****: The will to survive ****

As much as she hated being ordered about, or even reprimanded for that matter, Eira's conscience refused to let her disobey Rika after witnessing what their leader had done. Swallowing her pride, she gave a curt nod, accepting both the light scolding and command. "Just for once!" she said aloud, and began a series of acrobatics that would have left any monkey gaping in shock, to make it harder for Serenity to aim.

All this while, she only had one target: the head, and if she could not come close enough to chop it off at normal arm's length, she would extend her arms. Eira wondered if interception from Gray and Meryl would be enough to distract Serenity from protecting her head. But the Claymore quickly shook off such thoughts, and concentrated on the task at hand. Her eyes glowed a determined gold.

Serenity detected a rapid rise in Yoki in the one to the back-left of her, she caught a look at her and saw the Claymore's sword aimed for her head, and she jumped, Serenity made a fast sideways dodge, and keeping Eira in mind, she began to make her move against Rika.

***___***

Serenity was angered at the recent moves Rika pulled, and even more aggravated that she underestimated Rika. Yet she was surprised she could pull that off and that she was still alive and willing to fight on with the wounds she sustained as she heard the determination in her voice, it rivalled Serenity's own determination to survive. She looked at Rika, then the other claymores behind her former arm. Serenity knew there was no point in getting the arm back, especially now that one of her legs had been impaled at one of the joints. Either way, she had to move, fast. She had to buy some time so she could regenerate a new arm.

The first move she made was this, she used her remaining arm to make a number of small spikes just above where her arm became a blade, there were at least ten of them, no larger than a nine millimetre bullet in comparison, she fired them in rapid speed, spreading them across the claymores, hoping to distract them long enough. Then she made some leaps into the trees, and once out of view, she used her Yoki to make it look like she was retreating, but in reality, she found a place where she could regenerate her arm, and while sparing a little Yoki to trick her adversaries into believing she was circling them, and about to attack from the front. She began regenerating her arm and leg wound, her leg wound was regenerated in seconds, but her arm would take at least some time, she laid low and concentrated on that, while trying to keep her enemies busy looking for her.

After her arm healed, with was no less than fifteen minutes, she used her deception to make them prepare for another strike from the front of them, but she attacked from behind

Gray simply watched his leader make her moves against Serenity with amazement and guilt, amazement at what she did, and guilt for both underestimating her and not helping her or following her orders as he should've. The fact that, with all the damage she had taken, she still had the will to keep going, Gray had only seen that in himself. he spun his claymore around and cut Serenity's former arm clean in half, from the end of the blade to the other end of the arm, then he raised his blade in preparation to attack. He listened to Rika's orders, and looked at her, her tone also gave him a new determination.

'damn it! She can't find much longer, if I followed her orders in the first place she wouldn't have become as injured as this, no doubt the Awakened wil take advantage of this, since she wants me to awaken, i will raise my Yoki, but only enough to maintain a good enough balance of strength and speed' he thought, and he raised his Yoki, only by ten percent, with this he had more speed, and enough strength to cause significant damage to Serenity." I'm sorry commander, if I raise my Yoki any further than this, I will weaken in strength, but raise in speed, and after thirty, my Yoki will become harder to control and rise twice as fast as yours does, and at fifty, I will Awaken, this is why I have suppressed my Yoki up to now rather than used it, I dislike using my Yoki as it makes me unsafe to be around, please, forgive my insubordination." just as he finished saying this, he began to move to the left, and then he saw Serenity aim her remaining arm at Serenity. he did a single jump in front of her as Serenity fired the small spikes, with his extra speed, Gray deflected those headed for Rika. "Commander, you are in no position to deflect these so I had to, I can't let you die right in front of me, not now after seeing what you did and not helping you, and disregarding your orders, I'm partly to blame for those injuries, if not almost entirely." With that Serenity had seemingly began to retreat further north into the forest.

Then Gray moved some small distance forward and detected her Yoki circling them. "She's circling us." He held his sword ready and turned around as the Yoki source was circling them, he kept alert. Although he awaited orders. The next sight he saw froze him with shock and anger, his yoki rose.

