Disclaimer: I do not own RWBY or its associated characters. The characters in this writing so far are all original characters, but I make no claim over the existing characters.

Chapter 8

Ambush

The rest of my squad helped me load the bodies into the vehicles. We only had the six members of my team and the two rearguards from Sergeant Zim's team left alive, which left us with ten bodies to return to base.

The third team, led by Staff Sergeant Hearth, should have been on their way to the meeting point by now, so we mounted up and set off down the mountain.

With five vehicles requiring drivers and only eight soldiers to drive them most of us were stuck operating a vehicle by ourselves. Sergeant Zim's body was strapped into my passenger seat, and another soldier whose file I had read but had never spoken with was secured on the floor of the empty gunner's position.

Ahead of my vehicle I could see Private Wilks attempting to treat Lieutenant Amber, who was slowly regaining consciousness. Our best guess was that he hadn't had adequate food or water in several days, and the stress of amplifying his aura to activate his semblance in response to the explosion had been too much for his body to handle.

The drive down the mountain was much less aggressive than the trip up. Nobody wanted to disturb our lifeless passengers as we descended. When we arrived at the rendezvous point we were met with a more positive sight. Staff Sergeant Hearth's team had been largely uncontested, and had been able to examine their objective then drive directly to the meeting point with no casualties after taking a few hits in the initial breakout. She and I held a hushed discussion, then resolved to keep our casualties in my vehicles to avoid the morale hit we would take from spreading them around the convoy.

Lieutenant Amber was lucid again, and was eagerly devouring energy bars and water that Private Wilks was slowly rationing to him. I handed the Lieutenant back his weapons, with the promise that he would take it easy until he gathered his strength.

With our team organized we mounted up and set off back towards Argus, where a second breakout team would be coordinated to assault a weak point in the enemy lines to give us an opportunity to get back inside the walls. We drove in silence, the only noise was the deep humming of Puma engines and the splashing of tires through mud and dirt.

-/-

As I drove I couldn't help but feel some lingering doubt that I was making a mistake. I already knew that I could have saved time going straight to the second cave. I also knew that I should have properly searched the stash for traps, it was stupid to assume that Hyperion wouldn't have set up something in case the Lieutenant had managed to escape. Beyond that though, something was bothering me, something about our return to base. My hand tightened on the wheel, squeezing the life out of it and turning my knuckles white beneath my armored gloves. I wracked my brain trying to figure out what I was missing.

There was some kind of problem with our evacuation plan. We had made it the day before and coordinated with our armored support. We wouldn't be taking the same route back because they would be ready for us. Instead we were circling about fifty miles to the west to enter the city a little bit closer to our base. Hopefully the enemy resistance would be weaker there, and we could afford to take a longer route because we wouldn't be on the time crunch the meeting had imposed on us.

Something about our plan felt wrong though, and I shifted to pull my scroll out to view a map of the area, driving with the other hand and only half focusing on the road.

Along our path there was almost nothing notable, we were avoiding the residential area we had come through on our exit, and would instead be driving through a business sector. In fact if we went a few miles off of our path we would be able to cut straight into the city and meet up with Team SAGE at the Dust Works Tower. In fact, the main benefit of taking this route was that if needed our second breakout team could be diverted to provide support to Team SAGE, or vice versa.

My mind, which had been idling while I tried to generate ideas, focused on that last fact. We were only a few miles from the meeting point, and we had just set off a massive explosion that Hyperion would doubtlessly recognize as the trap he had set in his cave. If he was observing us from the air somehow then he would know where we were and would be able to intercept us.

As I pieced it together I hurriedly stashed my scroll and accelerated to catch the lead vehicle. Sergeant Hearth was in the passenger seat as I pulled up alongside.

"We need to go faster!" I shouted across the gap. She nodded, her expression hidden behind the full helm of her powered armor, and leaned over to speak to her driver. They accelerated and I dropped back into my position in the middle of the pack. I hoped that accelerating our time table would be enough to prevent interception, but I wasn't optimistic.

A few miles of frantic driving later I got my answer, it wasn't.

-/-

The first indication of any problem was a small brown and green streak slamming from the sky into the dirt road in front of the lead vehicle. As we approached I was able to make out the figure of a lone woman standing up from the crater she had landed in. She had brown curly hair, greenish blue eyes, and a young looking face, with an expression that seemed almost indifferent. She wore outdoor hiking pants and a light green jacket against the cold. A moment later a figure in black and blue power armor materialized next to her, Hyperion.

