Small Talk

"Uuuuuuggggggggggh....."

Rumi had her hands in her face as she gave a bit of a muffled scream. Not a loud one just a...., 'did this really happen' sort of one. The kind of scream you give to yourself in the mirror after a failed presentation or into a pillow after a dumb ass mistake on a date.

The pair were sitting on one of the rest benches in the room. She'd.. well she hadn't strangled him but she did kinda drag him to sit down on the bench while she stood to give him a bit of a harsh talking to. She had plopped down on the bench herself to let out that little frustrated cry before getting some more water from her bottle.

"Look, I... might have gotten a little worked up." She announced without looking at him as she kicked her feet out in front of her.

"You think? Look I... don't mean to like bring it up but you were kinda... working it." he was slowly choosing his words about this, "And while you seem pretty..., liberated I guess might be the word for it? Or Free Spirited is probably better. Still," he gave a weak chuckle, "I didn't think you'd do something like that. So when I walked in..."

"No no you're... kinda right." she gave him a weak wave of her hand, "Maybe Cupid did something to rile me up a bit but it's.... probably more myself. I mean," she gave a small shrug and smaller smile as she traced her hand over one of her legs, "I honestly wasn't expecting to be able to... do that again."

The air grew a little cold and the space between them seemed to increase, even though neither had moved. She didn't seem to want to take the initivie here. Which was a little weird considering how much she'd just plowed into everything thus far today. Seeing her looking a little down was, more worrying than anything.

Well..., he was used to rushing in a bit and doing something stupid.

"You wanna talk about it?" he offered.

"....maybe a bit."

Standing up with a stretch, Rumi walked around the gym floor. Cole got up and walked with her, just a bit out of range to give her respectable space. Their path lead them around the side of the boxing ring over towards the practice bags. Rotating her arm a bit, she threw a few quick punches into one not really putting in effort into the action. It just helped her think a bit than just stew in her thoughts.

"Before I got dragged here I was... kinda injured. Badly. Word is...., quadriplegic I think." she started as she focused on the bag.

"Spine?"

"More like my limbs got ripped off."

She could hear the flinch he made. Pretty sure he had braced for anything but news like that..., well not many could take hearing that without some sort of reaction. Gave him some points though for reacting like a human though.

She moved over to a standing bag and lightly threw a few punches at it, more focused this time around. It felt pretty good; both the bag and her arm. She was a bit worried about her limbs still but the feed back felt right. She hit it a few more times as a rhythm started to build. With a spin she brought her elbow around and slammed it into the bag before taking a pivot step and planting two high kicks into it.

Bringing her arms down into a 'relaxed' stance she give a bit of a laugh before spinning with a bounce back towards him.

"I lost them while doing what I wanted to do; being a hero. And it wasn't all at once, took two big fights to lose them. I don't regret doing that but..."

"So it's a bit weird that you got back something that you were so proud of, huh?"

"Something like that yeah." She gave a quick flash of a smile and a snap of her fingers, "Prosthetics would have let me live a non bed bound life but... dunno. How'd you feel if you lost your fists Mr Boxer?"

"....probably something similar." he brought a hand up to rub the back of his neck, "I can't blame you for... going a little overboard? Then again if I lost then gained my fists back I probably would just be warming up on a bag for a few hours to prove 'this is real' or something. So ... guess it makes sense what you were doing."

"I do enjoy having a body like this, both it's strength and well looking like this." She ran a hand from her thigh up to the tip of her ears before weakly pointing at him, "But just wanted to let you know I'm not gonna..., do that all the time we're together. Just... getting it out of my system now I guess. Tweaking my ass randomly isn't something I do every day."

"SO I hope you burnt that image in your head cause you're not getting it again." her eyes glint and her smile grew wide.

"Eh... fair enough." he shrugged as he offered a hand, his own grin widening, "That said if you want some alone time just... put up a sign or something?"

"Hahah what?" She gripped his hand hard and shook it up and down, "Like putting a sock on the door or something."

"Look if you wanna do that..."

"NO you jerk." she interjected and gave him a light jab in the shoulder. The smile never leaving her lips though.

He gave a grin back as he rubbed where he was 'hit'. It wasn't a hard hit, but he knew she could hit way harder from what he'd seen earlier. He motioned at the sandbag she had used moments ago, her eyes following him.

“Still for someone getting back into the swing of things.., that was a good hit. Felt that from sound alone.”

“Eh…" she shrugged as she walked over to the sandbag, "I’m still just warming up big guy. Lemme build up some steam first. Here watch this.” Rumi flashed a grin as she spun and put a few more thrusting kicks into the bag.

It swayed a bit as it recoiled from the impacts. In fact the fact it was till standing was pretty impressive just from how loud the hits were. He was pretty sure she could tear through a normal sand bag if she wanted to even just goofing off. But if that was the case, why give an entire gym set up for her? Wouldn't that cause problems when normal people used the equipment?

“Hmm," she paused her attack and took a step back as she rubbed a hand along her leg, "Was starting to build up steam there, surprised its still intact. It's probably built with my power in mind.”

“That's what I was thinking.” Cole muttered, his own fist clenching close a few times, "If that's the case we might need to move this stuff elsewhere. Last thing we need is for any customers to break their hand during training."

