Chayote brushed her hand over her hair. By that point she had spent a couple of years traveling in space. She's only had a couple of meaningful stops: Beiko and Sando and while both planets gave her a lot of useful work on her fighting style and martial arts, none of them served to further her goal at all. After learning a bit of how turning Ki into water worked and the emotional backing behind it from the Deep One of Planet Sando, Chayote thought she'd have an easier time restraining her fury but… Whenever her blood pressure came up, she just lost control and that was that.
Shunabehan was right, ultimately, it didn't matter if she learned how to think, feel and act to shape Ki into water or ice, unless she grapples with her emotions, whenever she gets mad, it will merely make it impossible to enter that state mentally. The thought of applying those same principles to quell the fury was a grand one but a foolish one as well.
She also was becoming a lot better in shaping that golden rush attack at will. She wanted to practice it against some planetoids in her way, some meaningless, uninhabited rocks but then she recalled that the universe was already well past its reduced to rubble planets quota. The last thing she wanted was for the whole universe to get blinked out while she practiced how to crash and slam into people and things while enveloping herself in Ki.
There have been numerous meaningless stops in the way. Most of them qualified as glorified resupply stops as there was almost no meaningful time being spent wherever she stayed. All that boredom forced Chayote to enter the Frieza Army space, thinking that there must have been a reason why nobody wielding a blaster and a scouter invaded any of these planets and started pointing their barrels in every direction. She was well within the belly of the beast now. At least she had plenty of spares of the gear…
It might have been for the better if she didn't blow up any planets just for practice, Frieza might have noticed that a few of the rocky lumps in his chest might have gone missing and intensified patrolling in the area.
A particular planet fifty lightyears away from Frieza Planet 79 caught Chayote's attention. It was brimming with electromagnetic activity though her scans of the place provided no data on life signatures. It might have been an empty dump filled with factories and generators. One of those abandoned border worlds that served as an industrial dump. A space where all the inhabitants had either been forcefully evacuated to other planets or the afterlife so that the Frieza Army could drain the planet's resources and run it into disarray.
Chayote could have used an empty space like that. Moreover, it was intriguing to see an abandoned industrial dump so close to an important beacon of Frieza Army's rule like Frieza Planet 79. The emperor himself commonly spent time in that planet as his throne room of choice and here it was – a dump not even a hundred lightyears away, practically within reachable distance of the tyrant and the rumors used to be that Frieza was quite the aesthetic in most things he practiced.
It was this self-challenging enigma that prompted Chayote to land and have a better look inside. Something that Chayote did not expect to see at all was that the planet was nothing but skyscrapers reaching well into the atmosphere, complex monorail systems and knots of magnetic rails. If all the inhabitants were gone, how come the whole place still had something as meaningless as rail systems?
The Saiyan dragged her hand across the screen in front, trying to measure the distance she still had to land to reach the bottom though for the life of her she couldn't. The distance went down and down and further down, nothing but erect skyscrapers and gas, the only semblance of meaningful platitude in the place where any potential inhabitants might have gone out to draw breath was the layers upon layers of magnetic rails.
Chayote's spaceship landed atop one of the shorter skyscrapers. The Saiyan jumped out and landed on one of the monorails, looking around while scratching her head in confusion as to where everybody could have gone off to. This planet appeared to be very much brimming with life. Advertisements, music, various entertainment attractions plastered all over the screen yet not a single soul left to enjoy it all. None of this planet's electromagnetic activity was due to industrial factories or fuel-burning. There didn't seem a single trace of any smog except these biological gasses that layered around and hid the various floors of the complex rail labyrinths.
A mechanical screech made Chayote turn around, it was far too late for something metallic hit her and rolled across the railway, then fumbled over it and shot downward and through the thick, green gas onto the railway on the lower level where Chayote saw a handful more of those mechanical vehicles crashing and flipping over. She jumped after it.
