Alrighty then, now that RTX is done and dusted for another year, I can get back to writing. The main issue I'm having now is that because I live on the wrong continent, I have no idea what was in the episode that aired at the RWBY panel. All I know is the trailer for Volume 2, which has given me a few ideas for later on, and the fact that RWBY is getting it's own game (which is, in two words, f***ing awesome).
Anyway, judging from the reviews of the previous chapter, the nightmare and the pursuit was well received, so I'll be making it canon.
Chapter 26: The Vision
Wandering the dark streets, they were surprisingly abandoned. Cars dotted the streets, parked perfectly along the sidewalks, but it was as if everyone had just vanished. Gone. Not a single soul remained.
But when I turned the corner, I saw why. A massive wall of blackfire, slowly advancing. As it overtook a nearby car, it exploded with a fearful bang, sending various pieces of it skyward, only for them to come back down like deadly hail. People were screaming, but the streets were empty. As if the echoes were reverberating straight into my ears.
I turned and ran for my life, dodging falling car parts and burning debris. But the wall of fire drew closer and closer, licking at my heels. Diving into a nearby alleyway, I crouched behind a dumpster, desperate for safety. As the fire passed, I covered my ears, now aware of a hellish tone that threaded through my skull like a string of fire. But it wasn't a low note. Rather, it was a voice. Soft, sweet and low, but coated in malice.
"…you lied to us…"
"…you betrayed us…"
"…you used us…"
"…you manipulated us…"
Standing, I looked back in the darkness, to see a pair of blood red eyes glaring back at me. I panicked, and leapt over the dumpster, hearing a howling roar and the contact of padded feet on hard pavement. I didn't look back, just continued to run as fast as my legs would carry me.
But at a crossroads, pillars of black fire erupted from the ground. Turning, I sprinted towards the exit to my right, but it was cordoned off by another set of blackfire columns. Looking back, my third exit was blocked in the same manner.
Boxed in, and nowhere to hide. No, wait. The flames parted briefly, and a snow-white lioness leapt into the arena, ready to pounce and tear me limb from limb.
"…you lied to us…"
Those damn voices in my head. I squeezed my skull in a futile effort to drive it out. But as I did so, black fire swarmed out of nowhere, morphing into tentacles. The tentacles helically twisted and turned, until the powered into the ground, leaving behind a burning figure. One with silver eyes burning with anguish.
"…you lied to us…"
Ruby?
Another plume of fire formed from the deadly wall, this one twisting into the form of Weiss.
"…you used us…"
Blake was the next to form from the fire, followed by Yang, whose red eyes drilled into my core, almost causing me to crack.
"…you betrayed us…"
"…you manipulated us…"
Finally, the white lioness crouched on her front paws.
"…and now, we take back what you stole!"
The four girls' voices deepened in pitch, until it sounded like many demons speaking from the four mouths. The four disappeared into individual streaks of fire, Blake wrapping around my ankles, while Ruby and Weiss restrained my arms outstretched. Yang, however, twirled around my struggling form, as if checking to see if her prey was truly helpless. Letting out a dark chuckle, her tendril of fire morphed into a hand, ready for… something sinister.
She gently flew to the white lioness's outstretched paw, resting on it like a glove. The lioness inspected it, whilst I struggled. Then, she lunged forwards, shoving the glove straight into my chest.
The pain was unbearable. I let out a mighty roar of pain, as this lioness ravaged my insides, looking for something. She grinned evilly, and pulled her glove out of my torso, dripping wet with blood and internal fluids. Between the fingers, I saw a blue glow. Had she… stolen my soul?
But it was a question I never received an answer to, as the lioness's other paw slashed at my throat, severing the veins and causing me to choke violently on a metallic liquid.
My blood.
An incoherent scream exploded from my lips, as I awoke from the nightmare. That same nightmare. Every time I had fallen asleep, it would be there, waiting for me without fail.
It had been a week since Blake and Sun foiled Roman's heist. As for me, I just bumbled along, screwing everything up like usual. Blake had been hurt, and my teammate's trust in me had been annihilated beyond repair.
