A/N: Team PASM and CPER are making their way through the dangers to protect a broken-down village fleeing. Just when they think they are out of danger, they'll have to face Grimms and Assassins and Spies...Oh my, I feel like I just subconsciously did something familiar from a tale that RWBY is partly based upon.
Chapter 16: Grimms and Assassins and Spies
The Beowolf howls as the other Grimm charges. Huntsmen and Huntresses ready themselves for battle.
Day 2 of the Huntsmen mission. After crossing the river yesterday, the Grimm attacks became fewer. Winter wake up this morning with her energy returned, through Clover suggested that she should take it easy. If only she'd listen, for Winter is fighting with all her skill and agility against the Grimm they face.
Ernest stands against a horde of Beowolfs. He plants his feet on the ground and positions himself to hold against something. the Beowolfs leap onto him and...CRASH! They slam just an inch away from him as if they hit a wall. Clawida leaps in the air towards the Beowolfs, she lets out a yell as she descends on them and strikes them down.
Clawida cheers as the Grimm are defeated. "Yea! that was Paw-some!" Clawida raises a hand, Earnest smiles and raises his hand to hers, the two of them doing a high five.
Patrick is going head to head against a Beowolf. The Beowolf swipes its claws at him, Patrick dodges the first two then blocks the third with his swords. The two of them hold each other in place. In the hold, Patrick activates his leg bracers with Fire Dust. He repels the Grimm's attack and delivers an explosive kick right on the Beowolfs torso, sending it flying and dissolving in midair.
Winter is surrounded by the Beowolfs and miniature Deathstalkers. She plants her weapon to the ground, using her Glyph to summon a swarm of Nevermores. The Nevermores peck off against the enemy Grimm, distracting the monsters as they swipe at them like a bunch of flies. Winter slashes at them with her sword until they have fallen.
Just when Winter is about to relax, two Beowolfs still remain and they ready their attack on her. Winter braces herself for combat. Much to her surprise, another Beowolf comes in and starts attacking the other two. Once the charmed Beowolf defeats the two Grimms, Winter looks past it and noticed Selena is not far from the Beowolf, and she appears to be singing. That's when Winter realizes she's using her Siren Semblance.
With the Grimm defeated, the Huntsman and Huntresses continue onward. The area they are in is mostly a wide-open field. Not so easily ambushed and there isn't much Grimm roaming around. Everyone is able to make a greater distance than the first day. Even though it's easygoing at this point, Patrick can't let his guard down. Winter's the same, but it's mostly towards him she can't drop her guard.
By Afternoon, the team arrived at a forest. "If we make it past these woods, we'll have arrived at our destination," Anna says.
Clover and Winter stand in front of their students. "I'm sure you all already know, but the woods is a dangerous place. Ambushes are most likely to happen. Everyone stay sharp."
In their usual formation, they all head into the woods. Everyone remains on guard and all the citizens stay quiet and safe within the Caravans.
The whole time, Winter just focuses her attention on Patrick, instead of keeping an eye for any Grimms or other ambushes. Peter is pretty much the same. While he is starting at Winter, it's for a different reason than his own Perverted nature.
"Hey, have you noticed Winter is always giving Patrick the stink eye?" Peter asks Earnest.
Earnest turns his attention to Peter. 'WE SHOULD BE FOCUSING ON LOOKING OUT FOR ATTACKS.'
"You know I don't understand what you're saying with your hands," Peter says. Earnest lets out an exhale through his nose while rolling his eyes. Wishing it was Rayla he had been paired with.
Akira and Clover walked on the frontline. Akira's Fox Ear twitches, it draws her attention. Akira raises a hand as she stops, and Clover and the rest of the Caravan come to a halt. Clover turns his attention to Akira, who is slowly positioning herself to her fighting stands with a hand on the hilt of her sheathed Katana.
Just as she's on alert, everyone else does the same. Even Clawdia can sense the same thing Akira is picking up.
"Second Sword Form..." There's a quiet pause. Afterward, arrows come flying in at great speed. The second Akira senses their arrival... "Heat Slash!" she unsheathes her Katana in the direction of the arrows, unleashing a wave of fire that cuts like a slice of wind., splitting the arrows in half. "Show yourselves," Akira demands.
By her demand, the attackers come out of hiding, surrounding the entire party.
Assassins. Not just any assassins, and Patrick is silently astonished to see them. "Branwen Tribe."
The leader of the Assassins, the Masked Assassin, walks towards their pray. He muffles laughs. "Hurtsen and Huntrisis. Praypor to eat oar doom!"
The Mask Assassin expected them to feel threatened and scared. But instead, they're just confused. "What?" Akira asks.
