Fandom Distorted Mirror [IC]

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

God, the arrogance of the old.

Raven didn’t even hesitate to press her attack, no matter how he looked at her or how badly the odds seemed to be against her. They didn’t need to win the fight, only to stall and get out of here with the relics. To that point, even as she slashed away, she yelled loudly in Ruby’s direction: “Hurry up!”

An offense against the likes of Carnelian took most all of one's focus; giving that man anything less than your all was how you ended up maimed or a corpse.

Navano knew that better than anyone else in the room.

Which was why the only warning Raven got was the soft touch a step far lighter than its body implied before a massive backhand swung to catch her in the side of the neck; the sort of hit hunters took from grimm or criminals all the time, but if it connected there was a flicker of a moment where she lost consciousness and sleep overtook her. Barely enough to keep her off balance, more than enough that the portal to vacuo flickered out of existence.

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

"CINDER!" "CINDER!"

Penny had to waste precious seconds boosting to the other side of Watts and swirling into a tight formation that had the fire explod around them instead of straight into them before she blasted off after Cinder. Yet even the other Penny only got their fast enough to have to come to a hovering halt in mid-air with Grey in hand as her swords came into formation behind her back, and a few moments later the first Penny did the same on the opposite side of Cinder, their faces mirrors of terrified determination.

"Release her!" "Release her!"

Cinder had a few moments to comply or not when all twelve swords pointed straight for her as the pennies spoke in stereo; There was little point in keeping themselves from action if she was going to kill Cinder anyways, and they both knew what had happened to the Fall Maiden from Remnant Prime when she'd been drained.

Watts would have been right up there with them, were it not for the fact that his armor was trying to cook him alive still. He activated the release, and the armor's limbs popped open along with the helmet, leaving him in just the chestplate and his dress clothes as he rolled of the armor with a pained groan to land in the snow that immediately started to steam around him

 

[MidwayLives]

However screwed in the head she may have been, Yang was that same dragon where it mattered, and she threw herself forward in a combat roll clear before any of the debris landed. Ruby's semblance made sure she was upon her by the time she was even turning around, though, which meant the most she could do was set her feet as she ate a mechanized fist right to the face that would've knocked out a solid 7 out of 10 huntresses, present company notwithstanding. Her head turned with the impact, and...

That was it. She didn't fall, didn't fly, didn't stagger. Yang hardly even moved, outside of a short slide back out of range of any followup strike as she stared at Ruby in mild surprise and touched a few fingers to her cheek, a few licks of flame starting to manifest in her hair.

"...."

Ruby was at a loss...

She took a step back.
​

"Mmm."

Nothing needed to be unpacked about the kind of 'mmm' that was that hadn't been already, but there was plenty to take from the shotgun blast that followed and the fist that slammed into Ruby's nose like a bag full of sledgehammers. The force was astronomical in comparison to the punch she had just thrown, and as Ruby was flung right across the room like a piece of trash in a hurricane she found herself facing the same issue Ironwood had.

The punch caused Ruby's aura to flare for the umpteenth time after the onslaught of blows she'd just been privvy to.

She was thrown back and her aura shimmered once more upon hitting the wall.

Sliding down onto her rear with her arms splayed out onto her lap, Ruby sat there for a good moment or two.

​

"It's too late for me... he took everything that I was ever supposed to be away from me. It'd just... *snff*... It'd just break an old lady's heart if I saw the same thing happen to you, okay? So that's all I ask... just... discover Ruby Rose. Whoever that person turns out to be. Personally, I'm dyin' to find out! I'm feeling a little old to keep calling you Masqueykins all the time, haha!"

The laugh was genuine, but so was the single black tear that welled up and trickled from the corner of her goggles, there only for a split second before she wiped it away.

"Like I said, if you disagree with any of that I'd rather we not argue. I'm... a little tired, to be honest... I think I might lay down... But I love you, Ruby, and I never thought I'd have the chance to see you again. So I just wanted to give you some food for thought to chew on, before it... before it's too late. K?"

She flashed a hopeful grin, and spread her arms wide for a hug if the girl was so inclined.

There was a tempered steel in the delivery she used for that last sentence, but she reigned it in immediately with a soft, defusing huff.

"I have my own vision for a better world, you know. I suppose it must conflict with whatever his looks like. Come on... I'd like to tell you all about it."

And unless the former Red Masque protested, she did.

"...I'm glad you didn't kill anybody escaping, Ruby. Its good to know that you know that's something with some serious weight. But... I gotta ask, hun." She said as she tilted her eyes up with a quiet frown. "Why are you working with these people? With that other Yang, with Ozpin? It doesn't sound like they treat you very well." she muttered with a flash of red in her eyes

So many people had given her the time of day.

So many people had given her a chance.

But amid the beating she'd just received, something had rung true.
​

"...Well, look who's the weak one now. Here's the pecking order according to civilized society, sissy, in case you forgot: it goes the faunus, the worms, the dirt, the Grimm, and then us. And I'm supposed to believe you just woke up one morning and what, changed your mind? Cuz some bimbo in a blonde wig fell from the sky and held out her hand? That is such... such bullshit." She shook her head and settled back onto her haunches more fully, giving Ruby some precious leeway to move her arms for the first time. "Where's my hand?"

Nobody had been there to help Yang like Weiss had been there for Ruby.

Nobody had been there to share laughs with or hug like Maria.

Nobody had played games with Yang like her other had.

...Nobody was there.

It wasn't rocket science that with no guiding figure or anyone to love them, her Yang turned out the way she had.

Ruby chuckled softly aloud.

"I guess we both need therapy, huh, Yang? We're just a couple of screwups.."

Pushing herself up despite the aches wracking her body, Ruby sniffled.

She'd created a monster and now it was time to take responsibility for it.
​

No matter how good she was with her hands, she wasn't better than Yang.

"My thing, dipshit."

Ruby straightened herself out and sighed.

"I could live a thousand lifetimes and I still wouldn't feel like I'd done enough to repent."

Placing her prosthetic arm behind her, the palm began to glow.

"....But that doesn't mean I can't do the right thing."

Her eyes locked onto the Grimm masquerading as an arm for Yang.

"Starting now..."

Whatever Grimm had been chosen or created by Ozpin in order to serve as Yang's limb...It was a strange one that unnerved Ruby. It seemed to have less of a reaction to her eyes than the other Grimm that Ruby had ever seen. It also appeared to have some kind of connection to the murderous brawler that Ruby couldn't quite comprehend. But if her eyes could still inconvenient it and Yang by proxy if just for a second. The chunk of wall behind and around Ruby was immediately covered in a thick layer of ice as she used the momentum to propel herself forward and towards Yang, a trail of ice following behind her. Attempting once more to grab her sister by the neck with her flesh and blood hand, Ruby didn't let off the figurative throttle, the force from her arm firing off hoping to compensate for her relative physical weakness compared to Yang and push Yang back further and further.

"I KNOW you hate me! I haven't...ugh....gone a day without thinking about what I could have done differently! That I should have treated you like you deserved! I was wrong, Yang! Not just about how I treated you but everything! The Grimm, joining Ozpin, everything! I was too cruel to see that! Too naïve to realize I couldn't trust him to leave a world worth living in! He's a monster..."

'...And so am I.'

Whatever blows Yang may have certainly laid upon Ruby in the process, the bandit's aura flared and flared as she grunted. It hurt worse than anything else she'd dealt with to this point. That included having ripped her former prosthetic off her stump back at the Battle of Beacon. Once they hit the wall, Ruby's eyes narrowed and the light finally died down in the palm of her hand.

"...But that's not an excuse for you to do whatever you want! You're not taking the Relic! I don't care if you beat me to a pulp! YOU'RE NOT GETTING YOUR OWN WAY!" Ruby ran her arm over the forearm of her prosthetic and a blade emerged and rearing her arm back, she thrust it forward with a primal scream to try and sever Yang's Grimm Arm at where it connected to her body. Making it up in the air if Ruby had been speaking to Yang or the thing attached to her.

"You say don't care if I die or live...But you won't kill me...NOT LIKE THIS!"

The arm lit up once more and Ruby jumped back and gripped onto the forearm.

"RRRRRRRAAAAAAAAHHHH!"

Whatever Ruby might have said, she didn't do this without regret.

Tears were shed.
​

 

[MidwayLives]

As the big woman's attention rested firmly upon Yang, that was when another's fist slammed into her side, revealing who Raven had glimpsed coming through. A far smaller person but incredibly strong in her own right, empowered both by some of the dust Clover had earlier tossed her way and the lightning a certain teenage maiden had given her. The punch was meant to knock the faunus back, at least for a second, as Nora glanced towards Yang. "Things really got crazy here, huh?" She questioned, not really requiring an answer as she stepped to stand by Yang's side. A lot of this seemed really bad, but honestly...she had always wanted to be part of a duo team up with Yang especially. Even if it was just for a short time, to delay this gang until the relics were safely through the portal. Their combined strengths...

