HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Rooster Teeth Productions
Co-authored with ToxicExotic
A Soothing Song (19)
Pulling her coat a little tighter, Blake let out a small breath that instantly turned to fog. The day was another cold one, probably the coldest of the year so far, leading to her choice in clothing being her leather catsuit for once. The tight fabric was a tiny bit restricting, but the fact it kept body heat trapped inside, and the frigid wind outside, were benefits that far outweighed such a small negative. Another thing that was good about her outfit was that Ruby's eyes had flown wide open when she had entered the kitchen wearing it.
Despite knowing they were going on a mission, of sorts, Blake couldn't help tease her girlfriend a little. With the outfit being very form fitting, she had enjoyed feeling Ruby's eyes on her whenever she reached into a top cupboard for sugar, or stretched in preparation for the mission. They may have been taking things slow, but knowing Ruby was definitely interested, along with seeing the flustered look on her face whenever she thought Blake had caught her looking, was a little too cute to resist. She had even waited until the last possible minute before putting her coat on, something that Yang had remarked about as they left the house.
The coat itself was a beautiful, white tailcoat with light purple accents, and had been a gift from Weiss after the heiress saw her eyeing it for nearly a week, so she was always cautious about wearing it overmuch. However, despite how thin it was, the material was designed to keep the wearer warm during cold weather, so it was also too good to pass up on such a cold day. Unfortunately, even with her clothing designed to keep out the cold, it was still managing to sneak its way in through the tiniest gaps.
As she pushed her way through the trees though, she returned her thoughts back to the mission. She was currently following a track she had picked up roughly five minutes ago. She had no idea if it was the right one, as there were no prints due to yesterday's sleet fall, but the broken twigs she was following were definitely not broken by Grimm. Taking a knee as she found another, she heard Ruby and Yang stop behind her.
"Find something?" Yang asked, just as she did every time Blake stopped to check.
Blake didn't mind of course, as she knew the blonde simply wanted to know when she could punch whatever had killed the girl. It was however a decent clue this time. While it was just another suspiciously snapped twig, the direction was consistent with all the others she'd found so far. So giving a short nod as she stood up, Blake pointed in the direction she was certain the tracks were headed.
"They seem to be leading that way," she said firmly.
"That's Peel's Pond up ahead," Ruby said with a hum. "Guess I should have gone with my gut instead of starting where she was found."
"No, it's good you changed your mind," Blake clarified. "Had you been wrong we would have wasted a day searching the area. At least now we have confirmation she came from that direction."
"And what she was doing there."
Both Blake and Ruby gave Yang a confused look as they had no idea what the blonde was talking about, but thankfully she quickly filled them in.
"She had a date," Yang groaned with a shake of her head. "Peel's Pond is a dating spot. All the Signal kids know that."
"I didn't?"
"Well you never had a date, and graduated before you could."
"Oh. True."
"If she had a date then surely there would be someone else missing," Blake said and continued their walk towards the pond, making sure to push Yang aside so that she didn't scuff the tracks. Just in case they were still needed. "We would have heard about that yesterday, right?"
"I dunno," Yang shrugged and slipped her hands into her pocket. "Hopefully whoever is was got away, or didn't show up. A shitty as that sounds to say."
Blake understood Yang's meaning on the last part. It felt callous to say as it meant Pearl's last thoughts might have been that she was stood up, but it also meant that person would have avoided what was obviously a very deadly situation. As she thought about it, she was glad that situation would never arise with Ruby; while the reaper seemed to have a little more trouble with fighting people, she was more than proficient at taking out Grimm.
Blake actually quite liked that about her girlfriend. Ruby cared about not hurting people so much that she always had trouble committing to an all out attack; but when it came to Grimm, she was like a surgical instrument. Never a wasted strike, never a missed opportunity, watching her fight the bloodthirsty creatures was like watching an artist paint a masterpiece.
"Maybe," Blake said quietly as Ruby came up to her side. "You two know what's on this island, what do you think did it?"
"Dunno," Ruby said with a sigh. "None that I know of. Kelly said she had small scratch marks on her, but Signal has classes on how to escape Beowolves. She also smelled like seawater apparently, but there are no underwater Grimm this far inland since we have blockades where the river meets the ocean."
"Yeah," Yang agreed thoughtfully. "Could be something new though, been a couple reports of new stuff lately."
