Hey, how's it going everybody! I'm Sou-rrgh-wait, rewind that...*coughs*...I'm M12R0R, pronounced Mirror, and welcome back after a long wait for the next chapter of Brightest in the Dark. I am truly sorry for the wait, I had the holidays, then a vacation, then just abut load of personal issues I had to deal with, also, school, and school sucks...(If you all didn't know that already). I just couldn't find time to write and when I did I was exhausted and unmotivated. But that was the past and its now been 3 months so I was like, no, that is unprofessional and unfair, considering that you guys have gotten this story to almost a hundred follows and over have of that have favorited this story. That to me is...dumbfounding...because I never thought that when I first posted this story it would amount to much, I thought I would fall under the radar like most do, but you guys didn't let that happen, and for that I sincerely thank you all. For this, I will start something new as to where if you ask me a question in the reviews I will answer it. Starting today!
Doormaster: Its been three months...0% progress...DEAR GOD GIVE ME THE ANSWER!
Delta: The Titan really did try to go through the portal, but due to the Hobgolbin shot he took through the spine and the intense fire that he took from the Goblins, he physically couldn't find the strength to move. Also. the choice to throw the Ghost through was out of desperation. If his Ghost got out, got revived, and managed to return, it would return to resurrect him, like the whole thing never happened, but no Ghost, no life. I hope that helped.
That about does it guys, please enjoy!
With her next semester at Signal Academy beginning soon, Ruby worked hard to ensure everything was perfect. She purchased a new combat skirt, and ironed her hood. The last step, was to clean her weapon, her sniper scythe, Crescent Rose. Her skills with said weapon were incredible for her age, making her one of the strongest in her class. Though Thorne would be more then happy to take credit for her improvements, he knew that he couldn't. It was her Uncle Qrow, who trained her and honed her techniques with the blade. Something Thorne had noticed, unlike the Guardians, who relied purely on strength to overcome opponents, the Huntsman and Huntresses of Remnant were much more fluent and graceful, overall more skillful fighters. Thorne learned a lot about Remnant's history, but when it came to such things like Dust, Auras, and Semblances, he was absolutely lost.
"So, is it like a forcefield, like a shield that a Wizard or Captain has?" Thorne pestered as he hovered around Ruby, who was seated at the desk in her room, tinkering with the trigger mechanisms of Crescent Rose. Stretched all across the room different pieces on the weapon, smaller pieces placed upon her bed, and larger pieces like the handle and blade on the floor. Ruby has preformed these type of repairs before, but with her friend's newfound interest in these rather well known facts, it became a major challenge. For some reason he couldn't make any sense of it, like it was beyond his understanding.
"Aura is in a sense, yes, but it's not artificially generated like those, it's an extension of ourselves, our souls. It will take hits for us, or we can use our Semblances and that will use it up as well."
"But like, how does it work, where does it come from." Ruby's hand slipped and the screwdriver caused all her progress to explode out of her hands. Ruby's hand fell on the table along with her head, she proceeded to let out a low groaning sound. Just as she did, a knock fell onto the door and the knob began to turn. Thorne looked over in a panic, as the door opened, he was still visible. Ruby grabbed him and held him in her hands. It took him a moment, but he figured out what she was thinking. His lense blinked off, and he resumed a static state, but he was still fully aware of everything going on around him. The door opened and through the frame entered a long, flowing, golden mane of a familiar figure.
"Hey Rubes...woah..." Yang's eyes grew as her eyes widened and she scanned around the room, glancing at all the parts.
"...did your weapon explode or something?"
"Uh, no, I'm just doing a full cleaning before next semester starts, making sure she's in tip top shape...hehe." Ruby laughed nervously as she glanced back down to Thorne, who's lense was dimly lit as if he was peeking. Yang walked over towards her sister and leaned herself against her desk, looking down into Ruby's hands to see the strange little toy.
