The Middle Child: Part I
Chapter 3: No Pain, No Gain I
By: TheRealBigJ
Disclaimer: All Dragon Ball Z characters and story elements aside from my Original Characters are created and owned by Akira Toriyama and Toei Animation.
A commonly detested feature of Planet Salada is the unbearably scorching hot heat waves that blanket the surface of the planet. Only a few regions on the planet ever get to taste the seasons of anything other than burnt sand, and even then, they were no complete exceptions to the planet's heat.
Today was no different for Onin, who unwillingly found himself in the middle of a small clearing just a few minutes away from his home. It was sort of like those old-fashioned gladiator rings he read about, though if this pit was anything like what those coliseums were described as, it has long since eroded away. On top of one of the many tree-shaped stone pillars that arced across the expansive terrain was his brother, Raditz, who was the one that quite literally dragged him out into this open area—by his tail, no less. Raditz sneezed girlishly when a gust of wind blew by.
" Listen up, Onin," Raditz recovered quickly, his voice booming in the clearing and his echoes bouncing freely across the stale air, " you've got only two weeks. Two weeks' worth of time to get yourself to the spot of even thinking of surviving the Hounding Race."
Onin simply nodded, attentively listening to his brother while staring at an inconspicuous beehive underneath a stone pillar. While his brother was unsurprisingly a crass Saiyan teenager, it didn't mean he didn't have valuable experience to give. As a reminder, Raditz has conquered over five planets by now, all of which were graded high in the difficulty index. That being said, this rather informal lesson from him could serve as quite a challenge for Onin. Who knows what type of ruthless training Raditz has in store for him. The best the young boy could do is hope for the worst.
" And to do that, let's be real for a second," Raditz continued, " you're weak. Like, even weaker than me, and that's saying something."
" Ouch…?" Onin tilted his head at his brother's double-edged insult.
" So, before we even start your fighting training…" Raditz shoved his hand into a crack on the pillar he was on. Seconds later, Onin heard a loud clank of a lever, which was followed by the loud rumbling of stone grinding on top of another stone. Onin looked back to the source of the sound, finding that it was in fact a large boulder being lifted up from the rock wall, revealing a deep and dark tunnel. " We gotta get your stamina and endurance up."
" By… running in the dark?" Onin guessed, finding the pitch-black void to be irksome.
" Not just running in the dark," Raditz smirked devilishly, pressing yet another lever than Onin's finding a hard time seeing. Another rocky sound appeared, this time right under the pillar Raditz was on. The shape of the new entrance was no different from the one directly opposite from it, with the only exception being the numerous glowing yellow eyes that dotted the blackness.
Raditz grinned to himself, watching gleefully as his younger brother started shock-still at the eyes in the tunnel. However, much to the dismay of his assumptions, Onin wasn't scared at all.
" How did you even get someone to make all of this?" Onin asked genuinely.
"... What?" Raditz blinked, his own confusion appearing. " What are you blabbering? I built this all myself."
" Huh?!" Onin's eyes widened, staring at his brother with disbelief. " How?!"
Onin's reaction only ticked off Raditz even more, who's eyebrow twitched involuntarily. " How is that hard to believe…"
" Cause… cause you're Raditz!"
" Wh–" Raditz pinched the bridge of his nose, groaning to himself. " Just because I don't suffocate myself in stupid books doesn't mean I'm not smart…"
"..."
"...and I also took architecture class school."
" Wow," Onin blinked with genuine shock, " you actually went to school?"
Onin wasn't blessed with a verbal response. Instead, what he got was a sharp whistle from Raditz, which was quickly followed by the ear-screeching sound of metal chains ripping into shreds as the wielders of the piercing yellow eyes set themselves free and into the light. One, two, and a total of twelve dark brown massive canines stormed out of the entrance, coming to a complete halt just a few meters away from Onin. Now he was shock-still.
" You've got a three second head start! Three!" Raditz shouted.
" W-Wha—" Onin stuttered.
"Two"
Panicking, Onin attempted to wave his hands frantically to stop his brother. " R-Raditz, this isn't fair—"
" One! Let loose, you mutts!"
" You forgot zer—" Before Onin could even register a full sentence, the colossal brown wolves all pounced at him without a second wasted. Quickly, Onin found his vision flooded with brown fur and long razor-sharp fangs sinking into his flesh…
… or that is what he thought would happen. Instead, as if by a magical miracle, his body moved on its own, and within the span of a second, he just barely managed to back up from a claw swipe that would've left him with a nasty wound and a missing arm. As lucky as that was, he still had another set of twenty-three claws heading his way.
