Significant Changes: As you can see this chapter contains the original scene between Qrow and Taiyang. I separated it from the other scenes. It's longer than it was before, and I thought it deserved the separation. There's also a short additional scene for Qrow and Glynda.

Original chapter length: 2,107
Revisited chapter length: 2,246
"Regular dialogue" [Faunus speech only]

Chapter 14

Qrow returned from his mission more sober than he would have liked. He had drained his flask hours before, and he had no refill to sip on. Reporting to Ozpin had only darkened his day in a way he couldn't quite articulate. He lived a dangerous life. There were risks involved with that. Death was so common he'd thought himself numb to the idea of losing friends and what little construct of family that he knew.

Raven's death forced him to reconsider everything he had come to know about himself.

He heard the news from Ozpin first. Then he saw the report made by Ruby Rose, the handwritten missive detailing every gory detail. His first instinct was disbelief. He had to see it for himself, so he went to that little village. When he was faced with what had to be the gravesite, denial burned him from the inside out. He just couldn't swallow down the fact that his own sister was dead.

Gone.

As twins they held a special bond over the years. They were as famous for their relation as they were for their skill. They were slaves to their vices, irredeemably so. That commonality bound them close when nothing else could. In their youth one sibling couldn't come up in conversation without mentioning the other. It happened all the time. Both of them were being compared constantly. If they weren't on the same team, it might have even been insulting.

It certainly inspired rivalry, if little else.

A rift formed between them, made worse over the years for a variety of reasons. Too many to name, and most of them too small in the grand scheme to have really mattered in the first place. Qrow regretted it now. A lot of the past couldn't be undone. Now, there was no chance to reconcile either.

Qrow didn't know how to feel about that, his mind a constant conflict.

As her brother, he'd always felt a particular duty to Raven. To look after her, to protect her. She hated it. They never saw eye to eye, fighting more often than not. Raven was independent like that. She didn't want to be coddled. She didn't want to be in her brother's shadow, and he respected that. He didn't have a choice but to trust in his sister.

Raven was strong.

Pound for pound, her brute strength and swordplay was only just a little weaker than his. What she lacked in that department she made up for by being sly and cunning. She was no push-over, not as a huntress or as a person. He knew too many women in the trade to think that Raven was an outlier, either.

He came up in an academy full of women like Raven. He graduated only to meet more as time went on. He sat side by side with one such woman, the reserved blonde sipping on a gin and tonic as the time ticked by. Glynda Goodwitch offered silent comfort. The companionship was comfortable when she wasn't lecturing him about his reckless behavior.

He appreciated the support, even if he wasn't quite sure what to say.

He looked down at his scroll as it lit up again. He didn't even try to answer it. As far as his nieces were concerned, he was still on a mission. For now, that's how it would stay. So many missed calls, and he still didn't have a way to respond to them. A single question found its way to his lips. "So, does Tai know yet?"

"Yes." Glynda said, keeping her voice perfectly neutral. "There was no reason to wait. Ozpin and I notified him after you made the confirmation."

"Not before?"

She licked her lips, voice delicate. "We had to be sure."

Qrow nodded in understanding. They had doubted her report at first. It was outlandish, in a way impossible. It was hard to believe, harder to swallow. It didn't making him happy to think that his biases had gotten in the way of his niece. Ruby was something of a prodigy, a lot like her mother in that way. A cut above so many, her formative years riddled with accomplishments already. Her youth was the only thing slowing her down on her path to greatness, a few more years in the field would give her that final edge she needed.

He changed the subject, reaching for something else to talk about. "Is it true about the kid?" Qrow muttered. "It's really Raven's?"

"That's indisputable." Glynda told him.

"Damn…"

Glynda nodded, lips thinning before she wet them with her beverage of choice. "I don't know how you plan to cope with that. It seems like Yang and Ruby have a handle on the situation."

"Do they?" He groused out, side-eyeing Glynda unhappily. "Or are you just hopeful?"

"Simply realistic." Glynda told him gently.

"Right." He groused angrily.

"According to the records, the child was village born." She continued to explain. "Team RWBY made the accommodations required to keep the baby with them in Vale for the time being. I believe they plan to raise her themselves."

"Does Tai know that too?"

"I thought I'd leave that to you."

He gave her a look, a thousand curses dying before he could speak them. Deflated, he could turn to hail the barkeep.

Glynda watched as Qrow order another drink, this time asking the bartender to leave the bottle. She said nothing to it, not a single harsh word. It was one of the few times she wouldn't think to scold him. Instead, she merely clinked her glass with his and took another sip.

In a strange way, it was fitting. A silent toast to the bygone vagabond.

Whiskey was a strange liquid. A golden monstrosity. Heaven and hell all in the same drink. It teased him constantly, cloying the back of his mind. He was an alcoholic, and he struggled when he couldn't get his fix. In times of stress he found himself sinking deeper into the bottle, a bad habit of his, he knew. It didn't stop him from pouring another glass.

Instead, it aided in his downward spiral.

It gently burned a path down his throat, a constant reminder that he was still alive. For better and for worse, he walked this sordid planet when others didn't. Fortune spitting in his face and taunting him when he had absolutely nothing to live for.

When others had every reason to live, they died. He didn't begin to know why. Couldn't guess, and didn't dare to prophesize. All that was left was to carry on the best way that he knew how.

Whiskey a single consolation for years of failings.

