#cloud!jaune arc

[wu-gang-writing]

Motion Sickness Chapter 63

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

"Well, are you?" I asked Jasper.

"Am I what?" She returned from her place by the counter.

"Going to shut down the strikes. She made some pretty good points about the Grimm," I said. I leaned on one of the tables, my massive sword handle extending over my head.

"No… I told you we aren't even in charge of the strikes really. It's a bit of an avalanche that's carrying us along. And if we don't get on board we'll be left behind," Jasper returned. "I'm not saying that she didn't have any good points. And maybe the only way to get real change going is with the elections. And Robyn Hill is basically a shoe in over Schnee. Especially down here in Mantle. Money can only buy you so much. Might be for the best if things were to die down."

"But you're not sure," I affirmed.

"How can I be? Nobody's sure. It's the Cetra condition. The Happy Huntresses are about defending Mantle, though. They've been at it for a while and they've done some real good. Maybe they're right about this too. I certainly don't think the military will shoot on the crowd but if they do it would be bad."

"The Happy Huntresses don't seem to like me which is a point in their favor."

"Oh pssh. None of that. You do fine."

"So, I'll just come by again later?" I asked.

"Yeah, really sorry about this, cutie." She winked. Her fox tail swished around in the air behind her in a brownish-red and white flare.

I ignored that last bit.

Neo tugged on my sleeve from her position by my side.

"What?" I asked her. "Want one of their drinks?"

She held up a finger to her lips as though deep in thought. Then shook her head.

"Then I have no idea what you want." I turned back towards Jasper. "We'll be back later. I'm going to go scope out this Adam Taurus and the protests. I might end up having to kill him after all."

"If you say so. See you later tonight."

"Yeah well no promises, especially if I end up in a fight."

Neo and I strode out and mounted my motorcycle. "You are being a needy bitch today, Neo. What's up with you?"

She shoved a finger in out of a rounded hole made of her other fingers. "Not happening. Didn't happen. I would remember something like that."

I was like seventy-five percent sure. Maybe a hard seventy.

She shrugged at me, somehow making the gesture teasing. An 'if you say so.'

"I do say so." And I did. It did not happen.

No matter what she herself implied. I would remember. I would know. Sure the night before was little more than golden blurs. And sure I somehow ended back up at the motel with all my armor and gear.

Anything could have happened after I really started drinking and the morning when I woke up. Anything but that, that is. The warm memories I felt were probably from The Den not from you know… sex… with Neo.

I rubbed a hand over my face hard.

"Neo you're fucking killing me. You know that, right?"

She grinned and nodded.

"Yeah well even if it happened once it's never ever happening again. I'm too fucked up to be doing that level of drugs again, that was a mistake. I don't know what I was thinking. I'm also too fucked up to be having sex with you."

I looked down at her as she frowned and slapped me on the arm.

"No points against you. You're drop dead gorgeous. But, well, tough shit," I returned. "For me and for you."

I revved up my motorcycle. Neo straddled behind me and flickered into a disguise for while we were driving. She was wanted, more so than my own form. No reason to give some patrol-man a reason to pull us over and start calling for backup.

And she couldn't exactly cover every camera we came across while driving. There were too many on the main roads and we went by too fast. So this little disguise helped.

She was still gorgeous in her double, with bright green eyes and dark black hair, just as long as it was when she was in her normal form which was to say waist length. Neo had that otherworldly angel-esque appearance some hunters got after a few years with aura.

It was a cure all to wrinkles and blemishes and left the user looking out of this world. Neo was no exception with her tight stomach being exposed and her muscular, relatively long smooth legs in those heels propping up her butt. Her short stature didn't detract from her beauty.

Huntresses, man. They were just like that. Like they came from another planet. Maybe I was a bit like that too, though. If I could be so arrogant. I'd had aura most of my natural life. Tall, blonde, and huntsman, I recalled a conversation in GaiLong I had with an old man about it. He told me not to be dense. I attracted more than my fair share of looks. More than my fair share.

Ruby had been like that. Beautiful like a little angel. Her hair and eyes stood out unnaturally even amongst huntresses. Yang, of course, was staggeringly gorgeous with her blonde mane of hair and lilac eyes. Weiss had a sort of pristine crystalline look to her that had drawn me to her immediately. Like she was multifaceted. Like a cut diamond. Blake had that bookish appeal but translated over to the huntress side of things it made her stand out in any crowd.

Pyrrha… well it went without saying with Pyrrha. Her emerald eyes and bright red hair flashed behind my eyelids every time I closed my own. She haunted me, Pyrrha Nikos did.

Even Jasper had started to have a bit of that. Stomach and face like a supermodel and long legs to boot.

Huntresses, man. Ain't nothing like 'em. Aura was a hell of a drug. It turned people into angelic beings.

But Neo was no exception. When I first arrived at Beacon I thought I'd have been lucky to have sex with someone as gorgeous as she was.

Now the thought only filled me with a slight sense of dread. A mix of betrayal and hurt welled up from deep inside me. Even though I had no right to feel that way. My feelings about it weren't valid. Not then when I'd first arrived at Beacon, all my feelings from then were fake. And not now when I was cruising around like a monster.

I rolled up on where the miners were picketing. It was near the open pit mine I'd been at for the bombing. They'd lined up around it, eight or ten people deep. They were armed with  protest signs and little else from what I could see. They had no weapons.

Could Ironwood really open up and fire on a crowd like this? Would that really solve the negativity problem or just make it worse? I could see it now, a swarm of Atlesian Robots mercilessly breaking up the protest with sleek assault rifles.

I thought it would make things worse. For sure, for sure but my opinion hardly counted for squat, did it.

By the crowd there were police officers lined up around the perimeter. They probably had standing orders to leave the crowd be but break up any fighting. They looked nervous. As they should before a mob like this.

The people were baying for change.

From the protestors' signs they were demanding safe improvements to their work and higher wages. Nothing crazy, at least in my opinion. In my estimation they would get it. They deserved it. These people weren't hunters. They hadn't signed up for danger. They wanted their working environments to be safe so they could go home and see their families every day.

There was nothing crazy about that. Nothing insane. These people already should have had that. Mining should be one of the safest occupations. It could be done right. It didn't have to be a dangerous, well, a minefield. Save that for the hunters.

I guess the collapse of this mine, artificial or not, had been a bit of a breaking point for the people. I trolled around the crowd for a few hours. Traffic was ground to a halt in places as the protest spilled out onto the streets, blocking vital arteries of city flow beyond the capacity to reroute. It backed up traffic for miles and miles. It was unbelievable.

It was a mess. I could confess that. But it seemed like an easy enough decision at the top level. Capitulate, and nobody would have to get hurt. Of course if old man Schnee cared more about people than the profits his company could pull in, then people wouldn't be protesting, would they.

It was hard to see him winning the election to the council with open picketing happening against his company but Atlas got a vote too and they were separated from all this. One of the benefits of keeping the people of Atlas and Mantle segregated.

It was gross but effective. Keep the different stakeholders in different places and there would be no need to capitulate. I didn't hide the disgust I felt and let it roll out onto my expression. Jacque Schnee could keep his company rolling the way it had been and become a council chairman. He could have his cake and eat it too.

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

I never found Adam Taurus.

It wasn't exactly a point of shame for me either. The entire Atlas military couldn't find me but then again I was driving around in broad daylight with my own illusionist. It made me wonder if Adam had his own illusionist. Like maybe someone like Emerald Sustrai. She was an illusionist too.

What I managed to do instead was drive around and observe the absurdity of the crowd for a few hours. If I needed to find Adam Taurus bad enough I would use Aurum. Not drive around lost.

