Wrath of a Savage Rose
Chapter 1: The Wrath of a Savage Rose
Every night I dress in sheeps clothing
And I go out to play
But every night my secret keeps showing
And I scare them away
When they cry
Wolf, Wolf, Wolves!
It wasn't the biting chill of Mantle, nor was it the obvious state of disrepute the city had fallen into that unsettled the woman in black who melted through the darkness, flitting between the penumbral spaces of the streets and rooftops. It wasn't the demographic of Faunus that disproportionately inhabited the condemned buildings, the undersides of bridges, and the darkened alleyways either.
No, what weighed upon the woman in black was the cloying atmosphere of Mantle, a great despair that lay thick over every section of the city. Mantle was rife with despair and decay like no other city whose boundaries she had crossed. It radiated from the citizens like a roiling smoke and assailed her senses. She could practically see it in every comatose and dust addled junkie shambling through the cold unforgiving streets, from every exhausted labourer scrimping on their meagre weekly income, forced to choose between a warm hearth and ravenous hunger, from the children already fallen to the ravages of gang violence and knife fights in the street, despair reigned supreme. And not least of all, the despair of the Faunus, shunned by the 'civilised' Atlesian upper classes, left to rot in the abandoned slums of a city to which economic prosperity was a fleeting memory.
The decaying state of a defunct kingdom was laid bare before her, bare husks of buildings stripped of their valuables loomed imposingly over street fronts, casting shadows over the hollowed addicts and beggars. Street lamps sputtered as they clung to the last vestiges of life remaining in the old bulbs, highlighting the gaunt cheeks and hard eyes of the residents who roamed the streets. A tattered propaganda poster proudly displaying the image of an Atlesian soldier standing on the defeated body of Valesian and Vacuoan soldiers swayed wildy in the biting winds, the words emblazoned on the propaganda piece "Atlas Forever, Emotion For None, So the Many May Live". She scoffed, Atlas was nothing if not dramatic.
This city set the woman's teeth on edge, a rare thing for someone with her training, keeping her left hand from straying too far from the contoured handle of her dust pistol. However she was more than capable of defending herself from any number of these people, the woman was an apex predator among the people here. She felt little sympathy for these peoples plight, such weakness had been conditioned out of her over the years through brutal training and harsh experience. No, what set the woman's teeth on edge was pure hatred, a hatred so powerful it made her body tremble with rage. Hated for the climate, hatred for the people beneath her, and most of all, hatred for her target she could view on the horizon.
As she crested the top of an office complex her silhouette was partially revealed in the moonlight. The woman's 6 foot figure was clad head to toe in a black bodysuit. Her face was covered by a black mask with the only identifiable features being two lights for eyes resembling the gaze of a Grimm. The bodysuit was laced with lines of dust sewn throughout the material, while light armour plating was concealed under the material in strategic areas, bulking up the woman's figure slightly and making her even more imposing. A dust pistol and spare magazines were holstered to one leg, a ringlet of throwing knives circled her other, some standard, and some of the viciously sharp tips infused with various types of elemental dust. In the lowlight a symbol of a white wolfs head with claw marks slashed through it had been painted onto the chest piece of her suit. Armoured knee pads and greaves ended with a pair of low profile combat boots designed to withstand the friction generated by the high speeds its owner was capable of. Even with the additional bulk of her suit, it was clear that she had a superbly shaped figure shaped by years of hard conditioning.
Activating her visors magnification and HUD, she checked her progress towards her target, she was only a few kilometres from the factory she was tasked with destroying. The factory was officially a new investment project by Atlesian property moguls for dust refinery and steel production, however the true productive use of the factory was far less savoury in nature. According to the woman's intelligence the site was a secretly funded pet project of the highest divisions of the Atlesian military, rumoured to be personally overseen by General Ironwood himself. No, the sites true purpose was a bleeding edge armament research and development facility, intended to produce weaponry, ships, mechanised soldiers, and other technology that would allow Atlas to gain more military power.
The womans eyes hardened behind her visor as she surveyed the facility through the magnification function of her helmet, the night vision slaved to the optical zoom painted the imposing corrugated slabs, and even larger vent stacks that made up the building onsite, as she panned around for the emplacements that made up the factories defences, she reflected on the previous Atlesian offensives of the last 22 years of her life. "These warmongering bastards never learn" the woman thought to herself. She remembered the spring offensive that commenced only 5 years ago, when the revolutionary Atlas mechanised paladin divisions had stormed Valesian territory in a matter of days. Before that, the offensive when she was only 12 years of age, Atlas had had Miatralian support during that abortion of a campaign, abandoned on the blood soaked sands of the beaches of Mistrals coastline facing the eastern face of the continent of Vale when Atlas abandoned their ally to the ravages of the victorious Valesian military. Though there was the one that she always remembered more vividly than any of Atlas other transgressions, the one that fuelled her panicked nightmares in the night, one that filled her with pure hatred for everything Atlesian, be it the citizenry, or its monolithic institutions. The one that took everything from her, and yet perversely gave her a clear purpose in life where none had existed before.
A stab of pain spiked through her head as the memories she forcibly suppressed clawed to the forefront of her mind. The woman fell to her knees on her office perch overlooking the city, her breaths coming hard, short and shallow. Her eyes were wide and tears were forming, her arms and legs shaking uncontrollably, though it had nothing to do with the freezing cold at this altitude. She could feel it like she had never left that moment in time. The crack of a door being kicked open, tall and terrifying figures clad in white bursting into her families home, destroying the tranquillity of her quiet island, flashes of flame, of blood, and the image that haunted her every moment of sleep, a pair of lilac eyes, unseeing and listless, tears and blood mingled together in the soil….
She was brought back to her senses by pounding music filtered through her internal comm speakers, the raw verses grounding her in reality again.
It's the motherfuckin boogeyman
Push your hands together
Pray to whoever
Bullets with no name cut through the air at night
If there's masks on our faces then we came for your life
Tell God bring the suffering I can take whatever he sends
My bones are stone there's no nerves in my skin
I was built for war I'm the beginning and the end
I am the Alpha and Omega close your eyes and count to ten!...
