Disclaimer: RWBY is owned by RoosterTeeth and I do not claim to own any of it (though I would love to work on RWBY alongside them... just saying...), all I own are the characters you likely don't recognise and the idea for this story, so without further ado, let's get into the fic.

Chapter I: The Shining Beacon

We resume the tale a couple of days after Ruby thwarted the attempted Dust Shop robbery, in Beacon Academy where Glynda and Ozpin appear to be having something of a disagreement.

"Ozpin, as much as I respect your judgement on the staff you hire, I must question whether it was a good idea to bring Red back to Beacon" Glynda said, pacing in front of Ozpin's desk while the man in question merely sat at his desk, mug in one hand and a Scroll in the other, looking over the current year's applicants to Beacon. When Glynda had finished talking, he glanced up at her.

"And what is the basis for your doubts on Red, Glynda?" Ozpin asked in amusement at the Deputy Headmistress' obvious dislike of Red Rose "The man is undoubtedly a competent Huntsman as well as reasonable at teaching; if I remember correctly, some of the highest grades in years were achieved during his time as the Combat Class teacher. He's also highly competent with Aura Manipulation, a field that you were complaining that we were understaffed in just last week, so what is the problem with him?"

"Aside from the fact that the man is insufferable at least half of the time?" Glynda retorted, raising an eyebrow at the silver haired Headmaster "I'm not doubting his ability, more of his personality. He was considered unstable after THAT particular incident – he admitted it himself – but goodness knows what effect losing Summer had on his psyche. He's been mostly out of contact for a DECADE, Ozpin. You can't tell me that you know him to be stable after that!"

Ozpin sighed and took a drink from his mug, which – despite popular belief – was not filled with coffee, it was in fact filled with hot chocolate.

"While it is true that I cannot confirm how stable Red's mental state is, I can make an educated guess based off of the fact that both Qrow and Taiyang have trusted him with looking after Ruby and Yang on occasion, and you know how paranoid those two can be, especially when it comes to the safety of Ruby and Yang" Ozpin replied, fixing Glynda with a pointed look "We've also been warned about the possible fall of this academy from Raven of all people and I will not allow any of the students to be put in needless danger because I failed to protect them and the academy adequately."

"So you've deemed the current staff of Beacon – whom, I may add, are some of the best in their respective fields as well as some of the best Hunters on Remnant – as well as the entire Vale Military as 'inadequate protections' based on the words of the leader of a bandit tribe, and your solution to this is hiring ONE Huntsman?!" Glynda asked incredulously, slightly insulted by Ozpin's apparent dismissal of the capabilities of herself and the rest of the staff. Ozpin merely sighed and massaged his temples.

"I know full well the capabilities of the staff, Glynda. However, I would be a fool to ignore Raven's warning, especially when she hears things that even our best agents would likely miss. Red is merely an additional layer of protection for the students as well as an assistant for the staff when teaching and patrolling, you can't be everywhere at once, after all" Ozpin answered Glynda's question before taking a drink from his mug and changing the subject "So what do you think of this year's applicants?"

Glynda's brow furrowed and she opened her mouth, likely to question Ozpin on his sudden change in subject before the elevator let out a "Ding" as the doors opened and the subject of their conversation entered Ozpin's office. Glynda shut her mouth and shot Ozpin a suspicious look, which he just smirked and shrugged in response to.

"You called, Headmaster?" Red said as he entered, blood red eyes scanning the room as he approached the two at Ozpin's desk.

"Yes, Glynda and I were just going over the applicants for this year and reviewing their transcripts, we thought you might want to help with that as it would help you adjust to some of your duties this year" Ozpin replied smoothly, returning his attention to his Scroll as Glynda pulled hers out.

"Doing someone else's paperwork, got it" Red muttered, pulling his own Scroll out and looking over some of the transcripts before stopping on one, frowning in confusion at it "No offence Ozpin, but how on all of Remnant did this student get approved for Beacon? His grades barely count as passing and his attitude leaves a lot to be desired. Seriously, there are multiple counts of racist behaviour towards Faunus here as well as numerous – albeit mostly unconfirmed – reports of bullying. This is the type of student you take now?"

