Chapter 16.
Long Distance Affair.

"It's not so bad. All I need to do is point the ship in the right direction and the auto-guidance takes me there."

"Yeah yeah, I just don't understand why it's an auto-guidance system instead of an autopilot."
Rhuba slumped at her desk.
Autopilots can literally fly and navigate to set coordinates on their own with only some functions requiring manual input.
Auto-guidance on the other hand simply maintains speed and direction but has no path-finding capabilities in the event of a planetary body or satellite getting in the way, meaning Garagus is woken by alarms whenever proximity sensors think there's a problem.
He needs to avoid the collision manually, point the ship towards the destination, and reactivate the auto-guidance.

Throughout the conversation however, Rhuba couldn't shake remembering how she spoke to her mother through a computer, mere minutes before the planet was destroyed.
But she dare not voice these feelings to Garagus. The last thing he needed was more reason to worry.

"Anyway, how's the hotel?" He asked.

"It's comfortable. The food is nice, but the portions are tiny. I've been dipping into our rations on the ship."

Garagus was grinning through to her as he placed his hand on the screen. He felt endeared by how shy she was to confess her guilt in that regard.
"That's why it's there, Rhuba… you're so adorable~"

"Sh-shut up!" Rhuba ducked away from the camera on her side. She could still see him and hated his smug grin. "Anyway, enjoying the rust bucket?"

"There's no gravity generator. That was a fun surprise…" Garagus remembered nearly throwing up as his body had to experienced feeling all of his weight to none of it with no adjustment time at all from the moment the ship crossed the barrier between the station and deep space.

"How are you sitting right now?"

"Seatbelts. But to get around the ship I can strap these magnet soles on my boots, or I just float about."

"Sounds, fun?" Rhuba retook her seat as Garagus showed her everything he needs just to live on that ship. "Hehe, you can't do any training on that ship can you?"

"What do you mean?"

"What use are sit-ups if you're weightless out there? Maybe I'll be stronger than you by the time you get back~" Rolling up her sleeves, showing off her arms, Rhuba silently mocked her man on the other side.

Fist slamming on the table, Garagus roared through his nostrils as he stared Rhuba down.
"Don't make me turn this ship around!"

"Hehehe, anyway. As much as I'd Love to completely destroy you, do try to find some way of staying strong out there." Rhuba liked the determination on his face. However, there was truth to what she was saying. The longer he's in zero gravity, the weaker he'll become over time.

"Good night, Rhuba…" Garagus was about to end transmission.

"Wait!" Rhuba held out her hands.

"What?" He looked unamused.

Rhuba looked at the screen, then the camera, then the screen again. The ship was empty, both of them in fact. It was literally just the two of them.
But still, it's embarrassing…

"N, never mind…"

"No, what is it? If it's important, I should know." Garagus washed the annoyed look from his face. "Tell me what you need to say."

"It's not…" Rhuba was blushing slightly. She was unsure before, but now it's worse. "Hmm… Actually, I'll show you later." She smirked, thinking about how much better it would be if she waited.

"Show me what?"

A few teeth peeked from behind her lips as she held her grin.
"Bye-bye, Garagus~ beep~" With that, she cut the transmission. With a deep sigh, she stretched out her back and disembarked the ship.

The industrial sounds of the repair station rang loud in her ears as she navigated the docks, with the heavy smell of oils, waxes, and soldered metals.
The sky was permanently dark, save for the bright floodlights illuminating the walkways and ships in need of repairs.
It was generally an uncomfortable environment to be in, a real assault on the senses the longer you hung about.
However, Rhuba resisted the urge to simply fly to the hotel to save time. It was agreed that keeping that fact quiet would help keep their cover as Saiyans.

A small tribe on an ice planet is one thing, but a space station with visitors from many systems, any one of them could be familiar with the notorious Saiyans.
Many species were driven to near extinction and many planets came under King Cold and Lord Freeza's rule thanks to them, and it's reasonable to think that should anyone who survived that fate encounter a Saiyan, it would be with some great pride they would anonymously report to Freeza.

In many ways, Rhuba is just as stuck and isolated as Garagus is.
He may be on a cramped ship all by his lonesome, but he's free to be himself.
Rhuba has the shipyards, the hotel, and the entertainment complex, but eyes are everywhere. She can't even really show off her strength to others, let alone her tail.
There's a pressure not to stand out. To be normal without being normal. What does normal even mean on a station filled with aliens?