With his training abruptly begun, Onin took to defense and attempted to stretch the distance between him and his new assailants. But no matter how many backward leaps he did, nor how many claw attacks he somehow dodged, the distance between them and himself was only narrowing. Onin quickly found his back approaching the stone walls of the stone pit, but, at that exact moment of realization, his clever mind did what it did best. Not even three minutes in his training and he has already brewed the most efficient plan in dealing with these wild dogs.
" Woah!" Onin quickly leaned under a dangerously close piercing attack that would've gashed his left eye. Using the same momentum, he rolled to the side of the wave of wild dogs, causing the mindless beasts to crash into the stone wall in a large pile. While his plan was a success, three of them from the back managed to slow themselves down from the body pile and quickly continued the wild chase.
Having temporarily dealt with more than three fourths of these crazed beasts, Onin was given the breathing space to actually process what was going on. Appearance wise, these giant wild dogs seemed to be unintelligent, and the more he saw their disorganized sprinting the more it became clear. But at the same time, seeing them graze each other with their own attacks and appearing completely unfazed implied they had considerable endurance, which eliminated any possibility of him even trying to attack. Onin was aware of his own lack of offense and adding that to an enemy with high durability isn't a great match.
Now that he thinks about it… this first exercise from Raditz is actually quite thought out. With this, instead of addressing his immediate weaknesses, he's improving his current strengths—stamina—which is probably the best thing for him to do right now. So, for now, while he's quite literally making circles around the pit, Onin's focus was to increase his speed and stamina.
" Not bad, Raditz," Onin thought to himself. Maybe he'll need to give more credit to his brother, especially if he's going to be his teacher. That wasn't a thought he would've had before all that has happened.
" Is that all?" Raditz yelled from above with a heavily disappointed tone. Onin glanced up to see his brother standing cross-armed, a bored expression on his face. " You could at least throw a rock or something."
" Like that would work!" Onin yelled back, doing a quick jerk in his direction, causing one of the dogs to shatter their ankles completely. " They're too tough!"
" Well, blame that on your weakness," Raditz scoffed. Although he couldn't see it, Onin could tell Raditz rolled his eyes.
Aside from his brother's contradicting comments, running around in circles wasn't a long-lasting tactic, nor was it wise, as Onin will soon be cornered from both the dogs behind him and the ones that are still recovering at the spot near the wall. Halfway from making the full cycle, though, was the entrance to the first tunnel that had opened from Raditz's impressive little contraption. It was an option, but not one Onin liked.
No, it wasn't because he was scared of the dark. If anything, the darkness would help him hide, but he clearly didn't have the time to look around for a hiding spot, much less have the time to adjust his sight. He'd risked running into something in the dark while also being chased by these crazy dogs. And no, he wasn't afraid of the dark.
But his time was short, and his options were thin, so he had to think fast and pick the best of what he had. Thankfully, his brain knew what was best in this dire situation.
His mind concluded, Onin took action without wait. With a big leap, Onin retained his speed and slammed his feet against the stone wall. From there, he continued his run—his wall run, putting everything he had into his legs to not lose his momentum. And, to his surprise, his legs didn't fail him, and he began to make quick progress up the side of the pit, leaving the growling and barking dogs below, who scratched at the walls as they helplessly followed his path.
His theory, as risky and doubtful as it was, worked out perfectly! With that said, he was now in a position where he can safely finish this whole exercise.
" Haha, yeah!" Onin laughed out loud, feeling a flood of exhilaration in his body he's never felt before… well, in a less life-threatening way. The before him would have had absolutely no faith in himself ever achieving this feat. And yet here he was able to do it and then some more. What's even more surprising is the lack of exhaustion he's feeling from this. By all means, this was definitely a new and exciting discovery to him.
BOOM!
Unfortunately, just as Onin was about to breach the edge of the surface of the outside world, the front of his path exploded in a flash of brilliant purple light and large chunks of rock. The shockwave completely overridden his momentum, and consequently he lost grip on the wall.
"WhaaAAaaAA!" Like a frisbee, Onin fell down in a spiraling motion, eventually crash landing onto the hard sandstone floor of the pit. The dust was far from settled, and even after groggily sitting up after a few seconds of recovery, Onin could barely see anything in front of him.
