Bianca felt a warmth envelop her and she instinctively flinched. She heard Vitoria’s voice and knew the sort of sensations that typically followed. A blow to the face, to the wings, perhaps her back. Slander, words that would scar Bianca’s pride, words she could no longer discern truth from. She opened her pale blue eyes and was met with a somewhat familiar scowl, a jaw line that matched up with one in Bianca’s mind’s eye. She was being held like an innocent child, girl careful not to her the Faunus. She felt like she was being held like expensive china - so very fragile. She faintly heard a rhythmic heartbeat, perhaps it was somewhat faster than your typical heartbeat but Bianca couldn’t really tell the difference. She felt the warmth of a black turtleneck up against her face, it was the warmest she had felt since she was left in that building to rot.

Vitoria scoffed at Gratia. “You don’t have to be that careful, she’s damaged goods.” She said noting Gratia’s care. She placed her blade back onto her lower back and lead Gratia back out of the door. Walking in front of the hired muscle, Gratia would notice the presence of two more blades on the right and left of her calves. They seemed to have another proponent to them, as their handles possessed a small length of chain, but it was difficult to tell without staring. Vitoria eventually lead Gratia back to the elevator and got inside. She clicked her tongue and considered reaching over to the cargo to strike it. “Dumb bitch is shedding all over this goddam office.” Vitoria said underneath her breathe. “Fucking Faunus, I swear.” She said reaching over to Bianca and plucking out a feather rather sharply.

Bianca felt the feather leave her left wing and winced into Gratia’s heartbeat. She focused on it, attempting to block her outwards sensations, attempting to turn off her hearing, to turn off her sense of touch. It wouldn’t work, of course. She let the tiniest noise out, a small wince. The pain had been sharp and jarring, but she knew she was no longer contained. She was in the arms of Gratia Mindaro. She was no longer under the control and presence of the Dodici Cosca. And she knew, more than anything else – if Gratia was here, they would pay. She found that her grimace had opened her incredibly chapped lip up, she sucked on it – not wanting to bleed on Gratia’s sweater.

Vitoria pushed the button that would take Gratia to the garage. The doors closed and she leaned back against the wall opposite the mercenary. She brushed her forehead collecting the sweat accumulating on it. “I honestly don’t know how the hell you wear all that shit. You’d be more comfortable if you took something off.” She said licking her putrid lips.



Demetrius laughed at the Faunus’ block. “I see I will not be bored today madam, but you have me at a disadvantage, who do I kill today?” He asked flipping his knife over the back of his hand and catching it. He walked backwards, keeping a steady eye on the girl, once more right into the void of her pupil. Noticing out of the corner of his eye Vega, he continued to pace away from the Faunus. When he reached an acceptable distance, he stopped, steadied his gaze on the Faunus and sent a kick directly to Vega’s abdomen. She would be out until she managed to recover from the surprise attack. He gave her room to prepare, seemingly expecting a gladiatorial battle. He readied himself but waiting for the girl opposite of him to move.

“It’s more exciting if it’s just the two of us.” Demetrius mused happily, rocking backwards and forwards rolling weight between his feet. “Just out of curiosity, do you fight me for self-defense or out of kinship for the Faunus being used here today?” Demetrius asked, sounding genuinely curious to the girl’s intentions. There was something behind that crafty gaze of his, a certain amount of excitement. Like a kid on Christmas waiting to unbox his newest present.

Beryl Harken- B- A Crazy Old Guy

Beryl was certain that Demetrius already knew her name. With the amount of times she had been in a tussle with his thugs she was probably on a hit list or something. Whether the guy had yet to recognize her or was playing some other game was yet to be seen.

"Beryl." Was all she said. A small use of her semblance coated the ground in water. Enough to make it slick, but not much else.

Then he kicked Vega.

For a second Beryl did nothing, just standing there staring at her teammate. They had barely gotten to know each other but the faunus already called her a friend.

With controlled even movements she settled into a combat stance. Sword arm back, blade held level at shoulder height and pointed directly at her opponent. Her weight was on her back foot and her body was at a slight angle to her opponent.

