Mordred Pendragon
Mordred looked down on the holographic projection of the city and frowned, the number of troops from Atlas was significantly lowered due to the Grimm attacks.
"How do you think this fight will end?" Mordred asked Malacci, who was standing next to him, rubbing the handle of his pistol. "The orange haired one will die." Malacci said matter of factly.
Mordred only shook his head and sighed, it would be a wasted resource if the Grimm attacked in large numbers. "All we can do then is wait for the Black Queen to make their move." Mordred said, he had his left hand on Caliburn's hilt and was stroking the ruby placed in its hilt.
As the two of them watched the fight Mordred found himself impressed by Pyrrha Nikos, she was what the Knights wanted in a fighter. "Damn." Malacci said after the other fighter, the android, was destroyed by her.
Almost as soon as it had been cut apart a familiar image replaced the feed from the arena, a black queen chess piece on a red background. Mordred ignored the words of the woman speaking, his thoughts turned to the coming storm.
"Orders sir?" A crewman asked him after the woman finished her speech. The bridge was silent as Mordred took a breath.
"Get our forces already on the ground ready for combat, i want Archangel wing and Valkyrie wing ready to engage any airborne hostiles if needed. Prepare several Bullheads for evac and bringing more Knights into the City." Mordred said quickly and clearly as he turned to leave the bridge with Malacci in tow.
"Get the others ready." Mordred said as he pressed his hand on a glowing pad at a door he stopped in front of. "On it." Malacci said as he sprinted down the hall.
Mordred stepped into the room and looked straight ahead as the lights flashed on. He walked over to a wall and placed his hand on a holographic panel, the wall slid out and revealed a suit of white armor with blue lines that bent upwards on the shoulder plates.
Mordred began to strap on the armor quickly, it was light and flexible, but able to withstand the force of a Beowulf's jaw. After he finished getting the armor on he picked up a segmented mask with two more lines that bent upward to form slight V's. After he put the mask on his face the segmented parts moved back to cover his entire head and the lines lit up, the same shade of blue as the other lights.
The door to the room opened and Malacci spoke in a formal voice. "Sir, the other's are ready." His voice was distorted by the mask he wore, this one had two small circular lenses that were meant to help him track target more easily.
"Good, and the Bullhead?" Mordred asked, his own voice was distorted to be much deeper than it usually was. "Armed and ready, are we moving ground forces down first?" Malacci replied.
"Yes, we are acting as the vanguard for additional forces, i sent word to the Apophis and the Shadow, they should be here within the next few hours." Mordred said as the two of them left the room and began to head for the hangar. "Have you contacted the Maleficar?" Mordred asked his subordinate.
"I did, they said they would be there as soon as possible, the Grimm are already attacking in force at their location." Malacci replied. The two of them walked down the hall for a while, on several occasions crew members had to move out of their way.
"Where are we landing at?" Mordred asked calmly. "Near the CCT, we can use that as a staging point and the tower itself can stand up to the Grimm for a while as well." Malacci said before following Mordred through the bulkhead that led into the hangar, where seven Bullheads were being loaded with Knights.
"Commander on deck!" A large knight with an even larger mace on his back said while giving Mordred a crisp salute as he approached. "At ease Percival, this is no time for formality." Mordred said as he stood in front of the ramp leading up to the troop bay of the military grade Bullhead. Another knight spoke "Are we going after the Maleficar?"
"No. our foes this time are the Grimm and the White Fang, should they get in our way." Mordred said, no one could see his face or hear how his voice was quiet, the voice distortion hiding it.
"Mount up! We need to secure a landing zone for any reinforcements!" He shouted as his squad of four walked into the Bullhead.
Lirril Evergreen
"Motherfucker!" Lirril shouted as she cut down yet another Creep, the bipedal Grimm had always disturbed her and the area they were in was filled with them.
"Lirril we need to fall back, there's just too many!" Niren said as he jumped back towards her and fired Gungnir four times and killed four more creeps, Lirril jumped at his voice which was distorted by the black mask he wore on his face, the multiple circular lenses were making his shot even more accurate, or so he claimed.
