SAPR

by Scipio Smith


Return to the City of the Dead (Rewritten)

Return to the City of the Dead

The return to Mountain Glenn was far less welcome than the return to the Emerald Forest had been. The forest possessed a beauty to it that was wholly lacking from the city of the dead, and absent the grimm, the Emerald Forest would have been a bright, vibrant, beautiful place, the perfect place to spend a pleasant afternoon, to walk in the woods with Jaune, perhaps.
There was nothing beautiful about Mountain Glenn. Even absent the grimm, it was still nothing more than a vast tomb that was slowly crumbling under the assault of the elements and uncaring time.
Pyrrha had not greatly enjoyed coming here the first time, and she doubted that she would find the return much more pleasant.
This place was a monument to the hubris of men and the destructive power of the grimm. It was a place of death and decay where the streets were interrupted by barricades and the ruins of rusting cars and bushes; a place where the buildings were scarred by battle and where the walls had been holed by the grimm smashing through them.
It was a place that seemed to mock them all.
As the ruins in the Emerald Forest, the dead bones of a forgotten kingdom had seemed to mock the efforts of mankind, so too the ruins of Mountain Glenn — and if anything was going to become a forgotten ruin like those in the forest, it was certainly this city, which had already been abandoned and was even now starting to be reclaimed by nature — seemed to mock the efforts of huntsmen and huntresses more specifically.
Here she was, a long scarlet sash hanging from her waist, a circlet gleaming on her brow, wearing armour that was both supposed to protect her and to please the audience watching her fights on pay-per-view; what was it all worth, in the face of this death and devastation and destruction? She had vowed to defend humanity, but what was that vow worth when confronted with the dead bodies they had seen in the police station in the underground city? Many huntsmen and huntresses had defended Mountain Glenn, and every one of them had pledged themselves life, body, and soul to defend mankind just as she and her friends had done, but all those huntsmen had failed and fallen, and the city had been lost with all of its attendant bloodshed.
Pyrrha’s prodigious skill at arms, her sense of destiny, her belief that she had been blessed with great ability in order that she might accomplish some great thing in the world, her desire to protect humanity, her wish to protect her friends who had brought so much new light into her life … Mountain Glenn mocked all of these ambitions. Every shattered window, every open door gaping like a mouth, every darkened building standing like a tomb, everything about this city clad in mourning mocked her for a fool.
Give up, it seemed to say, with a thousand voices carried on the wind. Give up your vain efforts and your vainer hopes. Turn your back and run away.
Pyrrha slapped her own cheeks with both hands, feeling a stinging sensation even through her aura. She could not think like this. She would not allow herself to think like this; she did not have the luxury of self doubt, not at this time, not when Sunset…
Sunset was standing a few feet away from the rest of them, staring at the ruins that confronted them. Her back was to Pyrrha, but by the limpness of Sunset’s tail, Pyrrha doubted that she was going to see any great confidence in Sunset’s expression when she turned around.
Sunset had agreed to come back here, Sunset had seemed to force herself to come back here, but at the same time, it was clear — to Pyrrha at least, and probably to Jaune and Ruby as well — that their leader was far from comfortable with this.
It would probably be an exaggeration to say that any of them were comfortable with this, but Sunset appeared the most discomfited of all.
Sunset was not only their inspiration, but also their confidence; Sunset always knew the right words to say to banish fear and doubt. She was not without those things, she did not pretend to be without them, but at the same time, when the moment came, she could appear to put them away, in a box within her soul where they would not trouble her.
And she always knew the words to say to Pyrrha, to make her feel better when a bout of melancholy was upon her.
But now Sunset was the one who was sorely oppressed, weighed down by the ghosts of this place.
We should not have come here.
Who else could have undertaken the duty? Team YRBN, without Blake? Team BLBL, who were nowhere close to being our equals even when they were four strong?
Are we four strong now?
Sunset is … Sunset believed in me when I was being selfish; I must believe in her now when she is acting … unwisely perhaps, but in a good cause.
I must believe … and I must be strong.
That was the point. That was why she could not allow Mountain Glenn to oppress her with all that it represented; that was why she could not take its whispers to heart. Because Sunset seemed to be doing quite enough of that already, and in her absence, it would fall to Pyrrha to be the strong one, to be strong for Sunset, strong for Jaune — strong for Ruby too perhaps, but Ruby seemed far less in need of strength than any of her teammates.
She could not falter now, for if she did, there would be no one to pick her up again.
I defy you, Mountain Glenn. I deny you and defy you. I say that you have no power over me. I have triumphed over Cinder Fall! I have seen the enemy’s greatest champion flee in terror of my arms!
Why should I fear your ghosts after such a victory?
You say that I alone, with all my skill, could not save a city such as this. True, I know it well enough. But I am not alone. I can do much, and we can do more, and I alone, or we alone, are not here to save a city such as this, but to do things that I, that we, can very easily do.
And you will not prevent us.
“I really thought we were done with Mountain Glenn,” Ruby groaned.
“It isn’t looking any better the second time around,” Jaune agreed.
Pyrrha frowned. On the one hand, it was good to know that they all shared at least some of her feelings, but on the other, those were perhaps not the feelings that were good to have at the beginning of a mission.
Sunset had once written Pyrrha a letter, a letter that Pyrrha was only intended to read in the event of Sunset’s death but which she had happened to read much sooner, thanks to Sunset’s choice of where to hide said letter.
It was a letter in which Sunset had very generously given Pyrrha her voice in the choice of who should lead the team in the event of Sunset’s death.
Sunset was not dead now, thank goodness, far from it, but nevertheless…
Nevertheless, it seemed to Pyrrha that she was not quite capable of exercising her leadership as she might have been in other places, other locations.
Which meant…
How does that speech format go?
“We’ve been here before,” she said. “Obviously, you remember that as well as I do. And it’s true that there are dangers lurking within these streets — and beneath them. We should not expect all the grimm in Mountain Glenn to have died assaulting Vale, nor that no new packs or herds or whatever the correct term for that particular group of that particular species has entered the ruins since we were here last.
“Nevertheless, we can take comfort in the knowledge that we have been here before and survived, when far more dangerous adversaries than grimm were lurking in the tunnels below. We can take comfort in the fact that the numbers of the grimm have been dramatically reduced from what they were when we were here last. And we can take comfort from the fact that we know this city far better now than we did when last we were here.
“We don’t yet know exactly what is at stake here, but mysteries left unattended have a habit of growing more dangerous with age, just like a grimm, and I am sure that we all wish to nip this particular mystery in the bud as swiftly as possible.
“If we do this properly, as I am sure we will, then we can complete our mission and be out of here without once having to set foot underground. And we will be back home at Beacon before we know it, with the Vytal Festival and a lot of fun before us. Isn’t that something to look forward to?”
Jaune grinned. “You make it sound so simple.”
“I mean … it can be,” Pyrrha declared. “If we do it right.” She glanced at Sunset, who had not reacted at all to her words. “Excuse me,” she murmured.
She turned away from Jaune and Ruby and approached Sunset.
