[Open] Stillness, Rapid, End.

No sooner had the mechanical locks tolled closed once more, than could the training hall's new arrival be heard making her noisome way towards the hastily dressing faunus. Preceding her arrival was a dull, throbbing pulse of heavy bass line which, though somewhat muffled, crossed the intervening distance with little difficulty. Following close behind the rhythmic beat, there came a softer and decidedly less sonorous assortment of sounds. Quiet mechanical clicks, the whirring whisper of small motors, and sibilant hisses. Worst of all, there was the singing, if the sequence of atonal and pitched notes and half mumbled, entirely mangled words could be called such.

Aegle loped lightly into the hall but a few spare moments after her horrendous singing voice had made its own debut. She carried, looped over one shoulder, a duffel bag near as long as she tall, one which dragged heavily down at her side such that she looked on the very edge of tipping over with every other step. Her ridiculous frill of fiery orange hair bobbed in dissonant time with her whirring, strutting, barely balanced progress. A pair of headphones, the source of the muffled music she was ineffectively parotting, cut her crest in half, and made it seem to wave as she walked. She had made it halfway across the broad hall, her irregular course seeming aimed for a pair of heavy bags set up in one corner, before she noticed the hulking faunus and the puddle of water beside which he stood.

The realization that she was not alone did precisely nothing to stop the musical butchery already in progress, but it did bring a broad grin to her previously placid, distracted face. Swinging one arm up, with a sound not unlike a ratchet being quickly reversed, Aegle waved at the stranger, who represented an unexpected but not unwelcome change to her usual routine. Then, with the only warning being the brief silence from her beatup headphones, Aegle threw her head and shoulders forward to a shrieking cacophony of tortured notes, each one of which rang out shockingly clear through the training hall.

After a brief interval of furious head banging, more closely resembling a medical emergency than actual dancing, Aegle swung her weighty bag off her shoulder. With a stumbling swing of her arm, she flung the duffel bag heedlessly towards the bags that had been her destination, where it crashed with loudness only slightly less shocking than its owner's recent, shameless display of uncoordination.
"Yo~" She piped in greeting, as she spun about to fully face the stranger. At the same time, she scraped her headphones back and off of her head, causing the hair previously depressed to spring erect in a most improbable fashion.
Ignorant as she was of the large man's distress from moments before, she saw no issue with ambling forward for a closer look.
"Gee, y'a big one, innit'cha?" She wasn't wrong. The faunus would have been tall by most's reckoning and, beside Aegle, he was practically a giant, half again as tall as she was. It didn't help matters that she maintained a slight slouch as she approached. The disparate absurdity of their comparative heights only grew more pronounced as she drew nearer and was forced to crane her neck further and further back just to keep her smile directed at his face. The need to do so greatly amused Aegle, who couldn't help but smile wider and wider as she fought the contours of her own body to maintain eye contact.

Had it not been for the puddle, it is hard to say just how close Aegle would have gotten before she was satisfied. She had definitely shown every intention of standing on the big man's toes. Then her heavy boot came down in the puddle, and a number of things happened, seemingly all at once. Aegle's foot skidded and, while it stopped after barely a hand's breadth, the resulting movement sent a spasm up her hips and through her twisted spine, to coil about the muscles of her straining back. The searing hot wire that sewed through Aegle's shoulders and neck wasn't so bad on its own, but it made her flinch, and that was enough to overcome the tiny bit of friction which had been holding her sodden boot in place. She fell with a soft grunt and whirring whine, to fall a-clatter upon the floor in an ungracious heap.

Aegle, no stranger to falling over, tried to catch herself, but succeeded only in keeping her head from bouncing off the training hall's scarred wooden boards. The rest of her fell flat with a resounding thud.
"Crud." She huffed. She'd landed awkwardly, one leg buckled beneath her and the other fully extended, and the rest of her splayed out like a spilled doll. Aegle spent a moment trying to get her one leg out from under her throbbing back, then sagged and sighed.
"S'a stupid place for a puddle, innit?" She muttered, to no one in particular.
She could feel it soaking through her pant leg and crawling coolly up the back of her thigh. As if to add insult to injury, she actually saw a drop fall down from the ceiling above, and felt the spreading wetness where it landed. This latter indignity prompted another shuddering wiggle and squirm, as Aegle attempted to get herself up, and succeeded only in mopping up more water with her hind quarters. It was no use though. She'd fallen over-extended and bent back at the hips, and just hadn't the strength to sit up. Even with her arms pushing off the ground, the position was too awkward for her to get more than a few centimeters off the floor.

