Ambush in Mantle
When Rainbow Dash and Applejack told her that the Shadowbolts were jerks… Blake would never have expected that they’d have turned out to be underselling it.
Blake sat in the back of a cargo truck, the grey metallic walls enclosing her and her travelling companions, with no windows out into the world beyond their vehicle or even the cab where the androids were driving them through the Mantle streets. There was nothing in this little world but the six of them.
Which meant, unfortunately, that there was no way of getting away from them.
Sunny Flare was watching the news on her scroll – Sugarcoat was watching too, even if she had to lean on Sunny’s shoulder to do it – which at least meant that none of them were talking at the moment, although they would probably start again soon.
“In an attempt to revive his embattled campaign for the vacant Council seat, Jacques Schnee gave a speech in which he promised to reduce what he called overspend in the military budget to repair holes in the tattered social safety net-”
Sunny’s lip curled into a sneer as she slammed her scroll shut and put it away. “Typical. Absolutely typical. And I thought Principal Cinch endorsing him meant he was going to be different. Instead, he’s just like all the rest, pandering to these animals.”
“Excuse me?” Blake asked, her glance flickering between Sunny Flare and the faunus Lemon Zest – a pony faunus, like Rainbow Dash – who was sitting next to her.
Sunny gave Blake a flat stare in return. Sunny Flare was about of a height with Blake herself – Blake’s ears might have given her the edge in that department – with cerise eyes set in a round face. Her hair was purple with streaks of raspberry red, and cut short above her shoulders with a straight fringe. Like everyone in the truck – except for Blake – she was dressed in a black bodysuit, with hardened armour-like plates protecting the chest, shoulders, elbows, and knees. She had what looked like a flamethrower, with a glowing red tank of fire dust, resting on the floor of the vehicle behind her feet.
“Is there a problem, dearie?” she asked.
Sour Sweet laughed. She was the leader of this operation – everyone seemed to obey her orders, at least – and she was the tallest and, as far as Blake could tell, the fittest of the Shadowbolts; she moved with an athletic grace that reminded Blake of Pyrrha a little. Her eyes were indigo and brought out by the copious amounts of sickly green eyeshadow which she was wearing, while her complexion otherwise seemed a little jaundiced to Blake’s eyes. Her hair was rose-coloured and worn in a long ponytail descending down her back, with a single streak of aquamarine running through it. She wore a bow slung across her back, with a sealed quiver of arrows upon each hip.
“Oh, don’t get upset, Blake,” she said, in a soft tone, “Sunny wasn’t talking about faunus… she was talking about the poor.”
“It’s disgraceful,” Sunny declared. “This city is filling up with unemployed wasters who do nothing but cause trouble and complain about how hard their pathetic lives are, and no politician has the guts to tell them to stop moaning and pull themselves up by their bootstraps.”
“Really?” Blake murmured.
“The fact of the matter is that Mantle is doomed,” Sugarcoat pronounced in a dry, authoritative tone. She was the one that Blake had met before, at the party in Atlas when Jacques Schnee had announced he was running for Council, and she still wore her hair in the same triple tails on either side of and behind her head. She had what looked like a sniper rifle – or possibly a DMR – slung across her back, while an elegant sabre with an ornately-decorated hilt and a blade that looked so fragile it resembled glass more than metal rested upon her knees. “The mines were running dry in Nicholas Schnee’s time, and even continuing deep-level exploration and the concentration of dust processing here hasn’t made up the difference. The Willow Wells aren’t delivering one fifth of what they were predicted to on discovery, and the deeper the SDC digs, the more man-hours are lost to accidents.”
“Not to mention the men themselves,” Blake said softly.
Sugarcoat either didn’t hear or didn’t want to respond, because she continued as if Blake hadn’t spoken. “At the moment, the Council pays the SDC millions in tax breaks and subsidies to maintain operations in Mantle, but eventually, that’s not going to be enough to make it profitable to keep wasting money like this. Mantle needs to transition to a new model, or it needs to be allowed to die; it’s as simple as that.”
“It’s probably not as simple as it sounds,” Blake said.
“Crystal City did it,” Sugarcoat pointed out. “The name came from the mine the town grew up around and the dust crystals of superior purity that were dug up there. Then the mine ran out, and the city had to find some other way of justifying its existence. And it did; it became a testbed for military R&D. And now, it’s thriving like never before.”
“But of course, in Mantle, they’d rather bitch and moan and blame it all on Atlas,” Sunny growled. “I think the best thing that they could do for Mantle right now is to suspend all the laws for a night and let us just sweep through it, like a purge or something.”
“That wouldn’t solve any long term problems,” Sugarcoat pointed out in a dry tone.
“Maybe not, but there’d be fewer useless mouths to feed,” Sunny replied.
“Are you serious?!” Blake cried.
Sunny smirked. “Did I offend your delicate sensibilities?”
Blake got to her feet. “You’re talking about indiscriminate mass murder; you’re damn right I’m offended!”
Sunny’s smile remained fixed in place as a chuckle escaped her. She followed Blake up and onto her feet, walking forwards until mere inches, if that, separated the two of them.
“The Warrior Princess of Menagerie,” she said softly. “You know, I wasn’t sure why you would want to come to Atlas after the Battle of Vale, but now I get it! You hung around with Rainbow Dash and the Canterlot crew and you actually bought all of their crap. Comrades standing shoulder to shoulder, we fight as one, the Mettle, the spirit of Appleoosa, and all the other garbage, you thought that was what we were, didn’t you?” She chuckled again. “Newsflash, dearie, that’s not who we are. Despite what those losers think, Atlas didn’t get where it is today by being nice. Atlas got where it is today by being tougher, harder, and meaner than anyone who might try to mess with us, and by rejecting anything and anyone who makes us weak. So if you think I’m going to hold back on your account, you can think again. Only the strong deserve to survive, and all the strength left Mantle long ago.”
“Come on, Sunny, if that were true, it wouldn’t be any fun to do anything about it,” Indigo Zap declared. She wore her hair in the same style as Rainbow Dash – and like Dash, she wore a set of goggles perched just above her golden eyes – but all of the warm colours had been leached out of it, leaving only cool blues, a deep cornflower shot through with lighter arctic streaks. She had no visible weapons, but her gauntlets glowed yellow with what Blake guessed to be lightning dust. “The whole point of this mission is that we get to test ourselves against these Happy Huntresses. Personally, I hope they put up a fight. It’s only by testing ourselves against the best that we become better, right?”
Yes, the mission. The reason Blake was in here with these people. The reason she had come down to Mantle in the first place, the reason they were all hiding in this truck. A group known as the Happy Huntresses - led by Robyn Hill, of whom Rainbow Dash was decidedly not fond - had been stealing military supplies from trucks moving between depots in the city. The plan was to conceal themselves in just such a truck and proceed to ambush the ambushers; more Shadowbolts – Fleur de Lis, Jet Set, Upper Crust, and Suri Polomare – were waiting with a Skyray to provide air support if necessary.
“With luck,” Sour Sweet had said at the briefing, “we’ll be able to arrest all four of these ‘Happy Huntresses’ and put this whole business to bed in a single night.” Her face hardened. “And if we don’t, then I’ll know just whose incompetence was to blame.”
Blake's eyes narrowed as she continued to stare at Sunny Flare. “General Ironwood-”
“Is a man out of his time,” Sugarcoat declared. “A throwback to a bygone era.”
“I don’t believe that,” Blake said. “Everything that I’ve seen-”
How much was that, really?
Even Rainbow Dash was surprised by the character of the commanding officer when we got to Cold Harbour.
“Aren’t you seeing us?” Sugarcoat asked.
Blake glanced once more to Lemon Zest, the other faunus in the truck besides her. Her eyes were closed, and on top of her long green hair sat a set of customised headphones that covered all four of her ears. She was tapping one foot on the floor of the truck, while her weapon – some sort of cannon with a chainsaw grip – sat propped against the wall beside her.
“Yeah, Lemon’s not going to have your back; she’ll be out of it until the mission begins,” Sunny told her.