"Look at the name on that transcript and you'll get your answer, Red" Ozpin replied, prompting Red to do so and see the name "Cardin Winchester", the youngest son of the Winchester family. The Winchesters were a Vale based family that rose to fame and fortune by manufacturing weapons and tools for the militaries of the Four Kingdoms – particularly Vale – though the family business had recently seen a decline in the weapons manufacturing side. Still, the family's influence had apparently not diminished too much in Vale, as seen by the fact that Cardin had been approved for Beacon despite his poor grades and attitude.
Upon seeing Red's eyes narrow in understanding, Ozpin showed him another transcript.

"What do you think of this one?" Ozpin asked him, Red's eyes scanned over it and at first didn't notice anything out of the ordinary, but then he noticed something which Ozpin picked up on "See anything interesting, Red?"

"More like the exact opposite, this transcript is the embodiment of average. This 'Jaune' fellow doesn't even have a note of a detention or absence from class, yet there's no commendations for exemplary behaviour either" Red answered in confusion at the apparent contradiction, getting a nod from Ozpin.

"That's because this transcript is fake" Ozpin said, getting looks of disbelief from both Glynda and Red, as they were wondering why Ozpin approved it when he knew it was fake. Seeing their looks, Ozpin decided to explain further "I approved this Jaune's transcripts because it shows that he was either capable of hacking Beacon's systems to put his fake transcripts in there, or he has the resources to get someone else to put the transcripts in our system. Both are quite useful skills for a Huntsman to have, especially during reconnaissance missions…"

Any further explanation from Ozpin was cut off by a loud explosion from Beacon's courtyard, they all sighed.

"Doubtless some idiot was transporting Dust in unsecured containers again, I'll go and make sure no one was hurt" Red muttered before heading towards the elevator as Ozpin and Glynda returned to reviewing the transcripts.

Scene Change – Beacon Courtyard

"… I guess I did go a little overboard when designing her" came the recognisable tones of Red's niece from just ahead of him. After Red had left Ozpin's office and gone down to the courtyard, he'd been informed that a girl with a red hood had exploded due to another girl in white waving poorly sealed Dust containers about, he then decided to check on Ruby to make sure there'd been no adverse effects from the explosion and found her showing off Crescent Rose to a blonde guy that he recognised from the photos of the transcripts as Jaune Arc.
Jaune was around six feet, one inch in height with messy blonde hair and blue eyes, he was wearing a white diamond-shaped chestplate cut off above his lower abdomen and white spaulders with rerebraces set under them alongside a pair of brown wrist-length gloves with exposed fingertips and small metal plates over the back. Underneath the armour, he wore a black short-sleeved hoodie with detached reddish-orange sleeves that was mostly covered by the chestplate. He was also wearing blue trousers that resembled jeans with a white patch on the left knee, as well as black. He also had two belts crisscrossing his waist, both different shades of brown, with a pair of small pouches on them. He was holding a sword with a sheath that doubles as a collapsible shield strapped to the left side of his hip.

"Considering the blade of that scythe is almost as big as you are, I'd say you did" interjected Red as he approached, smirking as the two jumped and whirled around to face him, Ruby's face lit up when she saw him.

"Hey Red, guess what? I got into Beacon two years early, how cool is that?" she squealed in excitement as she collapsed Crescent Rose down to its rectangular form, which she then placed on her lower back, Red quirked an eyebrow at her antics.

"It's very cool Ruby, I know your mother would be proud of you… and jealous" Red smirked, ruffling Ruby's hair much to the chagrin of the girl in question as she playfully batted his hand away "Anyway, what are you two doing here, shouldn't you be in the amphitheatre by now?"

"Well, we kinda got lost, so I decided to compare weapons with Jaune here" Ruby answered before spotting the hilt to Red's sword poking up above his right shoulder; as he was wearing his cloak mostly towards his left side, the hilt could easily be seen and presumably easily accessed by the Huntsman if the situation came up where he would need his sword; since Ruby hadn't seen his sword that often, she couldn't help but ask for more information about it "Hey Red, do you mind showing us yours?"

