The universe was painted black, and red, and white, and gold. It was something incredible and primordial, something that hadn't yet been changed or altered for the best purposes of humanity, or anything else.
They floated down, down, down. Past whispers of voices that were both their own but also were not. Past lives that had long since passed, past people and beings and civilizations. The world that they knew somehow both did and did not yet exist.
They floated among a feeling that was somewhere between blistering heat and bitter cold.
In the nothingness, they met.
She was there, skin bone-white and her eyes the same violent red that they had always been. She reached out for them, and opened her mouth as though to say something.
This was a dance that the two of them had been through a thousand times before. Always weaving in and out of range of each other, both of them always looking for something where there was likely to be nothing.
"Ozpin." She greeted them, voice smooth as silk and fluid as water. "It has been a long time."
"It has." They responded, but the voice that left their mouth was almost foreign. Not quite their own, surely one that they had used in the past. "I see you are getting stronger."
She laughed at them. Her voice reminded them of bells, but there was something wrong about it- layers which were much like Ozpin's. Past lives, just the same as theirs.
"I am." She replied to them. "And you should know, Ozpin-" She tugged them in close to her, and they went. Her lips brushed against the shell of their ear as she spoke. "I cannot wait to see you burn."
"I won't allow it." Ozpin replied, pulling back and feeling the space around them both getting more intense, and more harsh. "You know that."
"I am well aware." She hissed, and just like that Ozpin was kicked from the vision, and that space in between realities. Back into the real world.
Ozpin awoke with a brand on their hand, burned into their palm. It was a familiar thing, something that they hadn't seen in person in a very long time. Wordlessly, Ozpin let their thumb brush over the symbol, and the dread that she had brought settled on them, heavy and infinitely damning.
They climbed out of their bed, late in the night. Since she had come to them, they knew that they wouldn't be able to rest any more. Ozpin dragged themself from their home and went to Beacon, which stood silent and still as always. They took the elevator up the tower to their office, and almost immediately upon arrival Ozpin walked to the window of their office, to look out at the monster that was so far away but so close to them. It picked its head up, and its eyes seemed to ignite into a more vibrant, more violent shade of red.
In one fluid motion, it opened its mouth, and it roared.
Ozpin reached for their scroll, and made the call for anyone that could help. Glynda, Ironwood, Qrow, Lionheart- everyone that they could think of. Everyone that could possibly be there to protect the people.
Before they were even off the scroll, the students began to scramble, down in the dorms. From where they were staying, Ozpin could hear it all. They dressed themself as quickly as they possibly could, and rushed down to the main hall where students were gathering.
Many of them were afraid and wide eyed, many of them still in their pajamas. Some of them had decided to dress themselves, and some had come armed. A scattered few had managed to get half into their combat clothes, but still clearly more ready for bed than battle.
The second that Ozpin stepped out into view, all of the students looked up at them in panic.
"Students." Ozpin said plainly. "You must do what you can in order to remain calm." It wasn't going to do much to help the situation, but it was the least that they could do. "Any panic here will only further upset it."
"But it roared!" One girl said, taking a few scared steps forward. She was still in her pajamas, and Ozpin recognized her as Nora Valkyrie. "What if it's coming?"
"I have already began to assemble a team of veteran huntsmen to assess and hopefully handle the situation." Ozpin said plainly. "In the meantime, all of you should go back to your rooms, and dress and arm yourselves. I cannot promise that students won't be needed for what is to come."
The tittering that came from the gathered students wasn't encouraging, but they were children and they had a right to be afraid. For many of them, this was likely to be the first time in which they were seeing signs of aggression from such a large grimm, and so close to them. For the vast majority of these students, the last time that grimm had been small and plentiful had been when they were children.
At the back of the hall, the door opened, and General Ironwood strode in, fully dressed for battle and no doubt armed to the teeth. Behind him, Winter Schnee was similarly prepared for whatever was to come.
Ozpin cast one last glance at the crowd. "You should all go and prepare. Should you be needed, a call will be let out on the intercoms in the building. And please, do what you can to remain calm."
