Team GASH was making their way back to the dorms after their classes had ended, each of them bored out of their minds after sitting through Professor Port’s lecture.
“Oh my gosh!” Hera yelled ruffling her hair in annoyance. “Why does Port think we care about the same stupid story about how he killed ten Boarbatusks with just one shot? He’s told that story to pretty much every single student that has taken that stupid class!”
“Really?” Aurora said tilting her head in surprise. “Surely he has to have told other….”
“Nope” Gray said with a sigh. “That’s his main story that he tells every single time he’s either lecturing students or meeting up with old friends. Believe me, he has told that story to me and my family at least fifty times.”
“Consider yourself lucky” Sora said placing his hands behind his head. “Since my mom is headmistress at Haven, she has to listen to….” They suddenly stopped talking when they saw their families walking away from Professor Ozpin’s tower, all of them in a complete daze. Not sure how to react, Aurora was the first one to just rush over and embrace her parents. The rest of Team GASH followed suit.
“I’m so glad you’re okay!” Aurora said as she hugged her parents even tighter.
“We heard about what happened at Haven” Sora said as he ran over to his parents as well. “How bad is it?”
“As far as defeats go,” Ty said scratching his neck, “this one stung a bit.”
“So the Order has complete control over Mistral now?” Gray asked with a worried look on his face.
“Not exactly” Brooklyn said weaving her way past everybody. “The Order skipped town as soon as they got whatever it was they were after beneath Haven academy. But the Grimm that moved in will make rebuilding difficult.”
“What were they after exactly?” Hera asked scratching her head.
“We can’t say out in the open” Miles said with a sigh. “Not until we are sure that nobody else is listening in.”
“Another one of those universe shattering stories from Ozpin I take it?” Aurora said with a smirk.
“Just about all of Ozpin’s stories are universe shattering, trust me” Christy said stretching her arms.
“So what now?” Sora asked looking around the group.
“I have to coordinate with everybody on what we are going to do next in preparation for the Order’s next move” Pyrrha said pinching her forehead. “As well as make preparations for getting rid of the Grimm back in Mistral. But first, I need to get a bite to eat.”
“I’ll join you” Evan said following Pyrrha to the cafeteria. Jacob, Ty, Brooklyn, Christy, Beanie, Weiss, Ruby, Bovia, Terra, and Jaune followed suit.
“You not going with them?” Gray asked Yang and Ember as they still stood there.
“Not really that hungry” Yang said as she clasped her right arm and walked towards the docks. Ember sighed and started walking towards the dorms.
“I’m not in the mood for school food right now” she said picking up her pace. Gray watched as the two of them went their separate ways. He hesitated for a moment, but then started making his way towards where Ember had walked off too with Arri not far behind him. Natalie sighed and decided to follow Yang to where she walked off to. This left Miles, Blake, and the rest of Team GASH just standing around there.
“I think I’m going to go talk with my parents” Sora said as he flew off to catch up with the rest of the group going to the cafeteria. Hera stood there, not sure where to go.
“What’s your plan dad?” Aurora asked placing her hands behind her head. Miles looked around, and pointed at the auditorium.
“I’m not super hungry, and I don’t feel like just sitting around. Want to get some practice in?”
“I’m in!” Aurora said almost excitedly. She immediately ran straight over to the auditorium in an instant using her Semblance. Miles sighed as he and Blake started making their way to where their daughter was impatiently waiting.
“You want to come with us Hera?” Blake offered turning back to her, almost forgetting that she was still there.
“I’m good actually” Hera said pulling out her Scroll. “I’m going to text my sister, find out where she and Gray went off to.” With that, Hera walked off in the direction that Ember and Gray had gone. With a sigh, Miles and Blake continued on their way to where their own daughter was waiting.
Nobody really felt like talking. Everybody just sat around the table picking and eating their food little by little. Everybody seemed to just fidget and poke, not really sure how to respond. Not just to the information that Ozpin had dropped on them, but the fact that they had lost Mistral in a single day. Jacob was the first one to break the silence and slam his fist on the table.
“How did it get like this?”
“How did what get like this?” Brooklyn asked with a mouth partially filled with food.
“We beat the Order” Jacob said with frustration in his voice. “We beat them, we stopped them from taking over the world, and all of a sudden, just like that, they’re back and causing us even more pain.”
“I get where you’re coming from” Ty said taking a quick sip of his water. “But they’re back now and we have to deal with it.”
