R.D. dropped into a battle stance, with his right hand held in front of him, clenched into a fist, and his left held behind him, hand open. Clenching his hands, Godhand exploded around his forearms, and the energy swept around him, briefly forming the image of a roaring dragon's head.

Matt looked up at the exploding Godhand, and his armored fist burned in response. "Oh yeah?"

His knuckles crashed against R.D.'s, creating a massive impact.

The energy held between the two boys was bleeding out, flaring in the form of wild lightning that crackled between their fists. To the onlookers, it seemed as if they were clashing their wills against one another, one trying to overpower the other.

Finally, R.D. launched his attack, pushing forward. He threw out his fists over and over again, alternating fists with each strike as he unleashed a hurricane of blows against Matt. As the final strike came in, he reared his right hand back.

"God Hand... Smash!"

The fist shot up and out, rising up to meet his opponent's chest.

Matt caught the blow directly and sailed up, flying upwards in an arc before landing on the floor with a massive crash.

The Godhand dispersed from R.D.'s hands as the blow landed, and smoke seemed to rise up off of various points on his body. R.D. ignored the burning feeling trailing through his arms and legs. He looked back up and held his right hand out. One by one, his fingers closed into a fist, and he could hear the fabric of the glove stretch as he clenched it into a fist.

===Sector D-7 Training Control, Aube===

"So this is where they're at?" Alasea asked, mostly to herself as she stood in front of the pribnow box window. Her arms were crossed beneath her breasts, and she was frowning as Matt finally landed on the floor after R.D.'s final strike of God Hand Smash.

"Why are they trying to kill each other?" she asked, looking down at Hugo.

"Hell if I know," Hugo muttered. "At least R.D. knows how to take a punch."

"Hey," Alasea said, looking over to a nearby technician. "Why are those two in there fighting?"

"Special Officers R.D. and Willard volunteered to test out the Matter Wave systems in the training chamber," he replied, not looking up from his console. "We had just gotten the system repaired from the attack."

"Well, tell them to get out here," Hugo said.

"No can do," the technician said. "We haven't completed the tests."

"I don't care. I need to talk to him right now."

"Look, the whole chamber is locked down, okay? We can't stop their combat until we're done with the system tests," the technician said, looking slightly irritated. "If you need to talk to either of them, you're just going to have to wait."

Hugo turned back to watch the tests, silent.

Alasea also turned her gaze back onto the simulated battlefield, just in time to see a bright flash of light and feel a light rumble go through the chamber--apparently, R.D. and Matt had decided to step it up a notch once more.

===Simulation Chamber===

Bolts of lightning rained down and were deftly avoided by a suddenly haggard-looking R.D. as he rolled between two simulated rocks. Coming out of the roll, he flung a hand wide, spraying a trio of fireballs at Matt before he took off running again.

Matt rushed aside into a blur. Now he was going at full speed thanks to the power of electricity, and he rammed into R.D. with a fast blow.

"Gyahh!"

R.D. was smashed hard by Matt's tackle, and he was sent hurtling back--his body seemed to collide with air made solid, and behind him hexagonal energy shielding briefly flared up behind him--in reality, he had collided with the wall of the simulation chamber.

Landing partly in a kneel, R.D. pushed off before Matt could follow up, jumping to the side while firing a wave of plasma at the ground in front of his opponent. Growling, he landed against the wall, as if he were crouched against thin air; he could feel the energy of the shielded wall crackle against one hand before he shoved off of it. He regretted his inability to combine elemental power with his body to enhance its capabilities like Matt. And knowing that the techs would've liked him to not alter the simulation chamber, he had no way of drawing up earth- and stone-based attacks, nor could he utilize Shell Bullet in any way.

Edited by RisingDragon on July 12, 2009 at 19:47:10.

He didn't have long. He burned power fast when he was moving at high speeds. Best thing to do now would be to pummel R.D. like hell until it wore out.

So he did.

This time, R.D. was ready for Matt's assault. With a grunt, he flung out a hand and channeled, weaving flows of energy around it and outwards, forming a barrier of faint energy in front of his palm. As the attacks smashed against it, R.D. fell back, gritting his teeth as he tried to withstand the endless blows.

Throwing his right fist back, he spread his legs out to brace himself. Energy gathered into his hand, suffusing and supercharging it with power. Wind swirled around his wrist into a tiny cyclone, spinning faster and faster. He began to growl. "Revolver..."

R.D. shoved his left hand forward, forcing his barrier out at Matt. The wind around his right wrist suddenly stopped and spun even faster in the opposite direction as he swung his fist up at Matt. "Cannon!"