She couldn't help but be excited about that, despite the bad situation.

Tiger skidded back just a few inches.

Her body still wasn't back at feeling perfect.

The bandages that seemed more tightly wound around her waist were proof enough of that.

Still, she didn't look angry to see Nora again.

"Ah, you came to help your friend..."
​

"FROM HER"

As Yang made her move and Tiger tried to steady herself...

Something clicked for the faunus.

"...Wait...Oh..."
​

-it would've been hard to mount any sort of defense in the face of being clobbered like that, and while she was still stumbling from Nora's strike the the floor groaned under the sheer strength Yang was putting in her strides before a metal fist slammed into Tiger's gut, and she got to feel what a 106% plus Yang Xiao Long's own prodigious strength punch felt like on the receiving end, which is to say the shockwave blew out the stain glass of the atrium's ceiling above them as Tiger rocketed into the wall hard enough that she richoted off the steel. Yang leaped into the air while she was still disorienta-

Or rather, she moved to leap and let out a baffled squawk of surprise as everything but her prosthetic moved upwards and she crashed back to the ground in an awkward heap.

"I remember!"

She really should have paid more attention to crucial information.

"URGH!!"

The punch hit harder than even any of Nora's dust empowered punches from their last fight that'd left Tiger in her current state.

Tiger's eyes widened in horror that her realization came too late.

In the midst of the pain though she took time to muse on something.

'I think this is the farthest I've ever been punched. Huh.'

She was thrown back and let out a cry as she was flung back off the wall...
​

The words were light and congenial, and way too recognizeable for Yang to be comfortable with as she stumbled back to her feet only to be met with the visage of Pyrrha Nikos not two inches from her and already midway through a slash with her blade. Her arm swung up at an angle for an expert glancing guard against her gauntlet, only for her arm to yank up higher than intended and give Pyrrha a clean slice against her stomach that sent her stumbling to the side as her aura flickered again, at the same moment a shield thrown from the elevator richoceted off the wall for the side of Nora's head to keep her off balance and give her fellow gladiator time to get her bearings.

The shield swung through the air and back to her arm regardless of whether it connected or not, and pyrrha gave her fallen friend's otherworldly double an apologetic smile that could almost be believed if her eyes weren't positively dripping with excitement as she took a defensive stance and drew a line of sparks in the floor with her sword.

"Why don't we keep things a little more even?"

"*cough cough*"

Tiger rose to her feet and her ears twitched.

"Thank you." She said genuinely to Nikos.

...Then she was quickly on the move, the floor groaning under her boots as she moved towards Nora to try and grab the diminutive warrior and smash her into the floor.

In Vacuo, Neo winced for a reason she didn't really understand.​

 

[MidwayLives]

It wasn't nearly as strong as the monstrous shot that his opening volley had been, but it was absolutely enough to snap her head backwards, sparing him those those few moments of additional damage before Penny came careening straight over the pair with a six sword slash straight through the grimm arm pinning Watts to the ground. She landed with a powerful skid just a few feet away, already swinging her hands around her head to guide her swords like a conductor to swirl around her for a flurry of slashes to force Cinder off Watts "LEAVE HIM ALONE!"

Grey was horrified by what he could make out on his scroll's camera.

These were kids fighting for their lives...

He had to do something...but...
​

This all, of course, happened way too far away from Grey for him to be of any use-

Something scooped him up into a bridal carry from behind so fast that it dented his aura a bit and carried him blasting off straight for the melee.

Penny(???) looked down at him and beamed with a "Greetings, Grey!" before her smile became more determined as she turned he gaze back towards the fight.

"Lets save our friends! and me!"

"AGH!"

Grey shrieked before it became clear to him what'd happened.

"Penny!"

...

"Penny???"

'Mental note: When not being carried through the cold air by a friend, apparently this 'other world' phenomena has affected androids as well.'
​

The evil one glanced over her shoulder and instantly spun both of them around to face the incoming pair, a black and jagged sword appearing in hand. "That's close enough!" She shouted, pressing the edge of the blade against the vulnerable skin of the kid's throat.

"I'd be extra careful about what you do next, if I were you." She cruelly taunted. Her grimm arm began to glow with crimson energy as she started to drain the terrified girl, her whimpers muffled behind the black hand that covered her mouth entirely.

"Cinder!"

She was a good kid by all accounts.

Grey couldn't fly, he couldn't fire streams of fire from his mouth, he couldn't bend the elements to his whim.

...But he could do his best.

Spewing out a cloud of black fog big enough to obscure most of him, the fog didn't drift towards Cinder or anything of the like.

Flicking his left wrist, Poisonheart came sliding down his sleeve. Gripping the hilt of the blade, Grey tried his best and whipped it. The fog dispersing and fading as the knife soared through the air on a collision course with the Grimm Arm muffling Cinder's mouth.​

 

[Gus Gungus]

Some time ago.

James Ironwood was having an interesting day.

Granted that his entire basis of day-to-day conduct being an elaborate lie made most days somewhat interesting, but barely managing to keep track of two semi-identical maidens through the scope of a longshot rifle about half a click away was the sort of sight that probably would've had news networks buzzing had it not been lost to the blizzards of the tundra. He would've been lying if he'd said it was a sight that came naturally to him. For years it had seemed so simple: four maidens, four kingdoms, each tasked with keeping them secure from the threats that pursued them. Now?

Extras. New threats, new maidens. Three currently occupying the one kingdom, by his count, none of them on the same side. And as was apparently becoming a trend on whatever number Remnant this was, Atlas was completely in the dark as to why.

He scowled. What a mess.

There wasn't much he could do from this position besides coordinate allies, deploy the likes of Penny+ and Gray while directing evacuation efforts for those unprepared to face the wrath of an empowered maiden, if she could even be called that. The truth was she wasn't. She was a thief. Cast an eye back far enough in any civilization and there'd be no shortage of myths, stories and fables about those foolhardy enough to steal power from the gods. None of them ended well.

Fortunately, Cinder's wasn't the only such tale unfolding in Atlas, and as the two orange streaks in the sky became one his scope picked up a third tearing through the air towards them from above, this one colored a pale, icy blue, trailed by a typhoon that seemed to gather and swirl around it. That could only mean one thing.

Backup.



From Watts's position, all he saw was an overwhelming flare of blue light up the clouds, stronger and more dazzling than the technological glimmer of Atlas in the distance.

From the Cinders', the most warning they got was that same glow momentarily cast across Gray and the two Pennys' faces before a gauntlet shot through a glyph the same instant it spawned in the air next to her, closing around the wrist holding the blade and preventing her from making good on her threat. Its twin appeared on the side opposite, metal fingers glowing white as they pried Cinder's claws off her younger self's face. The otherworld parasite found herself in the unfamiliar position of having her arms jerked out to either side of her like a marionette on strings, and as the other Cinder fell from her grip she felt words as sharp and as cold as icicles stab her in the back.

"I suppose it'd be asking too much to expect you to remember, but on the one occasion we spoke? I told you one thing. A thousand leagues from Atlas. Or more."

The glyphs swiveled, the gauntlets jerking her around to come face to face with what Penny had seen before any of them.

Weiss Schnee, eyes bathed in lights of blue and red, wearing the type of stern, dismissive look an ant might be privy to from the wrong side of a magnifying glass.



And more imminently, the gargantuan glyph comprised of smaller ones hanging in the air just behind her, approximately the size of a Manta if not bigger. A terrifying sight by itself, made all the worse by the fact that it, along with both trails of light streaming from her eyes, very suddenly turned a scathing and malignant crimson.

"You should've listened."

Two of Myrtenaster's vials burned, and what followed was nothing less than a full elemental maelstrom refined, bound and condensed by hardlight into a beam that nuked Cinder out of the sky and all the way back to the ice below, generating a lightshow that would've been visible all the way from Atlas even in the worst of storms.

Of which one seemed to be brewing.​

 

[MidwayLives]

From Watts's position, all he saw was an overwhelming flare of blue light up the clouds, stronger and more dazzling from the technological glimmer of Atlas in the distance.

From the Cinders', the most warning they got was that same glow momentarily cast across the two Pennys' face before a gauntlet shot through a glyph the same instant it spawned in the air next to her, closing around the wrist holding the blade and preventing her from making good on her threat. Its twin appeared on the side opposite, metal fingers glowing white as they pried Cinder's claws off her younger self's face. The otherworld parasite found herself in the unfamiliar position of having her arms jerked out to either side of her like a marionette on strings, and as the other Cinder fell from her grip she felt words as sharp and as cold as icicles stab her in the back.