She stood tall, unfurling her fingers that had curled into tight fists, as she anchored herself to the rhythm. The lyrics washed through her and distracted her from her memories. Her breaths evened out as she calmed herself, taking long, slow breaths to relax again. The music continued to pound aggressively through her helmet speakers she slowly began to return to form…
Hands up!
Don't shoot...
We drop the window then we loot
What did you think we would do
I threw my body on the bomb on the truth
This ain't the time or the place
We don't speak where we're from we put guns in your face
I'm not your partner or friend
If they move they dont see their families again
If I take your life I promise you I won't lose sleep at night
I'm only living to fight
Fuck what is right
I came to die!
It's wartime!
Violence... took my family!
Took my life from me!
Took my everything!
The climax of the song tailed off and was replaced by the voice of her mission handler.
"Can you hear me Red?"
She breathed deeply before keying her comm activator
"Affirmative Fall, reading you loud and clear"
The voice chuckled over the channel.
"This mission was supposed to be conducted with radio silence, but thanks to that little stunt I'm willing to bend the rules for you. You're supposed to be our best and strongest operative after all. We administered your meds before you entered the city, so please do try to control your emotions from here on out, we wouldn't want to have to flush the operation because of a few flashbacks now would we? I know you're not weak Red, pull yourself together and show me how good you really are, because I would rather that doesn't happen again when you're inside the target area, I won't be able to do much when you're inside that facility." "So, once more Red, are you good to go?"
Red grit her teeth together, clenching and unclenching her jaw, she took her time responding, though she could feel Fall's impatience through the whispering background static of the open channel. "I understand Fall, it won't happen again. I'm ready to move on the target." a curt response came through before the channel was cut "Damn right it won't, we can discuss this further during one of our sessions."
Falls voice filtered through the comms once more. "Now, why don't you take this opportunity to remind me of your primary mission on site." Red clenched her fists to suppress her annoyance. "Don't treat me like a liability Fall, you know me well enough not to do that."
"Just answer the question agent.". Red cited her briefing information, a little exasperation creeping into her tone." Chief Armaments scientist Arthur Watts is on site, termination of him and the destruction of the armaments and research facility is key to the security of Vale"
"Very good Red, now get on with it and accomplish the mission." The channel went dead as her handler cut out.
"Dammit" she thought to herself. She sometimes dreaded her sessions with Fall that didn't involve physical training, the woman might be the best combat instructor in the four kingdoms but sometimes she had a nasty personality streak to match her caring side. Most notably, her handler couldn't stand weakness of any kind, mental, emotional or otherwise. But all that would have to wait till later, it was time to focus on the objective.
She rezeroed her visor on the massive factory, panning over the hangar bays housing air frames in various states of production, looking for the entry point listed on the building schematics so helpfully provided by the lead designer on the project, "Of course the pistol at his forehead was a nice incentive", she thought to herself and snorted. "There it is". A small fire exit door leading to a landing on top of the main administration area, with a ladder set into the side. Her entry point determined, she panned around to identify the facilities defences that were not subtly concealed in the least.
Dozens of 20 millimetre quad barrelled rotary cannons loaded with hybrid ice dust tip and explosive dust cores were placed strategically at angles that covered the entire area with overlapping arcs of fire if necessary. She had seen classified test footage of the cannons effect on human targets, they created devastating wounds, with the ice dust tip fragmenting inside the wound channel when the explosive dust core scattered the metal fragments on impact, turning human flesh into pulp. Those cannons were to be avoided at all costs, even with her aura. Electrified current fencing powered by a yellow dust compound ringed the perimeter, stretching six metres in height. Motion sensor units also detected movement inside the courtyard of the compound, while armed Atlesian military soldiers were dressed in the fatigues of the "Zeiss" front company who supposedly owned the facility.
The woman in black took this all in with little surprise, she had been informed of these measures in her briefing and recon, though to see them in person was impressive. General Ironwood had clearly been given carte blanche from the Atlesian council on funding, and he had used that rare opportunity to its fullest. "Even with my semblance in play, this entrance is going to need to be perfect, I'll have to be careful." With that in mind she began her final precheck of her equipment, "Fire dust on my left arm, check, Gravity dust on my right, check." She checked her throwing knives on her leg, dropping her arm to the first knife to test her ease of draw, then checking the colour coded handles were in her preferred order. "standard, explosive dust tipped, lightning dust tipped, check, check, check…" Moving to her pistol she checked chamber to make sure the magazine had fed properly, the large 11mm casing glinting through her visor output, she returned the slide into battery, then holstered the weapon.
Checking her spare magazines feed lips were not deformed or loose, she stowed those as well. Lastly she checked the three most important items critical to the success of the mission, the ghastly slashed wolfs head adorning her armour was clearly visible, marking her as an elite member of the White fang. While the red emblem was for lower tier fighters in the fang, white was the colour afforded to their hit squads, small, highly trained teams capable of generating an aura and in rare cases, even semblances. Placing the blame at the white fang's feet was the perfect cover for an attack on Atlesian soil. Next, she checked the explosive package strapped to her back, soon to be set inside the complex, "all in good order". Finally, she brushed her hand over a boxy white package resting across her back above the explosive she had stowed below it, reassuring herself that her greatest asset was still there with her.
Her checks completed, she readied herself for her pass at the factory, feeling the power of her semblance flowing through her as she called on it… And activated it…
The world blurred past her as she sped toward her target at inhuman speeds, jumping from building to building, the fencing racing quickly toward her in her vision. She waited for the right moment, constantly recalculating her speed and trajectory…
"Now!"
