Kip was waiting outside, and Penny had just come back out and found him.
"I killed them all," she said. Then she landed. "I don't really get tired, but I seem to be having some trouble regenerating Aura as quickly."
"My mother enhanced my Aura regeneration," Kip said.
"Ah," Penny said. "Well, because I have less than a human, my father made sure most of me runs on other things, but you know, you can't run forever on anything but Aura. Until you die..."
Kip sighed. "Sometimes Aura isn't enough either. My mother always admired the Penny Project because she said that a mechanical body with a human soul would be the perfect way to make sure no one ever got sick or old. But the only problem was you couldn't make more people...easily."
"She said that to you?" Penny was well aware of how biology worked, but her father had told her not to talk about it in polite company.
"Why not?" Kip said.
"Oh...nevermind." Penny didn't care to explain. "I don't hear any yelling... Are they all right?"
"I think so," Kip said.
Penny was on the point of going in after them anyway, but then Hamish and Libby scrambled out of the grate, and then pulled the others out.
One could only imagine what Kip thought when his mother followed them all out.
In the open sun, Victoria was covered in dirt and what might have been oil and looked like she hadn't slept in 4 days, but she was still hopped up on dust, and you'd never have known she was tired by looking at her.
Kip froze.
Penny, perceptive enough to know this was not good, stepped in front of him.
"I'm sorry," Pyrrha mouthed at them behind Hamish.
"Look who we found," Meridian said, cheerfully.
"Kip!" Victoria locked on him.
Kip backed up.
"What's the matter?" Victoria said.
"He's afraid of you." Penny frowned at her. "Because you're mean!"
"I don't need a robot to tell me I'm mean," Victoria said.
"Yes," Pyrrha said. "You should be able to tell yourself that."
Hamish and Meridian choked on a laugh.
"Pyrrha," Jaune hissed.
Victoria turned to give Pyrrha a deadly look. "What did you just say to me?"
Pyrrha didn't flinch.
"I don't mean to tell you how to be a parent," she said, "but the first thing you should be telling your son is 'I'm sorry' after all the terrible things you made him be a part of. You wanted to see him, but that doesn't mean we're going to just let you take him. He's terrified of you."
"He never was till you people messed with his head!" Victoria said.
"Oh, come on," Weiss said. "Take it from someone who's left both their parents. If you were a good mother, no one could have convinced him to leave you that easily."
"Oooh..." Meridian winced. "Is that what I sound like?" he asked Hamish.
"Nay, she's way more well spoken," Hamish repiled.
"Guys," Jaune said, "I know Meridian's kinda affecting us, but can we not try to make her kill us all?"
"I think Kip can speak for himself anyway," Penny said. "Right, Kip?"
Kip swallowed. "Hello...Mother."
Victoria turned to him. "Well?" she demanded.
Kip rubbed his hands nervously. "I only came back here to save the kingdom because these are my new friends," he said. "I don't want to go home. They're right. You're...you're scary. And what you did to those nice ladies, it was awful. They've been really sick."
"Whatever are you talking about?" Victoria said.
"My sister!" Weiss snapped at her. "Let me tell you something, crazy lady--thanks to your horrible experiments, their Aura was off balance for days! It was terrible. They were weak, and they almost died, and Raven's been turning into a bird randomly off and on, and do you know how much pain Vara is in all the time? And Cinder--not that I care--but her arm never did grow back, and she was messed up too, only that was probably for the best, but the others didn't deserve that."
"Well, if you had waited for me to remedy it, that wouldn't have happened," Victoria said.
"Newsflash!" Weiss gestured wildly. "If what you're doing to someone is already hurting them, fixing it later doesn't make it better that you did it! It's called basic morality, you lunatic!"
"Weiss," Jaune hissed, "stop it."
Victoria looked at Weiss like she might fry her.
"She's right!" Kip burst out. "It was wrong!"
"You all don't understand why I do what I do," Victoria said.
"I think I do," Pyrrha said, "because you think it's right. Because it's necessary. I understand. I've done awful things for that reason too... You don't want to get someone killed over it though, Ma'am."
