2A/N: So, I wrote this as an attempted cure for writer's block while working on another story. I recently rewatched all of RWBY and couldn't get the characters out of my head, so I just kinda decided to write this. Basically, it's summer reflecting on the past few years of her life and her relationship with Tai and Raven but from a lighter perspective than some others I've seen.
I'd love some feedback on how I did, since this is my first RWBY story ever and I absolutely love the show.
Reflection
Summer Rose grinned as her house came into view, her red and black hair blowing behind her in the breeze. She'd been out on a mission for the better part of two weeks and was really looking forward to staying home for a while. It had been her first mission since she'd given birth to her absolutely adorable daughter, Ruby, and Summer was beyond nervous about having to leave her behind. Especially since her husband, Tai, was also going to be gone for a week, leaving their children in the care of their Uncle Qrow.
Their family dynamic was an… odd one if you really stopped to think about it. The three of them had been on the same team together at Beacon, the preeminent Huntsman academy of Remnant. Team STRQ was one of the best to ever graduate and their victory at the Vytal Tournament during their last year had solidified their places as rising stars in the Huntsman community. No matter what else they did, that's what they were at heart. Huntsmen and Huntresses. The defenders of the people.
After they'd first graduated, they mostly took missions together around the kingdoms, often at the request of Professor Ozpin, the Headmaster of Beacon as he slowly introduced them to the secret underbelly of their world, trusting them more and more with the secrets of his never-ending war against Salem, the queen of the Grimm.
The Creatures of Grimm were a force of nature. Monsters and demons attracted to negative emotion whose single goal in existence was the destruction of human and faunus kind. They were what she and the others were trained to fight. The life's work of every single Huntsman and Huntress, no matter what kingdom they were from, was defending the innocent from the Grimm. Which is why learning that there was an immortal, sentient mind directing them had been the source of nearly all of Summer's nightmares since Oz had first let her in on the secret. Likely Raven's too. Maybe that was why she'd left…
The truth was, Summers older daughter, Yang, wasn't actually her's by blood no matter how much she loved her. Yang's biological mom was Raven Branwen, Qrow's twin sister, the R of team STRQ, and her now ex-girlfriend. See, Raven had black hair and red eyes just like her brother and was the archetypal edgy bad-girl. Summer found her hard to resist. On the other hand, their last teammate, Taiyang, was a solid, dependable, blonde doofus that she just couldn't help falling in love with. At first, she'd felt terribly guilty and conflicted when she realized she had feelings for both Tai and Raven while they were still at school but that had been quickly washed away one night during their third year at Beacon.
Officially, they'd been on a training mission, which was only partially true. That year, Professor Ozpin had revealed to Summer that a very unique trait about her was actually super important. Summer had silver eyes. For most of her life, she'd just thought it was just what made her unique. Instead, she was startled to learn that having silver eyes meant you also had the power to magically turn Grimm to stone! Naturally, she'd wanted to try right away and, after some coaching, they'd been sent out into the wilds to test the ability in live combat.
Her job was to stand there and try to activate her eyes, while her team kept the Grimm off of her. It had been going well, aside from the fact that she just couldn't get them to activate, when she'd been pounced from behind. Tai had tripped, slipping on log that was hidden under a pile of leaves and accidentally let an Alpha Beowulf get past him to strike at Summer. Alpha's were powerful Grimm. Pack leaders that had lived long lives and become much more effective killers. Summer, understandably, had panicked, frantically trying to draw her weapon, when Qrow suddenly came out of nowhere and took the hit for her.
The strike broke his Aura, the manifestation of his soul which Huntsmen and Huntresses used to protect themselves, and the claws of the Beowulf cut deep into Qrow's chest. Seeing her friend, her partner, so badly injured because of her lack of awareness had triggered a cascade effect, activating her eyes. All the Grimm around them suddenly became statues with a flash of white light, but that wasn't what Summer cared about in the moment. Qrow was hurt! They'd all been frantic, calling for help and trying to stop the bleeding. It wasn't long before were quickly picked up by the Bullhead that had been assigned to them and rushed to the hospital.
Thankfully, the wounds weren't as bad as they'd all thought. Qrow would be just fine, and once his Aura was recharged, he'd be back on his feet and in fighting shape within a couple days. The hospital wanted to keep him under observation for a day and sent the rest of the team back to their dorms. Summer then spent the next few hours pacing around the room, fretting and worrying, despite the assurances of the doctors. Mostly, she just felt guilty. Qrow had gotten hurt because of her. She'd then been snapped out of her spiral of guilt and worry by Raven.
"For the love of the gods, Summer, will you stop pacing?!" Raven had shouted from her bed.
"I can't help it!" She'd replied. "Qrow got hurt because of me!"
"No, he didn't." Tai had said, calmly from his position at his desk. "If I hadn't tripped, none of this would have happened."
"Maybe it's Qrow's fault then," Raven grunted. "Seems like bad luck tends to follow him around." That was true. Odd things tended to happen around Qrow. Nothing ever truly horrible, just inconvenient. The poor guy had started to think his Semblance, meaning his own special superpower, was Misfortune.
"Even so, I still feel bad about it! I should have been paying more attention." Summer had almost whined, guiltily as she sat down on her bed.
"You know what," Tai had perked up. "You need a distraction. Keep your mind off it."
"You have something in mind?" Raven had asked, skeptically as she raised herself up on her elbows. One eyebrow was cocked as she'd started at Tai.
"Well uh…" he'd stammered, looking like a deer in headlights. "What about that new scroll game? Poggle!" Scrolls were relatively new devices that allowed communication over long distances. Along with browsing the net and, recently, a bevy of video games that were being released.
