Hi, how's it going everyone? I know, I know, I'm late, but rest assured that I'm not dead, nor is this story, not anytime soon.
Anyways, here's the chapter, do enjoy and as always, reviews are welcome and appreciated.
Ruby Rose yawned as she walked towards the cafeteria, she shouldn't have stayed up so late.
"Jeez, for how long were you and vomit boy at it?" Yang said as she looked Ruby up and down.
Ruby yawned again as she stretched her arms above her head. For how long were they playing? Oh right. "Three hours after you guys went to sleep…" To be honest, Ruby was regretting her choice of challenging Jaune to Mortal Kombat, how was she supposed to know he was a Kotal Kahn main? And good one at that, it took way too long before the two settled on a draw.
"Wait, it was just three hours? Felt like way more," Jaune tiredly said from besides her. Her fellow leader wasn't looking too good either, walking around like a zombie and with eye bags only a late night gamer could have.
Weiss gave them an unimpressed look. "Because just watching movies until 12 wasn't enough for you."
"Yep, definitely beginning to regret that decision…"
As the group of RWBY + JNPR were right next to the cafeteria, Ruby spotted someone else coming, someone she could recognize. "Huh… that's the huntress from yesterday."
"Oh really, the same huntress you crashed into?" Yang said as she brought a hand to her chin, a smirk slowly forming on her lips.
Ruby knew that it could only mean one thing. "Oh no…"
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Tranquility tried to always be aware of her surroundings, it was, after all, one of the many lessons beaten into her during her training, however, her thoughts had been keeping her mind occupied as of late, so much so that Tranquility found herself not fully noticing things happening around her.
Her stomach growled as if to answer her. Maybe she was just hungry.
Tranquility had only made it 5 steps into the cafeteria before someone tapped her shoulder, she turned to see a tall blonde girl with a small amount of annoyance in her eye, though her mask kept her from seeing that.
"Hello!" the blonde said with a singing like tone.
Tranquility tilted her head at the girl, but before she could answer, another voice spoke.
"Yang, please don't." the voice that came from behind the blonde was rather low in volume, not much louder then a whisper, still, for Tranquility's trained ears, the voice was one that she immediately recognized.
Tranquility tilted her head further to the side in order to get a better look at the small girl in the red cape who stood with an embarrassed look, it was rather amusing seeing her tugging at her cape and glancing around. A thought came to Tranquility's mind, what wss her name again? She pondered on it for a brief moment before another thought interrupted her current one, a much darker one.
For the briefest of moment, for the thousandth of a thousandth of a second, Tranquility didn't see a girl, she didn't see a student, a treacherous part of her mind made her see something else entirely different, it came in the form of a word that vanished just as swiftly as it came.
Sheep.
Just as that word faded from Tranquility's mind, she remembered the girl's name. Tranquility glanced at the blonde, who was now looking at her with a strange look, had she truly taken so long to answer? She sighed to herself, she hated being this unaware. With a final shake of her head, Tranquility took a step towards the caped girl.
"Ruby, that was your name, was it not?" She finally spoke.
The girl in question looked at Tranquility with confusion and surprise. "Y-yeah, that's me, but how did you-?"
Tranquility didn't give Ruby the time to finish asking her question before answering it, pointing her finger at the white figure to the side. "Weiss said it when we met, just as you said hers."
The silence that followed after she said that was almost deafening, it as Tranquility's turn to feel confused. Had she said something wrong?
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Oh no, this was not going well, not at all! Ruby wished she could just hide under her hood and disappear, she regretted ever mentioning the huntress to Yang, she regretted everything! I mean, what was she supposed to answer to that?! She looked behind to see if she could get any help, the rest looked just as lost as her.
Jaune was just blinked repeatedly before looking at Ruby's silent plea for help and forming an x with his arms while shaking his head, Blake was simply staring at the whole situation with a look of mild amusement, Pyrrha laughed nervously, looking like she wanted to be anywhere but here, Weiss was just being Weiss, standing with her arms crossed and looking at Ruby with a single raised eyebrow, Ren just looked passive at the whole thing, but he did offer her a supportive thumbs up.
