Everybody was on high alert; they didn’t want to let their guard down and possibly end up like Reva. Hazel uprooted her wrench and backed up to be at the other’s sides. Violette floated meters off the ground.

“You can stop this now!” Shiso shouted. “I happen to like classical music, so we can split it even if you let our friend go.”

It seemed that Shiso’s comment only made Violette more determined. They saw a fire light in her eyes as she began to strum faster than ever. Reva’s body jolted towards Hazel; she threw down a plate that expanded into an entire wall, but Reva burst through like it was nothing. One bash and Hazel was flying backwards.

“Such a strong body!” Violette marveled. A few more strums and Reva was charging Saffron. Shiso took the opportunity to fire three shots at Violette. She played a sharp and sudden note to recall Reva, who blocked two of the bullets. The third one was deflected by seemingly nothing.

“Guys,” Hazel said over their coms. “If Reve’s being controlled by her music, can we just cover her ears or something to stop it?” Saffron and Shiso looked at each other.

“Is it really as simple as music mind control?” Saffron asked. Shiso shrugged his shoulders in defeat.

“I remember when listening to music was just a thing people did! They never tried to kill each other doing it. Well, except for that crazy night in-”

“Not the time.” Saffron and Hazel said in unison.

“Right. I’ll get crazy green. You two focus on the puppeteer over there.” Shiso said before darting off. Saffron and Hazel darted to go after Violette.

When Violette saw the groups split off, she paused her playing for a second and wiped some sweat from her forehead. For a second, Reva’s body slumped to the ground as if it were just a husk.

“Time to raise the heat.” she said, sighing. Violette started strumming away again, this time seemingly even faster than before.

“What the heck?” Hazel exclaimed in shock. “Is she strumming even faster than before?!” Saffron felt the wind pick up around them.

“Hazel, I need a bag of something powdery, now!” Saffron yelled. Confused and stressed, Hazel reached into her bag without question and pulled out a bag of powdered sugar with some kind of devil on it. She tossed it to Saffron who scattered as much of it as she could into the air.

As if on cue, something pierced through the powdery air. The vague image of what looked to be some kind of sword slashed at them in time with Violette’s beat. Saffron tapped her attachments on her ears and a visor formed around her eyes. She could see some kind of highly compressed air being moved about.

“Haze, she’s got some kind of air-swords after us!” Saffron shouted.

“So, what do we do?”

“I don’t know; create a vacuum?”

“Like, the black hole kind?”

“Uh, more like a vacuum chamber kind.”

“No dice.” Hazel informed. “Can’t do that in an open space.”

“Then cover me while I go in.” Saffron ran in to try and shake Violette from her rhythm.

She had the advantage of being able to see Vio’s weapons, but that was it. She loaded a spell card into her bracer and a green broadsword made of light appeared in her hand. She jumped as high as she could.

“Haze, I need a little bounce!” Saffron demanded. Hazel pulled out a ball and threw it under Saffron’s feet. The ball expanded into a trampoline, which Saffron bounced off of. Unfortunately, Violette could quickly move out of the way with ease, which is what she did.

Saffron landed on her back with a groan. Her visor was showing various errors before it came back online. She closed her eyes as she braced herself for one of the air swords going for her throat. Hazel gasped and yelled.

“Saff-”

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Shiso knew that there was no way he’d win a head-on assault against Reva; he was just occupying her so the girls could take down Violette. He leaped over Reva and fired shots into her arms, which would cripple most people’s ability to fight.

The force knocked over Reva, but she quickly was yanked up as if nothing was wrong. Shiso could see his reflection in Reva’s eyes, but also something else. He saw a look of hopelessness as tears ran down the emotionless face. Reva was still very much awake and in pain. She needed help.

“Hold on… Reve. I’ll get you out.” he whispered. Reva was thrusted forward and went to strike Shiso with her shield, but she was too slow to catch him. He heard a voice in his ear.

“Shiso! You there?” Hazel’s voice rang.

“Yeah. What’s up?”

“Our game of musical chairs isn’t gonna last much longer at this rate. You got a plan to finish this?” Shiso grunted; he didn’t really know what to do.

“I’m gonna converge with you guys.” he responded. “Get ready for Reva.”

Hazel was getting ready to say something, but stopped and gave the most concerned gasp that Shiso had ever heard and a tiny scream.

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Saffron assumed that she was dead, but for some reason she wasn’t. When she opened her eyes, the sword was moving incredibly slow towards her. She simply rolled out of the way and watched as it continued very slowly towards the ground.

“That… doesn’t look very normal.” she whispered to herself. She even kicked the sword, but it just kept flying in its newfound trajectory. In the corner of her eye, she noticed that her scarf had actually changed color! It was no longer a light pink, but instead now a rich blue that gave off little particles of light.

Saffron looked over and noticed that there was actually a sword heading for Hazel, coming from her blind spot. Saffron ran and tackled her.

“-ron!” Hazel finished, confused as to why she was suddenly moving. Everything seemed to play at normal speed, but everyone was confused, even Violette.

“It looks like someone decided to start playing in double time.” Violette said, gritting her teeth as she started to play a new song, at least twice as fast than the last one. Once again, a flurry of swords came at them, but as soon as one looked to almost hit Saffron, her scarf turned blue again and the world around her slowed.

Saffron moved Hazel out of the way of any of the swords while Saffron took up two in her hands. She charged forward and jumped on the trampoline, but was disappointed when the bounce never came back; the trampoline just slowly started to come back from Saffron’s impact. Grunting in frustration, Saffron merely threw the swords at Violette and braced herself on the trampoline.

