Chapter two everyone! It's longer than the first one and it kind of ends abruptly, but hey new characters! Has anyone cracked the code yet?

Chapter 2: Partners

After three hours on the flight, only wasting half of my playlist, the aircraft shuddered to a stop at the helipad a few meters from the main courtyard of the school. Placed between the helipad and the school was a small soundstage and about three hundred chairs. Behind the chairs stood a crowd of reporters taking pictures of the grouping. We seemed to be the last to arrive as most of the seats were already full.

I stood up, straightened out my beige collared shirt. It looked as if someone from a WWII desert unit would wear with a collar and epaulettes on the shoulders. I placed my headphones around my neck and placed my phone back into my pocket.

I walked out with the rest of the passengers, waving to the photographs to document this momentous occasion. I took seat near the back and looked up on the stage, on the stage was the headmistress herself with the assembled teachers of various ages and races.

"Welcome to Remnant, Vale, and Beacon children of Earth!" The woman spoke into the microphone to greet the new students. "In four years, I expect to you all here to graduate to become Earth's first Huntsmen and Huntresses. On your shoulders is the future of both our worlds. So no pressure." She laughed nervously. She looked to her left and saw a cat eared woman and nodded to her. "I would like to introduce you to outreach specialist and fellow Profess, my sister in law, Blake Xiao Long."

The assembled crowd applauded the awkward speech as the taller black haired woman took to the podium. "My name is Blake Xiao Long, and I must tell you that once you enter these grounds you will be treated the same as your Remnan comrades. You will be pushed to your limits and some of you to your breaking points. My job is to help you in any way I can. Ruby will help you in weapons and class scheduling, I deal with handling life here." She paused for a second. "I will confide in you something, when I first came here at the age of 17, 25 years ago, I hid in the corner hiding from everyone. My team which included Professor Rose here, her sister who would later become my wife and your future combat instructor, and Professor Schnee your Dust teacher, showed me what I could do and how to come out of my shell and trust again." She paused again. "To cut a long story short, never hide from or hate your team, because you will never know what they can do for you that we can't."

As she walked off teary eyed into the arms of a blonde woman with a robotic arm, another woman with bright white hair walked onto the stage and began to speak. "My name is Weiss Schnee and I would like to announce that your weapon designs have been approved and are located in the locker rooms for pick up and testing. I wish you all good luck and not to blow any limbs off on your first day. Along the walk to the school you will meet a Remnan first year who will guide you through this school and help you adjust."

Everyone got up from their seats and began walking towards the campus. Along the path were their fellow first years from Remnant each holding up a sign. The sign showed a name of another student to follow them. I walked a few dozen yards before I saw a young woman holding a sign that said John Bauer. She was of dark skin and maroon hair, her red eyes stared intently at me and motioned me over.

"Hello," she stuck her hand out to me, "my name is Winry Maroon, you must be John." Her voice was pitched somewhere between high and low giving her a quiet, mature tone in her voice. She wore a red and black sleeveless top that was more of a vest than a blouse, her red hair shaved on the left side and combed long on the right with two small braids coming down the sides. She had a green ghillie cloak wrapped around her body, but barely hitting her black leggings, giving glaring contrast to the rest of her. On her forehead rested a pair of brass aviator goggles which seemed to droop a bit.

"Bauer, John Bauer." I took her hand and shook it firmly.

"Okay my job today is to help you get acquainted with the campus and your weapon." She explained turning around. "If you could follow me to your locker." She walked quickly forcing me to jog in an attempt to keep up with her. All the student who found their guides went to the front door of the massive building causing a bit of congestion. I felt my wrist being grabbed by Winry causing me to look up to see her mouth get ready. Before I could ask what she was going on about, I received the sensation of being punched in the gut by a fifty-pound weight and suddenly I was next to Winry on the complete other side of the hallway where there were fewer kids.

"Short range teleportation." She explained. "Comes in handy sometimes." I felt like I was going to vomit from the shift in position. "Don't worry you get used after 2 or 3 times through the rift."

She continued walking past a dining hall and a large gymnasium eventually arriving at a normal locker room. "Okay you got locker number 23." She stated reading from a card she had pulled from a breast pocket. She then handed it to me. "I can't tell you the password out loud can I?"

