Chapter 3: Title Pending

As soon as Ozpin mentioned landing strategies and I saw a kid jet into the air. I went from "bring it on" to "Oh shit" in about a thirty second time frame. I watched as Zora got launched to my left and felt the plate stiffen under my feet suddenly springing forward, launching me into the air.

I pulled out my machete and pistol as I flew through the air used them as a booster and steering wheel in a way. I fired off shots with the pistol hoping to gain some momentum while using the machete as a balance. In front of me was a very old mahogany tree that I used to slow down my descent.

I stabbed my machete into the bark of the tree and started to slide down the side. When my feet hit ground I took a look at my surroundings. All around 100 feet of trees blocked out most of the sunlight creating an eerie setting. I used my semblance and sensed the area around myself for around a mile. I felt a couple Grimm to my East and a few students just a few hundred feet away.

"Zora! Garnet!" I yelled, searching for anyone I knew; I received no responses and sighed. "Well, looks like I'm walking." I started to walk in the direction I thought the forest temple was and just relaxed. I put my hands behind my head and called out to Zora or Brendan occasionally. Well, might as well figure out what Ozpin might put at the temple. With his personality and the read my semblance got off of him it's probably a game piece of some sort.

Just as I finished with that thought something tackled me from above. Instinctively I pulled out Winlen and threw a girl into the nearest tree holding the sharp blade up to her throat.

"I thought you said to chill" Zora joked pointing out that her spear head was an inch away from my stomach. "Call it a draw?"

"Deal." I let her down from the tree I pinned her to and smiled. "So I guess you're stuck with me for another 4 years!" She put her two fingers to her nose and shook her head. "Well that's not nice." I mimicked her and she just walked away.

"You and Garnet are so childish sometimes." We left it at that because as we walked into a clearing, and instantly were surrounded by two Ursa. I pulled out Eld and prepared for a fight. Zora and I stood back to back in a clearing about twenty feet around. The first bear charged at me but I was ready. I fired a single shot into its eye then front flipped over it, drawing Winlen at the same moment and making a gash in the large Grimm's back . It turned in an instant and swiped, hitting me in the chest, sending me flying into a tree a couple feet away.

"Hey Zora, are we targeting one or taking one Ursa apiece?" I landed and jumped up into a tree with branches higher than the Grimm could reach, whipping Winlen in my hand so the blade faced down.

"These Ursa are tougher than usual, you think the school sicked them on us? Either way it's just a test, take your pick on one and kill it." She was already blocking hits from one the bears with her spear so I figured I'd go for the other one. You poor cub . I jumped out of the tree higher into the air and prepared to stab the Ursa in the head. I was falling so fast my blade was almost molten with heat, but my aura had encased me so I couldn't feel a thing.

My blade tore right through the thick armor and stabbed the large creature through without even dulling. When I pulled the blade out of the Grimm's head it was covered in thick black blood and I wiped it off as I watched Zora attack her Ursa.

"Try going for the stomach. There's no armor underneath" I called out helpfully,. She just glared at me and slashed the Ursa across the face using her range as I major advantage. The spear made a clear connection as she ducked a swipe the Ursa took with its giant claws and she rolled close into it. She grinned and sunk the spear head into whatever thing that kept them alive. They didn't have a heart so I usually called them black holes where their heart should be.

"I don't need your help you know." She said looking angry.

"What did I do this time? Don't give me the silent treatment Zora. You know you love me!" I threw her over my shoulder as a joke and started to walk.

"Put me down Brendan! This isn't funny!" she laughed and lightly pounded my back. I just looked over my shoulder at her and smiled. I carried her like that for five minutes when my arm started to get tired and I put her down. "How close to the temple are we?"

"I lost all sense of direction one we got in that fight." I shrugged and examined Eld, my pistol, it had a few dark marks on it from the Grimm's blood splattering on it but other than that it was in good condition.

"Can't you just use your semblance?" Zora said fixing her hair. She had a silver hair clip in it to hold her hair out of her eyes. I smiled and she gave me a weird look. "What?"

"Nothing, it's just been a while since I actually was alone with you." I turned back to the forest in front of me and activated my semblance, hoping I could pinpoint the temple. I could feel a bunch of energy coming from close by to the North. It was probably the energy of the other kids grouping together. Well that's going to the attention of some big Grimm. "We're close, we can get there in a few minutes if we sprint it."

