Ruby Rose, leader of Team RWBY and a Huntress of Remnant, had just returned to Remnant after she, the rest of her team, and Jaune returned from Ever After. However, instead of ending up in Vacuo like Jaune did, Team RWBY landed on the island of Patch. Ruby herself was on the ground on her knees looking up at the sky, tears threatening to fall from her eyes.
"We're too late..." Ruby uttered, barely louder than a whisper.
Her teammates, Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna, and Yang Xiao Long were right behind her looking up at the sky as well.
The sky had nothing notable about it at the present time. Dark clouds and nothing more, but what made this sight so notable to them in particular, is that after all they've done to this point since the fall of Beacon.
Saving Haven Academy, defeating Adam for good, fighting a Nucelavee and a Leviathan, broadcasting Ruby's message, fighting off the psycho James Ironwood had become and saving the citizens of Mantle, even getting out of the Ever After with Jaune...
This would be the last view of Remnant's sky they'd ever see.
Words echoed inside Ruby's mind, words from a pair of higher beings, a declaration of Remnant's end.
"Upon the next hour, all of humanity in this universe… will cease to be." The gods of Light and Darkness declared to all of Remnant.
Ruby stopped thinking about those words as her head snapped back slightly as she screamed to the sky in anguish and sorrow. "WE'RE TOO LATE!" Ruby collapsed onto the ground as she cried her heart out.
Yang and Blake's own hearts ached at the sight of the usually optimistic Ruby Rose crying on the ground, but they couldn't bring themselves to say anything.
Weiss however, gulped down whatever woes she was feeling and walked up to Ruby. "Ruby..." Weiss softly said.
"Don't bother trying to say something, Weiss!" Ruby flat out ordered her partner, halting Weiss's advance. "I was supposed to stop her! My power was meant to stop Salem, and we- I couldn't!" Ruby told Weiss after facing her, ing the tears on her face and how red her eyes were from crying.
"Ruby, it's not your fault! We had no clue that Salem would be able to find all the relics while we were in the Ever After!" Weiss tried to tell her leader, in an attempt to get her to cheer up, even if it wouldn't amount to anything.
"Weiss's right. It's not your fault at all." Blake told Ruby. "If anything, it's Cinder's fault for getting us sent there in the first place."
"Ruby, I'm not going to say that everyone will be fine, but-" Yang was going to throw in her two cents, until…
"Everything will NEVER be fine, Yang! NOT WHEN EVERYTHING WILL BE GONE FOREVER!" Ruby told her sister with venom in her voice. "Salem obviously got the relics together, the gods made their verdict, THE WORLD IS GLUED TO A TICKING TIME BOMB, AND THERE'S NOTHING WE CAN DO ABOUT IT!" Ruby finally yelled at her teammates, making them take a step back at the rage Ruby was exuding. "And do you guys honestly think that telling me all this is going to make me feel better?! I'd feel better if the whole damn world wouldn't vanish from existence upon you saying those words!" Ruby told them, getting Yang agitated.
"I know it's not going to make the world better, but if crying about it won't solve anything, then what's the point in doing it?!" Yang told her.
"Yang's right. I'm broken up about the fact that Remnant is doomed, but I'm happy about the fact that you guys are still here." Blake said, looking at what little positive side there was to their situation.
"Ruby, I know you're frustrated right now, beyond frustrated even, but…" Weiss teared up as she spoke up. "Can we just be glad that we're still here." Weiss begged Ruby.
Ruby's expression lightened as she saw the begging faces of her teammates as she realized all she'd done up till now was be negative to them. She sighed before speaking. "If the world is doomed anyways, could we…" She rubbed her eyes clean of tears. "Can we go somewhere? We're on Patch after all." Ruby asked them.
"Wherever you want." Weiss said without hesitance as she walked up to her leader.
As Ruby and Weiss walked off, Yang wore a raised eyebrow on her face.
This surprised Yang as she knew where Ruby wanted to go, and she was going to agree with her younger sister's request, but Weiss agreed not even knowing that as far as she knew. Yang brushed that aside however as Blake held her hand.
"Blake?" Yang looked to her partner.
"Let's go, shall we?" Blake urged her partner, Yang smiled as did Blake.
"Yeah. …Sure." Yang agreed as they went to catch up with Ruby and Weiss.
(A few minutes before the hour's end…)
Ruby and Weiss were standing over a gravestone that was on the side of a cliff, one with the words 'Summer Rose. Thus kindly I scatter' embedded onto it as the broken moon's light shone down onto it, and illuminating the area around them.
"Is this…" Weiss softly asked Ruby.
"Yep. It's where my mother was put to rest… at first." Ruby said with a sad expression on her face as she walked up to the gravestone. "Hey Mom. Sorry I've been gone for so long. I was trying to do what you always taught me to do. To help people…" Ruby sorrowfully said. "Even if I didn't do a good job in the end." Ruby said with an empty smile on her face.