I walked across the rather large room until I stood before locker 23. I input the password written on the card causing the door to open. Inside sat a pair of dull iron gauntlets with sharpened claws where the fingers were. Above them was a shoulder holster containing a FN Five-seveN pistol on the left side and three extra magazines on the right. Attached to the door was a letter written in Enigma.

XDM

PDSJJCDLNFYFDYZNDCPQXLDXSIWUCZRWTFMEFSWJKLRBFWZCAMLQOV

I placed the note in my pocket to decrypt later. I grabbed the holster and slung it around my shoulders and then reached for the gauntlets. The inner side was covered in two tubes, one glowing blue and the other glowing red. I inserted my left hand in the left gauntlet and secured it with the leather straps. On the inner forearm were three buttons, one blue on the left, another red on the right, and a white button in the middle with a red S on it.

I strapped the identical gauntlet onto my right hand and turned around. "How do they feel?" Winry asked giving a slight smile at the sight. Cradled in her arms was what appeared to be a PU Mosin.

"A bit heavy." I explained. You know we have classes all about using these back home. I heard.

"I heard gauntlet users get used to it after a while." She explained. "For now, follow me to the practice range." She turned around and walked out into a padded sparring area. She picked out a corner in the room, dropped her rifle onto the ground, and beckoned me over.

"Sparring?" I asked.

"Show me what you got." She said raising her hands and shifting into a horse stance her hands moving to that of a Wing Chun form.

"I can't hit a girl!" I exclaimed. She responded by punching me in the gut. "Oh, come on!" I ignored the fact that I still had my gauntlets on and took a boxing stance. I ducked down and threw an uppercut between her arms aimed at her jaw. I knew her Aura would absorb the blow so I didn't hold back. She responded by raising a knee into my temple causing me to raise my other arm to defend the side of my skull. The force of the strike caused me to tip over as I finished punching. I grabbed her thigh on the way down, bringing her down beside me. I swung my elbow around to try for a face strike causing her to swing up her arms to defend her face. My arm bounced off her fore arms causing her to grab it and use it to twist me around so that I was pinned to the ground with my arm behind my back and her straddling me.

"At least take me to dinner first." I gasped in the compromising position. She leaned in close behind me pressing herself against my back. Don't you dare!

"I just might." Using her flirting as a distraction, I swung my head up causing the back of my head to hit her on the nose. She released my arm allowing me to push up with my lower body to knock her off of me.

"Fuck!" She screamed gripping her face as she got up.

"Don't you have Aura?" I asked.

"It's just for injuries. Not pain." She shouted before charging at me, throwing punches rapidly as I got my arms back up to block. As she started to punch my lower abdomen, I reached up wrapping my hands around her shoulders and forced her face into my knee. She responded by using the opening I gave her to strike where no person should ever strike.

I toppled to the ground with my hands between my legs. My groin was burning in pain, but to the surprise of everyone I was both whimpering and laughing at the same time. That's what you get for flirting with a woman who isn't me.

"You okay?" Winry asked helping me off the floor.

"Yeah." I said between fits of laughter. "I just need a rest."

"Here, let's get you to firearms training." She said walking out a different door. I followed her into a very large room with various firing ranges. Each range was filled with two types of targets. Humanoid and Grimm. She set me up at a station and set up three human, three faunus, and four Grimm targets on range. "Let me see what you can do."

Ignoring the pain in my arms and chest, I drew the pistol from its holster and presented the left side of my body to the targets. I placed the gun in my right hand and brought it up to my left eye causing the weapon to take on a rather angled position. I placed my left hand over the right and pressed my thumbs together on the frame.

Two shots into the head of the first human target, my grip controlling the weapon enough to get them in the same hole. Another four shots took out the other two human targets. I repeated the same process with the faunus targets.

I pushed the weapon forward until my trigger arm was straight with the same angling of the sights. Two shots into the eyes of each Grimm until the slide locked back signifying that I had shot the gun dry.

