Description: Zach, Tenma, and Hotaru combine windsurfing and fighting! Only one of the three boards survives the battle... (Winners: Zach and Tenma)
Apparently if you know how to fight, you're also a natural at all kinds of other extreme sports just by default. At least, that seems to be the assumption made by the fight coordinaters in Howard's entertainment enterprise. This week's venue is out to test that theory, as three fighters are given a morning's worth of instruction on how to use the larger than normal (thus somewhat steadier) windsurfing boards. Hey, nothing like picking up a new skillset all for the purposes of a crazy, elaborate SNF scenario, right?
While relying on fighters to be exceptionally quick students (or not - a complete inability to keep the board up has its own entertainment value as well for the television audiences ).
The morning's lessons and inevitable accompanying mishaps out of the way, it's time for the actual event to get going. The three fighters will get their start being pulled behind a low, slow flying biplane until they release the ropes and are left to the winds and their own abilities to keep the sleek boards upright. The section of the ocean selected for this potentially dangerous sport is along the ridiculously long Donghai Bridge, spanning miles of seawater. Which means that not only are the fighters supposed to keep the watercraft upright /while/ fighting each other, but avoid dying against the pillers that keep that bridge sturdy.
To Hotaru Futaba, it sounds completely insane. But she's not one to back down on a challenge. Surely the difficulties of the scenario would make it just as hard for the other two fighters to handle the battle either. Adding to her confusion is the fact that she's been double-bookeed this weekend. One fight this afternoon, another later on in the weekend. But... she'll leave figuring out her travel arrangements to the SNF beancounters.
Dressed in a blue and black striped, one-piece swimsuit with a nifty attached blue skirt to go with it, Hotaru has also opted for the thin white lifejackets that were offered to reduce the Death Odds by a little at least. Being pulled by the biplane out to the water to get their crafts some speed, Hotaru presses her feet hard against the surface of the board, the wind blowing her pigtails out straight behind her. She's fought both of her opponents before, but the battles were more traditional in nature... which means she really has no idea what to expect out of either of them in this environment. How is Tenma going to handle that bokken of his while trying to keep the silly device from tipping over? At least if Zach goes nuclear with that power of his again, she has decent odds of putting distance between him and her this time...
Breathing in deeply, enjoying the easy tow out to sea before the actual fight, Hotaru concentrates on just keeping the thing going straight forward for now. Granted, straight forward pretty much puts all three of them on an eventual crash course with the bridge pillers ahead, so some turning may be required before too long... The fight is only seconds from starting - it'll be time to just let go of the rope pulling them along and then figure out how in the blazes to hit each other!
COMBATSYS: Hotaru has started a fight here.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|
COMBATSYS: Hotaru focuses on her next action.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|
Zach is more concerned with staying upright than not going nuclear right this second. He wobbles and weaves around the the bridge pillars and rocks only by virtue of sheer luck at the moment.
"HEEEEEY! MISS FUTAAABAAA!" Zach spins in a couple of circles, his eyes wide, "FOCUSED STRIKE!"
COMBATSYS: Zach has joined the fight here.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Zach
COMBATSYS: Zach takes no action.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Zach
Seriously, man, what the hell kind of a fight is this, anyway? Tenma looks less than pleased to be out here on what amounts to a really, really BIG obstacle course, standing on a raft with a sail or something... And yes, he's got his bokken, of course! The weapon is already alight with bloody chi, a violent aura of smoky red surrounding the wooden blade, while wonders how he's going to steer his stupid raft one-handed. "What a pain in the ass," the Gedo swordsman mutters irritably, looking over at the other fighters. "Just don't screw up!" Tenma adds towards Zach, who he honestly doesn't know from Adam, but... He KNOWS Hotaru is strong. But then, he also knows that he's incredibly awesome. So how can they not win? It's inconceivable!
