Chapter 1: Last stand.

Noble Six was going to die, she knew she was going to die, the Spartan stood next to the canon she'd been using to protect the Pillar of Autum.

She was going to die and their was nothing she could do about it.

She was going to die and she was sure as hell gonna repay the favour.

She walked over to Emile's corpse, her friend had died fighting and so was she. Reaching out she took the Energy Sword from his dying hand. Igniting the blade she walked over to the edge of the platform and leaped down, walking towards a group of Grunts.

The short aliens didn't stand a chance, the blade swung through them in a second, striking them down in an instant. Deactivating the blade she grabbed a Needler, sending the purple crystals into a nearby group of elites, but this had a cost, they knew she was there now.

Lashing out the leaped at her, their guns firing and swords swinging. Six did not give a dam, she fought on, trying her hardest to stay alive, refusing to die, well for a while anyway.

She couldn't keep up, part of her knew she couldn't, she was a Spartan, but she wasn't immortal, her end did come.

It started once her shields fell, the plasma bursts where starting to hurt now, each one burning through the metal of her armour, bringing her to her knees as the pain became overwhelming. Pulling her damaged helmet of her head she stood up and clumsily grabbed the nearby abandoned assault rifle. Firing all around her, desperately trying to take out more elites, more covenant.

Until the sword hit her in the back, burning a hole straight through her, Six was forced to the ground, as the Elite turned her to strike the final blow Six made one last effort, punching the alien in the face, again and again. It may have brought her time if he was alone, but he wasn't, he had backup, and in the end, Noble Six, the last human on Reach, died, her armour batted and burned, her last breath on the surface of a dying planet.

Except it wasn't, something happened to that Spartan, something that doesn't always happen. She woke up, far away, far far far away from her home.

Why was not immediately obvious, but part of her knew the reason; Spartans never die, they're just missing in action.

…

Six was surprised to wake up smelling pollen, she was surprised to wake up at all if she was being honest, her decision to stay wasn't something she intended to wake up from.

Opening her eyes she looked around, her environment was weird, defiantly not Reach, it was a lush green forest. Confused she tried to stand up, and noticed several things that where drastically off.

She was far to short, The Spartan stood well over six foot before hand, but assuming the trees where the size of regular trees that would make her closer to five foot. Her armour was also gone, as was the under suit. Running her hand over her now exposed stomach she could see a burn wound... a burn wound in the exact same place the Elite had stabbed her in. A quick glance at her body revealed a lot of scars and bruises.

This was normal for any Spartan, it came with the territory, what was not normal was the fact the body seamed so much younger. Despite being in her early thirty's she appeared closer to sixteen.

Sitrep, I'm much younger, still sporting injury's but none of them fatal, in some weird forest. If this is the after life than the after life seams determined to confuse me.

Six now had to think of what to do next, staying where she was seamed like a bad idea, so setting of somewhere had to achieve something, she was about to head off, but she spotted something on the ground. A long black object with a heavy blade mounted at the top, A Gravity Hammer.

Smiling slightly the Spartan picked up the weapon. Feeling much safer now she had a heavy duty alien weapon in her hands the Spartan set off.

…

"Help, someone get me down form here!" Came a voice from somewhere near her, the Spartan decided to investigate. Pushing through a cluster of bushes she saw a teenage boy pinned up a tree via a red spear.

"Civilian, do you require assistance?" She asked, looking at the boy and taking in more details, He was blond, with blue eyes and wearing a black hoody and some crude looking white armor.

I doubt the Mjolnir crew need to worry about anything.

"Yes! Please help..." He started to say, before looking down at the Spartan.

"Okay, try to stay still" Stated the Spartan before taking a few steps back before charging up the tree, climbing up and balancing on a branch near the boy.

"I'm going to remove the spear, once that's gone brace for the landing, got it?" She asked, not worried about the fall, it wasn't far enough to get seriously hurt if you fell.

"Yeah... wait!" He cried as the Spartan freed the spear from the tree as the boy fell.

"Are you okay?" Asked the girl, looking down on the boy.

"Yeah... ow... that hurt." He muttered, before looking up in time to see the spartan jump down and land perfectly on the ground, before straightening up to look around.

"I'm Jaune." Said the boy, distracting the Spartan.

"Noble Six." Replied the Spartan, moving towards a bush wear she'd heard a disturbance, readying her hammer as she approached the bush, as something large and black charged out of it. Only just ducking in time the Spartan whirled around to look at the thing.

A black wolf like biped, and it was heading for the boy, who, credit where it was due, was reaching for his sword, although why he had a sword was a question for another day.

