Infighting, Insanity, and Social Ineptitude
is a fanfic of RWBY by Najio on Fanfiction.net, in which teams are shuffled.
In the new setup, Ruby feels like a one-eyed king in a land where everyone else has two; Dove babysits three avatars of chaos and destruction; and Jaune just wants his team to stop arguing for ten consecutive minutes.
Infighting, Insanity, and Social Ineptitude Tropes:
- Blood Knight: Yang and Russel both show signs of this during initiation.
- Brutal Honesty: Russel has a tendency for this, which almost gets him in trouble a couple times. He later tells Pyrrha she needs to learn this.
- Clingy Jealous Girl: Nora to Ren, Even though she insists they aren't "together-together", she admits during initiation that she plans to threaten whoever Ren's partner wound up being to make sure the two of them team up, and she keeps sneaking into his room or dragging him into hers for things that could have been discussed in public.
- Collapsing Lair: Inverted on two separate occasions:
- Weiss and Blake kill a Deathstalker by causing a cave-in and then fleeing while it gets crushed.
- Sky and Ren use the steel pillars in a White Fang base to crush Mercury.
- Compelling Voice: Roman pretends to have this so RSPR has an explanation for why Pyrrha and Penny are behaving oddly, when in reality Emerald is using her Semblance on them.
- Comically Missing the Point: Russel's reaction to Dove calling him out for his comments to Jacques Schnee:Russel: "That is a... bold choice in facial hair. And this is coming from a guy who once tried a soul patch."Dove: "Oh my god, Russel. You just insulted Jacques Schnee's mustache."Russel: "Well, someone had to. He looks like a starved walrus!"
- Crash-Into Hello: How Yang meets Jacques, with the addition of her getting food on his white shirt.
- Curse Cut Short: Weiss interrupts Torchwick's attempt at saying "Son of a bitch!" by cutting him in the shoulder.
- Death by Adaptation: Almost the entire Disc-One Final Boss crew: Mercury, Adam, Cinder and even Kevin the dragon are all dead by the end of the Vytal invasion; Emerald is unconscious and left for dead too. On the protagonist side: Sky.
- Dirty Coward: Sky is first introduced hiding in a tree from an Ursa Minor, and he later abandons his team and Penny when they run into Roman and Neo. A large part of his character arc involves growing out of this.
- Dreadful Dragonfly: The Damsel Grimm that BRYN meet on their return to the Emerald Forest.
- Drives Like Crazy: Russel while trying to figure out the controls to the airship he's flying away from a Damsel in.
- 11th-Hour Superpower: Weiss unlocks her summoning during the final confrontation with Adam.
- Engineered Public Confession: Jaune gets ERMN to reveal what they really think about Cardin while he's within earshot. He doesn't take it well.
- Eye Scream:
- Adam slashes Weiss across the face, destroying her right eye.
- Russel does this to the Grimm Dragon.
- False Friend: ERMN is this to Cardin.
- Fantastic Racism:
- Cardin, as in canon, discriminates against faunus, and his friendship with ERMN only encourages it further.
- BRYN suspects Dove is anti-Faunus after he makes several comments about Velvet's timid nature. Velvet herself eventually sets Dove straight.
- With Torchwick being arrested, the White Fang visibly making large assaults on the Schnee Dust Company to get enough Dust for the Breach is inflaming human/faunus tensions. Cinder fans the flames by setting up teams with Faunus against teams with racists during the Vytal Tournament.
- Too Fast to Stop: Ruby had this problem when she first unlocked her semblance.
- Fire-Forged Friends: Their encounter with Torchwick helps Weiss and Blake finally get along. Nora lists this as one of two good ways to make friends.
- Follow the Chaos:
- During initiation, Ruby and company try to follow explosions to meet with other students.
- Weiss and Sun, having run out of other leads, decide to investigate an explosion to see if Blake was involved. She was.
- Frame-Up: Emerald uses her Semblance to make it seem as if Sun was with the White Fang during a raid on their base.
- Friendly Fire:
- Cardin accidentally hits Weiss with his mace during initiation, breaking her Aura. He doesn't care, even when he later repeats the mistake with Blake.
- Yang invites Nora to hit her at the beginning of fights so she can charge up her Semblance. Nora complies.
- In the Back: Pyrrha kills Cinder by using her Semblance to hit her with a signpost from behind.
- I Shall Taunt You:
- Cardin does this to Adam to get his attention away from Weiss and Blake by comparing him to a raging bull. Adam's reaction just gives Cardin more ammunition.
