#seltiss

[23 November, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

Through his mastery of the alchemical arts, King Rehval III Trismegistus had conquered the universe. The Saiyan had merged his life essense with the Planet Nagoka, making both impervious to any attack. The bulk of the Saiyan species had bound themselves to his will, and any galactic powers who dared to defy him would suffer the wrath of giant earthen creatures that he could control like puppets. The cult of Saiyans who served him had been in high spirits. Their greatest enemy, the Super Saiyan Luffa, had failed to destroy them, and she had fled the Nagaoka System, disgraced and alone.

Then she returned. King Rehval believed she had come back to die in a blaze of glory. For all her power, she was no match for him, or his army of alchemically powered Saiyans. He expected his warriors to hunt her down within a matter of hours.

Eight days later, Luffa was still at large, and the morale among Rehval's followers had declined sharply.

What frustrated everyone was that no one understood Luffa's plan. If she only wanted to die in battle, then there was no need to drag things out. Whatever she was trying to do, she needed at least eight days to make it happen, and in the meantime, Rehval's cult had been powerless to figure out what it was or how to stop it. The two prevailing sentiments among the cultists were:

"Why doesn't Trismegistus do something?"

And:

"Trismegistus has it all under control. Trust the plan."

Because of these contradictory opinions, the growing list of Luffa's victims were viewed both as "heroic martyrs" and "unfaithful losers".

From her lowly position in the cult, Lesseri heard it all. Scrubbing the breeding pits, she would catch parts of a conversation from passers-by. Trimming wicks for the candles, she would overhear idle chatter from the barracks. Disposing of diapers in the nursery, she would see how frightened the children were when they could sense Luffa's ki on the attack. There were a multitude of perspectives, but it boiled down to just two. Either their omnipotent leader couldn't kill Luffa, or he was allowing this terror to continue for unknown reasons.

Lesseri's own thoughts were usually focused on binaries like these. Strength and weakness, acceptance and rejection, good and evil. Of all the cultists, she had actually trained under Luffa during a brief period in her former life. The cult had a dim view of this past association, and Lesseri had been struggling to redeem herself ever since. She found herself awed by their grace, but also frustrated with the way they punished her for something so trivial.

For Luffa, that training camp had been a passing fancy to try to teach other Saiyans her ways. For Lesseri, it was just an opportunity to get close enough to kill her own mother. Vigurd had abandoned Lesseri and her sister in a gestation facility, and Lesseri had been bitter about it ever since. It seemed strange to Lesseri that the cult approved of her ruthless assassination, but not of the way she had manipulated Luffa to achieve it. It wasn't as if Luffa had passed on forbidden knowledge to Lesseri and the others. Mostly, Luffa had nagged them all for not being "Saiyan enough". Lesseri had dismissed Luffa as a hypocrite a long time ago, but the cult still demanded more contrition from her.

But now that Luffa was here, and Lesseri could sense that immense Super Saiyan ki once more, she was reminded of just how deeply Luffa's harsh words had cut. Luffa accused other Saiyans of cowardice. On Nat-Chezz, they had encountered a pair of aliens with the ability to to fool ki senses. They used this power to bluff stronger warriors into surrendering without a fight. Only Luffa had the courage to stand up to them, not because she saw through the deception, but because she alone wanted to fight enemies stronger than herself. The lesson of that incident had been lost on Lesseri that day, but now, Lesseri was experiencing it all over again. Nagaoka was supposed to be an invincible stronghold of power, and yet Luffa had dared to attack it all by herself. Rehval's followers had the advantage, and yet they were still anxious about what would happen to them. None of them were eager to die when they were so close to achieving final victory.

It hurt Lesseri to think about it. She had given herself over, body and soul, to Trismegistus, and yet her old frustrations and doubts still lingered. It had been convenient to blame everything on Luffa, but now she wondered if Luffa's only crime had been to point out the problems that had always been there. And now, she had come to Nagaoka to pass final judgment on them all.

Lesseri didn't know or care who would win in the end. She only knew that, no matter what happened, that Lesseri would surely lose...

*******

The surface of Nagaoka was desolate, but not completely uninhabitable. The persistent cloud cover made the scenery especially gloomy, but enough sunlight made it through to support some vegetation. Most of it was inedible, although Luffa had discovered some roots that were nutritious enough to justify the effort of picking them. Game was scarce. The apex predator in the grasslands of Nagaoka was a small, four-legged dinosaur that chased after rodents. It took patience to catch them, but that was no problem. She needed something to pass the time anyway.

As she chewed on the raw carcass of a fresh kill, she walked back to her latest campsite, which was little more than a small fire and a Saiyan skull she had been using to carry her stone tools. The only other item was her prisoner, a cultist she had captured on one of her raids, three days ago.

"I killed six more," she told him as she slung the carcass by the fire and picked up the skull. "They sent more after me, but it didn't help much. I think Rehval's trying to do a pincer thing this week."

The man lay helpless on the ground, his arms and legs fractured in several places. Luffa had hurt him so badly that he lacked the ki energy to be sensed by his comrades. She estimated that he would die in another day, if not sooner. She kept talking to him anyway.

"Pincer. You know what I mean? Spread out his forces across the planet, then when one group is close enough to engage, some of the others can come in from the other direction and cut off my escape. What he doesn't get is that it just gives me a bigger target to shoot at while I run away."

The man groaned, either from the pain of his injuries, or from hunger, or terror, or delirium, or from all of these. Luffa ignored him and began carving up her kill.

"Funny, that's the same thing Jerk Number Seven said when I killed his six buddies," Luffa said. "You should have seen it. They tried to surround me, but I rushed right into a group of them, like I was trying to slip between them. Then I set off an explosive wave right in the middle of them. The six died right off, but the seventh was far enough away that he just got hurt really bad. He's probably still alive, though. For now."

"Triis... mej... isssss..." the man tried to say.

"He's not here and he's not coming to save you," Luffa said. "You can pray to him all you want, but he doesn't give a damn about you. Idiot. You sold your pride to that fool, and he doesn't even know you're still alive. I doubt he'll bother giving you any medical attention, not after that stunt I pulled on their hospital ward a few days ago. No, he'll want to conserve his supplies for the healthiest troops. The ones who stand a chance of pulling through in time to defend his sorry ass. That won't be you."

She put the bulk of the dinosaur on a spit she had fashioned from a spear she had taken from one of her victims, and carefully positioned it over the fire. "Ahhhh," she said. "This is really gonna hit the spot. It's like the old proverb: hunger is the best seasoning. So how was your day? Anything cool happen while I was gone?"

"Wh-wh-why... are you... doing this?" the man whimpered.

Luffa lay down on the ground, propping her head up on a pile of brush she had gathered. "Really?" she asked. "I mean, we've been over all that, haven't we? I told you all about it. How Rehval's a monarchist fool. How he took my son from me. Twice. He wrecked my marriage-- although I'll take partial responsibility there. And he even showed me that my own species is a worthless band of hooligans that deserves to die. Oh, and he's trying to conquer the universe, which wouldn't bother me so much except for the rotten way he's going about it. Magic potions. Really, what is that?"

"Nooooo..." the man whispered. "Not that... Why...... why... keep me... alive?"

"Oh, that," Luffa said. See, it's actually pretty simple. I learned this when I was a kid. I guess your parents never filled you in on it. See, when you're up against a superior force, you can even the odds with some psychological warfare. Wreck their morale, they start making little mistakes. Before they know it, their advantage starts to fritter away. That's why I hit their medical supplies. I'd like to taint their water supply too, but I haven't planned that out yet. I may not have time to get around to it, actually. Make sure you tell Rehval that when you see them."

"See...?"

"Yeah, they should track down this camp before too much longer. If not, I'll just transform and they'll come running. I'll be long gone when they get here, but they'll find you. And you can tell them everything I've been telling you this whole time. Every last word. Or as much as you can remember. I think the message will get across."

"M-message...?"

"Yeah," Luffa said. "See, I'm not 'keeping you alive'. You'll die eventually, no matter what. But I want the others to see what I've done to you, and hear what I've said to you, and I want them to realize exactly what it is they're dealing with."

She reached into the pockets of her yellow pants and pulled out a wooden stick, about five inches in length. There were several notches cut along its length. As she spoke, she stared intently at it.

"I think a lot of them see me as some sort of ultimate foe, and they get to have this big epic showdown with me, or at least they can die for their master, quick and clean. Makes sense. I'm the Legendary Super Saiyan, and Rehval's taught them all that I'm the devil or something. They want a big dramatic battle, like in a movie. A few of them might get their wish. But not you. No, you get to suffer. And I want them to know that any one of them might get the same treatment as you. Or not. Some of them might luck out and take a Vengeance Cannon through the brain and die painlessly. Some choice, right?"

He shivered, either due to the cold, or the onset of some infection he had contracted, or perhaps simply because Luffa's words horrified him so. Luffa simply did not care. She watched her meal cooking, monitored enemy movements with her ki senses, and then carved another notch on her stick with her thumbnail.

*******

[25 November, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

"The water supply? You're absolutely certain that's what he said?"

The cultists who found Luffa's prisoner bowed low to the ground as they murmured in the affirmative. "He was insistent on this point, Master," said their leader. He rambled like a madman, repeating everything she had said, including many unspeakable insults towards you and your ancestors, but--"

"Enough," Rehval said. "Return to your duties. No, wait. You three." He gestured to the trio of men on the right side of the group. "Go and help the repair efforts on tunnel six. Dismissed."

Normally, he spoke to his followers in more parental tones, closing with words like "Let my triple-blessing be upon you," or "Go with Jindan, my children." But Luffa had been laying siege to his planet for ten days straight. He no longer felt the mood to keep up his role as Trismegistus, the almighty Alchemist Supreme. Even the easy diplomacy of King Rehval seemed to escape him these days. Nearly two thousand of his followers had been killed since Luffa had arrived on Nagaoka, and with each hit-and-run attack, Luffa always found a way to hint that this was only a warm-up act.

"Having trouble, dad?"

He had begun to find a measure of comfort in his daughter, the Princess Seltiss. In his heart of hearts, he had always viewed her as more of an apprentice in statecraft, or a great bridge he had engineered to lead the way to the future. Now that she was back in his life, and now that they were stuck together on this planet, he finally began to appreciate her as family. Of all the Saiyans on the planet, she knew him best, and was never afraid to speak her mind.

"You saw the man they brought in this morning," he grumbled as she walked into his chamber.

"Yeah, I just came from the infirmary. They just pronounced him dead," Seltiss replied. "I came over to tell you. His last words were something about the water resevoir--"

"I already know," Rehval said. "It's bait. It has to be. There's fresh water all over Nagaoka. Even if she does poison our wells, even if she takes out our geothermal stills, it would only be a minor inconvenience."

"Like the spaceport," Seltiss said. "And the medical supplies. And Tunnel Six. She's not interested in striking decisive blows. She's wearing us down, a little bit at a time."

"It's more than that!" he insisted. "She's... building towards something. She threatened to kill us all, even me, when she already knows that's impossible!"

Seltiss shrugged. "She probably thinks that if she kills enough of your followers, then you'll lose the power you took from them, and that'll weaken your connection with the planet," she said. "Could that work?"

"Not well enough to do her any good," Rehval said. "I need the Saiyans. Without them, my work has been in vain. But there are other Saiyans in the galaxy. Weaklings, and not many of them, but enough for me to begin anew. As for this planet, my connection to it is complete."

"Cool beans. Then you have nothing to fear," Seltiss said. "It's like you told us before. Luffa's no threat to you anymore."

"That doesn't matter!" Rehval shouted. He rarely raised his voice. He considered it one of his more admirable qualities. What surprised him more than his outburst was the way he had slammed his fist on the armrest of his throne. Without thinking, he had pulverized it, and sent cracks running down the right side of the seat.

Seltiss had never seen him like this before, and though she tried to mask the shock with cool indifference, he knew better. He leaned back in his seat and rubbed his forehead. "She is the serpent in my garden," he said. "Rebelling, even when there's no possible way for her to win. I have to kill her or control her, or my authority will never be absolute. Her defiance proves that I can never tame the Saiyan heart, no matter how completely I control the others."

"So control her," Seltiss said. "You keeps saying you have the power. Find her, and put an end to this."

"She can mask her ki, and somehow use it at the same time," Rehval said, more despondently than he meant the reply to sound. It was unseemly for him to whine before his own child. "I suspected that she could do something like this, but I didn't realize to what extent. The squads can't find her."

"Then take away her hiding places," Seltiss said. "We know she's living off the land. Like, you keep saying you are the planet now. You can do with it as you please, right? Take the land away from her, and what does she have?"

Throughout this crisis, a thin beard had begun to grow on Rehval's face. He had been too preoccupied to shave. Now, he rubbed the stubble thoughtfully as he considered his daughter's advice.

*******

[30 November, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

Luffa waited for the squad of cultists to fly directly overhead, and then she attacked, transforming into her Super Saiyan form so quickly that none of them had time to react. There were twenty of them in all. The first died instantly, and she used an explosive wave to kill two more, and throw the rest off balance. Then she flew away, leaving the other seventeen to wonder what had gone wrong.

As she flew into the clouds that covered the Nagaokan skies, she took a moment to admire the destruction taking place on the surface. Rehval had finally grown impatient enough to order a carpet bombing of the wilderness. As before, there were groups of twenty or more Saiyans spread out across the planet, but instead of hunting Luffa, they were now scouring the land with ki blasts. This suited her perfectly. With so much Saiyan energy being tossed around all at once, Luffa could fly much more freely across the planet without being detected.

Adjusting her trajectory, she propelled herself directly into the path of another squad two hundred miles away, and powered down so they wouldn't sense her approach until it was too late. Then she transformed again, and tore through them like so much paper. Just as they began to get their bearings, she flew away again, leaving them completely disorganized.

She repeated this trick again and again, picking off targets across the entire planet. It would have been glorious, if she wasn't so furious with them all.

"It's not like it was in the Federation, is it?!" she screamed as she impaled a warrior on his own short spear.

"Boxing me in, forcing me to jump from planet to planet to keep you from hurting innocent people!" she screamed as she broke another's neck three thousand miles to the southeast.

"You thought you could wear me out! Well I'm still standing!" she yelled while blasting four of them with a barrage of energy needles.

"And now you're the ones on the back foot!" she roared. At the equator, one of them managed to get off a decent shot at her, but she pulled one of his teammates into the line of fire.

"You've got nowhere to run!" Her boot slammed into a Saiyan's back at twice the speed of sound, and she grinned at the wet snap she heard on impact. Nearby was Nagaoka's fourth-tallest active volcano.

"This time you're trapped here with me, and I've got nothing and no one to protect!" Near the south magnetic pole, her Vengeance Cannon technique cut through five of them in one shot.

She doubled back to the fourth-tallest active volcano and shoved a woman face-first into a lave floe. "You all move so slow you might as well be standing still!"

She found a beach and decided to stand her ground for a few minutes. This wasn't for sport, but just to remind them that she could. The squad she attacked seemed almost grateful for the chance to try to fight back, but they soon found that their numbers weren't as effective as they'd hoped.

"I've been fighting you clowns for months!" she screeched as she slashed her nails through a Saiyan's throat. As he fell back and clutched his bloody neck, Luffa rolled forward and caught one of his partners with her legs. She flipped him over and sent him crashing down to the surf below, and then fired ki blasts down at him, then towards a third Saiyan who was trying to catch her off-guard.

"All that ganging up you punks do? It doesn't mean anything to me anymore! I've seen all the routines a dozen times! Hah!" She suddenly flung her left hand under her right shoulder and fired backward to catch a Saiyan coming up from behind. "Six? Ten? Twenty? It won't save you!"

One of them had the good sense to focus his ki on protecting his vital organs. Luffa punched him in the forehead and was surprised that he withstood the blow. She kept on punching him, like a jackhammer, until his skull finally gave way.

Before long, she had finished them all off. She sensed reinforcements coming, and by the time they arrived, they found her in a half-squat position, charging her power. Once they were within range, she unleashed it all at once, creating a massive explosion all around them.

"Still alive..." she observed as she flew towards handful of survivors. She rose up into the air above them and swung out her arm at the ground. "Now that's what I like to see!"

Her follow-up fused the sand into glass, but could not penetrate more than a few feet into the ground, thanks to Rehval's mystic power that tied him into the planet. Instead, the energy Luffa released was reflected back upon her targets, and they were helpless to resist the intensity of it. A few survived, and Luffa slaughtered them, lopping off their heads by using the edge of her ki-charged left hand like a knife.

"Enough, Luffa!"

She turned and found a familiar face, and she grinned savagely at the sight of it.

"Well, well," she said. "Look who's finally come out to play."

The ground behind her had swelled up, forming a hill, which gradually shaped itself into the image of a man: King Rehval.

"I'll say this for your stupid alchemy powers," Luffa said, "You've made this planet a lot sturdier than anywhere I've ever been before. I can't destroy it, but that's kind of handy too. It's nice to know I can cut loose while I fight your lackeys, and not have to worry about the whole planet exploding out from under me."

"I command you to stop this immediately!" he shouted.

Luffa responded with a Gallick Gun to his stony face.

"You can't harm me in this form!" he said. Indeed, the attack had left his earthen avatar completely undamaged. Luffa didn't find that very disappointing.

"Don't worry," she said. "That Gallick Gun was just a baby, Rehval. When I'm ready to hurt you, you'll know it."

"Damn you, woman!" he seethed. "You know this is pointless!"

"Sure it is," Luffa said with a grin. "And you came all the way here to remind me, just in case I'd forgotten how pointless this is. Very thoughtful of you."

"If you already know that, then why do you persist in this--?! Arrgh!"

As he had spoken, she gathered her energy and plowed directly into the avatar's body, then released it in a massive explosion. The surrounding area was reduced to charred wasteland, and Luffa alighted near one of the largest fragments of the rock-Rehval she had destroyed. Slowly, it merged with the ground below it, and rose up again to form a new body.

"Will you--! Stop that?!" Rehval seethed.

Luffa laughed again. "What's wrong? If what I'm doing is so pointless, what does it matter whether I do it or not? Don't tell me the almighty god-alchemist, his royal majesty King Revahl the Third is getting flustered over little old me."

"I'm not!" he shouted, and then he attempted to regain his composure. "I just... I don't like when you... when you flout my authority. I wish you would... not do that."

Luffa raised her hand high over her head and extended her middle finger. "And I just don't like you. I don't like your authority much either. I don't think anyone else on this planet likes it much either. I'm just the only one around here with the guts to do something about it."

"I'll kill you," Rehval said. "You won't be able to avoid my forces forever, Luffa. There's only so much habitable land on this planet, and there's less of it each day. Once you run out of hiding places, you'll have no choice but to face the full force of my power."

"It's a date," Luffa said. "You're going to rue the day you first heard my name, Rehval. But right now, I gotta go. See you real soon!"

With that, she shot into the sky like a rocket, just as another squad of Rehval's followers arrived.

"My lord," gasped their leader as she fell prostrate before his earthen likeness. "We came as quickly as we could..."

"The Saiyans who joined us," the rock-Rehval said. "Seltiss's band, the Free Companions. Have they received the Jindan power yet?"

"N-no, Master," the leader said, now rising to an upright position. "There hasn't been time for them to complete the initiation rites, and--"

"I don't care about the rites!" he snapped. Go back and prepare them immediately. I want them as strong as possible, so that I can crush that vile little throwback once and for all!"

The leader was gravely disturbed to hear this, but she was too loyal to question the command. "Yes! It shall be done right away, Great One!"

Then they flew back in the direction of their base. Having no further use for the rock-creature, Rehval allowed it to collapse back into the ground.

From her hiding place in the sky, Luffa saw all of this while she listened in on the comm-link she had stolen from one of Rehval's soldiers. She made a grim smile, then cut another notch in her stick.

*******

[3 December, 233 Before Age.]

As Trismegistus, Rehval had established a lengthy series of rituals and trials for initiates in his cult. He claimed that these were necessary to make the applicant worthy of receiving the potion that granted the Jindan power. In truth, their actual purpose was to brainwash the cultists and erode away their sense of independent thought. Now, as Rehval became more desperate to put an end to Luffa's rampage on Nagaoka, he chose to skip the protocol and dispense his potion to the newest recruits into his fold.

His daughter, Princess Seltiss had assembled a band of independent Saiyans, with the idea of establishing a new Saiyan nation in her father's absence. She had allied this Free Company with Luffa's Federation, but then switched sides, rejoining her father once it became clear that he was unstoppable. Seltiss considered herself a pragmatist above all. In her mind, joining her father in his moment of triumph was completely consistent with turning against him during his apparent madness. The decision was simple. There was no hope in opposing an invincible enemy, one who held every card and offered no weaknesses to exploit. And yet, she still feared for his sanity. The decision to join him had been a simple one, but it was by no means easy for her.

On the other hand, convincing the Free Companions to accept the Jindan potion had turned out to be very simple and easy. Luffa had killed over three thousand Saiyans since she arrived on Nagaoka's surface, and most of these had been Free Companions. The Jindan-empowered cultists were stronger and faster, and while Luffa had killed plenty of them as well, the Free Companions made much easier targets. As much as Luffa despised the cult, she had a real talent for driving Saiyans into Rehval's open arms.

