Chapter 14

The lights were spaced along the walls just enough to dispel the darkness, not to truly illuminate the hallway. The vaults beneath Beacon containing the Grimm holding cells were all poorly lit. Ruby wasn't sure if the point was to emphasize the darkness of the creatures within, or the school's administration didn't feel like spending money on the electricity needed to light up an area people almost never went. Either way, the end result was there was a distinct creepiness that came with being in the vaults. Behind the sealed doors, you could faintly make out the sounds of Grimm prowling in their cages or struggling against their restraints.

"I'm still not sure we should be down here." The ever cautious Weiss was saying. Normally, Ruby found her constant nagging annoying but now she was just glad Weiss had more or less come out of her funk. Ruby knew enough to know that it wasn't likely to stick, but you had to keep on someone and keep them from dwelling on it. Which was part of the purpose of this little field trip.

"Oh, it'll be fine." Ruby reassured her partner. "No one's gonna care if we just take a quick look." Privately she wasn't entirely sure about that, but after staring death in the face the threat of detention didn't have much sting to it.

"Besides," Yang added. "Don't you want to see him? You never did get a close look earlier." Ruby and Weiss hadn't been in the group that brought Subject Alpha down, and the team had flown back in a separate bullhead. Consequently, Ruby hadn't gotten any more than half a look at the man at the heart of Project Icarus. She was really curious. They passed several more cells until they reached the end of the hall and a thick and heavy metal door. Yang pressed the button on the wall beside it and the door slid open with a grinding noise that suggested it wasn't used very often.

Within was a large space, nearly completely empty. Contrary to the area outside, this room was brightly lit with fluorescent lights. Coupled with the bare pale walls and floor, it almost felt like a white void. The only thing that broke the effect, the only object in the entire room, was a black metal cell standing in the center of the room. It stood eight feet tall and half as wide with handles dotting the outside so it could be carried, though even Yang would be hard pressed to lug it very far. The only gap in the exterior was a small window sunk into the metal at about face height.

Ruby stepped forward and peered through the window. All she could see was a bruised face with shaggy black hair. His hands were locked into restraints above his head with the distinctive hum of active Aura surpressors. The way his eyes were closed tiredly and how he seemed to hang there limply, he looked as though he had been beaten into submission. Which, come to think of it, he had. "Did they really need to lock him up like this?"

"He's dangerous." Blake replied softly. The cat Faunus didn't like it much more than Ruby did, but she was a realist. "He attacked Shadow squad without warning; we can't leave him to his own devices."

"Yeah, but…" 'It's wrong to treat people this way', Ruby might have said but it sounded painfully childish even to her. There was just something about his haggard appearance that made her feel really sorry for him. He had been kidnapped, imprisoned, and experimented on. She couldn't really fault him for being mad as hell about it.

Ruby had intended to watch Alpha for just another moment, but she jumped backward as his head rose and eyes opened. He stared at her, eyes narrowed and saying nothing. They stayed like that, watching each other silently for a minute. Finally, he caved. "What do you want?" His voice was scratchy, like he hadn't used it in a long time.

"I don't want anything." Ruby answered. "What do you want?"

Alpha's eyes widened a bit before narrowly suspiciously. "I don't want anything."

Ruby was pretty sure that was a lie, but didn't press it. Something occurred to her. "What's your name? Subject Alpha can't be your real name, after all." It'd just be rude to keep calling him that.

'Subject Alpha' didn't respond to her question. He just slumped against his restraints and dropped his head again. Ruby tried to cautiously prod him into answering. "Well…? Is it Jason? Or Hector? Or, wait, let me think…Hercules?"

He looked up and stared at her with emotionless eyes. "I do not remember."

"You don't remember your name?" Weiss asked incredulously. Ruby had almost forgotten the rest of them were there. "How?"

