Alright, now the Flood have entered the universe of RWBY. Can Remnant survive the coming darkness, or will they be consumed? The answer may surprise you. This takes place after the end of Volume 3.
Disclaimer: I do not own Halo, RWBY, Mass Effect, Bionicle, Metroid, Killzone, Star Wars or anything else that shows up in this chapter.
"Mankind has always remembered their early beginnings: the creatures of Grimm emerged from the darkness to return humanity to the shadows. That changed with the discovery of Dust, and with it, mankind drove the monsters back. But one fact has been lost to the mists of time; the Grimm were not alone in their efforts to destroy humanity. They were serving a darker, far more ancient threat. And now, that threat has emerged from its slumber."
-Salem
...
Off the coast of Atlas, a pair of Bullhead aircraft made their way toward a small island, filled to the brim with Atlesian troops, Knights and one single specialist. The specialist in question looked at the news report on her Scroll, thinking back to what had happened at Vale and how her sister had been caught up in the middle of it.
After the events at Beacon, Weiss had been returned to Atlas by their father, and Winter hadn't heard from her since. She wanted to go talk to her, but she got called away on an assignment.
One of the Schnee mining facilities had discovered some sort of strange archway made of unknown metal while searching for more Dust. The miners reported seeing some sort of blue-white portal in the center of the arch.
Less than 12 hours later, there was a report of the White Fang attacking the mining facility, and an experienced Atlas Hunter was dispatched to investigate. All contact with the mine was lost after that.
Winter sighed internally, refusing to let any sign of her doubts show to her troops. She hoped that she wouldn't have to halt a worker's strike at the end of this. It was just another bad reminder of her father's legacy.
She was shaken out of her thoughts when the aircraft finally reached the island. They landed on the coast, to avoid being noticed by the potential hostiles in control of the mining facility.
"You all know what to do." She said to the organic portion of her team. "Intel says that the White Fang is in control of this location. Assume they're hostile."
As Winter watched her platoon moved out, she looked at the squad of Atlesian Knights, feeling wary of trusting them. She had heard enough about what happened in Vale, how Torchwick had turned them all against their handlers. She didn't want her team to be caught in the crossfire like that.
...
A few minutes later, Winter felt a chill run down her spine. She had yet to see or hear any ambient animal sounds around, or even Grimm for that matter. Eerily, it was like all other life in the area had vanished.
As such, it was almost a relief when they came across signs of conflict, specifically fallen trees and crushed vegetation. But that relief turned into even more concern as they saw debris, grass and other plantlife just hovering in the air, as well as a strange crater/void that looked like all matter within the radius had just vanished into nothing.
Startled grunting drew the attention and weapons of everyone in the vicinity, but they relaxed slightly when they saw it was just a soldier, though he seemed to be having trouble lifting a large tree branch.
"Private, stop fooling around!" His sergeant shouted. "Move that thing and let's go."
"Sir, it's not me." The soldier protested. "This tree weighs a ton!"
Several other soldiers moved to assist and prove him wrong, only to find that the tree actually weighed around three tonnes. Even the robotic strength of the Atlesian Knights couldn't move it. They realized several other objects in the vicinity had the same properties.
"We're wasting time." Winter interrupted. "Let it be, and move on."
The strike force moved away from the distorted field and toward a small valley that held the actual mines that stretched under most of the island. The Knights and soldiers took up observation positions along the ridge, many of them gasping as Winter went to join them.
Winter Schnee had been a Specialist for Atlas for several years, and while she may not have been a veteran like General Ironwood or Ozpin, she had seen and had more than her fair share of horrifying experiences, from the soulless nature of the Grimm to the depths of human and Faunus cruelty.
And yet all of that paled in comparison to what she saw next: Several dozen humanoid abominations milling among the valley; They were a sickly yellow and green, the color of rotting flesh, and with a start, she realized they were all human and Faunus, albeit so badly mutated and twisted that there was little chance of determining who they once were.
Suddenly, a sound from the right drew the attention of one of the forms in the valley. Seconds later, every green body turned towards the threat as one. A bloodcurdling howl/roar pierced the ringing silence as the abominations drove themselves to a frenzy.