- Neon's appearance in the Vytal Festival is full of this, unsurprisingly. Most of it is focused on Ruby's age.
- Kill Me Now, or Forever Stay Your Hand: Jaune does a nonlethal variation of this by telling Cardin he faked his transcripts. Cardin, having just been healed by Jaune, decides to let him be.
- The Load: Sky believes he is this to RSPR due to his low combat skill and lack of a semblance.
- Loveable Rogue: Russel's past in thievery and his good relationship with his team definitely helps him qualify, though the jury's still out on the "loveable" part.
- Mistaken for Gay: When Jacques Schnee hears about Weiss and Blake getting into a fight with Roman Torchwick at the Docks, he assumes that they went out there in the first place to have sex. Weiss doesn't deny it, as he would likely pull her out of Beacon if he found out she was trying to reconcile with a former White Fang member. They wind up having to keep this up when Jacques decides to personally visit Vale, and Weiss realizes she actually is gay for Blake.
- My Significance Sense Is Tingling: Sky's semblance is a danger sense.
- Nature vs. Nurture: BRYN debates this with regards to Velvet's unwillingness to stand up to Cardin. Velvet herself eventually weighs in, convincing Dove it's entirely nurture.
- Noodle Incident: Several involving Nora, which have gotten Ren to ban her from cooking, drinking, and caffeine.
- "Not So Different" Remark: Weiss calls out Adam for being just as controlling towards Blake as her father is to her.
- Only Sane Man: Dove and Jaune are this to their respective teams.
- Physical God: After killing Cinder and absorbing her power, Pyrrha is definitely on this level.
- Playful Hacker: Russel. He is very disappointed when he doesn't have to go through security to launch his team into the Emerald Forest despite it being off-limits to students.
- Point of Divergence: The key divergence is different teams being formed during initiation.
- Ruby, Sky, Pyrrha, and Ren make up team RSPR (Raspberry).
- Dove, Russel, Yang, and Nora make up team BRYN (Brine).
- Jaune, Blake, Weiss, and Cardin make up team ABSW (Alabaster).
- Power Incontinence: Pyrrha has trouble controlling Amber's half of the Fall Maiden's powers, and her attempts to hold it in leave her distracted enough she loses the Vytal Tournament quarterfinals to Velvet.
- Reflexive Response: When Mercury tells Junior to not get beaten up by a kid again, Ruby yells "Hey!" before realizing it's Junior and not Roman he's talking to and therefore she isn't the one being called a kid.
- Stuff Blowing Up: Blake explodes a crate of Dust to get an edge over Torchwick.
- Super-Empowering: Blake is the one to unlock Jaune's Aura.
- Nora knows how to unlock Aura without a chant, and she uses it several times to save civilians during the Grimm attack on Vale and Beacon.
- Swear Jar: BRYN makes a Jerk Jar for whenever Russel is being an ass. Whenever someone else is being a jerk, Russel suggests they contribute.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Jaune and Cardin eventually reach this after a round of taking turns calling the shots proves Jaune is the better leader.
- Tempting Fate: Invoked by Yang and Russel in order to draw out a powerful Grimm during initiation. It doesn't work.
- Took a Level in Badass: Sky does this through training with Ruby. Jaune eventually asks to join, so Ruby sets him up with Pyrrha to learn swordwork.
- We ARE Struggling Together: ABSW has the worst performance in combat class thanks to everyone except Jaune hating each other. Only when Weiss and Blake work out their differences do they start winning.
- We Need a Distraction: Dove, Yang, Nora, and Sky serve as this while their teammates are sneaking around in a White Fang base. They do this by pretending Yang is mad at Dove for cheating on her with Nora.
- Wrecked Weapon: Adam's semblance allows him to strike hard and fast enough to do this even if his target is using their Aura to protect their weapon. He does this to Winter's saber to allow him to escape from a fight where he is outnumbered 5 to 1, and he later slices Jaune's shield in half with a blow that would have taken his arm had the shield not been there.
- You Are Not Alone: Ruby, Ren, and Sky refuse to let Pyrrha fight Cinder and Emerald alone. Ren and Sky take on Emerald, while Ruby provides sniper support against Cinder.
- You Just Told Me: Glynda pulls this when Roman calls her and surrenders, asking Ruby to pick up the scroll when she had no way of knowing Ruby was there.
- Your Head A-Splode: How Cardin kills the Alpha Beowulf during initiation.
