When Ruby snuck out of her bunk to snatch a late-night snack, she didn't expect to see Jaune slumped depressingly against the door to his dorm. Seeing him lock himself out again wasn't what surprised her, though. Seeing him at all was the kicker.

"Hey, Jaune!" Ruby greeted him. He jumped in surprise as he swerved around to face her. "Long time, no–"

Ruby cut herself short. Bandages upon bandages covered his face. One of his eyes was an unhealthy pink with yellowish swelling surrounding it. His bruised nose was off-center, and if that wasn't dried smears of blood along his chin, Ruby didn't know what those were.

Even Yang's worse bouts of street fighting never left her this badly hurt. Jeez, what has Jaune been getting himself into lately?

Jaune instantly put up an annoyingly fake smile. "Oh! Uh, hey Ruby!" At Ruby's prolonged silence, his smile faltered a bit. "Guess I should have been more careful during Professor Port's class, huh? I never liked Boarbatusks. I have an uncle who owns a farm outside the north of Vale, and there's this pack of them that–"

"Don't change the subject, Jaune," Ruby glumly interrupted. A part of her wanted to go back to her bed and forget seeing Jaune look so beaten and putting up a front for himself, but Jaune was her friend. A friend that she didn't know all that well, sure, but a friend nonetheless. "The Boarbatusk couldn't have hurt you this badly. Professor Port would have sent you to infirmary if it did. What happened?"

"I... fell down some stairs," Jaune said meekly. "That's all." Ruby numbly nodded in response, kinda expecting such as lackluster answer.

"What's going on, Jaune?" Ruby asked with a crestfallen sigh. "You've been avoiding, us, your entire team, and hanging out with Canderous all the time."

"Yeah... that's exactly what's going on," Jaune said slowly. "You've seen me during combat classes, Ruby. You've seen Canderous, too. He's been, uh, tutoring me. Y'know?"

No, Ruby didn't. There was tutoring, then there was training, and then there was brutalizing. "You could have asked anyone else," Ruby pointed out. "Ask Pyrrha. She's your partner. She even told you that if you ever needed help with anything, you only need to ask her."

"Don't need to ask if someone's already helping me," Jaune countered. "What happened to my face is wholly my own fault, Ruby. Canderous can be a little heartless sometimes, but..." Jaune chuckled nervously. What was there to laugh about this?! "I really didn't know what I was getting into when I enrolled here. Canderous is showing me what to expect when we eventually go on our independent hunts. Really! My grades have gotten better, too. Look." Jaune started typing on his scroll, but Ruby didn't care about getting better grades if it meant getting mauled and scarred like Jaune had gotten.

"Canderous is a bully, Jaune!" Ruby insisted in a half-shout. "He's hurting you! Better grades aren't worth letting a bully walk all over you. Bullies don't care about anyone. People like Canderous don't care about helping you. All they want is to use you like – like a dog that they beat and barely feed, but the dog stays with them because he doesn't know that he has anywhere else to go to."

Adopting Zwei was still the single best decision Ruby has ever made in her entire, short life.

"There are other people, good people, you can go to for help or tutoring, Jaune," Ruby said softly. "Just go ask them."

Jaune's good eye widened as far as his bandages and injuries allowed. He obviously wasn't expecting Ruby's rant. Neither was Ruby. She rarely had the drive or the nerve to lambast or lecture the few people she considered her friends. Being the leader of her team must be doing herself more good than she gave it credit for.

Before Jaune could respond to Ruby's rant, a voice, slightly modulated by a sound filter, cut in. "You're late, Arc."

Everyone in Team CRDL often wore at least parts of their signature armor when not in class. Canderous had his boots, Jaing had his helmet (which wasn't surprising, considering his blatant Faunus features), and Artus had his cape.

Aside from the times when teachers ordered him to fully wear the school uniform under threat of detention, Jango wore his full set of his armor, from the helmet to the jetpack to the gauntlets, all the time.

Jango casually strolled down the hall, his head tilted so that he looked like he was looking down over Ruby and Jaune. Reaching a hand into one of the satchels on his belt, Jango tossed what looked like a bottle in Jaune's direction.

"The ointment for your skin," Jango said as Jaune clumsily caught the bottle. "Better tell us now if you have any more medical issues to deal with. I don't want to hear that you're also allergic to kath hounds. Allergic reactions from them are deadly, and expensive to treat."

Blinking, Jaune gulped uncomfortably. "I'm fighting kath hounds next?"

"Not fighting. Taming."

"Oh, dear god, why..."

Jango shrugged uncaringly. "It's Canderous' game that he's running. You agreed to play it." Jango glanced at Ruby.

Ruby looked back.

They maintained their mutual gaze.

Ruby felt herself tighten her grip on her pack of crackers, the petty rumbles in her stomach long forgotten. It really has been a long time since they last met. Hasn't it?

"He's waiting, Arc," Jango continued, without looking away from Ruby. "Don't waste his time."

"Right, right." Jaune gave one last grin at Ruby. "I guess I'll see you later, Rubes." He ran off, leaving Ruby and Jango to their stare down.