In her quarters, Seltiss contemplated the bottle containing her own dose of the Jindan elixir, the last one. The cultists seemed to trust her to drink it, or perhaps they didn't see her empowerment as a high priority, since Seltiss didn't have a high power level to begin with. There was really no point in anyone checking to make sure she took her medicine. It was a matter of survival now. The curious red liquid might be the only thing that would save Seltiss' life during Luffa's next attack. And even without Luffa rampaging in their midst, she had already resigned herself to drink when she ordered her ship to surrender and land on Nagaoka. Things were happening faster than expected, but the cold equations had not changed. Her continued survival depended on swallowing her father's concoction, and then washing it down with whatever was left of her pride. What was she waiting for? Seltiss herself didn't seem to know.

And then, just as she brought the bottle to her lips, she sensed that terrible ki once more. Luffa was on the move again. Startled, she dropped the bottle, and so great was her dread that she didn't even notice it until the glass shattered on the stone floor. All that remained of the potion was a strange discoloration on the rock, and some maroon stains on her pink Montablanian leather boots.

Seltiss wasn't sure whether to be relieved or afraid. As she sensed the rising powers of her father's followers, she realized that it might not matter how she felt any longer.

*******

There were no names for the places on Nagaoka, and even if there were, Luffa wouldn't have known them. She had chosen a particular location to make her stand, but mostly for aesthetic reasons. It was a dry lakebed surrounded on all sides by buttes and mesas. It reminded her of some of her favorite hunting grounds on Dorlu Prime. More importantly it offered the best of both worlds for a battle: The lakebed was a wide-open space for fighting, while the surrounding topology allowed plenty of nooks and crannies to hide behind for ambushes. Luffa didn't expect any of this to matter, but she had a sentimental reason for choosing her battleground.

She expected it to be her last.

Rehval's forces had destroyed most of the terrestrial life on the planet by now. His hope was to cut off Luffa's supply lines by taking away the flora and fauna that she fed upon in between her hit-and-run attacks. But he had utterly failed to consider the seas, which were abundant in edible wildlife. While his followers had scoured the land in a desperate attempt to flush her out of hiding, she had been diving under glaciers for aquatic mammals. In the lakebed, she now chewed on a piece of blubber while she prepared herself for what came next.

The skies of Nagaoka were perpetually overcast, but on this night there were peals of thunder that hinted at a storm. It was completely dark, save for an occasional faint flicker of distant lightning in the clouds. Luffa took the stick out of her pants pocket and felt the notches that she had made in the wood. Satisfied with the count, she cut one last notch with her fingernail, and then tossed the stick to the ground. The time was right.

She transformed. Since coming to this planet, she remained in her Super Saiyan form only long enough to attack or to outmaneuver an enemy. This time, she stood and waited, letting the yellow glow of her aura illuminate the desiccated ground. She could sense Rehval's minions all over the planet, searching in vain for her. Now that they could sense her power, now that she was staying in one spot, they all began to converge on her position. Within minutes, she was surrounded. Thousands of Saiyans stood on the rocky outcroppings in all directions, all of them dressed in dark red uniforms, and carrying short spears, which seemed to be the signature weapon of the cult. The tips of the spears glowed a pale blue color. Luffa had been dealing with these weapons for some time now, and could only guess that there was some trick to making them work. Every time she had taken one for herself, it only behaved like an ordinary spear.

They all kept their distance. Luffa might have accused them of cowardice, but she couldn't deny that it was the smart play. Anyone who might have broken ranks to rush at her prematurely was probably already dead from all of the previous skirmishes. Those that remained knew that best hope of defeating her was to put their combined might into a single, concentrated force. If they could cut off her escape, if they could keep her surrounded and attack her on all sides, then they would have the power to overwhelm her.

Or so they believed.

At last, King Rehval himself showed up, after a fashion. She could still sense him staying behind at his underground compound on the opposite side of the planet. She had expected as much. He was a coward, above all else. Instead of appearing in person, Rehval used his avatar again. By whatever mystic alchemy he used, he formed a mass of earth and rock to rise up from the ground and assume the shape of his own body, more or less. The eyes of this two-hundred foot tall creature glowed purple as he glared down at her.

"Enough, Luffa. This time, there will be no escape," he announced.

"That's what I was about to say to you," Luffa replied.

"I thought you had some plan," Rehval said. "But I see now that you really did come here to die, after all. You just decided to drag things out for as long as possible. You wanted to kill some of my flock to get a measure of revenge, but now you've run out of hiding places, haven't you? Why else would you stand still and raise your power level? You practically summoned us here to destroy you. You've clearly given up hope."

She turned her head and spat on the ground. "You don't get it, Rehval," she said. "I already gave up hope before I came to this stupid planet. Everything since then has been rage. And patience. The waiting is over, Rehval. I'm ready to kill you all now."

"You don't have the power for that," Rehval said. "And even if you did, you could never kill me, Luffa. I have transcended beyond the mortal realm. I am more than anything you could imagine. I have the power of this entire solar system behind me. What do you have, besides that garish transformation?"

Luffa smiled. "Let me show you," she said.

And then, she began to yell.

Rehval and his forces held back, unsure of what to expect. Luffa's body glowed brightly, and for a moment, some of them expected her to attack, but instead she fired a ki blast straight up into the sky. The energy dissipated into the clouds, and for a moment the thunderheads turned yellow from the light. Then they parted, opening up a hole of clear skies directly above Luffa's head. For the first time in untold centuries, starlight shone down upon the surface of Nagaoka. The hole expanded in diameter, until at last, the clouds had retreated to the horizon, leaving only a panoramic view of outer space.

And there, high above the battlefield, was Nagaoka's moon.

It was full.

Luffa looked straight up to admire it. Her lips curled into a wicked smile, and her green eyes suddenly turned blood red in the moonlight.

"No..." Rehval said quietly as he realized what was happening. Panicked murmurs could be heard among his troops, as the ones who understood explained it to the ones who didn't. Luffa could barely hear them over the pounding of her heart in her chest.

"The tail!" Rehval shouted. "Destroy her tail! Now, before she has a chance to--!"

But it was already too late. Luffa began to laugh, and then a wave of golden energy spread out in all directions. Then another, and another. The Saiyans attacked, firing their own energy in unison, but none of their ki blasts could penetrate through to Luffa herself. They couldn't even see her.

But they could hear. The lakebed echoed with the giddy laughter of a Saiyan woman with nothing left to lose. And they heard this laughter gradually transform into the low, feral growl. Bolts of yellow lightning arced out across the lakebed, dancing from one mesa to the next.

At the epicenter of this terrible disturbance, Luffa continued to stare up at the moon. Her heart beat harder and faster with each passing moment. She let the transformation carry her away, neither knowing nor caring where it would take her. Normally, her body was only sixty-three inches tall. Now, she expanded with each breath, swelling to ten feet, then twenty, then thirty, and more! Her limbs and torso changed proportions as she grew, and a thick coat of fur sprouted from her skin. Her face contorted, warping her nose and mouth into a savage muzzle lined with sharp teeth, and her ears formed slight points on top. Her clothing was ripped to shreds by this awesome change, but this was the furthest thing from Luffa's mind. In that moment, all she cared about was power, and the retribution it would bring.

At last, when the transformation was complete, and her enemy could finally see her clearly, she loomed over them in the form of a giant ape. The Saiyans knew the Oozaru form well, but this was different. For Luffa's Great Ape had glowing yellow fur instead of the usual dark brown. Her blood red eyes glowed with murderous intent, and her bestial lips twisted with fury as she looked down upon them all.

By now, Rehval's followers had been fighting Luffa for some time, and they had allowed themselves to believe that they were used to the idea of what Luffa had become. Now, as each of them felt their blood run cold, they realized that they had no idea what to do. They all stood transfixed at the sight of this new horror, unsure what would happen next.

Luffa threw back her head, and began to pound her fists upon her chest. And then, she made a deafening roar.

[14 November, 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

Moments ago, Rehval III Trismegistus, King of the Saiyans, had declared victory. Large swaths of the galaxy didn't know it yet, to say nothing of the rest of the universe, but his victory was absolute nonetheless. In a telepathic address to Luffa's allied fleet, he announced that their attack on his planet would be futile, and he demanded their unconditional surrender.

Luffa didn't understand Rehval's power completely, but she had learned enough to get the basic idea of it. Even a middling Saiyan had enough fighting power to destroy a planetary body. As the Super Saiyan, Luffa had assumed she could annihilate Nagaoka with ease, wiping out Rehval's Jindan cult in a single stroke. But the planet had resisted her, like a mighty warrior blocking an offensive technique. It was like the planet was a living thing, and according to Rehval, it now was. He had merged his life essence with Nagaoka. The way he explained it, planets possessed a tremendous energy of their own, but they lacked the consciousness to wield it like a Saiyan. Now, he controlled Nagaoka like an extension of his own body. As long as he remained on the planet, both would be indestructible.

If that were all it was, then Luffa might have been tempted to leave him trapped on the prison he had built for himself. But Rehval had other abilities. His followers had traveled to other planets, seeding them with an alchemical potion of his own creation. Once activated, the elixir gave Rehval partial control over the mass of those planets as well. He could mold a large chunk of earth into a monstrous figure, one powerful enough to destroy the planets' inhabitants. Luffa had fought these "rock-Rehvals" before, but she had no idea that he could operate so many of them simultaneously, and now there were hundreds of them scattered across the galaxy, each one holding a different planet hostage.

The only way to stop them all was to destroy the man who controlled them, but Luffa had just tried that and failed. She had fired a ki blast down to Nagaoka's surface, only for the energy to be absorbed and then fired back in multiple directions. Rehval claimed he had gained that ability by studying genetic samples from Luffa's wife. Zatte could do similar tricks with ki, but on a much smaller scale. Each of Zatte's people were born with a unique power. The idea of Rehval simply duplicating it for himself was galling, even after everything else he had done.

Rehval claimed that everything he had done was for the good of the Saiyan species, but Luffa knew the truth: He was a small, petty man, frustrated with his own lack of importance. He couldn't stand the idea that Saiyan history would carry on without him, and so he had turned to alchemy and treachery to cheat his fate. He had promised his followers greater power, but his Jindan potion only bound them to his cause, just as he had bound himself to Nagaoka. Now, he demanded that every Saiyan in the universe join his cult, so that he could fulfill his mad dream of converting their once-proud race into nothing but a hive, interdependent upon their immortal king.

What sickened Luffa the most was how eager her fellow Saiyans were to accept this. Guwar had defected from the Jindan Cult when he realized how depraved it really was. It was Guwar who revealed the location of Nagaoka to Luffa, so that she could destroy it and save the Saiyan people. But at the first sign of adversity, he resigned himself to returning to Rehval on bended knee. Luffa left Guwar's dead body in the cargo bay of her ship.

As she made her way back to the bridge, she could send the ki of the crews of her fleet. All around her, the allied fleet seemed to struggle with what had just happened. They had surrounded the planet to ensure that no one could escape. Now, they began to break formation. The Federation ships moved away from the planet, perhaps fearing an attack, while the Saiyan Free Company seemed to fall apart completely. A handful of ships descended into the atmosphere, their crews apparently not willing to wait for their leaders to make up their minds. One of them broke orbit, only for another SFC ship to open fire on it. The commanders were probably trying to contact Luffa for further instructions. She wasn't sure what to tell them.

Stepping out of the lift onto the bridge, she found Zatte rocking back and forth in the pilot's chair, her hands clutching at the red hair on either side of her scalp. Once she noticed Luffa, Zatte looked up at her with dread. "This is all my fault," she said, her voice trembling with remorse. "Luffa, I'm so sorry..."

For a moment, Luffa worried that Zatte had been hurt somehow, but there was no sign of an injury. Luffa almost wished there had been. It would be far easier to treat a physical wound. She put one arm around Zatte, then leaned over her to reach the computer terminal. There was no time to comfort her now, not while the fleet was still in a combat zone. Satisfied with the ship's status readouts, Luffa opened a channel with the Saiyan Free Company's flagship.

"Get control of your people, Princess," Luffa said as Seltiss' image appeared on the viewscreen. "I see SFC ships trying to land on the planet, fighting each other..."

"We're going to surrender," Seltiss said.

"What?!" Luffa shouted.

"You heard what my father said," Seltiss replied. Luffa could tell that Seltiss was upset. The teenage Saiyan was doing her best to hide it, but it wasn't enough. They had all come to this planet expecting to take Rehval completely by surprise, and he had turned the tables on them all.

"I don't give a damn what he said," Luffa growled. "We came here to kill your father. It's just going to take longer than we thought, that's all."

"He took your best shot and bounced it back at us," Seltiss said. "It's over, Luffa! He's too strong for you. For... any of us. All we can do now... is admit defeat."

"You fool!" Luffa shouted. "He doesn't give a damn about any of you! He just wants you to take that potion of his, and then you'll under his thumb forever!"

"And how is that any different from what you wanted?" Suddenly Xibuyas stepped into view and stood beside Seltiss. He was Luffa's son, though Rehval had acquired the boy and somehow matured him to an age of sixteen. Another piece of the family that Rehval had stolen from her.

"Katem, listen to me," Luffa began, even though she knew he wouldn't. She wanted so badly to believe that he belonged to her, at least in some small way. She wanted him to see her with something other than hate and envy, but it was hopeless.

"Listen to you? Or what?" Xibuyas demanded. "You'll attack us? Kill us? We only joined forces with you because of your power, and now it looks like Rehval has beaten you at your own game! It's not the way I wanted this to end, but at least you've been exposed as the fraud you are! As if any mere woman could be a 'Super Saiyan'."

"You're wrong," Zatte mumbled to herself, so quietly that only Luffa could hear. "It's not her fault. It's mine..."

"That's enough, Xibuyas," Seltiss said before he could say any more. "Luffa, I'm sorry it turned out like this, but he's right. You didn't mind bossing everyone around when you were the one on top. I have to do what's right for my people. If we don't surrender to him now, he'll just hunt us down later and destroy us. There's nothing else we can do."

Luffa said nothing. She just stared at them in disbelief. After a few seconds, Seltiss closed the channel.

"It's because of me," Zatte said. "Luffa, I never meant for this--"

"It's not you're fault," Luffa insisted. "He got ahold of a sample of your DNA, and he studied it until he found a way to replicate your powers. It's not like you gave it to him."

"He never would have known about me if I hadn't been with you!" Zatte protested. "I was so stupid. I could have just died on Dorlu Prime when the Tikosi invaded, or you could have killed me on the Makyo Star... Then he never would have been able to stop you--!"

"That's enough!" Luffa said. She pulled Zatte up by her shoulders and lifted her out of her chair. "You're a survivalist, aren't you? I need you to focus. He can manipulate energy the same way you can, and he's got a whole planet powering him, but that doesn't make him unstoppable! We can still come up with something, we just need to regroup!"

Before Zatte could say anything, Luffa noticed a flashing light on the console, indicating a priority transmission. With an irritated grunt, she lowered Zatte to the deck, then turned to answer the call.

"Booth," Luffa said when she saw the man on the viewscreen. They had left him and a reserve force at the Gelbo System, halfway between Nagaoka and Federation space. Like Seltiss, he appeared to be troubled, but determined not to show it.

"Luffa," Booth said. "I'm surprised to see you're still alive. I suppose this proves what Rehval said earlier. He really doesn't see you as a threat."

"Don't tell me his telepathy reached you all the way on Gelbo," Luffa said.

"Telepathy?" Booth asked with surprise. "No, I was contacted by Prester Ganzut back home. One of Rehval's rock monsters appeared there, and informed him what was happening on Nagaoka."

"Good, then it saves me the trouble of briefing you," Luffa said. "We need to regroup and link up with your forces so we can plan a new attack. The Saiyan Free Company has switched sides, and--"

Booth knit his brow before he spoke. "Luffa, there isn't going to be a new attack. Not while Rehval is holding Federation planets hostage."

"I can destroy those rock creatures in a few minutes!" Luffa protested.

"Yes, I know," Booth said. "But it would take you two weeks to get back from Nagaoka, and Rehval has promised to destroy Despye before you even get close enough to save it."

"Then I'll defeat him on Nagaoka, and solve the problem from this end!" Luffa insisted.

"And how will you do that?" Booth asked. "If you had the power to destroy his planet, you would have already done it. What else does that leave? A surface attack? Our troops wouldn't last an hour against a hundred Saiyans, and I'm guessing he has a lot more than that waiting down there. Not to mention the entire Saiyan Free Company has joined him, so we'd need to fight them as well. Just what exactly were you planning to do, Luffa? Besides getting yourself killed?"

"What I won't do, Marshall," Luffa snarled, "is bow my head and beg for mercy like a sniveling coward."

Booth sighed. "Right, your honor. I had forgotten what we were really fighting for out here. Somehow I got it in my head that we were trying to protect the lives of Federation citizens. Thank you for reminding me."

"Don't hand me that, you pompous little despot!" Luffa shouted. "You never gave a damn about anyone! All you ever fought for was a chance to seize more power for yourself! Well how many planets can you rule with Rehval lording over you for the rest of your life?"

"More worlds than I'll rule as a corpse, I should think," Booth said quietly. "At least this way, I'll live long enough to find out. I've already contacted the rest of your fleet, Luffa. I'm recalling them to Gelbo, and then we return to Federation space to await Rehval's orders. You're welcome to return along with them, but I had a feeling you wouldn't leave Nagaoka quietly. What happens next is up to you. It was an honor serving under you, Madam Federatrix. Have a splendid death."

He cut off the transmission, just as Luffa was drawing a deep breath to continue shouting at him. The viewscreen returned to its default display, which showed the planet Nagaoka below them. Whatever harsh, defiant words she had in mind never materialized. There was nothing to say, and no one to hear.

Then she felt a slight shudder in the deckplate beneath her feet. The ship had begun to move. Luffa glanced over at the pilot station and saw that Zatte had entered a new course.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"I'm taking the ship out of orbit," Zatte said. She made a pathetic sniffle, then looked back at Luffa and offered a slight smile. "Not to retreat, of course. I just don't want anyone shooting at the ship while you figure out your next move."

But there was no next move, and Luffa knew it. What infuriated her most about Marshall Booth's words was that they made a lot of sense. The only way to beat Rehval was to fight him in the heart of his stronghold, and there wasn't enough power to make that work. Even if Seltiss and the Federation had stayed with her, the odds seemed impossible.

"Sorry for how I cracked up back there," Zatte said meekly.

"Don't be," Luffa said. "Right now you're all I've got left."

"I want you to know," Zatte told her. "Whatever you decide, I'm with you all the way. You can still save them, Luffa. I know you can do it."

She was referring to the Saiyans. Zatte was convinced that Luffa could redeem the Saiyan people from Rehval's control. She wanted Luffa to be accepted by her own kind, and this had fit in neatly with Zatte's other beliefs: that Luffa would change the universe for the better, that Luffa was destined to achieve some great thing, that Zatte was destined to support that holy mission at all costs. But now, Luffa was beginning to think none of those things would come true.

The realization was painful, but it finally lifted the mental block that had kept Luffa from deciding what to do next. There would be nowhere to run, and her pride refused to surrender, so her only choice was to go on fighting, even if there was no realistic chance of winning. Even if that meant disappointing the one woman in the universe who still believed in her. It was a grim admission to make, but with each moment, Luffa felt that it was the only option that made sense.

"I want you to take the ship out of the system," Luffa said to her. She kept staring at the viewscreen as she spoke. "Not too far, but make the jump to superluminous speed, so they'll think we've left."

"Okay," Zatte said. There was a glimmer of hope in her voice. As the ship moved away, Luffa switched the monitor to display the view from the stern of the star-yacht. Nagaoka quickly receded, and when Zatte activated the faster-than-light engines, the entire system quickly shrank into an unusually bright point of light among the stars. Luffa never took her eyes off of it.

"That... that should be far enough," Zatte said after several minutes. "Now what?"

"Set a course for some friendly planet," Luffa said. "It doesn't matter where, but outside of Federation territory. We can't trust them anymore."

You've got it," Zatte said. "But... what do we do when we get there?"

"I'll drop you off," Luffa said. "Then I'm coming back to Nagaoka to finish things. One way or another."

"What?!" Zatte shouted. She leaped up from her seat and grabbed Luffa by the shoulders. "Luffa that's insane. You'd be trapped there. Even if you made it to the surface, what would you do when you got there?"

"There's only one thing left to do," Luffa said. "They have to die. All of them."

"Luffa, no--"

"All of them," Luffa said. "Every last Saiyan. The whole stinking species. It ends here. The lies, the treachery, the cowardice. I'm going to kill them all."

She was trembling with rage. She hadn't noticed it until Zatte put her hands on her arms, but now there was no mistaking it. For Luffa, it only confirmed that this was the right decision.

"Luffa, please, stop and think about what you're saying! How many Saiyans are down on that one planet right now? If they all die, will there be enough left to keep the population going? You'd be driving your own people to extinction!"

Luffa finally looked away from the viewscreen and stared into Zatte's eye. "You know I'm right!" she shouted. "You've seen what Saiyans are capable of. You've seen the depths they'll stoop to. Rehval doesn't care how many people he has to kill to get what he wants. And the rest of them don't care what happens as long as they get to be on the winning team. Nothing matters to them, Zattie!"

She pulled away from Zatte's arms and began to pace angrily around the bridge. "Dammit to hell, nothing matters to them at all! It's all a lie! It's all been lies!"

