Hunting For Answers

Two and a half weeks had passed since Sheev Palpatine, the Senator from Naboo, was exposed as a Dark Lord of the Sith and 'died' at the hands of the Masters of the Jedi Council. During that time, the Republic, with the support of the Jedi Council, had liberated Naboo and heavily sanctioned the Trade Federation.

During this time, Death followed Darth Sidious's trail to the former Sith planet of Exegol, which they were just making the final approach towards. The Jedi had not been thrilled about being left out, but the Supreme Chancellor acquiesced to Death's request for jurisdiction in this matter, despite Jedi protests.

Obi-Wan, at Death's suggestion, was permitted by Qui-Gon to be elevated to a Master Jedi, so Death only invited Qui-Gon to participate in the attack on Palpatine to verify Death's claims. Death had inserted a virus made by Penny into republic computers and was letting it spread in preparation for a mass release of evidence that would shred the flawless reputation of the Jedi Order and that would introduce his involvement, representing the 'Gray Jedi Order' in cleaning up the mess made by the Jedi.

The evidence was not going to make the Jedi look evil, as that would be a lie and he had no interest in telling lies when the truth worked much better. No, they would look like they were blinded by their idealism to the point where they made stupid mistakes. They would not even be able to deny it because the evidence that they had gathered in the last year was just too good.

"We are about to enter the orbit of Exegol." a Republic soldier announced.

"Yes, this is definitely the place." Death announced as he looked through the shielded window towards the planet before them. As he watched this scene, he felt the strong but relatively small arms of Pyrrha wrap around him from behind, and felt her breasts suddenly pressing into his back.

"Once we finish here, you need to show me a good time" Pyrrha whispered in his ear seductively.

Death chuckled and slowing turned around in her arms to face her "I definitely wont let you down, dear. I hope you don't need to walk for a couple days after I finish with you" he teased.

"You are good, dear, but not that good" Pyrrha chuckled in amusement.

"Is that a challenge?" Death chuckled "How about if I temporarily seal your aura?" Aura was, of course, a huge cheat, and he knew it was the only reason she was confident that she would not need so much time to recover.

"That wont be necessary, dear" Pyrrha giggled "I concede defeat."

Death nodded and had a smug expression on his face as he gave Pyrrha's butt a playful swat "Well, we have a homicidal maniac to deal with. We can have fun afterwards."

Pyrrha nodded, turning her expression to a serious one "Yes." she released him and turned her attention towards Salem, who was also with them on the bridge, albeit she was meditating at the moment.

While this world was beyond the reach of the brother gods, and she was free from the effects of the curse here, that did not mean that the curse was completely gone. Even in this new body, it remained tethered to her in a very distant manner.

Salem had said that she felt like she was getting closer and closer to the answer to breaking the curse once and for all, and had started meditating more and more in recent days, and it was not easy to rouse her out of meditation

Death and Pyrrha nodded to each other in understanding, then Death looked at the Republic soldiers on the Bridge withh them "Jedi Master Qui Gon Jinn, Pyrrha and I will head down planetside. Remain in orbit. We will return once Darth Sidious is dealt with" Death ordered before leaving the bridge to get Qui Gon and use space magic to reach Darth Sidious.

Death, who anticipated what Sidious would do, had devised a method to track him wherever he went, by turning his resurrection method against him. He was basically a huge glowing beacon that drew Death straight towards him.

------

As the inevitable conflict between Death and Palpatine approached, Salem shed tears while meditating. Whatever she was witnessing, it was making her feel sad and a bit afraid, but at least she finally had her answer.

She triggered a dimensional shift while opening her eyes and had to quickly stand up because she found many people walking around her.

While she was walking in the group, Salem spread her magic to the surrounding people just before there was an explosion, and she and ten others were blasted off the strange platform. Had it not been for her magic, they all likely would have died, and if they had not, they still would have fallen into the empty abyss below, but instead the magic shielded them from harm and kept them from falling.

