Puttin' this up a wee bit early cause I'mma be busy saturday.
Frankly you guys are lucky I was able to tear myself away from DOOM Eternal long enough to get this betad and posted.
Also, some people really need to pay attention to author's notes! I did mention that I likely wouldn't make the two-week deadline! Don't come cryin' to me when you were warned!
Same thing applies now! My job is hard on the noggin' and I've been busy. I write when I have left-over brain processing power from work. Trying to get a chapter out, I can write some 300-500 words an hour. Well, this chapter is over nine-thousand words. That takes time, time which I could (and do) spend doing other stuff when I'm simply too tired from work. This is fanfiction, I write it first and foremost for me to have fun. I post these on the off-chance someone enjoys my tripe. It'll take as long as it takes, I'mma try and continue meeting the two-week deadline, but shit happens and I might not meet it.
And before y'all start lecturing me about Ironwood. I've figured out the logic and bounced it off several people, all of whom initially disagreed but once I explained the logic agreed it wasn't out of character. The problem is that the explanation of that logic does not fit in this chapter without making it rather awful and high-handed.
Anyways I'mma go into a bit of a less ranty explanation of my logic behind the rant, so if you are not interested in reading that feel free to skip to the chapter itself, hope you enjoy, drop me a review.
With that said.
Bit of clearing up from the previous rant! For those that did not realize. Were you among the numerous people sending me PMs that said "Well Actually, Archer's 'suicidal fighting style' is Gabriel Blessings fanon" with different levels of snootyness? If the answer to that question is no, then the rant and sarcasm were not meant for you brah.
If you still get offended by it...uhh...well nothing I can do about that. You do you.
Why I posted the rant as a chapter? Well, look at it this way. If I stopped to explain to everyone PMing me "Archer's Suicidal fighting style, humm humm Fanon but it's okay you probably didn't realize this" that no, I'm talking about something else actually. I would have taken even longer to finish this here chapter.
Oh yeah. Thing to note about the rant. A good chunk of the explanation behind "Archer incorporating risk into his melee fighting style" that's head canon. The only things we know about how he fights in CQC is that he favored Kansho and Bakuya. We know that from HF day 15, Sparks Liner High. Specifically these lines.
[The method I couldn't come up with, the stance that will guarantee a kill should exist.
He favored these swords.
Then there's no way he hasn't come up with an ultimate attack to get him through the countless battles!]
So we know he favored K&B, and that he fought "countless battles" with them. So much so that he came up with "Crane Wing Three Realm" or "Triple Linked Crane Wings" (whichever you wanna call it), an ultimate move only he could pull off and which could only be done with K&B.
We also know that his main fighting stance has his arms down by his legs and the swords pointing towards the groundish. And if we take the animations of several anime and fighting games (and that one CG of him advancing against Lancer at the prologue of the VN), sometimes he has a propensity to cross his arms in front of his chest as he is fighting. May or may not fire off a point-blank arrow when the situation calls for it.
That's it. That's all the info we got on how Counter Guardian Emiya and plausibly an adult Shirou fights in melee.
Saying that he probably created his own style and incorporates risk into it is me trying to take that rather...risky...stance and applying fighting logic to it. Saying that he reads his opponent's fighting style from their weapons is a further attempt at explaining how it is that he would be able to use such an...open...guard effectively in a fight, is also me trying to rationalize that...sigh...stance.
As to why I dislike that stance so much? Well, I practice martial arts. To be specific; Tae-kwon-do, kickboxing, Brazilian Jujitsu and a buddy of mine showed me a few Muai Tai moves. This actually has helped to elevate my writing of fighting scenes, cause I know what it feels like to get my breath literally kicked out of me, and I know the feeling of causing microfractures on someone's thoracic cage. (Don't look at me weird that one was an accident, I really didn't mean it!)
So I kind of understand the importance of keeping a proper guard. I've even experimented with drawing an attack, yeh? Dropping my shoulder a bit so my opponent has a clear line of attack to my jaw. The logic is sound, I know he'll attack there so I can use that to make an opening for a counter. But uhh...guess what? If you measure it wrong or react wrong? You get decked in the jaw. XD
And it's not just me, sparring buddies of mine I was helping with the same thing got decked in the jaw, even after slowly going through the motions several times, waiting for them to be ready, and counting down. There were still times that they messed up and I decked them on the jaw. It's just how it is, one has to practice A LOT to leave an opening and not get fuggin' destroyed. This is where the argument for 'he's built risk into his fighting style' comes from, that main stance is...well...bad, it's not a good guard stance.
And it's not just me! Several people who are also martial artists and HEMA (Historical European Martial Arts, literally swords and armor sparring) enthusiasts PMed me and agreed with my rant about atrocious stances!
So, why is Archer's stance such a big deal if messing up only gets you decked in the jaw? Well in Shirou/Archer's case, he'd get decked in the jaw with a spear/sword/hammer/ax/other cutty/stabby/bludgeony tool. And those tend to result in...well...dying. And yet Shirou/Archer makes it work and it's up to me to come up with some explanation as to how in order for my writing to go more smoothly! I enjoy getting into the nitty gritty like that, and if I force myself to overlook it, it bothers me and the quality of my writing suffers as a result.
But again, keep in mind, Everything beyond the line "That's it. That's all the info we got on how Counter Guardian Emiya and plausibly an adult Shirou fights in melee" is my own personal headcanon put together through my own experience with fighting and sparring.
Now, to the people saying Shirou in the short-story should have been able to beat Raven in a spar...are you serious? I did gave hints as to how young he physically was at the time. XD
In that snippet he was a twelve year old superhuman facing off against a 27+ year old superhuman. Meaning he is fighting someone who is bigger, faster, stronger, and just as experienced as he is (because again, this is Shirou not Archer, and in this story he left earth when he was around his thirties, so he's got some twenty something years fighting experience, and so does Raven). The only way he is winning that spar is if he pulls out a Noble Phantasm and atomizes Raven, the Branwen camp, and possibly a good chunk of the scenery! XD
On an entirely different note. Gabriel Blessings fans have a lot of free time on their hands.
