datadiving | oh boy here we go

[ It was the sudden surge of network energy fluxes that always signals a fight in the undernet that first snagged Forte's attention as he'd been flying through the empty digital skies, dodging the occasional pathways that hung midair (this area of the undernet was remote and the nearest Undercity was not that near), the wind whistling in his audio receptors.

At first, Forte dismisses it. A thousand such squabbles takes place every day down in this network and if he took the time to wade in and crush each one in vague hopes of getting a decent challenge out of it, no matter how much he relished battle, well. It'd be asinine.

It's noticing that all but one of the netnavis in the fight register as members of one of the dozen local gangs (weaklings, the whole lot. Too puny to stand on their own so they cluster together) that makes him pause. And that the energy output of the one who's outnumbered is yet to gutter out.

Intrigued, he dips in altitude and veers off the course he'd been setting, honing in on the fight's location.

Hello, Magicman. That approaching unsttling aura you're sensing? Just decided to make himself known.

It is also much easier to pick up on the build-up of power accompanying this decision. Easy enough that the gang navis can sense it too. The first massive blast comes ripping down like an arrow and strikes the ground with a crash, breaking it and sending plumes of dust and grit tumbling up. The impact was deafening. ]

[ The sudden swell of energy definitely catches his attention; the blast he can't exactly avoid completely, but he reacts more smoothly than the other navis do, at least.

He leaps clear, skidding to a halt, fixing his attention on the owner of the aura that seems powerful enough, just by presence alone, to exert its own kind of crushing pressure.

He feels like he's seen this navi before, but at a distance, and probably not like this. He's interested, at the very least - more interested in this one than the other navis who are scrambling to get out of the way. ]

[ Forte pulls up to a halt fifteen feet up in the air, and says nothing for a moment, taking stock of the situation below him with cold eyes. The navis scurrying away from the edges of the smoking crater. It takes a few moments for shouts to start going up as Forte's appearance (or at least, his cloak and the crushing aura he carried with them) sparks recognition; they can match a face to a unsavory reputation.

But hand already engulfing itself in a crackling, purple-black-fleck flare, Forte makes no disguise of his contempt. They're too slow. ]

Scram.

[ The second blast he launches hits its target.

The new crater matches the first one, overlapping its edges. This time, it catches a couple of the netnavis before they can run, leaving them broken and groaning or dead silent on the ground.

Needing no further encouragement, the other navis scatter. A few stop to haul a damaged fellow up, arm around their shoulders, and drag them away. Most don't bother. ]

Edited (wow grammar errors) 2015-09-09 03:34 (UTC)

Hmph.

[Forte turns his attention to the navi who'd had enough skill to withstand one of his blows. Yet... an unfamiliar navi. There is the smooth economy of movement that comes to somebody who knew how to handle himself in a battle, yes - beyond that... ]

You, how powerful are you… ?

Edited 2015-09-09 03:33 (UTC)

I've never measured.

[ He surveys the damage; he hadn't even bothered to move at the second blast, judging with a decent amount of accuracy that it wasn't aimed for him.

That strange signal this navi is giving off still puzzles him, but he puts it aside for now. He has something more pressing to attend to. ]

Are you looking to try me out? [ He tilts his head a little, eyes calm. Ready to spring out of the way, if he needs to. ]

Oh, really... [ The damage to the landscape is noticeable; Forte didn't give it a seconds' glance. His hand drops to his side, dark power extinguishing itself. For the moment, he fails to pick up on any oddities from the other navi. His eyes narrow. ]

Aren't you quick on the uptake?

[ He floats down until he's only a few feet off the ground.

At his side, Forte's visible hand converts itself into a buster. So, that's a pretty clearly threatening "yes" right there to that question. ]

Edited 2015-09-09 20:06 (UTC)

Quick enough. [ No matter what else he has or doesn't have, he at least has confidence in spades. He seems ordinary enough.

He's not going to make the first move, though. That seems like folly. He'll wait to see what happens next, eyes on his new opponent, poised to spring. ]

[ Good. No beating around the bush here. ]

Then, scum, you'd better not be a complete waste of my time.

