[h3]Diamond, Emerald & Esther[/h3]
[hider]
After the fall… In the skies 

[i]BANG![/i]

It was the worst possible timing. Everything had gone to hell in an instant, that much was for certain. But, as the saying goes whenever it rains, it pours. Moments after Stovetop had speared his long time friend out the back of the airship, an explosion from within the belly of the ship sent debris flying after them. The first volley separated the two in midair. The second volley went straight at Esther’s face and head, immediately knocking her unconscious. To be out cold, unable to deploy a parachute in an emergency or to utilize a Hunter’s protective Aura while on a free fall trip to meet the ground, was certainly lethal. Stovetop, his real name being Antonio, knew all of this. Breathing heavily from his ever rising heartbeat thanks to the wonderful effects of adrenaline coursing through him. ‘Tony’ as Esther called him, struggled to correct himself as the two of them free fell. Quickly reorienting himself, he knew he had to relink with his friend and get her to wake up and fast. If worst came to worst, he would have to deploy their chutes on his own.

Streamlining his body as best he could to cut through the howling winds, it wasn’t hard for him to regain his hold on her. Aligning themselves so that they were face to helmet, Tony started off with lightly smacking against her cheek to possibly wake her. For whatever reason, he didn’t know. What, like he could hurt her? No, it was more so he was afraid she would later find out and he would have to deal with the…’fall out’. Which mattered little if either of them were to die.

[b]”Vanessa! Hey! Vanessa, wake the hell up!”[/b]
He looked her over quickly.
No bruises, cuts, or blood.
He would make jokes about her thick skull later.
[b]”Fuck! Damn it! Vanessa! Wake up![/b]
He smacked her across the face harder,  but it didn’t work.
She was out.

Looking around as the ground grew closer and closer, an alert on his HUD from within his sealed helmet warned him that they were approaching the critical altitude and needed to deploy their parachutes NOW. If he deployed his own chute now, would it fail after being thrown off balance from having to support their combined weight? If he deployed her’s first, would their chutes possibly entangle and just doom them anyways? Damn it all, he should’ve paid more attention during flight training exercises. His mind drawing blanks on the proper course of action to take, eating more precious seconds that neither of them could afford to waste.

[b]”Think! Think! AGH![/b]
Action was better than no action, right?
Something had to be done.

Grabbing her red emergency ripcord, he simultaneously pushed her away as he yanked down hard to deploy her chute. The wind immediately took hold of Esther’s unconscious body and pulled her away from Tony, to which he then deployed his own chute. For the first few seconds, their descent slowed. But when their fall started to re-accelerate, Tony looked up and cursed again to see that there were tears in the canvas. Must’ve been damaged in the earlier explosions. Shrapnel had peppered them after all, after they jumped. He had hoped that they would be fine, but nothing about today seemed to be going alright.

Well, together they would go.
Or maybe…
Maybe just one of them would have to go?

Unsheathing the knife at his hip, Tony sliced through his harness and removed the faulty parachutes altogether. Diving towards Esther and relinking with her, he did the same to her torn chute. Sheathing his knife, he held Esther as tightly as he could. Seeing the rooftops of the nearby town, Tony figured that with all of his armor and tech that he could act as some sort of weird cushion for Esther. Soften the blow for her and increase her chances of surviving, even if it meant his own demise. He couldn’t know, he never did well with physics and all that. All he knew was to grab a weapon and go fight things. He was a soldier, nothing more, nothing less. Esther on the other hand was an instructor. She helped to mold the future for generations of powerful Huntsmen to come. In his eyes, her life was worth more than his own life. He was expendable, he knew that. Esther would revive him and kill him a second time if she knew that was how he felt. But, it didn’t matter. He came to accept his inevitable death years ago. They all did.

Shutting his eyes tight from within his helmet, he waited for the coming hard impact to his back that would probably flatten him and pancake him over the shingles of some poor farmer’s house. Ruptured organs, internal bleeding, et cetera. Not that he feared pain or death, he just prayed it would be over quickly. Maybe extreme blunt trauma to his brain will cut his lights out, at least so he hoped.

