[IC] RWBY: Deep Blue

[pyre101]

Kael began to blush as he ran out of the classroom. How in the world could he make such a gigantic fool of himself? Now, everybody would make fun of him. He ran out of the building at a full-tilt run, his zhen halves bouncing on his belt. His feet soon carried him towards a bit of the outskirts where he saw another building, this one a bit run-down. He had to find a shower though, even a bath, so Kael went in, hoping now to find another class in there. He pushed open the wooded door, it full of cracks and small holes. The inside was a bit nicer, with some candles unlit, waiting. The floors were made of some kind of stone, probably a dark marble. He found some chairs on their side, some of them in pieces. Kael began to get a dark feeling here, as if he should probably get out of here. Taking this into account, he began to walk out, probably to go find a pond or a lake, somewhere he does not get a strange feeling. Leaving through the door, he went up the hill, not looking back. After some walking and avoiding some of the individuals on campus, Kael found a small pool of water, hidden in a small valley. Interesting that there was one so close. He began to run, not even taking the chance to take off his clothes.

[Henzukaya]

Prof. Rirahk glanced around, proud of the class he was in charge of. It seemed everyone had lightened up and was happy or enjoying themselves. With a few exceptions. Although those exceptions might come to change, with time. For now, his job was- SLAM. The sound of hands brought down on the table, nearly smashing it, startled everyone. To their surprise, it was the calm and meek Saurodrinn, not usually one for breaking rules. "I've had enough of this. Are you saying this class is for fooling around? We are to be the future Hunters and Huntresses to protect the world, and you have us doing arts and crafts?!?" He clenched his fists in anger, before heading out the door. "I'm going to do something more worthwhile with my time." And with that, the student was gone. The Professor now had time to recover from his surprise. Certainly, some students wouldn't like his idea of class, but to go this far? The hesitation was apparent on his expression, as he watched the students again. They were whispering among themselves, some nodding in agreement to what the student had said. "If you agree, then you may go with him." Prof. Rirahk said to them, recovering his calm composure, a faint smile on his face. "While its true this class doesn't teach much in the ways of combat, I feel it is still important in the lives of all to have some relief of dread from battle. This class isn't to prepare you for combat, its to relieve you of stress from combat. If you think you are better off without this, then you may follow after him."

[harinezumikouken]

An ear perked up whenever a student slammed his hands onto a table, nearly shattering it. Pausing his work, Kuhaku looked up to see who it was. He struggled not to make a face when he saw it was the human. "I've had enough of this. Are you saying this class is for fooling around? We are to be the future Hunters and Huntresses to protect the world, and you having us doing arts and crafts?!?" "Good point." He agreed in silence, nodding slightly. The human then stood up and left towards the door. "I'm going to do something more worthwhile with my time." Kuhaku lazily turned to see how the professor would react. The other students were contemplating the same thing, it seemed. "If you agree, then you may go with him." he answered. "Sweet." "While its true this class doesn't teach much in the ways of combat, I feel it is still important in the lives of all to have some relief of dread from battle. This class isn't to prepare you for combat, its to relieve you of stress from combat. If you think you are better off without this, then you may follow after him." Kuhaku agreed with the professor to some extent about the necessity of decompressing after the experiencing the rigors of war, but to dedicate an entire classroom period for it? No, thanks. He could finish his weapon alterations some other time and find better use of his energy elsewhere. Gathering up his things, it didn't take him long to decide on his next course of action. Slinging his stolen bag over his shoulder, he stood and turned. Leaving without a word. He could probably use this time to go to the gym in the morning. Shower. Sleep more, Eat breakfast. Hell, anything else. If he could help it, he probably would not be attending 'Arts & Crafts' anymore unless required of him to. Opening the door to the classroom, he quietly walked out and quietly closed the door behind him. He intended on dropping off his things and changing over to go to the gym. That sounded nice.