The colors looked different, with more silver, purple, and blue than khaki, green, and brown. Besides that and the height difference, the armor almost looked like a carbon copy of the set Sheriff Fett had worn when he was still alive. Ruby may be a gun nut, but she's also had her eye on armor designs for a long time, too. Journeyman Protector armor and True Mandalorian armor weren't all that different.

Once upon a time, Yang Xiao-Long and Ruby Rose were going to become Huntresses, and Jango and Arla Fett were going to become Journeyman Protectors. That was the dream, until the Death Watch came to Patch and shattered it.

Finally, Ruby broke the motionless air. "You never found her, did you?" she asked.

Deliberately, Jango shook his head. "I found enough to know what happened. Wherever she is now, Arla is in a better place."

"I'm sorry." Ruby hadn't known Arla Fett too well. She had always been more Yang's friend when they were all growing up. Nonetheless, Ruby had still liked Arla. Arla had taught her and Jango how to recognize a trail a person leaves behind when they walk through a dense forest and on a dirt path. It was the first ever hunting lesson anyone ever taught her.

The Fetts were the first people outside of her family that Ruby would consider as close friends. Year after they were gone from her life, she still made sure that she remembered them.

Jango hardly resembled the little boy who had dove into wrestling bouts with Yang, gotten constantly lectured by Arla, and tagged along with Ruby on their adventures around the Fett homestead. Now, Jango looked like a fully-fledged Mandalorian.

Mandalorians could often be scary individuals, and most of the people who called themselves Mandalorians that Ruby has personally met were, unfortunately, bullies.

"Thank you," Jango said curtly. After what felt like an awkward pause, Jango turned his back to Ruby and began marching away.

"Wait a second!" were the words that blurted out of Ruby's mouth before she could think about it. Partly using her semblance, she dashed to block Jango's path. "What happened to you? Why are you here at Beacon? Why are you trying to become a Huntsman?"

If Ruby didn't already know that she was talking to a human being, she would have thought she was talking to a static, unmoving robot. "A lot can happen in seven years," Jango answered.

"I mean– specifically. The True Mandalorians are supposed to be in Mistral."

The True Mandalorians were a sizable nomadic band of mercenaries, with ties to the original Mandalorians from before the Great War. In a lot of ways, they were a lot like Huntsmen and Huntresses; trotting across Remnant, taking freelance jobs without having to directly answer to a Kingdom, and supporting folks in need of a helping hand. The main difference Ruby has seen between a Huntsman and a Mandalorian is that a Huntsman works for the good of humanity while a Mandalorian works for the good of his fellow Mandalorians.

Ruby followed them on the news. Their energy-based blasters were the most efficient in utilizing the potency of synthesized Dust. Canderous' heavy repeaters were proof of that.

"I'm not with them anymore," Jango explained. "Still a Mandalorian, I suppose. Still use the armor, the language, the customs. It all comes as naturally to me as living and breathing." Jango lifted his head, looking absently over Ruby's head. "After I made my peace with what became of Arla, I stayed with them for a while. I was your age. I didn't have much of the drive or the nerve to leave if I really wanted to. Jaster Mereel – You remember him?"

"A little," Ruby confirmed. Jaster Mereel was the sheriff on Patch before Jango's dad. The Death Watch – another offshoot of the old Mandalorians, except entirely made up of bullies with no exceptions – were hunting Jaster down and wanted him dead. He helped Dad, Uncle Qrow, and Sheriff Fett drive the Death Watch off the island on that unforgettable day seven years ago, but Dad and Uncle Qrow still blamed Jaster for attracting the Death Watch to Patch in the first place.

"He adopted me, formally and everything," Jango went on. "Canderous will talk his head off about the glory, legacy, and duty of a Mandalorian, but I don't really care much for that kind of stuff. Being a True Mandalorian just became a banality of being Jaster's son. After he died..."

Ruby held her peace. Some older students and professors may think Ruby to be a naïve little girl, and she admittedly did have her moments of naivety, but Jango didn't need to say more for her to understand.

"You went to your Aunt Rozatta," Ruby said. Aunt Rozatta was an old, retired Huntress from a generation before Team STRQ. She's a friend to many of the families on Patch, especially with the Fetts... before the Fetts were killed... Aunt Rozatta was Ruby's favorite babysitter as a toddler and her favorite substitute tutor whenever Uncle Qrow was too busy out on a hunt. "She told us that you were back in town. Yang and I looked for you." And they never found him until Beacon's initiation ceremony.

"I noticed," Jango remarked dryly. "Yang didn't try very hard." He wasn't wrong. The search for Jango quickly shifted to another chapter in the search of Raven Branwen for Yang, leaving Ruby alone and without any more potential leads to follow up on. "Seven years ago, we were little kids too scared to leave the sandbox. Now, we're practical strangers. I saw no reason for us to get back in touch."

