Hello people!
This is my second story on the website, and the second RWBY crossover... of two, clearly. I haven't written in a while, I was sort of indefinitely stuck on "halfway done" for the next chapter for the past year. But with the return of Berserk's serialization, and the start of RWBY: Ice Queendom, I was inspired to try and write something again. I don't know how this will go, especially because of all the changes I've already planned which you'll see over the next few chapters, so before we start I'd like to go over some key changes.
To start off I'd like to say that Berserk and RWBY do NOT take place on the same world in this story. That might seem weird to say here, but further down in the chapter that's sort of implied-it's just the limit of the characters knowledge. Sort of. Just so people don't think that's the case.
Yang is 3 years older than Ruby in this, so she's 18 and going into her second year at Beacon. "Wait but then what about Team RWBY?" Its uh... not a thing? I don't want to say who the team is yet, that'll happen next chapter. So if you're reading this when chapter 2 is already out, then I probably already updated the character list, and you can find it out pretty easily.
She's replacing Yatsuhashi on team CFVY, mostly because I literally have no plans for him. Sorry big guy. I'm sure he's out there doing his own thing. Maybe he's at Haven. Who knows. It's convenient because it's still C-F-V-Y, and I don't have to come up with original characters like Diggo Fluncher the macuahuitl wielding flute player.
Judeau is ALSO 18 in this (and 5'2), which is what the Official Guidebook says (including the 5'2 part. Tiny man.) which I'd normally consider to be a load of malarkey because most of the Guidebook is spotty at best, but it works out here, so I went with it. (Also there's nothing wrong with being 5'2, he's just the shortest of the Hawks)
The story will follow generally follow the same beats, except with a slightly different team.
Anyways, sorry if that spiel comes off as snarky, I finished proofreading this at like, 2 in the morning. So the grammar might be bad at some points.
With that in mind, let me know what you think! I've already started on chapter 2, so it won't take too long to come out. As long as I don't get distracted. I get distracted very easily.
Without further ado, here's the chapter:
———
A Night Beneath a Broken Moon
Judeau was smiling when he died.
"You sure do cry a lot, you know," were the last words he choked out before his vision began to fade completely. Casca must have known he didn't have a chance of making it, and she couldn't keep the tears from escaping her eyes.
He wasn't exactly sure why his lips curled up into a grin, there was nothing to smile about in Hell, or whatever else you might call the nightmarish world that surrounded them. Maybe it was one last attempt to keep Casca from breaking down. Maybe it was because the numb sensation had spread from his mangled right arm to the rest of his body, and it was caused by one last moment of peace.
This was the second time Judeau knew it was too late to tell Casca how he felt, especially since the scenery was terrible. He thought someone might get a laugh out of that, if things were better. Maybe one of Pippin's low rumbles that broke his stoic, silent facade every once in a while, or one of Corkus' shrill and honk-like laughs. The first time he knew was after he found out about her and Guts. Admittedly, he was partially at fault for that. He couldn't toughen up and tell her, not after Griffith was arrested and the Band of the Hawk were kingdom-wide fugitives. She stepped up and became the leader the Hawks needed at the time, and that… scared him away.
"She's got enough to worry about," he'd tell himself, "there's no point in pointing that in front of her, too."
Judeau's thoughts bounced around like that for what seemed like an eternity as Casca's crying face faded from view. He knew his body fell limp before he lost consciousness for the last time, and he didn't know what came after. If Hell was real —which he was now more certain was the case— Judeau thought he was probably going there. He hadn't lived a virtuous life, even before joining the Hawks he had his fair share of misdeeds imprinted on his soul. Before he joined the circus he had been a member of a band of thieves since before he could remember, and he was good at stealing. It turned out that Judeau was good at a lot of things: he was good at fighting, whether it was with swords, or knives, or a bowgun, he was nearly a sharpshooter when it came to some stuff like throwing cards or throwing knives, and he was very acrobatic. His small frame helped with that; he was never particularly tall or heavy, he might've even been the shortest member of the Band of the Hawks aside from little Rocket, even Casca was taller than him.
Eventually, like most groups of criminals, the band of thieves ran into trouble, so Judeau ran off and never saw any of them again.
He was practically still a child at the time, 10 or 11 at most, when he ended up in the circus. It was a shocking change of scenery for him, but he was no longer killing and stealing to get by. He didn't make much money from what he remembered, if he made any at all, but he was housed and fed, which was enough for him.
That was when he met that little pointy haired elf, Poke—or… was it Puck? Pick? Judeau couldn't remember all too well. He never spoke to the little thing very often, seeing as he was a tumbler, and the elf was a part of the more fantastical part of the circus, with that old fortune teller lady, and that poor fellow they had act like a cyclops. The little elf was the one that had given him elf dust after he had gotten into an accident during a show. He had hit his head falling off of something, he wasn't totally sure what since he was concussed from the landing, but the elf dust helped with all the scrapes and bruises he had gotten.
He had been given a pouch of it after he parted ways with the circus, and it had come in handy in the years following, especially after he joined up with Griffith when the Band of the Hawk was still a burgeoning group of "mercenaries." He had given the last of the dust to Guts after he had killed those hundred-or-so men, or rather, he gave it Casca, who gave it to Guts, and he really wished he had kept it in those last moments of his life, not that it would have done much to heal his wounds at that point.
