Hey, me again but you knew that. Sorry this one took a while, and I probably rushed it towards the end maybe. If so let me know and I'll do something about it. Anyway, I should probably quote some power levels here so you know who's stronger than who. Also, credit goes to Daige for Kin and Hiyori. Frankly, it was a bit difficult figuring out how to put them in but I did it also with his help (I'm assuming you're a guy) so yeah, credits.

Rikku(recovered)-4500

Naya-3470

Kin(At full power)-3200

Hiyori(At full power)-3000

Their power levels while injured should not be necessary, hopefully.

Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Ball Z but just you watch me. I will soon. Maybe. Possibly.

Chapter 3

Naya

"Owowowowow!"

Naya dug her knee into Rikku's back right behind the solar plexus, placed her hand on his shoulders and forcibly shoved his ribcage open again. The bronze skinned boy promptly fell over onto the rough brown bark of the tree branch they were on. He lay there taking his first deep breaths in a while, his bare chest heaving.

Naya had carried Rikku some distance from the battleground and then placed him up in this tree. It was to be their base while he rested. She'd picked somewhere high up just to be on the safe side. The fact that the branch they were on could easily have been a street was a solid plus and the massive leaves kept them well hidden. Of course, it meant everything had a green tinge because the light filtered through the leaves. With that in mind, Naya had cleared the leaves above them so proper sunlight and air could get in. Looking up, one could see the sun was setting.

She stood up and clapped. "Alright, turn over I want to see the back of your neck."

"No," he whined.

She ignored him and turned him over, checking his shoulders and neck to see if he was alright. She also compared the alignment of his neck with that of where his spinal cord was. She tapped him once and said, "There's nothing wrong with your neck, it was probably just turned too far when that Veridian hit you."

"Just turned too far she says," came Rikku's muffled voice. "Like something like that couldn't snap my neck and kill me."

She rolled him over roughly so he was facing upwards. "You were lucky he didn't break it."

"Anyway, you'll have to rest your arms for a bit," she continued. "Especially, the right one-"

Rikku gave a pained grin. "Your right or mine?"

"Do you want me to hit you?"

"No ma'am," he said quickly.

Naya paused, irritated. Then she sighed and stood up straight. The leaves she'd ripped out lay right next to the trunk in a kind of makeshift bed that she'd put together for them. On that bed lay Rikku's cracked armor, broken scouter and ripped shirt. She pointed at it like someone telling their pet to go fetch.

"Ok, so you can go rest now or whatever you want," she said. "I'll go get supper."

Rikku slowly, got himself onto his knees and then pushed himself up with the utmost care all the while wobbling dangerously. Almost immediately, he began trembling wildly, so much that his legs seemed to shoot out from under him and he fell back down on the branch with a hard thud. He groaned, then winced a bit as he accidentally moved his neck. Right after that, he turned it through the full range of motion.

"OW!"

"Shouldn't you wait a bit before you do that?" she asked, slightly concerned. "I could carry you to the bed."

"You have no idea how wrong that sounded just now," he responded, gritting his teeth through the pain. Even though he was hurting he sounded very much amused.

Naya blanched. "You know what, you do it yourself."

She turned away, still uncomfortable about letting him move on his own. Arguing with him over things like that would achieve nothing, because he was stubborn and he would do it anyway. Plus, if he couldn't handle it he would stop. "Ok then, I'm going to get some food. You just stay put."

She looked out at the surrounding forest, already formulating a hunting schedule.

"It's going to be such a hassle hauling everything up here," she muttered, rolling one shoulder. "Ok!"

Her aura burst to life as she gathered her energy and promptly took off at speed. As she flew through the forest, she thought up which creatures to go for as of now to get a good meal, preferably the gigantic ones- no telling how hungry that annoying boy was at this point. She boosted ahead. After about thirty minutes flying Naya spied two massive brown feathered birds resting quietly in a nest the size of an arena. She zoomed in and collided with them both feet first, knocking them clean off the branch. They squawked indignantly as they recovered themselves in mid-air and glared at her. She responded with a fierce blue energy wave that blew a hole through the breast of one bird, sending it crashing to the grassy forest floor. The other one made a move to fly away but she appeared in front of it and shot both eyes with two energy blasts. Flying wildly, it crashed into a tree trunk and fell to the ground.

Naya ripped a vine off a nearby branch and flew down to them, blowing a hole through the head of the unconscious one with another, more casual energy wave. As she began the arduous process of tying them up she wondered why Rikku had been so defensive during the fight with the Veridian. He was a lot better than that. He was an almost entirely offensive fighter and yet back there he'd been playing defense almost the whole time.

She sighed as she tied a knot. When would he ever get serious? Did she have to go and die or something to make him fight properly? Definitely, the opponent was strong and some sort of strategy was in order but that was ridiculous. Why was he like that? She'd seen him put up more of a fight against Vegeta, who was way stronger than that local. He had no idea how much that irritated her, this lack of fighting spirit, especially when it gave him unnecessary wounds. But she knew that, if and when it became necessary, he would come through. He tended to do that when things were really important. Not just that, but if she was being honest with herself, she knew why and that was why she wasn't giving him any grief about it. Of course, that didn't mean she had to like it.

