Chapter 19, and one heck of a fight is happening! The infamous Gargarfummi, whom caused many a player to rage and throw controllers around, is facing down Penny! Can she defeat it? Let's find out!
(Insert music: Megaman Legends 2 – Manda Ruins Boss)
Penny felt her legs tremble beneath her slightly. Though she was confident in her abilities as a Huntress, she hadn't been expecting to fight a monster of this scale.
"KICK HIS BUTT PENNY!"
Penny looked over to see Ruby shouting her on at the top of her lungs. With new found confidence from her friends, the synthetic girl prepared herself for battle. She held two of her swords in her hands and eight more hovered behind her.
Gargarfummi made the first move, leaping skyward and aiming to squash Penny underneath it's massive weight. Penny saw this coming a mile away, throwing the two blades in her hands behind herself and embedding them into the wall on the far side of the arena. Two cable that were attached to the blades retracted, pulling Penny back and out of danger.
Gargarfummi then opened it's gaping mouth and fired out it's tongue. Penny had only just retracted her blades from the wall when she noticed the tongue fly towards her. It smashed her into the side wall then retracted, allowing the poor girl to fall to her hands and knees.
As Penny looked up, the tongue fired again. This time, she used the jet boosters on her blades to dodge it, the tongue shooting past her and hitting the spot where she had just been. Before it could pull back this time, Penny took the two blades in her hands and slashed down on the tongue.
The piece near the end fell to the floor, quivering and twitching on the ground as it was cut from the main body.
Gargarfummi raised back on it's hind legs, wiggling the front two in pain as it gave a roar and pulled what was left of it's tongue back.
Penny regrouped herself and got into her battle stance again. She got a light cheer from the crowd for the move she had just performed, which only served to make her even more confident.
Gargarfummi stood back on all fours and opened it's mouth again. Penny prepared herself for another tongue strike, but this time, the Reaverbot did something different. Out of two holes in the back of it's mouth, several small Reverbots flew out. They were cylindircal with the characteristic red crystal eye and a small tail. They flew around on a pair of small wings and started to circle above Penny.
"Balfura's." Penny said to herself, identifying the flying foes.
As if realising they had been discovered, the Balfura swarm dived down towards Penny, their tails extended to stab at her and their wings spinning up like sawblades.
Penny drew all of her blades and arranged them in a circle, like a fan blade. She then started to rotate them around her hand, spinning them so fast that they formed a shield to protect her.
The Balfura found this out the hard way, several of them charging straight into it, resulting in a mix of sparks and clangs, before their pieces fell to the ground. The cylinder shaped Reaverbots chopped up neatly like they were cucumbers.
Those who had survived hovered around Penny and switched their tails into small laser guns. They fired a barrage of shots at her, trying to overwhelm the girl.
Penny split her blades into two groups. She used the first five for defence, letting them move to different positions around herself to deflect the laser bolts. The other five switched to ranged form and fired back at the attackers.
If the spectators were not that interested in the fight, they were getting a free laser light show as well! Not to mention some fireworks as the Balfura exploded one by one after a hit from Penny's guns.
With all of the targets destroyed and littering the arena, Penny focused her efforts on the Gargarfummi once again. Redirecting her weapons, she opened fire on the main Reaverbot, hopeful that one massive barrage would defeat it!
She was in for a shock however, as she fired, the energy blasts simply pinged off the armour, dissipating as soon as they hit and causing no damage whatsoever.
The Reaverbot took a moment to laugh at the girl, before it made it's next move. Unleashing it's tongue again, it swept it across the arena floor. Penny threw her blades into the wall again and clung to them so she was not caught by the tongue, but that was not the Gargarfummi's aim. Instead, it gathered up all the pieces of the Balfura that had been destroyed and placed them in it's mouth.
Penny watched on curiously as the frog Reaverbot began to chew on the pieces, keeping it's mouth shut as it did so. When it reopened it's mouth, all the pieces had been crunched down into small, sharp pellets. Gargarfummi leaned back and gave a mighty croak. As it opened it's mouth to do so, the pellets fired.
The effect was like a machine gun. Red hot bits of metal shot forth from the beast and impacted off the walls and floor, not to mention the few that reached Penny. They pinged off her aura, though a few got through leaving small holes in her clothes. Penny deflected them as best she could. Fortunately, the assault was quickly over as the Gargarfummi ran out of ammunition.
