Untitled 001 - Incomplete Story

A story I began writing way back when I first started Temptation, and was going to be my second story instead of Escalation before I put it on hold. Not sure if I'll ever go back to it, so I thought I would share.

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“Up!” Ruby yelled as she burst through the door in a shower of rose petals. It slammed against the wall and rebounded, almost hitting her in the face. Her palm slapped against the wood, stopping it dead in its tracks. “Get up! Up, up, up!”

Yang groaned as she turned over, wrapping her sheets and blankets tight around her body until she resembled a burrito, while Blake sat up so suddenly that her back cracked audibly. A line of drool ran from the corner of her lips down over her chin as she blinked blearily, her cute little kitty ears twitching rapidly.

“Come on, get up!” the youngest member and leader of Team RWBY commanded. “I have important news!”

“What on earth are you hollering about?” Weiss stormed out of the bathroom, freshly showered with a towel wrapped around her head. “Don’t you know what time it is?”

“Don’t care!” Ruby dashed over to her sister’s bed and grabbed the end of the blanket burrito, tugging her off the mattress in one fluid motion. Yang squawked as she hit the ground with a thump, thrashing within her fabric prison.

“Ruby!” Yang growled when she had little success, only making the wrap of blankets tighter around her form. “What’s the big idea?”

“Team meeting,” Ruby declared. “Right now!”

“Have you been drinking coffee again?” Weiss demanded.

Silver eyes suddenly appeared inches away from icy blue, causing the white haired girl to flinch back in alarm.

“We are getting a supporter!”

Blake was instantly alert, the tiredness vanishing from her face within the blink of an eye. Yang stopped struggling, becoming eerily still. Weiss gaped at her leader stupidly.

“W-What did you just say?” she asked.

Ruby nearly vibrated out of her boots. “We are getting a supporter!”

Blake slipped from her bed with liquid grace, asking, “I thought they couldn’t find anyone?”

“Well they did – and he is arriving today!”

The silence was long and deafening.

The world of Remnant was filled with dangerous creatures called Grimm, darkness incarnate that took the form of monstrous animals that prowled the lands with only one thing on their minds; the destruction of humanity and faunus-kind. The only ones that stood in their way were the huntresses, trained from a young age in the use of aura and dust; young women charged with the protection of their world. For reasons unknown to science, the majority of women could unlock aura but the majority of men could not. While there were thousands of aura users world wide, a vast number of them were women. Men only accounted for a very small fraction, meaning that the power balance on Remnant was firmly on the side of the ‘fairer’ sex. It hadn’t always been this way but at some point, the scales had tipped heavily in the direction of women. Of the few men that did unlock their aura, their semblances tended towards a more support role than one of combat. It wasn’t that they couldn’t fight. It was just that their abilities were much more valuable when used to bolster huntresses.

And they were about to receive their own aura-capable man!

Not every team was gifted such a thing. Only the best of the best were bestowed such a blessing. Team RWBY had long known they qualified as such. They had one of the highest successful mission counts for a first year team in the history of Beacon Academy. Better than older, more experienced teams! No, the problem had been in the fact that there were a lack of viable male candidates.

But the Headmaster had found someone at last!

It wasn’t just their role to support their huntress team on the battlefield either. They also supported their teams in other ways. Be it by doing the laundry or cleaning their rooms, or making them meals, they were the ultimate house husbands. Indeed, that is exactly what many men who unlocked their aura become; literally married to their teams. It was how Ruby and Yang’s father had ended up with their mothers. Their value as aura-capable men could not be understated.

This was a monumental occasion. Everything they had ever wanted was within their grasp. Not only would they get stronger, become better huntresses, but they would also gain a partner for life if things panned out. Because there were times that very rarely, things did not go to plan. They had all heard the horror stories; supporters drunk with power, men who wished to lash out at the perceived oppression of their gender. Those stories never ended well and usually ended up in their death. The sad thing was, they weren’t entirely wrong. In many places in the world, men were treated as inferior. Vale was ahead of the curve in that regard, treating their men a lot better than places like Vacuo and Mistral, but there was still inequality.

But that wasn’t going to happen here! Ruby would make sure of it! They were the only first year team to get a supporter and she wasn’t going to blow this chance!

There was just one thing that didn’t make sense, though; something that had been on Ruby’s mind ever since she had been given the good news.

“Did Team JNPR also gain a supporter?” Yang asked, curiously.

