Ch 74: ...and a Storm of Teamwork

"Dilo KIICCCKKKK!!!!!" Right after Team RWBY's barrage forced the Grimm back, a streak of white light impacted with one of its heads, seeming to send it stumbling backward. Unfortunately, concepts like right way up and balance meant very little to a horror that was little more than a mass of writhing snakes stuck together, and as one head fell backward, two more shot up into the air to strike the hovering small bird Faunus girl that had just hit it.

"Damn it, Dilo. Don't rush ahead on your own." A young man with black hair and a large silver kite shield on his left arm shouted as he rushed to help his teammate. Seig, the leader of Team SHLD, thrust his shield out in front of him and activated the large green wind Dust crystal implanted in the center of his shield, causing a violent updraft of wind to take form in front of him.

*haha* "Thanks, Boss~" Dilo laughed and waved down at her team leader as she caught the updraft with her white feathery wings and used it, and the comically oversized clawed rocket boots on her feet, to dodge the two snapping snakeheads. She landed behind her team leader with a twirl and a raised double peace symbol as her other two teammates emerged from the forest behind her.

*Haaa* the light brown-haired Faunus girl with the ears and tail of a raccoon. Lydia sighed as she walked up behind Dilo and lightly bonked her on the head with her hammer, which was connected by a thin razor wire to the katana in her other hand. "Can't you be a little more considerate of all the trouble you cause for Seig by always rushing in like that?"

The last member of their team was a human girl with blue twin tails wearing a frilly blue and white princess dress and wielding a blue folding fan, Hime. They were Team SHLD, a team largely considered to be made up of the weakest members of the first-year class at Beacon. Despite this, they and Team RWBY, the strongest team, had been the first to arrive when their friends needed help.

[Individually, only Lydia might be considered strong, but they make up for it with excellent teamwork and steadfast dedication to becoming true huntsmen and huntresses.] Ray thought as he stood with his arms crossed, leaning against a tree on top of a cliff overlooking the scene of Teams RWBY, JNPR, and SHLD fighting the bundle of King Taijitus down below.

"What tha!?" "Is that thing regenerating!?" Ren and Weiss cried out in surprise as the flesh around the stumps of the necks where Yang had pulverized two of its heads began to wriggle and boil then suddenly erupted in a meaty fountain to form new heads to replace the ones it had lost.

"Then we just have to keep smashing it till it stops regenerating!" *HYAH* Nora shouted as she smashed her hammer into the head, chasing her and caved in its skull. However, reality proved not to be a simple as the orange-haired energetic girl would have liked. No matter how much she smashed or her friends sliced, diced, and blasted the Hydra, it continued to regenerate at an annoyingly fast pace, refusing to maintain any injury for long.

"Uh, Teach? A little help here!" Hime shouted, having spotted the relaxed Ray above them as she used her semblance, hydro manipulation, and water dust imbued dress to ride a stream of water away from several sets of sharp snapping teeth.

"Nah." Ray replied with a casual wave of his hand, and his eyes closed as one of the snakes came dangerously close to biting off the head of a distracted Jaune.

""WHAT!?!"" Jaune and Hime shouted in surprise as they scrambled to create some more distance between them and the Grimm.

"But, you're so strong and smart. I bet you could kill this thing with just a flick of your finger, couldn't you. *Waaahhh* I wish I could get the chance to see your cool, heroic figure fighting this beast. Pretty please, won't you show us~?" Hime, the president of Ray's fan club at Beacon, begged and teased him with fluttery eyelashes as she tried to subtly push up her meager assets with arms.

"Yeah. But this is your mission, not mine." Ray opened one eye to glare at the fangirl. "There are twelve of you and twelve heads. You got this."

"Bu-" "Quite complaining, Hime." Weiss snappishly interrupted her as she zipped by.

"He's right, Hime. In this twisted, shitty world, if you want something, you have to grasp it with your own two HANDS!" Sieg said as he rushed over, and shield slammed the head that had been chasing her away.

"Hey, Weiss, do you know her?" Ruby asked as she battled alongside her partner. They may have been in the same class for almost three months, but Ruby still wasn't familiar with most of her classmates, and, from what she had seen, Weiss didn't interact with too many people outside her team and Team JNPR either.

"She was one of the more tolerable second-generation rich kids my parents forced me to socialize with." Weiss quickly explained as if she was trying to prevent a miss understanding.

"Oh." Ruby said simply, feeling a touch of relief that she couldn't quite place. "We have to find a way to stop it regenerating. Anyone remember anything about this type of Grimm from class?" Ruby called out to the other huntsmen as she twirled her scythe and beheaded another head. They were destroying the heads easily enough, one right after the other, but if they kept coming back like this, the fight might never end, and they would be the ones to tire and make a mistake first.

"None of our classes have talked about a multi-headed snake Grimm like this, and there is nothing about such a Grimm in any of the books I've read either." Weiss shouted back as she pierced her rapier deep into the eye of one head as she slid past and then jerked it out to dodge another with a graceful twirl and slice a bloody line along its neck as she passed.