Out of the corner of their eye, Ozpin watched as the groups assembled and many of them began off on their way.
They walked to Ironwood, who was soon falling into step beside them. "Ozpin-" Ironwood said, sounding somewhere between upset and frustrated by what was going on. Surely this had brought back bad memories for him as well. No doubt because of the noise. "What is your current plan of action?"
"That will depend on how many huntsmen get here." Ozpin said, watching and keeping an eye open for someone. The door burst open and Qrow and Taiyang both came in, both similarly prepared for battle. Glynda and the other professors were soon to join.
It wasn't a complete group, but it was a good starting point. That Ozpin was confident about.
Everyone was looking for them for action. They took a breath and looked to Glynda, Port, and Oobleck. "I want for you three to go down to the city and do what you can to calm the civilians. Prepare to move them to secure locations."
"Of course, professor." Glynda said, already turning, but Oobleck stood behind. Ozpin cocked an eyebrow at that because if Bart was deciding to stay, he had a good reason for it.
"Professor-" Oobleck started, his voice somewhere between panicked and calm. "I believe that it may be for the best to consider certain historical precedents with regards to battling a grimm of that size."
Ozpin blinked and nodded before looking to Winter. "Go with Glynda and Port."
"You heard them." James said, looking to Winter now, clearly doing his part to make sure that there is a chain of command in place. "If something happens, report in."
"Yes, sir." Winter said before rushing after the others.
Ozpin locked eyes with James now. "If you are able to, assemble whatever troops you have here in Vale. If you have more Specialists, then you should get them as well."
"Understood." James replied, giving them one last very nervous look before stepping away from the others. He was already removing the sleek black scroll from his pocket to make a call, and that left Ozpin to Taiyang and Qrow.
They looked between the two men. The fact that it was the only two of them left from their team was harsh. Ozpin sincerely hoped that it wouldn't get any worse than it already was, but that wasn't something Ozpin could be confident in. "Gentlemen."
"What do you want for us to do, Oz?" Qrow asked, taking a half-step forward. "Because someone is going to have to go out there."
"I want for you two to attempt to lure the beast away from the people of Vale." Ozpin explained, not at all happy with the orders that they were passing down. The risk of danger was too high for their liking. However, as things stood they had no other choice in the matter. "This will be difficult, and you should expect for there to be others joining you in this endeavor when I have a chance to send more out."
Taiyang took a step forward, looking distinctly worried and afraid. "Are you planning to send students?"
"I cannot say just yet." Ozpin said, though it would do nothing to make this any easier. "If it comes to that, I can assure you that all responding hunters will be alerted to that fact."
"Just..." Taiyang swallowed hard. "Don't let my girls get in over their heads."
"I won't." Ozpin answered, not believing so much as a word of it.
Ruby tugged on her hood, fastening it in place and doing her best to ignore how afraid she felt. It was like that roar couldn't get out of her head, and the remnants of what she and her team had been doing when it had happened had been left on the floor, abandoned school books and sheets of paper and pens alike.
She wasn't the only one that was trying to prepare for what was to come. Weiss was in the process of fixing her hair back and out of the way, Blake was checking the sharpness of her blades, and Yang was stretching, mind probably more on the monster outside than anything else.
It had been all but silent ever since they'd gotten back to the dorm. Nobody had been able to come up with anything that they wanted to say. Ruby was scared herself, and she was at least expecting for someone else to want to do something.
After all, this was a team- if they were going to be able to do anything, they needed to communicate and work together.
Ruby turned to face her teammates. "Guys?" She asked. "What do you think is happening?"
"I don't know." Yang said, and she sounded the most worried already. "Dad sent me a message to let us know that he was going out with Qrow to try and-"
"Dad's going out there?" Ruby's eyes widened and she was able to immediately feel her heart beating too hard against her chest. This was exactly what she didn't want to deal with, and the news about her father and uncle was not a good start. Now Ruby knew that she was going to be worried about her family in addition to everything else.
