As in my version of Remnant, the students apart from Ruby are all over 18, and Vale has British licensing laws, so celebrating initiation will have some of the hallmarks of Freshers Week.
There will be some changes to the initiation events as Jaune is not carrying the idiot ball—he is just less experienced at dealing with aura.
For those who don't know it, Yakety Sax has been called the tune that makes any movie chase scene better.
LGDF stands for Local Grimm Defence Force. Think of it as a sort of emergency service for dealing with Grimm in Mistral and Vale.
/-/
Sky thought that the early signs were good for Team Cardinal. Their leader had obviously been planning how he would lead the team and qualify for the Vytal Festival.
The first news was that he had a family member who had promised and could afford to upgrade their weapons and provide them with a uniform. Cardin sounded confident that they would qualify for the Vytal Festival this year without sounding delusional.
His leader was also making an effort to ensure that the four of them thought of themselves as a team rather than Cardin and Dove dominating the other two. Cardin had arranged the sleeping arrangements so that Sky and Dove had the beds next to each other on one wall, and Cardin and Russel had the beds on the other.
There was a further good sign in that when Russel had looked a little doubtful about the funding offer and the thought of armour, Cardin didn't shout him down. Instead, he pointed out that Weiss Schnee, Pyrrha Nikos, and Brede Campion all had money they could spend on their teams. Certainly, Schnee's use of dust in that clip they had seen of Team RWBY fighting the Nevermore suggested that she wasn't worried about her budget. Russel had nodded at that.
Cardin then showed some imagination by clarifying that Cardin's great Aunt Agnes would not expect to be repaid by the team members and that her motivation for helping them was the honour of the kingdom and the family, not to impose obligations on the team members. Russel visibly relaxed at this being made clear. Sky would ask Cardin about that later. Sky knew virtually nothing about Vacuoan society, and as far as he was aware, Cardin had only spent two, maybe three, weeks there this holiday.
Finally, he also did not get upset when Russel said that he wasn't convinced that being heavily armoured suited his fighting style. He had agreed that if this was correct, then Russel could simply have lightweight clothes that matched the armour that the others were wearing.
Cardin finally said that each of the two partnerships should spend time getting to know each other before they attended the dinner celebrating a successful initiation. There was a lot of noise outside in the corridor, so it was suggested that each partnership should walk through the grounds.
They were just about to set off when there was a knock on the door. On a nod from Cardin, Dove leapt up to open the door. Outside was Weiss Schnee, Brede Campion and an older man wearing a servant's uniform, which looked straight out of Fordville Abbey.
Brede had his monocle in his eye and said, "Hello, chaps. I just wanted to introduce you to Reginald Bunter so you won't be startled when you see him around."
Reginald nodded, "I am Mr Campion's and Miss Schnee's valet."
Weiss said, "Bunter will cook all five teams breakfast tomorrow. He can cater for the minor differences between the Full Mistralian, Full Vale and the Full Mantle, as well as provide lighter fare for those who prefer croissants, Patch Pastries, meats and cheese."
Brede added, "According to my uncle, he is the Remnant expert on pick-me-ups after a heavy night."
Weiss added, "All Atlas knows Brede's uncle is an expert on hangovers."
Brede looked at Weiss and raised an eyebrow at her, and Weiss coloured.
Brede cheerfully added, "According to Coco and Tom, his expertise will be needed tomorrow morning."
Bunter nodded politely, "Mr Campion is too kind, but many of my gentlemen and ladies have expressed satisfaction with my efforts. I understand that tonight is likely to be a memorable occasion."
Weiss looked embarrassed. Perhaps the snide comment earlier had broken some social convention of politeness between the Atlas elite. She added, "Bunter has also worked for my family in the past and gave complete satisfaction."
Cardin said, "Pleased to meet you, Bunter." He then introduced the rest of the team to the older man.
Brede added, "Bunter will be delighted to organise any necessary dry cleaning tomorrow morning. Toodle pip and see you this evening."
The other three members of Team Cardinal looked at each other with disbelief as the door shut. Sky was sure he recognised the man, but he decided to leave the revelation until he was alone with Dove. It would help break the ice. He simply brightly said, "Well, an offer of breakfast, hangover cures, and dry cleaning sounds good to me."
