Chapter Text
My return to the world of the waking was sudden in much the same way that a club to the head was sudden—namely, I had a migraine. I also had the memories of a seventeen year old from another world that knew Remnant as a work of fiction inside my head so I feel that my condition was quite an understandable reaction, thank you very much.
To clarify: I was a gestalt of two people now. Both were teenagers, both from different worlds. But one had their life cut tragically short and was unceremoniously (and none too gently) shoved into the head of the other until both of us became what we were now: a single person, who had the memories of two lives but lived both of them.
I sat up in bed and winced, the pounding in my head not abating at the sudden motion. With all the energy of a particularly sluggish sheep I blinked blearily, peering about my room. It was a spartan but high quality room; I didn’t have nothing, after all, but I didn’t particularly care for clutter or creature comforts. The furniture that I did keep in my room served a purpose—a pine wood dresser for my clothes, a desk for homework and charging my scroll, a wall-mounted rack for Miló and Akoúo̱—Miló in javelin form, Akoúo̱ (as always) a shield.
Next to the dresser was a mirror and I padded over to it, looking myself over. Teenage body, flame red hair on my noggin, piercing emerald eyes—yep, I was Pyrrha Nikos. Or still was Pyrrha Nikos, from a certain point of view. A Pyrrha Nikos with messy red hair, little strands poking out all across my head, a pink nightdress on, and a yawn splitting my face. I stared at the mirror a little bit and stuck my tongue out, the half of me that used to be someone else reveling in the feeling that I was new. I was Pyrrha Nikos. And I was going to die at the end of the year.
That took a bit more self-actualization to come to terms with, I decided, and I padded back to my bed and sat down heavily. Then I yawned again because neither part of me was naturally an early riser. So, RWBY was a thing. For the sake of my sanity, I decided to just classify it as what would have happened, had this not occurred—no point in questioning it or its veracity. For the moment, I would treat it as fact and adjust accordingly; which, of course, meant that my death was rapidly approaching.
Dying at the end of the Vytal Festival was, to say a word, inconvenient, and it ran contrary to my goals of “not dying”. I know, I know, I dreamed big. But at the same time… there wasn’t a way to avoid it, was there? Assuming I went to Beacon and was a nice person, Ozpin was going to ask me to be the Fall Maiden. I wasn’t going to say no to him—I wouldn’t just condemn someone else to death because I was a coward—and Cinder would try to kill me. And even with half the maiden powers, I didn’t fancy my chances versus Salem’s prodigy.
Try as I might, I didn’t see a way around it beyond facing someone on top of that tower, be it in one year or ten years. Salem would never stop hunting me down if I did get the maiden powers and I wouldn’t pass up the opportunity if it would save someone else’s life—that was something that both parts of me were in agreement on. My life was on a timer now and even knowing that… I couldn’t, wouldn’t, get off the track that I’ve set for myself.
One year to live, huh?
I flopped backwards up into my bed and stared at the wooden rafters criss-crossing the ceiling, letting the softness of the mattress soothe me.
Then I better make it count.
“Good morning, sweetie!” my father—Peleus Nikos—said, his face lighting up as he saw me come down the stairs into the cramped kitchen that made up our home. He was a big man, easily the tallest I’d ever met, and built like an Ursa, with a long dirty blonde beard and a ponytail. Today, he had on a white apron with “Kiss the Cook” emblazoned upon it over his Huntsman gear; I watched as he flipped a pancake end-over-end in his skillet, the pancake making exactly three and a half rotations before it landed.
My mother, on the other hand, looked up from the cup of coffee that she had in her hands and gave a smile and a weak mumble of a greeting before going back to sleepily staring into it like it held the secrets of the universe. She had her hair cut into a bob and glasses but otherwise looked identical to how I probably would in twenty years, if I lived that long; her eyes and hair were shade for shade like mine and she had basically the same body type.
“Morning,” I greeted back as I sat down, my father giving a nod as he flipped another flapjack. The table we had was a simple thing, roughly carved from pine wood by my father along with the three chairs we had in the house.