"I suppose it'd be too much of me to expect you to remember, but on the one occasion we spoke? I told you one thing. A thousand leagues from Atlas. Or more."

The glyphs swiveled, the gauntlets jerking her around to come face to face with what Penny had seen before any of them.

Weiss Schnee, eyes bathed in lights of blue and red, wearing the type of stern, dismissive look an ant might be privy to from the wrong side of a magnifying glass.

Grey was at a loss for words.

He did cling to Penny like his life depended on it though.
​

And more imminently, the gargantuan glyph comprised of smaller ones hanging in the air just behind her, approximately the side of a Manta if not bigger. A terrifying sight by itself, made all the worse by the fact that it, along with both trails of light streaming from her eyes, very suddenly turned a scathing and malignant crimson.

"You should've listened."

Two of Myrtenaster's vials burned, and what followed was nothing less than a full elemental maelstrom refined, bound and condensed by hardlight into a beam that nuked Cinder out of the sky and all the way back to the ice below, generating a lightshow visible all the way from Atlas.

"I fought her, you know.." Grey said so softly it could have been mistaken for a whisper.​

 

[MyrtenRose]

Yet even the other Penny only got their fast enough to have to come to a hovering halt in mid-air with Grey in hand as her swords came into formation behind her back, and a few moments later the first Penny did the same on the opposite side of Cinder, their faces mirrors of terrified determination.

"Release her!" "Release her!"

Cinder had a few moments to comply or not when all twelve swords pointed straight for her as the pennies spoke in stereo; There was little point in keeping themselves from action if she was going to kill Cinder anyways, and they both knew what had happened to the Fall Maiden from Remnant Prime when she'd been drained.

"Well well well, look at this. Two of Atlas's little wind-up toys, forever slaves to their programming. It must be my lucky day." Cinder taunted. Her grip on her weaker self tightened.

"No." She replied to their simultaneous demand, that mockingly cruel tone only growing more and more noticeable. She hardly even seemed to care that a dozen swords hung in the air, all aimed at her. "How about this-" Cinder didn't finish that sentence, her attention snapping over to the guy one of the dumb bots held on to. He immediately proved himself to be just as dumb, if not more so.​

Flicking his left wrist, Poisonheart came sliding down his sleeve. Gripping the hilt of the blade, Grey tried his best and whipped it. The fog dispersing and fading as the knife soared through the air on a collision course with the Grimm Arm muffling Cinder's mouth.

"Tch. Idiot." Those words, and Cinder immediately shifting in place, were the only responses the grimm hybrid spared for the man directly. Her sudden jerk of movement put the inferior version of herself in the blade's path, where she oh so graciously intercepted that attack. The blade dug not into the grimm arm of the dark threat, but rather deep into the auraless shoulder of her hostage. Something which elicited such a loud scream of pain that even muffled, all of them could hear it. "Say, any of you heroic fools want to try something like that again? She has another shoulder, all ready to go!" More than a few tears fell from the poor kid's one good eye, not just from the pain but from being confronted by the levels of her other self's casual cruelty. That hurt just as much. A second or two later, her gaze rose up and delivered a pleading look over at one of the Pennys, hoping that somehow they would manage to get her out of this, even if she didn't see how yet-​

From the Cinders', the most warning they got was that same glow momentarily cast across Gray and the two Pennys' faces before a gauntlet shot through a glyph the same instant it spawned in the air next to her, closing around the wrist holding the blade and preventing her from making good on her threat.

-she blinked in surprise from that out of nowhere glow that illuminated their faces just then. A sentiment shared to a degree by her older otherworldly double.

"Wha--"

Cinder Prime didn't even get to finish that single word before she was grabbed.​

Its twin appeared on the side opposite, metal fingers glowing white as they pried Cinder's claws off her younger self's face. The otherworld parasite found herself in the unfamiliar position of having her arms jerked out to either side of her like a marionette on strings, and as the other Cinder fell from her grip she felt words as sharp and as cold as icicles stab her in the back.

"WHAT?!?" This time she managed to say it, but it carried angry frustration instead of confusion. She did her best to resist, struggle against the summons, to not much success as the kid maiden fell out of her grasp. The teenager dropped down ten feet or so before her own flames sputtered to life underneath her boots and kept her hovering in the air, with her head tilting towards her shoulder as she wondered whether she should try to take that blade out or not. It really hurt ;-;​

"I suppose it'd be too much of me to expect you to remember, but on the one occasion we spoke? I told you one thing. A thousand leagues from Atlas. Or more."

The glyphs swiveled, the gauntlets jerking her around to come face to face with what Penny had seen before any of them.

Weiss Schnee, eyes bathed in lights of blue and red, wearing the type of stern, dismissive look an ant might be privy to from the wrong side of a magnifying glass.

And more imminently, the gargantuan glyph comprised of smaller ones hanging in the air just behind her, approximately the side of a Manta if not bigger. A terrifying sight by itself, made all the worse by the fact that it, along with both trails of light streaming from her eyes, very suddenly turned a scathing and malignant crimson.

"You should've listened."

"YOU BITCHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH--"​

Two of Myrtenaster's vials burned, and what followed was nothing less than a full elemental maelstrom refined, bound and condensed by hardlight into a beam that nuked Cinder out of the sky and all the way back to the ice below, generating a lightshow that would've been visible all the way from Atlas even in the worst of storms.

Of which one seemed to be brewing.

The scream faded into a distant echo as the grimm hybrid got driven straight into the icy ground way below...and through it, again, ending with her buried in what was less a crater and more a chasm, a testament to the sheer, undeniable power that Weiss Schnee brought to the battlefield. When the overwhelming bright lightshow faded, all those in the air were treated to minutes of comparative quiet(save for any talking) that stretched on for long enough that the good Cinder began to wonder if it really was over now. Hopes that were dashed shortly after when the distant gash in the earth began to glow, burning orange illuminating that area at least just as brightly as Weiss's attack, if much less visible given the ground obscured most of it.

Again, that Cinder seemed to be a volcano personified as she exploded out of the ground just then. A dark figure, framed by the scorching flames behind her, glaring at them with rage, frustration, disgust, annoyance, hatred...all of it so overflowing that she would have doubtless made quite a snack for any grimm, were she not partly one herself. Call it arrogance, or a blinding lust for power, or something else entirely but even after that brutal assault, the woman still refused to give up. All the flame around her swelled up even further before it thrust forward as one beam attack of her own, greatly dwarfing even the similar attack she had launched to counter Penny's laser from before.​

 

[MyrtenRose]

The bandages that seemed more tightly wound around her waist were proof enough of that.

Still, she didn't look angry to see Nora again.

"Ah, you came to help your friend..."

"Of course!" She beamed.​

"Sorry, but, two versus one? I don't think that seems very fair"

The words were light and congenial, and way too recognizeable for Yang to be comfortable with as she stumbled back to her feet only to be met with the visage of Pyrrha Nikos not two inches from her and already midway through a slash with her blade. Her arm swung up at an angle for an expert glancing guard against her gauntlet, only for her arm to yank up higher than intended and give Pyrrha a clean slice against her stomach that sent her stumbling to the side as her aura flickered again, at the same moment a shield thrown from the elevator richoceted off the wall for the side of Nora's head to keep her off balance and give her fellow gladiator time to get her bearings.

The shield swung through the air and back to her arm regardless of whether it connected or not, and pyrrha gave her fallen friend's otherworldly double an apologetic smile that could almost be believed if her eyes weren't positively dripping with excitement as she took a defensive stance and drew a line of sparks in the floor with her sword.

"Why don't we keep things a little more even?"

"Oh no." The shift to the opposite mood was so swift and sudden that in a less dire situation, it might have been hysterically hilarious. That face, that voice...now...now she was much less enthused about the fight that seemed inevitable.
​

...Then she was quickly on the move, the floor groaning under her boots as she moved towards Nora to try and grab the diminutive warrior and smash her into the floor.

But that didn't mean she was any less ready to fight back against the faunus. Nora planted her feet herself, and as the grab came in, she went for a counter-grab on Tiger's wrists in an attempt at grappling the much bigger woman, the floor liable to give way under both their feet.​

 

[MyrtenRose]

An offense against the likes of Carnelian took most all of one's focus; giving that man anything less than your all was how you ended up maimed or a corpse.

Navano knew that better than anyone else in the room.

Which was why the only warning Raven got was the soft touch a step far lighter than its body implied before a massive backhand swung to catch her in the side of the neck; the sort of hit hunters took from grimm or criminals all the time, but if it connected there was a flicker of a moment where she lost consciousness and sleep overtook her. Barely enough to keep her off balance, more than enough that the portal to vacuo flickered out of existence.

