Yatsuhashi was the first up in the morning. It had been agreed that he would meet with Beau at 6.30 in the ballroom and liaise with the librarian who had been landed with supervising the new students overnight. The librarian, who was reading Salutations, greeted them. He said that the students had generally slept well. His main task had been to direct people to the nearest toilets if they woke up in the middle of the night and were slightly disorientated. He said that there had been no industrial level snorers this year, so he had not needed to use his silence semblance during the night. The last group of chatterers had given up by midnight and they had not been noisy.
He did say he had used his semblance at 6 in the morning when Nora Valkyrie decided that her partner had had enough sleep and needed to be up and about. Yatsuhashi asked what her reaction to being silenced had been and the librarian explained that, as this was not the library, he had merely placed her and Lie Ren in a self-contained noise bubble so they could speak to each other, but not disturb anyone else. He said that he had been told that the effect was a little like being in an echo chamber.
About half the students seemed to be up already and Fox said that many were in the gym or seemed to be running in the grounds. Yatsuhashi had quite enjoyed himself yesterday, but Velvet seemed very tense in the evening, although she seemed to cheer up slightly at the end of dinner when Glynda had a word with her. The incident with the auras appearing out of nowhere had been puzzling, but on the positive side it did provide confirmation that Fox's abilities were extremely useful.
Yatsuhashi joined Ren and Nora for breakfast. He thought that even by Nora's standards she seemed hyperactive. He reassured them that they would both be fine, marveled at the ability of Nora to consume pancakes and listened to her monologue about how she and Ren could ensure that they were on the same team together. He shared the sloth impersonation idea with the rest of his team. Coco and Fox were amusing themselves by playing fantasy teams and sharing the most outrageous suggestions with him and Velvet. Coco was attracted by the idea of a Power girls team consisting of Nora, Yang, Pyrrha and Lydia, especially as the initials PLNY gave plenty of scope for inventive names. She admitted that it might be rather hard on Pyrrha to have three such boisterous teammates, but at least they would not be worshippers. Fox had amused himself by suggesting the worse matched combinations.
Coco reported that Weiss had sought her out and had been pumping her for any information she might have about the strongest fighters from the new Vale students. Coco pointed out Cardin, Lydia, Henry and June from Pharos and Yang from Signal. She saw a slight shake of the head when she pointed out Henry and a grimace when she pointed out Yang. Yatsuhashi prompted Coco to suggest Pyrrha and Nora as being strong fighters from mistral. Weiss had replied, "Of course it would be perfect to be on the same team as Pyrrha, but one must consider all the options and have the best four people." She had raised an eyebrow when Nora was suggested – apparently, she had been one of those awoken by a cherry "wake up lazybones" before the librarian had utilised his semblance.
The students had all washed and fed themselves. Fox confirmed that all the new students were in and around the locker rooms. They had armed themselves and many were either cleaning or making last minute adjustments to their weapons. Coco saw Jaune talking to Pyrrha and Weiss, Pyrrha being amused and Weiss being annoyed. Velvet reported the conversation to them and said that while Jaune seemed a pleasant enough character he was trying too hard. She repeated Ruby's story about the ladies love it line as an example. Pyrrha had posed for a few more photographs.
Glynda sent a message to Team PLUM and Team CFVY telling them to usher the students towards the main hall. When they got there, they were handed numbered arm bands by Glynda which they were told to put on over their clothes. It was explained to the students that this would enable the Professors to monitor and grade them and would activate the drone cameras when they came within a certain distance of them. It was explained that the number matched the launch pad which they would be using to be catapulted into the Emerald Forest. The number of the arm band each person was given was noted by Peach and typed into a scroll. The information was copied to the Professors scrolls and to those of Team CFVY and Team PLUM. Professor Port and Dr. Oobleck checked that the arm bands were correctly fitted and the students were then led towards the cliffs.
It was interesting to watch how the students dealt with the nervous anticipation. Nora had not stopped talking at Ren, Ruby was asking fellow students about their weapons and clinging to Crescent Rose, Yang was high fiving the Signal students and generally geeing them up, Blake was still reading (although at least it was a pocket paperback), Lydia was using a golf club (which Yatsuhashi presumed doubled as a weapon) to drive golf balls off the cliffs, Cardin and Dove were doing stretching exercises, Pyrrha was politely off to one side smiling for an extra photograph or two by Velvet, Jaune was pacing around looking nervous and consulting a piece of paper which Yatsuhashi assumed carried the advice on landing strategies he had received last night while Weiss was doing something which Coco assured them was called practicing her form.
