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teamoliv-archive · 4 years

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Cutscene: Real Professionals

Auroras stood calmly while he looked at the three armed would-be huntsmen and huntresses in front of him. Hari had the other half of them. This was going to be remarkably easy, he predicted. “How nice of you to already split yourselves up for us.” With a stroke of his quill, a flash of aura went from his page to create a barrier between his trio and Hari’s. It wasn’t going to last more than a few seconds but it was the statement that mattered here.

“So what do you think our chances are here?”

“With how easily they took that Grimm down? We’re screwed...”

“Well we can’t just do nothing. We have to fight.”

“I’m gonna ask you this one more time, little Nyx. You and your friends really want to do this?”

“We don’t really have a choice here. You want to drag me back to Atlas and Molly back to Darcie. I can’t have that.”

“She’s right. You’ll have to force us.”

“As you wish. It’s time for you to see real huntsmen in action.”

Auroras took a careful step back and placed quill to paper with smirk. With several quick strokes flashed toward the trio in front of him as if he were writing his design into the air.

“Brace!” Lapis put up his barrier. Lazuli spun backward as a chained aura duplicate of her brother did the same. Molly took to her wheel and spun around in a circle, trying to strafe the attacks. Lapis took the hit straight on and buckled. His barrier was still standing, but he could still feel that impact.

Lazuli quickly swaps her stance as her duplicate is destroyed by the incoming strokes coming through the air. Lapis wasn’t fairing a lot better. She needed to think to bring more of these to bear. One at a time, she understood that one, and they were connected to her memories somehow. She started thinking of her times with her friends before their capture and a new chain started to form from her heart into a new form. The feeling of her aura leaving her to create the double was still really weird to her. Then something smacked into her and Lapis from behind as new strokes appeared above and then swooped behind them.

Molly felt a similar impact slam into her side and knocked her out of her wheel, which drove helplessly into the dirt before falling over. She only barely managed to land on her feet.

Auroras flashed a quickly dissolving sheet of paper with glowing curls drawn on it in a taunting manner. “I was hoping your weak points would have been a little less obvious, but none of you ever finished school, did you? I’m ready to try again whenever you are. Hari, please tell me your side of this is a little more interesting?”

“Yeah, yeah, keep your hat on.” Hari flipped the brass knuckles of his gauntlets back into place and took a step forward with a raised fist in a mock punch, gauging their reactions. “Yep. I got this.”

Without another word, Ivory leveled her weapon and pulled the trigger, charging forward as fast as she could. She felt her ax bite into steel as it caught one of the gauntlets. She caught sight of Onyx flinging himself upward and creating a new net.

Violet was keeping her distance from Hari, peppering him with covering fire from her pistols while Ivory charged forward with her ax. At first she thought she was hitting- then she saw blood, not aura.

Hari practically ignored the incoming small arms fire. It wasn’t so much that he didn’t feel it more than he was conditioned to the pain. He closed in on Ivory and one of his knuckles started sparking with a fire dust burst. With a harsh uppercut, he slammed his fist into her and sent her flying upward. “Pretty sure I gauged that right.”

Onyx didn’t have time to plan further, only turn to see Ivory flying in his direction and slam into him, hurtling them both down to the ground. He was about to reach out and create a new line of wire when another of Auroras’s swipes appeared in front of him and solidified his plummet.

Molly picked herself up and looked between Auroras, her lost weapon, and Violet. This was bad. She had to slow things down to think. “I’mgoinginwatchmyback!” She says with increasing acceleration as her perception of the world slowed. She reacted with her body delaying heavily from her mind. She saw Ivory’s ax still slowly floating down to the ground and Hari reaching out to grab it. Violet was charging.

“Waitwaitwaitwait!” She felt something snag her leg and pull her backward. A rope had twirled around her and yanked her into Lauzli’s next attempt at an offensive move.

“Here’s another word of advice, free of charge, if you don’t have a backup plan for losing your weapon- don’t lose it.”

“Got you now!” Violet shouts, flipping herself upward and flaring out her whip to snag his arm. Her other arm reached out as a ball of light appeared at the barrel of her other pistol. She cracked off the blinding shot, but not before the large man swung his free arm around- and Ivory’s ax.

