Colors of Remnant

Citrine had decided that Professor Whatsherface could kiss her ass. She wanted to test out her newly fixed brake, the courtyard and boulevard were the best place to do it. She could get another detention for all she cared. So that was where Citrine found herself that afternoon, speeding up and down the strip with a cackle, her white ponytail whipping out behind her. She was running through several uses of her back brake, how it felt with emergency stops, how it felt around sharp corners, how it felt with speed adjustment, making sure everything was working as it should.

Citrine rode up one of the pillars that encircled the courtyard, before steering her bike to run perfectly sideways, parallel to the ground, along the inner vertical side of the circular structure. At one point, she paused in her path, halting and locking her bike. She maneuvered off the vehicle to stand on on the side of it, using it as a platform and jumping up and down a little as she tested the resistance. A problem with brakes meant a problem with gravity dust, and she needed to make sure the gravity defying features pf Ex-Machina were in proper condition. When the bike refused to budge from its parked state, sticking to the side of the structure rather than falling to the ground, Citrine gave a satisfied nod and remounted.

In a flash of green, Citrine and her bike disappeared from the structure, returning to the ground.

“Yeah I knew you’d be back to perfect in no time,” She said to her bike, patting the front of it like she was petting a dog. Pleased with the results she was getting, Citrine sped off down the boulevard again, running laps up and down the paved stretch, practicing a couple tricks as she did so. The boulevard would be an excellent runway, she thought, an idea coming to mind. With a smirk, she gunned the engine, racing down avenue towards the end where airships usually docked against the cliff. She reversed the direction of the gravity dust in her wheels as she reached the cliff’s edge, so that rather than sticking to the cliff face she flew off it. She let herself fall for a second before cranking a lever located near her handlebars. The clicking and clanking of mechanical parts shifting briefly filled the air as the wheels of Ex-Machina split apart, flipping upwards on mechanical arms and starting to rotate at rapid speeds, catching the bike in its fall.

Citrine let out a soft huff of relief at the bike hovered, she hadn’t been sure it would actually work. Letting out a shaky laugh, Citrine guided her bike back towards the top of the cliff, dismounting so she could stand on the seat. It was easier to glitch while standing, and if worse came to worse she would need to be able to get back up to the cliff safely.

Steadily, Citrine and her bike rose above the edge of the cliff, most of Citrine’s focus directed towards keeping her balance as the bike wavered in the air. She directed the bike forward until it was hovering over solid ground once more.

“There we go…. good girl….” she muttered quietly, addressing her bike as it touched down, the wheels retracting back into their proper form. “Perfect.” She grinned at the successful landing.

The only thing that kept her trip back from the city from being insufferably boring had been the upbeat music playing in her wireless earbuds, up until the tail end of the trip when Beacon Tower in all its magnificence was in view. It was all the usual public transit stuff as the ship steadily made its way to the skyway. Ax was eager to get up and walk around again when there was a sudden stir of activity on one side of the ship, followed by an unexpected lurch as the airship detoured off its normal docking path.

Well, it happened sometimes. At first, Ax wasn't going to get up or investigate. Then she picked up something from a little crowd that gathered near one of the massive ship windows. Concern, maybe? Fear? Whatever it was, it got Ax to move. She hopped up from her spot and meandered over to the windows to see what people were gawking at.

"She's gonna go over the edge!"

"Oh no! I can't look!"

The subject of the fear, it seemed, was a white-haired girl driving her motorcycle in a straight line for the edge of the dock. Ax's eyes narrowed as she took in the stunt that followed. There were gasps of relief and shock alike when the incident seemed to more or less work itself out - the bike had some kind of hover configuration. Ax would've probably been impressed if not for all the other factors that went into this. The hell was anyone doing driving around out on the skyway? Talk about reckless.

Citrine's little stunt had apparently startled the ship pilot. They had to pull around in a circle before they docked and Ax finally got to touch down on the ground again. There were a lot of eyes directed over at Citrine in the wake of her little stunt, but no one actually approached her or talked to her. Instead it was all hushed whispers and quiet judgment. Ax had a half-mind to simply let it go, too, but when she caught sight of the girl out there looking so proud with that big grin on her lips, Ax figured she probably had no idea that she'd even startled or inconvenienced anyone.

