You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs. This belief had been ingrained into James Ironwood through decades of trials and failures. This belief was also shared by most of his men.
"Let me go ! You have to stop this James !"
But not all of them. A single man was currently being held down on this airship's floor by four Huntsmen. It didn't stop him from yelling obscenities at his superiors.
"My nieces are still down there !"
Poor, miserable, naive Qrow. He had always been unable to understand the greater picture.
"Yes, I know that. Now would you please go back to your post, before I throw you into a cell."
"There are innocent down there, you can't just bomb them all to kill a single man !"
"I can, and I should have done it sooner."
"You're crazy..." Qrow turned towards his holders and the rest of the crew in the command room. "How can you follow this man ? Are you all mad ?!"
"Enough ! I will not allow anyone to insult my men's loyalty. Get him a cell."
"You can't keep getting away with this forever ! Oz will learn about this !" Qrow yelled while being dragged out of the room.
But Ozma wasn't here, and his replacement wouldn't arrive before a few months at the very least. The loyalty of the other Headmasters was before all to Ozma, and there was no guarantee that they would be willing to cooperate. And that wasn't even taking into account the damages to their communication network caused by Vale's destruction.
He was alone. No one could help him, and no one could tell him what to do. The ruins of Mountain Glenn was the lair of a 'necromancer' , and possibly of an international terrorist too. They both took part in the destruction of Vale, and therefore had to be destroyed. What was the life of a few civilians compared to an entire country ?
"Sir, a Bullhead is trying to escape. What are your orders ?"
"Order them surrender. If they refuse to comply, the use of lethal force is allowed." Said Ironwood like he was reciting it straight from the manual.
"Unidentified Bullhead, this Atlesian airship AAF87. Deactivate your weapons and head towards us. If you fail to comply, you will be shot down for unlawful intrusion into Valean airspace."
James Ironwood was fully expecting the Bullhead's pilot to ignore the warning, and probably do something even more reckless after that. However to his surprise the vehicle actually powered down it's weaponry, and slowed down to a standstill.
A pleased smile found its way on the general's face. There were still logical people in this world after all.
Kieffner's POV
"A tunnel just collapsed because of the shelling. We will need to make a detour." Kieffner stated while trying to keep tab on everything that was happening through his undeads.
"Things can go worse apparently. Shit !" Said an imposing faunus before kicking the wall to his right.
"How much time will we lose because of this ?" Asked Adam as he patted the raging faunus' shoulder.
"One hour, maybe two. We should get some reinforcements along the way."
"What a mess... Well it shouldn't have a big impact on the schedule. Let's keep moving, just keep an eye out for that thing and don't wander too far." Concluded Adam as he led the way with his glowing katana.
Ruby's POV
The first thing Ruby noticed, before even opening her eyes, was how the ground was shaking beneath her. She could feel it reverberate through her bones. It never ceased. Flashes of light passed through her closed eyelids.
It was loud everywhere, yet her brain couldn't understand what those sounds meant. To her those where simply background noise that she could barely even register.
For a moment she feared that this was an heartquake, that the ground would open and shallow her whole. But that wasn't what Ruby feared the most. The last thing she remembered was pain, sadness, mourning. She couldn't open her eyes, for she feared what it would reveal to her.
Seconds passed, then minutes. The Huntress realized that she wasn't shaking because of the ground. Tears were rolling down her cheeks. She didn't know why, didn't want to know why.
Something closed around her left hand, something warm and soft.
"It's alright Ruby, you're safe here." Said Yang.
Yes, everything was alright. Yang was here, she wasn't alone. Slowly, carefully, Ruby opened her eyes. Plain grey concrete surrounded her on all side. This was a room, in building, the girl's hazy mind concluded.
She looked around her. Blake was standing next to an opening in the wall that may have been a window at some point. The faunus' ears perked up as she noticed that Ruby had awoken. The two girls' stares locked for a second, before Blake broke eye contact by lowering her glare.
