Chapter Eighteen
"Okay, we're all here, now what?" Weiss demanded, sitting in my chair and crossing her arms. Both teams, RRWN and ABYN, had packed into my team's room, seated on the beds and desk chairs, as I'd asked for a meeting.
"Remember when I mentioned cross-training?" I questioned back, looking around the room, getting nods. "Well, we've had a week, and change, and I think it's obvious we have a lot of time on our hands, at least for now. Things might ramp up near the end of the semester, but, well, I think it's obvious we're supposed to be training on our own."
"What's the rush, Arcs?" Yang asked in turn. "We've got four years 'fore we graduate."
I turned to look at her, sitting cross legged on her bed, her sister next to her. "Do we? Or will we have to start going out tomorrow. Yeah, we'll be probably be fine, but we've already seen how. . . unrestrained? Unregulated?" I paused searching for the word.
"Uneven?" Ruby offered, and I hesitated.
"Unbalanced," tossed out Blake, and I had to nod to her.
"Yes, unbalanced the challenges we face are. Yes, we were able to take out that Greater Nevermore, and that Ancient Deathstalker, but it was close. And, if only one of our teams had had to handle both. . ." I trailed off, getting grim looks from some of my teammates, while the others just looked confused.
Weiss disagreed, waving off my argument with a, "But, the teachers would've done something!"
"What would that be?" countered Ren, causing her to turn a betrayed look his way.
"I don't know, something," the heiress tried to argue, crossing her arms once more as she huffed.
"Glynda's range is a couple hundred feet, Ozpin's a CQC fighter, and none of the others were there. Even then, Port's a close-range specialist, and Oobleck's the same with his flamethrower thermos," I disagreed, "Not sure about Tim or the cow, though from what we've seen the former's probably also a close and mid-range fighter."
"How do you know that?" Blake asked, brows knitting.
The answer was I read their character sheets, but I couldn't say that. "I've done some research on them. To see if any were long-range specialists. I, at first, thought along the same lines as Weiss, only to find out I was wrong," I. . . creatively explained. Most of it was things I'd already known, but there was no safety net here, other than Aura itself, and it showed in little ways that hadn't been important in the show, but things were already different. "If any of us had died, we would've just been another casualty of the Grimm, and only marked down as having failed the entrance exam."
"But they wouldn't let us even take it if they didn't think we'd pass," Yang argued, though she wasn't as sure as Weiss had been.
"I'm sorry, but that does not seem to be the case. If certain things hadn't gone the right way, some of us very well might have died," Pyrrha noted, giving me a significant glance, referring to her awakening of my Aura mid-test.
"Team LVND might've been able to take out the Deathstalker, but not the Nevermore. It would've picked them off," I added. "They might have been able to lose it, but we couldn't. And Pyrrha and I weren't somehow directed to the Deathstalker because she could take it, I stumbled across it because I got hopelessly lost."
Yang tried to repress a snort of laughter, but she didn't try very hard. "Okay, so they're lucky we're awesome. If we're so awesome, though, why do we need to train? Shouldn't ya be given this speech to those slackers?" she asked, gesturing out the window, where a couple of our classmates were hanging out on the commons.
"Because I don't care about them, and I can't be sure that, the next time either we stumble across something bad, or, as Schnee said, they throw something at us they think we can handle, we actually can win," I replied. It was a little cold, I supposed, but I'd learned to only care about those that I knew, to avoid being taken advantage of, with only some success. "The fact that she's yet to win a single spar kinda suggests we won't."
"Hey! I can win fights!" the girl in question objected. "Grimm just don't charge in like people do!"
Nora and Ren exchange looks. "Uh, Weiss?" Nora asked. "Grimm do that all the time. That's like, what they do. Other than look mean. And growl. And give horsey rides."
"That's just with you," her partner pointed out.
"Still something they do," the ginger argued. "What was I saying? Oh, yeah. Some of them are all like 'Oh, I see you, I am going to be charging now', but some of them just jump out of the bushes like 'Surprise!', but not like a fun 'We're having pancakes!' surprise, but more like a bad 'We're out of syrup!' surprise, only that just hurts my feelings, and they hurt your everything else!"
