Against the numbness of her skin, even the sun was powerless. Dull red rays of dry desert heat beat against her face and uselessly beat itself upon the muddy red fabric covering her body, moving with a purpose that was almost unbecoming of the sun. It fought, with all its heat and all its power, it struggled against her body, desperate to make her acknowledge its presence. Desperate to make her feel. But all she felt was the tightness in her lips and the pressure behind her eyes. One quivered while the others closed, shutting tight as Hoda tried to push his face out of her mind. But it wouldn't leave her. The image of his smiling face, the soft beard and gentle eyes that always lit up whenever she came into a room. The strong arms that had lifted his granddaughter as easily as they bore the weight of the village. Even in death, she could still imagine her father's smile. Her head lowered as she struggled against her own body. It urged her, pushing her to give in to it one more time, but she didn't. Her head was already pounding with the leftovers from the last hour of her giving in to her body's needs, and even if she did feel like putting herself through more, Hoda wasn't sure that she had any tears left to give.
But for as much as her skin had gone blind to the heat, her mind had not gone blind to those emotions. Her lips quivered, then fell into a taught frown as she bowed her head and pulled the hood of her cloak tighter, closing it out from the rest of the world. With her eyes closed, Hoda might have been able to convince herself that she was in absolute darkness, completely isolated from the rest of the world. Alone enough that she just might have been able to let herself cry one final time.
But she couldn't. For as much as she wanted to retire back to her room and pretend that today had never happened, things weren't the same as they had been a year ago when her husband had died. Her father wasn't here anymore. His arms would never hold the village's weight again. His smile would never reassure the people, and his eyes, wise and kind as they were, would never be able to look towards their future again. All of that had fallen to her shoulders, the first woman to ever be put in charge of the village. But her mind didn't focus on their future. Instead, only a few short words echoed over and over again throughout her skull, reverberating against the bone and stabbing deep into her brain as though they'd come alive. Those five malicious words that wouldn't abandon her, no matter how hard she pushed them away. 'My father isn't here anymore.'
The words alone sent a new wave of pain through her body, and all at once it was back again. Her body had found more to give at the cost of her brain. A migraine shot through her skull and Hoda winced as tears began to well, her lips shook and then split open in a remorse-laden grimace as her eyes shut tighter. Despite the heat on her skin, her body felt cold. She shuddered, gasping for air to keep herself steady, then slowly lifted her hands to her face. Aggressive hands rubbed away tears and shaky lungs sucked sharp breaths as the woman slowly forced herself to look back up. Around her, the sullen, gaunt faces of those who were left moved like whisps of dust. Quickly, but with a kind of heaviness to their movements, sluggish and tired. In their arms were the corpses of those who had been lost, and they themselves were the shambling masses of the people who should be dead. Women and men worked in tandem with each other, digging graves for the dead that they could find and burying them, bringing what little comfort they could to the departed... and any of their family who were left.
There wasn't much left for them to mourn.
Most of the people that the aliens had killed were completely destroyed on contact with their attacks. The few who weren't were easy to bury, and though they'd usually put the graves further out in the desert, where the bodies of those who were gone could be reclaimed by the sand... they weren't going to be here for much longer, so the decision was made to entomb those whose bodies could be recovered near their home. By now the graves had been dug and the bodies- or what they could find- had been set down inside of them, all that remained was pouring the sand back over their final resting place. That would still take another hour. Most of those who were left were children, the eldest being no more than twelve. The few adults who remained were divided. Hoda was to oversee things, helping where she could as her father might have, Ford was assisting Frieza in his transformation, and Merce had gone off into the desert with Garkos to assist him in sending out a signal.
When she finally pried herself away from that wall, her body had warmed, but not by the will of the sun. Her head pounded in thick, loud pings against her skull, and her face had turned a shade of crimson that shared more resemblance to rust than blood. Her body was warm, but her skin still felt numb. Hoda didn't want to waste much more time here, and she knew that if she stayed there for even a moment longer, another spike of melancholic sorrow would bore its way into her skull from her chest, and the woman would drop back down into that endless blue that she couldn't escape from.
Thus, she trudged away from the wall, her feet scraping against sand and kicking large bowls of it up as she went. Hoda moved as though she was in a haze. As much as she wanted to put her mind off of her father, as much as she knew she had to, she couldn't really bring herself to focus on anything other than the image of his smiling face in her head. Another wave of sorrow washed over her face, but as the woman stumbled over a sand dune, her synapses fired, and a new face flashed in her mind for a moment. She stopped, then scanned the crowded people around her, now conducting funeral rites for the dead, and of the few who were left, one was missing. Hoda turned and began to walk once more, her feet still shifting through the sand almost as if without purpose, but this time was different. As the final bodies were buried and last rites were held, Hoda stepped away from the group and crested over a small hill in the sand that had been kicked up by one of the blasts. There was one person who had never handled grief well, someone who was more willing to hide herself away and find any excuse to escape reality than she was to face it. Someone that Hoda knew she couldn't leave alone this time.
If there was one person in all of this who had it worse than herself, it was almost certainly Yota. At least in Hoda's case, she was a full-grown adult. Someone capable of handling the tougher realities of the world. She'd seen plenty of her friends and family die off over the years, and while it didn't make this one any easier to fully process, she had perspective that her daughter lacked. But it was almost worse than that. Yota wasn't just unprepared for the realities of death, but she had lost not only her father, but also her grandfather in one year... Hoda couldn't even fathom how her daughter must have felt at this moment. It was hard enough for Hoda to lose both her husband and her father, but for Yota? Someone who had always been closer with the men in her life than she was with almost anyone else? Someone who was so young? Hoda couldn't imagine the pain her daughter must have felt.
Yota was good at hiding it from everyone else, but Hoda knew her daughter too well to not notice when she'd start to vanish more often than usual, when she'd stop eating so much to focus on talking with others, even strangers, trying to find some way to distract herself. To everyone else, she might have looked normal, but it was those little things, the times when she would go quiet, the times when she would think to herself and not bother anyone else. Those were the times that she needed someone the most. And often, it would be the time that she ran and hid and found something else to occupy her time with. The last time this happened, when she lost her father, the girl hadn't just gone off to hide somewhere so she could be alone. She'd thrown herself away from reality and headlong into fantasy, something that had only become easier when Frieza arrived.
'That man... he'd brought her a lot of joy when she needed it...' Hoda thought to herself, then shook her head. Frieza was a complicated subject for her. Deep down, even if she didn't admit it to Merce, he did worry her. But at the same time... she'd seen him change over the last year. Seen him become... well, "part of the village" may have been a stretch, but... he was a friend. And seeing how he lit up Yota's life and gave her so much joy simply by occasionally indulging in her questions had only increased that mental image of him. 'Even if he didn't even mean to do it. He gave her a way to ignore her problems, to push them away until they didn't bother her anymore... I wish he could do the same for me...' But at the same time, there was always an edge to Frieza. Like he could kill her for any reason at all, and like he wouldn't even bat an eye if he did. Looking back on what he'd done to the invaders earlier that day... Hoda wouldn't admit it to Merce, Frieza, or Yota, but that man terrified her.
Hoda continued to walk, waving off the concerned glances of some of the women as she began the long march towards the spacecraft that Frieza was intending to use to leave. It wasn't that far from the Plateau, but it was far enough that the others would be forgiven for assuming that Hoda was intending to abandon the group and leave, maybe to die out there in the desert. But that wasn't why she was heading towards the ship. Tempting as it sounded, Hoda knew that she didn't really want to die out in the desert, she knew she'd miss her life, miss her friends... and mostly, she knew she'd miss her daughter. Her daughter, who had a habit of running off and hiding, and an enthusiasm for exploring that no other child could match. To that girl, the ship that the invaders had arrived on, for all the nightmarish terrors it had brought, it represented everything Yota longed for. It was isolated, quiet, and most importantly, it was new and shiny. Hoda felt her cheeks tug at her lips as she thought about her daughter running about the ship, exploring every inch of the place, amazed and astounded at every turn. Before she managed to smile, however, a darker thought floated through her head as she remembered what hell the ship had brought to them both.
