After 5

All that Ozpin could see was an endlessly black abyss, one that surrounded him on all sides, above and below. It was far from unfamiliar to him, though he hadn't seen it in years. With Salem gone and sealed away years ago, he'd thought himself free of this curse of his.

He'd long lost count of how many times his dreamscape had consisted of this. In fact he'd seen it more times than a single regular man or woman had slept in their entire lives. Here and there, he would get a glimpse of his previous incarnations, small reminders of his successes and failures. Sometimes he was a family man, sometimes he was a farmer or a soldier, a doctor or even a sailor. He'd been just about everything that a man could be, and in some cases he would never speak of, what a woman could be.

So, with the purpose of his continued existence gone, and what he could only assume to be his last life left to live, he found himself confused once more. Why was he here again? What task had he, who was charged with protecting humanity, left incomplete? What ghosts remained to haunt him? What danger hadn't been accounted for?

Slowly, the void began to tremble around him, and he felt his mind shake uncontrollably. Something was soon to reveal itself to him, whether he was ready or not. Somewhere in the back of his head and the bottom of his heart he felt a cold fire burn intensely. Some kind of pressure pushed on him from every direction. It was the second time he'd felt such sensations from within instead of from the outside, and to such an extent. It was several lifetimes ago, when he'd first been made aware of the responsibility thrust upon him. It was the feeling he had when he came face to face with one of the creators of his species, the god of life, light, creation and order. Had the deity returned to him? To congratulate him? To admonish him? What purpose was he being approached?

The answer that came to Ozpin was none of the above. Light shown from above him, casting rays on the back of his head, but it wasn't white light. It was crimson red and as discomforting as it was impossible to ignore. When Ozpin turned to face the caster of the light, he felt as if he had been shrunk to insignificance.

The caster of the light was no ordinary luminary. It was an eye, an eye too large to be held within the head of any creature of remnant, past or present. It was the center of an impossibly massive body, hanging over rows of enormous teeth. Each singular tooth was larger than a building, and there must have been hundreds of them. Its skin was far from black. It was some dull gray or white hue that would either suggest malnutrition or an alien origin. Without turning his head completely to his left or right, he could capture no more of it in his eyes. It must have been as large as a volcano, and far more dangerous.

But its eye, Ozpin could not ignore that enormous eye. Second by second he made out more features of the eye. Its rippling pattern was identical to the one he'd seen in Ruby's right eye, but it was detailed with multiple comma marks that orbited the pupil. With that eye it stared down at him, and struck him with a pressure he thought forgotten long ago. He didn't forget. He didn't know what this beast was, but the fact that it felt to him as the presence of a god did, could not possibly bode well.

When he woke up, he did so with a cold sweat. Every cell in his body, every echo of his countless lives since past, was screaming at him about the danger that was approaching. That danger was above Salem, the equal or greater of the gods themselves possibly, and if he wasn't both proactive and extremely lucky, there would be no hope for the survival of mankind. The sun hadn't yet risen, but he couldn't wait for dawn to return to his work. He needed to cease his proverbial retirement immediately and return as humanity's guardian. He needed to contact a lot of people, and quickly, lest he allow his strange new enemy to strike first and without obstacles. He only hoped that there was time to do so, as the gaze of that massive red rippled eye continued to linger in the back of his mind.


With her back arched, Ruby stretched out her arms and yawned. Her half-open eyes scanned the airbus' cabin for the nth time, for there was nothing else for her to look at. Her scroll ran out of power as she forgot to charge it, and she had little interest in the sights beyond the windows, which she had seen plenty of already. Yang was nowhere to be found, except for the onboard bathroom.

The huntress sighed at the lack of boredom that was assailing her. She could have avoided this and saved herself hours of time if she just chose to make the trip on foot, in a very literal sense. She was many times faster than the cruising speed of the airbus and if she used her chakra to boost herself, she could definitely make it before she came close to exhaustion. How she regretted that now, among many of her other choices in recent memory. Unfortunately, there was no chance of her getting permission to open a door or window in a pressurized cabin just to kill her boredom. Without a thought, she walked towards the left side of the cabin and sat down where she could. Sleeping off the rest of the trip and letting Yang wake her up didn't sound like too terrible of an idea. But ten seconds after she closed her eyes, she heard an electronic hum come from ahead of her.

