#qrow has some stuff to answer for

[tumblingxelian]

How do some even think that RWBY has male characters “hijack the narrative?” It’s like they project what their grievances with past stories on what looks like the same but not really.

Like Jaundice in Volume 1 flies right by marathoning the season. No bigger than a single episode of TV at 20+ minutes.

So the answer to that questions ranges from what you said to several things like:

Not watching un years & misremembering what was watched, being misinformed & not having watched at all, lying and such. But, I think I hit on another major reason for this problem and its kind of hilariously twisted so please hear me out.

Every arc I've noticed that a certain strain of "Fans" get very attached to one or two male characters and start projecting the idea that they are the real MCs & then get offended when it turns out they aren't.

In V1 to 3, it was Jaune & Adam. Then in volumes 3 to 6 it was Qrow & then Ozpin, Followed by Ironwood in volumes 4 & 7.

All these guys are introduced either in a typical shounen hero or antagonist or mentor and ally role.

Then have the layers people back to show what exists beneath the archetype and what they either have to overcome to remain on the actual main characters side. IE, Jaune, Qrow & Ozpin.

Or what it is that they long since failed or will fail to overcome and grow from that makes them into villains, IE, Adam and Ironwood.

The reason this keeps happening is because that particular strain of "fan" has such a "Men as default" head-space that they cannot, genuinely cannot grasp that they are watching a story about women. Thus they keep expected ay given guy who shows up to be the "real" main character.

Aside:

You may also notice Ren, Oscar & Marrow never gets on the above list. The closest they get is being someone else's cheerleader or not mentioned at all. Meanwhile the white (Or perceived as white in Qrow's case) cis and overtly straight men do get said treatment. I wonder why that could be? Such a mystery :/

But I digress, this is important because it reflects a deep subconscious bias in those "fans" & I think said bias also exists in the people making claims like this.

IE, because they treat men as the default & the protagonists in a given scene, while subconsciously placing women below them and more as accessories, their focus on any given scene is always on the men.

Kind of like those tumblr posts that are explicitly about women & have a bunch of people with piss poor reading comprehension tagging it with dudes or even going so far as to say "Just say gay men". & rather similar to that observation that a lot of fandom treats men, any man from a piece of media, as an inherently deep and complicated character with so much to analyze or so much freedom to expand on. Meanwhile dismissing women out of hand as awful & or boring.

Thus, when they see a group conversation scene, they instinctively assume that the one leading the conversation, with the most to gain from the conversation, with the most narrative weight in the conversation is a man.

Even if he barely said anything and all the lot relevant, interesting character stuff and such was being done by women.

This head-space persists consistently and inflames any given scene, story beat or exchange.

But, here's the twist, these "critics" know o a conscious level that RWBY is about women and that, that is a selling point. But then they look back over their memories, subconsciously blurring out the women and think, "Wow, the girls didn't do anything, it was all about the guys!" Even though its actually just cos they refused to pay any attention to a character that wasn't a man.

Then they get mad because "Clearly the writers are doing this wrong" and ten they get madder when these men fail, or are villains or have to learn lessons, because in their eyes, those guys are the righteous protagonists, and super complicated, "Can't these blank slate girls realize that? Can't the writers!?" But again, its just because they weren't paying attention, rather tan it being a problem in the writing.

Its very similar to that trend of, "There was no queer foreshadowing, they were both obviously straight!" & then their evidence is like, she looked at a man once, & so therefore every interaction with women she has is platonic by default and therefore does not contain foreshadowing.

Damn, could have just led with that, its male bias, rather than straight bias, but the end result is the same. They don't perceive the women on the screen, they don't see the queer signals.

Then, when the story develops around those women, when queer characters & events set up across years happens it slaps them across the face & they insist it must have come out of nowhere.

Sadly, nothing you can say is liable to change their minds, because in a way, they really are watching an entirely different show.

It'd be like if I went into Naruto thinking Rock Lee was the main character & then never adjusted from that perspective.

Not an identical situation, but one that conveys my point regarding why they claim so much nonsense with such confidence.

[bestworstcase]

option 1: tai’s guarding the crown of choice.

pros:

a legitimately important task that recontextualizes his ongoing decision to remain on patch as a personal sacrifice he makes for the greater good.

ozpin would pick the guy named for the god of light to be the gatekeeper of choice, huh.

if any parent in this story is meant to die, it’s him, and narratively this is the most intuitive way to do it.

cons:

realistically, what can tai do to prevent salem / cinder / summer from accessing the vault if they find it? if he’s the gatekeeper, staying on patch alone after everyone else evacuates achieves nothing except, ah, signaling to the enemy that the real vault is under signal academy. bad plan.

it means oz is breaking his promise to be honest and forthcoming, undermining his character growth for the sake of ‘surprising’ the audience with the most obvious answer.

means qrow has either been kept in the dark (see prev point) or he’s also deliberately hiding this information from his nieces after they asked him outright if he knew where tai is; this is so far afield for his character as to border on character assassination, and likewise undermines his positive growth since v7.

honestly makes both yang and ruby seem kind of stupid. they know the crown is hidden somewhere near beacon, that ozpin did something to protect it differently from the others, and that their father hasn’t left patch. ruby was sharp enough to guess that long memory might be a relic hidden in plain sight; yang is just as smart, and she knows tai had “some things” to look after on patch. are we expected to believe that “hey, is dad guarding the relic?” somehow hasn’t occurred to either of them?

tai harbors a whole lot of resentment toward ozpin, and based on qrow kicking him out of ruby’s bedroom to drip-feed her hints on where to go next, he seems to have been on the outer perimeter of the inner circle. why would oz entrust him with the relic’s safety?

glynda—ozpin’s scrupulously loyal second-in-command whose emblem is a crown and whose semblance puts her on par with a maiden—is a far more narratively plausible vault-guardian than tai, and the “sun dragon” makes a damn good red herring.

if he’s guarding the vault, he dies. sorry. but the point of putting the father of 2/4 protagonists in between the two main villains and the thing they want most (choice) is so they can kill him to get it, increasing tension and raising the emotional stakes of negotiating peace. to be clear, rwby is willing to Go There, but i think it’s an unsatisfactory way to close out the rose xiao long family arc.

option 2: survivors trapped under mountain glenn, and tai is taking point.

pros:

a genuinely important, worthwhile thing for him to be doing—even more so than guarding the crown. likely sets up a resolution for him in the vein of “you can be a good huntsman or a good father, and tai picked being a huntsman,” which is an elegant way to balance his contradictions.

gives him meaningful stuff to do in v10; for example, one stealthy huntsman with a bullhead could slip in and out of mountain glenn to get a few dozen people out at a time, and/or run supplies and messages between the kingdoms.

we get to see zwei back in action around mountain glenn :)

introduces a natural segue from playing defense in vacuo to mounting a counteroffensive against beacon as tai’s work clarifies the situation in vale.

easily the most 'heroic' direction for him without contorting the story to arbitrarily lionize tai: he’s a scout preparing the stage for the heroes to take the fight to salem, making him the good counterpart to watts.