"If it is then we'll need to tread carefully. Study as much as we can before we kill it, then report straight to Ozpin. New Grimm are bad news."
"Agreed," Blake hummed.
Huntsmen and Huntresses weren't just tasked with the extermination of Grimm, though that was their main job, they were also tasked with gathering as much information about them as possible. It was dangerous to come across a new species for the first time, as they would always provide a new challenge, but that was exactly why it was important. Gathering intel helped others who encountered it in the future, meaning less people were likely to die. Of course, the Grimm dying took precedence if it was too dangerous to study, but studying them was always encouraged.
Fortunately, she wouldn't have to wait much longer to see if it was a new species as they quickly arrived at the pond. Pushing through the trees, her eyes fell upon a body of water that was a little bigger than she expected. It was actually quite beautiful, the still water reflecting the cloudy sky while small bushes lined the bank, each one glittering from the frost that clung to its brambles. Nothing immediately struck her as odd, but clearly something had caught Ruby's attention as she took a step forward and focused on the water.
"Something wrong?" She asked, alert just in case she needed to track something.
"The pond should be frozen," Ruby replied, her voice barely above a whisper. "It always is this time of year."
Ruby was right. With how cold it had been the last couple of days, there should have at least been a thin layer of ice across the pond; but there was nothing. Suddenly the beauty the pond had possessed before turned ominous, and Blake drew her weapon, as did Ruby and Yang.
"You think whatever attacked Pearl is still here?" Yang asked, following Ruby's lead in keeping her voice quiet.
"Could be," Ruby hummed and raised the sniper, using her scope to check the other bank. "Fan out. Search the bank for clues, but don't get too close and stay quiet. If it hasn't realised we're here yet, then we keep the element of surprise. But if you see anything that looks like a Grimm, shout."
"Got it," Blake and Yang said, both of them splitting off in the opposite directions and activating the team's coms, though hers seems to be messing up, and giving a slight bit of feedback.
Ignoring the slight humming in her ear, as she could still hear Yang and Ruby just fine, Blake kept one eye on the ground and one on the water. As she walked slowly around the bank of the pond, she felt the wet mud slosh around beneath her feet. Ruby was right in that it wasn't normal. In such cold weather the lake should definitely be frozen, and the bank should be hard with frozen mud. Looking towards the water properly, she gazed into it and tried to see anything. Thankfully she saw nothing.
Good, maybe it's moved on, she thought to herself, returning her gaze to the surrounding area. This place really does make a good dat… Blake cut out her thoughts and shook her head as it wasn't the time to be thinking about such things, though the action made her earpiece hum a little louder. Must be a faulty wire, she thought, making a note to ask Ruby to look later.
As she continued her search, she knelt down every now and again to investigate some tracks. They were odd, not like anything she had seen before. Multiple thin lines about the width of Gambol Shroud's sheath, but the edges were quite wavy. Had the tracks not been so wide, she would have said they belonged to a snake; but while they were wide, they were also too thin to belong to a King Taijitu.
"Anything yet?" Ruby's said through her earpiece, the voice causing a shiver to run through her for some reason.
"No."
"Found some tracks, could be something else though," Blake replied.
"Alright."
Gods, even her voice is amazing. Again, Blake shook her head free of the thoughts. Focus, Blake.
That was easier said than done. Every time she shook her head the humming from the earpiece seems to get louder; and though it was slightly distracting, it wasn't entirely unpleasant. Thankfully there was no crackle to it, just a hum that her brain seemed to have found some melody to. Pushing it aside, she returned her focus to the bank followed the tracks along the water's edge.
After five minutes of searching, she felt her foot hit something more solid, yet more giving, than a rock and came to a stop. Leaning down, she pushed some of the mud aside and saw what looked to be a bracelet. Picking it up, she watched all the silver beads drop to the ground and quickly inspected the split ends of the string. It hadn't been torn or ripped away from its owner, but cut. The pink spots that ran along the string itself were enough to tell Blake that the bracelet had not been lost without injury.
Pocketing the string and reaching down to pick up the beads, she raised them to eye level. Each one was engraved with a single letter, and though she knew what the word would spell, she rearranged them until the word PEARL sat in her hand. Letting out a brief sigh, she stared at them for a second and found herself transfixed. The way the faint light of the sun glinted off of them was almost exactly like the way Ruby's eyes danced in the light. Or when she saw some freshly baked cookies.
