Well buddies, here we are with the FINAL chapter of the magnificent story that is Angels and Demons...
I'd personally like to thank anyone who has reviewed the story and/or PM'd me with OC's or criticism, I really do appreciate the effort you guys have went through and A MILLION AND ONE thanks for sticking with this terrible story until the end and making it the MOST reviewed story in the Titanfall/RWBY fanfiction...
I've been through some stuff lately and I haven't had anytime to work on the story, mostly thanks to the stupidness of Exam block and having to study like hell's coming for my ass..
I really do appreciate ANY reviews, except those which are just hate-mail, and I am still looking for any OC's or weapon names that you peeps out there might have, so just leave a review or PM me if you have any ideas... and if you already have, then fret not if your character or weapon name was not added, I shall be adding them in the continuation of this...
If anyone is wondering what exactly will be happening next chapter, I'll be doing a semi-canon version of Vol 4 of RWBY while adding my own flare to it, then I'm cutting away from the canon and adding in more stuff from the Titanfall universe, satisfying the needs of those who are all like 'WHERE THE HELL IS THE TITANFALL STUFF!'... This is not the end for this franchise and I look forward to continuing the story of Demon, Rosaline, Kira, The Angels, RWBY, JNPR and everyone else who's coming along for the ride...
Oh, and before we start, I was kinda drunk near the end... so that might explain... well, you'll find out...
And without further adieu, onto thy final chapter of Angels and Demons...
Naughtbeast
Chapter 41:
Pain… it's a pretty funny thing when you think about it. It's meant to be a response from the body to tell you something is wrong or you're getting hurt, so obviously, when there isn't any pain then nothing's wrong right? Well, there comes a point in the body's processors when one takes enough pain that it basically goes 'well, I think they get the point' and it shuts off the pain receptors… although another side effect is that one does not necessary become as receptive to pain after this little moment.
Such was state of Demon as he awoke from what seemed like an unfortunately long nap, a state of unfeeling that gave him the idea that the worst that could have happened was that he snored… although that wasn't exactly the message he received when he finally came back into consciousness.
His eyelids fluttered as he lay on the ground, his head still spinning from an unknown blow, although as his surroundings came into focus, he wasn't quite as thrilled to find that the only thing he could see was pure blackness. His heartbeat was palpitating as he thought of what this meant, although it slowed to normal after he remembered he was wearing a helmet. He reached up and wrapped his hand around the sides, slowly pulling it off and letting his arm fall to the ground from lack of energy.
He closed his eyelids as the light of the midday sun flooded through into his unaccustomed eyes, burning bright spots into his retinas before they eventually adjusted and he could vaguely see. He tried to sit up, only to find that something heavy was resting on top of the left side of his chest. With a laboured movement from his free arm, he carefully shifted the offending object off him, hearing a deaf slap as it dropped to the floor beside him.
Grunting in effort, he sat up at the waist… only for his gut to wretch when he saw what was holding him down. Not specifically a what though, more of a who. Laying across the bottom half of his body, trapping his legs, was the body of a White Fang member… or more accurately, what was left of it. The tattered remnants of the symbol could barely be seen through the dark crimson patches and tear marks across their armour, patches of clothing torn enough so that it revealed the chunks of meaty flesh beneath that had been ripped free and had been bleeding for some time.
Demon choked back bile that was threatening to come up his throat and he lifted his other arm to help push the body off, lightly brushing the object that had been resting on his left shoulder, this time turning to see another body. This time it wasn't a White Fang but a student that had met a grim end. Their head wasn't even attached properly, hanging loosely by a few tendons, while the rest of their body was covered in various scratches and bites, their hands still clutching their weapon as if they were still capable of fighting.
With renewed vigour, he shunted the body off his waist and stood up, having to hold onto a nearby wall to stop him from falling over, his legs still weak from neglect. This time, his thoughts turned to figuring out where he was… although that wasn't too hard considering what he could see standing up. All around him was what could only be described as a warzone… and then the memories came back.
Demon collapsed to his knees as the memories of the battle came back… he smiled feebly as he remembered that at least Ozpin, Ruby and Qrow had made it to safety, although judging by the student he had just made acquaintance to, the evacuation figures probably weren't as good as he'd hoped. There was only one problem, lying in the fact that he couldn't quite recall the finer details of what had transpired to lead him to by sitting on the ground covered in bodies, the last thing he remembered being, once again, calling on Kalazar to help.
Kalazar? Are you there?
As he waited, he was shocked to find that even after a minute, the obnoxious voice still hadn't made himself known.
KALAZAR! ANSWER ME!
As if to say he wasn't going to answer, Demon was interrupted by a very disturbing fact… one where his left eye was slowly gaining a red haze to it as he looked around. He tenderly took his hand and rubbed his eye, looking down on his glove and seeing a shiny red that contrasted the normal dull hue of his armour… blood. Taking his knife, he put it up to his eye level and looked right above his left eye, seeing a large gash that ran from the centre of his forehead all the way to just above his ear. When he wondered how it had got there when he was wearing his helmet, a glance at said mask showed the answer.
A massive piece of shrapnel was embedded through the faceplate, luckily being stopped before it could travel any further, although by the miss-shapen nature of the mask Demon hazarded a guess to say that none of the systems still worked, only being slightly disproven when only the radar was still active… although it did end up showing something rather strange. Demon scrambled and tore a piece of cloth from the nearby White Fang grunt, using it to cover his gash and his eyes, then took a closer look at the mini-map.
It showed a single, non-moving friendly signature a few hundred metres away from his current standing. With a laboured movement, he stood back up, being a bit less shaky on his feet, then set off over the rubble, his helmet still held in his grips. He moved like what could only be described as a turtle on tranquilizers as he shambled past the rocks and pieces of torn metal that blocked his way. It was some time before he had made it half-way there when he suddenly realised a rather large problem… he didn't have a weapon.
Well, when you didn't count his knife he didn't have one… but other than that he didn't have anything else at the ready. Demon reached down to his pistol holster, only to find that his Wingman's barrel was hideously miss-shapen, the trigger mechanism being completely snapped in half from god-knows what. Hesitantly, he reached over his back to see if his weapon was alright… then let out a sigh of relief when his hands formed around the familiar hilt.
He pulled it off his back, marvelling at how easy it was… then saw that half the weapon was missing. A clean cut ran straight through the metal of the sheath, shearing it clean through with the other half no-where to be seen, while the shifting mechanism of his odachi was also cut clean through which essentially limited it to its katana mode.
"Ahhhhh… shit" he grumbled, putting it on his back in the hopes that he could fix it later, knowing that if he took out the katana it would do more harm than good.
Demon did a quick double-take of the surrounding area, setting his eyes on a discarded rifle that he had seen the Atlesian military use, stumbling over and picking it up. With a quick glance at the display on the weapon, he saw that the energy cell it used only had 15% charge, giving him around that many shots before it ran out. All the other spare cells were out of charge and he didn't even bother questioning how the one in the weapon kept its charge.
With weapon in hand, he moved off towards the signal, trying to stick to the sections with more cover, keeping an eye out in case any Grimm were still prowling. After about an hour, he finally made it to his destination, the dining hall. Carefully moving around the charred remains of the dining hall, a fire having torn through and caused most of the support structures to collapse, leaving a barely-standing roof to cover half of it from the sun while a massive pile of charred tables, chairs and building rubble was piled up in the other corner.
With a gait in his step, he stumbled past the rubble and sent out a ping with his helmet, seeing a small waypoint appear in his implants, carefully walking over and falling to his knees at the point, a small tear coming from his eyes. He dropped his own helmet and picked up the one that lay in front of him, one that was covered in their signature paint of black and yellow, a hornet emblazoned on the front.
"Dammit Tempest…"
Demon swore to himself under his breath, hating to add another notch to the already large belt of those who had died under his command… he just never expected it to be Tempest who was the one to go. He dropped the helmet and didn't have to look far to see a body face-down on the pavement with a large piece of ceiling smashed over its head, Demon growling in disgust at his friend's apparent death to a piece of building, until he saw a blood-red katana lying to the side, its blade still covered in dried blood.
He reached over and took the blade, wiping the blood off, putting his knife back in its pouch and reversing the grip on the weapon.
"Waste not want not, right?"
He stooped down and kneeled over Tempest's dead body, holding his hand over his heart in respect.
"From one soldier to another my friend, you did good in your life and we'll remember you for the things you did for us. I hope being up there's sure a hell of a lot better up there than it would be down here, I'll be sure that Yang knows just how you went out…"
"Damn, that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me!" interrupted a voice from beside him, Demon diving to the side and aiming his rifle at the source… only to see Tempest standing there looking confused. "Wait? You can hear me!"
"I THOUGHT YOU WERE DEAD!" Demon shouted, still as confused as Tempest apparently was.
"Hmmm… I thought I was just a ghost that had some unfinished business or something? And guessing by the way your looking I thought you were too"
"What do you mean the way I look?"
"Ummmm… have you looked in a mirror recently?" asked Tempest. Demon didn't bother and looked over the front of his body, not finding anything at all.
"What are you even talking about?"
