The next day, the fallout begins

Tragic Solitude awoke many hours later, with a bizarre and unpleasant feeling permeating her body.

"Ughhhh…" she moaned as she sat up, rubbing her forehead. She looked around, and saw smoldering wreckage and sparking electric components everywhere. Shards of crystal littered the floor. Mostly red and purple, but a few other colors as well. They glowed with a strange energy that made them disorienting to look at.

Next to her was the motionless form of Melanie Antiqua, surrounded by a puddle of blood. Tragic's eyes widened as she took in the sight. She rushed over to her friend.

"Melanie? Melanie? OH MY GODS, MELANIE! PLEASE WAKE UP!"

It was no use. There was no pulse, Melanie Antiqua was dead.

As Tragic stood up, memories of the night before started to return. The intruder, Link, sneaking into the machine to start Ship Survivor early. Calling Melanie for help. Something going wrong, and the Power Core exploding.

Link. Where was Link? She looked around, but he has gone. Perhaps crushed under the rubble? No, there were footprints in the dust leading away. He must have awoken earlier and left.

Tragic followed the footprints out to the last remaining entrance to the cavern, other than the massive hole in the roof. Ascending the stairs, she eventually came to the surface to another shocking sight.

The city was gone, leveled by the blast. The skyscrapers were nothing but smoldering heaps of broken concrete and twisted steel.

Fortunately, the destroyed buildings meant dust everywhere, and dust meant more footprints to follow. She would have to find Link and bring him to justice. If anyone else was even alive, that is. Just how widespread was the destruction? Was it only the city? Or perhaps the continent, or even the whole planet?

Tragic walked for hours, seeing no one but the occasional corpse or severed body part. She couldn't place it, but she felt weird. Not just the shock of everything around her, but another sensation. Kind of like staring into a UV light for too long, but permeating her whole body. Was it the radiation from those crystals? Or was she dreaming? Was anything even real? Where was she going again?

Tragic started hearing voices in her head when she thought of the crystals.

"There are really four dimensions, three which we call the three planes of Space, and a fourth, Time."

"Do you ever wonder what it's like, to be wanderers in the fourth dimension? To be exiles?"

"Mr. Spock, set the calculations for time warp."

"Where we're going, we don't need roads."

"You weren't there, in the final days of the War. You never saw what was born… the Could've Been King with his army of Meanwhiles and Never-Weres!"

"I'm a Time Lord. I'm the LAST of the Time Lords."

In order to quiet the voices, Tragic talked to herself.

"Heh heh, nobody gonna stop me 'cause nobody's here! Everybody's so scared of me that they left! Don't need that seat on the Mod Council, this ashen dominion gonna be mine!"

Eventually, many miles past the ruins of the ACPM, she started hearing more sounds. Not just voices, but gunfire and explosions. And she couldn't make them disappear by talking to herself. They weren't just in her head.

"What's going on?" Could it be? Are there others still alive?"

Soon she came to a ridge, one of the foothills of the Guns N' Roses highlands. As she hiked to the top, a vast battlefield was laid before her.

Down in the battlefield

"Die fiend, you unholy invader of our Subreddit! Go back to the degenerate cesspool from whence ye came!"

JMHS Rowing, captain of a torpedo boat on the Crescent River, was locked in combat with the dreadnought battleship That's Enough Internet For Today. In the past 24 hours, the planet of r/RWBY had gone from an orderly and peaceful civilization to a free-for-all war zone. The APCM explosion had caused a chain reaction of exploding Bragg Crystals that overthrew every major Ship Nation except Guns N' Roses and Armed and Ready. For some reason, strange energies were preventing post-WWI tech from working across much of the planet. Many leaders were dead or missing, and the Mod Council was nowhere to be found.

In the chaos, dozens of new factions had sprung up and attempted to seize control. Instead of lending aid, their sister planet of FNKI had sent their most ambitious warlords and their followers to cause even more chaos. Including those in the That's Enough Internet For Today across the bend on the river. JMHS Rowing was also from FNKI, but at least they had arrived to help!

Another shell landed and exploded in the water nearby, drenching Rowing and pulling them out of their thoughts. They grabbed the railing as the waves rocked the boat. "Crew, continue evasive action! They can't keep us away forever! Gunners, continue firing on their cannons."

They were in a bad spot. With a bar of land in between their group of torpedo boats and the attacking dreadnought, they could not fire their main weapons. All they could do was continue dodging the enemy fire, and hope their crew's small arms fire could land a lucky hit on one of the enemy cannons. If they could just avoid getting hit for long enough, then they could move in close enough to launch the torpedoes. They were all that was left of the Guns N' Roses Navy, their battleship Alabama hadn't lasted long against the That's Enough Internet For Today's heavy cannons.

As both sides were about to launch another volley, a new force came onto the scene. A dozen red Triplanes flew in with the sun behind them. Their leader shouted with a megaphone.

