A/N: Here we are yet another chapter, I am having fun, Chapter 37: No More Games. (Very creative title I know)
Chapter 37: No More Games.
This strike broke Ruby's crimson aura, laying a cut across her face horizontally. The tip of the saber burned the flesh as it cut her face. Recoiling, Ruby screamed as she recomposed herself. Her face was in great pain, both in her left eye and the cut. Though as she recoiled from the strike something felt different with her aura, almost like the force was affecting it in some way even though for as long as she has had the force it was a separate ability.
It was at this moment Ruby snapped fully embracing the dark side as she realized Blake was fully willing to hurt and even kill her. Blasting a bolt of force lightning out of her left hand, though her lightning had shifted color from it usual purple to red. As Blake recoiled blocking the attack from her saber absorbing the attack, Ruby assembled Rose De Sang and extended its hilt and switched its main top blade to the quillon so it was now a light scythe. Blake's eyes went wide with the thought of, by the force no, she has a scythe. Blake trembled with fear as this sight, though what she saw next shocked her even further, Ruby's red and white mixed aura pulsed back to life, though her metal arm had an aura of its own and it was black, pitch black and spreading. Even with all that she witnessed, the words that came next would end up haunting the Faunus Jedi for the rest of her life.
"No. More. Games. BLAKE!" Ruby's voice roared, as she blasted forward using the force and her Speed semblance to increase her speed to ludicrous levels. Though, as Ruby's aura pulsed back to life healing her wounds in full Blake watched with fear as she prepared to intercept the incoming strike from Ruby's blade.
As she darted around looking for the perfect opening on Blake, Ruby felt like the force itself was tethering to her Aura. It felt like the bond between her and Weiss but this was between her and the force. This surge in her connection to the force was palpable to the young Sith, as she felt the surge in power making her smile wickedly. She felt her aura pulse with power as it intermingled with the Darkside of the force. As she felt this new, heart-fluttering sensation, Blake's defense opened up and pounced in for an attack with her light scythe.
Blake could barely register where Ruby was. The air cracked as she darted around her causing puffs of snow to pop up from the ground. Blake steeled herself for the attack to her neck blocking it with Candlelight's blade. Though, she quickly got kicked in the spine by Ruby as swung around behind her due to the momentum of the attack. Stunning the real Blake, Ruby force slammed her to the snow cover duracrete pad. Blake recovering, rolled away from a downward strike as Ruby aimed for her legs. Jumping back up on her feet, Blake readied her double saber for more combat. Ruby came back in for a hooking swipe that Blake avoided though she had to react quickly as the opposite blade came around which she locked and tried slamming Ruby with a force push to no avail.
Blake had to retreat back, but as she did she found a large duracrete slab ripped from the ground flying at her. Unable to shove it back, she sliced it in two. As she did she found a downward strike from a light scythe coming from above. Blake barely managed to parry that strike, deflecting the hammer like blow into the ground. Though Ruby quickly followed the strike up with a swipe with the opposite blade. Blake ducked under the strike as she activated her semblance, the clone barely formed before Ruby had dealt with it, though it did give Blake a chance to retreat. She had leaped on top of one of the landed dropships seemingly without Ruby noticing. She was mistaken in that assumption.
She felt the entire ship lift off the ground, then shot off the back of the mountain. Blake managed to avoid being thrown with it by rolling off the front. Though her legs caught in something as she fell to the ground even though nothing was around. It was at that point she looked at her legs as she hung in the air. On her legs were two floral glyphs that reminded her of Weiss's semblance but she never had a glyph that looked organic. That's when Blake realized they weren't Weiss's, they were Ruby's own brand of glyph. Thankfully she located Ruby and blasted her with a disruptive force push, which weakened Ruby's focus on the Glyphs just enough to break them.
