RWBY: Rusted Rose
Part 1: Scars
The sounds of footsteps echoed throughout the black void, illuminated by a group of floating green willo-wisps. A hand, riddled with small cuts and blood reached out to them, but they felt cool to the touch despite looking like fire. The person tilted their head in confusion, before being alerted by the sound of metal clanging. As they walked towards the sound, hoping to find someone to speak to in this barren wasteland, they stopped as they soon saw a familiar face.
Before them was robot, but weirdly having roots for a spine on their back and human brown hair tied up in a ponytail, using a hammer to pound hot metal. This was a blacksmith, one the person met only once, long ago during a period of great uncertainty. Right now didn't seem any less fitting, the person didn't know where they were and needed guidance.
"I've been expecting you, though it took longer for you to arrive her than I thought." The blacksmith said, not even turning around as they continued their work.
"I…wasn't expecting to be…anywhere after." The person, revealed to be a middle aged woman said dejected. She bore a tattered red and black dress and sweatpants, ripped boots, red and black hair tied with a red string in a ponytail just like the smith, and had lips red as the rose. But the most distinct feature of this adult was a sharp frown she bore as she uttered these words.
"Are you, the spirit of the tree?" She asked, her tone growing fearful as she noticed the smith finally down her hammer and paused. She was worried she asked something stupid of insensitive before being startled by a chuckle from the smith.
"Yes… you could say I am, but that is a simplistic understanding of what the tree is. It is more appropriate to call me a guide, one for lost souls like yourself." They said in a motherly tone. But the woman only winced at the mention of "souls" it brought her a disturbing revelation.
"That's right… I died. So... is this the end for me? Is it all finally going to be over?" she asked fearfully but with a tone of weird hope the smith didn't fail to take notice of as they frowned. They had met suicidal or at least self-deprecating people in this dimension before, but they could sense this one in particular had a very heavy weight on her shoulders.
"Before anything else, let me ask you this. Who are you?" They asked softly, startling the woman who gasped as she heard this question. Her lips quivered as she struggled to speak, it was an obvious answer for her, one she would have easily spoken years ago. But in that moment, she choked as she couldn't bring herself to talk, she felt so weak right now and honestly didn't know what to identify as. Was she a woman? Was she a huntress? Who was she?
The blacksmith tilted their head curiously seeing their guest pant a bit in exhaustion as she became overwhelmed with emotion.
"Do you know who you are?" they asked.
Soon the image of an orange hair girl and a red haired girl flushed into the woman's mind. They laid on the ground with their arms limp while looking at her with lifeless eyes.
"Pyrrah… Penny…" she softly said before a young blonde boy bearing armor glared at her disdainfully, sending a sharp pain in the woman's gut as she clenched her stomach.
"Jaune!" she screeched painfully, tears forming in her eyes.
"Are those…your names?" The spirit asked.
"No! There my friends… or at least they were." She said bitterly.
"Pyrrah and Penny died years ago because of me, and Jaune… I'm sure he hates me for that. He wanted me to save them, but I couldn't." The woman cried.
"And what did you want?" the spirit asked. At this point, the woman's eyes turned bloodshot with rage from all these incessant questions. She forced herself back up and got in the spirits face, almost startling them as they withdrew slightly, but still eyed with woman intently to give full attention.
"What I wanted, was for all this pain to be gone!" she screamed.
"I wanted all this weight in my chest, all the expectations, all my failures to be done with! OVER!" She yelled.
The blacksmith remained silent from this reveal, they could see this woman was clearly traumatized and in need of guidance, it was what they were here for. Slowly they walked over to her, resting an empathetic hand on her shoulder.
"I see things haven't changed since we last met, your still carrying a tremendous pain in your heart aren't you?" they asked softly.
After a few moments of sobbing and hiccups, the woman raised her head, her silver eyes flushed with tears as she glared at the smith.
"You have no idea." She coldly stated. "For the last 20 years, all I have ever felt is hurt." She said bitterly.
Yes, 20 years have passed and each day of them was like a knife to her gut, but today was one she could never forget, the day she gave up.
Reunion
8 hours ago…
The Ever After, an alternate world, parallel to Remnant that hosted many anomalies. It was one where animals talked, weather was impacted by strong emotions, and that was only a fraction of the weird stuff that could be experienced. It was rare, but sometimes humans and Faunus could become trapped in this world, their only hope for escape, a giant ancient tree with rainbow leaves in the center of the world. But to get there, one must embody a certain characteristic that is feared amongst mortal kind, and one man in particular, was desperate to deny it and lived far away as possible to avoid it, almost living a life even more imaginative than the fairy tail world he resided in for 20 years now.
