You know it's gonna be a great day when alarms start blaring at 6:24 in the fucking morning. Lukas had fallen asleep on the sofa at midnight, and I stayed up two hours more before calling it, so I'm feeling great.
"Breach…? Fuck me…" I groan, listening to the alarm blare from Vale. It's loud, even all the way at Beacon on one of the farthest parts of campus from the damn city.
"Ngh…" Lukas grumbles from the other side of the couch, getting up. He's a bit quicker to wake than I am, but still.
"Yo, dude, grab that bottle of hot sauce from the cabinet, please?" I request.
"Why?" he asks in return, tossing it to me.
I twist off the cap, and shake a solid mouthful into my mouth. It burns, my sinus clears, and I have to sniffle because of it. "Just a way to wake myself up, I guess. This is short term, though, so…" I trail off while grabbing an energy drink from the fridge, put the hot sauce back, and slide on my shoes, not even bothering to tie them. As Lukas and I jog across campus, it occurs to me that not many people are even here at the moment. Most people are still on their missions as far as I can tell. At least we can count on JNPR…
Oh...
Anyways, we get into the armory, and I start to throw on my gear as quickly as I can. Levi bounds over, almost falls, and catches himself with his maul. "Doge!" he shouts.
"Yeah? What's up?" I ask, sliding on my gauntlets.
"What's going on?"
"Vale's been breached. That's what that alarm means."
"No, no, I know that. I meant, like, what happened?" he asks, putting on his breastplate and pulling the straps.
"I know just as much as you do, dude."
"Friends!" Jade shouts, sprinting over.
"Yeah?!" I call back.
"Hey, Jade!" Levi shouts. Lukas is laser focused on getting what little gear he needs to get on, and once he does, he stands by, eagerly tapping his foot.
"What's happening?" she asks. Oh, yeah, she probably doesn't know why she was woken up by alarms.
"Vale's breached." Lukas gruffly says.
"That can happen?!" Jade asks, baffled.
"Of course that can happen!" I shout back, finally having everything on. "C'mon, let's roll!"
"Wait, are we ordered to do this?!" Jade asks, following after us.
"No, but I just have this… feeling?"
Levi's the next to speak, "Like what?"
"Just… I don't know! We don't have time for this, though!"
As we reach the bullhead, I see Team JNPR moving towards an unarmed one.
"Oh, hey guys!" Nora shouts, waving wildly.
"Get in this one! It actually has armaments! We're heading to Vale, too!" I shout, already throwing myself into the vehicle and turning it on. While it warms up, I slam the Monster, and crush the can before stuffing it under my seat. I'll pick it up later.
Once everyone's inside, I can hear Jaune counting, "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight in the cockpit. We're good!"
With that, I take off, and start for Vale. Smoke's billowing out of the city near one of the walls, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out that we're going there. As we approach, a Nevermore decides that we're not making it there, and dives at us. "Hold on to something!" I shout, already in the midst of pulling us hard left, and reducing throttle to make a tight turn. Once spun around, and with the overgrown pigeon on target, I let the guns rip and tear the Nevermore to little bits. Its body flies into a building right before dusting away, and I curse.
"Can you fly this thing- hurk -any less stable?!" Jaune asks, the green on his face a clear indication that he's not a massive fan of my evasive maneuver.
"I'm trying here, okay? Just bear with me, we're almost there!" I call back, shooting down another Nevermore as we get close.
Once we get even closer, I can see a King Taijitu standing tall, and Nora gets this look in her eyes. "Doge, Doge, Doge, let me at it! Let me at it!" she shouts. I also spot Team RWBY down there, along with a crashed train, and an unconscious Roman Torchwick. I can only tell that it's him from his bright orange hair, to be honest.
"Fuck it, sure! Get ready to drop!" I say, putting us into hover and pulling in close to the towering Grimm. Nora jumps out and shouts, "NORA SMASH!" before turning its head to a nice paste with her hammer. Once everyone's out, I pull out for a moment, spin around, and start strafing the hordes of Grimm. It's doing a little, but the constantly having to evade Nevermores is starting to get on my nerves, so I start looking for a place to land…
Meanwhile, on the ground, the rest of DAIS and JNPR are gradually thinning the horde. Jade digs her fists into the ground, and rips up some chunks of rock that morph into something closer to claws on the end of her fingers. She dashes forward, cutting her way through Beowolves like there's nothing else in the world. A Creep gets a little too close to her, and she flips it over before tearing into its throat, a wild look in her eyes as she darts off to the next target.
