Ch 32: Solace: Final Chapter
Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.
- Mary Elizabeth Frye '1932
ITS THE FINAL CHAPTER!
- Months After the Successful Attack on Beacon, and Liberation of Vale: In a Cemetery-
"You ever wonder what it might have been like if he made it, if he pulled through?" I closed my eyes, refusing to answer her question. "You know they all died for us? Right? They ended the evil that plagued our kingdom."
I fell down to my knees and began to cry, weeping for my loved one I had lost, his life cut so short. She walks over to me and puts her hand on my shoulder. "I know nothing that I say can help you get over this but, you have to move on. He would want you to."
I attempt to stop my sobbing and place a bouquet of flowers onto the plot of land in front of his grave. The white flowers reminiscent of what in my mind angels wings were. "It's time for you to make your piece." I remain silent and gaze at his marble slab marking his name. All of the feelings and emotions running wild through my body I continue to cry, my tears falling to the lush green grass.
One day, will this all be over? Will I ever be able to put him behind me? I wipe the tears from my cheeks as I stand up on my two feet. I gently wipe the grass from my skirt as I turn around to face the girl who has been attempting to help me through my grief.
"I think I'm ready Blake, I think I'm ready to let go." I say this as I glance back at his tombstone. It reads: Many people fought to free Vale from the ruthless occupation under the White Fang, many never got to see it be free. Devin Cross was one of the many who never saw this. He will be remembered and never forgotten for his sacrifice he gave. "The Spirit", the name he was given by those who knew him, feared by those who fought against him, will be just another nickname amongst the countless men and women who died for a free Vale. He will be greatly missed, and will always be close in my heart. The inscription ended with -Weiss Schnee.
"Are you sure Weiss? We don't have to leave yet." Blake questioned me, worried about my emotional state.
"I think I am." I stood up and walked over to Blake hugging her tightly. "I just can't get over the fact that he is gone."
- Hours Following the Attack-
I opened my eyes to realize I wasn't dead, not yet at least. The lights above me blinding as I looked over my shoulder to my left. On a gurney next to me lay a heavily breathing Devin. We made it, we fucking made it. But where the hell are we?
I turned to my left to see a table with countless operation tools on it. God dammit, we are in the E.R.
"Quickly stabilize the one in the trench coat, his heart rate is spiking." Ordered an unknown voice.
"On it Dr. Jones!" replied another voice as two nurses ran to Devin's side. His breathing continued to grow heavier and heavier.
"Dr. Jones, the electrocution seems to have damaged his automotive cognitive motor functions, each breath he takes is slowly killing him!" screamed one of the doctors who was tending to Devin.
"Quickly! Attempt to sedate him Miss Tuggey! Miss Zech, put an IV into the other one, I'm not losing any more patients today." Barked the head doctor. I felt a sudden prick in my arm as the nurse, apparently the Miss Zech drove the IV into my arm. I turned once again towards Devin.
Mustering all the strength I attempted to call out to him, "Don't-. die-. Don't die Devin. Weiss-. Weiss needs-. You to pull through." I close my lips as I watch his breathing suddenly stop. Then another doctor busted through the door.
"Dr. Jones which one is the one in critical condition?" The new doctor asked pointing at myself and Devin.
"The one who just flat lined dumbass. What took you so long Dr. Free? You need to try to bring him back quickly!" Yelled Dr. Jones.
Dr. Free reached for a pair of defibrillators and counted down "One, two, three. CLEAR!" Devin's body shook from the shock, but his chest didn't rise. "Bollocks, lemme try again!" The body shook again, yet no breathing returned. No I don't want to lose any more friends I have already lost too many.
"BLOODY HELL! I'm gonna give it one more try!" Yells Dr. Free as he puts the paddles to Devin's chest, just one more time. Yet nothing happened. "God dammit, I think we lost him." Yelled Dr. Free.
"Try again, god dammit, don't let him die!" replied Dr. Jones as he ran to Devin's side and attempted CPR. "While I attempt to bring him back, Miss Zech, pump the other one full of pain killers and sedatives, we need to fix that hole in his chest."
"On it. Are you sure Dr. Jones?" She asked as she put to vials into my IV.
"Yes ARRYN I'm sure, we aren't going to lose another one, not while I'm here." Replied the doctor in a strict tone. Suddenly my vision becomes quite blurry, and I close my eyes, the pain finally leaving me.
- Unknown Amount of Time Later-
I open my heavy eyelids once again to find myself in, you guessed it, a hospital bed. I slowly leaned to my right to see a sleeping Blake in the chair next to me. Good, she made it. "You are awake. Ruby he is awake." I rotate my head to my left to see Yang pointing at me.