Alpha looked past her, not seeing any of them as he relived his memories. "The scientists put in their machine to be their fuel, ripping my power from my body for their experiments. Every time they did so, I had to put my mind back together myself." There were the faintest signs of a smile on his face, as if he wanted to try to play it off as no big deal but couldn't muster the nonchalance needed. "Eventually, things started to slip away. My name went pretty early, I think."

Ruby digested that. It was a common enough urban legend that a person's Semblance was a manifestation of their soul. So, if you were having your Semblance forcibly activated and twisted by someone else, that would probably do a number on your psyche. Alpha kept talking, the dam broken. "I can still remember I had a brother, and a mother. But not a father, that I am very clear on. Even if I've forgotten why, I can still remember that." His eyes burned with a quiet determination, despite the hauntedness. "I will not forget."

Ruby stood deep in thought for a moment before making her decision. "Okay then, I'm gonna call you Frank until you can remember your real name."

"What?" The painful emptiness of the newly christened Frank's expression had been replaced with surprise.

"Ruby, you can't just give him a new name." Blake admonished.

"Sure I can." Ruby replied, already committed to the idea. "It'll just be a temporary one until he gets his memory back. 'Sides, we can't just keep calling him Alpha, that'd be weird."

"Why Frank?" Yang asked.

"I dunno, he looks like a Frank to me."

Weiss sighed, resigned. "Won't you be used to calling him Frank by the time he gets his name back?" She tried to reason. "You'd keep calling him by the wrong name."

Ruby pshhed. "Frank can just be a nickname by then. You worry too much."

All of them were interrupted by a quiet chuckle. Frank was watching them with a slim curl to his lips. "And what is your name, girl?" he asked Ruby.

"I'm Ruby Rose. That's my sister Yang, and our teammates Weiss and Blake."

Frank cocked his head. "Ruby Rose, you are without a doubt the oddest scientist I have ever met. None of the other researchers cared what I was called."

"Huh?" Ruby didn't know where he was getting that. "We're not scientists. What makes you think that?"

Frank looked at her like she was an idiot. "Who else would know me as Subject Alpha?"

Before she could reply, the lights shifted to a red hue and a klaxon began to blare. Over the noise, Ruby could make out a crisp female voice coming over the PA system. "All students are to be advised, the campus is under lockdown. All students are to report to designated shelter areas immediately. Failure to comply with this instruction will result in exceedingly strict disciplinary measures."

Beacon's communication room, about two thirds of the way up the campus' central tower, was the scene of devastation. There was a rather large hole in one of the walls, none of the room's advanced surveillance or communication equipment had been left in functioning state, and that wasn't even considering the bodies that littered the floor.

Blood dripped freely from the gash in Glynda's leg. It wasn't a truly serious injury, though it was enough to keeping her from standing or putting weight on the leg. At first, she had thought herself extremely fortunate when she had survived a brush with Mortis Manus' famous Bloody Hand with only a minor wound. Then Bart had darted in to protect her and been nearly disemboweled by Mortis, and she understood.

Conventional military thinking, contrary to what the average citizen might think, disapproved of killing enemy combatants in most cases. A dead solider was one enemy out of the fight, but a wounded one wasn't likely to be doing much fighting either. And not just him, someone had to take the injured back to a medical facility, someone had to tend to him, someone had to produce the medical supplies used and bring them to the front lines, and so on. Mortis had fought in the Faunus War, he knew all about the strategic benefits of creating and exploiting weak points. Dead, Glynda had no benefit to him. Alive, she was a distraction for her colleagues, they would try to save her instead of devoting their full attention to him.

Even knowing that, Glynda still couldn't bring herself to let Bart and Peter die. The two of them had been nearly torn open by Mortis, but they were both still alive. If she used one hand each, she could keep them from bleeding out with her power, but between that and her damaged leg she was more or less immobilized. Mortis stood barely five feet away, but mustering her power to attack meant abandoning one of her friends to death. Even when he stepped over to her and raised a glowing crimson hand over his head with his head with a smirk, she couldn't do it.