Nora continues her smashing quest, batting Boarbatusks away as they roll at her. She hits one directly back where it came from, knocking down a group of Beowolves. "Strike! Eheheh!" she giggles, skipping off to find something else to hit with Magnhild.
Ruby kicks off a Deathstalker and uses Crescent Rose to fire herself into the air, which she quickly turns into scythe form and digs into a passing Nevermore. Using Crescent Rose to steer it with a low degree of control, she rides it until it crashes into another Nevermore, and then jumps off with a burst of rose petals before tumbling to the ground.
Pyrrha stabs an Ursa in the neck with Miló, and cracks its neck with a turn of her wrist. As it slides down on the spear, she uses Akoúo̱ to bash the Grimm's corpse off of it, and turns to watch Jaune single handedly cut down an Ursa himself. She smiles proudly, and then turns to duel a Beowolf. Shocker, she absolutely obliterates it.
Levi finds himself back to back with Yang, RWBY's here too, and probably to blame, with both of them firing their weapons as they spin, slaughtering anything that gets too close to them. Ember Cecelia and Zum Seiger spit hatred in every direction as the bullhead lands not too far from them. Both are laughing maniacally, and having way too much fun. The epitome of a good huntsman and huntress.
"Having fun?" I ask, stepping out and incinerating a Beowolf that they missed.
"Absolutely!" Yang shouts back.
Marching forward, I carve my way through several weaker Grimm, Beowolves, Boarbatusks, Creeps, and find myself by Lukas' side. He's currently shocking an Ursa into submission, and I finish it off by stabbing it in the chest before shoulder bashing it off of Hell's Retriever. An Alpha Beowolf locks eyes with me, snarls, and starts sprinting my way. I fire off both shots, but it manages to dip them both. As it pounces, I form a circular shield of fire on my left arm and brace, and it bounces over my head before skidding to a stop. "Alright, motherfucker, dodge this." I raise my left hand like an orchestral conductor, and a geyser of flame sends it into the air. "Lukas?"
"Yup!" Lukas fans the hammer of his revolver, putting six holes into the Alpha that weren't there previously. It's dead.
Blake slides across the ground and cuts open the belly of an Ursa before firing a burst of dust at the Grimm, putting it down. The ground under her starts to crack, and she teleports away as a somewhat damaged looking Paladin crawls from the ground. Zwei and Doctor Oobleck quickly exit the cockpit, and Blake jumps even further away at the sight of Zwei, letting out a small yelp in the process. Zwei, meanwhile, spots a Boarbatusk rolling towards Oobleck, and headbutts it to stop it where it stands, er, rolls. Oh, fuck it, same thing.
"Yello, folks! Junior detectives on the case!" Sun Wukong shouts, apparently having shown up at some point.
"We have the badges to prove it!" Neptune says, standing right next to him, holding out a badge.
Lukas shouts after slitting the throat of three Beowolves back to back, "Make yourselves useful, or fuck off and go away!"
"Jeez, no need to be so har-" Neptune is cut off as a Boarbatusk slams into him, and sends him through a window. Sun starts to awkwardly shuffle to the side before dipping into the store to try and help Neptune.
By now, the Atlesian Military is deploying Knights to the battlefield, and they're somewhat doing their job. Not half as well as the huntsmen and huntresses, but they're helping add to our numbers. A pair of them get folded by an Alpha Ursa, which Ren slashes the chest of and shoots until it staggers backwards. As it falters, the Alpha gets cooked alive with a two piece from Antiquity's Roast via Oobleck, and my semblance. "Hey, Doctor, mind setting that wood pile on fire for me? I'm kinda burning through aura!" I say, pointing to a bit of wooden debris resting on the road.
"Yes, yes, give me a- Did you just make a fire pun?"
