Jaune didn't even wait to see Ruby and Weiss leave.
He didn't have the time.
He hobbled out of the building and channeled his healing aura to his arms and legs. His heart still beat irregularly and his ribs bristled against his lungs. But he could stomach that. What he couldn't do right now was swing his sword or walk without pain.
Unfortunately, that was exactly what he had to do as Grimm seemed to pour from the tower from thick black slime.
Some luck was on his side though. All the Atlesian mechs had been shut down. What could have been serious speed bumps were reduced to useless piles of trash.
I owe whoever pulled that off. Assuming it's not just some political play by the general.
A Beowolf lunged at Jaune, but Jaune struck first and struck hard. The Beowolf dropped and Jaune trudged several more steps to combat the next.
Though slow, Jaune did manage to make it to the base of the tower after several grueling minutes of struggle. His arms had recovered and he was able to dispatch the Grimm without too much pain. His legs however were still in poor shape. Walking was possible, as was running if required, but any real footwork was out of the question.
Black tar splashed around the circumference of the tower in large bathtub sized blobs. From the puddle that resulted, Grimm were spawning. It was slower than the rate at which a horde could spawn, but it was constantly happening rather than in waves. Their constant presence had been a nuisance to push through. Jaune was just thankful that the Grimm were weak enough for him to handle.
Jaune looked at the interior of the building. The elevator shaft was empty and mangled. He wouldn't be getting a lift to the top.
Come on Jaune, you can do this. One foot after another.
Jaune began to climb the side of the tower using his aura step. His torso which he had ignored now had to support his weight. With his dwindling aura reserves, he pushed for as much recovery as he could. He estimated by the time he reached the top he could pull off maybe a minute of fighting with what little he had left. Were this a tournament, he'd already be disqualified.
As he climbed, the sporadic sounds of something akin to wind gushing become audible. It was in time with the lights that shone from the top of the building. Jaune assumed it was Cinder or a maiden's power. It certainly wasn't something Pyrrha would be capable of normally.
When he was barely a meter from the top, he learned that the lights and sounds were gouts of flame. The flames spilled over the edge licking at his hands as he climbed and the tower's peak was heating up.
As Jaune spied the first flicker, Jaune's already struggling heart skipped a few beats.
Why did it have to be flames...
Jaune took a deep breath and pulled himself over the edge.
As he pulled himself up, the radiant heat doubled and slammed into him in a large wave. In the middle of the tower, Jaune could see Pyrrha manipulating the metal she had summoned. Instead of its previous black, it was glowing orange all over due to having absorbed the heat of the flames. It moved sluggishly and barely managed to keep Pyrrha covered.
Above her, Cinder was flying. She used jets of flame to keep herself afloat and simultaneously attack Pyrrha. The heat was causing Pyrrha's defense to melt and drip away.
"Cinder!" Jaune shouted. "Leave her alone!"
"Jaune?! Where is everyone else?" Pyrrha shouted back.
Cinder arrogantly gestured for Jaune to go ahead. She didn't even bother continuing her assault. She seemed just as eager to hear it as Pyrrha was desperate.
"They're… not coming. Adam was too strong and the professors-"
"Weren't much help I imagine." Cinder gloated. "Since I left one dead and the other on the way."
"What do you get out of this anyway?" Jaune shouted. "You work with the general right? That means Salem is your boss or whatever. What could she possibly offer you to make all of this worth it?"
"She's not my boss! I'm doing this for me." Cinder fumed.
"Surely there was another way?!"
"No. Anything less than the power of a maiden is useless. Think for even a second about what it's capable of. Even she managed to draw upon its strength with barely an hour of holding the power. She conjured something from nothing. You can't beat magic." Cinder stated. She blasted Pyrrha once more with an explosion of flames to accent her point.
"Stop! Stop, please." Jaune begged.
I've got to think of something to say that can get us out of this. I won't be able to get her while she's up there and Pyrrha wasn't able to do anything by herself.
"It's power you want right? I'll help you. We both will. You clearly aren't against having allies. You picked up Mercury and Emerald because they were useful right? I can be helpful. You can have Pyrrha and I work for you. Two maidens are better than one, right?" Jaune asked, hoping to persuade her, or at least earn some time.