“Heeeeeey,” Sour Sweet said, drawing out the word as she took Blake and Sunny by the shoulders and carefully pushed them away from one another. “Come on, girls, let’s not fight each other. After all, we are on a combat mission.” She laughed. “And Sunny, Principal Cinch asked Blake to come along on this mission because she sees something in her, so I think that she’d want us to gently mentor Blake into the proper way of doing things, not push her away with… well… with all of your you.” She smiled. “Plus, you know, we’re in the hot zone right now, so I suggest you both sit down, shut up, and get set for an intervention; do I make myself clear?!”
Sunny sucked in a breath through clenched teeth. “Yes,” she muttered.
“Okay,” Blake muttered.
“That’s better,” Sour Sweet said. “By which, of course, I mean it took you long enough.” She waited for them to both sit down before she stalked back to her seat.
“May I say one more thing?” Sugarcoat asked.
Sour Sweet stared at her. “Do you have to?”
“I’d just like to leave Blake with one thought,” Sugarcoat said. “Jacques Schnee has been publicly accused of condoning the physical abuse of his workforce, and yet, he is still polling at above thirty percent.”
Blake looked away and didn’t reply. She wasn’t sure how to reply because… because, damn it, she was right. That did say something about Atlas, and what it said wasn’t good. Even if you assumed the best case scenario that a lot of people were so disconnected from politics they hadn’t noticed the allegations, well… that wasn't brilliant, either. It was just a little better than the idea that they just didn’t care.
She had told herself that Jacques Schnee and the SDC was an anomaly, that it was an outlier in the emerging Atlas that she had seen, but had she been wrong? Were they right, were they the real face of Atlas, was the SDC the real face of Atlas, was Jacques Schnee the real face of Atlas? Were all the friends that she had made, Rainbow Dash and Twilight, Ciel, Weiss, all of Rainbow and Twilight’s other friends, were they all just… people out of time, like Sugarcoat said? Was General Ironwood, kind and supportive, a walking anachronism destined to be replaced by someone less congenial?
No. No, she couldn’t believe that; she had seen too much goodness in Atlas to believe that all of those she had seen be good and kind were nothing more than anomalies.
But did you see enough before you made this choice?
Trixie, Starlight, it’s not like I spent all my time with Team RSPT.
More of the Canterlot crew, as Sunny would put it.
Sunny is a word my mother wouldn’t like me to use, and what about my mother? What about the treaty between Atlas and Menagerie, what about Councillor Cadance, what about the new CCT, is that the action of a predatory kingdom, one that worships strength above everything else?
Unless it’s just that Menagerie has something Atlas wants.
The SDC hasn’t gotten what it wanted out of it.
I came here. I met with other Atlesians beyond the ones that first befriended me. I didn’t trust blindly.
But perhaps I didn’t look far enough.
Rainbow warned me that I might not like what I found at Cold Harbour. She warned me about the Shadowbolts.
She didn’t warn me strongly enough; she must have known what they were like.
Was Rainbow only showing me the good parts of Atlas all along?
If she was, then why? She must have known that I’d find out sooner or later.
I understand why she didn’t want me to spend any time with these girls.
I just wish I knew if I wished that I’d listened.
Even if they aren’t the real Atlas, they are a side of Atlas – over thirty percent – and it’s probably good that I’ve finally noticed that.
Finally.
Provided that I can do something about it.
Provided that I don’t have to stay in this truck with them for too much longer.
“Hey,” Blake murmured, looking up from her deliberations.
Sour Sweet sighed. “What?”
“Did you girls know anyone called Ilia Amitola?”
Sunny Flare reflexively rubbed her jaw in what was, for Blake, a very satisfying gesture. “Yeah, we knew an Ilia Amitola.”
“Tough nut,” Indigo added. “Principal Cinch liked her. Pity she turned out to be so sensitive.”
“Why?” Sunny demanded.
“No reason,” Blake murmured.
“Oh, well, I’m glad we were able to satisfy your curiosity,” Sour Sweet hissed. “Next time keep it to yourself.”
The truck rolled to a stop.
Indigo grinned. “I think this is our cue,” she said, tapping Lemon Zest on the shoulder.
Lemon took off her headphones. “What did I miss?”
Everybody stared at her.
“What?” she hissed.
Sour Sweet rolled her eyes. “Stack up,” she whispered. “Weapons ready.”
Blake was closest to the door, along with Indigo Zap, whose gauntlets crackled with electricity as she raised them in a boxing stance. Blake drew Gambol Shroud, her weapon flowing fluidly into pistol configuration as she aimed it at the door. Sugarcoat held her sword loosely in her hand. Sunny Flare set off a brief burst of flame from her flamethrower.
“Take them alive,” Sour Sweet ordered. “If possible.”
The double doors at the back of the truck swung open, revealing Robyn Hill – Blake recognised her from her interview after the sabyr incursion – and all three of her associates standing in front of said doors, eyes widening at the sight of the six Atlesian specialists confronting them.
“Surprise!” Lemon called in a cheery, sing-song voice.
“Scramble!” Robyn yelled, as she and her associates split up, each fleeing in a different direction. “Lose them and meet up back at the hideout!”
Indigo Zap let out a lupine howl, the sound echoing through the grim and dimly lit Mantle street. “I call the big one!” she yelled as she jumped out of the truck and took off in pursuit of the tallest and burliest of Robyn’s crew.
Blake jumped out too, but waited for orders as the rest of the Shadowbolts exited the truck.
“Sugarcoat, take the faunus,” Sour Sweet commanded. “Sunny, Lemon, with me, we’ve got Robyn. Blake, handle the blue one.”
Alone? Blake thought, but said nothing as her legs began to move, pounding down the street after one of the two smaller members of the Happy Huntresses, the one whose blue hair was illuminated by the flickering street lights she passed beneath.
She certainly didn’t question her orders, for all that it wasn’t the way she would have played it, and probably not the way that Rainbow would have played it either.
Still, it wasn’t as though there weren’t reasons to take this decision. Robyn Hill was a former Vytal Festival champion, and a former Atlesian specialist to boot. The other three, by contrast, were unknown quantities and probably lesser threats. Counting on a single specialist to be a match for them was arguably smarter than underestimating Robyn herself.
Plus, she wasn’t sorry to get away from the Shadowbolts.
So she pursued her target as she fled down the street. Robyn and the others broke off, turning down side streets and back alleys to try and lose their pursuers in the maze of Mantle, but the blue-haired girl kept on going straight, kept on running, kept on trying to put pure distance between herself and Blake.
Blake saw her keep turning around, looking over her shoulder, seeing if Blake had fallen behind or given up yet.
Blake didn’t intend to do either of those things.
The streets of Mantle were old, dilapidated in some cases, with crumbling facades and rusting pipes and fire escapes, but those same fire escapes and the exposed pipes offered purchase for her hook as she transformed Gambol Shroud back into sword mode and swung from such exposures to gain ground on her quarry. The street lights were old, and half of them didn’t even seem to work, but the ornate, old-fashioned metalwork likewise gave her places to swing from or to leap from. While her prey had to dodge cars or leap over bonnets as she navigated the teeming roads, Blake was free to swing across, carried safely over the heads of the vehicles coming below.
Her target turned away at last, darting into the mouth of an alley jutting off the road. Blake followed, hard upon her heels, only to find the alley empty.
There was nothing there. The darkness was concealing nothing from her faunus eyes; she was seeing nothing because there was nothing there to see.
But that wasn’t possible. She’d been right behind the other girl. There was no way that she could have gotten out the other end of what was a pretty long alley before Blake got here.
It wasn’t as though there was anywhere to hide; it was just a straight shot down the alley.
So where had she gone? How had she managed to lose Blake? It wasn’t possible, unless…
Blake’s eyes narrowed. Slowly, holding Gambol Shroud in one hand, she bent down and picked up an abandoned beer can lying on the street and threw it down the alley.
It disappeared from view.
Blake gritted her teeth as she charged forward, bursting through the area of her quarry’s semblance as her target came into view.
She was dressed in a long brown coat, with metal vambraces on each wrist and more armour protecting her belly. She was armed with a bladed staff, the blades curving backwards at each end of the weapon which she swung at Blake. Blake’s clone dissipated under the blow as the real Blake caught her opponent in the face with a spinning kick which sent her reeling into the alley wall.
Blake landed on the ground. “Surrender peacefully and-”
The blue-haired girl turned, her long ponytail flying around her as she slashed at Blake with an overhead poleaxe strike down upon her head.
