Ozpin stood in front of them, the sheer drop of the beacon cliffs behind him. Ruby thought he cut a rather distinguished figure with the steaming mug of coffee in his hand, lit by the barely-rising sun from the east.

The incoming class stood arrayed before him, each of them on a strange metal platform, waiting for him to explain what they were doing here.

"The four kingdoms and seven principalities," he began without preamble, "cover barely a tenth of a percent of our world's land mass. They are tiny dots of light and order on a canvas of darkness. Even today, the lands outside these pockets of civilization are largely mysterious to us.

"But we call our world 'Remnant' for a reason. Scattered throughout these unexplored lands are the remains of our long-forgotten past. The first duty of any hunter or huntress is to protect the people. But in times of peace, when the Grimm are not an imminent threat, we spend much of our time mapping these lands, exploring the many ruins that sprawl across our world, and retrieving relics left by those who came before us.

"These gifts of knowledge and artifice from our ancestors are why Vale enjoys the quality of life we do today. From the secrets of working dust, to the wrecks that formed the prototype for modern airships, every part of our world has been shaped by the discoveries of those who had the courage to venture into the unknown.

"Your initiation today will give you your first taste of what this life is like, as well as accomplishing certain administrative necessities. Each of you is currently standing on a powerful catapult. You will be flung, one by one, to a random location in the Emerald Forest behind me. There, you will make your way north, fighting through the legions of Grimm which inhabit the forest, and attempt to locate an abandoned temple which was discovered here long ago. The temple is no more than a day's travel on foot, but getting there will be a challenge for most of you.

"You are encouraged and expected to meet up with your fellow students on your way to the temple. The forgotten lands are rarely braved alone, after all. The first person you make eye contact with inside the forest will be your parter for the next four years, should both of you continue on to enroll at Beacon. Please do not attempt to cleverly circumvent this rule. In fact, you should consider preventing Ms. Goodwitch from becoming annoyed with you one of the parameters for this mission. You will be graded on your performance as a pair."

There were murmurings from the crowd after that. Ruby felt a little confused herself.

Ozpin continued on, undeterred.

"Once you have found your partner and located the ruin, you will delve into it and retrieve one of the relics we have placed in the inner sanctum. Exactly one relic per pair, to be precise. If you return to these cliffs with your relic within three days, your initiation will be complete.

"This is a difficult task, and some of you will fail to complete it. I realize that you did not come here today expecting an exam. This is by design: the most important tests you encounter in your career as a hunter or huntress will be those which nobody told you to prepare for. Those who fail this initiation are, of course, welcome to reapply next year."

The murmuring grew louder at this. The boy to Ruby's right swore under his breath. Ozpin stood in front of them calmly, sipping his coffee until they quieted down.

"Of course," he continued, "if the thought of being thrown off a cliff into a forest of deadly Grimm isn't to your liking, I would again strongly encourage you to consider delaying your matriculation. Several of your peers have already withdrawn after a discussion with me last night, and many more will withdraw before the end of the day. There is no shame in it. Many of the greatest hunters and huntresses this institution has had the honor of producing delayed their enrollment until they felt they were ready, and many of those who declined enrollment entirely went on to lead successful and fulfilling civilian lives.

"Now, we will go down the line, starting with the student furthest to my right. Each of you should ask any questions you might have, although I will ask that you please keep it brief, and then clearly indicate whether you would prefer to delay your application to Beacon, or be catapulted into the forest behind me."

Ozpin raised his cane and pointed at the boy furthest down the line.

"Do you have any questions?"

"Yes, sir." he said, his voice soft but nonetheless carrying clearly. "What are our chances of dying on this mission?"

"An excellent question. Nobody has ever died during initiation before. With that said, you are, I remind you again, being catapulted off a cliff into a forest of Grimm. We cannot guarantee your safety. Anything else?"

The boy shook his head. "No. I am ready to begin."

There was a short pause, and then the metal plate below him snapped up faster than Ruby's eye could follow. The boy's aura flared pink as it compensated for the enormous force on his body, and then he was flying through the air.

Ozpin went down the line, answering the occasional question before sending the student flying, until he got to Jaune.

Jaune didn't look very good. He was only about a dozen spots down the line from her, next to some green-haired girl, and she could see that his face was deathly pale. He seemed to be sweating, too.

He was wearing a light backpack, presumably full of supplies. Ruby admired the preparation. She'd considered doing the same, since she knew they were headed into the forest, but had decided that it would slow her down too much in combat, and had settled for packing a few extra things into her cargo pockets.

"Mr. Arc?" professor Ozpin said. "Any questions?"

Jaune swallowed, hard. "Could...could I have a moment to think, sir?"

"Of course." Ozpin took another calm sip of his coffee.

Jaune was looking at something off to his right. Ruby tried to follow his gaze, but as far as she could tell he was looking into empty air off the side of the cliff.

