Fandom Distorted Mirror [IC]

[MidwayLives]

Neopolitan let out a rasp of a yelp as she found herself suddenly airborne and caught a cyclone like a three-tone Pomeranian shut into a drying machine. She didn't even try to right herself; she merely did her best to keep her eyes on the boss till he deigned to toss her away, and a freshly spin-cycled Neo landed with a graceful roll, her momentum coming to a halt with the aid of Hush' blade slammed into the ground as she growled just like one of those small dogs-

Her eyes shot wide as she caught sight of Char, but before she could even take a step forwards she was buffeted by the winds yet again. Rather than try and fight it, she let it pick her up, and she seemed easy prey for the boss as he lunged forwards-

"Die now, child! Fall into Hell with your eyes wide with despair!"

He lashed out to finally put an end to this once and for all.
​

Only instead of her neck, he found herself gripping the middle of Hush instead, a flexible twist that would've made a gymnast blush twirling Neo up and over him as she put her weapon between them and started to use him as a pivot point to swing her foot in for a kick. The Boss' semblance was incredibly powerful, far and away more dangerous than Neo's. Yet she had a lot practice against a very similar semblance....

Neo's eyes for the briefest of seconds met the Boss's. The only visible part of his face hidden away by his bandage-like mask.

They seemed fractured as if she were staring into his soul-split up as it was among the three personalities that inhabited the body: The Boss/Jack/Aurora.

Although neither Jack or Aurora were truly aware of their 'existence' as mere personalities created by the Boss, the three were unanimous in one thing.

This girl was a pest.

What did you do with pests? You exterminated them.

As her foot came in to kick him, she'd have seen the vaguest outlines of a knife in his free hand.
​

Whether the kick connected or not, she found herself flung back in the other direction, and landed with a stumble on both feet, more cat than pomeranian this time as she carried the momentum forward to land next to Char with a worried frown.

The two had been separated but as Char took heavy breaths, he didn't seem none too relieved even as Neo approached to help.

"Kid...I..." He started as the Boss thrust out his right hand and both Char and Neo were sent skidding across the ground.

"I think I've seen quite enough." The Boss started as he strode forward, wind sailing all around him as he walked. His movements careful and measured but with the same tension that one would expect from a tiger preparing to launch itself at it's prey. "I truly didn't know that there were depths to which the Hitman Team could sink even lower. But you've managed to exceed even my wildest expectations, Char." He chided with a slight shake of his head. "Men like Marcus Black had once been a peer, an example for you to look up to, and yet here you are. Dying in the cold night with nary but a misguided child to act as your savior."

"I don't know what's more pathetic."

He stopped a few inches away from the two.

"Your willingness to give into utter fear or her determination to fight a battle that's already been lost?"
​

She was already slipping her jacket off by the time her momentum stopped, and while the boss was dealing with whoever the hell had decided that this was their moment to open fire on some lunatic serial killer, she used her jacket to wrap Char's wound to try and staunch the bleeding.

Char didn't say anything but Neo could have seen and gotten just a good idea of how terrified the Ashes were of their enigmatic Boss. His hair was a mess due to the constant wind and his skin was covered in a wash of cold sweat. His bottom lip trembled and whether he himself knew it or not, he clung onto Neo's arm as though it were his only lifeline. The pain from his wound-even as she attempted to treat it-didn't matter. Not in the face of overwhelming terror.

He didn't know who this man was. Or why he'd been saying the things he had.

But the hitman had figured enough out, at least enough to try and give himself some peace of mind.

Callie had been right. Whoever the 'Mistral Murderer' was, they'd had connections with none other than the self-proclaimed 'ruler' of Mistral himself: the Boss.

The Boss held his hand out and the wind started to grow stronger and stronger as it spun around Neo and Char. Threatening to leave the two so battered down they'd been unable to move. "I'm bringing an end to this farce. Everyone in that warehouse IS going to die and child!" The gangster called out. "It's going to be all your fault." As it felt like they were being encircled by the wind that the Boss's semblance let him call upon and control, the hitman started coughing. As though it were beginning to get hard to breath. "I'm sorry, kid. Sorry we got you into this...Blanche and I..."

~~~

*BANG*

Another shot rang out. This time the Boss had been ready and had shifted the wind that made up his personal 'field' to flow counterclockwise. Thus redirecting the bullet's course and sending it back the way it's came. As the bullet clipped her shoulder and caused her aura to flash, Abyss kept this masked maniac in her sights. She'd known that members of the team like Violet had teased Char now and again for his seeming reliance on his semblance. Blanche had always been there for Char when she couldn't be. She had to be the leader and that meant not taking sides. They were all adults and they needed to act like it. How could they present themselves as professionals otherwise? To see him so completely captivated by fear. It was a feeling that she'd seen only once before: at a time when the entire Hitman Team had felt it.

The private investigators they'd hired to scope out the Boss's identity had stopped responding. After a couple of days they were listed as missing. It was only when they started getting strange packages sent to their apartment that things started to become clear. One of the Boss's Elite Guard had kidnapped the PIs and tortured them and sent the Hitman Team the remains piece by piece, little by little. Just a reminder of the Boss's influence and how much he valued his privacy. Once he'd established his place as one of-if not THE most influential and powerful man born and raised in Mistral, the man who'd become the 'Boss' had nearly any traces of his past wiped clean. Public birth records, childhood associates, possibly even family. Abyss knew her team had been traumatized by the experience. Char retreated within himself and became always eager to show he wasn't cowardly, Blanche tried to lean more on Char whenever he could to show that he'd be there for him, Violet didn't talk about the incident, and Vanile? She didn't say anything....at all.

What of Abyss herself? Well, sure, the incident was disturbing. But she couldn't let herself show any signs of weakness. It was a dog eat dog world out there and she'd started life off on the wrong foot by failing to unlock her semblance. Growing up she coped with it however she could. All the way up to becoming leader of the Hitman Team. So, whether it was some hired goon by the Boss or some deranged psycho, she didn't care. She'd only seen a bit of his semblance but she felt as though she understood it: he could control and manipulate wind in various ways. But he needed to let go of anything he was holding before he activated his field and to strike it...all you needed to do was do as the kid had done. Move counter to the way that the field was spinning.

She took aim....

*BANG*

The bullet hit a raised cobblestone that'd erupted from the ground due to the force of the Boss's semblance. It tore a chunk out of it and just as Abyss had hoped, it shot upwards. Catching the Boss by surprise. The field couldn't be reversed in time. As the bullet continued to soar upwards, a trail of fabric that made up the Boss's mask fluttered to the ground, landing at his boots. He wasn't sure how it could have happened but the worst possible scenario had come to pass and all because of another interloper's efforts. Pink hair poked out bright enough to stand out even amid the darkness. Char's eyes widened and the wind started to die down.

The Boss's hands fell to his sides.

"Aur....Aurora...?" Char sputtered.

No....it...it couldn't have been. Aurora was but of a boy of only seventeen. He couldn't have been much older than Pinky or her friends. This man...hard as it was to make out his features as part of it was still hidden by what remained of the mask. Char guessed the man to be in his...mid to late 30s if that.

The Boss sighed.

"I had really hoped to deal with you first, Char. Your semblance if used properly could be an...annoyance. But it seems that you'll be able to breathe for a second longer..." He chided as he looked towards Neo and the huntress could have seen the hints of Aurora that resided within this strange man, this...this murderer. "...But not a second more." With that the Boss turned his attention in the direction of who'd been shooting at him and blasting off into the sky, Neo and Char could have seen him using his control over the wind to propel himself through the sky. Having a moment to finally realize the pain he was in, Char clutched at his wound and looked at Neo.

"Kid...I...I've never been so scared of anyone in my life. There's only one man that could do this to me....It's the one who brought the Bound Ashes together. Put *cough* Mistral under his thumb. The man who's been hiding from public sight for so long." Char looked up again in the sky only to see that the Boss was gone. "The Boss..."

~~~

Abyss could see a figure coming in and fast.

"Ah, so it was you. I should have figured you'd take one last stab at defying me."

Abyss raised her rifle and pointed it at the Boss who stood inches from her, arms folded across his chest and foot tapping against the wind itself to keep himself afloat.

It was hard to make out distinct facial features in the dark like this but with her visor, Abyss could get a better visual on the Boss than either Neo or Char had. The sight nearly made the rifle fall from her hands. Instead, she merely chuckled bitterly. "....I had my suspicions, you know. Back when Aurora told us that Char and Blanche were likely to have been captured or killed. He'd lost it on me and pushed me against the wall. The common layman may have just written it off as plain aggression, unpent stress that found it's way out in the worst possible situation. But I didn't get this role without being perceptive. I wasn't just shoved like a freshman down the hall...I was thrown back...by wind." It all started clicking together.

She laughed again.

"To think that all these years of working for you....What we'd done for you. That the day we'd finally see the real you....is when you've come out to kill us." She snarled, obviously referring to how he'd been about to kill Char before the kid had jumped in. The Boss didn't seemed all that perturbed.

"Nobody will believe Char. He's absolutely hysterical, close to the breaking point I'd imagine." He reasoned. "...On top of that, I doubt the child will be saying much of anything. Let alone who she saw just now." He lightly shrugged his shoulders. "You even managing to suss it out doesn't matter either."

"Oh yeah? Why's that? Huh??" She demanded as he raised the rifle.

She knew why, she'd known from the moment he'd appeared before her.

"I'm going to make it quick." He floated closer to the rooftop. "Out of respect for your service." The derision in his voice was palpable.

*BANG BANG BANG*

Shots rang out and were turned left, right, up, down. None ever hit him or came close. He gave the slightest flick of his wrist to the right. The wind practically snatched the gun from Abyss's hands and launched it over the rooftop. Her hands went for her side pieces but the Boss had already closed the distance between them-

*drip*

As painful as it was, she never cried out. Not even for a second.

"Goodbye, Abyss."

He pulled his bloodsoaked hand back.

She clutched at her wound and stumbled back.

He didn't care to see her fall. Turning his back to the leader of the Hitman Team, he stepped off the rooftop and resumed floating.

"Nobody, not man, woman, child or animal. Will ever threaten my everlasting apex. I simply won't let that happen."

~~~

Neo and Char saw the light kicked up from Abyss's rifle going off fade and cease entirely.

Char hadn't realized who'd been defending him from afar. Had he known, he didn't know how many more tears he would have had to shed.

Leaning on Neo, he coughed.

"We....We worked so hard for him.....I...I don't understand...."

~~~

*thud*​

 

[Gus Gungus]

Somehow, even when exiting the churning waters of an ocean now filled to the brim with monsters on the brink of insanity, Blake was so deathy silent exiting the waters that it was like she simply appeared on the deck herself, masked eyes taking in the carnage surrounding them and in the sky, Carnelian privy to how her mind shifted gears; painfully efficient for someone who's emotional spectrum had been so erratic over the last few days.

He was still a priority. His loyalty was still in question

He was just no longer the only one.

Bear breached the water almost silently as his pupil, though it was harder to mask his boarding as the entire manta shifted and bobbed as he clambered aboard. Roaring Claw's grip dripped with oily, damp ash that was fading away already, purporting the reason for his late return, his countenance grim.

Greki was far less graceful. She surfaced for a moment in a flurry of stabs and roars "FUCKINflroguh-" She sunk back into the water "-GOD DAMN COCK SUCKING- ARGH!" She burst from the surface and onto the deck still mid grapple with what could only be called a grimm shark, her metal claws caught on either side of its maw and her arms shaking with effort, her aura flaring from the pressure until Roaring Claw crashed into the beast's back in a spine shattering crunch. Greki gave a massive sigh as she flopped back down onto her back, content to just lay there until the grimm fully faded away.

"Boss,-"

"Not now Wo-"

"-No no, its now. y'all don't pay me 'nough for this. Seriously. I'm gonna quit."

"...Noted. You'll get a raise or I'll kill you when we're done here. Your choice"

The wolf faunus made a noncommittal grunt that belied just how god damn confused and terrified she was with all of this, as Blake rose to her feet, Gambol flipping into her hand and shifting into chain-scythe mode.



"Bear. Wolf. Tiger. Defend the dragon. Watch Carnelian. If he so much as sneezes, end his miserable life."

Greki's eyes widened slightly in more external terror as they shifted over towards the general while she was still flat her her back, but she nonetheless gave a thumbs up before rolling to her feet. Bear didn't even bother voicing his agreement as he rose to his full stature, his wizened gaze sweeping across the waters; it seemed the grimm were mostly tearing into each other, but who knew when that would change? He did, however, have a question.

"What of you?"

Blake's answer almost tired, but resolved.

"Trying to kill Weiss Schnee. Again."

There was a blast of gunfire as she whipped Gambol shroud into the air, and a passing Gryphon that had recovered before crashing into the waves found its neck leashed, held in place as the blade's final rotation buried itself in the monster's neck. It let out a gurgled screech and began to plummet, but not before the ribbon's pull tore Blake into the sky. As the beast faded and the ribbon came loose, Blake's momentum had begun to ebb, but a semblance dash sent her crashing into the underside of another airborne beast that shrieked in surprise and hunger as the Hand gripped its underside feathers and disappeared fully into the swarm, out of sight.

Carnelian's watchful, knowing, strangely mirthful stare never strayed from the Hand's own, seeming to relish in every shift of expression or lack thereof enough that it held his attention over the level of sheer mortal peril even he would've been remiss to ignore reaching a fever pitch around them as he threw his head back and guffawed at the suspicion levied his way. It was a bitter noise, but also one rife with amusement at the suggestion the three wounded cubs she was leaving to watch the den could do it; laced with more than a hint of intrigue in seeing them try.

"Very good, young lady. 'Fraid you're barking up the wrong tree, though. Ohp. I beg your pardon. Mewling."

He gave her the mock salute any soldier heading off to war deserved as she took swung off on her most noble and righteous crusade.



It was downright insulting how little time elapsed between then and Greki looking up to the sight of hell's general looming over her.



She could tell just by his expression that it was not a social call. In the time it took her heart to skip a beat, the guise of the stately gentleman was shorn away like the skin of a snake; every aspect of his true colors showed on his face in that brief split-second of eye contact. The hatred. The rage. The malign savagery that quite frankly seemed so much more at home surrounded by Ozpin's cabal of myrmidons than the blue-blooded elites of Atlas that it put it into perspective how absurd it was that the distilled force of malice and wrath before her had ever risen to that stature, that this Grimm in a collared shirt had ever amounted to anything more than the most base, bloodthirsty cutthroat from the most forgotten hovel of the human world.

But he had. And the reason why was very simple.

Because he was good at disguising his intentions.

Carnelian had always been fast, faster even than Navano, and it was appalling to the old bear how little that had changed in the years between their war and the current one. If anything he was almost faster; the unyielding march of time the only enemy the Butcher of Solitas ever feared, and one his efforts to combat had been as grimly effective as any other battle tactic of his, worth any price; even the one of the lances of pain that danced across the periphery of his expression every time the patchwork grotesquery of cybernetics propelled him to such speeds, or when it sent his old bones' strength surging to three times that of his younger self's.

