Chapter 3: Drunk Raven
"Didn't I tell you not to call me that?" Raven raised her eyebrow. But she hugged Alban back with a slight smile on her face.
"Then, Teacher Raven," the young man cheekily replied.
Raven pinch the bridge of her nose. "Even after 9 years of knowing each other, you still haven't changed the way you are calling me," she sighed.
"And I never will," he bubbly replied. "You were the one who taught me how to handle a sword, after all," he added.
"I can't deal with this," Raven sighed and started looking for a fridge. "There is nothing in here," she grumbles after looking inside it.
"I just got here, teacher," Alban chuckled at his teacher's antics. She likes to drink whenever she is stressed about something, so he tends to keep some alcohol back in Atlas.
"I have a can of beer with me though," he throws a can toward her after rummaging for it in his bag.
Raven caught it and walked toward the couch to take a seat.
*Beep* *Beep*
"Can I?" Alban asked Raven if he could answer his scroll to which she nonchalantly gestured him to do so while drinking from a can.
"Hello? This is Specialist Cygnus speaking," he answered.
"Yes… Yes… I understand. Yes… Thank you for informing me about this, partner," the expression on Alban's face is unnaturally serious. For Raven, she had only seen that kind of face when he was on a mission or when she trained him.
"Sure, I will look after your sister. Yeah, yeah. Take it easy. I will update you on her growth," his face became relaxed again when he was not talking about a mission.
"No, I am not going to take photos of her secretly for you. Do you want me to get fired on my first week of working as a teacher?" he retorted the unreasonable demand coming from the other side of the scroll.
"Kay, thanks. Bye!" He hung up the scroll after that.
"I guess I also need a drink or two," Alban muttered while putting his hand on his forehead. "Teacher, let's go for a drink," he told his teacher and started wearing his coat.
"You go first. I will follow from behind," Raven replied lazily, not wanting to move from her territory.
"Then, I will close the door from the outside."
Alban walked around the campus looking for Glynda to ask for a good place to grab a drink. He had never been in Vale and he doesn't want to unknowingly get into the expensive one. Even though he now has money because of being a Specialist, he doesn't like to use it excessively.
He was always dragged around by his rich partner, so he didn't need to pay for most of his spendings back then. You can say that because of his upbringing, Alban Cygnus likes to save money.
Many students are passing here and there, making him stand out like a sore thumb with his Specialist uniform. He asked a random student A for directions where Glynda could be.
With the help of that random student A, he arrived in front of the combat room where Glynda is teaching an extra class.
When he went inside it, he was greeted with the sight of a blonde-haired boy being thrashed around by another blonde boy.
"This is the part where you lose," Cardin Winchester sneered at the other boy.
"Over my dead-!" The other boy, Jaune Arc is cut short as Cardin knees him in the gut, making Jaune drop his sword and fall to the ground in pain.
Alban looks over the two of them and feels sorry for Jaune. When he saw a boy being thrashed around by his classmate, he thought about himself. Alban sees himself in the boy. So, when he saw the boy sitting on the floor, hanging his head in shame, he immediately formed the exercise routines to train him.
He waits for Glynda to finish her class before walking inside. Some of the students stopped to look at a young man who is clearly not from their school.
"Miss Goodwitch," Alban nodded, making himself known to her.
"Mister Cygnus," Glynda also nodded as a greeting. "I believe you were going to take a rest in your room," she added.
"I was…," he started. "Well, until I got a call from my partner and now, I need a drink," he sighed to which Glynda raised her eyebrow.
"I came here to ask if you know any good places to have a drink," Alban asked, stating his reason for coming here.
"A good place to drink? Aren't you a bit young to drink?" Glynda asked him with a stern voice. Her professor persona is fully active right now.
"Miss Goodwitch…," Alban sighed. He got that a lot in the past too. He was always asked for identification whenever he went for a drink with his partner.
"You have a class to teach tomorrow. Just… don't drink too much," she finally decided to relent as she can't stop another teacher from drinking alcohol. She opens her scroll and sends him the location of the bar she frequently visits.
"Thank you, Miss Goodwitch!" he bubbly thanked her and proceeded to walk out of the room.
"Hmm?" He turned around as he noticed someone he had seen before. The girl has neck-length black hair with red tips.
"Miss Rose!" He shouted after trying to remember the name of the woman he met 10 years ago.
"Yes?" The girl turned around along with another 3 girls. One of them is the sister of his partner and another being the daughter of his teacher.
Alban walks toward them. His mind is in a mess, not knowing what to say to the girl.
"This…," he takes out a letter he always brings with him wherever he goes. It is already worn out but everyone can see that the letter was well kept.
"I was supposed to give this to you 10 years ago," he started, giving the letter to the girl. "I am very sorry I couldn't find you sooner," he continued. "And for not being able to save your mother," he added in his thought.
"Thank you for keeping it for me this long… I guess?" The girl answered him with an awkward smile. He must have weirded her out.
