Jaune's back arched in agony, his body jerking with a sharp inhale as his shattered aura barely managed to restart his failing body. It was like being hit repeatedly with a hammer from the inside. Every breath was a struggle, and the flickering, sputtering remnants of his aura sparked weakly against the overwhelming pain. Something was broken inside, no, many things. His ribs screamed with every breath. His right leg wasn't facing the right way. His insides were warm in a way that shouldn't be warm.
He was bleeding internally. Dying, maybe. How he had survived that fall. That impact.
He doesn't know.
But he was alive.
Barely.
Above, the battle for Atlas raged on in the distance, the dull roar beneath the pounding in his ears. Even with the city half-tilted from the explosion, the artillery at the Academy still thundered across the battlefield, their shockwaves cracking through the air with brutal rhythm. Up above, Atlas's battered air fleet carved lines through the sky, trading dust-laced firepower with the winged Grimm that blotted out the clouds.
It was a losing fight. Even Jaune could see that. The sky was dark, not with storm clouds, but wings. There were too many of them. Endless.
Still, even in the middle of all of that, Jaune's attention was fixed on only one thing.
Pyrrha.
She lay cradled against his chest, unconscious but breathing, barely. Her aura was gone, and her armor was cracked from the fall. But she was alive. That was all that mattered.
Jaune tried to move. Then stopped. His right leg was twisted grotesquely, bent at an angle it shouldn't be. He grit his teeth, grabbed his knee with both hands, and forced it straight with a wet, horrible snap. The pain stole his breath, and for a second, he thought he might black out. His aura flickered out entirely, and the world dimmed.
But Pyrrha let out a breath. Faint. Barely a whisper.
That was enough.
He forced himself to his feet, his arms trembling as he rose. His body protested every movement, but Jaune had nothing left to lose. His aura flared again, blue and red in wild sputters like sparks off a dying fire. He put a hand gently on Pyrrha's back, channeling what he could into her, just enough to keep her stable. Just enough to buy them both more time.
His other hand gripped Crocea Mors.
It was time to fight.
The Grimm surged from the smoke like a tide of nightmares, their fangs bared, claws glinting in the dim orange firelight that spilled from the shattered sky. Jaune squared his stance, shield strapped to his back, Pyrrha cradled in one arm. He held Crocea Mors tightly in the other.
They would not take her.
The first Beowolf lunged. Jaune met it with a clean, brutal slash across the throat, severing its head with a surge of aura. The second came from the left. He pivoted and slammed his elbow into its snout, crushed its face flat against the ground, then stomped down hard. Another Grimm came, and another. A never-ending flood of snarling mouths and razor claws.
But Jaune fought.
He fought like a man possessed.
He spun and slashed, ducked and shouldered, blocked with the shield on his back and lashed out with brutal, efficient swings. Crocea Mors cut clean through bone and sinew, its blade singing in the air with every desperate swing. Grimm after Grimm fell, evaporating into smoke as he carved his way forward.
His body screamed for rest. His lungs burned with every gasp of air. But he couldn't stop.
Not with Pyrrha unconscious.
Not with the city falling.
A hulking Ursa barreled toward him, knocking aside lesser Grimm as it came. Its bellow shook the broken street beneath Jaune's feet.
Jaune waited until the last possible second. Then he ducked low, letting it sail overhead, and drove his sword up through its stomach. The Ursa howled, swiped wildly, and caught Jaune across the back. He staggered, almost dropping Pyrrha, but didn't. He gritted his teeth, screamed through the pain, and twisted his sword deeper until the Ursa gurgled, collapsed, and vanished into ash.
Another pause. A breath.
Then the sky darkened again.
A shriek tore through the clouds.
Nevermores.
Their wings beat the air like drums, their talons outstretched. There were too many. He couldn't fight them like this.
He had to move.
Jaune looked around, heart pounding. Through the haze and smoke, he saw an old transport building, half collapsed, but standing. Barely. It was enough.
He ran.
