Colors of Remnant

Normally, it's rare to see Maria going out with others on weekends night. She usually would rather staying home and relax, wrapped up in a warm blanket, reading or listening to music. However, her caretakers were more than a bit upset when Maria hadn't make any new friends after three weeks attending Beacon. Particularly Jonas, her surrogate father, who chewed her out on the phone for needing to go out and put some effort in make some friends. "You would never make it as a Huntress without friends!" he would often repeated on and on. Decided she would take his word of advice to heart, Maria had accepted the invitation when a girl next door in her dorm reached out to invite Maria to a night out.

The Illuminous is a rather fancy bar. Not much to look at from the outside; a simple one story building with red walls and a flat roof, looking like a giant box with some black tinted windows and an entrance. The main room however, was anything but simple. From the entrance, a black and gold hallway leads to a hexagonal room with the dance floor in the middle. The dance floor is built into the ground, and along the walls, there're tables set up with a few wall booths at the far end. Against one wall is the bar, counter made of refined wood and white marbled top. There're shelves lined the walls with different type of alcohols. Lastly, the entire establishment seemed to be perpetually lit with a dim purple light, chandeliers of gold light up the bar and pathway.

At first, Maria had thought she was tagging along to have some fun, getting to know her neighbors a little more and potentially make some friends. Alas, that was not the case. The club environment didn't turn out to be what she had expected. The entire night until now, she had to be constantly on the look out that her drinks didn't have any alcohol in it; something that annoyed the bartender quite a bit. Secondly, Maria soon became the group's designated "bag keeper". After a decent talk, one by one her friends would got up and join the dance floor, asking the group to keep an eye of their belongings. Maria was the last to leave the table, and such, she quickly became the person who's keeping watch over all the others' handbags and purses.

"You need to go out more, he said. You need to be more sociable and make more friends, he said... Bite your tongue, Jonas..." The scarlette muttered under her breath, leaning her body against the table and resting her head on her hands, elbows pivoted against the table top.

After the stress of the last several weeks, the recent interpersonal tension, and the chore that was modifying and acclimating to her new metal arm, Ax decided to hit the streets of Vale on her lonesome this time. Her wandering had led her to this club - one she'd never been to before. She figured it either must've been recently opened, or she was just a bit behind the curve when it came to getting her party on down in the Commercial District. It didn't really matter at all to her. What mattered to her right now was the song that was playing over the speakers. 'Inside', by the Baby Blues. A song from her old life, her old band.

Every once in a while an old song from the past came back to remind her of days gone by. This one was an old favorite of hers. She hadn't had a whole lot of creative input in all the old songs her band played back in the day, but this one was one of the exceptions. It awakened all kinds of ancient feelings in her, but she had a cure for those complicated emotions: she'd dance them all away. Ax was a veritable force of nature out on the dance floor, her white-pink hair whipping around to the rhythm of the music. Her lips moved in time with the lyrics, mouthing words as if in a serene trance as she let out all the steam that'd built up inside of her to the song.

"And it's late nights, and it's Game Boys
And it's too bright and it's synth noise
And it's Charli and it's milkshakes
And it's Carly and it's heartbreaks

But the right words
Never come
It all comes out
Silly-dumb
And all the things I need to say
And all the big words seem to stay
On the inside
On the inside..."

Her fervor and her passion emanated from her being like a cloud of joviality, reaching out and touching unaware spirits with whom she shared the dance floor. At any other club this song might not have been a crowd favorite, but right now the place was sweaty, hot, and alive with motion and music. She didn't sing along; the voice that belted out the lyrics over the speakers was hers from another time, another life. It was surreal, being there unrecognized yet dancing and singing to a song she herself wrote seemingly so long ago.

Everywhere she went she was attracting attention nevertheless. She didn't really pay anyone else there much mind during that particular song. Only when it finally reached its natural end and the next one came on did she stop and make an effort to duck out from the frenetic crowd. As she did, she brushed through a kind of rowdy bunch, and a stray, lingering touch found her tail-feathers. Ax's retribution was swift and sudden, but pretty mild - where she'd have broken a man's face for this normally, she found the self-control to settle for a shove and a glare before she was clear of the dancefloor. She turned for only a moment to glance back at the crowd before she moved elsewhere in the aftermath, and along the way she caught sight of a semi-familiar face, sitting by her lonesome at a table full of junk.

Semi-familiar. She felt certain she'd seen the red-haired young lady over there before. Seeing as she'd yet to recognize anyone else and the bar was full of weird-looking guys giving her and every other attractive lady in the club strange looks, she decided to go ahead and try a cold approach. She'd get along better with a soul from Beacon than anyone else here, most likely.

"Let me guess. You must be the designated driver for this table," Ax spoke up, raising her voice as she aimed to get Maria's attention. She bent down and rested her hands on the tabletop, offering Maria an affable, friendly smile. The crowd made it impossible for her to use her semblance and actually detect individual emotions with any precision. It was too noisy and crowded. She'd have to just focus on body language to see how uncomfortable she was making her fellow student by forcing her to be social, but she figured that these types often secretly hoped someone would approach them and relieve some of their boredom anyway.

The redhead was a little distracted at all the people on the dance floor and booming music to noticed someone approaching her booth. While the taste in music is pretty nice, it's a bit loud for her taste, especially how the booms from the speakers made her body felt like it's vibrating at every beats. It's hard just to hear other people talking from a table away. How the people can dance away to the music while standing a few feet away from them is beyond her. Looking toward the dance floor, she only hoped the others who invited her along have more fun that she was tonight

A loud voice suddenly caught her attention when her eyes turned back to greet the tall figure standing before her table. The face is pretty familiar, as if she had seen the Faunus girl somewhere before. It take another glance down at her figure and the feathery tail below the waistline that it finally struck a cord. She's a student in one of Maria's class -she believe it was a class studying about Dust. She had thought the girl was a little too flamboyant between the white and pink hair, her carefree attitude and tattoo over her chest. Now seeing her in the casual wear... or the lack thereof, it really hammered home the carefree notion. Maria would have dismissed the girl or simply didn't reply, but at this point, having someone to talk to is better than nothing at all.