Judeau's mind seemed to float on in nothing. There were no sensations, he couldn't hear anything, or see anything, or touch anything, but his thoughts continued, "maybe hell is all backed up," he joked to himself, without being able to laugh about it without a mouth. But maybe that was the case, there was at least a hundred men, maybe close to two hundred, then had been dragged in, and many of them had been killed rather quickly. Judeau didn't exactly know the rules of the afterlife, maybe they all had to be judged, like what the Holy See said in their scriptures, or maybe the mark the monsters had left on his hand meant he had no destination other than Hell, and there would be no angel to judge him. All the stuff they said about sacrifices and doom certainly made that seem like the case.
All Judeau was certain about was that he had plenty of patience if Hell was his destination, because it couldn't have been much worse than where he had just been.
And so he waited. Patiently.
Completely detached from any sense or feeling, Judeau had no way of knowing how much time had passed. There was no world around him, which meant there was no sun and moon above him to keep track of the hours, or days, or years. It felt like his perception kept changing, one moment it felt like all his thoughts had flown by in an instant, and he had only dropped dead just moments before, the next moment he was sure it had felt like at least a hundred years of nothing around him.
The strange part was that it eventually stopped being nothing. There were flecks of color that flashed in and out in an instant, and he could feel his eyes darting back and forth to chase them. He couldn't blink, since he could only feel his eyes, not his eyelids or any other part of his body.
His ears came back as well, eventually. It wasn't sudden bursts of sound like it had been bursts of light and color, instead it was the constant sound of crickets chirping and grass rustling in what he could begin to assume was a night's breeze.
Everything came back to him quickly after that, but it wasn't a sudden jolt. He became aware that he was breathing as he felt the rise and fall of his chest, and then he felt his back against the damp ground, and the clothes against his skin. He laid peacefully for a long time before he realized he could see the silhouettes of trees above him, illuminated by the corner of the moon poking out behind some clouds. He placed his left hand—the one that had been branded by the demons, he noted— over his chest. There were holes in his tunic and armor, but he was fine. In their place were three circular scars, probably with matching ones on the back.
He managed to push himself off the ground so that he was sitting up, and that's when he found that his right arm still hung limply by his side. "S'pose I shouldn't have expected to be totally lucky…" his lips curled up in grim amusement. His arm wasn't a disgusting sight, just a sad one. The skin was no longer torn up and pouring blood, but it was clear that the muscle that had been chomped out hadn't exactly magically grown back. He could move it a little bit, he could flex his elbow to lift his forearm slightly, and he could wiggle his fingers, more specifically just his thumb and pointer finger, but that was it. There it sat, swinging back and forth by his side.
Judeau reveled in being alive and in a cool, calm forest for a little longer, it was certainly infinitely better than eternal suffering. He would have to start moving eventually, since he wouldn't last long in the forest in the state he was in. He also wanted to find out what forest he was in, the trees had big round leaves, he wasn't sure what type of tree that made them, he wasn't a botanist after all, but he knew that the region around Wyndham and much of Midland was mostly filled with needle-y pine trees, and he didn't see many of those around him.
He pushed himself up onto his feet with his left arm, and began walking aimlessly through the trees. His goal was to find a river or stream, and then follow it upstream until he either found civilization or the source. He didn't want to sit around and be food for some hungry bear or pack of wolves, after all. The clouds were completely covering the moon now, and his only source of light was the stars that poked through the clear patches of the sky, which made navigating the woods much more difficult.
He wondered if anyone else had gotten spit out into the world like he had. Maybe he'd run into Pippin or Corkus, just as lost and confused as he was, or maybe some of them were still struggling and fighting those monsters, he was sure Guts would be, if anyone. Maybe he'd make it out of there, hopefully bringing Casca with him. Judeau hoped she would be alright, but deep down he knew she probably didn't make it much longer than him.
He shook those thoughts clear from his head and pressed on. Now that he realized his throat was dry and itchy, he really wanted to find some water. The woods were quiet around him, as if him and the crickets were the only living things there. Judeau was sure he had seen something out of the corner of his eyes more than once, one of those times he was certain it was a deer that had darted off after it noticed him, but he couldn't tell what animal he had seen the other times. Just so he didn't stress himself out over it, he convinced himself that the thing that had looked like a big dog with boney plating on its face was his eyes playing tricks on him in the dark, and not one of the demons that had been slaughtering the Band of the Hawk.
Eventually he did hear the sound of running water, it was quiet at first, and much further ahead of him, but once he got there, he saw that it was wide enough that the sky above was clear, as the treetops didn't stretch far enough over the water to cover it. A piece of the moon was beginning to peak out from behind the clouds again, which lit the water below Judeau and showed him a dim reflection of himself as he went down to drink-
Judeau did a double take, and his eyes shot back to the sky. A piece of the moon?
