Fanfic / An Arc for every season

All his life Jaune Arc wanted to be a hero and now he's given a task that can help save the world. All he has to do is stay on a team with four teenage girls who are powerful enough to destroy Remnant and make sure they get along. Is it too late to change his mind?

— Archive of Our Own summary

An Arc for every season is a RWBY fanfic written by Vendetta543. In it, Jaune Arc failed the initiation for Beacon Academy and is on his way to being expelled when Ozpin gives him an offer: he can stay in Beacon, and in return, he has to fulfill a mission off-the-books for Ozpin. Said mission is to guard the Four Maidens: Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna, and Yang Xiao Long, now known as Team RWBY. Jaune accepts the offer, not realizing the hell he'll be put through by the superpowered teenage women.

Additionally, there are several omakes that modify the premise and explore the comedic results, usually by giving four other characters the Maiden powers and throwing poor Jaune into the mix again.

The story can be read here for Archive of Our Own, here for FanFiction.Net and here for SpaceBattles.com.

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This work contains examples of:

• Abusive Parents: As per canon, Marcus Black was an absolute monster of a human being and a parent. Mercury takes time to mention that he was just as abusive sober as he was drunk, which is why he doesn't mind drinking himself. Mercury implies his mother wasn't much better.
• Adaptational Badass: All of Team RWBY are not just capable Huntresses, they're also the Maidens, meaning that together, their power is enough to shift the tide of any battle singlehandedly.
• Adaptational Early Appearance: Vernal appears shortly after the Breach, whereas in canon she didn't first appear until volume 5.
• Adaptational Heroism: Mercury is still a remorseless assassin, but he works for Ozpin instead of Cinder now.
• Adaptational Origin Connection: Blake had a direct relationship with Amber after leaving the Fang but before getting to Beacon, traveling with her and even being let in on the Maiden secret. She was thus present for Cinder's attack that killed her and gained the powers that way.
• Adaptational Personality Change: Since she doesn't have the Maiden power and is thus nowhere near as strong as in canon, Cinder is far more stressed and paranoid than in canon and far more volatile as well. When Adam kidnaps Jaune, she outright yells at him for it, something that volume three Cinder would never do.
• Adaptational Wimp: The very premise of the story means that Cinder doesn't even have half of the Fall Maiden's powers by the time her plans for Beacon begin. Notably, this means that the power imbalance between her and her allies is far smaller, and even Adam can threaten her into submission rather than the other way around.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul:
  • Jaune's relationships with all of Team RWBY are changed once he's put on a team with them; Ruby has romantic feelings for him while the rest see him as a dear friend, as opposed to canon where he's best friends with Ruby but barely interacts with the others.
  • For various reasons, Jaune also ends up having stronger relationships with Peter Port (to the point of being on a first-name basis with him) as well as Mercury Black, whom he considers his only male friend. On the flip side, he barely interacts with any of his canon teammates.
  • In canon, there's no indication that Jaune and Adam even know that the other exists. Here, they have a very personal hatred due to Adam kidnapping and torturing him, with Jaune fully admitting that he wants Adam dead.
• Adaptational Sexuality: Mercury admits to being bisexual to Jaune in Chapter 69.
• All for Nothing: All of Yang's efforts to search for her mother end up being rendered pointless when Raven dies two weeks before Beacon's Initiation with her being none the wiser. Yang doesn't even find out about it until Vernal tells her.
• All-Loving Hero: Jaune has deep empathy for everyone from his best friends to complete strangers until they wrong him personally or harm others. It's why Blanche keeps recruiting him to fight against Wardes Winchester — he knows that Jaune genuinely cares about the people being hurt and thus won't pass up the opportunity to take them down, even if Blanche ostensibly lets him do that. Unfortunately, this same care ends up jading him over the story, as the way that other people don't care infuriates him and makes him cynical.
• An Arm and a Leg: Adam shows up with a cyborg arm; the author's note says that Pyrrha cut it off during their fight on the train.
• Audience Participation: At the end of some chapters, Vendetta543 has the habit of writing down his ideas for future plot points or omakes for the series and letting the audience decide which one they want to see next.
• Big Brother Worship: Jaune's little sister, Lily, has the closest relationship to him of all his sisters, to the point that Jaune actually says she's a little clingy. She takes Jaune and Ruby dating very poorly.
• Black Comedy: Jaune is constantly put in danger through his friends' powers, and it's surprisingly hilarious to read.
• Blackmail:
  • Subverted. After Jaune is brought into the loop regarding the Maidens and their existence, he tries to slyly ask what's stopping him from going public with everything right then, clearly intending to threaten Ozpin. Ozpin instead points out that even if he did, no one would ever believe him, and thus he has no power there.
  • Wardes Winchester tries to blackmail Jaune to get him out from under Richard Blanche's thumb by pointing out his business connections and threatening to hurt his family financially. It's rendered pointless when Mercury records the threat, which ensures he'll get taken down if he tries to go through with it. He does still try to do it on the downlow, but Blanche counteracts it, with Jaune's family not even noticing anything changed until he points it out to them.