Jaune Arc, the rusted knight, was ridding his rabbit deer beast Juniper through a forest made of origami paper, with a few familiar friends on the beasts back with him.
Yang Xiao Long, Weiss, Schnee, and Blake Belladonna, clung to each other desperate to hang on as Juniper ran fast on Jaune's orders, ignoring their pleas to slow down. He had to get home now of all times, to see her, to let her know who he found after so many years. Sunset was upon them,
As they exited the forest, the girls stood in awe at the sight of a small village with koi ponds connected too and overseen by a large dam above the village.
"Wow! It's beautiful." Weiss said softly. Jaune couldn't help but chuckle at this, a rich girl being impressed by modesty, but decided to press forward as he waved his arms at the girls, motioning them to follow him to his own house. It was a small shack, probably fit enough for 2 or 3 people at most, but he was determined to have his friends be comfortable. He had waited so long for their return and he wanted it to count. His only real concern was the person inside the house and how they would react. Not the person, but the girls beside him is what Jaune feared. They were in for the shock of their lives.
With a deep breath, Jaune hit the door a couple times.
"Honey I'm home! I brought guests!" he yelled. The girl's faces bolted wide open as they heard him say "honey".
"Wait Jaune, your married!" they yelled in unison, now unsure if this bearded middle-aged man was truly the goofy "vomit boy" they knew back at Beacon.
"Yeah, but that's not the biggest surprise your getting trust me." He snickered.
Before they could get answers, the girls heard footsteps approach the door, followed by a somewhat familiar voice.
"Coming Jaune!" she yelled.
They stood frozen as their hearts pounded, growing anxious from this voice.
"That couldn't…no she couldn't be…Is it!?" Blake asked softly, her eyes widen with shock at the possibility. Yang shook her head slowly, the voice was familiar but too mature to be her.
But as the doors opened slowly, the girls gave off thousand yard stares as they soon came face to face with a middle-aged woman with an all-too familiar face.
"Great timing honey, cause dinner's…ready….?" The woman said with a broken tone as their silver eyes soon teared up at the sight of the girls beside him.
"Ruby?" Yang asked softly, tears forming in her lilac eyes as she an unbelievable sight before her. Her little sister was all grown up and even taller than her. Her brain was stunned seeing the impossible before her.
"Yang, girls, is it really you?" Ruby replied, slowly stepping towards them. She eyed her sister especially, her hand slowly touching her cheeks to make sure this wasn't an illusion. She felt her heart melt as she felt the warm familiar sensation of her sister's flesh on her hand, it was something she yearned for these past 20 years. It was something she feared she never would feel again after Yang's fall to save her little sister on that bridge.
"Yang." Ruby yelled said softly, it really was her.
"Ruby!" Yang replied tearfully as she gripped her now older sister's waist in a bear hug, soon joined by the others as they tearfully embraced, flushed with emotions of joy, confusion, and relief as they had finally been reunited.
Everyone soon sat down at the dinner table, enjoying a modest meal of white rice and fish caught from the nearby lake. Despite the small amount of food and flavors, it was one of the happiest meals Ruby enjoyed in ages as she eyed her friends, still giving a few broken sobs here and there.
She soon broke her sobs to give off a small laugh when a minor grumble from Weiss about being sore from sitting on pillows instead of chairs. It was refreshing to hear her snobby attitude after so long. She soon noticed Yang and Blake holding hands affectionately, before her jaw dropped at the sight of Yang feeding Blake like a lover would.
"Oh my gosh… You two are going out aren't you!?" she screeched, but in a way Yang and Blake could tell was devoid of judgment and filled to the brim with kindness and support as they smiled warmly.
"Yeah, being stuck here had its advantages. We realized time could be short so we wanted no regrets and just let it all out after a while." Yang said sheepishly, blushing a bit, as she was still embarrassed from her confessions earlier. Blake soon turned to her and gave her a sad look, instantly drawing silence to the group.
"When you fell off that bridge, I thought I'd never see you again. So when I did, I realized I loved you and I never wanted to be separated from you again." Blake said softly, blushing heavily as Yang smiled and rubbed her cat ears tenderly, almost tempted to purr before Weiss coughed a bit, drawing everyone's attention, and a small stink eye from Yang for ruining the mood. But Weiss felt she had to let Ruby know what happened to the relics, to what happened since they fell into the Ever After.
