Chapter Text
Chapter One – Fractured
Fracture (n.): A breaking apart under pressure—where once-whole things split into pieces, not yet destroyed, but no longer the same. In body, in mind, in purpose… a fracture is where everything begins to come undone.
The wind stopped.
For a moment, Ruby felt like she was floating. No ground beneath her. No sky above. Just…falling. Endless and slow.
Then—impact.
She hit the ground hard enough to knock the air from her lungs. Not hard enough to kill her. That would’ve been easier.
Soft grass. Warm light. Birds chirping like the world hadn’t just ended.
Ruby lay there, arms out, cape twisted beneath her. Her eyes stared up at the pink and purple sky, where clouds danced in slow spirals like they didn’t have a care in the world.
It felt wrong. Everything was wrong. She didn’t know how long she lay there.
Eventually, the numbness gave way to cold ache. She pushed herself up on trembling arms. Her body ached, her chest even more.
Around her, the forest stretched—vibrant, whimsical, dreamlike. Trees with painted bark. Flowers that shimmered when they moved. Mushrooms the size of tables.
A fairytale. But it didn’t feel like magic. It felt like mockery.
Ruby took a breath and spoke, weakly: “Blake?” Her voice disappeared into the trees. “Weiss? Yang?” Still nothing. “Penny?”
The name tasted sharp in her mouth.
Blake didn’t fall with me.
Ruby clenched her jaw. No one had.
Yang had gone first— shoved into the void by Cinder’s explosion. One second fighting, the next— gone.
She didn’t know who else had made it out. If anyone. Were they all still falling? Did they land somewhere else? Did they…?
She cut off the thought before it finished. The silence pressed in around her.
She looked down at her hands. Dirt in the seams of her gloves. Tiny golden petals clung to her sleeves.
She remembered the platform shattering. The roar of fire. Blake and herself plummeting into darkness. Jaune screaming something she couldn’t hear. Weiss lunging forward—
And then blackness.
I couldn’t stop any of it. I should’ve done something. I was the leader.
Ruby stood up. Her legs felt like they didn’t belong to her. That’s when she noticed one critical piece of her missing.
She looked to her side—reaching instinctively for it. But her hand found only air.
Crescent Rose was gone.
Her breath caught.
She patted the ground, then searched it. Nothing. Not a single shard of metal, not even the familiar click of locking mechanisms.
It was with me… I—no… it… it didn’t fall with me. I lost it.
She stared at her empty hand. She didn’t know what hurt more—the fall, or that hollow, disarmed feeling in her chest.
You dropped it. The one thing that made you feel like a Huntress. Like you mattered.
No weapon. No teammates. No plan. Just the wrong sky above her and too-bright flowers beneath her feet.
She took a step forward into the strange forest. It didn’t feel like survival. It didn’t feel like hope. It just felt like motion. And that was all she had left. She didn’t know where she was. She didn’t know if the others were alive. And most of all—
She didn’t know what she’d do if they weren’t.
Ruby started walking. She didn’t know where she was going. Didn’t know what she was hoping to find. But standing still meant thinking. And thinking meant facing the possibility that no one else made it. And that she might be all that’s left.
The deeper Ruby walked, the stranger the world became.
Leaves shimmered like glass in the breeze. Trees whispered to one another in a language she couldn’t quite hear, soft and rustling, like words just out of reach. Some trunks had faces carved into them—smiling, frowning, sleeping—but when she blinked, they were just trees again.
A crooked path unfolded beneath her feet. Not a real one—just a stretch of flowers all bending in the same direction. Pale blue, curling like question marks. She didn’t ask where they led. She followed them anyway.
Time passed. Or maybe it didn’t. The forest didn’t care about time. A flower opened its petals as she passed, revealing an eye at its center. It blinked once. Ruby didn’t look back. She passed a tree with a swing tied to one of its arms. It swayed gently, as if a child had just leapt from it. There was no wind.
Her footsteps were the only sound for a while. Then came the whispers. Soft at first. Distant. Like wind through tall grass. Then clearer.
“You let them fall…” Ruby froze.
She turned sharply—hand reaching again for Crescent Rose out of instinct—but there was nothing there. Only the empty strap across her back and the pit in her stomach.
“Where’s your weapon, Huntress?” “What kind of leader loses everyone?” “You don’t even know if they’re alive.”