cons:

makes no sense to keep it a secret. the emotional beats of B4 can still happen if the girls know this is what tai’s doing: instead of “do you… wonder why he’s not here? i know qrow said he’s on assignment, but what’s more important than here?” yang says “do you… wish he were here? with us? i know qrow said he’s looking for survivors, but how many of them can there really be by now? we need all the help we can get,” and ruby says “maybe we don’t have the full picture” as in maybe dad knows something we don’t and that’s why he hasn’t given up yet. the emotion is the same, and the big "they’re hiding in mountain glenn" reveal is hinted without spoiling.

leaves hanging the narrative thread of what tai has been doing since the fall of beacon, because the “some things” he was dealing with in v4 obviously wasn’t this.

option 3: tai is dead.

pros:

explains the apparent secrecy; qrow knows tai was away “on assignment” (i.e., had taken a huntsman contract that brought him out of the kingdom) at the time salem attacked vale, so he is missing but not yet presumed dead.

might reopen the mystery box of summer’s last mission through the real-deal “left on a mission and never came back” echo.

cons:

raven would know.

it’s a cheap, narratively unsatisfying twist that fails to deliver on the bread crumbs set up in v2-3 (tai starts going on missions again) and v4 (“some things”), and also undermines any serious emotional resolution with regard to yang and ruby’s complex relationships with tai.

option 4: summer’s working with salem, and tai is trying to convince her to come back.

pros:

“some things” being his presumed-dead wife who left him to join the enemy and with whom tai is now having an affair or otherwise hoping to coax back to the heroic side through the power of love whilst also keeping his mouth shut about her being a) still alive and b) a traitor is OBJECTIVELY the funniest answer.

brings forward and interrogates the way tai’s romantic grief informs the choices he makes as a parent: from hiding raven and then refusing to talk about her with yang, to shutting down when he lost summer and letting his five-year-old pick up the pieces, to discovering and then keeping summer’s secrets for the sake of some faint hope that she might finally come back to him.

cogent with the Dead (Absent) Mother / Neglectful Father / Evil Stepmother fairytale paradigm rwby deconstructs with raven, tai, and summer; the father chooses the stepmother over his children.

raises the emotional stakes of the war for summer through direct confrontation with the life she left behind, creating narrative opportunities to develop her character (is she still in love with tai? how does she feel about being his first priority, over their children? does she resent that he has her on this pedestal even now?) and apply pressure to her relationships with salem and cinder (do they know? is summer keeping her communication with him a secret, too? or is he an “asset” she’s using for salem’s benefit?).

consequently, raises the momentum of the narrative toward negotiation with salem; tai still has the coalition’s trust, however strained his personal relationships may be. summer is the obvious ambassador for salem’s side of the war, but she’s also the traitor who needs someone to vouch for her good intentions.

the secrecy needs no explanation: just as summer’s last mission was a summer secret, tai’s "assignment" is a taiyang secret and the girls know everything that oz and qrow do, because all of them have been left in the dark. raven might know, and she has the means to find if she doesn’t, but tai’s whereabouts are entangled with what raven knows about summer, so she can’t explain where tai is or why until she reveals her deep dark secrets about what happened between her and summer that night.

foreshadowing is solid: tai starts to go on "missions" again in v2, after the inner circle becomes aware that salem has infiltrated beacon and just before the breach downtown. when ruby visits summer’s grave in v3, she says "[dad] told me he’s going to be on some mission soon! i think he misses adventuring with you." he’s got to "look after some things" (but he isn’t talking about yang, because he stays home after she leaves). and then with B4 we have ruby echoing what the blacksmith taught her about summer in relation to tai, "maybe we don’t have the full picture?"

juicy

cons:

???

dependent on the unconfirmed theory that summer is working for salem as herself, not some unrecognizable enslaved monster, but i am as confident in that as i was about salem going to vale next and we all know how that turned out :)

taking their mom was not enough salem had to go for the full set APPARENTLY

option 5: secret fifth thing

pros:

???

cons:

???

[one-real-wrimonkey]

I was reading your critiques on taiyang xiao long, and I want emphasize a criticism with the writers.

We don't see Tai enough to even know what he did or does.

Sure, he's by Ruby's bedside first time we see him, and he tries to help yang recover.

But the writers seem to not sure what to do with him.

RWBY Beyond has him going on a mission instead of seeing his girls back..why? so he can reunite with them in V10?

It took us 9 volumes for Tai and Summer scene. For goodness sake, even though it took about 10 years for the bees to kiss, at least we had buildup.

My point is, that Tai suffers from lack of screentime on the writers part, and that kinda makes it difficult for anyone to get a good feel for his character.

And while I ADORE RWBY Chibi (Ruby and Penny had a DATE!) that doesn't quite count towards canon, now, does it?

Anyway, sorry, wanted to contribute my thoughts towards your input

Firstly, thank you for your thoughts. I have a few more of my own in answer/continuation. And yes, I’m taking my stuff from the OG show and not Chibi haha. Sorry this gets a little long.

I completely agree that he has very limited screen time but the screen time he does have shows him in a poor light, both when he’s on screen and when he’s spoken about. And we certainly get more where he spoken about.

Personally, I do think he has a fairly consistent characterisation when he is on screen/talked about, just a somewhat complex one.

He is their dad and he does love them and they do love him AND he’s also a bad parent who’s happy to let Yang do all the heavy lifting after Summer dies. He’s haunted by losing Raven and Summer and that may be why he acts how he does with the girls.

Some of the conversations he has with Yang in V4 make me think he’s seeing Raven in her too much, rather than fully seeing and understanding who Yang is, and it may be the same reason he left Yang in charge of Ruby, because she looked too much like Summer. It may be he’s looking at his girls and seeing ghosts.

I do believe he loves his kids, but that doesn’t make him a good parent. Everything we learn about his parenting post Summer’s death leans into that.

Yes he was by Ruby’s bedside when she was hurt and worried about her, but when she left she was on her own (aside from JNR and Qrow). He says he can’t go after Ruby to protect her or bring her home because he has to take care of Yang (which he is indeed trying to do) but once Yang is recovered, he lets her go off alone through grimm infested wilderness to look after Ruby instead. Despite the reasons he gave for staying, when those reasons are no longer there he doesn’t go after his kids to keep them safe, he lets Yang take over looking after Ruby… again.

At best this is parentification of Yang through neglect. At worst it’s parentification of Yang through manipulation (if he said that intentionally knowing she could hear to motivate her to get better) but it’s very consistent with what Yang and Ruby tell us about how they were raised after Summer died.

When it comes to looking after Ruby, Tai passes the parenting baton onto Yang (and Qrow) in just about every instance we see or are told about. It is consistent characterisation.

(And ok, benefit of the doubt maybe, he was running missions in Vale, but those aren’t the reasons he gave, and that doesn’t change the impact it had on his kids.)

Personally I’d love to see and know more, but I want them to flesh this out, not try and change it and make him a good dad when he wasn’t. He loves his kids and they love him, and maybe he did have other missions to complete, but he was a poor parent.

So yeah TL:DR, I agree he has limited screen time but I think his characterisation is actually fairly consistent, if a little complex.