My father plated the last of the pancakes and brought them over to the table, giving one plate to my mom, one to me, and then absolutely drowning the last in a flood of syrup. “So,” he said, taking a very sticky bite, “three days until the big day, hm?”
I smiled, putting a more moderate (albeit still somewhat copious) amount of syrup on my own pancakes. My mother took hers plain, mechanically spearing bites and putting them into her mouth. “Three days till Vale,” I said between bites, “then another eleven until Beacon’s Initiation exam.”
Leaving home is mildly terrifying but hey—Beacon’s going to be exciting! And moving to the city a week and a half early gives me some good time to get used to new surroundings. I wonder if that’ll be early enough to help with Roman or some of the trailers? The White trailer is up in Atlas and pretty private, and I’m pretty sure the Black trailer’s already happened, so that just leaves the Red and Yellow trailers. Maybe I go bump into Yang when I get there?
“We’ll still be flying you and your stuff over, so make sure you’re all packed up early,” my dad reminded me.
I nodded. “And the two of you are still going on a mission tonight?”
My father sighed heavily as he speared another bite of syrupy sludge. “Unfortunately. We’d stay back if we could…”
I shook my head. “But you’re hunters, I get it. I’m a teenager, a famous tournament fighter, and about to be a huntress in training, Papa—you can leave me at home for a night.”
Well, more than a few nights, but my parents are overprotective as hell. Which is ironic, since they pushed me into being a tournament fighter, but I guess there’s a difference between fighting for sport and safety at home? And I’ve had a couple stalkers… okay, nevermind, they’re probably the right amount of protective.
He pursed his lips and glanced at the rack by the door holding Bunyan, his weapon—a mechashift bardiche/mortar—and nodded. “You’re right, but…”
“She’ll be fine, Peleus,” my mother said, rubbing her eyes as she finally woke up enough to join the conversation. “And if we leave early we might be able to get back in the evening instead of staying the night outside.” Her weapon was racked next to Bunyan and was in its morning star form, sharp feather-like spikes forming the pointy bit of the morning star/sniper rifle named Arkus—unrelated to the ship, of course.
My father perked up at that and began shoveling the rest of his breakfast into his mouth, chewing quickly. “Then let’s—ulp—get going! Daylight’s a-wasting!”
Thetis sighed but started on the remaining portion of her breakfast with renewed gusto.
“Your sandwiches are already packed?” I asked, taking another bite of my pancake stack.
My father grinned, shoveling the last bite in. “Since last night!”
“You remembered the camping supplies?” my mom tagged in as she finished the last bites of her pancake.
“In the bags!”
Dad’s definitely forgotten those a few times—I guess that’s something that I need to make sure to keep in my bag when I become a huntress. Sleeping outside’s safe enough if you’re careful about it, but if there’s any Grimm nearby and you have a nightmare…
My mother smiled. “Then I suppose we’ll be leaving, Pyrrha,” she said, getting up from the table and coming around to hug me. I returned the hug with a soft smile, luxuriating in the fact that despite having another soul in my body—that despite a fundamental part of my person being changed—mom hugs were still the best kind of hugs.
And then my dad jumped, sweeping both me and Thetis into a crushing bear hug that left us gasping for breath until he finally released us.
My mom smiled. “Is it okay if we leave the dishes with you?”
I nodded. “I’ll take care of them before I do my training.”
“Don’t overwork yourself, okay?” she asked, her voice tinged with concern. “Enjoy the rest of your time off. You only get to be young once.”
“I’ll relax,” I promised. “Stay safe, both of you.”
My father laughed boisterously, crossing his arms. “When do we not?”
Though I tried to play it off as my parents left, by the time I was done with the washing up, my mind was running through the halls of my brain at hundreds of miles per minute and it was all centered around one thing: destiny.
“Do you believe in destiny?” I heard my own voice say, echoing from the future.
Grabbing a notepad from my desk drawer, I plopped down into the seat with a sigh. It was a small notebook—a reporter’s pad, more than anything else—and I grabbed a pen from a “World’s Best Daughter” mug that my father bought me years ago and had found its life as a pencil holder. Pulling off the pen cap, I chewed on the end, mulling it all over.