The voices weren’t coming from behind her. They were all around. In the rustling leaves. In the petals curling open. In the laughter of birds that sounded too human.
Ruby clenched her fists. She took another step forward. The ground crunched beneath her, but when she looked down, the grass was made of tiny clocks—ticking, breaking, reforming. She kept walking.
She passed a tree with red petals hanging like curtains. Her reflection shimmered briefly in them—but it wasn’t quite right. Too pale. Eyes too dull. She looked like a ghost of herself. And for a second, she felt like one.
Ruby sat down on a fallen log, breath shallow. Her body was tired. But her mind was worse. She buried her face in her hands.
I don’t even know if they’re alive. What if they’re not? What if I fell first for a reason? What if… this is what I deserve?
A soft breeze stirred the branches overhead. A flower bloomed at her feet. It was shaped like Crescent Rose.
And then it wilted. How appropriate.
A soft rustling drew Ruby’s attention. Not like the trees or the whispering flowers. This was closer. Real.
She blinked, lifting her head from her hands. Something small was scuttling through the underbrush—leaves shaking as it moved, muttering quietly to itself. She stood slowly, unsure if she should hide or call out. Then, from beneath a tilted mushroom, a tiny mouse emerged.
It was no larger than her palm, with a satchel tied to its side and a determined little scowl etched into its face. It didn’t seem surprised to see her. In fact, it seemed annoyed.
“Excuse me!” the mouse called out, high-pitched and confident. “You’re sitting on my thinking log.”
Ruby blinked. “What?”
The mouse crossed its arms. “That log. I sit there every morning to organize my goals. Now I’m going to fall completely behind schedule.”
Ruby just stared at it.
A talking mouse? Of course. Why not.
The mouse tilted its head, peering up at her with dark, curious eyes. “Are you alright? You look like someone who hasn’t made a decision in days.”
“I… I don’t know where I am,” Ruby murmured.
“Well, that makes two of us,” the mouse said cheerfully. “But I still make decisions. Like not dying. That one’s important. Or not talking to suspicious strangers… though I may have just failed that one.”
It squinted up at her.
Ruby gave the smallest shrug.
“You don’t say much,” the mouse noted.
“I don’t have much to say.”
A pause passed between them.
The mouse gently tapped the satchel at its side. “Well, I’m going to assume you’re not a threat. Mostly because I’ve never seen a threat look quite so… wilted.”
Ruby glanced down.
The mouse continued, “I’m Little, by the way. Just Little.”
“…Ruby.”
“Ruby.” It nodded approvingly. “A color name. Very fitting. You’ll blend right in.”
Ruby wasn’t sure if that was supposed to be reassuring.
Little hopped up onto the log beside her.
They sat in silence for a moment.
The forest buzzed and whispered, but it all seemed to dull around this tiny mouse with its determined energy.
Ruby finally asked, “Do you know what this place is?”
Little shrugged. "Nope. I've lived here my whole life and still get lost around here. It's just a big 'ol forest in the Ever After. The trees change names every week. Sometimes the rivers flow up. It's that kind of place."
Ever After? “…Great.”
“You’re from the other side, aren’t you?” Little asked. “The not-from-here side.”
Other side?
Ruby hesitated. Then nodded. “I think so.”
Little’s eyes sparkled. “Then maybe you’re just what I need.”
Ruby blinked. “Need for what?”
“To figure out my purpose, of course!” Little hopped down from the log and began to pace. “I’ve been searching for someone who looks lost. And you—you look very lost. It’s inspiring, honestly.”
Ruby rubbed her eyes, overwhelmed.
This mouse—this whole world—was ridiculous. But for the first time since she landed, she felt… something. A flicker of warmth, however faint.
She stood.
“Alright, Little,” she said quietly. “Lead the way.”
Little beamed. “Oh! I don’t know where we’re going.”
Ruby almost smiled. Almost.
“So…” Ruby walked behind Little through a bend in the trees, boots crunching on soft, mossy roots. “You said you’re looking for a purpose?”
Little turned, walking backward with surprising ease. “Of course! Everyone has a purpose here. You’re not really someone unless you do.”
Ruby frowned. “What does that mean?”
Little made a vague circling motion with one paw. “It’s just how things work. You’re either a gardener, or a painter, or a gossiper, or a bridge-builder—oh! I met one of those once. Didn’t build bridges at all. Just fixed arguments.”
Ruby raised an eyebrow.