"No? Wait, yes, but not on purpose!" I respond. Oobleck smiles, ignites the pile of rubble, and I absorb the flames to restore my aura before heading back into combat. "Thank you!"
"Of course! Just repay the favor by not dying!"
It's around this point that I realize that I haven't been listening to any music, and go to check my scroll to see what's playing. There's nothing playing, but I can still hear guitars… Oh Godsdamn it-
"Hey Ladies! Guess you need some saving again, huh?" Coco Adel calls out from an approaching Bullhead, Caffeine blaring from the speakers. The girl is wearing a big ass smirk behind her shades, and she tosses herself to the ground. Said smirk vanishes as she sees that a clothing store has been blown up at some point during this engagement. "Oh? Oh really? You bastards had the gall to destroy my favorite clothing store?" She spits on the ground. "Realy?!" A Beowolf makes the mistake of getting close, and gets her handbag slammed into its crotch. Ouch.
"Dramatic much?" Lukas asks, electrocuting a Creep before putting it down with his revolver.
"Can it, Sinclair!" Coco shouts back before slamming the Beowolf's head into the ground. Soon after, her bag transforms into a minigun, because why wouldn't it? She starts to absolutely shred through Grimm, angry scowl on her face the whole time.
Fox slides over towards me, and wins a fist fight against a Deathstalker. Suddenly, it feels like I'm being watched… 'Oh, hello, Doge.' Fox "says" telepathically, cutting off the stinger with Sharp Retribution and throwing it into the back of an Ursa that was attacking Yang. 'Having fun?'
"What are you guys doing here?" I ask, currently hilt deep in Beowolf guts.
"Saving the day, duh!" Velvet says, kicking a diving Nevermore out of the air so that Yatsu can finish it.
"Lovely." I say, continuing to push forward. A Knight gets its arm torn off by an Ursa, picks up said arm, and uses it to beat down the Grimm. That's kinda metal, honestly. Jade swings in on a vine and wraps it around the neck of a Creep, strangling it and stomping it into the ground. Also kinda metal, truthfully.
Blake ends up next to me, and I almost bring up the hoodie thing. Time and place is not it, though, so I just blast away a group of Grimm with fire. A Creep tries to bite her from behind, to which a grab its jaw, and after a bit of wrestling it back and forth, manage to break it. After breaking it, I pull the pin on a fire grenade, shove it down its throat, and throw it away. Blake cuts the head off of an Ursa as I do so, and she hums at my little display. "Was that necessary?"
"Absolutely not." I say, shrugging as I move to engage whatever I can get my hands on next.
Levi is locked in a struggle against an injured Alpha Ursa, the beast having gotten Zum Seiger locked in its mouth. Levi's body jerks as he activates Overdrive, and he tears it free. Instead of picking it up, though, he starts to beat the ever-loving hell out of it, and once it's down, he grabs Zum Seiger, jumps into the air, and splatters its brains across the pavement.
Weiss kicks a Creep off of Myrtenaster, scoffing as she does. "How many more of these things are there?!" she gripes, freezing the ground and sending a pair of rolling Boarbatusks into Jaune, who stabs them.
"I don't know! Just keep fighting!" Jaune tells her, blocking an attack from a Creep with his shield. The tail comes severed as Ruby rolls past, and she gives him a friendly smile before moving on. Jaune decapitates the crippled Grimm, and continues his assault. As Weiss turn around, she sees a Beowolf leaping at her, jaws wide open. Suddenly, a blast of electricity sends it to the side, and Lukas shoots it in the head.
"Now we're even, Princess." Lukas says, going back to back with Weiss in order to not leave either of them exposed. Weiss grumbles under her breath at this, but continues to fight nonetheless.
The sound of heels clicking can be heard as Glynda Goodwitch makes an appearance, instantly closing the breach, and killing any Grimm that happen to be making the critical error of existing in her view.
With everything done, I sheathe Hell's Retriever and let out a long sigh. I wipe a bit of sweat from my brow, along with wiping some ashes from my cape, which almost looks more black and grey than red in some places. Now's the time, and kinda the place. "Hey, Blake…"
"Yeah?" she asks. "Are you alright?!" Blake's eyes do a once over of me, but upon not seeing any signs of real injury go back to my face.
