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[color=ccff99]"...Why aren't you wearing your belt?"[/color]

Max jolted in place as the hand touched his shoulder, residual adrenaline in his system goading him into swirling around to face his assailant and raising his trusty Belt of Death at his side like a loaded crossbow. Oh, just Eris. Not a murderer. Well, not [i]the[/i] murderer; he didn't want to assume the best in any leech's case.

[color=8585ad]"Son of a bitch,"[/color] Max exhaled in lieu of an actual answer as he deflated. He was way too wound up, that wasn't good - it'd draw attention, and he wasn't keen on making a scene yet. After taking a moment to regain his composure, the mage leaned in casually. [color=8585ad]"First weapon I could think of,"[/color] He whispered conspiratorially, confident that the action wouldn't be out of place at a vampire party of all places, [color=8585ad]"There's a fucking corpse behind the ballroom. Somebody made a mess of their midnight snack and didn't even bother cleaning up the body."[/color]

[color=82ca9d]"Wait...Max? Eris? What're you, no, what were you doing?"[/color]

The buckle of Max's belt rattled at the intrusion, his magic still on high alert even if he wasn't consciously paranoid while mixed into the crowd. Just what he needed, another annoyance to pester him. And not even a well-connected annoyance like the Retriever who might've been useful here. Flower Boy's verbiage was an issue too. How much had he seen? That was a pretty pointed question for someone just running into people he recognized at a party. Max didn't see him as much of a threat physically - the murderer was obviously a vampire, and he doubted Salem had the balls for that kind of thing anyway - but he was still connected to that Astorio, and Max could totally picture [i]him[/i] ripping some girl's throat out for sport. 

[color=8585ad]"Trying to get out of playing high society, what else?"[/color] Max responded with feigned nonchalance, walking closer to Salem with an equally-fake grin. He lowered his volume as he followed up, [color=8585ad]"The real question here is what [i]you[/i] were doing. Bit suspicious to be slinking around like that, hmm?"[/color]

Might as well drop the pretenses, he didn't have the patience for word games and double-speak right now. If Salem really was clueless, Max could just admit to have been hunting for liquor and walk away. And if not, well, he still had his belt. 

[hr][@Hero][@Trainerblue192]