Silver

by Imyoshi

Forced to admit that Crocea Mors didn't feel right in his hands—no matter how he held it—Jaune Arc struggled to overcome this obstacle through the insane idea that Aura could become more than just the armor that protected him. Barriers broke as he pushed past the limits of what Aura was capable of, creating and forging his very own weapons from the manifestation of his soul.

23. Grease

Disclaimer: I own nothing of RWBY.

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Grease

By: Imyoshi

Faith and trust sounded the same, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

Faith allowed a person to believe in another power unconsciously.

Trust allowed that person to believe in that power consciously.

Having faith in Lore's abilities but distrusting its power almost tore a rift in Jaune Arc's soul, especially for such an emotional-based power, but he finally managed to repent his ignorance and close the gap. Fear no longer gripped his heart. Ragnarok—his shield—protect his team with the power of Lore!

Hide them in the shadows where the light couldn't blind them!

"Ragnarok?"

Something inside Jaune Arc broke upon hearing the near-defeated tone of Nora's voice. Last time she sounded so destroyed was when she ingested the Lore shard, on the verge of death, and now it was related to Ren's critical condition with a cruel twist of Fate reversing the situations. Tch! Outer Space felt a dwindling life force on the brink of release and revealed another missing entirely. Time was not on their side. She knew this.

Lore cooled to impossibly cold depths.

Nora Valkyrie needed reassurance, Lie Ren needed help, and Pyrrha Nikos needed saving. Team JNPR—his friends—his family—all needed their Fearless Leader!

Now!

"Don't worry, I've got you covered!" Jaune struggled against the iron sand and threw his right hand out for Gravities to speed toward Amber. "Grab Ren and get behind me! Hurry! Nora!"

Nora gasped. Her leader's orders snapped her out of her trance, and she hugged Ren's body close to her chest with secure arms. Right! Fresh tears reluctantly stopped, and she picked up his body protectively, racing toward Jaune with a renewed sense of hope. Her heart still shattered with each weak breath Ren took, but she thanked Monty Oum that he was still breathing. Weak was fine, she could manage weak.

"Where do you think you're going?" Amber demanded. "I'm not finished with either of you!"

She growled and aimed a tendril of iron sand for Nora's back, but the whip remained stuck to the shield. No amount of bending would break it free. So she huffed. Her right eye glowed in annoyance. Retracting some of her control, she cut ties with the ends of the iron sand connected to Ragnarok and freed her metal. Right after, she willed the material to strike her target with sharpened ends, but those strange black orbs collided with her attack and disrupted her sand. Suddenly the ore sediments became difficult and slower to move, like a sharp weight change during mid-battle. Other bits of grains got pulled into the orbs and weakened the form of her spears altogether.

What. The. Hell!

Jaune glared while smirking on the inside. Poor Amber, what good was fighting with a weapon too heavy to wield? Quickly, he shifted his sights to his running teammate, frowning at the blood staining the inside of the cloak. Not good. She tentatively approached the black ooze of Lore on the floor with a nervous foot, first time seeing Dark Matter. After what happened to Ren, he hardly blamed her hesitation, but when she figured out it belonged to him, she dashed inside and ran up to him with a runny nose and tears on the edge of escaping.

Her broken voice would haunt his nightmares until his dying days.

"J-Jaune... Ren's..."

"I know." Jaune struggled to maintain a stalemate between his Gravities and the iron sand from this distance. Not an easy task. Not with his body damaged and a teammate to look after. As far as he saw, he only had one option. He carefully kneeled and patted the floor of darkness. "Leave Ren right here."

She quickly backed away and held him for dear life. "But! But! But—!"

He swiftly jumped forward and blocked a hailstorm of iron bullets from pelting her on the back. Ragnarok absorbed the blows, but he fought to push her back. Amber was slowly learning her way around the Gravities. Iron moved faster. The weakness of Lore's lackluster speed was growing apparent with their body-jacker. Lore protected, not fought. He needed a fighter to exploit the openings with a powerhouse of brawn.

He needed Nora.

A quick thrust of his hand propelled all five Gravities to home-in on Amber's body, and she summoned a wall of iron to protect herself and capture the spheres in a waterfall of cascading minerals. Such a risky tactic blocked her sight. The leader briskly used this moment to shift his attention back to the troubled girl. They might not get a second chance to plan a strategy.

"You're going to have to trust me, Nora. I need your help—Ren needs your help. Pyrrha, too. I can't fight her alone. Lore's too slow on its own. We'll distract together and keep her from attacking Ren. Okay?"

She bit her lip, emotions running rampant. An internal struggle raged inside the Valkyrie. Love made people act dumb. She only wanted to run away and keep Ren safe, but Pyrrha and Jaune needed her too. Turquoise eyes couldn't ignore the damage on her leader's body. The bruises, the cuts, all of it! She knew full well Lore didn't heal. The fight with Penny Polendina wrecked his body, if she wished to save her family, then she had to trust Jaune.

Then she saw the dried tear stains between the blackness of his eyes and knew right then and there this wasn't easy on him either. None of it. All of this wounded him just as much as it hurt her, she wasn't the only one about to lose a partner. This fight mattered. Leaving Ren alone must be tearing him apart inside, but abandoning Pyrrha would kill his soul.

"Okay." Nora anxiously laid Ren down on the floor of darkness. She ran a tender hand across his cheek and held back a hiccup. "Promise me you'll be safe, Ren."

He said nothing so Jaune filled the void with confidence. "Ren's always been a man of few words. He'll back on his feet in no time, just you wait!"

That managed a small smile from the Valkyrie. She laughed bitterly. Leave it to Jaune to make her laugh—silly leader—but it did help lift her spirits. Fists formed, a body stopped shaking, and tears dried with nothing but anger taking its place. Nora turned around and bore hatred to the wall of iron sand blocking them from their other friend. First her precious Magnhild and now Ren? Failing one friend almost crushed her, but two? No. No! They would not lose anyone!

Nothing bad ever happened!

"Let's show this Amber person why you don't mess with us! She picked with the wrong team to mess with!"

He smirked. "Ditto."

She spared a glance over her shoulder at Ren. First, pummel Amber, rescue Pyrrha, and then save Ren. All in that order! Good! Without another thought, she charged for the faker with Jaune staying behind. Once she exited the small circle of Lore, he peeked down and willed Dark Matter to converse around Ren. The new control felt strange. Maybe Lore was giving him a break on the ins-and-outs? Either way, he deeply appreciated the technique and decided to train later. Running on his instincts, he slapped his hand down on the floor and focused entirely on the circle moving around his friend's body. A massive chunk of Lore secreted from his soul and merged with the Lore beneath.

Dark Matter shrunk and began arching upward to form a sphere similar to that of Penny's Dust dome. All of it gravitated to the Lore cloak.

"Hide... Dark Matter."

Jaune sighed in relief when he observed the Lore attach to the cloak and escape his control. Part of him thought that might not work, but it did, maybe more of his Lore cutting him some slack, and now Dark Matter started encasing itself around Ren's body. Humph! Small mercies later! The Arc frowned at his companion's weakening Outer Space. Time to end this fight! He quickly ran out and chased after Nora and turned during the run to check if Dark Matter created an Empty Space for Ren to hide in.

It did.

How lucky.

Thunder!

Jaune set his sights on Amber's location. A bolt of lightning crashed down upon the wall of iron and dislodged the Gravities inside. Iron conducted the bolts of electricity, and he pulled and summoned his orbs back in fear that she might manage to destroy them. Maiden Powers, or whatever Penny called them, were too great of unknown to take chances with, and he preferred not learning if they could or could not destroy Lore. Five Gravities would be a detrimental waste of Lore.

Nora stood a few feet away from the mass of iron. The clouds above them turned murky. A sense of dread filled the air, and she occasionally forgot to breathe. Jaune soon joined her and raised Ragnarok in preparation of another volley of metal, she couldn't help but offer Ren another peek, but when she glanced over, he was gone.

Panic quickly seized her heart. "Wait? Where's Ren!"

He grinned. "Don't worry about him. Trust me, he's hidden. You can thank Dark Matter for that."

Her heart thumped. "... Are you sure?"

"Positive."

She wanted to ask more questions, demand even, but the iron wall suddenly produced spikes and pivoted in all directions. Metal, metal everywhere! Nora prepared to dodge incoming pins, but Jaune lunged forward, shielding her with Ragnarok pulling in the spikes. Feet dug into the ground with his Gravities hovering nearby to lessen the weight of the iron and working to increase his. His body still trembled from the direct collision, but at least he stopped the threat. Just in time, too, because Pyrrha's stolen body walked through the sand with a deep frown and summoned her weapon back.

"I was hoping that kill you." Amber groaned with her eye glowing and metal floating. She glared directly at Jaune. "I can't believe you beat Penny. So much for the weakest in Beacon."

He refused to humor her, bashing away the iron stuck to Ragnarok. "What have you done with Pyrrha? Give her back!"

She scoffed. "You're too late, she's gone, and I'm in control now."

A quick glimpse with Outer Space showed nothing but Amber's Aura controlling Pyrrha's body. All the evidence pointed to her claim, but stubbornness refused the results. Still, he couldn't find an ounce of familiar blood Aura anywhere. Nothing! Ragnarok shook in his arm. No! Look harder, Arc! Pyrrha had to be alive in there!

Somewhere.

Amber leaned forward with a smirk. He grunted, moving his foot back to prepare for another possible attack. Blue eyes flickered up to the posed weapons of iron, and his thoughts clicked at the edging metal. Wait? Iron? Polarity? Semblance? Something wasn't adding up. Amber shouldn't be able to use his partner's Semblance since that power belonged to Pyrrha, not Amber. Semblances, like Aura, belonged to an individual's soul. Maybe? Potentially? He had to believe that the truth.

Ragnarok stopped trembling. He moved forward. "No, you're wrong. You're still able to use her Semblance. I might not know much about how Semblances work, but I do know they're a manifestation of the person's soul. Pyrrha's still in there! That's the only way you're still using her Semblance, and I intend to save her!"

"Yeah!" Nora added. "We'll save her! So give up!"

Amber dropped the smirk and frowned. "You'll fail."

Gravities wavered around their shoulders and challenged the tendrils of metals. Dark sclerae glared over the edge of Ragnarok. "Wanna bet?"

Growl!

Amber screamed and unleashed her iron sand at the pair with deadly brutality. Betting? No! After fighting Ren and Nora, she wasn't planning on taking any chances. She spread her arms out and commanded the iron to rain down to pierce any vital spots. Metal danced in the air, bodies moved, and the duo separated by flanking her ten-and-two. A pull shifted in her grasp, her metal centered back on that bothersome black shield of his, leaving her side wide open for the powerhouse to come in.

"Nora, you have to deliver the blows!" Jaune roared while sending out Gravities to weaken her Aura. "I'll be your shield!"

"Right!"

Amber clicked her teeth. Nora took advantage by charging forward with her wisps stuck and fists ready to deliver some nasty blows. Not good. She reached out to pull iron sand free from a tentacle, forming a staff to combat the girl's mad strength, but those pesky orbs were closing in fast. Twirling her metallic staff, she smashed some of the spheres away while blocking an impact with the brunt of her weapon from a fist that shook her bones and strained her muscles. The action caused her to slide back and tumble against the floor, but at least it created some distance.

Not like it mattered.

Nora remained relentless. Fury drove her to act without mercy. Regret kept her senses sharp. Amber had to roll out of the way of a foot attempting to crush her stomach, multiple times. Each effort like a crack on the floor. Each miss made the blood race in her ears and heart. None of this should be happening, but her weapon was currently locked down with that leader. If that wasn't enough, when she managed to flip and throw the girl off her balance with a well-timed leg sweep, one of those Gravities collided with her foot mid-kick to her stomach, and she swore her Aura took a significant hit doing so, throwing off her concentration and worsening her mood. Couldn't be though, had to be her mind playing tricks on her.

Jumping back, she willed the iron to break away from the shield, but that plan backfired almost immediately. The stubborn fool only pulled her iron sand closer, staying put in that one spot while she dealt with Nora and those black orbs that he appeared to be controlling with one arm. Fantastic. More headaches. At least she had her alloy staff to fight with, but all the twirling in the world barely made a difference when it was six against one. Nora took clear advantage of that by lunging inside to tackle her down. Not like Amber planned for that to happen, so she spun her mineral staff and landed a horizontal strike on her lower abdomen, but things turned worse when Nora deliberately grabbed her weapon and locked them both in place with regained strength.

Amber blinked at the brash tactic. Seriously? Who took damage on purpose? Then her answer came when she easily flicked away one of those Gravities with her palm. Her body convulsed upon contact, forcing her to abandon her weapon in favor of dodging the other four orbs. Aura levels dipped. Nope, not imagining it, definitely losing Aura when those things hit. Breathing, her eyes widened when Nora threw her spear at her shoulder. She quickly caught the staff, only to be stuck dodging an array of crashing Gravities. Tch! Any time she hit one of those with her weapon, it momentarily grew heavy, like a bag of rocks. Things weren't—!

Smash!

What? Hazel eyes grew in horror. A vicious right hook delivered a nasty blow to her abdomen, sending her flying violently across the clearing. What the hell? How did she manage to move so quickly? Where had that strength come—arg! She crashed into a tree, breaking worn bark with it ultimately toppling over and falling on her, creating a cloud of dust. A hush silence soon fell over the battlefield with Nora ready at a moment's notice as the iron sand dispersed from a lack of control.

Jaune held his position upon watching the hue of Amber's Aura glowing brightly in the dust cloud.

Underneath the tree, Amber gripped handfuls of dirt, teeth bared with shaky shoulders. Damn it! She slammed a fist against the floor. Nothing was working. Another fist. Not a thing! Iron sand couldn't accomplish anything, not with Ragnarok, whatever that blasted shield was, restricting her movements. She first needed to rescue her iron sand before taking the fight to them. Not such an easy task with that Nora girl protected by those orbs which, in turn, protected her annoying leader.

Humph! Her head shot up to look passed Nora to glare at the Mr. Tall, Blond and Scraggly. Those eyes of his creeped her out, not to mention his freaky shield sent bad vibes up her skin, like a nasty case of the heebie-jeebies, but the answer to her problems centered around him. Attacking Nora achieved nothing but draining her Aura and wasting time, time she did not have. No. She settled her sights on him. He had to go down. Take down the armor and expose the underbelly.

