I do not own RWBY. I do not own Monster #8.

The Boy

Jaune Arc had a dream. He wanted to be a Huntsman. He wanted to be a hero. Wanted to live up to his family legacy.

His father and mother disagreed with that dream. So did most of his sisters.

"You aren't strong enough, Jaune," his father said and his sisters echoed.

"Then show me how!" He had begged at ten.

"No one can show you how to be strong. It's more than muscle and speed," then the man refused to elaborate further. Continued teaching his sisters. When he caught Jaune trying to watch the lessons, he took them out of the walls of Ansel.

Much as he wanted to learn, Jaune couldn't follow outside the walls. That was just suicide.

So, he took what little he did know and practiced that when no one was looking.

The only one who knew was Sapphron.

"You can do it, little bro," she encouraged him on one of her visits. She was, aside from Jaune, the only one to defy their father. The man hadn't wanted her to move away for school. He didn't approve of Terra. He didn't approve of the fact she was lesbian.

"If you'd just meet him-" their mother tried to reason with the oldest of her daughters. Julius Arc had set up an engagement with another local Huntsman, but Sapphron wasn't having it.

The young woman was about to blow her top, Jaune could tell. Then her face lost its pinched look. She smiled a winning smile.

"Go ahead. Bring him in. I will tell him everything. Every little thing. I'll explain that my own father would rather see me repeatedly raped and bred than see me happy. I'll let him know that, after you, the Arc name is worthless. That you care only about your personal-"

She was cut off from speaking further when Julius slapped her. Rather than back down, it only made her more fervent.

"Thank you, Master! May I have another!" She lifted her chin, "Use your knuckles or I won't bruise!"

"Get out of my house," the man growled at the untrained girl half his size.

"Gladly. Don't call. Ever," she left then, only stopping long enough to hug and kiss Jaune at the door. She didn't even pack her things. Other than Jaune, she cut ties with the family that didn't support her.

Julius forbade anyone to mention her. He swore up and down that they only had six daughters.

He was more than a little incensed three years later when Jaune received an invitation to the Cotta-Arc wedding.

"The only reason you'll go," Julius said sternly to his son, fifteen years old, "is to tell her she is not an Arc."

Jaune said nothing. He would say no such thing to the only sister that supported him. The wedding was beautiful. The after party where they asked him to donate sperm for a child in the near future was somewhat awkward, but it was all very clinical in execution. He went to a sperm bank, they processed it, and Terra and Sapphron had it reserved for them.

And, when he was sixteen, just two months from his next birthday, he stole into the night. He took with him money, the clothes on his back and the family heirloom sword.

His father met him at the door.

"You aren't worthy of that blade," Julius said.

Jaune, borrowing an inch of spine from Sapphron, said, "You aren't worthy of your name. The sword comes with me." He started forward.

Julius Arc, strangely enough, just watched him go. There was no regret in those eyes. Only mild annoyance. Before Jaune made it out of earshot, Julius had one final thing to say.

"When you fail," his look was, as ever, unfeeling, "Do not return here. You are no Arc."

Jaune whirled, a murderous glare on his young face.

"No! I am more an Arc than you, or anyone in that house! And when I succeed, I will never even dream of returning to this place!" He stormed off then, stomping his feet and cursing under his breath.

Julius shook his head and walked back inside.

Jaune kept moving. His scowl lasted as long as it would take to get out of town. Almost as soon as he passed through the gates of Ansel, his mood began to lighten.

He was finally doing it. He was going to be a hero. He was going to be a hero!

"I will make my great grandfather proud," he swore to himself. He clenched his fist before him and imagined it holding the remaining flame of Arc honor.

Then he looked up, running face first into a giant black and white wasp.

It had glowing yellow eyes, ten legs, humanoid teeth and an eight inch stinger.

The teen would have screamed in fright, but the wasp's legs lashed out like tentacles, wrapping around his neck and hands. It grasped the edges of his mouth and leaned towards him, forcing his jaws to open.

"I… found… a… good… one…" the voice was high pitched, childlike even, and stilted. Each word was accompanied by a short gasp, air seeping into its body through holes along its sides.

Before Jaune could try and guess what that meant, the monster dove, head first, into his throat.

Immediately the pain started. This thing was tearing at him from the inside out! It was eating his organs and dismantling his skeleton.

Before the blonde's eyes, his left arm became wobbly and flopped around.