Mortis' grin vanished and he sprang backwards like a bolt of lightning. Glynda could only blink in surprise as her impeding death fled as if he expected her to kill him instead. Mortis seemed to share her confusion, glancing around the room with narrowed eyes. When they landed on the doorway, and the man inside it, confusion gave way to understanding.

"I see." Mortis straightened up from his crouch. His easy, unnervingly so, smile had returned. "So that was you, not her. May I say, you're a bit later on the scene than I had expected."

Ozpin said nothing, ignoring Mortis in favor of walking over to Glynda. "How are your injuries?" He asked in controlled tones.

"I'll live." Glynda strived to match his composure and fell a bit short.

"And the others?"

"I have them, for now."

"Good." Ozpin said in the same even voice. You had to know him as well as Glynda did to hear the anger simmering below the surface. Currently, Beacon's headmaster was furious. "Why are you here?"

Mortis cocked his head as if confused. "For you, why else? Your students and faculty were decent appetizers, but I always intended for you to be the main course. I wonder what your eyes will look like when I kill you. Narrowed with rage, wide with shock, a bit of both maybe? Shall we find out?"

Ozpin's eyes narrowed. "If you wanted to fight me so badly, you could have just asked."

Mortis chuckled. "Do you think I'm an utter fool? If I had challenged you to a formal duel somewhere, you would have just swarmed me with your tin soldiers. And even if I turned them all to scrap, you would have attacked in force instead of providing me with the battle I wanted."

Ozpin's grip on his cane tightened. Glynda felt as though the air were crackling. "I see. Do you have anything else to say before we begin?"

"There was one thing I wanted to ask you." Mortis looked surprisingly thoughtful. The expression was out of place on a man who looked so gleeful at the thought of causing others harm. "Why do you allow yourself to be chained?

"A man with your power could create drastic shifts in society and the world with even minor actions. Yet you refrain. You allow pencil pushing bureaucrats and armchair generals to dictate how you act. You huddle inside this school and pretend that you're making a difference, but we both know there are a dozen people who could do your job. At the end of the day, what have you really accomplished?"

"I could ask you the same question." Ozpin replied. "You were born with the natural gifts that could have let you become the world's greatest Huntsman. All you've managed is to be its greatest murderer."

Mortis laughed. His laughter was unnerving for how normal it sounded. It should have been shriller, or with a mocking edge to it. This warm, mirthful chuckling belonged here less than Mortis did. "I kill because I enjoy doing so. I have no other real desires, so I accomplish everything I intend to by killing. You, on the other hand, claim to be trying to safeguard the world. And you've done a great job ending the Grimm menace, or stopping humanity from trying to destroy itself."

"You don't understand the point of Huntsmen and Huntresses." Ozpin replied. He spoke quietly but firmly and Glynda could feel the power emanating from his words. "We struggle. We strive. We keep advancing closer and closer to the better world we aim for. The Grimm will not be eradicated in my lifetime, or in a hundred years. But one day, one day they will. You, who are only interested in satisfying your own twisted impulses, lack the maturity to respect the ideal of working for tomorrow's sake."

"Hmph. We'll see." Mortis raised his glowing hands. "The true test, after all, is surviving. If you die then all your pretty ideals amount to nothing, do they? If you can defeat me, I'll acknowledge what you said had some merit." The smirk on his face said how likely he thought that would be. Ozpin shifted his grip on his cane, readying it for battle. He and Mortis stared each other down, both waiting for the slightest opening to attack. The tension in the room sharpened, the air filled with the pressure of two master warriors' killing intent.

The opening came when Mortis took a step back all of a sudden. Ozpin didn't move in, however, because a brilliant crimson crescent burst through the floor where Mortis had been standing. Mortis took a quick step to the left and dodged a second crescent. Something seemed to occur to him and he glanced behind him. Glynda understood a second before it happened. The first two slashes had met at their respective ends. The third slash connected their other endpoints and finished the triangle. Mortis dropped as the floor he was standing on was quite literally cut out beneath him.

