Professor Ozpin set a leisurely pace as he walked Ruby back toward Beacon. It was a warm night, quiet except for the occasional chirp of mating insects, and the professor didn't seem to be in any hurry to scold her.

Ruby slowly relaxed as they walked. She knew she was still in trouble, but it was hard to be on edge when everything was so peaceful.

Professor Ozpin spoke, finally, when they were more than halfway back.

"You aren't in trouble, Ms. Rose. Ms. Goodwitch has had a long night, and I'm sure she will regret her aggressive stance in the morning. She has good reason to be concerned, but ultimately this blunder is on our shoulders. We will have to add an administrative note, next year, that prospective students are not to leave the grounds. A pity; the commencement is already so long..."

Ozpin sighed wistfully.

Why was Ozpin so nice to her?

"Um...thank you." she mumbled.

They walked in silence for a little longer.

"For what it's worth, though, professor - I don't think I was in much danger. My semblance is, well, it keeps me very safe."

She wasn't perfectly safe of course. The world didn't stay slow forever, even when she fought Grimm. But she'd gotten very adept, over the years, at striking quickly and then retreating until her semblance was ready for another burst of speed.

Professor Ozpin nodded.

"I can see why you would believe that, Ms. Rose, with the knowledge available to you. But you must understand, the education you have received thus far is lacking in many respects. Yet another way in which fault for this incident lies on our shoulders. I was the one who approved Signal's curriculum on the Grimm, and I deemed certain facts too dangerous for public consumption."

Ruby rubbed her left arm, unsure how much to say.

"Um...so, my uncle told me to not to tell people about my semblance, but I figure you're, like, a professor and stuff, so..."

Ozpin chuckled.

"Don't worry, Ms. Rose. I had a long discussion with your uncle prior to granting you early admission, and I am intimately familiar with the details of your semblance, at least as far as he understands them. Is there anything significant you have withheld from him?"

Ruby shook her head, then realized Ozpin might not have seen. "No."

"Well, then, Ms. Rose, I can assure you that the Emerald Forest contains numerous threats to your life. The island of Patch, where you have trained until now, is fairly civilized. The Emerald Forest, however, is truly wild, and abuts the Grimmlands themselves. The most frightening threats do not stray so close to the cliffs, but traveling into the forest alone, at night, without supervision, was still terribly unwise."

Ruby gulped.

"Oh..." she said, in a quiet voice. "Um, if you don't mind me asking, professor, what sorts of threats are you talking about? I'm so much faster than any Grimm I've read about that I have trouble imagining."

Professor Ozpin sighed, and for a moment he sounded very old.

"Indeed, Ms. Rose. Trouble imagining is precisely the problem. I'm afraid that until you have completed your initiation, I cannot share any of the forest's more dangerous secrets with you. I can tell you that, even among the ranks of Grimm you have read about, there are threats to you in that forest. Just last year there was a deathstalker, a very old one, and thus quite clever, that had grown smaller rather than larger as it aged. It was terribly quick, and nearly silent. It almost killed a student before his team even knew it was there. We put it down, fortunately, but there may be more."

Ruby gulped again. When she'd had her eyes closed, trying to draw the Grimm to her...

"Five years ago, there was a truly ancient nevermore discovered very close to the cliffs. It fired several waves of its feathers at supersonic speeds before flying off. The feathers were razor sharp, heavy as iron bars, spaced no more than a few inches apart, and spread over half an acre. A student died in that attack, much to our shame, and the beast is still out there."

Ruby was studying the ground very intently as she walked. She might be able to knock enough of those aside with her scythe to make a hole before any impaled her, but she certainly didn't want to have to try.

"Now," Ozpin continued, "I know what you are thinking."

That was a surprise to Ruby, since she wasn't thinking anything in particular.

"You've no doubt determined that tomorrow's initiation will take place in the forest. Indeed, I suspect that was half of why Ms. Goodwitch was so annoyed with you. The surprise is part of the point, you see. In any case, during initiation itself, you will be permitted to travel the forest with other students. If you combine your talents, exercise caution, and shelter during the night, then I expect you will find the forest difficult but manageable. We've had a handful of serious injuries during initiation over the years, but no deaths."