That was precisely her approach, having a fairly sure expectation of how deadly Carnelian was in battle after Mistral. Her, Qrow, Tock...it was incredible. And that approach was why she didn't even see the backhand coming. It sent her flying, bouncing off one of the office walls, and for a moment there, her vision darkened completely. It was so quick she would have ascribed it to just being a blink, were it not for the fact that the place where her portal had been now stood empty. "???" Raven didn't dare take her eyes off the combatants around her for too long, but in her mind, a panicked thought reigned supreme. What was that?

Meanwhile, across the world...

The portal had disappeared! That hadn't been the plan!!!​

In Vacuo, Neo winced for a reason she didn't really understand.

That Neo suddenly got grabbed on both shoulders by the teenager. "Hey, what happened???" She asked, as if the tiny ice-cream coded criminal had any more idea than she did. Or that she could even talk.​

 

[MidwayLives]

The portal had disappeared! That hadn't been the plan!!!

That...

That wasn't supposed to happen?!

THAT was the WHOLE reason she'd come with these...these...assholes!
​

That Neo suddenly got grabbed on both shoulders by the teenager. "Hey, what happened???" She asked, as if the tiny ice-cream coded criminal had any more idea than she did.

Neo shook her head from side to side.

Holding up her hand, she gestured to the illusion of the relic.

Where were the relics?!

WHERE WERE THE GODDAMN RELICS?!​

 

[MyrtenRose]

That...

That wasn't supposed to happen?!

THAT was the WHOLE reason she'd come with these...these...assholes!


Neo shook her head from side to side.

Holding up her hand, she gestured to the illusion of the relic.

Where were the relics?!

WHERE WERE THE GODDAMN RELICS?!​

“I DON’T KNOW AHHHHHHHHHHHH”​

 

[MidwayLives]

“I DON’T KNOW AHHHHHHHHHHHH”

Neo tried to create an illusion of the portal.

But that's all it was, an illusion.

It shattered into pieces and Neo quietly stamped her feet and pulled at her hair:

-She'd been forced to unleash the prisoners.

-Got the shit kicked out of her.

-Lost Hush in the process.

Now, she was STUCK in Vacuo with...

"...!!"

She fell to her knees and hid away her face with her hands as her shoulders moved up and down.​

 

[MyrtenRose]

Neo tried to create an illusion of the portal.

But that's all it was, an illusion.

It shattered into pieces and Neo quietly stamped her feet and pulled at her hair:

-She'd been forced to unleash the prisoners.

-Got the shit kicked out of her.

-Lost Hush in the process.

Now, she was STUCK in Vacuo with...

"...!!"

She fell to her knees and hid away her face with her hands as her shoulders moved up and down.​

Spoiler: Rude. At least she knew this wasn't in their future.

 

[Gus Gungus]

God, the arrogance of the old.

Raven didn’t even hesitate to press her attack, no matter how he looked at her or how badly the odds seemed to be against her. They didn’t need to win the fight, only to stall and get out of here with the relics. To that point, even as she slashed away, she yelled loudly in Ruby’s direction: “Hurry up!”

Ruby obliged, rushing towards the wall and reaching out to pull on the blade and free the relic before hopefully anyone else could interfere.

An offense against the likes of Carnelian took most all of one's focus; giving that man anything less than your all was how you ended up maimed or a corpse.

Navano knew that better than anyone else in the room.

Which was why the only warning Raven got was the soft touch a step far lighter than its body implied before a massive backhand swung to catch her in the side of the neck; the sort of hit hunters took from grimm or criminals all the time, but if it connected there was a flicker of a moment where she lost consciousness and sleep overtook her. Barely enough to keep her off balance, more than enough that the portal to vacuo flickered out of existence.

Disturbingly, a very different voice in Raven's mind answered back in the last moment before her consciousness flickered, foreign and invasive. It came even as Carnelian shifted his grip on his single sword to a stance more resembling her style, beginning to parry her blow for blow as a shadow looked over both from behind.

The presumptuousness of the young.

When she recovered a moment later Carnelian was gone, seemingly considering both her and Bear below any further attention beyond the relaxed two-fingered salute of a younger man he tossed flippantly towards the latter.

Then she was out of sight, plummeting rapidly towards the distant ground below. Her weapon morphed in an instant, her regular pistol switched up to a grapple gun. The lock-on in her visor gave her the precise angle she needed to fire at in order to arc the projectile back into the room, and as she fell with the wind racing in her ears, she pulled the trigger. The sound of the projectile firing was oh so satisfying, and though she wasn’t currently in the best position, she allowed herself a small smile. Her systems, calibrated to the utmost degree, hit right on target. The magnetized projectile landed solidly on Ironwood’s back with a fairly audible clank.

And though she was not as strong as Ironwood, she tugged on the other end of her grapple gun to yank the former general right out of the room to ensure he couldn’t inflict too much damage, as well as leave her not falling alone. After all...she had just made a vow to make sure Ironwood faced justice. She did not plan for those to be empty words. Still, that left her with another precarious situation: the rapidly nearing asphalt of Atlas’s streets. She was about halfway down now, the wind roaring even louder. Yet even so, there was no fear in her eyes.

Another hardlight shield popped into existence some several feet directly below her just then, wide enough and strong enough that it served perfectly as a platform to land on. Gwen slammed back first into it, and though the impact was still hard, enough to drop her aura considerably, it was not as bad as it could have been. It also drove just about all her breath out of her body, and she was content to lay there for a bit. Both to catch her breath and for the dizziness she felt to fade away.

One of Ironwood's sole blindspots was a play from a threat he already believed neutralized, and it appeared Helios had picked up a few tricks since he'd known her. His eyes widened as he felt himself getting tethered, and one could almost pinpoint the grey in his hair getting greyer with how little love he had for the situation as a whole.

"Hmm."

Such was his final word on the matter before he was yanked out into the night. It wasn't the smoothest pull, his frame heavy enough that Gwen almost felt enough resistance coming from the other end of the line to swing off of, but his proximity to the window in the first place meant he did indeed join her in her fall.

For a second.

Gravity did not seem to deter the indomitable general's aim, and the muzzle flash of his revolvers lit up Gwen's vision before she felt a hail of well-placed bullets rain down against her aura, increasing her velocity and making the landing all the more ugly.

It was a landing Ironwood may well have joined him in, had a single round from that same bullet storm not severed through the cord connecting them and its kick not proven powerful enough to reverse his mid-fall momentum entirely. His revolvers, storied in their history and ornate in their engravings, had been specially modified to accommodate his metal chassis' weight, and the continuous rain of shots coming down on Gwen was sufficient to boost him all the way back up into the office (again). It was apparent he wasn't really interested in a sustained gunfight with her, and from his belt a flat metal cylinder was lobbed at the edge of the window, where the compressed dust release mechanism within flashed to release a full-fledged wall of ice that expanded to fill the space where the glass had been.

His concentration was such that that wasn't even where most of it was directed. That honor went to Ruby, or more accurately the one being confronted by the Shadow Fang butcher, his eyes carefully tracking the whirlwind of petals until they coalesced—

Crescent Rose was on her back, but she didn't draw her weapon. The sorrow in her widened eyes only intensified, and it was only at the last moment that Ruby burst apart into rose petals again, coming back together by the relic and tugged the sword out in one smooth motion to have the relic fall into her waiting hand. They didn't need to fight, she certainly didn't want to fight. They just needed these, and they needed to get out of here. Jury was still out if she was smarter or not.

—And solidified, two shots reflexively squeezed off with pinpoint accuracy. The first, once again, struck the relic of knowledge as it fell, the lamp ricocheting aggressively off the wall and spinning away just inches from Ruby's grasping fingers.

The second struck the relic she was already holding, meant to knock the staff of creation he'd spent so many years safeguarding straight from her grip, where it rolled to a perfect stop at the feet of quite possibly the one man he would have never in a million years entrusted it to under any other circumstance.

Carnelian.

"...."

Ruby was at a loss...

She took a step back.


The punch caused Ruby's aura to flare for the umpteenth time after the onslaught of blows she'd just been privvy to.

She was thrown back and her aura shimmered once more upon hitting the wall.

Sliding down onto her rear with her arms splayed out onto her lap, Ruby sat there for a good moment or two.







So many people had given her the time of day.

So many people had given her a chance.

But amid the beating she'd just received, something had rung true.


Nobody had been there to help Yang like Weiss had been there for Ruby.

Nobody had been there to share laughs with or hug like Maria.

Nobody had played games with Yang like her other had.

...Nobody was there.

