I'm very late, and It's a shorter chapter than normal, I know. College has gotten in the way pretty badly, so this will be the last chapter a write for any of my stories for a while. This chapter has been beta'd by Sixteen Vanilla Beans, who helped fix up my story and make it presentable for everyone, considering this is the fourth iteration of this particular chapter that was no easy task. Enjoy.

Fire, there was so much fire, it flickered and crackled unnaturally all around her… Winter Schnee found herself on her knees, utterly spent and covered in wounds of various depths and types. Her sword was shattered and the hilt buried in the wall next to her head, the blade was nestled painfully in her stomach. She saw her team, the one she'd fought and bled with since her first days at Atlas's academy, lying around her in states of death, or dying. Dried blood flecked across her face, but she didn't notice any of it. Winter's attention was focused solely on the three people in front of her, wreathed by dark, almost blood red, demonic flames. One of them was her partner, the other two were the people responsible for this hell she was living in.

"Well, this is certainly turning into an exciting little clusterfuck, isn't it?" Roman Torchwick, at the time some nameless low level thug, said to his partner. She was a short girl with brown and pink hair and eyes that seemed to continually be changing colors, though that could simply be the result of Winter's blood loss from the multiple stab wounds. His grin was that of a devil being delivered a fresh soul to devour as he stood with his cane resting casually in his hands. The little girl merely turned and gave him an energetic thumb's up accompanied by a matching malicious grin.

Winter's partner was lying on the tile floor between the two of them, a parasol's blade skewered through his spine. He had blood pouring from his mouth, but he wasn't quite dead yet. He looked at her and attempted to speak some sort of final words. It seemed fate was against such a notion as Roman casually angled his cane to line up with a fracture in her partner's helmet. With a quick pull of the trigger and an odd echoing blast, Winter watched her partner of over four years die right in front of her; his last words forever left unspoken as a hole in his head smoldered from the blast. No, not die. He was killed, murdered by the pair of monsters in front of her. Roman casually raised his cane and leveled it at Winter's head. A thin veneer of blood now coated the tip of the cane and began to slowly drip from its tip. As Roman prepared to fire, his eyes met with her's, he hesitated for a moment, then spoke to her.

"Sorry it had to go this way sweetheart, but what's done is done, can't change it now. From where you're sitting it must look like you've had a truly legendary run of bad luck. I'll let you in on the little secret, though, just between us. The game was rigged before you even stepped on the board." with that Roman squeezed the trigger and fired. As the sound of the blast rang out Winter's vision went dark as the round collided squarely between her eyes and detonated.

The world around her shattered like glass and her mind was flung down into the uncomfortable inky darkness of her subconscious. There was something else here something alien, something unnatural in this darkness. Winter began looking for it, and off in the distance she saw a strange pinkish light begin to emanate. However, before she could move towards the light, a new nightmare soon took shape within her mind, forming colors and images that clouded her eyes and covering the light that quickly faded from memory. This dream was equally as painful and demented as the one she'd just experienced, this time she'd been trapped in the control room and had been forced to watch the massacre without being able to do a thing to stop it. This continued for hours before she'd finally broken down mentally. She watched, completely disconnected from her body, as she began to participate in the murder of her comrades in this vicious dreamworld, and soon enough she replaced Roman entirely in these dark visions. Winter couldn't help but marvel at her skill at creating carnage, the pyromancy lining her nightmare simply didn't give her any choice but to be enraptured by the bloodshed. She was blessedly struck with amnesia of the atrocities she partook in when her dreams began to dissipate. As she began to awaken, however, Winter remembered the name and the smirking arrogant face of one Roman Torchwick looking down triumphantly as the flames reached up and burned her world around her.

With a start, Winter jerked awake, a cold sweat drenching her was the third time this month, always the same nightmare. Winter had been suffering these nightmares for a long time, even seeking out psychological help when these nightmares had begun to affect her day to day performance. Her psychologist claimed these dreams were the vague recollections of that traumatic experience mixed with what she'd been told later regarding the event during her recovery.

