To Carry Her Home { a Monochrome/Checkmate AU one-shot }
Roughly based off of dashingicecream's drawing here. A lost and broken Blake finds she was never alone in the first place.
"Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without words, and never stops at all." – Emily Dickinson
"Wake up…please, just wake up!" …
The sky that day was falling, she remembers that much at least. It's never been easy for Blake to forget events that hold so much tragedy in them. She remembers the bright streaks of red stripped across the clouds, the disappearance of the broken moon at night, but perhaps a stronger reminder of that day were the flames that followed. Most of all, worst of all, she remembered her friends. Their bodies strewn across the battle field in a mess that the faunus wished desperately to forget. The greatest thing would be to forget.
The greatest thing would be if she had died with them. That day, her heart had firmly decided to choke the life from her without letting her follow them into the dark. Now she wakes up, still reliving those moments whenever her eyes are closed. A sigh escapes her paled lips, swollen eyes barely open to view the rest of the world around her.
Sitting up slowly, she pulled her knees tightly to her chest in an attempt to stifle the mad beating of her heart. Looking out over the hill, the world around her continued to move without a care. She cursed it, the entire thing. What gave everyone else the right to feel happy? What had they done to deserve their happy ending when all she was left with were the remains of everything she held dear? Her mind ached; there were so many stupid questions but no real answers.
An image flashed through the girls' mind; the last kiss she'd shared with Weiss before the destruction of that day. Weiss had been smiling at her, telling her how much she cared about her, how much she loved her. How she was sure that, no matter what happened, they would come out stronger than ever before. And after, they would celebrate. After the fighting, they would go back home together, all of them.
Weiss wanted to marry her.
Blake bit her lip to try and stop the tears from spilling from her eyes, a stab to the heart reminding her that it was best to try and forget these things. Weiss was gone. Her life, her love, her team; they were all ripped away as easily as the sun set every night after. There was nothing left in this world for a broken faunus like herself.
A breeze shifted past her skin, sliding over her like warm arms around her shoulders, and suddenly she could feel the weight of a figure leaning behind her, pressed against her back.
"Blake," came the soft, familiar voice past her ears as something pulled within her chest.
Immediately her head shot up, eyes filled with the tears she was trying so hard to stave off, and as she spoke her voice fell like glass, strained and coarse.
"Weiss…? You…you can't be—you can't be here; you can't be real—"
"Blake, please. Listen to me, just this once, alright?"
Blake forced herself forward, pulling her body close as she turned, and golden eyes widened with shock before a choked sob rang from her throat as her hands shakily covered her mouth. It was enough to convince anyone that they had gone crazy; white wings were not real, none of what she was seeing was real. Weiss had died, she saw it happen. This lookalike, she was nothing more than an illusion, an onslaught of emotional stress that finally took its toll on the torn huntress, who was now too mortified to even move except to let the cries shudder through her. Hands shot to her hair, blocking sound from her ears and closing her eyes like a frightened child as she whispered over to herself that it must have been a nightmare, it wasn't real; Weiss was dead, Weiss was dead, she was dead, dead, dead—
She was pulled into a hug, felt the world around her stand still as her heart began to sink and Weiss began to speak, voice soft and filled with sorrow.
"It wasn't your fault, Blake…"
The sobs grew louder.
"I'm still here for you, I'll always be here for you."
And louder.
"Please, please stop torturing yourself."
Blake could feel her girlfriends' fingers glide through her raven locks, bringing back the memories of a time that seemed so long ago. Eventually she allowed herself to lean forward, and slowly her arms lifted, curling around Weiss's waist. She held tight, the hot streams of tears flowing freely down her cheeks.
A cracked response rose from the huntress's lungs.
"Don't leave me, please don't leave me here alone…!"
Weiss stroked the back of Blake's head with care, a small smile lifting the edges of her mouth.
"You've been lost and I finally found you; I'm never going to let go ever again, I promise."
When the tears had finally run their course, when the ground they stood on ceased to feel alive, Blake remembered everything clearly. Images of the battle, the blood that seemed to seep into the sky above them. A certain kind of fog had lifted from her mind, something like film over a lens. Blake remembered both life and death; even the moment she, too, had died.
A glance up, a breath of new air, grasping hands because it was all they had left. Their reasons for living and knowing why they had lived. They had lived. Weiss held on to her hand guiding her as they began to walk, feet lifting from the ground and touching the air around them. For once, the storm inside of Blake had come to an end, settling like the ashes of a fire, and finally her wings could take her places she couldn't see before. Tightening her grip, she let a few more tears fall, the remaining sadness she had left tumbling to the earth below her.
She was finally going home.