Then she moved. One, two, three running strides that took her the majority of the distance to Demetrius. Her footing unimpeded by the liquid on the ground. Slightly out of range of a normal blade she struck, putting all of her momentum into a thrust with an impressive amount of power in it. The attack did not end there however. Partway through the thrust she flicked a switch and Stream segmented, extending to gain the length needed to hit the mafia don and then some. If he dodged the thrust it would turn into a slash in whatever direction he fled.

Gratia Mindaro - An Old Friend [LA GRANDE TERREUR]

Gratia Mindaro did not reply for a second, instead shifting the bundle in her arms slightly into a less uncomfortable position.

Onyx eyes glanced down at the cargo, lingering for the barest of moments, before the flat, empty gaze flickered back up to meet Vitoria's eyes straight on.

"It's unnecessary," was the only reply.

She waited for the elevator to reach the bottom.

Vitoria let out a vicious laugh and nodded. ”Suit yourself, mercs are all the same.” She said, placing a hand on her own shoulder and massaging it gently. The elevator went silent save for Bianca’s irregular breathing, it was seemingly difficult to inhale for the Faunus. Examining their surroundings, the elevator was approximately six and a half feet wide, and nearly ten feet tall. Vitoria, who was directly opposite the doors stood about four feet from them.

The elevator made a noise that Vitoria seemed alerted by. It was a metallic choking noise as the elevator stopped. “What the fuck is all this?” Vitoria said banging once on the door. “God damn it.” She said rubbing the sweat from her forehead once more. Gratia could see that her hand was slightly red from where she had struck the elevator door. “Shit, why the hell did that hurt so much?” She said pulling her phone from her pocket and immediately hitting a single number and holding the phone to her ear. It rang briefly.

“Elevator’s stopped, I think we’re here can you override this for me?” She said in a somewhat sweeter tone than expected. Silence filled the air once more as they waited, Vitoria impatiently tapping her foot, sweat pooling on her forehead. They sat there, in the elevator for four minutes until a ding from the elevator ended the silence as the doors screeched open and their surroundings became clear. Vitoria sighed in relief and closed her phone. They were in what appeared to be a parking garage. The ceiling was perhaps ten feet high and the floor, ceiling, and walls were all concrete. One other man awaited Gratia at the end of the parking garage beside a black S.U.V.

Vitoria exited as soon as the doors opened, and turned back to Gratia. “I’ll be coming with you for this ride we aren’t headed too far.” Vitoria said motioning for Gratia to begin walking towards the car. As she motioned she felt the lower portion of her back where she had kept her knife once more. As Gratia would go to step out of the elevator, Vitoria would step in front of her. “Girl looks heavy, that turtleneck seems pretty warm.” She said wiping the sweat out of her eyes once more. “Why the fuck am I sweating so much?” She asked Gratia meeting her steely gaze with a psychotic one. She seemed to be tightening the fist of the hand not brandishing her blade in an attempt to regain focus.



Beryl’s swift movement elicited a strange reaction from the elder man. He winked at the girl as she lunged in towards him, his right eye performing the deed. He took two quick steps to the right in order to avoid the lunge, but was surprised by the quick slash that followed. It seemed the tables had been turned as he was barely able to get his own blade in the way of Beryl’s causing him to recoil slightly. However, he used the momentum of his recoil to spin around and attempt to sweep Beryl’s legs.

She would notice as he spun he stared directly into her soul through her eyes, making eye contact with her while attempting to knock her down to his level. Should Beryl avoid his attack his leg would meet his other and propel him backwards, attempting to create some distance between the two. Moving towards the direction Napoli originally stood.

Beryl Harken- B- Crazy Old Guy With a Creepy Semblance

Beryl was starting to get a handle on the old guy now. First of all, his semblance was of the more subtle type. Chances were that he had activated it when he first started staring at the otter faunus. Which meant that any of it's nastier effects would start kicking in soon.

Secondly, his power required eye contact. Pretty intense eye contact too. He had yet to completely break off from her once so far.

Third, judging from what she knew of his character there was a very good chance that his semblance would involve taking something from her. Not something that Beryl had any plans to allow.

