Chapter 4: The Badge and Burden of being me

Holy Crap! Over one hundred people have checked out this story within three days! Sure, not as many are following, commenting, or marking it as a favorite, but I'm new to this. So is that stopping me from writing so much right now? No, it is not! Will I keep writing until my fingers get sore? Most definitely! I do this for you, whether or not you want me to! I am not Monty Oum. Therefore I do not own RWBY or its characters. Enjoy.

It was a beautiful morning at Beacon Academy.

The sun was rising. The birds were singing. Team RWBY was sleeping soundly in their beds for a little bit longer. And music was starting to play.

…Wait a minute. Music was starting to play?

"Woke up this morning,

To a girl, half-past dead."

Uh oh. Looks like Duncan was already up. This wouldn't end well.

"So I rode… Back… Over into… Comatose."

"Oh. You're definitely going to be in a coma when I'm through with you, Verser!" Came Weiss' voice as she just woke up to the music her teams extra member was blaring at six thirty in the morning. If the music didn't wake up her team mates, her voice most certainly did.

"It's our first day of school, and I can't sleep in because this guy decided to blast music this early!" She ranted while getting up to give Duncan a piece of her mind.

"Weiss! Lighten up already! We need a little extra time to decorate our room anyway." Yang tried to tell the girl.

"I don't care! It's a matter of principal! If we don't stop this now, he'll keep doing it!" She instantly told the boxer as she was already at the door, the others starting to follow her.

They had to agree with her reasoning. If they didn't get him to stop, he would keep his music playing loudly in the morning. So they went to the dorm right next to theirs, music still playing. Once they reached the door, they found it locked.

"Verser! Open up right this instant!" Weiss yelled as she started slamming on the door with her fist.

He couldn't hear them, obviously. The music was too loud. Unbeknownst to them, the song was about to end.

Blake pushed Weiss out of the way and began to pick the lock. It was easy enough. Once they opened it up, they found a rather, different sight.

Duncan had already decorated his room, making it appear as though it was a mix between a man cave, and a geek's lair. A couple game consoles, a DVD player, a large flat-screen TV, a shelf of movies and video games they'd never heard of that seemed to be about super heroes and the like, black dressers and desk, and the walls had writing on them (quotes, by the look of them). That wasn't the strange thing.

Duncan playing an air guitar and lip synching as the song was ending in his pajamas? That was what was strange.

"She said, 'Strap back, I'm about to attack!

Strap on your goggles and get ready to react,

To the venomous words, that slip through my teeth.

Roll out the window and crash into the streets.'

(She'll find me.)

When the grass grows tall, creeping and crawling through the shadows on the walls,

And I'll find you!

If it's the last thing, the last thing, the last thing that I do!"

As the music started to fade, Duncan opened his eyes and saw that he had an audience. He stared at them for a few seconds, down to his nonexistent guitar, then back at them.

"I…don't have a good explanation for this." I told awkwardly told the girls.

"Nice moves there, Rock-Star." Yang commented with a smirk. Blake was also smirking at me. 'Great. Like getting caught wasn't bad enough. I get caught by my four team mates, two of which seem to have set their sights on me.'

"Whatever. You need to stop with the loud music." Weiss said after composing herself a little.

"Why?" Was all I said.

"It's keeping us all up, that's why!"

"Shouldn't you be decorating your room anyway?"

The argument went on for another minute, until…

"Duncan. Please don't play your music in the morning." Was all Blake said.

"…Yes, Blake." I said, backing down almost instantly.

Having accomplished what she came to do, Weiss went to go change into her school uniform, as did Ruby. Blake and Yang however, decided to stick around.

'Oh, lovely. So this is what a normal teenaged boy feels like in high school. Powerless, completely powerless around all the girls.' I think to myself. I'd seen attractive girls when I went to high school, but they didn't actually cause anything really significant in me. I just didn't really care. It was rather lonely.