“Well apparently,” Evan said clenching his fist, “they have been around longer than anybody outside of Ozpin. So I guess it was stupid of us to assume that a group that old would be stopped by a bunch of teenagers and their teachers!”
“It doesn’t matter how long they’ve been around” Christy said pointing her fork at the group. “We’ve stopped them before and we can do it again! Heck, they’re just normal people trying to take over the world! We took on the power that literally created this world, and won! We…”
“We only won because of an assist from Salem, remember?” Ruby said taking a drink of milk from her glass. “Ozpin told us, the only reason the power of the Wizard got disrupted was because Salem sacrificed herself to save the rest of the universe. We had no chance of winning before that happened.”
“But we still held our own!” Jacob said raising his voice. “We were just kids and we held our own with a god!”
“A god” Weiss said sipping her coffee. “Singular. And we only held our own because Mortem didn’t know his full potential yet. He had barely used his powers for no more than a week.”
“On top of that,” Pyrrha interjected, “If what Ozpin said about the powers of the Wizard is true, than if Mortem truly had command over his powers, then he could have just as easily snapped his fingers and turned us all into dust in an instant.”
“Pleasant thought” Bovia said taking another bite of her sandwich.
“Okay, can we stop dodging the elephant in the room?” Terra said standing up suddenly. Everybody looked over at her confused. “You’re really going to make me say it?” No response. “Fine. First we lose Ember’s dad to these monsters, then we lose Mistral, and then we learn we lost something even more important that could lead to all of us getting destroyed by our enemies! All within the span of a few days! Am I the only one who thinks we need to stop thinking about the rest of the world for one second and think about each other?” Everybody fell silent once again. Nobody knew how to respond. They just returned to eating again, trying to take their minds off of everything. But finally, there was some sniffling in the air. A couple of them had started shedding a few tears. Some tried to hold it back, but couldn’t. For the first time since the world got turned on its head, everything finally came out all at once. There were tears, there were sobs, there were angry yells of frustration, questions of “why not me?” or “why Nathan?” and elements of that nature. There were plenty of hugs to try and help, plenty of talks, people who walked off to be alone, and others who walked over to comfort those who did. Then, they all sat together again, and started to laugh and remember the good times they had all shared with Nathan in the past.
“Remember the time our second year when Nathan managed to somehow do a rimshot with three Beowolves to cause them to evaporate?” Ty said to laughter from the whole group.
“Yeah!” Evan said laughing while holding back tears. “Remember when he would always respond to the question “what’s up” with “the ceiling” every single time?”
“I can’t believe out of all the jokes that Nathan made,” Jacob said with a smile, “that’s the one that somehow Miles of all people started using all the time as well!” Laughter and fond memories filled the cafeteria hall for the rest of the day, just remembering the person they had lost.
Aurora rushed forward and tried to land a strike on her father, but he had already prepared his blade to block the incoming attack.
“You can’t rely on your Semblance over and over again Aurora” Miles said as he parried Aurora’s attack. “You’ll run out of Aura before you can blink, and then you’ll be completely wide open. On top of that, depending on your opponent, they could easily read your ability and defend it rendering it useless.”
“You only say that because you’ve trained me in how to use my ability dad!” Aurora said as she tried to use her speed once again to get the upper hand, but once again, Miles had already prepared for where Aurora was going to strike and blocked the attack with his own swords.
“You telegraph your movements too easily” Miles said as he held Aurora’s blades in place. “Even if you’re moving faster than I am, your body is revealing every single step you are going to take before you take it. I thought you had that whole training trip with both Ruby and Jacob to try and help get rid of that habit.”
“It did help a bit, but at the same time, they each have one piece of something that is uniquely my own” Aurora said pulling her blades out and resetting herself. “I just need to get better at translating the general fighting technique that you and mom taught me into the speed force without making it too obvious.”
“At least you’re able to recognize your own weaknesses and move forward from that” Blake said as she continued to observe from the sidelines. “Most people your age just run with their weaknesses and just assume it will get better with age, but great warriors find new ways to improve themselves each and every day.”
“I’ll believe I’ve made some progress when I actually find a way to beat dad when he’s actually trying for a change” Aurora said as she launched a flurry of strikes that Miles managed to parry easily.
