章 7: Strife in Mistral
POV Strife
The trip from Argus to Mistral took a 19 days since they were in a caravan and could only go as fast as the slowest member. Even though they left later then Ghira had intended due to needing to get Adam treated, they technically made it on time for the scheduled protests which were to start in two days. They just did not have as much time to prepare as they would have liked.
During the entire trip to Mistral, Adam would constantly glare at Strife and Cinder, so Strife had not let Cinder out of his sight much, and had been extra diligent to take care of her, because he would not put it past Adam to attack her if he saw an opportunity. He definitely had a bad impression of the boy. Strife knew that he could defend himself, but Cinder had no special training, so she wouldn't be able too do the same.
During their travel between Argus and Mistral, Strife had taken it upon himself to train both Cinder and Blake, and the pair got along fine, which he thought was great considering what he'd heard of human and faunus relations in general. Cinder had been through a traumatic situation, and was in serious need of a friend, and Black tried her best to be that, in spite of the age difference between them. Strife did the same as well
Over the past few weeks, the Belladonna's had grown quite close to Strife. Even Ghira, who had initially been a bit leery of him, had decided that he was a good kid, and asked him to partner up with Blake and to mentor her since he was so strong and so mature for his age. This pissed Adam off even more, since he'd wanted to partner up with Blake, but that was no longer possible.
Of course, Adam's dominant hand was crippled and he had to retrain himself with his weaker hand, so even if Strife had said no, Adam would not have gotten the chance, but that did not even register to Adam. Of course, Strife was also the one that crippled him in the first place, so the hatred he felt towards Strife was already like a bottomless abyss.
Sienna Khan initially disliked Strife for having crippled Adam, who she felt had great potential, but after seeing how kindly he treated little Blake, and seeing that he actually agreed to remain with them and to be Blake's partner, her attitude softened.
Even though Strife looked like a human, Sienna understood that he wasn't one, but neither was he a faunus. Ghira had not given her the details, but she'd gathered that he was of a species called Nephilim that she had never heard of, and that he was the same age as Blake, despite looking older and acting so mature..
It had been a lot for her to accept, but she had three weeks to come to terms with everything, and she had. The more the other White Fang came to accept it, the angrier Adam became at the world, in addition to his already bottomless hatred for Strife. He hid it well from the others, but it was as clear as day to Strife.
Strife could tell that Adam would inevitably act out eventually, and remained vigilant the entire trip.
Upon entering Mistral, Ghira brought his family, Cinder, and Strife to the house of a faunus family that was letting his family stay with them. That was using the word family very loosely, since it was just a husband and wife, both of whom were cat faunus, who lived together. They had no children yet, but they were still young and had lots of time.
"Norio, Tanaka, it's great to see you again" Ghira greeted the couple who had come outside together as they approached.
"Ghira, welcome" The man named Norio greeted him "We were getting worried, we expected you three or four days ago."
"Yeah, sorry about that. We ran into a bit of trouble just outside of Argus, and had to turn back there to get one of our people medical treatment. He lived, though."
"That's good." Tanaka, the woman agreed "So, who are these two human children?"
Ghira looked at Strife and Cinder "Despite appearances, Strife here isn't actually a human. Additionally, he is Blake's official partner now and into the future, basically like a son to Kali and I."
Norio and Tanaka both nodded,. accepting Ghira's word in the matter.
"As for the girl, yeah, she's human, but her father in Argus asked us as a favor to escort her to Mistral so she can catch a bullhead to Vale. there was apparently some weirdo faunus in Argus plotting against her for some unknown reason." Ghira added to the couple.
"I heard his name, it is Tyrian, he is a scorpion faunus, and I'm pretty sure he was a violent psychopath." Strife added to the couple.
"Tyrian Callows maybe?" Norio suggested to them "I heard of a faunus by that name. Killed a bunch of humans and faunus up in Atlas and Mantle, so they caught him and brought him to be executed, only to have him escape and massacre a bunch of people on his way out. That story might be exaggerated though."