Hari plants Isengrim into the ground by its crescent blade and turns to Auroras’s remaining pair. “Still not checking your back, huh?” He placed his hands by the shallow bullet wounds Violet had made in him and let the blood trickle down his fingers. With a quick movement and a flare of aura reengaging, Hari flung the droplets into the air as they solidified into small hardened knives. “Hurts like a bitch, but I think I can afford to be flashy here.”

With the knives hanging in the air, he quickly gave a series of swift kicks to send them all flying toward the Hamelin siblings. The impromptu daggers hit their targets before the aura gave out on them and they splatted back to the ground.

“And now to finish this off.” Auroras took his time with this next series of strokes. He needed to catch the distances precisely, but thankfully this was a maneuver he knew well. A series of chains came from Auroras’s paper and drug the entire group to them. “Hari, ready the restraints and collect their weapons. You remember the way to the shuttle, right?”

Violet angrily struggled against the aura-created chain and then the real restraints as the former quickly faded away. “What are you going to do with us..?”

“Well you and your team are coming with me back to Atlas. Ty’s got some plans for you guys, like I said. Come on, don’t you all have family up there?”

“If you think I believe for a second that’s actually your plan, you’ve got another thing coming.” Lapis jerked violently before he saw Auroras lift up Briar and his sister. “Lazuli!”

“Molly!”Ivory was shoved into an awkward sitting position and wasn’t able to try and stand like Lapis had. However, seeing him getting harshly kicked back down for his efforts dissuaded her from trying.

“Like I said before, you two are coming with me. Our employer has plans for the two of you. Does ‘Pandemonium’ ring any bells?”

“Y-Yeah...” Molly admitted. That was Darcie’s center of operations. It wasn’t that she didn’t like the woman- her and Jade were the closest thing to parents she had, but it was still concerning that she sent these guys to capture her by force instead of sending a message. Lazuli and Ivory were probably the reason. She wanted to be sure that she’d come along.

Lazuli stared at her brother and his team, trying to give a reassuring look. “We’ll be fine.” She finally says, “Just focus on keeping yourselves safe. If... This is what I think it is, Molly and I will be okay. I promise. We’ll come back for you.”

“Are you out of your mind?” Onyx hisses, “What about this situation is ‘okay’? After all the trouble we went thr-” He feels his voice catch his in throat and replaced by a wave of pain and grits his teeth.

“Onyx, don’t strain your voice. You’re still healing...” Ivory stares carefully at Molly, seeing the conflict plain on her face. “I trust you. Both of you. If they wanted us dead, they’d have done it already. We’ll get through this- I hope.”

#teamoliv #Team OLIV - Project Borealis #Team OLIV - Pandemonium #Onyx Cheshire - Cutscene #Lapis Hamelin - Cutscene #Ivory Reynard - Cutscene #Violet Goodfellow - Cutscene #Molly Briar - Cutscene #Lazuli Hamelin - Cutscene #Auroras Hallward - Cutscene #Hari Lackey - Cutscene

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teamoliv-archive · 4 years

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Cutscene: New Beginnings, New Dangers

“Well, I guess we have good news and bad news. Good news is we get to start Ivory and Molly’s huntress career early. Bad news, we’re surrounded.” The group that now consisted of Team OLIV, Lapis’s younger sister Lazuli, and Ivory’s former partner in crime Molly stood in a ring surrounded by far more Grimm than they had anticipated when they were told of a ‘swarm of monsters a team would be useful to take down’. Swarm was a bit more apt than anyone really was comfortable with; there were dozens of spider-like creatures that would let out screeches as they crawled closer and those jaws looked poisonous. A team they were, but professionals they were not. This was going to take some creative teamwork.

“Alright, everyone, split up and take a section!”

Violet turned toward one section of the creatures as they charged. She flared out her whips and hurled herself upward and over the Grimm, a flurry of cracks and blows staggered several of the creatures while surrounding ones were blown apart one by one.

“I’ve got backup, keep pushing!” Ivory stuck herself in a kneeling pose, braced by one of her targets locking her in place while she carefully turned and blasted at any Grimm that got too close to their area.

“Got it!” She landed on one of the spider-creatures and jumped again, shooting at the grounded monster, causing a spit of bile to misfire and hit the ground. She aimed down and a brilliant flash followed her next shot, blinding the pack with a loud popping sound.