Or after I kissed her, Blake thought with a smile to herself as she looked at the beads.
"Hey, Blake," Yang's voice came over the coms. "Can you stop humming? It's hard to listen for stuff with you in my ear."
Yang words caught her off guard. She didn't know when she had started, but her throat was definitely letting out a low rumble in time with the earpiece. "Sorry."
Pulling her eyes away from the little balls of metal, she quickly placed them into her pocket alongside the string, and continued her investigation. A low fog was starting to pour into the area, not particularly thick at the moment, but with how fast it was coming on they likely only had just over an hour before it became too dense to see the other side of the lake. Letting out a sigh that they would likely only be finding tracks today, Blake followed the tracks until they abruptly ended.
There were no more tracks. Not on the grass, nor on the bank, so leaning down she inspected the end of them closely. They were deeper, like whatever had left them had dug itself into the mud and jumped. With the extra depth, she could see that the lines weren't in fact solid. Part of them was, the very centre being roughly the same thickness as her arm, but shooting off from them were short, thin lines. While Blake didn't know what had left the tracks, she knew what the lines were. Bone. More specifically the thin, hair-like bones you would see jutting from the spine of a fish.
Mmm, fish, she thought instinctively. Ruby and Yang had bought her one yesterday and prepared it. After months of decent-at-best school food, the meal had been a wonderful treat, and Blake had savoured every mouthful. The conversation had been pleasant as well. Though Yang and Ruby were still clearly a little upset over Pearl, they all still managed to have a decent time.
The night had concluded with Blake and Ruby cuddled up on the couch. Not much had happened except a little hand holding and a kiss goodnight, but she remembered how it felt to be near her. How she smelt like strawberries, how due to the warmth of the house Ruby had changed into her pyjamas which clung just that little bit more tightly to her body and accentuated her curves. Her mind raced even now as she thought about how badly she wanted to run her hands over those curves, how she wished she had tasted Ruby neck with her lips when it was so clo...
No… that wasn't right. She hadn't thought those things last night, though she was certainly thinking about them now; and she could barely stop her mind from racing. And why was she humming again? She could feel it, her throat pulsing in time with the song in her head. Something was wrong, these weren't he…
Standing up, she looked around and saw the fog was thick enough that she couldn't see her team. But that was too soon as well. Confused by the thoughts, she span around and tried to see through the dense mist.
Then she saw her and her mind eased. Ruby was there. But why was she in the lake? She hadn't told them that she was entering it. And what had happened to her clothes? Why was she barely wearing anything?
So they don't get wet, duh, she reasoned to herself, her humming continuing as she took a step towards her girlfriend. The girl seemed to notice her approach and turned to face her, a wide smile painting itself across her face, and she glided effortlessly through the water. An arm raised toward her and Ruby crooked a finger, clearly wanting Blake to join her. Blake knew she shouldn't, that she was supposed to be doing something; but with her beautiful girlfriend before her and a wonderful song playing in her head, she couldn't remember what that thing was. So with no clear reason not to join her, Blake gave the girl a smile and took a step forward with her own hand outstretched.
That was when she heard it. A loud blood curdling scream that chilled her entire body as if she had been plunged into the pond itself.
"BLAAAAAKE!"
"BLAAAAAKE!"
She was already running as fast as she could, even though she had seen it too late. The pale white, misshapen body that almost looked human from afar that stood in the water, the grotesquely bent arm that was held out to Blake, Blake's own reaching back. By the time she had seen it and took off running, Blake was already underwater, taken by the sea creature to the depths of the pond.
She was stupid. So stupid. The lake, the humming, the tracks, the seawater smell on Pearl; she should have realised what was happening. But the river barricades had never failed before so she hadn't even considered it. But that didn't matter, hindsight wouldn't help right now, all that mattered was getting to Blake. So stripping her coat and throwing it to the ground as she neared where Blake went under, she prepared to jump in. However, just as she was about to jump, she felt a strong hand close painfully on her shoulder and throw her backwards with enough force that she rolled head over heels a number of times.
Finally coming to a stop covered in dirt and mud, she looked up just in time to see Yang's blonde hair disappearing below the water. She wanted to shout out again, to run and join so that they could get Blake together, but her smarts won out. She knew Yang wouldn't fail, she never did, so while she waited with her nerves on edge, she retrieved her coat and ran over to collect Gambol shroud from where it was left forgotten and scooped it up. By the time she had shoved it onto the back of her belt, a bubbling could be heard coming from the lake, followed by a geyser of water that sent a malformed shape slamming into a rock on the opposite side of the bank.