Sergeant Hearth recognized the danger, and immediately opened fire on the pair as her driver accelerated into them, clearly intending to ram. The Puma's engine roared and the tires bit deeply into the dirt as it leapt forwards on a collision course with the pair, who seemed completely unworried about the one ton death machine heading for them.

Right before the Puma collided with them, the woman held out a hand, palm facing towards us. The Puma slammed into an invisible barrier a few feet in front of the pair, the frame crumpling as it met with a perfectly non-elastic barrier. The passengers were flung from their seats, only to be caught by their safety harnesses and crushed between the immovable wall and the rest of the Puma behind them as the momentum of the vehicle caused it to collapse in on itself.

Sergeant Hearth herself barely survived the initial impact as the weight of her armor broke free from the straps, sending her upwards and out of the way of the rest of the vehicle behind her. She still splattered against the invisible barrier in front of her with an ugly crunch, then fell limply atop the wreckage of her vehicle as it folded beneath her.

The rest of the convoy swerved and slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting the invisible barrier. In the back of the vehicle in front of me Lieutenant Amber shakily stood up, bringing his weapons to bear on the pair in front of us.

Hyperion took a running leap towards Lieutenant Amber, and the woman behind him pointed a finger towards us, causing him to fly forwards at incredible speed. He spiraled through the air like a football, his cape wrapping around him as he twisted until he flared it outwards at the last moment to climb slightly higher and allow his legs to swing out in front of him.

He kicked with both feet, slamming into Lieutenant Amber and throwing him out of the back of the vehicle. Amber's safety harness snapped from the impact, and he was sent flailing a dozen feet backwards to slam into the hood of my vehicle.

Friendship!

My belt practically shouted with joy as I looked at Hyperion's advancing figure.

"Wrong!" I whispered back harshly, fighting to unsling my rifle from the awkward position it had gotten caught in when I had been forced to stop. "That is not a friend!"

Hyperion strode purposefully, but not quickly, over to Lieutenant Amber, picking up the staggered officer by his collar. A deep and distorted voice emitted from the armor's speakers

"I told you not to try to escape David, and now look what happened."

Lieutenant Amber brought his shotgun to bear point blank on Hyperion and pulled the trigger, but the pellets bounced and deflected off of his armor. A sheen that I now recognized as magical protection caused the projectiles to harmlessly reflect off of his chest piece.

"I'm disappointed in you David, I thought you knew better." Hyperion continued. "And unfortunately for you, your team leader rejected the deal I offered for your safe return. I promised her that I'd say goodbye to you for her, and I'm a man of my word. So..."

Hyperion leaned in close to Lieutenant Amber, placing the faceplate of his helmet next to the Atlesian Huntsman's ear.

"Goodbye." He said quietly.

I finally got my rifle free, and brought it up to fire at Hyperion, but my bullets were also unable to overcome his magical ballistic protection. They pinged off his armor, leaving behind only small scratches on the paint. I switched my focus to aim at his relatively unarmored neck with the last few shots in my magazine, but his dark blue aura flared into existence and blocked my attack.

Without even glancing my way, he slammed Lieutenant Amber into the hood of my vehicle, then threw him almost a dozen yards away into the underbrush. I rose from my seat, detaching my harness and resuming firing at Hyperion now that my view was unobstructed.

Still not looking at me, his helmet visor locked on Lieutenant Amber, he drew his own rifle with one hand from where it had been collapsed along the thigh of his armor and shot two high caliber rounds at me. The first round nailed me directly in the chest and caused the magical protections from my belt to fizzle as it bored into my armor. The second round caught me in the neck, piercing my semi-flexible armored undersuit and traveling through my voice box, windpipe, and spine. The round smoothly exited the back of my neck and I collapsed in a heap back into my seat, blood pouring from the wound into the driver's seat.

My vision narrowed as blood flow was cut to my brain, I tried to gasp for air, tried to reach up to stem the bleeding, but my body refused to answer my brain's instructions.

Panic! Confusion!

The belt shouted, magical healing pouring into my injuries. I could feel the wound closing slowly, too slowly for me, I was losing blood too fast and by the time the bullet holes would be closed I would be beyond saving. My vision continued to tunnel as the world faded away. I could loosely hear shouting and gunfire, with vague blurs of movement in front of me. There was a tickle in the back of my mind as the belt tried to communicate with me.

