And the Writing block is over!
Now I just have to contend with the fact that moving is a pain, especially if your moving out of a lease, and have to clean the place top to bottom.
But that's almost done, amd then it's just the slow process of unpacking all of our stuff, which always surprised me how much stuff we actually have. But hey.
I have a feeling there will be a divide after this chapter, those who think I'm just being ridiculous at this point and those who don't, but before the reviews get spammed with how I 'ruined it' or made it too 'marysueish' or whatever, know that I had this in my head for a while, and since I couldn't decide, and my friends couldn't either, I consulted the best solution to my situation; a coin.
So before you judge this, just know that it was fate that did this, not me.
That being said, I hope you enjoy it anyways, I own nothing but this story, please RR, Your input is greatly appreciated.
"Hang on…" Cortana spoke up after the Monitor had left,
"What is it?" Chief asked his AI, everyone looking up at her avatar as she was Analyzing the console.
"There's someone in the pod." She told them, "It's Human,"
"You serious?" Yang asked,
"Yes, female, 27 years old, went into stasis about 12 years ago, she's quite wounded,"
"That's the same time I went missing." Ruby replied, "Wonder who it is."
"We should probably, go find out," Blake suggested, "She'll probably be disorientated after 12 years in that thing, give her some treatment too."
She was still lightheaded and nauseous when the pod opened, she shouldn't have come here, still recovering from her wounds, she just wanted to collapse to the floor, which is what she did, panting.
She guessed she was thankful the pod didn't shut and leave here to die in there, a little rest would get her on her feet again, then she could maybe find her way back to Vale.
"Easy there," a deep voice spoke up, she managed to tilt her head up to see a huge thing of Armour, did Atlas find her? But there was nobody around a moment ago, her head was so fuzzy from the blood loss, what happened?
"This will sting like hell, but it will stop the bleeding, he took a small canister out from a pocket and began spraying a foam onto her wounds. He wasn't kidding, it hurt like they were being made all over again, the burning sensation making her groan in pain despite her trying not to.
"Her vitals are stabilizing," another voice said, it sounded like her, which made her try to sit up and look around, but that just made it hurt even more.
"Easy," the first said again, "We mean you no harm."
"Then why is she here…" she managed, her head was becoming clearer now, as she managed to sit up, looking around her, there was a Faunus, another set of armour, a… thing, in silver armour, it didn't look like any sort of Grimm she had seen before, and a human girl, not much younger than she was.
Upon closer inspection, she reminded her of little
"Mom?" She asked.
"Wait, Mom?" Ruby looked at her sister, confused, before looking at the woman they had brought out of the stasis pod. She had shoulder-length brown hair, with red highlights, wearing a corset with white underdress and a torn-up white and red cloak. Dried blood caked her outfit and covered her face, but the eye that was open was unmistakably silver. "Are you saying that's Mom?" The Spartan asked again,
"I thought she was killed 12 years…" Blake began but died off as she realized what she was saying."
"Ok, what's going on?!" Summer Rose demanded, still clutching her chest and panting, "Where are you Salem?"
"Salem?" Cortana spoke, "Who's Salem?"
"Oh haha," Summer, "You think I forgot just because you beat me up, what, come to watch your minions finish the job properly?"
I think there's some sort of misunderstanding," Cortana spoke, as Chief pulled out the chip from his helmet, her avatar appeared as she spoke, "UNSC AI CTN 0452-9 designation Cortana at your service."
"Wait, you're not Salem?" Summer asked, confused, the foam had numbed the pain, but there was still the blood loss to contend with, she still couldn't think very clearly, those three had said something about a mom…
"You are still very Injured," Cortana warned, "The biofoam just plugged up the holes, you still lost a lot of blood.
"Hang on," Ruby said, scrolling through her tack pad, "Yes!" A box appeared in her arms, "Thank goodness the monitor on Reach is a competent one."
She set the hexagonal box on the ground and opened it up, and retrieved a bag of a red fluid. With a long taper towards a needle at the end. "I don't know how he managed to make these, but I'm not going to question it, we've got blood."
A few minutes later and proper bandages had been applied, and a blood transfusion made, as the woman out of her time began to start thinking clearly, still required to sit down and recover her strength, she watched as the monitor began fiddling with the pod.
"So could someone explain to me what's going on?" She asked the group, taking a nervous glance at the Arbiter. They all looked at each other before Yang spoke up,
"You're kinda… 12 years in the future," she told her step-mother, who looked at her with shock,
"How? I was in that pod for a few seconds."
