For a moment, Weiss didn't react. Who cared where the massive boulder blocking the tunnel came from? It was a problem, and by Dust she was going to solve it and get them out of here. She half-processed what Blake was saying and turned, "What?"
She caught the panicked look in the dark-haired girl's amber eyes, the unnatural stillness of her partner in her arms. Her partner.
In three quick steps Weiss was fumbling at Ruby's collar, searching for a pulse. She didn't feel one, but the angle she was trying to work at was more than awkward. Probably she just had the wrong spot. If her hands would quit shaking maybe she would be able to find it. "She's probably just... here, I can't tell. Put her on the ground."
Throwing a knowing glance at Weiss, Blake complied, gently laying Ruby on the ground. She sat back a little, keeping hold of one of Ruby's hands while allowing the heiress to tend to her partner. Too exhausted to even think about crying, she simply held Ruby's hand, grasping it firmly, as if to keep her tethered to them somehow.
An artery just beneath the jaw. That's where you were supposed to check for a pulse. Weiss swept the white hair that tumbled over her shoulder out of the way so she could see what she was doing. Ruby's eyes were closed, her skin wasn't yet cool to the touch. She definitely didn't have a pulse. Maybe if she tried at her wrist instead? That was another place you could check. She took the hand Blake wasn't holding and pressed her fingers to the inside of her partner's wrist. Nothing. The heiress pressed her ear to the girl's chest. Still nothing.
No breathing. No heartbeat. There was a raw edge of panic to Weiss's thinking, but seconds were precious now. She pinched Ruby's nose, lifted her chin, took a fast breath, and sealed the younger girl's lips with her own.
First this, then chest compressions. Or was that reversed? She didn't have time to try and remember.
Come on, Ruby. Weiss took another breath and leaned back in, her own heart pounding in her ears. Breathe.
"Whoa!" Jaune stumbled backwards, dodging the Grimm's whipping tail more by virtue of luck than skill. He swung Crocea Mors at the creature's face as it came around. The rat dodged back, baring teeth longer than Jaune's arm. He paled, bringing his shield up to fend off a swipe of its claws. The force of the Grimm's blow made him skid a handful of feet towards the edge of the cavern. His voice cracked as he yelled to Professor Goodwitch, "Professor, please keep doing that thing with the purple and the rocks!"
"Incoming!" came a shout from above. He didn't know what was happening till a streak of silver smote down on the Grimm's skull. The giant rat dropped, its brain pummeled into mush. In the moment of relative calm that followed, Nora gave her team leader a bright grin, "Hey Jaune! How's it going?"
"Uh..." The blond young man swallowed thickly, watching the leaves all around shift and rise, signaling the emergence of another half-dozen rats.
Professor Goodwitch scowled darkly at the rats flooding up from below. Rocks would be too slow, for multiple large targets like this she needed a storm and she needed one now. She mentally sped through the varieties of dust she had on hand. Ice - too indiscriminate. Fire - same problem. Her eyes lit up. Lightning.
A purple glow surrounded her as she flung a ball of energy from her riding crop into the sky. It erupted into more concentric purple rings of unreadable script, which slowly dissolved into enormous storm clouds. Lightning crackled within them. Glynda called to her students with one simple command, "Stay on the ground." With that, she swept her arm back and downwards, calling fierce bolts of electricity that raced towards the tallest targets they could find - the Grimm Rats.
Jaune and Nora hit the dirt, screaming as the lightning crackled down. Well, maybe Jaune screamed. Nora watched the white-hot bolts of electricity fry the Grimm left and right, singing the fur right off of them, or just catching it on fire. Many of the trees surrounding the spot met the same fate. The stench of smoke and burning hair filled the clearing.
Glynda smiled at the mayhem around her. Lighting always was one of her favorites. The smile left her face as even more rats flooded upwards, bursting forth from new tunnels, replacing the fallen as quickly as she felled them. The ground beneath her began to crumble. All these blasted tunneling rats were ruining the structural integrity of the area. She darted forward, calling out yet another command. "Fall back to the trees!"
