An unexpected move
After a ravaging battle, the dust was now slowly settling on the small planet Layrilia. Among the rubble, the young Gine was sound asleep. The moon projection had lasted for days but as soon as it had disappeared,
it's effects had worn off and all six Saiyans had shrunk back to their normal form. They had gone rampant across the entire planet, destroying all its lifeforms. Ofcourse that had taken up a lot of energy, which meant that they all passed out soon after.
Slowly but surely Gine regained consciousness. She opened her eyes carefully, and as she adjusted to the sunglight, she could see the damage they had done.
All around her bodies were scattered across the ground. Buildings were reduced to nothing more than piles of stone. Except for a few smaller houses and one big tower right in front of her that had caught her attention. Did she really just see a small flickering of light inside ? Gine got up to investigate, hoovering a little above the ground to spare her injured leg. As she got closer, it became clear that the tower was just barely still standing. Large chunks of the outside walls had seemingly been ripped out. Again, something blinked near the entrance. This time Gine was sure she had seen it. It was dim, but it was there. Something was there. For a second she halted and started doubting. What if it was something dangerous...? But that was almost impossible, since the chance something or someone could have survived their siege was small.
"It might be one of the others..." she tried reassuring herself and went on.
Getting closer, Gine could see that it wasn't 'something' that was causing the flickering. It was someone. "Someone actually survived our attack...?" she thought to herself.
The figure must have seen Gine closing in, because the flickering had suddenly stopped. A shadow quickly retreated back inside the tower, to the safety of darkness.
"Hey..." Gine whispered, "Don't go away...I won't hurt you..."
The figure returned. Gine moved into the tower now too and she could barely make out the posture of a child. It had to be, since it seemed rather small.
"Don't be scared, please...Let me help you..."
"G-go away, Saiyan !" a high pitched voice squeaked. "You hurt my family, you big ugly monkey !"
"I'm not like the other Saiyans. I promise...Where is your family ?"
"I...I don't know..." the child murmered. "I haven't seen them since this morning, when you Saiyans attacked them..." he went on, still trembling in fear. "But you...You do sound different..."
"I am..." she tried reassuring him. "My name is Gine. What's yours ?"
"I am Tartar..."
"Hello Tartar, now..." Gine held out her hand. "Would you step into the light so I can see you ?"
This time the little alien didn't hesitate that long. He took a step into the sunlight, finally showing himself to Gine. He was small ofcourse, with pink scaled skin and light green hair. You could say he looked like some kind of large pink, scaled frog. He wore a necklace with a green gem, which must have caused the reflection of the light.
"Good !" Gine smiled. "Now that I've seen you, I'll help you look for your family if you want." She had figured that a child like him shouldn't be all by himself in such a dangerous place. Even if they didn't find any survivors, she'd figure out a way to help him.
"Why, that would be very nice of you... You are not like the others Saiyans at all, lady !"
" I know," Gine sighed. She remembered how this was probably gonna cost her when the others would find out. "Now where did you last see your family ?"
"Near this building actually. We used to live at the top of the tower !" Tartar squeaked, pointing at the sky.
"Well...I guess it couldn't hurt if we went to have a look, I can fly you up there." The Saiyan held out her arms. Tartar didn't hesitate and jumped into them.
But before she could even take off, someone jumped at her. "Let go of that child ! "
Before she knew it, someone hit Gine hard in her side and she was knocked to the ground. Tartar fell too and rolled over the ground. He ended up against a rock, unconscious. The Saiyan in her turn was used to such hard impacts and almost instantly got up again, but her wounded leg bothered her. The pain made her sink to her knees and the hand she used to grab her wound was covered in blood.
Groaning in pain, she looked up at her attacker. Standing before her was what could have been an adult version of Tartar, only this one was darker in color and had no hair at all. He was also pretty muscular which made him look threatening. Wanting to send out a distress call, Gine reached for her ear. But her attacker seemed to have read her mind because he came closer, holding a device in his hand that ressembled Gine's scouter closely.
"Looking for this ?" he asked with an evil grin on his face. "I'm afraid you lost it in battle, right before you transformed. I picked it up just a few hours ago, and look ! It got me back to you ! I am Mayo and I'll make you regret that you ever came to this planet in the first place !"
As he started studying the object, it started bleeping. Gine knew what that meant. Someone was coming.
"You're in trouble now..." She tried scaring him, but clearly in vain. Mayo lowered himself to the ground and crawled over, coming uncomfortably close. In fact he was so close, their noses almost touched.
"Well then...Why not make the most of our time together..." he almost growled as he suddenly pulled her hair and sniffed it. Gine groaned in pain. "Mmmm...You are quite the beauty for a Saiyan...I wonder if our species can crossbreed..." Realising what he wanted to do, even if it was a little late, Gine started kicking at him right when he grabbed her ankles. Not to her surprise, he was even stronger then the others of his species she had fought, and easily overpowered her. In blind panic, she struggled and wriggled like an eel to get free. But to no avail. It didn't even seem to bother him. She banged her fists against his shoulder but even then he just went on pulling the edge of her armour.
The frightened Saiyan never stopped fighting, but closed her eyes in fear none the less. Not wanting to see what he was about to do and in a way, accepting her 'fate'. She could feel his breath on her skin, when suddenly she heard a faint thud in the distance. An all too familiar voice sounded. "Let go of her !" Surprised as she was, Gine opened her eyes and saw her violator standing up again, facing the other way. Standing in front of him was Bardock.
"And who's this ? Your spouse ?" the hideous creature hissed. "Don't worry pal, you can have her back once I'm done with her..." He attempted to turn back to Gine but was stopped by a hand on his shoulder.
"You should have died like the rest of your kind, when you had the chance. Now it's gonna hurt !" With those words Bardock took hold of the alien's arm and just flung him against the rocks as if it was nothing. "No one messes with my crewmembers and gets away with it !" Not wasting a second,the captain followed his victim and started punching and kicking, visually doing great deals of damage everytime he managed to land a blow. " Mayo tried defending himself but was clearly the weaker one in this fight. It wasn't hard to see why Bardock had the upper hand here. Even Gine, who was quick on her feet, had a hard time following Bardock's movements. It seemed he was going all out, moving as fast as he could to not give his opponent a chance to strike back. One minute he was punching, kicking, elbowing, and the next he was tossing Mayo around like a ragdoll. Moments later he took the heavily wounded creature into the sky, his hands each on the other side of Mayo's head. "Time to say goodbye !" Bardock yelled, but as he wanted to snap Mayo's neck, the latter one's body started to light up as he screamed and squealed : "You won't win !"
The second Gine knew what was going to happen, time seemed to slow down. Bardock's eyes widened as he realised it too and he barely had the time to let go of Mayo, dive towards Gine and yell "GINE ! HIDE !" .He grabbed her right at the moment Mayo self-destructed. The impact blew them both against the rocks and everything around them seemed to light up. Moments later Gine felt a sharp pain at the top of her head. The last thing she heard was Bardock attempting to keep her conscious before the world around her fell away and evertyhing went dark.