2011-06-20 - That Was Just Practice?

 Tina Uesugi transmits, "Well, I'm in the Arena, gearing up."  Sinya Leland transmits, "Actually, Captain, I believe Miss Usagi--err Uesugi was looking for a combatant in the Arena."  Emperor Xiang Yuan transmits, "Hrrm."  Emperor Xiang Yuan transmits, "Maybe at a later time."  Sinya Leland transmits, "I could bring out Arius if you'd like, although I'm not sure how well we'd fare up against someone actually combat trained. Up to you, Tina."  Tina Uesugi transmits, "Well, I was hoping just to see what I can do against actual live opponents."  Tina Uesugi transmits, "But only if you want, Sin."  Sinya Leland transmits, "Sure, why not. I need to get him out and use him otherwise I'll get rusty at it. Meet you there in a few."

In the arena standby hangers, there's an AC covered in a tarp. Tina is looking over the data, and then pulls out a vial. She puts it into an injector gun as she moves the tarp. "Well, Cyber Breaker, are you ready for hell? Its time.", she says. THe woman brings the gun up to her neck, and injects herself with the liquid. Her eyes go wide, and she grips the ladder leading up to the cockpit with a white knuckle grip. The drug takes effect as she starts to breath heavily. The woman runs up, and jumps into the cockpit.

The Cyber Breaker enters the arena. A few people are looking on. Just two young pilots in the rankings. Cyber Breaker being new isn't going to draw real attention. A number of people are looking at the AC, wondering just where on earth its weapons are, as it seems only to have a missle pack on one shoulder, and a Chain gun on the other. THe bipedel mech walks on, prepping to fight, as Tina inside is breathing heavily, and sweating majorly...

 Tina Uesugi labored breathing, "I'm ready..." Panting...  Tina Uesugi transmits, "Heart rate is in the 230 range..."  Kazuma Ardygun transmits, "... that ain't healthy."  Tina Uesugi transmits, "It needs to be that high, Kazuma."  Tina Uesugi transmits, "Checking Adraline and Endrophine rates, Factoring in system checks. A little low on all checks, sims have both increasing in combat...."

The other unit slated for this particular match isn't one that draws too much attention either. Not a big name, or one of the heavy hitters more commonly known to the Arena. In fact, this one only had one registered match under it's belt, and that was a win against a mass-produced unit - under heavy betting for it's opposition. No, Sinya really doesn't get out much to the Arena - not nearly as often as she should. Most of the time, the catgirl tended to spend her days repairing machines rather than fighting them. Even so, it seems a change of pace is in order. So much had changed in her life over the past few days - why not add one more thing to the mix.

However, she does bring with her a few more people to the stands, and it's obvious why they might have an interest in the matchup. They all have on the coveralls of Raven's Nest mechanics, obviously there to cheer on one of their fellows, even if the bets are definitely going to be skewed in favor of the Armored Core. Tapping on her radio headset, Sinya chuckles to herself, "So, rules. First one to say 'yield' or become disabled loses. No cockpit shots." The second part is fairly standard rules, the first... well that's Sinya's tweek to things. For the most part, she isn't a pit fighter, so having a quick way of getting 'out' of the match to save her tail is a good thing.

Swinging herself up with surprising grace, the catgirl steps back into the space within Athe guymelef's chest, sliding her legs down into supports and her arms into strange looking contraptions that wrap them. Squeezing her hands shut, the cockpit closes, forming the chestpiece of the smaller machine which looks strangely like a cross between a gryphon and a midieval knight. Clunk. Clunk. It walks out onto the Arena floor, energists shining brightly in the half-light. Above, someone is calling out the names of the combatants, but Sinya can't hear them, her attention is elsewhere.

Her attention is on the larger, far more dangerous unit across the Arena from her. The guymelef's hand comes down, drawing something up from his side. The small cylindrical object is held out, and there is a click as it extends into a long glowing staff of colored light. These aren't beams, but some sort of physical manifestation of the power of the energists flowing through the weapon. "Alright, let's do this." The catgirl's voice declares, even as a buzzer sounds above. The gryphon, Arius, speeds forward, spinning that glowing staff in front of him as he closes the distance across the arena, lashing out with a quick set of blows aimed at the larger unit's legs.

Tina takes several deep breaths, and then the OP-Intensify flares to life. While Sin is hitting, its glancing scratch marks as the Cyber Breaker seems to explode in a series of quick bursts in rapid succession. Enough that a normal human would suffer severe whiplash. What the hell is going on with that machine? The woman inside is still breathing very heavily as she focuses. Tina growls, and suddenly yells out as her machine jumps over Sin's, going into a flip. The crowd starts to yell out at that.

