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nny11writes · 7 years

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Fictober 19- Order

Me desperately looking for the original prompt: It was here just a second ago, hang on, fffffff, what? Also Me: Oh hey look, that paragraph I never expanded on, I bet I can turn it into a SHORT fictober piece. Honestly, why do you people let me do this????????????? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It had been nearly a month since she’d taken Petro on as a Padawan, and Ahsoka was once again wondering if this was the best idea. They’d been granted temporary leave from the front lines for Petro to get signed up for his classes, and for the two of them to spend time actually working together. It was a new requirement as the war had begun to slow down, one meant to help normalize daily life for the Jedi still alive to appreciate the gesture. Ahsoka had taken several different classes about teaching, and had relied heavily on her fellow Knights and the Masters she knew, to help prepare herself before taking Petro on. By the time his trials had rolled around Ahsoka had been feeling at least confident on that side of things. She had pamphlets and emergency comms coded into her wrist unit, she had quizzed herself relentlessly and even practiced with a few Shinies who were willing to play along. Ahsoka had felt prepared.

She was not prepared.

It was a completely different responsibility to focus on this one person. To day in and day out work with him and try to not dictate everything at him. To let go of frustration when realizing that he had not put in the practice. To praise him for mastery without it sounding belittling. They worked well together despite the hiccups and a few arguments they’d already had.

And they did seem to be having the standard arguments for a new training pair. If there was one thing younglings were taught at the temple it was to speak your mind. And Ahsoka had never had a problem with speaking her mind back.

So far it had mostly been morning grumpiness, hanger, and in one case of too much idleness. But Ahsoka partially chalked that up to Petro joining new classes and primarily being away from her. Not that she spent all day lounging around the apartment. Ahsoka found herself acting as something of a liaison to the Council, the GAR, and various Senators all while being consulted for strategy and being tapped to teach some of the younger initiates classes. If anything, Ahsoka was busier now that she was at the Temple then she ever was out in the field, so she at least aimed to get structure back. Another distinct benefit of the GAR was daily structure. Her and Petro had a morning meditation, light work out, and on occasion sparring. He left for classes while she was pulled in twelve directions, sometimes they had lunch together, they would spend the late afternoon working together on paperwork. Evening was spent with sparring, meditation, an hour to relax, and bed. Petro was sometimes excused from evening sparring or meditation if he needed more time for his class work or if he just needed a break.

Ahsoka found that she needed both meditation sessions every day just to work out her frustrations and concerns.And it was strange, because she’d always liked meditation but found it difficult to maintain for more than about twenty minutes. She’d used the time to just reconnect in the force, to check on herself, Anakin, her men. Mostly observing and floating. Now Ahsoka was more active in her meditations, and was finding herself sometimes meditating through her hour off. Ahsoka had help, plenty of advice from Jedi who had been Master’s longer than she had been alive. But the meditation helped more than she’d expected. It was really a time for her to reflect on the day, to see how her actions had moved her life forward, and now to see if she was doing right by Petro.

Who was, to his credit, not complaining about the schedule she’d set at all. He was improving in leaps and bounds in his lightsaber forms now that he had someone working with him daily. His schoolwork never needed assistance, but having time carved out daily for it had helped him stay on top of it. The only thing was getting him used to being away from his creche mates. It wasn’t that Ahsoka was trying to end those friendships, but it was just the natural order of things. It was part of learning about attachments and part of advancing as a Jedi. But that didn’t make it easier.

That had been one of their fights. Ahsoka didn’t know what was too much contact or not enough. Half of her clan had died in the field, and Ahsoka hadn’t spoken to a single one of her creche mates since she’d become a Padawan. Her experience had been forcibly learning how to let her friends go because she didn’t have a choice. Eventually the two of them figured out the problem, no one knew what the expectations were. So Ahsoka tried to compromise.

If they were going to actually focus and not cause a fuss, Ahsoka was fine with the younglings crowding into their quarters to do homework. Although the four seats they had simply weren’t enough for all of them. Ahsoka had gotten used to stepping over Ganodi as she lay on the floor, Zatt who always seemed to claim a spot on the mats or Petro’s bed, and twisting past Gungi who’d nearly doubled in height and weight. It was when she was trying to do her work and the whole gang was playing games that she had to either retreat to her room or be the Master and ask them to leave.

So Ahsoka had also gotten used to writing on her bed, with an ever expanding fan of pads and data sticks around her.

It was actually nice now that she was allowing it. The laughter and happiness from the group obvious. Ahsoka had been the last member of Clawmouse after doing a stint as a Clan Leader to all four of her clan mates. She had been assigned to sleep in a new set of dorms with other small clans but she’d been pretty much left alone or ignored. Too many silent afternoons wishing she could be with her friends.

To be fair, Ahsoka was also feeling a bit lonely again herself. She’d made friends with as many Padawans as she’d been able to during her historically short time as one, but even they were unknowns. Her men were half a galaxy away with no reason to stop at Coruscant. Even if they had, she wasn’t allowed out with her men. Her Master was on missions, and everyone she normally would just spend time with were...just gone.

She was homesick for the 501st. It was easy for her to pick that up even as she tried to concentrate on the living Force around her instead of her petty concerns. To let her worries and negative emotions go. Maybe she could put some of this paperwork off so she could try to meditate on it? Done and done, Ahsoka took a breath in and sunk into the living force around her.

It was the massive smashing sound that pulled Ahsoka out of her meditation fully, and into the main room. Gungi half lay on the floor dazed with Zatt and Petro literally clinging to each other with laughter, Katooni was staring at Ahsoka in worry and Ganodi was doubled over gasping for air. Ahsoka looked over to the somewhat oversized chair she’d chosen for herself, the idea having been that she was still growing and it would fit someday. Her former chair. Splinters of wood and upholstery were scattered around Gungi’s rump, and as he slowly stood up a few pieces clung to his fur prompting further laughter.

Ahsoka supposed she should have seen that coming, is this how Obi-Wan felt when she and Anakin destoryed things? This resigned amusement? “You are all helping me find something better, Gungi will carry it won’t you big guy?”

Gungi’s weak chuff of agreement only set his friends off worse.

#starwarsfictober #Ahsoka Tano #Padawan Petro #Gungi #Katoonie (mention)#Zatt (mention)#Ganodi (Mention)#poor byph isn't mentioned at all #picture him off with his own master that's why he's not here #yup #nothing to do with forgetting him #I wouldn't do that #that's not something I do #seriously stop me from doing this I have so many things to do besides getting sucked into writing????#fanfiction

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gffa · 4 years

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hi!!! could you maybe recommend me some books/sources of information on how jedi order works?? wookieepedia is a little overwhelming to me lmao, and i kinda wanted to plan a fic about crèche master anakin, but that requires a lot of information about how raising younglings and clans work, more than i know at the moment!! thank you!

Hi! I have a meta guide for everything we know about the Jedi in canon here: Taking a Closer Look at the Jedi Order in Star Wars Canon [Meta/Reference Guide] You’ll find the most in chapters 3 and 4, which is really only a handful of mentions about the creche (you can just ctrl+F for mentions, if you want)--the problem is that there really isn’t any book or source of information on how the Jedi Order works. This area of worldbuilding has really been done almost nothing with it, especially because there are two separate continuities, where you have Canon and you have Legends. Legends probably has more details, but it’s always been non-canon to George Lucas’ Star Wars and so it really just kind of did its own thing (which often led to some amazing stories! Legends is a continuity that has a ton of value and meaning to people! but it also often contradicted what the Jedi were actually like because much of it was created pre-Attack of the Clones, so there weren’t even the three main movies out yet, much less The Clone Wars being out), which means you’re absolutely free to use it, but be wary of how it’s not always consistent. There’s not really even a source of information on what the Force feels like or how it works, aside from the interviews George Lucas has given on these things, which likely informs how canon attempts to treat these things, as they’ve said they’re trying to stay true to his themes now (for example--Legends often had “grey Force users” being stable, but canon now works according to George’s statements of how that’s not possible, the dark side corrupts, you have to actively resist it or you’ll fall to it), because not much worldbuilding has been done on this aspect of them. Instead, you have to piece together what we get in bits and bobs in the canon, which is what I’ve done with the above. If you want, you can read stuff like the Jedi Apprentice books, but they’re pretty firmly not canon anymore (like they had an age limit of 13, which has been overwritten by canon, where Ahsoka was 14 when she became a Padawan, there was a youngling in Dooku: Jedi Lost who was 16 and indicated they’d have to wait another year, there was no indication of impending age limit, even in Legends there was a book that had a 17 year old initiate who would have to keep trying) and so, again, you’re pretty free to make up whatever you like about the way Jedi creches work. The few things we do know, as mentioned in the above link: - On arrival at the Temple, Initiates are sorted into clans to help them foster trust and kinship. [Dooku: Jedi Lost] - When a Jedi youngling becomes a Padawan, they seem to go from the creche to partnering with their Master, though, first there are conversations with the crechemaster and the Master at some point: Obi-Wan said, “You know, I never had problems with that as a youngling. Being independent, I mean. I broke rules right and left. They even called me rebellious. Probably the Masters were surprised anyone was willing to take me on as an apprentice.” In fact, Qui-Gon had been warned about this very thing. He’d long since assumed that the crèche masters’ concern was overcautious. [Master and Apprentice] - Yaddle spends at least some time in the creche, whether regularly or they have rotating ones, is anyone’s guess, but she was there when Qui-Gon was a youngling: “Only yesterday, Dooku had chosen [Qui-Gon] as Padawan. He’d spent his last night in the younglings’ crèche laughing with his friends, imagining all the adventures he would have, and practicing with his lightsaber in the sparring room until Master Yaddle ordered him to bed.“ [Master and Apprentice] - They teach the younglings about the Force there: “Qui-Gon whispered, “The dark side?” He knew it was a thing all beings carried within them, a part of himself he would learn to guard against—the crèche masters had taught him all that. But it still sounded a little like some kind of ghost or monster, a mysterious thing that would leap out from the shadows to get you when you weren’t looking.” [Master and Apprentice], which is a direct echo of George Lucas explaining the Force: “ Only way to overcome the dark side is through discipline. The dark side is pleasure, biological and temporary and easy to achieve. The light side is joy, everlasting and difficult to achieve.” (George Lucas, Clone Wars writers meeting) - These bonds do seem to be significant, to at the very least some degree, as Obi-Wan thinks of his “creche-mate” even when he’s 17, indicating that possibly they’re often lifelong friends: Obi-Wan’s crèche-mate Prie, for instance, had been partnered with a Master who was expert in two things [....] [Master and Apprentice] - The younglings in the creche seem to sleep near each other (I have a personal headcanon that they sleep in piles, all cuddled up with each other, because Space Psychics) because they seem to often gossip with each other night by candle droid: In Dooku: Jedi Lost there is a gossip story passed around about a possibly expelled Padawan long ago, one that keeps getting passed around by Initiates telling stories by glow lanterns at night, which indicates that it’s considered juicy enough/surprising enough that it doesn’t seem to happen much/if at all. - We do see Yoda and Tera Sinube teaching classes of younglings as well, so they’re probably familiar to almost every youngling who passes through the creches. Whether these classes are based on the younglings’ clans or if they’re randomized, we have no idea, though. I’m assuming that at least some of them were based on clans, because we see Yoda teaching Bear Clan in Attack of the Clones, which also gives us an indication of the size of them--probably somewhere between four and eight.

We also see in Dooku: Jedi Lost that Dooku was part of the Hawk-Bat Clan, which often did things together, that Dooku spent time with Thranta Clan, while Tera Sinube spent more time with Heliost Clan. It’s probably reasonable to assume that the Jedi younglings from “The Gathering” are a clan as well, showing that they do things together fairly often:

Though, we see two other younglings there and Ganodi doesn’t seem to be part of the group, assuming that that’s Gungi, Byph, Petro, and Zatt with her. But we do see Tera Sinube spending time with them here and again later, when they’re practicing with their lightsabers:

Though, again, we see more than just that one clan--unless the two other younglings are part of their clan and just weren’t on that specific trip to Ilum with the others? Entirely possible there, too. But that’s it, that’s all we know. Anything else isn’t canon/never really was and can be fun to use, but I often find it doesn’t really fit well with what we’re shown in The Clone Wars or with George’s themes for SW. I think it makes sense, though, that it works like a communal society, where there are crechemasters who look after the children in their little mini-family clans, helping shepherd them to their classes, who shoo the children to bed at night and take care of them, talk with them about the things they need to know, work to help ease the transition when they become apprentices, etc. (As a note: If you’re reading Wookieepedia, even on the canon pages, they’ll reference The Jedi Path: A Manual for Students of the Force sometimes, but be wary, as that book is very firmly not canon. Elements of it may be recanonized, but only what appears in books like Dooku: Jedi Lost, Master and Apprentice, Choose Your Destiny: Obi-Wan & Anakin, Age of the Republic: Obi-Wan Kenobi, etc. are actually canon.)

#Anonymous #jedi order #meta #long post

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smhalltheurlsaretaken · 4 years

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Can we all agree that the most powerful being in the universe isn't any of the Skywalkers, Palpatine or Adult Yoda, but the kid who was able to look at the Child's pleading eyes and still refused to share his cookies? I wonder how much of a problem cookie stealing was in the Jedi creche?

My headcanon is that this kid was Force-sensitive (no kidding, that was my very first thought) and could feel baby Yoda’s attempts at weaponizing his own cuteness. How that brave boy managed to resist the powerful mind-suggestion remains a mystery, but he’s definitely up there with the Bendu, the Father, Son and Daughter, the Force Priestesses, and other such Force-entities. (Speaking of which, if one of their ghosts could kindly drop a freaking boulder on Gideon’s head instead of practicing non-interference, that would be much appreciated.)

Cookie-stealing obviously didn’t work in the Jedi creche, because it would always devolve into cookie-Force-tug-of-war, which led to cookie-crumbling, and no-cookies-for-anyone. A great way to practice non-attachment, patience and discipline, on the one hand - but also, cookie crumbs and crying kids.

Also, every single Jedi baby is far too precious and too adorable for the puppy eyes to work on each other, or the Masters. When you’ve got a gaggle of Baby-Wans and little ‘Sokas running around, not to mention Ganodi’s galaxy eyes, Cal and Zatt’s freckles, Caleb and Petro’s adorable pouty faces, Katooni’s little nose, and Byph and Gungi’s general preciousness, you have to adapt and come up with some serious defensive tactics.

I’m betting only Miralukas with mind-shields of beskar and nerves of durasteel were allowed to hand out the cookies.

#the mandalorian #mandalorian spoilers #sorta #ask #anonymous #baby yoda #jedi order

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celebrate-the-clone-wars · 5 years

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Just decided I'd mention for anyone curious. Jedi Fallen Order does confirm that Petro, Katooni, Byph, Zatt, Ganodi, and Gungi were killed. They are briefly seen being executed by stormtroopers in a flashback.

Edit 11/27 : This was disproved by multiple people already to not have happened.

#gif #byph #gungi #petro #katooni #zatt #ganodi #younglings #celebrate the clone wars #anon ask #Anonymous #jedi fallen order spoilers

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duhragonball · 4 years

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[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (128/?)

Disclaimer: This story features characters and concepts based on Dragon Ball, which is a trademark of Bird Studio/Shueisha and Toei Animation. This is an unauthorized work, and no profit is being made on this work by me. This story is copyright of me. Download if you like, but please don’t archive it without my permission. Don’t be shy.

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

[6 August 233 Before Age. Interstellar Space]

Immediately after the battle on Zenj I, Luffa underwent another round of mycotherapy treatment. It was a radical application of synthetic fungal DNA, which Dr. Topsas had devised as a way to heal all of Luffa's injuries as quickly as possible. Luffa's very first session lasted three days, but he had managed to refine the process since then, and this time Luffa only had to stay immersed in the stasis fluid for two.

Zatte counted down the hours and minutes until she could see her wife again. In recent days, she had comforted Luffa while she rested after a battle. It had been a very spiritual experience for her, and even if Luffa didn't share in that aspect of it, the lovemaking was great too. This time there would be a delay, but Zatte didn't see why anything else needed to change. And yet, when Zatte went to find her on the third day, Luffa had already left the sickbay, and had gone to the ship's gymnasium.

The entire star-yacht belonged to Luffa, a "gift" from a wealthy deathmatch promoter who desperately wanted her to go away. But Luffa usually slept in the gym, rather than any of the ship's luxurious cabins. She would spend time in Zatte's quarters, especially after they were married, but the gym was where she went to be alone, and Luffa generally preferred to sleep alone.

As Zatte entered the gym, she ignored the toppled exercise machines and torn mats. The place had been a mess for years, as Luffa used this space to let off steam. Now, she was lying on the pile of mats and towels she used for her bed, staring pensively at the ceiling.

"There you are," Zatte said. "I thought you'd head straight for my room, but I guess you wanted me to find you..."

She knelt down on the deck beside Luffa, who slowly rose to a sitting position.

"Hey," Luffa said, kissing Zatte on the cheek.

"What's wrong?" Zatte asked. What she really wanted to ask was: "Is that all? We're apart for three days and all I get is a lousy kiss on the cheek?"

"Nothing, I'm just... I'm tired, and I needed to think."

"I thought you'd want to... discuss what I did on Planet Zenj," Zatte said.

Luffa took a deep breath and nodded. "Yeah, you saved that kid," she said. "Hell of a job. I'm proud of you."

"It was nothing," Zatte said. "I... I meant what I said back there. I can't die without you. I'm sure of it. And when I'm around you, I feel like I can do anything."

Zatte was sure that Luffa would jump up and push her against the wall. Not too rough, but not too gently either. And Luffa would have some stern words for her about being more careful, and Zatte would fire back with some stern words about picking up the pace, and this would go on until they were too busy kissing to talk. Instead, Luffa just made a weary smile and squeezed Zatte's hand.

"Sorry, I'm just not in the mood, right now, Zattie," Luffa said.

"Oh. No problem. I figured you'd want to spar later on, but we can skip straight to that if you want."

"I can't spar with you for a while," Luffa said. "That mycotherapy junk worked pretty well, but Doc wants me to heal up from the last beating I took."

"Well, I won't tell him if you don't," Zatte offered with a smile.

"Sorry," Luffa said. "I'm playing it his way this time. It's been working out pretty well so far. I'm starting to think these medical types had the right idea all along."

"Okay, but you only use a tiny fraction of your strength when you spar with me," Zatte said. "What's the harm?"

"Probably none, but he told me to rest and that's what I'm doing. Dotz thinks the next attack will be a few days from now, and I need to be ready."

"Come on," Zatte said. She gestured toward her legs, which were clad in form-fitting black fabric adorned with neon purple highlights. "I wore your favorite training gear."

"Hey, if you want to train on your own for a while, that's fine by me," Luffa said. She rose to her feet and walked slowly to the door. "But I think I'm gonna soak in the hot tub for a while, so drop by if you need me."

She walked around Zatte to proceed on her way, but Zatte grabbed her by the arm to stop her. Luffa was somewhat surprised by how forcefully she pulled.

"I do need you," Zatte said. "For sparring."

"Zattie, I can't right now--"

"Don't give me that 'doctor's orders' bull. You'd do it if you wanted to."

Luffa raised an eyebrow. "What is this?" she asked. "I thought you only put up with the sparring sessions before. Now you're demanding it?"

"I'm part of this war too," Zatte said. "I'm here to support you, and I can't do that properly if I'm not at my best--"

"And the only way you can improve is by sparring with me personally?" Luffa asked. "That's crap, and you know it. There's other ways to train."

"Physically, but not spiritually," Zatte insisted.

"Spiritually?!" Luffa asked.

"The work you make me do," Zatte said. "Sensing your ki up close. It's a purifying experience that helps me--"

"You mean on top of the incense in the bedroom? And the litanies you recite before and after we... well... you know."

"When we have sex," Zatte finished for her. "Just say it. We have sex. Honestly, you can be such a child sometimes."

"Me? You're the one who keeps turning our whole marriage into a shrine! What's the matter? You don't trust Providence to make sure I'm doing their work right?"

"It's me I'm trying to improve!" Zatte said. "I have to consecrate myself as much as I can for the next time we go into action. I thought you understood that."

"I thought I did too, but lately you've been taking it to a whole other level. Frankly it's gotten pretty ridiculous. Are you going to follow me into the head and sing hymns every time I flush?"

"Very funny," Zatte said. "I'm just a joke to you now."

"What do you expect from someone as childish as I am?" Luffa snorted.

"Are you going to spar with me or not?" Zatte asked.

"No," Luffa said, "I'm not." And then she walked out the door.

Left alone in the gym, surrounded by broken machines, Zatte considered taking out some frustrations of her own.

*******

[7 August, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

Guwar was finally happy. He had everything he ever wanted, and more. Once, he had been a below-average warrior, but thanks to the wonders of Jindan, he had become one of the strongest Saiyans alive.

He wasn't the strongest, by any means. The Legendary Super Saiyan still held that rank, though Luffa was an enemy to the cult, and its leaders preached that she was a heretic and an impostor. Guwar wasn't entirely sure how Luffa could be both of those things at one, or why exactly she was evil incarnate, but Luffa was a threat to everything he had achieved in the cult, and that was enough for him.

After Luffa, there was Trismegistus, the founder and leader of the cult, and the inventor of the Jindan technique. One of the advanced rituals for cult members was the Trial of Revelation, where Trismegistus would meet with initiates and reveal that he was actually the Rehval III, the Saiyan monarch who evacuated his throneworld and vanished without a trace. Perhaps for some of the cultists, this was a bitter pill to swallow, but Guwar had found the whole thing anticlimactic. He had always tried to steer clear of the Saiyan Kingdom in the past, but that was mostly because he didn't think they had anything to offer him. If he had known the king was an alchemist with the power to make Guwar stronger, he would have thrown in with Rehval a long time ago.

After Luffa and Rehval, there were other mighty Saiyans, all of them enhanced by Rehval's magic potions. Many of the Jindan Priesthood were immensely strong, though not all of them.

Then there were the Executants, a group of elite Jindan warriors charged with special missions for Trismegistus. Guwar had been promoted to this level. He wasn't the strongest of the Executants, but he wasn't the weakest either, and simply holding the position was enough to satisfy him. Before the cult, Guwar had been a nobody. Now, he was one of their heroes. He was their champion.

Having returned from a recent assignment, Guwar strode confidently through the underground halls of the Jindan Sanctuary, their sacred base of operations. His brothers and sisters in the alchemical faith nodded reverently to him as he passed. He took his meals in the Holy Refectory, along with the others who had earned the privilege, and he was permitted to eat meat and drink wine, a special dispensation for those who demonstrated exceptional loyalty.

Then there were the women. Trismegistus forbade monogamous pairings within the cult. Instead, he had devised communal breeding pits, and arranged for certain groups of participants to make use of them. Guwar didn't understand most of it. Rehval claimed that he had the means to determine which Saiyans would produce the most powerful offspring, but he never shared his methods with Guwar. All Guwar knew was that he had been sorted into Eugenic Group Red, and he was authorized to procreate with anyone else in Groups Red, Purple, and White. The other colors were off-limits to him, but this only meant that he couldn't sire children with them. As an Executant, Guwar had special permission to help himself to any lower-ranking cultists he found pleasing. It had bothered him at first. Saiyans were a notoriously prudish species, and even the mere mention of intimacy was enough to make them uneasy, but somehow Rehval had made it all seem quite normal. You had your assigned breeding duties, you went where you were sent, and you did what was asked of you, for the good of the cult. Guwar rather enjoyed it this way. It took a lot of the awkwardness out of sex.

There were, of course, some things denied to him. Guwar had never thought of himself as greedy, but somehow his thoughts always drifted to what he couldn't have. It was as though having more only inspired him to want more. As he entered the corridor leading to the Executants' quarters, he passed his own cabin and knocked on the door of another, the irony of his desires seemed especially poignant.

"You're back already?" asked the woman who answered the door.

"It was an easy assignment," Guwar said. "The man I was supposed to kill had lousy security. I'd have finished even sooner, but Trismegistus wanted me to keep a low profile."

"Mm-hmm," she said as she put her hands on his arms. "And now I suppose you've come to collect your reward for a job well done, is that it?"

"You're not my first choice," Guwar said, but you're a fine woman, Zhidarr. "And you seemed to enjoy it well enough the last few times..."

"Well, you're not my first choice either," she said, but you smell nicer than most of the ones I end up with, so that's something at least." She led him inside and began removing parts of her uniform. "Let's make it quick, though. I have my own missions, you know. I'm leaving for Dubois III in a few hours."

"Dubois?" Guwar sat on the side of her bed and started pulling off his boots. "What the hell's in the Dubois system?"

"Beats me," Zhidarr said. "I haven't been briefed yet. Hopefully it's full of Federation soldiers. I'm itching to get into the war."

"No one's come back from Federation territory since the fighting started," Guwar said. "I wouldn't be so eager to volunteer."

"And that's why you're sharing a cot with me instead of Endive," Zhidarr scolded him. "Come on, don't deny it. You'd be knocking on her door right now if you could. But she outranks you, which means you have no right to request her for procreation privileges."

"So what?" Guwar asked. "For her I should go to the front and get killed by Luffa?"

"You should go to the front and get promoted," Zhidarr said. "Think about it: the first one to fight in Federation space and return alive. You'd be hailed as a miracle. Let's face it, it's the only way you'll ever outshine Endive. She's so far above the rest of us it's ridiculous."

"Well, thanks for the advice," Guwar said, "but I can't have sex with her if I'm dead."

Zhidarr tossed her body armor to the floor and approached the bed. "Well, you won't be spending so much time with me once I get sent to the Federation," she said. "I've decided. As soon as I'm promoted ahead of you, I'm cutting you off. No offense, but I've got better things to do with my time than keep you warm."

"Too bad," Guwar said with a smirk. "Of course, if you die on the front, Trismegistus will have to promote someone else to replace you. Maybe she'll enjoy my company a little more."

