Chapter 37
Everyone on this bizarre, mobile space station are trying to figure out more about the 'Dark Half' and the 'traitors and spies' that are hiding in this nearly moon-sized vessel. All the AIs are hard at work trying to unlock the encryption locks about Dark Half with some taking some time off to help the others out for it is the most difficult lock they have come across. So alien and so many layers that it would take an army of AIs like the Ignis to uncover the secrets hidden within the mainframe. Everyone else that isn't an AI with no body explore further into the very depths of the ship to learn about what else it has. They have found relics of ancient civilizations that are now gone, wondrous technological devices that no one knows how to use them, mystical items full of power and knowledge that go beyond imagination. They even learn more about the various species that are being held in stasis with some that look terrifying, others look more bizarre, and others that are more dangerous despite having humanoid appearances.
As they continue, the space station has stopped. Stopped somewhere on the very edge of the galaxy. Why? Because they have reached their destination. Everyone look at the images and see this massive, solar system size facility with a multitude of rings upon rings upon rings upon rings that hug this massive, spherical center that is about the size of a black hole. Everyone is in total awe as they see this gigantic, titanic, completely humongous facility out in the middle of space.
"Wow." Yang went as she stands beside her teammates, "That thing is a lot bigger than I thought it would be."
Team RWBY are looking out the window somewhere at the edge of the Not-Death Star as they are at awe by such a marvelous machine.
"Yeah." Weiss agrees and is stunned, "That is the biggest man-made object in space we have ever seen thus far."
Ruby takes pictures of the thing with a camera she just spawned in.
Blake just stands there, "I am speechless."
The other three look at Blake and are stunned.
Blake looks back at her team, "I'm serious. I have no words to describe this titanic facility." She looks back and press herself against the glass, "It must've been a major collaborative effort to create the last hope in the galaxy where species of all walks of life of every world and fiction to help repopulate what was lost."
The rest of the team look at Blake again and were a little touched by what Blake just said. For someone who is suppose to be speechless, she said something quite profound.
"Anyone wanna peek inside?" Ruby asks with a grin.
Zwei shows up and barks as he also wants to join.
"Zwei?" Yang is surprised, "What're you doing here?"
The Not-Death Star slowly makes an approach to one of the inner rings where all the other Not-Death Stars are at. It docks and becomes magnetically locked into place. To skip over the boring parts, everyone had a meeting about boarding into the facility, many volunteered and they went in. Including Team RWBY.
Team RWBY enter into another entry point along with Zwei. The facility is completely bright white as if it has achieved some level of cleanliness while being maintained for who knows how long. Thousands of years? Millions? Doesn't really matter. They get passed and enter into a long corridor that look like a mix of Forerunner and Protoss technology with halls made of gold unlike the silvery outside, crystals that emit the only source of light in these wide corridors, and some sort of 'windows' that are on each end of the walls that are actually made up of various glowing text symbols of many different civilizations that doesn't make any sense as they continue to stream in blue-green coloring. The whole place is huge that make it feel like you're in a cathedral out in space without the religious art.
"Geez." Yang went, "Gold and yellow is my color, but this is ridiculous."
"Looks a little different compared to the outside." Blake states.
"It does hurt my eyes." Ruby rubs her eyes.
Weiss takes a closer look at the 'window' on the left side as she tries to figure out what the fuck is it.
"Is there any point to these things?" she ask as she pokes.
Ruby also takes a closer look, "I think they might be bits of data that is keeping this big place running...somehow."
Weiss look back at Ruby with a deadpan look, "Ruby, if you're going to attempt to try to act smart, you need to be better."
"Was it that bad?"
"Eeehhh?" Yang gives a hand signal meaning that it is subpar.
"But I have to agree with her." says Blake, "Somehow this place is still functioning after all this time. The ships, the ball-shaped space stations-"
"Not-Death Star."
"I'm not calling it that. But in any case, that's why we're here. To find out more about this place and make our own solar system."