[strqyr]

...everyone in team strq keeps secrets of some kind. qrow had his semblance (and shapeshifting, kinda), raven's got being the spring maiden and her reasons for leaving, summer her mission (that i don't think she was being fully honest about with anyone).

so what does taiyang "i've got to... look after some things" xiao long have?

i don't think it's simply his refusal to talk about raven (and possibly summer), because it doesn't quite fit with the rest; it's not about him or what he's doing, if that makes sense. he could talk about everything and all, and it would not bring the answers desired.

and i do think he has a secret (or two) just for himself. something that possibly even his teammates don't know about; qrow says "there were a lot of those back in our day, but" in reference to the possibility that ozpin knew something about summer's mission that qrow and tai didn't, opening a room for oz secrets that weren't shared across the board; "still, who knows what he may have hidden from us over the years." <- that's an open door right there.

but my main reason for thinking so comes from 'known by its song' and raven casting doubt not only on qrow but tai as well on leaving things out, which seems slightly odd considering how... uninvolved tai seems to be in all things oz & salem in the present day.

"well, [qrow's] never given me a reason to doubt him before" -> "that doesn't mean those reasons don't exist."

"your uncle qrow and i didn't attend beacon to become huntsmen, we did it to learn how to kill huntsmen. daddy and uncle left that part out, hm?"

"you said tai told you all about my semblance. well, i doubt he ever told you what oz did to my brother and me." <- this, especially. tai talked, but he said nothing about oz-related stuff. not when he slipped up about what ruby did at the beacon tower. not when yang left, likely knowing she (and ruby) were getting involved in this stuff. even when he talks with qrow, he's being vague with his wording.

it reminds me of this quote from the official companion book: "to me, taiyang is the ultimate dad. he doesn't spend a lot of time talking about his emotions, but he's been through a lot. i think about men who went to war and experienced horrible things, but when they came back to support their families they never spoke a word about it. they took all that to the grave."

his team is full of secrets and he's got to look after some things (<- plural!!!) and if he's not the dragon guarding the treasure, i don't know what he is.

[itsclydebitches]

I think I sent an ask like this along time ago? IDK though.

The weird thing about Oz is that it feels like there was stuff they could have brought up if they wanted us to view him in a darker light that they just...dont

Like, that whole thing with Oz conquering the world with Salem and tricking people into worshipping them as gods. Yeah he eventually saw what he was doing was wrong, but that was after he and Salem had 4 kids. So for a long-ass time he was an imperialist god-king

Or the part where he nearly attacked Ruby once she asked Jinn the question.

It just...feels like those are totally things that should be discussed more. But instead they focus on a bunch of other things that are really weird to hold against Oz.

Like why focus on this you have way better things to hold against Oz right there.

That's very possible, anon! I don't know how many unanswered asks are sitting in this inbox now, but it's not a small number...

Totally agree. I think Oz gets criticized to an unfair degree by the canon and fandom alike (no one is shocked to hear this lol) but part of my issue is what he's criticized for, not just the extent. The show tends to take incredibly weird perspectives like, "How dare you give our uncle cool bird powers with no downside" and "How dare you save group members from a deadly airship crash." The fandom takes stances with larger political implications like, "How dare an abused man 'steal' his daughters away from the mother who wants to use them for a magical form of genocide" or issues that fundamentally break the core concept of the show: "How dare you let teenagers fight dangerous battles / How dare you reincarnate - something you have no control over - into a 14yo boy." The show does engage with some of Ozpin's morally complex choices with no easy answers like, "Is it okay to keep secrets if history has shown severe downsides to revealing that information?"... but then the answer the story decides on - "No it's not" - immediately doesn't apply to half the cast, with no examination of how that changes our perception of Ozpin's choice. And, as you say, the show simultaneously introduces HUGE mistakes - "You positioned yourself as a god! Then a king!!"- that the characters could absolutely mistrust him for... but they don't. Because they're too busy focusing on all of the above.

The only thing I'd push back against here is anyone being mad at Ozpin for "nearly attacking" Ruby. I'd consider that a highly unfair criticism as well given that:

We don't know if he would have attacked. He just charges with his and out-stretched, so Ozpin could just as likely have been intending to snatch the Relic

All these characters have aura and train/hit for funsies on a regular basis. It feels like a stretch - one working to paint Ozpin in an unfair light - to act like Ruby taking a hit is suddenly some horrific event that's worthy getting up-in-arms about

In this same scene the girls pull their weapons on Qrow and Oscar - someone WITHOUT that training/fully unlocked aura - gets punched into a tree. Again, consistent morality. Why is Ozpin in the wrong for charging with an open hand (ambiguous) but the girls are justified in pulling their weapons (clear intent)? Why should Super Fighter Ruby be defended for taking a hit after forcibly stealing secrets from Ozpin, but we should shrug off the newbie farm kid taking a hit for the "sin" of being an unwitting, passive vessel?

Plus... as said above, "forcibly stealing secrets." I'm not saying Ozpin is 100% justified in attacking Ruby over this, but I think he's a HELL of a lot more justified compared to actions like threatening Qrow or attacking Oscar. Ruby ignored his requests to give the Relic back; she ignored how terrified he clearly was. She wasted a wish (which Ozpin knew would happen). She revealed his entire, traumatic history to the group PLUS a total stranger (Maria) which, again, Ozpin knew would happen. Of course he tried to stop her. We will never know what lengths he would have gone to, whether he would have truly fought Ruby or just made a last minute grab, but even if he had fought her... It think that's understandable. We can argue about whether it's right, but it's not the sort of thing the heroes should be holding against him once tempers have cooled, especially when he has stuff like playing God that they have hold as a long term grudge.

Out of everything Ozpin has done, maybe being willing to fight the prodigy fighter to keep her from making one of the stupidest decisions we've seen in the show to date is pretty low on the sin list.

[zacs-of-rwby]

Home is Where Your Light Shines Brightest

Chapter 9: An Incorrect Intuition

Story Summary: Ozpin works tirelessly in his pursuit: to make Beacon of Hope a safe place for kids to grow up. With a bigger location and more kids to take care of, Ozpin starts to feel the weight of responsibility crushing him, and he plans to carry the whole thing himself.

For Qrow, volunteering for Beacon of Hope had only one purpose: to get Summer off his back for a little while. When he meets the polite, friendly, and handsome man in charge, he wonders if he could actually get something out of this whole ordeal after all.

With Qrow’s support, maybe Oz will be able to reach his goal of turning this house into a home.

Story Categories: Mental Health, Recovery, Slice of Life, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Slow Burn, Friends to Lovers, Found Family, LGBTQ+ Themes, Alternate Universe, Ozpin’s Halfway House AU, please check Ao3 tags for potentially triggering topics

Chapter Summary: Cinder would rather be anyone where else but Beacon. Her and Emerald would be better off on the streets where they could take care of themselves and answer to no one. And she has no intention of answering to anyone.