Wish I had that much free time. TT-TT
Incidentally, since the rant served its purpose of getting the bunch of "But Archer's suicidal gabriel blessings blah blah" PMs to stop, I was considering deleting it, then later posting this chapter in its place, but someone informed me that FFN doesn't like it when you do that and likely doesn't send the notification email. So the rant is staying if only to make it easier on myself.
Maybe I could replace it with a document that just says "Placeholder, move on! Tee-hee! =P"?
Dunno, haven't decided yet.
Well, if you stuck around this long, thank you for reading my long-winded much calmer explanation behind the rant! I'm hoping we can all collectively move on past this!
Have fun and hope you enjoy my rendition of a Shirou vs Pyrrha fight! Among other things. Be sure to leave me a review!
=][=
Pyrrha did what she could to stop herself from bouncing excitedly as she made her way to the sparring room's stage.
On the spectator stands she could see RWBY, CVFY, the rest of JNPR, and Professor Goodwitch.
Shirou had been strangely reticent about using school facilities to have their match, insisting instead on going some distance into the Emerald Forest. Uncaring of the school curfew or that they'd be breaking school rules.
Until Yang complained that it would be too much of a hassle and insisted on using one of the sparring rooms, upon which Shirou had capitulated immediately.
He'd also objected to Ruby's idea to contact CVFY because, as the excitable girl had put it. "Velvet is actually more of a weapon's nut than I am! It'd be a crime not to!"
Crime or not, Shirou had instantly denied Ruby's request, showing an admirable immunity to the girl's weapons-grade pout…until Yang had chuckled and asked what the harm was in asking one more group of friends to watch the match. Upon which Shirou had sighed and accepted.
Pyrrha blinked, could it be… She had at first thought that Shirou and Yang were half-siblings. But it was Ruby's head that he patted with affection not unlike one showed to a younger sibling, and while he had allowed the excitable girl to drag him around all day. He had denied both her request to use school facilities and to contact Velvet. Making it obvious that he was not seeking to advertise his presence in Beacon.
It had not been until Yang asked that he had agreed, instantly at that. There was only one possible conclusion that Pyrrha could draw from the evidence available to her. And it would likely break Ruby Rose's excitable heart.
Then again if the Sword Hunter was clearly into Yang, maybe Jaune would...
Pyrrha shook her head as she arrived at the stage, she couldn't afford to get flustered. The swords that Shirou could fire were fast, if she didn't get her head in the game she'd not be able to react in time to nudge them out of the way with her Semblance.
She looked at her opponent and blinked in confusion. He'd removed the anima cuirass and the steel tips of his boots, leaving him wearing only his black leather armor, hood, and waist cape.
Was he worried about his dexterity? Or did he know about her Semblance? With Polarity, she could create and control magnetic fields. She used it often in matches to nudge enemy weapons into directions that better suited her, as well as to augment the strength of her own attacks. Furthermore she could 'feel' any disturbance in the magnetic field she created, as caused by a magnetic weapon traveling through it, allowing her to react to attacks from a blind spot.
As professor Goodwitch outlined the rules of the match, he created a pair of bronze-plated gladii. Odd. She would have expected those Mistralean falchions he seemed to favor.
Reaching out with Polarity, she realized the swords were not bronze plated they were genuinely made of bronze. Copper and tin would be her guess, as if there were any nickel or iron in the bronze she'd have been able to feel it and nudge it about.
Had he lied when he asked her if she was famous, and in fact followed her matches and figured out her Semblance?
No, he had seemed genuinely out of his depth in the dorm.
Well, his Semblance was making swords. Could it be that he had some intuitive connection to weapons that let him know how they were used? The very idea seemed ludicrous but…
Professor Goodwitch took a deep breath. "Be-!"
His arm blurred and Pyrrha instinctively raised her shield, there was a deafening ring of metal striking metal as one of the gladii bounced off the face of Akoúo̱ with an impact that, were it not for her Aura, would have wrenched her shoulder out of its socket.
"-gi-!" Pyrrha stepped back, changing the angle of Akoúo̱ to deflect a thrust at the same time as she swept Miló to block the edge of a blade that had been sweeping toward her neck.
"-n!" The thrust she'd redirected had been a feint, Shirou's right hand snuck down beneath the edge of Akoúo̱, another gladius flashed into being in his grip and was used as a lever to wrench her shield out of the way, with Miló still trapped fending off the sword in his left. As she began to change the angle of her block and started to leverage her Semblance to add to her physical might, he took an aggressive step forward, stomping hard on her lead foot and drove his forehead into her nose. The pain caused bright spots to dance across her vision as she pushed herself back. She changed Miló into a rifle and fired off a few shots blindly to try and keep him away long enough to regain her bearings.
She heard the 'whoosh' of a sword cutting through the air, and she instinctively dodged sideways. She felt something cold brush past the tip of her nose, the wind of its passage ruffling her bangs. She brought Akoúo̱ up to cover her head and another punishing impact almost drove her shield into the side of her head. Her vision finally cleared enough for her to see him sprinting toward her, a new pair of bronze gladii in his hands.
She changed Miló into a spear and set her stance just in time to meet his charge as he launched into a flurry of attacks. Akoúo̱ rang continuously as she tried to use Miló's length to gain a little space but he doggedly matched her every step. His attacks were too swift and relentless to change Miló into a rifle and take a shot point blank in between his attacks. More than once she tried to nudge his weapons out of the way so his strikes would miss and unbalance him, giving her an opening, but there was nothing for her magnetic fields to latch onto.
By every third or fourth strike his weapons would crack, get gouged, or bend so far out of true as to reach the point of uselessness, but the tempo of his attacks would not so much as hitch as he discarded the sword and created a new one. The clatter of weapons being abandoned almost as ever present as the sounds of their duel. A part of her could not help but feel somewhat insulted by the way he treated his gladii as utterly disposable.
Pyrrha needed to take charge of the fight, but her usual subtle tricks for it were neatly and surprisingly easily countered. If she were to try something it would be overt…Well, she could handle team RWBY (though not necessarily all at the same time) and CVFY was out of the tournament.
Changing Miló into a sword, Pyrrha covered her head and neck with Akoúo̱, grit her teeth, then stomped forward, twisting her hips and back and made a huge, awfully telegraphed horizontal swing with Miló.