It wasn't rocket science that with no guiding figure or anyone to love them, her Yang turned out the way she had.

Ruby chuckled softly aloud.

"I guess we both need therapy, huh, Yang? We're just a couple of screwups.."

Pushing herself up despite the aches wracking her body, Ruby sniffled.

She'd created a monster and now it was time to take responsibility for it.


Ruby straightened herself out and sighed.

"I could live a thousand lifetimes and I still wouldn't feel like I'd done enough to repent."

Placing her prosthetic arm behind her, the palm began to glow.

"....But that doesn't mean I can't do the right thing."

Her eyes locked onto the Grimm masquerading as an arm for Yang.

"Starting now..."

Whatever Grimm had been chosen or created by Ozpin in order to serve as Yang's limb...It was a strange one that unnerved Ruby. It seemed to have less of a reaction to her eyes than the other Grimm that Ruby had ever seen. It also appeared to have some kind of connection to the murderous brawler that Ruby couldn't quite comprehend. But if her eyes could still inconvenient it and Yang by proxy if just for a second. The chunk of wall behind and around Ruby was immediately covered in a thick layer of ice as she used the momentum to propel herself forward and towards Yang, a trail of ice following behind her. Attempting once more to grab her sister by the neck with her flesh and blood hand, Ruby didn't let off the figurative throttle, the force from her arm firing off hoping to compensate for her relative physical weakness compared to Yang and push Yang back further and further.

"I KNOW you hate me! I haven't...ugh....gone a day without thinking about what I could have done differently! That I should have treated you like you deserved! I was wrong, Yang! Not just about how I treated you but everything! The Grimm, joining Ozpin, everything! I was too cruel to see that! Too naïve to realize I couldn't trust him to leave a world worth living in! He's a monster..."

'...And so am I.'

Whatever blows Yang may have certainly laid upon Ruby in the process, the bandit's aura flared and flared as she grunted. It hurt worse than anything else she'd dealt with to this point. That included having ripped her former prosthetic off her stump back at the Battle of Beacon. Once they hit the wall, Ruby's eyes narrowed and the light finally died down in the palm of her hand.

"...But that's not an excuse for you to do whatever you want! You're not taking the Relic! I don't care if you beat me to a pulp! YOU'RE NOT GETTING YOUR OWN WAY!" Ruby ran her arm over the forearm of her prosthetic and a blade emerged and rearing her arm back, she thrust it forward with a primal scream to try and sever Yang's Grimm Arm at where it connected to her body. Making it up in the air if Ruby had been speaking to Yang or the thing attached to her.

"You say don't care if I die or live...But you won't kill me...NOT LIKE THIS!"

The arm lit up once more and Ruby jumped back and gripped onto the forearm.

"RRRRRRRAAAAAAAAHHHH!"

Whatever Ruby might have said, she didn't do this without regret.

Tears were shed.

Yang's eyes widened, and though the moan that came out through her teeth when Ruby's silver eyes shone was pained, it was nothing like the screech that erupted from the back of her throat as the petrified limb was severed. Flakes of stone were already starting to chip and peel off, revealing the swirling, gestating pool of dark biomass beginning to recompose itself within, but when Ruby cut it off at the stump Yang let loose the most wretched, horrifying wail of distress she could recall hearing even in all her time as the Masque. Yang's feet kicked and scrabbled, her breath caught on anguished terror in her chest, and she shoved and pushed back meagerly without teeth in a manner that more resembled when they were children than anything Ozpin's hedonistic barbarian had ever done. She flinched right as Ruby aimed her dust repulsor, and her voice, typically so assured and trampling, dropped to a meek, terrified whimper to match; though in that moment, neither of those features were the most striking.

It was the eyes. Eyes that, as the stories went, served as a window to the soul, ones that now brimmed with tears and spoke of the nurturing spirit within's confusion, pain and fear over what was even happening, however lost and corrupted they may have been.

Eyes the Masque hadn't seen in years.



"Wh... wh... beat you to a...? Ruby, I would never hurt you! If I wanted that then don't you think I would have by now? I just, I j-just don't understand why you're so addicted to hurting me!" Her voice broke into a rough, scratchy sob, one wrought with far too much pained anguish not to come from a place of truth. "E-ev-every time, every time I pick myself back up you find a new way, sis, w-w-why I don't get it, I don't understand how you can just leave me here—!"

Whatever pause, whatever flicker of guilt, hesitance or whatever else that may have prompted in Ruby, that was where everything changed.

Everything.

The look. The voice. The sudden, cowed obedience of a Yang who bore more resemblance to the one Ruby used to terrorize than the one now terrorizing her. The most immediately noticable change was that it was now inverted, Ruby's legs swept and her arm twisted so she flipped head over heels and crashed down on her back with Yang's boot pinning her shoulder, metal arm hooked under Yang's remaining one, awkwardly wrenched up at a painful angle.

"It's okay though. You're not leaving, Ruby. You're just lost."

Her voice was different again; menacing, but a different, low kind of menacing, like the growl at the back of a predator's throat. A cloud of darkness gathered around her stump, and the freshly regrown grimm sprouted from it in all its toothy, bone-plated glory, Yang wiggling its fingers assessingly before she looked down at Ruby and flashed a maliciously satisfied grin.

"And big sister's gonna help you find your way home."

She gripped Ruby's prosthetic with both hands and pulled.

It shouldn't have happened; it was top of the line, some of Merlot's finest work, an achievement of engineering and aura integrative technology.

Which just made it all the more unprecedented when Ruby felt the most blinding pain she'd ever felt in her life, and with eyes searing red, hair igniting as if drenched in gasoline and one sharp, savage roar of exertion, the Dragon ripped her arm off in a single motion, the visceral sound of tendons snapping and sinew tearing where it connected to her body. Yang's boot kept Ruby pinned, and if she craned her neck to look up it was to the sight of the older woman beaming exuberantly down at her, waving manically with the arm she'd just detached.

"Hey sissy, need a hand? HA!"

She turned and pitched the limb across the room like a bullet, where it bonked off the head of her double wherever she was standing. Ruby found it hard to focus through the pain, but it may have occurred to her to wonder why exactly the petrified statue of the arm she'd severed from Yang before was moving, rattling, jolting like something was still alive in there, as if the grimm in question was so advanced it could split itself into multiple organisms.

Then it exploded into shards of stone, and a tiny black streak shot out from its remains towards her, reaching her in a blur so quick it was hard to track.

And burrowing directly into her bleeding stump.​

 

[MidwayLives]

It was the eyes. Eyes that, as the stories went, served as a window to the soul, ones that now brimmed with tears and spoke of the nurturing spirit within's confusion, pain and fear over what was even happening, however lost and corrupted they may have been.

Eyes the Masque hadn't seen in years.

She hesitated.

The arm began to power down...
​

"Wh... wh... beat you to a...? Ruby, I would never hurt you! If I was wanted that then don't you think I would have by now? I just, I j-just don't understand why you're so addicted to hurting me!" Her voice broke into a rough, scratchy sob, one wrought with far too much pained anguish not to come from a place of truth. "E-ev-every time, every time I pick myself back up you find a new way, sis, w-w-why I don't get it, I don't understand how you can just leave me here—!"

Whatever pause, whatever flicker of guilt, hesitance or whatever else that may have prompted in Ruby, that was where everything changed.

Everything.

"...Yang...I...I never wanted to..."

Her bottom lip trembled.
​

The look. The voice. The sudden, cowed obedience of a Yang who bore more resemblance to the one Ruby used to terrorize than the one now terrorizing her. The most immediately noticable change was that it was now inverted, Ruby's legs swept and her arm twisted so she flipped head over heels and crashed down on her back with Yang's boot pinning her shoulder, metal arm hooked under Yang's remaining one, awkwardly wrenched up at a painful angle.

"It's okay though. You're not leaving, Ruby. You're just lost."

Her voice was different again; menacing, but a different, low kind of menacing, like the growl at the back of a predator's throat. A cloud of darkness gathered around her stump, and the freshly regrown grimm sprouted from it in all its toothy, bone-plated glory, Yang wiggling its fingers assessingly before she looked down at Ruby and flashed a maliciously satisfied grin.

"And big sister's gonna help you find your way home."

She gripped Ruby's prosthetic with both hands and pulled.

Ruby squirmed and wriggled as best as she could.

"Yang! Yang stop! Please! You don't have to do this! YOU'RE NOT HIS SLAVE-"
​

Which just made it all the more unprecedented when Ruby felt the most blinding pain she'd ever felt in her life, and with eyes searing red, hair igniting as if drenched in gasoline and one sharp, savage roar of exertion, the Dragon ripped her arm off in a single motion, the visceral sound of tendons snapping and sinew tearing where it connected to her body. Yang's boot kept Ruby pinned, and if she craned her neck to look up it was to the sight of the older woman beaming exuberantly down at her, waving manically with the arm she'd just detached.