[Pyromania99]

Art class was such an annoying thing. She hadn't had a class like this since Primary School. . . Back when she could really find herself having fun. Being creative didn't mean a thing when there was a dangerous world outside. Francesca couldn't help but feel fidgety in the class. She preferred working her hands around the hilt of a sword or the grip of a gun, not soft and moldable clay. In fact, the clay felt disgusting. It was bad enough she had to wear a uniform around. Again. What was she going to make, even if she wanted to dirty her hands with this soft clay, she wouldn't have the first idea of what to mold it into. She was gifted with steel-forging talents, not soft squishy disgusting thing talents. Plus, she had a hard time envisioning things. She was glad to be able to leave, though not in the rushed way her apparent partner had done. She was no fan of skipping classes, but this. . . Art class? It seemed to do nothing more than stress her out about what to do. The best solution would be to removed herself from the environment. Perhaps there would be a weaponsmithing art class? Still, she had little else to do now. Perhaps an early lunch or so? She barely had a breakfast, so perhaps it was a good idea. The only surefire thing right now for Francesca was her music playing in her ears.

[Henzukaya]

The rest of the class continued like that, some students skeptical about leaving or taking part in the art, while others didn't seem to mind it, with few who actually left the class. The Professor was slightly discouraged, but didn't mind it overall. Some of the art pieces they were creating were quite interesting, too. He was even tempted to make something himself, but decided against it, as it may end up as him showing off. The bell rang again, notifying the end of first class. The second classroom, Professor Port's, didn't seem much different than the last, same general size and layout, only detailed drawings with information on Grimm, and plenty of stuffed Grimm trophies. A few dark cages were off in the corner, too. An old man, one who had seen many years of combat, was there awaiting them. "Welcome, future Hunters and Huntresses, to Grimm Studies! Luckily for you, this happens to be the most exciting and interesting class of them all as we delve into the secrets of the unknown, the Grimm! Why, I myself have had several discoveries with them, such as the time I..." The Professor droned on about some story for a while. "And after I had disabled its stinger- Oh, forgive me. The assignment for today is simple. We will be departing to just past the city limits to observe Grimm action and behavior. After all, experience is the best teacher. Take a look at myself, whom blah blah blah blah..." -------------------------- After arriving via the airship, they found themselves in an environment that seemed peaceful, some trees, plenty of hills and highlands, a few caves, even some rundown structures. For extra protection, they were grouped into parties of 8, in case they run into anything they can't handle. "Now, this session isn't about combat, its about investigation. But safety should always be priority. If you feel overwhelmed by the number or forces you may come upon, flee as best you can, or fire off an emergency flare. Good luck, and happy hunting! Aahhh, hunting. Reminds me of the time..." There didn't seem to be any Grimm in the surrounding area. A trail seemed to pass by some of the abandoned houses, various markings of combat, not all human, littered about. The caves also seemed suspicious, and the quiet of the nearby woods also showed promise. But, they would have to decide as a group of 8, not just 4 this time.

[Forsythe]

With art finally over, Schwarz was ready for something serious. Grimm studies, surely that would be more useful than this one. After all, that was why this school existed. Yeah. The girl was starting to wonder if the headmaster drank perhaps too much or not enough coffee when he was hiring these people, or whether not being right in the head was a prerequisite for being a hunter period - she’d have that requirement covered at least, if she was to be honest with herself. This particular professor seemed to be in dire need of audience it appeared, and unfortunately for him Schwarz only returned from being half asleep during the phases that described combat or the anatomy of some of the creatures, blown out of proportions no doubt but still useful. She perked up when the professor actually ushered them outside - this might be fun yet. Best of all she might even get to test what she had in mind. The fact that they were only supposed to observe did knock her mood down a peg, however that was nothing that couldn’t be rectified by subtly luring the grimm closer. Gads knew she had the overwhelming hatred for it alone. When two teams got paired up, she looked at the company. A few seconds too long went by before she gave up on the decisionmaking capabilities of either of the team leaders. “I’ll scout ahead and report when I find something worth seeing.” she said, waving her scroll in front of her, “I could appreciate someone who can keep up for backup.” she thrown for them to consider as she turned to her dark self and melted in the shadows, going off to see if a bigger grimm was nearby for her to report and then hopefully murder.

