[Opener: "Paranoia"--A Day to Remember]

The fire was getting suffocating to Emerald, and she rushed to the hall behind the stairs.

Mino followed, also coughing on smoke.

"Give up!" Emerald yelled at him. "We're both going to die in here if you keep fighting!"

"Just one of us!" Mino snarled at her, and she ducked so that his gun--which was now more like a buzzsaw--hit the pillar.

Emerald threw her chained knives around his arm and yanked it while he was trying to pull his saw free, and she kicked his arm hard, so that it almost broke.

He yelled in pain.

She pulled his weapon out of his hand and kicked him back.

"Just quit!" she said, coughing.

Mino looked up.

Emerald followed suit.

The pillar he'd just hit was already on fire...and it started to crack.

Mino got up and ran for it.

Emerald yelped and somehow tumbled out of the way--no time to unhook one knife from the other weapon--as the pillar snapped and part of the top floor came down with it, catching on fire.

 But it did make a path to the upstairs.

Thinking her chances were better of avoiding the flames if she went to the level they weren't currently on yet, Emerald used her other knife to swing up there, which took a lot more effort with less air. She coughed again.

But she stumbled into one of the bedrooms.

A bunch of Faunus kids looked up at her.

"What are you doing in here? Get out! This place is on fire!" Emerald screamed at them.

They jumped up.

"Where?" said one.

"Break a window, anything." Emerald didn't think the fall would hurt them too much from this story onto soft, sandy grass... Remnant kids were rough.

[But don't try this at home, real world kids. We don't have Aura... Unless there's something softer to land on, jumping out of a two-story house is a bad idea in a fire unless it's absolutely your last recourse.]

Some older kids grabbed heavy objects and began to hit at their window. They broke it in a few swings.

"There's the others," they said. "Hey, up here!"

They didn't see the Deimos, who were hovering over the house...but they weren't trying to go in. All Grimm were afraid of fire, usually.

"Just go!" Emerald urged.

The kids began to jump to the palm trees that grew close to the house... Almost all Faunus were already tree climbers, thanks to living in more rural areas.

Emerald ran to the next room. This one was empty. A lot of rooms were still empty here.

She ran up and down the hall and only found half a dozen more kids. Most of them were living on the bottom floor still.

It was good the orphanage hadn't been even half full yet, since it had only just opened, or this situation would have been even worse.

Emerald was going to jump out the window herself--she was getting light-headed...but suddenly she remembered...the attic!

She ran back to that side of the house...and the floor under her felt hot now. It was probably already on fire.

The smoke was getting thick up here too, since smoke rises. It stung her eyes, even though she used her Aura to shield herself a bit more from it...but after the fight, her Aura was depleted.

Please... please... she thought.

It was good that Mino hadn't had any other Aura-zapping devices, or that fight would have been over in seconds, she reflected.

She found the attic entrance and hit it with her knife. "Is anyone still up there? There's a fire!"

She heard nothing for a moment, then someone said, "Is that Emerald?"

"It's Emerald!" Emerald called.

"We're up here!" that was Mindy. "Can we come down now?"

"Is there a window in that room?" Emerald said, then coughed.

A pause.

"No," they said.

"Then yes, come down!" Emerald said. "Hurry."

"Where's the handle...?" The kids began to fumble for it, then they finally found it and lowered the steps.

The ground swayed under Emerald... It was too smokey up here.

"What's that smell?" The kids hadn't smelled it before.

"Smoke!" cried one of them who must have survived a fire before. "No! It's smoke! Not again!" She began to freak out.

"Shh, Sarah," the others hushed her.

An older kid grabbed her hand.

"Just hurry," Emerald said, leaning on the steps. "There's an open window..." She sounded hoarse.

The kids began to rush down, thankfully, even bringing Sarah, who was hysterical.

But one of them picked her up and carried her on their back.

They all rushed back to the bedroom.

"Ah! the floor is hot!" one said.

The others coughed.

Just as the first few of them got in the door, suddenly the floor under the others and Emerald snapped because it was on fire.

