Howdy folks, how's it going?
Hope ya'll have been keeping safe.
Not much to say this time around. Life goes on, same old, same old. Perhaps a bit more to say at the bottom's notes.
As always, shout out to Chaos Productions for his assistance.
And as always, I own neither RWBY nor LoL.
Now, enjoy.
/
Ruby couldn't help but give a single, slow blink as the words registered, her usual blank expression now being due to incomprehension. Because she was fairly certain that besides Yang, she did not have any other sisters. Sure, she remembered precious little about mom, and father rebounded from Yang's mom to hers rather swiftly, but he wasn't one for dalliances far as she was aware.
And yet, there was that niggling sense of familiarity that let her know that the word was not just being used in casual address. A feeling that something seemed so obvious, so close to clarity in the front of her mind, and yet remaining stubbornly elusive, as if surrounded by murky waters…
The other girl seemed to be able to read the confusion in her, because her grin widened in cheeky amusement, as she once again began to type.
"You really do not recognize me, do you?" The voice drawled, something in the girl's posture looking positively delighted at the notion of Ruby's befuddlement. "Suppose I cannot fault you that. So much has changed throughout the years, even I had to do some rather radical adjustments to get with the times. But then I suppose that family deserves to know all the same, so Imma just go ahead and say it."
Her grin grew just a tad bit wider, a malicious, hungry edge to it now, making it feel all the more uncannily familiar to Ruby…
"Hello, First. I was many things, across many ages, but I think Addiction's the one that'll ring a bell."
…And she remembered then, a portly, piscine creature, wearing the form of a race long gone, deep malice and monstrous hunger thinly hidden by a veneer of civilized gentlemanliness, friendly demeanour and silly appearance, always on the prowl across the riverways for new prey, the foolish and the desperate that failed to see the widening maw hidden behind the honeyed words that were its siren song…
…
…
…
"…Lost weight." Ruby stated succinctly, after a long, long, moment of staring up and down the figure of she who had once been the River King.
The blunt comment actually surprised the girl, wiping the cheeky grin of her face, to be replaced by a momentarily startled look that swiftly gave way to an annoyed pout, puffed cheeks and all.
"Now, that is just plain rude. Granted, I keep little to no memory between the forms I take so that makes me a little curious, but there ain't a lady out there that would like to see her weight commented on, you know? Poor form."
"No lady. Fat catfish. And proud… Nice hat, though…" Ruby replied evenly, as she once again considered the petite young woman before her, now with the full knowledge that she was anything but. "Who stole from…?"
"Hurgh, you fellas in the upper echelons really do get all the luck with this whole "physicality" thing. A fat catfish, seriously? Maybe not remembering ain't really so bad. At least I lucked out with this incarnation." The demon replied, a displeased grimace swiftly shifting back into a cheeky smile as she recognized the knowing edge in the question, giving a little, dainty twirl in place, as if she was trying to show off a new dress. "There was a girl, who lived in this here town. Lovely little thing, born to the upper crust, and yet her whole life was miserable, all because she couldn't talk, and daddy and mommy dearest couldn't accept her for what she was. She was always so angry they didn't let her be herself, and beneath that so sad and so lonely. How sad it was, that what she wanted was one of the simplest, smallest cravings. Poor thing, most of all, just wanted a friend. Wanted it so bad she began imagining one, and then wishing she was real."
For a moment, that grin grew, looking almost as if something other was hidden just beneath the mundane gesture by a veil as brittle as glass.
"I was only too happy to oblige. And now we're never apart."
"Why here, now…?" The red-cloaked girl opted to inquire blandly, knowing it would be pointless to dwell on a tale where there was no chance of changing the ending, but that did not stop the faint, barely there narrowing of her eyes.
"Oh my, is that a hint of hostility that I detect there, First? Seems a bit hypocritical all things considered, wouldn't you say?" Neo replied, a hand to her heart in a cutesy silent gasp that did nothing to hide the cutting cruelty of the taunt as she mimicked Ruby's previous motion of looking up and down what stood before her.
"Nothing alike." The red-cloaked girl replied with calm, unaffected certainty, with but the vaguest hints of a warning. She knew better than to allow the demon's words any sort of purchase. The form was different, the methods may have changed, but she still knew the tools of the predator before her. And she also knew that she did not care about whatever it might think of her and her situation, her most recent contact with their kind having taught her it was pointless to argue.