Her body reformed for a fraction of a second as she landed on her hands and pushed off with all her strength, gaining enough height to crest the height of the fence and reactivate her speed semblance. She heard a single controlled burst from the auto cannons firing at where she had been barely a second ago, the roaring shots piercing the night and leaving craters in the asphalt. The top of the administration block sped toward her as she deactivated her semblance and pushed her right arm out toward the building. She activated the gravity dust weaved into the bodysuit to slow herself down and slammed into the exit door, grunting as her aura took the rest of the shock of her sudden stop. The sound was masked by the short burst the guns had fired, so her presence was currently undetected. Her breath came in short, harsh pants, as she looked back at the distance she had covered. "Two kilometres in seven seconds, almost as good as my record" Pleased with her speed and efficiency, she silently dared her handler watching through her helmet camera to criticise her on her performance there.
She slipped quietly through the door as the guards in the courtyard rushed to investigate the source the guns had targeted and took the staircase into the corridors inside. In the harsh light of the floodlights illuminating the courtyard, all they could see were small trails of scattered thorns littering the ground…
As she ghosted her way through the facility she followed the layout she had committed to memory, the only company to contend with were the guard teams patrolling the corridors. The overhead lighting in most sections of the base was powered down to minimal levels, making her job much simpler in her pitch black bodysuit. "The wonders of proper intelligence" Red thought to herself. Her Faunus informant working at the plant had informed her as much of this, knowing that the facility was undergoing some electrical systems maintenance for the next few nights. "His intel was more reliable than I banked on" she scoffed as she mused to herself "Probably should have paid him more before I killed him I guess". After stealthing through a connecting corridor to building block B, her body held low with her pistol drawn and locked, she entered the eastern dust refinery wing, coming across a large room filled with vats of dust mixers working away to purify extracted dust from the Schnee mining quarries. Terminals and consoles tracked the purity of the samples undergoing centrifugation, then going through several sets of sieving to remove any remaining impurities.
She climbed onto one of the dust vats and examined the hatch mechanism that kept the vat locked. With such a quantity of dust being so valuable, the manufacturers had opted to use a 9 digit keypad, controlling 6 internal magnetic locks that even Red would be unable to break without potentially detonating the dust stored inside. But there was nothing stopping her from ripping off the keypad housing and jacking in manually. She searched the wiring for a port to interface a small state of the art code generator. Once the generator display pulsed yellow twice to confirm it was connected, she would have to wait around half an hour for the device to brute force the lock, but she was prepared to wait that out, the room had plenty of cover behind the terminals and the vats, even more so with the low lighting, as well as a grate to access the ventilation system should she need it. She decided to work on loosening up the ventilation cover in case she needed to make a quick exit, periodically checking on the devices progress as she did.
Around twenty minutes in, she was suddenly disoriented when the lighting in the room turned up to its highest setting, completely illuminating the room, and a facility wide alarm sounded loudly through her helmets audio systems. Red froze briefly in shock and uttered a string of colourful curses inside her suit, "What the hell could have possibly alerted them?!, maybe… maybe I messed up somewhere… no, no there's no way, I got in clean, what the hells going on?". She whipped her head up as she heard footfalls coming down the corridor, acting quickly she yanked the ventilation cover off and crawled inside, replaced the vent cover and held it closed with one hand. With her other she activated her helmets audio recorder and set it to filter out ambient background noise. She wanted to know what these bastards knew that had set them onto her.
She saw a group of guards entering the room with their rifles charged, scanning the room while the leader was talking to a woman in a black double breasted jacket, wearing a pair of black, thigh high boots with black heels and stockings to match. A slash of blue colouring ran down the center of each arm, while a line of blue ran down each frill on the skirted portion of her outfit. A white sash ran around the chest area for a bit of stylistic flair. Red noticed that the woman was around her age and had an attractively sculpted face, with piercing blue eyes and stark white hair. Lastly, and most concerning, she noted the presence of a sword with a dust cylinder affixed to a handle wrapped in white leather, with a viciously sharp blade at the end of said handle. Red knew exactly who she was looking at, it was difficult for anyone not to know really. The woman in black was looking at none other than the military prodigy and former heiress Weiss Schnee.
Red huffed in annoyance behind her helmet, she knew this woman could be trouble. While she had never seen the younger Schnee officer fight, she knew that there were very few aura users left among the forces of the four kingdoms, and even fewer still who bothered to master the blade to fight these days. Even rarer still were those with semblances, being very difficult to come by, with the dual users of aura and semblance being among the strongest fighters on Remnant.
Red was such a fighter herself, an apex predator who kept her skills honed tight and could best nearly any enemy who was foolish enough to challenge her.
But the Schnee sisters were also possessive of semblances, with their hereditary glyph summoning semblance being the exception to the rule, making them a high priority threat based on fact alone. " Shit. I just hope that her damn older sister isn't on site with her." Taking on one dual user was feasible, the odds were in her favour though she would definitely come out with some damage, battles between users were brutal and scarring affairs. But fighting two dual users that were academy trained could prove extremely difficult, even for someone such as herself, someone who had been training almost her entire life.
"Damn you Sergeant, I'm not just annoyed at having to come down here to investigate your incompetence, I'm furious. You explain away an autocannon burst in the middle of the night to an ammunition malfunction? You should be stripped of your position for such negligence, anyone could see those thorns on the ground, and those cannons have state of the art tracking systems worth more than your damn salary!"
"Lieutenant Schnee I understand your concerns but I'm certain that there is no one who has breached this facility- The woman interrupted the officer, snapping "No you do not understand my concerns Sergeant! If you did, you would have alerted General Ironwood himself of what was going on here! My god man, you saw the security recording, that wasn't a trick of the light was it? You think roses grow in Mantles climate this time of the year?"
" With all due respect Ma'am I think that you're jumping at shadows in the night, you're completely overreacting in ordering a full sweep and alert of this facility, if it were up to me- Weiss snarled "but that's the thing Sergeant, it's not up to you, it's up to me! And the problem with shadows in the night is that if you don't jump at them then they'll slit your throat as thanks for your negligence, now shut your mouth and do your damned job, I want that damn intruder found!"
The leader of security clenched his fists, grinding his jaw to keep his temper "Yes Lieutenant Schnee, my apologies Ma'am" he ground out venomously.