Time to take the fight to him!

A mighty wind blew the tree off her body with her stepping out, covered in foliage and dirt. She blew a pesky leaf off her nose and glared heatedly at the troublesome leader, Maiden eye burning. Yes, Nora was nothing more than a distraction. Bringing the leader down should turn the tides of the fight. Now, how to reach him, those floating spheres created one heck of a problem. Aura draining plus tracking with a powerhouse to add to the list of headaches.

Amber reached out to summon her small collection of iron sand freed from Ragnarok's icy grip, her staff stubbornly held by the Valkyrie girl. Humph! She tried her best to hold onto it, but mineral metal had its uses by breaking into bite-size bits before reforming again. Like so. Her reliable weapon surely shattered in Nora's palms to regenerate back in her waiting hands. Perfect, too, because those Gravities worked their way over to drain her Aura. Hitting them with her body was the last thing on her list of things to do.

Dodge! Parry! Block! Strike! Amber acted each one of those moves to combat against the Gravities. When it came to close-hand combat, she knew her footwork made others paled in comparison. Parry! Metal kept Gravity's elusive Aura-draining properties at bay. Striking allowed her the chance to spread them thin. Controlling five must be strenuous on the body. Dodging helped—!

She widened her eyes and jumped back to avoid Nora's attempt of a double-handed hit to the back of her skull. A quick kick to the chin, followed by a strike to the side of her midriff was all she could muster before the Gravities closed in and collided with the base of her weapon. Feet strained under an increased weight. Maiden Powers flared. Her body reacted, Amber quickly dropped her staff to sprint while Nora was busy recovering from her damage. She focused her Semblance on her metal leggings and covered a fair amount of distance, all the while reaching out to will the iron sediment to escape Gravities' weaker hold.

A spear with razor sharpened edges materialized in her hand.

Jaune Arc glared.

So Amber switched her sights for him? So be it. A quick summoning of his Gravities trailed her shadow as she closed in. She then threw her hands forward, and the iron sand trapped by his shield shifted, instead of moving away, it pushed forward, digging into parts of his body with spikes piercing delicate skin. A choked gasp escaped his lips with Nora chasing after the impostor. Fair to say he hadn't seen that one coming.

Ragnarok failed to protect his entire person, allowing drifting iron sand to strike various areas of his body. Shifting an attack versus directly blocking one was fundamentally different. Either as a regular shield and blocked what he could, or an advanced version of Black Hole and pulled in the attacks directly for the crescent moons, be it Aura or Semblance. Gravitating an attack, while a convenient ability, drained him of his Lore reserves, not to mention hiding Ren hadn't helped keep his reserves up. Blood spilling from his body only made things worse.

She closed the distance.

Iron sand confined his body, digging deeper into skin, allowing Amber to move in and connect a metallic strike across his cheeks with the brunt of her staff. A gurgle of blood drained from his mouth, she went in for a second attack, this time aiming to pierce his flesh, but Gravities closed in to protect him. Too bad his weakened state provided her the chance to recall her iron sand back. Vibrating metal danced in the air, then she turned around, rained down a hail of iron needles at the approaching Valkyrie, only for the remaining Gravities to null that attack by exhausting their velocity.

She smirked.

Oh well, worked for her! Turning around to will a mass of iron sand to bury the damaged Arc, she charged in when he lifted his shield to block the avalanche and landed a swipe of a sharpened iron blade across his exposed chest. Lore failed to mitigate the damage. Blood spilled. He groaned, she delivered a Semblance enhanced kick to his body that fractured a rib, and the tide of the battle shifted in her favor when he lost the concentration to maintain control of the five Gravities.

"Jaune!"

Nora dashed in and threw a haymaker for Amber's face, but iron moved up to block her strike. None of the impact made it to her. The tendril then wrapped around her wrist and traveled up her body to deliver the same treatment as Ren, but the Valkyrie possessed inhumane strength and ripped herself free before crushing minerals trapped her in a coffin. She followed up by using Amber's weapon as a stepping stone to close the distance between her and Jaune as blades of iron narrowly missed piercing her feet.

Amber relished the change of flow.

Nora landed in front of her panting leader, arms crossed in a makeshift shield, growling with the tendrils of iron mocking her. Each was ready to strike at any time. Jaune only coughed up more blood, too busy to pay them any mind. His fingers trailed up to touch the gash across his chest, ignoring the wincing the pain with diluted curiosity. Blue eyes unfocused on his bloodstained digits to concentrate on the lowering levels of his Lore reserves. Five Gravities wasted, not good. Playing defense wasn't cutting it. If he lost another surge of Lore like that, then their teammates were doomed. Ren would die. Pyrrha would—!

Time to move on the offensive.

"I'm okay, Nora, but you're going to have to share the battlefield. I'm joining in."

Nora shot a glance over her shoulder. "Fearless Leader?"

A bloody fist formed with the Arc willing away Ragnarok. He moved forward to stand beside her, illuminating a deep shade of black. Soon the blood vanished under a pool of darkness that spread from his fingers to his wrists. Both his hands encased themselves with shadows, and he took a pose similar to Yang's, only amateurish. Nora merely grinned predatorily at the confused impostor. Two against one, bring it on!

"Trap, Black Hole!"

Across from them, the iron sand wobbled along with Amber's confidence. A sense of fear seized her neck. Those gloves almost looked like—no! She vigorously shook her head. Couldn't be, had to be a coincidence, nothing more than a fluke. So what if they looked like the ones her attacker used? Those stole some of her Maiden Powers. What were the chances these did the same? Zero! Not a chance! Impossible! Positively not from Pyrrha Nikos' partner of all people! To lose her second chance to these two, and after she just escaped Death's icy grip?

Not a chance in hell!

A mass of iron centered entirely on Jaune, aiming to strike and end him. Iron spikes rained down. Fear took over. They moved. He dodged the impalement, narrowly avoided the disrupted bedrock in favor of sidestepping another volley of nails that left little time for him to gain a footing. Readily he summoned one Gravity between the relentless barrage, shared a quick look with Nora, and then they charged forward with his fists locked as a Gravity hovered over his right arm. Amber tched, creating a wall of bending steel between them to block the incoming punches, but her iron barrier faltered, burst apart amidst the combining brute force of two fists hitting center-mass. Her surprise lasted a brief second before bridging her arms together to block the unavoidable blows that rattled her down to the bones and forced her eyes closed from the spreading pain. She then opened her sights to see them coming in for another combination attack, this time aiming for her chest and head.

Not this time.

Maiden Powers reacted to her call. Wind pooled beneath her feet. Amber flew away, preparing to drown them in a sea of iron from the air, but the Arc mysteriously threw his darkened hand out. She suddenly stopped flying to be dragged downward. Huh? What? What! An invisible impetus pulled her in. When had this—? By the time she struggled to break free, Nora already invaded her inner circle. Her foot slid against the forest floor with her hand trailing up with an impressive buildup of momentum, all aimed for her.

This time Amber had no chance to block.

Nora dished out a cross squarely between her eyes, connecting fingers with her nose. While not as powerful as Ren's oddly weighted strikes, she moved more primal. Her other hand grabbed her corset between the valley of her chest and pulled her in to add in a nasty headbutt to the mix. She stumbled back, blocking the next blow aimed for her stomach by deflecting the attack downward with a closed eye, but Jaune used that opening to deliver a fist of his own. This one she blocked by capturing it within her palm, but something amiss occurred upon contact, something that made her blood freeze, and Nora seized her distraction to grip her arm.

Unable to move, Amber gasped when Jaune landed a jab on her stomach. For some odd reason this impact, while not overpowering or concise, hurt the worse, as if her Aura alleviated no damage whatsoever. Wait? Why couldn't she feel her Aura? A cold feeling was slowly crawling up her arm where she embraced his fist, familiar through touch. Familiar period. It terrified her. Gravity then rushed to hug her neck. Her breath hitched. She freed his hand, tasted her Aura bustling again to warm her body up, and called upon her iron sand to aid her.

He hated the idea.

A few more jabs connected against her body with each disrupting her control over her Aura, but it mattered not. Metal soon saved her, splashing down in a rainstorm of iron that split the earth. Still, those quick hits hurt. Bruises formed on her skin. What happened? It felt as if her Aura turned off when that Arc leader landed any punch. Each one of those left behind an enduring impact, plus it hardly improved her attitude that they managed to roll out of the way of her iron sand. At least their coordination proved easy to read. Stubborn fools, why couldn't they give up already?

Pyrrha Nikos was gone.

Her partner didn't seem to think so. He glared at her body like some specimen on display. Hardly any emotion could be seen through those pools of darkness, even with the iron sand floating ominously before them. Black sclerae looked through her, through her soul even, not an ounce cared about Amber, only Pyrrha. Such an abstract of light made her skin crawl. How Nora remained hopeful with a leader like that only reinforced her theory that Team JNPR was insane. Then again, this bastard killed Penny Polendina. Lunacy bore fruit.

Craziness aside, he reigned supreme.

Fighting Ren and Nora had been doable. Iron powder gave her a fighting chance. Not with this guy's unknown abilities. Power radiated out of him like that black ooze from earlier. Sending out wisps of iron only ended up colliding with his strange orbs of darkness that either blocked or increased their gravity. Ragnarok made it impossible to utilize the iron sand to the fullest, always pulling away from her intended targets, but now that shield was nowhere to be seen. Those gloves he called Black Hole unnerved her, sure, but throwing away this opportunity might finish her. So she pondered her next move while twisting iron specks in the air, all trained for their jarring actions. Throwing out alloy sand now would be a waste of energy with his troublesome ability to shift weights.

Amber had to counterattack.

Too bad the Fearless Leader refused to move. Nora kept herself attached to his side, like a shadow, pose ready to strike. Not her leader. Jaune danced the lone Gravity above Black Hole. His other hand reached out with a form of sympathy or pity. Amber couldn't tell, damn eyes made it difficult to read his emotions.

"Are you ready to give up?"

Amber frowned. Definitely pity. "And why would I do that? This fight's just getting started."

Expecting as much, he turned toward Nora and drifted Gravity over to her. The negative influences hardly affected her, maybe because she knew they existed, or Sir Scrabbles helped, who knew, but he smiled nonetheless at the ready girl. None of what he planned to ask her was going to be easy. Outside of Sir Scrabbles, Lore and Nora had a damaging history. Asking her of this might be a little much.

"I have a plan, Nora. I'll create some Gravities and make your next attacks heavier. Trust me, it works. Ren will tell you all about it later. All I need you to do is land hits, got it?"

A shroud of reluctance made itself known, but when she spotted the confident grin of her silly leader, it vanished. She smirked with her hands drawn to her side. If Ren believed in the power, then so could she!

"You've got it!"

Maiden Powers burned to life in her right eye. No one ignored her presence. "I can hear you, you know."

Suddenly he thrust his fists forward with Binary Black Hole compelling into two spheres of Gravity. Three Gravities raced toward the stunned girl, and only when Nora stood a few away, did Amber react. A wall of iron toppled from the air to build a wall of metal to absorb the impact. She expected nothing less from the last time the Valkyrie sought to punch through consolidated iron, except her sand burst apart like a sand castle with her opponent piercing inside as three Gravities flanked her blind spots. No matter, she willed spikes to sprout from the opening hole to pierced every angle of her victim's body.

No avoiding this one.

Pull!

Nora abruptly moved back, avoiding the wall of spikes. Her opponent snarled in rage. No way! Not a chance. Amber pushed for more iron to connect, only for Nora smash away the sediment with a dense elbow. Another fence of metal rained down from above, another dodge at the last second. The Maiden's eye glowed. No. Way. No one simply dodged like that, especially not an explosive fighter like her. How the hell did she evade that barrage of alloy?

Looking past the troublesome girl, Amber riveted in annoyance. When did he make another glove—gah! A Gravity crashed against her midriff with her smashing the orb away via staff. Aura levels dropped with misery invading her senses. Metal beckoned to her desperate call to shield her from further attacks. Her eyebrow twitched. How in the hell did that thing move so fast? Shifting her sights back to her orange-hair menace, she fixed her attention to the way a fist was cocked out as her weapon slowly blocked her view of the grinning pancake lover. Hn? So the short-stack hit the Gravity and propelled the orb beyond its ordinary speed?

Smart.

Foolish because she noticed the stinging sensation between the knuckles, but smart.

Dancing her fingers to control the flow of metal, a bolt of lightning struck Amber as the Maiden Powers intensified. Her back arched as she flung the metal wall forward. Nora frowned, dodging the tsunami of metal before it collapsed upon the floor. Her opponent smirked. Feet moved with her eye glowing in retaliation, a quick stomp of her leg propelled the metal minerals into the air, becoming a fog of ore. Jaune quickly ordered his Gravities to convert near his teammate before any of that metal spread to her skin or lungs.

Exactly as Amber planned.

Lightning shot out of her fingers, into the fog, spreading across each conductive mineral in a mismatched frenzy of electricity unfollowable by human eyes. Nora remained safe from the technique, absorbing the element with ease, yet the same couldn't be said about her leader. Thunderbolts curved around the dome and shot forward, directly hitting him in the chest with a chain of electricity. His screams were music to Amber's ears, and when he fell to his knees, breathing heavily, her smirk grew at the opening. Fingers bent to seize the moment.

Time to end this fight.

Fog compressed into walls of iron to block all of Nora's escape exits. Iron sand enclosed her from all angles, no way to dodge this one. Power alone wouldn't be enough to stop this alloy tomb, not this time. Amber smashed her palms together with her stolen Semblance burning to life. The dome constricted around the girl with iron forming stalagmites ready to tear her apart. Then everything stopped before it pierced her flesh, suddenly pulled away toward the leader. Her body froze.

No.

Ragnarok attracted the mass of toxic metal into its inescapable gravitational pull. During some point during the struggle to breathe, Jaune Arc summoned his shield by reverting Black Hole to protect Nora. No. Her alloy dune collided with his knee-downed body, but his weight somehow compensated for the difference and he barely budged, even when metal dug into his skin from the overabundance of steel. Not again! She desperately waved her hands to move the element, yet nothing. Stubbornness made it impossible to free her iron sand, and she flinched when the Valkyrie invaded her bubble with such lightning savagery that it made her heart skip a beat when noticing the static-electricity in her eyes.

"This one's for Ren!"