Winter had thought she'd made a full recovery, that these events were behind her as the frequency of these nightmares had lessened and the wounds that night left behind, both physical and mental, faded. This trend changed when the man responsible was dragged onto the ship and thrown into it's brig. Roman Torchwick was, as far as they knew, the only other living being with first hand experience of what came to be known as the Inferno massacre, named as almost everything in the facility, including the bodies of her comrades, had been burned, with the illumination that massive bonfire created being what lead a squad of hunters to investigate and discover the remnants of what had been a truly monolithic military force. It was said this was the moment the modern Dust smuggling trade was born.

He was currently residing in one of the cells below. He was the most dangerous man she'd crossed paths with, the most dangerous thing she'd ever had the misfortune to meet. He was leagues beyond any Grimm In one night, Roman Torchwick had somehow managed to completely decimate Atlas & Vale's joint anti-Dust smuggling task force. The identity of the person who'd leaked the secret information regarding the base's location was still a matter of friction between the two kingdoms five years on. Now they'd finally captured him and soon enough he'd face the firing squad for what he'd done. She should be happy; her friends were finally going to get the closure they'd deserved but been denied for close to half a decade. For whatever reason, though, she felt a strange sense of loss. After devoting so much hate towards the man, the thought that it was truly coming to a close was uncomfortable, to say the least.

Slowly, Winter made her way to her personal bathroom on the ship. She turned the water to an icy cold and took a shower. The water cascaded along her slender figure and she let the showers icy embrace run across her skin and chill her to her veins, which moments before had been boiling. After getting dried and properly dressed. she began making her way to accomplish what she'd set out to do for days now but lacked the nerve to do it. She would get answers before they put him down She slowly made her way to the holding cells. It was early in morning; the sun hadn't even managed to break through the horizon yet. So Winter was surprised to see there was already a group standing outside her target's cell.

"Heh, you're not the too bad kid, shame you don't have any idea what's coming," Roman chuckled as team CFVY did their best to stone-facedly ignore him. Fox suddenly clutched his stomach in apparent pain. "Something you ate this morning kid, or are you just not used to airships? Believe me, I felt sick the first day they stuck me in this little cell. Well, except I'm not a pathetic little brat who can't keep the garbage they call food down."

"Do you ever shut up?" The leader of the team, Coco, snapped in exasperation as Fox slowly made his way to the bathroom for the third time since arriving on the ship an hour ago.

"Nope!" Roman replied cheerfully. His grin disappeared when Winter made her way into his cell's view.

"Try asking him about his employers. We haven't found anything that'll make him clam up faster than that," Winter said as she approached the group.

"Ahh, Ironwood's little pet has finally come for a 's a pleasure seeing you again, Winter."

"I'm glad to see you remember me, Roman." Her smile promised he would soon be on the receiving end of unimaginable pain, making Roman somewhat reassured to have a top of the line security wall securely between the two of them.

"I never forget a pretty face. Besides, I doubt either of us will going to forget that night anytime soon." His eyes became downcast for a brief moment before the sneering veneer returned, though that brief lapse was noticed by all parties. No one chose to comment.

"I see." Winter turned to the remaining members of CFVY "Leave us, now."

"Wish we could ma'am, we're under strict orders to escort him to a location to be specified once we have him in our custody. We radioed in a few minutes ago and are waiting for a response." Roman began scowling, mumbling unintelligible things to the other parties around him.

"Hey, Hot Topic, would you actually like to know my boss's name?" Roman said suddenly, his face held an odd neutrality seemingly looking past them and focused on something in the distance. His question surprised the entire group, and it took a moment for Coco to respond.

"Just like that?"

"Well, I do need one thing first…"

"We're not letting you out, we're not getting you any cigars, and for the fiftieth time, no I don't know where your hat is," Coco snapped at him, to which Roman maintained his poker face.

"I wasn't asking for anything so dramatic my dear, I was simply going to ask for you to lock the doors, I'm deathly concerned for my safety you see." Roman said motioning to the two sets of doors leading into and out of the cell block.

"Why? You're already locked up in there, you can't get much safer at least until you get taken to the firing squad." Coco said, looking confused at his request.

"Yes, but what you fail to realize my dear, is that those are unbreakable locks. Believe me, I've picked enough locks to know, and if we wanted to ensure there are no interruptions, say from a couple of my beloved employer's agents that were already placed onboard the ship…"

"You're saying there are spies on board the ship?" Winter was dubious, but couldn't really declare it false outright, nor could she quite shake the sense of paranoia his statement created in her mind. Right now, Roman and the White Fang were the only confirmed members of the organization, yet it was obvious from the reports that there was someone else pulling the strings. Those people could well be connected to Atlas, or they may not. There simply wasn't enough information to go on yet.

