Woot! I'm finally done with school! Hello summer break! Hopefully this means I can pump out chapters at a much more rapid pace. Okay, looks like the time skip will just be a two-parter instead of three, which is good.
Please kindly point out some errors and give some criticism regarding this story. It would be very much appreciated so I can improve it if possible.
Now, on with the chapter!
The golden rays of the glorious sunshine shone down on the island of Patch. The citizens of the humble land began to arose from their slumber to start their daily routine. One of them was Ruby Rose.
The young Rosette sat up from her bed and let out a short yawn as she stretched her limbs. She smacked her lips together, trying to force off the drowsiness that tried to stay. She got out of her bed and went a dash for the bathroom to splash her face with water.
Ruby clenched open the sink and gathered her hands over the spraying water. But as soon as she did, she started quivering. Her eyes widened as blood suddenly appeared on her hands. Ruby whimpered as she desperately tried to wash it off. Tears began well up in her eyes as the blood wasn't coming off, making her terrified.
"Nonononononononononononono! Why won't it go?!" she thought, clearly panic-stricken.
She gripped her head and shook it in denial, desperately wanting things to end.
"I'm not a murderer! They were the enemy, t-they had to be dealt with. B-Besides, they weren't even human or Faunus anymore! S-So, why am I like this?! Why is there blood on my conscience?"
"Because you like it~"
Ruby yelped and looked around. Nothing. There was no one there besides herself. So then why-
"Teeheheheheheheh~ I'm a voice inside your head, you dummy!"
"What?" she uttered in disbelief. Was she finally going crazy? Did she snap during these two months?
"Yup! I've been in your cranium for at least half a decade. And no. You aren't crazy. Or at least, not crazy in the membrane and insane type of thing, no. But what you are crazy about, is killing."
"W-What do you mean? How am I crazy about killing?" asked Ruby out loud. She needed to know what was happening to her. For weeks, she's been getting dreams about being drenched in blood, holding various organs and limbs, all with a smile on her face.
"Let me put it into words that you would make you easily understand: You enjoy all the killing you did. You want to do it over and over again, until you're knee-deep in bodies!"
Ruby was absolutely appalled, disgusted and terrified at what the voice told her. "What?! N-No! That can't be true." she denied. It just couldn't be, could it?
"Don't try denying it! I saw your face when you went on and killed all those ghouls. You happily ended their lives, and you would've gladly done it endlessly! I should know, I was created from these thoughts."
"No! Y-You have to be lying! A-And besides, those people deserve it. They were the bad guys!"
"Oh how obscure your sense of morality is. It's all black and white! Newsflash, little Rose! Not every ghouls was a bad guy! What if they were forced into it? What if they were brainwashed to serve the enemy, huh?"
This earned her no response as it left Ruby speechless.
"Nothing to say? By the way, you forgot something. Those were just soldiers, following what their superior commander ordered them to do. Admit it, Ruby! You're just trying to justify yourself, when you know it deep in your heart that you enjoy all the killing!"
Even still, Ruby denied all of these accusations. She took a step back as she wrapped her arms around her body, trying to calm herself.
"No! No, I don't believe you!"
"Then you wouldn't mind taking a look at the mirror, right?"
Ruby did that just that. She looked at herself in mirror and was even more horrified at what she saw. Her reflection was in her old outfit, but had red slash marks all across the body. The eyes were completely black, except for the red slits. It was grinning at her, the teeth completely jagged and spiked. What's worse, it was holding a severed head, still dripping with blood.
"Ah~ What's wrong, Ruby? Afraid of your own reflection?" it taunted. The reflection threw away the head and slowly poked out of the mirror. "This is what you really are! What you really believe in! Accept it, Ruby! This is your new normal, your new nature."
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Ruby punched her reflection, causing it to flinch. The Rosette cried as she started to repeatedly punch herself in an attempt to push back into the mirror.
"Never! I won't ever be like you! I'm not a killer. I'm not!" she desperately tried to assert to herself, tears dripping down her cheeks.
The reflection did nothing to stop Ruby and was very content to just chuckling.