Finished with trussing up the birds, she attached another vine to her makeshift harness and stood up. As she began to lift off with them, she was distracted by a loud whistling sound.

What in the hell?

She looked around for the source, scanning the forest around her. There was nothing. But she was sure she heard something, the sound of something flying overhead. And then she looked up to see a very familiar silhouette moving across the thick canopy above. She couldn't contain herself! This was easily the best luck ever and if her scouters readings were correct, these guys were going to be easy pickings.

She smiled.

There… is our way out!

Veridia, A Giant River

Grass waved as a large grey square, with glowing blue thrusters underneath it began to land. On what was presumably the front side was a clear glass window showing the interior while on the opposite side were more thrusters. It was very unimpressive as space craft go. As it got closer to the ground, three landing pads extended from under it, compressing slightly as the space craft put its weight on them.

A hidden door in the side opened up to reveal a silver haired boy, standing in it. He took a breath, appreciating the view he was offered. They were in front of a massive river, easily wide enough to be an ocean. The only reason he knew it was a river at all was that he saw it on the way down. The water was a lovely shade of blue, the air was fresh, the grass was green and, upon his stepping on it, soft.

He wandered around for a bit before coming to a stop at the water's edge. The boy was quite muscular though not big at all, with healthy fair skin, most of which was hidden beneath a light blue gi that was tied off with a belt the same shade of blue, and a white short sleeved shirt underneath that gi. He had on white trousers and blue boots the same shade as his gi. On his well-toned arms you could see blue wrist bands.

In the water, his feminine face rippled with the movements of the river. He really did look like a girl, with his small mouth, pug nose and slightly large black eyes. His silver hair was glossy and hung in over his forehead. It was long too and the back end stretched to his waist in a long shiny curtain, adding to his feminine look. That and the long black eyelashes erased any possibility of his face being recognized as that of a male. Kin Dura sighed when he saw his reflection in the water. He had had his fair share of comments on his face in his fourteen years of life.

"Is it safe out there?" a voice came from the door he had just left.

He turned back to look at the space ship and said, "Yeah. You can come out."

A girl stepped out of the doorway, dressed in a black tied off with a thin green belt. She wore no shirt underneath it, leaving her chest and arms bare which exposed a black necklace with a green magatama as a pendant. On her wrists were green wristbands. Her trousers were black, and she wore white socks with black boat shape shoes.

The girl herself was small and slender but with good muscle tone underneath her fair skin. Her black hair was straight and fell onto her small shoulders, hiding them from sight. The rest of it covered her head and then fell over her forehead in a series of bangs. She had large, soft black eyes ringed by long eyelashes that looked slightly green, a small cute little nose and an equally small mouth. She tended not to talk much.

Seeing her, Kin felt a wave of focus come over him. As his younger sister, Hiyori was his rock, his foundation. Ever since their parents died she has been the one holding things together while all he seemed to be good for was fighting. Sometimes, he felt so useless in front of her… but now was not the time. There were supposed to be two members of the Frieza Force here on a mission right now. Everywhere else, they'd been hanging about in massive armies and those few who did work alone exuded so much energy it was stupid to even consider taking them down. These two were supposed to be moderately strong, which meant this was their chance to find out who exactly this Lord Frieza was and where he could be found.

Kin turned in the direction of the large clearing they had flown past on the way here. That massive area had been severely worked over by someone and he was guessing that only Frieza's men would engage quite so recklessly. He gestured to Hiyori and took to the air, knowing instinctively that she would do the same. As they both traveled to the clearing, Kin could barely calm himself.

Right now, finally… it was time, to show that they would fight back with everything they had.

Shadow Grotto, Kaloa Tree

Sanza came to a stop in front of the massive Kaloa tree, and looked around the grotto with some amount of pleasure. Then he frowned when he remembered why he was here. His son had rushed off to defeat the enemy without listening to the rest of his statement. Ordinarily, that would be a bad thing but as there is god of death there must also be a god of life. Sanza knew that the threat would not be so easy to defeat and sent his son as a probe. It was probably because he of what he was about to do that his son had rushed off without much thought for the consequences of his actions, whether or not he was one of the only two warriors left capable of fighting. Honestly, this kind of thing inspired carelessness of the highest grade.

The Kaloa tree was easily the biggest on the planet and was the only tree with luminous leaves. Those glowing leaves filled the land with energy and were what kept Veridia so fertile, and this very same tree absorbed the life energy of the things that died. Created by the Erven and his mistress, the goddess of life the legends said and Sanza for one believed strongly in those legends. It was what led him to master control over the tree but something of this scale would take a very long time. A balance between death and life to create an eternal existence… that was what the Kaloa tree was all about. With proper mastery over one's own energy, the tree could also be influenced if the communicator attained the proper synergy.