"Hm? Oh, sure" he replied, drawing it and holding it horizontally so the two could see it clearly: it was a fairly long sword with a double-edged blade and a handle that was long enough for it to be comfortably grasped with both hands but lacking a guard. There was also a rotating barrel embedded just above the hilt, this barrel had six different colours on it: white, black, red, green, blue and yellow, near to the barrel and underneath the handle was a trigger as well as a randomising button on the top of the handle. Occasionally a spark of electricity could be seen on the blade (A/N: If the description doesn't help you picture it, just think of Raiden's HF Blade from Metal Gear: Rising Revengance with a rotating barrel imbedded in the hilt of the sword as well as a trigger underneath the handle and a button atop the handle directly over where the trigger is located).

"This is Gambling Rose" Red began, seeing the awed looks on his niece and her friend's faces "She's a High Frequency Sword with a built-in modifier that changes how my Aura interacts with the oscillating current that runs through the blade, which thereby changes the properties the blade can exhibit – that's the barrel in the hilt, by the way – the different properties the blade can exhibit are shown by the six different colours on the barrel. The barrel is fitted with a randomiser controlled by the button on the handle, this randomly selects a colour on the barrel" here, Red showed the two by pressing the button which spun the barrel, resulting in the barrel coming to a stop on the colour white.

"It seems a bit risky, what if you need a specific property of the blade in a battle and the randomiser picks the wrong one?" Jaune asked, getting an approving look from Red.

"Excellent question, Mister Arc. See this trigger here? This allows me to rotate the barrel at will and thus choose the properties that I want or need, when I desire" Red answered, proving his point by pulling the trigger, which caused the barrel to rotate to green and stop with a click. This in turn caused the blade to glow with a light greenish hue, which was cut off when Red sheathed the sword again and started to explain the name of his sword "That is why I call her Gambling Rose, random chance of a favourable outcome but the outcome can be controlled if one knows how, just like gambling in real life."

"That doesn't really sound like gambling to me…" muttered Jaune which gave Red a slight smirk.

"You'd be surprised Mister Arc, but I was thinking more along the lines of Poker when I designed her: it's mostly random chance that decides what cards you get, but there are ways to control the game with sufficient knowledge and skill" he replied getting an uncertain nod from Jaune and a mystified look from Ruby as she'd never played Poker.
"Now, as I recall, we're supposed to be in the amphitheatre by now."

As Red led Ruby and Jaune to the amphitheatre, Ruby suddenly realised that she didn't know why Red was at Beacon, surely it wasn't for training as she knew that he was already a fully-fledged Huntsman. When she voiced her questions, Red just smiled at her and told her she'd "find out later" before the trio arrived at the amphitheatre.

"Ruby! Over Here! I saved you a spot" came the jovial voce of Red's other niece as they entered the crowded building, the group looked to where the voice had come from to see the blonde ball of energy that was Yang Xiao-Long waving enthusiastically at her sister with a wide grin on her face.

"Well, I believe that we've found the amphitheatre so this is where I leave you" Red said to the pair of Hunters-to-be and headed for the stage at the front of the amphitheatre where Professors Ozpin and Goodwitch were located.

"Okay, bye Red" Ruby called after him, which he acknowledged by raising a hand and waving to her. When he reached the stage, he was greeted by a glare from Glynda.

"You're very nearly late, Red" she chastised him, getting a shrug in response.

"Nonsense Ms. Goodwitch; I am never late, nor am I early but rather arrive…" he began but was cut off by the blonde teacher.

"…Precisely when you mean to?"

"No, at precisely the time I get to my destination" Red finished with a smirk which earned him a tap on the head from Glynda's whip "ACK! Would you stop hitting me with that whip?!"

"I'll stop hitting you when you actually behave like a regular human being!" Glynda snapped back, hitting him again with her whip.

"I swear you enjoy hitting me with that thing WAY too much" Red grumbled as he tried to take it off her, resulting in a slight scuffle between the two over Glynda's weapon. The students in the amphitheatre watched the antics of the two in bewilderment as Ozpin sighed and rolled his eyes before turning his microphone on, getting everyone's attention.

"I'll keep this brief" he began, pushing his glasses up his nose and saw out of the corner of his eye that Glynda had blasted Red away with her semblance and was currently brushing the dust off her clothes; Red, on the other hand, merely recovered from Glynda's attack, opened a rift behind him and backflipped into it, exiting from another rift next to Glynda and stood still, watching Ozpin.

