FIGHT!

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[stop music]



The vines around Ruby suddenly vanished, followed by her body slowly slumping over. "Ruby!" Yang shouted, dashing towards her and catching her body before it hit the floor. "Sis! Wake up! Sis!"



Ruby's eyes were open, but they didn't look at her. Not at the wall. Not at the ceiling, floor, anything. She just stared into oblivion, a single tear rolling down her cheek. She didn't breath, Yang couldn't feel any pulse and all the warmness of her once so cheerful face has vanished.



"Ruby... no. This can't be real! Ruby! Ruby!" Yang shouted over and over again. Tears flooded her eyes, her voice cracked. She looked up to watch at the monster who did this, but Marluxia as well as that demonic angel were gone. She was the only one left in this long, empty hallway. Crying, she closed her sister's eyes.



That bastard would pay for what he did to her. The angel appeared right behind Yang. Before she could react, Yang was hit by the massive scythe, catapulting her through the air away from her sister. Crashing back on the floor, Yang looked up right in time to see the sheer despair in her sister's face. "Sis-"[stop music] Getting closer and closer, Yang reached out to her sister. Ruby's eyes filled with tears, her sister really managed to save her. Their hands met, and A massive hurricane formed, trying to blow Yang away. Quick-thinking, Yang smashed her fists into the ground. With her fists being stuck in the floor, she was able to prevent to be sent flying further away from Ruby. Slowly, but steadily she "ground punched" her way towards her sister while the hurricane raged on.

K.O.!

Vega: Alright the analysis has ended and the combatants are set!Young: Time for a badass scythe duel!Grif: It's time for a Dea-Silver: DEATH BATTLE!--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------That wasn't good.Ruby twirled her scythe, Crescent Rose, and sliced a strange, grey being clean in half. She never saw something like that before. It had a large, cylindrical head with a symbol on it and seemingly wore some kind of jumpsuit, with a zipper located where the mouth was supposed to be. But she didn't have time to wonder about it any longer, as another of these beings darted towards her.With a swift backward movement, Ruby evaded the attack, turned her scythe towards it and fired a round right into the mouth of that thing. What were they? Some kind of Grimm? And how did she end up here in the first place? After moving as fast as she could towards Junior's club, she for some reason landed right in front of this giant castle. Then that mysterious hooded person appeared and lured her into it. But did she follow him? Didn't she want to get to Yang to help her with this strange new foe she battled against?Suddenly, her scroll received a call. Ruby answered it, and Yang appeared on the screen, battered and bruised."Yang! Oh my god, what happened?""Nothing..." Something in the background exploded, Weiss was flung through the air and a deep, menacing chuckle was heard. "Well, nothing we couldn't beat together as a team. Where are you?""I... don't know, to be honest. I was moving towards your position, but then I somehow ended inside a castle.""A castle?" Yang asked sceptically."Yes! And there are strange creatures, but they don't appear to be Grimm, and... wait a second!"Ruby disappeared out of view, a slashing noise was heard and Ruby appeared again, holding the severed head of one of these monsters in her hands. "You see?"Yang raised an eyebrow. "That's actually one really weird creature. I'll be searching for you and then we'll see what this is all about. Maybe it has something to do with those Insurrectionists the White Fang are cooperating with." Turning around, Yang looked towards her other two teammates. "You guys can handle this, right?""We're good, just find Ruby and make sure you two get back here as fast as possible!" Blake shouted while barely dodging a vicious haymaker from Tex/O'Malley.Yang nodded and turned back to Ruby. "You hear, sis? I'll be comi-..." Suddenly, someone darted right past Ruby with astonishing speed, grabbing the scroll in the process."What... hey! Give that back!" Ruby shouted. The figure wore a black coat and hood, seemingly looked at her and crushed the scroll in his hand.Ruby could only watch in disbelief, as she suddenly realized something. That was the person that lured her into the castle!"You! Reveal yourself!" Ruby said while pointing with her finger at the figure, who calmly answered. "As you wish."The person put off the hood, somehow scattering a few pink petals along the process, revealing a beautiful looking man with long pink hair. He looked extremely feminine, and if his voice wouldn't have clearly been the one of a man, Ruby could've sworn she was facing a