"The others died because they were weak," Zhidarr insisted as she climbed onto the bed and mounted him. "Their bodies were too flawed to make full use of the Jindan power. That's why the master sends them to their deaths, you know."

"'The Federation is a crucible,'" Guwar said, repeating the sermon he had heard from the priests when the first reports from the war came in. "'Many are sent, but only the worthy will return.'"

"You say that as if you don't believe it," Zhidarr said.

"I believe Trismegistus knows what he's doing," Guwar said. "Our power comes from him, so it's his right to use us as he sees fit. If he wants to purge the rolls, so be it. I just don't understand it from a strategic sense. How do we win a war if all our soldiers die?"

"You talk like an outsider sometimes, Guwar," Zhidarr said. She kissed him and patted him on the cheek. "Trismegistus has a plan for us all. None can understand his ways, not even his loyal servants. If it made perfect sense to me, then I'd be scared. If I could figure it out, so could our enemies. All we can do is trust, and place our faith in his wisdom."

Guwar couldn't argue with this. Rehval's military plans were bewildering to him, but so far he had done right by Guwar. Others may have been killed, perhaps needlessly, but Guwar was still alive, still powerful, still successful and admired among his peers. As long as Guwar prospered, it didn't really matter to him how Trismegistus prosecuted the war.

Or did it?

*******

"Ah, Guwar, there you are."

Guwar had only visited Trismegistus' inner sanctum a few times. Most of his orders had come down through official channels, or Trismegistus had come to him. The first time he had visited this room was when the Thrice-Blessed chose to reveal his true identity to him. Guwar shrugged and wondered why it mattered. Of course King Rehval would want to hide from Luffa. It only made sense for him to create a new identity, a new secret base, and a process to carefully vet his followers. The only real surprise was that their shadowy leader was a Saiyan himself, since Saiyans weren't known to dabble in alchemy, but Guwar was a mathematician himself, and never so he never paid much heed to stereotypes.

"Reporting as ordered, Master," Guwar said as he lowered himself to one knee.

"I have something new for you," Rehval said. "And I thought I should brief you on this personally."

"A new mission?" Guwar asked. This is it, he thought to himself, he's sending me to the front.

"Relax, Guwar, I'm not sending you back into the field already," Rehval said with a chuckle. "You just returned from Thoall, after all. I take it you've already helped yourself to your rewards?"

"Um, yes sir," Guwar said, awkwardly thinking back to Zhidar's cabin.

"Good man," Rehval said. "Zhidar or Potei?"

"Uh, Zhidar, sir."

"I thought so. Always one or the other. You should really broaden your horizons, Guwar." Rehval rose from his dais and gestured for Guwar to stand. As he did, Rehval approached him and clapped his hand on Guwar's back. "There are some excellent women in the technician section that I think you'd enjoy."

It had been easier for Guwar to discuss this sort of thing when he hadn't known that Trismegistus was a fellow Saiyan. Abasing himself was one thing, and talking openly about sex was another, but what was truly disturbing how easily it came to King Rehval. Guwar had often heard talk of the king wanting to force the Saiyan culture to be more like the rest of the galaxy, and now he was finally beginning to see just how cosmopolitan he really was.

"I, uh, well... once I've found something that works, I like to stick with it, sir," Guwar said. "Less disappointment that way. Uh, you mentioned an assignment?"

"Right," Rehval said with a grin. "You pull this one off for me, Guwar, and you can have anyone you want, whenever you want. I know you've had your eye on Endive since before you joined us. She's always been out of your league, right? Well, not for much longer, I think. Here."

He picked up a portable data drive and handed it to Guwar. "I've ordered one of the ships to be prepared for your personal use," he explained. "Not that you'll be going anywhere for this job, but I think you'll need its computer core. And I've assigned some acolytes to assist you while you work."

"I don't understand," Guwar said. He held the drive in his hand and stared at it closely, as though expecting its plastic surface to offer some clue about its contents.

"Of course not," Rehval said. "The war doesn't make any sense, Guwar, not to anyone but myself. I send my followers into Federation space, and they all die, one by one. The only reason Luffa hasn't gone on the offensive is because she doesn't know where to find me, and she can't conduct a search without leaving her territory undefended." He walked idly across the room, pausing to wipe the dust off of a shelf full of old scrolls. It was strange to see him without the heavy crimson robes he normally wore. His simple red shirt and linen shorts seemed unworthy of his stature. Guwar supposed that this was a sign of how much Rehval trusted him.

"The answers," Rehval continued, "are contained in that drive you're holding. This isn't a war for territory, or something that can be measured in casualties or starships. This is a holy war, Guwar. You do understand that much, don't you?"

"Of course, Master," Guwar said.

"You used galactic ley lines to find this planet," Rehval said. "That's why I hid my world from the universe. Not out of cowardice, but to challenge my followers to find me. Only the resourceful could discover my truth. For instance, you used your mathematics background to devise an algorithm for interpreting geomantic signals. That's why I needed you for this work, Guwar. You're the only one I can count on to check my calculations."

"Calculations?"

"You'll find it all in that drive," Rehval said. "Our goal is not just to empower ourselves with Jindan, Guwar. We aren't just trying to win the war, either. You are all the essence of the divine reagent, which I will use to transmute the entire universe. That is why my body remains here, on Nagaoka, while my earthen avatars fight Luffa in my place. The true victory lies here. This is where the blessed reaction will begin. If Luffa were to destroy this planet, it would upset my plans. That's the other reason I've worked so hard to keep its location secret."

"This has something to do with the galactic ley lines," Guwar said. "I never understood what they were or how they worked, but I got the impression that they were like a network of pipes running through every star and planet, and there was some sort of power coursing through them."

"That's not too far off," Rehval said. "Except the lines don't exactly channel power in the conventional sense. More like... possibility. Things are possible on Nagaoka that can't be done anywhere else. The lines that converge here give this planet immense alchemical potential, and if we can direct more lines towards Nagaoka, there may be no limit to what we can accomplish."

Guwar liked the sound of that. If Rehval could become even more powerful than he already was, then there would be nothing that could stand in their way. Not even the Super Saiyan would be a threat. And as Rehval's power increased, how much more generously would he reward his servants...

"My work is based on an algorithm designed by the original Trismegistus," Rehval said. "I named myself after that ancient master to honor him, and to claim his legacy. He had found ways to manipulate ley lines, but he lacked the raw power to attempt anything on a large scale. That is why I need you to go over his work, and build a more robust mathematical model."

"I'll get started right away," Guwar said.

"I knew I could count on you, Guwar," Rehval said. "As much as I prize Endive's service, this task will be more important than anything she's ever done for me. Consider this your path to becoming the First Executant."

Guwar liked the sound of that even more. He could have Endive whenever he wanted. Not to mention a few other high-ranking Executants he wouldn't mind socializing with. They would all adore him for his great service to the cause. And all he would have to do is ply his trade for a few hours. A day at most. He had drawn up mathematical models in his spare time for fun. How hard could this be?

*******

[7 August, 233 Before Age. Interstellar Space.]

Zatte stewed in her frustrations for a full day, and when she was ready to face Luffa again, she found her in the star-yacht's hot tub. Dr. Topsas had restricted Luffa from so many activities, it was just about the only thing left for her to do. Luffa didn't look up at her, and she didn't know how to begin, so she just started talking.

"I wanted to apologize for yesterday," Zatte said.

Luffa glanced up at her. "I shouldn't have mocked your faith," she said. "It defines you as a warrior."

"No, you were right," Zatte said. "I have been going overboard lately. Receiving training from you is... well, it's important to me. It makes me feel like I'm actively doing something to prove my support."

"Sometimes, you have to do nothing," Luffa said. "I'm not soaking in this thing because it's fun, you know. I wanted worthy opponents to fight, and now I've got more than I can handle. I have to play this carefully or I'll let them win."

"You're right," Zatte said.

"Doc doesn't even want me cooking for a few days," Luffa said. "I hate that."

"We've got enough leftovers to last a while," Zatte said. "And there's always the backup rations."

"You guys deserve better than rations," Luffa said. "But I have to play this smart. I learned that from you."

You learned it from Keda, Zatte thought to herself. The Dorlun child was much more sensible than either of them, but the pain of her death was still sorely felt, and so the two of them had a tendency to avoid speaking of her.

"Is there anything I can do for you?" Zatte asked. "Anything at all?"

Luffa shrugged. "I don't think so," she said. "You're welcome to stick around, but I think what you really want is a place to channel all that pent up energy. I don't think I can help you there. Not for a while, anyway."

"Sounds like we both have the same problem," Zatte said. "We might as well be miserable together."

She sat down at the edge of the tub and took off her boots, then dipped her ankles into the bubbling water. "Is this what it's like to be you?" Zatte asked after a few minutes. "I mean, being so riled up and not being able to cut loose?"

"I was going to ask you the same question," Luffa said. "For the first time in years, I'm having to conserve my strength and wait for the right moment. And there's no clear path to victory. Best I can hope for is to go from one battle to the next."

"Huh. I guess we've got a lot more in common than I thought," Zatte said.

*******

[15 August, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

Blusser didn't know what Guwar's assignment was, but she was deeply honored to assist him while he carried it out. All she really knew was that he had boarded a scientific research vessel which the Jindan Cult had captured several months ago. At first, she assumed they would be flying the craft to some distant star system, but instead the ship went nowhere, and Blusser and her fellow acolytes were tasked with standing guard on the tarmac to make sure he wasn't disturbed. On occasion, they went inside to serve him meals. She had done this herself yesterday afternoon, and she was impressed with his charming disposition. Executants like Guwar represented the finest warriors the cult had to offer, and everyone spoke so highly of Guwar. On top of that, he was a scholar too. Blusser never had much interest in math, but somehow he was able to explain complex ideas in a way that made them easy to follow, even if she didn't remember most of it. He was a fascinating man.

Her relief arrived at the shipyard, carrying a crate containing his dinner. Blusser took the crate and went inside the ship to deliver the meal before leaving. She had to perform some rituals with the priests, and then she would turn in and report to the shipyard the next morning to do it all over again. But the priests weren't expecting her for another hour, so she hoped to spend some more time enjoying Guwar's company.

The ship was designed for a crew of three, but it had a rather spacious common area. There, Blusser found a large triangular table with papers scattered across the surface. Three computer terminals were located at each corner of the table, although one of them had been torn off of its mounting and was now embedded in the wall. Guwar was nowhere to be found. Blusser guessed that he was in the head, or perhaps taking a nap in one of the cabins on the deck above. She laid the crate down on the deck and started arranging the dishes on the table for him. When she finished, and he still didn't show himself, she began to worry, and so she searching the rest of the ship.

At last, she found him in the engine room, seated at its single workstation, his face buried in his folded arms. There were papers here as well, some of them crumpled up into little balls.

"Uh, Executant Guwar?" she said, unsure how to proceed. "I'm sorry for disturbing you, but I wanted to let you know that your dinner is ready."

He looked up at her, his expression weary and frustrated. He seemed to be a completely different man than the one she had spoke with yesterday.

"What?" he asked. Then: "Oh, yes. Fine. Whatever."

"Is everything all right, sir?" Blusser asked.

"Everything's fine," he said, not even trying to hide his insincerity. "You can go now."

She put her hands together and looked away from him awkwardly. "Well, I was just thinking, if you had the time, I'd like to hear more about that theorem you were telling me about yesterday. I--"

"I said you can go now," Guwar snarled. "Can't you see that I'm busy?!"

He grabbed a tool from the desk and threw it at her. Blusser dodged it easily enough, but decided to leave before he could try again.

As she hurried out of the ship, she passed by her relief, standing guard outside.

"Better give him plenty of space," she warned her. "That job he's working on must be a lot tougher than we thought!"

NEXT: Proof by contradiction.

#dragon ball #fanfiction #super saiyan #luffa #lssjluffafic #zatte #guwar #trismegistus #nagaoka

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duhragonball · 4 years

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[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (124/?)

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

[15 June, 233 Before Age. Planet Yars.]

The Jindan Cult's war against the Federation was essentially a coordinated series of raids. Small groups of Saiyan cultists would attempt to invade a planet, usually along the Federation's frontier, and the defenders would be forced to respond before they could entrench themselves. The Saiyan Free Company, led by Princess Seltiss, could be counted on to handle one or two Jindan cultists, and the Federation fleet could intercept the cult's ships and destroy them before their crews could bring their powers to bear. But when six or more of the cultists landed on a planet together, it was a job for Luffa. Only the Super Saiyan had the power to cope with so many of the alchemically-enhanced warriors. And even then, they managed to wear her down, battle by battle, to the point where she needed time to recover.

During Luffa's convalescence, the cult managed to conquer Yars and without Luffa available to stop them, they went to work on fortifying the planet to serve as a base of operations. All the Federation and its allies could do was to intercept any Jindan reinforcements before they could reach the occupied planet.

But the cult had other ways to strengthen its position. Later, Yartian witnesses would tell stories of a gruesome ritual they performed, where one of their priestesses vomited red liquid onto the ground, and then an enormous earthen figure emerged from below. Then they worshiped this walking idol with cheers, songs, and sacrifices. The Federation's defenders knew this creature was an avatar of the cult's leader, Trismegistus, also known as the Saiyan King Rehval III. These avatars were immensely powerful, and now that the occupiers had one of them on the planet, there would be no way of removing them without Luffa's help.

"I would have thought she'd have been here by now," the rock-Rehval said. He was seated upon a giant stone throne that his followers had built for him in what used to be the planet's capital city. "Fifteen of my followers would be tempting enough bait by themselves, but I was sure she'd jump at the chance to destroy another one of my bodies."

One of his flock stood on the armrest of his stone chair. His job was officially to oversee construction projects in the area and to see to his master's needs, but the rock creature needed nothing, as the real Rehval was controlling it from many light years away. He was mostly there to let the avatar know when it was time to fight.

"I'm sorry to disappoint you, Thrice Blessed One," the man said.

"Well, it can't be helped," Rehval said with a mighty shrug. "I'll just go dormant for a while and check in again. It's not like she can get close to the planet without one of you sensing her approach or detecting her ship."

And so the great stone form of Rehval grew still. And just as the attendant turned to consider his other duties, he was decapitated by a beam of red light. Had he survived this, or if his master had not withdrawn his presence from the earthen figure, one of them might have recognized this as Luffa's signature technique, the Vengeance Cannon. Instead, his headless body tumbled to the idol's feet, while the idol itself remained motionless. Luffa approached it a few seconds later, and waited patiently for the other fourteen cultists to sense her power and find her. Civilian witnesses would describe the yellow glow of her hair and tail, and a sense of unease. Most Federation citizens appreciated Luffa as a benevolent protector, but many had seconds thoughts after seeing her in action. The news media tended to edit footage of her battles for the sake of decorum, but those who saw her fight in person had no such filter.

"You fools make it so easy," she gloated when they finally arrived. "You thought I'd rush in on a battleship, full power, give you plenty of warning. It never occurred to you that I'd do it all sneaky-like, did it? Suppress my power, coast my way into the system, reconnoiter for a few days."

"We still should have detected your ship!" one of the cultists protested. They all surrounded her as she floated above their earthen idol, daring them to chase her away from it.

Luffa laughed. "You call yourselves Saiyans?" she scoffed. "You must have forgotten everything you know about warfare when you went for this magical nonsense. You took this planet, sure, but you're still behind enemy lines. All the defense systems are enemy tech, aren't they? Including the early-warning outpost on the twelfth planet in this system. You didn't think those guys were much of a threat, but they've been scrambling your sensors since before I got here. So if you didn't detect my ship, blame those guys. I'm surprised your 'all-knowing' leader didn't mention it to you earlier."

"You're still outmatched, infidel!" one of the cultists cried as she brandished her spear at Luffa. "Even if you could defeat all of us, we only have to touch Trismegistus' form to summon him back to aid us!"

"Yeah," Luffa said. "I'm counting on it. Should make things really interesting. How long would it take for him to get here? A minute? Two minutes? And how many of you will be alive to help him once he's ready? And that's assuming you can get past me long enough to touch this thing. So many variables. I'm getting excited just thinking about it."

Without warning, she suddenly pounced onto one of the Jindan Saiyans and wrapped her legs around his before any of them could react. As she locked in the hold, he cried out in agony.

None of then had expected her to do this. It was folly to use a jointlock on a single opponent during a battle with so many enemies. And yet Luffa had done it anyway, leaving herself wide open for an attack. Only the attack never came, because her foes were too confused to seize their chance.

When one of them finally did react, he got as far as crying "For the Glory of Trismegistus!" before Luffa flew into the air to dodge his blast. Then she slammed into him, dragging her captive behind her as she continued to torture him with her hold.

"She's mad!" one of the Saiyans said in a panicked voice.

Luffa's raucous laughter did little to dissuade them from this opinion. She flew around her enemies like a hornet weaving through a group of frightened picnickers. When they finally gained the sense to try to intercept her and box her in, she used her arms to fire back on them. A Saiyan tried to cone up from behind her, but she flipped around as he approached, and swung her captive into him like a club.

His now constant wailing had taken a severe toll on their morale. Only a short while ago, they had been confident about their mission, but now, they all felt they were in a battle for survival, and they were losing. None of them dared to go for the earthen giant below. As powerful as the avatar could be, they each feared that Luffa would pick them off unless they all fought together.

As Luffa dodged their attacks, one of them stood still, struggling to prepare an energy technique. A ball of light coalesced above his right hand, and he growled and gritted his teeth as he willed it into existence. When the moment was right, he would unleash the power, and then--!

Before he could finish, a plasma bolt struck him on the side of his head, and he collapsed. He was dead before he hit the ground. Six hundred yards away, Zatte smiled as she looked at his dead body in the scope of her rifle, then shifted her aim to pick out a new target.

On the battlefield, the Jindan Saiyans saw one of their own fall, and believed it was Luffa's doing. They began to fear that her attacks could come without warning, and their panic forced them to go on the defensive. Luffa had killed the man she had caught in her leglock, and now she was seeking out a fresh victim. No one wanted to volunteer. In this way, the Jindan Saiyans gave up their sole advantage over Luffa. Their numbers could only overwhelm her if they attacked her together. Now, as thy scattered and kept their distance, they were unable to coordinate anything. One of them went for the avatar on the throne. Luffa fired a ki blast that got there first, reducing Rehval's graven image into a cloud of dust.

Luffa grabbed a Saiyan woman and broke her neck with a single kick. Another Jindan Saiyan tried to fight back, but he was cut down by Zatte's sniper fire before he could act. Luffa spared a backward glance to where the plasma bolt had come from, but quickly turned around in time to block an elbow strike and reverse it into a hammerlock. She used the man as a shield for a moment, then fired a ki blast through his torso, killing him and one of his comrades in the same shot.

That left just six of the original fifteen. With the power of Jindan running through their veins, six Saiyans were more than a match for nearly any force in the galaxy. Against Luffa, six were nothing at all. Under different circumstances, Luffa might have toyed with them, but she felt that they had held this planet long enough, and deemed that their occupation would not last a moment longer than necessary.

Civilian witnesses would later speak of the brutal efficiency of those final moments of the battle, but also that Luffa was laughing with joy the entire time.

*******

[15 June, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

The Federation had managed to thwart or repel every Jindan invasion into their territory. The casualty rate on the cultist's side was 100%. They continued to send warriors anyway. The prevailing attitude among the Federation's military leaders was that if they could easily win this war, if only they could take the fight to the enemy. But the cultists' home base was its most carefully guarded secret. Here, on Nagaoka, if King Rehval knew or cared that Yars had been liberated, his fifteen warriors slaughtered, and his earthen idol destroyed, he did not show it. Instead, he spent his day poring over scrolls he had gathered over the years, choosing which would offer the best education for his new student.

For her part, Treekul had no interest in learning anything from him. She had only come to this planet because three Saiyans wanted to find the Jindan Cult, and she had been intrigued enough by the opportunity to join their quest. She was an archaeologist, one specializing in ancient alchemical texts and artifacts. She joined the Saiyans for the challenge, and because she knew that Saiyans tended to find a handsome profit whenever they wanted to do something. But the Jindan Cult was no ancient puzzle to be excavated and studied. There was no payday at the end of their search. Instead they were stolen away to a secret lair. Her Saiyan partners had been indoctrinated into the cult, while their leader, Rehval, or "Trismegistus" as they called him, decided to make her his apprentice in the alchemical arts.

It could have been much worse, she told herself. The cult only accepted Saiyans, so it stood to reason that an alien like herself would have been executed on the spot. Her only advantage in this predicament was that Rehval seemed to enjoy keeping her around. He often told her that he found her attractive, but he also seemed impressed with her alchemical knowledge, and maybe he found it refreshing to have someone to talk to who wasn't brainwashed into worshiping the ground he walked on.

And so, her best chance of escape lay in exploiting his fancy. He made her a priestess in his mad religion, and commanded her to wear a sort of dress made of torn robes, and so she did. He wanted to teach her his secrets, and so she played the eager student. He flirted with her constantly, and she did everything she could to hide her disgust. Because she knew that if she did this long enough, he would eventually come to trust her, and that would be when her opportunity would present itself.

That was her greatest strength on a planet full of mighty Saiyans. They all spoke highly of their pride, but Treekul didn't have much use for it herself. "Pride" was just another word for "stubborn" in her book, and she knew far too many stubborn, brittle people who broke because they refused to bend. A little flexibility went a long way. For one thing, stubborn, brittle people had a nasty habit of mistaking compromise with surrender, which made them careless. She didn't like wearing red rags, or being forbidden to cut her own hair, or having to listen to Rehval's lectures, but she could tolerate it if she had to, and Rehval would assume she had already submitted to his will.

As she sat in the underground cavern that served as his laboratory, he went on and on about his discoveries and achievements. She knew the type well. He wanted a woman to hang on his every word, to nod in fascination, and tell him how brilliant he was.

"What is Jindan?" he asked aloud. "The word 'jindan' is easily defined. It's simply another name for mercuric sulfide, commonly known as the mineral cinnabar, or the pigment vermilion. Common chemists would say that it's a toxic substance, and they're... mainly correct. Most carbon-based life forms are poisoned by mercury salts. However, alchemical thought sees beyond the mere physical nature of mercuric sulfide, and explores the deeper truth that the salt represents.

"In alchemy, the element mercury is considered an important symbol. Unlike most metals, it is liquid at room temperature. It flows like molten silver, which is how it came to be known as "quicksilver". It is rather slow to react with most chemical reagents, although it has a number of interesting interactions with other metals. Gold is soluble in mercury, which made it very useful for the ancient mining industries of many planets. With enough heat, a gold/mercury amalgam can be separated. The mercury boils away, leaving purified gold behind. Mercury also dissolves aluminum. It almost seems to devour these metals, which may have been what has fascinated ancient alchemists since the dawn of time.

"Then there's cinnabar. The deep scarlet color of mercuric sulfide is also of great importance to alchemical philosophy. Red, the color of blood, the color of fire. The color of change and life itself. The earliest practitioners of alchemy knew that it held the secret of the great mystery, the mystery that governed all changes in nature. Copper and tin could be refined from mineral ores. Nature provides the minerals, but the metals must be taken through artificial means. The process must be sped up to a time scale that is practical for mortals. That is the power of alchemy. To accelerate or manipulate the natural processes. Mercuric sulfide represents that power in its most basic form. Mix metal mercury with hydrogen sulfide, and they form red mercuric sulfide quite readily. Distill the mercuric sulfide, and the elements can be separated, and the mercury recovered once more. Just like with copper and tin and iron, only mercury can be refined much more easily."

Treekul had heard much of this before, as a college freshman. The professor who taught that course only offered one class every other semester, and only on two days a week in the middle of the day, which had been extremely inconvenient to her schedule. What struck her was how passionate Rehval was about it, as though he wanted to make love to a mercury atom. She had to suppress the urge to laugh at that image.

"The dream of alchemy," he said, finally coming to the point, "is to reduce all natural processes to the same simplicity of refining mercury from cinnabar."

That got Treekul's attention. Simplicity. The core tenet of alchemy was that every process was a natural reaction that could be sped up, slowed down, or even reversed. It was just a matter of knowing how, of discovering the "cheat codes" that made such miracles possible. Know the right shortcuts, and one could do the impossible.

Treekul began to wonder if there was an alchemical shortcut for escaping a Saiyan cult.

"Let us consider the other component of cinnabar, which is sulfur," Rehval continued. "It is native to fire, earth, air, and water. Volcanoes spew fire and air and geysers spew water, all rich in sulfur, which eventually deposits as a waxy yellow material resembling earth. From within the earth, sulfur is born, and to earth again it returns. Molten sulfur turns blood red, hinting at its ties to cinnabar. When sulfur is set aflame, it produces a blue color. Colloidal sulfur is white. The colors illustrate sulfur's connection to the sun. It is the principle of the sun.

"Likewise, mercury is the principle of the moon. Take a bottle of mercury and spill it across a surface. It scatters into droplets, both large and small, like the many moons of different sizes throughout the countless worlds of the universe. These droplets can be bound to sulfur, just as the moons of the universe are bound to their respective suns. However, the moons are defined by their connection with the planets they orbit. Just as the planets exist as the intermediaries of the suns and moons, so does life exist as an interface between the Principles of Mercury and Sulfur. Those with wisdom can recognize this sacred relationship, and thus study the nature of cinnabar, or jindan, in the search for the power over life. For what is life but a natural process, no different from the refining of metal from ore, or the burning of wood into smoke and ash? By manipulating the Principles of Mercury and Sulfur, an elixir can be prepared, one that reacts with the reagents of life itself, accelerating some processes, while slowing others. The ideal elixir would grant a being immortality, but the wise know that this is not a thing to be pursued for material gain, or as an escape from death. No, the elixir of life is an end unto itself. Discover that ultimate secret, and all other secrets, the Whole of the Great Mystery, will be laid bare. What is immortality, when weighed against that perfect and total knowledge?