The group collectively took a moment to process that, "They've probably fought more Grimm than the rest of us," I advised. "And that's assuming we're fighting Grimm, and not people."
"When are we going to be fighting people?" Ruby asked, aghast.
Her sister paused, looking down at the tiny team lead, "Didn't Ozpin let you in early 'cause you beat up a bunch of criminals?"
"Oh, yeah. Oh no! We really need to help you!" the small girl gasped, looking to Weiss.
"I can take care of myself," the heiress snapped, and instantly reversed course, admitting in a small voice, "but I suppose I could use some practice."
Glancing to Ruby, who was smiling, I rolled my eyes, and she suppressed a giggle. "In that vein, I'd like people to start, not really putting together a lesson plan, but figuring out how to teach others what you're good at. Some of it might be 'well you obviously do X' kinds of things, but even that much will help, just remember that what's clear to you isn't to everyone else, or else we'd be okay at it too."
I looked around, "I'm not saying we'll ever be as good as any of you are at your specialization, but, for instance, Pyrrha could teach us all about close-quarters-combat, Ren about stealth, and Weiss about Dust use. It would also help out in class," I said, reaching into my backpack and pulling out a vial of Ice Dust I'd picked up from Home. "I'm still getting a handle on how to use it for Tim's class, but Weiss is already a master at it. The school actively provides spaces and resources to train, and we'd be fools to ignore it."
"Where did you get that!?" Weiss demanded, eyes locked on the Dust that I'd really brought as a prop more than anything else.
"I. . . asked for it?" I hedged, and was a little taken back as she stood, marched across the room, and snatched the Vial from my hands. "You could've asked," I told her, a little awkwardly, as the girl, now fully in my space, turned the container over in her hands, before popping the top, sniffing it, and finally, fishing out a single grain, closing her eyes for a moment as it, and not the vial in her hand, glowed, cooling the air around her slightly.
She dumped the grain back in, closing it, and pinned me with a look. "They just gave you six thousand Lien worth of Military-Grade Dust?" she asked, skeptically.
"Military Grade?" I echoed, worrying. With conversion rates of Lien to USD, keeping in mind that different economies didn't mean a 1-1 applicable price of all goods, that meant the single vial her hands was worth six hundred dollars. Mentioning that I had another three in my bag, in case we needed more, or that I had access to several dozen vials of every type, was probably a mistake. "Dust has grades?"
"Of course it has grades, you absolute philistine!" she shot back, looking to vial in her hands, and letting out a breath, before regretfully handing it back to me. I took it, and put it back in my bag, careful not to clink it against the others. "There's several different levels of Dust depending on their quality. What we're working with in class is commercial grade. That's as low as you can go without having problems activating it. Anything less is low-grade, only good for things where it doesn't matter if it works well, or reliably. It's cheap enough that even the poorest of Mantlesians can afford it."
Having no idea what a 'Mantlesian' was, I nodded anyways, as the heiress began to pace. "Past commercial grade is industrial grade. Commercial grade is most cost effective for things that require Dust to fuel itself. Heaters, engines, things like that. Industrial grade is what's used in Dust-infused items, as its higher quality means it can be used much more before denaturing and disintegrating."
"Oh, yeah, like Dust-Forging!" Ruby added, smiling. "I wanted to do that with Crescent Rose, but I would've gone way over-budget, and I couldn't decide which one I wanted, and it's supposed to be really hard to do right. I can't wait until Junior year when I can take that elective! It's gonna be awe-some!"
"You can use it for that," Weiss agreed, "Though it's normally used for Dust-Hardening, or to create power generators. Past that you have military grade which is only used for weapon creation or heavy ordinance. The fact that they would just give you some is. . ." she shook her head, as if the very thought was ridiculous.