"Two maidens with half the power; competition. No, I don't think so Jaune. I'd gladly take you, but she has to die by my hand. That power does not belong to her and I intend to take it back."
Shit shit shit!
Jaune clutched at straws for an idea.
"She has to die thinking of you right? If she doesn't who knows where the power goes." Jaune asked. "Well, I can promise you that if you don't leave us alone, she'll have something else on her mind."
He drew his sword and placed the tip against his unarmored belly.
"Jaune, no!" Pyrrha shouted.
Cinder lowered herself to the ground and stepped towards Jaune.
"You would kill yourself just to have a chance at delaying me for a few months?" She asked. "I didn't peg you for a complete idiot."
Jaune pressed the sword a little deeper without raising his aura. A small trickle of blood ran down from his naval.
"Fine." Cinder stopped. "Since you seem incapable of putting the pieces together, I shall spell it out for you. Let you die or let you both run away. In the former, I risk the power going to a random girl across Remnant after I slay her. Assuming, of course, I don't just steal the power the same way I did from the first maiden." Cinder explained.
Jaune remembered the previous maiden and what had become of her. Cinder was more than capable of pulling that off.
"In the latter, I let you go and you hide somewhere by yourselves. In which case, all I have to do is track you down or lure you out. You both have families, friends, it wouldn't be hard. And unlike this time, I wouldn't have to fight my way through an entire academy. At worst I'm facing a slightly more experienced maiden." She continued.
Jaune was beginning to falter as the threads of his plan were being completely unraveled. The resolve which he held his sword with was slipping.
If I do this, I'm not earning Pyrrha any time. Cinder will kill her just because she can. She'll take the risk.
"So… Go ahead Jaune, do it if you wish. I'll get what I want either way." She smirked, confirming his belief.
Jaune let his sword hand drop and he collapsed to his knees. Cinder smugly walked up to him and pulled him back to his feet by his chin, forcing him to look into her eyes.
"I get it Jaune. It's… commendable, to see you try to save her. You're loyal. All good men and dogs are. But the only way a stray like you lives a good life from here is if you're adopted by another. Join me; give up on your partner. There are plenty of pretty red-heads out there and you could take whoever you wanted by my side." Cinder offered.
Jaune turned his head away to look at Pyrrha and Cinder let him.
"Pyrrha…" Jaune whispered.
Jaune watched her closely. He had to make sure she was watching him just as close. That she was listening and ready to act.
"Run." He shouted.
Jaune grabbed Cinder around the waist and pulled the edge of his sword into her back. He drove all of his aura into his arms, far beyond the breaking point. In turn, her aura began to spark as Jaune gave his all to squeeze the life out of her.
Pyrrha hesitated, stuck between the decision of leaving him behind or staying to try and help.
"Run damn it!" Jaune screamed.
Pyrrha responded, but not in the way he had expected. The large mass of nearly molten metal was transformed into a spear. With Jaune holding strong, Cinder was unable to get away.
With all the force Pyrrha could muster, she thrust the spear into Cinder's chest.
Cinder dodged at the last second with her upper body, narrowly avoiding death but not the attack.
The spear which had been aimed for her chest carved through aura and flesh alike, ripping her arm off at the bicep.
Distracted by the pain and weakened by the sudden drop in aura, Jaune found his chance.
He spun and turned on one foot, pulling Cinder with him. With a push, he leaped off the roof with the half-maiden locked in his grasp.
Cinder pulled her wits together as the wind buffeted her face. She slammed into Jaune's back with her remaining fist. Even weakened and attacking through his armor, the blows were enough to break ribs.
Even then, Jaune held on. If anything, the last-minute rush of adrenaline only served to tighten his grip.
"I'll kill you both for this!" Cinder screamed.
Twin bursts of flame erupted from her feet, thrusting them both through the glass and into an office.
Cinder repositioned to be on top of Jaune and she grabbed him by the face. Her hands lit up.
With all his aura allocated to his arms as he, even now, held onto Cinder, he had no defense against the flames. And these were much hotter than any he had felt before.
His instincts screamed at him to run and get away from the source of the heat which was melting the skin from his face. He fought those instincts as best he could. But with the pain and his mind fighting against him, his strength waned. Cinder peeled him away and she finally stood up from him.