His eyes definitely weren't tricking him; a big jagged chunk of the moon in the shape of a pentagon stuck out from behind the passing clouds, surrounded by what must've been more pieces of the moon that looked like stars. As the cloud that obscured the rest of the moon continued passing, he saw more and more chunks of the moon in the sky. Had the sun destroyed the moon in the eclipse? That wasn't possible, he was sure of that. There had been plenty of eclipses throughout history, and nothing like that would ever happen. The moon looked like it had been smashed with a hammer, about half of it was still together, while the other half was shattered and scattered across the sky.
Judeau's mouth gaped like a fish as he fully processed the sight. He blindly dipped his hand into the stream and brought water up to his mouth to drink as his eyes stayed locked on the moon, to the point where his eyes began watering from a lack of blinking. He took a break from scooping water into his mouth to use his good arm to wipe the tears from his eyes, which helped him to finally look away from the moon.
The sky was an overwhelming sight, one that he didn't want to dwell on for too long before he could find civilization, so he kept his eyes on the ground, and began following the water upstream. It wasn't a sure shot that he would find any sort of village or town, but it might lead him out of the forest, or to higher ground.
He shuffled along the edge of the river, his eyes were firmly locked on the mud and rocks in front of him, mind still reeling from the sight of the moon.
Judeau had trudged along the river for what must have been about an hour when he first found signs of people. It was the remains of a small wooden crate. The wood was rotting and moldy from sitting in the water, and whatever it had held was nowhere to be seen, so whoever left it was long gone. It was a good sign, though, "There may be a road nearby," Judeau thought.
It was shortly after passing by the box in the river that Judeau had noticed that the forest had gone completely silent. Running water and the squelch of his boots in the mud were the only sounds he could hear, not a single critter scurrying through the brush, not even crickets chirping anymore.
Now, Judeau rarely trekked through the forest alone, especially not during his time in the Band of the Hawk, but he, like most people, knew this wasn't a very good sign.
Judeau stopped moving and turned his attention to the trees. He slowly reached his hand behind his back to grab his sword out of the holster on the small of his back-
"Shit!" Judeau cursed, that had been the sword Casca had taken when they were running on his horse. He had to reach his hand over his right shoulder to pull out his other sword, but that didn't provide him the range of motion to remove it from the scabbard, so he had to lower his hand and pull it out by the base of the blade, which dug into the leather of his glove and came near to cutting his hand.
He flipped the sword around in his hand so that the cutting edge faced the right direction, and lowered himself slightly into a ready stance. He was nervous, he wasn't afraid to admit that. Although he was good with a sword in either hand, which is why he used two of them, he would've felt much more comfortable if he was able to fight with his right hand.
There was the sound of a branch cracking, and Judeau's eyes shot in its direction. "It's probably just a big bear, you can fight a bear," he reassured himself, "...who am I kidding? A bear would eat me alive right now."
It was not a bear.
No, what came out of the woods was certainly not a bear.
The thing he had seen earlier, the big dog-like creature with bone plating, hadn't been his eyes playing tricks on him, because he was staring right into its eyes. It's big, glowing red eyes.
Judeau and the creature both stood still for a moment. It didn't seem to be smart, there was no intelligence behind its eyes like there had been behind the eyes of the monsters that attacked the Band of the Hawk, it just seemed like a predator sizing up its next target. Which happened to be Judeau.
It lunged first. It was especially quick for its size, which was that of a horse, but it wasn't so quick that Judeau couldn't dodge. As it soared through the air towards him, he rolled to the side, which muddied his clothes considerably. He tried to catch it with a slice to its back before the creature could spin around and face him after landing, but his sword just skidded off the plating on its leg. He would have to find a weak point; a chink in its armor that he could hack at with his sword.
He found himself really wishing he was someone like Guts or Pippin as he ducked under a swipe from the monster's paw, Guts probably could've sliced the thing clean in two without breaking a sweat, and Pippin could've just smashed its skull in.
As it's claws soared over his head, Judeau spotted one weakness that could give him an edge: the interior of its elbow-or knee, or whatever you would call it-was totally unprotected black hide, and taking out one of its legs would really help him. Judeau already began swinging his sword before he had finished that thought, he met the monster's arm mid-swing and his blade dug deep into its weak point. He wasn't able to generate enough force to sever the leg completely, but he was able to cut out such a large chunk of flesh that the beast couldn't swing that leg at him again.
He put some distance between himself and it. Now his back was to the forest, and the monster was on the riverbank. It gave him a little time to assess the situation. If he had any of his knives, he would've probably used them to try and take out its eyes, or hit its other legs, but he was totally out. That only left him the options of running away, or fighting it up close, with one good arm and one good sword. Judeau was pretty sure his only option was to fight, since the only direction he could run now was back into the forest. That meant he would have to let it attack him until it exposed a weak point, which would probably be on its underbelly.
As the monster began stalking towards him, ferociously growling, it clicked for Judeau.
Its mouth was a weak point too. Judeau cringed at the idea, but if he took out its other front leg, too, it would probably start biting at him, and then he could just shove his sword up through its skull.
"Well I guess they can't always be easy plans…" Judeau sighed and ran to meet the monster in its charge. Like he predicted, it swung its other leg, the right one, this time. Judeau swung his sword to parry again and try and catch the monster in the joint, but his strike sparked off the bone plate around its wrists, and his sword landed in the grass instead. The monster's swing continued, and Judeau stumbled forward, and by sheer luck, the monster extended its leg out further, which meant if he had dodged backwards, the claws would've caught him right in the face.