"Hey sissy, need a hand? Ha!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!"

Ruby wailed louder than she ever had before. Her last prosthetic was shoddily made compared to Merlot's work and she had to rip that one off herself. This one had been made under the careful eye of a great inventor like Merlot and yet it'd been ripped off as easy as pulling a band-aid. Blood gushed from the tears in Ruby's stump and exposed tissue from where the arm had been hooked on to support. "AAAAAAH!! MY ARM!!!!!!" She cried until she was coughing and sputtering up a storm. She felt as though she were back in the woods agaiin. Standing before the Grimm that'd devour her real arm before being turned to stone. Crimson blood running down it's petrified fangs. The slightest hint of bone poking out from where her arm had been savagely torn off/left hanging from the creature's mouth.

It was one of the only times Ruby had felt 'scared' in her childhood.

But she'd put on a brave face for both herself and Yang. Even as blood turned the grass red.
​

She turned and pitched the limb across the room like a bullet, where it bonked off the head of her double wherever she was standing. Ruby found it hard to focus through the pain, but it may have occurred to her to wonder why exactly the petrified statue of the arm she'd severed from Yang before was moving, rattling, jolting like something was still alive in there, as if the grimm in question was so advanced it could split itself into multiple organisms.

Then it exploded into shards of stone, and a tiny black streak shot out from its remains towards her, reaching her in a blur so quick it was hard to track.

And burrowing directly into her bleeding stump.

Ruby's vision was blurry.

Mostly due to all the tears and such.

As something shot out towards her, Ruby could barely make out what it'd been before-

"AAGHHHHHHH!!! GET OFF MEEEEEEEEEEE!!"

She tried to claw at her stump and whatever it was she felt invading her body. Burrowing deeper and deeper. Her nails cracked as she scratched at the floor. Calling out for her aunt with tears in her eyes. "AUNT RAVEN!!! H-HELP ME!!!" But as Raven had her own issues, Ruby's screams turned to a different plea for help.

"YANG....YANG HELP ME!!!"

Ruby's breath was caught in her throat.

"Mommy.....*sob* Mommy, help me!" ​

 

[MidwayLives]

But that didn't mean she was any less ready to fight back against the faunus. Nora planted her feet herself, and as the grab came in, she went for a counter-grab on Tiger's wrists in an attempt at grappling the much bigger woman, the floor liable to give way under both their feet.

As the ground began to crack under their feet, Tiger huffed and puffed.

"Here we are fighting for the third time...."

Then Tiger smiled at the smaller opponent.

"....The Hand probably wouldn't approve of me saying this....but I admire your dedication to your friends."

The faunus's muscles bulged and the veins in her arm stood out.

"....I'm glad to have met you."

Then she lashed out with a kick to try and catch Nora in the gut and send her flying across the room.

"....But I can't let you win. Not this time, not now."

If that attack was succesful, Tiger immediately moved to try and take advantage. Leaving dents in the floor from where she jumped, Tiger growled as she tried to land right atop Nora: boot first.​

 

[MidwayLives]

Something which elicited such a loud scream of pain that even muffled, all of them could hear it. "Say, any of you heroic fools want to try something like that again? She has another shoulder, all ready to go!" More than a few tears fell from the poor kid's one good eye, not just from the pain but from being confronted by the levels of her other self's casual cruelty. That hurt just as much. A second or two later, her gaze rose up and delivered a pleading look over at one of the Pennys, hoping that somehow they would manage to get her out of this, even if she didn't see how yet-

"Cinder!"

Grey felt a pit in his stomach.

"You evil bitch...." His fog began to exude from him before he retained it/it faded.

He'd made a mistake and it'd end up with somebody hurt.
​

"WHAT?!?" This time she managed to say it, but it carried angry frustration instead of confusion. She did her best to resist, struggle against the summons, to not much success as the kid maiden fell out of her grasp. The teenager dropped down ten feet or so before her own flames sputtered to life underneath her boots and kept her hovering in the air, with her head tilting towards her shoulder as she wondered whether she should try to take that blade out or not. It really hurt ;-;​

"Cinder! I'm so so sorry, I didn't mean to-"
​

Again, that Cinder seemed to be a volcano personified as she exploded out of the ground just then. A dark figure, framed by the scorching flames behind her, glaring at them with rage, frustration, disgust, annoyance, hatred...all of it so overflowing that she would have doubtless made quite a snack for any grimm, were she not partly one herself. Call it arrogance, or a blinding lust for power, or something else entirely but even after that brutal assault, the woman still refused to give up. All the flame around her swelled up even further before it thrust forward as one beam attack of her own, greatly dwarfing even the similar attack she had launched to counter Penny's laser from before.

Whatever else Grey had planned to say would have to wait.

On account of him clinging to Penny 2 so he didn't y'know fall to his death.​

 

[MyrtenRose]

Gravity did not seem to deter the indomitable general's aim, and the muzzle flash of his revolvers lit up Gwen's vision before she felt a hail of well-placed bullets rain down against her aura, increasing her velocity and making the landing all the more ugly.

It was a landing Ironwood may well have joined him in, had a single round from that same bullet storm not severed through the cord connecting them and its kick not proven powerful enough to reverse his mid-fall momentum entirely. His revolvers, storied in their history and ornate in their engravings, had been specially modified to accommodate his metal chassis' weight, and the continuous rain of shots coming down on Gwen was sufficient to boost him all the way back up into the office (again). It was apparent he wasn't really interested in a sustained gunfight with her, and from his belt a flat metal cylinder was lobbed at the edge of the window, where the compressed dust release mechanism within flashed to release a full-fledged wall of ice that expanded to fill the space where the glass had been.

As to be expected, even in freefall the general's aim was flawless. Every single shot he fired struck her, Gwen felt its sting. Not just across her body as the barrage dropped her aura more and more, but the damage burned beyond that physical manifestation and in her actual soul as well. Shots that went right to her heart.

BANG

The memory of a small, platinum-haired seven year old girl, eyes so fixated on the screen that calls for breakfast went completely unheard. She didn't even remember what was being said in the news broadcast, just the figure of the man with the chiseled jaw. The presence he had. The sheer awe he inspired.

BANG

"Welcome to Atlas Academy, the finest of all the huntsman academies in Remnant." The same man, greeting all the new students just starting their years.

BANG

A teenager, looking cautiously wary about being personally summoned to the headmaster's office, but much of the anxiety she felt was washed away by the sight of an easygoing smile on a usually stern face. "Miss Helios, you have managed something rather difficult. You've made several professors, some of the finest instructors around, look like fools in comparison. I will be watching your progress with great interest."

BANG

"Congratulations on graduating with top marks, Miss Helios. Or should I say, Special Operative Helios." The man smiled, extending a hand out for a shake. "Welcome to the Atlesian military."

BANG

A scroll message that hit her so hard she wished she could have it framed and hanging on her lab wall. Gwen, you have yet to disappoint. Your designs, work ethic...suffice it to say, you are one of the finest engineers this military possesses. I look forward to the brighter future we will build together. As you were, special operative.

BANG

But the loudest bang of all, was the sound of the gunshot that tore through the defenseless councilwoman's kneecap. A wound that came because she had failed. She had failed to account for Carnelian's semblance in the heat of the moment, failed to deal with the second pistol, f-failed in her duty of protecting Atlas's elected officials. Failed to recognize the man she saw there now. She didn't even know what was worse, that Ironwood had been so led astray by Carnelian, the Dragon and others...or that this was just a part of him all along, something she failed to notice over the years. He had always had a strong conviction, but to cross these lines, to go so far...

This was not part of the brighter future Atlas was meant to build.

Gwen would have been content with just laying there a bit longer to recuperate, but that was not what she did. She forced herself to stand on the hardlight platform, raising her head up towards the floor far above. Her eyes narrowed dangerously. Anger was an emotion she rarely felt. She was, in general, not a very angry person. But right now she felt like she was drowning in rage: at Carnelian, the prisoners, herself, but above all others...

A hand tapped on the tactical wristpad on her armor, and the bottom layer of her boots slid out of the way to allow for her modification to emerge, based on Penny's design. The hardlight platform dissolved, the thrusters getting her to rapidly rise back up to that floor in no time. Whereupon she was confronted by a wall of ice that blocked her off similarly to how she had briefly managed to contain the elevator crew. And just like that one, it was only temporary. Malware changed forms yet again.​

—And solidified, two shots reflexively squeezed off with pinpoint accuracy. The first, once again, struck the relic of knowledge as it fell, the lamp ricocheting aggressively off the wall and spinning away just inches from Ruby's grasping fingers.

