Broeckln

Crumble Away


So much for a rescue.

For all the light and flair, the strangest thing of all was that nothing had really changed. The only thing that drone did change was that Mantle knew they were down there. The tunnel was "too unstable" for a rescue operation, they'd said. Even for VIPs. But rescue would come soon, they'd said.

Fifty-nine days had passed since they were revealed to Mantle.

It was weird for Adam to think about. So long had passed, yet there was a certain sense of normalcy that had taken over. The tunnels were too damaged for a direct rescue, but Mantle could get supplies to them. Rations delivered from the surface were pretty poor-tasting even compared to canned food, but they were better than old and damp mine emergency bars. The humans and faunus weren't at each other's throats, but they had turned their sides of the mine into their own communities. Sure, he hadn't seen the sun in almost two months, but besides getting pale, it wasn't terrible. It wasn't like Winter had much to worry about, either: it was kind of hard to get paler than a Schnee.

Winter had chased him around for a while for that joke.

It wasn't exactly difficult to know the two things that kept their hopes up all this time: his father giving everything he had to keep morale up, and Mantle's supplies. Food, clothes, medical supplies—that slash on his cheek nearly had gotten infected—and even the occasional letter of support. But in the end, they were stuck.

But that was just pushing the inevitable: they knew if straits were dire enough, even that support might fall to a trickle. According to the people up top, Altebrucke was a ticking time bomb of unstable Dust and cracking stability. The equipment to get people or even heavier drones could bring the entire thing down. At least, that's what they said.

And so his father had come up with a plan.


"There's a lot of dirt between us and the surface, but it's not impenetrable!" He father stood tall amidst the crowd, scratching his scheme in chalk across a wall. "We have enough Gravity Dust to practically lift this whole mine up, and it's about time we put it to use. Lift 3 is still operational, but it's trapped under a good level's worth of rubble. Charge it up, make it weightless, and blast it out. We climb right up to the top with the lift cable and ladders." A circle drawn atop the map of Altebrucke.

"Freedom."

Adam clenched and unclenched his hands: he missed his mother. All he had from her right now was a letter one part promising the grounding of a lifetime, one part wishing with everything he and his father would be okay.

"You want to build a bomb in here?!" It was Steel that was so against the plan. Adam guessed when you had all the managers on your side, you could escape any punishment. "You could bring the rest of the mine down on our head with that reckless plan of yours!"

Minier cut off any growing shouts back from the faunus with a wave of his hand. "Not a bomb, my friends! I'm no Dust expert, but one of the human foremen"—the humans settled down at that—"knows enough to explain this next part." Someone Adam didn't recognize came up to explain the rest in words he barely understood. But it felt like everyone around him did, so Adam pretended he knew.

From what he could figure out, it was still basically a bomb. A bomb made by stripping down the lights' Energy Dust and combining it with Wind Dust for an explosive, yet consistent wave of force.

But that didn't matter: what did was that his dad provided the light at the end of the tunnel. Escape. Freedom.

Fifty-nine days had passed in darkness and cold, but Adam had never felt more energetic in his life.


Fifty-nine days had passed, and Winter was finally beginning to miss home. Make no mistake, it was not as though she did not miss her family all this time, but even the tense manor she returned to every night was starting to feel nice and cozy again. She knew it was her mind playing tricks. She had never been fond of the constant, winter sun beaming down over Atlas. Ever since they started to raise the very city itself, the cold had only been getting worse. Even so, the only sunlight coming from the door to the surface left her dreaming each night of it.

Her old room was empty and vast enough for her to feel alone even with company—just like the rest of that mansion—but when compared to the rocky caverns rarely more than ten feet across? It might as well have been heaven. Personal tutors and private lessons were droll, but not much more than needing to drag carts and supplies for hours on end. Carefully managing every morsel of food given to her was worth having food not from nutrition bars and cans. There was even a darker part of her mind, however foolish, that was deciding she would rather face that creeping tension between her mother and father than stay submerged in vicious intent any longer.