Destiny for me—much like Pyrrha told it to Jaune, some months for now—wasn’t real as a driving force. I could act outside destiny, I could do what I wanted when I wanted. But at the same time, the fates would always have their due and I knew I was going to die up on that tower. But… that doesn’t mean I have to leave things unfinished here.
On the top of the page, in big letters, I titled my notebook. “Pyrrha Nikos’ Bucket List.”
The first page was an easy thing to make—I titled it “Days” before making a tally mark. Eyeballing my scroll’s calendar, I had exactly 186 days until the end of the Vytal Festival—and, presumably, the end.
186 days to make the most of.
I shook my head and slapped my cheeks. 186 days was plenty of time to knock these goals out!
…As soon as I figured out what the goals were.
I nibbled on the end of my pen, thinking it over.
Alright, we go to Ozpin and tell him everything at the start of school. That’s a lot of stuff taken care of immediately, assuming I tell him the right things. Right? Let’s see, who are the antagonists that I can take care of and what problems do they solve?
I wrote down “take care of the Haven headmaster” at the top.
Boom. Nailing it. Uh, interpersonal problems? What can I speed run?
“Make Nora pancakes” joined the list, followed by “learn how to make pancakes”, “figure out what noise a sloth makes”, “make Blake call her parents”, and “make sure Sun doesn’t abandon his team.”
I nibbled on the back of my pen again. What else?
“Get Ruby friends” and “Get Penny friends” quickly joined the list, along with “Make sure Jaune doesn’t die during initiation”. He was a good person, even if he cheated into Beacon—I’d need to train him up to make sure he was in good shape for the Festival.
The rest of the items on the list didn’t come as quickly, unfortunately, and soon enough I was staring at an empty page. I stared again, willing ideas to come to mind, before sighing. Vale wasn’t built in one day—I had time to add things. Time to finish things and settle everything up.
Stretching, I got up and meandered down the stairs, grabbing Miló and Akoúo̱ as I passed their rack. I was already a shoe-in for Beacon, what with my fighting skills already being what they are, but a little training never hurt anyone!
And I had some ideas for how I could use Polarity more overtly now that I knew I didn’t need to hide the Semblance for more than the next couple hundred days. Budget Magneto, here I came!
Stakeouts are a complete snooze fest. And I mean that in the worst way possible. Seriously, it’s the middle of the night again and I’m just chilling on my shield, hoping that a very specific person is going to come by where I think she’s coming by.
I shivered a little bit, wrapping my scarf tighter around my head and burrowing a little bit closer into my jacket. It was cold and dark at night, two things that combined to really sucky weather to be hanging out on a shield barely big enough to fit one on, especially when I didn’t have anything else to do. The move to Vale had gone smoothly, my mother and father helping me get everyone set up before taking the airship back to Argus; I appreciated it greatly, even if it was just a hotel room for the next week and change before Beacon started up. Before leaving, both had promised me to be good and stay safe and warm, something I promptly ignored by flying up extra high late at night.
As that crossed my mind, a gust of wind blew over me and nearly froze me solid. Why didn’t I find a better jacket! I had a good jacket back at my room, it just wasn’t necessary when I was on the ground and I didn’t think to grab it! Course, even as I shivered from the wind, I didn’t lose focus over Polarity, given that it was the main thing stopping me from plummeting a few dozen feet and hitting the pavement just in front of Junior’s Nightclub, a one story tall old brick building nestled deep in the industrial district of Vale. I adjusted my goggles a little—aviator’s goggles, to protect from the wind—and rapped a finger on my repurposed biker’s helmet. And then I sighed and kicked my feet back and forth, waiting for something to come up.
I should get another shield. That way someone else could come hang out with me and I wouldn’t be bored like this. I mean, two shields can’t be harder to lift than one shield, and weight isn't really my limiting factor. I could handle two shields.
…Wait, I don’t have any friends.
Unconsciously, I slipped out Miló and started running a finger along the edge, toying with the blade.
