Ch38: Curb Stomp

(Y+1, M+5, D+2)

[White Fang compound Comms Center]

"Now, where were we?" I ask aloud, turning to the left and staring at the door to the comms center. On the other side were fourteen White Fang specialists, Faunus that actually had military-type training, setting breaching charges on the door. I was busy contacting Neo so I had been unable to sense the specialists, now stacked on either side of the door and ready to breach.

I sigh, preparing for battle. I reach out with my senses. 'Oh, they've got hand grenades. Let's have some fun.' I take cover behind a console, psychically pulling the pins from all of their grenades simultaneously. Their leader stops mid-countdown and stares in horror at the pins and spoons scattered across the floor. 'Four.' They start panicking. 'Three.' Some start to run, others fumble with the grenades, trying to throw them away. 'Two.' They're not moving fast enough. 'One.' Most of them panic even more, but a few make peace with themselves and face their deaths with dignity. I can respect that. 'Farewell misguided souls. Maybe I'll see you on the other side.'

With a thunderous noise, the grenades detonate, along with the explosives on the door. I step to the side as the door flies by, smashing into the massive screen in the process.

I feel a rather small someone tackle me.

'"I missed you."' I hear.

I pick her up and kiss her full on the lips. A few seconds later, I break the kiss. I chuckle as she blushes.

'"It's nice to see you too."'

I take a few seconds to look at her, her face is streaked with dried tears and I can actually feel the remnants of her grief. My greatcoat is hanging over her shoulders and my blue sash is tied around her waist. She had dropped a few things when I picked her up: my weapon belt, my cap, my scroll, a bandolier of rifle clips… and Sasha.

"Where did you find this?" I ask, picking up Sasha as the other items float into their respective places on my body.

'"It was in a white crate in the armory. When I thought you'd… I hadn't looked before and I wanted to remember you. I found the crate and, well, why didn't you tell me?"'

"I don't know. But I think The White Death is coming back to have some fun." I walk over to a console marked intercom system and plug in my scroll, downloading a song into the system and setting it to play across the compound on an endless repeat.

The wonderful sound of METAL echoes throughout the compound as I detach my scroll sn slip it into a pocket. "Neo, could you please give me my greatcoat?" I ask, loading a clip into Sasha and pushing the bolt forwards.

'"*sigh*"' She hands me back the garment and I put it on.

"You can keep the sash." I tell her.

She just smiles happily.

"Let's go have some fun, shall we?" I ask.

*Almost night, a crimson horizon, painting thousand lakes red*

'"What's the song? I haven't heard this one before."'

"Just wait." I say, walking out the ruined door and stepping past the shredded corpses.

'"You sure do know how to make a mess."' Neo walks up beside me, holding her parasol and my White Death SMG, which looked quite similar to a P90.

"Indeed I do."

*You're in the sniper's sight, the first kill tonight, time to die. You're in the bullet's way, the White Death's prey, say goodbye!*

I sing along to the last line, as I see a group of White Fang mooks cowering behind a barricade. They knew who was coming for them.

"Seems like my alias hasn't lost any of its fear." I say, bringing Sasha up to my hip and firing, blowing out the back of one mook's skull. I work the bolt with my mind and fire again. Another headshot. Neo jumps in and opens her parasol to deflect the hail of bullets directed at me by the six surviving mooks who had finally gotten their act together. I wait for the firing to stop and Neo closes her parasol, allowing us to both open fire: Neo suppressing the mooks while I delivered headshots with almost mechanical precision. Soon the barricade is manned by a small pile of corpses.

"The rest are massing in the vehicle bay. They're trying to evacuate."

'"That's no fun."'

"Precisely." I say, motioning for Neo to come with me. As we walk side-by side down the corridors, she looks up at me.

'"Do you know why they kidnapped you?"'

"I have no frakking clue." I say, idly drawing Marxman and headshotting a mook who was trying to sneak up behind us. "However, it was quite entertaining seeing the looks on their faces when they realized that I wasn't dead. I think Torchwick shat himself. They managed to get away just after I made the call though. But I'm going to find them."

'"I think it would be fun to return the favor to the people who tried to kill my boyfriend."'

"It would indeed be fun." I smirk. "But we do have to get out of here first. Fortunately, I have a plan."

'"Kill everybody?"'

"And then steal some form of transport. Maybe leave somebody alive to fly it if we want an airship. It's more of a vague objective. Wait. Scratch that. Just kill everybody and then we teleport back."

'"So, what's it like?"'

"It's like I can see everything, I can pick up things a dozen yards away, just on instinct alone I can put a bullet in between someone's eyes, when they're behind me. It's quite a different experience."

'"So this is the new you."'

"Not exactly. I think the stuff they injected me with jump-started my psychic powers and is probably boosting them in some way, I can feel it starting to wear off. I'm hoping that once it wears off I'll still be able to some of this stuff." I say, levitating a clip at chest level a foot in front of me. "And the whole people-finder thing. That's cool." I say. "We've got five coming around the corner, by the way." I raise Marxman and Neo raises the snow-camo SMG, which I'd named the P45. As the mooks come around the corner, ARs held at the ready, Neo and I fill them with lead. "The vehicle bay's just up ahead. Just through that door." I point. "I think it's a side entrance." I slowly ease the door open with my right hand, Marxman held unflinchingly in the other. I sense that they're not looking at the door but I just want to be certain. '"Alright, I'd say two hundred in all. Fifty manning barricades and on patrol and the rest loading up supplies into a whole crapton of bullheads and trucks."' I tell Neo, not wanting to make noise.

