Warning: Character death and depictions of grief. Spoilers for Volume 8
A soft grunt. The silver-eyed girl awakens. "I'm...alive?" She sighs, unable to be comforted by that. "Blake? Weiss? Yang?" Alone.
"Where...am I?" She looks around. In the distance, Ruby sees a big tree. A strange landscape. She gets the feeling she's not in Remnant anymore. But she cannot dwell on that, as the memories of what happened come rushing back.
Everything was going so well. Ruby saved Penny. They had a plan to evacuate Mantle and Atlas. Penny would go to Vacuo with her, continuing to do wonders on her optimism. Continuing to give Ruby hope. Then...THEY showed up. Ruby clenches her fists at the very thought of them.
Neopolitan, Roman Torchwick's sidekick. Ruby has a feeling she knows why she hates her so much. And now, Ruby only feels rage. Was revenge worth it in the end? Ruby supposes Neo will have plenty of time to find out, if she's somewhere in this strange world. Right now, Ruby can say there is only one person she hates more.
"Why does she always have to follow me?!" Ruby growls, more to herself. Indeed, Cinder Fall has had an infuriating habit of turning up wherever she goes. Mistral? Cinder was there. Atlas? With just one glass chess piece and a few choice words from her master, Ironwood gave into his paranoia, she and her friends were on the run, and Ruby began to piece together the truth about her mother. And now? She didn't know who made it out. If Weiss and Blake managed to survive, or if they...Ruby shakes her head. "I guess if they fell like me, they can't be dead, right?"
In the distance, Ruby sees something. Someone. "Hello?" No response. "If you can hear me, just...just tell me." She gets closer. The person has red hair. All too familiar. Ruby gasps and runs. Closer and closer. The girl...the one Ruby would do anything to protect...to save.
"Penny?"
No response.
"Penny?!"
Ruby tries to feel for a heartbeat. The heartbeat she KNOWS is supposed to be there. She felt it when they hugged. She doesn't feel it now. Nothing.
"Penny...?" Her body feels cold. Too cold. No heartbeat. Ruby notices she's not breathing either. Her eyes widen in horror as she notices something. "A...stab wound...?"
Were it not for that, Penny would look like she was sleeping. But as painful images bombard her...the last two times she saw her corpse...how close she had come to watching the girl she was so in love with die again...only to see her now...It becomes too much for the poor girl.
"Penny..."
Ruby weeps.
Ruby bawls on the chest of what used to be Penny. The girl who deserved so much more. The girl who was more real—more human—than anyone Ruby knew. The girl Ruby had loved for so long. Gone. Ruby can't stop crying; calling her name again and again. Begging the gods or whoever would listen to let this be a dream. To have her wake up to Penny's voice. But she knows in her heart she would never get to wake up to something so wonderful again. She'd never hear her, "Salutations!" Or call anything, "Sensational!" Or say she and Ruby are, "Combat ready!" She's gone. She'll never come back. Ruby will never get to tell her how much she meant to her.
Ruby can only let out a howl in her despair.