A/N: Fair warning, these last two chapters are also the longest.
Brothers damn it! Qrow shot through the skies of Beacon as a black bird, zipping across the ruined campus fast enough to be little more than a dart. Curses filled his head just as much as fear. When Kilgharrah had charged head-first into that black hole, he went to search for Ozpin. Too late: one of the airships blinded him in a red flash. Then when he thought to investigate that? Another airship goes up in a burst of gold. But it was the third light, pure and bright, that Qrow knew all too well.
Silver eyes.
He needed to find Ruby, wherever she was, but everywhere he looked, he found nothing!
High above in the clouds, the sky rumbled, but this time with a depth only nature could provide, and as Qrow continued his futile search in the forests, the first drops of rain began to fall.
Adam awoke to cold raindrops and a simmering pain throughout his heavy body. Before his blurry sight could even settle, the awkward jabs into his joints and back, as well as the crushing pressure on his arm told him where he was: strung up on rubble. The base of Beacon Tower, no doubt. He closed his eyes, but fought off the weight trying to force him back into unconsciousness. Getting soaked to the bone would only make things worse. Adam sighed. No time to rest, then.
He tested bringing his aura up, and was met with a flash of pain as the rocks around him shifted. Unbidden, his Semblance rushed to the surface, and the rubble trapping him decayed into rose petals. As he forced himself to sit up, Adam noted two things: the first was that he must've been dazed for a few minutes, as a good chunk of his aura had replenished. Less than he'd have wished, but it was there. The second was that his Semblance didn't drain his aura. Instead, the aching in his body had faded, but only for a moment. Cinder's... energy was still gnawing away at him. Problems for later.
Wilt and Blush uncovered themselves from beneath a fading chunk of Beacon Tower's wall. With a grunt, Adam pushed himself to his feet and dragged himself to his weapon. Thankfully, they were barely scratched. His Scroll was not so lucky: he felt the pieces shifting about in his pocket already. The rain was picking up now, enough for Adam to need to shield his eyes when he peered off into the sky. Little more than shadows and flaring thrusters, the formerly Atlesian fleet was departing Beacon. High above the campus, the looming abyss now laid dormant, standing out as a void even against the black clouds. Seemed that the fight was over. As Adam gripped his weapon and began to walk from the ruined center of Beacon, he hoped his battle was over, as well. All that was left was to find the others, and the closest would be Yang.
Above Adam, a lone raven flew, nigh-invisible against the clouds.
Across from him, in a ravaged building, Emerald watched from a broken window, tears masked by rain. Mercury waited beside her.
The rain came down harder.
End of an Era
Beacon was gone. What little was left of shredded buildings and roads pockmarked with bullets were abandoned. Not even the Grimm lurked the alleyways any longer, either swept into Amity's grave or having simply marched off to find prey. In the emptiness that followed, Yang almost wished she was back in a cramped cell. At least then, she could pretend that there was something beyond the walls. Making her way through silent streets, Yang assumed that she must've activated her Semblance before the impact: she still had some of her aura left, but not a lot. She'd care more if there was anything around, but the Grimm were gone, the only drones she found were in pieces, and Cinder...
Yang looked back at Beacon Tower. Still smoking, only half of it remained standing. Surely, Cinder was gone. She checked another road only to find it turned to a still pool of black tar. Yang grimaced and was turning to the dormant Grimm abyss it probably came from, when she heard something in the distance. Falling rocks. Metal against metal. When she turned, she caught a flash of white hair in the distance.
"Weiss, over here!" she called, and quickly followed.
Adam was skulking through the ruins when he heard her. His eyes widened, but he didn't call out. He couldn't risk either of Cinder's minions finding them alone. Instead, he climbed atop one of the buildings and made his way across ruined rooftops towards Yang's voice. Above, the rain was turning into a downpour, but he didn't care. He needed to find them. One of them. Someone. The cold was just as much rain seeping through his jacket as it was from worry chilling his bone. His vision grew obscured, but lightning flashed in the distance, illuminating his target: Beacon's old cafeteria.
