Sorry one more time, slight Wi-Fi problem but all fixed.
Anyway, here we are again, been a while since I last posted on this one, also I've seen the RWBY: Ice Queendom and holy crap it is beautiful, and the Volume 9 trailer OH MY GOD! I cannot wait! AHH!
I do not own RWBY only my OC's and the change of selected scenes that are not in the real episodes / chapters.
Enjoy!
The Daughter of Bad Luck
Volume 1 Chapter 4 - Campfire stories
'Sharing your story is a courageous step towards healing your own heart," - Lynda Cheldelin Fell.
It has been weeks since Hawke became Professor, her impression on the students have gotten better then she hoped for, several students from the other years decided to join in with the first years, much to Headmaster Ozpin's delight, however for Hawke more students mean more paperwork and more paperwork means extraordinarily little sleep while trying to grade every single student. Due to this, she had been told by Ozpin the little adventures of her cousins and their friends in the Forever Fall Forest and at Vale's Docks. Hawke was so close to develop a twitch after hearing that, she told them off with a warning after they explained everything about why they were at the dock's in the first place.
Aside from that, Hawke was glad to see her cousins have gotten good friends in Beacon already especially for Ruby, but that led to her letting the truth about Hawke's relation to them out, Hawke could just imagine her Little Rose kicking herself for doing it, nevertheless thankfully only team JNPR are the only ones that are in the knowing.
On that note, the stress was getting to the young Professor, however she came up with an idea for some experience with the outdoors, after going it through with Goodwitch they are getting the plan into motion with some help from the other teachers.
Hawke is in her room, leaning on her desk, dead to the world in slumber, as the sun rises for a brand-new day. Her lightly snoring soon turns into grunts of discomfort, Hawke wakes up in a jump, she falls off her chair backwards onto the floor, clinging to her face over her scar, breathing fast, trying to calm down shaking like a leaf.
"Damn it," she mutters getting up from the floor still holding her face.
She calms herself before looking at the desk, seeing where the papers have landed, she gathers the papers, putting them to one side.
"I need to stop staying up late," Hawke says, gently rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. "Right, I better make sure I got everything; it's going to be a long weekend."
Hawke grabs a bag already packed for the night, straps her weapons on her back and belt, and leaves her room.
Meanwhile on the Beacon Grounds.
Teams RWBY and JNPR received a message on their scroll, saying to meet near the Beacon cliffs and are to wait for a professor to take them on a weekend survival trip into the Emerald Forest. Once they arrived they found medium size rucksacks, their names on each one for that student, and all of the bags have a lock on them.
"That's odd," Jaune says. "Why are they locked?"
"So, none of you can have a peek in just yet," Hawke says, walking towards them.
"Hey Cousin," Yang greeted, the two high fived. "You going to guide us this weekend?"
"No Prof Peach is doing it," Hawke says sarcastically. "Of course, it's me Firecracker."
"Why do I get the feeling that you leading us was a set up?" Weiss says.
"Hey," Hawke replied with her hands up for surrender. "My hands were tied, Goodwitch picked who would be with who."
"So, who has Cardin and his team?" Pyrrha asked.
"Goodwitch herself," Hawke laughed. "Krama for the win. Anyway, down to business, as you lot know the meaning of this weekend is to get you the idea of what it would be like on the road when on missions. Right let's not waste any more time, lets head down."
"We are going to launch ourselves are we?" Jaune asked, his shoulders slumped.
"No that's Ozpin's way," Hawke replied as she walks to the cliffs edge. "We are doing it my way; grab your bag and I'll meet you at the bottom."
She jumps off, the teams run to the edge, seeing Hawke climbing down the cliff like it is nothing.
"Your Cousin is trying to kill us," Weiss says.
"No, she isn't," Ruby replied.
"Not yet anyway," Yang muttered.
"Yang!"
After they got down, with Jaune being the last one, they followed Hawke into the forest, after about 30 minutes of walking Hawke stops at address the group.
"Alright Kids," Hawke says getting her scroll out. "We are going to be staying in one part of the forest till Monday morning, so until we get there we are going to do tasks and I'm going to test your knowledge."
They carry on walking, Hawke still taking the lead, it was sometime before Hawke asked them the first question.
"Q and A, what is the most important thing that the body cannot live without?"
"Pancakes?" Nora says first.
"Maybe to you Nora," Hawke replied, "But no."
"Food?" Nora asked again, before anyone else could.
"Yes but not quite." Hawke responded.
"Water?" Jaune guessed.
"Ding-Ding, we have a winner, the body cannot survive without water for more than three days tops, while as for food you can go for 21 days, depending on your weight, now the first task is to find a water source, within a certain time frame, Starting now, fan out and when you find a stream or river call out."
