Chapter 226: RWBY Prime—Hero from Another World (12)

Chapter 226: RWBY Prime—Hero from Another World (12)

~Third POV~

Inside a restaurant kitchen, May Marigold leaned over a map on the counter, speaking over a communication device.

While she talks, Ruby, Weiss, Oscar, Maria, and Joanna walk inside and head across the kitchen listening in to May's words, "I know, Sector 3 is going to need the most help. I'm sending a backup your way right now. Fiona, do you copy? We need transport from Sector 3 to the crater."

Fiona responded back to May through her Scroll, "Copy!"

In the dining area, Jaune Arc, Yang Xiao Long, Blake Belladonna, Lie Ren, and Nora Valkyrie are sitting at tables while Penny and Pietro watch the news.

The news network is displaying a 'Fugitives' notice for Team RWBY, Team JNPR, Oscar, Maria, Penny, and Pietro. "—Once heroes, are now fugitives on the run. Many in Mantle are left to wonder what the future will—"

As Ruby's group enters the room, Nora turns and stands from her chair, smiling. She approaches Oscar, who recoils in fear, turning his head to the side, closing his eyes, and putting his hands up to stop the tackle that he assumes is coming.

Instead, Nora calmly walks over and hugs him, much to his surprise. He relaxes and hugs back, and Weiss and Ruby smile at the scene with Blake speaking her voice albeit shaking, "When we heard you went off after Ironwood on your own, we…"

Nora lets go and walk away as Weiss was curious how Oscar was in the slums, "How did you end up down in the slums?"

Oscar sighs at this as he responds to Weiss's question in a tired tone, "It's a… sigh, long story. I get the feeling there's been a few of those tonight."

Everyone looks at Penny, who looks down at her hands with Ozpin in Oscar's mind talking to him, 'You're not going to tell them?'

Oscar in his mind responded to the immortal wizard, 'You and I aren't done talking yet.'

Oscar's eyes widen slightly as he realizes someone is missing from the group voicing out the elephant in the room, "Where's Qrow?"

Ren, Blake, and Yang lower their gazes, and Jaune looks toward Blake and Yang before looking down, as well with Ruby answering, "We don't know. The last we heard he was with Robyn, but…"

Joanna enters from the kitchen as she walks further into the room to stand in front of them talking to them, "Alright, your friend is back now. You ready to work?"

She is met with silence as Joanna turns to look through a box of supplies and continues talking to them, "Sigh… The largest Grimm horde ever seen is hovering over the tundra, and out there is a city full of people with no heat and, from what you told us, no more military protection. And while we're happy to give you guys a place to lie low for a while… It's time to get those people some help."

Ren responds in a lost tone feeling pressured by the turns of events happening, "How? Ironwood is stopping all evacuations to Atlas. And we can't get them out of the city with Salem's forces surrounding us."

Joanna responds to them an answer with a hint of seriousness in her tone, "The crater. Beneath Atlas. It's not safe, but it's warm, and with everyone in one place, we can do a better job protecting them. May can send you where you're needed most. We've got to get everyone down into that crater before nightfall. In the slums, we might have a chance."

She turns and heads back toward the kitchen but manages to hear Weiss's words, "We're never going to sleep again, I just know it."

Joanna stops with her hand on the door and turns to look at Weiss making her point across in the current situation, "Either you're helping… or your baggage."

She then exits into the kitchen. Yang gets up and moves to stand in front of everyone voicing out her own thoughts, "We need to get out there and do what we can for Mantle."

Ruby begins speaking, to Yang about the seriousness of their situation of helping everyone, "We need to do what we can for everyone. What about Amity? And telling the world about Salem? We can't do this alone. We need help."

Blake joins Ruby's side of wanting to help everyone thinking of the bigger picture ahead of them, "Ruby's right. The Happy Huntresses are handling the evacuation better than we could. And there's a bigger picture."

Yang argues back to them about their hopes of shooting for Amity as she spoke out, "But Amity isn't even finished. It was still under construction."

Ruby turns to Pietro asking him in a curious tone what they need to get their goal of bringing Amity up and running, "Doctor? What would you need to launch Amity now?"

Pietro suddenly in the spotlight thought quickly before finally responding to Ruby's request about her plans with Amity, "Uh... We've made decent progress on construction and fuel collection, all potentially manageable, but uh… hm… Amity was designed so it couldn't launch itself without first being granted clearance from General Ironwood's terminal."

Yang turns to Ruby with her arms crossed and lowers her arms as she speaks, "Ruby, there is no way Ironwood will cooperate with us."

Ruby, meanwhile, is thinking before finally responding to Yang's words, "But he doesn't have to. We just need the green light from his terminal, right?"

Yang shocked talked to Ruby in clear surprise and a hint of annoyance, "You want to go back to the academy?"

Pietro thinks a bit before responding that Ruby's plan is actually possible voicing out to them all, "Actually… there is more than one terminal. The one in his office and uh… one in the main Atlesian Military Compound… at the base of the city. You'd have to get into the compound somehow, then, uh, get inside the operations room, and then… hoo boy… I might need to think about this some more."