[i]CRASH![/i]

The two shot through and into a house like a cannon shot.
Terminal velocity is such a bitch sometimes.
Tony’s final wish, was that the rest of his family made it out okay.

[hr]
As Diamond left the house, she wouldn’t make it very far before very likely halting in her tracks. Standing in the middle of the street, some distance away from her, was a person. But to describe them as a person wouldn’t be completely correct. No, the more accurate descriptor would be…

Humanoid.

At a height somewhere in between five foot and six foot tall, was...a creature. A thing. Something. Whatever it was, it had a bone-white mask on its face that hid its facial features. Or perhaps the mask was indeed its face. It resembled the skull of some oxen creature. With glowing red eyes and red markings on the bone-white face that looked like tears of blood. From its head sprouted antlers, branching out into eight pointed tips. Its body appeared to be all black, in stark contrast to its face and antlers. Either it was feathered or its hide was a sort of cloak, but no arms or legs could really be seen. The most unnerving thing about the creature, was how it simply stood there unmoving. Staring at Diamond with its red eyes. The most peculiar thing, was that at its side were two massive wooden spoked wheels near equal to its own height. Wooden wheels that had serrated metal teeth ringing them. Chains connected to their centers extended and vanished into the creature’s feathered body. 

Whatever the feathered, bovine, Grimm-like thing was.
It just waited.
Watching.

[i]FUCK. MY. LIFE.[/i] Diamond thought as she turned the corner and saw it - whatever the hell IT was. Prof. Port did not exactly cover the topic of devil’s children of Baels, Harpies and chariots. The monster seemed content on watching her though, and Diamond liked time. Narrowing her eyes to limit the flash, a bit of white appeared in them as she focused on the houses surrounding the monster, setting up the walls to explode in it’s direction. She kept her gaze pointed at the thing in case it decided standing around was boring.

Tilting its head, it continued to stare at Diamond with some sort of sick and disturbing playfulness. Though, hardly anything other than potential malice could be felt. It could smell it. It could taste it. The fear and apprehension coming from the Huntress. Good, it thought. More was needed. More was desired in order to satiate its hunger. To feed it. Turning its head slowly over its shoulder, it looked back at the fast setting sun. The glowing star starting to disappear behind the mountain ranges off in the far distance. Night was coming and soon everything would be ready.

It needed to buy time. And maybe send a message.
Turning its head back round to stare at Diamond, its feathered body undulated and moved slightly.
Emerging from its rustling cloak, was an arm sheathed in black cloth and a metal claw gauntlet.
Wrapping around its wrists were bundles of chains where apparently they terminated at, connected to the wheels. Slowly grabbing at the one of the wooden spokes of the wheel to its right…

With a distorted and garbled voice, it spoke with venom lining its tone.
[i]”Heretic.”[/i]

Diamond’s focus faltered for a second. Uncommon grimm she could deal with - the last one she fought was fucking liquid shit made alive. But one that talked? She was glad her headset was recording this, certain it would give her an extra credit or two in Grimm studies if she made a paper on this thing. That didn’t help though. She had no time for it - it needed to be dealt with and quick. Fortunately for her, the sun was setting already. Mere minutes and her semblance would get a boost. She needed to buy that time. [i]Wait… I like to talk too.[/i]

“Oh? The Grimm now believe that garbage that one god made everything? My beliefs predate that - who’s the heretic here?”

Tightening its grip on the serrated wooden quasi-saw blade, the modulated voice of the creature offered no direct response to Diamond. Not particularly interested in holding a conversation with her.

[i]”Herald. Harbinger. Heed my words. Pass on our adage. In Death we are One. In Death we are Whole. You shall make us Whole, again. Blood spilled will seal this contract, Heretic.”[/i]

With a surge of strength, the creature lifted the heavy wheel with its arm as the teeth that ringed it buzzed and roared. Viciously grinding and sparking as it spun up. With a powerful toss, the creature sent the wheel flying at Diamond to crush and grind her into the nearest wall.

