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"The loneliest moment in someone's life is when they are watching their whole world fall apart, and all they can do is stare blankly"

~ F. Scott Fitzgerald

It wasn't supposed to end this way.

They were supposed to grow old together, even with as dangerous a profession as they had. Veteran huntresses like them, several years out of the Academy, could handle anything that came their way, take on any contenders and laugh in the face of danger. She was supposed to be her future, their future together, their happy ever after.

And yet, here she was.

The rogue hunters were scum, they should have gone down easily. There was no possible way any of them could have gotten the drop on either huntress, especially the nimble Faunus woman. Or at the very least, Ruby should have been able to get there in time. She had a speed semblance, for Oum's sake, a terror on the battlefield as she flew across it, trailing rose petals and blood as she carved a path through Grimm, with Blake at her side.

Her Blake, always at her side…

But she wasn't fast enough. She saw it almost in slow motion, her beautiful raven-haired Faunus, leaping backwards through the driving rain, leaving a shadow clone behind to take the hit from the assailant in front of her. A gleeful smirk was on her face, so joyous in battle, so alive…

Perhaps it was the rain that obscured the man behind her, or perhaps she was expecting Ruby to be there, backing her up. Like she should have been, instead of around the side of the hill to chase down another of their targets.

But no, she wasn't there, just far enough away to see the whole awful thing unfurl.

To watch the sword as it entered through Blake's chest. The expression on her face changing from surprise to disbelief to pain. The spray of blood from her chest, from her mouth.

So much blood…

Ruby had screamed in rage as she sped in, her scythe held out wide to cruelly bisect both of her lover's attackers. She didn't care anymore for mercy, for restraint. The diminutive huntress had to get to her, get to her Blake…

But she was too late.

Ruby dropped her beloved weapon Crescent Rose to the side, ignoring the splash as it fell into the mud. She sank to her knees, gathering her Blake up into her arms. Desperately trying to staunch the flow of blood from both ends, but there was just so much of it… so much blood… It was leaking from her mouth, those perfectly lush lips just made for kissing, the lips she had just kissed not twenty minutes ago…

"Blake…" she sobbed despondently. "Blakey, come on, look at me Blakey…"

The amber irises that she could, and had, spent hours at a time just gazing into, fluttered open. They were already losing their lustre, filled with pain instead of love. Ruby could tell just how bad the wound was from the pink bubbles that formed from the Faunus' nose when she laboriously tried to exhale.

What do you say when faced with the loss of the most important person in your life, the one who gave your very life meaning? Do you profess your eternal love, ask for forgiveness, tell her everything will be alright? Do you lie to her in such a fashion?

Bending over the raven-haired woman to shield her from the rain, Ruby could only do that which would bring her shame from the memories of this day in times to come.

"Please," she begged, her tears running freely down her face. "Please, Blakey, don't leave me… please, please, please don't leave me… I can't…. I can't do this without you, please don't leave me like this, Blakey…"

For a brief moment it looked as if she might have tried to say something, but then Blake's body seemed to fold into itself as her last tortured breath escaped from her lips.

"Blake?" she whimpered. "No, no no no no… Blake!" The redhead shook the corpse in her arms, denying that her light could have left her world in such a fashion. "Blake!" The tears wouldn't stop coming, her frame wracked with heaving sobs. "BLAKE!" she screamed.

She sat back, pulling Blake's body into her lap and staring down at it uncomprehendingly.

This can't be happening…

This can't…

This…

Her Blake was dead.

Ruby threw her head back and screamed wordlessly, the keening wail of a broken heart, of a woman who just lost her reason for living.

She screamed at the world, at the universe, for the unfairness of it all. For taking away a spirit as lively as her lover's, someone who had overcome so very much, so much pain and despair. Someone who always told Ruby that she was her light, her sunshine, when Ruby knew all along it was her, it was always her. Blake was the light, as much as she professed to be the shadow. She was the light of her life, and now it was gone, dimmed to blackness with one fateful thrust of a sword.

Her voice was hoarse but still she screamed. So much pain couldn't be contained within her. Her very being was coming undone, shattering into a million pieces that she couldn't hold together anymore, she didn't want to.

What was the use?

What was the point anymore, if she didn't have Blake by her side?

At some point, her throat raw, she had stopped railing against the forces that conspired to take such a wonderful, vibrant woman out of her life. Gradually she lowered Blake's corpse down into the muddy ground and curled up against it like she would do on so many nights, snuggled up into her side and wrapping her red cloak around the two of them.

"Blake," she croaked weakly."I'm… I'm sorry, Blakey, I'm so, so sorry…"

She failed her when she needed her the most.

Huddled miserably against the cooling body, wet and muddy and shivering in the cold, she simply couldn't bring herself to care about anything any more.

There was nothing left for her.

"I'm sorry…"

Nothing but the unending pain and guilt.

"I love you so much, Blakey…"

It wasn't supposed to end this way.

A/N: Yeah, so. That was pretty dark. Firstly, I apologise for posting such a downer story during the tense last few episodes of Season Three. Secondly, I don't usually get very personal with my writing, I try to use it as an escape, but next Saturday, February 6th, is the four year anniversary of my wife's death from cancer. I still remember the feelings from that day and I expect the memory of them shall never leave me. So, this is kinda me just getting things off of my chest, as it were.

This can be considered as a prequel to Retired.

Anyway. On to more cheerful things, now I can go work on Pearls on a String again and not feel the need to murder the characters there that I'm fond of.

Oh, and hey. If you have a loved one? Give 'em a tight hug and appreciate the time you have with them, okay?