It was only a couple of moments, barely more than a dozen fluttery heartbeats, between Aegle's slip and her fourth failed attempt to sit up, or get her awkwardly twisted leg out from under her. The latter was beginning to hurt, overstressed muscle and none-too-happy tendons making their displeasure known. With a weighty mechanical rattle, Aegle sagged back. It had been her intention to try and maneuver her hips up and pull her leg out from under her with her hand. Then her gaze found the big man, who had been completely effaced from her reckoning by more pressing developments. She grinned sheepishly, less chagrined to have had an audience to her foibles than she was relieved to have someone big and strong nearby to lend her a hand.
"Hey big fella, would'ja mind?" The small girl asked with a toothy smile, adding, somewhat unnecessarily, "Seems I've fallin' and can't get up."

No stranger to being man handled, Aegle was still a bit shocked by just how effortlessly the big man picked her up. Not that there was too terribly much of her to pick up, or that what little there was weighed all that much, but it was still hard not to take notice of just how easy it was for him. Doing her best to show gratefulness for the assistance rather, rather the envy she was actually feeling, Aegle shook out her previously pinned leg in the intervening moments where she was left dangling from the faunus' hands.

"No worries, s'my own fault I guess." She chirped happily, sinking back into her usual slouch pretty much as soon as she was made to stand on her own. She made a point of flexing out her leg, which was already feeling especially weak and cumbersome after its brief spasm, an act which gave her the look of trying to balance on her toes.
At his asking after her health, a quizzical, almost amused expression passed across her face.
"No worse'n usual." She answered, almost sardonic in her cheeriness, as her emerald eyes snaked down to the big man's sword.
Asking, "Y'practicin'? What sorta sword?" She stooped down, getting down to eye level with the big blade's broad hilt, "What sorta style? S'a big sword. Weird lookin' sheath too... Custom? I guess it has to be, with how big y'are... What's it do?"

Quirking something not quite like a smile, the big man said, "Let me show you."
Aegle watched then as his big hand wrap around the scabbard, one finger lacing the artful guard beneath its mouth to brush what Aegle, too late, recognized for a trigger. She swayed half way back to her full, though meager, height just as he gave it a pull.
She was immediately relieved -With a huntsman's weapon, there was really no telling what a trigger might do when it was pulled- but also disappointed when all that happened was for the sword to slide a few fingers out of its scabbard with a dull but weighty click. Still, it brought a half-nervous smile to her lips and drew a half-nervous giggle from her chest.
"The technical term is a 'Kriegmesser'," He explained, hand remaining poised upon the scabbard while the other hovered nearby. Aegle was given to the impression that he was unused to pulling that trigger and not drawing the sword, and wondered why he had left it in its sheath.
"Though," He expounded, "Due to an issue with snapping, this example had to be reinforced." Aegle eyed the blade in question. It was very thick at the base and would have required both her hands to reach around its blade. Her limited knowledge of swords, gained mostly from her eldest brother, told her this part was called the 'ridge' or the 'forte'. For most hand swords, it would have been no thicker than a quarter of the blade's width and, though the blade itself was uncommonly wide, its ridge was near to a third of its thickness. That much extra steel must account for a considerable amount of extra weight.
"The scabbard is custom," The big man went on, expansively, as his big hand adjusted its grip about the mouth of his big scabbard.

"You've a good eye; You can probably tell it's built to facilitate drawing the sword," It was true, and it was not hard for Aegle to guess the benefits. A sword was most likely to bind at the very base of its blade, so having a mechanism to eject that small but crucial length for you would all but guarantee a quick and smooth draw.
"My people's techniques emphasize speed on the draw, you understand." He added, by way of explanation.
"Your people?" Aegle asked, making no effort to conceal her interest. Reaching down, she took the well worn, sweat stained grip in her hand and found it warm to the touch. Grinning a little at that fact, she then drew the blade out by a few more fingers. It was incredibly smooth, like she was pulling it from a velvet sheath and not a rigid scabbard. The weight of it stated to settle across her bandaged palm, and she adjusted her grips, fingers working across the grip above their sleeve of wrappings. She got it another handspan out, never once stopping to consider whether it was polite or even appropriate to be touching another hunter's weapon in such a way, and her hand was dragged down as more of its weight poured from its scabbard.
She added her other hand as half the blade slid free and the sword began twisting downward in her grip. Despite being well balanced, it was remarkably heavy, more like a club with an edge on it than any sword she'd ever held.