What wasn't lucky for him was the fact that the paw still caught him in the side of the head, and launched him with the force of a cannon into the tree to his right.
His right arm, which was already useless to him anyways at this point, luckily took the brunt of the impact into the tree, but a few ribs were probably cracked as well. The hit also knocked the wind out of him, and his vision was spinning as he pushed himself up and placed his back against the tree. His sword was weakly held in his left hand, as if he still thought he could do something against the beast.
He had already accepted that he was going to die when he used his body as a shield to protect Casca, so accepting it for a second time wasn't difficult.
The monster approached him. It crouched on his hind legs like it was going to pounce on him, and Judeau just stared directly into its eyes.
"What am I doing?" Judeau thought. He had been struggling so much for the past few days. He started feeling like he should just give in.
Instead of pouncing, the monster reared up like it planned on crushing him instead, and, in an instant, all the fatigue and disorientation in Judeau's body vanished, "I don't want to die here!" His sword shot forward and he plunged it into the throat of the beast.
It roared out with a bloody and guttural screech, and Judeau pushed himself upwards, standing and pushing his sword deeper into its throat. Despite being the size of a horse, the monster certainly didn't feel like it weigh as much as one. If his right arm was working, Judeau was sure he could've pushed it over, but he was still capable of holding it upright with just his sword in its throat.
He twisted the blade around, and dragged it back and forth, completely obliterating whatever might've been inside the monster's neck.
By the end of it, the monster's body went limp, and Judeau was huffing and puffing for air. His back hit the tree again and he slid back down until he was sitting against the base. The monster started crumbling into dust before his eyes, and the night breeze carried its remains and scattered it amongst the trees.
Judeau had seen too much to be surprised at this point, and just watched the black dust disappear. He clenched his eyes shut and drew in a deep breath, which he released as he pushed himself off the tree. It couldn't be much further, that's what he kept telling himself. Judeau trudged back to the riverbed, this time he would keep his eyes out for more of those monsters, and now he knew he could stab them right through the throat.
The moon was directly overhead when the trees began thinning, and that's when Judeau spotted the great stone wall just past the forest's edge. A city! Judging by the sheer scale of the wall, it was definitely a big one. Maybe he had ended up outside Vritannis? That didn't seem likely to him; he had never been to the massive port city, but he had heard that it stood like a massive monolith within the coastal hills to the north of Midland, so he doubted that such a large forest was anywhere near it. Either way, he was sure he could find someone in there.
The river passed through a cutout in the wall, which was very short, maybe 2 feet tall at the top of its arch, and the iron bars that covered it looked like they had enough room for him to slip through.
Judeau looked both ways down the wall. It seemed to stretch endlessly in either direction, with no actual gate or entrance in sight, so this would have to do. Judeau got down onto his knees and propped himself up with his left elbow, his right arm hanging limply next to him was starting to get on his nerves, but there was nothing he could do about it. He started pulling himself through the bars, at one point he had to shimmy back and forth like a fish out of water to get his abdomen through the gap, but once his upper body was through he could just push through with his legs.
Upon surveying the inside of the wall, he found that there were… more trees. These trees, however, were much smaller than the ones in the forest, and they were surrounded by a short iron fence, and the ground around them was covered in wood chippings. A large metal pole stood next to the fence, based off the light coming out of the top of it, it was a lamp post, but it seemed like it must have been the brightest candle in the world, and it lit the cobblestone path beneath it with a dim yellow glow.
The stones were all smooth and white, like they were cleaned regularly, which was strange to Judeau. The path led him through more trees lit by strangely bright lamps, until the trees all circled around a single large statue.
It was of a man hoisting a battle axe over his shoulder, staring up into the sky, with his other hand on his hip. There was a plaque on the base of the statue, made of what looked like bronze, although it was extremely yellow from rust, so the only word Judeau could make out was 'HUNT'.
It was strange to see such an incredibly detailed statue sitting in the middle of a bunch of trees rather than in some great hall. The detail was even better than what he had seen in some of Wyndham's great halls, even.
The city kept getting more and more bizarre to Judeau, from the strange lampposts, and the strange statue, his confusion only grew more once he reached the end of the cobblestone path and saw the buildings themselves.
Many of them were made of uniform red bricks, and had lights pouring out of their windows.
He wandered through the streets, taking in the strange sights, like the giant metal… wagon-or so he assumed, based off the wheels- on the side of the road, or the fact that the road itself looked like it was carved out of one giant stone. Everything was so clean, and weird looking. He had never seen much of the stuff around him before, and he just couldn't wrap his head around it.
Judeau was now tired, hungry, and lost in a strange city, on top of already dying once today. Maybe there was an inn around here? Or at least a place he could ask for help. Based off the signs he had seen, such as the one he had just passed that said BAKERY-the door to which was locked, and there were no lights coming through the large window next to it- the people of this city at least spoke the same language as him.
At the end of the street, Judeau saw a building that was still lit up, but instead of the dim yellow light that looked like a big candle, the inside of the building was lit up with a bright white light, like steel reflecting the sun. He couldn't make out anything inside, both because he was on the other side of the street, and because he couldn't tell what anything inside was, but the big sign above the door gave him hope.
