Chapter 3: Team Building
Authors Note: Hello for the third time! I'll try not to get carried away with this chapter, because my phone gets laggy when I try to upload a huge chapter. There really isn't much to say. I'm still traveling around, so I can't write as fast as I can on my computer. If you haven't figured out by the name of haven't read the last chapter, I'll be presenting the team rosters in this chapter. I created a total of four teams, each with four OC's. Of course I'm not going to go too in depth with everyone, I'll be focusing on my main characters. That's pretty much it. Happy reading!
Disclaimer: RWBY and all its characters belong to Rooster Teeth!
Arin
Another dawn, another day. I stretch as I rise from my sleeping bag. It's nice to know that from today forward we'll get actual beds in dorms.
I glance over at Sam, who's sprawled across her open sleeping bag in her over-sized yellow t-shirt, snoring away.
I look around the room, everyone else is snoring away as well. Terence's sleeping bag lays open and empty. He's gone again.
Just then, Terence appears around the corner, barefoot, and wearing a maroon tee and grey gym shorts. He waves at me and I wave back. He gestures for me to come to him and I tip toe around the sleeping mass of first years to join him.
"What are you doing up so early?" I whisper, "the sun's just come up."
"I could ask you the same thing," he retaliates, "I was just going up to the roof to get some fresh air."
"This early?" I raise an eyebrow, "I'm coming with you."
Terence shrugs, "Alright, we gotta pass through the dorms though."
We walk upstairs, the carpet softening our footsteps. The corridor upstairs was lined with doors, dorms I guessed. We walked past the doors to reach the stairs on the other side.
Behind one of the doors we heard a bark. A dog?
"Zwei, shut up. It's too early." A voice on the other side says. The dog barks again.
"What is it boy?" A higher pitched voice asks the dog. Terence and I walk past the room as the door swings open.
"Hey, you were right. There were people here!" A petite girl stands at the door. She seems unusually pale, wearing a black tank top and white sweats with roses on them.
"Good morning," the girl greets us. She looks a bit young to be at this school, "I haven't seen you two before. You guys first-years or something?"
Terence responds, "Yeah, we are. Sorry for disturbing your sleep, we were just trying to get to the roof."
"Well, I won't hold you back," the girl seems awfully happy so early in the morning, "good luck with teams!" She closes the door.
More voices, "who was that Ruby?"
"No one in particular…"
Terence and I look at each other and laugh, "She reminded me of Sam."
"Right?" I say as we continue along the corridor, "so, about teams…"
"Don't worry about it," Terence takes the railing as we walk up the stairs, "Ozpin'll explain it all later on."
We reach the rooftop where the rising sun made the sky different shades of pink and purple. "It's beautiful up here," I breathe.
"Yeah, it is," Terence hops down and sits on the edge of the building.
I take a seat next to him, "what do you do up here?"
"Just appreciate the view," he swings his feet around, "take a breather, yell at the world, whatever you want to do."
I do just that. I take a deep breath and watch the sun rise and the sky change colors. All worries of teams left my mind.
"Ryane Bianca, Arthur Hinto, Sadie Ianthina, and Flynn Shao Qing," the pictures of the four initiates appear on the screen above Ozpin. The four of them step on stage, "You chose the Clove Cards, and will be known as Team SAFR [Sapphire]. Led by Sadie Ianthina." Applause erupts around the auditorium.
Next to me, Terence whispers to himself, "Ryane Bianca," as if testing the name. Maybe he's familiar with her.
They leave the stage as Ozpin announces the second group, "Maximilian Cole, Lawrence Duncan, Raymond Irvin, and Orion Zilar," we watch as the four step on stage with smug grins on their faces, "You chose the Diamond Cards, and will be known as Team MORL [Morel]. Led by Maximilian Cole." The applause that followed seemed to be slightly quieter.
"Next up," the pictures on screen change and rearrange, "Natalie Akane, Brian Conway, Lilly Huong, and Colin Porphyrios. You chose the Heart Cards, and will be known as Team CLBN [Columbine]. Led by Colin Porphrios."
Finally, our turn. "Lastly for division two," Ozpin announces, "Samantha Aurum, Terence Cordovan, Arin Steele, and Luther Yahto." We step on stage. My hands are shaking and I look over at my teammates. Sam is giddy with excitement, Luther has his arms crossed but seems content, and Terence is also trying to keep his hands from shaking by sticking them in his pockets. "You chose the Spade Cards, and will be known as Team ATLS [Atlas]. Led by Arin Steele."
Arin Steele. "M-me?" I stutter, "Why?"
Sam tackles me with a flying hug, "Don't question why, Arin."
