Chapter 136: Initiative

Chapter 136: Initiative

DISCLAIMER: This story is NOT MINE IN ANY WAY. That honor has gone to the beautiful bastard Ryuugi. This has been pulled from his Spacebattles publishment at threads/rwby-the-gamer-the-games-we-play-disk-five.341621/. Anyway on with the show...err read.

Initiative

In the end, we did go to orientation, if only to watch it from a distance. I did a headcount of all the prospective students and noted what details I could, looking for signs of anything important. I'd told Adam that Cinder might have other allies at the school if she was using it as her baseboth among the students and the faculty. I Observed the teachers and students one by one, which, though it didn't give me all the details, at least provided me with context for who they were as people. It gave me a rough idea of their skills, the basics of what motivated them, and often at least a word or two about who they were associated with, if only the companies sponsoring them.

From those details and what I saw and overhead, I began piecing together the puzzle. I didn't have enough information to guess how the teams as a whole would turn out, but knowing how partners were decided, it was simple enough to guess what most of the pairs would be. Comparing how their powers worked together gave me a rough idea of who were likely to work most effectively togetherleaving out the human element, of course, though given time, the teams would likely come together anyway. I noted a few that I thought had potential, but for the most part I just watched.

Adam and I stayed apart from things, even when headmistress Turchina finished her speech and the students began making beds for themselves on the floor of the hall. Tomorrow, we'd be students, but it wasn't technically official yet and I therefore felt no need to sleep on the ground. Adam and I withdrew to the roof instead and I let him rest while I stood watch over everything. While Mercury and Emerald slept beneath us, Cinder was already a student and went to her own room, but I made sure to keep track of her even so. The night was boring with nothing to do, but I wasted time watching the signals that filled the sky and toying with my new powers.

And soon enough the sun rose.

"Adam," I said and he woke at once to the sound of his name. Sitting up, he held out a hand and I gave him his sunglasses back wordlesslywhich were actual sunglasses, as his mask was in my Inventory. There was no point in carrying around something so easily recognized.

"Is it time?" He asked.

"Soon," I answered. "You can take a shower and get breakfast before we get to work, if you want."

He did and soon we were sitting side by side in the cafeteria. I was mainly just picking at my food since I didn't get hungry, but it was a visible enough place to draw attention.

"So you decided to stick around after all?" Kyanos asked, taking the seat beside us. "What made you decide to stay?"

I was tempted to tell the truth and say something about hot older women, but there was sadly the possibility that someone might make a connection down the line, so I kept it to myself and shrugged instead.

"Family stuff," I said, making a face. "Duty, honor, etc. It's been awhile since a Roma was at Mistral, so I'm doing my time."

"You make it sound like a prison," He replied. "Which parts of it have been over the years, so fair enough. You all set to go?"

"Not quite," I shook my head. "Since it was a little last minute, Adam and I are still waiting on some stuff from home. School supplies, backups, and a few things that are important."

Like Autumn. Since Adam was going to be hiding his real Semblance anyway, he'd agreed to pretend that he had a plant-related Semblancein this case, one tied to a particular rose. We'd either keep her close or in our room and explain any of Autumn'soddities as a result of his supposed power. There were weirder Semblances, after all. Such as mine, which had sort of created Autumn anyway, soyeah.

Making arrangements for Gou would take a bit longer, at least officially. Unofficially, he would come if I called and there wasn't much anyone here could do about it.

"Nothing that'll get in the way during initiation, I hope?"

"I'm not worried about it," I answered with a shrug. "Adam and I will deal with it no problem."

"So you two are officially partners, then?" He asked, to which I nodded. "That's cool."Visit no(v)eLb(i)n.com for the best novel reading experience

"And I take it you and Melania are, too?" I asked back, as if I wasn't already sure.

"Thankfully," He said, sighing as if relieved before jolting slightly. "Wait, sorry; that probably came off as rude. You know about the team thing our families have going on, right?"

"Yeah," I confirmed. "My mom sort of broke it. There was a little talk of me fixing it, but I had other plans, sorry."

"No problem," He dismissed. "I was about to say I wasn't talking about you. It's just, with the Roma gone, there was an empty spot, you know? So there was a lot of talk about who was going to fill it and for a long time, the answer looked like it was going to be Pyrrha. Who's a badass and all, but, well, hates me. Which would have been a little awkward."

"I can imagine," I nodded. "But Melania's filling in instead?"

"Yup," He nodded. "Did anyone tell you that Pyrrha left? Well she did and it was kind of last minute. A lot of people wanted to take her placehave their kids take it, I meanbut there wasn't a lot of time, there were issues of trust, and Melania had proven herself repeatedly. Gramps agreed and she tagged in."

"Then I take it Itri and Ulaan are a pair, too?" I asked. "And you're going to team up?"

"That's the plan," He nodded. "No idea how that's gonna work out or what the hell they're gonna call us, but I guess you know how it is. What about you? You've got Adam thereanyone else?"

"Not yet," I answered with a smile and a shrug. "Figured I'd use initiation to see what everyone was made of and choose whoever's best able to keep up."