Sunset stood with Sol Invictus held in one hand at her side, her head slightly bowed, but her eyes turned upwards, looking at the city.
She was biting her lip.
“I didn’t mean to usurp your place,” Pyrrha began apologetically. “It’s just—”
“I know,” Sunset murmured. “You did … reasonably well.”
“You could do better, I’m sure,” Pyrrha said, more in hope than expectation. “I’ve never much enjoyed publicly speaking.”
“Your words were … rough, in places,” Sunset said, “but you spoke from the heart. I, by comparison, would be conjuring…”
Pyrrha’s brow furrowed beneath her shining circlet. “Team Sapphire needs its leader, Sunset.”
Sunset hesitated for a moment, and then gripped Sol Invictus with both hands, very tightly; her hands themselves were hidden beneath her gloves, but Pyrrha was sure that if she had been able to see Sunset’s knuckles, they would have been white from gripping her rifle so tight.
“And it has its leader,” she said. “I’m sorry. I’m with you now.”
“It’s alright,” Pyrrha assured her as the two of them rejoined Jaune and Ruby.
“All set?” asked Ruby.
“All set,” Sunset declared.
Team SAPR had just been dropped off by a Bullhead that was even now flying up and away from them, back in the direction of Beacon and of Vale. An aerial grimm sighting had forced them to be deposited on the ground further away than any of them would have liked. But, with giant nevermores in the skies, the Bullhead pilot had refused to carry them any closer towards their objective — the Merlot Industries corporate headquarters — and so they would have to make it the rest of their way on foot.
“Students, it’s nice to finally have the chance to work with you in some fashion,” Doctor Oobleck said through their earpieces. “Miss Rose, I hope that your performance in the field is better than your grades on some of your papers.”
Ruby laughed nervously. “Yeah, uh, I … I’ll definitely show you my skills, Doctor.”
“You can rely on us, Doctor,” said Pyrrha, calmly but firmly too. “All that is asked of us, we shall accomplish, and all that is required of us, we shall deliver.”
“I’m glad to hear it, Miss Nikos,” Doctor Oobleck replied. “Of course, I’d expect nothing less of the up and coming team. Now, as you’re aware, old Merlot Industries technology was found interfering with our security systems; combined with the fact that it was also involved in some rather dastardly kidnappings in Atlas is very troubling. The use of Merlot technology might be nothing … OR IT MIGHT BE EVERYTHING! Which is why Professor Ozpin feels that it is worth investigating the old Merlot Industries headquarters in the centre of the city.
“Professor Port has been called away to monitor Team Coffee on their mission to Alexandria, but with my knowledge of Mountain Glenn, Professor Ozpin has asked me to keep in touch as long as possible. I’ve already uploaded a map to your scrolls detailing the route to Merlot Headquarters; unfortunately, I can’t guarantee being able to walk you through every; communications in Mountain Glenn are spotty at best.”
“We remember,” Jaune said. “I’m a little surprised that we can still hear you, to be honest. Last time, we had another team between us and Beacon to pass messages too.”
“That was probably a more reliable method of maintaining contact, Mister Arc,” Doctor Oobleck admitted. “At the moment, we’re using a Starhead transponder to boost the signal to and from, and of course, you’re not actually in Mountain Glenn yet, but I don’t know how long we’ll be able to stay in touch.”
“Is there any indication on how many grimm are left in the city?” Pyrrha asked. “It seemed like a lot of them followed us down the tunnel, but…” It seemed at the time like the city must be emptying of grimm to try and force the Breach, but was that actually the case? Have more come back since? How infested or not is the city at the moment?
“The Atlesians conducted several aerial reconnaissances in the immediate aftermath of the Breach, focussed on looking for the White Fang; however, in their searches, they didn’t report any more grimm moving into the city,” Doctor Oobleck said. “However, General Ironwood decided that putting boots on the ground would not be worth the—” He broke off in a burst of static.
“Doctor Oobleck?” Pyrrha asked.
“Students, can you hear me?”
“Now,” Ruby said. “But we lost you for a second there.”
“As I suspected, the communications are … try and boost … good luck out there. Try to come back … uncomfortable parent-teacher conference.”
“What was that about a parent-teacher conference?” Jaune said.
“I think the essence was ‘don’t die,’” Sunset muttered. “Something which … something which I would also very much appreciate. There may be…” She trailed off. “Anyway…” She pulled out her scroll and consulted the map that Doctor Oobleck had sent them. “It’s this way,” she said. “We can cross this bridge and be right on top of the Merlot building.”
But first they had to make their way down a wide, spacious boulevard, the kind that had trees planted down the centre of a road with enough space for two lanes, the kind that probably would have been home to upmarket shops and somewhat expensive restaurants when the city was at its brief but thriving peak.
Now, the tables at the restaurants had been smashed, the doors and windows had either been broken down by grimm or had decayed, and the only things that inhabited the place now was the pack of beowolves who had obviously not followed the train down the tunnel to their deaths in the breach. Rather, still very much alive and present in the city, they broiled out onto the boulevard like angry bees as soon as SAPR set foot there.
Fortunately, there were only a score of them, with no visible alpha to lead their group — although there were a few who were big enough to look as though they might have ascended to that position had fate not condemned to death at this time and this place — and they were dealt with, if not without a little sweat at times. The combined fire of the four huntsmen downed several before they even got close enough to try and use their claws — Ruby in particular planted Crescent Rose into the ground and was responsible for taking down a third of the monsters with her bullets alone — and once they did, their teeth and claws did not avail them. Sunset impaled one through the chest with her bayonet, bashed in the skull of another, and then extended her bayonet outwards like a pike to catch a third as it tried to leap upon her from above. Ruby sliced a beowolf in half with a single swing of Crescent Rose, then missed a swing at another that put her in a perfect position to shoot the beowolf at point blank range. Pyrrha’s red hair and red sash both flew around her as she danced nimbly through their black demonic ranks, her spear whirling in deadly circles as they fell before her. Jaune used his ice dust to good effect, unleashing it at just the moment when his sword struck home to fill the wounds he dealt with expanding, deadly ice.
And thus were all of the grimm defeated. Would that all battles could be won so easily.
At the end of the boulevard, there was a ramp formed by the rising up of dirt and rubble that obliterated the roadway in a mud and rubble barrier that, although climbable, was nevertheless steep. Pyrrha couldn’t help but wonder if it had been created by the inhabitants of the city in a futile attempt to form some kind of barrier against the grimm.
If that was the case, then it hadn’t worked, any more than the much larger and more obvious barrier that they found when, after passing up the ramp and cutting through a sidestreet to reach the old waterfront, they arrived at the bridge that, according to Sunset’s map, would lead them to their destination.
Or it would have if it hadn’t been blocked; a sturdy-looking barricade of corrugated metal sheets as large as the fronts of houses, collapsed stone columns, concrete blocks, containers, boulders, and even a metal sign emblazoned with ‘Mountain Glenn’ had been thrown up along the entire width of the bridge. There were claw marks on the barricade, scratching the metal and scoring the stone, and now that Pyrrha looked at the bridge beneath her feet, she could see gunfire and explosives impacts.