"Seriously, Tai?" Raven had deadpanned. "That's your idea of a distraction? The best way to keep Summer's mind off Qrow is a shitty puzzle game?" Summer just couldn't help herself and giggled into her hand.
"You got a better idea, Ms. Dark and Broody?" Tai'd challenged her.
Raven sat in thought for a moment. Then she smirked. "You know what, I do." Raven stood up and moved to the closet. Rummaging around in it for a minute, before standing up and triumphantly holding up a bottle. Peering at the label, Summer could see it was a huge bottle of 'O'Brien's Famous Mistrali Whiskey'. Just under the label was the phrase 'Now that's what I call a wee drop of the creature.'
"Raven!" Tai had exclaimed. "You know we're not supposed to have alcohol in the dorms! How did you even get it? We're underage!"
"Ah, shut up, Tai. Summer needs to take her mind off things. This will definitely do that."
Even to this day, so many years later, Summer couldn't remember exactly what had happened that night. All she did know was that she'd woken up literally lying on top of Tai with Raven cuddled up next to them and all three of them in a severe state of… not having any clothes on at all. It wasn't until she was more awake that, on top of apparently having slept with two of her teammates, who she might be in love with, she realized they'd also done the deed on Qrow's bed!
Naturally, of course, once the hangovers had subsided and they'd… gone another round, they cleaned up Qrow's bed and never, EVER told him about what happened in it. It was a close thing though when Qrow had come back from the hospital, flopped down on it, and declared just how much he'd missed his own bed. Raven had nearly busted a gut laughing while a mortified Summer had tried desperately to shut her up before Qrow caught on.
Despite searching, they hadn't actually found the bottle until much later. See, they lived on the same hall as the building's RA and her team, all of whom were out on a mission. After they got back, team STRQ had had some… difficulty trying to explain to Glydna, the RA, that they had absolutely no idea how an empty bottle of whiskey had found its way into her sock drawer with a pair of underwear that clearly said 'Taiyang Xiao Long' on the back stuffed inside it.
Summer, Raven, and Tai had eventually gotten around to having 'The Talk' and wound up starting a three-way relationship which they successfully hid from Qrow for all of 5 minutes before Raven starting making inappropriate comments and noises within his earshot, trying to mess with him. Later on, after they'd graduated, things started to look more serious. Raven wasn't the 'marrying type' as she said, but Summer definitely was so she and Tai started talking about maybe getting married.
Then Raven went off on a mission alone. She never told any of them what she saw, or what had happened. All Summer really knew was that Raven really threw herself into the physical side of their relationship after she got back. She was still loving, in her own way, but she was much more physically affectionate than she'd been before. It wasn't long after that they discovered that Raven was pregnant! It wasn't planned, but Summer and Tai were ecstatic! Tai even retired from active duty to start teaching at Signal, the combat school on the island of Patch that but Summer and Tai had attended.
They bought a beautiful cabin out in the woods on the island. Not so far out of town as to be inconvenient, but far enough that they had plenty of privacy. Even Raven began to come around to the idea of having a family, likely pulled along kicking and screaming by her twin brother, who was over the moon at becoming 'Uncle Qrow.' Then Yang was born. Their Sunny Little Dragon and Summer was sure she'd never seen someone love another person as much as Raven loved Yang.
For the first few months, Raven was what Summer would describe as the perfect mother. Attentive and loving, she seemed to delight in just sitting and watching Yang sleep and play. But then, Raven went on another mission. Her first since giving birth. Once again, she never talked about what she'd seen. She came back quiet and withdrawn. She started spending less and less time with Yang and more and more time with a bottle.
It wasn't long, maybe a month after she got back that, one day Raven just up and left.
She never said a word. Her note only said, 'take care of her.' Raven was just… gone. Even Qrow couldn't find her. It had been nearly three years since then and none of them had seen hide nor hair of Raven. They'd even accused Ozpin of sending her on some long term, secret mission, but he was just as in the dark about Raven's departure as they were.
It hurt that Raven had left, but Yang still needed them so they soldiered on. Summer took Raven's place as Yang's mother and showered the little yellow bundle of joy in as much love as her heart could hold. Then Summer became pregnant, Ruby was born, and they had two little bundles of joy. Eventually though, Summer had to return to duty. She was considering taking up a teaching job in a few years, but for now she wasn't quite ready to retire from active duty. Oz needed her.
Unfortunately, Tai was being sent to a summer conference with a bunch of other teachers during the second week of her mission, which meant that Qrow was left in charge of watching the girls. Summer wasn't worried. Qrow was a doting uncle and the girls loved him. Still, as she approached the door, she considered that maybe leaving him alone with them wasn't the best idea. She could hear crying coming from the house as she walked up. Before she could set her hand on the door, Summer heard Qrow's voice coming from inside.
"Yang, leave your sister's dirty diaper alone. Put that down! That is NOT a hat! That is not a hat! OH!" There was a brief pause as Summer cringed back from the door. "Okay, everybody in the sink!"
It was perhaps five minutes later, as Summer sat perched in a tree up on top of the hill, watching though her binoculars as Qrow gave the girls a bath in the sink, that she muttered to herself, "He deserves better friends." Then she thought about it. "Eh. One more hour away from the girls couldn't hurt. At least Tai will get a kick out of the story."
Well, I hope you liked it. Like I said, this was mainly an attempt to clear some writer's block and get a story prompt out of my head.
It's just a one-shot, but I would appreciate some feedback if you're willing to give it. All I ask is for comments or some constructive criticism. This is just a hobby after all.