It's been a full day since the incident with the criminals. Nick thought that was the end of it. Yet here he was, in Beacons main elevator up to Professor Ozpins office. He was nervous, it was the first time he was actually called up there. He liked the headmaster, though his stomach had dropped when his scroll notified him to stop by as he got back to the dorm from his shift.
The doors opened to reveal the large office. He first managed to notice the peculiar gears that decorated the floor and ceiling by their operating. The office appeared to be lit by the large windows at the far end of the room, which looked out onto the campus. Also sitting at the fat end of the room, sat a desk. On one side, the headmaster sat. The other was a empty chair.
The headmaster smiled in greeting to Nick.
"Please, come in." He said. Nick nervously made his way to the desk and sat down in the empty chair. "Mr. Veras, do you know the rules of chess?" He inquired, as he took a sip from his mug.
"It's been awhile since I've played it, but yes." He responded, somewhat confused. The headmaster smiled kindly.
"When would you mind humoring me with a game while we talk?" He asked. A dust projection of a chess board appeared on the desk. Nick nodded, and looked over the board for a moment. He reached over and moved his first piece. "So, I heard you had a run in with a group of criminals the other day while in Vale." He said as he moved his own piece.
"Umm, yeah. They weren't really that bad, though one got away." The headmaster chuckled.
"Relax, Mr. Veras, I assure you that you're not in any trouble. I personally find you did well to act where you feel you needed too. It's one of the many factors of being a true huntsman." Nick nodded and relaxed as he took another turn. "However, you don't know who the one who escaped was, do you?" Nick shook his head.
"No, but he was... Interesting to say the least. Also could you call me Nick? Sorry, but I'm not really into formalities."
"Of course. That man, his name is Roman Torchwick. He's a rather well known criminal in the kingdoms, particularly in Vale. Throughout the years, he has managed to escape capture. It was a shame he escaped again." Ozpin sighed as they continued the exchange of turns.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be. You protected the innocents and put multiple criminals behind bars along with your friends. Even if one got away, that's still a better result than if you didn't get involved."
"Thank you, Professor."
The headmaster nodded and watched Nicks next move.
"If I may ask, you're in the smaller group of teams leaders that didn't ask to resign or threatened to quit. As a matter of fact, you also went so far to acquire a part time job at a local dust store. Ignoring the indecent this week in the gym, you don't seem all that phased by these responsibilities. Why is that?"
"Oh, it's not that bad that some people are making it out to be. Once I got a schedule figured out for myself, it wasn't so bad to manage with my team helping me." The headmaster smiled slightly, as his eyes glinted under his spectacles.
"I see, so you like your teammates then?"
"I don't hate them if that's what your asking. When a certain set of partners don't cause me any trouble, I consider it a big help. Though honestly, we're not a team. We're a bunch of huntsmen in training shoved in a room together and expected to play nice and just accept whatever happens. That's not how things really are working in my case." Nick sighed as he moved his next piece. "Other than me and Indigo, we don't really work together as well as I want. Hell, I only work as well as I do with her because we've already trained together for years."
The headmaster nodded as he listened.
"Well, Nick. I'll let you in a little secret, I didn't warn everyone that real training begin tomorrow for nothing. Your physical and emotion limits as a person are going to be pushed. You and your team are going to have to learn to rely on one another, weather they want to or not. Otherwise, you will fail."
"No pressure, right?" Nick muttered sarcastically.
"What I mean to explain, is that one thing your team seems to be, is dedicated. You all want to succeed, and have given it your best efforts so far. Give it time, you will all come around to each other naturally as you grow." Ozpin explained. "Though I would ask of you to find your own advice to give to other teams that may be going through issues of their own. Should they ask you, of course." He added.
Nick nodded. The headmaster smiled as he moved his next piece.
"Checkmate." The headmaster stated, gesturing towards the board. A rook a few tiles away from his king that was forced into the open. Ozpin took another sip from his mug. "That was a interesting talk and game. I hope to have another sometime, though I won't take up any more of your time. After all, you are going to need to rest to be ready for combat training."
"Alright, goodnight then Professor." Nick responded as he stood from the chair. The dust projection of the chess board disappeared from the desk, Nick began to walk out of the office, before he turned to look back at the headmaster.
"Oh, and by the way. That was a risky strategy." Nick commented. Ozpin merely raised his eyebrows. "You practically threw your pieces at my defenses to weaken them, sacrificing a good amount of them to get my guard down. It was basic and effective, but wasteful. You could have waited for an opening and got the same result without wasting the pieces on making one."
"An interesting examination. I think I'll keep that in mind." Ozpin responded. Nick nodded as he stepped into the elevator, where he proceeded to mentally scold himself for saying that. Though he couldn't help himself, it just had annoyed him how needless some of the moves seemed from him. He yawned as the elevator descended, he was right about one thing; Nick should rest up for tomorrow, it was probably going to be a long day.
Nick adjusted the straps of his sheaths slightly as he sat down in a room he had only been to a handful of times. The main arena room. The main ring had seats stationed around it, though in the other room, other sparring rings existed. After he practically herded his team the seating area that they were informed to sit in by Professor Goodwitch earlier that say, he finally felt like he could relax a little.