His eyes rolled back in his head and he fainted. He missed it as his body began to grow. Up, out, his skin became darker until it was pure black. Spikes began to form with no rhyme or reason. His head seemed to bloat outwards for a moment before solidifying into a spiked mask. His lips curled back to show a maw of sharp teeth.

Something twitched in the woods. Jaune's body, changed as it was, moved of its own accord. By the time a patrol of Huntsmen came through, there was no evidence Jaune had ever been there.

Hours later, Jaune woke up.

Honestly, considering the last thing he remembered, he was fairly surprised that he ever opened his eyes again.

That he did so from half way up a five hundred foot cliff was its own nasty surprise. He scrabbled at the sheer rock face with his large, black claws, cutting into the stone like a hot knife through butter.

"What the fuck?!" His voice rumbled out, "Ah! My voice!" He let go of the cliff face to clutch at his throat. It took him a moment to realize that he wasn't holding onto it with anything. He slowly and carefully looked at his feet. Like his claws had earlier, his toes were stabbed into the rock face.

More than that, now that he thought about it, he could feel something beyond his feet, deep in the cliff face. Whatever it was, he could move it, retract it. So he did.

And proceeded to fall from the cliff face.

He screamed all the way down, hitting like a meteor strike. The earth shook, trees were blown over, a small stream was diverted into his crater to eventually make a small pond.

And Jaune hadn't felt a thing.

He knew he'd hit the ground. Could feel the water on his hard, black as night skin. Could feel the warmth of the sun. But he'd taken no damage from a fall that would have killed him yesterday.

He sat up, bringing his hands before his face again. Not hands. Claws. He had four digits on each hand, ending in two inch bone spikes that had cut through stone. There was a small, vestigial digit close to his wrist that might have been his pinky at one point. Luckily his thumb was still poseable. He followed the dark flesh from his finger claws to his arm. It was thickly muscled, rippling even. His bicep was bigger than he'd ever achieved before.

He moved his gaze to his feet. Three toes, two in front with more bone claws, one coming out of the heel. He bet he could grab onto things with them, like a falcon, or a bat. His legs were just as bulging with muscles as his arms. He was somewhat dismayed to find out he was apparently genderless now. No genitalia, that is. His abs and pecs and everything was now built for overwhelming power. He was surprised not to see any veins pulsing with blood being pumped.

Then he remembered how it felt when that wasp thing crawled down his throat. It had been eating his organs and bones. Did he even have blood anymore?

"What am I?" His voice was a horrifying mix of a gargle and a deep rumble. He knew he'd be terrified to meet himself in a dark alley.

He looked around the area he was now in and was surprised to see a familiar sight.

Crocea Mors. The Yellow Death. The Arc family sword. It was wedged into the ground, covered in mud and dirt from his fall. It had probably fallen when he had…

Had climbed a sheer cliff face in his freaking sleep!

He moved over to it. His feet tore trenches in the dirt as he moved and he felt, knew, that he could move far faster than he ever had before.

He made it to the sword and grabbed it with a paw-like hand that was far bigger than they had been. One was enough to grasp the entirety of the hilt. He took a long breath, held it, and drew the sword from the sheath.

He held it before him, looking into the reflective surface to see his face. It was just as horrible as the rest of him.

Black all over, except the face. Bone white mask covering his visage that only showed two glowing yellow eyes. His teeth were exposed and needle sharp. He flicked the inside of his mouth with his tongue and could tell he had rows of razor teeth.

Finally, around his head, Jaune had a crown of five spikes.

He sheathed the blade and sat down. He began to weep.

He wept for himself, mostly. This ruined his plans to become a Huntsman. Hell! This ruined any chance he ever had for positive human interaction. He also, to a far lesser extent, wept for Sapphron. She'd never know what happened to him. Their father would never tell her what happened to Jaune.

Or maybe he would. Julius could be cruel when he wanted. Jaune could see him telling Sapphron that the only Arc son had wandered off and gotten killed in the forests of Ansel, trying to become a Huntsman.

After a while, he wiped his eyes and stood up. Still in his monstrous hands was Crocea Mors.

"I should leave you here," he rumbled, "But I would rather have you with me." As he said, his chest opened up and several black tentacles shot out, pulling it in. The opened cavity closed and none would be the wiser. "Right. Freaky monster powers. I'm gonna have to… get.. used to… Oh, that just smells awesome!"

He turned his nasal hole in his bone mask towards the sky. He smelled… something. It smelled like a delicious mix of bacon, cake, and, somehow, X-ray and Vav. It just made him feel good. He started subconsciously following that scent.