Leave it to her sister to hit the nail on the head without trying.

Team JNPR – while Team RWBY prided themselves on being the best, they were only the best after Team JNPR. If Team RWBY had one of the highest successful mission counts in history for a first year team, Team JNPR had the highest successful mission count. While they could challenge their sister team academically in the classroom largely thanks to Weiss and Blake, when it came to battle... well, in team battles, they were zero wins for fifty-one losses. It was a horrible, depressing record that they would rather forget. One-on-one, they could beat members of their team. Just last week, Weiss had defeated Nora Valkyrie in single combat. But as a unit?

They hadn’t come close.

There were a few reasons for that. Their teamwork was better, for one. They moved together like a seamless unit, as if they’d been training all their lives together. As hard as Ruby tried to bring her team together as a cohesive group, and as much as she had succeeded in doing so, Team JNPR were just better at it. Watching them fight together was awe inspiring and a testament to what a huntress squad could achieve at the pinnacle of teamwork. But even if Team RWBY were able to surmount that peak of perfection, there was another laying in wait. Perhaps the single biggest reason they always lost was simply because of one young woman.

Pyrrha Nikos was the jewel in the crown of Beacon Academy. Hailing from Argus, people had expected the four time Mistral Regional Champion to attend Haven Academy. Imagine the surprise when she had forgone her homeland’s premier huntress school to fly halfway across the world to attend Beacon.

The hype around Pyrrha was incredible, a rock star of the huntress world – and it was well deserved. Ruby had never seen anyone move like she did on the battlefield; even fully licensed huntresses. There was a surety to every movement, a certain grace that transcended simple fluid movement and became something more. It was like she knew her opponents moves before they did and reacted accordingly, leaving them helpless against her brutal, precise strikes. Yang was a thrill seeker and loved to fight, almost more than anything. It was a testament to Pyrrha’s overwhelming skill and power that even Yang hesitated to square up against the crimson haired beauty aptly dubbed by the masses as the Invincible Girl.

She was the greatest huntress-in-training of their generation and already thought of as one of the greatest, most powerful huntresses on the planet. At the age of seventeen, that was an incredible achievement. If there was one person without question who deserved a supporter, it was her. Team JNPR was all but guaranteed it.

And yet...

“No,” Ruby answered. “They didn’t.”

There were rumors, of course. Everyone had heard them at Beacon; about how they’d been offered supporters before but had turned them down. It sounded ludicrous. It was surprising enough for a first year team to be considered, let alone picked – but for a first year team to turn down such an offer? It sounded crazy.

If it was Pyrrha Nikos, though? Ruby could believe it. She wasn’t a regular huntress. She was the best of them. If it were true, that she had been offered a man and had turned it down, what was the girl waiting for? Ruby didn’t know – and frankly, she didn’t care. Because they had their very own supporter coming and nothing was going to change that!

Yang must have felt the same way for she pumped her fist, looking proud. “Heck yeah! Take that, JNPR!”

“It seems our hard work has paid off,” Blake said, looking extraordinarily pleased. Unfortunately she looked ridiculous, her chin still lined with drool.

“You’ve got a little something right there,” Yang said, tapping her chin. Ruby snickered as Blake wiped at her mouth, flushing scarlet when it came away wet. “There you go, kit cat.”

“Why didn’t you say something earlier?!” Blake accused hotly, rubbing at her face to make sure there wasn’t anything else out of place.

“This is no time for dawdling!” Weiss exclaimed suddenly, drawing their attention. Her face was feverish, eyes bright. “We need to prepare this instant! I will not have you three embarrass us during our first meeting. First impressions are important!”

“Uh, Weiss?” Ruby questioned as her teammate began pacing the room, muttering under her breath. The more she paced, the more urgent her muffled words become. Soon she was waving her hands around, gesturing wildly as she talked to herself. “Uh, guys? She okay?”

She looked rather deranged, all things considered. The towel around her head only made the image worse.

Yang grinned. “Don’t worry, Rubes. She’s been waiting for this moment ever since she was a little girl. It’s expected that she would get a little overwhelmed.”

Ruby tilted her head. “Come again?”

“The princess is about to meet her prince charming,” Blake supplied with amusement. “The dashing, handsome supporter comes to sweep the sheltered, lonely huntress off her feet and steal her away from her overbearing family. A dream come true, you could say.”

Ruby blinked. “Oh.”

