After about an hour or so of handling small crimes around the city, our two heroes reunited just in time to receive a call from Yuri. "So, I looked into these... 'Demons' you told me about." She explained.
"I knew you'd come around!" Peter said happily.
"Thank you for trusting us." Pyrrha said, smiling under her helmet.
"They've been pretty busy tonight- hitting A LOT of Fisk properties." Yuri explained.
"Damn." Peter said.
"That's pretty brazen. Even if he's in jail, he surely has some connections to keep his businesses safe." Pyrrha added.
"He does. But if they can take these places over, the weapons and supplies Fisk had are more than worth it." Yuri explained.
"You girls thinking what I'm thinking?" Spider-Man asked.
"It sounds like they're attempting to start a gang war." Pyrrha said.
"Yeah. That's what I thought, too." Yuri agreed.
"But maybe we can still get ahead of it." Peter said.
"We'd have to find one of Fisk's properties that hasn't yet been destroyed, then hope that they hit it. Sort of the reverse of what my friends did once." Pyrrha said, remembering the clumsy way Sun explained their plan, shaking her head and rolling her eyes with a small smile.
"Right. Any locations the demons HAVEN'T hit tonight?" Peter asked.
"Let's see. Patrol reported a bunch of activity at one of his ship yards." Yuri explained.
"Thank you, Yuri." Pyrrha said gratefully.
"Yeah. We'll check it out." Peter agreed as they hung up.
Soon enough, they reached the shipyard, landing on the roof of a building just inside of the yard. A truck arrived, full of Fisk's men, all armed with automatic weapons. One of the thugs then raised a radio to his mouth and spoke into it, even though he was basically shouting loud enough for all to hear. "Listen up! Demons are making moves on all our caches! Lost two tonight! Just because the boss is in lock-up doesn't mean his hardware's up for grabs!" The thug declared, before calling to others for radio checks.
"Two caches just tonight? The demons are certainly working fast. Disturbingly fast. Do you think they could be working on a time table? If so, the date must be close." Pyrrha said, remembering what she heard from Team RWBY about the breach and how the operation seemed rushed when they interrupted it, almost like they weren't ready to carry it out.
"I don't know. But we need to take these guys out and figure out what they're guarding. Whatever it is, I don't want it in Fisk's OR the Demon's hands." Spider-Man said.
"Agreed." Pyrrha said, then observed the situation before them. "There's too many snipers. We'll have to take them out first before we can even think of dealing with the thugs on the ground." She said.
"Sounds good to me." Spider-Man said, swinging to the right and Pyrrha jumped to the left. Spider-Man made his way over to the guy in a high-up tower at the farthest point from where they came in. He scaled said tower until he reached the opening where the thug was sniping from, hitting him with a web and pulling him from his perch, webbing him to the tower. He then moved to his next target and turned him around with a web, so he was now facing the vigilante, before webbing his face and yanking him to the floor, webbing over him to keep him floored.
Pyrrha had made her way left, dropping behind the first sniper she encountered and extending her spear, using it as a long bar to hold against the thug's neck and choke him into unconsciousness, before moving on. She encountered the next thug and made things a bit easier, using her semblance to pull the weapon away and send it into the air, the thug looking on in confusion, which turned to shock and horror as she made the gun rocket back down and slam into the man's face, knocking him out. She encountered a sniper with a guard and went after them, quietly bringing the guard to the ground and dropping her knee down on his head, before turning to the sniper and, in a reverse of what she did last time, pulled the rifle with her semblance back harshly, knocking the thug off his feet from the pull and putting him on his back, dropping her knee on his face after.
Soon enough, they had cleared out all the snipers. A couple of thugs were patrolling and walking past a bit of scaffolding, which Pyrrha used her semblance on to pull down and take the two out. A couple more ran in to check on them or see what caused the scaffolding to fall, which in turn left some thugs without a guard or fellow patrolmen to notice them, allowing him to easily pull them away for stealth or perch takedowns. Pyrrha moved quietly and dropped a few thugs that were far enough from the others or when the others weren't looking at them. She would also occasionally use convenient nearby hazards, such as paint cans, to knock out thugs passing under second floor walkways or scaffolding that couldn't be pulled down. In a matter of minutes, the two had completely cleared out the yard of any patrolling thugs.