Mortis fell three stories with his piece of the floor. Unfortunately, he retained enough sense of mind to escape the plummeting concrete triangle without suffering any serious injury. Even so, he was impressed. The Bloody Hand slashes had passed through solid floors to reach him and required perfectly precise aim to perform that little trick. He looked out across the new room he had fallen into at his grandson and his friend. Sanguin's left hand flickered with their shared power, his sword sheathed on his back. The spearman's gaze pierced Mortis, almost unnaturally so. A vision related Semblance? It would explain how Sanguin had been able to line up his shots so perfectly.

"Argos, get going." Sanguin said, his eyes not leaving Mortis.

"You sure?" Argos asked back, also not looking away from their enemy.

Sanguin nodded. "I can take him. You know where you're needed."

Clearly reluctant, Argos turned to leave. "Right. Good luck." He left the room at a run. They were still fairly high up Beacon's central tower, in a largely empty room with desks and tables scattered here and there. Some sort of study space, probably. There was enough clutter to complicate the battlefield, but not enough to really get in the way. Sanguin had chosen the site of their battle well.

"It's good to see you again." Mortis said joyfully, as if he were talking to an old friend he hadn't seen in months. He eyed his grandson critically. "Your demeanor is much improved from last time." Sanguin didn't respond beyond a slight narrowing of the eyes and a few steps to the left around the pile of rubble his trap had created. "If you've chosen to fight me, I take it you have indeed mastered our family's Semblance?"

That got a rise of him. "Why don't you come over here and find out?" So Mortis did.

Their hands collided with a flaring of red energy. Mortis lashed out with his free hand and Sanguin twisted away. Disappointed, Mortis pressed the attack but made sure to stay on his guard. It would be the height of irony if he fell to the same trick he had first caught his grandson with. But as their fight continued, he became more and more convinced Sanguin remained only able to use one Bloody Hand at a time.

That was not to say everything was going Mortis' way. Sanguin was a much younger man, with skills and instincts sharp and honed from his training and frequent battles. In that regard, he was greatly superior to Mortis, whose own skills had degraded from his long years in prison. It was enough of an edge to keep Sanguin a step ahead of Mortis' numerical advantage in their Semblance and then some. He caught Mortis' fist, stopped the other hand by grabbing it by the wrist, and hooked a foot around Mortis ankle. Knocked off balance, Mortis was able to knock away the Hand powered punch but not the foot that slammed into his stomach. Sanguin slapped aside the counter attack, and spun away unharmed. Mortis let up, if only to get some air back into his chest.

"So, come clean." Mortis said to justify the pause. "Are you actually capable of using both hands, or not? Because it seems as if you still don't understand our Semblance at all."

His grandson glared at him. "I understand our power completely. It is fueled by rage and the desire to destroy. The more you hate something, the more powerful the Bloody Hand becomes."

"Then why can you not use both hands?" Mortis asked. "You've made it abundantly clear your hatred for me goes down to your bones. If no one else, I should be the one person in this world you could use the full power of the Bloody Hand against. I don't understand why you are so…so weak."

Sanguin straightened up from his stance, resigned to talking. "You wouldn't. The only way you would understand is to say we each have our strong suits."

Mortis gave a predatory grin. He'd been waiting for this. "That was true back at the prison, but I happened to fit in some training since then." He drew back a burning hand. "Observe."

His flying crescent was met by one of Sanguin's. His grandson had counterattacked immediately. "Impressive." Mortis let the flames on his hands burn brighter. "But I wonder if you can keep up." Mortis unleashed a storm of slashes.

"Ruby you heard the announcement, we have to go."

"I'm not leaving Frank here by himself!" Ruby was adamant about that. "He'll be in danger, locked up like he is."

