A/N: All Characters, Settings, and Macaroons are property of Rooster Teeth (Rights may change to Warner Bros.). Original characters, settings, and cookies are owned by me, myself, and I.
[Knights of the Sky]
Act 1 - Episode: Prologue
Beacon, the grand huntsman academy of the Kingdom of Vale. A place home to many huntsmen and huntresses in training, many of whom recently went up a year within the school. However, as most schools do, this meant newer students and freshmen would arrive to prove their worth and be put to the test of initiation. There lies a question however: how do huntsmen get around?
Beacon over looks the main city of Vale from atop a cliff edge, and the academy was also decentralized from many different settlements that often calls upon the aide of huntsmen. There of course is a simple solution of airships and dust planes, but these were completely unsuitable for missions and field trips as they were often under armored and unarmed. Bulkheads, armed transport ships, were most definitely used but were slow and clunky compared to their unarmed counterparts and make poor mission capable transport beyond the drop-off or end of mission rendezvous. So what else does beacon utilize to accomplish these requirements? Bulkheads are used for the routine and airships for travel to the city, but for missions? For such a simple problem, many would think of complex solutions; modified fighters or military grade gunships that can double as transports. Beacon opted for a different approach: they trained a special pilot and gave him a special bulkhead.
"This is Radio Vale coming at you live from station FM 97.2! Playing your favorite hits- ALL. NIGHT. LONGGGG!" The radio buzzed softly as the bulkhead swayed, its engines giving a muffled hum as the pilot reclined back into his seat, scroll nearly pressed against the glass of his pilot helmet. "I swear, she takes longer on purpose when I fly her into town." He grumbled softly as his bulkhead hovered within the vale dockyard.
"Sorry to break the tunes folks! However I just got a live report of a huntress fighting renown criminal Roman Torchwick in the middle of-" The pilot lurched forward, switching the public channel off and spamming multiple texts to the contact. "Fuck it." He hissed after getting no reply, gripping the controls of his bulkhead and pulling out of the dockyard and into the light of the departure gate.
As the light painted the aircraft, it revealed eight miniature auxiliary thrusters mounted upon the sides of the fuselage, close to the nose and cockpit section. Empty weapons racks just beneath the wings and the main thrusters had wires and tubes dangling from them, as if a payload had been haphazardly removed during maintenance. The normal bulkhead design had even been slimmed down, armor compacted and then angled for protection and aerodynamics.
Finally there was the massive chain gun at the front, perhaps the only thing that kept this bulkhead from being declared highly illegal was the fact it resembled the international version that had one for self defense for the voyages between the kingdoms. However, those were chambered with 7.62x51mm ATLAS, not 25x137mm custom cartridges. Finally the paint job made it clear it was Beacon property: an emerald green base, with stark white details along with the academy's iconic crossed axes heraldry.
The bulkhead had began to pick up speed at this point and bolted through the rest of the dockyard, uncaring of traffic as it climbed into the sky. The pilot, now revealed to be in a matching green jumpsuit with a black face-covered helmet, began to scan the city skyline for any disturbances. Just then, he caught the brief flash of light of an explosion and rolled the aircraft over into a dive towards it. The speed mounting as he dropped altitude to just be above the buildings, the view of another bulkhead entering his own. Opening his comms channel he spoke to the aircraft.
"Unidentified aircraft, surrender and land immediately!" He barked into his radio as he looked down to check the explosion area. Two figures looked up at him, a blonde woman in an office attire and a... goth gardener?
The pilot didn't look at them long as for when he turned to the other bulkhead, a flare had struck and exploded across his cockpit window. He hissed as the bulkhead engines roared as he rose collective to see above the smoke, only to no longer see the bulkhead. Turning to his instruments and flicking some switches, one of the displays within the cockpit turned to that of a radar. After a few seconds of glaring at it however, it brought back nothing. His attention then turned back to the ground and noticed the blonde had turned to scolding the young struggling gardener.
He than made the educated decision of slowly flying backwards and away from the pair and back to the port, only for his scroll to ring. Looking back down to the pair and his scroll in his hand, he answered while staring at the blonde on the roof. "H-Hey the-" He couldn't finish as the blonde responded with narrowed eyes. "Police station roof. Now." She growled in a way that made the pilot shrink a bit as he watched the arriving squad cars surround the building they were atop of. The blonde then hung up and he began to make his way to the police station.
The flight across town wasn't long, but he wished he could've taken longer given the fact of who he was dealing with. As he approached he leaned into the radio and switched it to the police air traffic control frequency. "Ground this is-" Before he could even finish sentence the ATC cut him off. 'She called ahead son, land at pad two, we'll refuel her while you wait in questioning room 2." The older voice of ground control spoke, obviously late on their latest caffeine hit. "Copy." He sighed back into the radio as he shifted the bulkhead to land. As he lowered, he could see the now quiet squad cars pull into the station which all but reassured him that the chewing out will be thorough and merciless.
