NOTE (March 31, 2018): I'm sorry. I got carried away with this one.

This was not the worst hangover he woke up to but it was still disorienting as all living hell. Dizzied and nauseous, Six rolled to sit on the side of the bed, wondering why his room looked different...

Wait.

The Courier rubbed his eyes, grimaced at the burn, wiped his hands clean of his own dried vomit, and then rubbed his eyes again. He blinked several times until he could see some pale-skinned brunette snoozing comfortably in the same bed. Shit.

The blanket covered most of her young frame. Young. Maybe a little too young. Too dangerously young. Shit. Fuck.

Here he stood, half-naked, trying to put on the rest of his clothes, staring dumbly at the back of some broad who he may or may not have knocked up. Why did he come to that conclusion? Because he never carried protection on him. Because he never needed to. Because he never bothered with that kind of comfort. Because people were thinking that he had fathered eight children somehow and he was damn determined not to actually be a father. (Again.)

Shit. Fuck, fuck, fuck! Goddamn it. Just be quiet, grab your all your stuff, and sneak out as best you could. Maybe ask the Garretts downstairs what the fuck happened last night. Six wanted to kick himself so bad. Keep breaking your own damn rules. Keep telling yourself never get wasted outside the Lucky Thirty-Eight and then you do and then this happens! He began reaching for his duster tossed against a chair when she stirred.

And long bunny ears flopped out off the top of her head like folded rubber springs.

What in the living hell?

For one, the girl was not naked. Not completely, no. She was just in her nightie. Skimpy, scanty nightie. Additionally, she did not carry that atmosphere of being some Vegas spinner. In fact, when he actually bothered to look around, the room was not in a complete mess. No clear signs of anything...steamy happening. Well, maybe she was being thorough. Maybe she was a...dominatrix?

He shuddered at the mental images of a mole-rat-looking broad in black leather. And he had damn well seen—no, interacted—with literal mole-rat-looking broads on more than one occasion. It didn't help that they smelled like mole-rats, too.

Or they maybe all the action was confined to the bed. Who could really tell?

Weird. He scrunched his eyes. Her bunny ears looked too real. Either the Garretts got some animal fetish theme going on with their hookers or the chick just had a personal preference for that crap.

Focus, man! Get the fuck out and get back to the Strip. Check up on the kids, hope the tower's still standing. Shuffle, shuffle. Stir, stir. Damn it, my gear's all over the place! Can't risk losing anything else right now—

"Oh... You're awake."

Holy shit.

"That's alright... You don't have to rush... Last night was...interesting," she said meekly in some weird Briton accent. Was it Briton? British? Fancy European? Agh, he could barely think!

"Uh...right," he croaked, his back completely turned.

"It wasn't that bad. You looked like you really needed it."

She...liked it? The fuck did I do last night?

"Don't worry about me. I enjoyed the company." She chuckled. "Though you were quite terrifying. Barging into my room like that...uninvited..."

Oh shit.

"Ah, sorry 'bout that, ma'am." He breathed deep as he turned to face her, genuinely apologetic and awkwardly scratching the back of his head.

She beamed at him. And her bunny ears moved too. Her bunny ears moved. By themselves. When she flashed him that warm smile, those furry appendages straightened up.

"The hell...?"

Strangely, she laughed it off. Then she said, "You don't remember, do you? That's okay."

The cogs in his brain started to grind together more cohesively. Disjointed thoughts and pointed memories came together. Oh, no. This can't be happening.

"You've been the most open person I've ever encountered since I...came...here. You...didn't react as badly as most when they saw my ears." She held out her hand. "Reintroductions should be in order, I suppose. I'm Velvet. Velvet Scarlatina."

He wiped his hands before taking it. "Uh-huh... Um, nice to meet you...again...Miss Scarlatina."

"Oh, you can just call me Velvet." Her ears bent over. "You already know what I really am after all that you said last night so...that makes me comfortable enough..."

The Courier could feel his eyes bug out of his sockets. Please, no. Not another one! "What?"

"I'm a faunus." She blushed. "Or part-rabbit, you could say."

Six felt the urge to swallow one of the grenades hooked onto his combat harness. "Ah, shit."

The Courier rubbed circles on his temples over his mug of coffee while Velvet casually went through her morning tea and biscuits. Sure, breakfast at the Atomic Wrangler wasn't the best but at least he didn't have to worry about Pancake maniacally drilling him to abstain from alcohol.

"How much did I...?"