"Look at your back you idiot…" he deadpanned, looking exasperated. Demon went over to a large piece of glass that was laying on the ground and propped it upright, tilting it so that he could see his reflection, then turned around to see what was the matter… and then he nearly fainted. Several large iron rods were sticking through the armour in his back, most of them in his back while two were sticking out of his right leg.
"How the hell did I not notice those…"
"It could be because of the bullshit that the author pulled to try and explain your no-pain feeling or something?"
"I'm just going to ignore you and ask if your helmet still works…"
"How would I know? I haven't even tried touching anything yet! I thought I was a ghost"
Demon raised his eyebrows and gestured to his two shotguns that were slung across his back.
"And yet you have your Hellraisers?"
"My connection to them transcends to the incorporeal plane!" Tempest answered cryptically, looking up into the sky as his eyes glazed over. Once again ignoring him, Demon checked over Tempest's helmet, beginning to link it to his armour. It took a few moments to calibrate to the suit, although after it did, it didn't really help with much.
About fifty alarms immediately came up in the HUD and alerted him to everything from exoskeleton failure to the miracle that the poles had somehow missed most of his vital organs, one going into the side of his stomach being one of the worst. One caught his attention though… he had a pole going straight through his heart.
"Ummmm… Tempest, can you check over this, I might have a concussion or something"
Said Pilot stepped over and looked through the messages. He hummed for a few seconds as he looked them over, until he gave it back with an indifferent look.
"I don't see anything too major…"
"THE POLE GOING THROUGH MY HEART ISN'T MAJOR!"
"I figured that it wasn't that lethal if you're still walking and talking… unless we're both dead and in hell or something"
"Well… I should probably get them out"
Tempest looked at him skeptically, taking out a handbook that was in the compartment of his Parkour Kit.
"On like the first page of the handbook it says in massive caps DON'T TAKE IT OUT IF YOU'VE BEEN IMPALED!"
"Screw that, I'll die of blood loss if I don't take them out and I can at least clean the wounds before they fester" Demon reasoned, Tempest not exactly trusting him but still going along.
Demon laid on the ground, his back facing up, while Tempest tried to figure out how he was going to go about removing them… until he just gave up and went with the most direct route. He placed his foot on the armoured plating and grabbed one of the poles with both hands… and then pulled. He was surprised at how easily it came out and the little blood that followed, although he was more surprise about the fact that Demon didn't even flinch when he took it out.
"Have you started yet?" he asked, moving uncomfortably on the floor, Tempest just opening and closing his mouth in something that was beyond confusion.
"Ummmm… not yet?" answered Tempest, carefully putting the pole to the side and getting started on another. It was some time before he had removed all of them, the nine rods were in a pile on the side, a puddle of a deep red blood pooled underneath them. Tempest looked back down at the numerous holes that were riddled through his armour, almost vomiting as he saw the flesh beneath and the hole that went straight to his heart, the light of the overhead sun showing a path straight down through his chest.
"Done?" asked Demon, sounding almost annoyed.
"Yes?" Tempest replied, not really understanding how he was surviving with not having a heart that was working and not having an effective blood-flow.
"Ok, if you can, clean out the wounds and then bandage them… there should be a spare medical bag in the kitchen or something"
Tempest wordlessly walked over to the kitchen, having to move a sizable amount of rubble to get through, finding a medical bag on a wall and taking the bandages and a large bottle of Vodka that was the only alcohol there. He made his way back to Demon, only to see him propped up on Adam's sword trying to drink water from a canteen.
What he meant by 'trying' was that the water was immediately dribbling out of the wounds in his back, pooling in a puddle behind him, although if Demon knew this, he didn't at all seem fazed.
"Took you long enough, now pass the bandages…" he said, putting away the canteen and holding out his hand. Tempest just passed them over and set down the alcohol. Demon took the bottle and poured it onto one of the bandages, rubbing one of his wounds with it before wrapping it around his chest and tying it off so that it covered the hole. Tempest watched as he kept doing this for all the cuts, not at all understanding how it was possible but going with it anyway, all until he was done with the wounds and decided to treat himself to a drink from the Vodka bottle… causing the bandage covering his stomach puncture wound to begin dripping again.
"You do realise that you've got a hole going through to your stomach and the Vodka's coming out…" Tempest interrupted, not quite sure how Demon was even alive right now… then again, he wasn't too sure how he was alive as well.
"Damn, I hate to waste alcohol"
"HOW CAN YOU BE SO CALM!"
"Meh, if I was going to die it would have already happened… although I think you survived for another reason"
"How then?"
"Easy, did you ever get Josh's nanobots removed?"
"ummm…"
"Where'd you get hit?" asked Demon, Tempest pointing to a spot on his chest where the blade had punctured through his armour "Well, the bots probably had just enough energy to get there and fix it before they shut down"
"Is that seriously the best you can come up with?"
"Well how would you put it!" Demon countered, crossing his arms and waiting for a response.
"I used the last bits of my plot armour to survive!" announced the Pilot, looking triumphantly into the distance.
"Fine, whatever you think…" Demon conceded, trying to stand up off the ground, although his left leg buckled as the muscles that were torn weren't enough to support his weight. With an 'ahhh shit' from Demon, he locked the exo skeleton that was covering his leg and used it as a sort of splint, Tempest helping him up so he could stand. Demon went over to the pile of poles and took out two, tying them together so that it was large enough for him to use it as walking stick.
"Ok, so what's the plan boss?" asked Tempest, taking out Hellraisers and smiling whole-heartedly.
"I don't know…" came the response "I haven't seen any Grimm at all since I woke up which is weird considering I haven't seen any other people as well… I suppose that could be because this area's been LFD (Left For Dead) or the Grimm are just waiting… either way we need to get some more weaponry and make for Vale"
"I've seen a few Grimm, although for some reason they only ever come within about a hundred metres of use before turning off… I can see a massive amount of them are nested up in Beacon Tower with a couple of Nevermores flying around"
"Damn… our best chance of getting out of here is to get to my pod which is on the other side of the campus, right past all those Grimm"
"Me and Hellraisers will take care of that!"
"If we fire even one shot from one of those the entire campus of Grimm will flock here, so I think we should go about this a lot smarter if we're going to get past them"
They sat there for a few seconds, trying to think of possible routes to get to the pod, until they were both interrupted by a massive screech from outside the dining hall. Weapons were readied in a second, Demon holding the scavenged rifle in one hand while the other was still holding him up with the walking stick.
"So, any plans for getting out of here?" asked Tempest, waiting to see what the source of the noise was.
"I would say I'd distract them but with a clip of about 15 shots and no aura, I'm pretty sure even a Beowulf could take me down"
Luckily for both of them, it wasn't a Beowulf… it was two Usai fighting, something they found out too soon after both of them crashed through the wall, nearly causing the rest of the roof to collapse… oh and I was lying about it being lucky…
One looked severely outmatched in the fight, being that the other was literally covered in white plate armour with red spines and being almost twice as tall as the other Ursa, although this was quickly righted when another Ursa came barrelling in and began attacking the bigger of the two. It roared in pain as its chest was slashed and retaliated with one of its own, cutting deep into the back of one of the other Ursai, breaking through the armour that was there, continuing with the attack and grabbing the bears head, twisting its own paw and snapping the others neck.
The second Ursai roared in challenge, although the larger threw the dead body, the bear crashing into the other, then lumbered over while the other bear was stunned. It took back its claw and slashed, taking the smaller Ursai's head off in one clean swing, looking on with distain as it crashed to the ground.
"So… that was a thing" Tempest whispered under his breath, trying not to alert the massive Ursai… although he failed miserably as it turned slowly and began growling at the two. "Would now be a good time to say I only have ten shots left in Hellraisers?"
"YOU SAY THAT NOW!" Demon shouted back, already trying to get sights on its head for when it attacked.
For whatever reason, though, it didn't attack, standing a few feet away from the two Humans looking indifferent and sniffing the air every couple of seconds.
"Are we going to do anything?" whispered Tempest, not exactly sure what was happening, although Demon wasn't faring any better. The Ursa finished sniffing the air and went down onto all-fours, walking towards Demon and sniffing him, grunting and then growling in a few different tones, almost as if it was talking. He wasn't exactly sure what was happening until it hit him like a tonne of bricks.
"Ok shit, it's you Rea'ksh!" he exclaimed putting down his rifle and letting relief flow through his systems.
"YOU KNOW THIS THING!" Tempest exclaimed, still pointing both his shotguns at the Ursa.
"I guess? I met him back in the forest and he didn't attack me" half-lied Demon, seeing Tempest raise his eyebrow in suspicion. "look, I don't know either… just accept it"
Rea'ksh stood back on his hind legs and looked a bit annoyed that the human wasn't responding like he used to and growled, turning to the one in yellow and black in confusion, wondering why the Alpha was consorting with those that would kill his kind.
Demon saw what was about to happen and quickly stood between the Ursa and Tempest, holding his hand out to stop the Grimm.
"He's a friend…" Demon said lowly, trying to speak in whatever language they had but not understanding why it wasn't working.
Damn, I need Kalazar for the translation…
Trying desperately to diffuse the situation he resorted to signs that he guessed that even Grimm could understand. He draw lines across his neck to try and say that he couldn't talk and Rea'ksh seemed to get the idea, although he couldn't exactly think of anything to say that Tempest was a friend, so he settled for something that would get the idea across.
