Xaviers!

After getting coffee, Onyx leads Nailah to the gym. Specifically, the boxing ring.

"You already seem very quick and agile," Onyx says as she climbs into the ring. "So, I thought we could work on giving you some real combat experience."

"Awesome, that sounds like a great idea." she nods and jumps straight into the ring with a couple flaps from her wings.

"I thought you would like it," Onyx says. She smiles at Nailah. "The rules are you can not leave the ring."

Onyx reaches into her belt and draws a knife. She takes a fighting pose, "The exercise ends once you neutralize me."

And then Nailah's friend charges.

Nailah lets out a yelp and throws herself to the side, the knife's blade clipping some of the feathers of her wing. She lands in a roll that beings her to the edge of the ring in a crouch, giving her a second to try and come up with a strategy. She pulls herself up and into a sloppy defensive stance, waiting for Onyx to charge again and aiming to strike at the knife-wielding hand to hopefully deflect the blade to the side so she can move in closer.

Onyx pivots and thrusts at Nailah, moving fast with the knife aiming right at Nailah.

Nailah is fast, but she doesn't really know what she's doing. She strikes at Onyx' hand with her palm but only catches her forearm and is forced to let herself drop to the side to avoid being stabbed in the gut. As she goes down she tries to sweep her legs at the back of Onyx' knees. She has the right ideas, but the execution is sloppy and a little bit panicked.

Nailah manages to catch Onyx and trip her. The girl rolls forward, nearly hitting the ropes, before getting her feet under her and pivoting back towards Nailah, slashing in the air as she turns.

Nailah isn't really fast enough to keep up with that, so she's only halfway to her feet when Onyx slashes at her. She let's out an undignified yelp and stumbles over backwards.

Onyx springs at Nailah, bringing the knife down into the canvas of the ring at Nailah's side as holds herself over her friend.

"That was very good, ma'am," Onyx says, not even breathing hard. "You have excellent instincts."

Nailah on the other hand is breathing pretty heavily. "Felt like I was just scrambling a lot... You didn't tell me you were gonna pull a knife on me!" she says, lightly hitting Onyx in the shoulder with one hand.

"I told you it would be a practical exercise," Onyx says, she smiles faintly though. "Weapons are a likely possibility."

She stands up and offers Nailah her hand, "Knives are difficult to defend against. Even if you disarm your opponent, you are likely to get cut in the process. You have to learn not to be afraid of the knife if you want to succeed."

"Despite the fact that you'll probably get cut?" she asks as she accepts Onyx' hand pulling her up.

"You will get cut and it will hurt," Onyx says. "But being afraid of getting cut will kill you faster than trying to avoid getting cut."

"Do not watch the knife. Watch me. Watch where I am looking, where I am moving," Onyx says. She gets back into a fighting stance with the knife.

"I will not hold back this time," Onyx says.

And then she charges again, rushing forward and thrusting forward in one smooth, quick motion.

Nailah, once again, instinctually tries to evade the knife altogether, jumping to the side and trying to grab Onyx' shoulder to use her momentum to push her into the side of the ring.

Nailah get's a hold of Onyx easy enough, but as she tries to push her friend into the ropes, Onyx brings her knee up into Nailah's gut.

That's not how that was supposed to go! Nailah stumbles backwards, trying to catch her breath despite the pain radiating through her abdomen.

Onyx felt bad for Nailah, but didn't let up! You had to learn to fight through the pain. She swipes at Nailah again with the knife, pressing her advantage.

Nailah is still trying to pull herself together when Onyx is already coming at her, swinging a knife. She doesn't really have much time to come up with a good plan, instead just letting out a scream as she closes her eyes.

I don't want to get stabbed! it shoots through her mind and the next second it's almost as if her body is moving on it's own. Step one, step into her and duck. Next step, twist around and grab her wrist. Step three, twist her arm down. Before she knows what happened she's stepped underneath the attack into Onyx' space, grabbed the girls wrist and sent her flying by pulling her arm down in just the right direction.

A very relieved Onyx is thrown and hits the canvas hard. She was glad that worked. She had not wanted to cut Nailah and was not entirely sure what she would have done if she had actually hurt her.

"Good job," Onyx says, sitting up.

Nailah blinks and looks at Onyx.

"What just happened!?"

"You stopped getting in your own way," Onyx says. "You are much faster that way."

"No it was... like... like I just knew what to do, what was gonna happen..."

"I do not know about that," Onyx says. "But it was an excellent counter-attack. We may be able to start more advanced scenarios earlier than I thought."

"But I don't know how I did it!"

"That is why you need to practice more. ma'am," Onyx says, retrieving the knife.

"Man, this is really hard." she says, wrapping her arms around her stomach.

"Yes," Onyx agrees. "And it will only get harder, ma'am."

"Are you injured?"

"I don't think so." she says, standing up a little straighter. She kind of regrets complaining now, not wanting Onyx to think she's a wimp. "Okay, let's go again."

Onyx smiles, "As you wish, ma'am."

She takes up a stance and charges again, repeating the same movements as before.

This time Nailah at least has a rough idea of what she could do and she tries to weave past the knife right away to get all up in Onyx' space, using one hand to try and deflect the knife-wielding hand. She doesn't entirely manage and nicks the side of her hand on the blade, but she manages to punch Onyx' wrist away anyway. From there she's not really sure what to do so she just ends up body-checking into Onyx.

The hit pushes Onyx back a bit, but she's surprisingly solid for her size. Onyx grabs Nailah's shoulder with one hand and tries to throw her off balance.

Balance is one thing Nailah's naturally good at. Her tail whips around to help keep her stable as she grabs Onyx' wrist of the knife-wielding hand with both hands, trying to make the two of them trip so she can try to fall onto Onyx' hand and knock the knife free.

Nailah is successful and she pulls Onyx into a tumbling fall as the knife is knocked free.

Nailah tries to scramble to her feet so she can get to where the knife slid and kick it out of the ring. She's probably disregarding Onyx in her back a little too much.

Which is why Onyx tackles Nailah from behind! Sneak attack!

Nailah goes down, Onyx' weight knocking the air out of her as she hits the ground. At least the knife skittered away from the two.

"Good work," Onyx says, holding Nailah down. "But this is why you should watch the opponent and not the weapon."

Nailah groans at her own mistake and tries to squirm out from under Onyx to little avail. She does slap Onyx in the face with her wings though.

The hit surprises Onyx and she falls backwards, her mask falling off her face.

"Ah!" Onyx says, covering her eyes with her hand.

Nailah scrambles to her feet and turns around triumphantly before making a surprised noise at the mask on the floor. "Oh my god, I'm so sorry!"