In one of the dorm rooms in Atlas Academy, Team RWBY can be seen snoring in their beds, until Penny entered the room to wake them up.

Penny: Salutations!

Every member of RWBY got startled to awaken by Penny's greeting, Penny stood in the middle of the room while doing so.

Penny: Good morning, Team RWBY!

Yang: Ugh, Penny. What time is it even?

Penny: Time to be Huntresses, of course!

Penny then strikes a pose holding two fingers by her head and winking, everyone except Ruby groans while she gets up excitedly.

Jaune Arc walks into a briefing room with two coffee mugs and heads over to where Team RWBY, the Ace Operatives, and his teammates are sitting. He takes a seat and hands one of the mugs to his girlfriend, then cheerfully prepares to sip his steaming hot coffee, only to notice Marrow Amin staring and wagging his tail. Jaune frowns and hands the mug to Marrow.

Jaune: (sighs) Sure, take it.

Marrow drinks the coffee, while Jaune hangs his head.

Clover: Eyes up, Huntsmen. Time to get used to the new normal in Atlas.

Sometime later, Ruby and Qrow Branwen are riding in a truck that is being driven by an Atlesian Knight-200. Qrow has fallen asleep, so Ruby looks annoyed and elbows him awake.

Clover: Your top priority is Amity Tower. That means protecting supply runs from Grimm and bandits. And protecting the site itself.

Ruby and Weiss drop down from the sky toward a Manticore outside the Schnee Dust Company Mine #2. Weiss severs its tail, and Ruby cuts it in half. Weiss then levitates a group of Beowolves into the air to allow Ruby to more easily kill them, then turns her attention to a group of Sabyrs. Weiss forms a replica of her Arma Gigas' sword out of ice and uses a glyph to swing it, instantly slaying the Sabyrs. With the Grimm in the area killed, Ruby gives a thumbs up to three Mantas as they fly overhead.

Clover: Diverting all construction resources to Amity Tower means there are going to be gaps in Mantle's defenses against Grimm. They'll need help on the perimeter.

Nora Valkyrie follows Lie Ren along the top of Mantle's outer wall, playing with his braid. Ren hears growling below and stops to look, causing Nora to bump into him. The two of them look down at the Sabyrs approaching the wall and draw their weapons.

The Ace Ops watch in amazement as Vader casually walks toward the sea of Grimm. Activating his lightsaber, he began to dance through each failed strike, using a combination of the force and his lightsaber skills to kill the Grimm. Once the number of Grimm had significantly decreased, Vader motioned with his hand, the Grimm rising up into the air by an invisible force. Clenching his fist, the knecks of each Grimm exploded.

Inside of the abandoned Dust mine, Yang, Blake, and Marrow fight Beowolves. After they kill a few of the Grimm, Marrow turns to Blake and Yang.

Marrow: Hey, have you two ever thought about branching out a little? You always pair up, but I don't know if your styles really--

Yang's eyes turn red upon spotting another Beowolf that comes running toward her. She uses the recoil from her weapons to launch herself at it and punches it in the head. She then rapidly attaches several explosives to its abdomen and slides between its legs to get behind it. Blake tosses her sickle to Yang, who stabs it into the Beowolf's chest and fires Ember Celica to launch the Beowolf into the air. Blake tugs on her ribbon to throw the Beowolf toward two more Beowolves closer to the mine entrance, at which point Yang's explosives go off, killing all three. Marrow watches the whole event and turns back to Blake and Yang, who give him disapproving looks.

Marrow: Really, really good stuff! Yeah, keep it up.

Jaune stands on a crosswalk somewhere in Mantle, holding up a small stop sign, while five small children cross the street.

Jaune: Single file line, you know the drill.

Clover: But there's still plenty to do in Mantle itself.

A group of five young women stands on the sidewalk nearby, watching Jaune and giggling excitedly. Four of them strike poses, grinning at him. One of the four winks, while another holds out her hand, gesturing for him. Each women turn around though from Pyrrha's steely glare, saying one thing clearly. Mine. Meanwhile, a blonde woman in a red coat has approached Jaune with a large casserole.

Jaune: (awkwardly) Oh, another casserole. That's too kind.

The blonde woman repeatedly attempts to hand the casserole to the reluctant Jaune before forcibly shoving it into his arms, Jaune almost drops it, but It's caught by Pyrrha who smiles fakely at the woman.

Pyrrha: Thank you, we will enjoy this greatly.

Clover: I think you'll find everyone appreciates having a Huntsman around.