She pulled her earbuds out and stashed them in her pocket as she approached, raising a hand and slipping a chrome thumb under the strap of her guitar case.

"Should think twice before you pull a stunt like that. After all, you've got so much to live for. Folks on the ship were about to call a crisis center for you," Ax deadpanned.

Humans, man. They could get away with anything. She glanced over her shoulder and back towards Beacon Tower. Were faculty on the way? She couldn't imagine something like this going unnoticed for long.

Citrine had been too focused on landing Ex-Machina to notice the incoming aircraft at first, but as soon as the shadow of the descending ship crossed over her, and the noise reach her ears, a bolt of panic flashed through her. Okay maybe driving around on landing strips wasn’t a good idea. She disappeared in a flicker of green light as she Glitched out of the way, reemerging a safe distance down the boulevard with Ex-Machina materializing beside her. Okay, crisis averted, but damn that hadn’t been fun. Avoiding attacks and falling debris was her specialty in combat, but being caught off guard was certainly an adrenaline inducing incident, and not the good kind of adrenaline either.

Citrine quickly swallowed her momentary fear under her signature crooked, cocky grin. Maybe whoever was arriving had seen her little show. Maybe it was more students! She hadn’t thought there were any new students moving in today, but it could be upperclassmen, she reasoned, it wouldn’t be abnormal for them to come back a little after the lower years had had a chance to settled in.

As the airship doors opened—revealing Citrine’s assumptions to be true—Citrine flashed a bright grin and rock signs to the arriving group.

“Sorry ‘bout that!” She called the approaching cluster of starting students with a light laugh, toying with her ponytail. “Didn’t think anyone would be coming in today!” Her smile dropped a little when the crowd seemed to more or less ignore her. Rude. Citrine barely suppressed a scoff and an eyeroll. Upperclassmen, always thinking they’re better than everyone else.

At the sound of someone speaking up, Citrine went through with an eye roll of mild annoyance before fixing her gaze on the source of the voice. “Relaxe,” she sighed, her voice mildly exasperated but still tinted with playfulness. “I knew what I was doing, I had a back up plan too. See?” She Glitched a few feet to the side, then towards the girl who had spoken, then back to her bike. “I don’t have to worry about falling!” She gave another side, lopsided grin, this time accompanied with a quick peace sign, as if to assure the girl that everything was alright. She decided not to mention that even with her semblance, falling could still have disastrous side effects if she build up too much momentum before Glitching.

Citrine leaned against her bike, her eyes drifting over the girl who had approached her. This girl probably thought she was all that, didn’t she? People with leather jackets always thought they were so damn cool. The phrase ’you gonna go tattle on me now or what?’ was on her lips, ready to fire, before her attention was captured by the girl’s bright pink tail feathers. Immediately any scorn or judgment she had for the girl dissolved into fascination.

“You have a tail? That’s so cool!” As she spoke, she Glitched back over to the girl to get a closer look at her feathers. Before she could launch into a tangent about how cool flashy faunus traits were, she remembered what that other faunus chick had said a few days prior and quickly backed down, stepping back to her bike. “I mean uh- like- they look cool...and…. yeah-” She gave an open hand shrug. Her gaze darted around for a suitable change of topic, locking onto the girl’s metal arm. She bet it had a whole interesting story behind it! How did it work? Did it have any cool features? Asher was more focused in auto mechanics, so Citrine hadn’t worked on any mechanical limbs before. Could it feel things? Could it shoot shot gun blasts?

“How’d you lose the arm?” That was probably insensitive. If Rosalie were here she’d definitely scold her for that. But how could she not ask? Missing limbs usually had cool stories behind them when it came to huntsmen and huntresses. Citrine had always thought it would be cool to have a mechanical limb. If she had one she would definitely deck it out with lots of cool extra features. Like a shot gun. If it wasn’t for her beautiful Ex-Machina, she probably would have made some type of arm canons as a weapon instead of her machine gun sword.

Citrine noticed the girl glance towards Beacon Tower. Great. She was probably thinking of getting a professor. Citrine really didn’t want to deal with Professor Bluehairwhatever at the moment.

