Chapter 29: Damsel

Sleep had not come easily to Scarlet that night. It was cold to begin with, and even his mostly decorative jacket did not do much to stop a chill. There had been adequate time to pack the bare necessities before leaving Vale, but without knowing what this mission would entail, there was no way he could have predicted that he would be sleeping on the ground in the forest. Given all of the options in front of him, he had taken to slumping against a tree, which happened to be the same one that Oobleck had been using to observe the other team's attempt to cross the field.

From that vantage point, he could get the gist of what was happening, even as time passed and the men that had left the tree line slowly shrunk into ants. The occasional sip of coffee from his thermos kept him warm, despite being almost totally still otherwise. The scene in front of him was very dull at first. Oobleck might have even dozed off once or twice. The calm and silence of their encampment acted like a sedative, but it really only compounded the fact that he hadn't slept since aiding the first evacuation of Beacon. The caffeine kept him from sleeping, which in his estimation was good… he didn't have time to sleep anyway.

Zwei had initially made several attempts to join his closest personal friend in the tree, but his stubby little legs meant that he didn't have a prayer of making the climb. For a while, he circled the trunk, before settling down a few feet away from it. A few quiet whimpers were the only sound that came from the canine team member before he also drifted to sleep.

Sun had done his best to maintain his meditation, despite the avalanche of worry that followed the discovery of his stalker, and the initial interruptions from an impatient Scarlet. For a time, he had actually found a way to enjoy the peace and quiet, despite having the dangerous prospect of his mission in the back of his mind.

From his tree, Oobleck could see the black vortex form over Beacon Tower. He pushed his glasses further down his nose, almost as if changing the lense through which he saw the world would make them disappear. His powers of observation had not misled him. Although it was a strange phenomena, there was little he or any of his new teammates could do about it from their current distance. There was a small comfort in the knowledge that Port was leading the young huntsmen in the field. He would see it, and... hopefully… know what to do.

That comfort was washed away by the unmistakable flapping of the giant wings of a Nevermore. Its trajectory had it heading straight for Beacon, flying out of the North. Oobleck guessed that it probably came from Forever Fall, which is to say that it had come a long way for something, although he was unsure what that could be. Like Professor Port, Oobleck did not have knowledge of Ozpin's secrets.

Even though it hadn't screeched, or made any noise outside of the flapping of its wings, it was enough to stir both Sun and Zwei. The former opened one eye reluctantly, then the other. He realized that this probably meant the end of his time of relaxation. The latter rose to his feet quickly, growling at the massive bird overhead. Both of them moved to the edge of the woods, keen on observing the new activity at Beacon.

Despite all of his complaining, the only thing that was able to wake Scarlet from his slumber was the shrill shrieking coming from the Nevermore, having now engaged Port's team. He jumped to his feet, suffering immediately from the daze that accompanied such a short, uncomfortable sleep. When he saw that Sun and Zwei were not where he had left them, panic set in. He called out to anyone who would listen, "Guys…?"

From no more than a few feet behind him, Sun responded, "Over here. Keep it down. There's something weird going on at Beacon." For a moment, the three of them stood together, trying to make some sense out of what was going on. From this distance, not even Sun could make out the specifics of what was transpiring with the rest of his team. The Nevermore had clearly landed, but any information beyond that was hidden in the faint moonlight.

The sound of two feet landing heavily on the forest floor behind them startled Scarlet and Sun. Oobleck had decided that it was as good a time as any to descend from his perch, in the least discreet manner possible... jumping. Afterward, he felt bad about scaring the unsuspecting observers below him. "Sorry boys. Even from up in this tree, I can't see what's happening at this distance."

Sun gave what little input he could, "I can still see the Nevermore, but I'm not sure about the others. I thought I saw something jump high into the air… Sage, if I had to guess… but after that, I just can't tell." Oobleck was about to speak, but Sun offered new information, "Okay, so the Nevermore's flying away now. Looks like it's going straight toward Beacon… great."

"Well, that doesn't bode well for the operational safety of our mission. The swarm of who knows what floating above Beacon Tower is one thing, but more Grimm seem to be gathering at the school by the hour," Oobleck reported. As he finished his thought, the screech of the Nevermore in the distance drew Sun's attention back to the source of the sound.