The punishment was immediate, as he dodged back one of his swords crashed into her unarmored right forearm with bone crushing force. She screamed in both pain and effort as she forced herself to complete the swing and flicked her wrist at the very end, throwing Miló and imparting spin to it. She then used Polarity to engulf her weapon in a magnetic field and increased the speed of its spinning until it resembled a red and gold flying buzz saw.
The weapon roared as it cut the air, forcing him to back away as she made the sword follow him. Pyrrha spun and threw Akoúo̱ at him as hard as she could, then charged at him.
Shirou deftly dodged the shield as he continued to backpedal, using the gladii to try and parry Miló resulted only in a third of the blades being shorn off.
Pyrrha suppressed a smirk as she used Polarity to bring Akoúo̱ in an arc toward her opponent's back. As she caught up to Miló, she jumped, adding a pirouette for additional centrifugal force. She reached out, using Polarity to slap Miló's grip into her palm (which to an onlooker would make it seem as if she'd perfectly snatched the weapon out of its perilous spinning) and attacked in a downward stab that had all of her built-up momentum, bodyweight and the aid of gravity behind it.
A stab that she had practiced extensively so it would force an opponent to keep their attention on her, on the fact that she could not dodge midair. Making it so that the first notice they'd have of Akoúo̱ as it hurtled toward their lower back, was the impact that would destabilize their footing and stance an instant before Miló stabbed down onto them.
It wasn't an attack she used often, but it was the technique with which she had become a national champion for the first time.
Which was why it came as something of a surprise when, rather than set his stance to take advantage of her vulnerability in the air, Shirou launched himself into a backflip, managing to just barely clear Akoúo̱ so the edge of her shield now hurtled toward her face.
Pyrrha used her Semblance to turn it so Akoúo̱'s flat faced her, curled up and landed feet first on her shield, bending her knees to absorb the momentum of her charge, then kicked off into a backflip of her own, launching her shield toward Shirou, who batted it aside and muttered something under his breath.
By the time she landed there were a dozen weapons floating behind him. She immediately used her Semblance and Akoúo̱ began its return journey to her.
Pyrrha put weight into her back foot as she prepared to launch herself forward, but aborted the attempt with a sidestep as a bronze-headed spear roared through the space where her head had been. She dipped under a copper dagger that would have struck her shoulder and leaped back to avoid a flint-headed spear that shattered against the arena floor. Akoúo̱ finally slapped into her forearm as she readied herself to launch forward again.
And then he stopped shooting the weapons one at a time.
The only sound that could overpower the shriek of weapons shattering the sound barrier, were the squeals of tortured metal as the weapons he fired fractured against the floor. Even though advancing toward him was nearly impossible, she pushed forward. She dodged, dipped, ducked and dove, angling Akoúo̱ so that any sword or spear she couldn't avoid glanced off the face of the shield. Every instinct told her to close the distance quickly, but she was forced to advance at an oblique angle, taking a leap back for every two steps she managed to push forward.
She instinctively used Polarity to try and make an opening in the rain of blades, but it never worked. Copper knives, bronze swords and spears, flint headed arrows, once she saw an ornate club with black, gleaming rocks driven into it.
Her heart pounded with the exhilaration of actually being overwhelmed in a match. Her breath came in short pants and she could feel sweat falling in rivulets down her face and back as she danced through the rain of blades.
She could tell that there was an easier way forward than trying to break through, a path of least resistance that she could follow and drive quickly towards him. But this was his rain of weapons, that path of least resistance was sure to be a trap. She felt her lips stretch out into an excited grin for the first time in what felt like an eternity.
She pushed forward until she was a couple yards away from him, but with the intensity of the barrage it might as well have been two miles. And then every weapon that had been roaring toward her dissolved into golden motes all at once, causing her to stumble in surprise for an instant.
In that instant he drove forward, and Pyrrha had just enough time to raise Akoúo̱ to protect her left side and Miló to protect her neck and head on her right. A sword slammed into Miló with an impact that almost made her stumble. The Sword Hunter then became a whirlwind of sharp bronze.
Pyrrha felt the grin on her face grow wider as they matched blades once more.
=][=
Ruby Rose had thought she would have been happy to see her Hero in a match against an international champion of Pyrrha's caliber. Had she been asked she would have used every synonym she knew for 'ecstatic' and maybe looked up a few more in the CCTN to help convey how happy she thought she'd be at the current circumstances.
After all, she got to see her Hero kill the creatures of Grimm in the flesh, before he very politely declined to skewer her team into chunky salsa when they later attacked him.
But those times she had been rather preoccupied, so she did not get to actually enjoy watching her Hero fight, which is why she had been so incredibly excited at the prospect of the match.
It just so happened that when the match started, Ruby had skipped past 'happy' to land firmly in 'astonished' and moved on from there.
Ruby had often heard the phrase 'a warrior's grace.' She had read of 'footwork so skilled and movements so fluid as to be a dance.' She had sought to emulate Huntsmen that she believed embodied that very ideal, as her Hero for the most part killed Grimm with sharp and stabby artillery. In all of her training, in all of her fights, Ruby had sought to move in such a way as to awe the onlooker with the grace and power of her movements as she fought.
It was not until this exact moment that she came to the startling realization that she had been doing it wrong all along.
He was a blur. It felt like she was seeing something liquid and unreal. Both of his blades moved in absolute synchrony. It mattered not if he parried, blocked, disengaged or riposted, it mattered not what trick, or twist, or feint, or change in tempo Pyrrha attempted. His swords forever moved in mathematically perfect harmony.
Fighting with paired swords is far from simple, and fighting well with paired blades is next to impossible. Many fighters she had bested had convinced themselves that it offered any benefit whatsoever over a blade and shield, or a longer single blade, or a spear, or a weapon that could shift between any of those options and was also a gun. Fighting with twin weapons was, most of the time that she had seen, for those like Russel who prioritized posturing over skill, seeking to intimidate their opponent and awe a bystander. Very few people that she knew of had mastered fighting with twin swords. Barring Ren, everyone she had fought against who used a two-sword style had merely been overconfident and, frankly, something of a disappointment as they'd used the second blade almost exclusively to defend, in which case they would have been better served with a shield.