"Tempest, put down your weapons" he ordered.
"WHAT!"
"Just do it and you'll see!"
Tempest reluctantly surrendered his weapons and dropped them to the ground, raising his hands in surrender and showing the Ursa that he wasn't going to hurt it, getting a better response this time given that it didn't immediately want to kill him.
Rea'ksh grunted in response and gestured to the hole he made through the window, lumbering off through the hole and not even waiting for a response.
"So, are we going to follow our potential murderer or do the sane thing and get the hell out of here?" Tempest asked, picking Hellraisers back up and mag-locking them to his back.
"We're going to follow the Ursa!" announced Demon, hobbling off through the breach, having a limp thanks to the crutch. Tempest sighed and followed him, grumbling about stupid railroad plots or the like. Once they were outside, they followed Rea'ksh through the rubble of what once was the proud grounds of Beacon Academy, being taken over to the massive fountain that was in the middle of the boulevard where they saw a massive Deathstalker with moss and skull white armour plating.
Rea'ksh took them both right up to said Deathstalker, Tempest keeping his hands near his weapons as nearly a hundred Beowolves began converging on where they were, although they all kept their distance and were pawing the ground in anticipation. Demon didn't seem at all bothered and went to stand right in front of the massive scorpion, staring it down and not at all looking worried. Rea'ksh explained a few 'words' with it and the Deathstalker scuttled over so it was right in front of Demon, its stinger positioned a few feet away from striking.
"Ummmm… Demon, you know what you're doing right?" Tempest asked nervously, keeping his shotguns at the ready, although not wanting to draw them in case it got his friend killed.
"This here is Araksa, the second in command to this specific pack of Grimm…" Demon explained, once again trying to show the Deathstalker that he couldn't talk by making cutting motions over his throat while pretending to talk.
"If that's the Beta then where the hell is the Alpha?" Tempest questioned, not at all liking the idea that the massive Deathstalker was the SECOND biggest threat that he would no doubt see.
"That, my friend… would be me!" Demon said almost too happily, turning to see Tempest's face of complete disbelief.
"You… are the Alpha… of a pack of Grimm?" he said slowly, trying to comprehend it for himself "How is that even possible"
"I have my ways… I don't even know myself, although it kinda involves me being able to speak to them and understand them, although it doesn't exactly work now for some reason"
Tempest mulled it over for a while, scratching his chin in contemplation, until he finally answered.
"Huh, the author REALLY took initiative coming up with that one" Tempest criticised sarcastically, jumping to the side as a massive piece of concrete slammed next to him "In any case, it's pretty cool"
"You're not going to get annoyed at all that I command an army of Grimm that basically feed of negative emotions and kill people for a living?"
"They weren't the ones that were in the attack on Beacon, were they?"
"I don't think so… don't tell them but I honestly can't tell which ones are mine or not"
"So, what now? You have an army of Grimm and we need to get to the centre of a massive Grimm-infested academy for kicking ass… are you thinking what I'm thinking?" he asked hopefully, smiling a sadistic grin as he gazed at Rea'ksh.
"We are not loading up an Ursa with explosives and sending it as a nuclear battering ram…" deadpanned Demon, rolling his eyes and walking over to a Beowolf that was crouched nearby, Tempest's eyes going wide when he had practically managed to read his mind.
"HOW!"
"It's pretty easy to know what you're thinking when 90% of it either involves direct attack or using explosives"
"Point taken… so what is the plan?"
Before he answered, Demon went to the Beowolf and reached behind its ears, scratching them for a bit before gazing back to the fallen tower… and then jumped on the Beowolf's back like a horse and reached out with one arm to Tempest.
"We ride…" he said with a smile.
[Two hours of uncomfortable riding later]
"I still don't see how we managed to get past them all…" Tempest noted as he jumped off the beowolf he was on, patting it on the head and throwing it a random piece of meat.
They had made it to Demon's pod, using the Beowolves to nimbly manoeuvre through the rubble without attracting much attention and, as only Demon knew, so that they masked the human's scent. It was only after hiding from Nevermores overhead, taking down the few Grimm that had seen them and hitting their heads on just about every single low-hanging light that they had to pass under.
"That wasn't a person, was it?" Demon asked as he climbed off his own, going so far as to bow to show his gratitude.
"Probably?" he responded, not exactly sounding sure of himself.
"Well, I need to grab a few things, so wait here and watch the Grimm…" Demon ordered, turning and walking to the pod.
"Dammit, stuck on babysitting duty… never would have had to do this if I just attached the bombs to that stupid Ursa" mumbled Tempest, hearing growling behind him and seeing the two Beowolves looking at him with what looked like anger… "So, you two come here often?"
Back with Demon, he took out his knife just in case there was any threats, then kicked the door of the pod down, knowing that the power would have automatically shut down by now. Glad that he didn't see anything suspicious, he switched the underbarrel light on his pistol to ON then made his way to the breaker switch. After several minutes of fiddling with switching around the powerboard and replacing half of it, he gave up and began looking around with a set of glowsticks he had stashed.
Putting on between his teeth, he sheathed his pistol and began rifling through the belongings that were strewn around the pod. He smiled when he saw an old friend, picking it up and feeling its familiar weight. His Spitfire LMG 'Jackhammer' was held in his grasps looking the same as he had left it, smiling as he saw that he hadn't even turned the safety on when he stashed it and there was even a bullet in the breach. Next on, he went over to his closet and took out his old Pilot helmet, syncing it to his armour, smiling at the nostalgia it brought… and the several blaring alarms that were trying to tell him he should be dead.
He dismissed them and went over to the large object under the tarp, looking under it a bit and letting out his held breath when he saw it was fine… although when he looked over to the other corner he found something very strange. The only new notification that showed up on the screen that was a small 'file de-encrypted' note that was put unobtrusively in the corner. Demon was slightly confused until he remembered back to the weird USB thing they found in the back of the helmet and the ridiculously encryption. He saved the file and was about to watch it, until he saw that it was about 3 hours long.
"Maybe later…"
He grabbed it and set it to sleep, taking it off the main power supply and stashing it in a small satchel. Next, he went over to the spectre rack only to see that they were all trashed as someone or something had torn apart their bodies. Next, he went over to the weapons rack and took two Carbines, attaching silencers to the end as well as HCOG scopes, stashing them in the satchel as well. Next, he went over and checked on all the comms equipment, seeing that someone had indeed tried to get into the files, although they didn't manage to get past the encryptions. He quickly downloaded the important data and purged everything, ensuring that no matter if they broke through they wouldn't grab anything hinting at his other-worldly nature.
When he was finally finished, he went over and stood up his motorcycle Cerberus, getting the keys from under the doormat (where else) and turning them over, hearing the engine purr in response. He used the bike and hooked it up to the tarped sphere with a chain, using the bike to move it closer to the massive Titan door which he unlocked with a key-code.
"Tempest, get the Ursa!" he called out, vaguely hearing the Pilot swear and come back with the Rea'ksh a couple of minutes later. Demon motioned for the Ursa to pick up the sphere, the bear getting the general idea and lifting it up, looking as though he was struggling to lift it. Demon jumped onto Cerberus and set the engine limiter as low as it would go so that it wouldn't make any noise, then got Tempest to jump onto the back, handing him a Carbine as he did.
"What now?" he asked, sighting down the Carbine and dropping out the clip to check his ammo.
"I need to deliver this to somewhere, so we're heading to Ozpin's compensation tower" Demon announced, revving the engine and beginning off down the path to the tower, being surprised at how well Cerberus went over the rubble. Rea'ksh was lumbering behind them with the two Beowolves at his side for protection.
A few minutes later, they met their first signs of resistance, being a single Beowolf biting at what looked to be the remains of a White Fang grunt. Tempest quickly dropped it with a quick burst from the Carbine and the continued, his weapon sweeping back and forth as he scanned for targets.
It was a few more minutes before they made it within range of the tower, being careful to stay out of sight from the massive pack of Grimm that were resting in the courtyard by cutting around to the side and keeping a fair way back. Demon cut the engine in his bike and climbed off, careful to not disturb any rubble… until he realised that he literally had an Ursa following him so it was nearly pointless. Rea'ksh lumbered up beside Demon with surprising stealth and carefully set down the sphere.
By now, it was just before sunset and an amber light was covering the once-proud tower, it's entire spire leaning from the broken foundations and Ozpin's own office sitting open to the elements compliments of the Grimm dragon. He slung off his satchel chucking it over his bike and taking out his own Carbine.
"We wait until nightfall, then we can recon ahead and see if it's safe to deploy, while we wait I need you to go back with the Beowolves and make sure Araksa gets the pack out of here"
"You're making me do that!" Tempest countered, somehow managing to shout even while he was whispering.
"Not to insult you or anything but you're not exactly that stealthy and I need someone to get the pack out of here"
"How far away?"
Demon contemplated for a moment, fiddling with the visor of his helmet for a bit.
"North of the Emerald Forest should do…"
"As in North of here?"
"As in so far North that they're out of the Emerald Forest…"
"Just how big is that bomb!" Tempest asked, eyeing off the sphere suspiciously.
