He was disappointed at first. When he heard the Vytal Festival Champion was going to visit the orphanage, he was eager to meet the great Qrow Branwen from Beacon and see firsthand the guy so overflowing with cool it found its way straight through the television screen and seemed to charge everyone it touched. He hoped whatever swagger Branwen would bring in would rub off on him and he'd be cooler than he'd been before just by being near, just by being in his presence.

Instead it was his partner, a girl who'd only participated in the openin round. She was already twenty but barely an inch taller than he was; such a dainty woman who seemed even smaller because of the bulky white hood she wore. He faintly remembered seeing her fight, but she mostly just followed up on attacks made by her teammates, incapacitating opponents with small, precise strikes rather than big swords and punches. She made so much less of an impression he was left to wonder who among the other children would be excited to see her.

Some of the girls were. A handful of the boys seemed to be open to meeting her, but many more were disappointed like he was. The only difference was that they managed to contain their disappointment and suffer through the visit in polite silence.

The woman was very accommodating of the children and seemed to be enjoying herself. She didn't show off any weapons or techniques, but did point out some of the older children who'd unlocked their Auras, telling them tales of life at Beacon academy, and how orphans were taken in when they were willing to work hard and put their talents to good use. He couldn't help but roll his eyes at her optimistic outlook… if they were lucky, the orphans would grow to be laborers. The talented ones might be able to be recruited by the police or work for the local SDC directors in some capacity. The ones without direction would probably end up as crooks when they aged out. He had talent, he knew how to fix a few things around the building. He might end up working as a mechanic, if only because he was good at that.

He was only twelve. It was a ways off until he'd be forced out, but he didn't allow himself to dream. He might believe he could be better than he was when clinging to someone else's coattails, but he didn't expect life would be drastically better outside the orphanage as a grown man than it was living inside it as a child.

Apparently his distant attitude was enough of an outlier to be noticed. The woman walked over to him, curious why he remained so far apart from the others. Because of how short she was she seemed quite young… up close she was just the same. "What's got you so down, bud?"

He didn't want to be rude, but he wasn't really in the mood to be polite in declining her company. "I'm sorry, miss. I was just looking forward to meeting Qrow."

"Yeah, I've been hearing that a lot," she acknowledged. "I get it- he's a pretty cool guy. Well, 'til you get to know him, anyway. Then you find out he's actually a total geek."

That caught his attention. "Wait, really?"

"Oh, yeah, totally!" she replied. "He's really smart and handles all our weapon maintenance. He loves building and modifying weapons. He built that awesome sword scythe thing himself and helped Tai make his greaves!"

"How'd he do that?" he asked, a little more eager than he expected to be. "Did he have to compensate for the extra weight your teammate was carrying around? Did he use a lighter metal or add in polymer?"

This caught her interest. "Didn't realize I was talking to an expert…" She smiled and asked: "What's your name?"

"R-Roman."

"Summer Rose."

He had a long talk with her after, and he found himself enjoying her visit far more than he expected. Still, he expected that'd be the last he'd see of her. Nice as she was, it can't have been any fun to visit an orphanage, not when her Vytal tournament win probably meant she could make appearances at far nicer places and get a nice bit of paid compensation for it. Life went back to normal for him.

But as summer break set in, Summer Rose did return to his orphanage. One of the other children asked why, and Summer explained that she was still deciding which kingdom to stay in while looking for a post after graduation and until she did she was in temporary housing in Vale. So long as she was in the kingdom, she'd devote some spare time to helping the talented children in getting set up at Signal Academy, where her teammate Taiyang Xiao Long had just started as an assistant professor.

She visited twice a month while corresponding a few times a week with the students she saw potential in. Roman had repeatedly dodged her attempts to recruit him, though not because he was ungrateful or disinterested in the offer. The way Summer talked about Signal, it sounded like it'd be the best possible way for Roman to find his way up in the world.

No, he'd been dodging her calls because…

Because for some reason he really found it hard to look in her pretty silver eyes.