Nora Valkyrie connected her fist to her jaw with three spheres of Gravity hovering by her shoulder, and she upturned the angle to finish the blow by smashing Amber against the floor in an arc to not send her flying. Weight like no other strengthened the foundation of her punch and buried Amber into the surface of the planet. Cracks formed from the collision with the earth bending against the imposing authority. Dust soared up! Bedrock scattered into the air. Even the surrounding birds flew away. Nothing but anger fueled that punch.

Smash!

Turbulence forced the leader to shield his eyes. Not Nora. No, she accepted the blast of earth with raging energy. Last time such an explosion occurred, she hid behind Ren. This time she made sure to watch it unfold. Both her friends needed this more than her. The furious wind blowing past her legs filled her with hope. Maybe next time someone would think twice before supercharging her with a blast of electricity or stealing her friend's body.

Behind her, Jaune choked with parts of his body burnt from the electrical discharge. How he survived it, he hadn't a clue. Blame Lore.

Any iron sand stuck to Ragnarok fell lifelessly to the floor with the Arc breathing in relief. Gravities centered over his prone body, acting like children hovering over their father's shoulder. Snort! He chuckled, absorbing the Lore into his body before he exhausted any more reserves. No time to dilly dally, he must search for remnants of Pyrrha's Aura while they had the chance.

He willed Ragnarok to convert into Black Hole, prepared to capture Amber's Aura and trap her Semblance. No Aura, no strength. Now, he got up on his feet, Black Hole reflecting no light, time to have a little chat with their impostor.

Buried in the floor, Amber groaned and weakly opened her eyes to see nothing but dust surrounding her vision. Her body hurt, her jaw ached, limbs refused to move, and the embers burning in her body dwindled with her Aura practically gone. Two silhouettes stood above her beaten form, hidden behind the soot cloud. She miserably narrowed her eyes, trying to summon her iron sand to help her, but a hand of darkness reached out through the particles of dust and gripped her neck with sclerae of black governing influence over her broken body. A second body shifted her weight to hold her down in place.

Gasp!

Her attempts of calling upon her power failed. Her Aura? Her Semblance? What happened to them? They felt trapped, out of her reach by a strong gravitational pull where the light of her powers remained sealed. Dread poured into each crevice of her soul as her heart grew louder. Death's fingers tightened like a noose with the executioner glaring with eyes blacker than coal. She endeavored to lift her head, except Arc wasn't forgiving, pressing her down without a fighting chance.

Huh? That coldness seeping up her neck? Feeling of powerlessness, yeah, now she recognized this sensation. How could she forget? It mimicked the same one as her fight with those three criminals. That arrow woman used a similar technique, although not as frightening. So the champion did have a partner competent of using that technique? What rotten luck. Her body inspired to move, to run away, but he dug his knee into her stomach as Nora kept her arms, legs, and everything else locked in place.

No chance of escape.

So she begged like before. "Please don't."

Jaune Arc ignored her entirely, focused exclusively on searching her body for a power not belonging to her. Asking for sympathy from the Black Knight right now was a pointless endeavor. The Lore influx and influence made his negativity outweigh his positivity. Her life mattered not to him. Just like that raven-haired woman. Yeah, he unmistakably saw through her, not at all, but through her, like that vile woman who stuffed her into that glass coffin. Neither one of them cared about her problems. They only fretted about themselves, but the answer to this team's dilemma was long gone. Victory belonged to her. Ozpin wouldn't allow these two to hurt her permanently. They only desired their teammate back, not the Maiden Powers themselves. Useless. Once they realize she was gone, things would work themselves out.

Above her, gripping the neck of his partner, Jaune trapped Amber's Aura using the properties of Black Hole while Nora held her down as he searched through the copper glow frantically. A strange power infected Pyrrha's body, nothing resembling Aura, but he chalked that up as the Maiden Powers and pointedly ignored it. Darkness narrowed in hopes of finding a drop of blood Aura anywhere.

Auburn, fall colors everywhere! Not a hint of red anywhere. Each failed inspection between her limbs only worsened his mood. No! He must not give up, Pyrrha needed him. A speck, any speck would work. Her trapped Aura should have exposed a fault somewhere, a weakness, anything, yet after checking both her legs, left arm, and most of her body, not a blemish existed to drive his hopes up. Actual fear gripped his soul, a torrent overshadowed every single one of his emotions, fueled off Lore's emotional properties.

His grip weakened.

Despair quickly poured into his soul. His eyes traveled to her right arm, losing faith and trust in his abilities. Nothing in the shoulder or the forearm, the last place to check was her wrist and hand. After that, nowhere.

Darkness traveled down the base of her arm and carefully inspected. Fingers had zero traces of Pyrrha's Aura, same with her palm, The last place to check was her wrist—!

Lub-dub!

The Arc choked back a sob. His dried tears returned, and Amber panicked when his grip on her neck renewed. Ha. Ha-ha! Yes! Dear Monty Oum, yes! A sliver of blood Aura twirled around the base of her wrist, right where Supernova and Miló clashed for the last time. Of all places—it no longer mattered. Funny, some of the skin still retained that shade of pink from the first degree burns.

"Jaune?" Nora called.

A laugh escaped him. He breathed wistfully, an oddity with his eyes hidden in darkness. Somehow the kind gesture burned a hole in Amber's soul.

"I've found her. Pyrrha's still in there."

Gasp!

That feeling of hopelessness, the sensation of her Aura trapped and Semblance out-of-her-reach, all of it returned. Amber struggled in his hold, but Nora and the Arc made movement impossible. Neither budged an inch. If they cared about her fighting for her life, both ignored it to converse joyfully. Such a scene sickened her to the core.

"Really? Yes! I knew you would find Pyrrha!"

He grinned, looking past her to her wrist. "Yeah, good thing I've got Black Hole trapping her Aura. I think Amber's Aura was eating away at Pyrrha's, like Lore with Aura. There's barely any leftover."

Nora frowned. "Can you fix it?"

An excellent question that Amber listened to intently. So her Aura ate away at the champion's? Good to know, now to free herself from this technique and allow her Aura to finish the job. Too bad this stubborn fool didn't know when to give up. Her restored hope for life signaled to her to live, no point in giving these two false hope.

"If I use Black Hole to hold her Aura down, then her Aura won't attack Pyrrha's, so I should be able to extract her Aura out."

Amber raised a brow. What? Extract her Aura, that was the so-called plan? Idiots, Aura couldn't be taken away or misplaced, at least not without a machine by Atlas' finest. They were wasting both their times. How he presumably was able to see Aura bothered her, but questions for another time. Now her only goal focused on dashing their hopes.

Their impostor laughed weakly and drew in their attention. "Even if you've found an insignificant portion of your partner's Aura, you have no way of saving her. My Aura's here to stay. Just give up and accept her Fate."

He squinted his vision with a lift of his hand. "If I can find a way to pull your Aura out and keep Pyrrha's intact, then things will work out fine. There's no reason to give up. I know how to fix this. I have the techniques to fix this, several."

"Oh? And how are you planning to accomplish that? Got a lab around here? She's got what, a minute at best? Maybe two? As soon as you let go, your partner is history. It's just bad luck that you found it with a few minutes to spare."

Nora smiled foolheartedly with black butterflies fluttering in her stomach. Bad luck? A few minutes to spare? Sob! Even now, Ren still fought alongside them, the big dummy. Her leader thought the same, relieved beyond reason. Some of Ren's misfortune must have remained and kept the team together? Either way, this Arc narrowed his sights down at the fidgeting Maiden. Lore began glowing with his smile stretching between his cheeks.

No more fighting.

"Thank you, Ren."

"What are you talking about, your teammate isn't here." Amber despised being ignored. "Hey? What's going on? Are you listening to me? It's hopeless."

Jaune Arc thinned his lips while summoning a Gravity to float down above his palm. Every word out of her mouth he ignored without question with his dark mass of Lore hovering ominously in the crater as trepidation slowly filled the air. Black Hole's properties to pull Aura worked just as effective, but Gravity worked slower. Had to be precise. A tremor passed through Amber's body as he uttered the words that made her heart sink into her stomach.

"Pull, Gravity."

Amber struggled fruitlessly in their hold. Not that technique! Anything but that technique! She remembered what that bloody orb did, and if what he said was true, then her life hung in the balance. Aura strived to flow, but that Black Hole ability shut her down. Natural strength paled in comparison to two bodies pinning her down. Calling for help proved futile with Penny offline. Everything else was forfeited when he gradually lowered Gravity right onto her stomach with a coldness only found in the deepest depths of a lonely abyss.

Pull!

Amber screamed her bloody lungs out, and the Maiden Powers heeded the call of their distressed master. Embers reignited to a blistering fire in her soul. Aura rejuvenated from the emotional outburst. Things flipped! Wind bellowed from underneath her trapped form and sent the duo flying out the crater with a dominant thud. The very ground itself vibrated from the shockwave of her power.

When the leader crashed first onto the floor, he groaned upon impact. When he opened his eyes a second later, he did so just on time to see Amber charging in with a silvery spear aimed directly for his heart. Lub-dub! Instincts overpowered him, and he summoned his Gravity to his hand, gripping the orb before it collapsed into his palm, and strenuously changed it to Ragnarok.

Clash!

Metal against cold, cold against metal. Amber bared her teeth with her eye glowing brighter than fire as iron sand closed in on his trapped position. No more games, no more chances. Running away wasn't an option, not with those blasted gloves of his. She couldn't even take the opportunity for Pyrrha's Aura to die off. For all she knew, this bastard might discover an alternative way to reverse the damage. Her feet dug into the ground as her spear pressed violently against Ragnarok. Nope! Jaune Arc must die.

Right here, right now!

Her target struggled to move as pivots of iron raced forward. Amber scoffed, she knew full well her spear couldn't pierce this enigma of a shield, so her goal focused on keeping him trapped until her metal reached her, but that energy tart came faster and tackled her away with a brash shoulder bump. Nora then grabbed her leader right before the torrent of iron sediments buried him alive.

Their opponent easily recovered from the blow, sliding her feet across the forest floor. She dug her spear to halt her momentum, glaring at the two people standing in her way to life. Iron moved to her command, surrounding the two in a whirlpool of steel, but Nora smashed through the barricade before the iron defense became too condensed. However, that small victory hardly quelled the storm brewing into her soul. She quickly spun around to plead with her leader.

"Jaune! What are we going to do now? We only have a few minutes at best!"

His eyes focused enough to push her out of the way before a cube of iron crashed down upon her. Aura and Lore flared to life in desperation. Honestly, he hadn't a clue to their next move because if Amber was smart, she would keep her distance until the timer hit zero. Bridging that gap while somehow finding a way to capture and erase her Aura in such a short time sounded impossible.

He frowned, an awful situation turning worse by the second.

Arg! He rubbed his head in frustration! Think, Arc, think! Next plan! Go! Still nothing. His hopes began dwindling faster than the hourglass sands. Tch—he smashed his Black Hole covered fist against a tendril of iron with his body hurting from all the unhealed injuries. Crashing on the floor hadn't helped. If only he had some Aura shards, then he would have charged in, protection forfeited, to cover the distance, but all he had was the—?

Black sclerae darkened in dangerous hope.

Cobalt irises followed a path down to his pocket. Black Hole comprehended the gravitational pull calling it, and that was when he reached into his pocket to touch a fragmented crystal colder than ice. Fear halted his ability to grab the shard. What was he thinking? What if this failed? What if it devoured his partner's Aura, too? Then what? The death of a partner, teammate, and friend? All would be for nothing. Then again, he saw no other option left to take.

This Lore shard might be Pyrrha's only hope.

Trust made him grip the shard faithfully. He stared down the incoming tendrils of iron while clutching the shard protectively in his hand. All or nothing now.

"I have a plan." Jaune whispered.

"Great, I'm all ears." Nora whispered back. "What is it?"

He held out the black shard for her to see, blocking them both from iron with Ragnarok. Light refused to reflect on the crystal. "I'm going to shove this Lore shard into Amber's mouth and destroy her Aura from within."

Nora blinked, stopping to stare slack jawed at her crazy leader. Her voice echoed higher than thunder. "Are you messed up in the head? That's insane!"

"I'll grab her wrist with Black Hole and hope to Dust that I could divert the Lore."

She stubbornly shook her head while dodging a claw of metal. Nora forcefully grabbed his arm when he refused to change his mind. "Stop! You're not thinking straight! This is a bad idea! What if the Lore destroys Pyrrha's remaining Aura? There has to be another way!"

Ragnarok absorbed the light from his eyes to unleash the anguish trapped inside. No positive emotions existed to cloud his judgment, only rational truth.

"We don't have time for another way! Believe me, I rather not do this! It's either that or we lose Pyrrha anyway!" Nora stepped back from the darkness overpowering her leader. The fear building up inside her got felt by him, so he reigned in his emotions to soften his tone. "I'm sorry, Nora, but I don't see any other option. We're running out of time. This might be—no, it is our last chance to save Pyrrha. And I can't do it without you."

The Valkyrie swallowed a lump of guilt. Of course, Jaune didn't want to hurt Pyrrha, but leaders made the tough choices. Pyrrha was his partner, this hurt him way more than it harmed her, no wonder he was so mad. He needed her to save his partner, like when she needed him to hide Ren.

"... Okay."

He beamed. "Good, I'll draw Amber in with Black Hole, and you protect me from the iron, once we have her, we force feed her the shard, got it?"

She nodded. Perfect, just in time to avoid a hailstorm of iron needles.

Metal shrapnel decorated the grassy land. Black Hole gripped the Lore shard in a universally tight grip as the other hand joined it to become a Black Hole. As much as he preferred having a shield over two gloves, sadly, as far as he figured out over the battle with Amber, Ragnarok didn't pull in people, only Semblances and Aura. Black Hole, on the other hand, drew in Aura and bodies. The absolute weapon to drag Amber into close-quarters. Taking the opportunity to discover whether or not Ragnarok consumed Aura would be a colossal waste of time.

Huffing, he ran toward Amber with Nora tailing his trail. For the first time during this whole headache-inducing process, he basked over his newfound control over Lore. Finally! His Lore limitation improved. Just like Aura, a sudden increase of concentration fueled his muscles, footwork, instincts, and durability to new heights. It felt, in the lightest sense of the word, amazing.

Such a missed sensation.