Zwei lets out some barks as he is at one of the doors to let them know that he has found something. The four peek from the frame and see some strange machine that is a bit hard to describe. It looks like a bunch of spheres connected to each other that have a strange Forerunner design to them that is white with one opening close to the door with another that leads to the other side of the room. The team enter into this room with the lights flickering on to reveal more of the strange machine.
"What is this place?" Weiss asks.
Yang looks back at Weiss, "Do you really wanna question what aliens do?"
Weiss thinks about it for a moment, "...wellll..."
"Forget it."
Blake finds a terminal for one of the machines and tries to figure out what they're for. The problem is that it is in a completely different language that is impossible to read as it is made of a million different symbols and letters that make it even more difficult to understand how these machines work. Ruby leans in from the left to see what Blake is doing.
"Ruby?"
"Hm?"
"Would you please give me some personal space?"
"Oh, sorry." and Ruby leans away.
Blake tries to decipher it the best she could as she tries typing something to see what she get. She tries to figure out which key is what but it changes every time she types. That is when she pulls out a notepad and pen from her black box to figure out what symbol is what. As she does, the others take a closer look at a window where a whole bunch of lights started to turn on. The three and Zwei look in total awe by what they see.
"Holy..." Yang went as she looks out the window.
From what they can see, there is a huge chamber that is full of pods that are filled with an untold number of species that stretch for miles in all directions. Blake got curious and can see what they're seeing. They look in all directions and can only see pods as far as the eye can see that curve around on both ends as they can see the ceiling that is also full of pods. They look down and can only see and endless abyss with only a small number of catwalks and rails with robots that look like a mix of Forerunner sentinels and Protoss probes that inspect and maintain this massive chamber.
"There must be trillions." Weiss is still in awe by the place. "Maybe quadrillions. Maybe more."
"That's enough to populate a large part of the galaxy." Yang points out.
Blake looks back down, "Just how far prepared were these people?"
A humanoid hologram comes to life behind them. The four yelped before taking battle positions along with Zwei. Although Zwei tries to stand on one hind leg before adorably falling back into the ground. The blue hologram flickers before taking shape. The four put their weapons away and try to get a closer look at the hologram. The hologram starts flickering to reveal an adult human male with hair in a swirly cowlick, a short beard, wearing a scientist outfit, sneakers, and a t-shirt with an atom on it.
"Wait..." Blake takes a closer look, "I've seen him before. But...younger."
The hologram speaks, "My name is James Isaac Neutron. But everyone used to call me Jimmy."
A blue scanning light starts to shine behind the Jimmy Neutron as it scans the black boxes. However, Ruby's black box starts to glow and it gets analyzed. Once completed, the hologram continues.
"I see you got one of the original black boxes. Good. But if you are hearing this, I am long dead. After the Great Galactic War, all of our soldiers were taken away by strangers from another universe."
"Rick Sanchez." Ruby's tone sound serious.
The hologram continues, "The rest of us got destroyed and erased by them. Me and many of my fellow scientist have collected samples of every single lifeform we can get in order to repopulate our galaxy. We spent years collecting, reconstructing and cloning as much as we could in order to bring back the great, galaxy-sized civilization we had before it all went heads-up. We have been working tirelessly in order to bring life back to the galaxy. However, something terrible came into our galaxy." Jimmy looks scared, "Something...unnatural."
"Dark Half." Yang pieced together what Jimmy is talking about.
"The things we've seen. The horrors we have encountered. If you are listening to this, whatever you do, don't come into contact with it." Jimmy is now frighten, "It has ways of controlling others to its will! Have friends turn against each other! It is insanity, treachery, and horror all in one! Don't let the voices get to you! YOU HEAR ME!? DON'T LISTEN TO THE WHISPERS!" and the hologram shuts off.
"Well that was...disturbing." Weiss is a little disturbed.
"I thought there would be more to this message." Blake thinks there should be more.
