Of Ladyfingers and Radishes by `InSaNe`/Schizophrenic Eggplant.
A/N: This was originally started over a year ago as a story involving my friend Silke developing a major crush on a certain Saiyajin in DBZ. It's not Vegeta though, (he's mine). If you guessed Kakarot, you're close, but not quite there. My friend came up with the character Okura. She belongs to Silke and I am only borrowing her. I don't own DBZ blah.
Chapter Two.
Fifteen minutes later, the novelty of solo space-flight was slowly wearing off. There was nothing but an endless blanket of stars. Some of the supernova's looked really cool though, their bright colours of exploded stars in suspended animation. Her radar screen beeped an alert, and a green blip showed up on the perimeter.
"Green is for us, red is enemy." She recited. The blip grew nearer, and the numbers showing the distance decreased to the level at which it was almost next to her. Next thing, her scouter beeped, indicating an incoming transmission. She clicked the button on the side to receive the message.
"3rd class recruit Okura." She responded.
"Ahh, yes, the fresh meat." A rough voice intoned. Okura raised an eyebrow. She didn't know whether to be intimidated or angry.
"Heh heh don't worry, all of us are expendable. I just want to make you feel part of the team. I'm 3rd class Squad Leader G'Noth." The gruff voice had a somewhat friendlier tinge to it. Whether or not it was in response to her young little girls voice, she didn't know.
"Um.. OK. So where are the others, Squad Leader G'Noth?" She asked.
"They shouldn't be too long, kid. I can already see them on long range. Hey, just call me G'Noth. I've given up on formalities… soldiers come and soldiers go. I'm just the lucky one I guess. So this is your debut mission?"
"Yes… yes, it is, G'Noth." Okura replied.
"Ahh… I remember back to my first mission. Six years seems like a long time in this army."
"Six? Didn't you go up after five?"
"No… I lost the promotion tournament. My ki level and kill count was too low to be automatically promoted. I'm Squad Leader by experience only. Luck and I guess a quick mind has saved me quite a few times now. Heh heh. Oh look. Here come the others."
G'Noth opened up a multilink channel on the scouters.
"Are we all here?"
"Yes G'Noth!" Yelled one.
"Present, Squad Leader!"
"Call me G'Noth. Ok, that's four of us. For those who don't know procedures, sleeping vapour will enter your pod in a couple of minutes. We'll be in stasis for about three days, and wake up about two hours before we land. I will relay the battle plans then. For now, its lights out! Sweet dreams," Okura's scouter clicked as the transmission ended, and she heard the hiss of a gas escaping into the pod. Before she could pinpoint where it was coming from, she was fast asleep.
Dreams are strange things. To children, they almost seem real, like a surreal, interactive storybook. To a child in stasis sleep, the subconscious hallucinations are a secondary reality, barely to be remembered on wake-up, but real as it is happening. Okura was no exception to this rule. Because she felt no closure before the sleep chemicals did their work, her visions were unsettled. This was her maiden voyage, an uncertain, open-ended part of the tale called life, equivocal to the aftermath of a job interview, or an undecided answer to a marriage proposal – not that she would know of such things, but it's just a comparison. It was unsettling, and her dreams offered her no escape. If anything, her core reacted severely to the frightening images that appeared in the ether.
Brown fur. Suffocating, warm, soft fur surrounded her. The texture called to her – so coarse, yet so smooth. The smell… something indescribable, but so familiar. A scent of… home? No.
The fur tore away from her, as if offended by that thought, her warm secure blanket floating away, becoming smaller, and assumed a shape…
Razor sharp fangs sliced the air, and two identical flashes of red accompanied the glistening incisors, canines, premolars and molars of this beast with an incredibly furry pelt. She'd never seen anything like it before. Her first reaction was to assume a fighting stance. Until further notice, it was an enemy.
'Do not be frightened.' A voice from inside her head spoke. It wasn't hers, it sounded older. The huge, hairy being turned around, and ran from her as only huge, hairy creatures can run. Okura chased after it, hypnotised by its tail. The tail definitely brought her recollection around. She ran faster and faster, trying to catch it up, entranced by the freely waving tail. A brown, furry tail. The faster she ran, the longer distance the huge beast seemed to gain, until it was just a moving shadow, only the tail was visible. She followed the tail for all she was worth, not stopping for anything. It was like she could run forever, and that is what she believed she was doing. In her field of vision, she noticed the shape becoming smaller, more compact, changing noticeably. It slowed down, allowing her to catch up.
It was a man. A tall man with long, spiky hair, and covered in muscle. A Saiyajin man. A dirty Saiyajin man was in her dream. Why?
