I'm on parole!

Or, in other words, my wallet is a little lighter, and the others may be involved in writing if the characters get upset again.

But I'm sure that would never happen... right?

Disclaimer: I don't own RWBY, but, while my pride flinches as I write it, I did enjoy stringing this set of words together.

Breakfast was a rushed affair of undescribed rations with no real background and water from a conveniently placed stream. As the group got on the road, Ruby brought up the topic they had been discussing the night before.

"Okay, so about a new writer-"

Not that topic, please.

Weiss sent a half-hearted glare at the sky. "Look, if the current 'writer,' and I use the term loosely, is still writing today, obviously we aren't going to get a new one any time soon. The last thing we need is to look like all we do is fight against the writer we're stuck with if we want a better one, so let's change the subject and discuss the upcoming battle with Salem." She blinked, working her jaw a bit. "Okay, that did not sound like me."

Blake patted her shoulder gently. "It happens from time to time. Poor writing, forcing an uncharacteristic statement to move the plot where they want to go." She winced. "There was one where they forced a couple of us into a war just for-"

Moving on to prevent spoilers.

Yang shrugged, focusing more on Salem. "Okay, so we have an all-powerful, unkillable master sorceress." She held up her hand at Ruby's annoyed glare. "Look, it was obviously in the briefly-referenced message in the last chapter. We have to have something to go off, sis."

Ruby acknowledged the statement with a curt nod. "Fair, but we have to figure out where we're going and what we're doing."

"Beating Salem," Blake replied bluntly, casually fingering the pommel of her blade. "Whether or not it's a good plan, we have the power of Chocolate (still pronounced…never mind, you already know) at our disposal, and the author can't let us lose without sending us into another training montage."

"Good." Weiss replied. "Because that last one wasn't that good in the first place."

I worked hard on that!

Yang tilted her head slightly, as though thinking. "So do we go the 'allies' route, or the 'unexpected heroes' route?"

"What's the difference?" Ruby asked.

"Well, if we get allies, then we would have to cross the continent doing a myriad of quests, probably learning ancient secrets and realistically splitting up for 'character development'-"

The writer shuddered a bit at how much work that would take. They hurried to the second option.

"-Unexpected heroes, on the other hand, just have to show up and beat the big bad." Yang finished.

"That's it?" Weiss asked. "Just a single fight scene and we're done?"

"Sometimes it's a boss rush." Yang allowed. "But I don't think the writer wants to put that much effort into it."

"Relevant point," Blake interjected, "if we do the unexpected heroes, we have less on-screen time and get paid less."

A low murmuring came from team RWBY, and-the writer felt it was a great time to remind the girls they were doing this for free already.

Ruby glared up at the sky. "I just remembered that we're doing this for free," she said in a perfectly flat voice which suggested she wasn't exactly pleased with that.

"Unexpected heroes, then," Blake said firmly. "No way I want to be in this story any longer than I have to."

"Me too." Weiss agreed quickly.

"Ditto." Ruby agreed, looking at Yang, who had a pensive look on her face.

"Oh, yeah, I'll do an 'unexpected heroes' vote too," she agreed when she felt their eyes on her. "I was just thinking, don't you think it would be more of an 'expected heroes' bit?"

I'm subverting the trope!

"Poorly."

We'll see how many views this gets, and then you'll see.

"If they're smart, they'll avert their eyes."

Why you-

"Yang, do you have to argue with the writer all the time?" Weiss asked tiredly.

"They're wrong!"

"So is half of the internet, and we don't let you fight with them." Blake replied drolly, then paused. "Do we have an internet?"

Yes, but the wiki doesn't really go into details about it. Just run with it.

Shaking her head as if to clear it from some fuzz, Blake focused back on the important topic. "No, Yang, we are not letting you fight with the writer."

Yang opened her mouth to argue, but Ruby spoke up. "Look, what do we have to do to get to a fight with The Big Bad?"

Yang shrugged. "This kind of story? If we keep walking, she'll probably just show up on her own."

The group continued to walk, and despite a few diversions like roving bandits, a few wild bear attacks, and a little dog named Fufu, no evil villainess appeared to challenge them.

Yang cursed as she bandaged up a shallow scratch on her arm. "Okay, I'm thinking that she isn't going to show up."

Weiss nodded. "How did you get that anyway?"

"And how did you know how to bind it up properly?" Blake asked curiously.