Cardin nodded and shrugged. "OK, see you back here in an hour or so. I suggest we head down at about 5.30 for the pre-dinner cocktails and nibbles. Don't want to be first, don't want to be last."
On the way to the grounds, Dove wondered aloud, "Are the stories about effete Atlesian plutocrats true then? I'd heard living in the city in the clouds had made them decadent."
Sky said, "I've seen the man before. I think he belongs to the Atlas Diplomatic Protection Squad. I've seen him hovering in the background at receptions at the Atlas embassy in Mistral. Brede's uncle is the Atlas Ambassador to Vacuo and used to be a senior man at the Mistral Embassy. Jacques Schnee always travels with a huge amount of security if he leaves Atlas."
"But they are both trainee hunters with aura– why should they need protection?"
Sky shrugged, "White Fang. His job will be to allow Weiss or Brede to make a getaway if they come in mob-handed to kidnap or kill them. That was the reason for all the security yesterday at Pharos."
He paused, "He probably will accompany them if they go down to Vale."
Dove nodded thoughtfully and asked, "You go to embassy receptions?"
"My parents are politicians in Mistral. They belong to the centrist faction."
"Centrist?"
"Mild reform, and let's not be beastly to the Faunus and the servants. Mother's the speech giver and the policy wonk, and father is the wheeler-dealer."
He'd given Dove his cue – let's see if he'll run with it. His quick look at Scrollpedia suggested that Dove's and Cardin's fathers' roles in their political careers were similar to those of his father and mother, only they were on the right of Vale's politics. He decided it would be too risky to make the comparison directly between his parents and the Cardinal/Bronzewing partnership, but letting Dove make the connection himself was OK.
"Mine and Cardin's father are also involved in politics in Vale. Cardin is the party leader. Dad is his right-hand man."
"How long have you and Cardin known each other?"
"More or less since birth. We went to the same schools, and we've always had each other's backs."
Sky had thought that he and Crimson had that relationship. Perhaps he was projecting, but Dove sounded doubtful that was still the case.
"I was impressed that he waited thirty minutes for us to get there before choosing a relic."
Dove brightened up, "That's true. They had changed the relics from what we had planned for. Was it really that long?"
"Russel confirmed it to me."
That seemed to relax Dove, who said, "Father has been Cardin's father's best friend since prep school and wants me to follow in his footsteps. Father is the enforcer and does the necessary behind-the-scenes arm-twisting."
Sky nodded. He had the germ of an idea.
"Dove, do you honestly think that from what you know of the other students from Vale, we have a real chance of qualifying as the third seed from Beacon in our year?
This was important because of the seeding system for the first group round of the Vytal Festival. If you were the third or fourth-seeded team in a group, you would be fighting the first and second-ranked teams from two other academies and the third or fourth-ranked team from the final academy. Only two out of the four teams in each group progressed to the second knockout round. It was rare for a fourth-seeded team to qualify for the second knockout team round.
Dove said, "I would like to think we could be higher, but I think the best we can hope for is to be third-seeded. Team Ruby and Team Juniper are just too good."
Dove paused, "Cardin is right to say that the third-ranked team from Beacon this year is likely to be as good or better than the second-ranked team from the other three academies."
"I wouldn't be surprised if that was true about Mistral."
"You wouldn't?"
"I'll read my scroll messages before dinner, but Pyrrha's defection to Beacon will hit morale badly in the other teams. I wouldn't want to fight Team ABRN in the first round, but none of the other teams I know about scare me. There are a couple of people who I haven't met who are rumoured to be coming to Haven from Vacuo, and Russel might know about them."
He would let that remark marinade in Dove's brain.
He added, "Cardin is doing the right thing in concentrating on team spirit. A real problem in Mistral is that often the teams aren't that cohesive."
Dove smiled, "My father says that there usually is some way of undermining political alliances."
"Mine too. There is always some weak link or insecurity which can be exploited without even leaving that much of a trail."
Dove nodded, "Herry Boxer is a good fighter, but he and my old friend Maurice will not mix well. Maurice won't appreciate being led by an animal."
"Shouldn't we say Faunus?"