Still it was good for me to see the crowd and feel their negativity for myself. It was easy to talk about it and have it all get lost on you what ten thousand angry people really felt like against your skin. Or aura. Whichever. They felt mostly the same to me. Maybe it was my short lifespan with a relatively long period of having my aura activated but I could hardly tell a difference.

I could feel Neo riding behind me with her cruel cold. I could also feel the crowd. Blazingly hot. Burning me up. Throngs of people fired up over a common reason. A common goal.

I wasn't much of an empath but even I could feel the negativity. Ren had always been better than me at that. Ruby had been too. What did it say that I was able to feel the negative emotions rolling off the crowd like a tsunami?

It meant that even a layman could probably notice it and pick up on it. The walls of Mantle had probably been under twenty-four seven assault by the Grimm. Meanwhile Atlas rested above, safe and sound. Connected to Mantle only by shallow guide wires for the gondolas and trams.

A shallow spider web that connected the two cities. Never crossing, never overlapping, but allowing the transference of people and ideas.

They probably felt none of this rage. Atlas was an island in a sea of negativity and Grimm. Albeit a floating island but an island nonetheless.

How could two places so close together feel so disparate? Was this how the segregation had remained mostly in place for so long? How long has things been like this with Mantle's red hot rage and Atlas's grey cold apathy?

It unsettled me, the stark difference between the two.

I shifted on the bike and Neo scooted down closer to me. She kept a single arm around me and under my plate.

"Well Neo, what do you think? Think we should cut this off and kill Adam Taurus?"

Was I just hunting for a reason for me to kill someone. Maybe. Salem was driving me mad. I at least had that as an excuse.

"Of course killing Adam Taurus won't end this. We'd need to get that Dyne guy. We started this, though. We're responsible for it, to one degree or another."

"I feel bad. Last night I was getting wasted in The Den and this shit was happening down here. You couldn't even tell how bad things are from up in Atlas. All the people down here, if you even care to look and see them, just look like ants."

I rolled back up on Seventh Heaven in the evening. There were more cars parked outside than normal. I marched up to the place and walked inside with a jingle of the bells.

It was relatively crowded. It had all the members of Avalanche inside, looking as they did before with their red bandannas. Then it had another man in a white mask, red hair and a long katana. He had the horns of a bull on him.

There were two more guys inside. A taller white skinned gentleman with a white shirt, green trousers and a green vest with red trimmings. He had only one arm. The other was cut off at the elbow with red bandages around the end. He had a wiry tail like that of some kind of big cat.

Another man was in there but his opposite arm, his right, was cut off at the elbow. He was taller, taller than me, with black skin and black hair.  He had thick brown boots and a brown vest with green trousers and a darker brown under shirt. He had a thick bushy bear tail.

Everyone turned to look at Neo and I as we walked in. We were the only humans in the room.

"Cloud…" Bisque said in greeting.

"What're these humans doing here?" The man in the white mask gestured his blade forward at his hip towards me.

"We invited them, before we knew this meeting was going to happen," Jasper said.

The man with the katana growled at me. I stared him right down back. It would be inaccurate to say nothing scared me, but not this asshole.

"He worked with us. He's a mercenary who helped us blow up the mine. He fought the Turks. He's cool," Wenge said.

"You did that?" The taller dark skinned man asked.

"I did." I nodded.

"Why would a human do that?" The masked man asked.

"Money. Information. Take your pick," I shot back.

"I don't like your attitude. And I do recognize her. She's Neapolitan. She used to work for Roman Torchwick."

"She works for me now. You got a problem with that then we can take it outside."

He growled and stepped forward towards me. A hand held him back and his chest from the man without his left arm.

"I'm Dyne. This is Barret," Dyne introduced. "We could use the help of a skilled merc. The picketing is losing steam already. We need to set a fire under Schnee's ass."

"Avalanche was telling us about another operation, one to sink an SDC freighter," the man without his right arm continued, Barrett was his name. "Make them beg for the miners back."

"They told me about it. I recommended that they wait," I said. "I take it you gentlemen want the operation to go ahead?"

"That's right." The man with the sword said. "If you think you're up for it. If they think a human like you can be trusted."

"Avalanche has one of my retainers." I pulled my pipe out and lit it. I made myself look comfortable.

"Oh Cloud can I get you anything to drink?" Jasper asked.

I looked down at Neo. She nodded. "Just one of those house specials for Neo. I'm good." I'd had enough to drink the night prior. "And who's this?" I nodded at the man with the Katana. "The rest of you were polite enough to introduce yourselves."

"I'm Adam Taurus."

"Ah," I said. "The man on everybody's mind. I might get paid to kill you tomorrow."

He grabbed his sword but he didn't draw it.

"Is that a threat."

"A little." I exhaled smoke in his direction. "It's the truth. Think you can take me, Taurus? Wanna dance?"

He growled at me.

"I, for one, like you, Cloud. What was your last name?" Dyne asked.

"Strife. It's Cloud Strife."

"Well I think we just may be able to work together. Avalanche has your fee? You'll do this op for us?"

I smoked and nodded. I looked over Dyne's head at Avalanche. They were giving me pleading and grateful looks.

"Should be cinch," I said. "We can discuss my payment later."

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

-WG

[wu-gang-writing]

Motion Sickness Chapter 56

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

Peach led the way towards the bunker. It looked mostly the same as the one built near Mistral. Dented in places from the Grimm, a sign that there was nobody home. Merlot wasn't here at least at first inspection.

The front entrance was just sitting open, though. It wasn't torn into like I would have done. It seemed from an open fuse box that somebody had wired their way inside.

They had to know about electronics much more than I did to do something like that. And it wasn't likely that Merlot would have to wire his way into his own facilities. Unlikely but not impossible. Especially if he hadn't visited in a while.

A harsh wind howled around us. It was quickly whipping up into a blizzard. I pulled my pipe out and smoked it. I struggled to get my lighter to work and I sniffled against the cold.

"This is it. But it wasn't open the last time I was here," Peach said. "Well not here here but near enough to see it."

"Stay here Peach. Be on your guard," I returned. "I'm not sure what we'll find inside. Merlot is rather famous for his experiments on the Grimm."

"On the Grimm? Why?"

"Why indeed. I suspect that he likes it but I haven't had the chance to talk to him about it. Maybe that changes today."

I rather doubted it but it was always possible that he was really here. Somebody had wired that door open.

Neo took a step forward and together we walked into the laboratory. Some Grimm had made their way inside and we collapsed on them easily. I pulled my shorter longsword and Neo used her stiletto. I cut down a creeper and paced my way over a hexagonal tiled floor. The lights were on unlike the last place we'd been to so I didn't need to use my soul to cast light on the place.  

A Beowulf came upon me and I easily sliced it and it disintegrated into ash and the usual Grimm goo. My heavy boot falls rang out against the tile. Even Neo's heels disturbed the sound of the place with little clacks. It was as somber as a crypt inside.

I stomped on a Creeper. I easily crushed the small monster under my heavy boot. They'd gotten inside and had started to tear the place up a little. Some of the glass tubes were broken and frayed wires sparked.

I felt a warning in my soul. My sixth sense called out to me.

"Someone is here. Or was here very recently," I murmured to Neo. There were giant tubes and inside them were Creepers. They were frozen in a strange blue fluid. It wasn't glowing from within like the experiments in Mistral had been, however.

It was incredibly macabre, even these monsters in the tubes rather than the malformed 'human' Grimm of Mistral. The chamber we were currently in was tall and triangular. But it went on past these white and blue suspension pods and deeper inside. Large electrical lights were on above us. They must be dust run, this far from civilization.

The laboratory had to be totally independent of the rest of Atlas and Solitas.

A creeper oozed from the blue liquid from one of the recently broken pods. It was blue instead of white but only in places. The transformation was splotchy and incomplete unlike the green ones we'd run into near Mistral.