The Arc couldn't remember the last time he managed to break a barrier with anything Lore or Aura related. Too bad the situation was too grim to enjoy. Sigh. His feet moved with his hands thrown up to pull Amber closer, but this time the Maiden prepared for such a tactic and used metal to keep her feet anchored. Humph! Fine by him, stand in one place, made it easier to shove this shard into her mouth.

Glowering at them from across the field, Amber struggled against the gravitational pull of a Black Hole. Fingers gripped her alloy staff with feet dug painfully into the ground. What were those two planning? Charging headfirst on such a short amount of time, with iron sand to contend with no less, should have erased their hopes, yet they crossed the distance to challenge her? Hn? Her Maiden Powers burned with fury as she sent a wall of iron to block them, not taking any gambles. A few grunting hits with Nora's fists broke through her defense and then they advanced their charge. None of that interested her except for the way Jaune gripped his left hand possessively. Huh? Why didn't he attempt to pull her in with a second Black Hole, made no sense?

Unless if it held the key to her destruction!

Knowing how surprising this leader could be, she took no risks and aimed directly for him. Spears rained down with that Nora girl blocking almost every shot to the best of her abilities. He managed to dodge the ones that made it through, never opening his palm to bash alloy away. Then he pocketed something too far to see and suddenly shot his other hand out. Binary Black Hole now pulled against her body, much harder to resist. The dirt's friction beneath her feet paled in comparison to the opposing force. Soon she found herself closing toward Nora with her arms out.

Tch! Damn it! Not like this!

Metal raced to distract the girl while she sent out a tendril of iron to collide with her leader. Nora bashed hers away smoothly enough, but Jaune never noticed Amber summoning a bolt of lightning to conduct around his iron opponent. Upon contact, her hand shot out thunder that swiftly traveled up the metal and toward his preoccupied body. Shock! The poor guy convulsed from the electrifying trauma as iron sand pelted him in a mudslide of metal. Nora immediately charged in to smash away the excess metal, but Amber smirked, the damage had been done. The way he struggled to stand proved it.

No more secret weapon.

"Jaune!" Nora pulled her friend away before another geyser of metal pelted them. She winced at the pain between her fingers. Digging against such a high concentration of metal caused the skin between her knuckles to split. If only she had Magnhild to back her up, then maybe none of this would have happened. "Are you okay?"

A trail of blood spilled onto her shirt as he leaned on her body. "No, no, I'm not alright." Cough! "I'm not in the best of shape. I can barely move."

She panicked. "Okay, how about I carry you on my back?"

"We don't have time for that, and that'll leave you defenseless. No." Lore glowed in revenge. No time for compromises. "New plan. Nora... I'll distract Amber. You have to get close enough to shove that Lore shard into her mouth."

She gasped loudly. No. No, no! Anything but that! She wished to argue. To create a better plan, but found her words stuck in her throat. The wounds on her leader were deep. Lore didn't heal. If he fell, then there was no saving Pyrrha or Ren. Only she was strong enough to save Pyrrha now. Jaune-Jaune could only support her. He could only serve as her shield.

"I'm scared."

He offered her his best smile and dropped the Lore shard into her shaky palm. Hiding the shard between her fingers, Nora found her heart thumping loudly in her ears. The shard in her hand brought back gruesome memories. Memories she had no desire remembering. Bad memories. Terrible pictures of a sad Ren and army of Grimm. It hurt her heart to think about.

The idea of doing this to someone else, especially to Pyrrha, tore her soul in two. She remembered the feeling of despair all too well, but this was the only way to save Pyrrha. It might hurt. Scratch that! It would hurt. So much so that she would never wish this treatment on her worse enemy. Nora was only happy that Jaune-Jaune was here to fix the damage after. Still, she hesitated.

She was having second thoughts.

Her hand couldn't stop shaking. Choke! The Lore shard felt unbearably cold and memories of the last time she held one made her heart weep. To ask her to shove this into Pyrrha's—no! Goosebumps formed from just thinking about it. Another way, there had to be another way to save their friend! There just had to be! No one deserved to have their Aura ripped apart like—!

Jaune grabbed her wrist and sighed. The darkness in those black depths couldn't hide his fear. "I know I'm asking a lot right now, and I'm sorry, but we have to do this for Pyrrha and Ren. They need us now, more than ever."

"But... but..."

He turned and grabbed her by the shoulders. The idiot had to lean his weight on her body. "Hey, hey, I'm right here. I know you're scared, and I don't blame you because I'm scared too, but I can't think of any other way to save Pyrrha. We can—we will win this. Not for us, but for them! I trust you, Nora. And so does Pyrrha and Ren."

Fear turned to courage.

Grip!

"For Pyrrha and Ren?"

"For our teammates and friends."

Angry tears burned her eyes. "For our family!"

He shared in her pain. "For our family."

She smiled bitterly. Bravery for her family made the shard warm between her skin for the briefest of seconds, but Sir Scrabbles and Ren both embraced the power without any hesitation. Even her Fearless Leader trusted the power. Only their friend Pyrrha needed to embrace the darkness to protect her from this dreaded light from another Aura.

Her bitter smiled changed into a full-blown confident one. "You can count on me!"

Ragnarok stretched to life on his hand. "I know I can."

Shooting him a final grin, she turned and dashed forward with the shard clutched firmly between her fingers. Its icy texture made her spine shiver, but then she remembered Sir Scrabbles' innocent face and thought of the idea of Pyrrha not being around to give her sloth baths. The tingling sensation stopped. Nerves reinforced themselves with bundles of steel against the nearly unimaginable odds.

A Valkyrie charged headfirst into battle with Ragnarok to protect her.

Amber smirked at the challenger. Her versus the Valkyrie? Ha, just like earlier, except this time she knew what to expect. Not like it mattered. The leader's strength had to be running on fumes at this point. Amber had no idea how right she was, his Lore reserves plummeted from that iron attack. Either he used Ragnarok or two weaker techniques, but not both.

Testing the waters, she unleashed a barrage of needles at the headstrong girl, not surprised when they all changed trajectory to impale those dark crescent moons. Oh well, that shield only messed up her iron sand, not her Aura. She dug her staff free, prepared to combat Nora in close-quarter combat when she lunged at her with a speeding fist. Metal clashed against a gloved fist, sending a shocking wave across the floor that made Amber's feet wobble.

Not good enough.

She twisted her angle to divert the momentum to the floor. Nora followed, finding her body buried into the dirt from her own force working against her. Her opponent grinned, aiming her iron staff to impale her back, but Ragnarok pulled against her pole too. Fingers struggled to retain her grip, revealing the opportunity for Nora to jump in and connect a cross to the base of her staff, and the combination of Ragnarok, plus her excessive strength, shattered the metal in Amber's hands.

Tch!

Amber released the useless metal to meet Nora head-on between a spar of fisticuffs. She parried the second strike by diverting Nora's hand's striking momentum to her side, using her palm, and countered with a Semblance enhanced blow to the Valkyrie's cheek. Nora stumbled, Amber grinned, then it all went downhill for her. The cheek connected to her fist turned stubbornly with renewed strength. Turquoise pierced hazel eyes with such intensity that she faltered. Nora pushed back with her shock absorption supplying her with a roundabout strength, landing a direct jab to Amber's cheek herself before connecting an attack to her stomach that knocked the air out of her.

The driving force would have sent her flying if Amber hadn't dug her soles into the dirt, stopping momentum with friction. Polarity stretched to her metal head guard, and a headbutt against Nora's temple followed. A hand then grabbed the disoriented girl, dragging her into the air before stuffing her into the ground. Nora barely threw her hands out in time to capture Amber's enhanced kick aimed for her face, absorbing the kinetic energy as the ground beneath her bent against the opposing impact. She struggled to twist her ankle, pinching her Achilles heel to break free.

Rolling out of the way, she stood up just in time to see Amber thrusting her Semblance forward for the iron sand to press against Jaune. No! Metal spread across Ragnarok to encase his hand, entrapping him. Growl! Not on her watch! Nora used the help of her shock absorption to launch the added strength to her legs, dashing forward with the Lore shard turning her right hook cold. Amber predicted this, turning to divert her next blow by pushing her fist away with her palm. Then she countered by throwing a Semblance enhanced metal armguard to strike Nora on the back of her skull.

You can count on me!

I know I can.

Grip.

Nora buried her foot into the dirt, using its friction to turn her body at a much faster rate. Her momentum carried over between the overturn, dodging Amber's strike. Velocity of her fist sped much faster as anger fueled her to break past her limits. Amber barely crossed her arms to guard against the fist to her chest, or so she thought. Valkyrie didn't aim for her chest. No, another foot dug into the ground for her to twist her body downward and push her fist upward for a bone-crushing uppercut to the jaw.

Amber never saw it coming.

The weight behind the punch knocked her off her feet, disorienting her senses, but Nora didn't let up, she grabbed her by the ankle, dragged her down with an even greater force, and delivered a haymaker across her chin, followed up by a knee to the stomach. Then she spun, yelling as their acceleration ever increased in the mini whirlpool of speed. Amber attempted to kick her in the face, only for her opponent to throw her toward Jaune.

No!

The Maiden twisted in the air to control her momentum, except he switched to Black Hole to pull her in with even greater acceleration. By the time she successful controlled her impulse, she collided with the Arc's chest. Hands covered in darkness quickly grabbed her by the wrist, locking her Aura and Semblance in place with the other extended outward toward his partner.

Not this time, Arc.

Throwing her free hand outward, she called upon the steel dancing in the air. Maiden Powers shattered Black Hole's Semblance restricting abilities, and metal tendrils whirled around their trapped bodies with its target the unmoving Arc. Edges shot down, Amber turned around to tug her wrist free against an unyielding embrace, and Black Hole vanished. Suddenly, Ragnarok appeared in his free arm to absorb the impact of her iron sand and cease her attack. Lore fogged around his body as his teeth gritted, increasing the hold on her hand with nothing but unbroken strength and an indomitable will.

Jaune bashed away the iron with building adrenaline as Ragnarok vanished to turn into Binary Black Hole. Of course, Lore had no use for high-velocity weaponry. Lore didn't heal or mend wounds. What shield did? It moved slowly, never too far from its user and preserved the ability to hide and seek those with troubling emotions. Lore was never an offensive ability. He saw that now. It protected those in trouble and became their shield.

A knight without a shield couldn't protect any soul.

Besides, the greatest offense was the best defense, a lesson Pyrrha drilled into his training from previous memories. He only needed defensive power! Above all, the only weapon in Lore's arsenal was his hands! Hand-to-hand combat!

The ultimate art of self-defense!

Jaune's Lore cooled. "Shall I tell you where you screwed up?"

"Screwed up?"

A fist connected right at the base of her abdominal. None of her Aura protected her, none of it could. The Black Hole gripping her hand in an unthinkable to escape gravitational pull made stumbling back an impossible feat. He pulled into another strike, this time lifting her body into the air from the unmovable force connecting below her chest.

"Just because you're controlling Pyrrha's body, doesn't mean you know how to use it! Those worthless Maiden Powers of yours only do so much!" Jaune released her wrist to grab her face, overturning her driving momentum to move downward. "It's nothing like your old body! Pyrrha's body has a long history of training to back it up!"

Crash!

Amber collided painfully with the earth, Aura useless against an assault of light-sealing Black Holes, but he was far from finished. Fist after fist blended to deliver a relentless barrage on her downed body with the ground cleaving from the bombardment. She felt every strike to the fullest. Only the Maiden Powers dulled some of the hits, but each jab weakened them too.

"She didn't rely on anyone's strength but her own! You only use her Semblance to hide, she used it to fight. A weakling like you, who couldn't even survive without those worthless Maiden Powers can't even begin to understand what she's been through!"

One of the Black Holes turned into a Gravity, hovering over his shoulder near a Lore covered fist. Amber turned doe-eyed once she saw that attack coming. Fear kept her still. Her limbs refused to move, lips trembled, and a hand with the striking force to send a tremor across the earth vibrated the landscape. Lore's shockwave burst the iron all around them with her body almost too beat up to move.

A Black Hole aided her by grabbing her red locks to lift her to eye-level. Hazel irises narrowed. "Why? I don't get it. How do you this have this much strength to fight with?"

He met her piercing gaze with an impenetrable shield. "Because I'm the partner of Pyrrha Nikos, the Invincible Girl! I'm the Fearless Leader of Team JNPR, Jaune Arc! I don't have the option to lose."

"... You can't save someone who's gone."

"You'd be surprised with what Team JNPR's capable of. Here, I'll show you." Jaune flipped Amber's body around and seized her wrist again with his Gravity reverting back to the second Black Hole. "I've got her! Hurry up, Nora!"

"Coming!"

Oh, Amber thought, not on her watch. She failed to break his grip, too damaged, but her Semblance still heeded her call with one arm. Iron sand slithered forward to surround the Valkyrie girl in a mausoleum with an exit closing faster than she could run, but the Arc chuckled like his teammates impending doom warranted an easy laugh.

"Did you forget what Black Hole could do, Amber?" An invisible forced tugged on Nora's diminished Aura. "You should know better than anyone else here!"

Nora's sudden velocity accelerated enough to escape her collision of iron sand. Metal splashed together without a corpse. Growl! Amber attempted to bite down on his hand, but Nora already covered the distance to grab her by the neck. Lightning raced in her irises with a promise of vengeance. Confidence spread along with her smirk. Hope flourished when Jaune seized her other hand to prevent movement of the iron sand, then the trigger-happy girl opened her palm to reveal a black crystal that made her soul quiver in agony.

Maiden Powers flared.

"You think you can just beat me that easily?!" Amber begged on her power to aid her. "I'm not done yet!"

High turbulence of wind generated beneath their feet with the temperatures dropping rapidly. Slowly, they rose in the air with Nora forced to hold onto her corset to prevent separation, a risky tactic as Amber used the distraction to kick her in the stomach. The hold on her armor persisted, but another boot aimed for her other hand dislodged the shard in her palm to be lost in the mighty tornado forming.

"No!" Nora cried. "The shard!"

Jaune glared, forced to release one of Amber's arms. He extended out Black Hole, willing it to transform into a Gravity. The dropping temperatures made moving his body difficult with Lore's already natural cold properties. Regardless, his control remained precise, following the Lore shard with Lore of his own. On the other side of the spectrum, their impostor smirked and called the iron sand to join her tornado.

Desperation created hope.

