Before anything else, I own nothing but the original characters, and content therein related to them. RWBY is owned by RT, and any mentioned creator's work belongs to them, and them alone. Rest in peace Monty, your vision lives on in us all.
CHAPTER 11
Team SPGL took the liberty of rearranging their room about a week after classes started. They'd turned in two of the four bed frames into storage, and threw Siniy's broken one out into the nearest dumpster. Clayton had anchored a hammock to the corner wall and ceiling. Pale kept his bed to the far corner, and maintained a militaristic level of order in how he tidied his sheets and blankets. Siniy, with Halcyone and Clayton's extra mattresses, slept in what looked like a nest of cotton and wool under Clayton's hammock. Finally, Halcyone slept underneath Pale's bed on the floor with no more than a few sheets and a pillow. Just how she liked it… That and she replaced all the skirts she was provided with the men's uniform pants. Ain't no way she was dancing around one of those things. Eventually Clayton put up a "King Wong" movie poster near his bed. Halcyone left her headphones and outdated mobile CD player on the nearest nightstand. Siniy owned next to nothing, and Pale... Well...
"What the fuck, man?!" Halcyone asked, as her teamate unrolled an old 3 foot by 6 foot Anima Rebel flag from his things, hanging it above his bed.
"What?" Pale asked, as he tacked the last corner in place.
"Cunt, you're in Vale now, that's not cool." She said. Pale shrugged.
"Ain't nothin' wrong with the flag. It's an eastern heritage thing. My forefather carried this up Yank hill under cannon fire in the war." He reasoned.
Clayton groaned before settling the matter. "Pale, I don't care if you hang the flag in the room, but if this is going to be a problem with the others, take it down." Clayton said.
"Alright then. Siniy, you care if I hang this up?" Pale asked the other known fanus in the room.
Siniy sighed. "I'd have torn it down if I took issue with it." He said.
Pale shrugged at Halcyone. Halcyone puffed a breath through her teeth. "Keep it up then. But I swear if you get us in trouble for this, I'mma kick ya' ass." She said.
Once school had actually picked up the pace, combat class easily became one of the most entertaining periods for Team SPGL. "Kick him in the dick! Kick him in the dick!" Halcyone shouted to Jaune as Cardin got into a lock with him. Jaune apparently didn't hear the advice, but Cardin did, and sent his knee right into Jaune's groin. The auditorium groaned in sympathetic pain, as the match ended, with Cardin the victor. There was a small lecture about the Vytal festival coming up in a few months, but Team SPGL, RWBY and the NPR of JNPR were more interested in either, helping drag Jaune off the arena in Yang, Ruby, Clayton and Pyrrha's case, or in everyone else's case, leaving to go get dinner.
As usual the seating arrangements hadn't changed. Ruby, Blake, Yang, Jaune, Nora, Pyrrha, Ren, Clayton, Siniy, (he had to bring a jackstand turned into a steel stool with him everywhere on campus because he regularly broke wood chairs and benches with his weight,) and Halcyone all sat together, while Weiss ate by her lonesome, and Pale disappeared after quickly wolfing down his food. Little did they know he was going through the personal belongings of his classmates, looking for signs one of them had ties to the White Fang, aside from Blake. His own team's belongings were easy enough to go through, as they owned so little, or in Clayton's case, simply had a personal notebook that was more than chicken scratch and lewd or sensual drawings of Ruby. "My god Clayton, get a new hobby." Pale said, as he came across a drawing that looked like... Well it wasn't done yet... but he assumed it was supposed to be Ruby and some other girl.
RWBY's room was harder to get to as he needed to use the grapple on his bayonet to scale the outside wall and get in through the window. There was no payoff to searching their things unfourtunatly, which to be fair, only made sence. Weiss was against the White Fang, no doubt, and it was entirelly unlikely Ruby or Yang was going to have White Fang paraphernalia if Clayton didn't, unless they were faunus in hiding like Blake, but there was no evidence of that. Speaking of evidence, it didn't seem like Blake had anything laying around relating to her reasons for being at Beacon, which again to be fair, would be reasonable since she was in hiding under a fake last name. For that matter, the most damning thing Pale found in her corner of the room indicating her faunus nature was smut... Lot's of weird interracial smut... Maybe Blake was just a pervert?... JNPR's room was even less telling. From the looks of it, they were just four messy roomates. Over the past week he'd been canvasing the campus for any signs of White Fang infiltrators, as he had the nearby dorms of his classmates, and thankfully, thusfar he'd returned empty handed.