After a minute and all the teams had found their place, he noticed Professor Goodwitch standing in the center of the ring. The slight indistinct chattering amongst the students quieted by her appearance. She looked around the room briefly, before beginning the new class.
"Good afternoon everyone, I will be monitoring these training classes from this point onwards. Today, we'll be having team duels. Two teams will combat each other until they are either knocked out of the ring, or their aura becomes too drained to continue. It's quite similar to the rules of regional tournaments or even the Vytal Festival."
There was a pause for the students to soak in her words before she continued.
"Now then, I shall select two teams to come down here to start us off. Once they are done, I shall select two more and so on... Would team CFVY and team CEDR please start the first duel?"
Nick watched as the two teams stood from their seats and began making their way down to the ring. Coco was practically walking backwards, talking to her teammates in her usual fashion, while they looked exited. The members of team CEDR looked less than excited. That group just looked nervous about the idea of taking on one of the teams that had made a name for themselves during the initiation mission and around campus.
Nick didn't pay them much mind, he turned look at his fellow teammates.
"Whoever we end up fighting, I think we might have a decent advantage over." He said
"Why's that?" Amber asked.
"Well, just think about it, our team is pretty diverse in skill sets. So we pretty much have a counter for most basic things thrown at us. Plus if push comes to shove, we can use attempting to overpower them as a last resort. I mean, just having Indigo around during a tournament based fight gives us a big advantage on it's own." He explained. Indigo gave him a annoyed eye from her seat. Navy grunted.
"I can handle whoever we go against. Just stay out of my way." Nick sighed.
"We shouldn't get ahead of ourselves though, besides, they're watching our teamwork more than the actual outcome." Nick sighed, and gestured towards the fight. Team CFVY was operating smoothy, forcing team CEDR's members apart and towards the ring edge. On the other hand, CEDR didn't seem to be coordinating very well. They seemed confused and slow in comparison. "You want to win; we have to work together."
Navy grunted again in response. A buzzer filled the room, signifying the end of the match, two of team CEDR were pushed out of the ring by Yatsuhashi, while the other two lay on the ground with their auras broken. The professor typed something in on the scroll she held in tablet form.
"Team CFVY wins." She announced simply. Nick watched the team climb back into the stands after packing away their weapons.
"Nice fight," Nick commented as they passed by.
"Oh, that? That could've gone better if some of us stuck to the plan." She replied, her tone growing slightly pointed towards her team as they sat down near team NANI.
"You won in spite of that. Perhaps a message our own leader should take from." Navy said.
"Can you shut up." Indigo muttered. She gazed down at the floor and hunched over. "I don't want to deal with your crap today." Navy huffed.
"C'mon Navy, it won't kill you to try it a little." Nick said with a shrug.
"Well, I can't wait to see you guys out there, though I'm sure you'll be fine. After all, we're not the only team with a lucky fox." Coco replied, she gave a wink and walked away. Indigo scowled.
"What do think she-," Amber began to say, but was cut off.
"Nick, can I talk to you for a minute?" Indigo asked, her voice was low and growled. He listened briefly as the next set of teams were announced, not them yet.
"Uhh, yeah sure, let's just be quick." He said as he stood from his seat.
She guided him to the empty hallway entering the arena room. Once she was satisfied that nobody else was listening; she groaned in seeming frustration while facing the wall.
"So, what's up?" Nick asked cautiously.
"Coco found out." Indigo grumbled as she turned to face him. Nick resisted the urge to roll his eyes slightly, her last comment made it a little obvious.
"And? How did she take it?" He asked.
"Fine, I just wish she wouldn't say stuff like that in front of everyone." She grumbled.
"Then why are you telling me that?"
"Because... I was hoping you could talk to her... I don't know. She makes me nervous, and you know i'm not good at talking."
"You being nervous, that's a new one." For once, he wasn't being sarcastic, it was rare for her to get nervous about anything and show it. He sighed. "Look, maybe it would be better if you talked to her yourself on your own terms. It's not my secret, and you need to learn how to deal with something that makes you uneasy instead of hiding behind me. I'll support you, but you have to do it." He explained. She leaned against the wall and smacked the back of her head on it before sighing.
"I know... You still remember the night our village burned down?"
"How could I forget? I only think about it every single day..."
"Well... You weren't there for a lot of it, you didn't see what me and my grandparents had to put up with... I don't want to go through that again, the things people said about us... The time we actually met, that wasn't the first time."
"Indigo, that was years ago. Besides, look around us, there are a lot more Faunus here than there were back home. Nobody's doing that openly here... Plus you're strong enough to not put up with it anymore."
The sound of the buzzer could be heard back in the arena room.
"We should head back." He said. Without waiting for her, he began to walk back towards the class, she began to walk with him. He remembered something and turned to look back at her.
"It's not good for you to have your tail wrapped around you like that all the time. You can't spend four years doing that, so you need to tell everyone at some point." He said before he walked back to their seats. Amber gave them a glance as they sat down while Navy said nothing.
"I know..." she muttered under her breath.