Well. That was news to Ruby. She'd been too wrapped up in her own head to even wonder why Ms. Goodwitch and professor Ozpin were at the cliffs, but they must have been setting something up for tomorrow. She probably would have figured it out once she'd had some time to think, though.

They were approaching Beacon now. In a few more minutes they'd be at the great hall, where the prospective students were staying tonight.

Ozpin drew to a stop, and Ruby stopped beside him, not making eye contact.

"I believe I can leave you here, Ms. Rose. Two things, however: a word of advice, and a request."

Ruby nodded mutely.

"First, the advice. Semblances, as I'm sure you know, aren't fair. Yours is one of the least fair I have ever seen. I'm given to understand that it is somewhat less efficacious against those with aura, since their own aura may resist or even overcome the extreme temporal dilation you produce, but against Grimm it is a truly remarkable gift. It is my belief that you will be one of the greatest huntresses Beacon has ever produced, if you can avoid dying alone in a dark forest before you get an education."

The professor smiled as he spoke, taking the sting out of his words.

"That is not my advice, however. My advice is this: remember that Grimm aren't fair, either. If you follow the path you are on now to its end, you can and will encounter Grimm which are as difficult for you to fight as you are for a beowolf, and likely not for the reasons you expect. Until that happens, try not to grow complacent."

Ruby feld a chill go down her spine. She would make sure not to.

"Finally, my request. I will not ask you to keep what you know of the initiation tomorrow a secret. That would be a terrible violation of the bond of trust between you and your sister, and of the pact that students everywhere must hold against their instructors. Instead, I would ask that you limit the spread of what you know to a few close friends. It really would be frightfully disappointing for Ms. Goodwitch if she doesn't get to see any surprised faces tomorrow morning."

Ozpin gave her a wink, and before she could quite muster a response, clapped her on the shoulder and began walking back toward the cliffs with a spring in his step.

Ruby called after him, when he was already an awkward distance away. "Um...Professor! Thank you! For everything!"

Ozpin waved his cane without turning around, and Ruby smiled.

Maybe she had two friends here, even if it did make her a bit of a teacher's pet.

~o~O~o~O~o~

"Where." a pajama-clad Yang growled, eyes already flecked with crimson. "In the goddamn hell. Have you been."

Ruby backed up a step, waving her hands in front of her face.

"Whoah whoah whoah! Wait a second, Yang. I told you exactly where I was. Check your scroll."

Yang stepped closer, into Ruby's personal space. She looked mad. Ruby had a brief, irrational moment of fear that her sister was going to sock her in the face, but instead Yang wrapped her up in an enormous hug.

"Oof..." Ruby managed to get out. "Yang, you're crushing me."

"You deserve it, dummy. Your message said you'd be back before sundown. That was hours ago. And you didn't answer when I called..."

Ruby looked down guiltily.

"Sorry. It's hard to notice my scroll during...well, you know."

Yang finally let her go, but held on to her shoulders, looking her in the face. At least the blonde girl's eyes were lilac again.

"What about when you were done?" she asked. "I left you like a dozen messages."

"Um..." Ruby said, looking away. "Some...other things happened after. Promise you won't get mad?"

Yang raised an eyebrow, skeptically.

"We'll see. Spill."

~o~O~o~O~o~

After relating the whole story, calming Yang down a second time, and suffering through an admittedly-deserved lecture, Ruby finally managed to pry Yang off her long enough to go get changed into her pajamas.

Ruby found a big locker room with a row of showers at the back a little ways off from where they were sleeping. She brought her bag in, and after quickly checking that she was alone, stripped out of her clothes and stepped into the shower for a rinse.

Aura tended to normalize away dirt and grime, so hunters and huntresses didn't really need to shower. But it felt good, and your self-image could start to drift if you never washed yourself.

Ruby had a more immediate concern. Aura tended to normalize away dirt and grime, but sometimes there were quirks.

Ruby stuck her head under the water. It was torrential, and steaming hot. After a moment of resistance, her aura gave up and decided that she was getting wet.