Friendship?

Rejection.

Betrayal!

-/-

Consciousness returned in a flash. I was walking towards Lieutenant Amber, rifle up, black and blue powered armor squared at a slight angle to properly deflect his incoming fire with minimal damage.

The faceless Atlesian soldier who had shot me in between the armor of my chestplate and helmet had been surprisingly accurate, and had reminded me that I needed to keep my chin tucked and arms up while I was facing incoming fire.

Amber unloaded both barrels of his shotgun fruitlessly towards me, then rapidly fired all six shots from his revolver, aiming for the knees and elbows of my armor to try to score a legitimate hit. He clearly wasn't as good of a shot as that other soldier had been however, as each shot failed to strike a weakpoint. Huntsman weaponry still packed more of a punch than the standard Atlesian rifle though, and my aura was drained a bit from where it had to supplement the armor plates and the magic woven into them.

I returned fire, but Lieutenant Amber activated his semblance, allowing my shots to pass through him, then stepped backwards through a tree.

"Come and get me asshole!" He shouted, poking his shotgun through the tree and firing off another blast. I blocked the shot from hitting my visor or throat by tucking my forearm up and pressing my wrist to my temple in a block, and was rewarded with a slug round pinging off the armor plate on my bicep instead of cracking against the more vulnerable faceplate.

He was trying to bait me away from the infantry, likely trying to protect them from being slaughtered by Yaslin and myself. That was fine by me, since I had no real interest in killing them, but we also couldn't have them gathering the reinforcements we had spotted on a breakout run.

I subconsciously activated my semblance, fading from view to give me time to assess the situation. Two soldiers leveled weapons to where they had last seen me, so I stepped to the side to avoid their spray of unguided gunfire. I couldn't stay invisible forever, and I had found that the quicker and more violent my actions were the more focus it required to bend light around me, leading to draining my aura more quickly. With that in mind, I kept my movements minimal while I observed my environment.

Another group of soldiers had dismounted, two of them munitions troopers by the look of it, and were charging where Yaslin was blocking the road with her forcefield. I double checked that none of them were going to be able to flank her, watching as the rockets from the munitions troops detonated impotently against her barrier, then spoke quietly into the microphone built into my helmet.

"Clean up here please, make sure they don't have any vehicles that are working before you go. I'll send up a flare after I'm finished with Amber."

My scroll encrypted the message, then I focused my semblance on clearing the air between myself and Yaslin, allowing it to be transmitted through the jamming immediately rather than setting it to loop until it finally broke through. The constant jamming was noisy, and irritated the sixth sense I had developed for light waves beyond the visible spectrum, like a speaker playing random static or a strobe light to the eyes, but I had to put up with it to keep any form of advantage against Atlas.

My message was answered by her using the telekinetic aspect of her semblance to pick up two of the enemy vehicles and smash them into each other, dropping them atop the soldiers who had just fired the rockets at her. I winced as their screams were suddenly cut off, then turned to give chase to Lieutenant Amber.

-/-

"Sir!" Someone was shouting, it sounded like Private Wilks, but I wasn't sure. My eyes fluttered open for a half second before a wave of pain hit me. My entire head ached, and the pain mounted as it traveled down into my spine before abruptly stopping just below where I had been shot. I could feel a flexible bandage covering the wound on my neck, the same type I had applied to Sergeant Helmsman the day I had first awoken. Evidently Wilks had managed to stem my blood loss quickly enough that the belt had been able to save me. I struggled to move, but found that my body still failed to react to my commands.

I sensed more than felt someone dragging me free of the Puma I had been driving, and forced my eyes open again to see the last of the Atlesian soldiers, the last of my team, firing uselessly towards the enemy huntress as she almost casually slaughtered them.

One soldier's rifle ripped itself out of his hands, then smashed itself into his helmet, crushing both the helmet and the skull beneath it. Another soldier's boots lifted him up almost fifty feet into the air before dropping him on his head. He screamed and flailed the whole way down, landing out of sight behind a demolished Puma and falling silent.

"Retreat!" Corporal Pike shouted, firing off a burst of rounds then grabbing the soldier next to him and sprinting away. It was the only reasonable chance they had at surviving, there was no way any of them could beat either of the huntsmen that had ambushed us.