This was fortunate, because no sooner than the last thug was incapacitated did a police cruiser approach, siren briefly whining and lights flashing. The officer stepped out of his car and approached the heroes as they came into the light, Spider-Man hanging upside down from the overhang of the roof and Pyrrha dropping down from the roof. "You know we can't have vigilantes running around trespassing and doing illegal searches." The cop informed them.
"Yeah..." Spider-Man said hesitantly.
"I'm sorry, officer." Pyrrha said, giving a respectful bow.
"Which is why I brought a warrant." The officer explained, pulling out said warrant. "So, what do you say we do some perfectly legal searching?" He asked.
"That sounds wonderful." Pyrrha said, smiling under her helmet.
"Yeah, it works for me." Peter said, dropping down. "So, what's your name?" He asked the officer.
"Davis. Officer Davis. But call me Jeff." The cop introduced himself, shaking Spider-Man's hand, then Pyrrha's. "And you are?" He asked.
"Uh..." Peter said uncertainly, looking back and forth between him and Pyrrha, who was equally hesitant.
"Just messing with you." The cop assured them. "My son's a big fan of you, Spidey. And Arkos, you're making quite the impression on him, too. I caught him using a broom and a trash can lid like your shield and spear." Jeff explained.
"So, does that warrant cover breaking down doors?" Peter asked.
"Not without A LOT of paperwork." Jeff said.
"That's a shame." Pyrrha said. That was often one of the biggest gripes cops have about Huntsmen and Huntresses, that they don't have to deal with much paperwork.
"Alright. We'll see if we can find another way." Spider-Man said. The two made their way up the building, looking for convenient points of access. "A place this run down should have a hole in the wall or a broken window..." Peter said aloud as he thought to himself.
"Would a vent work?" Pyrrha asked from up above, Peter zipping up to the roof to see she had opened an exhaust vent, before jumping through.
"Huh. The girl catches on quick." He said, jumping through after her.
The two landed on a support beam, figuring out the layout, before dropping down and moving to the door Jeff should be waiting behind. "Officer Davis, are you still there? We made it in." Pyrrha informed him.
"And just so you know, I'm trying real hard to refrain from knock-knock jokes." Peter said.
"Appreciated." Jeff said.
"Very much." Pyrrha agreed. She did miss her friend, but she had to admit, one thing she would not miss from her old world was Yang's puns and other lame jokes. "I could open this with my semblance, but I'd prefer to keep up my aura reserves for combat later." She said.
"Right. We'll have to find another way." Peter agreed.
"You guys see a junction box attached to the door?" Jeff asked. After a quick look to the right, they spotted it and confirmed they did see it. "If you can overload it, it should force the door open." He explained.
"Smart, but I don't have anything that packs enough current." Peter said.
"I'm afraid I can't help much, either." Pyrrha said.
"Try this..." Jeff told them, before sliding his taser under the door.
"A taser. Smart. Come to think of it, the capacitors from this thing would be perfect for an upgrade I'm thinking of." Spider-Man said.
"Isn't that a bit rude to dismantle a POLICE OFFICER'S taser for a few parts?" Pyrrha questioned uncertainly.
"Hey, go for it. It's on the mayor's bill." Jeff called from the other side of the door.
"Norman. I don't mind causing him a little inconvenience right now." Peter said, creating his new gadget and firing his electrified webs at the junction box, powering it and opening the door for Jeff.
"Gadget man, huh? Reminds me of my son. Started taking apart our TV when he was 5. Now he's unlocking his friends phones." Jeff said.
"Impressive." Pyrrha said. She wondered what weapon this son might make if he went to Sanctum or Beacon.
They looked around the warehouse once again. "Nothing illegal in plain sight." Jeff said.
"Kinda anti-climactic, right?" Peter asked.