Plans to counter whatever Demetrei had cooking would have to wait another second or two though, as the old man attempted to sweep her feet out from under her. The teenage hunter lept up and back to avoid the attack, flicking Stream off the knife currently blocking it and hopefully onto a path that would send it's segmented blades slicing across the offending leg as she did so.

And then she activated the first dust charge in her weapon.

Electricity usually did a good job of knocking out the man's goons. Hopefully it would work on the head honcho as well.

Gratia Mindaro - An Old Friend [LA GRANDE TERREUR]

"Must be SARS."

Its contents possibly sarcastic, but the tone ... flat, utterly flat. As if she was reading off of a shopping list.

Gratia's onyx gaze did not recoil from the clear psychosis evident in the other woman's eyes. They continued to watch impassively, unblinkingly.

She shifted the position of the cargo in her arms once more, easing its ability to breathe.

She didn't look at the SUV nor the man beside it.

She didn't look anywhere else.

Her eyes were trained on Vitoria.

She was waiting.

Vitoria held the onyx gaze for some time before her eyes drifted downward to the cargo Gratia carried with her. She casually lowered her blade so that it softly caressed Bianca’s pale skin. “Her cries while we were torturing her,” Vitoria said beginning a story in the middle, as if Gratia could hear her thoughts. She seemed to turn the blade on Bianca’s fair skin but immediately lifted it, giving Gratia a playful gaze her face was strange now. She wasn’t like Gratia had met her. There was a desperation, her makeup was starting to run, and her eyes were tired and confused. “They were intoxicating.” She said with a grin so wide it threatened to rip the corners of her mouth. Her eyes quickly darted back up to Gratia. “I don’t think we need you, you bitch.”

With those words, Vitoria’s attack began – though slightly weaker than what she had meant for, she thrusted her blade downwards, aiming for Gratia’s arm or Bianca’s throat, thinking she would inevitably hit one of them. She also seemed to reach out to grab Gratia’s wrist with her left hand, perhaps to pull Bianca away or any other reason.



The Faunus leapt over Demetrius’ sweeping leg and as he brought it back in towards she lashed out with her blade. Demetrius pulled his gaze from her eye line in order to deflect the blade ever so slightly with his knife. Though as she activated the electricity charge in the weapon he felt his hand tense uncomfortably around his knife as it was conducted by the weapon. He successfully retreated back to where Napoli had stood, afterwards picking up his second dagger that Napoli had deflected earlier.

Demetrius exercised his hand, tightening it and shaking it slightly until it felt useful enough to use, once more he took Beryl’s gaze.

He walked towards her while brandishing his knives, speaking in a slow methodical tone. “Why are you here, girl?” He said, his voice lashing out. Regardless of her answer he would attempt to quickly stab her mid-section the knife in his right hand once he reached her, extending his arm and turning his body to the right in order to limit her counter attack options.

Beryl Harken- B- Crazy Old Guy With Knives

Has this been some other baddie in need of a thrashing Beryl would have been fine with the banter that normally accompanied such an encounter. In this particular instance though she had the seeking suspicion that she would live longer the less she engaged with him. As such she said nothing.

Besides she was a liiiitle weirded out by the fact that he had just shrugged off enough electricity to put a fully grown thug on the ground. All this seventy something old guy showed was some hand cramps. Aura or not, that was just plain abnormal.

She acted before he could move into knife range. Spinning low with Stream extended and scrapping the ground she activated the second dust charge in the weapon. Ice spread out from where the blades hit the wet ground, turning the layer of water into one of ice.

Then just for good measure she continued to spin as she rose. The move sending her blade on a course to swing around and impact with Demetrius' side. If he used his knife to block it would simply whip around and hit the arm holding the knife. Maybe even wrap around the man himself, considering how close he was and the length of her weapon.

Gratia Mindaro - À la lanterne!

A pale hand smacked at the knife, the force of the sudden blow redirecting the direction of its thrust away from the vulnerable throat of the prone form hugged tightly against her body. The atmosphere grew thick and heavy, as if an oppressive, invisible pressure had descended from the heavens, suffocating the air with clouds upon clouds of choking, cloying emotion. Clouds of seething hot hatred. Clouds of heart wrenching disgust.