So no matter how prepared Bear was for this exact turn of events, no matter how quickly and urgently he reacted, he fell oh-so-painstakingly short of making a difference in what was about to happen. His swords were still at his side, but the dense, serrated bowie knife he clutched like an extension of his self already gleamed with the crimson of his bionic eye as he stabbed downward—

—And straight through the brain of the thin, wriggling, horrifyingly toothy blend of leech and eel that had shot up from beneath the inky waves, on a flight path towards Greki's ear canal with intentions that probably didn't merit thinking about but that the mercenary probably would anyway. He weaved under whatever reprisal Bear sought to visit on him and carried it fluidly into a poised, easy stride for the Manta's helm. He sent a roving gaze out across the feral waters, drinking in the carnage before his gaze settled on the creature speared on the tip of his knife, still wriggling madly in its death spasms as its body caught up to its brain.

Once upon a time, before all this, before even his war, there had been a boy. A boy who, not long after his semblance first manifested, had made the mistake of reaching out and touching the mind of a Grimm; But the boy was young. The boy was frail, sickly, bullied. The boy was so enamored with his new ability, with trying it out on every human, faunus and animal in sight, that he failed to consider the ramifications of attempting to know the unknowable, failed to take the proper precautions. And so when he peered into the mind of Grimm, the inevitable, yet terrible, happened.

The Grimm peered back.

From that day forward, the boy was never the same. Wrath ruled his heart, hatred his brain, the glee of inviting harm, suffering and bloodshed on those weaker than him the only sensation that brought a smile to his face. The rest was static. The boy may have survived that day, but he lived for one thing and one thing only.

He lived for this.

"Hheeeennnnhh."

Even now, there was risk inherent in opening his mind to too many Grimm. The chance that it'd snap. That chance that whatever shreds of humanity were left in there would finally go under, never to resurface.

"Hheeeennnnhh."

But even all these years later, the boy was as much a slave to his impulses as he had ever been. The strange, primal breathing sounds coming from the man's lips gave it away; knowing full well what might happen, he had done it anyway. Had opened himself to the maelstrom of poisoned, screaming, suffering Grimm all around him. He drank in their pain. Their rage. Their fear. Just for a second, just for a taste, he dipped below the surface and almost didn't come back up this time.

Unfortunately, he did.

Krk-KRAK

Beautiful.

He rolled his neck out to either side, old joints popping with the faint resonance of metal as he tossed the bowie up and caught it between his teeth. His hands lowered to his sides, and there was something slow, deliberate, and viscerally intense about the way he drew his swords, sliding one foot back into a stance and addressing the three faunus without turning as all around them more and more diseased Grimm started to take notice.

"Four-point crossroads formation. Back to back. Nothing that isn't human or animal gets on board this ship."

There was a chilling serenity to the general's tone, and had any of them been able to see the smile peeled back across his face it would've sent chills all the way down their spine.

It was almost picturesque. Carnelian, the great Atlesian butcher, prepared to stand side by side with the revolutionaries of the species he victimized. In his mind, there was only one word for it.

"Hooah."​

 

[Gus Gungus]

Weiss did her best work during crunch time.

Whether she was cutting her teeth in the world of academia, economics, politics or global conspiracy, that had always been the case. Just as it was the nature of some people to buckle under immense, soul-destroying pressure, it was Weiss's nature to spit in the face of that pressure and thrive, the proverbial diamond among the coal; a short time and many miles ago she had shared her theory that she didn't know how to be happy, and that had been so much more than simply a moment of maudlin self-reflection.

It had been an admission of her greatest weakness. The one that had allowed Snake to slip a bomb past her notice, Blake to visit her savagery on Winter and Yang to worm her way into her heart with nothing more than dumb jokes and an unyielding warmth. When things were going well, when her plans were unfolding as expected and all the cogs were turning smoothly, that was when Weiss was at her most vulnerable. When the victories started going to her head, the near-constant state of paranoia and neurosis she lived in began to subside, and even briefly, even just for one second, she started to let herself relax.

She was the strangest, most wildly juxtaposed woman to be found in Atlas, if not all of Remnant. A bundle of contradictions, one with copious amounts of pride offset by a nevertheless terminally low opinion of herself that never climbed any higher, no matter how satisfactory she deemed her own achievements. There was always something more to be done. Always something more she could give. It was the ultimate legacy of a demanding parenting style, of the series of unrealistic expectations set before her since birth that she had somehow, someway, found a means of rising to every single time anyway. Eventually she had outgrown those parents, started assigning those expectations autonomously, yet in the face of all logic she had continued to meet them. Every time.

And now she was here. On the edge of the known world, staring down the most demanding unrealistic task she'd ever been set. It was that voice, she reasoned, that was to blame; the one that had started as her father's yet lived on long after his demise, and seemed to berate her everywhere she went. Needling her from sources both external and internal.

'You can't.'

"Whatever you think he's capable of bringing to bear if you force his hand, you're lowballing it."

'You won't.'

"I can't trust you with the future of my people Weiss. I couldn't trust you with anything. Because the moment the scales of the equation asked you to, you'd throw us right back to the wolves to keep your sordid little peace for the humans that outnumber us. Unlike Ozpin, the bigger end of the scale always wins out with a monster like you."

'You could never.'

"I'm sorry it came to this, Weiss. You convinced me you were the best option for Atlas's future, and I believed you. I don't know what happened in the time since, but it's plain to see that's no longer the case."

"Sure, okay, I may not be the most experienced person when it comes to the world, but if you honestly think either of those things are a-okay? Then you know even less than I do about how a world is supposed to work."

"Its proof you Schnees are all the same. Drunk on power and faunus blood for centuries. My FAMILY'S blood."

"You're just a narcissistic, traitorous, sociopathic bitch with family issues and a hero complex, and the only thing you deserve is to be locked away for the rest of your life. I imagine that is how long it would take you to come to terms with how vile you really are."

So many people. So many agendas. All presuming to know her, all lining up to offer her their opinion of how wrong she had gotten everything; of what a deluded little child she was. All telling her what she was, what she could do, what she could be. She didn't even care if they were right or wrong at this point.

She was just tired of it. And after everything that had happened, there was only one counterpoint left she felt she still had the energy to make.

What if they were wrong?

What if she could?

What if she did?

What if she was going to, and damn anyone who tried to tell her otherwise? They weren't her. They didn't even know her. Most of them had made it clear they had no interest in getting to. Only she dictated what she could and couldn't do. Only Weiss Schnee decided the limits of Weiss Schnee.

She was Weiss Schnee. And she had decided a long time ago that she could do whatever the hell she put her mind to.

As deeply embedded in layers of complexity and convolution as she operated, Weiss only had one agenda. Everything she had ever done, right or wrong, cold or otherwise, had been in the pursuit of a very simple goal: to leave this ugly, disorganized, chaotic excuse for a world a better place than she found it. To correct the flaws she saw everywhere she looked. And this?

As far as she was concerned, this was it. If Weiss, deeply and miserably aware of her own flaws as she had become in light of recent events, still clung to any shred of belief that she had a destiny of any kind, that there was a moment everything else in her life had been a precursor to, then this was that moment. Face-to-face with the greatest evil Remnant had ever known, defying his expectations just as she once had those of another man with an engorged ego, unlimited resources and crude sense of entitlement to the world around him. She could succeed here, ensure it had all been for something, or she could fail, and confirm the suspicions of every single naysayer who ever told her it hadn't. To put it another way?

It was the crunch time to end all crunch times.

She had work to do.

The rapidly approaching beast was no threat at all, under his influence or not, something made apparently clear by the simple blast any maiden could have accomplished utterly obliterated the corrupted grimm.

But that left him open to Weiss's desperate assault, and the sheer light behind did at the very least temporarily blind him, his grip relaxing enough for her to get out of it with enough effort. That assault and the fact that even the whale grimm began to shake from this strange affliction got even him to stumble. As it turned out, all of what Weiss had just unleashed only blinded him for as long as it took for several blinks of his eyes, but fortunately by the time his sight fully restored, his attention was not upon her then. It was on the gargantuan grimm he stood upon. Ozpin knelt and pressed both hands flat on the beast's back, his complete and utter focus on utilizing his magic to purge the beast of whatever this was that Weiss had brought down upon it. More than that, his concentration went out to every grimm in the area suffering from these effects, from the ones that had crashed upon the whale, to those plummeting in the water, to Yang's own arm.

No matter what it was, he was going to wipe it all out in one move. He had put too much effort, too much time in constructing this army, to lose it to the machinations of one traitorous, conniving, smug bitch.

He would make her suffer like none other after this was done.

The moment Weiss was loose of that crushing vice around her neck, the moment Ozpin's mask of overwhelming dominance, authority and self-assurance slipped for the first time since their fated confrontation began, so too did her own bearing change. There would be no more talk; she had done quite enough of that. No more gloating. No further attempts to rile the man or get under his skin, to make him too eager to indulge in his base impulses to punish her impudence to notice the blight she had unleashed on his army. Judging from the look on his face and how effortlessly her frontal barrage had been brushed off, the very next time Ozpin gave her his full attention for longer than a second she was going to be dead. Or worse.

As mentioned, crunch time.

That was just one of the parameters she had to work with. Another was that what she needed to do couldn't be achieved through overwhelming force. Not as damning as it sounded; overwhelming force wasn't even really her forté. She was a paragon of strategy, precision, and technique first and foremost, and had been long before the acquisition of magic catapulted her into another stratosphere.

So, she just needed to kill Ozpin in a single strike, before he could focus his attention on her, in such a fashion that circumvented his as-yet-untouched aura and magical barriers. And not die in the process.

Oh, and she had to do it on the back of a grimm whale currently nosediving towards the grimm-infested ocean. At least it was doing it slowly.

When Ozpin's sight returned to him, he still found his vision hampered. Weiss was nowhere in sight, and the whale's back was coated in a layer of ice stretching out in all directions, currently sizzling with heat as thick plumes of mist wafted up from it to blanket the area and reduce visibility to nil. A tactic she was borrowing from the other world's team RWBY; Yang had had a name for it, but she couldn't recall. Probably something dumb and irrelevant.

Purging the serum from his creations was within his ability, but it was going to be an exercise in patience and concentration—the chemical was just so ravaging, so virulent and persistent in how it disseminated through the Grimm's oozing, adaptive biomass, spreading like wildfire through his army even now as those infected passed it on to their brethren through tooth and claw. The level of attention required made it easy to dismiss the sounds of faint, distant glyphing occurring in the fog around him, the occasional snatches of movement curling the fog as Weiss pinged from place to place erratically like a pinball, no apparent rhyme or reason to it other than to make her angle of approach nigh impossible to predict. It went on for at least ten seconds. Twenty seconds. Thirty-

Suddenly, movement. A figure with blade in hand whisked towards him through the fog in the corner of his eye, sword outstretched for a single thrust—

—Batted aside with only minor effort, rendering it pathetically easy to snatch Weiss by the throat again without so much as rising if he so chose. If he did, his realization was immediate.

It wasn't Weiss at all. It was a woman who looked a great deal like her, though she was taller, more military in dress and wielding a cutlass rather than a rapier. The most easily discernible difference at this range was that she was one of Weiss's summons, and her blue, ethereal features wore no fear; Winter's glare of dutiful spite marred only by the smirk she pointed at his expense.

The next few moments were a whirlwind of simultaneous action. One gauntlet of the Arma Gigas appeared through a glyph in the ground, closing around Ozpin's wrist and yanking hard in a bid to keep it pinned there, even momentarily. Its twin emerged through a glyph behind him, snatching him by the hair and wrenching his head back sharply in turn, angling his bespectacled gaze upwards.

Just in time for him to come face-to-face with a Weiss who was more bullet than woman having fired herself at him from another glyph somewhere above, mind cleared of all else save her goal and expression a tightly wound portrait of unmitigated focus. Two smaller glyphs bounced the master of Grimm's lips apart, Myrtenaster lanced out in a forward thrust, Weiss let loose as cathartic (and nervous) a battle cry as there had ever been, and if it all came together as intended the rapier stabbed straight through Ozpin's open mouth and down his throat, burying itself all the way up to the hilt in his windpipe and bringing new meaning to the words 'choke on it'.

She had no intentions of stopping there. Her eyes were already pouring light as she came down, channeling as much elemental magic through her weapon as she could muster, fully intent on filling her enemy's insides with so much ice it sprouted up from his eyes, ears, and nostrils like roses in bloom.

Brutal, effective, and quite frankly the most ridiculous thing she had ever attempted. So much had to go right for it to stand even a remote chance of success. The timing. The coordination with her summons. The level of pinpoint accuracy required for Myrtenaster to even end up where she wanted it to go. But those were some of her sharpest talents, and under the circumstances it was the best she could come up with. If now was to be her time, she hoped that, more than anything, was what people remembered.

That Weiss Schnee did her best.​

 

[MyrtenRose]

The moment Weiss was loose of that crushing vice around her neck, the moment Ozpin's mask of overwhelming dominance, authority and self-assurance slipped for the first time since their fated confrontation began, so too did her own bearing change. There would be no more talk; she had done quite enough of that. No more gloating. No further attempts to rile the man or get under his skin, to make him too eager to indulge in his base impulses to punish her impudence to notice the blight had unleashed on his army. Judging from the look on his face and how effortlessly her frontal barrage had been brushed off, the very next time Ozpin gave her his full attention for longer than a second she was going to be dead. Or worse.

As mentioned, crunch time.

That was just one of the parameters she had to work with. Another was that what she needed to do couldn't be achieved through overwhelming force. Not as damning as it sounded; overwhelming force wasn't even really her forté. She was a paragon of strategy, precision, and technique first and foremost, and had been long before the acquisition of magic catapulted her into another stratosphere.

So, she just needed to kill Ozpin in a single strike, before he could focus his attention on her, in such a fashion that circumvented his as-yet-untouched aura and magical barriers. And not die in the process.

Oh, and she had to do it on the back of a grimm whale currently nosediving towards the grimm-infested ocean. At least it was doing it slowly.

When Ozpin's sight returned to him, he still found his vision hampered. Weiss was nowhere in sight, and the whale's back was coated in a layer of ice stretching out in all directions, currently sizzling with heat as thick plumes of mist wafted up from it to blanket the area and reduce visibility to nil. A tactic she was borrowing from the other world's team RWBY; Yang had had a name for it, but she couldn't recall. Probably something dumb and irrelevant.

Purging the serum from his creations was within his ability, but it was going to be an exercise in patience and concentration—the chemical was just so ravaging, so virulent and persistent in how it disseminated through the Grimm's oozing, adaptive biomass, spreading like wildfire through his army even now as those infected passed it on to their brethren through tooth and claw. The level of attention required made it easy to dismiss the sounds of faint, distant glyphing occurring in the fog around him, the occasional snatches of movement curling the fog as Weiss pinged from place to place erratically like a pinball, no apparent rhyme or reason to it other than to make her angle of approach nigh impossible to predict. It went on for at least ten seconds. Twenty seconds. Thirty-

Suddenly, movement. A figure with blade in hand whisked towards him through the fog in the corner of his eye, sword outstretched for a single thrust—

—Batted aside with only minor effort, rendering it pathetically easy to snatch Weiss by the throat again without so much as rising if he so chose. If he did, his realization was immediate.

It wasn't Weiss at all. It was a woman who looked a great deal like her, though she was taller, more military in dress and wielding a cutlass rather than a rapier. The most easily discernible difference at this range was that she was one of Weiss's summons, and her blue, ethereal features wore no fear; Winter's glare of dutiful spite marred only by the smirk she pointed at his expense.

