It all happened so suddenly, but seemed to go so slowly. Jaune yelled Blake's name. The gunshot. He grabbed her. The bullet flew through the air. He threw her to the side. The round penetrated his aura, tore through his armor, and buried itself into his shoulder. Jaune fell to the ground. Blake froze, stunned. A hundred screams. The crowds panicked and ran. The sound of a bolt sliding back. A spent shell being ejected. A fresh one taking its place. Blake looked up to the archway. She saw the shooter lining up his next shot. He pulled the trigger. A second gunshot. The second round flew towards Blake. Suddenly, Yang was there. She raised her arm in front of Blake, the bullet glancing off her gauntlet. Her other gauntlet loaded and ready, she fired a shot at the assassin. When the smoke cleared, he was gone.
Blake snapped out of her trance. She quickly assessed the situation. Jaune was on the ground, bleeding heavily. Pyrrha was knelt over him, keeping pressure on the wound, and shouting his name. Ruby had already sprinted to the security gate and back with their weapons. Weiss had dropped her souvenirs, taken Myrtenaster from her, and was attempted a healing charm to lessen Jaune's bleeding. Yang was watching the rafters for any sign of their assailant. Weiss was finishing the enchantment and giving Pyrrha further instruction to get Jaune to safety. Blake scanned the rafters for their attacker. With her heightened senses, she heard footsteps and turned to see the assassin retreating up a ladder to the upper levels.
"There he is," Blake shouted to the others, pointing to the assassin's position. Yang instinctively fired another shot at him, just barely missing as he escaped from their sight.
"Don't just stand there," Weiss ordered. "We have to go after him."
Ruby tossed Gambol Shroud to Blake. "Blake, you've got the best hearing and stuff. You stay on him and lead the way. We'll be right behind you."
"And I was afraid we might not get to kick a little ass today," Yang said, readying Ember Celica.
With that, Team RWBY engaged in pursuit.
Damnit. If it wasn't for that kid trying to be a hero… Deathstroke was free running along catwalks and through rafters to try and make it out of the arena. He could hear the girls following him. They did a good job keeping pace. No matter what he tried, he could not seem to evade detection.
The one leading the chase, the girl in black he had set his sights on first, she was good. Too good. Not just some girl with a sword. She knew exactly what she was doing. She'd spent time honing her senses and learning how to use them to her maximum ability. He simply could not shake her. The dossier had no mention of her past or training. Slade knew why and was confirming his suspicions about the dark-haired member of team RWBY. What were really the odds of there being another Faunus with combat training named Blake Belladonna? But now was not the time.
Slade had to drop to his knees to dodge under the flame blast. They had caught up with him.
Blake had no trouble keeping on the attacker's trail. Her sharp eyes could easily spot him running along the intricate system of catwalks. When he escaped from sight, she would allow herself a moment's pause for her heightened hearing to pick out the signature sounds of his armor rustling.
When they had gotten close enough, Weiss launched a blast of flaming Dust at the assassin. He expertly slid under the attack, but bought enough time for Blake to get within range. She drew Gambol Shroud, collapsed it into kama form, and flung it at the assassin. In a fraction of a second, the assassin dodged the blade and grabbed hold of the ribbon connecting Blake to her weapon before it could even go taut. He pulled hard and she fell from her perch in the rafters. With the ribbon still in hand, Blake quickly pulled Gambol Shroud back to her and threw back up. It caught around a beam and stopped her fall.
"Wow," Blake couldn't help but say out loud as she looked at the concert seats below. Blake took a second to let her heart rate catch back up again and thought about how close she was to an awful death. She looked back up to the beam that had saved her life. Lucky. She then began her climb back up to the catwalk above. Her team still needed her help.
Yang used the assassin's pause in his escape to her advantage and leaped directly at him, firing her gauntlets from the air. Deathstroke diverolled to avoid her shots and drew his own handgun. Upon her landing on his catwalk, he opened fire. Yang, using her gauntlets to shield herself, struggled to protect her vital areas from the assassin's gunfire.
As Slade was lining up a killing shot, a rifle went off to his left and he had to backstep to avoid losing his head to Crescent Rose's curved blade. Ruby had launched herself directly in front of the assassin to lessen the heat on Yang. He took aim on her, but Ruby dive kicked Deathstroke's gun from his grasp, landing within arm's reach of him. This was her mistake. While deadly in Ruby's hands, Crescent Rose is not meant for close range and tight areas. Slade used this and, once getting past the massive blade, easily closed the gap.
He quickly and precisely attacked Ruby, focusing on pressure points to try and slow her down. Yang leaped back into the fray with another shotgun punch, this time hitting Slade in the shoulder. She closed in and the two engaged in a violent dance of punches and kicks, blocks and shotgun blasts. Deathstroke ended the dance with a quick counter, spinning around, twisting her arm behind her back and knocking her to her feet.
He drew a knife to finish her when an ice blast caught him in the wrist, pinning his forearm to the railing. Slade looked up to see Weiss leaping toward him, sword in hand. He just barely avoided being stabbed through the chest. He followed his dodge with a forearm to her face and a kick to the stomach, knocking her away, before pulling his arm free of the ice binding.
Farther below, Blake had climbed up to the beam she was hanging from and was leaping from beam to beam to reach her partners.