"Let's get going then!" Zora smiled and took off in front of me.

After sprinting for 5 minutes we finally arrived. The entire area was like a bowl with cliffs going down steeply into a field like area. Garnet was standing to a Rabbit Faunus girl who was holding a chess piece. I noticed he got paired with a girl and gave him thumbs up. He smiled and went back to talking with her and that girl Ruby. We walked up onto a platform and sure enough bunches of chess piece were sitting on podiums. I picked up a white queen and tossed it to Zora. She nodded and I walked over to that blonde girl from last night.

"So we meet again. Miss me?" I put my arm around her and stood next to her like a complete arrogant bastard. She had been talking to her partner and she already had her arms crossed so I knew It would be hard to hit me in the face. I was practically leaning on her and her eyes looked murderous when she turned to me.

"Not really, trust me when I say you are not getting with this." She shoved me off and glared at me.

"Oh come on! I don't want to 'get' with that. I was just thinking that my extreme handsomeness was enough to at least get a flirt." I smiled, but my smile vanished when I heard a scream from above and saw a blond guy trying to catch some girl in mid-air, he caught her but they both fell straight down with the girl landing right on top of his back. Then I saw the Grimm. A Death Stalker had just bust out of the woods, chasing a girl with bright red hair and wearing Amazon-like armor. Circling above us was a Nevermore, it was looking around almost in a hungry way trying to determine who to eat first. Called it, I took a better look around to see where we'd be fighting and it wasn't good. First off the ruins around us could fall down at any moment.

Most of the other first years drew out ranged weapons, which would mean friendly fire on accident or not at some point. I looked over at Zora and knew she was thinking the same thing.

"There's no point in staying here. Our mission is to get an artifact and get back to the cliff. We don't have to fight these things." Ruby said taking charge. Her voice had changed into a completely different tone from what it had been before, much more mature.

"She's right; we need to get going if we want to avoid a fight." A white haired girl said. Ruby nodded to her and we all took off towards the cliff. I looked back when I was halfway up the hill and saw that Yang and some girl dressed in black had stayed there.

"Come on beautiful! I don't want that pretty face getting hurt!" I yelled as I sprinted up next to Garnet. "You know we're gonna have to fight don't you?"

"Yep, just hope we can take those things down." He pulled out his katanas and jumped on top of the ruins getting a better view. I followed his lead and took the other side. Right as we were about to make it out of the valley the Nevermore blocked our path to the cliff.

"Nora distract it!" a black haired guy called somewhere to my left. Why just her? When I saw that this girl had a grenade launcher I instantly thought. That…is…so…AWESOME! We ran into a ravine that had a large stone bridge connecting different towers that rose up from the Foggy Bottom. We had just made it to the center of the bridge when the Nevermore came in for an attack and separated out the group. I was on one side with Zora and like 4 other kids including Nora and the blond guy while Garnet and his partner had gotten stuck on the other side.

Well, as usual, I took a lucky draw and had to fight the Death Stalker. The black haired guy pulled out some sweet mini pistols and started to go to town on it while another girl slipped out a rifle and followed his lead. I pulled out Eld and was nailing every shot making several chinks in its armor. The girl with the grenade launcher had turned it into a war hammer and nailed the Grimm right in the head! The blond guy, I really need to learn their names, charged the Night Stalker with the classic sword and shield combo. We managed to shove the Grimm back a few feet giving us room to fight. Zora was with sword guy and was slashing at its eyes when I saw the guy with the machine-pistol things jump onto its tail and start to shoot at the connecting point of the stinger and tail.

He had done a lot of work when the Grimm started to shake its tail around sending him flying into the nearest column.

"REN!" Nora yelled letting her smile fade for the first time.. Well that's his name.

"Zora we need to go for its tail!" I yelled to her. She nodded and threw her spear with deadly accuracy slicing the stinger completely off and slightly embedding it into the things head.

"Nora now!" said the blond guy. She nodded and used the other girl's shield as a booster to launch herself into the air. She fired a grenade and used the momentum to get higher than shot another one bringing her down even faster then slammed the stinger through the Night Stalker's head. We're done, how's Garnet doing? Hope he hasn't gotten himself beaten-up again.

