Here we go, people, Chapter 2! Introducing some new characters and all that. Hope you enjoy it!

Chapter 1: Class is in Session

Lanseal Royal Military Academy, January 7 1937

Entrance exams had been finished. People were screened for their combat classes. Students had been assigned to their learning classes. And Larry Eiling was one happy camper. According to the screening, he was an engineer! The boy hopped out of bed with much enthusiasm, getting his uniform on quickly, but well enough. But the most important thing that would go into his gear was… His book-holder. Within it was a technical manual on various guns throughout Europa. It was a sign of Larry's wanting to be an engineer even before he signed up at the Academy. Reaching into his pocket, the brown-haired boy took out a picture and looked at it with matching eyes.

A picture of him at seven, and his father John. He was busy playing with a model tank, while John was the one actually looking at the camera that his mother Mary was holding. Still, he looked at it as a reminder of three things: One, that he always had this passion from an early age, and two, that he'd be following in his family's soldier footsteps. He might not have gone on to be a proper combat trooper like his old man, but that wasn't what he wanted to be. He wanted to be working with cold, hard metal and tools to make better weapons for his country. And play with them. And finally, three, he'd grown a helluva lot since that picture. Larry now had a good six feet of height, and was at least competent and muscular enough not to get trashed in a street fight, not to mention handle heavy machinery. Once he was done reminiscing, Larry put away the photo and got to moving out to class. As he did, he thought about what kind of people might be there.

Walking through the halls(and reading his book at the same time), he already saw a varied set of individuals attending—Even a few Darcsens. But he didn't really care about the race of all the students he saw. His eyes—when they weren't on his manual and he wasn't narrowly avoiding bumping into people—were on the symbols that their uniforms bore. Just how many of them were Engineers? Shocktroopers? Armored Techs? Dare he say, even Anthem Corps? Well, he concluded he didn't see that much of that last one, but maybe it required a little musical talent, that job.

He arrived at his destination with about five minutes to spare: Classroom E. And already he saw quite the… Collection of people in it. The first one that caught his eye was a very tall, very muscular Darcsen, with messy hair, and a Darcsen-patterned bandana and neckerchief, barely shorter than him, but clearly older. The young Engineer spotted the Armored Tech symbol on his uniform, and realized that his muscles were far from just for show. He actually scared him a little. Larry feared that if he pissed this guy off, he would get snapped in two like a twig.

Unfortunately for him, he was pissed off in general. Regardless, though, the Engineer decided to reach out to him. "Uh, hey there... My name's-"

He was sharply cut off by a growl, though. "Go away." The larger man said this in a low, clearly threatening whisper. But it was loud and menacing enough to get the Engineer to back the hell off. "...Zamuel. Now you know exactly who not to talk to, stupid." The older one crossed his arms and got back to waiting, rather clearly impatiently.

Larry backed off immediately and his eyes thus turned to the other immediate body in his vicinity. A girl with… A maid headband. Okay, that's different. Larry noted. …And a little cute. He chuckled to himself as he sat down next to the girl, noting her overall appearance. She had the symbol of a fellow Engineer… Now that was something. "Well, hey there." He said as he sat down next to her. "Welcome to Class E. My name's Larry Eiling."

"…Er…" The girl, rather short and somewhat meek in appearance, looked at him with her bi-colored eyes—One teal, one brown. Larry took in the somewhat dark color of her skin, and her shoulder-length hair. Clearly, she wasn't able to say much more, due to her nervousness. "Eet eez… Nice to meet you." She got out as politely as she could despite the awkwardness of the situation. "My name eez… Eclaire." The Engineer girl gave a polite bow, even as she sat, which had Larry taken aback a bit. That was different.

"Um… OK…" He scratched his head nervously as he tried to figure out what to do next from there. Then came a snicker just behind him, and the brown-haired boy turned to see who it was. And he was awestruck—about as an equal level as with Eclaire, currently. He saw a girl with glasses, having a surprisingly matching complexion to the accented young woman, but taller and more athletic-looking. "What's so funny, Beautiful?" He asked, in retaliation for her laughter. A comical blush spread across her face immediately from embarrassment, letting him get a laugh in turn.

This girl didn't look very impressed regardless, though. She crossed her arms while looking at the young Engineer with a raised eyebrow. A look at her combat-class insignia showed that she was a Lancer. Larry quickly noted this was someone else who could break him into a couple of pieces. But still, she was pretty damn hot, he thought, even if she looked older than him. But he was 17, she couldn't be that much older. Between her and Eclaire, though, she had some damn good dating choices. Sam finally recovered from the comment he made. "You are, but not THAT funny, little boy." She tauntingly patted his head, and the Engineer merely grinned at this.

Next to them, of course, Eclaire just kept staring back and forth, wondering to assess—but never say—about Larry. Just like the dark-skinned girl, she was not universally approving of his statement. She even looked a bit insulted, in fact, but Larry didn't see her frown. That look changed to one of mild horror, and then into flat-out disdain and suspicion. Now she kept an eye on the Engineer with increased wariness. Little did Larry know, she was devoting herself to a specific task now.