"Weiss? Rubes?" Yang shouted through the rumble of thunder as she took refuge in the cafeteria. The walls were full of holes and the burgeoning storm still made its way through the many shattered windows, but it was better than nothing. She tried to ignore the scent of blood lurking beneath the rain. Pretended that the masses beneath tables were shadows and tricks of the mind.
"Either of you two..." But she couldn't ignore the white and red in the building's center.
Weiss and Ruby lay side by side, huddled and still. The red spreading out from beneath them was not from Ruby's cloak alone. Emerald was propped up against an overturned table beside them, gaze blank, one hand over a stomach oozing crimson, the other wrapped tight around a still-smoking pistol. The world slipped through Yang's fingers like sand. The rain's hiss became static. The breeze alone was almost enough to push her aside.
"Admiring my handiwork?"
Mercury stood with his back to Adam in the center of the cafeteria. Even as Mercury spoke to him, he didn't look back, instead watching the open entrance.
At first, no response came from Adam. All of his attention was focused on the two bodies. The two dead, and only one of their assailants having met the same fate. No. This was a trick. It must've been a trick. An illusion. Falsehood! Emerald wasn't dead. No, no, she had to be around here somewhere, waiting to strike him when she thought him most vulnerable. But the blade never fell. The shot never rang out. Seconds ticked on in cold, frozen silence until, Mercury finally turned only enough to look over his shoulder.
"I was hoping you'd have been here too, but better late than never."
Mercury's legs were working just fine. That wasn't right: he'd damaged them on Amity. He couldn't have fought. Couldn't be standing. But Adam could not pull his eyes away from Ruby and Weiss. It was an impossibility. He couldn't fall for this, damn it!
"Don't worry, though." Mercury turned back and strolled towards his fallen friends. He nudged Ruby's head with his boot, and pain flared in Adam's core, too hot to bear. Adam could hear the cheshire grin in Mercury's voice. "I can tell you their last words, if you want."
Adam's eyes widened, and then all he saw was red.
Just a little longer. Beside one of the many shattered windows of the cafeteria, emerald-green aura crackled bright enough to easily be seen, but her targets would never even glance in her direction now. Emerald held a hand up to Mercury, a vicious grin on her face. Just a little longer.
Twin lights burned to life, one of crimson, one of gold. Twin cries of anguish and rage echoed out. There. Revenge so close, Emerald could taste it. Adam and Yang flung themselves forward, towards a target that only existed in their own minds. Towards one another. The impact reduced what few windows were left to dust and warped the very wall Emerald leaned against. If they hadn't slaughtered each other, then she and Mercury would finish the job. Cruel, yet well-deserved.
But rather than the sight of satisfaction and vengeance, Emerald peered out to find a new woman standing there. Her crimson sword held Adam's own in place. Her sheath was turned back to catch Yang's punch. Emerald was from Mistral. She knew who this was the moment she saw the intricate Grimm mask and small headdress of feathers fading into her stark black hair.
Before the shock could hit them, Raven Branwen suddenly twisted, flung Yang into Adam, and in an instant had sheathed and drawn her sword, blasting them both through the building's opposite wall. Emerald's gaze followed the two out. Was this some kind of dark fortune? Another ally? She'd heard veiled mentions of some kind of attack involving her on Beacon's comms, but—
"Em!" Mercury shoved her out of the way, and a split-second later, a razor-thin line of crimson aura sliced out where her head once was. Raven was already behind Mercury before she hit the ground. He didn't even have the time to pull his arm back.
Emerald forced the shock from her mind and focused every last bit of aura she had onto Raven's own. Her next slash, visible only as a warp in the rain, snapped out above Mercury's head. Mercury dove to Emerald's side, and in that time she'd swung twice more. Her mask suddenly turned down to where they were, and Emerald's blood froze in her veins. She couldn't keep up with the attacks. She couldn't update the illusion fast enough.
But she didn't need to say that they didn't stand a chance: Mercury had snatched her wrist and fired his boots to leap away into the stormy night before she could utter a word. And yet, even as Emerald kept her hallucinations locked onto Raven, she could feel the bandit leader's gaze following them, long after she was out of view.
