Ruby winced when she pulled her scythe out of the messy corpse of a savage Grimm. The last passing memory of her mother was regularly caked in gore and blackened blood, constantly reminding her of the legacy she'd left behind for her daughter. The creatures tended to make a terrible mess, too – of themselves and other people like.
Dragging the scythe back in close, leaving a faint trail of dripping blood on the ground, she looked over the mess that was Beacon. The city she'd grown up in was once a thing of beauty – ornate, masterfully constructed buildings headed the skyline around her, rising up from the ground like valiant stone knights. The architectural style had a tendency for building tall rows of windows atop these massive, towering buildings, which gave the appearance of visors through helmets.
Yet now these once gallant knights had been battered and broken, and black dragons rose from their corpses, billowing plumes of smoke from multitudes of fires all around the city. The sight was a pain to her eyes, and the ash was an agitation to the rest of her senses.
Standing up straight, she pulled her cape and clothes tighter to herself – once upon a time she'd dressed in dark red dresses and frilly skirts, but now she wore thick bundles of travellers clothes, stuff that made sure the black blood never seeped through to her skin. Up high on the ramparts that connected the taller buildings of Beacon, the wind blew hard, and her cape billowed out like a flag.
A familiar voice caught her attention, almost making her jump. She looked around and saw a tall woman emerging from an open window set in a nearby rooftop. "Keep yourself low, Ruby! Otherwise you're going to get swept away by the wind. Again." Ruby's eyes lit up as the reflection of her sister's mane of brilliant gold hair caught them. It was the main thing that stood out about her right now, considering she was garbed in dull, torn church robes that had been wound up tightly about her body by cords, with a rebellious tail of fabric that fluttered out around her hips. Likewise, her once quite modest clothing had been coated in blood, and she'd been forced to scavenge for something that would keep her clean.
"Sorry, Yang." Ruby apologized, lowering herself to a crouch. "I was just caught off-guard by a Grimm, is all. Did you find any dust?"
"Yeah." She replied, without a hint of pleasure on her face. "Along with a few bodies in the next building over. Looks like the Grimm got here way earlier than we thought." She dropped down to Ruby's level, and handed her a small glittering crystal, a deep blue to match the darkening sky above them. "Here you go. Keep it safe."
"I know." Ruby said, her voice dropping into a mumble.
Yang's gaze softened, joined by a hand that reached up to cup Ruby's cheek, pulling the girl's dirtied face up to meet her. "Is something wrong? How are you holding up?"
"A lot of things are wrong." Ruby's eyes veered off to the side, her grey orbs unable to hold on to Yang's violet eyes. "But I guess I'm not about to fall apart right now."
"C'mere." Yang pulled her younger sister in, and wrapped her arms around her shoulders in a warm, comforting embrace. "It's okay, it's okay." She remained quiet for a few moments, holding onto Ruby in an attempt to console her. The only sounds to be heard as they leaned against each other was the wind, and the distant cracking of wooden frames that collapsed as they burnt, and the ravenous howling of the Grimm that infested the city. Certainly, they made it difficult to appreciate the intimacy of the moment.
"Look." Yang began, her hand lifting up to ruffle Ruby's hair. "I know I went away for a while. But that won't happen again. Specially now it's just me and you. I won't leave you alone. Not for good. The other kingdoms are safe, we'll go to one of those, okay?"
"No, no." Ruby shook her head, her eyes returning to face Yang with abrupt defiance. "We can't just leave to somewhere safer. We've got to help Beacon! We've got to help everyone we know here!"
"What? How? How are we going to kill all the Grimm that have just...shown up? What if one of us turn into them too?" Yang laid her hands on Ruby's shoulder, her sister's defiance met with grim determination. "What if I turned into one of them? Would you save them from me?"
"I-I d-don't -"
"Of course you don't know. Neither of us know. We have no clue what's going on! I thought the Grimm weren't real, but...if they're here, then they are, and that means a new hunt will start." Yang's voice has grown panicked, almost, her speech quickening, as if time was running out. "We can't stay here. We need to leave."
She would have carried on,but a stone-splitting shriek tore through the air, causing them both to immediately reach for their ears as it shook them with its immense pitch. A sudden tremor rocked them both, before a figure leapt from behind one of the nearby rooftops and landed atop the end of the short stone bridge they crouched upon – a fearsome Grimm, bigger than before, tall and gangly and coated in coarse black hair. It was a twisted perversion between man and beast, bipedal, yet disproportioned in monstrous ways, a white skull set atop its head with a crown of sharp, pointed antlers that must have been at least three meters wide.
Yang immediately grabbed hold of Ruby and pushed her back, yet the Grimm bounded towards them and leapt over to the other side of the bridge, putting itself a few short spaces away from them both, but now Ruby was in front of it.
"No! Get back!" Yang yelled. She tried to tug Ruby back again, who was still stumbling about from the first shove, and the tremors caused by the Grimm's heavy movements, but was barely able to make any progress compared to the lumbering, yet speedy actions of the towering beast.
Unarmed aside from her fists, she was unable to do anything but watch as the massive Grimm snatched Ruby off from the ground and tossed her aside, shrieking as it tossed her away violently, as if she were something disgusting and frightening that it wanted to be rid of as soon as possible, down into the depths of the city.
The whole series of events passed by in a flash, and Ruby's mind was awash with fear as she lost total control of her body, as it was lifted from the ground and cast into the into the lower levels of the city. The wind roared past her as she fell down and down, and yet, as soon as she hit the ground that raced up towards her, she felt nothing, and the world went black.
It was like a sudden sleep – she didn't feel herself lapsing into it, but there was that vague subconscious knowledge that she wasn't in the waking world. Of course, there was the fact that she woke up, from that sudden slumber. Her eyes opened, and she found that she wasn't a broken mess upon the cobblestones of Beacon, but instead, she was in front of a small building, sat amidst a grove of trees, that continued in all directions, until it grew so thick she couldn't see beyond.
"Welcome, good huntress." A soft voice greeted her, and she turned to see a young woman dressed in in a fine gown and shawl, in faded grey and green. She held a head of brilliant ginger hair that was tied in a loose bun beneath her bonnet, and bright, almost luminous green eyes. "I am here to guide you." Despite what had just happened to Ruby – well, she wasn't sure if that was real, or if this was real – she found this stranger's voice soothing, as if it were all just a bad dream.
"Who...who are you?" Ruby asked, realizing that she was sitting on the floor. "Where am I?"
"My name is Penny. You are in the dream." She replied. Her figure was almost...stiff, as if she wasn't human. "You have awoken here to hunt the Grimm."