"In public, yes, but between ourselves, let's be honest. Anyway, it will be easy to wind up Maurice."
Sky inwardly grimaced, but if that was how Dove and Cardin thought, he would roll with it. He changed the subject, "You saw Weiss's look of shock at the announcement of the leader of Team RWBY."
Dove nodded, "I can see that they will have some issues. Still, they fought well enough together. The sisters are close. It's not as though there is a Faunus on the team." Ah, so Dove had taken Sky's point even though he had pretended not to.
Sky smiled to himself. He wasn't saying anything yet, but he was 85% certain about the bow being a disguise. He also knew who the older sister's mother was, and he couldn't imagine that would make Weiss, Nora, or Ren happy. No matter that the mother hadn't been near Yang since she was born. Teams could implode.
He looked at his scroll. The news had broken in Mistral about Pyrrha and the team of Mistralians she had ended up being on. His teammates were desperately sending him messages asking him to join their team after all. Interestingly, the leaders of four other teams were sending him invitations to join them. By the looks of it, only Team ABRN of the leading teams had not been conned into thinking Pyrrha would be joining them.
He had been drafting his reply since arriving in Vale and redrafted it when he saw Pyrrha. Now that he was on a team that had a realistic chance of making the Vytal Festival, it was appropriate to reduce further any suggestion of bitterness.
He showed the initial reactions of the news threads to Dove. "I don't think that Pyrrha is the most popular woman in Mistral right now, and the fact that Jaune Arc is the team leader is not going down well."
He was confident that Pyrrha would come through it fine. For a start, he had a pretty good idea that her management company would be thrown to the wolves, and the fact that she was on an all-Mistral team at Beacon would make forgiveness easier. It would be interesting to see how Nora, Jaune and Ren would react to the publicity and pressure. Jaune, in particular, would be under strain.
Sky wondered what would happen to the man who promised Crimson's father he could fix it so that Pyrrha would be on Crimson's team. He had no doubt Crimson's father would be out for blood. Not only had he wasted his money, but he had been made to appear a fool to his son and the parents of his son's team. He had also granted a significant political favour to Sky's family. Father had made certain that it got paid in advance of the start of term at Haven. If the fraudster were lucky, he would be caught by the police rather than the Spiders or the Scorpions. It wasn't that he would be safe in prison. It was just that there would be less opportunity to teach him the full error of his ways before he died.
He wants to discuss with Dove whether he felt that Team CRDL or Team LLAC were the likely third seed in their year. He also wanted to test a hunch that Dove would be vulnerable to mind games.
"I've never seen any of Team Lilac before. We all know snipers are more useful in real life than in the arena, and the girl seems a bit rough. Still, they looked competent but not outstanding."
Dove nodded, "Too early to say for certain, but I would agree. Russel rates the cat."
When he got to know Dove better, he would point out that being rude about someone on good terms with another team member was a bad idea.
"How good is Cardin's cousin?"
"Not as good as Cardin." The response suggested that she was better than Dove and that this was a sore point with Dove.
"Will she have problems being led by a Faunus?"
Dove thought about it. "No, and especially not that one. She's a Faunus Justice Warrior of sorts."
"Is she a snob, or will she overcompensate?"
"You're thinking about the wild card girl."
A pause, "The latter, if anything. Look, I dislike her, but she is WYSIWYG."
Sky must have looked puzzled as Dove added, "What you see is what you get. She doesn't engage brain before opening her mouth. On the other hand, most people at Pharos liked her for some weird reason."
Sky knew he should stop digging any further. He nodded, "Still, Anne must be the weakest link in that team in terms of training and confidence."
Dove looked at him. "You're right. Let's watch them this evening."
He and Dove were bonding well—actually, better than he had been expecting, as Dove said, "I was relieved today that Cardin waited for me before choosing the relic. I messed up at the end of last year."
Sky tried to convey the sympathy needed to ensure a full confession.
"I misplayed things when I was trying to ensure that Cardin was confirmed as the Victor Ludorum at Pharos. Look, you and I know that if we are going to have a real chance of getting into the second round at Vytal, we need to be the third-seeded Beacon Team."