Before they had even made it two steps the bumper of the Pumas ripped itself free and crashed into them from behind, knocking them off their feet.

Wilks grabbed me under the armpits and jerked me backwards, the sudden motion caused my head to loll on my lifeless neck. A sudden spike of pain shot through me as my vulnerable spine was tweaked and I blacked out.

-/-

I was back in my powered armor, hunting the oddly elusive Atlesian Huntsman through the underbrush. I saw another flicker of white movement and sent two rounds towards it. They impacted a rock he had just phased through, each armor piercing shot blasting chunks of stone free and filling the forest with tiny shrapnel like pebbles for a moment.

I ground my teeth, then jumped off the tree I had climbed to give chase. The redwood groaned with the effort of resisting the weight of myself and my armor, but held firm. I flared my cape for half a moment, then landed on the soft forest floor with a muffled *thump.* The sound dampeners built into my armor helped, but not even they could keep me completely silent. I considered ditching the armor to better stalk my target, but ultimately decided it wasn't worth the effort of hiking back to wherever I left it once I finally caught him.

I turned partly invisible, both to skimp on aura expenditure and to let Amber believe his plan was working so he wouldn't try to lose me entirely. So long as he was sure he was leading me away from his rescue party he would stay in contact. All I had to do was wait for him to slip up.

-/-

I gasped for air, then felt a hand cover my mouth. I tried to thrash against it, but my body failed to react to my commands.

"Shhh" Wilks whispered softly, his voice was almost completely silent, barely even a breath. Through a woozy haze induced by blood loss and shock I puzzled out where I was, trying to separate where I was now from what I had been experiencing just a moment ago.

We were underneath one of the Pumas, I could feel his pulse through the contact between his wrist and the side of my face, it was pounding fast and hard as we hid from Yaslin's destruction.

I focused on breathing quietly through my nose. Much of the pain had faded from my neck wound, but I still couldn't feel anything below my neck. After a moment I heard a female voice speaking English, just a few feet from where we lay.

"Yeah," she said calmly, almost nonchalantly. "Gary's prisoner escaped apparently, not sure how. I'm helping him clean up right now but I'll be back in time for dinner."

There was a pause, presumably while she waited for her message to transmit and a reply to be sent. The pause dragged on while whatever communication system she used tried to break through the jamming. Finally I heard a second voice reply through the speaker of her scroll, but I couldn't make out what it said.

"Sure, steak and potatoes sounds good, I'll meet you there." Yalsin replied. Then she crouched slightly, her boots scuffing the dirt, and launched herself skyward.

Wilks released his hand and I sucked in air.

"Belt?" I tried to ask, but the words didn't form properly, instead coming out as more of a "el?"

Exhaustion, failure.

The belt replied, presumably indicating that it was low on magic from healing me, or that it was completely unable to heal my lingering paralysis, I was unsure which.

"What?" Wilks asked. Looking down at me with a shell shocked expression.

I tried to shake my head, but was still frustratingly unable to move on my own.

"We need to go" I tried to say, it came out close to "E eed oo oh."

"I.." Wilks said distractedly, then looked around. "I just... They're all dead." He was definitely in shock, I probably was too in retrospect, but I was still at least thinking about what to do next. I focused on forming the words correctly, then spoke again.

"Wilks" I said weakly. "We need to go." He blinked, looking down at me as if shocked I was still there.

"Sir?" He asked.

"We need to go, I can't move, are any of the Pumas still functional?" He blinked again.

"I don't know sir." He finally replied.

"That's okay," I reassured him, "I need you to go out and look at the Pumas, then come back here and tell me if any of them are working. Can you do that for me?" I spoke slowly, both so that I could focus on enunciating my words and to avoid overwhelming him. Wilks was my only lifeline right now, and if he broke down we would both die out in the middle of nowhere.

He nodded, and cautiously crawled out from under the wrecked Puma to examine the other vehicles. A minute later he returned, getting down on his knees and elbows and scooting back under the car.

"They're all broken sir." He reported, "But I didn't see that Huntress in the sky, I think she left."

I would have nodded had I been capable of it, instead I focused on what to do next. We were still easily ten miles away from Argus, and our breakout force likely wouldn't come searching for us. Their orders had been to create a breakthrough for us then hightail it back to base, they wouldn't wait around to get shot. We had a few hours until sundown, but with it being the winter months darkness would come sooner rather than later.