[pyre101]

He leaped out of the pool of water, glad he was finally rid of all the mud. Kael sighed as his thoughts turned back to the classroom he had unexpectedly went in. Why? Why did such bad things have to happen to him? He laid there for a while, letting the sun dry his clothes. Kael looked at the sky during this small period of time, watching the clouds slowly move on, ever flowing on. He was stuck on this idea for a while, before he heard a bell. Perking up, he did a mental check for his things and ran towards the campus, glad he would finally be able to join his classmates. He saw their small tablets and some of them were laughing at them. He was confused for a bit, wondering what he had just seen. However, he soon saw Schwarz with all the rest of the crowd moving about until they entered another classroom. He hurriedly went in, hoping to not cause another scene, and took a seat where the teacher, some old man, introduced his class as the study of Grimm. Kael felt his brain start to tingle, for he might be able to answer questions and ask several, hopefully redeem himself in the eyes of his class. But, it seemed the teacher liked to hear himself talk. Kael slowly began to put his head down to the desk before closing his eyes, hoping somebody would take mercy on him and cut his throat, put a round in his head, something! Finally, the teacher mentioned them going outside. Kael practically jumped for joy at this announcement. They all entered the airship and took off. After landing and been given instruction by the teacher, he saw that Francesca was there in the midst, as as Schwarz. Schwarz seemed to take off into the forest. He reached out, before she turned dark. Kael slowly went down onto the ground and put his ear to the ground, listening for the vibrations that would be made by either a great mass or a quantity of masses. (Just assuming that all of us went to second class. Will edit if need be)

[Henzukaya]

Much to Schwarz's dismay, there didn't seem to be any Grimm lurking in the sea of trees. At least, from what she could tell. Although there was little wildlife in the surrounding area, the rustling of leaves strangely louder due to absence of other sounds. Finally, something. A snapping of a twig, more than enough to give a tell of something moving. It was followed by more rustling and breaking of branches. Whispers and discussion could be heard. Students. Kael was having worse luck, his attempt to detect anything else only proved fruitless, as the only sounds he could hear were verified by his sight; other students moving about. Schwarz then detected something else, further off. It was silent, it was slowly moving, a beast in the shadows. A Grimm, a rather weathered Beowolf, most likely older. It was alone, which was an odd sight, considering they usually travel in packs. Still though, a single Grimm was better than none. The Grimm sniffed the air, then growled softly in Schwarz's direction. Then turned to the direction she heard the other students. Weighing its options, it returned into the forest, away from the cluster of humans.

[Forsythe]

It took some searching. Fighting the Grimm was one thing, but tracking them was turning out to be harder than Schwarz thought. She could do without the distraction provided by her fellow students, however she thought she heard another source of sound. Following up on it, her shadow crept through the undergrowth. She found a few snapped branches close to the ground. Bingo. If only she knew what she was tracking. From what she could tell, there was only one, perhaps a boarbatusk? Deactivating the semblance, she fished the scroll out of her pocket and flipped through the contacts. She could have thought of taking her team's numbers at least before going off. Oh well, at least she had enough sense to look up the numbers of the teachers beforehand. To: Prof. Port Subject: Contact Message: Contact cca 175 meters northwest. Single, big one, I'm continuing to track. Please relay to team. She put th device back to her pocket, continuing on foot in case somebody messaged her back, her senses primed at any sound.

[Henzukaya]

Professor Port was rambling on to his audience of a small number of students, when he got the message. He stopped as he looked down at the Scroll, bringing relief to his victims. They seemed to be doing rather well, if they had already found Grimm activity so soon after starting. Although he was curious why Miss Schwarz didn't just tell the rest of the team. Without delay, he forwarded her message to the rest of her team's Scrolls, then carried on his story telling. The group of 7, still silently deciding what to do, got Schwarz's message. Nodding, they journeyed Northwest to reunite and continue their objective. The Beowolf was moving away rather quickly, but Schwarz was able to keep up with it. Silently, too. Only a few times had it stopped to sniff the area, suspecting something, maybe in the back of its mind, but never resolving anything conclusive. It trekked on through the trees, to return to its pack. It emerged from the edge, now running briskly Eastward. After following it outside of the trees, she noticed off in the distance several ruined structures and foundations. The rest of the team had arrived, quickly noticing the Beowolf running into the town as they got closer.