CRASH!
The doors to the bathroom flung open and a pair of arms suddenly wrapped itself around her and pulled her away from the mirror. The young girl flailed her legs, trying to free herself from captivity.
"No! Please! Stop it!" begged Ruby, her voice slowly becoming hoarse as she hyperventilated.
"Ruby! It's okay, calm down. Calm down. I'm not gonna hurt you. Just…calm down. Everything's gonna be okay. You'll be alright. Take deep breaths and you'll pull through. "
Ruby's breathing started to slow down, eventually, she calmed down. She looked behind her and saw it was Yang who was holding her down.
Yang had changed quite a bit. She wasn't as playful and adventurous as she once was, but she still acted like the same big sister Ruby once knew. Ruby noticed that her was still in her pajamas, and she couldn't help but stare into her red eye.
Yang had gotten a new eye, courtesy from an anonymous sender. It was a mechanical eye that had its wiring attached to her optical nerves, making it possible for it function like a normal eye. And along with that was also a new prosthetic, combat hand. Or, more like a new arm. Whoever had sent the eye had also sent an arm. But Yang only wanted the hand, seeing as she still had a functioning arm. But after a long, and detailed conversation with both Ruby and their dad, she decided to implant the arm into her bones, and then surgically integrate the hand over the stump.
Problem solved!
Yang looked at her little sister in worry. She looked up to the bathroom mirror. It was all shattered up, some of the fragments having fallen to the ground, a few blood splotches scattered around the remaining glass. Yang looked down on Ruby, seeing her hand bleed. The blonde softly sighed and gently helped her sister up.
"Come on, sis. Let's get that hand patched up."
Ship En Route to Menagerie
Blake stared at the vast sea, leaning against the ship's railing as she had reminiscence from the past months. She had bunked in with Sun and his team after they were transported into the safer areas of Vale. For the two months that have passed, she stayed with her boyfriend during his time of need.
How could she not? He had lost the thing he cherished, the thing that helped him proudly identify himself as a Faunus. And besides that, she felt it was her fault that he even lost it in the first place. It was her fault that Adam had targeted him. It was her fault he got her, because she was too weak. It was her fault that he-
"Blake?"
The feline Faunus looked behind her to see Sun facing her with a concerned expression.
"Something wrong? You look like you got more than you should on your plate."
She shook her head and gave him an assuring smile. "It's nothing. Just trying to figure out how to properly talk to Sienna Khan once we get to Menagerie."
The blond scratched the back of his head , nodding at her response. "I figure you'd be thinking about that. We're gonna be dealing with the head honcho of the entire WF." he said, censoring the White Fang into acronyms, not wanting to say it out loud in public and cause an accidental panic.
Blake had decided to confront Sienna Khan regarding her decision to send Adam, who was in an alliance with the Grimm, and Nazis, to attack Vale and assist the enemy of all. Blake knew Sienna, and she knew that she only did things that would benefit the Faunus as a whole. What happened in Vale was the opposite and she intended to get her answers.
Blake closed her eyes and smiled, feeling the cool air brush against her cat ears. She had decided that the time to hide was enough. She couldn't afford to keep running, and decided to face her challenges head on. So, she decided to no longer hide her ears. And along with that change, she had discarded her old clothing and went for a new style.
She opted for a long, white tailcoat with dark gray linings and a sleeveless black crop top underneath. A pair of fitted pants with a white belts, thing-high black heeled-boots with a bit of gold-colored edging around it, with her family's emblem on it. On her back was a diagonal strap that had a small, magnetic clip and she was using it to sheath Gambol Shroud.
The feline Faunus looked at her boyfriend, admiring his new look. He had switched out his jacket for a white, sleeveless, long tailcoat, unbuttoned of course, still largely preferring to show off his abs. He kept his wrist bracers, although upgraded it into arm ones. He forgone his cargo pants and sneakers and went with black, fitted yet flexible pants, and simple combat boots. On his neck was his necklace, his emblem proudly emblazoned on it.
"You know, I think Yang would be purring all over your body if she were here."
