Chapter 10. Stuck in shit

"Morning, Captain." her commander and lieutenant greeted her in one voice when Akane joined them for breakfast in the barracks that wasn't really a barracks.

She gave a rough sound of the throat in reply as she helped herself to some cold chicken. She suspected that the bucket containing the meat had to be zapped before consumption in some fashion, but they hadn't the means for that in this compound. The meat was fit to eat cold, so that was what she did and though it was a bit dry, it was salty and coated with a layer of spicy crumbs too and the bones had a nice crunch to them. Having gone for moons on nothing but energy bars on countless occasions during her missions, she wasn't picky. If it was meant as food and packed some flavour, she was eating it.

Her men resumed their breakfast while quietly talking amongst themselves, knowing better than to ruin her day in advance by starting it off pestering her. Akane had nothing to say to them. Her mood wasn't all that foul yet, but her fuse felt short from not having slept since she was taken out of her forced hibernation. A decade and a half under the ground had really fucked with her appreciation for sleep. She had done that long enough to last her another fourteen fucking turns around the suns. Her eye fell on the cracked wall behind Turles' back. The surface bore the impression of her face and the sight made her mood go from not yet foul to extremely sunny. There were more silent reminders of how the prince had made himself count the previous morning. The place had been cleared up, by her men she supposed because she sure as shit hadn't bothered, and the table was back in place, the white, glossy top now bearing a long crack from having been mishandled. One of the funny wheely-chairs had suffered a worse fate and lay in the corner of the room a dismantled heap to prove what aggression had overtaken the prince. He could have simply rolled it out of his way. Instead, he had opted to remove it from his path with a kick that had turned it to pieces. The cold-boxes the chair had upended were stacked back up as neatly as it went dented as they now were. This all may not have meant much, nothing on this planet was built to outlast a Saiyajin's potence, but the prince had shown himself very contained in navigating this weak world as well as his own affects. He seemed about as animate as stone. Until he didn't.

Akane tested the all but healed graze on her temple with her gloved fingers, heat blossoming between her thighs at remembering the kissing lips that had whispered across her busted skin. Had that gotten away from him as well? The recall kicked off a slew of enticing, steamy mental images that weren't half as soft and her whole body started thrumming with the flames of want igniting in her. Her desire was so blatant that she sensed first Ringo, then Turles prick up in awareness. She made a snarling sound deep in her throat and let her tail bristle to signal that they should leave her the fuck alone. They both backed off without challenge, though being an inherent pack-leader had Ringo at odds with himself, his upper lip trembling in an unexecuted snarl. Had he not been a soldier drilled to stick to his station, he would have acted on that urge he was struggling with. And had she not been his captain, he still wouldn't have gotten her bent over this table unless she chose to let him. Akane was his superior in more than rank alone. She outclassed that lanky streak of piss in strength too. The poor beggar.

Turles was sucking it easy. He had no dick-swinging urges to get a handle on and his focus soon shifted back to the food on the table. His nature was to concur. He was a follower, the backbone, destined to serve his pack, not himself and not his needs. It made him a nice companion, unconfrontational, mindful, always ready to help raise morale and step aside for his betters, like he did now that Akane slapped his hand away from the big bucket of chicken she was intent on finishing by herself. As a bed mate too, Turles would never take the initiative or assert himself, but if she went to him – like she had done last night – he would lavish her with his tender loving. She couldn't really get her kicks from that. She liked her twine untamed, unpredictable and uncompromising. But an itch, as they said, was an itch. And it stayed an itch until you scratched it. As long as her prospects had not been hit with the ugly stick too hard, she wasn't picky about that either. She had needed a scratch, Turles had needed a scratch and so they had helped each other out with that last night.

Ringo, who had been too busy sleeping to catch Turles come back to her quarters with her, was having a rash right now, and it was starting to get the better of him. Akane watched, mildly interested, how his blown up tail unfurled itself from around his waist to rise behind him in declaration. He was getting his full dominant-dick on and when she met his gaze, his greenish-brown eyes were brimming with fire. She grinned. Given her own current state, she may as well help him out with his and let him rough her up a bit. Yeah, she could go for that. Sometimes a quicky was all it took and Ringo was quicker than most. He could pounce her faster than she had time to blink and be gone again before she even fully realised that he had just taken his pleasure from her. Even when he gave it time, he never lasted longer than it took for him to get off. He was a greedy taker, but Akane figured that she would have no trouble catching up with him at the moment. Her drive was in overdrive and she didn't know if it was just her celebrating her freedom or the prince kick-starting her back into gear last morning.

