Change-over into Rogue

With Tennisman going into the detrimental stage of the BeastOUT, there was no stopping him as his Ace Serve became a deadly wave attack of terror.

Fishy2A: DELETED
Fishy2B: DELETED
Fishy2C: DELETED
Powie2A: DELETED
Powie2B: DELETED

Terrain: 30% Normal, 65% Sea, 5% Missing

TennisMan.EXE: 290 HP [50HP Barrier] [BeastOVER - 0 Turns Left]
Deuce.SP: Unsummoned

-ROGUE BATTLE THREE, VICTORY!!-

Rewards:
- 1800z

Battle Effects:
- BeastOVER: 1 Turn Sig/NC/Folder Lock, Poison1 for next battle
With the deletion of the final virus, the battlefield turned eerily serene. Tennisman was no longer in sight and only a small amount of zenny floated on the water's surface like the spoils from a great ship wreck. The red flashing warnings on Desmond's PET closed on their own one by one until everything seemed back to normal.

"...Tennisman?" Desmond called out, almost afraid of the response.

A few bubbles broke the water's surface followed by a splash and a navi's body, gasping for breath. It was Tennisman. He had returned to normal.

"DUDE!" Desmond shouted in relief, "Hoooooly crap! DUUUUDE!"

In between deep gulps of air, Tennisman spoke, "I am... Okay."

Crawling out of the body of water that he had created, he collapsed on the hard floor in a heavy slump. Pain streaked through his body and wracked his mind. He groaned, succumbing to the harsh aftereffects of his exertion.

"Yeah, you totally don't look okay..." Desmond noted, "What happened? Was that the BeastOUT?"

Tennisman murmured something but didn't actually move from his position.

"...Yeah, you look like crap" Desmond said, "I'd jack you out but I don't want you drooling all over the inside of the PET. I'm going to send Deuce back in. Maybe you can use him as a crutch or something while you sober up."

"I can hear you." said the racket.

"My bad." apologized Desmond, jacking Deuce back into the network.

The support program appeared grip first in Tennisman's limp palm. It took a while, but he eventually gathered up the energy to hold the racket with his own strength and partially pick himself up, albeit crawling along like a baby to do so. It practically pained Desmond to see his navi like this and he was about to perform a jack out but unexpectedly found Tennisman locked in.

((Resummon Deuce))
((NCP locked, max HP -50)
((Battle 4))
With Tennisman limping further into ACDC, Desmond returned Deuce to his rightful place on his hand, and searched around for some viruses. And viruses did they find, bouncing and hopping around like there's nothing else better to do. The upgraded Melody, Hellody, bounced around on its spongy exterior, while the springy TuffBunny made tracks everywhere. This led to the disarray of a place already steeped in disrepair, and bad news for honest exploring Navis. More so for crippled and honest exploring Navis.

HellodyA: 140HP
HellodyB: 140HP
HellodyC: 140HP
TuffBunnyA: 100HP
TuffBunnyB: 100HP
TuffBunnyC: 100HP

Terrain: 60% Normal, 30% Cracked, 10% Broken

TennisMan.EXE: 240HP [NCLock1] [SigLock1] [FolderLock1] [Poison1]
Deuce.SP: 180HP

-ROGUE BATTLE FOUR, FIGHT!!-
Tennisman paused at the sight of the viruses, knowing that he needed to pull himself together seriously before they all assaulted him. He fought to stand and shuddered as wave upon wave of pain demanded that he fall. Weakness consumed his body and prevented him from moving beyond simply standing under his own power. He looked normal but he was completely helpless and immobile.

"Desmond, we're stuck." Deuce announced.

"What do you mean? You look fine." His operator contested.

The racket continued, "No, he's just putting up a front. We're sitting ducks out here."

Tennisman attempted to perform a signature attack that didn't require him to move and he soon settled on using Netplay. He closed his eyes and tried to send the information stream through the floor when a sudden jarring backlash cancelled those plans. He winced and stopped, finding that he had been cut off from all of his innate abilities. His Court Changes, Rally Defense and even his most basic Ace Serve had been restricted. For now, he needed to move. Recognizing that his opponents were Bunnies and Melody variations, he knew exactly how they attacked. They seemed faster but he hoped their basic patterns would remain the same. Strafing slowly to the side and around his enemies, he hoped to avoid being struck with Zaprings. The Melodies were a completely different story. These viruses chased after their victims and Tennisman wasn't sure he could outrun them in his condition. All he could do was keep walking and hope that they had problems landing on a moving target.

"Windracket the Bunnies!" Desmond commanded and slotted in the chip.