Sun raised an eyebrow and looked at the girl incredulously. "This, coming from the cat Faunus, huh? Don't deny that you haven't lied down on these fine pecs for more than a day when I was asleep."
Blake blushed and tried to sputter out a response. "Wh-! Th-! I just wanted to see if it was hard, or something!"
"The pictures that Neptune and Scarlet took says otherwise. You were curled up on my stomach. And you were purring!"
Blake hung her head, quite obvious that she couldn't win on the argument. Although, it did feel nice to act so… carefree. And she dearly wished that she could feel it more. But with the world's current status, that would be impossible.
She turned around and leaned back on the railings on the deck, peacefully watching the waves crash against the ship.
"Mom. Dad. I wonder how you guys are doing?"
"DOOOOOOOOODGE!"
Oscar immediately dived onto the ground, narrowly dodging a green sphere. The projectile made contact with a tree and it blew up in a small explosion. The young boy quickly pushed himself up and dashed back to dodge another green sphere. However, it struck the ground, and the resulting explosion threw him off his balance, causing him to fall.
Oscar grunted and desperately tried to get up, but to no avail, he was hit by the green sphere, sending him flying into a tree. The young lad groaned softly as his body slid down to the ground. He craned his head to his left, seeing the Branwen siblings, giving them a pleading look.
"Why do we keep doing this?"
Qrow looked away, while Raven shrugged indifferently and pointed at the man who had attacked her young charge. Not much had changed between the two of them. No new hair styles, no new wardrobe, no new nothing. Same could be said for Oscar. Ozpin, however.
The former headmaster had changed into clothing reminiscent of his time as Ozma, although shaded to fit with his current color scheme, which was black and emerald green. Ozpin slammed down his cane and looked at his supposed descendant with a passive look.
"You accepted this training, young Oscar. I told you repeatedly that it would be difficult, and yet you still went through with it because you wanted to get stronger."
"No, I know that. But why do we just keep doing this? You attack me, and then I dodge or it hits me. I don't think I cant get stronger from this."
Ozpin smirked and pushed up his spectacles. "There's a simple explanation for that, young Oscar. Constantly dodging heightens your alertness and makes you push your body against it limits. What's more, the mortal body goes into a sense of adrenaline when it feels it is in danger. This feeling allows you to temporarily surpass your limits in order to avoid the danger. Take a look at your biceps."
Oscar pinched his arm a bit and was quite shocked to feel it was no longer as flabby as it used to be before Raven found him. In fact, he could feel some firm muscles starting to grow. Ozpin grunted and pointed his cane at the young farm boy.
"You're next line will be - 'Woah! You're right, Mr. Ozpin. I guess I am getting stronger!' Now."
Oscar dusted himself off and stood, looking quite happy."Woah! You're right, Mr. Ozpin. I guess I am getting stronger!" The young boy realized what he said and looked at the bespectacled man with puzzlement and awe. "Eh? How did you know?"
The Reincarnation Warrior shrugged and brought down his cane. "It matters not. Now, are you ready to resume your training?"
"Mhm!" Oscar replied with vigor. "I can see now why you chose this training method, Mr. Ozpin. Let's go a couple more rounds!"
"Hmph. If that's the case," Ozpin pushed back up his glasses to the bridge of his nose as a tinge of green began to surround and outline him. He dashed forward, looking more like a blur as he approached his student. He appeared behind him, his cane raised to strike him. "DOOOOOOOOODGE!"
Oscar yelped. He spun around and managed to block the cane mid-blow. This action earned him a quirked brow and an amused smirk from his teacher. Ozpin pulled back, before spinning around and jabbing Oscar by the chest, pushing him back.
Ozpin cocked back his unoccupied arm. He drew from his reserves and another green sphere the size of a ball formed in his palm. He grunted and threw it at Oscar, not screaming anything.
The young boy's eyes widened and rolled out of the way. He'd be even more surprised as Ozpin began to repeatedly barrage him with volleys of Aura Spheres. Oscar started dodging like there was no tomorrow as he did every possible action he could to avoid the attacks. Rolling, jumping, dashing, diving, hell, he even did a few front and back flips.
