A/N: The Grimm Invasion might be imminent if the Huntsmen and Huntresses don't do anything to stop the threat. Teams PASM and SHDW make a plan to eradicate the Grimm hiding out in the forest. Meanwhile, Aria has problems of her own. And it may become a threatening obstacle for both teams.

Aria belongs to my friend Koyukiy.

Chapter 68: Invasion

It is early before dawn. Teams PASM and SHDW begin their awakening and have a quick breakfast.

Once everyone's set, Mashika stands. "All right. Everyone set?" Mashika then notices something, or someone, missing. "Wait. Where's Aria?"

Everyone looks around. They don't see her anywhere. And now that they realize it, they haven't seen her since last night. They all figured she's probably still asleep, so they decided to go to her room and check in on her.

Only when they arrived, they weren't expecting what they are seeing.

Aria is on her bed, rocking back and forth her arms wrapped around her legs, with a horrified expression on her face, and breathing heavily.

"What's with Golden Eyes?" Sakuya asks. "She looks like she's seen a ghost."

"Guys, this is serious." Marlene observes Aria. "I think she's having a panic attack."

Selena tries to get Aria's attention. "Aria?" Selena speaks to her in a quite calming tone. "You okay? Is everything all right?"

Aria speaks in between her breathes. "Can't...reach...him...can't...see...can't...hear...can't...can't...can't." She doesn't even turn her attention to anyone as she speaks.

Everyone's pretty much confused by what she's talking about. Then Hikari takes notice of Aria's Scroll in front of her. He picks it up and reads the error message on it: "Contact is Outside of Service Range. Please try again later."

"Something tells me that she's trying to reach someone and she's panicking about it." Hikari says.

Patrick groans. "We don't have time for this."

"Shadow Boy's right." Sakuya says. "If we don't deal with the Grimm now, they'll invade the village."

"But Aria is clearly in no condition to fight." Marlene says. "Sherry and I will stay here, and see if we can get her to calm down."

Everyone does as Marlene suggests. Mashika takes Team SHDW and Patrick out on the mission while Selena and Marlene stay behind and help Aria. When Anna heard about the situation, she decided to help out as well. While Mashika's Team make their leave, Selena, Marlene, and Anna are with Aria, who is sitting on the bed rapidly, but slower than before, breathing into a paper bag.

The girls wait for Aria to cease her bag breathing but she doesn't, and eventually Selena speaks with her. "You feeling any better, Aria?"

Aria speaks in between her bag breathing. "N-no. I...a-am not...d-d-doing any..."

"Would you mind clearing up what it is that's worrying you so much?" Marlene asks.

"C-cannot...v-v-video chat...with b-b-b...brother." Aria says.

Aria keeps on breathing in the bag while Selena and Marlene exchange looks with each other. "Sounds like Separation Anxiety. Only I've never seen a case this serious." Marlene says.

Anna looks at Aria's Scroll. "If your brother is somewhere far out like in Mistral or Atlas, it makes sense she can't reach him."

Hearing that only panics Aria even further. Selena notices Aria's panic. "Okay, Aria. Why don't you and I try a few relaxing techniques? Get ready to be destressified."

Selena helps Aria stand and leave the room, even though her body is stiff as a board from the panic. "My father taught me a few things about communication towers. Maybe Dr. Viktor and I can figure out how to boost the tower's signal to try and reach Aria's brother."

Meanwhile, Team Mashika returned to the woods, only to find the area is crawling with countless Grimm. "Oh boy, that's a lot of Grimm." Hikari says.

"It seems there are even more than yesterday." Patrick says.

"Indeed, Love." Mashika takes out her spear. "We should split up. I'll take the Grimm up on the front. Mr. Aki, you and Sakuya take the Grimm on the left. You three take the Grimm on the right."

The group divides into three teams and they each head towards the session they're ordered. The Grimm have taken notice of their presence, and once they spot the Huntsman and Huntresses charging at them, each of the Grimm roars and takes action. Mashika takes the first action by jabbing her lance through the first Beowolf, then she leaps over and throws the impaled Beowolf over her with her lance and slams it on the incoming Ursa. Several Beowolves and Sabers came after Mashika, but the Instructor does not flinch at the sight of them. Instead, she takes a stance and braces for the battle before her.