"Trees, right," Jaune picked his way across sections of quickly disintegrating landscape, rats snapping at his jean cuffs. Nora bounded across islands of steady ground, sending batches of red leaves scattering in her wake. Half of his team was still down in the cavern. Pyrrha and Ren down in that boiling mass of black and red Grimm rats... Jaune's stomach turned as he hacked at the eye of a monster trying to drag him down by shield. On the bright side, they were at least distracting some of the rats.
Glynda dispelled her storm, leaping from a rat's head up into the treetops. With a flick of her riding crop, long purple lines snaked forth, spearing every Grimm in their path below her. Steadying herself in the tree, she paused to scan the horizon. Her smile returned. Two airships loomed in the distance. Reinforcements were coming.
Ren sprinted as quietly as he was able, for what felt like eons. He kept an ear out for anything lurking behind the tunnels not marked by the guiding light of what he hoped was a line that lead directly to team RWBY. Rounding another bend, he screeched to a sudden halt. As if the fates had heard his plea, there before him were three of team RWBY's members. Blake and Weiss sat hunched over Ruby. His eyes traveled from Blake, bandaged and clearly dazed, over to Ruby, capeless, weaponless, and motionless on the floor, then to Weiss… kissing Ruby?
At a loss for words, he stated simply, "I found you." Blake's head snapped up, staring at him as if he were a winged banana. A pause. He noted Yang's absence. "...Most of you."
Weiss disengaged and blinked, then snarled at the young man in green, "Don't just stand there. She's not breathing. Help us!"
There was an ominous tremor, and bits of dirt sprinkled down from the roof of the tunnel.
Everything clicked. Without a word, Ren dropped to Ruby's side, gently ushering Blake out of the way. The Faunus shifted over to kneel next to Weiss, eyes trained on her green clad classmate. He reached around and carefully placed his left hand near the center Ruby's chest, before placing his right hand slightly lower down on her left side. He shut his eyes in concentration.
Blake watched her team leader's body jump lightly beneath Ren's hands once, twice. With a start, she realized he was using his aura to jump-start her - like a human defibrillator. Was that even possible? Ren pulled his hands away. In a brief second of despair Blake wondered if he'd given up. Then, she heard it, the most wonderful sound she'd heard all day - a weak cough. She gripped Weiss's arm.
After ducking into a nearby tunnel and narrowly avoiding a Grimm rat lumbering past her towards the cavern she'd just come from, Pyrrha continued speeding down the lit path, shield and spear at the ready. She stopped when she reached a peculiar area. A cave-in had crushed a good few rats, another quite headless rat sat in pieces, its head smiling up at its own body, and a huge section of the entire tunnel was covered in solid ice. All except for one opening – it looked as though it had been shattered with brute force.
Pyrrha approached the opening slowly. Adrenaline surged through her at the sight that greeted her as she peered around the corner. A Grimm rat's face, not more than inches from her own, but very much dead. A long jagged impossibly deep gash ran from the corner of the beast's mouth clear down to the end of its haunches, nearly splitting it in two. Something about the sight struck her as ominous.
Still, the icy trail continued on past the Grimm, so she strode past it without a second thought – right into another. This one had a gash running from its eye socket, all the way down its back, its whole body split open like a melon. The redheaded huntress leaned past the carcass to better see down the tunnel's entirety. There was a trail of them, each more gruesome than the last. A trail of destruction that coincided with the frosted path she was intent to follow.
Gripping her shield and spear a little tighter, Pyrrha continued down the tunnel.
After a while, she noticed arrows carved into the ground that coincided with the trail of ice and dead mangled Grimm. They pointed straight in the direction she was headed, so at least she knew she was going the right way! She stopped when a particularly large Grimm rat carcass blocked her path through the tunnel – this one's face had been split in two, vertically. Suppressing a shudder, Pyrrha leaped over the body, landing at the opening of a four-way split.
The trail ended abruptly. She stopped cold. There, sitting cross-legged directly in the middle of the four paths, was Yang. The blonde, practically turned strawberry blonde by the innumerable streaks of red in her hair, looked as though she had been through a meat grinder. She didn't seem to notice the intrusion, remaining motionless, eyes downcast, gaze fixed on the large weapon in her lap - Crescent Rose.
