[IC] Heroes of Beacon - the Next Chapter

[harinezumikouken]

Esther Vanhomrigh - Infirmary

Esther returned to the world of the living when she detected movement near her, leaving the terrible maelstrom of chaotic thoughts in her mind behind. She was surprised to see the good Professor Rowan seated at her side, blinking a few times to wet her dry eyes. When Rowan whispered those comforting little words to her, Esther let out a relieved sigh and slightly leaned into her as she put her arm around her tired shoulders. Esther rubbed at her weary eyes and took a moment to straighten up her hair before burying her face in her still-gloved hands. Scoffing at first, Esther chuckled and quietly responded to her boss and yet friend.

"Huh. You know me, Rowan. I can never slow down. But, I appreciate the concern."

Esther's voice betrayed just how exhausted she was to her friend. Though, as bone-tired and soul-drained as she was, it was unfair to not be considerate of her students. All of whom save for Diamond were laid up on hospital beds. Not to mention the four that weren't even allowed the luxury of breathing on this earth. Esther sighed, her shoulders sagging. Running her hands back across her hair, she lowered her head to stare at the ground. Groaning softly, she allowed herself to complain a little bit. Her head aching.

"Ugh, I could really use a drink right now. Or 10. And a cigarette. Why the fuck can't we smoke on campus grounds...?"
Esther bitched privately to Rowan.

[MULTI_MEDIA_MAN]

Oswald Connoly- Infirmary

Looking between Cobalt and Professor Iderson, Oswald let out a defeated sigh as he lowered himself back onto the bed. "Fine. Though, I do plan to spend as much time in a chair as possible, Cobalt. Let my back and chest relax for a while before its time to get down and dirty again." His voice managed to hide the myriad of self-flagellant emotions he was harboring at the moment, but as it did so very often recently, his Aura betrayed him.

Rather than rampaging tendrils of shadowy energy, this time Oswald's Aura manifested itself as a very faint layer of scales across his body. He hadn't even noticed it himself, until he looked down at his body one more time. His entire left side was covered in a group of bruises, already beginning the healing process.

What struck him as odd, though, was how different the two instructors in front of him were behaving. Professor Iderson, on the one hand, was giving off an air of care, comfort and unity. On the other hand, Ms. Vanhomrigh had acted much more like the Hunters he remembered from home: crude, inflammatory, and down to earth. The difference was enough to make him look between the two a few times.

If it came down to it, he'd stick with Vanhomrigh. At least with her, he could expect what was coming and handle it pretty well.

[Abillioncats]

Emerald didn't know Rowan, this was the first time they'd really met. Though she immediately struck her as a rather kind and caring individual, and even with all the dark thoughts going through Emerald's mind she started to feel a little less terrified than before. She had to remember that she was safe now, those things couldn't reach her here in Beacon.

And yet while she knew that, part of her still trembled, as if her mind and body were in conflict. She looked at Rowan with her big eyes, being uncharacteristically silent. She had however stopped crying for the moment.

[Crimmy]

Gratia Mindaro - Journée des Tuiles

They were gone.

It was time to begin.

Gratia ghosted through the hallways of the office compound, silent and impassive, her intact disguise as merely another lowly thug within this soon-to-be-nonexistent collection of scum allowing her free rein of the building. There were few obstacles in her path, she noted dispassionately, no pathetic little insects for her to squash beneath her feet. Not that she particularly desired to take time out of her plans to do so - they would suffer no matter what she chose to do, and watching their dreams crumble to ashes was more than enough to sate her bloodlust. No, she would leave the pest control to the cheese-eating goat-fucker.

He would enjoy bashing in the skulls of the unwashed masses of animals far more than she.

She glanced down at the USB stick in her hand, a new piece of evidence that would join the dossier that the Marissa woman had provided her. It was not particularly necessary for her to retrieve all these shitty knick-knacks lying around, but she made sure to be thorough. All the little bits and pieces would be truly useful in ruining the disgusting name of the Dodici to the extent where they would be struck out from history. She would make their extermination slow and painful, and every little piece of evidence would help her in doing so.

Quietly, the young Huntress stepped back from the empty storeroom, having successfully retrieved all that was useful.

It was time to begin.

The fire alarm began to ring, the wild, frightening sound echoing across the compound.

Just like she wanted.

[Write]

VGNB: Cleaning Crew

Beryl

The Faunus did not wait for anyone. They all immediately got up and rushed towards the exit opened by Beryl. With seemingly nothing stopping them some swarmed Beryl herself, others ran for the horizon. It would be impossible to contain them all, though perhaps that would be for the best. As Beryl watched the sea of Faunus escape from their confines the fire alarm began to blare its racket from the main building, a secondary alarm soon heard its queue and began doing the same. This cause most of the Faunus that had joined Beryl to instead begin following after the others that were running full tilt to make it out of the compound. It seemed the Dodici truly were burning down today.

Gratia

Panic has set in on the compound. Beryl had dealt with the Faunus, Gratia the Intel and Bianca, perhaps everything was finally falling into place. Gratia placed the USB in the dossier and caught a glimpse of the Nuit family insignia. That dossier would prove to be… Helpful, insightful perhaps in this situation. All that was left was to bring it home, stick the final landing. The emergency services were already on their way to the compound.

[Krayzikk]

Most of the time, Ben would claim he was the levelheaded member of the team. He had to be. He was the Captain. Lauren, Amy, Sangue they could all be as hotheaded as they wanted. Amy was proving that pretty handily right now. But Ben needed to be the one ready to rein them back in. But being a Huntsman wasn't all about being calm, collected, and clever. If it was then any General worth their salt could do Ben's job, and probably do it better. No. Part of being a good Huntsman was knowing when the rules of play went out the fucking window, and knowing how to fight like a goddamn maniac to compensate.

And fighting a Manticore on foot with shotguns and blades fit the bill.

We better get some serious fucking brownie points for this.

"Hey, bitch!" Bastille's, at this point potentially certifiable, team leader called out, throwing a rather obscene gesture the Manticore's way while he swaggered up towards the edge of the roof. "This your idea of fun? Did the other Grimm call you names, so you're gonna pick on the puny humans?"

Grimm, generally, were much too stupid to grasp the meaning of words.

But this one would have to be clinically braindead to miss Ben's tone. Did he think he was going to badger the Grimm to death? Absolutely not, but he could piss it off. And if he was pissing it off, it'd be paying less attention to Amy. And hey, if his tone didn't do the trick, the Fire Dust rounds rocketing at its eyes would do the trick. As would the Lightning ones he casually swapped into Artorius' chamber and sent after their more fiery brethren.

He eyed the Manticore's movements, waiting for the preparatory bunch of muscles. Either he got its attention and it went after him, in which case Deinamig was on standby to get him out of the way in time, or it stayed focused on Amy. In that case he had an opening. Win win.

Didn't make the plan any less insane.

"Give it a shot! See what happens, you ugly bastard."

[Crimmy]

Gratia Mindaro - Third Punic War

Everybody was fleeing.

Gratia closed her eyes, listening to the horrid shrieking of the alarm bells. It was a truly ugly and disgusting noise, one that would induce the worst fucking headaches in those who were unfortunate to listen to them. The harsh sounds were to the force the Dodici, the unwashed vermin and insects, to flee, to scatter into the winds like the cowardly scum they were. From this day onwards, none of them would be Dodici. The name would be eradicated from history. Gone, like the records of a civilisation fallen to the monstrous hordes of Grimm.

She glanced towards the dust repositories, the vials upon vials and containers upon containers of the beautiful, mysterious substance that had given mankind the power to fight. That had given the Dodici the barest hints of ability. Her onyx eyes seemed to shine in the dull light of her burning lighter. It was truly ironic, that they would in the end be fucked over by their own puny ambitions and desires. By their own self-aggrandisement and confidence in their power.

Hiss

The fuse was lit.

The lighter snapped shut with a metallic click.

It was done.

The teenaged huntress left the storeroom, quietly descending through the closest fire escape to leave the building. When the night was over, the building would be a charred hulk, a skeletal fragment that would fall to ashes with the barest hint of the wind. An undignified death for an organisation that deserved no dignity. She couldn't help but laugh quietly, a guttural giggle that was drowned out in the rush of screams and panic of the Zephyr nights. Their little goons, the pond muck who had eagerly allowed the Dodici's tiny cocks to ram them, they would live to see the destruction of everything they had worked for.

Fitting vengeance against those that had sought to destroy Nuit.

Gratia Mindaro gazed upon the towering Dodici compound.

Windows across the floor of the storeroom shattered in an ear-splitting explosion, a shock wave of heat and noise bursting free of its constraints to crumple the very walls of the building. Orange flashed across the dark night, attracting the attention of anybody awake to the sight of the Dodici compound set ablaze, consumed by a sudden firestorm of wild, impossible hate. It creaked dangerously, framework beginning to buckle against the heat and damage. Black smoke filled the air, eerie dust in the glow of the fire. Flames furiously licked every surface, leaving nowhere that was clear of the destruction they had wrought upon themselves.

The emergency services would never be able to rescue the building.

It was hellfire materialised. A funeral pyre for a group of animals now enjoying themselves with the Devil.

The Dodici had been scorched to ashes.

And once the evidence was submitted, not even that would be left.

"Mission complete," she messaged to every member of the team.

Their job was done.

[Lugubrious]

Brewing Storm

@krayzikk@sho minazuki@herecomesthesnow@kaithas@plank Sinatra@suku@narayank

While the Manticore repositioned, the radio came alive. The voice of Goodwitch, not much less composed than normal but still a notable departure from her usual tone, declared, “I’m on my way. I’ll strike from above and open it up. Be careful; if we can force it to retreat, we can buy enough time to get the survivors out.” Having kept abreast of the teams’ chatter, Goodwitch knew that in a very short time the survivors from the basement, the second floor, and the hunters Jack, Cian, Lucas, Lauren, and Sangue would be exiting the building. At least, she hoped as much, and saw no reason why they wouldn't. A Manticore was a monstrous threat, one that she knew her students could fight but almost certainly not beat. No amount of bravado on their part would suddenly give them the power to take down a beast never before encountered or properly prepared against. Next time, Goodwitch vowed, she would demand that mission control send in recon to discover problems like this first. Now that the students were out of the frying pan and into the fire, though, Beacon’s combat instructor would not allow a single life to be lost.

Above the confrontation on the roof, the airship flew into position. In midair it span, a door opening up, and the wind whipped Goodwitch’s pale blonde hair as she walked down the ramp. Through narrowed eyes she watched two students stand before it, and picked up snippets of Benjamin’s taunts. Did he think to enrage the beast? Could one goad a merciless killing machine, tempered by age and reinforced by battles past? Manticores were no garden-variety Grimm. A plume of fire appeared as Benjamin plugged its eyes with dust, provoking an irritated snarl. By the time he swapped in lightning dust for a second volley, however, the beast moved its left foreleg into position to block the yellow bolts. For all of its experience, it couldn’t have known that the puny beings before it wielded ranged attacks. Benjamin’s search for bunched muscles turned up an abundance; the monstrous Grimm moved forward, putting more of its body onto the roof, and slammed down at him with its upheld left paw.

It did not stop at this, however. When one enormous foreleg fell, the other rose, and in a frenzy it beat the roof of the distillery like a humungous drum. Its huge crushing limbs and deadly claws hammered down again and again, in various positions and with nightmarish speed. The roof and walls began to buckle readily, crumpled as if they were plastic. Snapping her riding crop, Goodwitch hoped that both Benjamin and Amaranth could escape this catastrophic attack rush. She flourished her weapon, sending a deluge of purple magic spears to pepper the creature from above. They lodged in its scalp and back, hurting it a little more, perhaps, than splinters might hurt a human, but for the moment at least the Manticore would not halt its frenzied assault. Goodwitch frowned and prepared to cast a more decisive spell.

-meanwhile-

As near-panicked as they were from the terrifying noises and vibrations filling the building, the survivors managed to succinctly convey what they could do to help with remarkable composure. Of course, not a single one thought that standing around talking about skills would be a better option than just grabbing the girl and getting the hell out of dodge, but they seemed committed to the idea that Jack knew best how to handle the situation. Lucas, Cian, and Jack were informed that the group could take a detour through the underground garage and ride the lift straight up to the distillery’s loading area outside the front. One of the survivors revealed himself to be the technician who usually ran the transportation routines, and that as long as the facility had power he could unlock the system and get everyone up.

With this information relayed, the group of survivors almost instantly began moving in the indicated direction, only to freeze and wait for the hunters’ say-so. Nobody had told them who would be best suited to carrying Priscilla, either. At the very least, the attention paid to her by Lucas and Cian ensured that she would be able to be transporting without too serious a risk of further injury.

[MULTI_MEDIA_MAN]

Chorus of the Deep

The Captain's words ended to the tune of tramping boots. Simultaneously the respectively large and fluffy-eared shapes of Abel and Shiro appeared, rounding the corner of the war room building to rejoin their teammates. Both exuded a sense of renewed liveliness, surely stemming from their break, though not one turgid enough to dazzle the others. The sight of Sapphire and Gren out in the open, their manners confident, provided evidence enough for Abel to assume that action lay in his near future. "Right then. How's this gonna go down?"

Gren was making a list of things he'd need, things he wanted, and notes on the situation when Abel and Shiro arrived. As soon as they got close Gren wasted no time doling out orders. "Abel, you and Sapphire are going to go scout out the last known location of Daisy. Sapphire will be doing most of the recon, but if anything happens I want you near by to help. If you see the Siren, don't engage it unless you have to. I don't want either of you two risking your lives trying to take it on without the team. Me and Shiro are going to head towards the armory where I can try to whip up something to help Shiro deal with the Siren's song, as well as get some equipment that could help us fight it. We'll meet back here within a few hours at most, discuss what we've done, and figure out how to take on the Siren."

Sapphire watched Gren dolling out orders. It wasn't that she had a problem with anything that he was actually saying, in fact she agreed with most of it, it was more the fact that he was issuing them as though he was the team leader. Sapphire didn't have a problem with her teammates making decisions for themselves. When it came down to it she didn't want to be responsible for telling them every single thing they had to do, some initiative was called for but Sapphire could sense a brewing storm a mile off. Since day one, which admittedly had only been two weeks ago Gren had considered her appointment as leader a mistake on the part of the administration and was vying to take it from her. While her teammates thinking for themselves was a good thing Gren was setting things up so that in a point of conflict down the line the rest of the team would be more likely to side with him over her because they were more used to hearing his ideas and orders from his mouth.

Without batting an eye Sapphire fixed her gaze on the orc faunus. "Not that I disagree but I'd thank you to remember who's in command of this unit."

Not expecting positive reception from that statement but knowing it had its intended effect of reminding everyone that Gren was not team leader Sapphire motioned to Abel. "We best get going if we want to wrap this up today. I don't fancy spending my weekend hunting." With that and the location of the attack site gained from Miss Rookwood Sapphire walked through the precinct doors and waited for Abel outside. She assumed that they'd need a couple of minutes to exchange whatever it was Abel and Shiro had discussed with one another that they felt the need to hide from her and for Gren to add his own thoughts to it. She started to whistle.

Gren only smirked at Sapphire. She may not admit it, but the faunus knew she felt threaten by his slowly growing authority. The fact that she needed to keep pointing out that she was the leader of the team only made it clear that even she was having doubts who the boss was. Still, petty power struggles can happen later. They had a job to do.

Once Gren was finished speaking he walked over to Shiro, putting a hand on his shoulder and giving him a comforting smile. "I got some ideas how we can help you against the Siren, and some real cool shit I'll need your help with. You down for that buddy?" Gren raised his hand up with his palm out, showing Shiro some of his ideas. A couple of harpoon guns, wasp knives, big-ass speakers, a floodlights, and that was just a few things Gren was skimming through.

Looking over at Abel Gren also kept smiling, though he was also a bit more serious. "Take care of her Abel. I don't want any problems with Sapphire." Gren purposely voiced that phrase ominously, suspecting that if Sapphire was hearing then it would be confirmation of Gren's motives, which he could play off as a misunderstanding. And if she wasn't, he at least enjoyed it for what it was.

Watching the interaction between the students with a small sigh and a shake of the head, Captain McDougall returned to his War Room and watched them from afar. About to fight a Siren and having a petty argument about leadership. I guess I'll have to tell the headmaster to speak to them about this in my report. Might as well talk to the big green guy before they do this.

Stepping out of his War Room once he was sure Sapphire was gone, Captain McDougall approached the remaining members of Team SASG with a smile. "Gren, was it? Could we speak for a moment?" Gesturing to the War Room with his arm, the Captain gave what could only be described as a congenial smile to the large Faunus.

Gren looked towards the captain, a bit curious. He wasn't sure what the Captain had to say to Gren that he couldn't say right now. The fact that they had very little time, or at least no luxury to waste it, made Gren initially hesitant to follow, or at least ask the Captain to tell him right now. But whatever it was, Gren figured some privacy was needed. Perhaps it was something important that couldn't have been told in front of Sapphire. Or maybe it was something that had to do with Gren specifically. "Shiro, you know where the armory is? I'll meet you over there soon, gotta chat to the captain for a bit. Confirm details and what not."

Gren followed after the Captain, the faunus previously friendly demeanor in front of Team Swansong now replaced with a more serious and professional one. Gren did not want to come off as hostile, though he was hoping that he was intimidating in the event that the Captain was going to try to bully Gren into doing something he wouldn't like. As the green faunus followed behind him, Gren realized that perhaps he wasn't quite subtle enough with his intent on usurping Sapphire. Mentally, he chastised himself for thinking that the Captain was just some country bumpkin fool, and wouldn't be able to pick up on Gren's ambitions. And even if he wasn't that sharp, he'd have to be very ignorant to not think about Sapphire's own little statement about her leadership.

If Gren had to guess, Captain McDougall may be worried about the team's ability to cooperate with each other. Gren was fairly confident that he, Shiro, and Abel can work well as a team. Sapphire too, though only through rehearsed attacks. Working on the fly, being able to think like one another and coordinate moves unpracticed, these were things that needed more than just training. It needed a certain empathy, the ability to look someone in the eyes and go "You thinking what I'm thinking?" Granted, Gren's relationship with the others weren't that close, but sometimes he felt like they were on the same wavelength. Though Sapphire was a signal all of her own.

"Something you need, Captain? Do you need instructions on how to use my Scroll? Forgive me if I seem presumptuous, my device doesn't use the same interface as other models, and I wouldn't mind giving a quick tutorial so you can watch me properly."

"No, I believe we'll be alright with the Scroll. I wanted to speak with you about your team. Now, I'm not going to tell you how to handle your issues. I'm sure there's plenty of reason for whatever is going on. But I do know one thing: you're a group of First-year students on, what, your second mission?" Sighing, Captain McDougall turned away before continuing.

"I'm a man of simplicity. I enjoy walks on the beach, helping protect people, doing justice. All that nonsense." A wave of the arm punctuated the Captain's dismissal of his own interests. "I'm also a very patient man. On some occasions, waiting is the proper move. Waiting until your enemy makes a mistake that you can capitalize on. Waiting until that girl you're interested in looks like she's in a good mood before trying to talk to her."

"But sometimes it's the wrong move. Sometimes, quick and decisive action is required." Turning around, McDougall frowned. "Now is not one of those times. A Siren is no walk in the park, young man, but this is hardly the time or the place to be doing this, don't you think? From what I've gathered from your interactions, your leader, the young lady, is not...particularly friendly. She seems rather curt." Nodding at his words, McDougall continued.

"Yes, I would say curt. Now, normally, I'd leave the machinations of a team for that team to work out, but I'm getting the impression that this is less of a difference of opinions and more of a hostile takeover." Bringing a hand up to rub his jaw, the Captain thought on his words for a moment. "It took me a long time to reach my position in this unit. People died to get us where we are. People were hurt, as you saw. I may not particularly like some of the people under my command. But I would never, not ever, endanger their lives through reckless, negligent, or intended behavior."

"And that is what you are doing with your little game. For now, you're speaking as a leader and putting forward an idea as though it were law, rather than a suggestion. Soon, you'll be confronting your team and your leader about why you, or one of your other teammates, are better fit for command."

Captain McDougall looked to the floor before speaking again, his voice much more somber. "Then you'll be at each other's throats, figuratively if not literally, and decisive action will have to be taken. One or more of you may be removed from the team, and likely the school. So, young man, I would like to simply advise you on something: be patient. You hardly know a person after two weeks. Hell, some days I wonder if I really know my kids or my wife of twenty years. Maybe you're making the right choice. But you're definitely not doing it in the right way. Now, that was all I had for you. Your friend should be in the Armory, best not to keep him waiting." The pretenses dropped, Captain McDougall gave Gren a small nod, before looking back to the assortment of maps laid out on the table. No argument was to be given, that much was obvious.

Gren merely bowed his head, his expression never changing between dull professionalism and mild interest. So the captain wasn't dumb enough to not notice the underlying tensions between him and Sapphire, but felt it was necessary for him to comment on it. Was he hoping to change Gren's plan by pointing this out? Because he was going to need to do more than just give a little life story to affect Gren's ambitions. "I'll take it into consideration. Thank you for your thoughts."

As Gren was going to turn to leave, he did feel that he needed to at least respond with his own explanation for his motives. Though there wasn't time to participate in a debate, so Gren made his point short and deliberately vague, so the captain can mull on it. "How many second chances should someone get? If they can't do it right the first time, how many failures does it take before it gets better?" Actually that's something he should be asking everyone in his team. But once again, now was not the time to be worrying about leadership. There are bigger fish to fry, perhaps even literally, and Gren was more interested in trying to create that revolver-harpoon gun he just thought about.