FROM DUST TILL DAWN
…That sounded like it could be an inn. Perhaps they housed people from dusk till…
Judeau knew he was wrong, so he cut that thought before he felt like an idiot. Still, there were people inside, so maybe someone could help him.
He pushed the door open, and a bell above his head chimed. There was a man behind a counter right in front of the door, he was wearing a red apron over a dull green shirt, a few shades more gray than Judeau's own tunic. His bushy gray eyebrows shot up at Judeau's ragged and muddy appearance, but his eyes barely opened more than a squint.
"Sorry to bother you," Judeau greeted sheepishly, "but do you know where I could get something to eat?"
The shopkeep grunted, and pointed at a shiny blue box labeled 'Snacks'. Judeau supposed that would do for now, and he normally kept a small bag of coins on him at any given time.
Judeau patted his pockets, which were all empty, and he realized he had left his money back at the band's temporary camp.
"Sorry, uh… I don't have any money," he said while scratching his cheek.
The shopkeep waved him off and tossed him a pouch from the box anyway. Judeau caught it out of the air, and inspected the pouch.
"Thanks a lot, really," Judeau grinned at the shopkeep, who just mumbled something incoherent in response. Judeau absentmindedly walked deeper into the shop while inspecting the pouch. It was the same shiny blue as the box the shopkeep had pulled it out of. It had the image of a brown disc on it, which looked like a piece of bread, dotted with darker brown spots throughout its surface.
"Oh!" Judeau came to a realization as he read the words on the package, "it's cookies!" He'd had cookies before, just about anyone with a few coins in a city had eaten them. Those ones were more like lumpy wafers, not like the round disc on the box, though.
Judeau struggled to open the shiny, crinkly pouch for a few moments, before electing to just tear it open with his teeth. He sat the thing down on one of the shelves and pulled the first cookie out, popping it in his mouth. It was a totally new taste to him, parts of the cookie were salty, but it was also sweet like honey, before he knew it, he ended up shoving every cookie in the bag down his throat.
A quick glance at the shelves around him made him realize that he was surrounded by incredibly colorful and fine powders. Did the man sell dyes and pigments? That would explain why his clothes were so nice, he would be making a lot of money after all.
Upon closer inspection, all the tubes of fine powdered were labeled with things like LIGHTNING for light blue, or BURN for the brightest shade of red. Those seemed like they would be strange names for pigments.
Judeau must have gone in to a trance when looking at the wall of colors, because he hadn't heard the bell chime above the door, or hear the people who had walked through the door. In fact, he only realized someone new had entered the building when a hand was placed on the pauldron on his left shoulder.
"What are you deaf or somethin' kid?" The man who'd grabbed him asked. He wore a strange pair of red tinted spectacles on his face, and wore an equally strange looking suit. "I said put your hands up!" The man raised a red short sword to Judeau's throat.
Judeau raised his left hand so that it was away from his body and about level with his shoulder, "Sorry," he said, "that one doesn't work so well," he joked as he motioned towards his right hand.
"All ya lien and dust. Now." The man was trying to sound threatening, but his fat face and funny accent just amused Judeau, even with the sword at his throat.
By some strange coincidence, Judeau, and another customer in the store, decided to ask the same question at the same time:
"Am I being robbed?"
Judeau knew the answer was obviously yes, but the man sticking him up clearly had a short temper and Judeau knew he could use that to his advantage. "The hell do ya think, kid?" The man growled. Yep, Judeau was correct.
"I dunno," Judeau shrugged, "maybe you're short on change? I don't have any money on me anyways, or whatever you're trying to steal from-"
CRASH! A red blur shot through the front window of the store, much to the surprise of everyone inside, including Judeau, and the man waving a sword in his face.
Judeau was quick to take advantage of the distraction by swinging his leg up to kick the man in the groin. He whipped out his sword, which he had moved to the scabbard on the small of his back, and slashed the man across the chest. A flash of red sparked across the man's chest and he fell onto his back on the floor. The front of his suit was cut clean through, but there was no wound visible. No blood was on Judeau's blade either, so the source of that flash escaped him. But by the way the man's head was lulled to the side and the way his lower jaw hung loosely, he was out cold, which was good enough for Judeau.
Some of his friends had ran outside, including a man in a bright white coat with fiery orange hair, but one of them had stayed inside to deal with Judeau.
Unlike the first tubby guy, the new thug swung at Judeau first with an identical red sword to the one the last guy had been carrying. Judeau met the sword midswing with his own and parried, flinging the man's sword arm up and to the right, and carried his swing down into the man's shoulder. His blade was met with sparks once again, this time they were white, but the man yelped in pain from the hit anyways.
He brought his red sword back down towards Judeau, but his swing went wide as Judeau jumped back to avoid it, and it collided with one of the tubes of light blue powder on the wall labeled LIGHTNING.
Judeau and the thug both looked at the glass tube, the man had a look of fear plastered for an instant before the powder in the tube exploded and sent bolts of electricity throughout half the store. Judeau was quick enough to dive away and behind another shelf once he first saw the flash begin, but a stray bolt struck the sabaton that covered the boot on his left foot, which sent a jolt up the entire leg.
