The sun rose over Argus, bringing a peaceful morning to the city by the sea. Roy gazed out of the room's large window as the bright sun beams cast glittering flashes on the water. They'd opened the window to keep the room cool and the breeze coming through the screen was chilly, but not unpleasant. Roy felt refreshed and invigorated that morning, having slept well the night before.
He turned away from the beautiful view to watch Dahlia pack her things. They were going to head down to the Atlesian Outpost at 2:30 to secure Dahlia's passage to Atlas, then return to the Blue Dust to wait. For the life of him, Roy didn't know what he'd do to pass the time. Sitting and waiting day after day held little appeal for him, so going forward he'd have to find a way to stay busy.
I could take a look at the local hunt board, he mused to himself, although it might get messy if anyone finds out I'm unlicensed.
Roy rubbed his chin thoughtfully, feeling the rough scratch of stubble under his fingertips. His attention turned to Ebony, perched on the edge of the bed. She looked miserable and Roy knew why. During breakfast, Ebony had revealed that she was thinking of telling Dahlia about her father's murder that day. It was a now or never situation, but Ebony wanted to part on good terms. Now, the conflict of interests was written all over the faunus's face.
Dahlia placed the last of her belongings into her knapsack and closed it with a sigh, "I still don't want to leave you," she said, her face set in a frustrated expression.
Aster patted the smaller girl on the shoulder, "Don't worry Lia, we'll all be back together before you know it." She turned to Ebony and Roy, shooting them a look of faux desperation. "Come on!" she hissed jokingly, "Back me up here!"
Dahlia gave Ebony a concerned look, "Is something wrong Eb, you look like you've seen a ghost."
The female faunus gave a small jump as the smaller girl spoke, "I-I'm…." She sighed, "No, I'm not alright Lia. There's something I need to tell you and I can't find the words."
Dahlia tilted her head, "I'm guessing this isn't something you can just come out and say." Ebony shook her head and the smaller girl crossed over to her, placing a comforting hand on the female faunus's shoulder, "hey, if you can't tell me now, that's okay! I can wait."
Ebony gently grabbed Dahlia's hand, "but you're leaving today and I don't know when I'll ever see you again!"
The smaller girl reached forward and delicately tucked a stray strand of hair behind Ebony's ear. "Ebony," she began, her voice gentle and soft, "as much as I worry about seeing you guys again, I know how stubborn we all are." She shot Roy a small grin, "If you think something like an Atlas blockade is going to keep this team apart, you've got another thing coming."
Aster snickered and checked her watch, "We should get going, we want to get there before all of the supply ships leave."
Roy gave the pilot a quizzical glance, "How do you know about the airship schedule?"
The pilot shrugged, "I worked down there for a little while and memorized it. You wouldn't believe how easy it is to slip into Mantle when you arrive with all of the supply ships."
Roy snorted, "I should've guessed."
The pilot nodded vigorously, "yeah you should've. I'm good at my job!"
The faunus crossed his arms, a smug smile appearing on his face, "Not good enough to get through an Atlas blockade I guess."
Aster pointed a finger at him, a playful growl entering her voice, "I still have captain's privilege to throw you overboard you know."
Roy gave a soft chuckle and turned to Dahlia, "ready to go?"
The smaller girl nodded, slinging her bag over her shoulder, "As ready as I'll ever be."
-:-
2:30 came before they knew it and Team SDE+A left the Blue Dust Tavern, setting their sights on the Atlesian outpost. Roy and Ebony trailed behind, their heads together as they discussed the future conversation with the Dahlia.
"Everything will work out fine Eb," Roy whispered, "This is Dahlia we're talking about."
Ebony squeezed his hand, her face creased with worry, "But this is her father's death we're talking about. I feel like I should tell her now."
Roy gave her hand an answering squeeze, "Do you feel ready?"
Ebony sighed and shook her head.
"Then wait," Roy said, "I have every reason to believe we'll be in Atlas before the end of the month."
Ebony rubbed her eyes, an exasperated hiss slipping through her teeth, "I can't gauge the right time based on my feelings. I need to think of Dahlia."
The faunus thought for a couple seconds, "What if we waited to tell her until we visit her family?"