Once his landing gear touched down and the bulkhead's engines whirled down, the pilot removed his helmet and unzipped his flight suit at the collar. He then stared at a pair of police officers approaching the aircraft wearing fuel crew uniforms. His reflection within the glass showed in his peripheral, his face being that of pale skin and slimmed features, light bags under his yellow-gold eyes and feathers matted down about half an inch below his jaw and continuing down his neck disappearing into his flight coveralls.
Leaving the cockpit and opening the side hatch further back in the bulkhead's passenger area, he stepped off of his steel winged carriage. He then turned to the fuelers. "Please be careful guys, she's worth half of y'alls budget." He winked at them, receiving nods of acknowledgment and rolling eyes of sarcasm as he continued onwards towards the roof entrance.
Once inside and escorted by a policewoman, he arrived upon the interrogation room at the same time as the huntress and the suffering botanist. "Hi-" He attempted to speak, only to be cut off. "In. Now." Her voice firm and steely, an apparent twitch in her eye. Now seeing the botanist-in-agony up close, he noticed her rather striking silver eyes and apparent youth though he wouldn't assume off of looks alone. The two stalked into the room as the huntress stayed behind to talk with the policewoman. Sitting in a pair of chairs now opposite of where they entered, an awkward silence seemed to hang in the air as the scythe-wielder fiddled with her skirt and the pilot ruffling the feathers on the back of his neck.
"Sooooo what's your name?" She spoke softly and nervously, shrinking a bit as the pilot's full attention now upon her, "Gavin. Gavin Goodwitch. What's yours?" He spoke back in a reserved but friendly tone. "Ruby! E-Erm, Ruby Rose." She replied, the small stutter causing him the chuckle. "I'm guessing you're apart of the "poor social skills club" too, huh?" He followed up, watching her nervous expression fade a bit as she smiled a bit more. "Y-Yes! Thank goodness I didn't want to come off as rude or anything!" She spoke with an awkward smile and sense of relief as he gave her a similarly awkward smile.
However, before any more talk could occur, the door had swung open to reveal the blonde huntress once more. A stern look was worn upon her features as she walked with a newly acquired tablet tucked under her arm. "Now then." She spoke in a restrained tone as she set the tablet on the table and shut the door with the flick of her riding crop. "I do hope you know that your actions tonight put yourself and others at great risk." She spoke now with a much harsher tone as she began to pace around the two. "But they started it!" Ruby managed to call out, however Gavin could only slump a bit as the blonde narrowed her eyes further and picked up the tablet to scroll through some tabs. "If it were up to me you'd be sent home with a pat on the back-" Ruby's face grew slightly happy, only for the blonde to draw her riding crop and slamming it down onto the table. "And a slap on the wrist." She ended as Ruby reeled back in a flinch, counting her fingers.
Gavin had flinched as well, but he could see her eyes had shifted to him. "And you young man!" She pointed her crop straight at his chest. "I told you to wait at the sky port!" Now it was his turn to protest as he leaned forward with a light frown on his brow. "I heard of the radio you were fighting Torchwick! I couldn't just sit back when I heard-" Once more the riding crop snapped on top of the table, however the huntress' eyes had softened a bit. "You know full well I can take care of myself." Gavin slumped back and crossed his arms at those words. "You're strong but nobody's immortal." He muttered under his breath, and although the huntress caught the words she just let a sigh out. "Well, I'll deal with you at Beacon." She said, tiredly pinching the bridge of her nose as she turned back to Ruby. "Now then, before any action can be taken place for you young lady, someone's here who'd like to meet with you." Ruby looked at her strangely as the door to the room opened to reveal a silver-haired man with a plate of cookies in one hand and a cane in the other.
"Ruby Rose." He spoke with a hum, setting the plate down in front of her and taking a seat across the table. Leaning forward, he spoke once more as he stared her down intensely. "You have... Silver eyes." He said, seemingly more making an observation than anything. Gavin slowly sunk further into his seat, only to receive a rather intense side-eye from the man. "And my trouble maker grand-nephew." The man hummed, Ruby turning to Gavin as he awkwardly twiddled his thumbs. "I do apologize for his acti-" The blonde huntress was cut off with the soft chuckle of the man. "It's fine miss Goodwitch, I've never been one to be harsh on him have I?" He chuckled as Ruby then whipped her head back and forth between the the adults and the young pilot next to her.
