Chapter 25: -Chapter 25-
-Last Time-
*Thwip* *Squelch*
Neo stumbled back slightly as she felt something strike her in the waist, before gasping silently as she felt a sudden searing pain flood through her body. Reaching for the affected area by instinct, the ice-cream themed girl blinked in surprise as her hand clasped around an obsidian arrow that was firmly embedded into her lower torso on the opposite side that Naruto was leaning on.
Knowing only one person who used such a weapon, a sneer crossed her lips as she glared at the direction the arrow came, barely even registering as Ruby and Naruto called out her name in shock and worry.
'You fucking bitch,' She mouthed before collapsing.
-And Now-
"Neo-chan?!" "Neo!?" Naruto and Ruby shouted in shock as their friend was struck down, the former catching the ice-cream themed girl before she could hit the ground with one of his tails.
Ruby moved to help, but she only made it three steps before suddenly skipping back as another arrow zipped right past her face. Remembering the danger they were still in, the raven-redhead drew Crescent Rose in sniper mode and fired blindly in the direction the arrows had come from.
Meanwhile Naruto was trying to help Neo, his eight free tails reflexively forming a fluffy barrier between them and the incoming projectiles. "Are you okay Neo-chan?"
Neo rolled her eyes at the stupid question, unable to help herself even as she started coughing up blood.
Of course she wasn't okay! She had a fucking arrow in her gut!
Despite that though, she lied to the boy and nodded her head a little while trying to sit up, only to fall back down as pain seared through her body. Knowing that a wound like this wouldn't hurt this much normally, Neo reached down and pulled the arrow free with a silent hiss before frowning when she saw the green tint on the barbed arrowhead.
Poison, just as she thought, how fucking perfect.
Before she could contemplate the severity of how screwed she was any more, Neo was jarred from her thoughts as Ruby ran up to them. "We need to get out of here. Now!" The scythe wielder said while pulling Neo's up to her feet and slinging the injured girl's arm over her shoulders.
The reason for the girl's urgency was clear as dozens of armed men and women wearing grim masks started coming into view from behind the storage containers the arrows had been coming from, all of them armed with various guns and explosives. Ruby knew that there was no way she could take on that many people at once while protecting both Naruto and Neo, so their only option was to retreat.
However, any hopes of escape were immediately squashed as even more White Fang members revealed themselves at every possibly exit. Trapped, the trio could do nothing as more and more of the faunus extremists surrounded them from all angles.
"Oh crap," Ruby said with a pale face, her head swiveling as she desperately looked for a way out of their current situation, only to find none.
"O-oba-chan, what do we do?" Naruto asked nervously as the masked faunus continued to get closer and closer.
"I… I… don't know." Ruby muttered, her brain running through a hundred different yet insanely crazy plans that were basically guaranteed to fail, such as using her semblance to charge through the enemy lines while carrying Naruto and Neo.
All too soon though, the reality of the situation settled in and the cookie loving girl let Neo fall off into Naruto's grasp do she could heft up Crescent Rose up and activated its scythe mode. Twirling the large weapon once in her grasp, she got in front of the ice-cream girl and nine-tailed boy protectively as the White Fang members trained their guns on her.
'Guess this is it for me,' Ruby thought while she cocked the gun portion of her war-scythe. 'Looks like I'll be reuniting with you a lot sooner than I expected Mom, hope you have a plate of cookies ready for me.'
"Fire!" One of the masked faunus yelled before the entire area Naruto, Neo, and Ruby were standing was engulfed with explosions and bullets.
For several minutes the White Fang members continued to shoot, filling the air with dust, smoke, and debris until their clips were finally empty.
…
...
"Did we get them?" One of the grunts asked aloud, earning several 'are you an idiot' looks from his companions.
"Of course we did!" Another said confidently. "There is no Oum damned way that they avoided that."
"Unless they did something like that." A third grunt said while pointing to the area they had been bombarding as the smoke cleared away, revealing a heavily battered dome of ice and rock with the tip of Crescent Rose sticking out the front.
"…Oh you have to be shitting me."
Meanwhile, inside said dome an equally stunned Ruby was standing with her scythe stuck mid-swing in the unexpected barrier. Once the surprise wore off, she shook her head and pulled her weapon free with a quick tug.
"Okay, didn't see that coming. Was that you Naruto?" She asked while turning towards the pair behind her, before blinking in surprise when she saw Neo pressing the tips of Naruto's ice and earth tails against the ground in the exact middle of the dome.
Putting two and two together, Ruby was about to praise Neo for her quick thinking, only to end up rushing to the tri-colored girl started to cough up blood again while clutching her side. Looking over the wound closely, the raven-redhead couldn't help but hiss in sympathy at the damage that had been done.
The wound was small, but bleeding profusely, with several small chunks of loose flesh thanks to the bards on the arrow. "That's not good, we need to get you to a hospital fast."
Neo nodded her head in agreement, her body was already going numb and her vision blurry from the combination of blood-loss and poison. She didn't have long before it was too late, about five minutes maybe ten if she was lucky.
"Oba-chan? Is Neo-chan going to be alright?" Naruto asked nervously, huddling against the silent girl's uninjured side for both his and her comfort.
"Huh? Oh, uh yeah, yeah, she'll be fine." Ruby said quickly to keep the boy calm, which failed epically as the dome shook from more gunfire and explosions, causing the iced earth to start cracking apart.
'Okay, think Ruby, you're surrounded by at least a hundred bad guys armed with enough ordinance to wage a small war, the only thing protecting you is a crumbling wall of ice, Neo is quickly bleeding out, and you have to protect both her and Naruto.' Ruby thought as she crudely bandaged up Neo's side with the prize bag fabric. '…Yep, we're screwed… unless,'
Reaching into one of her pockets, the raven-redhead pulled out a small green bottle about the size of her fist with a jagged capital C written on the label.
'Thank Oum I decided to keep one of these for emergencies.' Ruby thought before she uncapped the beverage and chugged it down in just a few gulps.
"Keep firing! They can't hide there forever!" A faunus yelled, most of the White Fang continuing to attack while roughly a third of them split off to start collecting the large Schnee Dust containers.
*Kraka-boom*
However, just when the rocky ice dome looked to be on the brink of collapse, part of it suddenly exploded outwards with a loud bang. Pausing their assault briefly in surprise, the masked faunus watched as Ruby stepped out through the newly made hole, a wide grin on her face as her pupils dilated to the max.
"Time to play." She said before vanishing in a blur…
…before reappearing right in front of the terrorists with her scythe held high.
"What the fu-gah!"
-Insert battle Music-
With absolutely no mercy, the hopped up raven-redhead started slashing her way through the masked faunus like hot knife through butter, striking down entire swathes of people with just a single swing.
She zipped around like a rocket, blowing away anyone that got in her path without a care as she sliced, chopped, and bashed at every masked face that she could reach, leaving a trail of groaning bodies and flaming rose petals in her wake.
