AN: I realized the poor timing of making you guys relive Penny's Volume 3 death so soon after her Volume 8 death. Sorry about that.

Also, it wasn't until I looked at the transcript for the episode "Battle of Beacon", and didn't realize that you can see Roy being carried off by a Nevermore in the air behind Blake and Weiss. Damn.

Anyways, let's continue the sadness, shall we?

Chapter 73

Pyrrha barely registered the woman's voice over the loudspeaker, only able to look on in horror at the mangled, dismembered body lying before her.

She hadn't meant to!

Please, why was this happening?!

What was she going to say to Ruby?!

Pyrrha covered her mouth with her hands, falling to her knees as tears rolled down her face.

It took everything she had to not vomit.

"Alert. Incoming Grimm attack," an automated message played over the speakers. "Threat level: Nine. Please seek shelter in a calm and orderly manner."

She could hear the people in the stands begin to panic and rush for the exits, but she couldn't find the strength to even stand up.

"Ladies and gentlemen, please," a new, authoritative voice announced. "There is no need for panic."

After he said that, a giant Nevermore landed on top of the force field above the arena, pecking at it with its beak.

Ozpin looked on at the scene, his knuckles turning white from how tightly he was gripping his cane.

"Ozpin!" Glynda yelled as she entered the office.

"Get to the city!" Ozpin ordered. "Qrow and Aqua should already be there!"

"But-!"

"NOW!" he shouted, and Glynda finally did as she was told, turning around and entering the elevator. Ozpin turned to his scroll, and dialed up James's number.

"Ozpin, the girl…" James said. "I-I can explain!"

"You brought your army to my Kingdom, James," Ozpin said. "Use it."

"Blue Two, what's your status?" a voice on the control terminal asked to the recently-emptied-out bridge of the General's flagship. "Blue Two, come in! Someone answer me, damn it!"

Neo happily skipped through the command center, stepping over the bodies of the Atlesian officers, the girl herself wearing a white uniform and carrying her dad's cane and bowler hat. With a big smile on her face, she entered the cell block and opened up the door to his cell.

"Well, it's about time," Roman said, before Neo threw her arms around his waist in a hug. He affectionately patted her head. "It's good to be back, kiddo."

Within minutes, they had taken control of the ship's guns, turning them on the other airships.

"Bring them to their knees!" Adam commanded as his Bullhead landed at Beacon's airship docks, depositing both his men and the Grimm that the woman had somehow managed to provide for them.

Today was the day that the revolution truly began.

Today was the day the humans would learn to fear the might of the White Fang!

Weiss and Blake stood in shock as the Atlesian Knights fought off the Grimm trying to make their way onto the fairgrounds. Civilians were running around in a panic, trying their best to escape.

"I don't believe this…" Weiss said. Blake's scroll suddenly rang, and the black-haired Faunus picked it up.

"Yang, are you okay?" she asked.

"I'm fine," she answered, running through the halls of the dorm. "Is Ruby with you? She's not answering her scroll."

"No, she isn't." They could see Yang stop running and look on worriedly. "Yang, I'm sure she's fine. She's a Keyblade wielder. She can take care of herself."

"…Right."

"This can't be happening," Weiss said sadly. "Penny…"

"I'm headed to the docks near the courtyard," Yang said. "The White Fang are releasing Grimm into the school!"

"The White Fang is here?!" Blake asked in alarm. They could hear growling coming from the other end of the call, worrying the two of them. "Yang!"

"Ugh! Gotta go! Be careful!" The call ended, leaving Blake's screen blank.

"Blake what are we going to do?" Weiss asked.

"We're going to the docks, and we're doing our job," Blake said, using her scroll to call her rocket locker to her. She opened it up, and picked up Gambol Shroud. The partners looked at each other and nodded resolutely.

"Warning: Safety Barriers Falling," a voice over the speakers announced, but Pyrrha found that she still couldn't look away from Penny's body.

How could she have done something like that to her?

"PYRRHA!" Jaune shouted from the arena. "Pyrrha, that thing's going to break in! You've gotta move!"

She could vaguely register the sound of the Nevermore slamming its beak back into the dome. Jaune jumped down from the stands, trying to get to her.

"Pyrrha, please snap out of it!"

