Chapter Four: Initiation
The first thing Phoenix heard when he woke up was a voice ecstatic shouting, "Wake up lazy butt," and then repeatedly announcing it was morning. The voice sounded familiar, but he couldn't remember where he'd heard it before. The moment he sat up he recognized her: the girl from the airship who wouldn't shut up about pancakes. She was talking to the same boy she was with during the flight.
"Well, no time to talk," Phoenix thought, grabbing his bag (sticky note still on it) and making a break for the locker room, taking special care not to be seen. Ozpin had arranged for him to secretly have an additional locker where he would store his Flaming Shadow gear. When he finally reached his destination, he took a moment to survey the room, looking for anyone else in the area. When he was sure no one was around, he opened up his bag. Inside it was his mask, coat, swords, etc. Phoenix quickly stuffed it all into his locker. The only thing he kept with him was his lighter. With that done he breathed a sigh of relief.
"That was easy," he thought. Just as he thought this, he heard footsteps behind him. He quickly slammed the locker shut just in time to keep Weiss from seeing its contents.
"Oh, hello," she greeted him in an unusually cheerful way. "I'm glad to see you again."
"That makes one of us," he grumbled.
"Excuse me?" she snapped at him before quickly catching herself. "I mean that I came here to apologize to you for the 'incident' yesterday."
"Thanks. I-"
"After all, why should two people as clearly superior as us fight? The son of the headmaster should only associate with the best of students."
"And let me guess, you're one of those students."
"But of course. The two of us would make an ex-"
Phoenix cut her off before she could finish her proposal. "I'm just gonna stop you right there. No."
"What do you mean 'no'?"
"What I mean is that even if I was going to be on a team, which I'm not, I wouldn't want to be on a team with you, Ice Queen."
Weiss' rage was momentarily replaced with confusion, "What?"
"I'm not an official student, but being Oz's son lets me come anyway. How did you even find out about that?"
"I heard that blond oaf screaming. Here I thought he and that girl you were with were the only two fools who had managed to stumble their way into Beacon. Clearly I was mistaken." With that she stormed off.
Once he had had his breakfast and got dressed in his street clothes, Phoenix headed back to the locker room to meet up with Ruby and Yang. When he found them, they appeared to be in a discussion about teams. "I don't know. I… I'll just be on your team I guess," Ruby muttered.
"Maybe you should try being on someone else's team," Yang replied nervously as she stroked her hair.
Ruby picked up on what Yang was trying to say and exclaimed, "My dear sister Yang, are you implying you do not wish to be in the same team as me!"
"Am I interrupting something?" Phoenix asked.
Ruby instantly ran over to him and replied, "No, your timing is perfect. Maybe since my sister has betrayed me you can be on my team."
Phoenix just gave a confused look to Yang who said, "It's not that I don't want to be on the same team as her, it's just that I thought… I don't know… maybe it'd help her break out of your shell."
"Wha-! I don't need to break out of my shell, that's absolutely-," Ruby argued before Jaune finished her sentence, "Ridiculous!" and then saying something about locker 636.
"Anyway, want to be on my team?" Ruby asked, looking slightly desperate.
"Sorry Ruby, I would if I could, but…" He proceeded to explain the same thing that he had to Weiss.
"But why not just-," Ruby tried to ask before Phoenix finished her sentence.
"Attended Beacon officially? Simple, if one more person joined there would be an odd number of people, so one of the teams would have one extra person. Satisfied?" he asked the two of them.
"Just one more question," Yang said, "You say Ozpin is your dad, but your last name is Fall. Why?"
"Well…uh… you see… funny story," he said nervously, cursing himself for not bringing smoke bombs he could use to get away. Before he could act on plan B, using his semblance and lighter to set off the fire alarm as a distraction, an announcement over the speaker system said, "Will all first-year students please report to Beacon Cliff for initiation."
"What's that? Literally anything else? Let's go!" Phoenix said as he ran towards the exit. As he ran, he saw Jaune pinned to a locker by what appeared to be Pyrrha's spear.
When he got to the cliff, he was still wondering how he would explain everything to them. "It's only a matter of time before I have to tell them," he thought, "But where do I even begin."
His thinking was interrupted by Ozpin starting another speech, "For years you have trained to become warriors. Today we will put your abilities to the test in the Emerald Forest." Afterwards Goodwitch started talking about teams, something that Phoenix just tuned out. However, since he was on the first launchpad, he had no warning when he was catapulted into the air, his only thought being, "Probably should've listened to one of their speeches for once."