[pyre101]

Kael ran after them the group after they took a look at their tablet things, and read some kind of message. Who could it have been? Schwarz had ran off so it could be her. Could it be a teacher? He shrugged at these type of questions went on and trudged on the trail, seeing a town in front of them. Kael did take notice that there were only 7 of his classmates here with him. Taking a small breather, Kael dropped to the ground, putting his ear to the ground again, hoping to hear something from the town or the ground would be a nice, dirty cushion.

[Henzukaya]

There weren't any other students within the vicinity, which means Kael could finally detect something without hindrance. After lowering his head, there was definitely movement he could sense, the repetitive and near silent steps proved it was a gathering as opposed to something large and alone. Although as they gazed upon the desolate town, nothing could be seen.

[pyre101]

Kael stood up from his position, wiping off the dirt stains from his pants and he turned towards the group that they now had. It was smaller than he would have liked, but hopefully capable enough to handle a horde of smaller Grimm. He did not want to go through the problem that they had faced last time during their team-building exercise. That had turned disastrous. They would have to see. "Guys, there is something gathering in that town. It sounded like lots of things are stepping on the ground. I think now would be the best time to prepare for a ambush and to come up with a plan." Kael began to search for multiple entrances into the town, like an alley or a gate. If there were multiple streets, it would not be best to split the group. If there was a gate, it would be best to find out if there is more than one. If there is more than one, it would be best to figure out if they can either get on top or through them. He began to think of many different situations as he stood there in the middle of the group, paying attention only to the city and the ground, where his right shoe was beginning to move in a fashion that could be best described as making several lines in the dirt with maybe a oval in the middle of those lines. He began to mutter to himself as he began to think of a strategy.

[Kiddo]

"Well aren't you fast?" Ravira finally caught up to Schwarz, a bit later than everyone else, but not tired in the least. Good thing the two of them were teammates, right; wouldn't want to be around your support when you're off chasing Grimm into the unknown. Oh well, it was partly Ravira's fault for not really trying that hard to keep up; yeah, that was it, Schwarz certainly hadn't meant to leave her behind! She just didn't keep in mind that it was a bit harder to keep leaves and bushes and spider webs out of your path when you only had one arm with which to push them aside. "So what are we gonna do? We're only supposed to be 'investigating,' right?" Ravira peeked over the others to examine the ruins.

[Henzukaya]

They were at the edge of the settlement, a 7' tall wall blocking them off, as most likely was meant to stop Grimm, although judging by the large opening that was smashed through, it didn't do its job well enough. There was a large gate in front of them, and through it they could see most of the street. It was a rather wide street, which turned several dozen feet ahead. Three narrow alleyways were scattered, two in the West, one in the East, with the lack of openings between the buildings, but they were rather dimly lit, despite it almost being noon. The buildings themselves were shambles, like shells of their former foundations, albeit breached. There was clear damage to the doors, windows and other openings, some Grimm-made, such as the gaping holes in the walls that revealed the destroyed furniture inside. Two particular houses, nearly adjacent to another, appeared to be boarded up, wood covering the windows and markings of nails and planks across the empty doorways. A large building loomed over the street, as if gazing upon the desolate wasteland as it towered above the other structures as it sat at the end of the street before it turned. It seemed far more solid, with almost no holes in the walls, save one at the lowest floor. There was no life they could see in this town, with knocked over and destroyed barrels, ruins of a carriage, a pile of boxes with a tarp covering them, and a torn stuffed teddy bear on the ground, next to multiple old bullet shells. Dark brown stains scattered, in various places, most apparent inside the buildings they could see into. The city looked bleak and dead, but something sent slight shivers down the students's spines. Michelle, Perry and Fransesca said they would cover the entrance, to ensure the other 5 had a safe route out of the city if things got hairy.