The figure was hideous. Pale white skin stretched over bony ribs so tight that it was torn in places revealing the organs underneath. The arms were bent and crooked, bones and sharp spines stuck out at odd angles. It's face was the most disturbing. Almost human enough to be deceiving from a distance, but Ruby knew that up close that it eyes were actually covered in a thin fleshy veil that was almost always hidden by a curtain of lank, patchy black hair. From the waist protruded six skeletal limbs, each one looking like the carcass of the fish Ruby had thrown away yesterday, and each ending with a malformed eel's head whose jaws snapped at the air. Attached to each the limbs were shining, bulbous yellow sacs.
As the Syren righted itself and dove back into the water, a disturbance on her side of the bank drew her attention, and she quickly darted forward to meet her sister. Blake was in her arms, her whole body shivering from the ice water she had been plunged into. She was breathing but it was fast, much too fast. She was gulping like every breath was difficult, and before Ruby could say a word Yang had thrown the Faunus into her arms.
"Help her, I have this."
Looking at her sister, Ruby saw the blonde's eyes were such a fierce red that she didn't reply and simply obeyed. Before she could move however, one of the creature's skeletal limbs shot out of the water straight at them, only to be swiftly caught by Yang.
"GO!" She bellowed, the limb twisting side to side as it quickly snapped free of Yang's grasp while pulling the girl forward towards the water. A nod was all Ruby could give and she immediately activated her semblance.
Carrying another body was still difficult for her, but there was nothing that could make her fail now, not when so much was at stake. Within a second Ruby arrived back at the treeline and placed Blake gently on the floor. She was deathly pale and she knew the girl's body was going into shock. With one last glance over to her sister, she saw the blonde slam her fists together, her hair glowing brighter than the sun as steam folded off her. Another limb shot out of the water, but Yang seized it and pulled hard. That was all the time she had to watch the two beasts fight as she knew Blake needed her attention.
"B-Blake," Ruby stuttered, trying to get the girl's attention as her trembling hands worked the zipper of the coat down. "I n-need to g-et these off."
Blake was panicking and there was little she could do for that right now. She needed to focus on the main issue, and that was stopping the blood that would be rushing to Blake's chest. With the coat finally open, she shoved the two sides apart and pulled down the zipper keeping her catsuit in place. She only needed access to Blake's chest, but the zipper didn't go far enough so she was forced to rip the leather a little deeper into the cleavage.
Just like I wanted to this mo…
Ruby cut her thoughts short, knowing the Syren was influencing them. Now that it was exposed, it was spreading its song properly to try to play on their desires to weaken them, but Ruby pushed it from her head and instead focused on helping her girlfriend.
Reaching down to her belt, she pulled one of her spare rounds free and put the tip in her mouth. What she was about to do was risky and that Weiss would berate her if she ever found out, but that wasn't going to stop her, so activating her aura, she bit down as hard as she could and gave it a solid twist; praying the dust inside didn't activate. Thankfully it didn't and the bullet came free. Without wasting a second she poured the bright red powder onto Blake's chest and repeated the process with two more bullets.
When she was sure it was enough, she grabbed for Blake's arms but they were still flailing slightly as she struggled for breath.
"Bl-Blake, please," She sobbed, trying to grab the limbs and finally succeeding. "Look at me!"
She found her voice firm on her last instruction and it clearly punctuated Blake's panicked mind as the amber eyes found her own. Emboldened by the newfound focus, Ruby placed the freezing cold hand on the edges of the dust before placing her own on Blake's chest so that they were covered in as much of the powder as possible. Though she normally would have closed her eyes to focus, Blake seemed to need them to stay focused; so gritting her teeth, she gently activated her aura.
Heat erupted between her hands and Blake's skin as the fire dust heated up, but Ruby was careful not to let it fully burn. She needed Blake to warm up, not to burn alive. It was tough, Weiss had stressed how careful she needed to be with the aura flow when teaching her, and Ruby tried to remember everything Weiss had said. Thankfully she knew she was doing well as her girlfriend's shivers began to slow, as did her breathing. More and more focus returned to Blake's eyes with each passing second until finally one of the hands lifted and closed over her own. Seeing Blake able to move and breathe properly again finally made the tears that had been on the verge of spilling break free, and she let her head hang in relief.