Seeing the Grimm acting, Diamond had no trouble dodging. For how long though? “Well then, allow me to reunite you with your other parts!” She growled back and snapped her fingers. The walls left and right of the monster cracked at ground level and flown outwards to slam shut like a book. Wasting no time, the ex-thief made a beeline for a side alley. She would need help with this. 

The creature had fast reflexes and thankfully was able to raise its arms to defend itself against the walls. Shattering the wall sections and reducing them to rubble as its body glowed with a pinkish-purple Aura. With a jerk of its right arm, the creature pulled its wheel-weapon back like a yo-yo. Hefting both of its wheels, it walked straight ahead at a casual pace. Seeking prey to hunt. Blood to spill.

It did not follow. Crap. She couldn’t leave, not with Emerald being defenseless close by. Maybe if she got to the rooftops and hit it from behind. Taking a couple of breaths to clear her mind, Diamond got climbing. She kept focused, trying to eliminate all emotion radiating from her in case the Grimm could sense her approach. Once up on the rooftops, she located the Grimm and started to move behind it.

Stopping in its tracks, it slowly looked from right to left as it tried to locate Diamond. Obviously, with its casual demeanor the creature had lost her. Moving at the snail’s pace it had been moving at. Truly, it didn’t appear too concerned with Diamond as it didn’t perceive her as a big enough threat yet. Really, it didn’t matter much, as it intended to bring her out of hiding. It would bring the entire town down if need be. Raising the two wheels it held in its hands above its head, it snapped and combined the two to make a massive ‘yo-yo’ weapon. With the teeth from each wheel spinning and grinding in opposite directions and the chains attached to it the ‘string’, the creature then began to spin it round and round. Building up momentum as it intended to use the destructive instrument as a flail to cause wanton and reckless damage to the buildings surrounding it. 

As she jumped from roof to roof, Diamond started preparing her attack. Her heart nearly stopped when after one leap, she found herself to be flying at a house with a gaping hole in its roof. She had no time to check inside though - her time was up. With that shot of fright and surprise, she likely lost the advantage. Laying her eyes on the big grimm, she launched the dozen ice spikes she was summoning against it. Immediately afterwards she grabbed her remaining flare gun and fired it off, hoping to everything that was holy someone would notice and not be gutted down on approach again.

Its intentions slightly ruined, the creature instead directed its weapon to swing away at Diamond’s incoming attack. Easily smashing and turning the ice spikes into cold dust but delaying its next attack. With a turn of its body, it moved from deflecting Diamond’s spikes to sending the massive combined wheel straight towards her. The object would be hard not to miss and a bit slow, so Diamond could easily dodge the serrated wood-and-metal wheel/yo-yo weapon. But the creature had something else up its sleeve should she actually choose to evade. 

Diamond did, but not without an ulterior motive of her own. As she wheel flown close by, she lashed out with a shadow spike to jam it in one of the links of the chain that bound the wheel to the creature, intending to break it. It would be much more manageable then.

[i]Snap![/i]
The chain link Diamond attacked, broke.
Sending the wheel flying off to embed itself into a neighboring house. 
The creature hadn’t anticipated that and for a moment, it stood staring at Diamond.
Angered, the creature’s body again glowed with a pinkish Aura as it buried its hands into the ground.
With a roar, the creature ripped out pieces of the road in two chunks and chucked them at Diamond. Following after its own attack by leaping up at her to slash her with its claws. 

[i]Run![/i] screamed her old criminal instincts. In a calm state of mind, Diamond might have tried to reverse the chunks of asphalt and send them against the leaping creature. But when under stress, one fell to what they knew, what they were trained in. And so, Diamond bolted, heading perpendicular to the incoming Grimm, trying to keep one eye on it and one on where she was going.