He couldn't avoid her forever. He knew she was trying to help him and he was making things difficult for both of them and all because he… what? Thought she was too pretty for him to talk to?

If he kept up this pointless chase he'd just drive her away. He'd have to well up the courage to just accept the help she was offering, and try not to fumble too many words when he talked to her.

He was being dumb. She was eight years older than he was, a grown woman, a champion fighter, and a huntress setting out to travel the world. He was a former street urchin who'd be lucky if he saw the entirety of the kingdom of Vale in the course of his life. She was showing him kindness because she was a kind person, not because she'd ever have any weird fluttery feelings in her chest when she talked to him.

Just had to be brave, just had to be grateful for what Summer was doing for him. He was being presented with an opportunity and he should take it. Just had to look her in the eye and say thank you.

Just had to look her in the eye.

Summer recorded him with her Scroll, documenting the process. Roman found it easier to talk when he was working, with his attention on the mechanical and his eyes away from her. "With acceleration through the barrel, ten grams of Dust are necessary for a concussive burst. I'm still trying to find a good balance for the firing mechanism, because too many shots in succession will still warp the metal."

Roman held up the rifle, lifting it with both hands. "I'm still trying to find a way to modify it so it can be used as a melee weapon. Right now when I swing it around the Dust rattles too much, and it's… uh, exploded a few times."

Summer laughed. Roman tried not to let it bother him, but she probably noticed when he continued to avert his eyes. She was about to ask him something when her Scroll interrupted the video with some other image attachment. Roman was still tinkering with the rifle when he heard Summer gasp with excitement. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her smiling warmly, and wished he'd never looked.

"Something good?" he asked.

"My friends' daughter was just born!" Summer excitedly replied. "They sent me a picture and she's just so adorable!"

Roman wasn't sure what exactly he should say to that. He'd seen a few babies before and 'adorable' wasn't usually how he'd describe them. Must've been a girl thing.

She was still staring at the screen, entranced at the sight. Summer brought a hand to her cheek and sighed wistfully, staring at this apparently very interesting baby.

Roman thought maybe he should say something. Or maybe just gently move them back on track. "So, uh, are all your friends married?"

Summer finally looked up from the Scroll to look at him. "What?"

"Uh, I mean, does anyone else bug you by talking about their kids?" Roman tried. He knew he was blundering already, but wasn't sure exactly what might get her attention back to him.

"No, just my teammates," Summer answered. "A few of my friends from Beacon got married after graduation too, but… wait, why do you want to know?"

Roman knew she was onto him. If he abruptly changed the subject –as was his first instinct- she'd realize she caught him. He had to press on. "I'm just… uh, curious, I guess. You're not married. So I was wondering why so many of your friends were."

Summer eyed him curiously. "I'd like to get married someday. Maybe if I meet the right guy."

"Well, then, what if you end up in some other kingdom?" Roman asked. "You won't know anybody there."

"Well, most of the good guys I know are either married already, or…" Summer stepped over and ruffled his red hair. "…maybe a little bit too young."

Roman wasn't going to stand for her teasing. He decided to be bold, if only because he didn't want to let her get away with having fun at his expense. He turned his green eyes to Summer, making himself look at her. "Well, I won't be young forever, will I?"

Summer slowly withdrew her hand from the top of his head. "No, I guess you won't."

No time like the present, Roman thought. It was hard to keep looking in those eyes, but he figured as long as he had her undivided attention…

"Well, then, you want to get married?" Roman asked. "You know, when I'm older?"

Summer laughed again. She laughed so much she snorted a few times in between, reaching a hand down to hold her stomach.

Roman wasn't sure whether to press on. Certainly he didn't want to be laughed at.

He thought of what he'd seen on television, on what he'd heard people braver and cooler than himself say: "I'm not hearing a 'no…'"

Summer was still giggling, but eventually managed to calm herself down. "No. I guess you're not."

She smiled at him. Roman returned the look as he could, trying to look much more confident than he felt.