Across the street, Nora watches Jaune and Pyrrha.

Nora: It's totally the haircut.

Sometime in the later hours, a Sabyr runs into an alleyway in Mantle. It stops and turns around to face Yang and Ruby, who are chasing it. The two exchange a look with a smile and then charge into the alley.

Clover: You're of course free to enjoy your time off as you see fit. Whatever helps you take the edge off.

In a huge training room, Weiss summons her Arma Gigas while Winter Schnee watches her. Weiss looks back at her sister with a smile and then looks upset when Winter looks away disapprovingly.

Ironwood: You might not hear Oz anymore, Oscar, but that doesn't mean we can't try to jog him loose.

Ironwood and Oscar enter the training room.

Oscar: What did you have in mind?

Ironwood turns to Oscar in a battle-ready pose, and Oscar draws his cane and gets into a battle pose. The two then charge each other.

Ironwood tries punching Oscar, but he easily slides under and trips him. He blocks several more punches by going through the motions Maul taught him, and eventually began to see a pattern within Ironwood's attacks.

Striking his shoulder where his mechanical arm connected to his real body, his arm went slack, unable to move. Maul applauded from the stands, happily watching his apprentice's growth.

Clover: The Huntsmen around you can be an invaluable resource. If you're willing to pay attention.

In the training room, Jaune slides back after blocking a hit with his shield. He then scales a stack of blocks and begins jumping from stack to stack. Vine Zeki uses an Aura arm to punch one of the stacks just as Jaune lands on it, causing the latter to fall with a scream. Vine catches him with the arm and places him on top of another stack of blocks.

Vine: Have you ever thought about extending your Aura?

Clover: But make no mistake, school's over. You get to choose what type of Huntsman or Huntress you are.

Ren leaps from a wall of blocks behind Elm Ederne and fires his weapon's blades, wrapping the cables around her right arm. He yanks on the cables, causing her to stumble a little, but she stomps on the floor, using her Semblance to root herself in place. She jerks on the cables, turns and puts her left arm out, causing Ren to slam into it and tumble across the floor. He pushes himself to his feet and looks at her with a determined expression.

Ren: Again.

Din watches Ren closely, observing how he coldy interacted with Nora. While Marrow is groaning out of defeat, a victorious Pyrrha standing above him.

Harriet Bree runs in circles with her Semblance, while Ruby dashes alongside her with her own Semblance, with Weiss using her glyphs to help Ruby. For a while, Harriet is ahead of Ruby, but Ruby catches up and then passes her. Marrow, Elm, and Vine watch from nearby.

Vader strode into the training room, having been challenged to a fight by the Ace Ops. They most likely want to learn my strengths. Vader thought as he saw Harriet stretching before getting into a ready position.

The rest of the Ace Ops followed, standing with their weapons drawn. Vader smiled slightly and unclipped his lightsaber, decreasing the intensity so it would still wound Aura, but not cut through weapons. He held the blade in front of his head, before falling into the Djem-so position.

Harriet ran forward, using her semblance. Vader had to admit, her Semblance would have been tricky to counter if he hadn't already devised a plan for it. Reaching out with his hand, he felt Harriet through the force, and activated force stasis.

Harriet's speed slowed tremendously, just as she was about to reach Vader. Her face showed the same amount of confusion her teammates were feeling. Vader simply swiped with his saber, taking a chunk of her Aura out.

Clover: Okay... Harriet's out. Elm! Marr-

Clover was cut off as Vader picked him up with the force, before chucking him across the room.

Marrow: St-

Marrow collapsed, the air removed from his lungs. Elm and Vine looked at each other warily, before charging forward.

Vine reached out to distract Vader, while Elm charged forward. Vader pushed back Vine's body with the force, making his aura arms stop. Elm tries firing her rockets, but there simply returned to sender.

Harriet recovered from force-stasis and watched Vader easily disarm Elm of her hammer, and throw it at Vine, it colliding with his head. Charging her semblance again, she rushed forward with a yell. Elm watched her teammate rush forward and saw Vader turn his head to acknowledge Harriet.

Reaching out, she went to grab Vader and restrain him. But Vader extended a hand towards her, blowing her back. Harriet punched with incredible speed, Vader blocked the electrically charged metal fists with his saber, before Harriet ran at him again.

Vader smiled and sidestepped, instead of slowing her down again, he used the force to speed her up. Harriet lost control and slammed headfirst into the wall, she was defeated.

