[hider=New Faces, Old Places]
Robert, his hands and knees buried underneath the snow, began to cough as he tried to catch his breath. Looking down to the white powder beneath him, the boy was surprised to instead find it to be a crimson red. “Well that’s never good,” he said aloud, wiping away the blood that was still trickling down his chin. “How did I get myself into this mess?”

[hr]

[u][b]Before Robert Got Himself into this Mess[/b][/u]

In the brightly lit streets of Vale, a lone figure walked through the streets carrying multiple shopping bags, each filled with various gifts for his teammates and friends. Robert had finished his Christmas shopping and was ready to get back home to his dorm to finally give his wallet a rest. Everything seemed peaceful at first, with the undriven snow blanketing the streets and the lack of people walking the sidewalk with him. It was a good thing he had decided to get this done early to avoid the crowds.

As per usual with the boy’s luck though, the peace did not last long as he suddenly began to hear the familiar sounds that came from a serious beating. He’d been in enough fights and enough missions to recognize the sound of someone getting their ass kicked. Dropping his bags, Robert rushed toward the sound of battle, ready to intervene and put an end to it.

It didn't take long for the redhead to find the victim, a young girl with patches of wool sticking out from underneath her sleeves and pants to reveal her sheep faunus ancestry, and three grown men beating on her. Unable to defend herself, the girl lay on the ground curled up into a ball to prevent their punches and kicks from landing on her face. The sight disgusted the hunter-in-training, watching grown adults hurt a defenseless girl for no reason other than because she was different than them, and he immediately jumped into action.

The closest of the men felt the tap of an index finger on his shoulder in which he turned around to find the source of, only to receive a punch to the face. The unexpected strike instantly knocked him out of the fight as he fell to the ground and redirected his companions’ attention toward their attacker. With an enraged look, Robert raised his fists in a fighter’s stance, ready to take on the two men who almost doubled him in age as well as in muscle and size.

The first of the two to attack charged forward with a normal punch to Robert’s face, an attack he easily blocked by simply moving his forearms in front of himself. As he felt the knuckles collide with his arms, the boy used the moment to his advantage and grabbed the man’s arm, pulling him off balance and sending him tumbling face-first into the snow.

The last of the men attacked now, but Robert was prepared. Kicking up the snow at his feet, he sent the white powder into the air to block his attacker’s vision. Before he could wipe the frozen, crystalline water out of his face, the boy struck, landing an uppercut on his opponent’s chin and sending him toppling right on top of his companion.

Thinking the fight over, Robert looked down to the sheep girl and extended a hand toward her to help her up. Instead, he was awarded with her screaming out the words, “Look out behind you!” before feeling a sudden impact to the side of his face where a long piece of plywood struck. Apparently one of the men wasn’t as unconscious as he had believed and had picked up a discarded piece of lumber to use as a weapon. With his ears ringing and an unbearable amount of pain in his head, all the boy could do was curl up into a ball just as the girl he had been trying to save had done.

[hr]

[u][b]Back to the Present[/b][/u]

After the three men had finished their beating, throwing around insults like, “Faunus peace of shit” and “Stupid punk ass kid,” they left Robert and the sheep girl behind to recover while returning to whatever dump they called a bar. The young hunter-in-training picked himself up off the ground first, dusting off whatever snow was still stuck to his clothing. “Are you okay?” he asked the girl after running his tongue along his teeth to make sure the blood he had spit out hadn’t been from a now missing or loosened tooth.

“Yeah. They basically forgot about me after you showed up,” she replied, looking over his injuries. Though, instead of a major injury or blood stained article of clothing, the first thing she took notice of was his serious lack of animalistic features. Looking behind him to make sure there wasn’t a tail or a pair of wings she’d missed, she looked at the boy curiously and asked, “Um, what type of faunus are you?”

“I’m not a faunus, I’m human,” he replied innocently, not seeing where she was going with her line of questioning.

“Then… why did you help me? Most humans just ignore us or, even worse, join in when we’re getting beaten.”

“Because you were in trouble and those guys were hurting you. Do I need another reason?” Robert asked with a shrug before turning away to retrieve his belongings, only to see that the men had been grateful enough to take his bags along with his dignity.

Seeing his disappointment at the loss of his property, the sheep girl decided to change the topic in hopes of improving his attitude. “Um, my name’s Yuki. What’s yours?”

Putting on his best smile to hide his sour mood, Robert turned toward Yuki and gave her his hand for a friendly handshake. “You can call me Robert.”

Accepting the handshake, Yuki asked, “So where did you learn to fight like that? It was pretty impressive... until they suckerpunched you of course.”

“I go to Beacon actually. Most of that was from stuff my team leader, Sand, taught me. I was pretty pathetic in a fight before she started tutoring me. I guess I still have some way to go since I forgot one of the first rules she taught me, never turn your back on an opponent.”

