THE 'DARK VALLEY', THE ZONE, UKRAINE

February 15, 2012 - 12:03 p.m.

Two men stood around a faint rippling in the air, idly throwing bits of trash into it. One of them, clad in a trenchcoat despite the sun beating down on them in the concrete pool, threw a bolt into the ripple as he asked the other a question.

"So, what's Karlov so interested in this anomaly for again?"

The other one shrugged, throwing a half-smoked cigarette into the ripple. "One of the guys said it ate Pirosov. I guess we're here in case it spits out his gear or something."

An empty vodka bottle went into the ripple.

"Seriously? Dude was with us for a month, tops. He couldn't have grabbed anything worth waiting for."

"He did find a couple of artifacts a couple of days back. Stupid bastard didn't hide the glow well enough. Looked like a Soul and a Mama's Beads."

The trenchcoated man laughed, throwing a spent shotgun shell into the ripple. "How considerate. When he gets back out of this anomaly, we can beat him for longer, and we don't have to worry about beating him too badly."

"How do you know he's getting out?"

"Two things. One, there's no body. Two, he's not smeared all over the base. Unless he fell into a Space anomaly, he's getting back out."

The other man nodded, picking up a can off the ground. "Hey, where do you think all this shit goes, anyway?"

"Fuck if I know. You want to find out, go right ahead and jump in. Just leave your kit here first."

He snorted and threw the can at the ripple. "Fuck you, I might need it. I-" He stopped as the can didn't vanish into the ripple like he intended, dropping to the ground instead.

"The fuck?"

"Maybe it didn't like your can."

He walked over to the can and picked it up, throwing it at the ripple again, only to have it drop to the ground again. "Stupid fucking anomaly. Throw a cigarette, throw a vodka bottle, throw a shotgun shell; all that shit's fine, but I can't throw a fucking can? That's bullshit."

A third attempt at throwing the can through the anomaly was interrupted by something coming out of it - a human, to be precise.

"Hey, Pirosov, that you?"

The human paused, the rippling anomaly behind him obscuring some of his movements and muffling his speech. What the anomaly couldn't muffle was the unmistakable crack of gunfire, as two short bursts blew through the bandits, clearing the way for the anomalous traveller.

"Fucking great. Just get back from another planet, and my welcome party is Bandits. This'll be fun."

YANG

I watched Taltos step into the 'anomaly', as he called it, and vanish from Remnant. It was kinda surreal to see, because there wasn't even a hole or anything. It was like he walked into thin air. In my experience, that's how all crazy adventures start, unless they start with 'you all meet in an inn'.

I'm kidding; there's only been two people I've known who teleported into thin air, and one of them was a psycho. The other is... well, it's kind of a long story. So, by my guess, we had a fifty-fifty chance of stepping into his home ground where we would suffer a terrible and undignified death, or getting on with a mission of mind-blowing scope.

Only fair that I go in first.

Heading through the portal was interesting, mainly because I'd never been through one of those things before. No rush of colors, no weird 'woosh' noise, just bright white everywhere until you pop out on the other side.

Right into a firefight, as it happened. The portal dumped me - and Taltos, once I had a look around - into some weird concrete-lined pit, with guys in tracksuits and trenchcoats lining one side and firing in, but they stopped when they saw me. Tal was taking cover under that side, so I figured they weren't friendly to him. Never hurt to check before I started laying into people, though.

"Tal! Friends of yours?"

"Does this look like 'Hey Taltos, we missed you'?"

I looked up at them, all menacing in their dark coats and tracksuits - as menacing as someone could be in a tracksuit - and decided to have a little fun. "Could be. I don't know how things work here."

He gave me a look like I was, well, from another world. He wasn't wrong, but it was funny. "Hey, I'm messing with you. I know that guns generally don't mean 'hi'."

"Right. Meet the Bandits. They wear trenchcoats and tracksuits and would like nothing better than to rob you blind. They've never seen a woman since they fled whatever town they called home, so they're probably a little stunned. If you and the- hey, where are the others?"

I turned around and saw that I was the only one of the team that had decided to head through, unless the others had gotten stuck in the portal somehow.

