I tore through the halls of the floor like a hurricane.
I rushed passed gouges and broken doors towards the sounds of struggle without any real thought in my mind, only instinct taking precedence. I turned sharply towards an apartment I remember passing on the way to 107, noting that the once barricaded door was now torn down. All the furniture that braced the inside was thrown across the floor, much of it crushed and gashed. I ran into the room without hesitation with Crocea Mors at the ready, and saw the ruin that was front and center.
Pieces of a man were scattered across the floor of the apartment. His parts were practically thrown from his torso, and I could make out the fresh blood staining the floor that glinted in the low light.
"P-plea-keh!"
My eyes snapped up from the floor and I toed further into the room. At the far end I made out a towering silhouette, one with long puffy limbs that hung from the torso. It was sideways with its arm held out. From its hand was a person kicking and tearing at the hand around their neck. In the low light I only managed to make out one feature.
Long crimson hair.
My heart stopped. I watched them kicking and struggling in the grasp of the monster, unable to breath myself. A high-pitched ringing whined in my ears, and Crocea Mors shook in my hands. Everything came flooding back all at once. The attack on Vale, the loss of the Academy, the desperation I felt that day. Over all of that, was her.
'Pyrrha?!'
The creatures other hand reached up, both lanky and bloated, and the spindly claws at the end were thrusted towards its prey. Horror was swapped with righteous rage in my heart. My teeth bared themselves and I shouted.
"PYRRHA!"
The dark gloomy apartment disappeared under the assault of a blinding light. Colors and even silhouettes washed away from the brightness. Everything felt right. When it died down I found myself where the thing was standing, shield facing forward and blade readied.
The creature, which I could now recognize was some Grimm I'd never seen before, was very much dead. It was reduced to ribboned skins that lay on the ground, draped over fallen furniture and oozing. I looked oddly at the deflated Grimm and had the intent of inspecting the smoking corpse, but sniveling tore me from it. I whipped around instantly when my brain caught up.
"Pyr-!"
The name caught in my throat. Behind me was a child, not her. A little girl with crimson hair almost as long as she was tall and a face streaked with tears and specks of red. Her rich red eyes looked at me widely as she shook, and I looked back. She couldn't have been older than 9, and that reminded me of my younger sisters.
"Daddy!" She yelped suddenly, jolting to the side to look around the room. I reacted swiftly, kneeling down and letting my sword hit the floor to cradle the sides of her face. I held her there and forced all her attention on me, so she wouldn't focus on the misfortune around us.
"Hey, don't look! I need all your focus right now. Your dad called me here and asked me to take you somewhere safe." I lied to her face, watching as she slowly started to look into my eyes. "What's your name, kid?"
"C-cerise…" She choked out, nearly coughing her own name. "Where is he? He's got black hair, and-and-"
"Don't worry about that, I need to get you to the Green Zone." I said, moving away from questions about her father. I didn't have the heart to tell her he was alright for the sake of getting her to work with me. I couldn't stomach it. The lies already felt like swallowing lead. "Come on, we need to move."
Cerise took a second to scrub the tears from her face with her palms. Her body shook with sniffles and attempts to stem the crying. I let her go, grabbing Crocea Mors from the floor.
"Th-there's more of those tall things. Lots more!" She whispered harshly, grabbing at my chest piece with worry written on her face. "They can go through walls!"
I looked at her curiously at those words. It's not surprising there would be more of them in a building this big, but walking through walls?
'Then again, Grimm are Grimm.' I thought flatly.
A chittering sound, like bone against bone started peaking over Cerise's muffled sobs. My eyes snapped towards the direction they came from, and Cerise clung harder to my armor.
"They're here!"
I watched the entrance of the apartment in restrained shock as bone fingers seemed to grow from the frame. From nothing they slid into view on the inside of the apartment, distended arms that puffed in odd places and a height that outgrew the door. There were very few patches of bone armor. The most striking were the bone covered spindly fingers and the eerie human-like skull face. The eye cavities were empty, but they still looked our way while forming.
"KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA"
My face scrunched up when they started chattering their human teeth. I gently took Cerise's hands off my armor and stood, gripping Crocea Mors hard.
"Stay here."
I launched forward, clearing the gap between us in no time and slicing the legs from one of the Grimm. A pointed set of fingers jabbed me in the neck, and I felt my aura flare to compensate. I sliced the arm off with a lateral swing, stepping back to avoid the legless Grimm as it fell to the floor. Launching forward I slammed the face of my shield into the stomach of the one left standing. Problem is, my attack bounced off like rubber. Spindly hands grasped onto my armor and lifted me off the ground. I kicked, but that was just as effective as my shield bash. Thinking quickly I stabbed it through with Crocea Mors just as I was brought up to its skull face and ripped it downwards, disemboweling the Grimm.
