Cinder came around shortly thereafter, and Emerald was waiting for her.

She decided not to mention what she saw--even if Cinder was pissed that they'd brought her back. [Way to be grateful to the only person who likes you, Cinder.]

Emerald tried to explain, "You were hurt. I was just trying to help."

Not a good moment for Mercury to walk in, but he did... That meeting had been short.

"I think she's had enough help," he said meanly. "Besides, she went against our queen. I'd be careful who you back."

"Cinder's hunch was right," Emerald argued. "If we'd had support, then maybe we would have--"

"Would you stop trying to protect her already?" Mercury held his hand out. "She doesn't care about you." [Takes some guts to say that in front of Cinder...and did she help herself?]

Cinder's eye lit on fire.

"Both of you, get out!" she snapped. "I'll let you know when you're needed next."

Emerald lowered her head. She was pissed at her...but why? What were they supposed to do?

"Yeah, about that--" Mercury never did seem to care if Cinder blew his head off with her magic. "--Salem's got other plans for me. I'm not gonna be taking orders from you anymore."

Emerald couldn't believe her ears...not that she hadn't seen this coming, but was he out of his mind?

Wait, why was she so horrified? Wasn't this just kind of what they did now?

"She wants everyone on the bridge," Mercury added. "Something big is about to happen."

There was nothing to do but get up and go, so they did.

* * *

Oscar's head stopped spinning after a while, and Ozpin resumed talking to him.

He was sore all over, but at least Oz provided a bit of a distraction from his many injuries.

"I'd like to express again," Ozpin said, "This is my burden to bear, not yours. His grudge is with me."

"No, it will be even worse," Oscar managed to speak, with difficulty. "He's holding back with me, I can tell."

Had he been able to see himself right then, he might have wondered just how much good that was really doing him.

Somehow, though, he didn't think he'd sustained any internal bleeding from all this.

"I understand, I do," Ozpin said, "but you've done so much already. The least I can do is give you a break. And try to get us out of here."

"We can't leave yet," Oscar said. "This is our chance."

Something he'd been thinking about while getting knocked around was that...why did Salem even have these people working for her?

It made no sense...unless maybe she lied to them.

Hazel might be kind of a jerk, but Oscar had seen him do minor acts of kindness before. He didn't think that, deep down, he was a sadistic psycho like Tyrian. So what would possess him to work for Salem, the only other person he could blame for his sister's death?

[As an aside, he's lucky that Salem didn't have Tyrian torture him--I suspect because Tyrian would have gotten carried away and just killed him off. I really couldn't have watched that.]

Maybe it was inheriting Ozpin's experience, or maybe it was that Shine had grilled him on how to read his opponent for the last week or so, but he was starting to think that something didn't add up...and maybe he could use that.

"Hmm. Maybe you've taken one too many hits," was Ozpin's cheerful vote of confidence in his thoughts.

"Salem," Oscar was thinking out loud now. "She knows that she can't take on the whole world at once. So she doesn't. She has her followers work their way in, sabotaging us from the inside out. Maybe--"

"--Maybe we should do the same," Ozpin finished with him.

A pause.

"We certainly are similar, you and I," Ozpin said.

Oscar choked on a laugh because it made his ribs hurt too much. "You've never tried that," he said, coughing.

"No?" Ozpin said. "I'm sure I must have." [Name one time. I'll wait.]

"No," Oscar said. "I don't think anyone has. Sounds like something Shine would suggest, though. She got Raven to cooperate, somehow...at least enough to listen to her."

"We still don't know if Miss Branwen actually is going to help us or continue her pattern of staying out of it," Ozpin said.

"Yeah...but still," Oscar said. "Shine tries to know her opponent. You spend all your time countering and trying to keep things away from her, but Shine goes right up and personal and confronts them."

"Granted...and how has it worked out for her?"

"Maybe it's too soon too tell," Oscar said. "But we can't try the other stuff you do, not here--so, it's worth a shot."

"Well...it's better than no plan," Ozpin said. "I'll go along with it for now, but if it doesn't work, I still want to get us out of here."

He meant using magic...

"Even if the same thing happens as before, getting out of here is still our best chance," Ozpin said. "And it didn't kill you. She never said it would kill you. Being here might. We'll have to deal with the consequences later."

"I don't want to go back on my word," Oscar said. "There has to be a better way to escape... Let's try my idea for now..."