woman."Why am I here? What is the meaning behind this? What are those creatures? And who are you?" Ruby asked, the questions leaving her mouth in quick succession."My name is Marluxia, and the rest... well, let's talk about that later." The man named Marluxia said with a smile while holding his hand up the air, a pink petal slowly falling into it. Suddenly, a scythe, the Graceful Dahlia, materialized in his hand and he pointed it in Ruby's direction.Slightly surprised at first, Ruby readied Crescent Rose and prepared herself. She didn't knew what this what all about, but there was one thing for sure.She wouldn't leave without an answer.Both combatants darted forward, ready to cut off their respective opponent's head. Dashing past each other, their scythes met with a loudMarluxia immediately turned around and swung the Graceful Dahlia, sending a pink shockwave flying towards Ruby. Quickly holding Crescent Rose in front of her, Ruby blocked it, but was still forced to take a step back from the impact.Suddenly Marluxia appeared right behind her, swinging his scythe and aiming for Ruby's neck."Too easy."But the moment his weapon should've made contact with his opponent, she suddenly disappeared in a flurry of rose petals. Marluxia, slightly surprised, quickly checked his surroundings, as he heard a clicking noise above him.He teleported by pure instinct, the sniper round shot from a considerable height above him hitting the floor. Ruby was slightly annoyed. Apparently this guy had a Semblance very similar to her. Still in the air, she noticed a petal falling from above. Knewing what was coming, she fired a round at the floor and used the recoil to spin around with an insane speed, swinging Crescent Rose multiple times in the process.The first strike actually blocked the Graceful Dahlia swung by Marluxia, who was right above her and taken by surprise. Therefore, Marluxia couldn't do anything as the second one hit the hilt of the scythe, while the third managed to knock the weapon out of his hands.Ruby swung a fourth time at the now disarmed Marluxia, but she once again hit nothing but petals. But this time, she had an advantage over her opponent:She exactly knew where he'd appear again.Quickly looking towards the Graceful Dahlia's position and pointing Crescent Rose at the opposite direction, she fired and catapulted herself towards the scythe with insane speeds.And she was right, Marluxia appeared next to his scythe to pick it up again. At the last second, he saw her flying towards him and only evaded her slashing attack by performing a mad backwards jump, Crescent Rose only narrowly missing his neck.As Marluxia landed, he made a swift upward gesture with his hand. Suddenly, all of the petals scattered through the duration of the fight started flying through the air. Ruby could only watch as the petals stopped and appeared to sharpen themselves, hanging in the air like dozens of daggers, all facing towards her. Then, Marluxia brought his hand down.The petals were raining down on Ruby, who quickly spinned her scythe around, trying to cut them all down. Marluxia was fascinated by the magnificent picture he saw, with dozens of petals flying with high speeds at Ruby while the latter twirled her scythe so fast and skilled that she actually sliced through each and every one of them.Right as Ruby made it out of the assault unscathed, she saw Marluxia picking up his scythe and disappearing. Ruby quickly turned around, expecting her opponent to appear behind her once again. This time, she was wrong.The Graceful Assassin appeared above her, hovering in mid-air and swinging the Graceful Dahlia multiple times, sending out huge energy waves in the process. Ruby quickly dashed from side to side, narrowly avoiding each and every strike. But suddenly, she folded her scythe into the rifle-like mode.Marluxia, a bit confused as to why she chose to do this, swung the scythe and fired once again an energy wave. Strangely, Ruby didn't even attempt to dodge. Instead, she aimed with the rifle at the attack... and fired.The shot destroyed the attack, but Ruby continued firing. To avoid getting shot out of the air, Marluxia held the Graceful Dahlia in front of him. Though he managed to block the shots, he still felt the force behind them. Knowing this couldn't go on forever, he planned to end it right there.He teleported out of Ruby's view, who, by getting used to this, used her Semblance for a quick dash to the side, just in case her opponent would appear once again behind or above her. And she was right.Just as her dash ended, she turned towards the point where she stood just a second ago, with Marluxia dropping from above and slamming his scythe into the ground. Ruby smirked. That guy just made a terrible mistake. With his weapon seemingly stuck in the floor, there was no way he could counter