Disclaimer: I don't own RWBY, it belongs to Rooster Teeth.
Neo watched intently from her position on the nearby roof as Roman was marched out of the building by the two people she had fought earlier, at the behest of that woman, Cinder. They were headed to a landing pad at the back, in a relatively large, open space between several buildings, that currently housed an air-ship, presumably their exit plan.
Had it just been the first two, she might have been able to pull him out – but with the latter there, her chances were very slim. She decided that she could really use a distraction.
She marvelled at the fortuitous timing of that thought, as the door opened again and the perfect distraction entered the field.
Glynda stormed through the door leading out of the building – and immediately saw a Bullhead drop-ship, preparing to take off. A young man and young woman had just bundled another man onto it – seemingly against their will – while a quite familiar individual was supervising them.
"Stop," she called out clearly, "Power down your ship and surrender peacefully, or I will apprehend you with force."
The black-haired woman in the red dress, as she suspected, the same one she had fought the night they met Ruby, turned around. Glynda saw that she had somehow covered the top half of her face with a mask.
"Take off," the woman ordered the other two.
Glynda wasn't having any of that. Her riding crop rose to stop the drop-ship – but she instead found herself raising a shield to defend against the fireball that had been fired her way.
Not missing a beat, her opponent fired off a set of flaming projectiles, each smashing against Glynda's force-field with enough force to crack the ground around her. Glynda used this to her advantage – with a flick of her unusual weapon, several pieces of rock rose into the air. With another flick, they were propelled towards the woman at speeds exceeding any bullet.
This didn't even give Glynda's opponent pause – she casually stopped each one with her hand, exerting a similar force-field to the one she herself had produced earlier.
Glynda intended to keep the initiative. With another flick, several beams shot into the sky above her – instantly forming severe storm clouds. With another flick, rain began pouring out of the clouds – however, instead of falling to the ground as it normally would under the constraints of gravity, it quickly collected into a large ball in front of her. Using the ever-growing mass as a translucent shield, Glynda moved it to intercept several fireballs. Once the mass of water had grown big enough, she slashed forward with her riding crop, a grunt of exertion passing her lips.
The water burst forth in a huge tidal wave, threatening to engulf not just her opponent, but the low-hovering drop-ship, as well. The pilot started pulling up, as quickly as possible. The fire-wielder was unfazed, however. She took a step forward, and thrust outward with both arms – and suddenly, a similarly-sized wave of flame rolled forth to meet Glynda's own attack. The two collided – and her wave evaporated, covering the battlefield in foggy steam.
Glynda allowed herself to smile.
"What's going on?" Emerald hissed, "I can't see a thing."
"Damn it," Mercury complained in realisation from the pilot's seat of the bullhead, "This was her plan with that wave. She forced Cinder to cover the whole area in this steamy fog, and now we need to wait for it to vanish before we fly this thing anywhere or we might hit another building or something on the way out."
Cinder's eyes narrowed in annoyance, as she realised she had fallen neatly into the teacher's trap. Now the Bullhead was trapped until the fog lifted, and the fight was now low-visibility, which meant any fire attacks she used would light up her position like a beacon, whereas her opponent could throw debris without the same problem.
It would have been an extremely effective plan – had she been limited to purely fire attacks, or unaccustomed to fighting silently. Unfortunately for her opponent, she was.
With a flourish, a glass longbow formed in her hands. She nocked a trio of arrows, and let fly in the direction her opponent had been. Not wasting a movement, she continued to form arrows at a pace many would find astonishing, a figurative hail of near-silent projectiles flying through the fog.
Glynda had less than a split-second of warning before an arrow whistled through the air, dangerously close to her face. Another flew by – and a third, this one on course to hit her before a hastily-conjured force-field stopped it. She ducked under another arrow, then, realising she required a more permanent defence, raised a wall of rock and concrete from the ground in front of her.
Her manoeuvre had backfired somewhat, it seemed – her opponent was clearly able to fight in low-visibility, likely even better than she could. Just as a fireball exploded against her wall of stone, her opponent clearly having ascertained her location from the noise, she flicked her riding crop again, and the fog moved away from the fight and began to convalesce around the drop-ship.
The battlefield cleared – and the stand-off commenced once more, both women staring each other down, waiting to see who would make the first move.
This time, Cinder decided to take the initiative. Stepping forward, she pushed her arms out and to the side with a cry of exertion – calling forth an enormous wave of extremely hot flame, even larger than the one she had used to counter Glynda's wave earlier.
Cinder took a deep breath as she watched the explosive tsunami of fire roll forth towards the teacher with enough force to easily smash through the walls of a building. These large attacks were beginning to tire her out, and she wasn't sure how long she could keep fighting at this kind of intensity.
Glynda's response was equally impressive. She twisted her riding crop upward, and the ground shifted.
