Chapter 80 - The Tower
The Tower
Twilight had broken through the encryption moments before the shooting started.
She wished that she could take more credit for that, but the truth was that, without the computing power of the entire CCT at her disposal, she would never have been able to brute force her way through the security on the email that had outed Blake's past to Beacon and the world. Still, it had been her decryption programme, and it was her trace programme that started running immediately once the encryption was broken.
"Yes!" Twilight yelled, barely resisting the urge to leap out of her seat as a map of Remnant appeared on the monitor in front of her, and a blue trace-line began to depict for her the progress of that email backwards to its point of origin.
Whoever sent it was good. It wasn't just the encryption that was protecting their identity; it was the sheer number of places the mail bounced between. A less sophisticated trace might have been foxed by it. The passage was traced in reverse: it had been sent to every Beacon student and the VPD from the CCT here in Vale, the very tower in which Twilight sat; it had been sent to that tower from the Mistral CCT, and to there from Atlas, then back to Mistral, then Atlas again, then Vacuo, then back to Vale, bouncing off a few accounts in Vale that Twilight was 95% certain were bots or dummies, then Atlas, Mistral, more dummy accounts, Vale-
And that was when Twilight heard the shooting echoing up from below her.
Twilight was not a soldier by temperament or trade, but she had lived in the world of soldiers for all her life. Her father had reached Colonel by the time he retired, her brother was the commanding officer of the Council Guard, her family moved in the circles of officers and soldiers; two of her best friends were huntresses. Twilight wasn't a gun person, but she had spent enough time around gun people that she could identify several different types of weapon by the sound, and right now, the sound of multiple Atlesian assault rifles firing on fully automatic was unmistakable.
But how? Well, obviously, they were putting their fingers on the triggers and pulling back hard, so the question was more accurately why? Or, what? Why were they shooting, what were they shooting at? The White Fang? Had the White Fang gotten onto the campus? Nobody seemed to be shooting back. Grimm? Had the Creatures of Grimm gotten into Beacon?
Neither option was particularly promising. This was Beacon Academy, after all, a self-proclaimed light amidst the darkness; if their enemies had entered the fortress, then…
Then why was Twilight only hearing the firing now? If there were enemies rampaging across Beacon, then Twilight ought to have heard a lot more fighting than just shooting going on down below her in the tower. Localised fighting? A small scale attack? That… that made sense. The distance between the tower and the ballroom combined with the music from the dance would mean that nobody would hear the shooting in the tower, allowing time for the attackers, whoever they were, to do whatever they had come here to do.
Of course, that still didn't explain exactly who these attackers might be-
Spike, sitting on Twilight's lap, barked loudly, rousing her from futile – and, in the circumstances, somewhat pointless – speculation and bringing her back to the more important question of what, in the circumstances, she ought to do next.
Twilight glanced at the monitor, which was still depicting the progress of her trace on the source of that mail.
Twilight had seen more fighting than she had expected when she took this assignment, and she felt it was fair to say that it hadn't gone very well so far, armour or no. The cyclops in the forest would have killed her if it hadn't been for Pyrrha and Cinder; Adam would have killed her if it hadn't been for Sunset and the fact that the threatened arrival of her friends had convinced him to withdraw. She had spent the train fight in the armoured carapace of a Paladin.
All of which was to say that the idea of summoning her armour to join the battle down below did not strike her as a wise one.
She had already proved that was not where her forte lay.
And there were much smarter courses open to her.
Twilight snatched her scroll off the worktop in front of her. It was running the tracing programme, but with a single swipe of one trembling finger, she opened up a new window. She opened up her address book, scrolling through the folders to the one labelled 'Friends' which contained five headshots within it.
Her hand didn't shake at all as she selected Rainbow Dash.
XxXxX
Rainbow Dash was standing in the upper gallery, looking down at the dance floor below. In particular, her attention was focussed on Penny, who looked like she was making Ruby Rose a little bit dizzy as she whirled her around on the floor.
"I'm not entirely sure how much fun Ruby is having down there," Sunset observed as she joined Rainbow at the balcony. "Do you think I ought to rescue her?"
Rainbow looked up to see that her fellow team leader was smirking. For her part, Rainbow didn't smile.
"Sometimes," she confessed, "I feel more like a mom than a team leader. Like I'm watching somebody grow up right in front of me, figuring themselves out as they go."
"She'll be doing well if she gets it right the first time," Sunset muttered. "Especially with you as a role model."
"Oh, that was feeble, even for you," Rainbow said. She frowned. "I'm watching her grow up, and I'm leading her into battle. What does that make me?"