Mr. Sword Hunter was graceful, swift, coordinated, strong and many more things. But the way he fought had nothing of what she'd call 'flair.' Every movement was swift and precise, without a single instant of wasted motion. In fact he often snuck in a shallow cut or stab any time Pyrrha swung with a little too much flourish, an opening Ruby herself had seen before but had never been able to move quickly enough to capitalize on. His every swing was calm, collected, precise. It was almost…impersonal.
Pyrrha's thrown shield moved in ever more intricate patterns as they fought, but he always moved aside just enough so it did little more than ruffle his cloak. She turned her sword into a spear and cast it with a flare of high-grade combustion Dust, but every cast of the spear was met with a conjured sword or spear slamming against it in midair.
In fact, there was a surprising amount of discarded weaponry on the floor. To such an extent that, rather than fight on the actual floor, most of the fight was now happening on top of those bronze gladii that Mr. Sword Hunter was using to fight…now that she thought of it, why was he using old weapons? Could it be that they were more Aura-effective to make? No, the Sword Rain she'd witnessed had used steel weapons.
And Pyrrha definitely seemed to be having a harder time than usual…her dodges and parries were less graceful than Ruby was used to seeing from her friend. Could he have figured out Pyrrha's Semblance in the short time they'd known each other? But if so, how was using bronze and stone weapons countering her Semblance?
As she asked herself that question, she saw Pyrrha's spear get knocked out of the air by a conjured sword. Ruby watched as the spear was sent sailing off to the side before ricocheting off the force field enclosing the combatants and sailing unerringly back to Pyrrha's waiting hand.
Ruby blinked, that...should not have happened quite like that. She tracked Pyrrha's shield the next time her friend threw it, and watched in fascination as it jinked from side to side, was repulsed into the ground and skipped off a pile of bronze swords before coming in behind Mr. Sword Hunter, who dodged it by a minor margin and the shield slotted itself seamlessly into Pyrrha's vambrace.
Ruby felt her eyes widening. Telekinesis? No, if that were the case Pyrrha would have had no trouble with the Sword Rain. It had to be something like telekinesis but didn't work on bronze or stone...
When Pyrrha's defeat came, it began as a trickle that quickly escalated to a cascade. Mr. Sword Hunter changed weapons mid-swing, going from a bronze gladius to a wood and stone club the instant before his attack met Pyrrha's shield. The unexpected weight behind the attack caused her to take a step back in order not to overbalance and fall.
The piled weapons Pyrrha stepped on disappeared as she put her weight down on them causing her to begin to topple backwards. Pyrrha immediately and almost seamlessly transitioned into a backwards cartwheel that she combined with a flash-kick to keep him at bay.
And as she was halfway through the cartwheel, the enormous slab of stone that Mr. Sword Hunter used to kill that King Taijitu appeared in her way in a cerulean flash, halting her movement cold. As she rebounded from the stone sword, he took hold of her ankles and slammed her back down to the floor so hard that Ruby heard Pyrrha huff as the air was crushed out of her lungs.
He then pointed at her ankles and a pair of deer horn knives that looked to be made of actual deer antlers slammed into place around Pyrrha's ankles, knees, and thighs. He stepped forward and pinned her left arm to the floor by stepping on her wrist, then pointed to her right hand, where another deer-horn knife slammed itself over Pyrrha's wrist, the same soon followed on her forearm, elbow, biceps and shoulder. Her left arm soon received the same treatment, a singularly enormous knife pinning her shield to the floor.
He stepped back from her, the air above her sparkling with blue lightning as swords began to appear. Pyrrha struggled, her entire body trembling as she tried to free herself, but the knives were seemingly immovable.
Two swords became ten, ten swords became five dozen.
Ruby blinked, her mouth falling open into a perfect 'o'.
There was just no way.
He couldn't possibly.
Right?
=][=
Shirou looked over his handiwork with a critical eye, then added a few more knives and Altered them so they'd spread out into the concrete like tree roots.
That should be good enough for her not to be able to free herself…maybe.
He wondered if perhaps he shouldn't just do the thing while facing her just to be on the safe side? Thinking of safety, where was Miló?
He looked around and spotted the Sword-Rocket Spear-Rifle lying an arm's length away from Pyrrha's pinned hand. That could have been dangerous. She didn't need to have the weapon on hand to fling it at him, and for this next bit he would be distracted.
He immediately covered it in four dozen copies of the literal deer horn knives he'd made for Vernal as a birthday gift a few years back.
There, that should be safe now, worst come to worst the crack of shattered concrete would let him know if it got free.
He looked down at the trapped, struggling girl, and decided that this whole 'Lethality' thing took way too much effort to set up safely. He crossed his fingers and hoped that the nagging feeling he got while playing that game would come back and make him remember something about the green-eyed girl. He looked over the several dozen swords floating above her, nodded, and prepared to snap his fingers.
"E-Excuse me," Pyrrha said tremulously. He blinked and looked down at her pale, sweaty face. "Hey umm…I yield? There's no need to go through with the whole 'Lethality' thing, okay? I can't move and am at your mercy, it's your win."
Well crap. The whole reason he'd agreed to the fight was to test that nagging feeling he got when he watched the video game version of himself do that thing.
Goodwitch began to label him the winner, there was a buzz, the screen showed remaining Aura levels. He was still well above half while Pyrrha had fallen to under thirty.
He pursed his lips behind his mask as he pondered, then nodded. "Do me a favor and stay right there."
He then turned his back on her and snapped his fingers. There were shouts of alarm that almost drowned out Pyrrha's frightened "eep!"
He didn't bring the swords down, after all, it was the turning and the snap that made him get that feeling. He felt something new spring up within him as he snapped his fingers.
Oh hells that felt awful.
There was anger, and no small amount of disgust and…incredulity?
He furrowed his brows and snapped his fingers again.
The second snap was even worse. But why was it worse? Why did snapping his fingers in this particular situation make him feel awful? Maybe if he did it one more time?
The third time made him feel physically ill, and he resolved himself to never ever snap his fingers again for any reason.
"Ummm…" Pyrrha said nervously behind him. "M-May I stand up? Please?"
Shirou blinked and looked back at her. Oh right, the knives.
He dispersed every weapon that he'd created, then offered her a hand up.