Yatsuhashi noted that Velvet was now taking photographs of students posing with their weapons. The team had discussed the ethics of Velvet photographing weapons with a camera which allowed her to copy them. Velvet had not used her hard light weapons in classes yet and had not needed to use them when on missions with other teams. It had been agreed that she would not use a copy of someone's weapon against them in a friendly fight. No doubt there was a row to come in due course, but they hoped they could put if off until the Vytal tournament in their fourth year. They could argue that it was not that different from copying improvements in weapons which happened all the time. They also hoped that Velvet would have built enough goodwill through her willingness to help other students improve their weapons for it to be greeted with a shrug or even taken as a form of compliment.
Coco had added a fashion commentary via Fox's semblance. She felt that Weiss's costume while elegant did not seem quite right for forest fighting. She opined that Lydia's jodhpurs, black boots, leather waistcoat and white blouse was rather more stylish than she was expecting although these went oddly with the golf bag she carried over her shoulder. She commented "Trust her to be better dressed when fighting than at social events". She thought that Blake looked chic and decided that on her the bow worked and did not induce feelings of nausea as it would when worn by most late teenagers. She asked Fox "Do all huntsmen in Vacuo leave either their arms or their chest bare?" Fox asked for more details, Coco summarized what Corkran was wearing and he explained to her that it was an Vacuoan Rules football shirt.
Yatsuhashi and Velvet accompanied Dr. Oobleck to one of the bullheads. The bullhead contained a bank of television screens and an assortment of weapons. He explained that to start with, each of him, Port, Mulberry and Peach would be watching over sixteen students each. As they paired off, the pair would be allocated to one of the watching professors. There was a program for reallocating observation duties when pairs had finished the course. He explained that their duties included drawing his attention to anything he may have missed. During the initial phase, when students came within certain distance of another unpaired student, the screens would start flashing to draw his attention to it. They were also to note the most exciting bits of action as these would be played on the screens during the ceremony announcing the teams and in the Academy bar during the celebrations in the evening.
They listened to Ozpin's talk to the students and asked Dr Oobleck what the "relics" were this year. Dr Oobleck replied "This year we are using a mixture of chess pieces and multisided dice. We nearly went for pieces from Remnant : The Game, but decided against it on the basis that it risked resulting in too many teams consisting solely of members from the same Kingdom if we used the forces and it seemed in bad taste to use the Grimm figures. We think that next year we will have to get figures especially designed as we understand there are crib sheets recording the relics we have used for the last 10 years and we have repeated ourselves a few times during that period."
They watched the students being catapulted into the air. This year they sent four students every ten seconds – this was to reduce the risk that they collided in mid- air. They also tried to make it harder for people to track the person on the launching pad next to them by not letting them off sequentially– so even though they started with numbers 1, 17, 33 and 49, the next four were 6, 22, 38 and 54. Yatsuhashi sensed that Velvet was relieved to see that Weiss Schnee's launching pad seemed to be less powerful then some of the others while Blake's was one of the most powerful. He wondered what that was about and whether this was an accident or deliberate.
As the last of the students were catapulted into the sky Glynda got out her scroll and brought up coverage of the twelve students she felt most concerned about or interested in.
She was pleased that her attempts to separate certain students seemed to have worked. Miss Nightshade had been propelled half a mile more into the forest than Miss Schnee. While normally the landing would have been included in the highlights reel as it was stylish, it did shout cat Faunus. She decided that she would take up Miss Scarlatina's suggestion and recruit the talents of Miss Adel to improve the disguise.
Miss Schnee's use of glyphs to break her fall was impressive, but she was still nervous about James's reservations. He had said that "She has been coached well, but she is more suited to formal duels with strict rules than fighting Grimm or bandits. Jacques invited me to the final test he gave her before letting her go to Beacon which is where she got her scar. She is stubborn, talented and brave, but has been sheltered from the real world. Watching that fight convinced me that it is true what the scandal sheets say that Jacques regards her as a stopgap heiress – when Whitley comes of age or if Winter leaves the military she will be replaced the first excuse she gives him. When I asked about the risks of the fight, he said "If she is any good, she won't die, if she is not good enough, she may as well die." I understand the sentiment, but I wished that I had not felt that he was half-hoping for the latter result."
