May contain side effects
Chapter 9:
Out of time
A man strolled through the streets of the business district in Vale. He wore a hood that concealed part of his face, making it difficult for onlookers to recognise him.
He smiled as he observed the busy looking people who passed him. It was past 5 o'clock and most of them were going home from their jobs. The hooded stranger liked this part of town - so many rich marks ripe for the picking. That and the fact that most of them were too busy or too tired to even notice him snatching away their hard-earned cash.
It was a paradise for thieves like himself, the parades of people made it simply too easy to hide from the cops.
Pulling his bag from his shoulder, he opened the zipper and looked inside. Today's catch had been great, it was certainly enough to live from for the next few weeks, but he was wondering if he should treat himself for once. 'I could use a new television, or should I get a new laptop? Man, my friends were right, there are so many things to choose from when you have enough money!' One thing was for certain at least, he would go to his favorite club to meet up with his friends and fellow thieves. The establishment was owned by an infamous man named Hei Xiong, but everyone called him Junior, or boss if you worked for him.
While he was pondering over whether or not he should treat them as a form of celebration for his abundant catch, he passed the only Dust store in the area: From Dust till Dawn. Any other day he would have passed the store without even glancing at it, it wasn't like he needed Dust nor had he the money for it. He didn't even consider robbing the store as the shopkeeper was an old man. He never stole from the elderly, especially if it was obvious it was hard for them to get by. Even a thief had standards.
This time he did take a look at the store however, as something had caught his eye. He had seen a peculiar flash of yellow through the crowd.
When he stopped and looked he noticed it was a blonde girl casually leaning against the wall of the store. She looked totally out of place as she wore a pair of shorts and a tan vest. He had to admit she looked gorgeous as her clothing did little to nothing to hide her broad figure or her significant bust.
That's when he realized she was holding a snow white and very expensive looking purse. The distinctive logo of the Schnee household was embroidered on the front.
'Schnee? Interesting, I doubt this blonde girl is related to the Schnee family whatsoever. Why does she have that purse? It doesn't matter, I'm pretty sure I just hit the jackpot!'
He came closer and observed the girl once more. He realized her eyes were closed which made him celebrate internally. This was going to be the easiest catch ever! Was the girl asleep?
Deciding to use one of the oldest tricks in the book, he began staring inside of the shop like something caught his attention. It made people less suspicious as to why he was standing so close to them and made them relax. In his past experience the trick had worked every time.
It seemed it would be even easier than it normally was as it looked like the blonde hadn't even noticed him coming closer. He saw a particularly shining Dust gem on display and stared intently at it. That's what he wanted her to think however, he was actually observing her in the corner of his eye.
'Just got to wait for the right moment…'
The density of the crowd seemed to lessen a bit, creating the perfect gap to escape.
'Now!'
All of a sudden the man moved. He snatched the purse out of the blonde's limp fingers, closed the zipper and was already running through the gap before the girl had even time to realize what happened.
The thief was fast, and he knew it. After all if you weren't fast, you weren't cut out for his form of work. People flashed by him but didn't spare him a glance - after all - these businessmen and women only care about their own money. He could hear a faint cry in the background, the blonde must have realized she was missing something. It didn't matter, he was long gone.
When the man arrived at the end of the street he stopped for a minute to catch his breath. He decided to take a glance at the street to see if the girl was following him, although the chances weren't in her favor, he was really fast after all.
He didn't see the blonde, much to his expectation, but instead he heard screams of people, multiple people. His eyes widened as he saw a massive fireball coming towards him.
'What is-' But his thoughts were cut short as he noticed the blonde he stole from not even a minute ago in the middle of the giant ball of fiery death.
'You've got to be fucking kidding me!'
As the walking manifestation of Hell itself inched closer and closer the man decided to get the hell out of there and run for his life. Traversing through the people who dove for cover as soon as they saw the fire speeding towards them, he could feel the soaring heat of the flames behind him. The blonde was catching up by the minute.
Moving through the crowds proved to be useless for him as they were hindering him more than the crazy girl tailing him. He saw a possible escape in the form of a deserted alley which was blocked off by a fence.
Taking a sharp turn he hurried into the alley and began skillfully climbing onto the fence while holding onto the purse with one hand. He had learned some parkour tricks from a friend of his and while he almost never used them, he was certainly happy he was able to pull them off right now.