"Come on, it's just one human girl! Take her down!" One of the grunts yelled as he finally recovered from his surprise, snapping his companions back to reality as they charged at Ruby with their guns blazing and swords drawn.
Unfortunately for them, Ruby was able to easily dodge most of the incoming rounds with ease while deflecting the rest by rapidly twirling Crescent Rose around her. Not only that, but the shooters had forgotten to take in account that the girl was right in the middle of their ranks and by the time they realized their mistake, several dozen of their own had been killed or crippled by friendly fire.
Taking advantage of the extra breathing room, Ruby reached into her ammo pouch and pulled out an unusual ammo clip with a glowing yellow strip where the dust stamp usually was. "I was planning on testing this out tomorrow, but I guess now is as good a time as any." She said while unloading the old clip and putting the new one in.
However, instead of pulling the bolt back to cock the gun portion, the hyped-up girl pushed it forward then up, causing a yellow glow to travel up the weapon's handle. The moment the light reached the top, the bladed segments of the scythe gained a light golden sheen as arcs of lightning crackled between them.
"Oh this is gonna-GAH!" A woman faunus started to stay, only to end up screaming in pain along with her comrades when Ruby closed the distance between them in an instant and smacked them all away with her electrified weapon.
-Pause Battle Music-
Meanwhile, back at the broken dome, Naruto cautiously peeked out the hole that had been blasted in the side of the icy protection. Upon seeing all the White Fang members were distracted (Read: getting utterly wrecked) by Hyper Ruby like planned, he ducked back inside for a few seconds before reemerging with Neo leaning on him for support.
Moving as quickly as a child supporting a badly injured teen could the pair hobbled away from the fight, stepping around the various bodies of Ruby's victims while occasionally stopping to knock out one or two that were starting to get back up.
Once they got far enough away, Neo had Naruto use the shipping containers to hide as they headed towards the exit of the docks.
As said exit came into view, the ice-cream themed girl felt a flash of hope. Perhaps she'll survive this clusterfuck of a situation after all. Then she could get to planning her vengeance on Cinder for shooting her.
…Wait a second, where was that backstabbing bitch?
Neo suddenly grabbed Naruto and jumped back right as a pair of obsidian blades stabbed into the space they had been occupying less than a second ago.
"Neo, Neo, Neo, did you really think such a pathetically obvious distraction like that would work on me?" Cinder asked condescendingly as she stood over them with a smirk. "And here I thought you were a smart girl."
Neo glared at the woman scathingly while stabbing at her head with her parasol as a long cylindrical blade shot out the end. However, the moment the deadly weapon struck her, Cinder vanished from view and reappeared a few feet to the left.
Perfect, her annoying stooges were around somewhere as well.
"Though I should give credit where credit is due, you were able to figure out that my arrow was poisoned and removing it yourself must have been agony." Cinder said while 'dodging' two more stabs before catching a third with her bare hand. "But sadly, all you've done is delay the inevitable."
As the amber-eyed woman spoke, the portion of the blade in her hand started to glow red until she snapped it off from the rest of the weapon with a casual flick of her hand. Looking over the broken piece of metal in her grasp with a feign look of boredom, she squeezed her hand around it for a few moments before opening it, allowing the now molten slag in her palm to fall to the earth.
"Bad Lady! Go away!" Naruto yelled as he lashed his tails out at Cinder, forcing her to back away slightly, yet she never lost her smirk. "Leave Neo-chan alone!"
"Ah, how cute is that, he's trying to protect you," The raven-haired woman said with a chuckle. "Too bad he should be more worried about himself."
*Clatter*
Hearing the sound of metal bumping against metal behind her and reacting on pure instinct, Neo shoved Naruto away while twisting around and catching the green sickles that would have cut straight through Naruto's neck, revealing Emerald and a silver-haired young man.
*Squelch* …Unfortunately, that left her wide open to the glass blades that impaled themselves into her back.
"And the same thing could be said about you." Cinder said while pulling her weapons free, causing the tri-colored girl to start to fall before the silver haired teen sent her tumbling away with a harsh kick.
"Neo-chan!" Naruto screamed as he got back to his feet and rushed over to Neo. Kneeling next to the girl's downed form, he shook her gently. "Are you okay Neo-chan? …Neo-chan?"
Neo didn't respond. She just laid on the ground unmoving as blood slowly pooled around her. "Neo-chan? Neo-chan?!" Naruto shook the girl even more to no avail.
"Give it up boy, she's not going to get up." Cinder stated as she and her two subordinates started to approach him.
"Shut up! Leave us alone!" Naruto yelled, shooting a column of flames from his mouth at them. Emerald and the silver-haired teen were forced to back away, but Cinder didn't even flinch as the fire washed over her without singing a hair. "Come on Neo-chan wake up. We have to go. Wake up!"
"Deny it all you want, but you know it's true.".
"Go away!" Naruto yelled, glaring at the amber eyed woman as his tails shot at her, only to strike nothing but empty air as she faded from sight. The nine-tailed blonde didn't seem to care about that though as he went back to shaking Neo once more, tears pouring from his eyes. "Wake up Neo-chan, please wake up… please… please."
"Don't be sad child," Cinder said as she 'appeared' behind Naruto with one of her obsidian blades poised to strike. "You'll be joining her shortly."
Smirking, she brought her weapon down on the boy's head with a single clean motion…
…before blinking in shock when his hand shot up and caught it mid-stroke.
"You hurt Neo-chan," Naruto stated, his voice coming out harsh and gravelly as his grip tightened, causing small cracks to form in the black glass. Recovering from her surprise, Cinder frowned slightly while failing to pull the blade free from the child's grasp. "This is your fault."
"Uh, what the hell is that?" The silver haired teen asked as a dark bloodred bubbling aura slowly oozed out of the whiskered boy's stomach and began to engulf his form.
"I don't know, but I don't like it." Cinder said before trying to stab at Naruto with her free blade, only for it to be caught by one of his tails. Gritting her teeth in annoyance, the raven-haired woman adjusted her grip on the glass weapons as they glowed a bright orange and smoke rose from the limbs holding them.
However, instead of making him let go like she expected, Naruto's hold only tightened further even as the smell of his own burning flesh filled the air. "You hurt Neo-chan." He repeated, his body shaking slightly as the dark aura spread further.
"Okay, fuck this." Emerald said as her sickles turned into pistols and shot at Naruto, before growling in frustration when the boy's remaining tails automatically sprang up and blocked the rounds.
"You hurt her, she won't wake up because of you." Naruto muttered as his nails grew out into claws that sunk into the glass sword, his whisker marks became bolder, his canines grew more pronounced, and the crimson aura completely engulfed his form. Snapping his head towards Cinder, he glared at her in pure rage with glowing violet eyes as he crushed her blades. "I told you to GO AWAY!"
-Play Animal I've Become By Three Days Grace (Or preferred Battle Music)-
With much greater speed than Cinder was expecting, Naruto pounced on her while smacking her subordinates across the storage yard with his tails.
