Pyrrha opened her eyes to unearthly, hallowed luminosity. She was here again.

It was a white world, a familiar world, devoid of everything. In that white, familiar world, she had trekked many a night, never advancing, never ceasing. For a final time, Pyrrha strode freely through this space, absent of the earthly sensations that had plagued her in her final moments.

There was a presence lurking here–of that she had been certain from the start. In her dreams, it tempted her, cajoling her with promises of power and knowledge beyond that which man could hope to imagine. It offered gifts that stretched beyond the cosmos to space that was not space, and where strange time ebbed and flowed without consistency. It had offered so much, that anyone else would have considered her a fool for not accepting.

Now, it offered survival.

A veil had been lifted; the fragile membrane that encased this world had been torn asunder. The blank void was blank no longer. A simple, stone throne had been erected in this empty place, and upon its seat sat the barest facsimile of a woman.

The form at least, was humanoid, but what passed as flesh was as devoid of color as its surroundings. Slight shadows upon the face implied the base structure and contours of a countenance, but any true features were entirely lacking.

Imperiously, it perched atop the stone throne, head resting upon a hand. Though it could not express effectively, Pyrrha could sense a sort of perverse mirth in its body language, as if this being were privy to some great truth that she had only barely begun to grasp.

When it moved, its motions appeared jittery and stilted, like a puppet whose strings had been fastened at the wrong points. It's movements were grotesque and shallow, made in imitation of human motion with little care for the actual mechanisms behind the act. A hand shuddered up, presenting a glowing ember of flame, no larger than that of a candle.

"That's...for me?"

The being had a space which resembled a mouth, at least, and it stretched in answer to Pyrrha's confusion, its head inclining forward for the barest fraction.

Pyrrha hesitantly reached for the proffered light, and the flame began to stretch, drawing itself into her palm, trailing flickering lights up her arm and throughout her body. She could make out the shadow of bones and veins as the flame illuminated her from within. It itched, like a sunburn peeling and sloughing off.

Finer details began to etch themselves into the shadows of the being's face. Its contours subtly shifted, growing more defined, until, with stark, unnerved horror, Pyrra found herself staring into a horrific parody of her own face.

It was bleached of all color, as empty and cold as the void itself, but it was undoubtedly the same face that had always stared back at her from the mirror. Sitting superlatively upon that seat, "Pyrrha Nikos" leered down at her, her face twisted into a teasing smirk that offered both assurance and mockery.

She moved to draw her arm back, disconcerted, but staggered when she found it grafted to the flickering ember.

"Let me go." Her voice wavered slightly.

The empty, hideous grin only stretched wider. It was a horrific, manic expression that Pyrrha had never expected to see upon her own face.

"I said, let me go!" Pyrrha's free hand flew up to grasp the pallid wrist, and immediately, the knowledge of the cosmos flooded into her mind, battering her psyche with impossible sensations.

She saw out of many eyes, she saw out of none. Multitudes of noises filtered indistinctly through uncountable, deaf ears. Her form stretched without limit, yet terminated on a single point of nothingness. Sights, sounds, feelings, she was bombarded by it all, absorbing it all, but unable to parse even the slightest bit.

Pyrrha jerked away, almost stumbling backwards in her confusion, but her bound limb arrested her movements abruptly. The knowledge that had leached into her mind fled just as quickly the moment she released the thing's wrist. She was only left with the vaguest impression that she had experienced something horrifying. Even with death as her only alternative, she nonetheless began to regret her decision, but it was already too late.

The fire flickered wickedly as the last of its light sunk fully into her body, and she became an incandescent star, supernal in her light and luster, burning all that stood in her path.


I am Haste

Granted with grace

WIth purifying flame

These lands shall be chaste

The requisite energy had accumulatdt. A suitable host had been found and acceded to the Will. The membrane insulating this world from what lay beyond had been slit, if inadvertently, by the sole being who held the key to that sacrosanct space.

All of the criteria had been met.

From the darkness of unbeing, a sanguine ruby coalesced, glimmering with refractions of a great inferno.


Perhaps it was instinct. Perhaps it was reflex. Something within Cinder's mind screamed at her to move. She obeyed; she had been in her profession long enough to realize that such impulses were not to be ignored.

Jerking backwards, she leapt several paces away from the glowing form kneeling before her. Something had gone wrong; that much was abundantly clear. The girl should be dead, burnt away like spent kindling until not even bone remained.

Before the might of Cinder's semblance, neither stone, nor sand nor even steel would remain. All would be rendered molten and malleable within moments. There should have been no question of the effects upon a weak, human body.

Yet, the girl's body had not dispersed into motes of light and ash, as so many had before her. Instead, that lucent form now moved. Impossibly, unthinkably, it struggled to its feet with the stumbling, uncertain steps of a newborn calf.

