[ → Bumblebee ← ]

  "Chasers of the Light"

11

For a moment, Tiffany couldn't believe it.

I mean, how could she?

One second, Taeyeon was laying down surrounded by her arms.

Then the next second, she ceased to exist.

Tiffany scrambled and reached out to gather the floating lights. A voiceless scream rumbled in . But the lights blew away. Scattered. Evaporated. Disappeared.

She crumbled down on her knees, her body shaking. The rest of the team had caught up and stood behind their broken leader. They were silent for a while, neither knowing what to say.

Despite Taeyeon's body disappearing completely, a thunderous clank turned their heads. On the floor was Taeyeon's sword. Though it didn't blaze with electricity, it laid still waiting for someone to pick it up.

Rosie stepped forward with immense care and reached out to Tiffany. Their leader closed her eyes and drew a breath. Extending her arms, she tapped the glass sword, afraid it would burst like Taeyeon did. Then after a still moment, she curled her hands around the grip tightly.

"Tiffany..I'm..." Ice choked out. "We're.."

Tiffany gazed down absently at Taeyeon's sword, gleaming with the fake sun. She stared at the frail, thick blade, hoping to find some sort of trace, anything that would record Taeyeon's existence, but there was nothing. Not a single fragment of its owner was present in that shining reflection.

The ends of Tiffany's mouth twisted. The four heard in a distance a deafening roar as the Master Grimm grew closer. Finally, the remaining 6 survivors ran to the middle revealing themselves. Although none of them seemed to have any intention of slaughter one another, their alarming and cautious stares were obvious.

The ground shook with each step the Master Grimm took. Tiffany stood up and looked at it in the eye. It's features didn't differ that much greatly from any normal grimm. However, the difference in height and body mass were obvious. The grimm had to be 20 times larger than an averagely normal grimm. It's humongous paws slashed with a hint of death. One hit would kill you without a doubt.

With anger, regret, sadness, and everything else sparking in Tiffany's head, she screamed louder than ever, loud enough to garner the grimm's attention, and launched forward with no plan. The only audible words heard in the midst of Tiffany's howls of anguish were, "I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!!!"

Both of her hands were wrapped entirely around Taeyeon's weapon. She had some experience with similar weapons, but she hadn't had enough practice to completely master their way of killing. She pulled back the sword and struck at the grimm's feet. She took two or three weak steps forward, then the blade.

It wasn't even a proper attack. The grimm swung it's paw and easily tossed Tiffany to the side. Despite the huge chunk of flesh missing from her left leg, and the gruesome damage she took upon her head. Tiffany stood up with unease. She tried again, swinging the sword at difficult and strange angles.

The rest of the survivors could only stare in a distance with a pityful look, juggling the idea of whether or not to help the clueless Tiffany.

Tiffany was feeling better, looser, ready to try the more advanced and difficult technique. But the constant pokes she had done to the grimm only agitated it restlessly.

She must have done little to no damage to the large grimm as she was once again swept to the side. With her speed, Rosie managed to catch the half-concious Tiffany before she completely fell to the ground.

"I have to kill it..I have to..kill...for..Taeyeon.." Tiffany couldn't handle it anymore. She broke out in a river full of tears as she weakly hugged Rosie.

Rosie cupped Tiffany's face, keeping her tears at bay as well. "We can't lose you both..that'd be too much.."

The rest of the survivors finally mustered up enough energy to fight the Master. They worked together despite their great differences and managed to weaken the grimm. Not weak enough however, the grimm bent over and ripped apart two noble hunters. Just like Taeyeon and the rest who had died, they burst into lights and disappeared a few seconds later.

Millions of jumbled unexplainable thoughts breezed through Tiffany's throbbing head. Her heart beated faster, pounding at trying to keep her body alive. She slipped and crashed onto the ground with such force she lost her breath.

But that didn't stop her.

The image of Taeyeon handing her the wild bouquet she handpicked in the forest flashed by slowly. But knowing she was dead now, she suddenly forgot what her smile looked like. She had never dared to go into the Emerald Forest alone. Yet Taeyeon did.