"Though sulfur represents an equal portion of Jindan, we must consider mercury to be the superior portion. Mercury has the greater density, and its atoms are larger and more massive than those of sulfur. Every planet has a sun, but only some are blessed with the moonlight, of which mercury is a symbol. For this reason, the alchemical notation for mercury is depicted as an arc atop a ring atop a cross. The arc is the crescent moon, the ring is the sun, an the cross is the life on the planet sustained by them both. The cross represents the veins that carry blood through the body, sustaining life with the same color as jindan. Mercury is the moon, placed above the sun, which is Sulfur, placed above the planets, which are Life.

He paused here to write the symbol on a handheld electronic tablet: "☿". It was the only modern technology Treekul recognized in this laboratory. Everything else looked either archaic or unfamiliar, or both. She had seen the symbol before, of course, and the one for sulfur as well, which was a triangle atop a cross. But something about Rehval's fervor in describing it made her uneasy. To her it was a piece of trivia, but it was clearly something deep and meaningful to him.

"All of this," Rehval said, "Is a very elaborate way of saying that Jindan, my Jindan, is a way of harnessing planetary energy as a supplement to ones own ki. Cinnabar represents the connection between the Principles and living beings, but it's also just a mineral you dig up from the ground. Ancient scholars would drink potions of cinnabar and die, or go mad from mercury poisoning, because they took the connection too literally, too directly. The truth is more sublime, more complex.

"You see, there are three types of ki in the universe. The ki of living things is what makes the Saiyan race mighty. We Saiyans have more of this energy than most beings, which makes us stronger, better. Then there's the ki of the heavens. The sun and the moon. The stars themselves possess a ki which is inaccessible to us. Oh, the moonlight allows Saiyans to transform into giant apes, but the moonlight is only a catalyst for releasing latent ki we already possess. That's why I cut off my tail a long time ago, because I learned to harness that latent power without transforming. It's why I ask my followers to do the same. We don't need the moon. We don't need tails.

He pointed at the cavern floor. "What we need is the third ki, which is found in the ground beneath our feet. This is the interface where life and the heavens meet. Mercuric sulfide. The moon and the sun combine to form a mineral, which resembles lifeblood but can kill the uninitiated. My Jindan is the ki equivalent of that elixir. My technique is to draw power from within a planet. Done properly, it can magnify your strength many times over. But if the power is harnessed recklessly, it can destroy the user completely. Do you understand, Treekul?"

"Not entirely, but I get the general idea, I think. How'd you figure all of this out?" she asked.

"Alchemy has long been one of my passions," he said. "I wasn't blessed with great ki like other members of my family, and I sought an explanation for that injustice. Alchemy teaches us that the universe is governed by rules, but those rules can be manipulated by those who know how. Thus I was able to become as strong as I wished, as powerful as I wished to become. I turned lead into gold by transforming my base self into the golden King of the Saiyans. Soon to become King of the Universe. There remains only one obstacle, one stubborn impurity to be purged."

"Luffa," Treekul said.

"I've seen enough divinations to know that our destinies are intertwined, hers and mine. She is the Sun, bright and yellow and powerful. I am the Moon, lurking in the shadows, sublime and contemplative. The key is that our genders don't line up to that analogy. In alchemical thought, the Sun-Sulfur Principle is male, while the Moon-Mercury Principle is considered female."

"Cool, but what's that got to do with it?" she asked.

"It means that I must join with her, to complete the intermingling of our essences," Rehval said. "Well, that sounds a bit esoteric, doesn't it? The simpler explanation is that I need her, or some part of her, to complete my legacy. If she won't join me, then I'll have to take from her what I need. The Golden King must have the Super Saiyan power along with everything else. As a Saiyan myself, it stands to reason that if I defeat the Super Saiyan, that would mean I become the Super Saiyan."

"Wait, you think killing her would suddenly cause you to absorb her transformation into yourself?" Treekul asked.

He chuckled at that suggestion. "No, not really, though it is an interesting possibility. Perhaps the Super Saiyan only emerges once every thousand years because there must be one and only one. If the one that emerges were to die, would the power automatically go to another? Another natural process in the universe, one that I can study and master, but only when Luffa has been neutralized once and for all. I don't need to become a Super Saiyan literally, Treekul. Not when I can learn what the power is and how it works. If I find a way to make Super Saiyans at will, then I would be more powerful than any Super Saiyan before or after. That's the power I want. If my descendants can benefit from it, then the Saiyan race will have surely triumphed over all."

Treekul wasn't sure what to say. "You're a hell of a guy, King Rehval," was all she could manage.

"Thank you, my dear," he said. "And I think you'll make an excellent courtesan. It'll be nice to have someone to discuss spagyric theory with."

She made an audible gulp.

*******

[15 June, 233 Before Age. Planet Yars.]

Luffa's star-yacht, the Emerald Eye, had fifty cabins, most of which rarely ever saw use since Luffa took ownership of the vessel. She had occasionally used the extra living space for guests, though the only time it had approached the maximum capacity was when she had hosted strategic conferences between the Wist-Extraliga Wars. Among the many aliens on board during that time, there was once a Solarian monk who had left a letter on the bed during his stay. He had sensed great turmoil in Luffa's spirit, even by the standard of most warriors he had encountered, and his intention was that she would discover the letter at some later date, and perhaps find a measure of comfort in the words he had written. Also on the bed were a pair of the monk's headphones, which had no special significance. He had left those behind purely by accident.

When Luffa finally entered the cabin, she only noticed the letter and headphones long enough to sweep them aside as she laid her wife on the bed. The monk's letter fell to the floor, where it would never be seen again. They were too preoccupied with each other to worry about it.

"You... never... should have... got...gotten... so close to the....mmph... battlefield," Luffa said as she started pulling off whatever articles of clothing she could manage. She had some trouble speaking, as Zatte kept kissing her between each word.

"You're right," Zatte said. "But you were there, so I went in anyway."

"I almost didn't make it," Luffa whispered into her ear. "One of them was all set to blast half the city. The half you were in. He would have killed you--"

"But he hesitated," Zatte replied. She grabbed the front of Luffa's sleeveless shirt and pulled on it until it ripped apart. "They always hesitate, because they don't know who I am or what I'm doing there. More than enough time for my golden girl to come to my rescue."

"I was fighting twelve of them," Luffa panted.

"Eleven, after the one I shot," Zatte said. "Ten, if one of them managed to run off looking for the shooter. And they never find me until I want to be found."

"That's still too close, young lady," Luffa said. "You took a big gamble..."

"It felt like it," Zatte said. "But I wasn't really in any danger. Or are you saying those twelve Saiyans were too much for you?"

"You... ah!... you want the truth?" Luffa asked.

"I wouldn't be asking if I didn't," Zatte asked.

She inhaled sharply and gripped Zatte's shoulders tightly. "I have no idea," she said.

"Say that again," Zatte said.

"I don't know for sure if I could have beaten all twelve of them or not," Luffa said, an octave higher than she usually spoke. "Not if one of them managed to bring that rock creature back to life. Dammit, your hair smells amazing."

"Thanks, but don't... wow... don't change the subject."

"I thought I was in a pinch," Luffa said. Her voice began to tremble as she went on. "I was actually... glad when you shot one of those guys... but then I wasn't sure I could hold them off and help you at the same time."

"But you did," Zatte said. "You won, just like always."

"Thanks to you," Luffa said. "Without your courage I... I..."

For some time after that, they each found they had little else to say, so they used their bodies instead. There was a great deal of theatrics to their intimacy. Luffa alternated between her transformed and normal states depending on the mood. Occasionally, Zatte would become invisible, or alter her own body temperature using her ability to manipulate energy, mostly for the novelty of it. Telepathic communion had proven corrosive to their relationship, though Luffa had recently discovered a way to work around that. Instead of opening their minds to one another completely, she could establish a connection very briefly, allowing only a very small exchange of their thoughts. Mostly these mental quanta were too small and random to be of any meaning. It was for fun, more than anything else. A way for each of them to hear the other's voice in her head, even if it was gibberish like "laundry", "perpendicular", "beloved", or "leftovers".

There was no clock in the room, and neither of them had any interest in asking the computer to tell them the time. The battle of Yars was won, and until there was any word on another attack, there was nothing to do but wait. At some point, Zatte stood by the cabin window and admired the view of the planet's dayside.

"Was this how you thought it would be?" she asked Luffa without looking away from the window.

"What do you mean?" Luffa asked.

"I mean, was this how you wanted your life to turn out?" Zatte asked.

"Well, the last couple of hours have gone great," Luffa said with a satisfied smile.

"I mean, the whole thing, dummy," Zatte said. "When I was a kid, this was pretty much how I thought it would be. I had this old book my uncle gave me before he died. It was all about space battles and all the characters in the illustrations weren't really dressed for it. There was this one picture of a princess staring out a window on a ship. I guess that's why I'm standing here right now."

"Yeah, but you don't really like to fight," Luffa said.

Zatte nodded. "I guess it's not exactly what I had in mind, but most of it worked out for me. You and me, together, roaming the stars in our ship." She turned from the window, and gestured to the ocular implant where her right eye used to be. "I guess I pictured myself having two eyes and a lot fewer scars, but I think it's worth it. I may not like to fight the way you do, but I take a lot of satisfaction in the results. I have a holy cause. Someone to belong to. That's worth a few injuries, I think."

She sat down on the bed and patted Luffa's shoulder. "So was this anything like what you expected?" Zatte asked.

"I don't want this to come out the wrong way," Luffa said. "But when I was a kid, I figured you'd be a Saiyan man, and I'd have six or seven brats underfoot."

"Oh, right," Zatte said. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked--"

"No, it's all right, Zattie," Luffa said. "It's just... I had no idea what I'd become. I still don't know what I am. I wasn't kidding before when I said I didn't know if I could beat those Saiyans. It was like, one minute I wasn't strong enough to take them, and the next minute I was. Maybe knowing you might be in trouble was what did it. It pushed me over the edge, like when I first transformed."

"That's wonderful," Zatte said. "If I helped you get stronger, then I'm honored..."

"Before, I would have died before accepting help from anyone in a fight," Luffa went on. "Now... well it doesn't bother me as much. I just sort of shrug and keep going. I've fought battles and won victories that would keep most Saiyans satisfied for a lifetime. But I see all the people who suffer on the sidelines, and that bugs me more than I thought it would."

"You're helping those people," Zatte said. "You should take pride in that."

"Maybe. It's just hard for me to say it's worth it, when I don't really know what 'it' is. Seems like it keeps changing on me. But one thing I do know..."

She took Zatte's hand and drew her closer. "There's a lot I'm not sure about, but hearing you say this is how you hoped it would be... well, that puts my mind at ease. People tell me I'm doing the right thing, and it's hard for me to know if that's true, but at least they're saying it. You guys can't all be wrong."

Zatte lay down beside her and put her head on her shoulder. "You'll see," she said. "One day, you'll understand what you've become. Until then, well, it's kind of cool that you don't get it, but you keep plugging away at it anyway."

*******

[15 June, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

The acolytes waited on her hand and foot, as they always did. Rehval had arranged for Treekul to be a priestess in the cult, which granted her considerable freedom and privilege. Rank-and-file cultists had almost every aspect of their lives micromanaged. Their diet, exercise, sleep patterns, even their sex lives were strictly regulated by Rehval's priests. In turn, the priesthood answered to Rehval, though she had found that they were so thoroughly indoctrinated that they needed little direct guidance from him. Treekul was the only exception. She was mostly exempt from priestly duties, which was fortunate, since she had little understanding of what those duties were. Even so, the cultists treated her with the utmost devotion, if only out of respect for the office.

Rehval had multiple reasons for arranging this. First, it kept his followers off-balance. They had been taught to view outsiders as inferior or even wicked, and yet he had allowed an alien in their midst and given her a place of honor. Contradiction was one of many tools he used to control them all. Second, it suited his ego to work his "apprentice and/or consort" into his private religious order. Third, it kept Treekul off-balance. She was a prisoner here, and the "apprenticeship" made her feel more like a slave than a student. And yet, when she was dismissed from her lessons, she was treated like a queen, and free to do whatever she liked... except leave.

"Is there anything else we can do for you, mistress?" one of her attendants asked. The anxiety in his voice was depressingly typical for this place. It was the sound of a man who was constantly terrified of displeasing his superiors. Like all of the Saiyans here, he had come seeking power, only to find that it would be taken away if he displeased his benefactor.

Treekul finished her meal--a bland stew made with artificial proteins-- and shook her head. "Not unless you know where I can get a haircut," she said. "I could use my ki for that," the other Saiyan volunteered. He raised his hand and the tips of his fingers glowed with blue light.

"S-so could I!" the other man quickly added. Treekul was too tired to look at him, but she could tell from his voice that he was worried that he hadn't thought of the idea himself.

"I may have to take you up on that," Treekul said, "but I'd much rather do it myself. There's something pleasant about using a hair trimmer, you know? Too bad I don't have it..."

She was about to mention that her hair trimmer had been confiscated when she was brought to the planet, but then Treekul had an idea. "I mean... it's too bad that it broke down on me the other day," she said. "I haven't slept well since it stopped working."

She ran her hand over the shallow field of green hair on her scalp. "It relaxes me, is all. I know it's not that long, but there's a certain length where it's just right. Too short, and it's rough, like sandpaper. Too long, and it feels too soft. So I trim it constantly, or I used to, anyway."

"Perhaps the technicians could fix it," one of the Saiyan men suggested.

"Technicians?" Treekul asked. "Oh, I'm sure they're much too busy maintaining Trismegistus's more important equipment. It'd be selfish of me to impose."

"Not at all," he said. "I know one of the technicians, and she would be honored to serve you, mistress. She's my... well, she used to be my wife."

Treekul tried not to react to the barely-repressed emotion in his voice. Rehval had very strange notions about breeding practices. She wasn't entirely sure how he ran things as King of the Saiyans, but as Trismegistus, he dissolved all family ties and commanded his followers to participate in communal sex rituals. And yet, Treekul had never seen any children or pregnant women on this planet. Rehval seemed to want a new generation of Saiyans, but she had no idea where he was keeping them. Maybe he had a second underground facility for that.

"I'd like to meet her," Treekul said. "You know, just to see some of Trismegistus' followers working for his greater glory. Yeah, that kind of thing."

What Treekul really wanted was to get as much sleep as she could before reporting to Rehval for another lesson. But this was too good an opportunity to pass up. It had taken days for her to learn enough about the cult's inner workings to confirm that spaceships were routinely moving to and from whatever planet this was. Ships required regular maintenance, and if Treekul could find the maintenance crews, she could find a docking bay, or perhaps a flight schedule or cargo manifest. Even if all she found was a star chart to tell her where in the universe she was, Treekul believed it was worth losing a few more hours of sleep.

"At once!" he blurted out. Then the other Saiyan nudged him with his elbow, and he thought better of it. "Er, I mean... after we've finished our duty shift, that is," he said.

"With your permission," the other man offered, "we could take the device to her and bring it back once it's repaired."

"Nah, that's all right," Treekul said. "I'd really like to meet her in person, and I'm in no big hurry. We can work something out later."

They exchanged awkward pleasantries, the two men apologizing for any inconvenience, and she halfheartedly assuring them that she wasn't displeased with their work. Then she withdrew to her quarters, a space roughly the size of a studio apartment that had been hewn out of solid rock.

It wasn't a total loss, she thought to herself as she lay in her bed. At least she had learned that the technicians weren't off-limits to her. She just had to wait a little longer before seeing them. And once she knew where to go, she could return whenever she pleased

And there were other possibilities. She had hoped Endive might help her once she learned the truth about Trismegistus being Rehval, but so far nothing had come of that. If anything, her devotion to the man seemed to be even stronger for some reason. But maybe Endive just needed time to let the truth sink in. And there was still Lesseri, and Guwar, although she hardly ever saw him anymore.

And there was always the chance that Rehval's enemies might somehow track him down and invade the planet. Treekul wasn't sure she would survive a battle like that, but at least it was one more chance. She was building quite a collection of chances. One of them was bound to pan out.

An hour later, she fell asleep, in spite of the uncomfortable length of her hair.

NEXT: Fytpall.

#dragon ball #fanfiction #super saiyan #lssjluffafic #luffa #zatte #trismegistus #treekul #nagaoka #yars

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duhragonball · 4 years

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shadowjack12345 replied to your photo “Got a commission this week by the awesome FrauleinPflaume, and it...”

Nice to finally see Zatte, I always liked her - she's dangerous in a way we don't often get in DB.

Hey, thanks, that means a lot to me. Also, this is all the prompting I need to try to explain how I came up with the character. Spoilers under the cut.

The thing that held me up early on was that I couldn’t decide if Luffa’s “career” in the past should be long or short. I used the Bardock: Father of Goku TV special as a model of a “short” Luffa arc. You have this character who’s only mentioned in passing (by Raditz), and the TV special fleshes him out and kills him off in the space of an hour. Then he wakes up in the past in the 2011 “Episode of Bardock” Special, if you want to count that. On some level, I imagined it could be possible to give Luffa a really quick run in her native era, and then send her to the future to join the TIme Patrol, like the Bardock specials.

I worked on Chapter 126 and 127 today, so I think it’s clear that I did not go down that route. I knew the alternative would be to really flesh out the character, having her go through multiple adventures like Goku in Dragon Ball. That meant I had to come up with extra stuff for her to do. The simple fact is that I really enjoyed writing the character, and I wanted to take the long road, so that later on, when she refers to her past exploits, there would be some weight to them.

So I worked on coming up with stuff for her to do in between major plot points. I thought about giving her some love interests, since we’d never seen a Saiyan character jump from one relationship to another, like Spider-Man in the 70′s. At some point, I thought it might be interesting to have her run into an old flame, someone who knew her before she went Super.

The problem with that was that when we first meet Luffa, she’s only 19 years old, and she’s been married to Kandai for about a year. And she’s been living on the Dorlun colony for about five years. I say this like someone else foisted this problem on me, but I’m the one who came up with all that stuff, to better amplifly the tragedy she experiences before turning Super Saiyan. This isn’t some seasoned veteran who’s been all over the universe, loving and leaving ‘em from one planet to the next. She’s young and inexperienced and isolated in a very small community.

But I still liked the idea, and I hadn’t published Chapters 1-10 yet, so I still had a lot of room to set things up for later. I realized the only way this would work would be if the “old flame” was a Dorlun who had admired Luffa from afar. And that led me to Captain Mesas, the leader of the Dorlun militia.

Mesas originally served only one purpose, which was to be a sort of proxy who could represent the entire Dorlun colony that Luffa had been hired to defend. I assigned her gender at random, I think. I just know that I didn’t put a ton of thought into it, since I was planning to kill all of the Dorluns off later anyway. Luffa would take this personally, because she came to appreciate these people without really admitting it, and this would be demonstrated by her respect for Mesas, who was their lead warrior, and thus the most Saiyan-like of the bunch. Eventually, I renamed her Captain Zatte, because I had settled on naming all the Dorlun characters after anagrams of metric prefixes, i.e. “zetta”.

So I quickly came to the conclusion that the only way this “reunited with an old flame” idea would work would be if it was a Dorlun, and the only one that would make any sense would have to be Zatte, and the only way that could work would be if there was some sort of romantic tension between them. They couldn’t be lovers in those early chapters because Luffa was married at the time, but later, there would need to be a moment where Zatte would confess her feelings and Luffa would have to feel the same way.

And this is how I ended up making Luffa bisexual. I didn’t want Zatte to be a man, and I couldn’t make Luffa gay, because I needed her to start out in a marriage to a Saiyan man. Too much of the plot depended upon that. I struggled with this decision for a couple of reasons.

First, I wasn’t sure I could pull it off, and I didn’t know if I wanted this story to be my first try, because I was already trying to do a lot of other new tricks. I didn’t want real-world wlw’s to see this story and be disappointed by my amateurish attempt to get it right.

Second, I felt disingenuous about making such a major change to the character for my own convenience. I felt like I’d seen that a lot in comic books over the years, where writers would seemingly assign bisexuality to characters arbitrarily, or for “shock” value, or just to be salacious. I didn’t want readers to think I was only doing this for shallow reasons, or to get my jollies writing two girls making out.

But at the same time, I really wanted to do it this way, and I finally decided to just go with it and see where it took me. In hindsight, I realize that I was just being a fraidy cat about the whole thing. Writing wlw romance isn’t so functionally different from mlw romance, and once I got used to the idea, I realized the only thing I needed to do was to treat it with the proper respect. And really, this wasn’t so far off from the original premise. I wanted to make the “Legendary Super Saiyan” a woman to defy convention and to piss off dudebros. Making her queer just continues that same line of reasoning, right? I used to see jackasses on the internet say that women couldn’t turn Super Saiyan because they couldn’t “get angry enough,” which is pretty similar to a lot of biphobic crap I’ve heard on the internet. I mean, I used to listen to Loveline on the radio around 2001, and Dr. Drew was acting like bisexuality was some made-up thing. Apparently Dr. Drew went nuts somewhere along the way, or maybe he always was, but he seemed pretty progressive in 2001, and he accepted gay and lesbian callers just fine, but he told bi callers to “figure out what they want”, and that never sat right with me. People used to say there were no such things as black swans, too. That’s Luffa all over. You can deny her all you want, but she’ll still kick your ass.

I’m this close to going off on a rant about J.K. Rowling, so let me try to force myself to talk about Zatte here. The problem I ran into almost immediately was that I wrote what I had originally planned for her, and I was very pleased with how it turned out. And then I had to move on to the next arc, and yet, she was still there, and I knew I’d have to do something with her. I feel like I’ve been winging it ever since, but my main priority was to set her apart from Keda, the other Dorlun character I kept around. So I ran with the idea that Zatte is more “Saiyan-like” than the rest of her species, and maybe that makes her a little radical at times, maybe not in a way we humans might notice, but a way that other Dorluns would find unsettling. Dorluns are survivalists, and for them “risk” is a four-letter word, but Zatte’s a thrillseeker at heart. She wants to survive in spite of the dangers rather than back away from them. Keda would find somewhere to hide for several months until it’s safe to come out, but Zatte would try to go all Die Hard on a situation. Keda sticks close to Luffa because Luffa is the strongest person in the universe, so by Luffa’s side is arguably the safest place to be. Zatte sticks close to Luffa because she’s a furry being by Luffa’s side is arguably the most dangerous place to be. If she can survive there, she can survive anywhere.

There’s also the whole fanaticism angle. At some point, I came up with the idea that Zatte sees Luffa’s Super Saiyan emergence as a watershed moment in history. I sort of threw that together, mostly to make Luffa uncomfortable and to add some tension to their relationship, but it also distinguishes Zatte from characters like Chi-Chi or Bulma, who see Super Saiyan as a lot of flashy nonsense, signifying nothing. “Punk rocker? Don’t you understand? Your son is a miracle!”

That angle is kind of hard for me to work with, because I also tried to make Zatte very grounded at the same time. I guess it’s like if you had Jerusalem Syndrome but you were very self-aware the entire time. You make a toga out of your hotel linens and just constantly saying “Man, I’m just being really nutty right now, but oh well.”

A lot of her tactics are sort of rooted in stuff I thought made sense with the weaker characters in Dragon Ball. I don’t really know how strong Zatte would be. I envisioned her as being like a “mere mortal”, like Lois Lane, but in Dragon World even guys like Mr. Satan are insanely tough. I’m pretty sure Bulma could kick Brock Lesnar’s ass if she visited our own world. He’d F5 her and she’d just get up and slap him in the face and he’d collapse. I feel like if Zatte entered the 23rd Budokai, she could sweep the entire thing. That’s not what I set out to do, and it sounds really arrogant because I’d be putting her over Goku and Piccolo, but come on, that’s low-tier by DBZ standards. If she couldn’t dominate the 23rd Budokai, then definitely the 22nd, which also sounds unthinkable, but that’s how this crazy show works. Yajirobe could have won the 22nd Budokai if he’d only thought to enter it.

My point is that “weaker” characters can do a lot from the sidelines if they know their limits and pick their spots, like Tien using the Kikoho on Cell and Super Buu, or Yajirobe cutting off Vegeta’s tail, and so forth. Most of those guys hate resorting to that sort of thing, because they prefer to stand and fight in the open, but Zatte specializes in sneaky hit-and-run attacks. She should be able to shoot ki blasts, but she sticks to firearms instead, because they’re more precise and ki senses can’t pick them up. She likes being underestimated, to the point where her ideal battle is one where the enemy doesn’t even know she’s on the field.

I dunno, I’ve always wondered if I was getting her “right” all this time, but now that I summarize it all in one place, it doesn’t seem as disjointed as I feared. I had all these different things I needed her to be and do, and most of them involved finding ways to justify her continued presence in the story, but maybe it’s all worked out after all. Sometimes I feel like Zatte is the Yoko Ono of this fic, but the Beatles suck, so I shouldn’t indulge in their crude analogies. I Zatted my way into this mess, and I’m happy to Zatte my way out.

#shadowjack12345 #luffastuff #zatte #i'm just so glad the visual worked out #i tried to make her look like this alien babe #but i was never sure how it would look if a real person looked like her #but the 'gwen from camp camp' socks and shorts really suit her well #i'm gonna have to write that in to the fic

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duhragonball · 5 years

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[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (111/?)

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

Previous chapters conveniently available here.

[2 March 233 Before Age. Despye.]

The Federation was an alliance of star systems united under Luffa's protection. She had forced its foundation by threatening to conquer the first four member planets unless they agreed to her idea. That idea was simply to create a bigger target. Luffa had grown bored fighting wars over individual worlds, and she believed that a large and prosperous galactic power would invite more challenging enemies. Despite her self-serving motives, Luffa's Federation actually worked very well for its citizens. Within a year, dozens of other star systems joined the Federation, hoping to enjoy the benefits of cooperation, free trade, and the protection of an interstellar military fleet backed by an invincible Super Saiyan.

But now, the Federation was under threat by an enemy powerful enough to upset the entire premise. A cult of Saiyans, empowered by something called "Jindan", had launched an invasion. Individually, these Saiyans were no match for Luffa, but they had numbers on their side. By attacking numerous planets simultaneously, they could push through the Federation's defenses. Luffa could only stop them in one place at a time, and the Jindan Saiyan were strong enough that they could hold their own against her by working in groups. It seemed that the cult's strategy was to wear Luffa and the Federation down in a war of attrition.