Leaping over the fence and into the alley on the other side, he couldn't help but smile a little. 'Surely she won't follow me so easily here.' He decided to stop running for just a moment and take a glance at the rusty fence behind him.
He wished he hadn't.
The blonde didn't climb over the fence to follow him; she simply melted straight through it. "Fuck me…" the man whispered, his eyes wide in shock.
The girl on fire stopped a few feet away from him. She simply looked at him and snarled mercilessly, flames licking around her body.
That's when the man could see her eyes, they were red. Blood red. He swore he just wet himself a little.
The girl who looked like she came from the depths of the underworld began moving forward again, step by step she came closer. The moment the heat felt like a solid wall, the man was shaken out of his trance and he took off once again, desperately trying to escape the warmth and the fiery blonde where it came from.
He turned around the corner and saw that they had somehow managed to reach one of the other big roads of Vale, this one was also swarming with people. The man decided not to make his mistake twice and thus didn't even bother to use the crowd as a hiding spot.
That's when he remembered his pursuer and he were very close to one of Vale's biggest waterways. And where there was a waterway, there was water!
His theory appeared to be correct as the sound of streaming water filled his head instead of the roaring fire behind him. This made him look around.
He was surprised to find himself standing on top of a bridge, he had been mostly running on instinct after all: towards the water and away from the flames.
Right now the water in question was flowing underneath and the flames were coming closer to the bridge.
The man considered his choices. He was out of breath, so trying to lose the girl was out of question as she appeared to be fit enough to run another few miles. He knew he couldn't fight her as he realized the flames were probably coming from her semblance. 'Is that blonde bimbo a huntress? What the hell did I get myself into?'
There was one thing he could try to get out of this situation alive and not in an ambulance or a hearse: the blonde seemed deeply attached to the snow white purse in his hand. He knew what he was about to do would make stealing the bag in the first place pointless, but he was out of options and out of time.
When the blonde stepped onto the bridge he did a desperate movement, with a big arc he flung the purse into the water and started running once more with the last of his breath.
The blonde didn't follow him anymore, it seemed his plan had worked.
Blake had been having this nagging feeling something was wrong ever since the zipper of the purse had been suddenly closed, trapping her in complete darkness.
Now she was just waiting with a pounding heart for something to happen. The purse had been shaking a lot, which absolutely didn't help to cease her anxiety. The faints sounds intruding the confined space weren't loud enough for her to make sense of.
The combined forces of not being able to do anything while being trapped inside a rather small, pitch black room as she wasn't able to open the lid from the inside, made her suffer from a severe case of claustrophobia.
Blake sat down into a corner of the purse, trying to get her head straight, the darkness was messing with her brain. Putting an ear against the velvet wall, she tried once again to listen to the what was happening outside. The leather was too thick however and she couldn't catch any noise whatsoever.
All of a sudden her entire world shifted.
She was slowly pulled off the ground by an unknown force and her stomach felt really weird. It was like she was floating in midair along with all of the boxes of makeup, she could still see their silhouettes in the dark thanks to her enhanced night vision.
Blake swore she was almost at the roof of the purse, near the zipper, when the floating feeling disappeared and she and the boxes felt in a heap on the floor.
The girl rubbed her head as she had hit it quite hard on top of the roll of lipstick, making her feel a little dizzy.
"Uuuh, what happened?" She muttered groggily to no one in particular.
Suddenly her hand felt wet, some kind of liquid was streaming towards her. 'What's this? Did a bottle of perfume broke or something?' she thought confused. She brought her hand towards her nose to smell the unknown substance.
The raven-haired Faunus was surprised to find that the liquid didn't smell at all, which could only mean one thing. Water.
As soon as she realized this a small stream began dribbling on top of her head, making her cat ears twitch in annoyance. Her eyes widened in realization as more water began leaking from the roof of the bag.
She was underwater.
"Oh shit…" she cursed softly when the small streams changed into floods of colorless liquid.
Panic filled her as she ran towards one of the walls and drew Gambol Shroud. With a powerful stab she punctured the leather. This didn't have the effect she had desired however, the hole made only more water flood the bag, the force behind it knocking her down.
