Conspiracy Ch. 6
By Ryu Dragon

The next morning at ten o'clock…

Chun Li, Jill, Ryu and Ryu Dragon are in a gym waiting for Natalie to come. They agree that Ryu Dragon will be the one who have to test her, he is now sitting in lotus position, meditating and waiting for his opponent. Fifteen minutes later, there are sounds of someone running to the gym, Ryu Dragon finishes his meditation and gets ready. He wears his usual fighting outfit, his white karate gi, red headband and a pair of fingerless gloves, the right hand glove has the soul and elemental gems attached to it.

"Puff, puff, good morning, sorry I'm late." – Natalie, as she runs into the gym and catches her breath. She wears red blood tank top, baggy black jeans, black jeans jacket and a pair of black combat boots.

Ryu Dragon smiles like a big brother to younger sister. "That's okay, at least you come. So, do you want to start now or you want to warm up first ?"

"Who'll be the tester ?" – Natalie.

"Well, four of us agree that I'll be the tester." – RD.

"Oh, okay. I'll stretch a bit first." – Natalie.

"Take your time, when you're ready, tell me." – RD. He sits back to lotus position to meditate again.

"Okay." – Natalie. She does a bit warm up and stretch while looking at Ryu Dragon, trying to judge on how far is his strength. Judging from the karate gi that Ryu Dragon wears, she thought that he is packed with more raw power, but from his not so muscle mountain figure, she assumes that he is also agile. Looking at how calm his expression while meditating, she feels nervous, she never learns any martial art officially, although she picked up a lot from her previous fights, but at least if she has learned something, she'll feels more confident. She took ten minutes to do the warm up and stretching, after that she stands into her fighting stance. "Okay, I'm ready."

Ryu Dragon opens his eyes, gets up and ready into his fighting stance. "Alright, give me all you've got."

Natalie looks confused. "I thought this is just a test, well, at least a friendly test ?"

Ryu Dragon smiles. "Yes, but this is also like a gambling, and its your call, if you lose, you can't join in the team."

"I see… alright." – Natalie.

"The three of them will be the judges." – RD signaling at his friends.

"Alright… ready ?" – Chun Li. She waits until both fighters ready into their fighting stances, then count to three silently. "Fight !!"

And the fight begins. Both fighters circling around the gym, each keep their defense up and try to looks for opening. Ryu Dragon moves forward slowly, but doesn't attack, he moves until close enough to Natalie – about one and a-half meter – then stops, and waits for her to attack first. Knowing that her opponent won't attack first, Natalie took the initiative to attack, she runs toward Ryu Dragon, then when she reach about half meter from him, she uses jumping spin kick attack, slashing horizontally around his head. Ryu Dragon ducks and lunged forward with a straight punch to her solar plexus, being vulnerable from recovering from her previous attack, Natalie doesn't have a chance to block or avoid the punch. Ryu Dragon stops his punch just about three centimeters from her solar plexus.

"If you're in, and I'm Bison, you're dead already. When I said to give all you've got, it means to use your special powers, any kind of your special powers or techniques." – Ryu Dragon. He feels a bit surprise though, seeing his fast reflex, he thought probably from the six days super hard training with Ryu and Ken. He moves back and readied his stance again.

Natalie was caught surprise, she had never seen anyone moves that fast before. *Wow, if he can moves that fast, and the other three are also as good as his, how can I stand a chance against the enemies ?* She ponders, and without her knowing, her confidant is going down.

"What's the matter ? You want to give up without a fight ?" – RD.

Ryu Dragon's words struck her mind like lighting. *No, what am I thinking about ? I won't give up. I've got to protect my friends, my hometown, and I've got the power to do it. I can't just give up, not without a fight.* She thought about what Billy said yesterday at the park, *' be strong and always remember that I always support you and be there for you.'* Remembering this, her confidant grows up, eventually, her power also raised. Readying her fighting stance, she looks up to Ryu Dragon with sharp gaze. "I'll show you a fight."

Sensing her power grows, Ryu Dragon feels happy and excited. He knows that he'll have a good fight, and more, his judgement about Natalie wasn't wrong. Raising his power, he strengthens his stance. "Then let's fight."

Again, Natalie took the initiative to attack first, every punch and kick now is more powerful, packed with her special power, fire. Ryu Dragon is now in trouble, he can't block directly every Natalie's attack, because each attack has fire power that burns every time he tries to block directly. Now, he can only evade or deviate her attack, if he tries to block, he'll surely burn a part of his body. At one time, Natalie sees an opening and sneaks in with a straight punch to Ryu Dragon chest, her punch goes in and hit Ryu Dragon squarely on his chest, the impact sends him flying about two meters but he still manage to land on his feet.

Staggering from the attack, Ryu Dragon rubs his chest, his gi is a bit singed, but his chest is okay, only a bit hurt. "Ouch, that was great. Phew, I have to be really careful." – Ryu Dragon. He readies into his stance.

