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Omake: Her Worst Nightmare

Blake Belladonna nearly gagged at the sight of her summon, the slim black suit and red sword a horrid sight that nauseated the faunus to her very core. She took an involuntary step back as the smoke cleared and the figure rose before her. Gambol Shroud was already in her hands; she couldn't remember when she drew the weapon but knew she was seconds away from using it anyways.

"N-no…Adam…"

She followed the instructions! Everything that dusty old tome said to do, down to the letter! The reagents, the location, even the time! She had no idea what would count as a 'catalyst attuned to the origin of a Heroic Spirit', so Blake let chance take the wheel since enacting the ritual without one would draw forth a Servant closely aligned to herself…or so it said. Because this?

This was a nightmare.

Out of an untold number of potential partners, mythical or not…it was still him.

Blake's breathing had skyrocketed along with her heart rate. The Command Seals against the skin of her hand, shaped like her own symbol, shone faintly despite the darkness of the night. Would this be a Rusted Knight situation again? But out of all the things Adam could have done in that moment, removing his mask was not one of them.

"Calm yourself, Master. I'm not the Saber you think I am," came a decidedly feminine voice. Blake's shivering stalled at the sight of two intact eyes, and the illusion of Adam Taurus generated by her fear vanished on the spot. Golden irises, short and choppy black hair, exposed cat ears instead of red hair and horns? Plus…a face she saw every day in the mirror.

"...you're me?"

"The possibilities are endless when magic is involved. Just imagine how it feels having all that information downloaded into your brain at once."

"Why are you dressed like Adam!"

Saber sneered at her Master's manic screech and the action twisted her face horribly. It was then Blake noticed, really noticed, how tired her doppelganger looked in the ritual candlelight. She…she looked the same as Blake had back when the huntress-to-be was losing sleep over the White Fang before the dance. Exhausted. Worn. Strung out with her sanity hanging by a thread, jumping at every shadow. Physically suffering from ignored hygiene and dark eye bags. Add in the blatant outfit reversal and Blake understood something was heavily wrong with her summoned counterpart.

"Why? WHY?! Because for all the terrible things he did, Adam Taurus' greatest achievement was the cultivation of fear throughout Remnant! A dead man has no use for such a thing…so I…took it for my own instead of letting it all go to waste!"

Blake swallowed thickly, greatly confused. The potential for drawing a summon with dark intentions was unlikely but never zero, as outlined by the book, but now? Here? Of course that was just her luck. Curiosity killed the cat. The faunus never should have opened the tome after finding it beneath her bed within the dorm room. It kept reappearing even after Weiss threw it away. Yet she ignored the red flags. AGAIN. This really was another Rusted Knight situation, and she was all by her lonesome.

Blake's voice came out a whisper as she raised her sword once more. "What did you do?"

Saber replaced her mask — his mask — but remained within her summoning circle, body and stance not at all aggressive in the least. "What needed to be done. Tell me, has the Vytal Festival happened yet? This is the most important question you may ever hear."

"It's on hold for now. Cinder Fall was killed and her plans revealed before it even started," Blake snapped at her counterpart. She expected some kind of anger or disappointment after clearly fishing for information. But what she got was a smile. A wondrous and beautiful thing that…well, Blake wasn't exactly sure of the last time she managed to muster even a hint of anything similar that wasn't some sort of smirk.

Her enhanced eyesight managed to pierce through the dark and see real, actual tears dripping from the bottom of Adam's mask. Saber sniffled, and the death grip she suddenly held against the rifle-sheathe weakened just as quickly. "Good! G-good," the Servant choked out, turning away to wipe at her eyes. As she turned back the unexpected joy had visibly lessened. "Things happened differently then. And what of the White Fang?"

Blake wasn't sure why she answered. "A joint effort between Atlas and Beacon attacked their camp in Vale. A good portion were arrested but many still fled."

"And Adam?"

Blake's ears wilted beneath her bow. "...he got away."

"Of course he did. The only person Adam truly cares about is himself," Saber spat angrily. "Then we need to get going, Master."

"What? Whatever for?"

The Servant raised her weapon before her face and pulled a few inches of the red steel free from Blush's confines. Wilt scraped audibly against the scabbard's interior before it slammed home with an echoing snap.

"We're going hunting."

The pain in her gut was crippling, yet the wound was nowhere deep enough to kill Blake unless it took her hours to receive any medical attention. Adam's ability to butcher his targets with pinpoint precision hadn't lessened in the least since she left. Blake tried to yell out, to warn Yang it was futile, to demand Adam leave her alone, to say any number of things that would only fall on deaf ears…and then it happened.

All sound was drawn from the room as Adam bowed forward, the red coloration along his person blurring with captured energy while Yang roared in blind rage and charged. Sight left Blake and all was turned to black. Then, the profile of Adam burned her eyes in a flash of light as he released his semblance. His sword was pulled, the swing complete, a line cut through space itself.

