Hey all my lovely followers and readers, I'm finally more able to type up new content for all your lovely people.
New chapter of "D'arc Game of Life" soon enough, I just wanted to put this story up since I've had this idea, as well as several others, for a LONG while now, and I figured a new story would be the best place to implement it, where there is even more room to grow the idea, and a clean slate gleaming with untapped potential.
Remember I don't own anything at all, so don't sue me pls!
Got it? Got it. Good. Let's start, shall we?
Chapter 1: A complementary thought to your rage.
Humanity… scattered through the prism lens, refracted and dispersed throughout time and space, but all once bound together in that singular point of conception… birthed from the purest white light… and born amidst a world of darkness.
Though my being is no longer of this world, a shard of my immortalized soul remains.
I felt dead and gone, but my heart brimmed with love.
Love for her.
Love for him.
And love for you.
You are so much more than you think yourself... so much.
You've touched only a fraction of the light you hold in your heart...
Please... look into yourself, dear...
See the light within...
Cast away these dark feelings...
And grasp your true power.
Yang awoke with a start, her head pounding like a pack of Ursa were throwing a rave in her skull. She brought her hands up to rub at her temples.
She felt partial relief from the vicious migraine, but... something was off.
No, no it wasn't... she definitely had her hand touching her head.
Hand... singular...
"Oh... right..." lilac eyes blinked as she looked at her bandaged stump, taking it in again.
Every morning when she woke up, she had to remember that it was gone. It still seemed too surreal.
One moment she was charged at that masked asshole who was hurting Blake, and then...
Blinding pain, she'd blacked out within moments.
Her aura had been low, the sword strike too strong, her shielding too weak, it was just a gigantic case of bad luck.
Pushing herself out of bed, she found it uncomfortable to lay in, for once. Maybe there was something to that?
The house felt empty, and yet full. She didn't hear any movement downstairs, no Ruby running around doing a million things in a way that was impossibly fast and yet hardly getting anything done, no dad making breakfast, no Qrow visiting and chatting, no Zwei barking, nothing.
The former brawler slowly pushed herself out of bed, wearing the same t-shirt she had been for the past three days, the same shorts that she had for the past five, hell, she felt disgusted when she realized that she hadn't even bathed or changed her underwear since Sunday. It was Saturday now... she felt disgusting, yet she hardly cared anymore. She couldn't keep Ruby safe, couldn't be a Huntress, couldn't do ANYTHING with her dominant hand gone. She felt useless, to be honest, and Ruby just couldn't see that. Her adorable little sister refused to acknowledge that her big sister wasn't going to ever recover, she even had the gall to say something along the lines of 'You could regrow it with your aura. It works on normal damage why can't it do that?'
Silly Ruby, aura didn't just WORK like that.
Her feet met the stairs, moving down them carefully, her remaining hand holding onto the rail so she didn't trip. She felt weak from having been so inactive, and she'd probably gained at least five pounds since she got home, "Curse dad and his good cooking." she grumbled, reaching the bottom of the stairs without any problems.
She walked into the living room and went wide-eyed. Her aura flared a slight bit in caution as she saw a strange figure kneeling in front of Zwei, petting his head. The person was wearing a black cloak of some sort and their hand seemed very dirty and stained, odd streaks of black staining their lightly tanned skin. She cleared her throat, "Wh-who are you?" she demanded in a tone she tried her best to make sound intimidating, but came out nervous and panicked.
The figure perked up, turning its hooded head to her, and they stood up. Yang noticed that she was a good few inches taller than this person, standing five-foot-nine in comparison to their five-foot-five, if she had to hazard a guess. They seemed rather thin, too, so she could most-likely take them on if she couldn't just scare them away.
"Yang... my god, I knew something happened to you, but I didn't think it was this bad!" they said, the voice feminine and somewhat distorted, as though they were speaking through a microphone.
"How do you know my name?" her eyes flared red, anger and defensiveness overcoming her growing nervousness and panic.
The figure walked forward, Yang backed away. They continued walking forward and she continued backing away. They stood in front of her, and the brawler did was she did best in these kinds of situations.
She threw a punch... and she missed. It wasn't for lack of trying, but rather for the fact that her fist had gone straight through the person's head, as though they weren't even there! She felt warmth on her arm where it intersected with the person's head, and she pulled it back, "W-what the hell?" she nearly screamed, fear overtaking her.