"Hey, I remember that thing, you found it, cool." Years ago, for the sake of Ghost not having to be tossed around like a ball, Ruby told Yang that she lost it on a trip into Vale.
"Oh, this, yeah I found it in a box in the garage. I kinda personalized it...because there is a lot of sentimental value, you know?"
Ruby was an awful liar. Yang could tell that there was something she was keeping back, but she couldn't place it.
"Yeah, I get it. Mom's funeral was ten years ago yesterday. It's tough...it's always tough around this time, and when Dad and Uncle Qrow leave, it's just us here."
"Have either of them said when they'll be back?"
"Dad checked in yesterday, Uncle Qrow hasn't said anything since he left."
"I hope he's ok..." Ruby rubbed some smudging away from Thorne's lens.
"He will be, he's the toughest remember, nothing stops him."
Yang tried to be reassuring for her little sister.
"That's what they used to say about Mom..." Yang reached over and placed her hand on Ruby's shoulder.
"No matter what Ruby, I'll always be here for you. Okay? That's a promise." Ruby looked up to Yang with her eyes watering a bit. With Thorne in her left hand, Ruby lunged up and hugged her sister around the neck, Yang happily returned the favor. Thorne's eye flickered on and gently squeezed himself out of her hand.
"Thank you, Yang." Ruby tightened her grip as Thorne hovered into her vision. From his eye he projected a screen that displayed the time and a reminder Ruby asked him to set.
"Anytime, sis. I-"
"Oh no! I'm late! I need to get to the Dust shop before they close!" Ruby cut Yang off mid sentence and pulled out of the hug. She looked to her weapon parts and began scooping them all up, throwing them into a backpack.
"What do you mean? It's still morning they won't be closing until the end of the night."
"Not the ones here! From Dust Till Dawn" has a sale on Gravity Dust! I need to get there before they close!" She slung the bag on her back and started for the door.
""From Dust Till Dawn"? That's all the way in downtown Vale. You have to take the ferry there, hold on, let me give you a ride to the docks."
"It's okay, I'll get there on my own! Thank you though!" Ruby zoomed out the room and down the stairs. "I love you, see you later, sis!" Ruby slung open the door and slammed it shut.
"Love you too?" Yang questioned while she looked around confused by what just happened.
As Ruby ran down the walkway from the house, Thorne appeared by her side, keeping pace with her running.
"That could have been handled with a bit more...grace." Thorne joked sarcastically.
"You said we had to go, so we have to go. So, how can I summon that-"
"Sparrow." As Thorne spoke the speeder bike started to materialize under her feet. Ruby stopped and reached out, the handles of it forming in her hands. The Sparrow's thruster threw flames like a dragon, and the two flew blazing down the path towards Patch's docks. In the span of an hour they hopped on the ferry and now waiting aboard deck. In the time she had while in transit, Ruby was attempting to reassemble Crescent Rose. Though the ferry was relatively short on passengers, Thorne wasn't going to float around freely. Like he had done for years now, he stayed close to her side, unmoving like the toy he impersonates. He just glanced around, and mainly watched Ruby put her weapon back together. As they began nearing Vale's port, the Ghost suddenly jolted up into the air. Ruby, who was just finishing with her weapon, was startled, causing the last screw she was tightening to go flying off without her knowledge.
"Thorne!..." She shouted out. "...You scared me. What's wrong?" She looked over to him.
"This. Look." He cast forward a projection of the VNN Live, with a special report from Lisa Lavender. As usual, she was on the right side of the screen, however, on the left side where their is an image of the subject she is speaking about, it displayed something rather disturbing. It was a black image with an ominous red light shining in its center. Thorne turned up the volume, tuning into what she had been saying.
"...over the last decade, our city has been under siege by an unknown monstrosity, leaving numerous of Vale's finest and even huntsmen dead in its wake..."
The two looked on curiously, however, Thorne could not help but become fixated on the image in the corner. It's red glow being terrifyingly familiar. Ruby, on the other hand, was completely enveloped by what the reporter was saying.