Yang falling, her aura shattered…her head separated by a single stroke through the neck. Blake watched it all in morbid disbelief as her partner's cherished hair split and fell about the ruined room in a haphazard manner, even as her body struck the floor and no longer moved.

Someone was screaming. She blinked.

Adam held her wrist in a painful embrace, mask missing and lips moving even with his voice overshadowed by the constant shriek in the air. Her blood covered his front in a ragged spray.

She blinked.

The screaming continued as she clawed at his unconcealed face, the two of them having moved at some point as they rolled around the dirty floor. A moment of luck saw her hands slip around his throat. This close, he could only scrape Wilt against her aura in an attempt to cut her and free himself, the distance far too close for any worthwhile slice.

She blinked.

Blake crouched over Adam with his own sword sticking out of his chest. His frozen expression was one of complete incredulity. Blank-faced shadow clones knelt around the fallen bull (when had she activated her semblance?) and mimicked her actions. They each held copies of Wilt and drove them up and down, up and down into Adam's mangled torso with machine-like proficiency. Blood was everywhere. Since when could her copies become solid without Dust? Since when could they move at all? How much longer was she going to keep stabbing Adam's corpse herself?

Oh…she was the one screaming the whole time.

She blinked.

Beacon was in the distance, partially hidden by the copious number of trees in the Emerald Forest. Wilt and Blush were carried in her listless arms (why had she taken them instead of Gambol Shroud?). The shock of the night had dulled everything…even the forest's healthy green foliage seemed lackluster and drained of its color. Airships and flying Grimm dominated the sky above and a part of Blake ironically knew she was safe out here…not that her own life meant anything right now. Any and all Grimm would ignore the lone despondent girl trudging through the woods when a smorgasbord of negativity was just around the corner, a far more enticing target filled with a sea of fear, pain, and death.

Where her partner, both old and new, lay dead because of her own weakness.

But in the depths of her despair, a single solitary truth made itself known.

"It's simple. The White Fang only seek revenge, not equality, and will tear Remnant to pieces uncaring of the casualties involved. Their justice would bathe the land in an ocean of blood. Innocence means nothing to them. Faunus who refuse to dirty their hands, or willingly interact with humans, are traitors to their own kind and must be dealt with alongside the rest of the human race. There are no virtuous members of the White Fang! Not. Any. More." Saber's voice was a low growl, muscles now tense enough to further worry Blake. "The only good White Fang are those incapable of hurting anyone, who can't spread their bile and poison the newer generations any longer! Remove them from the equation and the world will finally be able to heal!"

"W-what are you saying! You cannot be advocating for straight-up murder!"

"Why not? That's how our beloved organization has worked ever since our father was dragged from his position."

"He stepped down willingly!"

"Did he? Did he really? Surrounded on all sides by a rising tide of those who preached far more dramatic means of putting the White Fang's name on everyone's lips? He might have chosen to retire so early in his career but it certainly wasn't because he wanted to."

"Shut up!"

"Grow up!" the copy shot back. "I am you! The version of you who finally decided to stop running away! Leaving Beacon was the last time I acted so selfish! Isn't this what you always wished for?!"

"What about Ruby and Weiss?! What about Yang?! Where were they when you started doing this?! You haven't mentioned them once! You left anyways, didn't you?! Left them behind to become a serial killer! This is never what I wanted! Adam died and you stole his identity! You're not even Blake Belladonna anymore!" Blake screamed back, on the verge of tears. Her arms shook as she held Gambol Shroud towards the demon before her. "Not at all! Not if it means turning into Adam!"

"Except…that's exactly what happened."

Saber smiled again. It was the exact same as before, and yet now it looked to be the most hideous and crooked thing Blake had ever witnessed.

"Instead of running, I finished something that should have been taken care of long ago. Adam Taurus is dead in my reality. It was all over the news for weeks, his mutilated corpse found in the ruins of Beacon by courageous huntsman and huntresses searching for possible survivors. The Grimm got to him; his body was so torn apart there was no other possible conclusion. His infamous weapon was nowhere to be found. And then other rumors began to crop up. White Fang members were being butchered all over Remnant. No one knew how or why. The wounds were attributed to a blade." The servant shrugged nonchalantly. "I must have slipped up at some point because they thought it was the ghost of Adam returned for revenge. Why was he only targeting his former comrades? No one could say. But now he had turned his sword against faunuskind. I mean it has to be him, right? His clothes, his sword, his complete sociopathic disregard for life…it took a bit of practice but I can copy his fighting style well enough at a glance. Since he made them all this way then it's only fitting he be the one to end their bloody cause. It certainly sent the racists for a loop."

"STOP!"

"Oh, some of the encounters were difficult to set up, sure. But there's nothing honorable in what I do. Simply…righting a wrong. Fixing a problem. I wait for the perfect opportunity, and my appearance tends to cause my targets to freeze up right before 'Adam' stabs them through the heart. Even if it's for a second, that's all I need. My clones certainly come in handy now that they're proactive."

"I SAID STOP!"