• Blood Knight: Jaune is a harsh deconstruction; he greatly enjoys fighting other people when it's not to the death, especially in unregulated situations like cage fighting, but it soon becomes a coping mechanism for the trauma he endures, which is shown to be very unhealthy. Even Peter tries to intervene when he realizes that Jaune is genuinely putting himself at risk in these fights just to suppress his issues, and it eventually escalates to Jaune picking a bloody fight with Cardin for basically no reason.
• Brutal Honesty: Richard Blanche of the Vale Council skips any kind of weasel words or false pleasantries and admits right out of the gate that he intends to hire Team RWBY for Vale's propaganda, he knows Blake was probably in the White Fang but doesn't care, that he sees Jaune as an in to the team due to their close bonds, and that one of his motives is personal political gain. On a more mundane level, he outright admits that his colleague (Wardes Winchester, Cardin's father) is a racist when Jaune asks. It doesn't mean that RWBY-J trust him and it makes having any kind of argument with him a pain in the ass since he's so open about everything, but they're at least willing to hear him out.
• Butt-Monkey:
  • The number of times something goes right for Jaune can be counted on one hand, and it's always hilarious to see. There are exceptions, however, such as the horrific torture he receives from Adam Taurus.
  • Ruby becomes victim to this once she and Jaune start dating, as Penny's incredibly vocal lunchroom declaration that she cucked her results in a widespread rumor that she's heavily into NTR and actively tries to break up happy couples as the "Relationship Reaper".
  • Cardin Winchester. If he plays a role in a plot thread, that role will almost inevitably end with him being traumatised by the friends of whoever he messed with, usually Team RWBY if he messes with Jaune, or Coco if he messes with Velvet.
• Chick Magnet: While in Domremy, Port manages to pick up a small harem of women who fawn over his every word, with some of them even crying when he says he has to leave. Team RWBY are on the verge of vomiting just looking at it, while Jaune can only scoff and roll his eyes.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: Adam kidnaps Jaune, then proceeds to beat the shit out of him with his own hands until his Aura is broken... and then he doesn't stop, no matter how much Jaune begs him to, culminating in branding him in the same way he was once branded. By the end, Jaune's lying in a puddle of his own blood and vomit, barely able to breathe.
• Combat Pragmatist: Jaune's training is led by Qrow Branwen, whose teachings basically boil down to catching an opponent by surprise and being as brutal as possible. Noted techniques of his include throwing sand in someone's eyes and hitting them in the groin.
• Curb-Stomp Battle:
  • Unlike canon, the first fight between Blake and Roman goes overwhelmingly in her favor. By the time Jaune and Penny arrive, she's not only won, but Roman is actively trying to get himself arrested just to get away from her.
  • Jaune versus Neopolitan is a complete farce in the latter's favor, with Jaune not being able to get a single hit in. The narration specifically says that even calling it a fight is a stretch.
  • On the flip side, Neo doesn't stand a chance against Team RWBY and Mercury after they've been pissed off. The way they describe it, she spent the battle trying to run away and got knocked out instead.
  • Yang versus The Branwen Tribe, Vernal even thought to herself how Yang isnt even using her Maiden Powers.
• Death by Adaptation: Raven died about two weeks before the story began, which is how Yang got her powers, though neither she or Qrow learn this until much later.
• Didn't Think This Through: After witnessing a group of racists attack a group of peaceful Faunus protestors, Blake jumps into the fray with her Maiden powers and reveals herself as a Faunus to make them back off. It only occurs to her after this that she's now revealed her true identity to the entire world, rendering all her attempts to remain hidden pointless.
• Dies Different In Adaptation:
  • Cinder's attack on Amber killed her outright rather than just leaving her comatose until her death at the end of volume 3, which is how Blake received the powers.
  • Fria passes away as Weiss is undergoing her trial to attend Beacon rather than making it to the events of Volume 7.
• Disproportionate Retribution: For the crime of being Blake's friend, Jaune gets tortured and branded by Adam until he's left in a puddle of his own blood and vomit.
• Dramatic Irony: Yang is still held up over her mother walking out on her and is desperate to find any answers about it, to the point that she accepts a meeting with a strange and potentially dangerous contact to get that information. The readers already know that for Yang to be the Spring Maiden, Raven would have to already be dead, and it takes until after the Breach for Yang to hear about it.
• The Dreaded: By the end of their first fight, Roman is so terrified of Blake that even seeing her again later makes him almost piss his pants in fear. As she realizes, however, as terrified as he is of her, he knows there are lines she won't cross, and that means he's still not willing to rat out Cinder.
• Emancipated Child: A variant that is older than the usual examples, but all Hunters-in-Training at Beacon are legally considered adults upon passing initiation, regardless of age. Combined with Beacon having no tuition fees, this means that Jaune's parents cannot legally force him to drop out of Beacon after they find out he was kidnapped and tortured by Adam.
• Enemy Mine: Blake ends up forming an unlikely alliance with Sienna Khan, as both of them have reason to be concerned with Adam's plans following the Breach. Sienna almost immediately begins plotting against her as well once she learns the truth of the Maiden powers.