"Wow, I was afraid the subtlety of stating something outright would slip under your radar, but it seems you've managed to catch my meaning. I'm so very proud of you." Roman said, and not for the first time wanted a cigar, they always managed to help keep his snideness to a minimum

"…I don't think-" Coco began

"Do it," Winter interrupted Coco. Was that really the reason he'd been so resistant in the interrogations? Didn't he trust that his interrogators had been sufficiently vetted to know they weren't actually watching him for his employer? Admittedly barring Ironwood and herself, he might have a point, there had been a large number of transfers after several people came down with a mystery illness recently. There was a third of the total soldiers stationed onboard the vessel who she head never served with and didn't know anything about… These people were a variable that lent credence to his claim, even lacking concrete evidence it seemed too possible to dismiss out of hand. But now the question of what prompted Roman's sudden willingness to speak entered Winter's mind "Why are you talking now, afraid this may be your final days on Remnant?"

"Not at all. In fact, I plan on living for a quite a while longer, at least long enough to enjoy my savings at least. It just so happens I wanted to make sure that if I'm going to risk my life telling you miserable lot anything, best to be sure it'll actually be to someone not on her payroll," to which he inclined his head to team CFVY. Before Winter could respond, the sound of the locks engaging was audible.

"Okay, the doors are locked," for emphasis Coco tugged on the doors which refused to budge even slightly. "Now talk," Coco said glaring at him over her sunglasses.

"Well, just before you were telling me to do the exact opposite. What do you want to talk about? The weather, or perhaps my latest fling? You see she was-" Roman had a sly grin but obligingly stopped when Winter interrupted him. She repeated a question they'd been asking him since they'd incarcerated him onboard the ship, and to which no amount of waterboarding, electric shocks or plain old fashioned beatings had pried a satisfactory answer from his smirking lips.

"Who do you work for?"

"Her name is Cinder Fall, she was supposedly born in Mistral, the evidence is pretty weak, and she was a low-level Dust smuggler for a few years. One day she just promptly disappeared off the face of the earth." Roman made a poof sound effect and used his hands for emphasis before continuing. "She remerged close to nine years ago, with access to resources and powers not previously seen by anyone. Got all of that so far kids?" He'd lost a decent chunk of his network in Mistral to get those paltry scraps of information, her patron's reach was long and powerful indeed. What had prompted his sudden change of heart was the realization of just who it was that most likely was supporting her. His suspicions were enough and so he'd devised his own plan to deal with both Cinder and her benefactor, all in one fell swoop.

Winter was simply stunned into silence. For days they had interrogated him, he hadn't given them a single thing that had become workable intel in that entire time. Now he was just tossing out details like it was nothing, and without the slightest application of pressure to boot. Team CFVY seemed equally shocked at their success where Atlas's best interrogators had failed. Before they could ask anything further something began banging loudly against the reinforced door. It began increasing in tempo and ferocity until it seemed like a single continuous crash. No one said a word, they merely waited to see what would transpire, as something attempted to break through and get inside the cell block. After a few minutes, the noise abruptly ceased and Winter swore she could almost hear screams coming in the distance.

"Well, that certainly doesn't sound good," Roman said, breaking the silence. Before anyone could speak further the door flew inwards with the lock being ripped off the wall. The door was propelled by the force of the shattered corpse of some poor random Atlesian soldier, his face frozen in a vision of utter terror. "You wouldn't happen to know where my cane is now would you, Ice Queen?" Winter turned to yell something at him when something she hadn't realized up to now suddenly clicked in her mind.

"How'd you get out of your cell!?" She looked on in horror as Roman Torchwick, the abomination who'd caused her so much suffering, stood mere inches from her. Somehow, he'd managed to get within inches of her face without her realizing it. If he wanted to he could probably lean forward and touched her! The thought was sickening and made bile begin to rise in Winter's throat.

"Well, the door opened. I feel like the concept of walking should be something you should really understand. You Schnee do understand the concept, yes? It's that thing your servants are doing when they carry you around your personal palace."

"Get back in your cell!"