"Probably, doesn't matter." Blake looks like she was about to speak whenever I continue, "What does matter is that you stole my damn hoodie!" I say, faux glaring down at her.
"Oh. My. Gods. You are not actually bringing that up right now. We just got done fighting for our lives, and you're worried about your hoodie?!" she asks, rolling her eyes hard enough that she could probably see her brain.
"Yeah, I am! After Levi got sent through your door, I saw it sitting on your damn pillow! You could have just asked, y'know?"
"I mean… fair, but like… I just…." Blake looks down at the ground, embarrassed, and sighs.
We both hear some commotion, and turn to see Roman Torchwick being dragged along by authorities. "Hey, hey, watch the- Wait a second!" he suddenly shouts, looking at Lukas. The guards escorting him stop for a moment, and Roman's face lights up. "Gods be damned, is that you, my boy?!" he asks, a big ass smile on his face. Unlike the somewhat cocky one he had on before, this one looks genuine. Lukas knows him? Wait, wait, was that unnamed crime syndicate Lukas has been talking about been…
"Yeah. It is. I'm a student at Beacon now." Lukas gruffly says, arms crossed.
"You are, aren't you? Should have expected that, to be fair. You always were the goody two shoes type, eh? Well, not to mention, I saw someone giving off sparks that one night with the Paladin, and I just knew it was you, just didn't want to say anything. Still mad at you for that, Firebird." he says, looking at me.
"There's no fucking way you just came up with that on the spot." I say, exasperated.
"I'd been saving it for when we see each other again, actually! I've held onto it for a week at this point, just like how I bet you hold onto Kitty at night! But that's not important. No, no… See, someone wanted me to do something really bad that would result in you fine folks dead and gone, and this…" he gestures at the carnage that Goodwitch is cleaning up, "…was a part of it. I can't say too much, no, I value my life, but I can say one thing… Neo?"
Suddenly, Roman shatters, and he and Neopolitan can be seen standing on a roof. Neo looks a bit disheveled and confused, but still stands tall. Roman adjusts his jacket, and looks at the crowd of people below him. "To whomever it may concern, the deal's off! I'm not going to be responsible for killing my boy, thank you very much!" And with that, they both shatter this time, and are gone.
"That bastard!" Blake growls, and I place a hand on her shoulder.
"If he's telling the truth, I don't think he's the one we're after anymore…" I say, and her face morphs into one of confusion, yet holding the anger. He did call her 'Kitty' again, to be fair.
"Wait, what was he talking about? What deal?" Weiss asks, a perplexed look on her face.
"And who was he talking to?" Levi asks, looking around.
…
None of us see it, but a woman dressed in red is currently glaring at the shards of glass falling from the roof. Emerald walks up to her and whispers, "Did he just…?"
"We'll improvise. The plan can still work, we'll just need to be extra cautious now… The White Fang can fill the gaps of the Atlesian equipment." the woman says, scowling.
"They already were filling in the gaps!" Mercury says, a look of anger on his face as he approaches.
…
There's a knife on the ground where Roman had been standing. Lukas walks up to it, picks it up, and compares it to Solace. They're identical. He carefully clips it onto his belt, and nods. "Right then…"
"You have a lot of explaining to do, Lukas." I say, walking up behind him.
"I know." Lukas says, looking back to the rooftop.
"Well, that was all fine and dandy, but I'm tired!"
Yang says, hands on her hips. "Levi, wanna come back to the dorm and nap?" she asks.
"You two bett-" Weiss starts before being cut off by Yang.
"Yeah, yeah, I know, I know, no screwin' while everyone else is present. We're just gonna nap, right Levi?" Yang asks.
"I'm too tired to do anything else." Levi, clearly drained, says.
"You weren't even the one who stayed up all night!" I shout.
"You didn't sleep last night?!" Blake asks.
"Uhh… I plead the fif-"
"Don't start with that! You're going to bed as soon as we get back!" Blake states, arms crossed.
"Like that wasn't my plan anyways!" I respond, crossing my arms.
"Glad to see that he still has as horrible a sleep schedule as ever." Coco says, walking over with her hands on her hips. "I was worried whenever he stopped hanging out with us for the fresh batch of first years he'd forget his old habits."
