Chapter 11
"Fall back!" The White Fang lieutenant yelled as his men were being butchered by a certain blonde-haired brawler. The soldiers did just that, especially since their weapons appeared to be having virtually no effect.
Yang was concentrating her power into her punches, so her aura was almost nonexistent at this point. In spite of that, the bullets would penetrate her body, but the wounds would almost instantly cauterize. Her pure fighting instincts were taking over, so when she wasn't about to attack someone, her arms remained close to her torso in order to block bullets from hitting any vital organs. Yang was still getting shot quite frequently, but that was only fueling her attacks…and it would only take one well-placed shot to end it all.
"YANG!" Ruby yelled as she ripped Blake's jacket and tank top off to put her entire body weight onto Blake's uncovered wound. "She's putting everything into her attacks…Yang's not in control!" Ruby thought with panic.
"What are you doing, you brute?!" Weiss yelled, attacking as many faunus as she could from her distance. Yang had been pushing the White Fang back but was following them as they retreated. "YANG?!" Weiss yelled.
Both Ruby and Weiss froze when Yang responded to Weiss' call. Yang glared at them for a single moment, her eyes were blood red and her hair aflame. There was no rationalization in Yang's eyes, just pure hatred and rage. That look she gave was befitting for her current appearance; she had blood splattered everywhere on her body, she was bruised and swollen in some areas, and there were pieces of her victims that were stuck on her body after blowing them up. Yang turned her head back around and continued her onslaught.
Weiss heard Yang continue her rampage around the corner of the pipe before calling out again, "Y–"
"Don't bother…" Ruby said.
Weiss looked to her leader in shock, "What do you m–"
"Blake needs help!" Ruby yelled. "Put your hands here and hold pressure." Ruby explained.
Weiss simply followed her orders after seeing how much blood Blake had lost. Weiss put her hands on top of Ruby's and applied pressure, reserving her entire body weight until Ruby pulled her hands out from underneath hers. They exchanged slight glances before Ruby pulled her hands out and Weiss' hands almost immediately filled the emptiness. "Oh my god! It's not stopping!" Weiss thought after seeing it continue to seep out, despite her entire body weight being placed onto her hands.
"It probably hit her aorta…" Ruby said as she reached into one of Weiss's belt pouches for a vial of flame dust and a syringe of bio-dust. "Okay! On three, you're going to pull your hands away and I'll dump the bio-dust into her wound. When we're sure the bleeding has stopped, both externally and internally, you need to blast a hole into the house and see if our target is still there! Do you understand?" Ruby asked.
"Damnit! Yes, hurry up!" Weiss said. "We have to continue the mission or all of this would be for nothing." Weiss though, as she finally got to the same page as Ruby.
"One…two…" Ruby started as they stared at Weiss' hands, covering Blake's wound. "…THREE!" Ruby yelled before Weiss pulled her hands away. Ruby squeezed the syringe and watched as the liquid ran across the outer layer of Blake's intestines and blood vessels, stopping the bleeding. When Ruby was sure the bio-dust had congealed appropriately, she looked up and nodded toward Weiss.
Weiss aimed Myrtenaster toward the top of the pipe a few meters away and placed a glyph on the pipe. Just a few seconds later, the glyph exploded through the entire foundation and penetrated the basement. Weiss walked over to the hole, placed a gravity glyph under her feet, and launched herself into the building.
"Okay, Weiss is taking care of that…let's see what I can do here." Ruby thought as she squeezed the bullet wound closed on Blake's back. She then poured some of the flame dust on the wound and applied some of her energy to it. The flame dust instantly ignited and burned around Ruby's fingers, her aura not letting her get hurt by it. Blake, being unconscious, had no aura to defend herself…so the flame dust worked very quickly and efficiently.
When Ruby pulled her hands away, she saw a large burn where the bullet hole was. Not missing a moment, Ruby turned Blake onto her back and looked over the exit wound. Seeing that it wasn't bleeding, she was relieved the bio-dust had made its' way all the way through her wound. Again, she squeezed the bullet wound closed and applied flame dust and a bit of her energy. The wound closed up, leaving only a burn behind. Blake was lucky the bullet hit slightly to the left of her spine, in the narrow part of her waist.