"I agree. Look, sometimes one just needs to focus on weak links. Jaune is a team leader despite being the worst fighter on his team. Weiss Schnee must hate being under Ruby, and Blair doesn't like Weiss that much. On Team LLAC, we target the aristocrat and the poor girl in the arena to break their confidence."
Done smiled, "I agree. We need to decide how much we tell Cardin."
Sky knew that there were things Father never told Mother. The deal he had made with Crimson's father was one of them. "I will trust your judgement, but bounce any calls you have any doubt about off me. Tell him about anything which has a possible risk of backfiring."
"I'll hold you to that."
/-/
Cardin led his team down to the initiation dinner. It had been the right thing to do to have an hour with Russel alone. He knew that his impressions of Vacuo had been those of a tourist, but the few weeks he had spent in the kingdom had taught him that forthrightness was seen as a virtue.
He now thought that he and Russel could work well together and that Russel was at least prepared to be open-minded about the differences between Vacuo and Vale.
Russel had convinced him that Lydia and the Lynx Faunus would be an effective double act. Like most Mustangs, the man was more used to fighting Grimm and auraless bandits, but he had been involved in at least two firefights involving bandits and White Fang with aura, which meant he had fought without knowing that once your aura hit 15%, the fight stopped.
He was also known for being good at persuading Atlesian Ruperts not to do anything too stupid and dealing effectively with any of them who were rude to him because he was a Faunus. He would tell Dove and Sky tomorrow not to mess with the Lynx Faunus and definitely not to call him Elsie.
He'd also learnt that two people Russel rated from Vacuo were going to Haven as a pair. The Monkey Faunus had a useful semblance, and his best friend had money behind him. He would get Sky to find out from his contacts how good they were by Haven standards.
On the way in, they were met by Yatsuhashi and Velvet, who confiscated their scrolls. It was explained that what happened in the college bar on Initiation night was best not recorded and that the blooper reel would be given into the custody of Professor Goodwitch after tonight.
When they reached the reception room, he saw the other team leaders on their floor were gathered around Coco Adel. Julie saw him and waved him over.
As he arrived, Julie gave him a peck on the cheek, which he returned. She said, "Cardin Winchester, meet Ruby Rose, Jaune Arc, and TC. You will remember Coco from Pharos." Oh, so the Lynx Faunus was going to be called TC here.
Cardin bowed to Ruby and Coco and shook hands with TC and Jaune. He registered that Coco was surprised that he shook hands with the Faunus first and without hesitation. Good.
He said, "It's a pleasure to meet my fellow team leaders: my partner Russel Thrush from Vacuo, my oldest friend Dove Bronzewing, and his partner Sky Lark from Mistral." Russel and the Lynx Faunus greeted each other by gripping each other's elbows. Dove sought to peck Julie on the cheek, which she avoided.
Cardin then told his team to mingle. It was clear that this was part of the team leaders' initiation process.
After his team had departed, Cardin looked at Coco and said, "I am a year older than when you last saw me."
Coco lowered her glasses slightly and said, "We are all allowed to reinvent ourselves at Beacon. I hope that the new Cardin is an improvement."
"I believe that he is. I understand the new Coco definitely is."
Cardin looked at the Lynx Faunus and said, "Russel here has warned me not to underestimate you in a fight. I look forward to testing each other out over the next few months. Who knows, we may both be leading our teams into the Vytal Festival Arena in seven months' time along with Jaune and Ruby."
Jaune said, "We should not count out Team Saffron, should we, Julie?"
Julie laughed, "No need to be gallant. My team is a group of competent fighters who will not be bothering the TV cameras this year. After watching your team deal with the Death Stalker and Ruby's deal with the Nevermore, the only question is which of your teams will be seeded first and second and who will be seeded third and fourth."
Coco laughed. "You have not yet seen the blooper reel."
This intrigued Cardin, but just then, Ruby asked him about the Executioner and how often he needed to change the fire dust crystal in it.
Cardin answered in broad terms and then complimented her on Crescent Rose. The response was surprisingly informative, although it confirmed his impression that the weapon was a horrifying masterpiece of design which needed a lot of maintenance.