Pyrrha took a tentative step towards the battered huntress. "...Yang?"
Yang's head snapped up, hope briefly flashing in her eyes before immediately shattering, leaving the amethyst orbs hollow and dead. "...Pyrrha."
Dread took hold of the redheaded huntress. "Where is the rest of your team?"
Torment. That was the only word Pyrrha could find to describe the look Yang was giving her now. The brawler brought a hand to her blood-smeared face, features twisting in anguish.
"The Grimm... I couldn't..." her voice faltered, "…my sister..."
Yang felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up. Pyrrha knelt beside her, offering a solemn, understanding gaze. Yang dropped her bloodshot eyes back down at Crescent Rose. Pyrrha heard no sobbing, but she felt the brawler's shoulders shaking all the same.
Ruby's weak cough turned into a stronger one, racking her whole body till she struggled partway up on one elbow on her side. Weiss scrambled sideways onto Blake as Ruby retched, emptying a not-insignificant amount of bile where the heiress's lap had been a moment before.
The newly-revived team leader rubbed her face with her sleeve and groaned, "Ugh... whoa... I'm... not feeling super good, guys. Wha-?" she fell back as Weiss leaned over her suddenly, laying a hand on her forehead, then on her neck, "Uh...?"
The heiress waited, counting. Her partner's pulse was still uneven, and not terribly strong, but it was there and she was breathing. Two good things. Weiss withdrew her hand, her relief manifesting in the form of what could have been a truly blistering lecture: "Ruby Rose, don't ever do that again or so help me I'll... I'll..." she flushed, unable to come up with a threat that made any sense. Instead, she got up and crossed her arms over her chest, avoiding the others' gazes. "Just... let's get out of here."
"Um, okay," Ruby's voice came out raspy and awful sounding. She tried to clear it, but it took too much effort and her head was still feeling really weird for some reason. Also, why was Weiss mad at her exactly? She'd figure it out later. For now, everyone was lit with the pale blue light coming from Myrtenaster's blade- Weiss, Blake, and... Lie Ren?
"Where's Yang?" Ruby glanced around at the rock and dirt tunnel walls, "And... are we underground?"
Blake reached over and took Ruby's hands, squeezing them tightly in her own. "Ruby, you don't feel well because you've been poisoned. Yes we are underground, and we're trying to get you out of here to medical help," she paused "Yang is..." A sinking feeling swept over her. She hadn't seen her partner since falling through the surface into this hellish place. Blake turned to Ren with questioning eyes. His presence down here was a mystery. What was team JNPR doing here? Did Yang have something to do with it? Had he seen her?
Ruby looked at Blake's hands, holding hers tightly, then at her teammate's bloodied face and bandaged head. Her bow was missing, and her kitty ears had that uncertain half-perked, half-pinned look, and she was almost as pale as milk. Or well, in the light her skin was blue, and kind of covered with streaks of blood and dirt, but she was still pale.
Ruby pulled one hand free and patted her arm reassuringly, "Alright, we'll figure it all out later but for now let's go, okay? You look probably as bad as me," she glanced down at herself, "... maybe minus the throw-up. I'm also not really sure if I can actually walk, so..."
A small smile worked its way across Blake's face. She relaxed a bit, ears perking slightly, happy to see Ruby lucid and speaking again. "I'm sure I look terrible."
Finally released from the raven-haired huntress's searing gaze, Ren stood, turning his own gaze towards the rock that blocked the tunnel ahead of them. Two strides took him right up to it - the solid composition and red leaves beneath it a telltale sign that it had likely fallen here from Nora's initial... remodeling, of the cavern. He paused, considering whether to reveal the brief encounter he'd had with Yang.
It didn't seem like the best idea to tell Ruby what he'd seen of her sister right at this moment, lest she panic and undo the good he'd just done, or worse - she could flat out refuse to leave Yang behind. Uncertain, he opted for changing the subject. Placing his hand to the rock, pink eyes drifted to Weiss. "Is this the way out?"
"It used to be," Weiss scrubbed at her eyes with the back of her wrist. Ugh, she must have gotten some dust in them or... or something. "I assume you've come across an alternate route," the shake in her voice annoyed her, so she snapped at the huntsman-in-training, "Why are you even down here anyway? Where's the rest of your team?"