• Entertainingly Wrong: During the fic's brief take on the "Jaundice" arc, Cardin and his team are confused that Jaune doesn't show any real reaction to their bullying unless another member of Team RWBY-J is present, at which point he plays everything off as "guys being guys". Cardin eventually reasons that Jaune is doing this so he can maintain some level of masculinity and respect in order to impress the girls, which prompts him to go out of his way to make sure that one of them manages to witness Team CRDL's actions to embarrass Jaune. Of course, the real reason is that Jaune knows that his teammates can and will do everything short of murder if they learn Cardin has been bullying him; Jaune himself explains this, but Cardin doesn't take it seriously until it's too late.
• Everyone Has Standards:
  • For all that Peter may be a Blood Knight against the Grimm, even he is quick to call out cage fighting as an unhealthy coping mechanism and is clearly concerned when he realizes that Jaune genuinely thinks it's somehow helping him. It's later revealed that he told Team RWBY about this habit so that they could intervene and help him move past his trauma.
  • Councilman Blanche is a generally cynical and selfish politician willing to take advantage of Jaune's heroism for his own ends, but even he is genuinely shocked and horrified that Wardes was running an organ trafficking ring and makes it clear he would've done anything he could've to stop it if he'd known.
• Fake Relationship:
  • For various reasons, Blake lies to her parents and claims that she and Jaune are dating. He hates this plan, and even more unlikely circumstances force them both to continually up the ante, culminating in Jaune telling them they're in an open relationship and Blake saying they hope to get married. An omake takes this further and has them both continue their fake relationship until they are married, have children, and die, before reincarnating and starting their spiteful romance all over again.
  • Weiss tries to do this with Jaune as well when her father gets word that she's dating a faunus, worried that he'll punish her given the Schnee Dust Company's treatment of them, but Jaune naturally balks at the idea. She tries to rope him into a fake relationship when her father visits Vale for work anyway, only for it to turn out that Jacques was actually hoping that Weiss was dating a faunus, as it would help improve the company's image amongst civil rights groups.
• Fantastic Racism:
  • Jaune does his research and learns that Cardin's father Wardes straight up suggested putting the Faunus citizens of Vale into camps "for the safety of everyone in Vale" after the Breach.
  • Averted with Jacques Schnee. He has nothing against the Faunus, it's just that they are a persecuted minority that is easy for him to exploit. He's a greedy asshole, not a bigot.
• Foregone Conclusion: The omakes and other works by the fic's author are pretty clear about how Team RWBY-J ultimately stop Salem, that being the girls go at her all-at-once while Jaune powers them up from a distance, after which her remains are stuffed into a container and jettisoned into space.
• Glorified Sperm Donor:
  • Inverted. Yang calls Raven her egg donor, and corrects anyone who calls her Yang's mom. Summer is Yang's real mother, as far as she's concerned.
  • Vernal seems to view Taiyang this way. While trying to convince Yang she should join the Branwen Clan, she says that Raven was her real family, moreso than Qrow or Ruby, not even mentioning Tai. Granted, it may simply be that she realises she can't make any argument that Yang's father is somehow not her family, whereas she views Qrow, Yang's uncle, as a traitor, and calls Ruby, Yang's half-sister, a bastard. None of her arguments convince Yang, and she ends up being lucky Yang chose to meet her in a public park, as otherwise Yang would have put her in the hospital or the morgue for calling Ruby a bastard.
• Harmless Villain: Cardin's attempts to bully Jaune are so minor compared to the danger he faces just sleeping in RWBY's room every night that Jaune barely even notices he's doing it. When he realizes, he starts begging him to stop - not because the bullying is embarrassing, but that if RWBY catches on, Cardin will regret it. Cardin doesn't listen and ends up getting "talked to" by Team RWBY when Jaune is no longer able to hide Cardin's actions.
• Hopeless War: Subverted; Blake originally becomes cynical when she learns the truth of Salem, as she doubts the kinds of chances they have if Ozpin hasn't won in over a thousand years. Ozpin counters by pointing out that she hasn't won either, which calms her down slightly.
• Hypocrite:
  • Adam talks about how he's fighting for the good of all Faunus and that it's time to do unto humans what they have done unto the Faunus. He says this after leading a mission that got several of his soldiers killed for the sake of his own grudges and while torturing Jaune, who has not only not done anything wrong to the Faunus or Adam himself but publicly protected Faunus rights protestors in the past.
  • Team RWBY try to confront Jaune after he beats Cardin up in the lockers by saying that he needs to pick his battles and let off steam in a healthy way. Jaune fires back that they've been nothing but reckless since he's met them — Blake destroyed the docks, Yang destroyed a club, Weiss tried to fake a relationship with him to cover up her Dust experiments, and Ruby tested her flying powers with him as an unwilling passenger — on top of the fact that they were the first ones to go after Cardin in the first place even when he begged them not to.
• Hypocrisy Nod: Yang fully admits that she's being a hypocrite when she goes to a mysterious meeting about her mother solo even after admonishing Blake for the same thing, but the possibility of getting information about her mother is too good to ignore. Unfortunately for her, Blake is all too happy to throw it back at her when Jaune rats about her intentions to infiltrate the Branwen clan.
• Insistent Terminology: Yang makes it clear that she views Raven as her egg donor, not her mother, and makes sure to correct anyone who refers to her as Yang's mother.
