Chapter 9: The Scary Girl and the White Album

It was a mild, sunny Saturday afternoon. Maria was relaxing (or attempting to) in the school park, laying down on a bench staring at the sky and letting her mind wander. She glanced down at the small pink notebook that was laying on her chest.

"Oh, yeah," She moaned, sitting up and flicking through it to the most recent page. At the top of the page, the words "Road to Victory!" were written in elegant calligraphy, in direct contrast to the various crudely constructed drawings of her and Akame around the margins.

No matter how she looked at it, the prospect of fighting Akame in the tournament was terrifying to Maria, and all of her efforts thus far to alleviate her anxiety had returned no results except for this blank page. It was meant to be filled with strategies or counters or anything like that, but since she got a taste of Akame's malefic aura that one morning all she knew about Akame was how small Maria felt in her presence. She slumped down on her bench and looked around the field. It looked like Kito was jogging along the gravel path, but there was nothing else around. Maria had a realisation.

"Hey, Kito! Wait!" She called, scooping up her notebook and pencil in one hand and running after him. He didn't seem to take any notice of her, was he ignoring her? She began to run faster, but Kito stayed a good way ahead of her. She had no idea he was this fast.

"W-wait up…" She panted, and with a last burst of speed, she just about grazed his hoodie with her outstretched hand before tripping on a rock and tumbling to the ground.

"Did someone say something?" Kito said, pulling out his headphones. He turned to see Maria lying on the floor, gently groaning. "Um, are you alright?" Kito held a hand out for her.

"Yeah, im fine," Maria said, getting to her feet. About halfway up, she began to stumble again, falling to her side. Kito managed to prop her up with his hands at the last moment.

"Are you sure?"

"Y-yeah, I just stood up too fast is all." Maria pulled away from Kito.

"Well, was there something you wanted?" He asked.

"Actually, I was wondering… um, weren't you paired with Akame for the 2v2 thing on Monday?"

"Yeah, why?" Kito said, running some fingers through his silvery hair. Maria flicked open her notebook and prepared a pencil.

"Oh good, can you tell me everything you know about her?"

"Well, shes got white hair, I guess? She's really quiet?"

Maria glowered at Kito.

"Ok, I'll be honest, that girl is weird, and she scares me. Last night I saw her put like, 3 sugar sachets into her water and when I walked past her dorm room once after I got lost going to the bathroom I think I heard her chanting? The point is I'm trying to steer clear,"

"Yeah, thanks anyway," Maria sighed, slumping away. She put the miniscule amount of information she managed to extract down into her notebook in case it became useful at some point.

"Now that I think about it though," Kito began. Maria's face lit up. "I did see a bit of her quirk during the apprehension test on the first day,"

"What did she do?"

"I only caught the end, but it looked like she cut one of the silver robot villains from the second phase right in half with some kind of like, purple blade? The details are fuzzy, but I distinctly remember the death stare I got when I was standing there staring at her,"

"That's something!" Maria thought. she was ecstatic. She gave Kito a quick hug and scampered away.

"Thank you!"

"You're, uh, welcome I guess." Kito went back to his jogging.

As she walked back over to her bench, she opened her notebook and wrote in big letters in the middle of the page "PURPLE BLADE" and began brainstorming, putting down ideas in a mind map diagram as she went.

"Shadow… manipulation?" Maria pondered. "Nah, that's dumb." She began scribbling it out. Maria looked up from her notebook to see Ritsuo in the bench she had been sitting in.

"Oh, hey Ritz,"

"Is that what I'm called now?" Ritsuo asked teasingly.

"Mhmm," Maria smiled, sitting down next to him. "Watcha reading?"

"Oh, its just a couple of assorted Japanese folk tales," Ritsuo said, showing her the cover. "Hey, don't you have that development workshop thing with Sayama sensei right now?"

"Oh, crap," Maria thought. "I've, uh, got to go now. I'll see you later though." Maria darted off towards the school, Ritsuo gave her a light wave goodbye and then went back to his book.

Maria hurriedly made her way down the hallway to the gym where Sayama was waiting. She climbed the staircase and went through the automatic doors, the same way she went when she did the pacer test. As she made her way down the hall, she heard a muttered conversation on the other side of the gym door, it sounded like Sayama was talking to a student. She placed one ear on the door and listened in.

"That quirk is certainly one of the stronger ones I've seen so far, but you're unstable. You need to reign yourself in if you want to see success as a hero,"

"Right," an eerily familiar voice muttered.

"Oh, and good job on the special move. You really took what I said to heart. You're dismissed,"

Maria pulled back from the door, not wanting to be caught snooping. The door began to creak open and Maria tried her best to look innocent as the student stepped out. It was Akame, dressed in the school exercise uniform and looking down at Maria disdainfully. Akame pushed her out of the way with a shoulder as she made her way to her locker.

"H-hey, Akame,"

Akame turned to look at Maria.

"Good luck in the tournament." Maria gave Akame a slightly shaky thumbs up. Akame paused for a moment.

"Yeah, you too," She grumbled insincerely.