Falling back to the ground, Blake slammed Ruby back with all the might she had into the exterior wall of Waltstahl, stunning her, putting her into a daze for a time. Walking over to Ruby, Blake readied to cripple the young Sith and former friend for capture by stabbing her joints out, though it was at this moment the Droid that had been surveying the battle had decided it was time to intervene, and it was at this point a blaster bolt flew out from his rifle and slammed into Blake's back.
"Conviction, Threat to Mistress's life confirmed, executing the Meatbag," HK-47 spoke as he watched Ruby and the Jedi's battle from afar. Sighting on the Jedi he fired. The yellow bolt hit her in the back cracking her aura as he gave a quick follow up shot followed by several more then even more followed. As HK thought to 'exercise his trigger finger,' All these bolts hit across Blake's body, each impact causing her to recoil from each impact, causing her to stagger further and further. Though she was in shock and could not react to the bolts as the impact of the bolts spun her around allowing for the front of her body to be peppered with blaster fire.
She could not scream in agony as each bolt left their mark, either hitting her body directly or grazing her. Dropping Candlelight, she fell to the ground seemingly lifeless with multiple blaster wounds to her body. The last bolt took a notch out of her right feline ear. In total Blake took thirty-five blaster bolts all across her body. All of the wounds smoking as she lay on the ground, her aura doing what it could to keep her alive. Though, HK was very pleased not finishing her off as he decided the target would not last much longer and the threat was neutralized.
Ruby stood back up recovering from the slam she had just suffered, seeing Blake seemingly incapacitated she was allowed a lull to examine the situation. She could feel her aura was overcharged and the wound on her face from Blake's attack was healing under the soot on her face and this was all due to the massive burst of force supercharged aura she had just unlocked. Ruby saw Blake on the ground, various wound on her body, she could tell they were blaster wounds, she didn't know from where these wounds came but the young Sith could sense she was still kicking.
Grinning insanely, Ruby huffed as she picked up De Sang and retracted the hilt to its standard length. Walking up to Blake, Ruby looked at her, she was critically wounded blood and ash in the snow, she almost resembled a corpse to Ruby, but she knew somehow she was still alive. Ruby still enraged, readied to deal a fatal blow to Blake, until she sensed an attack coming from behind. Catching the aggressor's blade on a Quillon of the rear blade. Whipping around, Ruby countered, with a quick strike on the blue blade. Though the blue blade was quickly withdrawn to defend from a blaster bolt as the Jedi deflected the bolt back towards the Sniper that was over watching the battle. As a flash of something sparking in the distance signaling she redirected the bolt back to the shooter.
"Annoyed, I must withdraw," HK-47 said as he stood on the post he had been camped on top of, his blaster rifle's scope smoldering as the deflected bolt destroyed his method of long distance engagement. Being too far for the hunter-killer droid to engage without closing to distances where he could be seen by Ruby, and it was too soon for her to know about him. "Excited, though Master Revan would appreciate footage of her"
Back in the courtyard Satele stood in front of the lightly clad Sith female in front of her, Satele looked at her face seeing the soot of a lightsaber strike, though the tissue looked undamaged. Satele quickly noted Blake behind Ruby, who was on the ground, her life fading away. It was at that second the Grand Master realized who she was looking at, Ruby Rose. Standing, her missing arm tingling in pain as she readied the half of her saber staff in her remaining hand. Ready for combat. Ruby jolted as she felt a tingle in her spine, she felt Weiss was in danger. Seeing the Jedi who looked ready for war. Ruby pressed the attack she was not going to let this Jedi live. Though her first strike was parried by the blue blade, but she kept the offensive, attacking with twin sabers.
Satele, for one of the few times in her life, felt legitimate fear as she dueled Ruby. As she fought, the stump where her left arm was supposed to be, ached as she saw the metal one of her opponent. Ruby was fighting with a full ferocity that Satele could not counter easily. It wasn't long before she noticed Ruby connect her saber staff and started to use her sabers as one, trying to use the staff to lever an attack on Satele. Red lighting bolted up the blades and quillons as she charged them. Surrounded by a red glow, Ruby bolted forth as Satele barely evaded the inbound attacks though she managed to get a grazing cut on the Sith's left hand. Despite her aura tanking the hit the blow still loosed her grip causing her to drop her saber, allowing Satele to fling it away into the distance.
