Chapter Text
It was a very quiet, peaceful night at the RPBY dorms.
And that was the way Church liked it.
Back at Blood Gulch, it seemed every fucking day was new adventure, as a result Church rarely got a moment of peace and quiet. And if he did, then it would quickly be interrupted by Caboose's constant need for attention, a bored Tucker or the reds starting some shit.
So, this was a very welcome change of pace.
Right now we was just chilling on one of the beds, relaxing. Sarge was helping Ruby do some maintenance on Lopez, Yang was reading a comic book on her bed, unknowingly keeping Caboose distracted as he read with her. Pyrrha was texting someone on her scroll and Blake was playing assistant to Ruby. All in all, very normal.
But the best part was that there was no Agent Washington. Well, technically there was. Wash and Ruby were currently doing something of an experiment, they were currently 'combined' with the goal of seeing if there were any consequences from being 'combined' for longer than a fifteen minutes. So far they'd been like this for an hour now and nothing seems to have happened.
Still, it was a quiet night.
Then there was a knock on the door.
"Ruby, answer the door." Yang called lazily from her bed.
"I'm busy you do it."
"Blake get the door."
The cat Faunus rolled her eyes. "Stop being lazy and do it yourself."
Yang shifted and changed targets. "Pyrrha, stop sexting Jaune and get the door."
The gladiator in question blushed. "That's not what I'm doing..."
"Just get the door."
Pyrrha complied and went over to the door, opening it to reveal what Church could only assume was some form of mail man.
"I have a letter for this room." He stated, holding out said letter which Pyrrha took from him.
"Thank you!"
"Just doing my job ma'am."
The door then closed and Pyrrha was left looking at who the letter was addressed to.
"Whose it for?" Yang asked.
"All of us I believe." Pyrrha said before elaborating by reading out loud. "To team RPBY, from Felix."
"Huh, any of you guys know a Felix?" Yang asked the room.
It was a solid 'no' form Blake and Pyrrha, but Church could see Sarge, Ruby (and Wash by extension) and even Caboose all tense up.
Church had to admit, the name Felix did sound familiar, didn't the guys mention him in their stories a few times?
Yang was now next to Pyrrha and had snatched the letter from her hands.
"Well, lets see what here." Yang ripped open the letter and her eyes quickly scanned it, causing her face to quickly become confused. "Yeah, what is this supposed to be?"
"What is it?"
"Some kinda... love letter?" Yang shrugged. "Here, let me read it out to you."
She cleared her throat. "To my dearest Church, it's been a week since I landed on this shithole, I have to say, I miss you and our little sunflower dearly."
What. The. Fuck.
He stood to attention and saw the others as well, but not knowing this, Yang continued on.
"Let me tell you if this shithole was any hotter I swear that half my unit would be a fucking puddle on the ground, but still it kind of reminds me of back home, only less desert and more swamp."
Church could feel the start of a major headache coming on, but couldn't tell why.
"But still it's enough to make me feel a bit sentimental, like remembering when we first met back in basic. It's shit like this that keeps me from ripping out private David's skull and beating him to death with it, ya know?" Yang continued to read out.
Church's head felt like it was splitting, not really paying attention to the words of the letter anymore, he felt... he felt like this letter, it was important.
It was important, so, so very important. But he couldn't remember why. Like the memory of it was just ripped out of his head.
"...Anyway, the campaign won't be more than a few weeks, then I'll be right home on leave again."
Then Church knew, this was the last letter that she had ever sent him. The very last one.
He could not quite remember spending hours and hours reading and re-reading the letter over and over again. looking for something, anything that would help him understand why she failed, why she didn't come home, why he would never see her again.
Church both could and couldn't remember it.
An interesting sensation, but it was enough to make it feel like his head was splitting open, and he had a feeling that everything would be infinitely worse once her name was mentioned.
"...Anyway, that's enough from me, how's the homestead doing? And how's our little sunflower doing?" Yang continued on, oblivious to the suffering of church. "I hope to hear from you soon, forever yours, Allison."
Whatever Yang had said next went unheard by Church as his headache became unbearable, as if all of himself was torn apart all over again, as if the fragments suddenly returned are were again split from him all in the same instant.
Someone screamed, at least Church thought that he heard someone scream, hell it might have been himself for all Church knew. But he didn't care, all he wanted was for this to stop.
And as if some divine entity was watching over him, it did, almost instantly. but as a trade off Church was suddenly lying on the floor, with no clue as to how he had got there, Caboose and Sarge hovering over him.
"Church! Church!" Caboose said fearfully.
"You alright blue?" Sarge asked at the same time, his voice filled with an unusual amount of concern for his 'mortal enemy.'