Clover attempted to duel with Vader, using his own sword. But Vader was far superior and disarmed him, Vader wining.

Another morning comes, and Penny greets Team RWBY in their dorm room at sunrise. Weiss tiredly walks across the room while brushing her teeth with an electric toothbrush. Blake begins heading out of the room but then looks back to see Yang standing in one spot in a sleepy daze, so she grabs Yang's arm and pulls her out of the room. While this goes on, Ruby excitedly drops down from her bunk and talks to Penny.

Ruby: Penny, Penny! So yesterday, Weiss and I were like (grunts) and they were like (screams)

In the briefing room, Jaune walks over to Marrow with three coffee mugs and hands him one. He then sits next to Marrow, after handing the other to Pyrrha, and the two clink their mugs together.

Clover: So, what's it gonna be?

Team RWBY sits together in the briefing room, with Weiss, Blake and Yang growing more and more tired while Ruby continues to be excited. Eventually, only Ruby is left awake, sitting still with a smile on her face. Weiss is leaned against Ruby's left shoulder, while Yang is leaned against her right shoulder, and Blake lays across Yang's lap, with Yang's hand on her arm.

Sometime later in the training room, Flynt Coal blasts down a block wall with his Semblance, while Jaune blocks the blast with his shield and Hard-Light Dust. Neon Katt skates by, with Nora chasing her.

Neon: Never miss a beat, never miss a beat. Excuse me!

Neon turns and pulls her bottom eyelid down, sticking her tongue out and blowing a raspberry at Nora. She then turns and weaves around block pillars, laughing, while Nora smashes through the pillars with Magnhild. The blocks disintegrate when they are damaged.

Neon: Come on, lightning bolt, aren't you supposed to be fast?

Neon skates away into a room-like area. Ren has taken cover behind a block pillar, occasionally leaning out to fire at Ivori, who blocks the bullets with his whip.

Neon: Wow, your boyfriend's actually holding his own!

Neon comes back to where Ren is from the room-like area and leaps over him. As he raises his guns to fire at Ivori, she hits the guns with her nunchaku, using Ice Dust to encase the guns and Ren's hands in ice.

Neon: Where's all that energy when he's around you?

She points at Nora while she talks, then skates away. Just as Ivori raises his whip to attack Ren, Nora fires a grenade, which hits him in the torso, knocking him down. Nora then hops onto Manghild and uses it to fly after Neon, growling angrily. The two speed past Oscar and Kobalt and turn the corner.

Neon: Wee!

Oscar attempts to attack Kobalt with his cane. However, Kobalt catches the cane, takes it from him and tosses it away. He then grabs Oscar's head and lifts him up. Oscar kicks him in the chest and flips away. Ironwood, who is watching the spar from an observation room, nods.

Flynt is slammed into a wall by an unknown assailant, and someone flings Kobalt from behind a wall on the other side of the room. Neon skates into the room-like area, laughing. When she comes to a stop, she sees Jaune standing in one of the doorways. She turns and sees Ren standing in another doorway and then Oscar standing in another. She turns to the fourth and final doorway, which has no one standing in her way. She gets ready to skate through, but suddenly she hears someone yelling and turns to look, surprised.

Neon: Huh?

Nora leaps over a wall and slams her hammer down on Neon's face. Shortly after, Neon talks to JNR and Oscar with a black eye, which soon heals.

Neon: Wow! That was amazing! You guys have really improved since the Vytal Tournament. And that cute farm boy had a few surprises for us, too.

She winks at Oscar with a cat-like smile, and Oscar blushes with a shy chuckle.

Jaune: Well, you really had us on our toes. Thought you had us there for a second, whew!

Neon: Oh c'mon, it was way more than a second!

Flynt blows saliva out of his trumpet.

Flynt: You guys busy? Wanna grab some lunch?

Nora: Do we? I could eat a sandwich the size of Kobalt!

Nora grins as a giant imaginary six-layer BLT sandwich drops onto Kobalt, who removes the toothpick, causing the sandwich to disappear, leaving a lettuce leaf on his head. He takes a small step away from Nora.

Jaune, Nora, Ren's, and Pyrrahs Scrolls buzz. They withdraw their Scrolls to see the words "Incoming Mission" on their screens.

Jaune: Ah, man. We'd love to, but um...

Ren: Duty calls. Maybe some other time?

Nora frowns at the message.

Flynt: No worries! The next time you're free, just let us know.

Flynt throws up a peace sign, and Jaune awkwardly copies him, earning an amused laugh from Flynt.

