Niren Argent: Niren sat at a table with a blueprint of the Hades spread in front of him and a cup of water off to the side, he had already finished eating his food and was just waiting for Lirril to arrive with Talia, and also just listening to the chatter around him, more specifically a blonde who was trying to arm wrestle Yatsuhashi and failing spectacularly.
"Interesting." He said after noticing a way to increase the power efficiency of the Hades, after several minutes of doing the math in his head Niren noticed Talia had left him and was at the same table that had been the source of most the noise, she was now arm wrestling Yatsuhashi and so far seemed to be winning.
"Oh no." Niren said quietly after he noticed that the table make a slight cracking noise as the two of them began to put more effort into beating each other in a such a simple game. "I should try and stop them." He said before putting his things down and standing up to head over to the table, though just a second before he could reach it Yatsuhashi finally managed to overpower Talia, though the finally push from him did flip her over the side.
"That was awesome!" Talia said after jumping up after everyone looked at her with concern, Niren only rubbed his forehead and chuckled "Of course she's ok." He thought to himself, Talia was one of the sturdier members of their team.
Niren turned around and began to head back to his table, not really paying attention to what was in front of him, the calculations in his head taking precedence over that, after a few steps he bumped into someone "Oh sorry about that." He said in apology, only to be shoved rudely in response.
"Watch where you're going stupid faunus." One of the four people he had just happened to encounter said before his pals back him up with laughter. "Ah, a derisive comment followed by laughter from allies in order to make yourself seem bigger and tougher than you actually are." Niren said, his eyes narrowing and his voice becoming cold, he himself had no problems towards people treating him bad because of the fact that he was a faunus, but that didn't mean he had to let them walk all over him.
"Bigs words coming from an animal." The student said again, this time with a snort that made him look even more ridiculous than before. Niren chuckled after hearing several other stand up from the table behind him, Talia was already starting to approach before Niren put his hand behind his back and made a signal that she knew the meaning of. "The assumption that just because faunus have traits that may give them an edge over a normal human makes them an animal is rather dull, to be an animal one has to prove its dominance against something stronger than itself, which is what you seem to be trying to accomplish, am I correct?" Niren asked, knowing full well that his use of larger words was just to piss this idiot off.
"See, you can teach them things easy! I bet Goodwitch has him trained to serve tea too!" The student said before him and his friends began laughing even louder, at this point the conversation in the cafeteria died down and Niren knew all eyes were on them. "I'll say this once faunus, don't mess with me or my team, because if you do you will regret it." The student said while poking Nirens chest, Niren only sighed before moving faster than most people could, in a few second he had grabbed the students arm and tossed him overhead before pulling his arm back and hearing a painful pop as his arm was dislocated, the next three ended up with several broken fingers, a black eye, and another dislocated shoulder.
"I'm sorry what was that about regretting messing with you or your team?" Niren said before walking back to his table and sitting down again, they could tell Goodwitch any story they wished, there were enough witnesses to prove otherwise. The rest of the cafeteria went back to normal after that, the idiot and his team left, presumably to go to the infirmary and then possibly to spin a tale of how a mad beast assaulted them, Niren meanwhile would try and enjoy his tea and finish his work for the night before trying to get some sleep.
"Well, that was… unexpected." A new voice said after Niren had gotten himself back to the point he was at before he went to make sure that a table wouldn't break and ended up beating up four other students. "How so?" Niren asked from behind his blueprint, the voice was a woman's and he knew that there was at least one more person now at the table aside from him and her. "Most people don't just take four guys out that fast." The other person said, this one was also female. "They were not prepared to fight, they thought that three against one was a sure victory and so they lost." Niren said, slowly setting down the blueprint and being greeted by the face of the blonde who lost to Yatsuhashi, and a raven haired girl that he could tell was a faunus almost instantly, most from the twitching of her bow.
"So, you alright?" The blonde asked him before holding out hand for him to shake. "Yes, racism is something I have gotten used to, I know in some cases it is because of acts of violence and attention to those evil acts being more widespread than the good my people do, though in the case of them I think their families raised them to think that we are a lesser species." Niren said, feeling like a philosopher just for saying something like that. "Well...that's a good view I guess." The blonde said, not entirely sure of how to react to his little speech, meanwhile the other one seemed to agree.
"It might help this conversation if I knew your names and why you decided to come and speak to me." Niren said casually, trying to lighten the mood a bit with something other than views on how humanity treats the faunus and four idiots who didn't prepare themselves for a fight. "My name is Yang Xiao Long." The blonde said once again holding out a hand for him to shake. "Blake Belladonna." The other one said, as Niren repeated the same process, though this time his didn't feel his arm being pulled from its socket. "Niren Argent, a pleasure to meet you both." Niren replied after sitting back down and moving his things to the side.