"Yeah." Yang confirmed. "He said that Ozpin wanted him and Qrow to try and lure it away..."
"Was there any word on my sister?" Weiss asked, still standing with her back turned to them.
Yang sighed. "He didn't mention her."
"Right." Weiss mumbled as she began to load her sword with cartridges of Dust. "So let's say that we do end up getting sent out there-"
"I think that it's likely." Blake said, still not looking back at anyone else. "I don't know that anyone aside from us and JNPR know about there being other grimm out there."
Ruby nodded, walking up to her sister and placing herself in Yang's space, needing something to comfort her. "Blake is right." She said, feeling too quiet. "And we're just first years. If we end up being sent out there-"
"Then it probably won't end well." Weiss finished for her, sounding more upset than she was letting on. "Which means that we need to be ready."
"Okay." Ruby said, taking a deep breath and deciding that if what they needed to do was go out there, then someone needed to lead. And it might as well have been her. "So let's say that we're sent out. If they give us orders, then we'll follow them."
That alone wasn't going to be good enough- Ruby was already sure of that. There needed to be more to their plans if anything was going to go smoothly. "But if something comes up that seems worse or scarier, then-"
"I don't think it's possible that things can get worse than that thing." Yang said, walking over to the window and looking at. Her eyes were scanning the area for something, but Ruby didn't know what. "But if we're called out it'll probably be to deal with smaller threats."
"If they call people out to deal with smaller problems, it probably won't just be us." Blake contributed, walking up to the window as well. Weiss came up not far behind her. "People have been training here for years so that they can fight grimm. Not just us. And that isn't even thinking about how many professional hunters are probably being called in."
She went quiet, expression dark and her gaze far away before Blake continued. "And there are probably other things out there which are just as scared."
"What are you even talking about?" Weiss asked, her voice hardening and sounding much more frustrated. "Nobody is around here for miles."
"That isn't quite true." Yang spoke up, turning to face the rest of them. "There are... people out there. That choose not to live in the city."
Yang was facing them, but Ruby saw the way that her eyes flicked away from the rest of them. Almost like she was doing what she could to avoid the topic before it could drag them all down. It looked like Yang had something suddenly resting on her shoulders, physically weighing her down.
As for Ruby, she didn't exactly know whether or not she actually knew what Yang was talking about. It wasn't exactly a secret that there were things that Yang knew that she and their dad had kept away from Ruby. It had never bothered her before, but now it felt... different. And wrong.
"Yang?" Ruby asked, looking up at her sister's face looking for an explanation of some sort. It didn't need to be a lot, it needed to be enough to explain what Ruby needed to know. "Is... something wrong?"
"Yang is right." Blake spoke up, making sure that Yang was going to be okay by locking eyes. Ruby looked over at her raven haired teammate and listened. "There are people out there. Not villagers, either. Most of them are people trying to make their lives-"
"As bandits." Yang finished, venom dripping from the syllables. "And that's going to be something that they need to look out for as well. Even if it probably won't actually matter."
"Bandits." Weiss repeated the word, but she sounded a little dumbstruck. It probably made sense that Atlas didn't have a lot of bandits though, Ruby thought. Atlas was too cold for people to be able to really live away from their cities. "You have got to be joking. "
"We're not." Blake sighed. "And they live out in the forests."
Ruby nodded along, but she still felt a little bit more than unsure herself.
"So that's something that the hunters probably know about, right?" Ruby asked, picking her head up to meet Yang's eyes. Yang just gave her a look that didn't exactly seem sure about what she was doing. Ruby didn't like that at all. "I mean, they're bandits, do you think that they would-"
Blake shrugged. "I wouldn't put it past them to try and capitalize on the panic."
"Or they'll just run." Yang grumbled, stretching once more with her face more intense and looking more prepared than she had been before on the whole. "I just hope they don't become a problem."
"Right." Ruby whispered, letting her head drop a little bit. "Of course."