Chapter Categories: Adjusting to new surroundings, emotional hurt/comfort, angst, friends to lovers

Warnings: Mentions of child abuse

Author’s Note: Believe it or not, we finally reached the end of the set up with this chapter :) now that all the players are on the board, we can start playing the real game haha. There’s some fun stuff in this chapter and I can’t wait to share the upcoming chapters, too! Hope you enjoy :D

[novankenn]

Steadfast, Immovable (3)

The girls were terribly shaken once everything had quieted down. The walk back through the dark, away from the inferno Jaune has started, not helping their emotional state, and even now, they were still jumpy. Outside, Jaune continued to walk in a circle about the small homestead, compacting the ground into a shallow ditch. Tai held the girls in a group hug, as Qrow spoke to Ozpin.

“What happened Qrow?”

“Yang and Juniper decided they needed to find Summer. They bundled up Ruby, and talked Saphron in joining them.” Qrow looked over his shoulder, taking in the sight of Tai still holding the sobbing girls, before returning his attention to the video call with Ozpin. “They went out in the forest alone and unarmed. I noticed they were gone, and found their note. I was almost too late, Oz.”

“But they’re okay?”

“More or less, though I think Tai and I are going to be on nightmare duty for a couple of years.” Qrow took a swig from his flask, trying to calm his shaken resolve. “I’ve never seen such a pack on Patch. Not with the number of huntsmen and huntresses we have. One that size shouldn’t have been possible.”

“How?”

“Jaune.” was Qrow’s one word answer.

“He reanimated?”

“Reanimated, powered up, whatever. All I know is Tai, and I were barely treading water out there, and he just arrived. I thought he was a monster before, but seeing him in action… the Fire department have yet to contain the inferno he started. But without him…”

“So after 4 years sitting dormant, he’s active again.”

“Yeah, well I don’t think Tai is entirely impressed with the garage missing half its walls, or the fact he’s right now wearing a trench around the house, due to his patrol. But yes, without him just showing up…”

“Is there anything you or Tai need?”

“We need Summer found. These girls need their mom back.”

“I have Glynda checking out several leads as I am talking to you.”

“And I need Bart to drop by and check out Jaune. He went toe to toe with an Alpha, and his… he needs some work.”

“I’ll see what his schedule is like, and when he could leave for Patch.” Ozpin responded. “Is there something else, Qrow?”

“Things just feel wrong. There should have been no reason for a pack that large… It was almost like Patch was being targeted.”

“Yes, that is concerning. Very concerning.”

“I know it’s been four years, but have you found any clues as to why Ansel was wiped from the map?”

“Aside from the technology we discovered, I can see no reason why she would have taken such drastic action.”

“Couldn’t be the tech? I ran some of that stuff… It’s well beyond anything anyone has been able to develop, including Atlas.”

“That could be it, but I have nothing concrete to support that theory.”

“I need some answers, Oz.”

“As do I.”

“No, you don’t seem to understand.”

“What don’t I understand?”

“If I was a betting man… if the girls hadn’t run into that pack… it would have attacked us here at the house.”

“I see.”

/== Table of Contents ==/

[rwby-necromancer-au]

Hello and welcome to the world of the RWBY Necromancer AU!

My name is Morgan/Bowl, you’re lovely writer and blog owner. I’m the sole owner of this blog so if you have any questions about the AU, feel free to ask me directly! :]

Now, with that out of the way, here’s some things you need to know,

Salem’s whole thing happened a WHILE ago, so she is a thing of the past. There will be mentions of her and leftovers from the war against her, however she does not ever fight the main characters

Ozpin is functionally immortal, due to Ozma originally figuring out how to revive himself before death, there began a duplication loop of his magic. He gained his revived magic, but his original living magic needed somewhere to go, so it attached itself to the next host. Ever since then, each of the heirs to the magic are immediately revived after death without any control over it, thus continuing the cycle.

Oscar is autistic in this AU, he is 10 physically, but mentally he is more akin to a 5 year old.

Speaking of mental ages, revived people will take the appearance of whatever their mental age is, not the age they died at. So for instance, Oscar died when he was 7 but because of his mental age being 5, he looks like your typical 5 year-old

Ozpin, Oscar, Qrow, and Glynda are the main characters in this au, RWBY and Co play supporting roles

Ironwood, and by extension, Atlas & Mantle, are the main antagonists of the story. Mistral also serves as an antagonist but more so as a support for Atlas & Mantle

Pursuers are soldiers of Atlas who are assigned to hunt down and kill necromancers or capture them to put into a necromancer prison. No exceptions. Even children.

Songbirds are random people who decided to give up their names, identities, and lives for the cause of saving these necromancers from the prisons and from Atlas. They are known for singing coded songs that tell different meanings.

Ozpin, Qrow, and Glynda all met in Atlas when they were 12, two years later they were captured and put into a Necromancer prison. Three years after that is when they escaped via the songbirds and made their way to Vale

Vale and Vacuo are safe havens for magic users and especially necromancers

Healers are forced to work for the Atlesian government because of their healing magic

Shapeshifters are rare and most people in Atlas think they don’t even exist. They also have the capacity to change their general appearance so long as it still looks like them (I.e, changing hair length, sex, or body height), this is the only other form they have besides their animal form.

Shapeshifters are also capable of having animal features, however many have evolved to lack these features as a result of Atlas attempting to breed Shapeshifting out of people. Qrow for example, does not have feathers, while Blake, has cat ears and a tail.

This story is dark so be forewarned.

There is a separate timeline occurring on this blog called the Young Necromancer AU timeline. Which is how the story of what happened in the main characters’ teenage hoods is told.

Anonymous is on at all times unless I begin to get concerning or otherwise rude asks in an unreasonable amount

Cloqwork (Ozpin x Qrow) is in fact a thing here, it’s my favorite ship, sue me.

If you’re not sure what to ask, feel free to ask me what I’m in the mood for and I’ll give you some options :)

I go by they/them and necro/necrom pronouns!

Here’s how to use those:

Here is some other info you may want to know!

The map of Vale in the N! AU:

Holidays:

Past events timeline:

I hope you enjoy the AU! Hope to see you soon!

Please do not send Palestine asks to this blog. I will not answer your asks and they WILL get deleted.

This blog is an escape from that sort of stuff right now.

[miss-writes-a-lot]

Ozqrow Week 2023 Day 2

(Still going strong for @ozqrowweek with day 2! Let's see how long this lasts!)

CW for angst, crying, brief mentions of Summer Rose

Ozqrow Week 2023 Day 2: Accidental kiss

Qrow returns to the clocktower late at night to find it an absolute mess. 

The few pieces of furniture that are in Ozpin’s office are knocked over and are dragged off to the side. Papers and books are scattered across the floor, some of those pages ripped to shreds. The alarm bells in Qrow’s head immediately begin going off.

These books are - or, were - decades worth of notes and findings on whatever information he could gather on Salem. He wouldn’t just throw it all away like it was nothing. Someone was in the clocktower.

Someone got to Oz.

 The avian man draws his weapon and slowly leaves the safety of the elevator to enter the rest of the office. He scans the perimeter, searching for any sign of life or remaining intruders. He perks up when he hears the sound of quiet sobbing coming from one of the corners. He whips around, Harbinger at the ready to strike when he sees him.