I placed the weapon on the table and stepped away. She pressed the buttons on the frame of the booth and brought the paper forward. She nodded favorably at the shots. To push the point home, I pressed the blue button on my right gauntlet causing an ice dust blade to extend from the underside of my wrist. I sliced three of the of the targets in half. The blade soon shattered and I pressed the red button on the left one causing fire to shoot out of the tips of the fingers burning the others.

"You did well, you may be able to beat up a first day combat school student with time." The sniper taunted. "Anyway where did you learn to fight and shoot like that?"

"Would you believe me if I said a mixture of Art School and video games?" I explained releasing the slide catch on my pistol and placing it back in my holster. I walked out to the locker room this time with Winry following me.

I opened my locker and placed my gauntlets and pistol back into the compartment. I closed the door then turned around to see Winry looking a bit nervous. "John, Earthers can have an Aura, but not a semblance. Do you want an Aura?" She asked shyly. What does that entail, John?

"I heard what initiation entails, so I'm guessing that's not a question more like an order?" I explained. "But, I haven't eaten since this morning on Earth, so I would like to at least get some lunch first."

"Oh right, yeah." She said softly. She turned around and led me away from the locker room back into the main hall. It was less packed this time because the pairs had either gone into training or went to eat lunch. I opened the double doors of the dining hall and let her enter first. The large room was just as white as the rest of the building with each wall covered by floor to ceiling windows.

I walked to the other side of the hall where a large buffet had been setup. I grabbed a plate and went searching for something to eat. I found a nice assortment of chicken tenders and French fries or whatever they were called on Remnant, a couple of cut up strawberries, and a glass of milk.

I choose a random table nearest one of the windows and sat down with my food, across from me was a cat faunus with red hair and a cargo vest. He seemed to be speaking French into a cell. It was weird because most Remnans used scrolls and spoke the Remnant version of English.

He finished and pressed the hang up button. "Merde." He whispered. "They already think I'm being beaten up!"

"Excuse me," I ask, "Are you speaking French?"

"Oh yeah," He said, "that confuses a lot of people. I am a faunus, but I was born in France. By the way, Michael Rust." He extended his hand.

"John Bauer," I said shaking his hand.

"An American?"

"Yeah." I answered. "Did you come with the Earthers, or are you a guide?"

"Guide, they didn't want me to come with the Earthers in case it caused any confusion. We faunus are still rare on Earth." He explained. After that Winry sat down next to me with her lunch, just a simple salad.

I dipped the first tender in a little dish of ketchup as Winry and Michael got into a conversation about what they were going to do with their partners next. We both were wondering where Michael partner was until I looked up and saw Nicole sitting down next to Michael.

"I swear to God, John, if you say one thing insulting right now, I will gut you." She growled taking one look at me.

"I'd like to see you try." I responded with a smirk.

"You two know each other?" Winry asked.

"Who's she, the next girl you will try to convince to date you with an owl?" Nicole taunted.

"Well I see it takes a pussy to control another pussy." I insulted. She began to reach across the table in an attempt to grab my shirt. I responded by grabbing my knife and then grabbing her wrist. I slammed her hand down and stabbed the knife in the table area between her thumb and index finger. I then stood up, grabbed my lunch, and left the room.

I slid down a wall just outside the cafeteria and began to eat my lunch again, this time without the luxury of having a knife to cut up my food. You did the right thing.

"Thank you." I whispered back. I continued to eat while I began to hear some footsteps approaching me.

"What the hell was that for?" Winry shouted at me.

"It's a long story involving a camel, a walnut, and three pairs of chopsticks." I sarcastically mentioned before continuing to eat.

"I'm not going to be partnered with an asshole!" She exclaimed.

"I was telling the truth about the walnut part!" She slapped me in the face with that one.

"How about you try and survive initiation without an Aura! I'm coming to save your ass when the Grimm are tearing you apart limb from limb!" She screamed before storming off. My phone soon buzzed with the arrival of another message.

HFW

AMGKJWCAYNJOYMQZZPUVPEKLYHTVSUQ

ZHEP

LOGXXXWWRJ

I ran the message through my decoder and sighed at the translation. I then began to swear at Nicole for coming back into my life to continue to hurt me.