The worst had fallen right on their doorstep, far quicker than expected.
Adorned in pale flesh distorted by crimson vines… Ozpin could do little as Miss Politan stared into the eyes of humanity's unmaker. Familiarity spruced up with minimal apparent change would often provide a level of peace, but such offered little comfort as his hands itched to unleash a full frontal assault of his power. However, not only would Salem brush it away with her own strength, but her apparent hostage would face total obliteration.
All he seemed capable of during those few shell shocked seconds was calling out to the other young woman within two meters of the nightmare with skin.
"Miss Rose! To me!"
Startled from stillness, Summer's youngest and only by blood stammered out her partner's name. Ozpin reiterated, louder and more frantic; perhaps the first time in years he'd allowed genuine fear to dust his voice. That alone did nothing, until Salem stared into the girl's eyes. That kicked her out, and Ruby reformed beside them in record time; face unsettled with faux courage, and a shaky voice who somehow managed to display concise intentions.
"We need to save her."
Ruby personally could not have recognised the evil by face or obvious intent, but her body and soul very much caught on to the dangers his old love exuded. Salem had yet to do anything outwardly vile in their presence here, but Ozpin had a hunch Miss Politan could taste the palpable danger too.
Out of the lot, Cinder Fall looked most... bewildered; more so through her tone, as her face had yet to greet them again.
"Mistress?" The title seeped out into the open air, but no breeze picked it up. Everything within their vicinity, upon Salem's injection, came to an instantaneous halt. "Why are-?"
"Begone. Your work is done here." Apparently, his allies weren't the only ones lost, as Cinder took up a level of insult in her approach.
"What? But I have yet to unearth the vault. And Amber is here; I must find her-"
The space beside him jerked, torn up from the displaced servant blasted past them, leading to the destruction which caved in the wall of the freshman dorm at their backs. Ozpin could not see Cinder through the smoke, and if he had to guess, she'd been shot through more than one chamber. His eyes reared around front again to see the lone tendril snake its way across the ground and back into what most would call the hem of her dress; ignorant that any and all parts of Salem, clothes and jewelry included, originated from her tainted body and magic.
Salem wore not adaptable clothes, but a malleable hide she could summon and banish at a moments notice, and that twisted skin could fight if need be, as her servant had unfortunately come to discover.
Their eyes met, only for a second, before her own returned to Neo.
Ozpin had no contingencies prepped for a situation like this, but that didn't stop him from scowering his mind amidst his ex wife's calm before the storm.
.
.
Mint tried to turn when the audible crashing slapped her across the back of the head, but this thing that fire-bitch called 'mistress' didn't let her. To think, Cinder spent her time in the arms of this lady; she'd call it good taste if the very sight of what Mint would dub a "dark mommy" didn't bring her bladder close to tears.
A lone thumb traced her cheek, and a soft wetness spread underneath.
A small tinge of embarrassment welled up, but honestly, who wouldn't shed a few from inexplicable terror when a beautiful nightmare held you in her grips, looking ripe and ready to chow down.? A grimm in human form. Mint settled on the idea because for sure there wasn't any faunus alive with enough traits to accurately and coincidentally look both like a grimm person, and bring out so much terror from her mere presence.
The woman had yet to do anything, and still Mint felt the urge to curl up in a ball and beg.
Recognition welled up in her captor's face.
"Shh~ Hold still just a moment."
Alarm bells rang as the head leaned in, and the only thing which kept Mint from struggling had to be the thoughts of what this monster was capable of should she try. The pale chin settled at eye level, and a soft peck graced her forehead. A little kiss... not so bad at first, until something in her body rose up.
Mint then attempted, briefly, to yank back, but the dark mistress only held her tighter. Nausea erupted from as low as her bowls, and for a few seconds dry heaving burned her esophagus. Pressure started to bulge in her noggin, and those dry hacks became spews of spittle and gunk. Whatever her body could eject, it did, down the side of the black dress clung so tightly to the horror cradling her.
"Neo Politan."
Said aforementioned froze up, only for her neck to crook back until she stared up at the sky. The eyeballs nearly popped out of her skull when another joust of sour puss charged up her throat and dribbled down her chin and cheeks. And then she tasted it, that metal tang: blood. Her stomach ached as it tried to puke its way out of its home in her belly. Her ears deciphered nothing but white noise as they rattled and stretched and hissed like snakes for her alone to hear.
The grimm woman lifted a brow.