• In Spite of a Nail:
  • Despite having nowhere near her canon power and thus not being able to threaten Adam into submission like she did in canon, Cinder still manages to recruit him to her cause.
  • Even though Roman gets arrested after the docks heist and Team RWBY doesn't go to Mountain Glenn, the Breach still occurs in pretty much exactly the same way as it did in canon. Mercury's statements show that Neo and Adam stepped up to lead the operation in Roman's stead, and apparently his team still found the train even though Ruby only found it because of Zwei in canon.
• Internal Reveal: Chapter 31 finally has Yang learn that not only is her mother Raven dead, but she was the previous holder of the Spring Maiden powers. The rest of Ozpin's team has been filled in by Chapter 34 (the next chapter not counting omakes).
• It's Personal: Jaune's enmity with Adam Taurus is so strong that he is the first person Jaune agrees needs to be outright killed rather than stopped or imprisoned. Ironically, when Jaune finally defeats him, he spares his life, though mainly because he doesn't want him to become a martyr and that throwing him in prison means Adam won't get the last laugh.
• Jerkass Has a Point:
  • After Jaune is rescued from Adam, Mercury declines to stay at his bedside in the hospital, stating that wherever he is at the moment won't help Jaune recover any faster. It's more than a little crude, but RWBY admit later that being there wouldn't actually help them, and they all need to get sleep first anyway.
  • Jaune himself lashes out at Peter in an incredibly dickish way after Peter catches him and Cardin fighting, but it doesn't take away the fact that Jaune genuinely was defending himself (the fact that he provoked Cardin notwithstanding), and when Cardin got away with being a bully for months because Huntsmen need to be able to defend themselves, Peter has no right to get mad at him for finally doing that, which Peter himself admits when Jaune comes to apologise.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Mercury likes to pretend that he's a sociopath who doesn't give a shit about anyone around him, but his actions make it clear that he truly does care for his team and for Jaune no matter what he actually says. He nearly kills Neo for her role in Jaune's kidnapping and covers his worry for him by bouncing his knee on the bullhead ride back. In Chapter 51, he outright admits he couldn't care less about the string of Faunus kidnappings, and suggests beating up homeless people for information several times. But he also admits the only reason he's there is because Jaune's there.
• Knight of Cerebus: Adam comes out of absolute nowhere and singlehandedly changes the tone of the story from comedy to horror story. His torture of Jaune is easily the most horrific scene in the entire fic to date, and it's not until Adam leaves the narrative that things start to lighten up again - and even then, every time he's mentioned, the tone changes drastically.
• Leeroy Jenkins: What gives Jaune the biggest migraines (outside of all of Team RWBY pretending to date him) is the fact that their plans usually begin and end with "charge in and blast everything in sight".
• The Load: Deconstructed with Jaune. Everyone including him realizes that he's by far the weakest link on the team and simply can't compare to them, meaning he's essentially been dragged into a war he has no way to actually fight in. RWBY accepts him anyway because they care about him and they want to respect his choices, but Ironwood and Winter in particular believe that he won't contribute anything and try to kick him out of the team every chance they get. Jaune's realization of his weakness only gets worse after Adam kidnaps him, and it causes severe self-doubt and trauma for him.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Ozpin originally doesn't want Team RWBY to know what their powers actually are and tells them that they're instead a second Semblance. Jaune, who's let in on the secret immediately, can't keep up the lie for long and tells them the truth.
• Manipulative Bastard: What makes Adam so dangerous isn't just his sadism or his ruthlessness, it's the fact that when he needs to be, he can be one charming bastard. Blake mentally walks through all the manipulative things he does at the recruitment rally, beginning by brandishing his scars to garner sympathy and playing into everyone's collective traumas and desires to turn them into loyal soldiers. She disgustedly notes that a lot of this is the same tricks he pulled on her long ago.
• Mistaken for Romance: Most of Beacon is under the impression that Jaune is RWBY's collective sex toy/slave. Jaune himself is amused by this, not because the thought of being such a toy would be fun, but because he's so terrified of all of them that the thought of sleeping with them never crossed his mind. This perception becomes far less funny when it turns out that Adam got wind of it and is eager to show Blake's latest "pet" what he's capable of.
• Mood Whiplash: The wacky adventures in Domremy take an abrupt left turn into the serious when Jaune discovers a dead body outside of the city. It's somebody that he knows, and he takes it upon himself to deliver the news to his family - meanwhile, Ruby begins punishing herself and pondering if she could have saved him, forcing the team to give her the harsh truth that even with all the power in the world, you can't save everyone.
• Narcissist: After Sienna publicly disavows him, Adam makes new masks for his branch of the White Fang which all sport his bull horns, essentially declaring that everyone he recruits is only an extension of his will.
• Never Trust a Title: The chapter titled "Nothing Bad Happens" ends with Jaune being forced to kill several White Fang members when they kidnap him for Adam.