"If it's the same guy as I saw, then it's probably not exaggerated." Strife insisted to Norio "At the time I was more focused on saving Cinder and her father because it was the right thing to do, but in hindsight he seemed really really powerful. Homicidal murderer is not the kind of personality you'd want a fighting genius to have, but that man was both."
Norio and Tanaka both shuddered when Strife said that.
"Father." Strife looked at Ghira when he said that "Is it okay for me to look around town?"
"Papa, can I go with Big Brother Strife?" Blake asked Ghira as well.
Ghira chuckled in amusement "Alright, you kids can go, but be back here before dark." Ghira ordered. Even if Mistral wasn't the safest place, and he wouldn't normally let Blake wander alone here, things had changed a bit now that she had such a capable little partner. He trusted that no harm would come to his daughter while Strife was there.
"I...I will go too." Cinder insisted, then looked at Strife "father said I should take a bullhead to Vale, but he didn't say when I had to do it." she declared while grabbing a hand of both Strife and Blake.
Strife nodded to Cinder with a smile "Okay, okay, I wont make you leave or anything" he chuckled at Cinder "It'll be easier for me to protect both of you since I am the strongest of us if I am in the middle, though."
Cinder nodded, and, with a bit of reluctance, let go of little Blake's hand, and Blake went around to grasp Strife's other hand "I'll be in your care then, big brother Strife." Blake said to him cheerfully.
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POV Ghira Belladonna
While he was still conflicted about letting Blake wander off with Strife, he forced himself to remain calm and to trust the boy. Blake had taken to calling Strife 'Big Brother Strife' during these past few weeks Ghira and Kali had decided together to accept it. While they hadn't yet 'officially' adopted Strife, they probably would in the future, so he was relieved that Strife seemed to be alright with it.
Norio and Tanaka led the Belladonna parents inside to talk and to begin preparations for the upcoming protests before their trip to their next destination.
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POV Strife
Holding Blakes hand with his left hand, Strife led the girls through the streets of Mistral, looking around and taking in the sights, spending a little bit of lien that he'd gotten from Ghira to get them each a pear.
Cinder and Blake both ate their pears while they continued walking, while Strife carried his. They'd just exited a clothing shop and spotted a group of four men rushing into an alley. "Don't let that brat get away!" one of the men ordered.
Strife didn't hesitate to run after them, with Cinder and Blake feeling nervous, but still coming with him. In the alley, the four men had cornered a young girl with dark skin, short green hair and red eyes. She appeared to be around six years old, and appeared frightened.
"You steal in my turf and you have to pay your dues." the leader of the men told the green-haired girl smugly while she desperately clung to a loaf of bread like her life depended upon it.
"Leave m...me alone you big bully." the girl demanded.
"Emerald, even on the streets, us lowlifes have a hierarchy, we have rules. You have repeatedly broken my rules, so now I have to punish you." The man had a wicked grin "I won't enjoy it, but it must be done." he lied while taking out a knife.
Strife had seen enough, and slipped free from Cinder and Blake, put his pair into his pocket, and made Mercy and Redemption appear in his hands, and he was about to attack them, when Cinder, feeling a burning rage at seeing them about to hurt a girl close in age to her, activated her semblance.
Rushing at the knife wielder, she punched him in the center of his back, and since he had no aura, he burst into a pile of dust. She repeated this scene two more times before the last man was able to react and punched Cinder in the stomach.
Thankfully, she had her aura unlocked while traveling with the white fang, so while it still hurt a lot, do to her inexperience, she threw one last punch at the man as he was calling her 'Monster.'
Strife seemed proud of Cinder for being able to act like that, and made Mercy and Redemption disappear "Stay close to me and remain in physical contact with me or each other and no one will see us" he ordered the three girls and then they all left the scene..
The Mistral police were quick to reach the scene, but the four casually walked away without anyone appearing to notice.
"Th...thank you" Emerald said nervously once they were a couple blocks away, still protecting her bread with her one arm which wasn't being held by Cinder.
"It's alright. I guess. I mean, they were bad, but I still feel a bit sick." Cinder Admitted to the group "My name is Cinder. My friends are Blake and Strife. I know Strife would have saved you if I hadn't first, but I don't want to be weak and afraid anymore, so..." Cinder felt a bit embarrassed, which she figured was better then feeling gross.