She looked at his hand as if it were going to bite her, before shaking her head and accepting his aid to stand.
"You're pretty good," he said, and she was. Nowhere near Raven's level, but above Sylvie and Vernal.
She grinned at him. "Thanks for the fight, mind if I ask for a rematch later?"
He shrugged. "If I'm still around, sure."
He was then tackled to the ground by a red and black blur.
"THAT WAS AWESOME!" Ruby shouted in his ear.
A moment later he heard someone land lightly next to him, and saw that rabbit-eared Faunus girl that Ruby insisted had to watch his match with Pyrrha.
"Excuse me," she said as she pulled out a notebook and pen. "Why did you fight with outdated weapons? Did they have some special property? Were they cheaper to produce with your Semblance?"
"Uhhh…" he answered intelligently.
"You were going to do the Rain of Blades Lethality!" Ruby gushed, he could all but see stars in her eyes. "That was soooooo cooooooool!"
"I'm never doing that again," he said flatly.
"Why!? You gotta! It's so cool!"
Hrm, he did not know how to handle his current situation, what was it that Raven told him to do when he felt out of his depth dealing with people?
"Meh, shut your trap and scowl at them, they'll leave you alone eventually."
Somehow, he got the feeling that his go-to tactic for dealing with people would not work with these two.
He'd have to rely on his secondary strategy.
But Vernal wasn't around so he could shove her at these two while he slunk away. Hmm, he really needed to come up with more ways to deal with people.
"You gotta! Can you at least do it to me!? It'd be so cool!" Ruby wailed.
He blinked.
She actually wanted to get skewered by several dozen swords?
"Ruby. I'm not hitting you with swords," he said slowly.
"WHY!? I'm suuuuuper tough! I can take it! Hit me with your best sword!" she demanded as she began shaking him.
Well he certainly couldn't do that. Atomizing one of his little sisters sounded like a really bad idea.
"Ruby," he said, "let me up."
She blinked and seemed to realize that she was straddling him and her face got very, very red. Could she be coming down with a fever? That could be bad, but at least she wasn't competing in the tournament anymore and could get plenty of rest.
She was off him in a flash, pulling her cloak up to hide her face, an unending stream of words coming out of her mouth much too quickly for him to understand anything she was saying.
He pulled himself to his feet and took off his mask and hood. He heard the clicks of high-heels on concrete and immediately lowered his center of gravity, turning his body to minimize his profile and planted his feet a shoulder's width apart, his hands curling around the grips of swords that would take an instant to materialize.
He would have missed the hitch in Glynda Goodwitch's step if he hadn't been looking for any sign of hostility. Her hand tightened on the grip of her riding crop as she made her way to Pyrrha.
"Ms. Nikos, I trust that all is well?"
Pyrrha held her hands demurely in front of her and spoke to the floor. "Y-Yes, Professor."
"Good, my apologies but I need to leave," she held out her scroll toward Pyrrha, a moment later Pyrrha's scroll beeped. "I've granted you permission to control the lock on the door, please be sure to lock the room behind you when you are done."
"I…Yes Professor, I'll be certain to."
Goodwitch looked at the half demolished arena before turning her eyes to him, and Shirou once more felt the longing, the feeling that the woman before him was so close to the girl he searched for, yet was missing something that would mean he had finally found her. He felt a painful pang when she turned her back to him and began walking away, his hand twitching slightly as he almost called out to her, to ask her to stay a little longer.
He did not relax his posture until she was out of sight.
He turned around to see the rest of the three teams had joined them.
"Excuse me, could you bring out that spear that you use?" the Faunus girl said, her voice gaining in volume with every word she spoke. "Or those Falchions? Or that sword you used during the Breach!?"
Shirou blinked, and rather than answer he created Gáe Bolg and held it over his shoulder.
She squealed and began taking picture after picture.
"Oh great," said a girl that was wearing sunglasses even though they were indoors, "Velvet won't stop gushing about those for days."
He scowled in her direction.
Yang walked over with an admirable attempt at a cocky smirk on her face, could she also be coming down with something? That'd be bad seeing as she was still competing in the tournament, maybe he could sneak into the kitchen and make her some chicken soup?
Yang took hold of her left elbow with her right hand. "Hey, too bad you're not in the tournament, I'd love a chance at a rematch against you, that rain of swords is pretty impressive."
Shirou nodded, vanished Gáe Bolg and created Durandal. He rested its point on the ground and folded his hands on the pommel. Velvet squealed again and took more pictures.
"R-Right," Yang muttered with a grimace.
Blake walked up next to Yang and gave her shoulder a friendly squeeze, easing his little sister's grimace. "Well, you've always seemed interested in laying low for the most part," she said with a demure smile. "Showing up in a tournament that's seen by all of Remnant would kinda fly in the face of that."
Shirou froze. For some reason Blake flinched away from him when he turned his eyes to her.
"Say that again."
=][=
Raven could not help but feel the usual nostalgic pang as she flew over Beacon. She'd raised all kinds of hell in these parts for four years.
She remembered overhearing several teachers mention that they hoped Summer would be a calming influence on her, so Raven had made it her life's goal to corrupt the hells out of that repressed idiot.
Her brain regurgitated fuzzy memories of waking up still a little drunk, wearing only Summer's white cloak while her team leader was wearing Raven's own dress.
Gods only knew how they'd managed to get into that house, none of the windows had been broken into and none of the locks were forced, and neither Summer nor herself knew how to pick a lock.
Summer had beaten the crap out of Raven when she woke up and saw Raven wearing her cloak.
Good times.
She spotted a familiar head of blonde hair walking slowly through a deserted courtyard. Tucking her wings close to her body, she dove down several dozen feet before flaring her wings and flapping her way to a tree branch.
"And I am telling you it won't be an issue," James Ironwood ground out. "If anything, the result of that match shows that it is imperative that we obtain his loyalty."
"While I agree that Shirou would be a good ally to have, the point remains he does not trust us," Glynda growled. Good boy Shirou, Raven would ease his punishment a little.
Rather than forcing him to watch Vernal cook for a whole month, she'd bring it down to a couple weeks. Raven took off from her perch and flew to a light pole to keep up with the two as they moved.
"Besides," Glynda continued, "you heard him. He remembers next to nothing of the girl he's looking for. How exactly do you plan on finding the woman without so much as a physical description?"
