Chapter 2 - Full Circle
Four years had passed since Prince Vegeta had come into the service of the galactic tyrant, Frieza. Now a young man , the brash warrior was earning great renown as a skilled and powerful fighter. On each mission he embarked on for Frieza, he threw himself into the fiercest battles. Always he conquered, growing stronger and faster with every fight. But no matter how hard he tried, he was always lagging behind Frieza and his officers. More than anything, Vegeta yearned to be the greatest. To be the most powerful in all the universe, and to reign. It was his only goal. For the present, however, he could do nothing but obey Friezas' orders.
While returning from a mission of little importance, Vegetas' ship was forced to pass through an uncharted solar system in order to bypass a massive ion storm. The star itself was in the final stages of it's life, dying slowly. According to his ships' instruments, the star had only begun to decay relatively recently. Perhaps within the last two-thousand years or so. It also looked like the fifth planet in the system had once lain inside the habitable zone. That planet was now a worthless hunk of frozen rock, though it was remotely possible that something might have managed to survive. That was, of course, if there had been anything there to begin with.
Having nothing better to do until the storm passed, Vegeta decided to take a closer look and brought his ship within range for thorough scans. He held out little hope of picking up any life signs, let alone anything that resembled a civilization, so he was that much more surprised by what he did find…a power source. Could a technologically capable species be enduring those conditions? No. In the end, he concluded that only one group of people who would try establish an outpost so far from established routes. The Vorr Pirates.
The Vorr were a technologically advanced (and supposedly powerful) race that Frieza had made it his hobby to erase from existence after years of failing to conquer them. Frieza himself had gone to their planet with half of his fleet and most of his armies in an effort to wipe out the Vorr permanently, although a handful of ships managed to escape.
The pirates, all that remain of the Vorr, were led by a man named Bojack. Constantly harassing Friezas' empire with hit and run attacks, they had a knack for wreaking havoc and disappearing before reinforcements could arrive to overwhelm them. Though Vorr ships were a match for Friezas', they were on the loosing end when it came to numbers. The other advantage Frieza had was that it was rumored his species could survive in the cold vacuum of space, so even if his ship were destroyed he would live on, something the Vorr certainly could not claim.
Pirates or not, Vegeta thought, whoever is down there is about to get a nasty surprise!
As his oblong vessel assumed an orbit around the planet, Vegeta prepared to enter his drop-pod. Garbed in thermal gear, he settled into the small spherical craft and interfaced his scouter with the ships scanners. Once the coordinates of the power source were set the pod jettisoned from the main ship and hurtled through the atmosphere like a meteor on it's descent.
The white sphere glowed red-hot as it plummeted, shaking violently from the turbulence. Finally Vegeta felt the convulsions cease and braced himself. He gritted his teeth and tightened his seat restraints. The seconds slowly passed and then…crash! He felt his bones jarring from the sudden impact. After a few moments he collected himself and attempted to open the pods hatch, only to find that it wouldn't budge. "Damn, what now!?" he shouted. He tried to open it again. He heard the servos in the control mechanism whine, then silence. Peering out of the round, red tinted window at the front of the pod he realized what the problem was.
While a drop-pod typically creates a large crater upon impact, his had simply embedded itself in the ice. Bracing his head and shoulders against the back of the pod, and his feet against the door-frame, he pushed. Vegeta felt and heard the ice crunching as the door slowly opened.
Even in the dim light of the dying star above, the reflection of it off the pure white landscape was nearly blinding. He put on a tinted visor to shield his eyes and made his way out into the tundra. In his white snow gear he was all but invisible, or would have been but for the exception of his jet black hair which stood up in long, tall spikes.
Consulting the scouter, Vegeta began to make his way to the coordinates. As the intense winds of the atmosphere had thrown his pod off-course, and he didn't fancy trying to fly in it himself. Vegeta was forced to walk more than three kilometers before reaching his destination. Making matters worse were the sporadic tremors, occasionally severe. The planet was highly unstable, and about half way to the power source he contemplated turning back and leaving. Nothing seemed to be going his way that day and he wasn't sure he felt like pressing his luck. Stubbornness won out however and he trudged on.
Hoping in vain for battle, what Vegeta got when he reached his goal was merely disappointment and mounting frustration. The top of a derelict and ice covered building lay before him.
Not wanting to walk all the way back to his ship, Vegeta used his scouter to interface with his drop-pod, but with the high winds it would take some time for it to arrive. While waiting, he activated his scouter as was a habit when he was bored. Once again, Vegeta was surprised.
He detected a signal. And more than that, a fully active computer network. Remarkably, it had been easy for his scouters' decryption algorithms to decipher. Soon, he had access to the buildings' schematics, and had located an entrance. The only problem was that it was about twenty meters directly below him, making it useless.
