Okay, so before this chapter starts, there are a couple of important news I would like to announce, so let's begin, shall we?

As many of you may know right now, Monty Oum, the creator of RWBY, has been hospitalized in critical care and is now receiving the best medical attention possible. If you wish to know about what has happened, please check out Rooster Teeth's forum to read the entire passage as it will include all possible information about the situation. A donation pool and a link to a get well card has been included on the web page, so please do check it out. Described as a man who combined his talents and his initiative of creating something unique together, Monty is a hard worker who dedicated all his time in his series, RWBY. Thus, I wish to take a moment in saying "Get Well Soon Monty!" as he was the one to inspire me in writing this fanfiction. Let's all hope for the best, okay?

Second of all, I'd like to happily announce that this fanfiction has just reached around 5,000 views and more than 30 favourites….I can't express how happy I was to read the statistics. It always fills me heart with content knowing that there are people who enjoy reading my story. So, thanks everyone! I couldn't have done this without you guys!

Finally, I want to ask a question to you readers, okay? So the question is: What do you think of Dynos so far? Do you think I'm trying to hard to make him op and a badass or is he the traditional anti-hero in a story? I would really appreciate your comments and replies on this question, so make sure to hit that review button and let me know what you think!

'Till next time my fellow readers,

-Pyrothemusical

Something to FEAR about

Chapter 9: A gathering of old friends

"...Hmmmm…."

"...Dynos…"

"...So the G string is placed here on the bridge and the D string is placed to its right...Interesting…"

"DYNOS!"

"...Sigh...What is it now?"

"When are the others coming, Dynos? We've been waiting here for around an hour already and I'm starting to get bored!"

"...We have only been waiting for ten minutes…"

"Okay, fine! Regardless, I'm still bored, you know!"

"...They will soon arrive here. You must be patient…Now, the A string is placed right next to the D string and the E string is the last string that is placed on the bridge..."

"Sigh...You really are obsessed with that violin, aren't you?"

"..."

"...I'm going to take your silence as a yes, okay? Besides, we all know that-Oh! They're here, Dynos! Hey guys, glad you could make it!"

11:50 pm. Downtown Vale.

This was a time period where crime was popular amongst the streets of Vale. Without much authority supervision circulating the roads of the daily populated downtown Vale, crime rates were very high and it was not uncommon to spot criminals dealing trades with each other or groups of gangsters moving out together in little packs of 10-20 people. Of course, this did not exclude one of the most notorious crime lords besides the elusive Roman Torchwick and the now deceased Walter Danzo: Amartia Labelle.

She bared light green hair, ironically similar to the same shade of green that artists used to represent one of the seven sins: envy. The strands of hair, however, contrasted her orange eyes and pale skin which glistened in the silver moonlight. Wearing an elegant, strapless black dress accompanied by similar black dress shoes and expensive jewelry, Amartia smirked in satisfaction at the amount of cash she had just succeeded in snatching during her previous heist. She then stretched her arms and lazily jumped into her king sized bed, whistling while listening to her goons outside executing some of her…"disloyal" servants. Money could always replace one of those filthy monkeys, and if her servants dared to disobey one of her simple commands...BAM! They would be dead in 5 minutes.

Still, Amartia sighed in boredom as she crossed her arms behind her head. No matter what she did, she would never be able to catch up to Torchwick, the now number one head criminal wanted in Vale. Thanks to whoever had just killed Danzo a few weeks ago, Amartia now rose to the second most wanted criminal, only a few crimes short than Torchwick. But it seemed that even if she pulled off multiple heists, bribes or even terrorist acts, she would never overcome Torchwick's rank, always one step behind of following his path of crime. It was becoming quite annoying, and she hoped that she would be able to take care of this problem quickly enough. Regardless, Amartia shook off these thoughts and stood up, proceeding to walk towards her bathroom to take a shower. Perhaps she would then take the time to review any other heists that she was interested in….

Or, that would have been the case if she didn't just hear an explosion outside her room, causing the entire room to shake, almost on the verge of collapsing. Amartia was pushed back by the force of the explosion, causing her head to collide against the back of the wall. After a few seconds to recover from the sudden impact, Amartia immediately rushed outside to stare in shock at the scenery before her: broken debris was flying everywhere as everything was either scraped from the explosion or set ablaze by the now searing flames. Dead bodies were everywhere as her remaining goons were cowering behind two armored vehicles that had been flipped over by the impact of the explosion, using the vehicles as shelter from the debris. As Amartia quickly approached her remaining goons, one of them noticed her first and beckoned her to crouch besides the fallen vehicles.

