Look at how a single candle can both defy and define the darkness.
Because when you light a candle, you also cast a shadow.
-Fallen Rose-
"Okay Summer, you need to secure us a space to store our ships," Angie said over the pair's radio to her daughter. "Lantern has already sent favourable subjects that may be able to supply us with the right location with little questions asked."
"What will you be doing Mom?" Summer asked, whilst piloting cloud errant.
"I think... I'll go on a walkabout," Angie replied, a toothy smile playing on her face.
"Wouldn't people notice you?" Drei asked.
"I already have a disguise ready," Angie replied, "The uses of glimmer are simply remarkable."
"You programmed yourself new clothes?! Drei, we could do that?!" Summer exclaimed, excitement in her voice.
"Yes, Summer, as I have explained (numerous times)," Drei mumbled that, "Glimmer can be used to synthesize more than weapons and armour. AND ARMOUR ARE A TYPE OF CLOTHES!"
"Then why don't people wear them all the time?" Summer asked as if it was obvious.
Angie chuckled at the two. "All right you two, no more arguing. I'm setting Death to Kells to autopilot to follow Cloud Errant. Park em' somewhere safe, and then get permission to park them somewhere else. Angie out."
And with that, Angie transmatted out of her ship, new outerwear appearing on the way.
-Fallen Rose-
"The Vytal Festival! Oh, this is absolutely wonderful!" Weiss Schnee remarked as the members of team RWBY made their way through the streets of Vale, which were being decorated for the aforementioned festival.
"I don't think I've ever seen you smile this much, Weiss." Ruby Rose said, frowning a little. "It's kinda weirding me out..."
"How could you not smile?" Weiss asked, turning to Ruby. "A festival dedicated to the cultures of the world! There will be dances! Parades! A tournament! Oh, the amount of planning and organization that goes into this event is simply breathtaking!" Weiss continued to gush.
Yang Xiao Long gave a huff as they resumed walking. "You really know how to take a good thing and make it sound boring."
"Quiet you."
"Remind me again why we're spending our Friday afternoon visiting the stupid docks?" Yang asked, not phased by Weiss' glare.
"It smells like fish," Ruby complained, pinching her nose.
"I've heard that students visiting from Vacuo will be arriving by ship today. And, as a representative of Beacon, I feel as though it is my solemn duty to welcome them to this fine kingdom!" Weiss answered Yang's question before walking away again.
"She wants to spy on them, so she'll have the upper hand in the tournament." Blake Belladonna corrected for Yang as they followed their white-dressed companion.
"You can't prove that."
"Whoa, look over there." Ruby stopped her team and pointed down a street. At the end of it was a dust store, the windows were broken, and yellow police tape wrapped around the area. "What happened here?" Ruby asked one of the officers standing near the outer tape.
"Robbery. Second Dust shop to be hit this week. This place is turning into a jungle." He answered.
"Doesn't help with that dust refinery raid up in Atlas recently. Who place had to be shut down, and now Vale's copp'n the blow."
"Raid?" Weiss asked, worry playing on her face.
"Yeah," The first officer confirmed. "Day or so back, dust refinery was hit. Took some of the refining components, and even defeated the team of huntsmen stationed there to stop the two of them."
"Wait, did you say, 'the two of them'?" Blake asked.
"Yeah, apparently the rumours are that a rouge huntress and some sort of spider Faunus robbed the whole refinery by themselves." The officer answered.
"Must have been sum' sort'a elite White Fang Cell. Defect huntresses and all that." His partner chimed.
"Doesn't really matter to us who did it, but now that it's causing a drop in Vale dust supplies, it now matters to us that it happened at all caus' we have to clean up the scap."
"Hmph! The White Fang, like that's a surprise." Weiss scoffed as she folded her arms. "What an awful bunch of degenerates."
"What's your problem?" Blake asked with a soft, almost unnoticeable, glare.
"My problem? I simply don't care for the criminally insane."
"The White Fang is hardly a bunch of psychopaths. They're a collection of misguided Faunus."
"Misguided? They want to wipe humanity off the face of the planet!"
Blake faltered. "So then they're very misguided. Either way, it doesn't explain why they would rob a Dust shop in the middle of downtown Vale!"
"Hmm, Blake's got a point..." Ruby pondered. "Besides, the police never caught that Torchwick guy I ran into a few months ago... Maybe it was him?"
"And yet, I still see no defence for them robbing that dust refinery." Weiss pointed out. "The fact stays: The White Fang are a bunch of scum. Those Faunus only know how to lie, cheat, and steal."
"That's not necessarily true..." Yang tried to calm Weiss down.
"Hey! Stop that Faunus!" a cried sounded from the dock, distracting team RWBY.
-Fallen Rose-
"You know, disregarding the relatively smaller buildings, a lower grade of technology and absence of Exo, I'd say this really reminds me of the last city." Lantern commented from inside Angie's head.