"Criminals are very good at hiding things. You're unlikely to find anything just on the surface." Pyrrha said, once again remembering the stories RWBY told her and the rest of JNPR about their search with Oobleck.
"The girl's got good instincts let's look closer." Jeff said as they continued searching.
"Anything specific we should be looking for?" Peter asked.
"This yard's been around a long time. Bootleggers used to use it back in the day." Jeff said.
"Ah. Gotcha. Those guys love their secret rooms." Spider-Man said.
"Bootleggers?" Pyrrha asked.
"Uh... It's a long story. Tell you later. Just look for something out of place" Peter told her.
They looked around, before Jeff began knocking on one of the shipping containers, noticing something. "Check it out. That sound hollow to you?" He asked.
"It does. Which means there's something behind it." Pyrrha realized.
"Exactly. There's a hidden panel here, with wires going around back. Try to find another junction box." He instructed.
"Got it." Peter said, searching and finding two different boxes. After trying and failing with the first box, he webbed the second and got positive results.
"Thanks, no way I could've unlocked this myself." Jeff praised as he opened the box.
"Hey, I never even would've found it without you." Peter returned the praise.
"Teamwork truly does make everything easier." Pyrrha said with a sad smile, thinking back to her team, hoping she'd eventually see them again.
The safe was opened, but was revealed to be full of useless junk. "Got a big, fat nothing." Peter said.
"Where there's one secret room, there could be more." Jeff explained, taking a knee and examining the ground. "Notice anything about the floor?" He asked.
True to his word, there were numerous scratch marks on the floor along the path the door would swing. "The doors left scratches on the floors. And those can't be hidden like the doors themselves." Pyrrha deduced.
"Exactly. Keep an eye out for more of those." Jeff instructed.
"Right." The two said, before taking off to do so. They moved to the next floor and soon found what they were looking for in front of a red container. "Pay dirt! Scrapes, but no door! None that I can see." Peter said.
"I'll be right up." Jeff said, making his way to an elevator, but discovered there was no power to it. "Maybe not. Elevator's busted." He said.
"I believe I can help with that." Pyrrha said. Although the thought of this being what led to her confrontation with Cinder made her shudder a bit, she used her semblance to raise the elevator and bring Jeff up to their level.
"Thanks. Nifty powers you got there. You related to Magneto by any chance?" Jeff asked.
"Never heard of him. Sorry." Pyrrha said. She then looked over to the walkway they'd need to cross to reach the crate. "The bridge is out. This might be difficult." Pyrrha said.
"I got this." Jeff said, jogging to the bridge, before getting a good running start and leaping across, making the jump perfectly.
"Nice, stuck the landing and everything." Peter praised.
"We're not ALL doughnut eaters!" Jeff called back.
"You're certainly a step above the officers around my city." Pyrrha said, remembering how she had seen the crime scene of a Dust shop that was robbed and the cops were barely doing anything useful.
After some trial and error, Peter found the next junction box and zapped it, returning to the group as Pyrrha opened the container, but discovered it had nothing useful once again. "Nothing. I'm starting to feel like this is Fisk's way of messing with me." Peter said.
"I wouldn't call it nothing. Look closer. They stored guns in here." Pyrrha realized.
"Exactly. They wouldn't sneak them through the front. There has to be some path we're missing. Check out the wall." Jeff explained, pointing out a junction box in the container. "This might control access to another area." He finished.
"Fisk's men were talking about a vault. Think we're close?" Peter asked.
"We have to be on to something. If this is the only stronghold the demons haven't hit, they must have something here." Pyrrha said.
"She's right. Looks like this is a dual circuit. Try looking for another junction box." Jeff instructed.
Peter went off to find the next junction box, but found it was blocked by an elevator. Thankfully, with Pyrrha briefly lifting it once again, they activated it and caused a large section of the floor to pop up."you were right, Jeff. Trap door." Spider-Man said.
"Good work." Jeff said, squatting to open the door.
"I'll help you." Pyrrha offered, crouching beside him and helping him open the trap door, leading into a basement corridor.