It wasn't long before the reason she was moving to the vessel came into view. Yota tried to hide herself, ducking into the recesses of the ship and hiding from her mother as soon as her small face was spotted in the cockpit- something which finally managed to poke a small hole in the blanket of malaise Hoda felt wrapped around her, letting her cheeks win the war for her lips and forcing a small smile to appear.
The game was up now. Yota sighed, then slowly began to crawl away from the pilot's chair, heading off to find a hiding place. Her mom had seen her, and it wouldn't be long before she was being dragged back to the Plateau, dragged back and forced to stay around people she just didn't want to be near. Yota would have preferred if she could stay on this ship for the rest of her life, safe and completely alone, with only the mysteries of the world to keep her company. But that wasn't how things were, and as much as she hated it, the girl didn't have a choice.
The moment that Yota laid eyes on the ship, she'd known that she absolutely had to explore it. The moment she had first seen its sleek, pitch-black metallic shine with deep purple paint coating the wings and underside, the girl had known she'd love it. The moment she'd seen its wings, massive and jutting out from the body of the ship to make the shape of an X- each metal wing lined with what the girl could only assume were thrusters (though, part of her hoped they were weapons)- Yota had almost completely forgotten about the reason the ship was here in the first place. Almost. But the second she saw Garkos leave the ship unattended, she just needed to see the inside, she knew she'd love it. And once she had a chance to slip away from her mother, while she was left with the other children, Yota quickly took off across the sand and easily slipped inside. That had been an hour ago, and this place had stolen every ounce of her attention from the moment she'd stepped in. In fact, if she focused on its interior hard enough, she might have even found a way to ignore the little thoughts floating around in the back of her head.
She'd been right about loving it. Inside, the ship felt like it was a hundred times bigger. Almost as big as her grandfather's room had felt when she'd seen it for the first time, when he'd taken her inside and shown her all the little trinkets and mementos from when he was young...
Yota was quick to run through the ship, her mind racing to dredge up half-forgotten memories of Frieza explaining to her all the different parts that made up a functioning spacecraft. She assumed the very front of the ship, near the nose, to be its bridge, the place where the magic happened, where the Captain and pilots controlled everything and set sail across the stars. Sitting in the pilot's chair had been her first move, and though she had no intention of taking off, she grabbed hold of the steering wheel just as she had a dozen times before, only now she wasn't sitting on her grandfather's lap, letting him tell her stories about his grandfather...
After that! Yes, after that, Yota had been quick to leave the front and run into one of the other rooms, spotting a large, odd-looking tank. It reminded her a little of one of the engines back on her old ship, but Yota recognized these tanks. Healing Pods were what Frieza had called them that one time. She wanted to climb inside and see what it felt like, but the girl couldn't figure out how to start the machine up. Just like that time her grandfather had tried to show her how they operated the Sand Striders...
Yota had gone to the next room then, far in the back. When she did, she tried not to look at the kitchen area of the ship. It reminded her of their old ship, of that time her grandfather told her about how, "Back when the ship flew, our ancestors used to be able to get water from somewhere inside the ship". She'd gone back to one of the bedrooms... Well, they'd looked more like "dormitories", or whatever Frieza had called them. Instead of a single nice bed, they had bunk beds, made for a crew, or so Frieza had said. Yota felt a little sad about that when she'd seen it, she was hoping to see what a "real bed" and a "real pillow" actually looked like. Frieza had told her about them, but she still couldn't figure out what he meant by "feathers". She'd asked her grandpa about them that day, he hadn't known either. He'd wondered if maybe they were like what Skyfliers had, but when she told him that "feathers" were soft, he shook his head. It didn't take her long to leave that room.
She spent the whole hour like this, dashing from room to room, finding little nooks and crannies and all sorts of strange things. In a bathroom, she found a huge rectangular box, and imagined that it must have been a "spa", it looked close to what Frieza had described to her, but she'd thought it'd be bigger. Then, she remembered a time when she was very young and it was so very hot outside that her grandfather and father had gone to the lake on their own to bring the village back enough water not only to drink, but to wash in. She'd left the room as soon as that memory came, and as she'd gone, her foot kicked against something in the floor, nearly throwing her over, but the girl had managed to stay on her feet. When she had turned around and knelt to look at what she'd hit, she opened it, and found a single room, pitch black and nearly empty. She'd explored it after finding a light switch, and found it to be pretty boring. But as she left, turning the light out as she did, the girl had another memory, of the time her father cradled her in his arms when she'd woken up one night, screaming at something she'd seen in the shadowed corner of the room, and then later, when her grandfather had come in and promised to sleep in her room with her, to make her feel safe.
It wasn't long before she was back at the pilot's seat, trying to force her mind off of those thoughts, not that it was working. And before she could even try to make it work, her mom was coming.
Now, Yota wanted to hide. She ran into the room with the Healing Tank and shut off the lights before crouching down behind the bulky machinery, ducking under some big fancy tubing and assuming she might have been hidden in the darkness. But there was one small problem with her idea. The ship wasn't as big as she'd thought it was when she'd first come inside, and when her mom opened the massive side-doors that led into the thing, red sunlight spilled inside, blinding Yota... and revealing her position.
It wasn't that she didn't want to be with her mom, Yota knew that much. She loved her mom more than... she loved her more than she had ever loved anything else. If it came down to never seeing anything new again and never seeing her mother again, Yota knew she'd gladly throw away all of her own dreams to stay with her mom, and if anything happened to her... she didn't know how to even think about that. That idea was so terrible, so awful, that it made her want to cry just from thinking it, and more than that, the idea put so many Skyfliers into her stomach that it made her want to throw up. But more than crying, more than wanting to throw up, the idea made her want to find something else to look at, made her want to distract herself, to find somewhere far away and stay there. Because maybe if she was far enough away, maybe if she was alone enough, she wouldn't have to think about it.
That was probably the real reason she didn't want her mom to find her. She wanted to be alone, she didn't want to sit with her mom and sob and cry and remember. She wanted to find any way she could to think about something else.
But seeing her come in, seeing how sad her mother looked... Yota's eyes welled up and her face cracked open like a pipe about to break. Tears rained down her face as soon as her mom knelt down and opened her arms, and Yota ran forward almost immediately, already starting to sob halfway there. She wanted to hide away, she wanted to think about somewhere else, but she couldn't. For as hard as she had tried to get her mind off of her grandfather, to think about something, anything else, the girl couldn't. Not really. And as much as she wanted to stay here, to learn new things and see what else she could find, at that moment there was only one thing she really wanted.
"I miss grandpa!" Her mothers arms were around her as soon as she reached her, and her own arms tightened around her mother as swiftly as the girl could. And then, she was suddenly lifted into the air, held in an embrace so tight that it was like she was a small child again, "I don't... I don't wanna... I don't wanna leave! I don't wan him to leave! I don't- I don't-" She choked on her words, choked on her tears and yet... her mom held her. Her arms were metal, but they were soft. Her clothes were rough and dusty, but they were warm. It wasn't long before she buried her head between her mother's shoulders, "I don't..." She didn't want to think about him. She wanted this place to pull her away so badly, but no matter how much she looked, she couldn't fully push her grandfather out of her mind.
