An/ Man almost made a mistake and released a chapter out of order. God would have been scratching my head at that one for a bit.
Chapter 31: Flood 2
"Well, Hello there children!" it was a simple greeting, and yet never did a greeting fill ren with such dread, such abject terror as that. The speaker stepped out of the alley about a block before he and Nora. His voice filled with such malice, such joy for unending suffering. It was as if he could see the pure malice flowing off of him, such that it was practically visible. Ren blinked rapidly. No, wait, he actually could see what looked like petals fluttering off of him as black as pitch mixed in with hints of a crimson lust, a bright amber unrestrained joy, and the sexual overtones of a rose pink. All stained somewhat by that corrupted black.
If it was not for how utterly terrifying this man was, then he would be absolutely overjoyed at this new aspect of his semblance. This man who seemed like he would be at home in a field of corpses.
Ren only had moments to process this revelation. A meager few seconds in which the colors surrounding the man all turned a ruddy black tinged with red. In one moment he was there and the next he was not. Then he was upon them. Had it not been for that split second shift, that glint of iron that shaded the colors that surrounded the man. Ren was absolutely sure that he would have been just another that fell to his blade. He had barely brought StormFlower to bear. Just enough that rather than a rent carved into his throat. It was his arm that suffered a light graze instead. He could see the manic grin and widening of the man's eyes. Even as he lept back, avoiding a blow from Nora's hammer.
"My, my, my, you blocked my strike? I'm liking you more and more. But I think you would look just lovely with a bit more red. Don't you think?" their foe teased, shrugging off his long hooded cloak to reveal a man a bit older than them maybe about twenty-five with his black hair shaved into a mohawk, fair skin and aristocratic features, he looked like the very definition of a punk. Garbed in black traveling leathers, a white long-sleeved tattered and strategically torn tunic, and a plain green vest. With a pair of armbands on both arms, along with two belts that hung loosely. That had a holster for a sawed off and several butterfly knives matching the one he bared in his right hand.
"Mnnn, you're just my type too. We just need to give you a bit of a makeover." he moaned, licking the blood from his knife. "Oh, and you taste absolutely divine!"
"And just who the hell are you?" Nora snarled.
His posture, his demeanor, everything about him shifted dramatically when Nora spoke. "Who I am, girl, is none of your concern." with a glare filled with hate he added, "but if you must know I'm Andy. now if you would be so kind and scram. Me and cutie here have a date to get to. And I need to get him all dolled UP." he said, popping the P.
Ren shuddered, this time not in abject terror, but in disgust. Yea, that was a nope right there. A nope all the way to nopes-ville. This man definitely was not even his type. He more or less preferred blondes or redheads. Not totally crazy psycho stalkers. Pretty much anyone else but this guy, really. Who wanted to carve him up like a Christmas turkey. And based on the flickering colors, living was merely an optional trait in the partners of this man, Andy's ideal company. And Ren knew he would very much like to keep breathing. Yeah, most definitely breathing was not optional for him. Or living, for that matter.
He rushed them again, his blade work flawless, his focus on Ren alone deigning to deal with Nora when she got in his way.
"Mmm, honey, you're doing so much better now." he teased. Pairing a blow with his own blade. "Still, I had better finish this before my brothers get here." he said, nodding to himself as if violent murder and corpse desecration were normal topics one talks about. Idly blocking a thrown knee, groping Ren's partially extended knee. "Oh, and just look at these legs absolutely divine!" he exclaimed, "I absolutely have to have you all to myself."
"Get AWAY from him, you Bitch!" Nora exclaimed. Her hammer came roaring in at his unprotected side. Interrupting their dance of death.
There was the unmistakable crunching of bone after someone's aura shattered against Nora's hammer. A gasp and gurgled wheeze of breath. As Andy was dashed against the street. When he landed, his arm was bent at an odd angle, and he groaned in pain and shock. "You just won't stop, will you?" he asked aloud.
"You're goddamned right!" Nora responded.
"Ah... fuck, this hurts. Was not talking to you whore." he gurgled out in a wheeze, then sat up. "This hurts a lot more than Dan said it would." even battered, his words still contained malice. And his emotions only shifted to a darker black.
With wide eyes, both Nora and Ren himself stared in disbelief as he got to his feet. What was visible of his wounds closing rapidly. "Fuck, how does Dan put up with this?" he questioned, grabbing his limply hanging arm and tugging on it hard. Resetting the visibly broken limb with a sickening snap of bone. "Ahhhrg, fuck, shit, shit, shit!" he groaned. Taking deep, gasping breaths. He ran his free, now healed hand through his hair. Staring at the night sky.
"Ah, I guess big bro was right." he sighed, "but I suppose I bought enough time? Even if it's such a waste. And you would have made such a wonderful corpse." as if on some unseen signal. Clones all had the same facial features as him, but all were dressed slightly different. Bald, where he had hair. Topless with suspenders, leaving the chest bare. A long mane of hair and wore a pair of trousers and tunic similar to Andy.