Patrick and Sakuya are taking down the armies of Grimm that come at them. Patrick moves swiftly with his Lightning Dust Bracers and delivering slashes with his blades. The Grimm throws their attacks at him but he's too quick for them to touch him. Sakuya's the same. She uses her Semblance to teleport towards the Grimm, the second she's on them, Sakuya stabs the Grimm right in their throats, for the larger ones like the Ursa, she loads her Sais with Dust and delivers several stabs, sending the elemental blows deep within their bodies.

Wallace, Hikari, and Donnie are standing their ground against their forces of Grimm. Wallace and Hikari can only rely on their weapons since they're Semblances are useless in combat. Donnie gives the Grimm a beatdown with his hybrid weapons.

With the Grimm defeated, everyone takes a moment to rest. Not even a minute has past and already the next wave of Grimm comes after them. Still, they once again ready their weapons and attack.

Meanwhile, back at the village.

Selena and Aria, who is still breathing heavily in a paper bag under her panic attack, are both standing not far outside of the village. Selena then takes the bag, which startles Aria and causes her to look at Selena with frightening eyes.

"Just relax, Aria. These Yoga stretches will do wonders for your stress." Selena says.

"N-n-no..." Aria is still breathing heavily, struggling to get the words out, then she takes back the bag and does deep breathing within in, speaking in between breaths. "N-n-n-no off-f-fense...,Sherry. B-b-b-but...H-how is st-st-st...stretches gonna h-h-help?"

"When I was growing up, I was pretty nervous about..." Selena doesn't want to give away her stage frights as an idol. "...Well, I don't remember exactly what I was nervous about. I then took up yoga lessons and they really helped out. I think it'll do the same for you. Let's begin."

Selena has Aria start off with a simple Mountain Pose, taking deep slow breaths. Aria does her best to build the pose. Her movements are shakey, but she does a full mountain pose, but her breathing is still challenged. Selena then has them shift into a tree pose, then afterwards slowly descending their hands to their chest level. Aria can feel her nerves beginning to settle, but it's not enough. After the fourth pose, which leads to the Warrior II pose, Aira can't keep up.

Selena inhales deeply through her nose and then lets out a relaxing exhale through her mouth. "There. Doesn't this feel relaxing, Aria?" There's no answer. "Aria?" Selena then looks at Aria, who is shaking like a leaf during the warrior pose. "C-c-cannot...C-c-can-n-n-not..." She then falls into an armadillo pose, her breathing turning pretty heavy. "B-b-brother...Not...h-h-h-here..."

Selena ends her yoga pose. "Maybe you need to talk about your stress."

Marlene goes over the plans for the communications tower with Dr. Viktor. The two of them plan and wonder how to widen the communication range, hopefully, enough for Aria to reach her brother. However, Dr. Viktor questions about doing this project all just for one person.

While they work on it, Selena arrives and calls down Marlene, who is surprised to see her and then notices Aria is still in a panic state. Marlene takes a break from the project to help out Aria with a therapy session. Aria lays in the bed of the room she stayed in, still breathing heavily in the bag. Marlene sits on a chair by the bed holding a notepad and pencil.

"All right, Miss Stars. Why don't you explain what the problem is?" Marlene asks.

Aria doesn't answer, still breathing into the bag. Marlene rolls her eyes then takes the bag, and Aria finally speaks. "M-m-m-my problem is...m-m-m-my brother. I c-c-c-can't reach him."

Marlen then writes down what he says. "Hmm...Uh-hmm..." Once she's done writing, she continues the questioning. "Tell me more about this 'brother' of yours."

"U-u-uh...W-w-well. He's my b-b-b-big brother. He's a-a-a doctor in A-atlas. A-a-a-and...he is..." Marlene sees her heavy breathing is being, so she hands Aria the breathing bag. Marlene allows Aria a brief moment to calm her breathing then resumes the session.

"Now, tell me, why is he so important to you?" Marlene asks.

"W-w-w-well...H-h-he has always b-b-been with me...H-h-he and I h-h-have...have been r-r-r-really close...Th-th-this has b-b-b-been the f-f-first...time we've b-b-b-been apart...a-a-and I-I-I d-d-d-don't...know what t-t-t-to do."

Marlene then grabs the pillow and hands it to her. "Want to try screaming into this pillow?" Aria is hesitant and decides to go with it. Aria grabs the pillow, inhales deeply, and screams her loudest with her face buried. Her scream lasted for about nearly a minute straight. Aria then drops the pillow once she's done, looking more calmer then before. "There, now. Don't you feel better?"