With the altercation settled, Red saw Weiss reach for a scroll receiving a call "Yes Winter?, no… no, no one in this wing yet either… yes, understood… I'll wait there for anything irregular then… yes of course I'll be careful sister, this is just another chance to prove myself… of course sister, you as well."
"No no no dammit" Red cursed to herself as she watched the Schnee officer stow her scroll. "Find them Sergeant, your job depends on it, leave your men here and follow me" She stalked off down another access corridor, leaving both the Sergeant and Red fuming. " Gods almighty she's got a bug up her ass sir, what the hell is her problem?" The seargent looked at the man for a moment before responding "She's ambitious private, she's ambitious, and the little shit so focused on climbing the ladder that she'll step on anyone's fingers on the way up" the Sergeant scoffed "She'll get hers though, one day someone will take her down a notch, and then we'll see just how superior she thinks she is to others in her life" The men grunted in agreement as the leader moved off while his men scanned around the dust vats and terminals. Red uttered a sound of relief that they hadn't found the device, which had flashed a ready confirmation a few minutes ago. She was worried though, two dual users searching for her? She had to end this quickly and quietly and get to her transport.
Opening up the vent she jumped out as quietly as possible in a low crouch as she looked at both of the guards. It seemed the alarm she had filtered out from her helmets speakers was reducing their hearing, well mores the better for her then. She reached down and took two standard throwing knives from her circlet. She positioned herself behind a dust vat that the two guards stood on either side of, pressed tightly against it, playing out the motions in her mind before readying herself. Using her aura fuelled strength, she slid to the left and buried the knife into the guards head with a powerful throw, breaking straight through his helmet and piercing his skull, before jumping up to the top of the vat. The other guard heard the loud crack, saw his companion fall and broke to the right behind the dust vat with his rifle raised, only to be floored by a powerful weight landing on him and driving a knife through his throat. His rifle was wrenched from his grip to prevent him from firing on reflex.
Another guard turned the corner to see his comrade crushed to the ground in a pool of his own blood, he couldn't even react as a blur crashed into him at superspeed and drove an aura enhanced arm through his chest. He fell with only a cry of anguish and died before he hit the floor, the last thing he saw was a tall, terrifying figure clad in a black suit with a visor reflecting his own confused features back at him. Spinning on her heel, Red sprinted at the last man who had managed to circle behind her, lowering her body and jabbing his gun arm as he fired off a shot that skimmed past her shoulder, punching him in the gut and moving fluidly into a spinning kick that snapped his neck sideways. She landed with her pistol drawn, casting around for another threat, nothing moved. The encounter had taken no more than 30 seconds. Red stood in the centre of a maelstrom of blood and death she had unleashed, satisfied with her work. She took a moment to wipe the misted blood from her visor and brushed some of the gore from her arm.
She stood, dragging bodies behind the vat, knowing that she didn't have long before the squad would have to report in on their comms. She walked to the dust vat where she had planted the device, yanking the device from the keypad she wrenched open the dust vat lid and looked inside. A brewing mix of red dust and some other compound of dust were mixing around inside. She let go of the lid and reached for the package on her back, a red dust enhanced explosive charge. With the destructive power of the vat of dust combined with the charge would level this site to the ground. She only had to prime the device and drop it into the vat, then close up the lid and reset the locks. She could remotely detonate the device, but if she failed to do so the bomb was set for a twenty minute timer.
Jumping into the ventilation shafts she began making her way out of the facility…
Emerging onto the rooftop of the eastern wing, she pulsed her comms to communicate with Fall "Package set, ready for pickup". Falls voice replied over the channel "Bullhead in fifteen minutes coming your way, ten kilometres south east of your position, the top of the Queens tower complex." Reds urgency showed through her tone as she responded "Fall, be advised, Winter and Weiss Schnee are on site" "What?!" Fall yelled. Red continued "They're more intelligent than the average idiot manning this facility, they were onto me from the start". In a world where skilled aura users were even more valuable than flagships, the Schnees represented a danger than even Fall wouldn't trifle with lightly. "Shit! Alright we'll be there ASAP, do not engage unless forced to, repeat, do not engage, escape is paramount." Fall could be damned useful when it counted, even if she was difficult sometimes, which is why Red still had respect for her.
Cutting the connection, Red wasted no time, taking a running jump off of the roof towards the southwest and pushed her semblance to evade the autocannons, wincing internally as another booming short burst pierced the night, well behind her position but it would alert the Schnee sisters to her general direction.
She decided to throw caution to the wind and push her semblance continuously, though pulsing it in short bursts was more her style. Dilapidated buildings and run down streets blurred past her vision as she became a blur near impossible for the human eye to track. Her breath coming in great lungfuls, pushing herself to her limits, her semblance was highly developed and its toll on her body had been greatly reduced over the years, but pouring all her stamina into a fifteen kilometre dead sprint was a feat that would test even her vast stamina reserves.
As red saw the queens tower logo beginning to show on the horizon, she kept pushing hard, thorns streaming behind and scattering in her wake.
But she was tiring now, and decided to rematerialize for a moment to check her vectors, see if she had got out as clean as she thought.
Abruptly deactivating her semblance, her heels slammed into the top of a building long enough to slow her down. Throwing her left arm out in front of her, she activated the explosive inlaid dust, shooting out a powerful beam of heated energy to slow her acceleration. Her other hand slammed into the building and fired the gravity dust charge, the combined dust forces throwing her up into the air, where she gracefully flipped until she landed on her feet at a stop.
Using the moment's rest to catch her breath, she quickly scanned the vectors she had come from, the city being cast in a green tint from her helmets night vision function. There was nothing she could see on the scopes, panning from side to side to be sure. Until a small chain of white dots faded into view on her visors display. Reds features beneath her face contorted in anger at what she was seeing.
Her shoulders heaving with exertion, she magnified focus on the lights. Her stomach dropped as the image came into focus, it wasn't one chain of lights, it was two chains of glyphs running parallel to one another, they weren't static, but moving. But that wasn't the worst of it for Red.
No the worst was that they were headed directly toward her, and she could make out two figures sprinting from glyph to glyph, two shocks of white hair telling her everything she needed to know.