"Don't I know you?" Victoria suddenly glanced at her. "Not just from before... Wait, aren't you Pyrrha Nikos? From the cereal box?"
Pyrrha sighed.
"Look," Jaune said to Penny and Kip, "I know how you both feel about Kanap, but she's got a handle on the Apathy situation, so can we call a truce till we stop them, then sort out our problems with her? I hate to say it, but she's still less dangerous than them."
"If she is willing to help, I don't object," Penny said. "But being forgiving is usually easier for me than for humans."
With a cold look, for her.
Kip sighed, but, glancing at the kingdom over his shoulder, he said, "I guess it's more important to save Vacuo for now."
"Look at it this way," Meridian said to Victoria, "if you want your son back, you'd better convince him you're not absolutely mental. Good way to do that is to help us save Vacuo and not give him crap for running away from your horror house."
"For her what?" Hamish said. "Mer!"
"What? No, I meant h-o-r-r-o-r," Meridian said.
"Oh." Hamish looked relieved.
"I have to clear out the Apathy, whatever you idiots do," Victoria sniffed. "Don't try to bargain with me. But if you can make yourselves useful, I could use help."
"You could--" Weiss began, but Jaune interrupted.
"Do you know where they came in from?"
"Not exactly," Victoria said. "But I can tell you where the bulk of them are holed up."
She held up her scanner. "I've been trying to get there since yesterday. There's a giant cluster of them under Shade directly. Has to be in the Vault. I fought my way right to the entrance. Couldn't get in past that. One thing I can't understand is that they seem to replenish almost as fast as I can blow them up--also I'm just about out of fuel. I need to get to my old workshop--the one you set on fire."
"I thought you cleared it out," Weiss frowned.
"I took most of my stuff out of it, but I might have some dust and tools still lying around it," Victoria said. "Unless you have a better way to get weapons or a workshop I can use for the next 48 hours."
"We don't have 48 hours," Jaune said.
"Right you are," Victoria said, just as if that had been her point. "The Apathy is influxing exponentially. They're coming from somewhere, that's for sure. My estimation says that they will have finished this kingdom off by the end of tomorrow at the latest, possibly sooner. And if I don't restock, I'll go down with it. And you won't even last that long."
Cheerful.
"We have to find them ourselves," Pyrrha said. "Or we'll never save the kingdom. I have something that might be able to stop it."
She held up her vial of water. "Can you find it? With...whatever that is."
"Tracker," Victoria said. "I assume you don't know that Grimm have a specific heat signature that you can trace... Incompetent morons."
"I'm still not sure what she just said before," Meridian said.
"Accent not working fer you?" Hamish asked. "Or was it the big words? Because that's got me."
"She said that the Apathy are increasing way faster than we can kill them," Weiss said. "But I don't know how they can just move in so quickly. Is there another river of Grimm?"
"That is the most likely explanation, isn't it?" Pyrrha said. "What else could be moving them so fast?"
"After what we saw in Beacon...a lot," Jaune said.
"Pardon?" Victoria said.
"It sounds like the place to check is the school," Penny said. "And my father is there, so we can help with that also. Besides, Headmaster Theodore was heading there."
"Polendina was at the school?" Victoria said.
"We think so," Jaune said.
Victoria gave Penny a very long look.
"Well, he's dead," she said.
"Excuse me?" Pyrrha cried in horror.
"No way he survived that," Victoria said flatly. "Sorry, robot kid. Do you have human emotions? You do, right? It's a shame. He was a brilliant scientist."
"My father is not dead!" Penny cried.
"The Apathy drain your Aura," Victoria said. "There is no way he had enough to last even a few hours, not that close. Science is hard to argue with."
"But it's possible he could have left," Pyrrha said quickly. "Why assume the worst?"
"He wouldn't have wanted to. Did you miss how these things work?" Victoria said. "That's the worst of it--the more danger you're in, the less you care. Don't lie to her, girl. Might as well face the facts."
"You shelter your own son so much, but you're just going to talk to Penny like that?" Weiss said. "What is wrong with you?"
"Well, if you've been outside in this kingdom, I imagine you've already seen more than enough to destroy my son's innocence," Victoria said angrily. "So why not return the favor, Schnee? Am I offending your delicate sensibilities?"