When he saw the trees rushing towards him, the first thing he did was reach for his swords, only to find they weren't there. "Blast! Looks like we're doing this the hard way!" Phoenix yelled, pulling out and extending his staff. When he got close to the trunk of a tree he just shoved his staff in before propelling himself from the tree. When he landed, he dusted off his shirt before pressing a button on his glasses, which he had given record function. "Got to figure out what Oz wants us to do," he said to himself before watching the recording.
"Now then… if I were an abandoned temple with some so-called relics in it where would I- Wait, is that smoke?" Phoenix thought. "May as well give whoever started it a hand," he said as he ran off in the direction of the fire. He started to slow down when he heard voices, and when he heard who one of them belonged to, he almost turned around.
"Well perhaps if you had exercised even the slightest amount of caution in your strikes, I wouldn't have set the forest on fire!" Weiss shouted to who Phoenix could only guess was her partner. When he heard her partner respond he couldn't help but laugh. The next thing he knew, Ruby's scythe was at his throat. When she realized who it was, she immediately lowered her weapon, causing him to breathe a sigh of relief. This relief was short lived, as moments later he found the entire lower half of his body encased in ice.
"What the bloody hell is going on here?" Phoenix yelled as Weiss emerged from the bushes.
"You! I could ask you the same question!" she yelled back at him, her sword pointed at his heart.
"Woah there. Let's stop pointing weapons at me so I can explain myself," Phoenix said, hoping that this wouldn't be how he died. She seemed to calm down slightly, but still kept her sword pointed at him.
"Talk. Now!" she demanded.
"Okay. I was going through the forest when I saw smoke. I came over to see what was going on. When I found you two and realized you were partners, I started laughing. I mean, seriously. What are the odds that the two of you would end up together," he explained, his last remark earning him an annoyed glare from Weiss. "Alright, can you let me go now? I would be tapping my foot but it's still frozen," he said with a grin.
"It's definitely this way… I mean this way. It's definitely this way," Weiss said, pacing back and forth, "Alright it's official, we passed it."
"Why can't you just admit you have no idea where we're going?" Ruby replied.
"Of course, I know where we're going. We're going to the… Forest Temple," Weiss responded.
"Oh really. The Forest Temple. What a brilliant deduction princess. I suppose it's only because we're holding you back that you haven't discovered it yet!" Phoenix yelled.
"Exactly!"
He'd had it with her. "Why is it that you seem to think you're so bloody perfect!" he continued, at this point just venting.
"I'm not perfect," Weiss retorted, "Not yet anyway."
"Look, I need a moment to cool off. I'll be back in a bit," Phoenix mumbled, "Going to go try to find a good vantage point to get a bird's eye view." As he walked away he could hear Ruby and Weiss continue to bicker.
"For the record, this is NOT what I meant by 'bird's eye view'!" Phoenix yelled, clinging to the back of a Nevermore with Ruby and Weiss.
"Look on the bright side. You finally found something you hate more than flying in airships," Ruby pointed out.
"How are we supposed to get off this thing," Weiss demanded to know, seemingly just as terrified as Phoenix.
"Simple. We jump," Ruby answered like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
"Are you insane?" both Weiss and Phoenix yelled, but Ruby was long gone. "I die you are so haunted!" he yelled as he let go of the Nevermore, screaming in terror.
"You insufferable little dolts!" Weiss shouted after them.
"Sounds like another girl is in trouble!" Yang shouted, searching for the source of the noise. To answer her search, Blake pointed upward. Above them they saw Ruby and Phoenix falling from the sky, Ruby yelling "Bonsai!" while Phoenix was just screaming and yelling a random string of curses. Before Ruby could hit the ground she was hit by Jaune, who was also flying through the air. Phoenix, however, continued to fall and landed face first in front of Yang and Blake.
"Did you two just fall from the sky?" Blake asked Phoenix, who answered, "Yeah," his response muffled due to the fact that his face was still in the ground.
Before he had the chance to recover, he heard an Ursa's enraged roar, and quickly stumbled up, only to find out that the Ursa had been dealt with by the duo from that morning. "Nora, please never do that again," the boy said, looking over to where the girl, apparently named Nora, had just been, only to find that she was missing. Locating her was not hard, seeing as she was making a large commotion. She had grabbed a rook piece from a display of chess pieces behind them, and was singing about how she was "Queen of the Castle".