"A-Amartia, we just-"

SLAP! "That's 'my lady' to you, filthy monkey! Don't repeat the same mistake, or I'll stick a bullet inside your clearly damaged brain!"

The goon quickly recovered from the slap and cowered in fear. "Y-Yes my lady! "

Amartia instantly relaxed and turned towards the remaining goons who were trying to seek cover from the raining debris caused by the explosion. Standing above her goons while ignoring the falling debris, she roared, "Alright, what happened now, you idiots?!"

The captain of the goons quickly snapped in attention by saluting in front of Amartia, quickly replying, "My lady, we were executing the 'monkeys' like you've ordered us to when out of nowhere, some kind of sniper started raining bullets on us! He already got 3 of our men and is targeting anything related with explosives! We located his position, but can't approach the sniper's whereabouts yet, so-" However, he didn't get to finish his sentence as a bullet pierced his head, causing his body to suddenly collapse as if it were a machine that had just ran out of power. Amartia and the rest of the goons stared at the corps of the now deceased captain when suddenly the building that Amartia was just in exploded, resulting in the building to catch on fire and collapse into rubble. There was a sudden silence on both sides of the now bloody battlefield when Amartia screamed in rage as she saw all her precious money burn in front of her eyes, "GET THAT BLOODY BASTARD, YOU IDIOTS!"

Her goons immediately obeyed her command as they all took cover in order to lure the sniper out. After a few minutes of absolute silence, their plan had succeeded as they saw shots fired from the rooftops of a once abandoned hotel. Nodding in determination at Amartia who was giving the indication to kill the bastard who had took her precious treasure, the goons quickly swarmed the building and began to climb the long, rotten stairs that would eventually lead to their mystery sniper. It seemed as if it was an eternity to reach the top of the building, but it was eventually done as Amartia's now remaining twenty or so goons positioned themselves in front of the door leading to the rooftop, guns locked and loaded to blast the murderer who had taken the lives of their many comrades. Amartia herself had equipped herself her signature weapons that she used during her many heists: dual flintlock pistols that could use the power of dust to enhance the bullets' power and level of magnitude.

"On the count of three, we burst through the door and annihilate the faggot who dared mess with us…" Amartia muttered darkly as her goons nodded in agreement.

"1…" Two of the goons pressed their bodies against the door to prepare their charge.

"2…" The remaining goons set their weapons upon their "would be" target as the pressure in the stairways now raised to a breaking point.

"...3!" When three was pronounced, the first two goons charged at the door, breaking it in the process while allowing the others to charge towards the rooftop. With the door out of the way, Amartia and her goons prepared their weapons to fire it upon...nothing?

Amartia left her jaw hanging wide open as her goons quickly swept the rest of the rooftop, viewing the entire scenery in search of the enemy. True to their thoughts, the entire rooftop was now empty with no one in plain sight. Not only that, but there was no evident sign that a sniper was here a few minutes ago: no sniper shells, no ammo cartridges, not even smears on the ground indicating that someone was either sitting or standing on the rooftop. Screaming in rage, Amartia bashed the holster of her pistols on the ground in fury as the rest of her goons watched in silence. After a few minutes of thrashing in rage and disbelief, Amartia seemed to recover from her tantrum and wiped the sweat from her brow with her arm, muttering, "...Let's go back down. We should probably leave, anyway…" The rest of the goons nodded and started heading back down the hotel through the stairways when suddenly every person on top of the rooftop could hear faint footsteps approaching from the stairways. Drawing their weapons, two of the goons cautiously opened the door very slowly to reveal….a girl?