How he'd talk Ozpin out of using magic if it failed, he had no idea, but one thing at a time...

At least Hazel hadn't hit him in the head too much; a concussion would have made this harder to deal with. [You can get a concussion from hitting your spine too, but not your ribs, I think...]

Hazel came back in right then.

"Great," Oscar muttered. Time to test his theory.

"Oscar, please." Ozpin at least wanted to be the one to do this part.

Hazel picked Oscar up and shoved him into the wall--not even hard, for him, but Oscar was so battered it hurt anyway.

"You don't need to fight this war, kid." Hazel looked slightly guilty. "Tell me what I need, and we can be done."

Yeah, we'd be done all right, Oscar thought, done for... As if Salem wouldn't just kill me or worse if I didn't have any bargaining chips.

"Watch it, Oscar," Ozpin said. "Lip won't work on him."

Fine, you take it, Oscar said. But I'm stepping back in if he gets angrier.

They shifted.

"Hello, Hazel," Ozpin said, more calmly.

Hazel tightened his grip. "Coward! All this time it could have been you, but you let him suffer."

"My idea, actually," Oscar said.

He won't believe that, so it's a waste of time to say it, Ozpin shot back.

Hazel threw him across the floor. "Now tell us how this d----d lamp works. The boy has suffered enough."

"Why do you follow her?" Ozpin managed to get up despite pretty intense pain. 

Hazel kicked him down.

He struggled up. "I know...I know how you see me. But her? Look at what she does. How is she the answer? Why not stop her?"

"Oz, this is not the way I would go," Oscar said in his mind. "What if she hears this? Why are you yelling? That could ruin the whole thing."

Shut up, Oscar. Let me do what I need to do, Ozpin shot back.

Hazel did pause. "Salem can't be stopped," he said, walking to a horn sticking out of the Grimm. "She's a force of nature. I've seen it firsthand." [This is what we call crappy justification on the writers' part--pretty clear they didn't really know how to make his character's good and bad parts make sense together.]

He ripped part of the horn off. "But you, you send children to their deaths for a cause that you know has no victory. No end."

"Someone has to try," Ozpin cried. "Salem isn't a force of nature, because Salem can be fought. Unless she brings the Relics together. If that happens--"

"Ozma." At that moment Oscar's prediction came true: Salem was there.

But she didn't seem to have heard enough of what they were saying to be angry about it--or she didn't care. 

"You have wonderful timing," she went on. "The show is about to begin."

To say Ozpin lost his cool would be an understatement. Oscar could feel him freaking out.

Next thing he knew, Hazel had grabbed them and dragged them to the throne room, where Salem was sitting there, looking queenly--in an evil way.

Everyone was bowing before her.

It didn't suit Oscar to do this, but Hazel made Ozpin do it.

Salem announced that they had good news: Tyrian had heard from Watts--and that he had gained some control, with Ironwood's help, of Penny.

Oscar wondered why they wanted her...then Salem explained it.

"In order to track down the Winter Maiden," she said. "Can't be long now."

So they still didn't have her. That was good at least.

"Speaking of which." Salem turned then, "Cinder."

Cinder's arm started to malfunction as if it hurt her.

So Salem did control it in a way...

"You chose to disobey my specific instructions," Salem went on. "Just to fail again."

Oscar didn't like Cinder any more than anyone else did, but this still made him uncomfortable. He wished Tyrian would stop grinning.

"And I've realized--it's all my fault," Salem said, slyly. The arm stopped smoking. "You've fought your whole life, unwaveringly, for what you want. And here I am, holding you back, when I should have been lifting you up."

That had to be a trick. No way would she care.

Oh, yes, Ozpin thought. But what trick? This doesn't sound quite like her to me.

Salem took Cinder's Grimm hand. "You deserve so much more than what I have given you," she said. "Go to Atlas, recover Watts."

The Hound came by and sniffed at Emerald, who looked freaked out by it. "He can lead you to the girl. Whether you or my Hound gets to her first, you will finally have the Winter Maiden's powers. And I will have my Staff."

[Yeah, Salem puts both her bitches in a race this time--I use the word literally in this case, so it's not cussing.]

"You'll only be helping her bring about the end, for all of you!" Ozpin cried, losing his head completely.

Oscar would have wanted to yell that too but wasn't sure he'd have been that reckless while surrounded by enemies. Yeah, Ozpin might come back, but he could only die once!