Ebony snorted, "yes, increasing the number of people I tell is certainly going to make me feel better."
Roy elbowed her lightly, "they deserve to know just as much as Lia does. Besides, I'll be telling the story with you."
The female faunus's eyes widened slightly, "You will?"
Roy nodded, "there's no way I'm letting you do it by yourself. We'll figure out the best way to tell them later, until then, don't agonize over it."
Ebony sighed, "I'll try not too."
The four of them eventually came to the top of the street that led down to the coast. Street cars moved gracefully along their rails, the clanging of the bells ringing clearly through the morning air. As they began walking down the sidewalk towards the base, Aster stopped and pointed toward the sea, "What's happening to the base?"
Roy looked toward the base and what he saw caused him to do a double take. The front wall of the base was opening, the iron walls sliding open panel by panel. The jutting rock spire the base was built into suddenly split down the middle and opened. A gigantic mech stepped out of the darkness. Roy's eye widened; he'd heard of colossus before, but had never seen one in person until now.
The robot's body was squat and its legs made up the majority of its height, the arms stretching down almost to the top of its massive feet. Its left arm was normal with a massive, three-fingered hand, while the other arm was a massive dust canon. The size of the barrel made Roy's head spin as he tried to estimate how much dust it took to fire. The ground shook with every step as it walked out onto the landing pad.
A loud voice suddenly echoed throughout the city, coming from loudspeakers hidden on the robot, "Clearly the people have forgotten that they live in peace thanks to the awesome might of Atlas!"
The mech raised its massive dust cannon, to the sky. Roy saw a small, manta class ship flying above the mech's head.
The voice rang out once more, "Consider this...A reminder!"
The cannon started to spin up, a yellow glow building in the barrel. As the ship dipped low over the mech's head, it fired; the blast of electricity barely missing the small vessel. As Roy and his companions watched, the ship flew off down the coast with the mech in hot pursuit.
"That's…" Roy began tentatively.
"Not something you see every day?" Aster finished.
"Yeah, that," the faunus said as he scratched his ear, thoroughly puzzled.
"I wonder where they were going," Ebony mused.
"I don't know," Roy said, "but I think we'll have to wait until it gets back to ask about passage for Lia."
And wait they did, for almost forty minutes. As they hit the thirty-eight minute mark, Roy was scanning the large stretch of open sea for what felt like the twentieth time. His keen eye suddenly caught sight of a something beneath the water.
"Hey Eb, do you see that?" he asked.
The female faunus stood and squinted in the direction Roy was pointing. Her tail suddenly puffed up, every hair standing on end in fear, "Oh gods…it's huge!"
Whatever it was rose higher in the water, creating a massive wake that raced toward the city. The creature suddenly breached, sending a plume of water shooting skyward. There, standing out black against the blue sky, was a massive grimm leviathan. It was almost 25 meters tall, standing knee deep in water Roy knew wasn't shallow. It had a massive spiny crest on its back and a long fish tail that trailed in the water as it walked. Its head was long and angular, with six eyes glowing menacingly against the azure sky. Opening a mouth full of massive teeth, the leviathan let out a shrieking roar. The sounds echoed through the city, causing Roy's ears to flatten.
A siren suddenly sounded through Argus, adding its wailing voice to the cacophony. As Roy watched, a small fleet of airships took off from the base and flew off to meet the oncoming grimm. A sudden rush of wings cause Roy to look up and what he saw made his blood run cold. A large swarm of Manticores and Sphinxes, swooping low over the city. One landed on a nearby rooftop and let out a roar that made the windows of the surrounding houses rattle. As Roy watched, a dozen or so landed around them, sending civilians running in terror. Roy drew Μόνος, his head whipping to and fro to keep an eye on the grimm.
"Dahlia, your flight might be delayed," he said, right as manticore landed on the street in front of them.
Dahlia drew Comodia and Tragodia, the weapons twirling deftly in her hands. "No complaints here!" she said, striking her ready stance.
Aster and Ebony nodded in agreement, drawing their own weapons in a flash. "Everyone stick together," Ebony shouted over the roars of the grimm, "We don't want to get separated."
Roy grinned at her, "Couldn't have said it better myself."