It had powers beyond his wildest imagination. In some ways it was like a healing tonic. Soothing away bitter feelings and numbing his mind when it just wouldn't rest. In others, it was his vice. Cruel chains holding him in a powerful grip that he could not be rid of. This fine liquid was a constant paradox.

It always had been.

For him, it always would be. He knew the demon well, something he couldn't slay.

It was his answer to a great many problems, and his only way to silence the voices in his head. He took another sip and slouched over. Slamming his glass onto the table was a muddled afterthought. Qrow Branwen knew there would be no answers at the bottom of that glass. He could look down at it all that he wanted.

It wouldn't change a single thing. Not the past, it was long gone. Not the future, it hadn't even arrived yet. Life's greatest answers eluded him.

He doubted there was even a meaning to life. He cursed every possible deity. He refused to think that there might be a higher power in charge of this whole mess that he called living. If there was, it had a twisted sense of humor…

If there was a god, it was probably laughing at him now. Him, and the man beside him that grieved so deeply. More deeply than Qrow had ever known how.

"Hey, you just going to sit there for the next eighteen years?" He asked Taiyang flippantly.

"Not my problem." The saddened man slurred between his own drink. The short blonde hair on his head unwashed and disheveled. He was equally as drunk as Qrow. Sadly, he was less put together. "Not my kid." He finally said with a sigh.

"No shit, but your girls have taken a liking to the little rug-rat." Qrow said to him, morbid humor the only thing left to him besides grief. "Might want to see what all the fuss is about."

"She's your niece, Qrow." Taiyang spat. "You go see her."

"Why me?"

"Why not you? You're actually blood." There was a small tinge of clarity in his voice. Just briefly, as he looked Qrow in the eyes before faltering and looking away again. "You owe it to me, and to this family to step up here."

Qrow did the only thing he could do at that. He reached for the bottle and poured himself another drink. Not the most responsible decision he ever made, but by far not the worst. "Don't start up on me."

"Why shouldn't I?" The sharp question was dulled by lingering grief.

Qrow had heard that tone before. He knew it well. It was the sort that only came from a long list of regrets. With no hope to reconcile any of them. He knew, because he felt the same. A lump gathered in his throat.

"Look, Tai, I've made my mistakes." He said, knowing just how woefully inadequate his efforts had been. If he could turn back time, he would, but that was impossible. "I've done it plenty, I've got a whole damn list." His flaws a depressing mosaic that time itself could not erase. "When they're mine, I own up to 'em."

"Yeah, right..."

"I'm not going to take responsibility for this one." Qrow told him, wagging his glass slightly before sipping the amber liquid into his mouth. "It wasn't my fault. Besides, I know only just as much as you do, nothing more."

"That's bullshit." Taiyang muttered darkly.

The doubt was well deserved, but Qrow could do nothing about his past. He couldn't heal away the scars made by time. He could only sigh, complicit in all of the wordless accusations being thrown around between the both of them. Too many failings, and an overflow of wounded pride. "No, it isn't. I don't know anything else."

"And I don't believe you."

"Then that's on you." Qrow murmured. "I'm not dancing this cha-cha again. It was bad enough the first go around with Yang and Ruby."

"Yeah, it was, and you tapped out then, too."

"Hey, I'm not the one to blame for this."

"No, it wasn't your fault, but it was your sister's promiscuity." Tai told him. "You should take some responsibility here."

"Okay, okay, shit, don't you think that's just a little too far?" Qrow asked darkly. "Raven wasn't the most maternal human being on the face of this planet, I'll give ya that. She was a pretty bad parent, and she was rotten to you. Fact is, she didn't just spread her legs to just anyone, and you know that."

"Maybe."

"Hey, come on man. She was still my family." Seeing his friend at a complete loss bothered him. Knowing what caused it made him feel sick. "Tai, it wasn't anything you did. Raven was a loner. Always was, always would be."

"Then why find another man to screw? Why not just come home!?"

"I don't know, Tai."

Taiyang reached for the bottle. What else was he supposed to do? He shook his head. It was all pointless now. "She wanted a family? Its right here. Right where it's always been. Why do you think I never moved?"

"Cause you're an idiot?"

Taiyang downed his glass and poured more. "I waited." He muttered drunkenly. "Yang waited… And for what?" He couldn't help the way his tongue slid across the words. "To be forgotten about and disregarded entirely?" He shook his head. It hurt. Everything just hurt. "It isn't my kid…"

"Nope… It's not."

"It could have been." Tai told him then. "But, in the end, it wasn't…" More booze to drown the pain. A vicious medication all its own. "Excuse me if I don't know how to deal with that."

"You're right. The baby isn't yours. Raven moved on, maybe she did forget. Maybe she didn't give a rat's ass about you or Yang…" Qrow began, taking the bottle from Taiyang and filling his own glass again. "Or, ya know, maybe she was just too ashamed to come back home…"

"Did she tell you that?" The blonde man asked.

"Nope, sentimentally wasn't her style." Qrow sighed. "She'd never admit something like that."

"Then how would you know why she stayed away?"

"She's dead, Tai, we're never going to know." He shrugged at his own harsh words. "Fact is, Raven did pop out another kid. And like it or not, it is Yang's baby sister. For what it's worth, that bond means something to her."

"I know that."

"Then why the fuck are you still sitting here?"

Taiyang sighed, looking deeply at the amber liquid. Instead of answering, he emptied he glass one final time and closed his eyes. "Back at you, Qrow. Why are you still here?"

Hope you liked the two chapters. I'll post more when I can.