With Weiss no longer in the way, Ruby swung her scythe again at the assassin. But Deathstroke was ready. He sidestepped the attack and drew his own ballistic staff to block the next swing. Ruby was smarter this time, not allowing the assassin to get past Crescent Rose. As Ruby and Deathstroke exchanged blows, Yang rose back to her feet and charged the assassin, attempting to catch him off guard. The plan was to no avail. Deathstroke easily avoided the initial punch, collapsed his staff, and countered by throwing Yang over his shoulder into Ruby, both of them flying over the railing to a catwalk below.
By this point Blake had made it back up to Slade's level and drew her weapon. Simultaneously, Weiss was rising back to her feet. With the other two girls incapacitated for the time being, Deathstroke paused to size up the two left on either side of him. With his left hand he extended his staff; with his right he drew a sword from over his shoulder.
This is off, Blake thought to herself. Everything about him is too familiar. The movements. The combat. The arsenal. It all echoes… no. It can't be him.
"Who are you and what do you want?" Weiss demanded of the assassin, hoping to get a little information while Blake still pondered over how she recognized him.
The assassin calmly replied, "I'm the one they call when someone needs to be taken care of. Today, I'm taking care of you."
A hired killer. It could be. But not this. He wouldn't sign on for something like this. Not against me.
"Who hired you?" Weiss continued to interrogate.
His answer was simple. "Someone you pissed off enough that they called me in and offered to pay me a lot of money to get you out of the way."
The voice is muffled by the helmet, but… could it be him?
"Well this is a bounty you won't be collecting," Weiss stated before readying Myrtenaster for her next attack.
"You know, my contract only orders that I get you out of the way of my employer's future plans. I don't have to kill you. You could just surrender now."
"Not a chance!"
With that said, Weiss lunged forward. Deathstroke deflected the attack with his staff and followed up with his sword. Weiss parried but was caught off guard when the staff came around a second time and caught her in the head. She had to step back, dazed, to regain her focus. It was a light hit, more meant to toy with her than to cause injury. Slade was enjoying this too much to end it now, even with all of the openings she had left him.
With Slade focused on Weiss, Blake moved in. Deathstroke turned to block her attack and counter with a follow up. Blake countered it with a second strike, unsheathing Gambol Shroud and swinging with the scabbard. The two continued like this for a few seconds before locking blades and pushing off one another.
Meanwhile, while the two were dueling, Ruby and Yang were recovering on a catwalk ten feet below them.
"Let's see how he takes a couple shots to the head… and everywhere else," Yang said aggressively, preparing Ember Celica to fire.
"No!" Ruby stopped her. "He's too close to Blake. You'll hit her, too."
Weiss took the few seconds she had while the assassin was concentrated on Blake to recover from her dizzying blow and rethink her strategy. He's fast, strong, has perfect style and a weapon in each hand. He has an insane close range advantage over her. She needed to stay farther away. Unfortunately, that's nearly impossible on the narrow catwalk. She needed to tip the odds in her favor somehow.
Weiss prepared Myrtenaster for her next attack and, once an opening presented itself, blasted a wave of ice at Deathstroke. She had aimed and timed it perfectly so the blast hit the tip of his staff, freezing it to the railing next to him. Noticing the inconvenience, Slade abandoned the staff and drew his second pistol on Weiss. She leaped over the bullet and conjured a glyph platform to launch herself off of.
As Weiss lunged off her glyph toward the assassin, Blake delivered a simultaneous strike from behind. Deathstroke sidestepped Weiss's attack and spun to counter Blake's. The two immediately followed up their attacks to keep the heat on. They engaged in an elaborate dance with the assassin full of slashes, parries, dodges, Dust, and bullets. Despite being caught between the two Huntresses with only his sword and reflexes, Deathstroke held his own, still waiting for his opening.
He found it when he threw more force into his strike on Blake, knocking her off balance long enough for him to pull his staff loose from its ice casing. With it, he blocked a slice from Weiss and spun around to deliver a devastating blow to Blake's head, knocking her to the ground. Weiss thrusted her blade at his chest, but Slade dodged it, caught her arm, jabbed her in the gut with his ballistic staff, and fired its hidden gun.
"Weiss!" Ruby shouted as her teammate dropped to her knees.
"Now can I shoot him?!" Yang yelled at her sister.
"I wouldn't do that if I was you," Deathstroke called down, picking Weiss up to her feet. He positioned her so she was blocking any shot Yang or Ruby might get. Blake rose to her feet, but Slade saw her.
"The same goes for you," he said as he pointed his ballistic staff at her. "You see, I just hit your friend here with a dose of Taijitu venom." As he said this, he pulled the small needle from Weiss's stomach, showing it off to her teammates. "I know you've been given a vaccine for it, but all that will do is prolong her suffering." With this, Weiss began shuddering with pain. Her limbs began to contract. "Even now, she's going into shock. She'll be completely paralyzed in ten minutes or so. If she doesn't get help soon, she'll be dead in no more than two hours. That's not very long"
He said those last words and pushed her over the railing.
A/N: Fun fact: this chapter is the first one I wrote. RWBY: Contract spawned from this action sequence. Hope the combat wasn't too difficult to follow. If it was, don't worry. This is as crazy and complicated as it gets as far as location and the amount of people involved. Don't forget to check in next Tuesday for the next chapter.