Finally Ruby turned around to see the person currently holding her hand. It wasn't Yang.
"I'm sorry." Whispered Weiss as Ruby's eyes once again teared up.
Ruby slowly curled into a ball. Weiss continued patting her shoulder long after the shelling stopped.
Isaïe was confused, lost, disturbed and any other word conveying his current inability to act. The safe zone had been lost, every stronghold destroyed. Worst of all, he had even lost contact with his master. The connection wasn't there anymore. It hadn't just disappeared, it was more like it withered away, slowly eroding until it couldn't be used anymore.
There was nobody to tell him what to do. It felt strange, and he didn't quite know what to do with it. He still had to follow orders, it simply was what he was. Yet no new orders were coming, and the old ones were now... inappropriate.
He had to retreat, but there was nowhere to retreat to. What to do, what to do... He only had his protocols to work with, maybe there was something in them he could put to use.
An order to retreat meant that he had to get to the nearest safe zone with his troops. A safe zone was only one as long as there wasn't any hostile presence in it. Therefore any space without hostile presence could potentially be a safe zone. If there were indeed hostiles present, he had to evaluate whether getting rid of those was worth the potential losses and act accordingly.
The pieces were falling in place now. He had been ordered to retreat, yet nothing prevented him from fighting any enemy in the way of his retreat. Enemies were everywhere as far as he was aware, but that wasn't a problem. He just had to find a safe zone for him and his men. Fighting was allowed when following orders. He would get his brothers somewhere safe.
Kieffner's POV
"Five of my skeletons are nearby now, they should reach us in under a minute. Don't shoot first if you see something move." The necromancer explained for the rest of the group.
Adam and a few others nodded in acknowledgement, but didn't visibly react otherwise. Not that Kieffner even noticed that, as he spent most of the time with is eyes closed so as to better concentrate on his others, less natural senses. Also, walking in the dark is difficult wether your eyes are open or not.
Kieffner's focus was currently on the five undeads he had just mentioned. They were rapidly advancing along a tunnel perpendicular to the group's. Within ten seconds they should appear some distance in front of the group. Not that the ambient darkness would actually allow the living to see the dead. Adam's sword barely brought enough light to let him see where he was walking.
Kieffner suddenly furrowed his brows. One the the signals had just disappeared. Two others quickly followed. Had his body not already been dead, sweat would have started to gather on his forehead. The last skeleton managed to survive a few seconds before being destroyed too.
"Enemy ahead." Kieffner stated, firm yet not loud.
The group stopped and people pulled out their weapons. By now the monster had probably entered their tunnel, but they still couldn't see him. The opposite couldn't be said however, as Adam's blade made them an obvious target.
"It's somewhere there." Said Kieffner while pointing forward.
"You..." Started Adam while looking at the faunus right behind him, who was armed with a rifle.
"You've got fire rounds don't you ?" The masked combatant nodded.
"Perfect, then start shooting."
The man hesitated for half a second, before obeying anyway. A burning bullet left the rifle's barrel, and raced through the relatively straight tunnel. A small turn stopped the bullet's course around twenty meters in front of Adam.
The projectile exploded, showering a small area around it in flames. The whole process didn't last long, maybe three seconds between the moment the bullet left the barrel and when the last flame disappeared.
Those few seconds, however, had been enough to reveal the beast. It was vaguely human shaped, with the glaring difference that there beneath the torso other than a few threads of flesh. If you were to look at it closely, no one would be able to mistake it for an humain. It's skin was of a light grey, almost blue. The mouth was terribly disfigured, with the lower jaw seemingly dislocated and gently swaying with the head's movements. This revealed most of the interior of the monster's mouth, being open so wide as to being able to close around a man's head without difficulty. Finally, the things arms, while seemingly human at first glance, were stretched to impossible lengths. The monster did not have legs, yet it's arm were long enough to render it taller than most were it to stand up on them. Its fingers were equally thin and long, almost spidery in their look, but also clawed. In fact the fingers were so thin and bony that it was difficult to see exactly where each claw started.