"Speaking of which, about what happened on the bridge after you fell." Weiss said before a hand was raised by Ruby, startling everyone.
"Jaune told me years ago, about how we lost. How we lost the relics, how we… lost…Penny." She groaned a bit, struggling to spit out the words like rotten milk as Jaune walked over to her and hugged her shoulders supportively. He eyed Weiss disdainfully, gritting his teeth at having to remember mercy killing Penny, having to reveal it to Ruby all those years ago.
We are shown an image of a teenage Ruby, sobbing uncontrollably into a teenage Jaune's chest as he tearfully hugged her on a bridge.
Weiss frowned heavily, she knew it was likely Jaune would admit to this to Ruby by now, but she still felt regret right now for bringing it up. Nonetheless, she had questions that remained unanswered.
"I-I'm sorry for your loss. I really only meant ask you what you've been up to since we all fell." She said softly, causing Jaune and his wife to take a deep breath and calm down as they gazed her intently.
"We only just got her a day ago and encountered weird stuff like talking animals, Jaune's the rusted knight from a fairy tail, and now your both married and looking so… mature. How did that happen really?" Weiss asked, Yang and Blake leaned their heads forward as they were also curious.
Ruby and Jaune eyed each other solemnly, it wasn't easy to explain nor did a part of them want to explain. Regardless, they couldn't ignore the elephant in the room and knew they had to say something, but quietly nodded to each other, signally they wanted to omit some details.
"Well, here in the Ever After a lot of things are warped, not just the creatures but the laws of physics too." Jaune started.
"Basically a lot of weird crap." Ruby bluntly summed up. She was like her uncle Qrow, preferring to be blunt and get right to the point.
"When we got here, we met up by a small tree at the beach. It had some weird fruit on it that we were tempted to eat. But as we opened it up, it had an alarm clock in it for some reason." Jaune continued.
WBY raised their eyebrows in confusion over this.
"A clock in a fruit? Wow sounds yummy, does it make your stomach go tik tock?" Yang asked sarcastically before being startled by a slam on the desk by Ruby, whose glare silenced her. Everyone but Jaune was surprised by her sudden violent behavior, not expecting it from the leader they knew.
"This is serious! It had some weird power to turn back time. We got sent back time…. 20 YEARS!" She yelled, frightening the girls as Weiss put a hand over her mouth.
"20….You guys have been here that long?" Blake asked with a horrified tone.
"Yeah, it was a long time and we really, really, missed you guys. You don't really get how much it hurt waiting for you." Ruby said bitterly. Yang rubbed her shoulders nervously, she felt as if she had been slapped in the face. After all, she fell in first because she took a blow from Neo to save Ruby. Her little… or really big sister now must have been panicking looking for her when she got here.
"We did meet up with others like us back then. A girl named Alyx and her brother Lewis." Jaune said. Blake's ears twitched as she heard these familiar names.
"Wait! Alyx and Lewis? As in the author Lewis of the book "The girl and the Tree" with Alyx as the main character? Blake asked.
Jaune rubbed his head nervously, remembering her earlier admiration for his rusted armor. He knew all too well how that book went, because he experienced it himself.
"Yeah, we met them and played out the story you read as a kid all those years ago Blake. Thing is…." Jaune said nervously, drawing everyone's attention except Ruby, who gritted her teeth angrily.
"Alyx wasn't like what read about as a kid, nor was that Cheshire cat she was with." Ruby interrupted, her venomous tone causing the girls to freeze up. Ruby took a deep breath as she raised her palm to her husband, signally she wanted to continue, so he nodded supportively as he averted his gaze solemnly.
"Alyx wasn't a kind child with playful curiosity like the cat in the story, she was bitter and selfish. She wanted to get back home no matter what. And I mean she would do anything no matter how cruel it was if it meant she had a chance to get what she wanted." Ruby said bitterly, clenching her fist.
"She sounds like a real spoiled brat, I should know." Weiss said, twiddling her fingers nervously as she recalled her own spoiled behavior growing up before Beacon.
"She was." Ruby said as she nodded. "She stole from the After Ens, ruined towns, and even betrayed us out of jealousy all because she thought she alone deserved to get home, to get everything." Ruby said.
"Betrayed you how?" Blake asked nervously, almost afraid to get an answer as she pondered the revelation of her favorite kids book character.
"She took a liking to vomit boy here." Ruby joked as she pointed to her husband who gave a fake offended gasp.
"I thought you said you wouldn't call me that anymore honey!" he playfully yelled.
"Right I'm sorry. I meant Vomit Man!" She chuckled as they gave each other a friendly kiss on the lips before focusing on her smiling sister.