"So Talia sent you over here to check up on me did she?" Niren asked after the two of them explained why exactly they had taken the time to speak with him. "Yeah she said something about looking for your team's leader before asking us to come talk to you." Yang said with a puzzled look on her face as Niren put a hand on his chin and thought about it for a moment. "The most likely outcome is that I'll see her back at the dorm, it's about time I went back anyway, Vanir most likely won't be done for a while so we won't be able to go have a drink at Juniors for a while." Niren said before slowly standing up and popping neck.
"Oh so you know that place too?" Yang said with interest, she and Blake both stood up as well. "Yes, my brother and I go there quite often when we aren't having to attend class or aren't on a mission, they don't ask about ID's and we don't bother with their illicit dealings, underworld connections and all that." Niren said quietly, he didn't like that bit of information slipping out. "Well maybe I can go with you one of these days, the Vytal Festival is pretty much putting classes on hold so I don't have much to do until the tournament." Yang said with a grin, Niren smiled slightly before replying "I wouldn't mind seeing if someone could actually drink Vanir under the table, the man has a liver of steel it seems, have a nice night." Niren said before leaving, he had left a slip of paper with his contact info if they needed anything from him, as well as instructions to find his dorm.
Tonight was a strange night indeed.
Vanir Argent: Goodwitch had finally let go of Vanir's ear after they stepped in the elevator and it began to climb floor by floor, almost taking forever, or at least long enough for her to begin evaluating his mental state.
"How many times have you had to fight down increased levels of aggression this last month?" She asked him, waiting to write his response. "I dunno, three times? Being stuck in a hospital and being under painkillers made it less of a hassle until they let me start moving again." Vanir replied, usually he had a much more difficult time keeping his other half in check and only let it out when he was in combat. Goodwitch nodded and wrote down his response, or at least a less casual version of it.
"Very well, has it recently become more difficult to keep your other personality from manifesting?" Goodwitch asked, keeping up with her usual barrage of questions. "Aside from a few moments in the heat of battle were I don't really remember what happened, no though I have been putting more effort into keeping it down." Vanir said, that wasn't a lie his hands would shake when it got to the point that he was having difficulty keeping his bloodlust from making him go on a killing spree in the woods, not that Goodwitch wouldn't oblige him slaughtering Grimm and keeping the borders a little safer, the only problem was finding him the next day or week.
The next five minutes were question after question about various little things, some important ones like if Vanir could remember anything else about his life before the Knights took him and used him for experiments, he still enjoyed the memory of ripping that doctors throat out with his teeth. The elevator finally stopped and Goodwitch put her pen away before saying "Headmaster Ozpin will want to know about your mental state as well." Vanir nodded before walking out of the elevator and into the large office, already annoyed with the constant clicking, it was most likely meant to be soothing to some, but for Vanir it was painful to hear the quiet squeal of metal on metal.
"It's good to see you Mr. Argent." Ozpin said from his table, motioning to a cup of coffee sitting adjacent to his, Vanir walked over and picked it up before taking a sip, it had a very small amount of sugar in it and was mostly bitter, the exact way Vanir usually took his coffee. "I trust it's to your liking?" Ozpin said, a friendly smile on his face, Vanir nodded before taking another drink and swallowing.
"Definitely helps keep me from falling asleep, though I can't help but feel the warm welcome is out of pity for my injury." Vanir replied calmly, he knew Ozpin was just being nice but recently it felt like people were doing it because of his arm. Ozpin drank from his own cup before responding "I knew you would most likely want something to keep you up long enough to tell me the specifics of the fight, though I do feel bad about my task causing you such harm, you also knew the risks going in, just as you always have."
Vanir chuckled, at least Ozpin was honest with him, unlike Ironwood or the bastard who set him on the path he had taken for the last five years of his life. "Good, I hate people feeling pity for me because of my own choices. It's nice to be disillusioned prior to losing a limb." Vanir said before downing the rest of the cup.
"So, please tell me what happened during the mission." Ozpin said, his expression changing from friendly to serious quickly, Vanir started to walk back and forth and he began to tell Ozpin of the weeks of surveillance and clearing Grimm from around the village that their VIP had been staying at, and then finally of the day she left.
"She had finally chosen to leave the village after earning some money, getting some new clothes and equipment as well as food. She left on horseback and travelled for a few days before coming to a valley, we had been following on foot the entire time, keeping our distance so as to make her less worried about being attacked, of course none of that helped when a large number of Grimm showed up out of nowhere." Vanir said darkly, still feeling some hatred for that horde, they had mapped out every spot the Grimm spawned at yet somehow this group got past them.