Falling to the ground with a grunt, the raven-haired woman was never more thankful for her aura as it protected her face from the berserk child's clawing and slashing. By the time she managed to regain her wits and tried to fight back though, she found herself unable to thanks to Naruto's tails pinning her arms to her sides.
Said furry limbs had firmly wrapped themselves around her body and were slowly constricting tighter every second like a boa. Realizing the danger she was in, Cinder used her power to engulfed herself in fire in a desperate bid to roast Naruto off before he crushed her.
To her shock though, the powerful flames, which were capable of melting solid steel in just a few seconds, didn't even make the boy sweat as they licked over his cloaked form. Not knowing what else to do, Cinder cranked up the heat as high as she could, causing the fire to turn from its usual orangish-red to a near blinding white and the asphalt beneath her to start liquefying.
Yet despite this, they still failed to harm the child currently trying to rip her face apart and after a few more seconds they sputtered out entirely as the amber-eyed woman had to focus her attention towards keeping her aura up.
However, just when it seemed like she was doomed to be squeezed to death, a pair of familiar green sickles suddenly shot out on either side of Naruto attached to chains and wrapped around his waist and neck.
"Get off of her you brat!" Emerald yelled as she and the silver haired teen tugged the other ends of the chains back. Growling loudly, Naruto resisted as best he could, but eventually the pair's combined effort caused him to be pulled off of Cinder slightly.
Feeling her bindings start to loosen, the flame-wielder's struggling renewed and after a few moments was able to get her hands free enough to essentially drag herself out of the blonde's grasp.
"No! Bad Lady must pay!" Naruto yelled angrily while swiping his arms at his escaping target.
"Pull harder Mercury!" Emerald yelled, sweat pouring down her forehead while she and the now named Mercury were gradually dragged along.
"I'll pulling as hard as I can! At this rate he's going to rip my damn arms off!" Mercury grunted, his feet creating shallow trenches in the ground as he tried to stop moving.
"Oh quit being dramatic and- what the?" Emerald questioned when Naruto unexpectedly spun around and grabbed the chains holding him, the one she had with his hands and Mercury's with his teeth. "Is he seriously going to try-"
*Skree-Crunch*
Emerald fell silent in shock as the nine-tailed faunus child effortless bit through the chain in his mouth while he yanked on the chain in his hands, causing her to be pulled straight to him. Before her brain even had time to process what just happened, the greenette had the wind knocked out of her as Naruto buried his fist into her stomach before following up with an upper cut that sent her flying into the air.
The pain train didn't end there though as the child then used the chain still in his grasp to pull her right back to him and promptly sent her hurtling straight into her partner with a brutal smack of her own weapon.
Having dealt with them for the time being, Naruto immediately turned his attention back to Cinder, whom had managed to get back to her feet with a new and dramatically larger obsidian sword in hand. Grasping the bottom of the broken chain sickle still around his neck and pulling it free, he brandished it crudely at her with a snarl.
"You are turning out to be much more difficult to deal with than I anticipated." Cinder admitted with a small frown. "Guess I'll actually have to take this seriously then."
Naruto simply growled in response as the aura around him flared wildly before charging at her again.
Having learned her lesson though, Cinder quickly backed away to keep her distance while swinging her new sword in a wide arc that smacked the boy across the head when he got too close. While it didn't hurt him at all, the force behind the blow was enough to make him staggered back slightly.
"Since you don't seem to mind the heat, let's see how you handle the cold." Cinder said as she pointed her free hand at him that fired a blast of mist that froze everything it touched…
…except for Naruto.
The raven-haired woman's frown deepened when she saw the freezing mist washed over the child without any effect what-so-ever. Just like with her flames. Before she could think of anything else to try, Naruto regained his bearings and pointed his tails at her with an irritated growl while the tips glowed menacingly.
Remembering what Neo had told her about those tails, Cinder dropped her sword and fired a massive condensed blast of fire right as he unleashed a hailstorm of elemental blasts at her.
-With Ruby (Pause Music)-
'I hope Naruto and Neo got out already.' Ruby thought as she smashed in the face of the hundredth or so White Fang member with her scythe. Seeing the electricity sputter out around the blades and the now blackened bar on the clip, she quickly ejected it before loading in a cartridge of gravity dust rounds. 'I don't think I can keep this up for much longer.'
She was knocking these guys down like bowling pins, yet more just seem to keep coming and she was starting to be overwhelmed. Not to mention she had no idea how long until she crashed when the energy drink wore off.
*BOOOOM*
"What the heck!?" Ruby yelled, stumbling a bit as a huge explosion suddenly rocked the entire pier. Catching herself, the hooded girl snapped her gaze towards the source of the blast, only for her blood to run cold as she saw the large pillar of smoke rising from near the dock exit along with the sound of multiple smaller explosions. "NARUTO!"
The ground cratered underneath her as she shot off like a bullet towards the smoke, sending men and women flying as she blasted through the crowd of White Fang surrounding her like they weren't even there.
Instead of going around the various shipping containers that were between her and her destination though, Ruby leapt as high as she could and fired Crescent Rose backwards, using the powerful recoil of the dust powered rounds to launch herself high into the air, easily clearing the metal boxes and then some.
With her bird's eye view, the hyper girl was given a perfect view of Naruto duking it out with Cinder while keeping her two goons at bay with random blasts or swipes of his tails.
This also meant she could see Neo laying motionless on the ground in a pool of her own blood several feet behind Naruto. Gasping in horror, Ruby emptied her clip propelling herself towards the tri-colored girl, gouging her scythe through several containers in a row to slow her fall enough to land safely next to her friend.
Rushing to Neo's side, the raven-redhead knelt beside her and immediately place her fingers against the ice-creamed themed teen's neck.
…
…
*Ba-bum*
"Oh thank Oum," Ruby sighed in relief as she felt an incredibly faint heartbeat.
However, glancing over at Naruto as he and Cinder's group continued to trade attacks, the hooded girl found herself in quite the conundrum.
Neo was in critical condition and needed medical attention ASAP, while three unknown people were attacking Naruto. Ruby could either rush Neo to the hospital and leave Naruto to face his attackers alone, or she could help Naruto fight and thus condemn Neo to die.
Or at least, that would have been the situation she'd be in if it wasn't for the fact she was currently hopped up on Creature.
Taking a deep breath, Ruby's form started to vibrate rapidly before seemingly splitting into two different Rubys. Without pause, Ruby One picked up Neo in her arms bridal style and ran for the exit while Ruby Two pulled Crescent Rose out of the wall and loaded a clip with a glowing green strip while locking the bolt like before.
-Resume Battle Music-
Cinder grunted as she parried a stab aimed for her stomach and kicked Naruto away from her when he tried to grab her with his tails again. "Emerald! Why aren't you using your semblance?!"
"I am! It's not working on him for some reason!" Emerald yelled with a look of frustration while dodging out of the way of a gravity blast. She'd been casting illusion after illusion on the boy, each one meant to confuse and disorient him, yet they weren't even so much as distracting him. "It's like he can see right-Gah!"