This act enraged Ruby even more, as half of De Sang was thrown into the vast expanse of snow and forest. Switching between one and two-handed grips, Ruby lashed out at the one-handed Jedi, who managed to get another strike in on Ruby's leg, grazing the aura. Ruby smirked at the pain, her semblance really kicking up in a unique and new way. Petal flowing from De Sang's blade. Charging her semblance in her blade she flicked her wrist as the petals crack off a high velocity. The petals hit Satele giving her lacerations and puncture wounds, cauterized by the Saber petals.
This odd attack staggered Satele, though she recovered quickly. Darting forward, she engaged Ruby with a flurry of strikes. Her strikes were awkward as she had one hand at her disposal. Though she did push Ruby into a defensive Stance. Even for someone in relax wear Satele saw the daughter of Surik as an intimidating Sith. Though her eyes when she looked into them she saw the haunting mask of Revan appear over her face. Satele felt the darkness in the dark woman's heart as she saw the environment morphing into that of a hellish landscape. Satele knew force illusions could be elaborate but this was a whole new level.
"So you are Satele Shan, Grandmaster of the Jedi Order," Ruby growled as she appeared in front of Satele as the illusion disintegrated, slicing the emitter of Satele's saber deactivating it, and disarming Satele. Ruby quickly shifted her Blade to Satele's throat with full intent to kill as she needed to find Weiss as soon as possible. Though it didn't go to plan as Satele retaliated, dodging the red blade, and kicking the young woman's legs out from underneath her, sending her tumbling down into the snow with a poofy thud. Having to get her away as quickly as possible she used the force to send the fallen Ruby back into the fortress of Waldstahl specifically into one of the smoldering blaster impacts from the attack. Once the daughter of Surik was out of the way, Satele rushed over to Blake and picked her up while issuing the recall order, if she could have one person survive it was going to be Blake, the Kolto tank in the Fury.
Ruby after being flung landed in a pile of orange hot orange metal rubble on her right side, her Aura was depleted saving her from the sharp metal she slammed into and almost got impaled on and what little bit of her aura was left was taken up absorbing a fireball blast from a detonation inside the fortress that vented as Ruby fell. So the blast and slammed into the orange-hot metal seared the right side of her body with a fresh set of third-degree burns, she managed to push herself off the pile for a second with her right arm but she fell back in her face slamming onto an orange hot chunk of metal causing her to let out an ear-shattering scream as her face like her body took substantial second and third-degree burns. Fighting the shock in her body from the trauma she pushed back off, rolling off to the side of the searing hot metal, Standing back up she looked at the red and black charred skin on the right side of her body, it hurt so much. As like in her fight with Cinder, it was only her right side that took the damage.
Her clothing was burned and ragged on her right side, as she stood in the decimated part of the fortress she could a lot of the structure was to be like this. At her feet was her lightsaber, it was at that point she heard the caw of a bird. Looking up, a dark bird almost like a crow or raven, a bird of bad omen, either way, landed on a jutting out beam above her looking down at her before taking back off. She then heard the roar of a ship's engine she saw the landed fury's engines were warming up. As started to take off, Ruby reached out with her left hand, grabbing the ship with a force grip, holding it stationary in the air, it was a strain to do but she managed to hold it down until a small rear mounted defense blaster slammed into the ground next to her, breaking her concentration, allowing the ship to escape.
It was at that moment Ruby realized she had to go and find Weiss as soon as possible, as she was so consumed with trying to kill these Jedi, she forgot about what was much more important.