"Emerald Sus....Sustrai." Emerald answered timidly.
"You don't seem to have a good life here, huh?" Strife asked Emerald with concern, he could sense the answer without asking it, but he decided to make sure anyway "do you have parents."
Emerald shook her head "M...mother died when I was little and never knew my father."
While Strife knew that he couldn't take in every orphan, he got a good feeling when it came to this Emerald "Alright, Emerald. Come with me and I'll take care of you until you are strong enough to no longer need to depend on me" he offered.
"I have to go to Vale to live with my great aunt there." Cinder told Emerald as well
"Oh...okay." Emerald started blushing "Fine, but you have to wait until I am older to have me as "I only have enough for one flight there, but Strife is going there with a caravan. If you want to follow him until you get there, I'll try to convince my great aunt to take you in. I've always wanted a little sister."
emerald seemed to carefully consider their offers and then looked at Strife "I'll accept, then. Both of your offers" she seemed to have slight favoritism towards Cinder, though.
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POV Cinder Fall
Ghira and Kali were surprised when Strife brought back another girl, but after hearing her circumstances, the pair agreed to let Emerald travel with them and join in with Blake's training regiment since Strife did not mind training one more. This excited Emerald immensely, but made Cinder, who now wished to get stronger, feel regretful that once she left, she would miss out on the training that Strife could have given her. She loved her father, so she knew she would have to go to Vale, but that would mean losing a good opportunity to get strong.
The protests in Mistral went on for two weeks and on their last day there, Cinder felt like her time was up and she was sad. Looking at the ground the whole way to the Bullhead docks, she could only curse her misfortune.
Strife, however, sensed Cinder's distress and held her hand to try to comfort her, though it had little effect. Cinder didn't want to be be weak for the rest of her life. Even though when she was angry she managed to activate her semblance, she hadn't manages to use it again on command yet.
"The White Fang's next Kingdom where they will be protesting is in Vale" Strife reminded Cinder "We might not be able to go by bullhead with you, but we will get there eventually. Ghira estimates eleven months. So this is not goodbye. It's until we meet again." he tried to help Cinder to look on the bright side as they approached a Bullhead near where another Bullhead had just landed and people were disembarking.
Cinder let go of Strife's hand and then hugged him "I'll try to get stronger so that I don't disappoint you by staying weak" she pouted.
"I am sure that you'll be very powerful in the future as well, Cinder. I'll miss you, too. I've grown accustomed to having you around. You have great potential." Strife reassured her.
Cinder felt a bit happy that he would miss her, but figured this wouldn't get easier just by waiting longer and she turned and headed to the Bullhead to Vale, albeit with great reluctance.
"Striiiife!" Cinder heard another girl call out and looked towards the nearby Bullhead that two girls had disembarked off of. The slightly taller one had half pink and have brown hair while the slighting shorter on had long red hair.
It was the red-haired girl that had called out to Strife and ran towards him first, followed be the other girl.
"Fury!" Strife recognized her with a grin "Hey sis."
Cinder took a deep breath and rushed back to the new girls "You're Strife's sister, Fury?" Cinder asked "My name is Cinder. Strife saved my father and I." she figured she would get in the good graces of Fury under the assumption that she was strong like her brother. She was forced to separate from him for a while but hoped that there would be more opportunities to train together in the future.
Cinder gave Emerald, Blake, and then Strife a hug, then turned and ran back to the Bullhead, not wanting her to miss her flight, or to let her new friends see her crying because of how hard the forthcoming separation was hitting her.
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POV Fury
Coming to Mistral, she had certainly hoped to find her brother Strife, but never would Fury have imagined that she would spot him literally the moment she stepped off of the Bullhead. The girl that introduced herself first seemed bold and straight-forward, which Fury found admirable, but after reading the mood a bit the realized that the green-haired girl with him also had a look of longing directed at the departing girl named Cinder. She wondered if this was one of those 'girl crush' things. "You seem to be surrounding yourself with many ladies, Brother. When did you become such a ladies man?" she teased him
Strife sighed in response to her teasing "I was dumped here without instructions from the Charred Council, and my memories are a mess. Is it the same for you?"