"He's not there." Weiss said as she floated back down on a glyph. "How is Blake?"
"She'll probably live, though I doubt she'll wake up anytime soon. She probably lost almost three pints of blood." Ruby explained as she placed her hands over Blake's stomach and pulsed her aura through her. "I did as best I could, but I'm not too familiar with her aura." Ruby continued.
"I think we need to leave, but we can't go the way we came in." Weiss said, still hearing gunshots and explosions echoing through the pipe.
"Through the building, then. We still have to find the target." Ruby said as she picked up Blake bridal style.
Weiss grabbed Blake's mostly intact tank top and covered her torso with it. "In case she wakes up…I doubt she'll want to be wearing only a bra." Weiss explained. It was now that she fully recognized how much blood there was. There was a large puddle on the ground, and Blake was covered in her own blood. Some of the red on Ruby's clothes weren't from the fabric and Weiss' white attire was littered with blots and splatters of blood. The most blood, however, was on their arms from dealing with the bleeding. "At least the black hides most of the blood on her…maybe I shouldn't wear white while fighting." Weiss pondered as she placed a glyph under their feet and lifted them into the house.
As Ruby and Weiss landed in the house, they could hear the battle going on outside. They began to walk toward the only staircase leading up to the main floor with Weiss taking point. The stairs creaked as they quickly made their way up, but the war sounds from outside kept it hidden well. Weiss slowly opened the door and walked outside to find herself in a kitchen. She nodded toward Ruby who ran out and took cover behind the kitchen island.
"Schnappen Sie mehr Munition!" a voice yelled from upstairs. Weiss noticed the ammo of all kinds being kept on the dining room table and quickly darted toward the doorway and hiding to the left of it.
"What did he say?" Ruby whispered. Her curiosity was cut short by the sound of a few footsteps going down the stairs. Weiss stayed behind the doorframe until she heard them try to pick up an ammo box. She then darted through the doorway and stabbed one in the neck and, before the other could yell out, she pulled out from his neck and slashed horizontally, slitting the other's throat.
"He said to grab some ammo." Weiss stated quietly. Ruby came out from behind the counter and followed her.
"Looks like most of the soldiers are upstairs or in the living room firing through the windows. They probably took the target upstairs for an emergency extraction." Ruby said.
"They can't land an airship on this house." Weiss said as they made it to the bottom of the stairs.
"There's a balcony on the second floor that an airship could fly close to; close enough to obtain a package." Ruby said. Before they could make their way up, they heard a loud explosion from the second floor, causing Ruby sit lay Blake down onto the ground.
"The White Fang must have RPG's." Weiss thought. She was startled, but had a plan, "We need to get m–" Weiss turned her head after hearing a loud thud.
"Legen Sie das Schwert nach unten!" A man said. Weiss looked on as she saw Blake laying on the floor and Ruby being held in a one-armed chokehold by him. Blood was going down Ruby's face, which only pissed off Weiss more. Before she could try to attack him, many other soldiers from the living room rushed in and aimed their guns at her.
"How dare you hit her, you son of a bitch!" Weiss thought. She nonchalantly slid Myrtenaster in a horizontal pattern at each of the soldiers aiming at her while pretending to put the weapon onto the floor. "Ich werde...einfach nur entspannen." She said. Before letting go of Myrtenaster, she summoned many small glyphs under each of the soldiers she could see. When she let go of Myrtenaster, she pointed her right hand upward and immediately straightened her body upright. Her action caused each of the small glyphs to activate, which shot out a long, sharp pillar of ice to be crated and shoot up. Each of the soldiers she could see were instantly impaled.
"Was zum Teufel!?" The man said before Ruby did a backward head-butt, probably breaking his nose. The man stepped back and grabbed his face; when he removed his hands, he saw only Weiss' Blade about an inch away from his throat. Purposefully stopping, she activated Myrtenaster flame dust which exploded out like a flamethrower, engulfing his face in fire.
"Don't you dare harm my teammates again, scum!" Weiss said as the man screamed and scratched at his face in an attempt to put the flames out. In a matter of seconds, his body ceased all movement. "Ruby, are you okay?" Weiss asked after examining her head wound.
"Yeah, probably just a minor concussion." Ruby responded.