[ Forte grins, not moving to close the distance between them as the navi tenses in readiness. That's not how he prefers to operate in the opening stages of a battle.

Both of his arms snap up to level twin busters straight at the other navi and blatant bloodlust shows in the grin behind the lip of his cloak as he unleashes a hailstorm of machine gun-fast fire on Magicman's position. ]

Buster Rake!

[ That bloodlust startles a laugh out of him; it's been some time since he's seen someone with that much.

Not that it scares him. If anything, it encourages him.

He springs out of the way, preferring to dive towards Forte and under the hail of fire rather than away, aiming to close the gap. He swings his arm up, retaliating with a purple blast of fire that lingers annoyingly before changing the firing arm into a purple blade.

Ideally, it might sting a little, but it's not even close to fully charged; he's testing, as always. Slow and steady, or what passes for slow and steady, with an unknown opponent he's never faced. ]

[ Ah yes. Somebody who knew how to fucking play ball without Forte having to back them into a corner.

Seeing his opening volley of buster shots dodged, Forte doesn't bother to evade the return attack and lets the Life Aura absorb the brunt of the burst of purple flames when Magicman darts under the gunfire and springs towards him. The barrier momentarily flickers into view as it licks across its surface. An uncharged shot doesn't pack the damage points sufficient for punching through it. The heat is felt through the barrier, yes, but it's harmless. Forte blinks; the light clears, exposing Magicman's nearness and his upraised sword. Forte moves backward a few feet from his initial position, swiftly.

But not that far.

Magicman was hardly the only one gauging his opponent, testing the waters. Still: ]

Don't mess around.

[ Since Magicman helpfully came this close, let's try more shooting at him again. Buster Rake: TAKE 2, can you dodge at close-range. ]

[ If they're fighting one on one, there's really no point in backing away. Defense is important, but attacking is the only way to really test the skills of both you and your opponent's.

That's what Magicman tends to think, anyway. It's worked out well for him so far.

His preliminary fireball reveals an aura. That makes things difficult - just a little.

Now he has to test its strength against his sword. ]

No point wasting my effort if I can't even hit you.

[ He hops sideways in a practiced motion, then leaps straight up and above Forte, bringing his sword down as he's about to hit the aura with a not-insignificant amount of force behind it.

Yes, he can dodge at close range. While he can endure a hail of buster fire, he sees no need to put himself through unnecessary pain for little reward. ]

[ (There's also no point in making an easy target of yourself for an attack to land.)

Fast one, isn't this netnavi. Forte is something close to impressed. His buster shots weren't an attack easily dodged. Over the years of battles, Forte had learned to tell the difference between power, and power paired with actual experience. This unfamiliar navi was using the latter.

-- And Magicman comes down in his leap but that sword meets not the Aura: instead its caught by the palm of a hand with a dull noise, not breaking the skin. Forte's arm holds still as he grips the glowing blade tight, keeping it in place, not allowing it to finish its arc. His arm muscles tighten.

Despite the huge force driving the attempt, Forte is pushed back midair a mere few inches by the impact before stopping again. ]

Hah. That's true, I suppose.

[ Counting on the unexpectedness of his block to prevent Magicman from having the time to slow his own forward momentum, Forte whips around, keeping hold of Magicman's sword

and he's gonna

fling him hard as he can at the nearest boulder. Which. Was quite the large boulder.

Because Forte's a dick. ]

[ He doesn't know what to expect, so it's not entirely surprising that his blade is caught instead.

It's a tactic he's used himself, after all. He sees what's coming but he's going far too fast, with too little time to correct himself, to try and avoid it. ]

Ggh-! [ Look at him smash into that boulder. Ouch. He shakes off the ache that had given him in short order, getting to his feet with a little bit of unsteadiness. It's been a while since he's been pummeled - or rather, thrown - with enough force to elicit that response.

His recovery time is quick; he immediately drops into a guarding motion, fairly certain that this navi isn't going to just throw him into a boulder and be done with it. ]

[ That was an very satisfying sound. Smashing other netnavis into stuff is fun.