"I have no idea. Probably on their way. Meantime, you want these guys dealt with, right?"

"The ones above us?" Blake walked up behind me, quiet as ever until she talked. Lucky me that I was used to her doing that, or else I would've looked really stupid.

"Hey Blake. How far off are the others?"

"Ruby's still trying to convince Weiss to come through. I'd say another couple of minutes."

"Cool. And yeah, guys up there aren't friendly, but they're keeping Tal pinned down here." I waved at them; the longer we could keep them confused about how and why we were here, the better. "Think we should kick things off?"

"You have a plan?"

"My plan was 'beatings for everyone', but if you've got a better idea…?"

"I could use a little height. Normally we're the ones with the high ground."

I grinned and bent down slightly, interlocking my fingers to give her a step. "Whenever you're ready. Just give me some heads-up for how you want to do this."

She tucked her swords close, and took a run at me. Her foot hit my hand and I hefted her up, flinging her easily twenty feet straight up into the air, over the guys above us. There were a few yells, but nothing I understood. Their tones said 'confused', but that soon changed. Blake's voice, in contrast, stayed cool and calm in my ear.

"Fifteen-plus guys. Rifles, some pistols. No armor to speak of. My recommendation's Bacchanalia."

'Bacchanalia' was one of the callouts Blake had come up with. She'd come in high, landing in the middle of a group of enemies and slashing at anything that couldn't get out of range of her swords. My part in it was to come in as a clean-up crew when the opposition had recovered.

The shouts soon stopped and were replaced by gunfire; my time to shine. I let Ember Celica unfold on my wrists and aimed at the ground. Everyone tells me 'rocket-jumping' is a terrible idea, but it hasn't blown up in my face yet. Quick hop, two shots, and I'm over the rim. Nice and easy.

The sight I was treated to as I came up was… pretty normal, for Blake. There were guys all over the place, and a few bits of guys - arms, legs, whatever you wanted. There were a couple in punching range, so I got them first. For all the awesomeness having wrist-mounted rocket launchers gave you, they still fired rockets. Even an idiot can get out of the way of a rocket at a hundred meters.

Blake was a blur, but I didn't take long to hit my stride. Punch one guy, shoot, use the recoil to send my elbow into another, rocket over to another group, rinse and repeat. It might sound wrong, but I was hoping for an actual challenge from these guys. Instead, I got guys who went flying fifty feet off a single hit. Nothing like what I was used to back on Remnant.

Soon, though, I saw a red blur working its way around the field, showing that my sister had just joined the game. She wasn't an area fighter like me or Blake; her strategy was more one-on-one - just grabbing individual guys and ramming them into whatever she could get. Speed kills, not that she wanted to think she was killing them. Seeing as Ruby was here, that could only mean she'd convinced Weiss to come along, so I kept an eye out for the glyphs that were her handiwork. Anyone who was stepping on those would have a bad day, and I didn't have plans on ruining mine.

That's not to say her glyphs were bad news all the time; they had their uses, but mostly those uses were freezing people solid or flinging them around like they weighed nothing at all.

That being said, they made amazing launch pads, if you could set them up right. Lucky for us, Weiss definitely did. Didn't have to give her much, just a location you wanted to jump to. In this case, it was the third storey of a building. A few of these 'bandits' had holed up in there; probably because they'd seen what we were doing to their friends out in the yard and didn't want to get torn apart.

"Weiss! Red building, third floor!"

"Window?"

"Don't care, just get me in there!"

The guys in that floor had managed to get their act together more than the ones in the courtyard, because they'd started shooting, and hitting. Their shots weren't breaking through my Aura, but I could definitely feel them landing.

"Five steps behind you; you're going to need a grip."

Weiss' nickname - 'The Ice Queen' - started because we were making fun of how prim and proper she was, and how she always thought she was better than us - something she quickly learned she was wrong about - but we kept it because of the way she acted in a fight. Look at her when she's on a base, you'll see the same old high-and-mighty heiress to Schnee Dust Company that we saw four years back. Take her out into a pitched battle, that all changes. She stops being annoyed at little things, the emotion drains from her voice; it's like night and day.