Unfortunately Jaune's performance wasn't that impressive, he slashed the thing clumsily across the chest, Six doubted he was even trained, he was at best self trained, and even then it didn't look like he'd done that much.

Her instincts took over, the Spartan charged in, her hammer powering up as she slammed it into the beasts jaw. The force of the hammer tore the beasts entire head of, sending it flying into space; she'd seen worse, but what really surprised her was the beast started to dissolve, breaking down into many black wisps that flew away in a wind that hadn't been their a few seconds ago.

"Are you okay?" She asked again, looking at the blond as he put his sword away.

"Yeah, that's the second time you've saved my skin." he said, not looking her straight in the eye, Six gathered her lack of armour, or any clothes really; was the reason.

"Its my job, now what's happening, why are you out here?"

"Wait you don't know, aren't you here for the exam?" He asked, clearly confused.

"What exam? More to the point why are you out here in the woods alone, don't you have any backup?" Asked the confused Spartan.

Why would you send someone out where the dangerous monsters are? This kid clearly isn't trained for combat, was it a mistake?

"The Beacon entrance exam, wait, aren't you here for that?"

"No, what is Beacon?" The Spartan questioned as she heard something else moving around, powering up her hammer again, hoping the monsters weren't going to be that common; she wasn't sure how many charges the hammer had, lacking her helmet she had no access to her HUD.

"Its a school, it trains huntsmen and huntresses, you know what a huntresses is right?" The concerned boy said, looking over the girl, as if he was only just working out that the butt naked girl with a powerful alien weapon wasn't sane.

"In theory yes." Said the Spartan simply; someone who hunted stuff, like those black monsters.

"And you can come out of the bushes now." Six added, looking at the patch of bushes. Being surprised as a girl in a white dress and heal pushed her way out.

The new girl stood their for a second, took in the sight, and then turned and walked away.

"Weiss?" asked Jaune, but the girl was already gone.

"Who was that?" Six asked, realizing she had a lot of questions, the sooner she got a grasp on this situation the happier she would be.

"Another examine, her names Weiss." said another voice. Six looked behind her, another girl had entered the clearing, though this one didn't seam to be running away.

"And you are?"

"Phyrra Nikos." explained the girl, a quick glance over told Six she was far more capable the Jaune. She wore a bronze set of armour, her long red hair tied into a ponytail; her athletic frame showing she was ready for a fight, that and she seamed to have recovered the spear, based on the armour colour it was hers. Though Six did feel the need to question why she was wearing heals.

"Jaune why is this girl naked?" She asked in a low level whisper.

"No idea!"

"You two friends?"

"Er..." Started Juane before the red head answered.

"Yes, apologies for asking this, but who are you? I don't remember you from yesterday."

"Noble Six, and I woke up here about an hour ago." Answered the Spartan, determined to get some answers before something else came up.

"What is going on, Jaune said there was some kind of exam, can you explain this to me?"

"It's the Beacon Combat Academy initiation examination, our goal is to find a ruin in this forest and retrieve an artefact before heading back to the cliff." Pyrrha explained.

"Okay then, lets finish your exam and I'll figure out what to do next when where out of the forest." The Spartan declared, looking around.

"Any idea which way the temple is?"

The two just stared back at her blankly.

"Erm, where happy about the assistance, but aren't you worried, you said you woke up here, what happened before that...?"

"I'm not sure, but it doesn't matter, its not a problem right now; the beast infested forest however is an immediate problem, so lets get you two out of here; then I can worry about whats going on." The Spartan explained, about to set of before Jaune stopped her, handing something to her.

The Spartan was confused by this, until she looked the thing over, it was the boys hoody, while she'd been talking with Pyrrha he'd apparently removed it, realizing what it was for she pulled it over her head, it wasn't perfect, but slightly baggy was far better than nothing.

"Thanks, lets move out." The Spartan said, before heading out. The other two followed, but only after Pyrrha asked:

"Jaune why is Pumkin Peat on your hoody?"

"It was a prize, besides its really comfy." The boy retorted, having no problem with the design, and judging by her lack of reaction, neither did Six.

…

"Think it's in here?" Asked Jaune, looking into the deep cave the trio had just found.

"I'm not sure..." Muttered Pyrrha, looking worriedly at the painting outside the cave.

"I agree; however we've been looking for an hour, this is the best place we've found so far, however it looks dangerous; we should handle this with caution." The Spartan muttered, doing some metal jiggery in her head.