Ozpin hides behind one of the pillars closest to the window. His hands are buried deep in his disheveled silver hair. His clothes are ripped and ragged like his breathing. 

“Oz,” Qrow says.

He sheaths Harbinger and runs to him, sliding into a crouch in front of him. Ozpin doesn’t react when Qrow grabs his shoulders.

“Oz - Hey, Ozzy. Talk to me. What happened, huh? What happened? You hurt?”

Ozpin shakes his head, sobbing, “It’s all my fault, Qrow. It’s all my fault!”

“What is, Ozzy? What’s your fault?”

“All of...Of this!” he gestures out to the room, revealing his red, tear stained face, “This! You and Raven and - and - and Summer! It’s all my fault!”

Qrow leans back. The gears in his head start to turn. He takes another look around the office again. The ripped pages, the scattered books full of research, Ozpin talking about...her. Qrow sighs through his nose, releasing Ozpin from his grip.

“No, Oz. It’s not.”

Ozpin sniffs loud, “It is, Qrow. All of it is! I’ve wasted years researching and going on missions and - and sending you all on missions to find nothing! We have nothing and she-”

“Ozpin, no,” Qrow says firmly, “This isn’t all on you, okay?”

“But I-”

“No,”  Qrow scoots closer to him, his calloused hands slowly moving to Ozpin’s with a soft touch, “Sure, you asked us to help you with all this. But you gave us the choice. You didn’t say that we had to do it, right? You asked if we could. If we wanted to, and we did. We knew the risk; loud and clear and we still wanted to run into fire with you and we did.”

“Qrow, I-”

“We knew the risk,” he brings Ozpin closer until the foreheads touch, “We all knew the risk, even before Salem. I know it, Tai knows it, Summer knew it. We’d all have had to be idiots to jump in without knowing that we might not make it home or something.”

His hands move to hold Ozpin’s face, “You’ve been dealin’ with this all by yourself. Yeah, you fucked up a couple of times, but now, you’re not alone. This stuff isn’t useless. We haven’t lost yet. There’s still a chance we can find something to take her down. We still have Amber. We have Jimmy’s tech and the Nikkos girl comin’ from Argus, right? We still have a chance, so don’t give up on all this just yet.”

Ozpin stares at him with his red, puffy eyes, searching for the lie. Or maybe an answer that’s more concrete and that could end this all. When he doesn’t find one, his face twists and he buries himself in Qrow’s shoulder, heavily sobbing a chorus of ‘I’m sorry’s’ between heavy, ragged breaths.

Qrow cradles his head in one hand while the other travels up and down his back. “I gotcha, Ozzy. I gotcha.”

Qrow sits with him, the man who usually towers above him some days now the smallest he’s ever seen him, as he cries into his shoulder blade. He doesn’t say a word the entire time. He’s just there. He’s there the same way Ozpin had and has been all these years since they started walking down this path together. He holds him in silence because he knows the last thing he wants is to keep hearing Qrow rattle off all the ways this is supposed to work out somehow in the end. 

He knows that Ozpin just wants him there, so he’s going to be there for as long as it takes.

It’s only until Ozpin’s sobs dissolve into small sniffling does he look down at his companion with the beginnings of a smirk tugging at his face. “You doing okay there, Ozzy?”

Ozpin nods.

“You wanna look at me so I can make sure you’re okay?”

The silver haired man shakes his head, tightening his hold on Qrow’s jacket. 

“You sure?”

“Don’t...want you to see me like this,” Ozpin murmurs.

Qrow scoffs, “You’ve seen me in worse condition than this. I can handle whatever you’ve got for me.”

Ozpin hesitates. He slowly lifts his head to look up at Qrow. His cheeks are blotchy and red. There are noticeable tears stains streaked down his face to his chin and his hair’s a mess, which for Qrow, was just another Tuesday night for him.

“There he is,” Qrow says softly.

“I’m so sorry for this, Qrow,” Ozpin rasps, “I didn’t...I didn’t want you to see me like this.”

“So you’ve said.”

“I...I’m glad you came, however. I...I don’t think I could’ve braved this night alone.”

Qrow smiles. He leans in, brushes back Ozpin’s bangs, and pecks a kiss to his forehead. “Anytime you need me, Oz. I’ll be here.”

Qrow pulls back to Ozpin’s eyes wide as saucers staring at him. Qrow quirks a curious brow, wondering what got him so spooked until he realizes that he just kissed Ozpin.

Ozpin, his friend who is definitely not his boyfriend and has not kissed like that before - or ever. 

He feels his face burn several different shades of red. “U-Uh, that was an accident! F-Force of habit with my nieces, you know?”

“O-Of course.”

“Ye-Yeah, you get it, right?”

“One hundred percent.”

“Good.”

“Great.”

“Fantastic.”

They continue to stare at one another, their faces redder than Ruby’s cape. Qrow stands, hands awkward situated on his hips in an attempt to seem casual. “Welp! I gotta get going! Unless, you know, you...need me to stay with you and help you with somethin’?”

“Well...I could use a hand fixing this place up? Maybe you can help me piece my notes back together? Make sense of the scribbles again.”

“Uh...sure. I can - I can do that,” he replies.

“Could you...also help me stand up? My legs aren’t, uh-”

“Oh, yeah! No problem!”

Qrow reaches out a hand. Ozpin grabs him by the forearm and Qrow lifts him onto his shaky legs. Ozpin steadies himself against Qrow, which sends his heart rate skyrocketing. 

“Think you’ll be good?”

“I should be. Should we get to work?”

“Yeah, let’s.”

“Oh, and Qrow?”

“Yeah Oz?”

For the first time tonight, Ozpin smiles. He geniunely smiles. He seems so intent on putting Qrow in an early grave all by himself. “Thank you. I needed this tonight.”

Qrow smiles back at him, squeezing his hand. “Anytime, Oz. I’ll be here for you anytime.” 

[did-i-do-this-write]

Happy OTP Tuesday!

OTP of choice: do they know their partner's love language? what do they do when their partner has had a rough day and needs some love?

This answer is late, but I absolutely adore this question!!!! Thank you so much for the ask!

In my main fic that I've been working on, the basis of Oz and Qrow's relationship really is their ability to know exactly how to take care of each other.

When Oz has a bad day, Qrow jumps at the chance to make his life physically easier in any way he can. Getting meals for him, cleaning up and doing chores before Oz has a chance to, making sure the kids have everything they need so they don't have to go to Oz, stuff like that. Oz has a tendency to neglect himself on bad days so Qrow is there to pick up the slack.

When Qrow has a bad day, Oz jumps into emotional support mode. He listens and pays close attention and does his best to let Qrow run the show. If he needs space, he gives him space. If he needs a distraction, he creates a thoughtful, sweet distraction, usually something they can do together and/or with all the kids. If he needs to work through it, he's there to talk things out and listen.

Their versions of caring and showing love for each other are perfectly compatible with the other's needs, so they work very well together :)

This ask motivated me to write 112 words for Ozqrow Week Day 3.