"Well, you were clearly out of it," the faunus answered timidly. Good thing most of the Wrangler's clientele slept in. Apparently, the Garretts and their staff, along with most everyone else who stopped by this early, passed off her faunus traits as some silly decoration that went along with whatever she was into.

"Yeah, I got that," Six breathed. "What was I...what was..."

"Oh, we were just talking. Well, you were talking. Uh, mostly you were just rambling on about taking care of teams RWBY and JNPR. You probably didn't think I was in the room. You were actually talking to yourself most of the time."

Is that what really happened? "Nothing...else? Nothing, um, untoward?"

She shook her head, a bit of mirth gracing the corners of her cheeks. "No. You didn't even try to touch me. It was like I wasn't in the room. You just dropped onto the bed, vomited over the side, and fell asleep."

Six was more relieved than embarrassed at that. Could've been worse.

Velvet eyed him apologetically. "I don't mean to pry but you were mumbling...names and events, err, dates..." She raised her hands. "Nothing I bothered to remember!"

He sighed. I guess I really should lay off a bit if I keep dropping hints like that when I'm that deep in the bottle. "So...I guess the cat's out of the bag then."

The faunus shrugged. "It's the gossip of the town. Mister New Vegas would occasionally report about you...or, well, about RWBY and JNPR doing something bombastic. But hearing it from you... It was quite an interesting perspective." A proud smile stretched across her features. "Nothing quite surprising given their behavior. It's so much like them."

The Courier raised his brow at her. "So you know them?"

"We went to Beacon together." The mere mention of that mysterious academy's name clearly dampened her mood. "I'm a year ahead of them. I'm from team CFVY."

Six caught on but waited for her to compose herself and continue.

"Things...haven't been going well when I, uh, ended up here." A sigh. "Hope Coco and the others are doing okay," she muttered under her breath.

I don't need to know how that happened. "How long have you been around? Here. In the wasteland."

"More than a week, so far."

Huh. Lucky you. Looks like the raiders didn't get to you. Those bunny ears are pheromones to any psycho junkie out there. "What brought you here?"

"Trading caravan. They were friendly and very helpful. Taught me the basics, gave me some starting money, and pointed me in the right direction."

I don't know if this was even the right direction. It was debatable about which was safer (or least dangerous): New Vegas proper or the open Mojave, NCR 'protection' be damned. "Uh-huh. So what are you going to do now?"

Velvet looked down and her ears followed. It got some short-lived curious looks from across the lounge. "I, uh...honestly, I'm not sure. I was hoping I'd run into some help. The Kings were quite amiable. The Followers were very generous but I don't think they'd be able to help given their situation. That leaves the NCR and...well...now that we're acquainted..."

Six raised his brow.

The rabbit faunus gulped, shuttered her eyes, then hesitantly met his waiting gaze. "... You."

Goddamn it.

"They have a very optimistic view of the world."

"Optimists are the first to go. Then the pessimists. That leaves the cynics and the realists to duke it out until the winner either gets eaten by a deathclaw somewhere or dies of dehydration."

Velvet scratched at the back of her head, feeling for the tips of her folded faunus appendages. Under his insistence, she tucked them under a brimming bonnet thus effectively concealing her faunus heritage despite the discomfort it brought to her ears. Not that she needed those extensions for anything other than extended hearing, for all he knew. Perhaps she was used to having them out, about, and free...for someone to tug on.

"I'm only saying that you should forgive them for being, um...ambitious?" she bargained.

Six scoffed. "What a word. They're being fucking stupid. Trying to change the goddamn world overnight. Like that's even possible. Takes more than a damn lifetime to try to even change a fucking government policy."

The faunus followed the Courier's lead by sidestepping around a tattered drunk sprawled across the sidewalk. "You can't blame them. It's what we've all been accustomed to."

He stopped and leaned under the awning hanging off an abandoned barber shop. "Oh? Is that what they teach you at Beacon? That, no matter where you are, no matter how fucked up the world is, you can still make it a better place? Even if there are people who don't want it to be so?"

"I'm not saying—"

The Courier folded his arms and sighed. "Kid, I can't completely understand where you're coming from but I've a good picture of it. But just because it works at Remnant doesn't mean it works here on Earth, too."

"I know that."

Behind his visor, he raised a brow. "Really now."

Velvet clenched her fists. "Remnant is not a perfect world. But neither is here. And for your information, they're freshmen. They're still...hopeful."

"Right. And because you're a year ahead, that means you've seen as much as the folks on the frontline?"

She glared at him. "Not what I meant! Look, I've been through that stage. I used to have that outlook. But you can't just crush their hopes like that." Her eyes fell to the concrete, her mien downcast. "It...hurts."