The greenette was cut off midsentence time by a massive red and black scythe cloaked in howling gales wind slamming in her gut. Gasping as the air was forced from her lungs, Emerald was given no time to recover as Ruby zipped around her at blinding speeds, striking her repeatedly from all directions in just a few seconds.
Emerald only got reprieve once Mercury shot at Ruby with his robotic legs, which were revealed thanks to his burnt pants, causing her to back off. Falling to her knees, the greenette coughed heavily as her brain caught up to all the abuse her body had rapidly taken, before glaring at the hooded girl as she swiftly forced her partner onto the defensive.
Ruby was basically a cyclone of death, moving at near untraceable speeds while swinging Crescent Rose with awe-inspiring efficiency. It was taking Mercury everything he had to dodge each of her attacks as blocking was not an option thanks to the violent winds surrounding the blade, the sizable gouge in his left leg could attest to that.
Looking for any form of opening he could exploit, the silver haired teen found it when Ruby suddenly stopped mid-swing and looked around in confusion. Recognizing the surprised behavior from the many victims of Emerald's semblance, Mercury didn't hesitate to take advantage by rushing into the raven-redhead's guard and delivering a devastating kick to her chest.
Flying backwards from the blow, Ruby hooked her scythe into the ground to stop herself before frowning as she couldn't find her attacker. "So that's how you want to play it huh? Alright then," She muttered while reaching into her ammo pouch. Instead of a different clip for her weapon though, she pulled out an pair of goggles and a fistful of small black pellets. "Let's play."
Mercury was just about to kick the girl again when she tossed the pellets to the ground, releasing a thick cloud of thick black smoke that quickly blanketed the area.
*Cough* "Really? *Cough* Fucking smoke pellets?" Mercury muttered as he squinted his eyes in a vain attempt to see through the smokescreen.
"You're the one who decided to pull a vanishing act, I just leveled the playing field." Ruby said, her voice seemingly coming from all around him.
"So you made it so we both can't see, real mature." Mercury said while firing a few times blindly to try and clear the smoke.
However, on his third shot, Mercury suddenly found his leg caught between the two back prongs of Crescent Rose as Ruby appeared in front of him, now wearing the goggles. "Nope," She said with a smirk as she stared at him through the glowing red lenses, twisting her weapon slightly so Mercury couldn't pull his leg free. "Just you."
"Oh you little biIIIIIIIITCH!" Mercury screamed as Ruby hefted him into the air before spinning him around fast enough to generate a small cyclone that dispersed the smoke. "STOOOOP!"
"Okay!" Planting her feet down, Ruby redirected the momentum from her swing so that her scythe, and by proxy Mercury, arced over her head and slammed into the ground with enough to imbed the silver-haired teen several inches into the asphalt.
"… … …ow."
"And stay down," Ruby said before turning towards Emerald. "Now to deal with-*Gurgle* …oh Oum." A pained expression crossed the raven-redhead's face and her form started flickering as she clutched her growling stomach.
"Ha, looks like someone running out of steam." Emerald said with a vicious smirk while pointing her sickles at Ruby as they shifted into guns.
"Hey, you're not exactly full up on the tank either lady." Ruby retorted slightly breathlessly, ejecting her empty wind dust cartridge and loading in a normal clip. 'Stay focused Ruby! Naruto and Neo need you.'
-With Ruby One and Neo (Pause Music)-
"Must keep… going… almost… there." Ruby groaned as she wobbly walked out the exit to the docks with Neo in her arms, her stomach growling loudly at her with every step. The downside of drinking Creature, it extremely ramped up one's metabolism, especially for someone like Ruby who had a high metabolism naturally.
And since the only thing that had been on Ruby's stomach was a bowl of cereal from breakfast and a few snacks from the arcade, she was running on nothing but fumes right now.
That didn't matter to her right now though as she had a job to do. She needed to find someone, anyone who could take Neo to the hospital as she couldn't go much farther from her 'other half'. However, as she glanced around, she was shocked to find the usually bustling streets of Vale seemingly abandoned.
'Crap! Everyone must've run off because of the gunfire and explosions.' She thought with a frown before looking around in confusion. 'But then where are the police? Surely someone called this in already.'
Once again coming up with nothing, Ruby started to growl in frustration but stopped when she noticed something purple move in her peripherals. Jerking her head in that direction, relief shot through her body as she saw a familiar purple dressed rocket launcher carrying man walking down the street with a package in hand.
"Doc!" The hooded girl exclaimed happily, getting the man to look towards her in surprise as she hobbled over to him. "You have no idea how glad I am to see you!"
"Hey Ruby, what's… oh my Oum what happened?!" Doc demanded, dropping the package in his hand and meeting her halfway when he noticed the unconscious and bleeding girl in Ruby's arms.
"Can't explain now, I have to go, Naruto's in danger, please get her to a hospital." Ruby said quickly, handing Neo over to him as her form flickered.
"Of course, you can count on me." Doc said with a nod, carefully cradling the ice-cream themed girl in his arms before grabbing the rocket launcher on his back and holding it out towards the hooded girl. "Here girl, my gut tells me that you'll be needing that more than us."
"You don't know the half of it." Ruby muttered, gladly accepting the weapon before both her and it blurred from sight.
"Alright then, let's go get you all patched up," Doc said as he carried Neo over to his ride, an odd looking purple motorcycle.
-Back with Naruto and Ruby Two (Resume Battle Music)-
Cinder had a deep scowl on her face as she slashed at Naruto several times with a pair of obsidian swords, only for most of the attacks to be blocked or parried by his tails or Emerald's broken sickle piece while the ones that actually hit did little more than daze him briefly.
'This makes no sense. How is he still protected? He's been expending aura none-stop this entire time.' She thought while backing up to avoid the glowing black tail that shattered the ground she had been standing on. She could feel the air becoming heavy with the amount of aura Naruto was expelling from his body every second, and her attacks weren't exactly gentle.
'He should be completely exhausted right now or close to it, yet the only progress I've seemingly made so far is with some of those damn tails.' Cinder thought, glaring slightly at the fluffy appendages, five of which had shrunken down to half their length.
Jumping back several feet, Cinder slammed her fist into the ground, causing hundreds of large razor-sharp glass spikes to erupt from the ground all around her. While they did absolutely no harm to Naruto as he smashed through them, they slowed him down long enough for the ravenette to pull out a scroll and scan him with its aura detection function.
However, the instant the readout for the scan came up, Cinder's eyes widened and she dawned a look of utter disbelief. "That… that isn't possible… there is no way." On her scroll, an image of Naruto was displayed with full green bar along with the number, "99.95%... How? …How? …he hasn't even used a full percent of his aura?!"
While Cinder was making this horrifying discovery, Emerald and Ruby were locked in an intense duel, with scythe clashing against sickle for supremacy. The greenette had a scowl on her face as she was once again left unable to use of her semblance effectively because of Ruby's goggles, which had thermal infrared vision that she normally used to find and fix parts of Penny that were overheating thus allowing her to see right through the illusions she cast.