Jaune: Yeah, next time.

Team FNKI walked away.

Neon: Hey Ivori, if you're gonna go get froyo, can I have a bite?

Flynt: Aw, come on!

Ren hops down from the blocks he was sitting on, and Nora rises up from behind him with a sheepish grin.

Nora: There's still time for sandwiches, right?

Ren sighs, and Jaune smiles. Pyrrha happily watched from the observation deck, gladly trading in her spot for Oscar's so he could get some more training in.

A truck drives along a long, straight road in the middle of the tundra.

Ruby: Not that I'm bored, but why can't we just use an airship to take these supplies to Amity?

Ruby and Penny Polendina are sitting in the front seat, while an AK-200 drives. Ruby stares ahead sleepily.

Penny: The components for Amity Tower's construction are far too heavy. All that weight would require precious Dust we should be saving for the launch itself. And the Grimm that will come after.

Ruby begins to come closer to nodding off to sleep.

Ruby: It just makes for long... very long... supply runs.

Penny: At least the tundra is scenic.

Vader: I do not mind it, it gives me time to meditate.

To prove his point Maul was already deep in meditation. Vader soon joining him. Penny smiles and looks out the window. In the distance, a pair of penguins watch the truck, squawking.

Ruby: (unimpressed) Totally.

Ruby begins falling asleep, soon leaning over to Penny's shoulder.

Penny: Ruby!

Ruby is startled awake.

Penny: I just wanted to say how excited I am to be working with you in a professional capacity. As friends!

Penny grins excitedly.

Ruby: (laughs) Me too, Penny.

Penny: Relationships are so interesting and varied!

Ruby: Speaking of friends... Have you been able to make any new ones? Since, you know...?

Penny: Now that I'm the official protector of Mantle, I don't really have a team anymore. General Ironwood says I don't have time for friends.

Ruby: Oh, uh, how do you feel about that?

Penny: I feel like I wish I could do both the things I need to do and the things I want to do. Is that normal?

Ruby: That's about as normal as it gets, Penny.

Qrow speaks up from the back of the truck.

Qrow: Everything going alright up there?

Ruby: Just fine, Uncle Qrow!

Ruby gives a thumbs up. In the back, Qrow is playing a card game with Din and Clover Ebi, who sets several cards down on the supply crate they are using as a table.

Clover: I win again. Maybe we should call it quits?

Qrow: Shut up and deal.

Din: Maybe I should, his semblance is good luck anyways.

Clover laughs then gathered up the cards and shuffled them.

Clover: Your niece sure is one of a kind, huh?

Qrow: They all are. Been through a lot together.

Clover: It's a good thing they had someone to look up to and get them through it. Not everyone is so lucky.

Clover begins dealing the cards.

Qrow: I don't know about all that, they definitely looked up to Vader though. Thanks, by the way. For looking out for 'em. You and your team.

Clover: What good is saving the world without another generation waiting in the wings? Hopefully, they'll leave Remnant better than we left it for them.

Qrow: Once upon a time, I'd have drank to that.

Clover: You shouldn't do that, you know.

Qrow: Don't worry, I-I gave that up.

Clover: I meant deflect a compliment. Those kids wouldn't be where they are without you. You've had more of an effect on them than you realize.

Qrow smiles and rubs the side of his head.

Ruby: Uh, Uncle Qrow.

Qrow and Clover get up and head to the front of the truck.

Qrow: What's going on? Grimm?

Clover: No. Worse. You three with me. Penny, stay put and keep an eye on our six. We may need an element of surprise.

Penny: Affirmative. I will plan for six possible outcomes.

The three look at Penny, who smiles confidently. Din sighed and stood, sliding his helmet on.

Robyn Hill and Fiona Thyme are standing in the middle of the road in front of a sheet metal barricade built in front of a small canyon

Robyn: Alright ladies, time to show them our teeth.

The truck comes to a stop, and Clover, Din, Ruby, and Qrow exit.

Clover: Robyn! Well, if it isn't Mantle's hometown hero. Is there a reason you're blocking an official military transport?

Robyn: Clover, I'm so glad you're here. Maybe you can help me understand why this truck that's supposed to be taking construction materials to fix Mantle's outer wall, is on its way to the middle of nowhere? Are you lost?

Clover: (laughs) It's pretty easy to get turned around out here in the tundra, everything looks the same. Thanks for checking up on us though. We'll be on our way now.

Clover starts to walk away.