"Gods be damned to hell and back", the Schnees were coming for her, and at their current speed they would reach her before her bullhead arrived. To match her misfortune, the rain began pouring down….
Her only chance was to attack now while she had distance and concealment on her side. From there she might be able to play a game of cat and mouse until the bullhead arrived. She reached for the package that had been attached to her lower back, and deployed it. Gears whirred and pieces snapped into place, a long shaft slammed into place and the huge blade of the weapon unfurled into position.
Suddenly Red was holding a massive bone white sniper scythe, with a massively oversized calibre to match for hitting aura enhanced targets like the ones bearing down in her direction. The massive bore ran almost the entire length of the weapon, easily chambered for .50 calibre dust rounds, and higher if necessary.
She slammed the point of the weapon home into the rooftop, anchoring the weapon as she prepared to soak up a hell of a lot of recoil from the massive cartridges she was about to shunt downrange. Racking the bolt back, she checked her first round. The ammunition was a discarding sabot, armour piercing round with a small red dust tip for added explosive damage and an additional dust primer in the cartridge base to flatten the rounds trajectory and improve ballistic performance. When you needed to reach out and touch a Schnee from three thousand metres accept no substitutes. Red rammed the bolt home, rasping as the round nosed up the feed ramp and the ten locking lugs behind it rotated into place. Popping the optic up to her eye, she sighted in and held a lead on her first target. Slowly exhaling, she pulled the trigger and sent the round screaming downrange as a thunderous blast cracked in the quiet night.
Her lead was good and her aim true, through her optic she saw her first target, Winter, completely blown off her feet, the extreme deceleration causing her head to smash painfully against the road. That hit had to have strained her aura, even someone as powerful as her, and that could only make Reds odds of survival all the better.
She couldn't dwell on Winter though, panning her aim left and using her strength to cycle the massive bolt she reacquired her next target, setting the former heiress in her sights, holding her lead, and firing again. The cracks in the roofing material beneath her spiderwebbed further outward as another thunderous report rent the air, the huge muzzle report of the big gun obscuring her vision briefly.
But Weiss had been prepared for that after seeing her sister fall, casting a protective glyph large enough to cover her body facing in Reds direction. She hadn't completely failed though, Weiss stumbled briefly, the round still had enough energy to break through the glyph and throw her off balance, but hadn't done any real damage. Snarling, she rammed another round home, realising the Schnee brat was within fifteen hundred metres and by now had a good idea of her position. "Fire again now, then break line of sight" she thought to herself, pulling the trigger, again her round screamed towards Weiss again, only to be stopped dead by a much stronger protective glyph.
It was of no consequence though, the younger sisters vision would be briefly obscured by her own bright glyph, playing hell with her night vision. That was the moment Red used her speed to get groundside and weave through adjacent buildings, using their tall profiles to break line of sight with the Schnee sisters. As she jumped, she could feel the heat licking at her back from a pillar of fire that washed the rooftop in flame and devastation. It seemed the Schnee girl could shoot worth a damn after all. But that wasn't what was worrying her "Just where the hell did Winter get to?"
She fired her rifle to break her fall from the 10 storey building, landing in a hard crouch and rolling to spread the shock. Breaking left to better position herself, she deformed into thorns, becoming a blur…
Until a wall of glyphs in overlapping formation forced her to stop in her tracks. She quickly broke upwards, with the same result. Looking around she was trapped in a dome of glyphs. Spinning around she levelled her rifle as she hit the ground at the woman who had caught her, freezing when she felt the point of a large sword pushing against her throat at the same time. Her eyes followed the steel length dripping water, to take in a shock of white hair, grey thigh high boots, military style coat, and two blue eyes colder than ice, freezing her in place. Those eyes held the promise of bloodshed tonight. She had her sword at Reds throat, but the barrel of her rifle was pressed dead against Winters head- A Stalemate, for the moment…
Both women were breathing hard from their exertions, shoulders rising and falling as the rain steamed against their active auras. Finally Winter spoke "You can't escape me, drop your weapons, surrender, and I'll guarantee you your life, that must at least mean something to you" Her features darkened upon receiving no response "Go on then, give me the chance, there's nothing I'd love more than to run you through and drag you back myself."- "You're a violent faunus terrorist assaulting Atlesian officers, you think anyone will shed a tear if I kill you tonight?"….. At that Red decided to respond, her challenge issued through her helmets external speakers "You have no idea what I am do you huh human?, you're nowhere near powerful enough to bring me down on your own, step away now, or I'll paint this street with your blood you filthy Atlesian dog."
At that, Winter snarled, slamming Reds rifle to the side with the heel of her hand, stabbing straight toward her throat, but hitting nothing but air as Red deformed into thorns. She reformed behind her target, twisting her body in a brutal scythe swipe toward Winters legs, only to have her backflip gracefully over the blade and take a boot heel to the head. Snarling, she used her speed to get out of arms reach, jerked her body to face her target and threw two dust tipped knives toward the Schnee officer, obscuring her vision as they exploded on contact with the protective glyph she hastily threw up in front of her face, lightning and fire licking at the barrier.
Using the moments respite, she put the Schnees glyphs to her own advantage, firing her rifle downward to reach a glyph at the top of the dome and pushing off with all her might, firing behind her to eke out all the speed she could get. By the time Winters vision cleared she saw a black shadow screaming toward her, her eyes widened before a heavy swipe hit her square in the chest, her vision blurred as she was launched outside of her own protective dome, her grip on her glyphs failing as they guttered out.
She crashed through the front of dust shop, shattering the window and tumbling to a halt in front of a rack of comics of all things. Winter pushed through the fatigue and slowly got to her feet, gasping for breath after being winded by the powerful hit. Swiping glass from her forehead she moved to pick up her sword….
Red felt the shock of her scythe smash into the Schnee and sped after her, determined not to let Winter recover, if Winter was provoked enough to bring her full power to bear she might be able to defeat Red if she wasn't careful. Before she reached the storefront a wave of fire washed over her and slammed her into a lamppost, arching her shoulders back painfully as she impacted, her black aura flaring to life to protect her from the worst of the damage. She stumbled to her feet quickly and cast around for the other person she had lost track of until now, steam rising from her suit.