Jaune looked at it pensively. “Do you think … do you think they thought this would hold off the grimm, or was this just a way of buying time until everybody could get underground?”
“Does it matter?” Sunset asked.
Jaune shrugged. “If they thought they could hold off the grimm with this, then … it didn’t work, but if they were trying to buy a little time, then it might have worked, even if … you’re right, I guess it doesn’t really matter after all.”
This is, without a doubt, the most maudlin place I have ever been or heard tell of, Pyrrha thought.
“I believe it does matter,” she said. “The fact that later tragedies befell does not mean that the effort to get everyone underground was not worth making or that the extra days of life that were lived underground were not worth living.”
“I hadn’t thought of it like that,” Jaune said softly, “That’s a pretty good point.”
“It doesn’t make that much difference; this is still a grim sight in every sense,” Sunset muttered. “The sooner we’re away from here, the better. Pyrrha, do you think that you and I could shift some of this, you with your semblance and me with my magic?”
“We could try,” Pyrrha murmured. “But without knowing how thick it is on the other side … it might be better to try a different approach. Could we use the old waterway to go around?”
The bridge on which they stood had been built over Mountain Glenn’s waterway system, which had apparently been designed to run through the centre of the city like a river. It had dried up now; no more water flowed beneath them, leaving only a silted up and muddy riverbed with enormous pipes sticking out from both sides. It looked sheer on both sides, but there had to be some way of getting in and out, or how would they do any maintenance?
Sunset pulled out her scroll and consulted her map. “You’re right, there’s a lock not too far away; if it’s still open or we can get it open…” She put her scroll away. “Okay then … let’s go take a walk down the sewer.”
“Just pretend it’s a day at the water park,” Ruby said as she climbed up onto the ledge separating the bridge from the dry riverbed below. “Just a day at the water park.” She wrinkled her nose. “The icky, kind of gross, and nasty-smelling water park.”
They all leapt down from the bridge, landing with a series of squelches in the mud that covered the old waterway. That mud quickly spread over the tops of their boots, and since Jaune was only wearing trainers, it seemed as though his feet were going to get it especially bad. It might even ruin his socks.
“Okay, this is … nasty,” Sunset said, looking down at her feet as they sank into the mud which was now almost reaching her pants. She closed her eyes, and a soft green glow descended down to her feet, enveloping her boots and her ankles in a green light. She stepped out of the mud with a visible effort, forcibly wrenching her feet out of the viscous muck that tried to entrap them, and then stepped onto the very surface of the mud, which didn’t give way beneath her but bore her weight as though it was as solid as concrete.
“How are you—?” Jaune began enviously.
“A variation on the cloud-walking spell,” Sunset said.
Ruby’s eyes widened. “You can walk on clouds?”
Sunset grinned. “Did I not tell you I could walk on clouds if I wanted to? I need a balloon to get up there in the first place, but … I’ll tell you all about it later; for now, let me cast this spell on you all so that we can actually move down this oversized drain before we start to smell too badly. Ruby, you first.”
“Uh, guys,” Jaune said. “I think I just felt something brush my leg.”
Pyrrha stepped towards him, reversing her spear like a harpoon. “Where? Do you know what it was?”
“No,” Jaune said as he looked down at his legs and the area around them. “I just felt something brush my ankle.”
Sunset raised her rifle to her shoulder. “And I think I just saw some of that mud move a little.”
“You think there’s something alive in here?” Ruby asked as she contracted Crescent Rose into its stubby carbine configuration.
“I think I’m going to cast the spell on you all, and then we’re going to run,” Sunset said, and already, her breaths between words were a little heavier, as though she had been running already. “Starting with—”
Jaune gave a startled cry as he was dragged off his feet by an invisible force. His sword fell from his hand to land in the mud and sink into the morass as Jaune himself was pulled leftwards and off his feet, his arms flailing as he landed on his back in the mud which began immediately to receive him, the brown ooze beginning to engulf him within its murky embrace.
Not going to happen. Pyrrha’s shield was on her back; she had one hand free, and with that hand, she grabbed Jaune’s outstretched arm. The characteristic black outline of her semblance enveloped Pyrrha’s hand as she latched on to Jaune’s metal armour, all of it securely strapped around his body, and pulled towards her with all the strength at her command.
“It’s alright,” she said. “It’s alright, Jaune, I’ve got you.”
Jaune winced. “There’s something round my leg.”
“I can’t see it!” Sunset yelled.
“It’s there!” Jaune cried.
Ruby began to fire, letting fly from Crescent Rose as the barrel flashed brightly over and over again as bullets thudded into the mud around Jaune’s feet, throwing up miniature fountains of muck into the air as they struck home.
“Don’t hit his leg,” Pyrrha cried as she pulled Jaune back towards her.
“I’m trying not to,” Ruby said through gritted teeth. She fired again, pulled back on the lever, pulled the trigger again, only to be rewarded with a click that signified the magazine was empty. She frantically reached for another.
Pyrrha felt something nip at the back of her ankle. She half-turned, lunging down into the mud with her spear, but in that moment of distraction, Jaune was torn from her grasp and pulled down into the mud.
“Jaune!” Pyrrha yelled, and the black outline of her semblance grew to encompass her entire arm as she reached out for him, searching for metal, pulling it all towards her, everything that she could sense below and out of sight.
A host of discarded cans of pop, soda, and beer rose up towards her, but after a moment, so did Jaune, breaching the muddy surface with some kind of worm wrapped around his body. It was white, with red patterns winding their way around a body made up of a hundred segmented scales with tiny spikes growing out of it. It had coiled its way up Jaune’s leg and around his chest as though it were trying to crush him through his aura. He had grabbed the worm with both hands just below its head and was holding it back as it opened its mandibular maw and tried to bite him. Jaune’s face was a mask of concentration so intense it was hard to tell if he even noticed he had been pulled from the mud yet. The grimm worm flickered its tongue towards him.
Pyrrha’s expression was as grim as the monster's as she stepped forward, changing Miló into sword form as she did so, and with a single stroke, severed the worm’s head from its body.
Jaune let out a squawk as the dead head landed in his lap, batting it away into the mud. He looked up at her gratefully. “Thanks,” he said.
Pyrrha smiled. “Any time.” She offered a hand to help him up.
“Uh, guys?” Ruby said. “That grimm … it’s not smoking.”
Pyrrha glanced at the head that she had just severed. She was confused for half a moment, as the head was starting to disintegrate, but then she realised that the rest of the body — from which Jaune was trying to disentangle himself — was stubbornly refusing to begin turning to smoke.
Which means that it isn’t—
A yell from Sunset attracted her attention in time to see her team leader being dragged into the mud, cloud-walking spell and all. Sunset dropped her rifle, her hands scrabbling for purchase on the viscous, cloying surface, her face a mask of thoughtless panic, before she disappeared beneath the surface of the mire.