"Theres still a military Bullhead we can use!" Vanir shouted as he tossed an Ursa into a group of Beowolves with Gram, his own segmented black mask with a single line that bent in the middle to form a slight v made his voice seem lighter yet gave him a scary visage since it was glowing red.
"Talia! We need to fall back!" Lirril shouted as she and Niren began to fight back towards the Bullhead, the crew had been fending off Grimm as well and began to fight a little harder when they saw the two of them moving back, Vanir was busy sending Grimm flying as he fought his way to Talia, who was pinned down by a rather large Griffon.
"Niren, give them some cover." Lirril said as she switched her weapon into its submachine gun form as began to clear away Grimm, buying time for the sniper to start picking off Grimm as Vanir carried Talia back towards the Bullhead, the soldiers seemed to get the idea and began to help him out a bit.
"Get onboard!" Vanir shouted as he quickly unsheathed Gram and clear away a group of Grimm that had gotten too close, Niren and Lirril sprinted up the ramp and were quickly followed by Vanir, as the Bullhead took off Niren and Lirril began to fire at any Grimm that had gotten too close.
"Damn." Lirril said as she leaned against the wall and slumped down, the soldiers and Talia did the same while Vanir and Niren remained standing. "Get us to the city!" Niren shouted to the pilot of the Bullhead as Vanir knelt to check on Talia.
"We need a medic." Vanir said after looking at a nasty cut on Talia's back that was healing slowly. "Let me take a look at her." A Female soldier said after a moment, Vanir quickly stepped aside and let the woman do her work.
"Is she going to be fine?" Lirril asked after her breathing calmed down. The medic sprayed some sort of foam onto the wound and started to put bandages on her lesser wounds. "She should be, but she needs to rest."
"So now we're down a member." Lirril said as Vanir sat down next to her, the faunus coughed a small amount of blood out before responding. "So long as we can get to the city without crashing we should be able to get her some help."
Lirril stared into space for a few moments, waiting for her heart to slow down as well before speaking again, she could taste metal for some reason. "What about Mithril and the others?" She asked Vanir finally.
Vanir smiled as he pulled out his scroll, Lirril looked at the back of it and saw his symbol, a wolf's head had been carved into it by the faunus. "She sent me a message apparently." He said before reading it. "Grimm attacked, fell back to the city with Atlas forces, everyone is fine, for now." Lirril only nodded and felt relief, she disliked Mithril at times because of the fact that Vanir chose Mithril instead of her, but that didn't mean she hated her or didn't respect her.
"Lirril, Vanir, I just got a message from Mordred." Niren said while walking over to Lirril. "What is it?" Lirril asked, worried. Niren looked down at his scroll before responding. "Grimm attacking the city, my forces are engaging, head to Beacon to assist the battle there." Lirril sighed in relief at Mordred's message, she had thought that he was going to either abandon the city or join the enemy.
"Leave it to Mordred to protect the innocents." Vanir said. Niren nodded. "I already informed the pilot to let the three of us off there and take Talia to get some better treatment." He replied, Lirril noticed that both of them still had the masks on.
"Why haven't you taken those off?" She asked, the two of them looked at each other and nodded. "We can't risk landing at the academy, so we might have to drop in from above." Vanir explained, Lirril realized what he said, SHE could at least use her semblance to soften her landing, but they would have to figure something else out.
"Don't worry about it, we can handle a couple of Grimm on the way down." Niren said while reloading Gungnir, Lirril noticed that Vanir had Gram out and was holding a hand out to help her up. "It's going to be a long night." Lirril said to her two capable teammates with a grin on her face as she took Garuda off her back and split it into Suparna and Chirada.
Mordred Pendragon
Mordred looked at the scene unfolding in the city as the bay door opened, Grimm had been running wild and killing as they pleased, He intended to put a stop to that. "Sir, There's a large group of civilians at the CCT requesting evac." The pilot said over their comm channel.
"Copy, we need to secure it and get word out to forces from Atlas if possible, Land all forces in the area around it." Mordred said while unsheathing Caliburn. As the Bullhead came around for a strafing run on the area near the entrance of the CCT Mordred opened the ramp so that they could jump out and start clearing Grimm.