Unfortunately for him, he got struck by in the shoulder, and it all went downhill from there, his body getting struck multiple times. The force of the attack sending him crashing into a tree. Again.
From the sidelines, Qrow winced and hissed as he saw Oscar's body slide down. "Damn. Reminds me of our days in Beacon, huh Rae?"
The female Branwen flinched in remembrance and nodded. "I'm pretty sure that we've had it worse. After all, we had to endure Port, Oobleck, and most terrifying of all, Goodwitch."
Qrow grunted in agreement, shivering a bit as he called back to his days as a student. "True. We had to endure wrestling with Beowolves, dodging flaming potshots from a caffeinated madman, and the fucking owls!"
"Don't even remind of that!" cried out Raven, dread creeping up her face. "I already completely blocked that horrid experience and you just had to bring it back up!"
The drunk shrugged and took a large swig from his flask. "Hey. If I'm suffering from that, I might as well drag you down with me."
The siblings saw Ozpin approach them, having told Oscar to go rest for a few minutes before training resumes. The former headmaster sat down in front of the bonfire, looking at the roaring fire as he spoke.
"What is the status back at Vale?"
Qrow placed away his flask and faced his boss. " From what I've heard, they already got started in reconstruction. It shouldn't be too long until Vale's back up to its feet and is livable for everyone."
Ozpin nodded, yet did not look at his agent. "I see. Have you sent a message to James?"
"I can't get a hold of him for some reason. Best I could do was contact Father Anderson. He told me that they're handling things fine, and that there was a near-by abandoned lab from our location that used to belong to Millennium. He suggested we go scope it out, see if we can find anything worthwhile to use against them."
The bespectacled man said nothing and merely hummed in thought. He took a sip of water from his canteen and closed his eyes to concentrate. Raven stood up and asked the man a question.
"What's our next course of action, Oz?"
He opened his eyes and gave his answer. "I suppose we can take some time off our hands to inspect that facility you've mentioned, Qrow. A quick detour before going back to Beacon isn't a bad thought. It's decided. The day after, we will look into that laboratory and then head for Beacon."
Merlot's Island Laboratory
The two figures lay on the ground, completely dressed in stereotypical prison clothing. One male with silver hair. And one female with mint-green hair. Their wrists were bound behind their backs, their legs shackled to the floor.
They looked quite thin, but not to the point their bones would start showing. Another thing was that they were gagged and blindfolded.
Merlot walked up to the jail cell and unlocked the doors, flanked by two of his drones, with Doktor trailing behind. He stared down at the capture fugitives with a smirk and motioned for his drones to unshackle them.
"Bring them to the rehabilitation chamber." he ordered to his drones. They did as they were told and roughly picked up the two fugitives and went to move them to said room. He then looked at the Doktor. "We'll first work on wiping out their memories, barring their experience and skills in combat."
"Ho~ And how will we do that?"
"Hypnosis. Along with that, I can suppress their minds if needed. Once that is done, we start with the conversion. Replace their organs if needed, start mechanizing their systems, replace their skins and skeletons with metal plating, then install the A.I. and obedience chips within them."
Doktor nodded in understanding. He and his comrade walked into the rehabilitation chamber, just in time to see the drones chain up Emerald and Mercury into the chairs, wherein a large, swirl pattern connected to a drill hovered above them.
Merlot grunted and snapped his fingers. A drone flew over to the unconscious fugitives, carrying a large bucket filled with water. The robot splashed the contents onto the two, making them gasp and thrash around, trying to breathe in their needed oxygen.
Restrains popped out from behind their necks and clasped tightly onto their throat, further preventing them from any sort of movements. They wanted to scream, but they couldn't. They were still gagged. The drones roughly grabbed their blindfolds and tore it off.
Merlot walked up to the computer and typed in a few command inputs, which activated the drills. The chairs Emerald and Mercury sat on leaned back, forcing them to look straight at the pattern. Once they saw it, the immediately attempted to close their eyes.