Sunset leaned on the rail beside her. "The White Fang send children into battle, judging by Blake and some of the people she knows."
Rainbow frowned. "I don't know about you, Sunset, but I'd like to think that 'better than a bunch of murdering terrorists' is a bar I could clear pretty easily." Only, you know, maybe I can't.
Maybe we – the whole of Atlas – haven't. The memory of the brand on Adam's face rose to the forefront of her memory. She hadn't heard anything from Cadance about the progress of her investigation. Maybe there wasn't any. Maybe the tracks had been covered too well, maybe the SDC was just untouchable. Maybe…
Rainbow dismissed the other possibility. Cadance had given her word; she was trying, no doubt about that.
She had warned Rainbow it might take a while.
"You okay?" Sunset asked.
"Yeah," Rainbow said quickly. "Yeah, I'm fine, why?"
"You looked a little bit ill for a moment there," Sunset said. "Something wrong with the punch?"
"No," Rainbow replied. "Just… a memory."
Sunset nodded. "That face, right?"
"How did you know?"
"Because I try not to think about it either," Sunset said. "It… makes it harder to remember we're the good guys."
"Tell me about it," Rainbow muttered. She shook her head. "I'm going to go. Can you do me a favour and keep an eye on Penny for me? I would ask Ciel, but I don't want to bother her when she's got a date."
"Oh, but you're fine imposing on me?"
"Have you got anything better to do?" Rainbow demanded.
"Have you got anywhere better to be?"
"I'm going over to the tower to check on Twilight."
"Ah," Sunset murmured. She smiled. "Sure. I'll keep an eye on Penny. You go."
"Thanks," Rainbow said. "And for the party too; you and Yang did a pretty good job. I mean, you're no Pinkie Pie, but-"
"I'll pretend you stopped at 'thanks for the party,'" Sunset said. "Now get out of here."
Rainbow grinned and turned to go. She was interrupted before she'd gone more than a couple of steps by the buzzing of her scroll. The vibrations sent shivers up her spine for a moment before she pulled her scroll out from the back of her waist and pulled it open.
Twilight's face confronted her. "Rainbow, I need you."
Rainbow straightened up. "Twi, what are you-?" She stopped as her equine ears pricked upwards visibly at the sounds she could hear coming out of her scroll. Sharp, rattling sounds, numerous and repeating. Sounds to make Rainbow's blood chill. "Twilight, is that gunfire?"
Twilight nodded. "Yes. I think the tower is under attack."
No. No, no, no, no! This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening? How the hell was this happening? It wasn't even like the forest; Twilight was still at Beacon for crying out loud! She was in the CCT!
Get a grip. Calm down. Focus. You can't help Twilight by Twilighting. Rainbow took a breath, and clamped down on her rising panic hard enough to think straight and ask the question, "What floor are you on?"
"Nine," Twilight said, just as the noise ceased. "The shooting has stopped."
Rainbow nodded. "Show me the room."
Twilight turned her scroll away and waved it around, giving Rainbow a panoramic view of the entire room.
"Okay," Rainbow said. "That bank of desks in the far right corner, near the window. Hide under there, don't move, don't make a sound; I'll come get you."
"Right," Twilight agreed, as she brought the scroll back around to show her face. She glanced away. "Someone's coming up the elevator."
"Hide, stay quiet, and don't panic," Rainbow snapped, sounding closer to panic herself than Twilight seemed. "I'm on my way!" She ended the call, and leapt off the upper gallery, landing heavily in the middle of the ballroom floor. "PENNY!" she yelled, causing her teammate to stop – holding Ruby up by the arms – and look her way.
"Come on, we've gotta roll!" Rainbow shouted, trusting Penny to follow her as she began to run for the exit, shoving people aside as she did so. "Come on, make a hole."
Rainbow kept her scroll out as she sprinted out of the ballroom; she tried to type as she ran, but she kept hitting the wrong keys on the display. She gritted her teeth as she skidded to a halt, halfway to the CCT already but still seeming so far away from Twilight and… Rainbow tried to keep from thinking about what might be going on in there, what might be happening to… no, don't think about it, dammit, calm down! She typed in the coordinates to summon her locker.
"Rainbow Dash!"
Rainbow turned to see that Penny wasn't the only one who had followed her out of the ballroom. Ciel was there too, and – a little more surprisingly – Ruby and Sunset, the former running in bare feet, having apparently discarded her high heels.
For herself, Rainbow was glad that she'd worn boots to the dance.
"What's the situation?" Ciel demanded as the four of them closed the distance towards her.
"Twilight heard gunshots in the CCT, then the shooting stopped and someone started coming up the elevator," Rainbow said. "I think she's in trouble."