Once the sun went down Argus' Grimm patrols would pull back to their encampments, and the Grimm would be out in force. If we were caught outside the walls after dark the odds were good we would end up in one of their bellies. Unfortunately all of this led to one unavoidable conclusion.

"Wilks" I said quietly, "You need to hike back to Argus without me, you'll never make it before sundown if you try to carry me, but you can probably make it if you go now."

"What?" He practically squeaked, shocked back into alertness by my statement. "No! I'm not going to leave you here!" I opened my mouth to argue my point but was cut off as he reached over and grabbed hold of the collar of my armor. His hand slipped slightly as it came away bloody, I had lost an impressive amount through my neck wound before he and the belt had managed to treat it.

After a moment he adjusted his grip and pulled me towards him by my shoulder. I fought off a wave of nausea as my vision faded slightly for a moment. A piercing ringing entered my ears as the sudden motion aggravated the dangerously low blood pressure my body was dealing with. I was grateful that my armor had been designed to operate in Atlesian snow, the extra warmth was helping to combat the early symptoms of hypothermia that would be setting in soon.

Wilks hauled me out from under the Puma through sheer force of effort, then rose to a crouch and hefted me up onto his shoulders in a fireman carry. I grunted, feeling the blood drain away from my head as he lifted me up, then lost consciousness again.

-/-

And opened my eyes to see Lieutenant Amber in front of me, he had lost his weapons and his uniform was torn along the right sleeve. His normally white Atlesian uniform, already dirtied from being worn for several day, now featured mud stains along the knees and elbows, presumably from where he had been crawling to try to escape me. Blood dripped from a gunshot wound in his gut, just below the rib cage. He was kneeling on the ground with his hand outstretched on a tree to help him keep his balance, his face a mask of pain and regret. I expected to see anger, rage even, but instead he seemed largely resigned to his fate.

I leveled my rifle at his head, but felt a small twinge in my gut as I came face to face with him. He should have been angry, either at me or the world in general. Instead, he looked closer to being disappointed, sad maybe. With a long sigh I lowered my rifle, then reached up and removed my helmet, tossing it aside. I crouched down, still well outside of his reach and confident he had no way to attack me.

"Look" I said awkwardly, "We both know you're not going home. Is there anything you want me to make sure happens? Last words or something you want delivered?"

He breathed heavily, clutching at the wound over his diaphragm, trying futilely to keep the blood inside his body.

"Yeah..." He breathed, "I need you to-"

-/-

My head bounced off of Wilks' shoulder as he stumbled down a shortcut between switchbacks on the road. The light was fading quickly, which told me he had been hiking for several hours already. He tripped as a piece of shale broke beneath his foot, sending us tumbling down the last few feet onto the road below. I cried out in pain as my head smacked against the hard packed dirt, unable to protect myself from the fall.

"Shit, sorry" Wilks called out weakly, he sounded exhausted. Carrying a full grown man down uneven terrain was difficult even at the best of times, let alone with armor and weapons to worry about.

"It's okay" I mumbled into the dirt, "How long was I unconscious?" He grabbed my shoulder and gently rolled me over, checking me for injuries despite the numerous cuts and scratches I saw on his hands and face.

"A few hours." He replied matter of factly. "I was worried you weren't going to wake back up all."

"How far from Argus are we?" I asked him, trying to catch a glimpse of the city by straining my eyes.

"I'd say three miles or so. I think we can make it in an hour or two."

"Wilks." I said softly, "The sun's going down, you're not going to make it if you carry me." He paused for a moment, looking up towards the setting sun. After a few seconds I could see he had made up his mind. He reached down and hefted me up again, staggering under my weight on exhausted legs.

"We'll see." He grunted. "But we'll see together. I'm not leaving you out here for the Grimm." As if on queue, or perhaps drawn to the negative emotions surrounding the word, I heard the howl of a Beowolf half a mile or so behind us.

"Shit." We said in unison, and Wilks did his best to speed his pace. I tried to think of something I could do to help him, anything at all beyond being dead weight. Unfortunately my belt had gone completely silent, likely out of its magical reserves from its attempts to heal me, which rendered me effectively worthless. Wilks picked up his pace, going from a staggering walk to a steady stride. He was already operating off of pure adrenaline and fear at this point though, and the minor increase in speed wasn't enough to keep us away from the Grimm now that the patrols had retired for the night.

