Team Nightwatch

The Emergence of Power

     We came crashing down among everyone, guns blazing and lightning sparkling on my hands.  I found myself rolling through the swiping claws of Grimm until I found myself back-to-back with someone.  

     "This is a weird scene isn't it?"  I looked over my shoulder at Austin, one of his gauntlets sparking before shooting a bolt of white-hot fire at a boarbatusk, turning it to ash.  

     "Not really," I replied, firing a few rounds at passing Grimm.  "Two Huntsmen in training, fighting Grimm back-to-back to save people...."  I earned a smile from him and we stayed there, defending our small ring.  

      "You hear something?" Austin asked me.  Before I could ask what he was talking about, I heard a loud noise rent the air and an ursa flew into a fountain.  "What the hell was...?"  From the lull in action walked a guy who looked like a jazz player followed by a faunus girl on roller skates.  I noticed the silver trumpet in his hand and started to piece things together.  

     "Interesting," I said, swinging my sword over my shoulders.  "You're from Atlas aren't you?  Flynt Coal...or something?"  He gave me a grin and tipped his hat, looking over his glasses.  "We don't really have time for small talk, do we?"

     "Not really," Austin answered, hefting his sword.  "Come on...."  Normally, I would've ignored him but I had no reason not to agree with him.  He and I ran side-by-side, looking down different avenues for a fight, on occasion firing projectiles at Grimm.  "What a way for the Festival to end, eh?"

     "Invasion makes for interesting bedfellows," I answered, wondering if it would be faster to at least glide.  My thoughts were interrupted as a few things happened at once.

     We broke into a courtyard full of soldiers, students and Grimm.  I saw my team fighting how we'd trained just before a massive claw came out of nowhere and slapped me across the way into a wall.  I'm kind of getting a little tired of being tossed around like a toy.  These thoughts were where things got a little strange.

      I placed Nightblade back on my belt as tendrils of black energy started coiling around my hands and arms.  My fingers sank into the ground like it was water and I watched as the tendrils broke the stone walkway, impaling any Grimm that was too close to them.  One grabbed a passing Beowulf and threw it up into a passing Griffon, forcing both to come crashing down to earth.  The ground tore and cracked as I raised my hands, great chunks of rock floating around me.  

     Like I've done it before, I pulled my right hand back before flinging it forward.  One of the boulders went flying in the direction my arm went, crashing down on one of the heads of a basilisk, stunning the other head and pinning in.  Wondering if it was possible, I looked at a rock and concentrated.  As I had hoped, it suddenly burst into flames and flew into the sky, slamming into a Nevermore and erupting in a ball of fire.  A smile made its way onto to my face as I basked in the destruction I had wrought but a scream brought me back to reality.  

      Leah was cowering beneath an alpha Beowulf, its left claw coated in blood coming from the wound in her side.  Nightblade found its way back into my hand as a yell of rage and defiance left me, but something else happened.  A wave of golden light pulsed from me, going over everything which started to slow down.  The water of the fountain was suspended in the air, bullets stopped halfway to their targets, the Beowulf's claw stopped while raised to strike Leah again.  I moved normally, however, a little unsure about what I just did.  

     I waved my hand in front of Flynt's face.  No reaction.  I snapped my fingers under Scarlet's nose.  Still nothing...what's going on?  A sudden realization came to me...an answer.  Time wasn't just slowed down or bent like what I can usually do.  I'd stopped the flow of time.  

      Taking the opportunity, I dashed at the Beowulf, slashing in a couple different places but nothing happened to it.  The golden wave came back to me, the sounds of battle roaring back in full force.  The Beowulf fell apart from the waist, shoulders, and neck, dissipating into black smoke as it did.

      "How did you?"  Leah groaned, putting pressure on her bleeding side.  I didn't answer her as I put Nightblade away and picked her up as gently as I could, like a princess.  

      "Isabel, Destiny!" I yelled.  They both over at us.  "We need to get her to the evac ships!  Cover me!"  I waited for them to run closer before starting to run myself, trying to be as gentle as I could with Leah.  We ducked down alleyways, trying to take the safest route I could find to keep her safe.  "We need a medic!"

     A stretcher was brought as soon as the medics saw us and I laid her down.  Her eyes were closed and she was limp, almost completely unconscious.  My hands clenched into fists and my gaze turned to the tower, a flicker of fire that I knew was caused by someone who needed to be killed.  

     "Where are you going?"  Isabel called, reaching to grab my arm as I walked away.  I turned to her and she back away, almost scared of the look in my eyes.

     "Don't come back for me," I ordered, cracking my knuckles.  "But if anyone's going to die to today," I looked at the tower, "it's going to be her...."