"Understood," Ciel said, pulling out her scroll. Sunset and Ruby did likewise.
"Why would anyone want to attack the CCT?" Ruby asked as she summoned her locker.
"Could be the White Fang, although I kinda hope not," Sunset muttered. "If they can get in here whenever they want, it's not good."
"There is no positive in any hostile being able to breach the security of the campus," Ciel said.
"We'll find out who they are when we catch up to them," Rainbow growled as her locker slammed into the ground in front of her, smashing the stones of the courtyard path before popping open to reveal her wings, guns, and anything else that she might want.
Rainbow tore a slit up the side of her skirt all the way to the top, so that she could move her legs more freely.
Rarity would totally understand when she found out.
The lockers of Sunset, Ruby, and Ciel arrived as Rainbow still was strapping the Wings of Harmony onto her back. Rainbow didn't bother with telling them they didn't have to come or any of that stuff; it wouldn't have worked, and anyway, Twilight might need all the help she could get.
"You go on ahead," Ciel said, and with a single deft tug, she pulled her entire skirt off, letting the fabric fall to the ground as she stood in a pair of tight running shorts beneath the overly elaborate bodice. "I'll inform General Ironwood, and then we'll follow."
"Right," Rainbow said, grabbing her belt with Brutal Honesty and Plain Awesome holstered on it and clasping it around her waist.
"How did you-?" Sunset began.
"An Atlesian student is prepared for any eventuality, including that her garb may become suddenly unsuitable," Ciel declared matter-of-factly. She pulled Distant Thunder out of its locker. "Acceptable at a dance, invaluable in a shipwreck."
"Or a fight," Rainbow muttered as she pulled on her goggles, tinting the whole world red as they covered her eyes.
"Is Twilight going to be okay?" Penny asked anxiously.
Rainbow looked into Penny's wide eyes and forced herself to smile. "Of course she is. Twilight's gonna be just fine. Because we're going to save her."
She turned away, kicking off the ground as the jetpack of her wing-suit propelled her off the cobbled stones and up into the air. Her wings extended, catching the currents of the cool night air as Rainbow soared upwards towards the ninth floor of the CCT.
Hold on, Twi. I'm on my way.
XxXxX
The elevator was creeping upwards towards her floor. Twilight half-rose from her seat, but stopped. Out of the corner of her eye, the monitor screen had caught her attention.
The trace programme had tracked the message as far as… Drachyra? The signal had been bounced off Drachyra? No, more than that; that was where the encryption had been picked up from. Twilight boggled, staring at the monitor as her eyes widened behind her glasses. This… this was impossible. Drachyra was a barren wasteland, wracked by storms and infested with grimm. Nobody lived there, and even if they did, there was no technology that would allow anyone to connect to the CCT network… was there?
There's no way my programme could be wrong. Then… that means…
The signal had come to Drachyra from…Twilight watched as the blue trace line went right back to where it had started from, Beacon… from the scroll of…
An official photograph of a supremely confident young woman appeared on the monitor, smirking out at her. The name beside the picture was Cinder Fall.
Sunset's friend. But… but Cinder helped save my life. She protected me in the forest! Why-?
Once more, she was roused by the sound of Spike barking loudly, looking at her and then shaking his head in the direction of the elevator shaft as if to say 'hey, remember the emergency?'
"Right," Twilight said. "Thanks, Spike." Fight. Bad guy. Have to hide.
Twilight ran for the back of the room, leaving her scroll and, well, everything else behind her as she dived under the bank of desks nearest the window. She hunched down and covered her mouth with one hand as, with the other, she covered the mouth of her dog.
I'm really sorry about this, Spike, but we can't make a sound until Rainbow Dash gets here.
Twilight waited, huddled under the bank of desks, breathing in and out through her nose.
I left my work on the monitor!
Whoever came up here would see it and know that she was here! There was no point in hiding at all! Twilight knew that she ought to get up, to go back, to grab her stuff and erase the evidence of her work, but… but she was afraid. She didn't mind admitting that. It sounded like someone had just taken out all the guards, and now, they were on their way up here… to her.
She wasn't brave enough to get out and show herself under those conditions. Her combat record wasn't impressive enough, to say the least, to justify that kind of courage, especially not against someone who had torn through the soldiers down below. No, she should do as Rainbow said, and hide, and wait.
She couldn't see anything beyond the desk under which she was hiding. The green light of the CCT monitors reflected off the polished floor. She was too low down to see much out of the windows but starlight.
Twilight couldn't see the elevator, but she heard the click of heels upon the floor, and she heard the sultry voice of Cinder Fall echoing across the room.