"Not... quite. I'm just making sure no one is looking around our belongings while we're having fun." Maria murmured, dismissed the comment toward her. Not that it's untrue; she just didn't want to admit the fact.

"You're a Beacon student right? I believe we share the same class, though you might not recognize me. My name is Maria." The scarlette continued, striking up a conversation. Maria returned the Faunus girl a gentle smile, gesturing her hand forward to the seat opposite to her, inviting her newly met companion to join. Without looking, she quickly sweep aside all the empty drinks her companies had already drank without knocking over anything, leaving the table somewhat clean, as best as she's able to.

Ax nodded contemplatively at Maria's reply, as if she expected nothing different. She definitely got the vibe this chick was out of her element. What class had she seen her in again? She was having a hard time remembering. Probably some elective or another, maybe one of her specialist dust courses. Ax's lips curved once more into a smile as Maria took the conversational bait and made an idle observation of her own.

"Oh, I definitely recognized you. Didn't get the impression this kind of place was your scene, though," Ax noted with an offhanded shrug as she accepted Maria's invitation and took a seat, crossing her long legs in the seat opposite the scarlette. Pleased that the girl was being so accommodating, Ax decided to be a little more bold.

"Well, since I haven't properly introduced myself, I guess now's as good a time as any. I'm Ax," she smiled and leaned forward, resting her elbows on the table.

"I could get a drink from the bar for you. I figure us Beacon sorts ought to look out for one another, yeah?" Ax offered.

Was it that obvious that Maria was uncomfortable with her current situation. Sure, she was out of her elements, having never been to a night club before, but Maria had thought she masked pretty well. She put up a pretty convincing face, or she had thought so. She even tried to be engaged with the environment and all. Yet, despite all the effort, the scarlette neglected the fact that sitting around alone at an empty booth with other's belongings didn't exactly spell "fun". It doesn't take much to realize that.

"It's... really not." Maria sighed in defeat. She didn't want to admit so, but being demoted to the designated watchperson who keep an eye over the group's stuff while they get to have fun didn't rub her the right way either. "Nice to meet you, Ax."

At the offer to buy her a drink, the scarlette quickly refused, in a way almost physically recoiled. "That won't be necessary! I already have my drink here." Maria jolted straight from where she was sitting, suggested toward her half emptied glass of soda. Then, immediately, as if she could tell how her reaction might come off as overreacting, she played it cool. "It's that... I have an allergy to alcohol," a blatant lie. "and getting a reaction now might ruined the night for everyone else."

Her demeanor quickly change as the redhead composed herself. "Thanks for the offer though. I appreciate the thought. What about you? Do you want any drinks? I can probably get to the bar from here in a flash."

Ax's smile grew into a proper grin at Maria's little sigh of defeat. She was even undaunted by Maria's seeming knee-jerk reaction to an offer for a drink - her smile didn't fade, but she did raise a curious eyebrow. It made her wish there were fewer people around. She was trying to zero-in, so-to-speak, and focus on Maria's emotional state, but there was too much interference, too much emotional static from the whirlwind of music, drama and dancing all around them.

"Really now?" Ax seemed to buy it. She straightened up slightly at the table when Maria turned the offer around back to her. Not expected, but not entirely unwelcome... she could drink in moderation.

"Charmed. Yeah, sure... would you get me an Electric Lemonade, pretty please with a cherry on top? I can take over briefly as the table guardian while you're up," Ax smiled, apparently pleased at Maria's offer.

"Right, one Electric Lemonade. I'll get to it. Now, you might want to shield your eyes a little." Maria nodded, broadened her smile a little. For one, Maria finally get a breather from that rather awkward introduction between the two. Two, she can show Ax a little trick of her own, in a way Maria's introduction to her semblance without seeming like she's boasting. Lastly, liquors can lighten the mood and make the conversation sail more smoothly. If Ax is allowed entrance in here, she's probably old enough to drink... right?

The redhead quickly retrieve from her handbag a credit card. Took aim, her fingers faintly glowed red for a moment before she flicked the card forward. The red and white card spin like a disc, arcing as it flew toward the direction of the bar. Standing up from her seat, In an instant, Maria's aura flickered in a red flash before she disappeared from the booth and materialized next to the bar, her hand laid on top of the card that had landed on the wood like a throwing stars.

"Bloody- Kid if you're going to keep on scaring me like that, you're getting ban from the bar. " The bartender -a man in his forties wearing fancy suit and tie, beginning to bald, jumped when he turned around to see someone appeared from thin air. Maria only gave the man a smile and placed the order, paying with the same card she had used to get there. With the drinks in hand, Maria made a sitting motion where she's standing before the same red glow enveloped her form and disappear the next instance. "Beacon students..."

The scarlette must have left the table for a minute or two at most before she returned with the drinks in hand in a blink of an eye. Similar fashion to how she left, Maria blipped back into existence in the same place. She passed the drink to Ax, a cylindrical glass about 6 inches tall. While the content is mostly ice, the drink did make up in aesthetic. Living up to its name, the drink give off a cool electrifying blue colors, topped off with a red cherry on top of the ice cubes. Furthermore, the straw gave off a luminescence light, glimmered inside the blue drinks and the layers of ice. "Don't worry about the drink. It's on me for keeping me companied." Maria gave that same smile when she first introduced herself. She had also bought herself a small can of soda to top off her cup. This is usually where the conversation would pick up, but Maria was stumped. She didn't know exactly what to talk about now that the two were finally settled.