Her body was alight with the deadly radiance of Cinder's semblance, yet the infernal glow seemed somehow to grow brighter, as if stoked to greater intensity by some internal furnace. It pulsed and ebbed and burned in its vibrancy until even looking upon that fiery form became painful and, finally, it combusted fully in a violent gout of sweltering light.

A beast of wretched, ravenous flame stood where her victim had once stood. The base form remained humanoid, but a person, this was not. Not a single patch of flesh had been left uncovered by the swirling, shrieking flames. They flowed off the girl's form in contorted, impossible trails. White-hot tendrils streaked behind her in defiance of physical law, writhing unnaturally, splayed out like the gossamer wings of some hellish butterfly.

Despite the sheer impossible absurdity of the situation, Cinder could not help but feel the familiar sparks of fury ignite in her heart. Her prize had, somehow, escaped her again.

Her anger was quick to falter, though, usurped in an instant by stark terror as the monster's head turned, slowly, deliberately, to face her. Orbs that glowed with the light of suns gushed fury and hatred, and the glowing, demonic maw stretched open in a tortured shriek.

Whether it was a sound born of fury, grief, pain or some other unknowable emotion, it was impossible to tell. The sound that echoed from that wretched thing was something that could not have possibly been formed by human vocal chords. It was the untamed howling of frantic winds and all-consuming light. A vague reminiscence of it's owner's original voice tinged the terrible tone, overshadowed by the crackling cadence of a radiant star. It rose in pitch and ferocity, lilting through the shattered ceiling and past the peaks of the tower's spires to join the silent chorus of its brethren in the vaulted heavens.

And Beacon was ablaze.

The entirety of the academy's facilities became engulfed in an immense, otherworldly conflagration. Hellish and hungry, the flames sprung to life far beyond the immediate bounds of their origin, grasping and tearing indiscriminately at all combustible matter. Feverishly, they roamed, seeking to consume anything that could sate their endless appetite.

As attuned as she was to fire, even Cinder cowered before the monstrous intensity of the inferno. Her aura screamed in protest as the blistering heat gnawed hungrily against it, demanding purchase against tender flesh. The air had grown stifling, and breathing became difficult as the oxygen in the air grew thinner and thinner by the moment. She stumbled backwards, desperately trying to make as much distance between herself and the wailing thing.

A sudden, blinding pain at her side seized the entirety of Cinder's attention. She tumbled backwards with a gasp, clutching at her arm only to grasp at empty space. She glanced fearfully down while biting back tortured screams.

From below her right elbow, there was nothing. She gazed dumbly around her but could find no sign of her missing limb. The stump wasn't even bleeding; it had been burnt shut in an instant.

Another shock of pain, and this time she managed to see what happened. One of the flaming tendrils shot out at impossible speeds, consuming her left leg below the knee and, when it dissipated, left nothing but ashen agony.

This time, she did scream. She wailed into the night as she flopped limply on her stomach, struggling desperately with her remaining limbs to crawl away from the monstrous thing, but quickly stopped and curled into a screaming, thrashing, sobbing wreck as more and more of the tendrils flew at her.

They perforated perfectly circular holes in her flesh, cleanly burning away whatever they touched and leaving the surroundings cracked and charred. Over and over and over again, they seared through skin and bone, setting her blood hissing and sizzling as the wounds cauterized immediately. She was dimly aware that the thing was toying with her, purposely avoiding a lethal blow–each lancing, torturous impalement a sadistic testament to its wrath.

Whatever it was that the girl had become, it remembered, and it hated.

All semblance of rational thought or planning fled, and she thrashed about like a lunatic beast, unable to do anything but wail and withstand the full brunt of her tormentor's ire. For what seemed like interminable stretches of time, her entire existence became one piercing, burning sensation after the other, each levied with cruel precision until finally, impossibly, they ceased.

The savage ministrations of the punishing flames abated and an ominous glow, eclipsing all that had shone previously, blossomed. The monster, it seemed, had finally grown tired of toying with its victim. In dread apprehension, Cinder dazedly, weakly, slowly, turned her head as best she could.

She could not bear to look at it. The radiance burnt painfully against her sight, and she had to avert her gaze, lest she be blinded. A sphere, barely the size of the marble in the palm of its hand, shone with the intensity of the titanic, cosmic bodies above. It shone brighter and brighter until merely being in its presence scorched her retinae no matter where she looked.

It was not a brilliance that humanity could ever hope to obtain. It was the light of gods–of unknowable things that defied the world's laws and imposed their own through their sheer presence. It was an impossible, hopeless brilliance. It was death.

As it neared the apex of its luminosity, a voice, hoarse and weak, croaked:

"Pyrrha."

The being jerked involuntarily.

Jaune had drifted back into consciousness, the combination of deadly heat and maddening cacophony shocking him to awareness in moments. What he witnessed could only be described as hell.