The water ran clean through most of her hair, but at the tips it came out a gunky red; foul, dark, and thicker than it had gone in. Ruby left her head like this for a few minutes until the water ran through cleanly, breathing a satisfied sigh when her hair was finally clean.

She got out of the shower. There were no towels - typical. She wrung the water out of her hair as best she could, and trusted her aura to take care of the rest.

She put on her pajamas, then went to the mirror to take a look. Sure enough, where the tips of her hair had been a faded burgundy this morning, now she saw bright red streaks hanging down beside her silver eyes.

It had been a nasty surprise, the first time she'd cut a Grimm and been sprayed by its blood. Aura was supposed to protect you from that sort of thing. If you were dunked in a pool, sure, you'd get wet, but a brief spray of blood? That should slide right off.

Her aura disagreed. For some reason her self-image at age twelve thought being splattered in Grimm blood was just dandy. Over years of washing it off, scrubbing it out of her clothes, and dying her hair back to black, her aura had finally caught on and started sloughing it off when it touched her.

All except for the tips of her hair. Maybe it was because some part of her still felt like destroying the Grimm should be a bloody affair. Maybe it was because she'd spent so long struggling with it, and that struggle itself was part of her identity. Maybe the red highlights just matched her outfit. Who knew?

She could hide it, if she really wanted to. She didn't carry hair dye any more, but if she lathered and rinsed a few more times it would be the same color as this morning, and after about a dozen more it would barely be noticeable.

It wasn't worth the effort, though. People would notice eventually, and honestly, taking hour-long showers after every hunt was probably even weirder than having red-tipped hair.

Satisfied that she wasn't going to gunk up her pillow, Ruby left the bathroom, ready for bed, combat outfit stuffed into her bag, and way too wired to sleep.

~o~O~o~O~o~

Ruby lay on the thin sleeping bag Beacon had provided, head in Yang's lap as the older girl brushed her hair. Yang was too rough with the brush, which hurt, but the attention felt good.

Most of the students were already asleep, or at least lying down quietly, but the two of them were far from the only ones up. People were understandably nervous, and some of them were probably jetlagged. People came from all over to go to Beacon.

Ruby tapped away at her scroll while Yang brushed. She liked to keep notes on things. Not really a journal, per se, just a list of things to remember, and a tally of the Grimm she'd killed.

Be more cautious of the Grimm, she wrote in one section. Then, under it, bullet points:

- Grimm can be small and stealthy.

- Grimm can have AoE attacks which are hard to dodge.

- Worse things, unknown, difficult to imagine. General caution. Dangerous for reasons I don't expect?

- Grimm aren't fair.

- Don't get complacent.

After a moment's thought, she started another section.

A hunter is someone who is allowed to be unhappy.

Ruby had complicated feelings about aphorisms. (In fact, that might tell you everything you need to know about her personality, that she thought about the topic enough to have complicated feelings.)

The earliest aphorisms she'd ever been exposed to were, essentially, tricks. They were things adults told kids to change their behavior. "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all." "Two wrongs don't make a right."

Ruby had figured out very early on that these sayings were a sort of memetic virus. They sounded right, somehow, even if they were obviously wrong. If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all? What would the world look like if the police followed that rule?

But it didn't matter if they were obviously wrong. They stuck in your head and changed your behavior in ways adults found desirable, springing to mind unbidden when certain situations arose.

Ruby's position on the matter grew somewhat more subtle when she took up engineering, and discovered that the discipline was full of useful aphorisms. "Measure twice, cut once." It was useful precisely because it stuck with you and sprang to mind unbidden right before you did something stupid.

They were still designed to change behavior, but they were designed to change her behavior in ways she found desirable.

If "Two wrongs don't make a right." is a memetic parasite, "Your hands are always dirty in the shop." is a memetic symbiote. You'd happily accept it into your brain.

So when she heard "A hunter is someone who is allowed to be unhappy.", she had two questions. What is this memetic virus trying to accomplish? And who benefits?

"Ruby," Yang's voice broke into her thoughts from behind. "You aren't seriously thinking about that corny line from the end of Ozpin's speech, are you?"

Ruby pressed the screen of her phone flat against her pajama top. "Yaaaaang." she whined. "Don't look at my screen. What if it was something private?"

