The bell rang which signaled the end of third period. Jaune let out an exhausted and heavy sigh. Mr. Wolff's class was a little harder than he expected. Jaune learned a lot of new things but his brain felt a little fried. He looked forward to a five minute break.
As Jaune got the textbook from Mr. Wolff, he tried to remember what class he had next. He listed the classes he went through today he remembered that it was the class he was most excited and scared for: Combat class.
Jaune thanked Mr. Wolff, and began to head to the arena. As he was walking the hallway, he gripped Corcea Moor's hilt, which was strapped to his back. The last time he had used it was during Dew's spar and he didn't really do that well. That didn't bold well for today. Jaune took a deep breath and shook his head.
"I got this," he thought. "It's just combat class. It's the place where I can prove to everyone that I can be a huntsman."
As Jaune continued to hype himself up, he didn't realize that he was already walking into the arena. He looked around in the bleachers and noticed a lot of first year were already there. He saw NDGO chatting amongst themselves to his right. Nebula noticed him and gave a big wave to him. When the others of her team saw Jaune, they all waved at him. Dew gave a sly smile with a finger gun, Octavia gave a wave just like her leader, and Gwen gave a half of one but didn't look at him. Jaune grew a small smile and waved back. Unfortunately that would cause him a moment of embarrassment in a little bit.
"Mr. Arc!" Mr. Jett called out. Jaune looked over to the combat teacher. He was still wearing the scorpion pattern black robe with the long brown scarf that covered his lower face. He was also weraing the black jeans and combat boots. "You can flirt later we need to talk." Jaune went red in the face and he swore he heard Dew laugh like a maniac. He turns to NDGO to see that he was right, but Octavia was also giggling too. Nebula mouthed sorry while Gwen just looked down at the ground with a huge blush to match Jaune.
Jaune mumbled about how Mr. Jett shouldn't embaress his students as he walked over to him. "What was that?" Mr. Jett asked in a strict tone. Jaune shot up and shook his head.
"Nothing!"
"Good. Now then I still need to assign you a rocket locker. How often are you going to use it?" Jaune explained that he rarely used his locker back at Beacon as he felt a lot safer having Crocea Mors on him. "All right, well how about if you keep the locker in your room? A lot of the older years prefer to keep their lockers in their room so they can keep their weapons close to them instead of having to travel all the way down here for it."
"Wouldn't the locker make a giant hole in my roof, and the other floors?" This was often why they kept their lockers in the locker room back at Beacon. No point in putting holes in the floors of the school if they can avoid it. Besides the roof in the locker room opened up anytime a locker had to be launched out.
"Actually thanks to some of the computer guys work, the did some tweaking in the software so the lockers actually try to find the nearest window and break out of there. Cheaper to replace a window or two than a couple of concrete and wooden floors." Jaune had no idea if it was cheaper but he shrugged it off. Still though, he didn't know if he wanted to clean up glass shards every time he used the dang thing. When he told Mr. Jett this the brown skinned teacher nodded his head. "We're trying our best to find the ideal situation for the lockers. Ozpin keeps the lockers at Beacon in the room because he views that as best for the students. At the same time we know how much our students are paranoid about having their weapons and armor stolen so Belinda likes to experiment different ways. So far most of the students don't mind the cleanup with the locker in their room as they knew beforehand what would happen. So, you want to leave the locker here or in your room?"
Jaune took a minute to think about the pros and cons. Leaving the locker in the locker room seemed to be good idea. It's what he was most accustomed to so he would be more familiar with it. Besides he didn't mind carrying Corcea Mors around. At the same time, having the locker in his room would be easier to get to if he needed to get to it quickly. After all he would most likely be spending his time in his dorm so all he would have to do is grab and go.
You know what, new school... new methods.
"I think I'll try having the locker in my room," Jaune said as he gave Mr. Jett a smile. He put his finger up. "However, can I change it back to the locker room later if I want to?"
"Of course," Mr. Jett responded. "You sure you want it in your room?" Jaune gave a firm nod. "All right come to me after your classes are done. OH, and get some friends to help you move it." Jaune nodded his head and headed to the bleachers.
When he got up there he made his way over to NDGO. When they saw him Dew had a big grin on her face. "Sup Flirt master?" She jested. "Make any new girlfriends on your way here?"