Little nodded without turning. “Mhm! I must find one before the Queen notices.”
That stopped Ruby in her tracks. “Queen?” she repeated.
Little turned, blinked up at her. “Oh, right. You’re not from here. You don’t know.”
Ruby folded her arms. “Then maybe you should explain.”
Little hesitated. “Well… she’s the one in charge. Of all this.”
A vague gesture to the forest around them.
“She makes the rules. Decides who gets to be what. Names, roles, destinations—all of it. She says the Ever After is a story, and everyone has a part. But if you don’t have one...”
Ruby narrowed her eyes. “What happens?”
Little’s voice dipped lower. “She rewrites you.”
Ruby stared.
“She decides what you are. Or un-makes you and starts over,” Little added with a shrug. “I’ve never seen it happen, but that’s what the others say. She doesn’t like things that don’t fit the story.”
That last line sat with Ruby like a knife pressed to the chest. She didn’t respond. She wasn’t sure she could. They continued walking in silence.
Birds flitted through the trees, their songs oddly melodic—almost like humming a tune someone else had written. A breeze rustled leaves above that looked like painted paper, and for just a moment, Ruby swore the branches spelled out letters.
But they vanished before she could read them.
“You said you’ve been looking for someone,” Ruby said quietly. “Why?”
“To help me find my purpose,” Little said simply. “I thought maybe if I followed the wrong paths, I’d find the right one eventually.”
Ruby gave a humorless huff. “That sounds backwards.”
“Sometimes backwards gets you there faster,” Little replied. “Besides, the Queen can’t rewrite what she hasn’t found.”
Before Ruby could answer, something changed. The wind dropped out completely. A single breathless silence fell over the forest like a held note.
Snap.
Little froze. “Did you hear that?”
Ruby turned toward the noise. “Yeah.”
Another snap. Closer now. Heavy.
Branches parted as a shape emerged—not walking, but gliding. It moved like dripping ink, its limbs long and thin, body shifting and twitching in ways that didn’t follow logic. Its skin shimmered like oil, and its face—
It didn’t have one. Just a shifting void, filled with whispering mouths and blinking, unaligned eyes.
Ruby stepped in front of Little instinctively. “Run.”
Little didn’t argue.
The creature surged forward, warping the ground beneath it. Flowers curled in on themselves. Trees leaned away as if afraid.
Ruby grabbed a fallen branch, holding it like a blade. “Stay behind me!”
The creature hissed, mouths speaking in overlapping tones:
“No name… no purpose… Unwritten. Unfit. The Queen must correct.”
It lunged.
Ruby swung the branch—but it passed through the Jabberwalker’s form like it was smoke, briefly slowing it, but not stopping it.
She backed up fast, dragging Little with her.
“Jabberwalker,” Little whispered, trembling. “The Queen sends them to find the unfinished…”
Ruby gritted her teeth. No weapon. No plan. No one coming to help.
She ran.
Weiss Schnee had always prided herself on precision. Dust formulas. Duel stances. Perfect posture and perfectly chosen words.
She knew how to control a moment. Until she didn’t.
The fall was silent. Not through a portal. Not through light. Just the void.
The moment the ground gave out beneath her, she didn’t scream. She didn’t flail. She simply fell.
There was no weight. No gravity. No light to reach for. Just absence—of meaning, of structure, of everything she'd ever relied on.
She hit the ground hard. Aura protected her from the worst of it, but her limbs still ached from the impact. Her lungs burned with the effort of pulling in air.
Blue grass. Painted skies. Trees that curved like they belonged in a child’s drawing.
This place wasn’t real. It was wrong.
But what struck her first wasn’t the strangeness of the world—it was the silence. No more explosions. No screaming citizens. No airships burning through the clouds. Just quiet.
And for a moment, she hated it.
She sat up slowly, clutching her arm, eyes wide.
Then her thoughts caught up. Atlas. Mantle.
“Winter…” she whispered. “Whitley. Mother…”
They had still been up there. The city was collapsing. The people were running. And she'd left. She’d fallen while the world she was supposed to protect was dying.
“I abandoned them.” Her voice cracked in the still air.
Winter had the burden of command now—assuming she was even alive. Weiss had seen her fly off to fight Ironwood, and then—
And then nothing. The void.
She covered her face with one hand, fingers trembling.
“What if they didn’t make it?” she asked aloud. “What if no one did?”
The question echoed uselessly in the alien air.