“I am trying. You’re just too slow” Miles said jokingly. He smiled, thinking that this would get Aurora mad, causing her to go crazy and potentially teach a good lesson about keeping a cool head. But to his surprise, Aurora pulled back her attack, put her swords away, and sat down. Sighing, she looked up at her father and asked,
“Dad, what’s wrong?” Miles looked at her confused.
“What do you mean?”
“You come back from a war zone, talk to Professor Ozpin for a few hours, and suddenly you want to train with me out of the blue? Shouldn’t you and mom be resting? Catching your breath and trying to heal after such a battle?” Miles paused, put his blades away, then sat down.
“I don’t know. I just don’t feel like sitting around doing nothing.”
“Making sure you’re well rested for when something bad happens is crucial to being a Huntress. That’s what you told me when I wanted to go all out during my combat academy days. So why do you get to get away with it?” Miles sighed at his daughters observation, and laid down on his back, staring up at the ceiling.
“I feel like I could have done more.”
“The Order had us completely off guard” Blake said as she had started to walk over to where they were. “It’s not your fault that they got away with the Relic.”
“It’s not just that.” Miles said as he sat back up. “I’ve also been thinking about everything that lead to this point.”
“Such as?”
“What if I was a better friend to Nathan? Or perhaps, what if I tried to do more to help him instead of letting him go down the path he did?”
“Dad, joining Nathan on his crusade wasn’t the answer” Aurora said laying down next to him. “You would have been killed too if you had gone with him.”
“No, not being a better friend in the sense of blindly following him to the edge of the abyss on his crusade, but more what I could have done to try and help him from going on that path. Despite the two of us not having the best start back in the day, we really did become like brothers. He would look out for me when I needed help and I would look out for him when he needed it. And then when he reached this critical point in his life, he wanted me to join him on that path. I could see right away that this path was going to cause nothing but pain and despair for not just him, but everybody around him. And I was right. Now I’m just left to wonder what could have happened if instead of letting him go off on that path I had done more to try and stop him? Maybe I could have stopped him from doing everything he did. Maybe I could have….” Before Miles could finish, Blake pulled him up from the floor and embraced him tightly.
“There was nothing you could do” she said with tears in her eyes. “Nathan went on the path he did because he thought it was better to pursue vengeance rather than his family. You and I were almost both consumed by a similar path long ago. But we found each other, and now we’ve got a new path to follow together.”
“I’m living proof of that” Aurora said with a smile, fighting back some tears of her own. “Heck, if the two of you had never run into each other all those years ago, I wouldn’t be here today! I’d consider that a win!” Everybody laughed at Aurora’s remark, and they all came together for one big group hug.
“Thank you” Miles said as he finally let some tears of his own fall. “This family means everything to me. I will do anything to keep you safe.”
“Same goes for us” Blake said with a smile. The three of them just sat there, holding each other close, never wanting to let go.
Yang sat on the edge of the docks, looking out over the skyline of downtown Vale off in the distance. There wasn’t really any reason for her to simply be there, she just needed a moment. Dealing with not just the bombshell that Ozpin had dropped on them, but also everything else that had happened.
“You know,” Yang turned to see who the new voice belonged to and saw Natalie making her way towards where she was sitting. “Nathan always told me that any time you two would go out on a date back in school, no matter what you did or where you went, you always ended up here. Looking out over the city.” Yang smiled, and turned back to the horizon.
“Yeah” she said with a sigh. “We both loved this view. The idea that everything that we were trying so hard to protect was just across the way over there. All we had to do was learn how to protect the people out there by going to classes in buildings behind us. We always loved that idea. Looking forward at the bright future that we would share together. At least until….” Yang fell silent after that last bit. Natalie nodded her head and sat down next to Yang.
“Yeah, I miss him too.”
“You were his sister. Of course you miss him.”
“Yeah, but you were his wife. That counts for a whole lot.”
“It did. Up until that whole Sons of Aequo thing” Yang clenched her fist as she mentioned the name of the group. Natalie lowered her head in shame, knowing full well how Yang felt about that crusade.
“You don’t regret not joining Nathan on his journey?”
“I’ll admit, I was on the fence for a bit. Nathan was my soulmate. I loved him with every fiber of my being. I gave up an arm to save his life back in the day. And back then and for most of our marriage, I felt he would have done the same for me. But when he started pursuing the Order with his group, I felt less and less confident that he would choose me over his mission. I honestly felt like if I were to leave our children on Patch to go join Nathan on that journey of his, if I were to be in a life or death situation and there was also a key member of the Order in the room at the same time, I felt like Nathan would have gone after the Order member before even considering to save my life.”