"Well, that isn't spooky at all." Spider-Man said.
"Probably an old bootlegger's tunnel." Jeff guessed.
"And it looks like no one's cleaned it since Al Capone." Peter said.
"I'm just going to assume that's been a while." Pyrrha said.
Jeff jogged forward, before crouching down and observing the path ahead, largely collapsed by wooden beams, leaving next to no room to maneuver through. "Big chunk of concrete in the way. I can't get through." He said.
"I'm afraid that's outside my area of expertise." Pyrrha said.
"I'll see how it looks from the top." Peter said, crawling along a wall and pulling away the concrete, allowing the two to proceed, before the building began to shake. "What was that?" Peter asked.
"Subway maybe? Let's hustle. This place is unstable." Jeff said, hurrying through the crawl space.
"I've had enough of crumbling buildings for one lifetime." Pyrrha said as she followed Jeff.
Soon enough, there was another rumble and more shaking. "Okay, that DEFINITELY wasn't a subway!" Peter said.
"No. It sounded like explosives." Jeff deduced.
"It has to be the demons. Let's move!" Pyrrha said as they all picked up their pace in an effort to escape with their lives.
They soon escaped the cramped space and entered the vault, but found it thoroughly cleaned out. "Dang it! The Demons are already gone. How'd they beat us here?!" Spider-Man demanded.
"There must be a back door somewhere. See if you can find it." Jeff instructed.
"Yes, sir." Pyrrha complied as the three began to search. They hurried to the back of the room, where they discovered a set of double doors with the locks destroyed. "They got through by destroying the locks." Pyrrha said.
They slowly opened the doors to see the demons loading everything into a large truck, like a moving van. "Shh. Demons." Peter warned the officer as he walked up with his sidearm drawn. The demon in the back of the truck observed their stolen goods, which included a rocket launcher.
"Officer Davis, I think it's best if you stay here." Pyrrha told the officer.
"Hell no. It's gonna take all of us to stop them." Jeff said, before grabbing some left behind flashbangs. "And some of these." He said.
The three of them suddenly burst out as the trucks closed up and began to drive away, but Pyrrha used her semblance to pull one of the trucks onto its side to prevent it from escaping. However, this also caused a large wave of demons to pour out from everywhere, practically overrunning the yard. "Find cover!" Peter told Jeff, who quickly ran towards a large stack of pallets, Pyrrha running along in front of him, blocking any bullets until he got to the his cover.
Background Music: "Bad Boys" by Inner Circle
Once Jeff was safely behind cover, Pyrrha charged forward and bashed her shield into the nearest demon to knock him to the ground, before flinging her shield in the face of another demon. Peter, meanwhile, pulled a shelf of pipes down on another demon and jumped over a sword-wielding demon and uppercutted him into the air, jumping after him and landing a few solid hits in, before attaching a web line to him and throwing him away, using the momentum from the throw to get out of another thug's line of fire. Luckily, Jeff shot the demon down, anyway, so the web warrior avoided taking a bullet.
Pyrrha was locked in combat with two more demons, one of them with a sword as they teamed up to force her to give ground. However, she used this to her advantage, stepping into a scissor stance, spinning out and crouching while swinging her shield out to take the unarmed demon's legs out from under him, extending the shaft of her spear and swinging it up into the sword-wielder's crotch, before rising, spinning and slamming the flat side of her spear into the thug's head to knock him out. She then turned and blocked a round of fire from a demon with an assault rifle, flinging her shield at him, knocking him down before running in and dropping on his chest, knees first.
Jeff through a flashbang to stun a few more demon's, allowing Spider-Man to swing kick one of them into another stack of pallets, before webbing another thug on a walkway with an assault rifle and pulling him over the edge, causing him to land on the ground, unconscious, before Peter rushed to the last one and delivering a powerful haymaker while rushing past him, turning and executing another drive-by haymaker, turning and executing a jumping roundhouse kick to finish off the demon.
"See? I've got friends, too!" Peter declared proudly.