her next attack.But just as she dashed towards him, she noticed something odd. The pink haired man smiled. And then, cracks appeared all over the floor.A giant eruption of energy covered everything in front of Marluxia, with his enemy being right in the center. As the energy faded, there was nothing left of her.Or so did he think."Phew, that wasclose!" a familiar voice spoke behind the back of number Xl. Marluxia turned around, only to see Ruby standing there, with only slight bruises and panting a bit."If it weren't for my Semblance, you would've gotten me, you rip-off artist.""I'm what?""You heard right, just look at you. A black cloak? Check. A scythe? Check. Seemingly disappearing and scattering rose petals in the process? Check. That's plagiarism, you know?""Are you serious right now?""Hey, I may not know what kind of evil deeds you're up to, but let me tell you mister, copyright laws are a greater evil than you'll ever be!""Enough with this nonsense!" Marluxia shouted, losing his calm for the first time during the fight, and shooting a shockwave towards Ruby. The latter jumped clean over it, performing a front flip and shifting the Crescent Rose back into its scythe form.Marluxia blocked an incoming downward swing and grabbed Ruby's cloak, swinging her around and throwing her towards a wall. Ruby quickly adjusted herself mid-flight and kicked herself of the wall just as she made contact with it, catapulting herself towards her opponent. Marluxia saw this and waited just for the right moment. Then, just before she would've hit him, he swung his scythe in a horizontal motion.With a fast motion, Ruby quickly made herself as flat as she could, the blade missing her by a few centimeters. She crashed with her feet against Marluxia's chest, quickly pointed her scythe at the floor behind her, and fired. Using the recoil, she managed to perform a kick with enough force to send Marluxia flying up the air.With the air being pressed out of Marluxia's lungs, he could only watch as the girl became a blur of roses that dashed towards a wall and jumped off it, flying right in his direction. Normally, no one could've evaded that attack... as long as they didn't have the ability to teleport.Marluxia disappeared once again and reappeared back on the floor, panting heavily. Ruby performed a quick flip and shot towards the ceiling, with the recoil propelling her down. Just as Marluxia looked up, he readied his scythe...[stop music]He didn't react fast enough. Eyes widened in pure shock, Marluxia's head fell down on the floor. His body stood upright for a few moments, then slumped over, before slowly disintegrating in petals.Ruby turned around, looking at her dead opponent. She was victorious, but she'd now never get the answers to her questions. Oh well, now she had to wait for Yang to-"You're pretty good."Ruby turned around in surprise and made a quick jump backwards as she heard those words coming from right behind her. Facing her was Marluxia, smiling and looking like nothing happened."What? Why are you still alive? I decapitated you!""Oh, you think? Well, let me clear this up, what you just fought was merely a replica of me."Ruby was flabbergasted. "A replica? But... but...""Heh, as if I was that easy to beat. Didn't you want some answers? How about you try and get them out of me... a second time? Maybe it's the real me now." He performed a gesture and the Graceful Dahlia appeared in his hand.Ruby gulped. This guy was way more dangerous than she thought. But it couldn't be helped, she had to face him again. And this time, she would go all out.The hooded girl sprinted towards Marluxia, who simply slammed the hilt of his scythe on the ground, creating a big black circle on the ground in front of him. Not intending to find out what this was, Ruby jumped against a wall and jumped off it, flying over the circle and towards Marluxia.The latter threw his scythe towards her and vanished immediately after. Just as Ruby blocked the Graceful Dahlia, Marluxia appeared right above her, grabbing his scythe and kicking against her back, causing Ruby to stumble towards the circle.Just before falling face first onto it, Ruby quickly slammed her scythe into the ground and rolled onto it. Now laying on Crescent Rose, she pulled the trigger, the recoil launching her towards Marluxia once again.Marluxia held his scythe in front of him, blocking a strike from Ruby and quickly went for a strike aimed at her neck. Ruby ducked under the swing and spinned around, trying to cut off Marluxias legs. By using Graceful Dahlia's handle, Marluxia parried and brought the blade down, an attempt that was once again to no avail thanks to Ruby rolling to the side before swinging at the Graceful Assassin once again.This continued for quite a while, resulting in a high-speed scythe duel, with both of them