Weiss Schnee stood across the street from her, Sword held low in an Atlesian combat stance "Get the fuck away from my Sister!" Spinning Myrtenasters cylinder she launched a wave of ice toward her, but Red quickly raised her hand and activated the fire dust laced throughout her arm, disintegrating the column well before it reached her.
But Weiss wasn't done as she shot through the blast towards her, speeding in to run her through with Myrtenaster. Red threw up her scythe and used her free hand to brace the blade as Weiss smashed into her, their blades clashing as they fought for dominance. Red pushed back hard and shoved Weiss back, activating the gravity dust in her suits other arm she launched herself at Weiss, ready to blast her in the face. Weiss's eyes widened as she saw what was about to happen, ducking under her arm and rolling away. Red forced her to stay on the move, aiming her scythe and dumping a magazine at her.
Weiss leapt from glyph to glyph, blocking what she couldn't dodge with her strongest protective glyphs, but she was off balance now and had lost the initiative in the fight, as Red charged towards her while she was still off balance, putting Weiss down hard with a scythe strike that felt to the younger sister like a freight train had hit her in the shoulder. As Weiss dropped Red fired her last round at her, heavily dropping her aura and drawing a scream from the Schnee. With her scythe dry she dropped the magazine to load her last full one in as she prepared to deal with Winter. Suddenly she heard a strange humming noise near her and she shouted in surprise and pain as a pair of ghostly jaws clamped down on her free arm and her leg. Even through her aura holding the worst of it at bay the crushing sensation hurt like a son of a bitch.
Angrily she dropped her scythe to draw her pistol and shoot the apparitions through the head, feeling the pressure on her limbs release as they disintegrated before her.
Weiss didn't let up her assault, having struggled slowly to her feet she steeled herself once again, rapidly casting a series of glyphs around her and launching herself at Red, now without her scythe at the ready. But she didn't even make it past the initial strike as Red dropped underneath her sword strike and punched her in the gut, grunting in pain Weiss countered by smashing the point of her sword hilt into Reds helmet and slamming her knee towards her stomach, but she faltered when Red fired her pistol into the Schnees chest, winding her even further as her aura flared around her. The next thing she knew her legs were swept out from under her and the barrel of an Atlesian model pistol was staring her straight in the face.
Red put pressure on the trigger once again, until she received a brutal kick to the head from the other Schnee, throwing her through the pools of water and snow on the ground to land near her weapon. Groaning and getting to her feet she saw the two sisters standing before her as she picked up her weapon, reloaded and cycled the bolt. Even with the damage she had taken, she'd gotten off lightly compared to her assailants. "Who the hell are you?!" the younger Schnee sister shouted at her "You're not just another filthy white fang animal, you've got aura training and even rarer you've got a semblance- there's no way the White Fang has someone like you in their ranks, they haven't got the resources!" Red allowed a bit of humour to creep into her voice to keep up her deception as to her real employers "The White Fang grows stronger every day Schnee!, with every faunus killed in those damned dust mines of yours, with every public beating of faunus accused of crimes they never committed more join our ranks!, soon there'll be more like me, just as powerful, and just as devoted to the cause of revolution!"
Weiss cut off any further talk with her final statement "You're wrong you animal! you'll never overthrow Atlesian society!, those animals deserve the treatment they get because they're murdering, thieving scum!" Red was interrupted before she could respond by Winter "You must know the military police are on their way, they'll be here shortly and you've got nowhere to go! give yourself up for judgment and live!" Red chose to throw out a nice common White Fang motto as the Schnee sisters readied their weapons, clearly having come up with a plan. "The faunus have nothing to lose but their chains!" She watched Winter release a second sword from her primary weapons. Red sighed and raised her scythe in an overhead block to check the two sisters simultaneous charge.
Red was running out of time, she was holding out on the defensive, but against coordinated attacks from the sisters she could only hold out for so long, even if they were injured. She could still pull out a win here, if only that godsdamned bullhead would just- "Red, Fall here, bullheads entered the cities airspace, we're coming in for pickup now", faintly Red could hear the loud engines of the bullead drawing closer. Ducking a sword thrust from Weiss she tried locking out her arm to break it at the elbow, but was forced to kick Weiss away instead to deal with Winter bearing down on her.
Her scythe blurred around her in vicious circles, blocking strikes as Winter sped from glyph to glyh, using different angles and testing her scythe skills to their limits. The power behind her strikes was still jarring, if her injuries were hampering her Winter was doing an excellent job of ignoring them. Finally a double bladed strike underneath her scythe forced her guard up, leaving her open to a hard kick that threw her back toward a holding glyph cast by Weiss. Pulsing her semblance for a moment, she phased through the glyph and reformed to slam her blade into the ground.
She used her semblance to cycle the bolt at superhuman speeds, unleashing a rolling volley of gunfire at the Schnee sisters. The two sisters dodged and blocked everything they could, but their stamina was finally faltering, and a round shattered Winters glyph and punched into her shoulder, her aura flickered in intensity, she didn't have long now. Weiss must also be running low after the beating she'd taken. Falls voice came through "Red we're overhead holding station now, come on the Atlesian military will have scrambled VTOL's the moment we broke their airspace, we need to go now!" Red responded quickly "Fall, they've got hardly any aura left, if I press the advantage now I can take them- negative Red, disengage, that's an order!" "Come on Fall, I could take out two of the top aura users in Atlas tonight" "I won't repeat myself Red, break and run for the Queens tower, we can help cover your exfil from there."
The bullheads searchlight illuminated the scene of the battle, Reds queue to leave. She gripped her scythe in frustration as she wrestled with herself, she hated Atlesians, especially powerful ones that could actually challenge her. Yes, yes, they had actually dared to challenge someone of her skill, and while they'd only held their ground against her, that was a grave insult to her. These rich socialites had made this personal, she should open them both up and save herself the trouble of looking over her shoulder for a blade that would be aimed for her back. "Should have no mercy on em, they never did when I was young" she thought venomously, but… she lowered her scythe, restraint just barely winning out. Orders were orders after all, and it didn't do well to go against Fall.