"…Nah, I think I'd like to find my way off this ship before the thing that just did that finds me," Roman said as he pointed to the fresh corpse. He didn't manage to get far, the perpetrator stumbled into the light before Roman had even managed to take a single step toward the exit. Fox stumbled forward drunkenly; his twin blades, and his entire upper body to a lesser extent, were drenched in blood that didn't belong to him. His auburn hair was disheveled and his face was sweating while he was breathing quite heavily. With a few steps forward he abruptly halted. Fox stood there panting, his head angled down to hide his face from view. He took one more shaky breath and began to speak.

"Boss...Run. Please, I don't want to hur-urgh!" Fox suddenly clutched his chest, while his whole body seemed to quake and shiver. Just underneath his skin strange tendrils were visible as they twisted and coiled, causing to start moving erratically. In a burst of inhuman speed, he suddenly launched himself at his former teammates, his blades ready to carve them to pieces. A single fireball proved powerful enough to stop his momentum cold and send him crashing to the floor. Fox found both Winter and Roman still between him and his targets. His entire demeanor changed. Before he was relatively calm and collected, now his growls and feral hisses echoed quite loudly as they filled the cell block.

"Hey, Ice Queen," Roman said, his voice cold and brokered no disagreement as he kept his eyes trained on the murderous former hunter-in-training.

"What?" Winter spat out after taking a moment to compose herself.

"Do what you can with the three kiddos behind us. I'm going to deal with him." Before Winter had a moment to reply Fox let loose a bestial howl and rushed forward once more, his target this time being the two figures currently standing in his way. Winter was the one to counter this attack, disregarding Roman's instructions Winter took matters into her own hands. She wouldn't take orders from him of all people, the very idea was repugnant. Parrying away Fox's arm blades and, while sidestepping one his swings, Winter drove her boot quite brutally into Mr. Alistair's knee. The sound of muscle tearing and bones crunching became audible in the otherwise quiet atmosphere of the cell block. She locked her swords with each of his arm blades and used this as leverage to slam Fox against a wall, pulling back on her hold she was surprised when this seemed to break his shoulder blades instead of offering the sort of resistance that she'd been expecting. With his movement impaired and having been effectively disarmed, this should have been the end of the fight.

Instead as he struggled, a large black creature suddenly burst out from Fox's back. It was serpent-like, except for several rows of white spikes that studded the top of its head. It was almost like a Grimm, with its black body and glowing red eyes, but it looked more like a black sludge then the solid black coat of most Grimm. Winter was forced to disengage, losing the smaller of her blades in the process, and leap back to avoid being bitten in half by the newly transformed Pus of Man. Instead of charging forward this time, Fox sank to his knees, seemingly content to allow the monster on his back to do the attacking for him. From his left side, another mass of darkness exploded out just above his shoulder, causing the muscles and skin to tear down to his hip which caused his left side to droop down to the ground, exposing the mass of tissues and various organs contained within.

That dark mass slowly formed into a rather gnarled giant talon of a hand. The beast slammed its newly formed hand into the ground and began to slowly drag itself towards them, leaving a thick trail of black sludge, blood and intestines behind. With no other avenue, Roman sighed and began to chant out a pyromancy. When the monstrosity that was once Fox Alistair hobbled its way to within range, Roman pointed his hand at the black mass and let loose a blistering stream of blood-red flames. It burnt the abyssal entity to a crisp. Even with the flames however it continued forward refusing to simply lay down and die. Winter finally managed to end it by driving her blade through the beast's head as it slowly approached, and even with all of this punishment, the creature still proved resilient and thrashed around violently one final time before collapsing to the ground, defeated. It was still somewhat twitching when Roman sauntered over behind it and reached down, seizing the juncture where the serpent's head met the host body. With a strong tug and a mountainous spray of blood, Roman ripped the parasite straight out of Fox's back. This left a wide gaping hole at the base of Fox's spine and blood was flowing freely from that hole. Roman knew Fox was dying either way, might as well let him die as himself, not to mention he needed some information to start hunting for where this parasite had come from. With the parasite removed, Fox's mind cleared and he began trying to speak.