"I...I feel..." Aria doesn't say anything for a moment, and Marlene anxiously waits for Aria to say something, then suddenly her anxiety starts up all over again, and she immediately resumes breathing into the paper bag.

It didn't work. "Well, that was worth a shot."

Marlene then decides to hand Aria over to Anna, who may have an idea to help Aria. With that settled, Marlene returns to Dr. Viktor to continue with the project. Anna takes Aria to the village masseuse. "What you need is a nice relaxing massage. It'll help relieve all that stress and tension." Anna turns to the masseuse. "Take it away, Alyssa."

Alyssa cracks her knuckles and then begins her massage upon Aria's body. Aria is startled at first by the sudden force upon her body, but then her body relaxes feeling relief. Aria lets out a relaxing sigh. "That feels so good."

"That's it, dear. Let all of your tension melt away." Alyssa says.

Meanwhile, Mashika and her group are still fighting off against the Grimm. Their numbers are endless. Patrick, Sakuya, and Mashika have no problems with keeping up against the Grimm. The remaining three do their best against the monsters of darkness.

The Huntsman stand their ground as more and more Grimm appear. After a moment of stillness, a massive roar echoes, shaking the very earth around them. This startles everyone, even Patrick. Soon enough, the roar dies down. "What was that?" Wallace asks.

There are loud stomping on the approach. Several Grimm moves aside to reveal the source of it all: A massive Grimm that appears as a Creep, only this creature is glowing green instead of red like every other Grimm. The creature seems even bigger too, and has several green spikes growing out of its spine.

"Oh...Shit!" Donnie says.

"What kind of Grimm is that?" Patrick asks.

"It looks like a Creep. But it's nothing I've ever seen." Mashika says.

"Think it might be just as dangerous or worse?" Hikari asks.

The strange Creep stomps its leg to the ground and lets out another earthshaking roar. Enough volume to overwhelm everyone into covering their ears like hearing someone scratching on a chalkboard.

"I'm guessing worse." Sakuya says.

The mysterious Creep and several other Grimm slowly creep toward the huntsman. As they ready themselves for an attack, the Grimm suddenly come to a halt. They all look in the air, sensing something. "What are they doing? What's happening?" Wallace asks.

The Grimm looks around in all directions until they end, with all of them facing in one direction. Mashika looks in the direction they're facing and catches on. "Oh no." Some of the Grimm growls or roars, then they dash off. "They're heading towards the village!"

"What? What could be happening at the village to drag their attention?" Patrick asks.

"I'm guessing it's your gold eyes friend." Sakuya says. "Her panic must be attracting them." Sakuya turns her attention to her brothers. "Brothers, hurry back to the village and fight them off. We'll handle big, strong, and ugly here."

"Yes, sister." Hikari, Donnie, Wallace all say in unison. The three of them hurried back to the village, leaving Mashika, Sakuya, and Patrick to handle the mysterious Grimm before them.

Back at the village, Selena decides to check on her friend. Just before she enters the house, something breaks through the wall. This startles Selena and she hurries inside. Once in, she finds Aria on her knees, still panicking but even worse than before. Anna and Alyssa are in total shock. Selena looks out the hole on the wall, which shows the massage table is thrown right out of it.

"Your friend here is crazy strong, Miss Farron." Anna says.

"What happened?" Selena asks.

Alyssa explains what happened. "I was rubbing and pounding away all the knots and stress in her body and muscles. The next thing I knew, she was shouting something about her brother and was frailing like crazy. We tried to calm her down but then she started losing it. And then the rest is history."

"Can't anything calm this girl down?" Anna asks.

Selena thinks for a moment. "I may have an idea."

Selena takes Aria back into her room. She has Aria sitting in the middle of the floor. Selena sets up 3 Lavender Scented Candles in a triangle form around. Aria breaths heavily into her bag before asking. "I-I-I d-d-don't underst-st-stand, Sherry. Me-me-meditating?"

Selena sits in front of Aria, legs crossed. "Our friend, Akira, specializes in meditation. Before she was hospitalized, she taught us a few things. Honestly, Akira might be a better teacher for this, but this is a desperate situation. Now, just do what I do, and then close your eyes." Selena straightens her back. She folds her hands in her lap with palms facing upwards, right palm resting on top of the left, thumbs touching. Aria repeats everything, and closes her eyes. "Now, steady your breathing, and take deep, slow breaths." Aria tries her best to steady her breathing. "Now, concentrate solely on your mind. Let go of your physical body and visualize yourself at the center of the universe."