"Who said it was a bomb?" replied Demon cryptically, smiling behind his helmet "Now, grab the Beowolves and head back to Araksa"
As he finished, Demon pointed to the two Beowolves and motioned to Tempest, making running motions with his fingers, although they seemed to get the idea… when they started growling angrily at Tempest with delight in their eyes.
"Ummm… Demon?" Tempest queried suspiciously, holding his Carbine much tighter as he was walking back slowly.
"I think I just told them to chase you…" he noted, sounding amused, "sorry about that…"
Tempest swore to himself and took off in a sprint, the two Beowolves following him as fast as they could but still couldn't quite catch up to the Pilot as he wall-ran to gain speed and flew off into the distance. Demon waited a few more minutes until the landscape was no longer bathed in the amber glow of the setting sun, instead being lit by the cold light of the full moon.
He said a small prayer under his breath and activated the 'night ops' mode of his gear. The armour plating of his body armour folded down slightly so it looked like one continuously sheet of steel, while his Pilot helmet's normal bright red visor dulled to a very dim red, so much so that he couldn't even see it reflect off his chrome knife blade.
I'm glad that Ivan took the liberty of adding just about a hundred things I never even thought of… now that I think about it, how the hell did he even manage to get this metal and the nano-bots?
Taking his Carbine and setting it against his shoulder, he crouched low and made his way towards the tower, his footsteps being dampened by the cloth he had placed underneath his boots. His carbine was kept straight ahead as he crouch-walked through the rubble, sticking to walls and ensuring that his shadow wasn't splayed across half the courtyard. It was some time before he had made it to the broken and smashed lobby of the large tower, the room looking nothing like it did before the attack.
Four Beowolves were nibbling at a small pile of bones in the corner, the rest of the room being covered in scratches and tears in the tapestry, books and weapons scattered haphazardly throughout. Demon brought up his Carbine, moving the aiming reticule to the nearest Grimm, and silently moved inside, keeping it there until he had made it to the other side of the room next to the elevators.
He lapsed his view on the Grimm and turned to look at the elevators… and wished he had his dropship. The doors were pried open at a weird angle with scorch marks up the sides, with the cable going a few hundred stories down beneath the tower, Demon not being able to see much as there was no lights to illuminate the shaft. Upwards, there was the hundred stories or so of climbing to get to the top, only there wasn't exactly an elevator anywhere on the shaft.
Well… this is going to be a long climb…
[One painful climb later]
Demon threw his arm up to the edge of the shaft and grabbed onto it as strongly as he could, struggling to pull the rest of his body up over the lip and collapsing onto the concrete in exhaustion.
"I… am never… doing that again!" he panted, gulping his breath down in deep breaths and slowly pushing himself up to stand again. Around him was the destroyed and mangled remains of what once was Ozpin's tower, his desk lying off to the side a few feet from the edge, massive pieces of the clock embedded into the broken floor of the office. He mag-locked the Carbine onto his back and got to work, walking over to Ozpin's desk and flipping it back to how it was meant to sit. He reached underneath it and pulled out a set of cords, re-wiring them and plugging them back in, only to be rewarded with a few sparks and a very glitchy holographic image.
He had seen the access port some time ago when he hacked into the school's files, putting the info aside for later use, which was apparently now. He pulled out his data-knife and stabbed it into the spare port, seeing a small loading sign appear at the side of the screen, waiting a few moments for the hacking to be complete and the entire database to be revealed to him.
Demon set to work tracking down what he would need, a massive power source, until he found one that would suffice… the only problem was that it was 200 feet underneath the school.
So that's where that tunnel went…
He downloaded the map of the school and deleted all the data, ensuring that nothing was left, then made his way to the elevator shaft. As he did, he noticed something very strange. Sitting on the edge of the desk was Ozpin's coffee mug… completely intact… with coffee in it.
How the hell… what?
Demon reached over and picked it up, unhooking the lower section of his mask to test it, finding that it was, in fact, coffee. He took a sip and wondered how it was still hot and that it tasted half-decent, although it didn't have enough sugar for his taste. He put it down, not wanting to question why it was there, then moved off to the side of the tower, accidentally knocking it over as he went.
"Dammit!" he swore as he watched it fall… only, when it hit the ground it didn't break or spill ANY coffee. He went over and picked it up again, seeing that there were no chips or even any indication that the coffee had fallen.
Not wanting to break his brain anymore, he gulped down the rest of the coffee and clipped it to his belt. He briefly noted that the rags on his back were now wet from the coffee, then went over to the side of the tower, not wanting to go through the horror of the elevator shaft again… then jumped off. He flared the stealth jets of his parkour kit to slow his fall, enabling his helmet's thermal vison to aim right for where Rea'ksh was, then used his trained expertise to angle his body over the drop zone. When he was about 30 metres above him, he flared the pack and landed with a grunt, scaring Rea'ksh so much that he nearly fell over.
Demon smirked behind his helmet while he picked up his satchel, the Ursa grunted in annoyance while he righted himself. Demon instructed Rea'ksh to pick up the sphere once again, after many 'lost in translation' moments, then they began making their way back to the tower. Demon went ahead and quickly disposed of the four Beowolves with a burst of fire from his Carbine, having to empty the clip just in case they had managed to survive. They moved through the lobby and Demon got the Ursa to place it down next to the elevator shaft, the Pilot getting to work on making transportation.
He went over to the shaft and took out two of the grappling hooks in his gauntlet, spooling them as far as they would go and cutting them loose. He swung them around the sphere and attached it to one of the hand-holds on the device, looping it around and tying it off. Grabbing his magnetic hooks next, he put them through the hooked loop and attached the magnets to the metal wire of the elevator shaft.
With much effort, he tried to push it into the shaft, having Rea'ksh help for a second and shunt it the last distance where it fell a few feet down before being caught by the magnetic locks. Demon smiled at his won ingenious… until it slowly began sliding down because of the weight.
"Dammit… well, we're going down there anyway"
He jumped onto the sphere and it began sliding down MUCH faster than it was before, having to mag-lock his boots to the sphere to stop him from sliding. Once the grinding of the magnetic locks began to reverberate to a certain point, he guessed that they were getting close to the bottom so he fired up another magnetic grapple and attached it to the sphere, the wire pulling taught a few seconds later and the ride eventually slowed to a stop. When he looked over the edge and activated the lights of his helmet… he was about a centimetre away from hitting the ground.
Well that was close…
He detached the cables and wound the ones he could back into his gauntlet, having to leave the two hooked grapples behind. He left the sphere where it was and ventured into the massive chamber outside of the elevator, taking the Carbine off his back and activating the under-barrel light to get a better view of the dark corridor. The first thing he saw was, of course, that it was massive and could easily accommodate a Titan walking through its corridors, while the other was that it was extremely bland.
Small lights illuminated the edges of the vast room with smaller corridors branching off and none of his lights could pierce the darkness long enough for him to see where they ended. Well, he didn't have any time to search them out, so instead he brought up the map and checked where it was, seeing that the power was at the end of the massive corridor. He went back to the sphere and came up with the idea of using his grappling hooks to move it, firing one end onto the sphere and the other some distance up the corridor then activating the pull function to bring the two closer together. Repeating this about ten times, he managed to get the sphere a few metres from the power… then he actually turned to see what it was.
In front of him was two large capsules, both connected by a set of thick pipes with tiny specks of a glowing amber liquid speckled throughout the piping, one of them being empty… while the other still had someone there. A woman was lying in the pod, wearing only her undergarments that exposed her tanned skin and several dark veins that were covering half of her face, although the most notable feature was the arrow that was sticking out of her chest, being firmly embedded in her heart.
Ozpin… damn, what the hell were you doing down here?
He reached out and touched the arrow, instantly pulling his hand back as the arrow disintegrated into ash and was carried away in an unseen wind. It took him a second to comprehend what had happened and stepped away out of respect. Getting on with the task at hand, he went over to the empty pod and opened the panel, using his knife to cut into the back of the headrest where the wires would be and tearing open the panelling. He reached in and grabbed the wires, being careful not to tear them this time, then pulled them out long enough that he could attach his leads to it.
Walking over to the sphere, he opened one of the side panels, taking the tarp of just a bit to get underneath it, then took out two lead cables, moving over to the pod again. Taking them both, he hooked them up to the pods cabling and activated the display on the sphere, seeing the energy input going up to a measly 10% of the power that was needed.
"Please don't tell me…" started Demon, not bothering to finish as he went over to the station in front of the pods and activating the display, swearing to himself when he saw that all the power had been shunted into the occupied pod for some reason. He unhooked the cables and went over to the other pod, cringing as he opened the door. He dropped the cables and awkwardly put his arms under the dead woman, feeling a strange warmth radiate through his body as he made contact, although he dismissed it and continued his grim work. With a grunt, he lifted her surprisingly heavy body and moved it off to the side, setting it down carefully on the cold floor, ensuring that she wasn't desecrated even after her death.
Quickly stepping away from the body, he linked up the cables and shouted happily when he saw the power input reach 100% and the charge of the sphere slowly began climbing. Finishing his work, he made to leave… although he was stopped when he heard a quiet and weak voice.