And then a new faction entered the conflict. To Luffa's great consternation, the Federation's new ally was a group of even more Saiyans. She had invited their leader to discuss things with her over dinner on her ship. What they sent her was a teenage girl with pink hair, who introduced herself as Princess Seltiss, Daughter of King Rehval III.

Irreverently, Seltiss held out her hand, inviting Luffa to shake it.

Luffa simply slapped it aside.

"I'm supposed to believe that you're turning against your old man, is that it?" Luffa scoffed.

"Ow. More like he turned against me," Seltiss explained. She wiggled her right hand, then cradled it in her left as she spoke. "I hear you've got plenty of problems with the way my father ran his regime. Is it so hard to believe that there's other Saiyans who agree with you?"

"It's a little too good to be true, that's all," Luffa said. "Nearly every Saiyan I've met has rejected me as a monster. Now suddenly you show up with an army of Saiyans willing to fight for my cause?"

Nearby, Zatte took Ryba Booth by the arm and led him further inside the ship. "Come on," she said. "We should really go to the dining room."

"You want the truth?" Seltiss asked after they were gone. "My followers still don't care for you very much. I'm not entirely sold on the idea of a 'Super Saiyan' myself. I was hoping that if I got to know you better, maybe I'd, like, come around. But so far it looks like my dad was right about you. You carry yourself like some berserker from the old stories. I helped drive off those Jindan creeps before they could kill Marshall Booth. I saved his fleet, not to mention a couple of your planets, but you look like you'd rather kill me than thank me. Hmph, and people tell me I'm stuck up."

"I didn't ask for your help," Luffa grumbled.

"Um, no? That's what makes it a surprise rescue? You may not want my help, but you're going to get it," Seltiss said. "We're allies, whether you like it or not. My father's gone mad. Maybe he always was, but now he's abandoned our race and doomed us all."

"Where is he?" Luffa asked.

"In hiding," Seltiss said. "He might be dead, for all I know. Either way, he's not going to help us stop Trismegistus."

"The leader of the cult," Luffa said. "What do you know about him?"

"Not much, but those Saiyans working for him are feeding his power. The more of them he recruits to his side, the stronger he gets. If we don't stop him soon, there won't be a Saiyan race. It'll just be Trismegistus, surrounded by a bunch of livestock he breeds to sustain his powers."

"I've seen this routine before," Luffa said. "Your sound just like your old man when he asked me to help him stop a serial killer who was preying on Saiyans. The whole 'we're in this together' speech. Next thing I know he tells me he created the murderer just so I'd walk into his trap."

"Pozet," Seltiss said. She rolled her eyes as she said the name, as if recalling an embarrassing relative.

"Oh, good, then you know his twisted little windup toy," Luffa said. "Did you know he created that abomination using tissue samples he stole from my wife?"

"No, I didn't," Seltiss said with a wince of disgust. "You mean that lady who was here a minute ago? Pozet was...? Oh, that's gross... I'm... I'm sorry. I can't say I'm surprised to hear it, but I'm sorry."

"For all I know, princess, you're nothing but another homunculus he created, or a sleeper agent with altered memories to make you tell me whatever lies would suit his purpose!" Luffa crossed her arms over her chest and set her jaw.

"That's not true," Seltiss said.

"And why should I believe you, little girl?" Luffa shouted. "Give me one good reason not to dropkick you back out of that entrance hatch."

"Katem is alive," Seltiss said.

Luffa's eyes widened when she heard this. "How do you know that name?" she asked.

"Xibuyas told me you called him that when you fought him," Seltiss said. "My father left him for dead on Planet Pflaume, but I rescued him. No offense, I still call him Xibuyas, but mostly because I don't want to make the big lug mad. But you call him Katem, because you're his mother, or at least you say you are, and that's the name you chose for him."

"That doesn't prove..." Luffa stammered. "Rehval could have found that out somehow, or.... Well, it doesn't mean you're on my side!"

"My father wanted to marry me off with Xibuyas," Seltiss said. "He never dared to tamper with our minds or genes, because he needs us to make a bunch of royal heirs with Super Saiyan blood in their veins. My mother was never anything but a eugenics experiment to him. So I know what it's like to be used by the Saiyan king. I might know about it a little better than anyone else. Maybe that's not enough to hammer out an alliance, but I'd say it's a start, you know?"

There was a long pause while Luffa weighed the girl's words. At last, she turned, and gestured for Seltiss to follow her. "Dinner's almost ready," she said. "I still don't buy any of this, but you might as well eat with us. My wife doesn't have much of an appetite, so it'll save me from having to store a bunch of leftovers."

"Uh, sure," she said. "Maybe I can raise Xibuyas on the subspace radio. He was leading our forces at Despye, but he's probably got that wrapped up by now."

"You do that," Luffa said. "If I like what you two have to say, maybe I won't break your neck at the dinner table."

*******

The dining room on Luffa's star-yacht was a luxurious cabin with a panoramic window. Normally, it provided a breathtaking view of the stars, but the ship was currently docked at a spaceport, and so the window only showed the dark grey hull of the freighter currently docked beside it. Marshall Booth was far more interested in the scene transpiring at the table, as Seltiss tried to get on Luffa's good side. Zatte's attention was mostly focused on the video screen on the wall opposite the window. It was meant for entertainment purposes, but it was currently patched into the ship's communication system, and now displayed an image of Xibuyas, Luffa's estranged son.

"So, chronologically, Xibuyas is only four years old," Seltiss began. "I'm not much older myself, but biologically, we're both like sixteen, thanks to the Hyperbolic Time Chamber."

"The Hyperborean what?" Zatte asked.

"It's another dimension," Seltiss explained. "Or maybe it's some kind of temporal anomaly, like the time dilation as you approach a black hole, only in reverse. See, for every minute you stay in the Chamber, about six hours pass in the outside world. Great way to train people on a deadline, but a pretty lousy parenting style, if you asked me. I spent a few years inside the chamber studying before I went off to private schools, and Xibuyas spent his time in the chamber getting stronger. Not quite Luffa-level strong, but I heard he gave you a little trouble."

Luffa rubbed her fingers over her chin, as though recalling fondly the last time Xibuyas had hit her there. "He got in a few good shots," she said, never taking her eyes off the video screen that displayed Xibuyas' image.

Xibuyas, joining them remotely from the Despye system, sat up a little straighter in his chair, and looked away from Luffa's gaze.

"I don't want to get too far off track," Seltiss said, "but you two really do have a resemblance."

"I was just about to say that," Zatte added. "I can see a lot of his father in him, too."

"Really?" Seltiss said. "What was his dad like?"

There was a low rumbling noise, which turned out to be coming from both Luffa and Xibuyas simultaneously. "Maybe we should save that for some other time," Zatte suggested.

"Why didn't you just return to King Rehval, boy?" Luffa asked Xibuyas. "You seemed awfully devoted to him the last time we met."

"I wasn't strong enough to kill you, Luffa," Xibuyas replied. "Her Highness convinced me that I should have a escape plan in case things went poorly. There was an access to the Hyperbolic Time Chamber in Pflaume City, and I retreated into it, leaving you to die when the city imploded. The city was completely pulverized by the pressures of the lower atmosphere, but the entrance to the chamber survived. All I had to do was pilot a small craft out of the Chamber and wait in the Pflaumian atmosphere for My Lady to come pick me up."

"For what it's worth, Katem," Luffa said, "I'm glad to see you made it out of there in one piece."

"We both are," Zatte added. She leaned towards the table, hoping to give Xibuyas a better view of her as she held up her index finger. "I'm, uh, I'm your stepmother, by the way."

Booth raised an eyebrow at this, as he knew very little about Zatte, but he had already gathered that she and Luffa were a couple, and so the revelation was mostly trivial to him. The Saiyans ignored Zatte altogether.

"After I saved Xibuyas," Seltiss continued, "We went into hiding, basically to wait and see what would happen next. If Luffa had really kicked the bucket on Pflaume, then we could have gone back to my dad and all would be forgiven. But since you survived, I decided I should lay low, and let my father think Xibuyas was dead. We set ourselves up on a nice, out-of-the-way planet, and waited to see what my dad's next move would be."

"But you're not laying low anymore," Luffa said. "The Jindan Cult. What do you know about it, girl?"

"I only know what others have told me," Seltiss said. "We started establishing contacts with Saiyans who weren't aligned with the Kingdom. Expats, anti-monarchists, anyone opposed to the Rehval Dynasty but willing to consider me as an alternative. Through them, we found out that Planet Saiya was evacuated, and not long after that, we found out the you were still alive. At first, I just assumed dad had evacuated because he was afraid you would go back to Saiya and destroy it. A lot of Saiyans we talked to had fled the planet because they didn't want to follow Rehval. He didn't lift a finger to stop you from demolishing the citadel and beating up most of the population, so they didn't trust his plan to evacuate."

"Sounds like they're the smart ones," Luffa said with a derisive snort. "They never should have followed him to begin with. That faithless bastard was never going to protect them, because he was using them as a diversion. At least they've learned their lesson. Besides, the evacuation won't stop me. I'll hunt Rehval and his flock to the end of the universe if I have to, and then I'll rip out his heart and eat it while he watches! Here, let me top off that stew for you."

"Uh, thank you," Seltiss said, allowing Luffa to refill her bowl. "It's very good, by the way."

"Damn right, it is," Luffa said with laugh. "Rehval's offworlder chefs probably couldn't season a proper stew if their lives depended on it. It's probably why you're so skinny. But go on."

"Right, well, like I said, we thought it was just my father trying to hide from you," Seltiss said. "Then we started hearing from Saiyans who had gone with him, only to leave afterward. They couldn't tell me where the new homeworld was. I guess the only way to get there was some sort of teleportation system, so no one but dad knew the coordinates. Anyway, they told me he went mad. My father always dreamed of a more cosmopolitan Saiyan nation, with diplomatic ties to galactic powers, and all the features of a modern state. He had this backup planet ready to go in case of emergency, but he didn't consider how isolated he'd have to be when he finally had to use it. He was obsessed with destroying you and reclaiming his power, but he just didn't have the means. They had supplies and natural resources, but without steady trade with the rest of the galaxy, the kingdom collapsed. I got multiple versions of that. It's tough to tell which broke down first, his sanity, or the social stucture. But things got pretty bad. That's when the cult showed up."

"Are you telling me the cult killed him?" Luffa asked.

"No one knows if my father survived or not," Seltiss said. "But they did invade, and he couldn't stop them."

"How did they find the planet when no one else could?" Luffa demanded. It rankled her to know that her enemies were fighting each other without her involvement.

"Trismegistus knew where it was," Seltiss said. "You seem to know that my father's an alchemist. Trismegistus is the guy who taught him. Dad used to tell me that he killed his teacher after he learned everything he needed to know, just like he killed my grandfather and uncle, and anyone else who might become a liability or a threat to his rule. When I was little, he would show me his trophy room on Pflaume City, where he kept some of Trismegistus' organs in a jar of preservative. But somehow, he's back."

"Who's to say this guy isn't an impostor using the name?" Luffa asked. "Your father told me identity theft is a tradition with these alchemy types."

"You may be right, but I'm not so sure," Seltiss said. "Dad told me that Trismegistus claimed to know the secret of immortality. Lots of alchemists do that. That's why dad kept his heart in the first place, just to make sure he stayed dead. But maybe he found a way to come back without one. All I know for sure is that he found and defeated my father, which makes him a better alchemist than dad. And he has plans for the Saiyans. When he conquered the kingdom, he offered dad's subjects a chance to join his cult."

"Then maybe your father signed up too," Luffa suggested. "If you can't beat him, join him, right?"

"You wouldn't say that if you've heard what I have," Seltiss said. "Trismegistus isn't looking for allies or soldiers. He's using our people for something much worse. You've seen what the Jindan power does. It amplifies a Saiyan's natural abilities, but if Trismegistus decides you're not worthy of it, he can remove that power, and somehow that process leaves you weaker than you were before you joined."

"The former cultists we've met describe a system that demands total supplication," Xibuyas added. "Trismegistus controls every aspect of his follower's lives. What they eat, who they fight, and how they... breed."

"Sounds right up Rehval's alley," Luffa said. "I can see why he got along with this guy back in the day."

"You don't understand!" Seltiss said. "I'm not going to try to defend my father. He created this mess by dabbling in alchemy, but at least he was trying to build up the Saiyan race. All my life, he taught me that he was going to unite the Saiyans into a powerful nation, and it was up to me and my descendants to carry on that work. But Trismegistus doesn't care about any of that. He's not even a Saiyan. If he gets his way, he'll turn us into a slave species, totally dependent on his power. And if he ever dies, what then? No one else knows the secret of the Jindan power. His followers will weaken and whatever society they build will come apart at the seams. This has to stop while there are still Saiyans like us around who haven't been tainted by his power!"

"Then give me your father," Luffa said with an eager grin.

"I already told you," Seltiss said, "I don't know where he is."

"Yes, but it's a safe bet that Trismegistus is operating on that secret planet where your father was last seen. We find it, and we can take the fight to the enemy. And while I'm there, I can check to see if Rehval really is dead. But let's get this straight: there's no scenario where Rehval lives through this. The only way you beat Trismegistus is by working with me, and the only way that happens is by betraying your father. Are you prepared for that, little princess?"

"I've been preparing for it my whole life," Seltiss said defiantly. "My father was wrong about a lot of things, but he was right about the Saiyan people needing strong leadership. I knew one day I might have to pick up the pieces after his bad decisions. If he is still alive, then he's failed us all, so I'll just have to start sooner than I planned. All I know for sure is that the Saiyan kingdom has no future until your conflict with him is settled."

Luffa looked at Zatte, and then to the image of Xibuyas. "What about you, Katem? I offered to help you before, and you rejected me. Are you suddenly going to tolerate me just because your girlfriend tells you to?"

"I speak for myself, Luffa!" Xibuyas growled. "My allegiance was to the King Rehval I knew, not the disgrace he's become. If his rightful heir bids me to join forces with you, I shall."

"Well, she's going to have to bid a little more than that," Luffa said. "I'll work with you, Seltiss, but your army is going to have to take orders from me and the Federation military. We tell them where to deploy, and they do it. Think they can handle that?"

"They will," Seltiss said. "Keeping them united has been a full time job by itself. It'll be a relief to have someone else leading them into battle. I think they might prefer taking orders from outsiders for a change."

"Good. I want Katem with me," Luffa said. "At least for a while."

"With you?" Seltiss asked. "I thought it would be best to have you defending different planets, to cover as much territory as possible."

"And that's smart thinking, kid," Luffa said, "but we won't win this war by staying on the defensive. If he's as strong as he was the last time we fought--"

"Stronger," Xibuyas said with more than a hint of irritation.

Luffa glanced at him and smiled wickedly. "Then the two of us working together can deal some serious damage to the enemy before they have the chance to retreat. The more Jindan Saiyans we kill, the harder things get for Trismegistus, right? Eventually, he'll be forced to concentrate his attacks to a smaller area, and that's when we'll take the advantage."

Seltiss exchanged a worried look with Xibuyas. "I... I mean, I guess that makes sense," she said.

"Then it's settled," Luffa said. "Booth here has probably already been planning how to organize our forces, but I'd like to go over a few things with him. In the meantime, I want you to keep trying to find out where Rehval was hiding. The sooner I settle things with him, the better."

*******

[2 March, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

"Is the meal to your satisfaction, Treekul?"

Treekul had no idea where she was, though her surroundings reminded her of a stage in a video game she had played once. "Volcanic Fortress," she thought it was called, or possibly "Fire Caverns." The room she was in wasn't actually hot, but the red torchlight on the stone walls created a menacing atmosphere which belied the Bigreenese pasta salad and Camelian pheasant she had been served.

"The bird's a little gamey, but it beats the rations from the ship I've been riding for the last few weeks." Truthfully, it was the best meal she'd ever eaten, but she didn't like who she had to thank for it.

"And the dress?"

The "dress" in question was more like a very wide belt, with lengths of red fabric draped over her legs and wrapped around her shoulders and neck. When Treekul was a child, she remembered dressing up her dolls in outfits she had constructed from ribbons, strips of paper, and other items that amused her. She was reasonably sure that those dolls had ended up looking more dignified than she felt right now.

"If I told you I hated it," Treekul replied, "would you give me back the outfit I had on before?"

"No, I wouldn't," he said. "I had your old clothes burned during the initiation ritual.

"Ritual?" Treekul asked.

"For your companions," he explained. "The three Saiyans who brought you to Mundokuul."

"Then you're part of the Jindan cult," Treekul said. She had suspected as much. Her partners had fallen unconscious on Mundokuul, and before Treekul could find out what had happened to them, she had been stunned by some energy weapon, only to wake up here--wherever "here" was--- in the company of a man in a hooded robe. It didn't make sense for anyone else to go to such lengths to capture them. The Jindan cult was the only thing they were searching for, and so the cult was the only force that would seek to move against them... or for them.

"I am," he replied. "And now, so are your companions. Guwar and Endive and Lesseri. They have received the gift of Jindan, and now they serve me."

"You're Trismegistus?" Treekul said.

"I am," he replied. He approached the stone pew where Treekul ate, and sat down beside her. He did not look at her, but instead stared straight ahead, offering her only the shadow of his cloak instead of a glimpse of his face. "They've told me all about you. Your background in alchemical history. Your use of geomantic triangulation to trace the rumors of my power. I'm quite impressed, Treekul."

"Yeah, well, you didn't make it easy for me," she said. "The big break came when we found one of your lost sheep. A Saiyan named Salziff tipped us off to Mundokuul."

"Yes, but it was your genius that allowed the others to discover Salziff," Trismegistus said. "He wouldn't have attracted much attention on his own. Not after what I took from him."

"He warned us not to look for you," Treekul said. "Begged us, really."

"You should have listened," Trismegistus said honestly. "I cannot allow you to leave this planet. You know too many secrets, Treekul. Men like Salziff are useful for spreading rumors, inspiring others to seek my wisdom, but you--! Well, you know too much. Left unchecked, you might share your secrets with my enemies, or the unworthy. I can't allow that."

"For what it's worth, I didn't want to come here," Treekul sulked. "The others didn't give me much of a choice. For them, it was a chance to get all those super powers you promised, but there was nothing in it for me but trouble."

"True, but if you had resisted then, you would have only had to deal with three Saiyans," Trismegistus said. "Now, you have no hope of escape."

"Then why haven't you killed me?" Treekul asked.

"Because, like you, I am also a student of alchemy," he said. "The Saiyans who worship me benefit from my teachings, but they can never truly understand it. In you, I hope to find a kindred spirit."

"I'm not an alchemist," Treekul said. "I just study the people who do. Mainly the dead ones. Whatever you want from me, I don't think--"

He reached up with his right hand and placed it on the back of her neck. A chill ran down her spine as she wondered if he was about to crush her vertebrae or inject her with some arcane toxin on his fingernails. Instead, he simply moved his hand up to the back of her head, caressing the green stubble that adorned her scalp.

"You're a very beautiful woman, did you know that?" he asked.

Treekul was beginning to wish that he had killed her. The alternative wasn't looking very pleasant.

"Most... most people don't like the hair," she said, referring to the thin layer of stubble on her scalp. "I cut it short because it bugs me when it grows out too much. I... I took a page from Servocelsus the Red."

"Of course," he said with a genuine thrill in his voice. "A favorite of mine. Did you know that he used his own trimmings in his experiments?"

"Really?" she asked, feigning surprise. Of course she knew that. The Servocelsan Parchment was part of the freshman curriculum at her university.

But that wasn't the point. The point was that she had dropped the name of one of the most amoral, megolamaniacal spagyrists in the history of galactic civilization, and now her host was talking about him like a revered hero. He wanted someone to listen to his mad dreams and plans. He longed for a sympathetic ear, and Treekul was pretty sure he wanted more than just her ear, if the dress was any indication. And so, she would humor him for however long it took to find a way out. For now, that was her only option. She had been talking her way out of dangerous situations for much of her adult life, so this wasn't necessarily anything she couldn't handle.

She just wasn't looking forward to it, was all.

NEXT: The Transmutation of Lesseri

#dragon ball #fanfiction #lssjluffafic #super saiyan #luffa #zatte #xibuyas #seltiss #ryba booth #trismegistus #treekul #despye #nagaoka

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duhragonball · 5 years

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[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (105/?)

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

Previous chapters conveniently available here.

[8 February 233 Before Age. Planet Quadzityz.]

Unless Luffa acted quickly, the Planet Quadzityz was doomed.

Only moments ago, she had battled a Saiyan possessing unusual powers, powers that were now seeping into the ground where his corpse now lay. Luffa didn't understand the unnatural ki energy that was contaminating the soil, but she had her suspicions, and they didn't paint a very optimistic picture. As the ki soaked into the ground, it was absorbed into the soil, seemingly infusing it with power, a power Luffa sensed to be unstable. With each passing moment, the contamination expanded deeper into the ground and across a wider area. Luffa was beginning to think that it would eventually explode. The only question remaining was how much of the planet's crust would be destroyed when that finally happened.

Luffa had tried to quarantine the affected soil using her own ki energy. As a Super Saiyan, her power was far greater than the energy she was trying to contain, but she had to exert a greater effort over a large volume, and with each failed attempt, the volume of soil to contain grew ever larger, and the problem became that much harder to solve. Brute strength wasn't enough; she lacked the 'leverage' necessary to accomplish the task. She felt like a champion weightlifter trying to pick up a barbell with both hands on the same end.

She was worried about her wife. The dead Saiyan, Jolok, had managed to damage Luffa's communicator, so there was no way to warn Zatte about the impending catastrophe. She was tempted to simply abandon Quadzityz to its fate, grab Zatte, and get to their ship before it was too late. The act of a coward, but in her heart of hearts, Luffa always thought of herself as cowardly. Her immense Super Saiyan power didn't make her any braver; it just made her more secure against most threats. If anything, being a Super Saiyan only made her more afraid of situations she couldn't punch into submission, like the one that was unfolding before her eyes.

On top of that, there was the Mindworm. Jolok never said how he acquired his strange increase in strength, but he did mention that his benefactor wanted to keep it secret. To protect Jolok against telepathic intrusion, he was given the Mindworm, a psychic 'program' that replicated itself in Luffa's mind when she tried to probe Jolok's mind for answers. It didn't actually do anything to Luffa's own consciousness; it simply copied itself over and over again, taxing her own mental resources. It felt like the telepathic equivalent of eating something much, much spicier than expected, and being overwhelmed by the hot sensation. Luffa had managed to dispel the worst of its effects, but she was still distracted by the lingering "heat" in her brain, as the Mindworm still struggled to continue growing in her thoughts.

She slapped her hands on her cheeks and shook her head. "Focus, dammit!" she said to herself. "Everyone on this planet is dead if you don't do something! Chanisp would have figured this out by now!"

Chanisp was the last Super Saiyan before her, and Luffa often looked to the ancient hero as a source of inspiration. The stories said that a demon cut off his tail to prevent him from becoming a Giant Ape under the full moon, but Chanisp refused to give in to despair. He trained in secret, shoving heavy blocks of cut stone for lack of any other means, pushing his body to become stronger and stronger, until he no longer needed the Giant Ape form to claim victory and avenge his lost tail. The moral was that a Saiyan was greater than the sum of his parts. Denied one path to success, a worthy Saiyan would always find another. Luffa looked at the end of her own tail, which glowed yellow from her Super Saiyan form. She supposed looking at her tail was one thing she could do that Chanisp never could. There had to be a way out of this.

And then she had it. Chanisp beat his demon by moving large blocks of granite. Luffa would do the same.

She flew two miles from the center of the ki-infused mass, and dove straight into the ground. Had anyone been there to witness it, they would have seen a brilliant golden light shining out of the tunnel she had created. A moment later, the hole in the ground expanded into a trench, as Luffa carved a path through the bedrock below. Once the trench formed a complete circle around the affected soil, she began to cut at the bedrock beneath it, slicing through millions of cubic feet of rock with a thin beam of ki energy. When she was finished, she imagined the result looking something like a giant mudpie, four miles across, sitting upon a rocky crust.

Moving such a massive object would be impossible, even for her. Cutting it into smaller pieces would certainly help, but it would take days to move them all one by one. Fortunately, Luffa didn't need to move the entire thing. She tunneled under the center of the "mudpie" and charged enough ki to destroy it. She had enough raw power to destroy the entire planet if she wanted, so blowing up a small piece of it was easy. The trick was to direct the destructive force up and away from the part of Quadzityz that she didn't want to destroy. If Jolok's ki had been allowed to explode on its own, it would have potentially damaged the planet's crust, or worse. Luffa's plan would do a lot of damage to the surrounding area, but with any luck it wouldn't be much worse than the devastation caused by the war she was trying to stop.

She sensed the outer fringes of Jolok's power in the soil, and focused her attack on it. At the same time, she enveloped the entire "mudpie" with a ki field that would help channel the force of the explosion straight up. �� All of this seemed rather strange to her. Usually, the things she did with her Super Saiyan power were just a scaled up version of things she he had used her ki for as a teenager. What she was doing now felt more like some sort of engineering problem, even though the techniques she used were simple enough. There was no enemy here except for time and uncertainty.

When Jolok's posthumous ki energy finally detonated, the force of it proved almost too much for Luffa to hold. Her own power was superior to his, but the mass of the soil was a factor now. Somehow, Jolok's power had infused into the earth itself, making things difficult. That was why Luffa had made the "mudpie" so big. There was enough "good" dirt surrounding the "bad" dirt that it helped dampen the lateral force of the explosion. Luffa just had to make sure nothing got through. It was hard work, but reasonably straightforward. After several minutes, the destruction subsided, and Luffa could sense no more of Jolok's ki in the "mudpie". As she burst through it to emerge onto the surface, she saw that the soil that remained had been completely reduced to ash. There was no trace of Jolok's body at all, which was hardly a surprise, since the corpse had been at the center of Luffa's maelstrom.