"Ru…"
She cut the girl off and pressed her lips against the Faunus', her relief that Blake was going to be fine too much to stop her. However, less than a second later, she felt a hand on her own chest pushing her away.
"H-H-Help Y-Yang."
"But you…"
"Wil… fine," Blake breathed, her voice still stuttering heavily. "Pl...se."
Looking her girlfriend firmly in the eyes for reassurance, she found a strength there and knew it was fine for her to leave. So picking up the coat she had dropped to the ground when placing Blake down, she threw it over the Faunus and gave her a fleeting kiss before quickly running to help her sister.
As strong as Yang was, even she could only hold off an elder Syren for so long. Even the younger ones with their four limbs could be a challenge, but as they grew from their battles they frequently grew extra limbs and even shock sacs. It was those yellow sacs that were causing electricity to run across the limbs, along with causing sparks every time one slammed against the ground. While the current wasn't particularly strong, reports had shown that it was powerful enough to stun for a moment and even leave a nasty burn should it hit an auraless foe.
Seeing one tear through the air towards her sister, who had jumped to avoid another, Ruby activated her semblance and caught her sister.
"Thanks, sis," Yang breathed quickly once they landed. "How's Blake?"
"Fine."
"Good. Then let's kill this bitch."
Another limb surged towards them, the very end tipped with the skeletal head of an eel, it's thin needle like teeth barred. Glowing a bright gold, Yang reared her fist back and took a strong step forward as she struck out. Her fist collided with it and the bones shattered and scattered across the ground before quickly turning to smoke. Before they could take another step forward to the creature, it retreated further into the lake out of their reach.
Knowing that they couldn't fight it in its own habitat, Ruby turned to her sister and gave her a command. "We need it out of the water so don't destroy any more spines. Use them to drag it out."
With a nod, Yang rushed to the water's edge. Almost immediately another limb shot out of the water and tried to ensnare her but Yang caught it easily. Just as it did the first time, the Grimm twisted it's whole body and Yang was forced to let go, or risk being pulled in. The moment it was free, it thrashed in a circle and three more limbs swept through the air towards them, but they both easily dodged them with a small back step. However, as she moved vaulted backward, Ruby reached out and caught one of the spines with the hook of her scythe just below the eels head.
Once again, the Grimm tried to spin free, but since there was no arm to twist, its efforts were useless and the bones merely scraped along unyielding metal. It's strength was still an issue however, and if Yang's hand hadn't clamped on to the base of Crescent Rose, Ruby would have likely been pulled into the pond. But Yang and Ruby had been training together for years, they knew each other better than anyone else in the world and there was nobody in the world she trusted more with a piece of herself. So feeling Yang give a strong tug of the weapon, Ruby trusted Crescent Rose to Yang and took off at a sprint towards the main body.
More limbs cracked through the air as they tried to stop her approach, but she ducked and flipped over each of them. She could hear the song getting louder as the creature grew closer, not only from her sprinting but from Yang fishing it out of the lake. Ruby tried to block it out, but she could feel it digging in, dragging the desire from her. Nevertheless, she activated her semblance and jumped up onto the outstretched limb that Yang was pulling at. The main body was almost at the water's edge, the mottled flesh stretching over the torso flickering and smoothing out, the lanky black hair becoming voluminous and darker. The veiled eyes danced between red and amber. But Ruby ignored it, ignored the fact that Blake's body, or what she thought would be Blake's body, was right in front of her, and continued her charge.
Limbs flew at her at random, but dodging them with her semblance was effortless. As she reached the flickering body, she leapt and twisted her body in mid air to deliver a drop kick to the creature's face that would make Yang proud. With the Syren off balance, Yang pulled it the rest of the way out of the lake and Ruby used her semblance to push herself forward to avoid taking a plunge.
"RUBY!" Yang words echoed through the area the second she landed.
Looking up, she saw Yang throw her scythe straight at her with such force that the spinning blur of red sheared straight through another limb. With little effort, Ruby caught it. Crescent Rose was a part of her and she doubted there would ever come a time where she didn't catch it. And the very moment she felt the metal graze her fingers, she let it slide over her hands and easily altered the momentum to suit her needs. Smacking another limb aside, she let her hand fall to the base so the head carried her forward, sweeping her off her feet and nimbly avoiding another spine that careened at her.