Nodding at Gren's response, Captain McDougall took a moment to fiddle with Gren's Scroll, finding the function that allowed him to see Gren's view onscreen. "You know...perhaps you should have gone on reconnaissance. Not much good I'm getting from this, here, but I'll trust your team members to relay what they find. Good luck, now. In all your endeavors."

-=-=Sapphire and Abel=-=-

Swansong's leader had very little time to whistle. Abel appeared to her almost instantly, the words exchanged with the other members very few if not nonexistent. Out of the three men on the team, Abel almost certainly objected to her leadership the least. He did not particularly relish her power or company, but acknowledged her ability to get things done and would cooperate willingly with her for the good of the team. Gren's remark to him garnered an interpretation of don't let anything bad happen to her, which the guardian felt lay right up his alley. When he drew up beside her, glancing down from his great height at her pale features. They gave a slight impression of being taken aback. "What?" He said. "I'm here. Let's get going."

Sapphire's song stopped abruptly as the guardian appeared behind her. She'd expected them to be a bit longer inside and was mildly surprised that he came out so quickly. At his suggestion that they start there recon as soon as possible she nodded. "The beach where Daisy disappeared is over there." She said gesturing to the area. "We'd best get a move on."

"Gotcha." Without delay, Abel set off in Sapphire's indicated direction, walking ahead of his partner to confront first whatever dangers presented themselves to them. Since the bluenette's game plan revolved around stealth, Abel resolved to be the distraction and main fighting force in one, and in order to accomplish this without fear of aural penetration rummaged around in his pockets. From them he produced the earplugs and installed them quickly, making sure their rubber heads were securely lodged in their respective orifices. To be sure, they wouldn't block all noise, but should he be bombarded with the Siren's song he felt confident of his ability to resist.

The guardian's long, purposeful strides set a quick pace, and the two arrived at the beach in very short order.

As the pair arrived at the beach, they would be able to notice a very clearly labelled "DO NOT ENTER BEACH: BY ORDER OF TRAWL POLICE DEPARTMENT" sign near a building that appeared to be used to serve food. Above it was a sign that said "Sandy's Sandy Shack", apparently the name of the store.

Facing the water, they would notice a series of large rocks about a half-mile to their right, along with a large dune system further up the beach in that area. If they consulted their Scrolls, the pair would notice that this area to their right was an approximate match for the map they'd been given. Other than this area, the shop, and a few lifeguard towers, the beach was empty and devoid of mankind's interactions.

Sapphire looked around. According to her scroll they had arrived at the sight of the attack but from all visual signs there had been very little in the way of human disturbances in this area in quite some time. Sapphire turned to Abel. "I think I should take point on this. Miss Rookwood said that Daisy went into a cave system among those rocks over there. My semblance gives me an advantage in staying hidden, especially in dark places. You stand guard at the cave entrance, if I run into anything that warrants investigation or I encounter trouble then I'll text you on your scroll and I'll be engaging noise dampeners so if you need to call me back or have some more information then use your scroll." Sapphire closed her eyes and was about to activate her semblance when she thought that perhaps she should pay some mind to her teammates well being. "I'd look away if I were you, this tends to give people headaches if they're not used to it."

"Guard." Repeated Abel. Not exactly exciting, but not bad either. He nodded in affirmation to his leader. "Can do." With a raised eyebrow he watched her close her eyes, only to stop and issue a warning. "Ah, thanks," he replied, and averted his gaze.

Sapphire closed her eyes again and felt something akin to a click inside her head. When she opened her eyes everything was every so slightly out of focus. Not enough to impair her in any serious way but enough that it was noticeable. Of course once her eyes adjusted to this she was always surprised by how clear everything looked when she finally turned it off.

Sapphire briefly glanced at Abel. Since she was only using her semblance passively he would still be able to perceive her but if he kept looking her ability to remain undetected would send mixed signals to Abel's brain. Some that said she was there, some that said she wasn't. The usual result for most people was a mildly blurry image that wasn't quite stable though it varied from person to person. Some people were more or less immune to it while others it gave glaring headaches to when they tried to keep her in focus. She'd once met an epileptic boy who had experienced a seizure brought on by her semblance, not unlike strobe lights.

Curious, Abel glanced back to where his partner last stood. Only a couple of seconds' worth of staring at her location sent miniature lances of pain through his brain, and the guardian looked away. "Yeesh," he intoned. "Serious jamming you got there." Paying no further heed to her ability, he strolled toward the point where he'd set up.

Sapphire climbed over the rocks and disappeared from sight into the cave.

The cave was rather dark as Sapphire crept along it and the rocks of the wall she touched were slick with water. This wasn't really a problem for Sapphire, she'd always had fairly developed night vision and her training to fight blind because of her semblance side effects applied not too differently in near darkness as they did to total blindness. The Cave she was surprised to see was actually quite roomy. After she had climbed over the rocks and into the structure itself it had widened out, perhaps eight to ten feet in height, with a width at least dozen feet from one side to the other, Even someone of Gren's stature could move about almost unimpaired.

As far as Sapphire could tell the cave was a natural formation which made it the perfect hiding place for a Grimm that wished to remain hidden. After about three minutes of walking the path that Sapphire was following branched in two: one diagonally to the right, and one to the left. She didn't have enough information to make an informed decision about which way the Siren may have gone and any indications left in the cave by the singing Grimm were obscured by the darkness and the hard stone surfaces. Without any other option Sapphire turned down the right path. If it turned out that she was mistaken she could always retrace her steps and take the other one. She just hoped that this cave system didn't turn out to be a labyrinth.

With that thought in mind she took out her scroll and set it into a sort of map making mode. It didn't actually have the capabilities to map the area like an underground surveyor but Sapphire set it to record her own path, distances and direction and every time she encountered another divergence in the tunnel she could mark that part of her path so that she would know where she had and hadn't been and also be able to find her way back.

As Sapphire began to head down the right path, the cave slowly began to widen even further as it started to slope downwards, taking the girl further below the surface. Though Sapphire couldn't hear it through her bluetooth noise cancellers the sound of flowing water had become audible, bouncing off the cave walls all around her, along with an occasional "SCRTCH SCRTCH" noise that she remained oblivious to. Sapphire was forced to use the cave wall to guide herself down the path for though her night vision was fairly well developed there was so little light in this cave that she couldn't make out more than basic shapes. As she walked along her hands dragging over the side of the cave wall her fingers touched small moving things with hard shells. In fright she pulled her hand back before her rational mind sorted things out. It was just insects crawling along the walls of the cave. Not a surprising feature this deep underground, some of them were darting in and out of various crevices in the walls too small for anything larger than a finger to enter.

Sapphire swapped to the opposite wall and kept walking. She wasn't afraid of the bugs naturally but in this dark she didn't want to risk crushing any of them by accident as at the moment she couldn't tell if they were poisonous or not. Even if they were unable to notice her. As she drew closer to the sound of running water Sapphire started to feel it in the cave walls. It was subtle but she could feel a soft vibration running through the rock that felt like the natural flow of an underground river. Soon enough the flowing body of water revealed itself on Sapphire's right, with a small formation of stalagmites growing near the underground riverbed, stalactites hanging above them. What little light persisted in the cave sparkled off the water giving Sapphire a better sense of her surroundings. Surreptitiously she took a couple steps closer to the left wall and away from the flowing water. Though she was not actually afraid of it at this distance it made her more nervous than she would care to admit to anyone. She could remember the sensations of fear and panic that had caused her to almost drown in the past and she was in no hurry to ever relive that kind of terror.

Unbeknownst to Sapphire whose ears were still blocked the "SCRTCH SCRTCH" noises had slowly became more frequent, but the sound also seemed...warped. As though something were garbling its source.

After several minutes the tunnel that Sapphire was walking down opened up, the little river on her right spilling into a great underground lake. With the large expanse of space before her Sapphire was able to see much clearer. The water stirred rhythmically at the point where the river entered it. Small creatures swam inside the lake creating tiny ripples in the water. Near the trainee Huntress's feet a minuscule, pale salamander crawled. At first Sapphire took no notice until she realized something that made her squat down and examine the creature more closely. Sure enough it was missing something very important to most animals: eyes. Sapphire supposed that in such darkness being able to actually see was more of a hindrance to most animals than it was a help.

Stalactites hung above the lake, occasionally dripping water down onto its surface but without more light that was really all that Sapphire could make out. Rather than head back and report the little that she had discovered Sapphire decided to try something rash that in retrospect was likely a bad idea. She pulled a high powered flashlight out of her bag and set it on the ground before turning it on. The beam flashed over the lake spreading light over a comparably small portion of the cave but it illuminated much to the human eye. Sapphire was aware that this would likely attract something that preferred the darkness but since she wasn't holding the flashlight her semblance would still keep her hidden.

Almost as if the water was alive, it began to shift in response to the light, the small currents disappearing. Within seconds, the form of the water began to break.

And out came the Siren. Crawling slowly from the surface of the water, the large serpentine Grimm stared at the light which had intruded on its rest.

Sapphire stared frozen as the Grimm surfaced, slithering out of the water like a leviathan. Well she'd found the intel she was looking for, now all she had to do was make it back to the surface. Retreating from the situation would not be a difficult matter. The Siren was an aquatic Grimm which meant that it's land mobility was not optimal. As long as Sapphire cleared the point were the underground river and the tunnel intersected the Siren would be unable to follow her easily.

For a moment Sapphire considered charging the creature. She was at the moment immune to its song and without that a Siren was comparable to a single Ursa in terms of raw power. Barring any unforeseen complications Sapphire could deal with it on her own without putting her team in any unnecessary danger. What stopped her from drawing her weapons was an image of Gren's face, of what he would say if she came back having dealt with the threat without consulting any of them.

No respect for us or what it means to act as a unit. She's not capable of working with us. We should take this to Ozpin, get her reassigned.

Sighing with disgust at that thought Sapphire decided that it was time to return to the surface. She did need a team to graduate Beacon regardless of if they stayed together once it was done. At the academy they were being tested not just on their ability to fight but their ability to work together. It wouldn't look good on her transcript if she continued to play the lone wolf.

Sapphire began to back away from the Siren slowly. She didn't want to break the illusion her semblance was casting as it could still traverse the river to catch her. As Sapphire was retreating she pulled her scroll out of her pocket and turned on the sweeping picture mode of the camera. Since the light from the flashlight was illuminating the area she didn't need the flash. With a picture of the underground lake for Gren to examine Sapphire started to back up more quickly trying her best not to disturb any loose rocks.

Cocking its head to the side as it smelled the familiar scent of human, the Siren paused for a moment, before cocking it to the other side and moving to where Sapphire had been moments before. Lowering its head to the ground, the Siren looked along the path Sapphire had taken before seeming to pause for a second.

Sapphire swore under her breath. The major weakness of her semblance had always been smell. She could disguise her sight and any sound she made with ease but she'd never mastered how to keep beasts and faunus from smelling her trail. The Siren might not be able to track her exact location instantly but it could follow her scent right too her. She'd been foolish not to consider this.

And then it screeched. The sound reverberated off of the cavern walls, filling the cave with a deafeningly loud level of noise. Sapphire would only be able to escape without severe ear damage due to her ear protection. Pausing for a few seconds, the Siren screeched again, this time backing away from Sapphire and moving towards the lake.

The screech of the Siren reverberated around the cave causing the rocks to tremble. Even though Sapphire couldn't hear the screech she could feel the sound waves travel through her body like a punch. It knocked the wind out of her system and she had to hurriedly gulp in air as she turned and ran for the tunnel she'd used to get here. Her semblance was not as effective on beings that operated on a primal level. In humans it acted on the person's natural ability to discount or write off anything they weren't expecting or would have trouble accepting. That same thought process didn't exist in creature such as Grimm which made it infinitely more difficult to remain undetected.

The rocks seemed to have been loosened by the roar of the Siren as it searched for her as she could feel little avalanches of dirt give out below her feet. The cave was obviously stable but it made running for the exit much more difficult.

As Sapphire started to run, her illusion broke, giving the Siren pause. Indeed, the human it smelled was present. However, the Siren was the least of Sapphire's worries. Unseen, Beowolves, Salamanders and Creeps began to scurry out of crevices all around the lake, charging towards Sapphire with angry cries.

Further towards the surface, in the fork of the cave that Sapphire hadn't taken, a pair of Ursa awakened, roused from their slumber by the Siren's screeches. Growling angrily, one Ursa moved to the surface, while the other made its way deeper into the cave, on a direct intercept course with Sapphire's rapid escape.

"Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit." Sapphire cursed under her breath. She'd known the Siren was down her but she'd never expected this place to be such a nest of Grimm. As she ran it became apparent that the enemy was on all sides. From the light of her torch she could see the form of a large Ursa barreling down the cave towards her. Sapphire knew she had less than ten seconds before she was converged upon. With a rapid motion she pulled out her scroll and texted SOS into the group chat. Then she pulled out her shotguns and assembled her polearm before she took off charging at the oncoming Ursa.

Just as she had with Oswald in their first sparring match moments before she would collide with the giant beast Sapphire planted the staff into the ground and used it to propel herself into the air and over the Ursa's head landing squarely on its back. The polearm slipped from her grasp as she landed on the beast and without her melee option Sapphire clamped her wrists together and grabbed the hilts of Somnus and Melinoe as they assembled. She activated the boosters on the back and as they fired she stabbed the blades deep into the Ursa's spine. These were designed to cut through aura and with a little bit of help from the boosters an Ursa's hide wouldn't be much different.

Roaring as Sapphire dodged above it, the Ursa failed to turn in time, the blue-haired girl's daggers lodged themselves into its hide. Turning to swipe at her, the Ursa let out another roar as other creatures of Grimm continued their approach.

Meanwhile, on the surface, the second Ursa managed to reach the entrance to the cavern, coming out into the light. Upon seeing Abel standing there, it let loose a mighty cry and charged.

The beast hadn't far to charge. Even through his earplugs Abel heard the potent bellow of the Siren, echoing up from the cave and into the crisp seaside air. Guessing correctly that his partner had poked the proverbial tiger, he approached the gaping dark orifice into which Sapphire had delved. When a mad Ursa erupted from the entrance, he quickly stepped back, but retreated no further. From the looks of it, no other Grimm followed suit quick enough to reinforce the forerunner. Bear in a sea cave. Weird, he mused, disinterested, before waiting for the creature to lumber into range. Rumbling like a construction vehicle just heating up, the Ursa reared up to swipe downward with a heavy paw, evidently believing its strength to be the match of Abel's.

Unimpressed, the guardian let go of his bladestaff with his left and delivered a crushing backhand to the paw midswipe, using the metal of his vambrace to add extra kick to his own worthy force. With the Ursa off-balance and open, Abel brought his right leg up in an axekick to the creature's unarmored jaw, snapping its head back. From there, he smoothly transitioned into a straight Ampere thrust that tore easily through the spiteful beast's throat and out the back of its thick, fatty neck. Like twin lamps its eyes went dark, and the weighty corpse disintegrated into black ash on the coastal breeze. He remembered joking to his father about his talent for fighting Ursas in a video call a week ago, "They're basically dumber, slower, short-range versions of me. Of course they're easy." With no one around, Abel had no qualms about smiling a grim grin before penetrating the dark hole himself.

Sapphire activated the dust cartridges loaded inside the daggers: Fire. The blades heated to degrees on par with the flames of Hell as Sapphire slashed them upwards before pulling them free, the heated blades easily coming free from the thick hide.

Sapphire backflipped off the Ursa before it could retaliate landing next to her fallen polearm. She collapsed the daggers and used her foot to kick the melee weapon into the air before grabbing it with both hands and firing two ice rounds at the Ursa. Then she pulled a dust capsule from her bag, with no time to check what type it was, she threw it as hard as she could at the oncoming horde of Grimm.

As the Dust capsule broke, all of the Dust inside activated, filling the cavern with a series of vibrations to rival those of the Siren's shrieks. The cave began to shake, while the Grimm were able to mostly shrug off the effects of the Dust. Small chunks of dirt and rock shook themselves loose from the cave's walls and roof, but the cave managed not to collapse in on itself, thankfully. Undeterred by the attack, the small horde of Grimm charged on, intent to destroy the interloping human.

Sapphire was more than a little grateful for her hearing protection as the sound wave capsule went off though she was a little disappointed with its lack of effect. She resolved to talk to the designers when this was finished.

Her polearm was sharp and her mind was clear. She charged at the oncoming Grimm with a vengeance. Two of the Beowulves lunged at her and Sapphire cut them down clean their bodies dissolving behind her.

The Beowulves were child's play to someone of Sapphire's skill, and they seemed to know it as they backed away from her to let the Salamanders approach. Three advanced to face her, forming a line to block her from their brethren. As though they all knew her inner fears each unleashed a torrent of water from their mouths intent on forcing Sapphire to the ground.

Torrents of water didn't induce the same mind numbing fear that being thrown into deep water did but even so Sapphire's heart skipped a beat as she saw the oncoming attack. The first thought on her mind was to run, no plan, no strategy just run. She forced herself to think and in that moment a desperate though came to her. Sapphire pulled one of the fire capsules out of her bag and threw it as hard as she could at the torrents of water shooting from the Salamander's mouths. The fire collided violently with the water and just like with ice the water vaporized filling the air around Sapphire with a thick fog. Knowing that it would soon dissipate and well aware that with only one fire capsule left she'd couldn't afford to let the Salamanders get off another shot Sapphire charged.

She couldn't be sure where exactly the Salamanders were so guessing the distance as best she could just as she had with the Ursa Sapphire planted her staff into the ground and vaulted into the air. The fog was too thick for her to see accurately but she could see the shadows of the Salamader's as she flew through the air. She landed again in total obscurity and slashed behind her with the polearm balanced on her shoulder. Then she spun round and fired two electric shells where she believed the Salamanders to be standing.

As the cave filled with fog and Sapphire landed behind the Salamanders, the Grimm turned to meet her, more finely attuned to detecting prey than their human counterpart. The Beowulves were held at bay by Sapphire's slash, but as she fired at the Salamanders, stunning one of them, the others pressed the attack. Beowulf claws from behind, and a lunging Salamander bite from the front.

This situation was the very reason that Sapphire wielded a weapon that was both double bladed and double sided. Her polearm flew through the air like lightning cutting down Beowulves behind her and slashing at the Salamanders in the front. She twirled her double blades weapon as she danced through the air using as many acrobatic moves as she could to stay ahead of the Beowulves claws and the jets of water being fired at her by the Salamaders. The Beowulves fell one by one as he weapon pierced their hides and their bodies dissolved into the black goo it must have originated from.

The Salamanders were proving themselves much tougher opponents. They were heavily armoured but despite this quick on their feet. Each hit she managed to land seemed to simply bounce off and she couldn't get close enough to one to land on it before it scuttled away to continue its attack.

At that moment a yell from the passage to the surface announced that Sapphire's backup had arrived. The sudden rush of air brought along by the guardian's hasty entrance ate away at some of the fog, but not nearly enough to give him a complete picture of what lay before him. This much was certain, at least: his teammate needed his help against marauding Grimm. Unable to see too far in front of him, Abel looked down instead, and concluded from the moist shimmer on the stone that the cave floor was soaked. Perfect.

Two shapes dashed from the murky cloud, resolving themselves to be Creeps. Abel did not bat an eye; to him this species of Grimm occupied the lowest spot in the creatures' hierarchy, less powerful than Beowolves and less numerous and irritating than Ratatosks. He stepped quickly to the side to avoid a lunging bite, then again as the second tried the same. Then Abel lunged, thrusting the Ampere forward with great power, and it pierced straight through one to stab the other. One started dissolving, and the other hopped backward before jumping again. Deprived for the moment of his weapon -a rookie mistake-, the guardian threw up a side kick to try and knock the Creep out of the air, but it chomped down on his armored leg. Unable to get through the metal, it could only try and bite harder as Abel retrieved his weapon, hefted it, and then speared it through the head.

By that time, more company arrived. A Beowolf leaped out at him, swiping at his head, and Abel found himself surprisingly hard-pressed to block in time. I hope I'm helping her not die, he thought as he poked the Beowolf's exposed torso, waited for it to attack again, and then repeated the process. The third opening proved fatal for the beast, and the guardian cut through its heart. He looked down into the cave to see that the fog was beginning to clear, though the peril Sapphire was in had yet to diminish. "Hey!" Though he immediately moved forward to help, he did not relish the prospect of three Salamanders in a confined space with uneven terrain. One trip and either or them might be mincemeat. Found the Siren, and now fighting for our lives. He jumped into the fray. Wonder if the others are being as productive.

-=-=Gren and Shiro =-=-

Standing in front of the Armory, Shiro curiously peered at the assortment of weapons and equipment that hung on the walls and lay on the shelves. He was mentally kicking himself for not thinking of carrying a different type of Dust Shotshell for this mission. They'd more than likely be near or in water so his Fire-element Dust was almost useless to have. First thing on his grocery list was as many Wind and Lightning element shotshells as he could get, that was for sure. Though he preferred his special blue-colored Fire Dust, he couldn't be so stubborn as to not accept the benefits of using different Dust types. A pressurized wind shotshell would allow him to still use his boosted attacks underwater. An electric shotshell would surely give him a damage boost against any aquatic Grimm or other nasties near bodies of water. As he thought about what else he could use, Shiro reminded himself that he could possibly reverse the effects of his own Semblance to deafen himself. Instead of having to cobble together a prototype pair of ear protection specifically designed for his ears. He didn't know why he didn't mention it in the first place, but he chalked it up to him being simply forgetful. Then again, he only ever really tried to 'debuff' himself once and wasn't pleased with the results. It almost made him feel a little bad for the people he used his Semblance against in a negative way. Maybe Gren would have some better opinions if his Semblance was a more viable option against the Sirens. He hoped Gren had a mirror. He probably did, knowing that junk rat.