Where Jaune's sword had dug into her back there was a large deep groove that bled as freely as her dismembered arm.
From both, something crawled and pushed its way out. It was black with white tips and it began to smoke as it made contact with the air. Cinder's arm had been replaced with one of a Grimm's and her back now bore a strip of black with a row of white bone spikes.
Cinder thrashed in agony, destroying the room they were in. With her human arm, she tried to grab at her spine and push the spikes back in.
Jaune felt the tower vibrate as the dragon Grimm roared above him.
What the hell is going on?
Jaune tried to crawl away from her, lest he was struck by the Grimm arm that lashed out at everything around her.
"Jaune?" Pyrrha shouted.
He looked out the window behind Cinder, and Pyrrha was there riding her metal searching for him.
"What are you doing?! I told you to run away!" Jaune shouted back.
Pyrrha flew in, crashing the metal plate into Cinder's side sending her crashing across the room.
Cinder immediately got back up, as if possessed or controlled like a puppet. Her eyes locked with Pyrrha's.
"You did this you bitch! I was going to make sure you died fast, but now you're going to suffer." Cinder threatened.
Cinder summoned two flaming swords from thin air. The flames went out as she grabbed their handles, leaving behind pure black crystal.
Pyrrha in turn did the same, creating dozens of floating spikes. They weren't as well crafted as Cinder's, but their sheer quantity had a value of its own.
Pyrrha pulled one from the air and warded off an attack from Cinder. At the same time, she controlled several of the spikes just like Penny had and attacked Cinder with them.
Jaune tried to stand up to help, but his legs just wouldn't cooperate. The pain was beginning to get to him all at once and the shaking in his muscles was getting worse.
Cinder saw Jaune stumble and smirked.
She conjured a wall of flame between herself and Pyrrha, blocking her view for an instant. In that second, she threw one of her weapons at Jaune.
Jaune blocked with his shield, only for the weapon to explode into shards on contact. Dozens of small projectiles opened wounds along his unguarded legs. His jeans started to turn red.
"Jaune!" Pyrrha cried out.
Her guard dropped for an instant which Cinder didn't miss as she slashed at Pyrrha with her remaining sword.
Pyrrha managed to respond in time by raising her shield, but she fell to the same trick. The shards of glass deflected off the aura of her upper arms and shoulders. It kept her safe from harm but drained what little aura she had left.
The spikes dropped out of the air as her Semblance cut out. Without aura to fuel it, she was almost as weak as Jaune.
Of course, that didn't take into account her raw talent as a fighter.
Pyrrha still had the weapon she'd created for herself and she attacked her now unarmed opponent.
By all rights, she had the advantage, but for whatever reason, she wasn't able to land a definitive blow. She was just barely managing to destroy each of Cinder's weapons as she created them.
She's fighting while trying to protect me!
Jaune couldn't stand any longer and he didn't dare use his remaining aura on recovery or defense. He knew he might need it later to finish Cinder off. So instead, he pulled himself along the ground until he reached the edge of the room. Several tables had been stacked there during Cinder's rampage.
I'm not going to be her weakness.
"Pyrrha, stop thinking about me and fight! I'm behind cover!" Jaune shouted.
Jaune had to get back into the fight as soon as possible. Before his latest injury, his legs had at least worked, but the embedded glass was too big an obstacle.
Jaune dragged Crocea Mors through his pants and began removing the shards one by one out of his legs. Once they were removed he could work out what to do.
From behind the desks, the sounds of combat were escalating. Glass smashed and steel scraped against wood. Jaune could hear the sound of Pyrrha's stressed breathing between the shouting of Cinder. Flames licked at every surface of the room, shattering windows and crackling wood.
With almost half the shards removed, Jaune spared a glance around the corner of the desk to sneak a peek.
Jaune could see that Pyrrha had activated her adrenaline rush skill. Her whole body blushed from the increased blood flow. Several fresh wounds were bleeding at a fastened pace.
Cinder was uninjured, at least her human body was. Her Grimm arm was smoking from a large wedge that had been cut from her forearm.
Cinder must be blocking with her Grimm arm to avoid taking any real damage. Grimm don't feel pain and they don't slow down from injuries.
If I don't hurry up, she's going to lose.