However, this was only the beginning, as two black cars suddenly arrived, all four doors opening up on both vehicles and eight more demons were now on the yard and facing off against our heroes. "Unfortunately, it seems like they have more than us." Pyrrha stated, readying herself for another bout.
Spider-Man ripped the driver's door off of the car on the left, knocking away the driver and throwing the door into the one who sat behind the driver, knocking him into the rear passenger's side rider of the other car. Pyrrha used her semblance to manipulate the shield of the demon who sat behind the driver of the other car, sending him back into the junction box of the warehouse behind him, shocking him and taking him out of the fight. She then rushed forward and stunned the driver of the right car with a shield slam, landing several hits with the flat side of her sword, before delivering another shield hit to his mask-covered face, sending him flying back into another stack of pallets.
Spider-Man then moved to the two passenger's side demons and quickly knocked out the front passenger with a speedy combo, before ripping off the rear passenger's door and hitting him with it, knocking him back as well. He then turned his attention one he'd sent flying from the other car, knocking him into the air with a backflip kick, twisting, landing, jumping and twisting again to deliver an airborne left side kick, sending the demon into a wall of the warehouse behind him, close to the junction box where Pyrrha knocked out the other demon, rendering him unconscious as well.
Pyrrha once again fought against two demons, but this time she was on the offensive, blocking the attack of the one to the left with her shield, turning and blocking the other one's attack with her sword, lifting her leg and delivering a side kick to this one, putting her foot back down and looking over her shoulder to deliver a rear kick to the other demon's stomach, knocking him back into his car, before flinging her shield into his head to knock him out. She then turned back to the demon she'd hit with the side kick, knocking him into the air, jumping up after him and twirling around him until she was behind him with her spear behind her head and the shaft against his neck, at which point she spun towards the ground, slamming the demon into the ground under her, delivering a backflip kick of her own to seal the deal and knock the thug out.
Jeff threw out another flashbang to stun the remaining two demons, at which point Spider-Man webbed over to them, landing in between them and knocking them apart with a jumping spin kick with both legs. He then rushed to the one he'd knocked forward, delivering a quick combo before knocking him down with a final uppercut, combined with a pair of web lines slamming him back into the ground. He then turned to face the last one just in time to avoid a demon powered punch, diving back and webbing the demons face, before doing slingshot maneuver to launch himself forward and delivering another quick combo, before ripping one last car door off and knocking him out with it.
End Music
One of these demons managed to remain conscious throughout this beatdown and got up, limping away to the last shipping truck and getting in, just barely managing to avoid getting shot by Jeff, getting in and driving off as Jeff knocked another demon to the ground and began cuffing him. "You okay?" Spider-Man asked him.
"I've got this! You two go get him!" Jeff called.
"Pyrrha, think you've got enough left to stop it?" Peter asked.
Pyrrha panted a bit, getting a feel for how much aura she had left and between pulling over the last truck, her other uses of her semblance throughout the warehouse and the few attacks she took in between, her aura was definitely in the orange, likely not far from the red. "I'm afraid I don't have enough left. I'm sorry." She said. Sometimes she really wished there was someone out there who could just buff up her aura in a pinch such as this. Sadly, that was not the case and the two would have to chase down the final truck like they'd done for the odd carjacker before.
"Oh well. Just gotta do it the old-fashioned way. Hop on." He said, turning his back to her, offering her a piggyback.
"This won't slow you down?" She asked.
"Hey, I held up all that debris pack at Fisk's tower, I think a petite girl like you is no problem." He said.
Pyrrha nodded, before climbing on his back, wrapping her legs around his waist and her arms gently around his neck as he webbed away. They quickly chased down the escaping truck, with Pyrrha altering the courses of RPG's and thrown grenades just enough to avoid hitting the two. But eventually, they caught up to and landed on the truck, Spider-Man yanking webbing to the roof of the truck and swinging around to kick his target out of the van and Pyrrha simply extending the shaft of her spear, hitting the guy in the head and causing him to fall out of the truck.