Winter was no fool: she had her guards to protect her while she was on the 'human' side of Altebrucke for a reason. Her fellow man would treat her quite nicely now that there was a chance that they would escape, but she could hear the whispers behind her back, the echoes of Steel's attack on them both in their eyes and words both. The fact that they let Steel walk around was reason enough not to trust them.

But what of the faunus? There was still animosity. There would always be animosity between their races—their entire social classes, no less—and little she did was likely to change that. And so she stayed here.

Winter sighed. "I informed you already that this would not work, Adam." In a small pocket of earth the size of a garage, Winter withdrew her aura from her hands and pulled them from Adam's shoulders.

"Well obviously not with that attitude!" Adam huffed and crossed his arms. "I thought awakening aura was supposed to be easy!"

"Then you thought incorrectly." Winter took a seat atop a small pile of folded, tattered blankets as Adam groaned and dropped back onto a large pillow.

This tiny cave was where she spent most of her time that was not 'working'. Her and one of the only people she could trust in Altebrucke. Located while they were exploring, they filled it with just about anything that the remaining workers didn't want: old blankets abandoned now that better ones were delivered, torn pillows, an overturned wagon as a table, rations they'd saved for a rainy day and a few pilfered Energy Dust crystals to keep the place well-lit.

Adam said it was like an 'underground treehouse'. Whatever that meant.

"How am I ever going to become a Huntsman when my aura isn't unlocked?" Adam bemoaned, throwing his arms up into the air. "Most kids have already started basic aura exercises by now."

"I fail to see why it is so important to even be a Huntsman." Winter leaned forward, chin propped up on her fist. Her tutor would cry out at such a casual stance, but these days she could scarcely bring herself to care. "The armed forces are more than capable of keeping the peace."

"Yeah, maybe in Mantle, but there's no way I'm stickin' around once I can get to an academy. Once we can afford it, my family and I are heading anyplace but here!" Adam declared with a grin and a sweep of his arm.

Despite Adam's joy, there was something about the thought of him leaving that left her feeling... disappointed. Rather than focus on that, she smiled. "Oh, would you look at that: you have finally started using correct grammar."

Adam narrowed his gaze, pouting. "Well, you still talk like a robot, so hmph!" He turned away from her.

"It is called speaking properly."

"It's called being boring."

Winter rolled her eyes, and the two settled into a peaceful quiet. Unfortunately, that left Winter with all the time in the world to continue her previous thoughts. There were two people she trusted in this forsaken mine: the boy in front of her and his father. Even her own guards likely were more loyal to her father than her, and who knows what orders her father might have given them to keep her "safe."

And for how... loud he could be, the boy was honestly the only person close to her age that did not know her from her father's connections or did not try to speak with her specifically for those connections.

Her rumination was broken by the crackling of a walkie-talkie at Adam's hip. Grumbling about the poor range of the thing, Adam fiddled with buttons until, fuzzy and popping with static, his father's voice could be heard.

"Anyone home? Heeeeello?"

"Got it! Is everything set up down there?" Adam called back. After a moment's silence, he gasped and held it up to his ear. "Over!"

Minier chuckled on the other side. "Everything's fine, son. All that's left is the setup on your floor. Ready to bail outta this place? Over?"

"You two do know that model does not require ending your sentences like that, right?" Winter pointed out.

"You bet! The Vytal Tournament's next week: we can't miss that, right? Over!"

Completely ignored. Winter sighed and rubbed her temples, but considering just how big of a grin Adam had, she guessed they might've known that and simply did not care.

A chorus of laughs came from the walkie-talkie. "Nice to see your priorities are the same as ever. Get going and tell me when you two get there! This sixtieth day is going to be our last down here: bet on that, over and out!"

Adam turned back to Winter, beaming. "Come on, Winter: let's blow this pop stand!" He ran off for the exit, leaving a rather confused Winter in his wake.

