BloodBorne Twin Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own Bloodborne or RWBY. The former is owned by FromSoftware and the later is owned by Rooster Teeth.

The night was nearing its end. The Good Hunter felt it from the very start as soon as she woke up to the sight of a burning manor. The Plain Doll, as usual, stood in the same spot, never caring to look at the burning inferno that raged behind her. With curiosity showing behind her hooded kabuki mask, the good hunter walked up to the Doll for information. She simply wanted to know whether or not the feeling she was having was right.

"Good hunter, you have come," said the Plain Doll, "Dawn will soon break... This night, and this dream, will end. Gehrman awaits you, at the foot of the great tree." She points her white wooden finger towards the path to the gate as she says it, "Go on, good hunter..."

"I see, thank you," said the Good Hunter, so her feeling was right, everything is going to end for good, and she will soon be free of this curse.

She strode through the gate with purpose, but she halted within ten feet beyond the gate to look at the new scenery that was now all around her. She was treated to a graveyard covered in white flowers. Her eyes widened with surprise and awe as she beheld the beautiful scene. Even as the manor burned behind the gate, it only made the scenery all the more beautiful. Perhaps master Gehrman tended this place in honor of his lover of yore, Maria, or perhaps to honor the countless hunters that came through here. She may never know, but she did remember one thing; she had seen these flowers before back in the Astral Clocktower. But she mustn't be sidetracked, she was summoned by him after all, and patience wouldn't exactly be a virtue at a time like this.

Through her mask's right eye slit due to the strands of hair covering her left eye slit she saw, past the field of flowers and under the great tree, sat Gehrman. He was in his wheelchair, waiting patiently for her. He must have known that she would be back at this hour and knew what he must do, but so did she. With determination coming back to her senses, she continued on through the field of gravestones and white flowers, and finally up the hill to the tree.

"Good hunter," said Gehrman, "you've done well. The night is near its end. Now, I will show you mercy. You will die, forget the dream, and awake under the morning sun. You will be freed...from this terrible hunter's dream..."

"Wait," she interrupted in a gentle but stern manner as she held her hand up to silence him, "Before I'm freed and returned permanently to the waking world, I wish to give you something as thanks."

He raised an eyebrow at this. "Hm? What is it?"

Never in all his life in the dream did a hunter ever give him a parting gift. He severed countless hunters from the dream as a way of gifting them freedom from the hunt, but not a single one had ever given him anything in turn. He never asked for one, nor did he need one. All he had ever done was guide them on the path of the hunt and then severed their connection when the night was over. So this caught his curiosity, what could this hunter possibly have in giving him back, even during a time like this?

She walked up to him with her hand reaching down onto a weapon that looked awfully familiar. She undid the straps to the weapon and pulled it off after she came close enough and knelt down for him to see. "For you," she said, and to his surprise, what she held in both hands was Lady Maria's favored weapon, Rakuyo. He was speechless, he reached out hesitantly with trembling hands, and once he had a good grip on Rakuyo, he held it firmly close to his chest.

He looked down at the weapon in silence. He remembered how he admired the elegance of its design and how it worked. Seeing this brought so many memories flooding back to his mind. To his youthful days as the first hunter and his time with his student Maria, but it also brought back the regrets he made long ago. Oh, if only he could get just one chance to change all that. If only he were brave enough to tell her those few simple words, but that was just wishful thinking. It was all too late for that.

Suddenly, tears began to escape out of his eyes and tried his hardest not to cry. "Oh... Maria."

The Hunter stood watching in silence, contemplating whether or not it was the right thing to do. She learned that these two had a history together as student and master, but she didn't know how close they really were.

"Tell me hunter," said Gehrman after he wiped away the tears with his sleeve, "where did you find this? What happened to Maria?"

She was hesitant about it, not because of what would happen if she told him she killed Maria, but because she didn't want to bring up all those horrible memories of the nightmare that she traversed through. No longer needing to keep stalling, she cleared her throat before she began her short story. "While I was hunting in the Cathedral Ward, I was taken by an unknown force to a wickedly different world, one full of hunters and beasts fighting each other into eternity. I soon learned that it was called the 'Hunter's Nightmare', a place where hunters, or perhaps anyone associated, go to when they become too drunk on blood to live, or by other means."

"This place made me curious. It made me wonder how this place existed. So I travelled, and eventually discovered a research hall, belonging to the Healing Church. It was... disturbing to say the least." In truth, it was worse than that. Even if she was making her story short, she still did not want to mention anything of what the members of the Church did to those patients. She could still see them vividly in her mind. Those lanky looking creatures with large, eyeless, pulsating heads. And the constant wails, their manic screams; they disturbed her more than any other encounter. At least she ended their suffering, as morbid as it may seem knowing her profession.

"After that," she continued, "it brought me to the Astral Clocktower, and that was where I met Lady Maria. I... had to kill her in order to go further."

"I see," he replied somberly.

There was a moment of silence between the two of them, a moment when a pang of guilt and anxiety began to grow within her for telling him what she had done. Just when she thought she was going to regret it, he surprised her with an answer of his own. "I'm still not sure how she died in the waking world, and neither should I want to know. But who you fought in that tower was simply her consciousness, and for that," suddenly, to your next surprise... he smiled. He gave you a genuine, sad smile. "...Thank you... for releasing her from her shackles. Her nightmare."