There had been too much left undone. Too many people to save. Mantle had only just begun to evacuate, hadn’t it? Whitley had tried so hard to help. Their mother had finally shown a spark of responsibility.
What if it had all been for nothing? What if she’d failed them all?
Weiss stood, fists clenched, knuckles white. Her spine straightened out of habit, as if good posture could hold the rest of her together.
“I need to find them,” she said, half to herself, half to the world. “My team. And a way back.”
“There’s nothing to go back to,” a whisper in her mind offered. “You let it all fall.”
“No.”
She forced the thought away.
I won’t believe that. Not yet.
Weiss moved with careful purpose, stepping between tall grass and curling vines that shimmered faintly in the sun. The landscape was surreal—soft edges and impossible colors, like a painting still wet. Nothing here felt real. Nothing here felt stable.
Even the air smelled too sweet, too bright. Like the perfume section of a store that she hated as a child. And yet, for all its strange beauty, the silence hung too thick—like a breath held too long.
“I need a vantage point,” she muttered to herself.
It was instinct. Tactic. Strategy. When lost in unknown terrain: get your bearings. She scanned the edges of the forest until she spotted a slope to her right—more of a ridge than a hill, wrapped in crooked trees that seemed to lean away from her as she passed beneath them.
The climb wasn’t easy. Roots snagged at her heels, and uneven rock made each step treacherous. But Weiss pressed on. The sooner she understood this place, the sooner she could find the others.
Or… find a way back.
At the top, she stopped and caught her breath. Not because of how high she was—though the forest did stretch far, winding endlessly in every direction like a dream gone too long. But because of what stood at its center.
A tree. Towering. Ancient. Unfathomably tall. Its roots curled through the land like veins. Its bark shimmered like starlight. The branches reached into the sky like hands.
It made her feel small. And somehow, it felt important.
“That… can’t be natural.”
There was no path. No city skyline. No landmarks except the tree itself. The entire world bent gently toward it, as if everything else were pulled into its gravity. And worse—there was no sign of Ruby, Blake, or Yang.
No explosions. No rising smoke. No trace. Just that impossible tree. Watching over everything.
Weiss gripped Myrtenaster tighter, knuckles pale.
“If this is a fairy tale,” she said, more bitterly than she intended, “then I want out of it.”
But the tree didn’t answer. It only stood. Still. Massive. Patient. Waiting.
Weiss narrowed her eyes at the distant tree.
“If this place has rules… that thing is at the center of them.”
It wasn’t much to go on. But it was something. A direction. A landmark. A goal.
She adjusted her grip on Myrtenaster and turned from the ridge. “Find the others. Head for the tree. Don’t lose yourself.”
Simple. Focused. Practical.
Even if everything else had fallen apart, plans were something Weiss Schnee could still make. And she would follow this one—until she had answers. Or until she found someone else still alive to ask them.
Yang Xiao Long had always been good at surviving. Enduring. Getting back up. Pure grit. But this place was pushing it.
She’d been here for hours. Time didn’t work right in the here—wherever here was—but her aching legs and sore shoulder made it feel real enough. The moment she hit the ground, instincts kicked in: check surroundings, check for hostiles, check for damage.
The most immediate issue? Her damn arm was gone. Again.
She growled under her breath, kicking a too-bright mushroom aside as she stomped through the underbrush.
“Unreal forest, pastel grass, and what? The void eats prosthetics now?”
She’d checked the crater she woke in three times already—empty. Just a fine line carved into the ground where her arm had scraped through, then vanished. Typical.
“Could’ve at least dropped me somewhere with it,” she muttered, pushing a vine out of her way. “You’d think after the second time, the universe would throw me a bone.”
But jokes felt thin in her mouth. Forced. The silence here wasn’t peaceful. It was waiting. Yang didn’t trust it.
She paused near the edge of a bubbling brook, kneeling to check her reflection. One gauntlet. One sleeve pinned up. Dirt on her face. Eyes tired. She splashed some cold water on her cheeks and looked again.
Still her. Just… less.
“You already lost one arm chasing Blake,” she thought bitterly. “Now you’ve lost them both, and your way.”
No. Not again.
She shook the thought away, like it was a fly she could swat.
Focus. Survive. Find your arm.
Yang crested a small rise and froze. Sunlight cut through the trees—and for a second, something glinted.
Gold. Black. Metal. Her heart jumped.