striking, parrying, blocking, spinning and twirling at amazing speeds, their scythes only being red and pink blurrs and petals being scattered all over the place.Marluxia smirked. This truly was a pretty fun fight, but it was time to heat things up a bit. While still engaged in their fierce duel, he performed a barely noticeable hand motion, the petals laying on the floor behind Ruby beginning to slowly elevate up the air. Let's see if the little girl would be prepared for a surprise attack from behind.The petals suddenly darted forwards like arrows, but what Marluxia failed to notice was that Ruby had overlooked this maneuver out of the corner of her eye. Quickly spinning around in a 360° motion, she destroyed all the petals with one clean swing, but as she turned towards Marluxia again, her opponent was missing. Instead, she was suddenly surrounded by thorny vines...The vines went off in a pink explosion, with Marluxia watching from a considerable distance. As the smoke cleared, Ruby was standing there, only slightly bruised, her Aura having absorbed most of the blow.Marluxia grinned. "You know, you're just as good as I expected, if not better. I could use someone like you for my plans, so why don't you join me? Together, we could achieve-""Never!" Ruby interrupted. "As if I'd ever work together with someone like you! I don't know what evil plans you're up to, but I will stop you here and now!"Marluxia sighed. "That's unfortunate... for you, that is. You'll regret refusing my offer."Both locked eyes and readied themselves. Then, they dashed at each other with enormous speeds, only appearing as black blurs to the naked eye. Their scythes clashed, scattering red and pink petals, before both combatants quickly backed off, only to dash towards each other again. And again. And again.The fighters soon dashed not only across the ground, they even clashed in the air multiple times. If a regular person would've walked across the hallway, they would've only seen petals as well as two blurs darting around, alongside the sound of blades hitting each other and sniper shots going off.Suddenly, an empty magazine dropped on the floor. Shortly after, a shot went off, sounding louder then the ones before. Oddly enough, one of the blurs appeared to move significantly faster than before, seemingly dominating the other in speed. The clashes occurred more often than before, with way less pauses between them. Then, something crashed down on the floor.Marluxia got up slowly, holding his right arm. He wasn't able to block the last strike and got hit. Ruby landed quite a distance away from him on the ground, quickly adjusting Crescent Rose so that the barrel faced the area behind her.She dashed towards Marluxia, at the same time firing her weapon to use the recoil to amplify her speed. Marluxia dashed forward as well, though he began to notice something odd. Ruby didn't only get faster the more she closed the distance, it seemed like she was creating some sort of... vortex?Right as Marluxia and Ruby would've run into each other, Ruby stopped to a halt, the whirlwind she created flying past her and into Marluxia. Eyes widened in shock, Marluxia was literally blown away by that unexpected attack and crashed against a wall, which cracked largely at the sudden impact.Unable to move of the wall, Marluxia watched as Ruby came running towards him, jumped up and swung her scythe, decapitating him.Or so she would have, if Marluxia didn't once again teleport to safety. After accidently slashing the wall clean in half, Ruby turned around to see her opponent standing in the middle of the hallway, one hand at his side and looking like he'd want to rip Ruby to shreds at this very moment."This is it, I give you one last chance to join me an-""Thanks, mister, but no!" Ruby interrupted once again.Marluxia gave her a deadly glare, then stood upright. "So be it! As lightless oblivion devours you...". Ruby suddenly felt the air gathering around Marluxia, the petals scattered around the floor flying around him."Drown in the ever blooming darkness!" Marluxia shouted, suddenly standing in the center of a gigantic tornado. Ruby closed her eyes and shielded them with her left arm while simultaneously trying not to get sucked in. Then, as the tornado died down, she opened her eyes again... and couldn't believe what she saw.In front of her stood Marluxia, but there was something behind him, a being Ruby had never seen in her life. It was an angelic being of massive size with two pairs of wings, one thin and black, the other large and white, both shaped like scythes. It wore a skull like "helmet", and black colored tendrils billowed from the sleeves. To top it off, it held a gigantic version of the Graceful Dahlia in its hands.It was like she looked at the angel of death himself.Marluxia grinned slightly at the look of his