." I winced as the pain of my injuries provoked from the fall.

My entire torso felt bruised and battered, my head like it had been twisted to the right just a little too much and now all the muscles and joints around it were sore and tender with any movement too fast causing pain and making it almost impossible for me to turn my head to the right.

Which was why when I looked around the room I rotated my entire body to get a look at all the corners.

Left to my thoughts I wondered where Serqet was since she had been here before I went to sleep and now there was no one, not even one of my teammates or friends from all the other teams I had met. It started to make me feel lonely that there wasn't anyone here to distract me, I hated sitting around alone when I knew I could be out doing something productive with my time like continuing any of the things I was learning.

"Argh!" I grunted scowling as I clutched my head as a pounding headache, my eyes started to hurt as well.

But unlike that time earlier in the week I knew what it was now, I had since gone to the infirmary about it and got told about this thing called eye strain. The Nurse I had spoken with had the time told me it could be connected to my Semblance.

After twenty minutes of trying to ignore it the headache eventually left me and I was able to start thinking again without much issue. Though that's not to say things were any better when it was gone because there was still nothing to do and no one around to talk with.

Thankfully by the time I started praying to Gods someone finally entered the room.

"Your awake Azrael." Blake stated more so than asked as she sat down on a chair next to the bed.

"I am and it's been hell so far with how bored I am, so please tell me what I've missed." I almost pleaded to her.

"Well the Nurse told us you woke up on Sunday morning from what Hektor did to you in your spar." The dark haired girl was reading a book while she talked. "By the time we came by to visit you it was midday and we were sent away since you were recovering and needed the rest."

"Anything else I need to know? Like what day it is and if I at least get out of class work since I'm like this?" My teammate looked up from her book with those feline golden eyes crinkling into a smirk.

It was sort of weird to see her smirk, not that she hadn't smiled or smirked in our first term of being a team she had. However they seemed so much more full and real if that makes sense like she wasn't hiding behind something or keeping it all deep down under whatever mask she was trying to wear. Which you know should mean a lot coming from someone who literally hides who they are behind a physical mask, so in that first week back and right now every time she has they've just been brighter.

Her mischievous smirk wasn't unwarranted though.

"Pyrrha didn't want you to miss out and fall behind since you didn't go to a prep-school and went around making sure to collect the work you missed from your teachers." I could almost hear how smug Blake sounded since the moment she said my partner's name I had my face in my hands dragging them down my face.

"I love Pyrrha, but I really need to talk with her about how that will actually make my life harder since there will be so much to catch up on."

"You asked before, so it's Wednesday today, the reason Yang and Pyrrha aren't here is because they got roped into helping Ruby's team with the ball in a few weeks before we go on our missions." After that she went back to reading and handed me a book, it was one I had picked up from that bookstore when we were there with Hektor.

I sat in silence reading with the raven haired girl for over an hour until she eventually had to leave because her lunch break and free period was over which was around the time Serqet came in and ran through a short check up to see how I was coming along and discussed or rather I should say was very impressed by and praised my friend for managing to mess me up so badly with just his fists. From what my girlfriend told me about our spar apparently the recording had basically been seen by most of the Academy at this point and there was a lot of respect going around for Him and me for how 'entertaining' the fight was.

'Qet also asked me about the dance coming up and whether I wanted to go to it since she had been asked by some of the staff to attend as chaperone along with four other staff members. I had originally decided that I didn't want to go since we found out about it the morning before the spar, but I agreed to go with her to at least keep her from getting bored watching a bunch of socially retarded teens fumbling around a dance floor in formal dress. Though now that I put it that way maybe going will be worth it just to see that much, hell I'd love to see if Ruby goes and if she'll wear heels since I've heard her protests to Weiss over the matter before.

By the end of the day thankfully I was dismissed from Beacons medical wing being walked back to my room by Serqet who I think just wanted to get out of cleaning with the other Nurses, she left me to my devices and handed off the painkiller medication I had been prescribed to take for the next week along with a card of sorts that basically said to any of my professors who ran more physical classes that I wasn't allowed to partake until I was cleared fully by the Nurses.

[Out of the white room]

The first thing I did once I was back in the room was curse at the soft lingering pains across my body that had all been aggravated from the walk here. After that I made myself something to drink from the tea that Blake had sitting on the counter in the kitchenette. When my drink was ready I went and sat down on one of the couches laying back and looking at the ceiling thinking things over.

My wings were sore.