Yuki wanted to tell Robert that she thought he was amazing in the fight, but unfortunately she didn’t know enough about fighting to be able to give any sort of compliment. So instead she asked, “So where are you headed?”

“Probably back to Beacon. I need to catch the last shuttle before it… takes… off.” Robert began to frantically search his pockets as he tried to find his Scroll, knowing exactly what he would find but still hoping it wouldn’t be. Unfortunately he was not wrong, for not only was the screen  completely shattered, but from what he could tell the time was shown as eleven o’clock at night. He had completely missed the last airship back. “Darn it!”

“What?”

“I don’t have any way back home.”

“Well do you know anybody here in the city that you could stay with?”

“... Not anymore.”

Yuki was silent as she tried to consider a solution to her hero’s dilemma, feeling that she owed it to him after what he’d done. When an idea did come to mind though, she let out a disappointed sigh, deciding there was only one thing that could be done. “Well I guess you can stay with me and my family.”

“Oh no, I could never do that. I wouldn’t want to impose or be a bur-”

“Uh uh, you’re coming with me mister. No ‘buts.’ Without your help I might have died so this is the least I can do.”

“I’m a huntsman. I’ve slept out in the wild plenty of times. A little snow didn’t hurt anybody.”

Yuki didn’t reply, instead glaring at Robert until he conceded and did as she said. It didn’t take long. He was pretty easy to intimidate.

“Alright, I guess one night won’t make much of a difference. Where do you live?”

“It’s not far from here. It’s right on Loxley St.”

For a moment, a tiny miniscule moment that not even the sheep girl could catch, Robert froze at the sound of the familiar street name. He knew exactly where they were headed. How could he not? It was the street he had grown up on. Where his entire life changed.

[hr]

“- and then my mom said… Um, are you listening?” Yuki asked, seeing that Robert had stopped right underneath the street sign.

“Yeah, I just… I haven’t been here for a long time is all,” he said, catching up with the sheep girl.

“Did you know someone else who lived here?”

“You could say that.”

“Well maybe I know them. My family’s lived here my entire life. Do remember their name?”

“... The Fallsons.”

“The Fallsons? That was that one human family that… Oh. I can see why you haven’t come back since.”

Robert nodded slowly, following Yuki as she turned the corner and revealed the empty lot where his old house once stood. While the faunus went on her merry way to the front of the house next door, the red haired boy continued to walk forward until he was standing right where the door frame once stood of his childhood home.

Everything was coming back to him. The bright lights of the Christmas tree that sat in the corner, it’s bristles mostly missing because his parents had bought it cheap. The smell of the turkey cooking in the oven, the one his dad had burned almost every holiday prior. The feeling of the wrapping paper that surrounded the presents he kept trying to figure out the contents of. The taste of the cookies for Santa he’d helped his mom bake. The sound of the wood crackling in the fireplace as it warmed the living room.

The fire. It was spreading everywhere. The entire house had gone up in flames. His parents had grabbed his little sister and were running towards the stairs, pleading with him to follow before- before-

“Robert! Snap out of it!”

The boy opened his eyes again. His cheeks were wet with tears and his pants were soaked through from kneeling in the snow. Wiping away the drops of water running down his face, the boy got back to his feet and gave Yuki a weak smile. “I’m sorry, it’s just... It’s sort of difficult to forget something like that. Let’s go inside,” he replied, walking away and leaving the girl behind this time.

“Robert. Robert… Fallson? You were the one who lived here weren’t you?” she said, slowly catching up to the hunter-in-training.

“I guess I’m not as great at keeping a secret as I thought.”

“We thought you had all died in that fire. Some people said they thought they saw someone walk out of flames but no one was sure. Why… Why did you go off on your own? We could have helped you.”

Robert shrugged. “Shock I suppose? I’m not sure. I just decided to distance myself from everyone. I still try to do so. People tend to get hurt around me and I don’t want to be responsible for that.”

“That’s not your fault. You weren’t responsible for what they did.”

“You’d be surprised. I’ve found out some pretty interesting things about my semblance.”

Suddenly, Robert felt a sharp stinging pain in his cheek as Yuki slapped him across the face. Placing a hand on each of his shoulders, she looked him dead in the eye and told him, “You. Are not. Responsible.”

“But-”

“No! Listen. Stop being some middle school edge lord’s first OC for their stupid fanfiction and listen to what I have to say. You can’t blame yourself for what happened. You can’t keep punishing yourself by pushing people away. Stop letting life have its way with you and fight back. Take control.”

“I guess I am tired of always being alone.”

“Right? Now come on inside. I’m sure my mom’s hot chocolate will warm you right up.”

“Hey, Yuki?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks. I know you think I saved your life, but I think you helped save mine as well.”

“Don’t mention it, Robbie”
[/hider]