Zatte rushed to her side and put her arm around Luffa to console her. She tried to speak, to say something comforting, but she couldn't find the words. There were no words. Luffa knew it, and perhaps Zatte was beginning to realize it too.

"Saiyan pride," Luffa said between short, angry breaths. "It's worthless. They'll abandon everything they have just to get a little glory. Freedom doesn't matter to them. Honor is nothing. Rehval's turning them all into... into livestock, and they don't even care."

"You're not like them," Zatte said. "Please, listen to me. I'm begging you. Whatever happens, it doesn't change what you are. You're my wife and I love you."

"I love you too," Luffa said. "But you know I'm exactly like them. I've let you down before. I've betrayed you. I've been more interested in puffing up my ego than in things that really matter. I've just gotten more self-conscious about it, that's all."

"Luffa, no..."

"They have to die," Luffa said. "My species is a cancer on the whole universe. I see that now. This is what I was born to do. I have to destroy my own race for the good of everyone else. Tell me I'm wrong, Zattie. Tell me you don't believe what I'm saying right now."

They looked at each other for what felt like several minutes. At last, Zatte hung her head and sighed. "If he wins... no one will be safe," she said. "And you can't beat him without going down there and beating his followers."

"There it is," Luffa said. "I'm the only one who can do this now."

"He forced you into this!" Zatte said. "If this is how the Saiyans are supposed to end, then it's his fault, not yours! He's the one that tied all of the others to his own fate! He's forcing you to kill them all!"

"Maybe so," Luffa said, "but I think it would have come to this eventually anyway. What else could I do? Where else could I go for a worthy fight? I think this might be how it ended up for Chanisp, or Old Darbock, or the other old heroes. The Saiyans had to rise up and find a way to bring down the Super Saiyans, or else they'd surely be destroyed themselves. Well, this time I'm breaking the cycle, once and for all. The universe will just have to learn to get along without us."

"Okay," Zatte said. There was a long pause, and then: "Okay. If this is what you have to do, then I'll go along with it. All I ask is that you take me with you."

Luffa shook her head. "You know I can't do that. You've seen how powerful Rehval is now. You wouldn't survive. I don't know that I'll survive this."

"I don't care!" Zatte said. "I can't just stay behind while you do this. I have to be there, with you. You're the xan-nil'Dor. If this is your purpose in the universe, then I have to do everything I can to help you see it through."

"I know about all of that," Luffa said. She couldn't bear to look at her. As a child, she might have dreamed Saiyan suitor offering to die alongside her in a glorious battle. But Zatte was no Saiyan, and Luffa was no child. "It's not worth getting you killed," she said as she turned away from her.

"Yes it is!" Zatte pleaded.

Luffa stopped and slowly turned back to face her again. "What are you saying?" she asked.

"I'm saying that if you can't survive this battle, then I... I want to die with you." Zatte said.

The words shook Luffa to the core. "How can you say that? You're a Dorlun," Luffa reminded her. "A survivalist. Staying alive is what you do best."

"None of that matters anymore!" Zatte said. "Right now, I'm not a Dorlun, and you're not a Saiyan, okay?"

She walked towards Luffa and threw her arms around her. "Right now, you're my best friend and my lover and my wife, and I would do anything to be with you for as long as I can. If it costs my life, then so be it."

"Zattie, this isn't like you. You're not thinking straight."

"No, I'm not! I'm thinking that all I want to do is show you just how much you mean to me. Let me die for your cause, xan-nil'Dor. Let me burn with you. Isn't that the way you want it? The two of us dying together in an epic battle?"

Of course it was. The thought of it was too tantalizing to ignore. Luffa had imagined such a glory back on Dorlu Prime, when it was just the two of them against the Tikosi hordes. The last several months of their marriage had been marinated in a fascination with death. Even now, Zatte was caressing the hair on the back of Luffa's head, the way she always did while they talked about how dangerous their last combat mission had been.

Zatte hadn't always been like this. She had changed so gradually that Luffa hadn't really noticed until now. Perhaps she was right. Maybe Zatte wasn't a Dorlun anymore.

And that was what made up Luffa's mind.

"All right," Luffa finally said. "We'll go together."

Zatte looked up from Luffa's shoulder. "You mean it?"

"Of course I do," Luffa said. "You're right. About me, about us. Leaving you behind... well, it just doesn't seem right."

Zatte stepped away from Luffa and took her hands in her own. She was still crying, but the look on her face was joyous. "I... can't tell you how much this means to me," she said. "To be with you, right up to the end. The end. This is it, isn't it?"

"You never know, we might survive this," Luffa said. "But... I doubt it."

"It doesn't matter anymore," Zatte said. "You're going to save the universe, and I'll be with you every step of the way. I won't let you down... I... I... Oh, come here."

She pulled Luffa in and embraced her, cradling the back of her head with her hand.

"I love you," Zatte said. "I know it's awkward for you, but if this is the last chance I get to say it, then I want to say it. You're everything to me. Ha ha, I'm shaking like a leaf right now. I'm actually excited, you know? I never died before. It sounds funny to say it. I'm going to die. I'm frightened, but I don't even care anymore, because I know I'll be with you for the rest of my life. You know what I mean?"

"Yeah," Luffa said. "I'm... I'm scared too. I don't think this Super Saiyan business turned out the way I had in mind. I hope I didn't screw it up too badly."

"You didn't," Zatte said, her breath hot against Luffa's ear. "You won't. You're perfect just the way you are."

Luffa swallowed hard and made a strange sound, almost like a stifled howl. Zatte held her tightly. She sounded like she was hyperventilating.

"It's okay," Zatte said between rapid breaths. "It's okay. Shhhhh. You don't have to say it. I know how you feel. I've always known. My dear, dear Luffa."

"I know that you know. That's not good enough," Luffa said. "I gotta get this out."

She leaned into Zatte's embrace and took in the fragrance of her hair, of her neck, of the sweat in her clothing.

"You're my wife," Luffa said. "I didn't know what marriage was before you. Every day you've put up with me has been an honor that I don't deserve. You inspire me to push myself to be a better Saiyan... no. A better person. You've even saved my life. I owe you a debt that I can never repay."

"Luffa..."

"I wish it didn't have to be like this," Luffa went on. "That you and I could just stay here forever and hold each other, just like this. But it just can't be that way."

"I know. It's okay."

Luffa kissed her, and for what seemed like a millennium, there was only the two of them, no wars, no legends, no divine plans. When they finally separated, they each wiped the tears from each other's eyes.

"Look at us," Zatte said as she wiped her nose with her arm. "We're about to go off to war and we're bawling like a couple of toddlers."

"Yeah," Luffa said with a sniffle. "Well, I won't tell anyone if you don't."

"Deal."

"I love you, Zattie," Luffa said. "More than I can say. I just want you to remember that."

"Of course," Zatte said.

Luffa embraced her again.

"I love you. And... I'm sorry."

Zatte opened her mouth to ask what she was sorry for, but she never got the chance. Faster than Zatte could react, Luffa had charged her hands with ki, and channeled it into Zatte's body. The resulting shock rendered her unconscious. She gasped, and her left eye widened with surprise, and then she went slack in Luffa's arms.

The enormity of this suddenly hit Luffa, and the tears flowed freely down her face. She wanted to wait for her to wake up so she could explain all of this to her, but of course that made no sense. She would never hear this woman's voice again. Despite the tears Luffa's expression remained stoic, however, as she cradled Zatte in her arms, and carried her the captain's chair.

"I'm so sorry," she said as she lowered Zatte into the chair and adjusted the seat to make her more comfortable. "I really did want you to come with me on this. It'd be even better than you made it sound. I don't deserve what I have in you."

She went to the navigation console and programmed the ship to wait several minutes, and then fly itself along the course Zatte had entered earlier.

"But you can't go," Luffa continued. "No matter how much you want to be there beside me, I can't let that happen. I can't let you die."

Once the autopilot was set, she entered codes to lock out the computer. Then Luffa got up from the seat and knelt down beside Zatte. She ran her fingers along Zatte's cheek, stopping at the edge of the patch that covered her wounded right eye.

"It's because of me and my rotten family that you lost the colony," she said. "Dorlu Prime. My father betrayed you all, and I was too late and too weak to stop the Tikosi. You and Keda were the only survivors, and then we lost her too, because I was too late. And too weak."

Luffa pressed her eyes into the crook of her own arm to dab away the tears. "The Saiyans have to pay for what they've done," she said. "But I can't let you die because of that. You're the only one left from the Dorlu Prime colony. If you die too, because of my weakness... Well, I won't let that happen. You're supposed to want to live dammit. Dorluns are survivalists, and all. But you're ready to throw your life away for me. For me! But... I'm only a Saiyan..."

She stood up and watched the rise and fall of Zatte's chest for a moment, then somehow found the strength to turn away and head for the door. "It's not worth it," Luffa said. "And even if it is worth it... I still won't let it happen. If Providence wants me to do this, then it'll have to settle for my death. No more Dorluns die because of me."

Luffa stood in the doorway and hesitated for a moment. She wanted to take one last look at her beloved, but decided against it.

"G-goodbye, Captain," she said. And then she let the door close behind her.

*******

The star-yacht was large compared to many of the ships Luffa had seen in her life, but the walk to the cargo bay wasn't that long. This time, it felt like hundreds of miles. With each step, she felt the urge to turn back, to return to her wife, even if it was just to take one last look at her. Each step forward was a reminder of everything she was leaving behind, forever.

But she refused to turn back. She allowed herself to feel the grief and sadness, but only so that these emotions could stoke the fires of her rage. The thing within her burned yellow-hot, demanding release. The Saiyans would pay. Jindan would be destroyed. Rehval would die. The universe would be spared their blight forever. It had to be this way. Perhaps one day Zatte might understand that, and forgive her.

As she reached the entrance to the bay, the service droid met her in the corridor. She had nearly forgotten about it.

"PB-2," she said.

"Yes, mistress?" the robot asked. It had come with the star-yacht. PB-2's main function was to roam the ship, tidying up where it could and basically making its former owner feel a bit richer than he would have felt without a mechanical butler. Luffa knelt down to be at eye-level with it.

"I've set the ship on an automatic course. No one's at the controls, so just keep an eye on things and make sure it doesn't hit anything for the next couple of weeks, okay? Zatte's on the bridge. She'll be upset when she wakes up, because I've locked out the controls. Just take care of her for me, would you?"

"Very good, madam," it replied. "When shall I expect your return?"

"I won't be coming back," she said. "Fifteen days from now, I want you to transfer all command codes to Zatte," Luffa said. "The ship will belong to her, is that clear?"

"Perfectly clear, mistress," PB-2 said. The authorization of this was actually a much more complicated than it appeared. In the moment after hearing Luffa's order, PB-2 had silently scanned the sound of her voice, her life sign readings, and her retinal patterns, along with a number of other factors to confirm her identity. These features hadn't originally been part of PB-2's design, but Luffa had paid for the upgrades some time ago, in order to maintain absolute control of the ship.

"Good," Luffa said. "Yeah, good."

She walked into the cargo bay, past Guwar's fresh corpse, and began preparing the small pod for launch. Zatte had acquired this vessel on Ristet IV, and had joked that it was an anniversary present for Luffa. Luffa hoped that, in the future, Zatte wouldn't look back on this gift with too much regret. As Luffa ran through the pre-flight checklist, she noticed PB-2 had followed her inside the bay. For a moment, Luffa assumed that it was going to start disposing of Guwar's body, but instead it followed her to the pod.

"What is it?" she asked the machine.

"Will there be anything else, mistress?" it asked. It's tone was professional and cordial, the same as it had always been. And yet, Luffa couldn't help but hear a touch of sadness in its voice, as though it wanted an excuse to be with her for a moment longer before her final departure.

"I don't know if you can understand this," Luffa said after a heavy sigh. "I sort of hope you can't, because if you do, then I've been treating you like an object this whole time. But... thanks for looking after the place. You've handled a lot of stuff that you were probably never meant to deal with on a yacht, but you performed well. I'm... uh... honored by your service."

"As you say, madam." PB-2 replied. There was no indication that her words meant anything special to it.

"Yeah, I'm probably wasting my breath here," Luffa said. "Take care of yourself, PB-2."

"As you wish," PB-2 replied.

It stood in the corner of the bay, near the door, while Luffa boarded the pod and launched it through the force-field airlock that led into space. Luffa set her course for Nagaoka, and the pod streaked onward to its destination.

Inside the bay, PB-2 waited for a moment, until the bay doors closed. It waited a few minutes more, and then it rolled off to attend to its other duties.

*******

[14 October, 233 Before Age. Interstellar Space.]

The Saiyan Free Company was a loose alliance of Saiyans seeking an escape from the misrule of King Rehval III. For over a century, the Rehval Dynasty had sought to unify the Saiyan species into a proper nation state, but the Saiyans were unruly by nature, and many of them bristled at the heavy-handed policies of the monarchists. Tensions between the kingdom and the expatriates came to a head when Rehval III tried to destroy the Super Saiyan Luffa. His scheme backfired, forcing him to abandon not only his throneworld of Saiya, but his second home on Pflaume, an influential hub of commerce and diplomatic channels. With his disappearance, decades of careful statecraft were wiped out in a single stroke. The Planet Saiya was deserted, her allies bewildered, and her embassies on other worlds completely isolated.

In the midst of this political vacuum, the Princess Seltiss stepped forward to pick up the pieces her father had left behind. At only sixteen, she possessed a talent for leadership that was rare among politicians three times her age. Her secret was something her father, grandfather, and great grandfather lacked: flexibility. The Rehvals before her had relied on overwhelming displays of force to convince their subjects of their right to rule, and they reserved politics and gladhanding for the aliens they wanted to do business with. It made sense, but only if one had the power to pull it off. Seltiss was fairly weak by Saiyan standards, and in a galaxy dominated by the Legendary Super Saiyan, no one could claim to be the strongest anymore.

Instead, Seltiss listened. Her followers were disillusioned with the monarchy, or they outright despised government of any kind. So she played down her royal title whenever possible. They didn't trust her at first, because of her father, or her inexperience, or her multicultural education. So she didn't bother giving them orders directly. Instead, she used her more loyal followers to tend to their needs, and she found that they were usually more cooperative once their bellies were full and their ships were repaired. When she needed stricter military discipline, she got it by delegating command to her closest advisers: older Saiyans who respected her abilities, and were strong enough to command respect from those who wouldn't listen to her.

The end result was a strange admixture of political theory that would have probably made her great-grandfather furious. Some of the Free Companions with monarchist sentiments respected Seltiss as the rightful heir to her father. The antimonarchists saw her as the opposite: a leader who proved her worth instead of relying on a birthright. Others only followed her because she got results. Some saw her as nothing but a provider of food, supplies, and battle to fight. Many sided with her out of necessity, fearing the growing influence of the Jindan Cult and Luffa's Federation. Then there were some that saw her as a figurehead. These Saiyans only respected her advisors and generals, and viewed her as more of a symbol for keeping the whole group united. And the beauty of it was that it worked, because each of them were a little bit right about her.

It wouldn't last, of course. Eventually, Seltiss would need to transform her motley crew into something more unified, with a more obvious rule of law. Eventually she would be their Queen, or their Dear Leader, or their Chancellor, or whatever other title they could all agree upon, but for now she was satisfied that they all followed her. She would adjust as the situation called for it. There were simple relationships that governed everything in life. Cold equations that could be managed, but never ignored. Too many failed regimes in history had treated rebellions like foreign invaders. Protests, riots, revolts, these were all the result of societal pressures. The goal was to vent the pressure and find ways to redirect and release those energies before they upset the system. That usually meant changing the system itself, and those in power often loathed to do this. Change could be difficult, and some leaders took change personally, like an affront to their past authority. Those who wielded power had to be able to adapt to the times, or they would find their power taken away from them. Those who failed to vent the pressure would be destroyed in the explosion. It was inevitable.

At long last, it seemed like her father had finally failed to adapt. She knew the day would come, just as the day came when her father replaced Rehval II. The Saiyan Free Company was part of her plan to assure a smooth transition of power. She was proud to see it work so well, but it was all happening much sooner than she had expected.

It was a relief to retire to her quarters. Her command ship was one of the best in her fleet, but the accommodations were still very modest compared to the dorms at various private schools she had attended in her short life. She had decorated the cabin with a few posters and alien souvenirs she had picked up during the war. Her favorite was a lamp she found that contained a suspension of wax and some unknown liquid. The heat of the lamp would melt the wax and make it float up and down through the liquid, and the whole thing was dyed in her favorite shade of pink, which made it perfect. She shut off the other lights and sat on the couch to admire the rosy glow. It was something she had started doing lately to relax.

It wasn't working.

Just when she was about to shut off the light and try to sleep, the door chime sounded, and she answered it to find Xibuyas waiting to come inside.

"I... didn't mean to disturb you, my lady," he said, in that adorable way where he tried to make his voice sound a little more mature.

"It's fine, Xibuyas," she said. "What's on your mind?"

"Good news, I think," Xibuyas said.

"If it's about the fleet that's going to the Jindans' base, I've already heard about it," she said.

"No, better than that," Xibuyas said. He handed a computer pad to her. "I had the crew run a tactical simulation for me. There's a very good chance we can destroy Luffa's ship during the battle."

Seltiss looked down at the pad, then back at Xibuyas. "Um, what?" was all she could ask.

"It's safe to assume that when we reach the enemy stronghold, the allied fleet will begin a bombardment of the surface," he explained. "Once that's complete, we'll have a narrow opening to turn our weapons on Luffa's engines. The Federation ships may turn on us, but the projections on that pad show a casualty rate no higher than sixty percent. Acceptable losses, as far as I'm concerned."

Seltiss took a deep breath and looked at the pad to review his findings. She didn't go over it very closely, but seeing the word "Luffa" and the number "60" was enough to tell her this was not a joke. "Wow. Like, you really want her dead that badly, huh?"

"She's an abomination," Xibuyas growled.

"We're allies, Xibuyas," she said.

"That alliance will be over once the cult is destroyed," he countered. "Our best chance to destroy her is to strike while she's on a spacecraft, where her powers won't save her."

"What happened to all that bluster about getting stronger and defeating her in battle?" Seltiss asked. "Because this plan sounds like it was drafted by someone who's given up on that."

He looked her in the eye, then turned away from her. "I... was forced to re-evaluate my strategy," he said.

"You can't beat her," Seltiss said. "You think you'll never be able to beat her."

"It won't matter," Xibuyas insisted. "Either way, she dies, and this way it will be over that much sooner. Then the Saiyan race can move forward again."

"This isn't about the Saiyan race, Xibuyas," Seltiss said. "This is about your pride. You're still wound up over the idea that you might be Luffa's son--"

"I am not her son!" he seethed.

She no longer believed him. Her father had raised Xibuyas like one of the family, claiming that he had been an orphan. Xibuyas grew up with astonishing powers, which her father claimed to be the results of his own alchemical enhancements. It all made perfect sense at the time, but now that she had met Luffa in person, Seltiss could see the resemblance between them. Ironically, Xibuyas looked even more like Luffa when he angrily denied any relation to her. But there was no point in saying any of this out loud.

"Chill out, " she said. "We've been over this already. I need you, Xibuyas. I need you to help me make this Free Company work. Your bio-parents aren't important to me. But we do need Luffa, at least for a while longer."

"Why?" he demanded. This was the closest they had ever come to a genuine argument. Growing up, he had always revered her like a queen. He took the Saiyan royal family very seriously, even when she did not. It hadn't been easy to convince him to side with her against Rehval, but in the end his love for her won out. Now, she was beginning to worry that his hatred for Luffa might prevail against her.

"Look, we have to win this war, sure, but we've got to win the peace that follows," she explained. "Right now, Luffa makes things easier for me. She gives Saiyans everywhere something in common. They're all afraid of her. Even the ones that respect her know she could kill them whenever she wants."

"And this is helpful?" Xibuyas grumbled.

"Look in every generation, one of us is the strongest, but we don't always know who it is," Seltiss explained. "A lot of times, even the strongest Saiyan is outclassed by some monster or alien. My father claimed to be the strongest, but it wasn't exactly obvious, not like it is with Luffa. Or you."

He tensed up at this, so she reached out to put her arms on his shoulders. She'd learned a long time ago that affectionate gestures like these helped to calm his stormy moods, and it always reinforced his loyalty to her. Xibuyas had a glowing yellow aura when he used his full power, and while his hair didn't change color, it wasn't hard to notice the resemblance between his aura and Luffa's transformation. He had been self-conscious about it ever since their first encounter on Pflaume.

"Look, big guy," she said, "you've been stronger than my dad for a while now. Maybe you've always been stronger. And I need that, for sure, but if Luffa's out of the picture, that makes you the strongest Saiyan, no question. And you've seen how everyone feels about her. If something happens to her, they'll turn that resentment on you next."

"It would be different for me," Xibuyas insisted.

"Maybe, but they're still not ready," Seltiss said. "Not all of them, anyway. It helps that you're a man, but some of them would still resent you. For now, they see you as a counterbalance against Luffa, and we need to cement that idea for a while. And once they're used to you, then we can think about where to go in a world without Super Saiyans."

"But this may be the only chance we get!" Xibuyas said.

"Don't be so sure," Seltiss said. "You may not believe in your powers, but I do." She patted him on the cheek, then turned to approach a small refrigerator on the other side of her room. "You want a soda?"