" Wha— cough cough —what the he—cough—ck was that?!" Onin shouted out to his brother, or to anyone in general. He tried to stand up, but his body was too disorientated to even move his arm properly.
" You idiot!" Raditz's voice boomed out in both rage and dissatisfaction. " Get up from your lazy ass and don't do any cheeky stuff like that again! You hear?!"
To his credit, Onin did have a remark against his brother's claim, but he was involuntarily cut off from replying when his entire body was suddenly thrown into the air from the impact of a body four times his size. Onin once again found himself airborne, thrown out from the unsettled dust cloud and tumbling into the center of the pit. This one… this one he definitely felt, and it took nearly a quarter of a minute for him to recover. But, to his disadvantage once again, that span of time was far enough for his assailants to take the opportunity to completely circle him.
Oddly, for some reason, Onin felt himself back to square one.
Pushing himself to his feet, he winced as he wiped a thumb across his left cheek. There was a long, thin gash, likely from the attack that sent him flying into the air. It wasn't the worst injury he's had so far, but it still stung a bit. Shaking the pain off, Onin quickly returned his attention to his organic cage, studying as the wild dogs seemed to have grown brains and managed to cooperate into forming a tight circle around him. Each one growled and stared at him with the lust from their stomachs. Acidic drool dripped from their maws and into fizzingly puddles on the ground as they were surely imagining a full course meal with Onin as the main dish.
" What are you, a puss?!" Raditz yelled out loud. Onin spared his brother a glance just in time to see his overexaggerated facepalm. " Stop standing there like avian prey and fight!"
" That's already out of the question," Onin muttered to himself as he took in every factor of the situation. The distance between him and the circle of death was too long of a duration for him to run through the gaps between the dogs before they closed in. Neither did he have the energy to power jump over them like he did with the wall run, since his legs were still shaking from the double body slam. In other words, his options were still thin, and the longer he pondered, the tighter the circle shrunk.
" C'mon, think like you always do," Onin bit his lip in silence, keeping his eyes open for any sudden pounce. It felt as if his brain was running at full throttle, dwarfing any of his previous witty tactics so as to find the literal best option in this situation. Thus, this brings him to the truly inspiring realization that, during these life-threatening situations, he always just suddenly remembers an advantage that he has have yet to use. It was enough of a realization for him to facepalm. For Onin, this unused advantage came in the form of the very thing that barely kept him alive in the beginning.
" Damn it…" Onin chuckled low, shaking his head with a smile as he placed his concentration into the palm of his right, " I should probably study on myself more than anything else."
Soon, a familiar warmth enveloped his body, the exact one that appeared moments before his beatdown with Heele. Staring back to the dogs, he gave them a confident smirk as he concentrated this surging energy.
Closing his eyes tightly, Onin threw his glowing hand down, and, with the speed of a bullet, a bright yellow ball of light slammed onto the ground, simultaneously exploding in an enormous bright flash of light. At the exact moment of impact, using the shockwave as a little boost, Onin leaped over the blinded dogs, landing outside their death circle and making a run for it.
" What the…" Onin took a glance up to see Raditz staring at him with a raised eyebrow, his comment dying out. Onin smirked with confidence he thought he never had, tapping his finger on his head. Raditz stared at his brother for a second before simply spitting to the side and leaping off the pillar into a hover.
" Pull that stick out your ass, you still haven't finished this exercise," Raditz shouted out, nudging his head towards the tunnel, " get yourself to the other side, and fast. We don't have time for your parlor tricks."
Without another word, Raditz blasted off over the pit, towards the direction where the tunnel led. With no room for anymore comments, Onin didn't waste this window and forced his tiring body towards his new goal. It seemed what Raditz initially had in mind was for Onin to run through the tunnel while the dogs were chasing him… which didn't really seem to make sense on the outside. Maybe later he'll figure out what it would help him with.
Approaching the pitch-black maw of the abyss, Onin reactivated the energy in his hand, illuminating it into a makeshift flashlight. While it was nowhere close enough to light up the entire path, it was enough for him to see the rugged rocky surface of the tunnel. Soon, with the large dogs still whining from the flashbang, he was off into the dark.
" Flashbang…" Onin repeated to himself.
