What Remains ~ RWBY

Part 13

Ruby's P.O.V.

Five years seems like a century some days. Others, it feels like a dream you cant quite reach. Today, standing in front of the shining castle of a school as we did five years ago, standing beside the same friends I did five years ago, to attend the same dance I did five years ago, you would think it would feel like nothing had changed. But you would be wrong. Everything has changed. Looking at the brave men and women beside me, wrapped up in suits and shining dresses, its not hard to see that. Five years ago, they were students, naïve, having never lost anything, new friends ready to ride out their years at school in ignorant bliss. Now, they're warriors, survivors. They've lost more than anyone could imagine, they've stared death in the face so many times counting became irrelevant. They carried the burden of saving the world when the people in it hadn't the slightest clue of the danger they were in. Now, they're my family.

We walk side by side into the school that started it all. Sun, Neptune, Coco, Velvet, Illia, Penny, Jaune, Nora, Ren, Oscar, Blake, Weiss, Yang.

We lost people along the way. Too many. I look to team JNR, walking proudly. Pyrrha's voice is in my head again. But this time, she's not screaming.

She's laughing.

We stand in front of the doors to the hall, throwing excited glances to one another.

"I swear to god boys if you fucked this up-" Yang threatens.

Qrow and Glynda swing open the doors from the inside, cutting her off. We're immediately blinded by the light, shimmering and glittering and sparkling in more ways than I thought possible.

The walls are decked with shining fairy lights, streaming up and down the hall and draping across the ceiling. The light hits the floor, coated in a thin layer of glass that reflects it back up and around the room at every angle.

"You were saying," Jaune grins, jabbing Yang in the ribs as he walks past her, "Well come on, don't jus stand there gawking. Hit it Neptune!"

"Already on it!" Neptune yells, having already scrambled up to his sound booth at the end of the hall.

"Let's get this party started!"

Oscar's P.O.V.

So this is what fun is.

The music blares in my ears, so loud my thoughts have started to merge with the lyrics.

Red like roses.

Teenagers run around the place like excited puppies, spilling drinks with higher alcohol levels than Glynda and Qrow would like and dancing with the dorkiest moves I've ever seen.

Fill my dreams.

And she's right there, in the middle of it all. Her red hair flops over her eyes as she laughs, chatting back and forth with Jaune about something I'm too far away to hear. She's glowing. I find myself studying her smile, the way it stretches as she laughs and thins when shes listening. Before I know it I'm smiling too.

"You gunna ask her to dance?"

I spin around so fast I almost spill my drink all over my tux.

"Weiss, hi! I didn't see you there."

"So I noticed," Weiss grins, "So, are you?"

"Am I what?"

She takes the drink from my hand and sips it casually, leaving me staring at her dumbfounded. "Don't act stupid Oscar, we both know you know what I said."

I nod sheepishly, "Yeah, well, she seems pretty busy right now so I'll probably just ask her later."

Weiss shakes her head disapprovingly and takes another sip of my drink.