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Fox walked into Ozpin's office with Ruby, finding Glynda, Ozpin, and Ironwood waiting. They stopped in front of the desk and Fox stared at Ozpin, eyes narrowed and arms crossed.
"Thank you for coming," Ozpin said. "How are you feeling?"
Fox didn't answer.
"Okay, I guess," Ruby said. "I'd feel better if my bad guy catching record wasn't 'O' for three."
The three adults stared at her before Ozpin turned his attention to Fox, whose glare had yet to so much as waver.
"Ruby I just want you to know that I think what you did last night is exactly what being a Huntress is all about," Ironwood said, walking forward and resting a hand on her shoulder. "You recognized a threat, you took action, and you did the best you could." He turned to Fox. "You t-"
"Touch me and I take that prosthetic arm of yours off and shove it up your ass," Fox growled, eyes still not leaving Ozpin.
"Excuse me!?" Ironwood demanded.
"Mr. Winters!" Glynda gasped.
"It's fine," Ozpin said, both staring at him. "Is there something you'd like to say, Fox?"
"You lied," Fox snarled. "Not just to me, to my friends."
"What are you talking about?" Ruby asked.
"Yes, what are you talking about?" Glynda asked.
"I checked the school records," Fox growled, ears standing up and angling forward. "You lied."
"We'll discuss that later," Ozpin said. "First, I need to know what you can tell me about-"
"My height, white, black hair over her left shoulder, arms glowed whenever she attacked, and no Ironwood, it wasn't Dust," Fox said, Ironwood, who had been about to speak, closed his mouth. "I can smell that. She generated flames and used them to form obsidian swords and arrows, and she was able to turn small chunks of glass into pointed projectiles that she then hurled at us without touching them. I thought they were ice at first, but after the fight I checked what they left behind and they were definitely glass."
"Save for the glass, that sounds like the woman I fought the night we met Ruby," Glynda said.
"Wait, you think this girl's connected to Torchwick and the White Fang?" Ruby asked.
"It's possible," Ozpin said. "However, we lack the required evidence to link the two together."
"She was talking on a communicator when we arrived and mentioned a base in the south east," Fox said. "Now can we discuss your lies?"
Ozpin stared at him for a moment before sighing. "Thank you, Ruby. That will be all."
Ruby nodded and left, taking the elevator back down. The moment she was gone, Fox growled loudly.
"Why the hell are me an my team not a part of this school!?" Fox snarled. "What happened to your grand offer? What happened to us always having a place at Beacon?"
"What's he talking about?" Glynda asked. "What does he mean they're not a part of the school? He's in class every day. He's one of my top students."
"Oh you didn't know?" Fox asked. "Yeah, turns out me and my entire team aren't on the school roster. Or anywhere else, for that matter. There's no record of us anywhere in the school database. For all intents and purposes, me and my team were never actually a part of the class."
Everyone looked to Ozpin, who sighed. "What do you want me to tell you? You saw the records."
"I want you to tell me the truth!" Fox shouted.
"But there are many truths," Ozpin said. "Which would you like to hear?"
"All of it!" Fox snapped. "Just tell me what you're hiding! And how do I know you?"
Ozpin stared at him before sighing. "Very well. But you'll have to bear with me. The tale is a bit of a long one, and a bit farfetched."
"Oz, you can't really mean to tell him that, can you?" Glynda asked. "He's not ready."
"The last time I told him when we believed he was ready, he turned against us," Ozpin said. "Alright Fox. Here's the truth. You and I are childhood friends."
"That's physically impossible," Fox growled. "I'm a teenager. You're an adult."
"Oh I'm much older than an adult," Ozpin said. "And as for you, you both are the age you seem, and yet you're much older."
"What the hell does that mean?" Fox growled.
"I am very, very old," Ozpin said. "Centuries."
"Then it's even more impossible for me to be your childhood friend," Fox growled.
"But you are," Ozpin said. "Each time I die, I reincarnate into a like-minded individual, and then over time, that person and myself combine. I'm the same, yet slightly different each time. And you and I have known each other as every one of my reincarnations, except for one."
"Again, that's physically impossible," Fox growled.
"But it's not," Ozpin said. "Magic exists. Real magic. Your semblance borders on it. You can conduct pure energy, any kind of it, into a beam. You use it to augment your strength, your durability, your Aura. You use it to defy gravity, and to fall large distances and land without harm. You use it to harden and sharpen your sword, and to form a string and arrow for your bow. In the past, I've seen you hurl blasts of it from your hands, and I've seen you wear it like a suit of armor, further augmenting your abilities. However, there is one ability of your semblance that even you are unaware of."
"And what's that?" Fox asked, crossing his arms.
"Each time you are killed, or that you die of old age, or sickness, your semblance transforms you into pure energy," Ozpin said. "Energy cannot be destroyed. It merely changes forms. In the past, you've been a red-head, a brunette, human, faunus, even female once. But each time you die, you are transformed into energy, and then reborn. Not literally, of course. You reform into a complete body somewhere in the world, sometimes as an infant, sometimes as a toddler. But every time, you grow up believing you are an orphan. You believe that your parents either dies or abandoned you, and you grow up taking care of yourself. Each time, your memories are almost totally erased. You remember some things, like the fact that you use a weapon that goes from a sword to a bow with no string, and how to work your semblance. You have, shall we say, the ghost of memories of people, which is why you feel like you know me, and why you feel bored with so many things, because you've done it all. Several times. The first time I met you, you were already in the grips of your cycle, and you believed you were abandoned. We grew up as friends. But then you were killed. The next time we met, we were enemies. You believed that I was the cause of your parents deaths, and it was your goal in life to kill me. In another instance, you believed me to be your biological brother."
