Woohooo! More chapters! Quick responses to some reviews... Zachary2: a few chapters ago (I think) an Ironwood PoV segment showed that he'd given Yolona a boost and that's where her unnatural rage came from. Josh Spicer: Winter has four years at Atlas plus another three or so post-graduation, it'd be... rather difficult for us to fit everything we plan to show how canon was her fault in just ten chapters. As for chapter eleven uprooting everything, all will soon be explained!
Soon. Just stick with us for a couple more chapters! :D
~Angel and Hel~
Chapter Eighteen: Deathwish
-.-.-
The ground was too unstable for her to skate over, and wasting energy getting the blades to cut through concrete was a bad idea anyway.
Krypton skidded to a stop, panting. She could still hear - still feel the Wyrm and that other girl, Vivian. Them fighting.
This whole thing was -
Rude words. This whole thing was some very very rude words.
Avos seemed right as rain, spending most of their time in the air with grappling crossbow things.
Another thunderous boom behind her. The big SDC building started to collapse even further. Served them right, she guessed. Only good thing to come out of this mess.
"Avos can you - " She spat out a mouthful of dust. "Avos, can you see any of them following us?"
CLink-kachink. Avos retracted their cables and landed in front of her, shaking their head. No allies, no enemies.
"Did you see what happened to the wolf?" Was she asking as a teammate or for -
"Never catch this sis, never catch this, whee!"
Krypton shook her head and tried to ignore the aching hole in her heart.
Avos shook their head again, and launched themselves away towards the fading trail of the flare. The low light of the burning apocalypse made it a bit easier to spot.
Krypton sighed and followed, muscles bunching and unbunching and helping them spring from one wreck to another. "So think we should go get ice cream, or go to a bakery, or what?"
Clingk-kachnk, clink-kachink. No reply. Not even so much as an acknowledgement.
"I mean, at least we'll die happy. And full of food."
They seemed to be silently judging her. For her treatment of the wolf? For her callous disregard of the end of the world?
"Look, I just - I was asking about the wolf cause I wanted to know. And I do care about all this it's just… we're two people. Two mildly trained people but what can we do? At what point do we say, ok, time to think about how we want to die, what frame of mind we want to be in when we do, you know?"
Avos landed on the rooftop opposite, the pair pausing for a moment. Avos tilted their head in confusion.
"Were you daydreaming?"
They nodded, made little motions of a bird with wings with their hands. It hadn't occurred to Krypton before, but Avos would probably be very good at shadow-puppets.
"Goddamnit Avos, you and your goddamn birds!"
Happy carefree shrug. That stupid mask. And its funny hat thing. With those two little dangly bits hanging from the sides. Aaaand they were off again. Just - why was she friends with them again?
But she was thinking less about stuff. They'd taken her mind off the collapsing city around them, the giant beasts behind. So… maybe she liked them for a reason.
The world started shaking again. Bigger this time, but not quite enough to knock her around like when the Wyrm - probably an Elder Wyrm - showed its ugly mug. Vivian doing something? Another Wyrm?
A blinding light - of course she turned to look right at it - and a deafening screech like nails on chalkboard that filled her ears. She winced, hunching and squinting and trying to see what the fuck was making that -
It was another flare.
Avos landed beside her in an uncoordinated lump, flailing a little before rolling off the side. She leaned down to grab them and haul them up.
"Who the fuck keeps doing that?" She wasn't even sure she could be heard over the noise. And she was getting a headache.
Avos thanked her in their own way, before taking up a ridiculous pose with finger guns, making little 'pew-pew' motions. She just knew there was an unabashed smile under that mask somewhere.
"That kid with the guns? Yeah, seems like something he'd pull." Krypton slapped her shoulder pad more firmly into place. "Let's go explain to him that loud noises and lights are very rude and a bad idea."
-.-.-
Winter woke to the sounds of battle. No, not battle. War.
She had no idea how long she'd been out. The last thing she could remember was… was… fighting with Maverick. The prick had cut her off at every opportunity. Not listening to her try and explain. She wasn't opposed to his idea, she just thought he was prioritising survival, something that wasn't as important as the damage they could do. Her mouth tasted of blood and her ribs were aching.