Tapping his chin, Shiro walked up to the window of the Armory and undid his bandoleer belts that carried his ammunition. Laying them on the little shelf, he slid his belts of blue shotshells forward.
"Ah, half Wind-element shotshells and half Lightning-element shotshells please. If you don't mind."
He flashed a bright grin at the Armory custodian.

Counting the shells on the bandolier carefully before writing the number down and removing each of them, the custodian placed the shells near Shiro. "Hang onto those. I'll get you the rest right now." Turning away, the gentleman gathered the requisitioned ammunition and looked at Shiro. "Would you prefer to load them or can I?" His tone was one that suggested he'd prefer to control the situation, but more in a fashion of routine than mistrust.

Shiro briefly glanced upward at the ceiling before quickly making his decision. He completely understood where the armory custodian was coming from. Raising his gloved hands, he made a little waving motion implying that it was quite alright for the man to do however he please. Shiro didn't want to step on his toes after all.

"Ah, it's quite alright sir. You go on right ahead I don't mind. But, if I may? Could I have one belt be completely one type and the second a different type? I'd much appreciate that."

Nodding at the trainee Huntsman, the Armory attendant began loading the rounds into the belts.

At some point Gren returned. The armory was both unimpressive and surprising. Unimpressive considering that Gren's own weapon locker had more hardware and bullets available, but surprising since it was quite well stocked for a small sea-side town. Then again they did have to take on a Megaladeus at some point, so perhaps they simply upgraded for the occasion. Gren spotted Shiro talking to the armory custodian, seemingly bartering with him. "Yo Shiro." Gren approached the smaller faunas, looking over the custodian.

"Gearing up?"

As the attendant finished, he grabbed the newly loaded belts and fastened them around his waist. Ears twitching, Shiro turned as he was half-way through fastening his second belt to spot Gren. Smiling, he nodded in the affirmative. "Ah, yeah. I figured that the ammo I had would be a little ineffective so I swapped 'em out." Shiro turned back to peer into the window of the Armory and quickly thanked the attendant before focusing his attention back on his friend. "Oh, I've been meaning to tell you something. I don't know why I never mentioned it before, but I can actually use my Semblance in an opposite way to dull my own senses. I'll just need a mirror or something reflective to be able to do it. Ya think that'll work better than trying to find or make special hearing protection for me?"

Gren raised an eyebrow at Shiro's mentioning of his semblance. The green faunas figured that Shiro could affect himself with his semblance, but he didn't think he'd need a mirror for it. "I think I could rig something up. Anyways let's get to work. I've been given permission by the captain to use whatever I need from the armory. I see there's the usual under-water fighting equipment, harpoon guns and such, so I'll be using those as well as some boat gadgets. Know anything else that might help us, Shiro?"

Shiro shrugged, he honestly couldn't think of much else for them to bring to arm themselves properly. He thought briefly for a moment to make doubly sure he considered everything. An imaginative light bulb flickered to life above his head as he remembered another idea. "Ah, do you think the Siren's song effect is immediate or takes time to work? I ask because should we wear hearing protection beforehand or after we discover a Siren? My Semblance won't be much help if I use it after a Siren has already gotten into my noggin to fool around. Know what I mean?"

"Wear them before hand. Your hearing makes you more susceptible since you don't have as many filters as I do. That being said, if the siren is near and doing it's thing, you'd be the first to know... Hmm..." This was something that Gren was considering. Allowing Shiro to be their "Canary" of sorts in order to let them know ahead of time when they were getting closer to the Siren. Gren's own sound filters weren't prepped to do something as complex as being able to both pick up the Siren's song and leave him immune to her singing. Either he can hear it or he can't.

"Anyways, I wouldn't concern yourself over that right now. We need to make sure your lil ears won't turn on you, so I'll be making you a set of headgear to help you with that. That being said... You could always use your semblance." As Gren spoke to his partner he was also working around the armory, picking up useful stuff and getting them ready for crafting. The first thing he picked up was a harpoon gun nearly as big as Shiro himself.

Shiro shrugged again, but nodded in silent agreement. As Gren worked, he didn't really know what to do or how to help. Growing immediately bored, Shiro began to linger about curiously looking at and touching various things. He had decent blacksmithing and forging ability, with some basic knowledge of mechanics and electronics. But, nothing along the level of expertise of Gren. Until his friend voiced his need for assistance, Shiro would just impatiently wait around as he poked his nose into anything that remotely intrigued him.

Gren had finished laying out a series of weapons and equipment he needed to work on. Where he alone, he'd start only on the basic things he could finish off quickly and were more essentially to his operations. But because he had Shiro, he could delegate the tasks to him while Gren worked on more special projects on himself. "Shiro, could you help me with these?"

One of the first projects was a harpoon gun. Simply enough, he needed Shiro to put together a functional grip and trigger, since the base of the harpoon gun was meant to be attached to boats and used on whales. The second project was more subtle; Gren had amassed various knife-like metal spikes, as well as a canister of oxygen and various small canisters about the size of a battery. Combining these things together would allow Shiro to make Wasp Knives; blades that when they are stabbed into an enemy, can release the gas inside the hilt in order to displace internal organs and cause an internal freezing effect. Or for aquatic Grimm, force them onto the surface. The last thing Gren needed Shiro to do was simply to make sea mines. However Gren's sea mines were considerably more crude, consisting of metal barrels, a mixture of explosive agents, igniting agents, and shrapnel. Hardly professional explosives, they would be better used as roadside bombs, but at least they'd be water-sealed.

"If you need help with any just ask me. I'll be working on some things myself over here." Gren seemed to be working on something involving floodlights and speakers, and he seemed quite focused on it. He whistled a jaunty tune to keep himself focused as he started breaking things apart.

Shiro nodded, happy to be finally doing something productive. The tasks Gren assigned him seemed a little too simple and easy to complete, it was slightly insulting. But, brushing aside his feelings he got to work. The first task to create a grip and trigger for Gren's harpoon gun was the fastest to complete. Already familiar with how trigger mechanisms worked, Shiro walked into the Armory and browsed the firearms that already sat on the shelf. Taking a few of them back, Shiro field stripped them and played a sort of mix-and-match game with the parts he had. Most manufacturers followed an industry standard, to allow for parts commonality between models of common and popular weapons. Logistically, it saved a lot of time and money especially on the consumer's end. Proprietary parts tended to not sell well and were expensive to make and sell anyways. So, Shiro was simply discovering which parts fit the best onto Gren's harpoon gun. After finding the one that fit the best, he ground down and sanded off material to perfect it. Done. Easy enough.

The next task Shiro had to scratch his head at a little bit. Removing his Scroll, Shiro tried to search for diagrams and video clips of exactly how 'Wasp Knives' worked. He'd heard of them before, sure. Even seen them in action against some poor and unfortunate melons, but he was never curious enough to dig into a bit of research regarding them. As he studied up on the wasp knives' design, Shiro glanced over at Gren to see what he was doing and tilted his head slightly. Was his friend making some explosive new sound system that would take the music industry by storm? Shaking his head from side to side, he frowned a little.

"Uh, Gren? Are you making explosives?"
A little redundant and obvious, but Shiro was the kind of guy to be like that.
"Wouldn't those be a bit...dangerous to everyone if we used those underwater?"

Of course explosives were dangerous. Shiro had hoped that someone as intelligent as Gren would understand that using explosive devices underwater were far more lethal. Not just against foes but against any living thing in the waters at the time. Shiro couldn't remember the exact science, but he knew it was bad news to be underwater when a bomb went off. Something about the water molecules amplifying the force of the explosive and causing the resulting shockwave to essentially crush your soft and squishy organs into mush. He knew it was almost certain death. Internal organ ruptures and bleeding was a hell of a thing. Sure, Gren probably would do just fine with all of his artificial body parts and armor, but his teammates wouldn't have that luxury. Unless...Gren intended to include suicide bombing into his list of potential plans.

"Since my rockets won't function well underwater, I'll have to make due. There is some risks involved of course, but obviously I won't be placing these near us. Once Sapphire and Abel come back with more intel, I'll see if I can't set these bombs up at possible escape routes the siren would try to take. That way if we can't kill it wherever it's at, these bombs ought to finish the job. " By this point Shiro could plainly see that Gren had attached the floodlights to a sort of harness about Gren's size, which he intended to wear over his armor. He even tried it on, though it was an awkward fit and needed more work.

"Fighting the siren in the water is the last thing I want us to do. Fighting it in it's element all together is bad, even for our skills. If we can't kill it, it would at least have the advantage of making a quick escape. These bombs will make sure that it can't escape, but if it comes to a point where they're needed things might not be going so well for us either."

Gren plugged in the floodlights into a compartment in his chest, causing all the lights on the harness to shine with gross incandescence. It was bright enough that even Gren needed to divert his eyes, but slowly his eyes grew accustomed to the brightness. Now he just needed to make sure the harness was snug.

Shiro's ears twitched upon mention of Gren's rockets. An idea popped into his head but he waited for Gren to finish talking before voicing it. So Gren intended on using the bombs as control points, as traps. That made a bit more sense but it seemed a little like overkill. Shiro chuckled at the thought. 'Overkill'. Hell, this was Gren he was thinking about. The dude practically screamed 'Overkill' just by looking at the hulking guy as he walked into a room. Then again Shiro used a massive Shield that doubled as a giant explosive axe, so he wasn't really one to talk. The floodlight harness Gren was fitting to his body confused him a little though, what purpose was that for? Shiro and Gren were both faunus and he knew most faunus had enhanced night vision. Not to mention that Gren probably had some tech in his armor that enhanced that even further so he didn't even have the slightest idea why Gren would want to skyline himself as a walking light show. Maybe to act as a beacon of light for their human comrades? Shiro chuckled again. He wasn't sure.

On the subject of fighting Grimm in the water, he already had a bit of experience with that and was probably the best equipped for underwater combat. Not that his paws had webbing, but purely because of his own natural swimming skill and strength. When Gren plugged in the light harness to turn it on, Shiro winced in pain and had to look away. Shaking his head and waiting for the starbursts in his vision to disappear, Shiro raised his forearm to shield his sensitive eyes from the lights as he tried to look at Gren and say his piece. Now was a good time for him to voice his ideas.

"Can't you just convert your rockets into something akin to torpedoes? Like remove the propulsion systems and replace them with some sort of underwater drive or engine? You could also convert them to air-to-surface missiles, couldn't you? Like fire them upwards to have them dive straight down into the ocean to take out any nasties like that? Just an idea. Gotta ask though, what's with the light show boss? Turn that stuff off, it's giving me a headache."

Shutting off the floodlights and trying to adjust to the following dimness, Gren chuckled at the idea of converted his rockets into torpedoes. While technically possible, the armory didn't have the things he needed for that to work, and it'd be too time consuming to do with all the rockets he had. He'd need to spend the whole night, or at least a good few hours, dismantling his rockets and putting them into a suitable shell that would flow through water, as well as rig himself pump-jets to propel those torpedoes instead of the conventional chemical propellant that his rockets currently used. "That's uh... A little bit beyond my abilities, and what I have to work with. Not to mention that even if I had torpedoes, The God Eater isn't suited for underwater combat. It's a tough girl, but I don't want to risk damaging her too much by filling her with water. Hence why I'll be needing that huge harpoon gun and the knives."

Gren then proceeded to put the harness back onto himself, trying to fit it once more. He was getting close. "Sorry for the lights. They're multi-purpose. Obviously Abel and Sapphire will need help seeing in the dark or underwater, but also to distract the grimm. As you might have guessed, I'm making all these weapons because The God Eater won't be effective underwater. Thus I have to compensate with other weapons and tactics. With these lights the Grimm will be targeting me, which makes things easier since I won't have to worry about them aiming for you, Abel, or Sapphire. And if they happen to blind the grimm too, awesome. I'll be making some specialized googles for you and the others to accommodate."

Once Gren had the harness properly fitted the harness, there were only a few other projects left. There was Shiro's earmuffs, and a few things that Gren wanted finished if possible. What he wanted done was not simple however, even for him. Daresay, it would be game changing if he pulls it off. He'd need Shiro's help, but first thing's first. "Alright Shiro, if you're done with the weapons, let's get you fitted for those earmuffs. As an added bonus, I'll see if I can't work in a sort of radio receiver so I can talk to you when you're near me."

Grasping the basic design, Shiro looked the knives over in his hands. He wasn't quite finished with them to be honest. To buff out any problems he'd have to test them but they could be considered 'done' for now. Setting the knives down, Shiro walked over to Gren and placed his hands on his hips. "Alright, sounds good. Let's try and hurry up so we can continue on with this mission. Oh, and if you're going to be adding a transceiver in the ear pro, make sure to have the volume set real low. My ears are really sensitive and I don't need someone screaming in my head every bit of the way." Shiro grinned as he scratched at his ears, his tail energetically swaying from side to side.

Gren grinned. "Alright buddy. Just hold still so I get it properly fitted. Don't want it to be uncomfortable after all." This appeared to be one of the more complex projects, as the sun was slowly setting by the time Gren was finished getting Shiro's measurements and gathering the necessary materials. Shiro's earmuffs ended up looking more like a helmet due to the fact that, unless he doesn't mind compressing them to his head, simply covering them won't make them stable. That and as Gren was measuring Shiro's head, he noticed Shiro's human ears and stud earrings. They were silver and shiny, but Gren couldn't help but feel.... Questionable towards Shiro. Shaking his head, the boar faunas could sometimes forget that certain faunas types had two-sets. Either way, this made a helmet necessary. But that was just fine for Gren; Shiro's helmet could match with Gren's.

As the big faunas was putting together the base of the helmet, he had Shiro on another job. This one was more mechanical in nature. To put it simply, he needed Shiro to create an underwater jetpack for Gren. As he explains, "I swim like a dead jellyfish. Too heavy and I won't be able to generate enough push to keep myself afloat. I'd have to... Well, remove most of my armor and heavier cybernetics if I want to even try swimming. And that's not a good idea. With this I'll at least be able to go in a semi-straight direction if I end up underwater, which will be helpful if I like, fall to the bottom of the ocean or something."

Shiro frowned severely as Gren started to assemble his headgear on him. He hated head coverings and protective headwear of almost any sort. Grunting and groaning slightly, it was clear that what Gren came up with was uncomfortable. Anything that touched his feline ears and put weight on them and his head was a big fat red 'Nope' in his book. Cocking an eyebrow at Gren's next assigned task, his eyes started scanning around the armory. "Okay, first. Whatever you're placing on my dome kinda hurts and feels heavy. Secondly, I think you're severely overestimating my technical abilities boss. I don't think I could make you a jetpack in such short time but someone once said 'All that is too complex is unnecessary, and it is simple that is needed.' What you need is something filled with air attached to you for ballast so you can float a little. After that something with enough propulsion underwater to carry you along. Seeing as how this is a police armory near the coastline, I'm sure they have something like an underwater scooter for you that you can pump up on tech steroids."

Gren knew what Shiro was talking about but didn't really agree with it. For one thing, those things might not be able to haul someone with his weight unless he supersized it, which is a big endevour on it's own. And he needed some way to keep his hands free so he could fight. He was about to explain this to Shiro when he realized that it actually wasn't a bad idea. It essentially was what he needed. he just needed to figure out a way to stick it on his body fast and easy. And he knew a way. "Shiro. Get me those water scooters and duct tape. All the duct tape. And super glue."

Shiro's ears slowly flattened against his head as his facial expression seemed to sag into a look of horror. "S-...seriously? L-like you mean...Uhh...Uhm.." Shiro looked around and then back to Gren. "W-well...alright. Okay, we're doing this." Walking over
to the window of the Armory custodian's window. "Ah...this is going to sound like an odd request but....Could we borrow your sea scooters, duct tape, and super glue? We'll need all of them." As he waited for the custodian to realize that Shiro was quite serious, Shiro thought of ways to alter the existing ear protection. Maybe just a simple set of ear plugs with a transceiver in them would be more effective than whatever Gren had in mind.

"What." For a moment, that was all that was said. "I...I get the scooters, but...no, ya know what? I don't wanna know." As the custodian went off to get the desired items, he could be heard quietly muttering about "Goddamn Beacon kids taking all our shit. We fought a Megaladeus but do WEEEEE get to play detectives with the god damn water scooters? Noooooo, 'emergency uses only, Quincey', emergencies my ass, there's never an emergency. God damn motherfuckers"

After a minute or two of this, the custodian returned with a clearly fake smile and ALL of their duct tape, super glue, and sea scooters.

ALL OF IT. There had to have been at least a hundred pounds of glue and tape in the various boxes that had been collected. "There you are."

Shiro smiled back and laughed nervously. "Th-thank you." With outstretched arms, Shiro tried to scoop up as much as he could. A few articles dropped noisily on the ground and Shiro turned his head over his shoulder to Gren. "Uhh, Gren? I may-" he dropped another roll of tape. "...-may need some help with th-OOP!" The unevenly distributed weight caused a klutzy moment for Shiro as he tipped over and fell. With a crash, everything he held just buried him. Underneath the supplies, Shiro simple declared his pain. "...Ow."

Walking over to Shiro, Gren lifted his partner to his feet and dusted him off. "Thanks buddy. I've got a prototype for your helmet, and once we're done we can work on putting all of this together." Showing Shiro the way, Gren had Shiro put on his rebreather before placing the helmet on his head. While bulky and not fitted with any sort of cushions, at least Gren made sure that there was a minimal amount of contact with Shiro's tiger ears. His human ones had a bit of compression, but they'd be softened by cushions once Gren works on the internals. "How's this Shiro? Just a general shape for now. I'll be using similar materials as the rebreathers to make sure the helmet keeps water out, but don't worry; I'll make sure it's comfortable enough that when you get smacked about the head, it won't hurt."

Shiro was still clearly uncomfortable with all of the headgear, but he knew it was all necessary evils he had to cope with. "I guess this is fine for now, but let's not dilly-dally for too long with the equipment prep. I'm not saying rush, but we don't have the luxury of taking our sweet time. Let's get this show on the road already, boss!" Grinning, he gave Gren a random thumbs-up. It was obvious that he was getting antsy. "Don't worry about me getting smacked about in the head too much, I've got a thick skull." Looking to the left and right, it was almost as if he knew what he had said would set him up for a stinging remark from Sapphire if she were present. He knew she wasn't there though, for the time being. Turning back to Gren, he smirked and placed his hands on his hips. "Alright, come on then. Tell me what's left to do and let's get her done!"

Once Gren had the information he needed for Shiro's helmet, there was only a few more projects to do: The helmet and the water jetpack. "Well, you've made those sea mines, right? Otherwise the last thing I need you to do is to attach all those water jets together. It's not the most sophisticated job, but I don't need those aqua jets to be put together very well. My semblance will do the hard part, I just need something that keeps them all together." Gren started working on Shiro's helmet, quickly putting together a new frame and molding the hull using some plastic and a blow torch.

Frowning, Shiro "grumped" and got to work on Gren's last project. Gathering the appropriate materials and setting them neatly in front of him, Shiro sat down cross-legged to begin working. As neatly and cleanly as he could, he started to piece together the water jets. It all felt slap-dash and crude, he wasn't pleased with much of the equipment prep that was being done. Unfortunately, it was logistically impossible to have a mobile workshop with him at all times. He could bring basic smithing tools here and there, but not an entire forge or even a workbench of some sort. Looking over to Gren, he wondered where Gren learned his trade. From what he could tell from his cybernetic parts and organs, the guy was a mechanical and technological genius. And yet, looking at the water jets in his own gloved hands he struggled to understand why everything they were crafting felt like two kids in a playpen slapping together toy bricks and calling their creations ingenious inventions. To be fair, Gren was maybe more like himself than he thought. Maybe he could only really do his best work with the proper materials, equipment, and time. Crudely cramming together some last minute items during a mission hardly seemed like the proper situation to be inventive.

Shaking his head, Shiro shoved all of the doubts of his mind and refocused himself. They would just have to make due with what they have. No use in wasting more precious time fretting over trivial things. What they were making would either work or it wouldn't. He just hoped they would work more than fail. And when they failed to not put a friend's life in jeopardy.

As Gren was in the middle of figuring out how he's suppose to rig a HUD into Shiro's helmet, Gren called out to his partner suddenly. "So, what's your thoughts about Sapphire?" Gren figured he could try to cannibalize parts from himself, since he always believed in having redundancies for emergencies like this. Whether or not he could do that for a HUD however.... Will certainly test his skills. Gren also noticed that Shiro hasn't made his sea mines yet, and with what little time they had Gren was going to have to improvise even further.