He still felt that strange flutter in his chest, but he also felt… comfortable, like he stood a little taller after asking for her hand.

"Do we need to shoot more for the video to send to Signal?" Roman finally asked.

"Oh, we'll need to redo the whole thing," Summer replied. "I'm keeping this video for me."

"Wait, you were recording the whole time?!" Roman gasped.

"Didn't mean to, but… yeah," Summer acknowledged with a sheepish smile. "Not every day you get a proposal on film."

Summer hadn't come to the orphanage for weeks. Roman surmised she was busy with something important and didn't give it much thought at first, until he read on the CCT that she'd accepted a post as a Huntress serving the kingdom of Vale. At first he thought that meant she was just on a long mission somewhere in the continent and away from the city, until he saw a more recent photo of her on the island of Patch.

He tried to think of why she wouldn't come by, or why he hadn't heard from her. Maybe Signal Academy was giving her the runaround in trying to get a few of the orphans accepted as students and she was working hard for them. Maybe she was babysitting that baby her friend Tai and his wife had for… several weeks.

No, he fell back on his old cynical habits. She'd finally found a job and wasn't going to come by anymore. Maybe it was just because she was too busy and wasn't able to get away to come see them… or maybe behind the sweet smile and pretty eyes she was just like every other huntsman and huntress dropping by so she could get people to take pictures of her with underprivileged children and then going back to her life once she felt good enough about herself.

At least in the time he'd known her –in the time he'd sought to get better because of her encouragement- he'd learned how to better balance his weapon. Still wasn't doing much damage on the melee front, but he could fire the burst at his own feet and not be affected by the concussive burst; the aim and balance were so precise. He'd been hoping that once he'd finished building it Signal would accept him.

He'd stripped away the rifle stock and grip and given it a hilt with the trigger carefully placed on its handle. Still wasn't quite right in his hand, but he figured it'd need a little more time. And the way it sang when he swung it through the air… maybe it was just an imperfection in the barrel with an unseemly air gap, but Roman had to admit it was a fine melody.

For several days he wondered if that would be it, if he'd never see his bride to be again… when he saw another picture of her on the CCT on a seedier, less-respectable website… a picture of Summer holding the arm of her teammate Taiyang, carrying his baby in a bundle in her arms. The author of the post in question asked (in needlessly large letters) if the Vytal tournament champions were having some sort of affair, if the married man was seeing his old school friend socially. Roman knew how much Summer loved the guy's baby and thought nothing of it.

The following day he received a message from Signal Academy. He eagerly opened it on his Scroll, hoping to finally hear… that while they were grateful to receive his application they had no room at the time for- and then he stopped reading.

He didn't seem to have much else to do so he scoured the CCT again, and found another picture from the same gossip site, and this one did catch his attention… of Summer hugging her teammate and squeezing him tightly outside a little wooden cabin. He tried not to let it bug him –Summer gave out hugs like candy, she had no sense of personal space at all- but the more he looked at it, it did.

Two days after that was another post on the same topic, of Summer Rose kissing him on the cheek after their qualifying round in the Vytal Festival. Taiyang's red-eyed wife was in the picture, so clearly there wasn't…

How old did he have to be? How long did he have to wait?

Roman pulled up a new search for the cheapest way to get to Patch. He didn't have much reason to stick around the orphanage, and if there was any truth to the rumor, that already married guy might've been toying with Summer's feelings.

He knew it wasn't a rational thought. He knew he wasn't in a good place after one of his brightest hopes had faded. But he couldn't think of anything more important he had left to fight for now.

And he'd gone through the trouble of making himself a weapon. If Signal had no need for him, then he'd find somewhere else a concussion burst might do some good.

Summer scolded him for breaking the door down. She tried to explain who he was to Taiyang, but Roman's explosive entrance had upset the baby girl and Summer went to tend to her. While she was distracted Roman pointed his index finger at the blonde huntsman and challenged him. He would fight for Summer's honor as her champion, because he'd promised to marry her when the time was right, and wouldn't let this man steal her away from him.

