The strange Drop Ship that had come to pick them up now contained all witches alongside their rescuee and this 'Qrow'. Minna looked on as, outside, Constantia flew beside them utilizing her IAD-80 to maintain herself close. The damned Striker Unit model was one of the best the Witches had at the time. High mobility, high load carry capability and useful to heavy weapons operators like Constantia herself. Night had also begun to settle around them, so it became inherent to reach this 'Beacon' place in time.
"What're you doing, C.C?!" Yelled Minna. Constantia gave her a thumbs up with a wide grin, then flew up into the sky, higher than the ship. Qrow looked to Minna and asked "Err... What's Catgirl doing?" A bit worried himself. Minna shrugged, as confused as everyone. She looked to Sanya, who looked outward toward the other side, standing up with her Fliegerhammer in hand and her magic antennae floating by her head, with Eila beside her, MG42 in-hand.
"Sanya?! What's wrong?!" Yelled Mio, worried. The Orussian girl pointed ahead, toward a group of fliers, which Qrow and Amber recognized. Black birds, resembling massive crows flew toward them. They had bone-like armor protecting their heads, but no other part of their bodies and they flew fairly fast toward them. The girls drew their weapons and steadied them, while Qrow and Amber looked at them, a bit surprised. Qrow yelled "What the hell are you girls doing?!"
Before one of the strange birds managed to engage them, Constantia's Panzerbuchse thundered from the sky as she dove toward the targets. The shot penetrated the creature's back skin, making it lose altitude. Bits of feathers and torn meat fell from the creature as the woman banked upward, leaving a contrail of smoke behind her. She turned around and, while flying in one direction, aimed her AT Rifle toward the creatures following her. She'd managed to distract them from attacking the ship. Bleeding perfect! She scoped in another one and, as it opened its break, she fired one of her HE shots. The round tore through the inside of the creature and exploded right in the middle, tearing it in half.
Gunfire echoed from the Gunship as well, as bullets flew past the creatures. Green, red and white tracers struck the backs of the creatures as the Witches adjusted their aim. God bless she had the Strike Witches with her. Kept the creatures busy while she scoped in a way to kill them. Well, that didn't mean they wouldn't fight back... Constantia found herself dodging a massive quill-like spear that flew right by her. Those damn things threw them toward her as their eyes shined bright red. She aimed her PzBh again and fired, to which a bird dodged.
"Your friend's gonna get herself killed!" Yelled Amber, looking at the girl flying high. She peeled away and veered up into the sky, higher and higher as the birds attempted to follow her. They threw quill after quill toward her, like fully-automatic MGs. The girl withdrew her MG34 from her back, cocked it and aimed it, then yelled "TIMBER!" As she pressed the trigger. A staccato symphony of rounds lit up the sky, some hitting true, right into the creatures' fleshy bits, others bouncing off their thick skull plates and many missing. The girl heard her engine sputter... She'd reached maximum climb height.
Perfect...
She threw her Striker Unit and legs upward, effectively turning herself around utilizing the momentum and, now facing the ground, she then boosted herself ahead at full speed as the engines regained power. She slung her weapon on her back and activated her shields, powering a multi-layered, drill-like system of Glyphs. The first creature, she caught dead with its beak open and went through, tearing through bone and black meat, splitting it in half. It fell from the sky as the girl immediately turned around, drew her MG34 again and opened fire toward the others, gutting through one as it turned its head. Three bullets tore through its beak and brain, allowing it to lose its ability to move. It fell from the sky, leaving two more to deal with.
She immediately heard the thunder of a speedy engine and looked beside her, to see, surprise, surprise, the Liberion, Shirley, flying with her and grinned. "Took your time, Liberion." Constantia berated mockingly, grin withstanding, to which Shirley smirked and said "Sorry. Couldn't land a good speed record 'till I made the mods." smugly as she cocked her BAR. "Shall we, Dacian?"
Constantia maxed her IAD's speed and looked back, then yelled "Try to keep up, Yankee!" with a sly grin. Shirley grinned too, then increased the magic flow into her engine. The propellers began to spin faster and faster as she throttled to the max, then pushed ahead toward Constantia, opening fire. The girls immediately matched speed and Shirley started overtaking Constantia, both girls firing their weapons out at the Grimm that threw quills at them. The damned things missed, left to right and up to down, no matter how the birds tried, they couldn't score a good hit on the girls... Shirley looked toward Constantia as she left the Dacian in the dust, then smirked and said "KEEPING UP, NO PROBLEM! OVERTAKING YOU, EASY! NOW, YOUR TURN, CANTACUZINO! GAS, GAS, GAS!"
Constantia grinned, cocked her MG34 and yelled to her new-found pal quite jovially "RACE YA TO BEACON AFTER THIS!" Then maxed her engine throttle into WEP...
Qrow, from aboard the vehicle, watched as the youngest of the crew of girls there, Lucchini, cheered her friend, Shirley, on. The girl jumped up and down with no pants on, basically revealing her southern hemisphere and her striped underwear. The man covered his eyes and looked away, then mumbled to himself "Oum forbid, we need to get these girls uniforms that fit their 'Striker Units'..." To Amber, who nodded, eyes locked onto Eila's ass. The Fall Maiden covered her eyes, blushing, then said to Qrow "Preferably something with Combat Skirts or something, to allow them to be mobile... But seeing such amounts of ass... I thought it was only possible at the clubs in Vacuo..."
