Chapter 1: Little Red
"Go on then, Roman. Time is of the essence. Besides, it's the last job of the day. I'd rather we finished this as soon as possible."
A woman, appearing younger and prettier than she had any right to be, beckoned to a tall and slim man dressed in a red-lined white suit, long, black pants, black shoes, a small grey scarf, black gloves with buckled sleeves and a black bowler hat that had a feather tucked into its red band to exit the airship and execute another robbery in another one of the hundreds of Dust shops in Valorie, the capital city of the kingdom of Vale.
"I must say, miss Cinder, I'm getting kind of tired of robbing these little shops off their livelihoods for nearly a month now, and you still haven't told me why you need all this Dust in the first place. It gets tiring doing tedious jobs like these with no motive, y'know?"
The deceivingly young woman, named Cinder, turned to face Roman to glare at him with her amber eyes, of which only her right was uncovered by her chest-length ashen black hair. The yellow abstract designs embedded with Dust along the long sleeve ending in a wrap around her middle finger of her right arm began to glow, as flames erupted next to her and a black glass sword appeared in her hand. She pointed the tip of this blade to Roman's neck, to which Roman responded by raising his hands in surrender. His slanted, dark-green eyes were slightly wide-eyed now. Cinder would have loved to see both of his eyes displaying that fear, but his other one was covered by the long bangs of his bright and long orange hair. The rest of the designs along Cinder's red dress, worn over knee-length black boots and black mini shorts, glowed ominously.
"Here's your motive: Do or die. We've hired you for a reason, Roman, and we see potential in you. Prove us wrong, and I will gladly dispose you. We don't need a failure. Do as you've been kindly asked, and you'll receive your due payment in full. No more questions. We're almost done with these, anyways."
"Simple and straightforward, I like it." Roman replied, smirking. He had a knack of being sarcastic no matter the situation, which was probably going to get him killed sooner or later.
"Don't try to be a smartass with me, Roman. Hurry it up."
Roman nodded and beckoned to the henchmen he had rented to get out of the dark alley and into the street outside. This was the twentieth time he had been threatened on this stupid job, and he was getting tired of it. He figured working through this quickly would allow him to get rid of this job quickly.
Roman decided to go for a direct approach, despite the large number of people roaming the street ahead. He didn't really care; he was tired of his employer and her anonymous colleagues. People suddenly began moving away and gasping as they watched him make his way down the street to his target; a peculiarly tiny shop with the title 'From Dust Till Dawn' written across the top of the building. He sighed, cringing at the name, and walked in through the front door. A doorbell rang, but that wasn't a problem here; the shop appeared empty. 'How convenient.', Roman thought. He spotted a calendar on the front counter that reminded him of the date and suddenly felt a bit of pressure when he read it – August 2, 80 A.U. He quickly recomposed himself to address his fortunate victim of the night.
"Hey there, old fella.", he called to the shopkeeper. "I've got a little offer for you. Come on, come a lil' closer." He beckoned to the shopkeeper to come up to him. Seeing as a relatively big group of dangerous-looking people had just entered his shop, he complied out of fear. "What do you say you give us every last bit of Dust you got in here, and we don't blow this place up, hmm?", Roman continued. The shopkeeper, immediately understanding the situation, begged for Roman to not move forward with his intentions, giving classic reasons of 'bankruptcy and not being able to make ends meet' that were as painful as a screech to his ears.
"Look, old man, I get your situation, but I'm in a bit of a life-or-death situation myself." He beckoned to his men to start collecting the Dust. They started with the long tubes lined up against the walls of the shop. "You see, this crazy but gorgeous woman will murder me if I don't bring her a lot of Dust, and she won't tell me why. And if I ask her too much, she'll still murder me. I don't wanna die young, y'know! So just let me calmly take everything here without making a scene. Plus, today's August 2nd, and you know what that means? It's the day before tomorrow, August 3rd. And tomorrow is a day I don't want to miss." The shopkeeper was clearly confused at the last line. "Look, don't bother questioning it. It's been a long day and that woman really frustrates me. So, don't make a scene, and I won't get mad at you. Capiche?" Before the shopkeeper could answer, Roman gave the answer he wanted to hear. "Capiche. Thank you very much for your cooperation." He then sat on one of the chairs intended for customers as his rented henchmen stored the Dust into tubes that went into briefcases and put the crystals on display into containers.
In the far corner of the shop, while Roman was talking with the shopkeeper, one henchman found a young girl in her teens standing next to a magazine stand. She seemed to be reading a magazine on weapons. She was wearing a red hood, but she seemed to have choppy black hair that graduated into dark red at the tips, and for some reason, the henchman could hear intense rock emanating from her. She wore an odd outfit; a black long-sleeved dress with a high collar and red trims on the sleeves and skirt, thick black stockings, black combat boots with red laces and trims at the top and red soles, a wide black belt slung on her hips at an angle that suspiciously carried bullets, a red gun, and what seemed to be an emblem, but most prominently, a large red hooded cloak that seemed fastened to her shoulders with some pins.