"That's an interesting effect… But of course, you can end it at any moment. Simply let your body go~"
Neo ejected from Mint, able to take some solace from the pain, but disturbed greatly by the sharp set of glowing eyes tied not to the body she left behind, but her. Salem pulled an unwary, suffering Mint into a strong embrace, and from that moment her lips moved. No words came out, but Neo read the silent warning clear as day.
"Lead the way."
Blinded by black and drowned in a sea of nothing, Neo struggled and rolled, until her hands met chilly glass. Through the haze of distorted light, she spied the pair of deities right in front of her tube. Without hesitation she laid against the glass, until it lowered to release its contents.
Plopped out on her side, Neo heaved, curled, and pushed herself up. On all fours, her breaths constricted. Her forehead hurt a little too much.
"Neo?"
"Give her a minute. Point blank's got to have her ears screaming out in pain."
"She couldn't feel the pain as spirit though."
"Not physical pain."
Neo glanced up at the pair shakily. Wilem stood comfortably in his vest, and Kobos stiff in that lab coat. The dark god, whose casual attitude suffered little when suggesting space, waved curtly, albeit with a strange stiffness to his posture.
"Welcome back. I'd ask about your trip, but I don't think you want to talk about Salem right now."
Did she want to? No. Did she need to? Yes. Unfortunately, the words to come out didn't match the topic of conversation. Her voice, here, could only offer a candle's warmth. Even so, she burned her fingertips with it willingly; hatred puckered up to shove its tongue down her throat.
"She took it all away..."
"It's not quite all gone." Wilem strolled over, each step muffled and soft when it should have clacked viciously. Her hair twirled up under the fingers of unseen winds, and curled into two pigtails. Across her chest the fabric flowed until it wrapped her in a familiar sheet. "You can return bright as day."
Yes, her mind begged.
"No." But her heart would not besmirch the memory. "It… It's gone."
Only she remained.
"You know..." Wilem stretched out his hand towards her, and she accepted it half-heartedly. Bit by bit her hair unraveled, and her dress fell, shed from her body to leave Neo bare. A cocky grin crossed the slick god's face, and out of all the actions he could take, he reached up to clap both her cheeks in his hands; centering her face on his. "If you ask me, I don't believe your buddies will see a difference."
"They don't know me."
"One does."
"She knew I was lying."
"Were you?"
Neo nearly wretched, shown only through a scoff and some brashness in her tone.
"No duh. She… Ruby's one of those hero wannabes. She'll befriend anyone she can. The others aren't like that."
"Maybe not, but they trust Ruby, don't they? And, if they trust her, then do you really think they'll go behind her back?"
Arrogant son of a bitch...
Neo grabbed hold of her outburst; not a hint of it showed besides a small sharpened squint. The urge to slap him took over, but like heck she could get away with slapping a god. Wilem may be lenient, but they made her, and they could unmake her. But they couldn't unmake Mint, and neither had they stitched her together.
The pain from before, that burning on her forehead, it returned in full force.
Neo ignored it.
"You wouldn't get it." Neo wanted to flop down on her ass, but stayed upright just to spite the gods looking down on her. "From far away we all look alike."
"I can say that about being up close too." Her glare burst through the gates, but the Dark Lord showed no reaction beyond his cool smile. "Near or far, you all appear identical. But looks, sadly, rarely ever tell the whole story."
Wrapped up in new clothes, Neo lifted her hands to see the dregs she'd always modeled before being lopped in with Beacon. From there, his own appearance contorted into a mass of purple, and then into an outline of a guy with ram horns - like a purple stickman. He clapped himself into a flawless copy of his brother, who seemed more focused on observing them - especially her - with unreadable focus.
The disguise blew off Wilem as scraps of dark dust, and they found themselves back to square one: the good old bartender get-up.
"I can wear a myriad of disguises, but I'm still the same god of destruction your home loves to loathe. As are you - minus the loathing part."
"What about it?" Around her she hallucinated their breathing: the many Neos all sharing a harmonious heartbeat in their comatose slumber. It had to be in her head, because their tiny breaths lay hidden beneath gunk within pillars of glass.
The Dark Lord sighed and shook his head.
"Never mind." Cheeky fuck slouched and waved her along. "Come on. Let's take a rest."
"Hold on." Lobos stopped them. The first words out of his mouth to address her, and they were a command. Wilem eyed him lazily, judgmentally, but then it stretched into hardened concern, and finally disturbance. From there, when both sets of eyes landed on her, the elder brother tightened his fist and glared at his little sibling. "Do you feel that?"