"I will be going now. See you tomorrow," he quickly tried to get away from there. "Oh… and here, have some cookies," he took out a bag of cookies from his waist pocket before going on his merry way. He tends to bake cookies for rations before going out on a mission.
Just when he arrived near the bar, he called his teacher to inform her about it. Not even a minute later, a red and black portal opens near him. It was a good thing he called her in the alleyway.
"Took you long enough," that was the first thing she said after coming out of the portal.
"I need to ask around for a good place to drink," he replied.
The two of them got a table for themselves and ordered their respective drinks.
"So, what made you want to drink suddenly?" Raven started the conversation.
"It was… Branwen tribe again," he replied with a sigh.
"Oh? Tell me more about it," the bandit tribe leader leans in and puts her chin on her knuckle.
"They just raided another village again," he says while massaging the temples. "And some of the settlements are asking for help from Atlas because of the shortage of huntsmen in Mistral," he added.
"Shortage of huntsmen? That's new," Raven raised said in confusion. They tend to fight with huntsmen in some of their raids but she didn't know that Mistral is in lack of huntsmen.
"Yes, we kept getting negative whenever we asked for the information from the Mistral," Alban took a sip of the drink and sighed.
Raven didn't interfere when Alban started ranting about the news he got from his partner. "Oh... by the way, teacher," he stopped ranting about his previous job as a Specialist. Raven tilts her head in response.
"You are staying in Mistral, right? Please be careful, okay? There is that Branwen Tribe and the kingdom is doing something fishy," he warned his teacher, not knowing he was warning the tribe leader herself.
"Are you underestimating me?" Her eyes immediately sharpened and glared at her student.
"Of course not. I already knew that my teacher is strong," he replied cheekily. "It was because of you that I immediately accepted the offer of being a teacher after all," he added.
"Wait… what do you mean?" That got Raven's attention. She didn't do anything except training him back then to make him choose to be a teacher over a Specialist.
"Well, you see…," he scratched his head a little. "Ahem… Ahem…," he tried to act like Raven and sounded like her. "It is a teacher's job to protect their student," he replied with a poor imitation of her voice.
Raven groaned and put her head in her hands. "Please stop," she hissed. It was true that she said that in front of him. But it was because she was interested in his weapon and letting him die would make the process go nowhere.
That weapon of his sends the chills up her spine. And she has a feeling that she is going to die when she tries to touch it. So, she will need to save him to make him own her and control him. Or so she thought. She can't even admit that she is from the Branwen Tribe. She wasn't able to tell her student that his teacher is a bandit, a thief, and a killer.
She tried to control him but she was the one who got mellowed instead… well, only in front of him, that is. In front of him, she is his teacher who has been with him since his childhood. She is one of the important figures in his life.
"By the way, I saw your daughter back there," the sound of Alban snapped her back into reality.
"How is she?" She asked while hiding her concern.
"I think she is doing well. From the look of it, she seems to be in the same team as my partner's sister," he replied with a shrug.
"Then, I will count on you to make her strong," she knew she could trust him with it.
"Don't worry, I will. With you looking like that, I might think you have a daughter edition of the book named 'Reasons Why My Sister is the Cutest in Remnant' which my partner has," Alban jokingly said.
Cold sweats suddenly appeared on Raven. She tried to look away, not wanting to look at her student's eyes. A blush is apparent on her face.
"Wait… you actually have that kind of book?" Alban exclaimed after noticing Raven's strange behavior.
And Raven drank until she was fully drunk that night. Alban stayed with her until she could finally open a portal to go back home.
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Team RWBY, right after Alban left them,
"What a weirdo," Yang commented.
"Yang, don't you know that uniform?" Weiss suddenly snapped.
"Do I need to?" the girl in question asked back confused.
"He is wearing the uniform of a Specialist from Atlas, you dolt!"
"Hey! I am not from there. How am I supposed to know that?!" Yang Xiao Long argued.
"You… insufferable…," and so on. Weiss started her rant.
"Are you okay, Rubes? You have been silent the whole time," looking at her sister, Yang asked in worry while ignoring the angry Weiss Cream.
"Yang, take a bite," Ruby Rose didn't answer but gave a cookie from a bag to her sister while sobbing silently.
Yang was shocked because her sister shared a cookie with her. Just for you to know, Ruby had never shared her cookies with her sister. Moreover, she got worried when she saw tears on Ruby's face. Her first thought was to find that cute face and smash her Ember Celica into his face.
Her eyes widened when she took a bite from the cookie. "This is…," she exclaimed.
"Uh-huh," Ruby nodded. "It tastes like mother's cookies," she added.
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Author's Note;
Well, Alban won't get a happy childhood because of the story I based him on. Like the ugly duckling, he had suffered rejections, the death of loved ones, and so on. And also, blushing Raven. Who would have thought?
Again, thank you Jeonmin for the serious look of our cinnamon roll. You can check it in the paragraph comment.
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