Six pushed himself off the brick and mortar. Get used to it. "It's never painless." I just hope you're more realistic than Hyper and her merry band of idiots.

"Can you at least go easy on them?"

There's no other way. "No guarantees." He held up his palm to stifle her protests. Mainly because he felt the minute vibrations coming off his Pip-boy alerting him to some incoming messages. He turned around to conceal the screen. Hsu. Huh, what does he want now? And Raul? Huh.

"Is there...something..."

"Stay here," he ordered before he walked into a nearby alley to find out whatever urgent errand the NCR had for him this time around.

Velvet was not fond of confrontations. As such, she did her best to avoid them and was consequently denied growth in the area of diffusing nasty encounters. So when one of Freeside's many roaming gangs surrounded her while she waited outside the alley, she did her best to weasel her way out of it. Unfortunately, they were just about what she expected them to be: persistent and...hungry.

"Well, if it isn't the little bunny that everyone's been talking about. Can't stay in the Wrangler forever, you know," the dominant one prodded, the odor from his breath nearly making her gag. "You looked really cute in them bunny ears."

"She's got a nice ass, too," another remarked.

Velvet squealed when a third grabbed her arm.

"Boys, I think we got ourselves a squeaker."

"This is gonna be good."

"Haven't had any in a while."

"H-hey, s-stop it!" she pleaded, trying to pull her arms away from their grips. "Let me go!" She really hated having to resort to force.

"Stop squirming, bunny-girl," the leering alpha cooed. "We'll take care of everything from here."

Now a fourth one had wrapped his arms over her body, his filthy hands worming up to her chest. The rising growl in her throat died in a faint squeak when the leader of the group snatched her hat, exposing her appendages.

The new attraction amused them. "Holy shit. You still keep 'em on? Must really like being a bunny, eh?"

Then they tugged at them. It hurt. A lot.

"Huh. You glued 'em on or somethin'?" one of them scoffed. "Shit. Yeah, you really glued 'em on."

"S-stop it!" she gritted, her passive resistance waning. Any more and she would have to really go wild. Corner a faunus and face the consequences. Especially if it was a female.

"Shut up, bitch—"

A powerful shot echoed from within the alley. Velvet stared wide-eyed as the alpha dropped to the ground, crimson pooling through a clean hole above his left ear. The other three gawked dumbly before another deafening pop burst from the darkness, ripping through the man on her right, giving her free reign over her arm while he fell motionless onto the concrete.

The faunus blinked, recovered her suspended adrenaline, and let her combat training kick in. A quick leg sweep and two quick jabs later, the other two townies were on the ground writhing in pain. She swiveled on her heels to come face to face with the Courier brandishing his smoking revolver.

"Shit," sputtered one of the panicked thugs. "Oh shit, oh shit!"

"Six! Thanks so much for the sav—" Velvet felt paralyzed at what happened next.

Six ignored the pleas of the two Freeside junkies. He squeezed twice, one bullet in each head. It was hard to tell what was behind that dusty old helmet of his as he casually wiped off a few spatters of blood that made it there, the rest of his face covered by that haunting combat mask. He strode over the corpses, smoking gun at his side, annoyed at this...chore.

"Y-you...th-they..." she stammered.

"No one'll miss them," he said coldly. "You alright?"

She nodded edgily, heart pounding, mind comprehending her apparent 'rescue.'

"Good. We're taking a detour. East."

Velvet blinked. Everything she had learned so far about the famously infamous Courier Six was ringing true. "E-east?"

"We're going to meet with a friend of mine."

"But...the Strip is right there."

She could feel his glare from behind those tinted lenses. "East. No questions."

"O-okay."

It took another several hours for Velvet to come to grips with the deaths of those men—vile as they were—even as she followed Six through the outskirts of New Vegas, back into that damned desert, wondering whether or not she made the right choice of roping herself with a conscienceless killer over asking for help from a military government. Then again, military governments tended to field disciplined conscienceless killers into their ranks to fight undisciplined conscienceless killers out in the wilds.

She may have seen the cruel reality of Remnant—quirks of being a faunus—but the Mojave Wasteland had a lot more to offer. And that made her damn well scared shitless.

NOTE (March 31, 2018): So...Velvet was not supposed to be in the story. At all. Mainly because I felt there was not enough of her canon material for me to work with. Then again, when it came to progressing into the following day, I pulled up with the classic 'hangover'/'the day after' plot device and...I got carried away. So. Yeah. Velvet Scarletina is now officially a part of the plot (for now). And to think I've been telling myself and to some reviewers that I wouldn't be expanding the cast... Ah, well. Plans change.