Meryl simply watched with shock, and although she did not like Rika because of how she treated her, she found a new respect for the single digit and shouted "watch out!" she had the urge to jump into the fight as it progressed, but she knew she'd only screw up Rika's plan if she did, then as Rika gave her orders, she raised her Yoki to thirty percent. "I am, let's kick her ass!" she said with a grin, totally ignoring Gray's speech, she broke right, and as the flying spikes headed towards her, she did a backflip which took her behind a tree that provided sufficient cover.

Then she jumped out to see the Awakened Being retreat, she cursed and shouted "coward!" She kept her position, and soon detected the Awakened Being seemingly going around them, she kept her calm, and like Gray, she awaited for Rika to give orders, then out of nowhere, with two blades, one seemingly longer and thicker than the other slightly, impaled Meryl from behind, Serenity pulled her blades as the blood gushed out from two wounds just under her shoulders, She turned around and swung her Claymore at Serenity with all the remaining strength she had, but Serenity blocked the strike, and cut Meryl's sword had off, blood gushed out and covered part of Serenity. She laughed and as the claymore fell to her knees, impaled her again, lifted her above her, took her blades out, and then stabbed her left through Meryl's head. She dropped, lifeless.

"Now where were we, ahh yes, awakening the male, I'm sure I assisted there since I feel a good surge of Yoki going through you, yes." She smirked as she said this. Gray was speechless with shock. Frozen. He knew he could not get to her in time to save Meryl. Yet his anger was slowly getting stronger, his yoki rising some more, he resisted the urge to go and attack Serenity head on. "Damn it!"

As the group of claymores awaited Serenity to get out and show herself Rika managed to heal her left eyes and her shoulder, though the wound over her eye, the small cut over it still left some drops of blood falling into her eyes and temporary making her vision more red then usual. Her palm was also reattached back and during the entire time Serenity used her deceptions on them she analyzed them carefully and all this while still keeping her youki at 70%.

She only closed her eyes for the first time in 15 minutes and then took a deep breath before seeing Gray protecting her from a couple of rods and then Meryl killed right in front of her. Apparently she needed to order her team-mates more specifically in order to keep them alive.

"Sweetie, back off! Get over here! Now!" she yelled when she saw Gray getting further away from the group. She waited a little for Gray to come back. When he got close enough she continued slowly.

"All of you sweeties listen now to what I have to say, especially you big boy. We will now fight back to back in a triangle. We will guard each other's back and say from which direction the attack comes from when we see it! We will have to rely only on our sight. Got it dear? Also if a long ranged attack comes from your direction you say the direction you want to go so as all of us to dodge it. We will force her to go out in the open area where she can't use her tricks on us. Also be very careful cause I still have a bad feeling that she may be hiding something else as well."

She not started to whisper to her team-mates:
"Now for the second part of my plan. Lure her here and then commission her. For 15 min she kept her awakened form and used a lot of youki to regenerate her arm and deceive us. This mean he can't keep this up much longer. Also I didn't spend 15 min with my youki at 70% for nothing. No claymore can keep this up this long especially in my condition, but I'm an exception. Though here's the trick, I can keep this up for a long, long time and I'm a defensive type. After I lower my youki steadily to initial state I want you Gray to raise your youki near the limit but enough to drop it to zero in a instant. This AB will believe that I'm nearing my limits and this topped by your high youki rate will lure her out. She will believe I am exhausted and that you are keeping the watch now. She will get out and when that happens you yell 'sweet'. This will be our cue to scatter near her. When this happens, you, big boy, dodge her attack and take out her right arm. After your swing drop your youki to near 0 to gain a boost of strength. That combined with the speed of the swing will be enough to chop her arm in one swing. While I attack her left side an keep her am busy, be so kind as to finish her off from the front honey. This is all. Avoid as much damage as possible." she concluded and lowered her youki to initial state. As her orders were given she knew this plan was nearly flawless. All they had to do now was to wait.

Eira found herself instinctively nodding even before her mind was able to properly process the plan Rika had formulated. As much as her free and wild conscience screamed at her, she obstinately stood her ground to obey. Rika's plan made much sense, and while she could imagine Serenity able to guess parts of it, she figured it was still worth a try.

Standing up, Eira turned away from Rika and faced a forest devoid of life, holding a state of intense alertness. She had not really understood what she would be doing, but instead silently decided she would make it up as they went along.