"What's-"

"Shh, it's okay, well not really in your case, brat. You've got a couple minutes before the shock and or Abyss takes you. Better use you last minutes well, I'll buy you what little time I can. In exchange, I need to know a few things before your grand farewell." With that Roman began doing his best to using what paltry healing spells he possessed that wouldn't leaving him entirely depleted. "First off, when'd you start feeling that stomach pain and where?" as he spoke a golden hue erupted from Roman's hands and the massive hole in Fox's back stopped pouring out quite so much blood

"Urgh, at B-Beacon, a couple days ago."

"Do you remember anything specific, anyone or anything that stuck out when the pain first started?"

"We… we were meeting the headmaster," Fox was speaking calmly and appeared to be getting stronger, and as the massive hole in his shoulder sealed shut as well, he seemed to be on the mend. Roman could already feel his healing begin to falter, unfortunately. The tendrils inside him were decaying leaving behind a toxic residue that was beginning to eat away at his insides. Roman began amplifying the healing, increasing the aura he was using but he was painfully aware that he was approaching the point where he would have to cut it off as the healing simply wouldn't make any difference past a certain point.

"Anything strange about the old man?" Of course, 'old' was a highly subjective term in Roman's opinion, but considering Ozpin's soul was an incredibly powerful one, though still leagues below his, Roman could certify that Ozpin could indeed be or at least live to be a very old man. In response to the question, Fox nodded.

"He was, oddly happy, and he kept playing with this really ornate box, his clothes…"

"What about his clothes?"

"They were gold, the whole thing was bright blinding yellow."

"Okay kid, that's more than enough." He turned to the rest of Fox's team and motioned for them to come over. "I've done all I can, say what you have to and say it quick." While the rest of the team began saying their farewells, Roman made his way over to Winter and spoke to her.

"Well, Ice Queen, care to call a truce for the moment?" to which she simply looked at him angrily. Roman simply shrugged. "I'll take silence as a yes then."

"What happened that night?" Winter asked defiantly as Roman averted his gaze, taking an intense interest in the metal wall in front of him instead.

"You should stick with the amnesia, it's better than knowing the truth."

"No, you want to leave here under your own power you'll tell me what happened!" Winter was enraged for reasons that were obvious. Yet, for some reason she didn't know, when the creature had advanced on them she'd been concerned for Roman's safety. These stray thoughts had cropped up before. Now, however, with him here in front of her, these bizarre thoughts and feelings were practically buzzing unceasingly through her mind. Roman sighed and looked at her sympathetically.

"You want to know the truth, fine. I'll tell you what happened that night, but just so when I get hauled before a judge, remember, I warned you."

With that, Roman recounted that night in brutal detail. The mission plan was to humiliate the joint task force and gain some notoriety, as the people who made the authorities look like a bunch of incompetent clowns. The job called for a three-person squad and they'd needed an inside man, or woman in this case, among them. She had acted her part perfectly, escorting him in, under the pretense of finding him snooping too close to the facility. She'd taken him to the holding cells. From there, things had gone horribly, horribly, wrong. Neo had proceeded to the barracks and it was here a trace of the pyromancy escaped its confines and ran wild amongst the soldiers. The soldiers became little more than husks that craved violence and destruction for its own sake. At that same time, Winter damaged the armory doors previously and prevented anyone from getting access to the heavy weapons. Winter and Neo had a field day with the people still alive, making mincemeat of those few who'd survived the soul-crazed soldiers that remained. When they had finally gotten around to freeing him from his cell, he took stock of the situation and began going about cleaning the whole mess up. Roman burned the recordings and bodies, Neo tore the place apart and Winter simply helped to show him where the secret backup recordings were located. From there Roman and Neo took a Bullhead and left Winter to wake up and report what had happened to the authorities.

"That's insane, there's no way on Remnant that ever happened!" Winter denied his story, but for some reason, her denial sounded strangely hollow, even to her own ears.

"Not willingly, no. But there are ways." As Winter stormed towards him, intent on cutting his twisted little head off, he held open his hand and a small red orb materialized. She froze instantly, unable to move.

"For the little that it's worth, I am sorry. I didn't plan on anyone dying, it's just… Things just got wildly out of hand. Rapport wasn't supposed to work that way, but it did. Right now, though, I'm afraid we have bigger problems. Now, I know you probably hate me, believe me, I get it, you've probably some pretty good reasons to do so. I reached into you head and monkeyed about for my own ends, that's my bad. However, right now we need to work together, and you can do this willingly or I can make you, do keep that in mind going forward." His little soliloquy complete he allowed the pyromancy to disperse, and to his relief Winter chose not to attempt to decapitate him once she regained control of her faculties. Roman felt a presence behind him. Turning, he saw the rabbit faunus was standing there a pale shade of what she had been merely a few minutes prior.

