"One more time. That's all I need. Just one more...

"GAH!"

After having thrown my hands up in frustration, they quickly returned to the controller and gripped it tightly. I was determined to do it this time. This would be the last time.

Clearly it was the last time, because the intense concentration was finally starting to take its toll. After fourteen failed attempts, this game had beaten me. My head was aching and I needed a break. After gently setting the controller to the side, I laid down on the floor, squeezing all the air out of my lungs as my back touched the carpet. If the headache was any indication, playing this close to the vidscreen wasn't a good idea.

"That's why they invented chairs, I think…"

Mumbling to myself wasn't a good habit, but I did it anyway. It was difficult to keep me quiet, after all. After I laid onto my back, it became apparent just how sore it was after sitting hunched over for an hour or so. And my legs were numb, the tingling feeling setting in as the blood started to circulate. Not a great time to have a headache.

With a tired groan, I rolled over to snatch up my scroll with both hands and lazily pulled it apart to reveal the entire thin panel. No new messages. I could've sworn the little mail icon was taunting me. She should've sent something by now! Clearly we weren't getting along as well as I thought.

"Ah...

"Well… Onto the next pretty face, I guess."

With that, I folded the scroll and placed it on the floor and rolled onto my back again shortly afterwards. I raised my hands to my head, clenching my fingers and tugged on my hair before rubbing my eyes and nose. This headache wasn't going away.

"Ranno! ... Hey! What're you doin' on the floor?"

I shot up to see where the voice was coming from, my eyes darted around before they settled on the figure in the corridor. It was my residence mate, Connor.

Wearing nothing but a towel around his waist. From the stupid grin on plastered on his face, he'd clearly forgotten about how many times I'd told him to be fully clothed before he went on strolls around the residence. Clearly, he needed to be reminded one more time.

"Connor, your room is right next to the showers. Get changed before you walk out here, man! Nobody wants to see that!"

I waved a hand dismissively at him in an attempt to shoo him back to his room.

"Heheh... Not you, maybe. But that one girl in my sparring group was checking me out the whole of last semester. You should've seen the way she stared!"

After his little gloat, he ran a hand through his wet hair and padded towards the kitchen with his bare feet.

"Speaking of last semester-" He began to mention off-handedly as he walked over to the refrigerator and pulled out a can. After he popped it open with a loud hiss and padded over on bare feet to one of the chairs. He paused for a moment with a blank look on his face before he flopped back onto it.

"What're your plans for next year? We don't have long before we have to pack up our stuff and get out."

I didn't answer him. After I stood up, I strolled into the kitchen and brought up a hand to wearily pull the cabinet door open. My hand instinctively found the headache pills. Clearly, I did this too often.

At that moment, I heard my scroll vibrate on the carpet. It was soon followed by the usual beeping of the message tone. After I filled a glass with water and gulped down the pills, I left the glass on the counter and sauntered over to the living room. After snatching up my scroll, I flopped back onto an armchair. Connor stared at the scroll in my hands, opening his mouth to speak.

"Whatsit say?"

I glanced over at Connor for a moment before I pulled the scroll apart once more. I smirked at him before I looked to the screen in front of me. It seems she had replied after all, today was my lucky day.

"Dunno yet… Let's see."

It was a reply to the application I had sent earlier in the year. My application to Beacon.

My finger moved forward to tap the icon but I hesitated for a moment. A sharp pang of anxiety shot through my chest, hard and cold like the edge of a knife.

What if I didn't get accepted?

"You got a reply from that girl, eh? Lucky bastard. I should've asked that sparring girl if she was interested long-"

"No."

There was a hint of apprehension in my voice and I could hear it. He could too, most likely.

"It's from Beacon Academy."

"You applied to Beacon?!"

He sat up as he spat the last word out. Thankfully, he wasn't drinking at the time. I'd see that he scrubbed the carpet later if he was. "That's the top academy in Vale! You've sure got high hopes. Especially after your performances at practice! I'm sure your reports had some shining testimonies to those pranks you pulled in class."

I shrugged and returned to staring at the mail icon as I spoke. "It was worth a shot. My scores weren't too bad and those ideas were pure genius. Plus, my mother and brother are there. I had to try, at least."

He sighed, sinking back into his seat and taking another loud sip of his drink, quickly swallowing before speaking again.

"Ahh… I forgot that your mom was a professor there. I'd bet that helps your chances a bit." He looked around before narrowing his eyes at me. "Y'know, it was really lucky of us to get this residence. Too lucky. It's the smallest of 'em all and it's also the most well-equipped. We even have our own little kitchen and living room! It's been a great senior year at Signal… And I'm glad you were placed in our dorm!"

"... Of course you are." I furrowed my brow, still staring at my scroll. I knew what he was implying. Too often, people just assumed that I'd gotten special treatment because of my father's company, Helios. What they didn't realise is that the company had failed and was sold earlier this year. I didn't know why we landed up in this dormitory. Perhaps it was more than just luck.

"Sooo... What does it say, Rann?" Connor stared at me inquisitively from the other side of the room, still half-naked and reclining on the couch."