Landing on the rooftop where Diamond had been previously, the creature thought to charge after her but it stopped. Looking off to the side where its weapon had landed, it thought to calm down and think instead of acting recklessly. It wasn’t an animal, after all. Jumping from roof to roof, it quickly relinked with its weapon and pulled it apart. Releasing the chains its center was attached to, the feathered/antlered creature tossed them aside and pulled more length of chain from underneath its rustling hide. It had brought extra in case of emergencies just like this. As it fed and connected more chain links to its weapon, it needed to think of something so that Diamond doesn’t think to try the same move again. So when it was done and reattached the two wheel parts together, it tightly grabbed the chain links and growled as its body glowed with its pink Aura once more. Using some special ability, it imbued the length of chain with its own power and reinforced them to withstand any future attacks from Diamond’s shadow. Turning to see her still running away from it, it again lifted its weapon above its head and swung it around and around to build more momentum. Satisfied with the build up, the creature again sent the Wheel-Yoyo weapon flying after Diamond with its teeth ripping and grinding loudly. Only this time, the creature didn’t wait for her to try and dodge it. Instead, the creature forced its arms outward and pulled apart the weapon in mid flight. Creating two smaller but still dangerous saw disks flying at her from now opposite directions.

[hr]
…
[i]A muffled groan.[/i]
Tony’s eyes snapped open from within his still-intact helmet. The first thought that ran through his mind was to ask himself if this was it.
[i]”Am I in Hell? Have I died?”[/i]
Another muffled groan.
[i]”Well, wait a minute. I didn’t make that noise.”[/i]
Blinking his eyes, the HUD within his helmet flickered back to life and he found himself staring into a pile of rubble.
[i]”Fuckin’ A’, I’m alive. I made it.”[/i]
According to the readings on his HUD, he was quite well in fact.
A more agitated muffled groan, this time sounding like someone was saying his name.
[b]”...Ony”[/b]
Tony frowned, still haven’t moved once he woke.
A more pissed off repetition of his name, still somewhat muffled.
[b]”TONY.”[/b]
Sharply inhaled, he remembered how he ended up here and immediately realized whose voice it was that spat out his name. Scrambling backwards onto his ass, debris falling off of him and his armor, he wiped at the front of his helmet to get a clearer look.
Sitting up, a pissed off Esther coughed and cleared aside some of the bullshit that had covered her. Having taken care of the largest piece that suffocated her.
[b]”Ass. You know how much you weigh with all of that shit on, and you want to take your sweet time getting off of me.”[/b] Esther fixed her jaw and popped a few tense joints in her neck as she resituated herself.
Antonio felt a wave of relief and he almost wanted to rush forward and embrace his friend in a bear hug, but knew better and decided against it. Laughing, he almost wanted to make an inappropriate remark as to their prior history with one another, but a sharp pointed finger aimed at his face from Esther stopped him.
[b]”Don’t you dare. You’re a married man with a daughter now.”[/b] Esther glared at him, knowing exactly what he was thinking.
Antonio just put up his hands in a defensive gesture and shrugged his shoulders.
[b]”I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, lady.”[/b]
Esther scoffed, spitting some dirt out of her mouth to the side of her.
[b]”Sure, you don’t. Ugh…”[/b]
Esther shut her eyes and held her head, she felt like hell.
Antonio couldn’t help himself, [b]”What’s with you? You act like you fell from the sky. Ha ha ha!”[/b]
Esther grabbed a wooden piece of roofing and chucked it at his face, nailing him and immediately cutting off his laughter. He stopped.
[b]”Yes, ma’am. Received, ma’am.”[/b]
Esther sighed, groaning angrily.

Antonio then got to his feet and quickly looked around. Checking himself over, he located his rifle just a few feet away and picked it up. Doing a quick functions check, he slung it over his body and walked over to Esther and offered his hand to help her up. Esther opened an eye and seeing his hand, took it and got to her feet. Dusting herself off, she did the same with her own weapons to make sure they were still in good working order.