"In any case-" Weiss spoke up, and for the first time she looked like she wanted to take charge in some way. She held her head up high, her hand hovering over her sword. "We need to focus in case we are sent out there. Focusing on theoretical possibilities won't get us anywhere."
"Weiss is right." Ruby said, taking a deep breath of her own. They needed to focus. Focus, focus, focus. "We need to-" She looked out the window again, searching for a sign of anything out there that could act as a sign that things were happening. Ruby didn't see anything, and most of the sounds had been civilians rather than combat.
"We need to get ready." Yang finished for her, sounding mostly resigned on the topic. "Right. Got it."
The four of them turned back to their own work, one by one and none of them shying away from it. For Ruby, that meant that she was now moving on to maintaining Crescent Rose.
For several minutes, the team sat in relative silence, with the only thing to jar them from it was the sound of a knock on the door.
All four of them exchanged a panicked look, all looking to the door. Ozpin had said that if something was wrong they would be contacted more directly, so...
Ruby got up and walked to the door. She let her hand hover over the doorknob for a moment before speaking up. "Who is it?"
"It's Jaune." The voice on the other side of the door said. "Can we talk?"
"Is it important?" Ruby asked, looking back over at her teammates.
"Yeah, we wanted to do a... meeting, thing. Can we do that?"
"We can." Ruby spoke up, swallowing hard and pulling the door open. Sure enough, Jaune was there on the other side with his teammates at his sides.
The four of them looked at each other, but Ruby stepped out of the way and invited them in. Together, Jaune, Nora, Pyrrha, and Ren stepped into the room and stood there by the door.
Only once the door was closed did anyone allow themselves to speak up.
"We had reason to believe that you would be stressed by the current situation." Ren said, and Ruby really couldn't remember a time where he had talked more to her. "And we figured it would be good if the eight of us spent some time together before something happened."
"Thanks." Ruby says, sitting down on her bed. Jaune was pulling out one of the chairs that were in the room. His teammates did the same, and in the process they managed to create a circle for them. "So were you guys talking about what might happen to you too?"
"We were." Pyrrha said, smiling softly but there being a clear sign of nervousness behind her eyes. "Seeing as we've fought actual grimm out there."
Ruby nodded, because that was the exact issue that she would have expected the others would have run into. It was something that they couldn't avoid really. If they were the only ones that knew about what was out there, then that meant that they were going to need to find their solidarity where they could.
Jaune sighed and took a deep breath, like he was steeling himself for what was to come more physically. "We figured that if someone was going to be called, it would be you guys first." He shook his head, and his eyes went over to meet with Pyrrha's. "We just wanted to know that no matter what, we're going to be behind you."
"It's possible we get sent in together." Blake offered, and she seemed unsure. She had picked up a notebook at some point and had scribbled down something there. Ruby craned her neck to try and figure out what Blake was writing. She couldn't tell at all. "Considering the size of that grimm."
Weiss blinked. "But it's also possible that we don't get sent out there at all."
"That depends on how the hunters do." Yang added, her voice still noticibly frustated by what was going on. None of them wanted to be the first to go out there, that much was obvious. "We might be sitting around here for nothing."
Nora nodded, her lips pursed and her legs swinging in the seat where she was sitting. "I mean, I don't know that's so bad."
Ren took a deep breath and looked among the room. He sat in a way where he was almost eerily still, and while that was enough to leave Ruby feeling a little bit unsure and nervous about herself, she didn't comment. He hesitated a moment, and then began to speak.
"Either way, if we get sent out together into the field we should be prepared to work together." Ren said, his eyes flicking back down to the ground and to his hands. They were balled in his lap, but they relaxed a moment later. "While our teams have some experience together in the past, we don't have the best ideas as to how to work together."
"I mean-" Jaune spoke up, waving a hand and gesturing vaguely, clearly unable to find the words that he felt like he needed to say. "We know how to work with our own teams, and we did pretty well as a group last time-"
"So if we're going to talk about this, then we should talk about it." Yang cut the others off. Ruby gave her sister a look, because she knew that Yang was getting impatient and that was something that they couldn't deal with. "What do you want to do, go around in a circle and everyone share what they can do?"