Towards the end of her enslavement in the WTO, she had lost her interest for most anything, sex included. The fair share of unwanted, foreign dick she had been given by rapist imperials that were lucky enough to outmatch her and she had been unlucky enough not to outrun, had played into that, but it had been more than just the rape. What had truly been killing her spirit, was the futility of her existence after the destruction of their planet. Even if she and her men somehow succeeded in completing their mission, they no longer had a home to which they could return their young prince. They had refused to abandon their duty even then. The prince was still alive, rumour had it, still in the hands of the one responsible for the Saiyajin genocide. That knowledge set her squadron on the course of desertion from the imperial army and on a piss-in-the-wind chase straight across the universe to find and save him. They were hunted down and forced to continue serving under bind and collar. Freedom was given back to them, many times, to bring more worlds under WTO reign, but it never lasted. As soon as the job was done, their leashes were pulled and they were back in chains.

Akane had launched escape plans to the detriment of her men, one by one losing them to the sick proclivities of a sadist slaver who had resorted to any means to make her get back in line. And when only half of their squadron was left, the sadistic cunt had crushed their revolt by putting them to sleep. Two more of her men found death on his ship, one succumbing to the symptoms of a malfunctioning collar, the other getting cut down in hibernation for ruffling the wrong feathers. After that, it had felt like accepting death every time Akane was forced to give herself over to the defenceless state of hibernation with enemies all around simply dying to settle some scores with her. Jun picked a fight with the wrong imperial and paid for it with a knife to the heart in his sleep, but Akane had possessed a talent for getting on the bad side of every bender that fucking ship counted. It had been only a matter of when she would suffer a similar fate. How often she had slipped into that black pit of slumber fearing that she would never wake up again.

But that was done. She had woken up again, and in true freedom this time. She, her commander and her lieutenant had made it out, with their hides and not a hair out of place. Why wouldn't they be celebrating? The idea of having a short and – hopefully – sweet mingle with Ringo, was gaining ground on her, but it fizzled out without coming to fruition when she became aware of another inherent leader entering the compound. Piss-streak would have to wait. Here came the biggest dick of all, and if she had to make a guess, he was coming in swinging. What she knew for a fact, was that no matter how she snarled and bristled, this dominant male was backing off for nothing. Her busted temple could attest to that. Akane was puddling in her seat now and Ringo, as yet unaware of the incoming rival, let his tail seek hers to coil with as a signal of his willingness to twine. Another snarl and show of teeth from her put an end to that, but not gladly. The low, dissatisfied growl Ringo let out in answer, died in his throat at the arrival of his competitor. Akane gathered that piss-streak's instincts would be playing up a merry storm at the moment, yet he showed none of it and let his soldier side take over. Ringo had bowed out before even opting in. Sensible. He would be eating dust before he had a chance to bare his teeth.

The prince came into the barracks, the look on his handsome face stoic. That wicked, captivating, excitingly fierce air Ringo had gained and that had made Akane keen as fuck for him, was crumbling in the face of their ruler's massive masculinity. There was no competition here. What the Prince of Saiyajins carried around with him, was not simply an air. His superiority was a broadcast that could be picked up from fucking deep space. He pinned her in place and did it with his eyes only. Now that was proper dominance. Akane felt like raising her arse in surrender at that commanding look alone. A shiver ran up her spine. He may have the appearance of stone again, the aggression this room and her busted temple evidenced, was obviously still with him.

Ringo and Turles stood up to salute him without bending the knee. Apparently, the prince had decreed that there was no need for them to get on the ground every bleeding time they caught sight of him, or so he had allegedly told her men when they crossed paths with him outside the compound yesterday. It was in keeping with court. The king's retinue had been excluded from the elaborate bow as it was undoable in the course of their daily attendance to him and soldiers falling directly under royal command had not been expected to give the bended-knee salute either. But whatever the fuck the current state of affairs was, court it was not and active service even less. It was up in the air. From what Akane was able to tell, it would remain that way too. This prince was in exile and clearly not looking to add a following to his two-bit dynasty. He was looking for something though, and his destination for her wasn't vague at all. It showed all the signs of her getting her much anticipated encore. About eight hours late in coming, give or take, and in a nick of time. Turles had been standing in, lousily in hindsight, and Ringo would have been a mere prop as well. She wanted this. All of it, all the way and all day long. She also, with equal conviction, did not want this. None of it, no way and never.