"Don't be afraid, my child, you're fine. I promise I won't harm you." the figure reassured, laying a gentle, ethereal hand on the blonde's shoulder.
The more she listened to the unknown woman, the more Yang felt like she'd heard that voice before, "Who are you?"
The woman stepped back, unnaturally lit as she moved her hands up to her hood. Her image shuddered slightly, as though it was a video that had frozen and glitched for a second, then it resumed, and Yang's jaw dropped.
Standing in front of her, with all the glory of a woman who had been haunted for years by stress and trauma, with her youthful features despite her many years of age, and hair no longer as vibrant as it once was...
... meeting her shocked lilac gaze with an equally calm silver one...
... was none other than Summer Rose, the woman they'd all thought was dead and gone.
"H-how?" was the younger woman's only response.
"A skotographic transplanar image projection machine, I took a lot of risks getting to it." the older woman explained, her words not making any sense to the blonde, but what wasn't said was the emotions that had dragged her normally bright, mirthful, lovely voice down to a soft tone that was full of sadness, "But I'd sensed overwhelming negativity, and I knew something was wrong, you were always so bright despite your less than ideal parentage, I knew something had gone wrong. I feared for the worst, I took risks, I just didn't know it would be like THIS..." her silver eyes were cast in sadness, and the whites of them were instead pure black, "You're probably most confused about how I'm here, though."
"Y-yeah! You're dead! How are you... y'know... n-NOT dead?" Yang's mind was a storm of emotions and thoughts. What was this? What did this mean? Was she actually still alive?"
"I was presumed dead, yes, but while I may have fallen, I did manage to get back up, but not in the same place I fell." she spoke in a slightly hushed tone, as if trying to not alert someone, "You're alone in the house, I already checked. I can keep talking while you get something in you, you look starved, girl." she said in a more motherly tone, "I would have thought Tai-tai would have resorted to force-feeding you at this point."
"What? But I've put on weight." she said with a pout. Had she not been paying attention to her own nutrition? Now that she thought about it... probably not.
"Maybe on your chest, but you look famished. Come on, you eat and I'll talk." the surprisingly-alive woman led the way to the kitchen.
Yang walked in and slowly began the process of pouring herself a bowl of cereal. It was none other than Pumpkin Pete's Marshmallow Flakes, and she teared up when she saw it was one of the one's with Pyrrha's face on it.
She was an awesome friend, and now she was gone.
Summer stood by, then slowly hugged the younger girl, though her touch didn't feel like solid flesh, but rather a soft ethereal warmth, "Is that Athena's girl? I could have sworn I heard something about that..."
Yang paused, "Athena? You mean the Mistralian supermodel?... that explains Pyrrha's ridiculous figure." seriously! Yang had demanded several times how Pyrrha was so slim, yet had those sweeping curves. She'd been told every single time that it was just the crimson-haired girl's genetics and body type, and that Yang shouldn't feel bad, since her body was more strongly built than hers anyways. That had made her feel better, at least, but looking at her midriff in the mirrored panels on the counter, Yang found that her muscles had begun to atrophy, and she was starting to imitate Pyrrha's figure a bit more than she would have liked, "I need to get back in shape, I'm starting to look like a twig."
"You're beautiful, sweetheart, don't let anyone tell you otherwise." the huntress reassured, attempting to pet Yang's head gently, but her hand was just phasing through her, "I wish I could be on this side and projecting myself onto the other side, but I'm not. I can't risk anything, and I'll have to go soon." she said cautiously, "So I'll have to make this quick."
Yang sat down and started eating, looking at the older woman with a curious gaze.
"God you look so cute right now, like a kitten, and I want to hug you, but I can't." the older woman whined almost childishly, resembling her nearly identical-looking daughter more than herself, "Regardless, I'm in another plane of existence. I should have died but it seemed fate intervened. I need to tell you several things, though." she sat down next to Yang and began.
She quickly spilled the beans. Her soul had fractured during the transfer process, and although she didn't die, a soulbound power she held, something called the Summer Maiden power, had been transferred to Yang, "I apologized to Taiyang, then to Ruby, and finally to you, sweetheart, for not being able to be there and be the mother that Raven refused to be... maybe it's luck, or fate, that you were the last one I thought of, but I've also been able to keep a watch on you, and your development is arrested, as is Ruby's, and it's partially Taiyang's fault."
"W-what? But dad's done nothing but make sure we've had the best lives we can have, how are we not developed?" the blonde girl received a boop on the nose for her outburst.
