#those flowers are made out of milky glass and when he moves they chime a bit

[betweenblackberrybranches]

Obsessed with the way @basyacriptid drew my fae au Eclipse so i made my own version of that, only the head tho because thats all my energy can do rn

[actualbampot]

White Noise: Chapter 3

Holy shit it’s been so long since I posted a chapter of White Noise but here you go (so slay me it was a bloody hard one to write) Read it on a03 HERE

Enjoy!

Existing through our need to self oblige leads not to gluttony, but to humanity in it's most corrosive form.

Cinder held her spine straight, focused ahead if it meant only to centre herself.

‘How did the Grimm find their way here?’ The pensive intone should have been foremost on her mind, not the way her blood was running hot. She knew better.

As the ring of glass heels born from surrounding dust quickened their chime, the sound of gunfire thundering from the upper levels became intermittent before falling disconcertingly silent.

It wasn't unheard of for a Grimm to scatter from it’s pack: Anima’s rocky woodland was treacherous, shielded by a valley of mountains that rendered radio’s in static. It was only logical that a Grimm in the area could lose it's bearings entirely.

And that a bunker dating back to the Great War would exist here.

Fortunate for Roman Torchwick that he insisted on being so useful, presenting his ‘Slice of Haven’ as he so distastefully described the run-down complex. To flee amidst the chaos of Beacon’s demise had been a timed effort, moving as swiftly as the news itself had spread to the other kingdoms. With Anima's borders sealing behind them, their footholds had been established almost immediately, no less on the doorstep to Mistral.

Cinder’s hand fell on the button to take service elevator up far heavier than necessary. Two floors underground and in the middle of nowhere. They were, essentially, off the grid.

Pacing back and forth, she could feel loose floor panels giving beneath her step as the creaking lift dragged to the ground floor at an infuriating speed. It was the price paid for a hideout operating on prewar Atlesian technology, and the wait was hardly helping to distract Cinder from the way she stung all over.

She could barely admit even to herself; Her torso, arms, face. Her pride.

Aura would repair the damage in due course, but there wasn’t much in the way of remedying how uncharacteristically unprepared she had been for the attack, no matter how meticulously planned. Unsurprisingly, that much could only be expected from an Atlesian Specialist.

Not to speak of one bearing the Schnee name.

With a shudder the elevator creaked to a halt, and Cinder paced down a lengthy corridor just adjacent to the main warehouse. Voices that couldn’t reach her before carried along the walls, shouting and strangled.

She swiped her tongue across her lips. A steadying inhale was supposed to steel frayed nerves- but the faint taste of rose petals on her tongue wouldn't allow it, treacherous and lingering on her senses.The urgency in her step faltered when touching the pads of her fingers to her lips, breathing in the distant scent of a blooming flower in midsummer heat; Her sullen, sweet little Ruby.

She succumbed like a flurry of petals trembling on the gale of a storm. It was almost unthinkable that the same girl who turned her gleaming, silver gaze to face impossible odds at the top of Beacon Tower now lay only existing, wholly dependant. Wholly empty.

And wholly hers.

Fractured and off-kilter was how Cinder had chosen to keep her, rewarding her weak and easily swayed heart with a nurturing hand. Distorting Ruby's perception remained a current, carefully executed task which painted Cinder in the only source of light the girl would receive. Unsurprisingly, Roman's glee when approached to play the malevolent role was only parallel to the sum of money Cinder had paid him to do so - and so he did, bending each and every truth that Little Red wholeheartedly believed in.

Given enough time isolated from colour, people, or anything that resembled more than the sound of her own heartbeat, Ruby had been prepared to believe any lie Torchwick spun, but most importantly that she was a victim rescued from atrocities committed by Ozpin and his so-called combat schools. That her guaranteed safety came aligned only with Cinder and no other.

Steel rattled not far off in the distance, dragging Cinder from her reverie to set about a faster pace. She expected a quadrupedal that could traverse the mountainside with ease had happened upon the front entrance, that unsuspecting White Fang soldiers unable to control their fear had attracted it inside.

Throwing open the double doors to the main warehouse with flames armed at her fingertips, she was ready to purge the Grimm to a blackened smoulder.

Cinder expected to find destruction, an ongoing fight against a larger Grimm. But on the floor Faunus bodies lay strewn and sunken in blood, drained from the same single, large puncture aimed directly at each of their jugulars. Executed.

Golden and sharp her eyes were drawn up beyond the bodies by the sporadic sound of clicking, plunging the blood pumping wildly through her veins into ice.