Yang looks back at the terminal, "Well, maybe there is more in the terminal."
Ruby looks around, "Where's Zwei?"
Zwei does a bark before falling into one of the machines.
"ZWEI!" the girls panic as the machine starts running.
The machine turns on as Zwei goes through it. Ruby, Weiss and Yang desperately try to find a way to get Zwei out as Blake tries to figure out how to turn it off. They are doing everything they can to get the little corgi out.
"HANG IN THERE ZWEI!" Ruby tires to cut the machine, but can't even make a scratch.
Yang tries punching it to get it to stop but couldn't get a dent in. Weiss tries stabbing the thing yet nothing happened. Even tried to use her summoning glyphs to get beowolves and a giant armored knight to crack it open. Blake is doing the best she can to stop the machine but is having a difficult time figuring out which is what letter while under pressure. The four are doing everything they can to get the poor guy out. But then Zwei made it to the other opening with steam coming out of it. The four check to see if Zwei is okay. However, they do see a pair of corgi ears twitching as they sigh in relief. Ruby runs up and gives Zwei a hug until she realizes something. She freaks out as a new figure sat up. A white person with short, messy black hair with grey to white highlights and has gray eyes.
"Holy shit!" says the new teenage figure, "I am not going through that again!" He then touch himself, "Wait. I can talk?" He look at his hands, "And I'm...human? That's what the machine did? It made me human?"
"Zwei?" Yang realizes who it is.
"Yang? Ruby?" he look at the girls, "Something is not right here."
The steam clears to show his form and even his black corgi tail.
The girls freak out, "HE'S NAKED!"
Ruby covers her eyes with her face all red and embarrassed. Weiss gets a nosebleed and faints. Yang's jaw is dropped by what she sees. Blake is surprised as she just stares at him.
"Can I get some help, please?"
"USE YOUR BLACK BOX!" Blake, Yang and Ruby shout.
"Right."
Zwei opens his black box and tries to find himself some clothes he can wear.
"Wow!" he is ecstatic, "I can see colors! Awesome!"
Yang yells, "PUT ON SOME CLOTHES!"
"Right, right!" Zwei checks to see what he can wear, "Um..." He look at the girls, "Any ideas on what I should wear?"
Blake walks up, "Let me help."
Zwei then tries to bite Blake before Blake quickly retracts her hands.
"Sorry. Still got some of my old instincts."
Team STRQ has arrived.
"Hey girls!" Taiyang greets with a smile, "Glad you girls manage to get one of the doors open. We're having a...hard time to..." He then notice the boy.
"Hello." Zwei waves and smiles.
"Zwei?" Tai immediately recognizes him as he raises an eyebrow as everyone else is shocked to see him as a Faunus...possibly.
"The hell happen to him?" Raven asks.
"This machine." Yang points at the machine, "Zwei fell in and got a humanoid body."
"How do we know that's Zwei?" Qrow asks.
"You give me some extra treats when Master Tai wasn't looking."
"Okay, yeah, its him."
Ruby turns with her face still red, "GET SOME CLOTHES ON ALREADY!"
"Oh! Right!"
Zwei uses his back box to put on a black jacket and a grey shirt, a pair of jeans, and red sneakers. He gets up from the machine and check on his new look.
"Its good enough." he look at his rear, "Wish I could put a hole in for my tail."
Summer asks, "So is he a Faunus, some other animal-human hybrid, or something like that along the lines?"
Weiss got back up, "What happened?"
Yang explains, "Zwei got turned into a humanoid."
Weiss got sad that the adorable corgi is now something akin to a Faunus. Ruby did turn back to see Zwei and something spark in her. Something that caused her heart to skip a beat. More on that later.
AN: Hey guys. Hope you like this little surprise. And I do apologize for not uploading this sooner because I have a lot of other stuff to do like making my book, making my very own tabletop rpg, and some other stuff of my personal life and job...and the site was down for a couple of days. Later guys!