It fell down to the lower level.

Emerald grabbed the kids and pulled them back just in time for them not to fall to their deaths.

Fire blazed up from the bottom level. And smoke poured in.

"AHHH!" the kids screamed.

The others stared at them.

"Go!" Emerald said, coughing.

The ones in the room ran for the window.

The Demios hadn't bitten the others yet; they were wary of the smoke and flames...but with so many humans standing out there, they were likely to get over that shortly.

Blake was panicking enough for them to be tempted.

Finally, one of the other adults slapped her.

"I can't believe a Belladonna is freaking out like this," they said.

Blake normally wouldn't have, but she had some excuse, since she knew what the Deimos did to people.

But she rubbed her face. "Just run," she said. "They're not attacking yet. Run, try to get into someone's house--no openings!"

"You heard her. Run," the others said.

Most of them took off.

Docie had found the ladder at least.

They heard the window upstairs break and put the ladder up to it. The kids began to climb down, some of them slower than others.

There must have been another 20 of them.

"Is this everyone?" Blake asked Docie.

"No," she said. "We weren't full by any means, but that's only about 50 or 60, with the new arrivals counted, which they wouldn't be. I know we had more than that before. Maybe another 10 or less. They were in...I think, your old room."

"No one was in that room," Blake said.

"Maybe they hid in the attic. Some of them like to hide in there," Docie said.

"The attic?" Mercury said. "That's it, I'm going in there. We can't waste any more time."

It had only been a few minutes, and he hadn't found any wall that wasn't already too hot to be a good escape route.

"Mercury!" Blake cried. "This place is going down too fast. You might never make it back out if you go in there now."

"Emerald is still in there, Blake," Mercury said. 

(They had seen Mino run for the trees a moment ago, but no one had time to stop him.)

Blake saw the look in his eye.

"Wait, there's a few more!" Docie said. "Maybe she's coming out."

More kids, very scared ones, were coming down the ladder.

But not Emerald.

"Is this all of you?" Blake asked.

"No, the green lady and some other kids are still in there. The floor broke," one older one who was upset but not crying yet exclaimed, pointing up.

Mercury looked up there.

"Mercury!" Blake said, helplessly, because she wanted to go in there too but knew it was a terrible idea.

"Don't," Mercury said, running up the ladder. "You have to think of more people than just yourself, Blake. I'll get her... If I don't make it back out, don't go in after me. This place won't be standing for much longer at the rate it's going."

Any professional firefighter would had told him going in there was suicide, but Mercury wasn't about to listen.

[But for the record, never go into a burning building, especially after it's already been on fire that long. Movies make it look easier to escape than it actually is.]

"Mercury..." Blake knew he wasn't going to turn back no matter what they said.

"I want to help the kids," Docie said, glancing at her, "but this is insane. Why is he going in there? I'm not sure we can..." She shook her head.

"Love makes you do stupid things," Blake said. "I can't stop him. We have to get the others away... We need Neptune, but the...the Deimos might stop us."

How would she get help if they all got bitten? Was anyone even able to help? What if they all were already poisoned and just this group wasn't, because of the smoke?

The answer to this was provided sooner than she thought.

They heard screaming starting to break out just down the hill.

The people who'd run for the houses had been set upon by the Deimos as soon as they deemed them far enough from the fire.

The wind that had protected the people at the docks wasn't far reaching enough to go up the hill, and the kids and adults were all already going into a frenzy.

For the kids, this was less of a concern for what they would do, being small and not armed, and more for what they wouldn't be able to avoid.

Over where Sun had chased down the rogue Faunus, he had used clones to block himself from getting shot by her, and Cinder had thrown up shields to stop the darts.

Royal had finally managed to shoot her feet out from under her so that she tumbled into a wall.

Then they surrounded her.

"You're working with them, aren't you?" Sun said, grabbing her by her collar before she could get up. "Do you know what those things are!?" He pointed up at the Deimos with his tail.

"Grimm," she said, struggling.