It let out a groaning noise and crawled toward me and I put my sword down through it and into the hexagonal tiles. The ground sparked beneath where I sliced it up after the Grimm dissolved into goo and died.

A voice was coming from further in. A low male voice from the baritone of it.

"Come on. Let's see who's up ahead."

As I walked I sliced apart the tubes we came across with Creepers in them. They disgusted me. Perhaps I saw a bit of the experiment that had created me in these. It made my blood boil with hatred. Not just for the Grimm and their ilk but also for Merlot. And for whoever was making noise up ahead.

It also, and I realized that it probably wasn't healthy, made me hate myself.

I didn't like me. That had been true before I learned the kind of monster I really was. I wasn't my biggest fan. I hated what I had to do to get by.

Even before I killed Ren and Nora I hadn't been fond of me. I'd gotten what I deserved more often than I had bad luck. I was disgusted with myself. At Beacon, I hated my weakness. I think that was when it really started.

When Ruby loved me I couldn't believe it. How could she? How dare she, an angel like her, love a monster like me. How could she do that to me? It was, in a self detrimental way, incredibly cruel of her to care about me so. Even before I knew what I was I had been like that. I loathed myself and it fucking showed sometimes.

But then again smoking wasn't healthy and I was doing that. I was also hell bent on this path of revenge. Had been bent on revenge for a long time now, between Cinder and Merlot. I probably just figured something else would kill me long before smoking did. My lifestyle plus the enemies I had made ensured that I was probably going to die young. Salem sort of sealed that deal for me, too, by being an immortal goddess.

My self hatred was there. It was present even in the things that I loved and in the relationships I formed with the people who loved me.

Then I started killing people. I became good at it too. I hated me for that even more than ever. I hated hiding it from Ruby when I killed Eminence and her Seifer.

Now that I knew that I had been right to hate me all along though… now that I knew I really truly was a monster… Now that I was doomed to die fighting with a goddess in my brain after she made me kill my team I just had all the more reason to hate myself.

If before I didn't like me, then of late I despised myself.

I tortured people now. I hurt them because I could and they… they couldn't stop me. I'd chosen blood and violence and when Wutai burned I'd thought about finishing the job just because I could and they couldn't stop me.

I wanted to kill Raven Branwen. She'd never done anything to me personally. Except through Vernal she'd never done me wrong but I wanted her dead all the same. Still, I wanted her dead. She'd only narrowly escaped me and I hungred for her blood as much as I did any of the others just because I could. I knew it was wrong.

I wanted to destroy Cinder Fall. I wanted to eviscerate her for all that she had done. For what she did to me personally when she took Pyrrha from me. Whatever could have been, whatever had been supposed to be, it was no more because of her. She took that from me. I was robbed.

Her minions like Emerald and Mercury would have to go too. That went without saying but they weren't at the top of my list of people to nix. If I ran across them and they got got, so be it. But I wasn't hunting them like I was the others.

Tyrian I had killed for so much as looking at Ruby wrong. The wounds he'd left on my body was meaningless beside what he had wanted to do to her. He tried to take her from me and bring her to Mother. He had to die for that. He did die for that, whether he himself knew that before the end was irrelevant.

Ren and Nora wouldn't want this for me. Pyrrha wouldn't have wanted this for me. She wouldn't have wanted me to seek my revenge against Cinder either but damn it, I wanted that too.

I'd chosen blood over friendship in my heart a long, long time ago. Especially relative to how old I was. One year old and I was committed to revenge.

Ruby's love had been too much for my Grimm blackened heart to bear. In my depths I wanted the boot and the sword. I wanted it.

Mother needed to go too. I wasn't sure how yet. I wasn't sure when but she'd suffer by my hand. As much as she was capable of suffering. However much that was she would experience it. I was going to cut her into pieces.

She had her fingers in my brain. It made me want to slam my head into the wall over and over. There was nothing I could do about it. Her claws were in me. Nothing could keep me safe from her. I was born doomed to go through this.

My cursed father Merlot who even now I hunted would also know my spirit. He would know what it meant to bring a monster into this world. He would know what he had truly wrought. How dare he? How could he?

It was all their fault and I hated them as much as I hated myself. I was a sword. I was meant for this vendetta. My power which allowed me to grow stronger with each beat of my hatred would allow me to strike them down.

We grew closer to the voice. A low aristocratic murmur. It was distant in this place and echoing beside our footfalls. We would be upon the source at any moment.

I suspected it wasn't Merlot but it could be. It could be… and then I'd give him to Neo. Or worse or something, anything worse. I'd split his limbs. I'd tear his eyes from his skull. I'd-I'd… I was working myself up into a tizzy.

I exhaled lowly and slowed my beating heart. It wouldn't do me any good to get jumpy. I breathed in and out, nice and deep as we crept up on our target.

This hall contained suspended Beowulfs now. I continued to spear them. I refused to be cornered by these monsters should the worst come to pass. Whatever purpose my father had intended the blue fluid to have on them was rendered utterly meaningless. Just as I would one day rend his heart.

I moved around a corner, and out a blast door. I came out into a huge open room sword and shield at the ready. I gazed up over a series of computers up at a man in a deep navy blue suit trimmed in yellow. He was speaking into a scroll and abruptly stopped at my presence.

He tapped a few buttons on one of the computers and a shimmering barrier appeared between us. Sealing me and Neo into the cavernous room and himself in the smaller control room.

"And who are you?" His voice boomed into speakers that surrounded me.

"Are you Merlot?" I demanded.

He laughed. "No, I'm not mad Merlot. Now what's your name?"

"I'm Jaune Arc," I announced.

"You… you're Merlot's creation. You're Salem's son!"

I glowered through the barrier at him. "I gave you my name. What's yours?"

"You have… you have the relic of knowledge! I thought your sisters would reclaim it."

"You know my sisters?" I demanded.

"My boy," he drawled. "I created your sisters. In my own laboratory. I suppose if Merlot is your 'father' then I am your 'step-father.'"

I stared at him. "Your name."

"I don't see the point in giving my name to a failure . In fact, I don't see much point in continuing this conversation. I will be taking that relic, however."

"Not from in there, you're not." I glared and turned my semblance on. "Come fight me."

"Oh," he mocked with a lazy yawn. "Shiny." He started tapping away at one of the control panels before him.

"Neo, do you think you can teleport in there and shut this barrier down."

She looked at it and shook her head.

I guess there needed to be a little bit of open space for her to move through and that shimmering barrier allowed her none. Some semblances had rules like that. Like mine had plenty of laws. Mine was even defined by its rules.

A gate began to open up in the floor in a spiraling fashion. I hadn't really taken stock of it but it was earth beneath my boots rather than the hard hexagonal tiles that made up the rest of the facility.

From the pit a giant Deathstalker emerged. It was slightly splotched blue like so many of my wretched father's other wretched specimens in this place.

It was enormous, at least as big as the one in initiation, if not a little bigger. It lowered its brightly colored stinger at me and I raised my shield and sword. It slammed it's stinger forward but I met it with the cold hard strength only my semblance could provide. I didn't budge. Back in initiation I'd been pushed back by that Deathstalker's claws but I was so much unbelievably stronger now than then.

I slashed out from behind my shield at the stinger where it met the rest of the white, blue, and black tail.

It screeched at me as I bit deep into its vulnerable flesh and it pulled back. It came at me with its claws but Neo and I vanished with our speed. She backflipped over it, picking at it's exposed eyes as I slid at it hard and sliced at its mouth.

"Neo cut the tail!" She landed next to me and I saw her nod. The tail was now hanging by a twist of flesh and little else. It was vulnerable there. I doubted we'd hammer the stinger into its own head, probably kill it some other way.

I dashed forward and I met its claws. I held it steady while Neo flipped over it and cut its tail off. It screeched again and the Deathstalker reared back.

