"Oh my," Headmaster Ozpin commented mildly, expression neutral but no less sharp, hands casually resting against his cane. "I believe this counts as breaking curfew?"
"It counts as trespassing," the man beside him corrected, voice icy and firm. "And last I checked, that's a crime."
General Ironwood already had his revolver drawn, hammer cocked back, its iron sights never leaving its target, that is, the cloaked figure in front of him, who had gone still the second he(?) saw them.
Ozpin's head tilted tiredly at the, as always, heavy handed approach of his friend.
And yet, looking at the appearance of the individual before them, that is, their outfit that was clearly meant for infiltration, Ozpin couldn't exactly say such behavior was unwarranted.
A mask and... is that black hair? I would say the description matches the one who attacked the CCTV... but according to Miss Rose, they had been quite obviously female...
Curious.
"Well, my friend here does indeed have the right of it," Ozpin said, and his cane made a sweeping gesture at the dark hood that just barely hid a white mask. "So, might I ask what your aim here is?"
"...And who are you?" Ironwood demanded without missing a beat.
That said...
When several seconds passed, and all that gazeless gaze behind the hood did was silently stare at them, not moving in the slightest, Ironwood couldn't do anything about the scowl that appeared on his face.
A beat later, however, the stranger did move, but it was only so they could cock their head at the window behind them.
The broken window.
And the one two figures could now be seen standing behind. "Yeah, I don't think our guy here plans on talking, Oz," Qrow called out, as both him and Glynda hopped down.
Or rather, Qrow did.
With exertion strewn across her face, Glynda floated down whilst carrying someone.
And the moment those two respective headmasters realized who, it was impossible to react in any other way. Both Ironwood and Ozpin, whether it was their bodies, their faces, or the very blood in their veins, they all completely and utterly froze.
"...I found this person coming out of the elevator, sir. Amber, in his arms... and like this."
Aware of the sudden spike in tension the air suddenly held, Glynda hesitantly spoke such words, and as she did so, she tossed an odd glance towards the ever quiet masked stranger as she circled him.
Meanwhile, Qrow stayed where he was, watching the individual like a hawk.
Glynda approached both headmasters, Amber in tow, the purplish hue of the woman's semblance no doubt assisted with the weight.
But they didn't focus on that.
The two men couldn't.
The sight in front of them was too distracting. That being the thought-to-be comatose girl blinking long forgotten chocolate brown eyes up at the night sky's shattered moon... and with silent tears streaming from an emotionless face.
That wasn't all of it though.
"No, how is it... stable?"
That murmur came from Ozpin, eyes uncharacteristically wide. What was more, the man's face was a stark mix of both disbelief and confusion, like he truly couldn't believe what he was looking at.
"Oz?" Qrow questioned.
Ozpin didn't answer.
Not when the headmaster was suddenly too busy using his lingering magic to prod at the girl's aura, and then marvelling at what he was seeing.
No, at what he wasn't seeing.
After all, the poisonous strain that had sunk its teeth into the girl's soul, refusing to let go, slowly killing her from the inside...
It was gone.
Ozpin stared at Amber, transfixed.
"...Her aura," he clarified, swallowing. "Before, the way it clung to her body, it was poisoned. Broken. Debilitated. Flickering. Slowly dying just like her body. But... but now... it's weak, faint even, but it's there. No, now it's even regenerating...?"
The wizard murmured this, still with that same disbelieving look and tone. And it was with a similar gaze that he turned back to the masked stranger.
"How did you... how could you have possibly—... even if you do have some kind of regenerative semblance... we've tried that. So it wouldn't be enough to just heal her. So... how? Her aura... how did you stabilize it?"
Ozpin asked this, breathily, and with none of the composure the wizened headmaster was known for.
So.
That was why it was all the more frustrating when all the masked stranger did was continue to stare back, doing and saying nothing.
"...Fine then."
And that was what led to Ironwood growling, finally overcoming his own shock. "It seems you're having trouble speaking. I'll help with that. In the name of the Atlas Military, and the authority granted to me by the Vale Council, you, whoever you are, are under arrest."
The general took a threatening step forward, both him and the menacing length of his gun inching closer.
But with just that, he already made a mistake.
Because the ground suddenly chose that moment to give way beneath his feet.
Wha—?
But it wasn't because the dirt had just randomly decided to break apart where he had stepped. No. It was because a frighteningly accurate hole the size of the man's footprint suddenly opened up right before he did.