Clouds of immeasurably cold fury.

"Bravissimo!" said the Huntress, her tone full of a strange, distorted cheer. "For some sort of professional criminal, you're slower on the fucking uptake than a brain-dead slug! I never expected that you could be such a drooling incompetent that you even surprised me with your level of shittiness!"

She easily hefted the mission objective into a fireman's carry with one arm, and the once dull countenance of her face split open into a large, bestial grin, baring her elongated canines at Vitoria. Her icy gaze had reached absolute zero, and reflected in those irises ... was anticipation.

"I almost feel sorry for you motherfuckers."

Gratia Mindaro giggled.

"That was a joke~~~~~bEcAUSe oTheRWise i WoULDn't ENjOy tHiS!"

Her free hand grabbed her carbine and fired into Vitoria's left kneecap.

SHE HATED HATED HATED HATED HATED HATED HATED HATED HATED HATED HATED

Bianca grunted as Gratia albeit gently, threw her over her shoulder. A bit of blood escaped her mouth as she coughed. ”It’s okay, I’m fine.” Bianca managed to choke out. ”Do it.” She said quietly.

Vitoria’s eyes shot wide open as she attempted to side step the carbine, however found her leg to be slower than she assumed. The bullet exited her thigh and she let out a shrill and desperate cry. She landed from her side step heavy, like a bag of bricks. Gratia would notice the man at the end of the parking lot heard the gun shot and began running towards the pair of girls. He, seemed tired.

Vitoria cursed and pulled another blade from her thigh. She threw a single knife at Bianca’s back that was over Gratia’s shoulder. Throwing another at Gratia’s leg. She struggled to maintain balance as she did this, stumbling out into the parking garage, allowing for Gratia to exit the elevator. Vitoria opened her maw to snap back at Gratia. But she found nothing, losing her words in Gratia’s giant, bloodthirsty grin.



Demetrius was an older man. He was slowing down. The ice came up from Stream and he was forced once more to tear his gaze from his prey, and salvage his arm. The ice seemingly melting around his aura. Seemingly predicting him being able to block the ice, Beryl continued her onslaught attacking Demetrius, an attack made to be impossible to block. But he found himself trying. He immediately raised his arm to stop the blade, but once it made contact with his knife it swung around it lacerating his arm.

He pulled.

Demetrius’ lower portion of his arm did not follow.

Demetrius smiled an uncanny smile as he glared downwards where his limb once was. Beryl could see the blood stop flowing. It began to clot and eventually stopped bleeding altogether, in a matter of seconds. Almost as if he was controlling his blood in a telekinetic fashion. With a deranged glare he looked back up at Beryl. “You understand now, right?” Demetrius cackled. “Why my children call me greedy?”

Gratia Mindaro - Madame La Guillotine

Gratia caught the first knife with her teeth, ignoring the second that barely even managed to cut at her trouser leg. It should have been more bothersome, like some irritating little insect that thought itself to be greater, but the pathetic power behind the blow ... the WEAKNESS the scum had shown ... even a fucking gnat could do more damage to her. If they thought that such miniscule efforts ... such trifling attempts ... could bring her down, then she would re-educate them!

She spat the knife out with considerable force, letting it clatter loudly against the concrete before it was crushed beneath her boot. sHe WOuld brInG thE DODICI COSCA TO! THEIR! FUCKING! KNEES! And that bitch ... she would be the first. The first to burn. The first to grovel for mercy that would never come. The first to drown in a puddle of their own bullshit!

"One out of twenty! PATHETIC! I've seen quadruple amputee kids at retard school who could put up more of a fight!"

The carbine rose again, spitting fire into Vitoria's other leg.

Beryl Harken- B- Its Only a Flesh Wound

I'm starting to get an idea you old psycho.

Again she said nothing out loud. The most recent events were major clues as to the exact nature of his semblance but she was still taking no chances.

All in all she was pretty calm as she looked at the gore in front of her. It may have had something to do with her previous fights with gangsters in the city. Whatever the case her actions were not slowed in the slightest.