"Okay, here's my suggestion, Pyrrha goes first; Jaune goes in the middle and I'll take the rear, that way we'll be going in in order of best defense and offense." The Spartan explained, though she neglected to mention she was prioritizing defense, Jaune had no offense skill, but hopefully that wouldn't matter.

The other two agreed; so they entered the cave, With Jaune holding an improvised flaming torch, so at least he knew what he was doing in some aspects at least.

Eventually they came across something glowing and yellow.

"Think this is it?" Asked Jaune. Six was surprised.

"You don't know what your looking for?"

"Ozpin wasn't very clear." Explained Pyrrha, straining her eyes to look at the glowing thing properly.

"This is it! I'm sure!" Jaune exclaimed; moving ahead and trying to grab the yellow thing.

"Jaune don't!" Cried Pyrrha, trying to stop him, but it was to late.

The thing had woken up.

If this is the artifact than this Ozpin guy is a sadist.

The glowing yellow thing was not the artifact, this was another monster, and this one was much larger, about on scale with a scarab tank, and by the look of it it was just as dangerous. Roughly the shape of a scorpion the Death Stalker was insanely powerful.

"We need to get out of here!" Yelled the Spartan, sprinting back through the cave, her training allowing her to block the pain coming from her feet as she was tearing her feet apart on the sharp rock floor of the cave she'd carefully navigated on the way in.

The other two where following her as fast as they could, Six was impressed Pyrrha could keep up with her while wearing heels.

"What are we going to do!" Screamed Jaune.

"We either need to get away or take it out." The Spartan responded, turning her head around to look at the creature, it was very heavily armored, the Gravity Hammer might be able to crack the bone plating, but their was no real way of telling, and even then what if this thing was tougher than that.

"Its a Death Stalker, I suggest we run, we may be able to out pace it!" Pyrrha responded, Six nodded and speed up, the ground was much softer; meaning she could move faster without causing more damage to her feet, even if her they where causing her to lose a lot of blood from the multiple cuts.

Eventually the trio broke out of the forest into a more open area. Six saw more people, a girl wearing black and a red cape; A blond bombshell, a girl with long black hair, an orange haired girl with some kind of grenade launcher on her back and man wearing green with a magenta streak in his hair.

Looking behind her Six saw the pair still following her, and luckily the Death Stalker couldn't be heard, so hopefully it wasn't still following them.

The blond looked angry as the girl in the cape pointed up at something, looking up Six saw the girl in white from earlier hanging onto the talon of a giant bird.

"Versatile bunch these creatures." Six muttered under her breath, before looking towards the new group, they where each holding chess pieces in their hands, so presumably they where the artefacts they'd been sent for; and she could see more of them on the pedestals behind them.

"Jaune, Pyrrha; the artefacts are over their, get one and lets get out of here." The Spartan said, gesturing toward the artefacts.

The two did that as the white haired girls grip finally failed her. Spotting this Six sprinted towards her, leaping into the air and catching her before she hit the ground.

"You okay?" The girl nodded, The Spartan let out a small smile before she got body slammed out of the way by the girl in the cape.

"Weiss! Why didn't you let go!" Cried Ruby, looking at her with a mixture of relief and frustration.

"It was insane! As was the entire plan!" The girl called Weiss responded angrily.

"Well it worked didn't it!" Cried the other girl indignantly.

"It was insane, if you had listened to me..." Realising this was not helping and unlikely to stop soon Six intervened.

"You two, this is not the place, your both okay and arguing is not a priority, that birds coming back, we should get out of here, grab an artefact and lets get to safety." This seamed to work, while Weiss still looked angry she did get up and the pair returned to the group, the Spartan following them.

"Everyone got an artefact?" inquired the Spartan. After a round of nods Six was about to lead them out, until the bird came back.

Specifically it swooped down and sent a storm of feathers at the group, most of them got away with getting hit, the two who didn't was Six and Cape girl; Cape girl getting pinned in place by a feather through the cloak, Six was less lucky.

Six suffered a feather through her right arm, all the way through, she cried out in pain as blood poured out the wound, in agony the Spartan tried to move towards Cape girl to help, but she didn't need too. The bird was on its way back, but it was halted by Weiss; who somehow froze the thing in place. Over the pain Six couldn't hear what was said, but the two seamed willing to work together now at least.

Six found herself surrounded by the rest of the group, all of whom looked worried at the injury, Six didn't blame them; it was pretty grizzly, but she'd seen worse and knew what needed to be done, even if she didn't have any omni gel.