Laying on one of Beacon's cracked pavilions, Adam coughed and heaved from the impact. Yang laid in front of him, out cold, aura crackling and lingering as little more than a golden haze around her. She took the brunt of the strike.
What just happened? No. He knew what just happened. The question was why?
Shakily, Adam pushed himself to his feet and turned his gaze up. Raven waited ahead of him in the storm. Her fingers tapped against the hilt of her odachi. Then, she removed her mask. Her face betrayed no emotion.
"Last chance, Adam," she called over the rain. "You've seen what you're up against. There is no victory down this route."
Adam scoffed. "This defeat is all the more reason to fight against Salem." He swung his arm towards the ruins around them. "In what world do you expect me to sit by and watch this happen again!"
"It'll happen again whether or not you are there to try and stop it, boy. Would you really think this was all worth it if your friends fell here? What would they have died for, Adam? What would you have died for?"
Pain and anger flared up once more within Adam. "I would have died protecting something. That's what matters."
Raven rolled her eyes. "Spoken like a true Huntsman." She spat the title. "Ozpin's gotten better at poisoning minds, I see. It took him three years to have Qrow spouting such nonsense."
"You must not've been paying attention if you think that's anything new for me."
She slowly twirled the mask that inspired him in her hand, the faintest hint of amusement in her voice. "Fair. You were always blindly optimistic. Tell me, where did that get your White Fang?"
Adam jabbed a thumb back towards the storm. "Last time I checked, they're the ones with the fleet."
"And last time I checked, that was under your lieutenant, not you." When Adam sneered, Raven only smirked. "You're blind, but you aren't a fool, Adam. You can speak your flowery words all you want, but if you didn't care about people dying pointlessly as long as it was for a cause, you wouldn't have let the Breach happen."
He clenched his fist. "It's easy to talk from the outside! We almost prevented this!"
"You made it worse!" Thunder crashed behind her words. She didn't even let the insult sink in before marching closer. "My Semblance isn't just those portals, Adam, it's to see the misfortune of those I can create portals to. Not just my own, but for any who are on the other side. I knew before you stepped foot off of that train what would happen to Beacon. What would happen to you and to Yang. And every step you took made that misfortune stronger."
It was just a trick to get under his skin, surely. Raven was trying to strike at his will and shift the fault. Her having to swing so low, however, only strengthened his determination. "Don't shift the blame to me, Raven. You are the one who didn't tell anyone."
She scowled, anger lighting up in her eyes. "I did! I still am! And not a single one of you listen!"
"Then why stick around!"
For a moment, Adam thought he saw a flicker of pain in Raven's eyes, only for it to be swallowed back up into anger. "To keep you idiots from getting killed!" The two only stared one another down. Yet, something occurred to him.
"You said you can 'see misfortune'. That's how you keep showing up right when you're needed." His fists were balled up tight enough to hurt through his gloves. "You can change it, can't you?"
He was met with silence.
"You know you can change it! All these things are only inevitable because you allow it!" Adam shouted. "Why here? Why interfere now yet let Beacon fall!"
Raven matched his furious gaze, but after a second, let her own fall to Yang. The fire in her eyes was extinguished in a flash. "You're... different." Yet the embers of frustration remained. "She's different. It's worth..." As if remembering who she was talking to, Raven suddenly straightened herself and steeled her tone. "It's something I can change."
"Then help us, Raven." He narrowed his eyes. "Because if you're going to keep trying to convince me to abandon everyone to their fate, you're wasting your time."
Aura flickered from how tightly Raven gripped her hilt. Though her scowl returned in full, even through the rain, Adam could tell that a plea stood at the tip of her tongue. Then, it vanished, and Raven stood straight, her stoicism reformed.
"Fine. Remain in this futile war." Raven slashed open a portal with enough force to send a cloud of mist whipping aside. Rather than leave, however, Raven walked closer.
Adam's hand drifted towards Wilt. "What are you doing?"
"Taking Yang with me," Raven said simply.
He scoffed. "Like hell you are."