As he saw Meryl's lifeless body drop and Serenity slowly moving towards him, his conscience inside him roared at him to attack Serenity head on but he still had the sense to resist it and fall back as Rika ordered. He made two leaps back and landed just in position. Serenity's chance to take him out was gone, she scowled and jumped on the trees, actually circling them this time as Rika began explaining the plan, Gray kept his Yoki at the ten percent mark as he listened, with his emotions under control again. He understood the plan and saw no flaws in his own mind. He took position and raised his blade. And his Yoki. "got it, let's do this, I won't fail you, either of you." Gray spoke with a tone of powerful determination that could only be matched by his loyalty to the cause he fought for.

As she circled the group, she sensed a depletion in Rika's yoki, and a rise in Gray's. "she must be weakening...and he is taking over, now is my chance" she thought making the decision to strike quickly, she caught sight of the claymores, they were back to back, she could feel Gray's Yoki rising, but to succeed in Awakening him, she would have to separate him from the others and weaken him first, she could not tell who the largest threat here was, as far as she could tell, the single digit was weakening, possibly from regenerating all her wouds. A ranged attack here would not yield any good results. She shapeshifted her blades slightly, curving their ends inwards resembling Kunai knives, she struck with a surprising short burst of exceeded speed and headed directly into Gray, who saw her in barely enough time shout, with disdain, "sweet!" to do a dive-roll to his right in an effort to dodge Serenity's horizontal slice attack.

In the midst of this, Serenity realised too late she had caught herself in a trap, she cursed and went straight for Eira, who's back was to Serenity, she twisted her curved blade of her right arm, and aimed it to impale right through her heart for a quick kill.

Gray recovered from his dive-roll and released his yoki to 40%. The most he could handle before he would lose control. His whole face disfigured, resembling a Yoma's face, his became thick and his body distorted, he roared and with speed worthy of a higher rank claymore, moved to strike, He moved close to Serenity, surprising her and with all of his willpower, he lowered his yoki, but only to the twenty percent mark, he could not suppress it any further. Too much anger resided in him; nevertheless, he hacked off the right arm of Serenity as ordered.

Serenity screamed in anger and pain, blood from her shoulder completely covered Gray, she jumped back. "Damn you!" She raised her remaining arm in defence. Gray held position, now his locked away anger was satisfied enough; he lowered his Yoki to normal levels and waited for either his comrades to move. "NOW!"

Despite her alertness, Eira still found herself reacting too slowly to the appearance of Serenity behind her. Even as she evaded the fatal hit, the blade touched her skin and dragged a long, deep gash from the elbow of her right arm to the wrist, just as Gray successfully hacked it off. Staggering slightly, Eira watched fat globules of blood drop to the ground slowly from the gaping wound. Though she had already begun regeneration the instant she was cut, it would certainly take some time to heal.

Nevertheless, she seized the chance. Gripping her claymore tightly, she sprang towards the head of Serenity, the thought of Meryl popping into her mind, and at the same time yelling at Gray, "don't just stand there; help!"

She raised her Yoki to 65%, swinging the sword with both hands until it was level with Serenity's neck. Then she extended her uninjured arm, using the momentum of the swing as her strength, as fast as she could possibly manage towards the Awakened Being's head.

With the cue sign given Rika jumped immediately left and ran forward, entrapping Serenity in a triangle, thanks to the position of her allies. Her youki was immediately raised to 30%, 50% when Gray was in full swing and then after Serenity's arm touched the ground it was back to 70%. It was no need for Gray to say what was next cause she already saw her opportunity to strike.

With 70% of her power unleashed her speed and power were near her hear peak and controllable limits... One step was all she needed to get airborne and another one to boost her towards Serenity. Her other steps helped her get more power for her next strike.

In a few seconds a steel curved blade and claymore clashed. Their mere contact caused small sparks and flashes. As Rika's tip of her claymore touched Serenity's curved blade she pushed it further with all her might, causing small sparks. It stopped when Serenity's blade got in touch with the handle. At that point Rika pushed the blade down towards the ground and watching her feet as well as Serenity's she forced her claymore behind Serenity, point at which her blade was pushed towards Serenity and upwards as well, causing it to get stuck between Serenity's armoured back and her arm. If Serenity wanted to move, her arm would have to be sacrificed or perhaps she'd have to risk a fatal injury to her body.

"You're all real sweeties guys. This worked just as planned. Go ahead Eira!" Said Rika with hand on the claymore.