Gather your team

Turns out, riding a **** Stalker without any sort of saddle was a lot harder than it looked. Though, it didn’t look easy in the first place. You slipped around a bit before finding a place to put your feet between some armor plates. That helped a bit and you managed to stabilize yourself. You still couldn’t let the **** Stalker run at full speed with all the bumps and had to yell at it multiple times. There was a silver lining in this again.

Pyrrha was sitting behind you, arms wrapped around your best for support.

Shame you both had armor chest plates or this would have been amazing. Guess you had to settle it with her face resting on your shoulder.

“This way is north, right?” You asked.

“Y-yeah!” Pyrrha pointed ahead. “Try going that way.”

“On it” You were able to tell the **** Stalker when you heard some explosions to the distance to the right. “Should we… help them?”

“I… up to you, Jaune.” Pyrrha told you. “You’re driving.”

“Doesn’t feel right to just leave people behind.” You admitted and tapped the **** Stalker’s head. “Head toward that explosion.” There was a slight jerk as it obeyed you and headed off. You covered your eyes with your arm as you smashed through some trees. The poor forest was being torn up. The fighting was getting louder as you drew closer and then you heard a female shouting something.

You realized too late that a large Grimm made a lot of noise when crashing through a forest.

An explosion nearly hit you and you ducked just in time.

“WATCH IT!” You yelled.

“Jaune?!” Yang was staring at you in shock before slowly lowering her hands. The shotgun blast had come from her gauntlet. “Is that a **** Stalker? And you’re riding it? What the hell?!” Behind her, looking equally shocked, was Blake. They must have been partners.

“Hello!” Pyrrha greeted, waving to them from behind you.

Yang noticed her position and grinned, but Blake was having none of this.

“How did you tame a **** Stalker?!” Blake demanded. “What are you?” Her grip tightened on her weapon.

“Woah!” You replied, raising your hands in surrender. “Hold your fire! We’re all on the same side.”

“Chill, Blake.” Yang told her. holding out a hand.

“The Grimm belongs to Jaune so it’s only natural it obeys him.” Pyrrha told them.

“How do you own a Grimm?” Yang and Blake asked in unison.

“Just… look.” You knew you couldn’t explain this logically, so you had to rely on one of the rules for your magical ownership. All it took was for them to see your name on the Grimm. When you pointed, naturally their eyes followed to what you were gesturing to. Instinctive reactions were handy.

“I see,” Yang muttered with a nod. “Well, it has your name on it, so it seems legit.”

“This is surprising, but I can’t really argue with this.” Blake admitted.

“Want a lift?” Jaune asked, gesturing to behind Pyrrha.

“Really?” Yang asked surprised. “Aren’t we competing with each other?”

“No?” You didn’t think so. “We were just supposed to partner up and find relics. I didn’t hear we were competing.”

“Besides, it would be nice to have more comrades in case we come across more Grimm.” Pyrrha agreed. “There’s plenty of room too.”

“No catch?” Yang asked, smirking.

“I accept Lien, gold, Dust, and other forms of payment.” You replied jokingly.

“Well I don’t have any money, but if you insist.” Yang began to pull down her sleeve and you face flushed.

“W-wha! Not that!”

Yang laughed and it quickly became apparent she was messing with you. Pyrrha was blushing behind you and Blake looked exasperated. At least Blake climbed up first and sat behind Pyrrha. Realizing she was going to get left behind, Yang scrambled up on the back of the **** Stalker and you four took off.

“This is freaking cool!” Yang laughed. “Going to have to raise my opinion of you, Jaune.”

At least she gave up on that ‘Tom’ nonsense.

“Do you know where you are heading?” Blake asked.

“North?” You didn’t have any other information to go by.

“A little to your right, you’re going Northwest.” It seemed like Blake had some survival skills.

“Maybe he wants to prolonged the trip.” Yang suggested and you turned around to look at her. She was staring at how Pyrrha was holding onto you. Blushing, you turned back. That was definitely not it, not that you minded. After this initiation was over, you were going to write your name on her and get **** for all her teasing. Thankfully, Pyrrha seemed confused at her words and didn’t notice.

“There!” Blake called out, pointing to the ruins just visible above the trees.

It was great to have a navigator.

Less than two minutes later, you arrived at the clearing with ruins. Inside the small ruins, there were several chess pieces scattered out.

“Those must be the relics.” You pointed.

“No, really?” Yang laughed. “I would never have guessed.” She walked up and picked up the horse figurine. “Guess we can grab a knight.” She winked at you. “Reminds me of your coming in and sweeping us off our feet for a magic Grimm carpet ride.”

Pyrrha laughed at your embarrassment and Blake rolled her eyes.

“Guess I’ll take a night too.” You muttered, grabbing the other horse. Being a knight was your dream after all. Helping people and saving the damsel in distress. “Think anyone else is coming?”

“I don’t see Ruby,” Yang admitted, looking around. “Maybe she was already here? She’s pretty fast.”

“Maybe we should head-…” Pyrrha started to suggest, when a roar and crashing brush alerted them to something heading their way. They all turned and raised their weapons, when an Ursa burst out from a bush. On its back was a ginger with short hair wearing a white and pink outfit.