Jaune ducked his head back down and rushed his way through the remaining handful. He worsened several of the cuts in the process.
Once finished, he could move his legs properly again. Although, they did still hurt on a deeper level from the damage he'd inflicted with his overuse of his aura.
"Enough!" Cinder roared.
Jaune readied himself to jump in and stop whatever attack she had planned. He stumbled as the entire tower shook.
Sections of masonry fell past the outside facing window and the roof caved in. Two three-clawed hands widened the gap and pulled the wall away from the entire floor. The dragon Grimm was tearing the tower apart to get at them.
"Let's see how you fare against this!" Cinder gloated as she propelled herself into the air.
Pyrrha dodged as the dragon vomited a pool of black tar at her. From it, Grimm began to spawn and fill the room.
Jaune got up and helped Pyrrha dispatch them before their numbers became too much to handle.
"It's not too late to run Pyrrha. You could get into the town and find somewhere to hide. She wouldn't be able to find you if you kept your head down." Jaune stated, trying his best to persuade her.
"And leave you behind?" She asked.
"Yes!" Jaune almost shouted.
She drew her lips into a tight line. "No."
He cut through the midsection of a Beowolf and stumbled beneath the claws of another. He used his fall to maim the attacking Grimm and he rolled away to cut down another.
A hand caught him by the side of the head mid-roll and reversed his momentum. The sudden change nearly broke his neck and he was thrown off the edge of the building before he could even react.
He turned mid-air to see Cinder retreating from the edge, clearly content that she had dealt with him.
Jaune tried to grab at the wall, but he had already picked up too much speed. His fingers uselessly scraped along the stonework. Even with aura, he doubted he could stop himself. Not without injuring himself even further at least.
My best odds here are to just stick the landing...
Jaune readied himself to try and roll through this as best he could.
He pushed away from the tower to position himself properly with his legs below him. He carefully watched and waited for the perfect moment to kick off the ground.
"Jaune!"
Something lifted Jaune out of the air. It felt like he was suddenly weightless and formless like he'd left his body behind. Just as he'd felt it, he was back to normal and being lowered to the ground by a familiar silver-eyed girl.
"You'd think you'd have learned after the last time I found you. Heights just aren't your thing." Ruby joked.
"Ruby?" Jaune asked. "I thought you said you weren't coming?"
"No, I said I had to prioritize my team. I got Weiss to safety and came straight back." Ruby explained.
"Pyrrha's still up there," Jaune stated.
Any levity that Ruby had left evaporated.
"Can you fight?" she asked.
Jaune had avoided a lethal end, but his body was still deteriorating the more he pushed himself.
"Yes." He lied.
Ruby nodded before grabbing onto Jaune's hand and turning into petals.
The sensation of weightlessness hit Jaune once more. Except this time he had the time to register what it was.
Ruby was somehow managing to pull him into her Semblance. It was more than just that though. Ren could affect others with his Semblance, but this felt more personal. For the brief few seconds it took Ruby to scale the tower, she was entwined with him down to the soul.
Jaune hit the top floor of the tower as Ruby dropped him to race into the Grimm that swarmed his partner.
Pyrrha was still fighting, but her injuries spoke for themselves. Her armor was beaten and torn and her trademark ponytail had been cut lopsidedly on one side.
Seeing his partner in that state was enough to switch Jaune into pure combat mode. Jaune gave no thought to his condition as he tackled a Grimm that attacked her from behind.
"So you're back again? And you brought a friend." Cinder asked with a hint of amusement. "You certainly are stubborn. Of course, I should have already known that."
Ruby's scythe sliced through the Grimm like butter. She instantly thinned the horde by dozens for each second that passed. With the reprieve, Pyrrha picked up a second metal spike for her offhand. She dropped to one knee and took several deep breaths to regain the stamina she'd lost.
"Ruby, we need to get Pyrrha out of here. Can you pick us both up?" Jaune asked as he drove his sword under the ribs of his grappled Grimm.
"I-I don't know. I've never tried to pick anyone up before. It just happened!" Ruby replied unconfidently.
"Then we need to take out Cinder. Do you think you can get her down here?"
"You need not lure me. I owe you all a lot of pain for what you've done tonight. I'd be more than happy to come down and repay you with my utmost generosity." Cinder announced as she lowered herself to the ground.