More important than that, however, she also knew Neo wasn't the biggest predator in this rooftop.
And going by how the girl frowned at Ruby's lack of reaction, the two of them stood staring at each other as reality moved around them, unheeding of the metaphysics of their interaction beyond the veil, she knew it as well.
"Yeah, I figured that would be the case. Dang, you're not giving me a lot of room to work with here, First. Frankly, I was sent to kill you. Cause let me tell ya, sister, your meddling has drawn the attention of some very dangerous folks, and put you right at the top of their shit list to boot, if you'll excuse the vulgarity." Neo typed out with a silent huff, her demeanour a little less mocking and a little more put upon, a signal of surrender in the unseen standoff. "But let's be real here, you and I both know that's not gonna happen. That just ain't how the pecking order works. So I'm mostly just here to say I tried so I can get that brat off my and my partner's backs, and take the opportunity to finally catch up. I ain't seen another of our kind since I don't even know how many incarnations ago."
"Torchwick…" Ruby said by way of reply with a slight tilt of her head, an unspoken question not missed by the demon, who simply smirked.
"Yeah, him. Funny fella, that one. Exquisite greed and ambition, and more over," She shrugged. "What can I say, he amuses me, and I keep the things that amuse me close by."
Perhaps others might have judged her harshly for the opinion, but Ruby did not particularly care about the thief's rather bleak future prospects. Just as she wasn't all that interested in wasting any more time indulging the lesser demon.
Just as the thought crossed her mind, the roar of engines pierced through the sky, moments before two bullheads came speeding past their position. Glancing to the side and checking where they were headed, she quickly glimpsed the highway in between the buildings, swiftly making to turn in that direction.
Only for the demon to blur into existence before her.
"Now, now, what's the hurry, sister?" Neo inquired, one eyebrow daintily raised in a way that ironically said, 'leaving so soon?'.
"Can't kill me." Ruby reminded, a faint edge of steel to her blank tone. What little patience the surprise at the girl's identity had earned her was swiftly running out, especially now she was making the unwise move of standing between the red-cloaked girl and her friends.
"Oh, yeah, no, we've already established that I cannot." The girl smiled impishly, apparently no longer cowed by the disparity in their standing. "But nobody said anything about me not giving it a go. And besides, we're still not done catching up."
"Move." The red cloaked girl stated tersely, ghastly flames ominously blooming in her eye. She was in no mood for these games.
Neo just grinned.
"No, I don't think I will."
She barely had the time to finish typing out the words before Ruby was upon her in a blur of petals and feathers, scythe lashing out swiftly, missing the other girl by a hair's breadth as she gracefully leaned backwards, retaliating with a kick as she moved into a summersault, which struck air as Ruby swerved to the side and lashed out at the demon while she was in midair.
The blow connected only for the girl's dainty form to fade in a blur, and instinct made Ruby blur away herself, stopping a little distance away and turning just in time to see the stiletto blade stabbing the space her head had been in moments ago.
"Ah, this really brings back some memories, doesn't it?" She said, a cheekily pleased expression on her face as she held a blade tipped umbrella in one hand and her scroll in the other. "I do hope you'll forgive me the impoliteness of fighting and typing, but how else would we communicate? Muteness has its downsides."
She was met only with silence and a blank, porcelain doll-like face as Ruby made to press the attack, but that only made the demon grin all the wider.
/
"Penny, is the jamming gone?" Jaune called to the back of the truck as the last of their pursuers was swiftly dwindling behind them.
"It is." The android replied primly after a moment's assessment. "I already took the liberty of calling the Atlesian forces to my signal for reinforcements, because I do not think we are done here."
"How do you figure?" Weiss inquired, blinking in confusion at how the girl could have done such a thing when she seemed to be lacking any sort of equipment for it.
"I am picking up on incoming ships, and it cannot be my back up, they're too far away. It's likely more pursuers."
"Afraid to say that the girl may have a point." The driver commented, with a tone that sounded unsurprised but mildly annoyed. "If you'll look through the rear-view mirrors…"
The rest of the passengers proceeded to do just that, and sure enough, two bullheads could be seen, homing in on them.
