Doctor Merlot had always considered himself a man of above average intelligence. Why wouldn't he? Most simpletons look at the creatures of Grimm and see monsters that must be slain or feared. He looked at them and simply marveled at the possibilities that they could provide humanity. Grimm were stronger, numerous, and from his observations, incapable of exhaustion. With how large their numbers were, it also meant that there was a near inexhaustible supply of them to be used. There was no moral issue as well, they weren't like the faunus and so it would be unthinkable to even argue in their defense or their treatment. Merlot would have praised as a hero if he actually succeeded.
But no, despite their cries of wanting to end the Grimm threat once and for all, they simply could not allow him to have more samples. He was close, so close to perfection before they all decided to shut down his research. Of course the Grimm would cause some negativity but where else was he supposed to bring them to? If they had planted his research facility outside the borders of the city then fine, just put some protection so that his research would go undisturbed. No. Instead, they wanted it within the safety of the walls where those brutes who call themselves huntsmen and huntresses could intervene.
Merlot knew the truth though; he could see it in their eyes. They just wanted to increase their chances of survival and the prospect of any Grimm that would break free, as preposterous as that sounds, they believed that if there were more people around, there is less chance that they themselves would fall to the Grimm. Never mind that others were thinking the same.
Humanity clearly didn't know any better. For all their talk of unity and camaraderie, they would always find ways to put each other down. They would come up with even more creative attempts to be on top that it might as well be its own art. The threat of Grimm wasn't enough for those who lived in the comforts of the inner cities. Never having braved the borders or the frontier, they simply could not comprehend the actual truth behind the Grimm.
His research threatened that curtain. Whenever he brought Grimm to his facility, many of the newcomers, those who only ever had the comfort of knowing about these wonderful creatures were silenced at the scale of the simple Beowolf. They were terrified of it that many had left, weak minds they were.
Put it worse, there are those who call themselves an ethics committee. Oh, has he made the appropriate measures to ensure that the Grimm of all things were treated well? Has he ensured the well-being of those under his employ? If he had wanted those who simply couldn't fathom the future that he was trying to create, then Merlot would have asked so.
Ethics. Ever is it the bane of true progress. If he had been given the permission to do everything as he envisioned it, humanity would have reached the pinnacle and conquered Remnant years ago. But instead, they chose to take the long road, sacrificing minds like him to the constraint of time and decay. With the bastardly constraint of ethical considerations, failures that could have been corrected a long time ago are still being made today. Those mistakes wouldn't have happened now if they had just let the genius out earlier. Of course there would be mistakes, that is how one learns. Who cares about the loss of life in that moment? Many more would be saved if they had just let them keep going.
Merlot looked over the video feed. The other three professional huntsmen were navigating their way around the facility in hopes of finding him. No doubt that their intention is to arrest him and bring him to justice. They would also most likely confiscate his work.
With a push of a button, the doors have closed. Acting quickly, the three of them found another path. Another button pushed, another door closed. That one called Ann Greene seems to have memorized the layout of the facility; she was the one leading the trio and knew her way no matter how many doors have begun to close them off. Even with the occasional Grimm heading their way, Greene still possessed an awareness of her surroundings and her sense of direction.
His eyes then turned to the fourth member of the team. The man who had called himself Doctor Henry Jekyll. Merlot had never heard of this man before and he most certainly did not recognize him as a doctor. Where did this wannabe even get his degree? Even had the audacity to claim that he had a case study of his own. They said that Merlot had some issues of ego but this Jekyll titled his own study after himself.
Looking at the behavior though, Merlot concluded that this must have been the Mister Hyde. An alter-ego? This one certainly doesn't act in the same way as Jekyll did from earlier. Merlot had reviewed the footage from their exploit earlier and it would seem that way. No huntsmen would dedicate too much time into being a performer. Even those who care more for the competitive scene and the money it brings wouldn't be good as actors. No. This Jekyll, this Hyde, is certainly an alternate personality that he must have created.
Once, Merlot had dabbled in the nature of the soul. As much as it frustrated him, he had to consult the fairytales as his source. Honestly, of all the places to store information to be passed on, the idiots have chosen fairytales? Children's stories that would have been embellished anyway because the target audience is too young and it would have been too much for their smooth brains?
From those research, Merlot had found that the human soul was created by the two Brothers. The Grimm were said to be created by the Brother of Darkness so it interested him to have at least some modicum of knowledge of human nature. This Jekyll and Hyde must have been an experiment on splitting the two aspects of the brothers as separate entities, then.
Hyde was certainly performing admirably. His brutish and savage nature as he powered through even the tougher variations of his enhanced Grimm certainly raised a few eyebrows. A rather simplistic division of humanity by attributing good and evil to what is really light and darkness. Pathetic.
"Well then, Mr. Hyde," Merlot said. "Let us see how well you fare against my greatest creation."