What was wrong? He seemed terrified of something. Ruby knew he'd had an unusual education, but surely he'd fought Grimm before. He'd never have been accepted into Beacon otherwise.

There were a couple of coughs down the line from him, but Jaune didn't even seem to notice. Finally, he closed his eyes, scrunching them tight, and when he opened them he looked determined, if still scared.

"No questions, sir. I'm ready."

Professor Ozpin stared at him. "You are absolutely sure, Mr. Arc? I remind you again that there is no shame in walking away from this."

"I'm sure, sir."

Ozpin gave the smallest of nods. He looked mildly confused for some reason. Maybe he also didn't understand why Jaune was so scared.

There were a few seconds of silence, and then everything went wrong.

The metal plate under Jaune's feet snapped up, but there was no flare of aura compensating for the force. Instead, there was a sickening crunch, and then he was flying through the air with both legs broken, screaming.

Ruby's mind screeched to a halt as the students around her exploded into a panicked cacophony. She couldn't, what, what had happened-

There another metallic sound to her right, and suddenly Pyrrha Nikos was flying through the air too, her catapult somehow having fired out of order.

Someone jumped backward off their plate in a panic, and soon everyone was scrambling away from the devices.

Ruby looked back at Jaune's catapult, her mind still trying to catch up with the situation even as adrenaline pumped into her system. It was smeared with blood.

That was enough. Her semblance slammed into her mind like a battering ram. There was no mix of feelings, motivations, subjective experiences. There was just a dark well of dread that Jaune might be dying while she stood there. It washed through her like a torrent, suffusing her, resisted only by a raw scream of defiance in her head, and a sensation of something hard and bright that refused to yield.

Her mouth hardened. The panic dropped away. She needed to act.

Pyrrha was in the air. By some quirk of fate, her catapult had fired her the same direction Jaune was going. No, that was ridiculous, she must have aimed it somehow.

There was no way she'd catch him. You couldn't hit a moving target Jaune's size from this distance. Even Atlassian missiles had targeting systems that let them make small adjustments as they closed with their targets.

But she was trying. Ruby would try too.

She felt a surge of shame at the fact that Pyrrha had beaten her to it. Ruby was the one with the speed semblance. It was just that she'd panicked, and-

No, that wasn't a productive line of thought. She could beat herself up over it later.

Ruby reached back for Crescent Rose. She skipped the usual dramatic twirl, just detached him from her back and extended him at the ground. She didn't even notice the moment her aura made connection.

She felt him extending, slowly, ever so slowly, internal friction and air resistance fighting her semblance every step of the way. She didn't have time for that. She pushed, and her semblance complied, dutifully drawing on her aura as it politely told the laws of physics to shut up and get out of her way.

Blood-red rose petals poured from the joints of her weapon as the friction vanished, the objective physical principles transmuted into something subjective, something more her. The gravity rounds were still already chambered. She fired at the ground, again and again, until she was flying toward Jaune, streaming rose petals as the air slid around her with no resistance.

~o~O~o~O~o~

Ruby didn't have fine enough control. If Jaune's aura was malfunctioning somehow, which seemed to be the case, she'd have to match his speed almost exactly, then lower them both to the ground gently enough to keep him alive.

She had twenty gravity rounds to play with, and she'd already spent several getting up to speed. The rounds made large changes to her velocity. Regular gravity was pulling on both of them. It was kind of a hard problem, and there wouldn't be much room for error.

She was kicking herself for launching into the air at Jaune without thinking. Now she was committed to trying to grab him. She had a lot of time in the air to think, and she realized that what she should have done was grab Ms. Goodwitch and bring her close enough to Jaune to levitate him down. Ruby wasn't 100% sure what the professor's semblance could do, but it seemed like a better bet than her current plan.

Ruby had to stop herself, again, from wasting mental energy on berating herself. There was no point. She went back to trying to figure out a clever combination of vectors that would get her and Jaune to the ground safely.

As she did, though, she noticed something strange. Pyrrha Nikos, who really had been on a remarkably accurate intercept course, but who now looked like she was going to overshoot, was slowing down slightly faster than she should. It was subtle - Ruby never would have noticed it if she'd been back at the launch site, or if time had been moving at a normal speed - but her course was definitely shifting, very slightly.

At this rate, it was very plausible Pyrrha would actually manage to intercept Jaune. Ruby felt a small stirring of hope.

Nobody knew what Pyrrha Nikos's semblance was. There were a lot of theories. One of the most popular among her fans was that she was literally fated to win; that the universe would fudge things for her, just a little, so that she was successful. It had started when someone had tallied up all the times her opponents had just barely missed her with a finishing blow, and once the idea was out there, people started seeing evidence of it everywhere in her footage. People thought it was the universe fudging things for her because these tiny nudges seemed to happen regardless of whether or not she could actually see her opponent at the time.

