Fanfic / RWBY: Reckoning

RWBY: Reckoning is a Self-Insert Fic set in the universe of RWBY by the troper Trogdor7620. It details the life of one Darrel Conway, as he's given a mysterious crystal by a woman who appears to be a Faunus, and is subsequently ripped from the world of Earth and forced into the dangerous land of Remnant. Along the way, he makes friends with the members of Team RWBY and JNPR. But when conspiracies rear their ugly head, Darrel finds himself embroiled in a war far beyond anything he ever dreamed of.

The author has stated that he is aware of how self-insertion fanfictions are generally regarded, and he is taking steps to avoid going down that path.

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RWBY: Reckoning contains examples of:

• Added Alliterative Appeal: Weiss's description of Darrel is an "irresponsible, immature, irritating, insufferable ignoramus."
• Adventures in Comaland: Darrel talks with Eve in the afterlife, known as Arcadia.

• Answer Cut: Chapter 8 ends with a tired Darrel trying to remember how students are put through initiation. Chapter 9 begins with Darrel flying through the air.
• Apocalypse How: Class 3a. Someone wants to use the Fragment of Arcadia to grant the Creatures of Grimm souls, and then use them to destroy every last bit of society.
• Apocalypse Wow: The class 3a apocalypse that can be caused using the Fragment of Arcadia to grant the Creatures of Grimm souls is shown in detail during a nightmare Darrel has in Chapter 7.
• Battle Trophy: Darrel takes a fang from a Nightmare Maw, the first Grimm he killed.

• Blood Magic: The writing in Adam's diary is only visible to Darrel, thanks to something called a "blood seal", meaning, depending on a specific blood type, the text will become visible, but only to the blood donor.
• Broke Your Arm Punching Out Cthulhu: Darrel manages to help kill the Nevermore, but gets badly injured in the process.
• Building Swing: Darrel does this in Chapter 32 to reach a highway across Vale.

• Cooldown Hug: Darrel tries this on Ruby when she's having a nightmare. During the Breach, Yang does the same to a Superpowered Evil Side Darrel.
• Curse Cut Short: Darrel's opinions on Ruby's doodle during Prof. Port's class is that labelling it "Professor Poop" is incredibly appropriate.
  Professor Port was spewing out a pile of sh—
• Dark and Troubled Past: Professor Kor was a member of KAYN, a team of Hunters that imploded after a mission went horribly wrong. One teammate had his spine broken, another lost an arm, a third stayed behind and was torn apart, and Kor himself was blinded.

• Dressing as the Enemy: Kimba tells Darrel to do this when he infiltrates the White Fang raid on the docks. Even Torchwick is fooled.
• Ear Ache: Weiss is more than happy to pull this on Darrel in Chapter 7.
• Eat Me: Part of Darrel's plan to kill the Wahtani.
• Epic Fail: Darrel's "landing strategy". To elaborate: he ties himself to a tree, falls from seven stories, hitting three branches, one in the gonads, and gets tangled in a bunch of vines. Then when that debacle is over, he gets rendered unconscious by his own weapons.
• Everyone Can See It: So much so that Nora started a betting ring. Not just with RWBY and JNPR, but with a legion of other teams from other schools. And it doesn't just cover Yang and Darrel's first kiss, either: she had also organized betting for when the two would hold hands, when they'd go on a first date, how it went, when they'd boop…
• Feed It a Bomb: Darrel's plan to kill the Wahtani is essentially tie a bomb to his back, jump down it's throat, plant the bomb, and get out.
• For Want Of A Nail: Darrel continually tries to alter events that have a negative impact on the storyline to resolve them a little more peacefully. Of course, when he pushes Fate, Fate pushes back, usually making the situation worse. Because of this, Darrel states that if he knew anything that would happen after Volume 1, he wouldn't tell RWBY to keep them from getting hurt.
• Good Cop/Bad Cop: Velvet and Darrel perform this act on Sky Lark to get him to talk about Cardin and Yang.
• Grappling-Hook Pistol: One of the Iridescent Basilisk's capabilities, known as grappling barbs in the story.
• Groin Attack: Once from a tree branch, another from Weiss (inadvertently), and a narrow dodge from a third courtesy of the Nevermore.
  Darrel: What do you have against my testicles?!
• Handicapped Badass:
  • Apparently, Jaune's father had lost a leg some time ago. Although, according to Jaune, he can still handle himself.
  • Professor Kor. The man is blind, and he was an exceptional Hunter in his youth.
• Heroic BSoD: After being on the receiving end of a Breaking Speech, being told that he isn't a warrior, Darrel is more than willing to hand over the Fragment of Arcadia, the very object that he's been told to guard with his life.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Blake pulls this on Darrel during the White Fang raid at the docks, shoving him out of the way of a falling shipping container. Darrel believes it's his fault that Blake was injured, saying if he wasn't there, Blake would never have had to save him.
• I Can't Dance: Darrel's dancing has been compared to Commander Shepard's. Ouch.
• I Need to Go Iron My Dog: When Darrel wakes up from his coma, Ruby decides to Leave the Two Lovebirds Alone by saying she has some… important thing… she needs to do.
• Implausible Boarding Skills: Darrel surfs down a highway at speed on a car door.
• Little Bit Beastly: Kimba has a pair of white lion ears. Fittingly, she was the previous leader of the White Fang before being forcibly usurped.
• Lodged-Blade Recycling: Darrel manages to shoot a grappling barb into the Nevermore's eye. He later uses it to get away from the Nevermore at the end of the conflict.
• Manchurian Agent: Darrel becomes one, thanks to some kind of chemical that causes him to follow the instructions of Cinder Fall when he hears her say "Queen calls the knight".
• Mix-and-Match Weapon:
  • As to be expected, Darrel's weapons, the Iridescent Basilisks, are no exception.