"Really? Who?" Cinder was silent for a moment. Twilight guessed that she was talking to someone else. "And is there a good reason why you just let them leave?"
Rainbow Dash. She's talking about Rainbow Dash and… someone else; Penny? Ciel? But then… that must mean that she has allies at the party, keeping watch.
Her teammates? Are they in on this too?
What is even going on here?
The only thing she knew for certain was that if this was Cinder Fall, if Cinder was her enemy, then she had made the right choice to try and stay hidden. She'd seen the way that Cinder fought, how she and Pyrrha had effortlessly dispatched the cyclops that had smashed its way through all of Twilight's drones; even with her armour, she would have been screwed going up against Cinder and out of her mind to have tried it.
As Ciel had told her, there was no shame in shirking a pointless fight, with nothing of consequence riding upon the outcome.
"I see," Cinder purred. "Never mind. I'll deal with it."
Twilight held her breath as she heard the clicking sound of the woman's steps upon the floor.
It was definitely Cinder; Twilight hadn't spent an enormous amount of time with her, and if it hadn't been for that time spent together in the forest, she might not have been so sure, but they had spent that time together in the forest, and she did recognise Cinder's voice.
"So, you figured it out. Clever, clever, Twilight Sparkle; you really are a talent."
You've got someone pretty talented on your side too, Cinder.
Twilight could hear the woman working on the computer. Erasing Twilight's work, probably. Or…no, there must be more to it than that, because she couldn't have known that Twilight was here before she came here, could she? Twilight had only told her team; Penny was too innocent to betray Atlas – not to mention, she was watched too constantly for that – and Ciel would never even contemplate it.
Which meant that nobody had known Twilight was going to be here when they launched their attack. Which meant that-
"Come out, come out, wherever you are," Cinder called. Twilight could hear more footsteps, but she couldn't tell exactly where they were in relation to her hiding place.
She started to breathe through her nose before she passed out. Spike was starting to fuss and fret. She scratched behind his ears and hoped that he could understand that she wasn't doing this to be cruel to him.
"Open your eyes, you have to get up," the woman whispered in a sing-song voice.
"Monsters are coming to gobble you up.
Out of bed, hide under the floor,
The monsters are breaking down the door."
It was a nursery rhyme. No, it was a hide-and-seek song. Or was it both? Twilight hadn't exactly had friends to play hide-and-seek with. Was it a traditional thing? Was it Mistrali originally? The sort of thing that children got taught to tell them what to do when the grimm attacked, except it had gotten tamed in places where the grimm didn't show themselves until the original meaning had been lost.
Except right now, hiding under a desk as a monster prowled the room searching for her, her footsteps echoing, Twilight felt she could understand the meaning of the original very, very well.
"Hide in the cupboard, are they near?
Monsters know how to smell your fear."
Rainbow Dash where are you?
"You'll hear the screams and then you'll know:
Mommy and Daddy can't help you now."
The chair nearest Twilight was rudely shoved away, and a masked figure dressed in black loomed over, a cruel smirk disfiguring the smoothness of her face.
"Close your eyes, don't look up," she said.
"Here comes a monster to gobble you up."
Twilight yelped as she was grabbed by the neck and dragged out of her hiding place. She beat futilely at the other woman, but Cinder paid as much notice to her feeble blows as she would have paid to a gnat.
Twilight winced as she was slammed back-first into the wall. Spike barked furiously and leapt at Cinder, who half-turned before kicking him away. He flew across the room and hit the far wall with a yelp of pain.
"Spike!" Twilight cried, half a second before she was slammed into the nearest desk so hard that she smashed through the monitor with her face, breaking her glasses in the process. Twilight shrieked as the pain slashed at her through her aura.
"You should worry less about your dog and more about yourself," Cinder said as she pulled Twilight up until the two of them were at eye level. Though her – now spectacle-less – view was a little blurry, Twilight could swear that Cinder looked like she was enjoying this.
Her smile, as best Twilight could tell, was hungry, and as sharp as a blade.
If… if she erased my work, and now she… how will my friends ever know who…who she really is?
Twilight gasped as Cinder began to squeeze her throat. No, it was more than just squeezing. Cinder's hands were boiling hot, burning hot, they were burning through Twilight's aura just through contact, just like the cyclops in the Emerald Forest.
Only this time, Twilight didn't have her armour to shelter in as her aura began to drain away.
She groaned and moaned in pain, twitching and writhing in futile efforts to escape the unbearable heat.