The next few moments were a whirlwind of simultaneous action. One gauntlet of the Arma Gigas appeared through a glyph in the ground, closing around Ozpin's wrist and yanking hard in a bid to keep it pinned there, even momentarily. Its twin emerged through a glyph behind him, snatching him by the hair and wrenching his head back sharply in turn, angling his bespectacled gaze upwards.

Just in time for him to come face-to-face with a Weiss who was more bullet than woman having fired herself at him from another glyph somewhere above, mind cleared of all else save her goal and expression a tightly wound portrait of unmitigated focus. Two smaller glyphs bounced the master of Grimm's lips apart, Myrtenaster lanced out in a forward thrust, Weiss let loose as cathartic (and nervous) a battle cry as there had ever been, and if it all came together as intended the rapier stabbed straight through Ozpin's open mouth and down his throat, burying itself all the way up to the hilt in his windpipe and bringing new meaning to the words 'choke on it'.

She had no intentions of stopping there. Her eyes were already pouring light as she came down, channeling as much elemental magic through her weapon as she could muster, fully intent on filling her enemy's insides with so much ice it sprouted up from his eyes, ears, and nostrils like roses in bloom.

Brutal, effective, and quite frankly the most ridiculous thing she had ever attempted. So much had to go right for it to stand even a remote chance of success. The timing. The coordination with her summons. The level of pinpoint accuracy required for Myrtenaster to even end up where she wanted it to go. But those were some of her sharpest talents, and under the circumstances it was the best she could come up with. If now was to be her time, she hoped that, more than anything, was what people remembered.

That Weiss Schnee did her best.

Blake's belief in Ozpin being power incarnate was not misplaced. Force for force, blow for blow, as powerful as Weiss was...she would always fall short in a straightforward battle. She was undeniably one of the most powerful individuals Remnant had ever seen, but she could still not compare. She had an incredible semblance, but so did he. She had the magical might of two maidens, but he had power comparable to four of them together and millennia more experience in harnessing and pushing what could be accomplished with it. But with his attention diverted, concentrated on stopping the madness she had inflicted upon his forces? She stood a far better chance succeeding then. There were very few people that could have been considered to stand as good a chance as her in those circumstances, perhaps even so few that they could be counted on one hand. In many ways that lack of focus on her was her greatest advantage here.

The fog that surrounded them was barely given the slightest attention, if any at all, and the faint sounds of the glyphs as well as the vague shadows skirting through the mist were given just as much. It wasn't until the moment he was quite literally forced to break his concentration that he did so, stopping the pale summon in its tracks and his attempts to combat the affliction ravaging his forces temporarily ceased. To call his grip crushing would have been an understatement, and had it been human, the pressure exerted against the neck was more than enough to immediately snap a neck. As it were, the summon merely broke apart and faded away like a grimm, that infernal smirk on its face vanishing into nothing like it was never there at all. But before he could do anything else, whether return to trying to stop the plague or to deal with Weiss personally, the gauntlets of the respawned knight he had just dealt with gripped him in turn, just as strong as he had held her summon. They pulled and wrenched him just as hard, head forced up to stare skyward. Before he could even unleash anything to burn them to ash, he witnessed her approach now.

His mouth was forced wide, a ball of a several colors twisted together springing to life in his only free hand and he thrust it forward in a beam...it missed, narrowly sailing past Weiss's face by inches as she dove forward. Pain, absolute searing agony struck him then and there before he could do anything more. The sharpened tip of the blade lodged itself deep in his throat, so deep that only the hilt of her weapon kept her from forcing it further down. Blood cascaded out wildly, and perhaps satisfyingly, the only sounds Ozpin could make were raspy, choking gurgles. But as that occurred, as the initial shock from the blinding pain wore off, his eyes, they...

They only glared, far more hatefully and dangerously than ever before. If looks could kill, that stare would have obliterated Weiss on the spot and every single person who bore the Schnee name would have likewise keeled over and died.

But it could not, so she did not and they did not either. The only one there who did so was that body, confined by the arms of the two knights and a rapier buried in his throat. Weiss lived up to her words on making him choke on it. It was only a second or two more before the lights in those spiteful red eyes went out and the head lowered rather lamely. A bright, blinding flash of light consumed the area then, and there was more to it than just the blinding flash. Both gauntlets of the Arma Gigas got annihilated from it, and Weiss herself was sent blasting back a great deal, knocking her unconscious and leaving only her and one corpse atop the whale.​

 

[Gus Gungus]

Did that just happen.

".....HA!!!!!! SEE, I TOLD YOU! I TOLD YOU I WAS GOING T-"

Unfortunately, no one told her she was going to get wiped out by a magical explosion immediately after.​

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

Blake landed deftly on the back of the Monstro as the corpse of her last unwilling pilot careened to the waters below even as it faded away, and her eyes slowly took in the sight before her. Weiss sprawled across the top of the whale. Ozpin, an overstuffed puppet bursting at the gruesome seams.

"..."

There was no cry of rage or gasp of despair at the lost of her master. No sigh of secret relief at the end of such a monster. There was a heady anger to her words, but a cold anger, one borne of frustration and the closing of the door, not of emotional weight. Nothing like the sounds Blake had made after Eve had died. Perhaps that wasn't strange in and of itself; it was strange Blake was talking at all.

"Ozpin has fallen. Weiss Schnee follows him shortly."

There was no crackle to the comms of the talon masks below. Nor was Blake one to talk to herself, and the words carried the momentum of those that expected a recipient. But no one materialized, no reply was forthcoming, and yet Blake seemed to find that acceptable and expected as she quietly loped across the beast to Weiss' fallen form. She raised Gambol towards the former councilwoman's heart.

A wry smirk formed under the mask. What an ignoble end to Remnant's savior. Put down like a rabid dog while fast asleep. Blake had never been one to care about that sort of thing; The kill was the kill. So long as your enemy died, it didn't matter if it was from a blade to the heart in mortal combat or from vomiting out their blood from a poisoned drink. Yet in this case it seemed particularly egregious. It would've been laughably bad if it were the ending of one of her books. Weiss Schnee deserved better.

More the point,

How she looked with the thin blade of a rapier jutting through her chest, and how for those few moments the world seemed to fade solely to shades of black, white and red.

Weiss Schnee deserved so, so, much worse.

Eve was dead.

"I... wanted to hurt you."

That was her killer's only defense. The only reason Eve no longer breathed.

Gambol shook slightly in her hands. It shouldn't have mattered. Winter was the only person Blake had ever killed cruelly. It wasn't who she was. She was a murderer, yes. Her body count was that of a monster. If there was an afterlife that weighed the sins of the living, the moment she died would the last moment of true peace that she had. But cruelty wasn't Blake Belladonna except in the farthest depths of her despair. It had been the lashing out of a woman in grief, of a warrior who wanted nothing but to follow her love into the abyss in the scant hours after her death.

She'd almost lost sight of her purpose. What she was. Why it was so important that she lived to finish The Work.

...Work that would no longer be served by killing Weiss Schnee.

It was a cold and hollow realization, but it was true. Weiss was more useful alive than dead. Far, far more dangerous, an enemy who would have no more foes to turn her attention to except the Shadowfang on her return, but even so. The staff of creation hadn't been in the care of the Dragon. a maiden dying while unconscious would send her powers to who knew where.

There were options to solve both those problems right beneath her feet.

Gambol slowly lowered as Blake took a shuddering breath and turned her eyes towards the sky, a silent plea to forgiveness sent to Eve for letting her killer live at least one more day. As if that was the only thing Eve would have asked for forgiveness form

Then the weapon shifted into blade form and Blake took a step forward as her other hand wrapped around Gambol's ribbon;

She wasn't killing Weiss.

That did not mean she was showing mercy.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Blake dragged Weiss through the depths of the beast by the scruff of the neck, her ears and touch attuned to any shift in consciousness from the heiress and a trail of blood barely visible against the innard's fleshy floor. It was... stranger to be inside Ozpin's Monstro without him than she expected it to be. Rather, it was strange how little had changed. The grimm inside, purged of their corruption, had not become the mindless beasts she'd expected without their lord. They still recognized her.

Still showed deference to their fellow predator.

Their trip ended in the throne room. Up the steps they went, an almost catlike curiosity overtaking Blake's eyes as they neared the throne itself. She needed to communicate with the beast; perhaps this was the best option.

She didn't dare sit in the throne itself, but she knelt before it, and her hand brushed the side of the chair's arm as she half spoke and half thought;

"I need one of my lord's grimm"

 

[MyrtenRose]

As it turned out, Ozpin had lived up to his words just as much as Schnee had. Weiss would suffer like none other, as he swore she would. It was simply to be a different kind of suffering than he had initially intended. She had, to a degree, accomplished what she had spent years building towards, a goal she pushed herself to reach. She had ended that body in a brutal and spectacular fashion. But Ozma, Ozpin, he was far more than just a single body. For centuries he had hijacked the forms of numerous individuals, pushed their psyches so down deep that no trace of who they were could be found, and he took their bodies for his own diabolical use. And in that moment, in his mind there was no one better to repeat the process with.

Inside her own unconscious head, her mind, her will, everything that made Weiss Schnee who she was, it felt like it was falling. Plummeting into some dark void that stretched on without end, and at the top of that gaping pit...there he stood. It wasn't just the familiar sight of Ozpin though, the form she had grown used to ostensibly working for. The body flickered ever so often, changing into different men she did not recognize, but his expression never wavered.

Congratulations are in order, councilwoman, I suppose. You did it. You accomplished what you set out to do, so tell me...the mental image of him knelt, peering down at Weiss. How does victory feel? How does it feel to die, more or less? How does it feel to be a ghost? He cruelly taunted, echoing her own words from before. Still, for all of that, there was a degree of wariness in those burning eyes. Weiss's willpower was not to be underestimated, and the projection kept itself mindful of that as he observed her. She was stronger in that way than many he had taken.
​

Blake dragged Weiss through the depths of the beast by the scruff of the neck, her ears and touch attuned to any shift in consciousness from the heiress and a trail of blood barely visible against the innard's fleshy floor. It was... stranger to be inside Ozpin's Monstro without him than she expected it to be. Rather, it was strange how little had changed. The grimm inside, purged of their corruption, had not become the mindless beasts she'd expected without their lord. They still recognized her.

Still showed deference to their fellow predator.

Their trip ended in the throne room. Up the steps they went, an almost catlike curiosity overtaking Blake's eyes as they neared the throne itself. She needed to communicate with the beast; perhaps this was the best option.

She didn't dare sit in the throne itself, but she knelt before it, and her hand brushed the side of the chair's arm as she half spoke and half thought;

"I need one of my lord's grimm"

"That won't be necessary."

Weiss's eyes finally reopened as she had at last reawoke there, crimson red and icy blue blinking several times trying to adjust. She stared straight into Belladonna's eyes...and laughed. But it was a far cry from the type of giggles she gave in Yang's presence, and even the most superior sneering that had ever come from Weiss beforehand did not compare to the malevolent laughter right then. By all rights, by the sound of it was her voice, herself laughing, and yet.........strange.

The smile on her face seemed just as out of place, crooked and malicious...and oddly familiar. Neither the laughing nor the smile was directed at Blake, but rather...elsewhere.

Outwardly though, the time of complete dominance he held over her body, however long that would be, he used it well. Weiss stared unflinchingly at Blake before her mouth opened to speak again. The voice sounded a bit off but still recognizable as Schnee's, still one she had grown accustomed to after years of sitting at the same table. The words, on the other hand...

"Hello, daughter." He, or rather she, depending on one's point of view, greeted and finally pulled herself free from Blake's tense grip to stand. She stood still for a few moments and scrutinized the faunus, curious eyes judging how she reacted, before Weiss's gaze turned and she strode forward to take her seat in her rightful throne. "I have things quite in hand, as you can plainly see. Now, pardon me for just a moment, then we shall discuss...things. I still have quite a bit of an army to save." Her eyes slid shut then, focus intensifying once more. It would take some time for the depths of his own magic to return to him in this new host, but as it so happened, the maiden didn't lack for a good amount of magic herself. Enough to suffice for this.​

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

As it turned out, Ozpin had lived up to his words just as much as Schnee had. Weiss would suffer like none other, as he swore she would. It was simply to be a different kind of suffering than he had initially intended. She had, to a degree, accomplished what she had spent years building towards, a goal she pushed herself to reach. She had ended that body in a brutal and spectacular fashion. But Ozma, Ozpin, he was far more than just a single body. For centuries he had hijacked the forms of numerous individuals, pushed their psyches so down deep that no trace of who they were could be found, and he took their bodies for his own diabolical use. And in that moment, in his mind there was no one better to repeat the process with.

Inside her own unconscious head, her mind, her will, everything that made Weiss Schnee who she was, it felt like it was falling. Plummeting into some dark void that stretched on without end, and at the top of that gaping pit...there he stood. It wasn't just the familiar sight of Ozpin though, the form she had grown used to ostensibly working for. The body flickered ever so often, changing into different men she did not recognize, but his expression never wavered.

Congratulations are in order, councilwoman, I suppose. You did it. You accomplished what you set out to do, so tell me...the mental image of him knelt, peering down at Weiss. How does victory feel? How does it feel to die, more or less? How does it feel to be a ghost? He cruelly taunted, echoing her own words from before. Still, for all of that, there was a degree of wariness in those burning eyes. Weiss's willpower was not to be underestimated, and the projection kept itself mindful of that as he observed her. She was stronger in that way than many he had taken.



"That won't be necessary."

Weiss's eyes finally reopened as she had at last reawoke there, crimson red and icy blue blinking several times trying to adjust. She stared straight into Belladonna's eyes...and laughed. But it was a far cry from the type of giggles she gave in Yang's presence, and even the most superior sneering that had ever come from Weiss beforehand did not compare to the malevolent laughter right then. By all rights, by the sound of it was her voice, herself laughing, and yet.........strange.

The smile on her face seemed just as out of place, crooked and malicious...and oddly familiar. Neither the laughing nor the smile was directed at Blake, but rather...elsewhere.

Outwardly though, the time of complete dominance he held over her body, however long that would be, he used it well. Weiss stared unflinchingly at Blake before her mouth opened to speak again. The voice sounded a bit off but still recognizable as Schnee's, still one she had grown accustomed to after years of sitting at the same table. The words, on the other hand...

"Hello, daughter." He, or rather she, depending on one's point of view, greeted and finally pulled herself free from Blake's tense grip to stand. She stood still for a few moments and scrutinized the faunus, curious eyes judging how she reacted, before Weiss's gaze turned and she strode forward to take her seat in her rightful throne. "I have things quite in hand, as you can plainly see. Now, pardon me for just a moment, then we shall discuss...things. I still have an quite a bit of an army to save." Her eyes slid shut then, focus intensifying once more. It would take some time for the depths of his own magic to return to him in this new host, but as it so happened, the maiden didn't lack for a good amount of magic herself. Enough to suffice for this.​

The moment Weiss stirred an inch, Blake had pinned her back to the ground with her blade against her throat and a hate in her eyes-

eyes that reflected in Weiss', right after they'd finished regrowing from what Blake had done atop Monstro. Her own suddenly shot open in surprise, and for the first time in what felt like a long time Blake was actually forced to reconcile with the feeling of being actually shocked.

After a few moments she rolled back from atop Weiss/Ozma, the motion far from graceful with how wounded she was but consuming with its deference in how swiftly her head was against the ground.