Raven raised an eyebrow, an aloof smirk on her face. "Oh? You think you can tell me what I can do with my daughter?"
"The daughter you abandoned?" That smirk vanished, replaced with a snarl. "Don't make me laugh!"
"It was for her own good, boy, but Ozpin dug his claws into you two anyway. I've made my choice."
Adam stepped in front of Yang. "Then let your daughter make hers."
"And let her die making the same mistake you are? Maybe you really are a fool, after all." She chuckled, dry and mirthless. "Ironic, isn't it? You speak of me abandoning her, but when I step up, here you are telling me to leave."
"Last time I checked, I asked you to help."
Raven smiled. "And I am." Her expression fell to an annoyed disinterest. "Now, move."
Adam couldn't help but notice the parallel to his past. On the brink of total exhaustion, standing amidst ruins, power and pain in equal measure coursing through his veins after seeing just how miserable this world could get, and here comes Raven Branwen, arriving just to push him that much further down. The only difference was that when he was younger, it was amidst a village set aflame. This time, he was in a drowning ruin. But with that came a glimmer of hope. It might've been surprise before, but it was the only time he scored a victory against his mentor. This time, all he needed to do was hold the line until Yang recovered.
Raven took another step forward. Adam clicked Wilt free from its sheath, and he caught surprise on her face. She was close enough now for him to notice her gaze darken. A glint of white from a scowl large enough to show teeth. The flicker of pain and frustration in her eyes. Raven placed her mask back on, but it didn't leave her laugh sounding any less forced.
"Don't make me do this the hard way, Adam."
Adam widened his stance. "You took the words right out of my mouth."
Lightning flashed, and the two clashed blades.
Sheer force left Adam's boots tearing grooves into stone as easily as dirt, stopping only when his heel was a hair away from Yang. His hand already ached. He couldn't afford to look back at her condition. Adam only knew he needed to get the fight away from her. Adam snapped Blush up and fired, but Raven was gone in an instant. He ducked under a swing from behind not seen but felt by the incoming spray of mist, then turned and threw himself back in time to deflect the next. Each of Raven's swings were hard enough to blast the rain from them both, but as long as he kept her at a distance and didn't take the full brunt, he could concede ground.
A fighting retreat, just a little further away from Yang. He didn't need to win. He needed time!
A step to the side, and a wave of air pressure carved a clean line across the pavilion. A leap back, and a multitude of slashes scratched down the road like claws of a beast. Raven shot forward, and Adam only realized his mistake when his feet were already off the ground: he couldn't dodge in the air. Raven drove her foot into Adam's stomach, rain scattered, and in the next moment he'd been blown through a chunk of concrete. He was surrounded by rubble. Back where he started, then, near the CCT.
Raven strolled through the dust left behind. "You'll learn this lesson one way or another."
As Adam rose to his feet, he held back a smile. She was focused on him.
Raven crouched down. The sheath at her hip spun. Adam caught a flicker of gold and slid to his left before she'd even moved. It was barely enough: Raven was at his side, and a blur of yellow passed so close to him that sparks leapt across to his coat. Her blade paused at the height of her swing. She was open! Yet when he swung to counter, she slammed his strike aside in an instant. She weaved around shots from Blush. An aura clone formed in the blink of an eye to deflect Raven's strike from his side, opening her up for a wild stab from Adam. Raven was too quick: she'd already spun the other way to slap it aside.
There was no room for thought. No space for him to blink. Adam sheathed Wilt and lashed out without pause. Blade met blade thrice in a flash. Attacks bled into defense, dodges indiscernible from getting momentum for the next strike. Each strike parried or blocked flowed into the next. No motion was wasted. It was a twisted dance just as much as it was a fight, the clash of steel and gunshot the melody until, finally, in a moment so brief Adam could have imagined it, he spotted a chance. With a shout of rage and heavy swing, Adam sent Raven's sword spiraling from her hand.
It was imagined.
Without hesitation, Raven caught it an inch before it would have been out of reach and slammed the hilt into Adam's stomach, sending him skidding away across wet pavement.