“Nathan would have never done that.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Well, when he and I launched our attack against the Order, somehow some way, we were discovered by the enemy despite having the element of surprise. A lot of that day is hazy for me, but I feel like Nathan made sure that I survived instead of sharing the same fate with him. The Order is clearly out for blood. And the fact that they didn’t get their hands on me, the woman who killed their last leader, I think that says something about Nathan and him keeping me safe.” Yang smiled when Natalie said this. She leaned over and gave her a hug.
“Thanks sis. That helps a little bit.”
“Any way I could make it help a lot more?”
“Not unless you’ve got a way to get your brother back from the dead and make him a much better person than he was when he ran out on me” Yang said with a chuckle. Natalie chuckled as well at the joke.
“I don’t think coming back from the dead works like that.”
Ember sat on the roof of the dorms looking out across the entire campus of Beacon. She kept trying to focus on other topics like battle strategies, her own shortcomings when fighting the Order in Mistral, how she could be a better teammate to help support her friends like when they were students, and just about anything else that popped into her mind in that moment. But every single time, her mind would wander back to that single moment in the caves with Lord Tenebris and the words that he said to her.
“I knew we’d find you here” Arri said as she appeared from the ground. Arri, Gray and Hera were all standing on a platform of vines and branches that Arri had created stretching up to the roof of the dorms. Ember smiled when she saw them and patted the empty space next to her, inviting them to sit down. They obliged, and sat there in silence for a few minutes. Then, Arri finally broke the silence by asking Ember,
“Are you doing okay? That weird guy in the mask really seemed to do a number on you.”
“I’m fine” Ember said pinching her forehead. “It’s just, how can he say such a thing?”
“What thing?” Gray asked leaning towards his sister. “What are you talking about?”
“Oh, right” Arri said with a small chuckle. “You weren’t there. And we only just got back. Well, the short version is, we lost, and the guy who killed your dad was there, and he talked down to Ember, calling her an imposter, and referencing the woman she was named after.” Everybody fell silent, but then Gray spoke up.
“He mentioned dad’s teacher? What about her?”
“Only that I’m just a pretender” Ember said with clenched fists. “That I don’t deserve to carry her name or something like that.”
“And who is he to decide that?” Hera said leaning over to get a better view of Ember. “Even if he knew the elder Ember, that doesn’t mean anything. Your father gave you your name and you should be proud of that. It was a name that he believed would bring honor. Just because some jerk in a mask says you aren’t worthy of the name doesn’t mean squat. He was her student, and you are his daughter. If anybody deserves to carry on the name, it is you.” Ember smiled as Hera said this, and gave her a hug.
“Thanks Hera” she said, tears rolling down her eyes. They all embraced each other, and sat there looking out over the campus.
“What do you miss most about him Gray?” Ember asked as they sat there.
“I miss his laugh” Gray said with a smile. “He always had a great way of giving a room some new life even when it was the most boring event in the world.”
“I’d say it’s going to be his welcoming nature” Arri said looking up at the sky. “He always tried to find new friends, and whenever somebody new in our lives showed up, he would make sure the felt welcome.”
“I don’t know about you,” Hera said with a chuckle, “but I’m going to miss his big cookouts. Man, those were fun.”
“Hera, those were mostly coordinated by my mom” Ember said with a laugh. “My dad couldn’t coordinate a big event even if he had a planner all lined up for him!” They all started laughing, almost falling of the roof. Regaining their composure, Ember said,
“I think I’m going to miss just being with him. Whether it was training, jamming, or just hanging out and talking, I felt like he was always there for me. Like I could go to him with anything on my chest and he’d hear all of it without complaint or issue. And afterwards, he would always do something to try and get my spirits back up. I think that’s what I’m going to miss the most.” The four of them continued to talk, wishing that things would go back to a simpler time before everything had changed so suddenly.
Ozpin looked over the map once more, and touched a single point in the desert of Vacuo.
“You’re sure Oz?” Ironwood said over the phone. “If you’re wrong and the Order catches wind of this, we might be in trouble.”
“Trust me James” Ozpin said standing up. “This place is perhaps the key to figuring out the riddle of how the Order has kept their hands within the world of Remnant for so long, even with my absence.”
“Who do you want to send in?”
“I have some people in mind for this operation.”
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