"... What is a 'pop stand'?" she muttered to herself as she followed.


Snow had begun to gather in Level E, leaving the tunnel to the partially-collapsed lift coated in a thin layer of muddled gray from dirt and ice. It was a warm day for Mantle, which meant only slightly dangerous for unprotected life, and the bitter wind rushing down made that 'slightly' feel less and less of a reassurance. Various crystals and wires were already scattered and prepared, the lights pilfered until the nearby side tunnels were corridors to darkness. Why not take it for all it had? Today was the final day.

Adam raised an eyebrow at a folded-up paper offered to him by Winter. "What is it?" he asked.

"My Scroll number, so we can remain in contact after this disaster has passed," Winter replied.

Taking it, Adam stared at the paper for a couple seconds, then looked back up at the heiress.

"I don't have a Scroll."

She waved it off. "I expected such. I am sure you will still have time when you can use your parent's Scroll."

Adam scratched his head. "None of us have Scrolls."

"... I beg your pardon?"

"Uh, Winter? They're kinda expensive."

Winter looked caught between disbelief and like she'd swallowed something sour. She scoffed. "It is only worth 600 lien."

"That's what my dad makes in a month!" Adam threw his arms up.

Winter's eyes widened, but only for a second before she'd furrowed her brow and looked aside. "Then..." She doubted her father, sympathetic over her plight or not, would let her 'frivolously' spend money on a faunus family. Then again, a Scroll number didn't matter if he left the kingdom altogether: the CCT currently only covered Mantle and Vale. A sudden rise in mail directed at her would be suspicious too...

Winter snapped her fingers.

"Hand me that!" She snatched the paper, pulled a pen from her pocket and scribbled something else onto it before handing it back with a pleased smile.

"The address of our butler!" Winter proudly declared. Seeing the look of confusion on Adam's face not fading, she sighed and slumped her shoulders. "We can write letters. Even if you move, I can always send a letter to the address you yourself sent it from. No one would question the letters of my personal butler." Least of all, her father. It was a lot to trust the newer butler with, but she had faith in Klein. He was a kind soul.

Adam's eyes widened and, with a renewed excitement, grabbed and stuffed the paper into his pocket. "That's a great idea! It'd kind of suck to go through all this and then never talk again, but first..." He looked off at the assembled crystals and wiring. "We should probably actually finish getting through all this."

Winter strode forward, picking up the first of the Gravity Dust crystals. "Agreed. Inform your father that we are prepared and relay his orders. I can handle the majority of this." Dust work was her field, after all.


Hours passed in what felt like only a few minutes. Winter smiled with pride looking over her work, and Adam was practically vibrating with excitement to finally get back. Numerous crystals in black and blue wrapped in wire stuck out from the snow-dusted earth like candles from a cake.

Winter swiped at her brow and waved to Adam. "Finished!"

As Adam told his father the news and she heard the cheers of the miners even through the ground, however, Winter frowned. Her eyes followed footprints in the dirty snow near the mound of rubble she stepped down from, all leading closer to the side caverns. They vanished in the slush and mud, leaving it impossible to tell if they really had come from the side tunnel or not. Yet, they seemed a little too big to be from them.

Winter shook it off: it was likely a trick made by her own prints.

"My dad's at the lift and he says we're all good to leave. Grab any souvenirs while you can!" Adam joked and rushed off for the exit.

Caught up in the boy's excitement, Winter smiled and followed along. "I suppose a final ride in the mine is unlikely."

Adam snickered. "Sorry, Winter: the luxury vacation's over." He had started saying something else, but Winter had stopped. She'd glimpsed something passing out of the corner of her eye. When she turned, she could swear she had seen something white, further down the tunnel at their makeshift Dust device. But it was gone in the blink of an eye. Her chest tightened, and the sinking feeling in her stomach grew stronger.

"Hey, 'something wrong?" Adam had noticed, walking closer. "I mean if you really want to go that much, I can probably make up an excuse..."