"Same as you my memories are a mess, but I can say with certainty that the Charred Council didn't send us here. They betrayed their own purpose, and betrayed the Horsemen, so I eliminated them. I remember that much." Fury insisted "as for who sent us here, and for what purpose, I have no idea."
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POV Strife
Strife frowned when he heard that Fury had killed the Charred Council "You said that they betrayed us and their duty? Can you tell me how?"
"My memories are a mess, but from what I can reassemble, I think it was that the Charred Council collaborated with heaven and Hell to start the apocalypses early, and framed War for it. I think it was because even though the Horsemen had been loyal to them, they feared our power. they even went as far as releasing the seven sins" Fury explained to Strife.
Strife sighed when he heard that. Never would he have guessed that the Charred Council would betray them, but he also trusted that Fury would never lie about such a thing. He knew that the Horsemen never would have betrayed the Charred Council, but did the Charred Council know it? Her explanation was plausible, and would explain why he had received no instructions from the Charred Council when he came here.
"I guess if we want more answers, all we can do is look for Death and War" Strife suggested to her "I didn't know how to do that, so I agreed to accompany the White Fang, as they've been treating me like family. Well, most of them. There's one guy whose an ass, but the others are great."
"Adam's an ass." Blake giggled.
Ghira chuckled "Son, try not to be a bad influence on your sister."
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POV Ghira Belladonna
Strife turned his attention towards Cinder's Bullhead, which was taking off, and waved to Cinder. Cinder waved back, but kept her head down, he presumed to hide her sadness. Ghira felt for the girl. She had proven herself in the past few weeks to be one of the good humans, not treating any faunus unfairly at all, nor showing any prejudice. This just showed that prejudice wasn't inborn, it was a learned behavior, and learned behaviors could be changed.
"Well, since we already decided to adopt Strife, would the two of you like to come with us as well?" Kali offered to Fury and Neo.
Fury nodded to Kali and smiled slightly "If I can reunite with my brothers, that would be ideal. That, after all, was the whole reason I came here."
"About that. How did you find out I was here?" Strife asked her with curiosity.
"This Scorpion Faunus named Tyrian in Vacuo was plotting to do terrible things to Neo here, so I took him out the way I usually take care of people who go after my family." Fury answered Matter-of-Factly "Before I introduced him to his maker, I eavesdropped a conversation he was having on a scroll. He mentioned during the scroll call that you screwed up his plans in Argus. Mistral was the closest location to Argus that I could fly to from Vacuo."
Ghira was surprised by how casually this little girl admitted to killing a grown man, who was probably Tyrian Callows. He had looked up Tyrian Callows in the past few weeks and the mans record was absolutely horrifying, with over 500 people confirmed to have been murdered by him, and those are just the ones people knew about!
It appeared to Ghira that Fury's strength must be at least on par with Strife's, which already impressed him immensely. "Well, we leave first thing in the morning, so lets go back to where we are staying tonight." he suggested.
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POV Cinder Fall
The Bullhead Cinder was in was a long range passenger one, so she had a comfortable seat. A few people had gotten up and mingled, but Cinder remained seated and looked absolutely devastated.
Even if it was hard, she wished that she could have joined Strife on his trip to Vale. Even if it did take eleven months, she still would have gotten to Vale, and she would have been far stronger by the time she got there.
Suddenly there was a loud explosion and the Bullhead trembled, with everyone on board starting to freak out. Who wouldn't when they were under attack! The pilots started taking evasive actions against further projectiles, causing those unfortunate souls that were not belted in to be violently thrown around inside the Bullhead.
When the second projectile struck the Bullhead, Cinder was knocked out by a flying mans flailing arm, and when she awoke she was in the rubble of the crashed Bullhead, with a bunch of scary men taking the survivor's away. Cinder registered the scene quickly and tried playing dead.