It was a painful sensation which caused him to kick the floor repeatedly against his will for a few moments, but it eventually settled into a numb pain. He counted himself lucky for not using full plate mail to protect his legs as he pushed himself up onto his feet. He peeked back into the aisle he had been fighting in, it looked like a bomb had gone off in the middle of the floor, as everything was covered in what looked like black soot, including the second thug, who was covered head to toe, and sprawled out facedown on the floor.
Now that he didn't have any more trouble inside the shop, he rushed out the open front door and into the street.
There, in the middle of the street, was a girl in a bright red cloak and black dress, with a red war scythe that was at least twice her size, and looked far too heavy for any regular person to swing around, who was easily handling all the well-dressed thugs. In fact, by the time Judeau was out the door, the only one still standing, aside from the man in white who was standing right in front of Judeau with his back to him, was met with a kick to the face, and was sprawled out on the pavement.
The man in front of him tipped his hat and sighed. He kicked the thug sprawled out next to him in the arm, "you were worth every penny, really, you were," he spat.
Before the man could take another step into the street, Judeau swung his sword at his back. To his surprise, the fiery haired man was very quick, and spun around to meet his sword with… a cane?
"Really, pipsqueak? You think I didn't hear you or something?" The man laughed, "Ohoh man you two are really something else." He flicked Judeau's sword out of the way with his cane and tossed him into the street by his forearm. His face hit the ground hard, and scraped against the pavement for a moment, before he rolled over and landed on his back, the sky was a total blur in his vision.
The girl in red rushed to his side, "Are you okay?!" She asked him in a high pitched voice, her giant silver orbs filled with concern.
He raised his hand up to his cheek, which was tender to the touch, and saw that he was bleeding. His face wasn't gushing blood though, so his answer was a simple "yeah..." while he tried to blink the disorientation out of his eyes.
"It's been fun kids, but I've got places to be," Judeau and the girl turned their attention back to the man in white. He lifted his cane and pointed it at them, the butt of the cane flipped up and revealed that it was hollow.
"Huh?" Judeau muttered moments before a bright red projectile rocketed out the butt of the cane with a loud BANG! and the girl in red jumped over Judeau, yelping "Look out!"
She raised her scythe to defend herself, before deciding to jump over the ball of fire and attempting to slice it in half. Her idea failed, but it changed the trajectory of the projectile and sent it soaring over Judeau's body, leaving a crater in the middle of the road. Had she not done that, it probably would've hit Judeau right in the chest and killed him.
"Are you okay… still?" Judeau nodded and propped himself up on his elbow, and took her hand when she offered it to pull himself up to his feet. Now that he was standing next to her, he realized the girl was the same height as him, maybe even a little taller.
Judeau looked back towards the store and frowned, "The guy's gone."
The girl turned towards the store, "Aw, dangit!" Her eyes darted around the city, "There!" She pointed at the man climbing up a ladder 3 buildings down to their right. She turned back to Judeau, "I'm going after him," she told him before she darted off towards the building.
Judeau watched as she quite literally flew up the side of the building using something in her scythe to propel her.
Judeau decided he would have time to think about that later, for now he should probably go after her. The guy and his goons had tried to rob him, after all.
The shopkeep had finally stepped out into the street, he must have been taking cover under the counter or something, and was looking back at the damages.
"Sorry about the uh…" Judeau trailed off, "I'm just gonna… go after him now."
The shopkeep turned to face Judeau, and, despite having a large frown on his face, waved him on with more incoherent grumbling.
Climbing a ladder with one hand wasn't much of a challenge, most of the time he was holding a sword in his other hand rather than having it as deadweight dangling off his side, though.
Once he reached the top of the ladder, the man in white had already stepped off the roof and aboard… something. Judeau had no idea what he was looking at as it began hovering in the sky. "End of the line, Red!" The man procured a bright red crystal from his pocket and tossed it back onto the roof. He pointed his cane down at it as it skidded towards the edge, and Judeau had the forethought this time to dip his head back down below the roof and brace himself against the ladder. He heard the whistle of the red ball of fire that came from the end of the man's cane, and the explosion that followed it rocked the building.
A small wave of guilt washed over Judeau's conscience as he realized that the girl with the red cloak and giant scythe was probably dead.
He poked his head back over the edge of the ladder, expecting to see the girl's mangled corpse.
Instead a third person had appeared on the roof (second? Judeau wasn't really sure if he counted as "on the roof".) She had bright blonde hair, and wore a tight white blouse and black dress, but Judeau couldn't see her face from his position on the ladder. A flat wall of smoke billowed into the air in front of her, and a big glowing ears shone brightly from what must have been a wand in her hand. Actually, upon close inspection, Judeau realized it looked more like one of those fancy riding crops nobles used when hunting.
Either way, she was clearly using it to cast some sort of magic at the flying machine. The only experience Judeau had with magic was with elves and fortune telling, so he didn't know what to call the type of magic she was using. Whatever it was, it was clearly working, because the purple tendrils she launched at the flying machine sent it teetering back and forth, and the man in white almost tumbled out the open side.