Winter held out a hand to stop him. She recognized this sensation: that feeling of danger if they went back. The same mounting dread she felt seeing Steel.

"Everything is fine, Adam." She put on a polite smile and turned back to face him.

At first, Adam stared at her with a furrowed brow, frown and a worried gaze. After a second, though, he lightened up and smiled.

"If you say so, Winter." He peered just past her, and his smile fell. "Wait, who is—"

Darkness swallowed them and a clap of thunder rattled the walls like a bolt of lightning had dropped just beside them. The clap was followed by another, then another, then Remnant roared with the din of crumbling earth and shuddering stone. It didn't let up. It was a second explosion, Winter realized.

A second collapse. Right next to them. Her stomach felt like it was rising, but not in the way she wished it to.

She heard a strangled gasp in the darkness beside her: Adam had realized what had happened a second after her. Winter wasted no time, blindly reaching out for Adam, taking his hand and sprinting off with him deeper into the tunnel. She was running blind, but it didn't matter. She had taken this path time and time again for almost two months: every piece of debris and crumbled wall was known to her. Groaning metal, snapping wire and the rush of falling dirt grew closer. Winter could barely hear herself breathing or the loud strike of her foot on the cave floor.

Crackling static sounded off behind her. Adam had turned on his radio. Winter squeezed her eyes shut: she knew what was about to happen next.

"Dad! Dad, can you hear me! What happened! Is everyone okay!"

Static.

Their hideout was close.

"Come on, come on, don't break up now! Dad!" Adam called out more frantically behind her.

Static.

The sound didn't cease, but the quaking wasn't advancing on them. Winter could see the dim lights ahead: their crystals were haphazard and weak, but they were separate from the power system that must've just gotten taken out.

The static lasted longer, this time. "Dad? Anyone? You're alright, aren't you?" Confusion. Fear.

Static.

Winter pulled him inside. She scrambled for any Dust they had brought. Ice. Ice would work. She froze the entrance. The walls. The ceiling. Anything to give some kind of extra support. When it was spent and her aura no better, she stumbled back to Adam.

Static.

And beside him, she collapsed against the frozen wall to the din of rumbling earth, the frantic calls of a boy for his father, and the quiet static that only ever answered. It was only when she brought her arms around him that Adam finally surrendered to reality, and shouting gave way to weeping. Minier was gone.

And so was their way out.


He could still be alive. His dad could still be out there, right? It could've just been that his walkie-talkie was damaged in the collapse. It would be fine. Everything would be fine. And if it wasn't... it wasn't his fault, right? They'd placed all the crystals right. Did he mess up a wire? Was he the one who...

Adam's thoughts swirled and clashed in a chaotic mess as he crawled ahead of Winter. Crystals and sharp rubble pressed into his palms enough to leave them scratched and bleeding, but he felt numb to it all. His throat was ragged from dust and cries, but as long as he could breathe, he was fine. Any focus he could scrape together was all aimed at getting back to the others. Their tunnels had managed to stay stable, and the moment that the shaking had stopped, they were running for the way back down.

He could feel Winter's eyes on him. From the moment he rushed off to now. Condolences in her gaze, an unspoken 'sorry' every second like it was somehow her fault this happened. Like there was no hope at all. Adam gripped tighter to the want to prove her wrong.

Winter paused at the exit, facing him as she crawled down into the main shaft. Well, the humans' side of it, anyway.

"I shall... come back once everything is settled, alright?"

Fighting the heat behind his eyes even that small recognition of reality brought, Adam forced himself to nod. He watched her slip from view, and then he was left alone in the shrinking dark. Adam looked down the cramped tunnel back to the faunus side. With effort, he forced himself to crawl. Slowly. Lethargically. Every second he spent here was another he could cling to hope.

He could hear something. Faintly, echoed off the walls: cracks of stone. Winter's voice. It was too quiet for him to make out words, but Adam tried to listen, nonetheless. Another minute of hope.

