The first thought Apara had about these new enemies, these pirates who thought themselves strong enough to challenge a crew with a Saiyan warrior aboard, was one of annoyance. The little girl looked up at three of the aforementioned combatants as they gestured at her and bleated on about the necessity of doing battle with a child. They were all tall, each of the sentients large enough that she only came up to their knees, but they didn't seem to have any particularly special traits she could make out beyond the enclosed black bodysuits they wore. She did notice an emblem of some kind emblazoned on the right shoulder of each suit, some kind of carrion bird, its wings draped over a world. Not worth remembering.

Her head tilted as she followed Dennis' progress throughout the ship.

He was moving quickly, and behind the slick and shade of his ki she thought she caught something resembling excitement. He was as eager as she was to wield their new power levels. Or at least as eager as she had been before she got inside anyway.

"-Look at her, she's clearly a child. What honor is there to be found in killing her now? We wouldn't have won anything."

One had a weapon directed towards her, but the other two seemed more intent on avoiding a fight. It was something like a disappointment, the feeling it gave her, but it was colored by rage. If her teacher was present he may have used an analogy like "They were taking the wind out of her sails''

Or whatever the fuck else collection of nonsense words he'd use to mean something entirely different from what he was actually saying. She didn't like that part of him all that much. Apara squinted at the heat of the weapon being pointed at her. It was making her throat dry.

"Leader Kerva was right to suggest attacking this PTO if they are so eager to send children to fight in the place of real warriors, but we should at least offer the chance for her to surrender."

The gun in her face lowered an inch, the orange blaze of heat emanating from it's barrel darkening as its wielder eased his grip on the trigger. She couldn't see the face behind the helmet tilted in her direction, but Apara could almost taste the pity in the action itself.

Even the words were an act of mercy, spoken in accented standard, an olive branch extended in her direction.

Apara's eyes narrowed. Their immediate power levels were larger than her own by around a third, but they didn't have any real interest in fighting yet, nor did it seem that they had any ability to gauge the danger she represented on the battlefield. Her fists clenched as she looked between them.

Or…

Or they did have a read on her power level, and just decided it was easily ignored. She held back from voicing her complaints, swallowing rage and pride in equal measure as she drew herself up.

Dennis told her about people overlooking her on the battlefield, it took a second for the words to come back to her, but Ki was already surging down her arm, building into her fingertips.

Ah, yes.

Never interrupt the enemy when they are making a mistake. Oh she would relish this greatly.

Her left hand came up to grab the barrel of the gun, wrenching it to the side with enough strength to drive an exclamation out of her opponent, before her right hand unleashed a wave of superheated ki into the closest weak point she could find. In this case the relatively thin cloth and metal weave between his legs.

The half scream, half wheeze the pirate let out as his reproductive organs melted against his thigh was a stark contrast to the relatively deep baritone she had heard him speak with. She left him to choose which tone he liked better, and maybe reconsider his manners as she stepped forward, the weapon now in her grasp as she stepped towards the other two.

The gun came up into a block just as a plated fist came crashing down onto her, sending her to one knee with the screech of twisting metal. Not long ago the force that echoed through the metal and down her arms would have broken bone, torn flesh, and left her a wreck on the ground. Today it was nothing. A spike of annoyance and a need to brace.

The second blow was deflected, twisted away with the pile of scrap and leaving an opening she was happy to exploit. Apara tore forward, leaping into the air, hands glowing with the burning heat of ki. She imagined eyes widening in surprise, but didn't get the chance to see them herself before her thumbs found their place in his skull. The third pirate opened fire once it was clear his ally was dead, the idea of treating her as a child dead with him.

Apara snarled as she dodged, this time as an expression of joy.

She was fighting scum, but scum she could pretend were warriors. Who knows what she'd be capable of slaughtering tomorrow? What victory could she taste in the chaos of battle?

The heart of a Saiyan thundered in her chest, and soon her body would rise to the occasion of seeing its truest desire fulfilled.

Her fist lashed out, shattering flesh and metal. Another False victory.

Another step forward.

I brought down one of my butcher knives into the meat of someone's shoulder with enough force for the body to sag, and part under the blow. Dark green blood splattered against my visor. Screaming, weapons discharging, and sparking machinery met my ears even as the sound of my own breathing echoed inside my helmet. I lifted a hand into the air, firing an energy blast into overhead lighting and plunging the hall into the familiar embrace of darkness.

I had been at this for a while now. Clearing hallways and rooms, scorching barracks and rest areas as I passed them by.

Five enemies in this corridor, once six, paired in one group of two and one group of three. A half second interval before startled confusion became determined engagement. Their armor was compensating, the yellow light shining from their helms now focusing in the darkness and narrowing on my position, but it took precious moments to do so.

I was on them far before those moments passed.

Pairing brutality and explosive movement with stealth and surprise was the key to how I fought. It was a rhythm I easily found myself lost in. Already inside his guard, I twisted someone's head in a direction I was certain it wasn't supposed to go, and as I did I found myself examining our enemy yet again. There was an arrogance to them I found more and more grating. An undeserved self assurance I found myself observing in their movement and in their ki. Light and heat flew what seemed to be every direction but where I was as I stalked forward. I reached out, both hands clapping around the head of one of these unfortunate giants with enough force to leave blood spurting from his eyes, mouth and nose. That arrogance seemed almost to explode forward with every body we leave broken in our wake. Like if you woke up one day and the sky was suddenly green.

It just didn't seem to compute.