• "Not So Different" Remark: When Winter attempts to remove Jaune from Team RWBY-J after his torture from Adam "for his own good", Weiss immediately calls her out for acting just like Jacques did - making decisions she has no right to make on behalf of someone who wants to make their own.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Wardes Winchester originally seems like nothing more than your typical racist Councilman - his one attempt to blackmail Jaune backfires in his face and Blanche is able to counter his efforts with no issue, meaning all he can really do is drive a wedge between Jaune and his parents. Then Jaune and Mercury discover that he also runs a Faunus trafficking ring that kidnaps Faunus off the street and harvests their organs. Even Blanche is genuinely shocked that someone he thought was just a racist idiot with too much power is actually legitimately evil.
• Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: Adam Taurus presents himself as fighting for the good of Faunus, taking the time to care for his people and being right in the thick of things with them. Anyone who interacts with him for more than ten seconds can tell that all he actually cares about is satisfying his own personal grudges and he's willing to kill anyone in the way of that goal, and he blames Jaune for the horrific torture he inflicts on him purely for being human so that he can send Blake a message.
• Oh, Crap, There Are Fanfics of Us!: After stopping Adam's attack, Team RWBY-J (well, Blake already knew) discover that people have been writing fanfiction and drawing art of them. Yang is disgusted by the amount of content depicting her and Ruby as a couple; Weiss is bothered that she's always a submissive regardless of pairing; Ruby is dismayed that no one seems to ship her with her boyfriend; and Jaune is bemused that he fluctuates between being the others' pathetic sex slave and an overpowered Author Avatar who has them as a harem, on the rare occasion he's even included.
• Offscreen Moment of Awesome:
  • Team PRMN engaged Adam and Neo on the train just before the Breach began, and Adam shows up later having lost one of his arms to Pyrrha, meaning the team of first years managed to drive two of the strongest characters in the setting away.
  • Team RWBY and Mercury's rampage against Neo and the White Fang is entirely offpage, meaning all we know is that RWBY caused as much damage as possible without destroying the warehouse and Mercury knocked Neo out with a kick to the head.
• One Dialogue, Two Conversations: After Penny easily wins a fight against some muggers, she gives them money for the hospital bill and says that if he doesn't get his act together, she'll give him another visit to help him turn his life around. The guy clearly believes she's threatening him like she's The Punisher and frantically swears to be on the straight and narrow from now on.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Winter attempting to have Jaune removed from her team and refusing to listen to Weiss's opinion on the matter makes her mad enough that she not only yells at Winter, but she loses control of her powers for the first time.
• Organ Theft: Wardes Winchester turns out to be running an organ harvesting operation, specifically targetting Faunus. Jaune is horrified to find out, and even Blanche is surprised Wardes would do something so horrific.
• Person of Mass Destruction: All four of Team RWBY are capable of leaving gigantic destruction in their wakes without ever realizing it, leaving Jaune perpetually terrified of being caught in the blast zone. It's said repeatedly that they collectively have the power to destroy Kingdoms.
• Point of Divergence:
  • A series of different circumstances lead to the ladies of Team RWBY gaining the Maiden powers instead of the canon characters (Amber, Fria, Raven, and an unknown woman) having them instead.
  • The drastic increase in Blake's power level means that the docks fight goes overwhelmingly in her favor, taking Roman out of the equation and into a prison cell far earlier than canon.
  • Mercury is picked up by Ozpin's forces before the story begins instead of Cinder, meaning that he's on the side of the heroes. Notably, this is the only major setting change that neither justifies nor is explained by the fic's premise.
• Pragmatic Hero:
  • It's revealed that Ozpin and Qrow are aware of several fight clubs around Vale, but are fine with letting them stay running as long as the participants are willing. Their logic essentially boils down to Better the Devil You Know.
  • Councilman Blanche is willing to essentially use Jaune and Mercury as spies purely because they're completely expendable and unknown compared to RWBY and their loyalty to Ozpin means they're not likely to talk. The fact that he says this upfront is why Jaune is willing to go along with it, as he can understand the logic and Blanche does give him the chance to decline the offer (even if he knew Jaune wouldn't).
• Precision F-Strike: During a meeting with Blanche about Jaune's expendability, Weiss punctuates her message that Jaune isn't expendable with a blunt "fuck with us and we'll fuck with you". Blanche laughs while agreeing with her sentiment.
• Psycho Ex-Boyfriend: As per usual, Adam Taurus is a complete psychopath who's willing to throw the resources of an entire terrorist organization around just to spite his ex-girlfriend. He begins by kidnapping Jaune in a way that kills multiple members of his team and beating him until his Aura breaks, but he stops cold the moment he learns Blake talked about him.
• Running Gag:
  • Blake being jokingly referred to as the "worst girl" by the narration.
  • Whenever a member of Team RWBY-J engages in questionable or self-destructive behavior, they will more often than not return to the dorm room afterwards to discover that the rest of the team has setup an intervention circle and have blocked all the exits. This is occasionally subverted, such as Weiss becoming the victim of a mock trial instead, or Jaune managing to leave the room just before the others can block the exits.
• Sadist: Adam beats Jaune black and blue no matter how much he begs for mercy, but still leaves him alive because he wants to keep it going later before he kills him. All of this is just because Blake left him and he wants to give her a message.