“Sun—” Pyrrha’s shout was cut off by the feeling of something biting her ankle; she whirled, and her spear whirled around in her hands as she slashed downwards with it, across her feet and into the dirt as though she were trying to shovel it out of the way. She was rewarded with a brief sensation of resistance and what sounded like a cry of pain muffled by the mud between Pyrrha and her target, but the moment of satisfaction was cut short when Jaune cried out in fear and alarm behind her.
Ruby’s eyes were wide. She fired blindly, this way and that. “Where are they?” she shouted.
Pyrrha responded with deeds, not words. She threw her shield down at Ruby’s ankles, using her semblance to keep it suspended just above the dirt and not sinking into the manky, murky depths as she hauled herself out of the mud with a mighty leap that carried her upwards just ahead of the three worm- or snake-like grim who erupted, hissing angrily, behind her as she leapt. Pyrrha landed atop her own shield, standing still only for the moment it took to grab Ruby by the scruff of the neck before she leapt again, concentrating all her aura to her legs for a kick that carried her and Ruby both all the way to the top of the nearest of the large drainage pipes that emptied like puking mouths into the old waterway.
“Stay here,” she said, “and shoot anything that sticks its head up above the surface. I’m going to get Jaune and Sunset.”
I should still have enough aura left even for this rather reckless use of my semblance.
Pyrrha threw her shield down, and with Polarity, she held it just an inch or two above the surface of the mud, holding it there even as she leapt down like a thunderbolt upon it, balancing upon the disc with her heels pressed close together, channelling her semblance through her feet to keep Akoúo̱ in place.
She spread out her hands, both of them engulfed by that black outline of Polarity, spreading it out around her, using it not like a hand but almost more like an ear, as though she were some kind of bat; except it was metal she was searching for, not sound.
They were both alive. They had enough aura to keep them alive. Some grimm were large enough to devour men whole — griffons, giant nevermores, other such great and fearsome beasts — and yet, the act of swallowing itself did not kill a victim with aura. Rather, as had been observed by huntsmen over the years, there was something in the belly of the beast that paralysed the victim despite their aura, rendering them unable to free themselves while their aura was worn away by digestion.
But they could be freed by others, alive and unharmed, if the grimm that had swallowed them were killed quickly enough.
And so she searched for metal, for Jaune’s armour, for Sunset’s cuirass and vambraces; she would take any metal, but she had already pulled out a lot of it from the mud already.
There! And there!
Pyrrha focussed, increasing the amount of aura she was putting into her semblance, grasping the metal as with invisible hands and lifting upwards.
It was a strain. She had expected it would be a strain; she was not lifting Jaune and Sunset but the grimm that sought to devour them also. She scowled, her arms trembling slightly. The weight of what she sought to move resisted her, the very mud itself, the layer upon layer of tight-packed earth resisted her. But she would not be denied in this.
Give them back to me!
She heard the distinctive booming sound of Crescent Rose and felt a little earth spatter upon her boot. She guessed that something had emerged out of the mud to search for her, and Ruby had shot it, but she did not look around, she did not even thank Ruby for the shot. She needed to concentrate.
She could feel the metal moving; she could feel it obeying her command. She could see the mud rising, great lumps of it bulging upwards until the mud cracked open to reveal the grimm.
They were not snakes at all; rather, the snakelike grimm that had grabbed Jaune were only tongues, tongues like snakes with mouths of their own and mandibular jaws emerging out of the mouths of immense black, slug-like creatures, great worms with white spurs of bone like little fins sticking out of their body at all angles and sightless masks of bone with sharp cruel beaks and lower jaws that split in three.
As Pyrrha raised them up into the air out of the mud they squirmed and wriggled, flapping their fat tails, moving their bone spurs back and forth, clacking their jaws together, shrieking harsh, piercing shrieks as their snake-tongues writhed.
Ruby held her fire, not wanting to risk hitting Jaune or Sunset if her shot penetrated these … things.
Pyrrha channelled all of her semblance through her left hand to hold both grimm in place through her grip on Jaune and Sunset. With her right hand, she drew Miló, shifting her weapon smoothly into sword mode.
With her feet, she sent Akoúo̱ gliding over the surface of the mud, carrying Pyrrha with it, flying over the dried up waterway, hearing the shots of Crescent Rose as Ruby kept her covered.
She approached the first grimm from behind, keeping clear of its mouth and its snake tongues, circling around before flying towards its harmless, flapping tail.
The grimm struggled in the grip of her semblance, shrieking wildly.
Pyrrha glided past its flank, and as she passed, she thrust Miló deep into its black, oily flesh, digging deep into the grimm’s flank and slicing it all the way towards its bony head.
The grimm opened up, and Jaune tumbled out and into Pyrrha’s outstretched arm.
His eyes were closed, and his body was cold to the touch, but both of those things … they were not good things, but Professor Port had made clear that they were to be expected in these circumstances; victims cut living from dead grimm took a short while for the paralysis to wear off.
Pyrrha rested him upon her shoulder as the grimm, no longer burdened by the metal that Pyrrha had been grasping to hold it up, flopped down onto the mud, its lifeless husk already beginning to turn to smoke and ashes. Crocea Mors hit the mud as well, but Pyrrha would have to wait to retrieve that; she couldn’t keep everything balanced all at once.
Nevertheless, the weight of Jaune upon her shoulder felt better than the weight upon her semblance, not least because he wasn’t in any danger on her shoulder.
The remaining grimm cried out, as though it could sense the death of its fellow.
Or perhaps it’s worried that it can’t hear it screaming anymore.
In any case, just a little longer, Sunset, here I come.
Once more, Pyrrha approached the grimm from behind, taking a wide arc on Akoúo̱ around it, keeping clear of beak and tongues as she slashed it open down the side and pulled Sunset out of the belly of the dying monster.
Sunset, too, was unconscious, eyes closed, body cold. Pyrrha gathered her in her arms, letting Sol Invictus fall as she had Crocea Mors, and with both Jaune and Sunset safely in her grasp, she leapt upwards, off her shield through the air to land behind Ruby on the pipe.
Pyrrha let out a somewhat weary sigh as she sat down upon the cold and rusting metal, her sash draping across it to dangle downwards as her feet kicked the air. She might have used her semblance more when fighting Cinder, but nothing that she had moved with it had felt quite so difficult as those heavy grimm.
Ruby turned around. “Are they okay?”
“They will be,” Pyrrha assured her. “Remember what Professor Port said about being swallowed by a grimm.”
“You know I can’t follow Professor Port’s stories!”
“They will be fine,” Pyrrha said. “We just need to give them a little time. Would you mind holding onto Sunset until she comes round?”
“Sure,” Ruby said, reaching out with her small, pale hands, grabbing hold of Sunset and balancing her so that she didn’t topple and fall off the pipe right back down into the mud.
Pyrrha cradled Jaune with one hand, resting his head upon her lap as, with her other hand, she retrieved Akoúo̱, Crocea Mors, and Sol Invictus from down in the waterway below.
She slung her shield across her back, handed Sol Invictus to Ruby, and kept Crocea Mors in her hand for a moment.