His boots pounded broken concrete. Grimm howled behind him. Wings screamed above.
He crashed through the doorway, kicked aside the rotting remains of a desk, and slid behind a wall of broken lockers. Carefully, painfully, he lowered Pyrrha to the floor. He checked her pulse.
Still there.
Still alive.
"Stay with me," Jaune whispered, brushing her hair from her face. "You promised. Remember? You said we'd fight together."
A whisper of a smile tugged at the edge of his lips. It didn't reach his eyes.
He limped to the door and began stacking debris in front of it, tables, desks, anything he could find. It wouldn't hold forever, but it would give them a few minutes.
He collapsed beside Pyrrha, shoulder pressed to hers, Crocea Mors across his lap. Blood dripped from his armor. Smoke filtered in from cracks in the wall.
The sounds of war raged outside.
"Hang in there, Pyrrha," he said again, softly.
His voice trembled.
"We'll get through this. Together."
And then, behind the barricade, Jaune sat in the dark, his sword bloodied, his body broken, and his heart still burning with just enough hope to face whatever came next.
His aura flickering as he gathered and scraped what's left.
Then after a minute, hearing more coming Grimm.
He stood and carried her out.
The wind howled through the broken avenues of Atlas, carrying with it the scent of scorched metal, ash, and Grimm ichor. The once-pristine streets were fractured veins across the dying heart of the city, buildings tilted at wild angles from the city's unnatural lean. Debris lay scattered like bones in an open grave, evidence of the battle still raging in the distance. The echoes of artillery thudded in the background, rhythmic, relentless.
Jaune trudged through it all, his body on the edge of collapse.
Pyrrha's weight across his shoulders was not the burden, it was the reason he could still move. He clutched her tightly with his left arm, her unconscious body slumped against him, red hair catching in the breeze. His right hand gripped Crocea Mors, the blade bloodied, but still unbroken.
Just like him.
Mostly.
Every step was agony. He'd lost track of how far they were from the Academy. Time had become meaningless, nothing more than a haze of pain and motion. His right leg still dragged, twisted from the fall and barely healed by his sputtering aura. His ribs throbbed with each breath. The inside of his mouth was raw from where he'd bitten down, again and again, just to stay silent.
He fell.
Knees slammed hard on cracked concrete. Pyrrha nearly slipped from his shoulder. He caught her mid-drop with a strangled groan, then sagged forward, resting his forehead on the cold pavement.
The world spun.
His aura flared, too little, too late. A flickering glow gold that sizzled against his wounds but didn't soothe them. A drop of blood splattered from his nose, joining the dirt.
He whispered, voice cracked, "No. Not yet."
Using Crocea Mors like a cane, he shoved himself back up. He screamed as he did, not caring if the Grimm heard. He screamed until his throat tore and his lungs burned, and then he walked again.
The Academy wasn't far now.
It couldn't be.
Black wings crossed the sky above. He looked up, expecting death, but the Nevermores passed him by, distracted by the bright flashes of gunfire higher up the mountain. He kept going. One step. Another.
The cracked glass of a fallen window reflected him. He almost didn't recognize the man staring back. A bloodied face beneath a dented helmet. Eyes sunken and red. His armor, once white and accented with gold, was black with soot and ichor, dented and torn in a dozen places.
But Pyrrha still breathed.
So he still moved.
Another block. Another fall. This time he rolled to protect her. Landed hard. Crocea Mors skidded across the ground.
He didn't get up right away.
Instead, he stared at the sky, the cold biting his skin. The air tasted like smoke and blood.
"Keep going," he muttered to himself. "Keep fighting."
So he did.
He rose.
He limped.
Snow whipped past him in howling sheets.
Jaune gritted his teeth and kept moving, one agonizing step at a time, his boots dragging furrows through the ice and shattered stone of the ruined street. Pyrrha's weight was familiar by now, familiar and unbearable. Her head limped against his shoulder. Her presence should have warmed him, and maybe once, it would have. But now all he felt was cold. Cold in his bones, cold in his chest. Cold in the marrow of who he was.