"What if you are--?" Weiss began.
"All right, break it up," Meridian interrupted. "I love a good fight, but this ain't helping anything, and we're wasting time. I say we head to the school and clear out the Grimm under that. Then we'll know for sure. And if crazy lady here can help us blow them up without having to get close, I say we let her. Move it, people."
They got moving.
Penny looked on edge.
"I'm sure..." Pyrrha began, then she stopped. "Penny, if there's anything we can do to help, just let us know."
"Thank you," Penny said. "But I think I just need to see for myself. I'll meet you all there."
She flew away.
"Firstly, stop by my workshop," Victoria said. "It's not that far from here and en route to the school. And on the way you can tell me what happened in Beacon, because it sounded important."
There was no reason not to fill her in, so they did.
* * *
Theo and Shine moved up the stairs to the office like they were running through wet cement.
Theo almost didn't make it all the way. He sank down. Shine had to jab him with her sword point. That got him up.
Finally, he got to the door and opened it.
The office was much as they left it. He stuck the key in the lock.
The door slid open.
They didn't expect the Apathy to be at the top of the stairs already.
Shine screamed as they emerged out of the hole before either of them could do anything to stop it.
At least the burst of fear helped undo the effects for a moment. Theo jumped back and pulled out a grenade.
The Apathy did their weird hypnotic screech.
Shine covered her ears.
Theo sank to the floor.
["Sound of Silence" AMV by Holy Schneet]
Perhaps it was Shine's gift of Insight, but she actually heard words in her head, almost audibly.
So tired, so tired...
It was like a slithering hiss that was somehow chilling and hypnotic at the same time.
The whole kingdom will sleep. All of you will sleep forever. Sleep of death... Why fight a losing battle? You will never win... Might as well just give up...
The words seemed to go around their heads and press on their chest so they couldn't even speak.
Getting inside their heads and trying to make their voices cooperate... Just agree with it. Just give up... It's fine. It's fine...
[If you will recall that Blake began doing that in Volume 6, you'll understand.]
Shine was pretty sure they weren't actually speaking. She thought her mind was translating what they were beaming at them into words, much like with Ozpin's speaking in Oscar's head. But it sounded so loud, she really could have sworn to it they were actually talking.
It was weirdly convincing for something that should have been raising all kinds of red flags.
The fact that she still knew it was a voice, however, meant she wasn't actually under their spell yet, but Theo's eyes had gone very dim.
He'd dropped his weapon.
"Forget it, Likstar," he said, sounding just like them. "It's pointless... It doesn't matter."
Coming here alone was a mistake, Shine thought dimly. But nothing to do about it now.
Her mind was going pretty blank, but a thread of verse came into it, and though it was as difficult as moving a 100 lb weight, she began to whisper the words, almost on instinct.
"The Lord is my light and my salvation;
"Whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the strength of my life;
Of whom shall I be afraid?
When the wicked came against me
To eat up my flesh,
My enemies and foes,
They stumbled and fell.
Though an army may encamp against me,
My heart shall not fear;
Though war may rise against me,
In this I will be confident...
"Do not deliver me to the will of my adversaries;
For false witnesses have risen against me,
And such as breathe out violence. I would have lost heart, unless I had believed
That I would see the goodness of the Lord
In the land of the living. Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart..." [From Psalm 27]
Her sword arm was plastered to the floor by the sheer weight, and the Apathy was reaching forward.
The blade flashed blinding light suddenly, and the creatures seemed to be vaporized in an instant.
Theo blinked and sat up.
"What was that?" he sputtered.
"Throw it down there, you idiot." Shine found her voice was working again.
Theo pulled the pin out and tossed the grenade down the steps.
They heard the explosion and black smoke rose out of the hole.
But Shine could feel that there were more down there.
"We cannot go down there alone," she said. "Come on." She stumbled to her feet and ran for the office door.
Theo decided to listen to her for once and followed.
"We're leaving the door open," he said.
"Doesn't matter. If they follow us, we'll be able to see them better, but they don't seem to like the sun," Shine said.
True enough, the Apathy didn't seem to care to follow them. [See what I did there?]