Already, the colour was returning to Jaune’s pale face. Already, he was not so cold to the touch. It would not be long now.
Pyrrha brushed some of his long blond hair out of his forehead; she leaned down and gently kissed him there, brushing her lips against his cold but warming skin.
Jaune made a quiet, wordless sound, a faint stirring.
His blue eyes fluttered, then closed again. Then they fluttered again, and this time, they opened.
Pyrrha smiled. “Welcome back.”
“Pyrrha,” he murmured. “I just had this awful dream where I got—”
“If you dreamed of being swallowed by a grimm in the ruins of Mountain Glenn, I’m afraid that wasn’t a dream,” Pyrrha said apologetically. “That really happened.”
Jaune’s eyes widened. “It did? Then how—?”
“Pyrrha got you out,” Ruby explained. “You and Sunset; it was pretty cool.”
“No doubt it was,” Sunset groaned. “Thank you, Pyrrha.” She blinked and shook her head. “How … how?”
“I used my semblance to pull the grimm out of the mud with you inside, then cut you both out,” Pyrrha said. “And no thanks are needed.”
“You have them nevertheless,” Sunset said.
“How’s your aura?” Jaune asked, sitting up and placing a hand on her shoulder.
“I’ve used up some of it, but are you sure you should be using your semblance so soon?” Pyrrha replied.
“I’ll be fine,” Jaune said as his hand began to glow with that white gold effect, spreading the light across Pyrrha’s body, bringing with it that warmth and the sensation of soft rain upon her skin as she felt her aura restoring immediately.
“So, I take it from the fact that we’re all perched on this pipe that there are still more grimm down there?” Sunset asked.
Ruby nodded. “I saw some of their tongues come out as Pyrrha was doing her thing.”
“'Their tongues'?” Sunset repeated.
There was a stirring of the mud beneath them as another of those grimm emerged from the mud right underneath the pipe on which they sat, its bones digging into the concrete of the waterway wall as the grimm hauled itself six feet out of the mud, its jawed tongues extending further, pressing up the wall, climbing, teasing towards them, sweeping back and forth as they probed blinding for their prey.
“What in Celestia’s name?” Sunset gasped.
Ruby fired at it, but her bullet glanced off the bony beak of the grimm, which immediately cried out and dropped back down into the mud.
Pyrrha could see the mud moving in two other places, where the grimm were close enough to the surface to disturb it with their passage.
“I can’t hit them when they’re underground,” Ruby growled. “Not just because I can’t see them but because dirt’s such a good bullet stopper. So long as they stay down there, they’re really well protected.”
“At least it doesn’t seem as though they can get us up here,” Jaune replied.
“Sure,” Sunset growled. “But they know we have to go back down there eventually. We’re like swimmers taking refuge on a rock; we have to go back in the water at some point.”
“Hmm, without metal inside them, I can’t use my semblance as I did to get you out,” Pyrrha said, “but could you pull them out with your telekinesis.”
“Hard to do without being able to see them,” Sunset said. “Besides, I have a better idea.” Her hands glowed, and she touched Ruby, Pyrrha, and Jaune in turn. Pyrrha felt a tingling feeling, a pleasant prickling like a particularly powerful shower, trickling down her body towards her feet.
“I just cast the variant cloud-walking spell on you all,” Sunset said. “When we get down there, the mud won’t present any problems.”
“You want us to go back down there?” Jaune asked incredulously.
“Not yet,” Sunset said as she got up, standing balanced upon the pipe. “I just don’t want to wait and not have the energy to do that later. First, I’m going to get rid of all those things, however many of them there are down there.”
She closed her eyes and held out her hands in front of her, over the mud in which the grimm lurked.
Slowly, gradually, a forest of spears began to appear in the air above the waterway; scores of them, perhaps more than a hundred in a hovering phalanx that stretched from the bridge a good way down the waterway as far as the earthen rampart that acted as a natural barrier to this section of ravine. Sunset’s brow was furrowed, her face wrinkled in concentration, her body trembling. Pyrrha couldn’t imagine what this amount of magic must be costing her.
“Sunset,” she began.
“Those things are too dangerous,” Sunset said. “I’m going to get them all in one single strike.”
More spears appeared, joining the tight mass in front of Sunset. It was a phalanx, like one of the armies of old: an unavoidable hedge of spears poised to fall from heaven upon Sunset’s enemies.
Every spear of magic thrummed with anticipation and the promise of destructive power as they hung suspended in the air by Sunset’s will.
Then Sunset opened her eyes as green as the spears themselves, and the lances of heaven fell to earth with the force of many great thunderbolts.
The world seemed to explode. Pyrrha turned away from the blinding light; she felt as though her eardrums might burst with the roar of the almighty explosion and the dying screams of the grimm that mingled with it; she raised her shield against the mud the erupted upwards in consequence of all the blasts.
And when the air had cleared, she contemplated what Sunset had done.
She had churned the earth more thoroughly than any plough could have managed; any trace of placidity about this stretch of waterway was gone. Nothing could live here, and there was no sign that anything did.
Sunset took a deep breath as a little muck fell out of her hair. “Got them,” she murmured, before she fell forwards off the pipe and down to the ground.
Pyrrha leapt after her, but Ruby was faster and reached the ground before either of them, half-catching Sunset as she fell so that she landed on her feet instead of flat on her front.
“Sunset, what’s up?” she asked.
“Nothing,” Sunset said, though she was taking very deep breaths. “I’m just … don’t expect any more magic out of me today. That really was my limit and a little more.” She picked herself up out of Ruby’s arms, and straightened up. “But I’ve still got my aura, mostly, so I’ll be fine.”
“You seem tired,” Pyrrha said, noting the way that Sunset continued to pant for breath.
“Don’t worry about me,” Sunset said. “Jaune, how are you doing?”
Jaune leapt down to join the other three. None of them sank into the churned up mud as they had done before. “I’ll be okay,” he said. “Sorry I wasn’t more help back there.”
Sunset shook her head. “Those things caught us all by surprise. I don’t remember reading anything about them.” She ran one hand through her hair, then looked disgusted when it came away dirty. “But they’re dead now, so let’s keep going. The lock shouldn’t be too far ahead.”
“I’ll lead the way,” Pyrrha said, in a tone that was far more statement than suggestion. She didn’t know exactly where Sunset’s or Jaune’s auras stood, but as Jaune had just recharged her aura, she knew that hers was in a healthy state, and she was a better fighter at close quarters than Ruby. So she would lead the way, and she did not intend to brook any argument upon this point.
Perhaps the others could sense that, for they offered none, and Pyrrha took the lead and let the others follow. Together, they scaled the earthen rampart that had grown up before them, an accumulation of dirt and detritus forming a kind of dam — or it would have been a dam if there had been any actual water left; they passed beneath another bridge, this one either destroyed in the battle for Mountain Glenn or else simply collapsed until the later and even more powerful onslaught of years. It didn’t take too long for them to find the lock that Sunset had identified, a dark metallic gate leading out of the waterway and back into the city proper.
Fortunately, the door still worked, even if it did creak open with painful slowness once activated.