The shoulder mounted Chain gun seems to roar to life unexpected as it fires in midflip. Wait, how the hell is it able to fire like that? The woman inside has a white knuckle grip on the controls as she turns and boosts to spin the AC around as it quickly accelerates. The woman inside glares at the screen as she's moving to close the distance between the two, and keep it a close range fight.

 A Random Low Ranking Raven. "The hell?! An AC just did a flip, and firing a shoulder mounted Chain gun?! That AC must have a PLUS."

The sudden movement of the Cyber Breaker comes as a surprise to Sinya, who nearly ends up having to take a stutter-step to keep from being totally unbalanced by it. She certainly hasn't seen an Armored Core do anything of the sort before, but she also hasn't fought a great number of them, either. "So, this must be why they won't let anyone near it." She murmurs to herself, a smirk playing on her feline lips as she grits her teeth, pulling Arius around even as the larger unit begins to flip above her.

For a moment, things go into slow-motion and you can almost hear someone in the crowd go, "OOOOO MYYYYY GOOOODDDDDD" In one of those low-slo-mo voices before the world snaps back into normal speed. It isn't just the flip that seems to surprise those watching, but also the fact that it isn't just for show. Even Sinya ends up being caught slightly off-guard by it, jolting as the sound of chain gun fire rips through the Arena. Pulling her arms back quickly, the guymelef's great metal wings fan the air, sending up a cloud of dust as she barely manages to avoid being hit by that strafe from the shoulder-mounted weapon.

"You really are quite fantastic." Sinya transmits, sounding just a little breathless, herself. Still, it's nothing compared to what Tina must be going through in order to pilot such a machine. "I've never seen a machine like it, or a pilot who can do that for that matter." Lately, the catgirl had seemingly been in a better mood - more social to those she'd only just met, and this seems to be an example of it. Even so, this is still combat, and can't let her guard drop for even a moment.

That staff remains spinning in the guymelef's hands, seemingly in constant motion as he has no problems keeping within the close melee range of the attacker. In fact, there don't seem to be guns of any type on the midieval machine - making it unlikely for it to have much in the way of ranged combat abilities. Still, the smaller unit is quick, and able to move seemingly as fast as its larger counterpart. Fast enough to appear directly in front of the Cyber Breaker, bringing the hard edge of that staff down in a quick blow aimed at the robot's chest.

Tina is sweating heavily already as she settles into the cockpit a bit. Its taking a lot out of her just to keep fighting. If it weren't for the stims, its very likely that she would have already have passed out just from the stress the machine is placing on her body, and her steel grip on the controls. As the staff keeps pressing its attack towards Cyber Breaker, it seems the machine is moving even faster, as it just seems to be just be right out of reach.

Tina takes a few deep breathes, and then pushes the controls as hard as she can. The Nioh parrying blade springs out of the wrist of the AC, and it seems as if the AC almost blurs out. It appears behind the Guymelef's, arm and blade on the other side. Tina coughs a bit, and holds her strike before getting out a small bag, and coughs into it. "That move hurts, and the sudden stop...", she says before barfing into it. What happend was the OP-Intensify moving at its highest acceleration, pushing the machine at higher then normal limits as it went forward, and attempted to slash through the Guymelef. Tina was able to adjust the blade to avoid anything major or hit the cockpit, but only barely, thanks to the stims.

One moment the Cyber Breaker is there, the next it seems somewhere else entirely. As fast as Arius might be, there is no way the gryphon knight could ever reach that kind of speed. Then again, it also isn't the type of unit that required advanced combat training or the use of drugs to be able to pilot, so there is certianly some advantages for using an ancient, possibly atlantean created beast machien from La Gias.

Thankfully, Sinya hasn't a clue about what is going on inside the Armored Core's cockpit, otherwise it might just make her lose her recently eaten lunch. And the last thing she needs is fish sprayed on the inside of Arius's control chamber - that would be a pain the clean up. However, what she does notice is the sudden reappearance of the Cyber Breaker not more than a short distance away from her, and that quick blow that seems to barrel down upon the gryphon's shoulder with a resounding clang of metal against metal.

In the crowd, those watching give a cheer at the first sign of real damage between the two. "First blood to the AC!" Calls out someone, who sounds very drunk, and probably has money on Tina.

The catgirl's eyes flash sideways, reading a display shown directly on the headpiece of her helmet. The damage was surface deep, not enough to interfere with the movement of that arm - not yet anyways. Letting out a breath, Sinya spurs the guymelef to keep moving. With the amazing speed that Tina's unit could put out, she had to at least try to keep herself in motion to avoid being a stationary target.