Running to the bottom of the stairs, they met Vara coming out of the hall that led to the holding cells.
She was pushing Ironwood ahead of her.
"And Schnee?" Theo panted.
"Couldn't wake him up," Vara said slowly. "Might have been alive, but I can't haul that guy's a-- out alone. Enough work to get this one."
Ironwood wasn't really doing much. He had a blank stare and moved mechanically.
Shine hit him with her sword, and his pupils dilated a bit more.
"What's going on?" he said.
"We're having the life sucked out of us," Theo said. "And we're not--"
"If you make a joke right now, I swear I'm going to murder you," Vara cut him off.
"Outside," Shine said. "Now!"
Somehow, they stumbled outside. Hazel was still waiting.
"It's too strong," Shine said, panting. "Can't go in like this...going to need a new plan. Also, I think we might be overtaxed."
She fell over.
Vara pursed her lips.
"All right, time to do this my way."
She held up her hands, and a dust devil swirled around her and then became a whirlwind that grew into a miniature cyclone.
The sky darkened overhead.
The cyclone swirled them all up inside itself and began to move over the kingdom, knocking things over along the way.
Then it dropped them all into the waterpool at the oasis, where a handful of people were waiting, slightly more alert than before.
Winter was waiting here. She hadn't gone back to the camp, but retreat had been necessary to try to regain her energy--so far it wasn't working as fast as she'd hoped.
"What are you doing?" she demanded of Vara.
"Quick escape, Ice Queen." Vara landed carefully.
Ironwood came awake sharply, splashing water every direction, and some hit her.
"Ah!" she yelled at the cold and shuddered.
A bird flew over. Winter shielded her eyes and thought it was Raven's size. She must have followed the cyclone.
Sure enough, a moment later she appeared in a tree and slid down.
"What was that?" she asked. "Did you get 'em?"
"No." Shine was wiping water out of her eyes. "Too many. They were waiting right under the office door. They expected us to show up there. It was risky to begin with, but I couldn't have lasted too long against them. Theo was already in a trance."
Theo crawled out of the water and sat down, looking shaken for him.
"Hey..." Vara sounded way softer than usual. "You okay, babe?"
Theo shook his head and wiped the hair out of his face. "I've never felt anything like that... It was inside my head, but it felt like my voice too. I guess...if your worst fears stopped scaring you and just became something you accept as inevitable? That's what it was like..."
Winter shook her head.
"To think that's how those people died..." she said quietly.
"I don't think so." Shine wrung out her hair. "I think the slow asphyxiation just makes you sleep and never want to get up...but when it's in your face like that, you can't just think there's no danger, so it takes a bit more sinister form. I could hear it in my head, like my worst fears playing on repeat. Only to me it didn't sound like me, it sounded evil."
She shivered. "It's cold out here somehow."
"That would be the shock. It's actually sweltering." Winter's face was pink from the heat, which said a lot.
Raven swallowed and then shook herself. "So how do we stop it then?"
"We're going to have to let the others tag in," Shine said.
Winter's scroll suddenly buzzed.
"It's Pyrrha," she said. She answered it.
After a second of listening, she said, "What?!"
Then they heard Pyrrha say, "Let me explain!"
Winter listened again and then sighed. "If she can help...but the school is under worse siege than we realized... Even Shine couldn't stand it for long. We're going to need a better plan... What? Oh, I forgot about that."
She looked up. "Pyrrha says that she used that special water, and it seemed to stop the effects."
Shine nodded. "That's right. I forgot about that... How much does she have left?"
Winter repeated this to Pyrrha.
"About 1/3 of it," she said, looking up. "It was a small vial. That won't go far."
"Tell her to regroup with us here," Shine said.
She sighed.
Winter told Pyrrha that.
"Just one problem," she added. "They found Kanap."
"What?!" Raven and Vara both cried, and Theo looked up.
"Apparently, she's helping them," Winter said, like saying that made her feel sick. "The reason being, this is her home also, so for now we have a common problem. I don't know if we can trust her, but there's no Maiden with her right now, so I suppose she has no motive to capture them...I hope. She wanted to pick up some tools."
