Chapter 36

All for a cause

Erik, The heart

The room looked old, it was circular with 12 heavy wooden doors covering the wall periodically. The stone parts of the wall had cave drawings on them depicting various scenes with a person wearing a Grimm mask, like the people we'd been chasing. In the centre was what looked like a throne made seamlessly from bronze and looked as though it was part of the floor. Six other people were in the room, the two that we followed and four more wearing more simplistic Grimm masks. The four new ones all wore simple robes; one was a tall man, another was a short stocky man, the third was a massive man with what looked like claws on his hands, and the last was a short woman with antlers. Now that I could get a closer look, I examined the two we'd followed. The upright one was impossible to examine, every part of them was covered somehow. The second person looked familiar and it took me a moment to realise why, it looked like Clara. She definitely looked a bit different, but the black hair was in the exact same style and she was built the same way, cat ears and all. She even bore the same weapons so it all stacked to be too much of coincidence for me to think it wasn't Clara. But why was she walking on all fours with a Grimm mask on, what was going on here?
"Clara?" I asked. The person with her turned to face me and quietly examined our group for a moment.
"Yes, but she's not herself at the moment." They said in an unnerving monotone. "If you leave us be for a mere minute I'll explain."
"Oh sure, let's trust the shady man in the Grimm mask," Isaac said sarcastically. "I'm sure he'll be nothing but helpful."
"I assure you we are not your enemy." They continued.
"Well, now I feel completely safe." Elith joined in.
"Sarcasm aside, we want explanations now instead of later," Dusty said. "We outnumber you, so I feel we win this argument."
"Fine, we have time for some things to be explained." They said begrudgingly.
"Who are you, what's your purpose, what's happened to Clara, and how's it tie into all the things we were sent to investigate." Dusty shot off.
"I'm Azoth, my purpose here is to bring about the great calm, Clara has no aura and has become like a Grimm in all but form, and we are indeed the cause of all things you were sent about." Azoth listed off quickly. "Now please go, time is of the essence."
"Not a chance, you either explain properly or we beat you and everyone else at your masquerade party into the ground until we get answers," Dusty growled, raising his voice as he closed his shields into their offensive mode. "So what'll it be you sack of shit, think long and hard." I was slightly taken aback by Dusty's sudden outburst, not that I blamed him for it. It just surprised me that the levelheaded hunter leapt so suddenly to this point, everyone else in our group also seemed taken aback as well.

The heart

Azoth quietly tucked his hand into his cloak and released a sigh, and in a slow movement withdrew them. They held weapons now, both strange and unique. In his left hand was a cat o nine tails with the sharp tips made of what seemed to be shards of dust, it was almost mesmerising the way the tips swayed and released a soft glow. In his right was what looked to be some kind of intricate bladed gauntlet, the only unusual part of it is how unnecessarily thick and heavy it looked.
"Wrong choice," Dusty said menacingly, he instantly broke into a sprint at Azoth with his gauntlets thrusting forward. Everyone else jumped to action immediately afterwards, keeping to their assigned spots. Ivory was the first to inflict any damage, deftly retrieving arrow after arrow from her quiver and firing them in the same motion. She hit with five of her six shots into the chest of the largest masked person, he grunted at the impact and thrust out his hands. The battlefield shook for a moment, knocking those with poor footing to the floor. Dusty fell in his charge but made up for it by tackling Azoth, sending them both to the floor and having a desperate fistfight. Liath hardly faltered from the shaking as he swung his claymore about and slammed its flat side into the chest of a short, masked woman with deer horns, sending her flying into the throne. A tall masked man cooly observed his surroundings and looked at Erik as he swung at Azoth, just as the blow missed he waved his hand and Homicida turned to its whip form, lashing Erik across his back. Azoth managed to push Dusty off himself and raised the cat o nine tails to strike, but found his weapon to be considerably lighter. He looked to see that an arrow fired by Ivory had severed the whip's tendrils.
"Missing something asshole?" Ivory laughed as she rolled into Liaths shadow.
"Oh for the love of,,, stop using my shadow, Ivory!" Liath shouted. "IT'S MINE!"
His request went unanswered, not that he would've heard it. The short and stocky fellow was already preparing to strike. He clapped his hands and a shockwave blasted at Liath, staggering him and making his ears ring. The short woman had no chance to take advantage as Carter rushed in to save his friend, smacking her on the head with a strange looking crowbar. Seemingly tired of taking a beating, the short woman yelled in anger as her body turned into a cloud of ash. The cloud swirled viscously around Liath's head, effectively blinding him.

Clara, the heart

These creatures felt familiar, not in the way Azoth did, but in a new and confusing way. I didn't know what to do, would the Azoth be angry if I struck them or was I meant to fight? As the creature with the shield-spike got up and made to strike at Azoth I made the decision, fight. I leapt from my crouched position and landing square on it's back and began slamming my fists into it, to my surprise flames exploded from my hands. I kept up the attack until shield-spike threw me to the ground, I started to get up but an agonising pain burned across my shoulder. I looked to see an arrow, dripping with clear liquid, in my shoulder. I looked to where it came from and saw a snake-eyed girl with a bow.
"Good night Clara," Snake-eye said. My vision tinged slightly red as I rushed her. "Or not, holy shit." Her eyes widened at my approach as she quickly grabbed another arrow and fired it into my leg, it hurt but I kept going. I began to smell desperation as the girl grabbed one last arrow and shot my other shoulder, it hurt and I started to feel drowsy. I got closer and closer and was almost at snake-eyes throat before I fell to the ground, too tired to move.
"What on Remnant did they do to you?" Snake-eye said as she looked at the arrows.

