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The Psychosis of a Grimm

Consciousness was dim, and only one thought echoed in her mind. Something was wrong, terribly wrong. Something was missing.

Where is it?

Hands on the steps, pushing her suddenly animated, sickly warm and shivering body upwards to an upright position.

Where is it?!

Hands sharpen as darkness envelops them, flexing in trauma and in raw emotion, fear. Her neck cranes backward as she stares at the dust stained sky. Her heart, along with every fiber of her body, shudders and seizes in dread.

I CAN'T FEEL IT!

Around her, she hears the dull speech of a victorious leader, who pauses in appreciation. The silence is suffocating and overwhelming, an emptiness that forces her mouth to open in a soundless gasp, before she vocalizes her torment.

" "̴͠I͢ ͏͟͠ḐON̡̛͢'͞T͟ ̕͝K̢̨NO͝W̛ ̛͢WH͞͡E̴̵RE҉̕͏ ̴̴͝ I͢T̡̀ ͜Ì́S̨̛͠!́"̨

All she can hear is a horror-filled, incoherent scream, human words suddenly foreign and without purpose. As the howl peters out, her name and her identity quietly slip away, beyond grasp.

The new Grimm knows what it must do, what… who it must kill, just as the dark master explains its mission to Headmaster Ozpin. The memories of the prey are vivid in the mind, along with their habitats and characteristics.

The hunt begins.

Throughout its journey, the creature searches desperately, constantly, but it can't find it. In a way, the Grimm doesn't fully comprehend what it's searching for: Only that in its absence, there is a thirst, a hunger, an emptiness that flickers deep within the cage of being, excruciating and unendurable. The only escape from the anxiety and despair is exertion. Strain. Exhaustion.

So, without any coherent answers, it distracts itself, dashing and constantly gorging on sensations, no matter how quickly they slipped away... Instantaneously: a vessel without a bottom. All thoughts, from dreams of freedom to nightmares of enslavement, all pass the same way, leaving the creature unaffected and unchanged.

The smells of flowers, of earth and sky, all became so dull and uninspiring in the first waking hours. Or maybe it was the volcanic ash clogging its nostrils. No matter.

There are other sensations to hunt, leaving the dust-riddle land behind.

It takes what seems like eons, new sensations present themselves before instantly wilting and losing vibrance. It is infuriating, to see trees but… not appreciate, not recognize. As if everything was a blur, everything forgotten, everything pointless and unimportant.

Must keep hunting for meaning. For soul.

Deep in the confines of its conscious, it knows how fearful humans are of dying. How disgusted they are of killers and murderers, traitors and monsters.

So it felt absolutely terrible, ripping into a person's neck and letting the red torrent surge forth.

But just as quickly as the guilty feelings came, they went. It happened with the other humans as well, the grief and horror passing on in a moment, the compulsion triumphing over the thought.

What a relief.

In fact, the common belief is that the Grimm are not obligated to feed... they choose to.

It was true. The disgust and nausea disappeared with the first couple wet clumps, replaced with a sensation of bliss: Long after the aura and the soul died, its phantom traces seemed to remain in the flesh, and in consumption, within the Grimm. The sensation clung to the monster, slowly draining away, but still there minutes afterward. Hunger sated.

And for a few couple wonderful moments, the Grimm felt some... semblance of being whole again.

That strength died quickly, and with it, the desperation returned. The hatred and jealousy festered immediately for the soul-ful, the complete ones. The Grimm fervently sought them out, quickly learning how to recognize their scent and sense their fear.

What helped the most was the Grimm's former knowledge and experience with humans, as a human. Dispatching foes was simple, their attacks or defenses easy to read, counter, and overwhelm. Maps read long ago were effective instruments for seeking out towns and villages, roads became highways for stalking and tracking travelers.

As well as finding its way to the objective. The goal that the master ordained.

Unfortunately, like a drug, the more consumed, the less the effect. Concepts of civility were discarded quickly, taste became generalized. Beggars could not choose. Everything was edible.

It just maddened the wandering Grimm further.

Closer to the settlement limits, guns and their accelerated little pellets of dust provided some novel sensations of pain. Flickering thoughts dreamed of parting this wall of metal balls through sheer willpower, but the Grimm quickly realized it was lacking the critical element.

It was then that coordination with fellow soul-less beasts became effective. They were the mechanisms in which she could scale the walls without interference, distractions for the defenders. In the blackened smoke of human despair, the feast commenced and the charcoal brethren howled at their messiah, praising it for the victory.

The Grimm's fangs and jaw contort into some disbelieving grin, as the howls reverberating through its body and help fill its emptiness.

Being an alpha is a delight. So much easier to overrun caravans, the larger the better. No sorrow for lost comrades, no fears of inadequacy or failure. Just showing the way and seeing humans break ranks and surrender to the black tide. It was such a wonderful time, romping across the landscape, sowing fear and terror into the hearts of the humans. The flaring pain of existential contradiction quieted and muffled.