The second struck the relic she was already holding, meant to knock the staff of creation he'd spent so many years safeguarding straight from her grip, where it rolled to a perfect stop at the feet of quite possibly the one man he would have never in a million years entrusted it to under any other circumstance.

Carnelian.

Almost immediately after those shots, the ice wall burst apart in a sizable explosion that sent bits flying all over the office, Gwen's weapon still smoking. She hardly gave any attention to the madness unfolding all around, her eyes fixated on exactly one man. The very same one she had been so fascinated by on that television screen so long ago. "James Ironwood!" She shouted like she never had before, jetting right for him, intent to just crash into him like a cannonball and keep going until one of the walls on this floor finally stopped them.

"DON'T TURN YOUR FUCKING BACK ON ME!"​

 

[MyrtenRose]

—And solidified, two shots reflexively squeezed off with pinpoint accuracy. The first, once again, struck the relic of knowledge as it fell, the lamp ricocheting aggressively off the wall and spinning away just inches from Ruby's grasping fingers.

The second struck the relic she was already holding, meant to knock the staff of creation he'd spent so many years safeguarding straight from her grip, where it rolled to a perfect stop at the feet of quite possibly the one man he would have never in a million years entrusted it to under any other circumstance.

Carnelian.

Everything about that was troubling but she didn't even get the chance to do anything about it. For...​

She gripped Ruby's prosthetic with both hands and pulled.

It shouldn't have happened; it was top of the line, some of Merlot's finest work, an achievement of engineering and aura integrative technology.

Which just made it all the more unprecedented when Ruby felt the most blinding pain she'd ever felt in her life, and with eyes searing red, hair igniting as if drenched in gasoline and one sharp, savage roar of exertion, the Dragon ripped her arm off in a single motion, the visceral sound of tendons snapping and sinew tearing where it connected to her body. Yang's boot kept Ruby pinned, and if she craned her neck to look up it was to the sight of the older woman beaming exuberantly down at her, waving manically with the arm she'd just detached.

"Hey sissy, need a hand? HA!"

She turned and pitched the limb across the room like a bullet, where it bonked off the head of her double wherever she was standing. Ruby found it hard to focus through the pain, but it may have occurred to her to wonder why exactly the petrified statue of the arm she'd severed from Yang before was moving, rattling, jolting like something was still alive in there, as if the grimm in question was so advanced it could split itself into multiple organisms.

Then it exploded into shards of stone, and a tiny black streak shot out from its remains towards her, reaching her in a blur so quick it was hard to track.

And burrowing directly into her bleeding stump.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!"

Ruby wailed louder than she ever had before. Her last prosthetic was shoddily made compared to Merlot's work and she had to rip that one off herself. This one had been made under the careful eye of a great inventor like Merlot and yet it'd been ripped off as easy as pulling a band-aid. Blood gushed from the tears in Ruby's stump and exposed tissue from where the arm had been hooked on to support. "AAAAAAH!! MY ARM!!!!!!" She cried until she was coughing and sputtering up a storm.

"AAGHHHHHHH!!! GET OFF MEEEEEEEEEEE!!"

She tried to claw at her stump and whatever it was she felt invading her body. Burrowing deeper and deeper. Her nails cracked as she scratched at the floor. Calling out for her aunt with tears in her eyes. "AUNT RAVEN!!! H-HELP ME!!!" But as Raven had her own issues, Ruby's screams turned to a different plea for help.

"YANG....YANG HELP ME!!!"

Ruby's breath was caught in her throat.

"Mommy.....*sob* Mommy, help me!"

...for one of the people she had been desperately trying to not think about, to not concern herself with, had become impossible to ignore any longer. The super quick Ruby stood utterly still, petrified by a hurricane mix of emotion that swirled within. Not a muscle moved, not even as she got bonked by the arm that...that this world's Yang had joyously ripped off. Not even the obvious pained agony and saddening cries that came from the other Ruby got her to move from the spot. Everything about that had just gone down over there, it was mindbreaking to witness. That there was a Yang and a Ruby who...she couldn't even finish that train of thought. She finally moved though, dropping to her knees with eyes as wide as they could possibly get in a vacant stare, dully staring at the thrown arm. No move was made by her to go after either of the relics.

"....................................................................................."​

 

[MyrtenRose]

As the ground began to crack under their feet, Tiger huffed and puffed.

"Here we are fighting for the third time...."

Then Tiger smiled at the smaller opponent.

"....The Hand probably wouldn't approve of me saying this....but I admire your dedication to your friends."

The faunus's muscles bulged and the veins in her arm stood out.

"....I'm glad to have met you."

Then she lashed out with a kick to try and catch Nora in the gut and send her flying across the room.

"....But I can't let you win. Not this time, not now."

If that attack was succesful, Tiger immediately moved to try and take advantage. Leaving dents in the floor from where she jumped, Tiger growled as she tried to land right atop Nora: boot first.

"Yeah, so what?" Nora shot back, almost rolling her eyes even. "Is that supposed to make us buddy buddy, make me forget that you're a part of the group that bombed us--" She only got that much out before the kick sent her across the room. When she stopped, she only had a tiny bit of forewarning, an aura sense of danger going off before Tiger was on her again, but it was enough. Magnhild was yanked off her back in one smooth motion, held up above her. Tiger's jump was caught, the big faunus's boots slamming into the metal of Magnhild's long handle instead of her body. Even with her strength though, that jump had so much power that it forced her hammer's handle down until it was nearly choking her. Nearly.

"Because I haven't." Nora finished saying. She wrenched her weapon around to throw the faunus off and to the side before she jumped back to her feet, dashing after Tiger to bring Magnhild down upon her in an overhead smash.​

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

A look of discontent crossed Pyrrha's face as Tiger thundered off after Nora. Those two seemed content to have their little struggle, and it wasn't as if Yang could be ignored. But this...

Yang snarled as she recovered and pushed off her back foot for a sliding quick step for a jab, only for her gauntlet to jerk upwards as Pyrrha answered with a step of her own and a flick of the wrist. Milo slashed straight across Yang's neck, a strike of maximum lethality with the minimum force required, making Yang's aura flair just as bright as Tiger's strike had with far less fed into the blonde's semblence.

...This sort of matchup was just going to be dreadfully boring, wasn't it?

She sighed as Yang gasped and stumbled at the strike before she pivoted on her heel at the same time Pyrrha spun Milo as it shifted into a rifle and-

Mostly due to all the tears and such.

As something shot out towards her, Ruby could barely make out what it'd been before-

"AAGHHHHHHH!!! GET OFF MEEEEEEEEEEE!!"

She tried to claw at her stump and whatever it was she felt invading her body. Burrowing deeper and deeper. Her nails cracked as she scratched at the floor. Calling out for her aunt with tears in her eyes. "AUNT RAVEN!!! H-HELP ME!!!" But as Raven had her own issues, Ruby's screams turned to a different plea for help.

"YANG....YANG HELP ME!!!"

Ruby's breath was caught in her throat.

"Mommy.....*sob* Mommy, help me!"

BANG

-Shot Yang square in the forehead instead of an unbalancing shot to the side of the cheek like she intended as she just suddenly... stopped moving, outside of the caliber of the bullet suddenly making her head jerk upwards, staying there for a moment before it slowly came back down.

Yang knew which Ruby it was making those sounds. Harsh as it sounded, her Ruby would've never broken like that. Her sister was too strong. She'd outgrown the need to be protected. At worst, she needed someone to watch her back as an equal, and at best, she was the one keeping Yang's feet on the ground these days whenever she existed anyways. But she'd gotten that way with help; from her dad, from their uncle, from their teachers, their teammates, their friends, and from Yang. She hadn't always been that way. There was a time, a long time ago, so long that it felt like a lifetime even to someone as young as Yang, that she would've called out to Yang like that when she was scared, when the nightmares got too bad, or some grimm she'd gotten overexcited about fighting and tried to take down herself proved to be too much.

Yang would always be there for her in those moments. Maybe this Ruby was something monstrous before, but she was trying to be better now, and it was clear she still needed someone at her side. It shouldn't have been the most important thing in the room. There were two relics that she needed to get if she ever wanted to get home to see Weiss and Blake again being literally tossed around in hails of gunfire. She'd never won a spar against Pyrrha back at Beacon, and a far more deadlier version of her former friend was trying to slit her throat. Weiss, the woman with the power of two maidens inside her, the girl who Yang had given up so much of herself to try and break her walls down and show that it was okay to let people in, was unconscious in a room of people who wanted her far, far worse than just dead.

All of that still mattered to her. Some of it so much that it hurt. But none of it mattered more than the fact that her little sister was crying.