Furthermore, she teleported with the people she had saved to another platform in this weird place.

Salem then rushed back to confront the bad person that attacked these civilians.

"Your little friend Oscar was right. But the easy part ends here." the madwoman chuckled "How did she know about that?"

Salem saw who the woman was talking too, and saw younger versions of four of her mothers (Team RWBY).

Ruby was the first to attack, followed by the rest of her teammates, and the woman that they were fighting, who she now recognized as a double for her Auntie Cinder, deflected the four with a burst of flame and rose into the air "I knew your plan would be bold, but I never would have imagined all of this. At least not without a little help from Jinn. I suppose I have all of you to thank for one last lesson. Sometimes, if you want to win, you simply can't do it alone."

"RUBY!" Yang had spotted Neo about to attack Ruby and rushed to save her, getting hit instead and getting knocked off the platform.

Salem, of course, had seen enough. Using her magic, she teleported Yang back up to the platform near her feet.

"You are bad. You might look like Mama Neo and Auntie Cinder, but you are not them." Salem said, growing angry.

"Doesn't she look like Salem?" Weiss suddenly noticed.

"So, this world still possesses my dark half." Young Salem scowled in annoyance.

Cinder was staring at Salem, completely shocked, as the little girl raised a finger and pointed towards her "Die for me"

Behind Cinder, a lightsaber, controlled by force telekinesis from Salem, lit up, and in one swift motion decapitated the evil Cinder Fall.

The evil version of Neo tried to flee, but was knocked out by a fist made using force telekinesis. Salem could kill the evil version of Auntie Cinder, but she didn't have the willpower to kill an evil version of one of her mothers.

Salem then felt maiden powers try to enter her from Cinder, and she rejected them and isolated the power to give to someone later. She recognized mama Amber's powers and realized that this evil Cinder had murdered one of her mothers, which was the main reason why she had no qualms with killing the bitch.

"Are you okay, Mama Yang?" Young Salem asked the blond bombshell who was just waking up.

"Why did you call me that?" Yang asked with shock.

"Because you look like Mama Yang." Salem answered nonchalantly "This seems to be different version of Remnant then I am used too, but you are still Mama Yang, even if a different version of her." she telekinetically picked up Jinn's lamp and brought it to her from Cinder's headless corpse while her lightsaber simultaneously returned to her belt "This is like the lamp that daddy protects, and Mama Penny has a staff that is identical to daddy's staff."

Penny had been approaching and seemed surprised to hear Salem's words.

"Sal-u-ta-tions. My name is Penny Polendina." Penny introduced herself.

"It's a pleasure to meet another Mama Penny" Salem nodded and seemed cheerful "My name is Salem Rose"

"Who is your father that you mentioned?" Young Weiss asked with confusion.

"Father is Death Rose. Father was adopted by Summer Rose and Taiyang Xiao Long and was raised alongside Mama Ruby and Mama Yang, and since he had no last name, he tool granny Summers last name." Salem explained to the girls "In my world, Father defeated the bad version of me and liberated my innocent half and gave me a chance to live again, becoming a little girl. Papa had lots of help raising me from all my mama's."

"Oh, so you call us Mama since we helped raise you?" Yang asked, surprised to hear about this mysterious adopted brother in another world.

"Auntie Cinder also helped raise me." Salem insisted "I call Mama Ruby, Mama Yang, Mama Blake, Mama Weiss, Mama Penny and Mama Neo 'mama' because you are all daddy's wives."

Ruby, Weiss, Blake and Penny all had a shocked expression on their faces with wide eyes.

"Jeez, what kind of a stud is this guy?" Yang had a huge grin on her face hearing that he apparently had six wives.

"Sounds like this world could sure use someone like that guy, if he's as powerful as you say." Weiss sighed, still struggling to grasp that another version of her married a guy with at least five other wives.