With a push of yet another button, Merlot unleashed his greatest enhanced Grimm.
/-/
"Woo-ho!" Jek—Hyde was having the time of his life. Why wouldn't he? As another of those Grimm creatures fell at his feet, he had no reason to take back control of his own body. Hyde shook his head. The two of them were not the same person. Je—Hyde is not Jekyll and Jekyll is most certainly not Hyde.
More Grimm have begun to rise from the ground. Without the other professors. Hyde was free to run wild as he pleased. He certainly appreciated this new dagger that Greene had given hi—Jekyll. Sharp, durable, and just had the most satisfying feeling as he jabbed it deep into the Grimm. Hearing their roars and growls turn to whimpers was music to Hyde's ears.
Each claw and bite that went into his body went ignored for the most part. For one, Hyde had aura. Most of those attacks didn't even go pass the first layer of defense. Besides, Hyde prefers it that way; makes them come to you instead of him going to them.
One bit him by the shoulder. With its superior weight and the momentum behind that leap, the modified Beowolf pinned Hyde down to the ground. The dirt rose up in a dust cloud as more Grimm descended on him with some already trying to pull him apart.
Hyde rolled. Using his free arm, he jammed the dagger deep into the Grimm that bit his shoulder. He tore the creature open as black and green spilled out. It would have been better had it been the color red but one can't have it all now can they?
Flicking his leg upwards, the Beowolf that was gnawing down on his foot flew to the air. As it descended, Hyde hacked away at the Grimm, trying to count as many slashes before it fell to the ground; he only made two. He tutted in disappointment.
An Ursa slammed him down from behind. The dagger had been dropped from his hand as he fell face first onto the ground.
He spat out the dirt that got into his mouth. "Rude." He said. "I don't think I very much like you, mate."
The Ursa growled as it charged at him. The dagger was too far from him to reach. Hands, it is.
For something so large, the Ursa strangely had good speed to it as the momentum it had made Hyde buckle down.
"I'm beginning to think that I've made a huge mistake," said Merlot in the intercoms. The cowards. Why doesn't he come here and deal with Hyde himself? It would certainly spice things up.
Smaller Grimm rammed Hyde. They were not really worth noting. Much closer to flies these Creeps.
Hyde grabbed one of these Creeps. As he began to fling them around, he also struck other Creeps that didn't even come close.
"Catch!" Hyde called out as he released the Creep, aiming it at the Ursa. Head-shot.
With the Ursa in a dizzy state, he managed to grab his dagger again to finish the jab. An eye for an eye was had for Hyde charged at the Ursa just as it did him. He didn't have the same momentum as the Grimm. Hyde may have the superior speed but mass was something he lacked. To make up for it, all that force was concentrated on the singular point of that dagger.
"I've got to get me one of these!" He realized. How many times had the blade made contact with something? He lost count. Hyde was amazed at the craftsmanship of these weapons and how well they hold up. No guns though; it is much better up close.
The Ursa wailed at him as the dagger buried itself deeper into the Grimm's neck. Like the predator that he is, Hyde prefers to choke out the air of his victims as they perish. The Grimm were no exception.
His fun was ruined though. Small spikes rose from the ground and the Grimm ended up protecting him from it at the cost of its own life.
"Rarrgh!" Hyde roared out. "Was that it! Was that everything you have? Some mad scientist you're supposed to be."
"I am a far better doctor than you will ever be," Merlot replied. He was angry now. Good. If he was half a man, he would actually bother to come out. "I, for one, am a real doctor." Or not. "Where did you even get your degree?"
"Hey," Hyde retorted. "Firstly, I'm just you good friend, Eddie Hyde. I—Jekky just wants to kill you. Me? If you have any more of these, I'm game."
"Oh, is that so?" Merlot replied. "Well. Let us see if you could even hope to deal with my greatest creation!"
The ground beneath him began to shake. Hyde turned around as the source of the disturbance was coming behind him. His eyes then turned upwards as the final Grimm rose from the ground.
"Big boy." He whistled.
"Bet you that you don't teach about them in Beacon!" Merlot boldly declared. It was true, Hyde doesn't teach about them in Beacon; he wasn't a teacher. There is nothing that he does teach.
At the sight of the modified and enlarged Deathstalker Grimm, Hyde could only say one thing. "It's knife to meet you!"
Before they could engage however, more Grimm emerged from the ground. Just Creeps and Beowolves. There were also a few robots heading his way. Hyde had to restrain himself from wiping a tear from his eye. It's like Krampus gave him his Christmas gift early. Though they were few, Hyde didn't have enough time to count them.
There was a modicum of strategy there. A simple one, nothing too hard to understand. Hyde's enemies had the advantage of numbers while Hyde was only one man. All they had to do was dog-pile him and he should be incapacitated at the very least.
