(AN: I just wanted to let everyone reading my story know that I have tagged this story as romance for a reason, believe me. I just have a lot of leading up to do.)
I got back to Beacon and handed the white bishop piece to Professor Goodwitch, who merely nodded at me. I waited in line behind four girls who were talking about something that I really didn't care about and moved forward as the teams were assigned.
"Russell Thrush. Cardin Winchester. Dove Bronzewing. Sky Lark. The four of you retrieved the black bishop pieces. From this day forward, you will work together as team Cardinal. Led by…Cardin Winchester." Professor Ozpin's voice rang out across the amphitheater. He went on to about teams Juniper and Ruby and then, when it was my turn to get called up, he looked at me with sympathetic eyes.
"Joseph Taren. You are the only one to come back alive with the white bishop piece." It took every fiber of my being to not break down crying in front of the entire first year student population at that statement. "You will be assigned to another team tomorrow morning, in my office."
I nodded to him and left the stage. As I walked past a few other first years, I saw them look at me with more sympathy. I stopped in front of the leader of team Juniper who looked at me with more shock than sympathy.
"What?" I growled at him. "You can't believe the fact that three other people died? Well guess what pal? That's the real world! People die in the real-fucking world!" I stormed past him back towards the ballroom to get some rest, not bothering to change as I cried myself to sleep.
The next morning I could've cared less whether someone killed me in my sleep. I only slept for about two hours last night and after I used the restroom and looked in the mirror, I noticed my eyes were bloodshot from the lack of sleep. It was only six in the morning but I didn't really care if the headmaster was awake or not.
Without grabbing breakfast, I headed for Ozpin's office, my heart more empty than my stomach. I pressed the button to go to the top floor and I felt the elevator slowly ascending. The elevator hit the top floor and stopped.
"Come in." I heard Ozpin's voice on the other side. I pressed the elevator button door that read "open" and walked into his office. He sat behind a big desk with gears inside it with his cane beside his chair and a coffee cup sitting in front of him.
"Please. Sit." He said gesturing to the chair that was in front of the large desk.
"Who's team am I on?" I asked, taking my seat in the chair and wanting to get to the point.
"First off Mr. Taren, let me express my most sincere apologies over the loss of your friends. I know first-hand what it's like to lose someone close to your heart and I know what you're going through." He said with a great deal of what I could tell was actual sympathy.
"So you know that I probably don't feel like talking right now, Professor Ozpin." I deadpanned.
"Yes. I do. Which is why I'll get straight to the point. What is your opinion of working alongside team RWBY?" He asked me.
"While I have nothing against working alongside a team of females sir, I would prefer not to."
He nodded at my answer and moved on. "What about team JNPR?"
"I don't think that would be a good idea considering how I yelled at their team leader my fit of rage last night, professor." I replied.
"I thought not. Very well then, your third and final option is team CRDL." He looked at me dead in the eye.
I thought for a minute. A team full of guys, so I could be myself around them. They didn't seem to give a shit about who got in their way, so they must be determined and headstrong… I thought about it until I remembered the name of their team leader.
"Sir, isn't the leader of that team Cardin Winchester?" Ozpin nodded at me and I took a deep breath. There is no way in hell that I'm being on the same team as the shitbag who made fun of Elias before he died. "Then I'm afraid that I can't be on their team either, sir."
Ozpin maintained his gaze on my eyes as he spoke. "Mr. Taren, you must choose a team, otherwise I will have to expel you from this academy and I assure you that I think that it would be a very big mistake on both our parts. Do you have a second preferred option?" He asked me.
"Team JNPR." I said. "Although I doubt that they would forgive my outburst last night."
"We don't know that until it happens. Very well then, I will inform them that they will soon be receiving a fifth teammate." He said, taking out his scroll and typing in a message to whom I could only assume was all of team JNPR. "Pack your things and move them into this dorm." He sent me a message that described where their dorm room was.
I nodded and left, hitting the elevator button for the ground floor as I leaned up against the back of the car. That blonde kid is going to lose his shit when he realizes I'm on the same team as him. I thought as the elevator stopped on the ground floor.
Once I was back in the ballroom, I packed up my sleeping bag and put Andrea's sword as well as my other clothes in my duffle bag and headed towards team Juniper's dorm room.
I knocked on the door. This is not going to go well.
A black haired guy with a pink stripe in his hair and magenta eyes opened the door dressed in the Beacon academy uniform opened up the door. "You must be our new teammate." He said quietly. I just nodded at him. He turned around and motioned for me to follow him into the dorm. There were four beds, one for each of the original team members. "This is an unusual case and we don't have a fifth bed so…" he was probably going to go on and offer me his bed, but I cut him off.
"It's alright, I'll take the floor. I'll just lay my sleeping bag down in the kitchen area. I'm an early riser anyways so I'll probably be up before any of you." I said to him. He simply nodded back at me and I placed my duffle bag down next to the door.
"Professor Ozpin told us you would be joining us and he sent us a uniform for you." The black haired guy said, gesturing to a Beacon uniform on a clothes hanger on the inside handle of the door.
"Ren, you better be making me my pancakes." I heard a female voice say with a yawn.
"Nora, we have classes today so I don't think that I'll have time. You can go get some down in the cafeteria though." The guy known as Ren said, turning to face the ginger-haired girl I recognized from the cafeteria.
"But the cooks there don't make them nearly as good as yo…" She stopped mid-sentence when she saw me standing in the middle of the room.
Might as well make a good first impression. I thought. Mustering the best smile I could in my current state, I decided to introduce myself. "Hi. My name's…"
She cut me off. "I don't really care what your name is!" She exploded at me, suddenly right in front of my face. "You had no right to yell at poor Jaune like that!" She said, gesturing to the blonde guy who was in his bed, beginning to wake up.