Ahead of her, a holographic screen appeared in the middle of the room. It was a news report. It started as it normally did, with the news hosts chatting to each other about local events. However, more quickly than usual, the screen switched attention to a live report from Vale's number one reporter, Lisa Lavender. Ruby barely heard the actual words that the woman was saying, when she was focused entirely on what was being shown. At the southern tip of the continent there were remnants of a large battle, bone shards that could only have belonged to rather large Grimm and artificial craters. Some of those craters however, which were what caught Ruby's attention the most, were filled with small pools of still-molten lava. Neither the news hosts nor the reporters had a clue where the lava came from. There was neither a nearby volcano, let alone an active one, nor was there any commercially sold dust that could produce molten lava. A professional huntsman was invited onto the show and asked about the scene, but they could give little explanation for the lava pools. Clearly it was the work of someone or something, and intentional or not it destroyed whatever gathering of Grimm was there.

Ruby, however, recognized exactly what it was. She'd seen it before, though it was several years ago. That much was what confused her, though. She knew a person who could create lava with her bare hands and even cover herself in it without any injuries. But that person, Luna, was dead. She'd been dead for several years now in fact. It was only after Ruby, Yang and Blake returned from Atlas and Mantle that they learned of her death. The autopsy report found no reasonable cause, no sign of any wound or poisons, and only determined that she died on the last day Team RWBY spent in Vacuo.

The broadcast returned its attention to the news hosts, who had much more to share. This was only one of many recent and unexplained occurrences. Towards the eastern edge of Mistral there was another battlefield. The severe lack of any indicating factors of Grimm activity was substituted with massive cat paw prints that indented the ground. There were several charred remains of trees as well, looking as if they'd been incinerated by someone or something. This occurrence, as noted by one of the hosts, seemed eerily similar to what happened several months ago. A similar battlefield had been found in the land between Vale and Vacuo. Large prints in the ground, these resembling the hooves of a horse or a cow, were accompanied by craters and abnormally high amount of precipitation. And as Ruby thought back, she realized just what these were as well. They were the work of her brother, finding and taking down creatures that no other person could ever hope of being strong enough to stop.

She remembered the ones she'd seen during the first two years of her time at Beacon. She'd seen a massive creature made of sand with one tail, a massive turtle-like creature with three tails, whatever it was with four that Luna once turned into. There was also that weird leech-like thing she and Team RWBY encountered in the Forever Fall. She wasn't sure what happened to that one, actually. Nevertheless, what excited her was the chance to see him and Weiss again, among other things.

A few minutes passed, the report ended, and Yang emerged from the bathroom. She was checking her hair from as many angles as she could as she walked, and reached for the distracted Ruby's shoulder.

"Anyone in there?" Yang asked, causing Ruby to turn her head to her abruptly.

"Uh… yeah, sorry." Ruby smiled with embarrassment. "I've just been thinking. What kind of place did Madara come from?"

"Like we haven't talked about that a hundred times. Why now all the sudden?" Yang asked curious.

"I just started thinking about it again. Those giant tailed things he's been going after came from the same place he did, and so did that pale guy, right? How many other people are just as strong as he is?"

Yang chuckled to herself. "He's definitely an outlier, wherever it is he came from. Y'know, we'll have the perfect chance to ask him very soon."

"I hope so."

"What's to hope for?" Yang asked, raising her eyebrow.

"That something crazy doesn't happen and mess up the team-family reunion." Ruby said, her voice lacking any hint of sarcasm or humor.

To that, even Yang had nothing to say. It was without opposition that whenever Madara or something even remotely related to him was involved, something crazy was going to happen. Combined with team RWBY's own propensity for chaos, they were definitely brewing a perfect storm. Yang didn't even want to say anything along the lines of "everything will be fine" for fear of giving the world even an inch to prove her wrong. Ruby thought the same, which left the two of them in a rather awkward silence. Although instead of trying to change the subject to some other topic, Yang found her eyes being drawn towards the window behind Ruby, and Ruby followed suit.