“Oh c’mon,” she sighed, “I was just messing around! There’s no need to go rat to some teach ‘bout it.” Maybe she could convince this girl to just let it go. “I didn’t mean ta get in the way of your airship, I was just taking Ex-Machina for a test drive ‘cause I just fixed her brakes! She gestured to her bike as she spoke, neglecting to mention that she could just have easily tested her bike’s brakes in a a training room.

Ax watched with a blank expression at Citrine's little display of her semblance. She could only imagine what kind of absurd, irritating invulnerability complex a semblance like that probably gave someone. It seemed to fit the personality of the girl, though, so there was that. Her lips twitched into a frown at the clear, evident interest in her tail feathers, and the frown didn't fade even as the girl backtracked and moved on to the next thing - her metal arm. Under a lot of circumstances, Ax would've gladly launched into a monologue about it. She liked to think she wasn't particularly sensitive about her new metal appendage... but this whole exchange was thoroughly ruffling her feathers. Ax raised her hands in a gesture resembling surrender as soon as Citrine caught her meaningful glance back at the tower.

"Stars, what kind of fucking narc do you take me for? As if I need to get anyone involved. Someone's probably on their way to get on your case literally as we speak," Ax huffed. She really didn't need to get involved. The smart play here was to just... walk away. Walk away before someone came by and got the impression that they were somehow associated with one another. Ax had enough headaches to deal with around this school as it was.

At the same time, though, she knew a thing or two herself about getting in trouble with the faculty. She knew how shitty it could be, getting singled out and targeted when you weren't really hurting anyone. Plus, it wasn't like Citrine was exactly radiating malcontent or ill-intent. Maybe she just didn't have good social skills?

"If I were you, I'd be getting out of here. Stash the bike in the garage, you know... ditch the scene of the crime?" Ax suggested. She looked back and along one of the pathways beyond meaningfully, raising her eyebrows. It was probably a bad idea to even consider helping this chick, but Ax had a hard time passing up a chance to chat up a girl. Any girl, even.

Citrine laughed at the bird girl’s words, nodding in agreement. “Yeah that blue haired professor will probably be on my ass if she catches me out here again. I already got detention from her once cause of it, doubt she’d be happy I’m out here again.” She glanced back towards the tower briefly, as though expecting Professor Monarch to come storming out right at that moment. “We ain’t on awful terms I think but I don’t think me being out here would help anything.” It would almost sound, for a moment, like Citrine was considering leaving. But then, in true Citrine fashion, she shrugged and re-straddled her bike. “Well if she catches me I’ll just say I don’t know ya and you won’t have to worry ‘bout anything. What’s a little detention anyways?” She flashed another bright grin.

She noted that the girl hadn’t responded to any of her questions. Rude. She fished a lime flavored lollipop from her coat pocket, unwrapping it and sticking it in her mouth.

“I got more if you want one,” she offered, still making an attempt to be friendly even if this girl clearly wasn’t interested. She looked through her various pockets some more. “I also got, uh… a couple cigs...some rocks…some bullet casings….and...uh...a small wrench. You can’t have my rocks though, I found them first, they’re mine.”

She stopped searching through her pockets, and leaned forward so her arms rested against the handlebars of her bike. She seemed to consider the girl’s words briefly before shrugging once more.

“Nah I got a few more things I gotta test first. So far no one’s come told me to leave so I ain’t got a reason to. And you don’t count ‘cause you’re not a teacher.” She pointed her lollipop at the girl, squinting in suspicion. “Unless you secretly are and this is just a fancy ploy to get me in trouble again.” She then laughed, taking her own words as a joke, as she sat up properly, a crooked smirk on her face.

“Oh, I don’t keep Ex-Machina in the garage,” she said. “She’s my weapon, so I keep her parked on the wall outside my room.” If this upperclassman had seen enough of Citrine’s test run, then she’d know how Ex-Machina acted with vertical surfaces. Citrine supplied an explanation anyways, just in case she hadn’t seen that part. “Ex-Machina’s got gravity dust in the wheels, so it can stick to vertical and upside down surfaces. So I can just park it outside my window then Glitch into my room.”