Rain scattered into the skies from a war fought in only a moment came crashing down around Raven. Adam nearly buckled to his knees, but not from the attack. No, the wave of pain threatening to consume him whole was from his own Semblance, charged so high in an instant, yet only giving that residual corruption from Cinder a path to dig itself even deeper. Even in death(he prayed), Cinder mocked him.
As did Raven, waving him closer with a finger. "Where is all of that confidence, now? You think you can beat Salem when you can't even scratch me—"
Red rippled through the air like lightning. Wilted petals kicked up lazily turned in the air. Adam kneeled far behind Raven, blade swept out at his side, aura crackling across it. Raven already had drawn her sword. Not a scratch lay on her. Raven scoffed, another taunt already on her lips.
Adam turned and tossed down the headdress he'd just sliced free.
Raven did not speak for a moment, but pale, red aura gathered along her sword, only to drip away and fade into the faint shape of feathers. A single swing, a single wave of air pressure, and Adam was sent crashing through a dorm, ground ripped to shreds in his wake. He rolled aside just before Raven was before him again, cleaving the room in two as if it were paper. It was only as Adam swung Wilt and the clash of their blades rotted the room around them that he realized his Semblance had rushed out without his command. Was it just too much energy for it to hold? Instinct telling him it was necessary to hold her back? Cinder's corruption?
The pressure against Wilt faded for a fraction, and Adam had already launched himself back out into the storm and across Beacon's main road in a single step. Raven chased behind. No matter the reason for why it arose, Adam was thankful: every slash he made left clean lines through the road and sliced trees in half, but every twitch of Raven's sword the rain rippling far into the distance. The crash of those shockwaves reducing another building to rubble echoed over the thunder.
Adam halted so abruptly that rain exploded out from the force alone. An aura clone lunged forward for Raven, yet she flipped overhead. Without hesitation, Adam fired almost every shot in Blush, Semblance turning them to crimson streaks in the sky. You can't dodge in the air.
Raven didn't need to: her sword flickered, tracked easier by the mist it left in its wake. Every bullet was struck from the air. She landed in a crossroad he'd walked through all too often. Just beyond the entrance to Beacon itself, beside the auditorium every student began in. Adam blinked. Raven was gone.
In the next blink, he'd sprung to the side and watched lines of red, thin as thread, traced themselves in the air. In the third, another section of Beacon was reduced to dust by countless slashes. Adam rolled to his feet, expecting a counter, but none came. There was nothing but him and the rain... no. That was a lie. Through the storm, he could feel Raven out there, spot the warp in the air, the mist in the storm. Raven, rushing around with speed he couldn't match. Power he couldn't reach. In defiance, his Semblance burned brighter, lighting the way in bloody-red bolts.
Adam understood, now. Why his Semblance demanded to be released. He should've known this was futile. He should've felt outmatched. Felt hopeless. Despair.
Yet in the face of this overwhelming power, all Adam could feel was fury.
"We were so CLOSE!" He lashed out with a wave of wild aura that turned rain to steam for meters ahead. Briefly, he saw Raven, sword raised to block it. Then, he watched himself fly towards her. Watched himself stab Wilt forward as less a blade and more a beam of red light. Watched eyes the same color widen behind Raven's mask.
Wilt met air. She was gone, but the rain betrayed her: a trail of mist marked her path in that instant. Adam slashed down to his side as Raven swung for his head. Her blade was reduced to rose petals. The road earned yet another scar.
"We could have won if we had just a little more!" Adam roared. He brought down Wilt time and time again, but Raven kept her calm and her defense. Every blade destroyed was replaced in the next moment.
"More power!" Some sent jolts rippling through him. "More allies!" Others turned the pelting of rain to icy shrapnel. "YOU!" He sheathed his blade, and his Semblance concentrated down to a single point. Immediately, he was surrounded by circling shadows: Raven's own clones of aura. Adam took the easy way out: he stormed ahead to force her back.
Being met only with the crashing of rain added more fuel to the fire.