Mr. Arc had clearly taken advice on landing strategies- he used his shield to increase air resistance and he had ensured his knees were slightly bent. However, he relied heavily on his aura and he had crashed violently into a tree. He was falling through the branches when Miss Nikos had arrived and caught him. Glynda pondered this pairing. On the plus side it would keep him alive today, on the negative side the skill gap was embarrassingly large and may discourage him. She felt that if he were on a team with more average students, he would believe that he could attain that standard with hard work. The whole landing was one for the teacher's only blooper reel.
She then checked her scroll for the recordings which her fellow professors had wanted to bring to her and Ozpin's attention for the purposes of the highlight and blooper reels as well as deciding on team leaders. At the bottom of the screen the pairings which had already been formed spooled by.
She had decided that she would ask Miss Valkyrie and Miss Travers about their landing strategies. She would not have expected that a hammer and croquet mallet could be used to improve the trajectory and the use of a lacrosse stick as a form of semi parachute had also been a surprise. She recommended that both landings as well as Miss Schnee's and Mr. Ren's would be in the highlights reel.
Cardin Winchester had teamed up with Russell Thrush. While at first blush a mohawked Vacuoan and a blue blood from Vale was not a self-evident good fit, she had read the report on Russell and felt he had more in common with Cardin than anyone would expect. She had never made up her mind whether it was better to concentrate the blatantly anti-Faunus students in one team rather than spread them around. They were making good progress and apparently had hardly come across any Grimm.
Mr. Campion had paired up with Miss Harker and they were busy fighting their way through some Beowulf. They fought well together with her street fighting skills and his training and poise making short work of the Grimm and she asked Mulberry to choose a clip for the highlights reel. Still it did not bode well for Miss Harker fading into the background and keeping her past identity secret. While they could to a certain extent control press access to Beacon, if they went out into Vale as a team there would undoubtedly be some paparazzi about. However, that was a problem for later.
Miss Xiao Long was clearly enjoying herself, indeed she had gone a good quarter of a mile further than Glynda had expected she would. The aviator glasses were a nice touch and again she agreed that this would be a candidate for the highlights reel. She watched as she started fighting two Ursa. The screen then indicated that another student was close by and she noted that it was Blake Nightshade. They each disposed of an Ursa each and became a team. A moment later, she was notified that Miss Rose and Miss Schnee were now a team.
She suddenly blanched as she recalled some of her recent conversations. The headmaster at Signal had stressed to her and Ozpin that the sisters were close and explained the background to their request two years back for Glynda to repair the locker room. Ozpin had said that Qrow had told him that there was a time when Yang had to act as a sort of substitute mother as well as big sister and that Taiyang had had some rough years. She had also spoken with Loretta this morning. Loretta had told her that "Yang is both delighted and dismayed that Ruby had started Beacon at the same time as her. She is worried that this will mean that Ruby does not branch out and make new friends as she is so much younger than everyone else. While she did not say so. I suspect Yang may have been looking forward to having at least one year when she could let loose and have fun without having her sister observing her. She did say that while she would like to be on the same team as Ruby, it would probably be best if they were not partners"
While she was happier about having Weiss and Blake in the same year after last night, she would still prefer that they were not teammates. There must be a risk that the sisters would think alike when it came to choosing a relic and she could only hope that the fact that Ruby and Weiss were amongst those furthest from the ruined temple and Blake and Yang the closest meant that some other pair would pick up the piece or dice matching the one Blake and Yang chose.
Coco noted that Cardin and Russell had got close to the relics and then halted for ten minutes. They had not encountered many Grimm and were looking relaxed. Cardin then got out a piece of paper, walked towards the relics and then stared at the pedestals. Before he made a choice Dove Bronzewing and Sky Lark had appeared. Dove and Cardin had greeted each other and then both chose a black bishop piece and walked towards the landing stage back to Beacon.
Tom Piper had drawn their attention to Ren's fight with the King Taijitu and the appearance of Nora. He said that Mulberry had been ready to intervene when the King Taijitu appeared but that Ozpin and Glynda had vetoed it although had allowed then to get closer in. He said that he expected this to be on the highlights reel.