And then there was Nora. "Well this is awkward," she muttered very loudly as she leaned towards Ren, as if she was telling him some big secret.
"Anyways!" Yang thankfully interfered before the conversation turned any more awkward than it already was. "I just wanted to apologize for my sister running into you like she did, Ruby's semblance can pack quite the punch when going at full speed."
"She already apologized, it was the first thing she did."
"I mean a proper apology," Yang said with a small smirk. "Just come sit with us and we'll get you some breakfast, deal?"
The masked huntress hummed before stepping to the side. "Lead the way then."
With that said, the group of teams JNPR and RWBY began the short walk to their usual corner in the cafeteria, taking the same seats as usual, or at least it would be if Yang hadn't seated the huntress right across from Ruby, for that, she glared daggers at her older sister.
"Righty then, it's the usual for everyone, right?" Yang asked, to which she received nods from everyone. "Be right back then, and meanwhile, you two." the blonde brawler patted Ruby and the huntress in the shoulder "Can get to know each other!"
Oh no, no way this was going to happen, she needed to find an excuse, anything would do!
Right as she finished that thought, it was like a light bulb suddenly lit up in her head, yes, it could work! "Yang forgot to ask what you wanted!" Ruby said as she got up from her seat, more than happy to delay the conversation with the woman in front of her as much as she could.
The huntress tilted her head for a moment, looking at Ruby with what felt as confusion. "Does it matter what I want?"
Ruby almost recoiled at the question. "Of course it does!"
The woman hummed to herself, thinking for a moment before answering. "Anything will do."
"Riiiight, I'm just gonna go tell Yang, be back in a sec!" she darted out of there as fast as she could without using her semblance, quickly catching up with Yang. "Yang! Why are you doing this?!"
"What, getting food?"
"No, not that!" Ruby said with a quick shake of her head "Why are you making me to talk to her? She doesn't even seem all that interested in talking!"
"Weren't you the one complaining about not apologizing properly last night?" Yang said with a smirk.
"I'm really starting to regret saying anything…" she said with a sigh.
"Try to look on the bright side, you get to talk to a real huntress, maybe she'll give you some tips, help you out with training?" Yang chuckled and proceeded to ruffle Ruby's hair, to which she tried to swat her sister's hand away, which of course didn't work. "Besides, what's not cool about having an honest to Oum huntress as a friend?"
That… didn't sound bad at all, there was one thing though. "Do you really think she'd like to be my friend?"
Yang shrugged. "Welp, not gonna find out if you don't ask, Rubes."
Ruby hummed, then grumbled, and after considerating the thought for a full five seconds, she reluctantly agreed. "Fine! I'll talk to her."
Yang grinned at her answer. "That's the spirit! What did she want for breakfast by the way?" Ruby stopped, looking at her sister with confusion, this earned a laugh from the blonde. "You really think I just forgot to ask? Oh my dear sister, it's all part of my carefully crafted plan."
Yang could sometimes be scary.
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Tranquility found herself looking around the cafeteria as she waited for Yang and Ruby to return, mostly just observing the rest of the warriors. The Vikings were of course, being the loudest in the entire room, gaining the looks from students who didn't seem to appreciate their boisterous laughter, not that Vikings seemed to care.
The Samurai on the other hand, were the exact opposite, giving thanks for the food before silently eating, keeping the whole affair as a rather calm one, she liked that part about them.
Then there were her fellow Knights, who almost managed to blend in with the rest of the students, almost.
"Those guys are pretty loud…" The blonde kid spoke with a tired voice.
Tranquility looked over at the table where the Vikings were sitting at just as Torbjorn, the raider, fell over backwards as an apple struck his face, courtesy of a displeased looking Frea; laughter erupted from the table at that.