As the battle between Ruby and Blake had just started, Malserik was dueling the Jedi Healer, the former Padawan of the Jedi that killed his family. With each slash and attack, Malserik cursed his family's assailant's name. His viridian saber clashing on the cyan sabers. Alik-Zander was a master of Telekinetic saber dueling, and he usually carried twenty lightsabers on him to overwhelm his opposition with the vast amount of Sabers. Malserik was not trained in how to combat such a threat so he took some light grazes and cuts as he sliced at the hilts of the sabers. Engaging the rotary Blade of SturmKrieg was his best option as it flung the floating sabers out of his way, though if they were not destroyed within minutes Malserik deemed he had entertained this Jedi for too long. Falling back Malserik unclasped his eye patch partially, unleashing his gaze upon Jedi. Anderon fell to the floor, convulsing in pain. Normally, Malserik would never have done this to the Jedi, but these were not normal circumstances. Though, Malserik removed his gaze after nine seconds just before the verge of lethality. Crippling the Jedi as he pinged his location to his guardsmen.
Recovering his eye with his hand, he walked back to find the legless Balikor and Dornettz. He uncovered his eye, focusing his sight on them. Smiling the Sith cherished their screams, he gave them nine seconds as well. Letting them recover he got down on his left knee, crouching on the scorched and charred floor. As the Baron of Hiskal did this he spoke to the traitorous elements, their eyes fixated on the man they had deceived.
"If you had betrayed me for another Sith, I might have killed you now, but you had to betray me to them!" Malserik hissed gesturing to Anderon, "I need to find out what you told them. So I promise you pain and agony that will make what I just did to you seem like a stubbed toe."
"We won't tell you shit!" Dornettz panted back defiantly.
"Well, you won't have to tell me anything." Malserik smirked, he had his methods but Ruby had even better methods and he was going to let them know that with, "I won't be conducting the interrogation, Ru-" Malserik said standing up his eye right wincing in a slight stabbing pain as he re-affixed his eye patch,"no. No. NO!" Malserik screamed as he felt that Holocron being opened. He saw five guardsmen dart around a corner, Malserik stood facing them as he said, "Arrest these traitors and the Jedi! Get them medical attention I don't want them to die on us yet."
"YES, MY LORD!" The Guards yelled as they called for a medical team. Malserik drew his saber, whoever opened that Holocron will DIE! Malserik Screamed mentally as he ignited his saber his left eye pulsing as it renewed its yellow color. He ignited his saber as he bolted towards the archive.
Roman and Neo had encountered a large amount of resistance from more opposing forces as they approached the defense control room. The resistance was waning but Roman was on the point of his troop's spearhead, in his mind he had a tune going he remembered from Remnant, as he had his blaster pistol firing its fire orange bolts each shot he fired connected with a target, Neo was firing yellow bolts out of her rifle from the rear of the formation, each one hitting with deadly effects. This was was war, this was true combat. The Troops behind Roman had moral and vigor behind them, motivated by Roman they stormed forward to the control room and retook Waldstahl reactivating the defensive cannons. Though they couldn't aim low enough to hit the one landed dropship, but whoever took off in it would be in for a rude surprise
Weiss felt hazy as she regained consciousness, for a few moments she felt weightless. As she looked around all she could see was black. Instead, to compensate for her current lack of sight, she felt the room around her with the force. She could feel figures closing in on her with the force. Weiss felt around on the floor for Mitternacht, feeling it as she patted her hand on the ground. Feeling and hearing the figures closing in the blinded Weiss leaped to her feet in a staggering manner. Feeling the activation stud, she ignited the saber, her Saber jumped to life as she heard more sabers activate as her left eye tingled and vision returned to her right. Her vision fading in, she could see she was surrounded by five Jedi and their troopers.