"Not just any Grimm," Sun said. "Grimm that drive you mad if they bite you."

She frowned. "What?"

"They make you afraid," Cinder said darkly. "Of everything."

Neo nodded. She'd just caught up.

"Everything?" Royal asked.

"Winter described it best, I think," Sun said. "It makes you think everything is malevolent--the air, the ground, the surroundings, and people. Anything you see. It's like a horror movie on the worst kind of steroids. And you feel all tense even after you remember what happened. You feel edgy for hours. And you might attack anyone in that time or just run from them...even off a cliff."

"Or into the ocean?" Royal said, pointing to where the beach was.

"Yeah, there too," Sun said.

"What?" the Faunus said. "They said the Grimm would attack Menagerie where they had their plants, not that it would drive us mad... But it won't affect us."

"You know, it really doesn't have to. Everyone else who is infected might tear us apart," Sun said. "Did they give you a way to call this off?"

"No, once this phase started, it was impossible to call it off." The Faunus was scared now. "That was part of the deal... They...they didn't--"

"Didn't tell you the full truth?" Royal was cuttingly sarcastic. "Wow, what a surprise from bandits."

"Not the time, man," Sun said. "If we can't call this off, then what are we gonna do? We have minutes."

They didn't even have that much. Suddenly one of the Deimos landed on the Faunus Sun was holding.

She flinched, but it bit her before anyone could do anything.

Royal was the only one who didn't know what to expect. The others had seen it happen up close, all of them except Cinder, who had been alone when she was bitten before.

But they understood the look in the Faunus woman's eyes as they seemed to glaze over at first and then became wild with fear, and her pupils got so large they almost swallowed her irises.

"Ah!" She began to howl and thrash. "No, stop...! Leave me alone!"

She kicked Sun hard while flailing around.

"Ow." Sun let go of her, and she careened away from him and then ran, stumbling over things and dodging things that were not attacking her, like barrels.

"Well...that was disturbing," Royal said.

Neo swatted suddenly at one that had tried to land on her.

She held up her umbrella and looked at them in horror.

Sun held up his pole to spin it to keep them off.

Cinder rushed to form a glass shield.

A Deimos landed on her hand, and she swatted at it.

"Ow!" Royal said, hitting his neck and seeing black goo. "Yuck... Oh no!" He grabbed his face. 

"Royal!" Sun was worried. "Oh, man, try to fight it. Maybe we can--some of us could before. Aura up!"

He activated his.

Royal activated his. "I don't know... I feel weird..." he said, strangely.

Neo shook her head and then crouched and began to make motions that they were pretty sure meant she didn't want this to happen again.

Cinder activated her Aura in the nick of time.

"Focus," she said, yanking Neo up. "Don't just stand there! Activate your Aura!"

Neo glared but did so.

The Deimos landed on her--but didn't bite her.

"Meridian was able to counter this thing before," Sun said. "Remember? I bet if Jaune enhanced his Aura, he could cover more people. Maybe hold off the... We gotta get back there."

"This whole island is going to turn on itself," Royal said slowly. "Isn't it?"

Sun hesitated.

Cinder frowned. "We can't think about that right now," she said. "If we don't get out of here, we're going to lose our minds also. You're not under yet, so fight it off."

Royal nodded.

"Yeah, let's move it." Sun shook himself. "Before it's too late."

They turned to run back towards the dock.

It had been mostly cleared of civilians, who were on the boat.

The Deimos were starting to break through the wind... Jaune couldn't help Dew forever; they both would be tired soon.

"At this point we're delaying the inevitable," Oscar said to him. "If you use up all your Aura, you won't be able to help anyone else or fight yourself. Dew, just go inside. Thank you."

"Fine, it's your funeral," she said.

She and her team were not the most cheerful of people.

She ran to the boat and down the stairs.

The Deimos she'd held off were now coming down hard.

Yang shot a few of them.

A portal opened finally. Raven, Qrow, Winter, Hazel, and Claw and Piper came out.

Piper had his spare pipe.