"If this was a normal armored core, where would it's weakpoints be..." She's using her knowledge of other machines, although that doesn't necessarily mean that it works for the Cyber Breaker. In fact, it may be a dangerous gamble. Still, she has to use every trick in the book if she wants to not just get outclassed right about now. So, drawing close once more, that twirling staff lashes out, but seems not to be aimed out with much power behind it. Instead, there are tiny taps from all sorts of odd directions, seeking out those weak points that only a trained mechanic might be able to see.

Cyber Breaker just seems to explodes into action once more. Tina inside is pushing her limits very hard right now as she spins the AC around into a dance. Two complete spins, and she's boosting sideways again. There's deep grooves in her shoulders from the harness thats keeping her strapped down as she avoids the attacks. Her combat awareness is sickening as she just seems to be able to sense such things. That is not quite a normal AC...

The chain gun on the shoulder starts to fire out once more, but this time in a much longer burst as Tina seems to keep close, but firing while boosting. Tina keeps moving, trying to circle around Sinya, preparing as both the Raijin blade, and the Nioh unsheathe from their wrist mounts, as the systems begin to charge...

"Damnit." Sinya curses, stopped halfway through the strange dance of little pressure-point taps against the armored hull. It isn't a real curse - not that she's angry, but it is a struggle to keep up with someone who is definitely combat trained. "Saw right through me, huh?" She asks, the staff spinning backwards to the guymelef's side as she stands still in the center of the Arena. It might look as if the gryphon were just inviting an attack, but there seems to be something that Sinya has in mind.

So, when the gun begins to blare out from nearby, Arius turns, ducking underneath the spray of metal and nearly flattening himself to the floor in a feat of athletics that most units wouldn't be able to handle quite so easily. It almost moves as if it were a person - or like a Gundam being piloted with a trace-suit. Somehow, the ancient robotics can at least match the movement of some of that modern technology.

But those two blades - those look dangerous. Arius and Sinya both raise their heads in unision, ears flattening backwards away from the machine's head. With a flap of his great wings, the guymelef swings himself to his feet again, landing with a thump and a puff of dust. "That, does not look good." Taking a few quick breaths, the catgirl forces her guymelef to move, and move fast. At the very least, if she were able to get behind it...

So that is what the catgirl does. She uses Arius's smaller stature and his full thrusters to speed around the circle of the Arena, moving to flank the larger Armored core. Then, staff spinning, the catgirl closes the distance, her hands moving as she guides Arius's staff forward, sweeping it out towards one of the Cyber Breaker's legs.

Cyber Breaker jumps at the last second, boosting in midjump as it launches itself forward. Missiles fire out from the other pod, small missiles, pretty much micro size. But little things can do some damage when nine of them hit at once. The woman closes her eyes, as she holds onto the control sticks. Her breathing is very rapid, and her clothing is completely soaked, as Tina focuses on the screen. "I have to end this soon.", she says.

Cyber Breaker accelerates forward, and the chain gun on the shoulder just keeps firing. It doesn't stop firing as it seems to track the Cat Girl's movements. Tina's machine has such insane response times, it almost feels as if Tina is in a trace suit. She keeps her mind focused. "I feel my body going through hell right now. I have to start focusing on finishing this.", she says, keeping the blades ready for the final assault.

Focus. While Tina may be trying to focus on finishing the battle, Sinya seems to be keeping her own concentration aimed on keeping her smaller machine out of the worst of harm's way. She knows full well that there is something dangerous looming from those blades - and as much as she had asked to keep the match strictly non-lethal, that doesn't mean that there couldn't be a world of hurt should Arius have to take the brunt of a fully powered blow from those weapons.

Sweat beads down the catgirl's forehead, forcing muscles not used to the hard effort of manually piloting her guymelef to strain under the effort. "Need to actually do this more often." She mutters, having to pant softly to keep breath in her lungs. "Just need to hold out, make a good showing of this." At least, that's what she tells herself, tail lashing out behind her.

There is a flash of energy from Arius as the guymelef's staff comes to rest on the ground. The color flares within that strange energist-powered light. It seems to echo in the crystals around the guymelef's body, as if the same energy were feeding all of them and connecting them by the same life-force.

Then, stepping forward, Arius seems to shift into a strange sort of movement pattern. Sinya's eyes focus, moving in a practiced sort of Kata, each step and thrust of her staff timed as if it were part of some dance. The end of the staff crackles each time it moves forward, radiating electricity and a force that almost seems as if each blow were lashing out with the very element of wind itself.

 Tina Uesugi pained labored breathing. "Have to push it...Can't keep going much longer..."  June Shelbech transmits, "Uhm...what are we listening to?' <Radio: A - TR-General> Sinya Leland transmits, "Don't push yourself past your limits, Tina. This is just practice..." <Radio: A - TR-General> Kazuma Ardygun transmits, "No point in burning out your body in a practice match."