One nod was all it took for Neo to ask "what?"
Both divines refused to answer, and as the seconds of stagnation carried out, Neo found it had started to get stuffy. A bitter chill covered her skin, she shivered, and soon breathing felt harder and harder to do. That thought alone unleashed a single second of realization to strike, and under the weight of her own panting it carved into her mind a devastating wrongness.
She shouldn't have needed to breathe in the void.
Needles jabbed through her lungs and joints, and without input, her soul ejected from her body. Neo never made that choice; her body instead kicked her spirit out. Slack-jawed briefly, Neo jolted to look back at her own flesh. In a place fate shouldn't have been able to reach, there was no need to evacuate her body period. Before she could settle her "sights," her spirit got sucked up by the nearest body, and from within her tube and through new eyes she witnessed her previous suit twist and bend.
Several cracked joints later and it took up a professional posture.
"Hello again~" That wasn't her voice. A sly smirk unveiled itself, uncomfortably perfect on her non-body's maw. "Kobos and Wilem... Are those new names, or have you just been hiding them from us all this time?"
"You shouldn't be here." Kobos took a single fierce step forward, his eyes crackling with sparks of gold. "How did you find us?"
"How could I not?" It giggled, if fucking giggled. "With how many times you've injected your experiments into her, it's no wonder she came to me."
"Who?"
"Who do you think?"
Neo swallowed hard. She may not have been able to tell exactly what was going on down there, but she knew enough to catch that.
"So it's true... She's developed her own individuality."
"A godless world is the perfect breeding ground for a new god, no? Or rather, I should say a new goddess."
"What do you want, Salem."
"Simple. I'm here to request you unshackle me of my curse."
Kobos' face crumpled.
"You've been warned already: you'll be welcomed by death once you understand its purpose."
"Is that a no?" He nodded, but Neo saw something else.
Maybe she'd just begun to go a little nuts from all this godly mumbo jumbo, but his perfect no-nonsense face... It looked a little too rigid. Heck, he had terrible people skills, but even when being an ignorant jerk he still had the decency to speak with a loose face.
Salem sighed, and Neo felt weird watching such a perfect copy of herself act so... unlike her, only to then go back to nailing the expressions and stance.
"She warned me you were stubborn, but I suppose I once again harbored too much hope. I figured you two learned a bit of mercy. Clearly, I was wrong." An arm extended - fingertips spread. "But I should thank you regardless; you've made my choice drastically easier."
Lobos opened his mouth to say something, but whatever it was caught in his throat. Neo didn't see it, because the damn gunk in her eyes cut out most everything... Wait a minute. The liquid suspending her new body didn't clog up in her eyes. Instead, its pitch shifted. The transparency fled in favor of raw black. Her skin tingled anew, but unlike before, something wrapped around her arms.
Steaming pressure whistled in her ears, and a slimy something breached damn near every orifice in her body and beyond. While not quite painful like having knives stabbed through muscle, Neo experienced something pull apart patches of skin all across her front, back, and everywhere in between. The blood rolling through her veins seemingly picked up speed. The underside of her outer layer bubbled, and pressurised streams of fluid flowed noticeably throughout, almost like she'd been trying to piss, but the piss ran up and down the innards of her arms and legs, instead of her crotch and lower abdomen.
The pressure soon rolled into actual pain as fire raked across her bones. Again, an invisible, untouchable force moved, but rather than inject her, it sought to rip apart her soft outer shell.
Neo channeled all her energy then to slam her fists against the glass. Unlike before, the black waters clogged her lungs, and that impossibility of needing to breathe in the gods' pocket world returned. Drowning in darkness - a metaphor turned quite literal - heightened the extremity of her flailing, until the muscles of her wrists ripped away to stretch forward.
The ear-splitting shatter of glass drowned itself underneath her newly freed lungs. While still on two feet, she curled over to puke up slime onto the once pristine floor, which appeared to have abandoned its perfection in favor of rusty iron. Once the pain subsided to an acceptable level, and she could breathe again - still horribly wrong, but that she fashioned as an issue for later - Neo locked eyes with her shaking hands.
Her crimson-webbed, uncertain ink-stained hands.