The crackle of static from his waist was sharp enough to leave his heart leaping into his throat. Adam fumbled with the radio as, suddenly, the world was felt with absolute clarity. Every rough rock. Every degree of cold.

He raised it to his ear. "Dad!"

"Listen." The gravelly voice on the other side was not his father's. Almond. The cavern felt just a little colder. "Wherever you are, stay there: the main level's dangerous. The humans are getting violent. Blaming everything that moves." Adam picked up something again further back: shouts, cries. He furrowed his brow and wriggled until he could face the other way. "Especially you and your father."

His throat felt like it was closing up. "Wh—what?"

"Adam, listen to me, and hold on tight to this: do not listen to them. I don't know what caused this, but it wasn't any of us."

Adam gritted his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut, ignoring the tears forced out. He nodded to himself. Chest out, head high. Chest out, head high. He exhaled, slow and shuddering.

"Thanks, Almond." The next breath came easier. He could grasp some of the thoughts tumbling through his head. "What about Winter?"

There was a pause.

"Focus on yourself."

Adam pursed his lips. He was going to respond when he heard another cry, loud and sharp. Winter. He looked down at the walkie-talkie in his hand, then back down the tunnel towards the faunus. Towards his people.

"Sorry, I can't!" He turned the radio off and scrambled back. The commotion grew only louder as he approached.

By the time he'd dropped out into the main shaft, raucous jeers bounced off of the dark walls and the stomping of feet echoed past him. The power was out down here as well, leaving him in an icy abyss even his faunus senses struggled to pierce through. Humans in white were curled up or collapsed along the walls. His eyes caught the gleam of a Schnee crest on one: guards. Fallen guards.

It didn't take him long to catch the sight of flames and dancing, red lights in the distance. A group of humans, blackened with dust and soot from the collapse. A last Schnee guard in their pristine, white clothes lay face-down nearby. Winter was held against a wall, an Ice Dust crystal at her feet.

Steel was holding her there, barely recognizable through the deep shadows the humans' torches and Dust crystals left behind.

Adam pushed himself harder than he ever had, sprinting for the group. He had better eyes than them. He could use that.

"It's not just a metaphor now, Winter!" Steel hissed. "This is your doing. Your Dust work did this! Your hands are coated in the blood of not faunus, but men!" He twisted to look at the crowd behind him. "Can we not agree that this betrayal of mankind deserves punishment!"

The crowd behind him roared in bloodlust.

Adam ripped a mining pickaxe free from a pile of rubble as he ran.

"Unhand me, scoundrel!" Winter shouted, barely heard over the demands and shouts of the humans.

"I was right all along! That we were trapped! That the bomb was just that: a dangerous, stupid, faunus plan! But you pushed it forward, and now look what's happened. You should have left while you could, little Schnee... but maybe we shall let you go after all. Though not without a souvenir." Steel looked back for something, someone.

Adam didn't care. He roared and hurled his weapon with all his strength.

Steel turned to look, but it was too late: he was left howling as the pickaxe struck his head, aura lighting up and crackling as he reached for whatever struck him. All that mattered to Adam was that he'd let go of Winter.

"Winter! Over here!" Adam kept running, even as his chest began to burn from the dust-clogged air.

Winter snatched the fallen Ice Dust crystal, twisted and sent ice washing across the legs of the crowd, leaving feet trapped in ice and shouts of confusion rippling through the mob. By the time Adam stopped, he was visible to them all, but he only waited long enough for Winter to come running. He twisted on his heel and left the trapped humans shouting behind them.

The two managed a faint smile to one another as they rushed into the darkness. It was short-lived: one moment Adam was looking at Winter, and the next his face struck the cave floor. He barely had time to cry out before he was yanked back by his ankle: something was tied around it. Adam looked back.