The offer might have angered him a moment earlier, but her flattery had taken a lot of the fight out of him. Now, he seemed to remember where he was, and the awkward anticipation he felt from spending time in her quarters. The boy was madly in love with her, and sharing a snack in her room was like a sneak preview of being married to her someday. When he finally remembered to answer her question, she tossed him a bottle and directed him to sit down. Then she took a seat beside him, draping his right arm over her shoulder like a scarf.

"Look, if we have to kill Luffa, we'll figure something out," Seltiss said after they each took a few sips. "I'm not saying we rule it out completely. But maybe we can work out something that, um, won't kill two thirds of our forces? You want to be king some day, right? Well, a king needs subjects."

He tried to hold his right arm still, like he was afraid of accidentally groping her somehow. He kept his fingers in as natural a pose as he could, but she could feel the tension in his muscles. As for his left arm, he wiped his mouth and sighed.

"Then... you still plan to be my bride," he said, as though he were just making idle conversation.

"Well, duh, how else can you be king?" she teased. "I'm the one with the royal blood."

"I just... I thought..." he took another sip as he put the words together. "It was King Rehval's plan that we marry," he finally said. "And you told me that we had more leverage by sticking together, because he needs us. In case your schemes failed, we could always go back to him and he would have no choice but to let us return. But now, we're preparing to kill him, and when that happens..."

She giggled softly. "All bets are off, is that what you're worrying about?" she asked. "My father's made a lot of mistakes, Xibuyas. Big mistakes, if you ask me. But pairing us off wasn't one of them. Sure, he only saw us as good breeding stock for making more Saiyan elites, but besides that, we make a good team, don't we? I need something to keep you around, don't I?"

"I see," he said, doing his best to hide his relief. "I didn't want to presume--"

"Of course, if you've found someone else, I can't exactly stand in your way," Seltiss joked. "Maybe you met some Federation farmgirl in one of the border systems."

"Absolutely not!" Xibuyas said. "I'd be lost without you, my lady. The only place for me is by your side."

Which was exactly the sort of response she had come to expect from him. In whatever society Seltiss would eventually build, Xibuyas would be its first citizen. Her father had found him, or stolen him from Luffa, or he grew him in a test tube, or whatever. Xibuyas revered him as a father/creator, but Seltiss had become his friend, his true love, his princess. Winning his loyalty from her father had been the first proof that she was capable of surpassing King Rehval III and staking claim to her own place in history. It was comforting to know that she still had Xibuyas wrapped around her little finger.

But not comforting enough.

"It must be difficult for you," she said after a long silence. "We've been plotting against my dad all this time, but I didn't think we'd reach this point so soon."

Xibuyas shrugged. "I only followed him because of you," he said. "It's a pity that things had to turn out this way, but he brought this upon himself."

"Yeah," Seltiss said. "But even so, he was like a father to you. It must be tough going into battle against him like this."

"Not at all," he said. "The man I respected, the man who was your father, that man died some time ago. If he ever really existed at all. I didn't want to believe the reports, that this 'Trismegistus' was actually King Rehval, but the intelligence reports are clear. He's not even trying to hide his madness. Killing him will be an act of mercy. Better than letting him live out his days as some pathetic wizard."

"I just always imagined things going differently," Seltiss said. "I wanted to build the Free Company into something bigger, and then reveal it to him when the time was right. Maybe ten years from now, or even fifteen. Then he would see what I'd accomplished, and he'd have no choice but to turn over his kingdom to me. He'd have to admit that I was ready, that I was better at this than he ever was."

"You already are better than he is," Xibuyas said. "Much as it galls me to fight alongside Luffa, your alliances and planning have all paid off. We stand ready to crush your father with overwhelming force. What more could you ask for?"

"Yeah," Seltiss said. "I guess I just wanted something more personal. You know, Luffa told me that Rehval's not even his real name. She said the real Rehval III was my uncle, and dad killed him and stole his identity."

Xibuyas made a loud harrumph. "I wouldn't put too much stock in anything that woman says," he grumbled.

"Is it any harder to believe than this cult leader scene he's into now?" Seltiss asked. "The point is that we'll never know for sure, because we'll never see him again. And it's a good thing. The Saiyan race can't move forward until he's out of the picture, sure. But... it's still tragic, you know? Things could have turned out differently."

He looked at her and smiled triumphantly. "It is tragic, for him. But it's like you've always told me. One man's tragedy is another's gain. You should be thrilled, Princess Seltiss. Killing your own father is a dream come true for most Saiyans. And at your age! You'll go down in history, with all the other old heroes."

Xibuyas stood up, and for a moment she thought he was going to lift her up from the couch and hold her in his arms. Instead, he took a step away from her, and knelt before her in supplication.

"I did have some attachment to the old man. I admit it," he said. "But his time is over, and his usefulness to you is at an end! We'll throw him away and never look back, just like you've always promised. I... I've always been in awe of your brilliance, Seltiss. And you're right about Luffa. I shouldn't let her get in my head. We have our whole lives to rid ourselves of that wretched beast, and with your genius, I know we can do it."

She didn't know what to say. She wanted to tell him to get up, to hold her in his arms and tell her it would be all right. She wanted to tell him how conflicted she felt about killing her father. Necessary as it was, she still found it hard to face the reality of it. It had been easier before, when no one knew where King Rehval was, or that he had anything to do with Trismegistus' cult. But now there was no denying that Rehval was a menace to the Saiyan species, and it was her duty to destroy him. The cold equations demanded it. Her political career, the welfare of her people, the welfare of the entire galaxy, they all depended upon her father's death.

But she would still miss him when he was gone. Perhaps this was part of the equations that Seltiss hadn't considered until it was too late. It wasn't that Rehval had been a good father to her. He had probably lied to her more than she would ever know. It was likely that he saw her and her sisters as little more than breeding stock. But he still mattered. She kept thinking of one morning when she was a little girl. He cooked breakfast for her. There wasn't anything particularly important about that memory, but it was enough to make her regret what was going to happen to him.

She always thought Xibuyas felt something similar towards her father, but apparently not. Or perhaps he chose to hide it, the same way she was hiding her own feelings. She couldn't show weakness at this crucial moment. Everything she knew about leadership told her that she had to be steadfast and unwavering. She didn't love Xibuyas. "Love" was just a word she used to keep him on her side. She couldn't allow herself use him as a source of emotional support. It would only teach him that he had leverage with her. The boy was too powerful as it was.

"On your feet, kiddo," she said, forcing herself to smile. When he stood, she got up and gave him a playful kiss on the cheek. She hoped that the low light in the room would keep him from noticing the sadness in her eyes.

"I keep telling you," she said. "You don't have to bow to me, okay? You're going to rule by my side one of these days, remember? We'll be equals. So as far as I'm concerned, we already are, got it?"

"You're so much more than I could ever aspire to be," he said. "I... I should go. You need your rest for the battle to come."

He always excused himself this way whenever he began to get emotional. He thought he was being subtle, but she could tell from the change in his voice, and the way he suddenly wasn't sure what to do with his hands.

And she let him go, since she felt the same way. It would have been nice to have him stay, to hold her as she cried over her father's lamentable fate. But Xibuyas wouldn't understand, or worse, he might see her indecision as a vulnerability. She had to be strong, even in front of him. Especially in front of him.

So she waited for him to walk out the door, then sat alone in her room, watching the light from her pink oil lamp dance across the walls. Soon enough, the tears came, and she wondered if her father had ever felt so alone.

[14 November 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

Zatte was a Dorlun, born with a unique ability to manipulate energy. She mostly used this for bending light and other radiation around her body, to make herself invisible, or for deflecting ki to protect herself or to hide her own power level from those who could sense it. She had accompanied her wife, Luffa, the Legendary Super Saiyan, on what she considered to be a holy mission to Nagaoka. Luffa had sworn to destroy the planet, and the wicked Saiyan cultists who lurked beneath the thick grey clouds of the Nagaokan atmosphere.

Mostly, Zatte's job was to keep the ship running and coordinate with Luffa's attack fleet. And she was more than happy to do this. This was Luffa's epic story, and Zatte was simply honored to be a part of it. The Dorlun culture prioritized survival, and the Dorlun religion commanded its people to stay alive so that they might eventually find a worthy cause to support. Zatte believed that Luffa was her cause, a pivotal figure destined to change the course of history, what the Dorluns called xan-nil'Dor. Zatte's life had become a swirling mass of contradictions since she realized Luffa's importance. It was hard to balance out all her roles-- loving spouse, devoted disciple, martial arts student, sensible advisor, down-to-earth sidekick-- but now those roles seemed to have finally converged into one. As Zatte stood on the bridge of Luffa's yacht and watched Nagaoka, she felt a serenity in her heart that told her that everything had worked out for the best. Luffa would triumph, and the universe would prosper. All Zatte had to do was follow her beloved the rest of the way.

And then the bombardment failed. Every ship in the fleet fired conventional weapons on the planet, and nothing happened. It was like some enormous force field surrounded the entire planet, but Zatte couldn't locate a power source on the surface big enough to support such a technology. She had never heard of a force field big enough to shield an entire planet, but she knew such a device had to run on something.

Undaunted, Luffa went to the cargo bay to fire on the planet herself. As the Super Saiyan, Luffa's power was greater than any other Saiyan in the universe, greater than the firepower of the entire fleet. For a moment, Zatte felt reassured. Nagaoka would be destroyed in an instant, and its secrets would die with it. From the bridge, Zatte could sense her bride's immense ki energy building. On the viewscreen, she could see the lance of golden energy streaking out to the planet.

And then the energy faded away, only for the planet to split it up and shoot it all back from a hundred different directions. Even if there was a force field big enough and strong enough to do this, there was too much cohesion in the reflected energy. It should have just diffused evenly, leaving little more than a harmless wave of radiation. To split a beam into dozens of smaller beams was something more like Zatte's own innate ability, but how could anything achieve this on a planetary scale? It was impossible, unless...

Her mind raced with horrified speculations, but soon the answer appeared before her as she watched the clouds on Nagaoka shift and swirl until they formed the image of a man's face. She instantly recognized it as the likeness of King Rehval III, the Saiyan monarch who abandoned his kingdom to start his bizarre alchemical cult on Nagaoka.

And then, as the lips of the cloud-image began to move, Zatte could hear his voice in her mind. "Hello, Luffa. I'm so glad that you've finally arrived. Now, at last, we can put all of this to an end."

Saiyans all had a low-level telepathic ability. Over a limited range, they could send their thoughts to other beings, like a sort of mental walkie-talkie, although they lacked more advanced mind-reading powers. Luffa could read minds, but only by making physical contact. In this case, it seemed like Rehval was projecting his thoughts across a much larger range, not just addressing Luffa, but anyone nearby. Zatte began to wonder if the entire fleet could hear this.

"I'm sure you remember Pozet," Rehval began, and Zatte's heart sank. She remembered Pozet well. Zatte had killed that horrible creature aboard this very ship. It had tried to prevent her from rescuing Luffa on planet Pflaume. It should have marked the end of that nightmare, it looked like Rehval wasn't finished with it yet.

"Homuncular synthesis is one of the greatest tests of an alchemist's skills. Many of the greatest alchemists die without ever achieving it. I actually pulled it off on my first try, but I didn't feel like I had truly mastered the technique until I created Pozet using folicle samples from your wife. She's an amazing woman, really. My compliments."

Zatte forced herself to look away from the viewscreen and get back to the computers on the bridge. The energy bursts from the planet hadn't been aimed at anything in particular, but a number of ships had been hit anyway. She needed to contact the fleet commanders and get them to back off from Nagaoka before something else happened.

"I created Pozet to act as that serial killer," Rehval explained, "which I used to lure you to my trap on Pflaume City, but she was also a peace offering if you changed your mind and decided to see things my way instead. I thought we could join forces, Luffa. I thought there would be no limit to the things we could achieve together, but you rejected my gift and you spurned my friendship, and now you've come here to destroy me. Fortunately, Pozet served a purpose for that scenario too."

"No," Zatte murmured to herself. "No, no, no..."

"I made three of her, Luffa," he said. "One to present to you, the second to act as my 'serial killer'. You and your lovely bride made short work of them, but the third Pozet I used for my research. I was fascinated with the energy manipulation powers, you see. Imagine what a Saiyan could do with that sort of ability! Imagine what I could do with it, the greatest Saiyan of all!"

Zatte looked up at the viewscreen and clutched at the fabric of her shirt over her heart. She didn't know exactly what all of this meant, not yet. She didn't know how Rehval had become so powerful, or what he planned to do with that power, but she knew that it would be something terrible.

And worst of all, he had used her to make it all possible.

*******

[14 November 233 Before Age. Despye.]

Prester Ganzut paced in a tight circle around his office in the capital city of Despye. There had been no word from the Federation fleet they had sent to Nagaoka. He didn't expect to hear anything, since they were avoiding communications to prevent anyone from learning of their counterattack. He would only receive word when the battle was over, and by his reckoning, the fleet would have just arrived in the Nagaoka system. A cold pitcher of iced tea was waiting for him at his desk, slowly soaking the wood with condensation. Every time the pitcher caught his eye as he walked around the room, he told himself that he would drink it later, but he never got around to it.

Nothing would be the same when this was over. Even if Luffa won the battle, she had all but promised to bring sweeping changes to the Federation when she returned. He had no idea how drastic those "changes" would be, and she probably had no idea herself, which was what made her so dangerous. Even if it all went perfectly, he doubted that her plans would bode well for his career.

As he mulled over his political prospects, the ground began to shake under his feet. He wasn't sure what to do about an earthquake, as this part of the planet had never had one before. Just as he decided to take cover under his desk, two of his security detail rushed into the office and escorted him to an emergency transport. This was standard procedure during an attack on the city, but he couldn't hear any air-raid sirens or any other sounds he had come to associate with a battle.

The way to the transport was underground, connected to his building by a tunnel, but before they could reach it, they found the entire entrance smashed into rubble. A large column of earth was rising out of the ground, and the tunnel entrance simply had the misfortune of being located in its path. So too, was the ceiling above them, and the upper floors of the building.

His security team managed to get him outdoors, and they even evacuated most of the other people inside, but as Prester Ganzut watched the Despye Executive Hall being impaled by a giant column of rock and dirt, he was certain that there had to have been causalities. Angrily, he demanded an explanation for what was happening, even though he doubted that anyone else had one to offer.

Then the great tower of earth began to shape itself, like clay in the hands of an invisible sculptor, and Ganzut suddenly knew.

"The cultists!" he gasped as the column finally took the form of a man. He had heard of this taking place on other planets, but Luffa had always been there to stop them before they could do any real harm. But Luffa was at Nagaoka, supposedly fighting the cultists, wasn't she? If so, then she wasn't fighting them hard enough for Prester Ganzut's liking.

"Prester Ganzut, I presume!" the earthen giant said aloud. It looked right at him, and Ganzut's blood ran cold. "Good day to you, sir. I'm King Rehval III, also known as Trismegistus. Well, this is an avatar of me, anyway. My followers planted it here so that I could talk to you when the time was right."

"This can't be!" Ganzut said. "You... can't be here! Luffa's fortuneteller, she told us there wasn't gonna be any more attacks from you Jindan Saiyans!"

"Fortuneteller?" Rehval asked. By now, the avatar was so detailed that Ganzut could see the look of surprise in its "eyes". "Well, now, that does explain a few things. I expected her to defeat my warriors, but I could never understand how she always seemed to know exactly when and where to find them. Such a resourceful woman. Well, Luffa's fortuneteller was right, Prester. There will be no more attacks on your territory. Right now, my avatars are rising up on planets all over the Federation, but they aren't going to fight. They'll just be standing by, awaiting your unconditional surrender!"

"Surrender?" Ganzut asked. "Are you sayin' you already defeated her at Nagaoka?!"

"Prester, you don't understand!" Rehval said with a laugh. "I don't need to defeat Luffa, anymore than I have to attack you. As of today, I've become invincible, and Luffa? Well, she's simply no longer relevant!"

*******

[14 November 233 Before Age. Chai I.]

A similar scene was playing out on the grounds of the Imperial Palace on Chai I, seat of the Camelian Empire.

"The war with the Federation was never about conquest or revenge, your Majesty," the rock-Rehval explained to Zinenz 15, the Emperor of Camelia, who had been playing cricket on horseback when the avatar rose up from the field.

"It was a diversion," Rehval continued. "Luffa had to stay put inside her own territory to defend it from my warriors, while the rest of you watched from the sidelines, believing that I was only interested in the Federation. All the while, my agents were traveling to your planets in secret, and pouring a special potion into the soil of your planets."

"All of them?" Zinenz 15 asked with some skepticism in his voice. His mount was very nervous in the shadow of the earthen giant, but the emperor did his best to stand his ground.

"Enough of them," Rehval replied. "The figure that stands before you know is more than powerful enough to destroy Chai I with ease. I can't destroy every planet in your empire so quickly, but I can threaten enough of the important ones to throw Eternal Camelia into turmoil."

*******

[14 November 233 Before Age. Festid III.]

"Unless we submit to you, is that what you're saying?" asked General Zinfandel asked.

"Precisely," said the rock-Rehval that had manifested on Festid's capital city. "You cannot defeat this giant creature that stands before you, General. The potion that animates it was already absorbed into the very matter that makes up your planet. You might destroy this physical form you see, but another will rise out of the ground to replace it, again and again, for as long as I see fit. Luffa has the power to break the spell, but your armies simply don't have what it takes. You'd only destroy yourselves in the attempt."

"Or we could simply take the fight to you, Your Majesty," Zinfandel suggested. "Killing you on this planet, you mentioned, Nagaoka, would surely disrupt your control over this thing you have created."

"Indeed it would, General, which is why I've taken measures to protect myself," Rehval explained. "Even now, my stronghold is under attack by a Federation fleet, led by Luffa herself. The entire planet is impervious to her strongest techniques. Even if she could find a way to reach the surface, she would have to fight through tens of thousands of my followers. Each of them has been empowered by my Jindan potion. Luffa struggled to defeat twenty of my warriors at a time. How can she hope to beat them all at once?"

*******

[14 November 233 Before Age. Goldwall.]

"This planet has seen enough tyrants, Rehval. I won't allow it to be dominated by another, no matter how powerful."

These were the defiant words of M'ranga, formerly known as Ensign Liberty, now the Kami of Planet Goldwall. Being a goddess was still new to her, and her performance of the role was highly unorthodox. When the giant Saiyan-thing emerged from the dirt, she descended from her Heavenly Lookout and met him directly, rather than watch passively from a distance. The gods of the higher realms might not have approved of this hands-on approach, but Ensign Liberty was a revolutionary, and to her the divine hierarchy was just another power structure to be questioned whenever possible. Likewise, she saw King Rehval as simply another bully.

"I respect your position, Your Grace," the rock-Rehval said. It knelt before her in a mocking show of respect, and kept angling its ear closer to M'ranga as if straining to hear such a tiny creature. "For the time being, I'll allow you to indulge in whatever comfortable slogans you like. Devastating your planet right now wouldn't accomplish anything. I don't want to make an example of Goldwall, but if it comes to that, I'd prefer to have witnesses to see it happening."

"Then wh--?" M'ranga began to ask, but then the earthen giant rose to his full height and looked away from her.

"I only produced these giant avatars because I wanted to inform you all of what was happening," Rehval said. "The Age of Trismegistus has begun, but it hasn't really reached you just yet. For now, this is mostly just to prove a point to Luffa, but once I've finished discussing it with her, I visit all of your worlds again, and I'll explain exactly what it is I expect from each of you."

M'ranga continued speaking after that, delivering a fiery speech about freedom and the irrepressible spirit of sentient beings, but if the rock-Rehval could hear her, it gave no response whatsoever.

*******

[14 November 233 Before Age. Nagaoka.]

"It's amazing, truly amazing," Rehval said as he bathed in the glowing red liquid that filled his sunken bathtub. It was a public section of his compound, and his followers were encouraged to enter and watch him soak. Some fell prostrate at the edge of the bath and worshiped him, while a parade of attendants added scented oils and other chemicals to the liquid as he soaked in it. Behind him, Treekul lounged on a mat and massaged his neck and shoulders.

"Tell me about it, boss," Treekul said. The hair on her head was over two inches long.

"I'm everywhere at once now," he said. "Not literally, but but I might as well be everywhere. I'm talking to a thousand people at once right now. I can see them, Treekul. They all look so outraged, so envious of what I've become."

"I'm sure Luffa looks pretty ticked off right about now," Treekul said with a smile.

"Oh, I can't see her," Rehval said. "But I can see her ship, and all the other ships she brought along. They're just hanging there in space like little toys. And beyond them, the stars, my kingdom. My laboratory. The very clouds have become my eyes, Treekul. I can see it all as easily as I see you."

He looked back at her, and raised one of his hands to caress her cheek. She pulled back at the sight of the crimson fluid still dripping from his fingertips.

"Oh, it's harmless, I promise," he said. "I've been drinking different potions and rubbing ointments into my skin for weeks to prepare myself for this. Without all those treatments, all of this would be useless, like stewing in melted candlewax."

"That's what you said about this lotion, too," Treekul replied. She held up her hand to show the oily film she had been rubbing into his shoulders. "And you talked me into that, but let's just say I'd like to know more before I jump in there with you. How did you pull all of this off?"