The Grimm separated, creating a ring around the four of them.
This is our only shot. If we can't beat her in a straight-up fight while she still thinks she's in charge, we lose.
Jaune drew his shield and took his most serious stance. He could leave the tricks up to Ruby and Pyrrha, he would do his best to shield his friends from harm.
"Jaune... You can't keep fighting like this. Look at yourself. You've lost too much blood as it is and you weren't steady on your feet when you got here." Pyrrha stated.
"Yeah, well, the only way I'm leaving here is with you. Payback is a bitch like that." Jaune replied, throwing her words back at her.
"What's the plan?" Ruby asked.
"We take her out together and then get out of here," Jaune answered.
"That's not really a plan," Ruby replied.
Despite her complaint, she readied herself for a fight.
Cinder confidently strode towards the three of them. She'd had the last minute or so to recover while Pyrrha had been fighting. She was mostly uninjured and had access to her weapons and her maiden powers. The advantage we had was that Ruby and Jaune still had a trace of their aura while she didn't.
Jaune stood front and center and instantly took on a double attack from Cinder with his shield. She wasn't as physically strong, especially without aura. As long as he could keep up with her speed and not let her use her powers, he could handle the defense.
As Jaune blocked, Ruby and Pyrrha flanked Cinder. Ruby launched a heavy overhead blow which Cinder blocked with a sword. Ruby must have expected that as the instant she did she fired a round. The recoil pulled the blade back through Cinder's space.
Cinder pirouetted away from Jaune and out of the line of Ruby's attack. Pyrrha cut her off with a series of thrusts. She parried the first and interrupted a second by planting her glass heels into Pyrrha's thigh. The blow landed clean and the heel snapped off inside Pyrrha's leg drawing a loud groan of pain from Pyrrha. The glass heel stemmed the blood flow somewhat. But even then it was beginning to create quite a mess.
While Cinder was on one leg he charged and bashed with his shield, knocking her off balance. Cinder was forced to discard a sword so she could perform a handspring to right herself.
Jaune followed up with a diagonal cut which Cinder knocked aside with a kick. Before he could continue his attack his lead leg was blasted out from underneath him by a jet of flame. It scorched his skin on contact.
The sensation of being burned like that cause Jaune to flinch and fail to catch himself.
His chest hit the ground, shocking him back into action. From the ground, Jaune slashed at Cinder's legs.
In response, she flipped through the air over Ruby who was forced to block as Cinder attacked her from above.
Pyrrha caught her with a glancing thrust before she landed. The small cut began to trickle blood down her arm.
Cinder lashed out with her Grimm arm, hitting Pyrrha as she dodged away by stretching the limb. Pyrrha was knocked to the edge of the building where she barely caught herself.
Jaune stood back up to continue the assault, only to be grabbed by that same arm as it wrapped around his chest. His upper arms were pinned by his sides. Cinder pulled him close and with two fingers created a knife of solid flame and held it to his throat.
"Game over. I win." She stated with the confidence of someone with a hostage.
Jaune for a moment panicked as the hot flame threaten to sear through his neck. But just as soon as he felt the panic, he felt an odd wave of calm. His fear of the flames dissipated, replaced instead with a simple understanding.
There was something more terrifying than the sensation of being burned. It wasn't the fear of death, or of pain or injury. Jaune feared losing Pyrrha.
My body is already broken. I won't last much longer at this rate. But that doesn't mean I can't squeeze some more use out of it.
"Hey Cinder, I guess you were right. I am a complete idiot."
Jaune closed his eyes and with just the use of his biceps, he thrust his sword through his abdomen. His sword cut clean through, piercing Cinder behind him who was too entangled with him to get away.
"No!" Ruby and Pyrrha screamed.
Something white washed over him, piercing through his closed eyelids. The arm which held him seemed to melt away. Jaune collapsed to the ground, lacking the strength to hold himself up unassisted.
A set of hands found their place on his side a few moments later. They frantically ripped away his singed clothing.
Jaune took the attention as a sign that he'd pulled off the impossible and helped deal with Cinder. At the very least he hoped that she was forced to retreat, giving them time to regroup and prepare.
