= Neopolitan's P.OV =

Professor Goodwitch's class was interesting to say the least. Because the Vytal festival was being restarted we had numerous new students. The room was a lot more crowded than it usually was. Goodwitch stood in the center of the sparring area and waited for everyone to quiet down. This on it's own was enough to tell me that class would be different today.

"Quiet down students, I have an announcement to make," the professor said to any that dared to keep whispering. The room fell silent instantly. Professor Goodwitch gave a small approving nod before continuing. "As I'm sure you're aware, we have quite a few more students than normal. Each of the professors here have prepared... special lessons to welcome the new arrivals.

"Here at Beacon as well as the other schools we have split you up into teams of four, and taught you to trust and depend on your teammates. However, it is likely that there will be times in your lives where your teammates cannot be there, and you will be forced to depend on those around you. Therefore, my lesson will be pairing each of you up into temprary teams of four and seeing if you can work through the new obstacles."

Students murmered among one another and I glanced nervously. It was true that I had become a lot more comfortable with talking lately, but that was with my team, with my friends, people that I was comfortable with. But this...

Wolf gave me an encouraging nod before Prodeasor Goodwitch cut though the noise and said sharply, "Are there any objections?" No one dared to speek against her, "Good," she nodded. "Here are your teams."

Around the room screens lit up, showing pictures and names. I groaned mentally, not even knowing which screen to turn to. Everyone got up to move to their screen. Before I walked away, Wolf pulled me into a hug.

"You'll do fine," he whispered encouragingly before jogging off to find his new team. It took me a moment to realize that I had a wide smile one my face. It slipped away as I began looking for my own team.

It didn't take me long to find my screen, and there was already a boy beside it. He was pretty tall. I mean at least 6 ft compared to my 4'9". He was dressed in mostly grey and black, and had a large broadsword with him. He noticed me as I approached.

"Hi," I offered cautiously.

"Hey," he nodded politely without much emotion. I stood next to him and scanned the room for our other two teammates. Ahead of us, I spotted a girl with black hair that was pulled back into a ponytail. She was dressed in mostly black, and was hugging another girl with a brown hair that had blue in it. They pulled apart and the one with brown hair said something encouraging to the other. The darker haired girl gave her a nod and a small smile before she turned to face me and the boy I was next to. Great, another anti-social butterfly. Exactly what we needed.

She walked over to us, offered us a nervous smile and said, "Erm, hi. I'm Axelle. I guess I'm on a team with you guys today." Her voice was very mellow as she stretched her arm out towards us. The boy next to me paused for a moment but took her hand anyway.

"Jake," he responded simply.

I took a turn shaking their hands before saying, "I'm Neopolitan, but you guys can just call me Neo." They greeted me respectfully with little warmth. It was clear that none of us was very sociable, and that we had all been shoved into an awkward situation.

"Where's the fourth?" Axelle asked, her dark eyes looking past me and to the board with our names.

"I don't know," Jake replied as both he and I turned to the screen.

"I'm not far," a boy's voice laughed lightly. The three of us turned to face him. He wore a soft orange jacket with white fur on the edge of it's hood. He had a similar shade of orange for his chin length hair that was messy but neat at the same time. He wore a black fedora like hat with a white ribbon around it, and an orange feather sticking out. He had striking catlike dark green eyes.

"Loki Meschever, at your service," he said smoothly. Before I realized what he was doing he had picked up my hand and kissed it lightly. My immediate reaction was to go to slap him, but I realized that this would probably get me into trouble so I resisted. I was still on a very strict, 'no fighting with other students' policy. Instead all I could do was glare at him. He gently released my hand and looked to Axelle, but before he could do anything she stepped back, put her hands up and said, "No thanks." This made Loki chuckle then he turned to look at Jake, arching one of his eyebrows suggestively.

"Don't you even think about it," Jake told the other boy, his tone going from calm to threatening. This however only made Loki chuckle and say, "Suit yourselves."

Goodwitch then called everyone's attention and announced that we would be traveling back to the red forest to gather tree sap, but it was filled with grimm so we would have to be careful and be able to work with our new teams. We were loaded onto air ships and sent on our way.

I caught a glimpse of black hair and a bow on the same ship, and sighed in relief as I recognized her. "Hey Blake," I called to her, happy to talk to someone that I knew.

"Hi Neo," she nodded, coming over to me. "How's it going?"