It appeared that the inhabitants of this planet were entirely mechanical in nature, they were the vehicles themselves, in a way, as they had a sharp helmet with a visor of tinted glass of varied colors, armor plating all over them with no arms, just wings spread out and angled as demanded by the possessor of the armor. The lower part of the living vehicle was all a flat pair of interconnected loops that had a couple of mineral orbs inside them with intense magnetic activity. So intense, in fact, that just their presence inside the mechanical gaps where the vehicle's legs or their wheels would have been forced the magnetic orbs to jolt off electromagnetic discharges that might have energized the whole thing.
"What a disaster!" a cybernetic pitch of the universal language spoken inside the Frieza Army space reached Chayote's ears, she looked at the nearest distressed mech in confusion.
"You guys were going pretty fast. I couldn't see you move until you stop, neither could my spaceship scan your life signatures… That's amazing, have you guys tried martial arts?" Chayote wondered out loud, becoming the focus of these aliens' fury.
"You! Off-worlder, what have you done!? Look at these suits, none of them will be able to work!" another mechanized suit postured over Chayote, directing its wings like blades at her at an attempt to keep the odd, fleshy alien that landed on their planet and disrupted their business like that, out of the blue, away from their dealings.
"Suits?" Chayote scratched her head, before seeing one of the totaled mechs open up and a wormy sack slither away from it, coiling over itself and whining in a loud and squeaky pitch. "Oh… I see… Those are exoskeletons…"
"Of course they are! You nincompoop!" another exoskeleton rolled over Chayote on the front, it was only then that the Saiyan noted the magnetic push that the suits employed and the smooth motion in which these exoskeletons moved in. It was a mechanical marvel of efficient movement. "Did you think that anything could be born this way!? Just wait until Governor Bonyu hears about this, the economic implications of this crash are simply staggering!"
"Wait, you mean to tell me you guys haven't had a single crash ever?" Chayote scratched her head.
"Of course not, are you some sort of an imbecile, or something? The society of Frieza Planet 79 prides itself on perfection and efficiency. Just look at all these poor souls that won't be able to go to work today! You've stigmatized them for life! You've made them good for nothing wastes of space, you may as well kill them now, Saiyan!"
"Now… Wait just a second, that sounds a bit harsh…" Chayote rubbed the back of her head, beginning to feel a bit guilty even though she didn't really know what she was doing as she was unable to see or track any movement while landing on the railway. Even now, the only reason she was able to see anything of the exoskeletons whizzing past her was because the local authorities closed down the road behind her and opened up interconnected detours that connected with other railway layers on the system.
"It absolutely is a big deal!" a more feminine and squeaky voice almost deafened Chayote as it rose above her and yelled out at her from that elevated position.
"Look, guys, I think this speed you guys got going is pretty rad. I'm willing to work for all of those guys and repay whatever debt I've incurred if you teach me about it," Chayote offered. "I'm pretty fast myself so I won't need any exoskeletons or whatever. Though if you do tell Bonyu, she'll probably kick my ass and get us all into trouble with Frieza, she is a member of the Ginyu Force, you know…"
"Governess Bonyu is no longer working with the Ginyu Force. Her interests are entirely focused on the technological improvement and benefit to Lord Frieza's empire. Though your offer does sound amusing. If Lord Frieza or Governess Bonyu found out about this unthinkable delay and the economic crisis that is inevitable due to it, he'd freak out and blow up our planet for sure. Very well, we shall teach you a thing or two about our discoveries in the field of rapid movement. Are you sure that you're not a lazy buffoon like most off-worlders and can keep up with the pace and expectations we will be placing on you?"
"Attention, attention! Fuel supplies limited!" a vicious yell made Chayote jump up. Just the moment when she thought she could get just a sprinkle of some shut-eye, this accursed harpy had to open up its high-pitched speakers and blare at her at full volume.
Did she not deserve at least that much for having spent three whole years breaking her back every morning, rushing to eleven different jobs all while being reprimanded by those magnetic dumbasses of Frieza Planet 79 about how much of a useless waste of an outdated exoskeleton carapace she was. It must have been some sort of a meaningful insult on their planet though Chayote couldn't really understand its point.