"Yang go get Ren. Tell him he is awake! I will wake up Blake!" exclaimed the red headed girl. Ruby rushes around the bed to Blake and begins to shake her as I watch. "Blake he is awake! Mako is awake!" I couldn't help but smile at Ruby's enthusiasm.
"You are back, we thought you weren't going to make it." Blake tells me as she stands up.
"How ironic, you are the one that tells me that I will always pull through." I begin to laugh to lighten the mood. Yet Ruby and Blake weren't laughing with me. Something is up.
"Mako, I don't think you understand how close you were to actually dying, this isn't something to joke about." Blake begins to tear up. "Especially when other didn't make it." Blake gulps, trying to force back the tears but it just doesn't work.
Too upset to continuing talking, Ruby picked up where Blake had left off, "Mako, you remember don't you? Ozpin, Jaune, the countless GICD soldiers, they didn't make it." My situation finally starting to sink in I begin to panic.
"What about Devin? Is he okay? Where is Weiss? Did Pyrrha make it?" I continue to stutter through incomplete thoughts until I hear the door open.
"Mako, no one is going to blame you for what happened." Ren stated in a stern voice as he shut the door behind him and Yang.
"Did Devin make it? Someone tell me?" Still worried about my fellow Comrade who I knew for such a brief amount of time, yet seemed to work so well with.
"Mako, he died next to you in the ER, the damage from Cinder's lightning was too much for him." Ren looks down, obviously struck with grief. "The good thing is you made it, plus Vale is back under the authority's control." What about Weiss?
"You didn't answer my other questions, where are Weiss and Pyrrha?" I began to become flustered in my words.
"They are fine, Pyrrha is out of the ICU, and Weiss is expected to get out as well pretty soon." Ren could obviously see the frustration in my eyes and tone.
"Does Weiss know? Is she aware that Devin didn't make it?" If not, someone has to tell her soon.
"No, no one has told her. We don't have the guts to break the news to her." Blake begins to look embarrassed as she says this.
"You know someone has to inform her, we can't act like it didn't happen." I look at all of my friends, not a single one saying a word. "Come on guys don't make me do this." Still no words came from my friends. I guess they didn't want to have to bear explaining Devin's death to Weiss.
"Fine!" I mutter, frustrated that I would have to do what they felt they couldn't. "Put me in a wheel chair or something. I don't think I will be walking to her." Ruby quickly walked out of the room and returned with a wheel chair, which Ren helped me sit down on.
"Well, take me to her. I don't want to put this off. I need to tell her now." Ren simply nods and begins to wheel me through the halls of the hospital. At least we won right? But was all this really necessary?
I zone out as we enter room 636. I gasp slightly, taking in the sight of all the equipment and medical gear Weiss was hooked up to. Guess it's a miracle she even made it.
Weiss lifts up her head from the bed slowly as the rubber wheels of my wheel chair stop at the right side of her bed. "Mako, you are alive!" She said, obviously shocked that I wasn't dead. "If you are here, where is Devin, I'm beginning to miss his company." The look on her face seemed so fragile, so innocent. How was I going to be able to tell her Devin wasn't ever going to keep her company again?
A sudden heavy feeling fills my chest as I take a deep breath. Weiss's expression changes accordingly, she knew something was wrong.
"Weiss, Devin," I pause as I gather the guts to finish the statement as her eyes begin to water. "Devin didn't make it. He died in the ER beside me." I nearly choked after saying the latter as tears began to roll down her cheeks and neck.
"That can't be true, we were going to be something more when this was all over. There is no way he would simply die! HE ALWAYS PULLS THROUGH. In all the years he protected me, he always made it through in the end." The flow of tears increased as she began to stutter, no complete phrases leaving her mouth.
I myself was about to start tearing up, just by looking at her. Fortunately, the rest of team RWBY entered the room to try to calm Weiss down. "Ren, I think it's time we let her teammates try to help her console with her loss." Ren quietly rolled me out of the room and shut the door behind us, muffling the cries coming from the room.
- 18 Years Later: Headmaster's Office in Beacon
Looking back on it, I felt as if the true reason I had Ren help me leave that room was because of all of the guilt I felt. For some reason I felt it was my fault. Even though my friends tell me over and over again, "It wasn't your fault. Everyone was just in the wrong place at the right time." It makes me think about fate, as if no matter what we did, all of those who died, even if we tried our hardest were destined to die that day.
"Professor Scatterfall, the student you requested who was having discipline issues has arrived and is right outside." Ren, now my right hand man at the school told me as he opened the door. As the student walked in I glanced down at the picture I have on my desk. In the picture was a happy family, MY family. I only wish that Devin and Weiss had the chance to have one.