"Oar DOOOOOM!" The Masked Assassin says, louder but still unclear.
"Anyone knows what he's saying?" Akira asks.
"I'm not sure, his audio speech is unclear," Rayla says.
"I think he said something about a broom." Peter says.
The Masked Assassin growls in frustration and turns to the rest of the tribe. "Ahtock the Hurtsen!" But none of them understood him. "Ahtock! The! Hurtsen!"
The assassins exchanged looks at each other. "What did he say?"
"I don't know, I never understood him."
"I think he's saying he wants us to attack."
"Let's just attack anyways."
The Assassins charges. "Defend the Caravan!" Winter shouts. And the Huntsman and Huntresses counter charges against the Assassins.
The Assassins fight with all their skill but are outmatched even 3 to 1. Marlene, however, becomes outmatched when she was fighting off against only two assassins. They have her knocked down, and ready to strike the blow, until Akira gives them a taste of her Second Sword Form: Heat Slash, knocking them away in the wave of fire.
With them defeated, Akira offers Marlene her hand and helps her stand up. The other Huntsman and Huntresses have no trouble facing off against their opponents.
However, as Patrick defeated them, he is greeted with the Masked Assassin. "Shado Hoarder! It's dime to kneel some baine!"
Patrick keeps his expression serious but his eyebrows are raised in confusion. "You...want to steal my brain?"
The Masked Assassin grows as he draws out his swords. The Masked Assassin suddenly vanishes. Patrick is on alert. He slowly moves his steps, looking all around his surroundings, bracing for an ambush. The Masked Assassin reappears behind him and strikes him. Patrick does a 180-degree swing...only to hit nothing but air. The Masked Assassin once again reappears and strikes him from behind. Patrick counter-attacks but fails as the Masked Assassin vanishes again.
This whole thing repeats over and over until Patrick finds himself exhausted. "Oh that's right, I forgot. Your Semblance is Teleportation." The Masked Assassin laughs and vanishes. Patrick smirks. "You're not the only one with an advantage." He takes out several Dust Crystals and smashes them to the ground. A heavy fog appears from the Steam Dust. Patrick then turns on the Lightning Dust on his Bracers then activates his Heat Vision. He searches around, he sees tons of body heat in the fog but none that belongs to the Masked Assassin. Peters is a close match but he can tell it's not his target. As much as he wants to hurt him while nobody can witness it, he has to focus on his real enemy: The Masked Assassin.
Patrick finds the right Body Heat that belongs to the Masked Assassin and ambushes it. The Masked Assassin vanishes and Patrick superspeeds away from his current location. When the Masked Assassin reappears Patrick spots him and attacks once again. The whole thing repeats over and over until the Masked Assassin falls on his knees.
When the fog lifts, the Masked Assassin sees the Branwen Tribe have either fallen or fleed. He as one of his swords pointed at him, and then Winter and Clover has him surrounded. The Masked Assassin growls in frustration as he slams his fist to the ground.
"Yo avit seen the lass of me!" The Masked Assassin then vanishes.
Once he's gone, everyone sheathers their weapons. "There's no mistaking it. That was the Masked Assassin." Winter says.
"Who?" Selena asks, feeling nervous.
"I think I read about him from the Atlesian Records," Marlene says. "A criminal assassin who wears a mask with a reputation of defeating his targets by hitting them before they can even see him."
"Indeed. The other Ace Ops and I have had our encounterments with him." Clover says. "His reputation happened cause of his Semblance. Even at our best, we can hardly land any hits on him." Clover turns to Patrick with a smile. "That was actually quite an impressive strategy you pulled on him." Clover looks past Patrick to Winter. "Right, Commander?"
Winter doesn't say anything, only sneers at Patrick then hmphs as she looks away crossing her arms. "Let's get moving." He walks away.
"I think she's warming up to you," Clover says. Patrick only groans as he facepalms.
The Caravan and its protectors keep moving through the forest. There haven't been any more assassins like the Branwen Tribe from earlier, but there have still been some Grimms attacking. But compared to the Branwen Tribe, the Grimm have been an easy match for them.
By the time nightfall comes, everyone decides to make camp. Everyone does their best to stay alert and remain calm knowing the night is a dangerous time in the woods. Rayla and a few other citizens prepared dinner while Peter and Clawdia went to get some firewood.
What's different this night is everyone takes the time to enjoy, sharing some joy and laughter. Clover often tells stories of his missions with the Ace Ops. Patrick and Winter are the only ones who are not enjoying themselves. Patrick mostly wants to be alone, and Winter is under a mixture of keeping an eye on him as well as she's trying to maintain her Soldier's Pride.