After only a few minutes I heard a rustle in the trees to the side of the road, followed by the sounds of crashing foliage. Wilks swore quietly, turning awkwardly and withdrawing a pistol from a holster on his side. He hadn't been issued that weapon, so he must have scavenged it from one of the sergeants who had been with our rescue party. He raised the weapon with a trembling hand, though whether it was fear or fatigue that shook his aim I couldn't be sure.

A single massive Grimm crashed through the underbrush and out into the waning light. It was easily twelve feet tall, with a vicious snarling face, glowing red eyes, razor sharp claws, and a deep otherworldly glow emanating from its maw. Bony protrusions split the inky black skin of the wolf-like yet still vaguely humanoid monster, and it sniffed the air for a moment before locking its eyes on us.

Wilks opened fire, backpedalling away from the creature in a panic. The low caliber pistol rounds impacted the creature of darkness, but had little effect beyond enraging it. It let out an ear splitting roar that was answered by a pack just out of sight, then leveled its muzzle towards us.

"Run!" I shouted, and Wilks complied, turning and sprinting away as fast as he could manage. He only made it a few steps before the Beowolf leapt towards us, swiping out with its claws. The blow caught my side, and my armor fortunately protected Wilks' shoulders from being split open as the force of the impact threw me free of Wilks' grip, sending both of us tumbling in the dirt. I tumbled and rolled, then came to a stop face up, forced to watch helplessly as the Grimm pounced on Wilks again, biting and clawing as it sought to get through the shell of his armor. Wilks pointed the pistol towards the monster's face and emptied the remainder of the magazine to little effect. In response, the Beowolf snapped outwards in a lightning fast bite, taking Wilks' outstretched arm off at the elbow.

Wilks cried out in pain, and the Grimm snapped its jaws again, fully consuming the piece of arm it had bitten off. Everything below the elbow was now just a bloody stump, rapidly dripping blood onto the ground. Wilks clutched at the wound, squeezing it in a death grip with his left hand in a desperate attempt to slow the bleeding. The Beowolf, now no longer encountering resistance from its prey, stood on its hind legs and emitted a howl of victory.

This time however, instead of being met by the echoing howl of its pack, it was matched by a much higher pitched scream. The scream hadn't come from either Wilks or I, but instead had come from the sky behind us. Despite the higher pitch, the scream itself filled with the essence of pure rage finally given release, and I wondered what kind of Grimm was filled with so much anger. The Beowolf snapped its head towards the source of the scream, locking its eyes on the approaching target.

A split second later, a massive hammer slammed into the Grimm from above, crushing its skull and driving it into the dirt. The hammer ripped itself free with a *squelch* and slammed back into the air, where it was caught by a small figure dressed in white Atlesian scout armor. White hair stained red at the ends with blood streamed behind the figure as she slammed into the dirt, crushing the Grimm the rest of the way and causing it to dissipate into smoke.

Captain Evelynn Stone stood in the cloud of rapidly evaporating smoke, then turned her head and looking down at Wilks as he clutched the stump of his arm, desperately trying to stem the bleeding. Her gold colored eyes burned with anger in the reflection of the setting sun as she dropped her hammer with a *thump* then pulled a tourniquet from her belt and rapidly applied it to the injured limb. The howls of the surrounding Grimm grew louder as she worked, and just as she finished tightening the tourniquet another Beowolf burst from the underbrush, swiping towards her with one paw.

Captain Stone ducked down, holding one arm up to shield Wilks from the blow and taking it on her purple aura, then stood and kicked the charging Beowolf's legs out from under it. The Grimm collapsed with a yelp, but before it could recover she whipped her hammer up from where it lay on the ground and brought it in a fluid swing down to crush the monster's skull, the monster puffed away into smoke.

More Grimm burst out onto the open dirt road as the rest of the pack finally caught up to us. Captain Stone reached down and picked Wilks up by his collar, then tossed him underhand towards where I lay in the dirt. The hapless medic hit awkwardly and rolled sideways, coming to a stop next to me.

"Stay down, shout if they're gonna get you" The captain ordered in a flat tone, then she turned to face the oncoming horde.

Whenever I had fought Evelynn I was surprised by how poorly her fighting style seemed to work against a human opponent. Even in our first bout, before I had my belt back, I had been able to land hits that any decent martial artist would have been able to evade. Instead, she had seemed determined to plant her feet and break oncoming attacks through sheer force of will.

