#maybe the Watchers are forces animating the fungus

[hellhoundmaggie]

I don't believe in Fungi Theory, but I think it'll go down something like this:

Except Wayne doesn't turn into a handsome, alive man. He just rapidly decomposes as the animating force leaves Sam's body. A tragic resolution, bittersweet at best.

I can only see the Wayne romance going one way, but I'm genuinely curious about what others think so:

[ruffsficstuffplace]

The Keeper of the Grove (Part 19)

Weiss blinked. “You're going to what?”

“Kill you!” Ruby repeated. “If there's anything that's going to stop your dad from attacking the Valley anymore, it's going to be that.”

Weiss nodded, before she gripped Eluna to her chest, stared blankly off into the distance, and reminisced about the series of bad decisions that had led to this point.

The most immediate that came to mind was her spontaneously telling her father that she wanted to join his newest venture: an expedition into the Viridian Valley. Like her maternal grandfather and his father-in-law, Nicholas Schnee, he wanted to find a new wellspring of mana to tap, ones similar to if not even greater than the gigantic concentrations of energy that rested under the Nexus, Valentino, Lumania, Zeal, or Solaris—possibly even the unprecedented titan that powered Candela.

“Uh, Weiss?” Ruby asked, before she waved her hand before her unseeing eyes.

She didn't know what it was that set her off about his droning on about all the failed expeditions, the rumours of the Keeper being responsible for it and thousands of other incidents, the new incredible advances in technology that made possible to thrive in a barren hellhole like the one surrounding both Candela and the Valley itself, but the moment she blurted out that she wanted to be a part of the scouting team, personally overseeing the operations like her grandfather before her, she never once thought of taking it back.

Now, she really wished that her father had vetoed that plan as he usually did.

With no response, Ruby turned to Penny. <What's wrong with her?> she asked in Actaeon.

<I believe she's experiencing what humans call 'thinking about where they went wrong.'> Penny replied.

<Why? What happened?> Ruby asked.

Perhaps it was how she reacted to Winter's leaving for the Avalonian Armed Forces six years ago. She should have sympathized more with her decision, understood she would have done the same thing if she could, not held it up as a massive betrayal, put a wedge between them until just before she was selected for Queensguard training, and become so surly, cold, and hostile to everyone, “projecting” her anger and hurt as du Pont had said.

She was eleven, yes, and it was a confusing time for her with puberty and all these new, confusing feelings and new responsibilities thrust upon her by society just because her age was now in the double digits, and the fact that her mother was long dead, that she had few close friends, and that her father was a hands-off parent (at best) certainly didn't help, but she probably should have done like Winter had, when she was twelve, had been old enough to fully understand their mother's death:

Grow the fuck up.

<It's probably when you said you were going to murder her,> Penny replied.

Ruby's eyes widened, her ears pulled back in alarm. <What?! I said I was going to 'fake her death' not 'put her to death!' Isn't that what I said in Nivian?>

Penny shook her head.

<But it's the same word…!> Ruby whined.

<It is, but humans add additional words to clarify that it's going to be a faked killing, not a real one.>

Or maybe it stretched even further back, to the one point in life she could clearly, confidently point to as the moment her already less than ideal life went to a constant, ever accelerating downhill slide leading to this moment: the day they got the call from the emergency response teams in Sekhmet, that their mother and her unborn child had succumbed to the plague ravaging the desert, that they couldn't even receive their bodies as they were needed to figure out how the hell they were going to stop the new disease from ravaging the rest of Avalon, and their ashes would likely be mixed with the masses of other dead.

Maybe, just maybe, she shouldn't have agreed with her father, and especially Winter's question, the tie-breaker to her decision to start giving away her beloved collection of plushies, the one thing that reminded them of their mother after her father had every portrait and image of her put into storage or hidden away where he'd never have to be reminded of who they'd lost, what died with them.

On the bright side of things, she'd be meeting her again soon, if the Aether really was real. Winter would probably join them soon enough, though she wasn't looking forward to meeting their father again, even if the Stewards always emphasized that they would be a completely different type of being upon reaching it, “stripped away of all that which divided us, our boundless desires and prejudices, the mortal things we clung to so desperately in life.”

Ruby sighed. <This is why I hate Nivian...> she muttered before she turned to Weiss, still zoned out. “Weiss? Weiiisss…?” she snapped her fingers in front of her face.

Blake turned to Ruby. <May I?>

Ruby sighed. <Go ahead...>

Blake stepped up, and slapped Weiss across the cheek.

Smack!

Weiss reeled from the strike, a new bright red print glowing on her skin. “Ow! Just kill me and get it over with, why don't you?!”

Blake sighed. <Believe me, princess, I would if I could.>

Weiss glared at her. “I don't know what you just said, but I know I didn't like it.”

Blake narrowed her eyes. <Feeling's mutual.>

“Okay!” Ruby cried as she stepped between them. “Blake: calm down! Weiss: what I said earlier didn't come out right!”

“Oh, so you're going to torture me instead, is that it?” Weiss spat.