"And I'm here to definitively say that that's not true." Weiss said strongly as she walked up beside Ruby. "Ruby, with me, Yang, and a good friend and teammate of ours as witnesses and people that believe in her, has done many things you'd be proud of." Weiss then took Ruby's hand into her own, making the cape-wearing huntress blush slightly. "She traveled to Haven Academy from Vale alongside the greatest friends I could've asked for on foot, she saved said academy from imminent destruction, she helped save countless people from both Mantle and Atlas, and…" Weiss blushed as she spoke the next part. "She saved me, by giving me the courage and tenacity to break away from the burden placed onto me by my family." Weiss said with a genuine smile.
"Weiss…" Ruby softly said.
"And because she did that, I realized I…" Weiss's closed eye snapped open as she embraced Ruby and gave the girl herself the most passionate hug she could muster. She then looked at Ruby in the eyes. "I love you Ruby. I genuinely love you. And nothing, not even the end of the world, will change that." Weiss declared to Ruby.
Ruby blushed and had a single tear of happiness fall down her face. "Weiss, I…" Ruby didn't know what to say, but decided to go the direct way of responding. "I love you too, Weiss." Ruby admitted before returning the favor and kissing Weiss on the lips, which Weiss happily returned as she caressed the side of Ruby's face and repositioned her other arm around her waist with the cape wearing huntress doing the same.
"Heh. Finally got your first kiss, sis?" Yang asked from a distance.
The two girls broke the kiss and looked to see Yang and Blake walking towards them while holding each other's hands for a bit.
"…Too sudden?" Ruby nervously asked.
"Actually, we expected it to happen eventually." Blake smiled, as team RWBY got together to look up at the moon. "Glad to know we aren't the only couple on the team." Blake smiled as she hugged Yang close to her.
"Yeah. I nearly forgot that with all the chaos with Salem." Weiss asked as she and Ruby smiled.
"Yeah…" Yang said before chuckling.
"Did you two share one last kiss on your way here?" Weiss asked.
Blake and Yang looked at each other and shrugged before passionately kissing each other on the lips for a solid thirty seconds before breaking it. "Was that enough for ya?" Yang asked.
"More than enough in the time we have left. That's for sure." Weiss smiled.
Ruby smiled. "I guess it's only fitting we go down the closest we can be to one another."
"Mhm. Guess you could say we're... going out with a Yang!" Yang smirked as this caused a sigh from her teammates before… they burst out laughing at the joke.
"It really IS the end of the world, huh?" Weiss said as tears fell from her eyes, not from laughing too much, but from rather her dormant sadness bubbling up to the surface.
"What makes you say that?" Yang asked, a single tear sliding down her face.
"This was the first time you've made someone, let alone all three of us, laugh with that dumb pun." Blake told the love of her life before looking down.
"Same as ever, huh sis?…" Ruby chuckled as tears of her own began to leak out again.
"What can I say except that I always try?" Yang smirked.
Blake looked over the horizon as best she could and saw the whole sky begin to turn into a global thunderstorm, with hurricanes and tornadoes starting to form as well. In the distance, they could faintly hear people screaming in fear. "I guess the end of the hour struck. …It's over now…" Blake said, broken up over the fact that the end was now upon them.
"A-Already?! Quick! We have to get to-" A large bolt of lightning struck where Tai's house was as the wind picked up. "DAAAAAD!" Seeing that the lightning strike caused a massive fire, Ruby fell to the ground, tears falling from her eyes, and she nearly started to cry. "No…" Her teammates joined her instead of helping her up as they soon hugged each other tightly before kneeling on the ground too. "I… didn't get to say goodbye."
"It's alright, Ruby. I didn't get to say goodbye to my family either." Weiss said with an empty smile on her face and her eyes closed.
"Yeah. Dad might be gone, but at least we're still together." Yang said with a broken voice.
"And we don't have to be apart from each other now that the end is here." Blake said as they all looked at each other one last time.
"…You're right. Now that it's actually here, I'm glad that…" Ruby and her teammates tightened their group hug and closed their eyes one final time, as the world was now completely blacked out aside from the patch of dirt they were on. "I'm glad that… my end was right here with you guys." Ruby finished as the Brothers themselves prepared to give Remnant the most devastating death they could.
Suddenly, the entire planet shook. Cracks began to form across the entire surface. Buildings, towns, cities, and even natural ecosystems collapsed on a global scale, even Evernight Castle. Massive waves flooded every coastline. Every volcano erupted. And because of all the fear, anyone on the planet was easy pickings for the Grimm. All that Team RWBY could do was hug each other tighter as the very island they kneeled on started to sink into the ocean.
From Remnant's moon, the Brothers watched as all life on the planet started to die off. They then looked at each other and nodded before turning back to the planet. "Fall."
And with that one word, Remnant was gone, blown apart into trillions of space rocks, never to see the light of life again. Anything left of humanity was nothing more than space dust. And with their task done, the Brothers moved on.
Ruby wasn't happy that the world ended, but… she was glad that her friends were there for her. Even after everything she cried before them. She couldn't feel happier to have- …Wait. How is she even-
'Why am I… Still feeling something?' Ruby wondered.