Above, Forte promptly launches several whirling discs of dark energy down at Magicman with a flick of his wrists while he's recovering his footing and standing up on the boulder. ]

[ He can deal with projectiles, at least. He skips backwards off the boulder in an oddly graceful motion for a navi that superficially looks like he has no business moving that fast, his sword flaring with purple energy as he cuts through one that's too close for comfort, ducks under another and skids away from the rest. One catches him in the arm, but he barely flinches, concentrating harder on his opponent than on his own injuries. ]

[ The very first discs that Magician dodges, crash into the boulder and leave it sliced in pieces. The rest, well. They're dodged as well or taken care of. Forte on the other hand, refuses to give Magician a second of breathing room. There's a blue of movement as Forte cuts his hovering, dropping down to the same level as Magician and leaps straight for him, fists clenching and two Dark Arm Blades forming with deadly intent in them, held at the ready. ]

[ He doesn't expect any breathing room, and doesn't get any. He braces himself instead of taking evasive action, this time.

The impact jars and sends him skidding backwards quite a distance until he can brace himself again, but the blades don't touch him, because he's caught them. ]

Hah.

[ And then he's the one to hurl Forte into a boulder with quite a bit of force, this time, to return the favour.

He drops into a defensive stance again, expecting immediate retaliation upon his opponent's recovery. ]

[ Forte takes an instant to progress the situation. His arms, jolted by the focused efforts to push the blades down being abruptly stopped, don't get either blade through to their target because Magician blocked him.

Magicman has never been gifted with somebody staring at him with such pure loathing for the all of five split seconds the two of them are unmoving. ]

You - !

[ Then he's lost his footing, and going flying to slam into that boulder. Hard.

Ow. ]

[ And he's back on his feet, shaking his head in disorientation. His audio receptors are ringing unpleasantly, yes, but Forte has had falling rumble and also a building dropped on top of him so this isn't gotta do more than make him angry that some stranger effortlessly turned the tables on him in combat.

smart move Magicman

Forte whips around immediately, snarling, and yep, that stunt Magician just pulled sure ruffled his feathers. The whine of energy crackling as it collected rapidly in his hands is all the warning his foe gets.

Earthbreaker, incoming! ]

Edited 2015-09-17 05:17 (UTC)

[ Well, he's not going to be able to defend against whatever that is; he drops his guarding stance immediately and skids backwards.

He's not fast enough to avoid its wide area of impact, but his quick evasive tactics and his naturally strong defense mean he's only caught partially by the attack instead of hit head-on, and what does catch him tosses him like a ragdoll but doesn't pierce anything too vital.

It goes some way to ensuring that he's not the equivalent of being punch-drunk when he pushes himself to his feet once more. He takes stock of the situation; his left side is severely damaged - though miraculously sparing his emblem - and the impact has rippled through his torso. His right arm is showing some cracking.

His response is to shake himself. ]

Ow.

[ Though he doesn't notice it yet, the sheer amount of damage he's sustained has let something else he usually conceals leak through; there are some strange signals coming from him now that hint at some kind of locking mechanism. ]

[ Forte's back to floating again, glaring down at Magicman as the other netnavi drags himself upright again. The heavy damage littering his frame was easily visible; the fine lines of cracks winding themselves over an arm like vines, one side damaged, unsteady posture.

Durable, wasn't he. Why was he still standing? Strong or not, shouldn't he be deleted already? That attack ought to have taken off all his hit points if it had landed head-on. Forte scowls. The netnavi was fast, he'd demonstrated that before - he must have had the pure speed to dodge most of it. ]

Tch!

[ But an opponent who went down quietly would have been boring.

Two sphere form in his hands. Forte still shakes his head a little before he starts to close the distance between them, brow furrowed, trying to dislodge the various bits of rubble that had wedged in the fins and his audio receptors were refusing to stop that unpleasant ringing. Must be the damage. There wasn't any time for resetting the audio. Forte would get on that once he finished off this netnavi and took its power. ]

[ ... ? ]

[ Wait. What was... ]

[ What was that, give him a few seconds to figure it out. ]

[ As the dust settles and Magicman's head stops spinning quite as much, he raises his badly damaged arm to look himself over.