Experiment Total: 69,843

[tumblingxelian]

Crossposting from SV:

https://forums.sufficientvelocity.com/threads/iwiw-rwby.125050/post-32676154

Regarding the expectation of perfection, yeah, I don't think the team expected it. The one who could be arguably said to have put the most "pressure" on Ruby is Blake as we saw in V8, but having faith in someone isn't the same as demanding perfection. & Blake showed she was fine stepping up and trying to help or support Ruby when she needed it.

The others applied even less pressure, at least knowingly, but none of them are aware of how Ruby had internalized Ozpin's lesson (& from what I know of Coco Second Semester does not make his lessons better)

But Ruby definitely took a lot of these things to heart in a way likely never intended. & more to the point that likely wouldn't be nearly as bad if not for the trauma conga-line the last volumes have been.

For instance in V8 Ruby does seem briefly hurt by Yang noting that following her lead hasn't worked out, but Yang's language is still rather casual, this isn't her trying to deliver some cutting barb to wound Ruby's pride. & given their reunion in V8 it didn't have a lasting impact... Up until V9 landed because with everything that went wrong, suddenly those words pack a lot more sting.

In regards to Yang & Ruby in particular, one thing I find interesting is that in early volumes, even after Ozpin's leader talk Ruby was more comfortable showing uncertainty, discomfort, fragility and the like.

Especially around Yang. She was sulking in V2 about Blake not coming to the dance and feeling overtly helpless, she was fine with being uncertain about her decision to reveal the WF's location to Ozpin & co, also in V2.

But more integrally, in Volume 3, after everything had gone to hell what is the first thing Ruby did once she could move under her own power?

Was it go to her dad for comfort? Seek Qrow for advice? nope, those two came to her, with Tai mostly being used for an intel update and Qrow being prodded for info, and only seeing a flash of vulnerability.

The person Ruby went to was Yang, Yang who she was surprised to find wasn't in a good head-space, and who when Ruby asked what to do couldn't answer her, seemingly leaving Ruby unsure of what to do. In essence, there have been periods where Ruby also expected others to be more sturdy than they could otherwise be expected to be. This isn't a jab, just an observation.

More integrally however, in V4 we see Ruby really hit hard on the repressing.

Oh she did it before, the fact she's modelled her entire persona after her missing mother and was raised by a girl two years her senior should already make it clear she's gonna have some issues. But it becomes a lot more overt with her being all smiles around JNPR but sad when unseen until she's hitting a breaking point. One that is... Sort of countered though of questionable help by being told she's inspiring.

The time we really see it break in in Volume 5 when Yang & Ruby reunited, she cries, she fumbles her words, she gets a damn hug.

But then, the next day, she sees that Yang is not nearly as recovered as she's trying to act. When Yang is upset & removes herself from the situation to calm down and mourn silently, its Weiss who has to help her out of it, because Ruby has no idea what to do.

That's not just her sister in there, its the girl who raised her, & this stuff is not Ruby's forte, but more integrally, Yang is the one who has always been 'all right', the one who Ruby could turn to whenever she needed and who she never had to worry about in combat.

But she's not OK the one person Ruby could always rely on is more fragile than Ruby ever realized, and so clearly, Ruby can't go to Yang with her problems either.

& thus closes her final person to really, properly, well and truly reach out to.

& the thing is Yang would have no idea this is happening!

She didn't hear Ozpin's speech, or Ruby re-phrasing it. She wasn't present when Ruby was really building her walls in V4, and any that existed before that will have been interwoven with Yang's own issues and thus be something she deemed as normal the same way Ruby deemed Yang's self sacrificing penchant as normal.

Put simply, Yang isn't aware that Ruby's mental image of her has shifted and so is not aware that Ruby no longer sees her as someone viable to reach out to.

None of which is helped by the fact Yang canonically admires Ruby and so is prone to see the best, strongest, most idealized side of her, and so like Ruby would need to be told Ruby needs help before keying into it.

Both these girls are very traumatized and damaged and they care about each other so god damn much, but also just cannot wholly see one another.

Its agony, I love it.

[strqyr]

So does that mean we could potentially expect:

Them being teleported to Vacuo via Raven after more character stuff?

Them possibly confronting Salem/Cinder at Vale (if the theory that they're going there instead of Vacuo is true)?

possibly, yeah. this—a potential vale mini-arc—is actually something i've been mulling over for some time now, and not to wear too many tinhats, but... they made a new model for glynda, and by the looks of it the crossover movie is going to focus on beacon / vale / potentially patch, so like. for a story that's definitely heading towards vacuo, that's a lot of time spent "rebuilding" vale ahead of time.

i also think that vale mini-arc could be the answer for "what about vacuo / atlas crew and their handling of team rwby + jaune's deaths?". if they start V10 with team rwby and jaune in patch, they can do split storylines, showing what everyone else has been up to during team rwby's time in the ever after while they are in patch catching their breath—for a while, at least; if salem and cinder went to vale instead of evernight or vacuo, that breath might be a short one—before they start the vacuo arc with full force.

whether they get a nice, quick portal to vacuo of course depends on where qrow is, but it would be an easy way to cut any travel short while also being like. no one would really know exactly how the timelines would line up, so if they followed vacuo crew for some time, it would come off as a "surprise" exactly when it happens from their point of view.

[angstpancake]

I have a grudge with the Xiao longs. This has nothing to do with how they're written, nothing to do with what they've done in the show. They're fantastic characters, and their actions are understandable and valid. My grudge is very bias based, and it has to do with how they behave/handle Ruby emotionally.

Yang is a very supportive sister. We see this in the first episode when both sisters are on the airship to Beacon. "I don't want people to think I'm special." "But you ARE special." That's great, and it's why I love their sibling relationship so much. I do have a problem with it though, and it's that Yang seems to be completely blind when it comes to Ruby hiding something deep down, and usually that coincides with Summer. The speech in vol 8 is a perfect example. "In case you didn't notice, my plan didn't work either" That's tough love, which is a way that Yang and Tai deal with their emotions. Works out for them, but the way it happens has shocked people in the past to the point where they were afraid it wasn't going to work out. Tough love is great for them, but not for Ruby.

I want you to answer this honestly: If ruby had lost her arm instead of Yang and Taiyang had told her to "get over it, stop moping" do you think Ruby would've handled it the same way Yang did? HELL NO.

In a family of tough lovers, that would be kinda rough.

Can't really blame them though, since they didn't have any models to base how they love different people off of. That's just how they cope.

Now, with Taiyang, I have a problem with his parenting. And he's self aware, which is what makes it so hARD XD. Taiyang only sees his dead wife when he looks at his daughter, which deters him from ever forming a deeper connection then surface level love and support. He doesn't really understand how to handle her, just knows the surface level stuff like supporting your kid's dream. But the problem is he hasn't really done that either. QROW has, but Tai just kept her sheltered up until Ozpin couldn't let him anymore. Qrow taught Ruby to fight, not Tai. Tai can see how tough Yang is, so it was easy, but for some reason Ruby is so much more fragile and precious, and that viewpoint leads to consequences later. Ruby felt like her dad would stop her if she said goodbye to him in person at the end of vol 3, so she leaves a letter instead.