Outside of the cabin was the sea that separated Patch and Vale. Even if it wasn't nearly as large as the distance between continents, the sparkling water down below was still beautiful to see. It wasn't often that they'd see it, and it wasn't much, but it was one of the first things the sisters saw when they left for Beacon. It was special to them, at least somewhat. There was one special quality to it. Strangely, it was rarer to find Grimm in this relatively small portion of the sea than any other in the whole world. Even lakes and rivers had more Grimm activity. In the past two decades, there had been maybe one or two small ones, but nothing too large for a regular civilian with a decent knife or gun to take out. If anything, seeing a Grimm in this area would either be an amazing stroke of luck, good or bad for that matter.

And as luck would have it, a few seconds later the intercom would turn on with a soft ring.

"We will be arriving at Seal Harbor in t-minus five minutes. Repeat, we will be arriving at Seal Harbor in t-minus five minutes." The pilot said through the intercom.

Ruby exhaled, relieved that things hadn't gone awry yet. But unfortunately her relief had caught the attention, or maybe the ire, of the weavers of fate. At her next inhale, there were two loud thuds from the roof of the cabin. Many of the ongoing conversations stopped and everyone's heads looked towards the source of the sound. Mere moments after those two thuds, they heard many rapid thumps, as if there was something running on top of the ship's roof. It continued, and a few heavier thuds began to intertwine with the thumps. Concern was steadily growing amongst the passengers, as while the Grimm alarms weren't going off, they could tell that something unusual was happening. Suddenly, the intercom returned to active state.

"This is your captain speaking." The pilot spoke with a calm voice. "It seems that some of the cargo stored in the upper compartment has come loose. If any hunters are onboard, would they please come to the cockpit and lend their aid?"

Their explanation seemed to work, at least on most of the passengers. Chances were though, that it was just an excuse to keep everyone calm while a hunter looked into the actual issue. Ruby and Yang went together, seeing it as an opportunity to get some fresh air, not to mention that they too were curious to know just what was causing the commotion. If it wasn't a Grimm, what could it be?

With a simple flash of their hunters licenses they were permitted to enter the cockpit. After being promptly thanked for their immediate response, they were shown to a special door that could be accessed without depressurizing the chamber. The ship wasn't moving that fast, so there wasn't any worry of being flung off of the hull if they weren't careful. Though, they were asked to avoid damaging the roof of the ship as much as possible. Fortunately, Ruby was unarmed anyways.

The door opened for them and they both took a deep breath of fresh air. It smelled as good as they thought it would, but they hadn't long to enjoy it before they heard a loud explosion, and the ship shook violently for a moment. The sky above them turned orange for a moment, and they both felt the heat of unnatural fire reach them. They quickly made their way towards the roof above the cockpit, from which they'd have a clear view of what was happening. What they saw was, simply put, unbelievable to either of them.

Atop the roof of the building just a few meters from them were two bodies moving at incredible speeds across the surface. They were clearly the cause of the turbulence. One was black and the other was white, and back and forth they shifted from one side of the roof to the other. All the while they were trading blows as quickly as they moved. Even Yang, who'd become accustomed to Ruby's top speed and could follow her with her naked eyes, could barely keep track of the two for more than a few seconds at a time. Ruby was able to tell with much greater ease what was happening. The Rinnegan kept her on top of everything in front of her. The white body was the same pale man from the other day. There were bulging veins around his eyes and he was wielding two white blades. The other body was a man covered in black clothes. He was holding a large flat fan-like object in his hand, and on the collar of his shirt there was a symbol of a red and white handheld fan. It couldn't have been any other than a single man, Madara.

The pale horned man tossed one of his swords into the air and slapped his hand against the large fan, smearing a large amount of that translucent blue fluid on its surface. The man backed away and ignited the fluid immediately, but the fluid was just as quickly flung off of the fan with a strong blast of wind. He angled the fan towards the roof and swung wide, blowing the flammable liquid off of the rooftop and preventing the fire from touching the ship itself. But as soon as he did, the horned man took his opportunity and lunged towards him with both white blades poised to stab.