Natalie smiles. Ryu Dragon crouches a bit, both his hands on his side, his palms motioned a ball. Sensing what attack that he'll use, Natalie prepares herself. Ryu Dragon extends his both hands forward, he opens his palms and from his palms, a solid blue and white ball comes out. Just when the solid ball comes out, Natalie jumps to avoid the ball, she thought that was a chi blast, but she is caught surprise when she senses deep cold power from the projectile attack. Ryu Dragon attacks Natalie while she's in the air, using his Dragon Punch attack, the attack hits Natalie on her shoulder sending her fly back and lands on her both feet and knee.

Natalie feels an extreme cold power from the spot that was hit, she shivers. She raises her power to counter the effect. The attacks that Ryu Dragon used were two of his special attacks, mixed up with ice elemental power. The projectile attack is Kori Hadokyu (Ice Wave Ball) and the Dragon Punch attack is Kori Ryuken (Ice Dragon Punch), the attack if hits, can cause from extreme cold like Natalie felt or up to freezing the opponent, depending on how much power that Ryu Dragon used and how strong is the opponent power.

After finishes repelling the effect, she attacks again, this time the odd is about the same. Their skills are equally the same, Natalie wins on speed and agility, but Ryu Dragon wins on technique and power. They trade attacks many times, each tries to creates chances to attack more. At one time, Ryu Dragon catches both Natalie fists, grips tightly and presses with his power. Feeling the pressure, Natalie changes her strategy, her long hair wasn't tied, so she spins her head, using her hair to sweep Ryu Dragon's eyes. Ryu Dragon was surprised with the attack, he didn't expect that kind of attack, he gets distracted from the attack and closed his eyes. Feeling the pressure gone, Natalie then stomps Ryu Dragon's shoeless left foot with her right foot plus the army boot heel (Writer – Ouch, grrrrr ^-^).

"Arrgh !!!" – RD. He releases his grip on Natalie's fists and quickly jumps back to avoid any followed attack. He looks at Natalie still a bit groggy from the pressure then took a chance to heal his foot. The other three fighters giggle at the sight. Ryu Dragon grins at Natalie. "Nice attack, I must admit, you've got one h*ll of strategy."

Natalie smiles, then she jumps high into the air, while airborning, she throws lots of blue fireballs toward Ryu Dragon and his surroundings (Fire from Heaven – Nadie's BF character special move). Ryu Dragon was caught surprised with the attack, but he quickly moves, evading the blue fireball rain. The fireball rain hits the ground, but it doesn't caused fire. Natalie keep throwing her fireballs with more speed, knowing that Ryu Dragon won't be able to evade her attacks all the time. And she is right, one of the fireball hits Ryu Dragon's leg, causing him to fall and receive more fireballs attacks. After a series of the fireball attacks, Natalie stops the attack and gasped. The spot where she concentrates her attacks is now a big deep hole. She lands slowly near the hole, kneels down and checks on the hole to see if Ryu Dragon is okay.

Suddenly she felt an energy coming, she turns and her eyes grew wide at the sight of a yellow electric ball moving with a great speed toward her. Doesn't have a chance to think or evade the attack, she raises both hands to blocks the ball, the effect however, isn't what she thought, when the ball hits, the impact sends her fly backward about three meters and stuns her body. She tries to gets up, but she feels like her body doesn't do what she wants, she can't gets up. She looks at the direction where the electric ball came from, and there was Ryu Dragon standing, his gi is torn in many places, and his body also got many bruises and minor wounds.

"How ?" is all that Natalie can asked.

"Lucky, I guess. Your technique is really amazing, if I don't have the technique that I used to escape from your wrath." – RD smiles. "I guess, right now I'll be the one who's down."

"What… technique ? …argh" – Natalie feels pain.

"This." – RD teleports to near Natalie.

Natalie eyes grew wide seeing Ryu Dragon technique. She then releases a deep breath and lie down, resting her limp muscles. "Oh well, I guess I failed, right ?"

Ryu Dragon crouches and channels his energy to heal Natalie from the stunning effect. Then he helps her to gets up. He smiles at her. "On the contrary, I think you've passed with high marks. To tell you the truth, if I didn't have the super hard training before coming here, the result would probably be different." He turns to the other three fighters. "Well ? What do you say, guys ?"

The three fighters get up and walk toward Natalie and Ryu Dragon. Chun Li takes Natalie hand and shakes it. "Congratulations, Natalie. You're in the team now." She smiles and blinks at Natalie.

"You've fought really great, Natalie. You're really impressive." – Ryu.

"Well, Natalie, you're a really great fighter." – Jill.

"R…r…really ? You mean it ? I'm really in ?" – Natalie in disbelief and excitement. The four fighters nod in unison. "Oh, woooow, I… I thought I… I was failed."

Ryu Dragon pokes her back. "Well, Natalie, you may lost now, but if you keep practicing your ability, I'm sure you can win on the next fight."

"Thanks, Dragon. Hey, I thought your power is ice power, but why is that last attack can stuns me ?" – Natalie.

"I'll tell you later about my power. Now, shall we go somewhere warm, its getting cold now, and I haaaaateee coooooooldd" – RD. They all laugh and go back to the hotel.