Hold the Line

AN: Hey everyone. I am sorry for how long it has been since I've written a chapter, and that this one isn't too long.

But with how things have been lately, it's been difficult to find time to write.

I will try to finish this story, I owe it to this story to be finished.

Stay safe out there and stay healthy.

Hope you all enjoy!

Outside the city of Minas Tirith, the armies of Mordor form up at the roots to the mountain, columns of organized soldiers ranging from Orcs, Uruks and even Grimm. Rourke made it apparent that this massive horde was not mindless or leaderless. These beasts were organized and eager to lay waste to the mountain city that stands before them.

At the gate, the soldiers over the ramparts spot thirteen trucks at rest beside the door, one of the soldiers at the guard tower opens the gate just enough for the two trucks to make it in and immediately close after. The trucks were unloaded to reveal mauled and some mangled soldiers in critical condition. One of the trucks had its occupants carry one of their wounded out, it was Faramir. He appeared to have a bullet wound between his neck and his shoulder, and another below the right of his chest. He was bandaged, but the medics didn't think he was going to make it in his current condition.

The soldiers carrying him were originally going to take him to the hospital, but Chancellor Denethor demanded he'd be brought up to the capital courtyard.

Meanwhile in the hoard beyond the city, the Black Knight of Mantel, Rourke Numenor, smirked as the front lines reach the start of the pathway to the Bloody Gate. About two miles of open field as wide as four yards and on an incline to two massive stone and steel doors. Centuries ago, he designed this fortress. Now, he lived again to bring it down.

The army readied their siege weapons, mostly stolen Atlas artillery from armories or armies they defeated on the way to the capital. There weren't too many, but there was enough to make the amount of damage Rourke needed to guarantee the siege would end in his favor, no matter how many bodies he had to throw at it, and he had plenty to spend.

In less than an hour, the soldiers brought Faramir to the capital courtyard for his father to see him. General Ironwood, Ozpin, Winter, Weiss and Penny were all present to their arrival.

Winter's eyes welled up at the sight of Faramir on the stretcher. A needle in his arm, attempting to give him back the blood he lost and the steady beeping from the heart monitor on his wrist.

"FARAMIR!" Denathor shouted as he ran to them without hesitation. They set Faramir's stretcher on the ground as Denathor tried to lift his head up with his hands.

Ironwood looked to one of the surviving sergeants, "What happened?"

The sergeant replied with a defeated tone, "Rourke knew we were coming. He had machine gun turrets and anti-tank cannons waiting for us before we even got close. Out of two thousand, only 50 made it back."

Denathor sobbed as he held Faramir's head. Winter marched right up to Denathor and pulled him up, "THIS IS YOUR FAULT!" All her emotions finally reached the boiling point and she couldn't contain it anymore.

The tower guard draw their weapons and aim them at Winter's head, Weiss and Penny draw their weapons and aim them at the guards. Ironwood holds his hand up, "Stand down, everyone!"

He reaches for Winter's shoulder, "Stand down, General… now."

Winter didn't look at Ironwood, she continued to glare at the heartbroken Denathor and let him go. She moved past him and dropped to her knees to hold Faramir's unconscious hand.

Winter knelt beside her sister. She then formed a green glyph over Faramir's shoulder. It would heal, but the process would take time. "He needs to go to a hospital."

"The line of Numenor has failed…" Denathor said as he walked away, dazed and not thinking straight. "MY LINE HAS ENDED!"

Denathor kept walking until he reached the edge of the courtyard and had full view of the armies below.

Rourke inhaled deeply, "Fear… the city is ripe of it." He begins to chuckle with pride, "Mantle was once a proud nation of strong warriors and devoted leaders… now it's become a cesspool of greedy apathetic worms that rely too much on their technology than to stand up for themselves. It is only right to give them a noble defeat."

Jackie chuckles, "You say that as if it matters."

Rourke smirks, "It doesn't, but I felt it was worth saying at least. Begin the opening barrage."

"FIRE!" Jackie shouted with her sonic voice as it echoed across the army. The Orcs and Uruks that manned the stolen artillery began the bombardment of the outer wall using Dust rounds of Fire and Electricity.

Denathor looked at the enemy's weapons bombard the outer wall. He could hear the people screaming as they are hit with the first wave of attacks.