Taking a step back, the tip wobbling free of the scabbard, Aegle planted her feet the way Aaron had showed her and reaffirmed her hold on the leather grip. Immediately, her shoulders started to ache and the small servos across them to buzz in quiet protest. Neither of which were quite so bad as the burning which spread throughout her forearms just from trying to hold onto the impressively massive blade.
"Heavy enough for ya?" She asked, toothy grin flashing, as she pivoted the sword vertical to ease the strain on her fingers. She could already feel her muscles starting to spasm though, with the small but telling tremors below her elbow being the worst. She had a new respect for just how strong the big man must be. Aaron was a swordsman too, like most Atlesian Specialists, and he'd let her hold it when she'd been deciding what to learn to fight with. Both were utterly unwieldy in Aegle's hands, which were barely strong enough to keep the upright, let alone actually maneuver them, but this sword was more unwieldy by far.

Concerned she might drop it, Aegle pivoted the sword back and let its heavy edge come down upon her shoulder, producing a quiet but notably metallic click in the process, freeing up one of her hands.
"Check it out~ Always wanted to be a swordswoman!" She chirped, grinning broadly as she shook the fire out of her forearm and the feeling back into her finger tips, "D'ya really swing this thing, or d'ya just put it on the Grimm's back and let it squash 'em?"
Exchanging grips, Aegle performed the same reinvigorating action with her other hand, grinning gritted teeth and the tense throbbing that filled her wrist.
"Gosh, but it's as big as I am~" She giggled, head tipped painstakingly back to look at the blade, "Bet it weighs about as much too. Probably more, even."
Her giggling lilted up into a shrill laugh, and she walked her hands up to the guard, so that she could offer up the grip to its owner.
"Take this from me, will ya, a'fore fall over again."
Even having rested on her shoulder, the sword made her whole back ache. Not so bad that she might lose her grip, not with the brace helping out, but enough for her to know just how absurd it was for her to even be holding it.

"I don't really swing it." Confessed the big man as he took his sword back. With a practiced finesse and shocking speed and ease, he swept the gargantuan blade downward, as though flicking it free of some unseen dirt her touch had left upon it, then stowed it back in its sheathe with an almost pious reverence. It had every suggestion of a thing he'd done so many times that he no longer needed to think about it, yet whose constant repetition had yet to harm the respect he had for the action.

Positioning one hand on the mouth of the scabbard and one upon the grip of the sword, he expatiated, "I just carry it where it wants to go. Like this."
Turning, the Big Man did something Aegle's emerald eyes couldn't quite follow. In a blur almost too quick to be seen at, he carved a cross in the air, and had his weapon sheathed before those shimmering lines had faded out. It really was a very impressive display, and left Aegle with goosebumps. She imagined a technique like that could quite easily catch an unwary attacker without both feet on the ground.
Offering over his big paw of a hand, the same he had swung the sword with, he introduced himself, "My name is Stanislav Kovac,"
Aegle took the offered hand with her own, which promptly disappeared within the massive palm. She squeezed as hard as she could, trying in vain to communicate her intense impression of the big man, succeeding only at demonstrating how weak her grip was.
Stanislav did not seem to mind, "My clan don't carry business cards, so we resort to this to make people remember our names. I don't believe you told me yours."
Aegle found herself feeling mildly flattered by Stanislav's effortless eloquence, and grinned ever wider as her cheeks grew faintly warm and her heart started to quicken.
"M'Aegle, Aegle Vitus, I've heard of you." She said, conveying all the enthusiasm her limp grip had been so unable to carry.
"Well, I've heard of y'family anyway. Blacksmiths, innit'ya? My brother owns one of y'swords." It had been a gift, or such was Aegle's understanding, for some act of especial valor and courage.
"S'nothin' like that one though," She nodded at Stanislav's blade, "Is a big thin', with a wide blade and two edges. S'almost as heavy though." Flexing her fingers free, Aegle tipped her head back and peered up into Stanislav's face.
"Told me he'd give it to me, once I became a huntress." Delivering the boast with a quiet giggle, one which recognized some inherent absurdity in her own statement, she rolled her crooked shoulders and shook her head.
"I ain't much for sword fightin', but it's a real pretty blade, y'know? Your kin do some keen work~"