Time seemed to slow down as the man's boot sank down, but at a diagonal angle, and Ironwood lost his balance, the barrel of his gun very briefly swaying to the side.
And that was enough.
Flutter.
A certain cloaked figure was already moving, and he closed several meters within the blink of an eye.
And this was done before Qrow even had the time to dash forward with his sword scythe, before Glynda had the chance to widen her eyes, and before Ozpin could tensely frown.
Before all of that, a different boot was already being sent screaming towards the center of Ironwood's chest.
Dammit!
The general's face warped, and he braced himself, preparing for when the completely unmitigated blow would send him flying backwards and off balance, and for even his aura to take a massive dent.
But none of those things happened.
The attack; it did land. But not with the crushing force Ironwood thought.
Instead, the agile figure's boot slammed into his chest, where it knocked Ironwood back only a few paces before he seemed to give up on the blow, bounding right back off of him with a flip. And with that, the cloak danced, and its owner landed right back where he started.
A wasted opportunity.
A failed maneuver.
One might say that.
But they would be wrong.
Ironwood grit his teeth.
Because the individual was no longer empty handed.
Under the incredibly wary gaze of Qrow, the narrowed seriousness of Ozpin, the startled confusion of Glynda, and the now even more thunderous looking glare of Ironwood... the hooded figure now had something in his left hand.
It was a very familiar looking modified revolver.
And that masked and hooded gaze stared at it almost appraisingly in the time it took for him to—in a movement that looked so clumsy and inexperienced that it had to be mocking(?)—open the gun's chamber, where six bullets came tumbling out.
And after that?
He threw the gun at Ironwood.
No, that wasn't even close to the right word. That person in the dark clothes cleanly lobbed it at him, where anyone could have caught it. And when Ironwood did, and after a very vast and oppressive silence, he had on the most stony of expressions.
"Do..."
A beat passed.
"Do you think... this is a joke?" the general eventually asked.
No, he seethed it.
In response, as per his usual, the mask and hooded figure didn't move for a good while. But then... he very obviously tilted his head.
Ironwood bit down on his teeth so hard he felt they might break. "Qrow!"
"...Yeah, yeah!" the man said with a shout, already on the move. He blurred towards the masked figure, scythe out, aiming for a slice on his shoulder. Naturally, Ironwood was already moving himself, fists clenched, and with a gait that was deceptively speedy given his size.
Incidentally.
As angry as Ironwood was, he clearly wasn't letting it get the better of him. Otherwise, he would have called for Ozpin and Glynda as well.
No.
Amber must be safely secured.
That hadn't left Ironwood's mind, and why he was pleased when the immortal wizard had already closed ranks on Glynda and her passenger.
Also, the blonde woman had pulled out her scroll, expression tense. Informing Tsune of the situation, perhaps? No, there was no time to be distracted by such things.
Not now.
Ironwood and Qrow both reached their silent adversary at the same time, their blows seconds—no, milliseconds away from landing.
And yet they didn't.
Twisting his body like a top, the disguised individual blurred out of the way of the scythe in one move, and in another, batted Ironwood's fist away with a solid forearm.
So, Ironwood spun and kicked suddenly, hoping to knock the (man?) off balance, and to give Qrow another chance to strike, which he was trying to. It didn't work. That hood and cloak dipped under the kick, slid underneath it along the wet grass, now standing behind Ironwood.
And suddenly, a wide-eyed Qrow had to make a desperate move to avert his swing, that is, in the effort to not hit his ally, clumsily hitting nothing but air instead.
Afterwhich, the man grimaced.
He would admit it.
He was starting to get a little annoyed.
It wasn't the same for Ironwood, though, not when the general's already stony face looked seconds away from popping a blood vessel.
Their hooded opponent however, having already retreated backwards a few steps, but was otherwise waiting for them... continued to remain irrationally silent and still, like an imposing statue.
Ironwood's lips pursed.
"...Resisting arrest, and assaulting an Atlesian General and Headmaster. In Atlas, that's already a year of imprisonment. If you also add breaking and entering and the intent to kidnap, we're now up to five. Do you think it's wise to continue...?"
Beside him, Qrow not so subtly rolled his eyes at the spiel that couldn't have sounded more Atlesian if Ironwood tried; still, he swished his scythe left and right, before readying his stance once more.