Beacon Academy was my original residence, but now I just got my sleep using park benches, old storefronts, anywhere remotely comfortable. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great either. Scrounging food from shops offering free samples, and the like had taken it's toll on me, but I had made a vow never to go back. Everything I became involved with just turned out worse. Weiss's argument with me, Blake getting her leg broken, and Cardin blackmailing Yang… all of these events traced back to me. I had promised myself that I would make things better, but they just turned out worse. Well, they wouldn't have to worry about me anymore.
Lying my head back on the bench, I pulled the blanket tighter around me, and fell back into the nightmare.
As dawn broke, the peace and serenity of the morning was shattered by the bellow of three familiar voices.
"DARRRREEEEEEELLLLLL!"
"COME ON, DARREL! WE JUST WANT TO TALK!"
"CONWAY, IF YOU DON'T SHOW YOURSELF, I WON'T BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR WHAT I'LL DO TO YOU!"
"WEISS! WHAT DID WE SAY ABOUT THREATENING HIM?!"
"WELL, EXCUSE ME FOR WANTING TO FIND HIM, YANG!"
Great. They were looking for me. No doubt to beat me senseless for lying to them. Well, I would have none of it. Throwing the ragged blanket off of me, quickly bundling it into a ball and shoving it in a nearby bin, I peeked around the corner, to see Ruby, Weiss and Yang walking down the street, screaming my name incessantly. No way was I going to be caught, and brought back for an interrogation.
Quietly tiptoeing away, I was about to duck into a nearby bakery for some breakfast, when I heard a yell.
"THERE HE IS!"
Oh, sunofa– they had spotted me. Looks like breakfast was going to have to wait. For now, I had to lose my pursuers. Ducking into a nearby alleyway, I ran for my life. Footsteps thudded behind me, but I didn't care. As long as I had wind in my lungs, and power in my legs, I would never stop running. Spinning around to throw a dustbin behind me and block my escape route, I kept running.
"Ew, gross! Garbage!"
"Go around, we'll flank him!"
At least Ruby wasn't the perfect leader. First rule of leadership: if your enemy hears your plan, think of another one, fast. Running down the sidewalk shoving aside various bystanders with a quick muttering of apologies, I saw a fire escape, with a ladder reaching down to a dumpster. Beside that were two piles of forklift pallets, positioned perfectly to make a staircase. Leaping onto one pallet, and jumping onto the fire escape ladder, climbing as if my life depended on it.
Eventually reaching the roof, I didn't stop to look back, hearing the metal clatter as someone climbed the stairs. I didn't stick around to figure out who, I just turned and ran, leaping off the roof, and landing hard on the next one, the ground cracking slightly as I hit it.
Looking back, Yang was looking down on me from the roof I had just leapt from.
"C'mon, Darrel! Stop running! We just want to talk!" She pleaded. I just raised my arms in disbelief, and snorted.
"Talk about what? The raid? The fact that I was dressed as a White Fang goon? Why I left you?" I spat. Yang just looked at me sadly.
"Darrel, listen for five minutes. Ruby's been worried sick about you, Ozpin's one more day away from declaring you Most Wanted, and–"
"Why should you care about me? All I've been is a dead weight to your team since initiation!" I yelled back.
"That's not true, and you know it! You kept the Nevermore off of us while Ruby enacted her plan! You fought the Boarbatusk with your bare hands, and won! You stopped the Wahtani when we couldn't! You're the best addition to this team, because you always know what to do!" She yelled back, her eyes beginning to water.
"Luck! Sheer, dumb luck! All of it is just luck!" I roared. Yang just leapt from her perch, landing in front of me.
"Damn it, Darrel, you need to stop beating yourself up like this! Just come home. We'll listen to whatever you have to say. I swear on my life." She said, tears streaming down her cheeks. I didn't care how much she wept anymore. I was tired of having to prove myself over and over again. All it rewarded me was heartache and betrayal. I just snarled, and unsheathed my blades, lunging at her. She jumped back, sobbing loudly.
"Darrel, stop it! This isn't you! Just calm down, please!" She was weeping openly, dodging my rage fuelled slashes. I was in too much of a fury to listen, so I kept up my assault.
"Darrel, don't make me do this, please!" She bawled, pulling out a syringe full of purple liquid. Nothing mattered anymore. I'd never be able to go home again, all because of this stupid world. I just wanted to take my rage out on anything.
*CHUNK-CHICK*
"Get. Away. From. My. Sister."