"I did what I had to," she said, "as for the Rakuyo, I found it down a well in a fishing hamlet I went to next, and from there I used it to kill the Orphan of Kos, and released him from the nightmare." (She did leave out one small detail about how she got the sword, but that's a story for another time)

When she mentioned a fishing hamlet though Gehrman shuddered at the memory of his crime. "Yes, I remember that place. I remember the atrocity we committed, all in the name of 'pursuing knowledge' they said. Looking back at it now... I'd say it was out of pure insanity."

"I used to have these sorts of dreams you know," he continued, "reminding me of my past deeds." He then smiles again, "but it seems I have you to thank for... for releasing me from my burden."

"I'm glad that I could help," she said as she gave a sad smile, but her expression then changed to that of a pleading look, "but I have a question, two if you do not mind."

He frowned, he looked to her in contemplation, and having impatience growing inside him. After a moment he decided to give her a little more time despite the dream about to die at any moment. "Go on."

"Firstly, what will happen to you now that this will end? And secondly... will I be able to remember my past once I wake up?"

That was somewhat of an interesting question coming from her, but why would she care about what happens to him? Either way, he answered back, "I will still be around, guiding hunters after you are gone. And as for your memories, you will lose everything that happened in the dream and on the hunter's night. The memories of those you have before the hunt will come back to you soon after, that I promise you."

"I see, it does sadden me that you won't be able to come with me; to live out the rest of your days in the waking world in peace. But I think I understand why you must stay. As for my memories, I'm glad I will soon remember my past in the end. Thank you."

He nodded, "So then," he said as he props the sword against the tree and slowly gets off his wheelchair, "are you ready?"

"Yes," she answered as she nodded.

She sat down on her knees facing the opposite direction. Gehrman grabbed the blade from his hip and swiftly connected the blade to the staff unfolding behind his back, creating a scythe. This was the Burial Blade, the first trick weapon made by Gehrman himself.

As Gehrman held the scythe blade to her neck, the Hunter remained still, her face virtually expressionless with her mask on, but underneath it was the expression of being at peace. This was her plan all along since the start of her career; to take the contract, fulfill her duty as a hunter and slay the source of the beastly scourge even without her memories of who she was. Although along the way, she discovered the true meaning of Paleblood, it did not deter her from her goal. She had no desire to transcend the hunt nor did she want to ascend as a Great One. Home was her ultimate goal, it was what drove her, it was what kept her sane after everything this horrible world threw at her. In the end, she finally found a way and took it, and now she would finally go back home; to be with a sister she could not remember but only in a picture inside her silver locket which hung by a chain around her neck.

But unbeknownst to her, something... or someone, had already known who she was, her plan and her current plight. It also knew where she truly came from, and had decided to fulfill her wish in their own way.

"Farewell, my keen hunter." He pulled back the scythe to make ready. "Fear the blood." And with that said, he swung the scythe down to her neck but... it didn't happen the way Gehrman expected it to do countless times.

When the scythe was to cut through the flesh and bone of her neck it only went through air. The supposed to be sacrificed that was once the Good Hunter was now a ghostly outline of arcane energy that dissipated after the scythe went through the neck portion of the outline. This incident has left the feeling of an unfinished ritual, and a dumbfounded Gehrman.

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Here sat the hunter, fast asleep against the base of a tree in the middle of the woods. Dusk had already started as the suns rays shined down sideways, only to be blocked mostly by the natural canopy of leaves. A gentle breeze went swaying the leaves to make more or less cracks in the natural roof to let the suns light shine through. It gave off a somewhat of a mystical atmosphere, even as the setting sun had begun to make the forest grow dark. All throughout the forest a symphony of sounds could be heard, from the chirping of birds to the creaking of bugs and the scuffle of small critters. Although this was also a home to the soulless creatures of Grimm, nature simply went on as usual. As soon as the gentle wind died down, the Hunter began to stir.

She opened her eyes, but her vision was dark and blurry at first. After blinking a few times, she realized she was still wearing her familiar Kabuki mask, which felt odd. After that little discovery, she steadily got up, took a stretch, and surveyed her surroundings.

"Where am I," she asked herself.

The first thought that came to mind to this dense and darkening forest was that she had appeared in the Forbidden Forest again. However, the vegetation was too green and healthy to be anywhere near the image of it, and there was no trail in sight. This place looked rather beautiful as far as she could tell.

'I wonder what the air smells like,' she wondered to herself as she lowered her hood and took off her mask. Once off, she took a deep breath through her nose and with her eyes closed. Sucking in the taste of that fresh, nature scented air, and for the first time in her long life... she never thought it would smell so good. There was no scent of blood, no stench of a rotting corpse, there was nothing wrong in the air that would relate to the Forbidden Forest. When she finally exhaled she went into a calm state of bliss until she breathed in more again and again. She believed that she would never get used to this feeling of peace, and for once it felt good.