Despite that, part of her still wanted to stay. She wanted to stay, and hide, and be alone.
But as her mother shushed her, as she slowly stood up and carried her out of the ship, Yota quietly accepted that, right now, she didn't want to be alone. She wanted to be with her mom. The ship still called to her, still promised an escape, an adventure, and she knew she'd answer it, she knew she wouldn't be able to simply sit and suffer for long... but for now at least...
For now, she only wanted the warm arms of her mom.
Frieza let out a sigh as the two men left the atmosphere behind them. 'And not a moment too soon' The former Emperor thought with a smile. Too long had passed between them recovering the ship and it being fully stocked to make the three-day trip across the solar system. Between bringing the ship back to the planet's surface to making sure it had enough resources to make the three-day trip to letting Garkos send out that distress signal with Merce, at least a few hours had gone by, "I was worried we were going to end up crashing into something again." He said dryly as he looked over to Garkos, finally able to find the humor in that situation now that he was really leaving the desert planet. Garkos, however, didn't laugh, and Frieza didn't expect him to, in fact, he expected him to remain as quiet as he possibly could for the duration of their trip. The less they spoke to one another, the better, or else Frieza might just lose it and end up killing him, and then where would he be?
Oh, he could fly the ship. In theory, at least. But Garkos had something more important than merely his piloting skills, he knew where the hell they were in the universe, and he knew what had gone on while Frieza was trapped in the desert. Frieza's original plan was to allow the Village Ship's Navigation Computer to take him out to civilization, or at least far enough that he could send a signal out and wait for some passerby to collect him, but with an actual pilot who knew how to actually navigate the stars? Well, it definitely made his job easier.
As the vessel shot away from the planet, Frieza chuckled a bit as he glanced out towards the area where there had been a ship, assuming Garkos hadn't been lying to him, "My my, it seems that they didn't want to stay and hear out the rest of my proposal." Frieza said, then laughed again, "They must have run off when they heard my voice. No matter." Frieza shrugged, then lifted his hand up and unbuckled the seatbelt designed to keep him in place during their takeoff. Standing, the former Emperor glanced at Garkos, "You know where they went, yes?"
Garkos didn't reply immediately, and Frieza nearly moved to strike him. He wasn't in the mood to deal with disobedience, civil or otherwise, but, seeing that suffering abuse at Frieza's hands wasn't worth it, Garkos sighed before the Arcosian had even raised his hand, "The ship does. Its NavComputer is pointing us in the right direction of the Crusher Corps home base." Garkos said, then glared over at Frieza, "I'll have to make minor adjustments throughout the journey to keep it steady, and you'll need me to land the ship as well. So don't get any ideas. At least until we arrive at the Crusher Corps headquarters, you'll need me."
Frieza chuckled, "Ah, you misunderstand! I'm not going to kill you even after we've landed! You've managed to get yourself a rather important position!" Frieza admitted with an almost cheerful tone, and the Zaltian actually looked more concerned about that than he had about the prospect of being killed. Frieza cackled at his terror, but waved off his concerns, "We share a common enemy in this." Frieza said, his voice lowering back down as he bent over until he was eye-to-eye with Garkos, "We both want the same thing- those Space Pirates killed. I figured that if you could take a few out, you might be of some use to me. Not that I couldn't do it all myself, but..." Frieza's arms came up in a nonchalant manner, his hands flicking and opening as if asking "what can you do" as he sat back from Garkos, a pleasant smile on his face, "I really don't feel like it, and I missed having subordinates."
Garkos' glare had turned into a snarl, but Frieza had already turned away and was ignoring the man. It wasn't really that he didn't feel like killing the other Space Pirates. Garkos was going to be required for a bit longer in general, this was true. Leaving and returning to any planet would be quite difficult without his assistance, and the man appeared to have a staggering power level if Frieza understood his position in this "Rebellion" correctly, so he could surely be useful in a battle. No, the primary reason Frieza was keeping him alive was because of his knowledge. Frieza had never heard of Garkos before, and he had kept a close eye on all rebellious factions within his Empire, so this Zaltian rebel must have been something that Cooler had grown. Frieza had been gone for more than a year, who knows what Cooler's done to his Empire since then?
Frieza yawned even as he thought that. Today had been a strenuous day, and even though it was only an hour before sunset on the desert world, Frieza could do with some well needed rest. Turning to Garkos again, Frieza found that the man had "stood" up. In reality, he was using what little energy he had recovered to float, but it was still no less startling, "Going somewhere?" Frieza cocked an eyebrow, but the Zaltian simpty glared at him before speaking.
"My wounds... They might be doing better, but I'd still prefer getting them proper treatment." Garkos spat, "So if its all the same to you, I'm going to use the Healing Tank and restore my body to peak condition before the wounds get infected, or worse."
"Hmph." Frieza shrugged, "Do as you will. I'm going to bed." Frieza moved to leave, but then turned, sparing another glance back at Garkos from the corner of his eye, "Ah, but word to the wise. It wouldn't be a good idea for you to try to kill me while I sleep. You wouldn't be able to use enough energy to do it at once without risking the entire ship in the process. Ah, and in case you're feeling like a martyr, I can breathe in space."
Weightless. That was the word that came to mind as Garkos floated there, basking in the comforting warmth of the healing tank. It was as if his arms and legs were strung up to the ceiling, or perhaps as if he was floating through warm clouds, suspended in mid-air. Surrounding his body was nothing but murky, dark blue liquid. Thick and viscous, it almost reminded him of gel, but the way he moved in it, the ease at which his arms parted the fluid, sending small disturbances through its calm form and kicking up small waves at the top of the tank made the man think more of water.
The Captain breathed a heavy sigh, the mask on his face that allowed him to breath gurgled for a moment before releasing a chain of carbon dioxide bubbles that rumbled to the top of the tank. Shutting his eyes, he let the comforting and strangely warm liquid soak into his wounds. It seeped through his clothing, ignoring the shredded fabric of his prison jumpsuit entirely as though it wasn't even there. It washed away the blood and the sand, clearing his skin and numbing his pain, and as it did, Garkos felt a kind of stillness that he hadn't since his capture at the hands of the Crusher Corps. There was a kind of tranquility to this place, a liminality of peace that was only enhanced by the soft, distant rumble of the ship's core and the much closer but only slightly louder buzz of the Healing Tank's circuitry. And as he hung there, suspended in the warmth of the healing liquid, Garkos felt his mind begin to drift. It wasn't easy for his thoughts to get away from him, not usually... But this time was different. A memory had been playing over and over in his mind ever since he'd returned to the village after setting the emergency broadcast signal, bothering him to no end, and now that he'd finally found a moment of repose that he could take for himself, the man found that he could no longer ignore it.
Hours ago, while tuning his Escape Pod so that it might be able to access and transmit a signal on the Rebellion's secret Emergency Broadcast Line, he'd finally managed to bring himself to ask Merce a question that had been burning in the back of his skull since he'd witnessed the way Hoda spoke to Frieza... and how she had lived through the act of speaking to him that way. He'd gotten his answer alright, but even despite the Scouter that he'd pulled from the Escape Pod before Frieza had slammed into him translating the man's words back to him...
They didn't make any sense.
"Frieza." Merce had started innocently enough while the men were on their way back to the village, but even so his words had still startled Garkos when they were spoken. Not only because his mind had been elsewhere, but because after an hour of silence, he hadn't been entirely sure if Merce even could talk, "What's your story with him? We know he's a murderer, we also know he's not right in the head, but you... the way you look at him, I have to ask, what'd he do to you?"