"The other kingdoms have deserted us…" Denathor said under his breath, "They betrayed us all…"

More artillery rounds impacted the city and the clouds overhead began to snow. To his eyes, this battle was already over, there was no point in fighting. "ABANDON YOUR POSTS!" Denathor shouted from the courtyard to all those that could hear him. "EVERY MAN FOR THEMSELVES!"

Those that heard him were more shocked by those words than by the attack itself, and many were too scared to even move.

Denathor turned around and found Ironwood right behind him, a metal hand back slapped him across the face, and then he felt a fist impact his gut. Ironwood turned around to see the tower guard not even phased by this, Winter's eyes were that of pure shock while Ozpin gave a judgmental look. Ironwood return Ozpin's look with one that read "Like you weren't thinking the same?"

Ironwood tapped his radio and spoke plainly to all channels, "All stations, prepare for battle!"

Within minutes of hearing his words, every soldier in the city gathered their arms and armor and sprinted to their posts for the battle that had reached them. Ironwood could be heard over the pa throughout the city, "I want every able-bodied fighter at the wall, everyone is fighting!"

Thousands of Atlisan soldiers and the remaining Atlas Sky Knights took postings along the outer wall and manned the heavy gun emplacements. Dozens of Huntsmen joined their ranks at key locations selected by Winter. Ironwood made his way to the outer wall on his own using the tram system, halfway there he received a call from the Artillery Command center, "General, our missile batteries cannot target the enemy forces, the snow won't let our systems shoot accurately."

Ironwood groaned, "DO YOU HAVE EYES, LIEUTENANT?!"

"Y-y-yes, sir…"

"Then use them to aim and fire by hand. We don't need accurate targeting, just thin out that army as best you can." Ironwood spoke with an annoyed tone. He then shifted his radio to the air traffic control, "Lieutenant Commander, I want your squadron in the air, NOW!"

"On it, General!"

Ironwood's tram reaches the outer wall, he along with Winter, Ozpin and Penny make their way to the front to get a full view of the army outside Atlas' door. Winter shouts at the top of her lungs to the soldiers around them, "LET'S SEND THESE BASTARDS BACK TO HELL!"

"FOR ATLAS!" Ironwood shouted as he and every soldier along the outer wall began opening fire on the army of darkness below.

Bullets and missiles flew from the walls and towers along Atlas' perimeter wall and started to lay waste to Rourke's front lines. Some of the Orcs looked nervous at what just happened in just a few seconds of the battle, but Rourke remained unphased. "Hold your positions. RETURN FIRE!"

The Orcs and Uruks fired more rounds at the wall, some getting lucky shots and hitting the top of the wall and roasting some troops.

Rourke could see the fighter jets launch from their airfields on the higher levels, they appeared to be moving in for bombing runs on the army. One jet looked to be committed for his position, he only smirked.

He started running towards the jet as it began opening fire on the army in a strafing run, he then jumped as high as he could, drew his sword and sliced its left wing off with one easy stroke. On the way down he lands on the back of a Deathstalker, killing it, but appeared to be unscathed. He turned enough so that one eye could see the jet he cut crash behind him, "Ha."

Lieutenant Commander Amelia, leading the fighter/bomber squadrons finished a run across the enemy front line, and then she noticed something in the clouds, green lighting strikes. "All fighters, I think we got Thunderbirds out here!"

As soon as it was said, dozens of Thunderbirds and giant Nevermores exited the cloud cover above and descended on the fighters in the air. Amelia was doing what she could in the dog fights against the winged beasts, but the squadron's numbers were dropping like flies.

"Angel 3 is down! Angel 12 is down!" Amelia counted as she was circling past the city's tower, "Atlas Tower, we need EVERYTHING you got, we're out numbered 20 to 1 out here!"

The air beasts that weren't attacking the fighters made their own strafing runs on the Atlas defenders. A Grimm Sphinx slid across the outer wall's ramparts and displaced dozens of soldiers and killed others. Jadis, riding on the beast's back, unleashed ice spikes on those trying to recover and impaled them. The Sphinx immediate took off to avoid being hit by one of the missile launchers.

Ozpin looked down at the field and saw some of the Uruks carrying tall ladders, much like the ones he saw at Helms Deep. The more armored Grimm took defensive positions around the ballista mounts that would be used to shoot lines for lifting the ladders onto the outer walls.

Before Ozpin could order the ballista units to be attacked, a Scylla Grimm came up from beneath the rampart and started attacking the soldiers. It released its toxic fumes and consumed several soldiers in its massive jaws.