"What you and Blake, what Jaune and I have… It was something she wanted the most really." Ruby said.
"For the first 2 years, I was going just as crazy as her, paranoid from being lost and confused."
An image of a teenage Ruby in her Atlas outfit is shown clasping her head with both hands, looking around as she saw talking raccoons and flying pigs with a look of panic.
"But I had Jaune to help me out the whole time I was crying my eyes out. He always just knew how to calm me down." She said.
A teenage Jaune, with a short blond beard and his armor rusting slightly is shown putting Crescent Rose into her hand, instantly calming her down and making her smile at him. The two soon start to blush as they eye each other intensely.
"And when you spend a few years with a person you like, that can quickly evolve into love." Ruby said with a warm smile. "Lewis and the After Ens here even wedded us in this village when we visited. Everyone was so happy for us…everyone except her." She bitterly said.
Ruby and Jaune as young adults kiss, soon the scene changes to that of them wearing flowers on their heads as they kiss at an altar in the Ever After, surrounded by several Paper Pleasers and Lewis who cheer and clap for them, except for Alyx who glares at them from afar.
"We still all wanted to go home to Remnant, so we stuck together regardless. After a few months we met some strange looking Cat I recognized from the book. It went by the name of Curious Cat, and for an annoying reason." Ruby grumbled. Jaune rolled his eyes as he recalled this as well to the groups concern.
"It was soooooo annoying, always asking each of us about Remnant and never doing its job as a guide like it offered. Only giving us fortune cookie nonsense whenever we asked about the tree or how things worked around here, so we eventually ditched it and pressed on." She said.
"Yeah, we had the same problem when we met it and did the same. It was so useless." Yang groaned.
Ruby eye's widen as she heard this, to her teams concern.
"You, you met the cat?" she stuttered, receiving a nod in return from her team.
Soon they saw her expression turned darker as Ruby clenched one hand with the other and began shaking.
"Ruby? Are you okay?" Yang asked, reaching out her hand to Ruby. Her warmth instantly stopped the shaking, and at a good time too. Ruby felt she was about to explode with anxiety and anger right now remembering what came next. Jaune merely closed his eyes and folded his arms in discomfort, unable or unwilling to say anything to Weiss's confusion.
"And then what?" Weiss asked. Ruby sighed as she finally found the strength to speak, but still decided to leave out some details, she had to. She just couldn't bring herself to say everything right now, it still hurt too much.
"After meeting that Cat, Alyx started to change." Ruby venomously said.
Alyx, a small teenage black girl with curly brown hair and black lipstick wearing a doll dress is shown giving a bright smile, before it descends into an angry glare.
"She started to grow paranoid, clingy even. Hanging on to Jaune and calling him her "prince charming" and ogling him despite being my husband. Whenever I told her to back off and that she was being creepy, she'd explode, throwing tantrums about us being "thieves" or "backstabbers" and running off saying she was going back to talk to the cat because he at least listened to her." She bitterly said, making finger quotes as she rolled her eyes annoyed with her old ally's past behavior.
"Then one night, she made us all soup for dinner and seemingly apologized. She said she was sorry for being jealous and wanted to make amends. I was so freaking naïve, thinking she had seen the light. That's when she betrayed us." Ruby said.
"What did she do to you?" Yang grunted, her eyes flickering red as she clenched her fist, obviously wanting to find Alyx and make her pay, she just wanted to know exactly what to say to her when she pounded her head.
"She poisoned me and Jaune's soup." Ruby sighed, her team gasping in shock at this reveal.
A young adult Ruby and Jaune are shown gasping for air, drool flowing out the side of their mouths as they get on their knees clenching their throats before collapsing.
"Luckily she didn't poison Lewis, she only put a little to put him to sleep for a bit while she dunked ours full of it. Honestly it was a miracle we lived." Ruby sadly recalled.
"WHERE IS THAT BITCH!? Yang screamed as she exploded with anger, her hair catching fire as her eyes reddened with rage.
"Easy Yang, don't burn down our house!" Jaune yelled before throwing a glass of water on her hair, putting out the fire and making her hair steam and sizzle. Yang slumped her arms to her sides as she sat back down, finally calming down as everyone glared at her to her embarrassment, only offering meek apologies in return.
"She and her brother escaped, somehow they got to the tree and left me and Jaune for dead." Ruby said as she finished explaining her story.
As a wave of silence overtook the house, everyone rubbed their shoulders or head nervously as they processed this heavy information before the sound of many tiny footsteps filled the room, alerting the group to a small yellow paper machete person holding hot tea came in.