"Well, that could be troublesome." Arslan commented, rather understating the general thought that crossed the minds of those present.
"Knew the bastards wouldn't just give up like that." Jaune grumbled in what almost seemed like a low growl, before glancing down towards the road, seeing the escort vehicle and Bumblebee and… "Wait, where's Ruby?"
At the unexpected question, the others blinked and did their best to look around, but indeed, the little red reaper was nowhere to be found.
"She could be riding up on the roof?" Pyrrha suggested encouragingly.
"I am afraid not." Penny replied seriously, glancing at the wall as if seeing something beyond it. "I'm picking up her scroll's signal. She's in a rooftop a couple of blocks away from here."
"How the heck did that happen?" Jaune voiced his confusion, turning in his seat to glance back at the mechanical girl, to see her look much the same.
"Hold on, let me see…" She mumbled, a look of intense focus one her face as she momentarily fell silent… Only to suddenly sit ramrod straight, a startled little gasp escaping her lips.
"Penny? What's the matter?" Jaune asked, guessing that whatever led to such a reaction was likely cause for concern.
"It would seem…" The girl replied slowly, as if trying to carefully pick her words while she gave him a meaningful look. "That she was intercepted by an old acquaintance."
The boy's eyes widened momentarily as he caught on to the unspoken implications of that statement, before he found himself struggling mightily against he urge to groan. By now, he long since noticed the pattern of how Ruby seemed to be a magnet to strange circumstances and things from the distant past, but for that to start acting up now was just plain shitty timing…
"Define "old acquaintance"." He said instead, trying to keep the resignation from his tone with not too much success.
"She's being confronted by that girl that was with Torchwick back at the docks. His sidekick and muscle Neopolitan, according to rather extensive police records on those two." Penny replied gravely, subtly nodding to confirm Jaune's thoughts, the suddenly stern and displeased expression in her face telling him that this was bad news for more than just the obvious reasons. The android had been happy to meet Ruby back when she thought the girl was an ancient fear demon, for fuck's sake, what could be bad enough to get this reaction from her?
At that moment, the truck's passengers were jolted as the closest of their flying pursuers opened fire, a hail of bullets carving through the road and forcing Yang and the escort driver to speed ahead to avoid it until it finally reached the truck, pinging loudly against the reinforced plating that held firm.
"They're keeping us pinned as they approach." The driver commented, his tone calm and professional, but not without some hints of concern. "Won't hit the wheels at this angle, they're shielded for just this sort of situation, but if any of you can do anything to get those bullheads off us, it'd be ideal."
The teen felt conflicted as he listened and considered his options. Part of him was screaming to turn back and go help his friend who could be in trouble while fighting yet another remnant, no pun intended, from the old days. Another, more logical, calm and collected part protested that the collection had to be protected no matter what. And yet another, less restrained part, that he had been trying hard to ignore for a while, was darkly welcoming the possibility of a confrontation…
Jaune's mind raced, as arguments and counter-arguments for both possibilities blitzed by, but to his mounting frustration coming no closer to a resolution…
His spiraling thoughts were suddenly stopped by the sting of a smack upside his head, the startled boy turning to see Arslan giving him a stern look.
"Jaune, stop overthinking." The buhru girl stated in a knowing, exasperated, but not unkind tone. "That girl can handle herself, and we have no way to reach her. Focus on what we can do."
"I must concur." Penny helpfully supplied just as Jaune was opening his mouth to retort. "I'm monitoring Ruby's situation. She's got things well handled. We should focus on our pursuers."
"How are you even doing that?" Weiss could not help but voice the bewildered thought at the redhead, who for all her talking hadn't made a single movement since she had taken her seat and still had no visible equipment to speak of.
"I'm something of a technopath. Semblance, don't worry about it." The android brushed off the question. "Anyway, any ideas? I could probably bring those bullheads down, but taking the risk of crashing two bullheads inside city limits does not strike me as sensible."
"Shit, yeah, there's that…" Jaune conceded the point, noting blithely to himself how little these sort of action scenes in film seemed to consider the collateral damages, before turning to the driver. "You think they'll get through the plating?"
"Not likely, sir, when our colleague told you this truck could survive a goliath stampede, he meant it as in it actually happened. We're safe enough here, just…"
"We can't so much as stick our noses out under that gunfire and they can use that to try to herd us in." Jaune concluded the thought, before turning to his partner. "I'm guessing this is a little beyond your skill, Pyrrha?"