Akane shifted under the prince's intense gaze as much as in the discomfort of her own ambivalence. She wondered if she should be bending the knee. After all, he had not told her that there was no need for it and he had made it clear that despite not requiring their service, he did expect her to show him the respect that he deserved. She wasn't going to bend the knee, obviously. If her men were granted relief from that ceremony, then as far as she was concerned, so was she. Should the prince be of a different opinion, she had no doubt that he would let her know. And that cluster-fucking fact redeemed him. Splendidly. Her views of him were also very much up in the air, yet that he was her prince, begged no more question and she would not be showing contempt for his title again. As for all the rest, it did not make a pretty picture. Everything that was wrong about it, put her off while the sheer inescapability of his presence was relentlessly drawing her in. She did not want to want this, but sweet Mother, what a yen she had for him.

Akane got up from her chair and placed her fist over her heart in salute to show the prince her fealty alongside her men. Ringo and Turles could just as well have been air. They were ignored completely, the intense scrutiny she was subjected to, was meant for her alone.

"Let's spar." Vegeta spoke in his low, dark voice.

Nonchalant as his words sounded, it wasn't an invitation. They weren't sparring neither, but his circumvention served her. Akane couldn't bear her men knowing about the interest their ruler had taken in her. If they did, then they would consider her his property. That notion, apart from being fucking inaccurate, was dishonouring in and of itself, but it also carrying the suggestion that she was on the same level as the lesser bitch, made it an unacceptable degradation. The prince liking her as an additional fuckhole next to the inferior cunt he offloaded in, was not flattering. Not flattering at all. Akane was keeping this flighty caper on the low.

"Certainly." she said with a measured: "Prince." She took a bottle of water from the table, grabbed a handful of chicken from the bucket and told her men: "You two are on your own." then added what she wondered had been better swallowed: "I know rumour has it that the native soil makes for quite a burrow, but show some fucking restraint, will you? Don't go digging holes out there."

"Aye, Captain." her men issued.

Whatever they might be thinking about her indirect insult to the prince's arrangement, it was kept to themselves in his presence. Akane wondered who her men were helping to save face exactly. They had shown themselves very ready to defend their ruler's honour. As they should.

The prince was already marching out and she followed trotting to catch up with him while munching on her chicken.

"I see you got that mouth to work again." Vegeta said with exceeding calm.

It was completely out of step with what turmoil could be sensed coming from him. Akane was clearly getting on his nerves again. She made a here-nor-there shrug in reaction to that realisation as much as his implication that he had fucked her well enough to leave her speechless. He had. For a while.

"I like to keep those bleeders untarnished." she explained with an obnoxious grin. "It won't last, obviously. Men will chase their dicks onto the chopping block if it gets them laid."

"Most men will." Vegeta agreed evenly, again not in tune with what was simmering beneath the smooth surface of his exterior. "Speaking of tarnished, from your position, boasting superiority makes you look petty and bitter and far too full of yourself. It must be pleasing to take the high ground when everyone else is stuck in the mud."

"The high ground took me. I was merely along for the ride." Akane shot back hotly. He was getting on her nerves as well.

Even if she did have options, it weren't many and should she not have had any, she would have opted for remaining solitary rather than let some lowly creature crawl between her thighs. The prince clearly thought that she wouldn't and that pissed her off. She should have left the topic of his lesser bitch alone like he had ordered her to, but she couldn't. It grossed her the fuck out and that was the very furthest from the kind of sentiments she wanted to take up space in her with him looking as rideable as he did. His situation was in her way. That he considered her hardly a step up from it, was in her way. He had softened that nasty insult by naming her fireball and overpowering her and his vigour had dispelled her aversion like a fucking charm. That he had gone so far overboard with his swing that he dick-slapped her in the face and made her suck him off, had her gagging for him all the more, and quite literally so, but she had been disgusted again when she sought his tail with hers and found him stunted. He had taken care of that by putting her face through the wall and killing any remaining reluctance to let him have her every way he wanted.

"Your diet could use some variation." Vegeta moved their exchange away from the previous – repulsive, vile, dishonouring – subject.

He may be offering her an easy out or he may be seeking one for himself, Akane couldn't really tell, but she followed suit. She really wanted to forget his situation and let him persuade her to give it up for him again. "I know." she mumbled with a crunch of bone. "I think I am getting hooked on these."

There was a hint of amusement in his otherwise impassive face. Well, she couldn't say that he was bitter. The slight half-grin wasn't given freely, but it was meant. It was also very fleeting. That turmoil in him was not budging. His strong being emanated something so visceral, so snarled and tight and thundering and sexual, that she thought he might run her through on the spot, yet somehow he had reins on it. That was remarkable. Akane wouldn't have been able to hold that in. She wasn't able to hold it in. He was getting her so ready for him again, it was a wonder that she wasn't sliding out of her kecks right where she walked. Could it be that he was in two minds about her as well? And if so, then why the fuck would he be? Surely he already found out that she was more than hardly a step up. Or she truly wasn't. Maybe he liked being stuck in the mud. And if that was true, then why, for the love of battle, was she getting so fucking eager to jump in and muck up her boots?