So for Taeyeon, Tiffany would win the Vytal Festival.

Her vision was slightly fading. Either that or she couldn't properly open her eyes. Whatever it was, it prevented her from noticing her team sneaking up behind her. Ice slipped her hands underneath Tiffany's arms before pulling her back. Jessica stepped in front of her and pointed with her right hand, activating her semblance. Tiffany then froze in her steps. Whatever Jessica did, it restricted Tiffany from moving. Rosie dashed to the side before skidding to a stop, her cloak, a little ripped from rigorous fights.

"Tiffany," Jessica spoke in a pleasant voice. "If we're going to do this, we're going to have to do this as a team." Tiffany remembered Jessica had said this before, but the way she toned it now made a slight difference in attitude. "I want to try something." She released the restraints and walked closer. Tiffany wasn't quite sure what her plans were, but she reached her hand out for Taeyeon's weapon. Emotionally pained, she pulled it back hesistantly, afraid Jessica would dirty it.

She made a sound of disapproval before bending down further to reach it. Too weak to fight back, she allowed her prized item to slip into Jessica's hands. They had been quite a far distance from the Master Grimm, but not too far that Jessica examined it with a quick pace. Then twirling it around, she pointed it at Ice and pulled her head down to initiate a nod.

As if they were talking with their minds, Ice closed her eyes and held the end of the amazingly crafted weapon that was -- like it's owner -- dead without energy. But the yellow beauty focused all her energy into the weapon.

It hadn't been done before. Taeyeon mentioned before that it was specifically designed for her electric semblance. But it seems that it was much more durable than that.

Ice's name was purely contradicting because her semblance was, just like Yang's, fire. Semblances weren't specifically elements. Other than her fiery punches, Yang had other exceptions to her semblance. Though, that's a story for another time.

Taeyeon's sword glowed a bright yellow before it dimmed into an orange sunset. Heat immediately surrounded the edges as it crackled with noise. Like the rest of the team, Tiffany had to take a moment to understand the phenomenon.

"I-It can absorb other semblances?" Rosie gasped in surprise, but her open mouth soon turned into a smirk as she reached out. Instead of handling the heated edges, she wrapped her arms around the handle and focused as well. Rose pedals surrounded the majestic weapon for a moment before it burned in Ice's fire. It was well known in the school that Rosie's semblance was speed. Her semblance left an after effect that was hard to ignore -- rose pedals.

Still on fire, Rosie picked it up with ease and swung the sword. But the swinging was a blur.

It was way too fast. Rosie chuckled when she realized what her semblance had done to the weapon : it made wielding it insanely fast. With each swing, the weight was forgotten as it split through the air, creating a gust of wind as rose pedals danced along before being eaten up by the vicious flames.

Then, the three looked at Jessica expectedly.

She groaned and rolled her eyes before catching the weapon gracefully. With her ice cold blue eyes, she breathed and squeezed the handle.

Nothing happened.

Jessica smirked with one side of before handing it back to Tiffany. "There. All done."

Ice raised one eyebrow. "What exactly did you do?"

To remind them they were still in the event, in a distance, the other fighter friendly Hunters yelled for their assistance. Jessica reached for her own weapon before raising it in the air, still grinning. "Come on, peasants."

The support of her team had given Tiffany enough to carry on her goal. Shaking just a bit, she stood up and ran forward catching up to her team. She wasn't exactly sure what Jessica had done, but with the entire team's semblance beating in the weapon, Tiffany decided to try it too.

Her semblance was shadow clones. She wasn't exactly sure what would happen but when she tried it out --

Tiffany had to stop when she heard a clank on the floor. She couldn't believe it. She cloned the weapon!

She hopped back and with her left hand, wielded the other one. Now she felt normal. She was dominately a dual wielder and this was absolutely perfect.

As she ran, her eyes counted the remaining fighters.

Ice.

Jessica.