Howls. Human and beast. Pain? Triumphant. Both.
Maybe if she just lay here, she could get a moment's peace. To think about Weiss, and Helia, and...
Just rest.
Was she even holding her sabre any more? She couldn't feel it. Or her dagger. The gun was still strapped to her back though. It was poking into her ribs, jostling them as the ground shook.
The sounds faded for a moment as she left her eyes closed. She could almost imagine she was back in the rubble of home with Weiss, as though she'd never gone on this misadventure. Like she was studying and Weiss was dancing in the background, pulling her away to try and race through the halls without the servants noticing, to read together in the library.
Home. Why had she left?
Her father's furious - no, not furious, disappointed face filled her mind. Not that there was much difference. His anger was always cold. Wondering how she could have failed her family again, could have let this happen.
What could I have done father. What - what could I have done.
A light burned her eyes. An infinite sound of pure agony lanced through her skull, starting and not stopping at all until -
It was over as soon as it had begun. But it had left its mark on her. The adrenaline coursing through her veins, her heart rate up, her breathing shallow, her muscles tense.
She had to move.
She stood in a crouching lunge, her eyes still too blind to see where she was, letting the pings of her aura warn her of danger. Rolled, bringing the rifle off her shoulder and firing it wildly. Suppressive fire, she hoped. Why couldn't Blue have had something that didn't require the ability to aim?
"Watch your fire!" a muffled voice. Barely understandable through the ringing in her ears. A stray shot hitting an ally - anyone other than Maverick, that is - could spell disaster. She held her fire, shifting her grip to swing the sniper rifle into - something, that flew away with a crack. Her eyes were clearing now, revealing a teeming mass of black shapes, held at bay by more black shapes.
Someone crouched and bleeding in the centre. Ripplings in the air. Two people fighting back to back with pistols and swords.
And… music? A guitar - rock.
"They see you as small and helpless;
They see you as just a child.
Surprise when they find out that a warrior will soon run wild."
She knew the song. But she hadn't heard it like this before. Normally it was solemn, an old reminder of how young huntsmen and women died. But here… it was a battlecry. A roar against the darkness. Not today.
Not today.
"Prepare for your greatest moments;
Prepare for your finest hour.
The dream that you've always dreamed is suddenly about to flower."
Grimm all around began to stagger.
"We are lightning,
Straying from the thunder,
Miracles of ancient wonder."
Crackles of gunfire, like the sharp crack of a lightning strike. Slade and his clones. Maverick's pistol. Slade dove past and in midair he blurred, three other half formed versions of him sliding out and shooting that massive pistol Maverick had been using earlier while the real Slade stabbed his swords into an Ursa's throat.
Winter shook her head. Focus. Holding Blue's rifle carefully, trying to find an opening to fire. To do something. Aphoth was still half crouched beside her, gesturing her troops forward - a break in the line as a Boarbatusk smashed through.
Winter held the rifle at her hip, fired twice, then changed the grip to try and punt the spinning Grimm away even as Aphoth launched sizzling beams of green energy across the beast's armour.
The thing squealed, unfurling as Winter smacked it, but it was already charging, tusks lowered and mouth chomping. She didn't have any Dust - she'd used it all - no empowered glyphs but maybe -
A simple repulsor, enough to launch it into the air over her. Holding the rifle straight up, hoping, praying. Pull the trigger.
The Grimm hit the ground, falling into smoke.
"This will be the day we've waited for.
This will be the day we open up the door."
Ash. It was Ash, standing on the roof, roaring out the words, hands a blur across the guitar, strings almost invisible with the force of their motion.
She was tapping her foot, banging her head. But the sounds came out differently. Concussive waves, shaking the air and the Grimm.
"I don't wanna hear your absolution;
Hope you're ready for a revolution."
A pair of Gruffs were ripped apart by the noise. This was a Semblance unleashed, nothing held back, the most powerful use she'd seen from someone her age. Maybe ever. An Ursa Prime stumbled forward, only to be pulped by another power chord.