"Holy crap!" he cried when he saw the Deimos. "I can't hold that many."

"Do something!" Claw cried. "There's more of these than I've ever seen in my life."

Hazel swatted one away. "They're already attacking."

"Listen to that," Qrow said, holding up a hand.

They all paused.

They heard it, then, screaming...screaming from all over Menagerie's small city.

"They're covering the area," Raven realized.

"Then it's too late?" Winter said. "Or...no, we can at least stop these ones. Worry about the civilians after that."

"I hope you aren't rusty, Schnee," Raven said. "This is going to be a long night."

Winter held out her sword, and a flow of summonings flew out of a glyph and started tearing into the Deimos.

Weiss held out her sword also, and another glyph flock appeared to join Winter's. She smiled at her.

"Stay close to me," Meridian said. "I might help protect us a little. But we're missing our teammates still."

Pyrrha had joined them by now.

"Guys, we all know that those will not be the only Grimm we'll see soon," she said. "Any moment, more will come out of the water or the desert."

"Our first move has to be stopping the Deimos, or no matter what we do, more Grimm will just show up," Oscar said. "But we can't do this. We need a special solution. We have to think, what would Shine or Wally do?"

"Sing?" Weiss suggested.

"Sing!" Yang said. "Like music! Guys, does Menagerie have music stands?"

"The ship has loud speakers!" Pyrrha said suddenly. "We could use that!"

"That's genius," Jaune said. "Can someone do that?"

"I can," the captain spoke up. "What music?"

"Here, I have it." Pyrrha held up her scroll. "Take me to that room."

"This way, ma'am." He pointed.

They ran to the ship.

"That might help," Jaune said. "But we have to hold them off in the meantime...and then figure out what to do once we have that. It won't cover the whole island, I think."

"Then we get everyone we can to this area," Oscar said. "The docks are more easy to defend than the entire island. If the Grimm are from the desert, we want them to be as far from that as possible. There are less aquatic Grimm than other kinds. Maybe they won't be as bad... At least they have to be in the water to attack."

"Guys, do you see smoke?" Neptune was looking at Blake's house. "That house on fire."

"What?" Yang turned toward it. "Oh, no way!"

"We have another problem!" Weiss exclaimed. "Oh, why...?"

"Weiss!" Winter said. "No time for self pity. Someone has to go."

"Jaune, maybe I can help," Neptune said. "Let's go."

"Okay," Jaune said. 

"I'll go. I'm more fireproof than you guys," Yang said. "Everyone else, stay here and hold off the Grimm."

"All right, but watch it. Someone had to start that fire," Qrow said.

"And I'll start a fire with them if they show up." Yang made a fist.

They all took off over the roofs.

"Our house is on fire again?" Kali looked at it. "Blake!"

"Blake would know better than to be in there if it was," Gira said. [🤣 Are you sure about that?]

* * *

Emerald and the three kids still with her scrambled back from the hole in the ground.

They were all coughing.

Emerald's Aura was running out, but she tried to spread some over the kids and push them back towards Blake's room.

One of them ran over the ground fast and got in the door and caught on. They went to the balcony door window and unlocked it.

Emerald pushed the other kids to go towards the room, and they ran for it.

She took a few more steps after them and then fell down, coughing, and her vision was going dark.

Not the way I thought I would die...she thought to herself.

Mercury made his way into the house from the ladder and ran out, covering his mouth, not that it would do much good.

He saw the big, gaping hole in the floor, and jumped over it.

He was really hoping the others hadn't just fallen through it, because they would have been fried already.

The house was so hot inside, it was astonishing they all hadn't fainted already.

The smoke was blinding too, but he stomped toward the hallway--he tripped over Emerald before he saw her.

Feeling around, he realized who it was.

Oh no!

Scooping her up, he ran for the open door.

The kids were on the balcony.

At least they could breathe out there, but they could see fire below them and Grimm above them. Nobody was moving.

"Blake!" Mercury yelled.

Blake and Docie came racing from the other side, avoiding the heat.