"Afraid so." The champion admitted contritely. "I practiced for precision and control, not this sort of… volume."
"Also, far be it from me to add to our problems." The driver once again interjected. "But while the good news is we are not that far off from our destination, the bad news is, that is gonna take us back to a more populated area. If they keep pursuing us this relentlessly…"
Yeah, no, that did not even warrant considering. Dammit all, they really had to find a way to stop-
To stop…
…
"I got it." Jaune said, making all eyes fall on him as nobody missed how his entire demeanour screamed of how badly he wanted to smack himself for taking so long to realize the blindingly obvious.
Though in all fairness, that was the general feeling among the passengers as soon as he voiced his thoughts. Except for Arslan, who as comms opened to coordinate with their escort, was instead pleased he had taken her advice to heart.
/
As a general rule, so long as you weren't threatening anyone in the admittedly short list of people she cared about, or trying to take her cookies, or implying that she was older than her 15 years, it took a lot to get under Ruby's skin. Her muted ability to actually feel emotions simply didn't leave much room for annoyance to fester.
But the demon she was facing sure seemed to be trying her best at it, and having a not inconsiderable margin of success while she was at it.
Every time Ruby tried to leave, Neo got in the way, and when the red-cloaked girl inevitably made to make her displeasure known, she'd immediately slink away, a game of cat and mouse that was as time wasting as it was vexing.
"I do have to say, there is something that I am not quite grasping in this here picture." Neo kept on casually prattling, even as yet another stab attempt from the demon was speedily avoided. Honestly, by this point Ruby had started specifically targeting the scroll just to try to shut her up. "What's your stake in all of this? I mean, I ain't one to judge given how much I myself have changed, but if I didn't know any better I'd say that you actually care."
"What?" Ruby replied, a small concession the sole purpose of which was to keep the other girl still while she looked for an opening.
"See, I've been thinkin' about it since the last couple of times we met, and it just doesn't add up." Neo replied, an expression of dainty curiosity on her face as she stared at Ruby with a light tilt of her head. "You are Fear, and it shows. It bleeds out this human suit of yours like a leaky faucet… And yet you're not trying to spread it. If anything, you're actively trying to suppress it. I could understand not wanting to draw attention, but it goes beyond that. You're living among mortals, interacting with them as if they mean anything to you."
The clear, honest confusion in her face would appear so human if not for the glint in her eyes as they shifted from brown, to pink, to milky white, that spoke of an intelligence that was anything but.
"I don't mean to judge, but this is all terribly more human than I'd expect from one of the Ten."
Ruby was not the slightest bit phased by the demon's incomprehension, and didn't feel any more inclined to explain things now than she'd been minutes prior. But still, there was one piece of these ramblings that did draw her attention, something that she had heard once before.
One time was happenstance. Twice, however…
"Hide. Who from?" Ruby asked, her mismatched eyes locking evenly with the demon's own.
And sure enough, after a few slow, owlish blinks, Neo gave her a long, considering stare, as if she was trying to determine what the trick was here…
…Before her eyes widened in dawning realization, and she put a closed fist to her mouth as she broke into a fit of silent giggles. When she eventually recovered enough to look at her opponent again, there was a noticeable shift in her entire demeanour, dropping the façade of cutesy whimsy in favor of smug condescension.
"You don't know." She typed out her conclusion, the taunting words echoing in Ruby's mind, shifting between a drawled monotone and an insidious whisper. "Well, ain't that a surprise? It does explain a few things…"
"Know what?" The red-cloaked girl pressed. And to her mild contempt, Neo seemed to almost writhe in cheer delight at the question.
"Oh my, oh my oh my oh my. This is just too funny. No wonder they want you dead." She said, somehow more to herself even though she had typed it out. "Was it sitting on your arse in that dusty "prison" that left you out of the loop, I wonder? Or is there more to this newfound "humanity" of yours…?"
She made a show of putting a hand to her chin while the other held her elbow as she looked up in theatrical contemplation for a few moments, before breaking into a careless shrug that was all too smug.