The grimm on the rooftops suddenly charged, bounding down over roofs and balconies to reach them. Roy felt the old familiar fire roar into being inside him and he charged forward to meet the encroaching beasts. His blade scythed through the front runner and he planted his feet, allowing the two halves of the grimm to tumble past. Quickly returning Μόνος to her sheath, he fired a round directly into the open mouth of a sphinx as it tried to tear his throat out. Redrawing the sword, he sent it stabbing into the throat of a manticore in the process of leaping at Ebony. Something flashed by him and he turned to find one of Aster's dancing rings buried in the chest of a grimm that had been just about to pounce on him. He heard a loud roar from his right and dodged backwards just in time to avoid a nasty slash from a manticore.
Shifting Μόνος into her whip form, he lashed out and wrapped the blade whip around the grimm's neck several times. Yanking it in closer, he sent his fist slamming into its face. The blow cracked the bone's mask, allowing Roy to pour the kinetic energy into his leg as he used the momentum of the punch to swing into a kick. His foot smashed into the grimm's head, breaking its neck with a loud crack.
He shook his hand, still feeling the reverberations from his bare knuckled punch. A fire ball smashed into the street next to him, sending cement shards wheezing through the air like shrapnel. Looking up, Roy saw a single sphinx flying just out of reach.
"Roy! Leg up!"
He turned to see Ebony sprinting toward him, Archimedes's emiter glowing yellow with electricity. Roy quickly dropped to one knee, allowing Ebony to step onto his shoulder. As her weight centered, the faunus lunged upwards and sent Ebony flying into the air. The female faunus twirled her weapon and stabbed it into the sphinx's chest, sending thousands of volts lancing through its body. The grimm's smoking corpse hurtled toward the earth and Ebony used the height of her jump to ambush a grimm below her; bringing her dust staff down on its head with a thud that made Roy wince.
Ebony's hair was a beautiful inky curtain, framing a face twisted in fierce concentration. Archimedes was a blur as she spun it in a deadly cyclone, scything through any grimm who dared to come near. The rhythmic thwack of the dust staff colliding with grimm skulls was the rhythm to the battle song.
Dahlia shot past past Roy, Comodia and Tragodia flashing in the midmorning sun. A manticore was foolish enough to stray into her path and she slashed straight through its neck without a second of hesitation. She let out a guttural yell as another grimm challenged her, her weapons putting an end to its life a second later. Wind whistles across the shotgun barrels of both weapons, creating an eerie howling noise. The sound was the melody of the battle song.
Aster was next, her chakrams a mesmerizing blur in her hands. Every blow was beautifully calculated and every turn spelled the end for another creature of grimm. Aster's eyes were alight, a smile playing around the edges of her mouth as she dipped and swayed. Her movements were the dance of the battle song.
Roy couldn't help but smile with pride as he watched his friends fight. They'll be fine, he thought, I'll be there to watch their backs. Twirling Μόνος deftly, he launched himself back into the fray.
As the fight wore on, Roy realized that they were just fighting the stragglers. The majority of the grimm swarm had moved forward to act as a sort of vanguard to the oncoming leviathan. Shield generators emerged from the sea and activated, creating a glowing blue barrier between the grimm and the city. Roy was distracted for a moment as he killed a grimm trying to sink its teeth into his throat. By the time he looked back, the leviathan had already blown through the shield like it was made of paper.
A second barrier sprang up, desperately trying to halt the leviathan's advance. Rearing back, the grimm opened its mouth and sent a fiery beam smashing into the one of the barrier's generators. The generator exploded, and the beam shot into the city, striking a building a street over from where Roy was standing. The large dome on top of the building tumbled out of sight and a deafening impact reverberated through the street, causing Roy's ears to ring.
Roy quickly dispatched another grimm and turned to his team, "We need to get to the collapse site! Ebony, I need you to work triage!"
His teammates nodded and together, they dashed to the neighboring street. It was chaos. The falling architecture had sent up a large cloud of dust that seeped into Roy's eye and nose. His ears flattened along his skull as they caught the sound of screaming. Several people lay among the debris. Some weren't moving, while others clutched bleeding wounds.