Later at night, everyone is asleep, except for each of two Huntsman and Huntress who stands on guard. Winter wakes up in the middle of the night. She walks around half asleep, with her weapon, and left the camp. What she doesn't know is once she passed the sleeping huntsman, Patrick's eyes opened, turning to the direction of where she went off to.
In the woods not far from the campsite, Winter approaches and kneels to a river. She scoops up a handful and drinks it, then splashes some on her face. She just sits there sighing. It's been a hard time for Winter for this mission. First exhausting herself on that bridge and now fighting a band of Assassins. In her stillness, Winter takes out her scroll, looking at the messages she had received from her sister.
Some of them goes on saying about her day about her studies and training as a Huntress. But what has her mind concerned of at the messages that involve her hardship with their father, Jacques. Winter exhales through the nose as she lowers her scroll.
"Sometimes, I just feel like I only left her behind. With him." She says to herself.
Once she has had enough alone time she stands back up and starts heading back to camp. When... "Don't! Move!"
Winter looks ahead, Patrick is standing across from her, a loaded bow in hands and aiming at her. Winter gets serious, she draws out her sword, only Patrick quickly aims for her hand and shoots, quickly disarming her.
Patrick reloads his bow with another arrow. "I said: Don't! Move!"
With no other opinion, Winter does as he says, as well as slowly raising her hands. "I knew you can't be trusted. Once a criminal always a criminal."
"Quiet," Patrick says, intimidatingly. The two of them are at a standstill for a while, until Patrick fires.
The arrow comes directly for Winter at great speed and it...flies just past her inches from her left head and pierces something. Winter hears the sound of static and machine noises. She turns to look and see, much to her surprise, an Atlesian Drone collapsing from being pierced right on the head.
"What?" Winter rushes to the droid and Patrick approaches as well after her. "An Atelsian Knight-130?"
"Yeah. That thing was spying on us." Patrick says.
"Spy?" Winter asks.
"Take a look at its markings," Patrick tells her. Winter looks at the droid and she notices there are painted markings on its upper right arm. "It's clearly not from Altas, wouldn't you agree?"
"A stolen reprogrammed droid," Winter says. "Did those bandits from earlier send it?"
"No, I know the tribe they work for. They don't use stolen droids." Patrick says. "Besides, I knew this thing was around. I spotted it after we crossed the bridge." Patrick stares at the markings as he thinks. 'I knew it. The Agency was spying on Winter.'
Patrick kneels down to the droid and then takes out his scroll, connecting to it. "What are you doing?" Winter asks, suspiciously.
"Getting some information from it," Patrick says.
Winter observes Patrick carefully, but then shortly afterward, her attention turns to the droid, that is acting weird. She gets a closer look at it, and her eyes widen in the realization.
"LOOK OUT!" Winter grabs Patrick and forces him away, about a second later. KA-BOOM! The Atlesian Knight explodes. Once the explosion settles, they both look back to find nothing left but charred grass and ashes. "Just as I thought. That AK-130 was rigged to self-destruct."
Patrick groans in frustration. "Damn it. I should have known it wouldn't be that simple. Anyway, let's get back to camp."
"Agreed," Winter says, who feels like that just leaves a strange taste in her mouth.
The two of them head back to camp, where they are greeted by Akira and Earnest, who were on guard duty but are concerned about the events that had happened earlier. "We heard an explosion. What happened?" Akira asks.
"A spy droid we encountered," Patrick says.
"This area is compromised. We must pack up camp and leave immediately."
Earnest speaks, which Patrick translates in the end. "Earnest says it'll be too dangerous to move in the dark with everyone asleep or mostly tired."
"I concur with Earnest, but given the events that happened in this situation, Miss Winter might be right," Akira says. "We'll have to adjust, starting with who can be awake at night.
"You and Clawdia Stone will have to be up since you'll have Night Vision," Winter says. "And Clover did his shift so I'll be the professional Huntress to stay up."
"Clawdia isn't much of a night person. But I am." Patrick says. "And my Semblance also carries Night Vision."
Everyone starts packing up camp, once everything is set everyone rests within the caravans. Patrick, Akira, Anna, and Winter are wide awake. Earnest wants to be awake but given his mute problem he won't be of much help when he sees something coming, so Rayla awakens and stands in his place.
The time they're on the nightly escort, Patrick finds himself stuck in thought. He knows that droid was sent by the Agency he seeks. He knows them well, how carefully organized they will be. They're no way they'll have an arsenal nearby of their spy droid. Then again, Patrick knows the targets they are after, one of them being Winter Schene, is royal blood.
During these times, it is unknown what events will happen. He has no other choice but to follow Winter's suggestion, and keep a sharp alert of their surroundings.
