Humble Beginnings

Fenrir Astrel was never one for crowded places. The air assaulted his nose with a hundred different scents, perfume, cologne, dust; his ears flattened against his silver hair as the ever growing din of chatter grated at his mind, he was able to hear every conversation without even trying. He watched the other potential students on the airship with his left eye, the yellow orb scanned the crowd. His right eye was covered by an eye patch. Yes, it was safe to say that the wolf faunus was absolutely hating every minute of this trip. He stuck his hands in the pocket of his hoodie and did his best to not look like he was in hell.

It wasn't that he hated the fact that he was surrounded by humans, even given all that they had done to faunus in the past, he realized that many were still good people. He simply couldn't stand being stuck in a crowd like this without any of his friends or at least someone he knew. He was the only one who decided to go to Beacon, all his other friends, his "pack" had decided to stay in Atlas and join the army.

He grimaced to himself, "Why did I think that I would be able to handle this myself. I can barely talk to the guy at the dust shop when I need to get new ammo or upgrades." He was snapped out of his self-loathing when he noticed that there was someone coming his direction. He quickly looked up to see if the person was perhaps coming to talk to him. He looked down again just as fast when he saw the boy's face was turning a sickly green color. "At least I'm not the only one who's not enjoying the trip," he thought to himself.

He looked out the window trying to ignore the person standing next to him. He looked over every now and again to see if the boy was looking any better, however he seemed to only be getting worse. Fenrir was holding a bottle of medicine for air sickness in his hands but was having trouble working up the courage to strike up a conversation with the blond boy. He took a deep breath and was about to say something when a hologram of a stern looking woman appeared.

Fenrir was so preoccupied in how to best approach the boy that didn't notice that he had lost his chance to help as said boy was already puking his guts out all over the floor. "Well looks like this isn't going to help anymore," he though putting the bottle of motion sickness pills in his pocket. As he looked down he noticed that he was standing in a small pile of vomit. "Hello and welcome to Beacon," a hologram that suddenly appeared started saying but Fenrir wasn't listening he was too busy trying to hold back his tears of frustration, anxiety, and fear.

"This is just a great first day," he said as he departed the airship. I don't know how I'm ever going to get on a team if I can't even talk to one person." He decided to go sit on one of the benches that lines the walkways around the school and try to calm down. Unbeknownst to him there was someone that had seen his entire ordeal.

When she saw the wolf faunus, Aria Rentel though nothing of how he looked, though she did have to say he seemed very cute, especially considering he had a big bushy tail or how he obviously wished he wasn't here. No, what she noticed was how lonely he looked. She saw him fighting with himself over giving the blond boy what looked like some medicine and she also saw the frustration and unshed tears when he would up in a puddle of vomit. She followed him off the airship wanting to talk to him.

She watched him from a distance waiting for a good moment to try and talk to him. She saw him sit down on the bench and decided this was a good time to try to talk. "I don't know what I should do," she thought, "I want to talk to him but I don't want to scare him or make him nervous." She worried for a few minutes before deciding that the best idea was probably to simply go up and talk to him.

Fenrir was still sitting on the bench sulking when his ears twitched, he heard the sound of footsteps approaching him. He looked around so that he could see who was coming. What he saw however startled him, it was a beautiful girl with crimson hair that hung past her waist. Her eyes where a piecing grey. She was looking at Fenrir with a smile that caused the wolf fuanus to blush.

"Hi, my name is Asrin," she said holding out her hand.

"F-f-f- Fenrir" The boy stammered taking her hand but looking down at his feet. "Why in the name of dust would a girl like this talk to me," thought.

"It's nice to meet you. Mind if I share this bench with you?"

"W-w-w-what?" he stammered.

"I said do you mind if I sit next to you?"

"No, go ahead," he spoke in almost a whisper as he moved over to make room for the girl.

"Thank you," she said sitting next to him.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, all the while the socially awkward wolf faunus was having a small panic attack. Fenrir decided to play with his scroll to try and take his mind of the beautiful girl sitting next to him. When he opened the device he noticed that the entrance ceremony was only a few minutes away.

"OH CRAP," he yelled jumping up from the bench, "WE HAVE TO GO OR WE"LL BE LATE!"

Aria jumped up to and they both started sprinting towards the main building of the school. Even for a faunus Fenrir was exceptionally fast, so when he reached the main building and turned around he wasn't expecting Aria to be there, right behind him. He wasn't use to having someone who could match his pace, though it did seem to have taken a toll on her given how hard she was panting and the slight sheen of sweat on her brow.

"I have to… find my…. friends they're… probably wondering where I went" Aria panted.

"Oh, ok," Fenrir said, feeling a little down trodden, "I guess I'll see you around then.

"Yeah. Good luck tomorrow during the initiation. Bye" she said as she walked off into the crowd.

"Bye," he called after her.

Fenrir barely listened to whatever Professor Ozpin was saying, he was too busy thinking of how happy he was that he actually talked to someone. Even when it came time for everyone to go to sleep in the main hall he was still bubbly. Normal on a night before and big exam or test he would be up all night worrying and thinking of possible ways for it to fail, but this night he went right to sleep and had a peaceful rest all night.