Mad Max: Road to Salvation
Episode 7: Winter's Grasp
A/N: Okay so I've posted a poll on my profile of who shall wed the road warrior. It's all up to you folks, choose wisely. If you think you've got an OC up your sleeves then leave the description in the reviews or PM me.
[Guest 1: I'm just getting that out of the way first, I've already set up a poll for Max's love life.]
[engineer2172: sorry I just couldn't help myself.]
[Guest 2: It's possible the angel combustion could once again will herself upon the world.]
[Mad Max Fan: He will, of course even his skills have limits.]
[Sam Hill: it did, but that was the magnum opus, not the interceptor.]
[supergifford: Step right up, step right up!]
[gold crown dragon: always bet on the winning horse.]
[Guest 3: thank for the automotive advice.]
[SilentType 1997: Well you're kind of right about that, so hopefully this fight will show that.]
[Guest 4: it is bit cramped now isn't it?]
[batmd: thanks for the suggestion.]
[Guest 5: You are correct in your assumptions.]
[SilentXD7: Well then I hope you like this fight, and thank you about the pun.]
[Guest 6: He is, but some people think he's a bit too OP. Yes unfortunately that does seem to be a pattern for poor old Max.]
[One eye: What do you mean by that first part? It is possible that others could seek the path of the warboy and follow max into battle.]
Winter charged at the waiting and ready to brawl Max. The road warrior sidestepped her assault and attempted to counter with a swift jab. Winter saw this coming from her training and dodged Max's retaliation with blazing speed. She jabbed her sword at non-lethal areas of Max's body so he would be relatively unharmed for interrogation. She landed a slice on Max's side and he grunt in pain. Pain was something he'd learned to live with and grabbed the razor-sharp sword by the blade. He then pulled winter in for a serious headbutt. This left her dazed enough for Max to punch her directly in the gut. That sent Winter sliding back, but she quickly recovered and rushed at Max again.
The road warrior then drew Raven's sword and clashed blades with the eldest Schnee. The sparks really flew from the collision of the blades as Max tried to fight fire with fire, or in this case blade to blade. Winter though was a far more experienced sword fighter and clearly outclassed Max's brutality with her honed grace. Max was determined not to be outdone and let his journey end here like it almost did at the citadel. He knew this woman wanted him alive, and from what he had experienced back home, he never wanted to be taken alive again. Max tried to match Winter blow for blow, but his wound was taking its toll. The atlas specialist saw her opponent slowly weakening and pressed the offensive.
"Bruz, hurry up! I can't hold her back forever!" Max uttered as he dodged one of winter's strikes.
"I'm trying boss, there's tools and parts scattered all over the damned place!" Bruz said as he gathered his remaining tools and parts into a toolbox.
"You're not going anywhere, except with me to explain yourself." Winter said as she used the less sharp end of her sword to toss Max away.
"No, I make my own way, and no one is going to stop me!" Max roared as he charged at winter.
"Leave the nice man alone!" Anya shouted from the safety of the car as she fired the bolt action rifle at Winter. The shot missed though, and Winter landed another slash at Max's torso. The little faunas girl's interference irritated winter slightly as she fought with her target.
"Woof!" Dinki-di barked from the car, obeying Max's orders to guard Anya and the interceptor.
"This can all be over if you surrender." Winter offered to a bleeding Max.
"Never, I will never be anyone's prisoner again!" Max growled as he dashed into winter, quickly grabbing her and delivering another furious headbutt. Continuing his furious assault, Max punched Winter rapidly as fast as his muscles would allow. Winter managed to force the furious fighter away from her and summoned a glyph. This one just so happened to be for gravity, shooting max up into the air and causing him to land on his back. The road warrior was dazed and confused hearing the voices again. Anya's especially, growing louder and louder for him to get up as he saw winter moving in closer with a pair of hand cuffs. Max shook his head and tried to stand up breathing heavily and clutching his wounds. He looked Winter in the eyes defiantly as she stood over him. Both sets of blue eyes met and for a moment she could see something within her target. Not just a simple minded feral ruffian, a vision of a former man of law and order. Then bruz ran over to help, hitting her in the head with a heavy pipe wrench. He hefted Max over his shoulders, and started hauling him back to the interceptor. Winter saw them escaping and quickly recovered. Bruz set down Max and pulled out his outback bowie knife, clashing blades with the specialist. Anya hopped out of the car and Dinki-di followed her.