Fire. Fire everywhere. Flames danced atop solid stone, devoid of any true source of fuel, yet grasping ever higher in spite of that. Glowing, molten pits and crags littered the shattered stone hall, bubbling and splattering angrily. The air was thin and sweltering–an unmistakable, palpable essence of wrath. A small inlet of still-solid stone was the only safe haven in the chaos, and he lay atop it, freed from his earlier entrapments.

In the midst of the maelstrom, a beautiful, excruciating light surpassed all else.

It was Pyrrha. He wasn't sure how or why he knew that, as the being wreathed in unearthly radiance only held the barest resemblance of a human. Its body was entirely engulfed in flames, to the point that one could not be blamed for believing that there was nothing solid beneath the roiling blaze.

What he gazed upon through a thick cloud of pain and delirium was closer to the silhouette of some enraged, underworld god, not the form of the person he had once called partner.

Even still, he just knew it had to be Pyrrha. So he called out to her. In relief, in confusion, out of sheer habit, he called her name.

The sound of his voice caused the molten form to spasm. It seemed to struggle, jerking with unnerving, unnatural motions. A keening whine, akin more to hissing steam than a sound produced by anything living, emanated from the gnashing, glowing mouth. The power it held in its flailing arms ruptured.

A spectacular bloom of light, a rushing roar, and the entire eastern face of Beacon was no more. In its place, a massive, glowing trench stretching to the edge of the cliff overlooking the Emerald Forest. As far as the eye could see, the lush foliage below was now engulfed in torrid flames.

A wildfire, the likes of which no one had ever witnessed, rushed through swathes of verdant greenery, spreading as if spurred on by a wild, vengeful wind. In an instant, the Emerald Forest had become a seething vision of purgatory.

Pyrrha's form shuddered erratically. The flames garbing her body flickered, momentarily revealing a blackened husk beneath, before blossoming fully once again. Her shaking ceased. Mindlessly, mechanically, she shifted back into position, another glowing orb of apocalyptic energy began to condense, once again directed squarely at the huddled, convulsing form of the woman lying on the ground.

Jaune witnessed this, and a mild seed of apprehension began to take root. "The city," he thought he muttered. Whether his throat actually vibrated, or his lips moved to form the words, he could not tell. For some reason, he felt that it would be very, very bad, if she sent another one of those in that particular direction.

She faced the entry to Beacon—the western wall of the academy. From there, was the grounds and further still the bay. Beyond that–

A sudden gust of clarity blew the cobwebs from his addled mind. That direction–the face of Beacon–was right across the city. Vale was directly in the crossfire. It was quite some distance away but from what he had just seen, it wouldn't matter.

"Pyrrha! The city!" Jauned repeated hoarsely, struggling against the ground to rise to his feet, crying out as his broken arm scraped uselessly against stone. The limb was thoroughly crushed, flopping painfully with every movement. "Pyrrha stop!" He groaned, "You can't!"

His words fell on deaf ears. The light continued to intensify, approaching its peak. Any time now, it would be released, erasing both the woman, Vale and anything else in between from existence.

"Pyrrha! Stop!"

Something rushed through his vision. Something dark and vivid and fast blurred through the air, even as he screamed.

From the gaping absence of the eastern wall, an umbral comet streaked. It barreled into the inferno unperturbed, slamming into the ground with the crackling retort of shattering stone, the remaining walls shivering from the impact.

Pyrrha had shifted in alarm, only to find one of her arms cleaved clean off at the shoulder in an instant. The limb bounced across the floor, sending its deadly payload of energy skyward, this time eradicating the bowing ceiling before settling into a pile of blackened ash

The lambent form screeched, thrashing about as if it still registered the sensation of pain. It lifted its head, and though it sported no discernable facial features, it clearly displayed an expression of intense hatred.

"Tsk, that was supposed to be a killshot." The newcomer clicked her tongue.

Jaune tumbled backwards as his knees gave out. "M-master?" He stammered.

"Shut up and get back, brat."

Her tone and mannerisms were identical to when he had met her in the city, but now her face bore a look that he had never seen her display before. It was not the stern, calm demeanor of the mentor he recognized, nor the wild, dangerous look he had been unnerved to discover in their last meeting. It was an expression of deadly focus–a cold, flat stare that saw all and permitted none. It was the look of a killer.

Pyrrha roared in Hua's direction, her glowing maw stretching beyond human limits. A gout of flame rushed out, only to be dispersed with the swing of the massive sheathe.

"Nice try, but I've already dealt with one of your kind before. That's not going to work on me."

A barrage of searing tendrils followed in answer.

"I said," Hua grunted, easily batting away the lashes, "That's not going to work!"

She dropped the sheathe on the ground, where it smoothly shifted open, revealing three hilts. She grasped the first and rushed forward.

Pyrrha saw the attack and moved to meet the hateful thing that had taken her arm. She blazed a path in an instant, but was caught off-guard when the newcomer easily matched her speed.