"Oh my gosh!" Blake said. She took out her Gambol Shroud and threw it to the balcony. "I hope this holds. Come on, swing down."

The kids seemed doubtful.

"Come on, just jump!" Docie said. "Slide down the line, just like a tree."

By now they were more afraid to stay put than to risk falling to their deaths, so they climbed off.

Thankfully they slid down pretty easily.

Docie caught them and put them on the ground.

Mercury took the line and put Emerald on his shoulder. He swung down and leapt the rest of the way.

"That was a crazy risk you just took!" Blake said. "Is she alive?"

"I don't know," Mercury coughed.

"Get away from the house," Docie said. "But the Grimm...they're attacking everyone who went that way."

"Hey!" Jaune, Neptune, and Yang came running over the roof and jumped down.

"Sorry we're late," Yang said. "Is everyone out of there?"

"Everyone is," Blake said. "That we know of."

Yang stared at the fire.

"What do you need me to do?" she asked Neptune.

"We need a lot of water," Neptune said. "You're the only one who can get close without being burned to get to any inside. Maybe a broken pipeline?"

"Got it," Yang said. She activated her Semblance and hit one of the walls in, then ran inside.

"Let me see." Jaune turned to Emerald.

Mercury put her down. "She was in there for a really long time," he said. "Because she had to be the hero."

Blake shook her head.

Jaune felt Emerald's pulse, then sighed in relief. "Okay, she's alive...but she must have inhaled way too much smoke. I can try to boost her Aura, but she'll need real medical treatment, and the ship is the closest... The hospital might be overrun by grimm by now."

Mercury looked like he might actually cry.

Blake put a hand on his shoulder. "I'm sure she's going to be fine...if we all live through this, that is."

"Yeah, the problem is the Grimm," Jaune said. "They're afraid of the fire, huh? But that's a not a good solution, obviously. The others seem to be holding them off for now. They didn't attack us, yet, but they might."

He was boosting Emerald's Aura while he spoke.

The kids huddled close together.

They heard a loud sound from inside the house, and then Yang came running back out, with soot all over her, but otherwise she was completely unharmed.

"Okay, there's water shooting all over the bathroom now," she said.

"About where?" Neptune asked.

Yang pointed to one wall.

"Jaune?" Neptune said.

"Okay, I think she'll be okay till you can get her to the ship if you go now," Jaune said, moving his hands. "Sorry, we have to figure this out or everyone on this island will be in the same boat."

"Haha." Yang acknowledged the unintentional pun.

"Yeah, go, we've got her," Blake said. "Mercury, you can get us to ship. With your eyes, they'll leave us alone."

Mercury glanced at her.

"You have to focus," Blake said.

Mercury nodded. "Yeah, yeah, you're right."

He stood and picked Emerald back up. No way Blake would have been able to carry her that far.

Blake and Docie grabbed the kids.

"Where is Sun?" Blake asked.

"They wanted him to help hold off the Deimos," Neptune called. "He would have been here, Blake, but he knew we'd be able to get you out faster than he could. Thankfully, you weren't in there at all."

"I couldn't." Blake put a hand to her stomach.

"Just go, we'll handle this," Yang called.

Jaune and Neptune focused on the house.

There was a rumble under the ground as the pipes strained.

The others began to run for the dock, but some of the kids looked back and saw a huge blast of water come out of the house windows and start soaking the outside and the inside too.

It was amazing, actually. By the time they even got halfway to the dock, the fire was almost completely out.

And Neptune was almost completely spent. He fell to his knees.

"Whew, that was intense," Jaune said. "Even for me." He took some deep breaths.

The house was a soddy mess now.

"There might be a little left inside, I'll get it," Yang said.

She ran inside and used ice and rock dust to put out any trace of fire.

She surveyed the damage... Well, the entire first floor would have to be replaced and most of the walls in the front.

But thanks to Neptune, a lot of the house was still standing... She didn't know if they'd be able to salvage it enough for it to be used, but at least it hadn't collapsed in on itself.

[All I can say is I hope Gira had double fire insurance.]