Aegle's smile shrank a little when the big man pulled back, seeming as though he'd grabbed ahold on something hot. It wasn't that she was unused to such reactions, and she had gotten through a few minutes of demonstrating just how fragile she was, and she did not doubt that Stanislav could crush her without thinking, but that still didn't really justify his sudden need to be free of her touch. Fingers coiling up, Aegle glanced down at her palm, half expecting to find a joy buzzer in it. She wiped the hand off on her ratty hoodie and, keeping her smile on, she listened with affable quiet as he said words she didn't really understand and put on an increasingly uncomfortable expression.

Wondering what was wrong, and dreading to ask, Aegle could do little more than watch as the small tremors ran across the big man's big frame. Revulsion, she wondered, or something else? Before she could guess the answer, Stan stumbled half a step, to collide with rattling weight with one of the nearby work out benches. He caught himself with a pained expression and, chagrined, met her eyes. Then came his question.
"Medicine?" Aegle repeated back. She'd come forward a half a step, as though she could have done anything to keep Stanislav from toppling over, besides get caught underneath him. Then her eyes flicked to his bag.
"S'it in there?" She asked, indicating with her hand, and already moving to tug it open. Nobody knew better than Aegle how immediately necessary medicine could be, and she wasted no time in going after it...

Aegle's fingers seized upon the first thing that looked even remotely hypodermic, coiling it up in her shaky grasp without hesitation, or even really observing what it was. She'd had all manner of things pumped into her veins over the last few years, so she didn't look too askance at anything taken in the name of 'medicating' an illness. It was only when she got the vial out and actually noticed the faint glow and noticeable heat of the thing that she grabbed, that she realized.
"This is Dust."
Unfurling her fingers, the small girl took a much closer look at the thing in her palm. Finally, she hesitated, her eyes flashing up to Stanislav's in silent query, as her brain tried to formulate a question capable of encompassing her confusion. There was no doubt from the container's construction that it was meant to be injected, and it matched the approximate shape of a few similar, now-empty, articles in his bag.
What sort of sickness did one medicate with Dust? Especially fire Dust, of all things. Wouldn't that be excruciating?

Despite her misgivings, Aegle still found her free hand reaching for Stanislav's arm, pulling the massive trunk of muscle and sinew down to expose one of the thick veins that ran along it. She knew well enough how to find a vein, and had ample experience with self-medicating, but she paused before actually raising the dust syringe, not wanting to inject him with the wrong thing. It was plain he was suffering some sort of attack, and that needed dealing with, but slamming him full of Dust when what he needed was medicine wasn't gonna help anyone. She waited on his approval...

Stanislov nodded, and Aegle stabbed the syringe down without a second thought. She expected him to wince at the last moment, as she pushed down the plunger, or maybe even cry out. She was shooting him up with literal fire after all. But he didn't. He just shuddered and flexed and, as the warm light of the dust spread out across his body, he regained a more healthy pallor and loosened up.
Aegle, frowning somewhat, looked down at the exhausted syringe that still lay in the palm of her trembling hand, and wondered about what exactly she'd just done.
"S'alright," She said to his offer of transparency, her emerald eyes flicking up to meet the big man's gaze, "If y'wanted t'tell a complete stranger why y'shootin' up Dust, I'm sure ya'd have it on y'shirt or somethin'."
With a casualness not wholly genuine, she lobbed the needle onto the bench beside Stanislav, then rubbed her emptied palm off on her shirt. She felt strangely uneasy about what she'd just done, like somehow giving the big man his 'medicine' had been the wrong thing to do. Such feelings were not helped by how apparently ashamed Stanislav was that he'd had to ask her to do it. He didn't seem the sort to begrudge a cripple's help, so she had to assume there was something inherently shameful about what he was putting into his veins.

An awkward moment passed, as Aegle searched for something to do or say, but nothing seemed obvious.