[center][color=007FFF][h3]Abel Fulgurate[/h3][/color][/center]

It took a lot to get Abel thoroughly hyped, but of all his moments in Beacon so far, this probably took the title.  Sure, the initiation ceremony had been great, but pride didn't quite equate to nerve-firing enthusiasm.  

Over the previous days, a routine quickly established itself, but familiarity didn't necessarily breed ease.  If anything, the teachers started pushing harder after the first day.  Having picked up from their various initial tests the strengths and weaknesses of the students, they professors dug in without hesitation.  Goodwitch, for instance, remedied the tenacity with which Abel, -not content with further loss after the first day- fought one-on-one by having him face multiple, smaller opponents at once.  Without a tool designed for defending against multiple intelligent opponents at simultaneously, Abel found himself a large, clumsy target, pestering with weak but hard-to-punish strikes whenever he attempted to focus on one person.  Finally, on Thursday, the punching bag had turned the tables.  By altering his traditional two-handed spear stance into a one-handed lance stance, using the armor on his left arm to block and retaliate.  He hadn't decimated the opposition, to be sure, but he'd improved.  His comfort zone had always been at range, but if pushing himself to greater heights meant leaving it behind, it was a sacrifice he was willing to make.

Abel found himself suddenly accosted by Shiro, perched upon the tall boy's broad shoulders like a jockey.  “Yeah, I'm excited,” he admitted, possessed of a slight smile equal parts embarrassment and affection for his jovial faunus friend.  “We're gonna rock that shelter, no doubt about it.”  Impulsively as he had come, Shiro was off on a vigorous quest to find his equipment.  Abel had the luxury of being able to avoid such a trip, though perhaps for the wrong reasons.  He was so used to wearing his armor that, whenever formality didn't require him to be in his enormous student uniform, he wore the metal atop his normal clothes in class.  Like much else, it was habit, and not going away anytime soon.  He returned Oswald's nod when he saw it, believing the motion to be as a gesture of greeting.  "Catnip's probably not good for him.  Clean-up's rough.  Thanks for the well-wishes; I hope your luck is just as good."  The Ampere was propped against the wall of the auditorium nearby, and Abel summoned it to his hand with a flick of his semblance.  He hadn't seen Sapphire yet, but he didn't need her to take initiative.  “See ya at the airships, Gren.”

A few minutes later, Abel stood only a few hundred feet away from one of the mammoth vehicles designated to the school for ferrying students.  He looked over the edge of the cliff, at the forest that gave way to the buildings and streets of town below.  It was a beautiful vista, and it instilled him with the same on-top-of-the-world feeling that permeated him when he stood upon the walls back home.