Turning, I saw Ruby pointing her gun at me, not in it's scythe format for a change. I just sneered.
"So what? You going to be the hero, Ruby?" I growled. Ruby frowned.
"Nope. Just the distraction." She whispered. As I heard those words, I felt a needle puncture the flesh of my arm, and my body went limp, hitting the roof of the building with a thud. But as my eyes shut, one final coherent thought flooded my mind.
'What have I done?'
Slowly opening my bleary eyes, I suddenly became aware of a spotlight shining down on me from above. Leaning my head back, I had to force my eyes shut, as the illumination was incredibly bright. I went to rub them, to try and alleviate the spots that dotted my vision underneath my eyelids, but for some reason, my arms wouldn't obey. Quietly blinking away the tiredness that ate at me, I looked down to find my wrists shackled to the armrests of a metallic chair. I went to tug at them, but all I received for my efforts was a red mark, and an ache in my wrists. Clearly, someone didn't want me leaving.
Sitting in front of me was a table, pure metal, and another chair. The walls were padded, except for one panel, which appeared to be a mirror, but I had a feeling it was really two-way glass. This whole room gave me the feeling that I was about to be interrogated. Well, I'd have none of it.
"Alright, joke's over! Get these stupid things off of me, or else!" I yelled out to no one in particular. No one answered.
"Where am I?"
Still no response.
"ANSWER ME!"
Nothing.
I exploded.
It was hard to tell what I did in my rage, but all I remember is thrashing around in the chair I was tied to, kicking my legs out at anything I could reach. I flailed my head against the table in front of me, staining it with blood. And the screaming… I howled out various profanities that would never be repeated in polite company. Even as my throat burned, I continued to shriek bloody murder at whoever was listening to me. But there were still no words.
Finally, my energy began to drain, and I let my head fall back, so that I stared at the ceiling. Panting gutturally, my throat was on fire, burning with overuse at all my screaming. I was on the verge of passing out, when I heard a panel moving.
"Are you sure you want to do this, sir? He could still be violent."
"Glynda, we can't hide the truth from him forever. Let me handle this."
That voice... Ozpin?
Squinting into the darkness, I saw the panel slide shut, and two figures silently entered the room, looking at me. One wore a robe, black, and covering all of her body, minus her head, which was a dark-skinned female, with goldenrod eyes and dark green hair. Kimba, no doubt. She seemed to have something bundled beneath her robe, though it was too dark to see what it was.
The other walked with a cane, and held a mug of coffee in his hands. Taking a seat opposite me, the light revealed him to be Professor Ozpin. I just sighed wearily. He'd want to know why I'd disappeared for a week, for sure. I snarled internally: ever since the incident at the docks, I'd promised to take my secret to the grave. But something told me that Ozpin knew my secret.
"Darrel. I must say, I wish that circumstances didn't permit us to meet like this. But obviously, the wheels of fate clearly have a grudge against you." He sighed.
"Let me guess. You know about my secret? That I'm not who I say I am?" I spat.
"Darrel, I've known since you arrived at Beacon. You had no transcripts, no recommendations, no tournament victories... quite honestly, it was as if you had appeared out of thin air. But Kimba had a hand in that. She told me of her plan to bring you here. I wanted to give you sanctuary. A home for the time being." He said. I rolled my eyes. Seemed that plan had turned to hell faster than he anticipated.
"Cut the shit. Why'd you send my team after me?" I croaked hoarsely. Ozpin just turned to Kimba, and gestured her to come closer. She complied, stepping into the light.
"Darrel... I am so sorry to have dragged you into the world of Remnant. But you must understand-"
"I understand plenty. You didn't bother to tell my teammates about what I was doing? Now they don't trust me! They would have shot me!" I spat. Ozpin held up his hand.
"They'd never do such a thing. Ms. Rose, and Ms. Xiao Long had their weapons laden with stun and tranquilizer rounds respectively, and Ms. Schnee agreed to only use her powers to stop your fleeing." He explained. I just scoffed.
"Like hell."
Kimba gave me a sad look.
"Darrel, I'm the one you should be angry at. I told you to dress as the enemy. I'm the one who abandoned you. Your ire is not to be directed at your friends." She sighed.