'"So what's your plan?"' Neo asks, reloading the P45.

'"As usual, I'm falling back on plans B and C; hand grenades and blow shit up."' I reach into a heavily armored pouch on my belt and pull out a golden grenade just a bit larger than my fist. '"Behold! The Holy hand Grenade of Antioch. Packed full of blast dust and a stabilizing compound, with a steel shell designed to fragment into tiny pieces of shrapnel on detonation."'

'"You're crazy Kurt."'

'"Gee, thanks."' I respond dryly.

'"I never said it was a bad thing. It makes being with you more interesting."'

'"And that's why I love you."' Neo blushes. '"But, as I was saying; the plan is to toss this into the massive pile of Dust cases and ammo, wait for the chaos to die down, and then we rush in and eliminate any survivors."'

'"Sounds fun."'

'"Just keep your head down. I don't know how big the blast will be."' I warn, pulling the pin and psychically launching it towards the rather large cache of Dust and ammo the White Fang had stockpiled about three-quarters of the way across the vehicle bay. 'Five.'

"It's HIM!" I hear someone shout. 'Four.'

"Dammit." I say, jumping back inside and getting behind a convenient metal crate, dragging Neo with me and bracing as if our lives depended on it (which they did). 'Three.'

Just a second later, the door (and most of the surrounding walls) are shredded by (poorly aimed) gunfire. 'Two.' I close my eyes.

With a rather impressive explosion, the world came to pieces. I threw up a psychic shield to deflect the debris and the shockwave.

When the blast had finally dissipated, I opened my eyes and saw a scene of beautiful devastation. The vehicle bay was in ruins. Those near the center of the blast had simply been vaporized. The entire complement of White Fang were dead; vaporized by the blast, pulped by the overpressure, shredded by shrapnel, or killed by the various effects of the detonated Dust. I just stare in awe.

"Some days I wonder why Beacon doesn't teach explosives fabrication. Then I remember that I'd be that teacher's worst nightmare." I sigh contentedly, looking out over the ruins of the vehicle bay. Most of which just so happened to be on fire. "This is one of those days." I take one look over the destruction and hear howls in the distance. "Let's go. The Grimm will be here soon. All this fear and death must be pulling them in like a magnet." I say to Neo, holding her hand. "Can you take us to the dorm? I need to get kitted up."

'"Sure thing. But couldn't you teleport us too?"'

"They used some sort of drug that suppressed my semblance and Aura and I think it's just starting to wear off. So I'd rather not risk something going horribly wrong." I explain, feeling the darkness of the Grimm horde close in on the underground compound.

'"Home it is then."'

And in a flash of light, we're standing in our dorm. And I finally realize that I'm covered in blood (not all of it mine). Ivan is sitting on his bed, holding a half-empty bottle of vodka, talking with Qrow. "I mean, I feel like I should've been there. Maybe if I'd, he wouldn't-" He cuts off upon seeing me arrive with Neo. "KURT!" He shouts, standing up quickly and swaying a bit before running over and giving me a bear-hug. He smells very drunk, his accent is much more pronounced right now. "I'm sorry comrade. I'm sorry." he sobs, before holding me at arm's length. "I thought you were dead." He smiles.

"Qrow. How much vodka did you give him?" I ask.

"Just a few bottles." Qrow says, standing up and taking a sip from his flask.

I sigh. "You've been corrupting him, haven't you Qrow?" I ask with mock disappointment. He just chuckles.

"You return from the dead and the first thing you do is crack a joke. I think I'm seeing what Taiyang sees in you. I'll leave you for now, but I expect you to tell me what happened."

"Don't worry, I will. I just need to get cleaned up." I grab my undersuit and walk into the dorm's bathroom. I close the door and step into the shower, getting clean for the first time in a week, I feel my Aura start to flow through my boy once again and everything's starting to feel 'normal' again. I step out of the shower and pull on my undersuit, a form-fitting one-piece garment with a slightly padded cloth inner layer, a thin rubberized inner layer to protect from water and electrocution, and a bullet/stab-resistant layer on the top designed with magnetized clips and attachment points for my armored plates. I turn around and do a few stretches to make sure everything's still working right, and then I poke the air next to the door, seeing the image shatter to reveal a slightly-blushing Neo. I smirk and kiss her on the cheek before walking out, snapping on my armored plates, putting on my weapon belt and pulling on my greatcoat.

"So how's the Vytal festival?" I ask my teammates.

"It just started up yesterday. Teams RWBY, JNPR, and SSSN won their matches. And your Uncle fought Weiss' sister right in front of the school. All in all, this place is starting to grow on me. Even if most of their booze is shit." Ivan says.

"Alright then. I'm going to grab a few more weapons and I'll be right back. I'm bamfing this time so it should be no trouble." I say, as Neo and Ivan both stand next to me. Neo holds my hand and Ivan places a hand on my shoulder.

"No. We're going with you." He says, looking remarkably sober.

"Alright then. Hang on." I say with a smirk.

*bamf*