The others had been isolated on the tower and looked like they had a plan. When I looked over Ruby and Garnet were loaded into a makeshift sling shot. The white haired girl had some weird symbol by their feet and when she turned it red they shot into the air so fast I almost couldn't see them. Both of them caught the neck of the Nevermore that had been frozen to the ground earlier. The symbols showed up on the cliff face and together Garnet and Ruby ran up the cliff dragging the Nevermore with them. Ruby holding onto its neck and Garnet catching it by jaw.

When they reached the top they both used shots from their weapons and tore the head completely off of the Grimm. As the body started to fall into the chasm below the cliff I saw red and black rose petals flying off of their bodies, scattering to the wind and leaving the rest of us speechless.

"That's my brother." I said to myself staring up at him with pride. "YA! GO GARNET!" I saw him blush slightly and then he and Ruby jumped down to their group. "THAT'S MY BROTHER!"

Later that day

We walked back to the cliff without running into any other Grimm, thank goodness. Just as I had planned it, when the first few kids walked through the main door BAM! Confetti cannons blasted above them and air horns blasted in their ears and after all that 20 gallons of water rained down. I just couldn't help but laughing! If you had seen their faces! Oh it was perfect! I was rolling on the ground and couldn't breathe I was laughing so hard!

"Now I see why you didn't want me using the main doors." Garnet laughed and fell down right beside me. "Oh man, that was too good! Where did you get that much water?"

"I just pulled a hose over from the cafeteria! I never thought that I would nail like 4 kids with it!" right as I finished I saw who one of those kids was, Zora. OH CRAP! She looked seriously pissed. "Hey Zora! I didn't know you were going to the pool today!"

"You little!" she ran after me as I ditched outside and started to duck around corners. "Brendan! Get back here!" She started to gain on me and I had one last moment to think note to self, don't prank Zora, before my head hit pavement. I tried to get up but she slammed a foot on my chest and held me down. "Now, who are you not going to prank again?"

"Zora, you're crushing me." I choked out as she applied more pressure. She pulled up her foot and gave me a boost off of the ground. "Thanks, we should catch up with the others." I put my arm around her and pretended to be drunk as we made our way to the Auditorium. We showed up just a few minutes behind all the other students and Garnet was sitting next to Ruby pulling out some of the moves I taught him.

The entire place was around 300 feet with rows of seats getting higher from the center outwards. The seats each had a table in front of them so it was obviously a glorified classroom. The tables were a sturdy oak as were the chairs but they had absolutely no cushion to them. I took a seat on the end with Zora next to me still dripping water all over. I saw Ozpin standing in the middle of the small platform in the middle of the room. He called out 4 names.

"Weiss Schnee, Yang Xiao Long, Blake Belladonna, and Ruby Rose." They each stood in front of Ozpin as straight as they could possibly. "You each collected the white knight pieces. From now on you will be known as team RWBY. Your team's leader will be Ruby Rose." I saw Ruby's jaw drop and Yang gave her a giant look and smiled. They walked off the platform with Weiss looking cheated. She seems to be very angry for someone who wears white.

"Who do you think will lead our group?" Zora asked leaning over at me. I just shrugged at her and turned back to Ozpin trying to see who was up next.

"Jaune Arc, Pyrrha Nikos, Lie Ren, Nora Valkyrie." They took the same pose except for Nora who was still bouncing on her heels and smiling. "You each collected the White Rook pieces. From now on you will be known as team JNPR. Your team leader will be Jaune Arc." He smiled slightly and took a sip of his coffee. As Jaune's jaw dropped even lower than Ruby's had they made their way back to a row of seats.

"We're up next Brendan; let's see who we get paired up with! Hopefully it isn't that guy over there in the knight armor. He seems like a huge jerk." We sat there waiting for Ozpin to look at his paper; he frowned a little bit when he saw the names.

"Garnet Rose, Velvet Scarlatina, Brendan Grimm, Zora Ignacio." We walked over to Ozpin and stood in front of all the other kids. Garnet stood next to me slightly blushing under the lights. "From now on you will be known as team BRVZ. Your team leader will be…" Not me, that's for sure. "Brendan Grimm." Crazy Professor says what now? Garnet punched me in the shoulder and smiled up at me. We all sat down next to each other in some empty seats and I was in complete shock.

"Brendan? Hey bro, focus up man!" Garnet waved his hand in my face and when I looked over at him and he smiled at me. "So how's it feel to be a team leader?" I got myself put back into one piece and just started laughing and looking up at the ceiling high above me. "We should get out of here to find our dorm."