Oscar looks at Ruby certainly wanting to verify with her about her plan, "And just to clarify, this is the easy option?"

Yang in not believing in Ruby's plan would voice out her disagreement with her younger sister's plans, "What you're saying is it can't be done. It's pointless. And even if you got the message out, there's no guarantee help would come."

Ruby becomes annoyed while Yang speaks responding back to her what's needed to be done, "It's not pointless! Atlas is only Salem's current target. She's not hiding anymore and once she's done here; she'll move on to the rest of Remnant. We need to warn them!"

Yang stands in silence for a moment before finally speaking to her about what she really thinks along with following her, "Ruby… when we came here, we said we'd follow your lead… but... things haven't exactly worked out."

Ruby recoils somewhat with a mix of emotions on her face. Yang's statement elicits various reactions from Weiss, Nora, Oscar, and Penny, as well as she tries to continue, "I just—"

Ren steps forward, interrupting Yang about what they need to focus on, "There are people here who need us right now. That's something we can actually do."

Nora on the other hand fully believes in Ruby's plans voicing out and warning everyone, "But this isn't about just Atlas. Ruby's right. It's about all of Remnant. They need to know in Vacuo, in Mistral, in Vale, what's coming. So, they can prepare."

Jaune steps between Ren and Nora, putting his hands up to each of them gesturing to Nora and then to Ren as he speaks, "Okay. Okay… Then let's go for both. Get Amity up and running and evacuate Mantle."

Ruby voices out being divided apart, of Salem's plans in concern falling into them, "But that's how Salem got this far - by dividing us. We have to stick together."

Oscar disagrees with Ruby's concerns as he voices out that isn't her attention, "No. What Salem wants is to turn us against each other. Just like this. Jaune has a point. We can work separately and still be united."

Penny interjects her idea getting everyone's attention to her about it, "Or… let me take the Relic to Salem… and maybe she will call off her attack on the Kingdom."

Oscar shakes her head at Penny's idea of Salem sparing them for the Relic, "I don't think we can trust Salem to actually do that. And the moment she uses the Staff to create anything else, Atlas falls onto Mantle."

Yang gave a stern look toward Ruby and Nora agreeing to one thing to them, "Nobody's turning you over to anybody. I think that's the one thing we could all agree on."

Ruby sighs in agreement as she turns her head to Pietro asking him, "Okay. Then I guess we're going to Atlas. Can you help us get to that terminal?"

Pietro stops for a bit before finally responding to Ruby, "I… suppose someone needs to help you bypass security."

Penny softly but firmly volunteers herself to help Ruby's goal, "I'll go."

Pietro looks at Penny, who has her back turned trying to stop her, "Penny, we can't risk—"

Penny turns to look at him, activating the Maiden flares in her eyes with a determined expression speaking out, "I'll go."

Yang sighs at this beginning to respond to them and do what she's doing, "Do what you've got to do. I'm going out there to see what I could do."

Yang begins walking toward the kitchen, and Blake watches her with a sad expression but Pietro stops her a bit before calling her name, "Yang."

Yang stops and looks at Pietro, who tosses her a key. As she looks at the key, the view changes again to future Yang, who looks at Pietro's pharmacy explaining to her, "Go by the pharmacy. I was developing some new tools for you all before… this happened. You're going to need them."

Ren stops a bit seeing Nora by Ruby's side, "Nora?"

Nora responds to Ren with a determined eye along with her voice to match, "I'm going with Ruby."

Ren questions about saving Mantle to Nora hoping to join, "But what about Mantle?"

Nora voices out what she will do in saving people making the group separate their ways, "Oh, I'm saving Mantle! Because I actually believe we can do this."

/////

*THUD*

Landing down on the ground with spy drones coming down seeing the unknown Bullhead reaching down Mantle with Ruby, Jack, Pyrrha, and Penny coming out in their disguise with masks on them.

Jack eyes the spy drone before pointing his finger at it and using <Shigan> at it.

*Pew*

*BOOM*

Piercing right through the spy drone Jack voices his concern to his group about how to go about them saving people, "Ok girls how do we go about saving both Mantle and Atlas? Not going to be long before reinforcements arrive."

Ruby thinks for a bit before finally responding to Jack about separating from her idea, "There is too much to cover by ourselves. How about divide and conquer? Two stay here to deal with Mantle and the other on Atlas."

The three agreed with Penny responding to the two with a serious expression on her face, "Of course. I will stay here and defend Mantle. I have to make sure the people are safe and in need of technical support."

Readying her own rifle and activating it Pyrrha began to team up with Penny assisting the people of Mantle, "I agree with Penny. I'll stay here and provide support. Jack, you are best suited to deal with Atlas."

Jack nodded with prior knowledge and known hacking prowess with him holding but gazes his eyes at Ruby contemplating a bit before finally agreeing, "Of course. Someone got to take care of the little cookie monster."

"Argh!"

Falling down at that Ruby slammed her fist at Jack while he spoke to Pyrrha and Penny, "In any case please be careful you two."

Penny and Pyrrha nodded as the two pairs began to split up going on their own objectives needed to be done.