Ruby didn't know what the truth was, but she was prepared to trust that Pyrrha knew what she was doing.

Over the next few seconds, Pyrrha's course corrected further and further, until it looked almost certain that she'd manage to catch him. Ruby hesitated briefly, then made the call. She'd be more likely to mess things up than help if she kept trying to put herself on an intercept course for the two of them.

She felt just the tiniest bit of frustration, that it was Pyrrha and not her that would save Jaune - that it was out of her hands - but she squashed the feeling ruthlessly.

As Ruby slowly let go of responsibility for the landing, she felt her semblance start to slip. First the stream of petals slowed to a trickle, and then stopped, the air whipping against her face again. Next the world started to speed up, barely noticeable, but faster every second, until in a rush she was dumped back into the world, hurtling toward the trees.

As if on cue, a twenty-foot nevermore rose high out of the forest in front of them, tearing through the air like jagged black rent in the sky. Ruby flinched, shocked for a moment by the sudden awfulness. Of course. Jaune was probably in a tremendous amount of pain. Grimm would come flocking.

It was almost painful to look at, but she kept her eyes on it. This was something she could do, at least. She fired two more of her precious gravity rounds, putting herself ahead of the pair. It would be a few more seconds until her semblance could activate again; she'd have to fight it in real time.

As she got closer to it, the nevermore's attention shifted to her. Fortunately she had more than enough negative emotions jumbling around in her head to keep its attention.

The oversized bird screamed, swaying the trees below with enormous pumps of its powerful wings, and then suddenly it was diving at her.

~o~O~o~O~o~

Interlude: Ozpin

"Everyone line back up, please." Glynda said, smacking her riding crop against her left hand loud enough to make several students jump. "Ms. Nikos' launcher did not malfunction, but if you wish, you may stand behind yours until your turn."

Ozpin tuned out the proceedings, giving his full attention to the tablet scroll in front of him where Ruby Rose and Ms. Nikos were both engaged with the Grimm.

He certainly hadn't been expecting this to happen. It fit, after a fashion, but...no, it would be too easy to deceive himself. He was still missing something.

His mind flashed back to the Arc boy, in the moments before launch, eyes fixed intently on empty space. What had he been thinking about? What could possibly have convinced him to go through with it?

Three possibilities came immediately to mind.

One, the boy was insane. Honestly, this was the most likely explanation. Something like one in a thousand people were seriously mentally ill, a much higher base rate than the other possibilities.

Two, the boy knew he would be saved. Even Ozpin hadn't seen how it could happen, so if Jaune Arc was able to, it implied one of a very select group of players were involved.

Three...well, the boy's aura wasn't activated, but there were powers in this world beyond semblances. He would have to consult the relic, once the initiation was complete.

Ozpin was pulled out of his thoughts by the sound of raised voices. Taiyang's other daughter was suspended in the air by purple shackles, eyes burning, shouting at Glynda. Glynda's responses were stern but calm, which only seemed to enrage the young girl further.

Ozpin sighed. He really needed to acquire an assistant with better people skills, to complement Glynda's otherwise exceptional abilities.

He glanced over the tablet scroll one more time. Everything seemed to be wrapping up nicely.

"Alright," he said. Everyone else on the cliff stopped talking, waiting for him to go on. It was still a strange experience, being in charge, even after all these years.

"Ms. Xiao Long, your sister is well. She managed to attract the attention of a large number of Grimm, but has been handling them admirably, and seems to be in no immediate danger."

He smiled at her kindly. That seemed to mollify the girl a little, although her eyes were still a deep, deep red.

Glynda didn't release her shackles, and Ozpin didn't ask her to.

"Ms. Nikos managed, somehow, to intercept Mr. Arc, land safely in the forest, and evade or destroy those Grimm which did not break off to pursue Ms. Rose. Mr. Arc is seriously injured, but stable, and Ms. Nikos is administering care to him as we speak."

That got a brief cheer from the crowd.

"Seeing these events, it seems natural to assume that Mr. Arc somehow exhausted his aura before arriving here today, although it is not clear how or why that would be the case. We will be conducting a full investigation of this incident later, but for now, I would ask that you respect his privacy and not inquire any further."

Ozpin looked around. It appeared that the students had, eventually, yielded to Glynda and mostly lined up again, although none of them were actually standing on their platforms.

He pointed his cane at the boy who had been standing next to Jaune Arc. "Mr. Windslow, I believe you were up next. I'm afraid that we are rather behind schedule, so please, no questions unless they are urgent. Do you wish to proceed?"

The boy had a somewhat haggard look on his face. He looked to his left, at the smear of blood on Jaune's launcher. Then he looked to his right, at Pyrrha Nikos' prematurely sprung one, and at Ruby Rose's, which was riddled with bullet holes.

Finally, he looked straight ahead, at the spot where the three of them had landed, and where even now half a dozen largeish nevermore were circling hungrily overhead.

"Oh hell no."