She saw Emerald and Mercury awkwardly knelt on the concrete, ensnared in red tendrils tangling their legs to their arms. Over them floated an inky blot, a shell of teeth and broken bone pulsing around a core of murky red. Nonplussed by Cinder’s arrival it hovered steadily as if in wait, all whilst Mercury and Emerald struggled to gasp past the tendrils wound around their throats.

Cinder was rooted on the spot, their eyes silently begging for her to intervene, but this was no ordinary Grimm. The remaining Faunus that had somehow managed to stay out of reach of it’s knifed limbs had it surrounded, dust-powered weapons raised.

“Wait.” Cinder announced, making herself known to the rest of the room. Eyes wide and frightened followed her as she stepped by the bodies to approach the Grimm, her hand quietly signalling the remaining Faunus to step back.

The Seer clicked in quickened beats, the change of rhythm echoing between corrugated walls just beyond the chime of Cinder’s heels. She stopped at a safe distance, unconcerned that it might harm her, but rather those in it’s grip.

Emerald was gasping, quickly turning blue while the coils around Mercury made to focus on keeping his legs pinned to the floor, and above them both the Seer’s bladed limbs precariously hung in gentle sway.

“I’m the one she sent you to search for. Aren’t I?” Cinder began barely above a whisper. “So release them. Your quarry is with me.”

She kept her focus without allowing her voice to waver, unable to afford showing weakness here despite how her pulse beat wildly against her ear drums.

Other than it’s unnervingly accelerated click the Seer did not seem to acknowledge her, and Cinder could sense doubt from the surrounding Faunus that a Grimm could comprehend human tongue let alone respond in any way, but the Maiden knew that with whatever cognitive function it possessed it was assessing it’s orders, deliberating it’s next moves.

Finally, the ropes loosened.

Emerald heaved forward on her hands, gulping down air the moment the Seer had released her. Similarly Mercury moved on his hands and knees, kicking the limbs away to catch Emerald beneath the arm, hoisting them both up and out of the Grimm’s reach.

“Piece of crap jellyfish” He cussed under his breath.

Cinder glanced between them, jaw drawn tight. They were shaken but otherwise unharmed, Mercury casting her a mute gaze of thanks before turning back to the now passive Seer, focused grey narrowed dangerously.

“Boss, let me take that thing out.” He snarled. From where Emerald was leant on her knees she managed a scowl of equal magnitude, one hand trembling as it reached back for her holstered sickle. “It got the spook on us before, but I ain’t gonna let it-”

“You will do no such thing.” Cinder said quietly.

Her disciples shared a stunned gaze, uncertainty flashing across Emeralds face first.

“But… Ma’am it slaughtered the Faunus here. It was about to-”

“And I want you both down below. Take the remaining workforce with you and ensure they remain there until this has been dealt with.” Cinder didn’t allow Emerald to finish, fixing them both with an icy look.

Not sparing them a moment more Cinder turned back to regard the Seer floating patiently in wait, her tightly drawn expression causing doubt creep onto both Mercury and Emeralds faces.

The boy breathed out of his nose when sluggishly Emerald was the first to move away, neither convinced of what exactly ‘dealing with it’ would entail. Trumping his apprehension with a snort, Mercury eventually tore away in Emeralds trail- almost colliding with the tanned girl as he did.

“What the- What’s the hold up.”

Looking down he saw pools of red widening in unmistakable panic, fixed on the double doors Cinder had just entered through, and as the remaining Faunus barrelled through them they paid no need to the small, dishevelled form that stood barefoot in blood matched to the same shade of her dark, unkempt hair.

She was white, and from here Mercury stood he could see, trembling from head to toe, her cheeks splashed with tears. “What the heck is she doing up here?”

“...

C...Cinder?”

No. Not here.

The woman turned stiffly, smouldering gold clashing with distant, blunt silver shadowed beneath the red tips of messy bangs.

Ruby Rose stood numbly by the double door entrance to the warehouse, taking small steps into a space packed densely with blood and bodies, unable to avert herself from the horror of her surroundings, and Cinder’s heart viced twofold.

Dim candle light and artificial fluorescence had stolen the rosy tinge from Ruby’s cheeks, and for a traitorous moment her thoughts weren’t of the very violence and bloodshed she had worked to shield the girl from, only how milky, pale skin seemed to glow in the natural light pouring from the shutters.

Her presence dropped a heavy weight on Cinder’s shoulder’s, dread too slow to soak into her bones before the temptation to taste the very tears from the girls cheeks with her lips caused all lucid thoughts to tailspin.