COMBATSYS: Tenma has joined the fight here.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Tenma
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Zach 0/-------/-------|
COMBATSYS: Tenma takes no action.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Tenma
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Zach 0/-------/-------|
COMBATSYS: Zach has joined the fight here on the right meter side.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Zach
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Tenma 0/-------/-------|
COMBATSYS: Hotaru has joined the fight here on the left meter side.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Zach
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Tenma 0/-------/-------|
COMBATSYS: Tenma has joined the fight here on the right meter side.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Zach
> //////////////////////////////]
|-------\-------\0 Tenma
Zach's call earns him a faint smile from the girl but that's it. This might be a very difficult fight to be chatty during... which might be for the best considering /one/ of her opponents. The time comes for the fighters to let go of the tow ropes, take over handling the boards on their own, and make with the attempting to actually do combat as well!
Hotaru's hand releases the handle before taking a tight grip on the board via which she can steer the sail. She understands the gist of it, anyway, and while the trio speeds toward the bridge off a ways, the girl suddenly veers to the side, steering directly for Zach's board, before turning it to run forward again, parallel to his.
"Hope you have a tight grip!" the girl warns before she takes the gamble of running off her board onto his in order to grab hold of the young man's arm and just basically kick the heck out of him - 4 strong, damaging kicks, aimed for shins, knees, stomach, and chest, before she lets go of him and attempts to escape back to her own board.
COMBATSYS: Zach endures Hotaru's Shin-Jou Tai.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-----==|=====--\-------\0 Zach
> //////////////////////////////]
|-------\-------\0 Tenma
Zach somehow keeps his grip as the kicks smash into his gut. He does something pretty interesting right after...when Hotaru attempts to get clear of him. A quick swivel of the wrist, as he attempts to grab her by the arm!
Zach uncases a move Hotaru has yet to see as he hooks an ankle around his pole, and places the now freed palm near her torso. A beachball-sized sphere spins into existance from that palm, at a speed she might have a hard time dodging!
Ah, hell. Tenma looks a bit unsteady as he lets go of the rope along with the others, drifting back... And of course, Hotaru takes the initiative immediately, lunging at his temporary teammate. The tall, lean Japanese boy winces a bit at the hit the tiny American takes, but since it seems like Zach's got that under control, and is lobbing something at Hotaru, well... Tenma might as well help out, right?
Keeping his own grip carefully, Tenma sweeps his bokken through the air, a harmless slash that couldn't hit Hotaru even if they weren't separated by water, but from the arc of the blade something else emerges, a crescent of roiling red blood, tearing through the air directly towards Hotaru, in the hopes of sandwiching her between the two attacks. "Heads up, princess!!"
COMBATSYS: Hotaru dodges Zach's Impulse Flare.
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Hotaru 0/-------/-----==|=====--\-------\0 Zach
> ///////////////////////////// ]
|-------\-------\0 Tenma
COMBATSYS: Tenma successfully hits Hotaru with Dharmapala.
- Power hit! -
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Hotaru 0/-------/--=====|=====--\-------\0 Zach
> ///////////////////////////// ]
|=------\-------\0 Tenma
Even as Zach reaches to get a grip on her arm, Hotaru snakes it right out of the way, keeping him from holding her still when his other hand brings forward that dangerous power of his. This lets her escape back to her board as she had been intending. The only problem there is the incoming, airborn crescent of blood-powered chi that comes crashing into her from behind.
"OW!" The girl yelps, her hands just barely getting a grip on her own sail as the red hued attack splashes against her. That's what he meant by heads up, she realizes, realizing that she shouldn't get so focused on Zach when she's got Tenma to worry about as well. Him and his nasty attacks - at least this fight is in the /water/!
She still has the problem of being trapped between the two of them, however, which is going to make this much harder than she thinks she can handle. A long glance is risked on Tenma before she focuses back on Zach, a faint grin forming on her lips as she hops back onto his board and trys to snag his arm again all in an attempt to swing him over and onto the board she just ditched. "Trade ya!"
COMBATSYS: Zach fails to interrupt Quick Throw from Hotaru with Sparklers.