"Your hot tea is ready." The Paper Pleaser said enthusiastically before wobbling, nearly tripping on the floor before Ruby Petal Burst behind it in a flash before her team could process anything and grabbed it.
"You got to be more careful Yang or your gonna burn yourself." She said before covering her mouth as she saw Yang's jaw dropped.
"Wait…Did you just call that After En Yang?" Human Yang asked, she was clearly unnerved and confused at this reveal, as were the rest of her turn while Jaune's eyes darted around nervously.
"Well, we just… after the paper pleasers found us poisoned they treated us and let us live in their village after that. They didn't have names so we decided to name each one. This one's yellow so we decided…." He said awkwardly. Yang merely folded her arms and raised an eyebrow.
"You really haven't met a lot of people have you?" she asked, somewhat offended.
"You have no idea." He bitterly said before eyeing the sunset outside the window and giving a shocked look.
"Oh my god it's late! Ruby its time, we need to go outside now!" He yelled, shocking everyone as he raced towards the door followed by Ruby, who chugged her tea despite it being hot.
"Right were late, were late, we got hurry!" she yelled as she bolted out the door to her teammates surprise.
"What is she late for, it's almost night time?" Weiss asked.
"Our parent's are off to save the village from the nightly fire." Paper Yang said, drawing the attention of WBY as they eyed it in shock.
"Parent's? Fire? What the hell's going on?!" Yang screamed in shock, making the paper pleaser recoil in fright.
"Oh right? Sorry… I was told not to tell anyone that. Our heroes simply see us as children for some reason I can't explain." Paper Yang said quickly to clarify, causing Yang to calm down somewhat.
"Our village comes under many threats like floods, fires from our night lamps, and storms, and don't get me wrong we are grateful for our heroes help. But these incidents made us realize for some time how fragile we are. We'd love to ascend and become something greater for them, to repay their kindness." Paper Yang explained.
"Ascend?" Yang asked, raising an eyebrow. She vaguely recalled the curious cat mentioning this a while ago but never got it to explain.
"Ascension is rebirth, when we die in this world or lose our purpose, our souls are taken to the great tree where we reincarnate as a stronger life form." Paper Yang explained.
Everyone looks out the window to see Ruby and Jaune dowsing some lamp fire's with water, Ruby even petal bursting to gather buckets faster while Juane grabs a blue and purple paper pleaser and throws them out of the way of the flames.
"Then why doesn't Jaune and Ruby let you? Haven't you explained that to them?" Weiss asked. Paper Yang folded its paper hands together awkwardly.
"Our heroes seem to think death is permanent for some reason and really don't want us to die. Especially the ones they named Pyrrah and Penny." Paper Yang said, making WBY wince as they realized the true reason for Ruby and Jaune's behavior.
Inner and Outer Battles
30 minutes later…
Ruby and Jaune gave each other high fives as they applauded the other on their successful rescue of the village from the fire, before turning their heads to their approaching friends and making them recoil with sharp bitter glares.
"So nice of you to join us, after we did all the work." Ruby said sarcastically, Blake holding Yang back a bit as she flared up from that tone.
"Why are you helping them?" Weiss coldly asked, shocking Ruby and Jaune.
"How could you even ask us that? Were hunters, it's what we-" jaune said before being cut off.
"They don't want to be saved, they want to evolve!" Yang yelled.
Ruby herself needed to be held back by Jaune as she formed a fist and steadily walked towards her sister for, what was for her, a ridiculous request. She was asking her to give up her very principles. Weiss got in between both sides as she raised her arms to keep them separate, desperate to keep the peace.
"Wait, Wait! Please lets just calm down a second and review. First, you two aren't wrong for wanting to help others." Weiss said, trying to appease her friends in the hope they would be open to reason. She sighed a bit as Ruby released her fist and seemingly calmed down, as did Yang whose red eyes became normal lilac. Now was the time to go in for the closer.
"The thing is, the paper pleaser said they don't want to burden you anymore by having you protect them. They want to evolve so, maybe we should just let them go." Weiss said somberly. Jaune and Ruby trembled a bit, memories of Pyrrah and Penny flashing through their minds at the mention of this notion.
Pyrrah being incinerated by Cinder on top of Beacon's roof and Penny giving off a weak smile as Jaune lowered his sword into her chest and screamed in agony.