The Mindworm still bothered her, but it had faded into little more than a mild annoyance. In another hour, it would probably be gone altogether. She wanted to lie down for a while, but there was no time for that. There was still a war going on, and she had just lost a lot of time saving the lives of all the people who were trying to kill her. With a sigh, she flew back to the island she had been using as her base. The mystery of Jolok's appearance on the planet would have to wait.

*******

"Why hasn't Unit 6 reported yet? Captured?! Then we'll have to divide the Third Corps to hold the perimeter... What do you mean there's no way to reach Third Corps? Blast it, you had better be working on it, mister! If I don't get--!"

The commanding general of the Red faction had been having a bad day. Luffa had destroyed his cyber-slorgs, mechs from the Green Army had nearly taken his headquarters twice, and communications had been spotty at best. So when the invisible intruder crept up behind him and injected him with an anasthetic she had stolen from his own medical staff, she decided that it was probably the best thing that had happened to him all day. By the time he woke up, she planned to sabotage his base to such an extent that he would be completely unable to command his troops. Maybe he didn't want this unscheduled vacation, but from the sound of his voice, he probably needed it.

When the general's staff rushed to check on their leader, Zatte picked them off one by one. A kick to his adjutant, then an elbow to his staff sergeant, and then she drew her pistol and stunned the two guards as they entered. The pistol was a last resort, since Zatte's energy manipulation powers couldn't hide the sound it made when it fired, but the guards were the last resistance she faced, and once she kicked their weapons away, she allowed herself to become visible again. Taking a seat next to the sleeping general, she put a portable drive of music into his computer, and hummed along to the tune as she began disrupting the Green Army's logistical network.

Several minutes later, she sensed Luffa flying towards the base, and when she crashed through the ceiling, Zatte turned her chair around to meet her.

"Rough day, sweetheart?" Zatte asked. Luffa was covered in dirt, sweat, and probably slorg remains, though it was difficult to tell. Disheveled as she was, Zatte had seen her in much worse shape.

"Are you all right?" Luffa asked.

"Sure," Zatte said. "What happened with that Saiyan? I couldn't raise you on the communicator, so I thought he must have damaged it. Then your power skyrocketed..."

"I almost got you killled," Luffa said.

"Oh?" Zatte said. She stood up from the chair and approached her.

"I was thinking... maybe you should get to the ship and get into orbit where it's safer," Luffa said.

"I think I'm safe enough right here," Zatte said.

"Somebody could drop a bomb on this place any minute, and I wouldn't be able to sense it," Luffa said.

"The base has alarms for that," Zatte said. "I took out a lot of their systems, but not the early warning stuff."

Luffa smiled somewhat bashfully. "Uh... something else then. There's enemy mechs in the area."

Zatte pointed at the general sleeping in his chair. "Not anymore," she said. "You can thank him for that when he wakes up."

"Oh. Well good," Luffa said.

"Are you batting your eyes at me?" Zatte asked.

"Huh? No, I'm just blinking. Got some dust in my eyes from earlier."

"There's a sink in the general's quarters," Zatte said. "You can go freshen up."

She took her hand, as if to lead her to the general's room, and Luffa suddenly pulled her close and embraced her.

"I really think you should get to the ship," Luffa said in a low voice.

"Only if you take me," Zatte said.

"I can't. I need to get back out there."

"Stay," Zatte said. She reached for the back of Luffa's neck and ran her hand through her short yellow hair. "I want to hear how you almost got me killed."

"It's... kind of embarrassing, really," Luffa said. Her throat was suddenly dry.

"Well, let's go to the general's quarters," Zatte suggested. She pointed at the soldiers she had knocked out. "Plenty of privacy there. Not that these guys are going to give us any trouble."

Luffa looked over Zatte's shoulder to see them. "You took them out yourself?" she asked.

Zatte showed her the knuckles on her left hand, which still bore bloodstains from one of the soldiers she had punched. "Does that answer your question?" she replied.

"You're good," Luffa said. She looked at Zatte's hand like it was a sacred relic.

"You still think I'm in danger here?" Zatte asked.

"Yes," Luffa said. "I know you can handle yourself, but..."

"Go on," Zatte said.

Luffa leaned in closer and spoke softly into her ear. "There's certain risks involved, and I wouldn't want to expose you to--"

"To this?" Zatte asked as she moved her left hand closer to Luffa's nose. Zatte didn't really understand Saiyans--not even after marrying one-- but she knew that the smell of enemy blood on her person drove her wild. Her left nostril twitched, and they both smiled.

"Maybe we should go to that general's quarters," Luffa said.

"Absolutely," Zatte said. She put her hands on Luffa's hips and worked her fingers into her pants pockets. "It'd give you a chance to get more comfortable."

*******

An hour later, the General in command of the Red faction awoke. Finding his subordinates missing, the base empty, and his communications equipment inoperable, he located a weapon and staggered through the corridors in search of answers. Eventually, he made it to his own quarters, where he found two alien women making love in his bed.

"What in blazes--?" he gasped. There were no words to adequately express his shock. It was truly the last thing he expected to find, and he had no idea how to respond. Luffa's nonverbal yelp--roughly transcribed as 'blaaap!'-- was probably more indicative of the common mood of all three persons in the room at that moment. Without really thinking, Luffa swung her arm out to fire a ki blast at the general, and might have killed him on the spot if Zatte hadn't reached out and caught her.

"Don't shoot him," she cried. "We need him to surrender his troops!"

"What the hell are you doing in here?!" Luffa shouted at the man.

"I--! I--!" In that moment, the general wasn't entirely sure what he had ever been doing anywhere. It had finally dawned on him that one of these women was the Super Saiyan who had been shellacking his armies all day long. In all the confusion, he had completely forgotten about the plasma weapon he had in his right hand. Truthfully, he had forgotten that right hands and plasma pistols existed as concepts. Now that he remembered, it all seemed very pointless. Falling back on his earliest days of basic training, he dropped his weapon and raised his hands over his head.

"Luffa, he lives here," Zatte said. As Luffa had gathered up his bedsheet to cover herself, Zatte resorted to using one of his pillows and a bath towel that happened to be lying beside her.

"I thought you knocked him out!" Luffa said.

"I did," Zatte said. "The sedative must have worn off... What time is it?"

"If you had just gone back to the ship like I asked--" Luffa groaned.

"Oh, you knew what you were doing," Zatte said. "Telling me you 'almost got me killed', like you don't know how much that turns me on..."

Luffa was already blushing, but somehow she managed to turn a shade redder. "Zatte, he's standing right there!" she growled.

"So?" Zatte asked.

"So you don't need to tell him every detail of--!"

"Luffa, he saw us," Zatte argued. "What am I gonna tell him that he doesn't already know? What did you do with my underwear?"

Luffa turned even redder. "Don't talk about--! Arrgh!"

"Honestly, you can be such a big baby sometimes," Zatte grumbled. "Like you'll shrivel up and die if anyone finds out you have a sex life. Oh, that's why I couldn't find it. He's standing on it."

The general looked down and saw pair of briefs under his left boot. "I... I... surrender," the general said.

"You stay out of this!" Luffa shouted.

"Hi," Zatte said as she waved hello to him. "Can I just get you to move your foot... Thanks. Yeah, so I know I'm not supposed to say this, but she and I are married, and we have sex all the time. It's pretty terriffic."

Luffa covered her head with the sheet and lay in a fetal position on the bed.

"You'd think one of us would have sensed you coming down the hall," Zatte said with a shrug, "but I guess we were distracted. You know how that goes."

"Uh... uh-huh," the general said. He finally found the wherewithal to move towards his chair, and he gingerly lowered himself into the seat.

Zatte turned herself and her clothing invisible as she dressed herself. For a moment, the only evidence that there was anyone else in the room was the depression Zattes's body made from sitting on the bed, and the whimpering heap that lay under the covers.

"So yeah," Zatte said, "we need you to order your troops to stand down. I mean, as awkward as all of this is, we did capture you just now."

"Of course," the general said. "Of course..."

"Luffa will escort you and your troops to the island with the other prisoners, and it shouldn't take too much longer to get everyone back home."

"Anything you say," he murmured.

Zatte finally faded back into sight, now fully dressed. She fetched Luffa's gear from various parts of the room and tossed it all onto the bed. "She's actually really nice once you get to know her," Zatte said as she gestured to the bed.

Suddenly, an alarm sounded through the halls of the base. Zatte and the general both looked up when they heard it, for both of them knew what it meant.

"Enemy mechs," Zatte said. "Guess they didn't know the base was already captured. Hey, Luffa! Break time's over, buster, we've got company."

"Go away," Luffa said.

Zatte tossed Luffa's clothes on top of the covers and took the general's hand. "Let's give her a minute to straighten up," she said as she led him out of the room.

The two of them were about halfway down the corridor when Zatte heard a loud crash from inside the general's quarters, indicating that Luffa had smashed her way out through the ceiling on her way to deal with the mechs.

"So," she said to the general. "While we're waiting for her to deal with that, maybe you can tell me what you know about that other Saiyan who showed up a little while ago. You know, the one who almost blew up the whole planet?"

*******

Later, after the Green faction surrender had been completed and Luffa had replaced her damaged communicator, she focused her efforts on shutting down the Blue forces. Her main objective was to destroy any and all slorgs on the planet, and since the slorgs were being used by the Red faction, she knew she would find slorgs wherever she found their prey. As she fought on the flight deck of one of their flying fortresses, she and Zatte discussed what they had learned from the Green general.

"The Greens had no idea that a Saiyan was on the planet," Zatte voice explained into Luffa's earpiece while Luffa ripped apart a plasma turret. "The general's no dummy. He knew any Saiyan activity on Quadityz was sure to draw you into the war."

"That goes for all three sides," Luffa said. "But I'm here anyway, on account of the Reds using slorgs. I'm thinking someone decided that I was going to pacify the sector sooner or later, so there was no use in holding back. Right now, the war is about which side can make the greatest gains in the rest of the sector while I'm bogged down on the planet. Even if Quadzityz was completely destroyed, or made uninhabitable, it would still-- Hang on a second."

Luffa stopped speaking while she confronted a mech. The machine was twenty feet tall and shaped like a winged man. A pilot rode in the robot's chest, and fired cluster bombs and missiles at Luffa in a desperate attempt to distract her from the flying fortress. Luffa could have destroyed the entire vessel in a single blow, but her goal was to disable its offensive capabilities while sparing its propulsion. That way, when its commanders ultimately surrendered to her, it could follow her back to her demilitarized island under its own power, and thus make a very tempting target for the Reds. The only downside to her plan was that she had to fight very carefully, holding back most of her power and carefully choosing her targets, while the enemy could strike back with no such constraints. Accordingly, the mech's pilot used Luffa's own tactics against her, positioning himself in such a way that Luffa would risk hitting the fortress if she attacked it.

To cope with this, Luffa decided to go on the defensive, hoping that would throw the pilot off balance. When she flew away from the mech, he hesitated before chasing after her, and this allowed her to circle around and flank it.

"Okay, I'm back," Luffa said as she cracked the mech's cockpit and hauled the pilot out into the open. She tossed him to the flight deck and watched him scurry back to the relative cover of one of the hangars. "Where were we?"

"Jolok's employer," Zatte said.

"If he had one," Luffa replied. "Maybe he really was a lone wolf looking for revenge."

"It's a safe bet that someone paid him to come to Quadzityz," Zatte said. "Sure, he might have had personal reasons for coming here to attack you, but he still had to arrange for transportation, and any of the warring factions would have been happy to reimburse him at the very least. Small price to pay for taking you out."

"Yeah, that adds up," Luffa said, "but whoever paid his way wouldn't have done it directly. Most people know that hiring Saiyan mercenaries is a great way to get my attention. They must have gone through a middleman."

"And if there really is someone secretly setting up mercenary work for one Saiyan, then he probably knows where we can find others," Zatte concluded. "Maybe we finally have a lead on this."

"It's his accomplice that worries me," Luffa said. "I only sensed him for a second, but it was definitely another Saiyan energy."

"You think he's still on the planet?" Zatte asked.

"If he was working with Jolok," Luffa speculated, "then he probably bugged out when he thought the planet was going to explode. If he was an independent operator, then he must have had some other business on Quadzityz. He must have been suppressing his ki so I wouldn't notice him. Something must have gone wrong, and he had to reveal his power."

"Then he probably fled as soon as that happened," Zatte said. "We might find a clue in the general area where you sensed the guy. If he left in a hurry, he might not have been too careful about covering his tracks."

"We can check it out after I get the planet pacified," Luffa said.

"Wait, really?" Zatte asked.

"Something wrong with that?" Luffa asked.

"I'm just surprised you're willing to wait that long," Zatte explained. "I know how badly you want to find King Rehval. I thought you'd want to drop everything and check this out."

"A few more hours won't change anything," Luffa said. "It'll be easier for us to investigate when we don't have people shooting at us. I'd ask you to go alone, but the area's too big for you to cover by yourself. But if you want to get a head start, that's okay with me."

"No, I agree," Zatte said. "I'm just impressed, is all."

"You've seen the devastation on this planet, Zattie," Luffa replied. "There's kids who don't even have clean water. I can't call in a Federation relief fleet until this place settles down, so every minute I waste, things get a little worse. I never should have let it get this bad in the first place..."

"You were busy putting out fires in other parts of the galaxy," Zatte said. "You can't be everywhere at once."

"No," Luffa admitted. "But I can still do better. I have to do better."

There was a pause in their conversation, during which Luffa descended below the flight deck and began smashing weapons systems and disarming soldiers as she made her way to the engine room.

"Tell you what," Zatte said. "We have a name. Maybe I can pull up some information on Jolok. Find out what he's been up to before he came here, and where he's been."

"He mentioned passing through the Reelor Cluster," Luffa said. "You might start there. Also, see if you can find any records on a fortune teller who was recently hospitalized. He told me he used the Mindworm on some poor lady before he suckered me with it."

"You think she might know something?"

Luffa grabbed a rifle from a soldier and struck him with the butt of it to move him out of her way. "No," she said, "but she didn't recover from it as quickly as I did. If she's still alive, I thought I might be able to help her..."

*******

Many light years from Quadzityz, Lesseri and her team were putting as much distance between themselves and Luffa as possible. With no particular destination in mind, Endive had set the autopilot and joined the others in the ship's mess, which they used for conferences.

"I still can't believe we pulled that off," Guwar said. "When I sensed your ki for that split second, I thought we were done for..."

"We would have been," Lesseri said, "if that other Saiyan hadn't shown up when he did." She picked up the sculpture that had been sitting on the table, and set it back down again. "We even made a little profit along the way. I don't know how much ruthenium is going for these days, but if it's worth more than gold, there ought to be enough in this trinket to finance the rest of our search."

"So who was that Saiyan anyway?" Treekul asked. She was the only non-Saiyan in the party, as evidenced by the lavender hue of her skin, and the dark green stubble on her head. "I can't sense power levels like the rest of you, but Guwar made it sound like he was almost as strong as Luffa."

"Not quite that powerful," Endive said, "but he did manage to keep her occupied for quite some time, which is a feat in itself. He was definitely Saiyan, though I've never sensed a ki like that from any Saiyan I've ever met."

"He's a Jindan user," Lesseri said. "He had to be."

"Maybe we shouldn't jump to conclusions," Guwar said. "Most of what we know about Jindan is speculation at best."

"There's no other explanation," Lesseri insisted. "He was no match for Luffa, at least not when she's being serious, so I have no idea why he tried to challenge her, but there was something... off about his power." She pointed at Guwar and Endive. "You both sensed it too, right?"

Endive nodded. "There was something unusual about him. Perhaps he was connected to Salziff."

"Salziff?" Guwar said. "What's he got to do with any of this?"

"You know him?" Lesseri asked. Her left eyebrow rose as she waited for his response.

"We've met," Guwar said ruefully. "I wouldn't call him a friend. And he definitely wasn't that jacked-up Saiyan who showed up and got in Luffa's face. The ki was all wrong for Salziff."

"Well some time back, he paid a visit to the same man we stole this from," Lesseri said as she pointed to the sculpture. "He wanted the same artifacts we did, the pot and that scroll."

"It's not a pot, it's a retort," Treekul said. "You use it for distillation, although the runes inscribed on its surface could--"

"All I know," Lesseri broke in, "is that a Saiyan named Salziff was trying to get alchemy stuff from a private collector on Quadzityz, and then we show up and do the same thing."

"You think Salziff is a Jindan user, too?" Guwar asked.

"Or maybe he's looking for Jindan users, just like we are," Lesseri said. "Either way, he seems to know something we don't, and since Treekul's going to need some time to work with those items we stole, I say we track him down and ask him a few questions in the meantime."

"He's no pushover," Guwar warned her. "He's nowhere near as strong as that guy who confronted Luffa on Quadzityz, but Salziff is nothing to sneeze at."

"Three against one?" Lesseri said. "I like those odds."

"But how will we find him, Lesseri?" Endive asked. "He'll be hiding from Luffa just like every other Saiyan in the galaxy."

"We don't have to find him," Lesseri said with a gleam in her eye that matched the reflection of the light on her teeth as she smiled. "We have something he wants, remember? He was begging that Quadzity collector for the scroll and the pot... excuse me, the retort. So once he finds out we have it, he'll come to us."

NEXT: Dire Warnings.

#dragon ball #fanfiction #lssjluffafic #luffa #zatte #lesseri #guwar #endive #treekul #quadzityz

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duhragonball · 6 years

Text

[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (86/?)

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

Previous chapters conveniently available here.

[23 May 234 Before Age. Planet Saiya.]

"That's it," Zatte said. "I'm almost positive that's where the killer originated from."

On the bridge of their star-yacht, Luffa looked at the star chart displayed on the main viewer and shrugged. On one end was the Saiya system, represented by a small white dot. Dozens of other star systems were marked with various symbols and notations, and many of them were connected by lines of various different colors. Most of these lines wandered out across the map, only to curl back toward Saiya, stopping short at a solar system relatively close to it.

"How did you work all this out?" Luffa asked.

"There's a ship on Saiya registered to one of the killer's victims, a Saiyan named Yarrow," Zatte said. "By the time I found out about it, the ship had already been abandoned, but the navigational logs were still in tact. From the planet where Yarrow's body was discovered, the ship went to four other systems, and each one reported at least one dead Saiyan."

Luffa waved her finger at the map, as though tracing the route. "That only gets you part of the way," she said.

"Right, but I played a hunch. I traced the same ship's itinerary before Yarrow died, and found other victims along the way. The pattern breaks down here, where a Saiyan named Okartish was discovered dead. Turns out he and Yarrow were partners."

"Are you saying this guy stowed away on Yarrow's ship for months without anyone noticing?"

"It seems that way," Zatte said. "Look, we're having a hard time finding him now that he's here on Saiya, so it's no surprise that he can cover his tracks. He must have some way to hide his presence, even while he's aboard a spaceship as small as Yarrow's."

"You think he can turn invisible like you?" Luffa asked.

"I doubt it," Zatte said. "I could mask my life energy and hide on this ship for a long time if I needed to. But I'd need food and other necessities. Plus, a ship's life support systems would detect the extra oxygen consumption from a stowaway. I might be able to hack the ship's computer to falsify the readings, but that would mean sneaking out of my hiding place to do it. Sooner or later I'd give myself away. And on a smaller ship like Yarrow's, it'd be that much harder for me to move around without being noticed."

"So how's he doing it?" Luffa asked. "We know he's a Dorlun because of the poison he's using, and each Dorlun has special abilities. What can this guy do?"

"It could be a lot of things," Zatte said. "Keda could shape-shift, which works a lot better for stowing away. She hid among the Tikosi for months, right? I don't think I could have managed that long. She probably spent a lot of that time making her body as small as possible."

"Then maybe this guy's a shape-shifter like Keda," Luffa said.

"Not necessarily," Zatte said. "He might have some sort of telepathic power. Your eyes might be able to see him, but he can prevent your mind from perceiving his presence. Or maybe he had some way to go into a dormant state. That way he could hide in the cargo hold without food or water."

"This is too complicated," Luffa groaned.

"For all we know, the killer might not have hidden aboard Yarrow's ship at all," Zatte added. "He may have paid Yarrow for passage, and made sure his name stayed off the ship's passenger records."

"But if he's been using his own victims for transportation," Luffa said, "then he's been leaving a trail all along."

"Well, nothing obvious," Zatte said. "It's taken me days to piece together all the victims with spaceships they might have used or owned. I know you're not a big fan of King Rehval's brand of diplomacy, but a lot of these murders took place in a lot of different jurisdictions. If Rehval hadn't established relations with so many of them, I might not have been able to get all the data I needed."

"It doesn't matter," Luffa harrumphed. "Once my technique is put into action, we'll find the killer no matter where he's hiding."

"Maybe," Zatte said, "but you needed Rehval to make that work too, right?"

Luffa rolled her eyes. "He has his uses," she admitted. Before Zatte could tease her about this, she turned her attention back to the map. "So you backtracked the killer to this system, but what good does that do us?"

"Maybe nothing," Zatte said, "but if the trail goes back any further, I might be able to find out something about him that we can use. I won't know until I go there and see for myself."

"You want to take the ship and leave Saiya?" Luffa asked.

"Sure," Zatte said. "It'll only take a day to get there."

"But Planet Saiya would be at the killer's mercy while we're gone!" Luffa objected.

"That's why we’re not going,” Zatte said. “You’re staying behind.”

"You want to go alone?!" Luffa asked.

"Luffa, it'll only be for a few days. A week at most. You've gone on training retreats longer than that."

"But the whole point of you investigating was so the killer would try to come after you," she said. "If the bait leaves the planet, then there's no trap."

"Let's face it," Zatte said. "If he was going to try to attack me he would have done it by now. Either he doesn't see me as a threat, or he knows it's a trap. At least if I leave the planet for a while, it might make him wonder what I'm up to. He might get nervous enough to make a mistake."

"What the hell am I supposed to do while you're gone?" Luffa asked.

"The same thing you've been doing, dummy," Zatte said. "Try to catch the killer with that technique of yours. And try to find out something about this 'Honor Guard'."

"I already did," Luffa said. "They're just an elite squad in the Saiyan military. They handle special missions, things like that."

"Then why would they recruit a civil servant like Finule?" Zatte asked. There must be hundreds of Saiyans who were stronger or more qualified, and she was willing to die before letting hem take her."

"You can always get stronger," Luffa said. "They probably have a harsh training regimen, and she got cold feet. She was just being cowardly, that's all. It happens, even to Saiyans."

Zatte wasn't satisfied with this at all. "Look, if you think that's all it is, then so be it. Finding the killer is what matters now, but don't whine about being bored if you manage to tackle him early. Take in a show. Spend some time with your grandmother."

"Oh that sounds like fun," Luffa groaned.

"You'll live," Zatte said. "If it gets too dull, you can always conquer the planet. Hey, what's the matter?"

"It's just... I don’t know. Be careful out there, Zattie. Okay?"

"I'm always careful," Zatte said. "But for you, I'll be even more careful. How's that?"

*******

[24 May 234 Before Age. Planet Saiya.]

Less than an hour after Zatte's departure from the planet, Luffa went to the capital citadel to find King Rehval. By now, the palace staff had grown accustomed to her frequent visits. They still stank of fear and loathing whenever she passed them in the corridors, but they no longer asked her to identify herself or make appointments. She waited in his bedroom for five minutes, and when he appeared at the doorway he walked up and seized her in a powerful embrace--one arm around her back, the other gripping her upper thigh.

"There you are," he said triumphantly. He hoisted her up until they were at eye-level to one another.

She planted her hands on either side of his head and pulled until they were close enough to give him a passionate kiss. As their lips finally parted, she bit his lower lip, drawing a tiny trickle of blood. He feigned outrage, and tossed her onto the bed.

Over time, Rehval had learned to indulge Luffa like this. At first, he had been very respectful about kissing her, almost to the point of being submissive. This was customary among Saiyans, as she was the stronger of the two, but she had always enjoyed the way her late husband Kandai would handle her, back when she was far weaker. It pleased her to see that Rehval could pull it off. It wasn't about physical power, she supposed. Rehval was far stronger than Kandai had ever been, and he was a monarch as well. He was used to projecting authority, in a way that Kandai could have only approximated with strength. So it was just a matter of getting him to stop being so damned polite to her. He was putting his tongue down her throat, not negotiating a trade agreement.

Even so, he still knew when to back off. Their make-out sessions would end the same way every time. Eventually, her guilt over betraying Zatte would surpass the thrill she got from him, and she would gently push him away. He never questioned her about this, and if he understood, he never mentioned it. He simply respected her boundaries like a true diplomat. It made her wonder what would happen if he didn't respect this. What if he wanted to press the issue? Would she kill him for his insolence? Would he try to persuade her to take things further than they already had Would she give in to temptation and betray her wife more than she already had?

"Shall we go?" Rehval asked pleasantly. Normally they would head to the mountains to train at this point.

"Yeah," Luffa said. "I think we're almost ready to try this thing out."

"You still haven't named your technique?" Rehval asked. He rose from the bed and fetched a new shirt from his wardrobe. Luffa had a nasty habit of shredding them during their more intimate moments.

"What's the point?" Luffa asked.

"The point is that you have something to call it," Rehval said. "When you and I find this killer, I want to tell my subjects how we did it. That'd be easier if I didn't have to keep calling it 'Luffa's New Technique, the One Where She Spreads Out Her Ki Energy Across the Whole Planet While We Sense For Any Unusual Activity."

"Fine, you name it then," Luffa said.

"You developed it," Rehval said. "The honor is yours."

Luffa rolled her eyes and shook her head. After a moment of consideration, she finally said: "Golden Duster."

Rehval paused putting on his shirt as he appeared to digest the name carefully. "We should workshop that," he said.

Luffa threw up her hands in annoyance.

*******

Hours later, at their training ground, Luffa and Rehval watched the stars come out in the night sky. The air was cold, but she barely noticed thanks to how closely he was holding her.