Sanza stepped right up to the massive trunk of the Kaloa tree and sat cross legged before it. He rested his spear on his lap and placed his hands on top of it, then closed his eyes and began to regulate his energy. He felt for the consciousness of the tree, and then used that to find its energy. As always, the flow was massive and hard to follow. It was all too easy to get caught up in the torrent but Sanza had trained well and resisted the flow, instead directing it with his own energy.

In short, he wanted the tree to give and not take. He had sensed the disappearance of his son's energy and knew what had happened. He could not bring back everybody, especially if they were not on solid ground, not to mention the amount of time required.

Needless to say, he would be here a while.

Tree branch, Makeshift base, a month later

I flexed the fingers of my right hand, pleased when they didn't quiver or twitch unexpectedly. After a month, my body was finally moving the way I wanted it to and that made me extremely happy. It had been so annoying trying to do something and having my damaged limbs spasm or flop completely. Naya had been a boon right then, she did everything for me when I couldn't. Of course not everything exactly, I still bathed myself and dressed myself difficult as it was. There were simply some things one should do alone. How I did so shall remain my secret.

In my other hand was my blue shirt, ripped almost beyond use. I had also decided not to use my armour, mainly because it was completely broken now. The cracks the Veridian made ran a lot deeper than I had previously thought and the suit could no longer hold itself together. Damn thing was too restrictive anyway. Right now, I had a choice between a ripped nearly useless shirt and my bare chest. I figured I'd just go with the latter for now.

I was sitting on the very edge of our little tree branch swinging my feet aimlessly. I found myself remembering, Naya taking time to rehab me. It was a tedious month where I easily got frustrated with how physically lame my injuries made me. If it weren't for her, just as when we first met, I would be nowhere or probably crippled in some permanent way. The damage ran deeper than I had foreseen, the bruises on my chest and arms had faded but the wounds were mostly in my muscle. Constantly blocking the Veridians attacks and that body slam had beat them out of shape and made it difficult to move them correctly. And then there were the closed ribs… That was temporary and easily fixed but breathing had been so hard.

After I got far along enough, Naya took to sparring with me to get me back up to fighting condition. As always, she came through for me. I was going to have to pay her back in some way for this. This wasn't the first time she'd done so much for me… God I was so stupid! I punched the branch with my free hand, sending splinters flying, and leaving a fist shaped dent in it. I was surprised when I saw the indent smoking, the vapour wafting up into the air and fading away… I'd gotten stronger it seemed. I briefly considered checking my power level on the scouter back on our makeshift bed and dismissed the idea. Darn thing was broken anyway, smashed during my fight with the green furred Veridian. I remembered Vegeta mentioning something like this, something about Saiyans getting stronger every time they get severely injured to the point of near death. I was thanking my lucky stars that I was able to recover in just a month; I had a very strong constitution even for a Saiyan.

But does crippled qualify? I wondered, and then shrugged it off mentally. Whatever, you take what you get and you don't complain.

"Hey," Naya said, dropping down next to me with a smile. "You look preoccupied, anything I can help with?"

Her brown eyes shone good-naturedly.

I stopped looking at them. "No, not this time, this is for me to deal with. I've recovered nicely; you've done your part."

She stopped smiling, her eyes softening. I had no idea what she was thinking at that point, it could have been any number of things from several different times since we met.

Almost instantly, the smile came right back. "Ok then. We'll have to get going and finish the mission anyway."

She stood up and I found myself staring up at her. Where did this come from all of a sudden?

She stared at me expectantly. "Well? You had yesterday to rest up didn't you? There's no more reason to delay."

"Oh, right," I said hastily, standing up quickly. I threw the shirt aside and dusted the seat of my trousers off, removing splinters. She was right, there was no reason to delay. We needed to set a game plan and then proceed with the mission.

"You said you saw an attack pod that time a month ago, right?" I asked her.

She nodded. "Uh-huh, so it's safe to assume there's more. Frieza wouldn't send the best to get us meaning it's someone about our level or slightly higher but seeing as there's two of us, it's also safe to assume there's more than one of them. Relying on my scouter readings, they're slightly weaker than us. Perhaps, they chose different landing points to track us down faster."

I thought about this for a moment, considering our position in the Frieza Force in terms of strength. There was no flaw in her logic except that percentage allowed to chance that anything could happen and that Frieza's ideal strategy could be a lot different from what she thought. I mean, people about our level in the Frieza Force weren't very common.

"Ok, so we're screwing the mission and going after the pods then," I finally said.

Naya floated off the branch and turned back. "Sure, but the next battle is still mine regardless of the enemy. You're on break for a while, think of it as personnel resource management."

I smiled and followed her into the air. That cheeky little girl… but well I did say I needed her at full power. There was that chief out there and who knows how many other threats we would have to wade through. With Naya's destructive power, we'd be able to blow through all the small fry if any and do a tonne of damage to any enemy that got in the way. Worst case scenario, I back her up. It was good enough, considering we didn't know how much had changed in a month.

