Excitement danced around the air, people couldn't wait to walk upon the hallowed ground that was Beacon Academy, but they did have to wait, at least until they were cleared at the gate. As soon as Jaune stepped off the dock, he took a moment to burn the sight of the academy in his memory, this was his first step towards being a Huntsmen. He couldn't wait to be taught how to become a hero, he took a step forward, and then stopped; they hadn't told him where to go.
An explosion shattered the silence, and his attention was grabbed by two girls arguing. One was the cloaked girl, and the other was...
White, crowned, white, pony tailed, scarred, white. What does she look like? A doll, a princess, but girls don't like those, an angel would probably do, but 'the angel girl' doesn't roll off the tongue.
He waste time trying to think about what to call her. He was normally able to make a name in the first second but she was giving him a little trouble. While he was busy, the bow girl joined the duo.
Angel, white Angel, Snow Angel would do.
He took too long. Snow Angel and bow girl had left the cloaked girl, who had just collapsed to the ground. He could relate, one bad encounter could seem like the worst thing to ever possibly happen, luckily he was more carefree after death. He smiled and walked over to the girl.
The cloaked girl looked up when he blocked out the sun. "Need a hand?" He asked as he held out a gloved hand towards the cloaked girl.
The girl took his hand and pulled herself up. "Hey, you're that crazy laughing guy." She said with a smile.
"And I've been calling you the cloaked girl in my head, but I don't say it out loud." He said as he walked, and dragged her by her hand.
"It's a hood, and you could call me Ruby." She said as she started walking on her own.
"I heard your name, the Not-Demon girl said it." He let her hand fall from his grasp.
"Not-Demon girl? Do you mean Yang?"
"Yang may be what you call her."
The cloaked girl looked conflicted and confused.
"'Crazy Laughing guy' doesn't really roll off the tongue. Not like Jaune Arc, it's short, sweet, rolls right off the tongue and ladies love it." Jaune smiled, the introduction was supposed to have been for him, but hopefully it could help Ruby relax.
She looked at him, her eyes examined his face. "They do?" She sounded surprised and doubtful.
"Totally, they just don't know it yet." He said with an exaggerated wink.
Ruby giggled, but her face quickly adopted an awkward expression as the silence stretched on.
Jaune would have found something else to talk about, but she was faster.
"Look at this!" She shouted as she whipped out a red and black box that quickly expanded into a scythe.
"That's awesome." He whispered.
She smiled.
"What is it?" He whispered.
Ruby twitched. "This baby is Crescent Rose, a war Scythe and a high-impact sniper rifle!"
"I don't even know what that is, but it sounds cool."
"It's a gun."
"Awesome."
"What's that?" She asked and pointed to the weapon hooked onto his belt.
Jaune unclipped his scabbard, expanded it into its shield form, and drew out his sword. "These elders are named Crocea Mors, they've served my family for nearly a century."
"Whoa." Ruby said.
The sound of birds suddenly chirping stole her attention, and she looked around. He also looked around, there was a small river, some trees, and no one else around.
"Where are we?" She asked.
"No idea." He admitted.
"Jaune!" Ruby whined.
Eventually someone was able to tell them where to go. It was a big room filled with potential Beacon students and a stage.
Yellow. Pain.
"Ruby!" The Not-Demon called out with a wave. "Come over here!"
Ruby nearly dashed off, but stopped herself at the last second. "I'll see you later, Jaune!" She said and went to the Not-Demon, Yang.
"Bye." Jaune whispered, without being able to see the purple eyes, it was harder to deny the truth.
Death had scared him senseless, but Pain was worse. Death was The End. Pain was Eternal.
Jaune pulled up a sleeve to check on his wounds, the charred parts were almost completely gone from his arm. He watched as the Demon chatted with Ruby, who was ranting about something, and Snow Angel snuck up behind her, then Ruby jumped into the arms of the Demon. He half-expected her to catch flames and be burned to ashes. Luckily, the Demon had enough control of her hellfire to not burn the innocent. Snow Angel was showing something to Ruby, who looked confused and then confident.
After a while Snow Angel suddenly pointed at Jaune, and then she froze as she got a good look at him, he could almost hear her gag. Although he felt bummed out, not too much obliviously; he was a corpse after all, he was mostly in fear as he saw the Demon turn to look at him, but before she could send him back to pain. The sound of a microphone turning on gained the attention of everyone in the room.
A man with white hair, dressed in a green suit and holding a cane started to speak into the microphone. A small part of him wondered if the man could make his cane stand on its own, Jaune's grandfather could do it. Next to the green suit man was the non-holographic form of Glynda Goodwitch.
The Green Suit Man had introduced himself and gave a rather lackluster speech.
In the locker room, Jaune was given odd stares as he just sat on a bench as everyone else was busy placing their gear into their lockers. After nearly two hours had gone by, he was finally left alone, he quickly changed out of his clothes and into his onesie, limiting the amount of time he exposed his wounds to a few seconds at most.