He tripped again.
The ground slammed into his knees like a hammer, jarring what was left of his fractured body. His aura had already broken once, twice, maybe three times and now what flickered inside him felt more like the ghost of protection than the real thing. Crocea Mors, heavy and blunt with evaporating Grimm blood, hung in his free hand like an anchor.
His breath misted from his lips in uneven gasps. His vision swam. But he forced himself up, groaning through clenched teeth as he staggered upright again, adjusting Pyrrha's unconscious weight. Her armor had been scorched and cracked in places, the red of her sash dulled with soot. But her pulse still beat against his palm when he checked it.
Still alive. That was enough.
"Just a bit more," Jaune muttered, not sure if he was talking to her or himself.
The path to Atlas Academy was still far. Buildings leaned sideways or collapsed entirely. Craters pocked the streets where airstrikes and artillery or Grimm had left their mark. And above it all, the constant sound of battle hummed like a heartbeat. the thunder of artillery, the whine of airships engines, the distant roars of Grimm.
They had to keep going.
Jaune trudged forward, almost in a daze now. The pain in his body had stopped registering as pain and had become something else. Something like background noise. Every joint screamed. Every tendon strained. He had to stop twice to set his knee again when it buckled. Blood, his own, froze at the edges of his collar and seeped slowly through a cracked seam in his armor.
Somewhere along the ruined boulevard, he collapsed again.
His vision went black around the edges. He tried to stand, but his legs didn't answer. He blinked up at the fractured sky, stars hidden by clouds of smoke and swirling snow. He could feel Pyrrha's weight on his back, and for a terrifying moment, he couldn't move at all.
He let out a weak breath, shaking. "I'm not done," he said hoarsely. "I'm not done. Come on. Stand up!"
He gritted his teeth and slammed his shield into the ground, driving it in like a crutch. He forced himself upright, using his shoulder and every shred of willpower left in his shredded soul. His aura crackled around him, sparking like a broken engine. Still, he stood.
Then he walked.
And kept walking.
Every block, every corner, every ruined street felt like a mile. He passed toppled mechs, downed airships, and streets littered with bodies of Atlas soldiers, Huntsmen, civilians. He tried not to look at their faces. He tried not to imagine what would've happened if he hadn't caught Pyrrha. If she'd been one of them.
At one point, he heard a Beowolf's howl. It was close.
He kept walking.
A cluster of Lancers swarmed overhead, but Jaune ducked behind a shattered wall until they passed. Too weak for them to notice. Not now. His aura was too weak to fight them. Not while carrying her. Every step he took was a prayer of denial. A challenge to the darkness consuming his vision.
Finally, he spotted it.
Atlas Academy. Battered. But still standing.
Its turrets fired relentlessly at the sky. A makeshift barricade had been set at the main entrance, and he could see silhouettes of soldiers, Huntsmen scrambling in and out.
Hope.
He started to run.
He made it five steps before his leg gave out again.
He hit the ground with a grunt, Pyrrha rolling onto the snow beside him. His arm immediately reached out to catch her, to keep her from hitting the ground too hard. He pulled her close, cradling her against his chest like she might vanish if he let go.
A voice shouted nearby. He couldn't make it out.
He blinked and felt warmth on his face. Blood? Snow? Tears?
Another voice. Closer. Boots. A figure in armor.
Then more.
"Get a stretcher!"
"Med evac now!"
"Someone get him stabilized, he's not gonna last long!"
Hands reached for him. Jaune batted them away until one of them touched Pyrrha's shoulder, then he stopped resisting.
"She's hurt," he managed to croak. "Help her first."
"We're helping both of you," someone said firmly.
And then, at last, Jaune let himself fall into darkness.
He didn't dream.
But if he had, it would have been of warm fields. Of wind in the crops. Of his sisters laughing. Of a red-haired woman, smiling at him in the sunlight.
He would have dreamed of home.
But he felt like destiny was pulling him somewhere.
Then his aura sputtered to life again.