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Staring at the man in front of you, you feel a certain… disconnect with your surroundings, like your brain has reached its limit and has simply ceased trying to understand. No part of you can conflate the man you see before you with the friend you remember leaving behind after your fall. He’s… older. Worn. Broken and rusted, like he’s weathered many a storm in your wake. His eyes, though. His eyes are the same, weary and tired, but unequivocally him and a small tendril of relief unravels tentatively at the core of your being. Despite the clear signs of the passage of time, Jaune stands tall, proud almost, like he has found a purpose down here. He doesn’t look much like the friend you knew from months past, grieving for his partner when he thought no-one was looking. He looks better.
As your shock subsides, and your team begins to ask their questions, you feel a small smile blooming on your face. Sure, Jaune may be down here, but he’s alive at least. You can work with alive. Green and orange flash through your mind briefly, dropping your smile to a small grimace, but you push it aside. Your aura itches as you realise your team and Jaune are staring at you, waiting for you to say something, and you panic, reaching for the first question that comes to mind.
“What happened to your sword?”
A simple question, you thought. Maybe he broke it fighting that beast from the market place, or maybe it was damaged by the fall. Then Weiss’ shoulders rise to her ears, and guilt and fear make home in Jaune’s familiar blue eyes. He swallows hard, and a brief glance to your team reveals that your sister and Blake are both as confused as you about this reaction. You reach out to comfort Weiss as Jaune speaks. Not to you, as you’d expect, but to your partner.
“You didn’t tell them?”
“I told them what happened! Penny sacrificed herself to stop Cinder from getting the Maiden powers!”
You barely have time to flinch at the mention of your dear friend, before Jaune lets out a worn sigh.
“We both know that’s not the complete truth. Lying achieves nothing, Weiss.”
Something about his tone turns your stomach to stone as you look between the two and wet your lips.
“What didn’t you tell us, Weiss?”
You retract your hand from Weiss as she curls into herself and turns away. Through the thundering in your ears, Jaune’s voice is small and meek, yet somehow also loud and painful, his every word a bullet to your soul.
“Penny asked me to kill her. So I did.”
Your sisters gasp is drowned out by the torrential storm in your mind as you choke on the air around you. Grasping at your neck, your vision swims. A spectacle of reds run wild on his armour, deep, crimson stains, dried and cracked, dripping in the shadows cast from the lanterns around you. Lanterns that start to sway in the sudden biting winds, surrounding you, your team, and the man you thought you recognised. As you taste the bile in the back of your throat, he moves towards you, hand gripping his sword tightly, forcing you back, away from him. The thunder in your mind has leaked out to the world around you, crashing down and striking where it pleases. You all are safe under the canopy for now, but the winds and the sky’s rage call out in pain towards you, feeding of the fury in your very soul. When he reaches towards you, you have no choice but to run, ignoring the pleas of your team but hearing the crystal clear creaking of his rusted, bloodstained, armoured hands, as he tries to grab the falling petals of your semblance.
Blindly, you race back towards the market, the centre of an incoming storm. Idly, you think of the creature and the cat and the danger, before speeding ahead. You’d rather deal with a known devil than whatever creature you can hear chasing you with your team. You run and you run, lungs burning until your legs give up underneath you and you’re back at the bridge to the red land. Bile surges up your throat, scalding, as you vomit into the nearby grass, sobbing as it is washed away in the rain. You curse the Gods for what feels like the millionth time, ignoring the mouse on your shoulder trying to comfort you. Sometime later, after the rains have slowed along with your tears, you stumble up, placing little on a rock nearby with your cloak. They will be fine there, your team will find them and your cloak is nothing but a dead weight on your shoulders now anyway. Numb, sodden and cold, you wander deeper into the forest, wondering if it would be better for you to simply disappear into the growth, or take a new weapon from that blacksmith lady, or even pick a new form like Herb was offering you.
Your thoughts of a new life are not loud enough to drown out the anguished, hatred-filled screams of your soul.
Jaune killed Penny.
Your best friend killed Penny.
He killed Penny.
…
You killed Penny.