Amber aimed to crush that hope in an icy tundra where no life survived. Everything around them began to freeze. Sheets of ice encompassed all the vegetation with the air getting harder to breathe. Frost gradually covered their skin. Even their bones shivered. Metal—iron minerals—fused with her hurricane to create something truly spectacular! Now be buried alive in metal snow.

Jaune gritted his teeth. Following the Lore shard in all this mess was asking for the bloody impossible. Still, he endured the harsh cold. The blood Aura trapped between his fingers desperately needed him to be the invincible one for a change! If Pyrrha favored the cold, then so could he! Just a little more! Come on! Get trapped in Gravity's gravity already! A few more inches and—!

Lub-dub!

Yes! He caught it! Gravity pulled it into its gravitational pull. Good, he perilously pulled it in between all the debris, with Amber observing the black sphere flying back to them, holding that wicked rock. Lore reserves ran dangerously low. Hazel eyes burned in the eye of the storm, her hand reached out to summon every scrap of metal to diverge on their location in an attempt to dislodge the rock or shatter it. None of it worked, not with Nora disrupting her concentration by grabbing her wrist to break off the sync movement.

Amber finally couldn't take it anymore, screaming into the heart of the storm. "Why won't you give up!"

Jaune smirked as Gravity floated near Nora's hand with the rock floating harmlessly in its hold. "Because we're Team JNPR! Now, Nora!"

Grin!

Nora steeled her nerves, released Amber's wrist and snatched the Lore shard out of Gravity's pull. Coldness raced across her skin, but for the first time, she welcomed the crisp sensation as the impostor thrashed wildly in Jaune's hold, freezing them in place with the spinning vortex of ice and metal. None of that mattered. Not anymore. Nora used the remnants of her Aura to pull herself closer with the help of the metal corset, beaming at the scared eyes that did not belong to their beloved friend.

A smile so innocent that it just screamed guilty.

"Time to take your medicine!"

Iron sand from every conceivable direction in a freezing tornado came racing toward them, but Nora shoved the shard into her mouth.

Thwomp!

Lub-dub!

Darkness shielded a wayward soul from the blinding light.

Lore infested an Aura diseased body as Amber shrieked with her voice traveling across Emerald Forest, far louder than any of screams that had resonated from Penny's soul. Every inch of Pyrrha's body quickly became infected with concentrated amounts of Lore that attacked every bit of Aura. The Maiden Powers reacted just as violently, lashing out against the invaded Lore, antibodies fighting an invading virus, but faltered with only half its power and soon decomposed along with Amber's Aura in a fit of anguish fury.

Feeling the process from afar was one thing, holding and witnessing it happen upon someone else was a life-changing experience for Jaune Arc. Black Hole kept bits of Aura safe from the shards destructive powers, at least he assumed the sum hidden underneath his hand was safe. Her screeching made it impossible to concentrate. Aura glowed so impossible bright for one second, burning brighter than Quasar, only for the darkness to consume the light in a slow and painful process.

Then all three bodies fell from the air as the vortex of metal burst apart with lifeless iron raining down on the scarred battlefield.

Jaune grunted, flipping midair to impact the floor first so Pyrrha's body didn't suffer any more damage. An iron floor made for a painful landing. Amber still spit at the gesture, clawing away with her screams turning into silent cries. Muscles gave out. Willpower shattered. Lore left no survivors except for the bloody Aura trapped in Black Hole's impenetrable, ironclad defense. When he stood up, she slacked against the imposing force of gravity working against her.

Both literally and figuratively.

While his Lore always attacked Aura when it came in contact with it, this frequently ended before much Aura was released. Damage remained minimal ninety-nine percent of the time. To see it happen before his eyes, and on an entire body no less with his hand gripping her wrist, shook his foundation of Lore's anti-Aura properties. Had Nora gone through a similar treatment during that training trip? Was this what happened to her when she ingested that Lore shard? If so, her fear of the shard was justified, and an apology was owed.

Observing the phenomenal through Outer Space, he studied how Amber's Aura dissipated along with the fleeting Lore's pressure. The secondary energy—the Maiden Powers—quickly fell under the same scrutinizing, but it managed to fend off bits of Lore before turning to ash from power it had no immune system to contend. Aura and Maiden Powers fell victim to Lore's onslaught. Eventually, he released her wrist when nothing remained but the hollow husk of Pyrrha's body with three bits of energy barely glowing in her chest region. Amber's Aura remained, dying, but she retained control of his partner's actions and set her steel gaze upon him with her breath heavy and strength gone.

Amber knew Death stalked her shadow once this dreaded, cold power devoured each bit of her Aura in a feeding frenzy. Like a cliché before the final curtain type of thing, her life flashed before her eyes with a drifting consciousness watching the memory wheel play. Maintaining control became next to impossible, and she knew her number was up. They won. The scoundrels managed to beat her, Maiden Powers and all. Damn it. Idiots, didn't they have any clue to what they stopped? Hn? Who cared anymore, it hardly mattered, but she was sure not leaving without getting the final word. Bastards deserved to know what hellish experience they have invited upon opening Pandora's Box.

She began walking toward Jaune.

Upon her first step her body trembled, eyes rolled back into her skull, and she fought to remain conscious through the painful ordeal. A deep cough later and she continued her struggle, shaking like a leaf with her arms limp to her sides and body hunched forward. Specks of blood trailed out from her mouth with only one eye remaining open, fading from brown to emerald.

Glancing down to where her heart beat, his breath hitched. A tiny ember of those Maiden Power remained. It burned like a dying fire, moving like one too. For some strange reason, he didn't think it would ever recover after this battle. Unlike Aura or Lore, those powers worked differently from what he observed this fight. Whereas Aura and Lore shared a basic concept of Space, those powers, from what he perceived, had no such property. They had no characteristic of the sort. Whenever her eye had glowed, the influence of her Space reacted. That much was true. Maybe they added to the strength of Aura? A possibility, but he had little time to ponder with Amber only a step way.

The Fearless Leader didn't react when she wobbled toward him, Maiden eye opened. She only reached with one arm to grip the threads of his hoodie, falling to Remnant's gravity as she leaned upon him with her feet giving out. Her grip faltered, but the girl shook, glared with venom and managed to still yell through the excruciating pain. The quivering of her body only carried her voice across the metal forest with a vibration that each speck of iron felt.

"Y-You idiot! I hope you're happy! Who's going to stop Salem now!"

Jaune blinked. "Salem?"

His question went unanswered. Amber's Aura burned out, and Pyrrha's head collided with his bunny-logo chest. Darkness, sweet, blissful darkness took her. The girl was out cold before she hit the ground, sliding across his body with her blood meshing with his hoodie. Whatever Jaune wanted to say was left unheard. He was too busy smiling at the tiny remnant of blood Aura flickering to in his partner's chest. Good. Now that the battle was over he happily sighed before turning around to stare at the distance.

Lie Ren remained where he last left him, unconscious. Dark Matter was long gone. Heh, the Arc couldn't be sure whether or not it happened now or during the fight. Guess it no longer mattered. The slow rise of his chest spelled good things for everyone, including a special Valkyrie who whined loudly since her Aura hit zero upon hitting the iron-rich floor. Not that he blamed her, he had aches in every inch of his battered body with wounds in need of patching.

Grinning in victory, he moved to help Nora off the floor, but the melting ice of his Lore dried up. Sclerae shaded in darkness reverted to white with his shadow returning to his side. Suddenly, a pain matching no other spread across his whole body with every one of his nerve's pain-receptors set to eleven. No words passed his lips, not a sound uttered in the vibrating forest except for a body struggling to breathe.

Arg!

Jaune Arc weakly groaned, falling toward the ground with none of his body heeding to his call. His knees hit first before his body followed. Darkness soon swarmed against his blurring vision and pain seeped throughout his body. With a final force of will, he tried to push himself up, getting only a few centimeters off the ground before crashing back down in a futile defiance. What was happening? This pain? This sensation? All of it. It felt like every one of his muscles was tearing themselves apart? He couldn't move, couldn't scream. Thoughts slowed down between each painful thump of his heart as his body gave up.

Blue faded into cold darkness.

Nora turned when she heard the fall. Her breath stopped once she spotted her downed leader. Legs couldn't move quick enough as she struggled to run without strength or Aura. Adrenaline alone pushed her until she reached her broken leader, but when she poked his neck, no response.

"Jaune? Jaune!"

She quickly turned him over to find a small river of blood trailing down his mouth with numerous other injuries. Her throat hitched. She gulped soon after, struggling to apply pressure to his damaged skin. Fingers pressed firmly against Lore-cold skin. Every part of his muscles felt incredibly tense under her touch, and he was unconscious like the others. Nora attempted to slap him awake, shake him by the shoulders, even yell, but nothing worked. Fearless eyes remained closed in her most desperate hour. A third member of Team JNPR had fallen in battle.

Big-eyed, she looked around at the rest of her downed team, stricken with grief.

The eerie silence of victory made her chest constrict.

...

In his line of profession, Doctor Home M.D. saw his fair share of injuries. A middle-aged man hooked on painkillers who walked with the aid of a cane learned to expect the unexpected when working as Beacon Academy's leading medical practitioner. Above all else, he loved a good medical mystery. Beacon had plenty of those to go around. Strange injuries or unknown diseases worked fine, but he rarely got both to inspect under his microscope or stethoscope.

Then a ginger-haired subject burst through his door carrying three bodies over her tiny shoulders. Ha! Nora Valkyrie! His favorite customer. The girl had a delightful habit of sending patient after patient to his door. Kept him busy. Busy kept him from noticing the pain in his leg.

Her feet wobbled in a plain case of overexertion. Labour breathing pointed as evidence, minus the cuts and bruises, of course, those consulted from fighting. A clear-cut case of either one hell of a brawl or team bonding experience gone horribly wrong. Best part, she ignored him to drop the bodies onto separate adjacent beds before stumbling over to him. She said nothing, breathing like she ran four marathons. Sweat clung to her body with her body falling to her knees on his clean floor.

Doctor Home merely tapped his cane in annoyance, reaching for his Scroll. "I guess I should call the big guy upstairs. Drat, this is going to be hell on my minutes. Now how can I be caller twenty-one to win tickets to—!"

Clutch!

Nora Valkyrie summoned whatever energy she had left to grab his lab coat. No! She could not take any chances. None! The last time they saw Pyrrha before Amber came along was before she visited Ozpin, and she feared his visit. Paranoia gripped her soul. Maybe the two weren't related? Possibly they were? None if mattered! Nora didn't dare take the risk to find out with her strength too fragile to protect her family.

"Please... don't tell anyone... not yet. I'm begging you."

The sarcastic doctor glared at the stubborn girl. She appeared to need medical attention herself with how tattered her body was, darn teenagers, training accidents and their need to be suicidal in the pursuit of fame, made for entertaining but troublesome days. Beacon Academy protocol demanded he informed Ozpin. Their injuries alone made him take out his Scroll. Still, she hopelessly clung to his lab coat with nothing but faith and a faltering grip. Poor girl appeared on the edge of collapse, probably using his outfit as a source to lean on. Curse his bleeding heart of generosity and unrivaled curiosity to figure out what these crazy kids did to warrant such damage.

He sighed, shutting his Scroll. "I'll give you one day before I contact the Headmaster. Just one day! Being strange and stupid doesn't make you four that interesting."

Her weak smile almost made him push it to two days.

"Thank... you..."

An eye roll. "Whatever, sit down on the chair. Obviously, you're not as critical as your three friends here. I'll get to you last."

Doctor Home cursed. There was that grateful smile of hers. She really pushed for two days, deceitful bedbug. Ignoring her came easy, not with three patients thrown into his lab. Nora sighed gratefully, crawling to the nearest chair. Adrenaline, nothing but good old fashion adrenaline offered her the strength to carry her team home, but once she made sure the doctor inspected them on the safety of medical beds, her head rolled over to the side the moment she took a seat with sweet unconsciousness whisking her away to dreamland.

...

Tick-tock.

Ozpin savored the little things.

Some went well with warm chocolate, like the tick-tock lullaby his clock tower offered as the sun dusked in the endless horizon. Others included a paperwork prone Glynda, a supportive teaching staff, companions without a treacherous thought, adorable antics of his faithful students, or comrades against the elusive battle involving the Grimm. Everything the Headmaster of Beacon Academy cherished, but nothing beat delicious, steamy chocolate after a gruesome day.

Even now, he refused to simper during his favorite time of evening.

It was to be expected, being the Headmaster demanded he decided the difficult choices others couldn't, like allowing Miss Amber to walk away with Pyrrha Nikos' body. An arduous task, one that he took no pleasure in, while fortunate to have their faithful Maiden back, also unfortunate to lose a beacon of hope others saw as a symbol of justice. Days resembling this one made him regret his position as Headmaster.

Sip.

The man reached for a file on his desk, never taking his eyes off the setting sun with a thin grin finally making itself known upon opening the contents hidden inside. Team JNPR, a gruesome topic to offer a smile, but at the very least Pyrrha Nikos' sacrifice eased one burden. Now Jaune Arc didn't have to compete in the Vytal Tournament, after all, he was a man of his word first-most. A guilty pity, he wished to see the fruits of Mr. Arc's labors. His ill-intention vanished. The emotional pain he felt compared in nothing to what turmoil awaited her team, last thing that team had to fret over was a silly tournament meant to flex one's firepower. Alas, if anything, Destiny remained an unpredictable jester.

Where one door closed, another one opened, or in this particular case, a set of iron doors with a comical jingle.

"Penny isn't answering her Scroll."

Ozpin held back a chuckle from James' dismay. Not a foot out his elevator and already he panicked. So uptight, not enough humor, much like Glynda or Doctor Oobleck, but perhaps that was why he owned the moniker General Ironwood. A befitting title for one so direct. Still, Ozpin relished another sip of his caramel-mocha blend, throwing Team JNPR's file off to the side before entertaining his guest. Some bickering did wonders for the troubled soul.

"Must you always fret, James? She's probably exploring. I understand she has a natural curiosity to—!"

"Her emergency tracker isn't working either. Ozpin, that's not something she can access. Penny doesn't even know she has one. It's implemented right in her chest." James turned warily with his left hand shaking. "Something's gone wrong."

Now Ozpin put down the mug, gone from the mirth in his eyes. "You've never used that device before."

"We didn't have her escorting a Maiden before."