"Lord Oz.....pin? I... Had I known that was to be your new vessel, I would have never-"

 

[MyrtenRose]

The moment Weiss stirred an inch, Blake had pinned her back to the ground with her blade against her throat and a hate in her eyes-

eyes that reflected in Weiss', right after they'd finished regrowing from what Blake had done atop Monstro. Her own suddenly shot open in surprise, and for the first time in what felt like a long time Blake was actually forced to reconcile with the feeling of being actually shocked.

After a few moments she rolled back from atop Weiss/Ozma, the motion far from graceful with how wounded she was but consuming with its deference in how swiftly her head was against the ground.

"Lord Oz.....pin? I... Had I known that was to be your new vessel, I would have never-"

Or at least, immediately resuming purging this affliction from her army had been her intent, but she had not properly accounted for the fierce viciousness of the weapon that Sienna had forged, the one that she put to such good use. No counterattack or pushback came while she was pinned down. She only laughed again, but far more amused this time. "The very same. I see your reflexes are as sharp as ever." She commented in an appreciative tone, waiting until Blake pulled away before pushing herself up. A moment passed as she stared down at the faunus's display of loyalty before she reached down and extended a hand down towards her faunus follower. "Rise, my child. Worry not, it is quite alright." It was beyond odd how a smile from such a dark being could look comforting, but it managed to do so.

"In truth, it was not a change I expected myself. Weiss was capable and crafty, and the day proved full of surprises." She peered at her hands, opening and closing them before brushing some of her hair out of the way. "I imagine it will take some time before this vessel becomes more familiar." Weiss's head shook. "But that is not the time to think about that. In these early stages, before I become fully dominant, there's a chance that control can be stolen from me, especially with Schnee. Each second must not be wasted. If that occurs, you have my leave to do what you need to, but do not kill her." Her eyes rested on the throne, but thought better of it this time and spun on her heel.

"Walk with me."

Crimson and pale blue energy flowed out of those eyes mid-stride as she used the power of the two maidens to purge the remainder of the plague Weiss had wrought. She made her way to step to the outside of the whale. "How did everyone else aboard the ship fare? We should see to them. And what of the Atlas relic? Do you know whether they brought it, or where it is located if not?"​

 

[Gus Gungus]

When one awoke to the sensation of falling, there was always that brief, split-second absence of awareness, the urge to panic taking hold as their groggy mind tried to remember where they were and what was happening. Typically the answer was they were in bed, safe and sound.

No matter how much she might've liked to be, Weiss wasn't in bed. And she most certainly wasn't safe and sound.

When she was little, and Winter wasn't there to make things more bearable, she used to spend hours hiding from her family. It got to a point where her room was no longer a source of any respite; her father had taken the only key away. So with the readymade excuse of her studies and the help of Klein in misdirecting her father, she would instead sequester herself to the mansion's vast library, getting lost among the bookshelves and relishing the early taste of rebellion offered by reading whatever she wanted, more specifically the things Jacques least approved of. Her favorites were the stories about heroes. Not just accounts of huntsmen and huntresses—tales of knights, paladins, of selfless princesses oppressed by wicked rulers and benevolent sorcerers who wielded powers of light against the darkness tainting world around them.

She lost herself in those stories, every bit as much as in the rows on rows of books. Things made sense in them. They had order and structure; the good invariably triumphed over the bad, cruelty never abided, and the lands and kingdoms that had suffered under their thrall for so long could begin to heal. Hard work and noble intentions were rewarded, and the princess ended up in the arms of someone who appreciated what she had done and would never do anything to hurt her. The hours she spent imagining she was the hero in those stories were among the happiest of her childhood.

And then the book would shut, and they would be over.

Weiss loved those stories. But she was the last person who needed to be told real life wasn't one of them.

The trajectory of her thoughts brought snatches of those very memories to the fore of the bottomless abyss around her, vague shadows and sounds flickering on the periphery of her consciousness. For a moment, she wondered what it might be like to just disappear into them. To give up, close her eyes and keep falling. Everything was terrible, the cruel and vicious prospered, kindness was ephemeral and she couldn't do anything about any of it. It had all gone so wrong. She hadn't had a good night's sleep in what felt like years. She was so tired...

Another memory broke the surface, clearer and more recent than the rest.

“So if you’re really, absolutely, sure you gotta go, Snowflake, then go. Give ‘em hell. Just give me one promise in return; after its all said and done, after you’ve done whatever the hell it is you’ve gotta do over there, if there’s even the smallest chance you could help me keep my promise… take it. Try. ‘Kay? Even if its just a one percent chance, then take that percentage point and beat your way back out with it. Because I think the world's a better place with you in it.”

"...Are you serious?"

Weiss was no more than a speck by this point, but the voice that echoed back up to Ozma from the pit, while faint, was discernible under the laws of whatever strange internal landscape they were manifesting on. They were words that, while undoubtedly a bit frightened by the reality of the situation she was in, glowed brighter still with the spark of something the ancient evil could feel all around him. Something the environment around him thrummed with, both the light at his back and the endless shadows below.

Defiance.

"You think I didn't consider this? You think I was just blind to the possibility you'd try to visit my worst nightmare on me?"

A prisoner in her own body. Unable to do anything more than watch while someone awful walked with her legs, spoke with her voice, smiled with her lips. Every shred of agency and authority she had ever built ripped away from her, again, only this time it was so much worse.

It was the kind of thing a decadent twit like Ozpin wouldn't be able to resist.

The speck was growing larger now, and it was no longer a mere speck. An orb of radiant blue light surrounded it, keeping the shadows at bay while the voice continued to grow louder.

"I honestly can't tell what's more deluded. That, or actually believing that this was smart. Do you have any idea what you've just done, you wretched parasite? Do you know what I do to people who try to control me? Have you the slightest inkling of the kind of resolve you just locked yourself inside here with?! This body isn't my prison, Ozpin. It's your tomb."

Whether it was the manifestation of Weiss's sheer, unwavering willpower, the echoes of maiden magic following her soul all the way to... wherever they were, or some combination of the two, the Weiss that exploded out of the pit was like a phoenix rising from the ashes as all that mystical energy coiled, coalesced and swirled around her, a veritable supernova she gathered in her palms.



"DID YOU THINK I WAS JUST GOING TO LET YOU DO THIS TO MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE?!"

Her hands swept outwards, and all that wrathful energy surged downward for the flickering, changing forms of Ozma to wash over him, seeking to wrest back control and drive him deep, deep down into the shadows of his own bottomless abyss of memories.

She had no doubt it was a deep one.​

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

Or at least, immediately resuming purging this affliction from her army had been her intent, but she had not properly accounted for the fierce viciousness of the weapon that Sienna had forged, the one that she put to such good use. No counterattack or pushback came while she was pinned down. She only laughed again, but far more amused this time. "The very same. I see your reflexes are as sharp as ever." She commented in an appreciative tone, waiting until Blake pulled away before pushing herself up. A moment passed as she stared down at the faunus's display of loyalty before she reached down and extended a hand down towards her faunus follower. "Rise, my child. Worry not, it is quite alright." It was beyond odd how a smile from such a dark being could look comforting, but it managed to do so.

"In truth, it was not a change I expected myself. Weiss was capable and crafty, and the day proved full of surprises." She peered at her hands, opening and closing them before brushing some of her hair out of the way. "I imagine it will take some time before this vessel becomes more familiar." Weiss's head shook. "But that is not the time to think about that. In these early stages, before I become fully dominant, there's a chance that control can be stolen from me, especially with Schnee. Each second must not be wasted. If that occurs, you have my leave to do what you need to, but do not kill her." Her eyes rested on the throne, but thought better of it this time and spun on her heel.

"Walk with me."

Crimson and pale blue energy flowed out of those eyes mid-stride as she used the power of the two maidens to purge the remainder of the plague Weiss had wrought. She made her way to step to the outside of the whale. "How did everyone else aboard the ship fare? We should see to them. And what of the Atlas relic? Do you know whether they brought it, or where it is located if not?"​

Blake head tilted up from the ground, and she found herself dealing with the full ramifications of her master's choice of host: Weiss Schnee standing over her, her hand magnanimously outstretched to help the faunus so loyally and deferentially prostate beneath her to her feet.

There was a bit of teeth showing beneath the mask as she nonetheless took the hand let Ozweiss pull her up.

Her tone was as level and loyal as ever regardless as she fell into step behind her master, forcing the slight limp she still had to keep pace. "I mean no disrespect to your children, lord Ozpin, but it would take more than beasts to lay low my talons. As for the staff-"

Then some shit happened

 

[Gus Gungus]

Blake head tilted up from the ground, and she found herself dealing with the full ramifications of her master's choice of host: Weiss Schnee standing over her, her hand magnanimously outstretched to help the faunus so loyally and deferentially prostate beneath her to her feet.

There was a bit of teeth showing beneath the mask as she nonetheless took the hand let Ozweiss pull her up.

Her tone was as level and loyal as ever regardless as she fell into step behind her master, forcing the slight limp she still had to keep pace. "I mean no disrespect to your children, lord Ozpin, but it would take more than beasts to lay low my talons. As for the staff-"

Then some shit happened

The shit in question was the future Schnee overlord to faunus everywhere stuttering to a halt in front of her amid their sweeping pace, eyes squeezing shut and brows pinching together in silent exertion as whatever war for dominance was occurring on the mental plane registered only as flickering expressions in the physical one. A brief few seconds later it was over, at least for the moment, and when her eyes opened once more it was with a start and a soft gasp, pupils echoing with a faint flash of energy distinct from from those of a maiden as they blinked a few times and glanced around to get their bearings.

They stopped dead in their tracks on Blake, and while there were many ways she could've reacted to everything that had just happened and the predicament she was in that at least gave her a focal point to crystallize her thoughts around.



"Oh joy, exactly who I was hoping to see. What's all this blood on my face?"​

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

"Die now, child! Fall into Hell with your eyes wide with despair!"

He lashed out to finally put an end to this once and for all.


Neo's eyes for the briefest of seconds met the Boss's. The only visible part of his face hidden away by his bandage-like mask.

They seemed fractured as if she were staring into his soul-split up as it was among the three personalities that inhabited the body: The Boss/Jack/Aurora.

Although neither Jack or Aurora were truly aware of their 'existence' as mere personalities created by the Boss, the three were unanimous in one thing.

This girl was a pest.

What did you do with pests? You exterminated them.

As her foot came in to kick him, she'd have seen the vaguest outlines of a knife in his free hand.


The two had been separated but as Char took heavy breaths, he didn't seem none too relieved even as Neo approached to help.

"Kid...I..." He started as the Boss thrust out his right hand and both Char and Neo were sent skidding across the ground.

"I think I've seen quite enough." The Boss started as he strode forward, wind sailing all around him as he walked. His movements careful and measured but with the same tension that one would expect from a tiger preparing to launch itself at it's prey. "I truly didn't know that there were depths to which the Hitman Team could sink even lower. But you've managed to exceed even my wildest expectations, Char." He chided with a slight shake of his head. "Men like Marcus Black had once been a peer, an example for you to look up to, and yet here you are. Dying in the cold night with nary but a misguided child to act as your savior."

"I don't know what's more pathetic."

He stopped a few inches away from the two.

"Your willingness to give into utter fear or her determination to fight a battle that's already been lost?"


Char didn't say anything but Neo could have seen and gotten just a good idea of how terrified the Ashes were of their enigmatic Boss. His hair was a mess due to the constant wind and his skin was covered in a wash of cold sweat. His bottom lip trembled and whether he himself knew it or not, he clung onto Neo's arm as though it were his only lifeline. The pain from his wound-even as she attempted to treat it-didn't matter. Not in the face of overwhelming terror.

He didn't know who this man was. Or why he'd been saying the things he had.

But the hitman had figured enough out, at least enough to try and give himself some peace of mind.

Callie had been right. Whoever the 'Mistral Murderer' was, they'd had connections with none other than the self-proclaimed 'ruler' of Mistral himself: the Boss.

The Boss held his hand out and the wind started to grow stronger and stronger as it spun around Neo and Char. Threatening to leave the two so battered down they'd been unable to move. "I'm bringing an end to this farce. Everyone in that warehouse IS going to die and child!" The gangster called out. "It's going to be all your fault." As it felt like they were being encircled by the wind that the Boss's semblance let him call upon and control, the hitman started coughing. As though it were beginning to get hard to breath. "I'm sorry, kid. Sorry we got you into this...Blanche and I..."

~~~

*BANG*

Another shot rang out. This time the Boss had been ready and had shifted the wind that made up his personal 'field' to flow counterclockwise. Thus redirecting the bullet's course and sending it back the way it's came. As the bullet clipped her shoulder and caused her aura to flash, Abyss kept this masked maniac in her sights. She'd known that members of the team like Violet had teased Char now and again for his seeming reliance on his semblance. Blanche had always been there for Char when she couldn't be. She had to be the leader and that meant not taking sides. They were all adults and they needed to act like it. How could they present themselves as professionals otherwise? To see him so completely captivated by fear. It was a feeling that she'd seen only once before: at a time when the entire Hitman Team had felt it.

The private investigators they'd hired to scope out the Boss's identity had stopped responding. After a couple of days they were listed as missing. It was only when they started getting strange packages sent to their apartment that things started to become clear. One of the Boss's Elite Guard had kidnapped the PIs and tortured them and sent the Hitman Team the remains piece by piece, little by little. Just a reminder of the Boss's influence and how much he valued his privacy. Once he'd established his place as one of-if not THE most influential and powerful man born and raised in Mistral, the man who'd become the 'Boss' had nearly any traces of his past wiped clean. Public birth records, childhood associates, possibly even family. Abyss knew her team had been traumatized by the experience. Char retreated within himself and became always eager to show he wasn't cowardly, Blanche tried to lean more on Char whenever he could to show that he'd be there for him, Violet didn't talk about the incident, and Vanile? She didn't say anything....at all.

What of Abyss herself? Well, sure, the incident was disturbing. But she couldn't let herself show any signs of weakness. It was a dog eat dog world out there and she'd started life off on the wrong foot by failing to unlock her semblance. Growing up she coped with it however she could. All the way up to becoming leader of the Hitman Team. So, whether it was some hired goon by the Boss or some deranged psycho, she didn't care. She'd only seen a bit of his semblance but she felt as though she understood it: he could control and manipulate wind in various ways. But he needed to let go of anything he was holding before he activated his field and to strike it...all you needed to do was do as the kid had done. Move counter to the way that the field was spinning.

She took aim....

*BANG*

The bullet hit a raised cobblestone that'd erupted from the ground due to the force of the Boss's semblance. It tore a chunk out of it and just as Abyss had hoped, it shot upwards. Catching the Boss by surprise. The field couldn't be reversed in time. As the bullet continued to soar upwards, a trail of fabric that made up the Boss's mask fluttered to the ground, landing at his boots. He wasn't sure how it could have happened but the worst possible scenario had come to pass and all because of another interloper's efforts. Pink hair poked out bright enough to stand out even amid the darkness. Char's eyes widened and the wind started to die down.

The Boss's hands fell to his sides.

"Aur....Aurora...?" Char sputtered.

No....it...it couldn't have been. Aurora was but of a boy of only seventeen. He couldn't have been much older than Pinky or her friends. This man...hard as it was to make out his features as part of it was still hidden by what remained of the mask. Char guessed the man to be in his...mid to late 30s if that.

The Boss sighed.

"I had really hoped to deal with you first, Char. Your semblance if used properly could be an...annoyance. But it seems that you'll be able to breathe for a second longer..." He chided as he looked towards Neo and the huntress could have seen the hints of Aurora that resided within this strange man, this...this murderer. "...But not a second more." With that the Boss turned his attention in the direction of who'd been shooting at him and blasting off into the sky, Neo and Char could have seen him using his control over the wind to propel himself through the sky. Having a moment to finally realize the pain he was in, Char clutched at his wound and looked at Neo.

"Kid...I...I've never been so scared of anyone in my life. There's only one man that could do this to me....It's the one who brought the Bound Ashes together. Put *cough* Mistral under his thumb. The man who's been hiding from public sight for so long." Char looked up again in the sky only to see that the Boss was gone. "The Boss..."

