Jesus, how long's it been? Almost 8 years? Where does the time go?
Anyway, usual disclaimers: Monty Oum and Rooster Teeth own RWBY, Team GHST belongs to me.
"Whatcha got there, Jaune?"
Jaune Arc smiled at team RWBY's petite be-cloaked leader, who was hopping up and down to look over his shoulder. "It's nothing, Ruby. I think it's something Nora left for Ren." He folded up the note he'd found under his desk and stuck it in his breast pocket.
"So why ya reading it? Doncha know opening someone else's mail's a felony?"
"I don't think school notes count, Rubes. Anyway, I'll see you later for a round of Remnant?"
With her customary speed, Ruby hopped up on a desk and struck a triumphant pose. "Heck yeah! Weiss really got into it and even got us the new Aura Assault expansions!" She clenched a fist and thrust it at Jaune. "Better have a white flag on hand, Arc! I'll finally grind you into the dust!"
"That's if you stop Weiss from stomping your wall into paste. I'll see you then." Jaune waved good-bye and strode out of Glynda Goodwitch's rapidly-emptying classroom. Once away from the press, he reached for the note and opened it once again.
/Meet us at the West Grounds Obstacle Course. Come armed./
That's what the note under he'd found under his desk said. While Jaune Arc had a long way to go before he could match his more competent classmates, he was no fool. Seven sisters went a long way to sharpening one's sense of suspicion. The knight errant remembered his indentured servitude to Team CRDL and felt the bile rise in his throat. He crumpled the note and tossed it into the closest bin. He quickened his pace and headed for his locker room.
This has Cardin's stink written all over it. This time he's really asking for it! If he thinks I'm still the wuss from Forever Fall, I'll give him a taste of Mistralian shield form!
Jaune couldn't help a grin form on his face. He thought about the nights he'd spent training with Pyrrha. Aside from forms and fitness, she'd even included tactics when dealing with Grimm and humans. Invariably, the red-headed champion would use their classmates as examples. While the hulking Cardin was a natural fighter whose blows matched Nora Valkyrie's own in destructive potential, he was still a bully and a coward who used his team the way a hunter would use his dogs.
'Don't let them surround you. And fight smart.'
At the very least, Jaune was hoping he'd be able to hold them off long enough for help to arrive. The locker was in sight and his insides weren't the quivering mass they would have been so long ago. It had been a long time in coming, but it was finally time for the latest Arc to take action.
As to what that action was, Jaune suddenly had no idea.
Clad in his haphazard mix of jeans, hoodie and hand-me-down armor, the knight errant made his way to the West Grounds Obstacle Course.
In direct contrast to the cultured beauty of the rest of Beacon's grounds, the course was a great dusty expanse with structures and trenches built seemingly with the battlegrounds of the Last War firmly in mind. Every now and again, the Huntsmen and Huntresses in training would march to the grounds to find a new surprise had been erected to simulate the different environments they might find themselves deployed to in defense of Vale and beyond. A punishment every student dreaded the maintenance of the various structures that made up the course followed by having to test their handiwork.
Even if it wasn't a simulacrum of an urban environment, the Course was no joy to run. Last week, the freshmen had been just about to run a circuit when a sudden rainstorm turned the sandy ground into a swamp that swallowed shoes and left the aroma of rain and mud on every runner. Teams RWBY or JNPR had never been happier to return to their dorms. In hand, Jaune had a pair of dirty clumps that were his running trainers. Ren resembled a bedraggled cat. Underneath her soaked and tangled mass of dark hair with her dark-colored bow threatening to come undone, there was murder blazing in Blake's yellow eyes. Weiss was Weiss, meaning when they'd gotten back, she was incandescent with fury. Especially since she'd been in the crossfire in a mud duel between Yang, Ruby, and Nora (who started it). For a brief period in time, it seemed that the rain would bow before the Schnee heiress' wrath.
Suffice to say, it made the rain worse. The resultant scramble and brawl for the shower next door was such that a small betting pool forming between the members of JNPR. The laconic member of the quartet, Ren, swept up the pot of hoarded candy. His redheaded best friend then proceeded to eat half of his winnings. Jaune and Pyrrha had a laugh and tried not to notice the way Ren's magenta eyes glowed briefly with warmth and something else while Nora scarfed down the sweets.
Pyrrha had... Well, the only thing that stuck in Jaune's mind had been the quiet care she'd lavished on her hair as soon as she'd come out of the shower. When she wanted to, she's always been able to lay claim to the shower before the rest of her team. How the world disappeared as she'd concentrated on brushing out the tangles of her luxurious red locks. And how she'd laughed when swinging from the tower to the ground. Even with the sound of thundering rain and unamused Schnee, the peals of Pyrrha's laughter seemed to echo in his memory. Afterward, on the way back to the dorm, the red-headed Mistralian apologized and said she had no idea where the laugh came from. It only seemed appropriate.
Other things stuck in his memory too. Like how the shorts she'd worn afterwards set off her long legs and the smell of her shampoo which tickled his nostrils and made him sneeze... Jaune coughed and hurriedly put the thought out of his mind.
The grounds had just started to dry out. At least he wouldn't lose his shoes again. But what truly arrested the knight errant's attention was the small redoubt that seemed to have sprung from nowhere in the middle of the grounds. Jaune took the time to wander around, questions tumbling in his mind when he'd heard a voice from the top.
"Gage, he's here!"
That wasn't any member of CRDL. Unless I haven't been looking close enough...
Jaune coughed and raised his voice. "H-hey, what's going on? I got the note!"