Garkos didn't respond immediately. How could he? What answer could he give to that kind of question that wouldn't be obvious to anyone who knew the man and his crimes? Garkos' entire family had been slaughtered at the hands of his goons, it was a tragically common story amongst members of the Rebellion, and for him the need to even explain it felt... strange. Even so, he answered, "My family." Garkos had nodded, a tinge of sorrow in his eyes as he did, "Frieza's forces wiped them all out when he'd come to conquer our planet." Then Garkos turned to the man, and asked him a question that he'd regretted ever since, "Why? What makes you so curious all of the sudden?"
"Honestly? I was mostly just wondering if his stories were better than, as bad as, or worse than what he's been letting on." Merce had nodded back, crossing his arms as the men walked, "Seems like he really was telling the truth after all. Not a surprise, that man's a cold-hearted bastard if I've ever seen one, can't stand him most of the time."
"So, is it my turn to ask a question?" Garkos wondered, causing Merce to sigh, turn away a bit, and start thinking, trying to come up with a response. When he finally did speak up, it was with another, more focused, nod towards the other man.
"Go ahead, s'not like we've got anything better to do while we're stuck out here."
It took Garkos a minute of his own to figure out precisely what he wanted to say, "Why does he..." Garkos had frowned, unsure on how to phrase it at first. He wanted to sugercoat the question, try to be somewhat amicable, but he couldn't think of any better way to say what he'd known he'd had to, "Why does he do anything for you? I understand that you had some kind of arrangement with him, but... the Frieza I knew would have vaporized this entire village before he left the second he had what he wanted... so why did he leave you?"
Merce went quiet for a moment. Then, just as the men were cresting the hill back to civilization, he spoke, "Frieza's complicated." Merce shook his head, as if he himself couldn't believe it either, "He's a bastard, a killer, a tyrant, and he's even threatened to kill plenty of our kids in the past just because they got on his nerves." Merce admitted, then shook his head. "But at the same time... he saved us when we were starving. Gave us water when we were dying of thirst, housed us when we needed a new place to stay. Hell, he's saved my life a few times too, and he even rescued us from those two monsters you brought in. Can't say that he's a better man, can't even say that I like him..." Merced looked up to Garkos, staring at the man eye-to-eye, "But maybe he changed from when you knew him. Maybe he's not so bad as he used to be."
Those words rang in Garkos' mind as he floated in the tank. He couldn't fathom them, couldn't imagine a world where Frieza, the man who had destroyed hundreds of worlds, ended billions, if not trillions of lives, the man who'd been known as the Tyrant of the North from the moment he'd taken power from his father, had changed for the better. It didn't make any sense to him, he didn't believe it- couldn't believe it! How could someone so monstrous, so abhorrently, sickeningly evil possibly change even slightly? But as he floated there, Garkos also knew that Merce didn't have a reason to lie to him. Merce wasn't the kind of person who'd play defense for someone he disliked, so Garkos was left to wonder...
Had the tyrant really changed?
He didn't know, and that was what bothered him the most. The fact that Garkos couldn't immediately shrug it off as Frieza simply playing people for his own gain was simply the most terrifying part.
They were nearly halfway there before they discovered that they had a stowaway. Frieza had been the first to notice it, Garkos had been preparing his meal for what his biological clock told him was morning when the space tyrant had supposedly heard it- something scurrying around in the cargo hold. At first, Garkos had wanted to dismiss him and the noise as merely some part of the ship's lower regions going off. Garkos had been on a myriad of vessels like this, and it was often the case that old pipes would bang against metal walls or engines would rumble so loudly, so strongly, that a man might feel his bones shuddering alongside it.
But then he heard it too. A strange, irregular pattern of something moving and shifting beneath their feet, too abnormal in its recurrence to be a loose pipe, too quiet to be one of the ship's major features gone rogue, almost as though a small animal had crawled aboard, its feet scratching and scraping against the metal flooring of the ship. When Garkos mentioned that fact, Frieza had been quick to make him regret it. Whining and complaining about the mere idea that they- or he, rather- were sharing a space with a pest until eventually Garkos brought up the idea to go get rid of it. Of course, the tyrant wasn't willing to do it with him at first, but changed his mind about it, apparently deciding that Garkos couldn't be trusted on a matter so important.
The cargo hold itself wasn't an exceedingly large place. It also was barren in most of anything, all that littered the ground were a few trinkets that Frieza had wanted to bring along from his time in the desert as well as some random storage boxes that had been empty when the men had opened the hold to load the aforementioned trinkets. The moment they had first opened the hatch leading into the small, dark, and nearly-empty crawlspace, Garkos had assumed they'd immediately be able to see what it was causing the disturbance. But he couldn't, and so he was forced to climb down the ladder into the space. Frieza tagged along, almost certainly intending some sadistic fate for the wretched thing if he'd found it first.
Ironically, Frieza had been the one who discovered the source. Bathed in an otherworldly purplish-pink light emanating from his finger to give him just enough to see, the Arcosian walked to the edge of the room and spotted something inside of one of the boxes. Garkos turned when he heard Frieza hiss out in anger, catching a glimpse of the tyrant's arm as it flicked into the storage unit and caught hold of something. Something that cried out in surprise, "No!"
Something that cried out in the voice of a small child.
"What..." Frieza began tersely as he lifted the figure above his head, bathing her in that same pulsing glow that shadowed over his body as he did, "Are you doing here?!" Garkos stepped towards the pair as Frieza continued, and the Captain cocked his head slightly as soon as he came close enough to see the full figure. It was a little girl, not much younger than ten... and one he recognized, the daughter of Hoda, "You MUST be joking, Yota!" Indeed, what the men found wasn't a creepy-crawly or some kind of opportunistic predator. Instead, they encountered a little girl who had gotten in way over her head, "Do you have even the slightest idea how much trouble you're in? You could have suffocated in here!" The man snapped at her. At first, Garkos had moved to intervene, fearing for the girl's life he stepped towards them and extended his hand... but then he took notice of Frieza's tone. Then slowly, Garkos took in the Arcosian's posture, the way he held the small child in his arm, less like a man about to murder her and more like an infuriated parent, "Your mother is never going to let me hear the end of this! I can already hear her-!" The man cut himself off with a groan as his eyes flicked up, irritation written all over his face.
Garkos watched as Frieza set the girl down and moved his clawed hand up and then dragged it down from his forehead to his chin. The little girl waited quietly, much like a child who'd been caught might, pouting slightly and holding her shoulder with her opposite hand. Unable to keep still, she swayed around, less like she was upset about being caught and more that she was eager to move on. After a moment, she spoke up, "I... I... I just wanted to see the stars..." To which Frieza groaned again, as though he'd known that would be her answer, "Plus... I thought it would be okay! Uncle Merce said that some of his-" She looked at Garkos now- "People were gonna come pick us up so I thought I could go with you guys and then come back with him..."
Frieza remained stock still for a solid thirty seconds, the hand covering his eyes clenched so tightly that Garkos at first thought the man had succumbed to an aneurysm. But then another realization dawned on the man, one that caused his eyes to go wide with nothing less than shock; Frieza was trying to compose himself.
And when he finally managed to do, the Arcosian seethed one more time before lowering his hand from his face and looking down at her with wide, infuriated eyes, "Did you tell your grieving mother where you were going?" He asked in a sickeningly sweet tone that didn't match his expression in the slightest. When Yota shook her head, suddenly looking ashamed and moving to speak again, Frieza interrupted her with a sharp- "At!" And shot a finger up as he did, "Did you tell Merce? Or Ford? Or literally... anyone where you were going?"