"...though any physical depictions of this assailant have been proven impossible to come up with, witnesses have reported strange red lights appearing shortly before and after the sites of the murders. If you or someone you know happens to witness these lights, please report it to the proper authorities immediately. I'm Lisa Lavender at..." Thorne ended the broadcast, and floated slightly away from Ruby, turning from her. She looked to him and drew in breathe, preparing to speak.
"No." He spoke up before she could.
"You didn't even know what I was going to say." She retorted back. The Ghost spun around, his blue lense lights flickered and switched into a lightish pink color. His usual reserved and ironic attitude became excitable and perky. His voice also shifted into a higher pitch and tone, perfectly mimicking Ruby's own.
"Oh, Thorne! Wouldn't it be so cool and fun to track down and catch whoever is responsible for all that, even though no one knows what their capable of and that they've killed professional huntsmen and I'm just a little girl with a sniper scythe!" His eye and demeanor flipped back to normal. Ruby raised an eyebrow at his imitation. "But no, Ruby, it's out of the question." He glanced off at the water as it past by his starboard.
"Thorne, what's really going on? What has you so upset?"
Thorne's eye disappeared for a moment as he sighed.
"I know I told you about how my Guardian died, but I never said what it was that killed him." His eye lite up and he projected the image of a Goblin, then it switch to a Hobgoblin, and continued on, highlighting the different models of the Vex in his database. "They're called the Vex, a race of cybernetic beings that are hell bent on terraforming planets and eliminating all organic life."
"Sound scary." Ruby said with eyes wide as the projection of a Hydra appeared. "Now, hold on. They said all they saw were glowing red lights, what this thing could be is just some sort of Grimm that is loose. Plus, how could one of those get here?" The Ghost's shell closed around his eye like he was thinking intently. He looked as though he wanted to say one thing, but then retract his words.
"They're one of the most tenacious and bloodthirsty beings in the universe, it was only a matter of time before they found Remnant. But the Vex usually come to a planet in full force, so this could be just a small pocket controlled by a young Axis Mind." While Thorne spoke truthful speculation, he was hiding a critical detail. He had a feeling that he brought the Vex to Remnant when he awoken the ancient Warp Gate, giving them a straight shot to this unprotected world. Ruby's face shifted into one with slight determination.
"Thorne, if these things really are here in the city and we're the only ones who know about them then it's our responsibility to stop them. With my training and your knowledge we can stop these things before they hurt anyone else." He looked up at Ruby with a mix of fear and inspiration plastered across his lense.
"Your right, it's our job! We have to stop them!"
"Ya! That's the spirit!" She threw her hands triumphantly in the air as the ship they were on set of their horn.
(One ferry ride to Vale later...)
"Ruby we can't do this, you were wrong! It's not our job!"
He panicked as Ruby tried to desperately to push him into her backpack. He fought valiantly, but was rather quickly defeated as she sealed him inside with the zipper.
"You can't just pull a one-eighty like that on me, Thorne! You already said yes!" She yelled at her backpack, some people around the docks looking up from what it was they were doing to glance at the seemingly crazy child.
"You cannot detain me forever!" A muffled voice screamed out from the bag.
"I can and I will, we're doing this, I'm going to start at the site of the last attack; a back alley near the downtown commercial district. Let's get moving."
"Never! You ca-!" Ruby muffled Thorne's voice even further by pulling her headphones over her ears. She tugged on the straps of her backpack and began to leave Vale's dock.
As the hours of the day past, Thorne's detestability held true, but his complaining about it disappeared. He was eventually allowed to be released, the Ghost figured that if he couldn't deter Ruby from this quest, he would do everything he could to prepare her. With the sun setting, Thorne continued to give his pseudo-Guardian companion an explanation of what her possible adversary was capable of.