~~~

Abyss could see a figure coming in and fast.

"Ah, so it was you. I should have figured you'd take one last stab at defying me."

Abyss raised her rifle and pointed it at the Boss who stood inches from her, arms folded across his chest and foot tapping against the wind itself to keep himself afloat.

It was hard to make out distinct facial features in the dark like this but with her visor, Abyss could get a better visual on the Boss than either Neo or Char had. The sight nearly made the rifle fall from her hands. Instead, she merely chuckled bitterly. "....I had my suspicions, you know. Back when Aurora told us that Char and Blanche were likely to have been captured or killed. He'd lost it on me and pushed me against the wall. The common layman may have just written it off as plain aggression, unpent stress that found it's way out in the worst possible situation. But I didn't get this role without being perceptive. I wasn't just shoved like a freshman down the hall...I was thrown back...by wind." It all started clicking together.

She laughed again.

"To think that all these years of working for you....What we'd done for you. That the day we'd finally see the real you....is when you've come out to kill us." She snarled, obviously referring to how he'd been about to kill Char before the kid had jumped in. The Boss didn't seemed all that perturbed.

"Nobody will believe Char. He's absolutely hysterical, close to the breaking point I'd imagine." He reasoned. "...On top of that, I doubt the child will be saying much of anything. Let alone who she saw just now." He lightly shrugged his shoulders. "You even managing to suss it out doesn't matter either."

"Oh yeah? Why's that? Huh??" She demanded as he raised the rifle.

She knew why, she'd known from the moment he'd appeared before her.

"I'm going to make it quick." He floated closer to the rooftop. "Out of respect for your service." The derision in his voice was palpable.

*BANG BANG BANG*

Shots rang out and were turned left, right, up, down. None ever hit him or came close. He gave the slightest flick of his wrist to the right. The wind practically snatched the gun from Abyss's hands and launched it over the rooftop. Her hands went for her side pieces but the Boss had already closed the distance between them-

*drip*

As painful as it was, she never cried out. Not even for a second.

"Goodbye, Abyss."

He pulled his bloodsoaked hand back.

She clutched at her wound and stumbled back.

He didn't care to see her fall. Turning his back to the leader of the Hitman Team, he stepped off the rooftop and resumed floating.

"Nobody, not man, woman, child or animal. Will ever threaten my everlasting apex. I simply won't let that happen."

~~~

Neo and Char saw the light kicked up from Abyss's rifle going off fade and cease entirely.

Char hadn't realized who'd been defending him from afar. Had he known, he didn't know how many more tears he would have had to shed.

Leaning on Neo, he coughed.

"We....We worked so hard for him.....I...I don't understand...."

~~~

*thud*​

Neo gave Char a resigned, soft frown as he passed out. She'd have to hope her impromptu bandaging was enough; She placed a hand over his prone form, and he slowly faded away from sight with the sound of tinkling glass.

------------------------


Whenever the Boss finally deigned to turn his attention towards where Neo and Char had been, he found the diminutive parasol wielder waiting for him, seemingly patiently. Hush was planted tip first against the ground like a cane, Neo leaning against it with one arm while the other rested against her hip as she looked the crimelord up and down with an easy smile that bordered on condescending.

Whatever words he thought to bring to bear against her, if any, her only response was a finger moving to her lips in a silent shush as she gave the killer a wink, just in time for another Neo to flicker into existence scant inches above the boss' head in the midst of an axe kick for the top of his skull. Out of reach of both arms but not his semblance

That Neo turned out to be fake to, as the real attack came from the opposite side completely;

A rock, whipped at his shins. Thrown with all the force that Neopolitan's toned but tiny arms could muster, albeit completely silent till it impacted or was deflected. Whoever the gunman had been that had interrupted their duel, they'd given Neo a theory she wanted to test:

That The boss, Jack, Aurora, whatever he wanted to call himself, could only use his semblance one or two things at a time.

 

[MyrtenRose]

...Are you serious?"

Weiss was no more than a speck by this point, but the voice that echoed back up to Ozma from the pit, while faint, was discernible under the laws of whatever strange internal landscape they were manifesting on. They were words that, while undoubtedly a bit frightened by the reality of the situation she was in, glowed brighter still with the spark of something the ancient evil could feel all around him. Something the environment around him thrummed with, both the light at his back and the endless shadows below.

Defiance.

"You think I didn't consider this? You think I was just blind to the possibility you'd try to visit my worst nightmare on me?"

A prisoner in her own body. Unable to do anything more than watch while someone awful walked with her legs, spoke with her voice, smiled with her lips. Every shred of agency and authority she had ever built ripped away from her, again, only this time it was so much worse.

It was the kind of thing a decadent twit like Ozpin wouldn't be able to resist.

The speck was growing larger now, and it was no longer a mere speck. An orb of radiant blue light surrounded it, keeping the shadows at bay while the voice continued to grow louder.

"I honestly can't tell what's more deluded. That, or actually believing that this was smart. Do you have any idea what you've just done, you wretched parasite? Do you know what I do to people who try to control me? Have you the slightest inkling of the kind of resolve you just locked yourself inside here with?! This body isn't my prison, Ozpin. It's your tomb."

Whether it was the manifestation of Weiss's sheer, unwavering willpower, the echoes of maiden magic following her soul all the way to... wherever they were, or some combination of the two, the Weiss that exploded out of the pit was like a phoenix rising from the ashes as all that mystical energy coiled, coalesced and swirled around her, a veritable supernova she gathered in her palms.

"DID YOU THINK I WAS JUST GOING TO LET YOU DO THIS TO MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE?!"

Her hands swept outwards, and all that wrathful energy surged downward for the flickering, changing forms of Ozma to wash over him, seeking to wrest back control and drive him deep, deep down into the shadows of his own bottomless abyss of memories.

She had no doubt it was a deep one.

"Let me?" He questioned as an emerald energy began to course through the shadows around him, illuminating the darkness to a degree. "Silly, stupid girl. What you would allow or not allow is irrelevant. It doesn't matter what you think. It does not matter whether you considered it, no more than it matters whether you saw this possibility coming or not. It doesn't matter if you think it is deluded, or that you doubt it was a smart move, or what you do to other people who try to control you, or how good you think your resolve is! It doesn't matter! None of that saved you from kneeling under my command when ordered, and it will not save you now." He pushed back with his own willpower, and it staved off the mental assault for a time.

"I'm already here. Fight it all you want, this body is mine now. Tomorrow, a week from now, two, three, it does not matter! You can not stop it any more than you could stop time from rolling ever onwards. It is inevitable. In the end, your struggle is useless!" Despite his words, and his resilient will, the sheer emotional defiance within Schnee did at least win out, forcing him into fall into the abyss of his own memories.​

Blake head tilted up from the ground, and she found herself dealing with the full ramifications of her master's choice of host: Weiss Schnee standing over her, her hand magnanimously outstretched to help the faunus so loyally and deferentially prostate beneath her to her feet.

There was a bit of teeth showing beneath the mask as she nonetheless took the hand let Ozweiss pull her up.

Her tone was as level and loyal as ever regardless as she fell into step behind her master, forcing the slight limp she still had to keep pace. "I mean no disrespect to your children, lord Ozpin, but it would take more than beasts to lay low my talons. As for the staff-"

Then some shit happened

The shit in question was the future Schnee overlord to faunus everywhere stuttering to a halt in front of her amid their sweeping pace, eyes squeezing shut and brows pinching together in silent exertion as whatever war for dominance was occurring on the mental plane registered only as flickering expressions in the physical one. A brief few seconds later it was over, at least for the moment, and when her eyes opened once more it was with a start and a soft gasp, pupils echoing with a faint flash of energy distinct from from those of a maiden as they blinked a few times and glanced around to get their bearings.

They stopped dead in their tracks on Blake, and while there were many ways she could've reacted to everything that had just happened and the predicament she was in that at least gave her a focal point to crystallize her thoughts around.

"Oh joy, exactly who I was hoping to see. What's all this blood on my face?"

But it was only temporary. He came clawing, nay, soaring out of there before it managed to completely swallow him whole. Suffice it to say that his will fighting against Weiss's will was just as fierce a match as any they could have had out among the physical world. He surged forward, grabbed hold of her then and threw her backwards, followed immediately by an emerald blast to knock her back into the black, empty pit that represented the loss of control.

Outwardly the only indication that the struggle for dominance was still ongoing was that Weiss froze up again just after that question, eyes shutting and whole body going rigid and a brief silence descending. Then a twitch of the head followed, and those eyes opened again. "Grrrrr. Just stay down, you!" She blurted out in irritation before re-focusing on Blake. "Disregard that!" She demanded. "Continue! The staff, what were you about to say?" ​

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

The shit in question was the future Schnee overlord to faunus everywhere stuttering to a halt in front of her amid their sweeping pace, eyes squeezing shut and brows pinching together in silent exertion as whatever war for dominance was occurring on the mental plane registered only as flickering expressions in the physical one. A brief few seconds later it was over, at least for the moment, and when her eyes opened once more it was with pupils echoing with a faint flash of energy distinct from from those of a maiden as they blinked a few times and glanced around, getting their bearings. They stopped dead in their tracks on Blake, and while there were many ways she could've reacted to everything that had just happened and the predicament she was in that at least gave her a focal point to crystallize her thoughts around.

View attachment 831306

"Oh joy, exactly who I was hoping to see. What's all this blood on my face?"​

"Yours"

Before the sound even finished reaching Weiss' ears, the real Blake's foot crashed against the side of her head with such sudden ferocity and strength that there was a small danger of Weiss being Ozma's shortest lived host in all his many years.

By the time Weiss impacted the hall, Gambol slammed into her gut, just to the side of anything vital but more than enough to ensure Weiss' burgeoning aura return had something far worse to worry about than the concussion she was going to have from the fist that slammed home with an exhale of breath straight in the middle of the former councilwoman's brow, jackhammering her head into the bony protrusions that made up the whale's interior.

Blake's intake of breath was silent as she kept her fist against Weiss' forehead, the sudden explosion of violence making the ensuing silence eerie even within these unhallowed halls as she listened and watched for any sign that Weiss or Ozma were conscious beneath those lidded eyes.

It was then that the absurdity of Ozma's order fully rested on her shoulders. He wanted her to restrain the woman with access to the power of two maidens, maybe even his own, far more dangerous than even that, powers, at the drop of a hat. To say nothing of what might happen if this was a regular occurrence. What if, at the end of it all, Weiss Schnee commanded the hordes of grimm? Blake wouldn't always be able to get the drop on a dazed, still recovering Weiss.

She was tired of this.

She was the weapon of the faunus, wielded by two hands. She had listened to those orders faithfully, to a fault, and in the last few months all it had led to humiliation and defeat and death, most often at the hands of those who had been her allies.

She was still loyal, down to her bones. So long as she believed that Sienna and Ozpin were the faunus' best path towards escaping their torment, she would follow them. She had accepted each defeat as a cost of victory. It was forged into her bones at this point; she was a tool. She was meant to be used. If her weilders deigned her best use to be that of a blunt instrument of flesh they beat against their problems so that something else would solve it, so be it.

But just this once...

She was a tool. She was a weapon. But she was not just their weapon. She was for every faunus. For the future of all of them. Those that stood against them, those that stood with them, and every life to come, a living and breathing promise of vengeance against the humans and their masters who had so long kept them suffering, that they would not be born into such a world. A pact carved into her bones. A purpose of existence so consuming that it she would kill the very people who made her this way if it meant that purpose moved an inch closer.

She was going to take the initiative. Do what she had not been asked to do. Ensure that she was the unbreakable Ozma and Sienna seemed to treat her as. That she could contain the Schnee or any other threat that reared its vile head.

Even if it meant angering one of them in the process.

She hoisted Weiszma across her shoulders and made her way back inside the Monstro, and her hands caught the stalk of a passing seer grimm in a vice grip, her eyes burning with the predatory demand of an alpha as she slammed the creature against the wall and growled.

"Take me to the pools"

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

No matter who it was who was trying to wake the body up, Weiss' schnee's mortal form found itself on the receiving end of the same brutality every time it stirred until whatever Blake was doing was finally over.

Whichever one woke up in control when her work was done, they found Blake slumped against the hallway wall opposite of them, heaving with exertion. Gambol was discarded to one side of her.

At the other side was her hand, severed above the wrist in one violent slash if the gout of blood over a now cauterized wound could be believed.

As they stirred, she didn't make any move to stop them this time. Merely regarded the waifish form with a sort of curiosity that was far from the deference or hate the two of them were used to.

"...To who... am I speaking?" She asked between breaths

 

[Gus Gungus]

"Yours"

Before the sound even finished reaching Weiss' ears, the real Blake's foot crashed against the side of her head with such sudden ferocity and strength that there was a small danger of Weiss being Ozma's shortest lived host in all his many years.

By the time Weiss impacted the hall, Gambol slammed into her gut, just to the side of anything vital but more than enough to ensure Weiss' burgeoning aura return had something far worse to worry about than the concussion she was going to have from the fist that slammed home with an exhale of breath straight in the middle of the former councilwoman's brow, jackhammering her head into the bony protrusions that made up the whale's interior.

Blake's intake of breath was silent as she kept her fist against Weiss' forehead, the sudden explosion of violence making the ensuing silence eerie even within these unhallowed halls as she listened and watched for any sign that Weiss or Ozma were conscious beneath those lidded eyes.

It was then that the absurdity of Ozma's order fully rested on her shoulders. He wanted her to restrain the woman with access to the power of two maidens, maybe even his own, far more dangerous than even that, powers, at the drop of a hat. To say nothing of what might happen if this was a regular occurrence. What if, at the end of it all, Weiss Schnee commanded the hordes of grimm? Blake wouldn't always be able to get the drop on a dazed, still recovering Weiss.

She was tired of this.

She was the weapon of the faunus, wielded by two hands. She had listened to those orders faithfully, to a fault, and in the last few months all it had led to humiliation and defeat and death, most often at the hands of those who had been her allies.

She was still loyal, down to her bones. So long as she believed that Sienna and Ozpin were the faunus' best path towards escaping their torment, she would follow them. She had accepted each defeat as a cost of victory. It was forged into her bones at this point; she was a tool. She was meant to be used. If her weilders deigned her best use to be that of a blunt instrument of flesh they beat against their problems so that something else would solve it, so be it.

But just this once...

She was a tool. She was a weapon. But she was not just their weapon. She was for every faunus. For the future of all of them. Those that stood against them, those that stood with them, and every life to come, a living and breathing promise of vengeance against the humans and their masters who had so long kept them suffering, that they would not be born into such a world. A pact carved into her bones. A purpose of existence so consuming that it she would kill the very people who made her this way if it meant that purpose moved an inch closer.