She flared her semblance and poured the last of her stamina in a mad sprint, breaking for the tower, in hardly any time she was scaling the tower. Reaching the top she used the opportunity to glance below her, expecting to see the furious faces of the Schnees receding behind her. Except… she did a double take, not quite believing what she saw. They were gone, where the hell did they go?
Her handlers voice came through with a warning "Red, behind you!"- she broke left, throwing herself to evade whatever was behind her. But fast as she was, it wasn't enough. Her right shoulder weighed her down as she crashed to the ground, frozen solid by an ice dust strike. "Shit, the damn bullhead engines covered their approach" The Schnee sisters must have scaled the building from another side without her noticing. Before she could get up, a sword point was being hammered into her defences, grunting in pain with each strike chipping away at her aura she manuevered her frozen arm as best she could, activating a gravity dust pulse to throw her attacker off, but instead she hit nothing as her attacker stepped around the charge to hammer a knee into her elbow. She cried out in pain at that one, her elbow going as numb as her arm, before her visor rushed toward the ground as it was slammed repeatedly into the pavement.
Desperately she deformed into a cloud of thorns again. Too disoriented to land properly, she slid along the rooftop and impacted with a ventilation unit, but that was all Red needed to get to her feet, a spiderweb of cracks lining her weakened visor and obscuring her vision. She needed to remove it if she was going to fight effectively, but she had no choice, no one outside of the organisation could even be given the chance to get her image into a facial database. She could see just enough to know what was going on however, Weiss was engaging the bullhead, throwing dust strikes trying to get a clear shot at the engines as she sped in a complex glyph pattern around the ships blindspots. It seemed Fall was on board though, because Weiss was being driven back each time by fireballs and clouds of viciously sharp glass shards. The Schnees outfit was already being sliced to ribbons, though her aura was holding for now.
The sound of footfalls slapping against the slippery rooftop brought her attention back to who had dealt her so much punishment so quickly. Winter… This bitch dared to stand against her again after she had shown them mercy?! Reds resolve hardened in that moment, the Senior Officers broken silhouette contrasting sharply with the darkened night sky of Mantle through her cracked visor, she dropped her scythe in an unexpected move. She would do this unarmed for the moment, and she was going to tear this bitch to pieces unless she was ordered to stop. Sidestepping the sword thrust, she flipped over the reflexive side slash Winter threw with her second sword. Moving faster than Winter could react she grabbed her outstretched arm with her frozen one and put all her power into a hard punch to her elbow joint with her other. The effect was devastating, she heard with satisfaction a loud crack as she broke the womans arm, relished in the scream of pain drawn from her throat as her sword fell from her grasp.
Winter's aura had finally broken.
And now they both had one good arm.
Using Winters broken arm as leverage she pulled her good arm back and slammed her elbow into Winters face, her head snapping back with another crack as something broke up there as well. She kicked her hard in the chest, throwing her harshly to the ground. Fall issued a warning again "Red, watch out!" Knowing where Weiss would be charging from having seen her sister in peril, she dropped flat as the younger sister screamed past her, her rapier scraping against the back of her helmet, Red jumped back to her feet and threw an explosive tipped knife at Weiss, who saw it coming just in time, throwing up a protective glyph in desperation. But Weiss was exhausted and low on aura, her glyph protected her from the blast, but the explosive force threw her off the side of the building. Red uttered a small noise of satisfaction as she turned away to find Winter on the ground crawling where she had left her, taking her time she strolled leisurely towards her target, picking up her scythe and sliding a round home.
Standing over the woman, Red raised her scythe above her head, until Fall shouted into her comms angrily "Red, you step away from that woman right now! The VTOL's could arrive any minute now! Get your ass into this bullhead now!
She hesitated for a moment, scythe still held high over her head, which was something so irregular for her that Fall took that act as insubordination. A ball of fire slammed into her scythe and forced it from her grasp "NOW!" Red finally looked up and took Fall in. Her eyes were wreathed in flame and her body was smoking from holding back her rage, even Red didn't dare fuck with Fall, especially when she was like this. She sighed and keyed her comms "Affirmative Fall, my apologies, I- "Don't apologise, just get up here Now!"
She moved to step away from Winters form, until a hand grabbed her pistol and emptied it into her back, every hit from the 11mm pistol rounds exploded against her aura, battering it away until the pistol ran dry and the steaming slide locked back against the slide stop.
Red clutched at her chest, blood pouring from a gaping exit wound in her chest as she staggered onto one knee, her breath stolen from her lungs.
It seemed even her considerable aura had finally failed her, exacerbated by liberal use of her semblance.
She heard Falls voice, but it sounded so faint "Red?, Red you've got to get up, got to get moving…"
Reds restraint finally broke, and with a scream she threw her body behind a brutal scythe strike, mortally wounding one of the most senior specialists in the Atlesian military. Blood sprayed from Winter's chest as she was impaled by the large blade, and she gave a final gasp of pain before quieting. Her breath dropped to a low wheezing as she bled out on the rooftop. Summoning what was left of her failing strength, she flung Winter across the rooftop with the point of her scythe. Everything was deathly quiet for a few moments, a testament to what she had done.
Red stood panting, tired after dispatching the specialist, barely holding onto her scythe with her good arm, the other trying to stem the blood spilling from the gaping hole in her side. The only sounds she could hear were much fainter than normal, Fall cussing her out on the comms, the light dripping of her own blood on the rooftop and the rain pelting down. She wanted to feel the euphoric rush of killing another damned Atlesian, a high ranking specialist no less, she wanted to feel vindication for avenging those she'd lost in some small way.
But she was too wounded to enjoy the kill, her body felt cold even through the insulation of her suit as her blood mixed with the rain on the rooftop. Sighing, she turned to limp back to the bullhead when a scream of pure hatred and anguish drew her attention.