"Partners," Professor Ozpin states, "are determined by the face card that you have retrieved. Jack cards will be partnered with Queen cards, while King cards are to be partnered with Ace cards."
Terence and Luther fist bump and Sam keeps hugging me. "We're going to be the best team ever!" She squeals.
"Congratulations," Ozpin says to me in a quiet tone over the applause of the students, "you've got quite the team here."
I look over the other three, all smiling back at me. "Yeah, I guess so."
"WHOO!" Sam whoops as the door to our dorm room slams open with a kick, "Let's unpack!"
"There's hardly any room in this…" Luther pauses, "room. The beds take up too much space."
"What are you talking about? There's plenty of space," Terence tosses a bag onto one of the beds.
I set down my bag on the next bed over. The room was pretty plain by itself. Four beds, a set of drawers, some tables and chairs, and a bookshelf. I pulled open the curtains and unlocked the window. The cool air rushed into the room as I looked over the campus from our third floor window.
"Enjoying the view?" Terence joins me. Surprisingly, his gauntlets aren't on his wrist.
I nod, "it's good to finally be able to relax after the last few days. That said, did they give us our schedule yet?"
"Here," Luther picks up a piece of paper from a desk, "We have classes starting in an hour."
"What about uniforms?"
"Here!" Sam pulls open the drawers, revealing two sets of girls uniforms and two sets of boys'.
"Sweet," I say, "we're ready for class."
A knock at the door. Sam glances at me and I shrug. We weren't expecting company.
Luther opens the door to be greeted with a barrage of streamers and confetti, "what…"
"Welcome to Beacon!" Hey, it's the same girl Terence and I met this morning. Behind her stands three others. One had white colored hair, another wears a black bow that resembles cat ears, and the tall blonde has large… uh…
"Hey!" The smaller girl points to me, "you're that girl from this morning."
"Hi," I wave and introduce ourselves, "I'm Arin."
"Luther," He does a half bow.
"I'm Samantha," Sam jumps up from the bed and rushes over, "But you can call me Sam."
"And I'm Terence," he salutes casually, "thanks for the welcome."
"Well, I'm Ruby!" Ruby extends her hand to shake, which I do.
"Blake," the black haired girl seemed a bit lost in thought.
"Weiss Schnee," the girl with white hair curtsies.
"I'm Yang," the taller girl thumbs at herself, "We better get to class. You should too."
"We will," they wave goodbye as they start down the hall. They join up with another group of four, another team I guess.
I close the door, "you heard Yang, we better get ready and get to class."
"How are we supposed to change?" Sam holds a uniform in her arms, "I mean…"
"We'll head to the restrooms," Luther drags Terence along as they leave the room.
Once the boys are out of the room we change into our uniforms. I check our schedule, first class of the day is History of Remnant. I keep forgetting that this school doesn't only teach us how to fight, but also other subjects as well.
I sigh, remembering that history was my worst subject. There's another knock on the door.
"You guys done?" Terence calls from the other side.
I pull on my jacket and open the door. Sam whistles when she sees the guys in their uniforms.
"Hey, shut up," Terence points. He picks up his gauntlets from the table and snaps them on.
"You guys look good," Luther says, collapsing his rifle and equipping it to a harness on his back.
"Pshh, nah," Sam laughs, "Look at Arin, she's red as a tomato!"
My hands instantly fly to my face, which to my surprise is hot. The others laugh and I manage to smile, one hell of a team.
I groan and set my pencil down. I'm already bored to death. My notes are getting messier by the minute and my hand is cramping up. My page is filled with more doodles than notes. I can't keep up with how the four nations are right now, less so a few hundreds of years ago.
A ball of paper hits me on the back of my head. I turn, Terence sits a seat above me, but he seems to be concentrating on whatever the teacher is saying and taking notes diligently. A few more seats up is Sam, who is giggling like a madman.
I assume it's Sam, and open the paper ball. It's hard to read with all the wrinkles, but I can make out Sam's small handwriting. Hello partner! -S
I sigh, really? When does this class end? –A, I write. I ball up the paper again and toss it over my shoulder. It bounces onto Terence's table and he immediately opens it, scribbles something, and tosses it back down.
We got ten min –T. I look around, realizing that Luther isn't anywhere to be seen. I finally spot him towards the front, nodding off.
"Mr. Yahto," The professor says sternly. His name is written on the board but I can't make it out.
"Yes professor?" Luther snaps awake.
"Can you tell me why the territories of Mountain Glenn were overrun by Grimm while Vale was not?" he asks in a rather quick manner.
Terence's hand shoots up, but Luther manages to answer, "Mountain Glenn did not have the same natural barriers as Vale and was far more vulnerable to the attacks of Grimm than the rest of the kingdom."
