Ch 8: Feeding an "Empath"?

"You guys ready to go?" an energetic bunny yelled as she suddenly jumped out of the alley in front of the two boys she had talked with earlier that day.

*Wah!* "Yep, I'm Rajeev, and he's Jaune, by the way. But you can call me Ray." The blond's comical little scared jump backward as he fumbled with his sword at his waist brought an impish smile to Annabell's face that only slightly cramped at the redhead's deadpan response even as she landed almost nose to pecs with him. She glared up and pouted at the big bully for not giving her the reaction she was looking for and being so much taller than her.

"Sweet! Nice to meet you, Ray. Jaune. Now let's go kick some baddy butt!" But her pout quickly morphed back into a toothy grin as she spun around, pumping her fist enthusiastically into the air and 'accidentally' smacking Ray in the face with her ears.

Ray chuckles wryly and follows behind the little cotton ball, catching a glint of steel blades beneath the fluttering hem of her black and red-trimmed summer dress as she skips ahead of them.

A few minutes later, the trio found themselves sulking in the shadows of an alley across from the back entrance to the water treatment plant, watching a group of muscular men offloading unmarked barrels from the back of an unmarked truck. Each of them well armed and projecting the swaggering blood-tinted aura common among those used to solving everything with violence that seemed to scream, 'I'm tough, don't mess with me'.

"I count a dozen." Ray whispered from between the rabbit ears of the girl he was crouching behind to her and his friend pressing himself against the opposite wall of the alley. 

*hmm* Annabell hummed in agreement as her ears flicked involuntarily in agitation at his too-close utterance. Jaune nodded silently in acceptance, not nearly as confident in how many hostiles they were about to face but trusting his friend's judgment.

"How many could you take, Annabell?" Ray asked.

*hmph* "I could take out all twelve of them in an instant. So, should we each take four to keep it fair!?" the restless bunny boasted, bouncing eagerly on the balls of her feet in anticipation of the ensuing violence.

"Jaune?" Ray continued calmly, pretending not to care about their new friend while carefully filling away everything for later.

"Umm, I could probably take two?" Jaune half stated, half asked. A little intimidated by the 'tough toughs' aura the thugs were giving out. He was used to fighting Grimm by now, but people, criminals, were still a new threat to him.

Ray nodded in understanding. "Ok, Annabell will take the four unloaders on the right, I'll take the five on the left, and Jaune will deal with the three guarding the truck. Let's try to keep this quiet. No need to disturb the neighbors. Agreed?"

*pa puh pu* Jaune sputtered in surprise. [I just said I could only take two!]

"No problem!" Annabell eagerly chirped before springing into action. 

Her powerful legs tensed, their muscles and veins bulging as she quickly observed the positioning of her targets, feeling out the best route through them more by instinct than by any conscious calculations. Ray paused before launching his own assault to observe her as Jaune quickly went from a stuttering newb to a huntsman-in-training and accepted his assignment. 

Satisfied with the attack vector she had come up with within the half second it took Jaune to do so and grasp his blade, Annabell slipped her hands under her dress, unsheathing the pair of katars strapped to her thighs. Then, in a blur of speed that would have impressed even Ruby, she exploded from her position. A bolt of black lightning bounced from one ruffian to another, leaving in its wake explosions of grey dust highlighted by crimson blood glittering in the moonlight; no Aura for a bunch of common thugs like these to protect them, not that it would have made much of a difference in the face of gleaming sharpened steel backed by the momentum of a charging murder bunny.

Before Jaune's sword could clear its sheath, she was done. A sweet preteen little girl on the cusp of puberty, her inky black hair softly settling, her snow-white face tilted back, the tip of her soft pink tongue darting out from between glints of pointed canines to lick cherry lips curved into a smiling crescent as she stood there bathing in the moonlight, basking in the moment. Seemingly wholly disconnected from the sudden onset of violence she had just inflicted on these vulnerable hoodlums just trying to earn an unhonest living. Only the gleaming katars held in her hands, dripping thick, life-giving blood onto the cold, grey, gravelly ground, spoke to the truth of the moment.

The poor souls opened their mouths to scream in pain, but only bile and blood escaped their lips as they collapsed to the ground, writhing in silent agony. Before their comrades could shout in alarm, an azure bolt of lightning followed the black. Ray sprang into action, his steps light and swift compared to Annabell's explosive bounds but no less effective as he zipped from one astonished man to another. Burying his electrified fist into their sternum as he passed. His lighting coursed through their bodies, sending their diaphragms spasming, silencing any attempt to cry out in warning or pain even as it robbed them of their consciousness.

The sudden one-two punch of having three-fourths of their numbers cut down instantaneously stunned the remaining three into silence and inaction as Jaune finally caught up with the two speedsters.