"I didn't plan on you being here," Cinder declared, "but since you are here, I'm rather glad. After all, I just have to kill you, and then nobody will be any the wiser." She chuckled. "You have no idea how much I've detested you, you spoiled little girl." She squeezed Twilight's head a little tighter. "You have no idea how hard or cold the world can be, because whenever its chill reaches you, you just take a step back and let someone else deal with it. That's what you did tonight, isn't it? You called on faithful Rainbow Dash to save you." Cinder shook her head. "Well, if she gets here, I'll kill her-"
The windows of the CCT were shattered by the impact of Rainbow Dash, wings outstretched, busting through them and into the room. She soared across the chamber, a wordless yell bursting out of her throat as she slammed one fist into Cinder's cheek. The blow was hard enough to shatter Cinder's grip on Twilight, who collapsed to the floor as Cinder herself was tossed backwards, smashing through a bank of desks, skidding backwards across the floor.
The Wings of Harmony folded back into the backpack as Rainbow Dash stood over Twilight like a mother bear, casting a shadow over her as long and as reassuring as an Atlesian cruiser.
"Everything's going to be okay, Twilight," Rainbow declared. "I'm right here."
General Ironwood had heard Rainbow Dash bellow Penny's name across the dancefloor – it was unlikely that there was anyone who had missed it – and he had seen the three members of Team RSPT leave the ballroom in a great hurry, accompanied by half of Team SAPR, while the other half – Jaune Arc and Pyrrha Nikos – looked about as confused by it as the rest of the guests at tonight's party.
Ironwood glanced at Ozpin. "Something I should know about?"
"I assure you, James, that I am just as in the dark as you are," Ozpin replied. "Why don't you try and discover what's happening while I prevent the spread of unnecessary panic amongst the other students?"
Ironwood nodded, and he had already walked out of the ballroom – Ozpin, meanwhile, headed back inside – when his scroll began to buzz.
He tapped his earpiece to take the call audio only. "Dash?"
"It's Soleil, sir."
"Report." Ironwood snapped.
"Twilight Sparkle reported gunfire from the lower levels of the CCT," Ciel said, as calmly and as matter-of-factly as if she were reporting the weather. "Gunfire then ceased, but a possible assailant began to ascend in the elevator. Rainbow Dash has gone on ahead to secure Twilight Sparkle; myself, Cadet Polendina, and Sunset Shimmer and Ruby Rose of Beacon's Team Sapphire will follow immediately."
Ironwood bit back a curse. Someone was attacking the CCT? Under his very nose? And Twilight was in there! His goddaughter, the brightest mind that Atlas had produced in a generation, and she was in danger – again.
Nobody could have predicted that anyone would be able to infiltrate Beacon and overpower the guards. Not that his ignorance would save Twilight, nor excuse the loss of all that she might have done for Atlas over the course of her life otherwise.
And even that might be a small matter compared to the possibility that this had nothing to do with Twilight Sparkle at all. What if they knew what Ozpin was hiding in the vault underneath the tower? Had Amber's assailant come back to finish the job? What if they knew about the relic? Ironwood didn't know where exactly the Relic of Choice was – only Ozpin knew that; it was a secret even amongst the secrets of their organisation – but who knew what clues to its hiding place might be hidden in Ozpin's office if somebody got up there?
Is it her? Is she making her play?
General Ironwood controlled his voice. There was no point in letting Soleil hear how concerned he was. "Good work, Soleil. I'll try and raise the guard detail and summon reinforcements to support you. Good luck."
"Thank you, sir."
"Ironwood out," Ironwood said. He tapped his earpiece again, ending the call from Soleil and enabling voice-activated contact. "Lieutenant Reynolds, this is General Ironwood, status report."
There was no response.
Ironwood's feet carried him, almost subconsciously, towards the tower.
"Lieutenant, this is General Ironwood, please respond." No answer. "Sergeant Barnes, do you copy?"
Ironwood scowled. "Schnee."
There was a momentary pause before Winter Schnee's voice came over the line. "Sir."
"The CCT has come under attack. Load up three Skygraspers with marines and meet me outside the tower ASAP."
"Understood, sir. Do you want me to alert the Vale authorities?"
"We'll deal with that when the situation is contained; for now, double time it. Twilight Sparkle's in the tower."
"Yes, sir."
"Wonderbolt Lead," Ironwood said, ending his call to Winter and speaking a new contact name.
"Spitfire, reading you loud and clear, General," The squadron leader of the Wonderbolts, known by the callsign Spitfire, came on the line.
"Prep your team for ground action and rendezvous with me outside the CCT on the double; shots fired, situation unknown."
"Copy that, sir. Wonderbolts inbound."
Ironwood began to reach into his jacket for the pistol he always kept concealed in a shoulder holster. He was interrupted by another message.
"Ironwood."
