Light broke through the darkness.
Cinder Fall opened her eyes. Frightened, she thought, for a moment, that she had dreamed everything but, when she realized that she was under Atlas, she couldn't hold back the tears, which burned with pain. She struggled to get up and walked swinging, sometimes she lost her balance and fell; she got up every time she tasted dust.
In her head the question 'how could this happen?' hammered every thought and prevented her from thinking rationally about what to do now that she had no power. She was weak. Before she was the strongest creature in the world and now she was just a very ordinary woman on the verge of collapse. She slipped. She fell for what was the fifth time.
"Fuck ... why did this happen to me? I was … I was the strongest."
She tried to hold back her tears but she was too weak to even do such a simple thing. She complained like a child and, looking up at the sky, begged Salem to come back to her. But no one would come for her. No one would have felt pity for a murderer.
Cinder got up and began to move frantically.
A little further on, she saw a man who was sitting on a pile of rubbish. That man, facing the setting sun, was James Ironwood. On the ground you could see his guns still tucked into their sheaths, they were abandoned there as if they had been thrown.
When Cinder recognized the figure of him she breathed a sigh of relief and said, in a faint voice:
"You …! Kill me …!"
He turned around. His eyes were as dead as the fall. Seeing his enemy there made him neither hot nor cold. He turned away.
"Don't ignore me …! Kill me! I'm your ... enemy! Kill me! KILL ME!" she screamed crying.
He turned back to her. Same reaction. This time, however, he didn't remain silent and said in a low voice:
"Take the gun and shoot yourself. It doesn't matter anymore."
Those cold words struck Cinder in her pride.
"NO! I refuse it…! After all I've done… I can't die like this…! Kill me …! You have to kill me!"
He sighed. He stood up, picked up the gun reluctantly, and pulled the trigger. Nothing. He pressed it again. Nothing. He pulled the trigger four more times. No bullets went off. He threw the gun at Cinder's feet.
"Are you happy now? Go away. I don't have time for you." He sat down again.
"And where …? Where should I go? I have nothing left ..."
"Not my problem."
"But you can give me a worthy death ... you can end my life, right?"
"I've no respect for you. I've no reason to preserve your dignity."
"I killed Penny! I killed that robotic bitch!" Cinder cried desperately.
"It doesn't matter."
"Son of …!"
Cinder was about to throw a stone at him but she lost her balance and fell to the ground. Furious but saddened, she got up using all the strength she had in her body and she decided to abandon that man. But before she left she was struck by a sudden compassion for James, perhaps derived from a strong sense of guilt ... or from the consciousness of being weaker. Before leaving, the woman, spoke these words:
"When I took away the powers of the Winter Maiden ... I talked to her. She told me to tell you something important ..." She turned to him. "Penny forgives you."
Initially it seemed that the man had completely ignored those words; but after a few seconds the first silent moans were heard. Ironwood had bowed his head and put his hands to his visage to hide his tear-wet face.
For no reason she approached the man and placed a hand on his shoulder to reassure him.
"She was happy. She's now in a better place. Be happy with this. Penny will never have to endure the ugliness of this terrible and corrupt world."
He removed his hands from his face thus exhibiting those tears that shone in the sun.
"This is all unfair… I just wanted to protect the world… and I hurt my friends. Why did I become like this?"
"We all have to make choices. I too have made choices that have made people unhappy ... that's the way the world goes. Everyone wants to realize their own idea of utopia ..."
"You were helping a person who wants to destroy everything."
"To create a better world."
"Nonsense." Ironwood stood up. "The fact that you stand up for someone like Salem makes me sick to my stomach!"
"And you? Do you think Ozpin is a good candidate? Look where you are! You are in a landfill rotting with the garbage!"
"And where do you think you are?!" Ironwood exclaimed.
At that moment something clicked. They both realized that they had always followed Ozpin and Salem, that they had given their leaders everything and that they had done everything necessary to help them; both had demonized their adversaries; both had believed blindly in their words. In the end, however, nothing mattered. Both were in a landfill.
Refusals of an endless war.
Ironwood didn't add another word. He took the belt with the sheaths. He tied it up. He took his weapons and sheathed them and set out.
"Where are you going?" Cinder asked.
"Somewhere else. Everywhere." He paused. "Wherever my heart takes me."
"And what am I supposed to do?"
"What you want. By now we are both rubbish ... why fool yourself into being necessary? Take advantage of the opportunity to find yourself. I recommend it."
Cinder turned her gaze one last time to Atlas. One last time she called Salem in a low voice, expecting to be saved. A pained smile appeared on Cinder's face. She put the hand on her chest and murmured:
"You were right… Penny… all this time… Salem just manipulated me. She had used me as an object of hers … she owned me and I… I…" she sighed bitterly. "I accepted to be treated like this. But what else could I do? I had no one else but her ... she was my world. Yet ... and yet!" She screamed. "Yet you have forsaken me, Salem! Why?! Why? Why? I know why. You never loved me. I've always been, for you, a fragile girl to be manipulated freely. And I, like a moron, would've accepted it if you had at least loved me as a mother loves her daughter!" Her voice dropped. "But I was just daydreaming. I was living in a fairytale ... just a fairytale that I told myself to stop crying." She paused. "Never again. Never again! I swear by that little girl who suffered hell throughout her childhood: I will consecrate my freedom with your death, Salem! YES!" She, then, shouted: "Matricide will be my baptism!"
The woman, then, turned her back to Atlas and Mantle and followed James Ironwood.
Two souls without a home, weighed down by unmentionable sins, thus walked towards the sunset in search of a new life.
TO YOU READERS
Is this the end of the fanfiction?
No, far be it from me to want to end this story so prematurely. I wish to carry on the story but this time in another kingdom. I was thinking about Vacuo. But why do such a thing?
First of all I loved seeing the reviews under the story I had written. All. Every single review has given me the determination to keep writing and for that I would like to thank with my heart the people who have taken their precious time to read my work. But there is another reason that pushes me to want to continue writing; this is more related to how I have perceived the whole fanfiction so far.
Now I explain:
I've always considered 'A tale about a man' as a kind of 'rewrite' of Volume 8, an attempt to correct what I did not like. This time I want to build a new story.
I anticipate: No. I don't consider RWBY writers to be bad writers.
I've personally seen worse. The problem is that they don't seem to care about the characters they write. RWBY characters, especially the lead ones, have always been props rather than characters. They are completely passive towards the environment around them and, like chameleons, they adapt automatically without ever reacting in a way that you could define as 'personal'. A character must react in a way that cannot simply adapt to the surrounding environment and change their modus operandi just because the story asks for it.
Pretend it's like DnD. There is a story, which is like a flow that goes on, and then there are the characters who have to react to what happens in the story. Each character must act in a manner consistent with their nature and must be able to evolve. Of course the story may require the characters to make important choices but the choices have to reflect with the characters, that's all.
I know mine may seem prima facie an act of boldness towards CRWBY but far be it from me wanting to shovel shit on other people, also because I don't think I've done a perfect job with this story. I am not in a position to say whether I did a good job or not. This is the reader's duty. It is the reader who has the right to judge. I can only say that I know I have made some writing mistakes, I know I have not written a masterpiece, and I know that I certainly could have written some characters better. I am, however, proud to have tried.
I am proud but above all grateful. Grateful to you who took your time to read this fanfiction.
Thank you very much, if I could I would hug you all.
YKIR