Ruby hesitated because it felt like Yang was just trying to be sarcastic about it all, but at the same time it didn't feel that way. It was a good idea, one that they could go along with and one that they could use.
"I have Crescent Rose." Ruby started first, gesturing to her weapon, which she had folded away at the same time that JNPR had arrived. "And my semblance is speed, but if I can do it right I can basically fly."
"Lightning." Nora said, offhandedly. "And a big hammer. If I can get a good blast of electricity, I can use that to get stronger. But if it's too much it can hurt. Not sure if I'm going to be able to get that, though."
"Right." Pyrrha said, nodding and her brow furrowing. Pyrrha closes her eyes for a second, taking a breath before beginning her own explanation. She opened her eyes up and hovered her hand by her shield, and Ruby watched in wonder as it raised and floated up to her, only a small black aura surrounding it to show that something is happening. "My semblance is polarity." Pyrrha explained, smiling softly as she took the shield back in hand and set it down, by her leg and nice and neat. "I prefer not to use it too much in tournaments, but in a setting where there is a lot going on, I could do a lot to help."
"Is there anything that you need to know in particular for that to work?" Weiss asked, seeming curious. Maybe she had seen something of it before?
Pyrrha shrugged. "I just need to know that something is made of metal. Most people's weapons are made of alloys that I can manipulate, but that isn't such a sure thing with bullets. And even then, I prefer not to intervene unless I really need to."
"Got it." Ruby said, nodding because she was already starting to get ideas. She didn't know if she could ever use Pyrrha's abilities in combat, but there were definitely a lot of possibilities. Ruby couldn't speak for her teammates, but she knew for a fact that she didn't use bullets entirely made of dust. She looked over at her teammates, waiting for one of them to speak up and give an explanation.
To no surprise of hers, Yang let out a breath and stretched her arms. "I basically get stronger for every time I get hit. The weaker my aura is, the harder I can go. There's a limit, but if we really need it I can just throw myself to the front." She looked over at Weiss, grinning. "And I think that you're one of the best ones to do that. I mean, you've got that fancy glyph semblance."
"I can't do everything with it!" Weiss exclaimed, her face turning a bit red. "I can do a lot, but... I'm not as good as I could be. I will be, though."
Blake was about to open her mouth to explain when there was a knock on the door to team RWBY's room and they all went dead silent. Every single one of the students there locked eyes with each other, all feeling just as afraid as the others. It occured to Ruby that they could run into a lot of trouble for having JNPR there at a time where there was an important situation going on.
"You should get it." Jaune stage whispered to her, and Ruby nodded. She got up and stretched before approaching the door and letting her hand hover over it.
She didn't have the time to go hesitating over this, and yet here she was. "Who is it?" Ruby asked, doing her best to keep any panic from reaching her voice.
"This is Doctor Oobleck." The voice on the other side of the door. "I have been asked to retrieve your team and to take you into the forest."
Ruby pulled the door open at that, because she really didn't want to get into trouble for dragging this whole thing down.
On the other side, Oobleck was standing there with his head held high and decked out in the same hunting gear that he had worn on their first real mission. He looked at the people in the room and when he saw team JNPR he smiled a bit. "And there is the other set of students I was about to seek out. I need for all eight of you to come with me. I hope that you are prepared for what is to come."
"That's what we've been doing." Ruby replied as she broke into a light jog to get her over to her bed. Crescent Rose was there, sitting on her bed and waiting for her. She took a deep breath and picked the scythe up before attaching it to the magnetic plate on her back.
Everyone else in the room rallied and got ready, and as soon as everyone was prepared, Oobleck began to lead them out, rambling off what sounded almost like a memorized mission dossier far too quickly for Ruby to really be able to catch.
This was real, and it was happening.
Ruby was more afraid than she ever had been in her life.