Martin was having trouble deciding whether to cheer from the adrenaline rush he was getting from falling through the air with no parachute or to curse Ozpin's name for being the craziest person Martin had ever met. Only a crazy person would think of launching students off a cliff into a forest which, incidentally, was filled with deadly Grimm, then have them look at someone else to partner up. It had to be the dumbest or most genius thing ever conceived. Either way, the folks back home weren't going to believe it. Heck, he was having trouble believing it and he was currently living it. Well, he likely wouldn't be living much longer if he didn't figure out a way to land safely. There was a slight possibility that his aura wouldn't break after hitting who knows how many trees as well as solid ground, but testing that theory sounded more dangerous than the one time he got the neighbor's cat to play with a Fire Dust crystal.
The brief trip down Memory Lane gave Martin a wild idea. Taking his trusty axe Flame'n'Blade, he tucked it between his legs and activated the flamethrower. Martin was propelled forward, upward, left, right, and forward again. His improvised ride had no steering wheel and was therefore as under control as a rocket-propelled axe, meaning not at all. He needed to shut it off before he could crash and burn. Mostly crash, since the only real burning he would feel would be his own shame. Assuming, of course, his aura would still be up after a crash.
Martin reached over and switched off the flamethrower. When he looked back up, he saw a white blur in front of him, one that he immediately slammed into from being unable to steer. The loud and feminine noise that he was incapable of making meant that he had just hit a girl, presumably one dressed it white. Then again, he didn't hit anything soft when he crashed into her. For all he knew, he could've crashed into a very high-pitched guy. He hoped that had just crashed into a flat girl because the second option would just be awkward. Either way, he had found a partner. Quite the fortunate turn of events provided they would both still be alive after they hit the ground.
Keeping one hand on Flame'n'Blade and the other on his new partner, Martin looked for a way to break their fall without flying every which way. His answer came in the form of some black circles with a symbol he couldn't quite make out materializing in front of them and breaking apart as they passed through them. Their fall slowed with each circle they hit, not that Martin was complaining. As they neared the ground, his partner pushed away from him before the two landed, he in a brief roll and she(he?) on one of those circle-thingies, which was now white. At the end of his roll, Martin rested one palm on the ground and stuck out his axe in an artistic pose. Rising to his feet, he briefly twirled his axe before resting it on his shoulder, then turned to face his new partner with a smile.
"WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?" Definitely a girl if the shriek and dress were anything to go on. "UGH! YOU STUPID BRUTE! YOU COULD'VE KI-"
It was at this point that the two had made eye contact. Pale blue eyes looked into nut brown. Blue widened in shock and maybe revulsion, brown narrowed slightly.
Martin recognized this girl to be the one from the ship who was giving everybody the stink eye for no reason. She was shorter than him, despite wearing high heels of all things, and her overall appearance screamed "prissy, arrogant rich girl." She was also obsessed with white, if her white hair, or maybe it was very light blonde, and white outfit were anything to go on.
Martin's train of thought was immediately derailed when the rich witch suddenly pointed a giant metal toothpick at his throat.
"You tried to kill me!" she accused.
Martin's eyes widened. "Huh?" He knew the crash wasn't his best first impression, but this was ridiculous.
"I should've known the White Fang would find out I went to Beacon and send an assassin!"
Martin's hare ears, for he was not part-rabbit, drooped ever so slightly and his expression turned deadpan. Just his luck to get stuck with one of those "all faunus are White Fang and want to take over the world" weirdos.
The crackpot must not have noticed because she kept ranting. "I'm going to detain you until the faculty arrives and they can deal with you. No doubt they'll have seen your assassination attempt and will be here shortly."
Okay, thought Martin, she was definitely crazy. Best to get her attention, if only to keep her from shooting her mouth off. At this point, he was surprised someone hadn't ever tried taping her mouth shut. Now that he thought about it, if the two of them were going to be partners, he would have to invest in some duct tape.
"I'm sorry, did you say something?" he asked. "I've been completely ignoring you since our partnership started."
Predictably, the crone with baby skin quit talking for all of one second. "Wha-? Don't play innocent with me, you filthy faunus!"
Martin lifted one arm and sniffed the pit. "Nope, I'm good. What, is there something on my face?" Oh, how he loved throwing people's insults in their faces. Way more satisfying than burning them in effigy. Too much work, that was. Plus, there were only so many times a guy could watch a Jacques Schnee effigy burning before it got boring. Those guys over at the White Fang really needed better material.
"Why you-! The nerve of-!"
"Look, Miss White-"
"It's Weiss, you, you beast!"
"Weiss, white, to-may-toe, to-mah-toe. Point is, you're stuck with me, so put the toothpick away-"
"THIS IS A RAPIER!"
"First off, I barely know her. Second off — wait, never-mind first off. Bad joke, I never said it. First off, for real this time, we're partners for four years and that means no takebacks. Second off, you're a crazy conspiracy nut."
"Excuse me?"
"Third off, you keep carrying on about your weird faunus conspiracy theories and Grimm are gonna smell you from all over, assuming they didn't already smell your perfume."
"I'm not wearing perfume!"
"Shampoo, then. You know, I'm starting to think you've got anger issues."
The white whiner growled at Martin like a particularly high-pitched puppy. "I do not!"
Martin chose not to respond, instead snickering at the fact that White had just proved his point. She must have figured that out because she growled again.
"What is taking the authorities so long?" she demanded, looking up toward Beacon Cliff.