It was awe-inspiring, it was… terrifying. The precision required in order to avoid tearing apart her own team...
"Welcome to a world of new solutions.
Welcome to a world of bloody evolution."
Winter spotted Maverick, snatching back his gun from Slade, twisting and pointing it right at her. She snarled, beginning to bring the rifle up - if he still wanted a fight -
A deafening CRACK and a tearing pain in her ear. She opened her mouth to cry out in pain only to be knocked off her feet by the warm, wet corpse of something tackling her. Deaf in one ear, disorientated, she still saw him jam a fresh slug in and hand it back to Slade.
His face though, emotionless. He couldn't have cared whether he'd hit her or not. He had hit her, in fact - she could feel the wetness, the rippling pain from the strike. She kept her teeth bared at him. Fucker. Fucking cunt. He was probably enjoying himself, behind that mask.
Flicks of her fingers summoned more repulsion glyphs, launching a fresh breaching wave of Grimm away. Aphoth was fighting in close quarters now, her heavy staff blade slicing and cutting into Beowulves and Creeps as her dead tried to reach her, to pull her back. Winter spared a glyph to launch her to safety, another one to stop her momentum. She knew how to protect and care for her allies.
She almost missed the Deathstalker coming up on her left with the wetness of the noises on that side. She managed to block a pincer blow with Blue's rifle, tumbling to the cobbles, scrambling backward - where the fuck was her sabre, why couldn't she have held onto it. A lucky shot clipped the edge of the Grimm's eye and it roared, stinger coming down on top of her -
A dead man took the blow, giving Winter time to launch herself backwards. Her head stung, but she spared a grateful nod to the tired and grim looking Aphoth.
Something seemed off. She wasn't sure what -
A sickening scream was cut short by a wet crunch, the body slamming into one of the few remaining walls, right between Winter and Aphoth. Red - red everywhere. So many different it was hard to tell which wound they'd come from. The din of battle seemed to dull for a moment as they recognised her.
The music had stopped.
Ash.
Her ribcage had been torn open. Gutted. She could see her pierced lungs quivering as she breathed her last. Her torn heart shuddering. Her jaw hanging by a strip of meat. The left side of her face was simply gone.
Aphoth screamed. It was a wordless howl of anguish and rage and the dead answered, Grimm shuddering into existence, a mutilated Ash appearing and tearing at her guitar, the buildings shaking. Aphoth walked forward, still screaming, eyes pitch black, weeping tears of blood and darkness.
For a moment, the horde was driven back. The ever increasing tide of dead cleared space around the entrance of the Heart of Dust. For a moment.
Then the flyers descended, a Gryphon's clenched claw sending Aphoth tumbling to the ground, her creatures' movements becoming disorganised, and the Grimm surged forward again.
Slade was there, picking her up. His other arm hung limp, but he still lashed out with his feet, trying to fight the Grimm off. Winter tried to help, to fire Blue's rifle in support but - she couldn't hit them, her glyphs were too weak, she couldn't focus.
Maverick, dancing in. Shooting in a circle. Target rich environment.
Could the four of them ever have been a team? She liked to think she would have been leader - but no. That wouldn't have worked. Slade, then. She wouldn't have minded working with him.
A click as she tried to pull the trigger again. Out of ammo. She didn't know how to reload it, didn't have time to figure it out. She switched the grip to the barrel again, swinging it and knocking away another Beowulf.
Slade stumbled down next to her. "We've - got to - Dust in the shop. Better defence. Better offence."
Maverick must have heard, because he gave an unabashed groan of frustration. "Arrgghh, you too? For fucks sake we could have - y'know what fuck it."
The dead and the Grimm were clashing everywhere. It almost seemed as though the living were ignored, for a time. Fur and limbs flying, speckled with shadow.
Winter glared at him, her breathing shaky. What kind of trick was he going to try pull this time?