Shiro froze, becoming a tiger-sicle when Gren suddenly inquired about his thoughts on their oh-so-glorious team leader. Blinking furiously, Shiro's eyes nervously looked up at Gren and back to the project he was working on repeatedly. Whatever else Shiro was supposed to do, was all but cleared from his mind and obliterated from memory. Clearing his throat, he willed himself to continue on his tasks. "What do you mean?" Shiro struggled, but he managed to maintain his composure somewhat. He hadn't mentioned to Gren his intentions to potentially usurp Sapphire from her position and either take it for himself or have someone else fill her seat. Or...had he? Damn his atrocious lack of memory. "She...is our appointed team leader and...she has blue hair. What of her?" Shiro stated almost matter-of-factly. A slight inflection could be detected on the word 'appointed' indicating Shiro had deeper thoughts on the subject.

Hooking Shiro's helmet directly up to Gren's own head in order to calibrate the HUD, Gren spoke clearly, but didn't look directly at Shiro (since he was preoccupied with something else). "How do you think of her as a leader? Or even just as a person? I mean, it's no secret that none of us like her. Abel might, though I suspect it's only because she's his partner and Abel... Well Abel is a cool guy like that." Gren didn't want to say that Abel was a pushover when it comes to girls or people in authority. He didn't quite know the guardian well enough to say something like that, but Gren had his suspicions. And while Gren and Sapphire has had their tiffs, Gren was almost certain that the animosity between Shiro and Sapphire was far more volatile. At least Sapphire was aware of Gren's own machinations. But Shiro was something of a wild card, even to Gren. As far as the orc knew, Shiro was just another one of Gren's loyal pawns, albeit one that Gren is particularly fond of.

Shiro attempted to look as busy as he could, but to be frank he wasn't getting anywhere with what he was doing. Why in the hell did Gren have to bring Sapphire up? Every time someone mentioned her or he so much as even saw her he felt a vile stirring in his guts and foul sour taste rising in the back of his throat. Why was Gren asking this now? What did he have to gain from asking Shiro these obviously uncomfortable questions. He tries his best to be a good person around her and give her the chance to be viewed in a positive light in his mind. But he couldn't. She always seemed to bring out the worst parts of himself. She always managed to dreg up uncomfortable feelings and memories of a faded and blurry past. Try as he might, he couldn't bring himself to really 'befriend' her, not that either party cared or was interested in a friendship. So, what could he say to Gren to sufficiently satisfy his question?

"Ah...Sh-...She's...a leader, yes. And...she's definitely a person."
Answer? No opinion, no comment.

Shiro was hiding something. That did make Gren curious. Shiro was a nice enough guy, but he wore his heart on his sleeve. While he may not have been the easiest guy to understand, normally he made it pretty clear what was on his mind. But now he was trying to hide something. Perhaps something... Dark? Then again, Shiro did manage to hide the fact he was on meds up until recently. So it only made sense to Gren that Shiro has his own secrets. A secret for a secret then.

"I'm thinking of taking control of leadership away from Sapphire, one way or another. Perhaps it's too early to say, but honestly I just don't trust her judgement, ability, or intentions. The way she looks at us... It's like we're just tools to her. And our little problems are malfunctions, you know? Like we're just things. That makes me uncomfortable, more so considering... You know..."

Gren casually detached one of his arms and waved it at Shiro, emphasising his existence as an amalgamation of cybernetic parts. Reattaching the arm Gren got back to work on Shiro's helmet but continued to speak.

"Frankly I don't know if it's something that can be done officially. Short of Sapphire resigning or dying, I don't think I can just go up to Ozpin and demand a change in leadership. But I'll do it without the title if I have to. You, me, and Abel get along well enough that we work well together. And I think for Sapphire to be a better leader and person, she needs to realize that right now she is a complete bitch. And if she does realize that, then she needs to work on it."

Shiro's expression blanked. His ears twitched as if furiously attempting to pick up on every little noise and sound. Was what he heard for real? Did Gren feel the same way as he? He couldn't help but feel a little pleased about himself. This worked out in their favor. If Gren was willing to take Sapphire's spot, then...What? A power struggle between each member? No. Abel didn't have the audacity or the gall to force Sapphire to step down. Gren on the other hand, Shiro could definitely see taking aggressive charge. Either way, he'd support the two of them. If not, Shiro would take it. So, it was pretty much a win-win situation. But, how much would he let on that Gren had his support? How much could he reveal? Aggravating himself, Shiro's 'stripes' began to slowly fade into existence. Darkening more and more the more he got worked up. Damn it though, Gren read him like a book. He had probably figured that once someone shared something relatively private to him, he would feel obligated to share something too. He couldn't keep his fat mouth shut. Anyone could tell him something, say it was the truth and Shiro would believe them. And who could fault him for that? Call him gullible, but he had no real inclination to distrust or disbelieve anyone.

Ears slowly drooping, Shiro had a forlorn look to him. Tracing circles on the ground with his gloved hand, he didn't really know what to say. Only...
"...I agree. With everything. I agree."

Synchronizing Shiro's helmet to Gren's optics, he was near in completion. All he had to do was some final fittings on Shiro to make sure it was comfortable and such. He walked over to Shiro who also seemed close to done with what Gren needed him to do, but noticed that the raw materials he left for the sea mines have been untouched still. Sighing, Gren would just have to make due with The God Eater's rockets. Somehow.

"Glad you got my back. But I'll be clear with you Shiro; it's complicated. Even if I do become the leader, Sapphire is still going to be part of the team. Unless she's gone of course, but if she isn't, we'll have to live with that fact. And while I'm more than willing to stand up to her and let her have a piece of my mind, that won't be enough. I'll need support. And not just from our team." Gren handed Shiro the helmet.

Shiro took the helmet and looked at it. Everything Gren said made sense, when had he ever not? Staring at it for a moment, he quietly sighed and fitted the gear over his head. It definitely felt better, not completely comfortable. But, he'll just have to suck it up and make do at this point. Pulling off the helmet, he handed it back to Gren. Unpleasant subjects always caused Shiro to fall quiet, which could be a blessing depending on who you asked. So, he simply grunted at Gren. The grunt noise being both his agreement with Gren and the fact that he helmet was 'Passable'.

With the helmet complete and most of the gear done, Gren figured that they were pretty much done here. He wished he had more materials to make a similar helmet for Abel and Sapphire, but without their heads here to size it would have been a crapshoot. Besides, he didn't have enough material to make them as techy as Shiro's helmet. Gren gathered all the weapons, the harness, and the massive collection of taped/glued together sea scooters, and put them all into a box. Sapphire and Abel should arrive soon and they can gear up and get ready. Before the two would leave, Gren had one more thing to say to Shiro.

"In case I didn't make myself clear, I'm not going to talk about this to Sapphire any time soon. She already knows about it, probs, and I want to see what she does. Maybe she'll try to eliminate me, or maybe she'll change her act. Who knows. Whatever she does however, I have my own plans to establish leadership. And I'll need your help Shiro."

Gren went over to the tiger faunas and clasp his arm around Shiro's shoulder, giving the smaller faunas a sort of shoulder hug. "What we need is more friends. I got some, you know, but the more the merrier. More guys and girls who'll watch out backs and agree that things need to change. Shiro, no matter what people say about you, you're a pretty cool cat. That's good, cause you can make friends easily. So don't be afraid to spend some time away from the team, talking to others, letting them know about this little situation of ours. Get their support, or at least get their advice. You introduce me to your friends, I'll introduce you to mines, and eventually once we get a good group going maybe Sapphire would see that this is how a leader is suppose to be, yeah?" Letting Shiro go Gren turned to his partner and looked him directly in the eyes. While he knew he had Shiro's support, Gren wanted Shiro to know that he was being serious. This wasn't just a whim. Gren wasn't going to be a tool again.

"So, what do you say, buddy? Sound like a plan?"

If Gren had a plan, great. Awesome. Super. But when Gren put his arm around his shoulder, Shiro couldn't help but feel that there was something...wrong. Something dirty about this whole ordeal. He couldn't quite place his finger on it, but he shook his head and thusly away with his feelings of discomfort. Maybe he was just anxious and nervous. Maybe that was the source of his odd feelings. But, to make more friends? Shiro frowned. Surely, he would continue doing that. It wasn't exactly hard, but at the same time it wasn't easy. What exactly did people say about him? Why did people keep referring to him as a cat when clearly he wasn't a simple feline? Spend more time away from the team? Done. Talk to other people about his team's bind? Done. Get their opinions and advice? Done. While he wasn't really down with blabbing and complaining about how he thought his team leader sucked, it was an odd way to essentially stage a coup d'etat. Shiro wasn't really privy to how history tended to play out. How the same patterns tended to repeat themselves. When Gren locked eye contact with him, that was all that was needed to seal everything that was said into a special part of his memory. Finalizing their unspoken 'contract'. Holding the stare for a few moments, Shiro slowly and silently nodded.

"...Sounds like a plan."
Potentially unrelated, Shiro could feel himself growing hungry.

Whatever it was, one thing was clear. Gren had the charisma to lead and get things accomplished. Without making himself look like an ass at that. Whether or not Shiro felt a kinship with Gren as they were both faunus remained to be seen. If that played any part in his decision to agree with Gren's plan, he couldn't know. All he knew was that he would support his friend, and help him with whatever he needed down the line.

Charging down the hall, Captain McDougall pointed at the Armory attendant and started shouting. "Get me a quiver of harpoons, quick!" Turning to Gren and Shiro, he fished out Gren's Scroll and held it up. "SOS, boys! Whatever you've got, grab it and let's go!" Pulling out a pair of headphones from his newly-acquired backpack and hanging them around his neck, the good Captain grabbed the quiver of harpoons from his attendant and made his way to a back exit. "We got a Dune Rover out back, it'll get us there quicker!"

Shiro whirled when he heard a series of rapid, heavy footsteps plod their way towards them. Looking up at the at the frantic captain, his expression immediately grew severe when he heard mention of an emergency message having been sent to them. In the blink of an eye his irises changed color and his stripes became clearly visible. Grabbing what he could load onto his back securely, he shouted at the captain. "Tell me where!" Stubby black claws poked out from the tips of his gloved fingers as he assumed his quadrupedal running position. Gripping the ground tightly, he shouted again. "TELL US WHERE, NOW!" Regardless of how he felt about his teammates, he still cared about them deeply. They were still his friends. He would immediately answer their beck and call should they ever need him. A deep and loud rumbling growl vibrated in Shiro's chest. It was combat time.

Pulling up the GPS function on the Scroll, he sighed. "Dammit, girl's in the caves. From here, should be north-northeast. Got your stuff, let's move!"

With a huff and a short snarl, Shiro exploded out of the station. Same as he always did at Beacon Academy, he ripped and tore up the ground as he cut his warpath to wherever he was going. Making sure to control his breathing, on his deep inhales he made doubly sure to try to pinpoint Abel and Sapphire's scent trails to increase the accuracy of where he was going. He had to get there as soon as possible, the sooner the better. He wasn't sure what was going on, but all he needed to know was that the other half of his team was in trouble. Just in his nature to burst in with swinging arms.

Gren dropped the box of gear into the back of the Dune Rover. He had his harness on, four wasp knives on his waist, and two Harpoon Guns on his back. The God Eater was in his hands and the only thing he didn't have on his body was the water jets, and that'll come on later. "Let's book it Captain!" Gren shouted as he jumped onto the back of the vehicle, using his semblance to hold on tight. "Don't worry about me, let's go!"

Nearly jumping into the Dune Rover, Captain McDougall put the vehicle into drive and hit the gas, pushing the vehicle forward. It wasn't nearly as fast as any of the would-be rescuers could have hoped, but the drive wasn't particularly long, either. After about two to three minutes of driving, they arrived at the cave.

[Write]

Med Ward,
Bianca & Estelle

***

Bianca awoke from her slumber to find her older sister, sitting asleep by her bedside. She unstably raised herself up, pushing on the cot with her palms and scooching backwards in order to put her back against the pillow. She examined the room she was being held in. It was monotonous in design, all too similar to the room in which she was held in for longer than she could recall. An electric light hummed loudly above her head, when she glanced at it she noticed the light refracting through an I.V. which when glancing down at her arm seemed to be plugged into her. She tried to move her right leg, but felt as though there we holes in it. No doubt from bruising. She found herself out of breath after sitting up, breathing felt sharply and acutely painful. She winced.

Estelle awoke with a startle, her hand immediately reaching out for her little sister. She found Bianca’s hand and grabbed it, tightly but Bianca felt no pain. Her eyes darted around the room and met Bianca’s.

She calmed as Bianca seemingly noticed every facial feature return to Estelle’s typical demeanor, yet slightly off. Gone were her typically folded arms, small scowl, pointed eyes, flaring nostrils. This was not the Estelle who was attempting to teach her little sister why taking a cookie from the jar. Her nostrils still flared, but they seemed to be in order to warn the older Nuit that her tear ducts were opening. Her hands were both on the hospital bed, balled up into small fists that could shatter Bianca’s entire reality. Her bottom lip trembled, and she seemed to be biting it, a small indent from where she had been biting before remained on one corner. Bianca had grown all too accustomed to the signs of Estelle seeing loved ones die.

“Estelle, I know that I-“ Bianca began, her voice was hoarse – the first couple days of torture had seemingly injured her vocal chords. But she stopped as she watched a tear escape Estelle’s trembling visage. But she did not move, she did not excuse herself for her tears, nor did she pretend that she wasn’t crying.

Estelle attempted to shrug it off, it’s what she had been doing while she waited for her sister to regain consciousness, sitting in a cold waiting room. When she had spoken to Ozpin, Bianca’s team, their father, the nurses – she had maintained her composure. But she struggled to continue to do so now that she was looking her idiot of a sister directly in her giant pale blue eyes. To see her like she was, she had bruises on her throat that looked like strangulation. She had come in back to Beacon in someone else's clothes and Gratia’s coat. God knows where she got them from and where her old clothes were. Estelle could barely contain her emotions and she didn’t even know what they were. The elder sister placed her right hand back onto Bianca’s bruised hands and softly stroked the back of her hand with her thumb. She wanted to scream at her sister, punch her, kiss her, hold her, tell her to get back on the saddle, take her home to Mistral. She needed to make her sister’s pain, the pain that would follow Bianca around for the rest of her life, she needed it to go away. It would not.

“You sent a letter to a team of freshman to come and save you.” Estelle’s shaky voice blurted out.
Bianca’s eyes widened. She was surprised by her sister, that this was the direction she was heading. Bianca had known when Marissa had sent the letter to Gratia that Estelle was going to be angry. But for whatever reason when Marissa had asked Bianca who to send the letter to, she had given her the address of her old team’s room at Beacon. But it wasn’t ‘whatever reason’.

“It’s because of mom.” Bianca said not meeting her sister’s fiery gaze. “When I lost mom, I thought it was the worst thing that could’ve happened to me, when I got kidnapped I thought that was the worst.” Bianca’s voice was pitifully quiet, her usual singsong voice sounded like an entirely different person. “And then Marissa asked me who to send my letter to, who to ask for help.” Bianca’s voice grew quieter. “I thought if I asked for your help, they would capture you, you would’ve left immediately, you didn’t know your team, you would’ve just” she didn’t know what to say. “After I lost mom, I couldn’t lose you too.” Bianca said quietly towards her lap.

“And you’re fine with losing your friends?” Estelle snapped back, shutting her sister up almost immediately.

“No, I could never… But Gratia, you didn’t see her, you haven’t… She isn’t like me… Weak, defenseless… I- She-“

You didn’t lose mom Bianca.” Estelle said not letting the silence envelop the hospital room once more. “We lost her. You, me, dad – we all went to the fucking funeral together.” Estelle said snapping, her voice cracking. She opened her mouth to continue, as two tears raced down opposing cheeks towards her chin, but the only noise that came out was a soft exasperated cry. “Why don’t you get that we are supposed to be a team?” Estelle asked, begging for an answer.

“I’m sorry Estelle.” Bianca said, the sound from the young girl barely competing with the humming from the light. “I’m so sorry.” She said, sharply inhaling as a tear escaped. She looked up at her sister, with her bruised cheeks and empty eyes. “I didn’t know what to do.” She said as she began weeping. Her sister joined her as they embraced.

The girls stayed like that, their eyes swelling and cheeks drying up after about fifteen minutes. A long silence followed their tears.

“I got you something, okay?” Estelle said, her voice much more stable than it was before. Bianca nodded clueless. Estelle pulled a bag out from underneath the gurney that Bianca laid upon. It was a small, illustrious bag that was encrusted with onyx gemstones and some brilliant purple amethyst.

“That’s my old training bag, what did we call it?” Bianca said, reminiscing with a weak smile.

“C’est la Vie.” Estelle confirmed.

“Thank you Estelle, but what is it for?” Bianca questioned. Estelle simply pointed to an inscription that was not there the last time Bianca’s gentle hands held the bag. “Petit a petit, l’oiseau fait son nid.” Bianca read aloud.

“Little by little, the bird makes its nest.” Estelle mused.

“I know what it says, what does it mean?” Bianca asked in a somewhat callous tone.

“Ozpin is offering you a position on team JCL.” Estelle said gazing directly into her sister’s eyes.

Bianca nodded and placed the handbag back into its packaging, placing that beside her bed. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow, why don’t you get some rest – you look like shit.” Bianca said laying back down in her bed and turning away from Estelle. Her sister nodded, walking towards the door.

“Whatever mess you leave, Bianca. I’ll be by tomorrow to pick up the pieces.” She said quietly, leaving her sister.

[Sho Minazuki]

Jack Orpheus | Brewing Storm

Doesn't look like they were most helpful, but they did learn of a detour. He was actually surprised none of these survivors had medical skills. Still, with Priscilla patched up now that wasn't too much a problem. The detour presented was a lift that led straight up. That means however that they needed to jump start the generators and get the power on again before they can use the lift. As he thought before, there was possible threat the moment the generators started up and the lights came on...

"Alright, we'll get moving there. I will be the one to get the generators going again to turn on the power, I move fast enough alone to do this. The rest of you will hold position on the elevator itself", that was his plan. It was sound, and simple, so it should be easy to execute. It all came down to Jack whether or not he was actually fast enough, but even then he should be able to easily outrun whatever was in here.

"When we're all set we get moving", he said.

[Crimmy]

Gratia Mindaro

"Oh, you're awake."

Gratia stepped into the brilliant white infirmary, the dull black of her turtleneck sweater a stark contrast to the appearance of the room. Her onyx eyes clinically observed her surroundings, the dispassionate gaze picking through every nook and cranny. A thermos was hefted in one arm, while a plastic-covered sandwich roll, steam sticking to its transparent surface, rested comfortably in the other. There was, despite the general aura of chilly stoicism, a certain air of satisfaction or relief about her; barely noticeable to even those who knew her, but it was one that was usually not expected of a girl who had only recently brought down her wrath upon the Dodici Cosca.

"You look like fucking shit," she stated bluntly as she approached Nuit's bed, any visible emotion once more clamped shut. "Like a starving cow wasting away on its own fat and faeces."

There was no emotion in her words whatsoever, but the Mistralese huntress gently sat down beside her teammate's bedside, handing over the wrapped sandwich roll with little fanfare. The thermos lid was popped off, and the scent of a soup wafted through the air.

"Eat up Nuit. I don't have the time to find you some asshole taxidermist to stuff you if you turn into a fucking skeleton."

[harinezumikouken]

Esther Vanhomrigh - Infirmary

The sounds of other Beacon Students waking and talking in their beds roused Esther from her momentary respite. It was getting to that time, and she still had other important matters to attend to. Specifically completing Team CODE's mission report and paying a visit to Ozpin. Pulling out her Scroll to briefly glance at the message on its screen, it appeared her meeting with Ozpin had been scheduled. Sitting up straight, she ran her hands through her hair and let out a heavy sigh. Looking at Rowan, she playfully tapped her shoulder with her knuckles and stood to her feet. She had to make a quick trip home to shower and change. Put away her some of her equipment to be cleaned and serviced later.

"I'm gonna head home for a while. I'll be back later though. It was nice seeing you, Rowan."
Esther said, rather straight and to the point.
She wasn't looking forward to her meeting with the Headmaster.

Looking over to the members of Team CODE in their hospital beds, Esther eyed each one. Visually inspecting their condition from where she stood before she was satisfied. They were all alive and stable. That was more than she could ask for, considering. Turning, Esther strided towards the exit of the Infirmary. Briefly glancing to the side at a few random beds as she passed, she saw two girls talking with one another. What were their names...

Gratia and Bianca?
From Team VGNB, she believed.
She wondered how their mission had gone, as it seemed they were the second team to return home safely.
Hadn't the faunus girl been missing for some time?
Ah, well.

Boots thudding heavily as she stalked out of the Infirmary, Esther practically threw open their doors almost knocking aside a few poor nurses as she passed another student she didn't recognize.

"Move."
She growled at them, the nurses clearing their way for her as she left.
Esther really wasn't looking forward to her meeting.

[Lady Seraphina]

Chorus of the Deep Part 3

In short order, Shiro had the cave in sight. Refusing to slow down or stop, he shot straight in and was forcibly stopped by the fork in the cave. Huffing with an annoyed look on his face, he looked to the left and right. Raising his head toward the ceiling, he took a few short deep inhales as his ears swiveled freely. Growling, his instinct told him to take the right. Taking a brief moment to slide his ear protection on, he also unsheathed Kladenets to quickly load the green wind element Dust shotshells before re-sheathing his blade. Crouching down on all fours once more, he blasted forward deeper into the cave. It was a bit of a slippery and slick run, thanks to the damp moistness on the rocky surfaces. But, he was able to maintain traction in his mad dash. Frowning as a thick fog came into view, Shiro figured that was where his friends were trapped with the beasts. Why not take care of the fog and any potential Grimm in one action?

