Issue 1 Downtime

Running out of options, Will shifts into a rubbery substance, hoping the weight will bounce back up and hit Night Thrasher in his stupid face.

The thing is rather heavy, so while it bounces a little it mostly just serves to bounce up a tiny bit before coming back down on Will.

"Erg," Will said, as he stretched his hands out AROUND the weights to try to wrap around Night Thrasher's head and torso again.

He'd get up, but he was feeling a little depressed at the moment.

Once Will tries to stretch into range again Night Thrasher throws a punch at him to drive him back and swings his weapon (and with it Will) into a wall, crashing right through it.

Will lands, coughing, on the floor of whatever room THIS was. In no shape to spring right back to his feet, he quickly shifted to match the carpet, hoping to blend in and that Night Thrasher wouldn't notice him through the various debris and dust that had been kicked up.

He steps through the hole in the wrecked wall, brushing away some debris that's still clinging to the remains of the wall. He doesn't seem to notice Will, but he does seem to have learned from his earlier mistake, because he starts going to town on just about everything in what appears to be part of dressing rooms. He smashes down the dividers and more of the wall, benches and curtains, eventually zeroing in on the carpet.

Just before Night Thrasher can reach HIS segment of carpet, Will would rise up and try to envelop him in a giant sphere, trapping him.

Night Thrasher falls to the floor when the carpet catches him off guard and trips him up, but that doesn't stop him from trying to get a grip on Will and try to simply tear his way out.

Night Thrasher was strong enough to make holes in Will's body as it curved over and encased him. However, Will was also actively trying to patch in those holes as he went--and trying to stick to his fingers, as well.

Night Thrasher abandons his attempts and instead tries to hunch over to give himself enough room for his arms to pull back and punch his own thighs, counting on his body armor to shield him from the worst damage as well as the electrical discharge. The later gets to him anyway, but he powers through it, counting on the fact that it'll affect Will worse than him.

Will gritted his teeth (mentally, of course), and took the blast.

Now, instead of being inside a fairly consistant sphere, Night Thrasher was inside of an electrified, rapidly shifting in and out shape, cycling between different depths, textures, and solidity at lightning speeds. It was equally likely that a hole would develop that he could get out of...or that it would collapse in on him and knock him out.

Night Thrasher's suit is at least somewhat insulated and he throws himself back, tearing through Will and collapsing to the ground nearby, taking a moment to catch his breath and get his twitching muscles under control.

Will, on the other hand, took a moment, coughing on the ground, as pulled himself together.

Night Thrasher is the first to pull himself to his feet and kicks up one of the actual carpets, aiming to cover Will before kicking him.

It worked! Will was kicked!

And then, a metal spike shot out through the carpet, and towards Night Thrasher's legs.

It slices through the body suit and grazes Night Thrasher's leg, who tries to grab the spike and swing Will around and into a wall, his weight firmly on his uninjured leg.

Will was swung into the wall--but he had turned his body rubbery there, planning on using Night Thrasher's own strength to propel him back INTO the goon.

Night Thrasher wasn't about to fall for the same shifting trick twice and instead angles the bounce so he swings Will into, and through, another wall before letting go of him and letting momentum throw him across the store.

Will turned in midair, letting himself bounce against the first SOLID surface he would reach--and then would fire himself back straight at Thrasher, his hands ahead of him melding and solidifying into a solid iron block.

Night Thrasher seems to be getting ever so slightly faster with each exchange. He narrowly manages to twists himself out of the way of the iron block and throws a punch at the rest of Will as it sails past him.

The punch knocked Will off balance, but he recovered quickly, shifting his mass to land safely on the floor.

"Not...not half bad." he said, gasping for breath. "Didn't think I'd run into this much trouble on level two..." he said, eyes darting around him for something, anything he could use.

"The system is dynamically adjusting the difficulty." the computer 'helpfully' supplies while Night Thrasher stomps towards Will.

"Remind me to rip out your circuits later," Will swore, rocking back into what looked like a defensive posture.

Night Thrasher closes the distance and lowers his shoulder to run it into Will while simultaneously giving himself some cover from which to throw a static-y right-hook at Will's stomach.

Will desperately dove to the left, away from NT and the hook, and threw the first thing he could get his hands on at his head.

That thing turns out to be a stand full of soccer balls. They don't do much damage, but they make for a rather comedic takedown regardless when Night Thrasher tries to keep his footing among them and ultimately fails to do so.

Will then aims a kick right into Night Thrasher's soccer balls, as it were.

"Son of a--" he starts at the indignation of being brought down by soccer balls but is swiftly cut off by Will's foot connecting with his crotch. He pulls himself into a fetal position and tries to steady his breath before kicking out at Will with both legs, mostly just trying to push him away to give himself some room.

Will didn't let up, dodging to the right to avoid the kick. Will was used to keeping his footing on uneven ground, although normally it was his feet that were shifting around and not the floor itself. He continued his assault on the downed Thrasher.

"Adjusting difficulty. Opponents armament updated." the computer chirps cheerfully. And a second later Night Thrasher pulls a tazer from a pouch on his belt, catching Will in the arm after taking a punch to the chest.

"Gah!" Will shouted, falling back as his entire body rippled. Will focused, trying to keep himself under control, and was having success, but that was about ALL he could do, leaving himself open for another attack--or for Night Thrasher to regain his feet.

Instead of regaining his feet he goes for a kick to Will's chest from the floor and then tries to get back up.

Will takes the kick and loses his balance, falling down.

Shaking his head, he tried to stagger to his feet, slowly but surely.

Night Thrasher kicks one of the soccer balls up and catches it before throwing it at Will. With his enhanced strength the ball actually slams into Will with quite a bit of force.

Will staggered from the blow, off balance, but had regained his feet--perhaps faster than expected.

Seeing a basket of golf balls, he darted over there and started hurling them---many more than would be expected at one time, as he grew multiple arms for just such a purpose, windmilling in fastballs. Training with Bear hadn't exactly given him super-arms, but he still could throw things pretty fast.

Night Thrasher tries to bat the balls away but unlike Will he only has two arms. And while he's fast, he's not that quick and his armor only does so much to lessen each impact. After a while of trying to push his way through the assault his visor suffers one too many hits and cracks, along with his cheekbone underneath.

"Adjusting difficulty!" the computer interrupts again as Night Thrasher goes down and de-rezzes. At the same time the room changes into some kind of futuristic arena in the form of a huge pit in the ground. A segment of the wall behind Will moves and rudely shoves him down into the pit. Why the computer didn't spawn the new room around Will is anybody's guess. On the other end of the arena a man only wearing martial arts pants and not much else jumps down and cracks his neck. He's easily over 6 feet tall and muscle-packed despite looking like he's in his early fifties.

"Ok, just let me catch my breath for a minute," Will said, misunderstanding the program, doubling over to gain his breath.

"You'll have plenty of time to collect yourself when I'm through with you." the man says as he walks towards Will. When he's a couple yards away from Will he stomps his foot on the ground and an oversized metal-foot jumps from the wall behind him and kicks Will in the back.

"Gah!" Will said, being kicked in the back.

"Alright, you control the walls," he frowned, leaping forward to deliver a kick to the dude's face.

"Sure, let's go with that." he says and goes to his knee to punch the ground, resulting in a large fist shooting up in Will's path and delivering a giant uppercut.