A/N

So as promised I'm starting my Monday schedule now so expect them to be out around then. I apologise to anyone reading, that this is another short chapter but this is the last one as the rest are roughly 2-3x as long.

Once again, thanks to anyone who takes the time to read my story, whether you review or not, you are all amazing and as always, a massive thank you to Blacsparrow for reading and his/her feedback on the series.

Chapter 2 – New arrivals

Garrick Cane

"I'm here dad," Garrick muttered to himself as he stepped off of the airship that had carried him to Beacon. "Time to make you proud."

Garrick looked around as he walked, carefully observing everyone he could see. Most of the students were wearing Beacon's black and red uniform that he had seen around Vale quite often, but some among them were still wearing their combat clothes. As he observed all the new students, looking for any that he may be able to get along with, he noticed that most of them seemed to be wearing almost the same thing. Plate armour covering various parts of their body and weapons that ranged from swords to maces and crossbows to assault rifles; although one boy seemed to stand out from the rest, a rather thin boy with one thin blonde streak running through the left side of his pitch black hair. He wore a dark red zip-up sleeveless jacket with a yellow pattern of chains crossing at the back in a shoelace formation, underneath was a grey t-shirt with some kind of pattern on it that Garrick couldn't make out. His forearms wore a dark red bracer that led into black finger-less gloves and left his upper arms exposed, revealing a rather nasty looking scar that travelled along the length of his left arm while down his right arm snaked an actual chain that looked to be made of some kind of pale metal connecting to a circular metal backpack resting between his shoulder blades. His jeans were black but became grey further down, ending in grey trainers lined with yellow shoelaces and a yellow sole. The weirdest thing about him however was not his attire, but the fact that beside him stood a brown horse.

Garrick considered saying hello to the boy but decided against it as horses usually freaked out around him, in fact most animals did. Garrick came from a family of Faunus, humans that had traits of animals, in the case of Garrick's family, that animal was a bear and thanks to this bear heritage, animals had always been rather scared of him. This made having pets impossible and the one time his parents had tried to give him a dog, it had refused to come out from under the table; but being a bear Faunus wasn't all bad. He could hear far better than any human thanks to an extra pair of round ears atop his head and even smell things from much further away, best of all was the strength it gave him. This strength allowed him to lift things that no human would be able to, enough strength to lift the back of a car on his own.

Snapping out of his memories Garrick smiled to himself and picked up his suitcase slinging it over his shoulder next to his weapon, a weapon that had once belonged to his father, and was about to begin his walk down the long path the led to Beacon when he spotted a girl walk past him, head down and looking terrified. Garrick wasn't fond seeing people looking down and decided that it was now his job to cheer her up.

Evie Starr

Evie had never been more scared in her life as she stepped off the airship, having waited until everyone else had got off first and finally being told by the pilot that she needed to get off or he would have to fly back to the city with her still on board. She nervously took a look around the courtyard and immediately regretted it; everywhere she looked were people covered in armour, people she knew that she would have to fight against in sparring class one day. The thought of fighting them sent chills down her back as she imagined taking a hit from the massive mace of a bear Faunus that looked to be an entire foot taller than her and easily the best physically built out of everyone here. Evie herself had never really been much of a fighter, always preferring to help heal injuries rather than cause them. Years ago she would have been more than happy to go to a regular school, learn to be a doctor and eventually get a job at the same hospital as her mother; but after a trip to a nearby village with her mother to help the wounded after an attack from the creatures of Grimm, Evie knew that she could never sit by and help only those within the safety of the city walls while others in the outlying villages could be in far more need.

Three weeks later Evie had decided to take up combat training from one of her mother's friends and worked as hard as she could to get better, and while she had improved quite a lot, she was still far from an expert. The only reason Evie believed she even got into Beacon Academy was because of how much of a natural affinity she had with dust. Evie had learned from a young age how to use dust to aid in the healing of others and now wore full arm length gloves that were imbued with her four favourite types of dust. Water dust to clean wounds, ice dust to reduce pain and swelling, fire dust was used to provide heat to a wound and aid in blood flow, and even lightning dust for dire situations in with someone would go into cardiac arrest and she needed to jump start their heart.

Slowly taking her first step forward, eyes looking down at the ground, she only got more nervous. Even though everyone was busy with their own conversations she still felt like everyone was judging her, thinking she didn't look good enough and maybe they were right, maybe she wasn't; but just as she thought that, she felt a hand on her shoulder and raised her head. She was now looking into the sky blue eyes of the bear Faunus carrying the giant mace she had seen earlier.

"Keep your head up, you should be proud you made it here because they only accept the best of the best," he told her while smiling reassuringly.

"Th-Thanks," Evie replied, giving him a small smile and feeling a little embarrassed.

"No problem, my names Garrick Cane. If you ever need cheering up then just come and find me," he said confidently.

"E-Evie St-Starr," she stuttered back. "And I will keep that in m-mind."

He smiles and walks away, soon followed by Evie who now, thanks to Garrick, felt a little more confident that this was where she belonged.