Roy took in the scene at a glance, his brain already putting a plan together, "Ebony, start treating those who need it most. Dahlia, you keep the grimm away from her and the other wounded people. Aster, you and I will work the perimeter."
Ebony nodded and quickly bent down to inspect the injured person closest to her. Dahlia shot off to stop a manticore from swooping down on a young boy kneeling by the still body of a woman. Roy turned away and immediately intercepted a sphinx as it dove after Ebony. Quickly dispatching it, he whipped Μόνος around and relieved a manticore of it's head. Another grimm leapt at him and he caught its teeth on his bracer. The grimm ground its fangs down on the tough metal, desperately trying to find flesh. Roy flipped Μόνος around and buried the blade in the manticore's chest. The grimm's jaws stayed latched on his bracer in death and he struggled to free his arm.
Something suddenly grabbed him by the shoulders, heavy talons sinking into his flesh. A sphinx had silently swooped down and latched onto him. Hot blood ran down the faunus's arms and dripped off of his finger tips. Roy barely had time to register the pain before he was hoisted into the air. The shock of his sudden ascension, coupled with the weight of the dead grimm, caused him to lose his grip on Μόνος. The faunus fought to free himself, drawing his bayonet and slashed it across the grimm's talons. The sphinx let out a shriek and released him, the claws painfully sliding out of his shoulders.
The upward momentum tossed Roy forward as he fell and he struck the side of a building, his aura shattering with a crystalline crack. The air flew from his lungs as the brick facade drove into his back. He dropped down the remaining ten feet to ground, the impact with the concrete driving him to the edge of consciousness. Roy groaned as he pushed himself up onto all fours. His ribs were on fire and his back ached horribly.
That was sloppy, he thought, Not used to fighting this many flying grimm at once.
He could hear the frantic beeping of his teammates' aura alarms going off and shook his head to clear it. Roy dragged himself to his feet and staggered toward Ebony. The female faunus appeared to be deep in meditation, her eyes were closed and her hands glowed green as she worked to heal the civilian she was treating. Dahlia stood behind her, weapons poised to strike. She looked up at him as he drew closer, her eyes filled with concern, "Roy! Are you…?" Her eyes suddenly widened and she reached out a hand, "Roy! Move!"
Before he could react, Roy felt something smash into his back. The impact tossed him away from his teammates, sending him tumbling across the pavement until a cement planter arrested his momentum. Roy's breath came in ragged gasps as he struggled to get back to his feet. His vision flickered and he lifted a hand to his pounding head.
The grimm that had struck him was a large griffon. It landed in front of Ebony and Dahlia, letting out a shriek directly into their faces. The smaller girl answered the shriek with a war cry of her own, a scream so angry and defiant it made Roy's blood run cold. The griffon struck out at Dahlia, but the smaller girl dodged under the attack and lodged both of her daggers in the grimm's throat. She brutally ripped them out and a geyser of black liquid spewed out, Dahlia catching a face full as the griffon's corpse slid to the ground. The smaller girl stood still for several seconds and Ebony seemed to come out of her trance to say something. Dahlia said something in return, wiping the black ooze out of her eyes. The siren was still blaring and Roy couldn't hear what was said.
Aster was suddenly by Roy's side, pulling him to his feet and brushing debris off of his front. "You okay there Short stuff?"
Roy nodded, wincing slightly as her hands irritated his ribs. The pilot sighed, ruffling his ears fondly, "You really scared me, taking a fall like that."
Roy clutched his head, praying for the throbbing to stop, or at the very least, lessen. "Yeah...it was about as fun as it looked. These flying grimm are really hard to fight all at once like this, speaking of which..."
Aster nodded, "We got them all, at least the ones here in-"
She didn't finish as a sudden flash of light erupted in the bay, causing Roy's vision to go a blinding, silvery white.
Wowie fight chapters are hard to write XD. I hope you enjoyed it! is currently experiencing a glitch where the view counter in the stats page is frozen. I'll assume we've hit 9,000 views though as I've received several follower notifications XD. I am honored by all the attention and here's to 10,000! I think I'd scream out loud if I ever hit that many. Here's hoping FF can get the counter fixed so I know!
Catch you later!
-Ar3mRising.