"I saw something glowing hidden in that mass at its base. Maybe these are all really just King Taijitus, and something is holding them together and causing them to regenerate." Blake shouted as she swung from one serpentine neck to another and raced across their slippery lengths, slashing with both her katana and her cleaver sheath as she went, trying to find a weak spot.

"But how do we hit it? Every time we try to attack the main body, one of the heads gets in our way!" Lydia shouted as she looped the razer wire connecting her hammer and katana and jumped, letting gravity pull the noose tight and severing the head.

"Everyone, try to keep as many heads as possible distracted. Then Wiess and I will hit its core with everything we got! LET'S DO THIS HUNTMEN!!" Ruby shouted encouragingly.

""RIGHT!"" everyone replied with determination.

######

"Since when did possession-type Grimm grant the power to regenerate like that?" Roman asked out loud from the open door of their bullhead as he, his henchmen, and the twin Grimm Lords took off.

"Onii-chan gave the little guy a bit of a boost before it left." The white scaled one answered with a smirk as her brother stood silently next to her with a bow that appeared to be made of bones in his hand. His eyes were locked on the battle raging in the distance or, to be more specific, a young man casually standing just outside the area affected by the fight.

"But I thought you said it was a disrespectful little pest?" Roman questioned.

"Yes, but the gift wasn't for him. It's for the bastard who captured our Ototo." the black scaled one elaborated as his eyes never left the relaxed man. [Why isn't he helping? Aren't huntsmen suppose to a bunch of goody-do-gooders that rush in to help whenever anything happens? All I need is one chance. One moment when he drops his guard.]

[I guess it was too much to hope that all these things would be as stupid as that mutt.] Roman thought. "You don't want to mess with that guy, trust me. I've tangled with him before, and nothing good ever comes out of it. He captured your brother alive for interrogation, he doesn't need two prisoners." The ginger warned as he took some distance from the two.

"And you would be wise not to underestimate us or dare to give us orders." The white scaled Grimm Lord slapped her tail irritably against the metal floor of the airship in warning.

######

"GO! NOW!" Seig shouted as he used his semblance, Aggro, to attract the attention of the last two heads. They slammed full force into the wall of wind he had formed in front of him, knocking the huntsman-in-training back, but arresting their movements long enough for Hime to activate the trap she had set. Muddy tentacles soaked in the water created from her water Dust imbued dress and fan and infused with her Aura rose up from beneath them to wrap around their slippery scales, pinning them in place. However, such bindings wouldn't last for long. As the two snakes struggled to free themselves, Lydia ran up threw her hammer over one of them. The weighted line wrapped around its head, and as it began to lose momentum, Dilo flew overhead and grabbed it out of the air. The youthful bird Faunus flew a quick loop around the next of the second snake and landed on the opposite side. Dilo stabbed the claws on her boots deep into the ground and pulled tight on the line. On the other side, Lydia stabbed her katana into the ground and pulled it the rest of the way taunt. Locking the two heads in place.

On the opposite side, Jaune used his Aura to expand the size of his shield filling the gaping maw of one of the snakeheads, locking it down.

Next to him, Nora pancaked another head into the ground with her mighty hammer, and Ren continually shot and slashed out the eyes of another as he danced around it, keeping its attention entirely on him.

"You're not getting away." Yang snarled as she held two of the heads in an armlock, one under each arm, barely holding on. As they struggled with each other, two more pairs of arms made of her golden Aura seemed to grow from her shoulders and wrap around the snaky necks. With the help of her new semi-transparent limbs, Yang was able to securely pin her two heads in place.

Next to her, Blake had lassoed another two heads with her ribbon and was using their own strengths against each other to hold them in place.

*Hyaa* *Ha* Not far away, Pyrrha had locked one head down head by impaling its lower jaw with her javelin into the ground and holding it in place with her semblance, Polarity. At the same time, she threw her shield coated in her red Aura like a discus and sliced off the head of another repeatedly. She controlled it with her semblance to constantly carve off more and more meat with each pass, continuously interrupting its regeneration.

"Right!" Ruby called and jumped high into the air along with Weiss. *Bang* As they jumped, Ruby fired her rifle behind her and used the recoil to twist in the air to behead the last unoccupied head as she passed. All twelve heads were now accounted for, and she had a clean shot to the center of the mass of writhing snakes.

"Ice Flower!" Ruby shouted as she spotted the gleaming red eyes revealing the Grimm hiding in that mass. Weiss grabbed onto Ruby's shoulder with her right hand and raised her left to line up her Myrtenaster alongside Ruby's Cresent Rose. Three force glyphs enhanced with ice Dust formed in front of the muzzle of Ruby's sniper rifle aimed downward for the finishing blow.

However, perhaps sensing the threat these two represented, the Grimm focused all its regenerative powers into the head Ruby had just severed, and before they could react or fire lunged at them, mouth wide to swallow them whole.