Ax's blinked a single time at Maria's words of warning, but her expression didn't otherwise change as she opted to silently watch whatever was coming next rather than take the advice. She'd have probably been impressed with the card trick alone, but her eyes widened and her lips parted ever so slightly when Maria rose from her seat and then vanished in a flash of red. Ax's eyes flicked quickly over to the bar, which had enough action going on at the time that it took her a second to even locate the scarlette amidst the other patrons mingling and nursing drinks of their own.

She shouldn't have been surprised at this rate. She wasn't sure what it was about people with... flashy, mobility-related and/or teleportation-style semblances and their desire to make their capabilities known nice and early. Then again, she supposed she couldn't be one to talk; she herself was one of the biggest show-offs she could think of.

When Maria returned in a similarly flashy fashion, Ax rose her hands and gently clapped, nodding approvingly. She seemed impressed. She accepted her drink with a delighted smile, reaching in a pulling out the cherry and holding the stem between her middle finger and thumb.

"Color me impressed. You certainly know how to make a first impression, Maria. Do you get to do that trick for many other girls? Or should I feel special?" Ax rose an eyebrow, her tone suggesting she was being deliberately coy and playful. Maybe Maria wasn't feeling too sure about this, but talking to random girls at bars was hardly new for Ax, even if she hardly did it as often as she did back when she lived in Atlas.

Maria couldn't help but let out a light giggle under breath at the sight of Ax's surprised expression when she came back to the booth. There's a weird satisfaction in seeing people's reaction when they find out about Maria's semblance. "Sorry if it looks like I'm trying to show off. It's just for convenience sake, you know. It's a useful power to have when getting around an obstacle." Maria laughed lightly, covering her mouth with one hand while the other let go of the straw in her cup and gestured toward the crowd.

Ax's compliment actually managed to caught Maria off guard a little bit. If Ax could make it out under the dimly lit light, she would see a slight hint of blush on the scarlette's face. "It's- really, it's nothing. Just mostly for convenience sake." She almost sputtered, clearing the throat not to choke on her soda when she took a sip. Yet, if there's something the comment suggested, is that Ax seems rather... smooth in her execution. It somewhat reminded her of a few individuals she came across working at Jonas's inn, those that know what to say to make a girl blush. "Is this something she do often?"

"Anyway, since we're here, I guess it would be nice to get to know each others a little. How long have you been studying at Beacon? This is my first semester here." The scarlette changed the subject, taking another sip from her soda before turning all her attention on Ax. By this time, the tangy taste and the feeling of carbonated drink on her tongue had helped the redhead composed herself for the conversation.

Ax's keen eyes knew a blushing girl when she saw one. The faintest hint of a smug grin pulled up at the corner of her glossy, pink lips. Even with such a subtle little expression though, she absolutely radiated confidence. She psionically projected her emotions, after all; even without any note or mention of her own semblance, it was working. Ax seemed somehow more interested than before after Maria's modest words downplaying her semblance. She lazily popped the cherry between her lips, stem and all, but didn't bite down right away.

Maria's casual attempt to keep the conversation going, at first, seemed to go unnoticed. Ax's eyes flicked away from Maria, her expression suddenly thoughtful, willful even. A few seconds passed and the silence grew, but Ax seemed quite intent and focused on... something? She pressed her lips together and moved her lips a bit as she worked the stem in her mouth. Somewhere along the way she bit down and swallowed the sweet cherry. Finally, after a dramatic pause, the end of the stem poked out from the front of her closed mouth and she slowly pulled the stem from between her lips. About halfway down the stem it appeared to have been tied in a neat little knot. Ax examined her own handiwork with pride, holding it up and letting Maria see the work she'd done with her tongue.

"How's this for showing off?" Ax asked with a sly grin that soon enough broke into a laugh.

The gentle smile on Maria's face faded slightly when she had realized she was being ignored. It's kinda obvious that it was intentional. Even with the loud booming music of the club, she could hear Ax relatively well. Surely it wasn't the music drowning her out. Ax also seemed to be deep in thought, focusing on something else than the conversation. "Had she trailed off on something else? Surely she's not thinking that hard for a reply..." Maria brushed off a thought in her head.

The scarlette was about to asked if Ax was doing ok when there was finally a response from the Faunus. Ax took out the stem from the little red cherry in her drink and present it to Maria. At first, she found it weird that Ax is showing it to her, but upon further inspection, she found a knot tied at the middle. That's definitely not like that when the drink was first served. It took a brief moment of silence between the two for Maria to connected the dots and figured out what her newly met companion meant by "showing off".

That realization hit the redhead like a brick when Maria's face went full red from the comment, a mixture of embarrassment and more importantly anger, the smile was wiped off her face, turning her face to a more serious look. Just what in the world is this girl insinuating when she pulled a trick like that. What kind of person did she took Maria as? "I think it's best that yo-" Feeling emboldened, Maria would have asked Ax to leave when at the corner of her eyes, she saw a few men heading toward their way. People would quickly get out of their way. These men had a rather bulky and tough build, dressed rather well with each of them wearing a brown jacket with two diamond shapes layered on top of one another on their back. Lastly, the scarlette's eyes trailed downward and focused on the batons two of them in the back are wielding.

"Hey, love bird!" The man in front called, his booming voice carried a mocking tone. "You're the one that push one of my boys?" He leaned down, seemingly shadowing over Maria's and Ax's table. Behind him, another man, smaller in size, wearing a stained shirt, looked more pissed and ticked off than the rest of their friends.

Ax hadn't meant to leave the girl feeling ignored, but that was the tricky thing about clubs - there was too much emotional traffic for her to easily pick up the signs that someone was annoyed or bothered by something she did or was doing. Ax felt a rush of satisfaction at the beet-red color that came to Maria's face, but that satisfaction was swiftly cut short by Maria's indignant expression as her smile fell away. Ax didn't need a sixth sense to interpret what that meant.