Ozpin swung is cane at a head hard enough to knock it into another. A third head moved in and snapped at him, instead of Ozpin, its teeth came down on a green orb that surrounded him. Ozpin then unleashed a beam of light down its throat, decapitating the head. Another head moved in from the right side and was about to succeed where the previous failed, but as it opened its mouth a fire dust bullet flew in and caused a chain reaction of ignitions along its throat and blew up its whole body.

Ozpin turned to see Ironwood reloading his pistol, nodding at him.

Ozpin would have been relieved, but four more Scylla's started making their climb up the hill to the walls. "How are they reaching the wall so fast?" Ozpin asked.

"It's because their quadruped and live on these mountains," Clover replied, "They'll reach us, there's no question."

Ozpin looked to Ironwood, "We got ladders on their way up here, we need to take out those ballista mounts!"

Ironwood speaks into his radio, "Any and all turrets, fire on those ballistae whenever possible, we can't let any troops reach the top of the wall!"

Several ballista mounts fire across the wall, one by one a ladder started to rise from the army and land on the edge of the wall. While at the same time, dozens of troops move for the main gate with a large battering ram and began slamming it against the door.

Some of the ladders were shot down from the turrets along the wall, but it didn't take long for the Scylla's to wipe out the gun crews. Every ladder that reached the wall started spilling their troops in by the handful. Uruk Berserkers lead the charge on every ladder, flailing their swords and killing as many possible before they were gun down by the Atlas troops.

One of the ladders landed near Elm Ederne, she saw the Berserker coming for her and blocked its sword with her hammer. She used her root semblance to keep her ground and then pushed the beast back. She swung her hammer right and launched the Berserker off the wall, she then shifted her hammer into its rocket launcher mode and blew the ladder to pieces as the enemy troops were climbing up it.

Harriet Bree ran past multiple enemies in a row, striking them at key pressure points before they could even react to her presence. She stopped to take a breather, but then a Beowulf knocked her over and pounced on her.

"STAY!"

The Beowulf brought its teeth down to her neck but froze just short of her throat. Harriet looked to her left to see Marrow holding his hand out and then pulling up his rifle to shoot the beast off of her.

"I didn't need your help…" Harriet said with an annoyed tone.

"Your welcome," Marrow said as he shifted his rifle to its boomerang saw and threw it at a Scylla head, cutting it clean off.

At another location along the wall, Weiss reached Winter's post. As soon as she arrived, ladders holding Uruks and Orcs started climbing onto the ramparts.

"DRIVE THEM BACK!" Winter shouted to the soldiers near her. She turned around to see who had arrived when she called for reinforcements. "What are you doing down here? Go back to the higher levels!"

"Ironwood said everyone fights, so I'm here to fight!" Weiss countered.

Just then, another ladder of Berserker Uruks and Orcs started spilling onto the wall. One was gunning straight for Weiss; she almost didn't have time to react. Winter intercepted the beast after drawing her second sword and decapitating it with a spin strike. Winter lands just a few steps from Weiss, "This is NO PLACE for people who can't fight!"

Winter turned back to the fight and started attacking Orcs and Grimm that were in her way. A Boarbatusk a few yards away scraped its hoof and began to charge. Just as it was about to hit Winter from her blind spot, a large white sword came down and stabbed the boar through the body and nailing it to the ground.

Winter looked up to see the construct of a large white knight, she turned to see Weiss stabbing her sword into the ground and smiling. Winter smiled back, "Maybe you are Sky Knight material. Come on, I'll need your help."

Winter and Weiss begin efforts to remove the ladders from their section of the wall, with luck, they can continue this prosses all the way across.

As the battle continued along the wall, Rourke watched as every fighter and creature he sends up the path to the Bloody Gate get slaughtered before they can get within 10 feet of the gate.

"What the hell are you doing you useless maggots!" Rourke sounded very annoyed.

The Uruk commander, Beta answered, "None of our troops can make for the gate, they're defenses are too strong!"

Rourke rolled his eyes, "Stop wasting our troops on the gate, focus on the walls for now."

"But then how will we breach it?" Beta asked in confusion.

Rourke smirked, "With a little gift from the White Fang. It almost seems like a poetic justice, really." Rourke turned around and shouted to the troops behind, "Time to ring the Doorbell!"

At the rear of the army, a large piece of machinery was being hauled up the root of the mountain. It appeared to be covered in heavy plate armor and have a White Fang symbol painted over what used to say SDC.