Space was her ally in this fight. Knives and a fairly reactionary semblance made for a bad matchup with an extending whip-sword. Beryl slid backwards on the ice. If her guess was right the fire charge that was next in her weapon would have little effect on the man himself.

There was something else she could target though.

She repeated her previous move, for the most part. Her fire charge activated and the otter faunus spun in the opposite direction of last time. The flaming blades swept across the icy ground, melting then boiling away the cold layer. The steam from it was joined by more as she added a stream of water down the blade.

The end result was that the area was bathed in very warm but still survivable steam. It would not last long in a place like this but until then sight in the area was restricted to a few feet. Beryl was still perfectly capable of locating Demetrius. Both through his displacement of the steam and the water in his body.

let's see if he can say the same. She thought as she silently crouched down. Still able to dodge but removing the majority of herself from her last known location.

Vitoria knew what fear felt like. She knew what it was like her entire life. Her father had always told her that should she not live up to his expectations she would be exercised from the body of the family. She was taught torture. She was taught how to inflict fear, she had known that you had to pierce deeply and dig everything you could reach up to the surface. When Bianca Nuit was thrown into her doors, she inflicted fear. She cultivated it like a gardener.

And yet.

While she had fallen on her ass, looking up at a girl, hoisting her old prey over her shoulder. A hole in both of her knees. She didn’t feel fear. No, it was something most certainly more profound than fear. She was looking across the way at the god of death. And she was angry. Vitoria wanted to run, to kill Gratia, to kill her and that Nuit bitch. But the longer she thought, the more tired she became. She tried to pull herself up off the ground and yet she faltered once more.

Vitoria looked up at Gratia and screamed, as she did Gratia would notice the man who had been standing at the end of the parking garage reach her. He was already sweating profusely by the time he reached Gratia, he fell to his knees, and a phone spilled onto the floor of the parking garage – a man’s voice could be heard calling out on the other side.

Through all of this Bianca seemed to be struggling more to breathe. Coughing once more, once more blood coming back up.



Demetrius uttered a guttural howl as the steam rose up and immediately charged towards Beryl’s last known location thrusting immediately towards the girl’s chest. But felt nothing make contact with his blade. He immediately looked around for the girl.

“Where the hell are you?” Demetrius’ hand gripped his blade until his hand stung. “Give me back your gaze, Faunus.” To say his demeanor had slipped was a gross misunderstanding of the situation. It felt more like Demetrius’s mask, the utility he used to hide his identity before had disgusting holes in it. He paced erratically scanning the quickly dissipating steam for the girl.

Gratia Mindaro - Madame La Guillotine

"I could kill you."

A simple statement. There was none of her signature arrogance. There was no posturing, no hesitation, only a steely, onyx gaze that burned with rage and hatred.

She cocked her carbine up at Vitoria.

For the shortest of moments, nobody breathed.

Gratia's arm moved, and a number of bullets riddled the noisy phone, shattering it into unrecognisable pieces.

Silence.

She turned and walked away, carefully and gently making sure that the mission objective was not further damaged. Leaving the garage was ... not a particularly optimal idea for the time being, so she made her way to another part of the garage, a part where she could still keep an eye on the Dodici members ... without risking too much response.

She could handle the response.

The mission objective ...

The cargo ...

The Faunus ... Nuit ... couldn't.

The Mistralese teenager gently laid her teammate down on the cold concrete, hissing slightly at the sight of the blood the other girl had coughed up. It was not a good sign. She would have rather given Fiordilatte an actual fucking goat she'd bought with her own money than see Nuit in such a state. It was not fucking good at all.

Her aura spiked, her body still clearly combat-active. The Dodici would have to go.

All of them.

"Don't you fucking dare get yourself more hurt," she said, rolling Nuit into a position where the Faunus girl's windpipe wouldn't be so easily clogged, her touch soft as if dealing with a fragile young child. Even as she did so, she dug through her trouser pockets for a packet of tissues. "Saving your ass better have been worth it, birdbrain."

Beryl Harken-B-Psychoooooooo

But I like my gaze.