Lapis kept to a defensive, leaving his shield up as he pushed forward slowly. He saw the giant buzzsaw contraption of Briar’s drive through the spiders with her in it, chopping off legs and sometimes abdomens as she passed, but many were making their way to him. He blocked and parried with his shield and weapon, shoving any away that tried to leap at him.

“You know, I could use a little help here!”

“I got it, I got it, I got it, I got it!” Molly ran her weapon through the pack and with a pivot, flinging herself toward Lapis with her hand out. “Tilt-a-Whirl!”

“Wait, what’s Tilt-a-WOOOOAAAH!” Before he finished his statement, Molly grabbed his arm and let the momentum swing them around, throwing her in a circle with her saw being carried in the wide arc to batter and slice the surrounding Grimm. Lapis only had time to brace himself and keep from falling over from the force before he put his weight behind his arm and flung her off into the distance and into an oncoming second wave. She landed frustratingly expertly with the saw’s teeth biting into the oncoming Grimm and her perched on in the inside and waving.

“Woo! Let’s hear it for team attacks!”

Lapis stood up and popped his shoulder to make sure it was still in place. “You’re supposed to plan that out ahead of time! That was my shield arm, too...”

“We got ‘em, didn’t we? Besides, everyone else is doing fine.”

Lazuli watched “her” section of Grimm tangled up in a web. They weren’t dead or even injured, but they were busy. She looked up at the dizzying array woven through the sparse trees around them where Onyx was lounging.

The web tightened as Onyx looked down at Hamelin’s sister with an expectant look. Would that he had the vocal strength to throw his voice again, he’d have reminded her to start firing. Despite her time as the Arena’s prisoner honing her skills and unlocking her semblance, she had little to no experience with Grimm yet.

He tightened it again as the Grimm tried ti wiggle free. Sure he made it look effortless, but he wasn’t going to be able to hold this forever. One creature gets loose and tries to skitter up his wires to get to him. He dodges and rakes his claws around to dispatch it, but now the rest were getting free.

Lazuli wasn’t used to this implicit teamwork that her brother’s team did. She’d have to think of a way to handle what was about to be a rain of spider Grimm. Shooting them directly was only doing so much. She looks up to Onyx and realizes there was at least one thing she could do- but it would be a long shot. “Hey! You trust me, right!?” Onyx clung to his web and gives her an incredulous look. “I need an answer! Are we friends or not?” She heard a barely audible and scraping sound that closely resembled “Yes, now do something!” before she closes her eyes for a moment and springs into action.

“Good enough.” With visible effort, she jumped from wire to wire as carefully as she could before her aura began to glow and manifest a figure next to her, connected at the chest by a spectral chain. Said chain connected to the duplicate of Onyx wasn’t nearly as strong as others were. In fact this was probably her weakest one, but she hoped that would change with her time with Lapis’s team over time. From what she managed to figure out her semblance was strictly related to personal bonds and her duplicates were only as strong and the friendship and trust between her and the one she was trying to recreate. The duplicate Onyx grasped her hand and helped hurl her into the nest. Lazuli swung her weapon with precision, taking out spiders as she ascended while the duplicate followed suit and kept her stable. It couldn’t mimic his weapon’s finer details but she managed to clear out the web before slipping on one more wire and falling.

“Uh oh...” The duplicate faded as she lost focus. To make matters worse the mess of wires weren’t easy to grab. She fell about almost to the bottom before something stopped her fall.

“You need to work on your balance.” Onyx’s scratchy voice responds, having already sped to the bottom to catch her and set her back down.

A loud bang signaled the end of the swarm as Ivory took out one more that was about to lunge at Violet. With the group calming down and brushing themselves off, Violet spoke up. “I think we did it.” Then the rustling got louder, followed by a tree melting.

“Oh right, the big one...” An enormous version of the spiders they had fought before crawled into view, venom dripping from its fangs.

“Everyone get ready!” The group takes up fighting poses again before a translucent stalactite crashes from above into the creature.

Onyx was the first to panic, followed by Ivory. The rest looked more confused and stunned. A figure stood behind them with a stack of paper bunched up in one arm and a quill in the other.

“Pardon the interruption, but my partner and I have business to discuss with the lot of you. I have to say between the number, the open job searching, and your.. distinctive features,” The man glanced accusingly at Molly’s massive buzzsaw weapon, “You are almost comically easy to find.” The Grimm roared again as it recovered from the blow to the head. The man just sighed and with several blindingly fast strokes of his quill, spiked chains materialized from around him and entangled the large Grimm.