"Soleil reporting, sir. We've arrived at the CCT; all guards have been neutralised."
"Dead?"
"Unknown, sir; we haven't made a comprehensive-"
"Don't bother; securing Twilight is your top priority," Ironwood said.
"Yes, sir."
The sharp rattle of gunfire began to sound in Ironwood's earpiece. "Soleil!"
"Coming from above us, sir."
Rainbow Dash. "Hurry, Soleil."
"Yes sir!"
XxXxX
Ruby pressed the elevator button repeatedly, prodding it over and over again as if it was going to make the lift come down any faster. And as she pressed, she was muttering inaudible encouragement to it, or perhaps she was just upset that it wasn't moving fast enough.
Sunset left her to it. If she wanted to do something other than nothing, then let her. Even if it wasn't going to make the elevator come down any faster, then it wasn't going to make it move any slower either.
And it meant that she didn't have to look at the bodies of the Atlesian soldiers scattered around the atrium of the tower.
Sunset didn't know if they were all dead. Since General Ironwood had given them the clear not to waste time checking every one, nobody really wanted to spend any time checking any of them. So Sunset didn't know if they were all dead, but she did know that at least some of them were. You didn't get up again from having your neck twisted into that angle, and if you weren't crying out from a stab wound like that, you weren't going to cry out ever again.
The atrium was riddled with bullet holes, but so far as Sunset could tell, none of the Atlesian troops had been shot. There were some blade wounds, but no gunshots that she could see. Which meant that the Atlesians must have missed a lot of shots. Which meant that whoever they were up against was very good. Agile, fast, able to dodge like a fiend.
Sunset wished that she'd worn gloves; she was starting to sweat just a little bit.
Come on, where's that elevator?
Ciel was standing over one of the fallen Atlesian soldiers, one of the ones they were sure was dead. Her head was bowed, and her eyes were closed. Was she praying? Religion wasn't a big thing in Remnant, and certainly not something Sunset would have expected to see from an Atlesian.
"And now I vow to take up your struggle," Ciel murmured. "Until the final victory is achieved or I join you in the green fields beyond the mud and blood in which we live. Through your sacrifice shall the kingdom prosper and our enemies fail."
"I… I don't understand," Penny said, as she looked around at the fallen all around her. "Why… who would do something like this?"
Ruby looked at her. "I… I don't know exactly who's responsible for this, Penny. Not yet, anyway. But… there are a lot of bad people in the world who just don't care about life, who fight and kill because they can. They're… they're worse than the grimm because they know that what they're doing is wrong, but they do it anyway. And that's why we have to fight them. That's why we have to fight them with everything we have, because it's the only way we can protect our friends."
"But why?" Penny repeated. "Why would anyone deliberately do something that they know is wrong?"
Ruby sighed. "I really wish I had an answer for you, Penny, but I don't. I don't think anybody does.
"Their motives are irrelevant," Ciel declared. She opened her eyes, but her expression remained grimly set. "They are the darkness, no less than the creatures of grimm. They are the darkness, and we are the light that will burn them into nothingness."
One of the elevators finally began to descend down towards them.
"I don't think we can always understand why people do what they do, Penny," Ruby said. "Sometimes, all we can do is stop them before they hurt anyone else."
XxXxX
Rainbow broke through the windows, shards of glass bouncing off her goggles and getting stuck in her hair. She roared in anger as she swept into the room like an avenging angel because no one, but no one, but no one treated her friend like that and got away with it.
She was moving so fast that even with her shout, she still blindsided her opponent, a single woman in a black catsuit, catching her with a blow that knocked her across the room and, more importantly, got her to let go of Twilight.
As Rainbow's opponent recovered her footing, Twilight collapsed onto the floor next to Rainbow Dash. Rainbow glanced down at her. Her glasses were gone – smashed probably – and there was a terrified look in those purple eyes.
"Everything's going to be okay, Twilight; I'm right here," Rainbow said. She paused. "Did she hurt you?"
Twilight shook her head. "My aura didn't break."
Rainbow couldn't restrain the sigh of relief, any more than she could restrain the murderous glare that she shot towards Catsuit Girl, who just stood there looking down at them both with an infuriating smirk on her face.
"Cinder," Twilight murmured. "It's Cinder Fall."
Rainbow's eyes narrowed. Sunset's friend? What the hell? "Is that right?" she muttered. "Twi, Ciel and Penny are coming up in the elevator; when the doors open, run for them, okay?"
Twilight swallowed and nodded her head. "Okay."
Rainbow focussed all her attention upon Cinder "You want to play rough?" she asked. "You want to play with someone who knows how to punch back?"