"Please… help me"
He spun around with his rifle up at the new entrant, only to see the girl from the pod feebly reaching out with her hand, her eyes still shut tightly. He slung his weapon back in its place and quickly kneeled beside her and checked her pulse. By some miracle, her heart was beating, albeit weakly, giving off about a third of a normal heart rate.
"Shhhhh… save your breath, I'll get you out of here" he tried to console, reaching into his satchel and taking out a small needle of morphine and stabbing it into her leg. She took in a deep breath before her eyes fluttered open, going wide when she saw his armour.
"Raven?" she asked feebly, her throat sounding hoarse and raw, reaching out and resting her hand on his shoulder.
"Close, that'd be my mother…" he admitted, holding her arm up so she didn't have to use any effort. She looked confused for a second, pouting and taking her arm away and resting it by her side as the morphine began to take effect.
"Thank you…" was the only thing she could say before her eyes closed again and she fell asleep. He sighed and carefully picked her up again, holding her under her knees and shoulders, bridal-carry style, then moved back to the elevator shaft… then he realised something.
SON OF A...
[Roughly an hour later]
Rea'ksh was hunkered down in the lobby of the massive clocktower, sitting there and carefully watching for any of his own species that would hinder his Alpha's plan. He had already had to put down another Ursa that had stumbled indoors, its body already dissolving in a corner. It was boring to say the least, his claws used to gouging flesh when he was this close to the enemy, but he stayed his lust for blood so that he wouldn't compromise the Alpha, even if he had absolutely no idea of what he was trying to do.
As he was waiting, he felt a strange sensation come over him, as if everything around him just felt wrong. It was hard to describe, being that he had an already small vocabulary that mostly consisted of 'Yes' and 'Kill them all' but he knew the direction it came from. With haste, he lumbered over to the elevator shaft and looked down, seeing his Alpha hanging a few feet from the edge with a body slung over his shoulders and his breath laboured.
Rea'ksh leant down with his arm and grabbed onto the Alpha's own, pulling him the last bit of the way and placing him on the floor. The Alpha nodded in thanks, taking the body off his back and laying it carefull on the ground. When Rea'ksh had the chance to get a closer look, he realised with sudden awareness why he didn't feel right… it was a Maiden… or more specifically, was a Maiden.
Demon was tending to the woman's wounds when he heard the loud growl behind him, turning slightly to see Rea'ksh's teeth bared and staring intently at the woman. He was about to wonder why when the Ursa suddenly reared its arm back to attack and struck forward with the intent of ending her life. Demon had barely a second to take the Carbine off his back and used it to block the strike, being thrown back a few metres and seeing that the rifle was literally snapped in half.
"WHAT THE HELL REA'KSH!" he shouted, quickly getting back up and taking out Jackhammer, aiming it straight at the Ursa threateningly. Said Grimm was too dumbfounded as to why his Alpha was protecting the bane of his species when they were in such a weak state, not bothering to continue the attack as he stared at his leader with confusion.
The two stood where they were for nearly a minute, neither of them making a move, until eventually Demon slightly lowered his LMG and held up his left hand to say stop. The bear seemed to get the idea and lowered its gait, still growling in a combination of anger and uncertainty.
Demon had no idea why his enforcer tried to kill the woman but he guessed it was just because she was human or something along those lines. He carefully walked over to the woman again, keeping Jackhammer ready just in case. The Ursa was still growling but it had grown quieter, letting Demon step forward and care for the woman. He kept one eye on Rea'ksh at all times and managed to lift the woman over his shoulder with just one hand, then began his journey back to where he parked Cerberus.
When he got back, he found Tempest resting on said Motorcycle looking quite peeved as Demon came into view. He didn't bother saying anything but lifted up his right leg, showing a Beowolf cub that was firmly latched onto it with his teeth, letting it explain itself.
"So I take it the talk went well?" sarcastically asked Demon, Rea'ksh still following behind him, albiet still growling.
"Your Deathstalker is LITERALLY the worst…" replied Tempest, shaking his leg again to try and get the Grimm off.
"And why would you say that?" continued Demon, taking the woman and laying her over his bike and trying to get her in a comfortable position.
"Well, she didn't bother acknowledging me until I literally punched her, then I had to avoid being killed, THEN she finally let me talk and it took me AGES to get them to go to the forest… and just asking, who's the half-naked chick?"
"I found her in a secret tunnel under Ozpin's compensation tower…" off-handedly answered Demon, taking out his keys and unlocking Cerberus, revving the engine quietly.
"Like in a dungeon?" Tempest asked, not at all liking where this was going.
"Yes…" Demon answered, not at all comprehending what Tempest meant… for a few seconds at least "WAIT! NO, NOT LIKE THAT YOU SICK BASTARD!"
Tempest stifled back his laughter and went over to the bike, shoving his leg next to Demon, whacking the Beowolf against Cerberus.
"Can you get this thing off me?"
Demon just sighed and reached down, ruffling the fur behind the pup's neck and watching as it unlatched from his leg and sat on its hind legs, lolling its tongue out of its mouth expectantly at Demon. He kneeled and the pup jumped up, licking the side of his mask and nuzzling into his shoulder, all the while Tempest looking on in what could be described as both frustration and pain.
"How come you get an adorable dog?" Tempest complained.
"Because I'm badass…" was all Demon answered with, picking up the pup and placing him on the back of the bike, ruffling its ears before addressing Tempest again. "Ok, so I set up what I needed to, so now all we need to do is to get to Vale…"
"That shouldn't be too hard, should it?"
"For once I agree with you… there's only one problem"
"And what would that be?"
"We have one bike, one Ursa and three people… we're not exactly that stealthy"
And like that, Demon made one of the biggest mistakes of his life… he gave Tempest an idea.
"WAIT HERE!" he nearly shouted as he ran off into the darkness, Demon being sure that he was smiling even though he couldn't see his face. He sat there for a while, playing with the adorable little Beowolf pup while Rea'ksh looked on… until he felt and heart massive footsteps thunder from the darkness.
What the hell has he done this time…
Demon barely had time to comprehend as, out of seemingly nowhere, his second Atlas Titan, Jeeves, came careening around the corner sprinting as fast as he could.
"Look who I found!" Tempest spoke as he opened the cockpit, squatting on the door as it came down.
"Where did he come from?" Demon asked, dumfounded that he had managed to find the Titan.
"Well, I kinda left him outside the dining hall while I finished off the douchebag that was going to touch Yang, so I just went back and found him!"
"Goddamn, you're a life-saver!" Demon praised, taking a step back to admire the Titan, noting how twitchy Rea'ksh had become since the entrance of the mechanical beast. "We should probably go before the Ursa here decides that it'll be an awfully nice idea to have me for an early breakfast instead"
Tempest noded and jumped back into the Titan and powering up the reactor to full power, spinning up the electricity coils on the Arc Cannon. Demon went over and picked up the woman, carrying her over to the Titan and pulling down one of the cargo nets, wrapping her up and hooking her onto the top of the massive mech, right next to the opening for the reactor with the help of all the weapons cases running up his back. Just as he finished hooking the last of the clips, he heard the loud and resounding howl of a Beowolf, seeing one crouched on a large pile of rubble that led to the centre of the courtyard.
CRAP!
Grabbing a Smart Pistol from one of the gun racks, he quickly jumped off the Titan and landed hardly, getting up quickly and making it to Cerberus while he heard Tempest charging the Arc Cannon. He grabbed the Beowolf and wrapped its arms around his waist, getting onto his bike and turning off the engine limiter, receiving a delightfully loud revving when he twisted back the throttle.
He turned to Rea'ksh quickly and pointed towards the landing pads of the campus, hoping to whatever god that was out there, there would be some spare White Fang Bullheads left over. Gunning the engine, he sped away behind the Titan with one hand in the handlebars while the other was holding the Smart Pistol as it tracked targets.
A bright flash of light told him that Tempest had finally let loose with the Arc Cannon and the slight smell of crispy chicken furthered that observation, although he was too focused on getting away right about now. He nimbly traversed any rubble that would cause him trouble, all the while aiming the pistol behind him and letting it track targets, firing whenever it ran out of lock-ons.
A few moments later, he burst out of the area where most of the rubble was and saw a dark silhouette at the edge of the landing pads, a glimmer of hope forming in his chest. He gunned the engine and flicked on the headlights, smiling even more when he saw that it was, in fact, a Bullhead with the White Fang symbol on the side.
When he got within the last few metres he pulled on the break, nearly flying over the handlebars, but quickly righted the bike and set up the stock before seeing what was happening with the Bullhead. He jumped in the side and went into the cockpit, smiling when he saw the keys inside. Turning them over, he was even more surprised to see that there was nearly full fuel and the engine purred like a cat. Not bothering to question it, like everything else that stupidly happened in his life.
He left the engine to spin up and went over to the side, closing the back bay-door and pulling Cerberus into the loading bay and strapping it down with his magnetic grapples so that it wouldn't move, the Beowolf pup happily climbing into one of the side seats and contently sitting on its hind legs. He began to really appreciate the size of these Bullheads as the bike didn't even take up enough room to make it squishy and he bargained there would be enough room to even get Rea'ksh into the back rather than hanging him from below like he had planned.