The blow split Blake’s head in two and drove into her body, moments before said body turned into a sculpture made of ice which erupted outwards, trapping the Happy Huntress’s staff within its grip and sticking it fast.
Blake, mindful of the orders that the Happy Huntresses were to be taken alive, sheathed Gambol Shroud upon her back. “Now will you surrender?”
“Never!” the blue-haired huntress shouted, abandoning her weapon and lunging at Blake with one fist drawn back.
Blake dodged the blow, her body bending with a supple athleticism as she kicked the other girl again, sending her flying up into the air to hit the wall and roll back down onto the alley floor.
Blake was on her as she scrambled to get to her feet, grabbing her by one arm and slapping the restraints around her wrist. As the girl threw a clumsy punch with her other hand, Blake grabbed it and fastened the restraints around that arm too.
“You are under arrest,” Blake declared. “Whoever you are.”
The girl stared up at her, her olive eyes blazing with anger. “Up yours, cop.”
“I’ve been called worse,” Blake muttered as she hauled the other girl up to her feet. She looked young. Younger than Blake had expected, although she wasn’t sure why she hadn’t expected her to be young. She supposed that she’d sort of suspected the ground would be contemporaries of Robyn Hill herself, perhaps even her teammates, although she conceded that she had had no logical basis for that notion. The identities of the other three members of the Happy Huntresses were unknown; only their leader, Robyn, had been identified.
So she recruited a kid to follow her. Now, who does that remind me of?
The girl with the blue hair glared at her. “So what happens now?”
Now, Blake ought to call it in, get a transport to come and pick the girl up. That was what she ought to do, but somehow, she… dammit, she looked so young. She was just a kid, barely any older than Blake. If Blake deserved a second chance, then surely she did too? If a better way had been found for Blake, then…
“You’re coming with me,” Blake said. “Do you know of anywhere good to get coffee around here?”
The blue-haired huntress stared at her. “Are you kidding me right now?”
“No,” Blake replied.
“You want to go for coffee? Now?”
“That’s why I asked?”
The golden eyes of the other huntress narrowed. “Will you buy me one?”
“That was the general idea, yes,” Blake said dryly.
“Will you take these cuffs off?”
“No.”
The other girl snorted. “Okay, I know a place.”
The girl led her – sort of, Blake had hold of her by the collar and one arm and was sort of manhandling her along even as she was following the other girl’s directions – out of the alleyway and through the streets into a slightly more populated part of Mantle, where open-topped trucks carrying dirt-encrusted miners back from their shift drove along the roads, where street vendors sold fried food on sticks for passersby, where those on their way home after work passed those heading out to theirs. Bars emptied out and filled up again. The street lights worked a little better here, and people stood and chatted under the spots where the yellow glow dispersed the darkness of the night.
And over it all, the mighty airships of the Atlesian fleet loomed, blocking out the stars and casting their silhouettes before the moon, and yet, at the same time, providing new stars as their lights blinked red and green amidst the darkness.
Nobody interfered with Blake or her captive; in fact, they gave her so wide a berth that it was as if she had a disease, or fleas. But, even as they cleared out of her way, many of them glowered at Blake, gave her dirty looks, spat on her as she went by.
“I’m not very popular around here, am I?” Blake murmured.
“Nobody likes a cop,” the other girl said.
“I’m a Spec-”
“Down here, in this town, you’re a cop,” the other girl insisted. “And, well, you’re not exactly dressed to blend in. You stink of Atlas. You look like the personification of the boot upon our necks down here in Mantle. You come down here like this, of course people are going to hate you.”
“Nobody seemed to hate me the last time I was here,” Blake said.
“What were you doing the last time you were here?”
Blake was quiet for a moment. “The school run,” she said.
The blue-haired huntress snorted. “The school run! Oh, yeah, I forgot, that’s something you do, isn’t it? The brave soldiers of Atlas, fearlessly facing down nursery schoolers.”
“And sabyrs,” Blake said.
The other huntress looked at her. “That was you?”
“And a friend of mine,” Blake said. She couldn’t help but add. “I didn’t see you there.”
The blue-haired huntress snorted. “There’s only four of us. You know, maybe if Atlas didn’t keep railroading all the graduates into the military, we might have some spare huntsmen lying around to help take care of our community, did you ever think of that!” She gestured with her head. “This is the place.”
The place turned out to be a rather dingy diner, where the windows were too grubby in places to see out of and half the neon red lights spelling out the name above said windows didn’t work, so that the name of the place appeared to be "AB E S DI E." The interior was small, with a row of booths running along the window wall and single chairs lined up against the counter. Weary-looking men and women, human and faunus alike, all caked in sweat and dressed in labouring clothes and workman’s boots, sat at the counter or in the booths, and their tired eyes turned to Blake and her prisoner as they made their way to a free booth in the middle of the room.
No sooner had the two of them sat down than Blake noticed people starting to leave, as though Blake was driving them away with a bad smell.
That, or they were worried that the other Happy Huntresses might try to rescue their comrade and feared to be caught in the crossfire.
She drew Gambol Shroud and switched it to pistol configuration as she rested the weapon on her lap.
“Is that necessary?” the other huntress asked.
“You tell me,” Blake replied.
The blue haired girl rested her shackled hands upon the table. “Are you going to take these off?”
“No.”
“Then what do you need the gun for?”
“In case any of your friends show up,” Blake replied.
The other huntress watched her warily.
Blake leaned back. “Is this place any good?”
The blue haired girl shrugged. “Don’t expect a chai latte or anything, but it’s okay.”
Blake put that away for future reference, even as she grabbed the menus from their stand by the dirty window and passed one to her prisoner. “Are you sure you don’t want to tell me your name?”
The other girl didn’t respond.
Blake waited a moment longer, before she said, “My name’s Blake. Blake Belladonna.”
The other huntress remained silent for a few more moments. “May Marigold.”
“I’d say it was a pleasure to meet you, but that might sound rather disingenuous in the circumstances,” Blake murmured.
May snorted.
A waitress, a squirrel faunus with a grey tail rising up behind her back, dressed in a pink and white striped blouse, approached their table; there were bags beneath her eyes, and her steps were slow.
“What can I get you?” she asked, her voice tired and disinterested.
Blake glanced over the menu. “I’ll have a large Atlesiano.”
“Cappuccino,” May said, “and a bacon sandwich.” She grinned at Blake. “I mean, since you’re paying, right?”
Blake didn’t say anything; it would have been very churlish to have begrudged May the food, not to mention been counterproductive to convincing May that she, Blake, was on her side.
The waitress scribbled down their orders. “I’ll get right on it,” she said, as she walked away.
“Is she going to spit in my coffee?” Blake asked.
“Someone probably will,” May replied cheerily. “I mean, you are the oppressor after all.”
“I’m not oppressing anyone,” Blake said, “and neither is Atlas.”
May looked into her eyes. “Is that what you really think?”
“Yes,” Blake replied.
“Then what are we doing here?” May demanded. “Why aren’t I in a truck being driven away to lock-up?”
“I want to talk.”
“You couldn’t talk to me in an interrogation room?” May asked. “I’m not complaining, but-”
“I want to talk in a less... adversarial context,” Blake explained. “I want to help you, May.”
May snorted. “Help me? How? Are you going to cut me a deal if I sell out my friends? Do you think buying me a coffee will be enough to make me turn on Robyn?”
“That’s not what I meant, I’m not here to offer you a deal,” Blake said. Not yet, anyway. “I’m here to try to get you to think about what you’re doing.”
“I know what I’m doing, I’m fighting for the freedom of Mantle.”
“I know that’s what you think you’re doing,” Blake said. “I know that you think your cause is just-”
“Our cause is just!”
“How many innocents are you hurting in the pursuit of that justice?”
“None!”
“Because nobody who supports the status quo, even by inaction, is innocent? Because in a world where bigotry and oppression are the default there is no such thing as innocence?” Blake demanded.
“No, because we don’t go around hurting innocent people,” May insisted. “What do you think we are?”
“I think you’re a terrorist group.”
“Is that what they told you?” May asked incredulously. “Is that what they’re calling us now? Terrorists?”
“They didn’t tell me very much,” Blake admitted, and her encounter with the Shadowbolts had left a sufficient mark on her that she couldn’t help but wonder if that lack of information on the group’s activities had been deliberate. “But you were caught red-handed attempting to rob military property.”