I bet I could get Ruby to come hang out with me? Assuming we talk about weapons. Nora would join me for sure, but then I’d need an extra shield for Ren. Maybe Jaune? No, no, he gets motion sick. Probably not Jaune. I suppose Yang or Blake would likely be willing to come, assuming I meet them within Beacon.
Speaking of the woman in question, I did another scan of the streets below me, keeping an eye out for garish orange-yellow sports motorcycles, only to come up empty—like I had been for the past couple of nights. There were a few people around—a white haired woman entering Junior’s, actually, but not yellow hair so I didn’t care—and street lights illuminating the darker patches, but not the person I was looking for.
She must come sometime this week, right? Assuming the trailers are canon—no, they must be, she visits Junior’s again in Volume 1. Or was it Volume 2? Same episode as Blake and Sun infiltrating Roman’s meeting, so it must have been Volume 2. Mental note, really ought to do something about Roman.
Nodding to myself, I took out my bucket list from my back pocket and wrote down “take care of Roman’s whole deal”, just under some of my other stakeout additions: “fight Cardin because he’s racist”, “do a fastball special with Yang”, “kill the Nuka—Nuckoo—the Grimm that destroyed Kuroyuri”, “figure out how to spell the horse Grimm’s name”, and a couple other items that I’d added over the past few days. It was probably concerning, the rate at which my bucket list was expanding, but it would probably start shrinking once I hit Beacon and started checking off some of these goals.
I did another scan of the street below me and spotted headlights cutting through the darkness. A closer look revealed a yellow-orange motorcycle cutting through the gloom of the night, a shock of bright yellow hair under… was that a bright yellow helmet?
Props to her for motorcycle safety, at least, if not basic color theory, I decided as I grabbed both sides of Akoúo̱ and brought my shield in for a landing behind her.
Yang—or the woman that was cosplaying as her, and doing a very good job of it—stopped her motorcycle and kicked up the kickstand, disembarking in front of Junior’s and taking off her helmet to reveal… more blonde hair. The woman paused for a moment, looking the building up and down, and I decided that this was my best chance to intercede.
“Hello!” I grinned, hanging my upper body off my shield upside down and meeting her eyes. “It’s a nice night, isn’t it?”
Yang Xiao Long jumped in place before spinning around, swiping at me in reflex. “What the hell—who are you?”
I grinned, bringing my board a little lower so I was at eye level with her when I sat up criss-cross applesauce. “My name is Pyrrha! What’s your name?”
Yang crossed her arms and regarded me suspiciously. “Yang.”
Boom! The blonde teenager riding an orange and yellow motorcycle through an industrial district late at night was the blonde teenager riding an orange and yellow motorcycle through an industrial district late at night that I was looking for!
I shrugged and got off the shield, letting it fly up and lock onto my back as I put my hands behind my back and smiled curiously. “So, Yang—what are you up to?”
Yang crossed her arms. “Nunya.”
“Nunya?”
“Nunya business.”
I shrugged, fighting back the urge to apologize and instead pushing forward. “I mean, it could be some of my business! It sounds interesting. Going to Junior’s for some clubbing, hm?”
Yang rolled her eyes and started for the door. “Something like that,” she said, curtly.
“Well, you seem like the kind of person who gets into bar fights. Wouldn’t you want a soon to be Huntress in training to help with that?” I asked with a hopeful smile.
Yang stopped at that and turned back to me, looking me up and down properly. I grinned and struck a little pose for her. Between Miló and Akoúo̱, the limited armor I wore, and my general muscular—I could easily pass for a Beacon hopeful, maybe even a first year at the school already.
“Nah, I’m good,” she said, turning away and striding confidently for the door of the club. “You go do… whatever you’re doing but with another woman.”
Alright, so that’s not working. Which makes sense—Yang’s looking for information on a pretty sensitive subject and I am the rando that just popped out of the sky on a shield. Honestly, she’s practicing safer stranger-danger than I am at the moment. Does she count as a stranger if I know her from another universe?
I shook my head and jogged after her. Stop getting distracted!
“Okay, how about this,” I started. “We both go into the club, you take care of your Nunya stuff, then I buy you a drink and we go from there, yes?”