But the peaceful moment ended when the bush to her left started shuffling. On instinctual reflex after plenty of accounts of being ambushed out of nowhere, she dropped her mask, and pulled out the Blade of Mercy and her hunter pistol from the folds of her hunter garb. She aimed the pistol at the shuffling bush. Some thoughts of how her weapons came into her possession had occurred to her, but for the moment she set it aside to stay focused on the coming battle. Of course, all that preparedness for a fight came for naught as, jumping out from the bushes came a little rabbit. It's fur was grey, its ears were large and long, and judging by its size she could estimate about six pounds.

And so its entrance made her situation... awkward.

'I got jumped by a rabbit, seriously?' She mentally berated herself as she lowered her weapons and shook her mask-less head, "I must be losing it."

After realizing it was a false alarm she looked at the weapons currently in her hands. How did she still have these weapons, and how did she still remember their functions? Getting even more curious, she put away her weapons and investigated what else she still had on her. She still had fourteen quicksilver bullets, three bone marrow ashes, four throwing knives, a hand lantern, the old hunter's bone somehow, two fire papers, two Molotov's, a flint lighter, Simon's Bowblade along with six quicksilver arrows, and a bag of twenty shining coins. Sadly, she didn't have any blood vials, of course she only used them in case of emergencies, and her small travel bag was gone.

'Maybe they were a byproduct of the dream? Of course, no wonder I was able to carry so many items.' Unfortunately it means that most of her tools were gone, but something else occurred to her. Why was she still able to remember all of these items? She then thought back, and to her horror she still remembered the hunt and the dream.

"How is this possible," she muttered in shock.

Gehrman did tell her that she will forget everything she went through. So why is she still remembering it all?

"Jasper!?"

The sound of a boy (very young by the sound of it) echoing throughout the woods broke her train of thought, and to her ears he sounded almost close by. She panicked, it felt too soon to be seen by people, and what if that boy sees her and runs back to a village full of people who hate outsiders being in their territory? Not wanting to take any chances, she could only think of one choice, hide.

She kneeled down to pick up her mask, but just when she was about to grab it, she was surprised to see the rabbit was at her feet without her noticing. Here was this cute and harmless little creature not being afraid of her at all. Perhaps it's tamed, and if the boy calling out the name came out as any indication, then this must be his pet rabbit, Jasper. Of course, that means if she tried to hide, the rabbit would either be making enough noise to lead the boy here or follow her around to reveal her position. She couldn't let either one happen, so she had another idea along with the first. She grabbed her mask, putting it back on as well as putting her hood back up, grabbed the rabbit (now named Jasper), and hid behind the tree she once laid against.

Once behind the tree, she continued to hear the boy calling out to Jasper while she continued to hold onto the rabbit, amazingly not making a sound. However, when she took a step back to adjust her position, she accidentally snapped a twig under her heeled boot, making her freeze up. The snap was loud enough that the boy also heard it, as evident by the sound of his gasp.

"Jasper?" The boy called out in excitement. She then could hear the shuffling quickly becoming louder, the boy was closing in on the location until the shuffling stopped. The boy called out to Jasper again with still no response back from the rabbit. What was surprising to the Hunter was that Jasper the rabbit still didn't make any noise. He didn't even make so much as a struggle while holding on to him. She wondered if she had done something wrong to him, but when she looked down the rabbit was just fine. She was holding him in her arms firmly but other than that he was fine.

After a moment of waiting for the boy to leave, the unexpected happened. She heard the boy...sniffling?

"Jasper," said the boy albeit somewhat weakly, "where are you? Why aren't you coming back?" Then the boy cried, followed by a thud. As he continued to cry the hunter was feeling conflicted whether or not she should give the rabbit back. As much as she felt sorry for the boy losing his rabbit, she still couldn't bring herself to show herself and ask him for help. All she wanted to do now was find her sister and family, and to finally live in peace without fear of anything coming after her.

Well, it was easier said than done, she realized.

Truth be told, she had no idea where she was or which direction to go. Sooner or later, she would have no choice but to find someone for help. Being in Yharnam, however, taught her that no one would want to help a so called 'Outsider' as she was commonly referred to as. Try to convince herself as she might, she was totally and utterly lost without help.

In her moment of internal conflict, she was broken out of her train of thought by the faint sounds of grunts and soft whining squeaks loud enough for her to hear over the crying boy. Following the sound she looked down to see that it was coming from Jasper. Then an idea hit her. What if she were to give the rabbit back to him as a peace offering? That way, the boy would be more willing to give a good word for her so the locals would help her find her way home. It would be a risky gamble, but what better way to find help than by starting with him.

Taking the risk and gathering enough courage, she took a deep breath, then she slowly walked out from behind the tree.

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Author's Note: So here it is, the first chapter of my first FF story. So what do you guys think? Was it good, bad, terrible? Let me know what you think in the reviews, and if you have any questions about my story please leave me a PM.

Shoutout goes to DocHoliday0316 and CruxMDQ for the beta reading because you guys are awesome. Check out their stories if you're interested in what they've got cooked up.

Oh, before I forget, since many of you might be confused as to what the mask looks like, I'll tell you. It's one of the masks the Nobushi wear in For Honor.