"No, No! We can't….We can't fail anymore friends!" Ruby screamed as she clutched her head. She began hyperventilating as Jaune fought tears to hug and comfort her as WBY looked on solemnly. While they themselves had felt bitter from losing Atlas and their friends to Salem and Cinder, It was clear to them that these two had been struggling much more the last 20 years. Ruby's breakdown further showed them just how much damage they had endured, how much bitterness their losses had festered with them. These two desperately needed help, but the girls remained frozen as they were uncertain what they could possibly say to alleviate their friend's pain. They were just some teenagers talking to some battle-hardened adult's, Blake even thought they might get brushed off as naïve like they had been in the past by Ironwood.
Before another word could be even be uttered, the sound of a large crash ripped through the air like lightning as everyone looked to the east of the village in shock to see some demonic monsters smashing houses as Paper Pleasers floated away in the sky to avoid them.
"JABBERWALKERS!" Jaune and Ruby yelled in unison as they clenched their weapons and began running towards them.
"Wait! The pleasers they-" Yang yelled, but was silenced from a sharp glare from Ruby as Jaune briefly paused and sighed before giving her a glum look.
"Whether we agree with you or not, those monsters will destroy their souls. We got to save them." Jaune sternly said as he raised his shield to his chest and lunged at one Jabberwalker with his blade.
Ruby brandished Crescent Rose, but WBY noticed something amiss with the signature weapon of their leader. It was rusted from the blade, the dust slot for bullets being rusted so much it's inner components had long since crumbled to dust forming a gaping hole that left it unable to be transitioned into gun form and shoot.
"What happened to her scythe?" Yang asked nervously. She knew how much that weapon meant to her sister, she remembered her spending hours at night working on it for maintenance. She was shocked out of her stupor hearing a grunt from Ruby, who got tossed aside by one Jabberwalker before blocking a claw strike from another with the handle of her blade, breathing heavily as she petal burst away and clenched her stomach and wincing in pain.
It was then they all realized just how low their leader had fallen, it wasn't just mental health she was struggling with; she had physically declined all this time. She and Jaune had been neglecting everything to protect the pleasers, their rusted weapons and exhausted states being proof of that. It was the deciding factor to make Yang yell "screw this!" and charge at the Jabberwalkers to give her friends backup, soon followed by their friends.
As the group managed to kill each Jabberwalker one by one, Ruby soon took a breath of relief seeing the pleasers get away to the west of the village away from the conflict. She didn't notice a single one of her children out of place and finally felt fulfilled; she had finally saved everyone.
Soon she was startled by the sound of splashing behind her and swerved her body around, despite her stomach still being in pain, to aim her scythe's rusted blade towards the new enemy that approached her from the water.
Ruby's eyes widen as she dropped her weapon in fright to see not a Jabberwalker, but the body of one with Penny's face.
"Ruby…you look…terrible." The penny clone spoke with a tone mixed with hers and a demons that made Ruby shiver in fear as she stepped back slightly in terror. But her retreat made the penny clone frown with red eyes, eyes that signaled a bitter memory for Ruby, the day her friend was infected by a virus and begged her to do something horrible to aide her through the pain.
"Kill me…Kill me….KILL ME!" The memory of Penny and the Penny Jabberwalker screamed at Ruby, making her drop Crescent Rose. She couldn't kill her friend then and she couldn't do it now. She slowly approached Penny with her arms open for a hug, but recoiled as she saw Penny frown and lunged at her, pinning Ruby to the ground.
Ruby groaned in pain as she opened her eyes to see the penny clone's face morph into the Walker's face. Her eyes became bloodshot as she winced in fear, unable to lift her arms or reach her scythe as the beast pressed them to the ground and kept them in place. The Jabberwalker's closed mouth soon ripped open as shards of stone and saliva dripped on Ruby's face to her disgust and panic. She soon grew silent and limp as she felt its hot stinky breath on her mouth as it slowly drew closer to it, opening its jaw wide open as it prepared to devour her. Ruby felt a bitter feeling reappear in her, one that she and Jaune both felt and dreaded many times these last 20 years, helplessness. It was the bane of the existence of a hunter, and it was like a dagger in Ruby's stomach she normally hated to feel. But in that moment, Ruby felt all her pain go away, she felt as light as a feather as the beast grew closer. She simply closed her eyes as she gave a weak sigh, seemingly accepting her fate.
Old Wounds
"Ruby!" Yang screamed as she tackled the beast's neck while glowing yellow from a glyph summoned by Weiss and making it bellow as it stood upright in pain, before Gambrol Shrouds black line wrapped around its neck and Blake began pulling it off Ruby. Jaune then jumped onto the beasts chest, pinning it to the ground, a fitting reversal after what it did to his wife.
