Professor Goodwitch waved her scroll in front of the scanner. It took a couple passes but finally the large metal door beeped and slid open, allowing her passage into the Beacon Armory. On the other side of the door was a hallway, lined with offices, labs, and rooms filled with weapon-smithing tools. Beacon was very proud of this facility, a complete workshop that could be used by students if they wanted, but well-manned by only the best weapons smiths and technicians in Vale. In addition to being a place where students could forge, design, and repair their own weapon systems, the facility also acted as the most well-staffed and well-equipped weapons development and testing lab in all of the four kingdoms. It was here that breakthroughs were made in the war against the Creatures of Grimm.

The entire facility was overseen and run by a Doctor Maxwell Fletcher, a short and stout little man that absolutely did not care what your family name meant, what your title was, or how much power you had, because you were in his facility and you were damn well going to pay him the respect afforded only to kings. To most of his staff and visitors he was known strictly as "Doctor Fletcher," but Goodwitch was one of the few who had earned his respect enough to refer to him by something less formal.

"Max?" Goodwitch said as she peered into Fletcher's office from the open doorway. She could see the man's bald head behind his desk, but he was turned away from her, probably absorbed in something he was watching on his scroll.

Fletcher instantly recognised the voice and spun around in his office chair with a smile on his face. "Glynda! It's great to see you." He said, standing up from his seat, "How're you doing?"

"Busy, as always," Goodwitch said, returning his smile, "But it's hard to complain."

"Ah! That's what I like to hear!" Fletcher said. As the little man moved around to the front of his desk, it was difficult not to notice how his lab coat dragged on the ground behind him. "So, what can I help you with today?"

"I had some toys sent over for you to play with later yesterday, and was wondering if you had gotten the chance to examine them yet."

Fletcher's smile grew bigger. "Oh, but of course! Here, follow me." Fletcher walked past Goodwitch, leading her out of the office and back into the hallway, toward one of the main labs. "You know," Fletcher said, "doing all of this managerial work I barely ever get to get my hands dirty personally anymore, so whenever you send me one of these special projects it makes my whole week."

"Glad to hear it." Goodwitch said.

"So how's our little intruder doing, anyway?" Fletcher said, taking a sharp right turn down another long hallway.

"He's still unconscious, but in stable condition. It's looking like he'll be hospitalized for another day or two as something is disrupting his Aura and he's not healing as fast as he should be." At this point, Goodwitch and several of the other higher most staff already knew that this was not the case, and that this intruder didn't really have an Aura at all. But that tidbit of information was being given out on a need-to-know basis only, and Goodwitch decided that Fletcher didn't need to know.

"Good, good. Sounds like your students roughed him up enough to prevent him from getting any ideas when he does wake up." Fletcher said as they finally turned into the main lab. They were the only ones there, and after entering Fletcher turned and entered his personal password into the keypad, closing the door, and locking it completely to anyone but himself. Goodwitch waited patiently as he closed the shades, as well.

"So what did you find out?" Goodwitch said as Fletcher returned to the main worktable, where the mask that the intruder had been wearing sat, connected to the computer by various wires and cables.

"We'll start with this," Fletcher said, picking up the mask and turning to face Goodwitch with it, "This isn't your average facial armor. It's meant to act as a complete filter for the wearer to the outside world. Cameras on the outside feed into a visor in front of the wearer's eyes, and have modes for night vision, infrared, and range finding among other things. Microphones on the inside pick up and project his voice when he speaks, and microphones on the outside pick up sound outside the mask and send it straight into his ears, it even has the capability to block or deaden sounds that are dangerously loud. Finally, a hyper-compact filter provides him with clean air, and can block both biological and chemical agents. The outer surface is blast proof and the mask can make an airtight seal when used in conjunction with the wearer's helmet."

Goodwitch nodded, and a frown of worry could be seen on her face. "That all sounds very advanced," she said.

Fletcher shrugged. "To be honest, all of the technology here is stuff that's well used and tested by our own soldiers, or those of one of the other three nations. The only thing remarkable about it is that it's all fitted into this one unit, a research and development project that undoubtedly costed lots of money," Fletcher placed the mask back down on the table. "Honestly, the only thing that this really indicates to me is that he wasn't a normal soldier."

"What do you mean?"