Unfortunately, the sound of it activating drew five ursai out of the enormous pipes where they had been making their homes.
If Team SAPR had been in their best shape and fighting condition, then five ursai — they were none of them ursa major, only the younger minors — would have been, if not easy, then at least tolerable. Between them, they would have risen to the challenge.
But after their encounter with the slug grimm, the fact of the matter was that Team SAPR was not in peak condition. Sunset in particular was visibly struggling after her discharge of magic.
Pyrrha led the way in the attack on the ursa who advanced, growling and snuffling, towards them from out of the pipes, hoping to cut them down before they could reach her more battle-worn teammates. Miló spun in her hands, and Pyrrha spun too, red sash and red hair alike flying around her as she danced gracefully amongst these demons, striking down first one and then another as Ruby matched her kill for kill.
The fifth went for Sunset. Her rifle had been buried in the mud and couldn’t shoot; perhaps the spear extension mechanism was gummed up as well, or perhaps Sunset was too tired to remember it, because she didn’t use it; she just charged at the ursa with her bayonet pointing at the bear-like grimm.
With one paw, the ursa batted her thrust aside, and with the other, it swatted Sunset aside in turn, slamming her into the nearest wall hard enough to leave minute fractures in the grey concrete.
Sunset got up, but she was swaying on her feet like a drunken man, and when she drew Soteria, the black blade trembled in her hands as though the black blade had suddenly become too heavy for her to bear the weight.
The ursa stomped towards her.
Jaune threw himself between Sunset and the ursa with a defiant shout. The ursa roared back as it swiped at him with his paw. Jaune’s shield began to glow with the brilliant light of his semblance as he took the blow without flinching, then, with another shout, he hacked at the grimm in an orgy of wild slashing strokes, abandoning precision for a blunt ferocity that nevertheless put the last ursa dead and on its back in short order.
Jaune stared at the fruits of his labour in surprise for a moment before turning to Sunset. “Are you okay?”
“I think we both know the answer to that,” Sunset said softly as she sheathed her sword. “Thanks.”
“You’d have done the same for me, right?” Jaune said, as though what he had done was nothing at all. He turned his shield back to a scabbard, and sheathed his own sword in turn before holding out one hand to Sunset. “Do you need me to—?”
“No,” Sunset said quickly as she got out her scroll.
She brought up all the team’s aura levels, and as Pyrrha and Ruby joined them, Pyrrha could see the results as clearly as Sunset herself on the transparent screen. It didn’t make for particularly appealing reading. Jaune’s aura was in the yellow after being attacked by the grimm, using his semblance on Pyrrha, and then taking that attack from the ursa just now; Sunset’s was in the yellow and likely to get red if she took another couple of hits; Ruby and Pyrrha remained in the green with their auras, but in Pyrrha’s case, that was because Jaune put himself in the yellow for her.
“If you use your semblance on me, you’re going to risk going into the red,” Sunset said. She sighed and looked up at the sky. She sighed again, with great weariness. “Some of us are low on aura, I’m out of magic, and it’s getting dark. So we’re going to find somewhere to hold up for the night, get some rest, and get to the objective fresh in the morning.”
It was phrased as order, not suggestion and — not withstanding the fact that Pyrrha knew Sunset well enough by now to know, that they all knew Sunset well enough by now to know that she would be more open to suggestion and counter-argument than she let on at times like these — nobody took issue with it, just as nobody had taken issue with Pyrrha taking the lead, and for the same reason: because it was the right call. None of them had the night-vision that Blake or other faunus like her were blessed with, which meant that if they tried to push on through the dark, they would be at a double disadvantage against the grimm with their superior night vision and greater knowledge of the area, and with Jaune and Sunset’s auras in the state they were in, they could easily find themselves in a very difficult situation if they tried to push on, and all for what? Stubborn pride? There was no reason a single night’s delay should do them harm.
They quickly found somewhere to spend the night, somewhere close by the lock gate that had just opened for them, since spending a long time searching for a shelter would have risked defeating the object of seeking shelter at all: it was a low-rise tower block, one that looked as though it had been incomplete when the city was overrun, which meant that the team did not have to worry about coming across dead bodies or grim reminders of the fate of Mountain Glenn — as though they could forget it — to disturb their sleep too much. The walls were unfinished in many parts, and there was little to the interior besides a bare floor, but even when they climbed to the top floor about eight storeys high, there was still a roof over their heads, even if there was nothing but steel girders and the empty air on all sides.
They made a fire, acquiring kindling by ripping up a few of the floorboards from the ground floor and using a steel drum that had been abandoned on the third floor to contain the blaze that soon illuminated the darkness like a lighthouse beacon.
They had begun to eat — field rations, some sort of brown goop that was hopefully nutritious since it wasn’t particularly appetising — when a burst of static filled their ears and made them all jump.
“Team Sapphire? Team Sapphire, this is Professor Ozpin; can you hear me?”
Sunset put one hand to her ear. “This is Sunset Shimmer, Professor; we can hear you.”
Professor Ozpin sighed. “Good. I was hoping that we’d be able to reestablish contact. What’s your status, Miss Shimmer?”
“We’re not far from the old Main Street,” Sunset said. “We got into a couple of scraps with the local grimm, and I decided that it would be best to make camp for the night and continue in the morning.”
“I hope that only injuries were to your aura levels,” Professor Ozpin said.
“Yes, Professor,” Sunset said. “But—”
“I didn’t intend to reprimand you, Miss Shimmer, do not misunderstand me,” Professor Ozpin said. “Although recklessness is, on occasion, necessary, the situation where caution is a vice is very rare. I’m sure that you did the right thing. I’ll try and make sure that communications don’t fail again, but I can’t guarantee it, and unfortunately, I can’t promise to stay on the line. Doctor Oobleck will continue to monitor your progress as much as possible, but I’m afraid that I have other matters claiming a share of my attention at the moment.”
“Is everything okay back at Beacon, Professor?” Ruby asked.
“Yes, Miss Rose, there’s nothing for you to worry about,” Professor Ozpin said. “Don’t let it concern you, any of you. Focus on the mission, and tonight, focus on your rest. Goodnight, students.”
“Goodnight, Professor,” Pyrrha said before the line went dead, and they were left alone once more.
For a moment there was silence, with only the crackling of the fire in its metal drum to disturb the stillness of the night.
“Today was … not as easy as we might have liked,” Pyrrha said. “Certain grimm clearly felt more comfortable remaining in Mountain Glenn than they did following the train into Vale. Nevertheless, we are all still here, and tomorrow, rested and recovered and with an early start, there should be nothing stopping us from reaching our objective.
“The fact that we are having to overnight here is not a failure,” she insisted. “No one should see it as a failure.”
Ruby nodded. “What do you think we’ll find when we get there, to this Merlot place?”
“Someone living there?” Jaune suggested. “Maybe … more faunus who need rescuing, ones who weren’t saved by Rainbow Dash and Blake.”
“How could anyone live in a city full of grimm?” asked Ruby.
“Protected by their robots?” Jaune guessed.