"So, just to recap, all Vex have the ability to teleport to you at any moment they wish, do not let them touch you, they have the ability to warp your sense of reality, but I'm here so I should be able to keep any of that from happening. Also, their abdomen is their weak point, so..."
"Thorne. It's ok, we've trained for worse." She spoke with confidence as they past through a brightly lit portion of Downtown Vale. They stuck to the street's sidewalk, passing a multitude of different alley ways, some with little to any light inside them. The shadows in these were thick and abyssal, hiding whatever would like to be hidden. As Ruby past it, one of these shadows shifted, disappearing behind the corner of the building. She was oblivious to it, but the reappearing Thorne caught a glimpse. His shell narrowed around his lense.
"Ruby." He spoke in a hushed voice. She glanced back, noticing his focus, and placed her hand upon Crescent Rose.
She slowly backed herself to the wall and shuffled to its corner by the alley entrance.
"What did you see?" She asked again in her quiet tone.
"I'm not sure, it moves fast. I only managed to catch a glimpse. I'm going to preform a scan, watch my back." He cautionously hovered into the alley; Ruby, with weapon raised, followed close behind him. From where he believed the figure stood, Thorne began his scan. His shells expanded outward, his blue glow emitting a faint light in the darkness surrounding them. His shell then pulsed, like a heartbeat, releasing energy in waves that covered all things that were once concealed by shadows. This happened three times, then his shell returned to its proper form.
"Find anything?...Thorne?" Ruby looked to her friend, who sat stagnant in the air. She walked around to look at his lense, but unlike his body, his eye was bouncing all around like a pinball, as if he was trying to solve some sort of complex equation. "Thorne?" Finally, her words managed to elicit some sort of reaction from him. His eye shot up to look into hers. "What's wrong?"
"L-Light...it's Light." His eye shifted away from her, and he took off of around the corner of the building and down the backstreet. Small beams of light shot from his eyes as he continued to scan the path, like he was tracking something. Ruby chased him.
"Thorne! Slow down! Wait for me!" The Light construct took a sharp turn, disappearing without heeding her directions.
She tried to follow, but a sudden feeling overtook the young huntress; the feeling of a great evil looming over her. A feeling that could cause even the fiercest of Grimm to cower. A red light, like a spotlight, focused onto her from above. She hoped that what she was seeing was only her imagination. Though every fiber of her being told her not to, she looked up to where the light was coming from. Above her, on one of the escape ladders connected to the buildings, a large humanoid figure was perched, watching her like some sort of bird of prey. It's the light from its optics we're blinding. She could hear what sounded like dripping, and looked down to notice an illuminated white liquid smacking in droplets onto the pavement. The red light vanished around her, and the creeking of metal bars made her gaze shift back to where the figure was moments ago, only to see it had vanished. Her eyes grew large with fear. She backed away cautiously, and turned to run down the way they came. Her hope fleeted, as her path was blocked by the same figure that watched her moments ago from above. It was towering over her, at least an extra half of her high. It didn't move when she noticed it, it only stood there, studying her with contempt. She again chose to run the opposite direction, only when it vanished from her sight did she hear the horrifying sound of metal grinding into the brick of the walls behind her.
