The Desert Skies

[Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald]

"Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald, Zoid registration Number PTX-017-XAM2. Acknowledged" Stated the radiantly silver judge, "Standby until your opponent arrives"

Dr. Fitzgerald sighed lazily inside his custom modified Pteras as it flew hundreds of feet above the ground. 'Another day, another battle, another step towards regaining my credibility in the scientific community' he thought silently to himself 'I'm ready whenever you are.... whoever you are'

[RJ]

RJ flew in with his custom Wing Liger. He began circling around the pteras to show off his unique zoid. He observed that the opponents zoid was also different. RJ could tell he had a challenge on his hands. "Ready when you are." RJ said over the com link. he wondered what this "Doctor" thought of the Wing Liger. His opponents zoid was impressive, but RJ had already thought of ways to overcome them. His war experience would serve him well here. As he was thinking this, his Liger roared, anxious for battle.

[Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald]

Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald sighed, his opponent seemed to be rather immature, showing off his zoid and revealing all of his little secrets. No shield, extremely light armor, and merely a weak gun for defense, not to mention that unlike most zoids of this day and age, it was kept flying by a jet booster mounted on the back rather than the more common electromagnetic propulsion system.

'All in my favor' Dr. Fitzgerald thought as he considered the Zoid match up 'Not to mention i have the speed advantage as well'

Gerald opened up his com link "It doesn't matter when I'm ready, it matters when the judge is. Did you submit your registration to him yet?" A quick glance down at the Judge, who was trying to direct the 'unauthorized zoid to leave the battlefield', indicated that he probably hadnt.

[RJ]

"Oh yea, forgot about that!" RJ could tell by his opponents tone that he was significantly sure of this victory and was significantly underestimating him. He was probably assuming that because of its bulk, his Liger was slow, when in fact his liger's speed was one of its advantages. His opponent also probably hadn't noticed that his wings doubled as blades. RJ had done his homework and knew his opponent was a complete greenhorn to zoid piloting, and was obviously unaware of RJ's experience piloting in the Civil War of his home country. RJ entered his registration information and waited for the battle to begin.

[Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald]

"Registration accepted. Area Scanned, Battlefield Set up! Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald versus RJ. Battle mode 0992. Ready, FIGHT!" The Judge announced

As the battle began, Dr. Fitzgerald decided it was time to conduct an experiment. His guns out ranged and outclassed his opponent's, so the Pteras merely hovered near it starting point (a significant distance from the liger), and focused entirely on shooting its Upgraded Vulcan Cannon at the zoid as it would inevitably approach.

Considering that the finer aerodynamic principles of the Liger had not been improved(as it only had the wings and jet added), pinpoint movement surely wasnt in mind when the zoid was modified. Dr. Fitzgerald expected positive results from the test.

[RJ]

RJ expected similar maneuvers from the pteras. He used one of the evasive moves that he had learned and adapted for the liger. He tucked his wings in and dove down below the arc of bullets. His freefall lasted only seconds as then he activated his boosters, unfolded his wings, and ran at a breakneck speed on the ground. Then he flew back up into the air and flew up directly beneath the pteras. His speed outmatched that of a normal pteras, and he didn't think this one had any speed upgrades. His goal was to slice the enemy pteras in half from below with his wing blades. The entire maneuver lasted 3 seconds.

[Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald]

(I like how your free fall lasted 'only seconds', while the entire maneuver in total only lasted 3 seconds. frefalling from even something as low as 100 feet should take you at least 4 seconds, just for reference)

Dr. Fitzgerald was intrigued. The liger had initiated a free fall from over a thousand feet up, and had landed on legs which had been stripped of armor and had no extra shock absorbing principles installed. Furthermore it had immediately began using the same legs, that by all regards should have been crushed from the fall, to run and launch itself back into the air. Curious. Not to mention the tremendous G-Force and shock that this move would put on the pilot, it was hard to believe that these were the skills of a D ranked pilot, these seemed more in line with a B or A rank.

What was also curious was the pilots apparent attempt to catch up with the Pteras Doctor Mod. Dr. Fitzgerald activated the magnetic wings and began accelerating away from the flying shield ligers attack as soon as it had taken off from the ground, which would prove as an effective defense since the much lighter pteras accelerated faster and, as a zoid made for flying, was much more aerodynamic. The clunky flying liger couldnt catch up with that kind of speed advantage.

"Observation" Dr. Fitzgerald commed over to RJ "You seem to overestimate the logical capabilities of your zoid"

Regardless, after he had successfully avoided the attack, he began a strafing run from a safe distance away, trying to catch the flying liger as it was recovering from its attack. As before, Dr. Fitzgerald expected positive results as he abused the superior ranged firepower of his zoid.

[RJ]

(OOC: Before you had said hundreds of feet up, so I assumed you had meant we were 200 or 300 ft up, not a thousand)

RJ didn't even flinch when he saw his attack miss. His opponent had predicted his move and gotten out of the way. Pretty good for a first timer, but RJ wasn't done yet. He used the momentum of his previous upwards attack and kept going higher and hid in a nearby cloud. "Actually, since i made this zoid from scratch, I know exactly what it can and cant do!" Just then he dropped right out of the cloud, which was about 100 ft higher than the Pteras's current position, right over the opponent. He then pulled a lever inside his cockpit that directed more fuel to his booster, which increased its capabilities but put strain on his armor. He was going, with the increased energy and the force of gravity working with him, nor against him, he was going significantly faster. As he was falling, he fired off multiple shots from his gun aimed strait at the red zoid. His goal was, again, to slice part of it with his Wing Blade.

[Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald]

"You made it poorly then" Gerald taunted "Building something from scratch with accumulated mechanics knowledge is no replacement for a degree in mechanical engineering". As soon as the flying liger had (ignored his previous fire?) gone up into the clouds, its next course of action was too obvious to ignore. The Pteras quickly flew away from its previous position towards skies that lacked cloud cover, and fired at the skies underneath the cloud he had been at, expecting the flying liger to make an attack run through that area.

"Its far too limited. One doesn't need to be a master pilot to realize that all I need to do is use my superior speed and range to slowly put damage on you until you system freeze."

[RJ]

RJ cursed at himself and hit himself on the head. He knew his Liger was at least as fast as this darn Pteras, but he was being way to predictable.. He then came up with a brilliant idea. He angled his zoid mid-drop so that he would take some of his opponents hits in non-vital areas along its back, close to, but missing, his jet booster. Then he acted as though his jet booster had been damaged and deactivated it, causing his Liger to drop out of the sky. He then unfolded his wings at the last moment and purposely skidded along the ground. He then, in a show of his expert handling of his zoid, made it seem as though his leg had been damaged by putting his zoids weight on only the other and making a limping motion. He then feebly angled his zoid upward and shot at the opponent from the ground.

[Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald]

OOC: You just barely missed the 3 days mark from my last post man, could you give me a heads up next time you plan on not showing up for 3 days? My characters been stuck in this thread waiting for you> >_>

"It seems like that last one worked, i knew positive results were only a matter of time" Dr. Fitzgerald mused to himself "But there is no need to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory... since that zoid is damaged and its mobility should be nearly gone(regardless of the fact that it probably couldn't dodge this in its fully functional state), this should finish it off nicely"

Gerald kept his distance from the Liger and remained high in the sky. The Ligers weak machine gun was useless at this kind of extreme range, so Gerald could wait until his missiles obtained a lock on the presumably damaged zoid. He fired only two of the missiles at the 'damaged' liger, and let them streak toward the blue zoid. Surely they would cause a system freeze, and even under optimal conditions, his opponent did not seem to be particularly efficient in the shooting department, so the chances of the weak and inaccurate machine gun destroying the missiles was surely extremely low.

[RJ]

RJ was disappointed, he had hoped the Pteras would fly in closer. He was pretty sure that he could use what the enemy did do to his advantage, though. Even though he didn't often use this skill, RJ wasn't a bad shot. And when he actually stayed still and aimed, which wasn't often, he could do alot of damage. He locked his sights on only one of the missiles and shot it, but only after waiting for it to get in very close. At the same time RJ re-adjusted his zoid and took off, setting his booster to maximum thrust (which he hadn't done the whole fight). The second missile was close enough to the first so that it was triggered when the force of the first explosion hit it. The explosions provided a cloud of smoke that made it appear as though the missiles had hit and obscured his sudden liftoff. This also caused his armor to start cracking, not damaging any vital parts, but making the armor defending them weaker.

The Liger rocketed straight for the Pteras, firing off a few shots at it once it was out of the smoke cloud, in a best-case-scenario colliding with it and then it would rip it to shreds with its claws and teeth. But RJ had plans for any other outcome. If the Pteras were to go right or left it would get slashed by the Ligers wing blades. If it was to attempt to go over it, RJ would roll his zoid and bash the opponent with the flat side of his wing. If he were to attempt to get away by going under the Liger then he would drop on top of him and use his claws to rip it to shreds. If the Pteras did a 360 and ran away, RJ would continue shooting at it with his rifle. RJ was pretty sure he would hit his target in some way or another due to his planning and element of surprise.

[Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald]

EDIT 2: Issue resolved, waiting for edit

[Dr. Gerald Fitzgerald]

"It seems that it was indeed a simple rouse, what an inconvenience..." He muttered "This specimen is frustratingly resilient, if not blatantly predicable in its attacks. But in truth, this little game is beginning to bore me" The Pteras fired its remaining missile pod at the still locked Flying Liger(these missiles are semi-active homing missiles, which use the radar on board the pteras in conjunction with a small radar on the missile to track the target before impact), this time being sure to stagger the missile firings so they both couldn't be destroyed by a single lucky shot once more. The Flying Liger still wasn't that maneuverable, making dodging both missiles unlikely due to its inability to quickly change flight paths.

Once that was done, the Pteras made a sharp turn and accelerated to approximately the speed of the oncoming liger, ensuring the distance between the two would remain relatively constant, and the ligers weapon would remain significantly out of its effective range, flying directly away from the liger. "At the very least" Dr. Fitzgerald said, "I know he will have trouble catching up to me since my zoid is faster in the sky."

OOC: please note that your character doesn't actually know what kind of missile guidance is being used, so him having a tailored response to it is unlikely.

[RJ]

Stupid missiles! They were really ruining RJ's day. His shots fired when he first lifted off destroyed some of the earlier missiles. RJ continued moving foreword towards the retreating Pteras. RJ was able to avoid a good number of the missiles by rocking side to side at the last second and by continuing shooting, sometimes at the Pteras, sometimes at missiles. Explosions still rocked the Liger. Soon he had lost his right fang, use of his back legs (which meant no more moving on land), and his wing retractors. Eventually the barrage ended. RJ still continued firing at the Pteras, he couldn't accurately aim, but he shot so much that a few should have hit. He followed the Pteras, his intuition told him that the Pteras was now out of missile pods to use, which left only its gattling guns. Because they were forward facing, RJ knew his opponent would have to turn and face him sometime. RJ thought that, because the Pteras had so many weapons, its armor should be weaker to counter-act the weight and keep it in the air, and a normal pteras could be easily shot down by most guns, let alone a less armored one, which would give RJ the advantage in a head-to-head gunfight. Plus if he turned to face him RJ could catch up and strike him and end it! RRJ kept on fireing at the Pteras, knowing a few of his shots should hit.