Her enemy vanished, and the piercing pain in Pyrrha's flank indicated that she had somehow gotten around her. A tendril of flame snapped out engulfing the blade, but the woman surrendered it without hesitation, the melting steel vanishing before it even touched the ground.

More sharp pains, this time in her back, and she looked up to see a torrent of similar blades falling from above. She pounced to the left to escape the razor hail, only to receive a blow to the gut. Something long and thin had whipped around and batted her away.

A spear. The woman now wielded a spear. She flourished it with extravagant skill before unleashing a barrage of swift jabs, each finding their mark beneath the veil of torrid heat.

Pyrrha hissed, jumping away from the stinging flurry, but was caught off guard when the woman seemed to anticipate her actions. Transitioning into a fluid throw, her foe sent the weapon shooting towards her at blinding speeds. It bit deeply into the veil of flame, piercing what cowered beneath, and flinging her bodily across the hall. She crashed violently into a pile of rapidly melting steel and stone.

All around her, a cage of steel and blades manifested, rising out of the ground in a hulking, rattling cage. They wound about her form, binding her tightly before she could even regain her footing.

She howled miserably, struggling against her imprisonment before expunging a great deal of heat and light in a momentous, momentary pulse which slackened the trap just enough for her to swiftly slide out of its deadly embrace.

She retreated warily, cautious of any more unexpected attacks, and paused a good distance away. Her flames whipped about in intricate, frenzied patterns, flaring out in a show of desperate intimidation. Animalistic instinct weighed the benefits of continuing combat or fleeing.

Sighing, Hua tossed her weapon to the side, which, like its brethren, vanished into the ether. Her sheathe shut once more, and she grabbed the haft loosely.

"You're a stubborn one, aren't you?" She asked, curiously tilting her head and shrewdly eyeing her adversary. "I may not be in peak condition, but the fact that you still haven't gone down is seriously annoying." She hefted the gargantuan weapon easily with both hands. "I'll be getting a bit rough."

Pyrrha stilled. The writhing flames thrashed about in even greater agitation. Somewhere in her howling, confused maelstrom of a mind, something screamed of unsurpassed danger. Something that superseded conscious thought, something primal, insisted that she flee as fast and as far away as possible from the terrible, terrible thing with the cold, scarlet stare. Danger was here. Death was here.

The fiery lashes retracted cautiously, slowly closing around Pyrrha like a flower hiding its face from the world. She curled in their torrid embrace, supported by the ethereal tendrils as they wove a dazzling cocoon around her form. Their light grew incomparably bright as the orb began to slowly climb into the skies.

"Oh no you don't," Hua growled, bounding forwards, arms cocked to deliver a brutal blow, but stumbled when an unexpected weight latched onto her side.

"Wha—? Get the hell off of me, brat!"

Jaune had fought his way to his feet, his trembling form barely able to remain upright. He grasped tightly at Hua's waist with what fleeting strength he could muster, trying in vain to dissuade her from cutting down his partner.

"You can't kill her!" He rasped desperately, "That's Pyrrha!"

"I have no idea who that is!" Hua snarled back, brushing Jaune off with ease and sending him crashing painfully to the floor.

She turned back to find the orb approaching the zenith of its effulgence, radiant lashes barely contained within itself.

The strangled utterances of her downed apprentice wafted up from behind her.

"Shit," she groaned after a split-second of contemplation.

She leapt at her writhing disciple as the shine reached its peak and exploded into a hellish cataclysm. Brandishing her sheathe with astounding ease and dexterity for an armament of its size, she swept in great, heavy arcs. The weight of her strikes parted the blazing sea, dispersing and redirecting wretched, grasping flares to where they could inflict no harm. When it was over, theirs remained the only patch of stone in the immediate proximity that hadn't been reduced to cooling magma.

Growling, Hua whipped her head forward to find nothing but a glowing crater where the being of light and flame had stood.

Far overhead, a hateful star ascended into the dusky embrace of night, her supernal radiance outshining all her brethren in the spangled sky. For a scant few moments, that terrible luminary dispelled the darkness, bathing Vale in the luster of a false dawn.

And then she was gone, shooting beyond the horizon with another titanic explosion, a fulgent meteor wreathed in iridescent flame.

Silence fell and night reclaimed the skies. The temperature began to rapidly plummet back to the cool hues of an early-winter evening.

"She got away." Hua stated after a moment of stunned disbelief, her tone deceptively flat. "I could have finished it right here, but she got away. Damn it, brat. Do you have any idea what you've done?"

From his place on the floor, Jaune moaned miserably.

Hua crouched by his side, roughly grasping stained, golden locks and wrenching his head up to face hers. She studied his bloodied, bruised countenance dispassionately for a moment.

"No. Of course you don't," she seethed dully. "Congratulations, you've doomed thousands."

"I couldn't let you kill Pyrrha," Jaune hoarsely groaned through cracked, parched lips.

"Shut up." She hissed coldly, dropping his head in disgust. "You're a failure."