"It looks like this building is mostly empty now, everyone else is outside fighting the White Fang. Let's look around upstairs." Weiss said.
Ruby walked over and picked Blake back up bridal style, and began walking upstairs behind Blake. Most of the second floor had been destroyed by explosives and the roof was caving in. "I guess they took the target elsewhere." Ruby said.
They both looked out the window and could see some fighting going on in the fields, but mostly in the forest. The slaughterhouse is being occupied by the White Fang as an impromptu command center. In front of the slaughterhouse, an airship was landing where they saw several White Fang soldiers get out as well as a lieutenant carrying what looked like a chainsaw sword.
"That doesn't look like much fun." Ruby said.
"Where could they have taken the target? Into the forest?" Weiss wondered.
"No…" Ruby and Weiss were both shocked to hear this voice. They both looked down and saw Blake gripping her stomach. Ruby put Blake down and leaned her against the wall.
"Blake! Are you feeling okay?" Ruby asked.
"As okay as I possibly could be right now." Blake responded as she glanced over the window seal. "Looks like the fighting is heading toward the water. I bet the soldiers are taking our target to a hidden boat on the coast." She said while putting her bloodied tank top back on.
"This simulation is ridiculous." Weiss said sarcastically.
"You guys go ahead and ca– where's Yang?" Blake asked.
"She kind of went berserk when she saw you get shot." Ruby said.
"Idiot." Blake said with a sigh. "Go catch up to the target, I'm sure you will find Yang in the forest also. I'll try to contact her via radio and see if I can calm her down." Blake said before grabbing a sniper rifle from a corpse. "And if I manage to see anyone through the trees, I'll pick them off." She continued.
"You can't stay here!" Ruby said.
"I can't go with you…there's no way I can walk." Blake explained. "Just get to the target and call our airship in." She said.
"She right. We need to go if we want to pass the Hunt." Weiss said.
"Fine." Ruby said in a monotone voice.
Ruby and Weiss stood up and were about to jump off of the second floor behind the house. Weiss pointed Myrtenaster at the stairs and placed a few small glyphs on the staircase. "That's just in case someone tries to attack you. I put six traps on the stairs, so be careful." Weiss said.
"Thanks, you too." Blake said as she loaded the rifle.
Both Ruby and Weiss jumped off from the building and ran into the forest without anyone from the field noticing them. They began running toward the shoreline, using the trees for cover.
Blake screwed on a silencer she found and aimed the rifle out of the window. The second her rifle was pointed outside, she saw rain drops begin to start falling, "Yeah…that's my luck." Blake checked her scroll, to make sure it was still connected to her earpiece and opened a private channel for her and Yang. "Yang?" She asked.
There was static from the other end with the occasional explosion coming through.
"Yang? It's Blake. Answer me!" Blake said. She saw a sniper make his way to the top of one of the trees. Before the enemy could even aim toward the battle, she had sunk a slug into his head. "Yang?!" Blake asked.
All that could be heard over the radio were explosions, gunfire, and the occasional grunt from Yang. She was completely lost is probably sustaining even worse injuries than Blake. She switched back over to the team channel to talk to Weiss and Ruby. "Guys, I'm not making it through to Yang." She said.
"Yeah…she's a little preoccupied…" Ruby said.
"What do you mean?!" Blake asked.
Ruby and Weiss were appalled by the sight they saw. Dozens of dead soldiers and White Fang scattered around the trees with a forest fire building up, but being held at bay by the rain. Yang, herself, was covered in blood and gore from who knows how many people. Her eyes were swollen, her body was bruised, and she had a few bullet wounds in non-vital areas.
"She's not cauterizing the unimportant wounds anymore…She prioritizing her energy." Weiss said.
"So she's calmed down some?" Blake asked.
"Not for long…" Ruby said as she looked to her left and saw the White Fang lieutenant approaching Yang.
"I see the target!" Weiss said as she pointed behind the lieutenant to see a man, who had clearly been the victim of torture, tied up and being guarded by soldiers.
"We need to work our way around without getting involved in the fight." Ruby said. Without hesitation, Yang launched herself forward to attack the lieutenant. "No, Yang's fighting the big guy." Ruby said.
"What do we do?" Blake asked.