Lit only in the dim red and oranges of the torches and Dust the mob used to light their way, Steel stood. He strode forward, and in his hand was a simple, leather whip. One curled around his ankle. That manic, bestial look in Steel's eye had only grown. Only the whites of his eyes separated the gray irises from the dull dirt caked on his skin.

Adam tried to yank his leg free, but he was only dragged further back to the fiery light. Seeing Winter coming towards him, he shouted the first thing that came to mind.

"Run!"

Winter took a couple unsteady steps back, but only a single look beyond him—no doubt at the humans—and, her lips drawn to a fine line, she jogged into the darkness.

"Even when his father lies dead because of that girl and her company, he protects her." Steel yanked him back by his hair, ignoring Adam's shouting. A snap of his wrist, and the whip pulled away from him. "Typical animal."

Adam grunted as he was thrown aside like trash, only to be caught by two others. He struggled. He kicked. He pulled. He fought and shouted until his arms were pulled back, and he was forced to kneel by someone jamming their foot into his back. He tried struggling again, but the only thing it did was tighten their grips and leave his muscles sore.

Panting, Adam forced himself to rise up just enough to stare into the monstrous steiger's eyes. Yet, it wasn't that endless hate that frightened him. It was the careless gazes of those behind him: the silent wall of humans whose colors were washed out and replaced only by the reds of fire and blacks of the shadows they cast. Impassive at best. Outright pleased at worst. Monsters. He tried to look to where Winter was, but a crack of Steel's whip sent sharp pain across his shoulder. He cried out.

"Don't bother!" Steel snapped his whip at his other shoulder. "You must think you're quite the hero, Adam. Just like dear old dad." He paused and tapped his chin. "In fact... ah, how could I be so foolish! This souvenir really is more fitting for your kind: your father had even earned one of his own, when he was your age."

One of the lights grew closer, passed throughout the crowd with primal chants and shouts following it. At first, Adam thought the cherry-red light was another Dust crystal until it was freed from the crowd.

SDC.

Iron burning bright enough to have a light of its own in the shape of 'SDC'. A brand. Steel held his hand out and, like a page handing a knight his sword, a human placed the brand in his hand.

Adam reared back enough to force back the boot at his back, thrashing in a desperate attempt to free himself. Yet his eyes couldn't leave the glowing letters. He could feel the heat from it, even feet away. One of the guards twisted his arm, and Adam surrendered with a strangled cry.

"Why!" he demanded to know. "Why are you even doing this!"

"Revenge," Steel stated as if asked what color the sky way. He waved the brand closer to Adam, who cringed away from the heat the best he could while held so tightly. "Someone must pay for this."

Such a... simple answer was enough to break Adam's gaze from the blazing letters, staring up at Steel in horror. Not a single human moved to stop him.

"Oh, don't look at me like that. Did you think this was personal? That you were important? Please." He slowly aimed the brand. It drifted: one shoulder to the next, his chest, yet soon hovered near his face. "I just want the girl to know what happens when you run from your rightful punishment... and through her, I'll let that bastard Jacques know what happens when he treats us humans like faunus trash."

Steel settled on his left eye, and despite all his attempts to stay calm, a far more primal, desperate urge to escape left Adam struggling for his life. A pressure built in his chest: one felt all throughout himself that felt both cold and hot at the same time. Tears freely ran down Adam's cheeks, but he refused to scream. He wouldn't give the humans that pleasure. He refused. Even as they cheered like monsters. Surrounded him like Grimm.

"But if it helps, I do find it fitting nonetheless." Slowly, he stepped forward. Slowly, the brand grew closer. His tears dried, skin tingling then burning from the heat.

"If you want to be an SDC dog, then you'll be branded like one!" Steel brought the brand back, a moment's reprieve before, grinning wide enough to show his gums, he thrust the brand down. The heat grew unbearable, but Adam refused to scream. He refused to scream. He refused to scream. He refused—

A shriek pierced through the cave.