*Hah* the young hero shouted, rallying himself as he bashed his shield into the back of the head of one of his three targets. The invigorating shout and display of violence they could actually keep up with spurred the surviving pair into action. Drawing their intimidatingly large machetes as they prepared to fight for their lives. Jaune started, pulling up in surprise at the ease his first target had crumpled before him, but quickly focused back on the fight as his remaining opponents charged him with the fierce hope to live shining in their bloodshot, fear-filled eyes.

Ray glanced briefly at the scuffle as the thugs swung wildly, and Jaune carefully blocked and countered before concluding that his friend had this covered. The fight all but over in his eyes, Ray focused his attention back onto their new companion. 

Ray approached the mysterious girl, studying her carefully as she casually watched Jaune's fight. As he watched, he noticed a slight wrinkling of her nose.

[Disgust? Worry? Distaste?] The old reincarnated military schemer's pondering on the meaning of his "ally's" microexpressions was interrupted by a tugging on his foot as he tried to walk toward her.

*hmm* He hummed as he glanced down at his foot to see one of Annabell's targets grasping at his boot. His eyes wide with fear and desperation, still shining with a burning desire to live. Flecks of blood, bile, and spittle splattered about his mouth as his lips moved soundlessly in a breathless, desperate cry for help. As Ray's cold, detached gaze observed her work more closely, he saw that her push daggers had sliced cleanly between his bottom two ribs and opened up the bottom of his lungs. The man was literally drowning in his own blood. It was a horrible way to die. Not that Ray cared. Unintentional and unaware as the goon may have been, they had placed themselves in opposition to his goals, and he saw no value in them that would incline him to save them. So, with a purposeful tug, Ray tugged his ankle free of the dying man's grasp, severing his last thread of hope.

"It must be hard for you. The violence." Ray awkwardly said, motioning with his hand to the slowly expiring men Annabell had mortally wounded. "As an empath, I mean. Sensing all your opponents' fear, anger, hate, and desperate will to live as you cut them down." Ray pretended to ask casually while letting a hint of concern escape the careful grip he kept on his emotions during battle and into his voice.

"Huh?" Annabell asked distractedly as she refocused from watching Jaune's fight and reveling in the thick cocktail of emotions permeating the air onto the predator disguised as a friend that had silently stalked up beside her while she was distracted.

"Oh, yes." Annabell answered as she took half a step away from the dangerous redhead and lowered her head to conceal her face while pretending to casually wipe the blood off her weapons with a handkerchief.

"Out of curiosity," Ray asked, letting the space open up between them as he put his hands in his pocket and turned his body away from her towards Jaune, hoping to put the wary rabbit at ease. "How do they compare to the positive emotions you feel from the rest of the town?"

*Hmmm* Annabell tilted her head as she considered the question, "I guess the best way to describe it would be like different flavors. For example, these." she gestured at the men desperately trying to stumble, crawl, or drag themselves away to find help, "taste of spicy fear and bitter desperation with a citrusy undertone of hope. In contrast, the rest of the town tastes cloyingly sweet. Personally, I prefer the various sweet and savory flavors of more positive emotions, but some of my sib- I mean other empaths I've met prefer salty sorrow or sour jealousy. It's all preferences, and being uncomfortable with an emotion is only to the extent of being a picky eater. So, no. I don't have a problem with fighting." Annabel shrugged casually as they watched Jaune finish off the last of his opponents with a pommel strike to the head. "Not like it is for him, at least."

*hm* Ray grunted in agreement as he processed what he had learned. Jaune hadn't killed a single one of his opponents but had instead gone out of his way to ensure none of them received any serious injuries while knocking them out. Ray had considered marionetting one of them into falling onto Jaune's sword, but he had ended up being far more interested in Annabell's response, and the time for Jaune to lose his virginity would come. Baby steps.

More importantly, Annabell's explanation of how her "empathy" worked opened up some interesting possibilities. Did all her fellow "empaths" feel the same way, or is Annabell unique? What about the "nutrition" of the different emotions? Are they the same or at least comparable? What do people lose when their emotions are "eaten"? How many could be persuaded to only eat positive "sweets" from now on in exchange for protection and guaranteed sustenance? What kind of backlash might such an attempt prompt from both sides? Was even proposing such an experiment even worth it? And perhaps most importantly, if all these hypotheticals end up rolling their way, could there be a means of cohabitation with the Grimm now that the Grimm Lords had brought thinking to these unthinking monsters that had plagued Remnant for so long?

[So many new options to consider] Ray mused, a conspiratorial grin tugging at the corner of his lips as he pulled out his phone to signal the pair of Vale detectives on the Spider Lotus payroll he had called Melanie to have on standby nearby to handle the clean up and aftercare once they were done.