That was the first thought that came to Amartia's mind, and she wasn't wrong. Standing in their path was a slim, tall girl with long, purple hair tied with silky, pink ribbons that flowed down her back. The girl wore jade, green robes that covered her entire body along with emerald gloves for her hands. Strapped to her back was what seemed to be a sapphire coloured sniper rifle, meaning…

"YOU'RE OUR MYSTERY ASSASSIN, AREN'T YOU, BITCH!" Amartia suddenly charged at the girl, weapons drawn by her side only to have the girl immediately leap out of the way and landing a few feet away from the group of criminals, pulling out her own weapon in the process. Now that Amartia had a good view of the weapon, it seemed to be a mixture of a sniper rifle and a cross bow, meaning that the weapon could fire both bullets and arrows at its enemies, mixing the two different kinds of projectiles as an offensive strategy. Clenching her teeth in annoyance, she ushered her men forward and screamed, "GET HER, YOU IDIOTS!"

Responding with shouts of determination and agreement, the goons opened fire on the mysterious girl, leaving a cloud of dust to form where the girl was standing. To their surprise, including Amartia's, the girl pulled her sniper rifle out and started continuously firing towards the barrage of bullets, each shot canceling a representative one from the squad of goons. Thus, the girl was able to protect herself until the firing eventually halted, leaving the goons flabbergasted at how the girl, who also appeared to be 20 years younger than them, was able to deflect such a devastating attack. As the group of goons continued to stare in disbelief, the girl smiled while shaking her finger, almost as if she was mocking the goons of their poor shooting. This caused the goons to erupt with anger as each of them took any kind of melee weapons, whether it was a knife, axe or even a sledgehammer and charged at the girl who continued to smile as the group was approaching her position.

However, just before the group of goons had arrived at their target, the girl's grin widened as she reattached her sniper rifle to her back and took two hunting knives out of her robe pockets. Except the strange thing here was not the fact that the hunting knives were inhumanly huge, as they were as long as the blade's length of a katana, but as to why they were glowing a grim, dark green colour that surrounded the entire blade. Grinning in satisfaction at her now open and vulnerable opponents, the girl sprinted towards the group of goons, one knife in each hand, and started spinning like a top ass her enemies approached her. Although it seemed impossible that the girl was able to survive an onslaught like that, Amartia's eyes widened as she stared at the fight that was currently happening right in front of her.

If one were to summarize the fight in a few words, he or she would only need to say one word related to how long the fight took: quick.

Immediately, the girl disappeared inside the group of goons and started hacking and slashing at anything that was near her, regardless if it were her opponents or just their weaponry. What was quite horrifying, however, was the fact that whoever or whatever was hit by her wild attacks started glowing the same green colour that surrounded her hunting knives. This only confused the goons even more as her attacks did not seem to hurt them that much as they had anticipated since her slashes only stung a bit. This emotion was immediately replaced by confidence and hubris as the goons thought that because her attacks did not seem to inflict any sort of pain towards them, they were far more superior in strength and power, resulting in them swinging their own weapons at the girl. This only caused her grin to widen, if it was even humanly possible, as she continued to slash each enemy until the last goon was glowing the grim. dark green that surrounded her hunting knives.

With everything in place, the girl suddenly jumped back from the group of men and sheathed her hunting knives at once. She then pulled her left sleeve, revealing a wrist-mounted mechanism in the process. Pointing the mechanism at the group of men, she brought one of her fingers to her lips, almost as if she was telling them to be quiet, and fired the mechanism.

The bullet instantly pierced the first target it hit, right through the skull. However, to Amartia's surprise and horror, the bullet seemed to suddenly make a 90 degrees turn as it hit the grunt to his left, piercing his heart. Although one could call this luck, it would soon turn into complete confusion as the bullet took down each one of Amartia's goons, striking them down in whatever vital part was open to the bullet. Whether it was the brain, heart, lung, neck, it didn't matter: the shot would instantly kill them. Very soon, there was a heap of bodies surrounding the girl and all that was remaining in the girl's way was Amartia, something that the criminal quickly figured out.

Withdrawing the mechanism, the girl redrew her sniper rifle and aimed it at Amartia. She barely rolled out of the way as the assassin fired, only leaving a bullet hole in the wall that would indicate where she had shot. Hiding behind the wall of the staircases, Amartia quickly regained her breath as she checked that her flintlock pistols were well prepared. Holy crap! she thought as the firing continued, spraying the wall with bullet holes. This girl is gonna kill me if I don't do something! Th-think, dammit! What can you do right now!? After a few seconds of thinking, Amartia finally came up with an idea. If I throw one of these bricks towards her blind spot, she oughta turn towards the direction of the noise! I can use that to my advantage and finally kill that son of a b****! Deciding to go with the plan, Amartia slowly reached out for a brick and waited for the firing to stop. When it did, (Amartia presumed that the wielder of the weapon was reloading) she threw the brick to the girl's right and dashed to the left, weapons in her hands. Yelling in triumph as she saw that the girl turned her head at the brick, she screamed, "IT'S OVER NOW!"