"Can we not talk about that please?" Jaune said covering his now reddening face.
"I think it's the perfect time to talk about it!" Octavia butted in. "Tell me, where did you learn such sick flirting skills?"
"That's it I'm ignoring you guys."
"Will you idiots stop?" Nebula said. "Sorry for embarrassing you Jaune." Jaune waved his hand at the all-female team.
"Don't worry about it. After all I grew up with seven sisters it will take more than that to annoy me."
As the team and Jaune continued to chat the bell eventually rang for the start of class. When it did Mr. Jett walked out into the arena and got everyone's attention… by shooting a pistol in the air. Multiple times.
After everyone's initial scare they all look into the arena where Mr. Jett. Was. He took out the magazine of his pistol and loaded another one in and pulled the slide of his handgun back. "Good, now that all of you have shut up," he started as he holstered the gun. "We can get on with class." He began pacing around the arena. "I am going to do one on one's today as a warm up for coming back from the vacation all of you had. I need volunteers. If I don't have any then I will force you to participate understand?"
"Yes sir!" the arena echoed as the students answered. Jaune was impressed. To command such attention and reaction it made him wonder… how strong is Mr. Jett?
"So who will be the first victims?"
Jaune immediately raised his hand, but then felt one grab his wrist and yank it down. This did not go unnoticed by Mr. Jett. Jaune turned and looked to see Nebula shaking her head no. "You're still recovering," She whispered.
"Hey I took Dew's advice yesterday and rested I'm fine," Jaune said as he tried to raise his hand again. Nebula gripped it again and kept it down and Jaune tried to pull away from her. Unfortunetly for him Dew was on the same page as her leader and tried to keep his arms pinned down.
"Yo dumbass," She insulted. "When I meant rest I meant for a few days not for a few hours."
"Girls leave him be," Octavia said, although she wasn't really trying to stop them as she had her feet up and looked like she was enjoying watching her teammates and Jaune struggle. "If he wants to get himself killed let him. It'll be funny to watch."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Jaune hissed. Octavia just shrug with a grin on her face as Dew and Nebula tried to keep Jaune from raising his hand.
"Will you guys stop?!" Gwen whispered harshly. She tried to make herself smaller as to not to get noticed but her team and Jaune still ended up with people looking over to them, which made her anxiety worsen a bit. "We're going to get-" She is gut off by a gunshot going off and then something fast and small hitting near their seats. The three who were fighting all stopped in their tracks while Gwen and Octavia slid away from them.
Nebula had both of Jaune's arms to his side while Dew was hugging his shoulders to make it so he couldn't raise them. Meanwhile Jaune had his foot underneath Nebula as if he was trying to kick her off. Some of the students all look at Mr. Jett who had a furious look on his face. Meanwhile a bunch of the other first years were trying to stifle their laughter.
"Not even the first ten minutes and you are already causing problems Mr. Arc."
"I just… I uh, I didn't mean I…" Jaune got Nebula and Dew off of him and sat up straight. He looked shamefully at the ground "Sorry…"
"And as for you two," he pointed his pistol to Dew and Nebula. "I expected more from two people who have been here for almost a year now. Especially since one of you is a leader."
"Sir I was just making sure Jaune wouldn't hurt himself!"
"I don't care!" Mr. Jett's voice grew into a yell. Mr. Jett holsters his pistol and then crosses his arms. "Miss Violette, you are a team leader stop acting impulsively! I can respect you wanting to protect your friend but the fact you disrupted my class cannot go without punishment. I wasn't going to let Mr. Arc fight one on one due to his injuries, so you made a scene for no reason!"
He pointed his pointer finger up and said in a low tone, "In the real world, that can get you or your friends killed." He lets his words settle in and Jaune could see how much effect it had on not only team NDGO, but everyone in the room. People were whispering to their team and friends, and they all seemed a little on edge. Not that he could blame them, Mr. Jett's words cut like a hot knife through butter.
"A demonstration is in order." Jaune could see Nebula flinch but she nodded her head. As she took her crossbow off her back though, Mr. Jett yelled again. "No! You will not be fighting." He then pointed to the raven haired girl on Nebula's team. "Miss Darcy, you will be fighting." Gwen's eyes looked scared as he called her name.