I kept my victims head in my hands as he fell to his knees, and my fingers drifted down to find the neck of the half-corpse now leaning bodily against my chest. I took pleasure in educating these people for no other reason other than how they reminded me of everyone else on my ship. It was the same taste of superiority, yet it was far, far more unearned. A people likely only tested against themselves. Certain they were superior only for winning against themself. It was like a little boy running up to you and declaring he was stronger, with all that same youthful arrogance and none of the innocence that comes with it. None of the warmth and naivety or paternal love to keep them from the consequence of such assertion.

It was a leper declaring to all the world, oozing puss and reeking of piss, that he or she was undoubtably your superior. I couldn't help but think about the kind of knee-jerk instinct that kind of thing can bring out of a person, and what they might do if they heard it every instant of every second they lived in a situation quite like a battle to the death. I was in a bad mood today, and only the fact that I can prove these people wrong seems to be doing anything about it.

To think how different this could have been if they just kept their distance. Took shots at us from maximum range and minimized boarder presence. Attacked more defensively lets say.

In space, in the void, and in a slugfest between our two vessels, these pirates were at the greatest advantage they could ever ask for. Maybe they could have won like that. It was a battle, an even struggle, but here they sought to gain advantage outside of it. They just didn't understand what we were. These people were newcomers to a law of nature I was lucky enough to understand the moment I was introduced to Freeza force. They didn't know the rules we all have to live by.

Loose filaments of muscle and what might have once been a trachea spilled between my fingers. Two unfortunate souls watch as I pull a grim handful from their ally. He doesn't quite have time to gurgle in pain at his situation, but the sound of that much gore slopping against the cool steel of their flooring emphasized their predicament just fine.

The rules are very simple. For the foreseeable future the universe belongs to Lord Freeza, and for as long as he and beings like him live its nothing more than a grim playground for him and those who serve him. Myself and everyone else on this ship included included.

I caught that in the surprise I found in every one of the pirates aboard this vessel. They hadn't considered we'd be here already. They just thought of themselves as our superiors.

I was not the only one proving them very wrong.

Several commanders were already abroad, including the captain. Each of them were making a mess of things in a much more direct manner than I. I felt Jell as he walked from hall to hall as I did, crushing the opposition with contemptuous ease. He was not the only one. Sure, many of our people died, either in the void or in the unfamiliar halls we found ourselves in. But even they did not die easily. Even they advanced in positions both ahead of and behind me, making their own progress along the way.

This would be over within the hour.

One of the pirates screamed, agony lacing his tone as he opened fire on my position, pulling me from my thoughts. His pain tasted more intimate than the loss of a comrade, and was too warm for that of a brother by blood. A lover perhaps?

I jumped to the right, leaping over the burning energy and reading his ki further, coming from a roll into a crouch.

If it was, they had been for some time. A relationship of far more than convenience. Just another guilty thought soon to be forgotten.

"Jar Wor Vel!" One of them screamed from behind the party, his weapon coming to bear alongside several others, and shortly after scattered blasts of heat and light burned through the air and passed me by faster than I can follow, but were easy enough to avoid being in the path of.

I hummed as I advanced, charging forward.

I wasn't one to judge. But he had attacked me and mine, and I had little enough kindness left in me already. When I was close enough energy sparked in my hand again, this time bathing the room in hideously bright light just meters away from their position. They cried out in pain as they instinctively flinched away from the source of the agitation, one of them never got the chance at all, his head toppling to the floor as I stepped past.

He was lucky I felt for him. He could greet that companion of his in the afterlife without pain to accompany him, and I could send him there with the certainty there was a hereafter. For them at least.

Still wasn't sure what I had to look forward to on that end.

A lazy swipe of a cleaver left an alien man on his knees, looking down at the weapon still clutched in arms no longer attached to his body. Shock left him silent as I ripped the firearm away from his last remaining ally, my own weapon finding a place into the soft flesh just beneath the pirates ribs. I twisted the blade, ripping it sideways and letting the kitchen tool clatter to the ground.

This one struggled, batting uselessly at my shoulders as I buried my arm in his chest. I looked in the vague direction of an explosion I knew had been caused by Apara as she attempted her fun.

The body leaning over me stilled as I pulled out its insides.

I glanced over as the doors down the hall and to the left just before they opened, not fully turning around to greet what I knew were allies, and more importantly what I knew weren't threats to me anymore. There was a time not long ago I feared the idea of new warriors. People often all too eager to prove themselves on the blood of those weaker than themselves. Those incapable of even acting to defend themselves.

Now they were just rank and file. Fresh meat.

They froze at the display of violence. The spines dotting their cheeks and albino skin marking them as a group of newbies even if their ki and actions hadn't already. Their armor was fresh, they themselves were unscarred, and If I chose to get close I'm sure they would even smell clean. They must have just arrived on whatever they called this pirate vessel before we came along.

Scouters pinged, breaking them from their reverie and forcing them to tense before they remembered that the name and serial number that raced across their eyes belonged to the cook of the ship they called home. One at the lead stepped forward hesitantly.

"T-the captain wanted you to see the unknown's leadership get processed. Something about a personal request…"

I chose not to respond for a moment, looking them all over. I waited just long enough for them to seem a little nervous before I answered, pushing the corpse aside with a sigh. I flared my energy so Apara could know to link up with me when she was finished playing around.

"Alright. Lead the way."

If the captain was satisfied with what he'd captured so far, without any interrogation and well before our damage report came through, that meant these people had something to interest us. I ignored the sound of vomit hitting the floor as one of them lost their composure, gesturing to the door.

Sorry for the wait, that's my bad.