"Permission to jump sir?" Percival asked while looking down at the battle below. "Granted." Mordred said with a nod. Percival grinned as he ran off the ramp and jumped into a group of Grimm directly below the Bullhead.
Mordred then gave a signal to the other two Knights to follow him as they jumped from the Bullhead. He landed on his feet and ducked to avoid an Ursa's paw, before he stood back up he ran it through the abdomen.
"Meet your end, beast." Mordred said as he jumped backwards and listened to the Ursa scream in rage, just as it was about to charge at him several bullets pierced its torso and the Grimm fell to the ground dead.
"That was my kill Malacci." Mordred said as he turned around to see the other man holding up his pistol, still smoking at the barrel. "Sorry, didn't think we were going by a kill counter, given the situation." Malacci said while reloading his weapon.
"Right, kill them all then." Mordred said as a group of Boarbatusk ran towards them on their left, and a few Creeps moved in from the right. As Malacci began to fire at the charging Grimm on the left Mordred ran to intercept the Creeps.
Mordred had to dodge a few attacks from the strange bipedal Grimm before he could go on the offensive, he utilized his semblance well in cases like this, "If only i could predict Vanir's movements as well as these mindless beasts." Mordred thought as he tossed a Creep over his shoulder and stabbed it.
As he stood, another Creep jumped in the air, planning to jump on top of his and maul him, before it could however a large piece of rubble slammed into it, crushing the life from the Grimm.
"I've got your back boss." Percival said as he walked over to Mordred to help him up, the remaining three Creeps had the two men surrounded however and they stood back to back, ready to face them. "No heroic stands please gentlemen!" Malacci shouted before firing three shots the hit the Creeps in an eye, killing them.
"For the love of-" Mordred said before Percival laughed loudly. "Area clear, for now." Malacci said while loading another clip into his weapon. "All active units report in." Mordred said over their comm channel.
Niren Argent
Niren steadied his breathing as he and Vanir prepared to jump out of the Bullhead over Beacon, the two of them stood next to each other with their weapons drawn. "Open it." Niren said to the soldier who was standing next to the control switch
Niren began to run before Vanir, as he reached the edge of the ramp his only thought was. "I hate Grimm." AS he and Vanir fell through the clouds and smoke, he noticed how few Griffons there were.
"Heads up! I see multiple Griffons and Nevermores!" Vanir said over their comm channel as he held Gram in front of his like a air brake. Niren nodded as best he could and began to scan the sky for the creatures, he planned on firing on them to buy Vanir some time.
"There you are." He mumbled to himself as he saw a flock of at least twenty Griffons moving towards them, Niren began to clear his mind of any negative thoughts, he could only hope Vanir was doing the same thing.
Niren took aim at a Griffon that was straying from the pack and pulled the trigger, the Grimm screeched and then fell from the sky, silent as it dissolved. Niren looked to his left after a few flashes came from Vanirs direction. Several Griffons were burning as they fell and the Hades had smoke trailing from the palm.
"Nice shot." Niren said over their comm channel, Vanir responded with a simply flashing bar on Nirens HUD, he was focusing on landing, rather than banter for once. "Vanir, land in the courtyard if possible, looks like allies already there need some help." Niren said after zooming in for a better look at the battle below.
Once again Niren noticed the blinking red bar that said Vanir got the message. Niren Held Gungnir downwards and began to fire it in order to slow his descent, meanwhile Vanir had decided to fire a continuous stream of energy from the Hades at one small area of land, that area being a heavy mech from Atlas.
Niren was confused for a moment before he looked again and saw that the robotic portion of Atlas forces were attacking their allies. "Motherfucker." He thought to himself as he finally landed on a roof and rolled down the side before regaining his footing. He looked for Vanir before seeing him crash into a group of mechs. "He should be fine." He said to himself as he set up to begin firing at tragets.
Lirril Evergreen
Lirril had chosen to help keep the Bullhead intact as it moved to evacuate other students from Beacon, on top of that she couldn't leave Talia behind, so she watched as Vanir and Niren jump out of the Bullhead and into the fight, while she remained behind.