"Why would he do that, idiot!" Pyrrha complained.
"'He' can still hear you." Jaune joked.
"Oh thank Oum, you're still awake. That's a good sign. Don't worry Jaune, I'll take care of this, you just... just sit there and don't move." Pyrrha ordered.
Sounds good...
Jaune breathed what could have been a sigh of relief were it not for the tension in his gut.
"How's Ruby?" Jaune asked.
"Stop talking." She replied.
Jaune didn't want to push the issue but his impatience still made itself apparent.
"She's fine." She huffed when she realized Jaune was going to be difficult. "Unconscious, but fine. I think."
"You think?"
"She's breathing and the only cut she has is the one she came with and that's already healing. Now stop talking and let me focus."
Jaune sat quietly as requested and focused on a sensation that he assumed was Pyrrha's doing.
His back tickled and the cut itself felt almost swollen as if something was flowing back into it.
"Grit your teeth." She ordered.
Jaune didn't have a chance to before the sword was pulled from his abdomen.
The pain worsened once again when a searing heat was pressed into the wound.
"Fuck, Pyrrha! A little more warning next time!" Jaune shouted as he rolled onto his back.
"I didn't have time for... a warning." She muttered.
A thump beside him had Jaune opening his eyes to see his partner be the one in danger.
Her leg wound had been bleeding this entire time, as had all her other lingering injuries. In fact, they were bleeding now worse than ever due to having used her adrenaline rush with open wounds.
She'd managed to hold on just long enough to treat Jaune, but the blood loss was too far gone to ignore forever.
Jaune quickly rolled over to her to see what he could do.
"Don't you know you're supposed to treat yourself first in an emergency!?" Jaune stressed.
He quickly sought to perform the same treatment she had to close the wound. There was plenty of superheated metal lying around so Jaune picked up the closest and pressed it to her leg.
Pyrrha weakly groaned in response.
Still, the treatment hadn't fixed the issue entirely. Unlike her, he couldn't stem the internal bleeding by controlling the metal. All he could do was stamp down the flesh and put a lid on it.
With the amount she had lost already, any internal bleeding could be lethal.
With his thoughts on bleeding, Jaune realized that he hadn't done much of it. A few splashes here and there, but for the kind of wound he inflicted on himself, there was a suspicious lack of blood.
"Pyrrha, did you do something to stop my bleeding before you did that?" Jaune asked.
"Semblance... It's been stronger since the transfer... There's iron in blood." She slowly explained.
"Can you do it to yourself?"
She shook her head.
"No aura."
Shit.
There has to be something I can do!
Jaune racked his mind for a hint of what to do.
If only I could give her what's left of mine! I still have a few points I saved just in case!
Jaune paused for a few seconds after that thought.
"Maybe I can." He mumbled.
My Semblance is a combination of my mother and father's. Maybe there's a bit more of mum in me than an enlarged reserve.
Jaune held his hands over Pyrrha's leg and tried to visualize his aura going into Pyrrha. The effect was almost instant.
His hands glowed white and Pyrrha's red aura reached out to touch his before receding into her leg. Instantly, Pyrrha's breathing seemed less labored, like her pain had lessened.
Jaune watched closely to see if her wound would begin healing. When he saw no signs of improvement he tried to push even more aura into her, only to realize he was completely out. The aura that surrounded her leg faded away.
"No, no, no." Jaune panicked. "I don't care if I never use aura again I need to save her!"
"Help! Someone help! She's going to-" Jaune shouted to the skies, hoping someone, anyone would hear. Pyrrha interrupted him by pinching his cheek.
"You're being too loud." She chided. "You're still hurt yourself, so just lie down with me."
Jaune refused and looked around for something, anything that could help her.
"Don't make me sit up. I want to talk to you. Face to face. Before it's too late."
"That's not going to happen. There's still time." Jaune denied.
"Then let's use it properly." She pleaded, patting the space beside her.
Jaune didn't want her trying to move around, so he took the space beside her.
"Listen, everything's going to be okay-"
"I love you Jaune." She interrupted.
"I know you do. I love you too. I love you so much Pyrrha, so you have to keep holding on, okay?" he begged.
"Promise me... That you won't give up..."