shocked opponent. "Your heart shall be judged!"The angel swung the scythe, creating a massive energywave. Ruby quickly jumped to the side and watched as the angel vanished... only to see it appearing right in front of her again. Bringing down the hilt of its scythe, the angel apparently tried to smash Ruby with it. Though Ruby managed to avoid that, she was caught off-guard as the attack produced a shockwave, which she only evaded thanks to quickly firing at the ground and being launched up by the recoil.Swinging Crescent Rose, Ruby slashed across the angel's chest. To her shock, it did nothing. No wound, no reaction from the mysterious being whatsoever. The only reaction following this was the angel swinging the Graceful Dahlia. Quickly firing at the angels face, Ruby let herself being propelled out of the scythe's reach.This wasn't looking good at all. Neither the slash nor the shot did even leave a scratch on the body of that creature. She looked over to Marluxia. Something was odd... his feet seemed to be surrounded by something that appeared to be black and white vines. Was he rooted to the ground?She didn't have any more time to further think about that, as the angel suddenly appeared behind her, swinging its scythe. Quickly dashing to the side to avoid the attack, Ruby fired a shot right at Marluxia's head, the sniper round just narrowly missing as Marluxia tilted his head. His facial expression, looking like a man who just narrowly avoided a possible head shot, alongside the fact that hedodge byteleporting, made it clear for Ruby.Her opponent wasn't able to move from his position.Before the angelic being, still standing behind her, could swing again, Ruby already dashed towards Marluxia, ready to slice his head clean off. But the Graceful Assassin still had some tricks up his sleeve. Pointing towards Ruby, he unleashed a massive hurricane strong enough to not only stop Ruby's dash, but to also blow her back across the hallway, right towards the angel, who started to spin its scythe around like a windmill, ready to slice her into tiny pieces.Quick-thinking, Ruby fired at the ground, using the recoil in combination with the hurricane to jump high through the air and clean over the angel. The wind died down, and Ruby landed safely on the floor, panting heavily. This fight was putting her to the limit, she didn't fight an enemy like Marluxia before. And she had only one magazine left."I'm sorry, but I'm afraid this ends now." Marluxia spoke, pointing towards Ruby like if he was giving the command to attack. And the angel did just that. With a mighty swing of the Graceful Dahlia, it fired a huge energy wave. Ruby jumped clean over it, at the same time ejecting her empty magazine and putting her last one in. She had to make it count.Swinging the scythe over and over again, the angel bombarded Ruby with energy waves, the latter evading them all by shooting just as often as her opponent, each shot propelling her further through the air and torwards her main goal: Marluxia.But to get to him, she had to get pass by that giant demon angel. As she was really close to him now and with the angel attempting to slice her in half with one wide, clean swing, she got an idea. Just as the blade of the Graceful Dahlia was about to hit her, she hooked the Crescent Rose into it! Now hanging on the weapon of her enemy, she held on until the blade stopped to a halt.Using the force and speed of the swing, Ruby catapulted herself towards Marluxia, who simply raised his hand, ready to blow her away from him once again. But Ruby was ready this time.Just as Marluxia unleashed another Gale of Severance, Ruby shot at the floor, evading the hurricane and flying over Marluxia. Just as she landed, she dashed towards her opponent, who wasn't able to move fast enough to turn around in time, Crescent Rose readied. She swung...And hit right against the giant blade of the Graceful Dahlia. The angel had teleported next to Marluxia, shielding him from her attack with its scythe. Marluxia smiled, and reached out to Ruby, firing multiple razor sharp petals right at her face. Shielding her eyes as good as she could, Ruby wasn't able to notice a small whirlwind appearing right next to her. As she tried to desperately swing again, the whirlwind hit her, the impact packing such a surprising blow that she dropped the Crescent Rose and was sent skidding across the floor.Getting up as fast as she could, she quickly darted towards her weapon, only to be met with a vicious swing of the suddenly in front of her appearing angel. Luckily for her, the last remains of her Aura took away most of the damage this attack would've inflicted. But it was still strong enough to cut parts of her chest open, with blood splattering on the floor. Getting up shakily, Ruby could only watch as Marluxia fired black and white vines