"This is unfair!" Nebula shouted. "Dew and I were the ones causing trouble so one of us should-"
"Like it or not your actions have consequences Miss Violette!" Mr. Jett cut her off with his harsh rough voice. "Sometimes those consequences end up affecting someone who wasn't even involved to begin with. Yet they will have to face them. This is the burden of a leader, and I had hoped you would have learned this by now."
Nebula wanted to rebel, but deep down she knew that Mr. Jett was right. She sits down and looks at the ground. Jaune could see tears starting to form out of the corners of her eyes. She may have gotten use to being yelled at for her mistakes, but that didn't mean it didn't hurt. He scoots over to her and places a hand on her shoulder. She sniffs and looks over to see him giving her a sympathetic look.
"I know the feeling," he said giving a warm smile. "Trust me it sucks now, but you can only grow right?" She wipes her eyes and gives a nod. Meanwhile, Mr. Jett called Gwen down to the arena again.
Gwen slowly stood up, but Jaune could tell that she was shaking. Her eyes began to dart round as if looking at every single student, and they were all looking right back at her. The raven haired girl's breathing began to increase rapidly. She looked as if she was going to have a panic attack.
Gwen felt someone lightly tap her on her shoulder. She flinched and turned to see Octavia giving her a nod. "Take a deep breath Gwen," the red head whispered. "Breath." Gwen did as she was told and closed her eyes. The nervous girl seemed to be calming down. When she opened her eyes again she saw Octavia giving her a confident smile. "You got this girl. Go get 'em."
Gwen gave a nod and hopped over the stands that separate the arena from the bleachers. Everyone could see that Mr. Jett had calmed down a little. He rubbed his face in annoyance. As he took deep breaths he finally got moving on with class.
"Now then, since I am no longer in the mood for volunteers, I will be selecting the next fighter…" As Mr. Jett looked around the classroom for a minute, he found the next person for the fight. "Miss Tucker you are up."
"What?!" a familiar voice yells. Jaune looked around until he found who Mr. Jett was talking about. It was the same girl he heard boasting about how she defeated fourth years with his spar with Dew. She had slightly tanned skin and was wearing a bright green unzipped hoodie with black leggings and shirt. Her blonde hair was cut short that you could mistake her for a guy at first glance.
"I have to fight little miss shy and quiet out of any of them?! She wouldn't even put up a fight!"
"Miss Tucker…" Mr. Jett warned. However her anger kept her in a fit.
"Can't I at least fight Nebula or someone who will actually be worth a damn to fight?" Jaune could feel his hands turn into fists. Despite not being the best of friends with Gwen the fact that this girl was insulting her for her combat skills spoke to Jaune to a personal level. He looked over to the rest of team NDGO and he could tell they were pissed. All of them had this look on their face that screamed "I'm going to rip that bitch apart." Jaune couldn't blame them. He could only imagine how his own team felt when Cardin insulted his combat skills.
To be fair though, Cardin was right about Jaune to a degree. For Gwen though? Despite being shy, when push came to shove he can tell that she was tough enough to handle it. After all she handled herself well during the initiation.
"ENOUGH!" Jaune was broken from thoughts when he heard Mr. Jett yell again. "I have had enough of everyone's complaining!" He pointed to the girl who was complaining. "Maria you are getting in here and fighting, end of story! But since you seem to be so good at fighting let's see how you do two on one." Maria looked like she was about to argue but Mr. Jett cut her off. "Shut up and get ready. You dug your own grave for this." Mr. Jett took a deep breath to calm himself. Jaune noticed Maria was grumbling to herself but still was walking toward the arena.
Mr. Jett called Jaune to get his attention. "Jaune, you were among the first to raise your hand. Are you sure you want fight despite your injuries?" Jaune nodded his head. "Then congratulations you are on Gwen's team for this match." Mr. Jett knew NDGO would object to this insisting one of them should go, so he raised his hand towards them. "You will not always fight side by side with your team NDGO, this will get Gwen used to it. I don't want to hear your complaints."