The rest of the class seemed surprised. The bell rings, and we all get up instantly.
"Read chapter one, sections two through four for homework tonight!" The professor states loudly over the students leaving the room.
Terence is organizing his papers when I plop down next to him, "Jeez, how many notes did you take? And how could you make out anything he said, he was speaking so fast."
He glances at his papers and shrugs, "not sure. What do we have next?"
"Grimm Studies with Professor Peter Port," I read off my scroll, "Great, another useless class."
"Can't be that bad," Terence slings his bag over his shoulder, "I heard Port likes to go on about his experiences and battles with Grimm, so you could always use it as a free period."
Sam and Luther join us, "You okay, man?" Terence puts a hand on Luther's shoulder.
"I'm good," he responds, yawning, "just a bit tired. Didn't get that much sleep last night, I was up reading."
"What is with you guys and reading?" Sam exclaims, "it's like you guys are a bunch of buzz-kills."
We laugh, "we should get to class if we want to get seats next to each other this time," I say. The others nod and we make our way across campus.
"Good morning," a stout professor dressed in brown stands in front of us, "I am Professor Peter Port and this is Grimm Studies."
The four of us now sit in a row, where Sam sits to my right and Terence and Luther sit to my left.
"Give it like two seconds," Terence whispers. Huh? Two seconds for what?
"Open your textbooks to page thirty-seven," the sounds of pages turning fills the room, "here you will observe the anatomy of a Boarbatusk."
"Dammit," Terence pulls out two lien and slides it to a smirking Luther.
"As you can see," Port continues, "the Boarbatusk is covered in armored plating. Once, I had to face a large horde of these foul creatures and…"
I began to tune out what he was saying. The two boys' eyes light up, Luther with a look of astonishment on his face.
Terence laughs silently as Luther slides the lien back, returning the money they were betting.
Sam scoffs to my left, boys, she mouths.
I giggle, something strange coming from me, and flip to an empty page in my notebook. Naturally, I take my pencil and begin to sketch, occasionally listening in to Port's speech to make sure he's still ranting about his adventures. He is.
I feel a tap on my right shoulder, Terence leans scoots closer to peek at my notebook.
I move it away, as I hadn't finished my sketch. It had been of Sam in a fighting stance. I thought that maybe if I drew my teammates fighting I might be able to understand their techniques and thought processes.
Terence scoots back next to Luther where they continue to play a game of air hockey on their scrolls.
As I turn back, I realize my notebook's gone. Sam is flipping through the pages frantically, staring at all my sketches.
"Hey!" I whisper, taking the book from her hands, "who said you could look though this?"
"But Arin," she pleads, "it looks so good! You never told me you could draw."
"That's because we've known each other for three days!" I exclaim quietly, "and it never came up…"
"Fine," Sam crosses her arms and pouts, "where'd you learn to draw like that?"
"Uh," I close the book and move it away, "I took art lessons as a kid. Painting and sketching, though I'd rather use a pencil than a brush."
"What else have you drawn in there?" Sam tries snatching the book once more, but fails.
I flip to a page filled with doodles, "I dunno, just whatever comes to mind." The page is filled with cartoon Grimm and doodles of various teachers at my old school.
"Is that…" Sam leans over as I flip through the pages.
"Hmm?" I look at where she's pointing. She's peering at a large sketch that covered the whole page. It's a forest with four figures huddling around a camp fire."
"Oh this?" I flip the page quickly, "I remember it from a dream I had once, so I put it on paper. That was a while ago."
"Oh," Sam returns to her seat, "Hey Arin?"
"What's up?" I glance over to Port, who's still ranting.
Sam looks sad for a split second, but returns back to her normal self. She waves me off, "never mind, it's nothing," she smiles.
Felt like she was going to tell me something there. "Alright," if she wants to tell me, she will, in time.
The rest of class passes pretty uneventfully. The boys occasionally groaning or cheering quietly for either their win or loss at a handheld game, or Professor Port suddenly shouting to emphasize the importance of one specific part to his story. I had stopped doodling and actually paid attention to his story. Not soon after did I begin to nod off.
The bell rings and I snap awake.
"—and I… Oh… Well that tale will have to wait. Please study the contents of the first chapter as you will have a quiz by the end of the week," Port finishes.
Displeased moans fill the room as the students around us file out of class. We do so as well, following Luther as he's closest to the door.
"If I remember correctly," Terence twirls his pen, "We have Battle Training with Goodwitch next."
A glance at my scroll tells me he's right. The class is held in an elevated room where the seats are higher up and view a small scrimmage area below.