Spider-Man then jumped to the cab of the truck and jumped onto the side again, webbing the driver's gun and pulling it from his hand. At this point, the driver decided to go all out, weaving all across the road in an attempt to throw off the two vigilantes. This eventually caused the truck to collide with an tanker truck, sending it off the road and into the subway tunnel. Spider-Man quickly webbed it and started pulling it up, just when he noticed the incoming subway. "Great, now the 3 decides to run on time!" He groaned as he pulled the tanker.
But then, in addition to the demon's truck recovering and preparing to slam into Spider-Man, another black car with a demon noticably driving barreled towards him from the other end. "No!" Pyrrha cried out, using the last of her semblance to lift the car and fling it up and over Spider-Man and the car, sending it colliding into the truck, bringing it to a hault. Pyrrha panted and fell to one knee as her aura shimmered and broke. Unfortunately, while the truck and car were out of commission, the demons driving them weren't, getting out and taking aim. Pyrrha got up and charged forward, shield in front of her to block the bullets, before slamming said shield into the car driver's head, knocking him out.
Unfortunately, the other demon had a grenade and threw it at Pyrrha, which exploded and knocked her back. "Pyrrha!" Spider-Man shouted, glaring at the demon, who reloaded and prepared to shoot Spider-Man as he finally got the tanker back to safety, but Jeff suddenly appeared, running up and uppercutting the demon as he fired a few rounds off, but fell along with the demon, having a few minor injuries, likely from stragglers back at the docks.
"Ugh... I'm getting too old for this." He groaned.
People began to crowd around and even take pictures as Spider-Man helped Jeff up, then hurried over to Pyrrha. "Arkos! You okay?" He asked her.
"I'll be fine. The armor took most the damage. Just some bruising from the force of the impact. It'll heal quickly once my aura's back." She explained.
"Alright, then." Spider-Man said, helping her up, the two moving over to Jeff, telling the people how he was the big hero of the situation, rather than them.
Shortly after, police cars, fire trucks and an ambulance were on scene, a reporter... well, reporting on the scene at hand. "We've now identified the officer as Jefferson Davis. We're being told he has minor injuries and is expected to make a full recovery." She explained.
MJ walked away from the scene, walking around back of a fire truck, looking around for the two vigilantes. "Excuse me, Miss. Are you supposed to be be here?" Peter asked in a cheeky manner.
"Hello again!" Pyrrha said with a wave.
"Good to see you again. And I've got better reason to be here than you two. After that auction house thing, the Bugle put me on the city beat. Which means I get to focus full time on real stories like this. And the Demons." MJ said.
"MJ, I admire your bravery, but you're playing a VERY dangerous game here. The more you learn about them, the more you become a threat to them. A threat they'll no doubt attempt to destroy." Pyrrha said.
"Exactly. The closer you get, the more you become a target." Peter said.
"The closer I get and the more I learn, the better chance we have to stop them." MJ said, walking out from behind the fire truck and going to Jeff's side as he was loaded into the ambulance. "Officer Davis, Mary Jane Wattson, Daily Bugle." MJ introduced herself.
"No comment." Jeff answered, raising his hand.
MJ looked around, then back to him. "I don't blame you. But these guys are gonna tell their story, with or without you. And they thrive on controversy." MJ told him.
"So what's your angle?" Jeff asked as they loaded him into the ambulance.
"I don't have one. I just listen." She told him.
Jeff looked impressed by this, nodding. "Ok. Hop in." He said with a tilt of his head.
MJ smiled and climbed into the ambulance, the doors closing and the vehicle driving away. "She is good." Peter praised.
"Agreed. If you were the one that dumped her, you made a SERIOUS mistake." Pyrrha told him.
"Hey!" He said indignantly, causing Pyrrha to giggle a bit and walk away.
A/N: Thank you for reading, everyone! I hope you enjoyed it.
Also, I am now playing Spider-Man on my YouTube channel I've mentioned in previous chapters, Sai Blade, so please go check that out and maybe subscribe, PLEASE. That way, you'll be able to see my actual reactions to this stuff before reading these chapters. But thank you for reading and I hope you will eagerly await the next chapter.