"To your perspective, yes," Cortana spoke up, her chip now on the floor so she could be seen easier, "That pod can either slow down or speed up the passage of time for the individual it, your lucky it wasn't in the other configuration, otherwise, you would have starved and turned to dust in the span of a few seconds on the other side."
She shivered at that, before turning to Yang, "So, when you called me Mom…"
"Yeah," came her reply, "I'm Yang,"
"Now that I can think straight, yes… I can see it, you're the spitting image of your mother, aside from your hair of course." The elder sister looked at the ground at that note, but quickly shoved her thoughts away before changing the subject.
"Well, it's not only me here," she told her as she looked at Ruby, who took off her helmet, and smiled at her mother,
"Hey, Mom," she said slightly sheepishly, as Summer's eyes narrowed as she tried to figure out who Ruby was,
"R-Ruby?" She asked, to which the Spartan nodded,
"Yup, though a lot's happened."
"Well, I can tell that much, though Why do you have Atlas tech and Yang doesn't?"
"Oh no," Ruby quickly corrected, "Atlas wouldn't be able to make this for another century at least." Which only lead to more confusion,
Ruby sighed, "It's probably best to start from the beginning," The huntress nodded in acceptance.
"When your body wasn't found, a letter was sent home, with what little left that they could recover, so, bits of your cloak, and your badge," she only just noticed, as she said this, that it was, in fact, gone from the part of her cloak where it was usually pinned.
"Having just pestered Yang enough to Unlock my Aura, I couldn't accept you were gone, being a 4-year-old and not understanding that you were most likely dead."
"You got your Aura unlocked at 4?" Summer interrupted, "You must have been very determined."
"Yeah, well, what can I say," was the response, "Anyway, somehow, the monitor messing with the pod at the moment found me before any Grimm did, how, I still don't know, but because it is, for lack of better words, incompetent, it used the tech from the civilization that built this place to teleport me to a whole nother planet, where it turns out, another set of humans lived, as a space-faring civilization."
"How? Dust doesn't work in a vacuum."
"We don't use Dust," Cortana spoke up, "Dust, and Grimm, seem to be Remnant-exclusive properties, not to mention Faunus."
"So I was raised by a family on this planet, before it got invaded by a group of Aliens known as The Covenant," Ruby continued, "We had been at war with them for a while, and they were technologically superior in almost every way to some degree." Summer nodded, taking in the information, "So my new home was destroyed, and while I managed to make it out by a stroke of luck, my adoptive parents didn't."
"Oh…" Summer managed, simultaneously glad that it wasn't her, and angry at herself for not being able to be there for her daughter.
"The government had come up with a way to potentially be able to help with the war effort, and approached me, asking if I wanted to fight back, I responded with yes, so I was conscripted into what was known as the Spartan III program."
She continued to explain what happened to her with her time at the UNSC, much to her mother's horror, leaving out the particularly dark or gory times, as well as any classified information, seeing as they may have a way back to UNSC space, even with the portal network down for the planet.
After she had finished explaining how she had managed to come back, along with the Chief and Arbiter's arrival, with the statement, the war was won with the assistance of the Forerunners' tech, and a slipspace accident bringing them here, as well as the reason why she was only a few years behind her in an age now Summer, sat there, processing everything.
After several minutes, she looked up to Ruby, her eyes filled with sorrow and regret,
"I'm so sorry…" was all she managed, "You were my baby girl…" the pain was clear in her tone and face, "No-one should have to live through that."
"Well," Ruby began, not entirely sure how to deal with the situation, "I'm here now." It came out blunter than she intended, but Summer managed to crack a sorrowful chuckle.
"Yes, yes you are… And so am I."
It was at that moment the Monitor interrupted them, "Slipspace drive successfully disengaged." It said chirpily, "It has suffered minor damage from the Lekgolo, but it should still be functional."
"How far could we travel with it?" Arbiter asked the orb,
"How big of a vessel will it be employed?"
"Nothing too large, just over 100 meters or so."
"Then there will be enough energy to take you approximately 10 million lightyears," it replied.
"Thank you, Monitor," it gave a 'nod' in acceptance.
"If you no longer require my services, I shall continue to attend to this installation."
And with that, it flew off, its small engines giving if an almost perfectly quiet ringing sound as it went to the nearest maintenance shaft.
Ruby walked up to the large Forerunner machine that it had deposited next to the motley crew, and stored it her pocket dimension, before turning back to her mother.