"I cannot understand you!" The slightest movement out of the corner of his eye, and Adam sent his Semblance to hunt it down. Trees were ripped from their roots before they were reduced to wilting petals. Brick and pillar were reduced to dust. "Why let this happen!" His Semblance faltered, and the world slipped away from him. Pain and rage receded, yet underneath was only numbness and the call of unconsciousness.
Adam pushed through. He stabbed Wilt into the ground and forced himself to stay standing until his Semblance returned ever stronger.
And Raven watched him, impassive. The top right of her mask was gone, chipping away into wilting petals. "Don't blame me for your own failings, Adam. I won't help you in a futile war."
At that, Adam laughed. It was mirthless. Cruel. But it was enough for him to throw his head back. "Futile! Futile, she says!" He waved to the ruins around him. To shattered structures and memories. "Beacon is gone, but so is Cinder! Her minions? Fleeing! The White Fang? Watching her die and marching away! Even that... thing in the skies." He pointed Wilt. Even in the darkness of the storm, the abyss could still be seen, standing out against the black. "Is now dormant. Futile?" Adam grabbed at his chest. "It's futile because you stand there! It's futile because you watched!"
With her mask partially broken, Adam could see Raven's eye narrow. Her brow furrowed in disdain. He didn't care. That anger—that frustration—only burned brighter.
"You gave me the strength I have. 'Might is everything. The strong live. The weak die,' " he recited. "But we would've been plenty strong enough if you just stepped up!" Adam raised Blush. He ignored the tremble in his arm and the dying light of his Semblance. "So answer me, damn it!" he screamed, eyes wide and frantic. "Why do you stand by and do nothing! What are you so afraid of!"
Raindrops paused in their descent. Half of Blush slid away. Raven was in front of him, an icy-blue blade drawn. Her eye glowed in fury... no. No, it was truly glowing. He knew that light! The same as—
Raven's sword punched through his chest. Memories crashed down on him at a speed only thought could accomplish. Nora. Recovering from a stab wound. Recovering from the Ice Dust from within. Adam sent the dredges of his Semblance to the most unlikely place: his own wound. The blade shattered into wilting petals. They'd barely come apart before, in a rush of aura, most were frozen... but he was safe.
As safe as he could be, falling onto his back and clutching at his wound. Adam refused to give her the satisfaction of hearing his pain. Instead, with gritted teeth, as his aura tried to stitch him back together, he focused his hate-filled gaze onto Raven as she approached.
"Winning once isn't enough," she spat. "All I'd have done is give you false hope." Raven didn't bother sheathing her blade, reduced to little more than its hilt. There was no denying it now: he'd lost.
"Salem is more than you could ever imagine, child. There is no victory against her. Only meaningless sacrifice." His hatred was reflected in her lone, visible eye. "And your team was never meant to be one."
Yet if anything, his glare grew worse. "The world's full of so-called 'impossible tasks', Chief Branwen. If that dissuaded me, I'd have never joined the White Fang in the first place."
Raven scoffed. "Incomparable." She jammed the hilt back into its sheath. "And if I had it my way, it'd remain so."
Adam managed a dry chuckle. All he could hope for is that Yang managed to escape in the chaos. "To think that the one who granted me such strength... would have such a weak will." He laid his head back, scowling. "You disappoint me, Raven."
Raven flinched, but it was gone so quickly, Adam wondered if he imagined it. She raised her heel over his head. Then, there was a flash of white.
A bomb rocked Beacon's main road, ravaging what little was left. Most who took such force directly to the head would've perished on the spot. Raven, however, was merely sent flying. She flipped back to her feet, skidding across wet pavement. Even having recovered, she stumbled. Raven felt only pain and a telling, hot numbness across the right side of her face. Her mask had been reduced to scrap. Her right eye, gone in a flash from a strike so concentrated that it crashed through her aura through brute force. But her left still beheld the concentrated, white flames still coiling around the fist of her attacker.
Her own daughter.
But such misfortune did not come to pass.
"You disappoint me, Raven."
Raven pulled her foot back, turned and swung her last ice blade out to her side. A wall of ice stories high burst from the ground. It existed only for a split second before Yang crashed into it with all her might and turned it into little more than an explosion of steam from sheer heat. Even blocked, the force was enough to send Raven sliding back.