'Is this weird outfit the result of puberty?' thought the clueless henchman. Regardless, he called out to the girl, telling her to put her hands where he could see them. Seeing as she couldn't hear him, he pulled on her shoulder, and she turned around, revealing her silver eyes, pale white complexion and the cross-shaped pins fastening her cloak. She pulled her hood back and looked at the henchman.
Irritated, the henchman pointed at her headphones blasting loud rock. She pulled them down.
"Yes?"
"I said, put your hands where I can see them!"
"Waaaaiiitt a second….are you robbing me?"
"YES!"
"Aaaahhhhh…."
"Now hurry up and-"
Before he could finish, the 'kid' pulled off her gun and smacked him across the head, flinging him across the shop and through the left window at the front of the shop, sending shards of glass flying everywhere. Before anyone could react, the girl then charged at another henchman who was close by, throwing both of them out of the window.
Roman gave a single irritated and disgusted look at the wreckage and stood up to inspect the assailant attacking the sad excuses of henchmen he put his money into. 'Actually,' he thought, 'calling them henchmen is an insult to henchmen.' Roman made a mental note to call them hench-baboons from now on.
The girl extended her weapon, a red gun with black lining, into a large scythe with intriguing mechanisms, a rose red frame and black trims, along with a silver blade forged into the frame in a crescent shape. Interestingly enough, it seems the gun was the stem to a black shaft with one end holding the blade of the scythe along with a blunt and thick black-colored backside, along with the properties of the gun still present; the opening of the barrel seemed to be placed in the middle of the scythe, along the shaft, while the scope and trigger seemed a little further apart from the dramatic extension. The bottom of the shaft suddenly unfolded to a sort of straight, double-edged black blade that seemed like it could cut really deep.
"Okay…" was Roman's reaction to this interesting turn of events. "Well, what are you waiting for? Get her." He beckoned to his hench-baboons to attack her, since they were just staring in awe at her incredibly oversized gardening tool. Roman decided to call this little girl Red, because of the conspicuous amount of highlighted red all over her.
The newly-renamed hench-baboons pulled out red swords and charged towards her. One tried to diagonally slash at her, to which she jumped off her legs, balancing on her left hand on the scythe, only to spin around and kick the henchman in the face with both feet, sending him into the outer wall of the shop. The girl then jumped, pulling her scythe and spinning it in the air with her, grabbing it backwards, facing the other henchmen. She shot a bullet with her scythe to provide her momentum to spin around and slash at one henchman, sending him flying, not badly wounded due to his unexpected-for-a-baboon Aura Shield. She then twisted the scythe and spun it again to slam another into the road with the back of the scythe. Another henchman aimed at her, to which she quickly reacted by combining her Semblance with the recoil from shooting to push her away before bullets could reach her, eventually coming in front of him and pushing forward to slide through his feet, sending him into the air. She then planted her scythe to stop her speed, spun around on her scythe, pushing off with her hand to land a kick on him mid-air. As she landed on her scythe, she watched as the man slid to Roman, falling into unconsciousness. Her moves were unpredictable and savage, like an acrobat trained to be a fighter. Or maybe just a drunk acrobat who liked to pick fights at bars.
"You were worth every cent. Truly, you were.", he said, looking down at his hench-baboon, as he walked forward and addressed the girl. "Anyways, Red, I think we can agree it's been an eventful evening. But, as much I'd love to stick around, unfortunately, this is where we part ways. I'm a busy person, and I don't have time for teenage angst." As he said this, he opened the end of his cane and fired a bullet packed with fire Dust. The girl spun her scythe so that the barrel would face the ground, lifted her legs of the ground, and fired a bullet to be pushed upwards and barely avoid the small explosion that broke the road. She landed, only to find Roman nowhere to be seen. She moved around a little bit to look around her sides, and when she looked to her right, she saw Roman climbing a conveniently-placed ladder to the rooftop of a building. She could see an airship - more specifically, a Bullhead - rising into view a few rooftops away. She turned to the shopkeeper. "I'm…gonna…go chase after him. Take care!"
Just as Roman reached the top and was about to jump to the next rooftop, the girl landed on the same rooftop using propulsion from recoil.
"Quite the persistent one, aren't we?", he said, turning to look at her. "Look, I'm an exceptional thief, and I'm beginning to consider murder, so I think it's better for you to stick to my good books, don't you think?"
The girl prepared her scythe to push her towards Roman.
"Ack, fine."
