I had finally beaten her! This pint-sized little thorn in my side may have ruined my criminal operations, humiliated me, and turned Neo into Mary-goddamn-Poppins, but now I, master thief Roman Torchwick, had the upper hand!

"You got spirit, Red, but this is the real world!" Oh I had been planning this speech for weeks, I honestly didn't know if I'd ever get to use it or not! This will be fun!

I gave her a good whack before continuing my speech, "The real world is cold!"

Whack! "The real world doesn't care about spirit!"

Whack! "You want to be a hero? Then play the part and die just like every other Huntsman is history!"

Whack! Oh this was my moment! I was gonna make every playwright for the next century jealous! "As for me, I'll do what I do best: lie, cheat, steal, and survive!"

I wound up for another whack, and felt the sharp, curved beak of a griffon clamp down on my knees and turn me upside down. The griffon threw its head back, and me with it, and I slid down into the belly of that beast like a puck on ice. The inside of a Grimm was a hell of a lot colder than I would've imagined.

Y'know, I can honestly think of worse ways to go. Getting eaten by a Grimm after a wicked monologue certainly beats having a heart attack when I'm old and grey or starving to death in some dingy cell. It sure was nice of the griffon to wait for me to finish before eating me. Now that I think about it, chomp is a much better ending to that monologue than whack could ever hope to be. Sure, it's a shame I was the one that got chomped, but… actually know, the irony of me getting chomped is perfect! I bet lil' Red's gonna tell that story to all her friends; she'll recount my epic speech and its hilarious ending! My story will be immortal thanks to her!

Wait… We were about forty thousand feet in the air on that ship… and we were going down fast. What if Red didn't make it? What if there's no one to remember my speech besides this stupid Grimm? Oh dust, this is a fate far worse than death: a wasted monologue!

Oh well at least I won't have to think about it for very long once I get dropped into this bird's stomach. Should be any second now…. And yep, there's the stinging I was expecting. That's funny, having my skin seared off by acid isn't nearly as painful as I was expecting. I bet it's all the adrenaline. That kid Mercury was always talking about how good adrenaline was as a painkiller, I bet this is what he meant.

I felt myself slide around in the acid, as the melted end of my cane jabbed me in the stomach. Guess we must be flying around now or some-

And suddenly my head rammed against the griffon's… Rib cage? Do Grimm have ribs? Oh well, no use worrying about it now and… Hmm, what smells like burning?

And before I even knew what was going on, an explosion engulfed the griffon and me with it. I went from the mild stinging of having my body melted by acid to the intense burning of being cooked alive. And then everything went white.

When I came too everything was still white. Everything, save for a peculiar girl with teal eyes and orange hair. Her body was stiff, like she had metallic rods running through her limbs.

"Salutations!" She greeted me with a motion that was half wave and half salute.

"Uh… Hi and all that. Where the hell am I?"

"The afterlife! It would seem you died. That's so sad!" Her voice stayed bright and happy while her face contorted into what was supposed to be a frown.

"Yeah, okay, I understood that much, I meant what is this place? I always figured a devious bastard like me would get sent to hell so that I could live it up with demons and fire and stuff, but this is…" I trailed off as the realization hit me, "PURGATORY! No, it can't be! How many evil deeds does a guy have to do to get sent to hell? And for that matter, just who the hell are you that you got sent here too?"

"My name is Penny Polendina! It's good to meet you!"

"Name rings a bell," I rubbed my chin, "Oh yeah, you're that robot Cinder wanted to slice up right? Fought that magnetic amazon in a rigged fight! Hilarious, hysterical even!"

"You know, I prefer to be called an android."

"Whatever you want, buttercup, you're just a lost soul like I am now; ain't no strings on you."

Just then, in a shimmer of light, another girl appeared behind me, this one tall with a massive ponytail, clad in bronze armor.

"Oh!" I exclaimed, "Look who it is. Happy reunion, killer and killed, mano y roboto! How's about our fighters shake hands for old times' sake?"

Penny gave a steely glare. The amazon just looked up at me, and a strange look crossed her face. It's likely she was instantly smitten by my roguish charm. Myaybe she was just amazed to meet a gangster superstar – A gangstar! Ooh, I'd write that one down if I had a pen.

The amazon looked at Penny and horror came across her face. She ran over to the robot, sorry, android and wrapped her arms around her, "Penny, I am so, so sorry, I had no idea about your weapons, and that you…"

Penny effortlessly grabbed the girl by the shoulders and looked into her eyes, "It is okay, Pyrrha! I had fun during our fight, and I know you wouldn't have killed me if you had known better. Besides, Mr. Torchwick here admitted to rigging our fight; it looks like he and his cohorts realized your power would be deadly against me!"