"We're in no position to say no to her," Shine said. "She can come if she behaves herself. Is Kip all right though?"
"I don't know, but he must be there," Winter sighed, then to Pyrrha, "She can come with you, but hurry."
Then, looking up, she said, "One more thing--Kanap estimates that we have till tomorrow at the latest to stop this Apathy before the kingdom is completely succumbed...and considering that would mean everyone, not just those who are already on death's door... To save the most lives, we'd have to act immediately. And we couldn't move the ones who were the most far gone."
"I figured out what this plague is," Shine said, flatly. "The last one. Death. Just not of the firstborn...though the oldest people are probably the most affected. The one that could only be stopped by the mark of the Lord...which would have been the music we left, since it deters Grimm... At least it might have created safe havens that could have spared some people. If these stupid citizens hadn't taken them down."
She sounded so bitter there, it caught them off guard.
Some of the civilians looked at her irritatedly, but then they looked ashamed.
"That's true," Vara said strangely. "To think...we could have stopped this."
She stared at Vacuo. "If they'd just...done what they were told to do. That hurt me to say, but...are you saying that we brought this on ourselves?"
"Those were left to protect you from the Grimm attacks," Shine straightened and spoke angrily. "We knew Salem would probably retaliate, so we left a safeguard to at least mitigate it...and it would have helped. Maybe not the whole thing, but it could have made it a fraction of the people. Why didn't you listen?!"
They stared at her.
"This was your fault!" Shine added, nearly choking. "Not just hers. It wasn't ours--"
"Shine." Wally was suddenly there. He'd been circling, still, and had seen what was happening.
He put a hand on her shoulder.
Shine stopped talking and turned to lean on him.
"Come on." Wally led her away from the crowd.
The three Maidens and Theo exchanged looks.
"Frankly, they deserved that," Raven said.
"That's not what bothers me," Winter said. "She's lectured us all many times when we deserved it, and I didn't mind that, but that sounded more like she was just too upset not to say it. It wasn't calculated to help, it was..."
"Just real emotions? So?" Vara said. "I thought you were with her on that. Yeah, she blew up. It happens."
She kicked the sand. "I could tear my own hair out, then set it on fire and throw it at whoever stole those parts."
"That...was quite a visual..." Raven said weirdly.
"Please don't," Theo muttered. "Bald is not a good look for you."
"I hope that means you're feeling better," Vara said to him.
"I'm not, but we can't sit around feeling sorry for ourselves." Theo stood up. "People could be dying as we speak."
"Good news--" Mai suddenly walked up. "Did get one of those stands back up. It's working. People are waking up. I mean, obviously." She gestured at herself.
Robyn and the Ace Ops were already dragging people from other tents towards the right area and getting them water.
They'd run out of the buckets Nora and Pyrrha had left them already, and had to use it sparingly anyway, mostly on the Huntresses, but at least they were all mobile and helping.
And some of them had started dealing with the people who were already dead.
* * *
"Are you going to be okay?" Wally asked Shine after just walking in silence for a few minutes.
"I shouldn't have lost it like that." Shine pushed wet hair out of her face. "I...I've never seen this before, and when I realized it could have been prevented by what we did do--I just saw red. We didn't fail, they did...but they paid for it, and we've all paid for it too."
Wally knew Shine didn't really mean this.
"You know, Shine, I've gotta tell you something," he said, "people are really, really stupid a lot of the time."
Shine gave him a look and then almost stifled a laugh. "That was what you had to tell me?"
"Yeah, it's true, sorry," Wally said. "When the danger isn't there, we're really dumb. I don't know why. It's like we don't want to think it's real. I guess I kind of see why that is--who wants to live in fear? But...yeah, they're dumb. And selfish. And greedy. And it's not fair. But what I like to tell myself when I want to slap them is that maybe they are like that, but here I am, with all these people who still went out of their way to help someone they didn't even know and who risk their lives to save people, as nasty as they are. And sometimes, those people you save, they save others because it catches on. So you can spread good, or you can spread bad, but you can't call it for sure. So for that chance, that's why we go in every time and save them. Maybe those people were Grade A morons who stole that stuff, but there's a lot of them who weren't that dumb, who tried to help. They just didn't succeed. So we're here. To me, that's what it's about."
