The beginning of her journey involved a fair amount of Dust, a shockwave that knocked her out of her senses, and a dangerou explosion. But that was pretty much all she could remember.
Next thing she knew, she was running through the wildland with a small bundle tucked safely under her arms.
She should be confused. She recognized that. But a burning determination in her heart kept her feet moving as fast as they could carry her exhausted body.
The memory flooded back at her.
The fire. The castle. The ambush. The Grimm.
And suddenly she felt a dread in her stomach that she somehow missed before.
She looked over her shoulder. It was exactly what her brain had predicted. Dark shapes swarmed at her heels, snarling and biting at her.
She turned back to the road ahead. The fallen branches came a bit too late into her view. She tripped.
Ruby Rose never thought she would die like this, like a failure.
She barely managed to roll away from the swiping claw of the Beowolf. A lucky and blind dodge.
However, her exhaustion and distress slowed her mind and clouded her judgement. The second Beowolf caught her left thigh.
Ruby felt her flesh split open under the sharpness. She was too weak to generate enough Aura to protect herself, or to heal the wound. Blood poured out from the severed artery.
She was going to die.
Ruby sucked in a shaky breath and pushed herself harder. She may die from this, but she would be damned if she did nothing about it.
The bundle in her arms stirred. She looked down. The parcel in her arms, covered by layers of the most endurant fabric, twisted and whined.
She jumped over another fallen trunk and winced at the pain. The wind lifted the cover of her cargo.
A small face.
Ruby was half stunned to see the infant. But just when the surprise caught up to her, so did the memory.
The castle. The pillar she could not move. The blood.
A few stray white hairs twirled in the wind. She felt her eyes watered as she recalled the terrible event.
It didn't make any sense. But at the same time, it made perfect sense. She remembered her best friend pleading for her to run away with the child. She remembered the helplessness when she realized she had failed to protect one of the most important people in her life.
It should not make any sense, really. Because she also remembered fooling around with her teammates in one lazy afternoon, and she remembered the Dust and the explosion.
That memory did not fit with anything she had slowly come to accept as her reality at this moment. Was it just a dream? Did she doze off while on the run to seek out her sister and her partner, and that the incident with the Dust was merely a fantasy?
She would never know. Not in this life, anyway.
Her distraction cost her dearly. She did not see the tusk coming at all, but her intuition prompted her to jump - lifting the infant just high enough to avoid any harm, but not enough to move herself out of harm's way.
The pain was excruciating, she opened her mouth to cry out, only to realize that she was already screaming.
She fell to the floor, tumbling against the mud. The infant wailed in protest. Ruby wondered if the little girl knew what was happening.
The darkness was upon her. The shadows snapped their jaws, jerked with their claws, and twitched in anticipation.
She struggled to her feet.
"You will not take her." She wheezed out.
The voice surprised her. She sounded much older than she remembered. But that was of little consequence now.
"By Oum's name. I will not fail again."
A surge of power coursed through her vein. She screamed and lunged forward. The baby echoed her cries with her own, and she held on just a little tighter with her right arm. Her left arm had drawn out her scythe. It was broken, shattered, beyond repair, much like herself. But it was still sharp enough to deal with the enemy.
She fought and fought for what seemed like an eternity. Her vision had blurred until everything seemed like a patch of darkness. Her body was pushed beyond its limit.
Yet she continued fighting, tearing her pursuers into sheds.
She fell when the last of her enemy dissipated into thin air. It was her end and she knew it. Darkness evaded the corner of her eyes, and she saw her past flashing before her eyes.
The castle. Her best friend in an elegant dress. Her sister grinning happily as she lifted her wife into the air and spun around. The awkward dance she shared with her best friend. The birth of the child. The exhausted but content smile on her best friend's face. Herself weeping.
The open courtyard where they spent countless hours talking about nothing. The statues in front of the school entrance. The Dust. The explosion. Someone yelling her name.
She felt tired. But she opened her eyes once more.
Miraculously, her vision was clear. Maybe this was what people called a flashback. The last strength before a life perish. She didn't know.
All she knew was that, she saw the baby opening her eyes and looking directly into her own.
Her cerulean eyes looked just like Weiss.
A/N: I forgot to explain something yesterday when I posted this (I had a drink too many to function properly).
This is the piece I was talking about in the FS A/N. If you don't want any spoiler from this point on, I suggest stop scrolling down. Otherwise, here are some warnings:
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1) This story will have a center plot-line. However, the majority of it will be about the different universes I had in my backpocket.
2) Each of those universes will take up an undetermined amount of chapters. Some might be a short one-shot, while others might be multi-chapter stories. I haven't decided yet.
3) This is my "stress relief" story. I'll likely pour in whatever idea to the story. Hence there really isn't a genre to describe what this is going to become. Yeah, there might be all sorts of pairings and whatnot. I'm not ruling them out for the moment. I'll try giving out warning beforehand if some people are allergic to certain pairings.
Again, thanks for giving this a read. And my gratitude to all who have commented and fav'ed this story. Welcome to this wild journey.