The silver haired girl huffed with annoyance written all over her. "That's just barbaric."
"Well I think they look fun!" Exclaimed the energetic redhead.
Fun? Tranquility took a moment to think about it, it wouldn't be the word she'd use to describe the Vikings. Fearless, passionate, united, free; those would be the words she'd use to describe them if she were asked to do so, but now that she looked at them, at the victorious grin on the Valkyrie's face at seeing Torbjorn down on the ground as he was, at how carefree they seemed to be, it made her think that perhaps- "That's not a bad way to describe them."
"Do you know them?" were she any other person, Tranquility would have been startled by the blond kid's question interrupting her thoughts, she was too well trained for that however.
"I do," she answered plainly, which resulted in a long silence that Tranquility didn't mind, though the students clearly did if the glances they gave each other said anything.
The students, after a few moments of silent debate, turned to the blonde kid, who sighed at the numerous stares. "So uh…" he tapped his fingers on the table, unsure as to how to talk to her. "Ruby said you're a huntress! How's professional work like, what's it like being on the field?"
Tranquility tilted her head at him and blinked a few times. A huntress? Did they think she was a warrior like Qrow? She hummed to herself, considering her answer.
She didn't know what a huntress did, she could take a guess based on the title and what she'd seen Qrow do during their time as traveling companions but guessing wouldn't be good enough to answer his question, making assumptions would lead to mistakes, on the other hand she could simply be truthful about her duty, however, considering this wasn't Heathmoor, the students were bound to not be familiar with the term Peacekeeper, and that would prompt questions that Tranquility wasn't sure that she could, or wanted to answer . After a brief moment of considering both options, she spoke.
"It is tiring, the stress can be overwhelming, but it is also liberating." In the end, Tranquility decided that she should follow along with their assumptions, and use that to gather information, masking any questions she had as tests of the student's knowledge.
"Liberating? How?" asked the emerald eyed redhead.
Tranquility opened her lips to answer, when a metal tray of sorts was placed upon the table seemingly out of nowhere. "Aaaaand we're back, dig in everyone!" Exclaimed the blonde girl with a smile.
Tranquility tilted her head as the plates of food on the tray were swiped away by the others with words of thanks and one of the two redheads loudly exclaiming "pancakes!"
In the end there was only a plate of what looked like two slices of bread with an egg in the middle alongside some sausages.
"I'm sorry if you don't like it, you said that anything would be fine so…" said ruby nervously.
Tranquility tilted her head and took the plate before looking at Ruby. "It's fine, thank you."
The girl giggled nervously at her answer but didn't say anything else and the students began to talk amongst themselves as they ate, Tranquility on her part stared at the food in front of her, something about it seemed so familiar, yet she couldn't quite place it down, the peacekeeper sighed and lightly shook her head, that could wait, right now she needed to eat.
Tranquility lifted her mask, allowing her lips to show, and began to eat using the fork that came with the plate. The first bite was like an explosion of flavour in her mouth, the second was just as good, it suddenly felt like a door had been opened to her. A lesson that had been beaten into her by her trainers was to eat only what she needed to keep herself alive, it was a lesson which was beaten into her and thus never broke, which meant that Tranquility mostly ate bread and water with the occasional dried fish or salted meat, not once had she gone out of her way to try something different, why would she? Now though, for the first time she realized that there was more to food than just survival, the realization made her realize just how hard her heart was beating, her eyes suddenly felt heavy, and finally, a single tear threatened to roll down her cheek. Confused, she discreetly wiped it away, why did that happen?
"So! What we're you talking about before we came in?" The blonde girl's voice drew Tranquility out of her stupor.
"She was about to tell us about her work as a huntress," politely answered the green eyed redhead.
"Oh really? Awesome!" the blonde girl said as she leaned forward on the table. "So, tell us about it uh…" she began humming to herself before turning to look at the other blonde on the table. "What was her name again?"
