FINALLY, IT'S HERE!

Chapter 3: First Night

"Oh, there you are Ruby!" exclaimed Yang as Ruby re-joined her friends, "Where were you?"

"Oh, I was talking to one of the new students!" replied Ruby

"There are new students?" asked Yang, "I didn't think Ozpin let anyone in after the year started,"

"Well…" started Ruby, "He did look a little old to be a student…"

"Well, what was he like?" questioned Weiss, "We have to know if he's a threat or not!"

"Weiss…" began Blake

"What?" asked Weiss, "I'm just being cautious"

"He was reading a book," said Ruby, "So he must like reading, or he was just studying if he's a student"

Ruby directed her team to where Ulysses sat.

"And he spoke funny too," Ruby added, "Maybe you guys wanna talk to him?"

"Sounds good!" Yang smiled as she dragged the group to confront Ulysses.

Upon seeing the large scuffle of girls head his way, Ulysses marked his page, closed his book and prepared for an onslaught of questions.

"Hey there!" exclaimed the blonde, dragging 3 other girls by their collars. When the blonde got close enough to talk without shouting, she released her companions who all seemed to stand to attention, not wanting to make bad first impressions. Ulysses and his new found company stood (Ulysses sat) in awkward silence. Ulysses waited for the questions to start.

"So…" started the blonde, "What's your name?"

"Ulysses," he replied

"That's a cool name!" said the one in red

"Not my given name, close enough. Took it from history, found it in a book. It's an Old World name." he explained

"Old world?" asked a black-haired girl

"The Old World. Before the war." He replied

"The war?" questioned Yang

"You wouldn't know" said Ulysses

"Well… I'm Yang!" exclaimed the blonde who was immediately pulled to the side by the girl in white when she revealed her name

"What are you doing?" she hissed, "Have you seen how he's dressed!?"

"So what, Weiss?" replied Yang

"He's clearly a degenerate, he has to be homeless! His clothes are so primitive!" complained Weiss

"What's the problem with that?" asked Yang. The other two girls had now turned around to try and solve the dispute, whilst Ulysses silently slipped away to join his own companions. He found Six and Graham conversing about something called 'aura'.

"Aura?" Ulysses questioned, halting the conversation

"Ah, there you are!" Six cried, "We've been looking everywhere for you!"

"By everywhere, he means he searched the first two aisles before giving up and fiddling with his gun." Explained Joshua

"Hey! That's not true!" Six retorted, "I got a book!" he waved a blue covered book in the air

"You didn't read it." Joshua blurted

"Pfft, of course I read it!" argued Six

"It does not matter." Ulysses interrupted, "What is it about?"

"It's about this stuff called 'aura'." Six answered

"I thought you were researching Grimm?" said Ulysses

"Yeah, I was but then I stumbled over this." He waved the book in the air once more, "Looked interesting."

"A book with a plain blue cover looked interesting?" Joshua questioned The Courier's interests

"I meant the title." Said Six, "'Aura for dummies'"

"Now I do truly question your interests…" Joshua smirked

"Whatever," Six said, handing the book over to Ulysses, "Here, read it."

Ulysses took the book from The Courier and threw a question his way, "What did you find, Courier?"

Six started to explain his findings, "As you may know, I have been researching the creatures of Grimm. These creatures are basically add-ons to the local wildlife around here. The books said they were around as long as, if not longer, than humans. The books also said that The Grimm are attracted to negative emotion, so that means we're gonna have a bad time here. Older Grimm creatures learn from their past experiences, the older the Grimm, the harder it is to kill. So, summarising all that up, don't touch the old ones, don't be negative, although we are already full of that, and… oh yeah, they exclusively attack humans, so that means no 'Animal Friend' business. Anyways, Joshua?"

Joshua began to explain his findings, "I mainly researched Geology and a little on Culture. There are four different kingdoms in Remnant, Mistral, Atlas, Vaccuo and Vale. We are in Vale. I was also able to find out about a few of the different combat schools in Remnant. We are in Beacon; people say it's where the best of the best go. In the way of culture, not much to be found there, seems to be barely any religious beliefs at all. Ulysses?"