Aria focuses deeply on Selena's instructions. Soon enough, Aria finds herself in the model of the universe, her breathing begins to steady. As she further concentrates, she then hears a voice of a little girl.

"Big Brother."

Aria then finds herself in a past scenery. In a small house in the middle of a beautiful grassland field. Aria sees a little four-year-old girl with black hair playing around in the yard with a little boy. The little girl is laughing with joy.

"Slow down, Aria. You sure are full of energy." The boy says.

Aria watches the little girl and boy playing in the yard. Aria then smiles seeing the two of them. Then a beautiful housewife comes out of the house. "Aris. Aria. Are you having fun? ...Aria?" The woman's voice echos Aria's name. Repeatedly. Soon enough, Aria felt disturbed by it, especially when it starts to grow louder. And the voice begins to change.

"ARIA!"

Soon enough, Aria opens her eyes. She looks around to find herself back in the room of her meditation. Selena has her hands on Aria's shoulders. "Oh, thank goodness. You're back." Aria wonders what Selena's panicking about until she hears a bell alarm going on, a fainted voice shouting: 'GRIMM!' "We've got trouble."

Evan is ringing the bell repeatedly, shouting "GRIMM! GRIMM!"

Selena drags Aria through the village. She takes her up one of the towers and they both get a view of the situation, and Aria is horrified at it. Countless Grimm are charging in, heading towards the village.

It's an Invasion.

Patrick, Sakuya, and Mashika are fighting off against the Grimm on their end. They easily defeat all of the regular Grimm, but the strange green one is really putting up a fight. Sakuya is constantly throwing her Semblance onto the mutated Grimm, teleporting herself to every part of the monster, jabbing stabs with her Sais in-between each teleport. But her attacks only anger the monster. Patrick throws a couple of his arrows, some of them loaded with combustible or Gravity Dust. The arrows cause the monster to stagger shortly, but one it regains its balance, the beast becomes irritated.

The Creep starts charging towards Patrick with its might. Patrick dodges out of the way just in time. The Mysterious Grimm comes around once again and charges at the Shadow Hunter. Patrick dodges once more, but once the Grimm stops in place, Mashika and Sakuya strike at it from its sides. The Creep monster growls and does a sweep strike with its body and tail, knocking Mashika and Sakuya back.

"Damn, this thing's so powerful. It'll take an army to defeat it." Sakuya says.

"It must have a weakness somewhere." Mashika says.

"Hmm...Weakness." Patrick then thinks and gets an idea.

Patrick loads three more Gravity Arrows and fires them at the Green Grimm. The arrows irritates the Grimm and it charges at Patrick at full speed. Instead of dodging, Patrick stands his ground, bracing for the attack. Mashika catches on to what he's doing. "Patrick! Don't!" But it's too late. The Creep headbutts Patrick, knocking him back at full force and causing him to crash into a large rock.

Patrick's Aura becomes critical. He painfully groans as he tries to get back on his feet. Once he's back on his feet, he glares right at the Grimm with his eyes turning crimson red. Patrick observes the Grimm with his Weakness Vision. For a while, he doesn't see anything, for the strange Creep doesn't appear to have any weakness until it roars and Patrick sees something in its open mouth. "Bingo!"

Mashika and Sakuya fights off against the monster. While they do, Patrick ties together three arrows, Lightning, Gravity, and Combust. He loads them onto his bow, aiming right at the Creep. Patrick waits as he watches his Instructor and a Ninja fight off against the beast. Once they irritating it enough to make it roar, Patrick then fires his arrows, sending it flying right into its mouth.

And upon impact, the Grimm suffers a massive explosion. The Creep screeches in agony then falls dead to the ground, and starts fading away. The three of them take the moment to catch their breath. "Damn, that was one powerful Grimm." Patrick says.

"I'm sort of confused about how that thing is large and green. That was clearly no normal Grimm." Sakuya says.

"Agreed. But we'll have to think it over about it later. Right now, we need to hurry back to the village." Mashika says.

Cannons and Archers fire everything at the incoming Grimm. The Ninjas of Team SHDW arrived at the scenery. They fight their way through the Grimm until they reached the frontlines. Selena and Aria, who is resuming her panic statement once more, stand behind the barricades. Selena holds her staff, ready to attack. Once she looks past the Barricade, she gets a good look to see the incoming Grimm. A large one, an Ursa, starts charting towards the village.