Once more there was no outward answer to the old man's ranting. Somehow he had managed to miss seeing her completely in his earlier enraged stab.

She rose to her feet as he stalked away, silently lifting Stream from the ground with a thin coating of water. It slid through the air like a serpent through a lake. Maneuvering until it was on the mafia don's maimed side before striking. Coming from a completely different direction from that of where Beryl stood, it darted forward in an attempt to wrap around Demetrius' leg and repeat what had happened to his arm.

Bianca was laid down by her teammate, the concrete was cold to the touch, even with Gratia’s winter jacket. She heard Gratia’s best attempt at sounding concerned and let out a pained laugh.

“I can’t promise it’s worth it, but you wouldn’t want to suffer Napoli alone would you?” Bianca managed to squeeze the words out before letting out another slew of violent coughs. She gently moved Gratia, pushing on her shoulder so that Bianca could see Vitoria.

The Dodici was staring directly at Bianca, from the look in her eyes she could already see the hell she would be living in a matter of hours. Bianca raised a hand calmly towards the girl who had been oppressing her for what felt like months now. She closed her eyes and before she would open them again, Gratia would sense a blast of aura – Bianca’s semblance, ring out through the parking garage. Vitoria’s body rag flopped across the parking garage skidding against the rugged concrete. It seemed the farther from Bianca, the less the pain. She moved Gratia’s jacket and showed her a wound, it looked like a plus sign or a cross. “It was her semblance.” Bianca said waving Gratia’s concern off. “I’m fine.” She confirmed placing the jacket back over her chest. Her pale blue eyes met the Onyx of Gratia’s and she wanted to laugh, but it would hurt too much.

“Jesus I must look like shit.” She said noticing that she was being handled as fragile as she was. “Listen Gratia,” Bianca began but stumbled off, she gaze away from her friend. She tried to force the words from her mouth but all that wanted to escape was silence, a pained small whimper. She finally steeled herself, through her tears and spoke. “I don’t think I’m going to be able to fly anymore.”



Demetrius’ weaknesses exploited by the time he knew where Beryl was it was too late. The blade was wrapped around his leg and he fell down to the ground. He struggled to find the Faunus’ gaze, to recapture her semblance, use it in order to heal himself. But he had already lost so much blood – he quickly found his vision tunneling out, his body growing cold. He attempted to call out to the Faunus, to curse her name, repair his image, but just before he did he saw his family.

They were smiling at him, waiting for him to join them. Vitoria held her hand out for her father and he took it. He was unconscious and losing blood quickly.

If Beryl planned on following Napoli’s orders from earlier, she would need to do something rather quickly.

Beryl Harken-B-The End of a Man

The man deserved to die after all he had done. Countless crimes had been committed by him and his organization. He had even admitted that there were other Faunus being held in the building they were targeting.

But Napoli had told her to not kill the piece of filth and she had no desire to bring the focus of the police down on her team more than it was already going to be.

Still she waited. She waited untill just before the wound became truly life threatening before stopping the flow of blood with her semblance. Demetrius would be too weak to do anything even if he regained his mental faculties in the near future. And while Beryl was not a proper doctor she doubted that such extensive loss of blood would be good for a physicaly active life in the future, especially at such an advanced age.

After a quick stop by the mafia don to add a tourniquet, rope and remove his knife, the otter Faunus made her way over to her downed teammate.

"You OK?" She asked, crouching over Vega.

Team VGNB

Zephyr[/center]

Vega started to come to senses once she heard the familiar voice of Beryl. Everything happened so quickly for her that she did not have a chance to counter Demetrius kick. Indeed she still remembers it, the feeling of it still lasts as she got up, groaning in pain.

“Damn bastard, how the hell does he manage to get past my aura with one kick” as Vega collects herself. She saw a defeated opponent that she assumed was defeated by Beryl. “Impressive” as she was surprised, “Did you…defeat him alone? Where is Gratia and Napoli?” Of course Vega still had not seen Beryl abilities so she was wondering, as she gripped her stomach, “Tsk” as she still felt the pain from the kick.