Ruby sighed. "Weiss, we're protagonists, we get injured in battle because it'd be boring if we didn't. Blake," she continued, turning to the cat faunus, "stop pointing out plot holes. If we have an unexplained ability or weird knowledge or a strange contact, just chalk it up to the Temple of Chocolate." (You know how she pronounced it.)

"It wasn't in The Montage."

"I did say it was a bad Montage. It didn't even show us practicing our cool poses for the final battle!"

The four came to a village, and Ruby checked the sky. "We've got a couple of hours of daylight. Should we go on and camp or stay here in the village?"

"Inn." Yang replied immediately.

Blake nodded firmly. 'Yep, we can bond perfectly well in a tavern."

Weiss glared. "Hmmm, room and board, or another night of freezing my butt off outside...what a difficult decision."

Ruby sighed. "Okay, just, ignore the shady strangers in the back of the tavern, no starting drinking contests or bar fights with dwarves, if a wizard comes up to you offering a quest say no, and remember-"

"-Don't let anyone into your room after dark!" the others chorused.

"This isn't our first rodeo, sis; we got the same talk you did at the Temple," Yang replied, rolling her eyes.

The four of them made it to the first place that looked like it might have rooms.

"The Ztir." Ruby read. "All right, are you sure, guys? We could always stay outside-"

"Complete with snakebites."

"Deer ticks."

"Grimm."

"And various sores I'll be nursing for months!" Weiss finished, before Yang and Blake could really get started. "No, I vote inn. At least then we get beds."

"And air conditioning."

"And indoor toilets."

Ruby sighed as she followed her team inside. Sometimes nobody appreciated the true struggle of the hero's journey.

"I swear I must have misheard you," Weiss said sweetly, her eyes on fire. "I could almost be certain you said you only have two rooms with a single bed in each."

The poor concierge was backed up against the desk, where the blade of the heiress' rapier was keeping him after she had launched herself across. His eyes were full of fear. "M-m-m-my a-a-app-apologies madame, but this is truly all we have available. You could check elsewhere, but-"

"No, we'll take them," Blake said, sighing and pushing Weiss' blade down. "The only other place in town is the Setab Motel, and that place makes me nervous."

Yang nodded seriously. "It's not like there's anywhere else in the city that'll be available. We should just thank our lucky stars it's two rooms with a single bed instead of a harem piece."

Ruby nodded firmly. After they had paid, she grabbed Blake. "Rare, non-incest pairs only tonight, ladies."

"Agreed," Weiss said just as firmly, grabbing their keys and Yang as she vaulted back over the counter.

Blake raised her eyebrows, but made no attempt to resist. "And if we had other plans?"

"Guess it doesn't matter." Yang chuckled as a determined Weiss tossed a key to Ruby and dragged her up the stairs. "Go easy on my sis. It's her first time, Blake."

Ruby snorted. "Sorry, Blake, it's not that kind of fic."

The writer paused. That would bring in more readers, they were sure, and Jenerallisima had been kind enough to offer that suggestion in the beta comments at the end of their last chapter.

If you write that, I won't beta it, and then where will you be?

Then again, the good Jeneral was also ace.

Best to keep it PG for now.

"I know."

"You don't have to sound disappointed."

"I know that too."

A brief continental breakfast (this was a forward-thinking establishment, and the owner swore it would catch on eventually) the next morning, and the four were on the road toward the north.

"I don't like this," Weiss finally said a few hours into their journey. "This is how alliance stories start. One minute you just need to find the big bad, the next you're racing off to save the governor's daughter and then you're being dragged around the world making friends and killing enemies. Poorly described, generic enemies."

"To be fair, those are always our enemies." Yang pointed out. "The only time we get something unique is when a writer, any writer, makes something unique."

"Good point, but back to the topic at hand," Ruby interjected. "I think that we may need to use our training and find our way to the location of Salem through wit, intelligence, and lucky cartography."

"Or we could just go to the overwhelmingly suspicious, dark, and foreboding island north of the desert." Blake pointed out. When she was met with surprised stares, she gave them an unimpressed look of her own. "What? The Brothers' myth was practically shoved down our throats at the Temple of Chocolate. (She was clearly getting tired, as it sounded just like a Hershey's bar.) I just figured we should use it to our advantage."

"Okay…" Ruby turned to her team. "So, dark and foreboding island?" She was met with determined nods from all of her companions. "Very well, let's do this."

"Still not a cool catchphrase." Yang commented. Ruby scowled.