Yellow light shows through cracks; as he makes them visible to check if there's been any damage done, they show clearly to Forte too; shackles, spinning wheels around each 'wrist' and ankle, and a larger one rotating slowly on his back. They're complex programs that are meant to lock something in place. They don't seem to impede this navi's movement, but they're important to him, at least.

There is the faintest suggestion of something else roiling beneath the surface, a strange note underneath all this.

Magicman is still having trouble with the strange signal Forte was emitting; he's trying to work out what it is, exactly. His dizzied processes don't help much, but he has his suspicions. He puts them aside for now. ]

[ Forte feeds a last, quick charge of energy to the Darkness Overloads in his hands. Still closing the distance here.

Locking mechanisms are obvious (even before Forte places his finger on what sort of signals the damage dealt to Magician had left exposed to the open air) in the first glimpse Forte gets of its appearance through the yellow light; its appearance betraying its function. His mouth thins; the sight of them clamped around the other navi's limbs irritates him more than the sword-catching had done seconds before (though it's an irritation devoid of empathy and focused purely on the recollections it evokes.)

Limiters, locks, installed firewalls to keep something inside - was simple to process once identified, easy to decide to waste no time over and attack now. Don't give the opponent breathing room, don't let him set the pace. ]

[ so. ]

[ gonna chuck those two energy spheres at you now, Magiciman. ]

[ But the noise of something else, moving, underneath, a sore discord, something that doesn't say netnavi, that Forte does in fact pick up on; he was more intent on following through on his attack than immediately working what the source of the strange static note Magicman was accidentally letting slip through. Through the lock.

But you didn't put a lock between you and another being, unless you had the notion it was a being to be worried about. A being its wardens felt wasn't safe. Risky. A threat.

Which asked the question, one Forte hadn't yet wondered:

what would happen if the lock broke? ]

[ Even the circumstances of those locks are unusual; he'd requested they be made, for his own peace of mind more than anything else. Bad things happen if they're not there, and it allows him to put his mind at rest.

Even with his dizziness, he's still impressively fast; he skids out of the way of one sphere at the cost of diving, purposely, right into the path of the other.

The decision creates interesting results. He hears the signals that alert him to one of his locks being compromised; his data reacts at that opening. It's nowhere near enough to change his form, but it means he takes less damage than usual - some of it is siphoned off, absorbed in a way that's not like the program Forte uses to copy other navis' powers.

He certainly doesn't intend to die here (the fact that he's conscious enough to hang on at all is a testament to his willpower and his high defense), so instead of retaliating, he begins limping off. He knows that Forte won't allow him to walk unimpeded for long, but he's going to get as far as he can in this form before tipping his hand.

His lack of hand?

Whatever. ]

[ Not a request nor a thought Forte would have ever had. Imposing limitations on oneself like that, seemed an unsafe course at the best.

When Magician starts limping away, Forte snarls.

So impatient! ]

Where exactly do you think you're going?

[ Again, a low crackle as dark energy collects in Forte's hand. Again, the promise of relentless pursuit. But also, another question: how was the other navi still standing, that should have done it, that should have put him down, what was that faint signal he was picking up on, coming out stronger now that one of lock mechanisms that been stricken by one of Forte's attacks. It buzzed unpleasant, an accompanying noise to the ringing in his audio feed.

hi lunging after you in a blur of movement.

let's try punching, that usually works swell. ]

[ That actually...gets a laugh out of him? It's weak, but there. ]

Away from you?

[ Still, he can't move very quickly; he pivots to counter, switching his form as he does so - he needs the speed. His data breaks up and reassembles itself, and he meets the punch with one of his own.

Of course, his power here isn't in his arms, so it doesn't have much of an effect except cracking his already damaged restraint a little more, sending damage rippling over him in a wash of pain and alerts. Some of that energy - more of it now - is siphoned away.

