Mai winced at Drake's description of his world. It sounded very gritty, very grisly. Something that would immediately make her want to shut her eyes away from, but at the same time, want to try and fix. Even if she doesn't know how.

Their little meeting was suddenly disrupted when an alarm went off. Everyone was quick to follow through, although Mai did let her comrades go through first and was the last to come out.

What she saw paralyzed her for a moment. The place was in shambles. Screams of pain and agony roared through the village, and the sight of a mother and child being closed in by a group of Heartless sprung her into action.

Brandishing her Keyblade, the girl quickly dashed forward and thrust her weapon against the Soldier that was closest to her, and shortly disappeared after her weapon went through it. The Shadows in their vicinity were quick to react to their comrade falling, and had shifted their focus towards her. As she was clearing out the Heartless that were surrounding the mother and child, she shouted, [color=bc8dbf]"Leave the civilians to me!"[/color], to the others. Her swift and methodical strikes making short work of the weaker Heartless.

One of the Red Nocturnes at the farther side had shot a fireball towards her, and she couldn't dodge it in time as she was busy with the other Shadows. The fireball pushed her a few inches back and left a burn on her right forearm which she used to block it. [color=bc8dbf]"Tch."[/color] The pain wasn't unbearable, but it stung. [i][color=bc8dbf]"These guys are new."[/color][/i] After a moment, she took her stance and aimed her Keyblade at the Red Nocturne. [color=bc8dbf]"I'm just warming up!"[/color]

...

After dispatching a few more Heartless from the vicinity of the mother and child, she quickly ran up to them and held out her hand. [color=bc8dbf]"Come with me! I'll take you somewhere safe."[/color] She didn't exactly have a plan in mind yet, but for the moment, her biggest concern was to get as many civilians to safety as possible, even if she didn't know where that safety was right now. The other Heartless were closing in, so she hoped that they would cooperate immediately.