towards her."This is it!" Marluxia shouted while the vines quickly surrounded her feet, and a timer appeared above her, starting at six.Ruby desperately tried to move away, but she was rooted to the ground. With her feet being stuck and the Crescent Rose laying way out of her reach, it seemed like there was nothing she could do to prevent this timer from hitting zero.Suddenly, a wall was blown to pieces. With a confused look, both Ruby and Marluxia looked over to see what was the cause of this. A blonde girl quickly jumped through the gaping hole. "Ruby!" Yang shouted."Don't worry, your big sister is here, everything will be fine!"Yang dashed towards Ruby, but was suddenly met with a massive shockwave flying towards her. She managed to roll to the side at the last second, and saw how Marluxia pointed angrily at her."You won't interrupt this!"--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Young: GODDAMMIT! *Silver:Man, why did it have to end like this?Grif: Great, one of them just goes away and the other one's crying like a bitch.Silver: I'm not crying.Vega: I think it's better if we give them a moment. We're responsible for yet another RWBY character falling into bottom tier, after all.Grif: Hey, they should've at least expected it to end like this. The fight wasn't really close at all, the result was visible from miles away.Vega: What had Ruby going for her you ask? Well... pretty much nothing. You could argue that her sniper rounds were deadlier than some of the projectiles Marluxia brought to the table, and she might even be the more strategic minded, but aside from that Marluxia owned her in every other category.Grif: I don't even know where to begin. He's got an enormous moveset, with some moves being able to easily kill Ruby in one hit, his ability to teleport let's him dodge pretty much any kind of attack, he fought the likes of Axel and Sora on equal ground, with the latter trading blows with people like Hercules, Cloud or Sephiroth, he has way more experience... and then there's his second form. And his third.Vega: Hell, Ruby could consider herself lucky if she managed to defeat at least a replica of him! Let me remind you that one of those fought against Sora, Donald, Goofy and a replica of Riku (a guy who's supposed to be as strong as Sora) simultaneously for quite some time.Silver:In the end, there wasn't much hope left for the poor little Red Riding Hood, if there was any at all.Grif:Hey Young! Are you making the obligatory pun, or-...Young: Hell! No!Grif: That was clear.Silver:Today, a beautiful rose has withered.Vega: The winner is Marluxia.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Multiple people were sitting at a long white table. They didn't speak much. Some of them stared at the table, others were staring at the walls. The atmosphere had something of a waiting room, with everyone wanting something to happen but not necessarily feeling the need to talk to each other.Then, a dark portal appeared, with Marluxia stepping out of it."What took you so long? Where's the girl?" A pale-skinned girl with black hair and light armor asked."There were... complications." Marluxia answered, throwing Crescent Rose on the table. A middle-aged man wearing a kilt and a crown began to inspect the weapon."So she's dead? Why didn't you bring her body with you? She would've been a nice little addition to my dead people collection." he said with a wicked smile.Completely ignoring him, a woman with short blonde hair and a coat similar to that of Marluxia's, threw a knife at a wall. Multiple pictures were hanging on it, pictures of persons, creatures, machines and locations. The knife hit a picture of Ruby in the head."Are the White Fang and Insurrection ready at least?"A woman in a red dress and glass slippers began to speak: "Roman contacted me and according to him, Hargrove sent some of his men to our hideout. Right now, it seems like it's all going as planned.""Alright, then how about you-" the woman pointed her finger at the pale-skinned girl "-get moving and visit... what's he called again?"Marluxia took a picture from the wall, showing a blue skinned scientist with a scar underneath his eye."His name is Drew Lipsky, or Dr. Drakken as he calls himself. Despite his appearance and many failures in the past, he's still quite the evil genius. And now, he apparently build something that could help us all too well. But since he doesn't cooperate with us-...""More like WE don't want to work together with an idiot like Lipsky..." the blonde woman interrupted."...we figured that we might as well take it from him forcefully. And we think you'd be quite suited for this job. So, what do you say?" Marluxia continued, giving the picture to the girl.She briefly looked at it, smiled and burned it with a blue flame generated from her palm. "Oh, it'll be my pleasure."