"Fine... just a fuckin' headache..." Church breathed heavily. "What... what happened?"
"Well, after Yang finish reading out the letter, you kind of stood real funny for a minute then screamed and passed out." Sarge explained.
"Right..." Church nodded before turning away to see what the others were doing. It seemed like Pyrrha, Blake and Yang were all discussing the letter, more specifically the morality of reading someone's private love letter out loud, but Church quickly became concerned with something else.
It was Ruby, still sitting on the chair, now normally this wouldn't be very concerning. But the way she was sitting was wrong, she was sitting so very, very still, her expression unnaturally blank as she uttered a single word.
"Allison."
That single word was enough to end the conversation and draw all eyes to Ruby.
"What did you just say Ruby?" Blake asked, only for Ruby to continue staring blankly.
"Ruby?" Pyrrha questioned as they all approached their team leader.
"Allison." Ruby repeated.
Yang knelt down next to her sister, and put a hand on her shoulder.
"Ruby what's wrong?" Yang asked, her voice filled with worried concern.
"Allison." Ruby repeated once more, but this time her voice was ever so slightly distorted with a accent, most people wouldn't be able to tell the difference, but Church could.
Then a sinking feeling developed in Church's chest, as he realised something, very, very important.
It was not Ruby that was talking at the moment.
It was instead the person that was in her head when the letter was read out loud, and the person that would undoubtedly have a mental breakdown at hearing such an important letter.
Oh no...
"ALLISON!" Agent Washington and Ruby Rose screamed as one.
"Ruby? Ruby!" Yang screamed as she watched her sister scream her lungs out, Yang could only watch as Ruby fell out of the chair she had been sitting on and onto the floor, thrashing and screaming, her hands digging into her head.
"ALLISON!"
The moment of stupefied inaction passed as Yang broke out of her stupor and charged over the Ruby and attempted to restrain her.
It was much easier said than done, Ruby kicked and screamed, and no matter how many times Yang tried, Ruby's arms always seemed to eluded her grasp.
From the corner of her eye, Yang could see Pyrrha and Blake standing by, not sure of how to effectively intervene.
Then the door flew open, and team SALN entered, Nora leading the charge.
"What's going on in here? Whose screaming?" Nora asked in quick succession.
Seeing as Yang was busy trying to restrain her sister, Blake answered in her stead.
"It's Ruby!" Blake explained fearfully. "We just read out this letter and she stared screaming!"
"Letter?" Weiss asked.
Pyrrha picked up the discarded letter that Yang had dropped when she'd charged over to restrain Ruby.
"Hey!" Yang called over. "Some help would be appreciated!"
As they all came over Yang called out instructions.
"Hey Nora, grab her left leg, Pyrrha get the right, Jaune come and help me with the arms."
They all came over to help her out, and with much difficulty restrained Ruby.
"What now?" Jaune called out, barely heard over the ruckus Ruby was making.
"We need to get her to the hospital wing!" Yang called out over Ruby's screams.
Well, it was easier said than done, while they managed to get out the door, the noise Ruby made attracted a lot of attention as people left their rooms to see the commotion. thankfully one glare from Yang was enough for them to retreat and leave them alone.
Eventually, they managed to get there and Ruby was taken in by the medical team. which immediately carted her off, leaving everyone else in the waiting room.
They all sat there in silence and shock, well at least Yang was, the others might have been talking but Yang didn't care.
She was just very, very worried about her little sister.
Sure Ruby had a few mental problems before, namely talking to people who weren't actually there, but this... this was different.
Her thoughts were interrupted by the arrival of professor Ozpin.
"I've heard about what happened." He said. "What happened?"
"We were in our room when this letter came." Blake explained, the Ozpin interrupted.
"Letter? What letter?"
Pyrrha handed the letter to him and everyone waited as Ozpin silently read it. "Hmmm, continue, what happened next?"
"We decided to read it aloud, and a few moments later Ruby was on the floor screaming."
Ozpin pocketed the letter and turned to the assembled group. "I will investigate this further, but for now I would like you all to return to your rooms with the exception of miss Rose's own team."
"Of course, but please tell us if Ruby's condition changes." Weiss requested.
"Of course." And with that team SALN departed back to their room.
Ozpin then turned to them. "Please feel free to spend the night here if you wish, I will be telling Glynda and the others that you will be excused from classes for the reminder of the week."
"What about the missions at the end of the week?" Pyrrha asked.
"That, depends on Miss Rose's condition." Ozpin said gravely, his words punctuated by a scream coming from Ruby from another room, before sighing. "Now if you can excuse me, I must speak with the doctor."