The army began chanting a war chant in recognition to what was being brought to the front. Ironwood and Ozpin looked out to the army below and saw what was coming.

"By the brothers…" Ironwood said, "That's a Dust plasma drill."

Ozpin knows what this means, "Rally all that you can at the gate."

Ironwood nodded, "Huntsmen and Sky Knights, form up at the gate, now!"

As the battle for Atlas continues, miles to the south there was a fleet of Pirate airships. Mercenaries by the name of 'Storm Hawks'. They had a reputation of raiding coastal towns and villages in Vacuo and Atlas. Salem offered their leaders a great bargain for their services in joining the battle to wipe out Atlas' capital.

Their fleet was large for a pirate flotilla, mostly dropships and fighters and a handful of stolen cruisers they highjacked during the war. Their flight path put them within a day from reaching Minas Tirith, and as they traveled through the valley to avoid detection by Atlas Radar nets, their flagship received an unencrypted message. "You will go no further."

The captain of the flagship looked out the window and saw the origin of the message on a cliffside just eye level with the bridge. From there he saw eight warriors, appearing to be huntsmen, standing in a row.

"Open a channel," the captain said with a bit of irritation in his tone. The channel was opened, "Who is this?"

"This is Supreme Commander Jaune Arc of the Vale Military. Order your ships to hold here and prepare to be boarded."

Everyone on the bridge began laughing, Jaune looked to Pyrrha and she nodded. Pyrrha shifted her weapon to rifle-mode and aimed for the Captain's earlobe, the bullet went flying, piercing through the window and taking the captain's ear clean off.

The Captain screamed at the pain, some of the bridge crew stopped laughing and backed up from him quickly, in fear of another shot coming his way.

"I won't say it again… unless you'd rather I take your fleet by force." Jaune said through the radio.

The Pirate's first officer retorted, "What makes you think 8 huntsmen can take a fleet alone?"

Jaune smirks while replying, "Who said we were alone?"

The captain stood back up and saw Jaune raise his sword into the air, and within seconds the cliffside appeared to be full of hundreds or even thousands of ghost-like figures.

Smeagol reached the top of the great staircase, "Here it is! Here it is…. The tunnel to Cirith Ungol…"

Yang and Ruby reached the top, they stopped to catch their breath and briefly snacked on what rations they could to recover their strength. Yang looked down the tunnel, "Smeagol… why was Faramir mad when we told him we were coming here?"

Smeagol looked visibly nervous.

Ruby looked at him, "Smeagol… what's in there?"

"There is a nasty… old… and dangerous beasty in there… very nasty…" Smeagol said, speaking with the voice of experience. "Orcsies call it, 'Shelob'."

Yang squints at him, "Why didn't you tell us about it before?"

Smeagol looked directly at Yang, "There is no other way… either here or the Black Gate… both paths bad, both paths dangerous… but this one, not as dangerous."

Yang puts her rations away, "And we're just supposed to take your word for it?"

Ruby rolled her eyes, "Yang, he's been honest to us since we found him, why would he lie now?"

Yang looks to Ruby, "Because that mongrel wants the Ring more than he wants to help us!"

"I'll go firsties if it makes yellow hair happy…" Smeagol volunteered.

Ruby looks to Smeagol then back to her sister, waiting to hear her response.

Yang shakes her head, "Fine…"

Smeagol crawls slowly, cautiously into the cave ahead of Ruby and Yang. They didn't make 10 feet in before Ruby covered her nose, "What is that?"

"Orcsies… rotting Orcsies," Smeagol replied. "Many come through, few ever leave. Those that don't, remain forever."

As they made their way further into the cave, Ruby noticed something along the walls. She drew her scythe and brushed its blade against the wall to scratch on the surface, "What is this sticky stuff?"

Yang looks closely at what Yang scraped off, "Looks like… webbing."

"Shelob silk… yes. Yes. Shelob's home is close." Smeagol said whispering.

Yang's eyes widened, "Shelob is a SPIDER!?" Smeagol immediately raised his hand to silence her.

"SHHHH! Quiet!" Smeagol hissed, "She hears all… she says the same… if we remain quiet, we can sneak past her. I did once."

Ruby backs away from the webbed wall, then suddenly her foot went through the floor.

Yang turned, "RUBY!" she tried to grab Ruby by her scythe, but she was already too far to catch.

Ruby fell down a steep tunnel, curved and sleek like a slide. She tried to slow herself down with her scythe, stabbing it into the slide with the main blade, it succeeded in slowing her down enough to not reach the bottom painfully.

