Chapter 6
The Past Darkness
Sometime at Night…
Shade was in the training room where he faced Oscar.
"Im ready."
Shade said, pulling his swords out of his Gauntlets.
Oscar switched to Ozpin and readied his cane.
"I hope you are Mr.Leaf, this training will determine just how far you've come since you started your training."
He aimed his cane at Shade.
Shade readied himself as Ozpin ran at him.
He quickly blocked with his right blade, then aimed at him with his left and shot a laser at Ozpin.
Ozpin jumped over Shade and tried to jab him.
Shade held his right gauntlet up and blocked the attack with his Shield.
Ozpin landed behind Shade.
He quickly turned to him then Slashed at Ozpin with his right blade again.
Ozpin blocked the attack and moved a few steps away from Shade.
"That was a nice warm up but i believe it's time to get serious."
Ozpin ran at Shade at a faster speed.
Shade was almost hit in the head.
He quickly put his blades in a X shape, blocking the cane.
"A good block with your second weapon though"
Ozpin slide kicked Shade, making him slip.
He jabbed Shade several times with the cane.
Shade quickly flipped back on his feet and looked at Ozpin who had a small smile on his face.
He ran at Ozpin and flipped his blades up making them hit one another sending the right blade at Ozpin.
Shade extended his arm and a shadow arm extended from it grabbing the blade that was knocked away from Ozpin.
He grabbed his blade and picked up his second blade and slashed down at Ozpin who blocked with his cane.
"I see Mr.Leaf."
He pushed Shade back.
"You have the key to your second stage."
Ozpin put his cane back away.
Shade put his blades back in his gauntlets.
"What are you talking about, you mentioned this before."
"You've been given a rare gift, one that i can't exactly mention much of at the moment. But what i can say for certain is that you've truly made this power your own."
"My shadow manipulation?"
"Qrow already told you how rare your semblance is, but you should know that it is very dark. The closer you get to the light the greater your darkness will become."
Shade thought for a moment.
'The closer I get to the light. Does that mean-'
He shook out of his thoughts when Ozpin continued speaking.
"The light and darkness must always be in balance, so when the light grows bright, the dark must increase to balance. You must have noticed a change by now."
Shade thought back to when he was on Beacon tower.
'After I recovered my aura increased so I could use my Shadow Manipulation more.'
He thought.
"That's enough training for one night, you and Oscar need rest."
Ozpin said before switching back.
Oscar lost his balance for a second.
'How do you move like that so much?'
He asked internally.
'Year of training.'
Oscar looked at Shade who was still thinking.
"Are you ok?"
He asked.
Shade snapped out of his daze.
"Yeah I'm fine just a lot to process."
"So I'm guessing that shadow arm of yours isn't normal?"
"I've only ever been able to do it twice, and this time was only a test. I had no idea it would work."
"What was the first time?"
Shade thought back.
"It was when this monster Grimm tried to kill Ruby. I ran in front of her and I somehow made a large shadow version of my arm and gauntlet shield. It blocked the attack."
"Whoa."
"Whoa is true. I didn't even know I could do that. It was like my body was emitting shadows itself."
His arms were shaking a little.
He took a deep breath.
"It's strange, but powerful."
Oscar saw Shade clenched his fists.
"Anyway we should rest up, our training is nowhere near done and i plan on learning how to control this Second Stage as soon as possible."
Shade said before leaving the training room.
"You seem to be focused a lot on Shade."
Oscar said to Ozpin.
"Yes well Mr.Leaf is a special case, no home, no family, a very rare semblance. For all our sakes it would be best if he mastered his power quickly."
A bit of time passed...
Qrow exits a building looking defeated.
His search for fellow Huntsman and Huntresses was going poorly.
He had just paid off one of his fellow Huntsman's dept.
"Looks like you could use a drink."
Qrow looked up and saw Grayson Zera.
"Grayson."
Qrow was a little surprised seeing Grayson.
The man had a cloak covering his wings and a hood over his black hair.
A bit of time later the two were at a bar.
"So what brings you to Haven?"
Qrow asked as he drank.
"Doing a bit of recon before reporting back to the Belladonnas."
Qrow began to think for a moment.
'Wasn't that the last name of one of Ruby's teammates?'
Grayson took a drink.
"So why are you here?"
Qrow shook his head.
"Sorry but i don't plan on spilling any secrets unlike you."
