Before anything else, I own nothing but the original characters, and content therein related to them. RWBY is owned by RT, and any mentioned creator's work belongs to them, and them alone. Rest in peace Monty, your vision lives on in us all.

I finished this about 20 minutes after the last chapter. Original plans for my other works posting dates got a bit uhhh, complicated. But I'm getting back into it, and by the end of October, (or more preferably by the 15th) those pilot chapters will be up.

CHAPTER 5

"Well that takes the absolute cake on shit we weren't told." Pale said, left hand firmly grasping the handle of his bayonet after hearing what Jinn had told them of Salem and her origins. Clayton was biting his tongue to avoid saying things he might regret. Halcyone just had her face in her hands.

"How could you think it was ok not to tell us about any of that?!" Yang shouted.

"Professor… What is your plan to defeat Salem?" Ruby asked. Ozpin hesitated for a moment.

"There is no plan, is there?" Everyone looked at Pyrrha. "You gave up when Jinn told you that you couldn't destroy Salem a millennia ago, didn't you?" She continued, scowling at him, as Pale cut in.

"Limpin' on with nothin' more than false hope and promises for the masses yeah? Keep them relics apart for as long as ya' can, make sure the gods don't come back and kill us all 'cause your crazy ex wante' to become one of 'em?" Pale asked. Ozpin failed to answer, and Pale took out his revolver again. "You sumvabitch." He said, raising the gun, tensing his grip. No one was shocked by the sudden implicit threat of death, they were all too angered by Ozpin. Pale sighed, before he de-cocked the gun gently. "You're lucky I'm either stupid or confident enough to think that we can kill the witch." Pale said, lifting the muzzle of his gun away from Ozpin's face.

Clayton kept his lip tight. He wanted to speak, but knew what he had to say would only be echoing his friends. Qrow was the first to actually take violent action other than the slightly unhinged sniper, punching Ozpin in the face, causing the man in the boy's body to fall over. "No one wanted me… Because of my curse… And I devoted my life to you because you gave me a place in this world. I thought that I was finally doing something with my life. But now I know it was all for nothing… Raven was right about you. Meeting you was the worst thing that ever happened to us. Thanks for the fuckin' bird powers jackass." Qrow said. Without so much as another word, Ozpin left. Checked out. Said adios. Put Oscar back in control of his own body. The boy begin rubbing his face, and groaning about the bruise on his back from Pale's bullet.

"What happened?" Ruby asked, seeing Oscar's weaker tolerance to pain, and recognizing that Ozpin was gone.

"He's… Locked himself away." Oscar said.

"Then get him back!" Yang shouted.

"He just left us?" Weiss asked.

"Of course the coward ran." Pyrrha said, clenching her fist.

"Lyin' bastard tricked us into becoming his damn pawns!" Halcyone shouted. Suddenly there was a loud gunshot, and everyone turned to Clayton. Most of the group was holding their ears as they rang. His shotgun was smoking, a shell having been fired into the air to catch the group's attention. Clayton racked the slide to chamber a fresh round.

"That's enough!... It's going to be getting dark soon, and we're still stranded. I suggest we save tarring and feathering Ozpin until after we're out of the snow." Clayton said, before looking at Pale, the sniper, walking away from the confrontative conversation and heading up a trail. "Pale's got the right idea." He said, topping off his gun and slinging it.

Maria started to amble after Pale. "You all are just spewing negativity. I've lived too long just to die out in the cold, so I'll be following him. I suggest you might want to start up that car of yours and do the same unless you want to become grimm food." She said, as Halcyone sighed.

"Yang, give me a hand with it and push, your hillbilly family fucked the starter up." Halcyone said. Shortly after, the two had push started the manual car, and with both rows of seats and the trunk jammed full, Halcyone picked up Pale and Maria who hadn't gotten very far.

After just four short miles in the over encumbered vehicle, the General decided to give out, sputtering to a halt. Halcyone hit the steering wheel, and everyone dismounted, as she tried and failed to start it again. "Great." She muttered, getting out of the vehicle's window.

"The snow's getting worse. We've got about two more hours in the cold before our auras won't be able to protect us anymore." Qrow said, as the storm had began to enclose their fields of view.

"What now, just keep walking?" Yang asked, only for Pale to whistle sharply. His tinnitus burdened ear picked up something, as a high pitched noise somewhere was cancelling out the ringing. Pale looked off into the forest, and spotted something only his trained eyes would. Details. The colors behind the rows of trees were not natural. Pale started walking up the trail, being followed by almost everyone, as Pyrrha dragged the General with her semblance as best she could. Not a few seconds later, Pale had found his way to a derelict farming settlement.

"Looks abandoned." Weiss said.

"It is." Pale noted. There was no sign of recent human activity, at least a few months of nothing, but the estate was fully intact.

"Come on, anything's better than being stuck out in this." Qrow said, leading the gang past the gate.

Author's note.

And so the gang arrives at Brunswick. Could I have avoided this nightmare by simply having Halcyone's car keep running? Yeah, but the apathy are just too good to pass up, and besides the General is nearly on his last legs after what the bandit's did to it.