“Let’s not waste time. Hari, get rid of that thing.”

“No problem.” A larger man, this one covered in scars shown off by a small vest with a combination of brass knuckles and gauntlets followed close behind. He charged the creature and slammed his fist right into the monster’s jaw, causing it to reel from a dust explosion. Several more blows followed, assisted by more of those aura swipes as the other man kept sketching on his paper. With one more strong blow to the head, the Grimm fell to the ground before it could do anything.

Hari turned to face the six. “See that kids? That’s how the pros do it. Call it a free lesson courtesy of Uncle Hari. Auroras, why don’t you explain this one?”

“Who are these guys?” Lapis muttered to himself. They were easily outclassed. Professional huntsmen had been sent for them? Was this because of Briar and Reynard?

Lazuli cautiously stepped forward. “Who are you? You said you had ‘business’. What do you want with us?”

“Auroras Hallward and Hari Lackey of Blood Brothers LLC,” Auroras responded, “We were sent to locate and escort you to our client. You are of great interest to a few interested parties. Normally confidentiality would prevent me from explaining who that is. However, I have been given leave to extend a more public offer first.”

“You’ve got a couple of options here.” Hari points specifically to Team OLIV, “I’m pretty sure your parents are all worried about you kids wandering around on another continent. We’re here to take you home and put you to work. Onyx, Ty’s got an offer for the four of you. No hard feelings or anything. Come on, your old man’s got a lot planned and he’s willing to give you all jobs.”

Onyx stared hard at Hari. Those names were familiar- old teammates of his father before he turned to business. He always did wonder why he had never met them before while Cobalt Ymir was around. Ivory spoke up instead.

“You want us to believe Tyrael Cheshire wants all of us? After what happened to Lilac...” She pauses for Onyx’s sake. She didn’t want to reopen the old wound; it was still his sister after all.

“Wait.” Lapis stepped between Auroras and Lauzli, “You said four of us. What happens to Briar and my sister?”

“That is our other job here.” He stares at Molly with keen intent, adjusting his glasses. “Your mother misses you, you know. She wants to accept you back and you’re welcome to take your friend with you.”

Molly’s pulse raced. Of course Darcie would come looking for her. Why didn’t she think of that? Part of her was scared of how she would have reacted to Jade’s death. She had taken it pretty hard herself, but she had the comfort of being swept up in finally being a huntress. Something was still wrong. “Why would she send mercenaries instead of her own people to find us?”

“We were already going this way and it’s basically getting paid twice for the same job.”

Lazuli looked to Molly worryingly. “Y-You can go if you want, but I need to stay with my brother. Family’s more important than friends sometimes... I.. I get it.”

“Wh-What, no! That’s not it! C-Can’t you just tell her I’m okay? I’ll come back once I finish-” Whatever she was doing.

Violet gave a hard look to Hari at his comment. “Did you really talk to anyone besides Onyx’s dad? How do we know you’re telling the truth here? My dad gave us his blessing to get out here and get our licenses.”

“Ty’s the man with the offer. Besides, Auroras made the deal. Talk to him.”

“Perhaps I should rephrase. Our job, as we were paid to do, is to locate and bring the lot of you two the parties that want you. The offer is a generous one that our employers took time out to offer you. However, your compliance is not a required factor. If you choose to resist, we’ll simply have to take you there by force.”

“And there it is... Everyone get ready for a fight!”

“Can we handle these guys?”

“I don’t think we have a choice. We have to try!”

#teamoliv #cutscene #Onyx Cheshire - Overheard Conversations #Lapis Hamelin - Overheard Conversations #Ivory Reynard - Overheard Conversations #Violet Goodfellow - Overheard Conversations #Molly Briar - Cutscene #Lazuli Hamelin - Cutscene #Auroras Hallward - Cutscene #Hari Lackey - Cutscene

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teamoliv-archive · 4 years

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Cutscene: Rough Analysis

“Aaaand stop.” Hari announces, just as Lapis went flying backward and skid across the ground. He showed some aura readings and footage from the fight, with Auburn not having broken much stride at all while Team OLIV had varying degrees of ability to hold their own.