Time seemed to slow for everyone.

On the ground, their teammates and the members of Team JNPR and SHLD called out in alarm and warning.

On the distant airship, the black scaled Grimm Lord tensed and drew back the string on his bow. As he did so, an arrow made of murky red shadows formed upon his string.

Weiss and Ruby saw the oncoming maw and chose to ignore it, confident there was one more person nearby who would protect them.

Ray's eyes snapped open as he raised his head to look at the danger his twin and her partner were in. Six studs detached themselves from his right gauntlet as he unfurled his arms, five zipping over towards the onrushing head and the sixth slipping quietly into his loosely curled hand.

Time returned to its normal speed, but the Grimm had stopped. A glyph, the likes of which none of them had ever seen, formed by five small balls of metal connected by bolts of lighting, appeared around its neck, locking it in place. [Hmm, still needs work.] Ray thought as we watched the glyph flicker and struggle to contain the writhing snake. If it had trouble containing this overgrown worm, how was it going to trap the big fish?

The sight shock Weiss who considered herself an expert on glyphs so much that her own flickered and died just as Ruby fired her shot. The sniper round zipped through the air, but without the enhancement of Weiss's force glyphs and ice, it lacked the punch to completely destroy the parasitic Grimm hiding below and only damaged it. At the same time, the others were beginning to lose control of their heads as they struggled desperately against their restraints.

"WEISS!" Ruby called out in a mild panic to her partner as she struggled to fight against the inevitability of gravity and line up for another shot. [If only I had wings and could fly like Dilo.] The shout of her leader snapped Weiss out of her stupor at the sight of Ray's glyphs, and she quickly reformed the glyphs in front of Ruby's gun. At the same time, semi-transparent wings made of red Aura formed behind her, for an instant, steadying the two in mid-air and stopping their descent. It was only for a moment, but it was enough.

*BANG* *Fwwwsssshhh* Ruby fired. The ice imbued bullet empowered by Weiss's glyphs zipped past the wriggling serpentine body and impacted the center of the nightmarish monstrosity. The bullet exploded upon impact into a spiky ball of ice, ripping the Grimm to shreds.

*Bzzz Crack* As everyone was watching to see if the Grimm would regenerate again, Ray suddenly raised his right hand and flicked his thumb out like he was striking a marble. The Storm Tear in his hand shot out with a trail of lightning following behind it like it had been fired from a rail gun. It cut through the air, obliterated an arrow of murky red shadows as it passed, and penetrated through the wide-eyed black scaled King Taijitu Grimm Lord that had fired the arrow while he thought Ray was distracted by stopping the last head and the hull of the bullhead he was standing in.

His upper half disappeared, and his remains slumped to the floor of the bullhead as the passing railgun strike fried the ship's electronics and sent it crashing to the ground.

######

As the thirteen of them returned to Beacon to report the completion of their mission to Professor Goodwitch, they passed by Team CRDL, which was also returning at the same time.

[So even weaklings like them can act like true huntsmen.] Cardin thought angrily to himself as he watched the tiny bird Faunus he had pulled the feathers out of only a couple of weeks ago walk past him chatting happily with her teammates and Teams RWBY and JNPR about the giant Grimm they had just taken down together.

He hated it, but he hated what he was right now more. He wanted to change, and if he was going to change, there was something he had to do. No matter how much he hated it. Clenching his fist, he stepped out in front of them.

"Hey!" he shouted through gritted teeth. Dilo and Jaune's teammates moved protectively in front of them, and Team RWBY took an aggressive step forward in warning while Ray raised a questioning eyebrow at the struggling young man.

"I… I'm sorry." He finally squeezed out as he promptly lowered his head and bent his waist 90 degrees in apology. "I was wrong to bully you. I hope you can forgive me, and we can work together to become true huntsmen and huntresses."

Everyone stared at the bowing bully, now former bully perhaps, in silence, shocked by his apology. But none more so than the rest of his team who stood there with their mouth wide open as a fly buzzed through them.

"Don't mind it~" The silence was broken by the cheerful Dilo who skipped forward and patted the bowing boy on his over gelled hair. Her piece said, Dilo skipped past the bulky huntsman-in-training, more focused on the hefty lunch she planned to eat after they made their report. Her teammates smiled wrily as they followed behind her, able to guess where her head was at.

But as Seig passed Cardin, he whispered threateningly to him, "Dilo is too pure. She isn't capable of holding a grudge. The rest of us aren't so kind." Cardin, who had begun to raise his head after Dilo's pat, stiffened at his words. Of course, it wouldn't be that easy. It would take far more than a simple apology to make up for the things he had done. It would take a lifetime of action and repentance. Cardin clenched his fists tighter, determination welling up even stronger inside him. Determination to become someone who could be proud of himself, hold his head up high, and never be looked down on by anyone ever again for his childish and insecure attitude.