"First, to the upper years who are no doubt wondering why they are here: I am pleased to announce that we have made an addition to Beacon's staff for this year and he will likely stay on until the current First Years have graduated. Please extend a warm welcome to Red Rose, who will be acting as a teaching assistant to the professors of Beacon and as a counsellor for the students." At this, Ozpin gestured to Red as the students clapped politely and Red bowed in acknowledgement before moving up to the microphone to speak.

"I don't have much to add other than feel free to come to me with any issue, it doesn't matter what it is – be it extra combat practise or just for a quick conversation – I'll do my best to assist in any way I can" Red said before returning to his previous spot near Glynda and Ozpin began speaking again.

"Now, to the initiates: You have travelled here in search of knowledge. To hone your craft and acquire new skills. You plan to dedicate your life to the protection of the people. But I look amongst you and all I see is wasted energy, in need of purpose, direction. You assume knowledge will free you of this, but your time here at this school will show you that knowledge can only carry you so far. It is up to you to take the first step" Ozpin finished, his eyes taking one last glance at all the students in amphitheatre before walking off and Glynda took his place.

"You will gather in the ballroom tonight, tomorrow your initiation begins. Be ready. You are dismissed" she said curtly before turning and walking away with Ozpin and Red. As they left, they heard a certain male student's attempts at flirting.

"I'm a natural blonde you know" was the line in question, much to Red's amusement.

"Looks like we have a Casanova in Beacon this year" he remarked, getting a smile from Ozpin that was hidden behind his mug and a half-hearted glare from Glynda.

"Please try to refrain from mocking your students, Red" she said, concealing a smirk but – unfortunately for her – Red saw it.

"Did you find that funny?" he asked.

"Of course not, I am above such crude humour" Glynda replied.

"Nope, I definitely saw a smirk."

"Delusions are not a desirable quality of teachers at Beacon."

"Good thing I'm not a teacher then… wait, did you just call me deluded?"

"I would do no such thing."

"You did! Ozpin, Glynda's being mean to me."

"Leave me out of your little spats" Ozpin replied as he entered the elevator to his office and closed the doors, cutting off Red's whining about Glynda's so-called "meanness".

"Red, I would advise you get some sleep tonight. You're on patrol in the forest tomorrow during initiation" Glynda said to him curtly before turning and heading for her office.

"Erm, not to be a pain but where am I sleeping?" Red asked, realising nobody had shown him where his office would be.

"The Counsellor's office near the dorms, but I know you prefer to stargaze so we've added a route to the roof in it" Glynda answered, not looking back. Red turned and headed for his new office, deciding to rest before initiation tomorrow.

Scene Change – Ballroom

PoV Change – Third Person, Ruby Rose

"It's like a big slumber party" said Yang cheerfully as she threw herself down on the sleeping mat next to Ruby.

"I don't think Dad would approve of all the boys though" Ruby replied, not even looking up from the letter she was writing.

"I know I do" Yang shot back cheekily before making a purring sound. Ruby just rolled her eyes, knowing that though Yang like to tease and act a bit flirty, she actually wasn't interested in any form of romantic relationship until she finished her Huntress training.

"What's that?" Yang asked, catching sight of Ruby's letter after being put off from watching the posturing males by Jaune walking by in a blue onesie.

"A letter to the gang back at Signal, I promised to tell them all about Beacon and how things are going…" Ruby answered, looking into the distance thoughtfully before getting interrupted by Yang.

"Aw! That's so CUTE!" Yang cooed before she was cut off by a well-placed pillow to the face, courtesy of her annoyed sister.

"Shut up! I didn't get to take my friends with me to Beacon, it's weird not knowing anyone here!" Ruby snapped at Yang.

"What about Jaune? He's… nice" Yang replied, trying to lift Ruby's spirits "There, plus one friend. That's a one hundred percent increase."

"I'm pretty sure Weiss counts as a negative friend, back to zero" Ruby responded in a slightly depressed way as she turned to lie on her back.

"There's no such thing as a negative friend, you've just made one friend and one enemy" Yang said, but her (fairly terrible) attempt at cheering Ruby up was met with another pillow to the face, this one designed to look like a cartoonish dog face.

"Anyway, what about Red? You know him quite well, I'd have thought welcome seeing a familiar face" Yang continued, causing Ruby's face to gain a thoughtful look.