"I suppose those chess pieces are the relics," Phoenix thought, looking over at the "Forest Temple" as Weiss had called it.
He started paying attention to everything else again when the boy in green called out to Nora, to which she responded, "Coming Ren!"
"Did that girl just ride in on an Ursa?" Blake asked. Yang tried to respond, but before she had the chance, a Deathstalker burst through the trees, chasing Pyrrha, who called out to Jaune, which Phoenix could only assume was her partner. This set off a chain reaction of people yelling each other's names, concluding with Nora yelling out her own.
Yang, having had enough of this madness, shouted, "I can't take it anymore! Can everyone chill out for TWO SECONDS before something crazy happens again!" They stood there for two seconds, during which Ren ran up to them, and Nora made binoculars with her hands.
After the two seconds passed, Ruby, who had jumped down from the tree she had been flung into when hit by Jaune during the name calling reaction, pointed upwards, saying, "Uh… Yang, Phoenix."
They all looked up to see Weiss clinging to a talon of the Nevermore, shouting what Phoenix could barely make out as, "How could you leave me?"
"I said jump!" Ruby responded.
"Seriously Weiss, if the guy afraid of flying jumped, you should be able to!" Phoenix continued, hoping to use her stubborn sense of pride to get her to jump.
"She's going to fall," Blake said in a surprisingly calm tone.
"She'll be fine," Ruby replied.
This, however, was proven incorrect, as Ren stated, "She's falling." But before she could hit the ground, Jaune jumped out of a tree catching her. He had, however, seemed to forget gravity applied to him as well, but he was soon reminded.
When they landed, Weiss, who was on top of Jaune, sarcastically called him her hero, to which he replied, "My back."
Pyrrha, having finally been caught by the Deathstalker, was batted in front of Phoenix and the others. "Great, the gang's all here! Now we can die together!" Yang exclaimed.
"Not if I can help it!" Ruby yelled, charging towards the beast and letting out what was an attempt at an intimidating battle cry, but was, in reality, what Phoenix thought was "Adorable."
"Why do I keep thinking that sort of thing?" he thought. "Ruby wait!" both he and Yang yelled, chasing after her, but her semblance kept them from catching up. She tried striking the beast, but it simply batted her aside.
"Don't worry, I'm fine!" she shouted back at them.
"Ruby, if you're fine, I'm an expert pilot," Phoenix retorted, drawing his weapon and his lighter. Before he could do anything, The Nevermore launched a storm of feathers, knocking Yang and Phoenix back while catching Ruby's cape, preventing her from escaping. Phoenix tried lighting a fire, but his lighter didn't seem to work. "Damn it! It must've gotten wet when Weiss froze me," he thought, "I swear if Ruby gets hurt because of her I'll-." His train of thought was interrupted by a white blur flashing past him.
"You are so childish," Weiss said, having frozen the Deathstalker's tail just before it hit Ruby. "And dimwitted, and hyperactive, and don't even get me started on your fighting style," She continued.
"Here we go again," thought Phoenix, groaning.
"And I suppose I can be a bit… difficult at times," she finished, "But if we're going to do this, we're going to have to do this together. So if you stop trying to show off, I'll be… nicer."
"Well, that's surprising."
"I'm not trying to show off, I just want you to know I can do this," Ruby countered, to which Weiss responded, "You're fine." Phoenix and Yang both ran up to Ruby, and Yang embraced her.
"Thank Gods you're okay!" Phoenix exclaimed.
"Don't ever scare us like that again," Yang finished
"Uh… guys, that thing's circling back around," Jaune said, pointing up at the Nevermore.
"So? We don't need to waste our time with them. Our only goal is to obtain an artifact and return to the cliff," Phoenix said, immediately going into his more serious "tactician mode".
"Agreed, there's no point in fighting these things. Let's grab an artifact and move out," Ruby finished.
"Run and live. That is an idea I can get behind," Jaune said, grabbing the other rook piece. Ruby and Phoenix both grabbed knights, Ruby taking a gold one and Phoenix taking a black one.
"You heard the girl! Let's move!" They all ran off, Ruby taking a moment to pose heroically on a rock, and Yang taking a moment to admire her sister taking charge.
