Epilogue:
Once the cuffs were removed, Ruby and Glynda immediately began rubbing their wrists.
After spending almost two entire months shackled to the other without Aura to protect them, they shouldn't have been surprised to see so many bruises and marks decorating where the shackles used to be. It still caught them a touch off guard to see how many there were. Though the wounds began to vanish as their Auras reasserted themselves. Before the two knew it, all the bruises had faded away.
Lutch dropped the cuffs from large tweezers into a glass case before sealing the container. They doubted the cuffs could do anything now that they were removed from Ruby and Glynda, but they wanted to be absolutely sure nothing would go wrong.
"Let us know as soon as you two notice any side effects." Ran told the pair. "Who knows what else those things might have done to you two."
"If they could affect us in any other ways than just removing our Auras," Glynda began, glancing at the red-haired girl next to her before looking back at the scientists. "I'm sure we would have noticed by now."
"Just be sure to keep an eye out." Ran said as Lutch picked up the container. "Just in case."
"Um, hey…" Ruby muttered, getting the scientists' attention before she began twiddling her fingers behind her back. "Could we… Maybe… Keep a bit of those cuffs? You know, like… As a memento?"
"Ozpin wants us to study these." Lutch said. "Figure out more immediate ways to remove them, or if we can recreate their effects. We're going to need the entirety of them for that."
"… Oh…" Ruby said, trying to hide the disappointment in her voice as she looked away from them. "I see…"
With nothing else to discuss, the previously cuffed pair took their leave.
"Very subtle back there." Glynda whispered to the red-haired girl as the two exited the lab.
"Don't tell me you didn't want to keep them." Ruby whispered back. "I mean, they are the reason we started dating."
"Fair point." Glynda mumbled.
As the two began walking away, Ruby glanced around. The hallway was empty save for the two of them. As Glynda's left hand swung back, Ruby slipped her fingers around it. The teacher paused as Ruby lightly squeezed her hand.
"It feels…" Ruby began, looking down at their hands before turning back to Glynda. "Weird not being connected to you anymore."
"We'll get used to it." Glynda said, squeezing her girlfriend's hand back. "I mean, it took well over a week for us to get used to being attached."
"Yeah." Ruby nodded before her eyes lit up. "Oh, that reminds me. Do you mind giving me all those shirts I cut open? I want to try and fix them."
"I can just get new ones." Glynda waved at the idea. "You don't need to do that."
"But I want to." Ruby responded. "For my girlfriend."
Glynda's face lit up before she brought her hand up to Ruby's mouth. "Not so loud." The blonde said in a cross between a scream and a whisper. "Someone might hear you." Glynda glanced around the hall, confirming the two were alone before letting out a sigh. "Alright, but let's leave one of our shirts as it is." She sent the girl a playful smile. "As a memento."
"That's a great idea." Ruby nodded before the two began walking down the hall again.
As they approached a fork in the hall, the two turned to go to their rooms, before they felt a tug pull them back toward the other. The two turned to see they were still clasping the other's hand. Their cheeks warmed up before they sent a smile to the other.
"Are you… Doing anything next Saturday?" Ruby asked.
"I could be." Glynda answered. "If you want."
"I'll text you the details." Ruby said before glancing away from the woman. "As soon as I come up with them."
Glynda held back a giggle before their hands slipped apart. "Well, I'll… See you around…" Ruby said, a lack of certainty in her voice before she began scratching the back of her head. "How do you say 'bye' to your girlfriend?"
"'I love you.'" Glynda said.
"Oh-I-I love you, too." Ruby stammered, blushing before she and Glynda turned away from each other.
As the two walked in opposite directions for the first time in months, Glynda called out to the girl, "So am I bringing you all your stuff?"
"Oh right!" Ruby said before she turned to run after the woman.
Glynda had trouble sleeping at night.
It didn't matter which way she turned or how she laid her head on her pillow. Whether she was covered in her blankets or if she kicked a leg out. No matter what she did, sleep seemed to be avoiding her.
It wasn't that she wasn't tired. She might have been more of a night person, but she still enjoyed slumber and it was never this hard for her to get to sleep. None of her usual fixes for the issue seemed to work. She lost count of her sheep and had already read three additional chapters in her book. Why this was coming up now also pestered her mind. She didn't have this much trouble falling asleep when she was sharing her bed with Ruby.
… Oh…
Glynda let out a sigh, mentally slapping herself before she clicked her lamp on. She lifted her Scroll from the nightstand, wincing against the sudden blue light before she began typing her message to her girlfriend.
G: Are you having trouble sleeping?
She stared at her screen, listening to the seconds ticking by before her Scroll buzzed in her hands.
R: Yeah. I guess you are too?
G: Yes. My bed feels lonely without you.
Glynda's cheeks lit up, and she almost slapped herself for writing something so sappy. She could almost hear Ruby giggling at the message before she began typing her next one.
G: Come to my room.
Once the message was sent, Glynda got out of her bed and approached her dresser.
By the time she had finished strapping her bra on, she heard a tapping at one of her windows. Turning towards the sound, the woman almost jumped when she saw Ruby hanging outside of it. She shook off the urge to cover herself before she approached the glass, unlocking it for the girl.
"You could have used the door." Glynda whispered once the glass opened.
"I didn't want to be seen by the cameras." Ruby said before she jumped into the room "And I didn't have a key code."
"… I'll send you one in the morning." Glynda sighed before she closed the window, making sure the lock was secure. "Anyway, I think I have a solution to our sleeping problem."
"Sleepover?" Ruby asked with a grin.
"Sleepover." Glynda nodded before Ruby wrapped her arms around her girlfriend. "But we can't do this every night, Ruby. We need to get used to sleeping on our own again."