It took ten minutes before Ruby realised everyone else had fled long ago. Admittedly, her apology was cute, and it would have been like kicking a puppy to agree with her when she apologised for boring him. Besides, the rumours from Signal said that being unkind to Ruby unleashed the wrath of Yang, and that was universally acknowledged to be a bad idea.
He now knew that Ruby was unsuited to be a team leader. Team armourer, definitely. Assistant quartermaster to the whole college. Well, why not? But a leader, no. It was hard to imagine Weiss Schnee being led by this woman or that Blair Nightshade would respond well to her enthusiasm. As for restraining her sister from partying, forget it.
Depressingly, while Ruby was lecturing him, he saw that Cousin Lydia had been working the room in combination with her team leader. As always on these occasions, she was dressed in a man's dinner jacket with a flamboyant waistcoat, trousers, and bowtie, while her leader was in a white linen suit, which would need dry cleaning in the morning.
Elsewhere, Brede, Weiss, Coco, and Anne had stayed together. Anne was almost certainly wearing her best dress which had probably cost a fifth of the price of Brede's cufflinks. The man was affable, though, and the lower-class woman seemed happy in his company. Russel had told him that the man's uncle was as popular as any obscenely wealthy Atlesian could hope to be in Vacuo, and Brede had learnt from him. Weiss barely spoke, although he suspected that was out of embarrassment rather than snobbery. Besides, when you had Brede and Coco at the party, who needed to say anything?
He wished he could go back at least ten and preferably 13 years ago and treat his cousin with more respect. It was just that his father told him that Lydia and her family were in trade and contemptible. He had believed it and had pulled her pigtails and been rude to her. He couldn't blame her for taking delight in taunting him and Dove. He now knew that Lydia's father was the senior partner of the most profitable law firm in Vale and was paid (and earned) a lot more than Alizarin Cardin each year. Ideally, he, Dove, June and Lydia should have been on the same team, but Father had ensured that would never happen.
He wanted to catch up with Lydia at pressing the flesh, but Dove and the old crowd from Pharos had then cornered him. He could hardly tell them to get lost, but part of the point of tonight was to make a good impression on the people who didn't know him. He had little doubt that Lydia was making friends while gently putting the knife into him and warning people about Dove. Surely Dove knew enough not to make a pass at anyone tonight?
At six, they were ushered into the dining room, and each team had its own table. One bottle of white and one bottle of red wine was on each table labelled "With the compliments of Agnes Winchester." Thank you, great aunt Agnes. At one end of the room, on a dais, sat the professors and other members of the faculty. As the students entered, the faculty stood up and applauded. Team PLUM and team CFVY also had tables.
There were screens around the room, and throughout the meal, extracts from the initiation day were shown.
The variety of landing strategies was interesting. Lie Ren's was stylish, and when he looked at Sky, the man had nodded as if to say that was what he had expected. Yang's was over the top, and the aviator glasses only added to the impressiveness. He, along with everyone else, glanced over at Team RWBY's table and saw Yang had put back on the glasses. Ruby looked embarrassed, Weiss as though there was a stick in her bottom, while Blair was amused.
Blair's landing had been impressively soft, and he wished the highlights had shown how much or how little the impact on aura was. Anyway, it was clear that this was a student who was agile.
There were loud cheers when they showed the encore to Ren's fight with King Taijutu. Nora greeted him upside down, touched his nose, and said, "Boop." While everyone laughed at that, it confirmed that those two were a team, no matter what happened. Still, Team JNPR had an elite singles fighter, an elite doubles team, and a newbie. How would they gel as a team? Ignore that thought. No point in even thinking that Team JNPR were not a shoo-in for the Vytal Festival.
After that, he encouraged the team to watch the clips and take notes. With time to digest what was happening, he and Russel had impressively dealt with a group of Beowulf. Russel's speed and agility worked well with his power. Russel distracted them so that his blows got through with no defection. He and Russel clearly had the makings of a good doubles team.
Yang and Blair double-teaming on those Ursas confirmed that all four members of Team RWBY were threats. Still, he had been expecting that and was counting his blessings that they were all on the same team. Two super teams were better than seven competitive teams.