A wide wall of stone, curved to the form of a large, vertical half-pipe, rose into the air. The wave of flame rolled right along and up the curve of the wall, and was redirected back – straight towards her.
Grimacing, she pushed out her arms, and began to turn.
Glynda took a few deep breaths as the redirected flames began to twist around her opponent. That trick had taken quite a bit out of her, and she sincerely hoped that her opponent was beginning to run out of steam.
The flames stilled, and Glynda's eyes widened as they formed a large, serpentine dragon. The woman began directing it with her arm, and Glynda barely leapt out of the way as it smashed directly through her curved wall. Turning around as it came back for another run, she was forced to dodge again as it crashed into the remains. The wall was now effectively a pile of rubble.
Glynda quickly examined her options. 'Well, when you need to slay a dragon...' she thought dryly before her riding crop began moving again. The thick fog surrounding the drop-ship pulled together, and when the fire dragon came in for its next attack, it was intercepted by a large mass of water, which began shaping into a quite recognisable form.
First, visible arms, and legs, bubbled into shape. An approximation of an armoured head sprouted from the distinctly humanoid torso. Finally, as a huge sword, twice as tall as she was, and a shield reminiscent of a building wall rippled into place, the enormous watery knight strode forth to meet its foe.
"Look, the fog's recedi- oh boy," Mercury said in shock as he took in the battle.
"What are you – what the hell?" Emerald gasped.
It was like a scene out of a legend, as the fiery dragon, several times longer than their airship, weaved around, avoiding a swing from the sword wielded by the hydro-kinetic knight, standing several times taller than a human. The weapon carved into one of the surrounding buildings like a bride cutting their wedding cake. The dragon wheeled around, trying to get around the watery guardian, but was forced to veer off as the shield, the size of a castle gate, intercepted it's flight path. Cinder's arms and the Huntress' riding crop were constantly in motion as they directed their creations.
"Wow, they're really going at it," Roman marvelled nervously from his seat, where he sat, arms and legs bound, "I don't think I've seen a pair of women look this dangerous since that business with my affair! So, uh, this handy little flying boat of yours... I don't suppose it's proofed against dragons and giant swords, is it?"
"Okay, so... for what it's worth?" Coco stared in disbelief at the mythological duel, "The Prof seems to have the dragon covered."
"We getting involved?" Fox asked.
"No way," she told him emphatically, "This fight is even out of our league," her eyes narrowed in thought as she observed the situation, taking note of the drop-ship hovering nearby, "...but that doesn't mean there's nothing we can do. Cover me."
Neo silently altered her threat estimation of Cinder from 'Only fight as matter of last resort' to 'Run like hell, no matter what'. Coincidentally, she also placed Glynda Goodwitch in that bracket.
Still, Glynda was more than adequately holding Cinder's attention – now she just needed to find a way onto that drop-ship.
Once again, she was about to get exactly what she wished for – however, in the future, she would make a note to word her requests to the Powers That Be a little more specifically.
Mercury carefully edged the Bullhead away from the battle, still trying his best to stay close enough to provide an exit for Cinder without the ship being sliced in half or exploded.
"Hey!"
Frowning, he looked down through the window – a brown-clad girl he'd never seen before was shouting from one of the nearby roofs, accompanied by a boy in an orange vest.
"You're pretty good at flying that thing!" she called out, "But how good are you at LANDING IT?"
"What's she talking ab – oh god that's a minigun," Emerald's confusion turned to a panicked shout, shortly before a hail of high-calibre bullets shredded the Bullhead's right wing, causing it to spasm out of control. Mercury grimaced as they began descending uncontrollably.
"We are departing for: The ground!" the shooter declared, "Thank you for choosing to fly with CFVY! Enjoy your trip!"
"Open the doors!" Emerald snapped as the ship rocked severely, knocking Roman out of his seat, "We've got to jump!"
Neo finally saw her slim opportunity as the drop-ship began falling close to her rooftop, and both side doors opened up. There was a lower roof directly across the street, and a small window of opportunity.
This would require perfect timing.
Breaking out into a run, she quickly reached the edge of the rooftop but did not stop there. Jumping off the edge of the roof, she travelled through the air, looking to intercept the path of the drop-ship.
She allowed herself a moment of satisfaction. She had timed her jump correctly.
As she entered the left side door, her eyes briefly scanned the room and her foot instantly lashed out, kicking the startled Emerald back into Mercury, both stumbling back towards the cockpit. Smirking, her parasol then shot out to her left, hooking Roman by the back of his coat, yanking him bodily from the floor and out of the falling death-trap with her as she exited through the right-side door.
She landed with a neat roll onto the opposite roof, Roman giving an angry grunt of pain as he collided unceremoniously with the hard surface immediately after.