However long he spent running in this dark tunnel, it was at this moment that Onin decided to slow down and take a breather. Coming to a screeching halt in the cool and dry darkness of the tunnel, Onin put his hands on his knees in a crouching position.
His body was sweating more than he's ever done before, though thankfully the cool air was cooling his burning muscles. His "organic" flashlight… no, that was too odd of a name. His energy was dimming out, and with his fatigue growing the more he used it, he guessed it was also draining his stamina as well. It was the most plausible reasoning he could throw together at the moment, since this was the first time he was actively using this new part of himself. He's never studied it before…well, in honesty he never really had any knowledge of its existence in the first place. But he still somehow managed to perfectly do it during his trouble with the Trotter Lot.
Regardless, his eyes had adjusted a long time ago, so he could faintly see the outline of the stony interior. And from the empty silence of the tunnel aside from his heavy breaths and beating eardrums, Onin also concluded that his pursuers were far back near the stone pit. In other words, he could probably relax for now to regain some energy.
" Phew," Onin dropped against the cold stone wall, leaning his head back with a sigh. It was no comfortable position for him to sleep in, but he decidedly closed his eyes and allowed his thoughts to relapse on the events that transpired.
Aside from his brother's surprise training regime, Onin had no idea how he was going to prepare for the Hounding Race. It sucked that he still had no full idea what it was about either, and with only two weeks to train himself up into a barely survivable state, Onin had no luxury to do his research in the matter. And from what everyone has been implying so far, he should already know about this whole event by birth… but he doesn't, and that stings him a bit.
He's not even sure if he even wants to join this whole international race. But with some royal official just miraculously gaining interest in him and his mishap condition, he wasn't sure if he could just flat out reject. Actually, this is the government he's speaking about. His family might get into some trouble if he refuses to do the race, and the least he wants to do is bother his mother with that situation.
With that said, this event was nowhere near the term "a walk in the park," judging by how Heele responded to Onin's little theft attempt. And that just circles back to the problem with his training, which—while Raditz's plans seem to be working so far—Onin doubts he'll make significant progress by the deadline.
" I guess the best thing to do is just keep training until then," Onin thought to himself, rubbing off some dirt from the side of his lip with his thumb. He might as well come into terms that this is going to happen and, as much as he wants the context, he should be preparing for it. Who knows, maybe he'll get something good out of this.
Suddenly, Onin felt an icy cold droplet land on his nose. Confused, he passed it off as some rocky spiral dripping water, but after it had happened seven times consecutively, he couldn't resist the urge to look up. Instead of the stone spiral, unfortunately, he found himself staring at hundreds of large red eyes glaring at him with the same intensity as those starved wolves.
It was all the warning he needed. Before even processing who those red eyes belonged to, Onin was already sprinting off into the distance.
"Well, that took you long enough…"
Onin had finally reached the end of the tunnel. Coming to a tumbling halt right in front of the exit, the young boy rolled onto his back and heaved heavily, closing his eyes as the sunlight burned his face. He didn't risk stopping for another break after finding out there were more predatory creatures in the tunnel; he just kept running, which explained his rather pathetic form.
" Give… Give me… A second," Onin wheezed through his gasps for air, throwing an arm over his face. It turned out to be a stupid idea, because the red sand that got caught on his sweat-covered arms entered his eyes. "Gah! My eyes!"
Raditz simply watched with a sour look as his brother squirm on the ground, trying to rub the sand out his eyes but only making it worse. With an exasperated sigh he walked up and crouched down. " Stop squirming like a worm for a sec!"
Barely, Onin stopped his frantic movement to painful twitching. " But my—"
" Stop touching your eyes and look at me," Raditz grunted. Onin abided by his instruction to the best of his abilities, but his teary eyes struggled to open. Just when he was about to complain that he can't open his eyes, Raditz moved his pal in front of his face, and without warning, a powerful shot of air slammed into Onin's face. The force sent Onin's head back, enough to make him drop onto his back hard.
Shocked from the sudden wind, Onin blinked rapidly to recover. Then, after a second, he realized he could blink normally again without the pain of sand in his eyes. He stared at his brother, who had already stood up and crossed his arms with an expecting look.
" Get up," Raditz ordered.
" How did you—"
" Shut your mouth and get up!" Onin immediately did as his brother said. Raditz gave his little brother a look down before scowling. " That was a terrible performance. Worse I've ever seen… worse anyone has seen, if I'm being honest."
A cold sweat drop ran down Onin's temple. His head was still in a spin, so he couldn't think of a really good response. " I… at least survived?"
" Survived," Raditz suddenly chuckled, putting a hand on his hip while rubbing his eyes, " you survived, eh Onin?"
" I—" Raditz gave Onin absolutely no response time, throwing a powerful gut punch that sent the younger boy stumbling back onto the ground.
" I counted, Onin," Raditz began.
"Agh... W-Wha—?"
"You could've died TWELVE TIMES," Raditz roared with an explosion of anger, so much so it left Onin speechless, " TWELVE TIMES in the FUCKING WARM UP! WARM UP, OF ALL THINGS!"
Onin was stunned. He just laid on the ground motionlessly, looking at Raditz blanky, who had taken the silence as cue to continue.
" What the HELL makes you think you can say the word survive when you're in this SHITTY STATE from ONLY STRETCHING!" Raditz clenched his hands into tight fists. He breathed in heavily before exhaling sharply, though his face was still twisted in a disgusted anger. " If you can't even try clearing your training, what the hell do you think will happen in Phase 2 of the Hounding Games?"
Onin remained silent. There was no witty remark, no wise reply to that. Every word his brother was speaking was the unfiltered truth, no matter how much he could even try to reason against it.
" You will die before the announcer even says start!" Raditz growled. The air was dense with a feeling Onin couldn't describe. It was the first time seeing his brother this mad. " Do you understand now? Do you realize just how far behind you are? Two weeks is NOTHING at this rate!"
For a moment, the area was dead silent. Raditz glared at his downed brother, who was staring up at the reddish sky with heavy breathing. He clenched his fist even tighter but did nothing. Instead, Raditz turned around and began walking away.
" Get your ass up... you've got some work to do," Raditz simply said and no more.
Raditz's last comment made Onin blink back into reality. For some reason, deep in his core, that very phrase resonated an alien feeling of restrained stress to such a high degree that it made his head throb. Onin brought a hand to his temple and tried to rub away the foreign yet memorable feeling. What's worse is that, dwarfing that feeling on an astronomical level was the immeasurable hatred those words plucked in his very being. For a brief moment, Onin felt emotions he never truly felt at this level of passion, ones that genuinely made him scared.
This fear drove him to sit up, staring at the back of his departing brother. He took a second to collect himself, staring down at his sand-caked hands before shaking his head and managing to stand up. On his rigid legs, he placed a hand on his thumping chest and tried to control his breath. It didn't work, and he continued to feel these unwanted emotions.
" How am I capable of such… anger…" Onin watched his brother's form slowly getting smaller and smaller. He looked down at himself then flashed back to the state he was in moments prior. He truly was an utter mess, and what Raditz said was a truth he couldn't deny even if he wanted to.
He was weak.
Those three words were the logs of wood that turned these burning emotions in his heart into a blazing fury. His mind, which was still clouded, was suddenly cleared by a fortified resolve so incomparably intense that it made any other emotion he's ever felt before nothing but fake feelings. Within that moment of realization, he came to yet another even greater one.
He must win this race.
What was once anger was now the resolve, a resolve he's never had but always needed. With this newfound purpose, Onin felt his body feel lightweight. His injuries felt faint, and his energy felt restored.
Right now, Onin has experienced his third Zenkai.
The night of chapter one, city center of Bottleneck Sprout…
" Haha, sweet sweet victory!"
Heele's voice boastfully squealed across the streets of central Bottleneck. The Trotter Lot have just returned from their journey into the deserts south of the city, where they now make their way towards the Golden Oozaru headquarters. The city was buzzing with life; buildings of all shapes and colors were shining brightly with flashy and extravagant displays of advertisements, store signs, and lots and lots of propaganda. The streets were lightly crowded, with Saiyans and species of different races walking about.
Lace twitched an eyebrow as she gave Heele an annoyed look. " Could you keep it down, dumbass…"
Heele picked a pinkie finger in his ear and leaned over to Lace. " Ehh? I can't hear you over the BEST NIGHT OF MY LIFE!"
" How is this any better than your usual shit?" Lace deadpanned, before groaning and rubbing the bridge of her nose. " Actually, nevermi—"
" Well, thank you for asking, Lace," Heele said smugly, rubbing a finger and his nose. The finger, as well as most of his hand, was covered in dry blood. " Not only did I secure a spot into the second page of the race, I also left a permanent mark of my name on our rivals!"
" He was just a kid," Lace huffed, crossing her arms, " he wasn't even much of a threat to begin with."
" You think I give two shits?" Heele scoffed. " He had it coming with that shit he pulled. Now his momma and dadda are going to know not to mess with me, much more Bottleneck Sprout!"
The tall Saiyan with the yellow scouter pressed a button on his scouter before speaking. " The kid didn't look more than twelve, Heele. There's a rule allowing parents to demand compensation for their child."
"Pshh," Heele said dismissively, " they can ask for all the money they want, Welt, it still won't make a difference."
Welt simply shrugged without saying anything more. Not wanting to further acknowledge her brother's antics, Lace also kept quiet and gave an eye roll. Heele took this as them having no right answer to his reasoning, which only further inflated his pride.
The group continued towards the headquarters and eventually reached the front glass doors of the towering building. Entering the lobby, they found the place to be relatively empty as most of the contestants had submitted their findings an hour ago. However, the Trotter Lot had the luxury of not worrying about a time limit, so they slowly made their way to the front desk.
A young Saiyan woman was seated at the front desk. She looked up at the monitor she was lazily staring at and blinked when she saw the group.
" Welcome back. Please deposit the tokens into the box below."
A medal box slid from under the desk with a small screen displaying a fraction of zero over two. Starting with the leader, each member dropped their two golden birds into the box, with a green check mark appearing on the green each time toe fraction was filled.
Wasting no time, Heele—being the last to add his own birds—eagerly dropped his two birds into the box. After a few seconds of whirring, to his absolute delight, the screen let out an ear-splitting shriek and a x mark appeared.
"... What?" Helle's smile fell as the fraction stayed at zero over two, even though his two birds were in the box. Confused, he picked up the birds and dropped them back in the box. The same results occurred. " The fuck is this?"
The receptionist leaned over the desk to look at the box. She huffed with annoyance, waving a hand towards her. " Lemme see then."
Heele glared at the receptionist as he dropped the birds into her hand. " You better not fuck around with them…"
" Calm down, kid, I'm only inspecting them," the receptionist rolled her eyes as she brought a large microscope-looking machine onto the desk. Placing the birds onto the desk, she looked through the lens for a second before humming. " Weird…"
" Weird? What's weird?" Heele asked in a genuinely confused tone.
" The blood is probably messing up with the readers," Welt commented.
" Blood? There wasn't any blood on them when I got them," Heele said, crossing his arms, " that machine is probably broken. Always the cheap ass equipment…"
" No, it isn't the equipment," the receptionist said, removing the birds from the machine, " I've checked three times already. They're fakes."
Her response was enough to make Heele laugh out, though even he was unsure if it was a genuine laugh or not. " The hell are you spouting? I pried these two birds out of a kid's hands cold blooded. I know they're not fake."
"Mhm," the receptionist hummed dismissively, "unless you give me the real ones, I can't allow them through."
" Oh, don't fucking try me," Heele glared with resurging anger, slamming a fist onto the counter, " now takes these two birds and put them back into that stupid machine before I—"
Before Heele could say any more of his half-baked threats, the two golden birds suddenly began to swell up in light. Before anyone could even process what happened, the birds burst into small glowing particles before dispatching into the air.
The lobby was pushed into a void of silence. Heele, much like his team members though much more intensely, stared blankly at the empty counter where the golden birds laid.
" Damn," the braided girl exhaled with wide eyes, " that was… damn."
" What the—" Heele sharply turned towards Welt with eyes the size of pinpricks, " what the FUCK just happened?!"
" That kid you killed… he just got the last laugh," Welt began, crossing his arms with a look of genuine impression, " those two birds were ki constructs. They weren't even the real thing."
Heele didn't have a response to what he heard, nor did it appear he even heard anything, for he blankly stared off into the distance with an expressionless face. The receptionist sighed before putting the machine away.
" Well, there's your answer kid," the receptionist said, " without the required tokens, you can't register into the Hounding Race."
" W-Wait a sec—"
" With that said," the receptionist pressed a button on the intercom button, " the Trotter Lots, except for their group member Heele, have been registered into phase two of the Hounding Race. The preliminaries are over."
As the receptionist cut off the intercom and began to collect her things for the night, Heele blankly stared off into the distance. His reaction was… unnatural to his character, so much so it had most of the other members looking at him, waiting for what reaction he would give. Lace, not wanting her brother to cause any more of a scene than he already has, gave a smack on his shoulder.
" Oh, wake up, dumbass," Lace said in a joking voice, " you didn't get into the race. No shit, thousands of others didn't either. It isn't the end of the world."
Heele still didn't reply. His head was down, a shadow casted over his eyes. A drop of sweat ran down Lace's face as she was unsure how to respond to this unnatural silence. Heele was never known for being this quiet for such an amount of time.
" Hey, Heele—"
Suddenly, Heele snapped. With eyes turned red, veins popping in every muscle of his body, Heele threw his arm outwards towards Lace, who just barely ducked from the attack before it crashed into the wall and left a small crater with splintering cracks.
" SHUT THE FUCK UP," Heele roared with such a passion that it could be felt by everyone, no matter how unaffected they were by the sheer hatred seething from him. " WHERE THE FUCK IS THAT BRAT?! I'M GONNA KILL HIM! I SWEAR TO MY ENTIRE BLOODLINE, I'M GONNA—"
" Heele."
It was like a switch was flicked. The crazed Saiyan boy instantly went silent from his rage, his back flooded with an icy chill that was strong enough to cool the rage in his mind and replace it with a cold fear. The other members of the Trotter Lot, who were initially annoyed by the burst, also went rigid from their leader's voice, not daring to speak until spoken to otherwise.
" Y-Yes?" Heele responded with the voice of a puppy to its angered owner. Their leader simply looked at him with an expressionless face.
" It's over, you're done," their leader said plainly, not skipping a beat, " you're no longer part of the Trotter Lot."
The news snuffles away any anger or negativity that Heele bottled up. What was left was an indescribable terror, a terror so immense it was comparable to the terror of losing his life. His once proud and hubris stance was broken down to quivering knees and a shrunken form.
" B-Bu—"
"Leave," their leader said smoothly, not moving his sharp eyes from Heele once. The silence was palpable and, knowing he had absolutely no way to save himself, Heele brought his gaze down to the ground. With robotic motion, he made his way towards the doors, leaving behind the Trotter Lot, who all looked at him with different expressions.
When the doors closed, the braided girl huffed. " About time that loudmouth left."
Lace instantly looked at her friend with a poorly suppressed hurt expression. " Ilet, how could you say that? A-As much as he was annoying, he was one of our strongest. Heck, he was like the second strongest!"
" Brute strength means nothing when you're a dumbass," Ilet said.
" None of us even knew those birds were fake," Lace said defensively, looking at Welt, " not even you did, Mr. Smartass."
" Honestly, it's impressive how accurate those fakes were. I would've fallen for it too," Welt admitted, staring out at the doors, "but at the same time, it would have never happened because I was actually responsible with mine… unlike Heele."
Lace scowled at Welt, as much as he was right, before looking at their leader. He looked back at her with crossed arms, expecting a response. Lace parted her lips before biting down on her lower lip and looking elsewhere with a conflicted expression.
With nothing more to say, their leader began walking towards the doors. " Meet at field D for conditioning tomorrow morning. Anyone late is also dismissed from the group."
" Well, guess it is late," Ilet said, stretching her arms, " I'm signing out too. Cya guys."
As Ilet left, Welt looked at Lace, who was still looking down on the ground with a strange expression. " I'd get over it quickly, Lace. Your brother had it coming sooner for later anyways."
With that, all the members of the Trotter Lots left of their own accord, with Lace being left in the empty lobby. She looked back towards the front desk, where the fake birds had disappeared, before sighing and leaving as well.
Author Note
Thank you for reading! So sorry for the huge hiatus, I had a bunch of things to do at school and was always plagued by procrastination. Trust me, I didn't drop this story; I've had the whole lore brewing up in my mind for a while, I just need a way to fill up the gaps in between. I'm going to just be posting, cause I gotta understand not all stories are perfect.
Anyways, just to clear things up a bit, the Trotter Lot members are all punned after different parts of a shoe. Lace is shoe lace, Ilet is eyelet, Heele is heel, and Welt is welting. Leader's name will be revealed later on and not because I can't find a cool name for him.
Next chapter will be more training and uhh I guess some lore building. I'll try to see what I can do. I'm also making a second story as well, just to train my writing skills. Once again, thanks for reading and have a great day!