I cut at its claws where they met dark flesh and the blueish pincers retreated from me. It then charged me and slammed my body against one of the grey walls. I pushed back against it with a heavy boot.

The tail came around and smashed me in the chest, knocking me to the ground. I picked myself back up and met the pincers again with my shield. I slashed around it, trying for the eyes and mouth but it must have seen that trick before because it held me far away with the pincers.

Like an oversized lobster. I tried again to take off one of the pincers. I bit deep into the black flesh between blue and white flesh and it flailed pressing against me.

Neo flipped into place again and stabbed it in one of its eyes. It roared with rage, the mouth parts frothed with spittle and I felt nothing but disgust for it.  

This thing was just reminding me of better times with my friends. Not that I had anything against Neo, in fact I probably had the least against Neo out of anybody alive on the planet. She just wasn't a good replacement for my teammates and friends. She just didn't do it for me like Pyrrha, Ren, or Nora could. You know? It was nothing personal. I'm sure she felt the same way about me and Roman.

I dived and brought my sword down two handed against the claw and took the tip off through the armor. The tail came whipping around and I jumped and hovered in the middle of the air and Cross-Slashed its face and tail.

It writhed to get away from my combo and it screamed in agony as I took its tail off and left deep gouges in its carapace near its face.

There wasn't that much room for it to escape me from. I was guessing things in here with it were more locked in with it and less having it locked in with them. I was turning its usual situation on its head.

I stabbed down through an eye as I fell and it writhed and tried to shake me off. I twisted Crocea Mors and shattered its shell around where Crocea Mors was buried.

It cried and began to dissolve into dust and goo.

I walked up to the barrier that guy was on the other side of and banged on it four times. Gong. Gong. Gong. Gong. I began to recharge my semblance.

"Little pit, little pig, let me in." He began to back away from his control panel. I stood and charged for a long time. I got my hands on my semblance again and swung at the barrier as hard as I could, burning my semblance with it in a wild attack.

The barrier failed for a moment and lights on his side of the barrier blared.

"I'll huff and I'll puff." I menaced from outside. "What's it going to be Mr. Man."

He ran away, the enormous coward. I couldn't believe it. He was just leaving us locked in here. I charged up my semblance and rattled the barrier until it broke. I banged at it over and over again and then I Cross-Slashed it after putting my sword together with the shield and getting the broadsword. But whoever the man with the mustache was, he escaped.

I swore and I screamed and I slashed up some of the computers in my rage before I had the sense to calm down and remember I might want to look through them.

Then I marched down the passageway after the mustached man. It eventually led out a back entrance to the laboratory. I sighed. He was stone cold gone. Along with any chance I had of learning about my sisters.

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

-WG

[wu-gang-writing]

Motion Sickness Chapter 50

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

Neo helped me find what I was looking for. A place called The Den. I could feel the music even from outside. Neo led me by one hand down a set of long stairs deep into the Atlas rock in her typical silence. The steady beat of techno dance music hammered away at me.

We opened the door to the place and the sound of it rocked me back onto the balls of my feet. I could feel the sound of the music against the hairs on my arms. It was the sort of sound you felt as well as heard. Wump, wump, wump, wump, wump. It was like holding a jackhammer against my stomach.

We came out onto a dance floor of black and white. There were rich golden lights that shone down in alternating fashions. The yellow light alternated with purples, whites, and blues and gave the place an otherworldly feel.

It felt like a stranger's dream. Smoke breezed through the atmosphere of the place and the flood lights poured through the stuff. Both nicotine and Mary Jane filled the air. It was thick enough to cut through like butter. It wafted about and was dense enough that I felt like I could peel away at it.

There were people dancing on the floor in front of us. The women wore satin and silk dresses. Short skirts and slitted outfits were everywhere. The men wore white and blue button downs that played hell with my sense of color in the light. They wore black and brown khakis held up by nice looking belts.

Drinks were served around the edges of the dance floor. There were tables lined up against the walls. Red velvets adorned the seats of the first floor. Alcoholic beverages and cash were exchanged over the circular bar near the center of the dance floor and against the walls.

It was gorgeous and full of life. It was nothing like the Malachite's bar back in Mistral's lower floors.

This was a place the good folks of Atlas could use to get away from it all. And boy were they. The dance floor was a mish-mash-mosh-pit. Flailing limbs raved against day jobs as people tried to waste their evening away.

Wump, Wump, Wump . The hypnotic tune of the dance music battered away at me. It was the sort of sound you felt as much as you heard.

We walked through the raving limbs of the first floor of The Den.

There were other scents on the smoke. Probably other things being inhaled besides traditional stuff and Marijuana. Flashing lights strobed and warbled through the heavy weight of the air.

Neo was holding her nose. For my part I pulled out my own pipe and took a take. My exhalation was lost to the chaos of the first floor.

Atlesians were everywhere. Taking part in those finer things in life and trying to escape their evening. It was all about booze and dance.

Near stairs leading up to the second floor a man in a black shirt and jeans stopped Neo and I. He was armed with a pistol in a holster attached to the side of his chest. He wore dark sunglasses despite being inside which I kinda understood considering the strobe lights and all. He was about my height and broad at the shoulder but the pistol didn't look huntsman class. He didn’t look huntsman class.

I could take him disgustingly easily.

I stopped anyways at his gesture. I tried to read his lips as he spoke into a walkie-talkie on his collar but didn’t get anything. He pressed a finger into a wired microphone in his ear. He must have gotten a response he was looking for because he stepped aside. He swung a red velvet rope with him as he did.

I blew smoke and felt the relaxation take me over. Nobody wanted a fight in a place like this. Not me, and not this guy's boss.

I ascended to the second floor, away from the raving pit of people down on the first. Up here people were smoking harder things. There were razor blades and lines of hyper ready to be taken. In one corner there was an orgy going on. I watched someone do a shot out of a young girl's belly button, too.

I was starting to figure out why this place was called The Den.

It was a drug den, sure. That too. But it was more than that. It was a place to get away and be animals. It was about letting loose. I found the thought a touch hypocritical considering the racial segregation of Mantle and Atlas.

It was a touch quieter on the second floor and there were couches and balconies strewn about. One such couch with the red velvet covering had a gold haired man sitting on it. He peeked over glasses to reveal golden amber eyes. He was surrounded by security guards in that same black shirt and jeans uniform. He was also wearing a golden suit that I thought was tacky and flashed in the light.

I stepped closer and someone put a gun in my face. I turned to look at him in shock. Not because I found the weapon threatening, but because of the precise opposite. He couldn't kill me with that water pistol.

I blew smoke right in the guards face. Nice, and long. He coughed and I laughed. I enjoyed my little high and it was still loud enough that I couldn't hear my own madness. The whisperings of Mother were drowned out by the sheer volume. I picked at a bug in my ear, though, you couldn't have everything.

The golden haired man waved an arm and the pistol was removed from my grill. The man holding it looked away and rubbed his eyes from the smoke.

I walked up to the man on the couch and pocketed my pipe.

"Aurum?" I asked. The name was probably fake. I knew that. His hair might even be dyed. The suit was a bit hard on the eyes too. But if you were going to call yourself Aurum then you better work for it.

"You know my name but I don't know yours." He pointed to the side of the couch, offering me a seat. I took it and he started pouring three amber shots for himself, Neo, and I.

"I'm Cloud Strife."

"I've never heard of you."

"No one has."

"I know her, though, you're working with Neapolitan. Are you perhaps her new handler? I was wondering what would happen with Roman dead. You seem to fit the bill."

"Maybe a little." I let him read into that as much as he wanted. Neo moved like she was going to sit on my lap but I blocked her to the side, placing her next to me. She sat down on the far side of the wide couch of Aurum from me.

I turned back to Aurum.

"What can I do for someone like you?"