He watched the extracts from Team LLAC's fights with the Grimm with particular interest. Anne and Brede took out Grimm at a distance. The aristocrat used his rifles from around four hundred yards and never seemed to miss. He also appeared to have an inexhaustible store of dust bullets. Anne avoided close-quarter fighting by throwing dust grenades for staggeringly long distances. She took out groups while he sniped. It was odd that the one time a Grimm had got close, she had kicked it, and then Brede had taken the shot while it was sprawled. He made a note to tell his team that these two were almost certainly better at fighting Grimm than other students with aura.
He was less sanguine about how his cousin and the Lynx Faunus worked together, especially after hearing what Russel had said about the Faunus. He still thought he could beat Lydia seven times out of ten, but he didn't think that in a doubles match where he and Dove were partners, they could beat her and the Faunus more than three times in ten. He felt guilty about that, but the Faunus could probably keep him occupied while she wiped the floor with Dove. Lydia had Dove's number.
The desserts and a bottle of dessert wine labelled "With the compliments of the Travers Foundation " arrived at the table when Professor Ozpin stood up.
He said, "You are no doubt all bored with being talked at, and Miss Adel assures me that you all just want to go down the bar. Yesterday, I warned about the dangers of wasting potential. Today, many of you have shown that there is hope that you will make effective use of it. The earlier set of clips showed some of the more elegant and flamboyant landing strategies and your fights with the Grimm. Miss Adel and Mr Piper have assured me that there are some additional clips which will be played now with a musical accompaniment and an extended version in the bar without the music, which they claim show that I was understating how interesting the next year will be and that even the best of you have some learning to do or, indeed, are spectacularly insane. For the avoidance of doubt, we are not introducing Grimm Riding as a new event in this year's Vytal Festival. I am also told that, according to Miss Adel, what happens in the Beacon Bar stays in the Beacon Bar. You will be checked for additional scrolls on the way into the bar. They will be returned tomorrow morning."
Cardin looked around and saw that the Team RWBY and Team JNPR tables were especially amused or mortified by the Grimm racing comment.
The blooper tape started after the last dessert had been served. Tom Piper had warned him that traditionally, this tape tried to take the top teams down a peg or two but that they had an abundance of riches this year. "Cardin, the blooper tape is just part of the ritual. They did it to Coco and me last year, and the idea is that we focus on the better teams rather than humiliating the weaker teams. Your team is on it early, but tell Dove at the end that no one will remember him after the last five minutes."
They had been told that they had been equipped with miniature cameras to resolve disputes about eye contact, and he had seen some drones around. There were no doubt fixed cameras near the temple.
This year, they had added musical accompaniment. Tom and Loretta from Team Piper produced a kazoo and a penny whistle, while Velvet Scarlatina created a hard light piano, and Yatsuhashi had a gong. Tom and Loretta used their instruments to accentuate the pratfalls while Velvet played light-hearted tunes.
He had to nudge Dove to laugh when the clip showed Dove following Sky down with obsessive intent. Dove had explained his reasons for choosing Sky as a preferred partner, but he could have been more subtle about it. It was unfortunate that the camera seemed to be focused on Sky's behind. Fortunately, Tom was right, as Nora's use of her weapon to speed up her pursuit of "Renny" meant that Dove's enthusiasm would be overlooked – well, fingers crossed. He looked across at Lydia and decided possibly not, but it could be defused. He would negotiate a ceasefire with his cousin now that they were both at Beacon and tell Dove tomorrow not to even think about asking after Geraldine.
He had heard about Jaune's landing strategy from Dove. Fair enough, the man had not been to combat school, and his aura had only been unlocked a few months ago – no wonder he had decided to use a parachute to break his fall, and perhaps he had had training using them while in the Mistral LGDF.
Still, with the drones near the cliffs and so many people being distracted by Yang's exuberant shouts of joy at flying, there was an embarrassment of different angles recording the unfortunate incident. One shot, in particular, caught the move from concentration to surprise when Yang buzzed him wearing the aviator sunglasses and then terror when he instinctively pulled the cord on the parachute too early in the response. Ruby, who seemed to be pursuing her sister at an astonishing speed with the same concentration as Nora pursued Ren, did manage to avoid decapitating him at the last moment but still cut most of the lines on his parachute. The music paused to allow the shout of "Sorry, Jauney!" to be heard and greeted with hilarity.
