A newly named apathy culminated within the chest of Jay Williams, one which even he struggled to understand. He'd felt empty before, but this... nothingness stood alone as something almost alien. Ordinarily, a small fatigue would spread across his skin for a few seconds, akin to a chill, but hollow. Instead, this new emptiness came off as... pleasant, like he'd been kicked out of the bar, but got picked up by a random stranger who didn't bother to stick around.
Regardless, his legs carried him onwards, through the raging beasts who sought escape into the light far behind him. The train, as it did in the show, split into pieces and began to punch holes into the surface further down, but he hadn't been there to witness it in any level of decent detail. The explosions screeched and roared and faded one after another until the quiet resurfaced.
The monsters once caged, on the other hand, bit down hard on the hook and allowed themselves to be reeled in by the presumed scent of terror which surely swallowed the city by now.
Claws, snouts, jaws, and all manner of spindly spiked limbs passed through him. Jay experienced little more than the brushing wind; his body, to the grimm, apparently ethereal - once more lining up with what his captor claimed. Jay, or... whoever he was now, would be forever untouchable to the grimm, or dust, or any sources of magic. But that did not make him immortal.
Far from it; mere bullets did him in once before, as did a blade, and a myriad of other things he couldn't quite recall in perfect clarity.
A tiny chortle stabbed its way up his throat; Jay Williams had been waiting for the day he died, and he got his wish. In fact: every Jay prior got that fantasy fulfilled, but the dark truth which he had been allowed to carry - whatever mystical clone he turned out to be in the end - unveiled the disparaging realization that none of them found peace.
The dead never relaxed; nothing awaited them on the other side; there was no other side.
Death offered no comforting hand, merely erasure, which he couldn't for the life of himself accurately imagine. A small, funny thought filled his imagination momentarily: he couldn't ever tell Josh. Okay, so maybe it wasn't that funny, but it made his body a little less limp in its steps, so that had to count for something.
What was it? A few minutes? An hour? Jay tried to keep track of how long his walk back to the city under Mountain Glenn had taken, but it all blurred into a mash of repetitive recollections and continuous contemplations of how tangible he and everyone else on Earth really was. But in the end, he himself knew he only fostered those ideas because it lightened his heart... if he even had one to begin with.
Extremely faint noise slowly awoke Jay from his musings, and his eyes focused again to spy a few White Fang being yelled at by Emerald Sustrai.
That's weird, he thought. You two aren't supposed to be here.
Not that it mattered when the show's plot had clearly fallen off the tracks long ago. On the note of strange happenings, Mercury Black spied him through an unprompted glance towards the tunnel, and he seemed almost amused. He waved from afar, said nothing, and Jay maintained his pace. Jay returned a brief flick of his wrist; he couldn't be bothered to hate them at the moment, not after everything he'd learned.
"Didn't expect to see you again so soon." Mercury's shout yanked Emerald away from her rage. Her face screwed into itself in a twirl, to which she began to spout perhaps the first thought to come to mind.
"You're here?!"
Jay nodded, and as Cinder's unrequited admirer threaded a thin line across her lips, Mercury used his clearer, collected head to lead in with not opposition, but direct curiosity.
"Beacon's rug-rats did a number down here. I really thought you would have fled with them."
"I can't."
Mercury pursed his lips and cocked a brow; head tilting a little as his shoulders neatly shrugged. Emerald seemingly chose to voice her befuddlement.
"What do you mean you can't?"
"How much do you know about Salem?" He couldn't go back to Ruby or the others, no matter how harshly it whipped his back to know that Josh would spend an unprecedented amount of time in fluctuating worry. Better they live afraid than die unaware.
A sharp whistle darted out from Mercury, who stepped up once and teased a half-grin.
"Right on to the big guns." He glazed his lower lip in spit via a sharp lick, but found his answer fast enough. "She wants some things, and in exchange, we get power. Simple as that."