Turning and leaving his prone body amidst the cooling wreckage, she stalked to the end of the entry hall, furiously kicking down what remained of the door, and sending the heavy slab sailing off into the gloom. All around her, their progenitor now absent, dying fires stooped lower and lower.

The academy had been razed to the ground. The flaming thing's desperate parting-blow had swept the honored, gleaming edifices from existence, leaving only heaps of twisted slag and barren patches of black dirt.

She surveyed the wreckage as she made her way to the promontory overlooking the bay.

Charred, unrecognizable corpses lay littered across the grounds in various states of disarray. Some had clearly been caught entirely unaware, with messy piles of ash signaling that they had been vaporized where they stood. Others had desperately rushed from the demoniac flames, their shriveled corpses strewn in a headlong tumble down the path. She did not bother looking any further. She could already sense it: there was not a single survivor among the charred husks.

Hua's gaze shifted, turning skyward for a moment when the slight pitter-patter of drops brushed her ears.

The remaining flames drank the rain gratefully, sating themselves on the balmy dew and finally, fully extinguished. Soot and crumbling coal ran in dark, heavy rivulets, staining the shattered pavement before soaking into the blackened earth.

She basked in the sensation of light drops against her skin, the cool water subduing and soothing her inflamed temper. She inhaled deeply. The rich fragrance of petrichor had already begun to waft up from the earth, dispelling the choking aroma of smoke. She stood like this for several moments on the outcrop that overlooked the bay, allowing the droning droplets to lull her frenzied thoughts into calm serenity.

From over the gloomy horizon, an earth-shaking bellow trumpeted through the skies, shattering the stillness and bringing back the ugly irritation that had so briefly been warded away. Outlined faintly in the darkness, a gargantuan, draconian form gradually revealed itself. It beat great wings laboriously as it forged an inexorable path towards the helpless city below.

"Oh, good," Hua muttered, a vile expression gouging itself into creases upon her face. "A punching bag."


They really should have been more focused in a situation like this. They were in the middle of a war zone. Furious, ravenous monsters roamed the silent streets; complacency could spell a meaningless, needless death.

Even so, the guardians of the last line of defense found themselves swiftly slipping out of a battle-ready mindset into something more placid as the minutes ticked by.

Nothing had happened. They had waited in tense anticipation for the expectant flood to batter them, overwhelm them, but it had never come. Occasionally, a straggler would make it to their line only to be summarily dispatched. They had initially taken it as a portent of the oncoming horde, but after a handful more arrived with the same result, it was clear that there would be nothing of the sort.

The fight had been long and had taken its toll in every conceivable way. This abrupt lull following hours of strenuous combat now left them all only semi-lucid. Deprived of the adrenaline that had kept them going on the battlefield, they found their focus faltering, their minds wandering.

Yang sat idly atop the rubble of a half-collapsed building, half-focused eyes staring blearily into the distance. Weiss stifled a muted yawn, sagging against a darkened streetlight even as she struggled to maintain a prim and proper appearance. Even ever-vigilant Blake seemed barely able to keep her eyes open, her fingers slackening upon her weapon.

Perched atop a ruined building, the same was true for Ruby. She did her best to keep a diligent watch over their surroundings, just in case, but found her head dropping, her lids drooping, with increasing frequency.

She inhaled a deep lungful of wintery air to rouse herself, coughing slightly at the lingering scent of smoke, and peered through the glass of her rifle. She did a perfunctory sweep of the major veins and side streets, nodding in satisfaction at the lack of any discernible movement.

Just as she leaned away once again, something at the edge of her vision arrested her attention. Hurriedly, she jammed her eye back on the scope before frantically calling her team.

"Hey guys?" She spoke into her scroll.

"What's up, Rubes?" Yang's voice crackled languidly over the line.

"Something's coming," she relayed, squinting, trying to discern more from the darkness. "Something big."

"What do you mean, 'something big?' What is it?" Weiss demanded.

"I can't tell. It's too dark. I'm coming down. It doesn't look like it's friendly."

Ruby shifted Crescent Rose into its compact form and made her way down from the rooftops.

"Hey sis," Yang called casually as she arrived. "So what's this big–"

An aggravated, rumbling bellow trumpeted in the night sky. An ominous, titanic shadow followed, looming oppressively over Vale.

"Oh. Never mind. I see it. What the hell is that thing?"

It's wings beat in a strained, labored manner, and it seemed to thrash wildly in mid-flight, as if plagued by some dire ailment.

"It's a dragon," Blake murmured in shock, her faunus eyes able to discern the nature of the beast before her allies could.

The creature's altitude fell precipitously as it seemed to struggle to remain aloft. Its wings moved jerkily, uncoordinated in their cadence and tempo.

"Is it just me or is it getting lower?" Yang asked.

One of the beast's wings suddenly flew off, swiftly followed by the other.

