Chapter 43: Curtain Call
Choo choo! It's your conductor, The Draigg speaking! I hope all of you readers are strapped into your seats, because this hype train will activate it's thrusters any moment now! Check for any lose items, see that your seat buckle is secured, and know that I don't own RWBY or any other media I write about. Now, get hype for the music show! It begins now! GGGOOOOOOOOOOO!
The majority of students all over Remnant really revered Saturdays. It was a day of relaxation, a day where you could shrug off the responsibilities of the week and be happy with your life. Task Force Musical, however, didn't get the luxury to do any of that.
The work group was currently gathered around the soundboard, just off stage. Since Ruby had just arrived with drinks for everyone, their nerves were slightly softened. Yang proceeded to chug her energy drink, while the others sipped on their coffees.
Ruby took this time to try and inspire her friends. After all, as the head of this project, it felt like her duty. So, she moved in front of the group and propped one of her legs on a folding chair, and started with:
"Friends! My brothers and sisters in arms I'm so glad you're here to help me in this journey!".
"No prob, sis.", Yang said, toasting her with her energy drink can.
"Wait, wait.", Ruby said, shushing her sister. "Now, I know that we've had a long hard, journey, you guys have been brave. Now, it's important that you hold the line.", Ruby said, her chest puffed out.
"That's from a video game.", Ren pointed out. Ruby's chest deflated, since she was hoping they wouldn't notice that.
"Fear is a choice?", Ruby tried.
"Now that's from a movie. Bad one, at that.", Yang noted.
"These are the truths of this world?", tried Ruby again.
"Anime.", Nora chimed in.
By now, Ruby was scraping the bottom of the barrel of speech quotes she had memorized. "Take your sorrow and turn it into anger?", she questioned.
"Another anime.", said Velvet.
"Failure isn't an option?", Ruby asked once more.
"Okay, that's from too many movies to count.", Blake said.
"We're cancelling the apocalypse?", was Ruby's final try.
"That one doesn't even apply here. Whatsoever.", Weiss added.
"What do you want from me?!", Ruby cried, at the end of her speech-giving rope.
Yang patted Ruby on the shoulder and said: "Oh, Ruby. You don't need to give any speeches. We all know how important this is, okay? Right?". The others nodded at Yang's question.
"Just believe in us. We don't need any speeches or anything like that. We're all natural bad-asses here, anyway. We can do this.", concluded Yang.
"Well, can you all just act like I said something cool? I mean, I had this all in my head and…", Ruby drifted off, realizing how weird her request sounded.
The group collectively shrugged, and then started clapping. With whoops and cheers surrounding her, Ruby felt like she was on top of the world. This was now exactly like her greatest fantasy. And it was actually happening! In real life! It felt absolutely astounding to be her, to know that she and her friends actually made the music show happen.
"LAUNCH, TASK FORCE MUSICAL!", Ruby shouted, dramatically pointing in the air. Her exclamation caused her friend's cheers to die down.
"Task Force Musical?", Ren asked, rolling his eyes slightly.
"I think it's… charming.", Pyrrha offered. She wasn't exactly sure why they needed a group name. But, whatever, it was Ruby's idea. Might as well go along with it.
"It's certainly something…", agreed Jaune while he scratched the back of his neck. He personally thought he could come up with a better name. Task Force Musical sounded pretty uncreative, compared to better group names. He should bring that up to Ruby, in case they wanted to do something similar in the future.
"I like it!", Nora exclaimed. Of course she would. She liked most things. For example, she liked that tree costume so much, she had to be forced to take it off by Ren this morning. It took a lot of elbow grease and bickering on Ren's part, but it finally got taken off.
"Look, we can discuss it later. We should focus on the show now.", Velvet suggested, bring back everyone's attention to the matter at hand.
Admittedly, Velvet had a point. The work group always managed to find a way to get sidetracked. It was usually some weird, out of the ordinary thing, too. This had been a weird month. That was a known fact by now.
Back to the subject at hand, Task Force Musical decided to hang around the stage. They still needed to prepare themselves mentally for tonight. The hour of reckoning was only a few scant hours away now. It felt much closer than that.
Transitioning to a few hours later, Team RWBY was hanging around the snack bar bathroom. They were supposed to get dressed in their costumes, in order to save time later. However, Yang was sure as hell taking her time.
Blake, now starting to get annoyed at how long it was taking her, knocked on the bathroom door. It only took her five minutes to get changed. What was taking Yang so long?
"Are you done yet?", she asked.
Behind the door, Yang's muffled voice replied, "No! It's… umm… ill-fitting.".
Blake could tell that Yang was lying. However, before she could say something, Weiss shoved her aside and started to yell at the door.
"If you don't come out, I'll knock down this door!", she threatened.
When Yang didn't reply, Weiss started to kick the door.
"Hey!", Cedric the cashier yelled at them from behind the counter. "If you break that, you're paying for it!".
"Oh, I have plenty of money!", Weiss yelled back.
"Okay, okay! I'm coming out.", Yang cried as she caved into her friend's demands. She opened the (now slightly dented) bathroom door and walked out.
There was a good reason that Yang didn't want to come out. It wasn't that the costume didn't fit, it fit surprisingly well, actually. But, given her girlfriend's number of fetishes, she knew that the costume would appeal to a lot of them at the same time. Unfortunately for her, she was proven correct.
Blake froze in place when she saw Yang in her costume. The high stockings! The low cut top! The frilly, short skirt! This was all too much for her. A trickle of blood escaped her nose, in addition to the river of drool coming out of the corner of her mouth.
"Uhh, Blake ? Are you alright?", Ruby asked, waving her hand in front of Blake's face.
"S-s-sugoi…", Blake managed to moan out.