Given that I'd taken it from my pocket dimension's weapon workshop, it made sense it would be the stuff meant for weapons. Explaining how I was getting that quality regularly. . . I would probably end up actually asking Tim or Goodwitch for some Dust, rather than busting out the good stuff. Jaune was poor as shit, given how he'd spent almost his entire savings on fake transcripts, but I could probably ask Weiss or someone else to spring for the rest if need be.
"Past that is experimental grade," Weiss finished. "That's only useful for, well, experiments. It is almost never seen outside of laboratory conditions, which means you, Mr. 'Dust has grades?', don't need to stress your limited intelligence understanding it," she mocked.
However, I just nodded, motioning towards her as I looked to the others, "And thus I present exhibit B for why Cross Training is a good idea."
"What's exhibit A?" Ruby asked, tilting her head in confusion.
"The gauntlet I ran with everyone, with the others offering their assessments as well," I replied. "And, pursuant to that, if everyone could fill these out, I'd appreciate it. Not right now, but by tonight please." I grabbed my scroll, sending the document I'd already given to Pyrrha to everyone else, with some clarification notes about what the one-ten scale actually meant.
Everyone pulled out their own scrolls, and Ruby cheered, "Oh, like a video game!"
I nodded, "Something like that. Pyrrha's got a better eye for some of this than I do, so we'll be working together on a project involving them. That said, Yang," I stated, turning to face her. "You're the hand-to-hand expert here. You think you could give us an 'unarmed combat for beginners' course, say, Friday evening, after Tim's class?"
"I think I could pull somethin' out of my sleeve that'll hit the spot!" she grinned, reaching for the pun, but I chuckled regardless. "But I got one condition," she added. I gave her a questioning look. "If we're gonna be workin', we might miss dinner, so I want you to make us all somethin'. Those shakes are great, and I want to see what else ya can whip up after I whup your butt!"
"Says the girl who lost our spar," I smirked, "but deal."
DR
It was with no small amount of trepidation that I walked with the others to Amakuni's class. However, Goodwitch had asked me to, and the Vice Principal had, at the very least, not turned on me like I'd somewhat expected her to, so I'd give it one more chance.
One.
As before, the Cow wasn't in the workshop when we walked in. I took the same seat I had before, along with Yang, who was smiling confidently, but I could tell was also a little worried. Class started and the cow Faunus walked in from her office, hesitating a moment as she met my eye, before seeming to force herself to look away.
I waited, tense, as she took a position at the front of the class. "Welcome back everyone," she stated. "Today we're going to start working on mechashift mechanics. Yes, I know most of your probably know it backwards and forwards, but, for safety reasons, I need to make sure. As some of you have already found out, the workshop is open most afternoons if you want to use it, and can show that you can handle yourself," she nodded to Ruby, "but by the end of the month we should be done and can start using this time to work on your gear. If you don't know what to do, there's some basic projects that you can complete to show competence."
That. . . made a bit of sense. I wondered, had they stayed in Beacon, if we would've seen RWBY's gear improve over time, or if we would've seen other items added to their kit. However, with the school blown to hell, they'd been on the road, and thus didn't have access to high-level workshops. I'd seen costume changes, but not weapon upgrades, and that might've been why. I glanced to the girl beside me, amending that to having not seen weapon upgrades, except for one.
"Mr. Arc," Amakuni bit out, getting my attention. "It's been brought to my attention that I accidentally missed you on the roster. Come up, so we can get this over with, and I can get back to running my class."
Yeah, that was a blatant lie, but, still, calling her out on it wouldn't help me in the slightest. Glad I'd studied more, if only to work the machines in my workshop at Home, I hurried over to her as she made her way to the same machines she'd had everyone else test on. "Get started," she commanded, not telling me what to do like she had for the others, but I remembered, and grabbed the metal I'd need to cut and shape.
She stood, watching, hands behind her back, staring across the machine at me. Focusing on the task, knowing that, with Aura, I could survive anything she threw at me at first, I took the flat metal and cut, shaped, bonded, and magnetized it, as she didn't say a word, none of the helpful reminders she'd given the others present.
I finished, almost bouncing my hand off the plasma stream, not used to using something that could warp three dimensionally as a tool, but avoided it at the last second. My Aura could've handled it, easily, but I wasn't going to give her any chance to fail me.