"I'm looking for information on General Ironwood. I want to know the facilities he and his friends visit nearly every day."

He poured himself another shallow shot on the table in front of him.

I took mine. It tasted like oranges and was smooth and rich. It hit the back of my throat like a golf swing.

"The general doesn't have friends, by the by. That's a free-bee."

"Even still."

"I hope you can pay for information like that."

"I can. For every facility he and his associates visit everyday I'll pay you ten grand."

"Oh is that all." His voice came out low under the beat of the music.

"There's extra in it for you if it only started since Black-Out day."

"Well that is interesting," he purred.

"Something catch your attention?"

"Maybe a little," he shot back. Throwing my own words in my face as he did. "There's Winter Schnee."

"Winter Schnee…?"

"Special Operative Winter Schnee. She works closely with General Ironwood. "

"Oh?"

"She visits this special bunker nearly every day. Since Black-Out day no less."

“I can pay you two-hundred grand for the name of that facility and the details on it.”

Aurum took his second shot and poured me and Neo another. “Now we’re talkin’,” he growled. “What if I don’t need your money, though.”

“What? Do you need people killed?”

“People, plural,” he laughed out in a rich baritone. “I like you. No wonder you’ve managed to capture Neapolitan. You’re violent.”

“Well we are all products of our upbringing.”

“I don’t need people killed but I could use Neapolitan’s skills.”

“What for?”

“A little job. You see some of my men got locked up by Atlas Security."

"Sounds unfortunate."

"They're going to be sentenced to forced labor down in the mines."

Why wasn't I surprised that that was how Atlas dealt with its criminals. You just chuck the dissidents and anyone you can arrest down in the mines and you got yourself a slave labor force.

Gross.

And typical of Atlas. Nobody cares what happened to prisoners. I bet the prison system was for-profit here, even. Anything to make a buck in Atlas. The more the place tried to have redeeming qualities the more I hated it.  

I listened to a brief pause in the wump, wump, wump of the music.

"You need us to bust them out."

"I need her. I don't need you beyond that."

"We'll see. I'll need the details. What's security look like? When's the transfer?"

"In two days. They're being held in an Atlas police station. Security is tight. That's why I could use Neapolitan's help."

"Their names?"

"A boy named Obsidian. And another called Cobalt." He summoned photos of a dark haired kid with dark eyes. There was another frame which held the blue haired boy with pale eyes.

"We do this for you and those facility details are ours. Everything I asked for."

He held out a hand for me to shake. "It's a deal. What do you say?"

I shook on it and he grinned golden teeth at me.

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

I didn't trust Aurum. I thought he'd double cross me given the opportunity. I didn't have any real safeguards against him doing it beyond the threat of myself and Neo. Which if he knew who she was it was a pretty big threat. If he knew who I was it would be even bigger.

I think that's how shit worked up here. There was as much backstabbing as could be managed. Even still I had little choice but to help him and deal with the consequences later. If he tired to cross me I'd just kill him and torture him and not in that order.  

The operation was going to be a simple one. We knew when and where they were going to be transferred on the gondola down to the lower city.

I was going to fly down, open the gondola like a tin can, and we were going to grab them.

Nice and easy. In and out. No questions asked.

We arrived at the station in Atlas and fought our way inside. It was on the under belly of Atlas and had some guards to it. I slammed one to the side with Crocea Mors and jumped-kicked another. I was way too fast for some simple guards to stop me. I was just far too strong, too.  

"Stop right there!" Neo and I didn't listen to the guard.

We rushed Atlas Sec at the top of the gondola station and made our way down to where the gondola hung. We watched the car shuttle off with our prisoners in question inside. I could see more guards on board through the windows.

The station was all dark greys and blue lights. With a single tram line running down the middle where people could get on and off, it was lit by soft blue and white lights. It was manned by Atlas Security at the moment. I wasn't sure if this station was permanently owned by Atlas military forces or if this was a special occasion. Either way I was crashing their party.

I vaulted a security gate. With ease, my sprint turned into a hovering dash as I went over. I slammed a knee into a sentry's face. He went rolling down.

I grabbed one guard and slammed him against the ground. Then I hammered him into a wall. His armor shattered as I did.

I launched a high kick that brought down a third. It was going very well. Neo came hurtling alongside me and whipped her body weight around an Atlas Security agent's neck.

She teleported ahead of me and knocked another agent's gun upwards while I crossed the gap. I cut his gun in half and pulled the rifle butt out of his hands and smacked him in the head with it.

I swung my sword and knocked down the security officer before me. I kicked down another and punched the lights out of a third hard enough to shatter his helmet. Neo slowly choked out a last and we listened to the sound of communications failing between Atlas on the gondola and up here.

"Report! Soldier, report! What's happening up there?!"

I listened for a moment before I jumped up on the cable with an easy flip. I balanced for a moment and Neo reached out and grabbed a hold of me. I leaned forward and I flew down the cable on a pocket of air at the gondola car.

It took a few moments to reach it with the wind whistling past us in the clear Solitas sky. I felt and heard Neo hold on with bated breath.

I arrived on top of it and sliced into the metal with Crocea Mors as I flew and ripped into the roof so I could start to pull it off. I put the sword on my back as we dangled out over the open air above Mantle. I jammed a hand into the jagged slice I made in the metal and I peeled the metal back as I hovered with a casual strength. Glass shattered and fell down onto the lower city as I pulled the car apart.

Guards inside peppered me with fire but Neo teleported off my back and into the gondola. She jumped around inside  bringing down the guards with grace and ease. She swung her weight around and slammed one into the jagged glass where a window used to be. She flipped and shoved another into a twisted bar of metal from where I ripped the roof off.

She jumped up with her umbrella and teleported first Obsidian out to me who I grabbed. Then the other. I reversed my momentum, I was tractionless for a moment as I reversed directions and began to fly back up the thick cable of twisted metal wires. I rode up on the gondola cable and flew back up to the top where we'd already disabled Atlas security.

I watched Neo jump out of the car and begin her descent down with her parasol. We'd meet up later easily enough back at the motel.

I carried the two guys, one in each arm all the way back up to the top of the tram station. I held them by their handcuffs and it was easy enough to glide along the cable back to the station.

We made it look simple, too. No casualties, even. Probably. None up here but I could make no promises about what happened in the car. Neo hadn't exactly been gentle from what I heard once she got inside.

I set the two guys down and flipped to a landing in the grey gondola station. The members of Atlas Security we already disabled were still down.

"Well you're off then." I shattered their restraints with my sword and set them loose.

"What, wait! Who are you?" The black haired kid asked. I called him a kid but he was probably about the same age as me.

"I'm Cloud Strife. Run to your boss and tell him our business is done on my side. Go! Before more security shows up."

I kicked a rousing Atlas Security agent in the head and went back down with a muted grunt.

They bolted and I looked out of the station at the distant form of Neo.

I didn't need to fight my way out. I just charged Limit and jumped off the side of the station.

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

-WG

[wu-gang-writing]

Motion Sickness Chapter 41

Back to Jaune we go.

If you experience positive psychotic symptoms don't ever use marijuana.

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

"You think this will help?" I held the marijuana cigarette out in front of me and picked at a bug in my ear.

Greens for sure weren't likely to help with the paranoid thoughts, a goddess had her fingers in my mind, for real, or the suicidal thoughts, besides. But it just might take the edge off the bugs or the shadows.

Neo took it back from me and lit it. She took a long pull as though to say, 'see, safe.'

I took it back and inhaled the smoke in my lungs, it was still burning from where she lit it, and I took a drag. Almost immediately the bugs in my face eased. They weren't gone per se. They were muted. I could still feel them crawling around behind my eyes and in the tips of my extremities.

I coughed.