Oops. Well, this sort of thing happened sometimes. It wasn't the end of the world. Ax's eyebrows rose ever so slightly at the terse tone Maria used to reply before she cut herself off mid sentence. Ax was about to ask her to finish her thought when she traced Maria's gaze over to an approaching party. Any remaining cheer soon faded from Ax's own expression as she picked up a little on the mood around them as other passersby steered clear of the impending situation - there was unease, discomfort, and fear.

Great. Ax felt like she knew where this was going, even though she didn't exactly recognize any of the approaching men. Here she was, a faunus in a club... and now there were thugs here ready to start shit. What was worse was that she wasn't alone. Now Maria would get dragged into it too if Ax did anything. The timing couldn't have been worse. What could she do? Walk away? Start a brawl? It was like she'd lose in some manner or another no matter what.

Ax's jaw locked in place and her eyes snapped to the first thug that dared to open his mouth. Oh, she didn't like that. 'Love bird'? She placed her hands on the table and rose to her full height. Her best option was to try and intimidate them. If they were smart, they'd back off. If not... she'd need to take this outside before this turned into a scene that'd certainly shine less-than-favorably on her.

She'd been in such a good mood, too. But sometimes things changed fast. Ax rose her chromed-out right arm and clenched her fist. Electricity danced ominously between her fingertips, luminous and impossible to overlook in the relatively dim club atmosphere. She was a Beacon student, and not just any student. Even without Electra Heart, she felt pretty confident she could at least buy time through intimidation. They might ambush her later, but she'd just have to be alert.

"You don't know who you're fucking with," Ax declared, murderous intent in her eyes as she stared down the leader of the bunch. Her icy blue eyes were imperious, steely, unerring. Between the metal greaves, the plates on her outfit, the gauntlet and the metal arm she had, she looked less like a student and more like the real deal - a pissed off huntress ready to assert herself as aggressively as necessary.

There were twinkling of fear in a few of the men's eyes, sweat beading on their forehead as they second guessed themselves for now messing with a Huntress, or at the very least a Huntress-in-training, still terrifying nonetheless. Yet, the man getting in Ax's face, the leader of the bunch was seemingly unfazed. He continued the stare down with cold eyes, eyeing up the Faunus.

From behind, Maria had noticed the man only have his arm through one of the sleeves of his jacket. The right hand is hidden behind the jacket he is wearing, no doubt armed with a hidden weapon itself. That cannot be any good. While the music was booming and all attention is on the pink-haired Faunus with the gauntlet sparking electricity, Maria flicked something toward the men, aiming low at the ground and got up herself. If things get out of hand quick, she might need to act right away.

The leader chuckled, giving Ax a snarky reaction while he turned away from her to pick up a small half-empty drink. "I think I should be the one saying that. You, kid, have no idea who you just fucked with." He finally spoke up, gesturing toward Ax with the drink in his hand and almost a smirk on his face. With a flick of his wrist and thrusting his arm forward, he hucked the content of the drink toward Ax. "Here's to get even." He would have throw his jacket over the girl's head next to blind her and draw the concealed weapon hidden behind his back, but just as he reached toward his jacket, there were a red flash before he felt his arm being held back.

Without a word spoken, Maria kicked toward the back of the leader's knee and tackled him overhead, send him flying back to his group. The concealed weapon fell from his back and dropped onto the ground, revealed to be a pistol, a glowing red bar lined along the grip, presumably fire dust. As the commotion finally escalated, the entire club erupted in panic and disarray as people quickly fled from the establishment. While the ones on the ground scrambled to get back up on their feet, three still standing unsheathed their batons and quickly charged toward Ax and Maria.

Ax's heart rate kicked up a notch and a subtle hint of shame colored her cheeks such that she was grateful for the dim light. She did exactly what she was supposed to do; She summoned her star power and thought 'murder' the whole time she stared down the gutsy leader... but he didn't balk. She couldn't sense his emotions, but what was there to say?

'Welp, them's the breaks.'

She could still read body language and a stern expression. Maybe he had an ace up his sleeve. Maybe he was too stupid to get a read on her. Whatever the case, Ax was poised and now resigned to the fact that this incident was almost certainly going to escalate into actual violence. Her eyes quickly took stock of what was in front of her. She took a quick head count and aimed to try and note posture and morale, but she quickly gave up on assessing the whole of the group in favor of the man up front. He was the lynchpin. Maybe, just maybe, if she could break his spirit or undermine his nerve, the rest of his posse would bail.

She watched him with cold eyes as he picked up the drink, immediately figuring that there was a purpose behind him doing it. She didn't honestly care that much about getting wet though, and a tickling sensation in the back of her mind clued her into the more devious maneuver that followed. She was just about to throw a fist and crush the glass in the man's grip when a flash of red light made her hesitate and caused her to almost stumble.

Cool liquid splashed into her hair and over her chest and then onto her jeans. Thankfully it didn't look like she wet herself or anything, but it was far from her most dignified moment as she recoiled reflexively, shifting into a defensive posture before she realized what was happening next. She blinked as she watched the red-haired girl manhandle the leader, and then everything seemed to descend into chaos for a few moments.

As the crowd thinned and left her alone with the thugs, Ax reached up and picked up a bit of her hair at shoulder length, looking down at it and frowning at the boozy scent. This was turning out to not be her day. She had no doubt she could handle a few dumbass thugs on her own, but she and Maria weren't exactly in sync at that instant. It seemed Maria got the brunt of the attention as the apparent aggressor - all Ax had done so far was make a failed intimidation check and get splashed with alcohol.