Luckily, Port and Oobleck's bullheads were close enough for Fox to use his telepathy semblance. Velvet reported that she had seen Blake meet up with Yang and stroll towards the temple to pick up the "relic" which in their case had been a white knight. However, instead of making straight for the airbus back to Beacon they had sat down and watch others arrive and choose their relic. She assumed that Yang was waiting for Ruby and that Blake was happy to keep her company and read a book in the sun. A few minutes later, she added that she had scanned the pedestals and could not see the other white knight piece, but neither was any other pair listed as having picked it up. However, Yang was sitting on a seemingly empty pedestal and she suspected that the pedestal in question contained a white knight.
There had been a couple of times when one of the Professors had ordered the bullhead they were in to move closer to the action, but no time when they had felt like there was a serious need to intervene. After all, Beowulf, Boarbatusk and young Ursa should not be a real threat to a pair of trainee hunters. A few students had taken hits, but no one's aura had been depleted.
An hour later twenty-two pairs had made it back to the airbuses and there were only a few stragglers left. Two teams had collected their relic but had not immediately headed back to the airbuses. Yang and Blake were still waiting for Ruby. Coco noted that Lydia and Leslie had, after collecting their twenty-sided dice relic, returned to the forest to practice hunting Grimm. This seemed like showing a little too much enthusiasm even for Coco. Leslie had started by holding the golf bag while Lydia showed off each of her sports themed weapons. Port had apparently approved of the lacrosse stick being used to fire dust grenades. Leslie had then in his turn demonstrated his quick reactions and speed of fire with a combination crossbow and gun. They had then started experimenting with team attacks. These included the croquet mallet being used on a spinning Boarbatusk to knock it into a tree and then a crossbow arrow was fired into its underbelly. After thirty minutes of mayhem it looked as though any Grimm left in their area had decided to leave them alone. They had then shaken hands and finally departed for the airbus.
With only nine pairs left in the forest the screens had adapted so that all the observers could watch everyone left out there although the pairs each Professor had prime responsibility for were highlighted on their screens.
The two pairs who were occupying most of Coco's attention were Ruby and Weiss and Jaune and Pyrrha.
Ruby and Weiss's first fight with the Grimm had not gone well with each of them getting in each other's way. As she had suspected Weiss had more style and technically had a better technique, but Ruby was clearly far more experienced at fighting multiple Grimm at once and the need to keep moving. It was also clear that they were both too used to fighting by themselves. Quite how this had resulted in a forest fire was something Coco was at a loss to explain. To judge from Port's reaction there clearly was a blooper reel for the professors although he gallantly suggested that it may have been a deliberate ploy. He also noted that quite a lot of fixed cameras would need to be replaced for next year. Weiss had then insisted on leading them but was clearly lost. Ruby was also clearly frustrated, although silently carving a notch on a tree each time they passed it was perhaps being a little passive aggressive.
Yatsuhashi had drawn their attention to the fact that Nora had decided to take an Ursa back ride and that Ren was running behind them. She was steering it by giving it electric shocks with her hammer. Port had guffawed at this and wondered if they could negotiate a TV contract for Ursa races.
Her first thought on seeing Jaune and Pyrrha enter the cave was that they could have waited until getting back to Beacon. She then focused on the carvings outside the cave and asked Velvet to talk to Oobleck about them. The response confirmed her concerns and she persuaded Port to send in a drone behind the pair.
Suddenly everything went wrong at once. The drone in the cave was destroyed and Pyrrha appeared from out of the mouth of the tunnel pursued by a giant Death Stalker with Jaune holding on to its stinger. Velvet relayed that Oobleck suspected that it had gone to sleep there a century ago just before it transformed into an alpha and had found that it could not get out afterwards. At least not until someone angered it enough to break the cave entrance open.
Coco could see the logic of Weiss and Ruby climbing a tree to reorientate themselves. However, hitching a lift on a resting Nevermore seemed like a true act of desperation. Admittedly it had worked in the short term as they had quickly arrived above the temple and had used their landing strategies for the second time today. Weiss's Glyphs had been elegantly deployed and Crescent Rose had been used to slow down Ruby's descent at least until a flying Jaune Arc collided with her. Both had recovered quickly, although Jaune had been ill advised to try and catch Weiss to break her fall.