The giant warrior girl, Pyrrha, turned on her heel, and stared through me with the sort of intensity I thought was reserved for Grimm stomach acid and explosions, "Now hold on there, kiddo, everyone's got a day job! You huntresses kill Grimm and protect the kingdoms, and I…"

"Kill innocent people, ruin lives, and steal from the people we protect?!" Pyrrha spat her words at me.

"Well I was going to say cause mayhem for a tidy profit, but yes those are all in the job description too! What I'm saying is… We're all equal in death right? Besides, what're you gonna do, kill me again?"

"That would be a good place to start." Penny added.

"Not helping Penny!"

Suddenly, behind us, words appeared from thin air. They looked almost like… a neon sign. What the hell? Pyrrha noticed my gaze and turned to see the sign for herself, as did Penny. The sign spelled out the words, "Would you all stop shouting, you're making my ears hurt."

Pyrrha stepped towards the floating words, "Wait, are you God?"

The letters blinked out with a buzzing sound, just like the kind a neon sign would make. A few moments later, new words appeared, "Yeah sure, if that's what works for you."

Penny spoke next, "What is this place?"

After another rearranging, "Purgatory."

I found myself speaking up with the kind of righteous indignity I'd not felt since I was Penny and Pyrrha's age, "I can understand why I'm here, but these girls are selfless and good, what are they doing here?"

The sign blinked again, "You misunderstand. You are all here for the same reason."

"What reason?" We all said in unison.

"Gingers have no souls."

We were all dumbstruck. The sign blinked off when it realized we had read its message. After a few moments passed, the sign returned.

"Also robots have no souls."

"Android!" Penny shouted into the great white void.

The sign gave a new message, "Androids have no souls."

I sighed, "Pick your battles, Penny; is that really the argument you want to die for?"

"Mr. Torchwick, I think you're confused, we're all already dead."

"…Y'know what, I think I just realized that dealing with you is an uphill battle."

"Actually, sir, I'm built for engagements on level surfaces. I have a six-point-five percent higher battle success rate on flat land than I do on rugged terrain, and that statistic includes my loss against Pyrrha!"

"I rest my case."

Pyrrha began to shout to whatever almighty being had spoken to us before, "Hey! Giant sign-god! Is there a way out of here?"

The sign came back, not with words but with an arrow pointing… Well it felt like south, but compasses probably didn't mean anything here, so I'm just going to call it That Way.

"Thank you, Giant Sign-God!" Pyrrha shouted, waving to the arrow as we all began to walk that direction, "What a nice almighty deity."

"Great," I lamented, "I'm stuck in a boring endless void with two space-cases, one of which is made entirely of metal and the other could kill me with her bare hands if I were still alive."

"Actually, Mr. Torchwick, my body is only comprised of ninrty-eight percent metal alloys, the other two percent is-"

"Not helping, Penny!"

There was a certain tension in the air as we walked That Way through the empty void. Actually now that I think about it, was there air here? I haven't exactly been breathing. Had the others been breathing? I probably shouldn't ask, that'd be weird.

Anyways, I'd been the subject of enough scuffles between beautiful girls to know that this tension in the air had to be because of me. There was only one way to settle this: the gentleman's way.

"You know, whatever is going on between you two, it would probably be best if you just got it out in the open and settled it now."

Penny spoke up first, "You know, Pyrrha, you really don't have to blame yourself about what happened in the tournament. There was no way you could've known!"

Well that was a disappointment.

"But I killed you."

"Don't think of it as killing me, think of it as… an occupational hazard! I just happened to be on the receiving end of a workplace accident, and you just happened to be on the giving end of that workplace accident!" Penny's hardwired chipper attitude seemed to persist even in death.

"You really are not helping, Penny."

"But I don't want you to feel bad!"

It was quiet. It would seem that whatever was on Penny's mind wasn't me. Oh well, maybe she just wasn't programmed for love, or maybe she just wasn't programmed for sating her love outright. Guess it's time to test the waters.

"So either of you got friends back at Beacon? Anyone you're particularly," I cleared my throat for emphasis, "keen on?"

Penny tilted her head, clearly exercising all her computational power, "Well there's Ruby! She's my friend, and I'm keen on her!"

Oh my floating-neon-sign-God! My deductions were completely wrong! How advanced must Atlas be if they're not just making robots, not just female robots, but lesbian female robots!? Wait a second… Ruby…

"You mean lil' Red? You and… Oh wow! That is… not even mildly surprising now that I stop to think about it."

"Oh, are you friends with Ruby too, Mr. Torchwick?"

I chuckled, "Mortal enemies, sweetheart. I was about to kill her when I kicked the bucket."

"That sounds like fun!"

I couldn't tell if she was stupid or just naïve. Probably both, "And what about you, Pyrrha? Got anyone you're sweet on?"

"Oh, of course! There's this boy, Jaune, and he's adorable!" Well she cheered up in an awful hurry, "We kissed before I died, but before that it was mostly just a bit of handholding."