Antonio shook his head and chuckled, looking over his friend.
[b]”Gods, how the hell did we make it out of that? Falling from the sky and living to tell the tale?”[/b]
Esther looked up at his face and just gave him an accusing death glare.
[b]”Well, when your ribs are in danger of all cracking and your lungs are being squeezed of all their air..”[/b]
Antonio looked to the side when he realized what she meant.
[b]”Oh.”[/b]
Esther pursed her lips.
[b]”Mm-hmm. Not exactly a nice way to wake up when you’re mid-fall about to be splattered across someone’s house, is it? Being bear hugged to death by an augmented PMC.”[/b]
Not that he could exactly do it, but he still attempted to scratch at his helmeted head from feeling a bit uneasy.
Esther continued speaking
[b]”Good thing though, I woke up just in time to take the brunt of the fall with my Aura. Saving both of our asses.”[/b]
[b]”Yeah...Anyways, so what now lady? Where do you think we touched down at? What’s next?”[/b]
Esther sighed.
[b]”Well, common sense would tell us that we’re in some town and the only nearest town is the farming village. So, that would mean we were thrown so far off course when the airship was shot down that we ended up back here.”[/b]
Antonio kicked aside a stray piece of roofing.
[b]”That works in our favor, doesn’t it? You and I can scout around and see if we can find anything suspicious. Maybe something related to why our communications have been acting up?”[/b]
Esther nodded, walking over to the gaping hole the two of them made into some poor farmer’s home and peering outward at the darkening skies.
[b]”That’s the plan.”[/b]
Antonio walked over to her and stood by her side.
After a moment of silence between the two..
[b]”Do you think the others made it out just as well as we did?”[/b]
Esther shook her head.
[b]”Let’s not worry about that, right now.”[/b]
Off in the distance, the two looked up as a bright flare was shot into the sky.
Antonio placed a hand on Esther’s shoulders to stop her from immediately jumping out to investigate.
[b]”Hey, wait. That could be another trap. Like the first one that got us all shot down.”[/b]
Esther shrugged off his hand and turned to face him.
[b]”And? That could also be one of the emergency flares my students are using to seek help.”[/b]
Antonio shook his head and sighed, exasperated.
[b]”You never were the brightest bulb in the bunch.”[/b]
Esther elbowed him in the ribs.
[b]”Fuck off. I never claimed to be some genius or something I’m not. Besides, if it is a trap, imagine how surprised they be when we purposefully spring it and walk into it?”[/b]
Antonio just stood there, staring at her.
[b]”I think when we landed, you hit your head a little too hard.”[/b]
Esther smirked and reached up to remove her cover, only to find that she was no longer wearing it. Of course, she had lost it when they were shot down. She would have to get another one when they got back. Sighing, she undid the tight bun she normally kept her hair in and let it down. Quickly pulling it back and binding it into a ponytail. Grabbing at the gold badge she always wore on her chest, rings of light shot out and ran down her body as her clothing changed. Antonio turning his head away to give her a bit of privacy. Though, he knew she didn’t really care and he’d seen it all before.

Altering her normal military-like uniform and coat, Esther donned more archaic clothing with the use of her badge. Tan rugged all-terrain boots. Long camouflage trousers that had knee pads built into them. Thigh holster that carried her sidearm and its magazines. A ‘war belt’ wrapped around her waist that held various pouches for items and a sheath for her ‘knife’.  Long-sleeved camouflage blouse with a tan armor-plate carrier that protected her vital organs from the front and back. Shooting gloves that resist heat and puncture/slash attacks with a hardened knuckle built into them. Finishing off her transformation with a cloth face mask that covered the lower half of her face, clear ballistic eyewear to protect her eyes from shrapnel, and a tan ballcap from which her ponytail stuck out of from the back. All in all, she used tech far more archaic and ancient when compared to what most servicemen in the military used nowadays. But, it was what she always used ever since she was a fledgling Huntress herself. Keep it stupid simple, she always thought.