"Shoot!" Adam's voice in the mist.
Gunfire rang out. Raven twirled her blade fast enough to twist the newly formed fog bank around her... but no shots came. Suddenly, a shadow launched itself forward and was struck down in a single slash: a spotty aura clone from Adam. Raven scoffed as she heard another gunshot in the distance. A red light was rapidly making its way towards her left. Against anyone else, that might've been quick enough to distract her. But to her, the wounded Adam was moving in slow motion.
She turned. A shadow blurred past her out of the corner of her eye. A tug at the belt holding her heavy sheath, only for it to give way. Then it was gone, her sheath stolen right from her. Aura piercing used for something so minuscule—
Raven had watched Team Rua from a distance for a while.
Yang didn't know aura piercing.
What was that red light?
Another gunshot, a flash of gold, then piercing pain. That momentary distraction was all it took for Yang to have thrown herself through her guard, her Semblance still charged. Wilt pierced through her stomach, crackling with Adam and Yang's aura both.
Raven stared down in shock, but could not even see Yang's eyes through blonde hair that rippled like fire.
Clever little bastards. She was almost proud.
But such misfortune did not come to pass.
A wall of ice stories high burst from the ground. It existed only for a split second before Yang crashed into it with all her might and turned it into little more than an explosion of mist from sheer heat. Even blocked, the force was enough to send Raven sliding back.
"Shoot!"
She bolted straight ahead through the mist before the gunshots started. They were never aimed for her: they were for Adam to charge his Semblance and hand it off to her daughter. Raven wished she could've seen the look of shock on their faces when she interrupted their trick, but she had to make due with shadows diving away from her slash. They didn't know that these one-time tricks were little more than losses of aura due to her Semblance, but Raven knew she couldn't keep toying with them forever.
So she started with Yang: without their trick, she'd kept her Semblance up, and the glow of her hair was a dead give away. A single swing was enough to blow through her daughter's weak guard, a single crack of the hilt to her chin enough to shatter her barely recovered aura. Crimson light danced all around her, but Raven paid Adam's attempts to distract her no mind. Yang dropped to her knees. Satisfied, Raven turned and sheathed her sword. Just one more.
Yang tackled her. Without aura, it was barely enough to budge Raven, but it got her attention. Frustration shone bright in her eyes. Imbecile! She'd get herself killed doing tha—
Agony ripped through her back as Adam cleaved down from shoulder to side, his Semblance leaving a ragged wound behind. Her left arm hung limp. Pain overwhelmed thought. In the blink of an eye, Raven twisted as if Yang were weightless and slashed out with enough power to blast the fog away. Ice clawed up the auditorium, surrounding a scar ripped clean through to the other side. Adam collapsed to the ground, cut cleanly in half—NO!
But such misfortune did not
"ENOUGH!"
With Raven's voice came a shockwave ripping away mist, wind and rain alike. Adam and Yang didn't have even a second to start their improvised plan: they were bowled over as though slapped aside by the hand of the Brothers themselves. Adam was quick to his feet, but Yang struggled from the surprise. A second shockwave rippled out: Raven coming down like a meteor onto Yang, foot driving her into a crater and demolishing her aura in an instant.
He didn't even see her move.
Countless thoughts hit Adam at once: what brought this sudden power on? Why did she have the flames of a Maiden roiling in her eye? Why focus on Yang? Why toy with them at all when she could do this?
It was halfway through those thoughts that he recognized his aura was already cut through, shattered in a single swing. Without his Semblance to support him, his body refused to respond any longer. Adam collapsed to one knee. Wilt clattered to the ground. He kept himself from falling completely, but any attempt to stand just sent fire through his nerves.
Raven stood with her head lowered and blade already sheathed. Her fingers tapped incessantly against the hilt, and her shoulders rose and fell with each deep, heaving breath. Then, she snatched up Yang. The shock of losing her aura left her only able to weakly squirm as she was put over Raven's shoulder. There was no way Yang could resist. There was no real way either of them could've resisted. Neither now nor before.