Hazel slammed him into the ground...which might have been to save his life [Hazel and Winter have the same method of protecting people], then lifted him up so Salem could face him.

"You're too late," she said to his face.

Cinder and the Hound both took off.

Oscar was taken back to his "cell".

* * *

No one else knew that Penny was hacked. She'd disappeared from Amity Colosseum while trying to stabilize it, and Pyrrha hadn't been able to do it alone. They worried that she might have crashed, literally and figuratively... Pietro was distraught.

Pyrrha managed to use the mech they had to get them all down from the tower, and then the two elder people said she should just go join her friends and nevermind them--they were as good as caught, and they couldn't hide effectively. Pietro was too well known.

It took Pyrrha a while to get back to the Schnee mansion on her own.

In this time, Jaune, Ren, Yang, and Shine finally saw the storm blow over.

Wally found them too. Shine was able to send him a message via her paper-summoning trick.

He couldn't carry them all back to Atlas at once...and the icy tundra was a lot riskier for him to run on, so he said he'd just walk back with them till they got close enough for him to run them in.

It wouldn't have taken that long, had Yang not insisted on bringing that one bike they had left, and so they had to go slower.

That was when they found the Grimm river.

Something coming either from Salem's land, or the Zeppelin itself, but it was oozing black goo, and Grimm were coming out of it, going towards Atlas.

Nothing attacked them right off.

"This is gross..." Wally said. 

"The River Styx." Shine said it like "sticks". "The river of the underworld, Hades...could make you invincible...or it's the passage way to death from life. Opinions vary, but I think we can safely say Salem is not using it for life."

"If more Grimm come out of this, there's no way Atlas can hold out," Jaune said.

"How do we get rid of that?" Yang said.

Shine pulled out her sword and stuck it into the river cautiously.

The river around it peeled away like it was repulsed by the metal, and Shine glanced at it, then raised it up.

"Well, there's no stopping it without cutting off either it's path or its source," she said. "Not much hope of us finding the latter if it's underground, so perhaps we can head it off."

Before they could do anything about it, one of the Atlas ships pulled up in front of them suddenly.

Winter and the Ace Ops were standing in it.

They'd been sent out to find Penny as well as oversee the battle. Right now they were doing the second.

Winter still had her conversation with Qrow and Robyn in her mind, and seeing Shine and Wally there, along with the kids, didn't help her brush it off.

"Great...you guys." Yang was so done with them.

"Did you hear our message?" Jaune asked hopefully. He'd been trying to get word out about the river and Oscar for a while now.

"It's right there." He pointed at the river. 

"Where's Penny?" Harriet only glanced at it briefly.

"Are you serious right now?" Jaune said. "There are people in danger!"

"There are people in danger because you kids are acting selfish, and--" Harriet began. 

Just then the ground rumbled.

At the end of the river, it suddenly shot up towards Atlas like a geyser, and Grimm bugs began coming out of it and tunneling into the rock itself... They would reach the city soon enough.

"Nice going there," Wally said. "Your blame and anger is making this worse."

"Atlas..." Winter gasped.

"Is she giving it tapeworms?" Shine peered at it.

"They're going to destroy it," Jaune said. "Even Atlas isn't safe."

"I never believed it was," Shine said. "Ironwood is an idiot."

"Don't talk about him like that," Harriet said. "This is your fault--"

Shine took her sword and knocked Harriet off her feet, so that she landed on her rear end.

Harriet jumped up and lunged at her.

Wally grabbed Harriet's arms and held her back.

"Let me...go!..." She squirmed like crazy.

"Stop it," Winter said.

"No, you stop it," Shine said. "Enough of this crap. Those things will eat Atlas alive if we don't stop it. Take us over there, and let's see if we can."

"We're supposed to be arresting you," Marrow said.

"You're supposed to be protecting Atlas too," Shine said. "Prioritize, and keep Harriet quiet. If she can't be helpful, then she could at least not attract the Grimm right to us. Also, we have other bad news but no time to explain it now."

She got on the ship.

"You think we'll just let you?" Elm said.

"She can help," Jaune said. "West can too. What are we going to be able to do to stop that?"

Winter frowned. "If you're offering, then fine, but we're still taking you in."

"Then screw this," Yang said, kicking the ground.

"Yang, get on the plane." Shine pointed to the floor. "Now."

"Why should--" Yang said.