"Blake, call the airship. Weiss, you need to provide cover for Yang. I'm getting the target." Ruby said.
"Understood." Blake and Weiss said in unison.
Ruby dashed upward through the trees and began making her way over to the target. Yang was attacking like a monster, killing White Fang members, but never quite being able to hit the lieutenant too often.
Weiss summoned a glyph under the two personal guards who were protecting the target, causing them both to ignite. The White Fang members turned to see Ruby landing behind the target and untying him.
"Stop her, you fuck-wits!" the lieutenant said.
As the White Fang began running toward her, Weiss summoned a wall of ice to protect her. This only gave Ruby enough time to untie the target and pick him up. The second she lifted him over her shoulder, the wall of ice shattered from an explosion. Weiss jumped down to protect Ruby, giving her enough time to jump into the trees with him.
She sat him down in an unoccupied sniper's nest and turned her attention back to Yang and Weiss. Weiss was taking on seven White Fang at once while Yang was still facing off with the lieutenant.
"Ruby, I can see you and the target." Blake said. "Go ahead and give them a hand and I'll tell you if someone tries to swipe the target from us." She said.
"Awesome, thanks, Blake." Ruby said while jumping down to Weiss' aide.
As Ruby landed, she killed three of the White Fang and Weiss took advantage of the confusion and froze the other four in place. They ran up to help Yang with her fight.
As soon as Ruby had Yang in her sights, she saw the chainsaw begin ripping through her sister's abdomen. Yang was holding onto the blade as it was being pushed into her side, her gauntlets protecting her hands from being shredded and her aura slowly melting the chainsaw blade. The second the blade ripped off of the chainsaw, Yang pulled it out of her side and threw a punch at the lieutenant. The punch made contact with his stomach, but the fiery blast that followed seemed to blow the back half of his torso completely off. Pieces of his spinal cord, intestines, and blood sprayed all over Ruby and Weiss.
"Yang!" Ruby yelled as she ran up to her sister, who was holding her side. She placed her hand on Yang's shoulder, but she shrugged it off. "Yang, calm down. Blake is fine." Ruby said, causing Yang to look in her direction.
"Yang?" Blake asked over the intercom.
Yang's eyes went wide when she heard her partner's voice. "B–Blake?" Yang asked.
"Yeah, still here." Blake said.
Yang wiped away her tears with her hands, allowing Ruby a good view of the injury she sustained. "It looks like the wound is cauterized, but that doesn't fix the internal damage." Ruby said.
"Her kidney is probably mush." Weiss said.
"I'll be fine for now." Yang said in between gasps of air. "Let's just finish this stupid thing."
Ruby jumped back up to the sniper's nest to see the target lying unconscious. She looked in the distance to see the airship that Blake called. The airship just passed by Ruby when she saw a missile shot from the ocean coming directly toward the ship. Ruby jumped forward while pulling her scythe out and slashed the missile in half, causing it to immediately explode.
Ruby was knocked into a tree with burns on her arms and shrapnel in her entire body. She wasn't yet unconscious, so she began to flood her body with endorphins to help with the pain. She wasn't in any immediate danger, but her wounds were severe, nonetheless.
"Ruby!" Weiss yelled. When she looked out to the ocean, she saw a White Fang boat speeding toward the shore. Weiss stuck Myrtenaster into the ground, activating the ice dust, and froze the water up to about fifty meters away. The boat stopped in its tracks, but the passengers, in accordance with the laws of momentum, kept going. Five people landed, and slid, quite a distance and Blake was picking them off one-by-one.
"LZ is hot, get back to the docks. We'll come around for another run in ten minutes." The airship pilot said as he flew away.
"Too hot? The fuck does he– oh shit…" Yang was stunned by the sight she saw.
Weiss turned around and instantly jumped into a fighting stance, willing to protect Ruby no matter the cost.
"Guys, I think there are Grimm heading our way. I see a few Nevermores flying in the distance." Blake said.
"Yeah…you're probably right." Yang said as she cocked Ember Celica.
"What do you–" Blake was interrupted by the sound of hundreds of Grimm growling.
Yang and Weiss prepared themselves for the onslaught of Grimm that was coming as hundreds of Grimm began pouring through the trees.
"Shit."