One problem though: their opponent was Edward Hyde. If there was one thing that could be used to describe the man, it was that he was a hedonist that thrived only on the pleasures. It just happens that the pleasure was derived from the utter destruction of every living thing around him. Heck, the living part was optional; so long as they are moving and writhing, he'll take it.
Predators live by the prey that they pursue. It is such a shame then that the Grimm and robots aren't quite aware that the predator this time was him.
The Deathstalker was the first to attack. With its large pincers, it sought to trap Hyde and crush him like a can.
Hyde lazily moved backwards. Really, it was closer to him simply falling backwards as if to lie on a bed.
He rolled out of it and was met with an iron arm. The thing had dug itself into the ground and shoveled him out.
It wasn't his first time dealing with robots but it was most certainly his first to go at it without much restraint.
As Hyde came out of the dust cloud that had formed when he crashed into the wall, one could hear the laughter coming from it. Though Hyde was being made to fight to the death, he was blazing with life.
"This must be fate," he said. "What bliss, but do be wary if something is amiss."
Hyde's legs moved first. It was as though his torso had been dragged along for the ride. His dagger thrust deep into a charging Creep as he spun like a dancer. He slammed the Grimm still attached to the blade onto the next.
The Deathstalker was approaching him but others were there before it could come close.
Two Beowolves descended on him. Hyde had temporarily lost his balance when he had stepped on those tiles that contained the rising spikes and it cost him deep bite marks that would have pierced through his flesh were it not for aura. How much does he have left now? Eh, who cares?
The other Beowolf bit him in the leg. Both of their heads were shaking in opposite directions as they played tug-o-war with him as the rope.
Hyde pulled himself inward into a cradle position, dragging both Beowolves closer to him. With his free arm, Hyde pulled the upper jaw of the Beowolf. Its blackened flesh could not resist being ripped open.
Afterwards, Hyde stabbed the head of the other one and fell ungraciously on the ground. He looked around him and noticed that the Deathstalker was missing.
In a way that could have gone wrong if it had come from behind, the Deathstalker's massive stinger rose from the ground and penetrated Hyde. Blood had been spilled from his mouth. He hadn't been prepared for that and so failed to keep his aura up.
The stinger had him stuck as the Deathstalker revealed itself again.
"Ooh," Merlot said. "Stings, doesn't it?" He sounded like he was celebrating. "I had hoped that it wouldn't come to this but know that it wouldn't be in vain, Mr. Jekyll. You've certainly provided a lot of data that would be used to further my own research."
Hyde had never removed himself from the stinger any faster. "First of all, wanker. It is doctor Jekyll to you!" He slammed down the robot that had come for him and crushed its metallic head. "Second of all, there is no battle that I couldn't survive when I have never felt so alive."
"Alive?" Merlot laughed. "I'd advise you against this folly, huntsman, or you just pay dearly."
There was one other Grimm left other than the Deathstalker. The Beowolf leapt at him.
Hyde matched it with his own. He even growled at the thing as the two locked hands. Hyde proved himself the stronger as his gripped tightened and the Beowolf's arms began to bend along with it. Hyde wasn't done yet there, he kept bending it way past what it could anatomically be capable of doing. The Beowolf whined as it fell.
Once again, the Deathstalker was nowhere to be seen. Hyde leapt in the air as he didn't know where it would come from. There was a disturbance in the patch of ground behind him.
This time, it was the claws that came forth. The Deathstalker rose a few inches above ground as the humongous thing leapt to grab him. Sadly, for it, Hyde was out of its reach. His smile grew wider at the opportunity.
Landing on the claw, he bounced his way towards the stinger. "An eye for an eye, yeah?"
The Deathstalker was waving its tail frantically as Hyde held on. Green liquid began to pour out of the tail when Hyde had stabbed the dagger deep into connecting section that made its stinger.
"You've made him angry!" Merlot exclaimed from the speakers. "You wouldn't like him when his angry!"
Hyde wasn't listening. As he hung onto the stinger of the Deathstalker, his weight had caused the tear to become larger with each attempt of the Grimm to flick him off of it.
Eventually, he managed to grab hold of the dagger and fully tore the stinger from the rest of the Deathstalker. The Grimm emitted a high pitched scream as Hyde skipped across the ground like a pebble across water.
"No!" Merlot cried out. "You've ruined it! You've ruined my art. It was so beautiful and you ruined it! Crush him! Crush him with all eight legs. Make venom rain from the skies!"
"It can do that?" Hyde thought that it would have been asking for too much. But he was proven wrong and he loved it. Toxic liquid had been sprayed out of its back and aimed towards his direction.
Some of the toxins had gotten onto his vest. There was smoke that rose as that part of his vest seemed to have burned off.
"Oh yes it can!" answered Merlot. "Kill him my precious! Daddy will fix you! Daddy will—"
There was an interruption on Merlot's end. It was the sound of being smacked against the computers by the sounds of it.