- Power fail! -
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Hotaru 0/-------/-======|=======\-------\1 Zach
> ///////////////////////////// ]
|=------\-------\0 Tenma
Zach barely has a firm grip on his board when Hotaru comes in again for him. He sweeps his free hand, producing a fine spray of psycho power which does...
...absolutely nothing as the American is slammed onto Hotaru's board with a loud grunt. He slips across it, and almost falls off but for the timely snag of the pole. He's not going to be doing much more than hanging on right now!
Ohhh, that looked like it hurt. Tenma feels a brief, tiny pang of sympathy for Zach, getting lobbed around like a ragdoll by Hotaru, but he also feels a bit offended. What, isn't he good enough to fight with? Is it the blood? Is it too gross, or something? Gritting his teeth and steering awkwardly, the Gedo Gang member brings his raft in as close as he can get to the one Zach now occupies, before leaping off of his and onto that one; from there, he focuses chi in his legs, and then springboards off of the second raft, which sets it a-shakin' (sorry, Zach!) as he flings himself through the air at Hotaru...
Of course, the question is what Tenma plans on doing when he gets there, which is actually pretty simple; he holds his bokken backhanded, point downwards and with the butt end braced with his left palm, as he dives towards Hotaru and her raft like some kind of plunging bloody missile. "Hope ya like swimmin'!!" he bellows, and really? He thinks that's a pretty clever joke right about now.
COMBATSYS: Tenma successfully hits Hotaru with Deep Strike.
-* CRITICAL HIT! *-
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Hotaru 1/----===/=======|=======\-------\1 Zach
> ///////////////////////////// ]
|==-----\-------\0 Tenma
The girl is feeling pretty good about things so far. Sure, Tenma's attack hurt pretty bad, but she's handling Zach all around with little trouble. No doubt a lot of the things she picked up about her last fight with him are coming into play here, giving her a better chance against him than she managed last time.
Leaving the young man to fend for himself on the raft she just traded him for, the girl goes back to steadying the one she just stole, well aware that Tenma is coming in via the air from Zach's raft. The problem is the three boards are rapidly bearing in on the pillers as well, so the girl is a bit stumped as to whether she should deal with not colliding with the bridge in a collosal mess, or whether she should just let things play out while dealing with Tenma instead.
In the end, it turns out somewhat a painful mixture of both that ultimately goes as bad as possible. Releasing her hand from the sail's control, Hotaru glances up toward Tenma, a focused look on her face. He's taking a big risk making a giant leap like that, but she can tell what his intent is, too, trying to take out one of the rafts all together, and maybe her with it! Stepping back to move out of the way, her foot slips on the surface of the windboard - she had gotten used to hers, but Zach's feels different and she really wasn't ready to account for that just now. Her foot sliding away from her, she ends up in a half-splits, clinging to the sail to keep from falling over completely, but that unfortunately leaves Hotaru lined up with the inbound sword weilder. Tenma's attack ends up drilling right into the girl, whether he expected it to or not, driving her flat against the board with enough force to shatter the windboard right down the middle, plunging the girl into the ocean beneath it.
The fate of the board didn't really change either way, as it was doomed for destruction as what remains of it smashes against the first stone piller to come along, exploding into an array of wooden splinters in all directions. The fight might have very well been declared over at that point, if it wasn't for the projectile that breaks through the water and goes flying back at Tenma from off to the direction where he had ditched his own windboard... Followed shortly by the two arms of Hotaru as she pops out of the water and scrambles aboard his original board, flopping herself over it with a gasp. "...I need to stick to the traditional stuff," the girl mutters as Tenma's board misses the first piller by inches.
Zach does not do anything terribly complex. He simply heaves himself onto his... newly acquired raft, and attempts to get around those pillars while trying to catch his breath a bit.
This is hard work, after all!
COMBATSYS: Zach gains composure.
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Hotaru 1/------=/=======|=======\-------\0 Zach
> ///////////////////////////// ]
|==-----\-------\0 Tenma
COMBATSYS: Tenma endures Hotaru's Hakki Shou EX.