• When the Iridescent Basilisks are destroyed, RWBY builds him a new weapon, combining his backpack with a pair of Shoulder Cannons which double as Power Fists and Power Palms in melee form.

• Oh, Crap!: Darrel's response to seeing the Boarbatusk break free of it's cage on it's own.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Part of what drives Darrel to get revenge on Cardin: Yang's jealous actions are described by Ruby as being the complete opposite of how she'd react.
• Pinned to the Wall: During the food fight, Pyrrha uses her polarity Semblance to send steak knives against Darrel's hands and feet.
• Poor Communication Kills: Having failed to inform Team RWBY about his infiltration on the White Fang raid at the docks, Blake initially sees him as an enemy, before Darrel reveals himself. Later on, Weiss voicing her suspicions on Darrel as she sees him wearing the uniform of her hated foe causes Darrel to snap, and go on the run for a week.
• Power Copying: This is Darrel's Semblance. By touching a Hunter or a Grimm, Darrel is capable of copying their unique ability, and using it for himself.
• Punched Across the Room: Darrel does this on a Boarbatusk. It's so powerful, the Boarbatusk plows through four more classrooms before coming to a stop.
• Shipper on Deck: Blake fully encourages Darrel to get into a relationship with Yang, and Nora ran betting rings on the pair of them.

• Stepford Smiler: Professor Kor was part of a team that split when a mission went wrong. After the leader blamed him, and committed suicide, Kor blamed himself, and spent years brooding over his team's destruction.
• Super-Power Meltdown: The threshold limit (the absolute maximum Aura one body can hold) is said to result in this when it's surpassed, although it's commonly believed to be a myth.
• Talking Is a Free Action: Averted. While Darrel, Blake, and Sun are distracted by arguing whether Darrel can be trusted, Roman sends a shipping container on them. It results in Blake getting her leg broken as she shoves Darrel out of the way, and slowly pushes Darrel to his Rage Breaking Point.
• That Came Out Wrong: Darrel states in Chapter 12 that he wants to go to his dorm so he can sleep with RWBY. (He meant the team, not the person.)
• The Gloves Come Off: After seeing Ruby get shot, Blake being injured, and Sun being derided, Darrel immediately stops trying to stop the raid, and focuses solely on disemboweling Torchwick.
• Trick Arrow: Most of Darrel's ranged weaponry is this, though he prefers to use explosive arrows as his main mode of attack.
  • Chapter 28 shows an arrow that functions like a smokescreen, and can also dull the senses of a Grimm.
  • Chapter 32 introduces whip arrows, which can be coated in fire, ice, or electricity.
  • Chapter 38 reveals an arrow that, when struck into an object, becomes an electrical trip mine, of sorts.

• Unplanned Manual Detonation: When Jaune rigs a time bomb out of flares and scraps, he says he's unable to detonate it remotely. Darrel decides to use this to his advantage.
• Wrecked Weapon: One of Darrel's Iridescent Basilisks is crushed to pieces by a cloaked enemy. The other is mangled by a Beowolf's bite during the events of the Breach.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: During the time period where Darrel lives on the streets, he comes to believe that he's the reason everything went wrong. As Ruby, Weiss, and Yang pursue him, Yang tells him this, listing his achievements. Darrel just angrily blows it off, saying his achievements were "sheer, dumb luck".
• You Are Not Alone: So Darrel's from another dimension? Bugger that, he's our friend first! Jaune even lampshades this trope.
  Jaune: I know what it's like to be out of your depth.