"I'd have to agree with you there Lant." Angie did most certainly agree.
Walking around another bend, Angie began to see decorations spread throughout the street, and people setting even more up as others marvelled at them.
"Huh, wonder what's going on here?" Angie asked aloud.
"It's the Vytal festival, Ange." Lantern provided. "The people of Remnant hold it to celebrate the end of the war 80 years ago, it's called the 'Vytal' festival due to the name of the island where the peace treaty was signed."
"Well the more you know..." Angie smiled under her white scarf whilst adjusting her red hood, the classic house of Crosses colour combination. Other than those two articles of clothing, Angie also had a set of goggles to hide her extra set of eyes, a red tunic, white undershirt, four brown gloves (with fake extra fingers), grey leggings and what she personally considered were very nice boots.
She liked these boots. Cayde gave them to her.
'Cayde...' Angie thought, 'Will he be okay without me? Bah, of course he will be okay, he's Cayde.'
Angie then paused.
'Oh, Traveller he's Cayde!' was all Angie managed to think before something with collided with her.
-Fallen Rose-
"OOF!" both Weiss and whatever she collided with exclaimed as the air was knocked out of them.
"No, he got away!" Weiss complained.
"Uhh... Weiss?" Yang pointed to the person beneath her teammate. Weiss turned to come face-to-face with a person in a white hood, goggles and a hood scarily similar to the obnoxious red one her partner wore.
"Not to sound rude, but could you get off me?" The person asked.
"Bah!" Weiss exclaimed as she got off the person. The figure then also got up and dusted themselves off with all... four... hands.
RWBY seemed to be caught on this particular detail.
"Well," the person began, "I can't say this is what I had in mind when I chose to explore Vale." She then turned to face RWBY fully. "Hello, my name is Angela, but you may call me Angie."
She offered two hands for Ruby and Weiss to shake. Both girls tentatively returned the gesture before Angie moved to Blake and Yang, shaking their hands also.
"So! What are four young girls going running around haphazardly around the street?" Angie then asked.
"W-well, we w-were welcoming the other students to..." Weiss started, but trailed off, unable to tear her eyes away from the second set of Angie's arms. "What we were doing was..."
"WHY DO YOU HAVE FOUR ARMS?!" Ruby suddenly shouted, pointing at Angela.
"Ruby!" her team shouted at Ruby for her brash approach. They were distracted by a giggle from Angie.
"It's quite alright, it's not the first time I had a comment like that. Well, it's simply my own Faunas trait. Spider." Angie explained.
RWBY then all synchronously relaxed at the, in hindsight rather obvious, answer.
"Well, Angie," Ruby felt uncomfortable calling an adult a nickname, "I'm Ruby, and this is my team." Ruby gestured to her left.
"Weiss,"
"Blake,"
"Yang,"
"Penny."
"Yeah, so anyway, Angie, what are you doing in..." Ruby stopped as she realized something was wrong. She thought for a moment before coming to a realization:
'There are only four people on my team! Not five!'
Ruby spun to see a ginger-haired girl in a grey dress with black leggings, neon green lines running along both.
"WHO ARE YOU?!" Ruby shouted.
"Penny!" the girl answered happily. "I already took the liberty of introducing myself as you all were. It's a pleasure to meet you all! You as well Ms Angela."
"Please, call me Angie." Angie waved off.
"Okay!"
"Huh," Ruby said simply. "Well it's nice to meet you Penny, Angie," Ruby nodded to them both.
"It's a pleasure to meet you too!" Penny repeated.
"You already said that." Weiss pointed out.
"...So I did!" Penny realised, still with a chipper and exuberant attitude.
"So, what are you both doing in Vale?" Yang asked, attempting to draw the conversation out of the apparent loop it had fallen into.
"Visiting." "Fighting in the tournament!" Angie and Penny answered respectively.
"Wait, you're fighting in the tournament?" Weiss asked, all else forgotten in the prospect of scoping out the competition.
"I'm combat ready!" Penny answered with a salute.
"Forgive me, but you hardly look the part." Weiss snarked.
"Says the girl wearing a dress." Blake pointed out.
"Believe it or not, but I've seen people where weirder, huntsmen are rather expressive with their fissions sense," Angie added.
Much like Weiss was distracted by the newly presented future competition, Ruby was distracted by this.
"You're a Huntress?!" Ruby squealed.
Angie chuckled. "I guess you could say that..." she brushed her red cloak away to reveal four angular white revolvers, each with a card imprinted on them ranging from jack to ace, all of them being done in red.
"Wow! They're all so pretty!" Ruby gushed. "What are they called?"
"Royal Straight." Angie sated the red girl's curiosity with a simple answer.
"So cool!"
Angie chuckled at Ruby. "Well it's been nice meeting you all, but I must be going now."
