Episode Brooklyn: Chapter 3: Hiding

Chapter 3 of Brooklyn's adventure

            Brooklyn stepped outside for some fresh air.  Her headache was starting to go down, but every once in a while, she heard her younger self walking around near where she was resting, and the migraine sharpened once again.  She could hear Salem talking to Angela, but the words were muffled.  Every single thought was running through Brooklyn’s head at that moment.  What she felt at Beacon years ago, and now the answer to all her questions stood just beyond the wall.  But she wasn’t sure why.  If she was in the past, why did she return to the present?  How was her younger self also here if she had to come to this point in time as well?  Her questions continued as Salem exited the room and found Brooklyn on the side of the wall.

            “Are you all right child?” Salem asked getting down on one knee placing her hand on Brooklyn’s forehead.  “You don’t seem to be sick in the biological sense.”

            “How many people have come to this town through time?” Brooklyn asked taking a deep breath.

            “Not too many.  I’d imagine that given the storm you described from your time, not many have sought it out.”

            “And have folks ever run into their ancestors when they come through time itself?” Salem pondered this question, and then her eyes widened with realization.

            “How far back an ancestor is she?”

            “Well she’s my mother so….”

            “And the child inside….”

            “Got it in one.”

            “That raises so many questions.”

            “Preaching to the choir here.”

            “This is intriguing.  I would not recommend revealing this information to her at this time.  Instead, focus on the task my father gave you.  I will speak to him about this to ensure there is no residual side effects of time magic that could come into play here.  It would most likely not be prudent to have both of you return to the same era rather than your proper times.”

            “Right because I won’t be having a weird time with this mission at all…..”

            “Mortals.  Sometimes I wonder why my father did not make your kind more resilient.”

 

 

 

 

Brooklyn and Angela finished making their preparations on the outskirts of town, with Salem standing back in the village with the young Brooklyn watching as they got ready to go.

            “I know my daughter can be a headache,” Angela said to Brooklyn with a smile, “but never met somebody who had that happen to them literally.”

            “Trust me,” Brooklyn said as she reloaded her weapon, “There have been a cavalcade of moments I can’t fully explain today”.  Angela smiled and walked over to give young Brooklyn a hug.

            “When will you be back?” young Brooklyn asked.

            “As soon as I take care of those bad guys that have been bothering the people who have been taking care of us” Angela said ruffling young Brooklyn’s hair.  Brooklyn ran her hand through her own head as she seemed to start to remember more vividly that feeling of having her hair ruffled.  Young Brooklyn then handed Angela a silver necklace.  Brooklyn almost went pale seeing it as she immediately recognized it as the necklace that Angela had left at the gorge where they first fought all those years ago.  Angela smiled and put the necklace on, once again patting young Brooklyn on the head.  She then stood up and lowered her head in respect towards Salem.

            “Thank you for having your attendants watch over her while we’re gone.  I know she can be a hassle.”

            “No worries at all.  My father’s personal assistant will be attending to the child while you are gone.  He shall take care of everything.  May my father watch over you.”

            “Thank you” Angela said as she turned to join Brooklyn.  The two of them then set off and made their way down the mountainside.  Complete silence surrounded them as they continued on their way.  Brooklyn thought about saying a few words, but couldn’t think of what exactly to say.

            “So you’re from the future as well” Angela said finally breaking the silence.  “Are you before or after my time?”

            “Well after” Brooklyn said trying to keep her composure.  “But I got here by accident.  How about you?”

            “I came here on purpose” Angela said pulling out another necklace form her pocket which Brooklyn recognized as the very same one she found in Atlas with the coordinates for the very mountain they stood upon.  “I was a part of…..a bad group.  My family has served them for years.  It seemed impossible to escape.  But then I found something that not even most high-ranking officers know about.  A library of knowledge within their main headquarters, all feeding a giant supercomputer.  There I found books and data about different places on Remnant, and one mentioned a mountain that was forever consumed within a Time Storm.”