"We'll be in danger if we stay here." Weiss fired back. "Do you think they lock down the school just for fun? We're probably under attack or something."

"And who would attack the school other than those guys trying to get back Frank?" Ruby played her trump card.

Before Weiss could reply, probably something about the implausibility of two Huntsmen attacking the entire academy and the school being locked down in response to that, a whirring of machinery caught their attention. Frank had maybe two seconds to look worried before electricity began to pump into his body. He gave a strangled cry before slumping over, unconscious. Ruby turned to see Theron with his hand on the control panel next to the door.

"What are you girls doing here!? Didn't you hear the warning?" He looked angry, wild. His normal good nature and composure had crumbled away. He had a spear in his hand, his grip tight.

"We did, we just thought-" Yang began.

"It doesn't matter." Theron cut her off. "The academy is under attack. You all need to go someplace safe, right now."

"I would think right next to you in the deepest part of the school would be pretty safe." Weiss commented drily. Theron shook his head at her.

"Only I'm not staying." He tapped some keys and the bars locking Frank's cell to the floor released. Theron began to walk over. "I need to get this away from the enemy."

"Why?" Blake asked. Theron pulled up short. "Why do you need to move him? Wouldn't you be of more use joining the defense? Is the enemy's victory so inevitable you have no choice but to deny them their prize?" She drew Gambol Shroud. "Or is there some other reason you want to move Subject Alpha now, while everyone is distracted?"

Ruby's mind felt like it was crawling through mud. What Blake was saying seemed obvious enough, but for some reason she couldn't seem to process it properly. Yang caught Blake's meaning, activated her gauntlets and stepped up beside her partner. Weiss shared Ruby's confusion. "Blake, what are you talking about?"

"It's odd, isn't it?" Blake replied. "How a pair of foreign Huntsmen were able to hack into the prison's security system and completely shut it down without difficulty. Like they had someone on the inside. And how they managed to find Subject Alpha out in the woods while the majority of our search party was going the complete opposite direction. Almost as if everyone was being drawn away from them."

Finally, Ruby brain unfroze enough for her to draw Crescent Rose, though she kept it at her side. She didn't know what she ought to be doing with it. Her friends had all drawn their weapons too, and were pointing them at Theron, but he was a fellow Huntsman. A hero who had saved hundreds of people's lives over the years, maybe thousands. Blake had to be wrong, somehow.

Theron let out a long, slow breath and ran a hand through his hair. "So sharp you run the risk of cutting yourself, that's how dad put it." He said to himself. He focused back on Blake. "I'm not sure whether to commend you're perception, or criticize your sense of timing. You must know that not even the four of you together stand a chance against me."

Blake stared back defiantly. "What I want to know is why. You're already among the strongest in the world, why do you need more power?"

A flicker of annoyance crossed Theron's face. "Icarus isn't for me, it's for others. I am the last person who needs it."

"Then why?" Yang asked, her face hard.

"Would you trade a stranger's life for your sister's?"

There was a pregnant pause. Yang looked back to Ruby, confused, while Blake's eyes narrowed in understanding. "Not just a random stranger, but a criminal destined to spend the rest of his life in prison. Would you really care if eight such people were killed to ensure Ruby would survive her battles against Grimm and other threats?" Theron asked.

Ruby remembered that Theron's former teammates had died in the line of duty as he continued, his voice earnest and hopeful. "Why should those willing to risk their lives for humanity's sake be rewarded with painful deaths while those that prey upon the weak have all their needs taken care of for the rest of their lives? Instead of making society carry its dregs along, we could use them to give humanity far greater warriors to repel the Grimm. I am called a prodigy, a naturally gifted genius. Imagine a world where every Huntsman and Huntress was that powerful. We could drive the Grimm back into the dark places of the world, build a lasting peace for once."