He teleported in front of her, shoved a gun and a pile of clips at her. "I'm going to leave, like you asked," of course he had to add that, "And draw their fire away. Thought you might like something you could spray and pray with." And with that he was gone, reappearing by Ash's corpse, picking up her guitar-axe, giving it a test swing.
The Grimm split, some moving towards him, the rest pressing forward.
Gone. Gone to places only the moon above knew where.
"SLADE!" Maverick called, Ashlyn's axe buried in the back of something's skull, "REMEMBER THAT TRICK I TOLD YOU? USE IT!"
Trick?
Slade grimaced, slipping Aphoth to the ground. His hands clasped around that giant gun - and his form blurred like water, half clones slipping out to fire with massive cracks of sound again and again. But he himself didn't fire. He panted as they disappeared, gritted his teeth, did it again. The Grimm kept dropping.
But more were arriving. A flock of Vespyrs, large enough to block part of the sun. A pair of Deathstalkers. Another three or four Boarbatusks, including a vast low set one, almost crawling along the ground.
Winter cursed to herself. She needed to stop just watching - this wasn't like some show on the entertainment networks, she was here it was real and this inaction was going to get herself killed -
Glyphs. She pushed past the pain, focused, trying to launch the larger Grimm backwards, or hold them in place for Aphoth's dead to assault. For Slade to shoot.
The world faded into white as a piercing shriek assaulted her senses yet again. Those goddamn Screamer Flares - Hang on, he'd wanted her to fire those indoors at Yolona. So much light - she wasn't even looking at the source and it was still leaving marks in the back of her retinas.
Splat. Crunch. Thwack.
She felt the impacts. Her other senses felt useless. The diving Vespyrs, blinded by the flare? Echolocation. They can't see when to stop. Under the scream of noise she could hear more - the thick ripping of steel parting flesh and a series of heavy clicks. A booming roar of an old fashioned gun and an echoing roar of rage. Another hunter?
"Blood more blood! Foul beast!"
Slade's hand on her shoulder, dragging her back. His voice shouting in her ear. "Back into the shop, back, back! Reinforcements, fewer avenues of attack."
Another hand - she whipped her head around to come face to face with a startling, smiling, haunting mask. She didn't scream but she did jump backward, levelling the gun Maverick had left her -
"An ally, they're an ally, calm your tits!" Another faunus, this one clad like some sort of dumpster dwelling criminal. "We're allies. Saw the lights, came to help. Not sure how much we - shit!" She ducked a Creep's tailswipe, slashed at it, and for a moment the conversation halted as they cut apart another wave of Grimm. "Avos, hold here!"
The mask nodded, leapt into the fray with blades and bolts from oversized crossbows strapped to their arms. Giant siege bolts, tied with cable, piercing skulls before flinging the dissipating corpses around like flails.
They were getting Grimmstuff everywhere. They were painting the town red over and over before it all just steamed off as though it had never been there to begin with.
The horde seemed thinner now. Ever so slightly.
Another figure, slicing through into the opening, coat drenched in shining crimson. Their hat hung low over their faces, large brutal looking sickle lashing out as they roared. "Back, back! Away, away! Unsightly beasts!" The blunderbuss type contraption in their other hand boomed - then they flew back, as if held by invisible puppet strings, away from the swiping claws of an Alpha Beowulf.
A roar and they drove forward up to their fist in another Grimm, ripping it in half barehanded.
Winter stumbled back through the shattered door of the shop - the Wyrm or Ash's music? - crawling over to a smashed pile of dust vials. Scooping up what she could, a single massive glyph with whatever combination she'd found - she could feel the tingles rushing back up her arm, aftershocks.
Earthquake. No, she'd been in an earthquake. This was different. The Wyrm. The Wyrm. She put it out of her mind, tried to focus -
It roared, and even through her muddled senses and her attempts to it ignore it, there was no denying… it sounded triumphant. A beast, proclaiming its kill to the wastelands. Blue, Ash, now Vivian.
Slade and Aphoth were leant against the counter, both injured. Outside, the newcomers were still fighting - but the horde was still coming. The sky was black.
How much longer can we hold?
-.-.-
~R&R?~