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Hotaru 1/-----==/=======|=======\-------\0 Zach
> //////////////////////// ]
|=====--\-------\0 Tenma
Risk big, win big! That's the way Tenma Kiryuu plays it. Of course, sometimes when you risk big you LOSE big instead, but what sort of a man would he be if he worried about that? None at all. Unfortunately, the Gedo student should probably have thought that one through a little bit better, as the board shatters under the force of the blow, sending Hotaru into the icy water and leaving Tenma himself clinging - barely - to one half of the ruined raft... Just before it collides with the pillar.
The sudden explosion of debris does not, however, single the untimely end of everyone's (least) favourite bokken-wielding loud-mouthed fighter, though, as he can be seen clinging to the pillar thereafter, just in time to see Hotaru's chi blast heading right for him. That's not good. But living dangerously has paid off so far, and he doesn't really have any options at the moment, so he springs off of his perch, right into the projectile.
And then he goes through it.
Hotaru's seen him do this before, though to a much, uh, LARGER blast of energy, but the end result is the same; Tenma careening forwards through the air, aiming to land right on the same raft as the Futaba girl, and then lashing out with his left fist in a series of carefully positioned strikes at her torso, to disrupt the flow of energy through her body, moving to keep the pressure on her atop their precarious, moving perch...! "This is fun, huh?" he wonders, a little bit wryly. He's not a fan of their environment, but...
COMBATSYS: Hotaru dodges Tenma's Flow Breaker.
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Hotaru 1/-----==/=======|=======\-------\0 Zach
> /////////////////////// ]
|=====--\-------\0 Tenma
Dealing with the destruction of Hotaru's... Zach's... someone's! raft buys Hotaru a lot of time to get her breath back, pulling herself up on Tenma's board all together, and nudging the sail just enough such that the craft weaves around yet another piller. The water is definitely getting a lot less calm now that they're beneath the bridge, but it's the least of her worries as Tenma comes at her again. One hand lifting to brush her bangs aside so that she can see clearly, the girl lets go of the sail in order to better deal with him, this time being a lot more careful about her footing.
"Well, I did want to fight you again sometime... but this wasn't exactly what I had in mind," she replies as his left swings out for her with the intent to reduce her ability to fight at full capacity. Each swing is avoided as she ends up backing off to the far back of the raft, her foot coming down on the edge before she stops retreating. "Maybe we'll get a clean fight someday!"
With no more space to go Hotaru ends up leaping off to the side opposite of Zach's board, feet planting hard against one of the wide stone pillers, before she lunges right back at Tenma arms first as if trying to straight out tackle the student. If she can plant her hands against his shoulders, she'll flip up and press her feet against the sail and use that as leverage to drive the boy down to the board face first.
Zach is intent on two things suddenly; keeping an eye on the fight and catching his breath. Perhaps he should have been watching where he was going...
Zach remembers this and looks down river. Oh crap. Rock.
In a burst of quick thinking, Glen torques on the primative controls and hits the rock at an angle. The board is spared a destructive impact... but it is now in the air. Zach lets out a whoop as he careens towards Hotaru, only partly by design.
COMBATSYS: Tenma interrupts Ten Ranku-Tou from Hotaru with Head Breaker.
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Hotaru 1/---====/=======|=======\-------\0 Zach
> //////////////////// ]
|=======\-------\0 Tenma
"Ain't no such thing as a 'clean' fight," Tenma says, and while his tone hasn't really changed any... This is a somewhat more serious sentiment from the tall boy. Of course, it would seem to an outsider, to someone who doesn't know how his mind actually works, that Kiryuu has completely forgotten about his teammate, and so it might as well be a one-on-one fight, right? But not so! He grins a little as Hotaru lunges forward to tackle him, because he can tell that the other fighter is headed their way... Tenma just needs to create an opening for him.