Ruby frowned. “It's--”

“Ruby actually meant to say that we were going to fake your death,” Penny interrupted. “I believe the confusion came from the fact that Actaeon has very specific variations on the word 'kill'—that of killing an opponent; killing prey; killing predator; killing the enemy's morale or desire to fight; or in this particular case, faking a killing, for purposes of demoralization or manipulation.”

Weiss blinked, letting the realization sink in for a moment. “Can we all agree that, from now on, anything anyone tries to say to me in Nivian goes through Penny first?”

Blake and Ruby nodded.

Penny beamed. “I will try my best to make sure that no more misunderstandings will occur!”

“Good,” Weiss said as she headed out to the exit. “Now let's go make my ransom video! And let's be clear that I'm writing the script—the last thing I want my father to think is that this is all a terrible prank!”

Almost as long as people had been speculating and theorizing about what could be found in the Viridian Valley, they had been dreaming and fantasizing about what they would make of it, the grand cities they would build, the new lives they would lead in a place like nothing that had ever been seen in all of Avalon.

There was no shortage of artistic interpretations and depictions in all manner of fiction throughout the years: grand castles and cities built out of the blackened rock surrounding the area; elaborate wooden mansions dotting the trees and the vibrant vegetation, dirt roads thriving with flowers and herbs, animals left to roam and roost wherever they pleased; sometimes even a modern city like Candela or Lumania, glass skyscrapers, neosteel infrastructure, paved roads and carefully controlled and cultivated patches of nature amidst all the artificial construction, the ultimate symbolism of mankind's domination and control over the surroundings their ancestors were slaves to for so long.

They were all wrong, if only because no human had ever attempted anything like what the Fae had done.

The Bastion was the trees, the mountains, and the vegetation—their homes, infrastructure, and even their transportation built in their hollowed out cores, resting on top of them as foundations, or grown in such specific, intentional patterns and directions, it couldn't have gotten that way by itself. Weiss felt her attention dragged every which way as they walked through the streets of the city—or rather, its many hanging bridges, the giant walkways carved out of even bigger branches, the tunnels and pathways going into and around the rocks and mountains.

She saw Fae in specially made robes and protective gear tending over saplings, fungus, and even living creatures, magic flowing from their hands as they tended to their wards, guiding and accelerating their growth into their desired shapes, grafting and inducing features and details they wouldn't have in the wild.

Water poured out from the faces of rocks and mountains, being piped in by pulsing vines to their crop planters and their homes, spraying out from fountains and intricately carved statues and memorials, adding beauty to the surroundings and a place for citizens of all ages to play and enjoy themselves.

Fae of every shape and size going about their days, tending to all manner of weird and strange animals, giving packages to birds and sending them off, leading their lumbering pack-beasts through the walkways, training ferocious looking predators to attack certain target dummies and not others; going about the various stores and workshops trading, working, or just chatting with one another; strolling about enjoying the scenery, if they weren't immersed in their own version of tablets and comm-crystals, looking not unlike the citizens of Candela when they blogged, caught up on each other on social media, and enjoyed funny holos of cats.

And all the while, Weiss couldn't help but notice the sheer number of eyes looking back at her, the heads doing double takes, the people stopping to take pictures of her before sending it to others.

She didn't understand a word of what they were saying, but regardless of language barriers, you could always tell when everyone was talking about you.

The various “Watchers” posted almost everywhere were particularly wary of her, their eyes trained on her, their weapons at the ready, and their animals heeled, if only for the moment. Some of them were only pulling back just hard enough on their attack wolves' leashes to keep them from getting away, not slashing their paws at the air, barking and slavering at Weiss with their powerful jaws full of massive fangs, their fur bristling and crackling with what looked like electricity.

Ruby, Blake, and Penny surrounded her in a triangle, casting glares and barking warnings at others to stay back.

“I'm not very popular here, am I?” Weiss muttered under her breath.

“Your father's expeditions into the Valley have caused very serious disruption to the peace we usually enjoy here, causing a significant amount of panic, unease, and diversion of time, resources, and labour that would have otherwise gone to different projects,” Penny explained. “And this is not even going into all the casualties.”

Weiss blinked, feeling the pit of her stomach drop. “… Ah. Right.”

Weiss feet were aching by the time they finally made it to the tallest, biggest tree in the very center of the Bastion; she realized she really should have thought of packing at least a pair of bedroom slippers, because apparently the Fae were not fans of footwear of any sort, just straps around part of their feet, or bands of leather, metal, and bone strapped to their toes or heels, obviously meant for combat.

The inside of the “Tree of Life” was not unlike a tower, its circular floors built with giant open ring in the center to let you stare up, marvel at how massive the structure was, see the thick canopy at the very top, the sunlight peeking through the leaves.

“How tall is this tree…?” Weiss asked, dumbstruck.

“Pretty fucking tall,” an unknown, ominous voice said.

Weiss turned, and found herself staring into the face of her nightmares, the terror that haunted the dreams of Avalonians for centuries, like the bastard child of of a rat, a deer, and a wolf, with glowing red eyes that pierced into your soul.

The physical manifestation of fear itself waved. <Hey Ruby.>

<Uncle Qrow!> Ruby cheered, before she pounced and hugged him.