"Sith lower your weapon and come with us, you will not be harmed," one of the Jedi said to the confused Weiss, whose vision was at peak function in her right, nondominant eye though her left was returning in a hazy manner. She saw the blue and green blades of the Jedi surrounding her. She realized she was in quite the predicament as she started to regain vision in her left eye, though Weiss smirked at the challenge, she needed to vent her frustration after that vision. Though as her left eye opened the Jedi her gaze locked on and collapsed in pain. His screams rang through the air as all eyes were on him, though after ten seconds of agony his body disintegrated into ash. Weiss leaped back as the Jedi charged her back to the wall she could see all of the force that had her pinned her in her left eye. Her vision in her left eye was tinted red as all the Jedi and their forces within her vision, fell over screaming, as Weiss watched in horror, unsure of the device doing this.
After the ten seconds past the bodies disintegrated to ash before Weiss. Weiss was panicking, she didn't know what was happening, as she darted forth looking to escape the room. It was then her gaze fell upon four loyal hiskal guardsmen, they too collapsed in pain as the vision in Weiss's left eye flashed even deeper red. Weiss immediately covered her left eye in the horrific realization. Her left hand clamped to her face, a surviving Jedi walked up behind Weiss she turned to face him her left hand still holding her eye as the Jedi readied his saber, his eyes yellowed with the dark side. At this point her the right side of her body was engulfed in a burning pain which caused her to buckle, along with dodging the Jedi's strike as she fell to the ground in intense pain that she knew was coming from Ruby's body. As she fell she uncovered her eye and Weiss's reddened gaze fell on the Jedi aggressor. With that, he fell screaming, the screams shattered Weiss's ears as she slammed her hand back over her cursed eye as her face ignited with the same pain. Though as she did, the Jedi's screams were ended by a swift lightsaber strike, a viridian lightsaber strike.
Viridian looked over at his former apprentice for a few minutes as the situation clicked together in his mind, seeing the horrified look on her face and the fact she was cupping her eye. His mind was in denial, though this denial quickly shifted to a wave of furious, unreasonable anger. Going purely of his anger he raised his saber to strike the stunned Weiss down like a traitor, a move he would soon come to regret. As he came in for the strike he saw a giant blue sword blade attached to an arm that was partially formed from a unique glyph. Then he felt two gleaming gold eyes looking at him with fury and unrelenting anger. Leaping in, a furious and wounded Sith engaged as the summoned arm faded away. Malserik swung back with SturmKreig trying to bypass Rose De Sang's bloody blade, with little success as Ruby blocked the attack swiftly. Both parties overwhelmed with anger and fury, clashed in a duel that to most would have looked like a blur. Ruby with fast wide strikes of form seven, Malserik fine minute movements of form two.
The duel went on for a few minutes, Weiss watching in horror realizing this duel was caused by her actions, her curiosity. As it was at this second she knew Malserik's strife. Though it was at the second Malserik was going to unleash his gaze by undoing his eye patch when a loud voice boomed and two blue blades stopped the duel just as Ruby gained the upper hand physically but Malserik was milliseconds from disabling Ruby with his gaze.
"Malserik, Ruby, stop this. NOW!" Imperious Roared intercepting both of their blades with her two blue ones and disarmed them as Malserik snapped out of his anger, and burned Ruby relented, looking at the sight of Weiss pressing her hand hard to her left eye as imperious tore off a piece of fabric from the nearest Jedi corpse that wasn't ash. Ruby rushed over to Weiss, dropping De Sang as she bolted over. Weiss not wanting to hurt Ruby shoved her away and ran, bolting off with speed, further accelerated by the force and glyphs, not even bothering to pick up her own saber.
"Care to explain, Viridian?" Ruby said ripping her saber off the ground with the force and Mitternacht in her left hand, as she ignited both it gave a dichotomy of Ruby, one side lusting for war and battle, the other wanting knowledge and justification.
"Weiss found the Holocron of Darth Nihilus," Malserik replied somberly, as it dawned on him what he tried to do, "She now suffers my curse, those who her left eye gazes upon for more than ten seconds perishes in ash," Malserik continued ashamed of his actions more than anything, Ruby lowering the sabers as Imperious looked at Malserik with a look that begged the question of 'you had that Holocron this whole time?'