"Goddamn right I'm angry at you, Kimba. You gave me that stupid crystal, and you brought me into this world for a stupid war, without any care for how I might feel." I droned. Kimba just removed the bundle from beneath her robe, revealing it to be my backpack. Placing it on the table, she unzipped it, and rummaged through it. As her hand finally retracted from the bag, I noticed a familiar rainbow glow emanating from between her fingers.
"Ozpin... should I tell him?" Kimba asked, looking to her cohort. He nodded, and took a sip of coffee. Pressing a button on his cane, the cuffs around my wrists slackened, and my wrists tore free of their bonds. Rubbing the red marks my earlier tantrum had provided me, the ache in my bones began to dull.
"Darrel... Might you be familiar with the legend of how our people came to be?" She asked. I nodded.
"Yeah, your kind was born from dust, the Grimm tried to kill them, and the discovery of Dust prevented your extinction. What does that have to do with this?" I asked bitterly.
"Well, this crystal is called the Fragment of Arcadia. It's what supposedly gave life to humanity. No one knows how, exactly, but it has something to do with the containment of souls. But that's not the important part."
Kimba let this Fragment of Arcadia rest in my hands, and I looked at it, studying it intensely.
"What do you mean? What, is it some kind of soul jar?" I asked. Kimba shook her head.
"Not quite. A soul jar implies that the person's soul that's stored inside this is still alive. There isn't one soul in this crystal. There are trillions of them. Apparently, the souls of a long dead race, one that populated this planet from long before."
I looked up in confusion. If this crystal was powered by the souls of a dead race... what happened to them? And who were these precursors?
"How...? What...?" I gibbered, my brain still trying to process this. Kimba just kept talking.
"This Fragment's power can be harnessed, and if that happens, the souls of a trillion beings provide energy on an unimaginable scale. But my foes don't seek to use this as a power source. They seek to use it to grant the Creatures of Grimm with souls. And you know how dangerous they are without them. With intelligence... they will be the bringers of the Reckoning." She concluded.
I didn't respond. Even if my throat wasn't burning, I wouldn't have been able to make a sound. This crystal was the container of countless life forces. If Kimba's foes got wind of this thing... now I understood. Kimba must have given this to protect it. But what was I to do with it? Destroy it? Hide it?
"Darrel?"
I looked up, as Ozpin said my name.
"This may be hard to take in, but put simply, you are the only one who can protect this artifact. Should you fail... well, I'm afraid even the most esteemed warriors wouldn't be able to fight this inevitability. Not the incentive I wish to impart on you, but you needed to know the truth." He concluded. I looked at the crystal in my hand, mesmerized by the ever-changing colours.
I didn't hear them leave. The last thing I remembered, was the crystal giving a bright flash. Then everything turned dark.
As my vision returned in a flash of light, I became aware of a buzzing. An ominous hum, one that screamed out to me that something bad was about to happen. Glancing up, I came face to face with a yellow crystal ring, which rested on a base, held aloft with metallic spikes, with wires connected to the crystal. What could it be used for?
"Is it ready?"
"Y-yes, sir. But sir, there's no guarantee you'll be able to make it back."
"We're not coming back. I promised her we would escape, and I meant it. Get to your station, and get ready."
Looking around for the voices, I saw two men, one dressed in black, and having some kind of digital interface hooked around his head, encompassing his eyes. He was running to a nearby console, some distance away. The other wore a flesh-colour leotard, giving the impression he was naked, if not for the glowing TRON lines that irregularly flowed down his body. His shaggy, brown hair grew down to his shoulders, and he had a beard that covered every part of his lower face. He looked up at the crystal ring, and sighed.
"Sir! We have hostiles inbound! Approximately a battalion of troops!"
The brown-haired man swore violently. A woman came running up, with reddish curly hair placed neatly atop her head, and dressed in a very similar leotard as the bearded man. In her hand was a familiar rainbow crystal.
"Hurry! They're here!" She cried. The man turned to the technician, who was now hammering on buttons like his life depended on it. Which, given the circumstances, it probably did.
"Is the Galaxia Nexus stable?"
"Uh, power levels are fluctuating! We're trying to compensate!"
"Well compensate faster, dammit! They're going to kick the door down any second!"
An explosion rocked the room, causing small bits of plaster to rain down on the crowd.
"Sir, one of the power generators just went offline!"