She was going to take the initiative. Do what she had not been asked to do. Ensure that she was the unbreakable Ozma and Sienna seemed to treat her as. That she could contain the Schnee or any other threat that reared its vile head.

Even if it meant angering one of them in the process.

She hoisted Weiszma across her shoulders and made her way back inside the Monstro, and her hands caught the stalk of a passing seer grimm in a vice grip, her eyes burning with the predatory demand of an alpha as she slammed the creature against the wall and growled.

"Take me to the pools"

Exerting enough mental fortitude to contest Ozpin quite frankly required too much willful concentration on Weiss's part for her to have offered up any sort of a struggle against that even if she had had aura, and the only sound she made was a quiet, supplicating whimper where Blake had her head pinned against the wall before her knees buckled and she didn't stir.

Spoiler

Unless Ozma had taken control again by that point, in which case he reacted however he did to his own lieutenant handing him a stone cold beatdown the likes of which he hadn't experienced in centuries.

No matter who it was who was trying to wake the body up, Weiss' schnee's mortal form found itself on the receiving end of the same brutality every time it stirred until whatever Blake was doing was finally over.

Whichever one woke up in control when her work was done, they found Blake slumped against the hallway wall opposite of them, heaving with exertion. Gambol was discarded to one side of her.

At the other side was her hand, severed above the wrist in one violent slash if the gout of blood over a now cauterized wound could be believed.

As they stirred, she didn't make any move to stop them this time. Merely regarded the waifish form with a sort of curiosity that was far from the deference or hate the two of them were used to.

"...To who... am I speaking?" She asked between breaths

There was only one point when Weiss jolted back to consciousness throughout the grisly work, and it was too brief, vague, and confusing for it to truly even be referred to as anything more than an impression of consciousness. Her vision swam, but she thought she could see Blake crouching over her; or at the very least an outline that looked like her, though it was difficult to see past... whatever was on her face. Whatever it was felt awful in a way that was numbing, familiar, draining, but she didn't have nearly the capacity in that moment to recall how.

The pain in her chest felt awful in a way that was entirely different, white-hot pain that lanced through her body and made her torso convulse as her eyes flared wide and she tried to shout something muffled, clawing at the fabric on her chest. Whatever it was never quite made it all the way to a full thought, let alone sentence, and scarcely a second later the pain had given way to a stark, unsettling cold as Weiss's bucking started to subside, a numb tranquility that spread outwards through her body and worked in tandem with the whatever-it-was on her face to ease her back to unconsciousness.

It felt different this time. Final.

Her eyes started to dull, her brain finally managing to organize itself into a single, incomplete thought just as darkness took her. An apology for the last lie Weiss Schnee ever told, for one final promise she had failed to keep.

Sorry, Yang... I can't... I couldn't...

And then there was nothing.

---

At that very moment, a long, long way across Remnant, whether Yang's night at the inn was one of rest or sleeplessness became irrelevant as it was disturbed by a sudden, uncommon chill creeping into her room—a fact made strange by its being situated in the middle of the arid desert. The curtains swayed before the open window, despite the complete lack of any kind of breeze, her breath emerging as a fine mist through teeth that wanted desperately to chatter. The darkness of the room was suddenly flooded with crystal-blue light that sprang into existence around her bed, then began to gather and swirl around her, her body surging with a feeling of power not even her semblance in its most maximized state could compare to.

If the commotion was enough to rouse Ruby in her own bed, then the surreal sight was impossible to ignore; as was the fact that twin streams of an equally-brilliant, purple light were now streaming from the corners of her sister's eyes.

---

Against all odds, Weiss awoke an indeterminate amount of time later in a torrent of desperate, hacking coughs, a fact that felt almost as wrong as the strange absence in her soul did. Her lungs took frantic, greedy breaths, seemingly unable to suck down enough oxygen for their liking, and even Weiss's prodigious, quick-on-the-uptake mind was left in a state of absolute disarray as it scrambled to try and process that sequence of events, one hand on her chest and eyes tremulous as they lingered on the severed hand before settling on Blake.



"I... w-wha... I don't understand..."

It wasn't quite an answer to Blake's question, but served as one nevertheless. Her voice, when it came, sounded both incredibly hoarse and incredibly small.

In this context, they were two very different things.​

 

[MidwayLives]

Whenever the Boss finally deigned to turn his attention towards where Neo and Char had been, he found the diminutive parasol wielder waiting for him, seemingly patiently. Hush was planted tip first against the ground like a cane, Neo leaning against it with one arm while the other rested against her hip as she looked the crimelord up and down with an easy smile that bordered on condescending.

Having felt that he'd disposed of Abyss, the Boss returned his attention back to Neo and Char.

Only one thing soon became clear as he touched down upon the ground again.

Char was nowhere to be seen.

"Where is Char?"

He asked but he didn't so much as take a step towards the huntress in training.

"Where IS he?"

He asked again, his tone much more demanding this time.
​

Whatever words he thought to bring to bear against her, if any, her only response was a finger moving to her lips in a silent shush as she gave the killer a wink, just in time for another Neo to flicker into existence scant inches above the boss' head in the midst of an axe kick for the top of his skull. Out of reach of both arms but not his semblance

The Boss didn't so much as twitch as the other Neo took her chance.

Savage winds buffeted the fake, keeping her spinning around and around until she was swiftly tossed away.

That Neo was thrown back, likely shattering upon hitting the wall with such impact.

"I won't ask you again. Where is he, child?"
​

That Neo turned out to be fake to, as the real attack came from the opposite side completely;

A rock, whipped at his shins. Thrown with all the force that Neopolitan's toned but tiny arms could muster, albeit completely silent till it impacted or was deflected. Whoever the gunman had been that had interrupted their duel, they'd given Neo a theory she wanted to test:

"Tch..."

Something...Something had struck him? He'd felt himself stumble a step or two.

He glanced down and noticed the area around his shin flare up. Indicating that for the first time in what must have been years...He'd been hurt.

His semblance was powerful enough to leave entire streets demolished if he needed it. To ravage entire communities. Or when Jack used it...to murder and leave no evidence behind.

But there was a weakness to it. One that Neo and Abyss had managed to pick up on. For as long as the Boss kept a field of wind around his person to deflect incoming attacks/projectiles, he could only focus on one thing at once. If he was grabbing something or holding it, he'd need to let go/release it or else it'd be blown away by the force of the wind. That and everytime an attack came from a different direction, the wind would need to be 'reset' and flow either counter/counterclockwise. If you were to kick at him from the left, he'd block it, but if you were to suddenly use your right leg, his semblance would need seconds to compensate for the change in direction.

"You know...for the first time in a long time...I can say that actually hurt."

He chuckled.

It turned into a laugh and Neo could have seen the fingers on his left hand twitching.

The car that Blanche had fallen atop started to lean from side to side. It's headlights flaring and the alarm wailing.

"It actually HURT!"

With a visible modicum of effort, he raised his left arm upwards. For a moment or two, nothing seemed to have happened.

....Then, Neo saw her shadow growing bigger and bigger. As if something were eclipsing it. If she were to look up she'd see the car-minus one Blanche-crashing down towards her.

The child had proved herself to have some degree of talent. The Boss wouldn't deny her that. Sheer surprise/shock aside, he didn't doubt that she'd find a way to nimbly avoid being crushed. But it just didn't matter. Thrusting both arms out to their respective sides, the entire section of street/alleyway where her, Char, and the Boss had been having their little confrontation was run aghast with fierce buffeting winds. Any windows that hadn't already been smashed were destroyed. Anything that wasn't properly secured to the ground was pushed back or lifted up outright. These...'illusions' the child conjured up using her semblance. They seemed fragile enough. All he needed was to listen to her footsteps among the wind. Whether it was pushing her back or if it'd taken her right off her feet.

Whichever came first, he was upon her. His eyes filled with utter loathing and contempt. For the one thorn in his side that just didn't seem to know when enough was enough. He lashed out with both hands to try and grab her around the neck. His irritation at having been denied his chance to rid himself of the Null Zone being a potential liability angering him more and more.The way he saw it, enough was enough. Ghastly would kill the remainder of the Hitman Team and this brat's friends. But he'd make sure to deal with this one himself. Rid himself of a loathsome pest.

"Now, child...YOU'VE MADE ME ANGRY!!!!!" ​

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

Against all odds, Weiss awoke an indeterminate amount of time later in a torrent of desperate, hacking coughs, a fact that felt almost as wrong as the strange absence in her soul did. Her lungs took frantic, greedy breaths, seemingly unable to suck down enough oxygen for their liking, and even Weiss's prodigious, quick-on-the-uptake mind was left in a state of absolute disarray as it scrambled to try and process that sequence of events, one hand on her chest and eyes tremulous as they lingered on the severed hand before settling on Blake.

"I... w-wha... I don't understand..."

It wasn't quite an answer to Blake's question, but served as one nevertheless. Her voice, when it came, sounded both incredibly hoarse and incredibly small.

In this context, they were two very different things.

When Weiss finally stirred, Blake let out a quiet sigh of relief before she leveled a calm gaze into Weiss' own eyes, a grim smile on her face as she shrugged.

"The problem with using the same trick twice, Weiss, is that you already showed me how it works. Your never ending supply of contingencies are incredibly obnoxious, and I'm almost surprised that I'm not in the midst of choking on poisoned aura, or something equally stupid."

She moved to wipe the remnants of the CPR off her mouth, only to be briefly and utterly flummoxed by the lack of hand or wrist touching her lips, much like a cat who'd lost its whiskers and tried to fit through a crack as she stared at the stump. She gave a self derisive snort before she settled back against the wall, far, far more at ease than Weiss had ever seen her... ever. Like she didn't expect Weiss to be the most dangerous predator in the room, her one sided rival, or the fount of every crime ever committed against the faunus condensed into one, easily hated person.

She almost sounded apologetic.

"But you're not allowed to die so easy. Lord Ozma wants that form, and thus that form he keeps. I just ensured it's one you can't do so much damage in while he... adjusts."

Blake's severed hand twitched, and Weiss found that Blake's relaxed state wasn't because she feared any sort of inability to inflict violence; Gambol stabbed through the appendage faster than the eye could even track, and their was a screeching rasp followed by black smoke drifting through the wounds the poor, loyal hand had suffered.

She tilted the skewered hand up towards her own face, an air of mild regret in her eyes as she stared at it before she tilted her gaze to Weiss.

"I don't suppose you could tell me how healing works before this rots"

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

At that very moment, a long, long way across Remnant, whether Yang's night at the inn was one of rest or sleeplessness became irrelevant as it was disturbed by a sudden, uncommon chill creeping into her room—a fact made strange by its being situated in the middle of the arid desert. The curtains swayed before the open window, despite the complete lack of any kind of breeze, her breath emerging as a fine mist through teeth that wanted desperately to chatter. The darkness of the room was suddenly flooded with crystal-blue light that sprang into existence around her bed, then began to gather and swirl around her, her body surging with a feeling of power not even her semblance in its most maximized state could compare to.

If the commotion was enough to rouse Ruby in her own bed, then the surreal sight was impossible to ignore; as was the fact that twin streams of an equally-brilliant, purple light were now streaming from the corners of her sister's eyes.

Yang wasn't exactly a light sleeper on a good day. The last few days had been such a misery of stress and adrenaline that the moment she hit the bed, she barely managed to murmur a goodnight to her sister before she just passed out right on top of the covers, still in her huntress outfit that was probably way too warm for Vacuo even with her jacket tossed aside to just leave the overalls, her head a good few inches short of even being on the pillows, and honestly in dire need of a shower.

None of that mattered; she was drained. Emotionally and physically, every meter she had was running on empty. She didn't even dream that night. She didn't have the brainpower left for it. If it had been a normal night, it probably would've been one of the best sleeps she'd ever had, crappy motel bed equivalent be damned.

But since when had this Remnant ever been willing to give Yang Xiao Long a break?

When cold first took her, it only barely managed to wake her up, and only because off how freaking weird it was. She let out a groggy, uncomfortable groan, and pushed herself up onto her elbows to give the room a bleary glance as she slurred out "Rrrruuuby, really? Close theee..."

The look of dumbstruck, doe eyed confusion that locked onto her features as she saw the air swirling around her in faint blue glows no doubt would've given the not small list of enemies she'd made here more than a bit of schadenfreude, her sleep addled brain trying to parse the impossible.

Then she screamed.



Yang Xiao Long was brave. Braver than almost anyone, to the point that it crossed over into stupid, more than once, and sometimes even crossed that line right back into so stupid it was brave.

But she was only a certain kind of brave. Monsters? Villains? the odds? Her record as a chef? Ruby ever surpassing her in coolness? She laughed at those. Mocked them, on the regular, a facet of herself she paid the price for as often as that confidence and stubborness brought her and her loved ones victory. Matters of the heart, rejection and acceptance? Being honest with herself, with the people she loved? She hadn't been, before, but she was getting better. She was trying. She had to force it, but the bravery was still there.

...But Losing someone? Being left behind, again? Not being strong enough to keep the people she cared about safe? She didn't feel brave about those things. Not at all. She didn't want to have to be brave about those things.

The magic didn't care. Salem's pact was ancient, written into the core of Remnant's soul. It did not ask, it did not accept Yang's rejection of it or what it meant. It followed the young woman as scrambled backwards till her head bumped against the headboard as she pulled her knees against herself, trying to will the magic away from her like it was wolf she could beat off with an imaginary stick. It swirled through her, joining more with her soul every second even as she hyperventilated, the arcane fire spilling from her eyes going from soft lilac to a fiery red that had no place in the chill. "STOP! STOP IT!"

The room wasn't getting warmer the more the magic joined with Yang; It was getting colder, the wind blasting against the doors and blowing anything loose against the walls in a rattling, icy cyclone that was frosting the walls and the beds and her skin, whatever self control over her emotions Yang had fought so hard to gain over the last few years slipping from her grasp like silken threads from weak hands. Some part of her mind realized what was happening, how dangerous this was getting, and she gripped her head with both arms and keened as she tried to get a hold, any sort of control over the elemental power thrumming through her soul, but the grief and surprise and shock and anger and all of it combining into something so much worse was spilling over.

She could feel a bit of her inside. Just as Weiss and Raven had touched souls, she could feel her, and she could feel something so much worse.

The door to the room blasted into the hallway, its frozen hinges shattering and the icy wind coursing through the rest of the tavern.

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

Having felt that he'd disposed of Abyss, the Boss returned his attention back to Neo and Char.

Only one thing soon became clear as he touched down upon the ground again.

Char was nowhere to be seen.

"Where is Char?"

He asked but he didn't so much as take a step towards the huntress in training.

"Where IS he?"

He asked again, his tone much more demanding this time.


The Boss didn't so much as twitch as the other Neo took her chance.

Savage winds buffeted the fake, keeping her spinning around and around until she was swiftly tossed away.

That Neo was thrown back, likely shattering upon hitting the wall with such impact.

"I won't ask you again. Where is he, child?"


"Tch..."

Something...Something had struck him? He'd felt himself stumble a step or two.

He glanced down and noticed the area around his shin flare up. Indicating that for the first time in what must have been years...He'd been hurt.

His semblance was powerful enough to leave entire streets demolished if he needed it. To ravage entire communities. Or when Jack used it...to murder and leave no evidence behind.