"Ma'am, there's a group of students at the pad." The pilot said to Lirril. "Well then get us down there so we can get them out of here." Lirril said after moving up to the cockpit to get a good view.
She saw a decent sized group of students waving their arms in the air and shouting at the Bullhead. "I'm gonna need help holding it." Lirril said as she turned around to get the soldiers ready for another battle. "We need to hold that landing pad so that students can evacuate, if you're good to go for another fight, then come with me." Lirril said to the twenty men and women standing and sitting in the troop bay.
"I need to help the wounded students, so i'm coming with." The medic who had treated Talia's wound said while standing up from another soldier. At least ten of the fifteen soldier who werent too badly wounded also stood up shakily with their rifles in hand and a few nods. "Then get ready for a tough fi-" Lirril was stopped when she saw Talia trying to stand by using Oblivion as a crutch.
"Talia, stay on the ship you can barely stand." Lirril said when she saw the dark circles around her friend and teammate's eyes. "Bullshit…. I'm coming with… i have to help.. Niren." She said before falling to the ground. Lirril walked over to Talia and put a hand on her shoulder, the other girl was starting to cry at her situation. "You need rest, please stay on the Bullhead." Lirril said while grabbing one of Talia's hands.
"Then… make sure Niren… gets out safe." Talia said while breathing heavily. Lirril nodded before Talia fell unconscious again. "You may have to stay with her for a bit longer." Lirril said to the medic, who simply nodded and moved over to the girl.
"Let's move people!" Lirril shouted as the ramp leading out of the Bullhead opened and a group of White Fang soldiers ran out onto the path leading up to the pad.
Mordred Pendragon
Mordred looked at the battle raging in Beacon Academy with annoyance, whoever had caused this to happen had to be there, and he intended to find her and kill her if possible. "Sir, we're detecting some major seismic activity." a voice said from the Temeraire.
"Explain." Mordred replied calmly as Malacci applied some disinfectant to a wound on Mordred's sword arm, apparently a Griffons jaw could crack his armor. "Not sure yet, but they seem to be getting larger." The voice said with a note of worry. "We won't worry about it until it becomes a problem, continue to watch for the Apophis and Shadow." Mordred responded while standing up, the field dressing completed. "Yes sir." The voice replied.
"The fuck does seismic activity have to do with the fight at hand?" Percival said from the pilot's seat of the Bullhead they… appropriated from a group of White Fang troops. "We did a thermal scan of the area when we first arrived, and found something disturbing in a nearby mountain." Mordred replied calmly while checking Caliburn for any major damage. "And that seismic activity is related to it somehow?" Percival asked.
"The waves are coming from whatever the hell is in the mountain, something is waking up." Mordred said, not even trying to hide the worry in his voice. "So that's why you called in the other ships." Malacci said while rubbing his chin, he had to get rid of his mask after a beowolf hit him on the head, hard.
"Yes." Mordred said while looking down at the floor. "Coming up on Beacon now sir, looks like Atlas forces are trying to secure a LZ." Percival said. "Bring us down at that landing pad their attempting to secure, drop us in behind the White Fang." Mordred said, once again all business as he prepared to kill more enemies.
"Yes sir!" Percival said loudly as he opened one of the bay doors. "Let's go Malacci." Mordred said as he nodded at the other Knight. Malacci nodded back and jumped out of the Bullhead, before any White Fang could react Malacci had shot six of them, and Mordred had either decapitated or stabbed three others.
"Mordred?" Lirril asked as she forced a group of White Fang off the side of the path leading to the pad. "Your Vanir's current partner aren't you?" Mordred asked, he was still wearing his mask and his voice was still being distorted, this caused the girl to jump back a little.
"Yes, i am." Lirril said calmly before throwing one of her chakram past Mordred's head and into the neck of a White Fang soldier who had snuck up behind him. "Where are Vanir and Niren, and the other girl?" Mordred asked after turning around and retrieving the weapon.