Next, there was a split screen showing the view that Weiss and Jaune had of what happened next. Jaune's relief at landing on the glyph, followed by dismay when he saw Weiss on a collision course on one side, was matched by Weiss's look of horror as she realised that a man was in her path and she was going to hit him.
Cardin doubted that Weiss's mood was helped by Yatsuhashi hitting the gong and Yang joking loudly, "I like your style, Weiss. Trying to pick up a man during initiation." The collision of auras meant both fell off the glyph.
The shot of Pyrrha in mid-air twisting around to fire the spear at him, hitting the knapsack and spearing him to a tree, was impressive and comic. She also said, "Sorry, Jaune."
The clips were now speeded up to increase the silliness, and Velvet moved to Ragtime tunes.
He found it less funny when the clips showed him and Russel first charging at an insane rate towards the temple and then standing around with every look he gave at his watch focused on. He tried to tell himself that the fact that he could keep up with Russel was a good thing. He also knew he would need to talk with Russel about why he took on so many Grimm up close with his knives. Remnant, Cardin's family may not own dust mines like Weiss's or Brede's fathers, but he could spare enough dust to take them out at a distance if he could, rather than relying on one's reactions being quicker.
He looked at Dove and smiled. Dove smiled back. Phew, the man was predisposed to believe the best. Tomorrow, he would tell Dove that he had not realised how quickly he and Russel had been going, that he was wondering whether Dove had arrived before him and whether he should choose a single relic closest to what they had discussed.
Team LLAC was next for the treatment, and Brede's ability to keep the monocle in place was awe-inspiring. Frack, Anne had a strong throwing arm. The dust grenades travelled a vast distance and seemed to swerve to catch Grimm taking evasive action.
The clip in which his cousin showed off all the features of her sports weapons to her new partner, and he responded by doing trick shots with his crossbow, showed that at least the craziness was spread around the year. He hadn't realised how many weapons she had—he counted a golf club, cricket bat, lacrosse stick, baseball bat, hockey stick, squash racket, tennis racket, and umbrella.
Just then, Yatsuhashi handed Velvet a saxophone, and he heard the first few bars of Yakety Sax play. He soon knew that Nora was insane. The look of glee with which Nora had boarded the Ursa and used her hammer to give it electric shocks to steer it towards the ruined temple had left him open-mouthed, while most of the rest of the students had burst into laughing applause, which turned into whooping when the speeded-up clip showed Ren chasing after Nora riding on the Ursa. The music continued as the next few minutes answered some of his questions about where the Alpha Grimm had come from and how the fire had started. How on Remnant had Weiss and Ruby got it together to deal with the Nevermore twenty minutes later after starting a forest fire and hitching a ride on it to escape the flames? He glanced over at Team RWBY and saw that Weiss looked mortified, Ruby was embarrassed, Yang was excited, and Blair could not avoid smiling.
Pyrrha and Jaune entered one end of a cave to avoid the fire. No doubt it had taken time to get through the cave, but the film cut quickly to Pyrrha and Jaunes exiting the other end, pursued by a Death Stalker accompanied by the chase song and the kazoo.
Yatsuhashi hit the gong again when Jaune collided with Ruby. He also realised that she had been spinning when Weiss fell from the Nevermore, so she could not place her glyphs in the right place to slow down her descent. Jaune's attempts at breaking her fall had actually been helpful, but it was clear that Yang, although realising this, was going to tease both Weiss and Jaune mercilessly about it.
The extended version of the fights with the Nevermore and the Death Stalker at least showed that it had taken time for the eight to get their acts together, and the musical accompaniment was appropriate as Pyrrha ran from the cave to the temple and when all of them ran for the cliffs. They had another chance to admire the destruction of the alpha Grimm.
Indeed, everyone was in a good mood by the end of it (possibly excluding Weiss and Jaune) and ready to celebrate by drinking, dancing and singing in the college bar.
On the way into the bar, they were each given a choice of a glass of sparkling wine, a gin and tonic, an orange juice and, in Ruby's case, a glass of milk as they handed in their scrolls. Yatsuhashi made an impressive bouncer, and Velvet collected any additional scrolls and got them all to write their names on the post-its attached to them.
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