            “It has a name?  Who the heck named it?”

            “The book I found it in didn’t give a source unfortunately.  But I realized I had found my way out.  I had found a way for my daughter and I to live free from the clutches of my oppressors.”

            “But that doesn’t make sense” Brooklyn thought to herself.  “How can she be here in this time when I’m a child, when I kill her years later in our time and she’s still a member of the Order?”  Brooklyn continued to ponder these questions but was halted by Angela holding her hand up.  The two of them slowed down and heard the chatter and sounds of a nearby camp.  Brooklyn leapt up into a nearby tree and morphed her bracelet into rifle form.  She then looked through her scope to get an understanding of what they would be up against.  It was clearly a hastily-built camp given the tents strewn about as well as the fact that they were still setting up their wall for defenses with lumber they were actively chopping down from a grove of trees just near the biggest tent of the bunch.  And without the technology that Brooklyn was used to in her time, it appeared that the raiders were resorting to slave labor to accomplish their tasks.  Several Faunus bound together in order to lift giant slabs of wooden walls while a raider barked out obscenities while cracking a whip.  Others sat around a small fire and were serving up some strange type of stew it appeared.  Brooklyn jumped back down as quietly as possible.

            “They’re building their defenses in the middle of mealtime” she said cracking her knuckles.  “This should be easy.”

            “Or they’re expecting us” Angela said straining her eyes to try and see the outskirts of the raider camp.  “Have a few of their number look like they are relaxed and defenseless while the rest of their numbers wait in hiding in order to ambush anybody who dares attempt cross them.  Best if we potentially go for the tents first using stealth….”

            “Our tech can run circles around theirs.  I say we just take them down and be done with it.”

            “Tell you what, here’s how we’ll do this.”

 

 

 

            The Faunus slaves labored to lift up another set of logs to build up on the defensive wall.  The one holding the whip cracked it to try and incentivize the slaves to work harder.  Most of them responded out of fear and sped up the process, one keeled over in exhaustion and started coughing up blood.  The raider didn’t seem to care as he pulled his arm back to crack the whip with full power, but then a different crack sounded out and the slave driver went flying across the camp with a bullet in his head.  Everybody suddenly stopped what they were doing and looked to the forest where the sound originated.  Brooklyn slowly walked out, smoke still steaming from the barrel of her rifle.  She looked around and saw what had happened to the person she shot.

            “Nobody knows how to use Aura in this time period?” she said with a smirk.  “This’ll be easy.”  The rest of the bandits started scrambling to grab their weapons, but Brooklyn just started to open fire left and right.  And since nobody clearly knew what Aura was, they dropped with one shot.  She wasn’t quick enough however as a few raiders managed to grab weapons and shield and start charging at Brooklyn in the center of the camp.  But as they charged forward, several more shots rained down from the trees besides the camp mowing down everybody in its path.  Some of the raiders who noticed this in time hid inside their tents to try and defend themselves, but Brooklyn pulled out a cartridge of Fire Dust and fired them into the tents igniting the fabric of the tents.  Everything seemed to be going easily, but then one large woman wearing a helmet and armor made of steel that was emblazoned with what Brooklyn assumed was the symbol of the raiders, stepped out of the biggest tent in the camp.  She carried a giant spiked club that looked like the weapon an orc or some kind of monster would wield in a fantasy novel.  Brooklyn switched her weapon to scimitar form and charged at the new opponent.  Brooklyn morphed her weapon to scimitar form and tried to strike at the side of the warrior.  But the warrior blocked the attack with her club.  She then swung the club with full force into Brooklyn’s weapon causing Brooklyn to lose her balance and be sent skidding across the ground back towards the center of camp.  She quickly got up and got ready to try again.  When the warrior attempted to strike again, she was met with a barrage of bullets from the forest.  Angela had opened fire to try and slow her down.  But to her surprise, the armor seemed to be able to withstand the bullets despite clearly being made by products of the time that would not seemingly be able to withstand modern technology.  Brooklyn tried to stab the warrior with her scimitar while she was distracted by the hail of bullets, but her scimitar bounced off of the armor like it was a wall.