Antonio turned back to look at her once she was done getting into her combat attire and couldn’t help but remark something that caught his eyes while she was ‘changing’.
[b]”Hey, uhh...Not that I was looking but did you get-”[/b]
Esther replied instantly.
[b]”Yes.”[/b]
Antonio made a hmm noise.
[b]”Can I-”[/b]
[b]”No.”[/b]
[b]”But-”[/b]
[b]”Tony, your wife wouldn’t be too pleased about it.”[/b]
[b]”Wul, I mean...What she doesn’t know…”[/b]
Esther stomped on his foot.
[b]”You need to change your fucking name to ‘Jody’. Let’s get moving, I’d prefer not to walk up on the corpses of my students if you don’t mind.”[/b]
After finishing his little hop around, nursing his smashed toes, he sighed and racked back the charging handle of his rifle to chamber a round. Esther doing the same with her own special rifle.
[b]”Y’know, it’s really not fair that you Huntsmen have all this crazy power. I’m wearin’ a full suit of high-tech armor for Gods sake!”[/b]
[b]”Cry more about it.”[/b]
With that, the two jumped out of the hole in the side of the house and hit the ground running. Heading straight towards where they saw the origin of the flare shot.

[hr]
Emerald quivered from under the bed she had chosen to hide under. Under normal circumstances she’d never have even dreamed of cowering under a bed like this, but as it was she could barely stand without intense waves of dizziness overwhelming her. There was also how hot her body was, she couldn’t check her temperature but she had a feeling it was higher than it should have been. She had neglected to mention this to Diamond, she didn’t want the other girl becoming more worried than she already was, that could be dangerous in combat. 

From the loud noises coming outside, it sounded like Diamond had ran into trouble. It wasn’t far from the house, Emerald’s sharp ears had been able to hear everything, even in her current state. It sounded like Diamond was okay for the moment, but Emerald wished she could help. 

Emerald’s ears perked up as she heard something else...it was a bit more distant but it was definitely the sound of footsteps, humanoid for sure by the sound of it. Emerald held one of her shotguns tightly as they got louder, there was no way to know if they were friendly or not. She shivered, a sudden chill going up her spine, she had to be ready for anything. 

[hr]
If the grinding sound wouldn’t be a telltale, the look over her shoulder would. Diamond saw she had seconds before she was made tenderized meat. [i]Duck![/i] And then some! She looked in front of her and jumped down the first gap between the houses.

“Whoa!”

She did not expect anyone else to be there, much less one of the soldiers with Ms. Vanhomrigh. The wheels zoomed inches above her as she fell towards the street, with her surprised cry giving them the only warning before the student landed back first right under their feet, the wind knocked out of her.

The two of them both startled by the sudden and cliched appearance of a girl falling from the sky, Tony immediately acted upon his instincts. Just as soon as Diamond’s back hit the ground, he was literally right on top of her. Pressing his armored chest hard ontop of hers to force her center of gravity down, he roughly managed to flip Diamond over and twisted her arms so that they were behind her in the clutch of one of his hands. His other hand forcing her head against the dirt as he got up to press his knees into her spine. Diamond’s criminal background past would be immediately familiar with the rough treatment that most policing forces apprehended suspects, Antonio’s technique not too dissimilar. Following up behind him, Esther snapped in and stared down the holographic sight of her rifle as she pointed the muzzle of her weapon at Diamond’s head, distance staggered from where Tony and Diamond were. Of course they had acted so quickly that it wasn’t until Esther blinked a few times and recognized the face of her student. Before she could even sigh and say anything, Antonio angrily roared out questions. Going straight into the interrogations, taking Diamond to be a potential attacking enemy.

[b]”Identify yourself!”[/b]
Esther lowered her weapon and sighed.
[b]”Tony.”[/b]
Antonio’s helmeted head briefly turned to look at her before returning his attention to Diamond.
He did a double take, noticing Esther had lowered her guard so to speak.
[b]”What? What is it?”[/b]
Esther clucked her tongue.
[b]”That, ah...That’s my student you’ve got your kneecaps under.”[/b]
Antonio looked back down at Diamond and stared at her.
He had just been ready to draw his sidearm and press its barrel against the back of her head too.
[b]”Oh. Shit.”[/b]

“Ugh! Let go!” Diamond growled but the weight on her back was enough to make breathing hard, let alone answering and swearing. The good teacher finally seemed to notice, and only Diamond’s gaze facing away from the gun pointed at her head spared her another theatre.