"Vanir and Niren are fighting in the school right now, and Talia… she won't be able to fight for a while." Lirril said while catching her breath. "I see, Malacci you and Percival stay here, keep this area safe, i shall go and find Vanir and Niren." Mordred gave the order to his men.
"I'm coming with, I promised Talia that I would bring Niren back safe." Lirril said while grabbing Mordred's arm. "Very well, stick close to me then." Mordred said, a small smile forming behind his mask.
Vanir Argent
Vanir pulled Gram out of the stomach of a White Fang soldier and fell onto one knee as he caught his breath. "Motherfucker." He mumbled as his mask fell off, cut in two by the last soldier.
The situation seemed hopeless, the Grimm kept coming, and so did the White Fang, to top it all off even the mechs had turned against them. "Vanir, come in." Niren said calmly over the radio Vanir had in his ear. "Yeah, i read you brother." Vanir said as he slowly stood up using Gram as a crutch.
"Just saw a White Fang leader moving towards the Cafeteria, wearing a black coat and wielding a red katana." Niren said over the sounds of screeching and sniper fire. "Copy, moving to intercept." Vanir said as his eyes once again turned yellow and he began to move towards the Cafeteria.
Vanir had to carve a bloody path through White Fang and Grimm in order to reach the Cafeteria, by the time he did reach it, he wasn't tired anymore. When he looked in he saw a familiar girl laying on the floor, it took him a moment to make out her features. "Shit, thats Blake." He whispered.
Before he could do anything else he heard Yang shouting and then firing her weapons, apparently the battle had done little to help his hearing, some things were still muffled. He watched as Blake fled with Yang. Before either he or the White Fang leader could move a familiar man dressed in white armor stepped into the Cafeteria, with Lirril right behind him.
"Ah, Adam Taurus, i suppose you will have to do for an interesting fight." Mordred said from behind his mask. "Who are you?" Taurus asked with suspicion. "Consider me your foe, Lirril keep looking for Vanir and Niren, this one is mine." Mordred said while taking up a defensive stance. Vanir saw Lirril nod then waved Gram as best he could to signal to her.
"Go." Mordred said before rushing Taurus to buy Lirril time to cross the burning building to reach Vanir. "Am i glad to see you." Vanir said as Lirril hugged him. "Where's Niren? and what about Mithril and the others?" Lirril asked with worry. "Niren is off fighting somewhere, Mithril sent me a message saying she was helping with evac." Vanir said with a slight grin on his face. "Remind me to get caught up in massive battles more often if i want to see you actually worried." He said before Lirril slapped him across the face.
"Let's go get Niren." She said, Vanir looked back only once to see Mordred holding his own against Taurus. "Niren, i found Lirril we're moving to your location now." Vanir said while holding a hand up to the earpiece. "Copy! Hurry up though these mechs are becoming a problem!" Niren said, this time the sound of gunfire was very prominent. "On our way!" Vanir shouted before running even faster.
When Vanir and Lirril found the area Niren was at, the saw the extent of the battle, dozens of heavy and normal mechs were scattered about, as well as the bodies of soldiers from Atlas. "Fuck." Vanir said as he fired a beam at a group of mechs and melted them. "This is bad." Lirril said as she tossed Garuda at another group the was nearing them.
"Hate these things!" Vanir said as he cut two more that had gotten close in half. Lirril only grunted in agreement as she mowed down another group of them, while they were battling near the other first year students who had decided to act rather than flee, they felt very alone.
As Vanir cut another few mechs down he heard Lirril scream in pain, for a moment her aura had dropped, and a mech had managed to hit her in the leg. "Lirril!" Vanir shouted as he began to move towards her, his progress was slowed by more mechs, he thought he wouldn't make it to her in time as a mech was taking aim for her head when a shot rang out rather loudly and hit the mech square in the torso, knocking it to the ground. Several more shots sounded and cleared the remaining mechs from the area. "Got your back brother." Niren said calmly from a nearby roof. Vanir only held up a thumb as he sheathed Gram and helped Lirril up, she couldn't walk due to the wound.