Shine pursed her lips.
"You're right," she said.
"I am?" Wally had kind of expected her to put up more of a fight than that.
"Yeah," Shine shrugged, shivering. "You're right. It's not that simple. Humanity is not the sum of what the most foolish of them do. Sorry. I...don't know what's gotten into me."
"Uh, you just saw something horrible," Wally said. "And believe me, I get it. I feel the same way every time. But that's why you have friends to help you pull yourself out of it."
He pulled her into a hug. "Don't beat yourself up. I know you're going to be all right after this...eventually. But if you need to sit it out, that's okay. You did enough."
"Thanks," Shine said slowly. "But I'm the leader. I can't just do that."
She drew a deep breath. "You guys will have to tag in, but someone has to take over... I'm sure that the Grimm will soon be on the Relics. Can you bring them here?"
"You got it." Wally gave her a guns up.
He raced away.
* * *
The Relic group had been watching the horizon for Grimm and were surprised that none had shown up yet.
"So this really works?" Glynda glanced at the scroll they were playing music off of.
"Seems stupid, but apparently," Mercury said.
"I've heard theories that Grimm will attack less during festive occasions," Glynda said. "But they've never been proven to really work. Grimm are not always predictable."
"Ever wonder how much of that is Salem being bored?" Tai asked.
"Yeah, the way Grimm mostly act one way, but suddenly don't, makes you wonder," Yang muttered.
"I still don't know why we're not helping," Coco complained.
"We told you, we're following the plan," Neptune said.
"And why should we follow this plan? I don't understand it at all," Coco said.
"You don't have to. You're not the ones doing it," Emerald said. "Just stop."
"Excuse me?" Coco said. "Did I ask you, cheater?"
"Like we'd need to cheat to kick your a--," Mercury said. "Buzz off, Brownie Points."
"I don't understand that one at all," Velvet said.
[It's funny because Team CFVY are all named after different desserts.]
Wally startled them all by running up.
"All right, backup squad," he called, waving. "We're needed. All of you load up. We're going to Vacuo."
"But we just left Vacuo," Fox said.
"Join the club," Yang said.
"What happened?" Tai said. "They didn't succeed?"
"Well, yes and no," Wally said. "Come on, onto the plane."
They all started to move onto it.
Qrow suddenly flew down, and then he stopped in front of some trees.
"I thought I saw something," he said.
He stuck his sword in, and something blasted it out of his hands.
"I know that angry magic." Wally stopped. "Cindy? Is that you?"
A very reluctant and salty looking Cinder stepped out of the trees.
"What?" Yang said. "Are you serious? How did you even follow us?"
Cinder shrugged.
"I mean, she probably just followed the pull of the Relics," Wally said. "And the Grimm that are, like, circling all around this area, right?"
"How did you know that?" Cinder asked.
"I don't know, I guess I'm kind of developing a 6th sense of it," Wally said. "You've all been stalking us since Beacon, right? Still, I'm amazed you flew that long, unless you rode one of those things... Gross."
"She was stupid to get this close." Qrow picked his sword back up.
"I know you're about to say that we shouldn't kill her," Yang said to Wally, "but I hope you're not going to say we should--"
"--Bring her," Wally said. "Exactly. Let's sort it out later."
"I'm not going with you," Cinder said.
Wally held up his hand like he was counting on it.
"1," he said, "you absolutely will if I make you, and we both know it. 2, you had to figure we'd know you were following us and knew this would happen. 3, Shine already told us to let you know if you show up that we should talk--and we're planning to go stop Salem after this business is over, and you're invited to hop on. She said you wouldn't want to miss it."
"And just how do you think you're going to do that?" Cinder asked. "And why would I want to help you anymore?"
"I mean, if you want to trust yourself with the Grimm once Salem locks on the Maidens being here," Wally shrugged, "that's on you. Pick a nice person to give the Fall powers to, by the way. We're getting really sick of them."
It was hard to believe Wally, the "nice" one, just said that.
"Dang..." Neptune said.
Cinder clenched a fist.