Looked like the limelight was on Maria, but Ax cursed beneath her breath anyway, flexing her fists.

Maria didn't quite exactly understand what gotten her so riled up. Sure, she hated people who's trying to start troubles because they think the world is beneath them, but Maria would have usually handled these kind of situations a lot better than now. It hadn't even crossed the scarlette's mind that from an outside perspective, it looked like she instigated the fight. Bolstered by the surge of confidence she had to stood up to herself and get back at Ax for her rather un-tasteful first impression, Maria leapt into action at the first sign of aggression. Now, at the center of attention, Maria took her fighting pose and got ready.

The first man came running at her with his baton brandished, swinging wide, to which Maria easily riposted the attack, hooked her arm around his and tripped his leg by the ankle, letting momentum do the rest of the work as he tumbled and face planted onto the dance floor. Turning to face the other man, she ducked under his attack before throwing a punch of her own. The scarlette tried not to use her aura for any of her attack, not because of self-restraint, she just didn't want to pull any punches for this one. Her fist cracked against the thug's nose with a crunch before the redhead give a jab kick to push him onto the floor.

While the commotion was spiraling from bad to chaotic, the leader of the group finally managed to scrambled back up from the ground. The audacity of this little bitch. With the pistol back in his hand, the thug took aim at Maria's back while she had her focus on the another goon who's backing away.

Maria clearly knew what she was doing, that much was evident. Ax sort of half-watched the scarlette in action from an idle ready stance as she mulled over whether or not she was getting any more involved.

The pink-haired rocker girl was a bit reluctant to dive headfirst into the conflict unfolding, mostly because she was just... confused. It looked a little like Maria was sticking up for her, but given how annoyed she'd seemed a second ago, maybe there was more to this than Ax realized. A part of her thought about simply walking away here and now - if she backed out now she definitely wouldn't get in any trouble, right? She hadn't hurt anyone, hadn't caused any property damage... not only that, but the red-haired girl's eagerness to jump into the fray made it seem a little like she might've had some history with these goons or something. That, or Ax just hadn't gotten a good read on how hungry for action this chick was.

The thing that stirred Ax out of her introspection was motion from the guy that'd just been up in her face mere moments ago. As he started to awkwardly stumble back to his full height, she registered the urgency of his motions and quickly deduced what he was about to do. She hadn't seen exactly where the gun had fallen in the chaos, so she couldn't beat him to it... but the moment he was back on his feet with the gun in hand, Ax was there to greet him in a flash. He didn't get far enough to meaningfully aim before a metal hand locked around his wrist and pulled with staggering force.

A stray shot rang through the air, leaving a bullet hole in the club ceiling and causing further panic. Now all the bystanders were definitely headed for the exits, but Mr. Leader wasn't going anywhere. He barely got to turn his head to look at his feathery assailant before he was pulled and twisted in a complicated maneuver - Ax pulled his arm over her shoulder and twisted under it, forcing him to stumble wide in a quarter-circle before she let go, her body twisting and unleashing a spinning roundhouse kick that struck with thunderous force. Sparks flew from Ax's greaves and teeth flew from the thug's face as his body hit the nearest table like a sack of potatoes. The table legs collapsed, leaving the man unconscious in a heap of fallen drink glasses and other belongings.

In the midst of Ax's takedown, the gun again clattered to the floor. This time Ax got to it before anyone else could. As she picked up the gun she quickly disassembled enough of the gun to cause the clip to eject, rendering the weapon useless for the immediate future. It was one less thing to worry about... but on the flip side, that little display meant Ax was no longer a mere noncombatant on the sidelines. This stunt had attracted the attention of at least one of the thugs that weren't presently engaged with Maria.

The first one to approach halted in his tracks as Ax whirled to face him. She began to stride confidently towards him, electricity dancing between her fingertips. This time her intimidation worked - he backed away a few feet before he turned tail and fled. It bought Ax another moment to take stock of the situation.

These guys had to be pretty out of their depth to think they had a chance with how this was already going. Sure enough, thug morale wasn't exactly high. Between Maria taking down a few of them so confidently, the way the scene had escalated, and the fact that the boss man was floored, those that remained definitely looked like they'd be pretty easy to scare away. That was good, because Ax didn't want to still be here whenever the police arrived to investigate the disturbance, especially now that there was at least one shot fired in the chaos.

The sudden loud gunshot startled the scarlette as the music was now cut off and all the bystander rushed to get out of the building. Turning back to see if anyone had gotten hurt, Maria was partly relieved to see only the gang leader was knocked out cold with Ax standing on top. Maria also saw the handgun that was once on the floor now in her hand. At first, the redhead would have concluded that the bird Faunus had shot the guy's lights out, but taking another moment to inspect, she found the ammo magazine on the floor next to her foot. She almost let out a sigh of relief that her theory was disproven so quickly.

Maria's eyes quickly trailed over Ax's approaching challenger, no doubt another goon under the leader's wings. The girl was halfway digging in her pocket to pull out a hairpin when the henchmen stopped in his track, before turning and bolted head to heels along with his friends out the exit, blending in with the fleeing crowd, intimidated by Ax's intimidating aura. Without their leader, the goons were nothing but a bunch of scaredy cats, all barks no bites.

The two weren't quite in the clear yet. The gunshot had definitely got the attention of the bouncers and building security, no doubt law enforcers as well. While it's true that the two of them hadn't done anything wrong, Maria didn't want "getting into bar fights" to be on her records when she had only started attending Beacons for a few weeks. While the commotions were still rowdy and distracting, Maria swiftly took Ax by her wrist and turned tail, leading the bird Faunus toward the staff only area. A few narrow and winding hallways later, the two exit through the backdoor that leads to the back alley of the club.