Softly, Yota shook her head, and Frieza laughed. It wasn't the kind of joyful laugh that Garkos might have expected, instead, the man sounded so completely and utterly exasperated, so very done with the girl's antics that Garkos almost felt sympathy for him. Almost. Even so, this had definitely happened more than once, enough times that Frieza had not only come up with a list of questions for the girl when it did, but he even seemed accustomed to it, as annoying as it probably was. And that brought Garkos to another, more horrifying question: if Frieza has grown accustomed to this, how often has it been him who's brought her back?
"So..." Frieza's continued, a terse, taught bent to his tone as he did, "You abandoned home mere hours after your grandfather, as well as... the rest-" Frieza waved them off as though their lives meant nothing to him, and that was more like something Garkos had been expecting from the tyrant. A casual disregard for life was almost welcomed by the man after seeing Frieza of all people show, at the minimum, a modicum of regard for Yota's safety, "-were all killed by sudden, and I'm sure to many horrific, force, to come here and... see the stars?" He asked, but Garkos had a feeling that he didn't want an answer, and Yota didn't give him one as she began to stare down at her feet, new sorrow starting to overcome her expression, "Surely you're seeing the problem here. They're probably all panicking down there searching the ENTIRE DESERT for you!" He snapped one final time, then sighed and rolled his eyes, "Oh well." He shrugged with such sudden nonchalance that Garkos blinked at the shift in mood, "Since you're here I suppose we're stuck with you." He reached down and patted the girl's head twice, not that it did much to improve her mood as she continued to look down at her feet.
It was now that Garkos spoke up, "What?" He closed the distance between himself and duo, appalled by Frieza's apparent decision to keep the girl with them, "Are you really suggesting that we take her with us into enemy territory? That's insane! She's a little girl!" Garkos gestured to Yota, who was now starting to look up from her shoes, eyes starting to brighten a little even as she played with a piece of loose fabric from her shirt, "We should turn around and drop her back off before resuming our journey!" Garkos was primarily worried for Yota's safety, the Crusher Corps had demonstrated at every turn just how willing they were to end the lives of children if it suited them, and the man wouldn't be able to live with it if she ended up in danger because of Frieza's impatience.
Frieza narrowed his eyes at the Zaltian, crossing his arms, "Well I'm not turning around, we're more than halfway there already and its been two days! By the time we get back to that dustball of a planet, your rebel friends will already be picking them up!" Seeing Garkos' begin to glare, Frieza snarled back, adding, "We'll just send a message out to Hoda and inform her of the situation!" The Emperor's tone had changed, he wasn't asking, he was commanding. Garkos opened his mouth again, intent on snapping back at Frieza even if it costed him, but the little girl to their left spoke up with a sudden and gleeful tone, all previous sorrow forgotten, at least for the time.
"So, I can stay?" Yota beamed up at the pair of them with such an intense, joy-ridden smile on her face that the man found it hard to even muster the desire to tell her no. But as she looked up at him, Garkos felt his brow furrow a bit. There was something else in her expression, something hidden just behind her eyes, shielding itself behind rows of childlike eagerness. Something that preached excited words and made exaggerated motions as if they would hide its tragic nature.
Garkos wanted to speak, he wanted to tell her no and to put his foot down against Frieza's command, but as he looked at her, as he really saw her, Garkos knew he couldn't do it. He couldn't force her back there, not after he'd let her grandfather die. And with that expression in her eyes, he knew that sending her back would only make her feel worse. So, he shut his eyes and sighed, then looked to Frieza with a defeated nod.
Frieza didn't seem to notice her expression, instead only rolling his eyes and crossing his arms, "Yes, yes, you're staying." The tyrant did acknowledge Garkos' nod, smugly smirking as he spoke before souring his expression, glaring down at Yota as he added, "But there are rules to this!" He bent down just a bit, jutting a finger into the girl's face as he spoke, "You need to listen to me and do exactly as I tell you to, or there will be consequences! You aren't at home anymore and I'm not mandated to keep you from harm, if you get yourself into trouble, that's on you, got it?" Frieza asked, and Yota nodded, "Good, run along then! I'll give you more explicit rules when we arrive." Frieza flicked his fingers, sending the girl away. She didn't hesitate. The second she was dismissed, Yota excitedly took off towards the ladder leading back into the ship and quickly began scaling it, popping out of sight in no time at all. Frieza rolled his eyes once more, this time shaking his head in further exasperation, "Children..." He muttered then glanced back at Garkos, "And as for you, maintain course and dispatch a message to Hoda as soon as possible. Make sure it only goes one way, I can't imagine how irritable she's going to be with this one." Frieza sighs, shaking his head once more, "She's already bad enough to deal with without grief afflicting her."
Garkos begrudgingly nodded and moved to follow Yota up when suddenly the girl poked her head out from the hatch leading into the rest of the ship, "Um... I'm kind of hungry, can someone make me something?" She asked with a timidness that seemed unbecoming for her, "I haven't gotten to eat in a while..."
Garkos moved to answer her, but Frieza beat him to the punch, "Yes, yes, I'll be up in a moment. Really, you should have revealed yourself sooner, you could have ended up starving down here, you know." Frieza grumbled, walking towards the hatch and using his energy to float up. Garkos watched as the tyrant vanished, stunned.
He was going make her something to eat? Willingly?
Garkos wasn't sure how long he stayed down there, trying to fully process the strange relationship that the pair had, but at some point Frieza called into the Cargo Bay, demanding that he send the message along to Hoda, and at some point, the Rebellion's top General responded to him, nodded, and headed up.
'Something's wrong.' Garkos hit a button, then quickly rapped his fingers across the keyboard once more, reconstructing the message at Frieza's request, then, after a moment to check and recheck that he was sending it to the right place, making sure that he'd be directing his message back to the escape pod and sending out a ping so that the village might hear it, and taking time to ensure that the signal was properly encrypted, Garkos sent the words off into the nether.
And then, just as it had before, the screen before him lit up in bright, uncomfortably red text.
[Unable to send.]
"Huh." Hovering over his shoulder was Frieza, who sat back from the monitor with crossed arms, a tense, uncertain expression over his lips, "What's wrong with it?" He glanced down towards Garkos, lips pursing less out of confusion and more out of irritation as he did.
Garkos knew the answer, but that didn't help him feel better about it. In fact, he almost hoped he was wrong, "Give me one more chance." The Zaltian said, shaking his head before reaching forward and trying something new. Swapping frequencies over, he attempted to set the signal to broadcast over to Choso's ship. 'Please just be something wrong with the escape pod's transceiver.' He pleaded. 'Please...' The machine whirred for a moment- opening up the longer range signal broadcasters that were located on the back of the ship, Garkos could feel them rumbling to life, forcing themselves free from the main core of the ship- and then suddenly the console chimed at him again, "Damn!" Before he knew it, his fist had slammed against the console. It wasn't a hard hit, Garkos had the wherewithal to keep it from doing too much damage, but he knew it had probably knocked something loose.