Rosie.

Another hunter she learned was named Mercury.

Zwei.

And lastly, a dominate dust user, Cinder.

There were seven of them left. The team made no efforts to hide their alliance, so it seemed that the other three didn't bother trying to kill them. Instead, the remaining seven focused on trying to kill the colossal giant in front of them.

When the dust user ran out of her stock, she was targeted by the Grimm who was barely injured and was viciously vaporized. Too tired to dodge, Mercury followed after.

Tiffany ordered her team to stay on the defensive and analyze the monster first. But after Mercury --

Jessica had been too cocky. She was closer than their initial defensive maneuver. Though she had seen the attack coming, her puny little rapier was no match for the bone breaking claws of the grimm. Brutally smashed by the enormous hand, she was sent flying away. Rosie dashed to her side, but before she could do or say anything,

Jessica erupted into a thousand lights.

And she too, was gone.

Rosie, in deep depression, ignored all the precautions Tiffany had ordered them to take. Placing her weapon behind her, she pulled the trigger and swung her scythe at the grimm. Her anger was intense and with her anger, she managed to slice through the hand Jessica had died from. Believing it would greatly leave the grimm at a disadvantage, she psychotically laughed in mid-air, only for the grimm to lean forward and take her into it's mouth.

Tiffany didn't even get to see the lights erupt because Rosie was long gone by then.

The chain followed and Tiffany begged for Ice to stay. But wanting to avenge her little sister, she lunged forward just as Rosie did.

But she too, failed.

And she too, turned into light.

All who was left was Zwei and Tiffany.

And then, a switch flicked inside Tiffany.

Zwei, terribly afraid of dying, dashed back into the forest to hide leaving the Master Grimm all to Tiffany. He hadn't cared about winning anymore. He just wanted to survive.

Still holding Taeyeon's weapon that was blazing with Ice's fire, flying with Rosie's speed, cloned with her semblance, and secretly buffed by Jessica, Tiffany decided that she didn't care about winning anymore either.

She jumped forward, the swords following behind her. The Grimm saw the flaws in her plan and simply swung another paw. But Tiffany had other plans. She slashed through them and finally realized what Jessica had done.

Despite it's relatively light weight, the sword damaged like a rocket launcher. Within a split second, the paw caught on fire and exploded. A gruesome growl split the air as it crawled backwards in harsh pain. Tiffany didn't stop, she kept swinging. And swinging. And swinging. And swinging.

On the other hand, the grimm kept exploding. And exploding. And exploding. And exploding.

The grimm was completely on the ground now and Tiffany made one last attempt to penetrate the monster's heart. Extending her swords straight in front, she dived in and finally..flames sparked up and erupted the deadly giant.

Then, it was the monster's turn to disappear and fade into light.

Tiffany would have smiled if she wasn't so tired. Then she remembered all her friends ; Ice, Rosie, Jessica...Taeyeon.

Just as she was on the brink of tears --

Tiffany joined them.

She had heard the glorious cheering of all the spectators watching on the other side when she had killed the grimm, but it died down immediately as she felt a strange sensation numbing her body.

Zwei had came back from the forest and wickedly stabbed her in the stomach.

...She wasn't quite sure why he did that.

The whole point of the festival was to kill the Master Grimm. It didn't matter if you were the only one left. If you weren't the one who killed the grimm, you weren't the winner.

So...why?

A second later, he ripped it out of her body.

A second later, Tiffany crashed onto the ground.

And a second later, Tiffany vaporized too.

(Author's Note)

i gave up on fluff

as evil as i am, fear not, the ending will be a happy one.

or will it

also if you're a fan of my work, I would like to hint and slightly introduce a new story I've been working on. And for the first time ever, I'm going to work with a co-author.

stay tuned because that is gonna be the BOMB

Oh and I know this may be sudden but, Bumblebee may end at the next chapter. Or Chapter 13. Somewhere around there unless I think of a kick idea to extend it, but it should be ending very soon so brace yourselves.