Before he knew it, he was running. Holes opened up on his chest and back, providing a more efficient breathing and he started running faster. He was almost against the wall of Ansel before he realized where the smell had taken him. It had gained a certain spiciness that only enticed him further. His initial reaction to seeing the walls- a chill of horror at coming so close again to the home he abandoned- was overwhelmed by the appetizing scent.

Jaune crouched low, his leg muscles coiling, and launched himself up the wall. As he neared the top, more tentacles lashed out, digging into the wall and steadying his flight. With their help, he came down the other side, silent as a whisper.

Some sense returned to him when he heard voices and the sound of violence. He slinked quietly through the gap of wall and house, peering just barely around the corner.

"... Of my children!" It was his mother, all but screaming at his father.

A lot of people liked to forget that Tannis Arc was also a Huntsman. Most didn't know that Julius was the weaker of the two.

"Tannis-"

"No! Two! Two of my children!" She briefly waved a bundle of rags in his face. Then she kicked him in it. The man slid across the ground, his lip split and his nose broken. He surged to his feet, anger on his face, a growl on his lips.

His face was instantly back in the dirt, Tannis' foot pressing him further into the ground.

"Sapphron is gone," she hissed at him, "The last time she was here, she wouldn't even look at me! And Jaune!" She sniffed, wiping her eyes, then ground her heel into his skull, earning a groan, "My only son is dead because of my compliance! I trusted you, Julius! I trusted you!" She took her foot off his head and turned to walk away.

The man stood to his feet slowly.

"I am the one to blame," she said, standing among her remaining daughters, "I assumed the actions you took were for the good of the family. I thought Sapphron was being dramatic," she turned a blank eyed gaze on her husband, the father of her children, "Julius. By my authority as the Mother of Arcs, with our daughters as witness, you are no longer an Arc," the girls gasped, Julius stared in dawning horror, "I name you a threat to me, my children, and all children that come hence of my blood. Begone. If you return here, or to any land owned by Arcs, you will be killed," she turned her back on him, and motioned for her girls to do the same, "Look on him no longer," Tannis told them, "He is the father of none and of importance to no one. Let him fade away with no eye to witness."

One by one, the remaining Arc daughters turned away then. Little Jade was the last to do so, with the barest sniffle to show for her understanding.

Julias, no longer Arc, watched them all for a few moments. When he turned to walk away, Jaune, too, turned his back on the man.

As the girls went inside, ushered by their mother, Jaune noticed that the spice in the scent had faded. The X-ray and Vav portion as well.

Bacon and cake. Sweet and savory. A scent that told him prey lived in that house.

He leapt back over the wall. As he stalked forward, into the woods, away from his home for the final time, he voiced his thoughts. Put words to the dark epiphany he now suffered as truth.

"I smelled their sadness. I can track it. Their anger and anxiety and hate," he looked again at his inhuman hands, "I'm a Grimm."

He knew what he had to do. Jaune Arc was dead. Those rags had been the shredded remnants of his clothing. His family probably assumed he had been torn apart by Grimm. Best they continued to assume so. He needed to leave.

He might never be a hero now, would never be a Huntsman, but he could, in at least this small way, protect people. He could protect people by simply never going into another village or city. By avoiding human contact. By living in the wild lands, the scrub.

He was certain his new body would help greatly with that.

Two months later, the monster that Jaune Arc had become was walking through the harsh forests. And he was singing.

"I could be brown, I could be blue, I could be violet sky! I could be hurtful, I could be purple, I could be anything you like!" A tentacle snaked out of his back, a mouth with sharp teeth and a forked tongue at its end, and joined the singing, "I could be brown, I could be blue, I could be violet sky! I could be hurtful, I could be purple, I could be anything you like!" Another tentacle with a mouth formed, hovering over his left shoulder. It, too, joined in, "I could be brown, I could be blue, I could be violet sky! I could be hurtful, I could be purple, I could be anything you like!" The monster was dancing along as a third tentacle appeared, singing far high than the first two, "I could be brown, I could be blue, I could be violet sky! I could be hurtful, I could be purple, I could be anything you like!" It was joined by yet another tentacle, singing higher still, "I COULD BE BROWN, I COULD BE BLUE, I COULD BE VIOLET SKY! I COULD HURTFUL, I COULD BE PURPLE, I COULD BE ANYTHING YOU LIKE!"