The smirk on Cinder's face didn't waver for an instant.
Rainbow reached for her machine pistols, Brutal Honesty and Plain Awesome filling her hands as she swept the weapons up, pointed them at Cinder, and squeezed the triggers. Both guns blazed, muzzles flashing, cartridge casings falling to the floor at her feet.
Cinder didn't dodge. She raised both her hands before her, and the bullets slammed harmlessly into… what?
A shield? Never seen her do that before.
Not surprising she'd hold out on us.
Rainbow let her empty guns fall to the ground. Guess I'll have to do this the old-fashioned way.
Slowly, Cinder produced a capsule and flicked the cap off and onto the floor.
She waved her arm in a wide arc before her, spreading dust out from the capsule like seeds on a farm or something. The dust solidified a moment later, transforming into a wave of glass daggers that flew straight for Rainbow Dash.
"Twilight, stay down!" Rainbow snapped as she leapt forward and rolled beneath the wave of glass which passed, harmlessly, over her head. Rainbow rose right in Cinder's face, throwing a right hook.
Cinder blocked. She grabbed Rainbow's wrist, twisted-
Rainbow head-butted her in the face. Once, twice, three times, and the obsidian mask she was wearing shattered with a crunch, and that smirk on her face wasn't looking quite so smug any more, was it?
Rainbow threw another punch with her free hand.
Cinder caught her fist in her open palm.
And now it was Rainbow's turn to smirk as she let Cinder have it with an aura boom, turning her aura outwards with a blast like a cannon that, sure, burned through thirty percent of Rainbow's aura in one hit but was totally worth it for the way it sent Cinder flying backwards, smashing through two banks of desks and chairs before she skidded to a halt.
Rainbow charged, trailing a rainbow behind her as she ran with all the speed of her semblance to bull rush Cinder before she could recover. Rainbow yelled wordlessly as she carried Cinder into the far wall and slammed her into it so hard she made a dent.
Don't. Hurt. My. Friends!
Rainbow got a clean punch in on Cinder's face. Cinder dodged the second punch, but Rainbow converted it into an elbow strike. She swung again.
Cinder managed to evade the blow and catch her arm in a lock. Rainbow struggled as Cinder spun her around, got her hand on Rainbow's neck, slammed her into the wall, and then threw her away. Rainbow landed on her feet but with her back to-
"Look out!" Twilight yelled.
Rainbow wasn't able to avoid all the arrows; one of them hit her, shattering or exploding or something that hurt like hell and felt like it had taken another chunk out of her aura with it. She didn't know exactly how much she had left. She certainly didn't have time to check.
Cinder leapt into the air, hovering there for a moment as twin blades of black obsidian formed in her hands out of dust crystals. Then she descended like a hawk.
Rainbow dodged her initial swings. She kicked, but Cinder took it on her arm. Cinder slashed again, and Rainbow had to block at a cost in aura. Rainbow swung at her. That damn smirk was back again as Cinder ducked under the punch and threw one of her swords into the air.
The sword spun once as Cinder grabbed Rainbow's arm.
Again? Dammit!
The sword spun a second time as Cinder threw Rainbow over her shoulder and onto her back.
The sword spun a third time as Cinder caught it, reversed it, and brought it downwards, point first.
Rainbow caught the blade between her palms, then kicked upwards off the ground.
Cinder was still smiling. Rainbow was really starting to hate it.
She raised her fists. Cinder raised her blades in a high guard.
They charged at one another. Rainbow swung her fists and lashed out with her legs in high sweeping kicks, and Cinder ducked and dived and leapt away from them before slashing with her twin blades which Rainbow also sought to avoid. She was probably taking something off Cinder's aura, but she was also getting her own sliced away in the process; she could feel that, even if she couldn't gauge the exact amount. She risked another aura boom, knocking Cinder backwards at the cost of another chunk of her own aura in turn.
Rainbow panted slightly.
She has to be close to the limit if I am.
I just wish she'd stop smirking.
If Cinder was fazed at all by what Rainbow had done, she didn't show it. She combined her two swords at the pommels, forming a bow. A trio of arrows formed out of dust. She aimed squarely at Rainbow Dash.
Rainbow wasn't fazed; she could dodge those-
Cinder's smile broadened as she switched aim to Twilight, still lying on the floor, and let fly.
And Rainbow did the only thing she could.
She leapt into the path of the arrows.
"No!" Twilight yelled as the arrows exploded. Rainbow cried out in pain as her aura broke, the magenta field rippling over her body as she lost all protection from the flames and shards of glass. She hit the floor with a thud and the clank of her wings, her arms and side aching. She could feel blood, warm and sticky, starting to run. Not a lot of it, but she could feel it anyway. She groaned as she tried to get to her feet.