"Now!" Shine said.

"Come on, kid." Wally swung himself on, then helped Jaune and Ren get up.

Harriet scrambled up after them, looking ready to fight, but Winter gave her a warning look.

They flew towards the city quickly.

"Oscar was taken," Jaune hurried to start explaining.

They saw the Zeppelin itself lifting up and flying to the lip of Atlas' floating rock, then landing, opening its mouth, and Grimm beginning to spew out of a black river.

"That is...so wrong..." Wally looked and felt sick.

"How does she make those things?" Shine wondered.

"And now there's that." Marrow threw his hands up. "Someone has to stop that thing..."

"And Mantle," Yang said.

"Stop going on about Mantle," Harriet said.

"That's where Oscar is." Shine peered at the Zeppelin. "I'm sure of it. Salem is on that thing, after all. Who knows who else is with her."

Marrow checked his scroll. "The General says to evacuate all citizens to the subways."

"Um...did you see those things burrowing through rock?" Wally said.

"Yes, wouldn't underground be the easiest place for them to trap the civilians?" Shine asked. [The show forgot about the bugs, I'm convinced, since they don't show up and do that.]

Marrow looked uneasy. "Uh...well...those are orders."

"What about Oscar?" Yang asked.

"We have orders to blow up that Zeppelin," Winter said, flatly, after Ironwood buzzed in with those instructions.

"But you can't do that," Jaune said.

"We have to," Vine said.

"But Oscar is Ozpin," Ren said.

"Oh, that doesn't matter, Ren," Shine said savagely. "Ironwood already shot him off a cliff."

The Ace Ops all stared at her.

Winter turned to give her a look of horror.

"What?" Marrow said.

"Oh, he didn't tell you that?" Shine was mad. "Yes, in cold blood, he shot him. Oscar would have fallen to his death, if Ozpin--and I--hadn't both helped him. Didn't you know where the big hole in the bottom of Atlas came from?"

"No one mentioned a hole..." Winter looked now and saw that there was one.

"Can't the Grimm get through that?" Wally wondered.

"They'll head for people, not the Vault," Shine said. "But eventually, yes, they will. He left it wide open."

"Isn't that Pine's fault?" Harriet said.

"What the flip is wrong with you?!" Wally lost it finally. "Did you not just hear that your boss tried to murder a kid?"

"The kid is also Ozpin, who lied to us," Harriet said. "So he was collateral damage."

Wally looked ready to fly off the handle. "Do you have a heart underneath that mohawk, Harriet? Or did you freeze it when you joined the military?"

Harriet scowled at him. 

"I cannot believe the General would do such a thing unprovoked," Winter said.

"Oscar would not lie about it," Shine said. "I saw the hole and him falling. Do you think he would have jumped down himself? You see the evidence. Why would I make this up? Ironwood is removing anyone who stands in his way."

"That councilman had it coming, all right?" Harriet cried. "He was always pushing against the General's orders, and we're in a state of emergency right now--"

"What councilman?" Ren interrupted.

Silence.

Marrow looked at Harriet oddly.

"Sleet," Winter finally said, after a way too long pause. "He was...executed earlier."

Pause.

"For?" Shine said.

Silence.

"I'm guessing it was having an opinion," Wally said. "Okay, what's next? You push us all out of this plane?"

"Don't tempt me," Harriet said.

"Stand down!" Winter said to her in a chilling voice.

"Did you know this already?" Jaune asked her, upset. "Is that why you don't want to save Oscar?"

"I didn't know," Winter said. "But I don't think the General would change his mind about this plan over one person... Ozpin will return."

"Does that really matter?" Shine said. "Wake up, all of you. Who is the real enemy here?"

"We're in a tight spot," Vine said. "There is no way to save everyone. The General is making the tough decisions."

"So you don't have to?" Wally sputtered.

He didn't know this, but Winter had said those exact words to someone not that long ago, and she blinked.

"You all are so stupid!" Yang said. "But whatever. We're still going to get Oscar, whether you like it or not... You two will help us, right?" She looked at Shine.

"Not if it's going to get blown up," Shine said. "I can't risk losing all of you instead of just one, but Wally and I could still go."

"Yeah, I could find him," Wally said.

He looked at the Zeppelin...but Salem would be in there. Suddenly he felt kind of sick again.

"I...mean, she can't be...that powerful..." he said slowly.

"Are you mad?" Elm said.