Before she knew, she was swimming in the cold water which slowly but steadily filled the bag.
Knowing that it was probably her last chance she fired her weapon in its kusarigama form. The blade successfully pierced the top of the tower of makeup boxes and Blake began climbing the ribbon.
When she reached the top, the water had already filled half of the purse. Blake knew she was running out of time and precious oxygen.
She pulled Gambol Shroud out of the box and began trying to pierce the zipper of the bag, if she could succeeded in doing so, she could make a hole that was big enough to fit her whole body through.
The purse was now being filled at a rapid pace, the water was already at Blake's middle and she was still struggling with the metal zipper.
Her blade finally pierced part of it, but the water was at her neck and the oxygen was becoming scarce.
She took one more deep breath before the last bubble of air in the bag disappeared.
Now completely underwater and holding her breath, she desperately pushed and pulled at the zipper. Just when she thought she was going to drown, it gave in and a hole formed where she was able to escape through.
Darkness was replaced with rays of sunlight shining through the water, coming from the surface. The surface! If she was able to reach that, then she would still have a chance! There was air at surface!
With the last of her power she began swimming towards the light. She knew it wasn't that far away, if only she able to swim faster! Her clothes were dragging her down, but she didn't have time to pull them off as her oxygen was running low.
After a few furious kicks she had almost reached the glorious surface. Her lungs screamed for air but she couldn't stop now! She was so close! Just a little further!
But she couldn't make it, she slowly began to drift back down as she was simply too exhausted to move one more inch.
All of her remaining strength disappeared as she was beginning to lose consciousness. Then her body shut down completely.
The bright rays of the sun were the last thing she saw before drifted off into the eternal darkness.
Yang saw the bag sailing the through the air in slow-motion before it hit the water and disappeared from sight. Her flames were immediately extinguished and her eyes turned back to their vibrant lilac as anguish filled her. "Blake!"
She didn't think twice as she leaped after the purse, diving into the cold water. With desperate strokes she tried to reach the area where the purse had gone under.
When she reached it, the bag was nowhere to be found however, so she began frantically searching around the area.
She dove under water and began to grab wildly with her hands hoping she would get lucky and find the purse. There was luckily little to no current at the moment, which meant her partner had to be around here somewhere.
There was little time and Yang knew it.
Half of her wanted to turn on her semblance to evaporate the water. But her other half told her that that wouldn't work and she would only hurt Blake in the process.
Just when she thought all hope was lost she felt something brush against her hand. Yang acted quickly, she brought both of her hands together and scooped the unknown object out of the water.
Somehow she managed to find Blake.
'She must have escaped out of the bag.' Yang thought, relief washing over her. That's when she noticed that her tiny friend was unconscious. 'Oh no… Was I too late?'
The blonde wasted no time in wading towards the shore and climbing out of the water. She sat down with a pounding heart and held the limp body of her partner close to her chest, making sure the curious people watching Yang wouldn't see her.
"Come on, Blake, answer me! Please!" she whispered desperately.
But the little girl didn't move. Tears began to form in Yang's beautiful eyes.
"Don't leave me alone! Blake!"
A/N:
Shout to my two fantastic editors: Duranda1 and Heatrules!
You didn't want it, so here it is anyway, more cliffhangers!
Also third week in a row, going for that streak!
The story has reached almost 50 favorites and 80 followers! Amazing!
Keeping it brief, onto reviews:
To uberparagon:
I'm afraid I couldn't deliver on the Bumblebee part, but next chapter definitely while feature some!
To AdamthePyromancer:
As it turns out, not that bad, who knew?
To Rusk:
Thanks! Glad to see I can deliver on the romance part, probably my weakest! ;-)
To Kokuyoseki no tsubasa:
Never. It's never going to end... *maniacal laughter*
To dracohalo117:
Dang, so close, almost cared. I don't think you'll pity him at all after reading this chapter :-D
To Guest:
Thank you very much, my friend, I'm honored. Who knows? Possible one-shots...
SilverCivic:
Daw, you review made my day, good sir! Hope you enjoy this one as much as the rest!
Like always, If there is anything you would like to see, just ask! (no promises though)
Review, follow and favorite or maybe you'll be tossed into the ice cold water...
DragonSlayer out!