"Oh?" He wondered, raising an eyebrow. "And how are you going to do that?"

"By finishing in first place, of course," I stated frankly. "How else?"

"Mm," He hummed, peering at me. "I suppose that's one way to pick a team. And if it's you, I don't doubt you can do it. You already know about the Labyrinth?"

"Scouted it out a while ago," I confirmed.

"Arc andKnossos," He repeated, frowning lightly as he flipped through his scroll and brought up our files. "Hm."

They were full of lies, especially Adam's, but as always, there was enough truth to it that it should have been convincing. The Knossos had been a branch family of the Alexandria and Roma Families for over a thousand years, which was a nice way to say that it had been used to smuggle or marry promising personnel into Mistral back when such a thing matteredin Mistral's Imperial days, mostly. Ever since Chrysander Knossos had awakened with a Semblance capable of transmuting gold, it had been used to bring in valuable talents quickly. Anyone who did enough digging would find, to their complete lack of surprise, that he wasn't actually a Knossos, and even more digging would probably reveal a fair amount of well-hidden, scandalous information that was complete balderdash. From what Grandmother had told me, he was the bastard son of someone or other and a bull Faunus, had a record of some kind, and various other things.

The idea wasn't to keep him from looking suspicious, because anyone even vaguely associated with the Families was suspicious by default. Instead, his background was to make him look convincingly suspicious, like the type of person who had something to hide and enough skill to make it worth someone else's while. It should serve as another layer of protection to keep anyone from connecting him to Adam Taurus.

Though as for his first name, well, he'd asked and I'd allowed it. Adam was a common enough name and I'd rather he keep it then mess up when I called him by a fake name. Details like that can be tricky.

"Wow," Mr. Himmel said again, staring at his screen. "You boys hauled ass."

"Why even bother if you're not going to go for first place?" I asked. "How do we pick our teammates?"

Himmel pursed his lips, still staring at the screen. It seemed to take him a moment to remember to answer.

"Uh," He said. "Well, usually teams get formed in the maze. Groups form to deal with larger threats."

Knew it, I thought.

"Maybe you should have used a harder maze then," Adam answered with a snort, crossing his arms.

"Maybe so," Himmel replied, sounding bemused.

"Do you want us to go back for someone?" I asked, focusing on the issue at hand. "I noticed a few teams we could meet up with."

"No need," He answered, shaking his head. "I said usually, not alwayspairs making it here alone isn't uncommon, it's just"

"They usually take a little longer to get here?" I supplied.

"Just a bit," He agreed, shaking his head as he closed his scroll. He lifted a hand to his chin to look us both over, musing. "Besides, I get the feeling that sending you back for someone would be like giving them a free pass. So you're Isabelle's boy, eh?"

"I'm her son, yeah," I replied. "You knew her?"

"A long time ago," He muttered, squinting at me. "Saw your sisters a few times. Guess I should just be glad you didn't blow a path right through the Labyrinth."

"I thought about it, not gonna lie," I answered, smiling widely. "But I didn't want to damage the antiques."

He snorted out a quick laugh, but lifted a finger.

"You've got your Grandmother's mouth, I see," He said. "Be careful with it, thoughnot everyone's as tolerant of sass as I am, boy. A lot of your seniors are little princesses on the inside and you might hurt their delicate sensibilities."

"I'll manage, sir," I answered. "I'll try to be polite, too, but there's no helping Adam here. Whereas I was raised by wolves, he was brought up by more savage creatures and is rather lacking in the social graces."

"Why do you look so old, Mister?" Adam supplied helpfully, just to prove my point.

Himmel squinted at him.

"Because I'm old as balls, kid," He answered with a gravelly voice before jerking his head at one of the long tables set in the hall. "Go take a seat."

"What about our team?" I asked. "I was hoping to meet whoever got second place."

"It'll be awhile before anyone else arrives." He snorted. "We'll need to pick somebody suitable to be on your team, too. I hope you understand this is going to be a pain in my ass, boys."

"Sorry," I answered with a smile and a shrug.

He snorted again and jerked a head at the various screens positioned around the room.

"Feel free to watch your fellow classmates run in circles," He said. "Think of it as a reward for getting here early, because there's nothing I can do to keep you from looking and I don't actually give a fuck anyway."

Even before he spoke, I was letting my senses flow up through the stone around us. I could feel all the others, moving through the darkness and the danger with caution instead of certainty and moving slowly because of it. The tunnels beneath Mistral were elaborate, but not so much that someone with the right training couldn't get through it quickly, if they knew the way.

But they didn't, nor were they entirely sure what to expect from a place that filled Mistral's horror stories. It would take them time to find the right paths, to say nothing of the dangers they'd face doing so. The examiners, who were already whispering about Adam and I, would monitor how they performed and keep track of the skills they displayed, so as to better train them down the line. They were watching every move they made and adjusting their plans accordingly.

And so was I.

"Thanks," I answered, already wondering how much I could do from here without being noticedand how much I actually would. "It'll be nice to see my fellow students in action."