Fletcher thought for a moment, trying to phrase his response appropriately. "It's just like, he had to be special in some way. This isn't the kind of equipment you would supply to your average, rifle-toting infantryman. In order to justify this level of gear he would have to be a soldier within a smaller community of more skilled and advanced warriors."

Goodwitch processed this for a moment. "Like a Huntsman or a Huntress…" she said, staring at the floor, deep in thought.

Fletcher shrugged again. "That's not for me to speculate on." Suddenly, Fletcher's face dropped and his expression became much darker. "Follow me, there's one more thing I have to show you." he said.

Goodwitch followed him behind the main workbench toward the back of the lab. Fletcher led her to a smaller table, where the intruder's two weapons laid. It was obvious that they were firearms, one rifle and one pistol, that much she could be sure of, but they were not of a design that she had ever seen before. The black metal and synthetic that shined in the bright light of the lab gave off a sense of threat like no weapon she had ever encountered.

Fletcher picked up the rifle, holding it up for Goodwitch to see. "These are like nothing I've ever seen before in my life." He said.

"How so?"

"Like with most other things, it's what on the inside that counts," Fletcher said, putting the rifle back down on the table. "The ammunition they fire is not Dust-based. It's something else."

"What? How could that be?" Goodwich said, mildly startled by this information.

"That I can't say," Fletcher said, shaking his head, "while the general design and construction is similar to any other, the compounds used to make the rounds are completely foreign to me. While the bullets we would fire from our weapons are typically a concentrated dust compound propelled by a dust-based powder, these projectiles are made up a high-density metal, and the potential energy contained in the powder used to propel them is a great deal higher per-unit volume than your average dust-based stuff, and it's a lot more stable."

Goodwitch was intrigued, but really wanted Fletcher to just get to the point. "Okay, so what does that all mean?" She asked.

"Well, the problem with dust-based ammunition has always been that Dust itself is still a very unstable compound, despite how well we have mastered it over the centuries. Because you don't want a Dust-based projectile to become reactive before it hits its target, or for the Dust-based propellent to damage your weapon, there's always been an extreme restriction on the power and velocity that our ammunition can have behind it. This," Fletcher said, pointing at the rifle on the table, "defeats that completely."

Goodwitch was doubtful. "How much more powerful could it really be?"

Fletcher looked to the side and at the ground, visibly troubled. "Glynda…" he started, "these weapons are dangerous. Really dangerous. If you're fast, and I mean really, really fast, maybe you could block it or deflect it like can be done with Dust-based rounds. But if you took a direct hit…" Fletcher paused, unsure of how to word his thoughts, "it would be like your Aura wasn't there at all. These bullets would cut right through it, and I don't want to think about what they would do once they got to your flesh itself."

Goodwitch nodded. "And have you tested them on any targets meant to replicate flesh?"

Fletcher looked back up, meeting Goodwitch's gaze. "No," he said, "and frankly, I don't want to."

"Max…"

"No, Glynda. You know better than anyone that Ozpin hired me not only because of my extensive knowledge and experience with weaponry, but also because I always put what I believe is morally and ethically right over an advance in technology. And I'm telling you right now, you don't want these weapons in our world. If there is an evil beyond Grimm I have seen it and I refuse to take any action besides destroying these things completely."

"That's drastic, Max," Goodwitch said, crossing her arms, "and it's not up to you."

Fletcher looked away again, visibly irritated. "Alright," he said, "but don't say I didn't warn you.

…

The eight students that made up teams JNPR and RWBY stood silently together in the elevator as they ascended to Professor Ozpin's office. They had all been summoned simultaneously near the end of their lunch break. They had sat together, like always, but there was little speaking and even less eating between them. The events of the previous day were all too fresh in their minds for them to feel safe in the dining hall again. The elevator ride to the Professor's office seemed to be taking longer than normal.

"Alright, so lets get our stories straight," Yang said, breaking the silence, "gotta make sure we're all on the same page with what happened yesterday."

"What's the purpose in that?" Lie said, "We've done nothing wrong, if we all tell the truth our stories will align anyway."

Yang whipped around and glared at Lie. "He tried to kill us," she said, "he almost killed Ruby. I have to know we all understand that."

Blake stepped forward now "Yang, we're all just as upset as you are," she said, "but now is not the time to allow our emotions to drive our actions and words, certainly not in front of Ozpin."

"I agree," Pyrrha said, "Ozpin puts a lot of trust in us, lets not put that in jeopardy because we're angry. All we have to do is say exactly what we saw, nothing more and nothing less."