Summer tried to talk him out of it, to say he was being foolish and that he didn't understand. Taiyang seemed much more willing to go along with it and fight, and eventually Summer relented, just asking Taiyang not to hurt him.

They stood outside in a patch of even dirt, Summer looking on from the porch with the baby girl in her arms. Roman stood up as straight as he could and tried to look serious and confident… as much as he could, anyway, given what a hulking brute his foe was.

He knew how this played out. It'd be a hard battle, but this was all he had left to fight for. This was the moment he'd finally change things for himself.

Roman fired. Taiyang rushed right into the shot, the hit barely slowing him down. Roman tried to fire again, but Tai punched right at the hilt of his weapon, severing the hilt and trigger alike. Roman tried to improvise and swing, but the metal tube bounced off his shoulder with no visible effect. Tai kneed Roman in the stomach, causing him to double over… before gently tapping him in the back with the bottom of his hand, driving him into the dirt with contemptuous ease. Roman coughed as he lay on the ground, looking at the severed halves of his weapon.

He didn't remember much about what happened next. Someone carried him back to port and put him on a bullhead. Summer leaned down and told him to go home and that she'd try and reach him later to explain all that happened. He was a bit more cognizant as he sat in the transport, looking outside at Summer and her old teammate. He said something to her and she laughed, smiling her warm smile at him.

He shouldn't have been so surprised, really. She laughed when he asked her to marry him, too.

It had always been a joke. At least to her.

Roman didn't return to the orphanage like Summer told him. What was the point? A hot meal and a warm bed didn't fix a broken heart. Whatever she'd instilled in him… whatever she'd led him to believe was every bit as fake as the kind way she'd heard his proposal. She'd humored the poor dumb boy so as not to break what little self-esteem he had. He didn't know if she'd always had her eye on Taiyang, but it didn't really make much difference: she'd clearly chosen him over Roman.

No, that was an excuse. Roman was still a child, a boy pretending to be a man who was beaten by an opponent much stronger than himself. That was the way stories ended in the real world: not with the suitor winning the lady's hand, but the stronger fighter reaping the rewards of victory.

It didn't matter how far he'd come; he'd always be behind her teammate in Summer's eyes. It didn't matter if he'd gotten into Signal like he'd thought Summer was helping him with, because by the time he'd graduated from there Summer would've long since forgotten about him in favor of the better option.

Trying to fulfill his promise… it had been his last hope. What a fool he was to think things could change for him. What a fool he was to believe anyone would try and help him get anywhere in life, and that he could trust people to keep their promises.

What good was hope? All it seemed to do was hurt once it became clear there wasn't any reason to bother. All it felt like was time wasted chasing something he couldn't have.

Sometime during his wanderings he spotted a pool of water in the road. He saw his reflection, his red hair all messy and askew from his brief trip hitting the ground. He reached up his fingers to try and fix it, but couldn't quite untangle the mess.

Remembered how it felt when Summer ruffled his hair, teasing him about his age…

Roman tore out his hair in clumps, the pain of each pull easier to bear than the thought of Summer Rose laughing at him…

His reflection looked ridiculous now, with uneven strands and patches of dry skin lining his head. He was tempted not to care, but he also didn't want to stand out… didn't want anyone to notice him walking down the street because he very clearly tore his hair out.

Roman passed by a few store fronts before he found the right one. The dark red didn't quite match his fiery orange hair, but he liked the stripe. It had some class.

He couldn't fire his concussion burst anymore, but he could still swing the stick as a blunt instrument. Roman shattered the glass of the storefront and reached inside, pulling out the handsome bowler, shaking off shards of glass before he slid it atop his head.

It was a little big, but he figured he'd grow into it. He might've taken that as a sign that the hat didn't belong to him, but that wasn't the lesson that had been so thoroughly beaten into him today. Today he'd learned he had to be strong enough to take what he wanted, or he'd end up beaten down with nothing. He would try and be grateful for Summer teaching him the lesson, to try and dwell on the positive, even if every other recollection of this day was pain and heartbreak.

