Act 4-5: The End

—

….

—

"I don't see why we have to do this."

Teams RWBY, JSKT, and JNPR were all sitting in a noodle joint. Jawsome had posited his question after he'd finished his bowl, pointing at Pyrrha.

"Uh, what?" Ruby asked over her bowl.

"We're both from Beacon, just give the school the whole spiel or whatever." Jawsome twitched his sticks.

"I think they want to see which of you is stronger." Sonic stated, jabbing his sticks at the red hedgehog beside him.

"Repeat, why?"

"I really don't see the problem." Pyrrha said. "It's sort of a friendly competition."

Jawsome sighed. "I can accept that." He then flashed a feral grin. "I can also accept that you're goin' down."

Pyrrha nodded. "Challenge accepted."

—-

The crowd roared.

"Welcome to the final match of the Vytal Tournament!" Professor Port boomed over the loudspeaker. "Even though we know which school will take home the prize, we do still have to determine which fighter is stronger!"

"I'm rather sure we don't need to do this." Oobleck said, though not into his microphone.

"Nonsense! Anywho, Pyrrha and Jawsome of Beacon!"

The roar crescendoed as the two stood on the battlefield, seemingly illuminated by the pale light of the shattered moon.

"The match will begin in 3."

Pyrrha drew her spear and shield.

"2."

The Pyrobuster crackled to life in Jawsome's hand as Ecliptical Rose extended in the other.

"1."

Everything went silent.

"Begin."

Jawsome rocketed towards Pyrrha, bringing Ecliptical Rose down in a cleave. The sword-scythe slammed into her shield as the Pyrobuster whipped around to catch her spear from getting him in the leg. Disengaging, Jawsome extended Ecliptical Rose into scythe form, twirling the weapon around to slam the blade point into the ground, firing at the same time. The report of the weapon and the 'clang!' of the fire energy deflecting off of Pyrrha's shield rang out within seconds of each other. Pressing her advantage, she quickly transformed Milo into it's rifle form, blasting away at the red hedgehog, who had to reflect the bullets he didn't dodge with the blade of Ecliptical Rose, back in it's sword form. A blast of fire whizzed by Akuo, while the Pyrobuster and Milo, back in spear form, clashed, sparks flying from the impact. Jawsome brought around Ecliptical Rose, but Pyrrha blocked, leaving both of them locked against the other. Both attempted to overpower the other.

Something changed. Maybe one of them had slipped, the wind had shifted. Something, because soon they were a blur. Metal clashed, fire roared, even brief flashes of darkness were parts of the dance of destruction currently ensuing on the arena floor.

But then both appeared, on one knee, holding themselves up with their weapons. The audience's attention was drawn to the Aura meters, ignored due to their complete focus on the battle.

Both were hairs above knockout.

Jawsome's heavy breaths were interspersed with snarling, a habit he had from fighting things that were irritating to beat.

Pyrrha wasn't much better off, leaning heavily on Milo. Akuo lay at her feet.

Both staggered to their feet, walking towards each other with heavy steps. At the center of the battlefield, they met, staring at the other as their breathing began to normalize.

"Well, even match." Jawsome snarked.

"Indeed." Pyrrha replied. Then she did something unexpected. She slung Akuo onto her back, sheathed Milo at her hip, and held out her hand. "Draw?"

Jawsome stared at the offered hand, then shrugged, slung the Pyrobuster back over his shoulder and slid Ecliptical Rose back at the small of his back, and took it. "Draw."

The arena was silent for a few seconds. Then someone started clapping. The sound gradually grew in audibility, and then became the dull roar of cheering.

"And there we have it! One of the most intense duels in Vytal Tournament history ends in a draw!" Professor Port shouted. "Truly a battle for the history books! Sta… tu-e… wha-"

"Hello, people of Vale. Do not adjust your sets." A cool, dry voice had replaced Port over the loudspeaker. A black queen chess piece emblazoned on a red background dominated the screens. "We do dearly hope you've been enjoying the festival so far."

"Wait, that's-!" Ruby realized.

"What is happening?! Neither my robots or ships are responding!" Ironwood snarled.

"However we also know your true feelings. Lingering resentment. Deep hatred. We all want to be the best, do we not?"

"Oh no."

That was all Taiyang Xiao Long could say as he stared at the black queen.

"These emotions cannot be suppressed. So why bother? Just let them all...go."

Outside of Vale, two guards watched in terror as a horde of Grimm began to bear down on them.

"You won't regret it then."

"Glynda."

"Yes, Ozpin."

"The end has come."

The speech was capped off by a gigantic Nevermore landing on the protective field of Unity Coliseum.

...sigh…

So, hello there. Might be wondering why I'm cutting this short. Well I have good reason.

I'm rebooting Project ART.

Again.

The main reason is that, like all writers, I improve over time, and my old stuff just rubs me the wrong way. It feels rushed, sloppy, and really just…. No.

So among other things, there's that, and I'm also removing the Sonic elements from the series. It just really doesn't make sense in the grand scheme of things, and it would only be relevant for Project RWBY. Thereby, go byebye.

Next, I'm thinking about commissioning custom artwork. I have some skill in Photoshop, but it's not much, and I don't own the program myself, so it's moot anyways. Recommend artists you think would be able to do a good cover art.

Lastly, I do apologize about not being real communicative recently. My life, despite the fact that I'm on summer vacation, is arguably in one of the hardest fluctuations right now. I'm going to be a senior in high school, I have a job, and in between that and doing my own thing (say, playing Shovel Knight (plug)), my time for writing has gone down. I have been practicing anyways, and you have no idea how many revisions I went through before finalizing what I was going to do.

As a side note, did you know you can use a class ring and a shoelace as a pendulum? That is the only damn thing I'm gonna learn from Physics.

Anyways, I'm hard at work, and stay tuned for the (hopefully final) reboot, Re:Project RWBY. I promise not to have as many spinoffs and rereleases as that franchise. (Fuckin' Nomura).

The Pyro Jawsome

P.S.: Everything in the Future of Project RWBY remains true. Just have patience, I guess.