None of which mattered to Pyrrha, who's friendly smirk cracked into a more tense, annoyed smile as Yang just stood there. "I'm sorry Miss Xiao Long, but am I boring you?"

"Yea."

Her eyes finally snapped back up to lock onto Pyrrha's, the person in the way of her doing anything about any of that. It wasn't anger in her eyes. She was past anger, to a point of clarity of purpose that she wasn't sure she'd ever had or would have again in her life.

"You are"

She slammed her guantlets together and two explosive rounds went off right on top of her.

Pyrrha fought the urge to roll her eyes.

She figured out what this was the moment Yang started to pull her fists back to strike together; an over dramatic smokescreen. How mind numblingly simple of a tactic; if she had a lien for every person who thought she needed to see to use her semblance, she'd almost match her lifetime winnings in the arenas. She should've known better than to expect anything fancier than schoolyard tactics folstered by sheer brute strength and skill from a copy of the dragon, but something about the way everyone had reacted when she'd made her threat with the lantern had Pyrrha at least a little excited for this fight, no matter how lopsided it was to pit her against a woman with a metal arm.

Oh well.

She reached out with her semblance into the smoke and flame, found the arm, moving in the direction of a leap and jerked it forward.

The arm came out, the rest of Yang didn't, and Pyrrha had a downright uncharacteristic moment of surprise as she stared at the prosthetic that clunked harmlessly against her shield before a far more real fist smashed into her face with the fiery vengeance of an angry god. It was the sort of strike that would daze even a terminator like Blake or the man who couldn't feel pain in Hazel, and the sole downside of being the absolute queen of not getting hit was that she didn't get as much practice as most in taking them; She couldn't even get her bearings as she crunched into the floor with the sound of twisting metal and still bounced slightly back up before a low roundhouse kick caught her in the side to send her rocketing straight into the still open elevator with a thunderous crash.

She was still Pyrrha Nikos. She made it back to knees in a roll rather than ending up prone against the back of the elevator, and she instinctively raised her shield to catch the shot she knew was coming even as her vision swam, and was rewarded with the sound of Yang's gauntlet going up in a follow up shot-

that wasn't for her at all; instead angled just so so that it went straight through the hole the other Yang had left in the top of the elevator to the shaft above, and Pyrrha eyes widened as she heard the telltale sound of one of Yang's explosive rounds arming itself above her.

"Don't you DARE-"

*BOOOM*

The round went off, blasting the elevator clean off the cable, and the last Yang saw of Pyrrha was the most affronted look she'd ever seen as the elevator went screaming down the shaft in a spray of sparks.

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

That was precisely her approach, having a fairly sure expectation of how deadly Carnelian was in battle after Mistral. Her, Qrow, Tock...it was incredible. And that approach was why she didn't even see the backhand coming. It sent her flying, bouncing off one of the office walls, and for a moment there, her vision darkened completely. It was so quick she would have ascribed it to just being a blink, were it not for the fact that the place where her portal had been now stood empty. "???" Raven didn't dare take her eyes off the combatants around her for too long, but in her mind, a panicked thought reigned supreme. What was that?

There was no sudden or explosive movements from Bear as Raven regained her balance. Merely a calm and purposeful stride forward broken only by the slight sneer Carnelian got in response to his salute before his eyes focused back on Raven.

One of Salem's personal enforcers.

For all the crimes and horrors the Shadow fang had been directly responsible for and indirectly guilty of by virtue of their allies, this part of the fight still felt righteous to Bear. Learning what he had, about the kingdoms, the academies, the war, and all that had gone on behind it... the anger it roused in him was almost half as angry as the thought of Carnelian made him, which is to say it burned as bright as the sun. To claim that Salem had no part in how the faunus had ended up in the modern age was laughable; she quite literally had all the time in the world and much of the power.

They merely were never important enough. Never a priority.

It seemed it took all those crimes and horrors for her to finally deign to give the faunus her notice, even if it was merely as an enemy.

But he was in no hurry, no furious, reckless rush to take Raven down; all he cared about was watching for the moment of focus it would take Raven to try and open another portal, and waiting for his moment was something Bear had perfected

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

—And solidified, two shots reflexively squeezed off with pinpoint accuracy. The first, once again, struck the relic of knowledge as it fell, the lamp ricocheting aggressively off the wall and spinning away just inches from Ruby's grasping fingers.

The second struck the relic she was already holding, meant to knock the staff of creation he'd spent so many years safeguarding straight from her grip, where it rolled to a perfect stop at the feet of quite possibly the one man he would have never in a million years entrusted it to under any other circumstance.

Everything about that was troubling but she didn't even get the chance to do anything about it. For...







...for one of the people she had been desperately trying to not think about, to not concern herself with, had become impossible to ignore any longer. The super quick Ruby stood utterly still, petrified by a hurricane mix of emotion that swirled within. Not a muscle moved, not even as she got bonked by the arm that...that this world's Yang had joyously ripped off. Not even the obvious pained agony and saddening cries that came from the other Ruby got her to move from the spot. Everything about that had just gone down over there, it was mindbreaking to witness. That there was a Yang and a Ruby who...she couldn't even finish that train of thought. She finally moved though, dropping to her knees with eyes as wide as they could possibly get in a vacant stare, dully staring at the thrown arm. No move was made by her to go after either of the relics.

"....................................................................................."​

Someone else would've gone for the relics. They were the end goal of all of this, the primary objective, the entire reason for all the violence. Blake Belladonna was not someone else; an enemy left alive were the ones most likely to rip out your throat.

One version of a team RWBY member had already learned that tonight.

The moment Ruby hit her knees, there was a shadow taking shape behind her already halfway through a decapitating strike; it didn't matter if she had the face of a former ally, that she hadn't even drawn her weapon, or that she was in a moment of utter distress.

She was an obstacle. She had to die-



The sound didn't reach her until after the bullet did, catching the back of her hand mid swing with enough force from it's absurd caliber to send her spinning into the air as her aura flared, as another bullet ricocheted off the floor for Carnelian's chest. Blake's rotation went all the way around as Gambol shifted from sword to pistol and her amber eyes pierced the night sky out the window where any human would see nothing but black, and she squeezed off a shot in mid-air.

hundreds of meters away in a covert ops Manta, no time to change out of their dress uniform before they'd been given the order to fly, the sniper glanced to the side slightly as a bullet pinged off the inner chassis behind her.

"Hm."

That was just absurd.

"What the hell was that?!" Called back the pilot.

"Nothing you need to worry about yet."

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

"....MISS SCHNEE?!" "....MISS SCHNEE?!"

On the list of things- no, that wasn't important enough to waste thought cycles on, not when their friend was still in danger

"Cinder!" "Cinder!"

Both Pennies swerved their course down to her, the one without Grey in her arms moving to catch her before she saw it wasn't needed. "Are you okay!?" "Are you okay!?"

A question who's answer was going to have to wait

The scream faded into a distant echo as the grimm hybrid got driven straight into the icy ground way below...and through it, again, ending with her buried in what was less a crater and more a chasm, a testament to the sheer, undeniable power that Weiss Schnee brought to the battlefield. When the overwhelming bright lightshow faded, all those in the air were treated to minutes of comparative quiet(save for any talking) that stretched on for long enough that the good Cinder began to wonder if it really was over now. Hopes that were dashed shortly after when the distant gash in the earth began to glow, burning orange illuminating that area at least just as brightly as Weiss's attack, if much less visible given the ground obscured most of it.

Again, that Cinder seemed to be a volcano personified as she exploded out of the ground just then. A dark figure, framed by the scorching flames behind her, glaring at them with rage, frustration, disgust, annoyance, hatred...all of it so overflowing that she would have doubtless made quite a snack for any grimm, were she not partly one herself. Call it arrogance, or a blinding lust for power, or something else entirely but even after that brutal assault, the woman still refused to give up. All the flame around her swelled up even further before it thrust forward as one beam attack of her own, greatly dwarfing even the similar attack she had launched to counter Penny's laser from before.

Both Pennies looked at each other and gave a firm nod before they took off in opposite directions; One taking grey and swooping down low to the ground towards the enemy CInder, the other taking their Cinder in much the same sort of carry and instead taking her instead towards Watts.

"I know you want to help, Cinder; but all this other you wants is you."

her face was a worried sort of determined.

"That is not an outcome I can allow. Without your aura, if even a stray shot..." She shook her head. "With two maidens of their caliber firing upon each other, the risk is too much."

"-this is going to be very dangerous! I understand if you want me to abort!" the other Penny finished saying to Grey, the heat around them melting the ice into a sloshy mess beneath their flight as they closed in on the volcano the other Cinder had become.