But there was a weakness to it. One that Neo and Abyss had managed to pick up on. For as long as the Boss kept a field of wind around his person to deflect incoming attacks/projectiles, he could only focus on one thing at once. If he was grabbing something or holding it, he'd need to let go/release it or else it'd be blown away by the force of the wind. That and everytime an attack came from a different direction, the wind would need to be 'reset' and flow either counter/counterclockwise. If you were to kick at him from the left, he'd block it, but if you were to suddenly use your right leg, his semblance would need seconds to compensate for the change in direction.

"You know...for the first time in a long time...I can say that actually hurt."

He chuckled.

It turned into a laugh and Neo could have seen the fingers on his left hand twitching.

The car that Blanche had fallen atop started to lean from side to side. It's headlights flaring and the alarm wailing.

"It actually HURT!"

With a visible modicum of effort, he raised his left arm upwards. For a moment or two, nothing seemed to have happened.

....Then, Neo saw her shadow growing bigger and bigger. As if something were eclipsing it. If she were to look up she'd see the car-minus one Blanche-crashing down towards her.
​

For a few moments, Neo was feeling pretty smug.

She fell into a full bellied giggle fit at how angry getting hit by a rock had made the dude. Seriously? This was who everyone was scared of? She shook her head, wiped at her eyes, and sucked in a long intake of breath that came out in a heady whoosh as she leaned against Hush, looked up, and had all the color drain out of her face as her eyes practically popped out of her head right before she was completely flattened by a car.

The silence that followed was deafening. Neo stood next to the boss with both hands over her mouth in shock, absolutely horrified at the carnage she'd juts witnessed, even if the bloodstains underneath the car were already starting to fade away in geometric shards. She looked up to the boss and moved her hands down to her heart, her eyes shining with unshed tears that just screamed 'How could you?'

Also it drew attention to the fact that this neo was now wearing a shirt that had Aurora on it, having a deeply uncomfortable makeout session with a pig.

She snickered silently from where she was hidden as that next illusion was inevitably shattered. She loved self serious enemies like this. Pyrrha Nikos had been one, as well as a few of their opponents in the vytal festival, to say nothing of the Big Bad Glynda herself. She was never mocking them just to mock them (though it was absolutely part of it), it was far more purposeful than that. Angry people made mistakes. Flustered people made even more. Now that she knew just how this guy's semblance worked, she was gonna have fun with it. She was gonna make him pay for hurting Char and threatening her friends, as she broke him down bit by bit, hit by hit-

Except...

the problem with making your enemy angry...

was that sometimes you made them angry

The child had proved herself to have some degree of talent. The Boss wouldn't deny her that. Sheer surprise/shock aside, he didn't doubt that she'd find a way to nimbly avoid being crushed. But it just didn't matter. Thrusting both arms out to their respective sides, the entire section of street/alleyway where her, Char, and the Boss had been having their little confrontation was run aghast with fierce buffeting winds. Any windows that hadn't already been smashed were destroyed. Anything that wasn't properly secured to the ground was pushed back or lifted up outright. These...'illusions' the child conjured up using her semblance. They seemed fragile enough. All he needed was to listen to her footsteps among the wind. Whether it was pushing her back or if it'd taken her right off her feet.

Whichever came first, he was upon her. His eyes filled with utter loathing and contempt. For the one thorn in his side that just didn't seem to know when enough was enough. He lashed out with both hands to try and grab her around the neck. His irritation at having been denied his chance to rid himself of the Null Zone being a potential liability angering him more and more.The way he saw it, enough was enough. Ghastly would kill the remainder of the Hitman Team and this brat's friends. But he'd make sure to deal with this one himself. Rid himself of a loathsome pest.

"Now, child...YOU'VE MADE ME ANGRY!!!!!"

Her eyes wanted to snap wide open in shock at just how much force of wind was suddenly taking up the entire street, but they couldn't, emotional instinct losing out to survival instinct as they squinted half shut to keep debris out as the illusion hiding her from sight shattered while she stumbled back a few steps-

There was a startled gurgle as a hand suddenly latched around her throat, and all the mirth and cockiness were immediately displaced with an angry fear.

She left her feet in an instant; hoping that the fact that he had her arms around her meant she could return the favor, as her legs swung up to wrap around his longer arms and more importantly put a foot between his eyes and Neo's arm, and hush's stilletto blade slipped free of the rest of the parasol as she swung it beneath herself with the arm not trying to pry his hands off her her neck to stab straight into his gut.

 

[Gus Gungus]

When Weiss finally stirred, Blake let out a quiet sigh of relief before she leveled a calm gaze into Weiss' own eyes, a grim smile on her face as she shrugged.

"The problem with using the same trick twice, Weiss, is that you already showed me how it works. Your never ending supply of contingencies are incredibly obnoxious, and I'm almost surprised that I'm not in the midst of choking on poisoned aura, or something equally stupid."

She moved to wipe the remnants of the CPR off her mouth, only to be briefly and utterly flummoxed by the lack of hand or wrist touching her lips, much like a cat who'd lost its whiskers and tried to fit through a crack as she stared at the stump. She gave a self derisive snort before she settled back against the wall, far, far more at ease than Weiss had ever seen her... ever. Like she didn't expect Weiss to be the most dangerous predator in the room, her one sided rival, or the fount of every crime ever committed against the faunus condensed into one, easily hated person.

She almost sounded apologetic.

"But you're not allowed to die so easy. Lord Ozma wants that form, and thus that form he keeps. I just ensured it's one you can't do so much damage in while he... adjusts."

Blake's severed hand twitched, and Weiss found that Blake's relaxed state wasn't because she feared any sort of inability to inflict violence; Gambol stabbed through the appendage faster than the eye could even track, and their was a screeching rasp followed by black smoke drifting through the wounds the poor, loyal hand had suffered.

She tilted the skewered hand up towards her own face, an air of mild regret in her eyes as she stared at it before she tilted her gaze to Weiss.

"I don't suppose you could tell me how healing works before this rots"

"...You...!"

The wide-eyed, doleful look curdled like milk as Weiss's lightheadedness gave way to dawning comprehension. There were any number of directions the now-former councilwoman and maiden could have gone with that. Short, cutting barb that somehow landed with the same devastation as a sentence ten times its length; winding, bullet-pointed diatribe that dressed down all Blake's faults and spelled out something she didn't even know she hated about herself.

Even an attempt to retroactively explain the deterrent Blake had set off before she had a chance to leverage it would've felt appropriate, the device not dissimilar to Blake's Weiss had had her technicians implant in her own heart, to be activated as a last resort if her magical energies were extracted past a certain threshold. To ensure that at least the integrity of her own Remnant's maiden lineage could remain intact, in the event she failed to prevent someone from claiming the other's.

That was disquieting. A small part of her wondered how long she had been dead for, but there were far too many things wrong with the current situation for her to spend time dwelling on a single one of them. She drew in a sharp, indignant breath, doubtless formulating her thoughts into words.

So it felt entirely inappropriate when all that came out was a deep, shaky sigh, Weiss's efforts to conceal the involuntary shiver running through her shoulders at the sheer dissociating loss in power and control she was experiencing, what had once been her natural state now foisted back on her after so many years apart. Her gaze drifted listlessly to the floor, and her muttered attempt at returning Blake's frivolity was as hollow and uneasy as her eyes looked.

"...Yes, well... I must've forgotten to apply my spiked lipstick this morning."

The balance of power in the room had shifted, and Weiss knew it every bit as much as the faunus appeared to be relishing in it in her own way. It was forcing her to confront an uncomfortable truth, one that had always lain dormant at the core of every one of her interactions with the Shadow Fang's Hand, had dictated her every effort to breach her psyche, pick her brain, and stamp out any threat she could possibly pose with extreme prejudice. It was the sort of thing she'd always been able to bury in the avalanche of poise, rationality and self-assurance that came with being the most powerful person in the room, but in truth it was also the sort of thing that went beyond paltry concepts like power and prestige: something that Ozpin, for all he looked down on her with his malevolent, endless might, would never truly be able to wring from her. Something she had struggled to understand since the first faunus insurgents started giving her family trouble all those years ago, that only came about when you looked into the eyes of someone who truly, genuinely hated you; who believed without question that the world would be a better place with you gone, and no amount of charm and discourse would convince them otherwise.

The truth was, in her heart of hearts... Blake scared her. And she was doing her best not to let it show amid her vulnerability, but...

Her eyes snapped up a little too quickly at the sudden stab, and though she didn't bolt she had to release the breath she'd been holding like a knot in her chest as her shoulders slowly sunk from where they'd backed up further against the wall. She just stared at the question, expression slowly flattening at the actual nerve of it, but after a moment of thought she nodded stiffly and made to crawl over on shaky hands, settling on her knees a short distance away. She considered her next words briefly, unable to keep the chiding educational note out of her voice.

"It's... elemental magic is easiest because it's something our brains already know. Quick, easy, and effective. Most maidens never evolve beyond it. But the magic itself is far more... soulful, than that. True access can only be achieved by letting go of what your brain knows; Leaving the limitations of the mind and body behind." She paused for a moment, pursing her lips as she considered. "Think of your body as... an anchor. A conduit for your soul, nothing more and nothing less. Try and understand how your aura is simply another, lesser-understood element; comprehend its place among them, in the natural world. Reach out with your soul and try to shape it, amplify and suppress it as though you're waxing and waning a flame. Then focus it to where the damage is worst, and if you're doing it right, you'll notice. But it's..."

She huffed then, a hint of groaning frustration simmering in her tone as if she had just remembered who she was talking to.

"You have to be calm, Blake. The power is spiritual, not bodily. Willpower alone isn't enough. If that will is coming from a corporeal place, driven by concepts like fear or anger or hate, then it might seem more effective to someone uninitiated, but it's just... easier. Training wheels. More a hindrance than anything, really. So find your zen. Meditation helps. So does tea."

Her words were dry by this point, fully aware of the absurdity of suggesting the type of hobbies that might be passed around yoga circles. But, perhaps surprisingly, nothing about the words seemed insincere, though neither did the scoff she gave a moment later.

"Frankly, I doubt someone like you could manage a feat of restoration on that level even with months of practice. So I advise putting your hand on ice, for a start."

She sniffed, falling silent for a spell as her gaze drifted contemplatively towards the floor again. Her eyes seemed a bit absent for a moment, unfocused as if the bulk of her own concentration was being taken somewhere else, and only after enough time had gone by for Blake to question whether Weiss was even still with her did she speak again.

"I had no intention of trying anything, you know. It's everything... I can do..."

Her eyes snapped shut suddenly, teeth gnashing together with exertion as every muscle on her face contracted in an effort to combat whatever horrible tide was rising within her. But it was a tide that appeared to pass, at least for now, and her eyes fluttered back open a few moments later, breathing shallow and labored despite the fact that she hadn't moved an inch from where she was kneeling.

"...j-just to remain here. I'm acutely aware of my situation, and what becomes of Ozpin's hosts. I'd simply like to retain some occasional agency over my body in the time I have left."

Her eyes narrowed, accusatory and a bit petulant despite knowing full well where they both stood. She knew Blake considered herself a rationalist, and she had a bone to pick.

Because the fact was, she didn't know how much time she had left. How long her will and drive to continue could let her keep subsisting before everything that was Weiss Schnee vanished into the fathomless sea of lives that was Ozma, no more than a teardrop in an infinite ocean. She may not have had the time left to waste on being unconscious.

Fearful of her or no, whatever wrongs she may have committed to make it so, she was not going to tolerate being beaten black and blue and abused by a terminator with a grudge against her simply so she could indulge whatever foul moods the sound of her voice invoked.

"I could've told you that, had you given me five seconds. You had no cause to attack me. Thrashing a helpless enemy is the kind of flagrant barbarism I'd expect to see in the Dragon, not whatever it is you think you are. So don't put your thuggish hands anywhere near me again."​

 

[MyrtenRose]

Unlike most of the rest, or so she assumed, Raven did not manage to get any sleep on this night. For a long stretch of that time, she just laid there thinking about plenty. About the relics, about Qrow slipping back into his habit, about their world, but mostly...about her. Her daughter. It was...honestly, Raven did not know if it was more funny or sad. When it came to slaying grimm, it came easy, and naturally. Plotting raids on towns, battling against huntsmen or huntresses that got in the way, hardly anything to it. But when it came to family, especially now...uncertainty plagued her from head to toe. They had hardly exchanged any words since she had shown back up, with questionable company even. Yet there was barely any protests about that, something that was both a relief and an annoyance. Part of her was glad she did not have to try and justify their presence at length, but another part of her...wished that she had been forced to do so. At least that way they would have talked.

The simple truth was, that after all this time, all those years of being one really shitty mom...she didn't know how to approach Yang and start up a conversation. A normal conversation, something that didn't have to do with threats they faced, or the terrible situations they found themselves in, or battle plans, or anything just as serious. Half her thoughts were of what to even say to try and start one, but almost all of what she came up with was dismissed shortly after as sounding like crap, or pathetic, or hollow. Then there was the possibility Yang would not want to talk at all, and...well Raven could not blame her in the slightest if that were true. That just made it hurt all the more.

Fighting monsters, starring death in the face and spitting in its face over and over again, what did it say about her that doing such was so much easier than family matters? Nothing great.

But by the time she had worked up the nerve to get out of this room, to at least check on Yang if not actually getting to talk, life got in the way.

It was not a connection she had ever intended to form, not one she enjoyed having, but it was there, nevertheless. A spiritual tether between the former and current wielder of the might of the spring maiden. That much was obvious from a glance at their eyes, but it went so much deeper than that. And coupled with her semblance, it made the short haired Raven Branwen a unique witness to what was happening across the world. The pain the woman was suffering, the dark presence she was forced to endure, struggle against...and... "Oh hell." That was all she managed to get out before frantic yelling drew her attention. She had scarcely gotten out of her own room before the door to Yang's and Ruby's blasted off its hinges and embedded itself in the wall opposite.

She rushed over there, but stopped in the doorway. The uncertainty returned. Yet again she was unsure of what to say, could only stand there and watch.

Ruby, on the other hand, did not stand by. The raging icy winds and desperate, pleading yells and cries from Yang were more than enough to rouse her from her sleep, and she was by her sister's side as fast as her semblance would allow. She felt her aura being chipped away from the sheer cold, shivers running through her intensely, but the cold be damned! She did not have any connection like Weiss, Yang or that Raven did, lacked the insight that they already possessed to some degree, but she didn't care. She was by her sister in an instant, doing what she could to try and comfort her. Her first impulse was to ask what was going on exactly, but the storm going on in their room and the energy flowing from Yang's eyes made that clear. Somewhat.

The power of a maiden was transferring to Yang. The odds of it happening at random were not high. In fact they were probably so low that Ruby reckoned the chances were nonexistent. That meant it was a deliberate choice...and the number of people that would deliberately choose such was also really low. In that moment she believed she knew what was going on, or...had already transpired. It was not pleasant thinking. She shook her head, not dwelling on that as she roped Yang even tighter into a hug. Ruby couldn't bring herself to speak then, just doing all she could to project warmth, to be some kind of comforting presence as her older sister dealt with the whole bunch of everything that just got dropped on her without warning in the middle of the night.