These thoughts and more filled her head while walking to the entertainment complex.
With nothing better to do, Rhuba occupied herself with watching people throw their money at noisy flashy machines.
The whole room was a headache to be in, but it was the closest to social activity she could experience without being in people's sight or having a conversation.
Instead, she could simply enjoy their pride, sorrow, excitement, and soul-crushing regret from the sidelines.

"yes, Yes! Y-NO!" "C'mon, come on, YES!" "Jackpot!" "Oh, piss off you great blooming pinwheel!" "Yes! In your FACE!" "Nooo!"

Rhuba chuckled to herself as she walked by rows of machines and tables. Literally no one was paying attention to her.
It was its own type of fun that didn't involve throwing money away.
"Hmm?" It was so slight, but the floor was uneven. Looking down, Rhuba found a single colourful disk with the number 50 printed on the front and back. "uhh…" Looking around, no one seemed to have misplaced it. And of course, anyone she asked would volunteer to be the rightful owner. "hmph…"

Unknown to Rhuba, a set of eyes was in fact watching. Indeed, behind the monitors that check the casino, the floor manager had been watching that single chip for a while, waiting for someone to notice.
"go on, go on…" He saw the petite-looking black-haired woman study the chip and observe her surroundings.

Although it may look like a standard chip. It, in fact, was not.
A near-invisible barcode was on the side. Any machine that detects it going in would instantly pay out a few chips. Not a lot, but enough to trigger any addictive tendencies someone may have.
Once used, the chip made its way through the mechanisms before being dispensed behind the counter.
There it shall wait a day or two before one of the casino staff will slip it out onto the floor for someone else to randomly find.
The penalty for using it themselves was too dire for them to even dream about risking their jobs. There are cameras in place designed to seek out the specific machine that detects the chip just to make sure the user isn't an employee.

"oh why not..." Rhuba stuck the chip in and pulled the arm.
The rollers spin fast, then landed on the fourth lowest win then dispensing ten more chips.
Surprised, and even frightened by the chips bouncing in the tray below, Rhuba cupped her hands together as she picked them all up.
'now what?' she thought to herself, but everyone else was still entranced with their own luck or lack thereof.
"Well… maybe one more…" Rhuba picked another chip and slipped it in.

"Gotcha!"
Either she gives up after the next ten chips, or she runs away to buy more, hoping to strike gold again.
The manager leaned back and mimed a fisherman reeling in his latest catch. Only to nearly fall off his chair when she won the actual jackpot.

"S-Stop!" Rhuba dropped the chips she had in a desperate attempt to catch the ones gushing out from the machine.
This caught the eyes of many patrons. Rhuba had the terrified and unsightly look of someone being physically assaulted by her own winnings.

"ma'am…?"

Rhuba looked up to see a woman dressed in a shiny black outfit offer her a bucket.
"thank you…" Rhuba caught as many as she could in the bucket and loaded in the rest from the floor as well.

A couple of fellow gamblers were gracious enough to hand over some she dropped, while others subtly slipped some into their own buckets.

"Why did you play without a bucket?" Asked the woman in black. "Did you come expecting to lose?" She held a gentle smile. Most people do play knowing they'll lose more than they make, but to not even bring something to carry the possible earnings is rather grim for the atmosphere the casino is trying to set.

"No, I…" Rhuba didn't know if she'd get in trouble for using a chip that wasn't her own. "I guess I misplaced it when I went to the bathroom."

The woman in black pulled a 'Really?' face. No one in the galaxy is daft enough to leave their winnings bucket lying around in a casino. Nevertheless,
"Well, good luck to you." She said, about to head off.

"Wait." Rhuba glanced down at her bucket of chips and at the woman. "wh, what do I do with these?"

The woman was confused but put her work face on.
"You can cash out at any time at reception near the main entrance, the machines accept any chips you put in with a payout to match, or you can join any available where the starting bet is five hundred… But I prefer to give my wages to the machines, I'm boring that way."

"Oh…" Rhuba looked toward the entrance. "thank you." rummaging about her bucket, Rhuba pulled out a handful of chips and offered them to the helpful lady.
But she looked like she was offered a live grenade.

"That's, very nice of you ma'am… but I'm not allowed to accept tips while off duty." Glancing at the cameras on the ceiling. The last thing she wanted was to be called in for scheming with the guest and being accused of planting the winning chip herself.
She's not casino staff exactly, but she didn't want to give the idea of co-conspirators either.