"So what do we do now?" Ruby asked, her voice seething with rage as she wanted to chase after Weiss. Though she was concerned over the general situation as she could feel Weiss's emotions, right now if Ruby tried to help, Weiss would push her back. Ruby could feel her lover was struggling with the pain she had been given to bear.
"For now nothing can be done with Weiss, she was just like me, you will need to help her through this Ruby," Malserik spoke somberly again as he readied his saber, "Though, in due time, first we must make sure Waldstahl is secure first." He spoke ashamed, though he darted out of the room he had to get back to his troops and assist in the clearing effort, he needed to vent and what little remained of the Republic forces would do nicely for that task.
After a minute after Malserik left, Imperious contemplating the situation turned to Ruby who was still there, she noticed the fresh burns and charring on her flesh, They looked third degree and second degree, her aura wasn't healing it as much as it should have been. As a matter of fact, if it was healing her it wasn't noticeable.
"Ruby, why aren't your wounds healing?" Imperious asked quite concerned on the matter of Ruby's well-being, especially considering the severity of the burns.
"I am conserving my Aura for combat," Ruby replied somewhat lying, turning to face Imperious, these burns were much more substantial and painful than the ones cinder had given her, and she was quite exhausted from all of the combat from today. She was in no condition to use her Aura to heal the wounds. Imperious saw how the burns affected her face, they were quite noticeable she would have to see how they heal before she could judge how they looked on her former apprentice, but Imperious did have one comment to make on what she said.
"Ruby, if you can't heal those you need to get those wounds dressed or treated, you shouldn't continue, you should rest, let us handle this," Imperious said putting her hand on Ruby's left and undamaged shoulder.
"There is no rest for the wicked," Ruby said as she started walking down the halls wincing with each step as they did, in fact, have to clear the fortress. She didn't even know how bad the burns were but she knew they were bad. I hope Weiss is okay, Ruby thought as she walked back through the path she took to reach the archive with Mitternacht and a half of De Sang in hand. She was helping make sure the facility was secure.
by this point, Satele had loaded the wounded Blake into the Kolto tank aboard the Fury after a medical droid worked to stabilize her. Satele neglected to grab Blake's lightsaber as she couldn't even wait for anyone else to withdraw. She had already waited for as long as possible to see if any more Jedi or troops would make it out beside them. Satele had to make a call she did not want to make she had to evacuate lest she risked the death of Blake and herself, and her death would be too traumatic for the Jedi. With this fact in mind she took off, praying more would escape, but no one would. Even their escape almost did not occur as Ruby was seemingly very persistent and still powerful enough to hold a starship in place and that further frightened the Jedi Grand Master. As fate would have it no more could escape as Waldstahl's orbital defense cannons were brought back online and those few that managed to make it back to the one surviving dropship were shot down after they tried to take off.
A/N: Well, this was something, first off, the 'no more games' scene was one of my favorites to write back in the original story. As for the battle between Blake and Ruby, I wanted it to be a bit more dramatic and epic to show off Ruby's power. Same with Satele and Ruby's battle, but that one I changed the ending of considering in the original I had Ruby let them go, and when one is consumed by rage, they don't simply let something go. I also wanted have Ruby pay a bit of a price for that rage. Also, thank you, Guest, I decided to use the Crow omen.
Review responses
Dusk Clark: Here it is.
JimmyHall24: It would be an interesting parallel, but no Blake isn't going to be captured anytime soon.
ToxicGentleman: Welcome, I am glad you enjoy the story, as for the original, the original was effectively this same story but suffering from newbie writer issues, and was very cringy at the start, grammar and what not. So don't feel like you missed much there is more content now than there was then.
Now with all of that out of the way, feel free to ask any questions if you have them, or give suggestions or corrections once again if you have any please give them or leave a review. Alright everyone, be safe, have fun, and may the force be with you!
Blitzing Raptor