The Zaltian shook his head, lips pulling themselves tightly against his teeth as he tried to ignore the nagging worries in the back of his mind. He'd been hoping this wouldn't be the case, but that confirmed it, "We're being jammed, its the only answer." Jamming didn't work at longer ranges, you'd need to either have a ship nearby- which implied that they might be in danger of a dogfight in the next few minutes- or, and more likely, they were just barely within range for the planetary jamming devices to keep them out. But as he thought that, Garkos frowned a bit, then leaned forward again. 'If that's the case then I might be able too...' He wasn't as smart as his usual technician and pilot, Choso, but Garkos was sure he could at least try to break the jammer signal. If he had just a little more power, he might be able to push through and force a signal forward, but only assuming he had enough power. He could probably afford to shut down the lights, and so he did, then the radar, then everything else that was non-essential. It was only for a moment, "They probably don't want you or I getting a message out to anyone." Garkos explained, tapping at the console and putting everything he had into breaking through their encryption. If it was the case that they were being jammed by the planet-based apparatus, he might be able to do it, though if their was a ship in the area-
"Hmph." Frieza interrupted him, causing the man to look towards the Arcosian. In the unlight room, Frieza's scarlet eyes were the only things one could make out about his appearance. "Let them." Frieza shrugged the man off, causing his eyes to widen with unbelieving fury. But before Garkos could voice his thoughts, the man continued, "They appear to have forgotten just who it is that they are dealing with. I am no mere man that they can plan around. I am Lord Frieza, I am the Emperor of the Universe." His voice dropped low, and Frieza hissed with a kind of barely contained spite sent chills through Garkos' bones, "If they want to jam our signal, that merely gives you something to do when we land instead of simply following me around until I kill their leaders. Find the jamming device, shut it down, and then try to raise one of your friends and get Hoda on the line. How does that sound, General?" Even though he was using Garkos' proper title, the man spat it so venomously that Garkos knew Frieza meant no respect by it.
Garkos wasn't sure about it, but Frieza did make a good point. Even though Garkos despised the man, having him on your side was like having a God against ants. Even in this weakened state, Frieza was still more powerful than... Most of the universe... Garkos paused as he thought about that fact. The only person more powerful than him was his brother, and even that was a debate... But, the man put those thoughts in the back of his mind, he'd think about what the Rebellion would do about the Cooler Problem later, for now... For now, he had to focus on bringing down the Crusher Corps and getting the Rebellion back on his feet, both of which required him, and one of which, unfortunately, required Frieza, which meant he'd have to work with the tyrant for now, "Fine. I'll still attempt to break through their jamming signal from here though, just in case it turns out to be a ship, I'd like to be ready." Which meant turning back on the radar, which would mean he'd need to find something else to shut down if he wanted to get through the signal...
"As you wish." Frieza waved him off.
Garkos remained at the console for another hour, chipping away at the endless stream of energy signals blocking his message from sending, but it was like one man trying to bail out a cruiser with a bucket, eventually, even he had to admit defeat and give up on ending the jamming signal. Since nothing showed up on his radar, he had to assume that they were being jammed from the planet- or moon, rather- that the Crusher Corps had set up as their base of operations. He'd have to do as Frieza said, and shut them down directly. Even so, he sat at the radar for the rest of the day, waiting to see if anything showed itself. He had a terrible feeling about this, why bother jamming their signal at all? They were already on their way, it wasn't like Frieza was one to stop and wait for reinforcements... But those questions went unanswered in the man's mind, all the way until he went to bed that night.
Yota reached up and propped herself up on the side of the control panel for a moment, then was quickly yanked back down by Frieza, "Damn it, brat! Stay down there! What did I just finish telling you?" He hissed at her, before suddenly being jostled as the ship shook violently. His grip on Yota tightened as he rolled around in his seat, but not because he was concerned about her smacking her head on the side of the ship controls, rather it was because he didn't want her poking her head back above the control panel and accidentally getting herself spotted. As the Emperor was thrown around, however, he did glare at Garkos, "Lizard-" He began in a rough, teeth-gritted voice before Garkos interrupted.
"She'll hold!" Garkos interrupted, trying to sound confident. But even as the man spoke, Frieza could tell he wasn't sure. From the way he gripped the manual steering wheel to the beads of sweat running down his face, Garkos was having second thoughts about his landing strategy, "The shields are stable enough! Put some faith in me, will you? I've done this enough times to run circles around these- urgh!" Garkos was in a slightly better position than either of his passengers; he'd buckled in before they'd embarked on the landing procedure. Even so, as blasterfire glanced against the shields and threw the ship around like it was a sea vessel caught in a thunderstorm, the man was not immune to being thrown around himself, "We're nearly on the landing pad! Just hold out for another minute!"
"And let you end up destroying the ship? I would think not!" Frieza snarled, then glanced down at Yota. In his mind, the Emperor could almost visualize the ship's wreckage. He and Garkos would probably survive, sure, but her? And then as soon as the thought crossed his mind, his wretched snarl turned towards the girl currently clutched in his hands, and suddenly his heart was racing for all the wrong reasons. 'I don't care. I don't care.' He reminded himself, then was thrown around again as something red began flickering on the console. He pictured them combing through the wreckage after Frieza murdered the men here, Hoda stumbling across a scrap of her daughter's red cloak. 'I don't care! All that matters is-' He imagined her holding the fabric, then pulling it close to her chest. Then, he saw the woman collapse just as she had when he brought her father's remains over to her.
And then he looked back down at Yota's terrified, pale, little face.
"Oh fuck this." He hissed as he jolted from his seat. Yota moved to stand, but Frieza pointed at her as a gloomy purple aura emerged from his skin, "You stay right there! If they see you at any point, you're dead, or did you forget that part?" The girl backed down, then quickly clambered into the chair and clicked the seatbelt on. As soon as she did, Frieza made his way to the side doors. The ship rocked again, but unlike before, Frieza was exercising his powers, the vessel could be flipped upside down if it wanted, he'd remain steadfast now. But as the Arcosian stepped up to open the metal entrance, Garkos shouted back at him.
"What the hell are you doing?"
"Ending this!" Frieza responded, smashing the red button on the left side of the machine and causing the door to rumble open, sending a rush of air through the cockpit and causing all sorts of alarms to blare. 'Or maybe that's the ship warning us that shielding has just been burned through.' Frieza thought bitterly as he saw the soft blue field of light that surrounded the ship starting to flicker on and off. With no time to waste, Frieza leapt from the ship, through the buzzing, jolting rush of electric energy, and into a vibrant, light purple sky.
He emerged into an almost scenic world. It was warm, with a sky not only populated by an endless abound of white, fluffy clouds, but one that had been colored a soft, lavender color. But the feature which struck the Arcosian Emperor most wasn't the physical layout of the place he'd stepped into, it was how alive everything felt. By comparison to that hellish wasteland that he'd come from, this world seemed more like a paradise then anything else. The second the man stepped from the ship and into open air, he was greeted by the sight of a gigantic, swooning creature with leathery wings that were each at least twice his height and six times his width. It soared passed him, forcing the Arcosian to rear back to avoid slamming into the beast as it roared by, then turned and flew away from him. Any other man might have been awed, but Frieza... Frieza simply smiled. He almost forgot how much he missed living things. Things that weren't bugs at least. It wasn't as though he found any inherent beauty in such pitiful creatures, but after spending so long in a place so desolate, so devoid of life, of anything other than filth-ridden insects, it gave the Emperor a bit of perspective on other lifeforms that he'd been lacking.
Even so, he didn't stay on that thought for very long. Whirling in the air, Frieza summoned energy and focused it through the cybernetic on his arm. Two fingers shot out from the three-clawed hand, and he took aim towards the ground. Once again, Frieza was greeted by the majesty of everything surrounding him. The forest below was alive with dark red grasses and an endless, expansive sea of similarly colored leaves extending out from mottled brown tree trunks. The vegetation swayed as Frieza observed it, brushing and shaking as gale force winds rushed up from the ground, brought on by the intense, flaming heat of the laser-cannons being used to attempt to shoot down their vessel.