• Secret-Keeper:
  • The number of people who know the true source of Team RWBY's power is small but ever-expanding - Ozpin, Jaune, the Beacon faculty, RWBY themselves, Lionheart, Ironwood, Winter, and Qrow are the only active members of their circle to know; meanwhile, Qrow confirms that Taiyang knows. On the villain side, Cinder, Emerald, and Adam all know and Roman definitely doesn't, but it's unclear if Neo does. Sienna and Ilia later discover it for themselves, and Vernal later reveals that she knows because of Raven.
  • Ozpin later lets Team RWBY-J and Winter Schnee in on the secret of his true backstory, including the fact that the Maiden powers originally came from him. Unlike canon, it's stated that Qrow was already filled in on this matter.
• Secret Secret-Keeper:
  • Ozpin reveals that he was aware of Blake and Sienna Khan's alliance, but he was content to ignore it for as long as Adam Taurus is still a threat.
  • Winter suspected Weiss was the new Winter Maiden, as Fria had been listening to Weiss' music when she died, but covered it up and kept her suspicions to herself to keep Ironwood from imprisoning Weiss.
• Sins of the Father: When Wardes Winchester's crimes are revealed, Cardin gets treated by his fellow students as though he was somehow involved even when he's legally cleared of all charges. Jaune notes that it's pretty unfair, but that Cardin doesn't help his case by continuing to be a racist asshole who declares his father's innocence at every opportunity.
• Snub by Omission: Team RWBY regularly has to remind people that they're actually Team RWBY-J and that Jaune is a trusted friend and valued member of the group, as everyone (including Jaune himself, initially) tends to dismiss his presence due to him being the only one that doesn't have Wrong Context Magic.
• Spanner in the Works: Fria's passing should have led to Winter getting the Winter Maiden powers if it weren't for one crucial mistake: to keep Fria entertained, Winter had left her a tape of one of Weiss's concerts, and Fria had a split-second thought about it just before she died and sent the powers to her instead.
• These Hands Have Killed: Averted. After killing several White Fang members, Jaune notes that he expected to feel some remorse or freak out while staring at his hands, but his fight or flight response is still active so he doesn't have time to dwell on it until he's safely back at Beacon. By the time he is back and can think about it, enough time and pain have passed for him to rationalize that he had no choice in the matter.
• Took a Level in Cynic: The more time goes on, the more cynical Jaune gets. He endures things like being friends with four girls who could accidentally kill him in his sleep, he discovers someone he knows dead in his hometown, Adam Taurus kidnaps and tortures him, kills plenty of people along the way, and later on, he discovers a Faunus trafficking ring and personally sees a corpse with gouged out eyes.
• Trauma Button: After Adam kidnaps and tortures Jaune, even the slightest reminder that Jaune can't catch up to his teammates' power levels sends him spiraling down a depressive hole of self-destruction and traumatic memories.
• Underestimating Badassery: Vernal and the Branwen Clan don't actually know much about Tai, only that he's Yang's father, works as some sort of teacher, and lives on Patch, not realising that he is a veteran Huntsman who teaches at a Combat School. As such, the group they send to kidnap him gets their asses kicked.
• Undignified Death: Narrowly Averted. In chapter 64, after being beat down and horrifically injured, Adam flees into the sewers. Jaune finds him, and after a brief fight, Jaune wins by grabbing Adam's head and forcing it in the sewer water. Jaune considers killing him, letting him choke to death on shit, but ultimately decides to save him to prevent him becoming a martyr.
• Wham Episode:
  • Chapter 22, "Jaune meets the Ex". Adam kidnaps Jaune and puts him through horrific bouts of torture that Jaune can only escape by killing several people. It's the first time Jaune's proximity to Team RWBY puts him in legitimate danger and makes everyone realize just what kinds of horrible threats they're going to be facing from hereon in, alongside bringing in the personal villainy of Cinder and Adam.
  • Chapter 51, "Back to the Plot". Jaune and Mercury discover that Wardes Winchester leads a Faunus trafficking and organ harvesting ring, with Jaune forced to kill several more people in the process. Meanwhile, Blake and Ilia discover that Adam is personally recruiting new members to his White Fang branch, but they're forced to let him go since they don't know his plans yet.
• Wham Line: On the first two occasions when Jaune is asked point blank by members of Team RWBY if he's scared of them, his answer is a blunt "yes". The fact that even their best friend is terrified of them even while liking and caring about them shakes them all to their core and leaves them pondering the true weight of the powers they have. When he's asked this a third time, he immediately gives a blunt "no", and even Jaune is shocked that he no longer holds any worry that his friends could inadvertently harm them.
• What Does She See in Him?: Adam is a particularly dark example, with him wondering what exactly Blake sees in her latest "pet" Jaune that would be worth leaving him for. He tortures Jaune just because he wants to show her that she shouldn't have left him.

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The omakes contain examples of:

• Addiction Displacement: Willow in "Team MILF" has been cutting back on drinking alcohol thanks to Jaune's influence and a desire to reconnect with her kids, but has started drinking large amounts of coffee to replace her alcohol addiction with a caffine addiction.
• Affectionate Gesture to the Head: In Team MILF, receiving a pat on the head from Jaune leads to Weiss becoming obssessed with getting more headpats from him, to the point that she stops objecting to the idea of him becoming her step-father despite him only being a few years older than her (and being younger than Winter). At the end of the final omake, she's fighting over him with her mother because she wants headpats.