I could go so much deeper into this. I think the Xiao long- Rose family is the most tragic family in the series. (Yes, over Ren's. Oops my bias is showing, but I have reasoning for this). If you wanna know more, let me know by commenting, reposting, etc. Thanks for reading this word wall lmao.

[wixhing0nastar]

About the Yang Xiao Long Abuse post.

Something occurred to me; Qrow may have also contributed to the abuse.

Back in Volume 3, when Yang was framed by Emerald?

Qrow accused her of either lying or being crazy.

Yang sought one of her family figures for validation, and Qrow called her crazy.

Then Qrow told her that Raven didn't care for her.

Would what Qrow did be considered abusive as well?

There's a lot in Volume 4 I dislike, which is why its my least favorite volume, and the Patch Scenes were among them.

But I feel that the way Qrow treated Yang was also a factor in Yang's mental/emotional state.

Also, regarding Yang's prosthetic. It appears Tai had planned to "call in some favors, pull a few strings" in order to get Yang her new arm, which shows that while Tai is emotionally insensitive to a degree, he is still caring about others and willing to help.

Ruby did say that Taiyang does love them both and is overprotective.

But a person can be loving and yet at the same time emotionally harmful to a degree.

Its strange, given the character we see of Qrow and Tai in RWBY Chibi, both being loving family members.

How would you, if you could make suggestions to the writing team, made ideas on how to improve things in V4?

Beyond just Yang, it feels there was too much in need of a revision here or there.

So to start with the question about Qrow, those instances wouldn’t count as abuse. For something to be abuse there has to be a pattern of this stuff happening, so the single comment about the Vytal Festival isn’t abuse, just a really messed up thing to say to her.

As for the comment about Raven, while it’s a little too blunt, it’s not something she shouldn’t hear. Especially since Qrow gave her the information to find her and knows Yang’ll be meeting her in the near future and he wants to prepare her for that.

Like as much as she was saying she was just looking for answers, you know deep down she’d been hoping for years if she found her, Raven would care enough about her to take care of her and Ruby.

That being said, in V6 when Yang and Ruby find him passed out drunk, their reaction does indicate he was doing this regularly at some point in their lives and they know how to handle it… and taking care of a passed out drunk adult isn’t the job of a kid(s) and is also a form of parentification. So likely he contributed in some regard when Yang was younger.

However, Qrow acknowledges that he has an issue and does try (successfully!) to work on himself to be a better uncle/mentor both to Yang and Ruby but also their friends as well, which is important to acknowledge.

And yes, I never meant to imply Tai doesn’t love them both. He clearly does, it’s just that love alone isn’t enough when you’ve got a couple of very young grieving children at home, and then a traumatized teenager with fairly severe PTSD. (And tbh I wouldn’t ever put much weight into the characterization in RWBY “cake butler” Chibi, lol).

As for V4, I think that the biggest issue the volume had overall was that they were trying to follow too many different storylines in too many different locations. Like they had to balance:

RNJR + Qrow’s trip across Mistral

Weiss escaping from her father

Blake and the Faunus Civil War

Yang and her PTSD/Recovery

Introducing Oscar and all the world stuff that comes with the reincarnation story

Introducing Salem and Team WTCH

I’d suggest combining at least a couple of these earlier on to give themselves more breathing room. Tbh Yang’s entire recovery arc barely happened (it was like three, 5ish minute scenes across the whole volume, which was also almost every scene she had) and Weiss’s arc was also fairly short and a bit underwhelming for how much it was built up, so I’d try to fold them into other storylines.

Honestly, I’d specifically suggest combining Yang and Oscar’s stories (they both are dealing with huge, unexpected changes in their lives they don’t know how to navigate) and Blake and Weiss’s (Weiss could go through a very similar emotional journey as she did in canon but from the opposite side by witnessing how Ghira and Kali treat her and Blake compared to her father), with Yang and Oscar catching up to RNJR at some point in the later part of the volume.

If they specifically wanted to write Tai as a good parent now (while also not retconning anything from V1-V3), one of the first things he’d need to do is admit that he was in the wrong in the past (like Qrow did in V7) and was not there for her. And then make it clear he is now and then ask after and follow her lead in terms of what she needs to heal instead of assuming he knows best.

[bestworstcase]

i’m uh, not stressing myself out. lol.

“what is tai doing?” is a question the narrative has been openly inviting us to wonder about ever since v4. he says he hasn’t gone after ruby himself because he’s “got some things to look after” at home, and he doesn’t leave when yang does—ergo, there must still be “some things” he’s doing around patch.

okay, so what is “some things”? the only stuff we’ve seen tai do since yang left home is tend his sunflowers and sit on the couch to watch his daughter’s broadcast. tai has to have been doing something more narratively meaningful than this, because we are told as much (he starts going on missions again in v2-3, he has “some things to look after” in v4).

it follows that whatever tai has been doing is both narratively meaningful and intended to be unexpected—so the narrative keeps nudging us with little reminders that we don’t know. where’s tai? “on assignment.” what was tai doing before atlas fell? “some things.”

the narrative doesn’t do this with glynda—which is why there isn’t this level of interest in speculating about what she’s been up to. we know what she’s been doing: in the first CFVY novel, glynda is leading the effort to reclaim beacon from the grimm. we see her out and about in vale during the broadcast; she was shopping for dust when the broadcast began, implying she’s been doing stuff she needs dust for, like patrolling borders / fending off grimm / helping to rebuild.

we don’t know the specifics, but we know roughly how she’s spent most of her time since beacon fell, and likewise we know why she isn’t in vacuo: she went to a different kingdom to try to find help.

so glynda is currently in mistral-or-menagerie having conversations with councils or recruiting more people to send to vacuo with aid; she’s probably responsible for all those mistrali ships we saw at the end of v9. we can speculate that maybe she’s also doing something else—such as removing the crown’s vault away from vale, which her semblance theoretically might be able to do—but the “where’s glynda? what’s she doing?” question has a clear answer.

“where’s tai? what’s he doing?” doesn’t. or rather, the textual answer is “some things” and “on assignment, but what’s more important than here?”

if tai were working with glynda—either literally with her or just doing the same thing she is—then yang and ruby would know. there’s no reason for them not to know—no reason for the narrative to tell us what glynda is doing but pointedly hide what tai is doing if glynda and tai are doing the same thing.

now!

my point in juxtaposing tai-in-patch vs glynda-in-vale is we never once see tai or glynda interact during the period between the fall of beacon and the broadcast, and from the way oobleck and port phrase their goodbyes to tai in v4, tai isn’t involved in the effort to reclaim beacon—it’s not a dig at tai, it’s. these two characters have been in different places and focused on different things all along. given that tai isn’t involved with any of the inner-circle activities we see in v2-3, i’m also a bit skeptical as to whether he even continued to actively work for ozpin at all after ozpin, uh, got his second love killed.

like tai used to be one of ozpin’s agents. we… don’t know that he stuck with ozpin after summer disappeared? we do know that he stopped going on missions for a long time, which may have only been a pause for the sake of not orphaning the kids, but just as easily may have been tai completely justifiably telling ozpin to fuck off.