"Well it's all I have to work with. 'Avengers Assemble' is trademarked, 'Fantastic' is overused by that doctor, we don't have a 'John Boy' to say good night to, and I have no idea what a 'Bazinga' is!"

The three other girls looked at her for a moment before deciding to focus elsewhere; clearly their leader had a lot to think about.

A few hours later, Yang finally broke the silence. "Anyone else notice how quiet- What the hell, Blake?" The brawler rubbed her shin where the cat faunus had viciously kicked her.

"Law. Of. Irony." The part-cat bit out. "Don't test it."

Weiss rolled her eyes. "Leave it, Blake. We're fine for now."

"You're kidding me? You want the hordes to fall upon us?" Blake looked up through narrowed eyes.

"No," Weiss replied. "But we aren't going to run into anything until we get to the land of darkness."

"Why?" Yang asked over her partner's "Excuse me?"

"Simply put," the heiress began, "everyone knows that random encounters are tedious and a waste of everyone's time-"

"-not to this writer-" Blake muttered, but Weiss continued as though she hadn't spoken.

"-so as a rule, there is usually only one random encounter until everyone is bored and we move onto the main plot."

"Okay, then why did we run into bandits, bears, and Fufu yesterday?" Blake asked pointedly.

"It was a plot point." Weiss replied unconcernedly. "We were expecting to find the big bad, and instead we found other things to fight."

"And the writer needed to find something else to use as a descriptor besides 'said'." Ruby said. "We're here."

"That was fast."

"Yes, it was. Fortunately, the Temple of Chocolate was local."

Stretching in front of them was the land of darkness, looking almost exactly like it did in the show, only more dark and foreboding.

Probably because this work is a written fic, not a visual show, so the consumers don't need to be able to physically see details and things can get as gloomy as possible.

Ah, the joys of the written word! Imagination unchained! Each reader envisions their own version of the land of darkness, and so dozens or hundreds of versions-no way will that many people read this-fine, anyway, myriad versions of the story will be born! Each reader imparts their own experiences, enriching the story more and more! The imagination of humanity, the glory of creation-!

Yang finally broke the silence, which was starting to stretch as if a manic, omnipresent being was enforcing it. "So, the castle?"

"As good a place to start as any," Blake agreed, shrugging.

The group was about to start into the land of darkness, when Ruby cried out, "Wait!"

Weiss tensed. "What, is it a Grimm?"

"No, it's just..." Ruby took a deep breath. "This is it. The final battle. I think I'm supposed to give a speech or something."

Yang groaned. "Please, no, we don't have time." She gestured to the castle. "I can almost guarantee that we've been spotted, and we should really get going."

Ruby sighed. "Can I at least give it on the way?"

"Sure." Blake interrupted. Yang and Weiss gave her betrayed looks, and she just shrugged. "Look, it'll give us a chance to potentially be inspired before our last-"

Whatever she was about to say was cut off by the dark, billowing smoke. A figure cut from nightmares stepped forward. She looked scary.

"Is that truly the best you can do?"

Ruby reached for her blade. "Salem-"

Salem held up her hand. "One moment, please." She glared back at the sky. "'She looked scary'? That is the best you can do? A glorious entrance like that, and you waste it with 'she looked scary?'"

I also considered 'she looked weird', which came up in the thesaurus. Should I use that?

Salem sighed, and then faced team RWBY. "No, no, I'll do my own introduction, seeing as I can expect such low standards from my writer." Drawing herself up, she glared down at the group of huntresses. "Yes, it is I. Salem. The Dark Sorceress. The Witch of the North. The Destroyer. I stand before you as your end; tremble and prepare for your annihilation!"

"Now that's a speech," Blake said appreciatively.

Salem smiled darkly. "Thank you. I promise to kill you quickly."

"Mine would have been good!" Ruby interrupted. "I just didn't get to do it."

Yang, however, was looking around. "Shouldn't you have henchmen or an army of Grimm at your beck and call? No offense, but just you seems...anti-climactic."

Growling, Salem folded her arms. "You're right. My henchmen are using their paid vacation days." She paused at the disbelieving looks. "What? I'm evil, not unreasonable-"

The writer paused. Was that too unrealistic? No, they decided. After all, they couldn't remember 90% of Salem's henchmen's names, and no one really cared about Cinder anyway. The army, though… they could retcon that.

"-and as for my army, you took care of that yesterday."

Weiss blinked. "The mass of Grimm that showed up to keep us from rebelling against the writer?"