She was enjoying this, Ruby found it plain to see. She was enjoying lording this information the cloaked girl lacked, whatever it might be, over her as if it legitimately made her the superior demon…
"Ah, well, I suppose it doesn't matter in the end. Far be it from me to spoil the surprise after all and-"
She didn't manage to get the full sentence out before a spectral limb shot forward and caught her by the throat, the demon's bluster fading into alarmed surprise as she suddenly found herself lifted off the floor and then slammed hard against it. One, two, three times, this repeated itself, before the black claw shifted and extended to make her crash against one of the chimneys on the roof.
Ruby couldn't help but notice as she walked towards the now captive Neo, who was bewilderedly staring down the tendril of darkness from where it was trapping her against the wall, all the way to its origin point in the red-cloaked girl's shoulder, that while she certainly seemed to have had the wind knocked out of her, she was more rattled than actually injured. The form may be different, but it seemed like a capacity to withstand physical punishment was a common trait of the lesser demon. Unfortunately for her, that just meant Ruby didn't have much reason to be gentle.
"Explain." She stated simply as she stopped just outside of stabbing range, the half-asleep tone doing nothing to disguise the command that the single word was.
Neo seemed to recover from her surprise quickly however, merely giving her a wide grin as she pointed towards the floor a little distance away, a quick glance in that direction allowing Ruby to see the scroll that had been dropped when she had finally lost all pretenses at patience.
…
…
…
Another spectral claw billowed into being from Ruby's other shoulder, reaching for the device and placing it in the demon's free hand.
"Much obliged." She stated with a polite casualness that seemed distinctly out of place for someone whose feet where left dangling off the ground. "Seems like I miscalculated."
"Explain." Ruby repeated, the faint edge in her tone indicating that she would not say it one more time.
"Shall we bargain on it, for old times' sake?" Neo suggested chipperly, still smug in her less than advantageous position. Ruby replied by latching her second shadowy claw around the demon's throat and then tightening her grip.
"Alright, alright. Jeez, you're no fun." The demon relented, cheeks puffing not unlike a petulant child, sounding more sulky than actually concerned by the unspoken threat. "On the other hand, there's the ruthlessness I'd have expected from you. You're better at keeping yourself hidden than I had thought."
"Hide, from who?" Ruby followed up, ignoring the other girl's comments to stop her from derailing things further.
"Well, that should be pretty obvious if you stop a moment to think about it, wouldn't you say?" Neo replied with a quaintly raised eyebrow. "Have you never wondered, what could have possibly happened to make things turn out the way they did? Can't you figure out what was the variable that turned the status quo on its head? Really, doesn't take a genius to put two and two together."
By some metaphysical instinct, Ruby could tell that the demon had finally stopped with the mocking and the faking, and thus she gave the words some consideration. After a moment's thought, the answer was indeed pretty obvious.
"Grimm." She concluded, her mind going back to the abstract memories of the first time she had ever seen one of those creatures, in that chamber where time had passed by in the blink of an eye…
"That's right. Suddenly they show up, and countless mortal lifetimes later they're still here, while Runeterra on the whole is but a distant, faded memory, more myth than fact. The League, the Aspects and the Ascended, the Darkin and the Void, the Demigods and the Spirit Realm, all lost to history. Where there was magic and myriad species touched by it, there is now only a semblance of it, humans, some carrying within them the final dregs of vastayan blood, with both the havers and the not stupid enough to believe them different for it, and through it all, the Grimm remain, the new constant shadow, looming over all."
Once again, a cheeky grin spread across her face, one that seemed to tug at the edges of her mouth as if it wanted to stretch further than it was anatomically possible.
"You don't think that's a coincidence, do you? You've fought them enough times to know how relentlessly they pursue the signs of the olden days, those like you and me most of all. Honestly, did the good Headmaster not give you the whole picture?" She shook her head amusedly, air leaving her constrained throat in a silent chuckle. "Tsk tsk, shame on him. Training up the new defenders of humanity, they say. More like fattening up the first lambs in the queue for the slaughter."
Ruby considered the demon's rambles. She would not rise to the obvious bait, but neither, she realized, could she dismiss the words entirely. She knew she wasn't alone in being a preferred target for the creatures, thinking back to Jaune's own experiences, and even the confirmation of the fact by the Grandmaster at Arms. There could be no denying it, but still, there was something that the demon had given away without realizing, and that too was familiar to her from her previous encounter.