Not only that, but with all the blows she'd taken so far, she seriously doubted she even had enough aura left to use her semblance without compromising its protective properties.
Even with all that though, she still held the upper hand at the moment as her hooded opponent had to split her focus on both the fight and maintaining the afterimage that was getting Neo to safety while also ignoring the horrible cramping in her stomach.
'I swear if I ever hear anyone complain about having trouble multitasking I'm gonna punch them.' Ruby thought, just managing to avoid a slash to the face as her vision continuously switched from where she was now to where her other was several hundred yards away. 'Oh great, now I'm starting to think like Yang.'
"What's wrong little girl? Need a nappy?" Emerald mocked as she kept pressing forward, stabbing with her intact sickle while using the gun form of her broken one to shoot in quick succession while avoiding the raven-redhead's somewhat sloppy counter attacks.
"I should be asking you that, you're boring me to tears over here." Ruby bluffed while surprising Emerald slightly with several rapid swings that she only just managed to deflect. "Should I stop and let you catch your breath… granny?"
"What did you just fucking call me?!" Emerald roared, charging at hooded girl in a blind rage and unleashing a vicious barrage of attacks. Unprepared for the sudden assault, Ruby only managed to block a few of the strikes before her guard was broken and she took several direct hits. "How's this for granny you little bitch?!"
'Okay that was a stupid move.' Ruby thought once she regained her wits and backpedaled rapidly to avoid the Emerald's rage fueled attacks, before ducking under a familiar damaged robotic leg that lashed out over her head from behind and struck Emerald in the chest.
"Gah! What the fuck Mercury!?" The greenette demanded, snapping out of her blind rage as she staggered back from the blow and sent said silver-haired teen.
"Don't get mad at me, she's the one that- DODGE!" Mercury shouted while he and Emerald jumped back to avoid a spinning slice. "That's it! You go high, I'll go low!"
"Whatever." Emerald muttered angrily as the pair charged at Ruby at the same time.
However, they only made it a few feet before stopping in surprise when Ruby grinned at them…
…and tossed Crescent Rose into the air.
Wondering just why she would do something like that, their answer came in the form of a red blur that shot across the area and collided with the hooded girl. The moment it did, she suddenly went from standing up to crouched while pointing the business end of a very big rocket launcher at them.
"Bye-bye." She said in a chipper tone before firing a pair of rockets at Emerald and Mercury, blasting them across the shipping yard where they landed next to Cinder, snapping the raven-haired woman out of her shock.
-End battle Music-
"Get up you two, we are leaving now." She said while the two slowly got up, forming and launching several giant shards of obsidian .
"But Cinder, what about-"
"I said we are falling back, this mission is a failure." Cinder cut in firmly, making Emerald fall silent with a nod as the trio headed back towards the inner docks.
"Hey! Get back here!" Ruby yelled as she fired another set of missiles at the trio that Cinder quickly intercepted mid-air with a salvo of fire blasts while making an odd gesturing motion at Ruby. Eyes widening as she recognized that motion, the hooded girl jumped back as the ground beneath her glowed bright orange and erupted into a pillar of fire.
"I know you! You're that lady that helped Torchwick get away!" The raven-redhead exclaimed once she landed, dropping the now empty rocket launcher and catching Crescent Rose before it hit the ground.
Glancing back at her when she said that, Cinder smirked slightly before casually waving her hand, causing a thick wall of obsidian to block off the pathway she and her subordinates went while a few dozen White Fang members streamed in from other entrances.
"NO!" Both Ruby and the masked faunus jumped in surprise and terror when Naruto released a deafening howl of rage. "Bad lady not get away!"
Frozen in shock, they saw as the aura cloak around the whiskered blonde suddenly doubled in size before he charged after Cinder, tearing his way through both the terrorists and the glass wall in his path in seconds.
"Naruto! Wait!" Ruby called out while chasing after Naruto, though she was quickly bogged down as the remaining White Fangs attacked her.
"Are we seriously running away from a child and a brat?" Mercury asked as he, Emerald, and Cinder hurried down towards the piers where a Bullhead was waiting to take them away.
"Stop talking and keep moving." Cinder said with a scowl, creating another obsidian wall behind them as she heard her last one get torn apart. She did not need reminding on how fucked up this mission was or how she been completely outmatched by a child less than half her age.
That fight should have been a cakewalk, yet she had been stuck on the defensive almost the entire time and now she was running away just to save her own ass.
*Shatter* "BAD LADY!"
"Dammit, doesn't this kid ever give up?" Mercury asked as Naruto smashed straight the newly created volcanic glass like a tank through wet paper.
"I don't know, why don't you ask him?" Emerald suggested sarcastically.
"Bad lady hurt Neo-chan," Naruto growled out as he stopped charging and slowly stalked towards them, not even flinching as the trio unleashed a hail of bullets, glass, and fire that bounced off his cloak harmlessly. "Bad lady pay."
"Sorry, you'll just have to settle for an IOU." Cinder stated while waving her hand, causing hundreds of obsidian spikes to shoot out of the ground between them and the nine-tailed boy.
However, instead of trying to break through them like he'd done many times over, Naruto actually stopped at the edge of the glass spears with a soft growl.
"Well would you look at that, seems like someone finally got the hint." Mercury said with a grin, only for Cinder to shake her head.
"…No, he's up to something." She muttered, her gaze narrowing in suspicion while Naruto paced around for a few moments before doubling over with a grimace.
"He looks like he's gonna be sick." Emerald said with a raised brow that only got higher as the whiskered blonde started to convulse. "Maybe he's overexerted-"
"GRAH!" Emerald found herself cut off for the umpteenth time that day, this time by a blood-curdling howl from Naruto as half a dozen translucent bladed golden chains suddenly emerged from his chest.
"Or he could be doing that." Mercury stated with widened eyes as he, Emerald, and Cinder stepped back.
"PAY!" Naruto yelled before the chains shot at them at an astonishing speed, one each for the green and silver duo while the remaining four went straight for Cinder. But, to the groups further shock, the golden links didn't go over the obsidian spikes nor did they go around.
Instead, they phased straight through the black glass like it wasn't even there, leaving the trio with only a split few seconds to react. Emerald and Mercury were lucky as they managed to narrowly avoid the chains aiming for them by jumping to the sides, Cinder… not so much.
Acting on pure reflex, she jumped backwards while expelling a stream of super intense flames from her hands to try and rebuff the incoming attack. Just like with the obsidian though, the transparent chains had no issue passing right through the fire.
Having wasted what little time she had with that failed counter-attack, the raven-haired woman could do nothing else but watch as the chains cleared the remaining distance and shot into her chest.
However, to her shock and confusion, they didn't harm her like she expected and just phased through her like a ghost. At the same time though, Cinder swore she could feel the chains coiling around inside of her instead of passing clean through of her like it had everything else.
That feeling was only confirmed as she saw bits of the chain peek out of various parts of her body. Not liking where this was going one bit, Cinder reached up and grabbed the chains leading out of her chest (surprising herself slightly that she could) before trying to pull them out.