But as for Ironwood's question...
Of course, the masked individual just silently 'stared' back; them, and their dark silhouette.
"...I see," Ironwood rumbled quietly. Then he launched forward without delay, a lightning fast punch aimed right for that mask and face. Qrow was a half a step behind him.
The first of Ironwood's blows was easily sidestepped by the stranger, and the followup punch as well. The third attack, however, a quick jab, the stranger neatly pushed it aside, before backpedalling one step, no, two steps out of the way of a tight stab then swift uppercut from Qrow's scythe.
This put the masked man off balance slightly, and Ironwood was already there with an aura-enhanced fist. That said, his wrist was promptly caught by the mysterious person, and with two hands...
But since the force remained, Ironwood pressed the advantage, intending to kick off the ground and barrel into him, taking them both to the ground if he could help it.
But that didn't happen.
At least, not the way he wanted to.
Instead, the general could only widen his eyes when the person behind that cloak suddenly hopped, wrapped both legs around Ironwood's neck in a fierce hold, and then with their hands still on the general's arm, pulled it downward.
Ironwood couldn't get out of it even if he had been able to react in time.
He first naturally went tumbling forth, then, with the added momentum, somersaulting forward, his back hitting the ground.
Hard.
Ironwood grunted, not in pain or exhaustion, but the unadulterated surprise that came with getting knocked on his ass.
Dashing towards them, it went without saying that Qrow grimaced; if not because the masked intruder was already rising to his feet, then because Ironwood hadn't even rolled over off his back yet.
Still, the unorthodox huntsman was already sprinting forward with a fast and deadly downwards slash of his scythe.
Or it would have been a slash.
The stareless stare of that dark hood wasn't even looking at Qrow, but still, a perfectly rectangular formation of rock suddenly sprouted up from the ground and at waist level.
And Qrow, with a surprised grunt, could do little else but run straight into it at full speed, and in about the most graceless way possible.
"Guh...?!"
Semblance, again?!
With momentum that couldn't be stopped in time, Qrow nearly tumbled over it, the weight of his weapon's downwards arc suddenly a curse. Cursing, he grit his teeth. Then he cursed again. But now, for a different reason. A more dangerous one.
It was because a certain hooded figure was now already way too close, deleting the distance like it was nothing, their shadowy cloak blending and blurring with the surrounding night.
Still, Qrow's face tightened, and time seemed to slow as he tried to bring Harbinger's heft up in time, if only to tank the next blow.
But what would it be?
The cloak hid it, but the figure's fists were clenched. A punch? A tackle? Maybe even a kick?
What was it?
And where would it land?
Either way, along with his weapon, Qrow could only swell up his aura as much as possible as well, to try to block the blow. Then, if he's quick enough, he'll be able to line up a clean counterattack, and—
Time resumed in the next moment and Qrow's thoughts were halted as the masked individual attacked.
Except... he didn't.
Qrow's eyes went wide as the guy(?) leapt over him.
No, that implied it was a normal leap. It was a short hop with barely any airtime. But it was enough. It was enough to not just jump over Qrow's still hunched over back, but it was also enough to use it as a support to flip sideways over it.
But that wasn't all.
Qrow made a breathy disbelieving sound.
Because it had been done with such precise speed and momentum, that it had allowed the nimble bastard to grab his scythe by the base halfway through... Son of a—! Where it was then ripped from his very fingers.
Harbinger was gone.
Now bereft of his weapon, it felt like Qrow's brain rebooted, but he still tried to whirl around as quickly as possible, if only to react. To defend. To Dodge. To do anything.
And yet...
The serrated edge of a familiar scythe was already being held to his throat... its holder silently looking at him, and from behind a cloaked hood deeply entrenched in shadows.
Qrow blinked, then chuckled humorlessly.
"...Shit."
...
...
...
Glynda breathed a shaky breath, glancing down at the brown haired girl in her arms for the umpteenth time.
Amber had her eyes closed, sleeping, and while that scared Glynda to death...
She knew that's all she was doing. She hadn't slipped back into a coma.
After all, comatose patients weren't supposed to make sounds as they slept. They didn't quiver and shift in place either.
And when Glynda even found herself tentatively poking the girl's cheek, she knew someone in a coma wouldn't have scrunched up their face in such a way that made the blonde teacher's heart ache as terribly as it did...
Glynda looked away.