"I think they know we're here." Someone stated.
"Really, you think? Yeah, no shit, Kerry!"
Winter ignored them and charged into the fray, slashing through the creatures left, right and center. Their weak forms did little to protect them, as none of them had Aura serving as any form of defense.
Her glyph activated as she used it to leap over a milling horde, easily avoiding the weapons fire of the abominations. Skipping from glyph to glyph, she also used them to send a spray of ice shards into the forms of the approaching monsters.
Sparing a glance towards her soldiers, she could see that the robotic troops were actually holding their own rather well. The organics weren't doing so well, many paralyzed by fear of something even worse than the Grimm.
She saw several small squid-like creatures making their way towards the soldiers, and saw one of them slip past the defense and latch onto one's chest. To her horror, the creature slipped through a crack in the armor and buried into the soldier's flesh. Seconds later, green mutations spread throughout the man's body as his screams of terror were replaced by bloodcurdling howls.
Horrified, his comrades only stared in fear, as the infected soldier swung the tendril that was once his arm at the closest of his former comrades, sending the man flying into the flood of monsters.
"Everyone fall back!" Winter's voice cut through the developing panic. "We need to regroup!"
The Atlas soldiers gladly followed her advice, beating a hasty retreat from the seemingly never-ending tide of monsters. Winter had no clue where they came from, but clearly, charging head first into the fray wasn't going to work.
Strangely, as they retreated, the monsters didn't seem to be following, instead moving towards a point in the opposite direction. Winter wondered what could've drawn the abominations away. She got her answer seconds later.
From the treeline on the opposite side of the valley, a lone human emerged, holding a strange weapon in one hand, and making gestures with the other. The horde fired upon him, but the bullets halted in midair in front of him.
As Winter watched, each gesture seemed to alter the force of gravity in a given area, as some of the creatures went flying, others fell, and at one point, a small singularity appeared, crushing a dozen of the creatures into nothing.
Was this the Huntsman that had been sent here? Winter wondered. And if he wasn't, who was this person and why was he carrying such an advanced weapon? Every shot turned each monster into ash.
Winter decided to watch what was happening for now, and gave the order for her surviving troops to stay in concealment.
Bill ran through the forest, sending hard light bolts and gravitational shifts at the Flood forms that were following him. Any combat form not reduced to paste by the constant shifts in gravity was turned to amber ash by his hard light weaponry.
As he ran, he thought back to how he was in this situation: He had arrived at the tail end of a conflict between the Schnee company security and the White Fang, who had fighting over the question of who would take the portal as their own.
Well, that question's been answered. He thought as another two forms were dissolved into gold particles. The Flood were pouring out of a portal, and they had unfortunately spotted him after they had consumed all the miners and the White Fang who had targeted this place. His blood ran cold at the thought of the Parasite taking over this world.
Remnant was a curious world in the multiverse. Outside of the Flood and select groups in the Republic and Separatists, few knew the planet existed. This was due to several reasons: Unlike the superheroes and supervillains of Earth-16, much of the planet's technology stopped working outside the planet's atmosphere due to the unique properties of Dust. Furthermore, while the populace of Earth-16 had previous foreknowledge about the existence of aliens, Remnant had no such knowledge, and the two interdimensional superpowers were willing to keep it that way for now.
Of course, neither the Republic nor Separatists were just going to turn a blind eye to events of the world, which was why several covert agents had been deployed by both sides, as well as native inhabitants who served as occasional eyes and ears. That was why he was here, after all.
So when Republic satellites detected that the Flood were moving towards Remnant, he had been sent to the location to determine where they planned to end up. And as he crushed a dozen combat and pure forms in a small singularity, he could say for certain that he knew their staging area.
If the Flood took control over Remnant, this would be very bad for the multiverse at large. Though Dust currently didn't work outside of Remnant's atmosphere, no one wanted to see if the Gravemind could find a way to get around that limitation. And the inhabitants themselves were extremely dangerous if their Aura and Semblances were unlocked.