“Yee-haw!” She cried out as the Ursa collapsed and died. “Aww, it’s broken.” Her disappointment was evident.

“Did… she just ride here on an Ursa?” Blake asked.

“We rode here on a **** Stalker.” Yang pointed out.

“Good point.”

“NORA!” An exasperated male voice followed and a black haired boy in green burst out of the forest and was panting. He had obviously chasing after her. “Please… don’t do that again.”

“Okay, Ren!” The girl, Nora, answered and then turned to face the crowd. Her eyes widened. “Guys… don’t look behind you, but there’s a **** Stalker.”

You and the girls turned around to look at it.

“Yeah, that was OUR ride here,” You laughed and then couldn’t resist. “It’s bigger than yours.”

“REN!” Nora declared immediately. “We need to catch a bigger Grimm. Our honor is at stake!”

Ren looked at you like he wanted to ask about the **** Stalker, but noticed it wasn’t attacking. You found that weird that neither of them saw your name and just sort of accepted it. What kind of crazy stuff have they gone through?

“Like what?” He replied to Nora. “There aren’t that many large Grimm around here.”

“What about that?” Nora asked, pointing to the sky.

Your eyes moved toward the sky with everyone else’s and saw a large black bird flying above you. A Nevermore. One much bigger than a normal one. However, they saw something falling from it. Something red and then they heard it.

“AHHHHHH!”

“Ruby?!” You and Yang cried out in alarm.

Before anyone would say anything else, Ruby crashed into you. Looking back, you probably saved her from being a pancake. It still hurt though.

“Ow, my head.” Ruby groaned and looked down. “Ah! Jaune!”

“Nice to see you too, Ruby.” You moaned as she jumped off you. She gave you a hand up. “You find a partner yet?”

“Yep!” Then she looked up. “Weiss, I told you to jump!”

“You are insane!” Came Weiss’ voice from the giant Nevermore.

“Did you two… fly over on a Nevermore?” Blake asked.

“Rest of us came over on an Ursa and a **** Stalker.” Yang pointed out again, silencing Blake.

“Why did we have the smallest Grimm!” Nora cried out. “We should have gone for something bigger!” She fell on her hands and knees, causing Ren to pat her back.

“Use your glyphs like how you landed before!” Pyrrha called up to Weiss. People tended to panic in life or **** situations and usually just needed a reminder. Weiss let go and several pure white glyphs appeared in the air to let her jump down to join them easily. Unlike with Ruby.

“Nice to see you again.” You told her, noticing your name was still on her hand.

“Of course, I wouldn’t lose to something like that,” Weiss huffed. “Ruby just wanted to ride it here.”

The Nevermore cawed angrily and began to circle back. Everyone pulled out their weapons and prepared to knock it out of the sky.

After an epic fight that left the Nevermore’s head in a ravine, followed by its body, you and everyone else were carried up to the top of the cliff using your personal **** Stalker. You were exhausted with all the running, the explosions, raining feathers of ****, and blocking for your friends. You just wanted to head back to Beacon and rest. Everyone else seemed to be in a similar situation, though Ruby was incredibly excited. Ozpin and Glynda were waiting for you.

And they didn’t look happy.

Until they saw your name on the **** Stalker.

You realized instantly what the problem was. They saw you all taming a **** Stalker without seeing your name, so they were concerned how you did that. You would have to take that into account. Bringing the Grimm back to Beacon was probably not a good option, as some people would attack it on sight. Not that you blamed them.

Luckily, fate had other plans for you.

Crack!

Everyone turned around as the ground beneath the **** Stalker began to crack. You all were on a cliff, with the largest among you near the edge. That was a big mistake. Everyone began fleeing away from the rocks breaking away, but the **** Stalker wasn’t as lucky. It scrambled to avoid falling, but it was too large and claws were better for cutting over grabbing. It fell, in slow motion, down into the ravine with the Nevermore. There was a moment while everyone just sort of stared.

You and Yang stuck your head over the edge and peered down. Yep, it was dead and it’s body dissolving into black smoke.

Yang finally broke the silence.

“Jaune,” she said seriously. “Guess we won’t be seeing it next fall.”

You stared at her in exasperation as Ruby booed.

“Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Nora Valkyrie and Lie Ren, you retrieved the white rook pieces,” Ozpin said. “From this day on, you will work together as Team RRNW (Renew).” You clapped as you watched your friends. Nora hugged Ren excited they were on the same team. “Lead by… Ruby Rose.”

You laughed as you noticed Ruby looked ready to pass out. Weiss didn’t look very happy though. Finally, it was your turn and you walked up with Pyrrha, Blake, and Yang.

“Finally, Jaune Arc, Pyrrha Nikos, Blake Belladonna, and Yang Xiao-Long, you retrieved the white knight pieces,” Ozpin told them. “You will be known as Team ABYN (Abeyant). Lead by… Jaune Arc.”

You nearly passed out there from shock. Pyrrha slapped you on the back in congratulations and you actually did fall, causing Yang to laugh at you. Well, at least initiation was over. You would go back to your dorm and try to figure out the extent of your marker’s power. After the tests, you had to see Weiss again. You did own her after all.

And you got to share a room with three incredibly hot girls. There was that silver lining again.