Repositioning her body and the scythe midair, Ruby jammed the nozzle to the ground and fired off a round to propel her forward. Again her feet collided with the beast, though this time it was its rotted chest, and her knees bent as she gathered her strength. Activating her semblance, she boosted off the creature with enough force to make it stagger backwards towards Yang, just in time to avoid a tentacle that was swung at her. The blonde brute's strong hand quickly wrapped around the thing's head and, with a guttural scream of anger, she twisted her body and threw it as far away from the lake as she could.
However, as it soared through the air towards the treeline, Ruby felt something wrap around her ankle and instinctively activated her aura. She barely had time to look down and see the skeletal eel trying to bite into her leg before the momentum of the Grimm's body caught up and the world turned into a blur of colour.
She came to a stop as her back slammed into a tree and pain ran through her body. Aura stopped damage, but that didn't mean you didn't feel it. Thankfully she had a high pain threshold and quickly shrugged it off. In the impact, the spine on her ankle had slipped, but as she lay face down, her instincts told her something was coming. Listening to them, she rolled to the side just in time to avoid the bones that crashed into the spot she had been laying seconds ago; though she didn't avoid the electricity that sparked from it. One thin string of yellow lightning arced toward her and her nerves lit on fire, the immediate pain enough to elicit a grunt from her. She knew any normal person would have screamed from the pain, but Ruby gritted her teeth and bore it while standing to her feet.
The Grimm was now between them again, its curved, bone limbs holding it a couple of meters off the ground, but this time Yang was the obstacle the thing would have to overcome to get back in the lake. While Ruby would have done her best to stop it getting back into the water, she knew Yang was much better suited for that role if the Syren tried for a full force attempt. So picking up her scythe, Ruby charged forward to attack at the same time that Yang did.
The sound of sniper shots and rockets filled the air and Ruby was aware of a small, repetitive popping that sounded a lot like Blake's weapon. With each shot, more and more dirt and wood splinters filled the area as they both fought off the grotesque limbs that tried to keep them at bay. Every time they had a second of reprieve from the lashing tentacles, they would attempt to fire at the hideous creature's face or body, but it always either swayed to the side like seaweed or let its body flop disgustingly. While the entire thing was gross, the way the main body moved like it had no bones was enough to make Ruby's stomach churn.
"This isn't working, Ruby," she heard Yang shout as she missed another shot. "I can't… hit shit."
"We need… to take more… Ugh... limbs off," she panted in return, feeling another spark hit her body as she barely avoided another swipe. "Slow it down."
"Open to ideas, here."
Unfortunately, they were making little progress in getting to the body. Though two spiny limbs hung uselessly from the waist, it still had four left. They were quick too, each one slicing through the air with reckless abandon as it effortlessly repositioned itself with each swing, and getting hit by one guaranteed a shock to the system. She had already received three more hits in her attempt to get close, and her muscles screamed more and more each time the shocks ran through her. But she couldn't let it live, so knowing they had to remove more limbs to finish the fight before it exhausted them, she made a decision and smacked away another attempt to wrap her while twisting her body to throw her Scythe.
"Strawberries," she called as she let go of it.
The name had originally been Strawberry Sunrise, named after their favourite food and the gold of Yang's hair, but it had also become quickly apparent that the name was too long to say in the midst of battle. Thankfully, it hadn't taken long to get accustomed to the shortened version and Yang recognised the signal.
"Got it!"
She activated her semblance and launched into the air as the scythe hurtled towards Yang. . During her ascent, she saw the blonde sidestep yet another tentacle, that shot towards her as the Grimm dodged the spinning weapon, and twisted her body to punch the incoming scythe. Her fist landed perfectly on the butt of the hook and her gauntlets released a shell that rocketed the scythe into the air, where Ruby was ready to intercept. Emerging from her ball of roses, Ruby landed easily on the top of Crescent Rose and activated her semblance, just as she had against the Syren's chest. Careful not to lose its momentum, Ruby boosted herself off the metal and sent it screaming towards the ground as she went even higher.
Watching from high on, Ruby saw the short blade attached to the bottom split the ground and force the weapon to bury itself in the ground. Though the intent had been for the spear to cut through the Grimm itself, the Syren had dodged it again. However, Yang had the foresight to launch herself off the ground with the power of her gauntlets and seize two of the tentacles as Crescent Rose continued even deeper, the two long bony limbs that Yang held being severed cleanly when it finally bottomed out like a miniature guillotine.