Breaking through the treeline into the valley, he found himself staring at the bulk of the Flood forms on this world. It seemed that they were all waiting for him to show up, as weapons fire lit up where he used to be.
Summoning gravity to alter the bullet mass, the rounds halted in midair. Gesturing once more, he started to manipulate gravity again, this time either sending the Flood forms flying, crushing them, sending them flying and then crushing them, and in the case of a large group summoning a singularity in the middle of them.
The people of this world thought his control over gravity was due to his 'Semblance'. He actually had enhanced cybernetics derived from the technology of the Spherus Magna Great Beings to thank for that.
Still, he didn't have the energy to sustain his elemental power indefinitely. Summoning his armor around him, he was just in time to prevent a Flood infection form from burrowing into his chest. Swatting the creature aside, the force from the armor crushed it against a nearby tree.
Spinning around, he pulled out his assault rifle, setting the ammo to disintegrate everyone it killed, leaving ionizing trails in the air with each round. On fully automatic, he started destroying dozens of combat forms, yet there were always a dozen more each time.
A Flood combat form leapt through the air, it's lunge sending it towards him. Raising his hand, the combat form's arc halted as it slammed into the ground, the soldier having increased its force of gravity.
The Flood abomination struggled to rise, but the effects of gravity refused to let up. It was still struggling when a burst of energy bolts reduced the monstrosity to ash. The soldier then put his hand to the side of his helmet.
"I need containment teams here, now!" Bill shouted, putting down another combat form at the same time.
Seconds later, several blue-white portals appeared all around him, causing the Flood to gravitate towards them. Just as a few combat forms reached the nearest one, they were crushed to death by the emerging Republic Mgalekgolo, whose energy shields absorbed the resulting attacks.
More Republic forces arrived, consisting of armored containment soldiers armed with hard light weaponry, jet troopers armed with flamethrowers, a few biotics to supplement his gravity powers, a few Sentinels and even several Yautja armed with Blazers.
He was slightly surprised to see Separatist forces as well, consisting mainly of infantry and heavy battle droids, Pirate aerotroopers, and Helghast armed with flame weapons. Normally, the two sides would be fighting against one another (not to mention they usually stuck to their own faction when dealing with containment), but a Flood outbreak wasn't the time to be picky about one's allies.
A stream of burning energy emerged from the Blazer, cutting a massive swath through the Flood lines. They were followed by an incendiary stream of fuel rod gel, which cleansed another wave from the dirt. Particle beams, Helix missiles, hard light rounds, Sentinel beams and explosions burned a hole into the Flood horde, slowly pushing them back into the mine.
Then air support arrived, as the heavily armed dropships and drone fighters/gunships on both sides strafed the tidal wave of Flood forms, blasting them apart with explosive rounds, energy bolts and missiles.
At first, it looked like the combined force would be enough to bury the Flood in the mine, but then a large explosion behind them alerted the Republic and Separatists to a new problem: The Flood had taken control of the mining devices and were attempting to bypass the Republic and Separatists by tunneling their way past.
Furthermore, to Bill's surprise, they had engaged in conflict with Atlas military forces, and they reacted with the same inexperience most soldiers had when dealing with the Parasite for the first time.
They panicked, firing wildly into the horde, their weapons rather ineffectual when compared to theirs. One exception was the white-haired woman who was slaughtering her way through the Flood combat forms, probably a Huntress from Atlas. Bill had no idea when Atlas had arrived and how long they'd been here, but this was another potential complication.
To make matters even worse, the Grimm started to show up, no doubt attracted to the negativity in the area. This turn of events was unfortunate, but the next turn was really unwelcome: The creatures of Grimm ignored the Flood, instead charging the Atlas forces and the two superpowers. Additionally, the Flood ignored the Grimm as well. Add onto the Aura that the combat forms were now projecting, and their Semblances, and it would only be a matter of time before the Flood overran Remnant.
"We need orbital fire support, NOW!"
As if called on command, two frigates entered the atmosphere, one Republic and one Separatist. Both ships were approximately 800 meters long and bristling with powerful weaponry. The Republic vessel unleashed a stream of energy from its ventral surface, which carved its way down to the mines, filling the tunnels with boiling energy and destroying the generator that powered the rift.