Gratia Mindaro - A Friend in Need

Gratia glanced over at the now-unconscious Vitoria Dodici, her onyx gaze a wild tempest of barely restrained, primal emotion. It was strange, that when she saw the vulnerable husk of a woman, the utterly pathetic piece of criminal scum, that she could feel a dark, cold pit within herself, a strange desire to simply crush everything related to the filthy fool into the most miniscule of atoms. It was a hatred that was overwhelming, cold ... monstrous. And why was that? Her onyx gaze slowly moved away to face Bianca Nuit.

To face the tears on the other girl's face.

To face the choked expression.

That was right.

Vitoria Dodici had dared to hurt her people.

"Then I'll be your fucking wings then," said the Mistralese huntress in reply, her tone so utterly matter-of-fact that she could have otherwise been talking about the weather. "I'm dealing with your other bloody problems already, birdbrain."

She stood up and turned away, walking, her heavy footsteps echoing against the concrete, towards the other Dodici thug in the garage. The one whose phone she had destroyed. The one that was even more pathetic. Gratia Mindaro smiled at him, her semblance thrumming as it tried to draw more and more aura from the empty tank that was the suited criminal.

"I'll be taking everything you have."

Though their relief and gratitude were palpable, the two men could not form a single word amongst them through the chattering of their teeth and ragged breathing. Cold rolled off them in waves, but even being out of the food locker already appeared to helping. Neither made any effort to resist the removal of their clothes, despite the sickly pallor and clamminess of their skin, and without much in the way of lucidity then received the warmth offered to them by the students.

Benjamin’s inquiry received a punctual reply. Goodwitch’s familiar no-nonsense voice surged through the radio. “Yes. According to Manticore, eighteen people were present in the facility during the last report. I can get the names if you require, but you shouldn’t. With these two accounted for, and the bodies found, that makes five. Factoring in the people in the safe room mentioned by your new contact, you have thirteen. Five left,” she calculated flatly. “Time is of the essence. Take a look in all of the rooms in the hallway before going downstairs.



As a unit, JCL moved into the next room with Lucas on point. Directly after the decontamination room was chemical processing. While no doubt a marvel of engineering and efficiency during the distillery’s heyday, the processing room now lay in a state of ruin. An entire wall was dedicated to the stacking of chemical drums, separated neatly by a demarcation line into filled and empty. Of course, quite a few littered the floor in various states of damage, and a variety of chemicals lay in puddles across the floor. They suffused the entire room with an intriguing but nauseating odor, of which the students had only gotten a hint in the generator room. Judging by the state of the floor and nearby machinery, some of the puddles were acidic, but to a sane individual none would seem attractive for the setting of one’s foot. At the far end of the room was a lift, like the dumbwaiter but far larger, for the ascension of filled drums to the vehicle lot for transport.

The noise caused by the three teens’ entrance quickly gave way to silence. Worryingly abruptly, the feminine screaming had ceased, though by now it was obvious that it came from a closed but unlocked door to an adjoining storage area. After a moment, however, a new noise broke the oppressive quiet. A large chemical drum with sides raked by clawmarks, situated at the other side of the room, shuddered violently, a clang reverberating within. From this drum a muffled noise echoed forth, ambiguous in all but intimidation.



The three remaining students, with Jorie slung over Sterling’s shoulder like the catch of the day, made it to the evac point without incident. While a few of the lesser Taijitus tailed them, a couple volleys of projectiles successfully turned their attention back to the abandoned caravan vehicle to join their fellows in ripping into it like hagfish into a dead whale. No humans remained in the formerly-proud vehicle to elicit such wild bloodthirstiness; evidently the Grimm delighted in destroying the works of man nearly as much as eviscerating men themselves.

By a miracle of carmanship, the driver had arrived with Lilac just before Sterling, Estelle, and Sarina made the final ascent. They piled in, a collective despondency hanging around them like mist. As the airship took off, leaving the canyon of failure behind, the pilot said nothing; Beacon’s seniors would be their own worst critics. Not many students of their caliber flunked a mission, and while nobody lay dead on the dusty arid ground, team JESS seemed so gripped by a morose quiet that there might as well have been.