Fair point. "Hmm, you're quite right. Something has happened. Have you've tried contacting Miss Amber?"

"What do you think?"

Ozpin ignored the ill-placed venom. Ironwood had every reason to be on high-alert. Penny's sudden disappearance and the company she escorted warranted such a reaction. If the enemies that attacked Miss Amber on her journeys found her, disaster struck. No, the Headmaster remained faithful. Their Maiden would have run away, yet, Penny Polendina alone should have provided enough combat support to tip the scales if the same assailants pursued. Nothing added up. Ozpin knew this, and so did James.

Shifting his sights to the setting sun, Ozpin reached for his Scroll. "I shall contact Glynda and Qrow. They shall report in and help solve this little dilemma."

"That's if Qrow isn't busy walking the streets of Vale intoxicated."

"That is one of more of his eccentric traits, is it not?"

"If he was one of my men, I would've shot him by now."

A chuckle. "Due to Qrow's personality, I suspect he would've shot himself long before you did, James. Authority does not mix well with him. It's why he's one of my best agents."

The General glared, but it withered into a dying frown. No tracker meant no way to find Penny, so unless he felt like calling upon his forces to search the grounds for one body, he failed to act and sat down on the nearest chair. An exhausted sigh escaped him, one even Ozpin felt. Guilt choked the military leader. Ventriloquy-Mode? Under such orders, Penny overshadowed Amber's movements and shifted her to the top of the priorities list. What if something did happen, that ball of hardwired and cold-calculations was friendlier and warmer than most of humanity. If something grave transpired, if some enemy attacked from the shadows—another sigh—good soldiers died every day, yet he worried about one?

What kind of General was he?

"It is quite alright to feel emotional, James." Ozpin spoke, seeing the struggle between the wrinkles in his old friend's face. "It's only human. No one would blame you. I certainly won't."

James felt one thing, anger. "So you're saying Penny is dead?!"

Ozpin diffused the anger by placing a hand on James' right shoulder. "I'm saying it's only natural. Like how it's natural to assume the worse. If I've learned anything from my mistakes, it's to have hope."

"Hope alone doesn't win wars."

"No, but it inspires your soldiers. You do not win fights driven by fear. You win them by having faith and trust in your abilities and companions. Leave no man behind, as the saying goes."

James said nothing and waited impatiently for the witch and scarecrow to arrive. He refused to tap his foot nervously on the glass floor, but his left hand shook. Snort! Imagine the look his specialist, Winter Schnee, would have upon seeing her commanding superior reacting like this. Dishonorable. Weak. Scoff! Some part of him wished to be a cold-calculating individual, at least it would mend the pain of emotions. A General couldn't allow for his sentiments to get the better of him.

Ozpin clicked his Scroll shut. "Glynda's received the message, but no word on Qrow yet. But I have no doubt he'll be here by the latest tomorrow."

In the end, James Ironwood was human. "Be honest with me, Oz, do you think something terrible has happened?"

Ozpin desired to offer his trustworthy friend the benefit of the doubt. Things would be so much simpler to sugarcoat words, feed him half-truths. Sadly, kindness did not win wars either, and the Wizard knew that better than anyone. One could only hope for the best in dark times. Sometimes, when the tunnel appeared the bleakest, that was all one could do.

"In our line of business, Jimmy, anything can happen."

...

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Nora Valkyrie opened her weary eyes to find a sterile ceiling staring back.

Every one of her limbs felt like they had twenty pounds weights attached to them. None of them did, that was how exhausted she was. Self preservation must have jolted her awake. Although, she found herself on a medical bed with her wounds bandaged up. Made sense, she took the least amount of damage compared to her friends. So her injuries warranted less initiative, still hardly made the discomfort unbearable.

Struggling to sit up, she stopped when her body protested. Eyes begged for sleep, but she refused the request, not until she figured out what happened to her teammates. A second attempt to sit up failed with her falling back down onto the soft mattress. She frowned, hating how weak she felt. Okay! New plan! Without moving, figure out what was what.

The first was obvious. Night had fallen while she slept. Comforting darkness swept over her vision with only the moonlight to provide some light. A beeping sound—several—echoed throughout the quiet room. A heart monitor? Had to be, she sent enough people to the infirmary after a good combat class with Professor Goodwitch to know that jingle. She had grown accustomed to that oddball sound, but she failed to find such a contraption stuck to her finger. So that meant she wasn't in that poor of condition.

Good!

Wait? No. Not good. If that sound wasn't coming from her heart—and if she wasn't in critical condition—then whose heartbeats were those?

Following the sound, she turned her head to find three beds with her friend's silhouettes against the moonlight. A sense of terror filled her soul. Each one of them had a connected heart monitor, each one of them was in critical condition. No! What if someone else came to steal Pyrrha's body? Cough! Her hands gripped the bed sheets in a desperate effort to push herself up. Aura shards, her leader made more! He always made more. Their Auras needed a jumpstart. If only she could reach their room and retrieve them, but she failed. Muscles screamed no! She fell back down without the energy to move more than an arm.

So close, yet so far.

She sighed bitterly, at least their hearts worked. A plus in this unforgiving room! Whelp, with nothing else to do, she stared up and started counting specks of dust. A habit she picked up before Jaune-Jaune copied her. Around four-hundred, where her eyes began to give into darkness, she gave up. Slumber soon began to challenge her senses, and the Valkyrie turned her head on the comfy pillow to see what lay on the other side before giving into her dreams. Fatigued eyes found a note written on a prescription paper, underneath a syringe that taunted her.

Her hand reached out to pick up the note.

Because you're probably going to do something stupid or want to do something stupid, here's a shot of adrenaline. And no, it's not morphine. Like I'd waste the good stuff on fatigue. Your friends on the other hand... I expect a riveting story with love and betrayal.

Nora smiled tiredly at the jabbing note. She liked Doctor Home, he never complained whenever she broke legs. A rule-bender, just like her! She would make sure to make her next story an extra-good one, just for him. For now, her hand reached out to comforting darkness.

Her friends needed her to be the strong one.

...

Slam!

A pair of bloodshot eyes blinked from beneath its dwelling.

Sir Scrabbles crawled out underneath Lie Ren's bed upon the rattling of their room. Its caretaker stepped into the room in a panic, emotions bleak and rattling anguish. Her mind was elsewhere from her feet, she virtually tore the bedroom apart, searching high and low without a moment's rest. Pillows, bed sheets, and clothing flew. Beds got upturned. Books spilled. Her search ultimately ended when she found the pack leader's bag, sighing blissfully with a faint breath. Those Aura shards her pack leader created glowed between her bruised fingers with inviting warmth in the desolate room.

Her only companion a Grimm she learned to love.

Now that the shine of the gems illuminated the cold room, Sir Scrabbles crawled up the female's mate's divan to observe her behavior. Humanity's greatest curse blinked at the sight before it. Battle scars covered the female's form with dressing provided over her wounds, a sense of exhaustion haunted her person with her running on the fumes of the human spirit. Hold on, it wondered, where was the rest of the pack?

Sir Scrabbles noticed her legs giving out. The female was quietly losing the strength to hold herself up, so she sat down on her mate's bed while her lips wobbled, busy staring at the glowing stones. Her haunting emotions were troublesome to feel. The Grimm crawled up to her thigh, poking the tender skin with a curve of its claw. She jumped at the contact, clutching the shiny rocks possessively, like if it planned to steal them right out of her hand. Once she realized it was just it, she visibly relaxed, but hiding frightful emotions from a Grimm was an impossible wish.

"Sir Scrabbles?" Nora picked the Grimm up and quietly hugged the sloth, unable to smile. "Our family's hurt, but I'm going to fix them. Okay. You believe me, right?"

Sir Scrabbles blinked at the troubled girl, offering her the only remedy it knew to quell her wounded heart.

Boop!

Nora offered her first weak smile and planted a boop of her own on the Grimm's nose. Humanity's greatest threat? Nu-uh! Not in her lifetime or the next. This little guy was the only thing holding her together. At least some of her family wasn't broken. Heh, but she had the medicine to fix that. Glimpsing down at her warm palm, her frown returned.

Eight Aura shards only? She gripped them tightly. Better than nothing.

First thing was first, splitting them up evenly between her teammates. Pyrrha and Ren were hurt the most, or so she believed. They each deserved a full shard of Aura for themselves. They took the most damage, then again, she still hadn't a clue to why her leader suddenly collapsed. Maybe she should have checked their charts and—no time! After! After they each got an Aura shard for themselves, she would check. A firm grip savored the edges of the crystals pinching her skin, enjoying the wake-up call her nerves got from tasting blood.

After.

Nora cast a sleepy glance at her precious Grimm. "I have to go now, Sir Scrabbles. Be a good Grimm and sleep, m'kay?"

Another boop to the nose.

Ruffling up the Grimm's tuft of fur, she smiled and hid the Grimm underneath Ren's pillow. Good thing he preferred his privacy because Nora didn't have any idea when she might return. With a final sigh, she got up and exited the room with her adrenaline still running high. No Aura, not like she expecting any anytime soon, but at least she wasn't stricken to a bed like her leader when her Aura hit empty.

The walk back to Beacon's Medical Wing was the second hardest thing she even had to do. Every lingering shadow raised the hairs on her neck. The possibility of that being another body snatched, or worse, someone trying to steal her team's medicine, unnerved her, and there were plenty of shadows at night. Thank Dust the doctor gave into her request because she hadn't the strength to explain what had happened. She knew he wanted to know something, and the lines of a training accident sounded too far fetched even with her on their team. So she expected a possible interrogation tomorrow morning, but for now, she didn't care. Nora only sighed in relief when she snuck back into the medical ward to find her hearts still beating that toneless melody. Huh, her favorite song.

One she heard countless times when sleeping on Ren's chest.

Once inside she walked over to the nearest bed, unable to see the extent of any of their injuries in the darkness. Too risky to turn on the lights.

So she felt around until she figured out it was Pyrrha. Yup! Ren had long hair, but not this long. Plus he had more meat on his arms. Satisfied, she felt around for Pyrrha's mouth, finding her jaw first. A swift attempt to wake up the champion—a failed attempt—and then the Valkyrie cautiously lifted her friend's head and opened her mouth. A quick Aura shard between the teeth later and Nora forced Pyrrha's jaw shut, hearing the crunch of rock candy. An instant after a blanket of snowy Aura washed over her body that illuminated the dark room.

A thin smile stretched across her lips. She knew better than anyone how incredible these shards were, and nothing beat them.

Pyrrha still didn't wake up, but that was okay, Nora set her down gently anyway. Next, she tiptoed over to Ren's bed, fighting the urge to rest her head on his chest. No time! She grabbed him by the head and repeated the same action, loving the glow spreading across his body as his Aura urgently drank from the Elixir of Life. Finally was Jaune, but Nora didn't let go of Ren's head some time, stroking his mane with love and care. She hugged him tighter, biting back emotions from spilling out her eyes.

"Thanks for saving me, Ren. Get better, okay?"

Silence, but that was okay, too, Ren loved being all quiet. The strong silent type. She tenderly put his head down to stand over the railing of her leader. He appeared weak with a pained expression even in his sleep. To think this person just fought an intense battle between both Amber and Penny Polendina. Ha! Nora smiled like a dork and repeated the action, shoving a shard for her teammate to enjoy. Another chew, another glow of Aura, crisis averted so far. Three Aura shards down, five left to go.

Her grip on the remaining shards tightened. All too well she remembered what happened when taking too many at a time, and she preferred to avoid causing more harm than good. With a nod, she pocketed away the last bits, crawling into her bed with Scroll's alarm set to early. Tomorrow she would act as their nurse, but for now, her body was fighting her tooth-and-nail for more sleep. A quick glimpse up toward the ceiling, she counted more specks of dust.

Around five-hundred-three she fell into a blissful rest.

...

Nurse Nora!

The morning couldn't come fast enough for Nora Valkyrie. She practically beat her alarm clock up. Blah! She just got a weird headache. Who cared! The dynamity, lightning-cracker firefly of Team JNPR guarded her team's medical room with a handy-dandy nurse hat—which she did not steal, but secret-borrowed—and a stethoscope that she, too, secret-borrowed. No other nurse was allowed into the room unless they felt challenging the wrath of a protective Valkyrie.

One learned that lesson the hard way.

Call it paranoia, call it superstition, whatever, no one got in! She trusted no one else to take care of her teammates. Nope! Nope! The last time she left any of them alone, Pyrrha almost had her body stolen. Whelp, not this time. After Doctor Home had entered the room, she pushed him out with a strained smile. He didn't fight back, probably more confused that he walked into her using a stethoscope on Lie Ren's leg. At least he had manners on not to disturb her, unlike some of the more pushy nurses.

Oh, how she missed Magnhild.

Threatening to smash someone's legs was so much simpler with a hundred-pound hammer over her shoulder.

She fully expected them to contact Headmaster Ozpin in the future, that was a given. Some offered her pity though, wasn't uncommon for a teammate to linger around their hurt team. However, until the big guy arrived, she focused on the task of figuring how to divide the Aura shards between the three of them, next to fluffing their pillows. Pyrrha needed it more than Ren, right? Possibly? Maybe? She pouted, biting her lip. Maybe a quick peek at the patient's charts might help.

Grabbing all three of their charts, she flipped through them and deciphered the unknown medical terms the best she could. From Ren's graphs, it sounded like a few cracked ribs, fractured collarbone, and an intense amount of bruising. Pyrrha's was an oddball. Except for some extreme bruising—courtesy of Amber being a jerk—medical examination found moderate to minor damage elsewhere with absent Aura levels, but Nora knew better, having experienced the hell of Lore entering one's body. Plus who knew what kind of protection those Maiden Powers offered. She knew she landed some more than devastating blows against her teammate to warrant more than moderate damage.

Good thing she had those Aura shards Jaune-Jaune made.

Speaking of her leader, she picked up his chart and moved to sit down in a chair, moaning the instant her body slumped down in it.

Oum.

A nap sounded perfect right now.

Fighting to such an extent left her spirit drained and feet weighing like sinking sandbags. So much so she hadn't noticed how Monty awful tired her body felt until she sat down on a hard, plastic chair. Stupid alarm clock, why did she set one up again, a quick nap couldn't hurt, right?

Beep. Beep. Beep.

No.