"Oh shit." I exhaled. "That's good." I chomped on the cigar and Neo beamed. "I'm going to need a box of these, just to keep it at bay." I'd brought up some of my hallucinations and Neo had picked this up for me.

She was looking up at me expectantly.

"Thank you, Neo."

She grinned up at me even though I was sitting on the bed and she was standing. We were in a different dingy motel than the one in which we'd tortured Nickel.

The greens were good. I inhaled them and leaned back on the bed. If Neo wanted to kill me this would be the best time to do it. Instead she plopped up on the bed beside me. "Well, I'm hooked." A shadow jumped out at me from the corner of my eye and I just didn't care. I was so relaxed.

I factory reset the Don's scroll. It wasn't quite as good as the military grade one I'd had before, but as far as civilian ones went it was top of the line.

"I need to go to this Merlot's lab. Cinder's boss, Salem, has some way of controlling me. All my psychotic symptoms started then. Or… well, maybe not. I need to learn about it if I want to fight it. You're welcome to come with. Cinder probably won't be there, but it's on the road to her for me. I have to go."

I brushed my new diamond studs. I'd gone all in on my new identity, Cloud, Cloud Strife. My hair was done up spikey, and I had a half cape around my waist. I still had Pyrrha's cape around my bicep on one arm but on the other I had a single long sleeve, on my pauldron side. The dark blues and blacks of my new clothes contrasted with the bronze of my armor nicely. My half cape billowed around my legs when I walked and my blonde hair shifted in any breeze. I still had a pair of long gloves on beneath my gauntlets. They ran elbow length.

I'd gotten my sword repaired, too. The warp wasn't bad to take out and I was only without the blade for a couple of hours yesterday. I'd just waited outside the smithy while they worked. What was I supposed to do and where was I going to go without my sword? Nowhere fast. And I wasn't Ruby to repair it myself. I might have been able to buff it out with a whetstone, but why take the risk when my pockets were overflowing with cash?

My weapons would still give me away, so would my face, but I'd done what I could in terms of disguising myself. Unless my friends saw me face to face or weapon to weapon they wouldn't be able to find me.

Neo made a stabbing gesture with her right hand.

"There will be people to kill and torture. At least one person. Probably. If not there will always be more in Atlas."

She made a show of considering it, one finger on her cheek. I knew how lonely she was, though. Plus I was sure she liked taking orders. It was weird but then not really. She liked having a boss. And just so long as she had people to maim, she was happy. I think she was happier working with me than she had been in a long time.

What? A girl's gotta heist.

It was a coin flip where Cinder was heading next, Atlas or Vacuo. So I'd flipped for it. It came up Atlas. I'd start digging around there in Solitas after I was done with the Merlot thing. Depending, of course, on what I learned from his lab. It was closer anyways. And it maintained my future availability of options by being closest to Vacuo over here and Vale. It was closest to all three of the other kingdoms, really, depending on how you looked at it. And the closed borders meant little to me if I had Neo with me.

I roached the joint and stared at the slightly spinning ceiling. The softly rotating fan was a pleasure to watch as I laid back. I rubbed at my chest, moving my hand in light circles over the deep scars there.

I missed Ruby and her soft touch in those moments.

Neo nodded at length. A single small gesture I felt through the bed. I sat up and held out a hand for her to shake on it. She did, a wide glittering grin on her face. Her eyes swapped colors at that.

She was wearing new clothes, too. She had a cape with some collar straps and her collar was done around inside out near her breasts. The fancy shirt ended at her midriff before a pair of nice white pants. She wore a pair of much shorter heels than before beneath that. She had a set of long white gloves on as well, much like myself.

"We'll take a train to the South to this city, Shumi." I pointed out on a map with my scroll, "From there we'll ride on horseback to Merlot's laboratory, here near a place called Wutai. A few weeks max. Then we'll be back on the hunt for Cinder. Who'll probably go to Atlas. She has unfinished business with Ironwood anyway."

She nodded along acceptingly. She pointed at where I'd thrown out the cigarette.

"Yep. We'll need a ration of those. They really help. I don't suppose you know where to find more?"

She gave me a coy nod. Hiding a smile behind her hands.

"Fantastic."

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

She did indeed know where to find more.

A beefy guard waited outside a small house on the outskirts of Mistral. He was wider than me at the shoulders and had a few inches on me. At a glance I didn't feel the low hum of aura coming off of him though. He could be just withdrawn, at any rate.

Neapolitan and I walked up together. He gave us both a once over and we stood in silence. Then some other folks walked out of the house and he motioned to let us in. Controlling how many people were inside at any given time. Smart.

He held up a hand. "Your weapons," He had a slight accent. Atlesian, not unlike Weiss's but deeper and richer. "Leave them out here."

I pulled my harness off my back. Staring him straight in the eye the whole time. I didn't need Limit to kill him. I put them on a rack behind the gentleman and he stepped aside of the entrance.

Neo was let inside without any hassle, giving me a superior smirk as she twisted her umbrella in the rain. "Sure, rub it in."

She did. And even if she didn't, being without Crocea Mors made me uncomfortable. I was glad she was armed, if nothing else. Somebody to watch my back in a run down place like this was nice. And I always had Limit, just a short charge away.

We walked in on a place lined with jars and labels on them. Inside were greens of all sorts of names. Lemon Drop Haze. Blueberry Blitz. Lilac Diesel. They were all arranged on neat little rows on high shelves.

"Well I've got to hand it to you Neo…"

I was whistled at by a lanky dude in a ‘t’ shirt.

I was coming from a place of ignorance and I couldn't exactly ask Neo how the place worked.

"You been in here before?"

"No sir." I answered with a smile. "How much am I allowed to buy." Not what sizes did they come in, not anything else. What was the maximum amount of drugs I was allowed to leave with? They must have a limit to prevent resale. A closely monitored tight ship like this.

"Two ounces." That didn't seem like much. "And you gotta pay in cash, that is if no one told you."

"Not a problem. What would the-uh…" I gestured at him.

"Budtender," the Budtender said.

"Right. What would the Budtender recommend."

"For what? You wanna get high or you wanna relax?"

"Something to relax me," I told him.

"You want an indica, then. A bit mellower and a bit richer in the CBD."

He picked across the shelves. Staying away from things that had names like 'blitz,' or 'shard,' or 'rush.' He strayed towards the mellower sounding ones and distinctly avoided one which had 'panic' in its name.

"Lemon drop haze." He put his hand on one. "And...sunshine sherbet." He put his hand on another jar.

"Sounds good. An ounce of both, please."

He named a steep price. A couple hundred Lien. I whistled lowly. But the stuff Neo had given me was already wearing thin. The bugs were starting to come back and I needed relief. I could hear a low whispering too. That needed to stop. Fast, if possible.

I paid him in the cash requested without too much hesitation. The only other place I'd see real relief would be antipsychotic drugs. I didn't have the time to get a psychiatrist and as a huntsman I'd be forcibly relieved of my gear for potentially months.

PTSD was common amongst hunters and they couldn't have crazy ones running around. There were procedures in place for this that I was specifically trying to avoid. I just didn't have the time to get set up with something like that.

"You gonna need pipe-ware?" He asked.

I looked down at Neo. She rolled her pink and brown eyes and nodded. I could feel her aura against mine. Something cool with undercurrents underneath. An edge of something cruel.

"Yeah I'll need a pipe."

"They never just stop at one," he said with a smirk. Like he was sharing a closely held secret with me.

"One'll be good for now," I instead insisted.

"It'll be thirty extra for a pipe and if you want a grinder that'll be even more."

It sounded like a good idea so I took him up on it.

I paid him anyways, knowing he was gouging me. It didn't matter a whole lot to me at the moment anyways. He handed over two tins, a pipe and a grinder.

"Come back soon." He called at my shoulder. I stuffed the tins and paraphernalia into my pockets.