"This is bad, but I can handle this, can anyone create controlled heat?" Six may not have believed this possible moments ago, but a girl in a white dress freezing a giant bird had opened her mind and she was willing to ask.

"I can, but why do you need it?" Asked Weiss, the rotary section in her rapier spinning.

"You need to cauterise the wound, I can't move with this in my arm and I'll bleed out if I don't seal it, bandages wont stop that amount of blood." Six explained, getting a grip on the feather, the others looked shocked.

"That's crazy." The girl with the bow and black hair said, looking blankly at the Spartan.

"I can't leave this in and I'll bleed out if it isn't sealed, cauterising is faster and more effective than bleeding out."

"But that's gonna really hurt!" Exclaimed the orange hired girl.

"I can take it, Wiess, get ready; I'm pulling it out."

Before anyone could stop her she yanked and tore the feather out, the blood flow was worse and luckily for Six Wiess did as she asked and did apply the burning blade to her skin, the others where shocked as Six gritted her teeth as the burning pain shot through her arm, most would have cried out, but she was trained for it, she could handle it; she was a Spartan...

… A Spartan with one broken arm in immense pain but still a Spartan.

"Okay, lets get the hell out of here; move out people." The Spartan declared, picking up her Gravity hammer; knowing that with one usable arm the feedback would break her arm after one use, she really didn't want two unusable arms.

So the group set of, The cape girl (Apparently called Ruby) soon over took the injured Spartan, Six didn't mind, they weren't under attack so they should be fine, until they reached the mountain fortress.

That was when their foes caught up with them, The Death Stalker and Nevermore bird. The group prepared to fight.

Six was honestly impressed with what she saw; she'd pulled of some impressive feats herself, but this group of teenagers, she was feeling somewhat outclassed, especially seeing as she couldn't really fight.

It honestly was impressive to see, the group had an amazing sense of coordination and agility, they could jump higher and further than Six though possible unaided.

They ran across the an ancient bridge, those with guns providing covering fire to keep the Death Stalker back, until the Nevermore slammed into the pathway they where on separating Jaune and Nora from the group, however that didn't stop them; Nora improvised a strategy with her weapon, a hammer grenade launcher hybrid to get the pair back across,

Eventually the group was separated and seemed to decide to split their efforts. Ruby, Weiss, Blake and Yang took the Nevermore, using a tower as a base of operations, while Jaune, Nora, Pyrrha and Ren took the Death Stalker, Six making a dive of the bridge to help Jaune's group, her weapon wasn't ranged; so it made sense for her to fight the ground based enemy.

Narrowly dodging the beast's pincers Six ran to a more secure area, watching impressed as Ren leaped onto the tale and fired away at the stinger.

"That Tail is it's main weapon, we need to get rid of it..." Muttered the Spartan before crying: "Nora Help me!" The Spartan yelled, charging behind the creature, activating her Hammer and preparing for the pain that was coming.

Nora having got the idea followed Six's lead, running around to the other side of the scorpion, the pair leaped at the same time and swung their hammers in sync, slamming into the beasts tail and blowing the tail of, sending it flying and the scorpion rearing in pain.

The scorpion wasn't the only one; the Spartan had been right, that had really hurt, and judging by the snapping noise had done some serious damage.

Swearing loudly the Spartan collapsed, wanting to clutch her injured arm, but couldn't, and somehow the Scorpion knew, it turned around and raised a pincer to strike.

This could have been the end for Six, but Jaune leaped in at the last second, blocking the mighty pincer with his shield, forcing him back a few feet, but Six was uninjured, not wasting the opportunity Six ran as best as she could, getting out of the combat area, she was a liability now.

Six turned around, slumped against a tree, trying to deal with the pain; until life chose to throw more pain her way.

Specifically a giant snake.

Argh! More Grimm! What did I do to deserve this!

Six jumped out of the way of the snakes titanic jaw, whirling around to size her opponent up. It was about twenty feat long, its scales turning from black to white as it travelled down to another head.

Okay, what do I have to work with, my legs, right... I can't take this thing out alone, but the others have a fight going on, I can't afford to make this worse, I can by time, that will give them a chance to finish their fight.

Her barely formed plan in mind Six began a game of leaping around like a mad woman. Constantly forced to jump around and perform some embarrassing mid air moves to avoid the snakes jaws, each one trying to kill the Spartan, what he didn't know, that Six knew full well; was this:

Spartans never die!

Six was always ahead of the snake, diving out of the way, sometimes only just being able to avoid being crushed by the massive fangs.