"No objections to that. I could use a chance to change." Zora said flinging water on me. I was still laughing like a maniac. "I think he needs to calm down." We all got up with me leading the way back to the dorm we had been assigned as we walked out of the auditorium. We were over in the Eastern wing of the school and even as we walked into the room I was still giggling like a little kid.

"Okay it's official, he's gone in insane! Snap out of it!" Garnet said slapping me as hard as he could. I stopped laughing and looked at him. I guess I looked pretty angry because he backed up a few feet. I shook my head and looked at everyone.

"All good now. So I have one question right off the bat. How are we going to change everyday without one of you two girls starting at the studliness that is us brothers?" Velvet meeped quietly at my remark at blushed. Shy girl huh?

"You are so full of yourself Brendan." Zora said pulling out some clothes and walking into the bathroom. When she walked out she was wearing Pj's and flopped face down on the bed closest to her. I took the one in between her and Garnet.

"So anyway I'm Brendan, nice to meet you Velvet!" I smiled holding out my hand. She shook it and smiled back slightly. Our room was basically a Hotel room that could fit 4 beds and a couple dressers, tucked into the corner was the bathroom door. The carpet was a dark red and the walls were stark white. On the wall farthest from the door were our beds and a massive window. My bed was a full with a comforter that matched the carpet and a frame made out of some kind of thick Balsa wood.

I closed the blood red curtains and slipped into the bathroom to put on my pajamas while the others were talking about what happened to them in forever fall. I took off my shirt and saw a few new scars. At some point the Night Stalker had slashed my chest leaving a long but not too deep cut. My arms had a few nicks on them from chipping off the thick white armor and I could feel a slash on my leg from where that Ursa had gotten me. I bandaged up my cuts and slipped on a loose white shirt and some blue plaid pants.

When I walked out everyone was joking about how Velvet had fallen on Garnet when she flew off of her launch pad. I smiled and sat down next to Zora joining in on the conversation. We talked about old stories for hours on end, some of the funniest were the ones Velvet told though, and apparently butter is recession proof. Velvet fell asleep first followed in hot pursuit by Garnet. I sat on Zora's bed and as she got tired put her head on my shoulder.

"These next few years are going to be so crazy." She yawned. "I'll see you in the morning Brendan." She pushed my lightly off her bed and crawled under the covers.

"Good night Zora." I slipped under the heavy blanket and fell asleep almost instantly.

The next day

I woke up to the sound of Garnet's alarm clock. It was the Spanish station playing at max volume; I don't know why he listened to that station because he doesn't understand a single word. What should I do today? Maybe set Garnet up for a little alone time with Ruby? Yup, that's it! I slipped on some jeans and a tight black shirt. I tied the band for my machete sheath in my belt loops and on the other side I slipped the pistol holster on. Over that I put on my jacket and started to brush my teeth.

Everyone else slugged around where as I was bouncing off the walls. I had a crazy dream that I was at my grandparent's house talking to Pocahontas' dad about the president while a purple garden gnome sat between us. After that I went outside and met up with some red head girl, she told me something but I couldn't remember it. Weird night. I watched as the others finished getting ready.

"You guys do know that class starts in 10 minutes right?" I asked. Garnet turned to me eyes wide and used his semblance to dash around almost faster than I could follow, Zora pulled out a brush and went to town on her hair while Velvet frantically jumped onto her bead avoiding a head on collision with Garnet. "That's it, big brother mode." I grabbed all three of them by their arms and burst out the door and full speed flinging the others in front of me getting them to the end of the hall where they followed my lead and ran down the stairs.

I ran back into our room and opened a window jumping out of it. I dropped a few stories and came down lightly on my toes then sprinted over to Professor Port's class. I actually ended up ahead of everyone which really confused them. We all sprinted at top speed with teams RWBY and JNPR just coming through the doors. Velvet was struggling to keep up with the rest of us and started to fall behind when Garnet grabbed her wrist and made a reference I will never forget.

"I got you babe" Oh my gosh it was so perfect! He even winked to add effect and everything! Velv might've even blushed for a second or two. Eventually we did end up getting to class but only after a series of Weiss trying to blast me with her rapier for sticking my tongue out at her.

Sorry Vennie old pal but I'm handing it off to you here because I suck at writing classroom scenes! And to all you amazing and wonderful people who follow this story and big thank you and please leave a review about what you thought and/or a battle cry I can use at the end of future chapters.