Ruby and Yang immediately leapt into the fray. Ruby took the lead at her max speed, barely managing to intercept the horned man before his weapons landed. She kicked hard into his stomach, sending him backwards, just in time for Yang to slam her fist into his left flank. The man looked surprised, but not hurt at all, as he let go of both blades and retaliated against Yang. In a fraction of a second he put his elbow to her stomach and pushed once, sending her off of her feet and back towards the cockpit's roof. During which, Ruby noticed that the handles of those blades looked peculiar. They looked like they were made of bones, not any normal kind of material. In fact the blades in their entirety had an oddly organic look to them. No matter, the horned guy needed to be taken down before anything else could happen.

She prepared to strike again, but Madara ran past her side fast enough for the wind to brush against her to continue his fight against the pale man. Unlike the first time, there wasn't a single opening that Ruby could find to intervene. Madara looked like he was pushing deeper into his opponent's defenses than before, using his hands instead of his fan to maintain pressure. He wasn't using any of the techniques or powers she knew he had, likely to avoid collateral damage since even a weak attack could figuratively and literally sink the ship. From where Ruby stood, the two looked evenly matched, as far as speed went. But the weight of their strikes was somewhat different. She couldn't remember seeing her brother fight so intensely against another person, but the horned man still seemed to recover slightly quicker from blocking and avoiding direct hits than Madara, even if it was only by a fraction of a second.

"Ruby, you okay?" Yang said as she finally returned beside her little sister.

"Yeah, are you?" Ruby shot back.

"Yep, and my next punch is going to hurt a ton more than the first." Yang said confidently. Ruby could see that her lilac eyes were tinted with a slight red. "Any idea on how?"

Ruby stilled herself for a moment, formulating a way to make use of Yang's strength boost without being an inconvenience. They just needed a moment, but there was no way they'd catch the enemy by surprise again. He must have had them accounted for now. Then, Ruby had an idea. Behind her back, she held her fingers together to form a cross, and continued to wait and stare ceaselessly.

Madara caught his opponent's fist, allowing his own hand to get covered in more flammable fluid, but by catching his other hand too and keeping them still, he seemed to disable their ability to ignite it. Their ability seemed similar to ninjutsu, and required a particular gesture or two to achieve the intended result. Making a mental note of it, Madara quickly took his opportunity and rotated his arms, throwing his enemy off their feet before kicking them as hard as he could. It looked like it worked, judging by their pained reaction, when a large red mass rushed by him all of the sudden. It chased after the horned man, who hadn't yet regained his footing, before Ruby herself emerged from the mass; her entire body coated in chains of lightning. She grabbed onto the horned man, sharing the voltage with him before turning them both into a floating red mass that flew back towards Madara. But well before it reached him, a second red mass launched forward from behind him again, to even his small surprise.

The two red masses disassembled simultaneously. One Ruby threw the electrocuted man, while the second Ruby threw an angry and empowered Yang. The end result was a collision in the middle, between his face and Yang's fist, or rather, that is what it should have been. Shocked, Yang found her fist caught in one of his hands, with the other outstretched behind him. In the same direction was the Ruby that caught him in the first place, with a bone-like dagger stabbing into her heart, and causing her to disperse into a cloud of smoke.

His free hand hardened and sharpened into a blade of its own, which he thrusted towards Yang with an unimpressed look on his face. Ruby went into full panic and instantly positioned her feet to kick forward, but she wasn't the first. Madara was first to act, reaching Yang before Ruby could move. With one of the bone-like swords that was dropped during the battle, Madara severed the horned man's hand and pushed Yang out of harm's way. Not a second later, everyone's ears were filled with a wrenching sound of flesh being pierced and torn. Both Ruby and Yang felt their hearts, as well as time itself, stop for a moment, and their eyes shot wide open when they saw was Madara facing both of them. Emerging from his chest, over where his heart was, was the horned man's clawed hand.

END