Ruby watched everything as she rose higher into the air, Yang growing smaller and smaller until she was barely recognisable below, but as she felt her ascent slow and began to descend, she activated her semblance again and shot straight to the ground. It took less than two seconds for her to reach a speed so fast that she could no longer keep her eyes open, not that she needed them to be. She trusted Yang's aim, they had worked on the move for years and gone over it in meticulous detail; so, while at full speed she reached out both hands and felt a warmth meet them as she caught Yang's Dust rockets.
"AAARRRGH!"
Less than a second later, she struck the ground with such force that she knew every bone in her body would have been broken without her aura. That force was what she needed though. Pain exploded across her body as the frost-hardened ground cracked and fractured, the deep fissure spreading out from her landing point like spider webs. Without losing a single ounce of the momentum, she dropped to her knees and slammed the Dust into the crater. The force of her landing combined with the explosion of the dust caused a devastating shockwave to erupt around her, the fire Dust mingling with the wave to give it a burning orange hue and an incredible amount of heat. From what other people had said when they had seen her practice it with Yang, she knew it would look to an outsider like a large bomb was going off.
The force of the shockwave threw everything backwards. Dirt, rocks, chucks of the earth that had cracked when Ruby landed; even the Grimm that she had landed right next to. The vile thing spun helplessly in the air and Yang launched herself up to finish it. Apparently the Syren wasn't done yet however, as a limb struck out at the blonde. With the momentum of its spinning along with its strength, the force of the strike sent Yang plummeting to the leaf covered forest floor with such force that she bounced off the hard ground and her aura flickered for a second, but not enough to give out. Thankfully she stood up a second later, the limb that had struck her dangling lifelessly from where she had caught it as it slowly faded into smoke.
Pulling Crescent Rose from the ground proved easy due to it being so cracked from her landing; but as she stood up properly, she felt her body scream bloody murder at her for what she had just done to it. She knew that both she and Yang were low on aura, but thankfully the Grimm was done for. Turning to face where she had heard it land, she saw it laying helplessly on the ground. With only one limb remaining, it was no longer able to stand, no longer able to dodge or do anything to save itself. The only thing it could do was drag itself along the cold earth with its weak, broken arms that were only fit for holding something underwater.
In a last attempt to save itself, the final limb shot towards Yang, but once again the girl's hair glowed like the sun as she caught it. Knowing shocks would be running through Yang's already weak body, Ruby raised her sniper and shot the limb off at the middle. With the head that allowed it to move gone, the final spine dropped pathetically to the ground and remained still.
Watching Yang walk over to it, Ruby returned her weapon to its scythe form, the noise echoing across the now silent area and drawing Yang's eye. The blonde seemed to understand, and instead of finishing it instantly, she reached down to seize a clump of the horrid black hair to hold it up. As the body was picked up, the thin arms tried to scratch at Yang with its sharp claws, but the gold shimmer of Yang's aura protected her.
"All yours, Sis."
There was no rush now, it's fate was sealed after all, so Ruby held her scythe to her side and walked calmly towards the despicable creature. She had never been one for hate, never in her life had she actually hated a person, and knew she never would, no matter what they had done. But these things, they were not human. They didn't have feelings, or mercy; all they did was kill and ruin lives. How many had the one before her killed to grow so strong? Ten? Fifty? A hundred? Likely the latter. Then it had killed a friend, a child taken from her family forever, and then tried to kill Blake. It was those thoughts that rushed to the forefront of her mind and told her everything she needed to know. The pathetic thing in front of her was one thing she hated with her whole being.
However, as she was almost in killing range, something happened that caused Ruby some confusion. One of the veils that covered its eyes had split open during the fight and the black ball beneath was visible, the red iris in the center spasming around in the socket. But as Ruby drew closer, the red stopped spinning and locked into her own silver eyes. It was then that it happened.
The red contracted and the body began to squirm more. The weak arms that had been meekly clawing at Yang's began frantically scratching and tearing at the thing holding it in place. With every step, the thrashing grew more and more frantic as the red eye refused to stray away from her own silver ones. It was then that Ruby saw it, an emotion. Not love, or anything redeeming; but fear. Pure, unrestrained fear.