"Stay down, like a good dog," Cinder said, as she planted a foot on Rainbow's chest and pressed down, driving Rainbow back onto the floor. She cocked her head to one side. "Flower of the north," she murmured, as her black swords reformed in her hands. "Didn't anyone ever tell you that the tallest flowers get cut down?"
"No!" Twilight shrieked, getting up and starting to run towards them as though… Rainbow didn't know what she was thinking.
Cinder ignored her, looking down on Rainbow Dash as she raised her blades.
A green laser blast forced Cinder to leap hurriedly out of the way as Penny, Ciel, Ruby, and Sunset emerged from the elevator.
Penny's swords formed a halo around her head. "Get away from my friends!"
Cinder's ever-present smirk faltered; in fact, she looked downright irritated for a moment. Her smirk turned into a scowl as she raised her swords.
Laser beams leapt from Penny's blades, the green pulses flying straight and true towards Cinder. Cinder's swords shattered in her hands, breaking apart into fragments of glass which she flung outwards before herself, the ambient light in the room reflecting off the shards of glass like… like mirrors.
Mirrors off which Penny's laser beams were reflected, rebounding in all directions, up into the ceiling, down onto the floor, back at Penny and the others. Sunset flung out one hand, a shield as green as Penny's lasers forming in front of the group on which the blast dissipated harmlessly, but by then, Cinder had already turned and ran, crossing the room without further opposition, leaping out of the broken window pane and into the empty air.
XxXxX
Sunset rushed to the shattered window, ignoring Rainbow Dash and Twilight for a moment, ignoring the crunch of glass shards underfoot because all she could concentrate on was that this was Cinder, Cinder who had attacked the CCT and tried to kill Twilight.
It was Cinder who had betrayed them all.
Sunset could hardly believe it. She'd seen it with her own eyes, that face, that smile, but she could still… still hardly believe it.
I thought that you were like me. I thought that we were kindred spirits.
I thought that we were friends.
She had thought that they were so alike… was Cinder that good a liar, or was Sunset such a poor judge of character?
Sunset didn't know the answer to that, but she did know, as she watched Cinder fly – fly! – from the ninth floor down towards the ground, that she wanted answers.
And so she teleported, leaving Ruby and RSPT behind to appear in a burst of green light directly in front of Cinder as she landed before the tower.
"You're not getting away so easy," Sunset growled as she raised Sol Invictus to her shoulder and pointed it squarely at Cinder.
Cinder smiled. "Hello, Sunset."
Sunset's eyes narrowed. "I did wonder why you weren't at the dance," she said, "but you seem to have made your own amusement."
"Well, I did also tell you that I was planning to have some real fun."
Sunset bared her teeth. "Why, Cinder? Why have you done this?"
"Why?" Cinder asked, and she sounded almost surprised. "I thought that you of all people would understand, if anyone could understand. We're so alike, after all, you and I."
Sunset swallowed and tried to avoid the dry, brackish sensation in her mouth. "I'm not so sure of that any more."
Cinder laughed. "Oh, Sunset. Just because you've found out that I've been lying about certain superficial details of my allegiance, as though you've never done the same. It doesn't change who I am inside. It doesn't change the similarity between our hearts. It doesn't change that you and I are the same thing: monsters."
Sunset shook her head. "No. I'm not-"
"I feel it," Cinder hissed. "Inside you, calling to me, waiting to be unleashed. Let it out, Sunset. Embrace who you really are. I can show you, if you like." She held out one hand. "Let me help you, the way that somebody once helped-"
Sunset fired, squeezing the trigger of Sol Invictus as fire roared from the barrel of her rifle.
Cinder raised her hand and blocked the round effortlessly. "Now was that really necessary? I'm only trying to do what's best for you."
"I know who I am," Sunset growled, using her anger to mask her uncertainty. "And if you are my enemy, if you have always been my enemy, then I'm not going to just let you walk away."
Cinder smiled. "Do you think you can defeat me, Sunset Shimmer?"
"I know I'm going to try."
Twin swords sprang into existence in Cinder's hands as she forged them out of dust. "Very well. I'm very sorry that things have come to this. I had hoped… but, as you well know, destiny cannot be avoided. Come then, Sunset Shimmer, and let fate decide which of us to crown in glory!"
XxXxX
This chapter includes a last minute change - Cinder using the glass shards to send Penny's laser beams rebounding back on her - for which credit is owned to RuleroftheValaxy, whose Hellfire Phoenix one-shot Red and Gold is something I really do advise you to check out.
Last edited: