Whenever Chayote thought she was awake and conscious, it was difficult to say if she was blind or if the room was just sunken in darkness. There was no smell, everything inside had been isolated from any type of feeling, no cold, no heat. Not even the blood that she spilled felt like anything nor did it smell of blood. Whenever the Saiyan tried to recall something of value, she could only reach crippling flashes of lightning combined with the ugly mugs of her torturers.

She didn't recall any of those soldier types torturing her, each source of her torment had a distinctive look to them. One of them was a massive blob of orange flesh and spikes, another one was a more elegant, blue-skinned fellow with an affinity for loose, old clothing, Commander Zeeun, and Medamatcha also gone through their turns, Medamatcha most of all.

It wasn't like Chayote was complaining about being perpetually battered and broken to an inch of her life for whoever knew how long now but she failed to see the point of that activity. The first thing those demon spawns did was rid her of all possessions. Both of the sashes she had by her side were placed on the nearby plastic table with the larger one being freed of the Dragon Balls with black stars on them.

Whoever that Lord Slug guy was, he had all seven Dragon Balls but he didn't use them. Chayote would have recalled him using something like the Dragon Balls, she'd have certainly felt the colossal Ultimate Eternal Dragon ripping this planetary cruiser a new hole and making it a deadweight floater in the empty vastness of space. Then again, maybe that was exactly why Slug's crew didn't use them, maybe they waited for some destination to use them? Which destination would that be?

For how long has she been tortured here? It felt like her whole life, maybe weeks or months, who knew, maybe mere minutes that those demon scumbags made feel like years. If it truly was years and the Earth was gone before even realizing that Chayote had screwed up her mission, there would have been no way for the Saiyan to hear or otherwise feel the results of her failure.

The sashes… Thoughts were getting blurry, it was beyond just tough to concentrate as random flashes of painful memories peeled through Chayote's brain from its center at random intervals, but… Those Lord Slug commanders have placed the sashes nearby, they were so excited about emptying the one with the Dragon Balls that they've lost any desire of doing anything else that day. Back then, Chayote recalled tuning in and out, she could only barely recall the faint, orange gleams from the crystal orbs and the ugly mugs that reflected off of them.

The sashes, why did Chayote's mind keep on returning to them? What was she thinking about them and when? Something about them felt interesting, the Saiyan could recall at one point having thought up of something inciting great glee but… What was it? Could it have just been the joy in the fact that Slug's crew was oblivious to the effects of the Ultimate Dragon Balls? Yeah… That had to be it…

Those sashes… Chayote couldn't shake off those thoughts to the point where her eyes began frantically scanning the dark for any traces of that which the Slug's crew took from her. Was it right or left? She couldn't say. For all she knew, she may have been hanging upside down and it was up to where she was now, then again, maybe she'd have long since died if those commanders hung her that way. If she was ever permitted death, that was. The whole point through Chayote felt like dying and knowing that the whole universe, including every single one of those assholes getting deleted, wasn't all that bad.

That sort of supreme, cosmic justice would've been a nice middle finger to Lord Slug's face but… He'd have likely not known it was because of Chayote and the Saiyan, likely due to her genes, very much wanted the bastard to know whom he shouldn't have screwed with.

Senzu! That was why she was so focused on the sashes, none of those alien scumbags knew what Senzu were so they just dumped the sash and focused on slobbering all over the Dragon Balls. Though it wasn't like Chayote could move a finger right now. She was too weak, every single one of her bones may as well have been broken with excruciating electric jolts being the only thing denying her the release of death, just as that green shrimp had promised her.

That lightning felt awfully similar to Demon King Piccolo's techniques, stuff his minions used to do. Yeah… Chayote must have made that relation at some point too, during her hazier moments and that was why she had referred to Slug and his lot as "demons" in her mind.

She was getting off-point, the Senzu, she had to get the Senzu but…

"Ki-ki-ki, sorry, sorry, we must have left you alone for too long. It's just that messing you up is getting so awfully boring, maybe we'll kill you off soon enough, not yet though, not yet! Ki-ki-ki!"

Was it dark or was Chayote blinded? There were ample painful moments in her memory, one of them could have easily belonged to one of those demon bastards poking her eyes out. Not immediately though, Chayote could recall them taking the Dragon Balls, she saw the orange gleams in the dark. Yeah, they did take the Dragon Balls, why hadn't they used them though? They did take the Dragon Balls, they took both of her sashes and placed them on the table. Those sashes… Why was she so much into those sashes? Her mind just couldn't move away from them.

"Heh, heh… I need a good punching bag, stand still! Oh, that's right, you don't have a choice, do you!? Bwahahahaha!" a fat, orange mug with spikes and a folded set of wings walked in from outside, shedding some light onto its revolting appearance. The last thing the light illuminated was the fatso taking a punching stance and putting up his arms.

Chayote couldn't see anything. Come to think of it, neither could she smell anything. All of her bones were broken and nobody breaking them have been all too subtle about it. Certainly plenty of her blood was spilled but then why couldn't she smell any of it? Shit, she did still have her nose, didn't she? At some point she could still see, those bright, orange gleams suggested that. Yeah, those were when they took the Dragon Balls off of her, placed the sash holding them as well as yet another sash onto the table.

That other sash – Senzu! Shit! She was too busted to move a finger, not to mention that stasis field restraining her limbs. Not that it was of any use – if she was battered and broken, there was no use restraining her limbs. At the moment the only function that the stasis fields around her wrists and feet performed was keeping Chayote in a good, upright position for optimal beatdown positioning.

Jaco bolted, that cowardly asshole. If only he was here, he could have passed her a Senzu. One Senzu and she'd recover all of her injuries, not to mention power up immensely. She'd make mincemeat out of every demonic scumbag on this ship or any soldier under their employ. Shit, that Lord Slug guy ran an operation that Demon King Piccolo only dreamed of running. His own soldiers, plenty of spawns to do his bidding, all of his spawns were crazy strong, suggesting immense might of Lord Slug himself too.

"You brutish Saiyan, common torture is beneath me but… A barbarian such as yourself deserves what she gets!" the blue guy with horns and blond hair walked in from the light, the light entered when the door to the torture chamber opened and left when it closed behind him. Being beat down by someone wearing what seemed like a purple blouse hurt worse than his fists and he easily had three times her power level.

She just couldn't focus! Maybe it was because she couldn't see in general? There was no sense of sight until the door would have opened or something magical was unveiled, such as the time when one of the commanders opened the sash with the Dragon Balls. The sash… There was another one. Yeah, they placed both sashes by Chayote's side on the table. The other one… What was the other one?

Senzu! It had Senzu! Chayote didn't take much but she didn't have much chance to use any she did take, always leaving all of her equipment save for the Dragon Radar on the ship. Damn, if they looted her ship, they probably took the Dragon Radar, then again, Lord Slug probably already had all of the Dragon Ba… Senzu. She needed to focus on the Senzu. It was no use! Her whole body was broken. These were kind of familiar thoughts, has she thought them before? Why did the smiling image of that cowardly buffoon Jaco come to mind? He bolted when he could have slipped her a Senzu or something. It's not like he would have had trouble moving it unseen, he could move his gun to his own hands with his mind for fu…

Wait! Chayote closed her eyes and tried imagining the sash of Senzu, nobody knew what they were and all that the commanders could think or talk about was the Dragon Balls she brought. The fact that she brought whole four of them, oh, that drove them into absolute ecstasy. The sort of ecstasy that somebody who had the remaining three Dragon Balls would have experienced.

It wasn't tough opening her mouth, her jaw was busted and felt like it had recovered wrong from one of the many times that it was broken. Something cold bumped into Chayote's throat and fell without weight onto her tongue. Even moving her tongue felt like torment, it was as if the tongue and her entire mouth were suffering from fatigue all by themselves. The Senzu tasted like mashed seaweed for some reason…

"Hmph… How far away from Namek?" Lord Slug wondered, turning to the soldier by the star map who jumped up and must have wet his uniform from inside just a little after being addressed by the space tyrant who was known for murdering his own minion or two just out of sheer frustration.

"Three days, Lord Slug," the soldier muttered and screamed as if he had aimed to curdle someone's blood whole while an imperial red beam pierced his chest cavity and dropped him dead, cutting his screams short. The space overlord didn't need to declare the need to speed up the process any further than that as soldiers began flooding the control panels and inputting commands wildly out of fear to be next.