Ironwood coughed and grimaced to the side, which seemed to be universal male for 'That's a very pertinent question, the answer to which you won't like so I'd rather not say.'
"James," Glynda ground out, the sheer amount of anger and disdain she injected into his name was staggering. Raven decided to try that on her bundle of stupid, maybe it would finally get something smart through his thick skull.
Ironwood quailed under Glynda's glare, and pointedly did not meet her gaze as he said, "I have my ways."
Glynda stopped and put a hand on his chest. "That's not good enough James, what are you plotting?"
"I'm not plotting an-!"
"Bullshit!" Raven cocked her head in surprise, Glynda was never one for invectives. "You're a Headmaster and a General! Plotting is your default setting! What are you plotting!?"
Ironwood coughed to the side. "I have someone in my employ in whom I have full confidence."
Glynda took hold of his collar and pulled his face down to her level so she could properly glare at him. "Explain, now."
Ironwood took her hand in his and gently pried her grip free. He cleared his throat before speaking in a low voice. "One of my agents can…influence people."
Glynda tried to step back, but he did not release her hand. "You can't possibly-!"
"Yes," he interrupted. "I do."
"But! I! That's! You!" Glynda sputtered, her face turning a deeper shade of red by the word.
"It's worth it," he muttered, "once we've secured his loyalty we ca-"
Glynda's full armed slap almost sent him sprawling.
"You would dare do something so…! So horrid!? So immoral!? So monstrous!?"
"He's only one person!" Ironwood ground out and spat red tinted spittle to the side. "Weighed against the countless lives he could secure if he worked for us, then yes! I would! And I would sleep better at night after I do it!"
Glynda stood there trembling from head to foot, her hands curling into fists as she visibly tried to bring herself under control, unknowingly saving Ironwood's life.
After all, if Raven transformed and killed him, then chances were that Glynda would react in time to stop her getting through a portal. No, in order to safely kill Ironwood, she'd have to kill Glynda at the same time.
Easy enough to do, they were close enough that she'd be able to decapitate the both of them with a single swing. But Glynda had stood up for her bundle of stupid, so she did not deserve to die.
Maybe if Raven hung around a little longer, they'd part ways? Though knowing Ironwood, his guard dogs were not far behind. They shouldn't be able to slow her enough for Glynda to come back and avenge Ironwood…but chances were they'd learned of Shirou's relationship to her, meaning she'd have to portal to him and get him out.
And if Ozpin had dangled finding Shirou's girl…the bastard was probably lying, but Shirou would hold out hope, meaning she'd have to waste time either persuading him or attempt to overpower him, and he was good enough to win almost as many spars against her as he lost.
He probably wouldn't pull out one of his Artefacts against her…probably.
Stupid Ironwood, and stupid Ozpin, and while she was at it stupid-
She spotted her bundle of stupid walking past a window and took flight, following him as he made his way through the school, Summer's kid trailing after him like a lost puppy.
Raven cocked her head, if the girl's expression was anything to go by, Ruby had taken a liking to her bundle of stupid, and Raven was entirely certain he had utterly failed to notice.
Maybe she could prod him into realizing her feelings and giving her a shot?
Raven clicked her beak in annoyance, forcing herself to focus on the matter at hand.
She used a combination of glimpses of Shirou and somewhat fuzzy memories of her years spent in these halls to follow his progress through the buildings. As they made a turn she'd not expected, she came to the realization that they'd given her stupid kid quarters in the student dorms.
'Really?' she thought. 'Couldn't you at least have tried to be subtle? Stupid Ozpin.'
She flew along the wall until she spotted Shirou through one of the windows, landed on the ledge, and returned to her human form.
She was getting ready to knock on his window when her scroll buzzing made her twitch in surprise. She hurried to get it out of her skirt, fumbled it, caught it between her wrist and her breast, and answered.
"Yeah?" she asked tersely.
"Hi Raven," Shirou said. "You wouldn't happen to have been worried about me being in Beacon, right?"
Fuck! Had he heard her? "Of course not!" she lied snappishly. "I'm busy running recon on…the Karmesinweg."
"Oh? And how is that going?" he asked. Was he being snide? He better not dare be snide with her.
"Well enough! What do you want? You got yourself hurt and need me to bail you out again?"
"Maybe I just missed you?"
Raven quashed the warmth that question spread in her chest. "Don't try to act cute, it doesn't suit you."
"Maybe I thought you missed me?" he continued, and Raven decided that the inflection in his voice was most certainly not amusement.
"Shi-ro-u." She growled.
"I'm just wondering because, you see, I spot the edge of a rather familiar black skirt at the edge of my window."
Raven cursed and took a step further away from the window. A few seconds later she heard it unlatch and Shirou's face leaned out, still holding his scroll to his ear. "Hmmm, so how goes that recon?"
"Shut up and get the hells out of my way." Raven growled and jumped into the room, turning her back to him while she waited for her cheeks to stop feeling warm. She spotted his armor lying by the bed, sloppy, he shouldn't take it off while in enemy territory.
She could see several nicks and gouges, and figured he was about to repair it. Still, that could have waited until he was in a safer place.
"Nice to see you too, Raven," he said easily.
She turned around and met his gaze. "You haven't agreed to anything?"
"I haven't."
"You haven't accepted anything?"
"Other than staying here a few days, no."
"Have they offered to find your girl for you?"
His breath hitched, his eyes gaining a familiar fevered intensity for a moment before they mellowed out again. "No."
There was something there, but she chose to concentrate on the important things. "Well, don't believe anything Ironwood tells you, I overheard him talking with Glynda. He's got someone with a Semblance that messes with people's minds. He's planning to mess with yours to make you think he found your girl and 'persuade' you to work for him."
His eyes became amber-hued flint. His face paled until he was white as a sheet. His posture changed subtly, lowering his center of gravity. His hands did not tighten into fists, rather they were loosely closed. The lines of his Semblance blazed into being running from the sides of his head down to his arms and the tips of his fingers. He exuded a quiet rage that seemed to drop the temperature of the room by several degrees.
Raven thought that maybe, just maybe, she could have delivered her warning a little more tactfully.
He turned and began to march to the door.