"I'm not sure what to think about him to be honest. I've just found out we share the same surname and we even look alike, that makes me wonder if we're family. If so, why didn't he tell me? Is he ashamed of me?" Ruby trailed off as her mind continued to conjure up scenarios to explain why Red would keep his surname secret from her, few of them good. Yang saw the distress her younger sister was in and tried to soothe her worries.

"Hey, if it bothers you that much, just ask him the next time you see him" she said, which didn't soothe Ruby much.

"But what if the answer isn't what I want to hear? Would you want to know a member of your family abandoned you because they're ashamed of you?" Ruby asked Yang in a rare moment of visible weakness, she didn't see Yang's eyes darken at the question.

"Ruby, trust me, it's better to ask and not receive a favourable answer than it is to never ask, otherwise the question will just eat at you forever. Besides, if he is ashamed of you or anything stupid like that, then you're better off not knowing him" Yang answered, ruffling Ruby's hair, Ruby was about to respond when they were both distracted by the sound of a match being struck.

"That girl…" Ruby thought out loud when the two sisters looked over to see who had struck the match, she was a black-haired woman with amber eyes, wearing a large bow that resembled a pair of cat or wolf ears from a distance. Ruby immediately recognised her as the girl who had talked that "Weiss Schnee" girl down in the courtyard earlier.

"You know her?" Yang asked.

"Not really, she was in the courtyard this morning but left before I could say anything" Ruby explained.

"Well, now's your chance" said Yang before picking Ruby up and dragging her over to where the black-haired woman was sitting, waving cheerfully as she gave a loud greeting.

"I believe you two may know each other" Yang said as she finished dragging her protesting sister who turned her back on Yang once she'd finally been released. The woman in black merely looked up from her book at the duo.

"Aren't you that girl who exploded?" she asked Ruby, apparently recognising her from the courtyard incident.

"Err, yeah, my name's Ruby… but you can just call me crater…" Ruby trailed off, realising she was about to give Yang the knowledge of the (quite frankly ridiculous) nickname she'd been given by Jaune that morning "Actually, you can just call me Ruby."

"Okay" replied the woman uninterestedly, returning her gaze to her book.

"What are you doing?" Yang whispered to Ruby.

"I don't know, help me" Ruby hissed back.

"So… what's your name?" Yang tried again to get the woman to engage in conversation.

"Blake" the woman replied after letting out an aggravated sigh.

"Well, Blake, I'm Yang, Ruby's older sister… I like your bow."

"Thanks."

"It goes great with your… pyjamas."

"Right…"

"Nice night, don't you think?"

"Yes, it's lovely, almost as lovely as this book… which I will continue to read… as soon as you leave" Blake's voice had an annoyed tone in it towards the end of her statement.

"Yeah, this girl's a lost cause" said Yang as she turned and started to leave before Ruby's voice caught both their attentions.

"What's it about?" Ruby asked, getting a confused noise from Blake "Your book, does it have a name?"

"Well, it's about a man with two souls, each fighting for control over his body" answered Blake, caught off guard by the question.

"Oh yeah, that's real lovely…" input Yang, rolling her eyes.

"I love books, Yang used to read to me every night. Stories of heroes and monsters…" Ruby trailed off with a nostalgic look of her face before continuing "They're one of the reasons I want to be a Huntress."

"And why is that? Hoping you'll live happily ever after?" Blake asked, with a slightly amused tone in her voice.

"I'm hoping we all will. As a girl, I wanted to be just like those heroes in the books. Someone who fought for what was right and protected the people who couldn't protect themselves" Ruby explained.

"That's… very ambitious for a child, unfortunately the real world isn't the same as a fairy tale" Blake replied, slightly pessimistically but Ruby wasn't deterred.

"Well, that's why we're here: to make it better" Ruby's mature response was then ruined by Yang bursting in with a declaration of pride in Ruby and embracing her in a bear hug. Ruby was not amused by Yang's antics and responded with a punch aimed at the face which then descended into a playful sisterly fight that apparently disturbed some nearby cats (if the noises were any indication).

"Well, Ruby, Yang, it's a pleasure to… Blake was interrupted by a certain white clad heiress storming over.

"What in the world is going on over here?! Don't you realise some of us are trying to sleep?!" Weiss began angrily before noticing just who was making the noise, while at the same time, Ruby and Yang ceased their brawling and looked at the new arrival.