“Step up and try it then.” she extended her arms in a 'display' manner, reminding Cole of one of those tv game show girls, "Break your hand and you'll get a prize."

"And that would be?" he walked back to the bench they had sat on, grabbing the tape to wrap up.

"Hmm" she put a finger to her chin, tilting her head and eyes upward in thought, "Well you already saw me shake my ass..., should I care for you in a Nurse's outfit?"

The grin on her face made it clear she was messing with him..., and yet seeing her in one of those skimpy enticing cosplay Nurse outfits? He'd probably have a heart attack. And he wasn't entirely sure if she wouldn't do that just to have some fun with him anyway. She seemed like the type of gal to do that as a goof only to turn around and probably be rather caring if he did hurt himself.

Tapped up now and needing a way to clear his own head, Cole stepped up to bag. He rapped his knuckles against the bag a few times before settling into his stance. One two, one two, one two three; he spent time warming up with a few jabs before quickly stepping back to throw a huge charging straight into. The bag moved a bit but not as much as before

“Well?” Rumi asked as she leaned against another sandbag.

“Well it didn’t feel really sturdy or anything. Feels like a normal bag... kinda. Hard to describe, kinda like puching Jello or something." he said as he ran a hand against the bag.

It did feel weird, like some sort of gel was inside rather foam or other material. Part of his mind flashed back to Science class, something about a substance that gets harder in response to outside influences. Perhaps the bags were filled with something like that; soft enough for beginners but could get dense enough to handle Rumi's hits. If that was the case, she'd probably tear the bag itself apart before actually 'breaking' it.

“Maybe we can adjust the settings. They seem to have set us up to change things anyway, why not change the bags?” Rumi shrugged and spun away from the bag she used as support and went back to kicking.

“Maybe.”

He moved away from his own bag to watch her. It was..., enthralling to say the least. Rumi moved with mix of grace and **** he didn't think was possible. Even the showy spin kicks were done to help put more torque into her muscles like a rubber band and then quickly snap it out quickly or just SLAM the pent up energy into the bag. She clearly had a lot of years of practice in doing this and way more hands on experience in fighting than he did. All that in a tight, sweaty, bunny bod; she was really something out of a dream.

"Breeeeed..."

He blinked a few times as that thought came back to him, along with a quick image of her spreading her legs all to the sides to better show off her crotch. That was..., getting weird. Maybe he was he one that needed alone time. Needed something to distract him.

“… what style is that?” he asked.

“Eh, kinda use a mix along with my own tech.” She made a show of stretching out her leg (Which didn't help his current thoughts) before putting a few more quick kicks into a target. “If you gotta know; studied a couple different styles, mainly the ones involved kicks and legs.”

“So" she raised up a hand and started holding up fingers in time with her list, "there's some Muay Thai, Taekwondo, little Karate, good amount of Capoeira, a LOT of Kickboxing, and to wrap it all up…”

She instantly hopped into the air. To most people it would have been a full fledged jump but for her it just looked stupily easy. Her legs brought up close to her body reminding him a bit of a rabbit(fitting huh). Her legs shot out midway in her jump and wrapped around the sand bag, and before her whole body twisted hard. The bag shifted and spun with her, falling to the ground with a 'slam' as she rolled away to avoid having it fall on her.

“A good amount of Wrestling and CQC. Have to be able to take down thugs without kicking their head off.” she announeced, hands on her hips, chest thrust out and a big grin on her face.

“That makes a lot of sense..," he offered a small clap of his hands which made that grin widen a bit, "build towards what you’re good to the point of being stupidity strong and specialized in that style than trying to build up a weakness.”

“Yeah you get i-“ She took a moment to process what he had said before her eyebrows narrowed downward and the grin started to flip, “Wait what did you say about a weakness?”

“Well I mean…" the words started to come out on reflex before he could really think about it, "your punches were kinda bad.”

“Excuse me?!?!?”

Cole wasn’t ready for her to be in his face, veins starting to pulse. Her gaze was intense and her brow furrowed, and for a 'human/rabbit' those teeth were looking pretty sharp. He didn't think she'd be this mad but then again he didn't think when he replied either, it just came out. Part of him supposed it was just a sign of how comfy he was starting to be around her, already thinking of her as a gym mate or something.

“I mean compared to your kicks!” He said pulling up his hands in defense, “It’s clear most your power is in your legs and kicks; Those were like artwork. Compared to that your punches seem lacking but only cause of the gulf between them.”

She pursed her lips as she chewed it over. He was making a bet on trying to butter up her good attribute, something she had a lot of pride in, to the point that anything else she did was 'bad' only due to the comparison. He'd done it a few times in the gym, talk up someone's foot work over their ability to block. Usually it worked. Eventually she blew out some air from her nose in a huff but her features softened. On a spin, she turned and took a step back, letting him breath a bit.

“Well if you think so highly of my legs, guess that makes sense you’d say it that way. But don’t get it wrong I can still kickyour ass with fists.” She bobbed up and down a bit and threw out a few jabs off to the side.

“I’d also think there’s a difference between throwing a boxing punch and a blow from one of those martial arts you studied. So maybe just ignorant here.” He said trying to keep her calm.

Again with speed he wasn't expecting, Rumi was up next to him, poking a finger in his side and that wicked grin on her face and a glint in her eyes.

“Would yah like me to teach you then?”

Hoo boy…