Akane snarled, her sunny mood dying a swift death and becoming fouler than it had been in a good long while. She downed half the bottle of water in one big gulp and with it swallowed the very nasty things she wanted to say for the sake of him, despite all else, being the prince she had resolved to be loyal to. Wanted to be loyal to. She roughly wiped her greasy face on her sleeve as they continued their way out in silence. The prince was looking at her though, he was watching her very closely. That was just fucking great.

Outside the compound, they ran into Turles' brother.

"Hiya, Vegeta." the ever happy bugger cheered.

"Kakarot." Vegeta spat.

Goku just smiled, unfazed by the blatant hostility. He couldn't take a hint if it smacked him in the face, that one. "Are we sparring again today, Akane?"

"No." Vegeta answered curtly in her stead.

"Later perhaps, Kakarot." Akane said. What could she say? She had a soft spot for the runts of litters.

"Okay!" The Earth-grown Saiyajin quipped with a bright smile and then he ambled past them towards the compound.

"And that is captain to you." Akane called after him. She liked him, but she didn't like him nearly enough for him to not keep her fucking name out of his mouth. Unseemly sod.

She followed the prince over to what he called the gravity tank. He used the hopelessly outmoded, small, round spaceship for his training and could be found in there from the arse-crack of dawn onward. His doggedness was another redeeming quality. Well, he was basically a cripple without his tail so she could like him for a runt as well. She didn't though. The prince looked anything but cripple. He was in his fifth decade, in full prime, and it was showing. The very air about him was screaming sex and the part of her that felt so bereft and in need, was screaming right along with it and trying to shout down that which was cerebral and very opposed to the things he had in store for her. This duality in her made her hate his fucking guts.

Vegeta jotted in a command on the panel beside the door to make the ramp drop, grabbed her upper arm and practically shoved her inside when the thing wasn't halfway down. "Get in there."

The lights popped on automatically as Akane stumbled in, the bottle of water flying from her hand. She regained her ground just before smacking into the fat pillar that stood in the middle of the cylindrical room and whipped around to keep the prince in her crosshairs. His strength truly was an awesome thing and he clearly liked tossing her around as much as she liked having it done to her. Or would have liked… did like… The suns curse her blood…

"And blind my bleeding eyes!" Akane voiced the rest of the profanity, her shout reverberating off the walls.

The ramp slammed back up to shut them in together with a conclusive clang and Akane made ready to intercept whatever the prince was coming at her with, but he walked past her towards the pillar and started inputting commands on the console it bore. He said nothing to the amputated swear that had escaped her, but the shadow of a lopsided, infuriating little grin, lingered in the corner of his mouth while he prepared the ship for she didn't know what. The air hummed and seemed to grow closer as some invisible barrier rose up along the walls to encase the ship's innards. It must be some sort of protective shield that enabled him to channel large amounts of ki without wrecking the place. Akane summoned a ki ball in her palm and threw it at the wall beside her. The small, red orb impacted the unseen barrier and melted away in whisps to prove her theory right. Perhaps the ship wasn't as technologically inferior as it looked on the outside and perhaps – and she was loathe to consider this – the same went for the inferior cunt that built it. An invention like this had not sprouted from a witless mind.

The prince passed her again, took up position an exact arms-length across from her and gave her body the type of creeping look that needed no words to put across that he knew exactly how to handle every single part of it. The blatant eye-rape communicated another thing as well. For women sex was the ultimate act of submission. Letting men invade her with their fingers and tongues and tails and dicks inherently placed her beneath them. That was why the menfolk named their effeminate counterpart the weaker sex. And this overbearing arsehole was very deliberate in making her aware of that. No matter how achieved a warrior she was, that look said, how many ranks she climbed and shiny decorations she pinned to her fine tits, at the end of the day she was nothing but a hole for him to hang his dick in.

Akane sensed him gear up and far beyond what he needed to outmatch her. A warning, or promise of what was to come. The staggering battle power she found rising in this man who had showed himself so eager to manhandle her, made quick work of the disgust that had been in her way. That which took up all the space in her now, was the knowledge that her eyes had become way too big for her little belly. She had been poking sticks at the big-arse predator everybody knew to avoid out on the plain. She wasn't simply the darter he had dubbed her. She was easy prey that had gotten herself into a massive shower of shit.