"It's like I told you from the beginning, my Apprentice," Rehval said. "The energy of living things is what gives rise to ki. Saiyans have more of it than most, but it never seems to be enough, and there's more than one way to get it. There's untapped power within the very planets themselves. My namesake, the original Trismegistus, found ways to study that geomantic energy, but he lacked the vision to do anything with it. I named myself Trismegistus to honor the fulfillment of his discoveries."

"I thought you took that name to claim supremacy over all other alchemists," Treekul asked. "You know, 'Look at me, I'm the best.'"

"Well, that too," Rehval said with a satisfied smirk. "I can have more than one reason."

"Yeah, I guess you can have anything you want now," she said as she went back to rubbing his shoulders. One of the attendants handed him a crystal sifter of wine, and he sampled the bouquet with relish.

"I had more than one reason for keeping you here, too," he added. "Of course, I couldn't let you just tell outsiders about this place. Not until I had its defenses prepared, anyway. It took some doing to incorporate Pozet's abilities into my link with the planet's geology. But besides that, I needed someone I could talk to. Someone removed from the Saiyans, who could appreciate everything I put into this plan."

She leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. "Well, it's not like there's anywhere else for me to escape to, is there?" she asked. "You've practically conquered the whole universe, so I might as well stay here where all the magic happens."

"Exactly," he said. "Admit it, you didn't think any Saiyan was capable of this sort of genius. We're all nothing but brutish warriors to you."

"I gotta admit, I have been rethinking a lot of old attitudes since I got here," Treekul said.

"The whole universe has looked down their nose at the Saiyan species," Rehval said. "And rightfully so, because many of us believe in the same stereotypes. I tried to reverse that perception, to play the dignified statesman, an ambassador of goodwill from the Saiyans to the rest of the galaxy, but I knew they didn't really believe me. They thought I was a curiosity, or an aberration. Sooner or later, they expected me to revert to type. What those haughty princes and emperors didn't understand was that I was counting on them to underestimate us."

He raised his glass to toast the worshipers at the opposite end of the bath, then drank. "That was how my flock was able to seed so many worlds in such a short span of time. No one thinks of a Saiyan using stealth. They expect us to crash onto a planet's surface and run wild, pillaging everything in sight. No one imagines a Saiyan infiltrating a group of tourists, or a work crew. No one is on guard against a Saiyan stepping out of sight and pouring a vial of liquid into the soil near a government building. And even if that Saiyan were spotted, no one would understand what he was doing. They wouldn't even know he was a Saiyan, not without a tail to give him away."

Treekul gestured at everyone else in the room. "That's why you had everyone lop off their tails?" she asked. "So they'd be sneakier?"

"More than that," Rehval said. "I did it to prove that we no longer need the tails, that we're so much more without them. Look at Nagaoka. Surrounded by clouds, its moonlight is useless here. Even if you had a tail, on another planet it wouldn't be good for more than a day or two. But I've channeled the geomantic currents of this solar system. The planet's relationship to the moon serves me at all times, without a tail. That's progress, Treekul. Why would anyone want to escape from that?"

*******

"Aren't you forgetting something, dad?" Seltiss asked from the bridge of the SFC's command ship. It was unnerving to stare into the eyes of his image on Nagaoka's surface, but she fixed her gaze anyway, determined to show her resolve.

"Ah, Seltiss," Rehval said telepathically. "I hear you've kept busy while I've been away. I'll admit, I was somewhat surprised when I found out you had joined forces with Luffa."

"You were surprised? I thought you were dead," Seltiss shouted. "Or that you had gone totally freakazoid after you evacuated Planet Saiya! Then this cult shows up and I thought some lame-o wizard was trying to enslave us all! Turns out it was you all along."

"Then you should be relieved," Rehval said. "The Saiyans are in no danger from me. The Jindan power is a way for them to become stronger, and a way to make myself stronger in return. That's how I've made all of this possible. By merging my spirit with the planet, and drawing power from my followers, I--"

"You've empowered yourself," said Xibuyas, who stood beside Seltiss on the bridge. "But only yourself, from what I can see. You say you have rock-avatars on a thousand key planets, ready to destroy them if anyone defies you. The only way to stop them is to destroy Nagaoka, which you've made indestructible. That's not like you, Your Majesty. You always taught Princess Seltiss and me that wielding power was a much more subtle art."

"Yeah," Seltiss added. "It's a scalpel, not a club. That's what you always told us. Its like a strategic game. You make one move at a time, building your position until you can win."

On the viewscreen of Seltiss' ship, the clouds on Nagaoka chuckled in time with Rehval's telepathic laugh. "Don't you understand, children? It was a game, but it's over now! I've won! I wielded the scalpel, since long before you were born, and now the surgery is finished! The game is over, and this is the end of history. Whatever happens from now on will be decided by my power, and mine alone. This was always the point, Seltiss. It was always about securing the future of the Saiyans at the top of the universal food chain. Everything before today was a means to an end."

"But you've forgotten something, dad!" Seltiss insisted. "Whatever this creepy future is you've envisioned for the Saiyans, it can't outlive you! Who's going to maintain all of this when you're gone? You need heirs for that, and right now you haven't got any!"

She was trembling now, and Xibuyas nearly reached out to put a hand on her shoulder, until he thought better of it. He knew this was something she had wanted to say to her father for a long time, and now that the moment was finally here, she was building confidence in her words. Seltiss pointed her thumb at herself, then poked her own chest with it, deforming the logo of whatever musical act was featured on her 7000-credit t-shirt.

"I know about your eugenics plans, dad," Seltiss said. "You told me about it often enough. The genetic profiling, the incubation chambers, that was only just the beginning. You wanted to breed a stronger generation of Saiyans, and you wanted your descendants to be the strongest of each new generation, right? That's why you needed Xibuyas! He was your special project to make an ultimate Saiyan, but you needed me to bear his offspring, so they would share your bloodline!

"Well guess what? Xibuyas and I aren't playing along anymore. You may need us, but we sure don't need you, not anymore! So even if you are invincible, your new era won't even last another century... unless!"

Her lips curled into a triumphant smile, like a high-stakes gambler on the brink of winning the pot. Xibuyas couldn't help but smile himself. He didn't understand her fashion sense, or why she insisted on dyeing her black hair pink, or how she could possibly think Luffa was "cool." Xibuyas only knew that he admired this girl more than he could possibly express.

"We can work something out, father," Seltiss said. "You'll have to agree to share power, and grant certain concessions to my Saiyan followers. They have their pride, you know. They're not about to start bowing down to you like some sort of graven image, not when they came to me to get away from your bogus brand of order."

The cloud-image of Rehval seemed genuinely impressed by her bold demands. "Concessions," he said, as though trying the word on for size. "Interesting, Seltiss. Suppose I agree to your terms. What do I get from you in return?"

Seltiss relaxed slightly. "When we're older, Xibuyas and I will produce those heirs you want," she said. "And the two of us can take over your rule when you... well you know... die. And I can talk the Free Companions into a working relationship with you. They can act as enforcers, since you and yours are probably, like, stuck on that planet for the long term right?"

Xibuyas chuckled quietly. Luffa and her Federation fleet would be furious over this, but what could they possibly do about it? She had them over a barrel. As powerful as Rehval had become, she was the one person in the universe who had something he wanted. He watched Rehval's face on the atmosphere of Nagaoka, curious to see how he would react.

The face in the clouds simply laughed.

"Seltiss, Seltiss, Seltiss," he said as the cloud-image shook its "head". "I'm impressed with how far you've come. I really am. Organizing this Free Company of yours, building a coalition against me, well I knew you would try it, but I honestly wasn't sure how well you would succeed. You really are my twenty-seventh greatest creation."

"You... you knew I would turn against you?" Seltiss asked.

"I raised you, my dear. Sent you to all those private schools to teach you political theory. I chose those programs because I knew they would fill your head with ideas about taking bold steps to secure power, and how important it is for leaders to take initiative. I wanted you to grow up looking for ways to seize power from me wherever you could. At first, it was just so you would be a worthy successor if something ever happened to me. But when I abandoned Saiya, I knew you might start gathering all of my enemies together. Every Saiyan who would oppose my rule, all united under one banner. And how thoughtful of you to deliver them to my doorstep!"

"You wanted me to do this?" Seltiss gasped.

"Either this, or maybe you'd get them all killed in a war you couldn't win. Or they'd abandon you in disgust and recognize my power as the only one that works. But this! Oh, you've made me very proud. Your sisters were never capable of this kind of leadership, Seltiss. That's why I chose you to be the one who bore Xibuyas' children. It had to be you."

"Well it won't be!" Seltiss shouted. "I'm not your puppet, dad! I don't care how powerful you are, I'm not going to play along with your sick plans!"

She began to stamp her feet on the deck, not quite hard enough to smash the deckplate apart, but enough for everyone on the bridge to feel the rumble.

"We won't do it!" Seltiss insisted. "You can send your goons to chase us all over the galaxy, but you'll never get your heir! And Xibuyas can beat those rock monsters of yours. Luffa's already shown us how! So unless you plan to die of old age on that planet of yours, you'd better--"

Rehval started to laugh again.

"Seltiss, do you really think you were ever that important to my plans?" Rehval asked. "Would I really let a spoiled teenager out of my sight if I actually depended on her cooperation?"

"You knew you couldn't stop me, so you didn't try!" Seltiss protested. "That's why you didn't send your men to stop me from rescuing Xibuyas from Pflaume--"

"I let you have Xibuyas," Rehval said, "because I had no further use for him. He failed to defeat Luffa, and I knew he wouldn't bother me too much while he was with you, so I abandoned him. Just like I abandoned you when I had no further need of you."

The cloud image shifted, forming a planet-sized monochrome photograph of a cryonics laboratory. A scientist could be seen handling frozen embryos.

"I wanted grandchildren through you and Xibuyas," Rehval expained, but I never needed your cooperation to get them. I took genetic samples from both of you when you were small children, and sent them to a facility that specializes in genetic engineering projects. It's on Planet Bliff in the Nullon Sector. I'm telling you this because one of my avatars is already on the planet, ready to protect it in case one of you tries to interfere with my business there."

Seltiss was horrified. "You... you what?"

The image in the clouds shifted into a wider view of Rehval, soaking in his alchemical bath, surrounded by his faithful. "I saw great potential in both of you, but I had to see what you could do in practice, and I didn't want to risk losing your genomes if you got yourselves killed. You see, Seltiss, I want a line of descendants, but not as heirs. No, I needed you to produce a line of enforcers. Saiyans of royal blood who would go out and handle provincial matters in my new kingdom. You would be the matriarch of that line, and I think you'd be very good at that work. But your sons and daughters will fill the role just as well. I wanted you to cooperate, I really did, but I only needed one thing from you, and..." he paused to chuckle, "I already have it."

In the cloud-image, Rehval clapped his hands together with great enthusiasm. "As for my death, I wouldn't mark your calendars anytime soon. I'm not just bonded with the energy of this planet. I am the planet now. Its vast geomantic energies are mine to control, like the ki of my Saiyan body. The process has merged us in a way that I can't quite put into words, but I think I'll have plenty of time to figure that out. We Saiyans think of planets as things that are fairly easy to destroy, but Nagaoka is now a planet that can defend itself. Or rather, myself. And we think of Saiyans as creatures with a finite lifespan, but I've become so much more than that now. How long does the moon live in the sky? Well now I am the moon. I am the sky. I am the planet. So now that we've got that straightened out, let's talk about the concessions you can make for me, my daughter."

Xibuyas saw Seltiss trembling again, but this time it wasn't out of anxiety or excitement. Now, it was despair. He couldn't help but share it. He wanted to call Rehval's bluff, to say that it was impossible for him to do the things he was claiming. And yet, he knew he owed his life to Rehval's alchemical skills, and he had fought the rock-Rehval creatures before. As for Nagaoka, he could sense the strange power of this planet, and he had already seen how ineffective their weapons were against it.

"Every Saiyan who partakes in the Jindan potion has given me a portion of their energy," Rehval began. "Every Saiyan who does not, will be considered an enemy of the state. You, Seltiss, my daughter, will bring your followers to the surface of Nagaoka, and they will join me. Any who refuse, well, that's fine. I can destroy you here and now, or my followers can hunt you down later. I know there are other Saiyans out there who haven't taken sides yet. I'd like your help in finding them, Seltiss. But I don't need your help, and honestly, I don't mind taking my time. Those other Saiyans are no threat to me."

*******

Aboard Luffa's star-yacht, Luffa and Guwar watched Rehval from the open door in the cargo bay. The force field that maintained the bay's atmosphere offered a perfect view overlooking Nagaoka, and Rehval's telepathy relayed everything he had said to Seltiss.

"I'll go ahead and offer an invitation to Luffa as well," Rehval said. "No harm in that, since I know she won't accept it, but I would suggest that you consider the alternative, Luffa. You can't defeat me here. Even if you reached the surface, you'd never stand a chance against my armies. You can defeat my avatars, true, but you'd have to get to them first, and it'll take you weeks to get back to your precious Federation. If I were you, I wouldn't bother. I'll command my avatars to destroy any planet at the first sign of your approach. The Federation will surrender to me, immediately, I think. And you... well, I guess you can roam the stars, Luffa. No inhabited planet in the universe will dare accept you, not if it means incurring my divine wrath. I suppose you can find some remote world to settle on, or just fly your star-yacht as far as you can go until it runs out of fuel.

"I'm willing to let Guwar return the fold as well. Yes, I can sense you aboard Luffa's ship, Guwar. You were part of my plan, after all. I knew my scheme would make no sense without an understanding of what I intended to do with this planet. That was why I took you into my 'confidence', Guwar. I knew your faith in me would falter, and that you would go running to the only person you thought was strong enough to stop me. Hopefully, you see just how wrong you were to doubt."

It horrified Guwar to hear Rehval speak to him directly. He hadn't wanted to come along on this mission at all, and he had hoped the cult wouldn't learn of his presence on Luffa's ship. But now, Rehval had seen him, and.... forgiven him?

"I hope you appreciate my revenge, Luffa," Rehval went on. "I sacrificed so many of my favorite things when I tried to kill you on Pflaume City. And then I had to give up my kingdom on Planet Saiya. Well now I've taken away the thing that matters most to you, Mrs. 'Super Saiyan'. I've taken away your relevance. I've become more powerful than you now, and that makes your power meaningless. Now you can slither under a rock, the way I only seemed to do when I left Saiya. The difference is that I came here to achieve an even greater glory! While all you can do is decide how you want to die. Have fun making up your mind, woman."

Here, the telepathic words of Rehval Trismegistus came to an end. Luffa didn't move as she watched the clouds resume their natural patterns. She didn't move when Guwar approached her.

"I guess that's it then," he said with a sigh. "He played us all. Nothing left to do but head down there and accept d--"

Luffa powered down, her gleaming yellow hair resuming its natural black color. She turned and shot Guwar a murderous glare. "I'm going to kill them," she said. "Every last one of them."

"What?" Guwar asked. "Whoa, wait, you heard what he said! You saw what happened when you fired on the planet. There's nothing anyone can do! Let's just be glad that he's being graceful enough to let us join him. I mean, I've been there before, you know. The cult's not so bad, once you get used to it--"

There was a loud "crack" as Luffa swatted her hand across Guwar's head. Guwar himself didn't hear it, as the force of the blow killed him a split second before the sound arrived at his ears. The last thing to go through his mind was the right side of his skull. For a brief, horrific moment, his dead body remained standing, and then it finally collapsed, as though remembering what it was supposed to do.

Luffa turned and walked out of the bay.

[11 April, 233 Before Age.   Eetii.]

The Striker Corps. was a band of Saiyan mercenaries.    Their crew numbered over one hundred, not counting their young children, who had been known to join in on battles when needed.   Their leader, Mato had heard tales of the Saiyan Free Company, but he wasn't terribly interested until they became embroiled in the Jindan/Federation War.   Now, he sat across from the S.F.C.'s leaders in the conference room of some Eetian hotel, negotiating their entry into the alliance.

"We've learned that my father, King Rehval, is leading the Jindan Cult," said Princess Seltiss.   Mato had heard there was a teenage girl in charge of the S.F.C.,  and while it hadn't bothered him much at the time, seeing her in person made it very difficult to ignore how young she looked.    She did her best to carry herself like a seasoned leader, and maybe that was enough to convince others, but to Mato it looked like bad comedy.

Mato put his feet up on the table and grinned.  "I don't care one bit about you royals and your internal power struggle," he said.  "I want a good fight.  And this war of yours looks like it'll be one for the ages."

He'd already gotten a taste of that.   The Striker Corps had gotten permission to enter Federation space, but it had been a running firefight all the way to to Eetii, as the Jindan cult was very keen on intercepting any outsiders who might help the Federation.    Now that the Strikers had already drawn blood for the alliance, this negotiation was something of a formality, but there were still details to be sorted out.    A little insolence was a good way to test the waters in a partnership.  How badly did they need his help?  Were they willing to forgive a little rudeness to secure his cooperation?

"Have a care--" Xibuyas began to protest as he rose from his chair, but Seltiss held up her hand to call for him to stand down.  Xibuyas obeyed, and took his seat.    Well, that answered that.    Mato could sense the young man's power rising.    He was probably the girl's personal enforcer, and only present at this meeting to showcase the power at her command.   And he was very powerful at that.   Mato decided not to test Seltiss any further.

"I like your enthusiasm," Seltis said, "but you could find just as much action fighting for the other side.  Will you pledge your loyalty to me?"

"Hmmph!  They say the enemy demands more than loyalty, girl.  They would ask for my soul itself.  Methinks you drive the better bargain.  Aye, I'll pledge my allegiance to you, and my mens' as well!  Not the women, though.  They get a mite testy whenever I presume to speak for them."

This drew a smirk from Luffa, who sat beside Seltiss at the table.   Mato was pleased to see that at least someone in this alliance had an appreciation for humor.

"Fair enough," Seltiss said.  "If you need fresh supplies or repairs for your ship, you can speak with one of my generals."

"Fine, fine!" he said.  "For now, I only ask one boon, Princess.  The Super Saiyan?"

"What about the Super Saiyan?" Luffa asked.

Mato put his feet back down on the floor and leaned forward to stare into Luffa's eyes.  "D'you think you could arrange for me to meet him?"

*******

[17 April, 233 Before Age.   Planet Bakoom.]

The battle had raged across Bakoom for days.   There were multiple theaters of combat, as Federation and Saiyan ships sought to prevent Jindan soldiers on the ground from attacking major population areas.  On the rocky coastline of one of the northern continents, where the fighting was fiercest, Luffa and Mato battled seven Jindan Saiyans and hundreds of their mercenary allies.   No one knew the cultists had any allies until now, but things had apparently changed.  

Every time it seemed that the defenders would be overwhelmed, Luffa would summon more of her power and put her foes back on the defensive.  She would keep the Jindans occupied while Mato attacked the small fry.   She was the same woman Mato had met on Eetii, only now her hair and tail were glowing bright yellow, and her ki was so intense that he had trouble sensing anything else while she was nearby.    Gradually, Mato managed to adjust.   Instead of seeking out the energy of his foes, he began to search for "shadows" in the seemingly endless brightness that was Luffa's power.   It was like an astronomer spotting planets in transit across a sun.    

"Well, General?" Luffa growled as she broke the neck of one of her foes.  "You wanted to see me in action, right?"

"Said I wanted to meet the Super Saiyan," he shouted back.  "Never said anything about invading hell!"

He was exaggerating, but only slightly.   He had faced steeper odds in the past, but never with so much at stake.   There was no way off the planet, as the ships they had arrived in had been destroyed, and their comrades in orbit wouldn't dare come to pick them up until the enemy had been neutralized.   Luffa was the only thing keeping their forces alive, and while she was incredibly powerful, Mato doubted that she could handle all of these enemies alone.    As thrilling as the battle was, the taste was soured by the spectre of death.    If there was any possible way to retreat, he would have done so hours ago.    But leaving Luffa's side would be instantly fatal.    Even if she didn't kill him for cowardice, the enemy would surely pick him off before he could get very far.    

But Luffa was having the time of her life.   All Saiyans enjoyed combat, and it was said that the old Saiyan heroes loved it even more.    Men like Darbock and Chanisp were supposed to relish fighting in a way that Mato had never really understood.   But now, he was seeing this in person.    It was as if Luffa didn't care if she won or lost, or even if she lived or died.   She was surrounded by enemies on all sides, and she kept daring more of them to attack her.   There was a strategic purpose to this--by keeping the cultists focused on her, she could create openings for Mato and the others-- but there was nothing strategic about the eager smile on her face, nor the gleeful look in her cold green eyes.

Luffa laughed.  "What's the matter, too hot for you?" she asked.   "I can lighten your load a little."   Mato was horrified at the offer.   She was doing so much already, and offering to do even more?    He wasn't sure what scared him more: that she could actually pull it off, or that she would die with a smile on her face as she tried.

"This is no time to get cocky," Mato yelled.  He didn't like talking to her as she fought.    Sometimes she moved so fast that he couldn't even see her, and yet she could hear him all the same.  He didn't want to distract her, and yet, it never bothered her at all.  

An alien with a cybernetic jaw managed to get close enough to try to bite his arm.   He fired a wide energy blast to keep anyone else away, then swatted him aside, knocking the metal clean off his face.    