The creature let out a soul-wrenching hiss at the sight of the fire, and most members of the group at to clench their heads in pain as the sound burrowed into their very soul. The monster began to slowly advance towards the group, while keeping up it's scream.
Kieffner, who was only one unimpeded by the unnatural hissing, acted to make it cease. Looking around for a moment, his glare settled upon the faunus from which the first shot had come. Without paying attention to person's suffering, the necromancer jerked the rifle out of the faunus' paralyzed hands.
He did not feel the need to aim properly, as the monster had creeped forth to the point where Adam was at reach of its long arms. This proved to be a grave mistake as when he fired the bullet simply grazed the monster's head, not even detonating anywhere near it. Nonetheless it still had the desired effect of making the beast cease its shrieking.
Adam was the first to recover, in time to see the monster throwing itself at the faunus using its elongated arms. Adam's first reflex was to instinctively leap backwards out of range of the creature, but the presence of people behind him prevented him from doing so.
There was no way to effectively block an attach from that monster with the only weapon at his disposal. Those arms provided enough reach to their claws to be able to hit anywhere. Even a shield would be of little use in this situation, as the thing would simply throw its torso against the obstacle and tear its target apart in a deadly embrace.
However the creature didn't look particularly resilient, and his blade would without a doubt be able to pierce the former's sickly skin. There was no good defense, except for a good attack.
Adam raised his sword and got into a fighting stance that had been so thoroughly drilled into him that it was pretty much second nature at this point. Left foot in front, the right one behind. Both hands holding his katana horizontally at waist height, slightly in retreat. His breathing stopped as he steadied his aim, and then he thrust the blade and his entire body forward.
The red metal made contact with the surging monster's torso, yet Adam could feel no resistance against it. Under his bewildered eyes, the blade passed through the creature like it wasn't even there. This effect, however, did not extend to Adam's body, and he brutally slammed against the monster.
The beast's gaping jaw was now dangerously close to his own face, yet he was instinctively unwilling to drop his sword and was thus unable to find the support necessary to push the ugly monster away.
It was at this moment that Kieffner intervened in his companion's favor, grabbing the creature by the neck without regard for his own safety, and throwing it back with all of his might. As the beast was recovering, Kieffner recovered the rifle with his only hand, and shot at the ground the group and the monster. Sure enough, this time the projectile exploded when it was supposed to, creating a small ball of flames between the two opposing forces.
Barely did the bullet leave the barrel that Kieffner was already giving orders.
"Run, now !"
Right on cue, those at the back of the group immediately turned around and started fleeing, soon followed by the rest. Kieffner was starting to join them, when he noticed the monster climbing up the walls on the other side of the fire, the latter of which failed to cover the entirety of the tunnel's height.
Kieffner reacted by shooting at the ceiling, but instead of the fiery explosion he only received a click out of the rifle. No ammo. Cursing under his breath, the necromancer turned heels and ran for his life.
"Go left !" He screamed at the group stumbling in the dark. The first faunus entered what looked like an alcove in the wall. A little one slipped into it too. An imposing faunus followed. This was clearly more than a simple alcove.
Someone stumbled and fell down in the dark. Kieffner's momentum carried him past the fallen. By the time he looked back, the beast was already on the poor man. Kieffner turned his eyes away from the grim spectacle of a man getting torn to shreds.
There were only three people left in the tunnel now. Adam, Kieffner, and a feline eared faunus. The monster took a few bites of its victim, before refocusing on the others. Kieffner was already beginning to enter the supposed alcove, which was in fact a some kind of passageway to a small cavern.
The creature choose this moment to attack Adam. Kieffner was unable to turn around in time, and Adam's own blade was pretty much useless. He raised it nonetheless, more out of habit than any belief in the effectiveness of the move.