the “why is [insert other damaged adult] allowed to change, but tai isn’t?” point is a false equivalency: qrow, raven, willow, and ozpin have changed—as in, they have gotten onscreen character development leading them to take action in a new direction—whereas taiyang hasn’t changed yet—he has had no character development since yang left home at the end of v4. he is at a different point in his character arc than the rest of the adult cast.

so my interest in him is: okay, what will his character development look like? what incites change? what is the story setting up for him? how will that play out? which requires examination of where he’s at now and what he’s been doing and why he’s doing that. because that is the foundation of any character arc; you have to start somewhere.

as for, uh, this:

We don't know exactly what the girls have or have not been told about or why they were or werent told so why are we making grand sweeping statements as if we know anything at all what is going on. Speculation is great and fun but it has to be based on what we actually know and with some healthy occam's razor on top.

we do know that, though, is the thing. we know that:

yang and ruby have been told by qrow that tai is “on assignment”

neither of them know what that assignment is, exactly: “do you wonder why he isn’t here with everyone?” and “what’s more important than here?”

they’re both aware that they don’t have the full picture; yang in particular wants to know more.

and we can extrapolate that they’ve asked for more details—because there is a clear desire to know more, here—and not received them, meaning that qrow either

doesn’t know, or

is lying to them.

if qrow doesn’t know, then oz either

doesn’t know, or

gave tai this assignment and is lying to qrow about it.

occam’s razor is that none of them know. this tracks with tai’s apparent distance from the inner circle in v2-4 and increases the likelihood that the missions he went on in v2-3 were not inner-circle business but rather contracts he, a licensed huntsman, picked up off the job boards independent of ozpin.

shrug.

if he was taking random contracts around the kingdom at the same salem’s people were prepping for the attacks on the vytal festival, it’s entirely within the realm of possibility that he crossed paths with summer rose. and i think that’s both interesting and the best fit for the puzzle pieces we have right now. i am not sure why you think that i, notable evil sorceress apologist, am “upset” about the possibility that tai might have gotten himself romantically entangled in some way with salem’s general (his not-dead wife). i think that would rock! will i be broken up about it if i’m wrong? nah, who cares, but it’s fun to chew on.

if you don’t want to participate in speculation about what tai’s up to because it stresses you out, then… don’t? you don’t have to? no one is forcing you to engage with theories you don’t like? but im having fun and interacting with my posts on a topic that i am enjoying is not an effective way to avoid discussion of theories you don’t like.

@red-bulbasaur from here

ok but he's probably working with glynda?? it combines him saving people and protecting the relic in a way that makes sense and gives him important work that he can't abandon without making him too important to the plot. qrow not telling the girls much could be for a million reason including keeping a sensitive mission secret and not worrying the girls since they have enough allready.

three issues with the idea that tai and glynda are working as partners on the same ‘assignment’ for oz:

that’s not how ozpin did things. in every other context he assigned one person per task

we know what glynda is doing: she left vale to find help, presumably in mistral and/or menagerie. if tai is working with her, there’s no reason for his ‘assignment’ to be kept secret; even if “trying to find help” is a cover for the real mission (eg, moving the crown somewhere else), then the cover story should cover tai as well.

there is zero narrative connection between glynda and tai other than both of them being adjacent to ozpin, and glynda is much closer to ozpin than tai is. he’s on patch sitting at home during the broadcast, she’s visiting the dust shop in downtown vale. she spearheads the failed effort to retake the academy, he stays at home.

the issue with qrow lying to the girls is that lying is always framed as the wrong choice. the idea that they’re not trustworthy enough to know more than “your dad is on assignment,” or that they need to be protected from the truth, is exactly why everyone—including qrow—was spitting mad at ozpin after 6.2/6.3; qrow is also the one who chose to bring the kids into the loop and has since v6 consistently trusted their judgment and been forthcoming with them.

for him to outright lie to their faces about information they specifically asked him about would be an enormous, shocking reversal for his character—and that’s a frankly bizarre thing to expect the story to do at a point where qrow is sober and more optimistic than he’s ever been. bordering on character assassination, like i said. this is a narrative where you cannot be a good person and lie to people. period. the liar is always wrong.

so it’s like. it comes down to whether you think the narrative will just sabotage everything it’s developed with oz and qrow in the last few volumes for the sake of making tai look better, or if you think the two characters who have been present and actively trying to better themselves since v6 will prove to be more trustworthy than the one who’s been sitting at home off screen since v4.

[arc-misadventures]

Friend au) Qrow say why he didn't knew they were his friends: ruby and yang had never mentioned him when they talked about friends during calls back at Beacon, during RJNR ruby talked to ren and nora and to him when she needed help, ren and nora supported each other but never him, Weiss never even thanked him for saving her life and was always snarky when they talked , Blake when joined the group asked everyone if they need help with injuries, everyone but him, plus never said a word to him

This is going to answer another question where I was asked if Yang and Ruby are going to ripe one into Qrow.

///

Friends X

Qrow: Well, I'll say this, Firecracker, you left-hook has gotten better. But, did you really have to do that?

Yang: Yes. Gods, I can't believe you said such things about me! Thinking I had a crush on, Jaune? Why?!

Qrow: Seemed like a good answer at the time.

Yang: Well I never did...

Qrow: What's the point of all of this anyway, why are you all so upset? So what you're not friends, not like it's the end of the world if aren't friends.

Ruby: Well, maybe were just having a hard time dealing with the realization that someone we, I! I thought was a close, and dear friend never saw it that way! And it turns out it was because I was too selfish and never saw it that way!

Yang: Not to mention we completed forgot about him and we were all caught up in our own little words.

Qrow: I mean, that's understandable. You kids were all going through allot of stuff. Can't worry about everything that's happening to everyone else now can you?

Yang: Yeah, but...

Qrow: Some people need to be alone, to deal with grief, sure they can ask others for help every now and then. But, they need to figure out everything out on their own.

Ruby: That's the problem! Jaune said so himself! He's always been alone, before he came to Beacon and after he lost, Pyrrha! And he's been dealing with all this pain on his own!

Yang: We had Dad, Blake, had her parents, and Sun. Weiss, well, she had her butler! Ren has Nora, and Nora has Ren! Jaune, had no one! No one to support him when dealing with all of this! And don't you dare, dare say you can handle it on your own!

Qrow: What?! I have been handling it on my own! Damn succeeding at that!

Ruby: Then how come you've become a drunk since mom died!

Qrow: W-What did you say...?

Ruby: Ever since, Mom died you have been drinking your life away! Hell, you even said it yourself that you were too sober to deal with this, with us! What the hell makes you an expert on any of this!

Qrow: Ruby, wait, just listen!

Ruby: NO! Now leave me alone!

Qrow: Ruby! Ruby, wait!

Yang: And... she's gone. Nice going Uncle Qrow, you made your little niece cry, ya happy now?

Qrow: Well shit... There's goes my bad luck for the day...

Yang: Bad luck? Uncle Qrow, luck had nothing to do with this; You are just being a jackass. I'm going to go check on her, I'll see you in the morning...

Qrow: ...

Qrow: Hah...

Qrow: I'm still too sober to deal with this shit...