The instant she did though, a horrible chilling sensation flooded through the fiery woman as a red glow started to emerge from her skin, causing her to stop cold as her eyes widened in realization. "Oh no…"
"Bad lady pay." Naruto growled adamantly as the chains began to retract. Whilst the loose pair were gone within just a few seconds, the ones attached to Cinder became taut as they tried to pull her towards the angry blonde.
Digging her heels into the ground, Cinder grasped the chains sticking out of her chest as tightly as she could and pulled back with all her might, though she was still dragged along until she managed to catch herself against the volcanic glass she'd created to stop her attacker.
That's when things took a jump from crazy to completely insane.
Despite Cinder's best efforts the chains were slowly slipping from her grasp and returning to Naruto. Yet, instead of her actually moving with them, two separate clusters of chains gradually emerged from her chest, wrapped around a translucent dark crimson outline of Cinder and a fractured orange outline of an unknown girl respectively.
The Cinder outline was doing almost the exact same as the actual ravenette, with the exception that only one hand was gripping the chains pulling it along. The other was clinging tightly to the orange outline, which had already fully separated from the real Cinder.
Just as it seemed that Cinder was about to loose this unusual game of tug of war, Emerald and Mercury came to her rescue as they popped up on either side of her, the former trying to break the golden bindings with her sickle with no success as it passed through them uselessly before started helping the ravenette pull.
With their assistance, the fire-user managed to stop the chain's progress and even managed to start hauling it back, causing the Cinder outline to start sinking back into the real deal while Naruto was dragged towards the obsidian spikes.
It was to this sight that Ruby was greeted with when she finally caught up with the four of them, but because of the glass partially obstructing her view all she really saw was Naruto being pulled towards his death "Oh Oum, Naruto!" She yelled in worry while rushing over and wrapping her arms around his waist around the aura shrouded child to help him without a second thought.
Thanks to this, the balance was once again tipped again and Cinder's group found themselves starting to lose ground once again.
"Dammit, we need to end this now." Cinder said, her eyes severely bloodshot and sweat pouring from her brow.
"And how exactly do we do that?" Mercury demanded through grit teeth. "Break the chains? We can't even hit them."
"Hang on, I have an idea." Emerald said, her face scrunched up in concentration and exertion as she lifted her sickle up with a light green glow surrounding it before slicing at the closest two chains once more…
*SKREECHT*
…and cut straight through them.
As the chains snapped free though, they whipped out wildly due to the pressure they were under and one ended up smacking the greenette straight across the face, specifically her eyes, causing her to fall over screaming in pain.
"NOOO!" Cinder yelled in anguish as her crimson copy lost its grip on the orange girl when the chains holding it were cut. Both grasped for her desperately but failed as they fell back from their own backwards momentum while the unknown girl was yanked through the obsidian spikes by the chains and vanished into Naruto along with them as he and Ruby fell over as well.
"Whew… that was a close one." Ruby said with a sigh, wiping the sweat off her brow as she slowly sat up before glancing at the boy on her lap. "Are you alright… Naruto?"
Said blonde was clutching his head in clear discomfort, grunting and growling under his breath as he thrashed and spasmed.
Her concern skyrocketing, Ruby gently lifted the boy up and cradled him in her arms, missing as his bubbling cloak of aura flared around them wildly. "Naruto, what's wrong? Are you hurt?"
"…Ah… O-oba-chan… head h-hurting… make it… s-stop… ugh…please." Naruto muttered while looking up at Ruby pleadingly, his eyes flickering from violet to crimson to amber and back again.
"Of course, don't worry, I'll get you to a doct-AAGH!" Ruby started to say as she got up before screaming in both shock and pain as Naruto was suddenly enveloped in fire, causing her to drop him and stagger back reflexively.
Falling to the ground, Naruto curled up into a ball as the flames surrounding him tripled in size. At the same time though, a powerful chill filled the air and the ground beneath him began freezing over.
"Naruto!" Ruby yelled in worry once she recovered from her surprise, ignoring the multiple smoldering parts of her outfit as she tried to get to the boy's side, tried being the keyword. Before the hooded girl could reach him, she was rebuffed by powerful gale winds that started blowing around Naruto.
Meanwhile back across the spikes, Cinder had gotten back to her feet and was staring at her hands with denial written across her face. She waved them outwards, pointed at random things, gestured like she had been doing this whole time to summon her elemental attack, yet nothing happened other than her making herself look like an idiot.
"No, this isn't possible, this can't be." She muttered, completely unaware of her surroundings until Mercury grabbed her by the shoulder.
"Cinder snap out of it." He said while struggling to hold a still screaming Emerald, snapping the woman out of her thoughts. In that moment though, her denial turned into rage and she glared at Naruto's convulsing form as various different elements flared out around him.
"How dare you," She muttered spitefully, drawing her glass swords and marching towards the child, effortlessly slicing through her own obsidian blockade as she went. "How dare you take my power."
"Cinder! What are you doing?! We need to leave!" Mercury yelled incredulously, only to be ignored by the angry ravenette.
What did make her stop though, was when Naruto suddenly went still while the elemental storm around him vanished and an overwhelming feeling of pure malice that suddenly washed over her, freezing her in place. And she wasn't the only one as Ruby and Mercury found themselves paralyzed by fear greater than any other than they ever felt before. The only one unaffected was Emerald, who continued to scream in pain while clutching her hands over her eyes.
Unable to move, the three of them could do nothing but watch as Naruto twitched on the ground a few times before slowly pushing himself up. He didn't stand though, but stayed hunched over on his hands and feet, his shrunken tails grew back out to their eight-foot length, and the crimson aura around him solidified into the shape of a fox around him.
"N-Naruto, are you alright?" Ruby asked, managing to push past her fear enough to slowly walk towards the child. Not getting a response, the scythe user kept getting closer until she was right beside him and reached out towards him. "Naru-guh!"
Faster than she could blink, Ruby was struck across the face with the force of a semi-truck, launching her across the yard and crashing into the side of a shipping container. Sliding back to the ground, the hooded girl stared at Naruto in absolute shock as blood dripped out of four slash marks across her cheek.
Growling loudly, Naruto lowered his bloodstained hand back to the ground as he glared at Ruby with dark crimson and golden slit-pupiled eyes with before looking at Cinder and inhaling deeply.
"GrrrrrraaaAAAAAAAAHH!"
-End Chap-(*Bang* "Oh no you don't!" What the?! Nora! How did you… oh shi- *Smash* *Bang* *Crack* "No cliffhanger this time, continue scene!") Play: Monster by Skillet( Or preferred Music)
If Cinder were to choose one word to describe what happened next, it would be agonizing.
With speeds greater than anyone she'd ever seen or faced, Naruto closed the distance between them and sank his fist into her gut. Then before she could even feel that hit, he followed up with a punch to the face that sent her straight to the ground.