They got to the site of some old ruins before the Nevermore was able to catch up to them, perching itself atop a spire. "Doesn't look like there's any way around fighting now," Phoenix said. Before he had the chance to come up with a strategy however, the Deathstalker burst through the woods behind them.
"Run!" Jaune yelled, panicked.
"Nora, distract it!" Ren ordered, pointing at the Nevermore.
"You got it," Nora cheerfully replied, pulling out her grenade launcher and firing multiple shots at it while dodging the feathers it sent flying at her. The Deathstalker charged at her from behind, but Blake and Ren distracted it as Weiss got Nora out of the way. The nine of them started to cross the bridge, but the Nevermore charged through it, leaving Blake, Pyrrha, and Ren on one side, with everyone else on the other side. Meanwhile, Nora had just launched herself and Jaune across the gap. Nora, upon getting to the other side, accidentally knocked Blake off the edge. She used her weapon to grapple onto the back of the Nevermore, landing multiple blows as she ran along its back.
"It's tougher than it looks," she informed them when she got off it.
"Then let's hit it with everything we've got!" Yang replied. The four girls started unloading rounds into the beast, while Phoenix could only sit there, wishing he had The Blazing Hooks. He was not, however, completely idle. While the girls fired at the beast, he used his glasses to scan it for weak points. When the Nevermore crashed into the tower they were standing on, he found himself wishing for his normal gear again, this time his grapnel gun. He instead improvised, using his staff to help him vault between the falling pieces of rubble.
"None of this is working!" Weiss declared once they had reached solid ground.
"Obviously. Anyway, my scan shows that it's only armored on the outside and has a weak point at the neck," Phoenix informed them. "Think you can base a plan around that?" he asked Ruby, curious to see what she could come up with.
"I have one idea, but it's kind of crazy," she answered.
"I like it already," he replied, smirking.
"I! Hope! You're! Hungry!" Yang yelled, blasting round after round into the Nevermore's mouth while Phoenix held said mouth open with his staff.
"This had better work!" Phoenix shouted as he and Yang jumped off of its back while it crashed into the cliff side. "Now!" Phoenix and Ruby ordered as Weiss charged forward, freezing the Nevermore's tail. As she moved back to her original position, Blake fired her grappling hook towards Yang who grabbed it and pulled. When Weiss had returned to her original position Ruby launched herself into the rope of Blake's hook while Weiss created a glyph that held Ruby in place. The result was a slingshot-like contraption.
"Think you can make the shot?" Ruby asked to which Weiss responded,
"Can I?"
"Can yo-?" Ruby tried to ask again, but was interrupted by Weiss indignantly saying, "Of course I can!" She removed the glyph, launching Ruby and the Nevermore. Weiss then set speed glyphs all along the side of the cliff to increase Ruby's already tremendous speed. When Ruby landed against them, she dragged the Nevermore, who had its neck caught in Ruby's scythe, up it with her. When she reached the top she fired it, decapitating it.
"Take that 'ya bloody demon bird!" Phoenix cheered. He then noticed how high up she was and was and wondered how they'd get her down
"Jaune Arc, Lie Ren, Pyrrha Nikos, Nora Valkyrie, the four of you retrieved the white rook pieces. From this day forward, you will work together as team JNPR," Ozpin announced. It was the ceremony for the formation of teams. After this, the only four left were Ruby, Weiss, Blake, and Yang. "Lead by…," it almost seemed like Oz was pausing for suspense, "Jaune Arc."
"What? Me!" Jaune exclaimed, shocked by the professor's choice.
"Congratulations young man," Ozpin calmly responded as Pyrrha playfully hit him, only for him to fall to the ground. Ozpin then called the four remaining students up and called their names. "Blake Belladonna, Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, and Yang Xiao Long. The four of you retrieved the white knight pieces. From this day forward, you will work together as team RWBY, led by…," he paused for suspense yet again, "Ruby Rose."
"I'm so proud of you!" Yang exclaimed, practically tackling her sister with a hug.
"Agreed," Phoenix thought to himself, watching from the rafters.
"Looks like things are shaping up to be an… interesting year," Ozpin concluded.
So that'll probably be one of the longer chapters in this series. Again, if you have any ideas let me know. Just keep in mind that some of them may have to wait till a certain point in the story. As always, thanks for reading!