“They would have to be very fortunate, if so,” Pyrrha said. “But I suppose it is not impossible, even if it is more likely that we will find … it is most likely we will find that someone has been there before us and removed things: the cages, maybe even the robots, other equipment. If that is the case, it may also be that whoever removed it is continuing work begun by Merlot Industries, and we may find clues to it.”
“What kind of work requires kidnapping faunus?” Jaune asked. “What kind of work requires kidnapping faunus and trapping grimm?”
Pyrrha’s brow furrowed beneath her circlet. “Sunset, did Blake or Rainbow tell you why the faunus were being kidnapped? For what purpose?”
Sunset didn’t answer. She was looking down at her boots, her ears drooped a little.
“Sunset?” Pyrrha prompted.
“Huh?” Sunset replied, looking up suddenly.
“I asked if Rainbow or Blake had told you why the faunus were being kidnapped,” Pyrrha said softly.
“Oh, um, no,” Sunset replied, in a voice that was distant and distracted. “No, they … they didn’t mention it.”
“Oh,” Pyrrha said. “That is a pity, but I dare say that we will muddle through regardless.”
“Mmm,” Sunset murmured. She got to her feet. “I’ll take the first watch.”
“Are you sure?” Pyrrha asked. “Perhaps you should rest and let your magic—”
“I’ll be fine,” Sunset said sharply. “I will … I’ll be fine.”


It wasn’t that Pyrrha didn’t trust Sunset to wake her up when it was her turn to take over watch, but … well, Pyrrha didn’t entirely trust Sunset to wake her up when it was her turn to take over watch, the way she’d been acting, and so, Pyrrha was woken up by the vibrating of her scroll, which Pyrrha had set for the purpose, against her thigh.
She opened her eyes, blinking the last vestiges of sleep away as she sat up, looking around the unfinished building where they rested.
Jaune and Ruby were asleep on either side of the metal drum, now devoid of flames.
Sunset stood on the very edge of the building, looking out across the dead expanse of Mountain Glenn which stretched far off on every side around them.
Pyrrha got up and made her way across the floor of the building to stand by Sunset’s side.
“Sunset?” she asked, her voice a soft whisper, so as to neither startle Sunset nor disturb the others.
Sunset glanced at her. “Hey,” she whispered, speaking softly in her turn. “What are you doing up? Couldn’t sleep?”
“It’s time for me to relieve you,” Pyrrha informed her.
Sunset shook her head. “Go back to sleep. I can do more.”
“You need rest as much as any of us,” Pyrrha said. “More, perhaps; none of the rest of us ran out of our magic—”
“That’s because you don’t have any,” Sunset pointed out.
Pyrrha gave Sunset a look. “You know what I mean. What makes you think that you can go without sleep?”
“Pyrrha, I’m not going to get any sleep here anyway, so one of us might as well,” Sunset managed the impressive feat of snapping while simultaneously keeping her voice down.
Pyrrha was silent for a moment, saying nothing but neither making any move to go. “It’s this place, isn’t it?” she asked. She paused for a moment. “Does it … does it speak to you?”
Sunset looked at her, green eyes wide. “You’ve heard it too?”
Pyrrha nodded. “Before we entered the city. It is probably just our own fears and doubts given voice, but—”
“That doesn’t make it easy to hear,” Sunset muttered. She looked away. “I will find no rest in this place.”
I see. Well, it isn’t as though you’d simply leave me in such a state and go back to bed.
“Is it what happened here the last time,” Pyrrha asked. “Or is it what it represents?”
“It is … a little of both,” Sunset said. “But more, it is … did Blake or Rainbow tell you about what happened when they went scouting ahead for the rest of us?”
Pyrrha shook her head. “No.”
“Blake got attacked by a chill,” Sunset said. “It … it possessed her, right through her aura, took her over.” She shuddered. “The thought of more of such things lurking here, unseen, the idea of something like that happening to you, to any of you, it … I cannot bear it. If that happened, I … it feels as though we barely escaped with our lives last time—”
“But we did escape,” Pyrrha said. “All of us. We came through safe and sound — we won — against more dangerous enemies and more numerous grimm. Yes, we have had a tough day, but that doesn’t change the fact that the grimm are fewer in number here than they were before.” She paused. “And while I cannot deny that what happened to Blake is…” Terrifying. “But Blake survived, so what happened?”
“Rainbow Dash used a pulse of her own aura to drive the chill out after it had taken possession,” Sunset explained. “Like when you activated Jaune’s aura.”
“I see,” Pyrrha murmured. “Then even that threat is … manageable. Thank you for telling me that; I know what to do now.”
“Unless you’re the one who gets possessed,” Sunset muttered.
Pyrrha didn’t respond to that, rather saying, “We are stronger than you think, Sunset.”
Sunset glanced at her. “You mean you’re stronger than you feared you might be.”
Pyrrha did not flinch in the face of that. “I cannot deny the truth of that. My victory has given me a surfeit of confidence that I felt myself lacking before.” She smiled. “It makes a change, does it not? You are usually the one surfeited with greater confidence than myself.”
“Or I am usually better at hiding the lack thereof than you,” Sunset said quietly. “But this place … it frays at confidence, real and assumed, all at once; I can neither be confident, nor can I pretend to be so. I feel … I feel as though we danced on the edge of the abyss when we were here last, and now, we are returned to tempt fate a second time. And for what?”
“We know not,” Pyrrha said. “That is why we are here.”
Sunset snorted. “True enough,” she conceded, “but what could we find here that would be worth the risk of venturing here to find it?”
“We will know tomorrow,” Pyrrha reminded her. She paused for a moment. “You do realise, of course, that our chances would be improved if you were to rest and recover your strength?”
Sunset let out a very soft chuckle. “Yes, yes, I am aware, with my … with what passes for my mind, my rational senses. And yet, I fear that sleep will not embrace me here.”
“Try at least,” Pyrrha urged. “Please. Or let me keep you company, lest you should sit with sorrows overlong and fall into a greater misery than is warranted.”
Sunset turned her head a little Pyrrha’s way, and a smile began to grow upon her lips. “I would be glad of your company,” she said.
“Thank you,” Pyrrha whispered. She paused a moment. “I think that if our places were reversed, this might be the moment when you told me that we must put aside melancholy and fight on, for we must triumph here that we may win great glory at the Vytal Festival that is soon to come.”
Sunset covered her mouth with one hand. “Yes, well … possibly, I would say something like that, indeed. Would it work on you?”
“Not particularly, I’m afraid.”
“No,” Sunset agreed. “Victory proved a balm for your misgivings that no words of mine could match.”

“And yet I welcomed your words, always,” Pyrrha assured her. “You know … you know that I am no longer the Champion of Mistral.”
Sunset’s eyebrows rose. “No?”
“No,” Pyrrha said. “They had the final match yesterday, in the Colosseum. Metella triumphed over Vespa.”
“I’m afraid those names mean nothing to me.”