Yang was about to absolutely boil over, and that would not end well, it never ended well and certainly not in such a confined space like an elevator. If seething was a physical act than Yang embodied it in this moment. But before she could speak again, she felt a hand on her shoulder. Yang turned her head to see none other than her little sister reaching up to comfort her.

"It's alright, Yang," Ruby said, "lets just get through this as quickly as possible and get back to class."

It took Yang a moment, but she closed her eyes, breathed out deeply, and let her rage go. "Okay." She said.

When the door of the elevator opened, releasing the students into the Professor's monumental office space, the first thing they all noticed was the figure of General Ironwood standing tall, just a bit to the left of where Ozpin sat in his normal spot at his desk. They approached with caution. None of them had reason to dislike Ironwood, or distrust him, but there was just something about his presence that was unsettling. The military and the Huntsman academies were two very, very different cultures, and the students just didn't jive with the energy that Ironwood seemed to give off.

As they got close to the desk, Ozpin spoke, addressing their silent concern. "General Ironwood will be sitting in on our little chat today. As it's becoming increasingly obvious that this event is somehow connected to the military, he may be able to shed some light on some of it."

"I've seen all the security footage," Ironwood said, "I've made my own evaluations but I want to know what you all think."

In this moment the entire group found themselves lost for words. There was awkward silence as a couple people grumbled or turned their gaze to avoid making eye contact like school kids who didn't want to get called in class.

"To be honest," Pyrrha said, finally, "I don't know how much help we can be. There were plenty of other students around for most of the events, and it all happened so fast. It was just another fight."

"You all were the only ones to face him directly," Ozpin said, "and we all know it wasn't just another fight, I know my students, and they wouldn't be so shaken after any old stroll through a battle."

"It was just very strange," Lie said, "It was like he had a lot of opportunities to really go for our throats that he didn't take, and spent most of the time running. Ruby and her team pushed him into the cafeteria and then all of us together pushed him out of it again. He wasn't fighting offensively."

"Did he appear to try and warn you?" Ironwood said.

"Hey now!" Yang said, feeling that anger build up again, "we can't just dismiss the actions of whoever this guy is. He put us all in real danger!"

"He probably felt like he was in danger, too." Ironwood said.

That gave all the students pause. "Meaning?" Yang said.

"Look, I know that the idea of the military doesn't sit particularly well with all of you," Ironwood said, "but I've been doing this a long time, all the way from being on the ground with other men and women in arms. I've developed a lot of the strategies and procedures that my soldiers now use in this current environment of terrorists that melt back into the population after they've set off their bomb or robbed a Dust store. When I watched the security footage, I saw nearly identical procedures being used by this intruder of yours."

"Please elaborate, General," Weiss said, speaking up.

Ironwood cleared his throat. "Well, you see, when you're fighting people that aren't in uniform, just regular people with guns and hope, you have to be very, very careful about where to put your shots. Our soldiers have an entire set of things they have to do and circumstances they have to confirm before using lethal force on a possible enemy. You have to be sure that the person you're pointing your gun at wants to kill you, because if you kill the wrong person, nobody wins. If one of my soldiers was unexpectedly dropped into a situation like this, surrounded by people he didn't know, all heavily armed, in an environment he was unfamiliar with he would behave in much the same way."

Weiss was unamused. "With all do respect to you and your men, General, do you really believe one of your regulars could almost take down two teams of Huntsmen and Huntresses?"

"-In training." Ozpin added, sipping his tea.

"No, I don't." Ironwood said, looking directly at Weiss and addressing her with a much more stern tone, "It was not one of my soldiers, and in fact, I don't think that it was a soldier from any of the other kingdoms either."

"How can you be so sure?" Jaune said, "I mean, the dude sort of had military level equipment and stuff."

Ironwood shook his head. "We simply don't train soldiers to that level of skill. Nobody does. Every year there's a large meeting involving myself and several other commanders of Vale's military forces, as well as the head council members, where we discuss budgets for the military. And every year, there's always some Colonel or something that wants a bit of money set aside to train a smaller, elite group of fighters to handle more sensitive operations, and every year I shoot that down because I firmly believe that such things should be left to Huntsman and Huntresses, and all the other kingdoms feel the same way. We don't have the facilities, expertise, or technology required to train and equip a soldier of that magnitude."