I took my weapon back from the man outside and gave it a once over. My serrated combat-camping knife, sword and shield all looked fine, just as I left them.

"Let's get out of this fucking town." I told Neo. "I'm done with this city."

I freshly ground up some greens while we were walking and put it in my new pipe. I took a long drag, like it was the first breath of fresh air I'd gotten in months.

She skipped to keep up with me. Making it look natural.

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

"You assume there's nothing I can do to you, child. No torment I can bring upon you. You are mistaken."

I was hit with the sensation of making up but I couldn't turn my head. I rose from the train-car seat.

-then I was abruptly back in the train-car seat alone for all the world with the sensation of waking up again.

She hit me with that sensation. That feeling of waking up five more times and over what felt like subjective hours. My face crawled with bugs and I wanted to scream. I felt like I was falling for hours and hours.

-I jerked awake. There was Neo across from me in the train-car. I took a moment to get my bearings. It had been torturous. The sensation of waking up over and over again.

I breathed hard and Neo looked over at me, something like concern etched in her face.

"She's getting better at it," I said. "She's getting better at tormenting me. Cinder's boss."

I looked out the train-car window and watched the scenery pass us by. I watched a couple a few aisle's down. The man jumped and slapped his body like- well like he'd seen a bug on him. I was all too familiar with the sensation. The feeling of insects crawling across my skin and things jumping out at me from the corner of the eye. I recognized it.

I looked across from me and saw Neo's eyes narrowed in concentration. Her smile was wide in sheer delight.

"Neo," I whispered. "Neo!"

She looked at me and the man stopped his jumping-jacks. Her focus wanted on whatever illusion she had crafted. Pink and brown shifted in her hair as she changed focus.

"For gods' sake you're like a child. I'll get you people to torture for real. Knock it off."

She gave me a brooding look but nodded.

"Play some games on your scroll. For goodness sake. Don't torture just to torture. Do it with purpose."

She made a faux-angry face at me.

"Yeah I'm mad. Stop it. When we find Merlot you get to do all the torturing, sound fair? Even though he's my dad or whatever."

She gave me an odd look at that.

"I think… I think I was born in a tank. There are images of water. Muffled people talking. I think I was born pretty much full grown with whatever they had done to me already done to me."

"I don't know what they did to me. I don't know what I am. But when we find Merlot you get to be first in line for hurting him."

"They said he does experiments on Grimm, that might mean… it might mean that I'm part Grimm. That means I'm a monster. And you get to go first against the guy who did that to me. Sound even? We square?"

She didn't nod or give me any gesture. She just sat in her typical silence.

"Look… whatever. Just stop fucking with people who don't deserve it. If you're going to work for me then you only get to torment the people I say so. We clear?"

She still made no gesture.

"I said 'are we clear?'"

She gave me one firm nod. Her eyes were wary in part. Like she was anxious of making a deal she didn't want to keep. Like I was some fae of myth contracting her into bondage.

"Good. I promise it won't be all bad. And when we get to Atlas we'll have to make a name for ourselves. Make people scared of us. It's just an intermission on the torture and heists. They're not over."

Maybe I was a little antsy too. I wanted another pull of greens. The bugs were starting to become a bit of menace. And I couldn't exactly take a hit while in the slightly crowded train.

And Hell, I was bored, too.

"Plus there might be bandits out here. You can do whatever you want to them, I don't give a fuck."

"Heard there was a big tribe of bandits too. The Branwens you heard of them? Well I especially don't care what happens to them. Go nuts."

"With my luck I'm sure something will come up anyways. You'll get your kicks. Have I steered you wrong yet? That's what I thought. And I let you kill the Don even though I kinda wanted to. He threatened some disgusting stuff on my friends. I really wanted to snap his neck. Instead I let you cut him. That was grand, wasn't it?"

"So when I say you'll get your kicks in you better believe me. We just have to be patient for a bit. Play things smart and close to the chest."

"Otherwise Salem will get us," I exhaled. "Cinder and Salem both will get the two of us with impunity."

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

-WG

[wu-gang-writing]

Motion Sickness Chapter 39

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

I took my position alongside the mansion. Stealth was the goal and it was the dead of night which made my semblance a no-no. My semblance was the antithesis of stealth. I waited next to Neapolitan for a pair of guards to approach the same blind corner we'd snagged Nickel from and killed his buddy.

Random chance that we ended up with Nickel and depositing the other guard's body in an alley. I suppose Nickel ended up in an alley too so there's that.

A patrol was coming up.

I activated my semblance at the last second and spent it leaping out and grabbing one of the pair. "Hey-gck." I broke his neck by using my semblance on the move. He had aura and I just went right through it. It was blue colored and small compared to the flare of my semblance. A double flash of blue accompanied the sound of breaking bones and cartilage.

The shattered moon shone it's soft light down overhead, giving everything an otherworldly appearance.

Neapolitan brought her's down much more stealthily. She smirked up at me to rub it in while she choked the dude she was holding to death or unconsciousness.

We dragged them into the mansion's blind corner. I stepped up, jumped off the wall, and pulled a security camera off the wall and crushed it with my bare hands. The metal crumpled beneath my fingers.

"How long do you figure we have?"

She held up five fingers.

I nodded in relative agreement. It could be as many as five minutes. That wasn't all that much time all things considered. In a fight it was practically forever but for a series of fights as we infiltrated? Not so much. I started charging up my next Limit Break. When we moved we moved together like we'd practiced it. In truth we were both relatively skilled hunters. This just came par for the course. I pulled my longsword and tried to jimmy the mansion doors open with the tip of the shorter, thinner blade.

Neapolitan teleported up high on the mansion walls and disabled another security camera. Whoever was supposed to be watching those wasn't doing a good job. Or malfunctions were common in which case Don Corneo deserved this. He deserved what we were about to bring down on him.

I struggled with the lock. The long blade I was using wasn't designed for this kind of play. In the end I resolved to simply cut it at the lock. I stepped back, took careful aim, and swept my sword down at the door. I hit the lock dead on and prayed I wouldn't trigger an electric alarm system.

Cink.

The door opened and we trickled inside. No alarms went off. Maybe it was luck or maybe there wasn't one in set up at the door. Could be a silent alarm, too.

Inside there were places the plaster had been redone recently. They stood out amongst the neater walls as the places most likely to conceal explosives. I entered into a fine atrium, nowhere near as large as that of Haven's. There were five guards there. I brought my sword to bear and Neapolitan silenced them with her semblance.

We were on them. I brought the longsword around and neatly divided one's shoulders. I side-flipped through the air, low to the ground, both hands on Crocea Mors with the shield still on my back and cut into another with two rapid horizontal swings.

One of them was trying to speak into a microphone at his collar. Barking out commands for reinforcements or similar but it came out hushed. I cut him down with a piercing movement that ran him through near the heart.

The mansion's quarters were tight. I thought it would be best to just use the longsword for now.

Neo killed one by stabbing down through the collar bone down into the chest cavity. A spray of bullets chased her and silently shattered a large chandelier. It fell to the ground and scattered across the ground. She backflipped and cartwheeled back away from the arms fire, her eyes drawn in focus.

Her gaze fluttered. Her eyes rolling back in her head and her eyelids moving fast as she tried to concentrate. I got between her and the shooter. Blocking her with my body and shielding her from the damage.

I was on to the last man by then. I picked him up with one hand and drove my sword through his chest with the other. My shield was slightly folded in sheath form on my back and my breastplate shone in the darkness.

Things were going well. The current objective was to get at least Neo into the Don's office. That was our win condition. Our lose condition was getting caught too soon and being forced to fight all the guards and wading through the minefield. In that case we wouldn't even get the Don. He'd be sealed away inside his little vault and not even Limit would let me get access to him.