Emerald glared, but nonetheless turned to Jay, and it was then he found out they didn't even know as much as he previously assumed. In the show, they didn't know about Salem's dark desire, and that was fine, but most viewers had assumed they at least knew Salem didn't simply hand out atrocities and take joy in that alone. According to most fans, the duo harbored a healthy level of suspicion and mistrust towards the dark mistress. The fact even Emerald didn't have anything to say in regards to Mercury's casual simplification spoke of too much leniency.
"Is that all?" Jay traded glances with each, and when nobody spoke up he attempted to lead them in slowly. "Do you know what it is she wants? So much so that she's willing to offer you power."
"Don't know. Don't care." Mercury laid his arms behind his head; a careless mask over his face. "Sure, she'll probably be super demanding when she's in charge of everything. But at the end of the day, I prefer fighting battles I know I'll win, and if I have to bow every so often to be allowed to keep my life and act as I please, then I consider that a fair trade. I'm not going to fight just to die."
"But you'll bow for it instead?" Rot rolled through his veins; hypocrisy carried a gut-wrenching flavor, which filled his cheeks and spilled out through his nose, all the while it left behind a trail of fire. "You're willing to help her kill you easier?"
"You really think she'll waste time on killing non-threats?" Mercury scoffed. "C'mon, you're not that desperate."
"Salem wants the relics. Do you know why?"
His nose flared, but Mercury jotted down a firm smile, though it may as well have been scribbled in crayon.
"To keep people like Ozpin from getting in her way."
"But why?" Through a rare bubble of courage even he didn't know had blown up tight, Jay stepped forward, and for once spoke without even a hint towards fear, for he'd rung it all out. "She is immortal, indestructible. What possible threat do the relics pose?"
"They make it harder for her to snuff out opposition like Ozpin himself." Emerald seemed willing to try her luck. "Had it not been for them, she'd already be in charge."
"If she wanted to guarantee getting the relics, she would go after them herself. She has more magic than Ozpin, far more. If the relics were the key to keeping her at bay, then tell me: why hasn't Ozpin been using them? Why hide them away?"
Silence fermented in an uncomfortable array of scowls and traded expressions of uncertainty. Not one of them had an answer. How could they? They followed Cinder, who followed an immortal queen. Why question obvious power? Why ask for a reason from the one whose victory appeared guaranteed?
There was an answer, but not a pretty one.
"The relics aren't simple tools of ultimate power. They're keys."
"To what?" Mercury, while his expression remained steadfast, at least found his voice, although it flickered.
"The one thing she's wanted since the birth of the Remnant you know now: death."
"Are you saying she wants to kill everyone?" Emerald flipped on a pointed, speculative glare. Jay shook his head.
"No... That's just a side effect."
"And that means what, exactly? What could possibly be extreme enough that it'll kill everyone. You're making it sound like it'll hit all at once." Mercury crossed his arms.
"It will." So many ways to unveil the secret, and yet he didn't care for embellishment when it came to them at the moment. "The Brother Gods themselves cursed her with immortality, and only they can remove it.
Emerald snorted.
"Oh, so now we're involving gods?"
"They made the relics. The very keys meant to call them back to Remnant at a moment's notice."
"How?" Mercury stepped in, earning a sideways look from Emerald.
"You actually believe this?"
"You've been right about a lot of things..." Mercury narrowed his eyes, but for some strange reason Jay couldn't see it as threatening. "Too many things that you shouldn't even know exist. Salem never spoke about anyone like you... but you know things only she and Ozpin should."
"You don't believe I'm with him."
Mercury grinned, but it came out crude.
"If you were, you'd be on your way. But you can't, right?"
Jay shook his head, only to sigh. He could tell them about the Brothers' promise to Ozpin, but it didn't make a difference. While he didn't know how terrible an idea it might be, he couldn't really offer up any more than what he had in mind right then.