It appeared that the Nevermore had circled back over Beacon with an intent to rally more Grimm to its cause. As Sun explained this to Oobleck, the great black vortex began to change into a more amorphous cloud shape than the cone it had previously maintained. They watched silently as it followed the Nevermore out over the water, heading towards Vale.

The words stumbled out of Oobleck's mouth, "I… do believe that what we just witnessed was some form of leadership … Remarkable." After a moment he produced a logical thought process. "The oldest of the Grimm have shown signs of intelligence, but a Nevermore is much more independent than the others. They do not rely on other Grimm for assistance. It looks like… it has a plan…"

The air inside the hallway was hazy with smoke and dust. Visibility was limited, but only slightly. Occasionally, the entire building trembled, but it did not seem to be as a result of instability. The sound of Grimm activity in the form of shrieks and roars came from what seemed like everywhere. The particles clouding the air were not particularly bothersome, but Neptune lowered his goggles over his eyes, and looked at Port with a crooked smile. "Boom. Tactical. Utilization."

"I said… almost no proper tactical utilization… I promise you those will do you more harm than good," Port replied irritably, upset that he had been proven wrong by a perfect storm of circumstances. After a few moments of simmering, he returned to his normal, calm demeanor. "Now, we all heard the crying when we came in here. With all of the racket coming from the Grimm, it's going to be impossible to pinpoint its source, so we're going to have to do a room by room search of each individual lecture hall."

"That's going to take forever. We should split up," Neptune suggested. He received a nod of agreement from Sage, who seemed to be spurred on by the prospect of someone being in danger. "Whoever is crying could be hurt. We don't have time to do this one room at a time."

Port knew he was outnumbered, but he voiced his opposition anyway. "I would protest the decision to divide ourselves. This is not the same Beacon you remember from several days ago. The Grimm are everywhere, and whatever the source of that voice is may have been exposed to them. Haphazardly charging into an already dangerous situation would be an unwise choice. But, I suppose as long as we're no more than a rooms away from each other…"

A rush of adrenaline overtook Neptune as he realized that he was mere seconds from the beginning of his first real mission. He staked his claim, "Dibs on the first door on the left."

"I'll take the second on the left," Sage added.

With surprising enthusiasm, Port simply walked to the first door on the right side of the hallway and laughed. "Good! This is my classroom. You've made this easy for me," he said as he swung the heavy wooden double doors open. "Nonetheless, stay vigilant, and if you find something, be sure to call it out. Communication is key. Good luck to both of you." Having completed his parting remarks, he unslung his blunderbuss, and headed inside, leaving only the two young men still in the hallway.

"Good luck Neptune," Sage offered to his friend. He received only a nod that confirmed his understanding of the message in return. Both he and Neptune entered their designated doors at approximately the same time.

Neptune didn't know how to describe his feelings as he entered the single wooden door. Here goes… Our first real mission. I'm not sure if I should be excited or scared, but I'm definitely both. As the door swung open, he noticed that it was pitch black. Whatever the area that he was entering was, it didn't have windows. He reached in around the corner, searching for a light switch or anything that would make his search easier. When his fingers grazed the switch, he quickly flipped it on, revealing that this first room was a small teacher's lounge, devoid of life. Well. This is… disappointing, he lamented. Despite the fact that he could clearly see that no one was in the room, he did his due diligence, and headed inside to take a look around.

The room that Sage had chosen to search turned out to be the reverse of Professor Port's room. The double doors that he entered through opened up into a large lecture hall, with tables formed in a semicircle along stairs descending down into a sort of pit, where a teacher would be speaking during a normal class. The first thing to catch his eye in the room, other than its design, was the young girl kneeling at the bottom of the stairs, crying. She appeared to be no more than six or seven years old, and she knelt facing away from the place that Sage currently stood.

Even though she was obscured somewhat by the smog that lingered in the air inside the building, Sage could tell that she had dark hair, although he was unsure of its exact color. She wore a grey dress suspended over a light blue top. Her white socks were pulled up, almost to her knees, and a pair of black dress shoes completed her wardrobe.

It seemed odd to him that such a young girl would be on the campus for any reason, and especially now that the Grimm infestation had reached a new zenith. He took several steps into the room, but the girl didn't notice. She continued her sniffling and crying. After a few more steps without being noticed, Sage called out to her. "Hey, are you alright?" She whipped her head around in shock, before backing away from him. "Do you need help?" Still, she backed away. He began to make his way down the stairs towards her, until she began to whimper and cling to the lectern in the center of the floor, seemingly out of fear. Sage tried to comfort her, "It's alright, I'm here to help you. I can take you out of this place and to safety."