"Then you shouldn't be writing it while I'm being nice enough to brush your hair. What, do you think I'm just going to sit here staring into space? You need to remember you aren't the only person in the room, sis. You never know who might be paying attention."

"Maybe it wouldn't be a problem if my sister wasn't so nosy..." Ruby muttered.

Yang gave the brush an extra hard tug through her hair, making Ruby yelp. "I'm not your problem, doofus. If you're going to be a huntress, you're going to need to learn to be a liiiiitle more discreet. Like, for example, when you got back and started blabbing to me about all the things you were supposed to be keeping close to your chest, in the middle of a crowded room.

Ruby blushed.

"Fine..." she mumbled. "That was silly. Do you think anyone overhead?"

Ruby felt Yang move under her head, probably a shrug.

"Who knows? It's possible. I guess we'll find out tomorrow how far it spread."

"Oh! That reminds me," Ruby said, perking up. "I should make sure Jaune knows." She raised her scroll back up, flicking over to contacts and running down the short list until she found his name.

Yang sighed somewhere overhead. Ruby wasn't sure what that meant.

"Er...or maybe I shouldn't?" she ventured, hesitant.

"No, it's fine. Go for it."

"It doesn't sound fine."

"It's totally fine. You just sounded a little eager."

"No I didn't."

She felt Yang shrug again. "Alright, you didn't."

"Yaaaang-"

Yang ruffled Ruby's hair, letting her hand rest there. She seemed to be done brushing.

Ruby lay there for second, enjoying the amiable silence.

"So," she said after a bit. "What do you think it means, Yang?"

"Your excited tone of voice?"

"No. The thing Professor Ozpin said, about hunters being unhappy."

"Ruby, who cares? It's just some dumb saying."

"He told us to think about it."

"Just because he's a professor doesn't mean everything he says is a homework assignment. He probably just likes to end his speech with that saying because he thinks it sounds cool."

Ruby rolled her eyes. It was an understatement to say Yang was better than her at the whole people thing, but her sister had some blind spots. One of those blind spots was people like Ruby. Yang never seemed to get her, or at least, there was something important her sister was missing.

Ruby didn't think professor Ozpin was exactly like her, but there were commonalities. He was a man who cared about certain things. He chose his words carefully, for one thing, putting them together precisely as he meant to. And the way he spoke was a dead giveaway to Ruby that they were alike. The excitement when he spoke of teaching students to think for themselves. The slight hush when he spoke of secrets and dangerous things. A certain tone which sometimes leaked through and let Ruby know he had just said something clever, which he expected very few of those listening to understand. All of those stood out clear as day to her.

She couldn't imagine that a man like professor Ozpin would end his first speech to the incoming class with something inconsequential. Running Beacon Academy was what he was doing with his life. It would be as out of character as her building Crescent Rose's barrel slightly crooked.

Actually, now that she was thinking back, what were his exact words? He hadn't actually told them to think about it. He'd said they could attempt to puzzle out its meaning for themselves.

He'd literally said that.

How could Yang be so stupid sometimes?

She finished messaging Jaune what she knew about initiation, asking him not to tell too many people, and switched back to her notes. She added some text to the appropriate section: Maybe a puzzle disguised as an aphorism? Very strange puzzle if so. Maybe the purpose of the aphorism is the puzzle?

Yang groaned. She was still reading over Ruby's shoulder, apparently.

"Ruby, don't waste your time on this."

"Just humor me, Yang. What do you think it means?"

"It means exactly what he said, Ruby. We're allowed to be unhappy, because we can defend ourselves when the Grimm show up. Normal people don't have that luxury."

Ruby nodded, typing it in word for word.

You couldn't be wrong about a memetic virus meant, not if it was any good. It meant whatever people thought it meant. It would be better to ask a few more people, though.

Ruby's scroll buzzed, the first few lines of Jaune's reply sliding up from the bottom of the screen.

Ruby wanted to read it, but she was getting tired of Yang's snooping. She yawned dramatically instead, dropping the phone on her chest and stretching both arms over her head. "Whelp," she said, "time to get some sleep?"