The Nevermore shattered the dome above their heads, slamming into the floor. It kicked up a shockwave that knocked back Jaune and Pyrrha, and sent the pieces of Penny's body flying. It screeched and lunged at Pyrrha, only to be knocked back a red blur. Ruby landed in front of Pyrrha, her Keyblade held in front of her.

"Ruby?" Pyrrha asked.

"Leave her alone!" the red-clad girl yelled at the Nevermore. "THUNDAZA!"

A massive bolt of lightning struck the Nevermore, leaving it convulsing in place for several seconds. Multiple rocket lockers suddenly flew down and pinned the creature down, allowing Ruby to jump up with a yell and slice its head off. Ruby looked over to Pyrrha, who was still fighting back tears while the other students grabbed their weapons from the lockers.

"Ruby, I…" she said. "I'm so sorry."

"Me too," Ruby said sadly. "But it wasn't your fault."

"She's right," Jaune said, walking up with Pyrrha's weapons in his hands. "Whoever was on that microphone…" Ruby flinched a little when he said that. "They're the ones that did this. And we have to make sure they don't take anyone else." Ruby looked down sadly. Pyrrha took her weapons from her boyfriend, nodding to him. She looked over at the large collection of students surrounding them, smiling slightly. Then they noticed Grimm with four legs, wings, and beaked faces land on top of the arena.

"Griffons," Ren said.

"Anybody got a plan of attack?" Neptune asked.

"Yeah. Attack," Ruby said, looking up to see a Griffon fly down towards her. Before any of them could attack it, though, a gunshot rang out, knocking it back. They all looked back and saw Professor Port and Doctor Oobleck, their weapons in their hands.

"Students!" Port said. "I think it would be best for you to leave."

"But we—" Ruby tried to argue before Oobleck interrupted her.

"Miss Rose! This day will surely go down in Remnant's history. I'd prefer it if my students could live to tell about it." Ruby looked sadly at him before nodding.

"Let's go!"

The students exited the arena just in time to witness General Ironwood demolish an Alpha Beowolf.

"What's going on?!" Ruby asked him as the group approached.

"Grimm are crawling all over the city," the general reported. "The White Fang's invaded Beacon, and to make matters worse, some…vagabond has seized one of my ships. Until we regain command, the skies are out of our control. So I'm…" he paused to fire his pistol at a Grimm that managed to sneak up behind them. "…Going to take it back." He put his pistol back into his jacket and turned around to enter a Bullhead.

"What should we do?" Jaune asked, making the general stop and turn back to look at them.

"You have two choices. Defend you Kingdom and your school… or save yourselves. No one will fault you if you leave." He finally turned around and entered his dropship. "Let's mov out!" The students all looked at each, it being fairly obvious what they were going to go.

"I mean… come on!" Sun said.

"We can take a ship to Beacon!" Jaune declared.

"Hmm… Let's see," Roman said, fiddling around with the controls of the airship. "What does… this button do?" He pressed a random button, and heard an explosion in the distance. "Oh, fun! How about… this one?" He pressed another one, but it made no discernable noise. "Hm. Alright, nothing." Now, still wearing a white uniform for some reason, handed him a black scroll. He looked towards the slot in the central console with a chuckle.

"Now this one, this one's gonna be fun!"

Aqua was certain that was Cinder's voice on the CCT. What did this mean? Was Cinder responsible for Pyrrha killing Penny? Did she plan this? Why?

Was she the one who attacked Amber?

… Was Mercury humiliating Yang part of her plan?

Before she was able to contemplate it further, she and Qrow suddenly had to defend the civilians against a massive onslaught of Grimm, with Glynda joining them shortly afterwards.

Glynda picked up a few Creeps with her Semblance, tossing them into the air to be slashed down by Qrow. Aqua swung her Keyblade to kill another one, backflipping away from the claws of a Beowolf And kicking off the wall to slash at it. It disappeared in a puff of black smoke. Suddenly, the body of an Ursa slammed into the ground, and she heard a cackling above her. A shirtless man in black shorts whose body was engulfed in flames jumped down, and sliced the Ursa in half with a giant sword.

"Well, fancy meeting you here," Jecht said, standing up and slinging his sword over his shoulder.

"Jecht?" Aqua asked.

"That's my name." He looked behind her. "Hey, Qrow! Long time, no see!"