Not satisfied with this, the berserk blonde grabbed the ravenette by her ankle and proceeded flail her around like a rag doll, repeatedly bashing her into the remaining spires of obsidian until they were all shattered. He then carelessly tossed her to the side like a piece of trash and turned his attention to the only person still standing.
"Fuck this, I'm out!" Mercury yelled, dropping Emerald as he made a break for it. He only made it about ten feet however, before falling flat as something grabbed his leg. Looking back, his eyes widened when he saw a clawed hand of aura extending from Naruto's arm holding his ankle. "Oh shit."
That was all he had time to say before the silver-haired teen was dragged straight to the nine-tailed child who promptly opened an extra large can of whup-ass on him.
"Aaghaughagug!" He screamed out as Naruto clawed, punched, and even bit at everything he could reach. While most of the damage was negated by his aura, the pure concussive force behind them were rattling his internal organs like drums and his already badly diminished reserves were running out fast.
-Pause Music-
Thankfully for him though, he was rescued by none other than Ruby herself when she grabbed Naruto from behind and pulled the crazed child off him.
"Stop Naruto! This isn't you!" The raven-redhead yelled, holding the struggling blonde as tightly as she could in a nelson hold that she learned from Yang (aka Yang used said hold on her repeatedly whenever they play wrestled as kids) and pinched his tails between her legs. "Calm down please!"
"RAAAGH!" Safe to say he didn't calm down. If anything, Naruto became even more riled up as he thrashed in Ruby's grasp. As she was keeping him occupied, Mercury and Cinder managed to somewhat recover from their beatdowns.
Getting to her feet unsteadily, Cinder swayed slightly while coughing up a few globs of blood, several shards of glass dug into her arms and back. Sending Naruto and Ruby one last hard glare, she limped away over to Mercury and leaning on him for support. "Move, I doubt she'll be able to hold him for long."
Mercury simply nodded in agreement before they hobbled away, pausing as they passed Emerald who had finally stopped screaming and moved her hands, so they could see her… completely unharmed eyes.
"Emerald, what are you doing? Stop dawdling and get up." Cinder said in annoyance, causing the greenette to jump in surprise and look around wildly.
"Cinder? Where are you? Why is everything so dark?" Emerald asked, her ruby eyes looking around the area with fear and confusion, not even pausing as they passed over her battered partners forms. "Hello? Cinder? Say something."
Quickly putting two and two together, Cinder and Mercury glanced at each-other briefly, before continuing on without saying a word. 'Goodbye Emerald, you were a good pawn,'
"Cinder? Cinder where are you?" Emerald continued to call out, unaware of her abandonment, "What's going on? …Cinder?"
Back with Naruto and Ruby, the former was still going utterly ballistic within the latter's grasp.
"Please calm down Naruto. …I 'm not going to hurt you." Ruby pleaded breathlessly, her face turning red from exertion. Her begging fell on deaf ears though as Naruto continued to struggle while growling angrily.
A few moments later, his work bore fruit as Ruby's hold slipped up and one of her arms got to close to his mouth.
*Chomp* "YEEEEOOOWCH!" Ruby screeched out as Naruto sank his teeth into her forearm, causing her grip to loosen further.
Not wasting a second, Naruto's struggling managed to break free of the raven-redhead's grasp and lashed out with a back-kick that slammed her back against the storage container she hit before, only this time the impact left her completely dazed.
-Resume Music-
Staring at her limp form as she fell back to the ground, Naruto snarled softly before turning away and sniffing the air. After a few seconds he apparently found something he didn't like as a loud growl echoed from his throat and he walked away on all fours, stopping briefly to watch Emerald stumbling around blindly with a contemplating look before continuing along.
"Finally, this clusterfuck is almost over." Mercury muttered as he and Cinder arrived at the pier, where two dozen members of the White Fang and Roman were standing protectively around four large supply ship sized bullheads filled with dust and injured faunus.
"You two look like shit. What happened out there, and where are Neo and the annoying green girl?" The fancily dressed thief asked as he walked up to the injured pair.
"No time, we need to le-" *Screeech*
Cinder was cut off by a loud metallic squeal that echoed throughout the shipyard, causing everyone to jump slightly.
"What the hell is that?" Roman asked with a raised brow, only to get no answer as Cinder pushed past him.
"Get these damn ships in the air, NOW!" Cinder yelled, getting the masked men and women to start loading up on the aircraft.
*SCREECH*
The ravenette glanced around as the screeching sound repeated, only this time much louder and closer, before visibly relaxing when the bullhead's engines kicked to life and the four vehicles to the air.
"Okay, now can you- *SCREEE* …oh shit, INCOMING!" Roman as half of a broken shipping container suddenly flew into the air flying right at them. Hearing the warning, the pilot swerved to the side to dodge the incoming impromptu projectile.
Unfortunately, he wasn't entirely successfully and the hunk of metal crashed into the side of the aircraft, snapping the left wing and engine off like a twig.
"Oh for fuck's sake!" Mercury yelled in anger as the ship started spiraling out of control.
"Bail!" Torchwick shouted as he, Cinder, Mercury, and two or three White Fang grunts jumped out onto the tarmac just as the airship crashed into the ocean. Landing on the tarmac with a huff, Cinder didn't even look back as her escape craft sank into the freezing water with the remaining crew, dooming them to a water grave.
Her focus was centered solely on the enraged nine-tailed child currently marching towards the pier through a newly made hole in the stacked shipping containers with the other half of the ruined shipping crate in tow.
"What the hell? Isn't that the kid you were supposed to take out?" Roman asked as he got to his feet, but didn't get any response once again as Cinder never moved her eyes from the faunus currently stalking towards them, both fear and anger prevalent in her gaze.
Once he got close, Naruto growled loudly and with a single smooth motion hurled the broken metal crate at another ship, this time scoring a direct hit that caused the aircraft to explode violently.
"Alright, that's it, fill that brat full of lead!" Roman yelled over the radio, causing the remaining two aircraft to turn around and reveal the pairs of large miniguns mounted to the front of them. Revving up in sync, hundreds of bullets were spewed from their barrels at Naruto, tearing up the surrounding area.
Yet to Roman's shock, the whiskered blonde just kept coming, not even faltering as the deadly projectiles bounced off the aura cloak around him without any effect.
"GRAAAAAAAAH!" Correction, they did have an effect, they pissed him off.
Growling angrily, Naruto snapped his head towards the nearest airship, the cloak around his tails fluctuating before suddenly extending rapidly. In less than a second, the nine translucent tails crossed the distance between them and with horrifying ease pierced clean through the vehicle's armor.
"Dear Oum…" Torchwick muttered as muffled screams and gunfire could be heard from within the aircraft while it swerved wildly to try and break free. However, it was to no avail as Naruto's aura tails dug deep into the ship's hull with an iron grip.
If that wasn't freaky enough, an aurora of colors began traveling down the translucent appendages towards the enraged child.
"Please don't tell me he's doing what I think he's doing." Mercury muttered nervously as the glow reached Naruto, channeling through his fox cloak to his head and into his gullet.
"He's eating the dust on the ship." Cinder said, backing away until she hit the edge of the pier.