"Quiet." Winter held up her hand. "I cannot let all of you do this. Even if it wasn't against direct orders, it's crazy. You couldn't hope to get out of there alive, and we're supposed to be taking you in."

"Winter, can you forget what you're supposed to be doing for one second?" Shine said. "Look at this." She pointed. "Do you think evacuating people to tunnels is going to do a dang thing? If Salem gets what she wants from Oscar, then you're all doomed anyway. It won't matter. Ironwood's plan is to seal off Atlas, right? For how long? She has an army that can be replenished at will--you see it yourself. You guys will last a month, tops, maybe two, if you have more supplies than I judged you did while we were up there. No fresh water, no shipment of food, and nothing but dead people below you. If the other kingdoms show up to help, they'll leave you to rot for your arrogance and focus only on Mantle, as they won't be able to reach you even if they wanted to. No one will be safe. Salem can pick out the Staff at her leisure as soon as she narrows down the Maiden from everyone else around here. And she'll have the Maiden trapped in a nice little bubble. Ironwood is playing right into her hands."

"You seem to know a lot about what Salem will do," Harriet said.

"It's what I would do." Shine folded her arms. "If I was fighting you, I'd get you to screw yourselves over first. You all are so freaking predictable, it's a wonder she hasn't won long ago."

Winter motioned for Harriet to shut up.

"Miss Likstar," she said, "given that fact, if you were Salem, what would you be worried about us doing?"

Shine glanced at the chaos.

"Well, you can't save Atlas at this point," she said. "Not by your methods, anyway. She knew that. But if you got the people out of it and the Maiden and Staff, then all she really has is an empty husk. It's not a total victory for you, but it's not a total loss either. She'll leave the city, and if you manage to win this, you guys can come rebuild it later. Cutting your losses would be the smartest thing to do, in a war. But if you allow Oscar to die, you lose the only person who knows that much about the Relic, Maidens, or Salem. He could take months to pop up again, and that will be too late; she'll head to Vacuo after this. She can crush it long before he comes back. Then she just has to find the Fall Relic, and she's won. Beating her to the punch is about the only thing left for you to do, which is why Ozpin was implementing that strategy before he went silent, at least while Cinder is able to take the powers of the Maidens... If she wasn't, you'd have more options. The worst thing you could do for Salem is call off this strategy, work together to protect the Maiden, and get her the heck out of this city... Notice this." She pointed out to the wasteland. "She's not even trying to keep the city locked in from the air right now. You kids were able to just leave Mantle and ride around. She only cares about keeping Atlas sealed in because she knows the Maiden is up there. And the Staff. If you snuck all that down to Mantle and just ran for it, she wouldn't chase you. The last thing she thinks Ironwood will do is expose the Maiden like that outside the city. By the time she catches on, you might get her away. Maybe we can help with that. But that's a band-aid approach. The citizens would still be in peril... Still, it might do as a distraction for now. But so would getting Oscar. Blowing up the whale thing isn't a bad idea, I'll give the General that much. It would slow her down. But after that, you'll need more."

The others looked out.

"I think she's right," Jaune said. "We can stall for time if we get Oscar."

"Doesn't matter," Harriet yelled. "Because we don't take orders from you--"

"How long would it take you?" Winter cut her off.

"To get Oscar?" Shine asked. "Don't know what we'd have to fight. Wally could go in and get him out in two minutes flat if he was just lying around, but he'll be guarded, probably tied up, and there's probably Grimm inside that thing and other henchmen, so I'd say at least 20 minutes even with our speed, maybe more if it's a real maze in there."

"But under an hour?" Winter put a hand to her chin. "The bomb won't be ready for another quarter of that, probably, then we have to get it here...inspect the troops... I could give you an hour."

"What?" Harriet said.

The other Ace Ops exchanged looks.

"Technically, we're not disobeying the General's orders." Winter shot them a warning glare. "We're just enacting them in a preferred sequence. There is some room for interpretation on the field."

"Even an hour isn't that long," Yang said. "Not...not if there's a lot of stuff in there...and around it."

"I think we could do it," Wally said.

"We have to try," Jaune said.

"Yes," Ren said. "It's better than nothing."

"Hold it," Harriet said. "You know where the Maiden is hiding, right? Or who she passed her powers to? You can't go off without telling us that. What if you die? You could lose us our only chance to secure her."