"Headmaster, I'm really sorry about what happened, I swear the only reason I hurt that sophomore was because he was bullying a Faunus girl." The student sounded nervous, possibly intimated by my presence.
"No worries, as a first year student you will learn to suppress such feelings. I myself struggled with this." I said attempting to calm the student down. I looked up at the student finally taking a good look at his face, his snow white hair was messy, typical for a first year. Yet something seemed oddly familiar about his look, his face.
I look down again at the picture on my desk, taking in the picture that I see every day. It depicted Blake, our two kids and myself sitting in front of the steps at Beacon. "Excuse me but I don't think we have ever met personally. Please forgive me for asking you this, but what is your name?"
The student looked surprised at me, probably wondering why the headmaster would be so interested in his name. "My name is James Schnee, but all my friends call me Jimmy. Why do you ask Headmaster?" I knew it, I recognized the hair, such a color I had only seen on two such people, Weiss and Devin.
"I knew your father James." I quickly exclaimed as the look on James's face changed to one of grief.
"And not a day passes that I don't wish that he was here, teaching at Beacon." James's expression changed to a more positive one.
"What was he like, my dad? Sorry if it is weird for a student to be asking you this." He seemed embarrassed as he asked out of probable curiosity. "My mom doesn't talk to me about him a lot, yet I have a feeling she is always thinking about him."
"Your father was an interesting man, very skilled at what he did for the majority of his life. I didn't know him for the longest time sadly, but I knew he wasn't tolerant of injustice and wanted everyone, for the most part, to be treated fairly. But what stood out the most was his burning passion to keep Weiss, your mother safe. He wanted everyone to be safe for a matter of fact." James looked at me with a slight grin on his face, obviously glad to hear about who his father was.
I looked back down at the picture on my desk and turned it around, so James could see it. "Do you see the boy to my left in this picture, the one who I have my hands on his shoulders?" James nodded as I told him this. "His name is Devin, my wife suggested we name our firstborn after your father, something I agreed on. A reminder that we probably wouldn't be alive without him." James's expression changed to a more serious tone.
"Devin will in fact be a first year student coming this winter, my wife insisted he stay at home a little bit before going to school here. But I'm digressing, James. Your father would be incredibly proud at what you are trying to become. I just wish he was here to see it firsthand. You may leave now if you wish, not many people find me that interesting."
"I'm not in trouble for hurting that sophomore?" He asked, obviously thinking he deserved some form of punishment.
"No, I have a feeling that your father would have down the same thing, once again, I know I would. Now get back to class, you are missing Professor Valkyrie's class on Grimm studies." I said as I motioned for him to hurry to class, he smiled as he opened and closed the door behind him.
Such a nice kid, my son could learn from that boy. I guess they are kids though, a time in life they should enjoy, because I surely didn't get to fully enjoy it myself. I stood up from my desk and looked out of the large window that provided me with a perfect view of the lawn in front of Beacon. "Ren! Are you still there?" I yelled wondering if my associate, and friend, was still outside of the door in his own office.
"Yes Mako! Why did you let him go away scot-free?" He said as he walked into my office obviously questioning my reasoning.
"I just felt that he needed a warning, do you know whose son that was?" I ask, curious if Ren was aware.
"No, why do you ask?" Ren quickly responds.
"Oh, it's nothing, except you should expect great things from him. Can you hand me a phone? I need to call someone." I ask pointing towards a phone next to a bookcase.
"Sure, do you mind me asking who exactly you are calling in the middle of the day?" He walked over to the phone and handed it to me, waiting for an answer.
"Just someone I haven't heard from in a while." I say leaving the answer open ended.
"And who is that?" Ren asks, folding his arms over another, curious about who I was going to call.
"The parent of the student that just left the office, Weiss Schnee."
That is the conclusion of "Broken Body & Mind". Hope you all enjoyed my first fanfic. Expect the prequel soon, which will focus on Devin, and his involvement with Weiss and his job before the events in this story.
Not to mention I will be releasing my Volume 2 Canon Fanfic as well very soon, it will be driven by mainly OC's, two of which are being borrowed from UnanimousMusicians Fanfic. They however will not be as they are in his story since this will be different than his own fanfic. Expect two new original teams and the rest of the characters of RWBY in this fanfic. Send reviews and OCs, if the reviews are criticisms this would be appreciated since I want to make these next to fanfics as good as possible. And if the OC's are creative enough, and with your permission I might incorporate them into the story.
And A HUGE THANKS TO GEEKYSARCASM FOR BEING THE EDITOR & PUTTING UP WITH MY AWFUL GRAMMAR MISTAKES, SHE IS AMAZING AND I CAN'T IMAGINE DOING THIS WITHOUT HER!
Be Back Soon,
-Dallas, The Dust- Redeemer