• Age Lift:
  • Jaune is 19 in the Team MILF omakes.
  • Yang, Weiss, and Blake are 10 at the beginning of Zettai RWBY, though Weiss turns 11 part way through the first chapter, and Ruby is 8. Meanwhile, Cinder and Winter are 17, making them the same age as Jaune and the rest of the canon first years.
  • Reverse RWBY has Yang and Ruby swap ages as part of the setting's general Role Swap AU.
• Badly Battered Babysitter: Downplayed with Jaune in Zettai RWBY, as he generally manages to handle the young Team RWBY with minimal physical injuries, though it is exhausting. Played straight with their previous babysitter, who apparently quit by running into the Emerald Forest screaming.
• Beware the Nice Ones: In the Team MILF omake, Summer Rose and Kali Belladonna are this.
  • Summer is a loving mother and great teacher, but is completely willing to do something to Team CRDL once they make the mistake of trying to bully Jaune in her class (not helped by their racist actions against Kali). Whatever she did left CRDL traumatized. She also manages to intimidate Raven at the end, making sure she understands she won't be able to abandon her child with Jaune like she did with Yang.
  • Kali is a kind-hearted woman who has embraced her late husband's pacifist ideology and wants nothing more than to reconnect with Blake, who has come to the conclusion that she doesn't deserve to be forgiven for running away from home and missing her father's funeral. However, when Blake runs off on her own again to confront Adam on the basis that "only she can deal with these problems", Kali finally has enough, follows her, destroys Adam's White Fang cell, leaves Adam in a state where he probably wishes he was dead, and finally slaps Blake for her stupidity and stubbornness, forcing her to stop closing herself off.
• Black-and-White Morality: Discussed in Zettai RWBY. Blake views the world like this, which Jaune notes is understandable since she is only ten, remembering that he had a similar worldview when he was her age. It comes to a head when he has to stop her from assaulting some police officers for arresting a Faunus, claiming they (and Jaune) are only saying the Faunus, Sun, is a criminal because he's a Faunus, when in reality he outright admitted to breaking the law by stowing away on a cargo ship.
• But We Used a Condom!: At the end of Team MILF, Summer, Raven, Willow, and Blake all end up getting impregnated by Jaune, despite Raven and Blake both taking the morning after pill. As Ozpin notes, the Arcs are known for their virility, as shown by Jaune's father having eight kids, and he's honestly surprised Raven thought the pill would be enough.
• Cool Big Sis:
  • Name dropped by Jaune in Zettai RWBY in reference to Cinder, though also played with. Cinder loves being the cool older sister figure to Yang and Ruby, swinging by with presents and stories about how awesome Hunter training is... but she leaves most of the actual responsibility of looking after Team RWBY and keeping them in line to Jaune unless she's forced into a situation where she has to.
  • Another example from Zettai RWBY would be Winter, who takes a rare sick day solely to attend Weiss' birthday party when Jaune tells her about it, caring deeply about Weiss and being very happy to see her finally get to simply be a kid and have friends.
• The Coroner Doth Protest Too Much: In Team MILF, Jacques' automated Bullhead malfunctioned and lost communications during a freak snowstorm. Then it was struck by lightning and crashed. Then an earthquake happened and buried him in an avalanche. Finally, he somehow caught fire and was burned to ashes. This was deemed an accident, but everyone with even a basic familiarity with him and Willow knows Willow killed him, with Willow herself not even bothering to hide it and outright calling it a murder. Except Weiss, who insists it was a tragic accident, though it's implied that she's simply in denial.
• Daddy Had a Good Reason for Abandoning You: Downplayed in Zettai RWBY, where Ghira and Kali have sent a ten-year-old Blake to train her powers at Beacon. They tried to help her train, but quickly realized they didn't know how. Combined with their duties as leaders in Menagerie and their fears that Sienna would kidnap and indoctrinate her as a weapon, sending her to Ozpin was the best choice. Downplayed because they haven't truly abandoned her, and do their best to keep in contact and visit, but distance and the aforementioned duties make it hard for them to do so. This doesn't really help the young Blake deal with the stress of being sent to a completely different country and being away from her parents.
• Death by Adaptation:
  • In the Team MILF omakes, Taiyang, Ghira, and Jacques are all dead. Ghira died sometime between Blake running away and Kali joining Ozpin's team, and Jacques officially died in an accident, but everyone who isn't Weiss is well aware that Willow killed him, with Willow herself barely bothering to hide it (unless she's had a lot to drink, in which case she doesn't hide it at all).
  • Taiyang is dead in the Zettai RWBY omakes, having died on a mission several years ago, with Yang and Ruby being raised by Summer and Qrow before they got their powers.
  • Jacques is dead in A...Harem Chapter?, having accidentally choked to death on an apple. Unfortunately for him, while his entire family was in the room, they most definitely froze in shock and were unable to do anything about it.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Team RWBY manages to kill the Brother Gods in Team RWBY fixes (and sorta breaks) Remnant. Ironwood responds with a Flat "What" when he finds out (then another when he finds out RWBY have become goddesses and destroyed the Grimm, then fainting when they make it clear they will be displeased if he starts a war), Ozpin lets out a broken laugh (and is happy he can finally die), and Jaune rolls with it all.