Peering between the blades, Penny saw the Reaverbot still laughing, it's mouth wide open. She would happily punish him for it. Circling her blades again, she pointed them directly at the opponent and stood behind them. A green energy shot started to charge up. As soon as it reached full power, Penny released it. The shot travelled across the arena with great speed, before landing right in the Gargarfummi's mouth.
The hit clearly worked, and took it by surprise as it rolled onto it's back from the force of the strike, it's stubby legs wiggling like a crazy.
Penny wasted no time, going on the offensive with her blades as she used her boosters to dash beside the Reaverbot. She began to slash at it's stomach, lining up each blade behind the other so that as soon as one hit, another did the same, meaning there was no let up in her assault.
With surprising quickness however, the Gargarfummi rolled back upright and landed beside Penny with all of it's weight, knocking the girl away from her target.
The Reaverbot was clearly enraged now. It opened it's mouth and fired out...
"Bubbles?" Weiss seemed genuinely confused.
"Oooooooo! Pretty!" Nora said, gawking at the sight.
"What kind of an attack is that?" Blake wondered.
At least she did until one of the bubbles hit the arena wall close to them. It left a small green residue on the wall. This was then swiftly followed by a hissing sound. Bits of the wall where the bubble toughed were soon disintegrated, leaving a hole in the wall that was a little too close to Jaune for his own comfort.
"Not pretty! Not pretty at all!" Jaune squeaked as he tucked his legs up on his seat, away from the hole.
Penny had seen this, and decided the best course of action was to get rid of the bubbles as fast as possible. She sent one of her blades out to pop the seemingly innocent projectiles. The first blade hit the bubble, and immediately melted into a pile of molten metal!
Penny gasped as she quickly retracted her swords before any more could be destroyed. In her panic though, she did not notice one of the bubbles come close to her, and hit her in the right eye! The acid effect was immediate, her synthetic skin covering boiled and melted, exposing her robotic form underneath. Penny quickly moved her fringe over to cover the area, not wishing anyone to see what she actually was.
Readying her laser's again, she fired at the rest of the bubbles, popping them all in quick succession.
Gargarfummi had one more trick up it's sleeve however. Or more precisely, in it's back! Leaning forward, it fired out what most though to be missiles. As it turned out, they were slightly more troublesome than that.
"Oh no!" Pyrrha gasped. "Otamarns!"
The small, purple, tadpole like Reaverbots flew out from the sections on Gargarfummi's back, and flew around at Penny's level of height. The small circle on the front of them was surrounded by serrated teeth! They swam through the air towards Penny, biting her each time one of them swam past.
Penny was getting pretty sick of this! She needed to get them away from her, and she knew just how to do it!
She drew her blades in close to herself, allowing the ends to point outwards. She held one hand in front of her, and placed another on her chest. Most would think she was activaing a semblance ability, but she had another aim in mind.
The hand on her chest was holding directly on to her power centre. She looked through her protocols and found the one she needed to activate.
As she activated it, her energy core began to create excess energy. Small blue sparks started to arc off from it, and through her hand. Soon, her whole body had small electric shocks passing over it. They in turn, passed on to her blades.
With her whole body electrically charged, she prepared for one final surge. She grit her teeth and her eyes glowed blue slightly as she fired it.
Suddenly, a ball of blue electricity surrounded her, the blades forming the edges and shocking everything within the area. Of curse, this included the Otamarns.
The small tadpole Reaverbots all shuddered and twitched as the electricity poured through them, and overloaded their circuits. As the shock over Penny subsided, the Reaverbots all fell to the ground, dead.
Finally, she had some breathing space, now came the main problem of Gargarfummi.
It seemed that the only way to beat this monstrosity, was to hit it in the mouth, but how would she get the chance to without letting herself be attacked?
That was when an idea came to Penny. It was crazy, it was stupid in some ways, it was certainly illogical, but it was her only chance.
"What's she doing?" Ren said, puzzled as he saw Penny just stand there with her arms by her sides.
The Gargarfummi seemed confused as well, but it would not pass up a free chance to kill! It fired out it's tongue again, looking to grab Penny.
"Dodge it Penny!" Ruby shouted, concerned for her friends well being now.
But she didn't. Allowing the tongue to reach her, it wrapped itself around Penny's waist and pulled her towards the frog Reaverbot. It raised it's captured prise for a few moments, waving Penny around in the air. Then, it retracted it's tongue into it's mouth.
And took Penny with it.
"PENNY!" Ruby screamed as the Gargarfummi pulled her friend into it's mouth.
The audience was in a state of shock too, several gasps and screams came from the crowd, as well as a few people fainting.
