Disclaimer: This is a work of fan fiction based on multiple existing anime/manga series. The characters and settings used in this story belong to their respective owners and creators, and no copyright infringement is intended. This story is purely for entertainment purposes and is not intended to infringe upon any existing intellectual property. I do not own any of the original works that inspired this fanfiction, and I fully support the original creators and their works.
I'm also exceedingly rarely chilling in JaxWolf4's (Author of Nah, I'd Adapt and Zenin Days) Discord Server. It's a chaotic lobotomy mess. Not for the faint of heart.
Here's the link:
Disc: HrPrTeam
THE UNDIAGNOSED AUTISM HAS REACHED CRITICAL LEVELS WITH THIS ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!
-Story Start-
The evening sun had started to set over the horizon of the cloudy outskirts of Vale.
Located atop a sizeable hill with trenches at its base, riddled with both damaged and undamaged stone and metal structures, stood the town of Vache.
The expected scars of a Grimm assault riddled its roads, fences, and homes. Shattered street lamps, imploded Dust storage, and a messy weapon storage that had been rummaged through in what appeared to be a hurry, not too long ago.
Yet, recovery was moving at a swift, routine pace. Visible construction was in progress, as workers labored even now with sweat trickling down their faces, with advanced machinery to rebuild that which had been destroyed.
Surrounding the perimeter of the sizeable hill was a strangely designed fence; not enough to stop various forms of Grimm from simply hopping over it or squeezing through, but just good enough to not allow the cow herds roaming around to escape from the town.
Nestled within Vache was the swiftly reconstructed town hall, now the base of operations for one half of the Huntsmen responsible for the next big step:
Reclaiming the Mining Town of Rikjord - located in a valley roughly fifty kilometers from the town, and a good journey uphill at that.
It was a 'magnificent' thing of rustic oak wood, strapped together with hopes, dreams, Huntsmen forced to learn basic survival skills, and significantly fatigued farmers. Smelled like wood, glue, and a touch of genuine hazard to any Fire Dust - which luckily was all stored outside or safely in the Huntsmen's magazines.
A large table with various sketched maps of the valley and 'X' marks on potential breach areas that were either inspected or have yet to be inspected. A dozen rather colorful individuals, eight to be exact, sat at the table overlooking the maps with contemplative expressions.
They all appeared to be older than Alex, a team of third and fourth years from Beacon.
The subtle, but obnoxious hum of the electronic and rather old-fashioned communication device reverberated in the spacious meeting room as it stuck like glue on the wall near the entrance.
In the corner of the table sat the listless Alex, Excalibur strangely graced with its own chair to sit on to his right and to his left, the bored, blind Fox Alistair.
The two defensive measures of this town, who were in the 'kiddy' section of the table during this briefing, and weren't too keen on engaging their knowledge from pre-Beacon cartography classes.
"Andrite! Pass me the comms!" The eldest, a spiky-silver helmeted fellow with shoulder-length green hair and hard-leather gloves, barked an order, his gloved fingers pointing at the nearly checked-out Alex.
The response was immediate. "No. Get it yourself."
"Kiss my ass!" The helmeted fellow curtly retorted, without wasting a breath. He turned and pointed a finger at Fox.
Who couldn't really see the finger, but he went with it anyway, "Fox! Pass them comms!"
Fox snorted audibly, "Sheesh, man, don't you see I'm blind?"
"And I've been constipated for the last week, weak excuse!"
Instead of taking offense, Fox and a few others barked a laugh. Alex only managed to arch a slightly baffled eyebrow.
Fox answered with a disappointed shake of his head, "Get up and get it yourself, Jade. You're a grown ass Huntsman, you can be a big boy and grab a remote ten feet away."
Huffing in genuine dismay, Jade pushed himself off the table with his chair's creak being audible, "Then what good are you anyway?! You can kiss my ass as well!"
His step reverberated amid the light giggling of his would-be teammates and allies as he headed to the attached communication device, grumbling aloud. "Freshmen these days... I used to do errands for my seniors back in the day! Is this really too much to ask? No respect for the chain of command."
Alex answered his disappointment, "Chain of command or not, I just think you were bullied. Also, if you had asked nicely with a 'please', I'd have probably got up and got it for you."
Jade grabbed the device, his gruff tone lowering a pitch, "Really?"
Alex genuinely contemplated, his head lowering in thought for a moment. Only to shake his head as he arrived at an answer, "On second thought, probably not."
"I see... on second thought, you can kiss my ass!"
His pink-haired teammate giggled, "Andrite would kill you... and we can smell the stench from here."
Jade clicked his tongue loudly, "I TOLD YOU I'M FUCKING CONSTIPATED!"
His clamorous shout had been immediately followed by the door beside him slamming open, revealing a grinning Coco whose clothes looked as if she had just come back from the battlefield.