However, a negatory buzz sounded from his PET preventing the data from downloading properly. Thinking it was a temporary problem, Desmond withdrew the chip, blew on the exposed circuitry to clear it of dust and tried again. The PET gave another buzz.

"What the... FRIG! I CAN'T SLOT IN CHIPS!" realized Desmond.

Tennisman was now in a real bind. It dawned on him that without his custom programs and his chips, he was practically helpless. He hobbled around the viruses, feeling like he was being ravaged from within with each step. Though, through the torture, he could feel himself recovering. Soon, his pace quickened and his decrepit posture straightened out. His numb arms regained their mobility and he even found the strength to perform an evasive roll before he found himself back in perfect form.

"Desmond," Tennisman said in his normal voice, "Windracket."



((Poisoned for 4 actions))
Deuce - Armour Junction (180 HP casing)
Deuce Casing - Brace (halves damage of one attack)
1 - No sigs (Nothing)
2 - Movement (sidestep)
3 - No chips (Nothing)
4 - Movement (sidestep)
5 - Movement (sidestep)
6 - Dodge
As much as the viruses attacked the crippled tennis Navi, he was still pretty agile enough to evade most of the attacks that the viruses threw at him. However, his pain was more deep-rooted than he thought, eating away slowly at his internals. (6)

HellodyA: 140HP
HellodyB: 140HP
HellodyC: 140HP
TuffBunnyA: 100HP
TuffBunnyB: 100HP
TuffBunnyC: 100HP

Terrain: 60% Normal, 30% Cracked, 10% Broken

TennisMan.EXE: 234HP [Poison1]
Deuce.SP: 180HP [Armor]
"Fine, I'll try again." Desmond said and slipped the Windracket chip in one more time. By some act of divine providence, the data went through normally giving the operator reason to shout for joy.

"We should finish this fast, you're still bleeding out... Somewhere." Deuce noted

Tennisman did feel like something was still terribly wrong with him, but he could endure it. He was feeling a lot better since he crawled out of that lake and he had regained his mobility. He brought Deuce in front of him and weaved the racket through the air, and prepared himself to deflect incoming Zaprings. His programmed functions seemed to have been restored as well. The Windracket data had already been loaded and all he needed to do was release it. Diving into the group of Bunnies, ready to swat away incoming blows, Tennisman charged Deuce with the battlechip and unleashed it, assaulting the group of viruses with a powerful wave of air. He clutched his forehead with his free hand and shook off some mild dizziness from his sudden exertion but stayed committed to the fight.

"You still don't look so hot," Desmond said, "Let's use Binder."

His navi made a weak nod and focussed on evading the remaining viruses. In his stead, a Melody virus dropped from the sky and began to wreak havoc among its beefier cousins. Tennisman watched and wondered if they would get confused by the introduction of that new member.

"I'm going to test out a new chip we got from the trader. The chip shop guy had this offer and whatever, I'll tell you about it later. Slotting in Remotebit!" Desmond said, pausing only to add, "You bring it out on the field and it automatically attacks things or something."

The data channeled through Tennisman's body and formed a strange flattened object that he could only describe as a disgruntled midget control tower troll. What was even harder to describe was the floating satellite it summoned from nowhere. It had a weird face painted on it and hovered silently over one of the Hellodies. A bolt of lightning struck down abruptly from the iron tip on its underside with enough power to leave a deep crater in the panel below. Tennisman's eyes shot wide at the display, worried that he would get caught under it.

"Oh yeah, I found this site that tells you what every chip does so we don't really have to test them to find out anymore, but it's still better to see it for yourself, right?" asked Desmond.

There was something oddly comforting about watching others fight for him as he nodded in agreement with his operator.



Deuce Casing - Brace (halves damage of one attack)
1 - Rally Defence + Reinforce (6-hit shield)
2 - Move in
3 - Windracket TuffBunnyA, TuffBunnyB, TuffBunnyC (100 damage)
4 - Binder1 HellodyA (4 x 60 damage (random))
5 - Dodge
6 - Remotebit HellodyB (100 HP + 80 damage + panel break)
TennisMan was on the move after suffering a strange bug in his body, immediately heading towards the TuffBunnies with his WindRacket ready. The Bunnies made a last resort of randomly firing their rings at their enemy, which wasn't so successful as the the navi easily deflected two of the rings and instantly deleted them.

The Hellody found themselves fighting against its own kind when TennisMan activated his Binder and managed to distract the viruses from himself. After backing away a little, he tested his new chip, which proved to be a pretty useful when it zapped one of the viruses alive.