"Well, I'm at least amusing to you, so that's a plus for me." He replied, carrying himself well enough. "The name's—"

"Larry," The dark-skinned Lancer interrupted smugly, getting another laugh out of him. Oh, she was having fun already. That was good. "So, Larry, you're an Engineer, and I'm a Lancer. If you know about statistics, I'm sure you know which class loses more arm-wrestles. Can your masculinity handle it?" Truth be told, she didn't know statistics herself—too much reading was boring to her—but she just wanted to bait him and see how he might react.

"Oh, sure." The boy replied, shrugging, "But while you're busy arm-wrestling Rebels, Tough Girl, I'll be planting landmines on their radiators. Haha, hahahahaha!" Immediately, his new acquaintance gave him a soft, but firm punch on the shoulder.

"Do. Not. Ever. Laugh. Like. That. Again. By the way, the name's Samantha." She stated. Eclaire could only look between the two, thinking that they were absolutely strange. But she couldn't stop herself looking annoyed herself, while at the same time looking unsure as to why. …And then the look on her face turned to one of mild horror, but she immediately hid it as quickly as possible.

"Both of you stop, you're annoying the shit out of me." Zamuel finally spoke aloud, sending a chill down Larry's spine. He STILL sounded scary… Though he had just the faintest sliver of an odd accent as well. Maybe it was just his imagination. Then when he turned and got a proper look at the tough-looking(and tough-talking) Darcsen, who was looking back, his imagination jumped. For some reason, or another, he was starting to picture him with a guitar. It seemed oddly fitting. But he quickly shook it out of his mind, lest he get a punch to the face instead of in the shoulder from this guy. "Just shut up and wait for class, yeah? Ugh…" Larry noted the clear look of disgust on his face before he returned to his regular forward-facing position. Whatever he was thinking about himself and Samantha, it wasn't nice.

"Attention!" Called yet another female voice—There seemed to be a lot of them, Larry thought. Class E was damn full of tough chicks, clearly. The Engineer was sure that Eclaire, as a fellow member of his combat class, had enough close-combat potential for the job. Their gaze found a tall girl, about the same height as Samantha, with blond hair, an Yggdist emblem on her chest, and a sword at her side. Just like Zamuel, her uniform had the symbol of an Armored Tech on it. "Everyone, this is your Class Chair, Morgan Malvin speaking." Her green eyes looked about the class, and it seemed she was visibly nervous about it all. "It, um… Is a pleasure to have you all here." She said simply. For the moment, it appeared to be all, and Zamuel failed to look pleased or amused. But then she pumped her fist with determination. "We'll make sure to be the best class at Lanseal, even surpassing Class A, right!"

There was some laughter, but the response was a bit enthusiastic. Quite a few of the students in the class thought a girl like this Malvin was a breath of fresh air. Maybe a bit of a wide-eyed idealist, for the cynics like Zamuel, but otherwise good enough. Her competence would be shown soon as well. Larry and Samantha were among those laughing, and Morgan was visibly a bit embarrassed, but she calmed down, closing her eyes and gripping her sword. Which itself amused the class a little. "Now, presenting our Professor…" She got to her seat, and a man stepped through the door. If there was a height competition between the people currently in the class so far, this man had won it. Seven foot two, wearing a… Federation uniform?

Hold on a sec! Larry and Samantha's eyes focused on that one detail. What was a Federation officer doing in this classroom? On this campus? He wasn't to know the… Disastrous involvement regarding the kidnapping of the Archduchess, but regardless he and most in the classroom were shocked to see him there. Eclaire shrank back a bit in her seat—She was obviously fearful this man and his presence, even more than she was obviously intimidated by meeting new people in general. Finally, the man introduced himself.

"James London." He walked to the front of the class, and looked at all of them, making his own assessments of what they might look like. He didn't look completely unimpressed. The look on his face practically said "They aren't going to die quickly, and I have my damn way, they weren't going to die in battle without a stroke of bad luck." Then he confirmed Morgan's statement with a matter-of-fact one of his own: "I will be teaching this class."

Zamuel simply looked on at him, clearly even more unimpressed with their newest "guest." One could only wonder what sort of thoughts were going on in his head, but none of them were nice, that much could be certain.

Larry and Samantha, meanwhile, simply wondered how the class would go from this point forward. One last look at Samantha before things begun let him know that she was most definitely in the opposite mood from Zamuel. This(beautiful!) girl before him was amused, very much so. Almost as if she'd been hoping for this sort of development.

Well, there ya go. The classes have begun. Next chapter, I hope to show the antagonist side of things as I set up in the prologue. As a side note, Avan's laugh is somewhere between annoying and hilarious. But the presence of it in-universe was also addressed :P

Also:

Zamuel property of Saint-Zaby

Samantha Kruger property of RedShocktrooper

James London property of Turtler

Eclaire (last name Morgan, funny enough) property of Dr. Evil

I own only Larry and Morgan thus far :P