Akin to how she'd visualized an infection spread, the binds criss-crossed up along all of her skin; skin which faded from charred to normal, where the red webbing darkened into solid black. As if that hadn't startled her senses fully awake, the sight of her once beautifully strawberry-chocolate locks did the job completely. Cloudy white fell over her eyes, and abyssal black trailed her shoulder.
"Interesting..." Neo cocked her head directly at her other more natural looking self, whose host was anything but. "I'd have rather you'd fully adopted my shape, but that will suffice~"
She never got to ask what Salem did to her before all control of her meat-suit fled. Unable to even part her lips, Salem twisted to view the other numerous tubes containing all the other Neos in one swift turn, only to then raise a hand. It fell, and with it, every single container crushed in on itself. The floor flooded with that same onyx bile which threatened to drown her, however atop it strands of red rolled evenly; swallowed up by the greedy tar.
"We'll be having no more interference." Salem rounded casually, her features giddy to a point, but wrapped in controlled satisfaction.
No more bodies to trade.
Neo's legs betrayed her, and she dropped into the corrupt mess. On her ass but still upright, the lukewarm tide settled around her waist. Salem walked without delay, unbothered by the starless night sloshing against her coffee trousers, and squatted before her. Neo looked into the burning rings, and saw shrouding pity - unable to hate them completely.
"Do not worry, my dear. Those replicas are useless to you now." A soft, human finger pressed into her chest, right above her heart. "That body will prove more than capable to cover your needs."
Rising, the light around them flickered, and as if the darkness had reached her cornea to clear away a fog, Neo saw threads of serrated, needle-riddled vines climbing into sight. Salem stepped away, eyes shut as if comfortable in bed, and fell back into the black sea to be seen no more. Neo sluggishly regained motor functions, and crawled forth to find nothing below the spot.
Trapped and twisted in a skin unfamiliar and new, Neo had little else to do stew in a growth of fury. The fear had fled alongside its mistress, and only rage remained. Rage for her embarrassment of being kicked from her own body, and rage for her failure to save…
A rough, forceful cough popped her bubble of ire.
Behind her, the brothers sat waist-high in the dead sea, bound in twisted grimm vines which also gagged them. Only they could help her make sense of this mess, but one step towards the pair had tendrils shoot up from below to ensnare her. Tangible pain, much like breathing, shouldn't have been a thing, but was. By chance, or maybe some questionably unsettling mercy from Salem, they did little more than irritate her skin.
Wilem bit through his gag, spit out the torn chunk - thorns and all - and conjured up a playfully apologetic grin. The vines worked to wrap his head again, but deep violet flames roared and slathered his noggin. From the ball of admittedly pretty chaos, his voice reverberated.
"I'd blame big brother for this, but now is hardly the time. Listen to me, we cannot let Salem do whatever it is she wants to do. I speak for the both of us when I say this, but it'll not only be the end of us, but you all as well."
Well no shit. Neo paused, her thoughts dull, and slumped. Things truly were ground into dust if even her internal snark couldn't so much as dig up a snort from her nose. From the corner of her eyes, she spied golden fire, and out came Lobos with his own two lien.
"He speaks the truth. Whatever promises the Spirit Of Remnant has made to Salem are double edged. Nearly every change she's made has been to keep us out. And if it means sacrificing the entirety of her people, her systems and rules: Remnant will do it all to spite us."
"Especially since we've revealed our interest in her business." The God Of Destruction, wrapped up and bound humiliatingly in vines, still had the nerve to chortle. "Guess we've finally outstayed our welcome. Hey, Neo, this'll probably sound a little funky coming from the guy who's essentially your estranged grandpa, but I'm sorry for getting you and the rest of you mortals mixed up in this. Trust me, he's feeling it too, but he's more focused on what we'll do in regards to this."
"There's nothing we can do." Lobos sighed. "Not us, anyway." From behind the golden fire, Neo just knew he raised his head to meet her gaze. "We've no right hoisting this duty upon you, but you're the only one left we can count on. While tethered to Remnant, we cannot use the full extent of our power. However, we do have enough strength to return you to the world below. Sadly, we won't be able to reconnect with Salem and Remnant on the prowl; both will notice any attempt."
Or, in other words: they needed to kick her back down so she could challenge the bitch - or bitches, in this case - all on her lonesome. Of course, that also meant that, even if they made more Neos for her use, they couldn't send them out whenever her body keeled over.
Remnant would receive only one Neo, and she just had to hope it was enough.