"That's the Pflaume system," he whispered into her ear as he pointed to a faint point of light that had just become visible as dusk gave way to night. "That's where my villa is. I'd like to show it to you sometime."

"You already showed it to me," Luffa replied.

"That was a hologram," Rehval said. "I want you to experience the real thing. The sounds, the smells..."

He might have added "touch", but instead he gently caressed the side of her neck with his lower lip, and she found this far more persuasive.

"But we can discuss that later. I've kept you here for too long," Rehval said. "You probably want to get back to your ship."

"No, it's all right," Luffa said. "Zatte took the ship into space. I'm staying with my grandmother until she gets back."

Earlier, she had resolved not to tell him any of this. He didn't need to know, after all. Yet somehow, something about the way he held her and the sound of his voice caused her to forget her mistrust.

"She left the planet?" Rehval asked. "Why?"

"Chasing down a lead on the killer," Luffa said. "Not that it'll matter. You and I should have him cornered by the time she gets back.

"Then why don't you stay at the palace until she returns?" Rehval asked.

She took a deep breath and released it as a long sigh.

"I take it that's a 'no'," Rehval said.

"Maybe," Luffa said. "Let's focus on the Saiyan-killer, and then we'll worry about sleeping arrangements."

"Fair enough." Rehval released her and rose to a standing position.

"Where are you going?" Luffa asked. "I told you, I can stick around a while longer."

"Yes, but unfortunately, I have some business to handle back at the citadel. I can either put in a long night or get up early to take care of it before we meet up. Either way, I need to get moving."

"Business?" Luffa asked.

"It's a state secret," Rehval said. "I'd need to arrange a security clearance for you. Maybe if you and your wife choose to stay on Saiya for a while, we could make that happen. You've proven to be a great help to the kingdom. Both of you."

"One thing at a time," Luffa said. "I'll see you at 0900 tomorrow."

"Of course,” Rehval said. As he floated into the air, he waved good bye and made that damned wink that she found so endearing and smarmy at the same time.

“Don’t be late!” Luffa called out to him.

“I wouldn’t dare,” Rehval replied with a smile. “I know how much you hate to be kept waiting.”

*******

"Where is he?!"

By 1000 hours, Citadel Time, Luffa was in General Ratijio's office, threatening to wreck his furniture. The general was the strongest Saiyan in the royal military, and unaccustomed to dealing with such a tantrum. Typically, he would have killed any Saiyan who dared to barge into his office and make such a racket, but Luffa was far from typical, and he knew it.

"I don't know!" he pleaded.

Without really meaning to, he glanced at the most valuable object in the room, the palladium medal awarded to him by King Rehval II for his fortieth year of service. The display case hung on a wall just beyond his reach. It was a simple tactical assessment. His territory (office) had been occupied by a superior force (a Super Saiyan), and since he couldn't give the invader what she wanted (the king's location), she would sack his domain to vent her frustrations. All he could do now was try to minimize the damage. He couldn't hide his medals now, but if he could keep her attention on his desk or one of the file cabinets...

Then Luffa went straight for the display case. He raised his hand, although he had no idea what good it would do, but before he could even move, she had torn it down from the wall and moved back to her position in front of the door. He didn't think any Saiyan could move so quickly. He thought that she had to use her golden-haired form to tap into that kind of ability.

"Do I have your attention now?" Luffa demanded. She broke the case apart in her hands and let the pieces fall to the floor. Then, she knelt down and picked up the palladium medal he had been so worried about.

For a moment, he wondered how she knew that one was so important to him. Then he realized that she wasn't just faster than any other Saiyan; she had actually caught the movements of his eyes, and noticed what he had been looking at. She was a monster, and the king had welcomed her into the heart of his kingdom. Worse, he had actually begun having some sort of an affair with her. And now, the king, in his infinite temerity, had stood her up.

"Luffa," Ratijio said, trying to maintain what little composure he had left. "He's the king. He doesn't tell me where he goes, but I can try to find out if, you'll just--!"

"I've been trying to find him for the last hour!" Luffa snarled. I can't sense his ki, he's not in the palace, and none of his staff have seen him since yesterday."

"What about that technique you've been developing with him?" he asked. "I thought you could find anyone."

"Oh, I'm coming to that, don't worry," Luffa said. "The point is, he agreed to meet me at the palace this morning, and he isn't there. Finding him isn't as important as knowing why he isn't where he said he'd be. We're supposed to be tracking down that Saiyan-killer today!"

Ratijio swallowed hard. "Are you saying that the king is--?"

"I showed you how Golden Duster works, General," Luffa said. "I saturate an area with my own power, and sense for any movements within that field. It's for finding people who might be concealing their own ki, but it won't work on a corpse!"

"He... he can't be dead!" Ratijio said. "The Honor Guard would never--!"

Faster than he could register the movement, Luffa grabbed him by the chest of his uniform, lifted him out of his chair, over the desk, and slammed him against a wall, upside down. The sheer speed of this action was made even more astonishing by the fact that she did it all with one hand.

"The Honor Guard. Let's talk about them, shall we?" Luffa said with a sneer. "They're under your command, right?"

She was still clutching the medal in her free hand. Ratijio found that he kept glancing at it, even as he knew that he had to focus his attention on Luffa. He couldn't afford to make her any angrier than she already was.

"No," he said. "They report directly to the King! They're his secret police--"

"Secret police?!" Luffa roared. "What does a Saiyan king need that for?!"

In spite of his predicament, Ratijio made a knowing smirk. "You really are a back country yokel, aren't you?" he said. "I thought it was just an act to fool people, but you really-- ARRGH!"

Luffa's fingers suddenly charged with ki, and he felt a surge of pain in his chest.

"Dumb it down for me, then," she said darkly.

"Fine, fine!" he gasped. "You might think a Saiyan king should rule by strength alone, but Rehval isn't interested in merely ruling the Saiyans! He wants to redefine our very culture! The Honor Guard doesn't just suppress dissent, they enforce Rehval's vision of how the people should behave!"

"Then why would they recruit a file clerk like Finule?" Luffa asked. "The way I hear it, she was no fan of the regime."

"Finule?" Ratijio asked. "So they finally took her, did they? I didn't know, but I'm not surprised. She talked too much. Sooner or later someone was going to shut her up."

"Then why not just kill her and be done with it?" Luffa asked.

"To use her for--!" But he couldn't finish the sentence. He knew the information was classified, and that he wasn't supposed to share it with an outside like Luffa, but now he found that he literally couldn't tell. It was as if the words had been trapped in his throat.

"Use her for what?!" Luffa demanded. She charged her fingers with ki once more, and he convulsed with pain.

"They probably took her to--!" he tried to say, but rephrasing his answer made no difference.

Ratijio had never tried to betray state secrets before. This wasn't a matter of honor or loyalty, but fear of Rehval's immense physical strength. But Rehval was missing, and Luffa was here, and far stronger than Rehval could ever hope to be, and this alone made a very compelling case for treason. Only he couldn't go through with it, and Luffa was rapidly losing what little patience she had left...

"You know, I could just rip the answers out of your mind," Luffa said.

"I'm trying to tell you, but something is--!" Ratijio began to say. This time he stopped himself from finishing his sentence. He knew Luffa wouldn't believe him, since he hardly believed it himself.

She flung him to the other side of the room, where he crashed to the floor. Ratijio had the physical might to at least soften his landing, but he didn't want to risk antagonizing Luffa any more than he already had. As soon as he was able, he glanced to her hand to find his medal was still in tact. Even as he did so, he wondered why that should still matter to him.

"Don't bother," Luffa said. She approached him, reaching for his face with her empty hand. "I've wasted enough time on you already. I should probably use both hands, so before we get started..."

She held up the medal and closed her fist, crushing it into a chunk of twisted metal. Then she flung out her arm, launching it like a mortar bomb through the window of his office. Ratijio was horrified to see this, although he still couldn't understand why.

And then suddenly, he felt something snap inside him. There was an intense pain in his head, like something was trying to smash its way out of his skull, and he clutched at his face as he curled up into a fetal position. He heard an undignified scream, and eventually realized that it was coming from his own mouth. It was so excruciating that he completely forgot the angry Super Saiyan standing over him.

"What the hell is the matter with you?" she asked, though her voice sounded distant to him, as though she were calling to him from across a great chasm.

And then the pain simply stopped. Ratijio opened his eyes and looked at the palms of his hands, unsure if it was safe to move or speak. He gasped with relief, and slowly rose to one knee, until Luffa grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him to his feet.

"It was the medal," he said quietly. "Damn his eyes, he did it to me just like all the rest!"

"What are you babbling about now?" Luffa asked.

He noticed she had raised one of her fists and he quickly held up his hands in supplication. "Wait, don't!" he pleaded. "I'll tell you everything!"

*******

For lack of anywhere better to go, Luffa took General Ratijio to her grandmother's house. King Rehval III had now been missing for over four hours. While Luffa concentrated her senses on finding any trace of his ki, Arracash served him all the steamed vegetables he could eat.

"You don't see brassicas like that anywhere else on Saiya, now do you?" Arracash bragged. "You'd probably think they were imported, but I grew them right here in my garden."

"They are impressive," Ratijio said between bites.

"The secret is the molybdenum powder I sprinkle into the soil," Arracash went on. "Any idiot knows to use fertilizer in this sort of climate, but they don't know to do their homework. Sure, they can grow some crops, but if they don't pay attention to the micronutrients, you won't have much to show for it on the dinner table."

"I see," Ratijio said absently.

"Now, the iron levels in the soil here aren't a problem, but you still have to keep an eye on the others. Boron, zinc. Manganese. A lot of people don't even know what that is."

"If you two are through talking about gardening," Luffa growled, "I'd like to go over what you told me, General."

He swallowed hard at the sound of that. "I've told you everything I know," he insisted.

"Yeah, and most of it was stuff I already learned from reading Rehval's mind," Luffa said. "His father, Rehval the Second, was an alchemist. He used witchcraft-- or whatever you want to call it-- to hold onto his throne and defeat his enemies. He even used it on loyal officers like you, like that medal he enchanted to keep you in line in case you ever tried to turn against him."

"He kept his powers a secret," Ratijio grumbled, "but rumors began to circulate. Some of us in the military began to suspect he had some sort of influence over people. I didn't know for certain until you crushed that medal. For the last five years, I've treated it like a prized possession and never knew why."

"Well, the only trouble I have with that story is that Rehval II is dead," Luffa said. "Rehval III found out about his secret alchemy lab and killed his father in disgust. Only it looks like he didn't bother to track down all the talismans and potions his dad left behind."

"Why should he bother?" Ratijio muttered. "The current king may not have approved of his father's methods, but he still benefits from the results. The spell I was under made me loyal to their whole dynasty. It's the same with the Honor Guard. I'm sure they're under some sort of enchantment to ensure their absolute obedience. That's why I say the king must still be alive. If he died, the Honor Guard would immediately install his successor."

"Who would that be?" Luffa asked.

"Don't be an idiot, girl," Arracash said. "Obviously one of the king's children would assume the throne."

"Obviously," Luffa replied, "except Rehval has no children."

"Of course he does," Ratijio said. "The king is many things, but he's no fool. To rule over Saiya without an heir would jeopardize everything his house has ever worked for."

"That's impossible!" Luffa insisted.

"Why?" Ratijio scoffed. "Did you really think you were the first woman he ever fancied?"

Normally, such a cutting and personal remark would have embarrassed her. Her involvement with Rehval had been confusing enough before the General accidentally walked in on them in the middle of an embrace. He had kept quiet about it, but now that he was finally speaking up, Luffa was too shocked to be self-conscious.

"You and the king?!" Arracash blurted out.

"I guess you really didn't know," Ratijio said with a snort. "His Majesty's quite the charmer, isn't he? Probably convinced you that you were the only one he had ever loved. Well, I hate to be the one to break it to you, but it's just a line. Once he's satisfied, he'll move on to someone else and tell her the same story."

Luffa shook her head. "I read his mind," she said. "I didn't find anything about children or other women or..."

"You must have skipped a few pages then," Ratijio replied.

Luffa's eyes went wide, and she started taking quick, shallow breaths as she struggled to make sense of this. Somehow, Rehval had thwarted her telepathic probe, and she had never even dreamed that this was possible. In the past, others had resisted her mental powers, or fought back with psychic abilities of their own, but this was something altogether different.

"Luffa, he's telling the truth," Arracash said. Her grandmother had approached her and reached out with a sympathetic hand. "The king keeps his children out of the public, but he's held ceremonies to announce their births. I attended one once--long story--but the food was lousy..."

But Luffa wasn't listening to her. Arracash and Ratijio probably thought she was upset over being deceived by a romantic partner, but that wasn't it at all. Like a witless amateur, Luffa had overestimated her own power. She had assumed that a thorough telepathic interrogation would prove once and for all whether the king was friend or foe. Everything she and Zatte had done since then was based on this faulty premise. There could only be one explanation: Rehval had been manipulating them from the start.

Her thoughts turned to Zatte, who was currently headed for a whole other star system. Was that part of Rehval's plan? Was he luring Zatte into a trap, or was it just a way to remove Zatte from Planet Saiya while he put his true plan into effect?

"Luffa, what are you doing?" Arracash asked.

The old Saiyan had sensed Luffa's ki rising as she ruminated over her failure. Without really thinking about it, Luffa raised her hand and slammed her fist into her own sternum. Her jaw was clenched so tightly that her teeth hurt. As usual whenever Luffa made a mistake, she could almost hear her dead mother's voice scolding her in her mind. Complacent! The enemy was right in front of her. Her wife, her closest ally, had been right beside her. And what had she done?! She took both for granted, and now they were both gone. She could have strangled Rehval last night and been done with this, but instead she held him in her arms, tenderly, and let him whisper sweet nothings into her ear while they looked at the stars.

"Luffa! Not in the house! You hear me?! Not in the house!"

In her rage, Luffa's ki had manifested like a miniature whirlwind. Arracash was pleading for her to stop. Just beneath Luffa's skin, as always, was that thing. Aside from a private demonstration for Rehval, she had kept it contained during her visit to Planet Saiya. Luffa wasn't entirely sure why. Maybe it was because she wanted to at least pretend to fit in with her own species. While she had grown accustomed to her other form and accepted it as a part of herself, she still didn't relish the idea of showing it off to her own kind, to revealing herself as this yellow-haired, green-eyed monstrosity.

But now... Now that Rehval's lies were exposed, now that General Ratijio was rushing out of the house in fear for his life, now that Luffa felt like she couldn't make things any worse than they already were... Now, she could see no reason to hold back.

With a sharp cry, she released her power... released herself, and came to a decision.

If Rehval wouldn't deal with her directly, then she would just take the matter up with his precious planet.

NEXT: Behind the Throne

#dragon ball #fanfiction #super saiyan #luffa #lssjluffafic #zatte #arracash #rehval #ratijio #saiya

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duhragonball · 7 years

Text

[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (75/?)

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

Previous chapters conveniently available here.

[6 March 234 Before Age. Nat-Chezz II.]

When Zaperc led the Saiyans to Nat-Chezz II, their plan had been to defend the planet against any would-be invaders. The idea was to imitate what the Super Saiyan Luffa had achieved with her establishment of an interplanetary Federation. Instead of seeking out easy battles, they would stand their ground and try to cultivate a reputation as a force to be reckoned with. This would in turn attract even stronger invaders, giving the Saiyans a chance to become stronger themselves as they repelled them. At least, this was the theory.

In practice, Zaperc’s followers were virtually indistinguishable from the sort of invaders they pledged to drive off. Upon arrival, they declared martial law, shut down much of the planet’s communications, and helped themselves to whatever supplies and treasure they wished. The Chezzi people had endured worse occupations in the past, so they tolerated the situation for a time, but they still breathed a sigh of relief when Luffa discovered their plight and intervened.

In the weeks that followed, Luffa subjected these Saiyans to intense training, determined to mold the band into the sort of champions they had claimed to be. The Chezzi King had allowed them to keep the mansion they had appropriated, but all the treasure they had taken was returned, and the Saiyans spent most of their days drilling in the wilderness or conducting war games with the Chezzi military. When their work for the day was finished, they convened at their manor and feasted on whatever luckless animals they happened to find during their training exercises.

“That’s what I like about you, Jikama,” Lesseri said as she ripped hunks of flesh from a carcass on the table. “You may be half-Chezzi, but at least you eat like a Saiyan. I knew a mixed-blood on Siphone II. Guy had no appetite at all. Creepy.”

“Thanks... I think,” Jikama said between bites. “So, any word on when Luffa’s coming back?”

“Nothing new,” Vigurd said as she drank an entire pot of stew and wiped her mouth on her forearm. “What’s wrong, Jikama? You miss that gilded blowhard already?”

“I just enjoyed her cooking,” he said awkwardly. “Not that there’s anything wrong with this, but we’ve been roasting animals on a spit for a week now. I could go for some of that insect crumb of hers.”

“Insect crumb, my foot!” Lesseri scoffed. “Don’t listen to him, Vigurd. He just wants another pat on the head from Zattie.”

Jikama chuckled at this. Of all the Saiyans in Zaperc’s group, he had shown the most improvement in tracking Zatte through dense foliage. Luffa’s alien wife lacked Saiyan power, but she could make herself virtually undetectable, and she was armed with advanced weaponry and a talent for asymmetrical warfare. She had praised him a number of times in front of Luffa and the other Saiyans, which had earned him a lot of teasing from his comrades. Not wishing to antagonize any of them, he smiled and tried to take it in stride.

“If you asked me, it’d be just as well if she never came back,” muttered Brockle. He sat at the head of the table, nursing a flagon of ale while he devoured a plate of spare ribs.

“Please, Brockle,” Vigurd laughed. “We’ve all seen you leer at her when you think no one’s watching. You miss Zattie more than Jikama does.”

“Yeah,” Lesseri added. “Don’t take it personally, Brockle. You’re just not her type, if you know what I mean.”

The two women laughed, and Jikama tried to delicately suggest that maybe they shouldn’t make a habit of calling her “Zattie”, when Brockle slammed his fist on the table.

“I’m not talking about the damned alien,” he said. “I meant Luffa.”

“I wouldn’t let your father hear you talk that way,” Vigurd warned.

“I’ve learned all I need to know from the Super Saiyan,” Brockle insisted. “I’m getting stronger every day, and before long I’ll be powerful enough to surpass her.”

“No offense, kid,” Lesseri said, “but get real. We’ve all felt the ki Luffa puts off. You’re nowhere near her level.”

He stood up and raised his fists. “I’m more than a match for you, Lesseri!” he shouted.

She nodded and sipped her drink. “You’re right, but being stronger than me doesn’t change anything, does it?”

“I have the potential to beat her!” he insisted. “I know it!”

“Maybe so,” Vigurd said, “but until you do, you’ll have to put up with her crap like the rest of us. Unless she’s dumb enough to get killed in spaceflight. I wonder if someone could sneak an explosive on that ship of hers without her noticing...”

“Now what would that accomplish?” Lesseri asked.

“Oh, I’m just thinking out loud,” Vigurd chuckled. She finished her meal and patted her sizable belly with satisfaction. “People would pay a fortune to hire the mercenary who slew the Super Saiyan, wouldn’t they?”

“Not once the word gets around that she’s just a run-of-the-mill Saiyan like a hundred thousand others available for hire,” Lesseri noted. “All you’d prove is that you know how to set a time-bomb.”

“Wouldn’t someone else try to bomb your ship?” Jikama suggested. “Then they could cash in on being the one to kill the mercenary who killed the Super Saiyan.”

Lesseri pointed a table knife at Jikama. “See? He’s only half-Saiyan and he gets it.”

“I don’t know why my father put up with you fools,” Brockle grumbled.

“Because he knows he needs all the help he can get to keep his son from getting himself killed,” Lesseri said. “Maybe you were in line to serve in Rehval’s elite guard, but you fouled that gig up, and now you’ve got to scrape together a living like the rest of us merc trash. You don’t have to like us, Brockle. You don’t have to like Luffa either, or her blue-skinned devil girl, for that matter, but you still need us for the time being.”

He opened his mouth to respond, when suddenly all four of them gasped with shock and turned to look up at the sky. There was nothing to see, at least not with the naked eye, but the ki they had sensed was powerful enough to be sensed, even from outer space.

“Is that... Luffa?” Vigurd asked.

“It can’t be,” Brockle said. “It feels completely different. And there’s... two of them.”

“Jikama, contact the Chezzi military,” Lesseri said. “We’ll need telemetry on that ship.”

“Huh? Oh, right!” he said as he scrambled out of his seat. While he took off into the air, she turned to Brockle.

“Go find your father,” she said. “Looks like we finally have a fight on our hands.”

“I don’t take orders from you, woman!” he said indignantly.

“That’s right, you don’t,” she said. “We both take orders from your father, and I’d like to start taking some before whatever that is gets here, so hurry up and find him!”

He muttered obscenities under his breath as he got up from the table, promising himself that she would pay for her disrespect, but Lesseri didn’t care as long as he did as she asked.

She looked to Vigurd next. “Do me a favor and prep Zaperc’s ship for launch.”

“What?” Vigurd asked. “You want to run?”

“Right now I want to keep my options open,” Lesseri said. “Without Luffa to back us up, I don’t know if we can beat these guys, and I don’t know if Zaperc’s sensible enough to order a retreat. I don’t know about you, but I’d like an escape route handy.”

“You know, so would I, now that you mention it,” Vigurd said after a moment’s consideration.

“Yes, I thought you might,” Lesseri said after Vigurd flew off.

*******

Two hours later, Zaperc was with Hijik in the throneroom of the King of Nat-Chezz, accompanied by several high-ranking military commanders. They had been discussing plans to destroy the incoming vessel before it could deploy its forces, when suddenly an image of two women appeared in the center of the room.

Both of them had pale, almost transparent skin. The shorter of the two was almost completely concealed beneath a black cloak. Only her bare feet and lower shins were visible below the hem, and the hood of her cloak revealed only the portion of her face below her eyes. Her nose and mouth were contorted into a cruel sneer.

The taller woman was adorned in black leather up to her chest, which added emphasis to her large, muscular arms. An iron helmet concealed her eyes as well, though a dark, horizontal slot on the front presumably allowed her to see out of it. Lengths of wire hung from the back of the helmet, almost as if to serve as a crude substitute for hair. Her lips were stretched to reveal her clenched teeth, as though she were constantly on the verge of biting someone.

“Are they holograms?” the king asked.

“I think they’re some sort of ki constructs, Sire,” Zaperc said cautiously. “Hijik, can you sense them too?”

Hijik nodded, and curled his tail around his waist. Before he could give his own opinion on the images, the cloaked one addressed the room.

“Hail, King of Nat-Chezz. I am Ünderlyne, and this is Stryquethru. Henceforth, we shall be the new masters of your world.”

“Long have we coveted your scandium resources, King of the Chezzi,” Stryquethru growled through her teeth. “You will surrender your world to us, or we shall take it by force. Doubtless you have warriors who can already sense our power approaching your world. They will tell you that we cannot be defeated. Heed their warning and surrender to us!”

“Surrender, and you shall be shown... mercy...” promised Ünderlyne, though her tone lacked sincerity. “The tender mercies of Stryquethru and Ünderlyne... Oh how we beg you to submit.”

“Resist,” Stryquethru seethed, “and your people shall suffer terribly! Woe to the defiant! For there is no refuge from our wrath!”

“Woe!” wailed Ünderlyne.

“Woe!” added Stryquethru.

“Wooooooooeeeeee!” they howled in unison.

As their voices faded, so too did their images, and the message appeared to be concluded. The king looked to his advisors, and then to the two Saiyans, desperate for counsel.

“At current velocity, we expect them to reach the planet in two hours, Sire,” said one of the generals.

“My son Brockle may be able to destroy their ship before it reaches the atmosphere, Sire,” Zaperc said. “If not, I would recommend deploying our forces here...”

“Is this a joke?!” Hijik yelled.

Suddenly, everyone in the room fell silent, and all eyes were looking to him.

“It’s obviously a trick!” Hijik said. “Am I the only one who sees it?”

“Hijik, what are you talking about?” Zaperc demanded. “We don’t have time for--”

“That was Luffa, of course!” Hijik said. “Luffa and her alien ‘partner’ or whatever she calls it! They left the planet days ago, frustrated that we weren’t jumping through their hoops fast enough for them, so they dreamed up this phony invasion as some pathetic team-building exercise!”

Silence fell upon the room again. At last, the king spoke. “Zaperc, could he be right? Would the Super Saiyan do such a thing?”

Zaperc hesitated. He had studied Luffa’s career for over two years, only to find that the real Luffa was very different from what his sources had told him. She had been testing them for weeks now. Could this be another test? If it was, wouldn’t she have informed the king? Perhaps he was aware of her plan, and he was feigning ignorance to help Luffa gauge their reactions.

“I... I don’t know,” he finally said. “Perhaps we should wait and see.”

“Wait?! Wait for what?” one of the Chezzi generals demanded. “Neither of those women looked nothing like Luffa. The shorter one was at least six inches taller than her.”

“It was a ki projection,” Hijik said. “They could have made it look any size or shape they wanted!”

“And since when does Luffa have that ability?” the general asked sharply.

“Her woman has all sorts of energy manipulation powers,” Hijik said. “Working together, there’s no telling what they could do.”

“But why go to all this trouble?” the Chezzi king asked. “Why not simply arrange a war game maneuver?”

“Because it’s a team-building exercise,” Hijik said. The disgust in his voice made it sound like he was describing the most detestable atrocity he could imagine. “You don’t understand how women think, Your Majesty. They want to humiliate us, then force us to work together against a common foe, and then they’ll reveal their ruse at the last moment, to reinforce the idea that none of us can accomplish anything unless they allow it.”

“Wh-what?” the king asked.

Hijik sighed. “I can see I’ll have to go over the basics of involuntary celibacy with you. I’ll need something to write on so I can make a diagram...”

********

On a cozy island village off the coast of one of Nat-Chezz’s larger continents, Bodi stood in a library and watched patiently while a Chezzi woman looked through an almanac.