"Well guess what, princess!?" I yelled back. "Losing three friends in the same day generally tends to make me insanely pissed off, so pardon me all to hell for not thinking clearly after seeing two friends brutally mauled by grimm and a third being chomped on by a king taijitu!"
I looked over to see the blonde guy getting out of bed dressed in a rabbit onesie. "Nora, it's alright." He said calmly to the ginger girl. "I think I would've reacted the same way in his position." His attitude towards me took me off guard. I thought for sure that he would've joined in at yelling at me.
"But Jauney!" She started.
"Nora, just let it go." He said without a hint of anger or frustration in his voice. Nora nodded at him and she took her uniform into the bathroom, presumably to shower and change. The leader of Juniper turned his gaze to me and extended his hand to me. "Sorry about her. From what Ren told me, she can be a little hyper at times." He said with a chuckle. "Anyway, the name's Jaune Arc."
"Joseph Taren." I replied, shaking his hand.
"Good to meet you. The ninja who you've already met is Ren." He stated, placing a hand on the other guy's shoulder, who then took a bow.
"Lie Ren, actually. But you can just call me Ren, everyone else does." He said politely.
"And our other team member is Pyrrha." He said, gesturing to the famous mistrilian champion who was just now awakening from her slumber wearing a red and gold nightgown. While I had to admit she looked nice, she still wasn't nearly as beautiful as Denara in my opinion.
I had to take a deep breath in order to prevent the tears from flowing at the thought of the amazingly gorgeous female wolf-faunus.
"Yes, I've heard of her." I said.
"Hello. You must be our new teammate." She said politely with a wave and a smile from behind Jaune.
"And you are Pyrrha Nikos. I enjoyed watching your fights." I said, my fan-like attitude had dissipated since the events of yesterday. I noticed that her smile faded slightly at my remark, but I pushed it out of my mind. "I already told Ren that it's perfectly fine with me if I slept on the kitchen floor. So long as I have my sleeping bag, I'll be fine." I said to Jaune.
"You can take my bed if you…"
"Jaune, I said I'd be fine." I cut him off.
He then sighed resignedly and looked at my attire that I still wore from initiation day. "Wouldn't you be more comfortable without your weapons and armor on?" He asked me.
I looked at my equipment. "I think I'll ditch the armor but I'm keeping Castor and Pollux with me." I declared. Jaune and Ren both exchanged slightly worried looks.
"Joseph…" Ren started.
"Just call me Joe if you want." I interjected.
"Joe." He began again. "Wearing your weapons in full view of everyone during classes could cause some worry amongst the student population."
"Sorry Ren, but I don't feel safe without them after seeing two of my friends die on me. I also regret not being able to help Elias when he was in trouble." I replied. "If the teachers tell me to take them off, I will but until then, I'm keeping them on." As I finished my sentence, Nora emerged from the bathroom wearing her uniform. I quickly grabbed mine off the hanger on the dorm room door handle and went into the bathroom before anyone could say anything else.
I slammed the door behind me and after stripping; I entered the shower, letting the hot water work its magic. I came out about five minutes after wearing my uniform with Castor and Pollux over top of the Academy issued clothes.
"Shower's anyone's that wants it." I said to my teammates who were either trying to catch a little more sleep before the day began or reading. The next one to use the shower was Pyrrha, followed by Ren and lastly, Jaune.
While Jaune was in the shower, I decided to try talking with Ren.
"Ren?"
"Yes, Joe?" He responded, not taking his eyes off the book he was reading.
"How long have you and Nora been together?"
That was one topic that I learned was a trigger for sending him into a stuttering frenzy.
"We-uh-uh…"
"We're not actually together-together." Nora responded slightly nervously in his stead, still glaring angrily at me.
"Okay, got it." I said, dropping the subject.
After recovering his composure, Ren turned to me. "Why did you name your gauntlets Castor and Pollux?"
"They're the names of my uncles who helped me design, build and use them."
"A sign of sentiment." He observed. "It's nice to know that you have a good sense of decency." He responded.
Jaune emerged from the shower and tightened the necktie on his uniform. It looked like he was about to say something when we heard the words: "It's 8:55, you dunce!" from across the hall. Jaune opened the door and I saw Weiss Schnee running down the hall.
"T-to class!" I heard another voice say. Then, the two girls from the airship ran down the hall followed by the girl in black I saw in the ballroom on initiation night.
"Class?" Jaune said to himself. "We're going to be late!" We all tried exiting the dorm at the same time, only to end up on as a heap on the hall floor.
After a sprint across the courtyard, we made our way to Professor Port's grimm anatomy class, where he droned on about his exploits as a young man and the Schnee heiress fought a boarbatusk, only succeeding thanks to the girl in red's advice.
"Sheesh, what's with her?" Jaune asked.
"Probably just pissed off at the fact that she needed someone else's help to win a fight." I replied, picking up my books. "Come on, we should head off to Doctor Oobleck's history class."
We all followed Pyrrha, as she apparently already knew the school like the back of her hand.
Thankfully in his class, the Doctor actually taught us lessons about history; even he was talking a mile a minute.
Next class was combat class with Professor Goodwitch, but since it was only the first day, we didn't get to do any sparring.
After the day's classes, my new teammates hung back to play meet-and-greet with the other first-years, but I just headed back to the dorm to try and catch up on some sleep until dinnertime.
As I lay in my sleeping bag, my thoughts kept returning to my fallen friends and what life would be like at Beacon if I had actually been able to save them.
I breathed deeply. These next four years are going to be hell.