Her confusion was replaced with nervousness however as the man turned to her. "And as for you-" He started, Goodwitch now showing them a street camera recording of Ruby in action. Gavin quietly took back all the edgy gardener jokes he mentally stored as he watched her move with extreme speed and act with extreme violence. He even winced a bit as the goons that charged her were flung back as if they were lifeless dolls after each strike. He could even see one be launched right back into the dust store as Torchwick stepped forward to confront the young girl. "Now where did you learn to do that?" The silver-haired man hummed with curiosity as he also gestured toward the plate of stacked chocolate-chip treats.
The girl picked up a cookie with caution, eyeing it to make sure it wasn't obviously gross or poisoned. "Signal. Signal Academy." The girl took a massive bite of the cookie and her eyes brightened as she had determined them worthy of eating. She then turned to Gavin offering one, however he shrunk and politely shook his head while feeling the ever-burning gaze of the blonde huntress. "I do recognize some basics within the fighting, however do they really teach such advanced moves to one as young as yourself?" The man hummed, Ruby now shoveling the cookies straight into her mouth with both hands. "Kind of reminds me of a dusty old crow." The man's words seemed to make Ruby stop and realize something, making her pause her binge eating. "Crow? Oh Qrow! That's my uncle! He's the coolest!" She said, swallowing her food and puffing her chest out with pride, ignorant of a now slightly irritated pilot. "This makes too much sense for it to be a set-" His dialogue through gritted teeth was cut short as the heated death glare from miss Goodwitch was back with much more intensity.
"If that's so miss Rose then, do you perhaps know me?" Ruby's pride shrunk a bit as she began to scratch the back of her head. "Y-Your Ozpin, headmaster at Beacon, right?" She said as her nerves began to grow a bit. The man nodded with a smirk. "And the woman behind me?" Ruby shrunk with Gavin as she now locked eyes on the disapproving look cast upon her. "M-Mrs. Goodwitch, the assistant headmi-"
"Miss. I'm not married." The assistant headmistress gritted out, watching Ruby trying to make herself smaller as she folded beneath her gaze. "Good. Good. However, do you know anything of the young man next to you?" The headmaster had become serious now as he leaned forward, chin resting on bridging fingers. Ruby turned to look at Gavin, only to see primal fear in his eyes in return. "E-Erm, he told me his name was Gavin. H-He's a pilot a-and-" She began to almost panic as she felt a growing pressure around her. She then felt her lips seal as she had remembered his last name and looked at the assistant headmistress. The gaze she held now seemed to be targeting everyone in the room.
"Tell me miss Rose, do you find him interesting?" Ozpin spoke, his glasses now showing the reflection of the light while Gavin practically squirmed in his seat.
Glynda Goodwitch almost made her rising blood pressure audible.
Ruby looked at Gavin, him in his shrunken and scared senseless splendor, and felt a connection. The connection itself? The shared feeling of growing terror at the scary blonde in the room. "H-He looks nice and cool and all, b-but what was this about an offer?" She spoke in a near rapid constraint as Glynda turned her eyes to Ozpin. "Yes Ozpin. Please. Tell. Us." She growled out as the headmaster's forehead broke into a sweat.
"Miss Rose, how would you like to enter Beacon early?" The minute the words left his lips, a shocked silence enveloped the room. "I-I'm sorry?" Ruby stuttered as she cleaned her ears. "I: The headmaster of Beacon Academy would like to extend you an offer into my school miss Rose to become a huntress of incredible caliber." Ozpin stated, Glynda once more pinching her eyebrows. At this point Gavin knew the pressure was no longer on him, so he stood up and walked behind Glynda. "Gavin if you don't put your rear in that seat I wi-" She was cut off as he put his fingers on top of her shoulders and pressed down softly.
"You're being wound up like a spring mom." The avian pilot grumbled as Ruby's jaw dropped at both the offer and the words. The blonde, being temporarily pacified, Ruby regained her confidence a bit and spoke to Ozpin with determination. "It would be a dream come true and an honor sir!" She spoke with glee, Glynda groaning slightly as Gavin worked on each growing knot on her shoulders. "I know, I know. More paperwork." Gavin muttered to her as her brow tweaked at the mention of paperwork.
Ozpin smiled and nodded at Glynda, who shook off her son and swiped a few times on the tablet she held. Turning the tablet over to Ozpin, to which he read with amusement dancing in his eyes, set it down in front of Ruby. "Now then miss Rose please sign here and we'll take care of any legal iss-" The tablet was then snatched up by Gavin in just a second, shocking Ruby and causing Glynda to blink a bit out of her massage trance.
