Nigeria
It is very quiet in the wilderness of Nigeria, with the local wildlife just going about, minding their own business and performing their daily routines as usual.
Soon, however, the animals stopped in their tracks when they heard a noise that is unfamiliar to them.
A noise that seems to be getting closer to them.
When the noise reached its loudest, the animals' survival instincts kicked in as they hurriedly scattered, running toward every direction as a pair of UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters from the US Air Force flew past them from above.
The Blackhawks weren't here by chance: their occupants are headed toward a specific location to carry out their latest objective.
Lieutenant Ruby Rose sat in the passenger bay of one of the Blackhawks alongside her squad mates, rifle in safety mode held in her hands as she wondered exactly what everyone will be facing at their destination.
"Alright, ladies and gentlemen, here's a recap of what we're about to do and why, in case any one of you have forgotten!" The squad captain who sat at the front of the passenger bay of the Blackhawk, announced. "Intel has it that a local warlord will be receiving a shipment of weapons from Roman Torchwick, an arms dealer and notorious terrorist whose actions has led to the death of thousands of civilians. We have word that Torchwick will be personally overseeing the delivery of the shipment himself."
Roman Torchwick. Who in the world doesn't know that SOB's name? Ruby thought to herself.
"We will be landing about 20 clicks away from the warlord's base. From there, we will make our way to the outpost on foot." The captain continued briefing the squad. "Once we reach the outpost, we will stay out of sight of all hostiles, gather as much additional intel as possible, then wait for the best opportunity to strike, and hopefully capture Torchwick and shut down his operations once and for all."
"ETA to LZ: three minutes." The helicopter pilot announced via radio.
Upon hearing that announcement, everyone immediately put on their helmets and stood up, then checked their weapons to make sure they have everything they will be needing.
"There's no turning back now, everyone! So if you have something you need to say, spit it out!" The captain then gave a rousing speech to the squad. "Because in this mission, we either capture Torchwick or get sent home in boxes!"
...
After dropping off Ruby's squad at the LZ, the Blackhawks took off into the air again. From here, it's up the the squad to stealthily make their way to the Nigerian warlord's base.
The trek went off without a hitch, and soon the squad arrived at the warlord's base.
The base is located at the bottom of a small valley, with a few watchtowers lining the perimeter. Within the base itself is several tents, housing either supplies, weapons and ammunition, or acting as living quarters for the warlord and his guerillas. Several pickup trucks with machine guns mounted on them are parked by the sides of a larger tent, which is presumably the command center for the warlord. Guerillas dressed in camouflage and armed with AK-47s patrolled the base perimeter and manned the watchtowers.
Analysis of the number of guerillas and their positions tell the squad that they should be able to take on the base. However, as the base itself or its current occupants aren't the objective, the squad hunkered down and remained out of sight outside the base.
"Overwatch, is there any sign of Torchwick or his men?"
"Negative, sir. No sign of Torchwick right now."
"He should be here at any moment. For now, we lay low and wait. Over and out."
And so, the squad kept their profile low, watching the base from out of sight of its occupant and waiting for the right moment to strike.
Minutes slowly ticked by, and there is still no sign of Roman Torchwick...
Almost an hour later, the squad is starting to get tired of the waiting, especially for Ruby who had no other frontline deployments prior to this one. Despite that, the entire squad including Ruby kept themselves at a low profile and continued to wait and observe.
Just as Ruby is beginning to doubt the accuracy of the intel, the sound of helicopters drew the attention of everyone, both in the squad and the guerillas in the base.
Looking up above, the source of the sound is revealed to be two CH-47 Chinook helicopters arriving at the base and are descending upon it.
Ruby brought her binoculars up to look at the Chinooks. The lack of anything that would identify them as belonging to any country in the world indicates that they probably belonged to a militant group, or a terrorist organization such as Roman Torchwick's.