"Nora Nail it!" Cried Jaune, this and the resulting explosion mingled with a cry of pain distracted the Spartan for a split second; a split second she didn't have.

The snake crushed her legs in its jaws, the resulting crunch snapped both her thigh bones, shattering them and Six finally cried out in pain.

"ARGGGHHH!" The Spartan yelled as her two remaining limbs broke, the snake, realising how injured its prey was, proceeded to throw the Spartan up in the air, its gaping maw opened, like a black hole in the world, Six knew that it was over, she couldn't dodge that, her body was too broken, it was over for her, she'd woken up somewhere else and extended her life by maybe 2 hours.

Well, this seams like a waste.

And that was it.

The end.

Really.

Except it wasn't, at almost literally the last second a streak of red shot out of the air and stuck through Jaune's Hoodie, forcing the confused Spartan off course, sending her into a tree, not into the snakes mouth.

Looking up Six saw Jaune's group running to help, Ren firing with both his machine pistols, Nora unloading grenades on the thing, Pyrrha throwing her shield to strike the creature in its face, Jaune even got a few good swings in on the snakes underbelly.

This sight reminded Six of another group she'd barley known, a group who had her back, even if it wasn't for very long, this felt the same, this caused the Spartan to let out a small smile, the last thing she did before blacking out.

…

"Hello dear, I am Professor Ozpin; what is your name? You aren't a student and you weren't part of the imitation group." Six was surprised to hear this, mainly because she was sure she was dead... Again.

A few seconds to gain her bearings told her this was stupid, she was in pain yes, but defiantly not dead, a quick attempt to move her limbs confirmed to her that they were in casts.

Looking to her left she saw the speaker, an oldish looking man, drinking from a mug of something he was looking at her with a polity interested expression.

After waiting a second Six decided to answer his question.

"Noble Six." She said dryly.

"That's an interesting name you have their, is their anything else to your name Miss Six?" Looking at him seriously the Spartan decided their was no harm in giving him her full name.

"Spartan-B312, Noble Six"

"Hmmm." He said, looking at her, looking interested but with a hint of distrust seeping into his voice.

"You can doubt it but its my name."

"Oh its not that, its more I'm now wondering where you came from." The Spartan decided to play for time, she couldn't figure out what this guys deal was; but she figured she could by time to figure it out.

"My mother; isn't that where everyone comes from?" Cheek wasn't something the Spartan was used to using, so it came out stiff and awkward.

"Well yes, but I'm more interested in how you came to wake up in the middle of the Emerald Forest just as the exam started, you weren't their before, its like you just showed up, but that's impossible of course." Six stared hard at the man.

"What do you want to know, its clear you know something." The Spartan said, dropping all pretence.

"I want to know who you are and how you got here, all I can say is that an anomaly was detected around the forest as the exam started and you showed up naked in the middle of it, literally, I have it on camera." He said, messing around with a tablet for a second.

"Have a look, I think you'll find it fascinating." He said, handing Six the tablet. Curious Six watched a seemingly empty area of forest; amazed as a glow of yellow light appeared above the ground until she fell out of it and passed out on the ground.

"Miss Six, do you have any idea on how that happened, this is brand new to me." He said, smiling, Six thought for a second, he wasn't going to believe it, but it couldn't hurt to try telling him.

"I died fighting a war against an alien alliance intent on exterminating all of humanity; I was a commando and I died due to multiple plasma wounds and a stab through the chest with an energy sword." Ozpin looked deep into her eyes, before smiling.

"Very well Miss Six, so what do you plan to do next." Six balked, this was not what she expected.

"What do you mean Sir?" She said on instinct, the shock kicking in her military training unintentionally.

"Well what do plan to do now, you don't seam to have anywhere to go do you." The Spartan shook her head.

"That is true, to be honest Sir I have no idea." Ozpin nodded, the look on his face telling her he knew that was going to be her answer.

"Well I would like to offer a preposition Miss Six."

"I'm listening." The Spartan said Cautiously,

"I would like to offer you a place in my school, you completed the entrance exam in all the critical aspects and it would give you a place to live, food and teach you about this world." Six thought for a second, this seamed perfect, but her paranoia flared up.

"Why would you offer me this? it doesn't make sense; you know nothing about me, why would you invite me into your school?"

"Simple; if your a trouble maker I'd rather you be where I can keep an eye on you, and secondly, you need help, I'm a huntsman, its my job to help people." Six sat their for a second, she was probably making a mistake, she didn't know anywhere near enough about this place to make a situation, but she had to make a decision; so she elected to go with:

"Mr Ozpin Sir, I would be happy to except."