"Sapphire! Abel! Get down!" He roared ahead of his charge. His two teammates, currently in the process of stabbing and holding down a Salamander, respectively, dove unceremoniously out of the way.
Skidding to a stop, Shiro then lunged forward as he grabbed the hilt of Kladenets and activated its transformation sequence.
In a series of metallic shearing and grinding noises, clicks and clanks, Shiro's weapon morphed into its massive Axe form while the tiger Faunus was in mid-lunge.
Using the momentum of his lunge, Shiro twisted his body and weapon in the air for a sweeping horizontal swing. Further boosted and empowered by a mid-swing discharge of the first Wind Dustshell meant to give his cleave more power and the additional effect of scattering the fog.

Bang!

"Well, alright kid, just go running off half-cocked, I guess." Chuckling as he turned the engine off to the Dune Rover, Captain McDougall grabbed his harpoon gun and quiver. "Let's get going, guy. Your friends might need some help, even if it's just with cleanup." Putting on a pair of heavy headphones, the good Captain made his way to the entrance of the cave.

Gren said nothing as his helmet closed over his head, and as he strapped on the monstrosity of an engine on his back. It might be a bit of a tight fit considering the sheer size, but if he can fit through the cave entrance then it'll have to do. Gren activated his semblance to give him both a solid footing while allowing him to skate across the ground, letting him build his speed until he was barreling down the tunnel. He heard Shiro's weapon shoot in the distances, and knew there was trouble ahead. With the God Eater ready, Gren prepared for battle.

Before him the fog parted as if swept by the hand of some invisible giant. Though visibility in the gloomy, dank seaside cave remained lackluster, the scene quickly became apparent to the three new arrivals. Just now, as Abel rose to his feet, the Grimm advanced. First in line came a salamander, its low but broad profile moving quickly over the rough, stony ground. Its trap like jaws snapped shut a scant few centimeters away from the guardian's ankle, and as he raised the Ampere to drive it into its skull, they opened again to let loose a torrent of scalding water that caused Abel to stumble backward. Relying on blind luck, he attempted a backward roll to put some distance between himself and the creature. His aura handled the jagged edges and crags he encountered on the way, allowing him to bounce to his feet only a meter or two away from Gren and Shiro. Abel spotted them, and never had a moment so fortuitous for smiling gone unused. "Oh, good. Help." The Salamander and two of its closest friends scuttled in to make mincemeat of the hunter team.

With the Salamander's attention on Abel Sapphire sprung into action. She leveled two shots at the outer Salamanders and jumped into the air landing squarely on the one that had initiated the water blast. Sapphire drew her polearm straight up and stabbed it hard into the Salamander's eye and hopefully its brain before it had a chance to react. Sapphire shot two fire shells at the other Salamander's forcing them to cease their water shots. Then she jumping to Abel's side. She used the momentum from her landing to to grab Abel's arm and attempted to toss him out of range of the Salamander's blast. Of course it was a lot closer to a martial arts throw than a push. Since Abel was so much bigger than Sapphire she tried to use his own weight to get him the distance, but the guardian, confused by her course of action, resisted. He yanked himself out of the girl's grip easily, and glanced at the Grimm she'd attacked.

The Salamander Sapphire stabbed gave a whimpering death knell, and a feeble attempt to reach her with its claws was the last thing it did before starting to dissipate into black smoke, its life ended.

Facing two now enraged Salamander's Sapphire chose not to push her luck. She tossed her polearm behind her and backflipped away from the enemy hoping she was out of range even though she was the closest among the team to the angry Grimm. "Nice timing guys." She shouted behind her at her team who had arrived just in time for the showdown with the Siren. These salamanders didn't stand a chance against all four of them and the Siren was just beyond. "If you've got ear protection I'd put it on now." Granted if they did respond to her she wouldn't hear it but it was best to let them know she was aware of them.

Hidden to the Salamanders, Captain McDougall moved forward into the cave. With the members of team SASG on one side of them, the Grimm had focused their attention away from the cave's entrance. This would prove to be a fatal mistake.

Levelling his harpoon gun, McDougall smirked as he pulled the trigger, launching a barbed projectile into one of the two remaining Feinds' rear. Grabbing the thin metallic cord connecting the gun to its projectile, Captain McDougall gave a mighty pull, staggering the Salamander and forcing it to halt its attack. "Now!"

Abel, in a holding pattern and not far away, sprang at the chance. He hopped into the air, letting go of the Ampere, and the weapon twisted around midair in a twirl of electric string. When the guardian began to fall, his full weight drove the downward-pointing blade into the stricken salamander. Steel slid straight through scaly skin, slaying it with savage swiftness. Wrenching the bladestaff free, Abel turned its point toward the remaining salamander, whose target he'd become. Any one of the others could easily destroy it while its focus lay on him.

There was a click, then the sweet sound of titanium alloyed steel sliding into place. Stomping onto the scene, taking up a good bit of space, Gren spoke softly, likely unheard, but nearly impossible not to see. "Stand aside." Suddenly, the entire hall was light up in a bright light. Gren was so grossly incandescent, illuminating the darkness with his form. But if there was one thing that could be clearly seen when looking directly at Gren, it was his weapon. In it's Destroyer Form, the God Eater gave the cave and all it's inhabitants a greeting; a greeting of fire and steel.

Having switched to Armor-Piercing rounds for the purpose of shredding through the Salamander and any other Grimm present, Gren moved up to the salamander, activating his Friction Semblance to prevent the Salamander from running away. He braced himself for the Salamander's attempt to fight back, but any that haven't already turned towards him were not stuck in their position.

Newly revealed by the grossly bright light, and now making absurdly loud noises in discomfort and pain, a veritable horde of Creeps struggled to maintain their heading as they were blinded by Gren's display of sheer luminosity.

Seeing Gren, Shiro knew shit was about to hit the fan once his partner decided to open up a can of whoop-ass. Bracing himself for what he instinctively knew was coming, he quickly converted his Great Axe into its larger shield form and slammed its edge into the ground. Angling it and digging in his feet behind it, he knew he wouldn't be able to evade any of Gren's stray shots effectively. Shutting his eyes tight and gritting his teeth, he mentally prepared himself for whatever came from Gren's side. Exposing his back to the Grimm coming up behind him, but providing nearby cover for Abel and Sapphire if they needed it. He only silently begged that for whatever reason, his friend decided against using armor piercing rounds.

In the volatile yellow lightshow thrown off by Gren's disgorging of rounds, a vortex of azure blue could dimly be seen. Abel stood remarkably casually behind his weapon as it span, swathes of lightning covering its surface, catching and keeping any rounds headed his way in its frenetic electrokinetic spiral. His teammate's cone of destruction pummeled the Grimm without focusing on any one of them enough to totally eviscerate it, with the notable exception of that first salamander. Before long, however, Abel knew that the masked monsters would find a way to counteract his sustained fire. Images of creeps dropping from the ceiling popped into the guardian's head, but as long as Gren kept this up, he couldn't warn him about exactly what lay in wait--not that he knew completely himself. Bullets whirled around in the Ampere's electric whirlpool, dormant for now but no less deadly for having strayed Abel's way.

Sapphire couldn't hear Gren's warning but the moment his iridescent harness was turned on and she saw the God Eater in his hands she knew what he was about to do. If the four to them Sapphire was the only one that didn't carry any sort of defense with her. She'd always reasoned that speed was her best armor and in the worst situations she had her aura. Gren had his full body armor, Shiro had huge shield and Abel could combine his semblance with his weapon to deflect most attacks. Sapphire was the only one left out in the open with no means of defending herself.

When Gren started firing Sapphire dove for the nearest shelter available. In this straight section of the tunnel natural formations were absent so the azure girl was forced to take cover in a somewhat less desirable location. She dove to the ground, rolling behind Shiro's shield. It wouldn't provide enough cover for the entire team but at the distance and angle that Gren was firing was suitable for two people to hid behind.

As she came to a stop next to Shiro Sapphire looked at her shoulder where a stinging pain was shooting up her arm. Her jacket was cut and she could see a small patch of blood staining it. She'd been grazed by Gren's attack and his armor piercing shells were powerful enough to cut through aura if fired from the right location and vector.

Sapphire half considered that he may have done it on purpose. He'd not been subtle about the fact that he wanted her position. Then again Sapphire considered that he was smart enough not to gun down his own team leader. She was sure on the off chance that he actually did try to kill her Gren would be much more subtle about doing so. Though in all likelihood he was more inclined to leverage the rest of her team's dislike of her rather than do anything physical.

To Shiro she shouted. "Keep an eye on the creeps! They'll figure a way around this soon enough!" She herself had her shotguns drawn and was scanning the ceiling, walls and ground of the cave, ready for the creeps to make there advance.

After dealing with the Salamanders, Gren stopped shooting. He could see that his partners had prepared themselves from the possible shrapnel from his gunshots and that was a good idea. Perhaps next time Gren could just smash them. But he didn't really get much time to talk when he saw a wave of creeps coming down from the darkness. Little buggers that Gren could crush with his fists, but they were numerous and capable of some level of burrowing. If he was topside he'd use his dust thrower and set up a wall of fire, maybe layer some ice on the ground to give the creeps another obstacle to break through. But in this tunnel they could come from anywhere: Above, below, behind, and right in front of their face. And it was too tight for Gren to simply open fire; the others were in his way and he was too bulky right now to squeeze past them without walking sideways. So he did the only thing he could.

"EVERYONE, GET CLOSE!" Gren roared in the tunnel. As he shouted he walked towards the team and slammed his fist into the ground. This dramatic gesture wasn't just for show: this would allow him to focus his Semblance over a wider area around him. Instead of just being limited to the floor, Gren focused his semblance through the walls, the ceiling, and generally through the ground all around him.

Any Creeps that got into his radius (20 feet in the tunnel, about 5 feet into the dirt above, below, or beside him) would have their bodies stuck. The moment they touched the dirt affected by Gren's semblance, they wouldn't be able to get it off of them. And for those digging, they wouldn't be able to move it behind them. It'd stick to their mouths and claws, leaving them effectively immobile. For those who didn't dig, they'd simply come to a halt about 20 feet away from Gren. And unless they wanted to try to make the jump, they wouldn't get any closer, making them easy pickings for his team. Gren unfortunately couldn't participate in the shooting since he needed to focus all his concentration on channeling his Semblance around him and onto only his enemies, but he trusted that his team and the captain could handle creeps.

Gren's torrent of adhesive power, no doubt meant to allow Abel a free hit or two, provided instead a spectacular chance. Taking a few deep breaths to concentrate, the guardian moved his hands into position before abruptly grabbing the Ampere out of the air and pumping his aura through the highly-conductive weapon's frame. The lightning cascaded down its length, carrying along with it the bullets gathered from Gren, and all at once an electricity-infused burst of gunfire shot forward from the Ampere to tear straight through the three nearest creeps. Abel smirked to see the little Grimm obliterated before they could so much as shriek. He could not bask in the glory of his technique for long, though; many more remained. Stepping forward, he executed a thrust to one creep's body, but the angle prevented his blade from sinking in.

Peering over the top of his shield after the gunfire ceased, Shiro saw Gren's usage of his Semblance and smirked. Nodding once, Shiro ripped his large shield from the ground and turned to see Abel decimating a number of Grimm. Making another decision to aide his 'mate, Shiro lunged to Abel's side. Transforming his combined shield in midair once again into his Great Axe and bringing the head of his weapon down on the creep that Abel failed to sink his spear into deeply enough to finish it off for him. Converting his weapon into their sword and shield form, Shiro pressed his side to Abel's as he brought his shield up. Eyes forward, Shiro indicated that he was with Abel with whatever he decided to do next.

Once the team had eliminated the amassed Creeps, McDougall came up tothe group, harpoon gun in a resting position, his finger off the trigger. "I suppose we should move on up, unless you folks want me to head back and make sure there aren't any left behind us!"

Abel shook his head. His heart was pumping; the beat of his blood was razor-sharp. The dynamic entry of the four hunters-in-training and their temporary ally meant that none of the little monsters could have gotten past them. Abel gripped the Ampere, though not too tightly, for his weapon only grew more lethal when it left his hands. All that mattered lay ahead of him now. "Let's move up. Siren should be just ahead." He ahead into the darkness of he cave, trusting in Gren's light to beat back the inky blackness.

With the Creeps thoroughly defeated by the team working in tandem with the local Sheriff, Sapphire paused and pushed her hair out of her eyes. It was clinging to the sweat on her face, which she found very distracting. Her breath was labored but focused and her heart beat fast with anticipation of the fight yet to come. She switched off her hearing protection momentarily to hear the suggestions of the rest of the team.

"The Siren resides in the lake up ahead." They could still see her bright flashlight in the distance where she'd had to abandon it. "Its not strong but it'll likely have back up. Everyone keep your eyes out and if you have hearing protection I'd switch it on now." That said Sapphire reactivated her own protection and forged ahead towards the lake motioning for everyone to follow her.

Almost as if on cue, the surface of the lake's water began to ripple. Slowly, the disturbances grew in size, before suddenly halting. Somewhere further back in the cave, where the light seemed to die, Shiro and Gren would be able to see faint movement with their enhanced vision. Even with their natural gift, however, they could not tell just what was back there.

Shield still raised, sword in hand, Shiro tried to stay ahead of the team. To act as a vanguard. That being said, it meant that he was by Sapphire's side for the moment. Unpleasant as it was being near her, his focused eyes narrowed as they detected movement from within the darkness. His senses firing at their maximum with a jittery excitedness, giving him a bit of a 'jumpy' feeling. He half wanted to just charge forward and wrestle with whatever moved within the cave, but he fought the urge and knew that wouldn't be wise. As tight of an environment they were in, it would be a mess if they all got caught up in a nasty crossfire. Shiro wasn't looking to get shot accidentally by Gren. Or anyone else for that matter. Regardless, he pressed ahead with Sapphire, staying as close as comfortly possible.

Gren followed suit, his lights shut off. He had his scanners try their best to get a read on the shape of the cave, as well as any other information, most importantly structual weakness and the location of the grimm. However it was a lot of data to process without dedicating his entire system to it, so he had to wait. And while he waited Gren got into position, walking up the walls using his semblance in order to get into a good vantage position. This way it would minize Gren's likihood of shooting his teammates, and staying more or less near Shiro, it would allow him to be targeted first instead of his squisher allies.

As the cave opened up to a wider underground lake, Gren tried as quietly as he could to keep moving, staying close to the group but not so close that he could accidentally land on them or get in their way. He also had a few witty one-liners ready, most of them involving light, insults to the Siren's singing, and possible towards any of the more aquatic grimm that might show up and attack.

Quickly growing irritated, Shiro decided to discard any common sense thinking he had been considering earlier. Having grown impatient, someone had to take action. If no one else, then he would. At least Gren was providing overwatch support if anything went wrong. Sheathing his sword into his shield and moving his weapons to his back, he jogged ahead to the water's edge. Turning back to his teammates Abel and Sapphire, he voiced his intentions.

"I'm going to scout ahead and see what I can find. My vision can't pick anything up clear from here. Wish me luck!"

Sapphire couldn't hear Shiro's voice because of the protection she'd employed against the Siren however as he broke formation she realized a moment before what he intended to do. "WAIT!" she shouted taking a few steps forward but it was too late as she watched him jump into the lake.

With a thumbs up and grin, Shiro lunged forward and dove into the waters. Staying underwater for a moment, he shivered as he waited to get accustomed to the cold temperature. Once comfortable, he swam straight ahead. As he swam, he had enough sense to stick his tail out and above the surface to provide his team with a visual aid to where he currently was. He wasn't about to dive all the way down just yet, staying near the top layer of the underground lake.

Idiot. Sapphire thought to herself. The lake was the Siren's domain, its home. That was where it was strongest. Luring it on land was their best option as its mobility was greatly reduced out of the water. For Sapphire fighting on land was the only option. As Shiro dove in she could see his tail sticking up out of the water but she could also see something that he couldn't, the waters of the lake began to boil.

An intrusion. One on a much greater scale than any before it. A fledgling, of all things, was intruding upon its domain.

Infuriated, the Siren unleashed a massive screech, muffled by the water of the underground lake. Even then, however, it would be audible. Much louder than even a gunshot, the Siren's yell could be heard through all but the best noise-cancelling equipment.

Slowly, the Grimm swam towards Shiro, its screech dying in intensity as it ascended and lashed out with its proboscis.

The other side of the cave, where Gren and Shiro had seen movement, was now lit with the glowing red eyes of the creatures of Grimm. And they were angry. Shouts, roars, and bellows came from the inaccessible alcove, a few of the cries recognizeable. Salamander. Creep. Scavengers, even.

Even through her ear protection Sapphire could feel the vibrations of the Siren's screen as it riocheted through the cavern calling all manner of grimm to the Siren's aid. This was a nest, they didn't have a hope of defeating all the grimm that were now circling them. Given how deep these caves ran collapsing them could have extreme consiquences for those that lived in the immediate vicinity.

There best option was to exterminate the thing that held the nest together: The Siren. Everything else in the cave was secondary.

Until now a silent giant hanging at the back of the group, wary of whatever lay ahead but willing to focus his attention on potentialy threats behind it, Abel jumped forward after Shiro dove into the lake. As if he's thrown himself head-first into the netherworld itself, the faunus was immediately lost to sight. Even his tail, poking up from the water, could not be easily spotted in the darkness. Only Gren's illumination beat back the shadows now. When Abel prepared to channel his semblance through the Ampere and create an electric lightshow to help, however, a brutally loud noise resounded through the cave. If not for his ear protection, he imagined, he would have been deafened--perhaps permanently.

While the ringing stopped, he looked out over the water at the array of red eyes, swarming like fireflies on the nebulous far shore of the pool. His morale plummeted, and he spurred his imagination to think of a situation that could possible be worse for a team of humans, but could not do so. SASG was so thoroughly out of its element, he could almost laugh in despair. With fighting the horde dead-on in the wet dark a suicide plan, another method of solving the situation, like collapsing the cave, seemed optimal. Unfortunately, Abel neither possessed the firepower or the capacity to request the firepower of Gren necessary to do so. Instead, the guardian allowed electricity to surge through his weapon, levitating it so that it could fly out over the water, its bright blue sparks providing a beacon of light. Guiding it from afar, Abel used it to find Shiro, and once a furry tail had been spotted he kept the weapon hovering over his teammate's position. Knowing full well that the faunus could very well electrocute himself trying to grab it, Abel waited and hoped. See its head: stab it dead, he repeated in his mind, frantically searching the water for enemy movement.

"Oh dust he just ran in..." Gren could only groan at Shiro's recklessness. Ever so slowly he was understanding Sapphire's anger at Shiro. There wasn't much time to lose; Gren was just going to need to take advantage of the situation. Gren slid down the wall towards Sapphire and Abel, lodging the God Eater into the wall. He tapped both Abel and Sapphire on the shoulders before pointing to the straps on his harness, perfect for them to hold onto. Then he put up one finger as if to say "Wait", and then pointed towards his eyes, then at the entrance of the cave and the water. He wanted to know if Sapphire and Abel wanted to "Hang onto him" or alternatively "Watch the water and entrance". Whichever choice they decided to do, Gren took out his harpoons that Shiro had made for him a while back, getting ready to fight the Siren

Sapphire didn't really fancy sending another of her teammates into the lake but with Shiro already there she couldn't leave him without backup. She could yell at him later for his foolishness. Right now she had to make sure that they all came out of this alive. Knowing that Gren's helmet had a filter for the Siren's song and he could therefore hear her Sapphire said "Give Shiro a hand, we can't leave him alone out on the water. Abel and I will back you up from the land and keep the biggest of the other Grimm off your back. If at all possible try to lure it out of the lake, it'll be much easier to deal with on land."

Nodding his head, Gren returned to scaling the wall and roof. Channeling his semblance through his feet and deep into the stone around him, Gren walked on the ceiling roughly above where Shiro and the siren were fighting at. Gren had turned off his lights when he did so; the grimm likely could see in the dark, but for a moment he needed to not draw attention to himself yet. Hopefully his team's actions were hide his own.

Gren eventually got to a position roughly above the Siren and Shiro. However he didn't want to risk shooting into the melee less he hit Shiro; more so since, despite his athletic abilities, Shiro wasn't quite as agile in the water as he was on land. Not to mention that without being able to hear, Gren couldn't even shout at Shiro to watch out for his attack. No, instead Gren had to try something else. He needed Shiro to somehow get the Siren above his own body, or to stay still... Most of all, Gren needed to syncronize his actions with his partner to ensure they didn't get in the way of each other's attacks. Gren gulped.

"Here goes nothing!"

Gren activated his flood lights, illuminating the entire room with light. While the deeper parts of the lake were still dark, everything on the surface that wasn't blocked by more stones were now visible. Hopefully Shiro, who may have a hard time looking directly at Gren due to being the source of those lights, could at least see that he's ready to attack the Siren. He just needs Shiro to make an opening for him.

Recoiling in the water, Shiro's tail momentarily dipped back down into the waters as he held his head and curled in a fetal position. Hurt by the Siren's extreme shriek, it took him a moment to recover even with his hearing protection on. Whether it was due to their less-than-optimal quality or the fact that sound travelled easier through 'solid' molecules, he couldn't tell. All he knew was that the shit fuckin' hurt. Feeling the pain even from deep within his bones. He half wanted to suck in out of the sudden pain, but was able to stop himself from reflexively doing so. Shaking his head, he opened his eyes and realized that he had closed them. For a moment, he thought he saw someone else in the water with him but after blinking a few times the image disappeared.