“We thought we were robbing an unguarded truck,” May insisted. “Nobody would have gotten hurt; nobody did get hurt; we disengaged, if you remember, because we don’t start fights with the military.”
“You just steal from it.”
“All the stuff we were going to steal could have been replaced in a day,” May said dismissively.
“Then what was the point in stealing it?” Blake demanded. “You don’t even think you’re weakening the military, so why?”
May looked away, pouting slightly. “None of your business.”
Blake frowned, but didn’t say anything straight away, because at that point, the waitress returned with their coffees and May’s bacon sandwich. The cups looked clean, at least, although it was a very greasy-looking sandwich.
“Do you really want to eat that?” Blake asked.
“Yes,” May replied, picking up with her shackled hands. “It may not look great, but you get used to stuff like this.” She glanced at Blake’s coffee. “Do you want to drink that?”
Blake pushed the cup an inch away from her. “I’m not sure.”
May sniggered, before she tore a chunk out of her sandwich and wolfed it down.
“So you’re committing crimes that even you know aren’t going to get you anywhere for reasons you can’t explain,” Blake observed. “Does Robyn tell you that it’s to raise awareness? To put you on the map? Does she say that you have to do something, anything, to strike back against your oppressors?”
May swallowed. “What makes you think she says anything like that?”
“Does she inspire you?” Blake asked.
“What’s it to you?”
“Does she make you want to be like her?”
“Are you going to arrest Robyn for being a good leader?”
“Does she make you feel like you’re her family?”
“Robyn is my family, and we’re hers!” May snapped. “The Huntresses are my family!”
“No,” Blake said, “they’re not; they’re a gang, and they’re using you because that’s what people like that, people like Robyn, do. May, I’ve been where you are; I know how it starts. I know what it’s like to sit at the feet of a charismatic leader who makes you feel so special, who makes you feel as if you mean the world to her. I know how it starts, with petty acts of violence which steadily ramp up until-”
“You don’t know me, and you don’t know the Happy Huntresses!” May growled. “And stop talking to me like that, how old are you?”
“Nineteen,” Blake said.
“Well, I’m twenty-three, so stop talking to me like I’m your little sister,” May said. “What makes you think you…?” She paused. “Wait a second, I know who you are, Blake Belladonna! You’re the Menagerie Princess, aren’t you?”
“That’s what some people call me,” Blake murmured.
“You used to be White Fang, didn’t you?” May asked. “Sure, they came up with some cover story to make it look like they weren’t welcoming a terrorist – an actual terrorist – with open arms, but that was a load of BS, wasn’t it?”
“Some good friends showed me a better way,” Blake said.
May drank some of her cappuccino. “So… what? Are you going to pay it forward by saving me? Are you going to show me a better way?” She snorted. “Well, thanks for your concern, but the Happy Huntresses aren’t the White Fang, and I don’t need you to ‘rescue’ me.” She picked up her sandwich again. “But, since we’re here, you mind telling me how an ex-White Fang fighter from Menagerie who studied at Beacon ends up an Atlesian specialist?” She took a bite.
“I found a cause,” Blake said.
May’s golden eyes bulged, and the sandwich dropped from her hands as she started to cough violently, so violently that Blake feared she was choking to death. Crumbs of bread sprayed out of her mouth as she leaned over the table, hacking away, red-faced.
Blake leaned over and gave her a thump on the back, expelling a stringy, gristly fragment of half-chewed bacon from out of her mouth and onto the table where it stuck, surrounded by a thin layer of saliva. Blake delicately picked it up with a napkin and deposited it on May’s plate before dabbing at the damp spot on the table itself.
May was silent for a minute, breathing heavily in and out, drinking deeply of her coffee. She stared up at Blake, astonishment in her eyes, long before she leaned back and finally spoke again. “'A cause'?”
“You’re welcome,” Blake murmured.
“For what, almost killing me?” May demanded. “'A cause'? That’s your answer, you found a cause? Atlas? The glory of the North Kingdom? What do you know about Atlas? Had you even been here before you decided to join the military?”
“Once,” Blake said.
“Oh, great,” May said. “Let me guess: you spent some time with General Ironwood, you met Councillor Cadenza, you were onboard an Atlesian ship, you hung out with Atlas students, you visited the city as a tourist, and you imagined that you had seen Atlas.”
“And you’re going to tell me that I hadn’t,” Blake said quietly.
“You’re damn right I am, because you hadn’t,” May insisted. “You hadn’t seen Atlas; you’d met a couple of important people, hung out with a few less important people, and seen a few beauty spots. Where did they show you? These Are My Jewels?”
Blake did not reply.
“They didn’t show you Mantle, did they?” May asked. “They didn’t show you the dust mines or the slums-”
“They showed me Low Town under Atlas,” Blake declared. “And I’ve heard stories about Mantle.”
“From your friends in the White Fang?” May asked. “Maybe you should have paid more attention.”
Blake was silent for a moment. “I met so many good people,” she said. “I thought that Atlas must, itself, be a force for good in the world.”
“You thought?” May asked. “You don’t think any more?”
“No, I still believe that,” Blake insisted. “Although I’m starting to wonder if I might have to fight for that point of view against those who don’t feel that way about this kingdom.”
“Atlas isn’t a force for good,” May said, shaking her head at Blake’s naïveté.
“Atlas protects those who can’t protect themselves,” Blake said. “Atlas protected Vale when it was in need-”
“Atlas protected Vale to make itself look good, and then they left when nobody was watching anymore,” May said. “Do you think that Atlas would have given a crap about Vale if it hadn’t been for the Vytal Festival and all the cameras watching?”
“Yes,” Blake said firmly. “The Atlesian military has its arms around humanity-“
“Yeah, yeah, Atlas is holding up the world, blah, blah, blah; I’ve heard it all before,” May said. “I don’t believe it any more just because you’re saying it.”
“Atlas protects Mantle,” Blake declared.
“Oh, well, that’s very big of them, isn’t it?” May snapped. “After taking our money and our best and brightest like some giant vacuum sucking the life out of Mantle, how very nice of them to spend a fraction of the lien they take from us on keeping us safe from the grimm. Let me tell you what Atlas really is-”
“A superpredator?” Blake guessed.
May’s eyebrows rose. “No. Who told you that?”
“The people chasing the rest of your group,” Blake explained.
“Well, they’re full of crap too,” May pronounced. “Atlas is a belly. It’s a stomach, and Mantle and Canterlot and Crystal City are the arms; we’re the ones who actually do the work, who gather up the food which the belly then consumes. All of it, leaving nothing for the limbs who actually gathered up that food which it digests so ravenously.
“Let me tell you something: we wouldn’t need Atlesian protection if we weren’t being screwed out of everything we have by Atlas. If we were free, if we governed ourselves, then we could defend ourselves with the strength of our huntsmen and huntresses; if we had control of our dust, then we could afford to house the homeless and feed our kids instead of inflating Jacques Schnee’s bank balance.”
“Mantle is a net beneficiary of Atlesian spending-”
“That’s what they say,” May replied. “That’s what they want us to think so that we feel grateful for this largesse that is being lavished upon us, but ask yourself, if that’s true, why do they keep us around? If that’s true, why are we being branded a terrorist group? If Mantle costs Atlas so much to support then why won’t they let us leave?”
“Does Mantle want to leave?” Blake asked.
“We don’t know; they won’t even let us have a vote on it,” May said.
“Robyn Hill can’t even clear twenty percent in the polls, and you think Mantle will vote for independence?”
“I think Robyn can’t clear twenty percent because the votes in Atlas are against her,” May insisted. “Here in Mantle, she’s a hero.”
“Perhaps,” Blake conceded. After all, Sienna Khan was a hero to many too. The same might even be said of Adam. “But if that happened, if Mantle went its own way, then what would you do? Where would you go?”
May frowned. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“'Chai latte' was my first clue,” Blake said. “But more importantly, the idea of a state as a body with the ‘working’ elements of society as limbs and the ruling elite as a belly was first recorded by the Mistralian philosopher Plotius in the eighth century, although, ironically, he was arguing against greater democratic participation in public life-”
“Because in his story, when the limbs expelled the belly from the body, they found they couldn’t digest any food without it, and they atrophied from starvation,” May muttered.