Selena then gets an idea. She plants her staff next to her and begins singing her Siren Song. Once it's close, the Ursa becomes charmed by Selena's song. It turns against the Grimm and starts swiping at them. At this point, the Grimm are being held, but at the other entrances, they are already at the barricades, trying to break through.

That's when Sakuya's Sai goes flying towards them, and impales at one of the Beowolves, with her appearing right on top of it. Patrick and Mashika comes running in straight from the forest with their Lightning-Enhanced Leg Bracers. Mashika dives in doing a leap leg onto one of the Grimm, striking it with a powerful blow of lightning energy. Patrick draws out his swords as his runs, and he slashes at the Grimm.

By then it's too late.

The Grimm breaks through the barricades and starts raiding the village. The citizens are in total panic, screaming and running as the Grimm are running amok. Selena still concentrates on her singing, Aria is looking all around at the scenery. She's really in a hard panic state, the total chaos happening all around is making her anxiety worse.

As the chaos goes on, Aria then catches the sound of a screaming little girl. But what caught her attention was what she screamed: "Big Brother! Help!" Aria turns to find a little girl cornered against a large Beringel. The Beringel rapidly bangs at its chest and then roars right at the girl, who screams and cries in fear. The Beringel makes its strike, The girl braces herself for the blow, but nothing happens.

The girl looks and is astonished. Aria stands in front of the Grimm blocking the attack with her bare hands. Aria groans in a struggle as she holds back the monster's attack. She then starts to regain her strength and starts pushing the Beringel back. While the Grimm recoils, Aria tights one of her fists, charged with Gravity Dust. The Beringel is sent flying until it crashes against a building, cracking the wall.

The other Grimm take notice and they turn their attentions to Aria, who fearlessly stares at them and braces herself. The Grimm charges at her, which startles the little girl, but Aria stands her ground, she fights off each the Grimm, beating them off with her powerful punch and kicks. Some of the Grimm become overwhelmed by her immense strength and dissolve in their defeat.

Soon, they realized the strength Aria possesses, and the Grimm retreats. Aria lets out a relief sigh. "Emily!" Aria is alarmed by the sound of a boy's voice, then turns to see him rushing towards the little girl and hugging him.

"Big brother! It was so scary. I-I thought I was a goner, then this Faunus Girl saved me." The little girl says.

The boy turns to Aria. "Thank you, miss, for saving my little sister."

Aria studders, trying to get the words out.

Later, the Grimm Invasion comes to an end, and once things have calmed down, Selena, Patrick, and Mashika meet up with Aria and Anna. Anna gives Mashika a brief report on the village damage. There weren't any casualties, thank goodness, but most of the village is damaged from the Grimm breaking in.

"I understand, Anna. We still have a few days before we depart, so we'll do what we can to help out with the repairs." Mashika says.

"Thank you, Miss Kirei." Anna says with a smile.

Anna then departs from the group. Once she's gone, Mashika and Selena turns to Aria. "Miss Aria. I heard you overcame your anxiety to save a little girl in trouble."

"Yeah, that was incredible. How do you feel?" Selena asks.

Aria straightens before answering. "How do I feel? ...I-it felt...Good..." Aria expression is calm yet hard as she answers, then just five seconds later, Aria then falls back, and collapses. Fainted. Startling Selena and Mashika, but Patrick just rolled his eyes.

Selena and Mashika helps Aria revive, and as they do, they noticed her scroll is buzzing. Patrick reaches into her pocket and takes out the Scroll. It reads: "Video Call: Aris." "It's that person she's trying to reach."

Patrick's sentence made Aria's eyes suddenly dart open with a gasp. "Aris?" In a flash, Aria snags her Scroll back and turns on the video chat. "Aris! It's you! I've finally reached you."

"Aria. Thank goodness!" Aris says on the Scroll. "I was worried sick when I wasn't getting your call."

Marlene looks through a telescope to see Aria joyfully talking to her scroll. She turn turns to Dr. Viktor. "Looks like it worked, she must be talking to the person she was trying to reach."

"Well, that's good." That is all Dr. Viktor says.

Meanwhile, at a dark, frightening fortress, the halls echo with screams in fear and agony. A man stands in a dark room, watching over the countless monitors. He then receives a message on his scroll. The man opens it and reads what it says:

"The Experiment was Destroyed." His hand shakes with rage reading this, then suddenly calms as he reads the rest: "There's more: The Test Subject is found." Followed by an image of Aria, happily talking to her Scroll.