The brown-haired man in the leotard raised his fist, and slammed it down on a nearby crate, denting it. He let out a yell of rage. The woman went to him, placing a hand on his shoulder.
"It'll be okay, sweetheart. Just focus on the Galaxia. We need to get our people through there before it's too late."
"STOP REMINDING ME! I should be fighting them, fighting alongside my brothers! I hate this! I hate hiding!"
"And what good will fighting these creatures do? You promised us, promised me. We'd have a new life. Away from these abominations. So calm down, think about what we're doing. You'll think of something. You always do."
The man seemed to stop, and look up at the female speaking to him. He glanced at the woman. Then he wrapped his arms around her, and pulled her in for a passionate kiss. Even as another explosion rocked the building, the two didn't stop in expressing their love, until gunfire rang out.
"SIR! THEY'VE BROKEN THROUGH OUR DEFENSES! WE NEED YOU TO GO NOW!"
The man looked at the soldier yelling at him, then looked despairingly at his lover. The female caressed his cheek, and held up the crystal, so that the man could see it.
"Use this. It should have some power left."
"But our masters used it to grant us life, not power this thing! I'm not going to risk it!"
The female's eyes narrowed.
"Then I will."
Quick as a flash, she disappeared into the crystal ring's base, carrying the rainbow shard with her.
"EVE!"
But she would not listen. Hoisting the crystal above her head, she stabbed it into the base with a mighty yell of effort. Immediately, the humming intensified, and the ring began to spark. The woman called Eve sprinted back to her companion, and turned to watch as the sparking grew in power, slowly morphing from a tiny speck of light, to creating a swirling vortex of pure, unrefined power.
"How... Jex! Get the Dust!"
The man yelled to a nearby boy, almost the age of puberty, and he took off running. The man turned back to Eve.
"You know there can be no going back."
"I know. But we have no choice."
"I love you."
"I love you."
The boy suddenly appeared at the bearded man's side, carrying a briefcase laden with oblong gemstones, colored in innumerable shades. The bearded man nodded.
"Good work, Jex. Now go and help the others."
The boy nodded, pulling out a fire, and charged off to the sounds of combat. The bearded man turned to Eve, and handed the briefcase to her, closing it in the process.
"Go. Get the Dust to the other side. I'll be there soon, make sure nothing's left."
She nodded.
"You better be right behind me." She ordered. Then she gave a bellow, and charged into the swirling vortex, vanishing into the light, never to be seen again. The bearded man sighed.
"God be with you, Eve."
"A fitting choice of words, human. Because you'll soon be closely acquainted with him, once you die."
A distorted voice, belonging to neither male nor female resounded throughout the room. The bearded man turned, pulling out a dagger, and twirling it into an icepick grip. Facing him was some sort of shadowy being, armed with a pistol, and an orb of energy.
"You honestly believed that your kind would be able to stop us? Your masters? Pathetic. But I have to say, thank you for creating this device. I'll enjoy extracting your knowledge of it from your skull." The shadow snarled. The bearded man smirked.
"Smiling in the face of your doom? At least you know better than your miserable lumps of flesh that you call companions." The shadow laughed.
"Hardly. And it's not my demise. It's yours."
Spinning, he twirled the dagger so that he gripped the blade, and threw it at a nearby power cable. It sliced through it like it was nothing. All of a sudden, the ring began to crack and fragment, almost as if the man had destabilized it. The base exploded, propelling a single rainbow shard clattering at the bearded man's feet.
"NO! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!"
"Getting acquainted to God. So long, you Founder trash."
And the man grabbed the forgotten rainbow gem, and sprinted to the portal. Diving through the shrinking wormhole, it finally collapsed, the crystal ring splintering into dust. The wormhole, however, was not done. As it was about to disappear, it grew into a white sphere of light, growing ever larger and larger. The shadow screamed for a grand total of one second, before the orb of destruction took them, causing him to disappear into shreds, and then into nothing. As the light engulfed me next, one final thought flashed through my mind.
'Was this... humanity's final stand?'
Well, this one took quite some time. And I know the final sequence wasn't that well written compared to some other chapters, but I'll let you try and figure it out.
Anyway, this should provide some insight into some other aspects of the story I haven't covered in a while.
So, I should be able to churn out one final chapter before RWBY Vol. 2 premieres to the public. And yes, Darrel will be explaining the truth to his friends.