"Of course not. I'll keep trying and trying until I find something that works. I'll find a way to save you. Ruby came here, she must have told someone she was coming. Help must be on the way."
"Don't give up on... living. I want you... to keep living... No more stunts like tonight."
"Pyrrha-"
"I think... I think this time it's goodbye." Pyrrha whispered as tears began to run down her cheeks.
Pyrrha pulled with what little strength she had and Jaune let her guide his head towards her own.
"I know for a fact... It was my destiny... to fall in love with you. But it's your... destiny to become... something so much more. I always saw it in you."
Jaune didn't like where this was going. He refused to believe it was even a possibility.
"Pyrrha please, I'm not ready for this. I'm nothing without you! I need you to stay with me so I can be all the things you want me to be."
"I promise I'll watch over you... So please promise me... that you'll live a long happy life."
"How am I meant to-"
Pyrrha kissed him once, softly, before pushing him away.
With a smile on her face, she sighed.
"Pyrrha?" Jaune asked after a few seconds of silence.
He shook her shoulder jostling her entire body with no response.
"Pyrrha, this isn't funny. You can't sleep now. Don't you know it's dangerous to fall asleep at times like this?" he asked.
"P-Pyrrha?" he tried once more.
Jaune grabbed her wrist. There was no pulse.
Jaune instantly pressed his ear to her chest. She wasn't breathing and her heart wasn't beating.
"No, no, no…" Jaune panicked.
He hopped on top of her and instantly began compressing her chest.
He kept up the act as minutes burned away. He was too focused on trying to keep her blood pumping and forcing air into her lungs to notice the passage of time.
So, when someone silently landed upon the tower behind him, he didn't notice until they called out to him.
"Kid."
Jaune turned around in a flash, worried an enemy had snuck up on him.
"It's just me," Qrow explained, putting his hands up.
"I knew help was coming! You have to get her out of here." Jaune urged.
"She's gone, kid."
Jaune's brain refused to process what was said. So he just ignored it.
"You got up here so that means you should be able to carry us down right? I know you're Ruby's uncle and all but-"
"She's gone."
"No, she's not!" Jaune roared. "Help her!"
"We need to go," Qrow advised. "That thing might-"
"Help! Her!" Jaune screamed. "Why aren't you helping her?! She's the maiden right? She's important and you made her do all of this! You owe it to her! Do something!"
"Damn it, kid, Take a look at yourself! You need serious medical care right now. I need to get you and Ruby out of here." Qrow forcefully insisted.
"I'm not going anywhere without Pyrrha!" Jaune shouted back.
Qrow stomped forwards and grabbed Jaune by the scruff of the collar. Jaune in turn thrashed and beat at Qrow's arms trying to break free. Qrow's grip held strong so Jaune bit his hand so hard his jaw almost cracked.
"Ow! Little bast-" Qrow stopped himself from finishing that thought and cracked Jaune over the back of the head with his hand.
Without aura to protect himself, Jaune lost consciousness.
And that, my dear readers, is the end of A Little Push. However! It is not the end of the story. I am already in the process of writing a continuation of this story called "A Long Journey". A Long Journey is in part the reason why I made so many story decisions that I did. A Little Push could almost be considered the prologue to this new story. At least in the same way that volumes 1-3 of canon were a prologue to the story we have today.
Those of you who are following this story but not me, I would recommend you do so as I will be taking some time off to plan the story and get a bit of a head start. Perhaps April on my birthday I will be ready to resume uploading. Of course my own impatience may get the better of me and you might get it sooner.
Hopefully you can forgive me for what I had to do this chapter. Know that as a faithful Arkos shipper, it hurt me too.
To end this final author's note, I'd like to give a few shoutouts to my most faithful reviewers or those who I've had extended discussions in PMs.
Bomberguy789: Your reviews were hilarious. I look forward to seeing more of them.
Arsinis: Your constructive feedback was greatly appreciated. You helped put a polish onto this story with your reviews and have helped me grow as a writer.
HelpingHand: Shooting ideas back and forth with you was both fun and useful. I know how much effort your replies took and I appreciate it all the more.
There were of course many many more and I appreciated hearing from each and every one of you. In the last 9(?) months I have had a great time writing for all of you.
Thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading A Little Push.
Until next time,
Kensarto.