As the Chinooks landed in front of the large tent, most of the guerillas in the base went and surrounded them, aiming their AKs at the aircrafts. The guerillas soon lowered their weapons when a muscular Nigerian man - the warlord who owns and runs this base along with the armed militia that it housed - emerged from the large tent and ordered them to stand down.
Once the engines of the Chinooks have been shut off and their propeller blades slowed to a halt, the cargo bay doors on both aircrafts opened.
The first person to step out of one of the Chinook is no other than Roman Torchwick himself, complete with his trademark derby hat, though the cane seems to be a new addition. His henchmen followed him out of the Chinook immediately afterwards, some carrying their own weapons, others pushing out a trolley full of cases that presumably contained the weapons he will be selling to the warlord.
Upon seeing Torchwick, Ruby's first instinct is to raise her rifle and take aim at the notorious terrorist. But she stood down when her squad captain reminded her that the objective is to capture Torchwick alive. Obeying the captain's order, Ruby hunkered down again and resumed watching the events unfolding in the base with her binoculars.
More of Torchwick's henchmen exited the second Chinook, carting out another trolley full of cases, though these cases looked smaller and a bit different than those from the first trolley. These cases presumably contained smaller-sized weapons.
After the additional henchmen and the second trolley, one more person exited the second Chinook. This person appears to be a woman with half-pink half-black hair in casual dress, carrying a pink parasol that is currently folded up. She seemed rather nonchalant about walking into a base full of armed militants, or the fact that she stuck out like a sore thumb there.
That's odd. Ruby thought as she watched Roman, his henchmen, and the strange woman disembark from the Chinooks. Intel didn't say anything about Torchwick having a female associate.
Through her radio, Ruby heard her squad captain ordering the overwatch to pay close attention to the strange woman. Ruby thought nothing of that order itself, as anyone who sticks out like a sore thumb in this kind of place most likely have nasty surprises that normal people would never see coming.
As the Nigerian warlord and Torchwick started to talk, Ruby realized that neither she nor her squad mates could hear anything either of the men are saying from this distance.
"Damn, we can't hear anything from this distance." The squad captain also noticed the problem, whispering into his radio to let the entire squad know. "Whoever is carrying the directional microphone, now's time time to use it."
"On it, sir." A squad mate from a position Ruby can't see responded.
The directional microphone is set up within seconds, and soon the whole squad is able to hear through their radios what is being said down at the base.
"So, as I was saying, I am a man of my words, and here are the weapons you requested for your revolution." Torchwick said to the warlord. He then gestured at his henchmen to push the first trolley of cases closer to him and the warlord.
After that, Torchwick had two of his henchmen each grab a case from the first trolley and place them down in front of the warlord.
"First up, the AT4 rocket launcher." Torchwick said as he opened one of the cases and introduced the weapon to the warlord. "Recoilless, this bad boy packs enough punch as to make your boys' RPG-7 look like peashooters. It's so useful that the Americans adopted it before the Swedes who invented it did. Though I do need to note the misconception of it being reusable or having anti-air capabilities: No and no. The movies have no idea how it actually works. Do not attempt to copy them."
That statement was followed by the sound of one of the warlord's guerillas stifling a laugh.
Torchwick seemingly ignored it, and continued with his "sales pitch". "Anyway, strictly speaking, the AT4 is overkill for anything that doesn't have an engine. So the next one is something that packs far less punch, but still enough to mow down your enemies." He opened the other case and brought out a large gun. "This is an M2 Browning. 450 rounds per minute with an effective range of four miles. Invented during World War 1 and is still in use today, this is the most popular machine gun ever existed, with the saying that it will never be rendered obsolete, ever. Just don't grab the gun barrel after firing it, unless you want to scald your hands." After finishing his introduction of the weapon, Torchwick placed the M2 back into its case.
The warlord knelt down to get a closer look at both the AT4 and the M2 before nodding in approval. He then stood up and gestured at two of his men, who bought forward a large wooden crate that is then set down next to the weapon cases.
The crate is then opened, revealing it to be full of gold bullions.
"I'll take 50 of each of these." The warlord told Torchwick as he pointed at the weapons. "Then you can have all of these." He then pointed at the gold bullions.
