"S-shit, did you guys here that?" asked a White Fang grunt as he and his two friends stood on opposite ends of a barricaded door.
"Yeah," said a second grunt with a hint of fear in her voice. "Sounds like they took out the robots we had in the hallway." She turned to the comrade next to her. "Think they'll break in here?"
"Pfft, this door is a mark IV security door," the third one stated with pride. "SDC came out with them a little over a year ago. They can withstand a direct hit from a rocket. We're perfectly fine in her-what the fuck!", his gloating was interrupted as the wall next to him and the female grunt violently dented inwards.
While the mark IV security door is as tough as they say, the walls next to the door were not. They were lightly reinforced metal walls. All three grunts quickly got over their shock and aimed their weapons at the wall. Two more dents were made in rapid succession before they stopped. Several moments passed before they breathed a sigh of relief. Suddenly the wall exploded inwards and fell over, knocking the woman back and trapping the man under the debris.
Cardin Winchester charged in through the hole he made and immediately brought his mace down on the head of the poor grunt caught underneath. He immediately turned his attention to his left as he heard the sound of someone shouldering a gun. He ducked, dodging a burst of gunfire and then charged the shooter.
Cardin went to swing his mace when the shooter got another burst out. Two bullets impacted harmlessly on his armor, but the third struck his arm. His aura protected him, but the shot made his arm flinch upwards, making cardin strike the gunman's head, shattering his mask and knocking him out instantly. Cardin then turned to the last person in the room.
The last person quickly looked at her incapacitated friends, then back at the attacker. "You know what?" she said as she dropped her gun and raised her hands up. "I honestly hate working for them. These guys are nuts." Sweat started to form on her forehead as she silently prayed for this to work.
Meanwhile Ozone, Scarecrow, and Royce took up a defensive position in the hallway and waited for Cardin to clear the room on his orders. They didn't hear anymore sounds of fighting, but Cardin didn't give them the all clear yet.
"Shit," Ozone whispered with concern as he leaned forward to peek through the hole in the wall. "Hey Cardin, you alr-AHH!" He recoiled back as the body of a White Fang grunt came whooshing past him, slamming into the wall before collapsing onto the floor. Scarecrow couldn't help but notice that the grunt was missing some teeth.
"Room's clear!" Cardin called out, signaling the Atlas soldier to come in. "There hasn't been much resistance down here." he noted, voicing what everyone was thinking for a while now.
"Could be that this base was being used to house those droids in the storage house and they relied on them for security here." Royce said as he inspected the room they were in, which appeared to be some kind of security room. However, all of the monitors and anything that looked valuable or would hold information was smashed and destroyed.
"Maybe." Scarecrow replied. "Or the majority of everyone that should be here is out on a mission or something and that's why it's mostly empty."
"Either way we need to hurry," Cardin asserted as he inspected a door and the wall perpendicular to where the entered from. "Damn, this wall seems stronger than that door back there. We gotta go through the door. Ozone, on point. Get the door."
'Why am I always upfront getting shot at first?' Ozone thought as he took up a position on the door. Cardin and Scarecrow were behind him and Royce took up a position on the opposite side. Cardin tapped Ozone's shoulder, signaling him that he's good to go. Ozone nodded at Royce, whom nodded back and raised gun ready to provide overwatch.
Ozone gripped the door while holding his gun in his other hand. He turned the knob and violently opened the door. Cardin rushed in with Ozone following right behind him. "Clear." Ozone called out. Royce and Scarecrow then walked into the room and paused. Their eyes widened when they realized where they were. They recognized this room from the broadcast several hours ago. This is where Jaune and Yang were tortured.
The room was brightly lit and the floor and walls were covered in bathroom tiles, many of which were cracked. The floor was stained with many large puddles of bright red and black blood, filling the room with a foul odor. There were two chairs and several bands of metal chains that had some drops of blood on them. In between the chairs was a metal wheeled tray that had several sharp tools, needles, and a drill laying on it, all stained red. There was a smeared blood trail that lead to the steel door on the opposite.
There were also four dead White Fang bodies. Limbs were severed and pieces of flesh were scattered. They looked like that got sliced apart by a sword.
"Search the room! See if you can find anything important!" Cardin barked out as he got over his initial shock and took out his scroll and called Buck.
"Cardin, status. What did you find?" Buck's voice echoed through Cardin's scroll.
"We uh," Cardin choked out as the smell of blood was getting to him and filling his mind with images of what might have happened here, "we found the room where the White Fang broadcasted their torture of Yang and Jaune." He paused for a moment as he took in a breath. "There's also several dead White Fang guys in here. I think Jaune and Yang broke out." There was a long silence.
"That could be the case. We have some Fang casualties up here as well. Are there any signs of them or clues as to where they might be?"
"I… yeah, we have a blood trail leading out of the room. It looks fresh so we're going to follow the blood trail and it and hope it can lead us to them." Cardin said as he recomposed himself.