It was time to get moving. We flew off in the direction she saw the attack pod landing, west or so it was. As we travelled, I found myself thinking about Vegeta once again. Where was he now? What was he doing? I hadn't thought about him in ages. I mean, Naya and I may tease him a lot but he was kind of a big brother at this point. Remembering his strength and how he used to show it off back when we were new brought a smile to my lips. He used to bully Raditz a lot back then too, constantly making fun of him. Nappa had been our teacher those times, and he raised with us much care as he did his Saibamen and man did he love those Saibamen. Whenever he showed us new tricks and combat strategies, Vegeta would scoff and call it all farce saying that the only thing that mattered was ability. Then he'd challenge us and, being a natural elite, pound us into the ground with minimal effort. I missed the time when things were like that, minus the beatings of course. We used to have so much fun, then Vegeta kind of closed himself off after a while. Raditz died on a mission no one was willing to tell us about as yet and Nappa was suddenly too busy to spar with us anymore. It quickly got boring in the Frieza Force but Naya and I had nowhere else to go, assuming you could even leave the force. That and, dysfunctional as we were, Vegeta and the others were our family. There were no other Saiyans and even if there were, none had ever done anything remotely close to what Vegeta and Napa had done for us. They were irreplaceable in my eyes. Admittedly, I was suspicious of Vegeta when we got this mission but I had no real idea what he was doing. I just knew he was hiding something and that was it.

"I see it," Naya announced.

Once I was finally paying attention, I did notice a giant crater dwarfed by the massive surrounding trees with an attack pod in it. The door on the attack pod was closed and seemed just as weathered as the shell, indicating the owner hadn't reopened it in a while, possibly, the whole a month I was crippled. Which meant they were probably on a do or die mission, whether the mission was to annihilate us or check on us or something else entirely I didn't know but one thing was clear: It was important to someone who had a lot of pull in the Frieza Force. We landed on the edge of the crater, and I stepped forward.

"I'll check if it's online," I said, sliding down the side.

"And I'll keep guard here," Naya replied.

"Not like you have much of a choice you know," I called back as I stepped up to the pod.

She snorted and ignored me.

I looked over the pod, stepping around it carefully. The exterior seemed dirty, but that was it; just dirt. It looked very much in good condition. I knocked the side, and listened to the echo; no structure weaknesses either. This pod was good to go.

I circled back in front and placed a palm against the door. The thing did not move. I swore.

"What?" Naya asked.

"This is one of the newer ones," I explained, stepping back. "Each time you go on a mission they register it with your DNA so only you can open it, then when you get back they wipe it for someone else."

She swore.

"Whoa there with the swearing, when you do it after I do it, it makes it look excessive."

She sighed. "Let's just get a move on."

"It's not too big an issue," I said, taking to the air. "If we find these guys and slice up the relevant body parts we can still get out of here. It just means we have to take care not to destroy them utterly."

"Easy for you to say," she said with a frown, folding her arms and joining me in the air.

"I could do it for you," I offered.

"No, I said you're on break," she responded. "I'll handle it myself."

I gave a defeated smirk. "Well, I did offer."

She smiled at me. "Well, you know me. Once I choose to do something I go through with it, all things being equal."

"Indeed, I do," I said with a shrug. "I know you're not unreasonable, as long as you can take care of yourself I'm fine with whatever choice you make."

Naya took a deep breath, unfolding her arms as she did so. "Just have to be a little gentler, not that hard."

I found myself smiling slyly. "Right."

She turned to glare at me. "You're not helping."

"I know."

"I hate you."

"I know that too."

She snorted, looked away and said, "I will not let you goad me again, c'mon let's go."

I noted the amusement in her voice and allowed myself an inward smile. Mission Accomplished.

A loud boom rocked the trees around us and a massive bright glow shone between the trunks of the trees around the crater. Naya's scouter beeped as it desperately tried to measure the energy and then blew up in her face when it got too high for it. We both whirled to face the direction in which the noise came from, tense and ready to counter any surprise attack. Naya wiped the soot off her left eye with one arm, unhurt by the scouter explosion.

After several seconds, nothing came at us and we both relaxed just a little.

"I wonder what that was," I said. "It looked immensely powerful. That blast was incredible."

"I'm wondering if it has anything to do with the Chief," Naya said. "Or the soldiers sent here, dammit without my scouter I got nothing."

"I think we may have to check it out," I pointed out. "Unfortunately, we're pretty out of the loop right now."

"I know," Naya responded, powering up. "Let's go!"

She zoomed away, leaving a blue trail of energy. I quickly did the same and burst after her. What was the source of that explosion of energy? Who was possibly that powerful here right now? I had a feeling that the answers to those questions were not anything I could possibly conceive. I'd only ever seen one person exhibit such strength…

…Frieza.

