Wolf: *Unholy hacking and coughing*
Tiger: Chest infection?
Wolf: RAGING!
Tiger: keep it to yourself
Chapter 5 The Coming Storm
As the blizzard raged on, we came up to the front door of the main building to this "farm" I folded my ears back and pulled my hood up to keep snow from going inside of them. Neo huddled closer to me for warmth as we came to the door.
"I don't get it. The empty towns I've passed through were all damaged or unfinished. But this place looks... fine." Ruby sighed as we took shelter under the porch, Cole looked back through the snow to make sure that no Grimm had followed us.
"Maybe everyone left in a hurry. Before things took a turn?" Weiss said, her teeth chattering as she held herself to try and keep warm, Qrow went to try the doorknob only to find it was locked.
"Hmm. Stay on guard." He told us, I pulled Neo into my coat and drew my gun. He soon booted the door open and we all ran in weapons drawn, I was quick to check through the different doors.
"Downstairs clear!" I called back to the others.
"Close the door already! It's cold enough as it is!" Maria as she walked in, I holstered my gun and began to look around. Oscar and Blake pushed a drawer in front of the door.
"I saw a chimney from the outside. Maybe we could get a fire going?" Blake said.
"That sounds good." Cole said placing his broadsword by the door and taking his boots off.
"Please, I'll look for some blankets." Weiss smiled.
"Yang go with her." Qrow said, the blonde brawler nodded and followed her friend upstairs.
"Looks like a study. Or, a library?" I heard Oscar say, I wandered into one of the back rooms hoping to find something we could have to eat, our supplies were low enough as it was all we had were the clothes on our backs, some dust bullets and our weapons so having a good supply of food on us was out of the question.
My fingers brushed against the empty shelves, when a hand landed on my shoulder. Turning swiftly, I held my new axe against Cole's throat.
"Good reflexes." He said as I let him go.
"Sorry I'm a bit jumpy." He only chuckled.
"Yeah I can tell. Your buddy Ice gave me the run down on how you would react to certain things." He replied.
"The main reason I wanted to talked to you was because I couldn't help but notice your emblem on the back of your jacket, it looks similar to mine." He said taking off his jacket to show me his.
His emblem was a Beowolf, chasing the sun in the clockwise direction, it's maw wide open as if ready to devour it. Mine was similar but the Beowolf was chasing the shattered moon and was heading anti-clockwise.
"My dad was a man named Lye Chalk, my mother was Raikou Charcoal." My heart fluttered in my chest.
"My dad was named Micheal Angelo and my mother was also Raikou Charcoal..." I said, the realisation hit us instantly before I had even finished my sentence, no wonder he smelt so familiar.
Just before we could say anything else, we heard a loud high pitch scream, I leapt into action, axe in hand I burst into an upstairs room where the others stood in shock. A couple laid in the bed, their skin a sickly green and decomposing.
"Dead for at least three months." I growled covered my nose and mouth, coughing hard I left the room.
We sat in the library, the fire crackling and my coughing just got worse. Neo sat beside me, worried about my health.
"I'll be fine." I told her holding back a few splutters.
"It's the same in every house." Qrow said walking up to us.
"What?" Yang asked.
"Bodies. Every bed in every home. It's like the whole estate just went to sleep and never woke up." Qrow told her kneeling down by Weiss to warm his hands by the fire.
"Then we're not staying here, right?" Weiss asked I rolled my eyes.
"We've got no choice, we'd freeze to death out there." Cole said sitting on the sofa with a sigh.
"Well, might as well get comfortable." Maria said getting up to walk over to the bookcase.
"Yeah, fat chance." Yang huffed.
"Okay, then, let's do something. If this place wasn't abandoned it might still have supplies, we could use." Ruby smiled getting up.
"Hey, yeah. Maybe even a car." Oscar joked.
"I'll do another sweep of the grounds. No one else goes anywhere alone." Qrow said, Cole got up on his feet to go join him.
"Yang and I can search the other buildings for vehicles." Blake smiled.
"I'm going with them." I said getting up and coughing again.
"Need to find something Grimmgash can pull so no one is walking."
"Fine, whatever gets me out of this house." Yang growled with annoyance.
As Yang, Blake and I leave, Ruby moved the chest of draws so we could get back in if needed.
We marched through the snowstorm into a barn, as we entered and shoved the doors shut, I looked about seeing the shelving units that I could build a carriage out of, along with a bunch of spare parts, tools and a tractor, I could salvage some pieces from it.
"Something tells me that's not street legal." Blake said looking at the tractor, I snorted at her joke and began to take apart some of the shelves to start making the carriage I needed. Using Venge's fire to heat up the metal bars to bend them and weld them together.
"What do you think happened here?" Yang asked as I began to size up the planks of wood and split a couple of them with my axe.
"There's that well in the square. Maybe water contamination?" Blake replied.
"I hope not, I'm getting thirsty and I don't want to wait for some snow in a bottle to melt." I called over hearing Blake laugh.
"Hey, are you okay?" I heard Blake ask.
"Yeah... I mean, no. But I don't know. I'm just tired." Yang replied.
"Yeah." Blake replied.
"You think you're tired I just found out I had a half-brother." I mumbled to myself.
"Hey, I found something!" Yang called then gasped from something.
"What is it?" Blake asked.
"I..." Yang begun but never finished.
"I was just seeing things. I'm sorry. I still get flashes from that night." She told her partner.
"Do you think Adam's still out there?" Blake asked.
"I don't know. If he went back to the White Fang there would have been serious consequences. But he never really liked people telling him what to do. Adam's strong, but his real power comes from control. He used to get in my head, make me feel small. But now I see he just wanted to pull me down to his size." Blake explained.
"Hey, I'm not leaving. And if we ever see him again, I promise I'll be there."
"And I'll protect you." Blake finished.
"What?" Yang asked with a bit of anger in her tone.
"What?" Blake asked obliviously.
"Forget it. Let's just head back." Yang said as I tightened the last bolt holding the makeshift carriage together.
"But what about-"
"We're fine. We can hook that flatbed up to Bumblebee in the morning. Should carry most of us, Silver's made another one which should carry the rest of the group. Mission accomplished." Yang said marching away.
"It's okay Blake, I know you meant to say that you'd protect her like she protected you." I told the black cat, she gave me a smile which soon faded as I doubled over falling into a coughing fit.
"Silver are you alright?" Blake asked rubbing my back.
"I'd be lying if I said yes, I've got a weaker immune system than everyone else, always got sick easily in cold weather, the dust and the decomposing bodies didn't help much either." I choked as we left the barn following Yang back to the main house.