Was there any reason for him to pollute her dreamscape? He smiled a leery smirk at her. She felt a little intimidated, but knew that she could still fight. With a scream, she launched an attack, that seemed painfully slow. It seemed an eternity before her fist reached its target, and went right through. In anger, she turned around, and the man was nowhere to be seen. In his stead, was a boy, maybe a little older than herself. There was a slight definition of muscle tissue, but not to the extent of before. He may have been taller than her, but in body mass, she was more solid than him. The pattern of his hair told her that it was still the same person as before, but a younger version. Okura didn't know what to think. She had only seen adult Saiyajin, never one of this age. The boy regarded her with a mature silence, before he spoke.
"You don't know, do you?" His voice was double-pitched. The dominant one being the smooth voice of a prepubescent male, the other was a deep, quiet, rough yet subtle tone of an adult. It seemed weird that the second voice came out of the long-haired boy.
"Know what?" Okura asked, in her own voice. It sounded so squeaky, compared to both of the boy's voices.
"If you don't know it's not worth mentioning." The boy folded his arms, and gave her a self-satisfied smile, like he thought he was superior than her. A mere monkey-boy!
"You'd better tell me!" Her high-pitched voice sounded as threatening as she could make it.
"It's not for me to say. I thought the others were wrong. I thought you knew. But you don't have a clue! Don't worry, it's not your fault. You'll know soon enough, maybe." He chuckled in a mysterious way, like he was holding back a huge secret, and lording it over her. His cryptic attitude went right over her head, but it was the words that burned. She had never felt so enraged at anything before in her life, and it wasn't even real.
'I know.' That older female voice came again from inside her head.
"What? What is it?" Okura was vastly relieved that she might get an answer.
'I cannot say.' WHAT? Even her own inner voice was turning against her… or maybe it wasn't even an inner voice, just some other random thing sent to rub her face in something that everyone knew but her.
'Not everyone.' The female in her mind spoke again. This was making absolutely NO sense whatsoever. She'd reached her limit of patience and tolerance.
"If you won't tell me, I'll kill you instead, filthy monkey-child!" She screamed insanely, her voice reaching unbelievable peaks. The lad only laughed.
"Ha! That's really rich coming from a tailless freak!! Okura the tailless freak!" The voices echoed around her in surround. All three of them chorused, forcing her into submission. Blocking her ears did her no good, because it continued inside her head.
"Okura the tailless freak!!!… Tailless freak… Okura… Okura…
"Okura! 3rd class recruit! Wake up!!" Dark brown eyes opened, and little hands rubbed the crust of sleep-sand from around them.
"Wha… Whoozat?" She asked drowsily. It felt like her limbs were full of lead, and her brain was replaced by cotton wool. Maybe it was the after-effects of the stasis gas. She felt like she couldn't shake this feeling off.
"This is G'Noth. Are you OK? You were still asleep after the gas wore off. We're an hour and a half away from our target."
"G'Noth…? Oh! I remember." Her scouter beeped, quite frantically, jerking her out of her sluggish, physically and mentally tired state.
"Did your scouter just beep?" G'Noth asked curiously, wondering why it would.
"Um… yes. Wait a sec." Okura attached a sterile needle to a syringe, and inserted it into the rubber lid of the vial. Straw-coloured liquid seeped into the syringe, up to around 5.25 ml. Okura inverted the syringe and flicked it gently a couple of times to get the air bubbles to go to the top, then depressed the plunger slowly, making the excess 0.25 ml squirt out the needle in a thin stream, along with any gaps of air. Out of habit, she inserted the needle into her thigh muscle and pushed the plunger home. In a few seconds she felt the familiar initial surge of the drug taking effect. If she was feeling asleep before, she was wide awake now. Her eyes became more alert, and all her muscle tissue bunched under her flesh, becoming primed for action. Adrenalin began surging, and for the first time since taking off, she was properly focused, and looking forward to her first mission.
"3rd class recruit Okura standing by for orders!" She saluted, then remembered no-one could see her. Was she ready or what?
Their pods created deep craters in the terrain as they landed under G'Noth's instruction. They didn't meet with any enemy fire, the previous squad would have disabled all military forces on this B planet. Their orders were to destroy any forms of life on this planet. The Saiyajin were have supposed to, but the moon phase changed earlier than expected, thus having this change in plan. Because they didn't have to rely on the moon, they could attack any part of the planet they wanted, whether day or night.
"OK, we'll split up into groups of two." He pulled out a planetary map and marked co-ordinates. "Since she's new, I'll go lightside with Okura. You two take darkside and contact me hourly on your progress updates." He ordered the two other third classes – one who resembled a shaggy wolf on two legs and muscles, and one thickset reptilian creature. Both had low ki, but they had special mini-cannons that covered their hands and forearms, and shot lasers which varied from weak ones that could pack a punch, to medium-sized ones that could kill a Saiyajin, and maim a group of them. The wolf-like one was called Lukos, and the reptilian one was called Tua. Tua had a twin called Tara, who was killed when Frieza's forces ravaged his own planet. They saluted to their squad leader, and took off with their orders to destroy. G'Noth and Okura took off in opposite direction to the rest of the team, heading off to one of the major cities.