Decimated Forest

Kin stared in horror, at the massive damage before him. Merely by unleashing his strength the opponent had leveled a section of forest miles wide, all just to kill him and his sister. Had he not flown up at the speed he did and grabbed Hiyori, he and his sister would have been just like the scenery… wasted. What kind of monstrous, unnecessary strength was this?! And he could sense energy, so he was well aware of the fact that that wasn't even the half of it, or even the one tenth. This guy… no this thing had a tonne more where that came from.

Where there were once giant trees there was nothing but barren wasteland and crumbling rock. Ash floated on the breeze that was now free to pass where it was once blocked by the massive trunks and drape like leaves. In the middle of the mess, a single humanoid silhouette stood casually, cloak billowing in the wind. Next to him, Hiyori squinted in an effort to catch a glimpse. So far, they had no visual on their attacker so fast had he moved. The assailant pointed his index finger in their general direction.

Kin's eyes widened in fear. "Hiyori, run!"

He grabbed his sister and took off with such force he kicked up pieces of the ground, blazing through the air in a white flaming aura. He put on a burst of energy and increased his speed, but he was too late. A hail storm of energy blasts rained down around him as he flew, trying his very best to get away. He dodged them all, brushing dangerously close to several of them and trying to keep his sister out of the line of fire. It was like flying in a heat wave. The heat and force behind each ball was evident in the explosions they made on collision with the scant surroundings. He got caught in several explosions whenever he got too close to an impact zone but he blazed through the pain, keeping his mind focused on one goal : Run away. Inevitably, he started to wear down as the high speed attack was too much and in what felt like several minutes, but was really only a few seconds, Kin was blasted to the ground along with his sister. Their bodies steamed dangerously and their eyes were whited out.

Above, the sky began to darken as thunderheads began to form. The figure walked with the impeding darkness, cloak billowing in the rapidly growing wind. It was time to deal with the trash, no one could interfere with the test. The two Saiyans were not to be touched by anyone for any reason. It stood over the bodies and lifted a hand. A bright yellow ball of energy formed in its palm, its brightness indicating the concentration of power in the innocent looking thing. These two would die here.

The sound of two people in flight made the figure pause.

If I do this now, they'll get caught up in it too.

It shook its head. Well, when I finally test them I can just kill these two off later. I want no distractions.

The figure hidden in ash let the energy fade away and turned to the source of the noise in a lazy manner. It was time to go and continue watching from the shadows. The figure blurred… and was gone.

Rikku

I landed somewhere in the middle of a rocky wasteland and whistled in surprise. This was worrying. For miles there was nothing but rock and dirt mixed with ash and dust, all of which swirled together in a gritty cocktail on the wind. Visibility was horrible, and there were absolutely no trees at all. For a planet as rich as this one in fertile plant life, that was a first. No, this was done by somebody or something and from the looks of it, they were powerful. At the very least, Frieza level. And where were our scouters right when we needed them?! Oh right, they were broken! It was enough to make me swear again if not for the bad weather.

Somewhere behind me I heard Naya land too. This would have been so amazing if it weren't so terrifying… was it the Chief? Or was it something else on this planet? Maybe we really were sent here to be killed, possibly by whoever or whatever did this. I lifted one hand to shield my face, frowning at the grim thought and squinting my eyes against the particle infested wind. I began to walk through the mess, taking time to examine the area. Most of the damage seemed rough and uneven, possibly caused by explosive force which would explain why we felt it and saw it from so far away. I reached a point where the wasteland seemed to narrow down a lot more, the line looked only to be about sixty feet wide as compared to the five mile wide circle we'd flown across to reach this point.

Behind me, I noticed Naya crouched some distance away picking at a rock and eyeing it with some amount of distress when it crumbled all too easily. I looked back at the end of my little passage to see two bodies lying entangled in each other. What was I saying, the trough was like a dried up river path. Both bodies were releasing disturbing amounts of smoke and upon inspection both were barely alive.

"Naya!" I called out over the wind. "I've found two dead guys here."

She stopped examining her rock and flew over to me. She paused immediately, "Whoa, whoa, whoa whoa, whoa!"

"I know," I said. "They're barely alive."

She gave me an expressionless look. "You said they were dead."

I shrugged. "Might as well be."

"Well, they look foreign to this planet unless we missed something when we started killing the natives," Naya said thoughtfully, turning back to the bodies. "They most likely have a spaceship that they came here with. If we nurse them back to health, perhaps we can hitch a ride with them."

"Or we could search them for any necessary information to pilot their spaceship such as passwords and whatnot and leave them here to die," I offered. "We don't have any medical supplies you know."

Naya pointed at the bodies. "Are you seeing any pockets, 'cause I'm not."

I sighed. "I just don't want the extra weight. If they slow us down I'm totally killing them."

"Sure," Naya replied and picked up one of them one handed, then slung the person over her shoulder.

I picked up one too and did the same. "Alright, let's go."

With that we rose up and headed back to base.