"Dr. Merlot." The voice of Harold Mulberry could be heard now. "By the order of the Council of Vale, you are under arrest."
"No!" Merlot resisted. There was a muffled struggle that could be heard. No one could tell what was happening exactly on sound alone. "You will never—my research—I am so close!"
The noises began to die down until nothing was heard. Then, Hyde heard the voice of Thumbelina Peach, hi—Jekyll's partner. Why in bloody hell would that woman ever see Hyde as a partner? "We're done here, Jek—Hyde. Clean up the mess and we're leaving."
"Argh!" Hyde complained. "I was just getting to the best part!" He rushed towards the Deathstalker. It sprayed a little bit of poison that nearly got to his boots. "I'm cutting you to pieces for that!"
Suddenly, another message came up. It was still Peach's voice. "Get of there now! Merlot's activated a self-destruct sequence!"
The Deathstalker slammed on the ground, forcing him back. Even without Merlot's guidance, not like it needed it, the Grimm was still willing to fight. The warning had fallen on deaf ears. Hyde was more focused on the fight at hand.
Hyde managed to get past the crushing pincers. If the giant, scorpion-like Grimm was like the animal, it would be mostly blind. However, it still had eyes. Hyde poked each one.
The Deathstalker was tossing and turning. It was doing everything it can to get him off of it. However, Hyde had a good grip. He had just made poked its eyes out and thusly, that was left hollow. As he did so, he repeatedly stabbed the thing until it would eventually go down.
Hyde moved from one part of the Grimm to another and resume his stabbings and cuttings. There was only so much flesh that he could go to before he was just placing the dagger's blade into an open wound. He wanted to make more of that.
Eventually, the Deathstalker had chosen to roll over in an attempt to crush him beneath the weight. At the last second, Hyde leapt off of the thing and returned back now that the exposed bottom of the Deathstalker was ripe for the stabbing.
Unlike the part above it, the part below the Deathstalker was soft and fleshy. It was much more vulnerable that it made no resistance to Hyde's dagger.
"Kill!" Hyde exclaimed. "Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill!"
The Deathstalker was screeching in pain. In its desperation, it made itself helpless against Hyde.
When it finally fell dead, Hyde wasn't quite satisfied yet. "Alright, who's next? Where's the next one? Come on, I still got some lif—"
Hyde suddenly lulled in movements. Pain began to shoot all over him as he felt the body contort and change. Afterwards, he began to vomit. Jekyll was vomiting.
/-/
Jekyll's head was spinning. "I need some pills or something for this. It's like I just had a night out drinking too much wine." He tasted his own mouth. "Nope. Something stronger." When things started to become clearer for him, he asked, "what's going on. An emergency?"
He crawled his way to the door. Jekyll had to hold onto the walls just to keep his own balance.
Peach had caught before he fell. Her nose scrunched at the scent of his breath. "Easy there, big guy. I got you. We need to move faster."
"Where's Merlot?" Jekyll asked.
"Said that we wouldn't take him alive," Peach replied. She carried him as she flew them both towards the Bullhead. Jekyll's weight was too much that part of him was just being dragged on the ground as Peach flapped her wings as intense as she can.
Mulberry was the first to see them and acted quickly. He relieved Peach as Jekyll was carried inside.
"All accounted for, Greene!" he exclaimed.
"Get comfortable," Greene replied on the speakers. She was in the pilot's cabin. "Seat belts on and enjoy the flight passengers!"
They did not get to their seats. As such, when the Bullhead rushed out of the docking bay, all three of them were in direct contact with the back of the Bullhead. Jekyll's mind was still out of it but he could hear some explosions occurring far behind them.
Flashes of light filled the windows as the Bullhead continued to fly out at its maximum speeds. Even then, they didn't exactly escape unscathed as they felt the force of the explosions just before they had escaped.
When things had settled down, they were able to relax.
"Merlot had poison on his person." Mulberry was shaking his head. "It was fast acting the moment he drank it."
Jekyll nodded along. He was still mostly out it but he was conscious enough to at least be part of this debriefing process.
"Got the files, though." Peach produced a bunch of folders. "Gathered as many as I could. Mostly Grimm related though some were definitely unethical."
"Unethical?" Jekyll asked.
"As in, Human-Grimm hybrid unethical. Since Grimm have no soul, he was searching the possibility of putting a human soul into the Grimm. A superhuman experiment according to him."
"You got all that?"
"I skimmed." Peach shrugged her shoulders.
Jekyll laid his head on the cold steel of the Bullhead floor. His first mission where Hyde proved himself to be rather helpful. He'll take that as his win.
AN: Wasn't quite sure if I should have done the switch the way I did. Since we started with Hyde shifting back to Jekyll, I thought about maybe just doing the same but make it clear who is the focus in that moment.