HellodyA: 80 HP
HellodyB: 60 HP
HellodyC: 80 HP
TuffBunnyA: DELETED
TuffBunnyB: DELETED
TuffBunnyC: DELETED

Terrain: 48% Normal, 42% Cracked, 10% Broken

TennisMan.EXE: 228 HP [Poison1] [4-hit Shield]
Deuce.SP: 180 HP [Armor]
Having recuperated a bit thanks to his Binder and Remotebit stalling for him, Tennisman felt ready to take action and targetted one of the Hellodies. Bouncing a cluster of tennis balls off the ground in sync with the virus's own bounding, he served them across the field in a rapid volley before switching to his arm cannon.

"HiCannon." He said and pointed the gun at the second virus.

Wary of the Hellody's frequent evasive movements, he waited for the Remotebit satellite to catch up with the virus. Just as it had done so before, the floating contraption discharged a piercing bolt of lightning down over the virus, breaking another tile along the network grid. Tennisman used the distracting flash to fire his own weapon, immediately unloading the HiCannon shell in a powerful burst.

"Time for a Pickpocket?" Desmond asked in a cheeky tone.

Tennisman sighed and nodded, waiting for the chip data to be sent. Striking his arm out as if giving a silent command, his Bandacoon took shape at his heels and took to scurrying around his ankles. It chased its own bushy tail and ran figure eights in tight loops around his feet. Forced to hop on one foot, Tennisman had to then jump away in order to escape the shenanigans of his viral summon.

"Cute." Deuce commented.

It looked at him with innocent eyes as he pointed to the weakest Hellody of the bunch and dismissed it with his order, "Go!"

It tilted its head but understood the task it was given, quickly dashing off to commit its act of thievery. Knowing that he would need to execute the virus immediately afterwards, Tennisman followed up with what he hoped to be his final chip request for this fight, "MarkCannon."

Watching the Hellody carefully, he raised his modified buster at the virus and waited for the right moment to strike.



Deuce Casing - Brace (halves damage of one attack)
1 - Ace Serve HellodyA (4 x 30 damage)
* - Remotebit HellodyC (80 damage + panel break)
2 - HiCannon HellodyC (80 damage)
3 - dodge
4 - Pickpocket1 HellodyB (steals chip/zenny)
5 - dodge
6 - MarkCannon HellodyB (70 damage + lockon)
The first Hellody: death by tennis balls. The second Hellody: death by satellite zapper.

The last Hellody jumped at Tennisman, hoping to get a few smacks in, though it only managed one, and that was on Tennisman's Rally Defense. He then sent away a Bandcoon towards the final enemy left standing on the field. The Bandcoon crawled up, whacked the Hellody in a sidewinder, and bounded off back to its master to escape a very angry virus. It jumped at Tennisman for one last push, but that dream was shattered quickly with a nice MarkCannon round. The pseudo-Bandcoon rubbed up against Tennisman and dropped some of the data it got, before disappearing back into chip data. Suddenly, he felt the same internal bugging him for the last few moments clearing away, but not without a fight. (6)

HellodyA: DELETED
HellodyB: DELETED
HellodyC: DELETED
TuffBunnyA: DELETED
TuffBunnyB: DELETED
TuffBunnyC: DELETED

Terrain: 48% Normal, 42% Cracked, 10% Broken

TennisMan.EXE: 222 HP [3-hit Shield]
Deuce.SP: 180 HP [Armor]
RemoteBit C. Tower: 100HP [Anchored] (1 Turn Left)

-ROGUE BATTLE FOUR, VICTORY!!-

Rewards:
- 1500z
- [ZapRing2] Battlechip
- 36 BugFrags

Pickpocket: [Binder2] Battlechip
The battle ended along with the draining feeling he had been plagued with. Tennisman was sure he was back to normal now but resented what had come over him. There was no doubt this new change was the result of his battle with Squalo but the lack of control and savagery didn't seem as if they could be entirely blamed on the beastOUT program. It was partially his own faults coming to light.

"Suh-weeeeeet." gloated Desmond, "Two new chips! Man, this network is GREAT!"

Meanwhile, his navi was stuck deep in his own thoughts.

"I've been trading stuff like a beast so I'm going to change the folder some more." Desmond said.

Tennisman nodded blankly.

"Something on your mind?" Desmond asked, "Is it about that beastOUT thing?"

"Really? What tipped you off?" Deuce retorted.

"Well, y'know, he was being all- HEY SHUT UP!" barked the operator.

"May we logout now?" Tennisman asked.

Desmond calmed down and gave a dour answer, "Yeah, sure, no problem..."

Tennisman and his support program then both disappeared in twin beams of light as they withdrew from the net.

((Folder Edit:
-BigHammer1 out
-Guard1 out
-Panelshot out
-Firehit1 out

-Kunai1 in
-Wideshot1 in
-Bubblestar1 in
-Binder2 in))

((ACDC Town))