I stepped back towards the glyph, grabbing onto the edge when I could reach it. "Give me a count, Weiss."

"Three…" I could feel the glyph changing under my fingers.

"Two…" It got colder.

"One…" My hand loosened; the last thing I wanted was to break my fingers in the rush of air.

"Launching." I felt the air rush in behind me, shooting me off the glyph and at the building I asked for. Those guys won't know what hit them. Well, they'll probably see the blonde girl hurtling towards one of the windows, but they won't be expecting the beatdown I'll be handing out. Especially not the one who happened to be in the end window Weiss chose for me to enter. Poor guy.

I made it quick for him; a fist to the face as I came in. Not to say I was slower with the others - I don't think they could've held up to any more than what I was dishing out - but he hit the wall behind him hard enough that he went through, so I'd say it was pretty quick.

The guy next to him wasn't as lucky. He was dumb enough to try and shoot me once I punched his buddy into the next room. I was feeling fair, so I let him take a few shots before I grabbed him. He was surprisingly light, given the coat he was wearing. One hand lift and throw into the next guy. He wasn't gone, so I figured I'd save myself a little time and send both of them out the window. Would it kill them? Probably, but I don't think we were playing safe anyway. Blake wouldn't have gone in first if we had, because she's arguably the most lethal out of all of us.

The rest of the floor was easy. Sure, a couple of them managed to get a few shots on me, but nothing that broke through. I'm not sure if that was because they were terrible shots in general or because their guns were weak. Didn't matter to me, because I just breezed through them like it was a leisurely stroll. A bad-guy-filled, beating-heavy leisurely stroll.

Around the same time I ran out of guys on my floor, I heard things get quiet outside. I keyed the radio and tried to raise one of the team outside. I didn't know if our radios would work here, but it never hurt to try.

"You guys done out there as well?"

"Run out of guys on your floor?" Blake's voice was a little tired, but I could tell she was looking for more.

"Just hit a quiet moment. Noticed there wasn't any more yelling or shooting coming from outside, so I figured I'd call ahead."

"Yeah, we're done outside. Need a hand upstairs?"

I saw one of the bandits I'd hit try and reach for his gun, but kicking that away solved the problem for a little while. "No, just got the one guy left. I'll be out soon."

I walked over to the bandit that was still breathing and crouched down next to him.

"Hey, buddy. You speak Valish?"

"Suka. Prosto ubit' menya uzhe."

"I'm guessing that's a 'no'. Do you know what I'm saying? Nod for yes, shake your head for no." I mimicked the actions as I told him what to do. Not that it helped, because all he did was spit on my boot and say 'suka' again.

"Oh well. Good thing I've got a friend that can talk for you. Up you get." I picked up the bandit by his coat and dragged him to the window.

"Okay, I'm going to need you to hold on. Don't get any ideas, or you'll be talking through broken teeth." I lifted him over my shoulders, bracing him against my neck. Terrible idea, seeing as we were dropping about thirty feet straight downwards, but I didn't want to just drop him out the window alone. "Ready? Down we go!"

I leapt out the window, making sure to keep my feet underneath us the whole way down. The last thing I wanted was to land on this guy, though the noise he was making gave me the idea that knocking the wind out of him wouldn't be that bad of a plan. Lots of shouting, a little screaming, all for a thirty-foot drop.

We hit the ground and I dropped him pretty much straight away. Shouting Dust-knows-what into my ear for a short drop is one easy way to really get under my skin. It's not that scary. However, I noticed he wasn't moving or speaking, so either he passed out or I dropped him hard enough that he died.

When I'd made sure I hadn't hurt him too badly with the drop, I looked at the mess all around me. There were a few guys who weren't dead - probably Ruby and Weiss' work - but they didn't look like they were getting back up anytime soon. There were limbs everywhere, though, and I'll chalk that up to Blake. Two swords, with one of them attached to a ribbon on her wrist, are not the kind of weapons that make for non-lethal takedowns.

"What. The fuck. Are you girls?"

I turned at the voice and found it was Taltos asking us the question.

"What, you've never seen a handful of girls take on twenty or thirty guys in a fight without taking a hit?"