It seemed Weiss Schnee had made her way back up the apex of the building at the worst possible moment. She stood with her outfit slashed to pieces, her blood staining what was left of her jacket, small cuts from Falls glass adorning her sculpted face. Her face was murderous, and her ice blue eyes burned through Reds visor, feeling like they were gazing upon her very soul, but worst of all, those eyes sent an unspoken message to Red, that she would be pursued to the ends of the earth, that the white haired woman would not rest until she avenged her sister.
Red shivered internally, her body temperature felt like it was wilting further under those awful eyes.
Weiss launched herself toward her, the wicked length of her rapier aimed directly at her head, slowed down by her wounds Red desperately tried to deflect Myrtenasters point.
Her reaction kept her head on her shoulders, but it wasn't enough. Red yelped in pain as Myrtenaster punched through her visor and scraped along her cheek, leaving a long cut along the side of her face. A swift punch aided by a speed glyph snapped her head back and further shattered her busted visor, leaving a single silver eye open to the elements. A final sweeping kick brought her crashing down to meet the ground.
The Schnees voice snarled above her, a strange echo coming through her speakers and her exposed ear "This is for Winter you bastard!" Red narrowly dodged a sword thrust aimed for her neck.
"You're going to die here tonight!, I'll end your miserable fucking existence!-" Her voice was cut off as blasts of fire and glass forced her back, barely being able to defend herself with her glpyhs.
Red found herself being roughly carried by her handler, her fiery orange eyes glowing brightly and her face drawn slightly at the exertion of bearing Reds weight. As she was thrown into the bullhead she heard the Schnees cry of anger and despair "No! I'll murder every last one of you, drop her right now!"
"Sorry Schnee, you won't be killing anyone tonight" Fall calmly responded. Weiss gave one last scream of rage and cast a wave of fire from her rapier, creating a haze of water vapour as the attack burned any surrounding water it passed. "Die!"
Fall ended the battle by simply raising her hand to block the attack. The wave of fire simply washed around her as she stood in the centre of the maelstrom, a dark figure with eyes burning as brightly as the fire she was defending herself against.
Using the haze created by the blast to make it back to the bullhead, she barked out orders to the pilot "Take us out of here! Get straight to maximum speed, don't worry about staying under the radar or thruster burnout, just get us the hell out of here I can practically feel the VTOL's breathing down our necks!"
Reds laboured wheezing was cut off by a hand removing her visor. Falls furious face appeared before her, and her head was knocked sideways by a hand cracking across her face in a harsh slap. "How dare you disobey orders!, Do you have any idea what you've done!? One raid on a classified Atlesian facility wouldn't have been enough to attract much attention in the public eye, but the death of a Schnee!?" Red spat out a wad of blood before replying "I"- "No!, I won't hear it! a high ranking and long serving veteran, part of one of the most powerful oligarch families in the Atlesian state, and you kill the woman?! Using something as obvious and rare as aura and semblance training that haven't been seen since the halcyon days of the huntsmen and huntresses? Don't you have any idea how much harder you've made it for yourself to operate discretely?!" "That woman was Ironwoods protégé, and her sister is a rising force in the Atlesian ranks as well, do you think they won't have power and influence they can bring to bear?!, hell the Atlesian military controls law enforcement, their intelligence agencies, they barely even answer to the Atlesian council!" "And the Atlesian media!, oh don't even get me started on the field day those myopic propagandists are going to have with this, all of Atlas will be baying for your blood!"
Her reprimanding finished, Fall sighed and concern crossed her face as she grabbed a first aid kit and began stabilising Reds wounds. Red just looked out the cargo hold of the bullhead in shame, refusing to look Fall in the eye, watching the pitch black skies of Mantle rushing past. This time when Fall touched her face it was gentler as she looked her in the eye. "Ruby… talk to me… please. Why did you go against orders? You've always been a good operative, why now? Why make an exception for those two sisters?" Fall was being serious indeed if she was using her real name instead of her code and nickname.
When Ruby responded, her tone was harsh, her eyes had hardened to flint, wearing an expression devoid of mercy or pity. "Because she was Atlesian, and she dared to challenge me. A filthy Atlesian bitch challenging me, after everything her kind have taken from me? No she deserved to die, just like all the other Atlesian scum I've killed, and just like all the others I'm going to kill in the future. I hate them! And I'll watch them burn!" She paused, gathering herself before continuing "And besides, I've rid us of one of the most powerful aura users on Remnant, she would have come for one of our operatives at some point in the future, and this will show those repulsive people that they aren't as invincible or safe in their own territory as they thought they were."
Falls disappointment was evident as her tone dropped "Your hatred for your enemies has always made you our best operative Red" Fall scoffed "With the exception of myself perhaps, you have been of great use to the organisation, provided you followed orders, but be careful that your feelings don't consume you, because you will never be someone we can trust… Someone that I can trust. Am I making myself clear?"
Ruby nodded weakly "Apologies, I'll rein myself in."
Fall nodded though she was clearly still furious, their argument was over for the moment. She placed her hand on Rubies partially stabilised bullet wound. "Good, now hold still, this is going to hurt" A burning smell filled the ship and Red cried out in pain before slipping into unconsciousness.
Far in the distance, a terrible explosion shook the city as the timer reached zero...
A/N:
Hi everyone, sorry I didn't have enough time to add my authors note in before work. This is my first fanfiction and my first try at writing creatively at all really, so it would be much appreciated if you could leave a review with any improvements I can make to the story as I go along with it, for example I can tell my use of dialogue is fairly clumsy. This fic is meant to feature a darker and more selfish Ruby than in most fanfictions, and possibly a Whiterose ship though I've just got to figure out how to make it work within the story. I will do my best to update as quickly as I can without sacrificing chapter quality so bear with me please. Finally, thanks for taking the time out of your day to read this, it's much appreciated as I put a lot of effort into writing this, and I hope it will be well received as I continue updating.
Oh and for anyone who's curious the lyrics used in the chapter are from a band called King 810. If you like a unique style of metal rap give them a play, they're criminally underrated.
Thanks again