He glared at Grayson.
"That was a long time ago, besides we saved more people that way."
"You werent the one locked up for 3 days."
"True but you ended up doing a lot of damage after my distraction."
Qrow chuckled.
"Fine I'll give you that."
He finished his drink.
"Don't suppose you want to help me out would you?"
Grayson shook his head.
"I have my own mission to carry out, with Ozpin gone I have a lot of work around the other Kingdoms to some form of peace."
He sighs.
"Even if people dont approve of people like me."
His wings twitched under his cloak.
Qrow looked down.
"Damn it!"
He smashed his fist on the bar counter.
"What's wrong?"
Grayson looked concerned.
"I've been trying to gather Huntsman to help protect Haven, but all of them are gone just gone."
This made Grayson give a puzzled look.
"That's strange, i haven't heard or seen anything involving Huntsman disappearing."
Qrow looked at Grayson.
"There's no trace of any of them."
"I'll look into the missing Huntsman."
Grayson left some lien on the bar counter.
"This round is on me, but you owe me….again."
He walked out of the bar with his cloak covering him.
"Yeah yeah i heard you."
Qrow said just before he left.
As Qrow drank he thought about the missing Huntsman.
Meanwhile…
Dawn, Weiss and Yang were on one side of the table, Raven was at the other and Hiroki was behind the three.
'I'm not risking anything.'
Hiroki thought to himself.
Vernal had just poured drinks for the women.
She glared at Hiroki as she exited the tent.
Hiroki simply glared back.
She left.
"So what's the truth?"
Yang asked as her mother drank.
"You know it's better when it's hot."
Raven responded simply.
Dawn just pushed the cup away.
"I don't trust you."
"Smart, but you saw Vernal pour the same drink into all our cups."
Dawn just shook her head.
"The truth is that truth is hard to come by, a story of victory for one person is a story of defeat for another"
Hiroki thought back to the Vital Festival.
The people he and his team defeated had to suffer defeat by their hands.
"By now your uncle has surely told Ruby and her friends plenty of stories."
"Well he's never given me a reason to doubt him before."
"That doesn't mean those reasons don't exist."
"Enough stalling."
Hiroki said out loud.
"Tell us what this truth is already."
"You have a lot of nerve demanding things from me Hiroki. Did you forget who taught you everything you know? Who showed you how to harness that semblance of your's?"
Hiroki glared at Raven.
She sighed in response.
Raven and Yang started to talk about the motives of Huntsman, Raven also mentioned that she and Qrow enrolled to learn how to kill Huntsman.
This made Yang and Weiss gasped.
Hiroki didn't react to this and Dawn came from an Assassin school so she was used to killing at this point.
"Aside from Grimm, Huntsman were the only ones capable of ruining our raids and hunting us down."
Raven looked at Hiroki.
"You should consider yourself lucky you didn't run into one you would have been dead."
Hiroki did not respond.
"Our tribe needed a counter force and Qrow and I were the perfect age."
She continued to speak about how since she and Qrow were good at being Huntsman, Ozpin kept an eye on them, but it was team STRQ he was interested in.
Yang questioned this but Raven said Ozpin gave them extra missions and training as well as turned a blind eye over the occasional rule break.
Dawn couldn't help but think of the similarities between STRQ and RWBY.
Raven turned to them
"Sound familiar?"
Yang and Weiss immediately realized the similarities.
"What's your point?"
Yang asked
"How much do you know about Professor Ozpin?"
"Enough."
Dawn responded.
"About his past?"
Dawn went quiet.
"He was a prodigy, one of the youngest headmasters to ever be elected to a school."
Weiss stated.
"Because that's how he planned it.because the man you know as Ozpin designed those schools.And his followers are loyal to him and no one else."
Yang questioned this
"Because Old man Oz has a great and terrible secret, one that could spread fear across the world.One that he eventually trusted to our team.Once i knew there was no going back, i needed to know more, but with every new discovery i made the more horrifying the world became."
Hiroki didn't understand what she was talking about.
Dawn didn't either, she was trying to piece it together but nothing made sense.
"Alright so what's so crazy that the rest of us don't know."
Yang stated.
Raven started talking about how the Grimm have a master named Salem that can't be reasoned with or beaten and she wont stop.
"Why should we believe any of this?"
Yang asked.