Then, wordlessly, Blake took out her scroll and snapped a picture of Yang in her costume. Then, shoving Weiss out of the way, she marched over to the bathroom. Yang stepped out of the way before the door could close on her.
"Err… I was supposed to go next.", Weiss noted.
Yang palmed her forehead and sighed, "Of course this would happen.".
Weiss and Ruby were both about to say something, but they were interrupted by strange noises coming out of the bathroom. To them, it sounded like a cat meowing and fighting at the same time. It was abundantly clear what Blake was doing in there. A blush crossed all of Team RWY's faces, for a variety of different reasons.
A surprisingly short time later, Blake came out of the bathroom, looking completely disheveled. Her hair was messed up, and her bow was starting to come undone. She also didn't notice that the zipper of her pants was still most of the way down.
"All *huff*… yours *puff*", Blake managed to say between ragged breaths. She walked towards Yang, reaching out to her.
"Paws off, kitty.", Yang ordered, swatting away Blake's hands. If Blake got what she wanted, then the both of them would be out of commission into the next day.
Weiss and Ruby didn't move. They both had to change, but the both of them didn't want to use that bathroom after Blake's little hand service session.
"Y-you're up, Weiss", Ruby said as she pushed her towards the bathroom.
Weiss sidestepped her way out of Ruby's pushing, then said, "I think the honor should go to our leader.". She hoped that was a good excuse.
"No, no, a leader always puts her followers first.", Ruby deflected. She meant it in the literal way, not the metaphorical one.
Luckily for Weiss, Cedric heard what Blake was doing in the bathroom (He couldn't not hear it. The bathroom was attached to the snack bar), and walked up with a bucket and a mop. Not saying a thing, he shoved them into Blake's hands.
"Clean up your mess.", he ordered before walking back over to the counter.
Blake was too much in a daze to protest. Limping over to the bathroom, she closed the door to start mopping up her mess.
"We should just use our bathroom, right?", Weiss suggested.
"Yeah…", agreed Ruby.
So, leaving Yang behind to watch over Blake, the pair left to get changed into their costumes elsewhere.
Finally, the time had arrived. Evening had fallen over Beacon. Ruby was looking out behind the curtain, trying to count the amount of audience members they had. They had gotten more attendees than everyone expected. There was at least a third of the student body there, sitting on the lawn on blankets or chairs they had brought.
Ruby's heart felt like it was going to explode out of her chest and flop around on the stage. Turning back to the group back stage, Ruby stared at all of them. Jaune had on a headset and was holding a clipboard, with stage directions posted on it. Velvet was also with him, handling the expected program of events.
Nora and Pyrrha were sitting near the switches controlling the lights and speakers, ready to set them on at a moment's notice. Ren was stationed next to them, at the soundboard, ready to play the music.
Finally, Blake and Yang were helping Weiss apply some last minute make up on her face. Ruby couldn't help but marvel at how everything was turning out. This was it! The promised hour had arrived!
Walking over to Weiss, Ruby placed her hand on her girlfriend's shoulder. "I would say good luck, but I don't think you need it.", Ruby said.
This made Weiss smirk a little. "Of course I don't", Weiss bragged, "I AM a Schnee, after all.".
"Don't get ahead of yourself, Ice Princess.", Yang said, trying to apply some blush on Weiss' face.
"I meant it as a joke, Yang.", Ruby said in Weiss' defense.
"Meh. Whatever.", Yang replied, trying to focus on the matter at hand. "Ah! There.", she exclaimed as she finished.
Blake held a mirror up to Weiss' face. Weiss marveled at how pretty she looked. There was just enough makeup to make her look good, while also keeping some of her natural beauty in the forefront.
"I must say, you've outdone yourself, Yang.", complimented Weiss. Really, Yang did do a fantastic job on her face. Not that anything was wrong, of course. It just looked even better than perfect, was all.
Before Weiss' ego could be inflated further, Jaune walked over to Team RWBY. He was completely into his role of stage manager. Velvet followed after him, looking through the program.
"Guys, hate to break up your moment here, but I think we should get started soon. The audience is pretty much settled in. We can't keep them waiting.", he said to all of them.
"Yeah, I think we're all ready to start now.", chimed in Velvet.
Nodding to them, Ruby held out her hands wide. "Grab them, you guys.", she ordered to Team WBY. Unhesitatingly, they formed a circle and held hands. After a moment of silence, they all let go. They were ready.
Nodding at the group, Jaune then walked over to the rest of his team.
"Ready the lights.", he ordered to Pyrrha and Nora. Turning to Ren, he then said, "Turn on all the speakers.". Team NPR got to work, following Jaune's orders.
"Okay, people!", Velvet announced to everyone. "We've got a show now! Let's break a leg!". Nora grinned to Ren at that suggestion. Ren sighed and said, "Not literally.". Pouting, Nora turned back to the lighting controls.
Ruby walked Weiss over to the curtains, ready to show her out to the front of the stage.
Weiss took a deep breath and looked over at Ruby. Ruby offered a reassuring smile in return.
"Don't worry,", advised Ruby, "We're here for you.". She then placed a quick kiss on Weiss' lips.
Blushing Weiss said back, "I love you.". Then, hardening her courage in her bones, Weiss then swore to herself, "I'm ready.".
Nodding, Ruby pulled back the curtain. Weiss took a step forward, leaving the safety of the curtain. The audience erupted in applause, ready to start the show.
As for Weiss, she was ready to face the music.
WOOOOOOOOOOOO! I hope you're ready for this! We're cranking up the speed on this hype train! The ride doesn't stop here! Before you pass out from the excessive hyper-force, leave me something in the reviews section! And, for a fun game, name the works that Ruby tried to rip-off in her speech! This is your conductor, The Draigg, signing off to control all this hype! YEAHHHHHHHHH!