Actually everything is sore so I guess that's not really anything new since y'know I haven't experienced much else in well I was going to stay the past few days but I guess I mean more like the past eight or so hours since that's about how long I've been awake for.

Though I missed five days from how messed up I was, I guess I was right to be scared for my health before the fight.

While I was contemplating life my team arrived at the dorm and I was given obligatory 'how are you doing's' and Pyrrha along with Yang sat down with me on the other couch with drinks of their own to catch up with me since they hadn't been around when I was in infirmary.

"How was your trip Azzy?" my team leader asked with a raised brow.

"Boring and I wasn't awake for most of it as you would know, so pretty good I guess." I shrugged, there was probably something else she was building to, because that's how she worked.

Yang loved to start with a menial question she likely didn't care for the answer to before asking me what she actually wanted to know or saying what she wanted to say.

"I challenged your friend to a spar while you were out." Was how she started her next sentence. "He kicked my ass but I didn't end up like you so I think that proves I'm better than you." there it was, she smiled brightly and smugly at that.

My response was "Yang I have pretty average Aura levels you have above average and with your semblance you're basically built to fight against someone like him even if he did go easy on you and me."

Her face dropped a little, a confused expression crossing it.

"What do you mean he went easy on us?" she asked and I could see Pyrrha's attention spike.

"Well Pyrrha you've fought Nereius right?" she nodded. "Those two brothers are like demigods from old myths and stories with how strong they are, while I don't think that Nereius was exactly soft on you in your fight I think he and Hektor are much stronger than they let on." I explained my reasoning for thinking he had gone easy on us.

I've said that they were strong and all that, but they really were something else.

For that matter though I wanted to talk with those two about what their Semblances were and if I could get a demonstration because I had an idea of what Hektor's was, but I had no clue what Nereius' was. At the moment my guess was that Hektors allowed him to ignore someone's Aura, but I had nothing past that so I'll probably ask Yang about the details of her fight with him to see if what she experienced was similar to what I did where everything he hit me with.

By the time I tuned back into the conversation it appeared the blonde and redhead had moved on from what I had been saying, probably guessing I had gone quiet and lapsed into sleep while talking from the medication I was on. Which was fair because it felt like I did since I often closed my eyes to think because it helped me to visualise what I was thinking about.

The pair were talking about Blake by the sounds of it who wasn't in the dorm at this point as far as I could tell.

"She went out on Saturday and came back roughed up and avoided all my questions when I asked what happened." our leader said as I opened my eyes to her sitting on the couch with her legs folded.

"Was she dressed in her combat gear?" I asked.

"Yes and she had her weapon with her, it had some mud on the ribbon and her outfit was pretty torn up." Yang explained.

"Is there anything she could be going off to do?" my partner asked, prompting an idea into my head as I thought about it.

"Maybe it's the White Fang?" I said furrowing my brow as I tried to properly put it together. "She was a member prior to applying to Beacon right so what if she's doing something relating to them."

"Hm..." Yang hummed "Well she's not the kind of person to want to help them with all these robberies that they've been reported doing with that Torchwick, so maybe she's gone full vigilante and has been trying to fight back against this new wave of the Fang."

"I don't know very much about them but as far as I'm aware they were never about actively hurting or attacking humans before." I pointed out to my teammates. "I could definitely see her becoming some sort of weekend Vigilante to try and fix or change whatever is happening with the Vale sect of the Fang."

Had Mum encouraged her to fight for what she thought was right but accidentally sent her on her way to doing something so much worse than she might have if left to her own devices? I mean she's an amazing woman, a great fighter with a strong sense of justice and all that, but with what I had seen with those three who I found in that warehouse and had seen since there was a criminal underbelly of Vale that was very easy to stumble upon.

I guess I was mostly worried she might come across something big that she wasn't prepared for or couldn't handle. She was troublesomely stubborn and headstrong like that.

Our conversation came to a conclusion after Yang announced that we'd be holding an intervention for our wayward Feline member, Pyrrha had asked how we would go about it and our leader said she'd hammer out the details and come to us about it before midday friday.

[In Shadows]

The next morning I went to class where I had Marksman training with Mrs Garand or as it would be for me sitting around watching everyone else go through the gun range and improve their accuracy and all that. Since I was sitting out because I wasn't allowed to handle guns while on the painkillers I was taking I took it upon myself to watch our resident cat and see how she was, as well as that though I had my attention focused on the line up of replica mostly polypropylene guns that were around for people to practice reloading speeds and similar sorts of things. There were also polypropylene weapons in classes like Weapon Shop for reference and such.

