Diving out of the way of another barrage of those weird blasts, Ryan decided that it was time to go after the guy who was shooting at him—the same guy whom Sho had once insisted was his friend, though he seemed to have either changed his mind or decided to think about whatever it was that was bothering him later. There were a lot of bug-people in the air around them, so Sho had flown off to deal with them. There were also some bat-guys along for the chase; he’d taken a few of them down himself, but it was mostly Sho dealing with them.

Of course, now that he was going to pick a fight with the guy who’d started all the shit they were in, the bats and the bugs were probably going to start going after him now. Well, nothing for it, I guess. Time to bust some more heads. Diving out of the sky, Ryan had to swerve quite a few times to keep from getting pulverized by those blasts that Sho’s old buddy was slinging. He’d seen what they could do to concrete and asphalt, and he had no desire to find out if the Guyver he was wearing was tougher than those.

Landing on the balls of his feet, Ryan rushed the armored nutjob currently firing at Sho. Of course, this drew said armored nutjob’s attention directly to him, but there was really no way to avoid that. Besides, it took his focus off Sho, and that was generally a good thing, or so Ryan hoped.

"Hey, Sir-blast-a-lot!" Ryan challenged, firing one of his own blasts at the guy’s head. "You got a beef, take it up with me!"

The nutjob didn’t answer—at least, not verbally, anyway. He did fire another barrage of those weirdly similar-looking blasts at him, and then another one after that. None of them connected, though; Ryan made sure of that.

"Is that the best you can do?!"

"Well, if you want something different-!"

Armored Boy made a motion that suggested he was karate-chopping the air, and Ryan would have laughed at him except for one thing. One large thing. One large, green, glowing, crescent-shaped thing that was heading right at him!

Ryan didn’t know exactly what it would do if it hit him, but he was in no hurry to find out. That thing was obviously not of the good.

"Nice moon-shot," Ryan laughed after he’d managed to get the hell out of the way. "Looks like you missed, though."

"I might have missed you," he said, grinning in that not entirely sane way that really put Ryan on edge.

"Wha-?"

Turning to look over his shoulder, Ryan found that the blast was still traveling. And now it was heading straight for Sho. Fuck. Even as he made a beeline for Sho, who was still fighting the flying bat-and-bug squad, Ryan suspected that he wouldn’t make it to Sho in time to shove him out of the way.

+Sho, move it! You’re right in the way of some- I don’t know what the hell it is, but it’s coming at you, and I don’t think it’s a good thing! Get out of there!+

Ryan saw Sho turn his head slightly, then dart out of the way of the incoming blast. It was a good thing he did, too, since the next thing Ryan saw was that selfsame blast carving through the bat and bug guys like a knife through warm butter. One of them had been sliced completely in half; the two pieces were rotting even as they fell through the air.

Ryan really doubted they’d be anything more than a liquid by the time they hit the ground; or rather splattered all over it. But his problem was in front of him, and it really needed dealing with, so Ryan turned back to armored-boy.

"Murakami-san!" Sho shouted, and then started babbling something in Japanese that Ryan didn’t catch.

And then the armored wacko answered in kind. He was still laughing, something that Ryan had learned to associate with things that were not of the good.

+Are you ever going to tell me what you two are talking about, or am I just going to have to keep guessing?+ Ryan asked, starting to get annoyed. +Why the hell are you talking to him anyway? He’s the one trying to kill us, moron!+

+Fair enough,+ Ryan said. +Still, when you’re fighting, it’s not a good time to think about things like that.+

Just before he turned away to deal with the armored nutjob the way he’d promised Sho he would, Ryan looked back over his shoulder to see what Sho was going to do. As it turned out, Sho was getting back to fighting the bats and the bugs. There were only a few of them left, so that was good. That meant that there was a better than average chance that the two of them would be able to get the hell out of here soon, and that was a very good thing as far as Ryan was concerned.

Of course, before they could do any getting the hell out of anywhere, he’d have to deal with the irate, trigger-happy whackjob who had – presumably – started this whole thing. And that meant that he was going to have to think up some new moves; this guy seemed like he could shrug off most of what Ryan could throw at him. Most, because Ryan was getting some impressions from his Guyver again—impressions that suggested that this armor of his had something else up its proverbial sleeve.

"Are you the one who’s going to fight me now?" he asked, still grinning and looking like he was sizing up a juicy cut of steak. Ryan wasn’t too fond of the comparison. "Pity. I would have thought Sho would have at least tried to meet me head-on. We are old friends, after all."

"You’re trying to kill him, you demented, obsessive-compulsive, sociopathic loony," Ryan drawled. "I think he’d want to stay as far away from you as he possibly could; I know I would. And don’t try to feed me that bullshit about you guys being friends, cause there’s no way in hell that I’m going to buy that line. Old friends wouldn’t be trying to murder each other."

"Well, it seems that you have quite a few things figured out," Jonny Dementiod said, again flashing that crazed grin at him. "Do you think that any of it will help you survive?"

"Anything’s possible," Ryan said calmly, wondering where this conversation was going.

This guy didn’t really seem like the type to be so chatty with someone who he was trying to kill. Then again, he didn’t really seem all that stable either, so maybe this was just his way of blowing off steam before he started blowing off limbs. In that case, he was perfectly welcome to go fuck himself with the nearest jagged, pointy, and/or obscenely huge object.

"Indeed," the psychopath said, still grinning like a demented death’s head.

"What’s your name, anyway?" Ryan asked, both because he was genuinely curious and he wanted the nutball to stop grinning already. "I can’t just keep calling you ‘hey you’ while I’m beating the ever-loving crap out of you, you know?"

"My name – though ordinarily I would say that it is none of your business, Guyver – is Imakarum Mirabilis."

"Huh," Ryan scoffed. "I could have sworn Sho told me your name was Murakami. What happened? Freak misspelling accident?"

"Masaki Murakami is dead, and Sho is a sentimental, weak-willed little fool," crazy-guy – or Imakarum, though Ryan doubted he was ever going to actually call him that; he was just really fun to bait – growled, seeming pretty well pissed off.

"Wow, I gotta tell you I never really took you for a zombie," Ryan said, chuckling at the look on Imakarum’s face.

The Crescent Moon of Death aimed at his head let Ryan know that he’d pissed the guy off on an epic scale. Definitely not of the good.

Taking a couple seconds to make sure that Sho wasn’t behind him again, Ryan dodged and then lunged in quick succession. Imakarum the Loony was caught off-guard, happily enough, and Ryan was able to slam his fist into the guy’s face. Of course, he ended up getting thrown into the ground for his trouble, but it was really fun in spite of that.

Leaping backwards just as the Mother of all Lasers slammed into the crater where he’d been standing, Ryan flew back into the air to confront Imakarum again.

"So I see you managed to survive again," Imakarum growled.

"You didn’t think you could get rid of me that easily, did you?" Ryan laughed—the pissy look on Imakarum’s face was just too funny.

"One could hope," he spat.

Before Ryan could start attacking again, or tell Captain Crazy just where he could stick his hope, Imakarum dove forward. Bending at the waist like he was in a limbo contest, Ryan managed to just avoid the punch that the crazy flying guy had aimed at him. Ryan had a feeling that this fight he’d just stepped into wasn’t going to be over quickly.

Well, ain’t that just fucking great.