“No way.”
She sprinted, dodging branches and leaping roots, until she slid into a mossy clearing. There, half-buried under twisted leaves and vines, was her prosthetic. Scuffed. Cracked. But intact.
Yang dropped to her knees and let out a shaky breath.
“Still kickin’,” she whispered as she reached out. “Damn right you are.”
She reattached it with steady, practiced hands. The hiss of the seal. The soft click of connection. Familiar. Comforting. One thing—just one—put back in place.
She stood slowly and looked out at the impossible forest stretching in every direction.
Still no voices. No sounds of battle. No sign of anyone else.
But if I survived… There’s a chance.
It was a small thread of hope. But it was hers. And she wasn’t about to let go of it.
Yang flexed her fingers, the metal digits hissing softly as they closed into a fist. She was whole again—mostly. But the unease in her chest hadn’t faded. The forest around her was too quiet. Not serene, not peaceful. Just... watchful.
She turned in a slow circle, scanning the tree line. The leaves didn’t rustle. No wind. No birds. Nothing moved. Until something did.
A branch cracked to her left. Yang snapped around; fists raised. Nothing.
Then, from the corner of her eye— Movement. Shadows slipping between trees, limbs too long and bending at angles they shouldn’t.
Tall. Wrong.
Its silhouette stretched unnaturally high—at least nine feet tall, maybe more. A humanoid shape, but starved, warped, off. Its skin was the color of bruises—dark purple, nearly black—and clung to bone in a way that made its frame look carved out of ash.
Its spine curved sharply, each vertebrae visible like jagged knots beneath the skin. The collarbone jutted. The ribs looked like a cage barely containing what was left inside.
Its face… wasn’t a face. Just a void. Smooth, eyeless, with a mouth that was too wide, too still.
And it was not alone.
More stepped out behind it. Three. Five. Seven.All of them silent. All of them staring—somehow—without eyes.
Yang’s blood ran cold. “The heck are you...?”
She didn’t get an answer. Didn’t expect one. They didn’t growl. Didn’t hiss. They just moved—gliding closer on long, skeletal legs. Surrounding her. Herding her.
She backed toward a large boulder, forcing a shaky breath through her nose. Left gauntlet: active. Right arm: functional, but still stiff. No idea what these things were or what they could do.
Didn’t matter. She wasn’t going down without a fight.
“Alright,” she muttered, adjusting her stance. “Guess we’re doing this. Come on, you freaks.”
The nearest one twitched. Then they all charged.
Salt stung her eyes. Her lungs burned. Her legs kicked beneath her, slower now. Weaker. But Blake Belladonna had never stopped swimming before, and she wasn’t about to start now. The surface broke overhead.
She gasped—lungs greedily sucking in warm, humid air. The sky above was a swirl of orange and pale blue, like the colors didn’t know where they belonged.
And behind her, a vast ocean stretched out into the horizon, unnaturally still. No waves. No wind. Just… silence.
She pulled herself toward the shoreline, each stroke heavy with exhaustion. The beach was strange—sand too white, almost reflective, like powdered glass. Her boots sank deep as she crawled ashore, coughing up the last of the seawater.
Her bow clung soaked to her scalp. Her coat was heavy with water. But Gambol Shroud was still at her hip. A small relief in a world that offered none.
She sat upright and scanned the horizon. No wreckage. No people. But she remembered the last thing she saw before falling.
Yang had already fallen—dragged into the void, unconscious, silent. Blake had gone after Ruby as her and Neo were dropped into the void by Cinder. She had caught her, but the reprieve was short-lived as Cinder burned up Gambol Shroud's ribbon.
And then came the falling next. Screaming. Then nothing.
Blake closed her eyes for a moment, grounding herself.
So at least three of us… maybe four. She didn’t know what happened to Weiss. Or Jaune.
But if Ruby was here, then—
She pushed herself to her feet.
Her clothes clung to her body, heavy with seawater. Her bow sagged against her neck. Every step left deep prints in the pale sand. She turned toward the cliffs rising ahead. Beyond them, past a line of distant trees, she saw it.
A tree. White. Vast. Towering.
It almost looked like it didn’t belong to this world. Maybe none of them did anymore.
“Find the others,” she muttered to herself. “Find Ruby. Then figure this out.”
She took one last look at the empty ocean behind her. Her attention shift to the sand beneath her. " No way." She mouthed to herself.