"Get up! Please get up! I need you, we need you!" Anya said with tears in her eyes as Max was fading in and out of consciousness. Max heard her cries and rose up once more for battle. Anya hugged his leg and he put his hand on top of her head, ruffling her hair and extra ears. Bruz was battling winter desperately and giving her a run for her money. The wandering mechanic delivered a punishing blow to Winter's gut with his pipe wrench. He then door kicked sending her tumbling back across the desert floor. Winter was running out of patience now and used her semblance to summon a boarbatusk.
The summoned beast rolled at bruz and the dingo faunas engaged his own semblance of hyper durability to counter it. He bravely stood his ground with the summoned boarbatusk continuing to roll steadily pushing him back. Bruz let out a loud cry as he started to push back against the beast with a vengeance. Bruz had a slasher smile on his face as he lifted the white grim pig up and threw it at Winter. She dodged the incoming summon and rushed Bruz. The manic wasteland mechanic was exhausted from the overuse of his semblance, and Winter subdued him with relative ease.
Max approached her once more and readied his double barrels as his last resort. He had an ace up his sleeves though, she had not seen him use fire dust shells yet. Max drew the guns and fired a wall of flames at Winter. She took the full extent of his attack and Max quickly reloaded as she came at him again. Max saw another glyph form underneath him and rolled backwards, firing his sawed off at Winter, knocking her away. Max put away the guns and drew his blades, the sword he had taken from Raven as a trophy and his machete. Winter took up a dueling stance and Max did the same.
Though he lacked experience with the blades, he was about to prove he'd more than make up for it in sheer force of will. Winter was the one to make the first move and used a fencing technique to jab at max. The Road Warrior caught her blade with his own and entered a similar situation as he had with Raven. Both fighters were pressing with a heavy amount of sheer force trying overpower each other but max won out and door kicked winter in the chest. The attack had left a boot print on her clothes as she rolled backwards. Bruz picked himself up and went back to his earlier orders scavenging for tools, and his other weapons as Max duked it out with Winter.
The road warrior began using the machete for defense as he used Raven's sword for offense. Winter was actually having a hard time trying to defeat him, despite his lack of grace in his technique, the brutality certainly suffices. Max was gaining the upper hand until winter used a glyph on herself to zoom at Max. He crossed both blades in an attempt to hold her back but this time there was too much force for him to handle. Max's guard broke and winter had right where she wanted him, on the ground and pinned. Max thrashed violently in Winter's grasp as she pulled out the handcuffs once more. He tried to pull out his shotgun but Winter stepped on his hand to keep him from escaping. Dinki-di ran at her and tried to bite the determined woman but she just knocked him away with the handle of her sword.
Max shouted with all his might as he tried forcing Winter to get off of him. Winter fought hard to keep Max pinned as they struggled. He managed to break an arm free and smacked her across the face. Max then got on top of her and started punching her rapidly just like he did with Raven. Winter then actually slapped Max across the face. This did nothing to really halt Max's barrage but it made him pause for a moment. He went right back to beating the elder Schnee sister like a punching bag. Max then stopped to breathe when he could see that she was unable to fight anymore. He looked at his hands and then back at the woman on the ground. She was unconscious but relatively unharmed thanks to her aura absorbing most of the damage. Max stood back up and began to walk back to his car with his usual serious look on his face like a boss. He got into the driver's seat and the engine revved proudly as in celebration of Max's victory. He looked back at the unconscious and defeated Winter. Max did have to admit she was beautiful, and it didn't sit right with him to leave her like that. He sighed to himself and hopped out of the interceptor, cautiously walking over to his 'out cold' opponent.
"Oi Boss what are you doing?! Are ya bloody mad?!" Bruz yelled to the road warrior in confusion.
"Why are you going over to the mean lady?!" Anya shouted in agreement with Bruz.
Max just ignored them bringing out his canteen, he kneeled down to winter and she barely regained consciousness. Max offered her the water and she weakly drank it from the canteen. Once he felt she'd had enough to drink, he walked back to the car. Winter then started to rise again but only in time to watch Max and his partners drive way into the distance. Winter then called the bullhead down to pick her up, her pride was wounded. But she had to admit, it was gentlemanly of him to offer her water.