Now, I've had a few girlfriends when I was in my original reality, but I use the term 'girlfriend' loosely. The first was an on and off one when I was too young to understand relationships. The second, one blind movie date and a few phone calls. The third was also a blind date, but couldn't show. I wasn't really that smooth with women.

'And that lack of experience has come back from the grave to haunt me. Just great.' I thought.

"So, Duncan…" Blake started to say. "Would you have kept doing this kind of thing had we not intervened?"

"On and off again. Maybe just to piss Weiss off a little."

"Nice." Said Yang.

"So are you two gonna, like, stay here, or something? Cause you two just standing in my room, all of us in our PJs, is a little bit strange." I said after a few moments.

That got a bit of a blush on both their faces. 'YES! Finally! A little payback! I can make them uncomfortable too!'

Yang seemed to hear that line of thought and quickly retaliated. "Would that be such a bad thing, Duncan?" She "innocently" asked me.

While not something she would normally do, Blake decided to help get the immortal teen all riled up too. "I mean, we ARE young. Curious about things."

"What she said."

"ARGH! BOTH OF YOU! OUT! Before a blood vessel pops!" I exclaimed while pushing them out of the room.

With them gone to go decorate their own dorm, I had a little free time on my hands. I really lucked out when I got a dorm all to myself. No one seemed to use this one in the show anyway.

A couple hours of guy time and then a quick morph of clothes, and I had thirty minutes to spare before my first class started.

'Professor Port's class. This will be… No. No, I can't even joke about it. It's gonna suck. A lot, going there to hear a lecture about his over exaggerated exploits when he was younger and beyond simply sub-par jokes.' I thought.

The rest of my team still cut it close. Once they got here, they took their seats next to me. Then, something only comparable to an hour at a DMV, began.

Hell on Earth. Well, on Remnant. But who cares.

I managed to look like I was listening the whole time, so that was something. Meanwhile, Ruby was entertaining herself which was causing Weiss to have trouble keeping herself from blowing a gasket.

'I used to be like that. I can still be like that.' It sucks to see how you used to act and see that you had a huge pole stuck up your ass for the majority of your life. 'Oh well. I got better before I died anyway.'

However, Weiss was about to lose it. That would lead her to trying to show off as a means to assert dominance over Ruby as the better Huntress. But, would I allow someone else to show off aside from me as a means to try and soothe their wounded pride?

'Not in this life, you great, big, Tsundere.' I thought, wearing a huge face-splitting grin.

"The moral of the story?" Port asked the class. "A true huntsman must be honorable. A true huntsman must be dependable. A true huntsman must be strategic, well-educated, and wise."

"So, who among you believes themselves to be the embodiment of these traits?"

"I do." I said as I already started to stand up taking off the blazer and rolling up my sleeves.

"Well then. Let's find out, shall we. Step forward, and face your opponent." He said and directed my gaze to the caged Grimm.

Weiss was peeved I called out first, but held her tongue. The other girls just cheered me on.

"Go Duncan!" Said Yang

"Fight well." Blake encouraged.

"Yeah, represent Team RWBY! Well, Unit VRSE, who is part of Team RWBY!" Ruby cheerfully ordered.

"Yeah, sure thing. I'll get right on that." I said, trying to focus on the incoming fight.

"Alright, let the match, BEGIN!" Port exclaimed as he broke the Boarbutusk free from its cage.

It went right onto charging me as soon as possible. I just side stepped it.

"Ha ha! Wasn't expecting that, were you?"

I was, actually.

It charged again. This time, I front flipped over it. Before it could go further, I turned around, reached over its back, grabbed the tusks and held it in the air.

"Duncan! Go for its bel"- Ruby began to shout to me. Before she could finish that thought, I shoved my hand through its armored back and pulled out its lifeless heart. Then crushed it.

"…Ly?" Ruby finished with a sweat drop.

I drop the monster then try to shake the blood off my right hand.

"That was excessively violent and rather needless." Port said. "I like it!"

The majority of the class didn't though. I then looked up at them. "It's not like I ate the heart or anything! Sheesh."