Having watched the others do it last week, it wasn't perfect, but it was still better than what most had created. Stepping away, I looked at the professor.
"What?" she'd asked confrontationally, staring at me.
"I believe that's what the others did. Or do I need to do something else?" I asked back, coolly. The 'because you didn't tell me what I needed to do, bitch,' went unsaid, but, from her reaction, not unheard.
The woman pretending to be a professor didn't say anything for a moment, scowling at me, her eyes barely flicking down on what I'd made. "Mediocre, but acceptable. Go back to your station."
Deliberately turning my back on her, I strode to my seat, as she called, "Bronzewing, you're up next. Let's see if you've studied."
She ran through the students that had failed, two of them failing a second time, with the instruction to come in Friday after class for another try. The other students were all told what they needed to do, and given the help denied to me.
Part of me rankled at that, but with my enhanced learning from Science Talent, even the second-hand instruction I was getting should be more than enough. And, if she gave me a bad grade, given how the first class had gone, she'd probably get official blowback. I was still going to document everything, but I had a feeling this was going to be another one of those classes where, no matter what I did, I was going to get a C. Not enough to kick up a fuss, but not enough to do well either.
Given that, with Sweet Home, I could change dimensions, I really didn't give a shit about my grades, only my pride chafing at the injustice.
Class continued, my studying of Mechashift, along with Yang's explanation, let me pass the test at the end of the session. Why it worked, I had no clue, but how did it work? Gravity Dust.
We didn't use any of it that class, just going over safety procedures and proper handling, and why, dear god, you should never try to activate the Dust before it was properly bonded. We all watched as Amakuni put a basic mechashift device, the size of a matchbox, on a table, before lowering a Dust-hardened glass shield over it. Activating the unbonded mechashift device with an electrical shock, the small box instantly crumpled, like an empty tin can, before it twisted and half-exploded, sending metal fragments into the shield at speed.
"And before you think of weaponizing it, it's practically impossible to normalize the blast pattern outside of laboratory conditions. Everything from height above sea level, to humidity, to speed of the device, to the number and location of other mechashift devices can change it, and not in ways you can predict." The Faunus gave Nora, who'd squealed in delight at the detonation, a significant look, along with a boy in bright green who'd turned thoughtful at the display.
"Now, everyone study the safety procedures," Amakuni announced. "We'll start working with it next week, and if any of you set off a Mechashift Singularity you'll be out of class for a month." The look sent my way was also not subtle, and I made a mental note to check and double check everything, from my tools to the materials I was given, just in case there was an 'irregularity' that would let her remove me from her class for 'incompetence'.
We left, and it was a step up from last class, but not much of one.
DR
Headmaster Ozpin sat at his desk, considering his next move.
He knew time was limited, but haste made waste, something his opponent still didn't understand. He also had to be mindful of the queen, able to strike unexpectedly, less he take losses that would unbalance him.
Nodding, and sipping his tea, the remains of his lunch long forgotten off to his side, he made his decision.
"Knight to E5," he stated calmly, waiting for the response.
Headmistress Crowe, as usual, took the bait. She was the youngest of the four of them, and, while possessing a certain animal cunning, did not have the head required for strategy. However, she was also the only one of the three that would still indulge him in his games, Ironwood too busy, and Lionheart, as the man had finally admitted a decade prior, having gotten sick of losing.
Claire, however, never stopped, though Ozpin had started adding additional restrictions to himself. Sometimes it was not allowing his pieces to occupy a certain row or column, sometimes it was not allowing certain pieces to take others, and once he'd had an enjoyable game where he was only allowed to take a piece once his opponent had taken one of the exact same type.
He'd lost that one, completely, and it had been the highlight of the season.
He'd won the next.
The elevator could be heard, and he moved his next piece, setting up the second stage of the trap. Crowe would've seen a single layer trap, but she was still getting her head around a double layered one. Ozpin would be happy to instruct her. He was a teacher after all.