As being told the teens started to search, Pyrrha was the first find a river after 20 minutes, they all grabbed their metal water bottles once Hawke unlocked each of their bags, and once filling up the metal canteen and dropping a small tablet to purify the water, they carried on walking.
Before the daylight was starting to fade into nightfall, they find a good camping spot, in a nice small grassy land, the trees perfectly surrounding the area, Hawke sent the selected teens to do tasks for their base camp, Ruby, Yang, Pyrrha and Nora set up their tents, one per team, Blake and Ren where to collect enough fire wood for the night, while Weiss and Jaune are to start a campfire while Hawke watched them as she gets out a steel kettle and filling it with the water she collected. Jaune did start it right, while Weiss was struggling, which was no surprise to the young Prof, so she had to stand in, showing how to make fire with two sticks, after Weiss finally got some flame and trying to keep it going by adding dry leaves on it only for it to go out again, it was getting dark so Hawke just got a box of matches getting the fire going, not pleasing Weiss at all for finding that Hawke had an easy way the whole time…but where was the fun in that.
The rest of the group finished the tasks by the time the stars where about to shine, and after setting there collapsible camping stools they eat camp food ready in bag with their waters poured into steel mug with their insignia on the side, that where in the pack bags. After eating they all agreed that is not the best kind of grub, at least its better then the bread in Beacon's canteen, but when you are sleeping under the stars far away from the café or a five-star hotel with a buffet, you take what you can get out in the wilds. But learning on where to forage is not until tomorrow.
However, Nora being the little foody that she is, manged to sneak a bag of marshmallows and chocolate to make s'mores, Hawke was questioning herself how the ginger haired girl was able to hide it but then she thought if her Uncle can ship a Corgi in the mail, then why question the laws of physics.
"Well, we are camping," Hawke says as she grabs her bag. "And what's a camping trip without hot chocolate."
"Is it your own make," Ruby asked, her eyes shine.
"You know it Little Rose," she replied, taking out the bag.
"Homemade?" Ren asked.
"Yeah, Grandma Aquila's family recipe, didn't bring the milk, I didn't know if anyone's lactose intolerant, but it tastes just as good, also never keep a milk in your bag unless its powdered because your bag and everything in it will stink to high heaven."
She looks at where Ruby is sat.
"That was one time," Ruby replied with a whine.
"That one time Ruby stank the whole house for 2 weeks," Yang says, shuddering at the memory.
"Who wants a mug?"
All teens except from Weiss handed their mugs to her, putting two teaspoons of the chocolate powder, then the now hot water from the kettle, pouring the right amount in each mug.
"I could get use to this," Nora says dipping her s'more in her hot chocolate. "Did you and your team did this too during beacon?" Nora asked before eating.
"Yeah, we did," Hawke replied, smiling sadly.
The teens not related to her looked concerned.
"I lost my team 4 years ago on a mission," Hawke replied, putting her mug on the ground near her feet.
"Oh… sorry," Nora replied sadly.
"It's okay, you didn't know, that's one of the reasons why Ozpin asked me to be a teacher, we may prepare you to kill the Grimm and save lives, but they don't prepare you the consequences of when you lose a teammate or more, which I pray that what happened to me never happens to anyone."
"When you graduate, you can decide to stay as a team or go on your own or whatever your reason of being a Huntsman, my team and I, Team HNTR, we agree to stay together for a year, to see how we go, and we completed every mission with no problem, we took every mission that was offer to us, in Vale, Mistral and Vacuo, when our year was almost up, we agreed to stay as a Team," Hawke says, smiling at the memory.
"One day, we got a call from Atlas, a Dust Mine collapsed due to an ancient Grimm they woke or something down the line, trapping many miners, my teammates wanted to help, so we went there as fast as we could, their was a small helping party, a mix of Miners that got out in time, their families and a few Atlas soldiers, and when I say few I mean, like three or four."
Weiss face turned to shame hearing how the Atlas military hardly helped, and a horrible feeling in the pit of her stomach know the Dust Mine belongs to her Father's Company.
"We managed to find where the safe zones inside the mines, where most of the miners took refuge, the first two where easy to get to, but the rest that where trapped deep where Faunus workers, we had to go into the main routes to where they were once there we carefully dig enough to let them out. But we had to be careful with the Grimm was still in the mine, my partner and I help guided them to the exit while the other half stayed to help the treat the more wounded miners. I'll never forget the happy and relief of the families of those we got out, seeing them reunited."
Blake has a small smile, knowing that Hawke cares for the Faunus too.