Nora and Ren had then arrived at the temple just as the Ursa finally expired from a mixture of electrical shocks and embarrassment.
Coco had loaded her handbag with the Velvet enhanced bullets, she had been looking forward to a chance to try them out on an Alpha. However, Ozpin sent a message that they were to hold themselves in readiness, but not yet intervene. The eight students gathered at the temple and a white knight had suddenly become visible on a pedestal. After a hug from Yang, it was then clutched in Ruby's hand.
The following fight was intense and Coco was surprised that Ozpin had not ordered them to intervene. Still it was clear which two fights would be the main attraction in the highlight reel. Velvet said that Glynda had taken a bullhead into the canyon and had looked ready to use her semblance if anyone had fallen too far, so perhaps it had not been quite as risky as it had looked. Ozpin said that it was unfair to expect Ruby to climb down the cliff again and get to the official collection point, so Port directed the pilot of their bullhead to pick her up.
The last five pairs emerged from the forest and grabbed their pieces. They like everyone on the bullheads had been enthralled by the fight with the Death Stalker and the Nevermore. They made a decent go at pretending how disappointed they were not to have been able to join in the fight.
Glynda joined Ozpin and the other professors to discuss who should be the 16 team leaders. The librarian had already come up with some suggested team names and was working on more. Ozpin had decided five years ago that when there was no clear candidate to lead a team, a good tie breaker was choosing the person whose initial gave the best team name. The problem was that many students had had an easy initiation and had not had the opportunity to show true leadership ability while others had harmed their chances by trying too hard to lead their companion. They had left Teams PLUM and CFVY to take the students to the showers and then host a barbeque in the grounds before the team ceremony.
The Professors who had been watching each pair said who they had thought was best suited for a leadership role in each of the eight pairs they had watched or if both were suited or unsuited. Glynda had already decided that she did not want Miss Schnee or Miss Nightshade leading the other and Ozpin had accepted her call. The professors who had been watching the two pairs had nominated Miss Rose and Miss Nightshade. One pointed out that Miss Rose had come up with the decapitation plan and the other felt that Miss Nightshade was calmer in a crisis. That made it easy for Glynda to firmly say Miss Rose had demonstrated the most leadership skill in the test and so should be the leader despite being two years younger.
The combination of Mr. Arc, Miss Nikos, Mr. Ren and Miss Valkyrie had caused problems. Mr. Ren seemed to be too quiet and Miss Valkyrie too impetuous. Miss Nikos was clearly the most talented, but Oobleck expressed two concerns. First, she seemed too polite for the job and second may be predisposed to taking too much responsibility on herself. Mr. Arc was plainly the least experienced, but he had spotted the damage Mr. Ren had caused the stinger and had directed Miss Nikos and Miss Valkyrie to use their skills in the most effective way. Glynda felt that Ozpin had decided to use the name test to decide and calling a team Juniper appealed to his sense of humour.
With Miss Travers, Mr. Campion, Mr. Corkran and Miss Harker there were three potential leaders. It was felt that Miss Travers and Mr. Corkran's teambuilding instincts made them the front runners. The name did not help for once as Team LLAC, pronounced Lilac, worked with both. Port opined that it would be good to have a mustang Faunus being a team leader and that had also appealed to Oobleck. Glynda felt that based on the fact that Mr. Corkran was clearly rated by both Qrow and Winter and had been able to work with the atlas military then this was the right result, although she would have enjoyed seeing a team led by Miss Travers.
There was a quick discussion of what must be included in the highlights reel and then the meeting ended. Port, Mulberry and the librarian went to finalise the first version of the highlights reel. Glynda had already checked the footage and had excluded any signs of bow twitching. After the ceremony they would prepare a second version which would be played on the screens in the academy bar that evening as the students celebrated their initiation. There would also be karaoke organized by Miss Adel. Port mentioned to the librarian on the way out that Miss Adel had suggested that for the evening version they try using the Tony Tor chase tune to accompany the Death Stalker and Nevermore fight for the final playthrough.
Glynda then looked at her scroll. She saw that Miss Scarlatina and Mr. Corkran wanted to see her urgently. She suspected she knew what about.