A fire burned in her belly. She couldn't afford to rest now. She could sleep when she was dead and maggot food. Her friends needed her. Time to pay back the favor from the cabin. Before she looked at his chart, she shared a look among the three sleepy heads.

Nora frowned at her three friends. Between the three of them, Ren had the most bandage getup. Being almost crushed to death in an iron sand coffin would do that. Bandages were wrapped around his forearms and chest from what she guessed to be where the bleeding occurred, kind of funny since he carried around a first aid kit. They had one of his arms in a cast with his Lore cloak hung by his bed sight. She was almost tempted to wear it.

Jaune nearly tied with Ren, having his chest covered, too, from a deep gash and multiple puncture wounds from the iron sand. None of his arms had wrappings, but they bandaged part of his head with bits of his hair sticking out. His messed up hoodie rested on his legs in need of good sewing. The slow rise of his chest haunted her because she did not know why her leader had suddenly fallen.

Shaking her head, she turned to the last of the three with a playful roll of her eyes. Of course, the Invincible Girl had the least amount of gauzes. Most of the metal Pyrrha wore protected her from serious injury, but a stint existed around her Achilles heel. She barely bled during the fight. Now when it came to her Aura, well, they needed Jaune awake to check. This Valkyrie seriously doubted the staff here knew how to check for possible Aura infections. Heck! They probably never heard or thought of having too much Aura. Forget about Lore damage.

"May I come in?" Home demanded, appearing over her shoulder like a ghost. He took pleasure in her yelp. "Don't bother answering that, it's rhetorical." He stood before her, waiting. "So? Are you going to tell me what happened or are we playing twenty questions? Fair warning, I never lose."

"... Would you believe a training accident?"

A tilt of the head with a sarcastic pout. "Maybe, depends on how good the story is, even still, doesn't explain what's wrong with the blond one, and before you ask, you might want to look at that chart you're holding. It's got words on it."

Nora blinked. She peeked down at the chart with her eyes growing between each line verse by the second. Jaune's muscles? Tears! What? How was that—could muscles even—torn beyond their limits, ripped muscle fibers? Local bleeding and bruising? Rib fractures? How was that possible? Sure, he got banged up fighting Amber and Penny, but he hadn't shown any discomfort during the fight to such extremes. Muscles didn't even tear like that! She knew what tearing muscles felt like, training to wield Magnhild required some pain, but her leader barely trained in weights. None of this made sense.

The clipboard in her hand shook. "I don't get it, how did this happen to Jaune?"

"I was hoping you tell me, by the way, you have nineteen questions left. The training accident I could believe for the other two. I don't, everyone lies, but since you're my favorite, call it playing favorites. You get a pass on not one, but two, in exchange for the third."

She only knew of one possible way her leader's muscles stretched themselves too thin, but asking put them all on thin ice. Still, he wasn't leaving, she knew that, but she also wanted to prevent him from calling anyone else. So she asked her eighteenth question first. "Team patient-doctor confidentiality?"

He leaned on his case, smirking. "Oh, this is going to be good."

"Ahem!"

"Fine, fine! Go on, spill it! Don't worry..." Home whispered. "I'm a doctor."

"... Could his Aura be the cause of this?"

Home humored her. "Possibly, and I stretch the term very loosely. While true Aura does push muscles fibers to enhance body function, what you're implying is that your friend's Aura here could push the muscles so hard that they tear themselves from a lack of natural structure. It's like using too many steroids, too many and, snap, your muscles tear. In my line of work, not only is that unlikely, it's not possible." When Nora said nothing, gripping the files listlessly, he snorted in amusement. "Holy anchovy? You're serious?"

"Remember! You promised not to tell!"

The doctor glanced back at the comatose Arc. Huh? Muscle damage caused by Aura? Whelp, absolutely a new one to add to his list of fun diagnostic. He turned back to the flustered girl, poking her in the gut with his cane.

"You see, this is why you're my favorite."

Nora smirked, not planning on going to class. Doctor Home could care less. Fewer people's legs to put into casts.

...

Glynda Goodwitch never looked forward to combat class.

Adolescents made for the worst students, but she was anxious to see how Team JNPR was doing with the loss of one of their members. The meeting with James and Ozpin only furthered her cause to aid the troubled team. A missing Penny was indeed worrisome, but she had students of her own to worry over. Ren and Nora undoubtedly would favor on each for support, she expected nothing less from those two, but Jaune Arc might need a shoulder to lean on. So she waited to comfort him to the best of her abilities, not once planning on calling on any of the three into a spar today, but none of them showed up when the students flocked in. Hn?

Late? Not a problem.

Honestly, expecting them to be their usual roundabout way was asking for too much, plus Mr. Arc had once or twice shown up late or just barely on time. A minute passed with no sight of them. Then two minutes. Roll-call. Four minutes. Now ten. Glynda frowned during the spar between Cardin and some transfer students. By the time the match ended, fifteen minutes have passed with no sign of Team JNPR.

"Winner, Mr. Winchester."

Another match, another ten minutes flew by until she finally concluded that they had no plans of showing up today. Possibly they weren't up for fighting at all? Glynda mutely frowned as Miss Schnee finished off her opponent. If that proved to be the case, then asking Professor Port or Doctor Oobleck for their opinion might help. Oum knew Professor Peach never paid the slightest bit attention when busy playing around with volatile Dust. Glynda couldn't even sigh in relief when class ended, knowing one more period kept her from prying until the day officially ended.

"Winner, Miss Schnee. Class dismissed!"

...

Another day, another fight against the Grimm.

An elevator dinged tore the Headmaster away from his favorite past time of watching students flock in the courtyard with a beverage in his hand after a round of classes. Ozpin never got to finish stirring his brew of a double marshmallow blend of dark chocolate as General Ironwood advanced into the clock tower with unrestrained hostility between each step. It was a miracle by Oum himself that the glass didn't shatter. So much anger, yet he knew it was justified. Yesterday had been turmoil, to say the least, and he expected today to be just as worse. James' first words only reinforced such a dark thought.

"Penny hasn't returned! I was hoping it was a malfunction of her systems, a bug we could fix, but she never returned to her bunks, Ozpin!" James' left hand shook. "Something's happened to her."

Ozpin frowned, walking toward James to offer him his newly brewed beverage. Rarely he saw the General in such a fit of turmoil. Not even a mention of their potential missing Maiden, only Penny. Showed how much the man cared about that curious android. Not even the military could strip Jimmy of his emotions. All the training in the world couldn't remove him of his humanity. Perhaps that was the reason Penny Polendina meant so much to him?

A pleasant thought, but it only worsened Ozpin's frown.

No more riddles. Ozpin reached out and grabbed his shoulder. "Once Qrow and Glynda arrive, we'll go searching for her."

His friend rarely showed gratitude, but feeling the tension leaving Jimmy's shoulder and watching him sip away at chocolate delight was more than enough to know. Then the peaceful tension shattered when Glynda stepped into his office next, not pounding against the glass as harshly as James, but the clicking sounds of her heel resonated loudly in a room filled with tick-tocks.

"The remaining members of Team JNPR never showed up for classes."

Oz blinked. "You're referring to your class, Glynda?"

"No..." Glynda affirmed, not commenting on the odd scene of James drinking cocoa. "Not any of them. I've already contacted the other professor and have heard the same story. None of the remaining members of Team JNPR showed up."

"And you're positive that they didn't just skip? I wouldn't put it against them. They have just lost a teammate and companion. Emotions are high."

She frowned, arms bunched to her sides. "No, but after learning of Miss Polendina's disappearance—?"

"That the two could be related." James finished. A fire burned in his eyes. "We should find them and order them to report on their meeting with Amber and Penny."

Ozpin chuckled. "James, these aren't your soldiers, you can't order them to do anything. They're children. Demanding anything won't get you anywhere, it might make it more difficult. We have to confront this in a calm manner."

"Then you suggest we do nothing!"

"No, no, not at all." Ozpin peeked at the Headmistress. "What I suggest is we find the remaining members of Team JNPR and ask if they've seen Penny Polendina."

"And how's that different from my plan?"

"Mine involves a smile, Jimmy."

The General snorted, sipping away at the tenaciously, delicious blend of chocolate. Ozpin grinned. Good, emotions in check, solutions on the rise, everything seemed to be going smoothly. Nothing could interrupt this moment, except another ding from his worrisome elevator. This time Qrow walked in a purposely stubborn step.

Ozpin fought the urge to sigh. So many angry people kept stepping into his office.

"Yes, Oz? Can't you let a guy enjoy a few days of peace and skirts before you send him out on another grueling mission? I don't ask for much."

Glynda smelled the alcohol in his mouth. "Hello, Qrow, nice of you to join us."

He snorted. "The feeling's not mutual. So what's the problem? Who's in trouble now?"

"Didn't you read the message?"

"What? About Jimmy's missing toy? I thought that was some clever innuendo. I spent the better part of half an hour trying to decipher it before tossing my Scroll. You're serious, that bucket of bolts is missing? You called me in here for that?"

"Qrow!" James stood up to confront the smooth man. "She's a valuable asset to the Atlesian military and a vital piece to Aura bonding technology! If Penny's missing, it's a major problem. What if she falls into enemy's hands?"

Qrow nodded all about four seconds before turning to Ozpin with a pressing glare. "And what about Amber? Have you tried reaching her?"

Ozpin thinned his lips. "No answer, I'm afraid."

"But we do have a common link, Team JNPR." Glynda added. "They were the last people to talk to Amber and Penny, and they've failed to show up to any of their classes. Perhaps they know what might've happened."

Another nod. "Good, it seems like you have everything in order, then that means you don't need me."

"Qrow." Ozpin urged. "We need everyone to help locate them."

"How many places could those three hide in, they're either in their room or in the Mess Hall. I know that's where I'd be if I just lost someone."

Glynda had to hand it to the drunken man. Either they failed to leave their beds, or they sought comfort from the taste of foods and sympathetic calories. Huh, maybe Penny was comforting that team by filling the void? She loved to fill the space with curiosity and happiness, making it moderately challenging to be miserable. If that happened to be the case, then ignoring Jimmy's calls or not returning to her room made sense. Not the fractured or broken tracker, but malfunctions repeated all the time in this profession.

Anything could happen.

"Regardless, the more eyes, the better." Ozpin offered his hand out to the scarecrow. "Imagine if this had happened to either one of your nieces. Wouldn't you want more people searching?"

When Qrow Branwen pouted, Ozpin knew he won the argument. "Fine, you win, let's go brat hunting."

Glynda pressed her specs up to rub her temple with her fingers.

What a crazy Thursday.

...

Sir Scrabbles felt the troubling emotions bubbling before it heard the rasped knocking and even before the door to the room opened, but it remained motionless underneath the Sloth King's subject's bed when a pair of heels entered the territory.

The Grimm blinked, hiding deeper into the darkness of dust bunnies and misplaced clothing. Those didn't belong to the redheaded warrior. Hers were golden brown in colors, those matched it fur's camouflage shade. Eyes matching blood feared that its presence would be unearthed, sinking deeper. Fortunately, the new woman didn't remain behind too long, leaving just as speedily as she entered with a frustrated huff, but Sir Scrabbles didn't brave withdraw from the protection of darkness.

Nothing would draw the Grimm out except for its loving caretaker.

...

James Ironwood walked into Beacon's training grounds, hoping to find Penny teaching some poor fool how outclassed they were. Negative. Not a soul between the budding students came close to being her. Not a member of Team JNPR either.

Ozpin searched the Mess Hall, finding Team RWBY enjoying dinner without Penny's or Team JNPR's presence. Strange, the android adored Ruby Rose's company, and Team JNPR regularly stuck to Team RWBY like glue. Hn, another dead end. Perhaps someone had better luck than him?

Qrow Branwen ended up checking the courtyard and the library, coming up empty-handed as the other three, which only raised the hairs on his neck. Penny, by all accounts, was loud and overly destructive, prone to drama. Like his trouble-seeking nieces. Things were too quiet around this troublesome school. Something should have happened by now.

The four eventually found themselves back in Ozpin's office, standing around with the Headmaster sitting at his desk. The sky slowly adopted a harsh shade of orange as the sun set on a new day. Seconds turned into minutes. When not a word reached their lips, Ozpin turned with his fingers laced together, covering his scowl.

"I'm open to suggestions." Still not a word. "Beacon's a large school. Where haven't we checked?"

Oh, the occupants in the room had a few ideas. No one just wanted to say it out loud, but unless they felt like checking empty classrooms, unused rooms, or the janitor's closet on the third floor, then one of the four needed to build up the courage to speak. Another minute passed. Qrow then finally snorted, reaching for his flask to consume liquid courage.

"Fine, I'll say it, has anyone checked the school's infirmary yet?"

Ozpin countered smoothly. "I would've been informed if they ended up in the medical wing. Somewhere else, perhaps?"

"Unless, you know." Qrow shrugged. "One of the kiddos asked for the doctor not to call you."

"And why would they do that?" Glynda asked.

Qrow shook the flash at the good witch. "You tell me, all things considered, our little champion's last request was to seek out her team and part ways peacefully. I have a feeling in my gut that things did not go that way, and they don't want you anywhere near them. You think so too. You just don't want to admit it."

"What other place is there to check?" James huffed, agreeing. He turned to Ozpin. "Is it possible that you've not been informed?"

"Please." Glynda rolled her eyes. "Doctor Home breaks more rules that students break bones. The man's nothing short of a loose cannon—!"

"Who does excellent work, Glynda."

"—And is still a loose cannon."

The witch stared hard at her boss, arms crossed. Ozpin challenged her glare with an impassive stare. A stalemate. Headmaster versus Headmistress, an ongoing battle between indomitable wills. Tensions rose. Then Oz's eyes flickered over to Jimmy's face, seeing the pain of not knowing what happened to Penny. As a pillar for Huntsmen-in-Training, he knew some people died or went missing, an occupational hazard, that went double for James Ironwood, but as a friend, he felt vindicated to at least ease the burdens on his troubled soul.

Sigh.

"I suppose it couldn't hurt to check."

No one cheered, none smiled, this victory left a bitter taste in their mouths. All of them wished to find nothing.

...

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Nurse Nora traveled back-and-forth impatiently between her friends' beds, shuffling the remaining Aura shards in her hands in a distracted manner. Once the doctor left, after a second round of pushing, she guarded the room, checking every few minutes to see if any of them woke up to a poke to the nose. So far none did.