He had a point, Ruby had to admit. It was kinda unfair that the good died young while the evil prospered. It would be nice if the brave and selfless were rewarded with power they would use to help others, but then wouldn't bad people just join up to be Huntsmen and Huntresses just for the power? And, as Cardin and his friends proved, being a Huntsman already wasn't proof of goodness.

"A peace built on sacrifice." Blake shot back. "The only difference is instead of everyone choosing for themselves, you'll be the one deciding who goes to the altar."

Theron's earnest expression soured. "I shouldn't have expected townies like you to understand. Sheltered behind the walls, you know nothing of the true dangers people face beyond." He raised his spear, his mouth a hard line. "I won't ask you to join me, but I will have you get out of my way, if only for your own sake."

"Never!" Blake dashed forward, Yang and Weiss falling in behind her. Ruby, still torn, hesitated. And watched as Theron disappeared and her friends crumpled to the floor unconscious. He had moved and hit so fast, she couldn't even follow it. He reappeared standing in front of her and stared down at her with a silent question. Knowing the futility, Ruby swung Crescent Rose only for something to slam into her stomach like a freight train. The last thing she heard as darkness swallowed her was a familiar voice shouting.

Team CFVY hurried along, ignoring the klaxons and orders to find shelter. Being a school that trains warriors, Beacon's student body were not the sort to run away from danger as much as they were to run toward it. It was, Velvet reflected, probably why the lockdown announcement had refrained from mentioning the campus was under attack. A declaration like that would likely have been taken as a challenge by most of the students, rather than a warning. She needed only to look as far as Fox, who upon hearing the sirens told the rest of them they should hunt down and eradicate whatever the threat was. Thankfully, Coco kept a clearer head.

Many of the first and second year students shared Fox's enthusiasm, fueled by the invincibility of their youth, but the older students were more disciplined. It fell to the upperclassmen to help the teachers in herding the rest of them into the shelters. The bunkers were originally created in the event of a Grimm attack but they served amply regardless of whatever was assaulting the campus. They even worked as earthquake shelters, in a pinch. Of course, after they had wrangled all the underclassmen to safety, Team CFVY went looking for trouble themselves under the guise of looking for stragglers.

That was against Velvet's better judgement. She wasn't a coward, or at least she didn't consider herself one, but this seemed a tad hypocritical on their part. They had just spent twenty minutes overriding other students who thought they could handle whatever was happening. Sure, they were better trained and prepared to handle enemies than a freshman team would be, but the orders to take cover hadn't discriminated by age.

The campus felt empty. They had done a pretty good job of clearing out all of the students and the fighting had all been on the east end of the grounds, so there were no bodies around. If not for the incessant alarms, you might think the school had simply been abandoned. It gave her a surreal feeling. Velvet rounded a corner after her teammates only to finally see someone else, a man dressed in black with a large, double-ended sword.

Yatsuhashi raised a hand to his sword's hilt over his shoulder, but he seemed to recognize the man at the same time as Velvet. He was one of the foreign Huntsmen who had been on the same mission as them a day ago. If she remembered correctly, his name was Dom. He was staring up at Beacon's central tower. The reason why she assumed was the crescent of crimson energy that burst through the wall and scythed through the air before dissipating. Judging by the marks in the wall, it wasn't the first. She couldn't tell from here, but there appeared to be slash marks going around the length of the tower.

Dom was muttering to himself as they approached. "San knows better than to hack apart a building like that, not after that one time, so those are from Mortis. Which means he's mastered throwing the hand, great."

"What's going on?" Coco demanded when they reached him. Dom raised an eyebrow at the team.

"You all shouldn't be out here." He commented drily. Velvet had the decency to flush as the loudspeaker in the background intoned "-designated shelter areas immediately." for what felt like the thousandth time.

"The same could be said for you." Coco replied in the same tone.

"The orders were for Beacon students." Dom shrugged. "I don't qualify." He was trying to appear nonchalant but his eyes were fixated on the tower. Coco followed his gaze.