"Die." He coldly said as he thrust his sword into its chest, killing it while Yang cradled her sisters head as the latter breathed heavily at this sight. Everyone soon felt their spines chill as they saw the beast and all the Jabberwalkers that lay dead on the battlefield soon became enveloped by pink lights and disappear in a cluster of particles that morphed into one of them that remained and became a girl with pink and black hair twirling an umbrella they knew all too well.
"Neo?" Ruby softly asked. She hadn't seen the assassin in 20 years, despite knowing she fell in with her. She had honestly forgotten about her after all this time, something she was cursing herself for in that moment.
Neo simply gave the heroes a snicker as she motioned a gun shot motion with her fingers at Ruby. The mute being incapable of speech felt very satisfied to see the painful expression of her arch-enemy as she disappeared into a cluster of particles and left the area.
Everyone simply stood silent from this revelation, the walkers were Neo all along?
"B-But she… She could only changed into 1 person before. She could never summon clones! How did she get so powerful so quickly?" Yang asked, hints of fear in her tone that Blake noticed, not that she didn't blame her, with such a powerful semblance Neo could literally be a one woman army and attack at any time.
"She didn't do it by standing still!" Jaune said annoyed as he went and grabbed Crescent Rose and approaching his wife with a sharp glare.
"Ruby what were you doing? Why did you just stand there and let that thing pin-" he said as he gave her the scythe only to stop mid sentence as she fearfully recoiled and dropped it.
Ruby began panting heavily, clenching both her hands and teeth as she closed her eyes, she couldn't stand to hold it or look at them right now. She felt weak and worthless right now, unworthy of either.
"Ruby? W-Whats wrong?" Yang asked nervously.
Before she could get a reply, the group heard the sound of the paper pleaser at the west side of the village. Jaune and Ruby's eyes widen in terror as they saw a tower of them pulling on the wooden logs that held the dam up.
"3….2….1!" They chanted as they all pulled.
"No, no! What time is it!? No! Don't go!" Jaune screamed as he ran towards them and got to the village entrance, but it was too late. The logs were pulled out completely and released a large wave of water that engulfed the paper pleaser and headed towards Jaune.
Ruby quickly grabbed Jaune with Petal Burst and brought him back to her team, who recoiled at both the speed she showed and the sight of the village being consumed by a the wave.
Ruby and Jaune cradled each other as they eyed the village they called home for years, the people they regarded as family, everything now gone. WBY slowly approached them, placing empathetic hands on their shoulders, not that Jaune noticed. He simply gave a thousand yard stare at the destruction before him.
"Don't worry, their not gone forever." Blake said sweetly.
"They'll reincarnate and be back with us eventually. Yang said with a forced smile.
But all their attempts to cheer the couple up fell on deaf ears.
"Yeah, it's what they wanted. Besides we can rebuild, its not all lost forever." Weiss said, she had been comforted by Yang earlier about losing Atlas, her own home, that she could live in Patch and had options. She felt giving those options to Jaune and Ruby would help them now.
Oh how wrong she was. Her comment was the last straw for Ruby, who stopped hugging Jaune and glared at her partner with a threating aura.
"What do you know about anything?" Ruby venomously asked, making WBY do a double take. Ruby grew annoyed by their comments, but even more so by their silence.
"Regain what I lost? What do you know of what I lost!? I've lost more than you could ever imagine so don't make some blind optimistic crap up got it!" she hollered.
Blake's cat ears went down as she slowly approached her lover's sister as the others stood on in silent shock.
"Ruby… I'm sorry about Penny, but were still here for-" she said before being cut off by a frightening response.
"Shut. Up." Ruby said with a dark tone. Blake winced, almost crying as she heard the girl she looked up too say that bitter command. Yang saw her lovers expression and felt rage burn within her. She couldn't let even her sister slide for that.
"What the hell Ruby!?" Yang yelled as she cradled Blake's shoulders caringly.
"The hell? What do you know of that when you've lost nothing, when I am the one who had to live it after losing someone who meant everything to me?!" Ruby yelled back. Yang's face flushed red with anger that matched her eyes. She lost her arm, her friends Pyrrah and Penny too, how dare she say that? Seeing her expression, Weiss felt the need to intervene again before Yang plunged her fist into Ruby's head and splattered her brains all over.
"Ruby please, we still have each other. Penny was your friend but so are we. We can-" Weiss said before a yell cut her off.
"I'm not talking about Penny!" Ruby yelled.