So when Hotaru tries to bear Tenma to the board underfoot, twisting to face her instead of collapsing on his front, and even as his backside hits the board roughly, jarring his tailbone, Tenma's left hand grabs a fistful of Hotaru's hair... And then he smashes his forehead into her face hard enough to drive her off of him. "DORYA!!!"
COMBATSYS: Hotaru fails to interrupt Random Weapon from Zach with Ten-shou Ranki.
-* CRITICAL FAIL! *-
> ////////////////// ]
|=======\-------\1 Zach
> //////////////////// ]
|=======\-------\0 Tenma
COMBATSYS: Hotaru can no longer fight.
> ////////////////// ]
|=======\-------\1 Zach
> //////////////////// ]
|=======\-------\0 Tenma
"Yeah, there never would be with /your/ style," Hotaru hehs, her hands pressing down on his shoulders as she thinks she has Tenma right where she wants him. Only... He's not wedged down as solidly as she had hoped and he manages to turn around. Erk. No one has /ever/ done that when she's pulled this stunt on them before. She has no choice but to go through with it all the same, even if it means the drenched girl ends up straddling Tenma on his stomach when they come down to land against the board. There isn't enough time to even smile sheepishly at the situation as he gets a tight grip on her hair and holds her in place for the smashing headbutt to her face.
"Ow!" the girl yelps, sitting up straight, arm reeling back as she gets ready to clobber Tenma something fierce for the brutal blow to her nose, "Two can play th-" she starts, her tone marred by the blood swelling there. The water already pouring off of her hides the tearing up of her eyes to some degree from the sharp pain.
Her voice trails off as she only vaguly becomes aware of the shadow of impending doom of looming raft coming in overhead, propelled into the air by the rough patch they're going through now. "Erk, on second thought. Move!"
She never actually gets to expressing that as she pushes herself off of Tenma. Thinking that both he and she are about to get crushed by the incoming windboard, Hotaru attempts to use everything she has left in her to kick into it and redirect it from striking the board she and the bokken weilder are on. "Ten-shou-" *CRASH*
The girl just ends up getting sandwhiched by Zach's raft for her trouble, slammed down hard against Tenma's board and then driven through the /second/ windboard for this fight as it too gets shattered by the impact. Pushed beneath the waves again, the pig-tailed girl bobs back up to the top of the water after a long moment. But this time she's clearly completely unconscious. She'll be glad she decided to don the lifejacket!
Zach's eyes go wide as Hotaru ends up in the drink. He glances around for a moment, realizing that the preferred standbys of reach, throw and row are out of the question...
...Zach dives in after the girl. Swimming in some of Ohio's rivers never prepared him for this, but he is certainly glad that he has had that experience. He wraps one arm around the unconcious girl as he looks around for a moment, finding the shore. He does some quick math, and points an arm in the opposite direction. "...Burst Stream."
A brilliant torrent of violet energy screams loose from the palm, rocketting the pair into the sky and towards the shore. Zach shifts his weight, attempting to get himself between the rocks and the girl before the pair crash to the ground.
COMBATSYS: Zach has left the fight here.
> //////////////////// ]
|=======\-------\0 Tenma
Also glad he wore a lifejacket: Tenma. "Son of a bitch!" he shouts, as the whole 'Zach joining the fray again' thing goes a lot more dangerously than he'd been expecting - and here he had a Hotaru on top of him and everything! - and Hotaru ends up going through another demolished board, and indeed the whole board situation is pretty much a wash now. But on the bright side, one supposes, Zach rescues the unconscious Hotaru from the icy depths, which just leaves... Tenma floating there, the aura around his bokken dismissed as he holds it underwater, his eyes hooded and mouth pulled into a broad frown, giving him a decidedly flat expression.
Don't mind Tenma though, he'll just wait until the SNF crew fishes him out! But at least they won, right? That should make him feel better. He'll celebrate later, right now he's wet and grumpy.
COMBATSYS: Tenma has ended the fight here.
Log created on 20:12:21 08/20/2007 by Zach, and last modified on 06:26:30 08/28/2007.