But Raven had found her voice again, the elder once huntress and once bandit ruler dropping to a knee by Yang. Her pale hand reached out to land on her daughter's shoulder in her own small intention of support, hardly seeming to give a single solitary fuck about the tempestuous weather inside. It wasn't anything that she wasn't used to. Her voice was louder than it would normally be at this distance, trying to rise above the sounds of the raging winds. "Yang, I...I know it's tough right now-" The words still sounded lame, pathetic to her ears, but they came out all the same. Whether it was her place to say it or not. "-but...you'll get through it, I'm sure of that. You...you're the strongest person I know." It was a sort of callback to their talk in Haven's vault, one that brought the hint of a sad look across her eyes. She hesitated before continuing on. "So use that strength. Focus. I'll...I'll be here with you."

Her head fell for a brief second then, well aware that she should have been there so so so long ago...but she could not change the mistakes of the past. She could only try to make up for it now, and in the future. She was likewise aware of the possible truth, that she could never make up for it no matter what she did...but she would try all the same. For her brother, her daughter, her...family. "If you want me to be, that is."

By that time, a few of the others stood by the doorway, drawn by all the commotion. The young Cinder stood where Raven had, staring with a widened eye..and then acted, that eye blazing gold as she used her own maiden power in an attempt to calm the winds and cold that Yang was inadvertently unleashing in her panic. Nora's head poked around the edge of the doorway, observing in silence and worried concern.​

 

[MidwayLives]

Her eyes wanted to snap wide open in shock at just how much force of wind was suddenly taking up the entire street, but they couldn't, emotional instinct losing out to survival instinct as they squinted half shut to keep debris out as the illusion hiding her from sight shattered while she stumbled back a few steps-

The Boss had finally got her.

No more would she pester him.

It'd end here, right now!
​

There was a startled gurgle as a hand suddenly latched around her throat, and all the mirth and cockiness were immediately displaced with an angry fear.

Having gathered that Neo had managed to figure out a way around his semblance, the Boss burst forward with his hands still around Neo's throat.

Leaving the two of them against a nearby building with Neo's back literally and figuratively against the wall.

"You're clearly wise beyond your years, child." He mocked in between his growls of rage. "You managed to figure out a key...flaw...in my semblance." He was loathe to say weakness. To say that would imply that she or anyone else stood a chance at beating him. At destroying everything he'd spent his life working towards. That was a reality he simply refused to look in the eye and ever be willing to accept. "My wind doesn't flow on a dime. If you were to come at me from one direction but move from another, I'd need time. Time to redirect the course of my wind. That also means needing to let go of whatever I'm holding. Lest it be thrown away like refuse falling into the garbage disposal." He chided.

But even with half of his face still hidden away by the shrouds of darkness and what remained of his mask, Neo could make out the devilish grin on his face.

"But if you're up against a solid surface...where will you go? The winds will buffet you, pummel you, and I won't ever need to let you GO!"

He squeezed tighter, intending on just strangling the teenager to death like oh so many of Jack's victims.

"I've come too far...sacrificed too much...To have my whole life's work undone by the antics of meddling snot-dribbling miscreants! I'LL WRING THE LIFE FROM YOU AND YOU'LL DIE A FAILURE! JUST ANOTHER STEPPING STONE FOR ME TO SHOW MY POWER!!"
​

She left her feet in an instant; hoping that the fact that he had her arms around her meant she could return the favor, as her legs swung up to wrap around his longer arms and more importantly put a foot between his eyes and Neo's arm, and hush's stilletto blade slipped free of the rest of the parasol as she swung it beneath herself with the arm not trying to pry his hands off her her neck to stab straight into his gut.

The stabbing pricked against the Boss's aura.

It likely didn't matter to Neo but she'd been the first one to land such successive hits on the criminally insane mastermind behind the Bound Ashes. But given the crazed look in his eyes, one would find it hard to tell whether the realization that if one of them didn't give way, they were going to be stabbed/choked to death respectively. Leaving one hand around Neo's throat, the Boss pulled back one hand and Neo could see wind cycling around his arm as it began to wildly vibrate. "Once I've dealt with you and your friends and those insipid traitors in the Hitman Team, I'll move onto those filthy animals darkening Mistral's door." He warned, likely referring to the Shadow Fang. "Face it, child! You'll never learn my identity! I've erased your chances of winning and leapt to the conclusion: MY VICTORY!"

He thrust his fist forward with the extra impact/speed the wind was giving it in the hopes he'd straight up cave Neo's skull in.

"DIE!"

~~~

The punch still came and Neo's aura likely flared up as though it were embers floating up from a pile of ashes.

But it hadn't caved in her face or shattered her skull. Not like how the Boss had intended.



She'd also notice that the wind had come to an abrupt halt. As if it'd disappeared altogether. In the midst of whatever pain she was going through, she'd see a faint red glow outlining the small area where Neo and the Boss were standing. The Boss could barely contain his frustration as it bubbled to the surface and erupted. "Y-YOU!!!!" He shrieked as he looked over his shoulder to see the cause of this disturbance.

*drip*

Standing there leaning on the hilt of Riot Breaker for dear life, Char stood with the jacket Neo had wrapped around him darkened with his blood. His body language by all means expressed how tired he was. His aura shimmered like a beautiful light around him. The Null Zone had been activated and just in the nick of time.

"I'm...*cough* really sorry...*cough* I keep messing up your pretty little illusions, Pinky. Guess I was never too good for much but.."

He sniffled.

"My loyalty was always to the gang, to the family, above all else. But you killed Blanche...From the looks of it....You even killed Abyss." It seemed that in the short time between him briefly passing out and regaining consciousness, he'd put two and two together on who the mysterious shooter had been. Probably came to get Char and Blanche and bounce. "...You'll probably kill me too. I can't say I don't deserve it but....You're not gonna kill the kid." He growled before nearly stumbling to the ground. The Null Zone faded in and out, the glow almost transparent indicating just how fatigued Char was. But he'd keep it up for as long as he could. The Boss was an intimidating...thing(Char didn't feel it right to call him a man)but the longer he could keep his semblance at the bay, the better their odds were. That the kid could get away and regroup with the others...and maybe....things would be okay...

The Boss...to put it lightly....was a little annoyed.

"You....You FUCKING CRETIN! I WON'T BE STOPPED BY YOU OR ANYBODY ELSE!!" He roughly whipped Neo to the ground and opened up his coat to reveal one of his actual knives and not just one masked by his semblance. Drawing it from the pocket it'd been sheathed in, he moved towards Char and growled as the Null Zone extended along his path keeping him from activating his semblance. Char didn't make any effort to run. He didn't really feel he had it in him. He felt bad enough that the kid had tried so hard to save him and here he was botching it again. Just like he'd botched the mission that'd gotten Blanche and him in this mess to begin with.

"Neo!"

Char called out to her as the Null Zone started fading again.

"Get back to the warehouse! You've gotta tell the others who the killer is! He's the Boss! The leader of the Bound Ashes! I-I don't care HOW but you have to!!"

"That's ENOUGH!!!"

The Boss lunged for Char. H-He'd just have to kill him first and stop Neo!

He couldn't let his secret get out! HE'D WORKED TOO HARD FOR THAT!!!​

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

You've gotta tell the others who the killer is!

 

[Schnee Corp Lawyer]

"...You...!"

The wide-eyed, doleful look curdled like milk as Weiss's lightheadedness gave way to dawning comprehension. There were any number of directions the now-former councilwoman and maiden could have gone with that. Short, cutting barb that somehow landed with the same devastation as a sentence ten times its length; winding, bullet-pointed diatribe that dressed down all Blake's faults and spelled out something she didn't even know she hated about herself.

Even an attempt to retroactively explain the deterrent Blake had set off before she had a chance to leverage it would've felt appropriate, the device not dissimilar to Blake's Weiss had had her technicians implant in her own heart, to be activated as a last resort if her magical energies were extracted past a certain threshold. To ensure that at least the integrity of her own Remnant's maiden lineage could remain intact, in the event she failed to prevent someone from claiming the other's.

That was disquieting. A small part of her wondered how long she had been dead for, but there were far too many things wrong with the current situation for her to spend time dwelling on a single one of them. She drew in a sharp, indignant breath, doubtless formulating her thoughts into words.

So it felt entirely inappropriate when all that came out was a deep, shaky sigh, Weiss's efforts to conceal the involuntary shiver running through her shoulders at the sheer dissociating loss in power and control she was experiencing, what had once been her natural state now foisted back on her after so many years apart. Her gaze drifted listlessly to the floor, and her muttered attempt at returning Blake's frivolity was as hollow and uneasy as her eyes looked.

"...Yes, well... I must've forgotten to apply my spiked lipstick this morning."

The balance of power in the room had shifted, and Weiss knew it every bit as much as the faunus appeared to be relishing in it in her own way. It was forcing her to confront an uncomfortable truth, one that had always lain dormant at the core of every one of her interactions with the Shadow Fang's Hand, had dictated her every effort to breach her psyche, pick her brain, and stamp out any threat she could possibly pose with extreme prejudice. It was the sort of thing she'd always been able to bury in the avalanche of poise, rationality and self-assurance that came with being the most powerful person in the room, but in truth it was also the sort of thing that went beyond paltry concepts like power and prestige: something that Ozpin, for all he looked down on her with his malevolent, endless might, would never truly be able to wring from her. Something she had struggled to understand since the first faunus insurgents started giving her family trouble all those years ago, that only came about when you looked into the eyes of someone who truly, genuinely hated you; who believed without question that the world would be a better place with you gone, and no amount of charm and discourse would convince them otherwise.

The truth was, in her heart of hearts... Blake scared her. And she was doing her best not to let it show amid her vulnerability, but...

Her eyes snapped up a little too quickly at the sudden stab, and though she didn't bolt she had to release the breath she'd been holding like a knot in her chest as her shoulders slowly sunk from where they'd backed up further against the wall. She just stared at the question, expression slowly flattening at the actual nerve of it, but after a moment of thought she nodded stiffly and made to crawl over on shaky hands, settling on her knees a short distance away. She considered her next words briefly, unable to keep the chiding educational note out of her voice.

"It's... elemental magic is easiest because it's something our brains already know. Quick, easy, and effective. Most maidens never evolve beyond it. But the magic itself is far more... soulful, than that. True access can only be achieved by letting go of what your brain knows; Leaving the limitations of the mind and body behind." She paused for a moment, pursing her lips as she considered. "Think of your body as... an anchor. A conduit for your soul, nothing more and nothing less. Try and understand how your aura is simply another, lesser-understood element; comprehend its place among them, in the natural world. Reach out with your soul and try to shape it, amplify and suppress it as though you're waxing and waning a flame. Then focus it to where the damage is worst, and if you're doing it right, you'll notice. But it's..."

She huffed then, a hint of groaning frustration simmering in her tone as if she had just remembered who she was talking to.

"You have to be calm, Blake. The power is spiritual, not bodily. Willpower alone isn't enough. If that will is coming from a corporeal place, driven by concepts like fear or anger or hate, then it might seem more effective to someone uninitiated, but it's just... easier. Training wheels. More a hindrance than anything, really. So find your zen. Meditation helps. So does tea."

Her words were dry by this point, fully aware of the absurdity of suggesting the type of hobbies that might be passed around yoga circles. But, perhaps surprisingly, nothing about the words seemed insincere, though neither did the scoff she gave a moment later.

"Frankly, I doubt someone like you could manage a feat of restoration on that level even with months of practice. So I advise putting your hand on ice, for a start."

"Hrmh."

She tossed her weapon small frown of disappointment, letting it clatter to the ground, hand and all, a short distance away. Weiss knew her annoyingly well. She could be focused. She could be still, even relaxed. But that was always surface level.

Blake hadn't been truly calm in a long, long time.

She sniffed, falling silent for a spell as her gaze drifted contemplatively towards the floor again. Her eyes seemed a bit absent for a moment, unfocused as if the bulk of her own concentration was being taken somewhere else, and only after enough time had gone by for Blake to question whether Weiss was even still with her did she speak again.

"I had no intention of trying anything, you know. It's everything... I can do..."

Her eyes snapped shut suddenly, teeth gnashing together with exertion as every muscle on her face contracted in an effort to combat whatever horrible tide was rising within her. But it was a tide that appeared to pass, at least for now, and her eyes fluttered back open a few moments later, breathing shallow and labored despite the fact that she hadn't moved an inch from where she was kneeling.

"...j-just to remain here. I'm acutely aware of my situation, and what becomes of Ozpin's hosts. I'd simply like to retain some occasional agency over my body in the time I have left."

Her eyes narrowed, accusatory and a bit petulant despite knowing full well where they both stood. She knew Blake considered herself a rationalist, and she had a bone to pick.

Because the fact was, she didn't know how much time she had left. How long her will and drive to continue could let her keep subsisting before everything that was Weiss Schnee vanished into the fathomless sea of lives that was Ozma, no more than a teardrop in an infinite ocean. She may not have had the time left to waste on being unconscious.

Fearful of her or no, whatever wrongs she may have committed to make it so, she was not going to tolerate being beaten black and blue and abused by a terminator with a grudge against her simply so she could indulge whatever foul moods the sound of her voice invoked.

"I could've told you that, had you given me five seconds. You had no cause to attack me. Thrashing a helpless enemy is the kind of flagrant barbarism I'd expect to see in the Dragon, not whatever it is you think you are. So don't put your thuggish hands anywhere near me again."

Despite that, though, she was patient enough, some facsimile of calm as Weiss gathered herself and worked her way through what she wanted to say, amber eyes quietly boring into Weiss until she reached the end of her words.

When she did, the faunus' eyes narrowed slightly, and there was a grim, bitter smirk on her lips as she slowly shook her head.






"...You expect me to believe that. Weiss Schnee, still with the power of two maidens at her beck and call, didn't intend to try anything. No Weiss. You've conditioned me far too well for that."

Her arm dropped from around her knee at the same time the smile dropped.

"You've spent the last year trying to convince me that you were my equal, my better, my superior. And you spent the last few days taking every inch I gave you and ripping me to shreds with it, when all you needed was a millimeter to do it. Doing everything in your power to make me see you as some unopposable force that I had no other options in the face of other than total submission. You killed, you maimed, you used my body like some little science project, for every little bit of advantage you could wring from me in a fight you'd already won."

She slowly uncoiled from her crouch off the floor and started to lope forward.

"I tried so hard not to underestimate you, Weiss, but I did. You took every choice I made and turned it into a wrong one, into your right one. From the relics, to Atlas falling under heel instead of burning, even ending up here, in front of Ozpin in chains, it was all part of the plan. I was never going to bend a knee to you Weiss, to submit, but you've earned my respect, and I've learned my lesson. I won't underestimate you again."

She knelt down scant inches from her master's new host, and twin flames of amber began to leak from her eyes as one hand moved to firmly grip Weiss' chin to force her to meet that gaze.

"And you want me to think you're helpless now. Just accept that this isn't all a big part of Weiss Schnee's plan. No. I may have minimized how dangerous you can be, may have ensured that every second you spend breathing isn't one my lord's designs are in immediate danger; but I know better than that. You've taught me better than that. Until you've disappeared completely, I'm going to treat you with the respect you've worked so hard to earn-"

Blake's hand suddenly caught flame, the fires licking uncomfortably close to Weiss' skin without ever touching it, an absurd display of control for someone who'd gotten the maiden powers not minutes ago.

"-As an enemy."

She held her gaze for a few moments longer, before she released Weiss and the flames snuffed back out as she stood up straight and backed up.

"Come. The others await in the throne room. We'll wait there for Lord Ozpin to resume control. I assume you remember how to get there"