"It hurts, sometimes. Ilia was the hardest target. But I managed. She was always enamored with us but you already know that. I felt sick after, in more ways than one, but I used it to my advantage to make sure it was quick and clean. She deserved that much at least."

Blake had fallen to her knees, sobbing. "Y-y-you're a mon-monster," she choked out.

"It takes one to know one. You just haven't reached the truth yet. But don't worry, once we start you'll see how necessary this crusade is."

"NEVER! YOU EVEN SOUND LIKE HIM NOW!"

"Then I'll break the contract and find another Master. I can last for a few hours on my own, long enough to gain another source of mana. I'm sure Cardin would jump at the chance to ruin more faunus lives. I even get to kill Adam a second time. Now you can stay here and wait for me to return with someone willing to transfer the Command Seals…or I take your arm and leave you behind. Or you can still make the correct choice anyways. Choose."

Wilt rang in the night air as the blood red blade was freed completely, held at her side but ready to be used at a moment's notice even as she raised an inviting hand for Blake to take. The broken girl could only shake her head and point a trembling finger off towards the direction of the dorms before she fell to her knees. Saber scoffed but marched past without another look, sealing her fate. Somehow Blake was running away from the problem again without even taking a step this time. It took some time for the girl to collect herself once she was alone, scrubbing at her itchy and burning eyes with the backs of her hands, only for the very Command Seals of their final argument to flash across her blurred vision.

She remembered the older Jaune's untimely exit with some poorly chosen words.

No.

No!

Blake Belladonna wouldn't run from this. Not anymore. Not with lives on the line, innocent or not. She would have no part in senseless bloodshed. Only one would die tonight.

"By t-this Command Seal: Saber I order you to kill yourself!"

The left portion of her crimson emblem pulsed and faded into a smear of color. She could feel Saber resisting the order, overpowering the obedience embedded in the magic just enough to paralyze her arm from stabbing herself with Wilt.

"With this second Command Seal: Kill yourself Saber!"

The rightmost tongues of red disappeared. Blake grunted with effort as she felt her energy warring against the other Blake's ironclad will. She lived for the erasure of the White Fang no matter the dimension, and nothing would stand in her way. But Command Seals were called 'absolute' for a reason…and stacking the effects with the exact same command only multiplied the result. A normal magus would lose their mind over someone wasting the ability so willy-nilly like she was doing.

Too bad Blake didn't care.

"SABER! KILL YOURSELF NOW!"

A flash of unbearable pain spread across their bond as the final seal was wiped clean. The faunus felt the magic between them vanish as the smears across her flesh disappeared completely. Either that monster was dead or wounded enough she wouldn't stay breathing for long. Blake sagged in relief…and cried.

She cried until a small body stopped itself from tackling her, a squeaky voice vaguely entering her ears above the sound of her own wailing.

"Girls! I found her near the statue! I think she did the thing!"

Thin arms wrapped around her shoulders and she leaned into the embrace. At some point two other people joined the huddle, and the four of them remained that way until Blake felt like she was finally out of tears. When she finally raised her head, her watery vision made out the faces of her teammates watching her in concern and worry. Heaving from the exertion Blake couldn't do much more than apologize over and over again.

"Blake…what happened? We woke up to someone screaming in the halls and your bed was empty! Someone…died, they said? And then disappeared like Jaune did!"

It felt like she was swallowing rocks, her throat so irritated at this point. But Blake pushed past the discomfort as she rubbed at her face yet again, wanting to—no, needing to answer Yang's question. She told them everything. No more secrets, no more running away. Blake needed her friends more than ever now.

She'd caught a glimpse of what life could be like if Blake Belladonna finally decided to follow in Adam Taurus' footsteps, something he would no doubt be proud of. Not even the Rusted Knight's declaration of the events after the Fall of Beacon where she fled Vale and left her wounded team behind were this bad in comparison. Even if it was a billion to one chance she ever turned into Saber, those odds were still far too high for her.

Unlikely but never zero, indeed.

Okay, first off: midnightson41. That was a pretty good idea but, alas, completely different from mine. I already had it all planned out before your comment but not bad.

So basically this darker Blake had a mental breakdown after the death of her beloved friend and partner (slow your roll Bumblebee shippers or however the heck you spell it. Bmbleby? Bmblb? This was before they actually added a relationship in there in the timeline) and decided hey, the White Fang caused all of this so they need to go. The whole world is spooked thinking Adam is either alive somehow or undead and killing all his former comrades. Blake's semblance evolved to be more efficient in achieving her goal.

But why would Blake decide to do this? Sometimes people don't have or need a reason for their actions. Or their reason only makes sense to them. And then as I was halfway through typing this all up I had the thought 'what if it got reeeeally dark' and Blake carried around Yang's skull and talked to it as though she were still alive? It could be a Noble Phantasm somehow.

Then I thought nah.

But that doesn't mean there isn't a reality out there where it does happen.

Anyways that's a Saber, and Archer, and a Caster down. Next up in the summoning saga? Rider. Gee I wonder who that could be.