He shook his head and I could see a little disbelief sneaking in. "No, but that's not what I'm getting at. You picked her up," he nodded at Blake, "and threw her thirty, forty feet straight up. She looks like she weighs maybe eighty kilos. I can't think of anyone who could throw eighty kilos forty feet in the air. So I think I'm justified in asking what in the fuck you girls are, because none of you are human."

"All of us, Blake obviously excluded, are just as human as you are, Taltos."

Weiss beat me to the punch on the reply, but I was fine with letting her take it; she had a special thing about being thought of as human. Probably a holdover from her parents; I never asked.

"Bullshit. I'm one hundred percent human and I can't move half as fast as Ruby can, nor can I throw other people forty feet in the air. I heard Ruby's speed was caused by a thing called a 'Semblance', but I had fuck-all explanation of what that was. Seeing as I'm working with four girls who could put the goddamn Spetsnaz to shame, I want to know everything you can do. Right now. With explanations."

"Everything? You sure you're ready for everything?" We'd been fighting at the limit of what we could do - Ruby and myself excluded - but it never hurt to say we could do more.

"I've fought monsters that can get inside my head and do things I don't think languages have words for. I've fought monsters that have tried to treat me like a giant bag of juice and suck me dry. I doubt any of you can muster things worse than that."

Monsters? I guess Ruby won't be holding back the whole time that we're here.

"So, Tal, you want everything? Hope you're comfortable, because this could be a while."

While any of us could've done a quick run-down of what each of us could do, I was arguably the most showy. I strode over to Ruby and placed one hand on her shoulder, while my other one glided down beside her. "First stop on our power trip is my little sister, Ruby Rose."

"Yang…"

"Lil' Rubles here-"

"Yang!" She tried to elbow me in the stomach, but I knew where to stand to dodge that.

"As I've told you, has a Semblance that lets her move at blinding speeds. Not blinding to her, of course, but blinding to just about anyone else. Now, what's a Semblance, I hear you ask? I have no idea, I didn't study biology. Her weapon - the High-Caliber Sniper Scythe Crescent Rose - is, like the name suggests, a sniper rifle capable of busting a tank or particularly large Grimm, and also a scythe capable of slicing through anything we've tried it on. Don't think she's all about speed, though, because I've put her through a thorough training regimen that ensures she can beat almost anyone I can think of in a fist-fight."

"Two questions-"

"Please save all questions for the end of the presentation, thank you." I could've answered them, but I was on a roll. Didn't want to lose my groove because I was taking questions from the audience.

I strolled up to Weiss, number two on our team's roster, and repeated what I did with Ruby. "Next stop is the heiress to the Schnee Dust Company, 'Ice Queen' Weiss Schnee. She's nothing to Schneeze at, ladies and gentlemen, despite her small size."

"Hey!" Weiss hated jibes about her height, but it didn't change the fact that Ruby was a couple of inches taller than she was, and two years younger.

"Her Semblance is… well, I don't have a word for it, but it involves things called 'glyphs'. These glyphs can do just about anything, from speeding things - and people - up, to covering a small area in ice, fire, rock or whatever else she has loaded into Myrtenaster. What's Myrtenaster? It's her sword. Looks like a toothpick, plays like a sword, but it's more than just a sword. See the shiny multi-colored guard? The colors aren't for decoration. Each of those colors is a type of Dust she uses to charge her glyphs."

"Dust?"

"All questions will be answered at the end of the presentation."

I walked over to Blake, who was more on-board with my theatrics. "Third on our list is Blake Belladonna, our resident Faunus. She's had a long and storied past, nothing I'm going to mention, but she's probably the most capable fighter of us by experience. Her Semblance is, quite simply, Shadows. Blake, if you'd be so kind?"

Blake triggered her Semblance, leaping back as a second, picture-perfect copy of her appeared in her place.

"And now there's two of her."

"Yep. Blake?"

The 'shadow' evaporated as Blake put Gambol Shroud through its chest. "Still feels wrong to do."

Tal cut in before I could shut him up again, but the question wasn't as boring as I thought it'd be. "You can feel what the… 'shadow' feels?"