"So you're saying he's a Huntsman." All eyes turned on Ruby as she spoke, and as she felt the pressure of all the eyes watching her she began to stutter. "Or, um, something like that…"

"Possibly," Ozpin said, "or more likely, the military equivalent of a Huntsman. But not from here, or anywhere that we know of."

"So who is he?" Yang said, and the room went quiet again.

"We don't know," Ozpin said, "and we won't know until he wakes up."

…

When Cobin awoke in the hospital bed, even his eyelids seemed to strain from soreness and he groaned as he slowly opened them, exposing his pupils to the bright light hanging over him. Everything hurt, but he didn't like this exposed feeling of laying belly-up on his back, so bearing the discomfort he rocked himself into a seating position, his body screaming at him all the way up. As he slowly looked around the small room he observed nothing out of the ordinary. He had an IV leading into the vein on his right arm, there was a curtain half-surrounding the bed blocking his view of the entrance, and a couple of empty chairs rested in the corner. Cobin shook his head and rubbed his eyes, thinking hard and trying to remember what had happened. The EID came to mind first, he remembered very vividly the explosion and the subsequent tumble-dryer of pain. Yeah, that was it. He must have been pulled from the wreckage of the HMMWV and CASEVAC'd to a hospital somewhere. Then there was this really strange dream…

Cobin heard the door click and his head snapped around to observe whatever figure might come around the other side of the curtain. When Cobin saw him, just the man's appearance alone confirmed Cobin's worst fear; everything from the crazy greying hair, to the clothes, to those black-button-eyed glasses. "Oh, God." Cobin said, "It's not over yet, is it?"

"I'm afraid not," The man said, standing at the foot of Cobin's bed. "My name is Professor Ozpin, I am the headmaster of Beacon Academy. Who are you?"

Cobin nodded. "Alright," he said, "my full name is Rockland Marshal Cobin, I hold the rank of Sergeant First Class in the United States Army, I was born on the eighth of March, nineteen-ninety-two, and you can retrieve my service number from my Geneva Conventions Identification Card. I have now provided you with all of the information that I am required to under the Geneva Conventions and international law, and I will be answering no more questions." Cobin said this respectfully, but with confidence, looking Ozpin in the eyes as he spoke.

Ozpin sighed, and turned his back to Cobin as he went to retrieve one of the chairs from the corner of the room. Ozpin pulled the chair next to the hospital bed where Cobin sat, and took a seat himself. "Sergeant Cobin, I'm sorry to be the one to inform you of this, but you are a very, very long ways away from home."

Cobin was unphased. "I was already half-way around the world, it doesn't get much further than that. Regardless, there's nowhere on earth that can't be reached by the International Red Cross, and I've given you all the information necessary for you to contact my family and superiors through them."

Just then, the door clicked again, and around the corner came a nurse holding a green hospital tray. The nurse walked swiftly to the side of the bed where Ozpin sat and lowered it, offering two cups of tea. "Ah yes," Ozpin said, taking both off of the tray, "I've had them brew some for you too, if you're interested." Cobin didn't hear the question at first, because he was still too busy staring at the wolf-like ears seeming to protrude from the nurse's skull. Drugs. He thought. They have definitely given me drugs. "Sergeant?" Ozpin said, trying to get the dazed and confused soldier's attention.

"Oh um, tea, yes." Cobin said, reaching for the cup that Ozpin was extending toward him. Cobin held the cup of warm liquid in his hands but didn't bring it to his mouth, he wasn't so inept as to just drink whatever was handed to him in a situation where he was quite possibly a POW detainee being interrogated by a foreign agent.

"As I was saying, Sergeant…" Ozpin continued in between sips, "We believe you're much further away from home than you could probably think possible. Sergeant, what military organization did you say you were affiliated with again?"

Cobin raised an eyebrow, that wasn't one he was expecting. "The U.S. Army." He said.

"What do you mean by 'U.S.'?"

Cobin knew that someone in the room was definitely losing their shit and it could very well be him. "The United States," He said, staring at Ozpin, "The United States Army."

"Yes, but the United States of what?"

What in the actual fuck. "The United States of America," Cobin said, "It's kind of a big deal."

"Right." Ozpin said, brushing off that last comment. "Sergeant, are you familiar with the World of Remnant?"

Jesus, what kind of interrogation is this, Cobin thought. "The word 'remnant?' I think it means 'something that remains, or is left behind,' but I'm not exactly a walking dictionary."