"Please, please he still needs help..." Roman looked past her and saw the rest of the young hunters had their faces framed by the tears streaking down their faces for all to see. There wasn't much life in any of their eyes, it was a look of utter pain and grief with a hollow void behind it. She didn't expect him to be able to anything, she just deeply wished he could. Coco was on her knees cradling Fox's lifeless body in her arms. His eyes were glassy and his muscles limp. He seemed almost at peace, a far cry from the despair his teammates were in. The Large fellow, Yatsuhashi, was standing with his hands so tightly clenched that the knuckles were turning white. Of the three Coco seemed to be taking it the worst, the boy was probably her partner he surmised.

"There's nothing I can do now, but you know that don't you kid?" She broke down sobbing then and for a few minutes all that was heard in that desolate Brig was the heart-wrenching sobs of Fox's teammates as they came to terms with his passing.

"Why…" Coco choked out after a minute.

That's war, kids." Roman felt strange calling them kids instead of brat or some nickname for them, but at the moment it just seemed appropriate. Sitting there cradling her friends dead body, wishing beyond anything that he'd come back somehow, she was scared out of her mind and it reminded Roman so much of the orphans he'd seen on the road to Boletaria. "I'll make you three a deal, I can't bring your friend back." He looked at Fox's body and scowled in agitation. Even after all these years it still made him uneasy, seeing the corpses of those he still considered children, the casualties in a war they knew nothing of. "But I can probably deliver you the man responsible." At this, all eyes became focused solely on the master thief.

"How?" This time Coco spoke; her voice was hoarse and muted. There was

strength in her voice, though. It was a strength born from hate and misery, but there was steel shrouded in that pain.

"These parasites don't last terribly long without a host in Vale's environment, it's too warm for them. So they need to be transported in specific conditions, couple that with he got sick at Ozpin's office, and I believe that the box he mentioned could be what carried them to Vale. Find who sent the box, and we'll have your killer, assuming my hunch is right." In the distance, deep within the dark bowels of the ship, another animalistic roar could be heard. "This, of course, assumes we manage to get off this ship." Roman walked over to Coco and hovered a few feet from her. "Come on kid, we need to get moving." His voice was subdued and the closest he could get to gentle.

"We can't leave him here..." Looking over at his cell Roman motioned to it and Coco stared, not understanding his gesture.

"Look, hot topic, we can't just drag a corpse from one end of this airship to the other. That cell's by far the safest place for the body. I promise he'll get a proper burial once this all over." Coco didn't say anything, she just slowly carried the body and placed it gingerly inside the cell. With a slight hiss, the door sealed itself shut once again. With his back to the wall, it almost looked like Fox was just sleeping. For a moment Coco's hand rested on the glass. A few moments later Winter's scroll went off and the moment was lost. She answered quickly and received a rather garbled message.

"Winter… Get to…Defend the Bridge!" The crackling voice of a panicked Atlesian soldier called out before heard over a massive crackle of static before the call abruptly dropped.

"Any idea how to get to the Bridge from here, Ice Queen?" The sound of Coco's minigun cranking up was audible behind them.

"We're not going to the Bridge before we clear this ship of those things," Coco said, her voice seething with hate. Winter was about to protest, Before being pushed out of the way by Roman as the three remaining members of team CFVY stormed past him. She glared at him in annoyance and politely explained in clinical detail what would happen if he laid a hand on her again. Roman raised his hands in surrender and attempted to explain himself.

"Ice Queen, I know you love your orders and all but those three have murder in their eyes, best not to get in their way if you want to remain in one piece."

"We still need to get to the bridge. If someone was to get access to the ship's weapons..."

"Then we need to clear this ship quickly then. Now, if you'd please tell me where you lot stowed my beloved Melodic Cudgel, we can go get it and hopefully get to the Bridge before it falls to those mysterious assailants."

"Or…" The wheels in Winter's head turning and accompanied by a look that said her inner schemer was showing.

"Or?" Roman's eyebrows quirked up in confusion.

"Or, I provide you your cane, and you help me secure the Bridge."