It collapsed after that and I was dropped to my feet, only to be rooted in place by the other gripping at my ankles and climbing itself up my legs. I stabbed it through the top of the head before it could grab my arms, and watched as it started to deflate. My gaze lingered on both Grimm as their bodies flattened out, leaking a strange gel before turning to smoke.
"Grimm are Grimm…" I muttered, brushing off the oddness of the creature.
"HELP!"
I about faced and rushed back to Cerise before it registered in my mind. She held a shard of glass in her hand from a broken lamp that crunched under her feet as she backed away. Another of those odd Grimm had made it into the apartment seemingly out of nowhere, and was stalking towards the little girl.
Everything happened in the blink of an eye. Cerise tripped over a fallen coffee table and I cut the Grimm in half at the waist, lashing out a second time to decapitate it before it could hit the ground.
"How the hell did it get behind me?" I wondered aloud, watching the corpse begin to smoke.
"Th-they can walk through walls…" The girl repeated. At the sound of her voice I turned to her once more. She had scrambled to her feet, but was still clutching the shard of glass with all her might. I knelt and carefully unwrapped her fingers, grunting at the blood that smeared her palm from the cuts. She hissed at the stinging sensation and immediately balled up her fist.
"Guess so." I agreed, caving into her assertion. I quickly ripped a strip of cloth from my shirt and tied it tight over the cut in her palm even as she hissed at the sensation. My brain churned at the development, knowing now that I couldn't just clear a path. The only other options were dangerous. I sighed before simply patting the kid on the head. "Looks like you won't be safe just following me."
She nodded stiffly, red eyes locked on me for guidance. I kneeled once more and pointed behind me.
"Get on."
"Huh?" She said, looking at me confused. "A piggy-back ride?"
"Exactly. I'll be able to keep you close, and we can go as fast as possible." I explained, gesturing again. She looked at my back nervously before agreeing. I turned around and felt her clamber up my back, and when she settled the weight was negligible. I reached up and grabbed the hands that were resting on my shoulders and locked them firmly around my neck instead before standing tall.
"Okay." I muttered, testing out how it all felt. "Don't let go."
"Right!"
Her grip tightened and I took off. I bolted out of the apartment and came back on the route to the stairwell, only for a skull to come out of the wall followed by shoulders and arms. I didn't even blink at the Grimm, instead impaling its forehead as I ran by and severing the bloated arms that reached at me from the doorframe on the opposite wall. We raced through the ninth floor severing and slicing the strange Grimm that melted from the walls, coating my sword in gel that soon smoked away. We rounded the last corner before the stairwell was in sight, and a chattering alerted me before bone fingers came threading for my eyes. I slammed my foot down to stop and blocked with my shield, thrusting forward after it made contact and making the arm bounce from the impact. I swung and severed the arm, then the legs.
As the Grimm started to fall, I noticed a second just inches behind the first. Thinking quickly I impaled the first through the chest and followed through. I lunged forward and impaled the second one on my blade, slamming both down on the ground. Immediately after being pinned by Crocea Mors to the wooden floor they reached up with their grotesque arms and tried tearing at me.
'As good a time as any!' I thought, feeling Cerise grip me tighter.
I grabbed the shotgun with my shield arm and unloaded a round into their heads. The shot was powerful and lit up the hall for a brief second, just enough to see the jagged bits of metal that shredded their skulls to mince. I withdrew my sword and glanced at my shotgun appreciatively.
"Custom shots, huh? Neat." As I finished my sentence I saw Cerise lift her arm and point forward.
"Watch out!"
I dropped back to stance and glared at the three Grimm that slid through the stairwell door… right before rushing close and unloading a round that had a wonderful spread. All three were peppered by the shrapnel shell, and gel oozed from their wounds. One fell dead outright, and the other two were cut down and forgotten about.
We breached the stairs, and I looked over the railing at what the flickering emergency lights would show. Hands, arms, legs and skulls pulled themselves from the walls and floors. There were many, and they were coming for us.
"Shit." I cursed. Cerise just whimpered in my ear.
The chattering alerted me. I turned to my side with a high swipe of Crocea Mors that separated a Grimm skull from the body. The body fell smoking, and behind it I saw many more stalking towards me up the stairs.
'I can't afford any slips with the kid. I have to do this perfectly.' I thought, eyeing the flood of Grimm seemingly coming from nowhere. 'If I stayed to kill all of them I'd just put her in danger…'
One was closer than the others, and I made my choice. I stabbed it through the chest and threw the Grimm over the railing, leaving it to fall down to the ground floor after coming off my sword.