For beneath all the cutesy act, beneath the whimsy and the blatant attempts at getting under Ruby's skin, the red-cloaked girl could feel what could almost be described as apprehension, the same kind of pseudo emotion that she had felt in the shade of Nocturne beneath all the spiteful malice and hatred. Except that there was something wrong with it, something that by some instinct she did not comprehend finally clicked into place.
There was only one way she was going to get any kind of substantial truth out of the thing in a girl's guise.
"Not afraid. But made to be." She said simply, dread rising all around her like an unseen, writhing shadow as the baleful flames bloomed in her eye, the girl calling upon the full, unspoken authority that had been bequeathed to her, and bringing it to bear upon the being of vice in her hands. "No games, no lies. Tell me why."
For a minute, the girl in her grip balked and struggled as the pressure landed upon her shoulders, but then, as silence fell over the rooftop, and the two girls stared each other down, an unspoken interaction passing between them, the demon ceased moving. Then, slowly, Neo's demeanour seemed to drain away, the cheekiness and taunting disappearing, leaving behind a face almost as blank as her own.
"…We both know the truth behind that statement, First." Neo replied, her entire demeanour now as monotone as the words from the scroll, all false pretenses and mockeries of human personality discarded, nothing left behind but a lingering sense of wrongness.
This was the demon at its truest, Ruby realized. The closest to the real, formless existence that was the manifestation of mankind's foibles. Never anything to truly call its own, only the things it could take when it claimed a mask for itself…
Ruby had a feeling then, an instinct that told her that anything that the demon would say now, would be nothing but the truth. And so she considered everything that had been stated up to this point, carefully thinking over what should be said next…
…
…
…
"What are Grimm?" She eventually chose, staring evenly into the demon's own, emotionless eyes.
"…You already know the answer to that question. You just don't see it from these human eyes." Neo replied with emotionless sincerity. "Perhaps the better one you should be asking is, why Grimm are?"
As the words were typed out, some emotion returned to the demon. With a few, owlish blinks, she grimaced, suddenly looking almost physically pained from the reply, and now, at last, there was defiance glowing in those shifting eyes, a sense that nothing more would be forced out of her. The mask of a foible was firmly dragged back into place once again, the cutesy fakeness and mocking smugness returning with it.
"My, my, awfully impolite of you to cut into the heart of a matter quite so directly, wouldn't you say?" She drawled out, eyebrow quaintly raised in an affectation of displeasure. "Quite a breach in etiquette to expose a girl like that."
"Caw!"
Before Ruby could reply, a squawk from above got her attention. She glanced up, to see Merle circling overhead, a sense of urgency in the crow as the bullheads had long since vanished from view. In that single, momentary distraction, the ghastly limbs restraining the demon loosened their hold ever so slightly. And that was all the opening Neo needed.
As the red-cloaked girl's attention immediately returned to her captive, the girl's form shimmered and faded with a cheeky grin. Ruby immediately retracted her tendrils to a looming position over her shoulders, looking like coiled serpents poised to strike, before with that same shimmer New reappeared at the opposite edge of the roof.
"Well now, this was a lovely little re-encounter, but I suppose that it's a bit too early for either of us to be getting much in the way of answers." The girl typed out, all smug knowing smirks and quaint olden politeness. "And at any rate seems like it's high time that I take my leave. Go see to your little friend's trinkets, First, though you may come to regret keeping them down the line. I'm certain that we will meet again, though. I mean, you've seen how the past seems to be resurfacing. Surely even you can see the spinning of the wheels?"
With that last, cheeky taunt, the demon did a little curtsey, then skipped a step off the edge of the roof. Ruby did not need to look to know she had vanished.
The girl left on the roof took a moment to share a look with the crow that at that moment landed on her shoulder, as both took a moment to ponder on the unexpected encounter.
The Eternal Nightmare, and the River King. What other demons were still out there…?
Ruby shook her head, clearing away these lingering thoughts. She had wasted too much time here already. She had to get back to the others. And now seemed like as good a time as any to try this out.
With that thought, the girl let out a soft, barely noticeable breath. And focused.
/
It was with some confusion that the White Fang operatives that were giving chase to the truck noticed that it simply… stopped. The pilots almost overshot the thing due to the unexpected move, forcing quite the sudden stop from the bullheads and a few tumbles upon the passengers.