“I thought that was where the analogy fell down, as well,” Blake agreed. “But the point is, I doubt that you learned that down here in Mantle. You’re from Atlas, aren’t you?”
“Kind of patronising, don’t you think?” May suggested. “I mean, you’re right in this case, but still, just assuming that because I’m well read, I couldn’t be from Mantle?”
“You’re not,” Blake pointed out.
“Lucky guess; that doesn’t change the fact that I could be!” May snapped. “I mean, you know about Plotius too, Miss White Fang; where did you go to school?”
“…here and there,” Blake admitted. “My mother was a big believer in education.”
“And you think no Mantle mothers feel the same way.”
“It’s not my experience of Mantle mothers.”
May couldn’t avoid a chuckle at that. “Okay, I know what you’re talking about, and… fair point, but that doesn’t change the fact that you’re a patronising ass.”
“Perhaps,” Blake conceded. “So tell me, what’s an Atlesian elite doing in Mantle, committing crimes?”
May smirked. “I found a cause.”
Blake looked at her, and her feline ears drooped slightly towards her head.
“What?” May asked. “You can say that, but I can’t?”
“My cause isn’t criminality.”
“I prefer ‘outlaw’ to criminal,” May said.
Blake’s eyebrows rose. “'Outlaw'?”
“You’ve heard of Plotius, but you don’t know what an outlaw is?”
“I know what an outlaw is,” Blake said. “Or at least I understand the kind of outlaw you seem to be referring to: a good man forced to go outside the law to fight some wicked lord.”
“Pretty much, yeah.”
“There are no lords here in Atlas.”
“Plenty of wickedness, though,” May replied. She drained her cappuccino. “Look, do you really want to understand what we’re about?”
Blake leaned forwards. “Yes,” she said, “I absolutely do.”
May looked into Blake’s eyes. “Okay,” she said. “Let’s get out of here, and I’ll show you.”
Blake paid the bill, including for the coffee that she hadn’t quite dared to drink, and then May led her out of the diner and a few blocks down. The contrast between the grimy streets and dirt-encrusted buildings of Mantle, and the gleaming wealth of Atlas could scarcely have been more pronounced. Again, the people cleared the way for them, glaring and glowering at Blake as she passed by. It was no surprise that they recognised her for a soldier of Atlas; she was better dressed by far than any of them in their rough labouring gear or fraying parkas, their trousers that were starting to develop holes, their boots that were coming apart at the soles. Blake, in her long white coat which billowed around her as she walked, in her polished black boots of pristine quality and her good-as-new black pants, must have seemed like a creature from another world.
As far as they’re concerned, I am from another world.
A world which holds them in submission.
May brought Blake to a street where the drains had overflowed, causing large puddles to develop where the road and pavement met; thankfully, there were no vehicles around to splash them as they walked. The building to which May brought her was three storeys high, the upper two looking residential, with windows – only some of which were illuminated – protected by iron railings. The front of the ground floor was elegantly-styled, with opaque green windows similarly protected by ornate black rails patterned after Mistralian columns, with a glowing green cross above the door. However, May led her around the side, where the building was much plainer, where a single window was unprotected and a white light glowed above a simple green door.
May pushed open the door with both her shackled hands and led the way inside. It was a doctor’s office of some kind, was Blake’s best guess, judging by the bed in the corner with the monitoring devices powered down overhead, but there were also numerous bookshelves on the walls, along with various assorted curios like a whale statue or some empty bottles or the like. There was also a desk, piled high with paperwork, and in the other corner of the room, a great many boxes, neatly stacked up, stamped with the Atlesian symbol of the gear and spear.
May stared at them, even as Blake did. She raised her restrained hands to her face. “Doc!”
“I’ll be right with you.” The voice that emerged from behind the stacked up paperwork was rich and fruity. A few moments later, a man emerged, a portly fellow with a round face and hair and beard that were grey and turning to white. A pair of very small round spectacles, reminding Blake a little of Professor Ozpin, sat upon his nose, and he was dressed in a cream shirt and brown pants, with a red waistcoat which, collectively, seemed in a better state than most of what people were wearing in Mantle tonight. He did not walk, but sat atop a robotic chair which moved for him upon four whirring legs, which he seemed to control by thought, given the way he was not touching either of the blue control panels mounted on the arms. “Ah, hello again, May, and who’s your new friend?” He didn’t appear to have noticed that May was in handcuffs.
“Doc, what is that?” May said, gesturing with both hands to the pile of stolen goods. “You were supposed to take everything out of the boxes and get rid of them!”
“I know, and I meant to get around to it, but then someone came in needing to have some work done, so I had to deal with that, and then, well, one thing drives out another, as you’ll admit.”
“They’re stolen goods, Doc,” May insisted, “what if a cop showed up?”
“Oh, the police never bother me. Seriously, aren’t you going to introduce me?”
“This is Blake,” May said. “A cop.”
“Technically, I’m a Spe-”
“You’re a cop,” May said. “You’ve got me in handcuffs; you’re a cop.” She sighed. “Anyway, this is Pietro Polendina.”
“Nice to meet you, young lady,” Pietro said, either oblivious or uncaring of the fact that he could be charged as an accessory to the crimes of the Happy Huntresses.
“'Polendina'?” Blake repeated. She recalled something that Ciel had told her, a long time ago.
“Her father is one of the brightest minds in Atlas. Of the men who might be said or have been said to be his equal; one is dead, and the other wastes his talents in a clinic in Mantle.”
“Are you… are you by any chance connected to Penny Polendina?”
“Oh, you know Penny?” Pietro asked. He chuckled. “What am I saying? Everyone knows Penny these days.”
“Yes,” Blake acknowledged. “They do. But I was lucky enough to work with her before she became famous.”
“Ah, I see,” Pietro replied. “Well, no I don’t, but I don’t much suppose it matters. Yes, I’m connected to Penny, you might say. I’m her… you could call me her uncle or her second father or both. Japeth and I developed the idea and worked on the project together… until he kicked me off of it.”
“He threw you out?” Blake asked. “And took all the credit?”
“Sharing has never been one of Japeth’s strong suits,” Pietro said. “But it was my fault. I found my conscience a little too late, got cold feet about turning Penny over to the military. It didn’t seem right, once we’d created a life, that we shouldn’t give her a chance to work out for herself what she wanted to do with that life. Japeth reported me, and since the military was paying the bills for everything, they decided that they didn’t need my talents anymore.” He sighed. “They might have done me a favour; I never liked going up to Atlas to work. Too clean, too sterile. I’m happier where I am, down here, with my feet… well, not on the ground, maybe, but close enough.”
“And what is it that you do here?” Blake asked. “With stolen military property?”
“I know, it’s wrong, and if I had a better way, I’d take it,” Pietro said apologetically, “but when you run a free clinic, well, the clue is in the name. I have a stipend from my government work that keeps the lights on, but not enough to get materials for the prosthetics for those that need them.”
“Mining injuries, industrial accidents, incidents in their crappy homes,” May said, “there’s a lot of reasons people can end up missing an arm, or a leg, or an eye. A lot of people who could use a robotic replacement to help them get back on their feet. You know what the SDC’s insurance looks like? It looks like an accountant laughing at the idea that you get insurance, and even when people are insured, it’s not enough to cover the cost of a good prosthetic. People depend on this clinic, and Pietro depends on us.”
“And what about the soldiers and veterans who are also waiting for a robotic replacement?” Blake demanded. “Don’t the people who lost limbs in battle deserve to get back on their feet too?”
“And they will,” May said. “Like I said, all the stuff we take can be replaced in a day, and the soldiers don’t have to pay any extra. The military takes care of its people; the rest of Mantle has only got us.”
Blake frowned. There was some force in what May said. Even Jacques Schnee had admitted that the social safety net down here in Mantle had holes in it, and when you had holes, people fell through them. Yes, technically, he was receiving stolen property, but he didn’t exactly look like a fence; he wasn’t even selling the stuff on.
“So this is what you do?” Blake said. “You steal from the military and give it away?”
“Like I told you,” May said, “outlaws.”
“Hmm,” Blake murmured. “Okay, I won’t report this,” she said, gesturing to the pile of clearly marked evidence in the corner, “although May’s right, you should unpack before someone less generous comes calling. But you are still going to have to come with me.”
“Really?” May asked. “Still?”