At the last moment however, the remaining faunus leaped at the monster, brutally intercepting it. The creature bit off the faunus' left shoulder, decapitating the entire arm in the process. Unwilling to let himself be killed without a fight, the faunus teared the monster's neck apart with his own teeth while it was busy engorging itself with the shoulder. The monster in question didn't take kindly that its food was biting back. It quickly closed one of its hands around the faunus'neck, and, in a swift movement, snapped it.
All of this had happened relatively quickly, such that Adam was still paralyzed in shock, failing to react even as the creature dropped the fresh corpse and looked at him right in the eyes. This eye contact only broke when Kieffner brusquely grabbed Adam's arm and dragged the faunus behind him through the passageway.
The monster tried to get after them, to which Kieffner reacted by awkwardly pushing Adam before himself. When the beast entered the small tunnel, it was immediately greeted by a kick to the face.
Kieffner looked at Adam, the latter was still in the process of exiting the passageway from the other side. He still had to buy time. Now however, the beast was ready. Kieffner didn't have any other tool at his disposal however, so his hand grabbed a nearby saillant in the wall, and he resigned himself to his fate.
The monster approached, he tried to kick it, his foot handed up in the beast maw. It tried to pull the necromancer away, but the latter hold on with all his strength. He buried his other foot in the ground, and pushed back as much as he could. His bony hand struggled to maintain its grip on the smooth stone. He could see his flesh getting torn apart inside the monster's mouth. Then his hand slipped, and the beast started dragging him away.
Adam surged behind Kieffner, grabbed the latter's still extended arm, and managed to stop the beast from pulling Kieffner any further. He tried to kick the monster with his other leg, but it held firm.
"Adam, give me your sword !"
"But it won't be of any use against this thing." Replied the faunus while doing his best to keep hold of his comrade while nonetheless pulling out his sword.
"Just do it ! Please."
Adam handed the sword to the necromancer. For a few seconds Kieffner did nothing. Then, mostly out of habit, he took a deep breath, and cut off his foot.
The beast's pulling sent it sprawling back for quite some distance when all resistance ceased on the other side. Adam used this temporary respite to finally drag Kieffner out of the tunnel and into the cavern.
The monster quickly recovered, and immediately began to scramble through the tunnel as fast as it could. Thankfully, right before it reached the other end, the massive faunus of the group managed to roll a huge rock over the passageway, blocking it entirely.
Adam and Kieffner collapsed on the ground and the wall, respectively. Adam took a few seconds to catch his breath, during which he looked around himself. The cave wasn't what interested him, there was nothing really special about it after all. No, what he focused on were the other members of the group, and how few of them were left. Only four people were still there, including himself. When did things go wrong to such a point ?
"What... is this thing ?" Adam slowly whispered while gesturing at the rock blocking the exit.
To this Kieffner stood silent for about half a minute. Staring blankly at the ceiling, he appeared to be in deep thoughts. Adam, however, was pretty sure that the necromancer was just hesitating.
"I fear this may have been a Mourngul." Kieffner finally stated. Everyone looked at him with confused and worried eyes.
"I realize this must not ring any bells for you, which is probably a good thing about this world. From where I am from Mournguls are creatures of cold and hunger. Once human, their dying suffering was so strong that even after death took their mortal body, their soul refused to let go. Thus they wander the world, obsessed with fulfilling their dying desires, yet never truly able to do so."
"That's... interesting, but what do we need to do to get rid of it ?" Asked Adam, seemingly only slightly disturbed by the grim story.
"Fire, mostly. Everywhere I heard about them, it seemed to be the only effective solution. Considering how it reacted when I fired that fire dust at it, it's probably a good lead."
"There's only seven rounds left though." The faunus with the rifle noted.
"It will have to do. Unless any of you has a better idea of course." Was Adam's reply. He stared at each member of the group one by one, hoping that someone would disprove him. The two faunus failed to suggest anything, and when Kieffner's turn came, he could only offer a half hearted shrug.