"Good thinking back there, disarming the gun." Maria gave Ax a half thumbs up and compliment, closed the door shut behind her and pushed a large dumpster bin over to block anyone from following them.

Before Ax could decide what to do next, a hand clasped around her left wrist and pulled her away - the bird faunus didn't resist, though her head snapped to watch the redhead with a blank expression as Maria led them away.

"Wh-"

She didn't actually bother vocalizing anything beyond that brief, questioning breath that escaped her lips as the redhead pulled her along. Maria didn't need to do it for long - soon enough Ax was walking along entirely of her own accord. As soon as they were back outside in the cool air Ax's mind snapped back into analytical mode. They didn't want to be anywhere near this place for the foreseeable future... hell, maybe ever. Good thing this club wasn't really anything to write home about.

Ax slowed to a halt as Maria spoke up and got to work improvising a way to slow down anyone that might've decided to tail them. Her eyebrows rose slightly at what she heard - given how hard her first impression bombed she was taken aback by the earnest compliment she received. She only let the surprise show in her eyes for a brief moment before her lips curved into an easy little grin.

"Handled that pretty well yourself," Ax let out a soft breath that might've almost been a laugh with her words. Maria had definitely taken the proactive approach, but it might've been the right call. No one had been seriously hurt who didn't deserve it as far as Ax knew so far. That had to count for something.

"So... next step is getting the fuck out of here, yeah? I've got a getaway vehicle if we can make it to the parking garage up the street," Ax suggested. They were in this together now as far as she was concerned.

Maria gave a friendly smile and an acknowledging nod at Ax's compliment. While it looked as if the scarlette had had a change of heart about her opinions on Ax, in reality, it's a bit more conflicted. One one hand, she did made some rather rude and obscene remarks when they met for the first time. Heck, Maria didn't even remember if Ax paid attention to her while they talk or not. But when troubles started brewing and things got tense, the girl handled everything as well as she could have: Ax never really resorted to violence unless needed to, disarming anything that could potential causing harm to bystanders and took it all in stride. Maria couldn't say the same for herself; she was rather overzealous to start a fight. At this, Maria's at a crossroad between whether or not to overlook their awkward interactions or to keep her at a fix distance.

When the subject of a getaway vehicle come up, Maria was going to agreed and get back to Beacon as quick as possible. She had had enough for tonight, and the scarlette still have a lengthy explanation to her dorm neighbors on why she got into a bar fight on the first night they're out for fun. But she hesitated once the tale-tell flashing lights of a police car painted the wall at the end of the alleyway, perhaps that could wait a little.

"Maybe we can put off that plan for later when things calmed down for a bit." Maria's friendly smile turned a little awkward when her finger pointed toward the flashing light. Instead, Maria proposed a different plan. "There." She called out to Ax, her hand pointed toward a fire exit ladder. "We can sit out up there and wait until the coast is clear. I don't really want to get involve with the police at the moment. If you want to chance it, you're free to leave now. I can make my way back to Beacon myself."

Ax wasn't sure what kind of energy she was getting from Maria now that they were alone and she could properly sense things again. It was an uncertain haze... something like a vague discomfort. Ax's smile took on a subtle, slightly awkward quality as she recalled just how badly-received her little cherry stem trick had been. Well... this wasn't an ideal start for interactions with someone she was now escaping a crime scene with, but Ax had come back from worse first impressions.

Ax's eyes snapped to the wall as they were lit up by multi-colored lights and then she twisted around to get a look down the alleyway behind her. She was already turning back and starting to lead the way in the opposite direction before Maria spoke up and got her attention, prompting her to pause in place and stare at Maria with a somewhat perplexed expression on her lips.

Her eyes followed as Maria drew her attention to the fire exit stairs. She tried to think fast. On one hand, Maria was suggesting they linger on at the scene of the incident, which was potentially risky. On the other hand, the police response had already been pretty rapid; If they took to the streets, it wasn't like any police officer would hesitate to stop a striking-looking bird faunus with a propensity for speeding such as herself if they caught even the briefest glimpse of her.

With a brief curse beneath her breath, she had to concede that there was wisdom to Maria's suggested approach. Ax wasn't really ever much for subtlety. Trying to keep things low profile seemed likely to backfire. It was still risky to stay, but it was less risky than trying her luck at being subtle on the streets. That, and she had no idea what the deal was with the thugs that'd picked the fight to begin with... though she imagined most of them were more focused on evading the police rather than getting revenge on the Beacon students they were clearly no match for.

"...alright. Seems like the safer play," Ax agreed, turning to face their new destination. The fire escape ladder was currently up. One of them could go up and bring it down, but it'd be noisy. It'd probably be more discreet to just use dust, and she could let Maria do her teleporty thing to get up. Her head lowered to look over the sheer wall in front of her before she inhaled a deep breath and bolted forth. She rose a foot to the wall and then her momentum seemed to shift. Ax then seemed to run upward partway up the wall, her body leaning upward and forward. Ripples of dark energy from gravity dust seemed to line her greaves as she moved until she kicked off from the wall and her metal hands reached out to grab the side of the fire exit landing. She effortlessly pulled herself up and over the edge, raising her lower body up and over her head and tumbling gracefully forward and onto solid ground with an acrobatic flourish. The metal structure shook slightly - clearly it didn't see much use.

Ax wasn't about to rush ahead. She was confident that Maria could get up just fine on her own. Until this blew over, she figured they were both better off if they looked out for one another.

The scarlette was rather impressed at Ax's feat of acrobatic, particularly her skill in using dust for a variety of things. She had already seen sparks of lightning shooting from her metallic arm, which she assumed to be lightning dust, and now utilizing gravity dust to scale a 90 degree surface. Indeed quite impressive.