Ruby got up and dusted herself off, she looked around to see there were bones. Hundreds of bones everywhere. Ruby immediate pulled out her scroll in the hope to call Yang, but it had no signal that deep in the cave.

Smeagol was shoved up against the wall by Yang's prosthetic arm, "You set us up!" Yang hissed quietly, not wanting to risk the creature hearing them.

"No! No!" Smeagol grunted while feeling his throat being clenched by a metal hand.

Yang let him go to breath, "I need to know everything you know, NOW!"

Smeagol coughs, "She's old… older than Mordor… She hears, she learns, she hunts… But… I know her caves, I can find Mistress Ruby."

Yang loads up her gauntlets with short range explosive shells, "We're going after Ruby… and if anything happened to her, you're dead."

Smeagol nods and crawls ahead of Yang and the two continue down the tunnel. Smeagol sniffs the air and tries his best to remember the safest route and where Ruby might be.

"RUBY! IF YOU HEAR ME, WE'RE COMING FOR YOU!" Yang shouts echo in the cave

Smeagol turns back, "Are you stupid? She'll hunt US!"

Yang cocks her gauntlets, "Good; means she won't be hunting Ruby."

Ruby couldn't move. Every corner of the cave she was in was covered in webs, and most of the webs had bones wrapped in them. The smell was so intense that she began to vomit on the spot.

She wiped her mouth with her sleeve and shook her head, "Come on, Ruby… get ahold of yourself. You're a huntress…" she looked on to the exit to the cave and saw a small path in the webbing she could make it through. "Everyone back home is counting on you… I need to fulfill this mission…"

As Ruby walks through the bones and finds her bag on the ground, covered in webs. As she picks it up, she sees a ray of light coming out of it, "The shard!" she thinks to herself.

Ruby opens her bag and pulls out the Gold Dust shard out and lets it shine in the cave tunnel. She walks though the path into a tunnel that splits into two directions. In one of the directions, for a split second she thought she saw something moving down one of the tunnels.

It clicked in her head, 'Don't go that way'. She went down the opposite path with her weapon ready and holding the gold shard above her head. She continued down the tunnel for what felt like five minutes, then she heard a voice in the distance, behind here, "This way."

Ruby turns around with her scythe at the ready but sees nothing. "Was that Yang's voice?" she thought to herself. Ruby turned around, "Yang?! Where are you?"

"Where are you?" Yang's voice echoed.

"This way, follow the light!" Ruby then held the shard a bit higher, allowing the light to gaze deeper into the tunnel. Ruby looked in the direction of Yang's voice and saw something moving in the shadows, something with too many legs. "Yang?"

"Who's Yang?" the voice asked, with a sadistic tone.

Ruby turned around and started running down the tunnel. She dared not look back to see what was chasing her through the tunnels behind her, but it sounded big, monstrous and angry. "Where are you GOING?!"

Ruby ran for what felt like miles through the tunnels, with her speed. She ran until she got caught in webbing on the floor, her boots completely covered in the sticky wrap. She used her scythe to free her boots, hacking and slashing at the bundles of webbing keeping her in place.

She could hear the creature getting closer. Ruby turned around to look at the beast and what she saw terrified her.

A twisted perversion of a spider, behind anything she had ever seen. Aside from the eight legs, there was nothing this creature had in common with spiders. It stood maybe eight feet tall at full height, and had a face that was vaguely humanlike, the exception being eight burning red eyes instead of two, and a maw that was dripping with green venom. "Come now… you're just being a bad guest…"

Ruby placed her scythe between her feet and fired one shot at the ground, propelling herself up to the ceiling of the cave and freeing herself. She then aimed her rifle at the beast and fired three shots.

The spider covered its head with its front two legs as though they were arms, and it snarled, "Now that was rude."

"STOP USING MY SISTER'S VOICE!" Ruby shouted while loading a magazine of fire dust rounds into her rifle. She fired two shots at the spider's midsection, only for it to raise its body up high enough to dodge them. Ruby then fires shots at the webbing, setting it aflame and causing the spider to back off.

Ruby continued down the tunnel with haste. All she can do now is hope she can find the end of this labyrinth, and hopefully, her sister.

The war continued in the East. Nightfall came quick for Atlas, as the armies of darkness outside its gates continued to swarm. Some tried climbing up the walls, while the rest formed ranks behind their new toy.