“Boss! Look out!!”

She heard the air whip before the warning had fully left Mercury’s mouth.

Bladed points hurtled to silence Ruby’s arresting fear, but the Maiden’s reaction was snap, and without thought reflex turned her into the attack before it could reach the girl.

Summoned glass stretched from her grip, only barely forming into an edged weapon of use when Cinder sliced upward through the ropes of the Seers elasticated limbs, combusting the floating entity into a curdled shriek.

Cinder managed to stave their momentum; the blades lost their target, carrying some way before uselessly clattering against concrete around Ruby’s feet.

The following silence was deafening, tension dense enough to strangle where even Ruby’s cold, vacant expression and sobs from her heaving chest bore no noise. Emerald and Mercury stood stunned, and though they could loosely theorise what had just happened it was Cinder and Cinder alone who understood the sheer magnitude of her actions.

Whether it was instinctual, or an attempt of self-preservation a Grimm did not hesitate in the presence of a human with eyes like Ruby’s, be it last Grimm in existence it would still charge blindly and foolishly forward.

Though a creature with little purpose in the destruction of mankind was without contrariety to this fact, the Seer floating before them crooked and limp was not here for this purpose, Cinder knew that.

So did she.

“...How nice to finally see you again, Cinder.”

The voice emanating from the Seer spoke unhurriedly, jarringly humble in spite of all that surrounded them, of what had just transpired.

The Maiden’s pulse beat wildly in her ears, knuckles whitening hotly until the grips of her makeshift, imperfect blades became viscous enough sink and mold between her fingers. The dark, syrupy eye swimming within the gelatinous body of the Grimm was fixed upon her, but it was the voice that froze her soul to a dead stop, mind cold with numb shock to all and everything.

“Salem.”

-

Something in the click of Cinder’s heels was off, each chime trembling in strain as if they might shatter with the next step she took.

Diversions in plans were inevitable, and any goal took setbacks into account in the event of compensating for them. Find a different route to accomplish the same means, make use of the resources on hand and if necessary, recruit more. It was this kind initiative that Cinder acted on by second nature.

Amber glinted over her shoulder to glance at the Seer following quietly, albeit slowly in her shadow. She hadn’t been foolish enough to believe that this wasn’t inevitable, yet why had she refused to account for it?

The Seer followed her through the bunker to an unused room on the derelict side of the hanger, intending to see this discussion through alone where all focus could be solely upon her. Mercury and Emerald did not argue with her orders a second time, especially when it involved escorting Ruby to the furthest part of the bunker and guarding the door after ensuring she was locked in.

Ruby… She could complicate everything beyond repair.

Cinder didn’t notice how painful the lump in her throat was until she swallowed.

Opening a door, she had led them to a room that at some point had functioned as an office, one that undoubtedly belonged to an officer during the Great War; The obsolete symbol of Mantle was identifiable between cracked drywall, as well as brandished on various files and paperwork strewn across the room.

Allowing the Seer to enter first Cinder closed the door behind them after casting a glance down the corridor to ensure she hadn’t been followed again.

“Paranoia is unbecoming of you, my dear.”

For some reason she hadn’t expected Salem’s voice, and prayed her mistress hadn’t notice how her shoulders tensed suddenly.

“Of course.” She answered evenly.

Cinder approached the Seer, and attempting to ignore the thumping in her ears she held her arms rigid at her side, bowing at the waist in such a way that angled her near-perfectly with the floor, dipping far deeper than necessary.

No voice acknowledged her greeting this time with only the Seers rhythmic clicking serving to fill the tense silence. When the moment felt longer than an eon, Cinder blinked, slowly swallowing before attempting to bridge the gap:

“Salem. I wish to-”

“Do not speak.”

The younger woman’s spine seized, her bow suddenly becoming painful to sustain. She stared at the worn, patchy carpet beneath her heels, searching for anything to steady and centre her, but Salem continued. “I do not believe the nature of my dissatisfaction is in question, but I will say i’m surprised that you would choose stand before me with such arrogance. Rise.”

A deep, quiet breath was taken in through her nostrils, eyes squeezing shut for just a moment before she forced her spine straight with arduous effort. In the Seer’s murky belly nothing gave Salem away, only the abyssal swirl of crimson smoke.

“I am going to ask you some very simple questions that require very simple answers.” She said, distaste becoming more and more prominent on the edges of her words. “Tell me, how long has it been since your last report?”