"At least everyone here has an aura or something equivalent." Grumbled Adam while glaring at the necromancer.
"Anyway, let's rest here for a moment. I believe we will need the energy." Adam ordered. Everyone sat down or slumped against the walls.
"You must be hungry. Here, take this." The tallest and burliest of the group said to a young faunus girl. The girl wasn't an adult, barely even a teenager, yet she held her pistol like her life depended on it. To be honest, it probably did.
"But... isn't that our last ?" She asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
"Don't worry, I'm sure we will find more." Softly replied the masked giant.
Adam took a gulp from some alcoholic beverage in silence. Meanwhile Kieffner found it hard to relax. His link with his creations couldn't simply be turned off. Each time his eyes closed, he could see them. Small, glowing lights, floating in the distance. Sometime they called his name, spoke softly to him in a language he didn't know, yet fully understood.
"Hey boss." Called the big faunus.
"Have you ever thought about what you will do when this is all over ? I don't mean this mess..." He gestured around him. "... But in general. After the revolution, what will you do ?"
Adam stared at his soldier with a blank face for a while, before suddenly bursting out laughing.
"You know, now that I'm actually planning to say it, it sounds quite ridiculous." Adam began to say.
"The truth is, I've been wanting to write poetry for quite some time now."
At this the two grunts' mouths gaped open, and even Kieffner arched an eyebrow.
"May I ask where this desire comes from ?" Asked Kieffner.
Adam's smile slowly withered away. With his eyes now on the ground, he answered.
"You probably don't know this, but we faunus are far from being an homogeneous group. My kind live more or less everywhere, since as far as recorded history goes. We have little in common beside genetics and oppression under mankind. When we're finally free, I wish to do something to bring all those people together."
"That's... admirable, I suppose." Muttered Kieffner.
Adam scoffed upon hearing that.
"You don't need to pretend, you know. Back in Vale, what was admirable didn't seem to bother you. Your kind only cares about themselves anyway."
Silence landed upon the group.
Kieffner glared at Adam with the slightest bit of anger, while the latter had a hard time keeping up eye contact. Meanwhile the two faunus soldiers exchanged awkward glances between each other.
"I'm sorry, Kieffner. That was rude on my part."
"I mean it. You've done so much to help the White Fang, for little to nothing in return. You kept your word even when you didn't have to. I don't think you're a bad person."
Kieffner raised his palm to interrupt Adam.
"No, you were right. I choose myself over untold thousands. But I'm a necromancer, not a psychopath. I think I can recognize good from evil, even if I rarely do the former."
"I may be biased, but I believe what you are doing is good. If I can help you without bringing myself down, I will do it."
It took a while for Adam to compose his answer.
"Thank you Kieffner."
"It's nothing. We should leave now, we've been here long enough."
"Alright, you two pick up your stuff and ready your weapons." Adam ordered at the two other faunus.
"Wait !" Interrupted the muscular one while grabbing his rifle.
"You should keep this Sir Necromancer, I have my own weapon."
"You're handing a rifle to a one armed man. Are you alright ?"
"I saw you use it against that monster before, better than myself. It's probably better in your hands."
Kieffner's hand hesitated for a second, before taking the offered weapon.
"Very well. I shall use it wisely."
"It's not a legendary sword you know. Simply a mass produced gun like many others."
"Yes, but it's yours. Its user makes his weapon special just as much as the other way around."
The faunus acquiesced with a nod, after which he moved to help Adam move the rock blocking the exit. Little by little they managed to push it out of the way, and the group left the cave.
Sorry for the delay. Shit happened, but I'm sure you don't care about that. Next chapter should come out sooner hopefully.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Don't hesitate to leave a review, they're always appreciated.
Until next time.
Edit: Thanks to Kolek Blood Drinker for telling me about the lack of separation between POV. I had a bunch of "--" in my txt file, but for some reason they got deleted when I uploaded it. The problem should be fixed now.