It appeared to be an SDC mining laser, outfitted with large plates of armor and covered in gun emplacements along its hull. The Orcs and Uruks on its hull exchanged fire with the Atlisan soldiers on the walls, while large Ursa, and Goliaths pushed the large mining machine into place. It was just close enough for the missile batteries to have a line of sight, and with Jadis' snowstorm above, there was no hope in laser targeting the drill without risk of hitting the wall or gate by accident.

Ironwood lead the infantry and heavy vehicles to form a defensive line at the entrance of the gate. Should it be breached, their enemy will be walking into a wall of gunfire. Ozpin and some of the members of ACE ops joined in to provide their own support to the defense.

The mining laser began charging up, a high pitch sound began to emanate from the engine, once the tip of the laser shifted from red to blue, it let out a beam of light straight at the front gate. The gate was impacted with great force, causing the inside of it to buckle and other parts to melt from the extreme heat.

Ironwood shouts to all the soldiers by his side, "You are soldiers of Atlas! No matter what gets through that gate you WILL STAND YOUR GROUND!"

It was evident that more than half the soldiers in the blockade were scared. Some were even shaking in their armor. But they had to stand their ground, they knew that this was the time to be brave, this was the time to fight. Because if they don't, no one else would.

The laser charged up again, the Orcs and Grimm around it grew restless. Soon enough, their time came as the laser fired once more, this time blasting a hole through the gate.

As the gate was breached, Ironwood looked on to the breach, expecting swarms of Orcs or smaller Grimm to charge in. He was wrong.

Several Ursa and Razorback Grimm entered through the broken gate, growling and thrashing at anything in their way.

"FIRE!" Ironwood shouted, thus igniting hundreds of rifles and machine guns to open fire at the creatures entering the breach. Every Ursa that entered was torn to shreds from the barrage, while the Razorbacks hunkered down and rolled up into a ball.

The Razorbacks were large beasts, almost like Ursa, except they had armored plates all over their back and a long tail with the same plating. The only thing that didn't appear to have armor was their underbelly. When they rolled up, they were like armadillo, and their tails folded over their belly, giving them full protection from the bullets and rockets that impacted their hide.

Now in their protected form, they started rolling toward the infantry and tanks with great speed. They ran over the front lines of infantry in their way and slammed right into the gun emplacements.

Ironwood moved in as one was going for another machine gun turret and punched it with his right mechanical arm. The impact caused the Razorback to stop in its tracks, but it did not damage the armor plating he hit. The beast unwrapped and sung its tail at Ironwood, only for it to be blocked by Elm, followed by Harriet taking a step off Elm's shoulder and punches the Razorback in the face with her gauntlet. The beast fell back, hard, giving Ironwood the opening to shoot it in the belly and do enough damage to kill it.

He looked on to see other Razorbacks damaging the blockade, and more creatures entering the breach a dozen at a time. They began to swarm the frontline blockades. Ozpin formed a bubble around his blockade and gave the troopers around him the opening to mow down the Orcs and Uruks that advanced on them.

While at first glance, it looked to be holding, Ozpin and Ironwood both knew best; this blockade will only last if they had the bullets, which they were already running low on.

Ruby ran until she felt her legs weaken. She stopped just short of the exit to the tunnels. She was so tired that she didn't realize she dropped the Gold Dust shard. Ruby only focused on crawling out of the tunnel to safety.

She crawled until she reached a mound of dirt, it was soft and comfortable. She breathed heavily, setting down her scythe beside her and felt herself falling asleep. Then she heard what sounded like rocks falling on each other. She stood up sharply, scythe at the ready, inspecting her surroundings, looking at the entrance to the cave, then to the path onward to their goal.

She knew she had to continue, but she also wanted to stay and wait for Yang and Smeagol to make it through and find her. She stood her ground, consistently looking around for the creature that chased her. She turned to face the dirt mound again, hoping to at least get a wink of sleep, but she was met by something sharp piercing her belly.

Within a second she was out cold, the venom paralyzing her body and putting her mind to sleep. Shelob caught Ruby before she could hit the ground and began wrapping her in silk tightly. It continued to wrap her until it saw a blinding light coming from one of the tunnel entrances.

Yang was revealed holding the light in her prosthetic hand, and she had a rage-filled glare at the beast before her eyes, "Get away from her, you BITCH!"

Sorry it took me so long, you guys.
I will continue to write, try to get back on the horse.

I hope you're all staying safe out there.

ARKOS!