“Keep your dog on a leash!” she vented, shaking Tony off when she was identified. Taking a breath to calm down, she went to explain what was going on. “I’ll tell you more later but there’s this Bael… Harpy… Thing of a Grimm chasing me, which is the only thing keeping it from razing the town, so unless you have something better to do, I would very much appreciate a hand!”

More could be told later. Not waiting for an affirmative, Diamond launched herself back up the roof, alert for any incoming yo-yos of death. And then she saw it. Still up on the roof, there was her hat, sliced in half and shredded by the gods damn thing! Her jaw dropped a little and she could feel tears forming in the corners of her eyes. For about half a second, before any other emotion was drowned in a flood of rage.

The lungful of enraged roar echoed around the streets even as Diamond picked up speed, her shadow twisting into an irregular, abominable sharp thing ready to tear the speaking grimm up limb from limb.

Unable to get any words in edgewise the pair could only watch as Diamond took off, hot on her heels as they chased after her. Esther was able to launch herself high into the air just as her student did, but Tony had to resort to a bumbling and clumsy parkour-like climb in his heavy high-tech suit of armor. Keeping up with Diamond, Esther’s eyes widened momentarily with shock when she saw the antlered and feathered creature she had mentioned earlier before gritting her teeth as her shock melted away into anger. With a burst of energy, she sprinted ahead of Diamond a short distance before stopping. Whirling on the spot, she shot out her leg to give Diamond a solid roundhouse kick into her stomach in an attempt to stop her. If successful, she forced herself on top of the young girl and would bury her face in her arms and chest. Looking up as she saw Tony lagging behind, Esther screamed at the top of her lungs at her comrade.

[b]”FLASHBANG!”[/b]

Tony skidded to a stop and nearly lost his footing, almost falling.
But looking ahead to see what they were up against, he gave an understanding nod and pulled a canister off of his body. Twisting the top half of the explosive to unlock it, Tony hit the exposed button and chucked it hard at the creature’s face just as it was spinning up its weapon for another attack. 

It took a special occasion to confuse Diamond, and this certainly fit the bill. First she saw Esther screaming past her - that much she expected. The cheap gutshot that followed not so much. She was going to have to talk to this bitch about her behavior, preferably in a soundproof room with a single chair, duct tape, car battery and jumper cables. All anger was gone the second she got treated to a face full of 
lady pillows. Which would have been perfectly acceptable as an apology, were it not for the fact that she was being smothered by them. Hammering her fists at the weight above her, she tried to get free until she heard a hissing bang of the grenade that annihilated the weapon she was still holding, giving up trying to predict what would happen next.

After the flashbang went off, the creature howled and reeled back from the blinding light and deafening high pitched keening. Heavily disoriented, it wasn’t prepared for what came next. Across the way, Tony presented his rifle and let rip a blaze of automatic rifle fire into the creature’s body. Esther got off of Diamond and scooped the student up and onto her shoulders and back. Running towards the edge of the rooftops, she issued a command to Tony that could be clearly heard over the gunfire.

[b]”Tony, we’re clearing out! We’re regrouping!”[/b]
Tony nodded just as he emptied his first magazine of ammunition and dropped it.
[b]”Loud and clear!”[/b]
Pulling off another explosive from his equipment, he chucked it at the creature and chased after his comrades.

As the three of them landed safely on the ground, a loud explosion could be heard in the distance.
Running a good distance to get as far away as quickly as they could, Esther picked a residence and kicked in the door. Tony following in right behind her as he made sure nothing followed before closing the door behind them. Esther angrily removed Diamond from her back and subsequently body slammed her against the nearest wall, using her forearm to press it against her neck as she got in her face.

[b]”Why the FUCK are you alone!?”[/b]
And so, it began.
[/hider]