"We should probably get going," She said, addressing everybody, "While we've applied bandages, that biofoam won't last long, if we leave now, we should be able to make it back with enough time to get you proper medical treatment. Not to mention I imagine Dad and Qrow would be pleased to see you."
The, only slightly, older one chuckled at that, "I imagine they would, I take it Raven…" she trailed off, and Ruby caught on,
"With the tribe still," she nodded, "I wouldn't be surprised if Ozpin had her exact location close to his chest, but I'd rather not have to use interrogation tactics if you wanted to see her,"
"No, it's fine…" she sighed, "I guess I hoped she'd have changed her mind."
As Summer used the wall to help herself up to her feet, Blake and Yang went to support her, her wounds and the effects of the pod still taking their toll. While the other 3 double-checked the room, mostly out of habit, before leading the way out.
"Speaking of Ozpin…" Summer spoke up as they walked, "I need to have a word with him."
"Oh?" Ruby looked over her shoulder to her mother.
"Yeah, He has some explaining to do." She said this with an angry determination, the kind that Yang had never seen on her mother's face, it felt wrong to her, only knowing her smiles.
After reaching outside, Ruby called the Bullhead again, before dismissing her armour to reduce weight. This allowed Summer, who was resting on a nearby tree trunk, to finally get a proper look at her daughter, looking over the scars from war, as part of her cried out over the fact that her little girl had been exposed to such things. It took a while but she managed to steel herself, realizing that what had happened was in the past, she was here now, and that's what mattered.
It didn't take long for the Bullhead to arrive, and the short journey back was mostly done in silence, with the major event being Ruby calling ahead to Ozpin to get a spot in the infirmary ready. As the Bullhead came to land, Ozpin, Glynda, and a nurse came to greet them, Ruby, Chief, and Arbiter coming out first as the others got together to ease Summer out.
"I take it aside from the injury, your trip was somewhat successful?" Glynda asked the group.
"You could say that," Ruby replied as Blake and Yang carried Summer out of the shuttle, much to the headmaster and combat instructor's surprise.
The nurse came to help them, and as Summer got carried passed the two, she just glared and told them, "We need a word." Before being carried off.
"How..?" Was all Ozpin managed, still reeling from the shock.
"The combination of a really incompetent monitor, her curiosity, and a Forerunner stasis pod." Cortana replied, "She has sustained quite a few injuries, and lost quite a bit of blood, before Ruby gave her a transfusion from a UNSC field kit."
"So she's…?"
"Still biologically 27," Ruby replied, "Same age as when she went missing."
"I see…"
"I take it Dad and Qrow are still here?"
"Yes, they will probably be wanting to see her." They followed the others into the infirmary, a lot of the people they passed, still alarmed by the sight of the two visitors, Arbiter especially. They paid them no heed, having either gotten these kinds of looks before, or were understanding in their reasons for it.
As they got into the Infirmary, Summer's bed could be seen, with her now in a set of scrubs, her clothes in a pile on a nearby chair. Her face had been cleaned up, so she could see out of both eyes again.
"12 years…" she muttered to them as they drew close, "Seems like yesterday I was graduating."
"Yes, well, things have been somewhat calmer since then," Glynda replied, not without a small amount of spite, and for that, she was rewarded with somewhat of a chuckle.
"Yes, we did get up to some crazy stuff didn't we?" The combat instructor and headmaster hummed in agreement.
"You said about having a word at the pad…" Ozpin began,
"Yes, I did." Her voice regaining strength at the change of subject, "Though I think we should wait for Qrow and Tai, they need to hear it too, I know Tai doesn't work for you anymore, but he should still hear it."
"You found something out about her?" Goodwitch, asked, her eyes widening slightly.
"Yes, I found things out about Salem, and before you go on about Ruby being here, she's my daughter, and I feel she deserves to know too." She had cut the other two off as they began at the mention of Salem, "Knowing you Oz, you will try and shoehorn her into helping you anyways soon enough, so she might as well find out now."
"Hang on, you mentioned Salem when we first found you, who is she?"
Ozpin sighed and stared at the floor for a moment, and just as he turned to answer the silver-eyed Spartan, when the door burst open with Yang barely holding back her dad and uncle.
"Calm down!" Yang yelled to both of them, "She's not going anywhere!"
They stumbled over to the only occupied bed before looking at their old friend,
"Hey guys, long time no see eh?" Summer smiled.
Qrow very nearly collapsed into a pile of tears of joy right there, Tai, wasn't far behind him either, as he smiled through the tears and just responded with one word.
"Yeah."