It's now her turn to get up there, and with her semblance, she should be able to cover the distance quite easy. However, a slight issue presented itself. The gaps in the fire escape stairway were just large enough that a small bobby hairpin would easily fell between. While Maria didn't exactly fond of showing people what she have in her purse, it didn't seem like she had any other option at the time.

The redhead dug her hand into the small handbag she had on her and took out a dagger. She gave a quick twirl and grabbed it by the flat side of the blade with her fingers before taking aim.

"Be careful up there!" Maria called out for Ax before flicking her arm and launched the dagger toward the Faunus's direction. The dagger struck the brick wall with a sharp "kink" a foot or two to the side of where Ax was. In a red flash, Maria appeared beside her companion, her foot stepping on the dagger to avoid making it clatter.

The two quickly head up to the rooftop of the building. Now that the music from the club next door had been cut, the place was rather peacefully quiet, minus for the flashing lights from police vehicles and chatters down the street. It'd probably be best that they stay away from the edges of the building, just in case some wandering eyes caught either of them from below. Now, all there is left was to wait.

Ax turned her body and rested her arm lazily on the partially rusted railing, exhaling a little breath from pulling herself over the rail before. She turned her head back down the alleyway, briefly distracted by the sounds of shouts and the distant crackle of comms devices and distorted voices. When she looked back at Maria she had barely a second to react to the fact that the redhead was aiming a knife in her general direction.

Her eyes snapped to the blade as it soared through the air, and she caught herself swaying just a centimeter or so back before she stopped herself. Sure enough the blade embedded itself a few feet away. An instant later the redhead herself followed. She steadied herself and reminded herself that they needed to go right away, and that further talk would probably only serve to draw additional attention to them at this point until they found a safe place to wait this out, so despite her surprise she didn't really take much time to emote about it.

Their path took them a ways up the tall residential complex next to the club until they were forced to go inside. From there it was flickering fluorescent lights and pale hallways with shoddy, creaky, dusty wooden floors. Locating the roof was thankfully pretty easy - a staircase that took them straight up was just around the first corner. Thankfully it seemed that both Ax and Maria had the same idea.

The roof landing was fenced in on all sides, with a small concrete landing near the door. The rest of the area was mostly gravel, along with various ventilation ducts and electrics, along with a few pale white lights set up above the roof entryway and a few other spots along the fences that gave the place a sort of industrial ambience. There was actually an abundance of cover and places to hide. There was also a cheap plastic garden table and a few fold-up chairs set up not far from the fencing overlooking the alleyway where they'd just been. The ashtray there was full of cigarette butts, and there was a checkerboard in the middle of the table, though there weren't any pieces.

Ax idly raised her arms over her shoulders, her wrists behind her head. She then leisurely began to stroll over toward the table. She stopped and inspected the spot. There was an unlabeled bottle of liquid on the ground by one of the chair legs. Ax's lips formed a little grimace as she looked a little closer, and she kicked the bottle gently so that it rolled a few feet away.

"Looks like no one's been up for a game of chess up here in a long time," Ax noted idly, turning to look over and back to Maria.

While there were a lack of a verbal response, Maria noticed the subtle hints of Ax being put off, possibly about the lack of warning Maria give before she threw the dagger toward her direction. Maria could only give an awkward and apologetic smile at the girl before both of them headed up.

After some moments carefully scanning the surrounding just to make sure the two of them is alone, the scarlette finally settled herself down one of the folding chairs further away from the ledges. Obviously, this place has been used for some time. The colors of the checkered board on the table seemed fade, as if it had been sitting out for a while. It's clear that residents of the building would come up to the roof and use the space as a patio, playing chess and having a smoke together, maybe some beer or whatever the bottle Ax had just kicked contained.

"It seems so. I guess whoever own these won't mind if we occupied them for a while." Perhaps one of the two friend moved away, or the two just lost interest and didn't come up here anymore. From the looks of it, it didn't seem like this is a frequent location either. Either way, it seems like they could use the chairs and table to sit and wait.

"Look... I know we started on rather bad terms," As Ax took her seat, Maria began. "but from what I've seen so far, I think you're alright." Yeah... lets put it as that "If you want... we can start over from the beginning." The scarlette finally speak up what's been bottling in her head. She finally concluded it's worth it to give Ax a second chance to get to know her better.

"Well, here goes nothing." Maria ended with her hand extended out to Ax over the table to offer a friendly handshake. "My name is Maria. Nice to meet you." The scarlette re-introduced herself, giving the bird Faunus a gentle friendly smile.

She took a moment to linger at the fence for a moment, her face leaning in close to the metal wires as she tried to peer over the ledge and see if anyone was down in the alleyway below. She barely got a peak of movement before she pulled her head back. She could hear better than she could see anyway. While there was still some commotion below, they were high enough up in the air where everything felt a little further away than before.

She exhaled a little sigh and then plopped down into one of the folding chairs, idly drumming her metal fingertips on the tabletop. At first she was kind of trying not to look over at Maria too much. It was one thing for the girl to play nice, but Ax hadn't forgotten the awkward initial impression she'd given. The circumstances were now considerably different, and Ax really didn't want to make things worse.

She perked up a little when Maria spoke up to her again, before managing a small, slightly self-conscious smile over at the redhead. She'd take what she could get, all things considered. They were stuck up on that roof for a little while, and the least she figured she could do was at least try to keep the peace. Maybe they weren't or wouldn't be friends, but that didn't mean they had to be enemies.

"Uh, heh, yeah, I'd like that," Ax said. With that, she reached out to accept Maria's offered hand. A stray bit of harmless static zapped between their hands when they touched. Ax's cybernetic right hand was presently quite cool to the touch.

"Pleasure's all mine. I'm Ax. Look, I'm uh... I'm sorry about what happened back there."