To the other person with her.
Ozpin.
He was watching over them wordlessly, and with a complicated look on his face. But not just that. The headmaster was also keeping a wary eye on his surroundings.
Specifically, he was throwing the occasional glance where Qrow and James were still fighting; a distance away on a grassy expanse of Beacon's campus.
And.
Glynda frowned subtly.
A two against one in any scenario was difficult.
But when those two happened to be infamous huntsmen Qrow Branwen and General James Ironwood? That was a different story altogether. Not many people should be able to take on just one of them, least of all both at the same time.
And yet.
No matter how many times Glynda blinked, or how long she stared, that didn't change the sight in front of her, where their cloaked, hooded, and masked adversary was keeping pace with the two men, and with what seemed to be irrational ease.
Glynda's lips pursed.
Should I assist? Even indirectly? She could. She very much could. And it wouldn't even take a second.
Still, she found herself hesitating.
The reason lay in her arms.
She could help Qrow and James, but that would mean delaying getting Amber the help she needed. Fraught with this indecision, Glynda remained rooted in place.
Even though she knew the consequence for lingering. That the longer she failed to decide, the more at risk Amber, Qrow, Ironwood, Ozpin and even herself would be.
And speaking of, Glynda glanced back at the man. The headmaster. And judging by the look on his face, Opzin looked like he was warring with the same dilemma.
Glynda looked back to the fight, her face twisting ever so slightly more.
Except.
Ah...
The moment she did, her blood froze, and an uncomfortable tingle slithered down her spine. The battle. It had unequivocally changed.
The masked figure.
He now had Qrow's own scythe to his neck, with Ironwood a few, no, several steps behind. I need to—
Yes; Glynda didn't think any more complicated thoughts after that. She reached out with her semblance, intent to grab that dark as night silhouette with her telekinesis.
But.
Suddenly.
That was when an almost completely inaudible and strange whistling noise filled her ears, coming from a different direction. Above.
Huh?
Confused, Glynda turned.
And, for a fraction of a second, was just in time to see the projectile's cold glint as it headed straight for her. An arrow, she somehow realized in those dreadfully and impossibly slow seconds. And. ...Oh, she thought at that moment.
That's not g—
In the next second, steel pierced flesh, two successive wet and sticky sounds filled the air, and a messy array of liquid exploded outward like a water balloon, staining the ground an unpleasant shade of crimson.
Glynda went stiff, blinking slowly in disbelief.
After all.
She was perfectly fine.
However, the person who had suddenly and without warning jumped in front of her, the one now on the other end of her widened quivering eyes, mere inches away, a hairs breadth even...
They were not.
No, 'he' was not.
And it wasn't Ozpin.
That familiar hooded cloak hiding a white mask and black hair... they had closed the distance within the blink of an eye. How, Glynda didn't know. But she couldn't focus on that right now. Not as she noticed the most jarring of changes made to his appearance.
There...
There was now an arrow sticking out of what had to be his left shoulder. Like a pitchfork jutting out from a bale of hay. Except there was no dry straw in this scenario. Wet, messy blood was quick to fill in the gaps, as if it was a sinkhole.
Glynda didn't react immediately.
She couldn't.
All she knew was that there was a very loud banging sound and—oh, of course, that was her heart.
In the next second, the shadowy figure sank to one knee with a stifled breath, and Glynda faintly realized that had to be the first time she had heard him make noise at all, and of any kind.
It caused the blonde woman to finally let out a breath of her own. And then, suddenly an even sharper one.
Because with him now kneeling down, she could now see something that she hadn't been able to see prior. And it came with hollow realization.
Earlier.
Hadn't there been two of those hideous sounds?
Another arrow, the second one, stuck out egregiously from their back.
Glynda was rooted in place, staring with her mouth parted slightly.
She swallowed, once, and when that wasn't enough she swallowed again. Her brows twitched, knitted, then furrowed completely. And it was all because of the thought that surfaced in her head, then hid, then surfaced again, again and again.
This person... protected me.
It wasn't a question.
It wasn't allowed to be.
Not with the blood—blood not her own—now dripping onto the ground, sliding eerily on blades of grass, then sinking into the soil beneath, so close Glynda's footwear almost became just as stained, the edge of Amber's blanket too—
Glynda paused.
No, she froze, again.
Then she looked up.