"This is not turning into another session of 'Jump Doge for his bad habits.' I refuse." I retort, crossing my arms over my chest. "Oh, and I haven't hung out with you guys because you're literally never at Beacon!"
"If you'd quit giving us a reason to do so, it wouldn't happen! Comprehend that, Canicus!" Blake says, still looking up at me with that slightly mad look on her face. It's kinda cute when she's angry… I better not say that out loud, actually.
"Did you just mumble 'you look cute when you're mad'?!" Blake shouts, tugging me forward by my cape's wrap.
Well shit.
…
Later that day, in one of the shadier parts of town.
Lavender is currently in his home, one of the higher end places in his district. The floors are hardwood, and the leather couch has just been put into place after he ordered it an odd week or so ago. He sets a half finished glass of water into the stainless steel fridge, and yawns. Lavender's clock reads around seven in the evening, and he starts to wonder about what to do for dinner. He's just finished sweeping up a mess his adopted daughter Lilac made, who's currently in her room and sulking in repentance. As Lavender goes to sit down on the sofa and take a break for the first time in two full days, he hears a knock at his door, and walks over to it. He opens it, and comes face to face with Roman motherfucking Torchwick, Neo right behind him. "Oh, you're fucking me right now…"
"Lavender! How are you? Doing good I'd hope?" Roman asks, smug smile on his face.
"Spare me the bullshit, Torchwick, what do you want?" If Lavender's furrowed eyebrows and scowl didn't get the message of being pissed across, his tone did.
"Well… we need a place to stay." Roman says, taking off his hat and holding it to his chest in an attempt to look pathetic.
He blinks. "Are you serious? What happened with-"
"We- Sorry, I called it off. I'm willing to tell you all about what her plan was, if you let me stay." Roman seems slightly more serious as he says that. "She wanted to destroy Beacon Academy, and take down most of Vale in the process. I can tell you more, but I'll need a bed to sleep in. Or a couch; I'm not picky."
"You didn't even wait for me to stay if you cou- No, no, fuck it, I don't care. Too tired, or whatever the fuck. Is he telling the truth, Shortstack?" Lavender asks Neo, who swiftly nods. The gears in Lavender's head turn, and he sighs. "You do chores, and you'll pay rent starting in a month."
"Oh, thank you, really!" Roman says. "We won't make you regret it, isn't that right, Neo?"
"I can't believe I'm fucking doing this…" Lavender says, letting them inside.
"It's because you love us!" Roman exclaims, sitting down on the couch and stretching out.
"I wish I didn't…" Lavender sighs.
"And we're useful! We'll do every last chore!"
"If you couldn't, I'd kill you."
"Oh, I know, Scaly." Roman teases, a bright smile on his face.
"Don't call me that, I'll kill you." Lavender hisses.
Roman drops his accent and flashy inflection, and the smile vanishes from his face before anyone can as much as blink. "Yeah, I'm sorry. That's my bad, Lavender. I-I-I'll order us some dinner…" Roman pulls out his scroll, and orders a few pizzas for everyone.
Well, that's that, folks, canon is officially dead. As if 90% of what's happened so far isn't already off canon, but still. I still need to mostly go along with what Vol 3 does, but soon enough I'm gonna be on my own. That, and the lovely folks who help me brainstorm both plot points, and bits. Shoutout to the... whatever we call ourselves at the moment. Anyways, this was like, only two weeks between chapters! Good on me! Yeah! Can I keep it up?! Find out next week on Dragon Ba-
So, moving on, as always, massive thanks to those of you reading, because as much as I'm just writing this for fun and my friends, it's also kinda for those who've been following this for the past... fucken' hell, almost a year now? Well, more like ten months, but technically it's well over a year considering that the original draft of Chapter One was written in November of '23. (It was bad. I used to do dialogue like this)
Doge: "Blah blah blah, I'm tired, blah blah."
Lukas: "Something something quirky one liner, something."
Levi: "Me am Levi."
it was bad
Anyways! I got better, my writing style has definitely developed nicely, and this author's note is droning on. As always. Fuck my life.
Catch you later, my...
uh
I'll think of something next time.