The most eager among their numbers actually cheered, believing that the ship's guns likely hit something important and forced their target's abrupt stop. But the man in charge of this whole operation, a hulking giant whose position was marked by a lack of a hood and a full white mask, was not so easily convinced. He had seen the reports of the docks, and been on the comms to hear their first strike team get taken out. There was no way these damned huntsmen had given up, or been taken out so easily…
But he had his orders. There was something of supreme importance to the White Fang's cause in that container, and Adam had made it clear that it had to be reclaimed at all costs.
And so it was that he barked out his orders. The first of the two Bullheads made to land on the road to allow the grunts within to disembark, while the second one remained airborne, its guns ready to fire on any suspicious movement from their quarry.
As soon as their feet touched ground, the lieutenant didn't even need to speak as his men moved, cautiously approaching the rear of the truck in a formation that had been drilled into them, those with weapons in hand covering for the few that approached with equipment to breach into the armored container.
And throughout all this, there was no movement from inside the truck, no reaction from the huntsmen. Some of the more eager among the men had even circled to the front of the vehicle and tried to open fire through the windows, but the black-tinted glass did not so much as buckle under the assault, nor reveal any movements from within. Clearly, the huntsmen had spared no expense in securing transport.
He was about to give the command to breach, when several things begun to happen in swift succession.
His men closest to the truck cried out in surprise and alarm as their weapons and equipment seemed to be forcefully pulled from their hands, and sent flying to slam into the container's door, sticking to it as if magnetized. Then the doors immediately proceeded to slam open with a bright green flash, as… The lieutenant couldn't help but blink in befuddlement as a bloody giant glowing tentacle lashed out in a swipe, tossing the closest grunts around like ragdolls.
The bullhead that was still airborne immediately reacted as ordered and opened fire upon the opening, only for the hail of bullets to ping harmlessly off a sphere of green energy that completely covered the entrance point. And then a flickering shadow looming above made the hulking man glance up, to see that something had leapt from the nearest building and right into the open compartment of the ship, cries of shock and pain and fear ringing out as men were getting tossed off the ship, its gunfire ceasing as it begun swerving in place as if trying to dislodge the invader.
The huntsmen chose that moment to finally reveal themselves, charging out through the barrier and falling upon the closest men that could only recoil in surprise as they were taken down. The lieutenant's eyes narrowed hatefully as among them he recognized the hated figure of the Schnee heiress, because of course they would be involved in taking from the Faunus.
The hulking man was not surprised by the resistance, but that did little for his mood as he turned towards the nearest grunt. "Where's the rest of the back up? Where's the Paladin?!"
"We don't know, sir! It went radio silent roughly when the first squad did." The man replied worriedly, flinching away as the leader let out a deep, angry growl.
"No matter." He ground out, glaring towards the bunch that had stayed behind with him as the chainsaw in his hands begun revving up. "Well, what are you waiting for? Do you not see the Schnee among them? Kill her, kill them all! For the White Fang!"
He charged, and with his words galvanizing the troops, immediately as one they followed forward with bellowed war cries and roared hatred, those with firearms firing as they went.
Immediately the man made a beeline towards the heiress, intend on splattering her innards across the road, for what a glorious side benefit that would be as a result of this mission, when suddenly instinct born of experience made him stop as two projectiles came flying at him, sparks flying as he lashed out with the chainsaw to deflect them.
Standing in his way was a boy, floating blades hovering over him and a cold, stern expression on his face, belying the anger beneath. He recognized this one.
"Ah, the traitor's little pet project. That he'd take pity on a human, pathetic." He snarled menacingly, his voice calm, his tone measure, but both dripping with unbridled hatred. "He got what was coming to him for betraying us. And so will you for helping him."
The boy did not deign to respond beyond a narrowing of his eyes, but the faunus could see it clear, how his entire demeanour screamed of barely restrained aggression. A nerve had been struck, good, but enough words.
With the roar of his revving weapon, the lieutenant charged forward… and suddenly found he could not. His feet would not move. He looked down, and beneath his mask his eyes widened as he finally noticed the thick layers of ice forming all the way up to his knees, pinning him in place.