Auburn descended from a mass made of the shadowy melange she could spread around her. The team learned quickly that some of Shin’s hardening semblance had altered the properties of hers during the aura transfer. The shadowy mass faded away. “I almost feel like I wasted my time, but some of you actually managed to hold their own. By the way, Jett, how’s it feel over there?”

Onyx was one of the first taken out of the fight and hurled into a now mangled piece of training equipment. He groaned as he slowly started to pry himself out of it.

Tyrael watched with a pleased smile on his face. “Well, Hari? What do you make of them?” He watched Ivory stumble over to Onyx to help him out while the other two of OLIV’s team rose and double checked for bruises or other injuries.

“Honestly, they’re not ready. They can handle being backup for some decent missions that’ll show off what Auburn can do, but if you want ‘em to not be a liability in the real big stuff, they need training.”

Hari looks to Lapis with a scrunched expression. “Let’s start with you. I wouldn’t even really call what you do a fighting style. You block, parry, and sometimes counterattack, putting all your focus on the front and just assuming your opponent will be impatient enough to try and go through you rather than around you. People have lost wars doing stupid things like that. You need to learn an offensive strategy. There’s going to be times your shield won’t work.”

He then snaps his focus to Violet. “You’ve got the opposite problem. No defense at all. Those weapons of yours can’t block or parry and that semblance of yours might be flashy, but it won’t always give you the opening you need. You’re good on your feet and you could focus on that to help block. Hell, even some shin guards... yeah, yeah that could work. If you lose your pressure, you’re screwed and we need to fix that.”

“Sorry to say, Onyx, but you’re the worst of both worlds: no offense, no defense, no real way to hold your own in a one-on-one where you don’t have an advantage. You’re fast and skilled, but that won’t mean a damn thing if your opponent knows what’s up or you can’t outmaneuver them. You need to sharpen those claws of yours in more than one way and I think I know a few ways we can teach you to use those strings to make defensive formations.

“You’re a little more complicated,” Hari says to Ivory, “You’ve got your style down fine and you don’t really have any gaps in power or skill, but you don’t think. You keep relying on big heavy hits without considering your next move. What you need, is some lessons in planning and strategy. Take it from professional muscle, dumb professional muscle doesn’t make it far in the industry.”

Auburn gives a cocky smirk to the lot as they got their dressing downs. “See? You’re all weak. You can’t beat perfection. Unlike the rest of you, I don’t have any weaknesses. Are you really sure I need these guys to tag along with me? You got your benchmark.”

Hari watches Auburn with a bored expression, tapping his finger on the table he was sitting at while waiting for her to finish her posturing. “Did I say I was done? You didn’t impress me a lot either. You’ve got more work to do than the rest of them.”

Auburn furrowed her brow in frustration at Hari’s assessment, barely containing her growing anger at the accusation. “Excuse me!? You saw what I just did. They barely managed to get a hit in on me.” She glances to Tyrael in protest but the harsh glare the man gave told her she was expected to hear the mercenary out.

“And that’s still not good enough.” Hair says, pinching his nose and exhaling, “Listen, you’re good, but you’re artificially good. In a fair fight, you would have lost to any of those four you just put on the floor. You have all that power and not enough actual skill to back it up. Not yet anyway. You’re going to need training to fix that and the rest of you will, too.

Tyrael nods to Hari and then to the five fighters. “Hari, while you’re waiting for Auroras to come back from his usual opportunistic side-jobs, I would like to rewew our contract. I plan on showcasing Borealis and its results in six months. During that time, I want you training all of them, choosing their missions and collecting the data they bring back. In the meantime...” Tyrael pushes a button on the screen and five huntsmen licenses appear on screen. “The lot of you will be given lodging at my estate but make no mistake, this is so I can keep a careful eye on all of you. You will be allowed free travel of Atlas and Mantle to perform whatever work you wish. That will be the source of your personal incomes.

“Understand that this is quite a lot of trust I am placing in the four of you so allow me to make one thing very clear. If even a single word of your... unusual situation reaches public ears, the lives of Shin and Emril Goodfellow are forfeit. Not a word of them, or how you arrived in Atlas. If asked, you are Atlas graduates seeking work. You have no idea how difficult it was to have your records changed without Redmond here so I want you to fully appreciate the effort I had to go through to give you a semblance of comfort.”