"I told you not to tell me."
With every second that passed, the whiskered blonde consumed more and more dust, completely ignoring as the other ship continued to unleash bullet hell on him. After a certain point though, something odd started to happen… a layer of multicolored dust crystals started to form again as around the boy's forearms and hands.
Having a very, VERY bad feeling about that, Roman decided to add in his own little gift and pointed his cane at the boy as a cross-air popped up on the end.
Pulling the trigger on his disguised weapon, the orange-haired man couldn't help but smirk as he fired several flares that exploded like grenades upon impact, engulfing Naruto in a ball of fire and ash.
"Ha! How's that taste?" Torchwick asked mockingly, chuckling at his own joke.
"Grrrrrrrr…" However, his humor quickly died out as a deep growling reached his ears and the smoke cleared to reveal Naruto glaring directly at him as he swallowed the last of the dust, his arms now fully encased in crystal.
"Congratulations, you have successfully made him even angrier at us." Mercury said sarcastically before scrambling away as the whiskered blonde's aura tails pulled the bullhead out of the air and smashed it against the pier they were standing on, smashing the two unfortunate grunts.
Snarling when he saw the rest of them running for cover, Naruto lifted up the now destroyed aircraft as he followed Roman's movements in particular.
"I did not sign up for this shit!" The cane user yelled as he narrowly avoided being turned into a criminal pancake. Looking around for any possible way to escape from his current situation, Torchwick paused briefly as he looked back at the crazy child chasing him, or more specifically the large shipping container currently dangling from a crane in said child's path.
'Have to time this just right.' The wanted criminal thought with a frown, carefully aiming his cane while dodging out of the way of another squashing attempt.
Timing his shot carefully, which was luckily very easy to do as Naruto moved somewhat slowly thanks to the weight of his makeshift bludgeon, he waited until the boy was just under the metal box before firing. Like he hoped, the berserk blonde completely disregarded the flare as it soared over his head, thus not noticing until it was too late as the projectile destroyed the crane.
Naruto only had enough time to look up before finding himself squashed under the several ton metal crate. Watching the crate with bated breath, Torchwick only relaxed once he saw the translucent limbs vanish, allowing the crushed bullhead they had held to fall to the ground.
"Like my pa used to say… 'If all else fails kiddo, squash em like a bug'." The orange haired man said, wiping the sweat off his brow with a sigh of relief before looking to the others. "Now time to get the hell out of- *Screech* …here."
Slowly turning back around, all the color drained from Roman's face as the shipping container shifted slightly before the translucent tails burst through the metal walls and started glowing once again.
*SQUUEAAL* "GRAAAAAAAAAAH!" Everyone hit the dirt as the crate was torn to pieces and Naruto burst out with an enraged scream, only now over half his body was encased with dust crystals which had formed in the exact shape of the cloak surrounding Naruto's body.
Looking towards Roman, Naruto's left eye, the only visible part of his face left, narrowed while the crystal fox face snarled at him before appearing in front of the thief in the blink of an eye with his hand wrapped around the end of his cane.
"Hi… bye." The criminal said with a wave of his hand, before suddenly flying backwards thanks to the handle of his weapon shooting off on a rope, launching him off the pier and into the ocean.
Visibly surprised by this, Naruto blinked a few times before shaking his head and looking around for someone else to attack.
-End Music-
"GRAAAAAAaeaeaeah!" However, out of the blue, the whiskered boy suddenly fell over with a scream in pain, clutching his head tightly as glowing cracks appeared in the crystal covering him. Not looking a gift horse in the mouth, Cinder and Mercury scurried off while signaling for the last remaining bullhead.
At the same time, Ruby limped into view from the shipping containers, her face a mask of pain and determination.
"Naruto!?" She yelled when she saw Naruto writhing around on the ground, not even thinking twice as she hobbled over as fast as she could to the boy's side and pulling his head onto her lap. "Naruto! Speak to me! Are you alright?!"
"Ruby O-oba-c-chan?" Naruto asked, looking up at Ruby with his sole visible eye as it changed colors again and more cracks formed in his dust layer.
"Yes! That's right! It's me!" Ruby said with a nod.
"Head h-hurts… hurts so much…" Naruto whimpered, clutching his head tightly as tears fell down his visible eye. "Make i-it stop."
"I will, I will, don't worry," The raven-redhead said assuringly, rubbing the boy's crystal covered head. "Just hold in there and I'll get you to help."
"I can't… I c-can't… it hurts… i-it…" Naruto trailed off as his eye settled on violet once more."
"Naruto? Naruto can you hear-Hey!" Ruby yelled in surprise when she was shoved away by the faunus child's tails.
With her out of the way, Naruto slowly got back to his feet, the dust clumps on him dissolving into light that collected into a glowing ball in front of his face along with the aura that made up his cloak. This sphere then condensed down to the size of a marble that Naruto promptly swallowed whole before turning towards the ocean.
"Naruto?" Ruby said questioningly as she tried to walk over to him as his eyes and tail tips glowed blindingly bright, only to be shoved away again even harder.
Then Naruto opened his mouth…
…and what happened next would be seared into Ruby's memory for the rest of her life.
A beam of pure light shot from the child's mouth, zipping across the pier and out into the ocean, expanding drastically as it went and obliterating everything in it's path, including almost a third of Atlassian cargo ship.
The raw concussive force emanating from this blast made the whole dock to shake like an earthquake, knocking Ruby, Mercury, and Cinder over, almost causing the White Fang bullhead to crash, and making several stacks of shipping crates to collapse.
And it was only after all of this that Ruby finally heard the roar of the attack smash into her eardrums, forcing her to cover her ears with her hands. Because of this though, she never heard the creaking metal above her as a piece of the shipping container Naruto ripped apart fell from above and clunked her head, making her collapse like a sack of potatoes.
…
"Uhh, my head," Ruby groaned weakly, her eyes weakly flickering open. Looking around with blurry double vision, the raven-redhead took in the destroyed pier with a look of confusion until her gaze settled on a mass of red and yellow several feet to her left. "N-Naruto?"
Squinting her eyes in focus, Ruby could just make out said child laying unconscious on the ground. However, he wasn't alone as Cinder was kneeling over him with one of her glass blades at his throat, a look of livid fury across her face.
Eyes widening in alarm at this, Ruby tried to get up, only to find herself pinned under the very metal chunk that had knocked her out in the first place.
Hearing her struggles, the ravenette looked over at the trapped huntress-in-training briefly, before smirking at her victoriously as she tossed her weapon aside and picked Naruto up by the back of his shirt.
'No… No… No. No. No! No! NO!' Ruby thought in horror, her struggling redoubled as Cinder walked off towards the now landed bullhead with Naruto. "Naruto! Let him go! Naruto!"
The hooded girl's efforts were in vain. Her body had already been pushed past its breaking point and had nothing left to give.
All she could do was lay there and watch as her pseudo-adopted nephew was carried into that aircraft and flown away.
"NARUTO!"
-End Chapter-
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone