RWBY: Siblings Three (Malereader)

Heir

Y/n ducked under a swipe from a plant-like Grimm, its thorned vines whistling through the air where his head had been. He didn't flinch. Instead, he pivoted on his heel, his body moving with an efficiency that had been brutally drilled into him.

His hand snapped out, not to summon a replica of his own weapon, but to grasp a jagged, crystalline shard of ice Dust that had been knocked loose from the cave's wall.

In the same motion, he drove the shard up through the Grimm's jaw. Black ichor sprayed, sizzling against the cold floor.

The Grimm flung him into the air, and his body moved before the thought was fully formed. He twisted in mid-air, not to right himself, but to control the spin. His free hand, the one not slick with Grimm ichor, shot out and clawed at the cavern wall. Gloved fingers scraped against rough stone, finding purchase he summoned a pistol, firing not directly at the Grimm but the crystal wedged in its jaw.

A concussive blast of frozen energy erupted from the creature's head. The force of it slammed Y/n back against the cavern wall, the air knocked from his lungs. He slid to the ground and landed in a low crouch, not on the unstable ledge, but on a solid, flat outcropping five feet away as shards of frozen Grimm matter and rock pattered down around him like grotesque hail.

The creature's body dissolved into black smoke, leaving behind only the acrid smell of ozone and decay.

Silence descended, broken only by the drip of water and Y/n's ragged breathing. He didn't move for a long moment, just stared at the spot where the Grimm had been, his mind a numb, empty void.

A slow, mocking clap echoed through the cavern.

"Bravo!" Valerie's voice rang out, dripping with false admiration. She stepped from a shadowed alcove, her metal claws retracted, a smug grin plastered on her face. The broken nose had healed perfectly, leaving no trace of his rebellion. "See? Was that so hard? No messy emotions, no grandstanding. Just... efficiency."

"Father will be pleased," she continued, circling him like a shark. "A month ago, you'd have tried to blast it to pieces with one of your big, loud, obvious replicas. Wasted energy. Wasted Dust. Now..." She gestured to the frozen scorch mark on the wall. "You used the environment. You used the enemy's own momentum. You used a single bullet. Clean. Effective. Professional."

He finally turned his head, his eyes flat, but not devoid of their former fire. "What do you want, Valerie?"

"To give you your next assignment," she said, her grin widening. She tossed a scroll to him. He caught it on reflex, his movements sharp and precise. "Your little field test was a success. Time for a real mission."

"The White Fang's new management needs to eat, little brother," Valerie said, her voice losing its playful edge and turning businesslike. "And you're the new enforcer. Consider it your... initiation into the family business."

"I'm not your enforcer," he said, his voice low and dead.

Valerie's smile vanished. She closed the distance between them in a blink, her hand snapping out to grip his chin, her claws pricking his skin. "You are what we say you are. You fight how we say to fight. You breathe when we say you can breathe. Or have you forgotten your lessons with dear little Eel?"

A phantom pain, a memory of a thousand pinpoint needles, lanced through his nerves. He didn't flinch, he smacked her hand away. "Fuck you and Eel, I'm gonna gut you and kill that little shit."

Valerie's smirk didn't just vanish, it was wiped away, replaced by a flash of pure, unadulterated fury. For a second, he saw the sister he'd headbutted a month ago, the one whose control had slipped. Her hand, the one he'd smacked away, curled into a fist, the metal of her claws glinting in the low light.