"And we leave three deeply unsettled teenagers to fight a horde of monsters by themselves?" Roman asked, somewhat incredulously.

"They have their mission, and now I have mine. Besides, they appear to have the situation well in hand." After a moment, Roman shrugged, while in the distance the sounds of battle became audible.

"So long as the kid's body gets a good burial, and I get my cane, I believe I can agree with that." Winter smiled, but it was one entirely devoid of warmth like a smile is generally supposed to. It seemed her inner Schnee was finally getting some use. After all, her family had made its fortune selling its soul to the devil, though the guise would change the mentality did not.

"Make no mistake Torchwick, I still hate you more than anything on this planet today. I'm going to enjoy watching you die. However, I don't plan on getting rid of you until you can't serve my interests any further."

"Whatever floats your boat, Ice Queen. Now please, lead the way." What Winter failed to realize was that when she took the lead, Roman sent a covert message to a certain young huntress.

Said huntress groaned and vaguely reached for the alarm to make it stop. Groaning, Ruby sat up in her bed to look for whatever was making such a racket. After a moment Ruby realized it was coming from her arm, and suddenly she was wide awake. The message was from Roman and simply said.

"Get your team ready, get to a Bullhead and get to Ironwood's flagship, there's been an incident."

After reading the message, Ruby replied:

"Okay, what excuse should I tell my team?"

"Have you considered that as the team leader you don't have to answer to them and thus don't need an excuse other then you said so?"

"That's really rude… Come on Roman! Help me come up with an excuse, please?"

"I can feel your puppy dog eyes from here, Red. Just say you want to make sure I'm really secure or something. I'll meet you on the Bridge."

"Okay! Ruby Rose over and out!"

"...Sure Red, whatever."

With that Ruby quickly showered and prepared for her mission now fully awake. She roused her teammates, much to their annoyance, and they reluctantly followed along after their intrepid leader.

"Ruby, you dolt, what are you doing making us get up this early in the morning?" Weiss moaned, as she walked slowly after her partner. Weiss and Yang better-resembled zombies slowly trudging after her. Blake was still asleep, she'd been awake just long enough to get ready then had climbed onto Yang's back and had Yang carry her while Blake returned to the wondrous land of dreams.

"Sis, whatever it is, I'm sure we can just go back to bed, and do this later in the morning," Yang groaned.

"Nope! We're going to make sure of this now, that way we won't miss classes today."

"Make sure of what?" Weiss groaned in frustration. Before Ruby could respond they had arrived at the departure point for Bullheads and surprisingly saw team JNPR up as well, though Nora was much the same way as Blake was, clinging to Ren's back and still happily asleep.

"Hey, guys, what're you up to?" Ruby asked enthusiastically. Jaune returned the enthusiasm, the rest of his team were

"Jaune's gone insane," Ren mumbled between yawns as a lone Bullhead began to approach.

"I have not, I just want to make sure that he hasn't escaped." Jaune couldn't explain to his team he was following the advice of an angelic voice in his head...Maybe he was crazy after all.

"Jaune, wouldn't we have heard in the news if Torchwick did manage to escape?" Pyrrha said, rubbing her bleary eyes. secretly she suspected there was some other reason Jaune wanted to get onto Ironwood's ship, but she couldn't understand why that would be.

"Not if he's making his escape right now," Ruby chimed in. By now, the Bullhead had arrived by this point and they filled in. After they were heading for Blue 2, which was supposed to be holding Roman Torchwick, Weiss spoke again.

"Ruby, if, no when, it turns out this was a fool's errand, you're not getting any sweets for a month. I will personally make sure of it," Weiss scolded her partner tiredly. To her surprise, Ruby seemed entirely unworried about this threat and nodded in acceptance.

"That's fine since I'm right, does that mean we can go for ice cream since class might not have started by then?"

"Just on the one in ten billion chance you are correct, I'm saying no," to which Ruby proceeded to whimper sadly.

"But Weeeiissssss…" Ruby protested, looking miserable as tears streamed down her eyes. Her partner, however, remained unmoved.