Raven slashed a portal open.
It was futile. Of course it was. She was a Maiden. Cinder had the same power, and it took almost every trick they had and Cinder's own arrogant to make it remotely equal. And yet, Adam knew that if Raven stepped through that portal, she and Yang would be gone. This time, no doubt for good. Weakness dug claws into every muscle. Adam could barely see through hair matted down by the storm. Even thinking of moving left his body burning in protest. But he could find Wilt. He could force himself to stand.
Red light seeped through him, spotty and worn: aura not meant to be accessed, carried through channels not meant to be opened in the first place. Old scars.
Adam didn't know what he was trying to accomplish this time, stumbling forward with Wilt raised in trembling hands, drenched to the bone with only anger and willpower to carry him on. Was he trying to follow her? Stop her? Convince her to stay yet again? Was this for Yang? Was he selfish? Was he doing what he should've done the first time he turned his back on her?
He heard himself shout her name.
Raven stopped, her back to him. "You don't give up, do you?" she said quietly. She looked back. For only a moment, Adam thought he saw pain in her lone, uncovered eye.
Only barely, above the crashing of rain, Adam heard: "I'm so sorry."
"But you'll thank me for this, one day."
A flicker of red and rush of freezing white, and the upper half of Wilt clattered to the ground. Raven had turned in the blink of an eye, but a pillar of ice had swallowed up Raven's arm to her shoulder. Raven's blade, drawn in an instant, had halted with its tip digging in not even an inch away from the corner of his eye.
Adam didn't even feel Wilt break.
Weiss had faced anger before. She'd hidden from the rampaging fury of her father seeking a target and lowered her head to the oppressive chill of her mother's agitation. She had faced killers before. Stood against the White Fang. Raised her blade to Cinder. Even the man she'd just saved had once looked upon her with the same intent to kill.
The woman in front of her was one she'd seen many times in her studies. Raven Branwen. Top of the scale. Untouchable. But impossible challenges were something that Weiss had faced many times on this night alone. And yet, in that second, though Raven's glare over her frozen shoulder was only a glint of red in the pouring rain, a single thought settled—no, was forced onto—Weiss' mind.
She was going to die.
Weiss clutched Ruby, still unconscious, closer to her. Her legs refused to move. With both her arms occupied, Weiss couldn't change the Dust in Myrtenaster. She could only draw up ice, but now that Raven was expecting it...
Raven Branwen said nothing. Pressure built in the air. Raindrops halted their fall. The air tinged crimson. The ice around Raven's arm was vaporized by her aura alone.
"Raven!"
Someone crashed into the ground in front of her. Red cloak. Black hair. Ruby's uncle! His greatsword had been turned into a scythe larger than Crescent Rose, leveled at Raven.
"What the hell are you doing!" Fury and desperation laced his cry, but Weiss could not see his face.
And yet in the face of it, Raven didn't respond. She kept her blade leveled at Adam's head, leaving him at her mercy, locked in place.
Raven swept her sword down, and a scream trapped itself in Weiss' throat. However, rather than seeing her partner's life end, a whirling mass of crimson and black enveloped him. What it meant, Weiss didn't know, but Qrow cursing under his breath and straightening up surely meant it was nothing good. Qrow threw himself forward with enough force to nearly knock Weiss onto her back, but by the time he'd reached them, Raven had leaped into the energy, Yang across her other shoulder.
The portal dissipated just as Qrow's hand reached it. Then they were gone. The only thing left behind was a devastated road and the broken half of Wilt.
Adam and Yang weren't dead. As Qrow shouted for Raven with only the storm as his answer, Weiss sank to her knees. They weren't dead. She clung to that thought, because the reality of half of her team simply being gone was barely any better. Weiss wasn't sure how long she was left with only that as company, clinging Ruby ever closer, trembling in the rain. At some point, however, she looked up to find Qrow standing over the two, scythe limply hanging at his side. He watched them with tired eyes.
"I..." Qrow closed his eyes and sighed. "Let's get you kids somewhere safe, alright?"
One question lingered in Weiss' mind, even as she nodded to him.
What happens now?