“Vespa is … one of those faunus whom Blake would probably hate,” Pyrrha explained, “because she rather plays up to and upon her faunusness. She goes by Vespa the Wasp in the arena, and as you might guess, she is a wasp faunus — she has wings as her trait — and she wears a black and yellow banded cuirass and calls her semblance her sting.”
“What is her semblance?” asked Sunset.
“She shoots energy blasts out of her hands.”
Sunset frowned. “That doesn’t seem much like a sting to me.”
“No,” Pyrrha agreed. “Nevertheless, she is quite talented. Not quite on the level of myself, if that doesn’t seem too proud of me, but her wings give her great speed and mobility, she has a powerful ranged attack, and she is no slouch with the sword or the knife either. In my absence, and in the absence of Arslan, I would have wagered on her to take the laurels, if I were inclined to wager.”
“But she didn’t,” Sunset said. “She lost to this Metella person, who is she?”
“She is … better than Phoebe, and more pleasant,” Pyrrha said.
“Damning with faint praise there, rather, aren’t you?”
“Moreso than she deserves, clearly, but … I confess I would not have rated her to win the champion’s honours and dedicate her spoils to Victory,” Pyrrha admitted. “Metella is also a faunus, a fish faunus of some description, and perhaps for that reason, she calls herself the Mermaid Knight. Her armour is steel, but she covers the metal up all over with painted seashells, beautiful to look at, but … in battle, she swings her greatsword around wildly, making Cinder seem a model of precision and finesse by comparison. She is … one of those fighters of whom people say ‘she has a lot of heart.’”
“You mean because they can’t think of any actual compliments?” Sunset asked. “And yet, she won. She beat the favourite with her speed and agility and sword skill.”
“Precisely,” Pyrrha said. “Though the odds were against her, she battled on, and she went the distance.”
“Is this the outline of a point that I can see emerging?” Sunset asked.
Pyrrha let out the softest chuckle. “Yes, I think it might be,” she said. “I have — as you know, because I had unburdened myself to you — often felt … oppressed by the odds against us, and the odds against us are great. Salem, magic … so much that is so much grander than we are, and yet … like Metella, is it not fair to say that we have a lot of heart? And though it may appear that we lack other advantages, with that heart, may we not also triumph against the odds?”
“Winning that fight really went everywhere with you, didn’t it?” Sunset asked. “Head and heart alike.”
“Would you prefer that I be melancholy?” Pyrrha asked. “I could join you in your misery, and we could hope that in our respective despairs, we might offer consolation to the other.”
“Oh, no,” Sunset said. “This is … don’t worry; I like you this way, it is … it’s good to have you so full of hope. And you have a point; great powers have often fallen to unassuming heroes. Princess Twilight … might be offended to be called unassuming, but nevertheless. Nevertheless … nevertheless, I wish we were away from this place.”
Pyrrha placed a hand on Sunset’s shoulder. “By tomorrow night,” she said, “we will be somewhere else, somewhere better than this.”
“Home?”
“That depends on what we find in Merlot headquarters, I think,” Pyrrha said. “But by tomorrow, we will be away from here, at least. So take heart and try and get some rest. I will watch over you.”
Sunset smiled. “I know you will.”


They set off again the next day, with their auras restored and Sunset's magic presumably, hopefully renewed as well. They headed down what had once been Mountain Glenn's Main Street, a sight as dismal and full of reproachful melancholy as the rest of this dead, decaying city. The fading names above the store fronts were often familiar, big chains whose names were known across the whole of Remnant, plus a few that were no longer extant but which Pyrrha guessed had been just as big in their time. Some of the shop windows proclaimed 'Grand Opening,' while others advertised the latest toy, gadget, appliance, game that had been popular when the walls fell. Just looking at it filled Pyrrha with a deep sadness, and she was very glad when they left the street behind them and continued towards the dark and looming tower that dominated the skyline.
The Merlot Industries headquarters was a colossal structure, a tall and thin black monolith rising up into the sky like a lance to pierce the heavens. It looked like the sort of place an evil sorcerer would make his home, and Pyrrha would not have been surprised to find that nevermores made their nests in the high reaches of the place. With good fortune, they would not notice the four huntresses down on the ground, so far away that they must seem like ants.
They encountered no more grimm as they crossed the open square that surrounded the Merlot tower on all sides. No beowolves, no ursai, and if there were nevermores here, they were not interested in Team SAPR. They approached the tower quickly and were halfway there when the earth began to tremble violently beneath their feet, shaking and shuddering as though the surface were about to split in two.
"What's happen—?" Jaune began. "Oh my God!"
The tower was falling. Explosions tore at the base of the long, black lance, and it began to crumble, chunks tumbling down as the enormous building collapsed inwards on itself. As it fell, an enormous cloud of dust and debris rose up and began to race towards them.
"Run!" Pyrrha shouted, but it was too late. Cracks were already racing along the ground, spreading out all around them, racing ahead of them; the chances of Pyrrha or Jaune escaping were almost none, but between Ruby's speed and Sunset's teleportation—
"Don't even think about it," Ruby said, as though she had read Pyrrha's mind.
And then the ground gave way beneath them, and they fell, down and down into darkness, while the dust cloud from the collapse passed overhead and blocked out all light of the sun.
Pyrrha felt the impact like a heavy blow, bruising her aura but not threatening it, nor even threatening to send it into the yellow, according to her judgement. More worrying was the way that she had been plunged into darkness, unable to see a thing all around her.
She leapt to her feet, Miló in hand and Akoúo̱ upon her arm. "Jaune? Sunset? Ruby?"
A ball of green light appeared over Sunset's head, illuminating their team leader as she got to her feet. "Here. Everybody, over here! Ruby? Jaune?"
"I'm coming," Ruby said. "I see you, hang on."
"Jaune?" Pyrrha called, slightly more frantically, now that he had been the only one to not respond. "Can you hear me?"
"Yep," Jaune said, with a groan. "And I can see Sunset too; just give me a sec."
Pyrrha could not restrain a sigh of relief. "Are you alright?"
"Yeah, but let's not do that again for a while, okay?"
A nervous laugh escaped between Pyrrha's lips. "Okay."
They regrouped around Sunset and the light that hovered above her head.
"Everyone okay?" Sunset said. "Sorry about the lack of magical solutions; it was too dark, and it all happened too fast."
"It's okay," Ruby said. "We're all fine, so it doesn't matter."
"We're back in the underground city, aren't we?" Jaune said.
"Looks like," Sunset said as she switched on the flashlight strapped to the end of her rifle. "I should still have the undercity maps on my scroll from when we were here last time, so we can find the nearest subway station and—"
"Leaving so soon? But doesn't this just make you even more curious about what’s going on? Surely, you can’t want to just walk away before you’ve even begun unravelling the mystery."
That voice, that all-too-familiar voice in that insufferably arch tone, echoed from the rocks all around them. Jaune drew his sword, and Ruby unfolded Crescent Rose.
"Cinder," Sunset whispered.
A flame sparking from nothing in the palm of her hand illuminated the face of Cinder Fall, looking as though it was her birthday and she'd woken to an enormous pile of presents waiting for her.
"Hello again.”