Nestled between the mammoth trees and surrounded by a sea of crimson grass was a complex around the size of a small town. The majority of the buildings were gorgeous black structures made from stone, all of which ended in long, pointed spires and towers that created sharp, angular ridges and slants that gave them an almost gothic aura, but these were new, only recently constructed places. Frieza could tell- they were missing a vital part of true gothic architecture; the ornate, complex patterns that adorned the very structures themselves. Frieza had heard of this style before. It had become popular on some of the richer planets in the outer rim, often reflecting their penchant for criminal enterprise- they called it "Cyber-Gothic". Supposedly, it harkened back to the days of ancient civilizations and their penchant for gaudy, cyclopean stone buildings. He had never seen the value in it before but now... Well, maybe it's just the sight of something other than rusty machinery or endless, wavy sand dunes, but Frieza felt that he might finally have an appreciation for the style.
"Its quite unfortunate, then, that I'm only now understanding the style." He chuckled, then swung his hand down in a long arc stretching from one end of the complex to the other, and as his hand moved, mauve energy surged from his fingers and ripped a gash through the entire surface area. Under normal circumstances, this attack- his "Death Slash" as he was often proud to declare it- would have carved an entire canyon out from the rock. Here, it simply leveled the area it struck, vaporizing the immediate forest between the two points he'd drawn in the air while completely obliterating massive swathes of the complex- which Frieza was now starting to recognize as a castle- that he'd struck.
He'd been careful to target only the parts that he'd wanted to hit, and as blasterfire had abruptly ceased, Frieza chuckled again, "Well, that's most of their defenses! Now then, where are the real targets...?" But as the Arcosian spoke, he failed to notice a quartet of small creatures suddenly shoot out from the clouds and bind themselves to his arms and legs. "What?!" Frieza struggled against them for a moment, then felt the odd things try to bite into his metal limbs, only for their teeth to gnaw uselessly against the hard material. They were wrinkled, small, Frog-faced creatures from a race Frieza didn't recognize, but he did know of them. Somewhere, in the back of his mind a memory fought its way to the surface. He'd been discussing matters relating to an attack by one of the upper-level crime lords on one of his worlds with Zarbon... 'What was his name? Slog?' Frieza wanted to continue that line of thought when suddenly the rain of laser blasts started back up again, "Ah, so they were waiting for you to distract me. Unfortunately for you..."
Frieza let out a shout and unleashed a shockwave of force that sent the beasts flying off of him, but instead of dropping to the ground, the little nightmares unfurled wings and rushed at Frieza again. This time, he waited for them to close in, letting them get close enough to try latching onto his skin itself before suddenly twirling around and using the claws gifted to him by his cybernetics, easily shredding through their skin. Some of the little demons realized that they didn't stand much chance against him and quickly tried to pull away, but the Arcosian was quick to intercept them, darting in close to the pair who'd managed to escape the fate of their brothers before dragging his claws down and ripping them apart.
"My Medas!" A shrill voice screamed from below, and a much larger version of those entities suddenly shot up until he was at even level with Frieza, "I'll tear you apart for killing them!" He dashed forward, extending his own claws before trying to rip Frieza apart, but the tyrant dodged his attack as easily as he breathed, and before the entity could get too far past him, the Arcosian suddenly brought his leg up and embedded it into the beast's sternum before swinging his hand down and using his metal claws to slice through his neck and take off his head in a spray of viscera.
"Hm..." Frieza watched the body fall, then lifted his hand up to clear off the blood which now adorned his face, frowning slightly as he did, "What was his name?" Choosing to disregard that question for now, the tyrant shot towards the planet itself this time, shooting passed Garkos and Yota on the ship before extending one hand above his head and down towards the ground. "This time I'll be a bit more thorough." An orb of brighter, softer, purple light emerged from his palm and shot down towards the ground, where Frieza could now make out the presence of about fifty soldiers and at least two mounted laser-cannons. The orb which emerged from his hand began small, but as it raced towards the ground it began to swell and expand, increasing in size and scope until suddenly it encompassed the entire portion where the men were stationed, casting such a wide and terrible shadow over them that it was almost as though the moon had eclipsed their sun.
Frieza just barely heard them scream before he lost sight of the soldiers below him. And then the ball of light compacted in on itself, imploding suddenly as it reached its apex of power before swelling to such height that it exploded, washing the entire southern portion of the castle away in a blinding, omnipresent wave of swirling annihilation. Satisfied, Frieza landed, then waited for the ship to land. As soon as it did, Frieza smugly smirked as he waited for Garkos to come out and admit that they needed him. A smirk that died when he saw Yota come running out.
"Goddamnit! What part of-!" Frieza began to raise his voice when suddenly Garkos shot out of the ship and snagged the girl himself, hoisting her up and dragging her back to the vessel. Frieza approached as he did, listening in as he noticed the man speaking to her.
"We've been over this. Both me and Frieza-" Garkos sounded like he couldn't believe the words he was saying, "-Agree, its too dangerous for you to step outside until we're sure that the place is secure. You aren't like either of us, even the weakest person here could kill you. Just stay in the ship. It won't even be an hour, I promise."
Frieza rolled his eyes, but nodded as he stepped in behind the Zaltian. "Indeed. If anything, this won't take me longer than five minutes." Frieza said, then, seeing the girl's eyes wandering, darted down and snatched her face between his fingers, forcing the child to look him in the eyes as he hissed, "So stay put." Frieza dropped her as soon as she nodded, then his gaze fell onto Garkos, "As for you, you have your role. I'm going to find the man in charge."
Garkos nodded, "We'll meet back here in at least an hour. Is that good?"
Frieza returned it, "That will be more than sufficient. If you end up taking too long, I'll come find you." Already, Frieza was stepping into the air, and before either of them knew it, he was gone.
Frieza didn't spend long on the average soldier who stepped in his way, though he did find it strange that they all stepped in his way. He might have found their lack of self-preservation commendable if he didn't find it so odd. It wasn't until the thirtith- or so, Frieza had lost count quite some time ago- man stepped in his way that Frieza decided not to immediately kill him. Instead, he lunged for his throat, snatching it and hoisting the white-armored man into the air, "Alright. What the hell are you doing? Why are all of you throwing your lives away instead of running for the hills? Talk, and maybe I'll let you actually survive this encounter."
The man struggled against Frieza for a moment, his hand trying to pry the Arcosian's off his neck to no avail. When his arm wouldn't give, the soldier gave in, "Alright!" He choked. "I'll tell- you! Just let go!" Frieza considered his proposal for a moment, then figured that his clawed hands were actually a detriment this time, so he dropped the soldier. Once he hit the ground, the man dropped to all fours, choking and gasping for air for a moment, then he looked up at Frieza, "The Crusher Corps has a code. We fight honorably and we die honorably, or, if we live..." The man trails off. "We get a reward."
"A reward?" Frieza cocked his head, eyes lighting up, "What could be so rewarding that you'd be willing to risk fighting me for it?"
"Power." The Soldier replied. "So much power... more than you could ever imagine! Even just a taste of that fruit could make someone as powerful as the Ginyu Force! Depending on how much potential they've got, I mean." Then, the man looks down towards the ground again, "Its more than just that though. If I wanted power, I could pretend that I fought you and leave it at that, Lord Turles probably wouldn't even really care if I did as long as I survived seeing you. There's something different about him though... He's not like Lord Slug, not like serving the Frieza Force- serving you apparently- either..." The man tightened his fist, Frieza frowned, "He makes me want to impress him!" Lunging forward, the man swung his fist up towards Frieza's face, striking the Emperor across the chin.