He pushes back with a noise that's almost a snarl, before darting away - he's much quicker than he was before. ]

[ >B| look just stay for a moment. ]

Oh, but I'm not done with you yet.

[ Forte meets force with force, meeting the counter and bringing up his knee to lash out with a kick at the stomach while Magicman's close enough. He misses. The buzzing sound was starting to annoy Forte. He was certain it was from the NetNavi and the sore discord roosting inside it.

That meant...

Forte takes the return punch square to his side (if he had human ribs, they'd be unhappy with him right now) with a grunt before being shoved back in return as Magicman breaks away and bolts out of reach, towards the canyons that laid between them and the nearest NetCity. Forte tips his head, floating motionlessly in place for an instance, seeing the increased speed and linking it to the shift in appearance.

- his face shifts into a small smirk. Excitement? Or well, excitement under the bloodlust. Interest.

One forearm converts itself into a buster again and - yeah, he's going after Magicman now. ]

[ He knows he doesn't have much time to get a head start, but he'll take what he can get. He's not sure what he's going to do - he certainly doesn't want to get anyone else tangled up in it, and if this navi follows him up to the overworld (will he?) it's not going to be a good time.

He pushes himself, darting into cracks in the canyon sides, blurring with movement as he tries to make himself less of a target. He's focused on speeding away; if he gets caught, he'll deal with it when it happens. ]

[ The canyons are a twisting web of circuit-etched walls that narrowed and widened unpredictably. Forte is equally determined to not let his opponent give him the slip in them. ]

Buster Rake!

[ HI HOPE YOU LIKE DOGING BUSTERFIRE IN NARROW SPACES SUCH AS THE CRACKS IN CANYON WALLS. ]

[ HE SURE DOES not

He keeps going despite catching the occasional energy bullet; one hits him square in the back and completely ruins his momentum, sending him tumbling to the canyon floor. He reacts impressively well for someone in his current state, which is to bounce with the movement and keep running, getting up speed again and taking cover when he can.

At the end of it, he's received more than a few new injuries, but he's still keeping up a good pace - albeit slower than before. ]

[ DON'T BE A WUSS WHAT'S A ENERGY BULLET TO THE BACK OR TWO

But does that mean his pace has slowed down enough for Forte to lunge forward in a burst of speed and grab that large shackle spinning slowly and ceaselessly on the other navi's back? And grab it hard, with both hands, the one that had been a buster converted back to normal, with the possibility of leaving a dent or two in the locking mechanism's surface if he could grab on at all.

Because if it does, that's what he's going to try to do, Magicman.

Since plainly shooting Magicman isn't doing the job in bringing the taller navi down. ]

Edited 2015-10-04 02:04 (UTC)

[ WELL FOR ONE THING IT REALLY HURTS?? EXCUSE, HAVE YOU CONSIDERED THAT

and yes, he's slowed enough that Forte can at least grapple with the locking mechanism; he whirls in a panic as soon as it's touched, purple fire flaring up around his 'hands' (claws, now) as he thrashes at the intruder on his back with no sign of his usual relative composure.

He's injured and someone is trying to break his locks. But fortunately for Forte, he's not running any more. ]

[ WHAT'S A ENERGY BULLET TO THE BACK OR TWO

Good, stay put in one place for a sec. So he can adjust where he grabbed and push himself up onto it to get a better hold.

Dogged, Forte hangs on the locking mechanism on the other navi's back with an iron grip, refusing to be knocked off by the surge of movement of somebody who clearly very much wants him off that locking mechanism program now.

The purple fire is unpleasant and he's taking damage from the repeated wild bursts of it that's firing back at him, but the most Magicman's swipes with his claws connect with are the cloak's tattered folds, tearing at the cloth, winning several loud ripping sounds, and since. Forte is. on Magicman's back and thus not that easy to reach when panicking. Forte grins, excited, gloating. ]

Now, what do we— [ Ah yes, the delightful sound of dark energy begining to charge up. you know. from right behind Magicman. It'll take a few seconds. ] —have here?