"Not quite. It's difficult to explain; have you ever seen yourself get hurt on camera?"

"A couple of times. It's like feeling that injury when you watch the tape, I'm guessing?"

"Like that, yes."

Tal nodded, the way someone does when they're planning something. "Huh. Uh, should I have held that question for the end as well?"

"It wasn't 'what is Dust', 'what is Aura', 'what is Semblance' or any of those boring ones, so I'm letting it slide. Back to the presentation, though."

I beckoned for Blake to draw all parts of Gambol Shroud, because the first sword was only half the weapon. "Blake's weapon, which you got a little demonstration of earlier, is Gambol Shroud. One's a sword with a literal pistol grip, and the other's a sword that's also a sheath for the pistol-sword. The pistol-sword is also attached to the ribbons you might have noticed on her wrists. That way, she doesn't even have to be near you to cut you with it. Recap: She can cut you, cut you again, shoot you, and, if you run, she can cut you without moving from her place."

That left me as the only person I hadn't told him about. "And that brings us to the thrilling finale. I'm Yang. Yes, I've got a surname, same as everyone else, it's just long. Xiao Long." Nailed it.

"My weapons," I flicked my wrists, unfolding Ember Celica, "are 'Dual Ranged Shot Gauntlets' which I've named 'Ember Celica'. They'll shoot just about anything, so long as it comes in twelve-gauge." I never liked the title Signal gave them; but 'wrist-mounted shotguns' didn't seem fancy enough for them. Or, if it was, they liked the name they gave them better.

"You have rockets the size of shotgun shells?"

"That's just high-explosive rounds. Gets a lot more use than shot does in our line of work, because Grimm have thick enough skins to shrug off a lot of punishment. Only things that'll break through are swords, spears, axes - whatever your average human's been able to use for the past few thousand years - and explosives. Bullets just don't cut it."

"But everything else does, it seems."

"Hey, I don't make the rules, I just play by them. Except for my Semblance, 'course. Only one I can't really demonstrate or describe. Let's just leave it at 'I give as good as I get'."

I'll be honest, I didn't plan on it coming out that way, but Blake's reaction made it worth it. Nothing like a calm, collected Faunus suddenly losing her cool - in a good way - when a vaguely-bedroom reference was made. Even if 'losing her cool' meant 'snort cutely and blush'.

"Everything alright there, Blakey?"

She coughed and smoothed out her shirt. "Yes. I'm fine."

"Yes, you are, but I asked if you were alright."

"You know what I mean, Yang."

Tal seemed completely thrown by all of this, but he didn't look like he was out of his depth. If the grin was anything to go by, he'd already worked out what was going on. "Do you two need a room? I'm fairly certain I can find one in the buildings that doesn't smell of bandit."

"No, Taltos, Yang's just having a little fun. However, I think it's time we got on with the presentation, right Yang?" Blake's serious voice sounded amazing, but I knew I'd have time to make moments like that later.

"There's not a whole lot left to say. We're Team RWBY, fourth-year Beacon Academy students, and this has been a very brief overview of what we can do. Questions?"

A/N: Hey all, apologies for how long it took to get this chapter up.

Between me being distracted by just about anything I can get my hands on, and my usual editor stepping out for the month, progress on this has been slow. That's not to say progress stopped entirely, as most of that distraction was playing through Shadow of Chernobyl again, refreshing my memory of how the locations look and feel.

This chapter is probably a little shaky, both because it's unedited and because it's about 40% fight scene, which I've never been the most comfortable with writing. Anyone who wants to tell me that I goofed on the structure of the Bandit camp in the Dark Valley can freely come and do so - I hadn't actually reached the Dark Valley by the time I wrote this chapter, so it was all from memory.

An additional note: I can't guarantee I'll be able to work in every S.T.A.L.K.E.R. meme. People looking for this to be dripping in 'Chiki Briki', 'Blowout Soon', 'Get Out Of Here Stalker', et al, may be disappointed. More mundane ones like 'You See Ivan' are much easier, so expect more of those when they get to the more populated areas.

With luck, I'll be back to posting chapters every weekend again, maybe sooner as continued apology, so expect Chapter 6 to be up by this time next weekend.