Weiss suddenly turned upon them, pointing, “Mock me if you will but if you get in my way, you will pay.”

Yang laughed heartily. “He is our man, not just yours. You have to share.”

Weiss scowled, hands on hips. “I get first dibs.”

Blake arched an eyebrow in challenge. “I don’t think so, princess.”

“Hold it!” Ruby roared before a fight could break out in their dorm room. “No fighting – that’s an order!”

Her team grumbled their assent.

“As team leader,” Ruby then said arrogantly, placing a hand on her chest. “I get to experience things first. Do you think he can bake? I’m going to get him to make the biggest, bestest batch of chocolate chip cookies this side of Remnant.”

Protests rained down as they bickered furiously for several minutes, the four almost coming to blows. It finally ended when Ruby regained a modicum of common sense and found her trusty whistle. Taking a deep breath, she blew into it with everything she had. The shrill sound cut through the argument like a sword through flesh, bringing about blessed silence.

“Right!” Ruby exclaimed. “Enough of that. He will be here in a few hours and we have a lot of work to do, Weiss is right.” She ignored the smug look on the white haired girl’s face. “So! First on the agenda; we are getting a new room!”

“What?” Yang said before her eyes lit up in understanding. “Oh, right! I forgot about that.”

They were gaining a new member, meaning the dorm room they’d been living in for the better part of a year was no longer fit for purpose. All teams that gained a supporter were moved into a separate section of the school grounds. They would now be sharing space with only a handful of special teams, a walled compound on the northern part of the campus. They would now have access to their own private training grounds, a fully furnished house, among other perks.

It was also where specialty research was conducted.

Even after all these years, things like aura and dust were only barely understood; semblances even less so. Because of that, it stood to reason that the best places to conduct experiments and research, and gather data were at the various combat academies around the world. Even less understood were aura-capable men and the nature of their support-based semblances. The specialty research they would be conducting from now on would have to do with their newest team member.

“Did they tell you anything about the man we will be teaming with?” Blake asked suddenly, instantly becoming the center of attention. “What type of semblance does he have?”

Ruby pulled out her scroll and opened it up, quickly bringing up a file. A picture of a blond haired, blue-eyed boy with short, messy hair appeared alongside a plethora of information. For some reason, even though there were a lot of specifics about his height, weight, date of birth and place of birth, even his species, his name was absent. The file simply referred to him as Subject 12.

Yang whistled. “He’s cute!”

Ruby privately agreed. He was really, really cute!

Blake also remained silent, though her cat ears had perked up considerably.

“So this is to be my husband,” Weiss declared haughtily. Her cheeks had gained a healthy shade of pink, prominent upon her pale, blemish free skin. “I must say, the headmaster has chosen well. Our children will be beautiful.”

“There she goes,” Yang snickered. “She finds out she is getting a supporter and the Ice Queen melts. You are getting a little ahead of yourself, Weiss. He is going to be my husband first.”

Weiss sniffed.

“A concubine, perhaps,” ice blue eyes looked her up and down. “Yes, you would make an adequate mistress.”

Yang’s eye twitched.

Ruby held up her whistle threateningly. “Don’t make me blow this again!”

“Does it say anything about his semblance?” Blake asked, attempting to bring the conversation back on track. Ruby scrolled down until she found the part detailing his aura and finally, his semblance.

Blake blinked at the incredible numbers listed, shocked. “He has a lot of aura.”

Ruby squinted at the text and began reading aloud, “Aura amplification – the ability to amplify the aura of others and increase the scope of their semblances. All parameters are increased, including strength and speed, and the rate in which aura heals the body, as well as any defensive properties. Subject can also use the semblance on himself, increasing his own combat viability and has shown an increased rate of aura recovery. More testing is required to ascertain the full scope of this ability. Semblance is activated through touch, though has been observed to have increased potency when a subject comes into contact with his blood. It is possible that any genetic material will have similar or increased effects, though subject requires aura to activate.”

They all shared a look.

“As expected of my supporter,” Weiss exclaimed, hands on hips.

“That semblance is incredible,” Blake said bluntly. “Think of the applications. Just having him on our team will increase our combat strength by leaps and bounds.”

“That is good and all but didn’t you ladies hear what it said?” Yang pointed at the screen, specifically the part about touch and genetic material. A lavish grin spread across her face. “Testing is going to be so much fun.”

Ruby giggled. “Team RWBY is going to be the best!”