The arena fell silent for a few moments, though Ruby was still on her feet, anxious to see Penny somehow be alright. The Huntress was hyperventilating, each breath short and panicked.
The Gargarfummi sat still, enjoying it's prize. Then it suddenly twitched and gave a small growl of pain. Then another, and another. The audience watched as it rolled onto it's back, crying out in pain and waving it's legs in the air.
Small explosions started to come from it's body, getting faster and more violent as they went on. Something had happened to it, it was being destroyed, but by what?
The explosions stopped, as did the movements of the Gargarfummi. It twitched slightly and opened it's mouth wide to let out one final, weakened croak.
*KABOOM*
A huge pillar of fire and smoke shot up from the arena as the Gargarfummi was blown to pieces. Some of the larger chunks were still intact such as the head part, a leg and the massive jaws.
The beast had been defeated, but the audience just murmured in worry and confusion. Where was Penny?
Ruby and her friends looked all around the arena, trying to find some indication that she was okay.
Suddenly, Pyrrha pointed to the main jaw. "Look! Something's moving in there!"
As the smoke cleared away, the whole arena could see the jaws twitching slightly. Slowly, the mechanism creaked open, and a familiar face crawled out of the former enemy.
"SHE'S ALRIGHT!" Ruby cheered, half happy, half crying.
The rest collapsed in their chairs and let out a sigh of relief as the arena applauded the girl for her victory.
Penny got to her feet, looking slightly dizzy as she did so. Regaining her composure, she found RWBY and JNPR as well as X running up to her. Ruby ran on ahead of the rest, using her semblance to reach Penny first.
"Friend Ruby! OOF!"
Before Penny could get another word out, Ruby had floored her with a high speed hug. She refused to let go, still having unshed tears in her eyes.
"That... was the most crazy, daredevil thing I've ever seen you do! You had me worried sick!" Ruby seemed actually annoyed at Penny.
"Well... I... uh..." Penny tried to think of an answer as the rest of the teams watched on, unsure of what to do.
Ruby looked at Penny sternly, electing a look of worry from the robotic girl, before it changed into Ruby's usual happy smile.
"Looks like I taught you pretty well!"
JNPR, WBY and X let out a sigh before laughing too.
"Just no more crazy stunts, okay?" X said, placing a hand on Penny's shoulder. Penny gave a nod in agreement.
The cameras focused on the friends as X and Ruby raised Penny's arms like a referee at a boxing match. The rest all huddled around them, congratulating Penny on her first tournament win! They basked in the crowds adoration, Penny bowed to them as the cameras zoomed in on her face. Everything was going perfectly.
Until the screen changed to a symbol they didn't recognise.
The arena fell silent, save for a few worried gasps and conversations, as the sound system screeched and beeped, almost as if someone on an outside source was hacking in. The symbol on the screens was a red background with a black queen chess piece in the centre.
In the commentators booth, Oobleck was on a comm line to the camera crew. "Broadcast, what is going on? Cut off that feed!"
"We can't!" The reply came." We have no access to the camera network! We've been locked out!"
The symbol that appeared was unfamiliar, but the voice that came after it was. A voice they hoped not to hear for a long time, one that made RWBY, JNPR, Penny and X all freeze with a mix of anger and fear.
(Insert music: Megaman Zero 3 – Curse of Vile)
"How entertaining." the silky, smooth, poisonous voice said.
"That voice! It couldn't be." Ren said, genuinely afraid.
"It's her." Weiss confirmed his suspicion through a clenched fist.
"Cinder Fall." X finished, just as angry as Weiss was.
The arena was deathly still, listening to what Cinder had to say. The audience members stayed close to those they knew, hoping that all of this was just some idle threat, or a prank.
"A most impressive fight from Miss Poledina. To take down one of the most advanced creations from our forefathers is no easy feat. My congratulations to the young lady on her victory."
Penny suddenly felt a whole lot less joyful about her win.
"Then again, it wasn't truly a fair fight, was it? An ancient pile of nuts and bolts, against one of the most modern, up to date creations of our generation? I think we could all see how the fight would end a mile away."
X and Ruby were shocked. How did she know? The rest of their friends were just confused.
"That's right. I know all about your little project, Ironwood. Taking pieces of the old technology, and implementing them into your own creations. It's an ambitious project, and one that is definitely worthwhile."
Ironwood placed his head in his hands. This couldn't be good.
"Perhaps, most valuable of all though, is what it has inspired me to do. You built this world on top of the ruins of the ancient world. I intend to do the same."