The kingdoms were in chaos, it was clear to see. The amount of humans scrambling and traveling around the landscape told them that much. Was war a possibility? Trains ran at full speed, carrying vehicles of war and fighters of all sorts.

Then the hunters came, their bright colors and elaborate insignias, deadly weapons shredding through the pack. The Grimm must have been causing too much damage, getting too close to the vulnerable human populations for them to be left unaddressed. The team of four cleared the pack with ease, synchronous and formulaic. Their eyes gleamed so brightly, so brave, so heroic.

They barely scratched the alpha's armor. One lone spike protruding from its back was snapped off by the end of the fight, but at the cost of their lives. They were simply not strong enough, their semblances… unimpressive.

One of them, a girl with golden hair, had the emblem of two golden rainbows amidst a white backdrop. There was no doubt that she was related to one of the Alpha Grimm's targets. The delightful cascade of emotions that swelled within were sickening and horrendous, borderline insane, but gone so fast.

One thought remained, lingering longer than any other sensation prior. For at least three heartbeats it remained in the consciousness.

Unforgivable.

Inspiration to follow the dark commander's orders intensified. Perverse thoughts: What would it be like, how would it feel, finding him? Killing him?

But no matter what emotions that question created, the revulsion to the terror to the hysteria to the suicidal thoughts, it was momentary thought that faded like all of the others. No impression, no impact.

Curiously, that one thought kept petering in and out of her mind. Constantly living and dying:

Unforgivable.

Acolytes of the dark one, Salem. They blocked the Alpha's path, confident in their safety. A man, a woman, and their leader, who wore the insignia of Salem to confirm their allegiance. It was true, the beast could not kill these three. They were superiors.

How humorous, that the killer of Pyrrha Nikos would be the leader. The hunter known as Mercury expressed a similar opinion, and also complimented on the Grimm's appearance.

"Too monstrous, for my taste… Would have been better plain: no baggage and armor to cover her up, you know? What's the point of using her if they can't see it?"

"First and foremost," Cinder explained, her scarred face looking down from above, "She is a tool for hunting down RWBY. Not some method of psychological warfare."

"Aww, c'mon!. Why not pry off the mask a bit, let them see her face? What harm would that do?" Mercury prodded, stepping forward to inspect their new underling.

"Mercury…" The green haired girl began, before Cinder stepped in front of the renegade and stopped his approach.

"You're no fun," Mercury sighed, "Ever since 'Lil Red' gave you that lightshow…"

"Don't. Test. Me." Cinder hissed, staring Mercury down with a tone almost as bestial as a Grimm, "You're going to end up like Roman with that sort of arrogance."

Or you. Was the unspoken response. It was clear to see from Cinder's wounds that she had been dealt quite the setback. A dark satisfaction bloomed within, quickly fading into the darkness, but enough to make the Grimm purr.

Cinder spun around, placing her frustration and anger onto the aura-less creature.

"Oh, how adorable. Lets get to business, then! Team RWBY and JNPR, does that ring any bells to you? Hm?"

The purring stopped.

"Yes, you're a smart one for sure," Cinder spat, still spiteful, "They're a days journey away, traveling to Vacuo in hopes of pursuing the leaders of the White Fang. We're going to intercept them at the train platform overlooking Forever Fall. Do you know what to do then, Pyrrha dearest?"

The name only served it irritate the alpha, who shied away from Cinder's glare. But the Maiden of Fall would not allow it: the glove on her right hand shown with bloody malice, forcing the Grimm to return the stare.

"You're going to help us kill them. Mercury, Adam and I shall take care of Team RWBY, while you and Emerald dispatch JNPR. Understand?"

The response came without warning. The Grimm screeched, enough to make the red leaves of the trees and the blades of grass bend over from the force of fury. An incoherent roar of affirmation, with a single word drowning within the meaningless noise.

"͢͏D͠I҉E͟!̷͢"͟

Cinder smirked. It seemed that she could understand the captive Grimm's agonized, dismay-stricken hatred, while the other two grunts just covered their ears and flinched at the wall of sound.

"Good girl."

Ren frowned as the wave of sound crashed over them, echos from a demon far off in the distance, as lonesome and unaccompanied as a howl of a wolf. His friends glanced up from their own trains of thought, pausing and looking the trees, out towards the horizon.

"That was…"

"One incredibly pissed Grimm..." Yang finished for Weiss, her robotic arm flickering to life as it aura flowed through it, "How far off, Ren?"

"It's near, maybe a days run away." Ren responded, thinking hard about the scream, "We should have a two guards if we're going to make camp."

"I thought it was a death knell," Jaune muttered, very much preoccupied and disturbed by the sudden noise, "So much... pain in that sound."

"Don't dwell on it." Ren asserted, patting his leader on the back.

Ruby, Jaune and the rest of the group nodded in agreement and began to move forward, continuing the quest and mentally preparing for the battles ahead.

End Chapter