"Grow as PEOPLE. Taiyang taught you to keep yourself and your sister safe, and his temper rubbed off on you as well. You've a whole spectrum of power and you're only able to use a fraction of a fraction of it because you refuse to grow as a person. I've read your diary, I know you still keep your old pacifier to suck on when you have nightmares." her words made the girl blush all across her entire face in humiliation, "That's just part of you, but who YOU are needs to grow. You need to heal before you can take on the responsibility of the power you hold. You took the light, and you're hardly using it." the woman sighed, reining in her frustration, "I can't explain all of it, but let me try one thing... fire isn't meant entirely to destroy. It's a tool, it's light, with a lot of potential. It can burn and destroy, or it can warm and heal. You need to learn that you can warm and heal just as much as, if not MORE than, you can burn and destroy. You need to focus on your LIGHT, on the positivity in you. I know it's still in there, deep down." she poked Yang's chest, her hand phasing through her, "Here, or maybe here." her hand moved around inside Yang's chest, "Somewhere in that area. Use that positivity... and you'll be 'alright'." she smiled gently, placing a hand on Yang's shoulder, "Okay? Okay. Next issue, I'm in the Shadow Realm. Next issue, Ruby ran off and needs to be found. Next issue, Taiyang can NOT know about this. I know he deserves to, but it'll put him into more danger than it's worth. I need to go now, alright?" she stood up suddenly, quickly jogging back into the living room.
Yang was a bit distraught, and stood up too, quickly trying to get back to the living room as well, "Wait, but you're supposed to need to go before you tell me the very last thing! What happened to book tropes? she had just met back up with Summer, and now the woman was disappearing again? That wasn't fair!
"The very last thing is look into your heart and know you're a good person. There, no cut off words, no last-second blip-offs, nothing. Life isn't always like a book, sweetheart. I love you, okay? See you later." she began to waver.
"I... I love you too... I'll see you later." Yang finished their exchange with a defeated tone, the woman disappearing a few seconds later. Walking back into the kitchen, she sat down in front of her cereal again, thinking over what had been revealed.
She had some sort of power... the Summer Maiden? It almost sounded hilarious, like the punchline to a joke, except the joke was that she often claimed to 'burn hotter than the sun in the middle of July', and now this?
She didn't know what to do. She didn't know what to feel or what to think.
She felt even more lost than before! Her eyes turned red as she let out an inarticulate scream, flipping the table and her bowl over, sending milk and cereal flying everywhere as the box tumbled around and the table hit the floor with a great crash. She punched a hole in the wall, dented their steel fridge, broke part of the counter, smashed the coffee table, and threw a couch cushion so hard it broke through a window.
The floor caught her as she fell, crying and sniffling. She had lost everything, her arm, her chance at greatness, her sister's respect, her friends, all of it was gone!
It felt like seconds, but eventually something shook her gently, but firmly. She looked up, wiping her eyes with her hands-HAND, and sniffling again.
It was her father there, concern coloring his expression vividly, "Yang, sweetheart what's wrong? Did someone break in while I was gone?" he asked with a storm of righteous fury and fatherly concern tinging his tone.
Yang shook her head, sniffling, "I... I can't tell you, it's... it's too much..." she answered sadly, wiping her eyes again, "I need to wash up... I need something new to wear, I feel awful."
She felt a strong, yet tender embrace surround her, and her tears moistened Taiyang's shoulder as he gave her a fatherly hug of reassurance, rubbing her back gently, "It's okay, my little sunshine, it's going to be okay, daddy's here, he's got you. You're going to feel these emotional surges sometimes, and that's normal after what happened, just know that it's going to get better, okay? It's going to get better and you're going to be better, okay?" he let her cry onto his shoulder as he comforted her, holding her lightly shaking form as she slowly began to calm down. To drive it home, Taiyang began to gently sing a few lyrics to a song they both knew by heart, "Close your eyes~. Don't you cry~. Love's around you~. In time you'll fly~." the words were even more gentle than his embrace, eliciting a small hum from his daughter's throat.
She stayed silent for a long time, speaking up only when the silence felt deafening, "I'm alright, for now. Thank you, dad." she started to stand up with his help, stumbling over to the couch and laying down, feeling exhausted.
What was previously a bottomless well of energy, one that had at times allowed her to pursue her goals well into the night, yet awaken only hours later when the sun had risen to nearly its peak in the sky, now felt like a small puddle, draining her motivation and drive.