"Remnant will die in one of two ways. Salem gathers all four relics and summons the gods down, they see that humanity has not united in perfect harmony, and thus eradicate all life. Ozpin keeps the relics hidden for so long that the Brothers grow tired of waiting and come unprovoked, and kill everything for the same lack of unity. Either or, the world as you know it gets vaporized; the only difference lies in how long the world gets to keep breathing."
"Why do they care?" Emerald lifted her tone, just enough to toss a commanding aura over their group. "Assuming this isn't just some prophecy nonsense and you're actually right, why are the Brother Gods so set on destroying Remnant? Can't they just make another place and leave us to rot?"
"Because a realm cannot exist without a god." One of the stupidest excuses in the show, mainly due to being a last minute cop-out. At the very least, the implementation carried some interesting weight. "Everything in Remnant, all the plants, rocks, and creatures both on a spiritual and physical level trace their essence back to the two. Due to this, they're constantly leeching power from the pair to continue their existence."
"Huh..." Mercury fell into a state of... wonder? Jay couldn't tell, but he could hear the small laughter in his voice. "Sounds like the gods themselves have been reduced to batteries."
"Batteries with a built-in GPS that tracks everything they've ever made."
"So they're reading our minds and know where everything is?" Emerald's speculation dissipated bit by bit, and the White Fang behind seemed more lost than anything.
When writing gods, you had a few types to choose from. At first, many assumed RWBY would go with a sort of classical style more akin to the Greeks and such, where the gods themselves carried faults and human limitations. But then, near the end of the series, they evolved into near total omnipotence; more befitting of a tragedy. But since omnipotence itself had been ruled out, their near perfection had to be scaled back.
"Not quite." The more he explained the idea, the stranger his apparent eldritch wrangler's actions and goal became. "They know if you've gone through changes, and where you are at all times, but they cannot see your specific thoughts, and they can't physically see or hear you either. To them, when they look into their minds to see the world, it is only colorless shapes bending and twisting."
Or so it was said in an interview.
"Who are you?" Mercury asked, his voice a whisper, but his eyes rock solid with grit.
"I don't know. Your guess is as good as mine."
Mercury's scowl flattened quickly, which left behind less anger than Emerald's fast talking.
"What are you trying to do? Why tell us this?"
"I don't know that either?" Maybe they just weren't that important. Maybe their thoughts and actions didn't matter. Maybe he needed to vent. Jay couldn't decide which excuse to use, or to believe. But he did have something else. A thought fell into place, drummed up from ideas regarding the relics and gods. "Cinder wants me, right?"
"Oh definitely." Mercury let go of some of his edge, apparently ready to just take it all in stride and follow the tides wherever they crashed down. "You know things you shouldn't. She'll probably want to hear all about what you told us here."
"She'll also want to know where the Spring Maiden is, right?"
"Planning on buttering her up? Because trust me, it won't be that easy; ask Em if you need a personal recount."
Emerald hissed, but didn't deny it. In fact, she went along with his outlook.
"Cinder finds value in what people can offer in the long term; not what they give on a one time basis. She isn't a fan of one-trick ponies either."
"You'd be surprised." Cinder didn't give a shit about any of that. All Cinder Fall wanted was revenge against everyone. She wanted to slaughter the world that punished her for fifteen years since birth. In her eyes, no matter what Remnant gave her after, it would never make up for the life it had taken away. Cinder Fall: the Ruby who never was.
On that note, Salem and her had the same end goal, just under different levels of animosity.
"I know that look." Mercury narrowed his eyes. "That's the same one Salem herself gives when she has something prepared. You've got an idea in mind, and you'll do anything to see it through."
"Do you know where Raven Branwen is?"
His utterance of the name itself stabbed Jay with physical pain, enough to ground him, leaving him on his knees and gasping.
The exact proof he had been looking for.
Author's note
...
A short one this time; partially because I'm a little sick, and partially because I feel that ending it off here is fine.
A Jay chapter in its entirety, and one to do something drastically different.
Leaving it here for now - you can figure out where this is going.
Until next time.