Disclaimer: Dark themes ahead, this is your warning to turn back if you find dark material: offensive, distasteful, and/or triggering. You have been disclaimed and warned.

I don't own RWBY, only the OC(s).

Well Wishes

Chapter 1- Down the rabbit hole

The only thing keeping me from experiencing a fatal case of hypothermia is the fledgling fire in front of me. The weakly flickering flames are a mirror into my own state of mind. Staring deep into the flames and reflecting on the last hour since I woke up. I recall that after twenty or so minutes of calming myself down, I began gathering various twigs along with dry leaves and grass. The only thing keeping me from relapsing into another full on panic attack is the threat of hypothermia.

"If I recall correctly, two degrees of body heat is the difference between life and death without a proper shelter and treatment." The thought echoes in my mind as I slowly put another stick into the small pile of quickly burning fuel.

I resumed my playback and recalled about ten minutes ago when I found a lighter, my old lighter, on the ground where I woke up. I had backtracked and could see enough after my eyes had adjusted.

Coming back to reality, I found myself leaning a little too far forward for comfort and readjusted myself to lay down next to the fire. Staring up at the moon, I let out a small sigh and felt the urge to scream. Opting to clinch my hand hard enough for my nails to dig into skin, clinging desperately to the sting as I wished for nothing more than to wake back up in my bed.

Closing my eyes, I inhale and hold it in, listening to the absolute lack of nightlife and the rush of blood in my ears. I opened an eye to peek at the fire and that's when I saw it. Two pairs of glowing red eyes pierced the dark, not even twenty feet away, two formless black masses stalking me in the foliage. The whole thing was ironic, because despite knowing where I am, I forgot the most important thing about serving the big threats here. Emotion is probably the biggest killer in this world.

"Oh fuck me." I whispered as my mind raced to find a solution.

My first thought is to run, but I don't think I can outrun what is possibly a beowolf. My next idea is to fight, but there are two big problems with that. I cant fight for shit and depending on the size of the fuckeres, I may just get ripped apart before I can even raise an arm. I wasn't given the luxury of more time to think as one of the two darted towards my humble camp, startling me out of my stupor. Acting on something even deeper than instinct I reached my hand into the fire for the poking stick I was using and grabbed it, ignoring the slight pain I felt from the flames that licked the bottom of my hand, raising it up towards the charging hunter. My slightly fatigued mind is having a tough time keeping up with what my body is doing and trying to think of a way out of this encounter.

*snap* the thick piece of wood snapped and let out a startled gasp as something from a nightmare sailed across my vision.

Well missing most of the wolf, I did manage to hit it directly in its right side, sending its massive claws across the top of my left shoulder instead of my head. Unfortunately for me, the claw still hit.

Pain exploded across my left arm as I used my feet to frantically scoot away from the attackers. Sparing my left shoulder a quick glance and I felt my stomach churn as I saw what was probably bone and an unclean gash from two or three claws. Quickly standing, I looked back towards the beowolf that was readjusting itself in the darkness after missing my head when I heard the growl of the other one from my right and turned just in time to see the terrifying visage of the other wolf I forgot about and attempted to dive out of the way.

By the luck of whichever of the Two Brothers, I somehow was able to avoid the claws of my attacker this time. "This is it, run!" I thought, and so I did.

I ran, I picked the direction furthest from the two beowolfs and ran as fast and hard as I could. Every time I slammed a foot into the ground, I felt a pain flare up my left leg and arm. Despite this, and confirming my initial fears, I could hear the snarls of two very pissed off grimm not too far behind me. Not too keen on looking anywhere except ahead of me, I ignored everything my brain was screaming at me to do and just kept running.

It felt like hours, I knew better but it still felt like it, before I ran out of land to run on. I had come to a shallow rapid, I looked both up and down the river in search of a safer crossing before feeling a tremendous force smash into my back sending me and the beowolf into the rushing water. The last thing I saw before the world going black was the night sky, the moon and a spray of water.

Hazy fields of multicolored grain swayed back and forth, a glitch-like effect causing slight distortions every so often gave the whole view a rather new-aged 'old-age' look. It was very odd but… calming in some way, like… this is home or home away from home. A voice spoke softly but my attention was on a particular patch of the field as the vibrant neon blue of the grains changed into purple then green. I felt very relaxed. Then the world flashed and I woke up.

My eyes opened- eye opened? The shock of missing half of my vision was interrupted by the tremendous amount of pain that was wracking throughout my body. Looking around, I noted that I'm in a small bank where I imagine things get dumped every now and then. From the corner of my eye, I saw what looked to be a small bone knife or dagger. I made an attempt to stand up, that's when I noticed my right foot and it's oddly twisted position.

"Fuck me, what else is broken?" my voice quivered in a low tone as I checked myself over for injuries.

I counted three broken fingers (left thumb and both pinkies) and it looked like my right shoulder would need something done to it, oh and I think my right foot might be sprained. Holding back tears and curses, I hobbled my way to the knife and slowly dropped to a knee on my 'good' leg. Fighting back a cry as my ankle made a grinding sound, I reached down even further and grabbed the object with my only working arm. Looking over the knife as I slowly and painfully made my way to a nearby tree, I gleaned nothing of importance or any outstanding details due to the low light. Deciding to focus on more important tasks, I let the knife slide out of my hand and into the sandy dirt at my feet.

Propping my right shoulder against the tree, mentally preparing myself for the pain that will consume me in a moment, I took a single shallow breath and slammed the protruding part of my right shoulder into the tree. My vision blacked for a short moment and I could hear a fuzzy pop in my ears as I let out a cry of pain, hot tears streaking down my face.

After an agonizing, indeterminable amount of time passed, the pain finally subsided enough for rational thought to return.

"Oh thank fuck." I whispered out hoarsely as I flexed my right arm slowly, wincing from the pain.

Letting out a sigh of relief, I laid down slowly and looked up at the sky which had become cloudy enough to blot out the little light the broken moon offered. That's when a sound rang out, a ping. My vision of the dark night sky became obstructed by a shimmering black box. Unable to offer any form of response due to being so tired, adrenaline having long left me, I simply stared as the box filled up with words. My eyes grew heavy and before I could get the chance to read any of it, I embraced sleep for the first time in my new hell.

AN: Huh, so I don't have any excuse for the long delay other than life sucks. I honestly didn't expect this story to get even one person's attention, thank you very much for giving me a shot. Expect another chapter some time this week or early next week (of publishing). Take care everyone.