"This is Lord Penguino of the Oligarchy of Arkos, commander of the AAA Orgy squadron! In the name of peace and sanity, I order you to stop fighting! Surrender now so that we may restore order!"

In response, the That's Enough Internet For Today turned their guns against the new arrivals, tearing two of their planes to shreds and damaging five others.

Rowing ran into their torpedo boat's cabin and grabbed the radio from the operator. "Penguino you fool, this is JMHS Rowing of Rubyland and the Guns N' Roses Navy. They invaded us, neutrality only helps the aggressor! Help us defeat That's Enough Internet For Today if you want to restore peace."

As Rowing returned outside, they saw that AAA Orgy was strafing both the enemy battleship and their own torpedo boats. So much for that. A bullet hit one of their crew in the throat. She dropped to the ground, gasping for air and spurting out blood.

"You'll pay for this!" Rowing shouted, shaking their fist at the sky. They turned to their remaining crew. "We're doomed if we stay here, so we have nothing to lose now. We're moving in for the attack! Small arms, fire on the planes. We're going to torpedo the That's Enough Internet For Today."

As the squad of boats moved around the bend, there was far less fire from the enemy battleship, as they had redirected much of it to the enemy planes. Only three remained as Rowing lined up their boat for the attack. They went back to the cabin to order the radio operator to tell the other boats to prepare to fire.

Just as Rowing was giving the order, they heard an explosion. Looking outside, one of the torpedo boats was on fire and sinking.

"PENGUINO!" Rowing shouted at the last plane. The red plane turned around to strafe the dreadnought again, but a shell clipped one wing. On fire and spinning, the plane started to fall.

"I'M SSOORRRYYYYYY!" Penguino cried as the plane fell, crashing into the enemy dreadnought and exploding as it hit one of their turrets. The ammunition in said turret exploded as well, taking it out of commission.

"Now's our chance," said Rowing. "ALL TORPEDO BOATS, FIRE!"

The remaining torpedo boats launched their eponymous underwater missiles into the side of the enemy battleship. They exploded in a line, sending waves through the river. That's Enough Internet For Today burst into flames and rolled onto its damaged side. Within minutes, it had sunk to the bottom.

Up in the Guns N' Roses highlands, others watch and prepare

"One threat gone, who knows how many more to go," said General MacGregor Rose as he watched the enemy dreadnought sink from a distance through his binoculars. "Poor Penguino. I hope the other Pink Rose Gold council members are okay."

"Admit it, you just like watching your enemies burn," said the voice in his head that had been plaguing him ever since the explosion. "The safety of your friends is only secondary."

"Shut up, Tanya," MacGregor muttured.

"Who's Tanya?" asked one of his soldiers.

"It's nothing," said MacGregor. "Get back to digging."

The soldier shrugged and resumed digging, joining the thousands of others who were creating a vast network of trenches to defend Guns N' Roses from invaders.

Around the Subreddit, more players enter the game.

Tragic had finally found her home, in a suburb far from the former city and the current battlefield. She was confused that only early pre-digital tech was working, but she had a personal project that still fit the bill.

Inside her huge, diesel-powered mech suit, Tragic had one small piece of technology unaffected by the anomalous energies emitting from the wreckage of the APCM. A Net-Comms watch with profiles of many major Redditors. She was currently watching an old video from Ship Wars 3 showing aerial combat between Arkos and Freezerburn.

One particular plane stood out. Outnumbered and outgunned, trapped behind enemy lines, it still gave a hell of a fight to its opponents. Dodging missiles, taking out multiple enemy planes at once, performing maneuvers that would turn most pilots to goo, it fought on against nearly impossible odds. And the pilot was pretty handsome as well.

Is this what Tragic was looking for? Is this what would cure the strange feelings she had after the explosion? She smiled as she looked at the pilot's profile picture.

"Ara ara Colonel Strike."

In an old bunker left over from the Dimension Defender revolt

Peter s. Nachbar took of his trademark mask, exposing his brown hair and greenish Brown eyes, and groaned. How could he let this happen? He should've known someone would get salty at the delay and done something stupid. If only he'd called for more security around the APCM!

"Jannis, Armory, let's gather more people. We need a plan."

In a library

Exspiro V Cremantam pushed the secret sliding bookshelf aside to reveal a massive artillery piece. Being underground, the Fanfic Library on RWBY had survived the explosion.

"So many factions fighting," he murmured. "But we will see who is Objectively the best."

Under the sea

"So much fighting and chaos," said Celtic Crown, captain of the submarine Position of Power. "At least it's not my fault this time!"

"Go Team ADAM!" shouts Branwen.

"Hey, where'd my watch go?" Celtic asks.

In the invasion forces

"Tick tock, your time is up," says Metas M Petivero, holding up the Stolen watch.

"Slaves for my Empire!" shouts a man who has no name but numbers.

And all around the RWBY Sector of the Reddit Galaxy. But their plans will be for naught if they can't defeat ME.