Four faces looked down at him from the battlements. Four faces that definitely weren't CRDL. The disturbing enthusiasm on their faces gave him pause.
"Oh, good! You're early!" said the voice he'd heard first which belonged to a freckle-faced girl with a short boyish cut of the fieriest red hair Jaune had ever seen.
"We knew you'd show up," called down a dark-skinned girl with a soft Vacuo accent and with an undercut of a shade somewhere between blue and purple.
"Show up for what?"
The leader of the group, a wiry-looking youth with a red bandanna on his head spoke up. Jaune wondered how its ends snapped in the wind when there was obviously none. "Your initiation, Arc! What did you think you were here for?"
There was a complete stop in Jaune's train of thought. "Erm, what?" He coughed and straightened, trying to look authoritative.
"Just who are you exactly? What's going on?"
"We're freshmen like you. We're Team GHST," Bandanna-boy responded. "I'm Gage, this is Hestia," The girl with the purple undercut gave a faint wave. "That's Simon over there," A quiet boy in black with a short and neat mohawk. "And that's Torch to the far end." "The redhead gave an energetic wave that made Jaune think of Nora. "And we're no one really important. Except we've sorta been watching you, Arc."
Indignation was flaring within the knight errant, along with a kernel of curiosity. "Watching me? For how long? And for what purpose?"
Simon was the one who spoke up. His speech was clipped and brisk. "For no real purpose other than our leader's flights of fancy. What we're doing here now is that we're under orders."
"Orders from who?" The curiosity was flaring brighter than the indignation now. Gage shot Simon a dirty look before looking down at the blonde knight errant.
"No one important. But all you need to know is that we've been eyeballing you for quite some time and we're a little... Concerned."
Jaune blew out his breath in exasperation. "Just what I need, more seats full in my personal peanut gallery. Look, I appreciate the gesture and the feeling, but I'm good, you guys. Pyrrha's always making sure I catch up to everyone else, I'm starting to hold my own in leadership classes... Besides, my team's got my back and I have theirs."
Even from the height between them, Jaune caught a shared look between the members of Team GHST. The look reeked of implication.
Gage spoke up.
"See, we don't doubt that. That's half of why Ozpin divides us into these 4-person teams. Weaknesses covered while strengths can be honed. Smart man, Ozpin. But the problem is you, Arc." The lightness was fading in Gage's tone. "Valkyrie, Nikos and Lie would each drop whatever they were doing to come to your rescue. And you would for them too. But what we're here for isn't that desire. We're here for your capabili-Hey, where you going?!"
Jaune was already walking away when Gage called out. The knight errant threw his arms up and jogged reluctantly back to shouting range. "Look, Gage, was it? I've had a hard day. Goodwitch's leadership classes were Goodwitch's leadership classes, along with me being... Me. Besides, there's a spot on a Remnant game with my name on it. So unless you got anything else to say, I'm just gonna go."
There was a quick look of conferral among GHST, followed by swift nods shared out between themselves. Which was then followed by them looking down on him. The height difference had finally annoyed Jaune. He would have given voice to it first, but the chill down his spine demanded precedence. Standing on the battlements, with the sun glaring down over them, GHST reminded the knight errant of a quartet of judges pronouncing guilt then doom. He had a feeling he wouldn't make later's game. Simon had turned to disappear into the redoubt. Torch spoke up, her tone conciliatory.
"We're sorry about this, Arc, what's about to happen hurts us more than it hurts you."
The knight errant's temper was finally past fraying. "What are you going on about no-"
His Scroll began to ring. Jaune got a grip and pulled it out to answer it. It's probably Ruby, telling me they were setting up. It wasn't the young leader of their next-door neighbors. It was Pyrrha.
"Pyrrha?"
"Jaune? Jaune, thank goodness!" Pyrrha sounded concerned, frantic.
"Pyrrha? Pyrrha, what's wrong?"
"Hi, Jaune!" Nora was with her. "Ren's here too! And pancakes!"
"Nora, you ate them all. Without hands..."
Jaune's mind was whirling. "Guys, what's going on, where are you?"
"Your pancakes are still the best, Ren! Hey, Mohawk Boy, who made these!?"
"Nora, now is definitely not the time!"
"We don't know. They won't answer our questions! Jaune, get he-Excuse me! Get back here with that!" There was a sound like Pyrrha struggling. The fact that his mentor and best friends had apparently been tied down was enough to set off a series of mental alarm bells in his head. The blonde knight errant hung up and deliberately turned to look up at the three in the battlements.
"What did you do to my team?" Jaune was surprised to hear that his voice had taken on a toneless quality which he wasn't sure what to feel about.
With a grunt, Gage stepped up onto the battlement's edge so that he could really look down upon him. Jaune noted the thick dock chain around his body, as well as his green shirt and single yellow wristband. "All over the Course, you'll find things like ladders, battering rams, grapnel guns and even an old single-person catapult. Either turn around and go play Remnant, that's cool," there was an ugly smile on Gage's face. "Or save your team by assaulting our redoubt. What's it gonna be?"
A long moment had passed and the young knight errant still wasn't sure what to feel. Instead, he looked at his Scroll and dialed a number. He put it to his ear and waited for the person on the other end to pick up.
"Hey, Rube? It's me, Jaune. Yeah, yeah, I know you guys are setting up. Listen, I'm going to have to take a raincheck…"
All the while, his usually lively blue eyes had taken on a dangerous glint as he looked up at the ones who'd abducted his team.
And that's that for Chapter 1! It feels good to be back in the ring, tell you what! Anyway, y'all know the drill! Read, review, criticize and ask questions. Man's got room to learn, after all.