Lazy butts.

The Aura shards in her hand kept her skin pleasantly warm between the growing steps. Humph! She stopped to check the time on her Scroll, finding that classes ended for the day with everyone heading to dinner. Good, good! Plenty of time to not overcharge them on Aura shards. Now the healing could begin! Skipping over to Pyrrha first, she lifted the champion's head and followed the same procedure, helping the listless girl chew on her medicine. Amazing Aura burned to life across her resting body, gleaming in the medical room with a hopeful shine. Another successful operation from Nurse Nora!

Down to four Aura shards.

Not onto her—exclusively unbiased opinion—best patient, Ren! Nora skipped over to lean down and check his heart with the stethoscope. Perfect, not dead. She smiled at the sloth pictures she drew on his cast and wrappings. Good thing pink he rocked pink. Another Aura shard, another shine that brightened up the dull room, and one more patient left. Fingers wrapped around the life-giving medicine.

Down to three.

She hesitated. When she reached Jaune's bed, her hand remained closed. A smile vanished. What to do? His body was a wreck, and Nora wasn't sure if feeding him his Aura shards would help or hurt him. Charts didn't lie. If at all his Aura was the main reason for his damaged body, then she hesitated. Giving more might harm him, but withholding it might make it worse. Her body lingered over his bed with a shaky hand. Coward. No, not a coward, only confused. Feed him an Aura shard or don't? Her hand slowly lowered. Once her leader woke up, he would examine his Aura.

Too risky to bank on chance.

The Valkyrie's stomach growled, she frowned, pretending not to feel it. Another grumble, this time twice as unyielding, pelted her belly. Okay, maybe skipping breakfast through dinner proved to be one of her less than stellar ideas, but she remained absolute. Someone had to stay behind and protect her sleeping teammates. If not her, who? The nurses? Ha! Nope! No surrender, no retreat! If Pyrrha stomached through a Lore shard, Ren through an iron sand coffin, and Jaune from his body ripping apart, then powering through dinner should be a snap.

Grumble!

Maybe the nurses had some yucky clinic food lying around?

She gripped the Aura shards firmly, racing to the door to steal some jello or bland soup when someone beat her there. A figure stood before her. A man, dressed professionally with a square jaw and fixed frown focused on her form, raising a single brow at her hospital getup. He looked beyond her, toward her teammates' beds, and a second brow joined his first. That scowl vanished, replaced by a trifecta of unreadable emotions. Then he yelled.

Panic.

"Ozpin! I've found them!"

The imposing man moved passed her, drawing closer toward Pyrrha's bed. He stopped to gaze at her other friends before focusing entirely on the sleeping champion with his hands gripping the bed rail. Soon three other figures entered the room, two of which were the Headmaster and Headmistress, and one she had never seen before, sporting ruby colored eyes and a five-o'clock shadow with an over-sized butter knife on his hips. Two of them pointedly ignored her, except for Professor Goodwitch, who shared a look distraught with the disturbed girl, before crowding around Pyrrha's bed.

Nora said nothing, not sure how to react. Glynda, however, did by grabbing Pyrrha's charts the second she spotted them. A quick briefing and she scowled at her boss.

"From these charts, she's been in admitted since yesterday afternoon." Glynda huffed, slapping the charts in Ozpin's arms. "Told you that doctor's a loose cannon. Can't even follow procedure right."

Ozpin mimicked Nora by not ushering a word. Wisdom read over the damages written on the papers, every so often flickering back-and-forth between the diagnosis and the girl. Reports rarely lied. He quickly offered his other students a worried glance, eventually sharing one with her as well, before converging his attention to a bedridden champion. Every line he read made his age more relevant until he slapped the folder shut. Another quick peek between the three beds made his will falter for the briefest of moments, mistakes were made, and people got hurt.

"We've failed our Maiden."

James gripped the metal bars. "Should we try and wake her?"

"With those injuries, unlikely." Glynda answered. "You probably couldn't wake her up from her slumber, anyways."

Ozpin turned to Nora. "I wouldn't mind knowing how she got those injuries in the first place, hers and the others if you wouldn't mind, Miss Valkyrie."

Nora remained frozen, not a word out her mouth. Ozpin sighed. He preferred not to pressure her. Judging by the extent of the damages, trauma, from whatever occurred, might resurface if she talked about it. Best to wait after they were sure Amber was safe. Well, three of them thought that anyway, all except the General, this was the closest he came to pinpointing Penny's whereabouts, no way was he allowing the only conscious member of Team JNPR to remain silent.

"He asked you a question." James stood to tower over the girl. "Well? Tell us what happened!"

"General!" Glynda shouted as she pulled against his sleeve. "Control yourself! Think about how she's feeling."

"But she might know what happened to Penny!" James argued. "We have to order her to talk. It's insubordination—!"

"She's not a soldier! You can't expect her to fall in line." Glynda released his shoulder, casting a failed stare at the downed members of Team JNPR. Somehow she blamed herself for this. "Let's just calm down and go slowly about this. We've found them, that's a good start. The hard part's over. We'll have our answers when she wakes up, but yelling solves nothing."

"But—!"

"Just drop it, Jimmy, the kid's too scared to talk. Yelling's only gonna make it worse."

"Stay out of this, Qrow!"

To his surprise, he listened. Even he understood the man's pain. James merely huffed, never dropping the scowl. The two turned back to check up on their Maiden with Glynda offering an apologetic smile to the uncharacteristically quiet girl. Talks tuned down to hushed whispers with Nora's body shaking. She slowly moved to stand near them, a ghost as they fretted over Pyrrha's body and not their entire team as a whole. Then words like we should move her somewhere safer and Maiden registered across her senses. Her eyes snapped in focus with her lips twisting into a impossibly deep scowl. Ozpin noticed this—mistaking her anger for emotional instability—and began walking toward her to talk when the scarecrow spoke up.

"I guess I owe the kid an apology for making her go in, huh?" Qrow hung over Pyrrha's body with a rare sense of open guilt. "Who knew something like this would happen?"

Glynda narrowed her eyes, unable to look away from her broken student. "Not one of your shining moments, Branwen."

A heart skipped a beat.

B-Branwen?

Nora's balance suddenly tilted, the world around her spun with a wobbly axis. A Branwen? One of the people who murdered hers and Ren's family? Here of all places! No. Her vision began to haze. No, they were lying. A joke, it was nothing more than a sick joke. Ha-ha! Funny, except no one was laughing, not even her. Turquoise soon blended against red. Emotion blurred. She almost lost her balance, the air suddenly impossible to intake. Lungs burned. She had to run! She must escape this place. She must—wait? Wait. Wait!

I guess I owe the kid an apology for making her go in, huh?

Him? That man made Pyrrha go through all this trouble? The reason she clung so desperately to life was because of him? Her team suffered for his choices? Pyrrha hadn't wanted for any of this to happen! Everything could have been avoided if he had stayed away?

Branwen.

Fear turned into bravery. Who cared if he expressed guilt, he should have never messed with her team in the first place! Haven't the Branwen's stolen enough from everyone she loved! Her world shifted into equilibrium with everything turning crystal clear. Suddenly the idea of running was buried in the furthest depths of her mind. Gripping the last three shards of Aura firmly, she found her rage quickly taking over and resurfacing grieved memories. All of them were linked to the Branwen family. All made the frown on her face morph into indisputable anger. Her thoughts—her feelings—promptly drowned underneath the heavy thumps of her enraged, exhausted heart.

Every day—for the past twelve years of her natural-born life—she tried to wake up with a smile and positive outlook on life. If not her, who else? Ren wasn't able to at the time. He was too busy dying in front of her. Even now he woke up some mornings with a sad look on his face, and all because of a Branwen!

Nora had absorbed a ton of things throughout her young life. Her parent's death had been challenging to process and move past. Ren's unavoidable determination to keep her safe, the consequences that followed suit and his tendency to call himself a monster had nearly shattered her heart. The devastating truth about her family's demise had left a bitter taste in her mouth. Her friends—her family—had almost been killed and she still held it together to help them in their time of need.

She was the excellent definition of a shock absorber. However, a shock absorber, while indefinitely able to withstand tremendous amounts of punishment, had breaking limits. Everything, great or tiny, had a limit. Ren had a breaking limit. Pyrrha had a breaking limit. Jaune had a breaking limit.

Nora had a breaking limit.

Qrow Branwen turned out to be that breaking limit.

It was happening all over again. First Ren's family—her family—and now they wanted Pyrrha. Now they wanted to take her away to parts unknown and leave them missing the P to Team JNPR? They were going to tear everyone apart—he was already tearing them apart! That man was to blame for Pyrrha's struggle!

I can see why you want to hurt the people who killed our families. It would be so easy to get mad. To throw everything just all at once at them. It would be so easy.

Stepping back and blocking off the adults, she wrapped the remaining Aura Shards possessively between her fingers, digging the sharp corners into her delicate skin. The edges drew blood and Aura sprung to protect her digits, but she forbade the action. Not this time! Nora wanted the pain. She ached to remember the feeling of pure, unrestrained ferocity that bubbled from the pit of her soul. No more diluting the shock, her knuckles practically turned white from the constraining pressure her clenched fingers caused.

Nora?

She had no idea what would happen if she consumed three Aura shards with the limits of four Supernovas or more. It couldn't possibly be good for her. Her body might react violently to the influx of Aura; she knew that much from the time in Emerald Forest. The aftereffects were another problem altogether, just look at her Fearless Leader, but she hardly cared. Her emotions blinded her to such useless thinking.

But I don't think I can ever be mad enough at the person to want revenge. I've moved mostly past it. I mean... I'm still sad about it. I don't think I'll ever get over it, but to suddenly want revenge is not for me. It'd take more than this to make me want to hurt someone.

Now was the time for action!

Somewhere, hidden in Team JNPR's room, Sir Scrabbles removed itself from under Lie Ren's bed to blink at the building storm from its caretaker. The fury acted like a signal and made the fur on its back stand at attention. It was sudden. It was unparalleled.

It was entirely concentrated on one unlucky individual.

You're a stronger person than me, Nora.

"I won't let you..."

The remaining three Huntsmen turned to see Nora stand between them and the recovering members of Team JNPR. Her voice drowned out the sound and made the air hot. True hatred filled those once so-innocent eyes of hers, overpowered by malice.

All directed at Qrow Branwen.

Ozpin frowned. "Miss Valkyrie—!"

"I won't let you... I won't let you..." Nora mumbled, shaking like a leaf. There were tears in her murderous glare. Her shoulders jolted, and suddenly thunder echoed across Beacon Academy from the heavy boom of her voice. "I won't let you take my family away for a second time!"

She moved faster than lightning, gripping the fabric of Qrow's shirt. Before anyone reacted before anyone even breathed, she tossed him through the door they came through, through a wall, and out the medical unit of Beacon Academy in one fell swoop. The man angled himself up before he crashed into the pavement, but his bad luck didn't end there. Nora stepped out the hole with the intention to bury him six-feet-under. By the time the others behaved to the violent outburst, it was too late.

They failed to respond—couldn't counter—when Nora abruptly crushed a handful of exceptional Dust shards in her hand. Only when she consumed the said Dust did they move, afraid for her well-being. Except they knew nothing, without a doubt nothing! Those weren't typical Dust shards she just devoured!

They were made by her Fearless Leader to protect their team!

The exact moment she swallowed the shards, her pupils shrunk and a massive overload of Aura entered her body to supply her cells life. An explosion of fulmination soon followed, and all four of the Huntsmen had to maneuver away from the blast radius of lawless lightning. Even when away from the electrically charged zone, they failed to see past the electrical field, blinded by the sphere of electricity acting as a barrier and forcing them back. Strange how the circumference of the blast region only applied forward with the hospital wing perfectly fine, except for some small damage on the outer exterior.

Like it had a mind of its own.

Qrow frowned, forearm used to shield his body from the unbounded voltage. "Oz! What the hell—?"

The wild, turquoise electricity suddenly started shrinking in diameter, centering on an individual inside standing in the eye of the raging thunderstorm. Her electrified eyes pierced through the thundercloud and forced the energy to respond. Her Semblance bent and tamed to her unshakable will.

In total control, she stepped out her electron cloud, glare ever all-powerful. Nora's turquoise lightning acted as an omen for her opponent, forewarning him the potential natural disaster awaiting him. Lightning beckoned to its queen's call. Her supercharged cells rejuvenated her tired body to peak condition, and it took Qrow a second to realize that peculiar green hue hanging in the air was Nora's Aura glowing in plain sight.

A constant discharge of electricity conversed outside her entire body, coating her in a layer of infinite lightning, it never reacted far from the host, condensed tightly in her positively charged Aura. Her muscles, controlled by the impulses of electricity running rampant in her body, contracted violently under the power. All her cells signaled her nervous system with lightning-fast reactions and compulsions. Her initial body temperature elevated a few degrees Celsius, surpassing the realm of normal human limits.

Lifting a single hand, she flexed her fingers before tightening them into an ionized fist, accepting her Aura and energy for what they were, any average, sane person wouldn't have been able to handle such a tremendous influx of foreign Aura all at once, even she knew that. Unfortunately for her opponent, her body had survived such toxic environments and had grown used to Aura shards compared to her teammates, but she quickly ignored that and settled her sights on the scarecrow, and there was nothing but pure hate in those eyes of hers. Absolute, heart-wrenching hate!

It consumed every part of her soul like a convulsion of static.

Forming tightly-wounded fists, she growled, preparing herself by allowing her years of repression and instincts to take over. Static hugged tightly to her body. An electrical current traveled around her torso, her eyes were electrified, stunning in royal wonder, and electricity gathered rapidly between her fingers with deadly precision. All lightning around her moved in a wanderlust pace.

The intense heat of her Aura magnified her vocal cords, granting her a voice louder than thunder. Boundless electricity danced from her pores to travel upward, centering on a focal point above her head. Obstinate became tamed. The formless current took hovering shape. A single Thunderbolt fitted in the centerpiece to act as a jewel.

An orphan dawned a lightning crown befitting a queen.

Nora Valkyrie was the personification of Lightning in a Bottle.

"I'm going to break every bone in your body!"

---

Author Notes: In case none of you have noticed, it's Thursday during this scene and today's Thursday. Wednesday had the buildup (Chapter 21-23) and the Amber-Pyrrha fight.

Crazy Thursday.