Yang sighed, looked me and up and down, and pursed her lips. “Fine,” she acquiesced, starting back towards the club. “One drink.”
“Wonderful!”
Heck yeah! Perseverance and not saying no for the win!
…That came out wrong.
“So, Yang,” I said, walking next to the woman. “What are you doing here?”
Yang shot me another look. “I’m trying to get information,” she explained. “Junior’s supposed to be the guy to go to for that.”
Information about Raven, right? She had a picture of her in the Yellow trailer. I guess it makes sense that she’s still looking for information about her mom; Taiyang and Qrow both would clam up. What is Raven up to—she’s probably just kicking it with the Branwen Tribe in Anima, right?
Lost in thought, I followed Yang past two bouncers—the two just giving us a quick look over and then just waving us through—and into the club, the music hitting me like a sack of bricks thrown at a glass wall.
The visuals of the club interior weren’t much better; the music was far too loud for my tastes, a heavy bassline sending a thrum through my sternum with lights flashing all around. The dance floor itself wasn’t much better—it was a flashing red and white, lights set underneath glass strobing to illuminate the crowd dancing on it. The floor was set lower than the entrance, with a DJ booth just across from it—I could see a man with a cartoon teddy bear head playing some songs to keep the crowd pumping. Dotted around the dance floor were large glass pillars with fake trees growing out of them, lights inside the pillars matching the dance floor as they flickered to the beat.
While I was a bit distracted cataloging the club—screw me, this was new to both of my lives!—Yang was on a mission, making a beeline for the bar and forcing me to jog to catch up to her. The bar itself was black, lines and lines of bottles behind it indicating the wide selection they had on tap and with lights also flashing red and white to match the dance floor. There was a theme here, I was certain of it.
You’d think that the flashing lights would be a health and safety hazard or something. Epilepsy? Don’t flashing lights generally give people migraines after extended periods?
I trailed behind Yang as she brushed past one of the workers and I blinked, my eyes widening. The workers were in black and red suits, black bowlers on their head, but they had on red sunglasses—to cut down on the flashing lights!
Satisfied with that mystery solved, I turned my attention back to Yang as she made a beeline for the man of the hour: Junior.
Vale’s premier mob boss was a tall man, nearly seven feet at a guess, and had a lot of obvious muscle on him. He was wearing the same undersuit as the rest of his goons, the black jacket and bowler nowhere to be seen. His hair was closely cropped but not shaved with a neatly trimmed beard covering up a square jawline. Deep as he was in conversation with another woman —white hair, metal rimmed glasses, and a black turtleneck —he didn’t notice the two of us approach the bar as he tapped on the counter, indicating something to his client.
That woman feels familiar, but I can’t put my finger on why. White hair reminds me of Weiss, but there’s no way she would be dressed like that—or be in Vale right now. Too young for Winter or Willow, couldn’t be Whitely… did Weiss have any other relatives? Is there a completely different white haired person I’m forgetting about?
The woman smiled back at Junior. “That sounds lo-” she started, only for the smile to freeze on her face as Yang plopped down on the seat next to her.
“So, I hear you know everything in this city, huh?” Yang asked Junior abruptly, cutting the woman off.
I smiled and gave an apologetic wave to her, trying to convey how sorry I was about Yang interrupting here without struggling to be heard over the music. I mean, she was here first, Yang—we could always wait our turn?
Then I thought about who I was thinking that about and promptly discarded it.
Junior blinked and gave the woman a quick nod —presumably a promise to return to business later —and turned to Yang, focusing on her. “So they say, except for the fact I seem to have opened a daycare,” he snarked. “Parents didn't teach you to wait for your turn, blondie?”
Yang just ignored him and barreled on. “I’m looking for someone,” she said, opening her scroll and pulling up a photo of a woman. I think. I was, annoyingly enough, on the wrong side of the scroll to see the photo properly—all I could see was a blurred image in the vague shape of a woman.
It’s still probably Raven, right? What other woman would Yang be looking for?
“Tell me where I can find her and I’ll get out of your way,” she finished.