"Can't take long if they're not coming at all," Martin said with a smug grin. "See, they've got this thing called logic, which means they're smart enough to know that me bumping into you and then hanging on for dear life was a huge accident with a side of survival instinct."
Whitey the Whiner made that high-pitched growl again. She must've finally used her brain because she then put away the needle. "You will walk in front of me and don't make any sudden moves," she demanded.
Hearing this, Martin decided that Little Miss Crazy's paranoia had gotten old. "Oh, no. You go first."
"Excuse me?"
"You're crazy enough to think I'm out to get you, which means you're probably crazy enough to stab me in the back." She probably wasn't, but using crazy people's logic against them was fun. They were always surprised by it. Weiss was no exception to the technique, if her mouth gaping for all of two seconds was anything to go on. When the two seconds were up, her mouth closed right before she opened it again to say something that was probably not going to be logical.
"Oh, I'm sorry, I suppose I must've imagined all the countless times your people have attacked, harmed, and torn apart my family! I must be crazy for not being friendly with you after all your kind has done to me!" She gestured to the forest around them. "Would you like me to stop referring to these trees as trees? Or perhaps I should start calling the green grass blue? No matter how much you deny it, you and the rest of the faunus are nothing but liars, thieves, and MURDERERS!"
Martin blinked in surprise at Weiss' rant. His ears picked up the sound of birds taking off, likely from how loud she was. He sighed heavily. Yes, this girl and people like her were crazy, but he often forgot what might've driven them crazy in the first place. Mom and Dad had told him about how people went crazy back when the old White Fang was protesting. They didn't have an excuse for going crazy then. That came later when the Fang went wacko. Violence was contagious like that, as Dad would say.
Weiss and/or her family had probably been on the receiving end of one of the Fang's attacks and she latched onto that for her generalizing ways. Chances were she'd never even talked to a faunus, at least not in a conversation. Heck, she'd already assumed he was some kind of assassin. She was clearly a lost cause. There was really only one sensible thing to do in this situation.
"No witty retort?" Weiss snapped, bringing Martin back to the present.
Mind made up, Martin moved past Weiss and started toward where the ruins were supposed to be. Since he didn't feel like carrying Flame'n'Blade all the way, he clipped it to his back. Perfect for travel.
"Where are you going?" Weiss asked angrily.
"North," he replied, briefly turning his head. There was no way he could work with her. He'd just have to find some other partner and hope Ozpin wasn't so screwloose as to really enforce the "eye-contact" rule.
"Wha-? Are you walking away from me?"
"You'll thank me later." Martin's ears detected Weiss running up to him and walking behind. "Some people just can't make up their minds."
"Quiet, you! You could very well have been setting up an ambush by tricking me into letting my guard down via walking off."
Martin whirled around. A guy could only take so much. "I don't even know you, you idiot!"
Weiss scoffed. "Oh, please. There isn't a faunus on this planet who doesn't know my name or my family!"
"Well, I don't, so buzz off! It's a wonder you can walk straight with a head that big!"
"What do you mean you don't know? How can you not recognize me? Look at me!"
There was innuendo in there somewhere, but Martin had more or less lost his mood for that. Nevertheless, look he did, but not too hard. Mama didn't raise no perv. Weiss looked more like a doll than a person with how pale she was and all that white. Wait a second… White hair, blue eyes? Weren't those effigies colored similarly? Wait another second… Not a faunus on the planet who didn't-? Oh… Comprehension appeared like the flick of a lighter. "I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say you're related to that one guy... What was his name? Jackass? Jockstrap?"
"Ugh! I am Weiss SCHNEE!"
Well, on the one hand, that explained quite a bit. On the other hand, it didn't make any sense. "Yeah, right."
"Excuse me?"
"You mean to tell me that a girl from a family that hates faunus came all the way from Frostbite City, I mean Atlas, to study at a school that openly accepts faunus? Yeah, I don't think so. Are you some kinda fangirl?"
There was that growl again. "I am Weiss Schnee."
"And I'm the king of Atlas."
"You are an insufferable, perverted, filthy faunus barbarian!"
Fists clenched. "And there you go again, 'Weiss Schnee.' Is that why you picked Beacon over Atlas? So you could yell at some faunus?"
"My being here is none of your business!"
Martin sneered. "Right back at ya, Grimm-snack!"
Weiss drew the needle again. "I won't be insulted by the likes of you!"
Martin grabbed his axe. "Oooh, is daddy gonna get me fired?"
Weiss yowled like a house cat and charged.
Martin juked left, dodging the metal toothpick. "Well, since I can't talk sense into you…" He swung at Weiss, activating the Fire Dust in the blade. Weiss leaped to the side, avoiding the swing and the fiery wave that came with it. The flames hit a nearby tree, setting it ablaze.
Weiss conjured a circle beneath her feet and stabbed the needle into it. Spikes of ice sprang from the ground and sped toward Martin. Martin met it head-on with a flame-enhanced blow from his axe, shattering and melting the ice and the same time.
CREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!
The battling partners stole a glance at the sky, only to see a massive black bird diving at them.
I was going to wait a little longer to post this, but it's Christmas Eve, so...
Anyway, I'm trying to use different styles of writing to convey a character's point of view. Martin's POV is obviously going to be witty while Weiss is, for now, cold and formal. I'm usually not a fan of cliffhangars, but this seemed like the best place to end the chapter. Plus, I find it difficult to shift POVs in the middle of a chapter. I think it disrupts the flow. Not to worry, though. I'll try to have the next chapter out ASAP.
Merry Christmas!