“It’s still a crime,” Blake reminded her. “A jury here in Mantle will probably see things your way, but I don’t get to pre-empt that. I have to bring you in.”
“I’m afraid I can’t let you do that,” the voice of Robyn Hill declared.
It came from behind her.
Slowly, carefully, Blake raised her hands. “The last time I saw you, you were being pursued by three specialists.”
“Your people aren’t as good as they think they are,” Robyn observed.
“No,” Blake agreed. “That sounds about right.”
“May,” Robyn said. “Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine,” May assured her. “Joanna and Fiona, are they-?”
“They got them,” Robyn growled. “But I think General Ironwood will give them back in exchange for his new protégé, the daughter of his new friends in Menagerie.”
“You’re going to take me hostage?” Blake asked, her voice soft and even.
“Not my first choice,” Robyn replied. “I’d be lying if I said I liked the idea. But my first duty is to my people. I’ll do what I have to for them.”
“I knew someone who thought like that,” Blake murmured. “She made some terrible mistakes.”
“I’ve made mistakes of my own,” Robyn said. “But I don’t think this is one of them.”
Blake was silent for a moment. She knew Robyn’s reputation: Vytal Festival champion, rising star turned bogeyman of the Atlesian military. Not a pushover, for sure. Nevertheless, she had no choice. “I’m afraid I hope it is.”
May’s eyes widened. “Robyn, her semblance is-”
Blake’s clone disappeared in a puff of smoke as the real Blake materialised directly in front of Robyn, her foot lashing out in a kick that caught Robyn in the face and knocked her backwards out the clinic door and into the street beyond. Blake drew Gambol Shroud as she pursued, and the moonlight shone upon the black blade as she descended, spinning, upon her adversary.
Robyn raised her right hand; upon her wrist was mounted a kind of bow, supported by what looked like wings of metal, as though there was a falcon perched upon her wrist. She used the steel wings like a buckler, shielding herself from the blow of Gambol Shroud which glanced off it with a shower of sparks. Blake leapt away, landing down the street even as Robyn scrambled upright.
Blake grabbed her cleaver with her free hand, and as Robyn raised her bow to aim at Blake, Blake was already on the move towards her, darting left and right as she came on.
Robyn fired. The street was clear, but Blake couldn’t guarantee how far in either direction it stayed that way, so she used a stone clone to take the arrow rather than risk it hitting a civilian down the road. As the missile stuck in her rocky clone, the real Blake struck with a spinning kick aimed squarely for Robyn’s face.
Robyn took the blow upon one arm and then grabbed Blake’s ankle with her other hand, a scowl settling upon her face as she pirouetted in place, spinning Blake around like a hammer before tossing her away. Blake’s hair whipped about her as she was tossed aside, slamming into a lamppost hard enough to crumple the metal. She winced as she felt her aura drop under the force of the impact, and the groans of pain kept escaping her as she dropped to the cold street beneath.
Gambol Shroud shifted to pistol configuration in her hands as Blake rose onto one knee, the gun spitting fire once, twice, three times in Robyn’s direction.
Robyn caught the bullets on her wings, shielding herself with them as she crossed her arm across her body. The bullets ricocheted away, pinging off the metal to be flung away into the darkness.
Blake gritted her teeth as she switched her weapon back into its sword form. Robyn’s weapon might be useful as a shield, but it was still a ranged weapon at the end of the day, and that meant that she had a better chance if she closed to melee and used her agility and semblance to her advantage. She pushed herself up onto her feet and charged towards Robyn.
Robyn fired but missed, the arrow going some way past Blake’s shoulder.
Blake barely paid attention Robyn’s poor aim except to thank her good fortune as she rushed forward, body bent low, crouching for a—
The arrow, which must have bounced off at least one surface, hit her on the back of the shoulder hard enough to stagger Blake, the momentum of her rush falling away and leaving her open for Robyn’s counterattack. The leader of the Happy Huntresses rushed her in turn, a scowl upon her face, a wordless growl rising out of her lips as she raised her fist to deliver a powerful strike to Blake’s face which sent her staggering, followed by a knee into that same face as Blake bent almost double under the attack. Blake cried out, burning a shadow clone to get away before Robyn could sweep her legs out from under her. She appeared in mid-air, and once more, her weapon shifted from sword to gun as she fired a shot at her target, even as she flipped over her back to land with perfect poise upon the cobbled street.
Blake panted for breath. Obviously, now wasn’t the best time to check her aura, but she guessed that she had to be in the yellow after this.
She’s good. I can see why everyone thought so highly of her.
Honestly, her best option at this point was probably to disengage, her chances of victory being doubtful. Like Ciel said, a fruitless victory was not worth a single life spent to attain it.
But it would irk her to run, even so. Maybe it was just her pride talking, but it would stick in her craw to let not only Robyn but May as well slip through her fingers, to look like a failure in the eyes of the Shadowbolts and General Ironwood and the others. To run away from someone who had betrayed the cause for which she fought.
And besides, there was no guarantee that she would be able to get away. Robyn wasn’t likely to just let her break off the fight, and there was no guarantee Blake was fast enough to escape her.
And my aura is only in the yellow. I still have some fight left in me.
Or perhaps I’m just not assimilated enough yet.
Whatever the answer, she switched Gambol Shroud back to sword, holding it in her right hand with her cleaver in her left. Her eyes glanced around the street. She could swing on that lamppost and then-
Robyn levelled her bow and fired again. Blake wasn’t going to make the same mistake this time; as the arrow whipped past her, Blake’s hand darted out and caught it in a deft motion.
Red lights began to flash up and down the shaft, giving Blake just enough time to realise what she’d done before it exploded.
The fire consumed her, the light blinding her, the heat tearing at her aura, the sound of the bang hammering at her ears. Blake cried out, her sensitive eyes screwed tightly shut, as she staggered out of the smoke and the flame, the cleaver slipping from her grasp as she shielded her face with one hand. She coughed, forcing the smoke up out of her throat.
She heard Robyn shout and knew that the older woman was charging for her, just as she knew that she wouldn’t be able to respond in time.
As Blake struggled to open her eyes, she heard the whine of an engine, a voice raised in angry counterpoint to Robyn’s shout, and saw a burst of iridescent light flash before her.
She opened her eyes fully, blinking a little as the smoke of the blast still stung them.
Rainbow Dash stood between Blake and Robyn Hill, the Wings of Harmony unfurled upon her back, blocking Robyn’s punch with both arms, one hand grasping Robyn’s fist.
Her goggles made her eyes seem redder than before, and her face was set in a snarl of rage.
“Rainbow Dash?” Blake murmured in disbelief.
Rainbow didn’t respond. She didn’t get the chance as Robyn slashed at her with her own razor wings, going for her eyes. Rainbow leaned back, the blow passing over her head, but it weakened her grip on Robyn’s fist enough for her to leap away.
Rainbow pursued her, a rainbow trailing after her as she pressed home the attack, fists swinging.
Applejack landed next to Blake, the cobbles cracking under the impact as she descended like a thunderbolt, landing on her knees, one fist punching the ground.
“You okay, sugarcube?” she asked Blake as she got to her feet. “You look like you took nasty hit there.”
“I… I’ll be okay,” Blake said, although a check of her aura revealed it was very nearly in the red. “What are you two doing here?”
“We’ll explain later,” Applejack promised. “Once we’ve taken care of this varmint over here.” She pulled One in a Thousand over her shoulder and worked the lever to chamber her first round. She raised the rifle to her shoulder. “Rainbow Dash! Clear the field!”
Fire gushed from the Wings of Harmony as Rainbow Dash leapt into the air, carried aloft by her wingpack and leaving Robyn completely exposed.
One in a Thousand roared as Applejack advanced. Robyn covered her chest as the round ricocheted off her wings. Applejack kept the rifle to her shoulder as she worked the lever, then fired again with another roar from her rifle. The bullet struck the ground as Robyn leapt backwards. Applejack continued to bear down on her, kept the rifle at her shoulder, worked the lever, fired again. Robyn covered her face with her wings, and again, the round bounced off the aura-enhanced metal.
Rainbow Dash swooped down out of the darkness, descending on Robyn with her leg outstretched for a kick.