Meanwhile in the dinning hall. Nora had told some fever dream of a story to the table, and Jaune looked more down than usual. "Are you ok? You look like someone shot your dog." Halcyone said.
"I feel like if someone shot Zwei, I'd be pissed, not sad." Yang said.
"Yang, you punch people when they touch your hair." Clayton said, Yang smirked.
"My hair care routine is both expensive and time consuming, I have a right to be angry when people mess with it." Yang said, stroking her long locks.
"But seriously Jaune you ok?" Ruby asked her fellow team leader.
"I'm fine, seriously guys." Jaune said, only for someone's laughter to break the awkward silence that followed his response. The row with their backs to the noise turned to see Cardin Winchester and his team laughing at a second year, Velvet Scarlatina. The sound made Siniy look up and un-hunch from his near 175,000 calorie meal consisting of half a roast pig and near a whole stewing pot of potatos.
"Jaune, Cardin's been picking on you since the beginning of School." Pyrrha pointed out, saying what he wouldn't.
"Cardin? He's just a jock messing around." Jaune said, trying to wave off the concern of his friends.
"He's an asshole and a bully." Ruby said frankly.
"Name one time Cardin's bullied me." Jaune said.
Clayton held his left fist up, then extended his index finger. "Slapping your history book to the floor, breaking the spine forcing you to pay for a new one." Clayton said.
"Extending your shield in a doorway, which made you late to combat class." Pyrrha said, as Clayton held up his middle finger to accompany his index.
"The wedge after grimm studies." Yang said, as Clayton extended his thumb.
"Shoving you into a rocket propelled locker, and sending it into Vale." Ruby said, as Clayton extended his ring finger.
"That's four by my count." Blake said.
"What about in dust theory when he lit you on fire during the practical application last week?" Nora asked.
"If you ever need help with him, all you have to do is ask." Pyrrha said, as Jaune got up to throw away his trash.
"You guys, it's not that big a deal, besides Cardin's a jerk to everyone. Me, Weiss, second years, third years, he's an equal opportunity asshole." Jaune said, as the table turned their attention to the mocking Velvet was receiving for her ears. Siniy slammed his utensles into the table, sending a small crack through the wood, as he moved to stand up, only for Clayton to grab his forearm stopping him.
"Easy there big guy, we don't need you killing him." Clayton said, as he pulled Siniy back into his seat.
"Are you just going to let him make fun of her like that?" Siniy asked, placing his fists on the table.
"She should be able to fight her own battles." Clayton said, as Ruby, Yang and Blake looked at him.
"Clay, I know you want faunus to stand up for themselves, but Velvet doesn't seem like the type." Ruby said.
"We can't just beat up someone because they treat us like trash, that would make us no better." Clayton said.
"But if people are being hurt?" Nora asked, Clayton sighed.
"Then we can get involved. Force breeds force after all, nobody should be surprised by retaliation against an attack." Clayton said, before a cry of pain came from Velvet. "That hurts." She whimpered.
Clayton drew a sharp breath. "Ok, now we get involved." He said, releasing Siniy's arm. The gorilla and the bear stood up from their seats, as Nora smiled, attempting to stand, before Ren held her back, foreseing her instigating a fight. Yang got up with them, and cracked her knuckles. The treo then walked around the table over to where Cardin sat. The armored bully looked at the two approaching faunus, and the blond brawler, two of which were much larger than him, and swallowed hard, before letting go of Velvet's ears.
"Are we going to have a problem here?" Clayton asked. Cardin shook his head nonchalantly.
"No problems at all. I was just getting a look at her animal parts." Cardin said. Siniy nodded, and turned around to leave, clearly there was going to be no fight, and his potatos were going to get cold.
"Aha, right. Cardin, I want to make it known that I'm not exactly one to keep my temper in check, and I don't like you. So for your own health, I'd recommend you refrain from touching people without permission." Clayton said, getting a head nod from Cardin.
"Completely understood. I'll ask next time curiosity strikes me." He said with a smirk. Clayton nodded, and turned away, followed shortly by Yang, who sneered at the jerk, unable to hear what Cardin had called Clayton in a mutter. "Stupid monkey."