Veridia, Destroyed Clearing

Shadah sat up with a gasp, eyes roving over the area looking for the armored boy. He blinked repeatedly, confused as to why the boy wasn't there and why the clearing was so messed up. He forced himself easily to his feet, his body fresh and unhurt. His fur however, was a patchwork of clean green fur and dirty dark green fur. He needed a bath. Looking around, it was morning and gentle sunlight shone down on the clearing. It was very peaceful.

Impaled! The energy blew a hole in his chest and continued to blaze right through him. Spitting up blood and falling the instant the beam was cut off! Pain! Darkness! But in the middle of that darkness, the stranger in the cracked armor…

That was right! He had died at the hands of that boy, refusing to give up where the rest of his people were hidden. He'd even used his second form and he still died against the enemy. Shadah looked at his dirty hands and clenched his fists in anger, the memory of losing so horribly was strong in his mind. He had to get revenge not just for his people but for himself, for his own peace of mind.

"Ah, Shadah," a voice called out.

Shadah looked to his left to see a small maroon furred Veridian, a child clearly, smiling at him with sharp teeth and glowing eyes. The child was sitting on the tree the armored boy had brought down in a very lazy manner. Shadah blinked in confusion.

Why's he looking at me all creepy-like?

On seeing his clueless look, the child burst into laughter and said, "Everyone's heading for the Chief now, in the Shadow Grotto. I was sent to get you by the Chief himself."

"So father has a plan now?" Shadah asked.

"I think so," the child said, waving a hand nonchalantly. "To be honest, I'm only here now because I was told I would get meat if I came to get you. Everyone else was too scared to come this way, the other kids I mean."

Shadah nodded. "Let's go then."

The child leaped into the surrounding forest and Shadah followed after him. They leaped and jumped through the treetops with the practiced ease of all Veridians, covering the massive distance easily. As they traveled Shadah, thought once again about the two strangers, wondering how exactly one so weak was able to crush him who was much stronger. He had his techniques, his power but all of it wasn't enough. How did he lose? Was it luck? No, Shadah realized, it was the fact that his opponent was always one step ahead of him. The boy knew what he was doing and he knew how to handle each and every move Shadah was capable of. When he saw Shadah's true strength he simply made Shadah waste it to the point where Shadah was easy pickings. In earnest, the boy fought him very well.

They stopped some hours into the trip to pick up some giant fruits to eat. These fruits were Gourlug, ridiculously large round yellow lumps of juicy tangy goodness. He shared one with the child and they were on their way again, Shadah once again enveloped in his thoughts. If he was going to beat that guy, he needed to think and plan very intricately how he was going to deal with his techniques. That was how the boy beat him and so now that was how he would beat the boy.

Next to him, the child began singing, "Meat, meat, meat is the best. I love meat and so do you…"

Shadah found himself smiling as they sailed through the treetops together. Little children had few worries, but he was the son of the chief and the second strongest on this planet, he had too much weight on his shoulders to have fun like them, especially since everyone saw him as average, nothing special as compared to his father.

By evening, they reached the Shadow Grotto. The place was crowded with several Veridians, old and young, all bathed in the light from the Kaloa Tree's luminous leaves. The crowd whispered as he and the boy landed in their midst. Things like "Ah, it's Shadah", "Hmmm, he failed us", "Why is he so much weaker than his father?"

Shadah hung his head in shame. If they knew the kind of strength gap he'd had over the enemy, the insults would be overwhelming. He found himself praying that his father wanted private council just so no one else got to hear what he had to say about his battle. The crowd made a path for him, that extended farther ahead to the base of the tree where his father sat cross legged, bathing in the light of the Kaloa trees leaves. Shadah made his way towards his father walking with care so as not to trip on any extended feet.

When he got to the red furred chief, the path closed up again. All conversations had ceased so they could listen to what the Chief and Shadah would say to each other.

Shadah grimaced. So no private council then…

"Did you see what it was that was destroying our villages?" Sanza asked his son, eyes closed in meditation.

The chief looked tired and hungry, all signs of how long he had sat here with the tree.

"How many did you bring back?" Shadah blurted out.

His father bared his teeth in irritation. "That is not what I asked you boy!"

Shadah knew that his father's patience was not to be tested, especially when most of it had been spent on another task. The thing to do was to simply answer the questions and follow the orders, asking him that question now of all times had been stupid, mostly because the outcome would not change, the threat would not be dealt with and his father clearly did not have the time to deal with pointless questions. It was the dumb things like this that he did that made the villagers hate him. He could hear the whispers, "That inconsiderate boy. Doesn't he know his father is at his limit?"

And it was true, Sanza looked like he was going to keel over any second.

Shadah bowed, trying to ignore the pain he felt. "Sorry father. They were two people clad in armor with furry tails. They didn't have any fur except on their heads and their tails. They were good enough to take me in my first form but…"

Shadah paused, unable to say it.

Sanza raised an eyebrow. "But?"

"But when I transformed, I was many times stronger than they were," Shadah continued. He was struggling to bring himself to say it but he did. Now was not the time for this.

"Then why did you die?" Sanza asked.