"I believe that we must as well," Weiss nudged Ruby with her elbow.
"Oh, okay," Ruby said sadly, having not been able to look at the huntress' firearms further. "See you around, friends!" Ruby waved goodbye as she and her team left.
-Fallen Rose-
"I can't believe it..." Angie said to Lantern as she watched the young huntress team leave, followed by the android.
"Do you really think it's possible?" Lantern asked, uncertainty playing on her voice.
"Lantern, she looks like a miniature red version of Summer. There's only one explanation for this..."
"Angie..."
"GRANDBABY!" Angie shouted at the top of her many lungs; the sound fortunately silenced by the mask she wore under the scarf so that she didn't draw attention.
Well, any more attention.
"I have a grandbaby, Lantern! This has to be the third-best day of my second life! Right after getting married and legally adopting Summer!" It took all of Angie's energy to stop herself from dancing in the street right then and there.
"Angie, do you know what this even means?" Lantern asked.
"I finally get to spoil somebody without Ikora and Zavala telling me 'stop giving her rocket launchers, it isn't a good idea'?"
"...no, it means that this pretty much proves that Summer was from Remnant. And recently at that."
Angie slowed to a stop.
"Ah." Angie finally declared.
"So we are we telling Summer she has a daughter and was alive about fourteen years ago?"
Angie thought. "...No. Not yet, anyway. We don't know how this may affect her. And why fourteen years?"
"Her daughter?" Lantern pointed out. "She's registered at Beacon Academy, an early graduate of 14. Summer must have been here to give birth to Ruby at least that long ago, and, must have died zero to eight years after that, since Summer is seven."
"Oh yeah. Man, that does complicate things." Angie commented. "But this is just even more reason we shouldn't tell her straight away. We need to focus on getting back to Earth and rendezvous with other guardians, this would only serve to complicate things."
"So no telling Summer?"
"No telling Summer, yet. Come on, we should see if Summer has somewhere for us to stay."
-Fallen Rose-
Cayde 6 was currently not a happy man. Robot. Whatever!
His carefully measured footsteps practically shook the ground, frightening every guardian he passed by. Barely even waiting for the doors to slide apart and let him into the Vanguard room, he quickly moved to the table where both Ikora and Zavala were.
"What. Happened." Cayde asked, no, demanded.
Zavala and Ikora glanced between themselves, neither wanting to break the news to Cayde. After a long silence, it was Ikora who finally spoke.
"We received a transmission from Guardians Summer Ro..."
"What. Happened." Cayde repeated, clearly conveying that he wasn't in any mood for beating around the bush.
Ikora took a breath before restarting. "Angela and Summer sent communication from Mercury concerning the Cabal signal blockers. Apparently, all the factions of darkness were fighting over a gigantic golden age warp gate, leading to an unknown location. When Summer's stealth drive failed, they used the warp gate to flee the battle.
"When our scouts finally arrived there, they reported the gate reduced to rubble and all the factions pulling out. We suspect they were able to pull schematics for the gate and..."
Ikora was interrupted by Cayde's fist slamming onto the table.
"I don't want to know about that. I want to know Where. They. Are."
"...We don't know," Zavala said.
*CRRRKKKK*
The sound of Cayde smashing a datapad against a wall lingered in the silent room. Cayde stepped back from the table with his arms up.
"I'm okay, I'm okay," Cayde announced, calming himself before returning to the table. "So, what can we do?"
"Well, our best chance to both find Angela and Rose and stop whatever the enemies of the city plan to do with the gate schematics, is to follow the trail of whoever was heading their faction's assault at the original gate."
"So where do we start?" Cayde asked almost as soon as Zavala was finished talking.
"With the hive."
All three Vanguard turned to see the owner of the new voice.
"Their magic will be the fastest in creating a functioning Gate." Eris Morn informed. "Normally I say that the Vex would beat them in this, but the transference system is incompatible with their forms.
Zavala's eyes narrowed. "Eris, this meeting is..."
"Vanguard only? Yes, I know. But until Lady Angela returns," Eris stopped when she reached the table, her phantom Merlin appeared, "I am acting Templar Vanguard."
Seeing as Eris was by all accounts correct, none of them had anything to respond to her claim.
"Well, if you can get us to wherever they went, then I don't care who sits in that chair. Metaphorically, since someone keeps saying we don't need them." Cayde shot a glare to Zavala who returned it.
"Eris," Ikora spoke up, not wanting either of her fellow vanguard to use this as a segue into their usual chair debate, "Where do you think they are building it?"
"Saturn," Eris answered swiftly. When she didn't elaborate, Ikora spoke again.
"Why Saturn?" She asked.
"Because of the Dreadnaught," Eris answered again.
"Then I have an Idea." Cayde drew everybody's attention.
"We capture the Dreadnaught"
Please Comment!