"What's going on up there?"

"Mortis Manus has invaded your school." Dom said far too matter-of-factly for a statement like that. "Currently he's battling someone who I assume to be my squad captain, Sanguin Manus."

The Mortis Manus, the man who massacred Faunus for fun? Part of Velvet wanted to immediately run back to the bunker, another surprisingly large part of her wanted to go pull his intestines out through his throat. And there was another Manus here, fighting him? She didn't know what to make of that. Obviously he should be on their side but…

"What!?" Coco asked, eyes widening behind her sunglasses. "Why are you just standing here?"

Dom let out a slow breath. "I know better than to get in between those two. Besides, the way they've been going at it, the building is liable to come down any minute now. I'm willing to bet more than half the support beams of the structure have been hacked through by now."

As if in agreement, there came the sound of grinding concrete and the tower floors above the shifted. It didn't collapse, but it was leaning at a dangerous angle now. "That's not good." Velvet said. A thought occurred to her. "Is there anyone left upstairs? We need to get them out of there."

Dom shook his head. "Don't think so. Ozpin and Goodwitch brought out a bunch of wounded, and said they were the last ones inside." The tower gave another lurch as a crimson line slashed through the wall again. Dom started to look worried. "Okay, he needs to get out of there now." The rumbling of shifting building got louder and the tower began to fall. Velvet felt a spilt second impulse to run, before logic caught up and she reminded herself that the mass of metal and concrete was falling away from them. She felt a little better about her jumpiness seeing Dom take an involuntary step backwards as well. A red light burst through a wall and descended like a star falling to earth, heading right for them. Dom let out a sigh of relief at first, but when it got closer his expression turned to horror. The red light landed, and Velvet saw him.

He was an old man, with steel-gray hair and at his side his right hand pulsed with red energy. Velvet froze, her weapon slipping from loose fingers to clatter on the ground. It was him. Mortis Manus, the butcher of Menagerie. He winced as the tower hit the ground with an impact that shook the earth and gave a low whistle as he surveyed the destruction. Then an iron ring closed around her arm and she was yanked backwards. She dropped roughly to the ground with Dom's hand clenched on her arm twenty feet away from Mortis. Back where they had been standing, Velvet's teammates were drawing their weapons.

Mortis frowned when he noticed the ring of armed Huntsmen and Huntress surrounding him. He sighed. "Oh good, we're doing this now." His hand's glow faded as he folded his arms. "Look, I'm in the middle of something rather important right now, can I kill you all later?"

"Like hell." Coco was in the process of unfolding her handbag into chaingun mode. Mortis, hand burning red again, chopped the air towards her. She was quick enough on her feet to evade the lethal slash, but not enough to get her weapon out of the way too. Velvet reached her box, when would she use it if not now. She winced when she remembered, she had dropped it. She couldn't do anything as Yatsuhashi brought down his sword and Mortis' hand cleaved through it like a hot knife through butter. Mortis drew back his fist and beamed in Yatsuhashi's stunned face.

A knife clanged off Yatsuhashi's shoulder plate, ricocheting towards Mortis's face. He was surprisingly light on his feet, springing away in the second before it exploded. Yatsuhashi was knocked senseless by the explosion, but Fox and Coco acted quickly to drag him to safety. Mortis ignored them, focusing on the man standing next to her. Velvet stared up at Dom, a trio of knives in one hand, his dual sword in the other. Something in the hardness of his face made him seem powerful. It was like Yatsuhashi's air of quiet strength, but there was something else that pervaded it.

"You're looking well, boy." Mortis greeted him lightly, like they were old friends. "That wasn't very nice of you, blowing up that ally of yours like that."

Dom hmphed. "If you have half the instincts San does, you'd just dodge a direct attack. But they don't work as well on indirect ones, do they?"

Mortis smiled, conceding the point. "You've got me there. That was pretty clever of you. But if you're intending to compare me to my grandson, you should know I am far better at fighting than he is. Do you really think you can win?"