Cinder crossed her hands at the small of her back, out of the Seer’s and Salem’s sight to allow her fist to ball, tight enough to shake.

“Eight seasons, Ma’am.”

“Eight Seasons. Eight.” The razor's-edge on Salem’s tongue pressed in on Cinder’s vitals until the woman fought not to visually recoil. Her inhale was supposed to be calming when instead it stuttered in her chest as her mistress continued, slow and controlled; “I would like for you to explain to me..exactly why that is.”

“Unless I have misinterpreted my orders, our goal is to establish presence in Mistral. With the Kingdoms on high alert following our efforts in Vale, it was agreed that an indirect assault on Haven Academy-”

“And what do you pretend to know of my goals?”

Out of touch and out of contact; All that were present knew the answer, it would have been foolish of Cinder to claim otherwise but the tense silence that lay beyond the Seer told her that Salem’s question demanded a response.

“Nothing.” Cinder finally said, low enough that the word barely left her lips. “I have acted in my best judgement, as you have always trusted me to do.”

“And yet…I see your judgement has led you to undesired outcomes.” There was no mistaking the critical assessment that had caused Cinder’s hand to drift, open palm at the small of her back pressing to touch raw scars creeping from the cuff of her wrist. Her chin sunk a little as if it might hide the heavy wound that snuck along her jaw, and notch where her lobe used to be.

Though, there was nothing to be done about her state of dress. Dark lace and crimson asymmetry held to her body like a second skin, but where the signature sigils would have glowed with warm power they remained only as ruptured threads of dust, scorched to black and exposed like frayed wires.

“Explain.”

Their unmarked Bullhead routinely travelled to the outskirts of Mistral, slowly leaking Cinders authority into the lawless lower levels of the city, building capital, acquiring small businesses both honest and.. specific, until loyalties eventually fell in line. That had been the task assigned to her, albeit whilst such orders were tethered to valid goals

Cinder took a deep breath. “Our position in Mistral was leaked to the White Fang splinter group in conjunction with three huntresses. Granted the attack was carried out with unexpected magnitude; it reeked of desperation.”

Lacing together subterfuge with half-truths spouted as if a tongue of their own.

True to her word the landing pad had been rigged with explosives. Such things couldn’t harm her as it had the Bullhead, it’s pilots and her Faunus escorts, but the blurs of White, Black and Yellow that followed were another story, and one that Cinder chose her words carefully in telling.

“In ensuring the secrecy of our operation, my efforts were overextended.”

Had Cinder not bore the brunt of the attack she may even have applauded Weiss Schnee’s command of her semblance, and what unorthodox technique she had conjured to ignite the very molecules of dust itself.

Sewing dust into clothing was an age-old artistry Cinder prided herself in, but not even she could have foreseen it to be exploited against her.

However unconventional the application of Weiss Schnee’s semblance was, Cinder only remembered the velocity of impact targeted at the raw lines of dust in her clothing...closely followed by a volatile and explosive reaction that had sent her sprawling across the landing deck.

The noise still rung in her ears, vibrating the very roots of her teeth.

It wasn’t until she’d fully come to that Cinder realised the extend of what the little white witch had done, and with her Aura as it’s fuel the dust had ignited post explosion, fusing her burning clothing to her skin. Until Ruby stopped it.

Salem remained silent, informing no reaction to Cinder’s explanation, so she continued “The attack nor it’s perpetrators are a concern any longer, I’ve taken care-”

“I did hope…” Salem spoke over her shortly before she softly exhaled a sigh that had Cinder’s brows gathered. Her mistress was uncharacteristically quiet as if considering her words.

The next drawl told Cinder it was anything but: “...That your isolation had forced growth upon you. That you would continue to temper the edge of your newfound powers and drive results through your own initiative.” Her voice did not waver, did not carry anger nor disappointment, but all the same Cinder felt a bolt of uneasiness through her chest.

“How wrong I was.

Move your administration from this isolation.” The last word was punctuated on the razors edge of Salem’s teeth, and for the first time since their discussion began, Cinder recoiled. “And remove yourself from the sheer unutterable callowness you have surrendered to.”

The Maiden’s tongue lay heavy in her mouth, caged within a jaw clenched hard enough to hurt. There was nothing that could be said where Salem’s word lay in stone no less than the Gods themselves. It had been so long since she’d truly yielded, the final tilt of her waist caving into a deep bow, laden with the weight of Salem’s will.

Avoiding looking into the Seer, gold remained downcast when Cinder turned to take her leave.

“I do find it curious” Salem said. “That you would choose to keep the silver eyed girl with you, despite my warnings.”