"Are you sure you want to use those Dragon Balls on Namek, Lord Slug? I thought you wanted your youth back more than anything, why wait?" Angila wondered, looking at his superior. Despite receiving a scolding stare back from Lord Slug, Angila's face was filled with respectful curiosity and the desire to learn rather than questioning his leader, that was why Slug smirked and shrugged his hands.

"I do," the elderly space tyrant confirmed, "However, none of you could see what I saw in those Dragon Balls. They weren't Namekian."

"Wh-What!?" the beady eyes of Medamatcha clapped a couple of times.

"They were made by a Namekian but they were awfully defective. I could sense an overload of negative energy inside them, unlike anything I've sensed before. That energy was growing with each passing second too, not settling down. It feels as if somebody had tried to make the perfect Dragon Balls – ones that don't have a time limit and can grant any wish imaginable, in the end, they've created a weapon of mass destruction." Lord Slug explained. "If I was to use them on the cruiser, they'd destroy it without question as any wish they'd grant would be full of that awesome negative energy they hold."

"And the Saiyan woman? For someone so mighty and unscrupulous, you've insisted we keep her alive. I wanna eat her heart, Lord Slug…" Wings raised his meaty hand and clutched his fingers, imagining them wrapping around a still-beating Saiyan heart as he stared with lust and hunger at the imaginary organ that he could almost feel pulsing in his heart.

"That woman knows where those Dragon Balls came from. That means she knows a Namekian that might have invented them. I can guide that Namekian to inventing proper Dragon Balls for my use. Who knows, he might be a Super-Namekian like me. Before we do that, however, we land on Namek and use these Dragon Balls there to ravage the rock that rejected me once and for all. If they would not have me, they can all die." Lord Slug smiled as he stared at a Dragon Ball with two black stars on it.

A violent shake threw Lord Slug out of his throne, sending his spawns all in a fritz as they too struggled to stay on their feet. All of the soldiers that didn't fumble and fall on their faces picked up their arms and ran out to check for the source of the quake while Lord Slug rose with a cracked helmet and stared with a shocked pair of eyes.

"What was that!?" Angila turned to Wings, Medamatcha and Zeeun.

"It came from the Saiyan's chamber!" Medamatcha pointed with a petrified expression.

Zeeun lifted Medamatcha off the ground by his head and pulled the undergrown demon spawn up to his face. "Tell me you weren't stupid enough to heal the Saiyan!" he yelled out at the face of his terrified comrade.

"I-I didn't, I swear! I'm no idiot, you don't let a Saiyan recover from a life-threatening injury, everyone knows that!" Medamatcha shrieked out, worried about his life.

"Go, you fools!" Lord Slug roared out with vitality unbefitting his decrepit body. "Every second you're spending here babbling she's plowing through our soldiers and doing whatever she pleases!"

"Heh heh, lucky for you I've got a cool head…" Wings put on the scouter he had picked up from Chayote on the right side of his face and pressed the button that turned it on. "I'll sniff that Saiyan right out!"

"Make sure you find out the planet she came from before you kill her. She's too dangerous to be left alive, evidently…" Lord Slug sighed while taking the seat back on his throne.

Lowering her Ki signature to evade being tracked by scouter was a pain, especially when Chayote needed to hide from the soldiers rushing through the halls. Regardless of the trouble that this caused, she still needed to reach the room with the Dragon Balls and it was more than likely that it was the throne room where Lord Slug himself was. Either way, there was one more location she needed to visit first, a location that she'd have planned on hitting even if she wasn't captured.

A bright, clean bone-colored shroud slivered out of the open room where Chayote felt a handful of weak but revolting Ki signatures. Seeing a small, swampy forest inside of a planetoid-sized cruiser felt shocking all of its own but this was a location that needed to be taken out. A handful of Slug's soldiers ran past Chayote, not noticing that the person inside a soldier's uniform looked awfully feminine-shaped and frail compared to the normal Lord Slug soldier that flooded the halls.

"A soldier wandered into our woods!?" a hiss filled the air after Chayote walked in and let the door shut behind her.

"I've got no time, show yourselves you hags!" the Saiyan grunted after taking off the helmet and showing her face to the white oblivion flooding the dead woods inside the room.