Distracting him from what he thought he could've seen just then, a bright light illuminated the lake from just above him. Closing one eye and looking up with a hand to shield against the brightness, Shiro figured it was Gren above him looking to aid him. Turning away to quickly scan the lake, the light was just the thing he needed to pinpoint where the Siren was. Smiling and with a gleam in his eye, Shiro exploded forward in the water making a beeline for the Grimm. Fully intending on grappling with the Grimm and wrestling him out of the water.

Surprised by the sudden flash of light from above, the Siren insinctively retreated, its tail slapping through the water like a hand through air, sending a light pressure wave towards Shiro and pushing it further into the water. Its proboscis attack failed, the creature realized that it needed to retreat and find a more advantagous position.

As it moved deeper into the water, the Siren angled itself towards the far side of the lake, while releasing a song of its own into the water: slow, deep tones punctuated by an alternatively rising and falling beat.

On the surface, the Grimm in the alcove across from those who remained on dry land began to screech in anger and fury. Their leader was being attacked, and now that they had their call to arms, all sense of self-preservation was lost.

This would be a deperate swarming, a Hail Mary attack.

Creeps burrowed into the walls and floor, making their way towards Gren, as well as Sapphire and Abel. Beowulves jumped into the water, clawing and roaring at the water as they swam to Shiro. Scavengers taking advantage of their size and manuverability began crossing the ceiling, on direct route to Gren.

Worst of all were the Salamanders, despite their inability to cross the lake. Instead, they took the role of artillery, blasting jets of pressurized water at the Huntsmen and Huntress. At least six or seven jets of water came from the alcove, though the exact number was hardly distinguishible in the chaos and darkness.

The sight of myriad Grimm swarming toward his position evoked a swear from Abel, who immediately recalled the Ampere. Untouched and unutilized, the weapon streaked his way, and with a clap returned to its rightful position between his hands. Moving by instinct, Abel switched the Ampere to staff mode and unleashed his terror-fueled aura through it. The darkness of the cave gave way to brilliant blue as a huge lightning rent the air and exploded on the ceiling. Rather than rain, however, the thunder was followed by a deluge of rats. Even scavengers not hit directly by the bolt and fried plummeted into the underground pool thanks to the shockwave.

Abel did not draw much hope from the successful move, however. In the split-second azure radience of his thunderstrike, he beheld far too many Grimm to make a sustained assault a feasible task. Though he took a step back, the guardian could not avoid a jet of water ramming into his face, blinding and disorienting him. In this chaos Abel slipped, and the next thing he knew was the cold stone floor--and intimately. He groaned, even though his aura held, and struggled to his feet. Electricity arced across his body and the damp floor around him, illuminating the otherwise pitch-black for a few feet. Once again, the situation struck him as despairingly unsalvageable. He needed leadership. "Sapphire! Do something!"

While Abel's attack succeeded in dislodging, stunning, and even killing some of the Scavengers, those who survived simply performed an awkward doggy-paddle type swimming technique, clearly not used to traversing water. Much like the Beowulves, they began attacking Shiro.

Detecting other bodies entering the waters, Shiro stopped his swim and turned round to see a small pack of Beowulves giving chase after him. Looking up towards the surface, he saw what he could only figure to be one of Abel's lightning attacks, as small bodies of other Grimm falling dead into the underground lake before dissolving away. Cursing to himself, he had to make a decision. Should he fend off the Beowulves who would become a problem later and potentially lose sight of the Siren? Or distract and ignore them to continue his hunt of the Siren but possibly back himself into a corner with the Beowulves? What could he do? With a second passing by, he made his choice and decided to continue chasing after the Siren. But what to do with the Beowulves? He had forgotten how many rounds he loaded into his weapon and couldn't for the life of him remember what type.

Shaking his head, he pulled peeled off the Wind-type Dust shotshells and braced himself. As best he could, he smashed the three rounds against his body and almost caused himself to black out underwater from the force of the following explosion of reactive Dust. But, the explosion created an immense pocket of air and bubbles that would surely disorient and blind the Beowulves long enough for him to regain his lead on the Siren. Recovering, Shiro didn't linger long to see if it had worked and continued to chase after the Siren. Deeper and deeper into the waters he went, focused on his prey.

Beowulves screeched in anger and pain as they were pushed away and disoriented by Shiro's attack, but it did not come without a cost. Due to the concussive force unleashed by his shotshells, Shiro's headgear now sported a large, jagged crack along its length.

At the moment, it hadn't been rendered completely useless, but it was certainly damaged enough to cause Shiro to hear his surroundings with a relatively low level of sound dampening as compared to before.

Sapphire looked all around as the cave errupted with activity. Though she couldn't hear the screeching of the Grimm that surrounded her and her team they were so loud that she felt the vibration in the rock beneath her. Abel charged his weapon and blasted electricity at the horde coming towards them but far from being effective it only highlighted just how many Grimm they were facing.

Some fell into the water and in the dim light Sapphire could see the survivors start to converge on Shiro. Creeps in the ceiling and walls were surrounding the place that Gren stood and the rest of the Grimm were targeting Sapphire and Abel.

Pressurized water blasts from salamanders across the lake rained down on the pair. Sapphire didn't have time to worry about Abel's well being, a terrified part of her brain took over and she narrowly jumped out of the way. She was shaking and her breath was heavy. She saw Abel hit in the face and watched him fall to the ground. Clearly he was all right but Sapphire couldn't help feeling a burning shame in the pit of her stomach. She'd just left him there to take the hit. They were supposed to be better than that.

Blue sparks of electricity arced over the water that covered and Abel and he turned to look at her. There was desperation in his face as she shouted at her. She couldn't hear his words but what he was asking for was obvioius. 'Tell me what to do!'

Sapphire felt a sense of hopelessnes close in on her. There was no feasible way they could combat all of these Grimm. They didn't have the armaments, the stamina or the numbers for such a task. They might be able to battle there way to the surface but that would leave the town outside defenseless. No they had to destroy what kept these Grimm unified. They were faced with Ursa, Beowulves, Creeps and Salamanders. Tactically speaking these were not intelligent species of Grimm. They were all kept in line by the Siren. If Swansong could cut off the head the rest of the Grimm would fall into dissarray. The team could escape in the chaos.

Sapphire ran to Abel's side and as she did so loaded two ice rounds into each of her shotguns. She then aimed one side of the polearm at the underground lake and fired two shells at the water before flipping her weapon and firing the other two rounds. When the cartridges hit the water giant patches of ice exploded on the surface of the lake. Beowulves and other Grimm caught in the blast where frozen solid. She'd been careful to avoid hitting Shiro but everything else in the lake was fair game.

Then she turned to Abel, reached up and pulled the hearing protection out of one of his ears for a moment. "The Siren's priority, once it's dead the rest will become confused and disorientated, that's our chance to escape. Help Shiro out as much as you can from the shore. I'll keep the Grimm off your back as best I can. Good luck."

Sapphire replaced Abel's hearing protection before she reloaded her shotguns and took a couple steps away from Abel, ready to mark her territory against the oncoming monsters. The Salamanders continued to fire and as they did so Sapphire aimed up and shot the mass of oncoming water with two fire shells. The water vaporized in midair creating a cloud of steam over the lake. Then Sapphire turned to see the rest of the Grimm advancing on her.

Sapphire's attacks were effective at slowing her targets down, at the very least. The ice blocks left by her first shots slowly drifted side to side, offering a potential mode of transportation across the laketop, if one were foolish enough to trust "giant, unanchored blocks of ice" as a reliable means of suspension.

The Salamanders across the lake did not respond to Sapphire's attack, continuing to fire jets of high-pressure water across the lake, but this time they were unable to accurately target any of the people across from them.

Gren couldn't get a clear shot at the Siren as she swam away, and despite being mostly deaf Gren could plainly see more Grimm swarming, including the scavangers. On their own Gren wasn't too concerned, but even if he dropped from this height they would only end up falling into the water. And assuming that didn't cushion the fall and allow them to live, they would only end up swarming Shiro. Gren had little choice but to confront them, but without his God Eater, which he had to put away due to the bulkiness, he was not quite as ready for crowd clearing.

So Gren ran. At first he was just running to put distance between himself and the grimm, but then he noticed Shiro making an underwater explosion. "That's right, Shiro is after the Siren. If he kills it, then we can rout the horde." Gren would need to keep the rest of the grimm off his ass until then and that's exactly what he wanted to do in the first place. Keeping track of everyone's position, Gren put himself roughly at the center of all the chaos. He needed all the Grimm to be looking at him, that he kept flashing the super-bright lights in their eyes certainly helped. Once he was roughly above the middle, Gren dropped from the ceiling and down to the lake. But not into the water.

As Gren was falling, he had to focus his semblance. He has practiced this before. But this would be the first time he'd ever had to actually use it. He had to hope for the best, but was prepared for the worse. When Gren hit the water, he didn't sink. he stood on the surface as if it was solid ground. Channeling his Friction Semblance to only his feet, Gren was able to stand on the water as the grimm around him fell and were forced to swim. "You will learn fear!"

Seeing salamanders harass Sapphire and Abel across the lake, Gren fired his harpoons to impale them, reeling them in if the shot didn't kill them. He shook off any scavanger that landed on him and stomped on any that tried to swim underneath him. Occasionally Gren would take out one of the wasp knives and stab a beowolf or other swimming Grimm, trying to get their attention. Aside from the salamanders, Gren tried to get the attention of the swimming beowolves, mostly by stabbing them. He somewhat understood that the grimm, while not the most inteligent or dicplined creatures, wouldn't stop chasing Shiro since he was directly threatening the Siren, their leader. If they didn't focus their efforts defending themselves from Gren, he would take advantage of their single-minded determination by killing them.

Gren made use of his floodlights, constant roars, agressive tactics, and sheer size (Gren still had the water scooters attached to his back, making him twice as big as he normally would be) to keep the Grimm's attention to him. He was confident that his durability would allow him to weather their combined efforts, at least long enough for the rest of his team to complete their task. So stabbing, smashing, and shooting his way through any grimm that got into range, he was going to do whatever it took to draw the attention of all the grimm from his allies to him.

Shiro couldn't look back, he had to ignore whatever was going on above him and focus on the Siren. Doing his best to track the Grimm, Shiro continued to chase. Determined that the moment he got his paws on the monster, he'd tear it apart as quickly and viciously as he could.

While Gren's plan worked enough for him to remain on top of the water, his job wouldn't be easy, between blasts of water and Grimm falling from above. Some of the Creeps dropped directly on top of him, trying their damndest to slow the monstrous berserker down long enough for their compatriots to destroy Shiro.

Below the lake's waters, the Siren stopped its retreat, turning to face Shiro head on. Its proboscis lashed out angrily at the Faunus, while the creature itself slapped its tail in his direction once more.

Slightly above the pair, a quartet of Beowulves that had managed to survive Gren's rampage and Shiro's attack swam downwards, ready to kill the intruder as soon as they could get their claws on it.

As much as Abel wanted to help, he could only do so much to help an underwater ally from the shore, and this knowledge infuriated him. Still, he vowed to abide by Sapphire's request, and would not allow any calamity to fall upon his team. The guardian's knuckles turned white from his deathgrip on the Ampere, which he maneuvered into a javelin position and then hurled with furious might.

Nearly invisible in the darkness, it sliced through the air and punched like a piston into the armor of a salamander, just between head and shoulder. Shards of bone flew as the point penetrated the subpar defenses there, and the water-spitter keeled over, far from dead but unable to serve as a living mortar any longer. Abel flicked his wrist, recalling the Ampere, and grabbed it hurriedly when it approached. In truth, he'd been lucky that his guess on the grimm's location had been correct; he had only the jets of water to work with, after all. No amount of determination or strength, though his were admirable, could turn this situation into a good one. Abel prayed that beneath the dark waters, Shiro would soon find his prey.

As Abel managed to disable one of the Salamanders, his and Sapphire's time was up: Nearly a dozen Creeps burst from the cave walls around them, screeching angrily and lashing out with tooth and claw.

A pair moved directly at Sapphire from behind, while three moved for her side, five charged Abel, and a pair tried to flank the azure-clad warrior.

A pair of harpoons shot out towards Sapphire and Abel, skewering a pair of creeps each. Gren wasn't just helping Shiro but his entire team. While creeps were hardly the most threatening type of grimm, Gren wasn't going to let them get the advantage of flanking. That being said, this attack rendered Gren's harpoons useless when the rope snapped due to overuse. This mean he only had one more harpoon gun left, leaving only his knives. After that Abel and Sapphire would truly be on their own, but Gren wasn't without some means to help. He had to shout and could only briefly flash a light, but he pointed that light towards The God Eater nearby, which was still wedged into the wall.

"USE MY WEAPON!"

Controling it using the computer in his systems, Gren had the God Eater Partially dismantle. This made it useless as a weapon, but also unlocked it's dust cache for the others to use. They could try to use them as bombs or maybe sent up a wall of fire around them if they pour red dust and activate the contents. If needed, they could simply try to lift the weapon's blade (Which was only a 1/3 of the total weight of the weapon in it's dismantled form) and use it. That would surely cut down any grimm that it connected with. Whatever they needed to do, Gren needed to help Shiro now.

Dropping his now useless harpoons while still shaking off the creeps on his back, Gren allowed himself to fall into the water fast. While he did so he activated all the waterscooters on his back, combined with using his semblance to reduce the water resistance his massive frame would give. This gave him an immese boost to his mobility but only moving forward; turning was still hard to do. He was moving fast enough to catch up to Shiro, and more importantly deal with the beowolves swimming after him. Gren impaled one with the harpoon, shooting it through its chest to hit another. Once the grimm he killed dissipated into the water Gren began chasing down the other beowolves before catching up with Shiro and trying to help him nap the Siren.

Instincts alerting him to an incoming attack, Shiro halted in the waters and stopped his swim. With swift reflexes, Shiro brought up his arms in a defensive posture just in time to meet with the Siren's proboscis and grabbed at it. Looping the creature's 'tongue' around a few times to securely wrap it to his own arm, Shiro tanked the swinging tail attack and grabbed at it also.

"Thank you for handing these over to me!" Shiro thought to himself, wanting to snarl but only letting a few foaming bubbles escape from his bared fangs.

With his strength, he held on tight to both the Siren's proboscis and tail and began to pull them as hard as he could in opposite directions. Intent on ripping either or both off of the Grimm to handicap it before going in for the kill. Growling, he strained hard as veins pulsed in his temple. His icy blue eyes glaring lethal daggers at the hideous monstrosity. If it didn't work, at the very least he had a direct line to pull the creature closer as he would close the distance and bury his fangs and claws into its body or sink his weaponry into.

As one of their own died, the other Beowulves turned on Gren, their eyes glowing a bright, furious red. Even the Beowulf with the harpoon still inside it began to move after the hulking boar Faunus, claws lashing out with killing intent.

The Siren, meanwhile, did the only two things it could do: screech as loudly as possible, and thrash its flexible body around wildly. It knew that it was without any hope for survival, but at this moment, all of its energy went into defying the whelp who had so arrogantly come into its domain.

"!!"

Shiro should've figured that wouldn't have worked very well. Now instead he was holding on for dear life as he was whipped and whirled about in the waters. Keeping hold as best he could, he gradually continued to wrap his arms around what he had to pull the Siren closer and closer. His head starting to hurt from all of the Siren's underwater screeching.

Good news: the beowolves weren't chasing Shiro anymore. Bad news was that they were after him. Under normal circumstances Gren wouldn't fear Beowolves at all. He could kill them with his fists if he had to, or maybe even bite them to death. But underwater that wasn't as much of an option. Though he could use his semblance to give a good punch, with his constant forward momentum the best he could do was try to smash them as he continued forward however the beowolves had much better mobility whilst underwater.

Worse still was that one of the beowolves was a bit tougher than your common stock, somehow still surviving the spear in its chest. It clawed at Gren, who fortunately was still strong and durable regardless of his enviroment. With the beowolf so close, Gren was able to grab hold of its forearm as it tried to slash him. When he got a solid grip, he crushed the beowolf's arm, disarming the grimm... literally, Gren pushed the creature out of his way while he pulled the spear forcefully from its chest, leaving it in his bubbles.

There was still the other beowolves coming in fast, so Gren prepared to meet them. Sticking his harpoon gun onto the massive rig on his back, he used his semblance to keep it in place. Gren readied the two wasp knives Shiro had made for him. While his knife fighting skills weren't as good as Sapphire's, it'd be more than enough to kill these grimm. "Getting real tired of you sons of bitches!"

The Beowulf that had been impaled, now also missing a portion of its arm, roared silently as its body began dissipating as a marker of its death. Its two remaining companions reached their target, one going for each of his arms to disable the hulking Faunus.

The Siren was in a much worse spot. Shiro had it beaten in terms of raw power, even in its natural habitat. Its death was nigh, but it would not go without a fight. It only seemed to resist more as Shiro's deathgrip tightened, but there wasn't much movement left for it to make now. Its screeches intensified in power, the sheer acoustic force causing Shiro's hastily-constructed helmet to vibrate jarringly.

Sapphire had expected one of the larger grimm that prowled at the edges of the cave to charge her. To eliminate Abel's last defense before devouring him, preventing him from lending Shiro and Gren much needed aid. Instead the ground under their feet churned and over a dozen creeps burst forth from the ground. Instinctively almost before she was aware fo the threat Sapphire swung her polearm, letting the momentum spin her around as it slashed through the bodies of two creeps.

A second later one of Gren's harpoons whistled through the air scewering two more that had been attempting to get behind the azure haired girl. Though she doubted he could see her in the darkness Sapphire knodded at Gren's hulking form in thanks. Another of Gren's harpoons reduced two of the five creeps coverging on Abel to dust. That left only three of the small creatures for both the hunter and huntress to deal with.

With the element of surprise lost to them Sapphire made short work of those that had targetted her. Really creeps were such pathetic creatures one could only really call them a threat when in mass volume, like blackflies.

Every bone in Sapphire's body shouted for her to assist her comrade but she knew she must stay her hand. If she couldn't trust Abel to deal with a quarter dozen creeps she couldn't trust him with any task. Her efforts were better spent elsewhere.

Gren's Godeater lay waiting with valuable resources for Sapphire to make use of. While she was skilled in combat she much prefered subdefuge. There was no point in spending time and energy fighting a capable opponent when you could knock him on the head with a brick before he knew you were there.

Sapphire retrieved the dust cache, the shells and the rockets from the dismantled weapon. For a brief moment she considered taking the blade but thought better. It was to unwieldy for her fighting form.

The Godeater contained a massive quanity of red dust used in the flame thrower portion of the weapon. While the grimm where temporarily off her and Abel's back she spred this substanced over the ground in a ten foot perimiter around Abel leading up to the lake. She didn't activate it yet though. Grimm responded to what was in front of them. Create a wall of fire and they would find a way to put it out. Create the mechanism for a wall of fire and they wouldn't react till they'd already set it off.

Next she took the six rockets from the Godeater and after activating there preasure sensors buried them in the ground in various places a distance outside the wall of fire being very careful not to set off any of her traps.

With them safe as least for the interum Sapphire returned to Abel's side. She grabbed a stick from the shore and carved the word "Status?" into the sand before disabling her hearing protectors just long enough to find out how the fight with the siren was proceeding.

Shiro winced yet again, was it just him or were things getting a bit louder? Nonetheless, Shiro had the Grimm in his claws. Problem was that now that he got that far, how exactly was he to finish it? Shaking his head and blinking, he felt a bad headache coming on but was able to clear it well enough to come up with crude way of executing the Siren.

Letting go of the Siren with the hand that held its tail, Shiro used his free arm to unleash a softening blow against the Siren's body to stun it. After a punch, he shoved his knee in the Grimm and peeled three Wind element Dustshells off of his belt. Drawing his sword he pressed the spine of his blade against his equipment and opened the chamber. It was mighty useful being underwater, what with the lake 'holding' his ammo and sword for him as he did one-handed manipulations.

Grabbing the shotshells, he fed his sword and closed the chamber before positioning the point of his sword to where he believed would be the best location to pierce the Grimm. With all of his might, he shoved forward with the sword attempting to run through the Siren. If he made it, Shiro planned to fire off all three shotshells to cut it in half. Gren's wasp knives giving him the idea.

Even while Shiro used only one hand to subdue the Siren, the Grimm Lieutenant found no means that it attempted would allow it to break his hold. It did not wish to accept its fate, but as fate must, it had come nonetheless.

As the blade pierced its body, the Siren's screeching plummeted in volume, water filling its insides rapidly. Its body flailed uselessly, tail slapping at Shiro much more weakly than it had before.

At the same time, two beowolves also started to grow and expand as Gren's knives found their mark. When they tried to grab hold of him, Gren altered the friction of their claws so that they could not hold him, as if he was too slippery. When they failed to hold onto him, he used that moment to pludge the knives into their chests, sending compressed air into their body and forcing them to float out of his way. Without tearing out their flesh or the knives, they would continue to float unless they could somehow manage to get the air to release. In the meantime Gren went to Shiro, vaguely hearing the Siren's scream rise and fall.

Gren would soon meet Shiro and the Siren, and for good measure Gren had his harpoon out ready to impale the creature through the skull. While he trusted Shiro to slay the beast, it was pertinate that they did not cut any corners. He just needed Shiro to hold the creature still long enough for him to send the spear right into it's head.