When things went back to normal, Violette was caught by surprise, but ended up totally unaffected by Saffron’s attack. The swords bounced on impact with a previously-invisible shield that surrounded her.

The momentum from the trampoline finally took effect as Saffron was rocketed towards Violette, but she met the same fate as the swords as she merely bounced off the barrier. As Saffron layed on the ground in pain, she used her earpiece.

“Haze, you got anything?”

“Actually, I do now.” Hazel said confidently.

Saffron looked over to see Hazel manning a larger-than-average turret. She aimed and fired, confident that no music could shield her gun. In all technicality, she might have been right in that regard. Reva rushed over and blocked the laser, sending it right back to Hazel. She jumped away to see Shiso land next to her on his back, having been thrown off Reva.

“I almost had her too!” Hazel complained.

“Don’t move!” Saffron shouted. Everyone’s attention was drawn to what she was doing.

Saffron was moving her hands as if she was trying to operate some invisible loom, but what she was actually doing was pretty obvious at this point. Above Violette were multiple disk-looking apparitions with holes in the middle, with the biggest one being on top.

“You pull anything, I’ll level your face with a snap of my fingers” Saffron warned.

At this moment, Violette had a look of absolute desperation on her face. Then, she got the most underhanded idea she could think of. Her playing peaked into a sharp trill, unrelenting in the tension.

“No, none of you move! And take down your magic!” Violette demanded. Everyone’s eyes went wide with surprise and fear.

“Saff, take it down!” Hazel shouted. Saffron took down her magic as she looked, frightened, at the sight before her.

Violette had forced Reva to raise her shield up and reel her head back, ready to slam it forward at any time. Violette was using Reva’s entire life as leverage. The three slowly drifted together again.

“Drop all of your weapons.” Violette commanded. Saffron threw her field bracer off; Hazel threw her wrench and hip pouch away; Shiso gently put his guns on the ground and kicked them away. There was a wave of silence except for Violette’s trill.

“Come on Reva!” Shiso growled. “How are you gonna protect anyone if you can’t even protect yourself?!i” he asked.

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Reva struggled to stand as the weight layed heavy on her shoulders, weighing her down. All she could hear was Violette’s music and the world around her was pitch black and nothing but darkness. In the distance, the man that had attacked Reva in the forest came forward; silver armor and red sword. He knelt before Reva and looked her in the eyes.

“Help… me...” Reva pleaded. The man sighed.

“You should know I can’t do that,” he said sadly. Reva cried under the weight as her legs were also starting to shake and wobble.

“I can’t… do it alone…” she struggled. The man put a hand on her struggling shoulder.

“You never could. What’s wrong with that?”

“Wha...?”

“You can be the strongest person and still not be able to do it alone.” he said calmly. “You needed me to support you as much as I needed you. There’s nothing wrong with that.” Reva held her head down, still crying. The man put his sword aside as he lifted Reva’s head.

“Besides; I’m not here anymore,” he lamented. “Plus, you’ve got greater people to fight with and protect.” he laughed. He then got up and walked away, leaving Reva to think in the vast darkness.

“Greater people to fight with and protect…” Reva pondered. Her head was held low again as the weight finally began to make her sink.

“Need some help?” said a familiar voice in front of her. A bright light appeared in front of Reva as a leather-gloved hand was held out to her.

“Yeah, what’re you doing anyway?” joked another voice. Reva looked up.

Shiso held an outstretched hand, with Saffron and Hazel behind him. Behind them, the light was cascading in all directions.

“Come on,” Shiso said calmly. “Take my hand already.”

Reva reached out and took his hand, and the weight on her shoulders were instantly lifted. Violette’s oppressive music was also gone; instead, Reva heard a chorus singing all around her. Hazel patted Reva’s back.

“Go get her!” she said, giving a thumbs up.

Reva wiped the tears from her eyes and stood tall. The knelt down to the ground and picked up the sword the man had left behind. Her shield was nowhere in sight, but she raised the sword up high. She turned around to face the light, charging sword first into it. To the side, she saw the man giving her a thumbs up.

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Violette watched as all three of them put their weapons down and step back, waiting for her next move. Violette started a new song, giving new orders. Reva put her shield back down and got into a battle stance.

“Come on Reva!” Shiso growled. “How are you gonna protect anyone if you can’t even protect yourself?!i” he asked.

Reva braced herself to charge forward, but her body only gave a stutter when prompted to go forward. Violette formed a face of confusion; had she played a wrong note? She never does that on live performances. Violette strummed her violin again, but this time Reva was unresponsive. Her heart skipped a beat.

Reva’s motionless body began to slowly move again. Her fists clenched; her teeth gritted; her arms swayed. Quickly, Reva jumped to hit Violette. Violette didn’t fear though; Reva’s shield would certainly not be enough to break her barrier. Violette let out a highly audible gasp as she saw that in Reva’s other hand was a gold-gilded red sword.

“That is not how you treat your fans!” Reva said in fury. In one slash, she shattered Violette’s barrier into pieces. Violette’s instrument flew from her hands as she fell to the ground in a painful landing.

When Violette tried to get up, Reva planted a foot on her stomach. Violette only saw Reva on top of her, pointing a sword down at her face and having her shield ready in the other hand. She had no idea how Reva had overcome her musical spell.

“I remembered you being graceful and full of both passion and compassion.” Reva said in disgust. “Maybe you’re better left just as that; a memory.”