Junior took a glance at the photo —barely enough to register what the image was —before leaning against the counter and fixing Yang with a glare. “Sure. As soon as you pay, blondie,” he snorted. “Surely you’ve heard about that too.”
Yang crossed her arms. “Before you’ve given me anything?” she asked. “Yeah, sure, I’ll just throw away the rest of my lien while I’m at it. Information first.”
Junior’s lips curled into what could charitably be called a smirk but bore more in common with a frown. “You come into my club, flirting with age restrictions, you interrupt my conversation with another lovely lady without so much as ‘by your leave’. How do I know you won’t try to skip on the bill once you’ve got what you wanted, sweetheart? Besides,” he waved his hand dismissively, “getting what you want after you pay is how it works everywhere else, isn’t it?”
Yang rolled her eyes, tapping the counter between them. “We both know you don’t care about age restrictions, Junior, and there’s a difference between buying a drink and throwing a few thousand lien down the drain for information you only might have. Information first.”
The unknown woman —who I was leaning more and more towards just being a rando —tilted her head towards Junior, presumably offering aid as the conversation heated up. Junior ignored her, redoubling down on the bartering with Yang, and I decided not to get involved if she wasn’t. No point in turning the heat up more than it needed to be when Yang and Junior seemed to have it well in hand.
As well in hand as it could be, anyways—neither one of them seemed to be willing to budge, though I imagine that’s because neither of them want to back down and look weak. The fairest solution is probably half now, half after, but if Junior doesn’t have anything… I can see why Yang doesn’t want to throw lien into a hole without some guarantee.
Of course, that’s when other employees of the club took notice —specifically, the Malachite twins. “Boss, is the bimbo bothering you?” the red one —Miltia —drawled, voice thick with some sort of valley girl accent as she ran a painted nail up the blade of her crimson claws. Her eyes sparkled with something undeniably dark as she stepped closer to Yang, her sister —Melanie —walking around to Yang’s other side to box her in. Militia smiled. “We can show her the door, if you want?”
That was the moment that the mysterious woman’s Semblance chose to activate, peeling a white-and-blue image of a girl with a white ponytail and glacier blue eyes off of the woman and draping the figure over the woman’s shoulders like a haunting spectre. I frowned, my hand ghosting over Miló’s hilt, just in case the woman did decide to get involved.
Better safe than sorry, even if nobody’s actively aiming for this mess to break down into fighting. Hopefully Yang plays it reasonable and de-escalates before the fighting breaks out and we have to actually take down a legitimate business.
Instead of being a reasonable person and backing down, Yang just snorted, cocking her gauntlets back and letting shotgun rounds slide into the built-in chambers with an audible thunk. “You can try,” she threatened the twins, her tone carrying the underlying message of ‘but you won’t succeed’.
“Could you be as kind as to not begin spraying buckshot in a venue packed wall to wall with civilians?” the woman drawled, her tone filled with annoyance at the posturing. “If you are that hard on cash and high on frustration, I will happily rent a sparring room from Mr. Xiong here and we can sort you so some actual negotiations can happen.”
So she’s definitely supporting Junior if a fight breaks out, I realized, frowning. Two against however many people are in the club… I figured we could take them, sure, but it wouldn’t be a washout. Given that, I nodded, putting a calming hand on Yang’s shoulder. Sure, she immediately shrugged it off, but she didn’t sock me for it. “Let’s not resort to physical violence before we’ve exhausted our other options,” I added.
Yang scowled, crossing her arms and glaring at Pyrrha. “And you still owe me that drink,” she reminded me.
“Which she won’t be getting here, blondie,” Junior promised as he stood up, looming over Yang—the girl teen over a foot shorter even while standing. “Now scram and ask your daddy why mom hasn’t come back with the cigarettes yet.”
Oh, fuck.
I had a beat —just a moment —to register how poorly Yang was about to take that comment. I reached out with my semblance for Akoúo̱, letting the shield start to flow onto my left hand as the world sped back up and Yang lunged upwards and slammed a picture-perfect uppercut into Junior’s chin, the man’s eyes crossing as he was actually thrust into the air for just a moment.
Then everything went to shit.