“Now that we’ve established things, you are free to take the rest of the night and tomorrow off to get yourselves situated. You four will have a suite of rooms and a common area to share. A servant will escort you there. Your weapons will be repaired and we really should get you all some new clothes. You’re professionals now- I expect you to look the part.”

#teamoliv #Onyx Cheshire - Cutscene #Lapis Hamelin - Cutscene #Ivory Reynard - Cutscene #Violet Goodfellow - Cutscene #Tyrael Cheshire - Cutscene #Auburn Huldre - Cutscene #Hari Lackey - Cutscene #Team OLIV - Project Borealis

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teamoliv-archive · 4 years

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Cutscene: The Return to Atlas

The trip back to Atlas was long and soul draining. The flight was cleared to enter and the small private vessel swooped right onto a private helipad at the top of a building in the floating city. The words Cheshire Financial Group were emblazoned on the top of the building over a large crawler showing various stock and good prices as well as a few advertisements for loans and financing.

“Well here we are.” Hari from the cockpit with an impressive smile. “It’s a shame you kids didn’t want to talk during the trip. You know, Nyx, your mom never let Auroras and I visit you growing up. Something about ‘not wanting the family associated with lowly mercenaries’ or something like that. Hopefully, we can catch up. I wanna hear all about what your team’s been up to after Ty’s done with what he wants.”

When the plane lands two figures very familiar to each member of the team could be visible. All four leaned into the windows as best as their restraints would allow and a collective look of apprehension and shock covered them.

“You’re kidding me...”

“What’s she doing here?”

Auburn was clearly in far better shape than she had been. Her would in her fight with Onyx had caused a series of ugly clawed scars down the left side of her face and her hair was swooped to the other side. She looked far more confident and cocky if such a thing were possible.

Tyrael waited for the plane’s five passengers to depart, ignoring the mix of glares and incredulous looks from the team. “Release their restraints and collect their weapons, Hari. The four of you come with me. I went through a lot of trouble to gather you so I suggest you take what I’m about to offer very seriously.

Lapis wastes no time charging forward the moment his restraints are broken. “Not interested!”

Violet hit the realization quicker than the rest of them. They were being released and given their weapons back? That wasn’t normally how capturing people worked. Whatever it was that Tyrael Cheshire had planned, he wasn’t concerned about counterattacks. “Lapis, wait, something’s not right!”

Auburn swooped to the side and dodged Lapis’s incoming punch without much visible effort. She twirled around faster than anyone else could notice and slammed him into the ground with a well placed kick to his back. She then smirked at the others, locking her eyes on Onyx. “I told you I’d rise up past you, Jett. I hope you don’t mind but everything that used to be yours is mine now. Even your old room- dominance and all that. I hope you understand.”

“Are we all done playing?” Tyrael asks harshly, “Pick yourselves up and come with me. Hari, deliver their weapons to the new training room. Once I’m done with this, I will give you the rest of your payment.” He pauses and counts- four. “Where are the others?”

“What do you think? Auroras found a way to get paid twice. You specifically said you wanted these four and someone else wanted the other two so he went off to deliver them there. I’ll tell you the rest later.”

Onyx says nothing, merely rubbing his wrists when they’re freed. He ignored Auburn’s taunting for now and focused on what his father could want. It was strange he still thought of him that way. Perhaps that would never really fade. Seeing him turn and start walking to the door to the inside of the building, Onyx followed. Ivory was close behind him.

Lapis pulls himself up and begrudgingly follows. Violet was also acting on a slower pace than normal. “I don’t like this...”

“None of us do, but we have to find out what’s going on first.” Violet passes Lapis and catches up with Onyx and Ivory. She knew Hari was bringing up the rear and making sure no one tried to make a break for it.

-------

A tense and silent elevator ride down countless levels followed. Once it finally reached the floor it had meant to, it opened up to a large training room with screens, monitors, and various amenities. “This is where I will evaluate whether bringing you here will be worth my time.”

As the seven of them entered into the expansive training room, Violet glanced around to see what was here. There looked to be a door on the other side with a plaque saying ‘weapon storage’. “Let me guess, our stuff’s going in there until you say we can have it, right?” She froze when she saw past the glass and the lettering on it and to a familiar sight propped up in a sturdy case.

“That’s... His Majesty’s Colors! My dad’s weapon! Why do you have it!?”