Adam's eyes followed the glowing iron go past him, his cheek feeling the burn passing just an inch to his side. The pressure on his back lifted: the person stepping on him moved out of the way. His gaze flicked to Steel just as the iron clattered against the ground.

Steel screamed out again, shakily grabbing at his chest and the spear of ice now piercing out from it. The cave felt so quiet now. The monsters in human skins were just trying to figure out what had happened, eyes glued to Steel. Waiting for his next call.

Feeling numb, Adam turned to look down the tunnel.

Winter stood deep enough in the darkness that he could barely see her, arm shaking, eyes wide and with an Ice Dust crystal in her grip.

Adam jumped to his feet and pulled one of his arms free. Steel collapsed to his knees. One of the guards tightened his grip on his other arm.

A deafening buzz burst from the opposite direction. Chainsaw. The heads of the humans twisted that way, then the shouts of surprise and fear came. Adam was unceremoniously dropped to the ground as the crowd scattered, some running away, some to meet whatever it was head-on. More cries rang out, but ones he could recognize: the faunus.

Adam scrambled away on instinct, his face feeling freezing cold without that wretched iron in front of him. His breath came ragged, muscles sore even as he stumbled to his feet and raced for Winter, but he couldn't afford to stop. What if someone noticed him? He grabbed a fallen Fire Dust crystal and just prayed it didn't come to that.

The moment he'd gotten within arm's reach of Winter, she dove forward and yanked him into a crushing hug.

"Are you alright!" she called to him.

Instincts lashed and ripped in every direction: the want to be embarrassed and pull away—no, to feel calm enough to do so—was dragged beneath a sea of fear and anxiety, shame at being vulnerable was burned away by the desire to just be somewhere, anywhere safe.

The shouts were now joined by the clashes of metal and cracks of stone. Adam managed a nod, but nothing more. With a shuddering breath, he stepped out of her embrace and looked back. That pressure in his chest only grew, even without that dreaded brand near him.

It was a warzone. The fighters were just a mass of black bodies, gleaming metal and orange streaks from torches and Fire Dust crushed and stomped out under foot. He could only make out two: Almond standing a head above the rest, deepest in the pack with his chainsaw lifted high, and Steel laying on the outskirts. He didn't move. The bursting of a crystal left the crowd fully lit at last, but it didn't matter: it was just one big, tangled mass of bloodlust and panic.

Yet he couldn't find himself to be happy that he was out of it. It all felt so... frivolous. They'd kill each other. Then what? Whoever wins kills themselves too? They wouldn't have enough people to escape. The rest would be hurt, and then what? An even slower death? It all just felt so pointless!

That pressure was strong enough to hurt now. It spread, tingling through his limbs like fire. He felt Winter start to pull him away.

A shout came from the center. The roar of Almond's chainsaw ceased. He couldn't see him anymore. And within, something began to fray.

Adam didn't know what came over him: the next thing he knew he was storming back towards the battle. Winter was shouting something to him, but he couldn't hear her. His heartbeat pounded in his ears, breathing coming shorter and sharper with every step. That pressure was unbearable now, enough to where it felt like something trying to tear free from his chest. He didn't care. He wasn't going to die here. No one else was. Not Winter. Not Almond. Not Iris.

He stormed up a pile of rubble, tall enough to let him see the chaos below in its entirety. Attention. He needed attention.

Adam looked at the crystal in his hand. It was cracked. No, worse than that. It was peeling, like old wallpaper. Flaking away in his hand, turning black and decaying.

It'd do. It had to. Just as that fire within reached its breaking point, Adam reared back and flung the crystal high above the fighters.

With a clap of thunderous noise and red flames that scorched the ceiling above, the crowd was bathed in bloody, crimson light.

"ENOUGH!"

Silence. The crowd had finally ceased their fighting, looking up at the boy in the shadows. Tentative and borne from shock, but it would have to do.