"He was simply a better fighter than I was," Shadah admitted. "He seemed to know the answer to everything I came up with, every trick, every attack. I think only you can handle him."

Sanza frowned once again. "I'm in no condition to fight on that kind of level as I am now."

He paused. "Perhaps, if I transform it should make it easier on me to fight. With that kind of advantage I'd be able to do it, I think."

Everyone was listening to the Chief's quiet musings.

Sanza uncrossed his legs and stood up. "Alright, we'll all go. All warriors prepare your selves. We leave the day after tomorrow. I need to rest and recover just a bit. Gatherers, bring us food!"

Everyone cheered and scattered to do their various jobs. They would be eliminating the enemy once and for all. As for finding them, that would be no issue, after all they owned this planet.

Unknown

Standing high up in the shadows deep in the branches of the Kaloa tree, a place where the light of the leaves failed to penetrate, a dark hollow, he stood listening with some amount of worry. He was unsure the Saiyans could stand up to something of this scale, especially when they barely beat the green one alone. Maybe now was the time to make his move and test them, to see if they were worthy. Then he could transport them back to Frieza on that planet he was on right now, the one where he was searching for the dragon balls or something. Time was of the essence, as it was he felt they would be missing something important if they delayed anymore, something essential to their growth as warriors.

Yes, perhaps now was the time to leave the shadows…

Tree Branch, Makeshift base, the next morning

Once again, I was sitting on the edge of the branch swinging my feet aimlessly while the morning light shone in from the whole in the leaves above us. Naya was next to the leaf bed tending to the newcomers. They'd made an impressive recovery, as thank fully there was no trauma or anything it was mostly just energy burns. Whoever attacked them was holding back and that was really the only reason they were still alive. They were still unconscious however but we didn't have time to waste on waiting for them to wake up. We'd eventually decided that if they didn't wake up by afternoon we would just leave them here and take our chances with looking for the other soldiers of Frieza.

As I was contemplating the best way to search for the soldiers if it became necessary, it came to my notice that one of the people we'd rescued was right behind me. I froze.

"I see you're very observant even though you don't seem to know how to sense energy," the person said.

I remained frozen, keeping my voice calm and even. "There's just something very disturbing to me when the air stops flowing behind my back and I hear breathing behind me. I can tell you're standing, slightly off to the side because you're supporting yourself. I can roughly pinpoint where your head is. I don't want to knock you out so could you back off?"

"Can you tell that I also have a hand close to your head?" came the reply. "I could blow your head off before you made a move."

I didn't bother to argue because I could feel it, there were just some things you knew and I knew I could handle this guy before he ever got his chance. So I sighed instead.

"Rikku don't knock him out," Naya's voice rang out.

I felt my attacker turn and instantly shot to my feet and kicked him in the back of both knees. The second he hit the branch I had him in a choke hold. Now that I was turned around, I could see Naya dangling the other one by the ankle with one arm.

"She tried to choke me out," Naya explained.

Now that they weren't smoking quite so profusely I could finally see their features clearly. The one I currently had at my mercy had silver hair, he was dressed in a blue loose looking shirt, another shirt white this time, white baggy trousers, and blue boots. His hair was silver. He looked pretty strong too, judging by the muscle tone. Were he not so injured he might have been able to handle me, maybe. Probably.

Naya was holding up a girl dressed in a black kind of loose shirt, tied off with a green band at the middle by one leg. It seemed to be a one piece thing unlike the boy's which came in separate pieces. She wore some flat soled shoes with white socks. Her hair was shorter than the boys and was black. Both of them were very obviously younger than us, the height and the looks were a dead giveaway.

"Ok smiley," I began, bending down to closer to his ear. "What's your name?"

"Kin," he responded. "Kin Dura."

"Are you lying?" I asked with a dangerous smile.

"No reason to," he responded. "We have no one to protect from you seeing as you already took them away."

I looked at Naya, slightly confused. Did we kill anyone related to these two somewhere?

Naya looked as lost as I was. The girl in her left hand was very silent, eyes watching for a chance. Possibly, she'd seen how much stronger Naya was than her and was unwilling to make any strange moves. Even with so many holes in her defense, Naya was dangerous and this girl recognized that.

"Have we met before?" I asked him.

"No," he growled. "But your army, your comrades, your Frieza Force did the job. In other words, your Lord Frieza took my family and I plan to kill him too."

"Oh so you want to kill Frieza," I said, making sure to keep my grip firmly around his neck, just enough so he knew I could tighten it at any time. To be honest, that wasn't very surprising.

Naya also looked unsurprised by this revelation and let the girl she was holding drop. Immediately, the girl caught herself with her hands and sprang away from Naya coming up with her guard up. The boy I was holding also stomped on my right foot and leaped away. Or at least he tried to, what happened was I moved my foot and let him go. He stood right next to his partner, both of them in stances that were foreign to me however I didn't pay much attention to that.

"If it's Frieza you want, you can help us out then," I offered, casually spreading my arms in a noncommittal way.

They both looked very confused. "Huh?"