Cinder stopped. Her feet, the air, everything suddenly weighed of lead, least of all the gaze pierced onto her nape. Salem spoke lightly, but there was no mistaking the demand driving her query, so as steadily as she could Cinder fixed her expression and turned back to regard the Seer.

“Tell me, is she obedient?”

A cycle of questions tumbled in a nonsensical mess in Cinder’s head, and no less in the same moment that speaking her mind would undoubtedly yield serious consequences.

For the first time since the encounter began, Cinder felt real fear plucking at her frayed nerves. She didn’t like where this was going.

“Yes.” She asserted after a long moment, fighting tremors on the edge of her voice. “Perhaps of no practical use but her progress is promising. Given more time-”

“Time...an indulgence seldom had by many.” Salem’s voice was slow, a hint of displeasure in her tone. “And of which you most certainly have none, child.”

Nothing about this felt familiar, not the way Cinder’s heart seemed to wrench in different directions, or how the desire to open her mouth and dare protest against her mistress came without thought.

“The mission stands as your only priority” Salem interjected, her implication clear. “You are to migrate your administration to Haven within the week. As for the silver eyed girl, I have decided she will accompany me here as I determine her usefulness. I am sending Doctor Watts to-”

“Is that wise?” Anyone, even Cinder should have recognised she was exceeding the boundaries of Salem’s tolerance for failure.

As a child she witnessed subordinates throwing themselves before Salem’s feet to plead forgiveness, appealing to her wisdom or even more foolishly, her humanity: Their fates were sealed by their own hands, a truth the same as her own; risking herself over a negligible fixation was absurd.

Yet the rationale born of discipline felt like a lesson long forgotten, in its place there was only heat and anger at the first mention of Ruby. Any intention Salem had for the girl only meant she be taken from her and Cinder could not, would not accept it. “Her kind around the Grimm, around you.” She pressed heavier, roughly. “If something were to happen-”

“Your assurance that the girl is obedient should alleviate such concerns should they not, Cinder? You have your orders.”

“She's mine.” The Maiden snarled.

The air cracked, red ropes lashing towards her and ensnaring her throat in the Seer’s relentless grip. Cinder choked out, her eyes wide and aflame as it’s limbs coiled upward around her face and mouth, screeching as it wrenched her off-balance. Before Cinder had a chance to realise what was happening she was already on her knees.

“You’ve grown ignorant.”

Her lungs burned as she gasped for air, writhing more in shock and rising panic than any logical attempt to free herself, and for it the Seer was unyielding. Coiling around her left arm, it twisted from the shoulder to wrench up in a way a human limb should not.

Cinder stopped struggling immediately, keeping shouts of pain caged behind clenched teeth.

“You’ve grown soft-”

Salem's voice rolled out slowly, layered in calm as if conversing with a familiar acquaintance. Apparently she was most comfortable with her most revered strung up and noosed.

Strength flared in Cinder’s eyes, and as if in anticipation the Seer snuffed her defiance out by tearing her neck and shoulder in opposite directions, and the woman parted with a cry that shocked her as much as the pain did.

“-And it is clear that you have lost your objectivity. Allowing you to operate independently was a mistake, and while the blame in trusting your selfish, self-driven motivations falls on my shoulders I cannot help but to find this behaviour sorely disappointing.”

Cinder buried her Aura deep down, knowing that to defend herself would be to admittance of her guilt, but as the coils around her pulled with the intention to tear she instead found herself stabbing in the dark out of desperation.

“...I-I gave you Ozpin, gave you Beacon!-”

“With the power granted to you by me. You would be wise not to forget that, child.

Now, do you submit?” Salem asked, dangerously soft and doing nothing for Cinder’s festering trepidation.

Black began to dot the edges of her vision, swimming and airless her hands attempted to reach for the coils around her neck only to be wrenched and strangled tighter, utterly denied.

She heard the question once again bled out from between Salem’s lips as though listening from underwater, all whilst the Seer bore down from above, Cinder’s tunnel of vision filled with the judgement of crimson eyes blurred into abyssal black as if sucking the very soul from the Maiden’s body.

“Your infractions extend far beyond what I believed you capable of, and they will be addressed when your task in Mistral is complete. Make no mistake, Cinder.”

She fell numb, gears churning and stalling on one another without the capacity to conceptualise what to say. Salem had left no room for anything other than Cinder’s complete compliance, be it with her teeth bared and squeezed out as if each word rawed her throat until bloody.

“I submit.”