Necro-cyborgs, Mato had heard them called.   There were a handful of weapon designers and cyberneticists in the galaxy who had found a way to reanimate dead bodies and arm them for combat.    The main advantage was that a corpse could suffer operating conditions that would kill a live subject, and it was cheaper to manufacture replacement parts for a corpse than to simply build an entire android, or hire a real soldier.   The main disadvantage was that nearly every civilization in the universe deemed necro-cyborgs to be a war crime.    That didn't seem to bother the Jindans much.    Mato had heard that some of their people had dabbled in undead cannon fodder as well.    

He had brought six of his best soldiers to Bakoom, but four of them were dead or missing.    There were some Federation soldiers operating on the coastline as well, but they were fighting on the other end of the battlefield, trying to take advantage of the opening Luffa had created for them.    Mato and his remaining Strikers could only hold their ground and try to repel as many dead aliens as they could so that Luffa could handle her end of things.      And now she was offering to help them, like she  hadn’t been already.

"You might be the devil herself," he shouted, "but if you so much as take your eyes of those Jindan bastards, one of them will pick me off for sure!"

"Then I won't use my eyes," Luffa said.  "Ki senses should give me a target."

"These scum aren't even alive!" Mato shouted.  "They haven't got any ki to sense."

"Then I'll just use my own," Luffa said as she ducked an attack from a Jindan.  "Golden Duster."

She threw out her hands and launched a ki burst in the form of thousands of tiny energy globules.  One of the Jindans tried to block it, but the mist-like phenomenon simply spilled over his body harmlessly.  Seizing on his confusion, Luffa slipped behind him and landed a kick on one of his comrades before he could stop her.

Mato watched as the yellow fog spread out over the battlefield.    His own senses, though nowhere near as sharp as Luffa's, could suddenly make out the dead enemies just as easily as the live ones.    Before, their speed and numbers, along with the smoke and dust of the battle, had made them difficult to spot until they were almost on top of them.    Now, Mato could just pick his targets and shoot.  

She had adopted the same tactic he had used to adapt to  fighting in the presence of her blinding ki, and improved upon it.  Super Saiyan indeed.   

"'S a bloody miracle," cried one of his comrades, who siezed the opportunity even as Mato was still gaping in awe.  

"Miracle, my ass!"  said the other.   She also fired a barrage of ki blasts into the enemy line, but Mato could tell she wasn't relieved in the slightest.    

"Lighten up, Niptur," said the first.    

"She's a witch!" Niptur said.    "No better than whoever built these damned mecha-zombies, or those cultists with the weird powers!    We never should have come here, Azuki!"

"You were the one who was bored with being cooped up in the ship, Niptur!" Mato replied, trying to sound fearless in spite of the cold sweat running down his face.   Then he heard peals of thunder over his head, and he glanced up to find the cultists trying to fight Luffa hand-to-hand.  

"That's the way!" Luffa screamed.   "You all know what I'm up to now, don't you?    You're getting desperate to stop me, aren't you?   Well what are you waiting for?   Come on!"

Mato was to proud to admit it out loud, but he was beginning to wonder if Niptur was right about Luffa being a witch.     But there was nothing they could do, not while the enemy was still bearing down on them.   And then, just when it seemed like the fighting would never end, an explosion went off in the distance, and all of the necro-cyborgs collapsed like discarded toys.  A few of them sparked and sizzled as their circuits overloaded, but none of them were able to fight.    

"N-no!" cried one of the Jindan cultists.   Mato had never been able to get a good look at them until now.    He was a Saiyan man dressed in a red bodysuit with arcane symbols painted on his bare arms and legs.    He held a short spear that looked more suited to a whaling boat than an invasion.   The tatters of a burgundy cape hung from his shoulders as he looked out at the multitude of coprses strewn across the coast.  

Mato wasted no time aiming his hands to fire upon him.   The cultists had been moving too fast for him to hit, and there was a good chance that his attacks would be too weak to hurt them, but now that this one was standing still, and if he stayed off-guard for just a fraction of a second longer...

And then a miniature sun erupted in the cultist's chest.   Luffa had come up from behind and blasted him with a beam of her own power.  

"Yes!" she said, and Mato knew this was surely the last thing the cultist would hear.    

"You friends were pretty well-hidden," Luffa gloated,    "but now that I've picked them off, there's no one left to control all those corpses, huh?   That just leaves you four on your own!"  

Mato watched as Luffa came back into view, and the last of the cultists took up a defensive posture.    He wanted to try to attack them, but something told him there would be no point.    

"There's still enough of us to finish you, Luffa!" one of them cried, but it was obvious that none of them believed it.   Even so, Mato could see Luffa was hurt.   It had been easy to miss before, but now that he had gotten used to the glow that suffused her body, the bandages on her arms and chest were more apparent, and the way she moved indicated pain, even though she did her best to hide it.    He suddenly wondered if she had been holding back this whole time, and how much stronger she would be in full health.    

Luffa smiled.   "Hah!   Three Jindans is no challenge at all," she scoffed.    "You may as well take the shot."

"There are four of us, you damnable--!"    These were the last words of their leader, as a beam of light pierced his skull and cut him off before he could finish speaking.   His three comrades watched as his body dropped to the ground, then they looked off into the distance, searching in vain for the source of the attack.    

"Snipers," Luffa said.  She held up her finger and tapped a small communications device in her left ear.   "Not quite as talented as my wife, but Bakoom's got some good ones.    They've been keeping me posted during this whole scrap.    Now, I don't usually take prisoners, but if anyone wants to tell me where Rehval is hiding, I'd be delighted to make an exception."  

They didn't, and so Luffa destroyed them, one by one.     Mato had expected them to last longer than they did, but it was just as she had predicted.   Once their numbers were whittled down, they were no match for her.  

*******

[20 April, 233 Before Age.   Interstellar Space.]

After Bakoom, the Striker Corps was attached to the Federation's Sixth Fleet, operating mainly on the north-anticenter side of Federation space.  Battles were few and far between, and they mostly amounted to cat-and-mouse games through interstellar space.   The safest way to foil the Jindan Saiyans was to intercept their ships before they could land on a planet and bring their full power to bear.    Mato would have preferred to fight them hand-to-hand, but dogfighting starships was the next best thing.   Best of all, the Striker Corps was automatically granted salvage rights to any enemy ship they shot down.    The Federation only asked that they turn over any navigational logs first, so that they could use them to try to find the Jindans’ home base.    

Salvage was a big part of the Strikers' business.   Mato's flagship had an entire bay dedicated for the task of stripping down captured ships for valuable parts and materials.  At one point, his teams thought they might be able to track down the cult based on the ships they used, but this quickly proved to be a dead end.   The only pattern to the cult's materiel was that there seemed to be no pattern.     Some of their ships were civilian craft, possibly stolen, while others looked to be taken from armadas from every corner of the galaxy.  The “mecha zombies” proved to bear out this observation.  It had been hoped that there was an arms dealer who supplied them to the cult for their attack on Bakoom, but it turned out that they were stolen.   The cult simply lucked into the necro-cyborgs when they hijacked a ship that was carrying them to an actual buyer.

"I tell you, it's a nice little war we've got ourselves into," he said to Niptur as he watched the salvage crews stripping computer cores out of their latest catch.    "I almost hope we never find those cultists' home planet.    They can just send all their warriors here and we'll keep fighting them for years to come."

"I'd like it a lot better if that 'Super Saiyan' wasn't involved," Niptur muttered.   "For all we know, this whole thing is one of her tricks."

"Still on this 'witch' business, are ya?" Mato asked.  

"She's no Saiyan, Mato,"  she said with a sneer.  "She might look like one some of the time, and maybe even act like one, but that just makes the whole act even more disturbing.   That magic she used to destroy those cyborgs.  No Saiyan could ever do that."

"I'll admit that she's more than I expected," Mato said.   "But we've met strong Saiyans in the past.     Hell, I'm stronger'n you are.   Does that make me a witch?"

"Everyone said the Super Saiyan was a man," Niptur argued.   "Then we get here and it turns out she's not.   That doesn't make you suspicious at all?"

"Aye, suspicious of the rumors," Mato replied.   "Spread by a bunch of losers who didn't want anyone to know they got beat up by a girl, I reckon."

"Hmmph.    If I were that strong, I wouldn't leave any witnesses," Niptur muttered.   "Look, it's your Corps, and you're right, this is a decent gig, so I'll back your play.  But something's not right about this, Mato, and I'm not the only one who thinks so."  

He didn't respond right away, and then someone came over to ask Niptur for something, and she excused herself to attend to that.    For a while, Mato just stood there alone and watched the salvage crews at work.    

He already knew that others shared Niptur's distrust.   The Saiyans in the cult, empowered by something called 'Jindan', were phenomenally powerful, and it was all thanks to some alchemical treatment.   So it wasn't exactly a stretch to think that Luffa's power came from some similar magic.   Many believed she was an alien, or an advanced android, or some other creature who merely resembled a true Saiyan.     There were all sorts of rumors and innuendos about Luffa's true nature.   Mato had even believed many of them himself.  

Now that he had fought alongside the real thing, he soon realized that much of what he had heard about the Super Saiyan was built upon lies and exaggeration.    What troubled him was that others like Niptur could meet Luffa in person and fight alongside her and still come away skeptical of her.    Was it jealousy?   Fear?    Stubbornness?   Or was Niptur right, and Luffa had deceived him somehow?

No, he couldn't accept that.   Luffa's abilities were vast and mysterious, but she seemed very grounded otherwise.  Mato considered himself to be a good judge of character.    In his line of work, those who couldn't spot traitors didn't live very long.   But if he was right, and all the naysayers were wrong, or afraid, or jealous, then what did that mean for his crew?    What did that mean for the entire Saiyan species?

At last, he left the salvage bay and forced himself to carry on with his daily routine.    The fate of the Saiyan race was above his pay grade, after all, and he had more immediate concerns to deal with.  

*******

[19 May, 233 Before Age.   Grantrak X.]

Mato didn't cross paths with Luffa again until the Striker Corps were deployed to Grantrak X.    There was only supposed to be one Jindan Saiyan attacking the planet, but somehow Luffa got intel that there would more, and she arrived just in time to rescue the Grantrakkians and their defenders from no fewer than eleven cultists.    This time around, Mato couldn't fight alongside Luffa.    A stray ki blast had injured his arms and one of his knees, and he was forced to monitor the battle from a medical evac station.  

His ki senses told him most of what he needed to know.    To his amazement, Luffa was actually stronger than she had been on Bakoom, although it was difficult for him to compare power levels of that scale.    She was improving with each battle, which seemed to him as the ultimate proof that she was a true Saiyan, though he doubted Niptur would be convinced.    

"What's happening now?"  asked one of the other patients lying next to him.    They were being loaded onto a transport to be taken to a hospital in the nearest city.  

"Dammit, they got Letz!" Mato grumbled.

"Who?"  

"Friend of mine," Mato muttered.    "One of those Jindan bastards managed to corner him."    It infuriated him how powerful the cultists were.   Individually, they didn't hold a candle to Luffa, but they were still stronger than any normal Saiyan.   It was rare for Letz to meet his match in a one-on-one fight.   There was no question that the cultists got him.   There was a strange quality to their ki.    It was Saiyan in nature, but there was something... off about it.    It made it easy for him to tell who was who in a situation like this, but it also highlighted that the Jindan Saiyans had tampered with their own bodies somehow.    The thought of it revolted him.   At least Letz had died with his pride in tact.    He had fought and fallen as his own man.    That was all any Saiyan could hope for.    No, not any Saiyan.   The cultists apparently didn't care about their own pride.   They had thrown it away so that someone else could make them stronger.  

"But Luffa's still fighting them, isn't she?" the other patient asked.  

Mato would have ignored this man normally.    He was pretty sure the patient was a Grantrakian soldier.    He had purple skin, and four eyes in a row on his face.    Mato preferred to keep his dealings with aliens to a minimum.  He didn't exactly hate them, but they were weak, and even their warriors had a distaste for combat, and it was better all around if he could just haggle out a contract and move on.   But he was hurt, and the medic wasn't going to get him back on his feet any time soon, not if the pain in his knee was any indication.   Talking to aliens was the only thing he could do to pass the time, and they all wanted to know the same thing.  

"She's still in it," Mato said.   "Don't know why it's taking her so long, really.   With all the power she's putting out, she ought to be..."  

"Ought to be what?" the other patient asked.    

"She's hurt," Mato said.   "She's putting out a lot of ki, but her body's too banged up to make the best use of it."

"How could anything hurt her?" the patient asked.   "She's invincible, isn't she?"

Mato wondered the same thing for a moment, but as he thought back to Bakoom and the days leading up to that battle, he began to remember things he had seen but not truly considered until now.   Luffa wore bandages wrapped around parts of her arms and shoulders.   In the few times she stood still long enough for him to look, he could see the edges of bandages sticking out from under the black top she wore.   Her hands twitched from time to time, and Mato began to suspect that her gloves were intended to help conceal this, or perhaps hide some other injury.    

She favored one leg.   It wasn't obvious.   Most beings probably could never tell anything was wrong.    Mato himself hadn't picked up on it until now, and he suspected it was because he now had fresh wounds of his own to remind him of what it was like.   His injured limbs felt like they were being roasted over an open fire.  If he lay still, the pain was bearable, but if he tried to move too much or too quickly, the flames would come roaring up in protest.    He'd had knee problems in the past, and he'd adjusted his fighting style because of that.    His comrades who had known him in his younger days picked up on it immediately.    But now, those Saiyans had all died or moved on to other wars.    The Striker Corps were mostly younger warriors, with no inkling that Mato had ever fought differently in his youth.    

He didn't think Luffa's injuries were too serious,  but how could anyone know for certain?   With her incredible ki, she could break every bone in her body and probably still destroy whole armies.    It would take a little longer, but most onlookers would hardly notice the difference.  

Mato sensed Luffa's power as she battled the cultists a few dozen miles away.    She was winning, but not as quickly as she had on Bakoom.   Her power was even more intense, and she was fighting even more ferociously than she had on Bakoom, but it was taking a little longer.   Mato could barely notice the difference, but it was there.  

Was that the Jindan Cult's grand strategy?    Were they just sending wave after wave of troops against Luffa, hoping that they could wear her down?   How long would that take?   Even if they succeeded, would there be any cultists left to celebrate the victory?      

Luffa had surely taken this possibility into account.   The Jindan Saiyans were fanatics, not idiots.    They wouldn't have invaded the Federation without some kind of plan for defeating its greatest protector.    He'd seen her in action, and knew she was too gifted a fighter not to consider all of this.   That was why she had her allies spread out across the frontier, only concentrating her forces when absolutely necessary.   The idea was to force the invaders to spread themselves out, so that she could kill them off one by one with less risk.   But every so often, they would gang up on a planet, and Luffa would have to go there and deal with them personally.    That was fine, but not if she didn't give herself time to recover from each battle.  

So why was she running herself ragged?   The Striker Corps alone couldn't have defeated this many invaders, but they could have held the line for a few days.   Long enough for reinforcements to arrive, and then they could hold out for weeks, maybe months.    Luffa surely knew this as well.    If anything, it might be easier to withdraw from a planet like Grantrak, and recapture it later.   At least then they would have the initiative, and what was on Grantrak X that was so important, anyway?

"Hey."    The Grantrakkian lying in the cot next to him was trying to get his attention.    "You don't think she's really hurt, do you?"

Mato looked back at him and saw genuine concern in his expression.   At least, he was pretty sure it was concern.    The four eyes on his face made it hard to read his body language.

"She saved my butt out there, you know?" the soldier said.   "One of those creeps tried to shoot me with that funky spear of his, and she just swooped in out of nowhere.   Next thing I knew, he was lying there on the ground, and that spear was sticking out of his throat."

Mato tried to roll over to face him, but the pain discouraged him, so he just stared up at the ceiling instead.    "What's your name, kid?" he asked.    

"Booter," he said.   Then: "Uh, Booter, sir.    I'm guessing you outrank me."

"Forget it," Mato said.   "Save your salutes for someone on his feet.    I'm the leader of the Striker Corps, but that doesn't much matter now."

"Striker Corps," Booter said.    "That's a Saiyan company, right?   I mean... I heard somewhere that Saiyans killed their own wounded.  But you--"

"You heard wrong," Mato said.   "My folk are as brutal and ruthless as they come, but I never met a Saiyan that crazy.    Well, maybe these Jindan bastards fit the bill..."

"Sorry," Booter said.   "I've heard some nasty rumors about my own species before.    I shouldn't have assumed it was true."

"Nah, that one's pretty close to the mark," Mato said.   "It's rare for a Saiyan go out of his way to save somebody, that's for sure.   Luffa must have already been attacking that guy when he was about to kill you.    You just lucked out."

"Huh.  Well, just the same.   I hope she didn't get hurt on my account," Booter said.  

They laid there in silence for a minute.   The sounds of explosions could be heard in the distance, and the evac station trembled slightly with each one.  

"What's so blamed important about this planet?" Mato asked.   "I've been in a lot o’battles, and usually I can tell what makes a rock worth fighting over, but here?    I've got no clue."  

"I don't know what you mean, sir," Booter said.   "The enemy just showed up and started attacking.     Same reason they've hit every other planet they've been to, I guess."  

"Right, but why put up such a stiff defense?" Mato asked.   "Nothin’ personal, but is this place really worth it?    In the grand scheme of things, I mean."

"I don't know, sir," Booter replied.   "But a lot more of us would be dead if you all hadn't showed up when you did.    So thanks."  

"Don't mention it, kid," Mato said.    "To a Saiyan, a good fight is its own reward."    

But he wasn't so sure that was true for Luffa.   And the thought of that sent a chill down his spine that had nothing at all to do with his injuries.  

*******

[20 May, 233 Before Age.   Grantrak X.]

Mato had surgery the next day.   He awoke in a Grantrakkian hospital to the smell of stew, and grunted with pain when he tried to sit up to see where it was coming from.    

"Hungry?"  He recognized the voice as Luffa's, but he was still surprised when she moved close enough to the bed that he could see her face.  

"What in--?!" he blurted out.    He didn't know what else to say.   She was the last person in the universe he expected to see, and she was ladling stew out of a pot for him.  

"I dropped by to get checked out," Luffa said.   "My doctor wanted some early reports before I head back to my ship, and I got sick of waiting around, and then I sensed you here and figured you could use some decent food."

Mato's arms were a long way from recovering.   He had asked one of the nurses to leave the controller for the bed in his hand, so that he could still raise and lower the headrest.    But they had either forgotten about this, or it had slipped out of his hand.   Then the bed seemed to raise him up on his own.    When his head was high enough, he found Luffa operating the controller with one hand, and giving him a bowl with the other.    

She was wearing the same gown as the one he wore.  Two of them, in fact, with one on backwards, like a jacket.    He glanced down, and found she was floating slightly above the ground.   One of her feet was heavily bandaged, and the other had a series of staples across the top.    She hadn't come in for a simple examination.  

"Why?" he finally said.    

"Because I like to cook when I'm bored," Luffa said.   "Wait, your arms were pretty banged up.   You probably shouldn't hold this."   She took the spoon from the bowl and started to feed him.     "You'd better not get all stubborn about this, either," she warned him.   "I'd be pretty sore about someone feeding me like this too, but I made a lot, and I'm not letting it go to waste, so eat."

Mato gave no argument.    He knew better than to argue with the women in his own crew, and he was hungry.  

"Dammit, that's not what I meant," he said between spoonfuls.  

She glared at him for a moment.   "That's a funny way of telling me how much you like it, Mato," she said ominously.  

"It's delicious!" he said.   Suddenly it seemed like self-preservation was more important than getting an answer to his question.   "It's very thick, like sauce."  

"I put some starches in it," Luffa said.   "Lot of people don't know to do that.   They only think in terms of taste.   What vegetables to throw in.   What spices.   Texture's important too, though.   Makes you feel like you ate something substantial.   Now, what were you asking me?"

"That soldier you saved on the battlefield," Mato asked.   "This whole planet!   The Federation, for that matter!   You're going out of your way for them, wearing yourself down, just to spare them a few casualties!"  

"More than a few," Luffa said.    

"And here you are feeding an old grunt like me when you should be gathering your strength for the important battles ahead!" Mato cried.    “Why?”

"Because you remind me of my father," Luffa said.   "The parts I liked, anyway.  He deserved what I did to him, but sometimes I miss him, if that makes any sense."  

"The hell it does," Mato said.   "You're mad, girl.    I keep going over it in my head, and all I can figure out is you're so desperate for a challenge that you dared yourself to care about things no Saiyan would ever dream of."

"I guess that's one way of putting it."     The grin on her face was all he needed to confirm his suspicions.  

"Listen... I've been fighting all over the galaxy since before you were born.   I've lost count of all the aliens I've done merc jobs for, and I've gotten pretty good at reading the room-- gulmph!"

"And what do you read?" Luffa asked as she put another spoonful into his mouth.

"Look, I learned a long time ago that the best way to stay in business was to look at the political side of it.   Clients go to war, and there's reasons, objectives.   Governments have to answer to their people, one way or another.    When the civilians start to sour on a war, you know it's only a matter of time before the contracts dry up.   Then you need to think about moving on."

He paused to accept another spoon.   "I've been keeping up with the news outlets since we entered Federation Space.   Folks're starting to get sick of this whole thing.    They were grateful before, and some of them still are, but a lot of them see this whole dance as a Saiyan conflict, and they blame you for pulling it into their backyard."  