"Copy that. Sky, Spikey, and I will continue our sweep on the upper fl-" he pause, then a gunshot was heard and then Cardin's scroll showed 'connection lost'. Cardin panicked and tried to get a connection back, but to no avail.
"Shit! Alright listen." he called out grabbing everyone's attention as he put his scroll away. "Buck and his team ran into trouble and can't raise his scroll." If this bothered any of them, they didn't show it. "I'm sure he's fine, but we can't worry do anything about that now." In truth, he could call up Sky or Russel, but if most of the blood in the room was Jaune's and Yang's, then they couldn't waste anymore time.
"Right now," Cardin continued, "all we can do is continue to try and find Jaune and Yang. We're going to follow the blood trail and see where it leads." He slightly cringed at how morbid it sounded. "We're going to smash any freaks we see, we'll find them, and get the Hell out, quick." The Atlas soldiers nodded in approval. He ran up to the door as the squad followed. "Alright!" he shouted as he busted the door down. "Let-" taking one step in he was immediately pushed back by a hail of large caliber gunfire.
The bullets tore and dented his armour with each impact, He hit the ground as the burst of fire ceased. Scarecrow and Ozone Immediately grabbed Cardin and pulled him out of harm's way as another burst of fire came through where the door once was.
"Heavy MG!" Ozone called out over the heavy machinegun fire while blind firing a burst of from his rifle through the door. "Sounds like a Bolter 42! Cardin, you alright?!"
"Gah, fuck!" he shouted in pain as Scarecrow and Royce rested him against the wall and helped get his butchered chestplate off. "My chest peice got shot up." He said as he tore off his shattered chest piece with Royce's help. "It's useless now."
"Arua stopped the bullets. You're just winded from the impacts," Royce reassured with a pat on the shoulder. "You're fine."
"Yeah well of course I am." Cardin forced a smile and was almost unheard over the roar of the Bolter 42. "I'm training to fight monsters for a living. I'm not going to get taken down by a few gunshots, that'll just be insulting." Cardin and Royce suddenly jumped at an explosion and turned to the door.
"A little warning next time you do that!" Royce shouted in annoyance.
Scarecrow ignored them and took out another grenade from his belt and threw it down the hallway, just barely avoiding a burst of MG fire. They heard the boom of the grenade exploding but the Bolter 42 kept firing. He took another grenade and pulled the pin. He quickly peaked to get the MG to fire a burst and then threw the cooked grenade down the hall. He got the same result as the first two grenades did.
"Damn it!" Scarecrow cursed in frustration. "Turret's too far away and hallway's too narrow to get a good throw in. There weren't any other branching paths down here either. We're stuck." Cardin sighed heavily.
"I'll call it in." he pulled out his scroll to see that Russel was making a group call to everyone. "Hmm." He answered and put in on speaker.
"-UNE AND YANG! REPEAT, WE FOUND THEM!" Russel's voice hollered over the scroll, panting for air. "WE NEED TO GET THEM OUT NOW! THEY ARE GOING TO DIE IF WE DON'T"! No one needed to be told twice. Scarecrow threw a smoke grenade to cover their retreat. "How's the evac looking?!"
"This is pilot 479er," the pilot said over the scroll. "You have Grimm approaching from where you entered through the forest! Not sure if I can land without getting boarded! I'll try and help thin their numbers!"
"Peasant here!" his voice came over the scroll speaker over the sound of gunfire. "We got Grimm entering the storage room! Nothing we can't handle for now but they're increasing in number and the bullhead can't land until the area's clear! We need you guys back here now!"
A few minutes earlier
The White Fang grunt screamed in agony as he was electrocuted by the electric dust from Russel's dagger before collapsing on the trio had just cleared out 6 grunts in what appeared to be a break room.
"This is almost too easy with Spikey's x-ray vision." Buck commented.
"Yeah, he's handy like that." Sky commented before being shoved by Russel, his head shaking with a small grin. "Hopefully at this rate we find them soon." The trio formed up at the next door. Strangely, the door was ajar. Sky peeked through.
"Oh shit." he gasped and rushed in. Russel and Buck immediately followed.
They were greeted with a horrifying sight. There was a wide hallway with a door on the opposite side and one door perpendicular to the other two doors in the room. There were many dead bodies in the room, all of them in White Fang uniforms. Upon investigating, they each appeared to have died from either multiple gunshot or slashes by a blade. Slash marks and bullet holes coated the walls. The floor was almost completely drenched and covered with blood. Sky almost jumped when Buck's scroll began to beep. He crouched and answered the call in front of the door perpendicular to the rest.
"Hey uh, Sky. Come to look at this." Russel said with his voice slightly shaking. Sky ran up next to Russel, his eyes widening when he saw what he was looking at. It was a pair of severed legs, cut just about where the knee would be, lying on the floor, apparently covered in denim. Sky then realized something, none of the White Fang bodies in the room were missing any limbs, and denim jeans weren't a part of their uniform.