Somehow, someway, she had found her weapon, or maybe, her weapon had found her. From the ground, she quickly retrieve it and looked it over once, making sure what remained was intact. Then started toward the cliffs—leaving only a trail of footprints behind her in the glowing sand.
Once again, Blake’s boots sank with each step she took, the cliffs looming taller with every step. The air was thick and still—heavy with something unspoken.
Around her, the world whispered. Trees with twisted branches bent toward the sky like silent watchers. Leaves shimmered faintly, silver and blue, reflecting light that didn’t seem to come from anywhere. The forest smelled faintly familiar of something she had known but was unsettled by it.
The silence pressed against her ears, broken only by her footsteps and the distant, occasional rustle of unseen creatures. Her fingers brushed a strange flower, its petals translucent and shimmering like stained glass. It pulsed softly, almost breathing. She pulled her hand back quickly, uneasy.
“Not normal,” she whispered.
The ground beneath her shifted subtly, almost as if the ground itself was alive, watching her progress, waiting.
The cliff face soon gave way to a dense forest, its shadows deeper and colder. She moved cautiously, every sense alert.
Then—far off, carried faintly on the wind—came a sound.
Clashing metal. Grunts. A sharp cry. And then a voice.
Familiar. Sharp. Urgent. It pierced the quiet like a blade. Blake froze. Her heart thudded.
She strained to listen. The words were lost in distance, but the tone… She knew it.
Someone was fighting and calling out.
The forest seemed to hold its breath with her.
Without hesitation, without another thought, she headed off in the direction of whatever conflict was ensuing. She would not rest. She would only pursue these sounds. She was coming to help.
I’ll find you.
The broken blade pierced through the final creature’s throat. It didn’t scream—it simply shuddered, then crumbled into black ash, like the others.
Neo’s chest rose and fell with shallow breaths. Her parasol—splintered and scorched—hung from her fingers, useless now. Around her, the ground cracked with veins of molten red. Volcanic rock jutted like fangs from the blackened ground. The air was suffocating—hot, sulfurous, thick with embers—but she didn’t slow.
Her heel crunched over the glassy remains of a Jabberwalker’s skull as she pressed forward.
No illusions. No theatrics. Just movement. Purpose.
Her scowl didn’t waver as the volcanic wasteland gave way to a dense forest of dark, thorny trees. She vanished into the shadows without a sound.
If she was here, Neo would find here and finish it.
Jaune hit the ground hard. His Aura didn’t cushion the fall—it had already shattered somewhere between the battlefield and the sky. His body bounced once, then crumpled, arms limp, the hilt of his sword digging into his ribs. The blade was gone. Just the handle remained.
He groaned, but it wasn’t from pain.
The air smelled wrong. Too clean. Too fresh. Flowers bloomed where he fell, soft grass cradling his broken pride. Sunlight streamed through the leaves above like it had no idea what death even meant.
It was quiet here. Peaceful.
And Jaune hated it.
You killed her.
The voice came like a whisper behind his ear. He flinched, spinning—but there was no one there.
Just trees. Bright, blooming trees with oversized mushrooms and vines that glowed faintly. The kind of place fairytales whispered about.
But not his.
He forced himself to sit up. His hands were shaking. Dirt clung to his palms, mixing with blood. Not his. Hers.
You held the sword. You drove it in. You ended it.
“No.” Jaune’s voice cracked. “She asked me to.”
He stumbled to his feet weakly. The hilt of his broken sword hung from his hip like a dead limb. His armor was scorched, dented, half-useless. He didn’t even know where his shield was. It didn’t matter. He didn’t deserve to carry it anyway.
He heard screams again.
Not Penny. The crowd of people rushing by. The ones who were trying to get to the portal. Those doing everything they could to escape Cinder and her barrage of attacks that had sent so many other plummeting into the darkness beneath their feet.
People were running, crying out as Atlas crumbled overhead. And Weiss—frozen in horror, her blade limp at her side, staring at him like she didn’t recognize the boy standing over Penny’s body.
“Jaune…”
She hadn’t said it, not aloud—but her eyes did.
He saw the way her eyes shattered when he retrieved the sword from Penny’s chest. How his bloodcurdling scream attracted the attention of all remaining parties. There was so much for him to take in…
He remembered the cold clang of metal hitting the floor. Penny's last breath. The red spreading out beneath her like a rose blooming in slow motion.