In the smothering darkness Abel made his stand. Well aware of the direness of the situation, he decided to pull out all the stops. When the Creeps arrived, he released his grip on the Ampere and the blade did not return to his grasp. Played like a killer marionette upon strings of lightning, it danced back and forth, a whirlwind of steel ripping into the worthless creatures. More monsters came on their heels, but the Guardian was prepared. Reaching out of the trance of combat, he grabbed the blade of the God Eater and held it like a cleaver, and his semblance surged through the metal to guide the slab of steel's movements where his lackluster experience with it failed.

With this mighty makeshift sword in hand and the Ampere lashing about as if with a mind of its own, the Grimm charging him met a swift end. Back and forth the two blades cut and crushed. Though bereft of the kind of speed and agility Sapphire could boast, Abel wielded imrpessive strength, and with it smashed the Creeps to ashes. Sapphire's activities did not concern him; in a fight for survival, nothing existed to him but the next foe and the next deathly stroke.

Unknown to Sapphire a single Creep had burrowed through her defenses before they were properly set up. It now came to the sureface and charged. The azure haired girl was distracted, writing something in the sand with a stick. This was it: its moment to fulfill the instincts, the needs of the Creatures of Grimm. It would slay a human on this day.

Sapphire had no warning as a shadowy form slammed into her back, she was knocked off balance as the creature shoved her towards the water. Though they had been near the shallows of the water, the underground lake dropped off into greater depths very close to the shore. Sapphire stumbled, the force of the charging Creep pushing her over the edge, into the deep waters of the lake.

Sapphire was a strong swimmer, in fact when she was younger she had loved the water. Her brother had often compared her to a fish. That was years ago though, before her body had learned to fear the water.

The moment she made contact with the lake Sapphire's breath caught in her throat. One moment she was in the lake, the next she was in a pool, iceburgs exploding into being all over the place, a figure standing at the rim. Sapphire kicked and splashed, her breath was coming in ragged gasps as she fought to keep her head above water. She couldn't breath, she couldn't think.

Her wild flailing had sent the Creep flying somewhere in the water but she barely even remembered it was there. Her head dipped under the water and her frantic lungs pulled liquid into her airways. She began to cough as she fought to the surface, as she fought to breath.

'Anything can happen in the water, you have to be prepared.'

Sapphire pushed herself to the side, dodging away from something only she could see. Her head plunged below the surface again but despite being in a state of panic she didn't call for help, she didn't make a sound more than the splashing of her movements.

As it fell into the water, the Creep thrashed angrily, but found no purchase with its stubby legs. As if weighed down by the hatred it felt for mankind, the Grimm slowly began to sink below the depths, its life force fading rapidly.

The last beowolf dropped to the floor, a messy cleft halfway down its body starting by the neck, and Abel found nothing left to kill. His trance evaporated faster than a puddle in the peak of summer, and in very short order he found no allies nearby either, which troubled him. Looking from side to side, he seethed; he couldn't find a single damn thing in this darkness. He felt his aura flooding his veins, and decided to end the annoyance once and for all. A flick of the wrist recalled the Ampere to his hand, and Abel planted the butt of the partizan into the ground while switching it to Staff mode. Roaring, he channeled his electricity through the metal rod and focus crystal, releasing a stream of lightning straight up into the ceiling of the cave. Finding no ground, it spread out, illuminating the whole scene. He saw dark shapes moving in the depths of the lake, and between them and him, a girl who seemed to be in dire need of assistance. Fortuantely, though she trashed in panic, she was not in fact very far.

Abel waded into the water, thanking his lucky stars that his azure discharge lingered on the ceiling to provide light. He was dimly aware that electricity shouldn't work like that, but assumed his semblance to be the cause. Moving gingerly forward to avoid the sudden drop-off, he reached the Ampere out toward Sapphire like a tamer trying to snag a wildcat, intent on catching her hood or jacket with a corner and drawing her, fishlike, in.

Darkness oozed from the wound as Gren plunged the harpoon into the Siren's face. Taking a hand's on approach, Gren viciously stabbed the spear alone while holding onto the Siren's neck, using a combination of his strength and Semblance to ensure it couldn't escape. Once it's body disipated into the water, Gren turned his form towards Shiro, nodding and pointing towards the surface. It was time for them to go. Gren motioned for Shiro to go first as Gren needed some time to turn around, but once he was positioned he'd activate all the water scooters and follow after Shiro.

With the Siren's death, the cave suddenly became much quieter. The remaining Creatures of Grimm seemed to be stunned at what had come to pass, lost without the guidance of their leader. The Salamanders still remaining began thrashing about, armored carapaces smacking into one another with a dull thudding noise.

Shiro blinked, surprised when Gren's harpoons finished the job with offing the Siren. Watching as the Grimm's body faded away, Shiro turned to his friend and tilted his head. Following Gren's motions, Shiro looked up towards the surface of the lake and nodded his head. Considering the mission complete, Shiro removed his protective headwear and shook his head under the waters. Giving Gren the thumbs up, Shiro began to make his way back.

Along the way, Shiro happened to notice a figure thrashing about frantically and furrowed his brow. The figure didn't seem to be a Grimm, in fact it seemed to have the shape of..

Shiro's eyes widened.
"Is that Sapphire!?"
Powering through the waters, Shiro quickly made his way to the girl and breeched the surface of the waters near her.
"Sapphire, hey what's wrong? Calm down!"
He got closer and presented his hand for her to take. Seeing Abel not too far from them thanks to his lightshow, he could at least help keep her above water and assist in getting her back to the shore safely.
"Relax and just take my hand! I've got you!"

Gren followed Shiro, activating the flood lights beneath him so that the others could see them coming. But in the lights, Gren noticed Sapphire's thrashing body. He remembered her warning them of her aquaphobia on the airship, so he wasted no time rushing towards her. Shiro of course reached Sapphire first, and not wanting to get in the way Gren kept his distance and moved to the shore. Still he did something to help: he sent one of the water Scooters to Sapphire to hopefully hold onto. All she needed to do was grab the handles and hang on, and it would do the swimming for her. Once Gren crawled to the surface he gave himself a few minutes to breath before checking back on their leader, making sure she didn't go to a watery grave.

Sapphire lashed out at Shiro's hand pushing it away. She saw something else, a large well calloused hand reaching for her. She couldn't take it, couldn't accept help, couldn't loose focus, couldn't admit defeat. Couldn't let this be another source of the bruises that would cover her body when she failed one of his tests.

Her head sank under the water again as she struggled. She could die here, she might die here. Some voice at the back of her mind whispered to just let go. To give up. This would never end, he would never be satasfied so what was the point in trying.

Sapphire pushed that thought away as she forced her head above the water again taking in a breath of cold air. She couldn't give into that voice because however she suffered it meant that they weren't. If she wasn't around anymore she couldn't be a shield for them. She couldn't abandone them like Olie had.

Sapphire continued to thrash erratically locked in a loop of the same thoughts, the same visions, the same test over and over again. Tears ran down her face streaming into the water. Her arm collided with the water scooter and she recoiled from it as though it were something that might cause her pain. Her blow changed it's direction and it went rocketing off towards the other side of the lake. She didn't even see the Ampere as she struggled to to keep her head above water, struggled to keep herself alive.

Things were not looking too great when Sapphire pushed Shiro away, and even knocked the waterscooter off-course. In hindsight it should not have come to a surprise to Gren; he has read somewhere that drowning swimmers have a tendency to flail, which can be harmful for anyone trying to help them. Thus the best way to save them would be by taking them from behind. If they are flailing, they likely would not have the strength or skill to escape being grabbed by a competent swimmer. And while Gren was not a good swimmer, with the water scooters and the fact he was much bigger and physically stronger than Sapphire, he knew he could grab her out of the water.

"Shiro! Distract Sapphire! You need to get her to stop flailing or she"ll hurt herself.

Gren dove back into the water, activating the water scooters so that he sunk faster than Sapphire would. To minimize her injuries Gren was banking on Shiro to somehow keep Sapphire from flailing around; otherwise she might do even more harm to herself and everyone else. Anything wrong that could happen, might happen. For all he knew Sapphire may end up breaking her neck just trying to get away from Gren as if he was some sort of treacherous sea monster.

Ideally, Gren hoped Shiro could use his semblance to keep Sapphire’s attention, but he had his doubts. Shiro seemed to have a hard time using his powers for anything but dire emergencies; Gren hoped that Sapphire drowning was dire enough to warrant it’s use. Because while Gren was certain that he could survive Sapphire’s flailing, he couldn’t say the same for their team leader. She seemed injury prone and this time Gren wasn’t going to go through with his plan until his allies could do what they needed to do.

During this time, Abel watched from the sidelines, furious that he couldn't help. More of a natural lumberjack than a natural swimmer, and without any sort of gadgets to assist him, he didn't dare risk throwing himself into the dark waters, particularly with both of his teammates on the case. The only thing more dire to Abel than failing to render his help to his panicked, temporarily-insane team leader would be to attempt to help and make things worse. While the sight of Gren's floodlights, until now definitively underutilized in the dark cave, convinced him that the faunus' efforts would not be in vain, he did notice that the overhead light provided by his great discharge began to wane. Now fully apprised of a way he could be at least a little useful, the guardian turned his weapon skyward and unleashed another torrent of electricity, forming into a blue-white, sunlike orb against the ceiling to illuminate the whole surroundings.

Shiro didn't know what to do, his mind blanking out momentarily as he had an anguished look on his face. When it came to the water, everything came natural and easy to him. He knew to breathe and keep his head above water. He knew to remain calm and relax. Those two bits of knowledge were crucial to him when it came to swimming, and there wasn't exactly a way he could coach the actively drowning Sapphire in the next few seconds.

Mind clearing, he finally had an idea of what he could do. Only problem were two obstacles that caused him to pause and hesitate. The first problem was that Sapphire was actively drowning, as in still conscious and thrashing. If he were to attempt a rescue swim technique, that would endanger himself and make things harder. He'd have to exert more energy along with it. Neither self-endangerment or having to use more energy were really problems for him, and he certainly wasn't going to just wait until he started to see bubbles rise to the surface once Sapphire eventually dipped below.

In actuality, the biggest problem lay in the fact that Sapphire was female. For his rescue swim attempt, her anatomy was going to be his enemy. He just didn't feel that way about her, and didn't know her like that for what he was going to have to do. Then, there was the fact of what would happen after they all made it out okay. She would surely murder him in cold blood. Even still, no matter how much they disliked each other, Shiro had to act.

Furrowing his brow, he mentally prepared himself and took a deep breath. Diving down into the waters, Shiro swam to where he was facing her back. Swooping upwards, Shiro brought his arm underneath Sapphire's armpits and straight across her chest. A pang of guilt and strangely enough, revulsion shot through him as he pulled her body close and his head surfaced. In this odd arm and headlock, with any luck this would limit Sapphire's flailing and keep her head above the water. Even if she kicked wildly, at this point it would aide Shiro as he swam sideways with her towards the edge of the lake with his free arm and kicking legs or so he hoped.

He couldn't say much and didn't even try to calm Sapphire down to have her snap out of it. All it could do was struggle against her thrashing and constantly repeat to himself mentally, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Please don't kill me. Please don't kill me. Please don't kill me."

Sapphire barely registered the brilliant spark of light as Abel lit up the cavern with his semblance. Her mind couldn't move past the frantic beating of her heart. ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum over and over again ba-bum. She could feel it beating so fast she thought her chest was going to explode. Everytime her head sunk below the water it quickened. ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum faster and faster. She couldn't breathe, couldn't think, her arms and legs lashed out wildly but there was nothing. Only damp cave air and water.

Suddenly there was something else. Her arms crashed into something solid and it wrapped around her chest. Tightening its grip on her body. She gasped for air, her heart beat deafening in her hearts, blocking out all other noises, ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum ba-bum. She writhed in the grip of whatever had grabbed her and when that didn't shake it loose she pushed her head forward then cracked it back hard into whatever had grabbed her. There wasn't enough force to dislodge it but the blow shoved the limbs of it higher up on her chest and in reach of her mouth. She lunged down and violently crunched her teeth into the wet soggy mass till she tasted copper in her mouth and they withdrew with a yelp of pain.

She shoved herself violently away from whatever it was that had her, distance enough that it couldn't follow before her head slipped under the surface again. This time she didn't come back up. She'd had no time to draw in a proper breath before the waters claimed her and her lungs were screaming. She sunk deeper and deeper unable to summon up the energy to pull herself to the surface. Her frantic lungs drew in water so much so that she started coughing but with no air to replace it she only drew more into her lungs. She could hear her heartbeat slowing. ba-bum... ba-bum... ba-bum... It was all going to end here. In some isolated little cave in the middle of nowhere.

Before that thought could fully reach home her feet touched the bottom of the lake. She looked up and realized that she was only a few feet under the surface. Summoning the last ounces of her strength Sapphire pushed off sideways from seafloor, she placed the last of her aura into the action and it propelled her through the water towards shore where her head broke the surface in the shallows.

The moment it did she started to cough violently. Water came up from her lungs and right there not far from the shore she puked into the lake. Her stomach kept heaving, bringing up bile and water and her morning breakfast till there was nothing left in her stomach and she kept heaving for almost a full minute after that. When it finally let up she fell onto her side her shoulder submerged in the lake. "Water." she got out in a hoarse croak. Considering what she'd just gone through it was an ironic thing to ask for but she needed something to flesh out her throat and wash the taste of bile from her mouth.

After watching the whole thing, Abel wanted nothing more than to demand from Sapphire whether or not she did in fact want to die. With three people attempting to save her, she rejected each one with varying degrees of violence, only to barely survive. Of course, he wouldn't say such a thing. Barring the great disgust he felt from hearing and seeing his teammate retch the contents of her stomach into the lake, he felt that saying something hurtful would be entirely inappropriate. Unfortunately, he didn't have any water either. Quite happy to get some air out of this stinking, horrible cave, he told Shiro and Gren that he would go and get water before hoofing it out of there. En route, he noted how remarkable it was that no more monsters appeared following the siren's death. Perhaps after nearly drowning four people in bad luck, God saw fit to give them a break. Into the light of day the guardian emerged, squinting as he breathed free air. He jogged in the direction of the town, his eyes set on a little convenience store by the road.

Gren had helped Shiro drag Sapphire out of the water the best he could, up to and including helping Sapphire out of the water when she literally sank to the bottom of the lake. Was this suppose to be their leader? A panicking girl who couldn't control her own teammates, who'd sooner take a watery grave over accepting help? He understood that she had a phobia of water, but he couldn't imagine why she's never thought to prepare contingencies for it. More so when she fought right next to a lake of the stuff. But she would get an earful later; right now they needed to get out of here.

Regardless of if Sapphire tried to resist him, Gren helped her to her feet. Then he picked her up and rushed her out of the cave. "Let's go. The less time we have to spend in this godforsaken grotto, the better." Gren had a good idea that Sapphire didn't want him touching her like this, probally saying stuff like "I can walk on my own" or some such, but after her stunt in the water he doubts she was at her full strength. Besides, if things were going to get worse, it'd involve Sapphire taking another dip and doing this whole mess over again.

Captain McDougall turned to Abel as he emerged from the cave, a look of sarcastic concern on his face. "Don't tell me your whole team got merced by that thing, kid." Letting the look drop, he gave Abel a short nod of appraisal before taking a step towards him. "So what's up? They send you out here for better reception or something?"

Abel found it within himself to unleash a rare smile on the world. Nothing in particular appealed to him about the rather bleak town and seashore except that it, unlike the place where he spent the last half hour, wasn't hell on earth. "Got it, actually. Not easy, but it's dead. Looking for water for Sapphire." Having spent no real time with the sheriff, he did not look expectantly to him for assistance, and so sped up again to standard jogging speed to resume his quest for a drink.

Shiro floated in the waters of the lake for a few minutes by himself after Abel had left and Gren shortly after with Sapphire. Feeling left behind and a little forgotten, he swam to the lake's edge and pulled himself out. Feeling heavy and bogged down by his wet clothing. Rubbing the painful spot where Sapphire had bitten him with a frown on his face. Sighing, Shiro tugged and began to pull off most articles of his clothing and equipment to quickly wring them out to allow them to dry a little faster. Shaking his mane of silver hair out and sending water droplets scattering about as he stripped. Remembering to gently wring out his white tail as well.

After he had finished, he redressed himself and made sure he still had all of his equipment with him securely fastened. Standing alone in the cave, he turned on the spot as his eyes scanned around once more silently thinking to himself. This mission was nothing like how he had expected it to go. Just like their first one, Shiro felt it a complete and total mess. Hunting Grimm was supposed to be fun and yet, he derived little to no enjoyment from yet another shoddy mission with Team SASG.

Needless to say, he was happy that everyone made it out somewhat okay. They'd be going home now just a little worse for wear and he can finally just enjoy his weekend. Maybe go out at night to the city and hang out with some friends. To think he was actually looking forward to returning to the academy. Scoffing and smiling to himself, Shiro shook his head as he casually strolled towards the cave entrance to rejoin his team. Striding with his hands behind his head as he whistled a little tune, he figured that the most damage that had been done was to each of their relationships. How they would recover and strengthen their bonds, he couldn't know. As the light of the sun was in sight, Shiro decided he would just keep quiet for the rest of the time there until they all made it back to Beacon.

Rather than respond to her request for water Gren grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her roughly to her feet. She wasn't at the point to which standing would be considered a good idea and she felt suddenly light headed as her skull began to pound with an incessant rhythm.
/ What? \
Sapphire's legs gave out a second after but instead of (making allowes for this) Gren dragged her through the cave and to the surface. She would have pushed him off if she'd had the strength to do so but at the moment all she could think of was getting off her feet. Her head hurt and her limbs ached with the kind of tired pain that can only be cured by sleep and leaves little room in the mind to think of anything else.

When they cleared the cave and the bright light of day struck Sapphire's face she covered her eyes with one of her hands. The light was too much for her eyes to take all at once. She didn't even register McDougall standing nearby. She pushed herself away from Gren who had stopped supporting her the moment they were out of the cave. She sat down on the sand craddling her head in her arms, trying to block out the light and the pain in her head.

As Gren and Sapphire emerged from the cave, McDougall gave the pair a confused look. The girl wasn't hurt too bad, he could tell that her Aura was mostly intact from Gren's Scroll, but she looked like she'd just been on the brink of death.

"Dust, what the hell happened down there? Girl looks like she nearly died."

Sapphire muttered a response from her shelter between her arms. "Girl nearly did die, girl would like to sleep now."

Sighing, Gren rubbed the back of his neck. "Siren's dead. What do you want to do with this cave? If you leave it open like this, another one is just going to move in. Unless you intend to look for survivors or breed grimm, I'd say demolish it." Normally Gren wasn't one to destory a perfectly natural envioment, but this entire situation could have been easilly resolved if they just gave him some time to collapse the cave. Instead Sapphire, who was just suppose to be scouting, ended up engaging the Siren while Gren and Shiro were nowhere close. Gren was fortunate that his gear held up, but they could have been much better if they actually followed the plan of just gathering information, getting properly equipped to deal with the Siren, and then going in when they were at their strongest. Instead just like the first mission, Sapphire over extended and split off from the group. At least Abel was there to ensure she didn't get herself killed, not that it helped when she fell into the water.

Sometimes Gren wonders if people just like having a weakness. Sapphire surely knew that her hydrophobia would impair her on this mission. They were fighting a goddamn siren; where else would it be at aside from a big body of water? Granted, Gren didn't quite understand the full ramifications of phobias and the fear they envoked, but it was needlessly careless for Sapphire to put herself in such a precarious position. If they hadn't already killed the Siren when she fell in, there was no garuntee that things would have worked out as smoothly.

"Now then, we should get some rest and contact Beacon. Shiro! Where are you dood? I'll need a hand while I get things set up." Gren held out his wrecked God Eater. While he willingly had it dismantled for the others to make better use out of, he really wanted to get it back to working order as soon as possible. Hence, while Gren was going to fix up his weapon, he'll have Shiro report the mission while Sapphire rests up and Abel attends to her.

Sapphire groaned as Gren started to talk. Her throat felt rough and scratchy but she had to say something before Gren started blowing things up. "The cave runs under half the countryside and some of the town. If you collapse it you'll do far more damage than a siren ever could." If it had been a simple matter of blowing up the cave they wouldn't have needed to go in there. Hell the locals wouldn't have even needed to call in Beacon. "If you can do a precision blast," Sapphire had some doubts at to whether the word precision was in Gren's vocabulary. "then collapsing just the tunnel leading up to the lake should suffice if you're careful about it."

McDougall's face hardened into a dark glare when Gren suggested collapsing the cave. That had been one of the first things he'd told these students: that was not an option. Suffice to say...he wasnt much impressed wih team SASG. The bickering certainly didn't help.

That might have been an unfair assessment, however, given their relative inexperience. "How many missions you kids been on so far? This your first?"

Gren sighed. He was never told why they couldn't, and if the cave was as long as Saphire said it was, then Gren was surprised that they managed to find the Siren so quickly. he suppose he should count his fortunes that Sapphire was able to run into the siren so soon if it could have been anywhere in the country. Not that it mattered anymore; their job was done. Whether or not the town will make precautions to prevent another incident like this was beyond Gren.