"We both know it's more complicated than that," Luffa said.   "If I left the Federation tomorrow, they'd keep on attacking, just to draw me back.   And more people would die."

"Let them!" Mato said.   "You're letting yourself get played here!   And for what?   These folk won't even miss you when you're gone!"

"You really believe all that, Mato?"  Luffa asked.   "That I should cut and run?    Look out for myself?"  

"Of course I do," Mato said.  

"How'd you get those injuries?" she asked.   "I'm no expert, but it sure looks like you were blocking a ki blast that was too big for you."    

"I got cornered," he muttered.   "I'm getting too old for this stuff."

"You could have dodged," Luffa said.   "Or used the force of the blast to bounce yourself away.   Don't tell me you've forgotten how in your old age."    

"All right!" he grumbled.   "I was trying to cover Niptur while she was preparing an attack."  

"A Saiyan saving another Saiyan on the battlefield?" Luffa asked with a smile.  

"It's not the same thing!" Mato said.   "If I get killed out there, so what?   One less monkey on the battlefield.    But you're special!     One in a trillion!   If you die--!"

"If I die," Luffa said as she refilled his bowl, "then I must not have been that special, huh?   Besides, it's not like anyone would miss me, right?"

He wanted to shout at her, to force her to understand what he couldn't find the words to say.   There was something about her that was important, beyond her power, something that the whole Saiyan race needed to learn.    But she couldn't show them if she got herself killed in a pointless battle.   She wasn't even using her glowing yellow form right now, but there was still something awful and terrifying about her presence.   Even so, she looked very fragile to Mato's eyes.   Like a golden opportunity that would vanish one day without warning.  

"I gotta go," Luffa said as she laid the bowl down on the tray next to Mato's bed.    She tapped an earpiece that was tucked inside her left ear.    "My transport's almost here, and my wife'll kill me if they take me back to my ship looking like this."    

She turned slightly, as if preparing to leave, but then looked back at Mato's arms and legs, as though sizing him up for a fight.     "I hope I see you again, Mato.    It'll be nice to see how much stronger you get from all of this."  

"What about my stew?" Mato asked, only half-kidding.  

She looked down at the second bowl and smiled.   "The first one was free," she said.   "This one's a challenge.    It might be cold by the time you're ready, but I think you can make it."

With that, Luffa floated out of the room, leaving Mato alone with his thoughts.  

[21 Feruary 233 Before Age.   Planet Qondoging.]

Ryba Booth's tactical data reported Saiyan activity in and around twenty-five star systems.   By the time Luffa's star-yacht reached Federation space, she had received new reports that increased that estimate to thirty-two.    Five systems had reported Saiyans actually landing on the planet's surface.   Unable to help more than one world at a time, Luffa simply chose the closest planet where Saiyans were confirmed to be on the surface.

She was still recuperating from her last encounter with Trimegistus' Saiyan marauders.    It was clear to her now that the six warriors she had faced on Lubegev were not just a test of Luffa's measure, but a diversion to keep her out of Federation space long enough for the main invasion force to make their move.   Trismegistus had done something to enhance these Saiyans' powers, making them far stronger than any normal Saiyan ought to be.    Individually, they were still no match for Luffa's Super Saiyan powers, but a group of them could present a serious challenge.   Luffa estimated that a dozen of them, trained to coordinate their attacks, might be enough to overwhelm her.  

She doubted that her enemy would risk sending that many of his troops to a single world.   In such an extreme situation, Luffa could destroy the entire planet from orbit, or the Federation fleet could carpet bomb the entire surface, effectively achieving the same result.    The destruction would be horrific, to say nothing for the loss of life, but a defending force might consider it a justifiable course of action, as it would end one world to preserve many others.    Judging from the breadth of the invasion, Trismegistus' plan seemed to be to wear Luffa down by forcing her to travel from planet to planet, fighting just enough Saiyans to make things difficult for her.   Destroying planets wouldn't accomplish anything, as it would only kill a few enemy troops per world.   Destroying every planet the Saiyans attacked would simply be doing their work for them.   No, the goal seemed to be to force Luffa to run an interstellar gauntlet, fighting Saiyan after Saiyan until she succumbed to injury or exhaustion.  

She had to admit that Trismegistus understood the Saiyan heart very well.   She was sorely tempted to take this situation as a challenge of her power and endurance.   She suspected that most Saiyans would feel the same way, albeit on a smaller scale.   Trismegistus had laid out his strategy brilliantly, counting on Luffa's weaknesses to complete the trap he had laid.   However, he had underestimated her, like so many of her past enemies had done.    As a Super Saiyan, Luffa had fought battles most ordinary Saiyans could barely imagine, let alone experience.   Luffa had already faced gauntlets of warriors before.    Not long before becoming a Super Saiyan, she had battled the Tikosi hordes on Dorlu Prime, and they had slowly worn her down.   She had long regretted that defeat, and had spent years thinking of ways to handle that scenario differently.    She had tested them on the battlefield, daring large armies to fight her while she held back her power to make things more interesting.  Entire theaters of war had served as laboratories for her tactical experiments.    Trismegistus had laid down a challenge of endurance, but Luffa chose to see it as a challenge of innovation.  

As her star-yacht entered the Qondoging System, she stood in the cargo bay and smiled eagerly.   Beside her, Luffa's wife Zatte held her right hand and watched her nervously.  

"I don't know if I can do this," the Dorlun said.  

"Maybe you can't," Luffa said.   "But I think we can, working together."  

"But the entire ship!" Zatte objected.    "And you--!"

"This is Plan A.   If it doesn't work, Plan B is I bail out and fight the Saiyans hand to hand," Luffa said bluntly.   She pointed to the bandages on her arms and under her black sleeveless shirt.    "I'll win, but they'll make me pay for it, just like those last six I killed."

"I know, but--!"

"This is your chance, Zattie," Luffa said.  "You pull this off and you'll be helping my cause and keeping me healthy for the next battle.   That's what you've always wanted to do for me, right?"

"Yes, but if I screw it up--!" Zatte argued.

"You won't screw it up," Luffa replied.   "I'm a xan'nil-Dor, aren't I?   It can't be a dumb idea if I came up with it, right?"

"Providence deemed you important, Luffa," Zatte said with an anxious smile.   "They never said you were smart."

"Which is exactly why they sent you to cover my back," Luffa said.    "Your Dorlun pride should be burning in your veins right now."

"Not exactly," Zatte said, "but I love it when you talk that way."

Luffa grinned and tapped the communicator mounted in her left ear.   "Cargo bay to bridge," she called.   "How are we doing?"

"Um, okay... I think?"  The uncertainty in Dotz's voice was palpable.   "We're, uh, approaching the planet pretty fast."

"Great, Dotz," Luffa said.   "You sound like you're already getting the hang of it."

"Well, that's nice of you to say," Dotz said, "but, um, you only showed me how to use this thing half an hour ago.   Are you sure you want me to do this?   I'm a fortuneteller, not a pilot."

"I've got no choice," Luffa said, "I need Zatte here with me, and Doc's on standby in case we get hurt."

"Right," she said.   "Well, I'm happy to help, but..."

"You've got this, Dotz," Luffa said.   "It's a simple maneuver.   All you have to do is keep us from hitting  the ground, and pull up when the time is right."

"Um... when is that, again?"  

"You're the fortuneteller.    You tell me," Luffa said.    

"That's not how it works," Dotz said.

"Just joking," Luffa said.   "You'll know."

Luffa used her ki senses to decide when to begin.   The entire planet's collective life energy was easy to pick up as a great distance.   It was when she could pick up the individual Saiyan powers on the planet that she signalled for Zatte to begin.   The Dorlun held onto Luffa's hand and used her other to hold onto a power conduit they had pulled out from the wall of the cargo bay.   Then she applied her unique ability to manipulate energy.    Zatte typically used this talent for camouflage and sabotage.    She had never concealed anything nearly as large as a spacecraft, but Luffa had convinced her it was time to try.   It was a simple matter of bending electromagnetic radiation, refracting it around the entire ship instead of allowing it to bounce off its surface.   But this was just the beginning.   Zatte also had to diffuse the radiation emitting from the ship itself.    The heat from the engines, the illumination from its running lights, and the ki of its occupants.  It was a tricky operation, and Luffa planned to make it even trickier.

As they entered the planet's atmosphere, Zatte's focus began to waver.   "The heat," she said with a grimace.    "I'm having trouble dispersing it all."

"No worries," Luffa said.  "They haven't spotted us yet, and you're about to get a little help..."

She transformed into her Super Saiyan mode.    As Luffa's hair stood on end and her eyes glowed green, Zatte only clenched her teeth more tightly as she struggled to cope with this new energy.  

"Use it!" Luffa said.   "Take whatever you need."

"It's... too much!" Zatte said.   "I can't borrow your energy and use it to hide the rest of it all at once!"

She didn't have to.   Luffa had learned to hide some of her own ki in a fashion resembling Zatte's ability.    The only trouble was that neither of them could hide all of it at once.   But if they worked together, with Zatte borrowing some of Luffa's power to apply to the task, then maybe...

"I've... got it!" Zatte said.   "But I can't hold it."

Even as she said it, Luffa could sense the Saiyans taking flight, moving to intercept their ship.    Only they had no idea it was a ship at all.   Zatte's cloaking field wasn't absolute, but it was enough to confuse anyone who had detected them.    The Saiyans had detected their approach, but they weren't closing in to attack; they were keeping their distance to investigate.    They didn't know what the star-yacht was, but they were probably certain that it wasn't a Super Saiyan.  

There were five of them, and when the first three approached from the aft of the yacht, Luffa tapped the control for the bay door.   Before it had finished opening, she had acquired her targets.  

"Vengeance Cannon," she said with a grin.  

At this moment, Zatte's cloak could have collapsed altogether and it would make no difference.    From the perspective of the three Saiyans, they would only be able to see an indistinct blur in the sky, and sense an indeterminate power level.    And then, they would see beams of crimson light shooting out of the blur, one after another, aimed straight for their hearts.   The first one Luffa hit died instantly, followed by the second one an instant later.    The third Saiyan might have had just enough time to realize they were under attack, but Luffa's aim was too sure and her attack too quick for him to react.  

As for the remaining two Saiyans, they had approached the star-yacht from the fore, where Luffa wouldn't be able to attack them without firing through her own ship.   They didn't know they were under attack until they sensed the deaths of their three comrades, but once they knew what was happening, they moved closer to blast the yacht with their own ki beams.   On the bridge, Dotz was alerted to their approach, and so she did what any novice pilot would do in such a situation.    Panicking, she followed the only instruction she was given, and pulled the ship upward as sharply as she possibly could.    The Saiyans were confused by the sudden course change, and as they chased after the blur as it rose into the upper atmosphere, they found themselves making the same mistake as the first three.    Luffa picked them off with two more shots, and the liberation of Qondoging was complete.  

Luffa shut the bay doors and caught Zatte before she could drop to her knees.  

"Nice work everyone," Luffa said as she tapped her earpiece.    

"I nearly blew it," Zatte said between exhausted gasps.   "How do you handle all that power?"

"You did fine," Luffa said.   "With a little more practice, I bet you could keep this whole ship invisible for hours..."

"Just... help me get to sickbay," Zatte said wearily.    

Luffa smiled proudly as she helped to her feet and led her out of the cargo bay.    Once she had turned Zatte over to Doctor Topsas, she went to the bridge and set course for the next planet.  

*******

[1 March, 233 Before Age.   Interstellar Space.]

Over the next several days, Luffa's unorthodox tactics had proven effective.   With each planet she liberated, the Federation fleet was able to regroup and consolidate their gains.   She had staged counterattacks on three worlds now, and on each one she had managed to use the element of surprise to kill the Saiyans without sustaining any new wounds.   As they moved on to the fourth planet, Dr. Topsas was more concerned with the injuries Luffa already had from the battle on Lubegev.  

"You said you were going to rest between missions, little mammal," Topsas grumbled.  

"I am resting, Doc," Luffa said.   She handed him a plate of fried gizzards, still wearing the oven mitts she had used while preparing them in the ship's kitchen.   "Oh, I forgot your sauce, let me go get that real quick--"

"As much as I enjoy your cooking," he protested, "it won't do you any good to keep running back and forth on the ship."    

Luffa waved her salad tongs around the bridge, gesturing to Zatte at the navigation console, and Dotz at a tactical station.    "That's bunk, doc," she said.   "You all deserve a good meal after the work you've put in.    You guys have done really well these last couple of days.   I mean, I was confident, sure, but I'm still impressed.   Dotz hasn't even been in a battle before, but she's handled the ship better than I could have imagined."

"Really?" Dotz asked, looking up from her plate.

"Hey!  Don't fill up on bread, okay?" Luffa scolded.    "I've got baked tubers coming up, but the toppings aren't ready to come out of the oven."

Dotz dropped her roll immediately, and nodded.    

"Luffa, Dr. Topsas is right," Zatte said.    "I can get my own salad, and the ship can pilot itself long enough for me to run down to the kitchen for you.    Just take a seat and--"

"Like hell," Luffa said.   "If I put you in charge, you'll just slap some sandwiches in the microwave and call it good."

"What's wrong with sandwiches?" Zatte asked.

Luffa sighed and patted her on the head.   "You poor aliens are so backward when it comes to food," she said.   "It's probably because you eat so little.   You're full before you can really take the time to appreciate what you're putting in your stomachs."

Zatte looked over to Topsas and rolled her eye.   "I burned one sandwich," she said as she held up her index finger.   "Two years ago.   One sandwich, and I'm banned from the kitchen."

"I need all of you at the top of your game," Luffa said.  "I'm healing up well enough, but that'll go out the window if one of you gets sluggish from malnourishment."

"Uh, Luffa?" Dotz said as she noticed a blinking light at her workstation.   "I'm new at this, but I'm pretty sure we're getting a priority communication.   It's from a Rear Admiral Barone.   Should I patch it through?"

"Finally," Luffa said.   "We haven't heard from any fleet commanders since we entered Federation territory.    I was starting to think they had all been killed in the initial attack."

The video was blurry, and the audio distorted, but Luffa could see and hear well enough to tell that it was not Admiral Barone.

"Marshal Booth," Luffa said.   "You've looked better."

"Luffa...." Booth said, though only some of his words managed to come through.   "...d to see... joined the party."

"I'm headed to your end of the front," Luff replied.    "Busting some Saiyan heads along the way.   What's your status?"

"Saiyans... kind of jamming device," Booth said.   "They know.... coordinate our defense... Doing everything they can... disrupt communications."

Luffa turned back to Zatte.   "How long would it take to rendezvous with him?"

Zatte checked her readouts before answering.    "Three hours," she said.   "Luffa, I'm showing other ships on the long range sensors.   Booth's going to have some company out there."

"Marshal!" Luffa called to him.   "What's your status?   How many ships are with you?"

"...had ten to start with.    My flagship destr... Saiyans first attacked.    Made it to... Barone's ship.   Only one left in the wing," Booth said.   There was a long pause of static, during which Booth's lips continued to move, and then: "Repeat: I'll be linking up with the Sixth Fleet.... three days."

"Dotz," Luffa said.   "Can you tell if those other ships are on our side?"

"I'm sorry," Dotz said.   "At this range all I've got are energy signatures.   It could be anybody."

"Booth!" Luffa shouted, though she knew raising her voice would do nothing to improve the clarity of their transmission.    "You've got possible hostiles converging on your position!   Can you defend yourself?"

"Oh, you noticed?" Booth said with a smile.    "We've been... draw them away from.... System.     Already Saiyans attacking the planet now, but... 're being contained.     The ships following me were sent to help them turn the tide, so we had to give...  better target.   I volunteered.     No one else around, after all."

"Marshal, that won't work!" Luffa shouted.    "There's too many of them!   Even if your ship's undamaged, they'd still pick you off, and they'll head right back to join their friends on the planet!    You'll be sacrificing yourself for nothing!"

"Don't count us out yet," Booth said.   "... few surprises in store for them--"

"It's no good!" Luffa shouted in to the communicator.  "I can't reach you in time!  You've got to pull out of there!"

There was no reply.  Only a brief segment of audio that might have been Booth's voice, but could have just as easily been static.  Zatte looked up from the communications console and shook her head.  

"There's no signal," she said.

Luffa slammed her fist down on the armrest of her chair, and the force was so great that it broke off.

"How long until Despye?" Luffa asked.

"Three hours," Zatte said.

"You said that before!" Luffa snapped.

"Two hours and fifty-one minutes," Zatte said.  "And thirty-four seconds, for all the difference it makes!"

"I'm going to the engine room," Luffa said.

"Luffa that won't do any good!" Zatte said.  

"Nothing! Will! Do! Any! Good!"  Luffa shouted.  

As Dotz listened to them argue, she began to feel very helpless.   Even if there was a way to save Booth, Dotz doubted that she would be able to contribute much to the effort.   Luffa had healed her mind from an attack by the same Saiyans she was currently warring against.   Dotz felt obligated to return Luffa's kindness somehow, but she was completely out of her element.  Dotz was a fortune-teller, not a soldier, and she had only done as well as she had on the bridge because the controls happened to be user-friendly.  

And so, rather than succumb to despair, Dotz fell back on her natural talents, and turned her thoughts inward.   There was a small crystal which hung from a simple necklace underneath her purple shawl.   Dotz focused on it, and meditated on its spiritual vibrations.   She asked for nothing, for this was not a prayer to a higher power, but an exploration of a different plane of existence.   On occasion, she sometimes found what she was looking for.   Very often, the results left more questions than answers, but she almost always came away with something, even if it was merely a renewed perspective.    

To her surprise, things became much clearer than she expected.   It was like tumblers falling into place on some incomprehensible combination lock.   Luffa had no discernible future, that much remained true, but she could see glimpses of destiny surrounding the Saiyan.    There was Zatte, and there was Doctor Topsas, and others she did not know, and... Booth.    She could sense his cynical opportunism, his longing for worldly power.  He would not achieve it, at least not yet.    There were triumphs ahead in his lifeline, though she could not tell if they were great enough to satisfy him...

And then she felt a hand on her shoulder, and Dotz found herself back in reality.

"Listen to me!" Zatte shouted back.  "If we push the engines, we'll only gain a few minutes at most, but we run the risk of breaking down before we get there!  We'd be stranded in interstellar space."

"Those people are going to die!" Luffa said.  She pointed to the viewscreen, though there was only the distorted star field ahead of them.  "The Saiyans aren't going to just stand around and wait for me to fight them.  They'll start sacking the planet, and then--!"

"Are you all right, Ms. Dotz?" Topsas asked.  

She looked to her left to see the arachnoid physician standing beside her.    She had seen premonitions of him before meeting him.    Those premonitions had frightened her at the time, for he looked very much like a monster to her.    But once she had met him, she had found him very gentle and unassuming, despite his penchant for sarcasm.

"I'm... yes, I'm fine, Doctor," she said.    "Just... just woolgathering, that's all."

But it was more than that.  She was certain that Marshal Booth was in no immediate danger, though she couldn't explain how he would survive.   Dotz wasn't sure if it was a good idea to say anything.    Luffa had enough to worry about, and Booth's personal safety didn't necessarily mean that the planet he was fighting for would be protected.  

"I know," Zatte said to Luffa  "A lot of people are going to suffer, but there's nothing we can do to stop it.  The best thing right now is to prepare for the worst.  I can contact commercial ships in the sector.  We can organize a relief operation to take over once you've cleared out the enemy."

"I... Okay, do it," Luffa said.  "And you'd better get in touch with the Federation Council while you're at it.  If Booth's dead, they'll need to appoint his successor."

"Good idea," Zatte said.  "Listen, I know it's tough for you to sit this out.  I don't like it either but-- Wait."

"What is it?" Luffa asked.

Zatte didn't answer right away, as she stared down at the console to make certain of the readouts that displayed on the screen.    "I'm getting reports in from Despye.  Booth is still alive.    He's winning!"

"How?" Luffa asked.  "He only had five ships."

"Not anymore," Zatte said.  "It looks like he's gotten some reinforcements."

"What reinforcements?" Luffa asked

*******

Two hours and fifty-one minutes later, Luffa got her answer from Booth in person.   She was not happy to hear it.    

"Saiyans?!" Luffa shouted.

"You seem surprised by this," Marshall Booth said.  In the ready room of his command ship, he leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers.  The look on his face was one of a man who was very pleased with himself.

"We're fighting the Saiyans, Booth!" Luffa groaned.  

"I'm aware of that," Booth said.  He casually pointed at Luffa's furry tail and added: "I'm also aware that we have one Saiyan fighting on our side.  Why should it shock you that I would enlist the help of others?"

"You can't trust them, Marshall!" Luffa protested.    The irony of this was delicious.   He wondered if this mutual loathing was a common trait among the Saiyan race.    It would explain their hostile tendencies.

"I don't need trust, Madam Federatrix," Booth replied.  "What I need is a defensive line broad enough to cover our border.  As strong as you are, you can't be everywhere at once.  Our Saiyan allies may not be as  strong as our Saiyan enemies, but they make up for it in numbers and starships.  They can at least defend Federation worlds long enough for you to arrive and relieve them."