[ What's behind this lock and is it gonna be fun to fight when he cracks it open. ]

Edited 2015-10-08 01:58 (UTC)

[ His movements become more erratic, even though he should probably at least try to calm down, but he's injured and someone is targeting something he really would rather people leave alone and so isn't thinking very well. He's obviously trying to get Forte off his back.

The next noise that comes out of his mouth as he swipes and flares, purple fire rippling in patterns around his body, can't really be counted as something that would classify as a 'normal' noise. It's a distorted, panicked shriek that dips into somewhere between 'grating' and 'genuinely painful'.

As Forte keeps tugging on that lock, there's a shimmer; some kind of scar pattern that flickers in and out of visibility, an oddly pretty thing that looks almost like an abstract butterfly. ]

[ alwklmq since Forte's head is still ringing from getting slammed into that boulder, the unnatural, shrill shriek feel like it's drilling straight into his skull and he isn't amused by it.

~~It reminds him of a virus, grating and mindless.~~

Eyes squinting against the wild flashes of purple fire burning and flaring around (which are chipping away at his HP but too slowly and unevenly to make Forte let go like Magicman wants him to) under the shadow of his helmet and still not allowing himself to be dislodged from Magicman's back, Forte spots that shimmer.

And without a moment of hesitation, he releases a hand and slams that hand back down where he thinks it is and detonates the dark energy he had charged up, right into the lock, right into the vague outline of the scar pattern on it. ]

[ The lock - well, amazingly, it's blown open rather than blown apart, but it's rather damaged all the same. It's a testament to its creator's programmed-in failsafes that it's not instantly vaporised, though it's a little unfortunate that due to these same failsafes Magicman receives a good deal of that energy himself. It results in another shrieking, pained cry as he finally gives up on thrashing and curls in on himself instead.

All in all, it's an unpleasant experience. The pain is unbearable at first and then siphons off in short order as what the lock had been keeping in grows in violently; the force should be enough to knock Forte off. And it would be a good idea not to be touching his back, at this point.

They're 'wings', of a sort, to match the scar's patterns; more reminiscent of Gospel's frill than anything else, pulsing with an unpleasant, ugly reddish colour. Forte's senses will register that this is something that is more or less pure virus material; sensory organs that are oddly pretty and also completely wrong.

He's not quite a virus; the part of him that states he's a navi is loud and clear. But it battles, now, with the other part he'd rather keep hidden; and that signal is now exposed.

He gets to his feet, flinching as the 'wings' on his back pulse, drawing in data to heal his significant injuries. ]

Leave me alone. [ He takes off with impressive speed considering his condition; he seems to be fighting his own healing factor. ]

[ Magicman shrieks. But the shrill, grating sound is lost to Forte's hearing amongst the lock blowing open, the other navi curling inward and the blur of the 'wings' jutting up from his back to slam straight into Forte in the same breath, before he has the time to activate the Life Aura to shield himself from either the force, the recoil from his own close-range attack of dark attack, or the blows from the wings. Unfortunately, this means no time to appreciate the level of craftsmanship behind the lock program's creation.

So. Definitively getting flung really really hard off Magicman's back and into the canyon wall. There's a shout, pained. (It's short and gritted out.)

Crack.

He takes a few seconds to recollect himself, stubbornly peeling himself out of the crater in the canyon wall. Bits of rock tumble off the cloak. A shoulder guard, cracked. Headache hurts like hell, body hurts, burn marks galore that were slowly starting to close up and heal, audio receptors are banged up. Whatever. Bloodlust, want for the fight to continue overrides them all.

Then Forte re-focuses on Magicman; registers what he'd gotten smacked off with, how it rings with the same sore discord he'd kept picking up on but couldn't determine what it was. ]

So that's it. [ The puzzle clicks. The lock program. The durability. The uneven edges to the two things stretching out from the other navi's back, the clumping together mass of pure red-wrong-unfiltered-pulsing material, it's akin to nothing but bugfrags and at the thought, the Gospel virus entwined with his own system stirs. He's yet to call on it for its power, so it been running dormant under the surface. He and it exist together, without friction; from just an initial impression, it seems Magicman isn't so lucky. The energy signal he gives off conflicts, struggling with the viral signal. How pitiful.