"Hey," Wilem interrupted her second of introspection and maybe plotting - it went undecided as of the moment. "Don't worry about us, okay?" She never said she was, but at what point had she been able to hide anything from him? "We'll be free to weed out this little garden the second we cut our connection from the world. You focus on finding a way to handle Salem, and we will handle things up here. Besides, it's not like we can't speak to you from time to time; that, at least, I'm sure we'll find a way to do."
"Believe in us." Lobos once more found the most off-key ways to interject himself into their conversation. "They believe they've stalled us with their binds, but their presence here should have left us with enough information to crack down on a method to defeat her; we simply need to find it. Once we do, we'll contact you, even if it means facing their combined wrath a second time."
Until then, Neo reckoned her schtick with the world who wanted her dead would be to survive, and maybe even one-up Salem. And she thought Cinder was the worst of her issues...
Ideas loved to come from uncertain sources, didn't they?
Would Cinder work? Salem's pawn... Or, Neo thought she was her pawn. The flaming donkey called Salem 'mistress,' after all.
One look had been all it took to get a deeper chuckle from Wilem.
"I like that face. It screams "bite me."" The Dark Lord reached out towards her, and in his hand erupted black fire.
The Light Lord mimicked his younger brother, but with gold fire.
"Not many mortals have arisen to challenge their makers. Although I've a feeling you'll fare much better than your contemporary."
Threads shot from both, each wrapping around an arm to snake up to her neck, where they wound downwards to begin weaving a cocoon around her, which made its way up. When the binds crossed over her neck, only a head away from total mummification, Lobos gave her a final warning to depart with.
"We cannot send you immediately back to Salem herself, but we'll send you somewhere safe for you to recover and come to grips with your mutation. Take your time, and be wary. We can no longer rescue you as we did before, and I harbor no doubts this "gift" from Salem is anything less than a poison to some degree."
Neo nodded, and managed to chuck on a smirk of her own - only partly fake. She'd worry about Ruby and the others, but Ruby carried within her a strength like no other. Besides, the girl would have a whole team to help her hold down the fort, alongside all of Beacon if push came to shove. On a more disappointing note, she wouldn't get to see the Vytal Festival through, nor the team moves Ruby chatted about during some lunches before shit hit the fan. Fire Flower; Monochrome; Ladybug; "cool" team names she'd never get to see, and cheesy enough that Neo felt a little jealous.
One of Neo's last thoughts as the binds fully encased her settled on that weird habit Ruby and their friends had for naming things. If they knew she'd been tasked by the gods to challenge the literal Spirit Of Remnant over the destiny it had in mind for its people, would they give her her own weird nickname?
Monochrome Maiden? Nah; too similar to the team up. Gods' Gamble? Eh, sounded more like the brothers themselves had an addiction to curb.
Fate Slayer? … Huh…
A sly smile etched itself into place, and she could see the stars in Ruby's eyes right above a row of pearly whites. Neo felt like giggling a little. She liked that one, and so would Ruby if she knew. Maybe it wasn't the time nor place to play around like that, but Neo didn't care.
Anything to take her mind off of how royally boned they were.
Author's note
...
And then there were two.
A little weird, I know. Cinder practically kissing pavement because she annoyed Salem may seem a little extreme of an overreaction, but I'm pretty sure we know now why she wanted Cindy out of the way.
Lobos and Wilem are back, ready to face the music of not only Salem's ire, but also Remnant itself. Pretty bad when the original gods are being held back by their creation; granted, one is an uncertain spirit we know nothing about - other than her being the architect of destiny.
Neo's stuck with one body now, and a corrupt one at that. Fate Slayer Neo; sure, it's probably never going to be said aloud anytime soon, but at least Neo's finding some peace as she's whisked away to who knows where? Alongside that, Neo Salem's vanished too.
And so the plot opens up.
Only one review this time, albeit a strange one. I'll be honest, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me. I can't see how Half-Maiden Cinder managing to stand her ground against two huntsmen - high ranking ones, sure, but still only two - invalidates the whole plot against Beacon. Power or no, the invasion of Beacon has always been to cripple and disorient everyone as to make finding the Fall Maiden manageable - that hasn't changed from the main series.
Cindy vs two or four professionally trained hunters: challenging, but doable. Cindy vs a whole facility of hunters, plus a visiting small army, plus anyone from Vale who decides to pitch in? I'm sorry, but that's just silly - even for this story.
Then again, we didn't see either of them fight there, so we have no accurate idea how seriously either side got.
Anyway, that's all for now. Tootles.