The door opened and Amakuni stepped into his office, head full of steam, charging forward. He was just glad he'd put away the fine china. "What kind of game do you think you're playing?" she demanded, stomping forward.
"Chess," Ozpin smiled, happy to deflect what promised to be an unpleasant conversation.
"I, what?" the Faunus demanded, if anything, even angrier.
With a finger, he turned his screen, showing her his imminent victory. "Also, Queen to D8."
He waited, as Amakuni sputtered, and saw that Claire fell into the third layer of the trap. "Knight to G6, and I believe that's Checkmate. Always a pleasure, Headmistress."
"And you, Ozpin. Same time next week?" his opponent asked, annoyed that she'd lost, but amused at the joke, having heard the Faunus bust in. "And maybe ask not to be bugged when we're doing this?"
"I'll see you then, and I have, some are just. . . stubborn," he noted with a smile, avoiding the obvious 'bull-headed' comment, but getting his point across. With the connection closed, he turned to his surly staff member. "Now, Ms. Amakuni. You had a question for me?"
"What. Is. He!?" the woman demanded, causing Ozpin's eyebrow to rise.
How did she-, ah, yes, her Semblance. "I'm afraid you're going to need to be a little more specific. For instance, despite how much coffee he drinks, Mr. Oobleck is still human, even if he seems more caffeine than man."
"Arc," she bit out. "What is he?"
"Jaune Arc?" the wizard asked, as if he didn't know exactly who they were talking about. "I believe he's a Faunus, though if you ask him he claims to be a dragon, and, most of all, he is a student here. Something you seem to have forgotten, Professor."
The engineer scowled. "If he's a Faunus, then I'm a cow," she stated scornfully. "You know what I can do. It's why you hired me."
"I hired you for your skills, but yes, your Semblance is useful as well. To be able to detect the flow of energy, be it Aura, Dust, or electricity, is truly a useful trait," he noted, smiling, filling the space with information they both knew to get her to state her actual problem with the boy. A different kind of trap, and one she fell into easily.
"And it's that ability that tells me that isn't a Faunus. If anything he feels like. . ." she trailed off, and he could tell she was using her Semblance. She snorted, tossing out, "He feels like your kid, if you fucked a Grimm."
Ozpin blinked, not having expected that statement, stating calmly, and a little coldly, "You might not know it, but all of my children are dead, Ms. Amakuni." That took her back, knocking her off balance as his mind worked furiously, and he understood.
She could detect all he listed aloud, but Grimm had neither Aura, nor Dust, nor electricity. No, what they all carried was a spark of Magic. Destruction incarnate, to be sure, growing more intense the longer they existed, like a person's life would grow, though without the limitation of old age, but Magic nonetheless. As the only other person with Magic in this world, other than her, it made sense the Faunus would jump to conclusions.
"And, regardless of how he might have felt, I would expect better from you, as a teacher at my academy," Ozpin continued. "Judging a student unfairly for their Semblance is small-minded, bigoted, and beneath a member of this institution. Should we also think less of him because he has scales instead of fur? Or the fact that he has more obvious non-human traits?"
Touching upon some of the lesser known aspects of the Faunus community, at least to humans, the cow Faunus before him winced. "Do you know what it felt like, having him just walk into my class?" she demanded instead.
Raising an eyebrow as she tried to dodge the point, arguing emotions instead, Ozpin prodded, "Do tell."
"It was like having a Brothers-damned Goliath walk through the door, only packed inside a person like a fucking Chill. It took everything I could not to make sure he wouldn't hurt any of my students!" she nearly shouted, obviously having wanted to say this for a while.
Thinking about it, in terms of magical strength, putting him on par with the enormous, twenty story tall elephant Grimm was a bit much, but he was far in excess of something smaller like an Alpha Beowulf or an Ursa Major. And comparing him to the person-possessing Grimm known as Chill, at least in human appearance, was, again, a bit of a stretch, as he didn't have that ill-fitting overlay they exhibited, for those with the eyes to see. Though, given their Magical nature, most did not.