"Yes, I'm sure you'd like to secure her powers." Shine was cutting. "No part of this deal involves turning over that woman to you. Even if we knew where she was."

"Don't lie to me. I know you do," Harriet said.

"Nevermind," Winter said. "We have no time to retrieve her anyway. We'll have to wait till after the bomb is deposited."

"Are you kidding? We could go get her now," Harriet said.

"I said we don't have time." Winter made a frighteningly stern expression.

"But--" Harriet said.

"I outrank you," Winter said firmly. [I tell you, my sister and I cheered when we heard that line the first time. She predicted Winter would squash Harriet by saying something like that, and it was so satisfying to watch.]

"What about the...worm things?" Marrow asked.

Shine's eyes glittered.

"I maybe could take a shot at that later," she said. "There's a lot of them for one woman or even two people, but who knows? Numbers aren't that important for us."

"And what do you want in return for that?" Vine asked.

"Do I need to get something in return for trying to save the people?" Shine asked. "Someone has to."

"Yeah, you tell 'em." Wally put a hand on her shoulder. "And by the way, I take back everything I said about you being too hard on these people. They're jerks after all."

Marrow winced.

"I think we were all disappointed," Yang said savagely, "but not that surprised. Let's just go get Oscar."

The plane lowered close enough to the ground for them to get off. The ground of the city had grass and stuff, which was odd compared to the tundra around Mantle. And then it just...dropped, like a cliff.

Yang and Jaune were off.

"And after an hour, we will be dropping the bomb," Winter warned them grimly.

"Understood..." Jaune said.

Marrow shook his head.

Ren sighed. "I feel like you all don't really want to do this," he remarked.

"Want doesn't matter," Elm said.

"She's right," Shine said, surprisingly. "What you want has nothing to do with what's the right thing to do, let's not make that mistake...but this is just a bad idea."

"You guys could have gone with us." Wally shook his head. "I guess someone has to cover though."

He huffily got off the plane.

"So...he has more of a temper than I thought," Marrow said.

Shine shrugged. "You won't like Wally when he's angry," she said. "I've only seen it about twice since I've known him--really angry. It's terrifying...because he only gets angry when there's a very good reason. Me, I'll bluster and storm and not do much to you, but he'll lay you out if you're threatening innocent people."

"Miss Likstar," Winter said in a low voice, "you do realize that this is a dangerous plan? Anything could go wrong and end up taking more time..."

"I can't leave him there, and neither can they," Shine said. "It would be worse not to try... Thank you for letting us... Apologize to Qrow for me if we don't come back, will you? Not that it'll make any difference..."

Winter swallowed.

"And here." Shine handed her an envelope. "Open this if we don't get out also, all right?"

"What is it?" Winter said.

"I wrote down the names of some people who might help Atlas out," Shine said. "It'll make sense, if you read it."

She jumped off the plane, and Wally caught her.

"So this is going to be freaky..." he said, eyeing the whale nervously.

"Oh, come on, didn't you always want to know how Jonah felt?" Shine asked.

"Not really," Wally said.

"Me neither, but it's upon us. Might as well make the most of it," Shine said.

She glanced around. "Okay, Wally and I will try to clear the Grimm away from the front of it for you and see if we can slow them down a bit. You go in, stay hidden--that's you, Ren--and once you're in, we'll follow you. I can't see Oscar, so we'll have to find him the old fashioned way. Don't split up alone. If you see Salem, do not engage--run. If you get caught by her, try to keep her talking as long as possible and wait to be rescued. Don't provoke her. If you see any of her henchmen, don't provoke them, especially Tyrian. If you see Hazel at all, go along with him."

"Why?" Yang asked warily.

"Because he's not likely to kill you if you don't put up a fight, and then we can bail you out," Shine said. "Fighting them all is a dumb idea at this stage, so stalling is your best option. Do not look Tyrian in the eyes if you see him, and watch the tail, all right?"

"What if we see Emerald or Mercury?" Jaune asked.

"Them you can fight," Shine said. "But I wouldn't try to win, just get away. If it's Emerald, don't trust what you see, just get out of her line of sight."

"Okay, duh," Yang, who wouldn't have thought that far ahead herself, said impatiently. "Let's just get this over with."

"Well, Wally, let's scare some Grimm," Shine said.

"Sounds so boss when you put it like that," Wally said.

[For the songs, choose your own adventure: Option A) Funny. Option B) Epic.]