"All was left was several miners, my team gathered the rest as I took the lead, helping two chameleon Faunus to walk, we were halfway to the exit but, the Grimm attacked, we were in a close space, I gave my partner the Faunus I was holding, I started to fight it hoping to lead it away from them, but the stupid Grimm lost balance hitting the dust in the walls, the tunnel collapsing it started to block both ends, I tried to get to my friends and the others, the rocks fell from above me, then an dust explosion, then nothing but darkness."
Team JNPR have shocked looks, Nora had a s'more in her hand that she dipped in her Hot Chocolate stayed forgotten halfway in the story, Ruby and Yang having heard what happened before having concerned and sad look in their eyes, Weiss and Blake was not looking at her staring into the fire that has gotten smaller, Hawke puts a few logs on before continued.
"The next thing I know I woke up at Atlas academy medical wing, feeling like a Goliath sat on me, and finding out that my friends and the rest with us did not make it."
"My injuries where serious, nearly got blinded," she points to her scarred face. "Cracked and bruised ribs, broke my left femur in two."
"Yikes!" Nora cringed, the other apart form the sisters made a 'Oh that's got to hurt' face.
"Broke my hand that lead to this," Hawke removes her full glove showing four robotic fingers and knuckles, Pyrrha and Weiss cover their gasps with their hands. "I spent five months there, I would have gotten out in three if I didn't had major blood loss, I later found out that someone started to do a blood transfusion on the way to Atlas, saving my life, and the moment I could walk I took the first flight back home, took some time out till I was recovered."
"You didn't wait till you was healed enough?" Jaune asked.
"After what happened I didn't want to spend any more time there, plus I had this two worrying about me," Hawke looked at her cousins, as she puts her cloth back on. "Not long after getting back to starting missions, I'd met the former leader of the White Fang."
Blake flinched as she was about to take another sip of her drink, Hawke noticed but the others did not.
"Anyway, I think that's enough campfire stories for one night, this is going to be a task for you lot."
"Wait what?" Nora asked.
"The Grimm are more active at night, so when out here, you need to make a sleep list on how long you rest and how long you stay up and keep watch, so half of you will stay up with me for this night and the other half will do tomorrow night."
The teens look at one another.
"So, who wants to go first?" she asked.
Blake raised her hand.
"Alright Blake, the lot of ya in your tents and get some rest, when Blake is done I'll tell her who to wake up next."
The rest start heading to their team tents.
"Oh, and you better get to sleep fast, because the hours fly by before you know it."
After ten minutes the teens got into sleeping bags and as told, Hawke drawn her Nevermore, putting the tip in the ground to stand up straight within her reach, Blake taking her teacher's act does the same but lays Gambol Shroud on her lap. Hawke and Blake remained silent for another 30 minutes or so, to be sure the others where deep asleep, once they're both hear a mix of light and heavy snoring, more heavy on Nora's behalf, is when Hawke spoke, breaking the silence.
"What is it you want to talk about Blake?"
"So, you knew who I really was from the moment we met?"
"Yep, I cannot forget the name Belladonna, your dad's a good person, he and his wife, I was surprised that I would get a visit from them."
"I heard they went to Vale, but not knowing the reason, but why?"
"Because my teammates where Faunus," Hawke replied, getting her photo out for her pocket from her belt, she gestures Blake to come closer. "They heard what happen and they wanted to give their condolences."
Once she was close, Hawke handed her the photo, Blake's eyes widened, the photo shown Hawke and her team in their school days, seeing Beacon in the background, Hawke being the tallest of the three female Faunus, one on Hawke's left has Black hair with matching round ears on the top of her head, and the other two on her right, twins with white pointed canine ears on their heads too, Hawke's arms on their shoulders, the black haired girl's hand was holding Hawke's hand, the twins where giving the peace symbol, and winking, all four of them smiling happily.
"Natalie Nightshade," Hawke says softly. "The Panther Faunus was my Partner, she was from Mistral, and the Twins Tabitha and Rachel Snow, they were from Mantel. When we became a team and me as Team Leader, they thought I was one of those racist bastards like back at their Kingdoms, I was hurt at first, but I could not blame them, after when they got comfortable enough to tell me about their past, I was patience, and I had to prove I was nothing like the people who have hurt them."
"I take it, other Faunus in the school thought so too?" Blake asked handing back the photo.
"Yes," Hawke replied with a sigh. "And that's when the other humans starting bullying them, I took great pleasure in beating the crap out of anyone who picked on my teammates, the amount of detentions I got from Goodwitch was worth it, but thankfully they got the message and stopped bullying them within the first school year, me and the girls became as close as, as a family, and became one of the best teams in Beacon."