There was a loud clap of sound collapsing as he fired the attack. A concussive blast of wind shot out from his fist straight at Matt.

The force of wind smashed into Matt, hurling him away.

R.D. gave chase, running after Matt with a quick sprint. Once he was in range, he lunged at him, twisting around to deliver a flying side kick at him.

Matt's feet skid along the ground, and he dug in with his fingers. As R.D. came in, his bracer spun to a new gem.

"Iron Guard!" His body flashed, briefly engulfed in a silver aura, before he took the kick head-on. It smashed into the side of his head, and yet, he barely budged-R.D. had just hit an impossibly hard surface.

Shock registered on R.D.'s face as pain erupted up through his foot and into his leg. Kicking off of Matt, he landed and slid backwards between two jutting "rocks". What the hell was that? he wondered briefly, surreptitiously testing the injured leg while he fell back into a ready stance.

"That's a neat trick," R.D. muttered as he threw his arms out wide. Spheres of plasma burst into life in front of each of them, each gathering particles of energy from the air around them as they charged.

"You don't need to use the power of the earth for offense, you know," Matt said. He bent down and ran at R.D..

"I do!" R.D. fired back, stepping forward as he flung the first sphere forward. It exploded into a blast wave of azure plasma energy that cut through the air at Matt.

Not done, R.D. pivoted with the throw and hurled the second one right after it. The second one cut through the air faster than the first--within moments, shortly before the first would impact against Matt, the second blast wave smashed into the first. With a flash of light, the two had combined into a much larger blast, this one glowing an angry red.

The blast smashed into Matt with a powerful explosion, but immediately he cut through it, that same silver aura flickering.

"Gotcha, bitch!" Matt shouted before tagging R.D. across the face with a powerful, tetonic hook.

R.D.'s eyes widened in shock. "Cheater!" he shouted, bracing himself for impact. For a moment, blue light seemed to shimmer in the air around him. There was a loud booming noise as the hook punch crashed against the side of R.D.'s face, and he spun with the blow, causing fragments of armor to scatter through the air, dissolving into blue particles of light upon striking the ground.

R.D. put one armored boot out in front of him to halt his spin, presenting his back to Matt--now, his body was once again clad in the Dragon King Armor, summoned hastily at the last second to absorb the blow. Some of the helmet had been fractured and broken off from the strike.

He suddenly leaped up and spun in the air, swiping out with the armored foot at Matt's face. "Luckily I have my own armor!" he shouted as he attacked.

Matt caught the blow, and his feet practically sunk into the ground with the effort. He grit his teeth, straining, and with a yell, he tossed R.D. away from him.

"Okay, I'm done with this," he said, chambering his fists, beginning to draw power. "Megaton..."

He landed hard, digging his boots into the floor to halt his forced retreat. Looking up, the amnesiac locked onto Matt.

R.D. curved his right hand around in front of his chest as he channeled, and blue and white energy swathed around his forehand, followed by bolts of golden electricity. It crackled violently as he clenched his armored fist.

"Tenrai..."

===Sector D-7 Training Control, Aube===

"Alright, that's finished," one of the technicians stated. "We've completed the tests; all systems are green."

"That's good," Alasea said, "Because if Matt's doing what I think he's doing, you might not have a test chamber left."

"What?!" came the startled reply. They quickly checked the system readouts. "If those two fire that much energy at once, they'll overload the systems all over again! Deploy the Cancellation Field!"

"Deploying Cancellation Field!" one female technician responded.

===Simulation Chamber===

Suddenly, without warning, R.D. lurched as his control over energy was violently disabled, leaving him with a queer empty feeling. The same happened to Matt; the energy gathered for the use of Megaton Cannon dissipated immediately. The simulation shut down abruptly, and the wasteland disappeared, replaced by the stark gray-white dome chamber.

"Okay, that's enough, you two," came a technicians voice. "If you keep up that level of combat you'll damage the system and we'd have to repair it all over again."

Matt shook his hands, like he was waving some feeling off of them. "All right. That was good enough for me anyway."

R.D. dismissed the Dragon King Armor, letting it fade off of his form into particles of light that quickly disappeared. He interlaced his fingers together and stretched them forward, palms out, until he heard his knuckles crack.

"Well, you can return to the locker rooms now and wash up," the technician stated. "By the way, a couple of your friends came to see you. Said they needed to speak with you."

"Well, this should be fun!" Matt said, glancing at R.D. with an unexpected cheer. He strode towards the chamber doors.