Maria turned and made her way through the door into the gym. It was the same room where she had done the pacer test, but the marks on the concrete floor had been scuffed severely and there were indeterminate marks all over the walls that Maria deduced were burn marks of some kind. Sayama was standing in the middle of the room in his hero uniform with his arms crossed and a stern look on his face. He was covered in various cuts and burns and even a couple of bruises, they looked fresh.

"what happened to you?" Maria asked. Sayama looked confused.

"What, these little love marks? I wouldn't worry about them,"

Maria was worried about them. More specifically the possibility that they were Akame'es doing. She tried to put the invasive thought to the back of her mind, but it eventually bubbled out.

"Was it Akame? Did you see her quirk?" Maria questioned a little more desperately than she intended to.

"Why do you care?" Sayama began to wrap his hands.

"Well, I was just trying to gather some information on her for when we fight…" Maira said sheepishly, tapping her fingers together.

"Well, that seems a very intelligent thing to do, may I see that book?"

"If you want." Maria handed it over to Sayama, who went through it contemplatively.

"It is very intelligent…" he deliberated.

"Can I have that back now?" Maria reached out to grab the book from him. He slammed it shut in his hand and held it aloft, out of her reach.

"But there's not much honour in it," He spat in a chastising manner.

"Hey! Give that back!" Maria yelped.

"How's this for a first exercise? You can have this book back when you can take it from my hands,"

Maria leapt straight for the book, and Sayama whipped it away at the very last moment. "I'll take that as a yes!" He boomed, enthusiasm brimming from his voice. He disappeared in a burst of speed, reappearing right behind Maira. By the time Maria had turned around he was behind her again. She peered around frantically, Sayama appearing around her only as a faint blur. Maria was struck seemingly from multiple angles at once, and every time she turned there was always one at her back. She went to the ground.

"Come now Maria, haven't you taken anything I've said into consideration?" Sayama cried

"TIGER FANG KICK," he roared, striking Maria in the stomach and throwing her onto her back. Maria grunted, gritting her teeth. She stood up slowly and Sayama began to speed around again. His afterimages appeared in a ring all around Maria, kicking up a light wind and leaving scuff marks all over the gym floor accompanied by the sound of scraping claws. She leapt outward towards Sayama blindly, again and again, each time failing to connect with anything except for the occasional fist.

"I'm warning you, girl. My 'Tiger Tornado' has been the undoing of many a would-be villain,"

Maria cried out, making one last leap at Sayama, but she stopped halfway. She landed on one foot, pivoting outwards to where Sayama would be coming from. and launched herself with her other foot. And then, through sheer luck or force of will, she connected right around his upper chest, grappling him around the neck. Her tackle sent Sayama staggering backwards a few steps.

"Very impressive, but you aren't—"

"White Album," Maria whispered dramatically. Sayama grinned, but before he could do anything Maria took two fingers and placed them in her mouth. She whistled right into his ear, one long continuous and deafening note which pierced painfully right through Sayama, into his brain. He threw her off and began fumbling around almost drunkenly. The world appeared to be shaking around him and his body didn't follow any of his commands. Then Maria hit him, a right straight directly into his liver with as much force as she could muster. He coughed as he stepped backwards, accidentally stomping heavily on his own tail. A shiver came across his entire body and he fell backwards onto the matt. Maria fetched the notebook from his open palm.

"W-was that your quirks doing?" Sayama mumbled. Maria nodded gladly.

"It's a rather impressive ability. I felt like I'd been flashbanged." Sayama began to rub his chin. "That's some killer move," He mused.

About an hour passed. After Sayama had recovered from the effects of Maria's move, he began to drill her in some combat techniques. She wasn't learning anything particularly complex, but Sayama was perhaps a little more brutal than he should've been. By the time they were done, Maria was bruised lightly and sweating all over. Maria was just about to leave when Sayama called her over.

"What is it Mr Sayama?"

"Well, you wanted to know about that Akame girl didn't you? I've read her file, there are a few things I can tell you,"

Maria beamed with excitement, pulling out her notebook.

CHARACTER REPORT

Aspiring hero name: Liquid Lightning

Full name: Akame Rei

Age: 15

Quirk: Liquid Lightning

Akame can transmute atmospheric carbon into a material unique to her. It is plain white and almost weightless. Her quirk also allows her to control the material freely and fully. She can alter the temperature of this material at will, essentially giving her control of its physical state as well. She can heat it into a plasma for heat-related attacks or solidify it into a durable purple ice-like material. Putting energy into heating it up as well as cooling it down drains Akame's stamina.

Misc skill: Cooking, essay writing, speed drawing.

Statistics:

Power: A

Speed: B

Durability: A

Tactics: C

Quirk: A

Maria wrote every little detail in her notebook feverishly. After Sayama had finished, she looked down at what had been written, studying it carefully. She sighed, it appeared countering wouldn't be as easy as she thought.

A/N

A slightly shorter chapter here. More of an interlude before the tournament thing starts. Some details that would be useful to have before the fights and some character introductions/developments I suppose?

I hope you enjoyed nonetheless, and please tell me what you think in a review or a PM or whatever, I always like hearing from people after all.