Rhuba didn't know what she was talking about but didn't press the issue either.
Instead, she simply made her way to the front desk and cashed out the money.
Her heart was thumping like crazy when the sum was handed to her in cash. The chips' value was meaningless, but the intergalactic currency was something she understood.
"Can, I used this to pay off the damages to the ship?" She so badly wanted to order Garagus back so they could leave the instant the repairs are done.

"I'm not party to that side of the business I'm afraid. But I can have the money added to your account while you speak with them."

"It's fine…" Rhuba was about to shove the wads of cash in her pocket when the man behind the desk tried to stop her.

"Miss, I strongly advise against that. Security is good here, but if that were my money, I wouldn't bet it all against someone grabbing it and taking off in a ship."

That was a good point, but still. They'd have to know she had it, and no one was…
Rhuba looked behind just for a moment, and at least four people's heads changed direction, and those were the ones she noticed.

Gulping, and not willing to draw attention to herself by fighting off would-be thieves, Rhuba had to ask that an account be opened under the name Rhu and Gus. The password could be anything she wanted.

"Miss…" The man sighed, rolling his dark eyes back. "I advise against muttering out loud as you enter your password."

Rhuba's face turned bright red as she covered her screen, erasing what was there and thinking up something new.
"Done…" Handing the money back over, she watched a screen display how much she had.
[C-9,900.00]

She hoped it would pay off at least a good portion of the damage if not all of it, but when she enquired at the dock, she was all but laughed at.
"If you want me to repair the ship with Quack tape, then yes you can pay off the debt right now."

Storming back to her room in a huff. Rhuba was only able to pay off the damage to the elevator, not the external hull. Still, it was a start.
Theoretically, a few more lucky wins and maybe she could.
Once spread out on her bed, Rhuba thought about everyone else down there, throwing away their savings.
"no…" She refused to give in to that temptation.
The one chip cost her nothing. No risk at all of biting her in the ass. Any more of that thinking could mean Garagus returns to find them without a ship at all, and it would be all her fault.

Deciding that there was nothing better to do, Rhuba pulled her bed away from the wall and slid on her back until her chest was in line with the frame.
Saiyans aren't a popular race among worlds. They'll make enemies out there. She can't rely on Garagus for everything. At some point, she'll need to fight for him. For that, she needed to be strong.

The bed sadly wasn't much of a weight to build muscle, however, after thirty uninterrupted minutes of lifting and lowering without the lower feet touching the floor, her arms were starting to burn a little.
"c'Mon!" She huffed and puffed. Even without the weight she needed, Rhuba knew that her stamina should be better than this.
She imagined Garagus removing the gloves the next time they fight. This time, she wanted to go all out, pin him down and lift her chin knowing she won without him needing to hold back.

It'll be a short-lived victory because he'd stop at nothing to reclaim his status as the strongest Saiyan…
"Heh, I'm the second strongest Saiyan in the universe…" Rhuba thought with a pause for just a moment before continuing. "Gonna be, number one, soon." She pulled a determined grin as she worked a sweat in her bedroom.

elsewhere...

"Oxygen capacity at 99%, 300 hours in…" Writing out the sum on his pad, Garagus guessed he'd have at least three years' worth of oxygen left. So no worries there.
But his main reason for being this close to the machine was just so he could smell the fresh oxygen as it came out. It came with a scent that trees simply couldn't give. An inorganic fragrant that only a battery-powered piece of kit can produce.

"nice," He grinned as he floated effortlessly towards the pilot's seat and hanging on to the screen one-handed, he checked ahead for collisions within the next twelve hours of flight. If there weren't any, he wouldn't need to strap himself in to make a course correction.

So far it looked all clear.
"Good," Throwing himself backwards, past the generators and into the living quarters at the back of the ship, Garagus gently 'fell' against the wall and tumbled onto his bed.
The magnetic 'slippers' were stuck to the wall, so he simply pulled them off and strapped them to his feet.
"right…" Attaching himself to the floor, Garagus crouched down into a ball before standing tall, and again, and again. "worthless…" He sighed.
With no gravity it's nothing. Even weight training and pull-ups will do nothing for him.
But there was one option left.

Rhuba may be in an environment for training her body, but she's not in one where she can freely exercise energy manipulation.
No flying, no energy blasts.

