"You can't be serious," Noctis mutters, glaring at the silent, red-haired faunus. "What about the people on that train!? You're just gonna let them die!?"

His hands tighten into fists, but he makes sure they stay anchored at his sides, his fingers clasped tautly together, delving deeper into his palms. The wordlessness exasperates him, provoking him as he bites his lip until drawing blood. The wordlessness, he knows, is Adam's answer.

Noctis turns away, his back facing the red-head. "If equality means killing, if freedom means slaughter," He pauses, glancing over his shoulder. "Then I want no part of it."

Facing forward, his obsidian eyes meet amber ones that widen slightly in perplexity, but he does not acknowledge her tacit inquiry. His hand moves to readjust his black beanie, and he leaves his partners.

No, not just his partners, he corrects himself; he leaves the White Fang.


"W-what happened here?" Rowen mutters, Noctis looking over the shattered glass.

The raven-haired huntsman peers into the mirrored fragments - staring, gawking, glancing over each individual shard. The crystalline surface reflects his true self, the refracting light forming the negativity and hostility damaging his reputation and the misguided valor he once believed in. He does not see a reflection of himself, not even a hollow copy or a raw echo of his current state. The images intensify, and the calamities he had caused overwhelm the misfortunes of his own past, the hostility of others due to his own indignation. Biting his lip, he believes, is the only way to stop him from screaming. He sighs, shaking his head to rid himself of lingering guilt before replying to his partner. "It looks like a Dust Shop robbery."

His ears perk up at the sound of upcoming footsteps from behind him, and he does not turn to face the owners of the click-and-clatter. He hovers a hand over his twitching, wolf ears, hoping that fixing his beanie to lean farther back would quell their fervent movement; he does not need to look to know that it is Team RWBY.

"That's terrible." Yang sighs, resting her hand on her hip.

"They left all the money again." The police officers converse while Team RWBY, as well as Noctis and his partner Rowen, stays silent and listens.

"Hmm… Yea, it just doesn't make a lick a' sense. Who needs that much Dust?"

"I dunno. Ya know what I mean?"

"You thinkin' the uhh… White Fang?"

"Yea, I'm thinkin' we don't get paid enough."

Weiss crosses her arms. "The White Fang, what an awful bunch of degenerates." She scoffs.

Noctis frowns, looking a little too hostile than he intended. Her comment should not have bothered him so much; it should not have aggravated and irked him so much that he stepped quickly toward her, his body willing itself to seemingly lunge at the heiress. He opens his mouth to retort, but a hand lightly squeezing his elbow catches him off guard; so, he graciously, yet somewhat reluctantly, permits his old friend to counter.

"What's your problem?" Blake inquires, maintaining a stoic expression.

"My problem? I simply don't care for the criminally insane." Weiss shrugs, as if her response needs no justification.

"The White Fang is hardly a bunch of psychopaths. They're a collection of misguided faunas."

Noctis resists the urge to smile, looking over the cool demeanor of his old friend as she crosses her arms. She was always better - a lot better - with words than he, and he was beyond grateful for her quick-wittedness and clever rationality.

As Blake and Weiss continue their dispute, Yang and Ruby question his partner on the whereabouts of his other teammates, Rowen grinning before explaining how both huntsmen had barely escaped the clutches of their teammates wanting to drag them into a shoe store a few blocks away. Noctis closes his eyes, half-heartedly listening to the fuzzed-up whispers and stutters and bickering conversations around him, dancing mockingly around his wary ears.

The noise becomes high-pitched and deafening, ear-splitting and raucous, shrilling and piercing his once composed mentality; he cannot help but be driven crazy by the resounding, aching shrieks. A groan escapes his lips as his hands reach up to hover over his beanie, his fingers feelings the light fabric concealing his stigma - stigmas. He becomes inattentive, his body going through the motions of following his partner before his mind could register or recompose itself. He growls in frustration, unaware of the glance Blake's sympathetic eyes had done, and he allows his arms to fall to his sides.

His feet carry him toward the docks of downtown Vale before turning at a street corner, dashing after his friends. His legs cease movement almost immediately; they hesitate to join the group Team RWBY and his partner had formed, all of whom seem preoccupied with a peculiar green-eyed girl. He sighs, closing his eyes before a wave of nostalgia floods his mind. He met a girl before, a friend - months before he met even Blake, but he cannot remember her name; he can barely remember her face, but he remembers that her innocence gave life to the inanimate, and her touch chilled him, caused him to shiver. He remembers clearly the way she had lifted loneliness off his shoulders and how it came back when he watched her leave.

"Does that mean you know that monkey-tailed rapscallion?"

The voice breaks him from his thoughts, and a frown forms his lips, aimed at the Schnee Heiress. He tries to compose himself, to keep himself calm and collected, but the white-clad huntress's next words irk and, unknown to her, offend him.

"The filthy faunus from the boat!" Weiss exclaims, the green-eyed girl - Penny - retreating upon noticing the movements of the raven-haired huntsman.

His body had lunged toward her again, stopping directly in front of her, both hunters aware of the other's proximity. The shadows of his obsidian hair shield his eyes, and he must swallow the lump in his throat to keep his faults and feebleness, his breaking voice, in check. "Shut up." Anger tones his next words, and he nearly surprises himself with his own frustration. "Someone like you, who's had everything given to her, would never understand how hard it was!"

Weiss forces her body to stay stationary despite her brain commanding her to step back, her eyes widening at his outburst before she retaliates. "What are you even talking about?" She crosses her arms; it sounded like he was speaking from experience - she contemplates.

"Faunus are the target of discrimination for humans! They mock and insult faunus. They criticize and ridicule and curse them. They'll do whatever it takes to humiliate them." His hands tighten into fists, but he makes sure they stay anchored at his sides. "And the White Fang gave faunus a chance! It gave them hope that one day, they'll actually be treated like people!"

"Like people?" She scoffs, her arms falling to her sides. "Faunus of the White Fang are a bunch of degenerates, thieves, and liars! They're terrorists!"

He grits his teeth; she was right, and he cannot deny the truth. He reaches his hand up clumsily, shakingly, his fingers lightly trailing the stitches of the fabric atop his head. His breathing is deep - it is slow (and somehow painful.) He turns away, his back facing her, and he feels Blake's sympathy and his partner's tacit pleas to compose himself.

"They're a bunch of savages."

He feels the poison in her voice, and his hand rips the beanie off his head before falling limply to his side. His hand, dangling a bit too far back, softly collides with her unmoving one, causing him to shiver at her chilling touch. His fingers lose their grip on his beanie, letting it heavily hit the ground, as her fingers reach out cautiously, carefully, to trace over his calloused skin. Her fingers hover over his hand, hesitant, her fingers wanting nothing more than to intertwine with his.

Am I still a savage? She hears in a voice barely above a whisper, causing her to pull her hand back. She curses herself. She was right. She was right all along. She won the argument. She sighs, but she was slightly perplexed.

"Noctis! Wait!" Rowen beckons toward the huntsman hastily retreating before rubbing the back of his head, contemplating how he has to explain everything to his team.


A/N: I don't own anything

There's gonna be a second part to this.