Finally a mouth opened, sideways, between his pectorals, belting the song with a bit more attitude, "I COULD BE BROWN, I COULD BE BLUE, I COULD BE VIOLET SKY! I COULD BE HURTFUL, I COULD BE PURPLE, I COULD BE ANYTHING YOU LIIIII-IIIIKE!"

The one man chorus line was a trick he had mastered over the last two months of his self imposed exile. It had started, surprisingly enough, when he got hungry.

Jaune first looked for some firewood and a good place to dig a pit. While that was going on, he was trying not to focus on the question of how the hell he was going to hunt something to put over the fire.

A rabbit darted out of a bush in front of him. A tentacle lashed out, snaring the rabbit in a maw of sharp teeth, tore it to shreds and swallowed it, fur, bones and all. And he didn't feel as hungry any more. The tentacle fused with his body again and he looked around for a moment.

"God, I'm a freak," he said, dropping the fire wood.

He drank in a similar manner. He'd given a poor camper nightmares for sure when the man had seen him standing next to a rushing river, three tentacles submerged, sucking up water by the gallon.

He had, of course, fled, but that had been the closest he'd gotten to civilization since leaving Ansel for the final time.

But realizing he had mouths at the end of each tendril, he decided to see if they could make sound. The first sound they made, at his direction, was a terrible screech that had him covering his ear holes.

"Alright," he sighed, "Let's try again. Just make a little sound. A squeak."

The tentacle shuddered then gave a light squeak.

From there, with a lot of experimentation, he was able to create a real mouth. Tongue, lips, vocal chords. He had very little else to do. Even survival was a matter of moments to take care of.

"I could be brown, I could be blue-"

A familiar scent filled his nasal opening. Bacon, cake, spice.

It gave him a sudden wash of painful nostalgia. He thought of home. Of being in his own bed. Of his sister, Sapphron, and her encouraging words.

Of course, it also made his mouth water and his tentacles twitch with anticipation of a good meal.

Someone nearby was suffering. He needed to get away before the scent got stronger.

An explosion went off to his left.

Jaune wasted no time, leaping to the top of a tree to see the disturbance. If he still had a heart, what he saw would have stopped it. Hundreds of Grimm, maybe thousands, were converging on a town. From his position on the tree, the scent of bacon, cake and spice was amplified ten fold.

"I shouldn't go over there," he said to himself, climbing slowly down the tree. Another explosion went off, killing tens of Grimm but barely slowing the horde. "I'm just another monster. They don't need me to save them. A Huntsman should be there soon."

There was a wooden crack as his claws dug into the trunk of the tree. His whole body wanted to move, to act.

A sudden spike in the bacon scent and he was already off.

"Those people need help, damn it!"

Jaune reached the outskirts of the village to find that a gorilla Grimm was breaking the gates down.

He could feel the appetite in him growing. Beyond that gate were all the most delicious things he'd ever wanted. Cakes and candies and cheeses and steaks and livers and hearts and brains!

Jaune clenched his mouth shut so hard that it made an audible clack.

Just as the gate came down, he jumped into the fray. He didn't pay attention to the people. He couldn't afford to.

The first Grimm Jaune Arc ever killed was a gorilla thing that he didn't know was called a Beringel. He landed on its back, sank his claws into its skull and wrenched upwards. It was dead before it hit the ground.

From there on, his tentacles lashed out, only partly on his command. They destroyed every Grimm they came in contact with ripping off their heads. A few, with more bone plating than the rest, quickly learned to dodge. It only helped until Jaune took particular interest in them.

An Alpha Beowulf stepped forward to challenge him, and was struck by three tentacles. They lifted it up and proceeded to use it as a bludgeoning weapon against the other Alphas.

People screamed and ran. Grimm died. Jaune killed. One man watched.

What the monster with the mind of a young man did was not pretty. It wasn't graceful and precise. It was a horrible, messy thing that, if it weren't for the nature of the Grimm he was killing, would have left behind an ocean of blood and piles of body parts. Only his tentacles prevented the Grimm from actually getting into the town.

It took thirty minutes, even with his speed and strength, to kill every Grimm that had come for this raid. By the end he wasn't even breathing hard. He just stood there, contemplating the damage he'd done, and how much of a monster he was. He walked over to the fallen gate, lifted it up, and finally noticed he had a watcher.

A man, a Huntsman going by the way he was dressed and the weird weapon he had at his belt. Black hair, red eyes, five o'clock shadow. Giant sword.