They conceded to that, and their unease started to fade.

"Besides, that heart had much thicker blood in it. It would've gotten stuck in my teeth."

Then it came back even worse at the thought that I seemed to have eaten hearts in the past. Other than that, nothing else happened as the class ended shortly afterwards.

The day started to end pretty quickly. I could only assume Ruby was talking to Ozpin while Weiss spoke to Port, both receiving important lessons. I was going to add to the wisdom with sympathy and past experience. Not that I would tell them about those experiences in exact detail.

I managed to find Ruby first.

"What's up Ruby?"

"Nothing. Just thinking about some things."

"Wanna talk about them?"

"…Weiss doesn't think I'm a good leader."

"Let me tell you a little story, Red."

I lean against the wall to get comfortable for this.

"Once upon a time, there was this boy. He spent his entire life dreaming to become a hero. Always thinking how great it would be. The thing is, he never worked toward it. He spent his days just thinking of what it would be like. And one day, he lucked out. He got much more than what he needed to be a hero, but at the cost of the life he once led. This saddened him, big time. Years were spent just doubting himself. And it could be easily noticed by others. He wasn't good at dealing with all the new responsibilities thrust upon him."

"Then, one day, he learned that he couldn't allow any doubts to form in his head. Allowing that would be worse. So, he committed himself to doing everything to the best of his abilities and beyond. And in doing that, people looked up to him. 'The hero that shouldn't have been.' And you know what? He was a damn good hero."

"But, what does this have to do with me?"

"Ruby, you're a leader now. You don't have the 'privilege' to doubt. People depend on you. You do the best you can, always pushing yourself to do better. You will fumble. You will make mistakes. In time though, people will search for someone they can look for when they need to hope, and you will be that someone."

She stared at me for a few seconds… then a smile slowly appeared on her face. Then, she hugged me.

"Thanks, Duncan."

"Yeah, yeah. Run along now." I said as I awkwardly hugged back. After that, she moved to return to her dorm while I moved to find Weiss.

Before I could do that though, she turned around and asked.

"Hey, Duncan? What made the boy stop doubting himself?"

I stopped in my tracks, unable to turn around. Then, I answered…

"…Some stories, aren't meant to be told for a while." Was all that I said, before I left to find the heiress.

Soon enough, I found her. She was obviously a little down after her lecture from Port.

"What do you want, Duncan?"

"To add my two Lien."

"Oh, this should be good." She mumbled.

"I won't lie. Port's right. Your past of always getting what you want has soured your attitude. And that hinders your progress."

She wasn't exactly pleased at that note.

"But let me tell you about this guy that had everything you could ever dream to have. Anything he wanted, he got. But, he had a very difficult job. Always got harder to cope with, mentally at least. Then, he lost his cool for a brief time. In that time, he lost something he treasured more than anything else he had. And it broke him."

"Eventually, he managed to learn how to deal with what he had lost. But, the wound still lingered inside him. He would never be able to forget. And it haunted him for the rest of his days."

"What are you trying to tell me?"

"Weiss, you can't expect having everything handed to you to be able to just make you perfect. It's the work you do to earn those things, to earn that respect, to earn the help of those who care about you, which makes you perfect. If you fail to understand that, you'll find yourself a broken shadow of your former self, with no one to pick up the pieces for you."

"…I think I understand."

"Good." Then she proceeded to look for Ruby.

'Thank God. Hugging still feels weird to me.' I thought and went to my own room to sleep.

Duncan was unaware, however that Blake had heard his little story to Ruby, and tried to catch up and talk to him, only to find him giving another life lesson to Weiss.

One thought went through her mind as he left.

'He was talking about himself.'

Wow. That actually got rather dark and depressing at the end. If anyone's wondering what that song was at the beginning, it's called Comatose by Whiskey Kills the Butterflies. I think the band might've broken up, but they had some good songs. Check them out when you get the time. Now, am I doing well? Please tell me. If you don't, I'll Skin You Alive… Another one of their songs. And I won't actually do that.