Jaune could see NDGO was annoyed but they kept quiet not wanting to get into any more trouble. Trouble gave them a reassuring nod, unsure if it would help them, and then hopped over the barrier. He could feel the eyes of every student on him. This was the making or breaking point for Jaune. Initiation was the start of this journey, and now this was another test.
He walked up to Gwen and gave a small smile. "Are you ready?" he asked her. She took out two knives, one for each hand, and gave a small nod. Jaune gave nod back and then turned to Mr. Jett.
"Are both sides ready?" Mr. Jett asked.
"As always," Maria stated. She gripped the two handles that were strabbed to her back and unsheathed them, revealing two war axes."This will be a piece of cake." Jaune let out a small growl at her arrogance. People like her always ticked Jaune off. Congrats you can beat someone up, don't let it get to your head. When they do, their fall will be painful and hard. Right now, Jaune wanted to be the person to make her fall.
The blonde shook his head. Where did that thought come from? Even when fighting Cardin, he wanted to beat him to prove that he was getting stronger and to protect his friends, not to embarrass the guy. So why was she any different? She has his ego, and presumable his ability to beat him in a fight.
"Are you two ready?" Jaune was removed from his thoughts by Mr. Jett calling out. He shakes his head and takes out Crocea Mors and puts it in sword and shield mode.
"Yeah," Jaune answered. He looked back at Gwen who gave him another nod. "Yeah we're ready."
"All right then…" The teacher pauses for a moment. Jaune tenses up, readying his mind and body for battle. "Begin!"
Maria starts off by throwing both of her axes at jaune and Gwen respectively. Both sidestep out of the way to avoid getting hit. However they kept their eyes on the weapons they didn't realize their wielder was charging for both of them. Just as they turned to face her, Jaune felt a punch to his stomach causing him to lose his breath. He then felt her drag his arm, and essentially him, to move him into a position. She then kicked Jaune into Gwen, who barely had time to react, causing both of them to fall to the ground.
Maria left the two of them to struggle as she ran over to her axes, which lodged themselves into the wall. Jaune rolls over off of Gwen and shakes his head. He stands up and then offers Gwen a hand, but she gets up on her own. Jaune would've asked what was wrong if they weren't in the middle of a fight.
They turn to see her charging at them again. Maria jumped up in the air and let out a yell. She was going to slam her axes down on Jaune from what Jaune could tell. He rose his shield to protect himself, but it also blinded himself doing so. Maria took this chance to land swiftly on his shield and then launch herself off.
Jaune didn't realize what she did until he saw her launch at Gwen and by then it was too late. Gwen scrambled to throw one of her knives at her but just as she was about to let go she was kicked in the face. The knife drops to the ground and Maria unleashes a flurry of attacks on Gwen.
Maria attacked Gwen with brutal jabs and pokes from the end of her axes. She then kicked Gwen again but caught Gwen's foot with the beard of her axe causing Gwen to fall. Just as she raised it to slice down on Gwen, Jaune sprinted behind her and blocked her axe with his blade by placing it underneath the beard. He then used his shield to bash into her back, causing Maria to let out a loud grunt.
The force of the shield caused Maria to fall backwards. Jaune took this opportunity to stand over Maria and to swing down on her. However as he slashed, Maria blocked it by crossing her axes. As the two struggle for superiority, Jaune can see in her brown eyes that she is determined. So determined that she kicked Jaune in the nads.
Jaune let out a girly scream and gripped his spot. Maria got a leg under him and kicked him, causing him to fall over. Maria tried getting up but then Gwen got on top of her and then tried to stab down on her with one of her knives. She succeeded in slicing down Maria's aura a bit, but the axe wielding blonde dropped her weapon and then grabbed Gwen's neck. She then punched the knife wielder's face a few times. When Gwen was stunned from the punches, Maria nicked some of her pockets knives, and jabbed one right into her arm.
While her aura blocked it, it was still draining Gwen's aura, so she slapped the axe user's hand away and got off of her. She then started planting her knives in the ground by throwing them. When Maria got back up she grabbed her axes and charged at Gwen. The black haired girl gave a smirk and then triggered her knives, causing them to create a shock trap that stunned Maria.
As the two ladies kept their back and forth going, Jaune was slowly recovering from the kick to the nads. He slowly stood up and fought through the pain and tried his best to let his aura do the work. When he was able to stand up he took a look to see where the two were fighting. When he saw them he charged in to help. Unfortunately Maria saw the blonde in the corner of her eye.