"You don't seem very respectful of your leader," Kin said, tensing up. "Or loyal for that matter."

"Except when we're in the presence of him or his generals," Naya said. "Very few soldiers actually like him, you know? It's mostly join the strong or be crushed for most. The rest are actually pretty dangerous guys who get off on making people weaker than they are suffer."

"Oh and you guys happen to be the good Samaritans who fall into neither group?" Kin retorted, shifting his stance a little.

I sighed. "I'm not a good Samaritan, dumbass. What I'm saying is you help us get back and you get to see Frieza, we won't stop you or snitch you, mostly because I can't be bothered but hey."

Kin Dura blinked. "What? That's literally a typical 'I will look the other way if it's you gig'"

"Listen idiot," Naya interrupted, tapping the ground with the tips of her toes. "What we mean is we really don't care what you want to do with Frieza, mainly because we have other interests yeah? So are you going to help or not?"

I pointed at them lazily. "Oh, and you could you stop with the stances? We're more than capable of beating you senseless and could have done so ages ago."

Kin and his partner both started and cautiously stood up straight, then he paused to think about what we were saying eyeing us the entire time. He said we were the good Samaritans that fell into neither group. Ha! We did fall into neither group but we had our own reasons for being in the Frieza Force: We were there because the last Saiyans were there. We were there because Vegeta was there and he was our Prince, our big bro. That's all there was to it. We had no one and nothing except for him and Nappa. If Vegeta were to go against Frieza, as long as the reason was plausible, we would back him up. We were loyal to Vegeta, not Frieza.

"How do you have interests outside of your very own leader?" Kin demanded. "You honestly expect me to believe that?"

I closed my eyes in exasperation. "Well, you're not dead yet are you?"

I heard his breath catch.

"If, as you say, your family was taken from you by the Frieza Force it was most likely a purge to sell your planet," I said. "As to whether it failed or succeeded does not matter because what it means is that by the Frieza Force's reckoning you should be dead. If we were really interested in carrying out Frieza's will, the moment you admitted that we should have killed you two rather than ask you for help."

I opened my eyes to look calmly at his stunned face, his black eyes wide with surprise. Clearly, he hadn't thought of it that way.

"M-m-m-m-m-m, maybe you had some kind of plan in place to stop us from killing Frieza while we helped you," he stammered, sweating a bit.

"I admit that is a viable thought," Naya said, squatting to rest on her heels. "But you said something about sensing energy which means that you can tell how much energy we give off compared to you guys. Take a look then and tell me…"

She looked at them, her brown eyes suddenly very cold. "Do we need any such thing?"

Kin looked down, unable to meet her gaze. "No."

Her eyes immediately reverted to their normal look. She stood up straight and flicked her feet a few times.

"Good, so could you help us out?" she asked.

"I suppose it depends on what you need help with," Kin said.

"Oh, it's simple we just need a ride back to Outpost 244," Naya said. "Our pods are useless right now."

I shifted my weight from foot to foot, waiting for a response.

Kin paused and looked at his partner, who nodded.

"I suppose we could do that for you so long as nothing comes of it," he said.

"Don't worry," I said. "Anyone who tries to kill you will be destroyed instantly by Naya and me."

"That's not very encouraging."

"Right, let's get a move on then," I said, rolling my shoulders and taking a deep breath.

Kin looked surprised. "What? Now?"

"Why not?" Naya cut in. "You aren't so hurt you can't fly a ship are you? Plus, you have us for any heavy lifting. Not only that, there are no medical supplies here of any use if your wounds worsen. Either way, we would have had to go once you woke up."

He looked taken aback for several seconds, surprised by the ease and speed with which we were asking them to move .Kin frowned and looked at his partner who nodded.

They extended their hands to us.

"Fine, a proper introduction then," Kin said. "I'm Kin Dura and this is my sister, Hiyori Reza. It's nice to meet you."

What is he five? We already know his name, formalities are useless here.

Naya and I both walked over and shook their hands. "Naya Kirisame and Rikku Akazaru, nice to meet you too."

"Can't believe you said that last part," I muttered, placing my hands in my pockets.

"It's good to relate to people the way they relate to you," Naya responded.

She turned back to them. "So I'm guessing you know how to use energy from your failed assault just now, so can you guys fly?"

Both of them looked embarrassed about Naya's straightforward speech but they bore it well.

"Yes, we can," Kin answered, cheeks slightly pink. His sister looked no better.

"Alright then, let's go," Naya said, floating up.

We all joined her in the air and faced each other in a big circle. Kin who looked nervous, to Hiyori who looked wary and Naya who looked optimistic. Me? I was just glad after all, it had been so long and I was sick of this place.

Finally, we were leaving this dump.

AN: Oooooh, looks like leaving Veridia might not be as easy as it looks huh? Anyway, please review. As usual, let me know if there are any problems and please, NO GUEST REVIEWS cause I can't respond. I'm making it a point to answer every review so please do so. Imma drop it here, until the next one.