I'm pretty sure the material was mostly just referred to as 'Cold Steel' though, currently I was handling a replica of the Calico I had that was near perfect except that it didn't fire obviously. A proper description of it and most of these replicas is that the main body of the gun is the cold steel with actual metal in places where it was needed like some of the small mechanics inside the weapons.

Back to my teammate though, this was one of the classes she and I had at the same time so our leader and my partner were in Dust studies and applications with Miss Quartz at the moment whereas Blake and I had it later. Actually that's perfect isn't it because I haven't really talked about Dust yet right? I think I mentioned I'd talk about it in Quartz's class, so I can do that then since I'm still new to Dust in general.

Before that though there was history with Oobleck, the Doctor, had become increasingly annoyed with me and simultaneously thrilled with because I was pretty well read on parts of Remnants history because of all those books I read growing up.

As I was playing around with a random machine gun dropping its magazine, catching it and loading it back in cocking it then repeating. I noticed someone approaching me and I don't know why it took me a moment to recognise who it was-

"Mr. Solatium, how are you finding yourself?" It was-

"Headmaster Ozpin?" I looked at him and there was something off about him and it really got on my nerves as I looked at him and couldn't figure it out.

It hit me right before he responded that there were suddenly significantly less lines of death surrounding him.

"Yes I wished to come and see how classes were going and happened upon you here to the side alone." He offered one of those empty smiles once again.

"Yeah well I'm not allowed to participate until the Nurses clear me properly for the damage I took in my spar on friday." I explained though I was sure he already knew I mean most of the student body knew so there wasn't a way that he didn't.

"I heard about that, quite the spar between yourself and Mr Astēr- he's the nephew of Miss Cosmos isn't he?" I didn't understand why he was asking me even though he definitely knew already, but I couldn't see anything past those glasses.

They hid his emotion as well as my mask did, which I was wearing the original fox one today.

"As far as I know, yes, why?" when I asked back a spark of thrill that I had answered how he wanted me to flashed across his face.

"Ah no reason, however as I understand it you're quite well read on history and some myths from what Dr. Oobleck tells me?" This must have been what he actually wanted to ask me about.

"I guess so." I shrugged. "I grew up reading a lot because we didn't have half the stuff you guys have here in the city, as for the myths and stuff my Mother is a priestess so she always encouraged us to find our own way in that domain along with what she taught us."

"Mm." he nodded, humming, watching me as I continued to mess around with more of the fake guns, dropping what I had been using and picking up an LMG.

"Did you want to discuss philosophy or something with me Sir?" asking that seemed like another invitation in his eyes.

"Not exactly, I was wondering if you had a favourite myth or even fairytale since they are often based in part on myths." another odd question from my headmaster who couldn't see that I was, but I was giving a raised brow to.

"Yeah there are a few favourites I have..." my voice trailed off as I tried to recall them in all their detail but it was difficult to remember them properly after all this time. "I'm more of a mythological person than into fairytales generally speaking." was what I decided to answer with.

"Mm there are many to choose from I suppose it was a bit much to ask if you had a singular favourite." The older man paused before continuing after a moment to think. "I particularly like the story of the four maidens."

I furrowed my brow wondering why he was bringing up that religion, I mean what did it have to do with fairytales? Was there something I had missed when learning about Vale's main and largest religion?

And so I asked him.

"What does the Church of the Four Maidens have to do with fairytales?" He seemed more interested in my enquiry than actually answering me for a moment based on his expression.

"You're familiar with the religion then?"

"Yeah my mother's temple was on good terms with the church sect that was in Valor so I knew lots of their priests and priestess' who were more than happy to answer any questions I had about their religion, so yeah, I'm pretty familiar with it." My answer pleased him by the looks of it.

"Then you know the story of how the maidens received the powers of each season?" He prompted.

"Well when their mother died after childbirth because she had quintuplets their mothers divinity was passed onto them through their father Aššur the god of the sky who went on to die after they reached maturity and was taken to the afterlife by Azazel the angel of death which was when their powers manifested in full."

He didn't look like that was what he wanted to hear, in fact he looked baffled.

"Is that not the version you know?" I was feeling a little bit smug now because I had stumped him.

"I-"

Whatever he had been going to say was cut off when a bell rang and I took my moment to leave saying that we should continue another time as I left to go to Oobleck's class catching up with Blake on the way out.