"I know, I know." Ruby said, rubbing her glowing cheek across Glynda's collarbone. "But I really like cuddling with you."
"So do I." Glynda said as she brought her arms around her girlfriend.
Without letting go of each other, the two approached the bed before the covers glowed purple. The sheets lifted up, welcoming the two in before they crawled under them.
"Nice that we have our Semblances back." Ruby said before grinning. "I almost forgot how fast I could go."
"Being able to move things with my mind again is welcome." Glynda said as the sheets fell on top of the pair. Ruby felt the sheets envelop them, almost as if in an embrace as the fabrics tucked themselves under the two.
"So was it really weird to get changed alone for you?" Ruby asked.
"It was definitely an adjustment." Glynda said before tightening her grip on the girl, reminding herself that both her arms were wrapped around Ruby. "My arm felt so light since we got the cuffs off."
"I know." Ruby nodded as one hand went to Glynda's shoulder while the other clasped her hip. "I almost forgot I can use my right hand."
"Just another adjustment we'll need to make." Glynda said.
"... You meant what you said yesterday, right?" Ruby asked. "That we're still gonna be together?"
"Ruby, I will never stop loving you." Glynda declared as one of her hands slid to the back of Ruby's neck. "My heart is cuffed to yours."
The two stared into the other's eyes for a moment before they leaned towards each other, sharing a soft, sweet, but short kiss before pulling away. Once their lips parted, they touched their foreheads together.
"Good night, my little Rosebud." Glynda said.
"Good night, Glyn." Ruby responded.
The two drifted off to sleep in the other's arms, blushing brighter than Christmas trees.
And that does it. After eight long years, I have finally brought this fanfiction to a close.
I had two ideas for the scene I wanted to end this story: One was a callback to Chapter Four when Ruby and Glynda instinctively try to go to their rooms despite being cuffed together, the other was Ruby and Glynda falling asleep together one last time.
That second one could probably be used for another drinking game. How many times have I ended a chapter like that?
I decided to put the two together. They would both be pretty short any other way. And giving the story an epilogue chapter gives it a nice bit of symmetry I talked about in the last chapter. I also didn't want to start the final chapter with them waking up because... Again, you can make a drinking game out of that.
Also, Glynda's 'my heart is cuffed to yours' line was thrown in kind of last minute. It's something I came up with after publishing the previous chapter, and I wanted to include it in this one, but I almost forgot to put it in.
Other than that, since this is the last chapter, I'd like to let you all in on some trivia for this story:
-HoodWitch started as a crack pairing: It was originally going to be a one-off thing for a different story idea I had (Which I am never going to write because it was just absolutely horrible) before I eventually fell in love with the idea of it.
-The plot of this story started as an idea of a HoodWitch snippet series: Ruby and Glynda would have already been in a relationship when they got cuffed together. Eventually, I decided this was a good way for the two to start dating.
-HoodWitch wasn't supposed to be the story's name: It was just a working title I came up with while I thought up what would have been the proper title. Eventually, though, the name just stuck. Which is kinda sad, because if it didn't, I would have named this story 'Joined at the Wrist' which I think Is a clever pun.
-Ruby's perverted side wasn't supposed to be a different personality: It did eventually evolve into that idea though. I thought of leaning more into that afterward, but I eventually dropped that point. It was too similar to a certain other fanfiction I'm no longer a fan of.
-Yang and Ruby were to be step sisters: It's weird to think that there used to be a time when we didn't know anything about Yang and Ruby's family. An idea I had for Day 1 Part 2 was to establish that Ruby and Yang did have a mother, and Ruby refers to her by her first name due to being unable to move on from Summer after her father remarried. I'm kind of glad I left this idea on the cutting room floor.
-I didn't mention this in the Day 21 Author's Notes, but 91 Drawers is a reference to one of my favorite book series, 100 Cupboards.
-Long-time fans will probably remember Glynda saying she had a bikini she could wear in spite of the cuffs. This would have been a slingshot bikini. I decided that would have been too much for this story.
-I had originally planned for Ruby's hair to get dyed blonde during one of her and Glynda's showers, establishing that Glynda dyes her hair. This didn't make it in, though, because dying hair seemed like too complicated a process for Ruby to do on accident.
And with that, I can officially bring this story to a close and remove it from my writing cycle.
… Or…
I doubt I've made it much of a secret that I'm not a fan of my earlier works, and the first few chapters of this are no exception. So I'm going to try and fix that. After this chapter, I'm going to start rewriting the first 9 chapters, and I'll publish them as new ones. After that, I'll go back and replace all the old chapters with the new ones. The story's still going to be marked as complete, though, and you won't need to read these new chapters if you don't want to. I'm not going to change much of the story.
Just to give everyone a heads up, one of the things I will be changing in the rewrites is Ruby's age. Looking back on it, it wasn't really necessary to change it from what it was in the show. It doesn't really add much to the story, and it was mostly just derived from another story I read.
Though you'll all need to forgive me if I wait on starting that project. Kdin, a former employee of Rooster Teeth recently came out about her experience working for the company and... Well, it wasn't good, to say the least. As a result, a lot of people have started reevaluating their opinion of the company and the shows it produced, particularly RWBY; as well as their place in their fan spaces. Despite being an outspoken critic of the show, I'm one of those people. While I can disassociate my work from their work and work practices, it does make me feel somewhat uncomfortable to think that by writing stories and drawing pictures about this show, it gives some air of endorsement to the company behind it and its mistreatment of its workers. I'm not going to stop writing RWBY content completely. I just need to take some time away from it.
This is also why I'm only finishing this story now. I had this chapter pretty much ready to go in October.
Aside from that, thank you all for reading.
GoodBYYYYYYEEEE READERS!
Total number of Christmas Trees: 56