Good, Ruby thought viciously as she finally got close enough and slowly raised her scythe with aching arms. Let it be scared. Let it feel the fear that all its victims felt.
Holding the scythe high in the air for a moment, Ruby took a deep breath. Expelling it slowly, she brought the heavy metal weapon down. The blade slid through the rotted, pale flesh with ease, and the writhing instantly stopped as the body slumped lifelessly to the floor. Straightening up, she saw the head still dangling from Yang's hands by the thin strands of hair, it's mouth dropping open to reveal two rows of broken, chipped teeth. However, after a couple of seconds, smoke began to rise and the head slowly disintegrated from the neck upward. Just before it was done, Yang dropped it carelessly to the floor.
"Bitch," Yang growled, spitting on what little remained of the skull before turning to look her way. "You okay?"
"Yeah," Ruby breathed, whole whole body screaming at her as the adrenaline faded. "We should get Blake…" She was cut off as she looked at her girlfriend. "... home."
Littered around the treeline were smoking Beowolf bodies. Ruby hadn't even noticed, but it appeared Blake had recovered enough to protect them from any other Grimm that had tried to join the fight. But the fight seemed to have drained what energy the girl had left, and Ruby quickly rushed forward as Blake struggled to pull her sword from the corpse of a vulpine beast. Arriving just in time as Blake's legs gave out, Ruby wrapped a hand around her waist and kept her steady.
"You should have called for help," Ruby said with a sigh as she heaved Blake up to her feet, but merely receiving a slight chuckle in return.
"I'm fine," She replied, her voice clearly very tired despite her words. "Can you maybe scold me at home though? So I can lay down."
She was most certainly going to scold Blake for putting herself in danger without telling them, but for right now, she needed to thank her. As Blake finally found her feet, Ruby pressed in and kissed her. With no Grimm or emergency to interrupt them, Ruby put as much feeling into it as she could, before pulling away to give her a smile.
"Thank you. For protecting us."
"Alright you two, save the cute stuff for later," Yang said before Blake could reply, taking Blake from Ruby with a groan. "We all need some rest."
Ruby couldn't lie, rest sounded really good as her entire body was screaming for her to sit down, so much so that even the walk home seemed daunting. So giving her sister nothing more than a nod, she slipped her hand into Blake's and the three of them slowly made their way back to the house.
Raalm's Notes
Hello everyone, I hope you enjoyed this chapters. I actually had a lot of fun writing it, especially the first scene as I got to try my hand at some suspense stuff, so let me know how that felt. The Grimm was also something that was super fun to write. Me and Toxic spit-balled it for a while and pulled from a couple of sources such as Fey, Succubi, The Apathy. The result is something I am actually kinda proud of, so I really hope you enjoyed. Another things I had a lot of fun planning was the Strawberry Sunrise team attack. I pulled from a couple of sources in show for that, like the ending of chapter 2's food fight and Roman repositioning his Dust bullet on the aircraft in V3, so I hope that felt good too. Another thing I wanna touch on is a scene at the end of the fight with the Grimm freaking out. While we don't want to have Ruby activate her eyes in this story, as its not a show story line me and Toxic actually like or want to write, it would feel weird not to acknowledge them. So this was mostly an example of an elder Grimm being old enough and smart enough to recognise them, even though Ruby doesn't know about them. It was mostly inspired by Qrow's talk at the end of V3 about Grimm fearing silver eyed warriors.
Anyways, that is it from me. I really look forward to your feedback on this chapter and I very much hope you enjoyed. As I wanna start saying when the next chapter is in these notes now, the next chapter for this is scheduled for the 30th, so I hope you look forward to that. Have a happy holidays :)
Toxic's Notes
So yall know how I mentioned awhile back how I might end up in the dungeon, well beneath my dungeon is Raalm's evil scientist, the chapter u just read was mostly his brain child combined with a bit of my imagery work that resulted in what u just finished.
So... Now that that is out the way, I'm looking forward to seeing the comments as I always do, this chapter went through so many rewrites to get it feeling right I think other than how plot points went the whole thing is different from how we started. Not that that is a bad thing, anyway what I'm trying to say is, I'm really really happy with how much feedback we're getting on this fic like seriously you guys/girls/whatever yall want to be called, are nuts, I love to see ur comments and feedback even if its just a kudos, getting emails a solid five days after an upload is nuts to me, and its gonna take awhile to get used to it. So see u in the next one, and Happy holidays :)