[Origin of the Story]

During our morning break after History I joined Manus at the ruined Amphitheatre that he took us to for training. He wanted to have a chat with me away from the team since we hadn't seen each other since the Friday before the holiday. So here I was taking the medication I was meant to take now while watching my friend take a seat across from me on that pillar he knocked down all that time ago. He wasn't in his uniform but a torn shirt that looked like a Beowulf had tried to hug him and a pair of pants that were shredded near his calves.

"Are you doing okay? I heard Astēr punched a hole through your chest?" He gave me a raised brow with those blue eyes showing care.

"I don't have a hole in my chest from the spar no, just feels like it, but what happened to you?" I said motioning to his appearance.

"I got in a fight with my father when I went back home and haven't really sat down to rest and change since." he scratched the back of his head.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Hm? No I mean sure maybe later but right now I need to discuss something with you that's why we're here so don't distract me." So I shut up, waiting to hear what he had to say.

A few minutes of silence passed between us of what appeared to be my friend collecting his thoughts before he spoke again saying-

"What do you think about dropping out?" He asked.

I wasn't really sure what to say, I mean I was here because Priscilla said it might help me, but Manus is our Mentor and if he's suggesting it then maybe I should consider it? I mean it's not like I ever really wanted to become a Huntsman.

"You noticed my lack of motivation then?" I asked back.

"It's a surprise that your team hasn't noticed yet, I could tell since that first month." Manus looked out to the field. "That Sister of yours mentioned why you had come to Beacon."

[Chatter]

I know it's random of me to do it since I haven't really talked about when I pray normally but I spent an hour of my day praying to my gods and whatnot. Mostly it was just mundane things like hoping for my family's continued good health or my own healing if I was hurt.

"Hey Az Yang said you wanted to talk with me?" my green haired friend said as he stepped into the room interrupting my thought.

"Yeah." he tilted his head awaiting my question.

"I wanted to talk with you about yours and Hektors Semblances because I never got the chance to ask him about how all his punches in our spar forever ago ignored the armour I wear." I asked, eliciting a nod from my friend.

"Well my Semblance is difficult to explain, I'd have to show you when you're healed properly- as for my brothers he's been calling it Duridana it's like a play on that famous sword durendals name because as he puts it- 'It allows me to penetrate anything I infuse with my Aura' that's what he tells people though, I have no clue if it goes further than that." he ended with a shrug for emphasis.

"Penetrate anything huh? I guess that's why his punches ignored my armour." I really want to know what else he can do with a Semblance like that. "So this Semblance of yours that would be better if you showed me, at least humor me with a description."

He sighed. "Well..." he paused, trying to find the words. "I guess you could say it's like that Ruby girls? Y'know how she turns into a ball of rose petals and zips around?" I nodded my head waiting to see where he was going with this. "I only have other people's descriptions of me doing it to go off but apparently when I use it I look like a comet soaring across the arena or wherever I do it, for me though I just feel like I'm running and everyone else slows down to an almost halt."

Alright well he was right, his description left me wanting to see it in person.

"I can see why it would be better to watch it in person."

"Yeah, well it's not exactly a team player ability since it only affects me and creates a sonic boom behind me from where I take off."

[Classwork]

It was Friday morning again, I was headed to see Anastasia since I just finished up gun courses with Mrs Garand.

Dropping myself onto the couch in her office I watched as the older woman went about her routine ignoring me as she made something to eat for herself before sitting down opposite me on the other couch.

"So?" she prompted brushing her white hair out of her eyes.

"So..." I did not really know what we'd be talking about this session.

She yawned. "Do you ever wonder what things would be like if you hadn't come to Beacon?" Ana took a bite of her sandwich.

"Once or twice." I rubbed my forehead as it started to itch, wincing when I remembered the pretty awful gash that had become somewhat or a bruise sparked with pain.

"Hm… you know when I was in my second year of Beacon I quit in the middle of the year because I couldn't handle the workload they were putting on me in all the classes I was taking." It was almost commonplace now for her to go off on little tangents like this now.

"You came back though?"

"I did, though I was only gone for two weeks the reason I came back was because my partner on the team- Scáthach said that without me our team had begun falling apart since I was the de facto cook and level headed person since back then your sister was very wishy-washy and would only be around when she needed to do Leader stuff while Serqet was too drowned in learning medical terms to breathe." Her teal eyes looked out into nothingness as she recalled everything.

"What's your point exactly?" I asked not sure why she had brought it up.

"Oh? I don't have one, I just felt like talking about it." she gave me a very serious look after before bursting into laughter when I looked at her with a raised brow.

AN: I spent far too much time actually creating a religion just for that scene so that it could have ramifications to the story later on.