Qrow chuckled, then said "At least these girls have the decency to wear tops..." with a hint of disdain. Amber punched him in the shoulder, uncovered her eyes and looked ahead at the air battle ensuing as night time finally settled around them. The starlit sky was covered by 4 silhouettes and emerald and red stars crisscrossed patterns into its background, alongside dark blades that flew through the air in the exchange of projectiles.
The two girls synced, going back to back as they fired away, going up into the sky. Their silhouettes went against the Remnant Moon, which was in a stage where it could be fully seen. The witch-girls looked to each other and Cantacuzino winked, Shirley nodding. The two pushed themselves away from each-other at full throttle, diving toward their intended targets. Shirley dropped her half-empty 40-round mag and loaded her 35-round HE magazine, which she'd marked with a red tape, and opened fire. What looked like small bouts of flak exploded around the enemy bird. The explosions were concentrated center-mass, tearing meat and feathers off the creature. A quill it launched flew toward Shirley, implanting itself in her shield, then dropping out of it as the girl let it go. She grinned as she stopped mid air, dropped her empty HE mag and loaded in an experimental AP mag. She cocked the feeding bolt of the browning back and accelerated toward the creature's skull.
Dodging its close-range beak attack, the girl grinned as she scoped in its right eye, that looked exactly like a bright-red bullseye back at base, then opened fire. AP Rounds peppered the creature's head, cracking the bone-like plate and destroying some red symbols in it, whose shine died the moment the first bullet hit the eye, going through its skull. It screamed in pain as it collapsed, its shine disappearing. It turned hard and crashed into the ground. Shirley cocked her head toward Constantia, who was performing a combat roll just in the middle of dodging a quill.
Constantia maxed her engines again and drew her PzBchs, flying above and firing three of the five rounds she still had in her magazine, right into the bird's stomach. Another quill launched by it flew so close to Cantacuzino's head it nicked a bit of hair off the side. The girl looked at it, a bit horrified, then scowled and said "I just had it done right..." As she withdrew her MG34 and loaded the experimental AP rounds and fired, emptying her mag with a proud battle cry. Bullet after bullet tore through the creature's gut at incredibly close range. It screamed in pain and tried to fly away, but the girl kept up with it, firing more and more lead into its wounded abdomen. It was leaking some sort of blackish substance. Its lifeblood, seeping through its pores.
She twirled her weapon around, taking it by the barrel after running out of rounds, and flew above it, powering her magic for a good strike. She flew higher than the creature, wrapped her other hand around the gun's barrel, raised the weapon over her head and, with all her might and a bit of magic, brought it down as a mace upon the creature's skull, striking and breaking the bone plate. In the hole left by the weapon's butt stock, the woman pushed her Luger Pilot's pistol in, then pressed twice. Two gunshots and splashes of goop on her gun and arm, a testament to a perfect strike...
The creature fell...
Qrow and Amber had to pick up their jaws from the floor after seeing what the girl just did, whilst the Witches, beside them, cheered both girls on. Shirley saluted, then went beside Cantacuzino and threw an arm over her shoulder, grinning. "First round of drinks is on me when we get to Beacon and anywhere near a bar, Buzz-girl." To which Cantacuzino smiled, then said "We're still on for that race, right? Oh, wait..." She looked back, then yelled "LUCCHINI! FLY HERE, NOW! We're doing a three-way race to Beacon!"
The Romagnan pilot smiled, then ran toward her Striker Unit, put it on and flew out, gun slung on her back with a wide grin. She caught onto Shirley's chest, then said "I'm here!" with as odd a smile as she could give, squeezing... Cantacuzino watched, half horrified, half ready to burst into laughter as she watched Shirley not giving a single damn about her younger friend doing that. She rubbed the back of her head.
Qrow, about as jawdropped as before, watched the girls interact, then looked to Minna and asked worriedly "I-Is that how those two tend to be?!"
"Aye." Minna nodded, smiling. "Lucchini is a kid and Shirley's... Well, she's Shirley. Don't worry about them though. They're just playing." She waved it off and walked beside the other witches, to watch the race ensuing ahead of them. Barkhorn and Hartmann were both watching, with the former berating the other for taking bets from everyone else, while Minna encouraged her by giving her a pair of silver coins for Shirley, with Barkhorn sighing deeply and, defeated, handing her two silver coins for
Qrow and Amber watched them, the latter surprised by the girls while the former was merely getting used to the thought by drowning it in alcohol(As he usually did) and Amber poked Qrow's shoulder, then, upon the old man looking at her, she asked weakly "Can I have a chug... I think I'm gonna need it after seeing this." And Qrow sighed, looking at his flask, then said "Well... You're a minor and all, still... But... Ah, for Oum's sakes, one sip won't hurt." sympathetically and he handed it over. The girl took a big chug, swallowed, coughed and handed the flask back to Qrow, who looked inside it, shrugged and took another sip.
"Oum save us all... If Ozpin thinks of doing what I think he's gonna do for them..." Qrow thought to himself as he drowned himself in alcohol, exhaling. He knew Ozpin may try to induct them into Beacon before year's start, most likely make them part of his little circle of friends. If not them, at the very least, the squad's commander, that Wilcke girl. He shook his head, to clear the alcohol confusion, then took a seat beside Amber, who had passed out thanks to the sudden induction of Alcohol into her system. He grinned, chuckled, then said "Rest easy, Amber. We're gonna be home soon."
