A Reversal of Reticence [Milk]

@"King"

Murphy glared up at the sun from the ever shrinking shade of one of the tall trees that outlined the courtyard. It wasn't that he blamed the sun for shining, nor did he blame the weather for not providing any eye-sparing cloud cover, but after a total of 6 hours of sleep over the past three days he was sure as hell going to be annoyed at something. He took another drag from his cigarette andwatched the students flooding by as the bell rang, releasing them for the afternoon. If his intelligence was right, Milk should be passing through here any moment now like clockwork.

The woman had been a constant anomaly in his life in the short time he'd been at the school. On his first day here she'd been the one to show him around which had lead her to physically carry him to the infirmary after he'd... well what he'd done wasn't important. Though after a minor altercation regarding weaponry he'd made the mistake of saying something that was counter to something that she held as a core belief. He didn't know what happened to cause the reaction, but there had been a fire burning behind those big, brown eyes of hers; a complete change from her usual monotonous countenance and voice. What had escalated the situation from surprising to scary had been what happened to her body concurrently. He understood that her power was something to do with strength and by her name, probably bones, but something had writhed and bubbled just beneath her skin when she lost her temper. Something that made her seem horrible and inhuman.

Despite his best attempts to let it go, the encounter still bothered him. Every time he closed his eyes or tried to sleep, he was haunted by that single intense moment of rage burning in her eyes and the angry twisting of muscle and bone beneath her dusky skin. For anybody else he would have simply walked away from the situation and let them be, but something kept nagging him about Milk in particular. Her entire being ran contrary to his. She was strong, he was weak. She was a bastion of calm until she exploded into a ball of fury, whereas he wore his emotions on his sleeve and put on the breaks when things went wrong. She was brutally honest and he was, well, not. She was a rock in the river of chaos that was his life. Hopefully the few days that had passed would be sufficient time for her to forgive him... hopefully.

@"King"

Murphy watched as Milk corrected the other student and tried to wave her down as she headed towards the forest but she was already too far away. He began to jog after her, and quickly realized that she was gaining speed far faster than him. "Of course she's going to go train right after class, well, let's see if I can keep up with her..." he grumbled to himself and broke into a dead sprint. He was not a well built man, and it was doubtful that he could sustain the speed for long, but years of having to dodge reckless drivers, things falling from windowsills and various other accidental projectiles had given him a fairly impressive acceleration rate and reflexes.

She on the other hand, had been practicing and training her whole life, if the files were anything to go by. If she decided to start her run at top speed there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell he'd catch her. "Hooooooooooy!" he yelled as he slowly began to close the gap, hoping to grab her attention.

@"King"

When Milk suddenly stopped and spun towards him Murphy had panicked, he'd half expected to see the same hateful flame burning behind them and had tried to immediately stop himself. Instead of the graceful braking she'd managed, Murphy simply caught his foot in a tangled root and crashed face first onto the forest floor, skidding a couple of feet before coming to a stop.

Christ, ow. He let out a grunt of pain as he pushed himself to his knees and into a cross legged position and panted heavily, trying to catch his breath. The injuries didn't appear to be anything serious; a couple of cuts on his face and hands, his cheek was starting to swell a bit, and he might have twisted his ankle...hopefully nothing that he couldn't recover from in a couple of days.

"Mi....Milk... good afternoon." he gasped, trying to grin at the woman. "I...was hoping you...had a sec....to talk." Damn, he was more out of shape than he thought. Maybe he should start cutting back on the cigarettes.

@"King"

Her phrasing caused Murphy to cough violently, trying to cover his laughter. "I....alright... I think I'm fine." he clambered to his feet with the help of a nearby tree and brushed himself off quickly. "It's..." he was going to say really important, but Milk took her training seriously, it wouldn't help matters if he insulted her by insinuating that it wasn't as important as well. "It's about a couple of days ago, I said some things that overstepped the boundaries of our relationship and I'd like to discuss them. Er, maybe if I train with you?"

He wasn't sure what caused him to add that. There was no fucking way he'd survive half of what Milk did daily, hell, most humans wouldn't. But he didn't want to let this sit any longer than it already had... and he doubted he could go too much longer with scant amounts of sleep. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound.

@"King"

Her doubt stung his pride, no matter how true it was that he'd probably not be able to take it. Still, if he didn't made concessions he doubted he'd be able to get a moment to actually talk with her. Well, what was the worst that could happen? He took a moment to think about that and sagged inwardly, well, at least he probably wouldn't die? His luck hadn't gotten that bad yet.

"Yes." He answered after a moment. "I'm not terribly strong, and you're right, I might not be able to handle training to the full extent you do... but unless I push myself as hard as you I'll never understand why you do it will I?" He finished dusting himself off and smiled. "Where do we start?"