"Yup, definitely getting lower." Blake answered.

The massive drake crashed into the ground several streets away, leveling buildings as its gargantuan form carved a trench through the city.

"We should probably check that out, right?"

"Let's go," Ruby decided.

Team RWBY plus Ren and Nora left the other students–who were all too glad to remain at the barricades–and rushed through the adjoining streets. If the dragon was still alive after its fall, they would have to deal with it. Somehow.

A desolate slate of land marked the terrible grimm's descent. Everything–buildings, vehicles, even the pavement–had been wiped clear as the gargantuan body bulldozed through the obstacles. A long, earthen trench lay in their place.

As they approached, the beast shifted sluggishly, as if collecting itself from a stupendous daze. Several of its bony protrusions had cracked or shattered, and its mask was a broken mess, revealing putrid, black flesh beneath. All gathered could see ragged stumps where the massive wings had been sheared off. They flapped instinctively, yet ineffectually. As it moved, tarry, festering globules splashed from its form and, where they contacted the ground, new grimm rose from the mire.

"Tough bastard," someone complained, hopping from the stunned grimm's back, casually dispatching the closest spawn as she landed.

"You're–"

"The crazy teacher!" Nora cut her partner off.

Hua shifted a brow, finally noticing her small audience.

"Oh. The brat's friends are here. Great. I'm going to pretend that I didn't hear that, so make yourselves useful and help me deal with this thing." She peered, hands on her hips, contemplatively at the groaning behemoth.

"Roger!" Nora exclaimed, hefting her hammer.

"Don't waste your time," Hua reprimanded, "you won't be able to kill it." She shook her head. "Just shut up and follow me."

She studied the group, eyes lingering on Ruby for a touch longer than the others.

"You three," she decided, indicating towards Ruby, Ren and Blake. "You seem fast. Keep its attention and lead it to the breach. Try not to get killed. The rest of you, deal with the grimm it leaves behind."

Nora and Ren nodded, but the rest were not so quick to follow.

"Who the heck are you?" Yang demanded. She had adopted a boxing stance, warily eyeing the woman who suddenly appeared very, very cross.

"Why," Hua seethed, a dour expression twisting her features, "does no one on this gods-forsaken world just listen to me? Stop asking questions! This isn't the time! I know what I'm doing, so just do as I say!"

"Yang it's alright," Nora called brightly. "She's here to help, uh, I think?"

The murderous glare being leveled her way and the uncertain assurance did little to assuage Yang's suspicions, but she conceded nonetheless. The woman was right; it really wasn't the time.

They set off.

The trek back to the origin of the destruction was an expedient one. Though, that tended to be the only real option when an oversized murder-lizard was persistently giving chase.

The grimm dragon clambered through the streets, tearing through buildings with impunity, barely hindered by the obstructions. Luckily for the bait, it seemed that the abrupt tumble from the sky had severely injured one of its limbs, and it was just barely able to keep track of their forms as they swiftly bound from building to building.

Far below, all manner of fledgling grimm rose from the trail of putrid muck that it left in its wake. They were summarily executed by the cleanup squad.

Hua darted restlessly about the great beast, chains trailing from her form and entwining around the wyvern's body–loose enough that it could still move, but still snug enough that she could influence its course when it began to stray from the predetermined path.

Ruby was the first to make it to the plaza, using her semblance to zip further ahead, intent on forging a way through what would undoubtedly be a heavy grimm infestation.

Leaving the shelter of the buildings for exposed, open space, she fully expected an immediate, rabid assault, but was stunned to see that the grimm's numbers had dwindled significantly.

A familiar, white form danced among the masses, ruthlessly plowing down what was left of the horde.

The girl whirled with lethal grace, laying low even the mightiest grimm with ease. The heavy, hooded coat had been discarded, and flowing, white braids flew freely in time with her movements. The mask, too, had been cast away, and a familiar visage focused intently upon its enemies, eyes glowing fiercely in twin hues of azure and gold.

Ruby recognized that face immediately.

"Kiana!?"

The girl in question stilled mid-strike, a hapless beowulf crumpling noiselessly before her. Slowly, tremulously, she turned, and a bullet buzzed past her, striking another stealthily approaching grimm.

"You're okay!" Quickly stowing her weapon, Ruby rushed the last few yards to reunite with the friend that had gone missing all those months ago.

Kiana was unsure how to respond. She opened her mouth to either make an excuse or apologize, but was saved the trouble as Ruby latched onto her. For such a small girl, she certainly had impressive strength in her arms.

"I'm glad you're alright," Ruby said earnestly, before pulling back, beaming, taking in her appearance. "You were the Huntress?" She realized. "You were so cool!"

Kiana waved her hands nervously, taken aback by the sudden, excitable praise.

"I'm, uh, sorry for running off," she apologized, awkwardly patting Ruby's arm. "I thought it would be best if I got out of there after…that. I didn't think anyone would miss me that much."