Before Vanir could take a step however, the ground began to shake violently. "What the hell?" He asked no one as the battle stopped around him. The ground shook again and again, slowly building up to an ominous silence before there was a loud cracking noise and then what sounded like thunder as a massive creature of Grimm rose into the sky after breaking apart the top of a mountain.
"Holy hell." Vanir said as he began to move towards the landing pad. "Vanir? You seeing this?" Niren asked over comms while picking off Grimm that attempted to attack Vanir as he carried Lirril to a pad. "Yeah, just not believing it." Vanir replied. "That shouldn't be possible." Niren said before jumping off a roof to land across from Vanir, he ran over and grabbed Lirril by her other arm and wrapped it around his shoulder.
"We need to leave, now." Vanir said as they quickly came upon the landing pad, where some of Beacons staff had set up a more proper evac zone.
"We need help!" Niren shouted as a group of soldiers rushed over to relieve the two men of their burden, the troops were followed by Professor Oobleck. "Did you two see any other students?" He asked with worry. "No sir." Vanir said while sinking onto the ground, his leg was bleeding badly from a gunshot wound.
"Get a medic for this young man quickly! He's covered in wounds!" Oobleck shouted, Vanir's vision was becoming clouded, he was bleeding from multiple wounds all over his body. "Why isn't my implant doing anything?' He thought as he felt a burning feeling in his chest. As he fell backwards he felt Niren quickly catch him. "Bloody hell, the implant must've burnt out." Niren said as Vanir slowly fell unconscious.
Niren Argent
As Niren watched his brother being taken onto a medical ship to have the healing implant in him removed and his wounds healed as best as possibly, he looked up at the massive Grimm that was now flying around the tower. "What's it doing?" Niren wondered out loud.
"I'm not sure Mr. Argent, but it's time to leave." Oobleck said after putting a hand on Niren's shoulder, Niren agreed, he was tired enough that he was leaning on Gungnir for support. "Agreed sir." He said to Oobleck, his entire team was unable to continue fighting at this point. "You may board the same medical ship as Vanir and Lirril, it's heading for Patch and-" Ooblecks sentence was interrupted by a blinding flash of light coming from the top of the tower, which had been ruined by a fight moments before.
"What the?" Niren asked as he covered his eyes. After the light faded, he was shocked to see the Grimm laying across the tower, it appeared to be frozen. Niren was unable to say anything more as he fell to the ground, his wounds and fatigue had caught up to him. "Are you alright?" A medic asked as they ran up to him. "Just need some rest." He said quietly as the medic helped him get over to the ship that Vanir was on, he noticed there was a fair deal of blood on the bandages around Vanirs chest.
His last thought before he fell asleep was "They got it out of him."
Mordred Pendragon
Mordred lit a cigarette up as he stood on the bridge of the Temeraire, his flinched at a jolt of pain from the hole where his left eye used to be, the other cut and stab wounds were nothing compared to that.
"Taurus did a number on you sir." Malacci said as he walked up behind him. "I responded in kind." Mordred said with a growl. The Apophis and Shadow had arrived just as the Grimm was seemingly frozen by a flash of light from the ruined tower at Beacon.
"And we lost out on the chance to get the Maiden out as well." Malacci said with an annoyed tone. "Do not remind me." Mordred said as he leaned forward on the metal rail from his post. "So, what's next?" Malacci asked. "We fall back for now, the time has come to deal with my father and his schemes." Mordred said grimly.
"We may to need to wait for the Maleficar to recover, Percival said they were in bad shape when they fell back." Malacci said while moving towards the bulkhead door leading out of the bridge. "Let them rest then." Mordred said as he thought of how bad Vanir looked when he only caught a glance of him outside the building he fought Taurus in.
"Yes sir." Malacci said as he left the bridge. Mordre flinched again as another jolt of pain spread through his eye socket. "We all need some rest." Mordred thought to himself as he gave command of the ship over to the bridge crew and left for his own room.
Well, damn who would've thought that Volume Three was going to be so dark, still thought i finally got around to finishing this chapter, i have one last chapter before i finally deal with the Argent Knights which is going to be an in between seasons thing to help keep me occupied. Anyway, hope you enjoy this chapter of the story, thanks for reading.