Now though, I saw why she fought the way she did. The Grimm could only fight her a few at a time, and even then they were forced to abandon the momentum of their charge to attack her from multiple sides. Each one was easily three or four times her size, but it worked completely against them as they got in each other's way.

Evelynn spread her feet, tucking her head down and whipping the hammer in an underhand swing into an upwards arc as the first Grimm reached her. The blow caught the creature under the chin, slamming its mouth shut then carrying through and shattering both the jaw and skull. It collapsed in a heap, but didn't quite begin to dissipate into smoke. She carried through with her uppercut and twisted sideways, pivoting in place on her right foot to bring the hammer down onto another Grimm's outstretched paw. Without stopping the momentum of her strikes she stepped gingerly to the side, allowing the wounded beast to charge past her, then brought the hammer around again to catch a third monster in the ribs.

Bones snapped and Grimm cried out in an approximation of pain as she allowed the recoil from her hammer blow to reposition her just barely out of the way of another Beowolf. The move brought her only a foot or two from the Grimm whose paw she had shattered, but instead of trying to swing the hammer around she simply dropped her shoulder and slammed into the beast, staggering it for a critical moment before she reached up to catch it by the tooth and haul its head down into a knee strike.

Having successfully built herself a barrier of crippled Grimm, Captain Stone switched on the dust projector of her hammer and began firing blasts into the Grimm who had been eagerly awaiting their chance to attack her. Evelynn roared with anger, and I realized that by feeding her negative emotions she was not only channeling her energy into violence, but was also making herself more enticing to the Grimm, who had nearly completely abandoned Wilks and myself to instead focus on the loud, and very angry woman standing in the middle of the dirt road. Whether or not that was an intentional tactic I couldn't know, but I was grateful for it.

"Come on!" She roared at the remaining few Grimm. "Let's go!" The beasts responded with their own roar, then four of them charged at once. Evelynn thrust the head of her hammer out with one hand like a spear to break the charge of the first Beowolf, then leapt skywards. The head of her hammer dragged behind her as she carried the end of the hilt skywards, then she used her semblance to whip it along a pendulum arc into another Grimm that had charged from the opposite direction of the first. She used the momentum generated by her hammer to yank herself into a frontflip, releasing the hammer and slamming her boot downwards into the skull of a third Grimm in an axe kick.

She landed in a crouch as the three Grimm crumpled, then stood and raised her arms, blocking the swipe from the fourth Beowulf with her aura shield. It flashed purple, but wavered slightly for a moment, evidence that she wasn't at full charge. Abandoning the hammer that had lodged itself inside the chest cavity of the second Grimm, she jumped forwards into a tackle, driving the Beowolf she was fighting to the ground and pummeling it with a series of punches.

After several hits she stood, raising both hands above her head and waiting. Her hammer ripped itself free of the Grimm it had been embedded in with a loud ripping sound like old canvas and flew to her waiting hands. It oriented itself head up and hilt down, perfectly matching where she was miming holding it. The moment it touched her palms she took hold of it and slammed it downwards to crush the skull of her opponent.

"Captain!" Wilks shouted, pointing with his uninjured left hand to where the final Grimm had decided to go after the easier prey and was approaching our position. Captain Stone stood abruptly, whipping her blood stained hair out of her eyes with a jerk of her head. With a fluid motion she tossed the hammer up above shoulder height, catching it just below the head like a javelin. She pointed towards the Grimm with two fingers, then stepped forwards, pitching her entire body into the throw as the Grimm advanced on us. The hammer thrummed through the air and caught it in the back, crushing its spine and causing it to collapse lifelessly in the dirt before puffing into a cloud of black smoke. All was silent for a long moment.

"Holy shit" I whispered. "Did we survive?" Captain Stone approached, angrily kicking a crumpled Beowolf out of her way, then stood over us. Up close I could see that her fingerless black gloves, combat boots, and the sides of her hammer were also stained with blood, though clearly not her own as her aura was still unbroken. Her armor was also covered in soot in a blast pattern starting at her left shoulder and emanating outwards, likely from an explosion that she had been uncomfortably close to. Evidently she had taken it upon herself to break through the enemy lines defending the Argus perimeter wall.

"Specialist." She spat the greeting like left was a foul taste in her mouth.

"Ma'am?" I asked lamely from my position prone on the ground.

"Where the hell is my teammate?"