"Who are you talking to?" Neptune's voice called out from behind him. Sage turned around quickly, surprised to see his teammate so soon.

Sage motioned with his arm toward the lectern where the girl had crawled to. "I found this little girl crying… she seems scared of me though. Maybe you can try to-"

"Uh, I think you might need to get some rest, man. There's no one in here except you and me," Neptune declared.

His teammate raised an eyebrow and turned around to find that, to his amazement, it was true, there was no one in the room. "Wh- wait… what? I know I saw a little girl in here. She had dark hair, and she wore a grey dress. Couldn't have been more than six or seven years old." Before he continued to try to pointlessly explain the apparition any further, Sage quickly made his way down to the ground level, and began to look in every conceivable hiding place. He found nothing. After a few moments of utterly racking his brain in an attempt to make sense of what he had or had not seen, he threw his hands up in the air and shook his head. "I don't know Nep. There was a girl here. I swear to you."

Neptune didn't want to seem dismissive, but he had very clearly seen his teammate speaking to no one as he entered the room. "Okay. No, I believe you. I'm just saying, I didn't see anyone."

As Sage attempted to wrap his head around what was happening, he realized that he had been separated from Neptune for mere minutes before he reappeared. He also noticed that his friend was carrying a new piece of hardware with him. "Wait, how did you search your room so fast… and why in the world are you holding that?"

"It was just a lounge. Or a break room. I don't know. Either way, it was a really small area to search." As if he'd forgotten, Neptune looked down at his hand to the umbrella he had found. "Oh, this? It was in the other room. It's more like a parasol, if you ask me. And I have it because I thought it would make a really nice gift for-"

"For Weiss, yeah got it. You're going to give someone's umbrella… sorry… parasol to Weiss as a gift. How romantic..." Sage wanted to make a point to Neptune about the moral conundrum of giving something that didn't belong to him away as a gift, but he didn't get a chance before a shot rang out from the hallway. They quickly exchanged surprised looks, before Neptune darted off towards the double doors, leaving his newly found treasure on a desk near the bottom of the stairs. Sage followed.

Before they made it even a few steps up, two more shots echoed from outside of the lecture hall. They assumed that Port must have been the source of the commotion, but the fact that there was gunfire at all was a reason for concern. Their leader would not resort to that without just cause. Neptune was the first to reach the top of the stairs. Without stopping, he looked back to be sure that Sage was following, relying on his instincts to guide his body into the hall without incident. And… just like the several times he had acted on instincts in the last few hours, they failed him miserably.

He made it out of the room well enough, but before he could return his gaze to the path in front of him, he experienced what felt like a body crash into him, sending him to the floor in a heap. On the opposite side of the hall was the victim of his recklessness. A girl, who had taken the collision equally as poorly as he had, was on her hands and knees apparently trying to catch her breath.

She had a dark complexion, with neck length, light green colored hair that extended further in two long locks that had presently draped themselves over her shoulders. Her eyes were a dark shade of red. He knew her, but not well. She looked at Neptune, then Sage, who had just entered into the hallway. She seemed to be just as surprised as they were at what had just happened.

By the gasping and shortness of her breaths, it seemed that the wind had been knocked out of her by the suddenness of the collision. Still, she tried to speak, albeit with short, labored, broken sentences. "Sorry… Didn't know… anyone else was… in the building… Heard shots…" She got herself to her feet as quickly as she was able, and offered a hand to help Neptune up. As she did, her normal speech patterns began to return. "I came as fast as I could… I was already in the area… with my teammate. He wandered off… I thought the shots came from him… We've got to check it out..."

Neptune accepted her assistance, and was quickly restored to an upward position. Before he could even introduce himself, she began to pull him off towards what he assumed was the source of the gunshots, and also Professor Port's classroom. "We thought it was our friend too. I'm Neptune, and this is my teammate, Sage. I feel like I've seen you around, but I'm sorry to say I don't remember your name."

The group stopped just outside of the room Port had entered several minutes before. The girl looked back to her two new companions, placing her hands on the grips of her two holstered weapons, and forced out a smile, "Emerald."