She exclaimed with passion, "Isn't it such a beautiful, miraculous thing how all of us, colorful and diverse individuals that we are, manage to unite and work in a cooperative, mutually beneficial harmony through our joint hatred of Grimm?"
Jade chastised with the harshness and sassiness of a drill sergeant, "If you've got time to unconsentually prattle to us about your sunshine and rainbows philosophy... YOU'VE GOT TIME TO GET BACK TO YOUR DAMN STATION! YOUR SHIFT AIN'T OVER YOU NEGLIGENT DUMBASS! YOU CAN GET SOMEONE FUCKING KILLED! OUT!"
Coco pursed her lips for a moment, hands placed on her hips as she looked up at the tall figure of Jade, who stood before her with that threatening helmet of his, "I'll have you know we just fought the equivalent of a Goliath with the hordes of Grimm that didn't even come from the direction of the valley!"
She scratched her head in a show of frustration, "It's as if we've got an extra two hundred huntsmen on hand! I'm out of damn Dust!"
Confirming to herself with a nod, she completed her rant with snark, "So I came here to say 'hi' and then restock! You got that? Or is that steel-trap pressing on your head a lil too hard?!"
Jade nodded as he took in the words and complaints, and he inhaled a deep breath.
Then he sharply turned towards Alex with a loud, obnoxious voice, "DAMN IT ANDRITE!"
"What?" Alex innocently inquired, though a hint of irritation crossed his features, especially at how noisy Jade was being.
"YOU GOT A WAY TO NOT BE A USELESS LUMP OF GRIMM BAIT? YOU'VE GOT MORE AURA PACKED INTO EVERY DAMN BREATH YOU TAKE THAN ANYONE OF US HAS ON HAND! IT'S CAUSING PROBLEMS!"
Alex paused as he lowered his head to stare at Excalibur with a momentary contemplation. With it, he lifted his head, "Nope. Won't turn it off."
He rose up from his chair, regarding everyone present with his dull amber eyes as he extended his hand to grasp Excalibur from its royal seat.
He then turned to both Jade and Coco. "But I won't mind going on my shift earlier; it shouldn't be too much trouble."
"It's either this useless meeting." A statement Fox could agree with, "Or something of substance. And no offense, you guys have a screw or two loose."
[And you don't?]
His words were further reinforced by the fact that they only bellowed with laughter at his admission, with Jade patting the shorter and younger blonde's shoulders in approval and a less booming tone, "A fine gesture of proactivity! As for the loose screws, they are but a compliment; you need one or two to truly thrive in this depressing but fulfilling profession."
He regaled Alex and everyone around with the unrequested short tale of his friend.
"My old partner was a solid man, hopes, dreams, he was normal by all means... He got skewered by a giant nevermore back when we were first years."
"I liked that son of a bitch." He sniffed audibly; it actually felt genuine.
"See, Jade? When you speak without a stick in your ass, you're a real likable dude." Coco winked at him.
"I'm getting out of here." Alex immediately pressed on in his walking out of the room, his steps creaking on the wooden floor.
Truly, Alex wished nothing more than for these Third and Fourth year crackheads to head out to the valley and do their job already before he loses his mind and does it himself.
Alex shook his head as he was greeted with the outside fresh air and the quietude of nature, minus the whole machinery and hammering of repair works.
'There's no way these guys are real people. Who talks like that?' Alex expressed his internal bafflement once more, although it hadn't shown much on his usual thin line expression.
Indeed, the time constraint has now impressively lowered to two days if this nonsense keeps up.
What he did miss was Coco questioning Jade with a note of seriousness, "You ain't going to question why the Headmaster didn't send him to aid you in taking back the mines?"
"I trust the Headmaster, and I, in contrast to some people... do not question higher command."
Coco drawled out with disappointment, "Anddddd the stick's lodged back in thereeeee."
-----------------------------
Alex found himself before a rather weary duo of Velvet and Yatsuhashi, the former swiftly moving to hide behind her taller teammate for reasons he didn't care enough to try and decipher.
...Or did he?
Again, a strange chill went down his spine as he made eye contact with her.
On the way here and even on the Bullhead itself, they hadn't exchanged a word between one another. With some of her teammates taking up a majority of his... resting time.
Some of it is productive, for a change.
"That's... never happened? Why isn't my semblance working on you?"
"Some do, some don't. Haven't really looked into it, but I've got a resistance to Magic."
"Sounds like a load of bullshit to me. Just say you're resistant to Semblances, who knows why." Fox skeptically pointed out, further voicing his skepticism, "Even complimentary things?"
"Weiss's Time dilation, whatever glyph it was, didn't work on me, so I guess that counts? I don't make the rules." Alex shrugged uncaringly.
...
Shaking his head in favor of more important things, Alex noted the scarred battlefield, particularly further ahead of the dug trenches behind them.
With a light hop, he bypassed the trenches and closed the distance between the two of them, "I'm taking over your shift. Go take a rest."