Torchwick glanced at the crate full of gold bullions, and can't help but smirk about it. "Well, I guess we have ourselves a deal, then." He said as he reached out for a handshake.
The warlord reached out with his own hand to shake Torchwick's.
At the same time, Ruby and the rest of her squad are kind of disappointed that the arms deal did not provide them any valuable intel. But nevertheless, now that the deal has been made, it means that Torchwick is about to depart from the base, and they are about to lose the opportunity to grab him.
"Overwatch, hold your position and keep your finger on the trigger." The squad captain ordered. "The rest of you, with me. We need to grab Torchwick. It's now or never."
With the squad's sniper staying at his hidden vantage point, sniper rifle ready, the rest of the squad including Ruby followed the squad captain down the valley carefully and stealthily. Upon reaching the bottom of the valley, everyone quickly took cover to stay out of sight of the guerilla patrols and watchtowers, while keeping each other in sight.
At this distance, they are able to hear what Torchwick is saying without using a directional microphone. They hear Torchwick ordering his henchmen to take the crate of gold bullions and leave all the weapons behind for the warlord. As Torchwick turned to walk back toward the Chinooks, the squad captain used hand signals order the squad to get ready for a shootout.
"Oh, I almost forgot..." Torchwick suddenly stopped in his tracks and said to the warlord. "There is something else I would like to show you..."
This made the squad captain quickly throw up a hand signal ordering the squad to stand down.
Torchwick turned toward the woman that came with him. "Neo, would you do the favor, and show this kind gentleman our special merchandise?"
The woman Torchwick called Neo nodded with a smirk as she grabbed one of those smaller and unusual-looking cases, which she then passed to Torchwick himself.
"Thank you, Neo." Torchwick said to her before turning back toward the warlord. "Now, since our transaction went off without any issues, and I'm in quite the good mood today, I'm going to give you a preview sample of something very, very new."
That piqued the warlord's interest. The squad, on the other hand, didn't like the sound of it.
Torchwick opened the case, and then took out a small corked glass bottle that contained... something in it. The bottle seems to have what appeared to be a highly-detailed snowflake as its label.
"Allow me to introduce a brand new merchandise that I will be selling to people like you in the future." Torchwick then held the small bottle up to show it to the warlord and everyone else present, including unknowingly to him, the USAF squad in hiding that is ready to pounce on him.
"It's a little something I call... Dust..."
I guess this is my entry into the FNDM...
Anyway, some of you might recognize me as the author of the currently ongoing Young Maiden's Chronicles and Atsuko Kagari series, my fan remakes of Touhou Project and Little Witch Academia respectively. If you haven't check them out yet, do so if you have the time.
So, the story is, I only caved and started watching RWBY after constantly seeing Whiterose (Ruby x Weiss) being compared to Dianakko from Little Witch Academia and Lumity from The Owl House, just to see what's the deal with Whiterose.
Not even halfway into Volume One, and I can already see why Whiterose is put together with Dianakko and Lumity as "The Gay Trinity". A rich magic-using ace student with unusual hair paired together with a brunette underdog with no experience in what they're trying to learn in a prestigious academy. Yeah, I can totally see that...
Now, if you are interested in reading how this story continues, I need to inform you all that unlike Young Maiden's Chronicles and the Atsuko Kagari series, The Rose Thorn of Earth is NOT a fan remake at all. This first chapter alone has already made it quite obvious that it is going to be very different compared to RWBY canon, or even my other stories. Also, I haven't even finished Volume One yet, so I have absolutely no rights to do a fan remake of the series.
Enough talk. Now, please sit back and wait warmly for the next chapter...
Trivia: I came up with and wrote up this chapter in just three days, despite my FUBAR'd schedule slowing updates to all my other stories by a large margin. Talk about my quick jump into the FNDM, eh?
No unique quote to end the Afterword sections for this story, due to it going to be having a vastly different atmosphere than my other series.
Afterword ends here.