"Then what did you lose!? Stop being a bitch and just tell us already!" Yang demanded. Ruby gritted her teeth as she rubbed her stomach painfully, trying to force the words out despite her mind screaming and begging not too, but she just couldn't hold it in anymore.
"I LOST MY BABY!" she yelled, her screech echoing throughout the area and snapping Jaune out of his stare as he slowly looked at his wife with horror. WBY also gave off horrified looks, aghast to hear such a terrible declaration.
"What?" Yang weakly asked, feeling nothing but fear in her to hear the loss of a nephew or niece.
Ruby's eyes slowly flooded as she averted her gaze ashamed. She saw Jaune jittering, slowly shaking his head as if begging her not to bring this up. But she couldn't do it anymore; she had to let it out.
"A few months after we married, we found out I was pregnant. I was so happy… we were going to be a family. Things were finally going well after we lost Penny, after we lost you girls. But if Alyx or Cinder have taught me anything, it's that loss is all I'll ever know." She bitterly said. WBY leaned forward, intent on hearing her out despite a fearful knot in their stomach for the depressing revelation.
"When Alyx learned we were having a kid, she just snapped. After she poisoned us she saw me. She saw me try to help Jaune."
Alyx is shown giving off a bitter frown, teeth and fists clenched as a young adult Ruby is shown weakly crawling to Jaune's unconscious body.
Slowly she approaches her and kickes her face, revealing her to have a small pregnant stomach in this story.
"She started saying this like, "why you" or "you stole him from me!" and then when she saw my stomach she…" Ruby tearfully groaned as she soon reluctantly lifted her shirt up just to before her chest. Everyone gave off small squeals of terror to see a huge scar over Ruby's stomach.
"She stabbed my stomach… She killed our baby." Ruby bitterly said.
Alyx is shown with a dagger in her hand. She slowly lifts it up with a sadistic smile on her face as she descends towards Ruby. The screen goes black as we hear a loud scream from Ruby.
Ruby put her shirt down, frowning as she saw the horrified expressions her team was giving. As much as she didn't want to hurt them, she needed to let them know what she was feeling more. She was done thinking of them first.
"Juniper rushed in and drove her off after he heard my screams. That's when he brought us to the village." She said.
"We tried, so hard after that to get pregnant again but…*gasps* It never happened. I'm barren now. I can never have kids again. So when I saw the paper pleasers, how helpless they were I thought we could finally have some even if it was a lie. I didn't care I was selfish I just needed that. Can you understand what that feels like?!" she hollered.
She glared at them bitterly as they gave no reply due to shock.
She then walked over to her rusted Scythe, ignoring the glares of pity and horror from Jaune and the others. She only slowly bent over to pick it up, ignoring the nausea holding it was giving her. She felt much worse being here and talking to them right now.
"Yeah right, what do any of you know what this is like? Just shut up and leave me alone." She bitterly said as tears flowed down her eyes. Ruby suddenly petal burst into the Origami forest away from the group, ignoring a call from Weiss who held a hand out for her.
Jaune soon got up and yelled in anger and agony, startling the group.
"JUNIPER!" He roared. Soon the sound of hooves filled the area as the large rabbit deer came galloping over from the forest and Jaune got on it.
"Let us go with you Jaune." Yang asked, but as she drew near Juniper her hand that was reached out to his saddle was swatted away by Jaune angrily as he grunted at her, making her recoil.
"I think you girls did enough for one day." He bitterly said as he pointed to the destroyed village drawing their attention to it. Yang growled, as she felt indignant at this accusation. As she turned her head back to protest, she saw Juniper already leaping into the forest, following the petal trail Ruby had left and was left alone with the rest of her team, who merely got on their knees dejected by all the chaos that had unfolded.
"She… lost her baby?" Blake sorrowfully said slowly. The reminder of this fact made Yang cry as she choked on air. How could she have forgotten the fact her nephew or niece was murdered, that her sister lost her child, her home, everything.
Yang got on her knees and held onto her face as she broke down sobbing, screaming for her baby sister and her baby to come back.
Aaaaaaaaand Cliffhanger. You probably know how the rest of the story will go but minor changes to events and dialogue will occur. Ruby losing her child to Yandere Alyx made her dagger meaningful but I apologize to those uncomfortable with this event. I don't condone infant or child murder but I am setting things up for a happy ending in the next chapters to come. If you can put discomfort for this murder aside to focus on Ruby and Jaune's ordeal as they fight to escape the Ever After and more importantly their pasts then you won't be sorry I promise.