...Ping…

What was supposed to end as a victory to Amartia ended in the complete opposite. Amartia's eyes widened as she felt a bullet pierce her heart, causing her body to immediately collapse in shock and sudden fatigue. Struggling to get up, she saw that the girl was now leaning down towards her, peering through the scope of her sniper rifle. What shocked Amartia though was that she felt the bullet through the back of her body, meaning that there was no way the bullet could have been shot with the girl's weapon. Was there possibly someone else lurking nearby?

It didn't really matter anyway as Amartia coughed out blood due to the injury she had just received. Gazing up to see the girl's smiling face through the scope, a sudden feeling of anger swept into her mind as she suddenly yelled, Y-YOU THINK YOU'LL GET AWAY WITH THIS!? I HAVE POWERFUL FRIENDS, YA KNOW! AND WHEN THEY FIND OUT I'M DEAD, THEY'LL MAKE SURE YOU WISH Y-"

She never got to finish her sentence though as the girl shot an arrow in her eye, killing her instantly and silencing Amartia for good. The girl did not show an ounce of remorse as she slowly got up and observed with interest at the now bloodied weapons in the dead woman's hands. Picking them up, she turned them over a few times before pocketing them into one of the pouches of her robes, one of the single benefits of the spoils of battle.

"Clap, Clap, Clap...Magnificent….If I were to rate that fight by fighting style, beauty and elegance, I would give it cent pour cent…."

Hearing the male, french-accented voice, the girl immediately turned around, weapons pointing at the hooded figure. However, they were then lowered as the girl recognised who was standing in front of her.

"Tsk, Tsk…Ma petite fleur, is this how you greet your fellow comrade, especially since it has been an eternity since we have last-"

The figure did not finish his sentence as the girl suddenly threw her weapons down and leaped at him, her face showing tears of joy with a heart-warming smile accompanied with them. Hugging the figure, she snuggled on top of his gray cloak while the figure tried to escape her grasp. After a few minutes of struggling, he finally sighed and chuckled, "Alright! Alright! I give, okay? If we are going to do this, at least let me get up first, d'accord?"

The girl nodded as she got off of the figure and helped the hooded figure to stand up, grinning in process. The figure made sure nothing was broken before sighing and taking off his hood and cloak. "It has been awhile, Ryfia…."

Ryfia merely smiled as she took a second to absorb his appearance. Much to her surprise, nothing had really changed about his physical appearance, even though their last meeting was five years ago. Although his face had changed a bit since the last time she saw her, the figure still had his black eyes with the fancy, short, black hair. He was still wearing his signature, black sharp suit along with the same coloured dress pants, portraying a stylish and elegant background. Along with his grey gloves and black dress shoes, one would think that the figure had came from a rich bloodline as everything about him sparkled fanciness. However, what completely stood out of atmosphere were his weapons. Attached to his side were two dual grey scythes wrapped together with metal chains, each the size of a regular sword. Glistening in the moonlight, both scythe's blade were forged into the shape of a crescent, very useful in case the wielder wished to decapitate his enemy's head. Of course, they were anything but simple dual scythes as they also had the ability to drain its targets lifeforce, leeching it through the blades and transferring it back to its wielder, making sure that he/she would never tire out.

Brushing off whatever remaining dust that was left on him, the figure finally looked back and smiled, beckoning Ryfia into a hug. She smiled back and immediately complied as the two of them embraced each together, enjoying each other's presence. Kissing her forehead, the figure said, "...I missed you for a long time, Ryfia…"

Ryfia merely nodded when she heard his voice and snuggled deeper into his arms. After a few moments of peace and quiet, the two of them looked at each other once more before slowly closing the space between them, their lips barely touching….when the figure suddenly put a finger on Ryfia's lips. Slowly withdrawing out of Ryfia's grasp, the figure froze before walking towards the edge of the roof. Followed by a confused Ryfia, the two of them peered down and reacted in completely different ways: Ryfia instantly blushing at who she saw and the other figure clutching the bridge of his nose before muttering, "Mon dieu...Was it really necessary to spy on us, Elizabeth?"