"Gotta do this fast." I concluded, firing into the crowd before me. The shrapnel sent them reeling back, and I took advantage by thinning out the crowd. I stormed forward, slicing and dicing and throwing them down the stairwell as I conquered flight after flight. I was forced to ignore the Grimm crawling out of the walls for the safety of Cerise. The more time I spent, the more likely I was to get blindsided. Shrapnel and swordplay carried me down eight of the flights, but I ran into too many problems.
The shotgun was empty by floor 3.
'Two more flights, and we'll hit the ground floor!' I thought, feeling the sweat roll down my neck. Cerise had been a sport the entire time, alerting me to attacks from behind even through her shaking fits. I'd cleared tons of the Grimm at this point, and pillars of smoke rose all around from the bodies. But it seems it wasn't enough.
From the ground floor came a flood of these odd Grimm, enough to clog the entire section of stairs. All the ones that had been thrown over the railing, even sliced and partially dissected, climbed their way up like cockroaches. They were followed by others that had been untouched. I balked at the sight, and turned back the way I came.
'Too many! Cerise has no aura and she'd get hit for sure if I took that on!' I thought, sprinting back. The first door I saw I bolted for. I remembered it actually, it was the same that was wedged open by a body. I turned to it and busted it down with my shield before running inside. I had to fight the intense urge to vomit as I accidentally trampled the corpse, and my foot caved in its chest.
I shook my head and continued sprinting through the second floor, flinging gore and maggots from my shoe with each step.
The layout was slightly different, but manageable. One of those Grimm grasped at me from a broken door I passed, and instead of slashing I simply bashed its hands against the wall with my shield and kept gunning. I turned a sharp corner, and at the end saw another of those full-wall windows. I set my pace and sprinted as hard as I could, side stepping and lashing out at the legs of another Grimm.
"Cerise!" I shouted.
"Yeah?!" She shouted back, voice choked from tears. I braced my shield firmly in front of us.
"Hold on tight!"
The glass completely shattered on the face of my shield and I leapt, hopeful to leave the tidal wave of Grimm behind us.
My shield was angled to protect us against the initial spray of glass, and right before impact I felt the kid bury her face into my neck so it wasn't exposed. She screamed loudly and her legs wrapped tight on my torso and I couldn't judge her. Seeing the ground approaching, I felt the urge to scream too.
I shouted on the way down from the second story window and grabbed onto the kids arms to keep them from unlatching. I landed on my feet and skidded to a stop on the pavement, listening to her dying screams and the glass impacting the ground around us.
"Jaune?!"
"Winter." I greeted, taking a deep breath to calm down.
"What happened in there?" She interrogated, running to me from the corpses of three Ursa. I gestured to the soaked bag at my hip.
"Found Claude. Found a couple other things too." I grumbled at the end, which Winter wasted no time in pouncing on. She circled around me, studying my form the whole while.
"She's one of those things, I take it?"
I simply nodded. Various thuds caught my attention and ripped it from Winter though. I looked and what I saw was nearly comical. The Grimm were pouring from the shattered window and tumbling out to fall flat on the ground from the second story, they even bounced a little when they smacked down.
"Those are the other things." The words came blandly from me, and Winter clicked her tongue at the sight.
"Lurkers, annoying monsters. They can sneak into nearly anywhere." She held her blade at her side, eying the flopping beasts.
I felt a tap against my shoulder.
"What are we going to do, Mister?"
I eyed the tiny hand carefully, knowing what needed to happen.
"It's Jaune." I corrected. Carefully I grabbed her from my back and set her on the ground in front of me. "You are going with Winter. She'll take you to the Green Zone."
"I am?"
"I will?"
I grinned at the mirrored looks of confusion of the two girls faces. It became wider when they eyed each other.
"Of course. We need to get you to safety as soon as possible, and I've got some more stuff to take care of out here." I answered, ruffling the kids long crimson hair. "I need to get Claude to the Guild Depot ASAP."
I patted the blanket on my waist for emphasis. Winter's eyes narrowed at me, but she hesitantly nodded. She picked up Cerise and held her with her off hand.
"Very well. I'll escort her to safety and return to support you." The Schnee asserted. I walked past the two, putting myself between them and the small horde of Lurkers.
"Just go. I'll be alright."
I took up a stance with Crocea Mors. Immediately it reminded me of the basement with Pyrrha and the Headmaster. I shrugged off the memory. Winter took off without another word, racing the girl back to the Green Zone, leaving me to stare down the approaching Lurkers.
"Jaune!" I heard Cerise call. "THANK YOU!"
A smile crawled across my face.
[AN- Thanks for all the views everyone. Almost to 100 favorites, hope you guys are enjoying. Thanks for the comments too.]