            “What the heck is this stuff made of?” Brooklyn groaned as she blocked another attack from the warrior.  Angela surveyed the battlefield as Brooklyn ran around trying to gain the upper hand.  As she did so, Angela noticed that the armor was held together by simple strings on her back.  She quickly jumped down from the trees and activated her twin blades in her bracelets and tried to sneak around behind the warrior to cut the ropes and cause the armor to simply fall off.  But the warrior brought up the club and struck the ground with all her might, causing a literal wave of dirt to appear and cascade out into Brooklyn and Angela akin to if Ty had landed and created a shockwave in the modern day.  Knocking both of them back, the two of them slowly got back up and charged forward at the same time.  Brooklyn felt her determination rising and her body began to become enveloped in an Aura burn.  Her Semblance was finally kicking in.  But instead of letting it consume her whole body, she focused the burn onto her scimitar.  This was risky because since her Semblance was driven by Aura, she was essentially pouring her entire being into her blade, leaving herself vulnerable.  But she didn’t care.  She charged forward and brought her scimitar down on the warrior who attempted to block it with her club, but then Brooklyn’s blade cut right through it as if it were butter.  The blade then made contact with the armor and while the steel initially blocked it, Brooklyn then poured more energy into the blade, and the armor started to glow as the blade got closer to the body of the warrior.  The warrior started to panic and tried to punch Brooklyn, but Angela quickly ran over and sliced both hands of the warrior clean off.  The warrior screamed in pain as Brooklyn’s weapon finally cut through and dealt the killing blow.  The warrior fell to the ground dead, and Brooklyn brought all of the energy she had used on her sword back into her body.  She sighed and looked to see Angela examining Brooklyn with great intent.

            “How did you gain that Semblance?” she asked still looking over Brooklyn like she was a statue.

            “Beg pardon?” Brooklyn asked.  “You’re from roughly around my time, Semblance’s are a thing, this isn’t anything new to you?”

            “I’m well aware, but that is the same exact Semblance as my daughter.”

            “Coincidence maybe?  Maybe I’m a descendent of hers or something.”

            “You know something that you aren’t telling me.”

            “If we’re going back to the future, then I think you shouldn’t know everything that’s going to happen.”

            “What makes you think I want to leave?”

            “What?”

            “Like I said, I came here to get away.  To hide from what I was.  And what better place to hide than in the past?”

            “But…..” Brooklyn was about to protest when they heard a large explosion back towards the top of the mountain.

            “Something’s wrong” Angela said as she quickly started running back up the side of the mountain.  Brooklyn followed suit until they reached the village.  And what they saw surprised them.  The entire village, unconscious and asleep.  Angela ran over to one of the villagers and tried to shake her awake, but everyone was consumed by whatever was keeping them asleep.

            “What is this?” Brooklyn pondered as she looked to the sky.  Angela looked up as well and saw a strange green cloud hovering over the entire village that emanated a strange green light.

            “It looks like it’s centralized over the Hall of the Wizard” Angela said as they made their way towards the audience chamber.

            “But why are we unaffected?” Brooklyn wondered aloud.  They then stepped inside and saw a sight that almost made Brooklyn fall over in surprise and fear.  Ozpin and Salem, two of the most powerful beings she knew in all of history, knocked out as well and collapsed at the sides of the throne.  And sitting in the throne was not the Wizard, but a man wearing a black coat.  Angela’s eyes widened and her face turned white.

            “The Lost Master…..” she uttered in fear.

            “Took you long enough” the Lost Master said as he chuckled.

Author's Note

Please read/review/enjoy!