A light giggle could be heard as another figure jumped towards the roof, landing on both of her feet. "But of course, Alexander...It is necessary to keep a 'tab' on every single movement that you two make….After all, he has assigned me to do so, has he not…"

Standing before the pair was another girl with pale, white skin, short, white hair and bright, yellow eyes. She was dressed in a silky, blue dress and short, grey leggings. An interesting fact was that the same colour matched her own blue gloves and boots, almost making it seem as if she was painted entirely in blue paint. In her hand was some sort of leather book, completely sealed tight with metal straps along with a few cards sticking out of the pages of the book. Exchanging glances between the flustered girl and the teenager who was now groaning out loud, she added, "Of course, I knew he was just kidding….I merely wished to see your reactions to my statement…"

This caused Ryfia to widen her eyes at the statement at starting to gesture rapid hand signs, signifying her anger at Elizabeth for not telling them about this sooner. After taking a few seconds to understand her message, Elizabeth simply laughed before saying, "But what did you expect of me, Ryfia? I am always curious of observing what you two do...in private…"

Ryfia blushed even harder at her response and before they knew it, the two of them were playfully fighting each other. Alexander simply watched the two fight for a few seconds before suddenly appearing between the two girls and held the two apart in each hand. "Alright, enough of this child play, alright? If we are to argue about this, we shall do this after our leader has returned. Are we allowed to come to this agreement?"

And so time passed. Elizabeth sat against the wall and read her book while Alexander and Ryfia talked with each other, although it was mainly Alexander doing the talking. Ryfia was simply listening and nodding at his words, occasionally producing a few gestures to give an answer to his questions. This went on for a few minutes before the three of them suddenly flinched as if there was someone else nearby…

"...Oh my...I do believe our leader is approaching here very quickly…" Elizabeth murmured as she closed her book. "...Do you two sense him as well?"

The other nodded as Alexander stood up, taking a cigarette out of his pocket. Lighting it, he watched the smoke unravel from the cigarette butt before asking, "...Out of all of us, I think he has changed the most. Do you not agree with me?"

Ryfia simply gestured a few hand signs before giving a thumbs up. Analysing her gestures, Alexander chuckled as he extinguished the cigarette with his glove. "I guess that is true, mon cheri. He has felt the most pain out of all of us, especially since what happened to-"

There was the sudden sound of footsteps approaching the rooftop, causing the three of them to draw their respective weapons towards the source of the noise. However, they immediately relaxed when they saw who was standing in front of them.

"...I am glad that all of you could make it here in such short notice," The figure said before stepping out of the shadows and taking off his cloak. "...It has been a long time since team FEAR has assembled together, has it?"

"But of course!" Elizabeth exclaimed as she placed her book on her lap. "And what better way to celebrate our reunion than to finally meet each other after these couple of years! I can not express how content I am that you are still alive, leader!"

The figure smirked at her remark. "...You out of all people should know that I am not that easy to kill, Elizabeth…"

"Mais bien sûr!" Alexander chuckled as he crossed his arms together. "Why would we doubt our leader, the same person who granted us our amazing skills and powers!"

The figure sighed with a hint of annoyance before muttering,"...I do not know how many times we must repeat this, but I thought it was clear to all of you. Still, I shall repeat this again: The three of you must understand that I was not the one who granted your powers, but it was your potential that enabled all of you to unlock your own hidden skills by yourselves…Honestly, you will give me a headache if we were to continue this argument..."

Ryfia rolled her eyes and was about to gesture her signature hand signs when she was stopped by Alexander. Pausing for a few seconds, he sighed and said, "Very well, we shall talk about that later on. Before we are side tracked once again, I believe that you wanted to request our assistance with something, Dynos?"

Dynos bowed in appreciation before taking off his mask, revealing his bloody, red eyes. Looking at each of his combat partners, he repeated his previous statement,"...Once again, I must thank all of you for coming in such persistence. I wish to discuss our thoughts regarding the obstacles that will now stand in our path to victory….especially regarding with team RWBY and Project Machination..."

End of Chapter 9….