The sun was high in the sky on the planet, which was called Skina. The sky was brilliant turquoise, and shone down on the lush bright red grass. The natives were in an uproar over the recent attack made by the Saiyajin, so had placed scouts outside the city limits, and guards within a stronghold. The city was already in ruins, the Saiyajin having done most of the demolition work. But since they were recalled after the moon phased out of full, and sent to another planet, the work wasn't quite complete. Why? Because there were survivors. And that was what G'Noth, Okura, Lukos and Tua were here for.
The scouts were too busy scouring the land for the huge hairy apes that had caused so much havoc the night before, that the mismatched pair was invisible to them at an altitude that made them specks to the naked eye at ground level. They were aware that the sound and the impact of the pods landing might have caused a stir, from observing the scouts closer it looked like they were panning out and contacting their base.
"We're not taking any chances. We'll take them out first, before concentrating on the civilians." G'Noth ordered. Okura nodded in compliance, clear as to what her orders were. G'Noth pointed to one of the smaller scouts.
"Take him out first. If he raises alarm, kill anyone else who comes to his aid. I'll take the biggest one over there." And so saying, he stealthily flew over and positioned himself above the large scout. None of them had any energy sensing devices, so were doomed from the start. G'Noth descended upon his victim as silent as a raindrop, and snapped his neck. Okura followed suit on her prey, but didn't lock onto him as efficiently as her squad leader, merely knocking him face down in the grass, as she landed on him.
"What the…" The scout gave a pained growl, picked himself up off the ground, and confronted the threat – a little girl. She didn't have the pointed ears that marked one of their race, so she was an alien.
"Who are you?" He asked the girl, who stood there regarding him with dark eyes. Her mouth curled in a small, devilish smirk.
"The one who is about to kill you." Okura answered him truthfully, and before the scout could process that incredulous notion, she launched herself straight at his unguarded chest, and elbowed him side-on in the solar plexus, knocking the wind from his lungs. Lungs that would never feel air in them again. Eyes wide in shock and depletion of precious air watched as the young girl calmly walked towards him. He tried his best to scoot backwards, all the while struggling to get his diaphragm to move again. The movement cost him, as he would have been better off conserving his energy. Okura knelt down and pressed her small hand on his neck and encircled his windpipe. Her rosebud mouth came close to his pointed ear.
"You're very lucky." She spoke in an innocent-sounding whisper. "You're the first one I've ever killed on a proper mission, isn't that neat? You should be honoured."
The poor scout could do nothing but make choking sounds in reply, as the little hand was deceivingly strong and the pressure on his trachea was unbearable. Okura watched his eyes in interest, taking note of the struggle to stay alive. His panic-instincts kicked in, and he writhed, struggled and kicked, but she kept him pinned down with her other hand. She felt his body go rigid, and knew that he was in death's grasp, and seconds later he relaxed after one final convulsion. It was beautiful and remarkable, and Okura gave a happy little sigh as he went from frightened to peaceful, his forest green eyes losing their lustre as the life went out of them.
After a few minutes, she stood up, dusted her hands together and looked around for G'Noth. He wouldn't be far, close enough not to have to find him with her scouter. As luck would have it, he was walking towards her. He held his thumb up, a sign asking if she was successful. She replied with her own tiny thumb standing upwards from her fist. For the first time in a while, she felt so free in this fresh air, without the confines of a space ship or the sterile pristine rooms of Frieza's numerous spaceports and bases. She felt she could do this sort of work for a long time, that it was her nature to exist in this way. She grinned as G'Noth approached.
"Mission accomplished!" She beamed at her leader. G'Noth smiled grimly back.
"Good work, recruit," he said, standing next to her. "Although somewhat sloppy. That scout could have alerted his men, had he not being startled and underestimated your skill. Things could have got very messy."
Okura couldn't help but hang her head slightly.
"Sorry…" She started.
"I'll overlook it just this once, seeing that you're new. I won't include it in the report. Count yourself lucky." G'Noth stated. Okura regained some of her happy composure, although she couldn't help but notice a small tinge of menace in G'Noths countenance.
"So what are my orders now, Squad Leader?"
"G'Noth." He corrected, and stood behind her, facing the city they saw when they were high up in the sky. He pointed over her head. "We go there, see where those walls are between those hills? That's the stronghold where a lot of the remaining population have fled. We attack that first, and then sweep the surrounding area for stragglers and the ones who may have hidden somewhere, like in the forest to the east."
"I can't see the walls of the stronghold, G'Noth." Said Okura. It was true; she was too short to see where G'Noth was directing. She could see the hills, but nothing in between.
Squad Lead G'Noth pointed again. Okura was in front of him so didn't his other hand bunching into a fist, and she was too busy scanning the area where his pointing finger was indicating.
"It's right… there."
As soon as the last word left his harsh lips, he wound up his fist and backhanded Okura on the side of the head in a crushing blow. The little girl's knees buckled and she crumpled onto the bright red grass.