And then suddenly, the man reared back, clutching his hand. He'd broken his fist on impact. Frieza chuckled, approaching the man, then settling his hand on his shoulder comofortingly, "Well. I certainly hope you've suitably impressed your lordship. After all, you've just gotten done throwing your life away for him." The Emperor cracked his neck, then drove his fist forward through the man's chest, bursting through his ribcage and out the other end, snagging his spine on the way out, tearing it completely free from his back, "Though... I must admit, it is rather commendable that he's able to cultivate such loyal soldiers. Perhaps I should discuss integration into my army, I'll need good help to deal with Cooler and his treacherous little minions..." Then, dropping the spine and tearing his hand free from the body, Frieza blinked and smacked his forehead with his other hand. "Damn it! I should have asked where this Turles is..." Frieza muttered, then paused, his brow furrowing a bit. "That's... a Saiyan name." Then his face contorted into a sneer. "A... Saiyan." The mere concept filled him with venomous, spitting hatred.
And then, slowly, with a nauseating, chilling dread.
Garkos stopped in front of another control panel, frowning softly as he did. Tapping a button, the monitor in front of him buzzed to life, a dim hum of static over the display. This place might have looked new, but it was older than it let on, "I wonder if this is something Turles won during his war with Slug..." Garkos muttered, tapping a few more buttons until he accessed the sensor array- a series of massive satellites which surrounded both the facility and the moon itself. Satellites which were responsible for them being jammed, "That would certainly explain the technology..."
Or so Garkos had initially believed, but the longer he spent in this room, the control room for the entire military arm of the Crusher Corps fleet no less, the less convinced he became that they were being jammed from planet-level.
Because each and every last satellite that made up the entire array hadn't been brought online in months. 'But that doesn't make any sense...' Garkos thought, shaking his head. 'We were being jammed... and I sat by the radar for hours, there's no way a ship could have escaped our notice... right?' His eyes flickered around as he moved to the next console, activating it again and searching for any sign that it's connected dishes had been activated at any point in the last week, only to come up empty. He moved to the next, and the next, and the next, and each one replied the same way. Most of them hadn't been activated in days, and of the few that had been used recently, they'd been used to transmit signals, not block them.
'But... if that's the case, then... How were they keeping us from communicating? Was the ship sabotaged somehow, was I doing something wrong?' A worse thought struck him then, and Garkos swallowed his terror as he moved to leave the room. 'Had I missed a ship?'
But as the man prepared to leave, he spotted something on one of the nearby computers, a blinking red light- an incoming communication. Shrugging and figuring that he might be able to get some information this way, Garkos stepped towards the computer and activated the button, making sure that they were receiving audio only while he achieved full visual. Immediately, his blood ran cold when he saw who was on the other end of the screen. Messy black hair, dark, off-grey, skin and a light pink Scouter adorning his face, Turles had made his arrival, "Report, has Frieza arrived yet?"
Garkos cleared his throat. "Yes sir. In fact, that's the reason that visuals are down, he's decimated most of the complex by now." Garkos spoke in a voice perhaps an octave lower than his usual register, trying to obscure his voice even a little bit. Turles' eyes narrowed, and the Saiyan Warrior frowned.
"What's your name, soldier? I don't believe we've met." Turles asked, a calm, concentrated expression on his face. Garkos bit his tongue to keep from swearing- lying was never his strong suit.
"Calcorra, sir. I'm a new recruit from Lord Slug's former army." Garkos offered, and the Saiyan cocked his head before smirking slightly.
"Good attempt, but I was careful to personally vet each and every man from Slug's group before bringing them on. Not only to test their loyalty, but also their honor. You can't trust anyone who works with the demon clan willingly, even bringing on Medamatcha was a stretch too far for me... But I'm sure you've already taken care of him, so for that I must thank you. You gave it your best... Garkos, I'm guessing? But I'm afraid your best wasn't good enough. Still, I can assure you that this works out in both of our favors." Turles told him, and Garkos glared.
"What are you talking about, Saiyan? How does this work in my favor?"
"Easily. You see, I hate to admit it, but that base you're standing in? Me and my closest allies abandoned it after we were informed of Frieza's imminent arrival three days ago by Amond. The men we left behind are some of my most loyal, and also some of the ones that required correction, such as Medamatcha. Their role was to distract you from us for a bit longer in case you arrived too early... And also, hopefully, to kill you."
"Buying you time for what?" Garkos growled, already knowing the answer, "What are you doing?"
"As you're aware by now, that's a moon you're standing on." Turles tapped his temple with a finger, "Use your head now, Garkos. Where is the best place to plant the Tree of Might?" Garkos' eyes widened. If this was a moon, then chances are Turles brought the Tree to its nearby planet, and if Turles has already planted the Tree of Might, then that meant... "Yes." Turles nodded, "I've planted it on Planet Clariness, You didn't honestly think that I was intending to just wait around after that little threat from the ghost of Frieza, did you? I've taken precautions to deal with him. In a matter of hours, the Tree will bear fruit, and By the time the pair of you arrive, it'll be too late to prevent me from gaining enough strength to defeat Frieza in combat. After all, in a weakened state like that, it shouldn't take very much to bring him down." Turles smirked again as he suddenly looked behind Garkos, "Ah, but before that happens, I'm wondering if I can have you dealt with and brought to me personally."
Garkos turned, and before he knew it, a sizeable pinkish red colored fist had slammed into the side of his head and flung him through a wall, embedding him within it. Cacao, another one of Turles' higher-ups had arrived. He was a fair bit weaker than Amond, but that only put him on par with Garkos, "Deal with the General, I no longer have any use for him as a bargaining chip, but he might still provide us some valuable information regarding his allies. Killing him will give you the standard reward for a battle well-fought, Cacao. Sparing him and bringing him to me, however will bring you your share, as well as Amond's." Turles glared at someone off-screen. "Well, I'll leave you to it."
Author's Note: And so another chapter comes to a conclusion. I'll admit, this chapter was a bit longer than expected, and it was also a lot slower than I intended it to be as well, but we're still on track for the really interesting parts to come in, now that we're FINALLY off that godforsaken planet. You have no idea how much I related to Frieza during his narration sometimes, I wanted to escape it as well. But, now that we're here, I can assure you that we're going to be moving away from the more slow-going character-driven chapters, at least for a little while. From here on out its going to be one action-packed event to another. Starting with Garkos getting his ass kicked!
As for this chapter's events, I wanted to really emphasize how death affects the characters, especially the people related to the deceased. I didn't want them to just move on from Bendez's demise like he wasn't even there, and I don't want the narrative to do that either. My goal is to make sure that even though he's gone, you sense his presence in every action Hoda and Yota take from here forward, so I'm kind of laying the groundwork for that as well.
In any case, I think that's everything so lets get into some power levels for the moment.
Medamatcha: 140,000, a bit stronger than his canonical self, why is that so? Well, lets just say he's been eating his fruit.
Cacao: 150,000
And those are the only characters we see fight in this chapter, aside from fodder characters like Medamatcha's mini-me's and the Turles Soldiers, who both have power levels ranging from the low 100s to the high 1,000s depending on the individual.
Now for the reviews!
AliasTesin: Whohahh! Great comeback with your story. We are far from the 'point of redemption' but the story here surprises and fascinates
Me: True, we're still pretty far off from Frieza actually being "redeemed" by any metric, but he's definitely starting the process of earning some of that humanity that he's sorely missing. Still, my goal for this story is to show off how hard redemption really is, especially for someone like him, so don't expect it to come easily~
I'm glad you're enjoying the story though! I want to keep people on their toes while they're reading it.
Casual Dark: Damn I actually feel for Frieza now... Even if he doesn't understand it, losing people he's been "close" hurts.
Looking forward to the next chapter!
Me: Glad you're enjoying it so far! We're about to really ramp it up so that's going to be a lot of fun. Yeah, losing people you've come to care for is probably the hardest part about living, but imagine how it must feel for Frieza- someone who's never experienced care for someone else in the past. He's got to be having a mental crisis right now.
Welp, that's everything so, as always,
Until Next Time, True Readers!