Now. I was surprised by the reactions I got towards RWBY's resolve in the last chapter. Rest assured, RWBY and JNPR will get a very impactful, and perhaps even painful, reality check. It's going to take awhile to flesh out properly. As to why I developed them that way, I was basing off of their optimism and idealism during the Volumes 1 and 2...when they were still "unbroken" in a sense.

Anyway, thank you so much for the continued support, input, and insights. Hope you guys continue to enjoy this story. Let me know what you think of this, uh, development. :)

Also, here's a bonus.

Velvet stared at this stranger wobbling at the foot of her bed, at a loss for words, her mind wavering between confused and afraid. Here she lay under the covers, in revealing discount nightwear, away from her team—from anyone she knew—and at the mercy of this tall, unkempt prowler who had suddenly kicked down the door to her room.

Her hands felt numb from clutching the duvet over her chest. Her weapon Light Copies sat on the nightstand next to her but she worried that any sudden move might cause him to lash out at her. Or at least, that was what her paranoid self was screaming in the back of her mind.

Because all this intruder did was ramble incoherently, swinging his arms around and spilling alcohol all over the floor. For the past half hour. With her natural hearing, she could pick out the minute details being said. Or mumbled. Or groused. Or gargled.

Yeah, he was ranting about his life story, that much she could gather.

"Uh, mister...?" she tried for the fourth time.

"Fuckin' Hyper and her fuckin' scythe-gun!" he rambled. "Like she fuckin' knows what it's fuckin' like out there in the goddamn desert..."

He took another swig before stumbling over to her right. Velvet edged away despite his clear ignorance of her presence.

"I should've fuckin' left 'em in the fuckin' desert...should've left 'em to rot...in the fuckin'... Fuck... What the hell were you thinkin', eh, Six? You done fucked up again, 'ya did!" A burp. "Screwed over the best squad you could pull out of your fuckin' ass since...since...since Ar'zona..."

"Mister, please, you're—"

"Wond'r how V'ronica's takin' it... Ah, who the fuck am I kidding? She'll knock my damn head off... Like she'll ever fuckin' understand the big picture... Damn... I done really fucked that one up... 'Vegas Nine' no more. I'll toast to that!"

The faunus decided to reach out to him to calm him but he recoiled away, raising his near empty bottle to the coat rack, barking at said coat rack, and taking a long swig while telling the coat rack that he regretted killing some people.

"Hope Arcade's doin' well... Don't drop the soap, Arc! Eh, you'd probably like it..." He crawled onto her bedside. Somehow, despite his bloodshot eyes brushing over her form, he still thought she was nothing but air. Even the neon sign flashing outside her window did little to convince him that she was right there. "Cassidy Caravan's back in business! If Boone won't put you under, Cass will! That's a fuckin' slogan right there..."

Wait. What was that about Cassidy Caravans? Does he know Miss Cassidy? And Mister Boone?

"Mister, you need to sit down..."

The stranger, a big bulky man who could have easily stood a foot taller than Headmaster Ozpin (it was hard to tell in the dim lighting), haphazardly undressed (were those scars?), gave up halfway (was taking off the duster that hard?), and groggily collapsed right next to her on the bed (seriously?). "Fuckin' whiny-ass kids...an' their high-maintenance bullshit...costin' me fuckin' every cap... Spent whole fuckin' years raisin' funds like that an' they come an' fuckin' funnel 'em down the goddamn drain... Makin' everythin' fuckin' complicated... Yeah, keep tellin' yourself that..."

Velvet watched him mumble himself to sleep. Confused and bordering between amused and worried. She started to relax after she heard snoring. "Huh... That could have gone differently."

The man suddenly spasmed, heaved, and promptly vomited his dinner onto the floor.

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me..."

The snoring resumed immediately thereafter.

The faunus gawked. Her mind tried to process everything once again but petered out half way through. She was already too tired to care. She had been walking for miles, under the blistering sun, through the unforgiving desert, around ruined buildings, over uneven rubble, passed homeless predatory gangs to finally get some respite. And this happens.

Velvet groaned out her frustrations, letting her head drop back onto her pillow. Her whole body was still aching from all that traveling and she would really snap if she was so much deprived of any more hours of sleep. So she shuffled to the farthest edge of her side of the bed, ignoring the stench, and drifted back to sleep. She would deal with this first thing in the morning.

ORIGINALLY DRAFTED: March 24, 2018

LAST EDITED: April 30, 2023

INITIALLY UPLOADED: March 31, 2018