Those two arrows that were now bleeding red inside the body of the person in front of her... their shafts stuck audaciously out of their dark apparel... but their trajectories were low.
Left alone, and assuming she was the target, they would have viciously pierced her stomach. And with no obstruction, too, Glynda not having her aura up in that moment.
But.
That was only assuming she was the target.
Glynda swallowed, then shakily looked back down. But this time, at the brown haired girl in her arms, the one fast asleep, having no idea what just happened. No; what irreversible act had almost happened, and so soon after coming back to them.
He... for her?
Suddenly, a certain memory once again returned to Glynda's mind, that of a shady figure carefully propping a barely lucid girl along a wall, and with a blanket.
Thus, it was only natural that Glynda's eyes soon found themselves returning to a certain dark hood.
Right now, his gloved hands were gliding along where the arrow had entered skin, and all with that same pervasive silence. Glynda swallowed once more, as if in desire to say something. But nothing came out.
She was too stunned to speak... least of all move.
But that left nothing to be said for the headmaster still right beside her.
Ozpin had gone through his own flurry of emotions during the harrowing seconds it took to realize what was happening, no, what had almost happened... but as expected of someone who's lived for several millenia, he switched gears fast.
"Archer!" he roared, and with a grimace, he waved his cane and not second later, a vibrant green shield appeared out of mid air, floating protectively in front of Glynda, Amber, and... even the still kneeling form in front of them, hooded head down.
No... now ignoring the arrows, that head had twisted around at some point and was now looking up in a certain direction. But Glynda could barely focus on that. Because she just as quickly found her own gaze tracking one of the school rooftops.
There, overlooking them all, dressed in very similar dark apparel, was a figure. A person. A person who unlike a certain other, did not wear a hood, and had long dark hair that danced in the breeze. Below, there was a dark eye-mask, and then, their skintight black bodysuit.
A woman if Glynda had ever seen one, one holding a bow.
Wait, a bow?
Suddenly, a several week old testimony from Ruby... no, a several month old one from Qrow, too... they both had something silently clicking into place in Glynda's mind.
Even so, that sight above was a fleeting one, because the woman was quick to take a step back, then two, and then she had completely vanished from sight. And yet, just before...
Glynda could swear she saw that exposed mouth of hers twist downwards, and with utmost displeasure.
But still...
That was it.
A small movement returned Glynda's vision front and center. It came from Ozpin, he had taken a few steps forwards, with an indescribable expression on his face. And he wasn't staring at the roof anymore. He was staring at... Oh, Glynda realized.
The now slightly more familiar darkness of that cloak, and whoever was underneath... that person was now standing several steps away, silently staring up at where their other mystery person had disappeared off to.
Even...
Even as his own blood continued to drip onto the ground.
The arrows.
Naturally, they hadn't moved.
They were still very much in his body.
A strange silence filled the air.
No one moved.
Ozpin was still wearing a long look, brow furrowed. Same with Ironwood, a distance away, but he looked like he was trying to swallow something, and with great difficulty.
Qrow, on the other hand, didn't hide his shock in the slightest, having not moved from that of his scythe that had been so suddenly and without warning dropped at his feet.
But Glynda...
She continued to stare at that figure clad in both silence and obscurity, and with an expression that very much looked like she was on the cusp of asking something. And, as if somehow aware of this, the gazeless look of that hood and mask turned, meeting Glynda's stare.
Glynda opened her mouth.
Then, she closed it.
She opened it again...
But still, nothing came out.
Suddenly, the girl in her arms stirred. Amber shifted in place a bit. And... the blanket that had not been down in the basement prior to Glynda and them leaving it... it shifted right along with her.
The blonde woman glanced back up.
And... blinked.
The reason was simple.
The person, the cloak, hood, and mask; they all hadn't moved.
And yet, a small part of them had.
Perhaps it was the light of the nearby lamps. Perhaps it was even the moon. But, in that moment, Glynda saw it clearly. Head now tilted, that previously expressionless mouth just below the mask...
There was a ghost of a smile.
But then it was gone.
"...Ah."
No, and then that mouth seemed to mouth something silently, the air shimmered, and then they themselves were gone. Yes. There one moment, gone the next, there was no longer anyone standing there.
Just a stunned blonde professor, her three just as mollified colleagues, a sleepy girl, and Beacon's deafeningly quiet nighttime landscape, open and bare, without so much as a single shadow out of place.