• Exotic Extended Marriage:
  • By the end of Team MILF, after Jaune gets Summer, Raven, Willow, and Blake pregnant, Ozpin and everyone outside of Yang, who fainted, Blake, who is in shock, Willow, who is trying to cuddle with Jaune, and Weiss, who is fighting with her mother over Jaune because she wants headpats from him, begin planning a wedding for the five.
  • After a night of hard drinking in A...Harem Chapter?, Team RWBY-J wake up to find that they are all married to each other. Outside of modifying the legal agreement to make it so Ruby and Yang aren't married to each other, they all end up being fine with it, though Ruby and Jaune take a bit more time to come around.
• Functional Addict: In Team MILF, Willow is an alcoholic, but is still extremely knowledgeable about Dust and is more than capable of teaching classes about the subject and performing dangerous experiments while drunk. Jaune thinks that the day she attempts any of those experiments sober is the day Beacon will blow up.
• Happily Adopted: Cinder in the Zettai RWBY omakes, having been unofficially adopted by Qrow after he rescued her. The only reason he didn't officially adopt her is because the rescue was technically a kidnapping, and he burnt down the hotel afterwards. Cinder, for her part, loves Qrow, enjoys attending Beacon, loves acting as a big sister for Yang and Ruby, and loves Jaune.
• Improperly Paranoid: Cinder in Zettai RWBY never takes anyone or anything at face value, believing that nobody nice is as nice as they seem to be, even pointing out that Jaune, for all his good points, did falsify his records to try and attend Beacon then took an under-the-table deal when he failed initiation. Thing is, the person she is currently applying this logic to is her partner, Pyrrha Nikos, whose "big secret" is that she's Lonely at the Top.
• May–December Romance: Summer and Willow in Team MILF want to hook up with Jaune, despite both being old enough to be his mother (especially Willow, whose eldest child, Winter, is older than Jaune). Downplayed with Raven, who finds him attractive but wants nothing to do with him, thinking Jaune is trying to get in her pants and not wanting another blonde man to get her pregnant.
• Mayfly–December Romance: Salem desires to have this with Jaune in Zettai RWBY, solely for the purpose of getting Team RWBY to call her Aunt. No one else is on board with this, least of all Jaune.
• Older Than They Look: Downplayed, as she is still fairly young, but it is noted in Zettai RWBY that Weiss, who is ten and turns eleven part way through the chapter, making her the eldest member of Team RWBY, looks younger than the eight-year-old Ruby, the youngest member.
• Shipper on Deck:
  • Kali wants Blake and Jaune to get together in Team MILF.
  • Weiss wants Jaune to marry Winter and become her big brother for real in Zettai RWBY.
• Snowball Lie: Exaggerated in Worst Girl Wins. Instead of just claiming she and Jaune are dating like she does in the main story, Blake escalates the lie and tells her parents that they are engaged. In an attempt to force Blake to admit to her parents that their relationship is fake, Jaune immediately claims she is pregnant. Blake, being unwilling to break the news, ends up sleeping with Jaune and actually getting pregnant. They keep escalating from there in hopes of forcing the other one to be the one to admit it, eventually getting married, having even more children, and entering old age together. Of course, by that point they've long since realized they're in love for real, so the "final bet" is to see who'll finally confess their undying love first. It's Jaune, moments before they both die, which Blake smugly gloats about after they (and their friends) end up reincarnating.
• Tragic Keepsake: Zettai RWBY contains an interesting variation in the form of Yang's hair. Like in canon, she hates it when people touch her hair, however, while in canon it's due to simple pride, here it's due to Taiyang being dead, with her viewing her blonde hair that she inherited from him as being one of the last things she has left from him.
• Troubling Unchildlike Behaviour: In Zettai RWBY, it is noted that Weiss acts very mature for her age, but it is a sign of how poorly Jacques treated her and how she was forced to grow up far too early, with Jaune himself finding it depressing and going out of his way to help her, reassuring her that she shouldn't be in a hurry to grow up.
• Virgin Power: True Maiden exaggerates and plays with this. While a non-virgin can become a Maiden, as seen with Raven, once they become a Maiden they physically cannot have sex or even orgasm, no matter how hard they try. The reason Ozpin needs Jaune is because his Aura Transfer semblance also acts as an anaphrodisiac, meaning it makes people less aroused, and as such provides Team RWBY with some relief. When Jaune asks why he thought that was a good idea when he made the Maiden powers, Ozpin admits he was very drunk at the time. And depressed, but mostly drunk.
• Yaoi Fangirl: Blake is one in Team MILF, including writing a story shipping Ozpin and Ironwood. Yang uses this to blackmail Blake into trying to seduce Jaune to keep him from ending up with Summer, Raven, or Willow.
• You Kill It, You Bought It: Turns out godhood works this way in Team RWBY fixes (and sorta breaks) Remnant, with RWBY becoming goddesses after killing the Brother Gods. Since Jaune's main contribution to the battle was pumping as much Aura into them as he could and then staying far away, he doesn't become one.

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