Jaune stared at him. He stared at Jaune.

The monster dropped the gate and ran.

"Get back here!" The man roared, giving chase.

Jaune was strong beyond reason and at least half as fast. This Huntsman, whoever he was, was able to keep up. So he took to the trees. He used his tentacles to latch onto them and launch himself.

And still the Huntsman kept up.

"Slow! Down!" The man roared before Jaune felt a sudden pain from his right arm.

He roared in pain, but didn't stop.

He looked back to see how close the Huntsman was and took a bullet to the face. His sword was also a gun.

"Of course it's a gun!" Jaune rumbled, "Everything is a fucking gun!" He pushed himself harder. He started moving faster, started leaving the Huntsman behind. He didn't let himself stop for another thirty minutes.

When he finally did come to a stop it was at the base of a large waterfall.

Fighting all those Grimm hadn't made him break a sweat, but running for his life certainly had. Two tentacles came from his stomach and started sucking up water from the river. A third streaked out and snared a fish that it then ate.

"That's freaky as hell."

Jaune had just enough time to turn when something streaked past him. His tentacles were detached in a swing so fast he had barely followed.

"I don't want to fight you," Jaune rumbled at the man.

"Holy shit!" The man exclaimed, though he didn't let his guard down, "You can talk!" A grin spread across his face. "Ol' Ozzy is never gonna believe this," he pressed a button on the hilt and the weapon began to transform into a scythe, of all things, "Too bad for you I'm not feeling like letting you go." He crouched and propelled himself forward.

At the same time, more tentacles lashed out of Jaune's side, clinging to the rock face of the cliff next to the waterfall. It pulled him up and away quick enough to almost completely dodge the blow from the Huntsman. The blade hit the same corner of the mask that the earlier bullet had, chipping away the bone, all the way down to his mouth.

"Get back here, you son of a bitch!" The human yelled up at him.

From his spot at the top of the small cliff, Jaune lifted his middle finger at the Huntsman with a sharp toothed grin and said, "Can you fly, motherfucker?"

Seconds later, he witnessed the Huntsman transform into a crow and fly towards him.

"Well, I'll be damned, he can fly."

One of his tentacles tried to lash out to eat the crow, but he grabbed it with his hand, "No!"

That distraction was all the Huntsman needed to get close, transform back and kick the monster off the cliff again.

Before Jaune could get back up, the human dropped down on top of him, blade against his throat.

"Well, that was interesting," the human rasped. He didn't show his shock when he looked into the creature's eyes and saw a human eye, blue as the sky, gazing back at him from the crack in the mask.

Its chest began to shift and open. The Huntsman leapt away, preparing to dodge the attack.

Instead, a sword was pulled from within its chest. It took the sword in its remaining arm and looked at it forlornly.

"After you kill me," it rumbled sadly, "would you please take this to Sapphron Cotta-Arc in Argus? Just tell her… tell her Jaune tried to be a hero."

The Huntsman, Qrow Branwen, stared at the monster for a moment then moved forward in a flash. He lifted his weapon high above his head and brought it down.

Jaune didn't fight it.

Which was why, once more, he was surprised to be waking up.

Of course, there were some differences this time.

For one, he wasn't hanging off the side of a cliff. For the second, he was human again.

"I'm… I'm human again," he said softly, sitting up and looking at his hands. They were pinkish and soft and human! "I'm human!"

"Not quite," a voice came from a speaker in the ceiling. That was when Jaune took stock of his surroundings. He was in a twenty by twenty gray cell. There was no visible door, and he could just barely make out some human shapes behind an opaque glass panel.

Add those facts to the chains on both his ankles, things were not looking super great for Jaune Arc.

"Who's there?" He asked, noticing that even his voice had returned.

The opaque glass cleared. Behind it was a man with dark glasses and gray hair. Next to him was a blonde woman and the Huntsman that he had failed to escape from.

"My name is Ozpin. These are my colleagues, Glynda Goodwitch and Qrow Branwen," the man sipped from a mug and said, "And you are Jaune Arc, listed as dead by your family."

"Yeah," the young man said, "Honestly, what actually happened is kinda hard to believe."

"Try me."

Jaune sighed. He could feel the power still in his body. He could feel that strength waiting to come back at a moment's notice. He could probably escape this place.

If he was willing to fight his way out, killing everyone between him and the door.

"I guess it all started with this huge, freaky wasp…"