As soon as those words were spoken, a loud siren sounded, raising and lowering in pitch as it did so. Then, the screens changed to a warning symbol and a robotic voice came over the tannoy.
ALERT: GRIMM ATTACK INCOMING, THREAT LEVEL: 9. PLEASE SEEK SHELTER IMMEDIATELY.
People heard the warning and began to run out of the arena in a panic, trying to find any shelter they could. As they did so, there was a loud thudding on the top of the arena. The group of friends looked up to see a giant Nevermore, it landed on the security barrier and began to peck away at the shielding.
Cinder spoke again. "It's only natural. The weak civilizations pass on, when those who are stronger emerge to take their place. It happened to the ancients and, try as you might with your Hunters or armies, the same will happen to you. The time has come to usher in a new world, a stronger world. It's just a shame you won't be around to see it."
With that, the feed cut back to the warning screens, the symbol disappearing.
"How the hell did Cinder manage all of this?" Yang asked, frustrated at the scenes that were taking place.
"She had a little help." Ruby said, pointing to the Bullheads that were landing nearby. Blake recoiled in shock as she saw the symbol on the side. The wolf head with claw marks.
The White Fang.
The tannoy rang out once again, this time with Ozpin on the line.
"Attention all Hunters, you have been training for this day, though we hoped it would never come. Your first priority is to get the civilians to safety. Repel the Grimm from Beacon Academy, do not let them get near the city, keep them contained! If anyone is able to neutralise Cinder and her associates then do so. Stay safe, and good luck."
It was pretty clear that the last part of that message was aimed at X, RWBY and JNPR.
"Alright, battle plan." X declared. "JNPR, I want you to clear out the academy building. Go through the main entrance and work your way up to Ozpin's office, make sure he is safe."
"Gotcha!" Nora said, readying her grenade launcher as the team ran off to complete their objective.
"Weiss, Blake, Yang. I need you to get down to the landing bays and try to hold off the White Fang. Most of them are grunts and should pose no real problem."
"What about you and Ruby?" Blake asked.
"We need to find Cinder and her cronies! They're going to pay for what they have done here today!"
"How are we going to find her in this mess? She could be anywhere!" Ruby queried.
Looking above them, the team saw an Atlesian army flagship firing it's guns. Not at the various Grimm that flew through the sky, but on to one of it's own ships! The one that was hit never stood a chance, and began to point downwards and descend towards the ground below.
"That narrows it down a bit." X said as he and Ruby dashed off towards the hangars to try and get a ship to take them up there.
Yang and Weiss started to make their way to the docks, but Blake stayed behind, staring sadly in the direction her friends were running.
"Adam." She said softly. "Please don't let it be true." She then ran to join her friends.
X and Ruby were just leaving the arena when Penny stopped them.
"Friend X! Friend Ruby! Wait, I will accompany you on this mission!"
"Not this time Penny." X said. "You've just come out of a tough battle, your aura is already low, we can't risk it when you're in this condition."
"I cannot just stay here and do nothing!" She protested.
"You won't be." Ruby said. "Get these people out of the arena to somewhere safe! That Nevermore could break the shields at any time!"
"But I-"
"Penny, please! We'll be fine."
Penny was reluctant, but she gave Ruby a confident smile. "You can count on me Ruby!"
"I know I can." Ruby smiled back. "Come on X, let's go!"
With that, the two dashed off, leaving Penny to take care of things in the arena. This was it, the battle of Beacon was beginning.
Neo Arcadia
The hooded figures all gathered in the main transerver room, all of them seemingly ready for battle.
The relaxed one spoke. "Well, looks like Cinder has made her move, and forced our hand."
"Indeed." The deep voiced one said. "She is far to much of a liability to be kept alive, and recent discoveries by that man Qrow, have meant that we can no longer stand idly by."
The female figure then addressed Gate. "Is the override device ready?"
"Ready and working, my lady."
"We can assess the situation once we arrive. Just remember, I want X alive and Cinder dead. Those are your primary objectives."
"What about any other targets?" The relaxed one asked.
"Do with them as you see fit." The girl said, passively. "If they would prove beneficial to our cause, you may take them. If not, then dispose of them."
DUN DUN DUDU DUN!
It's happening! Cinder has launched her attack on Beacon, and all hell has broken loose! She is not the only one though. We are heading for one heck of a battle folks!
I know these chapters have come thick and fast, but I had a few days off and decided to put some more time into this story. Normal upload times will probably resume from here on out.
Enjoy the chapter, and don't forget to review and share.
Until next time.
TOODLE PIP!