Ulysses began to explain his findings, "Researched History…"

"Of course you did." Six deadpanned

"The Grimm came first, man came next. Grimm set their sights on man, almost wiped man out, before the discovery of Dust… A natural resource that can be used as fuel, in munitions and can even be fused with the soul. Everything runs on dust, the cars, the planes, the military, all of it… That is all."

"Alright," Six started, "We need to find out more about dust and aura. Dust sounds important and we know nothing about aura yet."

"I will research aura." Stated Joshua

"Me too. Ulysses, you can research dust since you seem to know more about it than we do." Six said. Ulysses nodded in response as the group gathered books on their selected subject and gathered at a table to begin researching.

The trio researched for nearly an hour, taking notes and remembering important facts and factors undisturbed. The time ticked around to 8:37pm and the group exchanged their notes and findings before deciding that they should get some sleep.

The night went by quickly and morning soon dawned, awaking the trio from their slumber. Six yawned as he sat up in his bed, checking his armor and weapons over. He looked over to the two empty beds beside him and then took a look at the digital clock on his bedside table.

7:48am

"Damn, it's late…" Six groaned as he hopped out of bed and Joshua emerged from the bathroom door.

"Finally awake." Joshua said as he sat down on his bed and began to check his equipment over, ensuring A Light In Shining Darkness was fully loaded and in good condition, along with his armor.

"Where's Ulysses?" asked Six heading into the bathroom

"I am unsure; he was not here when I woke up." Joshua replied

"Ah well, he can take care of himself." Six said from behind the bathroom door

Meanwhile

Ulysses sat in the near empty dining hall of Beacon Academy, devouring the food in front of him. Never before had he tasted food so… good. It actually had taste! Compared to Salisbury Steak and other food brands, this food was like a gift from God himself.

Ulysses finished his meal in just under three minutes and decided to head back to the trio's dorm room to check his equipment

When he arrived back, he was greeted by Six.

"There you are!" Six exclaimed, jumping up from his bed, "Where were you!?"

"Eating." Ulysses simply responded

"Eating? Oh, crap! We gotta eat! Graham! Where are you?"

"On the bed next to you." Joshua said from the bed next to Six as he checked over his ammunition reserves

"We need to eat! Let's go!" Six dashed out of the door and Joshua Graham followed him out the door, walking instead of running.

Ulysses sat down on his bed and put his Anti-Material Rifle down on the bed, checking the ammunition and ensuring that the gun was in working order. He did the same for his 12.7mm submachine gun as well as checking the condition of Old Glory and counting his frags and flash grenades. Everything seemed to be in working order.

Once he had finished his weapon check, Six returned to the dorm and slumped down on his bed.

"The food is gooooooood…" he mumbled to himself

"Stay awake. Initiation starts in three hours." Said Ulysses

"I'm tired…" groaned Six

"No, you're not." Said Joshua, arriving back at the dorm.

"Do we have enough ammunition?" asked Ulysses, looking over to Joshua

"More than enough." Replied Six, "I've got an entire bag of ammo for each of our weapons."

"What a coincidence…" mumbled Joshua

Six hopped up from his bed and hoisted a large duffle bag out from underneath his bed. After around twenty seconds, Six was finally able to get the bag onto his bed.

"Since when did you have this with you?" asked Ulysses. Six just tapped his Pip-Boy and unzipped the bag, multiple loaded magazines falling out for almost every type of gun.

"This thing is useful in so many ways," Six said, referring to his Pip-Boy, "We've got all the ammo we need."

"This is good." Stated Joshua as he rummaged through the contents of the duffle bag, "Ammo to more guns than I know of."

"Exactly! If we ever need more ammo for our weaponry, we can recycle these ones. Besides, I'm sure we'll find quite the amount in the way of weapons. I spotted some little girls walking around with some real high tech compact weaponry. At the moment, I'm leaning towards a shoulder-mounted machine gun," he smiled, "Improved version, that is."

"We can focus on weapons after the initiation." Said Joshua, "Let's just focus on staying alive for now."

"We are gonna kill this initiation!" a massive grin grew on Six's face, "Oh, that reminds me, I think I put a Plasma Rifle in here somewhere…" Six literally dived into the duffle bag in search for one of his favourite weapons.

"Hey, look, it's Red Glare!"

Whew! Finally back in business! I truly do apologise for the delays, y'know, writers block, losing the plans, that kind of stuff. But who cares? We're up and running!

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