The Grimm tried to attack the group as soon as they left the house, but Mercury blasted them, and that seemed to scare off the rest a little...since they had many targets now and were not so anxious to attack anyone who seemed tougher than the others.

But while they left that group alone, they saw people losing their crap all over the streets.

Running, yelling.

Blake and Docie had to keep a tight grip on the 8 or so kids they still had, so that no one would run into them on the way.

Thankfully no one attacked them still. But the kids were crying and trembling with fear at seeing this happen.

Blake had her ears down in an effort to block out some of the sound.

"This is horrible!" Docie told her.

She nodded.

Meanwhile, the knot of heroes at the dock were running out of ways to keep the Deimos at bay from themselves--and the panicking people who were running into the water as well as everywhere else.

Winter and Weiss both shot ice walls to block them from getting in, but this was a temporary fix.

Finally, Pyrrha and the captain got the music on.

Loud songs blasted out of the speakers.

Thankfully, it did have some effect. The Deimos began to fly away from that area and back towards the main part of Menagerie.

But...

"This only protects us," Oscar summed it up. "We have to go, get the other people here if we can...or just stop the Grimm."

"Even with all of us," Raven said, throwing fire at a few of them with her sword, "I don't think we can cover a whole island. And that's before the other Grimm will arrive soon to pick off everyone who's  already been poisoned. So far none of us have been except..."

"Me," Royal said. "But I'm okay, for now... I mean, things are starting to seem a little off balance." He shook his head.

"It must be affecting him more slowly because of his resistance," Weiss reasoned. "But slowly doesn't mean not at all... Should we...?"

"I think I can stop it," Oscar said. "I did before. Well, not really me, but--"

"We know. Just get to the point!" Raven said.

Oscar motioned to Royal and did his thing.

Royal nodded.

"Can you do that to everyone?" Weiss asked, pointing at the others who were freaking out.

"I don't know," Oscar said. "Can we extend our grace to them all?"

"I hardly think it would work on so many, of so many different conditions of mind," Winter said. "We must think about this. The Deimos represent fear, don't they? Everyone has fear. And even we were affected by them the first time. We're not immune to giving into fear. It's one of the most deadly flaws."

Roman shivered.

"I think I begin to see what their plan was," Raven said suddenly. "I couldn't understand what, but...the way they did this, waiting till we were here to release these Grimm, timing it so that it would be when we brought the kids...it's as if they're trying to frame us."

"Framing you or defaming you?" Cinder said.

"What do you mean?" Winter asked her.

"Well, everyone knows you wouldn't actually destroy this place on purpose. That would be crazy," Cinder said. "And Blake is a Belladonna. She'd never allow it. But if they show that you can be turned by Grimm, then you lose credibility as the only people who could stop them, and then they've already won. No one will believe you can save them. They'll surrender to the bandits instantly."

"Like Leo," Qrow said, "when he found Salem was unkillable."

"Or me," Raven said. She shook her head. "That...would probably work. There's no way this won't be all over the news by tomorrow if we survive at all. If we don't stop these Grimm in time to save even half this place, we'll be seen as failures. We lose credibility then... If that's what they want...it's genius."

"You mean horrible," Weiss said.

"Same thing for them," Raven said. 

"So that's why that Somnus girl said that we made an opening for them," Sun said. "I bet they wanted to make it look as if we couldn't save anyone, with attacking Menagerie, but now that we're here, it's even more bad for us."

"We can't rule out that this being a Faunus sanctuary may be a factor also," Winter said. "Many of the complaints against Atlas were it's treatment of Faunus, and if our name is associated with the fall of Menagerie such as this is shaping up to be, we might never recover from such a failure. Some might say we didn't care enough to provide protection for them...which is what it would look like--we had so few forces here. It would be a real tragedy because it was so weak."

"Weakness is a point of view," Raven said. "It's important enough to hurt you politically and economically if it's destroyed...but it's never had a strong military force."