Sky and Russel turned his heads to face each other. Their eyes showed fear. They both knew of only one person who wore jeans as part of their combat attire, and who was wearing jeans when they were kidnapped. Jaune.
"You don't think these are Ja-," Sky tried to ask but stopped as he heard a noise. It sounded like faint whimpering. They both immediately turned to where the sound was coming from, which was the door Buck was crouched by. Without thinking, Sky rushed to the door and threw it open.
"Copy that. Sky, Spikey, and I will continue our sweep on the upper fl-" Buck said over the scroll before he turned to see Sky open the door. The sound of yelling and gunshot after gunshot erupted from the room. Buck's scroll was hit by a stray bullet and shattered into pieces before he rolled out of the way and pressed himself against the wall.
"Jaune!" Sky called out. "Jaune it's me, Sky!" The gunfire stopped and the trio leaned over and peeked into the room. It was a storage closet, and in the corner on the ground was Jaune Arc. His legs were gone from the knees down. His shirt was blood soaked and torn, revealing several scars along his upper chest and shoulders. His face was painted red with blood except for his eyes. His right arm extended outward clutching a pistol while his left hand was behind him guarding somethi… no, someone. Yang Xiao Long was lying slumped against the wall unconscious behind Jaune.
"Oh my God." Russel mouthed as he, Buck, and Sky rushed in to their aid. Jaune's eyes slowly widened and he dropped the gun in shock as he realized whom he almost shot.
"S-sky?" He whimpered out despite the pain he was in. "H-ho-ow d-did-"
"We're here now! That's what matters!" Sky said as he ran up and crouched down next Jaune. "You two, go tear off some cloth from the guys outside, we need to make him some tourniquets to stop the bleeding!" Sky and Buck nodded and ran out of the room. "Jaune I have to be honest with you, t-this is bad." Shy managed to choked out. "Even with aura, I don't think w-"
"Forget. About. Me!" Jaune forced out with a cracking voice while reaching out to grab him. Tears started to fall down his face, washing some blood off. "Yang! Sky, Yang….pl-please….." Sky immediately understood what he meant and feared the worse. Buck and Russel ran back in with many pieces of torn cloth.
"Here, take them and wrap it around his legs to stop the bleeding. I need to check on Yang." They took Jaune and began to bandage his legs up. Sky now had a good look at Yang. His stomach knotted.
A bloody cloth, the same color as Jaune's shirt, was wrapped around her forehead and covered a little bit of her eyes. Her right arm was cut off a few centimeters below the shoulder, but it did have a tight makeshift tourniquet wrapped around it, also the same color as Jaune's shirt. And on her lower stomach there were a bunch of white makeshift rags, stained blood red, tied around Yang's lower stomach. The stained blood seemed to concentrate just around the…. Sky gasped.
Sky immediately put his hands on Yang's lower stomach and closed his eyes, focusing his semblance, pouring as much aura into her as he could. He could see a large slash on her forehead but it wasn't a deep cut. There were small cuts and gashes on her legs and her wrists were heavily bruised. He could see the nerves and pain receptors Yang's stomach were going crazy, had poured half of his remaining aura reserves into Yang's lower stomach, hoping it would be enough.
Meanwhile, Buck and Russel just finished tieing up and tightening the cloths around Jaune's leg. Jaune has finally passed out from the pain.
"We need to go!" They turned to see Sky rise up with Yang in his arms bridal style. "WE NEED TO GET THEM OUT NOW!" Buck immediately pulled a now unconscious Jaune over his shoulders in a fireman's carry.
"Russel, contact the others, we are leaving!" Russel pulled out his scroll and dialed up the others as the trio plus the unconscious hunters ran back the way they came.
Time was of the essence. They had to get out NOW.
"We need you guys back here now!" Peasant yelled over the gunfire from Meat, Chemo, and Archer's guns. Grimm were coming in through the opening in the wall. Thankfully, they were only Creeps and a few Beowolves coming in manageable numbers. But they knew that it was a matter of time until their numbers would increase and tougher Grimm would come. Thank God they took a lot of spare ammo in 479er's bullhead..
Dove yelled as he unleashed a nova blast and threw back three Beowolves back into a wall, killing two on impact, the third falling on a small pile of dead, decomposing Beowolves. Dove didn't know how much longer he could keep this up. They took out several Grimm nests earlier and didn't have enough time to rest before storming the compound. Fatigue was starting take it's toll, and it was a heavy fine.
A loud roar grabbed his attention. He turned towards the entrance to see a heavily armored Ursa Major stride inside. "Shit! Guys you have Ursi coming in! I just spotted them!" 479er yelled over the radio. "Fuck! I got a flock of Griffons flying in fast! I have to take evasive maneuvers! You're on your own, sorry!"
With 479er gone for the time being, Dove didn't know if he could keep the Grimm away from his comrades. He feared for their lives as an Ursa began to charge. He yelled a battle cry as he matched it's charge, preparing himself for an aura charge.