"Stop!" she said as she got in front of him and put a hand on his shoulder, but he did not heed her.
She activated her Aura and dug her heel into the floor, and he walked until his chest collided against hers. His shoulder was sun-warmed granite underneath her palm, likewise his core where it pressed against her.
"Shirou," she said sternly, moving her arms to hug him tightly as he tried to step around her, "Shirou, stop."
His breathing was steady and controlled, a good sign on anyone other than her bundle of stupid.
"Shirou, listen to me," she said, hoping that repeatedly using his name would snap him out of his anger. "You need to calm down."
He did not back down, but neither did he push any harder against her, his entire body taut as a coiled spring. When he spoke, his voice was cold and flat; a corpse would speak with more emotion than him. "I'll kill him."
"And that's fine," she said, tightening her hold on him in case he tried anything. "But he's surrounded by soldiers and armed robots. In the middle of an academy for Huntsmen, full of kids and adults armed to the teeth. I have no doubts you'll kill him, but can you kill him without killing a lot of other people?"
"Yes," he answered, still in that oddly flat, quiet voice.
"But can you get away without killing a lot of other people?" she asked. Not that she'd care, but now that Ozpin knew of or at least suspected of their relationship, if he went crazy now, Ozpin could retaliate against the Branwen tribe, and since they weren't moving around as much as ten years ago that retaliation would be more difficult to defend against.
He finally stopped pushing, his chest and back turning from warm marble into flesh. His breathing hitched and gained a more natural rhythm.
She felt his arms encircle her and felt him bury his face in her shoulder. He began to shudder from head to foot as his breathing sped up.
Well, it had been a while since she comforted him, so she might as well let him get it out of his system.
"Hush," she said as she gently rubbed the back of his head. "Hush, it's okay, you're okay. He won't get away with it. You're aware of what he'll try so if he does, he'll fail. Hush, you're fine."
His hold on her tightened to the point that she grunted in discomfort. It took him a few minutes to calm down enough to relax.
"Yeah, Ironwood's an ass," she said as she caressed the back of his head, then grimaced. "Credit where it's due, Glynda slapped him for making the suggestion. Out of everyone here, she's probably the only one that would deal straight with you."
She felt him nod and hurriedly continued. "That doesn't mean you can trust her, you hear? In fact, it'd be better if we just leave right now before they try to pull anything. Come on we should just go home and forget this all ever-"
His arms tightening around her waist gave her the distinct impression that he was going to be difficult.
"Shirou," she said warningly.
He pulled away from her and put his hands on her shoulders. "No wait! At least hear me out! It's a good idea this time!"
Raven bit her tongue to keep herself from snapping at him. "What idea?"
"I'll get Ozpin to let me compete in the Vytal tournament!" he said with a big goofy grin.
Raven's mouth filled with the salty, coppery taste of blood.
"Yang and her team explained it to me!" he continued excitedly, his eyes shining. "Nearly all of Remnant tunes in to watch the Vytal tournament! And the ones who miss it soon hear of the results!
"The winner gets to make a short speech! So if I compete and win, I'll be able to use that speech to reach out to the girl! Even if she doesn't see it, she'll be told of it!" his grip tightened affectionately on her shoulders. "I might finally find her, Raven!"
As he continued to gush happily, Raven had to stop herself from scratching her temple; she had the slight suspicion that if she started, she'd not stop until she drew blood.
This was a terrible idea. If he revealed himself so blatantly to the world, then everyone who the Branwens protected would know the fucking Sword Hunter had lived among them for years.
Which meant that that bitch would finally learn of Shirou's whereabouts, which meant that she'd start sending Killteams to put down her bundle of stupid for his propensity to annihilate Grimm.
Hells for all Raven knew, she'd just ramp up the number of Grimm attacking their turf until they were utterly overwhelmed. Shirou could not pump out those swords indefinitely; he did eventually run out of Aura.
No, she had to stop him. She had to make herself understood, in no uncertain terms, that she would not allow him to go through with this sword-brained idea of his.
Except, looking at his face, she couldn't.
When was the last time she saw him smile? Really smile, with that big goofy grin of his that threatened to split his face in two? Weeks? Months?
It couldn't have been years, surely.
And yet, here was that goofy grin as he babbled excitedly about a new dish he'd thought up so he could make it for that girl of his.
Raven could already imagine how it would go. She'd lay down the law, he'd object, they'd argue. She'd explain all the ways that his revealing himself would lead to danger for the tribe, for the people they protected.
He'd start listening, he'd nod, he'd eventually agree. And second by second, that grin would evaporate, the shine in his eyes would dull until they were as empty as a doll's eyes. They'd leave and continue to watch over Yang.
Over the weeks and months he'd resent her for taking this from him, and the worst thing will be that nothing would change; he'd still make her meals delicious, he'd still brush her hair, he'd still do what she told him.
Just as if she hadn't taken what might perhaps be his best chance yet at finding his girl.
"Raven?" His questioning tone broke her out of her thoughts. She could already see the light dimming in his eyes as he realized she did not share his enthusiasm.
Stupid swords-for-brains.
She stepped forward, buried her face in his chest, and used him to muffle her scream. She grabbed hold of his shirt to hold him in place when he tried to step back, and simply screamed until her lungs were empty.
Feeling a little better, she leaned back enough to be able to croak, "Fine."
"R-Raven?" he asked timidly.
"I said fine!" she growled. "No argument here! Alright!? Go compete in your stupid tournament! Win the gold! Say your damn speech!"
"Really!?" he asked. Damn him, did he have to sound so happy and excited? Would it kill him to make telling him 'no' a little easier?
She bumped her forehead against his sternum, it'd do for a wall. "Yes, really."
He engulfed her in a hug and picked her up so her feet dangled a few inches off the floor, saying "Thank you!" over and over.
"But you have to promise not to agree to anything too daming, Ozpin will try to use this as a way to get one of his slimy hooks in you," she warned.
"I won't!" he said excitedly.
"And remember, you cannot trust him, offer an inch and he'll take an acre. You have to give him the absolute least possible recompense for the favor of participating in the tournament, and since you're the one approaching him he's set to bargain from a position of strength."
"I'll be careful!"