Unlike what had happened to Naruto and Coco earlier. The menacing number of clones thirty strong did not zerg rush them, drowning them in a pile of highly explosive disposable bodies. No, if anything, this calm way they had approached. Things surrounding them on all sides spoke to a different plan. Ren was grateful, if only for that.
"You like my family?" Andy teased. A malicious, manic grin on full display. "I'm sure you must think how you get out of this, right? Just how does our semblance's work? Well, I'll tell you, right here, right now, this is where you die!" he bragged, feeling rather boastful about the apparent change in numbers.
"No, not really, you totally threw me off and really creeped me out." Ren admitted freely. "However, we were graced with the misfortune of a brutal taskmaster for a team leader." a small smile graced his face. "And I would hate to disappoint him by falling here." he added. "Nora, if you would?"
Nodding, Nora started twirling her hammer, stopping by digging the head of her hammer into the ground. "You better catch up." she said, stepping onto her hammer giving him one last look, and with a pull of the trigger she launched herself far over head past the encirclement of the clones.
"If you think this changes anything, then you're wrong. I'll just hunt that bitch down after I'm done here." the mad bomber sneered.
"That's where you're wrong. You see..." Ren countered, holstering StormFlower. "If it's just you, I don't need to worry about holding back. I don't need to constantly, worry about who I hurt when I use this technique." he curled his fist, spread his feet for a more steady stance. "I don't have to worry about things like pulverizing someone by mistake, or accidentally destroying a city block." he inhaled, then exhaled. "I can cut loose, see what I can really do…" he drew back his fist and drove it into the ground…
All was quiet for a moment, just a single moment. Then with a rising rumble, the spider web cracking of pavement, the street exploded for blocks in all directions. Choking the air with dust and falling debris.
]\[
Menma waited in stoic silence, sitting in the silence of the conference room, his focus instead on the news reports on his scroll and what sparse information this branch of the white Fang bothered to keep. Not bothering to react at all to the arrogance of Adam. even when the arrogant and foolish boy strode into the room. Like he had all the time in the world, like he owned the place, like he was on top of the world.
"So, what is this all about?" the young bull asked.
"This is about your faction's current foolish actions." the elder sage calmly stated.
Adam stiffened. "foolish?" he all but growled.
"Yes, foolish…" only now did Menma deign to look Adam in the eye. And still, all he could see was a stupid boy throwing a tantrum out of spite. He stood from his chair. "come follow me."
They hadn't even been walking for long before Adam's impatience got the better of him. "what is this all about? Where are we heading?" He asked in rapid fire.
Menma let out a sigh of frustration. He desperately wished that the boss could deal with this brat. He had to remind himself that he was no better when he was the same age. They hadn't gotten to the intended destination yet. However, where they were on one catwalk overlooking the bulk of the underground city and its maze of tunnels. He looked at the dilapidated city below and the Vale branch of the Fang below. "Tell me, Adam, what is it you see before you, what is the Fang to you?" He asked at long last.
Adam snorted in derision, "what do I see… is that not obvious, before you are the proud beginnings of revolution. Fought by the brothers and sisters of the Fang. all willing to lie down their lives to end the oppression we suffer. To overthrow the humans who see us as lesser creatures."
Menma stared in disbelief the boy was delusional, foolish, and quite possibly cracked in the head. "Really?" he asked, "cause all I see here is a bunch of arrogant bandits, bullies really. You're supposed to represent the Vale chapter of the fang, yet rather than having a public office in Vale you and your 'freedom fighters' live out here in mountain Glenn in squalor. Like mere bandits." he saw the glare the fool boy was giving him, yet he carried on, "you barely have running electricity, never mind running water or other utilities. You live out of tents!"
"How dare-," Adam began before the blonde sage cut him off, "no, how dare you! You fool boy, we sent you here for a reason. And it was not to play at being a bandit king all high and mighty upon your throne, it was to set up free clinics, feed the homeless and the children, to set up social programs."
"But the elders-" the young faunus tried to explain, "Do not interrupt me, boy!" Menma growled. "The elders are nothing but a bunch of fools, who care more for their immediate gain rather than the future of the generations to come," oh, how he ached, longed to dash this arrogant twats brains against the wall and be done with this. "if not for you, the Fang would not be considered a terrorist organization here in Vale. members of the Fang could walk around freely. Compared to Mistral or Atlas, Vale was positively moderate."
All Adam could do was grit his teeth and bare it in stoic silence. "If you wanted to disrupt the SDC in Vale, all you needed to do is establish unions, stage protests, not rob trains full of dust. It's why Blake left after all."
"If you wanted to use extra-legal or illegal means to further the cause, then fine. However, you should have never let it be connected back to the Fang."
