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Her acute hearing picked up everything. She knew her place, she knew her rank, and she knew her master. Her fingers touched the control panel, monitoring the heartbeat, brainwaves, breathing rate, and any of the other key factors. She wasn't that intelligent and she knew it; she'd been told it many times. All she knew how to do was use the rejunvenation tanks and how to fight. She looked up through her black locks to see the grim face of her master. He'd been brooding for days, mulling on his thoughts, wondering if it was time. She sighed slightly and looked up at the greenish light source. The boy was perfectly healthy. He'd been in there for...how many years? She didn't remember. It said on the status readout exactly 784 days. Two years, a month and 23 Terran days. Everything was as it should be: he was technically two years, a month and 23 days old, but he had the body and maturity of a thirteen-year-old. However, her primitive brain didn't pick up those facts: she wasn't even literate. She had almost no idea what the read-out said. She knew that if an error or a warning message popped up she was to get her Master. The door slid open with a hiss. She looked up from her station and another Master walked in, and one of her kind slunk behind, hunkered over. She could see the pain in his eyes. He was being beaten by his Master in private. She lowered her eyes in pity to him. The tall Master who strode in looked to her Master with a look of concern and anger on his face. "Are you insane?" "By your standards, yes. In my eyes, I'm making a smart choice." He got up, brushing his short bangs out of his face. "You see, he'll be even more powerful than all of us put together, and-" "And what?" The other exploded, crossing his arms over his chest and pacing around the shorter man. "What if he turns on us? Then we're all fucked again. They already fucked us once, and with him on their side, they're sure to do it again! They don't even know we're alive. And if they did," he leaned down to the other man's level, "Then they'd be here before I could utter a curse word. And we'd all die. We have nowhere else." The bio-warrior slave cringed at the argument and knelt down to the floor. She was frightened. So was the other slave. He'd already curled up in a corner with his hands over his ears. She didn't know what would happen if she was commanded to open the chamber to release the boy. That's what her Master planned to do today: release him and begin his training so he could have revenge. She shivered. "He'll be on our side. All he knows is what we know. He thinks his race is evil. Imagine his delight when he discovers he is one of us. Are you dense? Can you not see that he will be loyal to us? Even if he meets his parents, which I very much doubt because one of them is dead, he'll stay loyal. He'll think that I am a parent. Family is not always blood-related, my friend." "You are a fool Ix'bet." "And you are the bigger one Re'tan. To let this potential die." Ix'bet shook his head, his eyes closed. He opened them and looked at the bio-warrior that had been 'assigned' to him. "Drain the chamber," he ordered. Ix'bet ducked from Re'tan's fist. Ix'bet crouched, and swiped low with his leg, tripping the taller Talisian. Re'tan crashed to the floor, and Ix'bet pinned him. Re'tan's bio-warrior snapped out of his catatonic state and snarled. Ix'bet, being the creature he was, snarled back. "You're not matched to me," Ix'bet whispered to Re'tan menacingly. "Watch out- I could take you down in a single blow." Ix'bet got off his Talisian comrade, and brushed invisible dust off his armor. The female slave pressed a button that she was forbidden to touch. There was a loud whooshing sound followed by a high-pitched grinding sound which made her wince in pain. Slowly, the thick green liquid drained from the chamber. Ix'bet watched in satisfaction, Re'tan shook his head in the thoughts that his fellow Talisian was making a grave mistake. Even so, Re'tan grabbed some towels to help dry the child after being inside a chamber for over two Earth years. The child sank with the fluid level until he was slumped on the floor of the chamber. It took the hybrid a moment to come out of his induced sleep, and the moment he cracked his eyes to get his first look they burned. He screamed and tried to scoot backwards away from the pain, but he hit the clear wall, cracking it in the process. "Open the door quickly!" Ix'bet barked to the slave, and she pressed the open button as she made an apologetic gurgle in her throat for not pressing it sooner. One glassy side slid away, letting an army of cold air. The boy, who was whimpering in blind pain screamed again when the new air hit him like icy daggers. Acidy tears ran down his still-wet cheeks as he recoiled from the pain. He clawed at the walls, his long tail swishing clumsily around him, slapping his ankles. Ix'bet stepped forward, ready to help lead the half-blind crossbreed out of the chamber and into the world where he could be trained. Ix'bet's slender peach fingers reached out and lightly touched the child's pale skin that was slick from the fluids. The moment his finger brushed the skin, the child whirled and punched out, catching Ix'bet by surprise. The Talisian stumbled back and glanced at the boy. Two dark eyes, barely open from the pain of first use, glared out at him. The slave stepped forward, making low gutteral noises in her throat, obviously speaking in Saiyan to the 'new-born' child. Re'tan snorted, but before he could utter a comment on how the boy wouldn't understand, Ix'bet silenced him. The rebel knew that the boy needed to get warm and dry soon- or else the boy would die of hypothermia. He could already see the goosebumps forming on the boy's skin from being chilled. The boy listened to the slave. He didn't understand her, but somehow she calmed him. His instincts told him that she was safe, and so was the other one that was like her. Something seemed wrong with the others. He didn't flinch or snarl when she helped him out of the chamber and onto the floor where his legs almost buckled. She supported him, and made a motion with her head for Ix'bet and Re'tan to come with the towels. The boy tried to back away, but when he saw that the female was not afraid, something told him he shouldn't be either. Ix'bet lead them down the hall towards the washing-room where they'd warm the child. "I told you he wouldn't destroy us," he commented to Re'tan in Talisian. "I wouldn't be so sure," Re'tan replied, still using their native tongue. It was left like that.
She woke up suddenly. She never dozed anymore- you either had to be awake or asleep to survive here. If you dozed, your reaction time fell and you were toast. An easy target to those who were hunting you. She lived in a perpetual battlefield- Saiyans after Saiyans, constant explosions, always the danger of being blasted farther down into the depths of Hell. It had happened to her before- she's been overpowered and incinerated, only to find that she was transported down to a worse level of Hell. There was no way back up, you just kept going deeper and deeper. She didn't know how deep Hell went, and nor did she want to find out. She rolled quickly and was on her feet, running from the attacks being sent at the rubble around her. More of her House scattered, trying to get away. She dove and rolled, then shot into the air like a bullet, Ki flashing, and her piercing eyes searched for her attackers. She spotted them, and saw the crest on their armor: The House of Embedded Wrath. She snarled- they'd been after her since they found out that she was indeed a Legendary Super Saiyan. She powered up, golden hair stiff and green eyes holding a silent rage. She took aim, and fired. They saw her coming and dodged, but she fired again, sending multiple Ki blasts, hitting her marks. Singed bodies fell to the ground where her fellow House-mates could finish them off. She ran her hand through her golden hair and sighed. She was Hakuto, the prime fighter of the House of Savage Battle. All she wanted was to go home.
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