She did hate it all the same, given how often everybody threw it at her. Even when bashing her brains against the wall, those suited worms kept coming up with bigger numbers for possible jobs she could have been doing, each one feeling proud of one-upping the last number of optimal number of jobs that Chayote could have been doing. She was supposed to work for twenty-seven people though that would have had her do a grand total of 378 jobs, which would have been a bit steep even for the society of Frieza Planet 79.
The number of jobs a respectable member of community must have had depended on who was speaking on the propaganda videos that nobody could hear anyway since they were too busy rushing to their jobs. All that Chayote knew was that most people were outraged to know she didn't have at least fourteen jobs, which was, apparently, how many jobs were acceptable to a newborn toddler in Frieza Planet 79 to have before they were done dissolving their first pacifier in bodily fluids in the cockpit of their first exoskeleton.
After all this, Chayote deserved just a triplet of z's and yet… The vessel felt obliged to inform her that her fuel supplies were running dry. The worst part was that Chayote was well aware of how rational that was – the spaceship just kept on floating in the atmosphere in a calm orbit around Frieza Planet 79 until Chayote was done with the planet. Of course it would be low on fuel.
"What the nearest space station?" Chayote yawned.
"Thirteen lightyears away. Current fuel supplies will not be enough for the journey, set the destination anyway?"
"Please don't. What's the nearest planet we can refuel at?" Chayote growled in half-snooze mode.
"Planet Babari is the nearest planet to your current location. It does not appear to possess any refueling stations at all though it does possess a vast number of untapped natural minerals and gases that can be converted to fuel," the ship's AI replied.
"Alright, whatever, let's head down there… I guess those Babarians aren't all too interested in working their planet for what it has. All the better for us…" Chayote closed her eyes and stretched her legs.
A violent shake woke Chayote up from her sleep, irritated and still a bit dizzy, the Saiyan jumped up on her feet and looked around, confronting the obnoxious danger alarms and the irritating red gleam filling the interior. She approached the control panel of the ship and opened it up to see what the ship was so urgent to warn her about that couldn't have waited until she was done getting some due rest.
"Warning! Physical contact! Warning! Physical contact!" the ship kept playing the same tune of a broken record.
"What is the damage to the ship?" Chayote asked.
"No significant damage. Warning! Physical contact! Do you wish to ignore the warnings unless imminent damage to the ship is inflicted?" the ship went on and on.
"Why wasn't that always the case!?" Chayote groaned and looked at a small group of bipedal dinosaur-like creatures smashing the ship with fists, rocks and sticks that were as large as an entire tree. She pressed a button on the control panel and opened up a compartment at the side, removing a working scouter and put it on.
The aggravating bashing and thudding only grew more disturbing the closer Chayote went on to the hatch. When the ship opened up, Chayote charged out and dispatched of the small group of Babarians with a combo of swift strikes and kicks, still feeling a bit stiff in her muscles due to the non-stop, grueling physical labor she had to do on Frieza Planet No. 79.
The Babarians growled and writhed on the ground, Chayote examined all of them with her scouter active. She could sense from their Ki signatures that they were not an immediate threat to her though she would have liked to scan these creatures as well. Bulma and Dr. Brief would have liked as much data recorded in these things as possible and the microchips inside these things could have been placed in a wide variety of other communication technology like Earth's computers.
Planet Babari was a lush, beautiful and mountainous world. A natural paradise that was just as untapped by technology as the ship presumed it would be. It was too bad that it was filled to the brim with these raging savages though. Their power levels were nothing special, though they would have posed a challenge to the absolute lowest-ranking grunts of the Frieza Army with the few that Chayote managed to scan reading up to the power levels ranging from a 1000 all the way up to 3800.