Tyrael walked into the room to stand at one of the terminals by the wall of the training room. “Well well, once again your observation skills impress me, Ms. Goodfellow. You’re correct, that is your father’s weapon. I’m afraid both of your parents had a bit of a run in after their latest frolic in the frozen wastelands of Solitas. This is, partly, why you’re all here.” He pushes a button to show both Shin and Emril Goodfellow in effective stasis, the pods they were in showing various life signs.

Onyx took a step forward and finally broke his silence. His harsh damaged voice echoing as much as it could in the large room. “You expect me to believe that you went out of your way to collect wounded huntsmen on a rescue mission? That run in could only have been with you.”

“Well, I mean... yeah. Yeah it was- and it was all for me.” Auburn, in lieu of walking, decided on a flashy flip over the team and landed in front of them with a showy pose. “What you are looking at now is the product of the future. You see, your ex-father here took Ciar’s aura research and decided to put it to use. We got one of those fancy aura transfer machines that they found in Beacon’s wreckage and,” She smirks to Violet in a taunting way, “Your parents’ aura is mine now. Well... most of it. We needed them alive after all.”

Lapis jerked back, his normally solid form shaking slightly at the thought. “You can... do that?” He balled a fist as his features tightened. “So, what, are we just going to be more supply for your damn project!? Is that it!?” He was already prepared for another ill-fated fight. He knew he was outmatched by at least two of the people in this room, but he wasn’t going to let Huldre pull that on him again.

“Oh, please try and attack me again. We can do this with only three of them, right?”

“Both of you cool it down.” Hari mentions from the back, helping himself to one of the water bottles on a table. “Ty, I’m kind of curious, is this that ‘Borealis Project’ of yours?”

“It is, Hari. This is my version of Ciar’s Aurora. Using these transfers to enhance the abilities of huntsmen and huntresses to unheard of heights. What once needed entire teams to take down will now be the role of a solitary one. However, we’re still testing this and that is why I need a full team. You are to serve as my benchmark.” He taps another button and prepared licenses for Team OLIV showed up. “These are yours, as is access to this facility, room and board, and meals. All you have to do is your job and compare your performance to Auburn’s.”

“And if we don’t something happens to my parents, is that it?” Violet snaps. She realized she didn’t have much other choice and gritted her teeth tightly. What would Robin have done in this situation? She figured her brother would have likely gone berserk and tried to kill everyone in the room. The thought that this was what he was like now still frightened her a little. That wasn’t the kind of person she could be, though, and she just wasn’t strong enough. She reflexively shrinks down in a pained defeat.

“I’m not doing anything until my sister is back where she belongs.” He flings himself around toward Hari, “You tell your partner that you need to get her back here if you want me to do anything!”

“Sorry, kid, can’t do it.” Hari says with a shrug. “Auroras took the job and going back on a contract’s one of the worst things you can do in this business. I can’t say I like the people he was talking to, but sometimes that’s just how it goes. Besides,” He points to Tyrael, “It’s not like Ty to give you room to negotiate.”

“That would be correct. Lapis, was it? Your meddling is what ultimately destroyed my daughter if I recall. By all rights I should demand blood for blood, but I will choose to instead offer you a gracious forgiveness as well as a job. Or are you so selfish that you would risk trying to break through the entirety of Mistral’s underground yet again at the cost of putting your teammate’s parents in peril?”

Watching Lapis shrink down as well, Ivory took a step forward. “I want to speak with my father, Mr. Cheshire.” If anyone could pull something out of the man it would be Redmond Reynard.

“I’m afraid he’s away on business for the foreseeable future. He actually left before you got here. It’s a shame he had no time to see his own daugther, but when you have so many important things to do, sometimes you must make sacrifices.”

Ivory knew immediately that her father was sent off before she got here on purpose just in case he insisted on trying to change the offer somehow. She’d have to see if she could find Sterling later- he would know where he went and why with how often the butler hung around her father.

Onyx swallowed hard and felt an ache in his throat as he spoke again. It was still healing, but slowly. “I think that’s enough empty negotiating. You didn’t bring us here to this room specifically just to explain this to us. You said you wanted a baseline...”

“Indeed I did. Prepare your weapons once they are returned to you. The four of you will be fighting Auburn so I know exactly the gap in strength that Borealis provides.”

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