She was reminded every day, she had lost more than just an arm at the fall of Beacon, she'd lost most of her life. She felt awful in every aspect. She knew her father would give her literal years to get back onto her feet, not even caring if she contributed to the upkeep of the home, so long as she was safe and sound where he could make sure she was alright.
She felt awful because, on so many levels, it just didn't feel right.
It wasn't right for Taiyang. She was 17, an adult by most of Vale's laws, she shouldn't have to stay at her father's home and mooch off him indefinitely, she should have been out there, doing Huntressly things and kicking the asses of criminals and villains.
It wasn't right for Ruby, who shouldn't have to look at her big sister, the woman who helped raise her, in pity and sympathy. The little reaper never said anything of the sort, but Yang knew that her adorable little sister had witnessed far too much to be called innocent anymore, and she was scared. In these dark and harrowing times, the girl who should have been a shining rock of hope and stability was instead a dull, morbid mess of a person.
Most painfully, though, it wasn't right for herself. She should have been stronger. She should have been faster. She shouldn't have been taken down so easily. She should have been there earlier, gotten Blake out of harm's way. She shouldn't have been arrested, she had acted in self defense and the things the camera showed just weren't true! She shouldn't have to be here, laying on her father's couch and thinking about all this SHIT! IT SHOULDN'T HAVE BEEN LIKE THIS! THIS WASN'T RIGHT FOR ANYONE! IT JUST WASN'T!
THE ONLY PERSON WHO IT WAS RIGHT FOR WAS THAT BITCH WHO HAD INSTIGATED EVERYTHING! Yang felt rage well up inside her, not hot and burning like before, yet even brighter and more dangerous.
More righteous.
More intense.
She cried.
She flipped over, her bleary eyes seeing her father setting a potted bouquet of flowers next to her, a small fan wafting the smell around the room. He preferred natural smells to scented candles, and honestly, she did too.
Her energy faded, her eyes turning from red to purple again as her hazy stare focused on the plants, her eyelids growing heavy as the fresh, flowery scent invaded her nostrils.
In her mind, she sang softly as she spotted a single lilac blossom, leaning against a pink rose blossom.
Darkness overtook her vision as she drifted off to sleep again, her stump outstretched as if to reach out and touch the flowers.
She swore to herself that she would make things right.
Don't you worry about the dark.
I will light up the night with the love in my heart
I will burn like the sun, I will keep you safe and warm
Like the smell of a rose on a summer's day
I will be there to take all your fears away
With a touch of my hand I will turn your life to gold
...
Don't worry, I've got you
Nothing will ever harm you
I'm close by, I'll stay here
Through all things I will be near
...
Close your eyes
Don't you cry
Love's around you
In time you'll fly
...
Soon after the words faded from her mind's ear, she saw darkness. However, soon enough that darkness was touched by a single point of pure white light. It shone outwards with a brilliance like the sun, and she felt it.
She felt a warming love that washed away the burning hate.
She felt kindness.
She felt calm.
She felt peace.
She felt the flowers underneath her finger's touch as rage was countered by a kindness and love.
It was indescribable, and yet she understood it perfectly.
Yang awoke with a jump, her head pounding like a flock of Nevermore had pincushioned it with arrows. She brought her hands up to rub at her temples.
She felt partial relief from the vicious migraine, but... something was off.
No, no it wasn't... she definitely had her hands touching her head.
Hands... plural...
"This... isn't right..." lilac eyes blinked as she looked at the sun-kissed skin of her right hand, taking it in again.
This morning when she woke up, she had to remember that it was gone. This all felt too surreal.
She flexed her fingers, taking in the dragon tattoo that had mysteriously appeared, golden scales gleaming in the light. She saw the golden color fade to a rich green, and pulled the sleeve of her shirt up to see that it transitioned into a pair of intertwined flower stems that were capped by a lilac blossom...
And a pink rose blossom.
The small part of her mind that wasn't freaking out was currently squealing at how badass this looked. The rest of her mind was going blank with the sheer power of how much she didn't understand this.
One moment she was passing out on the couch due to sheer lack of energy to do anything, and then...
Refreshing warmth, she felt the bottomless well of energy she once drew upon return to her, hitting her like a freight train.
She pinched herself with her restored hand, "Ow." she winced lightly, forgetting how strong her fingers were.
It hit her again, like a second engine placed in the middle of that train for no reason other than to fuck up whatever was left on the tracks from what the first engine ran over.