Yeah right, he wouldn't know 'care' if it reared up and bit him in the balls. She muffled another scream before growling, "I liked you more when I could throw you."
"Love you too, Mom," he said cheekily, before grunting when she punched him in the short ribs.
Forgetting to put her down, he launched into another rambling rant about finding his dumbass girl and cooking.
She'd have to remind him that he was still holding her…but that could wait. She couldn't help but wonder what being hugged by her daughter would feel like.
She did her best to vanish that useless pang of longing and, resting her forehead against Shirou's chest, let his excited rambling wash over her.
Hugs were surprisingly nice.
=][=
Emerald Sustrai was not having a good day.
She had spent the better part of two days and a night trying and failing to find anything at all about Ozpin's mysterious Huntsman guest.
She had assured Cinder that she'd have compiled a comprehensive file on the guy by the end of the day.
Specifically, by the end of the day yesterday.
A file she had yet to start.
She threw a glare at Mercury as he laid back on the bed reading a stupid comic book. She did not dare look toward Cinder, she'd not be able to meet her gaze at the moment. To fail so monumentally…
"Emerald," Cinder said, as if thinking about her had been a signal. "How goes that file you promised me?"
Emerald grimaced, she felt her face become uncomfortably hot, her mortification feeding off her shame.
"It…Please, I just need a little more time, Cinder," she muttered at the floor.
"Hmm?" Cinder hummed, lacing the sound with a slight chastisement that caused Emerald to flinch. "I'm sorry, Emerald, I'm afraid I did not hear you."
Emerald cleared her throat and tried to look up from the floor, but stopped at Cinder's legs. Now that she stopped to think on it, those tight fitting grey pants really suited her, showed off her figure quite well and—
"Emerald," Cinder said as she elegantly crossed her right leg over her left knee, her normally sultry voice becoming hard as a rock, "look at me when I talk to you."
Emerald slowly panned her eyes up Cinder's legs, past the sarashi tied around her waist, up her beige leather jacket, past the waves of her coal-black hair that she'd pulled in front of her left shoulder, past the ridge of her jaw and finally into her smoldering amber eyes, the fiery glow of her irises was decidedly displeased.
"Now, if you'd kindly repeat what you said." Cinder demanded with a slight smile.
Emerald gulped and fiddled with a lock of her mint green hair, before speaking in as sure a voice as she could. "Umm…I…I haven't started."
Even though Cinder's expression remained unchanged, the temperature in the room became stiflingly hot. She heard Mercury give a strangled gasp of surprise.
"Explain."
Emerald suppressed a grimace. "He's a ghost! It's like he doesn't exist! He has no digital bootprint whatsoever! No name, birth certificate, or even a social media account! His Scroll is a burner with no saved data beyond his room key, and that's registered to 'Guest 1060'! I tried running an image search, but because he's dressed like the Sword Hunter, I got several tens of thousands of returns. The guy is a ghost!"
The room got cooler as she explained. By the end of her explanation, Cinder was tapping her chin in thought. She turned her gaze to the only male in the room. "Mercury, what did you learn through your surveillance?"
Mercury sat up in bed, tossing his head to get his grey hair out of his eyes. "Nothing much really, other than Little Red sticking to this guy like gum to a boot. In fact, both those groups of annoyances are sticking pretty close to the guy.
"As far I was able to see, he just let Red pull him around the place and scowled at everything." He snorted. "You'd think the guy was the Sword Hunter with how much she's fawning over him."
Emerald saw the corner of Cinder's left eye twitch at the mention of that man. "What do you mean?"
Completely unaware of the pitfall he hovered over, Mercury scoffed. "The Sword Hunter is basically all Red talks about. She's the biggest fangirl I've ever seen. I actually feel a bit bad for Em, she's had to actually sit through a few of Red's gushing sessions.
"It's just weird to see her fawning all over this guy, I figured she had the hots for the Sword Hunter," Mercury finished with a shrug.
Cinder turned back to look at Emerald. "Make me see an image of the Sword Hunter, and of this mysterious guest side by side."
"Umm…yes ma'am." Emerald said and activated her Aura. Her Semblance, Hallucinations, allowed her to make anyone she wanted see and hear whatever she wished. The only real caveat being that it took so much concentration that she couldn't manage to move at more than a slow walk while doing it, and using it on more than one person at once gave her headaches and nosebleeds.
She made Cinder see as accurate a representation of both the men she asked to see.
It was strange for Emerald, as she could see both the world as it was, and as she made Cinder see it. The space where the two illusionary men stood side by side at once empty and occupied.
Cinder stood and sashayed to the illusions, examining them in detail while muttering to herself in a low voice.
"You can't possibly think that…" Mercury began before swallowing nervously. "It can't be the actual Sword Hunter, right?"
Emerald threw him a glare so he'd shut up. It worked as well as it usually did, which is to say not at all.
"I mean, he fought tooth and nail to get out of seeing Ozpin. He wouldn't, you know, come here…Right?"
"Be silent," Cinder said distractedly. "Emerald, pull up the after action interviews of RWBY, JNPR and CVFY for the day of the Breach."
Emerald hurried to obey, but quickly furrowed her brows in confusion. "They…they're nowhere in Beacon's network. If they exist at all, then not even the Headmaster can access them."
Cinder was tapping her chin in thought while staring up at the face of the redheaded man, when her scroll buzzed. She absently pulled it out, and whatever she saw made her eyes widen in astonishment.
"What is it?" the question slipped out before Emerald could stop it, and she bit her tongue; Cinder did not like being questioned.
"There's been a sudden addition to the Vytal tournament," Cinder answered distractedly. "Our mystery man, Shirou, no last name given…is going to face off against teams that have been knocked out of the running."
Mercury and Emerald exchanged a confused look before he asked, "Which ones?"
"All of them," Cinder answered. "If any of them beat him, they're back in the tournament. If he beats all of them, he'll be granted a shot at first place."
Emerald felt sick to her stomach, this had to be a joke, or maybe a mistake, he couldn't be the Sword Hunter. The former plan might have been able to keep him busy but Roman went and messed that up.
Cinder's sultry chuckle snapped her out of her panicked spiral.
"Children" Cinder said with a beatific smile, her irises lighting up with a merrily dancing flame. "I have an idea."