"I don't know! I haven't opened it yet. And you're making the couch damp! Go get changed, you idiot!" My voice nearly cracked as I yelled at Connor and sure enough, raising my voice recklessly provoked the dormant beast in my pain-wracked head. It felt like an Ursa was rampaging inside my skull.

As usual, my voice was deep and incredibly masculine as I yelled at him. Some of the other guys my age would have a problem with their squeaky voices at times, but not me. Not at all. Nope. Definitely not the case. My soon-to-be-eighteen-year-old self didn't have that problem.

"Fine, fine…" He propped himself up and padded off down the corridor before taking a sharp turn into his room. The other guys in the residence left earlier this morning, so I didn't have to worry about any other intruders. My hand lifted up, my finger extended. My stomach tensed anxiously as my fingertip tapped on the icon . The mail opened, the screen was soon filled with a wall of text and an icon of my mother alongside another attached document. Looks like she attached a recorded message for me, though what is the other attached document?

My eyes focused on the top line, reading it. My chest felt like it was going to burst in excitement.

Congratulations, Mister Solden.

You have been accepted into Beacon Academy.

Please see the attached document for…

I raised both arms in triumph and the thought of bothering to read the rest of the acceptance letter didn't even cross my mind. After I was painfully reminded of my headache, I reached down to pick my scroll up and tapped on the icon of my mother's face, opening the recorded voice message and clutching my throbbing skull as I listened.

"Ranno! Congratulations on your acceptance into Beacon! I'm sure your father would have been just as proud as I am. It'll be great to have the whole family at Beacon and together again. Have I mentioned before that your father and I met while we were training at Beacon?"

It was always great to hear my mother's voice. She spoke so fondly of my father at times, ending her sentence with an embarrassed little giggle. Sometimes I forgot how young she seemed for her age. I'm also glad I've never told her that. As a huntress, she had more than a few ways of having my head separated from my body. Which strangely enough, didn't seem like such a bad idea.

"Anyhoo... The reason I sent this to you pre-recorded instead of calling you directly is because Athrin wanted to congratulate you as well! He's away on assignment at the moment and unable to call from there. But he recorded a message for you before he left and he should be returning at the start of the next school year. I've arranged with Signal Academy to let you stay in the residence for a little while longer while I find some other accommodation for you, I know you don't want to be there by yourself until your year at Beacon starts. I'll call you up tomorrow to tell you what I've found. Love you! Byeee!"

The audio stopped abruptly but the progress bar still had several seconds left on it. I stared at it for a while longer before the audio suddenly returned with a crisp, masculine voice. It was my brother.

"Ranno... Good job on getting in. Don't disappoint."

That was all he had to say?! He may have been three years ahead of me and finished his huntsman training, but he could've been a little more enthusiastic for me. Getting into Beacon was no small task. Not for him, maybe. But for someone like me, it's definitely a big thing. Again, the excitement caused my headache to react violently. It felt like my skull was going to split.

"Rann! Don't try to use the shower! No hot water left!" I heard Connor yell out from his room before he stuck his head out his door and smiled sheepishly at me.

"Sorry, Ranny. You'll have to wait a few hours."

Great. After last year's events, I was already a year late to Beacon. The last thing left to do was wait out the vacation. The long, lonely vacation.

Beacon couldn't come soon enough.

Author's Notes:

Disclaimer: RWBY does not belong to me. If you'd like to find out who the original creators of the series are, look up Monty Oum and Rooster Teeth Productions.

So, here it is! My first chapter to my first fanfiction. I know many people aren't terribly fond of Original Characters, but there's a reasoning behind it. Out of respect to the writers of RWBY and the characters they've created, I've decided to avoid writing something that revolved around them as I'd have to put words in their mouths and split-off from the canon route. So I thought up my own team and made up my mind to tell their story. The inspiration behind writing something like this is attempting to describe what it would be like to be a student at Beacon. The series has shorter episodes, so they don't have much time to describe things in detail. So this'll be a sort-of parallel story-line to the one in the series which focuses on different things. You may also notice a few references to things in this fanfic, I'll do my best to make them as tasteful as possible.

Why is this at the bottom, you ask? Well, I've decided I'm going to put these at the bottom of each chapter, so people can get right to the reading and save my ramblings for later.

Thank you for reading through this short teaser chapter. I know it doesn't cover much but I'm hoping to write more for each week. If you've noticed any inconsistencies, I'm sincerely sorry for that. Since the RWBY series was written and designed in America, it would naturally follow a more American way of doing things. Unfortunately, this means that I have to translate things from the metric system to the imperial and it also means that I don't have a very good understanding of how the school year works there. I'm committed to making this fanfiction as accurate as possible, but please bear with me on this.

As for the team name, RGNT is spoken out-loud as Argent.

A very special thanks to my friend FenrisTheGrey for editing all of this and providing advice/suggestions. You've been a massive help to this story and I'm proud to have such intelligent, creative friends.

And that's it for the first chapter! I'll be releasing a new chapter on a Thursday each week.