I looked over to my new team at Jake and Axelle who were trying to have a small conversation, and at Loki who was very quickly getting on my nerves, and replied, "I guess we'll see." It then occurred to me that I knew a member of Blake's team who was also easy to anger and fight with. "How is Yang doing with all of this?"

Blake sighed, "Yang's not here. She's not... feeling well. She woke up with a killer headache this morning and decided to stay behind."

"I'm sorry to hear that," I said, feeling a bit sorry for team RWBY. Yang was a great girl, but she was easy enough to anger without being in pain. I supposed that it wouldn't take much to set her off. Before Blake and I could talk much more, the aircraft we were on began to land and we rejoined our temporary teams.

"Hey sweetheart, I was beginning to think that you left me," Loki chuckled.

I rolled my eyes and grumbled under my breath, "If only I could get away that easy."

We broke away from the main group and headed into the forest. The deeper in you got, the more likely you would get to a good tree with lots of sap, but at the same time it was more likely that you were to encounter grimm.

Jake and Axelle took a nearby tree while Loki and I worked on a different one. One person would actually gather the sap in jars and the other would look out for any potential targets. Jake and Axelle worked quickly and efficiently, only using a few words but getting the job done fast. Loki and I on the other hand, moved a bit slowly because I had to do most of the work myself while Loki rambled on and on.

"... so you see, I've been debating coming to Beacon for quite some time now and the Vytal Festival seemed like the perfect time to see what it was like..." he was saying.

'Oh dear God no, please do not come to Beacon,' I thought to myself. It seemed like all Loki was capable of was leaning against a tree, talking about himself, and occasionally throwing a flirtatious comment in my direction.

"Can you hand me that class jar over there?" I asked cutting into his storytelling.

"Anything for you darling," he chuckled retrieving the jar for me and taking the full one.

"Please don't call me that," I groaned.

"Whatever you say babe," he winked at me. I growled to myself in frustration. I was actually debating killing him. I swore I'd never do it again, but if it would shut this guy up...

"Incoming grimm," Jake warned in a low voice. I looked over to see a single beowulf lurking in the bushes nearby.

"Can one of you take care of it? Axelle and I just need to fill these last few jars and we can go," I said, turning back to the tree. The two boys looked to each other. Loki made an 'after you' motion with his hands. Jake sighed and pulled out his broadsword.

"I'll handle it," Jake said casually. He approached the beowulf from behind and sliced it in half with a single swing of his sword. A surprised yelp escaped through the beowolf's jaws before it died. Unfortunately, that was enough to signal other grimm. A flock of tiny bird sized Nevermore were startled and flew from some nearby trees. I didn't even realize until Jake shouted, "Look out!" He transformed his sword into a sniper and took a few of them out before they reached us. One of them fell from the sky and shattered the jar that I was holding, sending jelly flying everywhere.

I sighed in annoyance and turned to face the oncoming monsters saying, "Axelle, finish your jar, more will be coming after all that noise."

"Right," the girl nodded, capping the last jar.

"Let's move," I said told the team.

"Ooh, I like it when you're bossy," Loki taunted. I paused in my tracks and bit my tongue, focusing on not shouting at him. He came up behind me, put a hand on my shoulder, and licked the sap off my face. Before that boy could blink I had him pinned against a tree with the tip of my blade pointed at his neck.

"If you EVER do anything like that again I'll carve your tongue out," I spat, holding him by the collar.

"That sounds like a challenge," he winked at me. I let my blade graze his neck lightly, seriously thinking about ending him as he hissed in pain. Jake and Axelle wached silently from a distance. They'd probably let me do it to.

'Do it' a voice in my head whispered. 'Run him through'. I thought about tbe consequences. Not only will I have broken my word to myself, I'd be letting the people that I car about down. Not to mention I'd get locked up for it. I released his colar and sheethed my blade back into my umbrella. I turned away from him and towards the other two.

"There, we made it theough our first fight. We're making progress," I could hear the grin in his voice.

"I have a boyfriend," I snapped not even turning to look at him as Jake and Axelle began folowing me back to the ship.

"Sure you do," Loki chuckled.

[A/N: thanks to everyone for reading! Im going to begin trying to get things back on track with the original series after this chapter. Loki is my own character, but credit to Jake goes to Qrow_Cresendel and credit for Axelle goes to FireFang13 Let me know if I didn't do something about their character's right. I'm sorry that they didn't have large parts but we'll be seeing them again!]