[LaXnyd]

Gerald remained silent as he approached the group, walking right past Michelle, Perry and Francesca as he joined the group heading into the city. What had he been doing? Turns out that school life was a lot more regulated than he was used to, causing him to miss several important things due to the simple fact he had not considered the existence of something as standard as a timetable. Well, actually, he probably did. The only problem was that he was too used to the idea of making his own to consider the idea of someone else telling him where to be at what time outside of an actual job to be completely foreign. "Investigating, yeah." Gerald muttered in response to Ravira as he kept one hand on Anwarter at all times. He was too used to pre-planned heists, jobs and attacks where every little move was planned, every single reaction expected and every single contingency considered - and with the map definitely memorized. He had gotten a few glances of the place on the airship ride over, but he had not had the time to commit a detailed image to his memory. "I don't like this. Too many things for Grimm to jump out of."

[Forsythe]

"Sorry, it would have gotten away. Oh, and pass me your scroll number please?" Schwarz said, sending Ravira a message with hers. "Looks like they are hiding in there, whatever 'there' is. Sucks that we don'T really know how many there are." she complained, looking up on the taller buildings with an idea forming in her head. She agreed with Gerald about the investigation part being a big fat disappointment. Already she felt the need to rip something black into pieces. And she was supposed to watch? If she did that several years before she would have been dead too! "I'll try to get to a vantage point. If you could keep the Nevermores off of me, it'd be much appreciated." she said and released the harness on her wings, letting them unfold. Taking a running jump, she leaped high into the air with a help of a wing beat, just barely reaching a ledge on the first floor of the taller building. Pulling herself up, she looked around to check if the room was empty before getting on it. Now jumping form a crouch, she repeated the feat and got on the second floor, hoping that would allow her to see at least few blocks away. The view was quite decent. Schwarz couldn't quite see on the streets further away as the rooftops obstructed them, but in the immediate area she spotted no threat. There were four buildings way taller than the rest that caught her attention. One had a domed roof she didn't know what it served for - a greenhouse perhaps? If that was the case it might contain a nest. Then there was one that reminded her of a chapel or a church. Another was a circular tower with a flat top. Perhaps from there she could get a better view? And then there was the middle height building which loomed over the street. She could see a symbol on it's side, a mark of the local Police department. What sent weird shiver down her spine was the lack of... well, life. Nothing moved down there that she could see. Not humans, not grimm, not even wildlife. As if the nature died in this place. Perhaps the people of the town thought to use chemical weapons? It was the only thing that came to her mind. She was sure there was a logical explanation somewhere. Maybe in the PD building? The girl made her way back down and shared what she saw with the rest of the group.

[Kiddo]

Ravira fidgeted uneasily as Schwarz described what she had seen. From what she knew, it didn't make much sense; animals weren't scared of the Grimm. After all, Grimm fed on complex negative emotions, and humans and faunus were the only ones who could provide those, as far as she knew. No, typically, animals were scared of humans. If there hadn't been any here for a long while, it made sense that wildlife would have retaken the place. Why then was there nothing there? "What if it's a trap?" The logical explanation was that there weren't animals there because there still were humans there. "Maybe we should rejoin the other groups. We weren't briefed on this place, and the last time I saw a camera drone was about fifteen minutes ago. No one will know if we just disappear." She grasped her staff more firmly and shifted her new armor nervously. "I think we should go back."

[pyre101]

Kael looked towards those individuals who were not going to be guarding the entrance and nodded his head at them, calculating their strengths that he knew about and the chances of annihilation. He scratched his head as he thought what could be out there. There were a infinite amount of Grimm that could be there, hiding themselves inside the ruins, but they needed to take a chance. Turning to the small group now, Kael saw that Schwarz was coming back from her scouting mission when the one-armed girl, Ravira, he remembered from the initiations, suggested that they retreat. Kael's face turned into a snarl at the thought as he did not run away. But, the math did not lie about their chances of survival. The best thing to do would be to contact the school and have the area bombarded before moving in to examine the area. However, by the time the school arrived, the Grimm could've moved on. He rubbed his chin, weighing the risks. "I believe the best thing to do is to send a message to the school with our coordinates and a request for reinforcements. This is a hive, a place where the Grimm can grow immensely stronger before they invade the innocent cities around. We do need to at least check the nearby area to ensure that the perimeter is safe."