Salem suddenly stiffened "Auntie Winter is in trouble." she glanced towards the portal that led to the Atlas vault and released the power she had gotten from Cinder towards Winter, who she considered a worthy candidate to be a maiden.

"There. I gave Auntie Winter the Power Cinder stole from Mama Amber, so she will be fine now. You all get to Vacuo and I will send Winter through behind you before I go deal with my evil half."

After saying that, she snapped her fingers and caused the unconscious form of Neo to disappear and then flew towards the portal where she sensed Winter at.

------

Winter found herself in a white place seemingly devoid of life "What is this?" she asked before a little girl appeared in front of her.

"Hello, Auntie Winter. I got the power that the bad Cinder took from Mama Amber, and I decided to give it to you I've decided you are worthy of being the next fall maiden. So I created this copy of myself to deliver the power to you." the little girl insisted.

"Who are you?" Winter asked, perplexed.

"Salem, the one you fight, is my evil half." the little girl insisted "You can call me Salem Rose. That's the name that my daddy gave me. Anyway, the real me will be joining you when you wake up, so go ahead and open your eyes."

"So...the destiny I have chose for you has arrived" Winter heard as she opened her eyes and saw General Ironwood looking at her.

At that moment, a little girl flew out of the portal and landed next to Winter "Sorry I am late, Auntie Winter" she looked at who Winter was fighting and seemed surprised "Wait, your fighting Uncle Ironwood? Is this that thing father and Uncle Ironwood warned me about, where Uncle Ironwood can go a bit crazy due to over reliance upon his semblance?"

"Who are you, little girl?" Ironwood asked with surprise.

"I am the good half of the entity you know as Salem. I am about to go kick her ass for you so calm down and stop relying on that semblance of yours and be a good boy." Little Salem explained and snapped her fingers, causing Ironwood to pass out "His semblance will be disabled for the next 6 months, Auntie Winter. Please take him to Vacuo. Uncle Ironwood does not mean to be bad. I'm sure of it."

Winter was shocked that Salem could knock out General Ironwood so easily "But how can you fight her?" Winter asked.

Young Salem chuckled "I think my chances are pretty good. Her magic is likely stronger then mine, but she has no foundation of training like I do, and can't use it with nearly the finesse that I can. It is like trying to hit a fly with a gigantic feather. And even if I can't beat her, I will still be able to flee, so right now focus on protecting the people of your Atlas and Mantle."

Winter seemed hesitant a bit, but eventually picked up Ironwood and flew through the portal with him. Young Salem had a satisfied nod and smiled "Stay safe, Auntie Winter. I'll leave my body double in your shadow for now. Hopefully I beat the bad me and don't have to use that method to escape." she gazed upwards just before hearing a scream from afar, which was filled with magic "To break the curse, I must triumph against my own dark half."

This was the understanding that her meditation brought her too. Her father was guided to Remnant by a foreign god, so a countermeasure left by the brother gods was triggered, which created a new Remnant that had not been influenced by that foreign god. The 'new' Remnant then became Remnant Prime. Only those native to Remnant can walk on Remnant Prime without creating a new Remnant Prime, and her evil half in Remnant Prime would continue tying her to that curse for all time, even if she personally met the conditions to be freed from the curse.

Unlike her daddy, though, Salem WAS a native to Remnant, so her appearance on Remnant Prime would not cause the creation of a new remnant Prime, so if she defeated her bad half, she would for real save this world.

Even if she now realized that her Remnant was not the 'Prime' one, it was still real to her, and the curse still tied her to Remnant Prime, so she still had a stake in things here. Salem knew that if she could just bring her daddy here, things would be much easier, but that went against her interests and was basically pointless, since his appearance would just create a different Remnant that became Remnant Prime, so killing the Salem of this world would not free her at all.

Gathering magic around herself, young Salem flew straight up through the earth and towards the most important battle of her young life.