Yatsuhashi tilted his head, his tone came out measured, "We have three more hours-"
Alex nodded and cut him off there, "Yeah, I know. I'm taking over..." He paused, adding a clause, "I mean, you're welcome to stay, it'll cut me some slack - but I'm getting you're having trouble from the Grimm because I'm here?" He asked, but their dirty and fatigued visages told him all he needed to know.
Yatsuhashi smiled apologetically, "It seems so-" His head immediately turned, as the wind blew lightly, a duo of Beowolves bursting as if on cue from the open wilderness and shrubbery.
Before either he or Velvet could even react, the wind howled, almost sweeping them off their feet as the noise of a slash barely resonated. Before they knew it, Alex was already in front of them with the beheaded Grimm dissintegrating before them.
Exchanging a momentary look between each other, as if there were any existing doubts regarding Alex's capability, Velvet and Yastuhashi blinked in slight befuddlement.
"I couldn't even see him move," Yatsuhashi admitted with a slight humbled yet impressed edge.
Alex nonchalantly declared as he reattached the two-handed Excalibur back to his left hip, "Rest up with your entire team. Splitting three-to-one is no good. There's no telling if the Grimm will get better or worse from here."
At that, Velvet spoke with a soft agreement, "Yeah. Rest up and take over your shift as a full Team is what you're saying?"
Alex nodded, "Should make things easier, and I won't have to handle both our shifts."
[You could simply dismiss Excalibur-]
'Not. Happening.' He growled.
He'd rather go through Purgatory than be separated from his salvation, for it to not be within his arm's reach.
[But I am a proud fan of your proactiveness! Good job!]
Yatsuhashi and Velvelt's steps on the coarse ground cut through the silence, as they passed Alex by, only for Velvet to momentarily pause in her steps.
"U-Umm."
"Yeah?"
She withdrew her strange camera contraption, presenting it with an awkward blush to Alex, "D-Do you..."
Alex frowned slightly as he sighed, "Just speak clearly, I'll hear you out."
"Umm, yeah, sorry. Do you mind if I... take a picture of you? Specifically of your Semblance?" Underneath that shyness, Alex could discern the look of an excited scientist on Velvet's face.
Blinking, Alex lowered his head to look at Excalibur, then turned to look back at Velvet with an approving nod and thumbs-up as he took out the sacred blade.
He didn't know why she was asking, but he could see a woman of fine tastes for certain.
He nodded with fervor, his voice reverent as he held out the blade at an angle as she positioned to take a photo, "Make sure to get all the good sides - not that there are any bad ones."
With the swift click of that weird camera-looking contraption, it seemed to be a succes-
"Gah!" Velvet yelped as she immediately dropped the camera thing that had started to... emit smoke.
A second later, it emitted a few electric noises before igniting into fire, as the smell of burnt electronics and...
A small explosion reverberated, and the three of them backed away immediately as a small fireball of flame engulfed a radius of roughly eight feet.
The flames dispersed, and the dust and debris cleared to reveal the scorched ground; only traces of metal and otherwise remained of the odd camera contraption that had suddenly combusted for no good reason.
Both Velvet and Yatsuhashi stood there utterly gobsmacked.
Alex gave his honest two cents, "Unfortunate. But understandable, Excalibur's sacredness cannot be captured in a photograph-"
"Oh no..." Velvet's voice was the weakest he had ever heard from her, not that he heard much from her, but that was still a feat of its own - her tone practically the lowest possible pitch.
Yatsuhashi was a pale, yet semi-composed figure. "I thought..." He exhaled patiently, "That it didn't work on Semblances?"
"But... it looked like a sword." Her protest was weak, and her expression incredibly dead.
"It's just a camera, don't stress." Alex arched an eyebrow.
"It's her weapon." Yatsuhashi corrected.
"Oh. Unfortunate." His tone flickered with a smidgen of pity.
Whether it was Alex's own presence or Velvet's own despair, a trio of Creeps rushed towards them.
A moment later, they were gone as well, but whisps in the wind.
Gone in an instant, just like Velvet's hopes and dreams.
To Be Continued!
-Author Note Start-
Hello bruzzahs!
Hope this chapter was just enough chill for you! And you (hopefully) enjoyed it.
This 'chill' arc should last roughly 2 or 3 more chapters before we get back to bigger things in life.
But I've got a goal in mind with this one chat! (Except letting the voices speak)
Which you'll see later.
Well, a couple, but a big one that's, like, the priority on the list.
Love ya and bu bye!
Next Chapter In 24 HOURS!
Also feel like this is a great time, as any, to request GENUINE CRITICISM. The story's been going on for a while, and I AM AIMING to improve. So, do assist me in this endeavour, please! Do not shy away from saying what may be harsh things, think a little, and I'm sure you'll find something I can improve on (minus pacing lmao). It's hard to objectively get a read on your own writing and such.