She still heard nothing. Ever since the first near hit that had exploded outside of her window, she hadn't heard anything at all, and that frightened her, but she didn't want to be taken by those men, so she had to act as through she were already dead.
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POV Raven Branwen
Since the day she became Chieftain of the Branwen Bandit Tribe, she had been engaging in a violent war against the Bloody Burrow Bandits. Compared to the Bloody Burrow Bandits, the Branwen Tribe could all be considered absolute saints among saints!
On the very day that she took her place as Chieftain, the Bloody Burrow Bandits had attacked them and abducted a half dozen women from the Branwen Tribe. The Bloody Burrow Bandits did not believe that women could be bandits, and treated them as breeding chattel and nothing else!
Raven had acted swiftly to rescue her people, of course, but they'd already been subjected to many indecent acts. How could she not want to kill every last one of them down to the last man? But just when the Bloody Burrow Bandits were on the brink of defeat, they had retreated closer to Mistral and took advantage of a low-flying Bullhead to bring it down and take more prisoners.
Maybe if she had not had a moment of hesitation and had chased them even towards Mistral, these people would have been spared. She could only feel regret right now. Even though Mistral would no doubt have people here soon, she still decided to approach the wreckage and see if anyone was still alive. Normally the Bloody Burrow Bandits were thorough, so it would be unlikely, but since they were so close to Mistral it was possible that they were rushed and made a mistake.
After walking past dozens of bodies with clearly fatal wounds, Raven was surprised to find a girl whose only injury appeared to be bleeding from her burst eardrums. Raven couldn't help but suspect that this girl was playing dead, but she was doing it so well if she was right!
Raven knelt near the little girl and touched her neck to check her pulse and found that her suspicions were correct "You're lucky to be alive little girl." she spoke, but did not expect the girl to reply given the state of her ears.
With one arm she swung her nodachi, using her semblance to open a black portal, then she scooped up the girl with one arm and tossed her through the portal "Tai is a softie. I'm sure he will take good care of you." she commented, unsure why she had such a moment of compassion, but what was done was done. She used her nodachi again and created another portal and stepped through it to return to her own tribe.
After this, Raven was convinced that Mistral would destroy the remnants of the Bloody Burrow Bandits for her, so she could focus on making sure her own tribe survived.
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POV Strife
Though it was certainly not in the manner that she had intended to get there, Cinder had indeed arrived in Vale, but Strife did not know that. That evening he heard about Cinder's Bullhead getting shot down, and that many died, while those who survived were believed to have been taken prisoner by the Bloody Burrow Bandits.
After investigating what they could about the Bloody Burrow Bandits, he and Fury were both horrified by how truly evil they seemed. Mistral revealed that their investigation determined that the Bloody Burrow Bandits had been at war with some Branwen Tribe, and that they were losing which forced them closer to Mistral.
They further announced that they would be preparing to attack those bandits within a week, but that was not soon enough for Strife, especially after verifying that Cinder wasn't among the dead. When they returned to Norio and Tanaka's place, Strife asked everyone to gather together in the dining room.
"Son, are you alright?" Ghira asked Strife once they were all gathered together.
"Father, with those bandits so close to Mistral, it's unwise for such a large group to leave right now, so stay here a bit longer." Strife told Ghira, then looked at Fury "Cinder is someone that I consider a friend. Would you please help me to bring her back, Sister?"
Fury nodded "Neo's semblance might be useful, even if she can't fight well yet. She is quite good at dodging."
"Emerald has a good semblance as well, but I am not sure if she is ready for the level of combat we'll be going too. Are you sure Neo can handle it?" Strife asked, to which Fury nodded confidently.
Emerald seemed disappointed, but could not actually disagree with their analysis.
Strife turned and looked at Emerald then "Please take good care of lil sis Blake for me until I get back." Blake probably would have complained if she had still been up, but she was already in bed.
Strife could tell that Ghira and Kali were concerned and he smiled at each of them "Dad...mom...we'll be fine...we'll be back in a few days, I promise."
"Being a father to a horsemen seems to be hard work also." Ghira sighed heavily "Alright, We'll trust you then."
Emerald suddenly hugged Strife "Please make sure she is safe."
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