After changing and finding an available locker, he stashed his things away. Before he left, he took a quick look in a mirror, the memory of Snow Angel's disgust was still fresh. In his reflection, he saw a deathly pale face with dark and heavy bags under his eyes. He immediately realized why he was so pale. When he had woken up he had been concentrated on healing his burns that he forgot to restart his heart, and he's been using a lot of energy to heal his wounds that he was neglecting his body maintenance.
Ah well, let's hope everything will be healed in the morning.
Jaune had taken a single step outside the locker room before he was violently shoved back into the room, he stumbled backwards aimlessly until his attacker rushed into the room and pinned him against a locker by his shoulder. Blazing red eyes burned, their focus entirely on him.
Pain.
In the midst of his fears becoming reality, he heard the cocking of something mechanical and felt something cold pressed against his throat, almost crushing his windpipe with force. He was able to avert his eyes from his attacker's face momentarily and he saw the top of a yellow gauntlet.
"Get rid of it." The Demon growled in a low and guttural voice, leaving no room for compromise.
Jaune was relieved that his heart wasn't beating at the moment, if it had been he was sure that it would've been burnt to a crisp from how scared he was. "What?" He was finally able to comprehend the words the Demon had said, and yet he couldn't understand her intent, aside from promising him pain if he refused.
"Get it out of me!" She shouted and the flames surrounding her body spiked with intensity.
He could feel the skin where she was holding him start to burn, ruining his onesie once again.
It's not a big issue, I still have some cloth and thread left over.
"What are you talking about?" He asked in a voice strained from his throat being crushed, but otherwise casually.
The Demon's face twitched, her eyes and mouth jittered about before a viscous grin stretched her mouth. "We are going to kill you, we will eviscerate your corpse and devour every bit of your remains." She licked her lips and her breathing became increasingly irregular as she'd opened her mouth and moved towards his neck. Then, her face twitched again. "No!" She cried and threw herself back, releasing him.
Jaune watched as the Demon held her head in her hands, her brightly glowing blonde hair frantically dancing like fire. She was oddly dressed for a demon, wearing an orange tank top and black shorts.
Look at her lights.
A sudden thought that had zero build up had formed in his mind, but he couldn't think of a reason he shouldn't go through with it. With just a blink, he suddenly saw the world through an ethereal lense. The locker room that had previously been a rather dull gray room was now bursting with glowing colors all loosely lined up in rows, it only took a second before he realized that the glow was actually coming from the gear inside the lockers.
With that out the way, he turned his attention back to the Demon, who was still struggling. He saw a brightly burning golden figure where she stood, but he also saw swirls of red and black ash swim through her, near where her heart might be.
"Please!" The Demon shouted weakly. "Just get it out of me." She begged. Her golden flames wavered and the ash began to swim faster.
Help Yang.
And again another thought formed, completely independently from him, but again he couldn't think of a reason he shouldn't go through with it. His body moved on his own, similarly to when he had jumped start his heart and when he first fought her, he approached the struggling girl. Who growled at him when he got close, but he didn't stop, he slowly reached out and placed a hand on her back, near her heart. Then he felt his hand leave his corpse and enter her body, and she spasmed suddenly.
His hand diffused and swam through every inch of Yang, collecting nearly every speck of ash that had polluted her body, but near her heart was a solid lump of it that he couldn't manage to move. After he was done doing what he could, he pulled his hand out her body, reformed it and slipped it back inside his corpse.
Yang groaned as she wobbled in place, she took a few steps before she collapsed on a bench, passing out right there.
Jaune was otherwise occupied to notice. When his hand returned to his corpse, his brain started to ache. Memories and thoughts flashed through his mind, some were his thoughts, but he didn't think them. Somehow he got a clear picture as to what had occurred last night.
He had the memories of riding a bike, then of walking into a club, and of starting a fight. In his memories he fought a rather strong goon wearing a janitor uniform, the goon was tough and he didn't seem to feel pain. After he roughed up her hair, he remembered going into rage. Her punch should've sent the goon flying, and if his Aura didn't break from the hit then she would've fired off her gauntlet as well, but the moment her punch landed she felt an immense amount of pain.
In the instant her punch had connected to the center of the man's chest, she noticed that she didn't shatter his Aura and that instead her fist had pierced flesh and bone. In the next instant, she felt cold electricity zap up her arm as malice was burned into her bones. Experiencing panic like never before, she accidentally fired off her gauntlet and released her Semblance. The bullets exploded with a velocity and intensity that even she was sent flying.
The moment she was zapped, Jaune could experience the memories after that event with even more clarity. And yet he was confused, but not him, the version of him that lived through these memories was confused. With his brain starting to hurt, he absently wondered if he could make himself even more smarter by zapping his brain, but then he decided that he didn't want to test that in his current state. He was already hopelessly exhausted, mentally at least, and maybe spiritually?
Right now he just wanted to get some rest and deal with everything later.
Just thought I should mention that originally this version of the story was going to be canceled, and then a reboot was going to come way later, but I've changed my mind, now I'm going to be continuing this story.
I've heavily edited the previous chapters, so hopefully they are more digestible and I also removed the EM abilities from this version, sorry if anyone liked those. And since I hadn't planned of writing more for this version of the story, I don't have an immediate plans for the next few chapters, I'm open to suggestions and ideas.
Visit my Forum or PM me if you have an idea.