"Did Yang and Ruby meet them too?"
"Oh yeah, my team adored them, whenever we got time off, I'd invite them to my Dad's apartment or Uncle Tai's home in Patch, the girls didn't have anyone to go home too, so my home became their home."
Blake smiled at that, seeing how Yang and Ruby didn't treat her any different after her secret was revealed, but her mind went back to Hawke's story of the horrible fate of her team.
"The Dust Mine, was it-"
"Schnee," Hawke cut Blake's sentence. "Yeah, and that was one of the reasons why we wanted to help the Miners, because that prick didn't want to spend his money in saving them, Gods I wanted to march up to Atlas and knock his block off, and after what happened in the Mine oh boy he added salt to my wounds."
"I'm so sorry for what happened," Blake says, her bow folds down.
"Thank you."
"The Chameleon Faunus you were helping," Blake asked, a horrible feeling in her heart. "Did they talked to you at all?"
"Yeah, they talked about their daughter."
Blake looked away, her heart hurt, feeling more terrible, but she had to know if it her intuition was right.
"Do you know their daughter?"
"Yeah, she, she was my friend."
"She went to the White Fang after that, didn't she?"
"She told me she and her parents are from Atlas, and after they died she joined."
Hawke sighed deeply, rubbing the bridge of her nose, Blake watches her.
"And what made you leave?" Hawke asked her.
"I, I could not stand how things where in the White Fang, I was ashamed, and someone I trusted… changed, I want to right the wrongs I have done."
"And you made the big step to a better life," Hawke replied, gently patting Blake's shoulder. "Your folks would proud of ya."
Blake looks away at Hawke, holding her tears, she felt weight lifted of her shoulders.
"And I meant what I said on day one, if you ever want to talk, my door is always open."
After another hour, Hawke took a small walk around the area for any Grimm while Blake stayed at the campfire, when she returned she tells Blake to get some rest and wake up Weiss. Blake nods and goes to her team's tent, when Hawke told her story she notices not only Blake feeling uncomfortable but the young Heiress too, know she has questions of her own. It was not long before she notices Weiss walking towards her.
"Why did you pick me next," Weiss asked as she takes her seat.
"I know you have more questions, ones for not be heard by the others."
Weiss gave Hawke a look, she cannot read this woman, first knowing that she is related to Ruby and Yang, then finding out that she knows her sister, not to mention that they have fought one another, on numerous occasions. And now knowing that she lost her teammates to her the family company, when Hawke spoke of her father not caring to more effort into helping the workers.
"Here," Hawke says handing her a mug of hot chocolate.
"Why?" Weiss questioned.
"You didn't get one, and it looked like you could do with one."
Weiss takes the mug, but didn't drink from it.
"How did you meet my sister?" Weiss asked.
"Oh," Hawke looks up at the sky to think. "It was during my second year at Beacon, Ozpin and Ironwood wanted to have team building exercise oh some shit, the kids in Atlas aren't student the are soldiers, they don't treat their teammates like friends, that is one of the many reasons why I hate Atlas.
"Then Winter didn't get alone with you,"
"Ho yeah she hated my guts, even more when I whooped her ass in our first fight," Hawke says with a small laugh. "But in time of her stay at Beacon and then whenever we crossed paths, we formed a, umm, coexistent with each other, if not then she would have saved my life."
"Beg your pardon?!"
"She was the one that gave me the blood transfusion, her quick thinking saved me."
"Winter used her own blood to safe you!"
"Yep," Hawke says popping on the 'p'.
"I never thought she would do that," Weiss muttered looking down into her mug.
"People will surprise, and you don't need to feel guilty for what your father did, that's why you came to beacon, is it?"
Weiss looks at Hawke. Hawke was right
"To be honest I would have done the same thing if I had an asshole of a Dad, but I'm sure you made the right choice coming here, I've seen you becoming different from day one, Winter would be proud you."
"Did, did Winter mentioned me whenever you two would meet?"
"Oh yeah, not as much as I talk about my cousins, but yeah in her own way."
Hawke stands up and grabs her weapons.
"I'm going for another walk, keep the fire going and hurry up and drink begore it gets cold."
Weiss watches her leave, she looks down at the drink, before taking a small sip, then looks back where Hawke walked off too, then back at the mug. It tasted nothing like the ones she got from Atlas, it was better.
There you go, I thought I would skip most parts of Volume 1, it was so we could get to the good stuff sooner, but I hope you liked Hawke's campfire story and her bonding with the teams, and I'll add detail flashbacks in the near future too.
Please leave a comment or a review down below.
Stay safe and take care of yourselves.
Next chapter will be in 'Legend of Korra'.
So, till next time. X