Shiro stepped out into the sunlight just as Gren had called back for him, his hands behind his head as he whistled his tune through his teeth. "Yeah, yeah. I'm right here, boss man. No need to shout. What's up? What did you need help with? He had arrived just as Mr. McDougall had posed his question to them. Deciding to be the one to answer, Shiro offhandedly replied "No, sir. We've been on two missions thus far. This is our second one. Why do you ask?" Shiro tilted his head curiously as his tail lazily wagged behind him.

A single eyebrow raising in amusement as Shiro's casual reintroduction, Captain McDougall let out a small sigh. "I just wanted to get a feel for your team's experience so I have some perspective when I make the report of this mission. I take it you were able to finish the job while I secured the outside?"

Shiro cocked an eyebrow and looked up at the empty space above his head as he thought briefly. "Well, if we're to be honest, we can all answer that for you. We're all pretty inexperienced. I mean, we're only first-year freshmen as Huntsmen. But, the mission's complete. Our team took out all the Grimm to include the Siren."

At that moment, Abel returned speedily, a one-liter plastic water bottle held in each hand. Sensing a conversation taking place that would probably not benefit from his input, he skirted around the rest with surprising discretion for a large man. After unscrewing the cap on the way, he passed the first bottle to Sapphire, silently pleased that she seemed concious enough to imbibe it herself. Though familiar with a few survival skills thanks to his upbringing, Abel knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that tender care wasn't one of them.

McDougall's face scrunched up into a look of utter scrutiny as he looked upon Shiro, as if he were questioning every fiber of his very existence. He was not, but he certainly knew how to look the part. "I see. Well, if the three of you boys would be so kind as to give us a moment, I'd like to speak with your leader privately."

As it had before when he spoke with Gren, McDougall's voice carried a subtle but paradoxically omnipresent power to it. It was a request that was meant to be an order, but given as it was in order to show respect and thanks for their work, as well as their presence.

Sapphire inwardly groaned. She didn't really want to be talking to anyone right now. Or moving actually but the job came before her personal comforts. Besides, there was a tone in McDougall's voice that said this was not a request. Sapphire used the rocks at the edge of the cave to pull herself to her feet before walking over the Sheriff. She was surprisingly steadly considering what she'd just gone through but she still felt like keeling over, not that it showed.

Stepping away from the three boys and shooting them a playful but serious look to stay clear, McDougall looked Sapphire up and down before giving her a sad smile. "How're you feeling?"

Sapphire took that moment to ring a good deal of water out of her ponytail. She wasn't one to complain about how she was feeling, especially to a stranger. "As well as can be expected. Mission didn't exactly go perfect but we're all alright."

Nodding his head gently in response, McDougall took a slow breath. "For a girl who nearly just met her Maker, you sure sound calm. But you'd do well to take a minute and breathe. I mostly mean that literally, because you look like...well, you look like you nearly just drowned." Almost as an afterthought, McDougall continued, his demeanor shifting into a grave one. "You should also be careful. Your team is reckless. You act without thinking of the consequences, and though you escaped serious harm, I wouldn't bet on it happening more than a few times."

Returning to his caring front, McDougall finished what he had to say and nodded. "Just think about what I've said. And make sure that wound on your shoulder heals. Blood is damned hard to clean out."

Sapphire sighed as she heard McDougall's appraisal of Team Swansong. "I know." With the exception of Abel none of them really funtioned as a part of the team. They all picked what they believied to be the best course of action on their own without coordination or even notifying the others. Even Sapphire was guilty of that though when she took action she tried to keep how her actions would effect the rest of the team in mind.

The wound on her shoulder was proof enough that Gren didn't think about his teammates before he acted. He'd fired numerous armour peircing rounds into a crowd of Grimm with his teammates in the line of fire. Luckily Sapphire had been the only one hit and no serious harm was done but it could easily have been a lot worse.

It was no secret to anyone that Shiro didn't function well as part of a group. He was impuslive and reckless which quite possibly was an actual mental condition due to braindamage his semblance had inflicted on him. He always meant well, Sapphire knew that but the way he acted was a danger to both himself and anyone in proximity. It amazed Beacon didn't have a more thorough screening process for new applicants. Though, with Grimm massing in such great numbers the kingdoms likely couldn't afford to be too picky.

Sapphire gave a shrug that may have come across as indifferent, or simply just tired. "We're still new, hopefully with a bit more time we'll pull it together."

When McDougall mentioned her wound Sapphire glanced at the hole in her jacket. It was most of the reason she wore black. Her jacket probably had half a dozen or more blood stains that had only partially come out. Sapphire had gotten used to sewing her clothes back together but having to scrub them down wasn't really worth it. Eventually she'd just given up on getting them clean and settled for having the stains blend in. "Yeah, I'll take care of it."

Stretching his arms out, McDougall turned away from Sapphire before leaving a few parting words. "Good. And just make sure you get your shit together sooner rather than later. Not everybody's lucky enough to make it out in one piece. Could be you...could be the hyper kid, or it could even be me."

His speech finished, McDougall fished the keys to the Dune Rover out of his pockets, quickly jogging over and climbing into the driver's seat. "Sorry boys, just wanted to make sure your boss lady was holding out okay. Drowning ain't a pretty way to go..."

Sapphire followed McDougall to the rover and climbed into one of the seats. She tilted her head back and closed her eyes. It wasn't a long right back into town but she might be able to get ten minutes rest.

Gren had managed to put the God Eater in some working order, though it was lacking any dust and missing a few rockets. Fortunately without being armed by the God Eater, those rockets werent much use aside as hefty paperweights. When McDougall came back mentioning he wanted to check on Sapphire, Gren chimed up. "Thank you Captain. We'll make sure to do something about that." Frankly, this mission was a bust. Sure they killed the Siren, and for the most part without any serious loss, but this end was unsatisfactory. They may as well had just blown up the caves with how smoothly they performed. They were illsuited to handle the environment where their target was at, and they still failed at teamwork and cooperation. Their communication was next to none, and the amount of trust they had with eachother was more or less the same amount they had for the grimm. Gren did wonder if there was a solution to their problem, or if the only solution was the type that involved removing the problem.

Gren decided that he wouldn't think about that stuff on the ride back. He merely sat in the vehicles, finally freed of the massive weight of the waterscooters on his back. If they were going to stay in town for a little while longer, Gren was going to need to repair and refurbish these and give them back to the armory. He was also a bit peckish and could go for some grub. Spear fishing sounded nice. "Say, how long do you think we'll stay in town?"

Shiro hopped into the vehicle last after Sapphire and Gren, not feeling super talkative for once. Once they had all settled in, Shiro took it upon himself to get comfortable for the ride back and slumped in his seat a bit. Crossing his ankles as he 'sat' at an angle. Pulling his hood over his ears, Shiro slipped out his Scroll and shook off any residual moisture left on it to boot up a gaming application he had installed on it. Nothing super special, just a typical hack-and-slash touchscreen mobile RPG. The game lacking any real depth and was only used for mindless distraction or to pass the time.

It wasn't until Gren finally said something that he returned to reality, at least for the moment. Only really offering a simple "Hopefully, not long." making it very clear he was anxious to return home to Beacon Academy. After saying his piece, he returned to tapping and swiping at the screen of his Scroll. Cheerful electronic sounds of eclectic animated combat quietly playing from the Scroll's speaker.

Something bugged Abel--something that kept him as occupied as the faux game did Shiro. Given the nightmare the team just went through, he didn't want to add anything to the burden of fatigue or pain each one already bore, but he couldn't stop thinking about it. This troublesome thought did not really concern his teammates, who he knew would be alright. Personally, he didn't think too badly about the mission. Given the sheer tactical disadvantage offered by a pitch-black, haphazard cave lined with Grimm and an aquatic enemy whose existence prohibited the communication so essential to teamwork, the whole thing could have honestly been worse. Nobody died, after all, and if not for her little swim near the end of the battle Sapphire would have been pretty much fine too. Heck, Abel himself barely took a scratch. Some of the little Grimm had gnawed some off his aura, and encounters with boiling Salamander jets and the hard cave floor did not give him pleasure, but he hadn't sustained any real wounds. None of that held any relevance to this new, haunting thought, though. After a few minutes, Abel couldn't hold it in any longer.

"So...um. When we got to the water, the underground water, why...why didn't you guys all hang back and let me electrocute it? Or try and rupture its organs with my grenades? The Siren, I mean." He remembered the eagerness with which Shiro dove into the water, which prevented him from taking any drastic measures against the subterranean pool's heinous denizens. "Wouldn't that...have been easier?" It felt wrong to suggest that perhaps his teammates' self-sacrificing had been in vain. He shifted himself in his seat.

Sapphire, always a light sleeper heard everything her teammates said through a fog of partial rest. She didn't feel the need to speak as Gren and Shiro talked about how long they might spend in Trawl before shipping off and after a few moments the rover settled into blissful silence. Sapphire dozed soundly until Abel voiced his concerns about the mission.

Slowly she opened her eyes. In all honesty she had thought of that as an option but she'd dismissed it quickly. "Might work in the Beacon pool but I figured that with such a large body of water even if you could summon up enough lightning to raise the charge to lethal levels the effort would lay you out and if it turned out the Siren wans't the biggest threat in the cave protecting you at severely weakened levels or possibly unconscious would make getting everyone out alive very difficult."

The method they'd used to deal with the Siren given the conditions they were fighting in had been decently effective. Aside from some minor scraps and bruises, the bite she took out of Shiro's arm and being very wet, all around the team had gotten out mostly unscathed.

Shiro paused in his gaming for just a moment when Abel spoke up. It may have been hard for anyone to see with his hood up, but when his teammate stated the obvious his cheeks flushed red. It was painfully obvious, but the idea hadn't even crossed his mind. Thinking about, that may have made things end a lot quicker and a lot easier. Making sure his hood was tugged forward as far as it could go over his head and ears, Shiro resumed his gaming. Uncharacteristically quiet, but he was sure Sapphire would appreciate his silence. Sapphire made a counter argument about how that may or may not had worked, but he wasn't interested in anything she had to say to them. He was still a bit salty, a bit sour that she had bitten him in her panic when all he was trying to do was help save her life. He made some odd grumbling sound that was a combination of irritation at his game and the dull pulsing pain in his arm. She had bitten him rather hard, but no visible damage was caused.

Though he kept quiet, Abel couldn't help but feel that Sapphire wasn't giving him enough credit. With the situation unfolding the way it did, he'd been reduced to releasing massive blasts of lightning at the ceiling just so people could have an easier time seeing. The guardian didn't believe he was a prideful man, but the amount of electricity he put out shouldn't be understated. Whatever contribution he made to the mission lay in the few small Grimm he killed, and definitely not in the wasteful discharge of power he made in an attempt to be useful. Thinking of this, he reclined in his seat as best he could, wondering when if ever he would be able to prove his worth. Next time there must be something. I will not let myself become this team's dead weight.

"Everything happened too fast." Gren said as he was reviewing some data through his helmet. "While the mission went rather well, all things considered, the scouting mission became a direct confrontation. We had very little time to plan and spent most of it reacting. Me and Shiro had just barely finished our preparations to fight the Siren. If it had happened even ten minutes earlier, I would not have been able to do anything in the water." But Gren could tell, subtly, that Abel wanted to do more. Gren wanted everyone to do more. But what could Gren do? he could always improve himself; but that would not help the others. It won’t help Shiro’s issues with his semblance. It won’t help Sapphire’s lack of cooperation. And it wouldn’t help Abel’s own passiveness.

Gren talked a big game about doing something for the group. But honestly, he had mostly been doing things for himself. A leader had to lead; they had to be willing to make sacrifices for the good of everyone else. They needed to know what their people were capable of, what they themselves were capable of, and find a way to cover those weaknesses. Gren did not consider himself haughty or arrogant, but he did not know what his weakness was. This was no boast; Gren worried that there was a flaw in his system that he was unaware of. Something he was blind to. So he needed to let the others know more about him so they could see his flaws and imperfections, and help him overcome them. Otherwise at the worse moment, Gren’s strength would fail them when they need it most.

When they get back to Beacon Gren was going to need to do some research. He didn’t care how long it would take: The only way for him to get stronger was to make everyone just as powerful.

As leader Sapphire had to account for everyone, take everyone's abilities under consideration and make sure everyone got out in the best shape they could. At the time she'd thought she'd been looking out for Abel and that is what she'd intended but after the fact it seemed that she'd hurt his pride by not allowing him to do everything in his capability. She needed to pull this team together. They were unraveling quite quickly given that they'd only been a team two weeks. It seemed she was always on a different page from everyone else. Sometimes she wondered if Ozpin had made the right decision in appointing her leader. She wasn't a team player much less a leader. Maybe the headmaster was just a fan of cruel irony. with those thoughts on her mind Sapphire let herself drift off as the Sheriff took them back into town so they could return to Beacon.

[Krayzikk]

Those muscles bunching were impossible to miss. He couldn't really tell Goodwitch he'd gotten the message, what with the soon-to-be-whirling maelstrom of forelegs, but he nodded a little anyway. Deinamig gave a nice big boost to his legs while he jumped back, but not quite quickly enough to get all the way out of danger; not with the size of the Manticore's legs. He boosted his arms reflexively and lashed out as one of its blows grew a little too close for comfort, and he felt Artorius strike something hard and keep going after a moment's resistance.

The next few seconds happened in something of a blur. His feet hit solid ground again, just outside the beast's reach, and Goodwitch's first strike struck home. A second later a small white object, a little smaller than his fist, landed next to him. A piece of the Manticore's claw, one of them at least,cut off right near the tip. It must have been what Artorius glanced off of. Ben scooped it up with one hand and jammed it in a pocket, firing Lawnslot's Lightning Dust rounds in the Manticore's direction while he kept backing up to keep some distance between him and the frenzied assault.

"Got it, teach, ready when you are!" He said into the radio, snapping his fingers a little to get Amy's attention. "I've got Desree here. Once it's running, and once the teams are out with the survivors, she'll get us up to the airship."

"Just say the word."

[harinezumikouken]

Kuhaku Shiro - Infirmary

Shiro's ears swiveled about, picking up little bits of conversation between the other Beacon students here and there. Some were here for minor injuries like himself, others were far more severe. It was odd being one of the few treated for negligible wounds. Watching as the Practice Class' aide walk by in some pretty seriously looking gear, Kuhaku winced as the nurse dabbed at his bite marks with some ointment. Sucking in air through his teeth, he broke his attention away to look at his forearm. The nurse apologized and finished, wrapping his arm with bandages and handing him his gloves.

Smiling and thanking the nurse, Shiro tugged his gloves back on. Flexing his arm, Shiro sighed. It was rather annoying, the fact that he came out of his mission with such a trivial wound. To be sure, he was grateful he and his team weren't in critical condition. But the fact that Sapphire had managed to break skin and draw blood because of the unexpected reaction really bothered Shiro. He wasn't able to use his Aura to defend from such an 'attack', which would've allowed him to avoid a trip to the ward altogether. At the very least, he was glad Sapphire didn't bite him right over his 'special markings' that he kept covered and hidden from plain sight. How she managed to have enough bite force to even go through his arm length gloves and bandages rather impressed him. She must've been either really angry or terrified.

Sighing again, Shiro's golden eyes looked up at the ceiling. Thinking about it, Sapphire had to have been somewhere in this ward herself. He figured it would least be nice to drop by for a few seconds and see if she was alright. No matter how terrible their relationship was, Shiro figured that was no excuse to be a complete tool. She was still his friend in his eyes. Determining himself discharged from the care of the medical ward, Shiro hopped off of his bed and began to wander around the wing in search of Sapphire's location. As his eyes scanned around, he couldn't help but smile and chuckled.

Hadn't they first met like this? Both in hospital beds.
He wanted to make this quick so that he could get changed and leave to go to town.
There was also a friend he needed to meet up with, rather badly.

[MULTI_MEDIA_MAN]

Oswald Connoly- Infirmary

Consciousness was almost a stranger to Oswald in these moments. After the adrenaline rush had worn off, the pain he was in was absolutely unbearable. He'd never admit it, but he felt like he was dying every time he tried to sit up. It only made sense, though. Three broken ribs. A punctured lung. His nose and thumb, broken and a bit disfigured as well. Dull and sharp pains assaulted his senses from seemingly all sides, and the pain medications he was supposed to be getting dulled his mind too much for him to use them. He had to think, but the suffering was too much.

Maybe he'd click that button, get a little bit of medicine, just to dull the edge.

Just as he was thinking of doing so, the presence of another student roused his attention. Somebody who didn't get maimed? It's a Dustmass miracle... The sarcastic thought remained non verbal as Oswald pressed his little button. And there it was, the pain dulling medicine he was so uncomfortable using.

"Shiro...sup, dude?"

[harinezumikouken]

Kuhaku Shiro - Infirmary

Shiro's ears perked at the mention of his name, swiveling to pinpoint their source faster. Turning his head, Shiro's face lit up and then immediately dropped when he saw who it was. He and Oswald had an odd kinship in his own mind, both Hunters wielding a shield and sword. The main difference was that Oswald's sword transformed into some drill like weapon, whilst his transformed into a grandiose axe. Though, he couldn't explain why the two of them shared a silent camaraderie. Possibly the two of them remaining somewhat traditionalists while the rest of the student body bore less-conventional equipment.

Like Gren's chainsaw/chaingun/rocket launcher/sword.
"Holy dust, Oswald?! Shoot, are you alright man! You look absolutely terrible!"
Shiro exclaimed, rather...loudly. Forgetting where he was.
"Oh, man! Are you alright? How's the rest of your team? Did your mission go okay?"
Without giving much consideration to thought, he began his string of verbal questioning. Bombarding the poor boy.

Shiro momentarily forgot his search for Sapphire, walking over to Oswald's bedside and looking at all of the machinery he was connected to.
He had to say, there was something odd about this scene. Especially witnessing it from an opposite point of view. Again, typically he was the one to be put in critical condition. Looking Oswald over, he slowly came to realize that for someone built like Oswald, the threat had to have been dangerously real.

"Gods and Goddesses above, what happened to you?..."
Shiro's tail restlessly wagged from side to side, he realized just how lucky his team was for their assigned mission.
Coming out relatively unscathed, he was becoming more and more grateful.

[Forsythe]

Diamond Frost - Infirmary to Dorms

Not able to help but overhear the conversation, Diamond raised her head, looking at neither Shiro nor Oswald in particular. "The rest of the team is over there, over there, and right here." she noted with a dry, humorless chuckle while nodding towards the beds occupied by Cobalt and Emerald. She shot Oswald a 'Get some damn rest' look when he took a dose of the painkillers and yet intended to keep on blabbering and, worse, moving around.

Deciding to answer something before he could hurt himeslf even further more than necessary, her gaze shifted to the tiger faunus. "I'm not sure we're even at the liberty to say." she started, thinking of the way to formulate her thoughts for a while before continuing, "But, suffice to say, we've got set up. Two times now, do I hear three? I did not imagine I would spend most of my time here fighting in human schemes. I thought that maybe the hunters, people who throw themselves on the biggest threat we seem to know would have a speck of decency."

"But you know what? They're the same filth and garbage as the rest of us. We don't need the Grimm, we'll destroy ourselves just fine, the monsters are a symptom, not the cause. The negativity, the darkness? It's in us." she summarized her thoughts on their mission. And she should know.

Just then one of the doctors walked past the room and peered in. "Miss Frost? I believe I agreed to let you go on the condition you go rest and recover. Do I need to arrange for another bed here?" he said to her in a scolding tone and Diamond nodded in defeat.

"I'll drop by in the morning, but scroll me if you need anything at any time. Board games. Books." She looked at the direction of the infirmary'S kitchen, "Real food." She smiled and nodded a goodbye to them, slowly shuffling to their very empty room.

[MULTI_MEDIA_MAN]

Oswald Connoly- Infirmary

Leaning slightly backward as Shiro approached and fawned over him, Oswald's eyebrow slid upwards. It was uncomfortable to have somebody, especially somebody he hardly knew, getting so flustered about the injuries he'd suffered. But it seemed like everybody wanted to treat him like he was liable to re-break all his ribs and puncture his lung again just with a little movement, and that was frustrating. "I'm...mostly alright. Feel like I got hit by a convoy of trucks, but other than that, I'm gonna live."

Letting Diamond go off on her rant, Oswald let out a light sigh. "She's...exaggerating a bit, but she's in the right...ballpark. Last mission wasn't a set up. It just...it was a situation that got bad because the right people weren't listening." Taking a few moments to arrange his thoughts and wonder what he could tell Shiro, Oswald continued. "This mission was a whole other deal, though. Rogue Huntress. Pair of 'em. Nearly killed us all. If it weren't for...if Ms. Vanhomrigh hadn't come when she did, we'd all be Grimm food right about now."

The image of Alex and Chase's bodies came unbidden to Oswald, making his eyes narrow in anger. "The..the one we fought, she fucking killed them, Shiro. Two guys who saved our lives. They were just mercs, with no measurable Aura. Probably couldn't even register on the most sensitive scales. And she just crushed them like...like tissue paper." For a moment, Oswald's Aura threatened to show itself physically, a small dark glow appearing around the wounded fighter before fading quickly. "And I just...I just watched it happen. I wasn't fast enough. I couldn't...I couldn't stop that fucking thing, even with three other people. And I couldn't even protect them."

Small tears battled to race down Oswald's face, but he fought them as hard as he dared. Staring away from Shiro, Oswald sighed. "Diamond...had to see it all. I was lucky enough to be half-dead and in the midst of shock, and I know I'll never be able to unsee that. I don't blame her for wondering what the fuck we're doing here."