When the two shook hand, there was a small shock that made Maria twitched in surprise. Another thing was the prosthesis was rather cold to touch, and is rather high tech. Maria hadn't seen prosthesis of this level anywhere else beside Atlas. Ax must be from Atlas herself, or have a damn good connection in the city to be able to have access to these kind of technology. All that eventually lead to the question of what happened before the prosthesis? Had Ax alway need one since birth, or did something happened? "Must be one hell of a story behind that."

Unknowingly, Maria held onto Ax's hand a bit longer than intended when she was deep in thought. "A-ah... I-I'm so sorry for staring. That is very rude of me." Snapping back, the scarlette quickly let go and shrunk in her seat.

"I-uh, I think it's pretty cool though, I have never seen anything that advance around." She needed to think of a way to salvage the conversation quick. Yet, "Where did you get it?" any chance of salvation is thrown off the roof in her attempt at normalcy. "Wait- I didn't mean anything by that! You don't have to answer if you don't want to. It wasn't what I meant to ask! 'Just shut up Maria!' I just... I'm going to stop talking now." The redhead slumped back into her seat, her face as red as her hair. It's evident that the best move is to accept it before she dug herself down any deeper than she already was.

The static visibly drew Maria's eye to their hands, and Ax felt for a brief moment like she could practically sense the question beginning to form in Maria's mind before she could speak it aloud. Ax was eager to fill the space with words rather than let things get too awkward and quiet, but when she looked up and parted her lips to speak she was taken aback by the sort of distant look in Maria's eyes as she took in the shape, color, and detailing on her heavily-customized cybernetic prosthesis. Unable to get a good read on Maria's thoughts, she awkwardly remained quiet for a moment. She shook her head quickly as soon as Maria started to apologize, slowly withdrawing her hand.

"Hey, no big deal," Ax quickly said. Her lips began to curve into a small, slightly uncomfortable smile as Maria continued. She was feeling a few mixed feelings at the moment. She felt like her arm was drawing all kinds of unexpected attention as of late... it was becoming a really consistent conversation topic. Sometimes she found herself able to talk about it. Other times it was a little harder to focus when it came up. She didn't particularly like thinking about certain key details related to its acquisition.

"Heh, it's... it's okay, really," Ax attempted to reassure the redhead softly, leaning back a little where she sat and attempting to adopt a more composed posture. She didn't want to go making a big dramatic thing out of this. Maria's question had actually been pretty harmless compared to the kinds of questions some others jumped to when they saw her arm.

"I got it here in Vale, actually. The base design was made here by a company called Bracket Cybertech, and the schematics were donated to the Academy. It was a pretty modular design so... I've made a lot of custom tweaks and changes to the base model."

Talking about the tech itself was easy. Talking about the incident that caused it... was a little more of a dice-roll. She got the impression that Maria knew better than to pry that far.

Ax had been awfully patient with Maria's inept social skill; furthermore, Maira was glad she didn't interpret that comment as an insult, implying Ax had stolen the piece of tech. Now that things had come to pass, the scarlette had no intention going back to that topic, least she dug her own hole even deeper. Instead, her attention quickly turned to her companion, moving forward with both her elbows leaned on the table.

Maria was a little surprised to hear Ax had gotten her new arm from here in Vale. She'd never heard of the company mentioned at Beacon before; albeit, she didn't have the best knowledge on high tech equipments. Traditional swords and cuffs were all that Maria familiar with. From the looks of the prosthesis, it's a pretty high tech piece of equipment, and from what Ax had mentioned, making changes on the arm by herself, Maria could assumed that she's quite tech savvy herself. Perhaps the redhead could sought either of the two out for help in the future, if she ever wanted to bring herself to modernized her equipment.

"You mentioned Beacon, how long have you been a student at the Academy?" Back tracking a little, Maria asked, gesturing a finger toward Ax, then gesture her hand back to herself and continued. "Oh, if you have any questions for me, feel free to ask as well. I don't want this to feel like an interrogation."

She was surprised and a little taken off guard by Maria's ongoing curiosity. She had been expecting conversation in general to feel more awkward and stilted between them, given how rough first impressions had gone back at the club. Her impression had been that this chick would probably be too uptight to take any sort of interest in her, even platonically. She wasn't about to complain though! While Maria didn't seem to respond super strongly to reassurance, it had seemed to soothe some of the discomfort in the air.

"I'm a third year," Ax answered. She then took on a bit of a wry grin. She knew Maria didn't respond well to heavy-handed flirting, but she also didn't want to bore this girl to death just bouncing questions back and forth. She was getting the strong impression that Maria wasn't very comfortable socializing with strangers. Definitely a bit of an introvert, albeit one with a streak for decisive action when it came to a potential crisis.

"You can interrogate me. I'm not worried," Ax mused, raising her shoulders in a lighthearted little shrug. "But I wasn't getting that impression, for what it's worth."

She raised her arm in front of her, and several sections of the forearm popped open, segmented plates spreading out and exposing the internal components. There was surprisingly little visible wiring, but plenty of concentrated, glowing electricity stored up within. A second later, the plates slid back into place and covered up the inner sections of her arm again as she lowered it onto the table in front of her.

"A lot of people ask about it. Can't blame anyone for being curious..." Ax trailed off, her gaze flickering about elsewhere briefly in thought. When she looked back at Maria there was clear intent in her eyes.

"I uh, actually wanted to ask for a little feedback. Sooooo, I was trying to flirt with you back in the club," Ax admitted rather bluntly. "And obviously I struck out right off the bat, I got that much. Not everyone reacts well to the cherry stem trick, but..." Maria had seemed offended. She would've understood being unimpressed, confused, or uncomfortable, but offended? She wanted to understand why. Maybe just getting it out and addressing it would help them both feel less awkward.

"...was it, like, a sore subject or something? Or maybe have you had to deal with a lot of lame come-ons tonight or something?" Ax asked.