There was a tremendous rumbling from the earth above their heads, and loads of dirt began to drop from the ceiling.
Ren shifted sideways, avoiding both Weiss's irritated gaze and a particularly large clot of dirt falling from the ceiling. Pink eyes glanced upwards. If the rats were swarming above ground in the same vast numbers as he'd seen them in the cavern, they didn't have much time before this entire area collapsed under the weight. Striding back to Ruby's side, he gave Weiss the briefest explanation possible as he helped Blake bring Ruby to her feet again.
"We saw explosions in the sky and came to investigate. Jaune and Nora are above, Pyrrha is in the tunnels." A large chunk of the ceiling crashed to the ground behind him. Ren motioned back down the tunnel. "The alternate route is this way."
"Obviously," Weiss scowled in response to Ren's last statement. Honestly, they were at a dead end: the only possible direction they could go was back the way they'd come.
"Like I said, guys, let's go," Ruby staggered between Blake and Ren, an arm slung over each of their shoulders. The wound in her leg throbbed so badly she could feel it in her fingertips. Aside from that, she felt kind of empty, like she'd been turned inside out and back again. It was hard to stay focused, and her vision kept doing this thing where everything seemed to be sliding to the left. She leaned on Blake a little more to compensate while she struggled to stay on her feet. "Weiss, can you light the way? Blake, ouch, sorry, ow...blech."
Weiss watched her team leader shake her head and wipe sweat and dirt off on her sleeve. Ren's little 'jump-start' seemed to have rejuvenated Ruby's aura a bit. Had her system managed to metabolize most of the toxin? Or was she just going to deteriorate all over again once her aura ran low? There was no sense in waiting to find out.
"Well, you heard her. We need to get above ground before this whole place decides to fall apart," the heiress exchanged a glance with Lie Ren, her ice-blue eyes demanding only that he tell her when to leave her trail of frost before she turned on her heel and set off up the tunnel, Myrtenaster casting its constant blue glow along their path.
Pyrrha had no idea how long she sat together in silence with Yang. She wanted to give the girl in front of her all the time she needed. It was an unfathomable loss for the readheaded huntress. Friends, family, an entire team stripped down to one lone survivor. Movement from the blonde broke her from her thoughts.
With a deep breath and a long sigh, Yang finally rose shakily to her feet. Gripping Crescent Rose in one hand, she offered Pyrrha a small smile that came nowhere near reaching her empty eyes. "We should go."
The walk back to the meeting point was slow, and quiet. Pyrrha stole occasional glances at the dispirited brawler walking beside her. She wasn't sure what to say to her - whether she should say anything at all. She noticed Yang flexing her left hand, experimentally lifting her hole-riddled arm and twisting it around.
"Is your arm ok?"
"Yeah, I'll liv-" the brawler's face contorted suddenly, whether from the poor wording choice or pain Pyrrha couldn't tell. "...It's fine," a forced smile, "Just weak."
They lapsed back into silence. Not long after, they arrived at the giant X marking the tunnel that lead to the caverns. Tired amethyst eyes met green in a vaguely questioning gaze.
"This is where we're supposed to meet with Ren." A vicious tremor shook the area, knocking bits of dirt and rock from the ceiling. Pyrrha tried to look down the path Ren had taken, but it curved away sharply not more than 20 feet in. Multiple smaller tremors began shaking the earth around them. In hindsight, splitting up might not have been the best idea. Pyrrha whispered to no one in particular, "Come on, Ren..."
A/N: This is Fiercesomest checking in real quick to say that while I may have been the one to choose where the chapter breaks are (and thus where the cliffhangers happen), DEFENESTRATOR is the one who wrote the part where Ruby quit breathing. Holy cow, when I got that post my heart almost stopped.
So who's the fiendish fiend now, huh, Defenestrator?
(Actually, it may still be me for making everyone experience the same thing I did... hm... oh well.)
Also YANG.
Just saying.
Also, I hear there's been some kind of issue accessing chapter 6? Is that still going on? Maybe fanfiction is just doing something weird. Bleah.
Anyway, Fiercesomest out.