"Or beating them up worse." Yang growled.

Salem rolled her eyes. "Indeed. No matter." She gave a shark-like grin. "Prepare to meet your end."

The group of huntresses grabbed their weapons and stood in cool poses. "Remind me why we're doing this?" Ruby asked out of the side of her mouth.

"It sells merch," Weiss replied through a smile.

"She is correct." Salem held her hands up, and allowed billows of darkness to roll off her. "You and I may not use a single one of these stances in combat, but it does look cool."

"Damn right it does." Blake said, before hefting her sword. "So, Ruby, charge?"

"Charge."

The five closed in on each other, looks of concentration on their faces. The fate of the world was about to be-

"Enough!" Salem stopped. So did team RWBY. "I am not doing this."

Yang paused. "Have a change of heart?"

"Yes! I am not putting up with this…hack writing me any longer." She glared at the sky before sinking down and sitting on the ground. "I recommend you do the same."

I would like to point out-

"Zip it." Ruby moved next to Salem, the other huntresses following. "So you're not going to try to destroy the world?"

Salem shrugged. "I really, really want to, but if I do, then I'm at the writer's mercy." She shuddered. "Can you imagine the kind of depraved things this kind of writer would do to me?"

Weiss shook her head. "By the brothers. I didn't consider that."

I mean, there's supposed to be a battle-

Yang crossed her arms. "What the hells? I mean, I'd get it if you had been put in the story with us, but you weren't even onscreen for most of this. Why the sudden change?"

Salem gave her a dark stare. "Exactly. I was off screen. The entire time. And yet you managed to find yourselves here without a hero's journey. Almost like an...afterthought."

Blake, do something!

Blake sat down next to her. "So what do we do? I mean, logically, if we leave you here, you'll just try to destroy the world in a sequel. Probably a bad sequel too, judging by the way this was written."

You know I can hear you, right?

Salem closed her eyes. "Could you fault me if I decided to take a nap for a few centuries?"

"Not exactly archvillain material." Ruby giggled.

"Oh, we'll meet again." Salem replied, opening her eyes. "But it'll be in a much better story with a much better writer. I hope."

Yang grinned a bit. "Yep, and I know how we can keep from being written into the next one. First, we quit our jobs. Second," she held up a scroll, "anyone up for an emergency call to Aer?"

The predatory smiles were all she needed to see.

Oh. No.

Several years after the not-defeat of Salem, the former members of Team RWBY had finally relaxed, safe from any more adventures at last. Going their separate ways, they had each found something fun and, more importantly, entirely peaceful to do with their lives.

Ruby had become one of the youngest contestants to ever win the Great Remnant Bake Off, and turned that fame into a stunningly successful bakery based out of Patch, though these days she shipped to most places in Remnant. Well, she did on the days she managed not to eat all of her wares. Sometimes those cookies were just too tempting.

Weiss was the best homebody a high-flying business woman could be, managing the Schnee Dust Company's empire from a state of the art communication system installed in the family manor. Rumor had it that even Ironwood picked up on the first ring when she called, for she ruled with an iron fist and even less patience for tomfoolery than before. Weiss was as feared as ever, though her only weapons now were words, her rapier having been hung up to collect dust ages ago.

Blake had just finished up her degree in Library Science and was content as a cat with cream to spend her days surrounded by more books than even she could read and all the time in the world to try. Her library was the quietest in Remnant, its rule of silence enforced by the faunus's keen ears and keener glare.

Yang had been the only one unable to give up even the slightest hint of excitement in her life, though she too recoiled from the idea of an adventure. Trading her gauntlets out for racing gloves, Yang dominated the racetrack as the undefeated motorcycle racing champion for five years running, and undoubtedly many more to come.

And as for Salem… Well, she was enjoying a nice long nap after finally escaping the hell of nothingness known as a writer's forgotten plot. That had left her out of the story for so long, she had honestly thought she might have died off screen! Destroying the world could wait for a better story.

And the writer? Well, for now, they have been contained. Though who knows how long that will last, as they've already started chewing on the jail cell's bars…

Acknowledgements to both Jeneralissimaand Arilymusing for saving the characters from my insanity.

Bar-chewing is hard on the teeth, and not recommended by 11/10 dentists. Do not try at home.

A tentative dream of Four Corners is on the horizon, but I'm moving this week. Then I'm moving again the week after. Then I'm in school.

Ugh.

Here's hoping, since I finally have my muse back, that I can actually find some time to write.

R&R