Adam stiffened. His posture rigid, jaw clenched, hand gripping his blade so hard knuckles went white with rage. "You have no right!" He hissed, There it was, the sore spot, the chink in his armor. Menma strode forth, right into Adam's personal space. Adam tensed, ready to strike. The elder sage scoffed, as if he would let this boy get that far. Swatting away his hand from Wilt's hilt, he got right up in the younger man's face. "I have every right. She was your student, not only that, but the daughter of Ghira! And you drove her away. You had one task, just one that was important above all else! To teach, to guide, to shape, to lead. To show her how to do the same some day!" Menma looked at the boy who thought he was a man up and down. And sneered, "from what I hear you were much more to her than just a teacher and you failed at that too." he did not like what he saw.
"She is a traitor to the cause." Adam blustered, his face the color puce with rage. "a failure!"
"A Traitor, a failure? Why, because you drove her away with spite and hate, it's not a crime for one to leave the Fang Adam." Menma said, "trust me when I say this Adam, I don't need to punch down to ruin you. I don't even need to lift a finger, so get your shit together and fix your mess. I speak for Sienna when I say this, WE ARE NOT AMUSED. Consider this a warning." his peace, said the sage walked away.
Adam could only tremble in impotent rage. How dare he… "the hell do you think you're going?" he said, his contempt clear. Reaching out to grab hold of the sage clone. Only to gasp in pain, his hand, arm and most of his torso tightly bound by thread, painfully so...
"I wouldn't if I were you," a voice warned. "you should consider this to be a punishment. Push it and the Captain is likely to take your arm." Adam craned his neck to look at the speaker. The speaker was a rather petite snow leopard faunus girl. With her spotted short shoulder length hair tied in pigtails and her feline ears and tail. Her faunus blood must have been really strong because it really showed. She was a breathtaking beauty with her ice-blue eyes, doll-like features, kimono top in red and white, a blue pleated skirt and thigh-high boots. But what Adam noticed most of all was the fucking tanto she had to his throat and the cold steel biting into his carotid. It would only take the slightest of movements, and that would be it. The end, full stop. "The threads will loosen in about five minutes or so." she said still with a smile on her face, "oh, and the next time you try this shit… well I happen to be rather good at advanced interrogation techniques, and incidental corpse disposal. So… try… not to FUCK UP." her grin and killing intent were on full bore. "We savvy, Yea?"
"Crystal," Adam nodded, wary of the blade the little Psycho had to his throat.
"That's great... Cause I'd hate to ruin your day?" she took the blade from his throat clapping her hands for a bit before the blade went intimately lower, "of course if you even think of drawing on the captain again, we won't be having this conversation. I'll just…" she made a swiping motion with her blade to illustrate her point, then drove her blade into his thigh a quarter of an inch. Cutting through his aura like it was not even there. "Of course I'm also really, really good at killing in interesting ways too." she bragged.
"Oi, Senka, I thought that was you I sensed. Quit terrorizing the fool and come along," Menma called out.
"Ok, captain," she agreed, removing her blade from his thigh. "Bye Fool, try not to have any unfortunate accidents, yea." she sheathed her blade and scampered off, trailing behind her captain. Leaving Adam behind to stew in his mixed emotions, the horrifying encounter with that utterly terrifying girl, and impotent rage.
]\[
The once paved smooth ground that made up the crown square and the surrounding area had already fallen to the corrupting rot that was this blasted earth, this cursed mud, a truly wretched thing. It consumed anything that got too close. It seeped into the very catacombs the castle itself sat upon. Into the lone place where survivors, their hostages, still lived yet. Not even the medallions affixed to their mantles would protect them from its infection. Even now, one of her men still screamed a visceral death rattle. His pain in agony unending even with four bullets put into his heart and head each. Even as his flesh was stripped from bone and his body morphed in unnatural, horrible, painful ways. He had gotten a bit too close, and now the vicious black ichor that made up this experiment flowed over him. Making his death unending.
Shapes not unlike what the poor soul was becoming were slowly sprouting up, not unlike a plant from the now ever expanding pool. Their wailing agony, their pain, their hatred for life blending with his own. It made for an eerie, discordant symphony of pain and despair. As it now took a direct path to sources of life. Pooling out of the square and into the Fore well and down the esplanade. It was fortunate that at the very least the medallions seemed to render Arrow and her men invisible, if not immune to any grimm and their kin.
Arrow knew that soon the many horribly deformed souls of this horde would soon make their way into the city. All her men, save for that one sole poor bastard, were at the Bullheads, ready to depart at her order. And the hour of their departure was soon at hand. This she knew all too well. The only thing that held her from departure was her semblance, affecting the way she perceived the very world itself. And right now the numbers, the way she predicted and perceived the world. Told her it was not time yet. That she and her men were still safe from the corrupting rot and they would be for some time as long as they had their mantels and medallions.
She drew her bow, nocked and an arrow. Inhaled and exhaled until her breathing slowed. Aiming into the distance. The city outstretched before her. Waiting for the moment, everything was right. She fired off into the city. As if blessed by the winds of chaos, it soared on unseen wings...
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