Cyber Breaker goes much into a dance with the other mecha. The woman inside is starting to get a nose bleed a bit as she focuses her mind. Those two blades come up, and protect the AC as the woman closes her eyes. Then the joints on the AC seem to flare a bit as the AC goes into a blur of motion. The blades just seem to come from everywhere all at once. The OP-Intensify is going at its highest, pushing the woman's physical limits almost beyond the breaking point as the AC just seems to go into a gracful dance of destruction. It takes everything Tina's got, and then some to keep each strike from becoming dangerious.

Tina grips the controls at the end of the dance, holding on for dear life as she focuses her mind. She spins the AC around to see what had happend to her opponent. Hopefully Sinya got out of the way, or that Tina was able to control it enough to just disable the mecha....

With those high powered blades coming at her, Sinya has little choice but to try to protect herself and her guymelef as much as possible. The great beast's wings sweep forward, the metal clanging against those feathered shields, cutting through them in some places and leaving them mostly in tatters. While it may be a sacrifice, it is enough to keep Arius from taking the brunt of the damage against his main armor. The crumpled, broken wings fold back behind him, looking like some angel that has fallen to earth from heaven.

While Sinya is able to continue fighting, she stops in the middle of the Arena, raising one hand as Arius gives the same motion. "Tina. I think we should stop here. You're going to hurt yourself." While she had been unable to do much damage to the quick Armored Core, she had managed to survive quite a while - a great deal longer than most would have expected.

The guymelef drops to one knee, bowing his head in an almost old-fashioned display. "I yield." The sound of cheers comes up around them - almost certainly from those who had bet on Tina and her Armored Core over the smaller, mechanic's unit. It was a fairly sure bet, even if Sinya had managed to pull out a miraculous win once before. "Get yourself out of there. Before you end up hurt." There is concern in the catgirl's voice, not wanting to see this become something more than a friendly trial of units in the Arena.

<Radio: A - TR-General> Kurou Daijuji transmits, "...Oh. Good. I thought that this was, uh, something else." <Radio: A - TR-General> Kazuma Ardygun transmits, "What's that, Kurou?" <Radio: A - TR-General> Tina Uesugi pained breathing. "Releasing the safety locks....This is really going to suck...and hurt..." <Radio: A - TR-General> June Shelbech transmits, "He's got a dirty pervert mind, Kazuma." <Radio: A - TR-General> Kazuma Ardygun transmits, "Oh." <Radio: A - TR-General> Sinya Leland whimpers softly, "Sorry Tina. I should have stopped this earlier."

The safety locks open up, and the cockpit opens. Crews will take her AC back for buffering soon enough. Tina falls out there. She falls to the ground, and lands with a heavy thud. There's a bit of blood coming out of her nose, and the woman is absolutely covered in sweat. She shakely gets to her feet, stumbling a few times as she tries to get back to her feet, and over to the Sinya's mech. She extands her hand, and it seems to take everything she's got just to do that. "Good match.", she says. The woman takes a deep breath, trying to keep her eyes open. "Sorry, just exhausted.", Tina lies....

<Radio: A - TR-General> Tina Uesugi transmits, "I-its fine. Really. Just...need to rest a little bit, or get a stim. Then I'll be fine."

There is a hiss as the guyemelf's cockpit slides open, revealing the dark space within. There is a hint of the silvery metal that makes up the control system, but for the most part it just looks like some dark void in the middle of the unit's chest. Still, out of that darkness steps Sinya, pulling her helmet off and giving a shake of her head as her ears come loose and perk upward. There is sweat beaded on her forehead, but she otherwise looks no worse for wear - even if Arius's wings may have been shredded.

She sets the helmet down, and then clambers down to the ground, landing in an agile crouch before pushing back up onto her feet. Seeing the way that the catgirl moves, it's no wonder that Arius was able to pull off those quite-agile feats of motion. With a concerned look in her eyes, the catgirl watches Tina skeptically, and then offers out her own clawed hand. But rather than shaking hands, she actually grips further up, wraping her fingers around the other girl's forearm.

Before there is any questions, she starts to explain, "It's a show of respect in my culture. You're a great fighter." She keeps her voice low, "And you have my greatest respect, however..." She raises her voice, looking over one shoulder, "Can we get a medic in here?!" Poor Tina, weather she likes it or not, it looks like Sinya is calling in for a med unit.

Tina blinks a few times, and it doesn't take long before the med teams quickly come in. "I'm fine! Really!", she says. The woman blinks as she tries to fight off 3 medics. They're trained for Pilots who just don't know when to call it quits, and soon, Tina is on a stretcher, sedated. She's sleeping for now, as they check her stats. One medic calls for an emergency vehicle to come in, and pick Tina up. The woman just seems to be entering a deep sleep already...