The man eventually disappeared inside the machine, and a shadowy figure replaced him. Literally. Judeau had no idea who or what he was looking at.
What ensued was a spectacle. Jets of fire slammed into the roof, and the roof erupted like a volcano, sending red hot debris every where, even barely over Judeau's scalp.
Some of the debris stopped in midair, and flew together to form a massive spike, which was glowing purple. The blonde lady flicked her riding crop in the direction of the flying machine, and the spike followed. It was met by another blast of fire, which caused it to shatter back into the pieces of debris it was made of. It quickly reformed into a spike and rocketed forward again. The flying machine tilted towards the roof, and the spike slid off the top and shattered into shards.
The blade of the girl in red's scythe folded up into the hilt, and she grabbed a handle on the side.
It fired a big bullet, and the girl pulled back on the handle and then fired another. It was like some sort of repeating versions of the handgonnes he had seen Tudor's footsoldiers use during sieges.
The shadowy figure seemed to block all of her shots with their hand, and sent another barrage of fire up from the roof, which the blonde lady and the girl in red dove out of the way of. The door on the side of the flying machine whirred shut, and it blasted off into the night sky.
The girl turned towards the older woman, "You're a huntress!" She exclaimed, her big silver eyes shining brightly, "can I have your autograph?!" She squealed.
The blonde woman thwapped her across the head with the crop, "You are in serious trouble, young lady."
The girls eyes dulled noticeable, and her excitement was washed out by fear and sadness.
"And don't think I didn't see you, young man." She pointed the crop in Judeau's direction.
"Uh… hello," Judeau laughed nervously, and he pulled himself up onto the roof to join them.
"You two are both coming with… me…" her stern look morphed into concern as she saw the sorry state Judeau looked like he was in.
His face was scratched up and bleeding, his entire body was caked with mud, the three holes in his breastplate that looked like they were made with spears must've been concerning too. There was also his right arm, which was dangling back and forth by his side which made his predicament all the more obvious. The entire right sleeve of his tunic was shredded, so the only thing that was fully intact on his right arm (including the arm itself) was the leather glove that covered much of his forearm.
The woman marched over to him, her heels clicking on the roof. She grabbed his limp arm and lifted it in front of her, "Are you alright, young man?"
"Oh that uh… happened a while ago. I'm…" Judeau paused for a moment to think, "well I wouldn't really say 'alright', I guess." He finished sheepishly.
—————————
Judeau had been staring at a sterile white ceiling for the better part of an hour. His right arm was propped up on a sling hanging from the ceiling, with a bunch of different needles and tubes sticking out of it. His face had also been bandaged, but that didn't bother him so much.
The blonde lady, her name was Glynda Goodwitch, had dragged him off to some hospital. It was nothing like the field hospitals he had been in before, which were more like hospices if you had anything more than an arrow sticking out of your shoulder, it was a big building that towered over everything around it, with countless people inside.
The girl in red, he had never actually learned her name, was dragged off to a different place, and she didn't look too happy about it when Judeau saw her last.
The blonde- Glynda Goodwitch had stayed in the room with him as a bunch of people in white coats, doctors, he was pretty sure, ran all sorts of tests on him and asked him countless questions, most of which he didn't know the answer to, such as:
"How long has your arm been nerve-dead?" "I don't know what that means."
"Was your 'aura' already depleted by the time you fought Roman Torchwick?" "I don't know what that means."
And "What's your blood type?" "I have no idea."
There were some he could answer, like "How old are you?" "About eighteen." "What is your name?" "Judeau." "Could you spell that?" "J-U-D-E-A-U." "Last name?" "I don't have one." That caused some eyebrows to raise.
He also had his own questions like "Why does the moon look like that?"
That also caused some eyebrows to raise.
Eventually, the doctors left the room, leaving him with his arm full of the tubes and needles mentioned previously, and Glynda Goodwitch.
She asked him her own set of questions, which were much easier to answer.
He told her that he had just woken up in the forest outside the city, "Vale," she told him, fought and killed a big dog-like monster, "A beowolf", she told him, which was apparently a type of 'Grimm', and not like one of the monsters that attacked the Band of the Hawk. She asked him why he was at the store, From Dust till Dawn, and he answered honestly, telling her he was looking for a place to eat.
"You were looking for food in a dust shop?" She raised an eyebrow.
"I don't exactly know what a dust shop is, ma'am."
"Hmm…" she looked away from him and towards the door, "and there's no record of anyone named just Judeau anywhere in the kingdom…"
The device in her pocket, which was called a scroll according to Glynda and the doctors, buzzed, and she stood up from her chair. "I'll be back shortly, the doctors will check on you periodically. If you need anything, just ask them." She marched towards the heavy wooden door and opened it. She took one last glance at Judeau before stepping back into the hall and closing the door.
Which brought him to his current situation, of staring at the ceiling, and listening to the dull buzz which he had deduced to be coming from the light in the middle of the room.
It was a strange, foreign type of peace, and Judeau wasn't used to it. He'd barely caught a break in the past few days, first the Band of the Hawk's camp was ambushed in the night, and then they rescued Griffith from the Tower of Rebirth in Wyndham and were chased out by the regular army, and then by the Black Dog Knights for nearly a day and a half, whose leader, Wyald, turned out to be one of those freak monsters like Nosferatu Zodd, and then the Eclipse.