It must be why the lock was there.

... It was strange, however. What kind of surface navi would be merged with a virus, if it clearly didn't like the virus being a part of it? Even it granted him power? ?

???

He floats back slightly, braces a foot against the wall. A Darkness Overload forms in a hand. Simple, to-the-point: ]

No.

[ And he's right off after him. Let a new actual challenge on the battlefield slip through his fingers? Please. ]

Edited 2015-10-14 23:52 (UTC)

[ Forte's impressions are halfway right and halfway wrong. He fights continuously against what he sees as the part of him that people would be terrified of, but it's part of him regardless. Intertwined in perfect balance.

As he increases his speed, falling into familiar patterns, that much becomes clearer; the signals stop fighting each other so much to hint at what the exact nature of his existence is, a seamless merge of two things that shouldn't exist perfectly together.

As he accelerates, his 'wings' pulse greedily, taking in data from the surrounding environment as his control over his 'healing' slips. He reaffirms it in short order, but the fact is that he's still fighting what could arguably be called his natural instincts.

Annoyingly, his speed has increased again, due to his healed injuries. ]

[ Not that Forte has much way of confirming his impressions mid-battle as right or wrong; the signals aren't conflicting as fiercely as they before to his senses. At the same time, the wings' sucking in data didn't seem deliberate.

Speaking of which. The navi's wounds were closing. Tch. Wonderful!

But he had fought other navis with healing factors (and the weaklings who had rely on their humans for Recovery chips) before, even if they hadn't been virus-based, and came out on top.

He puts on speed too, determined to not let his quarry outpace him. They've both gone straight for the skies and left the narrow slots of the canyons behind them in a matter of seconds. More room to maneuver.

Forte lobs two crackling dark spheres at Magicman's form in quick succession. ]

Edited 2015-10-18 00:17 (UTC)

[ Magicman takes one sphere right in the back while dodging the other; it knocks him out of focus again and sends him flying, and he hits the ground hard and only partially manages to roll with it. It doesn't stop him from scrambling away as fast as possible, claws gouging marks in the ground as he continues to retreat. He's 'bleeding' now, particles rising as his damage increases again, even as his wings pulse and lengthen, taking in all that free energy.

A fact: viruses swarm to other viruses. What could possibly be called 'cannibalism' comes easily to them. But...

This is a bit different then that. Undernet viruses surface from their hiding places (if Forte pays attention, Magicman's signal has changed to a different wavelength, synchronising with the viruses as they pop out) and begin to swarm, forming some kind of barrier between him and Forte.

They don't attack, but they're mobile, following the other navi as he continues to run ahead. ]

[ Forte slams the ground behind Magicman when he hits the ground with a vicious burst of busterfire, hoping to keep him pinned to a lower position; he misses, Magicman's recovery too fast for him to track before the navi stumbling back up and out of range again, into the air again. Forte scowls. He would prefer to catch Magicman before he reaches a server entrance and logs out, making the task of catching him all the more difficult.

They're nearing the internet city and odds are good there's one of them there.

Maybe if he ripped off the navi's 'wings' first...

In combat, all of Forte's senses are primed to the ready (except his hearing, mostly done to him needing to reset the damaged receptors) and the change in wavelength makes him first think, wary, attack? then his attention is diverted to alerts on his radar as more, weaker energy signatures come crawling up towards them, amassing.

The resulting floating virus blockage earns a faint laugh as he swerves around a large, geometric outcropping of rock: hey, Magicman he sure did just ping you off a message. ]

A puny display... !

[ Let's try blasting it.

STILL STUBBORNLY TRYING TO CLOSE THE DISTANCE BETWEEN THEM not having that much success but still putting on speed. ]

oh boy here we go

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) we anime fight scenes soon

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i don't know how this turned into some kind of ridiculous piggyback fight BUT SOMEHOW IT DID

IN BETWEEN THE SHONEN ANIME FIGHTS...THERE IS THIS

SO THERE IT IS amazing

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