"Gotta say, when you're right, you're right, Weiss." Jaune commented with a mocking smirk towards the man. "These guys really do tend to hyper fixate on things."
"What can I say?" The Heiress replied primly as she walked up to him, with an icy, scornful look of her own towards their prisoner. "So much blind hatred doesn't leave much room for working brain cells. Shouldn't take too long to clean up now."
As the Schnee bitch's words registered, the lieutenant blinked and glanced around. The men that had followed him into the operation had been the best of the best that the White Fang's cell in Vale had to offer, hand-picked and trained up by Adam himself.
And apparently that meant very little, as what was supposed to be a simple retrieval mission was instead turning into a slaughter against them. And only two girls, tearing into his men? It would be unbelievable if he wasn't witnessing it first-hand.
One of them was clobbering faunus left and right, swinging around a large golden orb on a string like a wrecking ball, laughing boisterously as she went. The other, who he just now finally recognized as that Nikos human, was almost like a battering ram, both shield and spear bringing grown men down with each swing. They were going about it so eagerly and so intensely that in a small corner of his mind the lieutenant couldn't help but wonder if they were making a competition out of it…
A sudden loud crash startled the man out of his surprised stupor, making him turn as far as he was able, to see that the second bullhead had landed roughly next to the first one, and out from it walked a masked man, except his mask was black and his clothes purple, and he was dusting off his hands as if just done with a chore.
But in the distance, the sound of a ship's engine could still be heard, which once again turned his attention forward, to see in over yonder ships, that he recognized as of Atlesian make, swiftly approaching alongside the truck's remaining escorts.
"Well, would you look at that?" The brat commented blithely. "The cavalry has arrived."
And that proved too much for the lieutenant, the rage building up within him reaching a boiling point. He refused to suffer this humiliation at the hands of traitorous humans, he would not return to Adam in disgraceful failure. He would not walk away empty-handed!
His entire body tensed, muscles bulging and veins popping as he pushed with all of his strength, and with a bellow of sheer, unadulterated rage, the hulking faunus broke free from the ice, leaping straight for the heiress in an overhead swing of his chainsaw. Distracted as they'd been by the arrival of their reinforcements, the bitch and the brat barely had the time to turn back around in shocked alarm before he was already upon them.
The chainsaw swung down…
…Only to bounce off with a loud clang as a blue glow suddenly suffused the Heiress' form. So utterly shocked by this sudden twist was the man, his mind so utterly blank from the sheer dismissal of his anger, that he didn't even manage to get his aura up in time as his own weapon came rebounding straight at his face.
Blood splattered everywhere as those present winced and cringed away from the sight.
Weiss pointedly opted to not even look, instead looking down at her body with confusion and distress as the weird glow, which she knew was not her doing, intensified, wisps of this foreign energy beginning to spin around her. She was too frazzled to notice how both Penny and the black-masked man stared in recognition, one in open wonder and the other in quiet pondering.
Then, there was a flash, and as the blue glow died down, Ruby was there, standing before her teammate with her usual blank expression, Merle at her shoulder. The duo took a moment to blink owlishly and take stock of their surroundings, before noticing how everybody present seemed to be staring at them, and tilting their heads in perfect synchronicity.
…
…
…
"…What?"
/
Chainsaws do not make for practical weapons, people. Intimidating, certainly, but liable to cause situations such as the one you just saw.
Also, some clarification regarding Neo, just in case someone found it contradictory. She remembers the general events she's witnessed in every incarnation she has been through. What she, quite literally, CANNOT remember is the appearance and personality traits of each incarnation, a cognitive block of sorts due to their reincarnating nature. And as I previously stated, she represents a different foible from Ol' Two Coats' Addiction, or perhaps a different aspect of it would be more accurate. I've left plenty of hints in this chapter, and I'm curious to see if anyone guesses right.
Also, this is a few months late at this point, that can we take a moment to ponder how, in the Star Guardians continuity, Ol' Fiddle used to be a girl, and a girl that, if the revealed artwork is anything to go by, had heterochromia? The funny coincidences keep piling up.
Anyway, next chapter we have fallout, exposition, world building, and maybe, just maybe, yet another player entering the board…
But before that, next month we got the next update to Beneath a Broken Moon, so look forward to that.
Cya all on the next one, stay safe and take care.