"Rubes gets attached to people she likes pretty easily," a voice supplied. Yang was the next to arrive, rushing over to the pair, and offering Kiana a wan smile. "It's good to see you again." She hesitated for a moment. "You, uh, won't go psycho on us again, will you?"

Kiana blanched, and opened her mouth to answer, but was cut off as the grimm dragon broke the final line of buildings and burst wildly into the plaza with an aggravated roar.

"Not the time, kids!"

Hua shot past them, a handful of ethereal chains muzzling the dragon while the rest of the group frantically commanded its attention.

Ruby grinned sheepishly, and Yang clapped Kiana on the shoulder. "We'll catch up later, alright? Right now we got a big lizard to kill."

Kiana nodded and the trio rushed to aid their allies.

"A bit more…a bit more…Perfect!" Hua yelled, tugging on the makeshift reins, ushering the squirming beast directly over the jagged scar in the earth. Flashing a thumbs up and a savage, toothy grin at the frantic students, she called out, "Keep it there for a second."

"We're gonna die!" One of them screamed. She couldn't be bothered to figure out which.

"Weaklings," she scoffed. A mass of chains sprung into existence, winding about the beast and dragging it down, tethering it to the earth. Helplessly, the dragon flailed against its bindings, but the shackles held fast.

"You. Miss Huntress." She stated the title mockingly, as if jeering at some cosmic jest that none but herself were privy to. "How high up can you get with those portals?"

"I'm…not sure," the person in question responded guardedly. "Pretty high up?"

"Good enough." She hefted the oversized sheathe to Kiana. "Break its back."

Deftly catching the armament, she staggered in surprise at the unexpected weight. "What?"

"Grimm physiology is similar to any other living creature. At least, it is where it matters. Shatter its spine and it'll stop flailing around. Aim for the base of the neck, right above the shoulders."

Dubiously, Kiana stared at the other woman. Some part of her, one that had long since slumbered, told her that this strange woman was an ally. This was a person who could be relied on, no matter how uncannily off she seemed.

Shrugging bemusedly, she chose to follow her instincts. Gripped the haft of the great bludgeon tightly, she conjured a portal at her feet. Like a diver plunging through a hole in the ice, she dropped through.

And was immediately plummeting from well above the city's skyline.

This high up, she could barely make out the jagged, ugly wound that marred Vale's heart, let alone her target, but she was confident enough in her aim to know that the beast was directly below her. She stabilized her fall and reoriented so that she was falling headfirst, straight as an arrow, a white comet in the night. Howling winds screamed in her ears and her blurred vision reduced the swiftly approaching ground to incoherent blobs of flickering light and abject darkness. She shifted the bludgeon in anticipation, loosing a mighty yell as she plummeted the final hundred feet.

Crashing thunderously down on the shackled grimm, the gratuitous snapping and crunching of bone and sinew served as a sickening symphony underscoring her deed. With an ignoble screech, the dragon slumped, its limbs twitching spasmodically as impulses from what passed as a brain were suddenly severed.

Kiana tumbled violently off to the wayside, crashing through rubble and gouging a path through stained pavement. She lay on her back in the filth, the cold, viscous fluids soaking her coat red. She stared blankly at the sky from which she had just fallen. Her abnormally robust constitution had spared her from serious injury, but she was still left winded and stunned, her arms buzzing painfully from the impact.

"Good work, Kiana." Hua maneuvered to the head of the beast, admiring her ally's handiwork.

Glowing crimson focused on her approaching form, and she met the hate-filled glare with unimpressed neutrality. "Quiet down." She reprimanded the snarling, snapping beast, and tapped into the last of her fleeting power.

It need not be a grand dream. It need not be absolute nor even particularly powerful. Now that the body had been crippled, stifling the mind would be child's play.

Something seemed to shift in the air.

"Is it…dead?" Ruby asked, approaching the scene cautiously, knuckles white against the haft of Crescent Rose.

The dragon had slumped into silence, the glow of its eyes dull and dim.

"Just asleep," the woman responded evenly. "If it were dead, it would be disappearing by now."

"Well, what are we waiting for? Let's kill it." Yang eagerly cracked her knuckles as she approached.

"Relax. I've got other plans for this thing."

"Oh yeah? Like what?"

"I was just getting to that." Hua nodded towards Ruby. "Say, Red."

"Y-yeah?" The girl seemed taken aback at the sudden address from this unnerving stranger.

"Blondie here's your sister, right?"

She blinked. "Uh, yeah, but why?"

"Good." Hua nodded thoughtfully, not answering the question. Striding over to the girl in question, mocking eyes meticulously measured her, sizing her up. Hua's lips curved upwards into a sly smirk.

Yang met that unsettling gaze unflinchingly, an ember of challenge smoldering in her eyes. Her muscles had tensed, her entire being on edge, screaming of danger as the woman approached.