The ride was uneventful until a pair of purple beams lacerated the hull of the Bullhead on its approach. Despite the pilot's best efforts, the ship began careening uncontrollably towards the bow of Blue 2. Most were awake, but everyone was awakened by the forced landing on top of the ship, a strangled cry their only warning. The Bullhead slammed down onto the top deck of the ship with a deafening boom and skidded along the top of the ship, grinding metal against metal. During the crash, the dust-filled fuel tanks ruptured, combined with the damaged electrical work the fuel soon caught flame and began to burn the exterior of the ship while cooking the inside like a boiler. The two Crystal Sages merely looked at each other in silence from their roost above. After a moment of contemplating the scene before them, one elected that there were other, more valuable, targets and he nodded before teleporting off of the ship. The other Sage remained, determined to see the Bullhead burning to completion.

"Did you just see that?" Roman asked as he looked from the bridge to the crashed Bullhead on the deck below him.

"Not now, Torchwick. What the, no, cancel." Winter didn't even bother looking up as she attempted futilely to get the blood-soaked communication system functioning. "It's no use, the systems have been disabled and I can't fix whatever they did to disable it." With a frustrated sigh, Winter turned from the damaged console and saw the crashed bullhead for the first time. "When did that get there?" Winter asked while Roman worked to open the door so that he could get to the crashed ship and examine up close. With a mechanical whirr, the ship's automated door opened as Roman managed to pry the severed limb out of from between the opening mechanisms that it had been shoved into. Unfortunately, Winter and Roman had arrived too late to save the bridge crew, their remains were strewn all throughout the bridge.

"About a minute or two ago, let's see if there's anyone still alive inside."

"Hold it, you don't give the orders I do," Winter said glaring at him. Obligingly Roman raised his hands placatingly and waited for Winter to take the lead and he followed dutifully behind her.

They had gotten about halfway to the crash site when the door to the Bullhead flew out and came within a hair's breadth of decapitating them. Black smoke billowed out from inside the wrecked vessel. Through the doorway teams RWBY and JNPR emerged, coughing and disorientated.

"Well, glad to see you all could come and join us," Roman said while looking around for whatever had caused the Bullhead to crash. Whoever was responsible was nowhere in sight as far as Roman could see, but he sensed the demon swirling around in the periphery, waiting to strike. The young hunters and huntresses in training didn't respond with words at first, though their expressions were priceless to see. Seeing the opportunity, Roman simply couldn't resist. He pulled Blake against him and snapped a photo of him with his other arm around her waist and her pressed against his frame. He had the mother of all shit-eating grins, while Blake was too stunned to possess any expression other than pure surprise. He immediately set that as the background for his scroll and allowed himself to revel in that petty victory. While he was doing that Winter approached them, but found herself stopped by some sort of invisible wall. Slowly the fog wall fully materialized, creating a line that bisected the ship in two. More importantly, the impenetrable wall of smoke cut Winter off from everyone else as the Crystal Sage, the one who remained behind, materialized behind her. The Sages were twisted warped beings, and as the Sage sat hunched over, cloaked in its black tattered robes and almost comically oversized hat, it looked out at them and that fact became abundantly clear. Warped by the dark corruption of the Abyss a being that had once been mere human in stature now was of comparable size to one of Atlas's Paladins. Its hands had become gnarled talons, though that did little to affect the skill with which it could wield it demonically enhanced Rapier or the dark blasphemies that it used to cast its spells.

It cast an imposing figure and radiated an aura of pure malice. Most people would have been terrified to face such an imposing figure, Winter felt a rush of relief. She'd been deprived of an opportunity to vent her mounting frustrations on something since she'd awoken this morning. Without thought to her personal well being she flung herself forward and did her utmost to tear the demonic wizard to shreds, while the rest of the ramshackle group was forced into the role of powerless spectators as the powerful Atlesian commander and ancient demented sorcerer clashed on top of the besieged warship, while underneath a trio of hunters waged a destructive crusade against the beasts that dwelled within the derelict vessel.

This is the last update for a while, there is a lot of work that's coming up, so I'll be writing a lot less until summer break. Once again I apologize for being so late and what's most likely going to be an extended delay for the next chapter. Until next time.

Reviews:

cipher111996: thank you for the brief but encouraging review

Ever Professional: Thank you I was worried that scene might fall flat, glad to see it had the intended reaction.

Touhou is life: only a seven? still thanks for the feedback. Unfortunately, no Sun praising this chapter either, but I'm thinking that Yang's make a great sunbro when I get around to writing chapter 4.