Citrine sucked on her lollipop for a minute, as though in thought, before speaking up again. “That case, does it hold your weapon in it?” She gestured to the guitar case on the girl’s back. As far as Citrine figured, the guitar shape of the case was probably a decoy to keep people from seeing or stealing her weapon. It was a pretty smart idea, she thought, and a good way to go undetected. She wouldn’t be able to achieve something like that with Verenium Strýchnos, not if she was rising around her bike, at least.

Ax couldn't help but gently shake her head, clicking her tongue in a soft 'tsk' at what she was hearing. So she was looking at a habitual offender, here. That was another point against getting involved, but by this point Ax had already committed to at least hearing the chick out.

"I mean... if you want to hang out in detention and rack up offenses that could get you kicked out, suspended or something, be my guest," Ax spoke up, her tone clearly disapproving. This girl wasn't the first of her type that Ax had met, and she probably wouldn't be the last. It was always pretty grating to meet people who acted like they didn't take their position seriously here at the academy. This chick 100% came off like she didn't give a damn about who she inconvenienced with her decisions, and she also didn't seem to give a damn about punishment. It really rubbed Ax the wrong way.

She rose a brow at what she interpreted as some kind of peace offering. The gesture didn't go unrecognized, but she rose a hand to decline nevertheless. Her eyebrows furrowed and her gaze turned a bit more sharp at the backhanded accusation that came her way soon after. Damn, this chick was abrasive. Ax hadn't wanted to punch someone like this in a while, but this girl clearly needed some sense knocked into her. She flexed her fingers and balled them up into fists.

"I'm... good," Ax said with obvious, terse restraint. She shot an anxious glance back at the tower as this girl started to go on about some other thing. Ax normally wouldn't have taken issue with talking shop or anything with anyone, but she was growing a little concerned about being seen with this girl. Ax wasn't willing to report her, and since she was a faunus and disciplinary figures in general seemed to love having an excuse to punish her, hanging out here probably would equate to her being an accomplice or something. Ax's sharp blue eyes flicked back to Citrine in time to answer her question.

"Yeah? Why? Look, I'd love to fill you in, play twenty questions with you or whatever, but I'm not here to fuck around. I get your thing now, and I've seen it before. You think you're being cool and rebellious or whatever but I'm not getting mixed up with whatever rebel-without-a-cause bullshit you've got going on."

Ax thumbed over her shoulder.

"I'm leaving. You're welcome to come with me, if you happen to wise up and decide you've got better things to do besides hanging out with old people and idiots in detention."

“Psshh, they’re not gonna kick me out,” Citrine said confidently. “I know how to play my cards,” she assured, “I know how to keep a balance.” Clearly the bird chick didn’t buy it. Citrine just rolled her eyes with a ’tch’. Upperclassmen, she thought bitterly, always acting like they knew everything. As if this random girl knew anything about her! She wouldn’t get expelled for getting detention, she’d been managing her detention levels to keep herself out of major trouble for years! How would here be any different?

Citrine felt further sparks of annoyance and frustration flash through her at the girl’s comments. God this girl clearly had some type of stick up her ass if she couldn’t even handle a little bike riding. Rebel without a cause? Citrine scoffed at the title.

“Oh says you,” she muttered with a roll of her eyes, her arms crossing over her chest. How could this girl be making such a big deal out of a little rule breaking when she herself looked like she’d just walked out of some punk clothing store. What a hypocrite. Seriously, if this girl was going to judge Citrine after no more than a few minutes of talking, then Citrine had no problem doing the same.

Citrine raised an eyebrow at the invitation. “Uh yeah no,” she said, her words clipped. With that, she settled herself back on her bike, revved her engine, and sped off. She took to the edge of the cliff once more, this time keeping the gravity dust features engaged so that rather than flying off, she simply drove down the cliff face to the docks, the dust adhering to the vertical surface. As she drove, she pulled her headphones on, blasting music through them. That had been….a rather frustrating encounter. This was exactly why she hated upperclassmen. She made a silent vow to herself that she would never be so atrociously formal and uptight when she was older.