With that Ozpin left the waiting room, leaving Yang hoping beyond hope that her sister would be alright.
The sun shined all so brightly as he tried to fix the flat tire.
Of course it was hindering his work, but that was fine. It added to the challenge.
But he always liked a good challenge. It also provided a good learning experience.
"Come here my little sunflower..."
"...I've got to show you something."
"This had better not be another cat video Wash." Connie complained.
"No way, this is totally different!" He claimed, eyes going wide.
But Connie just snorted "Yeah, sure..."
"...That I'll be the day." Yang said with a laugh. She frowned, this was serious!
"But Yaannnngggggg." She complained. "I could totally be a superhero!"
Yang just laughed, before falling over and...
...Immediately complaining.
"This is such bullshit!" Tucker complained.
"It is not. If you want to be any good with that sword of yours, you need to be at least decent at close quarters combat"
Tucker would only scowl at him.
"I know it's frustrating." He held out a hand to pull Tucker to his feet. "You'll get better one day, I..."
"...Promise." Qrow said to her.
"That's easy for you to say, your like a super awesome huntsman." She mumbled.
Qrow chuckled. "Thanks for the endorsement, now raise that scythe of yours and we'll take it from the start."
Nodding, she raised the scythe and...
...Charged.
"David!? What the fuck dude!" Cecil Kyle cried out, but he didn't care.
He hated him so much, he.. he needed to pay.
So he tossed Cecil into the mirror, not caring...
...About the consequences.
He rubbed his eyes, the creation of the Alpha was a slow process, but it would be worth it.
Anything would be worth it to win the war that had claimed her.
God, he would give anything to see...
...What all the commotion was about, seriously it was just some skateboarding.
But no, he was just walking out of a three hour hearing about safety protocol.
"So, learn your lesson?" York asked from his left, with Maine laughing on his right.
He groaned. "Oh believe me..."
"...More than you know." He told the Councillor.
He smiled grimly under his helmet. Soon, soon this would all be over and he would have his revenge.
It was only a matter of...
...Time, it was all he needed to buy.
He deflected the knives and managed to catch one.
"You think your the only one that's good with knives?" He asked rhetorically.
In response Felix simply powered up his sword/key.
"Oh, right." Well...
...Looks like it was time to fall back on training.
She snuck under the table using her advice from Qrow, those cookies would be hers!
Just two more steps.
But then her plans were ruined when she heard her dad call out, "Hey, what did I tell you?" Dad sounded exhausted.
He hadn't sounded that exhausted in years, not since...
...His days at freelancer. But still, it was natural that he would.
After all, he was getting little sleep chasing after Epsilon these days.
He kicked Doc awake, Maine the Meta had been awake as long as he had.
"Alright..."
"...Lets get this show on the road." The Director said.
"Right." He laughed, shakily. This was the third time this week.
And logically, he knew what the Director was doing, but he couldn't fathom why.
To win a war? To bring back a shadow? He didn't know.
But what he did know was that...
...He really couldn't take much more of this.
He really wasn't cut out for this, but still it was worth it for her.
"You alright Church?" She asked next to him.
"You remembered my name." He said with a smile on his face.
"Of course, it's not hard to remember a name as ridiculous as Church." She paused. "But can you remember mine?"
It was his turn to smile. "I could never forget your name Allison."
She laughed, and his world was made all so much brighter.
"Good to hear, but do me a favour eh? Next time, don't say goodbye, I hate goodbyes."
With that word, the spiral got worse as they fell into memories, all good, all bad.
They could not escape.
The spiral continued, getting worse with every second, good became bad and bad became blurred.
As they fell through memory, all they could do is scream.
Notes:
And that's the end of that chapter.
Am I a bad person for enjoying writing this so much? But yeah I had far too much fun writing this chapter, especially the last section, flipping through he spiral of memories from all the different perspectives was a blast to write.
So yeah, this was the first part of Felix's plan some good ol' psychological warfare. After all if you want to target the heroes, why not go for the (arguably) least mentally stable first? And so using a technique picked up from the Councillor he caused Wash to have one of his mental breakdowns while he happened to be inside Ruby's head.
Well, thanks everyone for reading and extra thanks to those that comment/review, you guys and gals make my day.
Next time... well that's a surprise, but till then I'll catch ya'll on the flip flop.
Review replies:
ReaderWarrior: Glad to see you enjoyed it.
Annonamous Elephant: Well, based on my theory of how to sword/key works I'd say they'd both be able to activate it.
Guest (1): Both of the songs are real ones titled, 'Snuck Your Way Into My Heart' and 'Your Best Friend' respectively. Look them up on YouTube and enjoy.