Intrigued, but impatient, Vegeta walked around to a side of the facility that faced the opposite direction of the wind. Then, raising his hand, he focused his energy into an orb and blasted the icy wall before him. After a couple more blasts he found that he reached the outer wall of the structure, and had put a big enough hole in it to gain entry.
Relieved to be out of the wind, he actually found the interior of the building to be in surprisingly good condition, in addition to a great deal warmer than the outside. Vegeta removed his snow visor and took in his surroundings. Emergency lighting was active, and a low hum could be heard.
Upon further investigation into the alien computer network, he learned that this was a geo-thermal power plant. The planet being frozen actually insulated the core, increasing the planets' internal temperature, thus allowing the plant to run at peak efficiency. It was also the cause of the seismic activity. The fact the installation had run for what must have been centuries, completely unattended, was nothing short of miraculous.
None of this really interested Vegeta though. What had caught his eye was the writing on various signs, and computer terminals around the room in which he stood. It was an ancient dialect, but there could be no mistaking it. The writing was saiyan.
Suddenly the gravity of his discovery hit home. He had found it. The birth planet of his entire race. Their history, their culture. Everything that was lost to the slow decay of time and the treachery of the Toffles, it was all right here.
Another tremor shook the ground beneath Vegeta. He could hear the metal superstructure of the plant groan as the vibrations intensified. Finally, the reverberation of the metal ceased as the tremor subsided. Vegeta accessed the plants' instrument readings. High pressure was building underground throughout the entire region. The whole area was a time-bomb. Sooner or later this place would erupt, and this might be the only opportunity to learn about the saiyans' past. So, he resolved to stay until he had gathered what he wanted.
After descending several levels, Vegetas' scouter notified him that his pod was nearing the facility's "entrance". Leaving his scouter to act as a relay, he made his way outside to use the pods' more sophisticated holographic interface to access the ancient computer network. He immediately began to download everything he could, but most of the files pertained to the running of the facility. Obviously, this was a local network made for the operation of the plant; not what he wanted at all. The ground quivered beneath him.
Vegeta attempted to locate other networks, assuming that if the geo-thermal plant was still active then there might be a larger, more public network in operation. After some time he found what he sought. A global network, or at least what remained of one. Though the plant had remained in surprisingly good condition, everything else he could find had fared far less well.
Though there were massive amounts of data stores within the network, most of it had been corrupted. He began to download everything that was salvageable. Although the bulk of the information was irretrievable, there were still thousands of terabytes of files to be downloaded.
Vegeta swore that if the planet remained intact long enough for a proper expedition to be sent, he would personally see to it that everything of value would be recovered. That was not to be however.
As Vegeta set his drop-pods' computer to begin the pre-launch checks for orbital ascent, he exited the craft and re-entered the facility to retrieve his scouter. Just as he had recovered it the most violent tremor yet had begun to rock the facility, and quickly escalated into a full scale seismic event. The sound of groaning metal soon gave way to screeching as girders were rent and torn. A support dropped from the ceiling, hitting Vegeta in the head and rendering him unconscious.
Several minutes later he awoke. His vision was blurred and it took him several moments to realize where he was. The violence of the quake had diminished, but a low rumble could still be felt through the floor. Suddenly, Vegeta realized the danger he was in. He stood up on shaky legs, barely able to stand. He felt the back of his head, where he now felt a throbbing pain, and saw his white gloves stained red.
He knew he had to escape, so he attempted to do so through the fastest means possible.
Raising his hands above him, Vegeta focused his energy. As he did this, however, his head swam and he nearly blacked-out. He felt like vomiting. Knowing he must have a severe concussion, the saiyan realized that trying that little stunt again was out of the question, as was flying. Tapping into his power took too much out of him at the moment, and he couldn't risk losing consciousness again.
The ground was shaking more violently in sporadic bursts, and leaving this place was the only thing that mattered now. So he started his slow ascent, stumbling repeatedly whenever the tremors intensified. Though his head throbbed and blackness threatened to overwhelm him, the determined Prince made his way to the upper level without further incident. The scene that greeted his eyes now, was far different than the one he had surveyed upon his arrival. Great fissures had opened in the distance, issuing black smoke and a fierce red light.
Again the ground shook. Without further delay, Vegeta climbed into his pod and sealed the hatch. The white sphere rocketed up from the surface, and after it docked with the main vessel Vegeta looked down to the planets surface to see the once white surface dotted with red. The planets' internal temperature had reached critical mass, and the pressure had finally been released.
Priceless data had been recovered and Vegeta would learn something from it that would change his life forever. But as the planets' surface raged below, he knew that all chances of future discoveries were lost.