“Sorry this is taking so long,” she said as she ran her maroon-skinned fingers down a table printed on page 702. “You’d probably have more luck calling the Royal Astronomy Society. They have a computer program that calculates things like this.”

Bodi smirked as he rubbed his chin with his thumb and forefinger. “Luck? Calculations?” he asked. “With the fate of this world on the line, there can be no half-measures. Take your time, and while you concentrate on finding the answer I need, I will drink in your beauty, and let it inspire my Saiyan power to unseen heights!”

The woman faltered for a moment, and clutched at her temples. Even the horns on her head seemed to droop slightly.

“Is something wrong?” Bodi asked. “Have you found it?”

“No, I just... felt a little ill for a moment,” she said. “Could you maybe save the cheesy lines for after the invasion?”

“Very well,” Bodi said as he dramatically removed his sunglasses. “I accept!”

He had been patrolling this part of the planet when he sensed the huge powers approaching from space. With Luffa and Zatte offworld, his standing orders were to report to Zaperc and the Chezzi military command, but he knew better. There would be only one way to halt this impending doom. Only one power that could bring Bodi and his comrade the victory they all craved. Bodi would seize that power, and with it, the triumph, and with that... maybe some grateful Chezzi women...

“Okay, I think I’ve got it,” she said.

“Good job!” he cheered, pointing at her with both hands. “The location of the full moon!”

“Well, that’s just it,” she said sheepishly. “The full moon won’t be in the sky for another week. It doesn’t matter where you go on the planet’s surface. It all depends on the moon’s position in relation to the sun.”

His jaw dropped.

“What I was thinking of was a solar eclipse,” she explained. “With those, it depends on where the observer is on the planet’s surface. At a certain latitude, the moon would obscure more of the sun’s disc, but that has nothing to do with lunar phases. I’m sorry.”

He didn’t move. A pathetic squeaking sound emanated from his throat, but nothing more.

“Are you sure you need this Giant Ape form to win?” she asked. “It just seems kind of unreliable to me. You get all this power from it, but it only works under the light of the full moon. And what if the invaders managed to cut off your tail?”

He nodded slightly.

“Well, is there anything else I can help you with?” she asked. “If not, I’ll uh... let you get back to strategizing. I feel like I ought to see my family before this ship arrives. So, uh, good luck out there.”

She left him standing there, dumbfounded. One by one, the other patrons left the building, until at last the librarian at the desk shut off the lights and locked the doors. Bodi didn’t move, except for a slight twitch as a single tear ran down his cheek.

*******

“Behold, mistress! The world of Nat-Chezz. And soon it shall be ours! The domain of Stryquethru and Ünderlyne!”

Stryquethru gazed at the image of the planet on the viewscreen, admiring whatever her helmet allowed her to perceive through the slot that obscured her eyes. A tear of blood ran down her cheek as she made a twisted smile.

“How peaceful it looks!” she exclaimed through clenched teeth. “Soon, very, soon my lady--my queen, we shall have all the scandium we could ever need. Scandium enough to sate the darkest of appetites!”

Their ship had only one deck, containing a single, nearly empty room. Nearly every surface was shiny and black, with heavy chains and manacles dangling from various positions on the wall. There were no physical controls. Ünderlyne simply waved her hands, seemingly clawing at the air with the long black nails on her fingers, and the ship responded instantly.

“But hold!” she said. “We are under attack!”

“The fools!” Stryquethru hissed. “Do those spineless worms reject our kind warning already?”

“Worry not, my pet,” Ünderlyne said in a spiteful tone. “The energy beam is a powerful one, rich in vital energy, but easily avoided. Yes, we need only slip our vessel beneath normal space, into the welcoming darkness of subspace, and wait for the danger to pass.”

As she spoke, she gestured with her hands to illustrate, and Stryquethru grunted with malicious approval. Then she tilted back her head and growled.

“Do I sense... Saiyan power in that attack?” she asked.

Ünderlyne paused and considered the question carefully. “Yessssss,” she said with a gleeful cackle. “And added bonus for our conquest!”

“I would bathe in their blood!” Stryquethru insisted. “The one who fired that insolent shot! Yes, my pet, I will not rest until shreds of his viscera are lodged between my teeth!”

“Let us not be hasty,” Ünderlyne said with an evil smile. “The Saiyans make fine stock for breeding, as well as for soup. Imagine an entire offshoot of their race, toiling away to refine scandium for our dark bidding.”

Stryquethru screamed for thirty seconds straight. “Delightful,” she added. “I cannot bear to wait any longer! How long until we arrive?!”

“Soon!” Ünderlyne cried.

*******

“Now!” Ünderlyne cried as they stepped out of the hatch of their ship and onto the courtyard of the Chezzi royal palace.

“Where is the king!?” Stryquethru screeched. “He must surrender his world to us immediately!”

“Bring us the king!” Ünderlyne shrieked. “Lest we hunt him down and devour his eyes!”

But the courtyard was empty, save for the two invaders and their black, disc-shaped vessel. Suddenly, the vessel was engulfed in an explosion.

“How dare!” Ünderlyne rasped.

“My chains!” Stryquethru howled. “All of my favorite chains were on board!”

“Take heart, mistress,” Ünderlyne said. “We shall soon forge new chains, of scandium alloy!”

“Seems your ship is much easier to hit when it’s standing still,” shouted Brockle as he flew over the courtyard. He alighted just in front of the invaders and the burning hulk that was once their ship. “Now I only need to destroy the two of you.”

“You were the one!” Stryquethru moaned. “The one who fired upon us before! Saiyan! I would have your innards!”

Brockle clenched his fists and raised his power level to its maximum. “Come and take them if you can!” he growled. “I’m going to make an example of the two of you. When I’m through, no one will dare come near this planet again!”

“Then let us do battle, fool!” Stryquethru shouted. “Let the seas run red with our blood! Unleash your power Saiyan. Bring forth your fury!”

“Wait, stop! We surrender!”

Brockle turned to see his father running out from one of the palace doors. He ran past Brockle and dropped to his knees before the dark women.

“Father, what are you doing?” Brockle asked.

“Spare my son, please,” Zaperc asked as he clasped his hands together in supplication. “He is only a boy.”

“Father, I am not a boy, I am seventeen years old!” Brockle protested.

“How touching,” Ünderlyne cooed. “The son seeks war, while the father begs for peace. Do you truly know what you ask, filthy Saiyan?”

“We’re no match for you,” Zaperc said. “We have no choice but to yield.”

“Then prove your sincerity, knave!” Stryquethru commanded. “Cut off your tail and eat it here in front of us!”

“That is disgusting, Stryquethru!” Ünderlyne muttered.

“It is the only way they will learn, my mistress,” Stryquethru said quietly.

“Father, you can’t be serious!” Brockle said. “I’m strong enough to defeat these wretches. Let me--”

“Son, your power doesn’t even compare!” Zaperc snapped. “Look past your pride and sense what stands before you! I’m not sure if even Luffa could stand against these monsters.”

Zaperc’s words were like a heavy blow to his gut. In that instant, all the confidence simply drained out of Brockle. “F-father--!” was all he could bring himself to say.

“I’ll do as you ask,” Zaperc said, glancing down at the end of his furry tail. “If you agree to let me and my son leave this planet peacefully.”

“No!”

The four of them turned, and found Hijik floating over the courtyard, looking down upon them. There was a large sphere of energy in his right hand, and he was brandishing it with look of desperation on his face.

“Hijik, what in blazes are you doing?” Zaperc asked.

“I’m rescuing your dignity from these she-beasts!” he shouted back. “We can’t defeat them, but we do have enough power to destroy the planet, or at least render it uninhabitable!”

“Are you mad, Saiyan?!” Stryquethru barked. “Put that energy away and come down here! Or do you want to kill yourself along with the rest of us?!”

“I’m not bluffing!” Hijik said. “If we can’t have this planet, neither will you! I suggest you get back in your ship and leave. This world isn’t safe for your kind!”

“They can’t leave, Hijik!” Zaperc groaned. “Brockle destroyed their ship!”

This was apparently news to Hijik, or he may have seen it happen, and simply failed to consider the ramifications. “He... did?!” Hijik stammered. “But... but...”

“We cannot leave!” Stryquethru gloated. “Nor would we wish to do so. Tell me, little man, would you hold that ball of death over us forever?!”

“No, wait!” Hijik said, thinking as fast as he could. “You could take our ship.”

“In the first place, Hijik,” Zaperc said, “it’s not ‘our ship’, it’s my ship. And second--”

As he spoke, they all sensed another Saiyan life energy moving overhead. It was Vigurd, piloting the very ship they were just discussing.

“What is she doing?” Zaperc asked.

“That coward!” Brockle fumed. “She’s running away! Leaving us behind!”

“Well, someone get to a transmitter and tell her to turn around!” Hijik yelled. “She doesn’t need to run away now! She can bring the ship down and hand it off to these two. Hell, she can leave with them for all I care. Just so long as they--”

Suddenly, Zaperc’s ship exploded into a fireball, and began a steep descent towards the horizon.

“Vigurd?!” Zaperc cried. He couldn’t sense her energy now. It was possible that a Saiyan of her power level might have survived the explosion, but if Zaperc couldn’t sense her ki, then that meant Vigurd wasn’t using it to protect herself, or to break her fall to the surface. If she wasn’t dead already, she soon would be.

Hijik wasted no time dreaming up another alternative. “There’s plenty of other starships on this planet,” he said.

“Enough!” Stryquethru shouted. “You’ve put up a nice front, little Saiyan, but your game is over now! Come down here, and if Ünderlyne deems you suitable, we may make use of you for our breeding experiments.”

“Breeding?” Hijik said. “You mean, me and you?”

Ünderlyne simply cackled and waved her hands with abandon.

“And perhaps I as well, dog,” Stryquethru added, “assuming there is anything left of you once dear Ünderlyne is through.”

Hijik quickly dissipated the energy ball in his hand and descended beside Zaperc. “When do we start?” he asked hopefully.

“Hijik, are you mad?” Zaperc asked. “A moment ago these two demanded that I eat my own tail!”

“What’s your point?” he asked.

“Not so fast, ladies!” called a voice in the distance.

“Oh, what now?” Hijik groaned.

The dark women were equally annoyed. The looked and found a figure standing atop one of the stone pillars in the courtyard, with his arms crossed and his back turned toward them. With a flourish, he backflipped off the pillar, twisting and flipping as he moved through the air, until at last his feet touched the ground and he struck a dramatic pose.

“Bodi,” Zaperc said. “I’m asking you to please stay out of this.”

“I’ve come to issue a challenge!” Bodi said. “We can’t defeat you ladies now, but in a week, when the moon is full, my comrades and I will be ready to fight you with all we’ve got.”

“Why should we do such a thing?!” Stryquethru asked.

“Your comrades are already surrendering to us!” Ünderlyne hissed. “What possible reason would we have for delaying our triumph?”

He rubbed his chin, then adjusted his sunglasses. “I see,” he said as he closed his eyes and smiled. “It seems I failed to consider that. Very well. In that case, all that I have left is...”

There was a long pause, and for a moment, Zaperc dared to wonder if Bodi actually had a way out of this situation.

“... No plans!” Bodi declared.

Zaperc shook his head mournfully and looked down at his tail once again.

*******

[7 March 234 Before Age. Nat-Chezz II.]

As it turned out, Zaperc got to keep his tail, at least for the time being. As sadistic as the invaders were, they seemed more interested in savoring their victory than in carrying out their threats. Thus, the first ever “Surrender Banquet” was held in the palace’s main hall. The decorations made the occasion resemble the interior design of Stryquethru and Ünderlyne’s ship. The streamers were made of black paper, the bouqets of flowers were dyed to as dark a hue as possible, and pieces of rusted scrap metal were laid upon each table like centerpieces. At the front of the room was a stage, where the new rulers of Nat-Chezz sat upon their “throne”, which was actually just a black leather sofa they had stabbed with assorted swords and knives. Hijik and Bodi stood on either side of them, each wearing heavy manacles on their necks and wrists that were more symbolic than functional.

“When do we start the breeding program?” Hijik asked Ünderlyne .

“At a time and place of our choosing, mortal fool!” Ünderlyne insisted. “If you do not stop asking, I shall carve out your tongue!”

“Oh, let him babble, my lady,” Stryquethru said. “I enjoy hearing the Saiyan whimper like an animal begging for table scraps.”

There was a loud metallic crack, and Stryquethru turned to scold Bodi. “Worthless wretch! I told you to stop fidgeting with those chains! Now you’ve broken them!”

Bodi had been trying to scratch his back, which had strained the metal to its breaking point. He grinned and adjusted his sunglasses. “Apologies, ladies,” he said as smoothly as he could. “I suppose that I was so overwhelmed by your animal magnetism that I forgot my own strength. Best surrender ever!”

At one of the tables, Zaperc was apologizing profusely to the Chezzi king.

“We still have a chance,” he said in a low voice. “Lesseri and Jikama are unaccounted for. One of them might find a way to summon help and--”

“What good will that do?” the king whispered. “These women are too powerful, Zaperc. They could defeat an army of Saiyans, and I doubt your comrades can find us that much help.”

“There is the full moon,” Zaperc suggested. “Bodi may have had the right idea after all. If we bide our time, we might--”

The king was horrified at this suggestion. “Don’t you think they’ve already anticipated that tactic?” he asked. “In another week, they’ll either chop off your tails or destroy our moon.”

Zaperc sighed as he realized the king was right. It wasn’t supposed to have been like this. His son Brockle should have unlocked his hidden potential and become powerful enough to tackle any challenge, including these invaders. Instead, Stryquethru and Ünderlyne had taken the planet without a struggle, and Brockle now sulked in a far corner of the hall, his spirit completely broken.

"Silence!" Stryquethru screamed. "We would have music! We would see merriment! Dance, Chezzi insects! Dance for your dark queens!"

With some reluctance, most of the ’guests’ rose from their chairs and began to dance in an open area of the hall. As commanded by their new rulers, they all wore black gowns and formal wear mottled with ashes.

"Shall we?" the king said, offering his hand to Zaperc.

Zaperc was irritated by the situation, but he supposed every moment he spent playing along was another moment he got to keep his tail attached to his body. Begrudgingly, he took the king’s hand and led him through a rudimentary waltz.

"You’ve done this before," the king said with some amazement. "I didn’t think Saiyans knew how to dance."

"It was in the book," Zaperc explained ruefully.

"The book? You mean The Luffa Way?" the king asked.

"There’s a section about opening oneself to new experiences. It goes on to describe a time when Luffa supposedly taught herself to waltz in order to defeat a giant sea serpent on Planet Zeezil."

"And you resolved to learn the same steps," the king said.

Zaperc nodded. "All of it was a waste of time. The real Luffa told me the book was a pack of lies. She had never been to the Zeezil system. Her wife--who isn’t even mentioned in the book-- told me that Luffa doesn’t know how to dance."

"How gauche," the king said. "I wonder what they did at their wedding reception..."

"Luffa levitated herself an inch off the ground and let Zatte slide her across the floor like a shuffleboard disc. At least, that was what Zatte told me. She may have been joking. It’s hard for me to tell."

"That sounds rather fun, actually," the king said. "Would you care to try it?"

Zaperc frowned. "The point is that I’ve been wasting my time. I devoted years to following in Luffa’s footsteps, only to find that her feet weren’t even touching the ground! All the rumors and tall tales and false accounts I’ve studied--! All it’s won me is a life of bondage. It would all be worth it if this somehow led to a better life for my son, but look at him over there. I’ve only doomed him to the same fate."

The King glanced back at Brockle, who was still sulking in his chair. A Chezzi maiden asked him to dance, but he wouldn’t even acknowledge her presence.

"Don’t give up hope, Noble Saiyan," the king said. "My people have endured numerous conquests and occupations in our history. This too shall pass."

"How can you say that at a time like this?!" Zaperc asked. "We can’t defeat these monsters! Not even Luffa could--!"

Suddenly, there came a loud noise from the back of the hall. There was a massive double door at the entrance, made of particularly expensive and sturdy breed of Chezzi timber, and decorated with bismuth ink. These now lay on the floor, the wood splintered and cracked where they had been shorn from their hinges.

"Eh? Who dares!" Stryquethru screeched.

The newcomer stormed into the hall, walking directly toward the invaders without acknowledging the Saiyans or Chezzi. When she was standing directly in front of Stryquethru and Ünderlyne’s sofa, she extended her hand and curled in her fingers, beckoning them to come closer.

"Let’s step outside," Luffa said.

NEXT: Post Mortem

#dragon ball #fanfiction #lssjluffafic #super saiyan #luffa #brockle #zaperc #bodi #hijik #vigurd #jikama #lesseri #stryquethru #ünderlyne #nat-chezz ii #so funny story #i had this dumb gag all set up #and guess what html formatting tumblr doesn't support?#so it was either this or change her name to haeperlinque and that ain't happening

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duhragonball · 7 years

Text

[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (65/?)

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

Previous chapters conveniently available here.

[24 November 236 Before Age. Extraliga.]

"I’m in."

Zatte had spent a week preparing for this. The theory was simple: Since the Recollector was designed to detect certain life signs and only allow those with Wistian ki to use it, she would disguise her own life energy to fool the machine into giving her access. In practice, the task had been more difficult than she had expected.

Every Dorlun was blessed with a special innate ability, and Zatte’s was to manipulate energy. Mostly, she used this to bend light waves around her body to become invisible, and to mask her own ki to prevent enemies from sensing her presence. Fooling the Recollector worked on a similar principle, and it was just a matter of warping and shaping her life energy as it emanated from her body. Making it different was easy; the greater challenge was altering it to match something specific.

For practice, she had tried to imitate Extraligan ki signatures, since there had been plenty to use as a reference. She had also tried to mimic Luffa’s power from memory, although she couldn’t hope to match the intensity. Such exercises had been helpful, but she had to wait for the Wistian invasion to arrive before she could put her technique to the test.

She had sensed the Shockmaster as soon as he reached the planet, and started immediately. His footsoldiers would have worked just as well, but he was by far the most powerful, and she wanted a strong ki signal that she could sense at a great distance. Also, by focusing on a single reference, she could avoid getting distracted by the subtler differences between individuals of the same species.

Now, as she touched the Recollector for the first time, Zatte breathed a sigh of relief. Until now, it had been completely intangible to anyone who had tried to touch it or move it.

"You were right Tobiko," she said aloud. "It’s a telepathic interface. Can the rest of you see the displays I’m seeing?"

She was mentally linked to a band of anti-Wistian rebels on the opposite end of the galaxy, thanks to an alchemical potion brewed from samples of her own blood. In reality, she was alone in a cavern near one of Extraliga's oldest cities, standing in front of the Recollector, which lay on a stone slab. In her mind, the four of them were sitting at a table in a roadside bar, with the Recollector laying on the tabletop like an appetizer tray.

It was a prism-shaped object, about five feet in length and three feet in height. Zatte could see green rectangles appearing on the surface, displaying information in an alien script. Paradoxically, she couldn’t read the words, but she comprehended their meaning anyway.

"I see it now," M’ranga said from the opposite side of the table. "These glyphs fell out of use before the end of the Second Reformation..."

"Is that bad?" Zatte asked. She peeked over the edge to gauge M’ranga’s reaction.

"No, I don’t think so," she said. "It’s just that this thing’s a lot older than I realized."

"You’re touchin’ the thing now, right?" asked Scotch Woodcock. It was his mental abilities that made this mind-conference possible. Now his three eyes were staring intently at Zatte, as he focused on her mind to keep the connection as strong as possible.

"Yeah," Zatte said. In the real world, she patted the surface of the Recollector. It felt like polished marble, though it was warm to the touch. "Right now it’s solid as a rock."

"Then suppose you take the bloody thing to a ship and get it the hell out of there?" he suggested.

"No good," Zatte said. "I'm behind enemy lines already. The city near my position is under occupation, so I'd have to get past a lot of Wist soldiers just to make it to a ship. And even if I did manage to get off the surface, the Shockmaster’s fleet has Extraliga surrounded right now, so they’d be sure to intercept me. Once the Shockmaster finds out what I’ve got, it’s all over."

"We’ve no choice," Tobiko said. "We must permanently disable the Recollector here and now, if we can."

"First thing’s first," Zatte said. "I’m going to reset this thing to allow non-Wistians to operate it. At least that way I can drop my 'disguise', and it’ll be a good test of how much we can really do with this thing."

"Be careful," M’ranga warned. "There may be other security measures to deal with."

"My people are all about careful, Ensign," Zatte said with a mirthless smirk. "We don’t know how to do things any other way."

"Never did tell us what your species is, girl," Woodcock mentioned casually.

"You’re right, I didn’t," Zatte said. "Nothing personal, just a precaution."

******

At one point, they hit a snag, and Zatte took a break while M'ranga and Tobiko tried to make sense of a line of Ancient Wistian Runecode that defied telepathic comprehension. In the cavern, she continued to stand before the Recollector, listening carefully to the proximity alarms she had rigged to alert her of any unexpected visitors. In the psychic bar, she was playing an imaginary game of darts. The game was pointless, since it wasn't real, and Zatte couldn't miss the board unless she wanted to. It was just something to do with her hands, although her real hands weren't actually doing anything at the moment. It was strange to divide her awareness this way, but she had grown somewhat accustomed to it.

Suddenly, she gasped and botched her next throw completely. Woodcock, who had been watching her play, raised one of his eyebrows.

"It's her," she explained. "They've started fighting."

"Been keepin' tabs on the missus, have ya?" Woodcock asked.

"Not really," Zatte said. "But this ki... it'd be hard not to sense it."

"Any idea who's winnin'?" he asked.

She shook her head. "I can't tell. The powers are too huge and I'm too far away to sense anything that specific. But I do know that she'll do everything she can to drag it out. So there's no telling if she's just toying with him or buying us time."

Woodcock took a swig from his drink and snorted. "Reckon we oughta hurry along, then," he said.

******

The next several minutes had been very productive, but not decisive. The four of them crowded around the Recollector and watched while Zatte worked the controls. For the sixth time, the display image read "INVALID COMMAND" in ancient Wistian glyphs.

"It’s not working," Zatte said. "I can do just about anything I want with this thing, except destroy it."

"Maybe there’s a higher-level access you need," M’ranga suggested.

"No, we’ve been over that," Zatte said. "The only security measure was the Wist-only thing, and I shut that off."

"How 'bout you rig it so nobody can access the bloody thing?" Woodcock asked. "It’ll just stay intangible forever. Problem solved, isn't it?"

"I like that idea, but I can’t find any way to do that in this interface," Zatte muttered. "If it can be done at all, we may not have time to figure out how."

"Then we may have no choice," Tobiko said. "You may have to risk moving the Recollector to take it off the planet."

"I don’t know..." Zatte said. "You might be right, but-- Wait... something's happened."

"What's it doing?" M'ranga asked as she leaned into look at the Recollector's display.

"No, I don't mean here," Zatte said. "The fight on Extraliga. I can still sense Luffa’s ki, so she’s fine. But the Shockmaster is... gone?”

*******

Luffa stared at the prone body of the Shockmaster. She had been waiting for him to make his next move, when suddenly he collapsed, and his ki dwindled to almost nothing. It simply didn't add up. He was demoralized, perhaps even desperate, but he was far from beaten.

She approached him cautiously, anticipating a trick, but as she circled around him, she could find no signs of what he was up to. She only knew that she could not accept this situation at face value. An attack now might spring some sort of trap. By the same token, if he was playing for time, she couldn’t afford to delay.

She decided to split the difference and flew away, heading for what remained of the Wistian base camp he had been setting up when they began fighting. She returned with a pistol and an explosive shell. Hovering at what she judged to be a safe distance, she lobbed the shell towards the Shockmaster, then took aim with the gun. If he was truly incapacitated, he would be helpless against these weapons. It was possible that he had some way to mask his *ki* while he used it, similar to the technique Luffa had learned from Zatte, but even if his *ki* was undetectable, he would still have to use it to defend himself.

To her surprise, the shell exploded on contact, but when the smoke cleared, the Shockmaster remained unharmed and unmoved. She fired on him several times with the pistol, but the plasma beams did absolutely nothing when they reached his body. Then she noticed the dust cloud that had formed around him.

Luffa swooped down and took a closer look. Her shots had passed through the Shockmaster, only to blast at the ground beneath him, and kick up the dirt, which also passed through his massive body. She recalled that she had heard about this ability before. The last time she had fought the Shockmaster, he had been in some sort of deep meditation just before their battle. During that meditation, he was completely intangible, and his ki was drastically reduced.

But what good did it do him to use this power in the middle of a fight? Luffa couldn't hurt him, but neither could he hurt her. Did he seriously expect her to just leave and give him a chance to escape? She had worked too hard for this victory to walk away now.

"I’ve worked too hard... and so have you..." she muttered to herself as she crouched next to his body. "There has to be a tactical purpose to this. I just need to connect it with your objective, and--"

She suddenly clasped her hand over her mouth as the answer came to her.

*******

"FOOLS! DID YOU TRULY BELIEVE YOU COULD HIDE THE RECOLLECTOR FROM ME?!"

Without warning, the Shockmaster was there in the bar with them. Woodcock rose from his seat to confront him.

"Private party, mate," he grumbled. "Bugger on off."

"Scotch, let me handle this!" M’ranga said as she stepped in front of him. "We need you to maintain the telepathic link!"

"That’s the point, love," Woodcock muttered. "This whole place is just a mental construct. If he’s here, talkin’ to us, then it’s down to me to kick him out."

"YOU THINK YOU HAVE ANY ADVANTAGE HERE?" the Shockmaster bellowed. "YOU’RE EVEN MORE HELPLESS AGAINST ME THAN IN THE REAL WORLD! ALL I WANT IS THE RECOLLECTOR, AND NOW--!"

He raised his hand, and a stream of lightning arced across the room, striking the large prism on the table. Zatte backed away, but continued to watch the displays on the device.

"Zatte!" Tobiko cried. "Shut it down!"