"Now you're catching on, so far you've done nothing but accept what others tell you. But you need to question everything."
"Like how you had me question others."
Hiroki stated.
"You know we trust no one."
"Did that stop you from bringing in a kid who lost everything?"
Raven shook her head.
She turned her back to Yang.
"You'll end up as blind as Qrow or your fool of a father."
Yang's anger rose and she broke the table with a shot from her weapon.
Hiroki walked to Yang.
"Don't you dare talk about my family like that!"
Yang said with her red eyes.
Vernal entered and aimed her weapon at Yang.
Hiroki aimed his at Vernal.
"She needs to calm down."
"And you need to stop thinking with shooting first and ask questions later."
"I know more than you realize."
Raven said.
"Not just about you, not just things I've been told, but things ive seen with my own eyes. I know the Grimm have a leader. I know people that can come back from the dead. I know magic is real and i can prove it."
Weiss and Dawn stood up.
Everyone looked confused at Raven, even Hiroki.
"You said Tai told you all about my semblance."
She started to walk to the back exit of her tent.
"Well I doubt he ever told you what Oz did to my brother and me."
She exited the tent and the four followed her.
They didn't see Raven.
Suddenly they heard a bird causing all of them to look towards it.
There was a Raven flying around.
"A raven?"
Weiss questioned.
"I've seen Raven before."
Yang said.
"So have i."
Hiroki nodded.
Dawn thought for a second.
"Wait a minute."
Suddenly the bird flew towards them and morphed into Raven Branwen.
"I knew it."
Dawn said
"How did you do that?"
Yang questioned.
"Well i could explain it to you."
She grabbed her sword handle and sliced the area next to her making a portal.
"Or you could ask your uncle."
"You're letting us go?"
"Most of you."
She looked at Hiroki.
"He has to stay, he broke our tribe's rules and must face punishment."
"No way not happening."
Yang said.
"Fine."
Hiroki said.
"What?!"
The three girls said.
"If it gets you three to Shade and Ruby it's worth it."
Hiroki looked up.
"Besides I feel like I owe some karma to the world at this point."
He smirks a little.
Yang got her bike ready with Weiss and Dawn on the back of it.
Hiroki stood behind them at a bit of a distance.
"I hope you can handle her."
Yang said, looking away from Hiroki.
She was hiding a smirk.
Raven was a bit away from Hiroki but close enough to stop him from doing anything to escape through the portal if he ran.
"I can't."
He shook his head.
"But i can by time!"
His semblance activated and all his aura went into his sword.
He swung it behind him and a huge blade beam went straight to Raven.
She quickly put her sword up and blocked the beam but was pushed straight to the center of her camp.
"Drive drive!"
Dawn said making strings grab Hiroki and pulling him through the portal with them before it closed.
Raven was standing in the center of the camp with her sword drawn.
'He put all his aura into his attack just to stun me a little.'
She thought with a small smile.
'Clever boy.'
A bit of time passed…
Shade was in a separate room thinking.
'The closer i get to the light.'
He closed his eyes.
'Silver eyes.'
"Hey Shade you should come down here!"
He heard Qrow shout.
'He's back already? I hope he found some good Huntsman.'
Shade left the room and went down stairs.
"Ok Qrow who did you fi-"
Shade stopped talking when he saw them.
Yang and Weiss hugging Ruby.
"You found them."
He said to Qrow.
"That's not all."
Shade turned and saw Hiroki and Dawn standing at the door.
"Hi Shade."
Hiroki said with a small smile.
"It's been a while."
Dawn added with a smile of her own.
Shade didn't speak, he just slowly walked to them.
"Uh Shade?"
Dawn asked.
He threw his gauntlets off and hugged both of them.
"You do not know how much I missed you two."
Shade for the first time in months felt a bit of happiness in his life.
Hiroki and Dawn hugged him back happily.
"I thought you didn't hug people?"
Dawn asked Hiroki.
"This time i will make an exception, but it won't happen again"
Shade stepped back from them and smiled at his two teammates.
The return of Team SHDE was soon.
AN:I loved Writing this chapter. This one was a lot of fun to write and I hope you all enjoy it. SHDE is going to be my main project for a bit. I really want to get to the last few chapters of Volume 5 since I have a lot planned then, though this chapter was huge, the next chapter most likely won't be considering not much else happens till the battle for Haven. Until next time.