Robyn turned aside, grabbing Rainbow’s leg to do to her what she had done to Blake-
One in a Thousand roared again, and Robyn cried out as she released Rainbow’s leg, clutching at her arm where the bullet had struck her. Rainbow’s other foot lashed out, catching Robyn on the jaw and sending her staggering backwards.
Rainbow landed, fists flying.
Robyn met her with her own fists and with her sharp wings. She was taller than Rainbow Dash, and had a little reach on her too, and although she might prefer to fight from a distance, it was clear that she was no slouch in hand-to-hand combat.
She is a Vytal Champion, after all, Blake thought, as she watched Robyn and Rainbow trade blocks and punches; neither of them really managed to connect a blow because each of them was just blocking the others strikes, taking it on their arms without ever letting a fist get near their body.
It was easy to see why Robyn had once been the pride of Atlas; she wasn’t letting the new pride of Atlas – or she who hoped to hold that title – get close to her; that was more than Adam had managed to say, for all that he had been the Sword of the Faunus in his time.
Mind you, Rainbow was being cautious; she hadn’t used her aura boom. She didn’t want to wear out her aura in the face of an opponent like Robyn.
That was probably wise of her… wiser, it had to be admitted, than Blake had been.
Meanwhile, Robyn seemed notably less confident now than she had been. “May!” she yelled. “Get out of here!”
May emerged from out of the clinic, hands still bound – it appeared that Pietro was not sufficiently in league with the group to remove her restraints, or else, he simply hadn’t noticed that she was still wearing them – and darted away, running down the street away from the battle.
“I’ve got her!” Rainbow yelled, leaping back away from Robyn, leaving a rainbow trail as she outpaced her opponent to take off down the street after the fleeing May, effortlessly catching her and sweeping her legs to dump her down upon her back before, without slowing down for even a moment, Rainbow charged straight back at Robyn, the rainbow blazing out behind her.
Applejack let her rifle fall to her side in one hand. The other hand she clenched into a fist and, with a mighty roar, brought that fist down upon the ground just as Rainbow leapt up into the air.
Blake staggered sideways, struggling to keep her footing as the ground shook under the impact of Applejack’s blow. Robyn struggled too, her guard faltering as she fought to keep from falling, and Rainbow Dash – who wasn’t affected because her feet had already left the ground – took advantage of the opening with a one-two punch to Robyn’s face and stomach that sent her reeling.
Robyn counterattacked, slashing with her wings to drive Rainbow back, then using the breathing room to turn on Blake, firing another arrow in her direction.
Blake leapt aside; movement, not reflexes or taking comfort in an apparent miss, was the key to dodging Robyn’s arrows. She didn’t feel a strike as she flung out her hook, catching it on the wrought iron of the lamppost and using it to swing in a wide arc around Robyn and across the street, landing nimbly on her feet next to Rainbow Dash.
“I think,” she said quietly, “that I have just enough dust left for an Ice Surprise.”
Rainbow glanced at her. “You sure?”
Blake nodded. “I’m sure.”
Rainbow grinned. “Then let’s go.”
Blake didn’t say anything. She just ran at Robyn, Gambol Shroud and her cleaver-sheath swept out on either side of her, her boots tapping on the cobblestones as she charged. Her black hair streamed out into the night behind her, flowing above her billowing white tailcoat, as she bared her teeth at Robyn Hill and swept her ebony blade back for a strike.
Robyn sought to get her blow in first, throwing her punch straight at Blake’s face. The blow landed, but the Blake she had struck transformed into an ice clone which erupted, the ice expanding to trap Robyn’s arm in its cold embrace.
Rainbow sped forward, trailing a rainbow that was all her own, her hair glowing with iridescent light as she swung her fist towards the icy prison, and in doing so, she at last unleashed her aura boom.
The sound echoed down the street like the explosion of a missile. Even a few windows shattered. Blake had no idea how much of her aura Rainbow had used, but she wouldn’t have been surprised if it was as much as half of it. The ice that had held Robyn fast was shattered into pieces by the blow, pieces which hammered into Robyn’s face and body, even as the shockwaves of the aura attack continued to ripple outwards, slamming into Robyn, lifting her up into the air, tossing her down the street like a discarded toy, spinning over and over in the air.
Flying, spinning down the street to where Applejack was waiting for her.
Waiting with her fist drawn back to catch Robyn with a semblance-strengthened punch which reversed Robyn’s momentum completely, knocking her back the way she’d come and down into the ground hard enough to shatter her aura and leave her groaning, motionless, down on the ground between them.
It was clear that she was not going to get back up again.
There was a moment of silence in the street, all sounds of battle ceased, a calm descending in the night.
A calm that was broken by Rainbow’s exultant cry. “Yes!” she yelled, as she thrust both her arms up into the air. “We got Robyn Hill! Woo!”
Blake pursed her lips and looked away. She did not feel particularly triumphant. It might be that they had brought down a wanted felon, an enemy of Atlas, but – as strange as it might seem, considering that she had forsaken flight in order to continue the battle – it brought her no joy. She sought inside herself to try and understand why and found that she could not help but think about the parts in Pietro’s clinic. Robyn Hill, criminal though she was, had nevertheless stood up for Mantle and for the forgotten people who had fallen through the cracks of Atlesian society. Who would stand for them now, with Robyn and all her followers imprisoned?
Is it possible that we have done more harm than we have prevented?
Rainbow left Applejack to put the restraints on Robyn, while she turned back to Blake. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Blake said. “Although if you hadn’t turned up when you did… why did you show up when you did, anyway?”
“We wanted to make sure you were okay,” Rainbow explained. “So we had Twilight follow you with a drone while we waited in an airship with Midnight.”
Blake’s eyes narrowed. “You spied on me?”
“Well, when you put it like that, it sounds weird,” Rainbow complained, rolling her eyes. “We were just looking out for you. 'Cause that’s what partners do.”
“Right,” Blake murmured. She wasn’t sure why she was surprised; it was nothing personal, or rather, their concern was personal, but their intrusive methods were not. General Ironwood’s paternalism had rubbed off on his prize pupils.
Not that she had much room to complain. She had, after all, needed the help. “Thank you,” she said quietly.
“Any time,” Rainbow said.
Applejack stood up. “I’m real glad that you’re okay, sugarcube, but do you mind telling us why you were bein’ such a damn fool in the first place? Why’d you walk that other girl all over town ‘stead of just callin’ in a prison bus when you first got her?”
“I… I wanted to understand,” Blake explained. “I wanted to understand why she was doing this.”
“They’re doing it because they’re a bunch of lawbreakers led by a deserter, and they-”
“No, Rainbow Dash, that’s not it,” Blake insisted. “I think they really believe they’re helping this city.”
“Uh huh,” Applejack said sceptically. “And what do you believe?”
Blake was silent for a moment. “I think that maybe it could use the help.”
Rainbow frowned. “There’s a right way and a wrong way to do things, and robbing our trucks-”
“I’m not condoning their actions; I’m just saying that their motives are more noble than you're giving them credit for,” Blake said. “I was like them once; I thought that everything I was doing was justified by the nobility of my cause. That was why I wanted to talk to May; I wanted to try and help her the way that… the way that you helped me.”
Rainbow coughed. “Well, when you put it like that…” She trailed off for a moment. “Why did she take you here?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Blake said quickly.
“Doesn’t it?” Rainbow replied, looking around. “Hey, isn’t that-?”
“Leave it,” Blake said firmly. “Please, Rainbow, let it go. We’ve got Robyn, and May; that’s enough.”
Rainbow stared at her, brow furrowed, before she nodded. “Fine,” she said. “Let’s call a transport and-”
“Rainbow Dash? Applejack? Blake, can you hear me?” Twilight’s voice sounded through Blake’s earpiece and into her ear.
“Twilight?” Blake said.
“Hi, Blake,” Twilight said. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Blake murmured. “Thank you for following me without my permission.”
Twilight laughed nervously. “Well, it all worked out in the end, right? Anyway, I’ve just gotten word from General Ironwood: we’re all to report back to him in Atlas, immediately.”
Rainbow wasn’t piloting the Skyray as it flew through the night sky back towards Mantle. Instead, Midnight had the controls, sitting in her modified body as she guided the airship homeward, leaving Rainbow free to sit with Blake, Twilight, and Applejack in the main compartment.
Blake sat with her legs spread apart, her hands clasped together over the open space between her knees.