However, Garagus had no such restrictions in space.
Taking a space suit would mean logging it out. His contractors may ask why he did it, and he didn't feel keen on sabotaging his own ship just to claim it was for repairs on the move.

One stupid idea later and Garagus found himself between the flight deck and the living quarters, specifically in the compression room meant to board and exit the ship.

"Override safety… reason for override?" His fingers hovered for a moment as he considered how to phrase it. "Collaborations." Seemed a fitting word for it.

Before hitting enter, he stopped to think. Before even getting in the chamber, he tested himself to see how long he could hold his breath. At rest, he could manage four minutes.
Is it worth risking a horrific death just to beat Rhuba in a fight?

[ENTER]
Yes.

The room hissed and Garagus felt pressure in his chest and behind the eyes and deep in his ears.
He took slow breaths as he watched the oxygen and room pressure drop below 80%, below 70%.
His skin was tingling all over, and cracking his joints hurt a lot more than they usually did.

50%

40%

30%

Garagus hit the Stop button to let his body adjust. At his command, the room would start to repressurize, but he waited, taking hard but shallow breaths as the airtight room stayed at the same pressure, but continued to lose oxygen from each breath he took.

He had no intention of going into space yet. This was merely a test to endure only some of the decompression of existing in a near vacuum, but more so to see if he could go without oxygen.

The pressure didn't actually hurt as much as he thought it would.
He remembered his old captain mentioning before that his body could regulate to strange worlds much faster than he'd observed in other species for a novice space venturer.

Saiyan biology, it seems, is very adaptable.
However, approaching the four-minute mark, Garagus felt his head getting lighter and lighter as the oxygen levels dropped to almost zero.
Taking in his last breath, Garagus stood tall, forcing himself to endure for as long as he could while his chest burned, starving for air.

His finger smashed the [ABORT] button as he hit the floor. The hissing popped his eardrums as the room pressurized and he gulped the oxygen like a refreshing drink as life returned to his starved body.

After a thirty-minute lie-down and splashing water on his face, Garagus went in again. No stopping this time, the pressure went down to 0, with not but the air in his own lungs to sustain himself.
To confirm it, he opened the door to the outside.
It was eery to step out as the ship cruised through space.
He almost expected there to be resistance when his hand went beyond the outer hull, but there was none.
No breeze, no wind, it felt just the same out there as in the decompression room.
Although, his hand would nip, sting, and twitch as tiny specks of dust hit his palm at cruising speed.

Still, he had no intention of leaving the ship.
For all he knew, the doors were maliciously waiting for him to vacate the airlock only to close on him and refuse to open from the outside without some key scanner found Only on the space suits.

" " He tried to swear out loud. Equally eery, is the absolute lack of sound. Knocking his knuckle on the walls would faintly reverberate sound through his skeleton, tissue, and eardrum, but any external sounds were mute.
Firing a blast into space warmed his hand for a moment, but ultimately there was none of the typical indication that he'd fired anything.

Looking towards the rear of the ship, he could see the large container he was assigned with.
The urge to jump out and land on the side filled his mind, but, his chest was starting to hurt.
'next time,' He thought as the door closed and the room filled up again.

It was so strange to be surrounded by the gassy fluid again. It was almost gross like he was wet and couldn't dry off.
But it was an exciting discovery.
With further testing or 'calibrations' as he put it, he may well be able to survive in a vacuum long enough to exploit another's inability to do the same.
But how? Air combat among fliers rarely goes so high in the atmosphere where this newfound ability would be of benefit.
However, their ship in getting repairs has limited shielding, but no offensive capabilities. Garagus could simply step outside and destroy any attacking ships himself, without needing to go through the trouble of wearing a space suit.

He imagined Rhuba waking up to the sight of him outside the ship, helmet off, looking dead.
Cruel. So awful. If he ever saw her body floating in space, he wouldn't know what to do. It would be as if the entire universe crushed him in an instant.
So naturally, it would be hilarious to see her reaction.
He couldn't wait. Above all, she must never know he can do this until the time is right.

Author's Note: Fanfiction does not like it when I try to link other sites. However, I find this to be petty.
If you like this story, perhaps you will enjoy some comic strips I have started making over on Deviantart.
Simply go to Deviantart and add the link below to the existing address for the main page it should bring you to my gallery.
/fanthonysfiction/gallery/84754168/surviving-sayian-s-comic-strips