"Oh well that's great-"

"Although sometimes at night, when I'm think I about him, I would start to-"

I decided to cut her off before this went somewhere weird, "OKAY! That's enough about John, or whatever his name was!"

All I'd done is talked over her, she had kept on talking in the meantime, "…but then my spear gets all sticky, and it's always such a pain to clean. I have polish it so the brass looks nice for my fights, but in the moment, it just feels right. This one time I think Ren heard what I was doing, but if he did, he didn't seem to mind."

My jaw had begun to hang open without me realizing it, "Pyrrha that is far more than I would've ever wanted to know about you."

"Oh, and there was this one time with Nora…"

"You know, for the exit from one of the planes of the afterlife, I kinda expected a little more pomp and circumstance."

And I had every right to be underwhelmed. I could see that Penny and Pyrrha shared my confusion. Before us was a door. Not some massive door, or a wide door, or even a double door. It was just a fairly standard door, like I would find in a house I would've been stealing from. It was a bit under seven feet tall, and was made of a light brown wood, cedar if I had to take an honest guess, but honestly I doubt that Sign-God would find trees here. The doorknob was cold and brass, perfectly polished and likely untouched by mortal hands. Otherwise it was just a plain-ass door.

Penny seemed to have the most initiative; she reached out to the door and yanked it open, stepping in without a second thought. She stopped and made a happy squealing sound, "Aww, doggie!" She ran through the door then, to whatever dog she had seen on the other side.

Pyrrha walked through next, "Zwei?"

I pushed my way past her. In the room was a mass of large computer monitors, showing various parts of Remnant and Purgatory. In front of these monitors was a desk covered with a complex array of levers, switches and keyboards, and behind that desk sat a black and white corgi who had a microphone headset wedged over his ears. As we walked in, it turned to us, tongue hanging out of one side of its stupid, adorable muzzle.

I stumbled slowly into the room as I felt my body stiffen and my eyes go wide with horror, "So it was all your work!" I fell to my knees in dismay, the weight of my entire life, all my crimes, and everything I had done for Cinder suddenly loading itself onto my back. The dog hopped down from its chair and walked over to me with a slight whimper, before licking my face and ruining my makeup. I wasn't sure if it was trying to cheer me up, or if it just wanted to taste my salty tears before they rolled onto the ground.

"Well, Zwei, this has been fun," Pyrrha didn't seem remotely phased by the fact that a dog had just led us through Purgatory, "But where is the actual exit?"

Zwei walked over to another door, this time metal and official looking, and barked at it. Pyrrha nodded in thanks before helping me to my feet.

We walked through the door into… a bedroom? Where the hell were we, and why does the exit from purgatory lead to someone's house. Before us was a large king sized bed, with several sizable lumps underneath. I took a moment to smell the air and realized something, "Oh my dog…"

As I spoke, the figured under the bed leaned up. Before us, caught in the most natural of acts, were a scruffy blonde and an ice-cream haired girl, "Neo? What are you doing with that ugly kid?" Neo pulled down an eyelid and stuck her tongue out at me in response.

To my left, Pyrrha's voice came out like a weak squeak, "Jaune?"

The blonde, Jaune, held a hand out, "Pyrrha, wait, I-"

From under the sheets another figure appeared, this one with short reddish-black hair. Wait a minute, what was lil' Red doing here?

A few moments later, it seemed like Penny I and had finally arrived on the same page, "Ruby, what are you doing?" I could swear I saw smoke rising out of her ears as her circuits started to work double time to figure out just what was going on.

Red shuffled out of the bed. I turned away as she wrapped her hood around herself, "Penny, I can explain!"

As they left the room together, Ruby slyly grabbing a wrench on her way out, my attention turned back to Jaune and Pyrrha, "Pyrrha, I am so, so sorry, I thought you were dead!" Jaune seemed as good at digging holes for himself as I was at stealing dust.

"Jaune, I… How…" Pyrrha looked as though she were on the verge of tears, "How did you know I've always wanted to try a three-way? And Ruby was so nice to let you practice while I was dead!"

Jaune and I's faces contorted with confusion. Neo's mouth bent into a grin. In one swift motion, Pyrrha had removed all her armor, and then jumped onto the bed. Neo, with nigh-perfect timing, pulled the sheets back down to cover her.

I turned and left. I had no words for what had transpired. After walking out of the angel's threeway, past Penny as her head caught fire, and out the front door of the house, I sat on the porch. I didn't even notice the blonde man sipping a cup of tea in the rocking chair next to me, "Ah, that boy is in there making me proud. There's a kid who knows how to heed advice when it's given to him!"

I turned to him. I stared not at him, but through him, into the endless confusing infinity that had become my life, "And what advice was that?"

He took a slow, loud sip from his cup, "Entire. Team."