Demon put everything he didn't need into his satchel, throwing it into the co-pilot's seat, then readied Jackhammer, laying prone in the bay of the Bullhead and aiming down the long courtyard that led towards the Clocktower. He saw Rea'ksh running full-boar the courtyard with the Titan not far behind, although they had what looked to be an entire horde following them.
He waited for them to get within semi-effective range and opened fire with the .50 cal rounds, keeping the recoil aimed away from Rea'ksh in case the bullets managed to kick in his direction. The first volley managed to take down a couple of Beowolves and another Ursa, although when Tempest let loose with another blast from his Arc Cannon, he finally got a better idea of what they were fighting.
So that's where the Goliaths got to…
Behind the Titan were two massive Goliaths, both of which showing scorch marks on their massive facemasks, hinting that even a fully-charged blast from an Arc Cannon barely made a scratch. He quickly stopped wasting his ammo on the smaller Grimm and shifted the rest of his clip to one of the Goliaths. Miniature explosions showed that he was, in fact, managing to land a few shots, but the problem was that not even the ridiculous AP capacity of the rounds managed to crack through the armour.
"DAMMIT!"
His clip ran dry and he quickly re-loaded, the Titan and Ursa now only a short distance from the Bullhead so he jumped up and quickly ran into the cockpit. He flared the engine enough so that it was hovering off the ground and could leave as soon as possible, then looked out to see that the two had made it within range.
Rea'ksh got the general idea and jumped on-board, the Bullhead rocking from the additional weight… and then the Titan decided to latch on after mag-locking the Arc Cannon on its back. Demon remembered back to when he had tried to get Bullheads to transport his Titans and they even struggled with those when that was their only cargo. He hoped for the best and gunned the engines… and it barely moved. He swore to himself and tried to give the engine more power, shoving the throttle as far as it would go. A tiny bit of hope let its way into his chest as it began slowly rising.
It managed to rise just enough that the Titan hanging underneath was out of the swinging range of the Goliaths and other Grimm… although there was still the Nevermore's and Gryphons to worry about, something he remembered as massive caws from said birds went up in the night air.
"Tempest, I hope to god you've got a bead on those things!"
His words were answered, luckily, when another blinding streak of lightning arced out from beneath the Bullhead and stuck down two fliers that were behind them.
Well thank god he can actually aim…
Just as Demon was about to fly off, he noticed something VERY strange considering the situation they were in. At the edge of his vision, he could make out a tiny speck of pink that was contrasting the usual stark-grey of the campus. He decided to go out on a limb and spun the Bullhead around, pushing the thrusts at an angle so they wouldn't lose height. As he flew over the location, he looked down to see someone in the ruins as well, although he couldn't see who they were from here.
He flew low to the ground and set it to auto-hover, moving to the open bay door of the Bullhead and firing a grapple down to the person below, seeing them grab onto it. He quickly reeled it in and helped them up before quickly getting back to the controls, pushing the throttle to max once again and beginning their journey back to Vale.
Once he was sure that they wouldn't be running into any mountains or anything, he set it to auto-pilot and went into the back to check on the person they had saved. They had brown hair, brown eyes,a bowler hat on top, with her hair being in two pig-tails, while she wore what looked to be a tailcoat and long-brown pants. She was holding what looked to be a pink parasol, a large cane hooked on her wrist, Demon getting a strange feeling for some reason.
She was sitting on one of the seats at the back looking rather nonchalant, although she was looking at the Beowolf pup curiously and giving nervous glances to Rea'ksh who was sitting asleep in the corner, too focused on the Grimm to notice Demon walking in. Just as he was about to say something, Tempest's hand came up from the side and he heard a muffled shout from below, not really hearing it thanks to the wind. He reached down and pulled him up, the Pilot taking a second to dust himself off and put Hellraisers in a gun rack.
"Well, Jeeves is trying to figure out how to have tea while hanging onto the Bullhead at the same time because he missed out on 30 days of it… so we've apparently been at Beacon for about a month" Tempest announced, turning to see the girl eyeing off the Beowolf "Just how many girls did Ozpin have in his 'secret' tunnel?"
Demon ignored him and went over to the girl, kneeling so that they were seeing eye-to-eye, noting just how short she was. She broke her concentration from the Beowolf when she figured she was being addressed and turned to Tempest, her face contorting in shock and recognition, although when she turned to see Demon… it was more fear than anything else. She instantly shot up and jumped over to the opposite side of the bullhead, taking out her parasol and holding it like a rapier, staring at Demon like he was going to kill her, the Pilot swearing that he saw her eyes turn to pure white for a split second.
He didn't exactly know how to respond, so instead he decided to not try and provoke her and stood up, holding his hands over his head in surrender.
"We're not going ot hurt you!" he said, gesturing to Tempest who had managed to pick up Hellraisers and was aiming them at the girl "Plus, we don't want to ruin the Bullhead with shotgun bullets!"
Tempest pouted and lowered his shotguns, dropping them onto the floor and crossing his arms. Demon waited for a response and when he didn't get one, he decided to continue.
"Look, we literally woke up this morning and have no idea what the hell happened, so could you cut us some slack and NOT try and kill us or something!"
She seemed to lighten slightly and put away her parasol, although didn't make any indication that she was going to move.
"So, I take it you're a student?" Demon continued, "do you have any injuries?"
She shook her head in response and flinched slightly when Tempest moved to sit down next to the Beowolf… then smiled slightly when it bit onto his leg.
"STUPID DOG!" he shouted as he flicked his leg to get it off, only succeeding in hopping so close to the door that he fell out. Demon sighed and fired a grapple, catching him before he could fall too far, then saw the Beowolf pup unlatch and climb up the rope and trot over to its seat, laying back down contently. "Would you mind reeling me in?" Tempest asked, still hanging with the grapple attached to his chestplate.
"You can come back up when I'm done talking to the girl!" Demon yelled back down while he fired the other end of the grapple onto the side door, "You can talk to Jeeves while you're down there!"
The girl finally seemed to calm down and took a seat again, crossing her legs while having her parasol resting on her lap, although she still didn't talk. Demon went and sat down opposite her, next to the Beowolf and began scratching behind its ears, the pups tongue lolling out in pleasure.
"So, do you have a name, or would you prefer to be called 'girl' for every conversation after this?"
She seemed to contemplate for a second before looking back to him and making slicing motions over her throat. It took him a while to figure out what she meant, until he slapped himself in frustration when he finally realised.
"OH! You're mute, aren't you?" he blurted out, seeing her nod enthusiastically, "Well now I feel like a dumbass… can you do sign language?"
She nodded again and freed her hands so that she could sign properly.
"Hello, do you understand?" she asked, waiting for him to translate. Demon, being the military badass that he is, had to undertake a battle-sign course during his Pilot training for when the comms were jammed, although not using it for a year made it a bit rusty…
"Wait? Did you say for me to go to hell?"
She looked a bit peeved and did it slower this time, letting him translate every word separately.
"Hello… do. You. Understand. Me… oh! Sorry, I only have basic battle-sign so I don't know if I can do the finer details… I have a scroll and I think that'll be better than my crappy translating"
He went over to his bike and took his scroll out of the satchel, inputting the password and changing to the notepad app, pushing up the font size and throwing it over to her, the girl beginning to type as soon as she had it in her hands.
"My name is Aspher" (Pronounced Ash-fur… although we all know it's Neo) she typed, turning it around so Demon could see. He seemed passive for a while, although he was really scrolling through the hundred of transfer student profiles that he had downloaded from Ozpin's computer and, seeing that she checked out, stuck out his arm for a handshake.
"I'm Demon and Tempest's the asshole hanging off the edge… nice to meet you"
She seemd hesitant at first, although eventually reached out and shook it for half a second, quickly stepping back awkwardly afterwards. She looked down and typed something, turning it for Demon to see.
"Where are we going?"
"We're heading back to Vale first off, so we can drop you off there, although I should probably head to the hospital first…" he stated, almost as if he needed to remind himself. Aspher was a bit confused until she saw the bandages, offering her hand inquisitively. He just shrugged and she went behind him, taking off one of the bandages and inspecting the wound. Demon couldn't see what she was doing but he definitely felt like she was poking around within the wound, until she moved the bandage back in place and went back around to sit in her seat, not really looking that fazed, typing into the scroll soon after.
"Doesn't look too good… how are you even alive"
Tempest heard them while he was still hanging over the side and decided to put his two-cents into the conversation.
"HE HAS TOO MUCH BULLSHIT PLOT ARMOUR!" he yelled to get over the wind, then got hit in the head by a random brick that happened to be falling from the sky. Demon decided to clarify for the poor girl who looked far more confused than she should be.
"I don't even know myself, all I know is that my Aura is somehow keeping me alive even though my heart isn't exactly working"
"I thought it was that teleport thingy?" she questioned, being surprisingly fast at typing.
"True, though I honestly still have no idea how I'm alive so it's the best explanation I have…"
Just as he was about to continue, he heard a series of massive shrieks from outside, sticking his head out the window to see hundreds of miasmic trails of darkness that were trailing behind the Nevermore and Gryphons that were following them.
"Just had to come now…" he mumbled to himself, grabbing the line that had Tempest on it and pulling him up into the hanger.