"Bruz." Max bellowed to his newest partner.
"Yeah boss?" The dingo faunus responded.
"Do you know somewhere we can lay low for a few days?" Max asked.
"Right'o boss, there's a few safe houses I've set up around these parts in case of something like this. I like to mess with them fangers all the time, so I needed to think smart in case they come looking for me." Bruz told Max his survival strategy.
"Where's the nearest one?" Max asked tactically.
"A few hours from here on the coast, big abandoned container ship. Used to be a grimm hive until they moved out to terrorize someone else." Bruz replied.
"Anything closer?" Max asked.
"There's a town we could stop in nearby, the doc there owes me big time. He'll get you patched up." Bruz told his new employer.
"Alright then, we'll head there first." Max drove down the highway with the town coming into to view.
"I'm hungry." Anya told the two of them.
"No problem Sheila, I have a little hidden supply cache where I can whip something for us, after we get the boss here to the doc. Sorry boss but we can only stop there for a short time since it's hidden for a reason, not as secure as the cargo ship. If we absolutely have to, we can stay the night, but it'll be cramped considering there's no beds." Bruz looked at the little girl sympathetically and then explained his reason behind the not staying at the supply cache to Max.
"My name's Anya." The little faunus girl pouted with a cute look on her face.
"We'll stay there tonight." Max ordered. They reached the safety small desert town of Ashford. Bruz pointed out the doctor's clinic and they hid the car in a back alley with Dinki-di being left to guard Anya and the car once more. The doctor saw Bruz carrying Max and his wounds were treated free of charge since the doctor owed a substantial debt to Bruz. After a while of Max getting sewn up, they departed the clinic and went over to Bruz's supply cache for a bite.
-MEANWHILE-
"How did he manage to escape your pursuit specialist?" General Ironwood asked of his subordinate on board an atlas airship.
"General Ironwood sir, I underestimated his tenacity and unpredictability. He proved to be very strong despite his apparent lack of aura. I managed to inflict some serious wounds, but he seems to have a high tolerance to pain. He also had assistance from a group of ragtag individuals, consisting of two faunus and an attack dog. Both of them were young, one being a teenager, the other a young child." Winter reported her reasons for failure and subsequent intelligence gathered on the Road Warrior and his motley crew.
"Is that so?" The general appeared intrigued.
"Yes sir." Winter responded. The general stood silent for a moment as if in thought and then he spoke again to Winter.
"You'll continue your search for him after you take some time to recover. Is that clear?" The general ordered to the specialist.
"Yes sir." Winter acknowledged the command.
"You are dismissed specialist Schnee." The general ordered her to take her leave and she did so. Winter then went to her quarters aboard the ship and contemplated the nature of her current target. He said he'd been a prisoner but as most records indicated he was not on any prison and or correctional manifesto. Yet she saw in him the gaze and honor of a lawman of some kind. It boggled her mind, but it did explain why he didn't go any further than he had in their battle. His gunfighting skills were also nothing to sneeze at since she had seen him in action personally.
While his fighting left some room for improvement, he'd expertly used his shotguns against her. He'd even been enough of a gentleman to offer her some water, yet she had been at odds with him. Winter just couldn't figure him out at all, even feeling something, she couldn't explain, an attraction of some sort. That was just ridiculous to her, he beat the snot out of her and she even slapped him. But he was handsome, and his eyes the blue color they bore… Winter got a quick look in the mirror and saw herself blushing. She just looked away and tried to focus on getting to her quarters for some… very personal time.
-Back with Max and Co.-
Max was letting his crew rest in the interceptor and he saw a bar across from the doctor's place. He supposed the was good business since a doctor was nearby in case there were injuries from a bar brawl. He saw a man getting mugged in an alley nearby and the former lawman in him decided to take action. He ran in and slugged the mugger hard enough to knock him out in one punch. Max then drew his shotgun and bashed he head of the larger and more muscular mugger. The victim just stood there against the wall with a look of astonishment on his face. Max beat them to a pulp and then walked away.
"T-thank you!"
Max said nothing as he just kept on walking to the bar for something he had not had in the longest time, a stiff drink.
-END CHAPTER-