"Jecht," Qrow greeted. "I see you're as insane as ever."

"Can we please focus?" Glynda asked. At that moment, several Atlesian Knights were dropped off, firing at the Grimm stragglers.

"Huh, never thought I'd be happy to see Jimmy's toys," Qrow commented. No sooner had he said that, when the Knights' visors turned red. The robots turned around, and pointed their guns at the Huntsmen.

"What?!" Glynda asked.

"Get down!" Blake yelled, tackling Blake to the ground to avoid fire from the Atlesian Knights. For some reason, as soon as they approached the mechs, their visors had turned red and they turned on them. They were quickly surrounded by the Knights, forcing them to draw their weapons.

General Ironwood was piloting his dropship, heading back to his hijacked flagship, when the hatch to the back opened and several Knights walked into the cockpit, pointing their rifles at him.

"No!" he shouted, trying to get out of the pilot's seat before they fired at him.

He was too late.

Ruby knew for a fact that Cinder was the one who spoke after Penny…

Why?!

Was it all a lie?!

Flashes of light outside drew her attention, and there was a series of gasps from the other students in the Bullhead as the dropship General Ironwood had just gotten on suddenly started falling from the sky. Ruby looked up at the flagship the general had been trying to get to and narrowed her eyes. She opened up the door to the Bullhead, which had only barely left the ground.

"Ruby! What are you doing?!" Sun called after her. Instead of answering, she jumped out, landing back at the airpad of the arena. She ran back inside, finding a rocket locker inside. She punched in a code, held on tight, and rode it as it took off.

Roman suddenly heard a loud thud above him. He sighed and looked to Neo.

"Go see what that was," he said. She nodded, and turned to walk out.

Weiss and Blake were fighting off both red-visored Atlesian Knights and White Fang members, trying to fight their way back to the main campus. They noticed human Atlesian soldiers fighting against a Paladin, the soldiers getting swatted aside easily.

"Come on!" Weiss shouted. Before they could move to assist the soldiers, they noticed a Bullhead falling from the sky, a Beowolf leaping from the aircraft. The Grimm landed and began chasing after fleeing civilians, heading towards the dining hall. Weiss and Blake looked at each, silently communicating their intentions.

"Be safe," Weiss said. Blake nodded, running off after the Beowolf. She chased it to the dining hall, only for the creature to start climbing up the building. Before she could shoot at it, a scream from inside the building drew her attention. She looked inside, and froze.

A familiar red-haired man in a black suit with horns had an Atlesian soldier impaled on his blood-red katana. The white Grimm mask stood out in the flames of the burning building.

"No…" Blake said in horror. "Adam?" Her voice drew his attention, making him turn to look at her with a wicked smile on his face.

"Hello, my darling."

"It's almost sad," Emerald said, standing on a rooftop with Cinder and Mercury, the boy filming the carnage on his scroll.

"It's necessary," Cinder said, an almost melancholic tone to her voice. "Focus on the Atlesian Knights."

"I'm getting all of it," Mercury said.

"Continue the broadcast until the end." A tremor suddenly rocked the area. "And don't miss what happens next."

Ozpin decided he had enough if watching, standing up to grab his cane and approach the elevator. Suddenly, a tremor rocked the room, making him stumble. He ran towards his window, and could faintly make out a giant Grimm dragon flying towards Beacon, black ooze dropping off its body and spawning more Grimm.

He narrowed his eyes.

It was time for Miss Nikos's answer.

Pyrrha and Jaune stood back-to-back, ready to continue the fight, when she noticed Professor Ozpin standing near the entrance of the tower.

She never game him her answer, did she? She looked back at Jaune, and then looked back at the destruction.

This was what the people after Amber were willing to do to innocent people?

And she was the one who was chosen to stop it?

Why did she ever think she had a choice?

Without a word, she stepped away from her friends and walked towards the Headmaster.

AN: Sorry about all the short one-or-two line scenes.

Sadly, Pyrrha realized that there really was no choice in the matter. I honestly feel like Ozpin knew that, and that's why he picked her. He knew she'd never be able to say "no". It's forcing her to do something while disguising it as a choice. Ozpin I think is honestly a little more devious than most people think.

As always, thank you for reading, and I'll see you all next time!