Gavin's eyes raced across the last lines of the contract, causing Ozpin to once more break into a nervous sweat. He then swiftly went to editing it while giving the headmaster a side-glare, to which Ruby was now sure he was related to Goodwitch. "There. I edited it a bit give you some freedoms, given with you looking younger than the average." He hummed as she looked through the contract herself now. Smiling at the small additions such as extra library time and book checkouts as well as forge access. Ruby then signed the contract digitally while Ozpin now suffered silently under the gaze of Gavin and Glynda was sure he deserved it, seeing as how the headmaster had an underhanded sadistic streak when it comes to his nephew.
With the night coming to a close and Gavin being kind enough to drop Ruby off at the ferry yard, he was now prepared to get an earful from his mother. As the flight was uneventful, he knew the estimated time to get to beacon from downtown Vale took about 5-10 minutes on a commercial cruising route. However, as they neared Beacon he dropped altitude a bit to level with the cliffside face, flipping switched that caused this collision lights to flash in an odd, but rhythmic way.
Suddenly a massive cut out of the cliff face retracted and pulled apart, revealing a massive tunnel leading into a landing pad. There he maneuvered into the lower chamber, hearing the faint rumble of the massive doors shutter close. There he came to a hover and rotated his aircraft to face the doors once more, landing and parking in the center of the pad."Gavin J. Goodwitch!" The faint yell of his mother from within his passenger bay caused him to flinch as he shut down his systems and sighed.
"Time to get in trouble for doing my job again." He muttered as he left the aircraft to see his mother tapping her foot and Ozpin adjusting his glasses.
"I'm not a kid anymore mom!" The argument had started the minute they had begun to walk towards the CCT tower as the two bickered between each other. "So suddenly breaking multiple air traffic laws and acting outside the realm of mission perimeters makes you an adult!?" Glynda barked back as Gavin crossed his arms. "My mission is to support all huntsmen and huntresses I'm to be attached to. And it was an emergency! How would a renown criminal nearly destroying a city block not be!?" He growled back as Glynda pinched her nose bridge for what felt like the millionth time that evening. "Young man I swear to Oum I will-" Glynda was interrupted by Ozpin clearing his throat and staring them both down.
"Perhaps I should mediate this." He hummed as Gavin clicked his tongue and Glynda threatened him with a raised riding crop. Ozpin turned to Gavin first. "Young man I gave you the responsibility of being a mission support pilot for a reason. You have amazing talent behind the flight wheel and at just sixteen you've surpassed most of the Vale Air Guard." He complemented as Gavin felt pride swell in his chest and his feather lightly rise due to the praise.
"However you are reckless, you have the potential to be flawless while flying missions and yet you end up taking unnecessary risks that I know have threatened to give Glynda here grey hairs." He spoke, indirectly irking the blonde as Gavin felt a bit of a pit in his stomach.
"You have to understand that you are still only sixteen, and you've only been her son for ten years. No doubt those have been the most proud and happiest years she's had since she took you in, and if she lost you I'd fear her reaction." As he finished, Gavin felt his shoulders slump and a cloud over his head. He loved his mother no doubt, but he just wanted a little more freedom. However he wasn't about to risk her happiness just for his sake. Glynda saw the talking down had gotten to her son and she placed a hand on his shoulder. Gavin turned to her and she gave a rare, yet reassuring smile.
"As for you miss Goodwitch, you're well aware he's in his rebellious years and he seeks new boundaries to push. He's bound to find them either way so it's better to leave paths open to him rather than try and shut them down entirely. And seeing him rush to aide rather than sit in compliance shows he's still very much good-natured in his approach to freedom." Ozpin spoke with a smile as Glynda sighed.
"I suppose you're right." She spoke as she took him into a side-hug. "You're lucky I raised you so well." She hummed as the pilot gave a slight awkward blush, but returned the hug in full. "Yeah yeah, love ya too mom." He hummed, however a stray round of curiosity had struck Glynda as she turned to Ozpin. "Also what was that portion of the contract my son had to modify?" She spoke as she watched Ozpin now find a very interesting part of his desk. Glynda's eyes narrowed as when Ozpin looked up, his showed a very awkward smile and a shrug of the shoulders. "Ozpin..." She gritted through her teeth as Ozpin put his hands up.
"Gavin h-has also reach an age where young women will take interest in him so I-" The headmaster was cut off as the bobbles on his desk began to float as Glynda began to seethe. Gavin felt himself backing away while his mother fumed in a way even he can't fight. "Gavin. Home. Now." She growled out, to which Gavin gave a snappy salute and quickly left to the sounds of Ozpin yelling: "Save yourself boy!" Before suffering the wrath of his mother.
Ignoring the orange-cat faunus custodian he passed by in his retreat, he came to a daring conclusion:
He hated Mondays.
A/N Section:
Editing 4/5/2024 - Tweaking to spacing and correction to some misspelling. Slight alterations made to sentences for better description/ understanding.
Current Status of next chapter = 100%: Chapter released and ready for public viewing.