He was years away before society would recognize him as an adult. But as far as Roman Torchwick was concerned, when he slid that hat on his head he wasn't a boy anymore.

Roman had done great work for the Xiongs. Junior was never going to go very far up the ladder, but he was a good contact to have. Roman could pass himself off as working in a nightclub, using some of his charisma to chase away prying eyes with his entertaining comments, and as an added bonus he had a possible safehouse to fall back to. Junior didn't much care for Roman, but so long as the Lien kept pouring in he was content to keep their business partnership going.

Roman was about to head out to case another Dust shop for a hit when he stopped just outside the nightclub. He was going through the local news reports on his Scroll, looking for any extenuating factors that might've made the score difficult when he spotted a familiar name in the news feed… a name he hadn't thought on in many years. Her name was under the banner headline. He might've missed it if he hadn't had such a keen eye for the smaller details.

BELOVED HUNTRESS RETURNS HOME

Vytal Tournament Champion Survived By Husband, Two Daughters

He did his best not to let it bother him. But try as he might, it did. It didn't stack. It didn't seem real to him that Summer Rose was dead.

There was an easy way for him to know for sure.

He had the Lien now for a quicker trip to Patch. He remembered the cabin he'd tracked her to last time. He kept a good distance away, walking the perimeter and careful to mask the sound of his steps.

He needn't have bothered. Turned out she wasn't really close at hand at all… her marker was on the edge of a nearby cliff. Roman actually pressed down the bottom of his cane –his recently renamed Melodic Cudgel- in the fresh dirt, prodding it for a moment before reading her name and her inscription: Thus kindly, I scatter.

He wasn't sure if he had anything to say to her. He had many things he'd have wanted to tell her were she alive, but what point was there in boasting to the dead? It wasn't as though Summer had ever listened to him in life…

No, that wasn't true. She had listened… she'd just never intended to grant him the life he'd sought. She'd humored the foolish boy who crushed on her, but never intended to follow through, offering only vague and non-committal words, letting him hope, leading him on…

Roman shook his head. Maybe things would've been different if she'd waited for him… but she'd have still been a huntress. She'd have still gone out and fought monsters and… for what? For whom? It wasn't like Patch was in danger of being overrun by Grimm, and in Roman's experience Vale never put much care in the lives of its citizens, at least in the low rungs he'd spent his life wandering through. Summer got a nice word written about her in the news… but by the time Roman reached her grave, the obituary was buried under six new articles about the latest gossip and soon completely gone from sight: acknowledged and quickly forgotten.

When he looked down at the clump of dirt and smooth stone marker, Roman thought it was too modest… and given where she was, as quickly forgotten for Patch as she was for Vale… just another huntress, dead like every other that came before her.

Roman tipped his hat. She couldn't see him, but if by some incredible contrivance she was looking down, he'd want her to see the man he was, and not the boy she'd so quickly discarded.

He'd paid his respects. He turned towards the port, towards the bullhead that would take him to Vale, and pressed on. He'd never been one for looking back.

Years Later

He was in a bad mood. Neo knew he was in a bad mood. She tried to calm him down, and changed the color of her eyes for the briefest moment.

He'd never told her the story, but she knew it just the same. She knew he'd once coveted the sight.

"Not today, kid, okay?" Roman requested.

Neo didn't let up. She smiled a coy smile, a pair of silver eyes looking back at him, reflecting his orange hair and bowler hat.

Roman reached over to place a hand on her shoulder. "Ki- Neo. How many times have I told you? The past isn't what's important. She's gone. She's never coming back. You're the only girl in my life. And hopefully it'll stay that way."

She seemed to accept that. Certainly he knew she'd prefer it that way too. Neo blinked, and brown and pink eyes now looked back at him.

"Now, come on, I'm late to see Junior," Roman informed her. "He's loaning me a few of his boys to hit this Dust shop the boss lady wants me to check out…"