He jumped to the next rooftop, and in that instant, the girl fired and slammed into Roman, sending them both rolling onto the rooftop after, where the Bullhead waited. Roman rushed to the airship, and the girl fired in his general direction, but missed, as she didn't try to aim. As Roman boarded the airship, he called out to the girl and pulled out a red Dust crystal. "End of the line, Red!" He threw the Dust crystal at her and fired at it mid-air. Before the explosion of the crystal could harm her, a mysterious woman jumped in front of the girl and formed a mysterious shield, covering the two from the glorious burst of flames, letting off a grunt of disappointment in the process. The girl looked up and gazed at the woman in awe.
This woman had light-blonde hair tied in a bun, with a curl hanging down the right side of her face. She had bright green eyes behind thin, ovular glasses. She had dangling teal earring that matched the pendant hanging off her collar. She wore a white, long-sleeved pleated top with a wide keyhole neckline and gauntlet cuffs that flare into pleats at the wrist. Below her top, she wore a black high-waisted pencil skirt with bronze buttons and black-brown stockings. She also wore black combat boots with bronze soles and a cape that was purple on the inside and black on the out, attached to her via her top. The cut of the cape seemed stylized to resemble flames and arrows, and she had a row of diamond-shaped bronze beads along the back of the cape. Above this line of beads was a bronze-colored emblem that appeared like a tiara. The girl simply stared in awe at the woman's style. Her eyes shifted to her hand, in which she held a crop, which may have been what she used to make that shield.
The woman pushed up her glasses with her index and middle fingers with a graceful sass before using what seemed like telekinesis to control Dust out of her crop, and sending it crashing onto the side of the Bullhead, landing cuts on the machinery, which Roman barely dodged as it passed through the exposed passenger deck. He rushed into the cockpit and called to Cinder, saying "We've got a Hunter on our tail!" Cinder hurriedly rushed out, leaving the controls to Roman. As she arrived at the deck, she met eyes with the mysterious female Hunter. The Hunter noticed that the small, grey VTOL tiltjet aircraft was trying to depart, to which she responded by releasing some lightning through Dust to strike the plane, and then releasing a mixture of Dust to produce shards of ice, which she then rained down upon the Bullhead. One of the shards even pierced the glass at the cockpit, causing it to barely fly by Roman's face.
"Holy shit…that's the second time I nearly died today! And it wasn't even because of Cinder!"
Meanwhile, the yellow lines on Cinder's clothes glowed orange as Dust emerged and formed into a fireball fired at the Hunter, which she blocked with another shield of Dust. The Dust from the fireball then broke apart into several smaller pieces that planted themselves on the ground around the Hunter, and Cinder manipulated the Dust shards to explode. The Hunter was able to react to this in time and jumped out of the way. She then controlled the shards and rubble produced from the explosion to form a massive spear and fired it towards the aircraft. Cinder countered this with fireballs that broke apart the weapon, but the Hunter simply reformed it and sent it back into its trajectory. Roman took notice and quickly tilted the ship to the left with his controls, allowing the spear to barely miss the deck and bounce off the sturdy metal of the aircraft, but then the Hunter separated the spear into three trails that closed in on the ship. Cinder hesitated for a moment before releasing a large amount of her Dust into the surrounding vicinity of the ship, burning away the rubble trapping the Bullhead and the ice planted into it.
Here, the girl nicknamed Red noticed the Hunter seemed to be holding back, for some reason, and took the initiative, changing her scythe back into its rifle mode and firing multiple bullets at Cinder, which she blocked with ease through an invisible force. In a moment of stalemate, she then planted more Dust into the ground around the two and set them to explode. The Hunter saw through this again and was able to move the girl out of the way using telekinesis and cartwheel her way out as well.
However, in this moment, the Bullhead found an opening that it used to flee the scene. Roman had escaped, along with the mysterious woman who had aided him.
'They could be part of something big…' the woman thought to herself.
"You-you're her! That famous hunter!" said the girl, calling to the woman who had aided her. "Can I have your autograph? Pleaaaseeeeee?"
The woman simply glared at her, and then spoke with a serious and threatening tone. "You're coming with me. I have some questions to ask you."
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Drakoserk
Drakoserk Hey there, new readers! Hope you enjoyed the first chapter! The beginning of this reboot may not seem too different from the original, but I can assure you that there are certain impactful changes from the canon RWBY.
Other than that, though, I do want to mention that I'm trying to establish a timeline in this version, and I included the date for the events of this and the next chapter - August 2nd, 80 A.U.
A.U. is a calendar system that stands for 'Age of Unity', which is meant to be a new age after the Great War where all the Kingdoms are united, allowing for an age of peace in this world of Remnant.
Anyways, I hope you enjoy what's to come!
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