Ruby didn’t see it. She was already gone. Swallowed by the void.
Maybe that was mercy.
You’re a murderer, Jaune Arc.
His stomach twisted. Something acidic clawed at his throat. He turned and ran. Not toward anything. Just away.
Branches slapped at his face. Vines snagged at his ankles. The deeper he pushed into the forest, the darker it became. Sunlight faded, swallowed by thick canopy and hanging mist. The air grew damp. Wet earth squelched underfoot.
You’re the reason she’s dead.
Jaune pressed his palms to his ears, breathing hard. “Stop. Just—stop…”
You said you’d protect her. You promised. You failed.
He tripped over a gnarled root and went sprawling, shoulder slamming into the mud. The broken sword flew from his belt and clattered nearby. He didn’t reach for it. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t. He stayed there, face buried in the soil, panting. His heart pounded like it wanted to escape his chest. Tears stung his eyes, hot and silent.
Then he looked up—and saw her.
Penny.
Her face etched into the bark of a tree, like a twisted knot that had formed her eyes and her smile. Gentle. Kind. Forgiving.
“Stop…” he whispered; voice raw.
He blinked. She was gone.
Just bark. Just a tree.
But she was still there—in his head. Her final smile. Her hand on his. The sound she made when the blade slid in. Not pain, not anger—acceptance. And that hurt more than if she had hated him.
You don't deserve forgiveness.
Jaune crawled to his knees, trembling. The hilt of his sword lay in the mud, half-buried. He stared at it like it might bite him. It didn’t belong to him anymore. He didn’t know who it belonged to. Maybe no one. He wasn’t a huntsman. Wasn’t a leader. Wasn’t even Jaune Arc. He was no one.
Through the thick mist and winding roots, past trees that stretched like spires into a sky he could no longer see he continued running. His boots slid in mud, snagged on thorns, but he kept moving. Forward. Away.
You let her die.
He stumbled, caught himself on a trunk slick with moss. His breath came in ragged gasps, hot in his chest, his vision tunneled to nothing but dark blurs and phantom colors. His heartbeat pounded louder than his footsteps.
You could’ve found another way. Ruby would have found a way.
“I didn’t have a choice!” he shouted, voice cracking. “She asked me to!”
The forest didn’t care.
Branches leaned inward, close enough to scrape his arms, grab at his armor. The light grew thinner, colder, the air sharp like glass against his throat. He didn’t know how long he’d been running—minutes, hours, days. Time didn’t feel real here. Just the guilt. Just the voice.
You didn’t try hard enough. You wanted it to end. You wanted the responsibility to die with her.
“No! I—” Jaune’s boot hit something—a rock, a slope, he couldn’t tell—and he pitched forward.
The world vanished beneath him.
For a second, there was nothing. Just weightlessness and silence. Then gravity returned with a vengeance.
Jaune plummeted through snapping branches and howling wind. He barely managed to raise his arms before hitting the ground. The impact came like a thunderclap—his body slamming against rock and root. His leg twisted under him with a sickening crack. White-hot pain screamed through his thigh. He didn’t scream. Couldn’t. All the air had been punched out of him.
He hit the ground again, rolled, and finally stopped near the bottom of a shallow ravine, half-submerged in muck and shattered leaves.
Everything hurt.
The pain in his leg was sharp, deep. Wrong. He tried to move, and the agony made stars explode behind his eyes. His fingers dug into the soil. Wet. Cold. Real.
His body wanted to pass out. It begged for it. But the voice didn’t stop.
Coward. This is what you are now. Broken. Useless. Murderer.
He clutched the side of his head, nails digging into his scalp. “Shut up—shut up—shut up!”
The forest echoed with his scream, then went silent again.
Jaune lay there, trembling, the fire in his leg pulsing with every heartbeat. He could barely breathe. The sky above him was hidden by twisting tree limbs, all but mocking his own. Somewhere in the distance, a strange red moon bled through the clouds.
He wasn’t sure how far he had fallen. He wasn’t sure he cared. He was alive, but he didn’t know why.
Pain bloomed in Jaune’s leg under the skin, each sensation worse than the last. His breath came in short, shallow gasps. The voice still echoed—relentless, cruel. He squeezed his eyes shut, hoping unconsciousness would come and take it all away.
It didn’t.
Instead, he heard a new sound: footsteps. Light. Barefoot, maybe. Soft enough to blend into the grass, but they were coming closer. He forced his eyes open.