Her head was bowed, and she looked at her clasped hands as the airship bore them back to Atlas.
“What do you think General Ironwood wants with all of us?” Applejack asked.
“Something important,” Rainbow replied. “Something big, I bet.”
“How do you figure that?” asked Applejack.
“Because it’s all three of us,” Rainbow responded. “And we all know. I think we might even be moving soon.”
Applejack whistled. “Well, maybe you’re right. I don’t rightly know how to feel about that. 'Cause if you are right, then that means she’s coming for us.”
“Not necessarily,” Twilight ventured. “I mean, it’s a possibility, certainly, but…” She trailed off for a moment. “It could mean that she’s going somewhere else, like…”
“Like Menagerie?” Blake asked, not looking up from her lap.
Twilight took a moment to reply, “Word could have come.”
Blake nodded. Word could have come. A message could have come from Menagerie in the night. She could be on her way to be told that Salem’s evil had taken root in her home, and her parents—
“We don’t know that it’s Menagerie,” Rainbow insisted. “It could be Mistral. Maybe that ambassador guy has said something that’s raising red lights.”
“Shining Armor was going to go and see him,” Twilight agreed. “Although… well, obviously, it will be good news that it isn’t Menagerie in the firing line, but if it’s Mistral, well, poor Pyrrha.”
“We’ll find out when we arrive,” Applejack said. “Ain’t no point worryin’ over what we might be about find out when we’ll get told all we need to soon enough.” She snorted. “Might we’ll get there and find it was nothing to do with Salem whatsoever.”
Rainbow chuckled. “Yeah, maybe. Like you said, no point worrying too much, huh? So, Blake, how was your mission with the Shadowbolts?”
Blake looked up, and into Rainbow’s eyes. “You didn’t tell me what they’d be like.”
Rainbow’s eyebrows rose. “We told you they were jerks.”
“You didn’t tell me they were psychotic,” Blake replied fiercely. “One of them talked about how she wanted to hunt poor people through the streets!”
“Seriously?” Applejack asked.
“Mhm,” Blake said, nodding.
Applejack pushed her hat backwards on her head a little bit. “Well, I never heard that one before.”
“They said they were the real face of Atlas,” Blake murmured.
Rainbow snorted. “Yeah, right.”
“Are they wrong?” Blake asked.
Rainbow rolled her eyes. “Oh, come on! Are you kidding me with this? I spend literally months showing you all the good things about this kingdom, and those jackasses come along and undo all of my hard work in one night?”
“That’s the point,” Blake said softly. “You showed me all the good things. All the good people. What about the things that you didn’t show me, the people you didn’t show me—?”
“Was I supposed to introduce you to everyone in the kingdom so that you could add up the good ones and compare it to the number of bad ones?” Rainbow demanded. “Sure, I introduced you to the best people I know, but I also introduced you to the Great and Powerful Trixie, and you still wanted to come here after that.”
“Rainbow Dash,” Twilight murmured reproachfully.
“I’m just saying, I didn’t sugarcoat this kingdom for you, if that’s what you mean,” Rainbow insisted. “General Ironwood, Councillor Cadance, our friends, Tsunami, this kingdom is full of good people.”
“And bad ones?” Blake asked.
“Every orchard has its bad apples,” Applejack said. “It don’t make it a bad orchard.”
“I know,” Blake murmured. “I just… between talking to the Shadowbolts and talking to May, I feel as though there’s a whole side of Atlas that I hadn’t seen before.”
“What side is that?” Twilight asked.
“The vicious side,” Blake answered. “The side that only respects strength.”
“Atlas doesn’t have a side like that,” Rainbow insisted. “The Shadowbolts want there to be a side like that because-”
“Because they’re a group of bad people who just happened to find each other?” Blake suggested, not keeping the sarcasm out of her voice.
“Like calls to like,” Applejack declared.
“Looking at you and your friends-”
“Our friends,” Twilight corrected.
Blake smiled slightly. “Our friends, yes, the point is that you don’t exactly have the same interests… or anything apparently in common at all, to be honest.” She shook her head. “Anyway, my real point is that…”
“You wish that you’d never taken the mission?” Rainbow guessed.
“No,” Blake said. “But I’m not sure that I’m glad we succeeded. The Happy Huntresses… they seem like they might have been the only people trying to help Mantle.”
“By stealing from the military?” Rainbow demanded incredulously.
“By giving to those who can’t get it from anywhere else,” Blake replied. “To be honest, after tonight, I’ve got a lot more sympathy with those asking why Atlas could afford to help Menagerie but can’t help its own poor down in Mantle.” She paused, judging that there was little chance now of any of them going back to the clinic, even if she told them the truth. “Twilight, do you know a Doctor Pietro Polendina?”
“Of course,” Twilight said. “He worked on Penny’s early development along with his brother, but left because of personal difficulties. He works in-”
“It was his clinic, wasn’t it?” Rainbow said loudly. “I knew I recognised it.”
“I’m a little surprised you’d been there before,” Blake said.
“I’ve flown Twi down to visit him a couple of times,” Rainbow explained.
“Is he involved with the Happy Huntresses?!” Twilight asked, sounding aghast.
“The Happy Huntresses supply him with parts to make prosthetics for those who can’t get insurance,” Blake explained. “I didn’t think he deserved to be arrested for helping people.”
“His way of helping people involves breakin’ the law,” Applejack pointed out.
“What moral force is there in an unjust law?” Blake demanded. “If Sunny Flare got her way and days of indiscriminate violence were instituted in Mantle, would you go along with it simply because it was the law? Why is it, in the greatest kingdom in Remnant, that people have to be dependent on a supply line from crime in order to get the prosthetics they need?”
“They shouldn’t have to be,” Rainbow said.
Blake blinked. “You agree with me?”
“You thought I wouldn’t?”
“Honestly? No, I never expected you to agree with me about this.”
“I don’t like Robyn Hill; it doesn’t mean I want to stamp on the poor,” Rainbow said reproachfully.
“You don’t get nothin’ for nothin’,” Applejack said.
“Oh, come on, Applejack, don’t give me that,” Rainbow replied. “What does Jacques Schnee do to make his money? He just sits back in his big house, and it just rolls in, day after day. Why should he have everything when the people who actually do the work have nothing?”
Blake couldn’t help but smirk at this sudden unexpected turn from Rainbow Dash.
“What?” Rainbow asked. “Just because I lived with Twi for a bit doesn’t mean that I forgot that I grew up poor. If Atlas did more to help Mantle and Low Town, then people like Gilda wouldn’t have joined the White Fang, then maybe people in Mantle wouldn’t spit on a soldier the way they do, maybe things would be better. Maybe we’d be an even more awesome kingdom than we are now.”
“Money isn’t unlimited,” Twilight pointed out.
“Even Jacques Schnee recognises the current system is broken,” Blake pointed out.
“Recognises he needs more votes, more like,” Applejack muttered.
“Either way, his money is unlimited, so he can pay for everything,” Rainbow said. “Problems solved.”
“I’m not sure that’s how it works,” Twilight murmured.
“I know that Altas isn’t perfect,” Rainbow said, “but Robyn Hill and the Happy Huntresses? That’s not how you deal with it. You don’t set your uniform on fire and declare war on Atlas. What good’s that going to do?”
“It stocks Pietro’s clinic,” Blake pointed out.
“Not any more, now that they’re in jail,” Rainbow responded. “Besides, sure, the doc’s clinic helps some people, but not everyone, and they were never going to be able to keep helping him the same way; he’s not going to be able to keep helping people. No offence to him, but he’s not going to be around forever. I mean, when you were speaking to that girl-“
“May?”
“Yeah, her, what does she actually expect to happen?”
“She wants independence for Mantle,” Blake explained.
“Huh,” Rainbow replied. “It’s a plan, I guess, but I don’t see it happening. The only way to make Atlas a better place is from the inside. That’s why we have to keep working, so we can get into a place where we can change things. We’ll tax the rich to give to the poor and make everywhere in the kingdom as great as Atlas.”
Blake smiled. “Just like that?”
Rainbow nodded. “Just like that.”
Blake leaned back. If only it were so simple. Nevertheless, even if the answers were a little more complicated, that didn’t mean there were no solutions.
They just had to be found.
And so she thought on them as the airship carried them back to Atlas.