"Ok, we've got to make it within range of the city's defences…" Demon began as he started to formulate a plan, "Tempest, I need you to get on top of the Bullhead and try and take down anything that comes at close-range, I'll try and get one of the Kraber's from Jeeves, Rea'ksh you can keep sleeping, Aspher… well, you can fly right?"
She nodded hesitantly and quickly put her parasol and cane into one of the weapon racks, taking Hellraisers and throwing them to Tempest before he could say anything, jumping into the cockpit and taking the controls. Tempest cocked both his shotguns and loaded the under-barrel grenade launchers, Demon raising an eyebrow when he noticed the launchers.
"Since when were they there?"
"They've been there the whole time, the dumbass writer forgot about them!" complained the Pilot, tensing his muscles to dodge the brick, although it never came so he just shrugged to off and jumped out of the bay door, grabbing onto the wing and pulling himself up on top of the ship and readying his shotguns.
Demon fed the grapple back into his gauntlet before climbing down the Titan's arm as it held onto the Bullhead, moving down as fast as he could until he was at the same height of the Kraber case, being around waist height on the Titan. He heard Tempest begin his long-range bombardment with what looked to be Arc grenades judging by the blue light that flashed behind him, although he didn't bother to look as he was too focused on unclasping to top of the case to release the weapon. It took him a while until both the clips came loose and he opened it, just about to take the weapon out until the Bullhead lurched to the side and the weapon slipped out and began falling.
His reacted fast, even by his standards, and managed to catch it by the muzzle break, about to shout up to Aspher in rage until he saw several Nevermore Feathers glanced off the hull of the Bullhead thanks to the angle, not doing anything to damage it. He silently thanked her and climbed back up, getting onto the roof with Tempest who was emptying the slug-shots of his shotguns into any Gryphons that got close, the Nevermore's staying back to try and hit them with their feathers.
He took a firing knee and put his sights on a Nevermore that was getting ready for a strafing run, putting the reticule just above its eye and a little to the left, to account for wind… then he pulled the trigger. The rifle kicked and a second later, a small explosion of blood sprayed from the Nevermore, Demon watching as it screeched and veered away from attacking, narrowly missing the Bullhead in its fit of pain, Aspher managing to veer out of the way just in time.
Demon racked another round and fired again, not hitting where he was aiming but still cutting a massive gouge out of a Nevermore's wing and causing it to plummet towards the ground at a sickening speed.
By now, Tempest had to reload his shotguns, having expended it blasting Gryphon's into nothingness, although this left Demon having to pick up the slack. When said Pilot stopped hearing the blaring discharges of Hellraisers, he reached over his back and took out Jackhammer, flipping the selector switch to the increased fire-rate and beginning to fire it one-handed into the mob of Gryphons, still using his other arm to aim and fire the Kraber. Whenever he had to rack another round for the sniper rifle, he would drop it for a split second, catch the bolt and pump it to chamber the bullet, then throw it back up and search for another target.
The LMG on the other hand didn't require much attention as anything that he generally aimed at was rippled with bullets, the miniature explosives taking care of the Grimm that happened to get hit as he strafed it back and forth. By now, Tempest had re-loaded his shotguns and was firing again, Demon running dry in his LMG almost as soon as that happened, mag-locking it on his back again so he could put another clip into the Kraber.
It was almost another minute before they had made it to safe space, seeing the glowing lights that were on the border of the city and seeing the strangely comforting laser targeting lines for the AA guns that were in place.
"GUN THE ENGINES!" Demon shouted below to Aspher in hopes that she would hear, relieved to see that the jets went horizontal and the Bullhead sped up towards the killzone, even though they slowly began losing altitude. A Gryphon came in for a last-ditch attempt at taking them down, being killed by Tempest before it could hit, although its body did manage to crash straight into Demon and knock him over the edge.
It took him a second to realise what had happened and by then the ground was fast approaching, no water or conveniently-placed bales of hay to break his fall.
Crap… KALAZAR! NOW WOULD BE A GREAT TIME TO WAKE UP YOU ASSHOLE!
Unfortunately, once again, the voice didn't answer him… although luckily for him, someone else was there to stop him from hitting the ground. It was a few seconds later that he felt a small force hit his back and saw two petite arms wrap around his chest. He couldn't see anything but he knew it was the girl, Aspher, although he wasn't exactly sure why she had chosen to jump down after him without a plan. Well she did have a plan… if it meant plummeting into the ground at Terminal Velocity.
"SHIT!" shouted Demon just as he was about to hit the ground… although he never did. He heard something that sounded like breaking glass and then… well he didn't feel like he was plummeting to his death anymore. He slowly opened his eyes to see that he was somehow standing back in the Bullhead with a VERY smug looking Aspher in front of him.
"Was that you?" he asked, feeling a bit sick and holding down a tiny bit of bile that threatened to com up. She nodded enthusiastically and went back into the cockpit, piloting the Bullhead once more. Tempest then jumped in through the side and slung Hellraisers over his back, whistling to himself and sitting down in one of the side-seats. Rea'ksh turned in his seat and a massive paw plonked down on his lap, causing the Pilot to freak out and try and pry it off only to stop when the Ursa growled defiantly.
"Don't you need to be killing Grimm?" Demon asked, Tempest answering by pointing outside to the streaks of AA fire that was tearing apart the Grimm, said creatures turning tail and running when they realised it was a lost fight.
Demon realised what was going to happen a second later and ran into the cockpit, getting into the co-pilot's seat while Aspher still piloted. As he expected, the comms system crackled to life and a very pissed male voice came over the system.
"Could you tell me why your assess need saving at FIVE IN THE BLOODY MORNING and… to top it all off, you've got the White Fang symbol plastered all over that thing, so would you PLEASE give me ONE good reason not to pull this bloody trigger to turn your ship into a flaming wreck of DUMBASS!"
Demon just sighed and pressed the transmission button, taking off the lower portion of his mask and leaning closer to the mic so he could be heard clearer.
"We've come from Beacon and we're requesting entrance into the city, we've got injured on board and need to head to the Hospital to drop them off"
"WAIT! You're from Beacon! How the hell did you make it out, that can't be right…"
"Well, if we can land then I can prove it to you… just give me second, I'll transmit the files through this frequency"
He pulled up his HUD and ran through the files, transmitting his student codes through to the guard, as well as Tempest's and Aspher's. He heard a humming noise on the other side, presumably the guard mumbling to himself as he looked them over, until he eventually replied.
"Well, the student files check out but these students have been reported dead for just under a month now, so I don't really think I can let you in…"
"Have you got a sniper manning the wall?"
"Yeah, why?"
"Get him to look at the top of our Bullhead, you'll see we're telling the truth" he instructed the guard, holding out his arm to signal for Aspher to stop the ship, then got out of his seat and linked up the comms channel to his helmet, jumping up onto the roof. Looking along the wall, he saw the glint from the scope, flipping the bird at the sniper until he heard chatter on the comms.
"Ummm, sir… this kid, I saw him back in the tournament, he's the dude that took out the entire Vacuan team"
"Are you sure it's him?"
"I know those Beacon kids and I'm sure they wouldn't let anyone else touch his armour without being dead or something like that, so I say that if he sounds alright then he checks out"
The guard grumbled a bit and Demon knew he had won, waving to the sniper and jumping back inside, giving the thumbs up to Aspher for her to continue, the girl nodding with another smug grin and beginning to move forward before the guard even responded.
"Ok, you check out, although we'll be tracking you and if you make any funny moves then we'll kick your ass"
"Right back at ya!" Demon chastised, cutting the comms and putting his feet up on the dash. "You know where the hospital is right?" he asked to Aspher, the girl shaking her head slightly, so he grabbed his scroll and set in the co-ords for the hospital, after having them marked on it after his two trips before. She nodded and they veered slightly to the left, the girl looking a bit tense as they passed over the wall with the turrets still tracking them, although she loosened up as they broke off and began turning to face the outer threats.
"Now… let's see how we can do this… getting the woman from under the academy to the hospital, somehow hiding Jeeves from the city as well as getting him some biscuits for tea time, fixing my weapons and my armour, making sure the Grimm don't eat someone… and then, maybe fix my heart if I have time… shouldn't be to hard!"
[Two days later]
Tempest and Demon stood in front of the monument for those lost at Beacon, staring at their own names that were engraved on the front. Demon was wearing a random suit that he had been given by Ivan at Apparel and Armour when he handed in his old armour and weapons, wearing reflective sunglasses to hide his eyes. Tempest, on the other hand, was wearing blue jeans and a black t-shirt with a bunny head on the front, a backpack hanging off one shoulder that contained their weapons.
"So, how exactly did you manage to hide Jeeves, the Grimm AND the Bullhead?" Demon asked offhandedly, taking a swig from a flask that he had bought from a convenience store.
"It helps when said mech has a gun bigger than anyone else's… it helps to 'convince' the thugs in the docks to leave"
"So, you left an almost 20-million-dollar piece of military hardware COMPLETELY unguarded in the centre of gang territory?" Demon questioned, not exactly sounding that happy.
"Hey, I left Aspher there to protect them, plus Rea'ksh is there as well… and, how the hell did you manage to get the woman into the hospital without filling out like 500 forms?"