"Huh," Luther says as we enter the room, "There are an awful lot of people in this room."
"Maybe people from all different years are mixed in the same room." I point out.
"Over there," Terence points, "isn't that Ruby?"
Without hesitation, Sam cups her hands to her mouth, "RUBY!"
Startled, many other students turn our way. Luther, Terence, and I take a step back from Sam. It does appear to be Ruby, as she turns when her name is called. Not only that, Weiss, Blake, and Yang are there too. Not surprising though, as they're all one team.
Ruby waves at us and we join them at the front row. "Hey guys," Ruby says rather giddily, "You're in this class too?"
I take a seat and set my rapiers down next to me, I brought them solely for this class. "Yeah! So what do we do in this class anyways?"
"Goodwitch pits us against each other in a fight to the death," Blake says not looking up from her book.
Yang cuts her off, "What Blake means is that Goodwitch chooses a few of us to spar."
"She then proceeds to make us look like fools as she points out all of our weak points," Weiss is filing her nails.
"I think it's really fun!" Ruby shifts in her seat, leaning over the balcony.
"Welcome students," Goodwitch's voice booms from below, "Welcome to the first class of the year. We will begin with a practice round. I will choose two students in this class to spar. Before we begin, do we have any volunteers?"
The blond boy sitting in front of Yang raises his hand. Goodwitch completely glosses over him, ignoring his raised hand.
He puts his hand down and sighs. Yang reaches over, "Next time, Arc. Next time."
"No volunteers?" I swear I saw a second where Goodwitch smirked at that Arc kid, "Ms. Shao Long, would you be willing to fight?"
"Hell yeah!" Yang bolts up immediately. She slides over the railing and jumps down to the stage below.
"Language!" Goodwitch hisses as Yang bounds on stage. The screen above displays her photo as well as her Aura level.
"Next!" Goodwitch searches the crowd for a suitable opponent. She looks directly in our direction once again.
"Young man," she says sternly, "what is your name?"
Sam and I scoot away from the two boys. Luther points at himself, but the professor shakes her head and gestures next to him.
"Me?" Terence stands, "uh, Terence Cordovan, first-year."
"Mr. Cordovan, are you willing to fight Ms. Shao Long here?"
"Uh," Terence seems nervous. Fighting someone one year two years older than us and had more experience.
His composure changes. He grins, "Sure, I could go for a round or two."
"Uhhh..." Sam whispers to me, "he seems different."
"I think it's an act," Luther states, "To make himself tougher than he appears to be."
Terence slides over the banister and jumps down to the stage as well, following Yang's example. His profile appears on screen as well.
"Nice!" Yang's pumped. The two bump fists and the yellow bracelets on Yangs wrists assemble into something that appears to be a shotgun.
Terence's expression says it all, shock-gauntlets. He's surprised, but he doesn't back down. It occurs to me that Yang doesn't know that he uses gauntlets as well, as the devices are hidden under the sleeves of his jacket.
"Are you ready?" Goodwitch asks as she steps off the stage. The two combatants retreat to opposite sides of the stage. Yang puts her hands in front of her in a punching stance. Terence, on the other hand, stands there with his hands on his sides. The tension in the room shifts as the two face off.
"May the best brawler win," Terence shouts to Yang. She nods to him and cocks he gauntlets.
"If there no objections," Goodwitch activates a transparent, protective, wall, "we will begin the match."
The screen above now shows a number counting down. 5.
I gulp, Terence seems calm. 4.
"Whoo!" Ruby shouts, "Go sis!" 3.
"Give it all you got!" Luther retaliates. 2.
"Don't die," I say under my breath. 1.
"Begin," an automated voice broadcasts across the room and Yang charges across the stage.
End of Chapter 3
Authors Note: Short, simple, rolls of the tongue? Hopefully. I'm really sorry for the delay. After about halfway through this chapter, my family moved to a different hotel, this one with terrible Wi-Fi. So I wasn't able to upload this when I had actually finished. (12/25/2015 wow Christmas Day!) Finally, some action with Team RWBY. I know it's not much, but they'll be making appearances now and then as will Team JNPR and other teams as well (CRNL and CFVY). I hope their introduction wasn't too strange or rushed. I realize I tend to rush a bit when I'm writing a chapter on a freaking bus. I just remembered, Zwei. As of the official timeline, this story takes place in Team RWBY's second year at Beacon and the events of Season 3, maybe late Season 2, have been overridden. So, no season maidens and no shock-gauntlet to the knee. That's pretty much all I have to say for now. Please review to give any suggestions and follow the story as I don't have a set upload schedule.
Thanks for reading, 'till next time.
-A