The kid facepalmed as the sudden realization that he'd forgotten to ask her name dawned on him. "I forgot to ask…"
The girl snorted, then giggled, and finally broke out in laughter, as she did, Ruby perked up. "W-we should introduce ourselves then! I'm Ruby, Ruby Rose."
Tranquility looked at Ruby, and, realizing that she was expected to give her name in return, she spoke. "Tranquility."
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Alistair sighed as he finished his food, after weeks of travel, proper food was indeed a blessing, now that he'd finished though, it was time to get back to business.
He stood up and cracked his neck before picking up his helmet from the table. "Conscript, follow me," he said firmly to the girl which had been sitting next to him.
"Wha-?! But I'm not finished yet!"
"I wasn't asking, now follow," he said before beginning to walk off. At this answer, Virgil hurriedly stuffed as much food as she could into her mouth before hurriedly following after him.
After a few moments of walking, Virgil swallowed loudly before speaking. "Uh… where we going?"
"To the arena, your training begins today," he said plainly.
Virgil's answer came in the form of a whimper. Alistair snorted at the pitiful noise, he truly was curious about how she ever managed to survive as a bandit, let alone before that, she was no warrior, that much as clear, but that wasn't what made him so confused. She was insecure, timid, easily distracted and most importantly; afraid.
Other warriors would not have begged for mercy at the executioner's block, other warriors wouldn't have hesitated to join the fight against the Grimm, other warriors wouldn't have hidden behind their shields.
That wasn't the worst of everything, he'd also noticed how incredibly thin she was, having seen her in the most minimal clothing as a consequence of not letting her out of sight, and the sight was not pleasant. It wasn't the worst case of malnourishment he'd seen, but it was getting there, her cheeks and eyes were sunken in and her pale, sickly dry skin had begun to cling to her bones.
She was a failure as a warrior, anyone with half a brain would say the same, and yet, even though she hesitated, she charged forward to save the life of a fellow warrior during the Grimm attack, and more impressively, she did not flee when he confronted her the day before, even though she knew he could have easily killed her.
Yes, the girl was afraid of pretty much everything, but she was no coward, and even though he wouldn't admit it out loud, he was impressed by that, having seen one too many 'promising' recruits with the right training and equipment flee as soon as the first blood was spilt.
She had potential, he only needed to exploit it.
Alistair stopped in front of the door to the arena before opening the door with a nod, it was time to get to work.
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Ozpin hummed as he observed the camera feeds, it was interesting to see what the warriors did after their breakfast, some wandered around, others went to the library to read, and finally there was the outliers. The one with the golden armor, Alistair if he remembered correctly, took the conscripted child to the arena, and at the moment was training her in one of the most ruthless ways he'd seen, there was also the one Qrow told him was named Tranquility, who was currently walking around Beacon with none other than teams RWBY and JNPR, he also noticed the crow that flew seemingly alongside them, following them as best he could from the outside of the building. Ozpin lightly chuckled, he didn't blame Qrow for being protective of his nieces, but the woman clearly meant no harm.
Ozpin switched to the next set of cameras, only to see the most interesting thing, a handful of warriors were looking at the technology around Beacon as if it was some sort of mystical thing.
It was at that moment that he decided that his questions couldn't wait more. He took his scroll and called Glynda, as he waited for her to answer, he glanced at the file he'd shown Qrow.
Glynda finally picked up her scroll. "Yes?"
"Could you please send Widren Atlas to my office? There's an important matter I wish to discuss with him."
Silence hung in the air for a moment before she answered. "Of course," she said before hanging up.
Ozpin sighed and took a look at the cameras again. "This will be interesting."
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH! That one scene with team RWBY took me an eternity to write, I must have redone it about five times before finally settling with this, now, onto reviews!
Brian.H.H.: Glad to hear you like my characters! It's really reassuring to hear as i often go through scenes three or four times just to check that what they say , do or think is consistent with previous chapters, now as for Virgil... All in due time friend, all in due time ;)