She took one of the knives she stole off of Gwen and then chucked it at Jaune. Unfortunately it hit the knight in his stomach causing him to lose more aura. When he tried to get in the fray, Maria again used one of Gwen's knives to keep him at bay. This time Jaune dodged the knife causing Maria to let out an annoyed grunt. She punched and pushed Gwen off of her and then kicked Jaune in the face when he was close enough. She did the "come get me" taunt, causing Jaune to get angry.
Jaune let out a roar as he charged, blade ready for a lunging stab. However, once Jaune lunged Maria stepped out of the way. Jaune missed her, but hit Gwen, who also tried charging at Maria. During the confusion Maria grabs both of their heads and slams them together causing the two of them to let out grunts of pain.
Maria takes her axes and begins attacking Jaune now. She starts with a flurry of blows to his shield but then tries to trip Jaune by using her Axes. Jaune's leg gets caught and he falls to the ground. Maria raises her axe and slams down but Jaune rolls to avoid getting hit. The force from Maria's axes cause part of the floor to be chipped out. She was about to attack Jaune again but she felt three sharp pains attack her back, followed by three small explosions. Gwen continued to throw her knives over at Maria, who began to run to Gwen. Jaune gets back up and shakes his head. He growls and begins running toward them.
Maria was within range of Gwen and began to chop at her to wear down Gwen's aura. She slashes both of her axes outwards on Gwen's stomach, causing the black haired girl to bend over. She then crosses her axes on the back of Gwen's neck and drives her knee into her face. Gwen stumbles back and tries to recover. Meanwhile Maria was about to attack again but Jaune came up from behind her and began to choke her.
He put his sword back into his shield and turned it to sheath mode to try and knock Maria out without hurting her. Jaune realized that Maria was pretty tall for a girl. He'd have to assume she was at least 5'10. Gwen recovered and saw how Maria was struggling to get free and took this chance. With Jaune still holding onto her, Gwen took out three knives in both of her hands to give her small claws and began to stab Maria repeatedly. With the tag team attack working, they dropped Maria's aura down quite a lot.
Maria had enough and kicked Gwen away from her. After taking moment to recover she then elbowed Jaune in the ribs causing the blonde to let go. She trips Jaune again and moves fast enough to slam him down into the ground while he was still in the air. Gwen comes up and jumps on Maria and begins stabbing her again but Maria grab's Gwen's head and then slams her into the ground.
The two of them get back up and see Maria glaring furiously at them. All of them were breathing heavily from the fight, and they needed a break. SO, Gwen took out four of her knives and then threw them into the ground. A second later they detonated, causing smoke to fill the entire arena.
Jaune coughed from the smoke and he couldn't see anything. He could hear both Gwen and Maria coughing as well. What he needed to do was to grab Gwen and keep them away from Maria so they could come up with a plan.
All of a sudden Jaune felt his head hurt again. His vision began to shift colors until it was green. When it did, he could see through the smoke, but he was still coughing from it. He looked around and saw Gwen's figure and ran towards it. He grabbed her wrist causing Gwen to let out a tiny yelp. That was enough for Maria to guess their location as a second later an axe went whizzing pass both of them.
Jaune leaned closer to Gwen. "Sorry Gwen but stay quiet okay?" Before Gwen could answer Jaune began pulling her away from Maria, who was cussing the two of them out.
When Jaune saw that they were as far away from the axe maniac as possible, he let go of Gwen's wrist. While they were still in the smoke, the two of them were close enough to see each other and listen to each other.
"Gwen, are you okay?" was the first thing Jaune asked. Despite tasking a couple of hits, Gwen nodded her head. "Good. Look we won't have a lot of time but right now I think we need to take a few moments to come up with a plan. Are you okay with that?" Gwen thought about it for a second but nodded her head. "Cool. Now how long do your smoke knives last?"
"Um.. a-about two minutes," Gwen stuttered.
"How many more do you have left?" Gwne counted the knives she had. While it wasn't a lot it was still enough for them to keep talking. "All right, when the smoke dies down keep throwing them to keep the smoke screen up. I have an idea."
To be continued.