Patrick looks all around standing up on one of the caravans. Once done, he sits back down next to Winter. "Nothing. It's really quiet."
"It is indeed," Winter says. There's nothing but silence between the two before she speaks. "Thank you."
Hearing this surprises Patrick. "What did you just say?"
"Don't make me say it again," Winter warns him. Patrick does not react in any way. Winter clears her throat before speaking again. "It's just my way of showing you my appreciation for stopping that droid."
"Well, I suppose the Ice Queen really does have a heart," Patrick says.
"Don't make me regret my decision," Winter says. "But just keep in mind this changes nothing."
"Trust me, I don't ever think it will," Patrick says.
The whole trip through the woods at night has been quiet. Grimm has not bothered attacking them, mostly because the citizens are calmly asleep and not spewing negativity to attract them. By the first light of the sun, they have made it out of the woods. Once everyone's asleep those who took the night shift gets some rest in the Caravan.
The Grimm attacks come and the Huntresses and Huntsmen handle them. After a while, the rest of them joins in on the escort.
By noon, they have arrived at their destination. In a middle of an open field there's a small town that's under construction, but only the beginning of it. Those who live in the town cheer for the arrival of the rest of the villagers.
While everyone unloads everything, Anna speaks with Winter and Clover. "We can't thank you enough for helping us. It must have been hard fighting off those Grimms and Assassins."
"It's all a part of our duty," Winter says.
"Are you sure you will be fine on your own?" Clover asks.
"We may need some Huntsmen protection while constructing our new settlement," Anna says.
"I'll send word to the Atlesians to see what we can spare," Clover says.
"Thank you, Kind Huntsman," Anna says. "You know, we had a village festival every year. Once we get everything settled, you must come by and celebrate."
"As much as we appreciate the offer, we will be too busy defending the Kingdom of Atlas and Remnant to settle down and celebrate," Winter says.
"Oh come on, Winter. Getting some rest and relaxation isn't going to kill you." Clover says. "We'll see about joining in when we can." After settling things with Anna, Winter and Clover meet up with their students. "Excellent work everyone. You did very well as Huntsmen and Huntresses."
"I respectfully disagree with you, Clover. You give them too much credit." winter turns her attention to the students. "Some of your formations are out of order, the fighting style is out of sync, and you..." Winter turns her attention to Peter. "Lack the discipline you need. Don't think I didn't notice you were staring at me and the other girls here while you should be focused on fighting the Grimm."
Peter does nothing but helpless stare at Winter, clearly not listening. "Trust me, Miss Winter, hiss a pawful." Clawdia says. Clawdia pulls on Peter's ear, snapping him back to reality.
"I understand your criticism, Commender. But remember they're only students. They're learning." Clover says. "Don't take Winter's commentary too seriously, but don't forget they're always room for improvement. I'm sure that's something Beacon can teach you."
With that note, they all get ready to head back to Beacon. Only it's going to be a 2 maybe 3-day trap back to it so Clover decides to call the pilot to come to pick them up at the settlement.
Later in Vale, the town is getting ready for Halloween, the streets and shops are decorated for the seasonal holiday.
While people are moving about on the streets, Hazel is among that crowd, in a disguise. He starts asking around the citizens wondering about any events that happened on a certain date. Most of them have no idea what occurred. Few have heard rumors but don't provide enough information.
By the end of the day, Hazel arrives at an apartment building. He goes up the stairs and to the room he and Arthur ranted. Arthur is on the computers and scrolls searching street cameras and security footage.
"Well, about time you have arrived," Arthur says. "Tell me what you found out."
"I can't find out what happened, just a number of rumors," Hazel says.
"Rumors you say. Hmm...Did any of them have a connection?" Arthur asks. Hazel doesn't say anything at first, then Arthur groans annoyedly. "Did any of the rumors you heard have anything in common?"
"Oh...Well, I don't know if it's true, but they said it happened at a building." Hazel tells Arthur the address and building number. Arthur taps into the security footage for the street and sets it for the day.
Arthur and Hazel watch closely. the footage starts with a dark ven appearing with Gaia coming out then dragging out the unconscious Selena. Arthur increases the speed until they spotted Patrick climbing up the side of the building and breaking in. After further fast-forwarding when the police arrive, they see Gaia being taken by the police and Patrick explaining everything.
"What do you think happened?" Hazel asks.
"Hard to say. I can't even tell if this relates to what Salem had sensed." Arthur says. He continues typing. "If only that building had security cameras I could tap in and see what happened."
"What do you suggest we do now?" Hazel asks.
Arthur thinks for a moment before he speaks with a smirk. "I think it's time we pay our new friend here a visit."