Most unfortunate for them, they could not. There were ghouls that stood at their side, applying pressure on to their pressure points, forcing them to keep their eyes open. The urge to scream and thrash around grew further by the second as the pattern drill began to get closer to them.
Doktor handed a voice enhancer to his fellow man of science as a couple of ghouls attached earpieces to Emerald and Mercury's ears. Meaning, they will hear nothing but Merlot and his voice. The rest then placed in ear plugs. The mad scientist grinned and began the process of hypnosis.
"Focus to nothing but my voice. Heed its every order, and every thing I say. Now, forget your past. Forget all of the good things that has happened to you. The memories you enjoy and cherish, erase them. Bury them deep. Revert your mind to that of an infant."
Slowly, Mercury and Emerald began to settle down, their eyes beginning to lull and lose focus. This made Merlot all the ecstatic. Progress was being made!
"But now, remember every abuse you've suffered, every pain that was inflicted onto you. Let it resurface and envelop your senses. The sorrow that you felt, the fear that coursed through you, the fury that made your blood boil. Cast aside all of the positive things in your body, and instead let the negativity."
Their eyes began to narrow down into a glare as their bodies struggled to thrash around, wanting to release the anger that was pent up inside them.
"Now, channel that anger into obedience. Channel that fear into loyalty. And channel that sorrow to fanatical devotion. All of them, direct it towards to me, Millennium, and most important of all, Salem, our dear mistress."
They began to calm down yet again, this time whatever smile they could muster whilst being gagged appeared on their faces. It was a similar smile to that of Tyrian's. Merlot and Doktor looked at each other, grinning. The process was a success.
"Now, when I reach to the count of three, you will fall into a deep sleep until the two of you are properly converted into the perfect soldiers." The mad man raised up his hand and began the counting. "One. Two. Three."
Once three fingers were raised, the ghouls released their holds on the two, their eyes closing and their entire body rigid and unmoving. Merlot removed the voice enhancer, very much satisfied with the result.
"It is done. Now all that is left is the conversion."
Doktor nodded, already putting on a pair of surgical gloves. "Indeed. If we work on this for about a week with only 10 minute breaks at each day, we will be quickly done." The Millennium Scientist pointed at a couple of drones and snapped his fingers. "Order us five meat lovers pizza, three pan cheese pizzas, a vegetarian pizza, and about a two dozens of coffee. Raus, raus!"
The drones nodded and moved to get the order done. Doktor looked at Merlot, who had changed into a proper outfit for doing surgery. The two mad men nodded at each other and walked to the operating tables, wherein the two unconscious teens were placed by some of the ghouls, having been also stripped of whatever they had on.
It was now time for surgery. Merlot picked up a scalpel and went to hover it over Mercury moving to make a vertical slit through his chest.
"Let us start by removing his organs."
"This is Morpho. Arriving shortly at the outskirts of Kuroyuri. You all best prepare yourselves for landing."
The five students, along with with Damien, arrived at their destination and slowly filed out of the helicopter. All six of them looked around and couldn't but let the sadness oozing out from the completely broken settlement affect them.
What was once a proud village filled with beauty and life, was left to be nothing but a dry husk of its former self. Wrecked buildings, broken roads, dead trees, and most unfortunate of all, a few skeletons along with swords and arrows impaled onto the pavement were little around. All there to display their failure to protect their home.
Ren clenched his fists in anger, remembering the beast that killed everyone and took away his home.
The usually zen male felt a hand on shoulder. He already had a sneaking suspicion whose it was. Ren placed his hand over Nora's, feeling a bit better at her attempt to comfort him. Sighing deeply, he looked towards the largest withered tree with a somber look.
"Time to face the music."
Ren started to walk, prompting his friends to follow him. They walked at a snail's pace, taking their time to arrive at the heart of the town. Jaune brought up his CODEC and initiated a call with Pyrrha and Damien.