Strangely, Dom smirked at that. "Maybe. I've done my share of training on how to beat someone like you. Might as well give it a shot."

Mortis charged forward. Dom sent his trio of knives wiping towards him. Like he had predicted, Mortis twisted to dodge them. He wasn't expecting them to detonate in the air as they reached him, however. Mortis fell backward, no longer smiling. Dom drew and threw another set of knives with practiced, oiled precision. This time, Mortis didn't let them reach him but instead destroyed them as they came with a slash of his own. "Clever little brat." He snarled.

'Clever' was understating it in Velvet's opinion. For his knives to have exploded without making contact with anything, their detonators had to be set on timers. Which means he needed to have calculated the distance between them, the time his knives needed to fly that far, and set the timers to go off after that time, all in a handful of seconds. Of course, that kind of trick only really works once. Proving her point, the next set of knives Dom threw were aimed at the ground and exploded upon impact.

Mortis nimbly sidestepped the explosions and countered with a red slash that arced through the air. Dom twisted out of the way, throwing yet another knife as he did. Mortis charged forward and destroyed the knife with another slash of his that kept on coming. Dom dropped to the floor and let it pass over his head. He rose swinging his swords but just like with Yatsuhashi Mortis cleaved through it with his hand. Unlike with Yatsuhashi, Mortis followed that up by immediately burying his fist in Dom's stomach.

Dom's sword dropped from limp fingers to clatter on the ground. He coughed and blood dribbled down his chin. Mortis smiled as he straightened up, twisting his hand and making Dom hack up another mouthful of blood.

"Oh, this will get him going, I bet." Mortis said to himself. "Now, I just have to find him again. There's no way he died in the collapse." He turned to leave, but he was pulled up short when Dom's hand closed around his wrist, keeping the burning ball of energy embedded in his body. Mortis looked back and sighed. "You're a stubborn bastard, aren't you?" His annoyance shifted quickly to surprise and fear when Dom drew back his free hand and decked him square in the jaw.

The blow set Mortis flying backwards and skidding across the ground. Dom collapsed, his hands pressed into his wound in a futile attempt to stem his blood loss. Her paralysis finally broken, Velvet rushed over to help but there was so much blood and she didn't have any first aid supplies and she never had anything more than basic training anyways… Her runaway thoughts were interrupted by a shout.

"Dominic!" The very air seemed to swirl around her as Velvet was joined at Dom's side by one of his teammates, the one with dog ears and white hair. He spent a second looking down at Dom horrified, before his face twisted into fury. "Mortis!" His daggers were drawn by hands trembling in rage. For his part, the Butcher looked just as angry. Both his hands were alight with the power of his Semblance and he looked ready to use them. The scream of jet engines interrupted them as a bullhead swung over the battlefield.

Mortis looked from the airship to Will, snarled, and leapt up to catch the bullhead's open passenger compartment. He easily pulled himself inside and hit the door button, but his eyes never left them until it was completely shut. The bullhead banked and flew off, disappearing in the setting sun. Will stared after it, almost growling, until a weak cough grabbed his and Velvet's attention again. Will swiftly bent down, scooped Dom up into his arms, and broke into a run towards the infirmary.

"Velvet!" Coco was running over to her, Fox following while supporting Yatsuhashi. "Are you all right?"

"I… yeah. Yeah I'm fine." She said it more to convince herself than Coco.

AN: I am absolutely convinced no one saw the identity of the traitor coming.

So this chapter took absolutely forever to get out, college starting up again has taken up most of my free time. Hopefully things have stabilized a little and I can get the next one out faster.

"Townie" is a slur used by people from the wildlands to refer to people from kingdoms, though a pretty tame one. Theron's from Vale to begin with, but he's spent most of his time as a Huntsman out in the wilds so he's picked up some of the vocabulary, and the ideology.