Meanwhile, the Separatist ship let loose with bolts of weapon fire, frying any Flood attempting to leave the island with pinpoint accuracy. Several combat forms attempted to leave with an Atlesian airship, but a bolt of hard light swatted the dropship from the sky.
In response, the Grimm turned their attention to the Republic and Separatists, attempting to maul them. But the creatures of darkness were no threat to the advanced weaponry of the multiversal superpowers, and Bill alone accounted for dozens of dead Grimm with his gravity powers.
Despite this, they knew that the Grimm were a distraction, to allow the Parasite time to escape. Immediately, Republic and Separatist forces started evacuating, covered by Separatist battle droids, in preparation for the complete destruction of the island by the orbiting warships.
Bill meanwhile, used his gravity powers and launched himself towards the Atlas forces, creating a singularity to temporarily give them some respite. Making a three-point landing, he unsurprisingly found himself at gun and sword point, the latter of which (he realized with a start) belonged to Winter Schnee.
"Identify yourself." Winter ordered, the blade of her weapon pointed at the cyborg's neck.
"I'm here to warn you." Bill quickly replied. "You need to get off the island. Right now."
"We're not going anywhere until you tell me who you are."
"There's no time to explain!" Bill said, gesturing at the approaching Flood and the retreating dropships. "We're turning this island to a cinder. It's the only way to keep the Flood from spreading."
"And what would make you think that we'd agree to let this happen?!" Winter demanded.
"If you don't, then your world will be consumed!" He countered.
There was a short moment of silence as Winter and the Atlas soldiers digested this information, some looking towards the horde of Flood and Grimm as they advanced across the island. Then Winter silently nodded in agreement and gave the order to fall back to their Bullheads.
As Bill watched them leave, he became aware of the gurgles and growls of the combined Flood and Grimm groups behind them. Exhausted, he nevertheless turned and prepared to launch another gravity attack when they were all destroyed by raking autocannon fire and missiles coming from a Helghast ATAC. Then a Republic dropship appeared behind him.
"Get in!" The crew chief shouted. "The bombardment's heading this way."
Bill didn't need to be told twice, taking the hand of one of a Quarren soldier, who pulled him into the troop bay. Safe and sound, the soldiers watched in silence as the Republic frigate carved the island apart, while the Separatist vessel picked off any Flood stragglers or the Nevermores that attempted to take them away.
After an hour, the bombardment was finished, and the entire mining facility and the island itself had been completely destroyed. Without the portal, the Flood couldn't sneak onto Remnant the same way. Still, it paid to be thorough.
The Republic and Separatist aircraft and fighters circled the remains of the island, while the advanced sensors of the frigates scanned for any surviving Flood forms. They couldn't afford to let one spore escape, lest they escape and overrun Remnant.
At long last, the superpowers could confirm the destruction of the Flood on this world. Just in time too. As Bill looked out the side of the troop bay, he saw a squadron of Bullheads and Remnant airships heading their way.
At this, the Republic and Separatist ships returned to their respective motherships. As soon as every dropship, gunship and fighter was aboard, the frigates vanished into the interdimensional void.
Winter couldn't believe what had just happened: the abominations had been destroyed by some sort of aliens and their ships. Worse still, they had reduced not only the mines, but the entire island to a field of glass.
Still, her thoughts drifted to the creatures she had seen on the island, those 'Flood' as that armored human had mentioned. She shuddered at the Parasite's ravenous nature, and prayed that they wouldn't return, as she could already see that they were far worse than the Grimm could ever be. Not to mention the implications when the Grimm just ignored the Flood...
Winter watched from her spot in the Bullhead as the strange ships vanished into portals. She had no clue what had just happened, but somehow, she just knew the events here would end up being classified.
She was shaken out of her musings when the radio started picking up the signals of approaching Atlas reinforcements. Of course, they were far too late to actually accomplish anything other than clean up.
Ready for the long trip home, she began thinking of the way that she was going to explain all of this to General Ironwood.
I hope everyone enjoyed this chapter and reviews are always welcome.