The heart

There was a pause in combat when Clara stopped moving, but it didn't last long at all. Argus rebooted the fray by charging at the largest man shield first, slamming into the man and causing him to stumble back. Argus didn't let up for a moment, slashing up at the man's face with his sword. The blow was ineffective, but a shimmer across the man's body betrayed that he was out of aura. Argus would have pressed his advantage but was caught in the side by a blast from the short man. The ash cloud around Liaths head reformed into the short woman, she slipped past him and rushed Isaac and Elith. She arrived to find Isaac and three Eliths, the four flashed a grin and they tackled her. Ivory saw an opening as the largest masked man raised a mace to strike the fallen Argus and fired an arrow cleanly into and through the man's throat. Erik had been fighting the taller man for most of the fight but to little avail. The man simply caused Erik's weapon to transform constantly which made it impossible for him to fight properly. His aura was low, half from the man's daggers and half from hitting himself. He was struck in the back by a blast and his aura dissipated, the tall man took the opportunity and thrust with his daggers. His blades impacted but did nothing, Erik's armour had protected him.
"That is why Argus and I are the smart ones!" Erik shouted as he rolled over and slashed out at the tall man, making contact. Three arrows from Ivory and the man was out of the picture. The short man was swiftly bound by chains and once that was done all that remained was Azoth.

Isaac, The heart

We all stared Azoth down, waiting for them to attack. Seconds passed, then minutes, and finally, he dropped his gauntlet.
"You've brought ruin to the future, or rather you've doomed it to be unchanging," Azoth muttered. "But you are forgiven, you didn't understand and did what made sense in your circumstance." He stumbled over to one of the paintings on the wall and pressed down on the depiction of the mask. One of the wooden doors opened, behind it stood a Beowolf with icy blue eyes, it stood stock still as it received no orders from Clara. I got what this meant immediately and shot the beast in the head with my Knixes.

Clara, The heart

The first thing I felt was pain, I opened my eyes to see three arrows being pushed out of my shoulders and leg. Then I felt relieved as the wounds closed, but then disorientation came. I pulled myself up to immediately keel over as I threw up onto the ground. I felt much better after that, enough to look up and get my bearings.
"Clara!" A familiar voice said I felt myself being picked up in one of Dusty's giant hugs. I weakly hugged him back, I felt more people join the hug.
"As much as I dread offending your group more than I have, I have some parting business to attend to. This was all for a cause and I need to make sure that my efforts have a chance of not being wasted." I heard the monotone voice of my captor say. "I need Clara to be here with me, no funny business or ill will I promise." After some hesitation my friends helped me over to him, he had an untamed Beowolf next to him.
"What, what more do you want," I muttered.
"We'd waste time working with words, after I use my semblance on this creature I need you to do the same to me," Azoth explained. "You need not use much, just do a little and then tear it from me." With that he placed his hand on the beast, he began convulsing shortly after. I reached out and placed my hand on him and the convulsions stopped, I flowed a bit of aura to him. I was suddenly overcome with a flood of thoughts, images, memories, and feelings. It was all so much and I was hardly able to take back my aura, as I did I saw Azoth collapse. Then I blacked out.

Elith, The heart

After Clara had fallen over we examined the battlefield, Azoth was dead and the sounds of howls and roars echoing through the cavern told us we were not the only ones aware of this fact. Haste entering our actions we checked our felled opponents and identified them as being members of the council, not much of a surprise to me since Coal was wrapped up in this. We opened the wooden doors and eliminated the remaining Grimm, for the sake of restoring all of Clara's aura. Behind the centre one, we found Dakota, scared and pacing but immediately excited and relieved at the sight of us. Upon seeing Clara he rushed over and started to nuzzle her and trying to make sure she was alright. Once he realised she was only unconscious he bit the back of her shirt and started carrying her, then he looked at us expectantly.
"Let's get out of here, no need to stay and find out how many Grimm this guy had," Dusty ordered. With that we returned to the tunnels, Isaac continued to help me along since it still hurt a little to walk and I'd received a few new injuries from our scuffle. He fussed over me the whole way to Carvail, constantly making sure I was fine and that my wounds were healing. I started to tell him to shut up and stop worrying about me, but then I stopped myself. Maybe I should stop complaining about good things I have, I do enough of that already. I should just appreciate that the partner I got paired with actually gives a damn about me, scratch that, that I got paired with a whole team that actually gives a damn about me. By the time we reached Carvail main my wounds had fully healed and I was free of his incessant worrying. We all walked into the inn, Dusty set Clara down on one of the chairs and we started to wait for her to awake.
Author's notes
Procrastination is fun, right?