"And instead of asking him to leave politely, explaining the situation, you chose to act the way you did," Ozpin rebuked. "He is not the first student we've had that has had issues. I believe a few years ago we had that boy with the Pheromone Semblance. He only had to leave for a month before Professor Peach was able to come up with a soap that repressed it."
"So you're saying it's all his 'Semblance'?" she demanded, obviously not believing it. "Fine, then explain this!" she demanded, reaching into a pouch and taking out a small plastic bag. Tossing it onto his desk, he opened it, blinking as the feeling of Magic reached up towards him. Inside were three metal rods.
"Arc's 'Semblance' apparently let him make them. He tricked one of the other students into testing them for him," the Faunus announced, as if this were somehow damning proof. Given the professor's obvious enmity, it made sense he would send a proxy, and spoke well of his leadership capabilities.
It was, after all, exactly what he would've done.
Carefully reaching down, opening the bag further, he moved the three items apart so their signatures didn't run over each other. One had a glimmer of Magic to it, almost below the level of perception, but still present, like that of Dust. One had more, almost as much as his own cane, though not nearly as. . . refined. The Magic was forced in, without rhyme or reason, raw, but potent.
The third, though, the third is what had captured his attention. If the second was a pale shadow of his staff, the third was a pale shadow of a Relic. It wasn't close to the real thing, lacking the purpose, the weave, the skill that allowed them to surpass the limits of what could be achieved even in the old world, but it was far closer than anything he'd ever made. Not that he would've, as, infused with raw creation as it was, it would very likely draw the Grimm. It wouldn't be nearly as bad as carrying an unshielded Relic, that would just be asking for trouble, but this would still likely draw them in from a mile or two.
"See?" the Faunus demanded, reading his expression, momentarily unguarded by sheer surprise as it had been. "And he's faked his transcripts!"
Collecting himself, Ozpin looked up. "That is quite the serious charge, Ms. Amakuni," he noted. The boy had faked his transcripts, but he wouldn't be the first, and likely wouldn't be the last. The wherewithal one needed to do so, as well as having the connections to less savory elements needed to acquire such a thing, where both skills one could leverage as a Huntsman, and thus were qualifications all their own. The entrance exam and first year were a crucible for those people, and they'd either flourish, or fail, or transfer to Mistral where the work was easier and the morals looser.
"This is his test!" she announced, taking out her scroll and sending the headmaster a document.
Looking at it, Mr. Arc achieved a passing grade. Something about it seemed off, but he couldn't put his finger on it, so noted, "He seems to be doing well enough."
Amakuni snorted. "He got the question about the chiller wrong! Everyone knows how to use a cooler! My idiot cousin knows how to use a cooler, but Mr. Arc apparently doesn't!"
The headmaster felt his age, and the limitations of running a college, as he had to remember what a 'cooler' was. Ah, yes, the device that used Ice Dust to cool materials to prevent overheating, melting, and half a dozen other things. They were cheap, and part of almost every workshop, as they also doubled as firefighting gear, able to instantly douse any flame in range. The fact that the boy didn't know, but supposedly had passed a workshop course with an average grade, was damning.
"That is, indeed, off, but some do poorly on tests," Ozpin stated mildly, not exactly lying per say. "I see no reason to stop him from attending, let alone your, quite frankly, abominable behavior towards the boy. I am not asking you to like him, Ms. Amakuni, merely tolerate him, as you would any other student. Am I clear?" he demanded, calmly, staring over his glasses at the professor.
She did not like his rebuke, but he was her superior, and she, after a long moment of staring, looked away, nodding. He waited, and she, seeing he was waiting, acquiesced, huffing out an, "I understand, Sir."
Smiling, Ozpin sat back in his chair, "I'm glad we could sort this-"
He paused, as Amakuni stiffened, and they both turned to look out the back window, in the direction of the Forever Fall Forest, where a burst of Magic had pulsed, and continued to flare. It was faint, very faint, but unmistakable, just as when Mr. Arc had been working, only without the wards to absorb the ambient energy.
"Please prepare a bullhead," he ordered Professor Amakuni, standing. "I do believe something has gone awry."