Behind her, the drop-ship collided with the building she had just vacated - and scraped down the side of the building, carving an enormous gash down it before hitting the ground in a thundering explosion. A short distance away, the duelling
"Okay..." Coco admitted after observing the manoeuvre, "I've got to admit it, that? Was pretty awesome."
The unknown girl stood up, and locked eyes with the leader of Team CFVY, sporting a smug smirk.
"What are you doing? They're getting away," Fox told her urgently.
Coco frowned in confusion as she brought her gun to bear on the roof, opening fire and riddling it with bullets on the non-lethal setting. Her frown became even more pronounced as the girl and the man she pulled out of the drop-ship simply disappeared, with a strange effect somewhat similar to a shattering glass window.
"What the – semblance," she muttered in realisation, turning to look around, "It looked like they were just sitting there."
"Don't bother looking around," Fox shook his head, "They're already gone – I'm guessing one of them has some kind of illusion trick."
"At least we know you can counter it," Coco said, her attention now on something else entirely, "Now, though, I think we really need to back up a little."
There was a momentary lull in the fighting, as Cinder and Glynda both turned to see the Bullhead fall to the ground, landing behind another building with a thundering crash.
Years of fighting dirty, combined with sudden desperation, ensured Cinder was the first to react. Her flame construct rocketed towards Glynda, who barely managed to snap her knight in place in time to stop it. However, instead of veering off, the dragon collided directly with the aquatic guardian – evaporating a huge amount of water, and kicking up a large amount of steamy fog once more, obscuring the latter's vision. 'Two can play at that game,' she thought with a small amount of satisfaction.
Not wasting a moment, Cinder turned and ran as quickly as she could towards the spot where the ship fell. Scaling the building in a single, fire-propelled jump, she internally winced as she took in the wreckage that was formerly their Bullhead – and the unmoving forms of Mercury and Emerald who lay within it. She grabbed the pair, one in each arm, before pulling her last trick. She prepared herself with a grimace – pulling this off was going to cost her dearly.
With a gesture of her hand, the woman blasted a fireball at the rooftop that housed Coco and Fox, forcing them both to dive out of the way and take cover. She then threw a small, white ball of flame towards Glynda, who had just appeared on the roof she had vacated – a second shot collided with the ball, causing it to light up like a miniature sun. The dazzlingly bright flash temporarily blinded Glynda, who instinctively raised a defensive force-field, but it was unnecessary - she was not attacked. When her vision returned, her opponent was gone, as were her fallen underlings.
"They're gone," Fox then called out, "Either that or somehow, she can move quietly even when she's carrying two people. Either way, I doubt we'll catch them, Professor."
The battle finally over, Glynda collapsed to her knees, breathing heavily. She was actually glad the fight had stopped - the exertion of using so many high-level attacks had taken a lot out of her and she wasn't sure if she could continue. She took a moment to catch her breath. "Miss Adel," she finally said as the two students approached her, "Report."
"We've got a bunch of minions and one guy who might be some kind of captain restrained in the warehouse," Coco responded dutifully, "He was tough as hell, but we took him down. Yatsuhashi and Velvet are guarding them. I brought Fox out here to see if you needed backup, and after checking out the situation, decided to shoot down their get-away boat. Also, before it crashed, a pink-haired girl with a white coat pulled some guy out of it and disappeared with some kind of illusion trick."
Glynda listened intently as she pulled herself to her feet. "Very well," she acknowledged, "Let's head back inside and ensure these prisoners are properly restrained. I imagine the police should be here any minute. We will go over the mission in more detail once we are safely back at Beacon."
Sure enough, the sound of sirens could be heard, getting steadily louder. Glynda sighed, and observed the surrounding area. The once smooth ground was completely torn up. The surrounding buildings had all their windows smashed, some had huge gouges from her knight's giant water sword or the fire dragon - another was wrecked by the crash of the air-ship. The place looked for all intents and purposes like it had seen the opening stage of a war.
She sat down, and decided to rest for a few moments - cleaning this up was going to take her all day.
Cinder staggered, leaning against the wall in exhaustion. She had managed to carry the pair what many would consider a remarkable distance away in the short space of time bought with her flare trick – but she was effectively done. She did not have the strength or energy left to drag them back to base, and would certainly not have managed another fight.
Observing the still forms of Mercury and Emerald, she reluctantly made a decision – the two were still alive, but needed medical assistance, immediately. She pulled out her scroll, and formed a message requesting a pick-up to her allies. That done, she slumped down to the ground.
And silently hoped that Adam would wait until she had enough energy to actually stand up straight before he started questioning her about how the operation went.
A/N: When I first started this fic, I planned for the rematch between Glynda and Cinder to be somewhat understated. Yeah, uh... you can see how that went.