"OH, NOT YOU AGAIN!" Yang and Weiss snapped loudly in unison, Weiss glaring at Ruby and Yang glaring at Weiss.

"Shh, guys, she's right, people are trying to sleep" Ruby said hurriedly, looking around the room and seeing that people were extinguishing candles and getting into sleeping bags, ready to sleep.

"Oh, now you're on my side?" Weiss barked irritably, immediately gaining the ire of Yang.

"I was always on your side!" Ruby snapped back, shortly followed by Yang's contribution.

"Yeah! What's your problem with my sister?! She's just trying to be nice!" the irate blonde added, giving the heiress a death glare.

"She's a hazard to my health, doubly so if she actually is related to that Rose fool we saw at the briefing this morning!" Weiss shot back, taking the sisters a tad by surprise.

"Why do you think we're related and what's your problem with Red anyway?" Ruby retorted in defence of her (possible) relative.

"Oh puh-lease, you can't say you're not related to that idiot! You look alike and even have similar dress sense as well as equally annoying personalities; if your surname was Rose, I'd say he was your parent, or at least a close relative!" Weiss paused from her mini rant to gather breath before continuing "As for my problem with him: he has no place in Beacon whatsoever! Did you see how he was acting around Ms. Goodwitch this morning?! He showed absolutely no professionalism and instead acted like a five-year-old child! How he ever got into Beacon is quite beyond me, and for that matter, it's quite beyond me how YOU ever got into Beacon also!"

Before Yang (whose temper had been building during Weiss' speech) could say something nasty and escalate the situation further, Blake blew out her candle, enveloping the room in darkness. Realising that everyone else had turned in for the night, the fighting girls returned to the sleeping bags and quickly fell asleep, wondering what the next day would bring.

Well, it has been a while, my beloved readers. I've not updated any of my fics since about February. Now, there are some good reasons for this: I'm entering Third Year at Uni, meaning I had to do my dissertation project over summer and thus I won't have as much time to devote to FF, however I hope that the time between future updates is not as long as this one. Also, my computer broke because of (I was told) rogue Windows 10 updates and I had to get it fixed, but it had to be fully wiped because when it broke, I followed some of the suggestions I was given and partially wiped the memory; so I had to start all my chapters off from scratch.
These weren't the main reasons why it took so long though, the main reasons were about 35% Writer's Block and 65% Laziness, so I do sincerely apologise for making you wait so long if you were eager for another chapter in this story.

Now onto the fun stuff: Some of you may be wondering what "THAT particular incident" is referring to; well, it'll be explained in a couple of chapters but I'll be nice and give you a hint: I took inspiration for it from the Dragon Age series. Now, I won't confirm or deny any guesses as to what it may be as I want it to be as surprising as possible but feel free to speculate =P

Some fans may also claim that Glynda's comments towards Red are out of character, but I disagree. Glynda is shown to have quite a dry (is that the correct term?) sense of humour during the show, such as when she breaks up the food fight between Teams RWBY and JNPR and all she says is "Children please, do not play with your food". It seems to particularly show itself when she's angry at something (again, as shown by the RWBY vs JNPR food fight), so I attempted to channel that when Red riles her up.
Also, people may say I made Weiss a bit too harsh. I'll just say that I may well have done so, Weiss (particularly Volume 1 Weiss) is a hard character for me to write as she has a delicate balance between general (pardon my language here) bitchiness and everything else throughout the show; If I write her as too bitchy, it looks like I'm bashing her (which is not my intention) and if I write her as too nice, it lessens the significance of her character development in later episodes where she becomes more tolerant of her team-mates. In short, I may have gotten the balance wrong and if I have, I apologise for that.

So, what do you all think? Do you like how I wrote Red in this chapter? Hate it? Not bothered? Let me know with reasons why. I'd also welcome any other feedback you can give me, especially for spelling, punctuation and grammar (please be very critical for those) as well as possible ideas for how you want the story to go in the future; there won't be too many AU elements until late Volume 2/early Volume 3 but I welcome any input from readers.

As always, my standard reviewing rules apply: All feedback is welcome be it a follow, favourite, review or PM, PMs and reviews are welcome provided they are worded in a polite and comprehensible manner, flames will be ignored, some form of constructive criticism is ideal in your review but not necessary.

Anyway, thanks for reading and until next time,

Darth Annihilator - out.