[Which is kind of dumb for a country that can't trust any of its neighbors to not have--unless they aren't allowed to have it, but the Belladonnas have guards, and the White Fang literally had a base there, and there were no human guards to make sure no one had weapons, so it really just makes no sense.]

"Guys, it's not our reputation I'm worried about," Oscar said. "If we fail here, people may say our God is less powerful than the Grimm. That would be a terrible thing."

They all realized he was right.

"But we are kind of getting our a---- whooped here," Meridian said. "Even if we're fine, that doesn't say the best for how well we can defend others. I don't think the impression that only we are of any importance to the Divine Nature is the one we want them to get."

"That might be better than just thinking it fails entirely," Raven said. "I can work with that, but not with failure...but either is bad. However, Oscar, unless you have some prophecy for us as to how we can put an end to this immediately, I have no idea. I can't have a strategy for Grimm that attack people's reason. That takes away all possible strategy."

Everyone looked at Oscar.

He looked up at the sky, which still had Deimos all over it, looking for new victims.

His eyes gleamed.

"Redirection," he said suddenly. "Remember, you told us that the Grimm turned away from you for a moment?" He was looking at Cinder and Weiss. "And attacked their handlers?"

"Just for a few seconds," Cinder said.

"Remember when Shine sent those big grasshopper things back?" Oscar said. "They flew back to Salem?"

"Yes," Cinder said. "I was there...oh."

She looked up. "I see... Do you think you could do it again?"

"I don't know, but it's the only idea I have," Oscar said.

"Better hurry then," Qrow said. "Because I think we're going to have company."

He gestured at the Grimm appearing in the water in the bay.

Though, they were holding back; the music probably was deterring them.

Right then, Mercury and Blake and their entourage came hurrying back to the dock.

"Blake!" Sun ran up to her. "Are you okay?" He hugged her. "Did they hurt you?" He kissed her.

"I'm really fine, Sun." Blake hugged him back. "I didn't even fight, I promise. They wouldn't let me, but there was... Whoa..." She swayed. "And I think I ran out of that extra Aura... Guess I don't need it now..."

She sank down.

"Is that Emerald?" Pyrrha asked. She was back on deck.

"She needs medical attention right now," Mercury said frantically.

"Come on." Pyrrha ran to help him get her below deck.

 "Can the rest of you help me?" Oscar asked.

"Just sit down." Sun put Blake on the dock planks next to the water.

They all rushed to surround Oscar.

"If we all do this together, they might fly away," Oscar said.

They all nodded.

Oscar stuck his staff into the ground the same way she'd seen Shine use her sword.

Winter nodded and tried to do the same with her sword.

Weiss, Qrow, and Raven imitated this, and Sun held out his staff.

Royal wasn't sure what they were doing and gave Cinder a strange look.

She was shooting out her glass, but then suddenly she stopped and yelped.

Then she pulled back her sleeve.

She'd dropped her Aura shield since they didn't really need it this close to the music, and now she saw one of the Deimos had crawled either up her sleeve or had gone in from the back of her shirt, because it had somehow hid there all this time, just waiting to strike.

Maybe it had sensed she was weaker from the residue of the toxin the day before and had wanted an easy target.

Cinder stared at it, then she didn't even wait for the toxin to set in--she just took off.

"Cinder!" Royal called.

"Where is she going?" Neptune asked.

"She just got bit," Royal said.

"How?" Neptune said.

"I don't know. Maybe it hid somewhere," Royal shrugged. "Why is she running away?"

"Cinder," Winter said, looking up. "She's concerned what she'd do to us if she lost her head...but she can't just run free either. Not just for the danger to other people--she might run into the water."

"I'll get her," Royal said. "I'm inoculated already. You guys focus on getting rid of the Grimm."

"Royal, she won't know who you are," Weiss called. "If it works on her, anyway. Don't let your guard down."

"I've got it," Royal said. He ran after her.

"I hope he can help her," Jaune said.

"Yeah, I know they're tight and all, but are they really evenly matched?" Neptune was not helping.

"Just focus," Oscar said. 

They all shut up.