"You two really do seem to care about each other quite a bit, don't you?" Hua's tone had adopted a saccharine quality of false interest. The smile, stretched too tightly to be considered friendly, widened, but still failed to reach her eyes–those remained flat and cold. "Quite the sisterly bond there."

Ruby fidgeted. Something about the line of questioning was causing her hair to stand on end. Her skin crawled uncomfortably with sensations of jittery anticipation.

Yang's lips pulled back in a grimace, lilac flickering dangerously to red. Her fists clenched tightly and she stepped forward, heedless of the instinctual, foreboding feeling that this woman's mere presence instilled.

"Is that supposed to mean something?" She growled, pushing her face uncomfortably close to the leering visage in front of her. The woman smelt of ashes and copper. "Yeah, we're sisters, so of course we care about each other. Is that supposed to be a problem?"

"No, no problem, really," Hua said. Rather than back down at the show of aggression, her tone only became more whimsical, more cloying in its careless intensity. "Just that either one of you would be quite distraught if something happened to the other, right? It would be just devastating."

The creases in Yang's face deepened into an ugly scowl, her eyes settled on a bloody, vicious crimson. Wisps of heat began to build around her. She growled threateningly.

"If you do anything to Ruby–"

"Who said anything about Red?"

An odd sound echoed in the silent night. A cracking and snapping, followed by soft squelches and the splatter of liquid onto already-drenched pavement.

"Yang?" Ruby called out, an oppressive dread mounting in her chest.

"Messy, messy," the odd woman muttered, idly wiping at a stained, crimson hand with a sleeve. She stepped backwards, and Yang collapsed, tumbling heavily onto the pavement, not even moving to break her fall. Crimson ichor flowed, mixing with the abundant red pools on the ground.

"Yang…no…" Ruby's words echoed distantly in her own ears, as if she had plunged deep within the ocean. She half-stumbled, half-ran to her fallen sibling, heedless of the monster staring dispassionately down.

Surprisingly, she simply stepped to the side, allowing Ruby passage.

Ruby knelt, loosing a strangled cry when she realized she could see the ground through her sister's back. Desperately, she rolled Yang over, fretting over the gaping, ragged hole.

"Oh no…You're going to be okay, Yang, you're going to be okay. I need to stop the bleeding," She murmured frantically, nearly incoherently, to herself, hands straying to the wound before flinching back. "No, no, I shouldn't move her too much. What do I do? What do I do? Yang, what do I do?"

Yang always had an answer for Ruby's troubles, but now she could only sputter weakly in Ruby's arms. Her eyes flickered wildly, erratically, back and forth, attempting to understand the situation. Her chest heaved unevenly, desperately trying to force air into ruptured lungs. The blood ceased to circulate through her veins, the precious pump responsible for that essential function now ruined beyond salvaging. Every wet, rasping breath she exhaled was replaced by a half-breath, and then a quarter-breath, and then an eighth.

Ruby blinked. Everything–the hellscape around them, her sister's dying form, her own hands, now stained scarlet–all blurred together in a wet, jumbled mess.

"Yang, don't leave me!" She bawled. "It'll be okay! Everything will be okay!"

She became acutely aware of a lack of movement at her lap.

"Yang?" Ruby furiously wiped at her eyes.

The stuttering rise and fall of Yang's chest had ceased, the pained, sputtering breaths now distinctly absent. Glassy lilac orbs stared unseeing into nothingness, wide and unfocused. Formerly rosy cheeks had paled considerably, and the normally smug, cocksure expression was now set in a rictus of shock and confusion. There was no longer a flicker of a soul remaining within that empty shell. The vital force had departed with cruel finality.

"No," Ruby whimpered. "No, no, no, no!"

With every denial, a stifling pressure built behind her eyes. A pounding migraine began hammering a swift staccato within the depths of a grief-stricken mind. Something silver and shining flickered tenuously, like the hesitant flame of a dying candle.

Yang couldn't be gone, Ruby tried to reason. Strong, reliable Yang. She was her unbeatable sister. They would always have each other's backs.

"The joke's over, Yang, get up," Ruby choked out. "You got me, alright? It's not funny anymore, so get up. Please get up."

Yang liked to pull pranks. Any moment now, she would pop up and tease her for being such a crybaby. Ruby was a good sport; she wouldn't get angry. She would take the teasing in stride and then they would laugh about it and go home like nothing had happened.

Yang didn't move.

"Dammit Yang!" Ruby shook her shoulder, as if to rouse her from a deep slumber. Lightly at first, but then more urgently. "Come back! Wake up! Please!" She screamed, now desperately shaking the cooling form that had been so vibrantly animated not ten minutes earlier. "I need you Yang! Please don't leave me!"

But still, her sister's body lay still and silent.

Ruby threw her head back, howling despair to the heavens, the reality of the loss crashing into her all at once.

And silver light blossomed in the night.


Second half of the battle. Fight scenes are still hard.