"I'm dreaming, I have to be! I have to find Thorne, we need to get out of here!" Ruby heard these words repeatedly in her head as she ran back down the original path, past the disturbing bright liquid. The sound of the metal scrapping stopped, she glanced back to see that there was no one in pursuit of her. She spotted the turn Thorne took earlier, and decided that was her best option, but not before taking the precautions of arming her weapon. She jumped around the corner, Crescent Rose extending out into its scythe form, she spun it around in a flashy display before using the blade tip as an anchor, jamming it into the ground. She aimed the barrel of the weapon down the street, ready just in case the figure was there again, but alas, nothing. She looked back in the direction she came from, nothing. Her eyes thinned, scanning to see if the her pursuer was still in chase. An uproar of electricity erupted in front of her. Her eyes shot to her front as what could only be explained as an electrical storm at ground level engulfed her vision. Dark brooding clouds concealed its form but it's red optic still shined through as a intimidating lighthouse. She panicked, pulling the trigger of her sniper scythe. The high caliber Dust round came roaring from the chamber. It struck the center of its abdomen, the being took the full extent of the shock, but that was it. It looked down at its stomach, reached up with its left hand, it's only human like aspect, and brushed away the Dust residue. It's sights shifted back up to Ruby. Fear filled her face as she gridded her teeth, she yanked Crescent Rose from the concrete. She lifted it high, and swung her weapon in a large arching sweep, trying to clip them in their shoulder. Her strike was met by its own, it's huge right forearm meeting the blade of the scythe. It's gleaming eye refocused on her weapon, studying it from its spiked pommel to the tip of its blade. It looked back at her, then to the top of the joint where the blade connected to the gun barrel, and it's gaze focused. The red light narrowed to a beam, and was directed where there was a screw hole, but no screw. Ruby flashed back to the boat, and thought she knew the exact moment where the screw may have vanished. It threw its hand up and grabbed the top of the weapon and twisted its wrist, to the point that the metal cried out from its strain. And suddenly, at the point where the screw should have been, the pieces of Crescent Rose snapped and went flying. Before they hit the ground, the being lunged forward, gripping Ruby around her head, lifting her effortlessly into the air, and driving her into the brick wall. Her impact cratered the brick and mortar
"THO-!" Ruby tried to scream out, but the figure reacted by rocketing it's right arm forward, it's Roman scissor imbedding itself into the wall.
"Hush now child, it'll be over soon...tell me...which way would you want to die." Ruby's mind began to flood uncontrollably with different images and visions, all of which involved her being viscously murdered. She screamed out in agony, while they weren't real, she felt every snap, every slash, every single thing that happened to her in her mind, she felt the pain. "There is no reality in which you escape...you are...MINE." She kicked and screamed for her life, but to no avail. It's eye grew brighter as did it's bloodlust, it ripped its weapon from the wall and prepared to gut her like a pig to slaughter.
"I'm sorry...Dad, Yang, Uncle Qrow...Thorne...I'm sorry." Thoughts faded to just this as she accepted what was coming, already knowing the type of pain that was coming.
"Apologize NOT accepted!" A voice rang out from the right, and the figure was immediately thrown off of Ruby, a flash of a crimson escorted them away from her. She fell to the ground, breathing heavily as she regained her composure. "I can't believe I left you alone here, it's my fault, I'm an idiot. But I'm here now, and I'm never leaving your side again." A familiar Light construct made its way into her sight, it's small blue illuminated eye bringing all the hope she could ever need. She reached up, cupping her hands around him and pulling him into her chest. Thorne reminisced back to their first day, when she held him in a similar manner.
"Its a Vex, Thorne, you were right."
"I know it is. When I went off alone I intercepted its energy when it teleported, and I came rushing back."
"It spoke to me...it made me die, over, and over again..." Ruby's eyes welled with tears as she pressed her hands to her eyes.
"It spoke to you?" Thorne squeezed himself from her hands and stared to where the Vex fell, Ruby's sparrow severely dented and set ablaze, as he used it as a makeshift battering ram. He watched it clamber to its clawed feet, it's balance slightly distorted from the impact, it's eye shot a glance at the sparrow, and up to Ruby, then to Thorne. Its eye matched up with the Ghost, it's eye starting to radiate with the intensity of a collapsing sun.
"I-T'S YO-U." The Vex's voice glitched and its different tones interlapped, creating a horrific guttural boom.
"That's no ordinary Vex." Thorne warned as it managed to gain footing, hunching over with its larger arm acting as a balancing tool. Thorne scanned the cybernetic monster, and he managed to gain enough information that he could properly identify the Vex, and he now wished that he didn't.
Cronus, the Rouge Mind