"The Hysterical One!? No! You shouldn't be here! He promised you wouldn't be here, that you wouldn't kill us!" the voice hissed, this time filled with dread. Judging from what Chayote could pick up, this was a case of a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts, not that it mattered, an emerald orb formed in Chayote's hand that would shake the cruiser once more and leaving a nasty hole on the cruiser's side that sucked all that Chayote didn't murder outright into the grasp of cold, dead space.

Just mere minutes later the door to the room where the priestesses with the uncanny ability to sense Namekian magic used to reside opened, only for Wings to close it up again after realizing that he was being sucked inside through the jarring hole on the ceiling – a chilling security hazard that would take at least four days to fix.

"Shit, her signature boomed in here just a second ago and now she's gone again… Could she have gone out the drain?" Wings wondered, scratching his chubby chin with his oversized claws.

"For all our sake, let's just hope that she can conceal her power level…" Angila shrugged. "Keep looking!"

"So you're Slug!" Chayote stared at the crooked, swampy-green figure that was too clad in cloth and armor to tell too many details about. The frontal portion of his face was visible, as were his dried out lips that were a familiar shade of green. He was just another ancient Namekian, just like Demon King Piccolo.

"That's Lord Slug to you, Saiyan, don't go anywhere and my clan will join us in a second. In the meantime, why don't you tell me the planet you've come from?" Lord Slug answered.

"Why don't you ask your priestesses where the nearest source of Namekian magic is? They'll tell you everything you want to know. Plus, I don't think that anyone's gonna come in here, I've picked up an interesting trick on the planet I came from – to control my power level." Chayote pointed at herself with her thumb, feeling proud of her swelling up power.

"I see, so you're hiding like a little space-rat." Lord Slug taunted the Saiyan.

Images of Demon King Piccolo smirking and mocking her the same way flashed by Chayote's mind, blinding her temporarily, the Saiyan stumbled back. Painful flashbacks to the torture surrounded her like a tunnel of worst nightmares that all led up to this point – yet another Namekian tyrant mocking her to her face with Chayote still too weak to do anything about it. Power… Power boiled inside her and it was tempting to let it out but she's gone down that path before and it had never before led to anything worthwhile.

"Maybe next time, when the fate of my planet isn't at stake…" Chayote shook her head and swallowed down her swelling rage, gulping all of the power that flowed with it. She didn't have much time now that she let this tremendous flare emerge. The Saiyan raised her arms over her head. "Solar Fist!" she yelled out.

"Lord Slug!" Commander Zeeun accompanied by Slug's entire clan burst into the throne room, confused by seeing their chief rubbing his eyes and writhing in irritation on his throne. "Wings said that the Saiyan's power level was just here!"

"She's gone… The damned bitch blinded me!" Lord Slug rose from his throne room, carefully opening one eye after another.

"That's how she outran me too!" Medamatcha pointed at Lord Slug while turning to his comrades. "That Saiyan ain't just common Frieza Army footsoldier, she's got scary techniques under her belt."

"She took the Dragon Balls!" Angila turned pale and pointed at the empty stand by Lord Slug's throne, only the royal rag rested on it, gently tipped over the side and hanging as if it would soon fall under even the slightest disruptions. "Quick, to the landing hull, she's going to use one of our vessels to escape!"

"She won't go far, if she did take the Dragon Balls, the priestesses will lead me right to her and if her planet has more Dragon Balls, they'll lead us right to her planet as well." Lord Slug clenched his fist as it began glowing in a fiery ring that grew in size while it pulsed.

"Umm… Lord Slug… She…" Commander Zeeun butt his fingers together, neither of Lord Slug's Demon Clan wanted to admit it to their Super-Namekian overlord what the Saiyan targeted first upon escaping her torture chamber.

"I don't know where I am…" Chayote mashed all of the buttons wildly while her vessel soared through the empty expanse of space, "But let's just hope I can still make it back to Earth in time!" she grit her teeth as sweat ran down her face. It wasn't the weary nor the worry of her recent feat of escape that troubled her, it was the sector of space that Lord Slug's spaceship was in. Her own spaceship was all busted up, the aliens tried to find the exact gadget that served as the Dragon Radar so Chayote had to destroy the whole thing before fleeing.

Of what use was saving the Earth by the skin of her teeth if Lord Slug and his crew found them by tracking them down with the Dragon Radar regardless and destroyed the planet personally? The worst part was over, all that was left now was the home run, most importantly – making it back in time!