Seeing the savage nature of the locals and the raw strength they possessed, Chayote could somewhat understand as to why the planet remained pretty much untouched even when it was inside Frieza Army space, albeit the farther off, north-eastern regions of it. Chayote pressed the red button on her scouter, sensing more and more Ki signatures incoming as the ruckus from the beatdown that the local Babarians inflicted on her vessel attracted some attention.
"Hey, listen up, you savages! You've busted up my ship and you're gonna have to work off that debt, because, apparently, that's how we do things here in Frieza Army space!" Chayote yelled out at the fallen Babarians before looking up at the rushing brutes from up ahead.
She was a bit surprised to see the Babarians she yelled at listening to her. Chayote was not fully sure if they could understand her completely but they did look at her as if they did and did not blink or look away until she was done speaking. As more and more Babarians joined into the bash, Chayote rushed at them as well, colliding with the wave of attackers and throwing them aside. She answered their savage calls for glorious violence with exactly what they asked for. At that moment, she was kind of beginning to like Planet Babari. It was here that she could rage out as hard as she wanted as the locals were tough enough to take some of it and survive, also, they all spoke the same language. The lingo of fists.
It was almost as if she was meant to always be born as a Babarian…
"Incoming transmission from Planet Earth!" an ear-piercing signal made Chayote do just that and pick her ear. A couple of beaten-up Babarians jumped up in shock from the sudden voice inside the quarters of their tyrannical empress that just appeared in their planet a year and a half ago and beat their entire society into submission before employing all of them into labor at fixing her ship and collecting rocks for her with tools she showed how to craft so that her curious fortification that was capable of space travel could grind it into food it could absorb.
"Piss off for now…" Chayote waved her hand at her crushed subjects that growled at her as if they were almost ready to challenge her for the throne once more but upon the revelation of the pain that beatings all over their bodies pulsed in, they submitted and withdrew.
Bulma's was the last face that Chayote intended to see on the screen, then again, she hadn't contacted Earth for a while. Though she had no need to and Chayote was always lousy at small talk. Bulma didn't seem too much into small talk herself and her expression looked quite grim.
"Chayote, are you done with your pilgrimage yet?" Bulma asked, skipping the meaningless chatter that made Chayote so hesitant to contact Earth in the first place.
"No. Though I don't think I want to be either. I'm on Planet Babari now, I kind of like it here. After meeting the locals, I've kind of come to accept the savage that I am rather than try and change that," Chayote admitted.
"That's wonderful, though, if you still treasure Earth, we could use your help a lot! Upa, I mean… Kami… Warned us about an incoming threat and he said that it's coming from space. Given how the only threats from space have been you and Piccolo… We can use any help we can get. They'll be here in about three days…" Bulma sounded worried, there were signs on her face that suggested she lost some sleep over the last week. No doubt, trying to find a way to contact Chayote's worn out spaceship that was on the other side of the universe by the time she found out a way to reach it.
"Three days? That's a tall order, you know, it would take me eight months to return from here to Earth at a normal pace…" Chayote scratched her head.
"Eight months!? You're that far away!?" Bulma's face got pale as it twisted in shock and hopelessness at the same time. "Th-There has to be some other way… Maybe Planet Babari has access to the Room of Spirit and Time or something…"
That would have likely only made the journey even longer. The Room extended for what seemed to be an infinite vastness for each dimension it connected. Who knew how many times it would lengthen the journey if Chayote tried it?
"That's okay, I've learned a few handy tricks about speed in Frieza Planet No. 79 so that I could keep up with all eleven of my jobs. I'll be there in four days," Chayote declared and turned off the transmission, starting up the sleepy ship systems that she hadn't interacted with for almost an entire year with. It will be a pain to reduce the duration of the journey this way for so long, she'll be worn out again by the time she reached Earth though if she dropped by Korin Tower for a Senzu, it'll be fine.
So, Goku's father must have finally decided to pick his boy up, just like Goku said he saw it in the water up on Korin Tower. And here Chayote thought she changed that vision just like she messed with a few of her own…