He had already started trying to block what he saw from his memory, but it was proving to be a futile effort. He didn't know what the demons had planned for them, specifically Griffith, or what the brands would do. He clenched his left hand and looked at the black mark seared into his palm. There was an almost constant buzzing pain coming from it, like he had been stung by a bee. The doctors had asked him about that, too, but he couldn't give them any answers. Glynda used her scroll to "take a picture of it," but, like most things Judeau had experienced this night, he didn't know what that meant.
It was while he was still staring at the brand on his hand when someone other than a doctor finally walked through the door, "You must be our John Doe," the man said with a small smile on his face. He had stark white hair similar to Griffith's, which made him look much older at first glance. On the bridge of his nose he wore tiny spectacles that were much more like the one's he had seen back in Midland. His clothes were simple: a Green scarf, with a black jacket over a dark green shirt and black pants and shoes. The cane in his hands also helped to make him look older. "Judeau, correct?"
Judeau nodded, "that's me."
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Judeau," the man smiled and sat in the chair next to his bed, the same one Glynda Goodwitch had been sitting in about an hour or so prior, "I'm Professor Ozpin, the headmaster of Beacon Academy," He paused, "though from what I'm told you probably don't know what that is," he chuckled.
"No I do not," Judeau answered simply.
"Miss Goodwitch has already filled me in on the details, don't worry. You don't seem to be from around here, Judeau."
"I'm not exactly sure where 'here' is, sir." Judeau admitted.
"Well," Professor Ozpin sat back in his chair, "You're in the Vale Central Hospital, in the city of Vale… in the Kingdom of Vale."
There was a bout of silence.
"I take it you've never heard of Vale?"
Judeau shook his head, "Never seen it on any map where I'm from."
"And where might you be from, exactly?" Ozpin asked.
"Well I've been in the Kingdom of Midland pretty much my whole life. Not sure where I was born exactly, I've always been a traveler."
"Well Judeau, it seems like we have something in common. You've never heard of Vale, and I've never heard of Midland." Professor Ozpin said humorously, "It seems we're in a strange predicament."
Professor Ozpin opened his mouth to continue speaking, before closing it and looking out the window, "Miss Goodwitch said you asked about the moon."
"Yeah, it's… broken."
"I take it the moon isn't broken where you're from?"
"No, it's one big white ball in the sky," or part of a ball, or a crescent shape, but that didn't matter.
Ozpin hummed and rapped the top of his cane with his fingers. "You know, that moon was once whole, too. Though it was far before any modern man or faunus walked the earth. They say that great kingdoms and cities covered the world during that time. Perhaps…" Ozpin looked at the moon outside the window, "Perhaps Midland was one of those ancient kingdoms. And just maybe..."
Judeau blinked. Was this guy trying to tell him that he was in the future? That might explain things like the flying machine or the girl in red's repeating gun.
"Bah, that's just the theory of a nutty old teacher, don't think too deeply into it," Ozpin smiled, "perhaps you were just raised as some sort of Luddite, but even Luddites know about aura and Grimm. Your aura clearly hasn't been activated yet. Quite frankly it's astounding that you managed to fight not only a Grimm, but two wanted criminals with their auras, and with one arm, at that. I believe it shows an immense level of talent." Ozpin complimented him, "…or dumb luck."
When Judeau never spoke up, Ozpin continued. "I'd like to offer you a chance, Judeau. Or… an invitation, rather. I'd like you to come to my school. If you truly were thrown into our time from the past, then you wouldn't stand much of a chance out in the world. At Beacon, you would have a place to sleep, food, education. Everything you'll need. I can see to it that you know everything you need to to fit in. And if I'm being totally honest… you intrigue me. I'd like to learn more about you. Particularly the mark on your hand."
Judeau thought about it for a moment, "What about this?" He nodded towards his arm.
Ozpin chuckled, "Don't worry about that. A brace is already being made for you, your arm will work just fine in no time."
A brace could make his arm work again?
Actually, from the technology he had already seen, he didn't doubt it.
"Then I guess my choice is pretty obvious," Judeau said.
"Fantastic. I'll have you brought up to the academy first thing in the morning. There's a lot we'll need to go over for you to be ready for next week." Like Glynda Goodwitch, Ozpin stood up, and walked to the door, "Ah, one last question," he turned around.
"I take it you've never flown before?"
———
That's it for now!
I have a habit on ending on dialogue like, all the time, so I'll try not to do that so often with this story.
Like I said at the top, let me know what you think! This chapter almost definitely drags on at a few points since I wrote it over the period of about a week while I came up with ideas for the story, so some parts might not really click together very well, and the dialogue might not be very "Judeau-y."
He considers himself a pretty carefree guy, but there's not a lot of time for him to be carefree in this chapter. He's got plenty of great quotes throughout the Golden Age, so I hope that I can emulate Miura's writing for him if I give him some long soliloquy any time soon.
Also I think I used the word "sheepishly" at least 40 times throughout this chapter. I really gotta pick up an encyclopedia.