Pushing herself off the couch, she found it uncomfortable to lay down. She had been presented an opportunity, and Yang Xiao Long was not one to look a gift horse in the mouth.
She was one to take the gift and send the horse back, playing with the first gift while hoping the horse came back with another.
But first, something had to be done...
"Hey dad?" she called out to the kitchen, where she heard the man cooking, "I'm gonna wash up before dinner, okay?"
"That's fine, sweetheart." the man called back with a smile, "Are you feeling better after your nap, sunshine?"
Yang grinned, giving her father a thumbs up even though he couldn't see it, "Don't worry, daddy, I'm 'all-right' now." she giggled at her successful pun.
"Well as long as you're okay, that's all that matters. I'm glad you're starting to get over this, at least, sweetheart, but I don't think jokes about your missing arm is the best way to go about things." the huntsman replied, plating the food, "Ruby is still gone, I'm worried, but we should keep up our strength in the meantime. I'm coming out with the food, alright?"
"Teeheehee, it's fine, daddy. I know what I'm going to do now. Tell me, do you need a 'hand' with the food?" she giggled harder.
"No thank you, sweetheart, I've got it just fine, please just stop with the jokes about the missing arm, it's starting to concern me." he replied from the dining room, slowly maneuvering the tray through the doorways.
She heard him get closer, so she dropped the bomb, "What missing arm?"
"Okay, now I'm thinking Qrow was right and you ARE going cra-" both Taiyang's jaw and his tray of food dropped to the floor when he saw the very definitely NOT missing right hand of his daughter giving him a thumbs up, then curl into a 'seriously?' gesture.
"Oh come on, I was gonna eat that!" she complained, then dropped the smile, "And before you ask, I don't know. Weird dream, flashing lights, flower tattoo, arm's back." she summarized what she knew and what she was allowed to tell.
She could already figure that this was part of that 'Summer Maiden' power that the not-dead Summer told her about.
"I don't know what's worse. The fact that you could regrow your arm and didn't do so until now, the fact that if this was accidental, that your first instinct was to crack a joke about it, or more concerning than the amazing fact that the arm is back that your eyes have turned green." he knew he had to have skewed priorities if the miraculous reappearance of his daughter's dismembered arm was less concerning than her eyes changing color.
Yang blinked, then looked at the mirror in the curio cabinet, seeing that her father was right and the once bright purple irises of her eyes had been replaced by a gentle, sweet, kind, life-giving green.
The transformed girl stared, blinked, looked at the older blonde, and raised her hand to her forehead, "Too much, back to sleepytown." she fainted in sheer shock.
The last thing she felt before she fell fully into her third sleep of the day was two gentle embraces, the physical warmth of Taiyang Xiao Long.
And the ethereal warmth of Summer Rose.
So yeah, first chapter, woo!
So the good few ideas I had, I'll list now so you know.
1) Yang's semblance isn't just "red eyes = danger" going Human Torch + Incredible Hulk mode, but instead that's just a part of a spectrum of powers she has based on various emotions, this is based on the simple fact that changing eye colors is pretty cool, but what if they changed to a different color? She has several colors to access, each of which alters her power over fire. Right now she has Red, which is rage, and represents more intense, but less controllable flames, and the just-unlocked Green, which is more akin to kindness and love, and it alters her fire to be more attuned to healing and protection, since fire can represent life.
2) Yang turns out to be the Summer Maiden (assuming that Summer was the summer maiden before her death) because of reasons (it doesn't matter the order in which she thought of the others, just that Yang was the last one she thought about), and her incredible strength and power is part of that.
3) Yang gets new arm. This one is far more likely to be canon than 2, and infinitely more than 1, because it's logical (Ironwood could hook her up as an apology or something like that)
4) Summer is alive by some means, taking mostly from "never found the body" and the ambiguous nature of her disappearance in the first place, which Yang herself states in the show, "One day she went out for a mission and never came back"
5) most importantly, WOW canon went from 0 to 100 REAL fucking quick, so I'm gonna right an AU, consider it another take on some direction Volume 4 could go in if a) I directed it, and b) it focused on Yang.
6) I like trying to figure out how these little ideas will work out, so this is more an experiment than anything.
If you lovely readers like the story, then I'll post more, but for right now I'm already putting this story on hiatus because it's taking a minimal priority, far behind D'arc Game of Life and even further behind my IRL things I need to work on.
Still, though, if you loved it, then favorite and follow and especially leave a review.
Thank you all, bye~ ^w^