"Nobody else is dying here while there's still a chance to get out!" Adam shouted. "Do you idiots really think Mantle's been doing nothing? They might still come down here, and last time I heard, we still have days of rations! You people want to kill each other when you run out? Fine! You want to throw our lives away on the surface! Fine! But I'd love to hear you people explaining to the ones who died trying to get you out that the moment things were going wrong you all murdered one another down here!"

One of the human spat. "Like I'd listen to some—"

"Quiet!"

The human listened.

Adam looked back onto the mass. At least a hundred still lived.

"No one else is dying in Altebrucke. This is not going to be anyone else's grave!"

The pressure finally began to leave. He could feel every quick breath he took, the sweat cooling on his face. The realization that he was still just a kid, standing there in front of a group of men who were fully willing to kill one another. The silence was far more tense.

"The boy's right," growled Almond, slowly rising up from the group, bruised and cut. The bandana around his mouth was ripped away, revealing an inhuman maw full of sharpened, arrow-like teeth. "I'm not leaving this place in a bag."

"I just don't feel like dying with a hole in me," Iris griped, holding onto his side with one hand and the steiger's whip with another.

"That doesn't change the fact that Steel's dead," one of the humans said with a sneer.

Almond grunted. "Died trying to burn a child's face. He had what was coming to him."

The human didn't have much of a response to that. Without the primal fear evoked by death looming so close nor the frenzy Steel had whipped them into, the shame left their eyes looking anywhere but to the fallen steiger. One by one, weapons were lowered. One by one, the two sides stepped back from each other. To their own sides, to stay until freedom or the final, desperate fight starvation would bring. Between them, the bodies of the fallen, Steel at its center, lit by the smouldering torches and crackling crystal left behind.

And finally, Adam could let his shoulders fall and could feel the pressure finally recede. He looked over his shoulder, where Winter was waiting. He forced a smile and turned around.

"That... could've gone worse, right?" He took a single step forward, and not just the pressure, but what felt like all the strength in his body felt like it vanished in an instant.

There was cold, then nothing.


A lightning bolt running through him left Adam's awakening swift and agonizing. Shouting out in pain, he gripped himself tight and squeezed his eyes shut as pain wracked him.

A heavy hand dropped down onto his shoulder to calm him, and when his wriggling left his back scratching against earthen ground, he realized he was lying down. He forced an eye open. Seeing red, he gasped and tried to sit up, gaze darting about himself as he feared the worst. But it wasn't blood. It was light, twisting and leaping across his form.

His aura! He'd unlocked it, right? Adam looked to the one near him, eyes wide. Almond. Not his father. The reminder left his heart hurting, then his body as the light shone brighter and sent pain shooting through his limbs. He gritted his teeth and didn't resist as Almond slowly pushed him to lie back down.


'Sickness of the soul'. That's what Almond called it. Adam called it being unlucky. Being so close to unlocking it himself, he already had 'channels' his aura could come from. Channels his aura tried to rush through all at once like a fire hose through a straw instead of just jumping to the surface all at once like a normal person. Channels that then probably broke instead of unlocking, like a torn muscle. So much for that.

He was left to watch the last days of Altebrucke from relative safety, treated with some weird mix of respect and care. And condolences. Adam could only run from the truth until everyone was accounted for, and his father was missing from that final list. Adam Minier Senior was dead. His father was dead. Gone. He wasn't even allowed to think about it for too long: too much strong emotion and his aura would hurt him again.

All he could do was bottle it up. Almond said it was better that way: he was too strong to spend his days weeping. Winter disagreed. He disagreed too, but it was hard to do so when sadness physically hurt.

At least he had Winter, though. As time ticked on, as people grew restless, as rations dwindled, she stayed beside him. They'd stick together.

Even after Iris burst into where the faunus were staying, breathless and shouting that they were getting rescued, the two were pulled up together, feeling the rays of sunlight for the first time.

And they'd keep it that way: even if it was only through letters, a friendship forged in that hell was one they never had any intention of letting break.

It was a promise.