"So you engaged them before they got close?" Ozpin asked him before drinking more coffee. "Yeah, we knew Qrow would be able to keep an eye on her if we couldn't, so in the middle of the night when it was storming we sent him the message telling him that we had met a large force of Grimm and to keep an eye on her until we could catch up." Vanir said, balling the Hades into a fist as he remembered the pain from the Deathstalker pincer.
"How did the fight play out?" Ozpin asked, his voice was one that calmed Vanir down from time to time. "About as well as you would think, Talia and I held them at the front while Lirril and Niren fought further back. Of course we eventually got separated when an Ogre showed up and forced itself between Talia and I, we killed it but after that the Deathstalker snuck up on me and hit me against some rocks, then after that I felt it's pincer wrap around my right arm and some pressure as well as pain, after that I'm told that my other half took control and handled things." Vanir said bitterly as he went through those events once again.
Ozpin was silent for a while before responding to Vanir's telling of the events leading up to his wounding, making Vanir worried that he may be angered with the team's inability to complete their mission. "You did the best you could in a situation that was beyond hopeless, I do not blame you or your team for falling back to a safer position to keep you alive Vanir." Ozpin said, catching Vanir completely off guard, the last time they had to retreat because of him Ozpin was less than pleased.
"You're not angry that we fell back during such an important mission? What about Qrow?" Vanir asked in confusion as he tried to process what Ozpin just said to him. "I am not mad, Lirril made the choice to save your life as opposed to letting you die to complete the mission, the four of you have grown much during your time here, especially you Vanir. For that reason I'm glad that she didn't leave you, have a good evening." Ozpin said, dismissing Vanir politely and leaving him very confused.
After a few minutes of walking across the campus to reach his team's dorm Vanir was still very confused about Ozpins praise for failing to keep an eye on the maiden, sure they had told Qrow about it so he could keep an eye on her while they fell back and got him to a hospital but that didn't mean they should be praised for not being able to defeat the Grimm without a casualty and having to leave the job unfinished.
Vanir's thoughts were interrupted by some faint words he could hear from the dorms assigned to the transfer students, he stopped and took a moment to figure out where the words came from, after a few minutes he found a closed window with its lights still on and began to listen in. After a minute or so Vanir finally stopped, he couldn't make out much more than some cryptic words and phrases about taking what strengths people have from them.
After he was well out of earshot Vanir pulled out a cigarette and lit it, he usually kept the smoking to a minimum of one per week but this time was his third time this week, it helped take his mind of the pain from his arm and helped him to focus on what he had heard. "Should keep an eye on that one." He said to himself before taking another drag from the cigarette and tossing it on the ground, not even half finished, he was disgusted with himself for even doing that. "Bah, Mithril's gonna kill me for doing that." He said after stomping on it to put it out and walking into the dorm, this building was larger than usual and had special dorm rooms, Ozpin had let them use it since they had begun doing those special missions for him, as a result they had a dorm room that was larger, with four side rooms that were small enough for a dresser, a desk, and a small bed, and a small common area for the team to spend time together. These rooms were meant for the school's alumni but also meant for teachers from other schools to use while they were at Beacon.
"Hope Niren's up at least, need someone to talk to for a bit." Vanir said before using his scroll to unlock the door and step into the dark common room, Niren was sleeping on the couch with Talia resting her head on his shoulder, also asleep. Lirril was nowhere to be seen which meant she had likely gone to bed as well, Vanir only shook his head and went into Nirens room and brought out a blanket to cover the two lovebirds ups with before heading to his own room, which was exactly the way he left it, the picture of him and Mithril a week after they fought Argo and actually became a couple was sitting next to the only clue about his biological family he had left, an old six shooter that was more cannon than pistol, it had taken Niren a solid year to track that thing down.
"I should take this thing off." Vanir said while pressing several release triggers on the Hades where it joined the grafting at his shoulder, the metal arm fell to the floor quickly and would have woken the others up if Vanir hadn't caught the damn thing before it could. "Still getting used to that." He said before setting on his desk next to some letters he had intended to send to the Maleficar, more specifical Iota and Hephaestus, the two of them were like family to him after two years of fighting together and he liked to let them know what he was up to, they had seemed pleased with him going to Beacon and getting a girlfriend, Iota called it "Normal living" Like going to a school meant to train warriors was normal.
"I should send those to them before the festival begins." Vanir said after tugging off his boots with one arm and taking off his trenchcoat, he wasn't going to bother with the rest of his clothes and just lay down in his bed, eyes drifting shut as he let sleep finally wash over him.