The chandelier had scattered glass all across the floor and it crunched under my boots as Neo let sound return to the room. Her semblance was fucking crazy. Though mine was a little like that too. Mine was about damage and raw skill. Her's, on the other hand, had utility in spades.

She could put up both visual and auditory illusions and had at the very least some kind of short range teleportation feature. Maybe longer than I thought, but she could do about fifty feet in my estimation. That's the biggest cap I'd seen on her doing it.

She was how I was going to win this thing.

Soft blue light preambled through the atrium and windows. The moon was high tonight and light trickled into the now dark mansion from outside.

"You ready?" I whispered.

She just gave me an eager grin and we proceeded through the house. There was a choke point ahead with more guards. Neo hushed them and I started cutting them down.

This room still had the lights on unlike the atrium and the blood was plainly visible in the soft yellow lights as it splashed across a fine painting.

I tried to cut through flesh and met aura. I sent the man stumbling even if I didn't kill him. He fell down to his knees and tried to rise. A wordless shout at his lips.

I thrust up under the ribs of another and charged a little. My semblance activated. I used the speed and strength to slice another nearly in half. He fell down in a silent scream.

I came back to the one with aura and I spent my semblance on a whirlwind of attacks. The same one I'd done to Cinder. His head hit the ceiling hard enough to crack it and he died from the trauma I put his torso through before I flung him. His red aura shattered under my assault. I'd perfectly timed the arrival of my semblance to deal with this more difficult foe.

Machine gun fire peppered my back and I lanced out with a leap and reached out, grabbed the man and tossed him behind me into Neapolitan's waiting arms. She put the small blade into his throat and beamed as he died in her loving arms.

I looked around and spotted a security camera. I pointed it out to Neo as I sliced the last guard down and she destroyed it.

We had to be fast. This whole operation was speed dependent. Otherwise the Don might start setting off his explosives and calling his men enforce. Neo drew back from where she put her blade through the camera.

Anything could give us away. Missing camera feeds or guards which didn't check in when they were supposed to. Plus someone could come across the bodies we were leaving behind in our wake. I figured that might give us away, too.

There was a plan B. I had an explosive that might be able to crack the vault open but without knowing what kind of locks were on it I'd had to make a guess with the fire dust crystal.

Neo had watched me rig the thing up with rapt attention back in the motel room with the dead man still on the chair.

"Just in case."

I'd said.

"Might be able to blow our way into the thing. You think you can teleport through a crack in the wall?"

She'd just nodded. It was good to have back up plans. If nothing else we'd make the Don uncomfortable and he'd probably be loath to call the police and have them go through his house. The last thing he wanted was cops around.

We might be able to wait him out. He'd have to come out eventually. Of course if his men overwhelmed and killed us it would be over.

Killed me, rather. Neo could just escape.

For now she was sticking things out with me because I was fun and I might get her that shot at Cinder. If that changed I'd be willing to bet she'd be gone.

We battled our way through a hushed corridor next. Neo's parasol was bullet proof, probably with webbed Titania. And she led the charge with her legs. A flurry of kicks broke the lead sentry's neck. I leapt over her and brought my sword down on the next. I went right through the gun he tried to raise to shield himself and bit deep at the collar. He went down.

If our map was accurate, that just left the Don's office ahead.

He was the first to notice us in the next well lit room.

I rolled into the room and thrust forward into a guard's stomach only to meet aura. I stood and slashed at him once, twice, thrice at the neck until I got through. Neo handled a guard with an electric stick by using his own charging momentum to fling him into the ceiling.

The electric door to the vault started to slowly close.

It was big with these metal knobs which would undoubtedly be hard to blast through or force open.

The Don was on the other side in a disheveled office with a mahogany table hammering away at a button.

Limit activated as I sliced into the stomach of another aura ridden sentry. I'd get through the last two of them eventually but not soon enough.

I used my great strength and an arcing wide swung to clock one in the head. He dropped like a sack of rocks from the trauma to his head. Then I stepped forward and smashed the pommel of my sword into the nose of the last hard enough to drive it back into his head.

I flicked my weapon into the door to wedge it open. The Titania in my sword groaned but held. The metal really was incredible. Maybe a bit of edge warping but nothing I couldn't get repaired if the rest of this op went well.

I gestured to Neo and she flickered inside through the tiny gap in the door. She pulled the Don's hand off the button and hit a different one and the door started to open.

I strode inside and Neo unhushed us.

"So," I said with heavy footfalls. "Should I tell you how this plays out or let you guess?" He leaned away from us with fear in his eyes.

I pressed a button with an arrow to the left on his desk, the same way the door was going and the mechanical vault closed behind me, reversing a second time on electric hinges.

Wide eyed, he was locked in with us.

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

I examined the edge warp on Crocea Mors with a scowl. There were some things that were sacred, some things that should remain as they were. For gods' sake if my mind and body weren't one of them then my sword should be.

The warp wasn't severe enough that the blade wouldn't sheath or anything. And it wasn't in a bad location per se, about midway between the hilt and tip. It could be worse, I decided.

I looked from the blade's edge down at Don Corneo.

From the corner of my eye, a shadow jumped out at me and I turned swiftly, prepared for more of a fight.

There was a secondary security deposit box at the edge of the room. At a guess that was where all the Lien was. Maybe the adrenaline just had me jumpy, was all. I hoped I wasn't going to start seizing. That would be pretty bad right here and now.

I put my sword in the shield and put my face down in Don Corneo's. I said nothing.

"Please…" he begged from his comfy looking chair.

"Listen, my friend here likes to torture people. She likes it a lot. She even gets off on it a little. A bit like you do with honey bee costumes."

He looked over at Neo and she nodded, eyes full of mirth as she loomed over him in those heels. A wicked smile etched in her face.

He shuddered. Maybe he didn't get off on those costumes anymore. "Wait… You haven't even told me what you want…"

I was maybe letting him stew in it.

"You're going to give us all your money. All of it. Every last Lien."

"You don't understand," he pleaded. "Cash is pretty much all I have right now. I'll be destitute."

"You hear that?" I asked Neo. "Cash rich and asset poor."

She smirked up at me. I bent back down over Corneo.

"You have your body. You have your life. You want to keep them?" I pulled out my explosive and stuck it to the smaller vault. Then I slammed his head right next to it.

"Oh please. Oh please. Gods please don't."

"See I don't really need your cooperation. I don't really need you to open this little vault. I can open it and your head at the same time. I can hand you over to my friend here and she'll cut your balls off and she'll like it too. There's only one way you get clear of this mess alive."

I wasn't really going to set it off while we were locked in this airtight compartment. But I could always open the door a little and give it some space. I could maybe survive an explosion like that. Maybe. But I would be none too fresh afterward and we still needed to fight our way out of here.

"Please I'll be nothing. I'll be no one."

"Cut his fingers off."

She held his hand out against the vault wall and drew her blade from her parasol.

"Fine! Fine! I'll open it, I'll do it. Just don't hurt me. Please!"

She cut him anyways and he screamed. His thumb dropped to the floor at my feet. I held his head against the little vault while Neo worked at his hand.

I looked at his desk. It seems the Don got a fancy looking new scroll, too, after Weiss made off with his last one.

"And I want your scroll, too."

He whimpered quietly.

"I'll do it. I'll do it please no more. Please."

Suffice to say we got the safety deposit box open and made off like criminals. I let Neo kill him too, couldn't let him start blowing things up on us or calling his guards.

There were millions of Lien in the little vault. We even had to leave some behind just because we couldn't carry it all.

"A thousand Lien for you." I counted out. "And one thousand for me."

She grinned down at me while I worked. Something nostalgic in her smile. Maybe a little wistful.

I let her think what she wanted. It'd be only cruel to crush her dreams and memories.

pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq pq

-WG