A figure stood over him—small, no taller than a child. A woman, maybe, though everything about her was odd.
Her face was powdered bone-white, like she’d painted it with chalk or the dust of crushed lilies. Her eyes were emerald and sharp, piercing, set against the stark contrast of her skin. Her lips were painted red, too red, like a cut that never closed. And her hair—vibrant crimson—was coiled into two perfect buns that sat like horns atop her head.
Her dress was made of layered silks and patchwork scraps, stitched in spirals and abstract patterns, too intricate to be madness, too strange to be normal. She looked like something out of a storybook—but not one with a happy ending.
Her voice cut through the haze like a knife.
“Well, you’ve done it now,” she snapped, arms folded. “Trampled right through my lily beds. Do you know how long it takes to grow things down here?”
Jaune blinked at her, disoriented. “What…?”
“You fell,” she said simply, turning her gaze to the wreckage around him—flattened flowers, cracked stones, broken branches. “Made a mess. No ‘hello.’ No ‘pardon me, miss.’ Just bam, down you go. Very rude.”
He tried to sit up, but the pain lanced through his leg again. A groan escaped him.
Useless.
The voice was louder now, as if angry to be ignored.
The woman tilted her head. “You’re bleeding. And shaking. And talking to yourself.”
“I didn’t mean to…” he mumbled, clutching his skull. “I didn’t mean to fall…”
She crouched beside him; nose wrinkled in frustration. “Who are you?”
He didn’t answer.
You don’t get to answer that.
She pouted, tapping a pale finger against her chin. “No name? Hm. All right then—what’s your purpose?”
He turned away. Mud clung to his face. The wind whistled through the trees above. He could still see Penny’s eyes when he closed his own.
You failed everyone.
“I don’t know…” he whispered.
“What was that?”
“I don’t know!” Jaune snapped, louder than he meant to. His voice cracked, and just like that, the strength left him. His fists clenched. “I don’t know who I am. I don’t know what I’m doing here. I don’t know anything. I know nothing! I’m nothing.”
He shook. The voice pounded like war drums in his skull. Every breath felt wrong.
The woman watched him for a long moment, her expression unreadable. Then, with a softness he didn’t expect, she asked again:
“Who are you? And what are you doing here?”
Jaune looked at her—and broke.
He didn’t sob. Didn’t scream. He just cried. Silent tears. They traced the grime on his cheeks, unheeded. He couldn’t remember the last time he let himself fall apart.
You deserve this. Murderer.
The woman sat beside him, cross-legged in the crushed lilies. Her tone was no longer irritated. Only curious.
“You have no name. No role. No story,” she said. “You are…without function.”
He nodded slowly. Numb. There was no fight left in his aching body.
“Then let me ask a different question,” she said gently. “What do you want?”
Silence followed. The question hung there, heavy and awful.
He could’ve said redemption. He could’ve begged for forgiveness. For a second chance.
But none of those things felt possible. Or deserved.
“I just wanted to be a hero. A knight. Now… Now I just want the voices to stop,” he whispered.
She tilted her head.
“I want to forget,” he said. “I want to stop remembering her face. Stop seeing the blood. Stop hearing myself scream. I want to be no one. Nothing.”
A long silence passed between them.
Finally, she smiled. Not kindly. But knowingly. Then, she stood with the grace of falling silk and smoothed her hands down her strange patchwork dress. The tips of her fingers glowed faintly, as if the garden itself responded to her.
“Then perhaps,” she said, standing up and brushing the dirt from her skirts, “you’re exactly where you’re meant to be.”
As he watched her, he couldn’t help but notice the voices began to fade. They became softer, and before long had finally been extinguished.
She turned slightly but didn’t leave. Her presence lingered, quiet and unnatural—like a doll that hadn’t been told to move yet. Her painted white face didn’t blink.
“This is your choice,” she said. “Remember that. But now, I will also give you purpose, Mr. No One.”
Once again, she began to glow, and before long, like the voices, Jaune’s sight began to fade, and he lost consciousness there in the garden amongst the beds of flowers.
Not far beyond the woman-- barely visible between the bushes and curling vines—a second pair of eyes blinked open.
Blue. Unblinking. Curious.
They watched from the underbrush, motionless, uninvited. Unnoticed. But the eyes stayed fixed on Jaune, as if he had been the one who said something most interesting.