"No." Ozpin said, shaking his head. "The World Of Remnant." When Cobin rebuttled with nothing but a blank stare, Ozpin added: "The planet that you're on right now, as we speak."

"The planet that I'm on?"

"Yes."

"But I'm on Earth."

"No you're not."

Cobin was silent for just a second before the words exploded out of him. "What the fuck! How is that even possible? It's not, it's bullshit."

"Sergeant!" Ozpin said, putting on his teacher-voice. "While I'm sure you are distressed and it is an unbelievable situation, rest assured that it's the truth. I don't know how you got here, but I'm trying to figure it out and I can't do it without your help."

This has to be some highly advanced interrogation technique. Cobin thought.

"Now, you're probably thinking that this is some high-level interrogation strategy, but I can assure you that it serves neither me, nor my school to deceive you." Ozpin said, placing his half-empty cup of tea on the side table. "I just want to know what happened."

Cobin was totally lost, just trying to put the awful, jagged puzzle pieces of this situation together in his head. He thought about that strange dream… or what he thought was a strange dream, for a long moment. "This is a school?" He finally asked.

"Yes," Ozpin replied.

"So those kids that attacked me, they were your students?"

"Yes."

"One hell of a school you're running here, professor." Cobin said, finally giving in to the insanity and taking a sip of his own tea.

"Regardless of the actions of my students and how they are to be judged, the situation at hand dictates that we have a different conversation; one where you tell me everything that you remember about how you got here." Ozpin stated, a firmness to his voice.

Cobin turned his gaze toward the ceiling as he sipped his tea. He focused with all of his energy on this ridiculous situation and how he could have possibly wound up in it. "I was driving the lead truck in a convoy," he began, "I'm a soldier, we were at war, you probably know how it goes. So We're driving down this road in the middle of the desert, on mission, and we stop to investigate something suspicious a bit down the road. When we do, a bomb that was buried in the road went off right behind my truck. I blacked out, and when I woke up I was surrounded by teenagers with guns. I'm sure you can understand why I may have been a bit on-edge."

Ozpin nodded, "So that's it, you got blown up in your world and woke up in mine?"

"Yeah, that's about it."

"So, what's your evaluation of that situation?"

There was a long pause before Cobin answered, and when he did, all he said was: "Professor, have you ever heard the phrase 'If a tree falls in the woods, and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound'?"

"No," Ozpin said, "I don't believe I have."

"It's just a bit of cheap, dime-store philosophy that's meant to reference the concept of Solipsism, which states that the only thing that can truly be known to exist is the self. Tracking?"

"Go on."

"The idea of Solipsism basically states that because all reality is perception, and it's arguable as to whether or not anything exists at all in the absence of a consciousness to observe it, I have no real way proving that you actually exist, that any of this exists. The consciousness, the self that is me is observing and processing you and your world, but I will never be able to completely prove that you're not an illusion of some kind. In addition, the concept of solipsism brings about the possibility that there's only one consciousness, mine, which is generating this entire reality independent of anything else in my environment, like being a lonely god in a universe you have no control over, or being in a dream you can't wake up from."

"So what are you getting at, Sergeant?" Ozpin asked, more interested in this than he had been in anything, in a long time.

"Well, because I very much doubt the possibility that a roadside bomb could open a portal to another dimension, the logical part of me assumes that I'm now in an induced coma and dreaming, or the even more likely possibility that my body has died, and this is the reality my mind has chosen to experience in the ten-to-twelve minutes I have before my brain dies, too. But because the perception of time is altered in a dream-space, my time here could feel like an eternity."

"So you believe that you're dreaming, and none of this is real?"

"No, that's just what the logic says. I don't know what I believe. It certainly doesn't feel like a dream."

"So what will you do now, Sergeant?"

Cobin shrugged. "Well, I really can't actually prove that this reality is any more or less real than the one I existed in before, so I guess I'll just make my best effort to exist here now." He said.

Ozpin was taken aback. "You know, Sergeant, I never would have guessed a response like that would come…"

"From a gun-toting killer that broke two of your guards and almost put a lot of holes in your students?"

"Yes, that." Ozpin said.

"Yeah, well, I've got a few tricks up my sleeve," Cobin said, "but you probably won't get to see them, my guess is that I get to spend the remainder of my time in this reality behind bars somewhere."

Ozpin smiled at the sergeant. "Or maybe not." He said.