{The two of you feel it too, don't you?}
{If by 'it', you mean this large presence of darkness that's prowling around this dead village, then yes.}replied Damien.{But if you are referring to the storm that is bottled up inside Ren, then I sense that as well.}
{It must be difficult for him.} voiced out Pyrrha, looking at her teammate with concern.{For years, he and Nora had not visited their home and have possibly never gotten the time to properly grieve and say goodbye to their parents.}
{Yes, you and I know it all too well, sister. But that's why friends exist, for them to help one other if ever needed. We are a shoulder to lean on, and a pillar of support to help him stand tall.}
{Well said.Let's just keep an eye out for whatever this dark presence is.}
The two redheads hummed in confirmation, and they cut the transmission. Ren stopped, taking notice of a small, tattered flag being blown around by the air. He reached up to the thing and managed to grab it. Looking at it, he saw it was the flag of the neighboring village, Shion.
"So, they didn't survive as well." he grimly thought.
As they were about to resume, Weiss took notice of something…black plastered on the floor. "What's that?" Whatever it was, it caught her interest.
The white-haired girl approached it with caution, Damien just behind. The two raised their eyebrows at what they saw.
"Hoof prints? Why would there be hoof prints here of all places?"
Damien knelt down and examined the print. He grazed his hand over the markings, his eyes closed in concentration. Suddenly, his eyes snapped open.
"Blood. And it's just a few days old. Whatever made it is still here."
Ren's blood ran cold at what he heard. Both fury and fear began to dominate his mind. Nora noticed her boyfriend trembling and immediately went to his side. She grabbed his hand and pulled him in for a hug, trying to comfort him.
"Renny! What's wrong?"
Though faint, she could hear what he silently whisper.
"It's still here."
Nora was completely confused by what Ren said. Before she could ask for an explanation, a terrifying roar breached everyone's hearing, causing them to cover their ears in reflex.
The ground began to tremble, accompanied by a loud thumping of foot steps. Once again, Jaune brought up his CODEC and contacted the Nikos siblings.
{The dark presence, it's approaching!}
{Could it possibly be a Grimm?} asked Damien. {What other reason would this presence have to come at us instead of some other direction. With the amount of negativity Ren is radiating, it would surely be attracted!}
{It matters not anymore. We need to tell the others.}
Jaune drew his weapons, immediately slipping into a stance. "Everyone, draw out your weapons and be on guard!"
They nodded and did as they were ordered. Except for Ren, who was still absorbed in reliving the nightmares that plagued him for years.
"I can't believe it! After all these years, that damned thing is still alive?!" He tightly clenched his hand before flicking it to the side, his face contorting into tranquil fury. "Whatever. I'll kill it before it comes to us."
The footsteps got louder and louder, the trembling getting stronger by the minute, until finally, it appeared.
It was a horse-like create with an equine main body and a skinless human-like shape fused with it. The forelegs were shaped likes claws, while the hind legs were standard hooves. The human-like creature had curved horns on its head, a mouth seemingly sewn shut, and two long elastic arms with two clawed fingers each. On the torso of the creature were boney spikes along the spines, accompanied by a variety of weapons embedded in it.
The thing roared yet again, forcing them to cover their ears to spare them of the terrible sounding screech. Weiss broke the silence among them to state the obvious question running through almost everyone's minds,
"What is that thing?"
Ren started walking up to it, his glare growing heated towards the towering figure. "That thing is a monster called the Nuckelavee. And the one that destroyed this village and killed my parents!"
As he finished his sentence, Ren started running up to the beast, hellbent on exacting revenge, his face now contorted into unbridled rage. The Nuckleave let out a lesser roar and its limbs elongated, rushing to hit Ren.
Ren's rage prevented him from seeing it, and therefore, wasn't able to dodge it. Damien reached out to Lie and activated his Semblance: Rapidity, a super speed Semblance similar to Ruby. The incubus ran off, becoming a blur as he ground to halt, grabbed Ren and took the hit for him, sending them crashing into a broken house.
The Nuckelavee turned its attention to the other four, making them take an involuntary step back. Jaune had a worried look as he tightly gripped his weapon.
"This isn't good."
Nora rolled her eyes, "Gee, ya think?" But she knew that she agreed with what her fearless leader said.
Now, what to do against an enemy they've never fought before?