"Why should I believe you?" Fox growled. "None of this is possible."
"You knew the password to my computer, did you not?" Ozpin asked.
"Lucky guess," Fox growled.
"Not so," Ozpin said. "You chose the password after the last time I told you of your past."
Fox glared at him. "Let's say, for a moment, that I believe you. Why would you hide it from me?"
"Because of the next thing you'll realize when you think about what I've told you," Ozpin said.
Fox stared at him in confusion before a thought occurred to him. If he was reborn and lost his memories, he wouldn't remember Wulfe, Leon, Ava, Blake, or any of his other friends.
"My friends," Fox said. "When I regenerate, I forget the people that matter to me."
"That's right," Ozpin nodded.
"So then, nothing I do in this life matters," Fox said. "If I die defending someone and succeed, it won't matter because whenever I regenerate I wouldn't even know who they are."
"That's not entirely true," Ozpin said. "It would matter, because they would be alive. You just wouldn't know it mattered."
"But none of the bonds I make will matter to me," Fox said. "So why bother making them at all? Why shouldn't I just spend my days destroying everything?"
"Because you are a good man, Fox," Ozpin said. "And when anyone else dies, they don't regenerate, but those bonds you're so concerned with are broken just as surely for them as for you. You just get the chance to make new ones."
Fox stared at the ground. "I want proof."
"Very well," Ozpin nodded, opening a panel on the underside of his desk and pulling out a small gold semicircle about an inch and a half thick with green near the middle and a round handle with a similar color scheme sideways connecting the ends of the semicircle.
Ozpin tossed it to Fox, who caught it, finding an "FW" carved into the side of the semicircle. He pressed a button on the side of the handle and instantly a piece of white metal swung outward from the opening on the outside of the semicircle. Then, more and more segments began to swing into view from inside the last, each one thickening after reaching its place, becoming the same size as the one before it. When it was finished, the segments were curved backward toward him slightly, for three segments, then the last two, the last one being only half the length of the others, curved forward. Each segment, barring the two on the ends, were about six inches, and sharpened on the side facing him. They also were completely solid and immobile, despite having sections cut out fro the next one, and folding in half. He stared at the weapon. On the inside of the end curve at both ends, there was a small green crystal, but when he felt it, it wasn't dust. He focused his semblance through the bow and the crystals lit up, a green string and arrow forming, Fox pulling the string back and feeling the bow bend with the barest hint of resistance. He let the slack back out and let the arrow and sting fade, then pushed another button, the arms of the bow swinging forward and connecting in the middle forming a long blade with seams where the segments met, before the semicircle guard turned clockwise until the grip was in the center of it. He spun the weapon. It felt lighter than his own weapon, and felt more natural.
"Do you recognize it?" Ozpin asked.
"It was...my father's," Fox said.
"That is what you usually believe, yes," Ozpin said. "That it was your fathers, and that his initials coincidentally match your own. But in truth, this weapon has been yours for as long as I've known you. Each time you've regenerated it, I've collected it for you, to give you later on. The crystals are pure emerald, a rare stone that you can't often find nowadays. It amplifies and focuses your semblance."
Fox slowly lowered the weapon, pressing the button to make it collapse and it folded back up. "Everything you've told me...it's all true, isn't it?"
"It is," Ozpin nodded.
"Why aren't me and my team a part of the school?" Fox asked.
"For your own protection," Ozpin said. "If your names appeared in the records as a part of the school, the White Fang would know you deserted, if they don't already, and would come after you."
"You're lying," Fox said.
Ozpin stared at him before sighing. "Because I need you to be able to do tasks and missions for me that must remain off the record. The easiest way to accomplish this, is to keep the four of you off the record."
Fox sighed, nodding. "So I'm your dirty little secret, then. I do the stuff you don't want anyone to know about. And in return, you pretend that I'm a part of the school and hop I don't find out."
"You are a precious member of this school," Ozpin said. "Not having your name on a list doesn't change that. You attend the classes, don't you?"
"Yes," Fox said.
"You have friends here, do you not?" Ozpin asked.
"I do," Fox nodded.
"Then why should a list change whether or not you are a part of this school?" Ozpin asked.
"I...It shouldn't," Fox said. "I'm...sorry that I..."
"It's alright," Ozpin said. "I knew you would come asking questions soon."
Fox held out the weapon Ozpin had given him, but Ozpin shook his head.
"It belongs to you," Fox said. "Keep it."
Fox nodded and left the office, slipping his handle into his cargo pocket. He walked to his room and found the others all waiting.
"How'd it go?" Wulfe asked.
"What's wrong?" Ava asked.
"It...it's nothing," Fox said. "Come on. We have to go sign up for a job."
He turned, walking away from the room and the others followed, all heading for the auditorium.
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