"I can’t!" she shouted after a suspenseful moment at the controls. "What the hell is he doing?!"

"WHAT I CAME HERE TO DO!" he said. "WHAT I’VE BEEN WAITING TO DO FOR THOUSANDS OF YEARS! AND NONE OF YOU CAN STOP ME! NOT LUFFA, AND CERTAINLY NONE OF YOU!"

"Luffa? What did you do to her?!" Zatte demanded. "Answer me!"

He gave no reply, other than to laugh as the tendril of electricity danced from his finger. Before her, the Recollector’s displays flickered with readouts and instructions.

"He’s controlling it remotely," Tobiko said. "It’s a telepathic interface... but the Shockmaster never displayed this kind of ability before--!"

"Bollocks!" Woodcock growled. He stormed toward the Shockmaster, ready to fight. "Don’t care what-all he can do, he’s in my world now, and that means--!"

As he reached out to grab the Shockmaster, he was suddenly enveloped in bolts of violet lightning. Woodcock began to convulse where he stood. When the Shockmaster finally swatted him away and knocked him to the ground, it seemed almost merciful.

"YOUR MENTAL POWERS MAY BE FORMIDABLE INDEED," the Shockmaster proclaimed. "BUT YOU’LL NEVER OVERPOWER MY FORCE OF WILL! NONE OF YOU CAN!"

"We’ll see about that," Zatte said grimly. "We might not be able to beat you, but I’ve spent a few weeks figuring out how to operate this kind of tech. And if I shut it off, all that force of will means nothing!"

"FOOL! IT WAS YOUR ACTIVATION OF THE RECOLLECTOR THAT ALLOWED ME TO SENSE IT IN THE FIRST PLACE! THE RECOLLECTOR WAS DESIGNED FOR MY PEOPLE TO USE! AN OUTSIDER LIKE YOU COULD NEVER OVERRIDE MY COMMANDS!"

"Yeah, but in the real world, I’m standing a lot closer to this thing than you,” Zatte said, hoping she sounded braver than she felt. “I’m betting that gives me some kind of edge.”

"THEN I’LL DEAL WITH YOU FIRST!" the Shockmaster said.

"You’ll have to kill me," Zatte said defiantly. "I know what you plan to do with this thing! You're going to expose millions of people to lethal doses of radiation! I won’t just stand by and let you murder everyone on Extraliga."

He raised his hand and pointed at Zatte, who ducked behind the thoughtform of the Recollector as best she could. She didn’t know what else to do. Disconnecting herself from this mental conference seemed useless. It would allow her to hide her own person, but if the Shockmaster could operate the Recollector from anywhere on the planet, then there was nowhere to run. The only chance lay in opposing him, and the only place to do that was where she stood.

But she couldn’t oppose him, not for more than a few seconds. She was reminded of her last stand on the Durlo Prime colony, knowing that all she could do was buy time, and very little of it, and for a very high price.

She set her jaw and waited for whatever came next.

The Shockmaster stomped towards her, his massive arms reaching out for her.

And then, the entire pub was engulfed in golden flames.

"WHAT--?!" the Shockmaster snarled.

As he glanced around in confusion, Zatte smiled.

"Bastard! Did you think you could sneak past me, Shockmaster?!" Luffa screamed. "Me?"

"IT CAN’T BE!" he shouted. "NOT NOW!"

The form of Luffa seemed to coalesce from the flames. She went straight for the Shockmaster and began punching him.

"You coward," Luffa screeched. "I told you before: You have to get through me before you get to the Recollector! A warrior would have accepted that challenge. But you--! You tried to trick your way around me! Well it won’t work!"

"NO!" the Shockmaster protested. The flames licked at his body, and he cried out in pain. Zatte looked to the others, and saw that they were all surrounded by yellow fire, but none of them were harmed. It actually felt pleasant to her, though the bar was quickly turning into a smoldering wreck.

"YOUR WILLPOWER CANNOT BE GREATER THAN MINE!" he screamed. "YOU CANNOT BE DOING THIS!"

Zatte knew better, although she saw no need to explain it aloud. Again, she was reminded of the last battle of Dorlu Prime, and the image of Luffa, drenched in blood, fighting well after the battle was lost. Zatte spared a moment to admire her wife in action, then returned her attention to the Recollector.

And then suddenly, the two combatants were both gone. The yellow flames were gone as well, and the damaged they had done to the bar vanished with them. Woodcock rose to his feet and straightened his black hat.

"What happened?" M’ranga asked.

"I managed to sever the connection between us an’ them," Woodcock explained. "Couldn’t do it before, but once they started fighting... Well, I think she musta helped me out. Doubt I could do much of anything to that crazy bint if she didn’t want me to. Like a bloody tornado, she is."

He glanced back at Zatte and quickly added: "Er, no offense, of course."

"None taken," Zatte said. "She’d probably consider that a compliment... Oh no..."

"What is it?" Tobiko asked.

Zatte’s fingers scrambled over the interface display as she tried to make sense of what she was seeing. "I... I have control over the Recollector again, but it's too late! He managed to set it for a retrieval!"

"Can you cancel the command?" M’ranga asked.

"No, it’s locked in," Zatte said anxiously.

"How ’bout pullin’ the plug?" Woodcock suggested.

Zatte nodded and spent a moment at the controls. When she looked up again, her expression was even more worried than before.

"I can’t!"

NEXT: Countdown to Extinction

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duhragonball · 8 years

Text

[FIC] Luffa: The Legendary Super Saiyan (43/?)

Continuity Note: About 1000 years before the events of Dragon Ball Z.

Previous Chapters conveniently available here

[16 May 236 Before Age. Extraliga]

"Long story short," Luffa said, "We kicked their asses."

From the bridge of Luffa’s star yacht, Keda sat in the captain’s chair and watched the viewscreen intently as the Saiyan filled her in on what had been going on these past few days. They had contacted her from the "F-Tunnel", the wormhole dimension Planet Wist had used to deploy its invasion forces. Keda wasn't sure how she was getting such good reception from another dimension, but this was the least of her worries at the moment.

"Look, I haven’t heard from either of you in almost a week, okay?" Keda said, trying to keep an even tone. "The last I knew Luffa was heading into a trap and Zatte was rushing into enemy camps all by herself. Now you’re in some kind of hotel room together wearing silk togas, and it sounds like... Is that a party outside? I think I need a few gaps filled in, if that’s okay."

Luffa was too busy gnawing on what looked like an enormous hambone, so Zatte answered instead. "Keda, I’m fine," she said. "The mission was a cakewalk, honestly."

"Then what’s with that bandage on your arm?" Keda asked skeptically.

Zatte glanced down at the wound as though she had forgotten it, and smiled nervously. "One of the Wist soldiers came at me with a knife," she explained.

"A knife?! Are you okay?!" Keda gasped.

"Of course she is, kid!" Luffa growled. "That chump had to use a knife because Zatte shut off the power to their firearms. Yeah, he got in a decent hit, but he had to get in close to do it, and in the time it took to do that--!"

"The program I uploaded into the Undeletor finally kicked in," Zatte finished. "Like we figured, the Wistian soldiers were just projected copies of real people. The Undeletor machine could recreate them as they were killed, but once I sabotaged it, the projections all shut down."

"Hell of a scrap," Luffa said with her mouth full. "One minute she was surrounded by guards, and then poof! They all vanished. Good thing, too. Another second, that guy with the knife would have gutted you like a--"

"Anyway... I came to the F-Tunnel after securing the Undeletor," Zatte broke in. "And Dr. Topsas has already taken care of my wound. It’ll be fine. I promise."

"Well, okay," Keda said. "What about the prisoners, then?"

"They’re all accounted for," Luffa said. "Argon was using faeries to keep them magically trapped in this place." She was holding her food in one hand and Zatte in the other. For a moment she had to decide which one to let go, then she finally laid down the shank and picked up a small round stone, which she held up for Keda to see.

"Take a look at this," Luffa said.

"What is it?" Keda asked.

"I don’t know exactly, but the Wistians used it to make the faeries do what they want. As long as Argon had it, none of us were getting out of here. But I’ve got it now, and I’m having the faeries undo all their spells so we can leave."

Keda knew Luffa well enough not to bother asking how she took such an important talisman from an enemy. She assumed the struggle was violent and bloody, and the less said, the better.

"Okay... so where do we go from here?" Keda asked. "It sounds pretty festive for a prison camp."

"The faerie folk couldn’t just cancel the spells that keep us here," Luffa explained. "Something about the balance of magic, kind of like how you have to cool down after a workout, instead of just stopping altogether. They fed us enchanted food to trap us, so now they have to do the same thing to let us go. And things have been pretty tense around here for the last few days, so a festival seemed like a good idea."

Zatte picked up a goblet and drank from it. "I wanted to leave early, so Luffa took me back here," she said. "Apparently this used to be Argon’s private barracks."

"Tomorrow morning, I’m sending Zatte and Doc back to Extraliga with the first group of prisoners," Luffa said. "Keda, you're in charge of seeing that Doc gets back home safely. That should keep you busy until I'm done."

"Sure, Luffa," Keda said. "What about you?"

"I'll be leaving the F-Tunnel from the other side," she said with a vicious look in her eye. "It’s past time I took the fight to Planet Wist. Zatte’ll fill you in on the details later."

Zatte nodded and waved happily, and after a few words of farewell, Keda closed the transmission. She sent orders to the service robot, PB-2, to tidy up the guest quarters Zatte and Topsas had been using while on board, then started a diagnostic check of ship’s major systems. After that, she stared at the blank viewscreen and steepled her hands.

She was happy for Luffa and Zatte, she really was. They had suffered through so much, and it made all the sense in the world that they should find some solace in one another. They were uneasy with public displays of affection, and they tried to play it cool in front of others, but somehow that just made it more obvious how much they enjoyed each other’s company.

But Keda couldn’t ignore how much Zatte had changed. She had survived this time, but what about the next? And there would be a next time, another opportunity to risk life and limb on Luffa’s behalf, another chance to throw caution to the wind. And for what?

Something had to be done. She supposed it would have to wait until Zatte was back aboard the ship. They could talk this out Dorlun-to-Dorlun, and hopefully set things straight.

But until then, Keda could only wait, and worry.

*******

[16 May 236 Before Age. The F-Tunnel.]

"You didn’t have to frighten her like that," Zatte said after Luffa shut off the comm drone in Argon’s quarters.

"Who? Keda?" Luffa asked. She picked up the large bone and ripped a hunk of meat from it with her teeth.

"You said that guard would have gutted me if I hadn’t defeated them in time," Zatte reminded her. "She was worried about me before I even started that mission. This scratch on my arm was bad enough for her without your embellishment."

"I'm a Saiyan," Luffa said with a shrug. "I gotta exaggerate. Besides, the kid’s a rock, Zattie," Luffa said. "She’s seen worse. This guy named Hamey tried to stab her to death back on Bigreen. She just shrugged it off and kept going. She's ironclad, just like you."

"Stabbed her? No, forget I asked. Look, I appreciate what you're saying, but--"

"And what I said was true, wasn’t it?" Luffa challenged. "I fought those Wist goons too, you know, and they don’t fool around. They weren't in my league, but they were more than enough trouble for you. Another minute or two and you might have been in serious trouble."

"I... well, yes, but..."

Luffa pulled her closer with her other arm. "I know you Dorluns are survivalists, not warriors, but sometimes it’s easy for me to think of you and Keda as funny-looking Saiyans."

"Really?" Zatte asked.

"No offense," Luffa said. "It’s kind of a backhanded compliment. But I really appreciate what you did out there. Took out a whole army of immortal soldiers, and all they could do was cut your arm."

"It was nothing, Luffa," Zatte said. "Really, I--"

She tossed the meat aside and began stroking Zatte’s crimson hair. "I wish you would have let me tell the Extraligan troops here about it," Luffa said. "They were pretty fired up when I told them the Wistians were gone, but they don't know who to thank. They just assumed I did it somehow."

Zatte smiled at her. "Thanks for not mentioning me."

"Why though? You ought to get a medal for this. Might look nice on that suit I bought you."

"A medal?" Zatte gasped. "For me?"

"Damn straight. You earned one, if I have anything to say about it," Luffa said. "When all this is over, I can tallk to Marshall Booth and we can hold a ceremony. I'm sure he'll want to meet you."

"That’s just it," Zatte said. "My people keep a low profile. It’s safer that way. Booth might be our ally for now, but he’s powerful and ambitious. The less a he knows about me, the better I like it."

"Hah. If he even thought about messing with your people, I’d tear him in half," Luffa harrumphed.

"Well, this way you won't have to," Zatte said. "Besides, you’re in no shape to bisect anyone, from what the doctor tells me."

She reached behind Luffa’s back and grabbed hold of her tail. Luffa tried to pull it free, but couldn’t.

"The fae are weak to Saiyan ki," Luffa said. "I can still power up, but if I do, even a little, they’ll all die. I have to suppress my power while I'm here, so... uh, maybe you could let go of that..."

"How’d you beat Argon without hurting any of them?" Zatte asked.

"It wasn’t easy," Luffa admitted. "Satisfying, though. Look, could you...?"

"You know, this could be kind of fun," Zatte said. "I’m not used to being the stronger one, and-- Are you okay?"

Luffa was starting to sweat. "That kind of hurts, Zattie."

She released the tail immediately. "Sorry."

"Nah, it’s fine. It’s just that it’s been a struggle holding back like this for so long. I thought it’d get easier with Argon out of the way, but I still have to be careful."

"You really care about these faeries, don’t you?" Zatte asked.

"They’re good people, basically," Luffa said.

They walked over to a balcony and took in the view of the city of Nhh-r-cooh below.

"The Dorlun legends always made them out to be horrible monsters," Zatte said. "Always lying in wait for an unsuspecting traveler to make a fatal mistake. Normally I’d feel pretty stupid spending the night in the middle of their own lair, but seeing you with all this power over them... They seem almost ordinary now."

"They won't hurt you," Luffa assured her. "I wouldn't let them, but it won't come to that. They learned their lesson a long time ago. That’s why I have to hold my power in. If I slip up, they’ll die thinking Saiyans are as petty and capricious as they used to be."

"Well, I know you can handle it," Zatte said. "You’re pretty conscientious when you want to be."

"Who, me?"

Zatte put embraced her and patted her on the back. "Sometimes, it’s easy for me to think of you as a funny-looking Dorlun. No offense."

Luffa kissed her on the cheek. "I’ve been called a lot worse. From what I’ve seen, the Dorluns are pretty good folks. I just wish you’d let me tell everyone else. You helped out a lot of people, Zattie. They should know what you did for them."

"You know, Luffa," Zatte said. "That’s good enough for me."

*******

[16 May 236 Before Age. Planet Wist.]

"ARGON... IS DEAD."

In the great hall of Goldwall Fortress, the Shockmaster loomed over his remaining chiefs of staff and crossed his arms over his massive chest. Though his features were obscured by his glittering silver helmet, his displeasure was palpable to all in the room. Communications with the F-Tunnel had been lost, and all attemps to open the wormhole from the Wist side had failed, suggesting that the controls on the Extraligan side had fallen into enemy hands.

"But what happened?" asked the Kami.

"The Super Saiyan happened," Kandai snarled. "I warned you, Shockmaster! That fool Argon was never going to stop Luffa, and now that we've drawn her ire, she'll come here! She'll find me and then--!"

"Oh, hush," Calgon said. "You think the Partner hasn't prepared for this possibility?" She looked up at the Shockmaster with an eager expression. "You have prepared for this, haven't you, Partner?"

"DON'T TRY ME, CALGON," the Shockmaster warned. "I HAVE PLANS FOR EXTRALIGA, AND NO ONE WILL STOP ME."

"But without the wormhole, it will take weeks to reach the Extraliga System by ship," the Kami observed. "By the time we arrive, they will be ready and waiting for us."

"YOU UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF WIST, KAMI. RETURN TO YOUR DUTIES. I'LL CONSULT THE REVERIE."

"You're going to meditate!?" Kandai asked. "At a time like this?! Don't you realize the danger we're in?! If she--"

Before he could say another word, the Shockmaster had grabbed him by the throat. He raised him high over his head and stared into Kandai's horrified eyes.

"YOU WANT A PIECE OF ME, KANDAI?" he asked. He tossed him to the ground and laughed. "YOU CAME TO ME FOR PROTECTION, KANDAI. YOU CAME TO WIST. IF YOU WANT THAT PROTECTION, YOU'LL DO AS YOU'RE TOLD. HAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Calgon knelt down to help Kandai up, but he brushed her aside. "O-of course, Partner," he said. "Forgive me."

"YOU HAVE YOUR ASSIGNMENTS," the Shockmaster bellowed. "I'LL SUMMON YOU WHEN I'M READY."

The three of them left the hall. As soon as Kandai and Calgon were alone, he shoved her against the wall of the corridor they were in.

"What do you think you're doing?!" he asked with a scowl.

"Me?" Calgon asked innocently. "You're the one he assaulted."

"We'll be vulnerable while he's in the Reverie, you little idiot!" Kandai seethed. "And yet you keep daring him to press on with this idiotic war!"

"He's already made up his mind on Extraliga, Kandai," Calgon said. She made a token effort to squirm beneath his hands, but the smile on her face showed she didn't particularly mind. "I just want to know how determined he really is. And maybe while he's busy bragging about his precious Wist, he'll let slip a few more secrets in the process, hm?"

"That's... absurd!" Kandai growled. "Do you have any idea how strong he is? And yet you insist on trying to manipulate him!"

"Poor Kandai," Calgon said. "You're not used to being in a position of weakness, are you? You have to be flexible, you see. You don't swim against the current, you swim at an angle to use the current to your advantage. It takes longer, but in the end..." She looked up at him and grinned. "You usually get what you want."

His face turned red with anger, but at last he leaned in and kissed her. Minutes later, when they had found a secluded part of the fortress, the two of them did a great deal more than that. He didn't know why he tolerated her endless scheming. It certainly wasn't because he trusted her. Maybe he found her recklessness exciting. Maybe, after being so desperate and afraid for so long, he admired her easy confidence, even if it was all a facade.

Mostly, though, she made him feel like he had some control over his fate, if only for a moment.

*******

[17 May 236 Before Age. The F-Tunnel.]

During her stay in the F-Tunnel, Luffa had gotten along rather well with the population. The native faeries were indebted to her, of course. The civilian prisoners represented a variety of different species, and they appreciated Luffa for being as much an outsider as themselves.

That left the entire Extraligan military, who were taken captive in the first minutes of the invasion. Officially, Luffa was their commander in chief, but as fellow prisoners in the struggle against Wist, formality had fallen by the wayside.

"Attention on deck!" one of them shouted as she entered the bridge of the airship. As one, they all dropped what they were doing and rose to their feet.

"What are you all standing around for?" Luffa said with a smirk. "I thought you guys were busy."

They all laughed and returned to their stations. One of them whistled as Luffa passed by, and another started chanting her name.

"Madam Federatrix, will you marry me?" called one of the soldiers.

"Get in line!" Luffa called back. The entire bridge roared with laughter. She walked to one of the consoles where an Extraligan woman was reviewing sensor data. "How do you put up with these geeks, Corporal?"

"I tell ’em you’ll knock some sense into them, sir," she replied. "That usually straightens them out."

"Well, normally, I’d love to roughhouse with these guys for a while," Luffa said, but I’m saving that for Wist. How about it, folks, anyone wanna come along?"

They all started cheering and shouting various slogans. One of them screamed "You gonna give ’em the Vengeance Cannon, sir!?"

"Uh... Damn right I will!" Luffa shouted back.

The Vengeance Cannon was supposed to be Luffa’s signature attack, at least according to the unauthorized, grossly inaccurate feature film that was made about her. No one ever seemed to question the fact that the real Luffa didn’t look or talk much like the one in the movie, but they all seemed convinced that the ki techniques were wholly authentic. She had long since given up on correcting people. Instead, she was seriously thinking about inventing an attack to play along with the hype.

"Leave a few of ’em for us, sweetheart!" one of the soldiers cried.

"All right, let’s settle down, people." The lone voice of reason in the room was Major Tedirv, the senior officer of the airship’s crew. As they crossed the deck, the Major saluted Luffa, then offered their hand.

"Welcome aboard, sir," the Major said. "I would have preferred a little more discipline in the ranks before a mission like this, but it is what it is."

"Doesn’t bother me any, Major," Luffa said as she shook their hand. "Everyone in the whole Extraligan military’s been stuck cooling their heels, watching me fight the battle for them. General Gordhowe told me damn near all of you volunteered to come along."

"Honored to be here, sir," Tedirv said.

"And I’m honored to have you. If it was up to me, I’d be taking the entire military with me to Wist’s doorstep," Luffa said. "But this blimp was the only aircraft the fae folk had that could still fly, and there’s only room for fifty, so there we are. They did show you guys how to fly this thing, right?"

"Queen Phenylal’s people were very thorough," Tedirv said. "And we Extraligans are fast learners."

"Good," Luffa said. "I guess it’s dumb of me to ask when we’re already a mile up in the air, but I’m used to handling my own transportation."

"We may be a little overeager," Tedirv said, glancing at their crew, "but we’ll get you where you you’re going. I assume you’ve eaten."

"Luffa patted her stomach and smiled. "Just came from the galley. I would have come up to see you sooner, but those faeries make some fantastic sandwiches."

"Good, then I just need to give you this, and we’ll be all set."

Tedirv gestured to one of the crew, who ducked behind a console and returned with a large scythe. He handed it to his commanding officer, who then presented it to Luffa.

"The hell is this?" Luffa asked.

"The fae told me it was customary for their ancient warmasters to carry one of these when they rode into battle," Tedirv said. "You find that kind of tradition in a lot of cultures. One of my instructors at the academy owned a cavalry sabre that his great-great grandfather carried while he captained an aircraft carrier."

"Huh," Luffa said. She took the long handle and examined the craftsmanship. It was longer than she was tall, and the blade curved out from one end like a talon torn from the foot of some immense bird-of-prey.

"Queen Phenylal thought you should have it," Tedirv said, "since one of your ancestors would have held something similar on an old airship like this one."

"Huh... okay," Luffa said. Her eyes lit up as the weapon’s significance began to sink in. She planted the end of the scythe on the deck and struck a triumphant pose, looking up at the blade as if it were a strange metal flag.

"It suits you," called another voice. Luffa turned and saw M’ranga entering through the hatch from the deck below. Other than Luffa, she was the only non-Extraligan aboard. This would have made her conspicuous enough, but her tricolor costume only made her stand out even more.

"Still with us, Ensign?" Luffa asked jokingly. "There’s still time to head back if you want to go to Extraliga with the other prisoners."

She smiled and shook her head. "I’ve got comrades back on Wist," she said. "And when I left, there were plenty of good, honest people who need the services of Ensign Liberty. I’m betting that hasn’t changed."

"Glad to have you along," Luffa said. "But tone down the inspirational speeches, would you? I don’t want to make these clowns any rowdier than they already are."

M’ranga looked around at the crew and smiled warmly. "You’ve given these soldiers all the hope and confidence they need, Luffa," she said. "I doubt I could say anything to improve morale further."

"Approaching the terminus point," announced the pilot."

"Wormhole is scheduled to open in thirty seconds," said a man at a communications station.

"Full speed ahead," Tedirv commanded. "We’ll be an easy target until we clear the portal. Let’s make it as brief as we can."

"Aye, sir."

"Keep an eye on the aft sensors," Tedirv said. "I’ll want to know as soon as the portal closes behind us." They looked at Luffa expectantly. "Once that happens, I assume it will be safe to use your full strength."

"That’s the plan," Luffa said. She laid the scythe across her shoulders and draped her hands over the handle on either side. The blade hung down from one end on her left, and she stared at the forward viewscreen with relish.

"One question," M’ranga said. "Did the Extraligans all molt last night? I don’t remember you all having the same bright yellow crest-feathers."

Luffa glanced at her and raised her eyebrow. "You know, I was wondering about that myself, Ensign. How about it, Major?"

Tedirv shrugged. "We, er, had a little briefing last night. One of the sergeants asked the faeries for some dye, and well, one thing led to another..."

"Ah," Luffa said. She looked back at M’ranga. "Show of solidarity. Good luck before a big scrap. I like it."

"I see," M’ranga. She ran her hand through her own dark hair. "I wish someone had told me. I could have joined in."

"Yeah, that kind of bugs me too, come to think of it," Luffa said. "Major, I’m in charge of this little shindig. I hope you saved some dye for me."

There was a rumble of laughter on the bridge as Luffa glared at Tedirv.

"Begging the Federatrix’s pardon," Tedirv said, "but General Gordhowe informed me that you were already prepared on that matter."

The crew laughed again.

"Five seconds to Wist," announced the pilot.

"Well that’s just great," Luffa said in mock indignation. "We’re about to go into battle, and everyone in my unit’s got bright yellow scalps except me. All because of a communication breakdown in the brass! Typical army..."

"Ma’am, I’ll still marry you if it’s any consolation!" one of the men cried out.

"Passing through the wormhole now!" called the pilot.

"No, it’s okay," Luffa said. "I’ll just have to muddle through. She took a deep breath and tensed up.

"Clear of the portal! Wormhole is closed! Repeat, wormhole is closed."

Luffa tightened her grip on the scythe. Her eyes widened. "It’s okay, Major. It's not your fault."

She clenched her teeth and made a loud grunt, and suddenly she was engulfed in a gleaming, golden aura. M’ranga took a step back and nearly stumbled over. The bridge crew cheered in unison as her hair glowed in a shade of yellow very close to their own.

"I'll just have to make do on my own!" Luffa shouted.

NEXT: The Battle of Wist.

#dragon ball #fanfiction #super saiyan #luffa #zatte #keda #the shockmaster #kandai #calgon #kami #tedirv #m'ranga: ensign liberty #wist #extraliga #the f-tunnel #finally done with the f-tunnel #i didn't think i'd get sick of typing 'f-tunnel' but i thought the same thing about 'bigreen' and 'tikosi' so i'm not too surprised #time makes fools of us all #lssjluffafic

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