Demon just smiled for a few seconds as he remembered.
[Flashback]
"So… you just came across her and she had an arrow in her chest… and it disintegrated… then she started breathing again…" said the VERY sceptical and annoyed voice of the Wolf Faunus doctor as she sat tapping a clipboard against an empty bed while Demon held the sleeping woman in his arms.
"Yes… now could you please just take her?"
The doctor huffed and propped up her clipboard and taking the woman, putting her in the bed and beginning to wheel her off.
"So I assume that you'd want the same thing that Ozpin wanted for you, I kill anyone that finds out?" she asked innocently, Demon doing a double-take on what she had said.
"WAIT WHAT!"
She smiled and reached behind her and took out a rather large pistol, smiling a tiny bit before putting it back and wheeling off the woman again.
[End Flashback]
"Oh, it wasn't that hard…"
They stood there for a few seconds until Tempest turned around and saw someone he hadn't seen in a long time.
"Come on man, can't we just let Yang know we're here?" he pouted, turning away quickly as Yang's gaze drifted over to where he was.
"We can't let anyone else know, in case there are any spies, although I'm pretty sure that we could get her over here and move her off to the side"
"Spies? Just how paranoid are you?"
"Paranoid enough to know that the attack on Beacon had more to do with the White Fang… just get Yang over here so she can pretend to be happy until she punches you as soon as we're out of sight"
"That won't happen, trust me…"
"Sure, sure… just make it quick" Demon finished, kneeling and looking at the engraving that Jaeger had left, Tempest thinking of ways to NOT make his girlfriend kill him the second that they met again. He spotted one of the guys that was talking to Yang and waited until he had left to grab a drink, walking casually over and grabbing his attention.
"Hello, do you know where I can find Yang Xiao Long?" Tempest began, the man turning around looking very startled and nearly spilling his drink, before switching to a more relaxed position.
"Who's asking?"
"One of her friends from Beacon, I just wanted to wish her my condolences for the friends she lost…"
"Well, she's over there" he said, pointing her out and going back to pouring his drink.
"Could you get her to come over to the monument, I have a friend who's kinda grieving over his girlfriend over there and I can't exactly leave him by himself"
The man nodded and finished his drink, smiling and walking back over to Yang, Tempest getting his own drink before making his way back over to Demon. He was turning a bullet casing over in his fingers when Tempest came back, dropping it and standing back up while never looking away from his own name.
"So… how'd it go?" he asked, taking Tempest's drink and using it to re-fill his flask before the Pilot could complain.
"Well, I got some dude to get her for us"
"Seriously?"
"Well it worked!"
Demon didn't even bother responding, giving up being the best option when dealing with Tempest's antics. They didn't talk for quite a while until Tempest decided to break the silence.
"… it's definitely weird being at your own funeral"
They both heard a gasp and turned to see Yang holding a hand over her mouth and her eyes going wide in shock, Tempest smiling awkwardly back.
"So… ya miss us?" he asked slowly, Yang's eyes flashing red for a second before they filled with tears and she rushed forward, wrapping him in a tight hug and crying into his shoulder. He smiled and hugged her back, Demon letting them have a moment until Yang reached out and pulled him in as well. They stood like that until Yang broke it, not wanting to attract too much attention from everyone else, although her eyes were still red with tears.
"How…" was all she could manage through her tight throat, still struggling to hold in the practical river of tears that threatened to flow.
"Pilots never die, we only bugger off for a few days and come back with a bigger shit-eating grin!" smiled Tempest, pulling his own to emphasise the point. (Thanks to BrokenLifeCycle for that)
"You were gone for a month!" she whisper-shouted, surprisingly sounding even more angry than when her semblance was active.
"We were unconscious for most of it and the rest we spent trying to break through the Grimm lines to get here, we literally only got here two days ago, and we didn't know how to find you…" Demon reasoned, casting a glance behind Yang to see Qrow giving him suspicious looks while they were talking to Yang, "all you need to know is that we somehow ended up here wondering what the hell is going on"
Yang slightly calmed down and decided to not pummel them into nothingness at that point, instead wiping away a few tears and telling them what had happened.
"Weiss' father took her back to Atlas as soon as we evacuated, Blake just disappeared and Ruby, the rest of JNPR and Rosaline took off to Mistral to try and stop the next attack by Salem. Kira, Markus, Josh and Jaeger are the only people who stayed behind to try and re-take the campus"
"Salem…?" Demon said, not noticing the name.
"She's the one who orchestrated the attack on Beacon and she's planning to take down all the separate combat academies for some reason"
"Well, now we have a name… do we have any other leads?" Demon asked again, filing the info for later.
"Are you seriously considering going after her now!" Yang scolded, finally seeming to stop crying as she got angry at her brother.
"Hey, what else am I meant to do!"
"STOP FIGHTING FOR ONCE IN YOUR LIFE!" she nearly shouted, drawing the attention of more than a few people… particularly the man they asked to get Yang.
"Hey, what's going on here?" he asked as he came over with a concerned look about him, putting a hand on Yang's shoulder as she continued to stare at Demon.
"Nothing dad… I was just talking to my 'friends' here…" she answered through gritted teeth. He didn't look at all convinced and fixed the two boys with an angry glare that made even Demon flinch under his gaze. Tempest, doing something smart for once, decided to break from the conversation.
"Well, we're terribly sorry for interrupting but we'll be on our way" he said, grabbing Demon by the arm and moving away, although he turned to Yang before he left to leave her a final message "Oh, and I intend to keep my promise if you're up for it… how does 8 o'clock sound?"
It took her a few seconds to realise what she meant before she nodded eagerly and he smiled, grabbing Demon again and getting out of there before Yang's dad pummelled them both. They made it outside before Tempest released his grip and ran a hand through his hair while sighing.
"Well that could have gone better…"
"At least she didn't punch you in the nuts" Demon noted, taking another swig from his bottle as he walked over to Cerberus as it was parked on the side of the road.
"No, but I will for her!" came a familiar voice right before Tempest collapsed on the ground nursing his groin, Demon barely had time to turn around before he was on the floor as well in the same situation, seeing Kira standing over them both looking extra pissed. "You assholes should have seriously considered NOT killing yourselves you know!"
"Ow…" was what both said as they lay on the ground, the group being joined by Jaeger, Markus and Josh a couple of moments later.
"So, how the hell did you make it out?" asked Josh, going to help them up until he saw Kira with a look that said 'I'll gladly do it to you as well if you touch them'.
"We found some stuff, broke out with some girl from Mistral, then made it here before the Bullhead crashed" Tempest explained, using a nearby street pole to pull himself up. Kira raised her eyebrows before sitting back and waiting for more.
"So… your still alive…" Josh said, not exactly sounding that convinced.
"Thanks to your nanobots apparently" Tempest answered, showing the massive cut on his chest where the blade ran through it. Josh went over to it and reached out with his gauntet, a tiny blipping sound ringing out when he glanced over it. He then went over to Demon and scanned again, although no blips ran out when he did so, Josh shrugging it off assuming he wasn't hurt although Tempest's eyes went wide and he turned to him with his jaw dropped.
"Ok, not even you should have that much plot armour!"
"What happened to him?" asked Markus, taking out his datapad and scanning Tempest as he assessed the nanobots. Just as Tempest was about to respond, Demon stopped him while he stood up, not talking until he got to Cerberus and put on a helmet.
"I don't think they'd want to know what happened Tempest, although I think we have hard days ahead of us so you might want to fix things up with Yang while I'm out getting Weiss and Blake…
"Why do you have to go!" complained Kira, not liking where he was going.
"Because I need you guys to head to Mistral and meet up with the others and help them finish whatever they're doing up there, then I'll meet you guys back here and we can take back the academy…"
"Is that really what you're trying to do?" Josh questioned, not exactly seeing how he could make any difference, "we got our asses handed to us even with the entire Atlesian military and hundreds of other Huntsmen and Huntresses in training… and you come in here saying you're going to take it back?"
"Exactly…" was all Demon replied with as he sped off on Cerberus, doing a wheelie as he left, the smell of burnt rubber filling the other's noses.
"Well, we should probably come up with some way to end this chapter…" said… Jaeger?
Tempest whirled around and slapped him in the face, producing a satisfying sound.
"BREAKING THE FOURTH WALL IS MY JOB YOU DUMBASS!"
Suddenly, out of nowhere, Deadpool waltzes into the conversation while listening to 'X don't give it to ya' through headphones.
"Says you asshole! The dumbass writer shouldn't have tried to mess with my powers!"
And then… a rain of bricks fell down, burying all three of them… until Tempest busted through the stacks and aimed Hellraisers at the reader.
"So, we've been through some tough times together… getting here through a completely unexplained teleportation method, getting Semblances through bullshit, breaking the fourth wall whenever we can and now we're sitting on the edge of a cliff while we wait for the writer to begin work on the next chapter… will Demon ever get the heiress and the faunus back? Will Hazel get to him before he's ready? Will that voice in his head ever answer back? Will Yang punch me in the nuts the next chance she gets?... only time will tell, so stay tuned for the next instalment of Angels and Demons… so, from the writer to me and from me to you… I say, OREVWA MOFO'S!"
(Gunshot…)