"We don't have to be strangers, though," Ruby disagreed. "I mean, we're going to the same academy. We go to the same classes. I've just been so busy with leader stuff and getting caught up on all the textbooks I skipped 'cause of my early enrollment to try harder to reach out to you." Getting enrolled into Beacon two years earlier than expected was definitely awesome, but it did have some of its downsides. "We can still be friends," Ruby continued. "You can never have too many friends." Hesitantly, she extended her fist forward. It was a stupid thing they did when they were kids, fist-bumping before doing a convolutedly complicated high-five. To be honest, Ruby wasn't really expecting Jango to return the gesture.

Of course, he didn't. "I didn't come to Beacon to make friends," he said stiffly.

"Then why are you here?" Ruby questioned as she let her arm fall.

"To learn," Jango said simply.

"Learn what?"

Jango didn't answer. He tried to sidestep her, but Ruby moved faster and kept him from walking past her. "Stop trying to avoid me!" Ruby snapped hotly. "Like you said, we aren't kids anymore. We can help each other with each other's problems, just like before, but only if we actually start talking again, like real friends."

"I'm not asking for your help," Jango gritted out sternly. "I've moved on from those days. What can't you? Why worry about me when your friend Arc is in over his head and is fine living as Canderous' personal chew toy?"

Ruby grimaced, but she wasn't going to give up just yet. "Mandalorians are supposed to be all about honor. Where's the honor in turning away a friend who cares about you and only wants to help you? Where's the honor in being a bully? In hurting Jaune and forcing him to avoid his friends? I bet that's stuff a person from the Death Watch would –"

All it took was one step forward from Jango, and the front of his helmet filled all of Ruby's vision. She shuddered slightly and froze in shock. She almost thought Jango was going to headbutt her. "I'm not Death Watch," he affirmed with a dangerous edge seeping through his voice filter. "Team CRDL isn't Death Watch. We aren't dishonorable, petty charlatans that murder, steal, and rape because they think it's their birthright. Don't you ever compare my team or myself to those aruetyc, dar'manda scum. Understand?"

Since Ruby finally broke through Jango's shell, she decided to double-down and stand her ground. "Prove it," she dared, making sure to keep her voice strong and level. "Prove that you aren't a bully like the Death Watch, then." Jango kept trying to push Ruby away. If he held by that principle, then he shouldn't feel as though he owed Ruby any explanation after offending him. If he didn't, then maybe the boy Ruby once knew wasn't quite gone yet.

A rumble came from Jango's helmet, maybe an insulted growl. "You never liked bullies," he said lowly. "Neither do I, but there's a difference between bullying and teaching someone how to grow a backbone."

Now Ruby felt insulted. "You've seen Jaune's face! What kind of teaching is that?"

"The merciful kind," Jango answer calmly. "If you're really worried about Jaune, take your complaints to him and Canderous."

Admittedly, Canderous still kind of scared Ruby, but if Jaune wasn't doing anything about him, Ruby would have to confront him herself.

"If I remember it right," Jango continued, "you want to be a Huntress because you want to become a hero. You want to help people. I don't know what Jaune's told you, but he isn't like you in that regard. He's not in the business of helping people. Amateur that he is, he's in the business of becoming the best."

Ruby frowned. "The best at what?"

"The best Hunter that's ever lived," Jango explained. There was a hint of arrogance in his voice. Ruby has heard enough of that kind of haughty talk from Weiss. "Too bad for him, I'm already the best. Always was. Beacon just doesn't know it yet."

Ruby didn't care much about being the best Huntress around. All she really cared about was making it out of hunts alive, making sure other people also made it out alive, and hopefully having a fantastical, epic adventure all the while doing it.

"Bottom line," Jango said with an air of finality, "we might have started in the same place, but now we're out to accomplish different things. Just don't get in my way, and I won't get in yours."

Suddenly, the door to Team RWBY's dorm opened up. Out walked Yang, who let out an obnoxious yawn. "Hey, can you keep it down? Some of us are trying to sleep in–" Yang cut herself short. She stared at Ruby and Jango in bemusement. She stepped forward, and Ruby just realized how tall Jango had grown during the past seven years. He used to be the shortest of their little gang of friends. Now, with Yang by their side, Ruby could tell that he was even taller than Yang by a couple of inches.

With Yang and Ruby in their pjs and Jango in his full armor, Jango didn't seem all that intimidated by the glare Yang was sending him. When Yang's eyes flashed red for a split second, however, Jango said, "Good to see you, too, Yang." Then Jango made his exit. Ruby didn't try to stop him from walking away.

Yang pulled Ruby back inside their dorm. "I still don't like him," Yang told her little sister plainly as she closed and locked the door. "You do know what the news is saying about Mandalorians these days?"

Some sort of Mandalorian cultural war was going on, Ruby recalled. That war was currently in Mistral, though, far from Vale and Beacon. "He used to our friend," Ruby insisted.

"I don't think that he wants to be our friend anymore," Yang pointed out.

That didn't matter. It was Yang's idea for Ruby to get out of her shell more and to try to be more social, to make more friends. Just like how she couldn't simply give up on Jaune letting himself get pushed around by Canderous, Ruby couldn't let this cold, surly loner take the place of the person that was her very first friend.

Mandalorians were supposed to be stubborn, and tremendously loyal to their family. Ruby'll show Jango that a Huntress can be just as relentless when it comes to taking care of her friends.