She knew he was right, but that didn't stop her from pacing angrily around his ready room.    Normally, Booth never would have provoked Luffa so brazenly, but he had just survived a very intense battle.     His Saiyan allies had turned the tide, to be sure, but experience had taught him that victory could be even more dangerous than defeat.     Even now, he could hear the repair crews just outside, working tirelessly to put his bridge back together.   Maybe it was the adrenaline rush, but he couldn't resist taunting Luffa with his success.    You're not so indispensable after all, are you?   I won the day without you, even if I needed your cousins to do it.

"What's to stop them from pillaging the same worlds you want them to protect?!" Luffa demanded.  He wondered if it had actually taken her this long to think of that point.   He had asked himself this question from the moment the Saiyans offered to help.  

"Self-preservation," Booth said.  "The Federation may need their help, but we're far from helpless.  If we have to fight them, we certainly can.  Given the choice, I'd prefer to fight the Saiyans who aren't empowered by this cult."

"This is a mistake, Marshall," Luffa grumbled.   "These Saiyans you've called in, they will betray you.  It's only a matter of time."

"The why don't you speak with their leader?" Booth asked.  "I was going to meet with their flagship soon anyway.  You may as well join us.   I haven't been aboard your ship in years.    Maybe you'd like to have us over for dinner."

"Fine," Luffa said.    "You look like you could use a decent meal, anyway, Marshall."

He smiled.   Booth would have preferred to let the Saiyans deal with each other without putting himself between them, but it couldn't be helped.    At least they would behave a little better with some food in front of them.

*******

[2 March 233 Before Age.   Despye.]

"Are we under-dressed?"  Zatte asked.   "I feel like we're under-dressed for this."

"Well we're not," Luffa grumbled as they stood at the open entranceway of their star-yacht.    Luffa was dressed in her usual black sleeveless shirt and baggy yellow pants.   She had changed her bandages this morning, but this was the only modification she had made to her attire.   As for Zatte, she was still wearing the grey leggings and white T-shirt she had been wearing for most of the day.    

"I mean, this is a diplomatic visit, right?" Zatte said.   "I know they're Saiyans, and they don't have much use for protocol, but they did help us out.   I feel like we should show some respect--"

"I'm making them a pot roast," Luffa said.   "That's more than they deserve.    Would you let go of my arm?"

Zatte backed away from her.   "Sorry.   Listen, if you'd rather not have me around for this, I totally understand.    I'd prefer to stay out of sight anyway--"

"You're here," Luffa said, "because I want you where I can see you.    You're not going anywhere near my kitchen while I'm messing with these fools."

"You're kidding," Zatte said.    

"I don't joke when it comes to pot roast," Luffa said.   "You should know that by now."

"I burned one sandwich..." Zatte groaned.    

"Quiet," Luffa muttered.  

Marshall Booth had arrived at the docking bay, and walked up the ramp leading into the ship.    "Madam Federatrix," he said.    

"Marshall," Luffa replied.   "Where's the Saiyan?"

"On her way," Booth said.     He stood on the deck and clasped his hands behind his back.    As he rocked back and forth on his heels, he glanced around, as though admiring the ship's interior.    "Will your... companion... be joining us?"

Zatte's species was secretive by nature, preferring to share little with outsiders unless needed.     As such, she had never been formally introduced to Booth, by name, or as Luffa's wife.   The women saw no reason to change that policy now, in spite of the awkwardness it created.    

"I made plenty for everyone," Luffa said brusquely.    

"Splendid," Booth said.   "Ah, I think that's her now."  

Zatte craned her head to get a better look through the entrance of the ship.    When she finally spotted the Saiyan, she asked "That's who you've been dealing with?   She's just a kid!"

Luffa watched the teenage Saiyan walk up the entrance ramp.   There was some polish to the way she moved, as though the girl were planning to run for office some day.   Her blue uniform lent her an air of gravitas, but she couldn't quite shake off the appearance of a child.    The bright pink dye she wore in her hair didn't help matters, nor did the wad of gum she was chewing.    As she entered the ship, she couldn't help but look around in every direction, taking it all in with wide-eyed fascination.   At last, she looked at Luffa and asked: "Permission to come aboard, Madam Federatrix?"

"Who the hell are you?" Luffa asked.  

"Wow, rude," the girl said.  "That's okay, I can drop the pleasantries.    I'm Seltiss, daughter of King Rehval III.    Princess of the Saiyans."  

[16 June, 234 Before Age.  Planet Shenia]

The military of Planet Shenia was formidable, much more so than would be expected for a planet considered insignificant by the major galactic powers.  Centuries ago, Shenia was a client state of the Camelian Empire, and used as a buffer against a rival power, the Qophean Khanate.  Decades later, the balance of power shifted, and the border moved, and Camelia withdrew from Shenia.  But the people of Shenia had not forgotten their vigilance against foreign invasion.  Their armies were well-trained and well-armed, and rumors of their ki techniques were enough to frighten away would-be raiders.  One of Shenia's national holidays celebrated a time when they defended their world against a Saiyan invader, and prevailed.

This time, however, Shenia was visited by two Saiyans, and the outcome was not as favorable.  A week later, the entire Shenian parliament was captured, and they quickly surrendered.  Over the next several days, a ransom payment was assembled to pay the Saiyans to leave the planet peacefully.  A portion of this was converted into a sort of expense account, which the Saiyans used to pay for meals and souvenirs while they enjoyed Shenia's nightlife.

"Look at this," Seltiss asked as she twirled around in a dress she had just purchased.  The price tags still dangled from the hem as she showed it off.  "I thought it was sequins, but it's actually some kind of fiber optic technology, so when the lighting changes..."

The discotheque's lighting included a number of lasers and other devices to shine an array of colors onto the patrons.  Seltiss was sticking close to the bar, but she stepped just slightly to one side so a passing strobe light could flash onto her clothes.  Her dress refracted and shifted the frequency of this light, producing a vivid pattern of oranges and violets.

Sitting at the bar, Xibuyas could only stare and nod awkwardly.  To everyone else in the club, they were just unusual-looking humanoid, not so different from the Shenians themselves.  To the bartender serving them meals, they were just a couple of rowdy adolescents.  But to Xibuyas, the teenage girl standing before him was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.  The dress had nothing to do with it.

"It's nice," he muttered, and then he looked away to take another piece of fish from his bowl.  

"Everything's so colorful here," Seltiss said.  “Not like Planet Saiya at all.  Dad would flip out if he saw me wearing anything but royal blue.  And the academy on Protef is even worse, if you can believe it.  Four options in their dress code, and all four are drab earth tones.  And they wondered why I dropped out."

Xibuyas said nothing.  For what it was worth, he liked her school uniforms, with their pleated skirts and the crisp sharp lines of their starched suit jackets.  They made her look very cosmopolitan, unlike the handful of other Saiyan females he had encountered in his young life.  Most of them were caregivers or teachers, middling warriors who only attended to his upbringing because they lacked the talent to do anything important on their own.  

Seltiss was different.  His instructors and King Rehval had told him that he would be married to her when they were of age, and he had absorbed this information like any other dry fact they had taught him.  But Seltiss herself was so much more than a princess of the Saiyans.  She was smart and funny and mischievous, and completely unafraid of anything.  She was the only Saiyan he knew who routinely disobeyed the king.  

And she really liked him.  She wasn't just using him for his power, the way her father did.  His power was important to her plans, true, but she spent time with him, and complimented him, and told him things that she never told anyone else.

"What's eating you, Xibuyas?" she asked.  "Don't tell me you're still sore about your fight with Luffa."

He didn't know how to answer that, so he changed the subject.  "Would your father still let us marry, Seltiss?  I failed him, and he knows not that I survived that battle.    I doubt that he would be relieved to find that I survived."

"Oh, is that all?" Seltiss said.  She approached him and patted his cheek, causing him to wince with embarrassment.  "Take it easy, Xibuyas.  Public displays of affection are normal for most civilizations.  You don't have to be so stuffy all the time."

But he did.  It helped him stay focused, especially around her.    King Rehval had great plans for him.  He was destined to become the king of the Saiyans, and through Seltiss, King Xibuyas' descendants would rule their people through centuries of prosperity.  It was a glorious opportunity, and he found it much less overwhelming when he used formal speech, and carried himself like he mighty warrior he was expected to be.  A mask of false pride to hide the cracks in his confidence.

What frustrated him was that he couldn't even use royal address with Seltiss, because she had commanded him not to.    "Princess Seltiss was never here," she had explained.  "As far as the universe knows, we're just two anonymous Saiyan raiders."  

It hadn't really been a command.  More like instructions for her plan.  He loved that about her too.  Seltiss respected him, and what little regal bearing she had, she dropped it completely with him.  He didn't know if that was because she loved him back, or because she saw him as a fellow royal due to their engagement.

"Why don't we get some air?" Seltiss offered.  "You don't look like you're in the mood to dance."

He sighed with relief.  Sometimes she seemed to understand him better than he knew himself.  After a few minutes to settle their bill, they walked outside together, though Seltiss stubbornly held onto his arm the whole way.

*******

The night air helped improve his disposition a little, and getting away from the crowd made a bigger difference than he would have expected.  Normally, he craved every moment alone with Seltiss that he could get, but things were different now.

"So what's up, Xibuyas?" Seltiss asked as they flew.  "You can tell me."

"It's difficult to put into words, your h-- er, Seltiss," he said.

"Good catch," Seltiss said.  "You were great the other day, you know that?  The way you tore through the Shenian fleet..."

"I could have done it faster," he said.

"Don't be so hard on yourself," she said.  "You're the strongest Saiyan alive!  The strongest Saiyan who ever lived, I bet."

"I wasn't stronger than Luffa," he grumbled.

"Well, she's not really a Saiyan, right?" Seltiss replied.

"That is what your father always told me," Xibuyas said.  "Suppose... well, what if he was... wrong?"

"You think she's really one of us?" Seltiss asked.

"I don't know," Xibuyas said.  "But she... seemed Saiyan enough.  I don't mean her eyes and hair, but the way she moved.  Her scent and the sound of her voice.  It was much easier to believe her a fraud before I faced her in battle."

"Okay, but what difference does it make if she’s a Saiyan or not?" Seltiss asked.  "She's still an enemy of the crown, the one you'll be wearing one of these days."

"You're so certain of that," Xibuyas said.  "Your father has other heirs to choose from.   One of your sisters, or perhaps he'll have another child in the future."

"You forget how stubborn my dad can be," Seltiss said.  "He likes to pretend that he's flexible, but once he makes up his mind, he's pretty much locked in."  She pointed at herself and smiled.  "You're not his only pet project, you know."

They landed on the beach of an island that happened to catch Seltiss's fancy, and she took off her boots so she could feel the sand between her toes as they walked.  

"My father had it all worked out since before I was born," she explained.  "He used some special system to test Saiyan women, then he picked one that would give him the best heir.  That was my mother.  He tinkered with me the whole time I was in the incubation tank.  I couldn't tell you what he did, but it was all for the sake of making me his ideal successor.  That's what I've been hearing my whole life.  My sisters are just Plan B.    I'm the one he put the most work into.  He made me smarter than all of them.  Don't ask me how."

She suddenly drew back her fist and tried to punch him in the jaw, but he blocked it with his open palm.  Seltiss grinned and shook her head.

"I'm not very strong, but dad doesn't seem worried about that.  My children will be stronger, he tells me, as long as their father has the right genes.  That's where you come in, tough guy."

"I never even knew my parents,"  Xibuyas said.  "King Rehval told me I was gifted with a strong bloodline, but he still used his potions to make me even stronger."

"You must have something about you," Seltiss said.  "Otherwise, he wouldn't be marrying you off with me.  Don't you see,  Xibuyas?  I know you’re grateful to him and all, but in the end, he needs us more than we need him."

She threw her arms around his neck, and for a brief, nerve-wracking moment, he thought that she might kiss him.  She only smiled instead, and he wasn’t sure if he was relieved or disappointed.

"At least, he needs us until we give him a litter of grandchildren," she said.  "So in the meantime, we're pretty much free to do whatever we please."

"And this is what pleases you?" he asked.  “Invading a backwater planet and playing tourist?”

"I studied military tactics for a semester," Seltiss said.  "This is the first time I've gotten to put it into practice.  I always wanted to conquer my own planet, but I was hoping you'd enjoy it.  You've been so depressed ever since the battle on Pflaume."

This time she really did lean in to kiss him, and he backed away from her, a little more forcefully than he would have liked.

"Xibuyas, what's wrong?" Seltiss asked.  "What happened between you and Luffa?"

"Nothing!" he lied.  The look in her dark brown eyes told him that his response was a mistake.  Seltiss was the smartest person he knew, with the possible exception of her father.  And she knew him much better than her father.

"There can't be any secrets between us," she said.  "It's just you and me against the galaxy, remember?  Dad isn't going to look out for us beyond his own needs, and the rest of the universe thinks we're a couple of brainless savages."

"I know," he said quietly.  That was exactly why he didn't want to tell her.  

"Whatever it is," we'll deal with it together," Seltiss assured him.  "I'm the brains of this outfit, remember?"

For a long monent, he struggled with his indecision, and then he finally mumbled:  "Very well.  The truth is that..."

But before he could say another word, the ground beneath them exploded.

"Saiyans!" a voice cried out.  "I never expected to find creeps like you on Shenia, but I guess I could use the workout!"

When the dust settled, they could finally see their visitor hovering twenty feet above them.  It was an alien, insectoid in appearance, though its lower body resembled the tail of a massive serpent.  

"Where did you come from?"  Seltiss asked.  Before she could get an answer, Xibuyas stepped in front of her.

"Careful," he warned her.  "it's stronger than it looks."

"Smart boy," the alien said.  "And to answer the female's question, my name is Clondique.  You might call me a superhero.  I'm kind if a big deal in this sector."

"I've never heard of you," Seltiss said.

Clondique shrugged all four of  her shoulders.  "I knew that publicist was a waste of money.  Well, take my word for it, I was a major player in this part of the galaxy.  Came to Shenia for my third metamorphosis, wanted someplace nice and peaceful while I chilled out for eighty years, and I wake up to find the whole planet's been conquered?  By a couple of kids?"

"I'm more than a match for a talking eyesore like you," Xibuyas replied.  "If it's a fight you crave, I'll--"

He took two steps toward Clondique, and then Seltiss called out to him.

"Hold it, Xibuyas!" she said.  "I'll handle her myself."

"What?" Xibuyas asked.

But she had already removed her dress, revealing the pink leotard she normally wore in combat situations.  She looked up at Clondique and smiled.

"You may be stronger than me, but I'm as much a Saiyan as you are," she said.  "This guy wants a workout, and so do I."

"Your boyfriend is right, kid," Clondique said.   "You shouldn't take me so lightly."

"Prove it," Seltiss demanded.

*******

Clondique's power was substantial, but this wasn't Seltiss' main concern.  She knew Xibuyas would step in if she appeared to be in any real danger.  The real challenge was getting him to open up to her, and she believed she could accomplish that through battle.  

She and Xibuyas were the same age, though the chronology of their young lives was distorted by her father's use of the Hyperbolic Time Chamber.  It allowed beings to enter another dimension where time flowed at a faster rate.  On different occasions, King Rehval had sent Seltiss into the Chamber to focus her studies, and to hone her combat skills with different instructors.    Xibuyas, on the other hand, had spent most of his life inside the Chamber.  He had been a baby when Seltiss first met him three years ago, but each time she saw him after that, he was always a little bit taller, and a great deal stronger.  Her father saw him as little more than a breeding stock, but he also wanted to use him as an enforcer.  More than four-fifths of his life had been devoted solely to mastering the art of war.

And so, as Seltiss charged after Clondique and exchanged blows with the alien, it was with the hope that she could reach him in a language Xibuyas would understand better than words.

Clondique's chitinous fists managed to connect with her a few times, though Seltiss managed to recover and back away before taking too much of a beating.  She responded with a hail of energy bullets from the palm of her right hand, but Clondique was able to avoid them with astonishing ease.  

She had her suspicions about what was bothering the boy, and with some clever manipulation, she was sure she could trick him into revealing enough information for her to figure the rest out without him even realizing it.  But that would defeat the point, which was to convince him that he should confide in her no matter what.  

"Hold still, you little--!" Clondique griped as she chased after her through the air.  Seltiss had no intention of standing her ground until she knew exactly what she was up against.  Until then, she danced around Clondique, a avoiding her offense as well as she could, and only fighting back when it was safe to do so.

The message she wanted to send was this: I'm a Saiyan warrior like you.  We share the same passions, the same longing for combat.    Xibuyas already knew this, but Seltiss liked to remind him from time to time.  Besides, she really did enjoy fighting, even if Clondique might not have been her first choice for an opponent.

The alien swung her tail at Seltiss and for a split-second, Seltiss thought she had successfully avoided the strike.   Then she sensed the ki energy welling up in Clondique's body, and Seltiss had to dodge again, barely escaping a volley of ki blasts from Clondique's hands.   Then the tail swiped at her again, and Seltiss found herself regretting that most of her combat training had been with humanoid sparring partners.  

After a few minutes, Seltiss decided she had enough of Clondique's measure to risk striking back, only to find that she had miscalculated.  Clondique could block with two hands, fight with two more, and use the tail either way.  This would only be a minor challenge if the two of them were evenly matched, but Seltiss was beginning to notice that Clondique's power level had been steadily rising as they fought.    The alien had been holding back, or perhaps she just needed time to warm up.

Seltiss resorted to an explosive wave, more out of a growing sense of desperation than any calculated plan.  She preferred to stick to a script, and while she had planned to look vulnerable against Clondique, she was turning out to be more vulnerable than she had expected.  Pink ki energy blasted out from the young Saiyan's body in all directions, just as Clondique tried to catch her between her fists and her serpentine tail.  Seltiss didn't expect it to stop Clondique, but it would at least guarantee some breathing room for--

And then Clondique grabbed her anyway.

"Cute trick," Clondique said.   Using one pair of arms, she locked Seltiss in a full nelson, and she used her lower arms to grab hold of Seltiss' ankles.   Seltiss wondered why Clondique hadn't used her tail instead, and then Clondique curled it forward until the tip of her tail was aimed at Seltiss' head, and it began to glow. 

"You bit off more than you could chew, kiddo," Clondique said.  "Happens to everybody, sooner or later."

Seltiss struggled against Clondique's grip, but it was no use.  It was only now, at this close range, that she could sense just how strong the alien really was.   She wasn't entirely sure if even Xibuyas could win.

Clondique's tail glowed brighter.  "This won't kill you," the alien explained, "although when you wake up, you'll probably wish it had.   Energy venom packs a hell of a hangover, but I can't risk you trying something stupid while I tackle your boyfriend down there."

Suddenly, Seltiss' morale brightened considerably.  "It'll take more than your puny attack to kill a Saiyan!" she shouted defiantly.  

"Didn't you hear me?" Clondique asked.   "I just said I'm not going to kill you."

Seltiss struggled against Clondique's grip, though she knew it was pointless.  "Even if you could destroy me, Xibuyas would avenge me!" she shouted.  

"What is your damage, kid?" Clondique asked.  "The fight's over.  You think that yokel down there can save you?  I can tell he's no match for--"

Without warning, Xibuyas transformed.   Seltiss didn't really know what to call it.  His aura glowed bright yellow, and his hair stood up.  His eyes glowed solid white, and his muscles seemed to expand a little.  Seltiss had never seen the Legendary Super Saiyan in action before, but from what she had heard, Xibuyas' power increase bore some resemblance to Luffa's other form...

Suddenly, it dawned on Seltiss.  It had been right in front of her the whole time.  

But before she could give the matter any thought, Xibuyas had already launched himself at Clondique, and severed all four of the alien's arms, freeing Seltiss immediately.  

Clondique barely had time to register what was happening.   Her energy venom attack was still charging, and when her arms were injured, she instinctively fired, though Xibuyas swatted this bolt of ki aside with a wave of his hand.   With his other hand, he fired a ki blast of his own, which tore through Clondique's torso, killing her instantly.  

Seltiss found that Clondique's severed hands still had a powerful grip, but without any ki to amplify it, it took only a moment's exertion for Seltiss to shake them off her arms and legs.  When she looked up, she saw that the battle was already over.

Only Xibuyas wasn't finished.  

With a loud roar, he released all his pent-up aggression and directed it at Clondique's body.  The barrage of ki blasts was as relentless as it was pointless.  Clondique was already dead.  Within three seconds, the body was damaged beyond recognition.  Within five seconds, the remains of Clondique had been completely reduced to ash and vapor.    Xibuyas kept firing for another fifteen seconds after that.  Fortunately for everyone on Planet Shenia, he had angled his fire away from the planet, so that his blasts would head for outer space instead of damaging the planet, though Seltiss couldn't tell if that was a conscious decision or if it was just from the habits drilled into him from his combat training.

When he finally calmed down, Seltiss approached him.  She was cautious, but cheerful nonetheless.  Her plan had nearly backfired, but it had all worked out in the end.  

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"That filthy thing was going to kill you!" Xibuyas shouted.  He turned to face her, and as he reverted to his normal appearance, she could see tears in his eyes.

"I had the situation under control, babe."

"I never should have let you fight her alone!" he said.  "I almost got you killed, and then--!"

He didn't finish the thought, but she could guess the rest.  Whatever he was keeping from her, however heavy the burden, at least he had the option to share it with her.  But if she were killed, the  he would have no choice but to carry that weight alone, for whom else could he tell?

"Luffa," he finally said after a long pause.  

"What's she got to do with anything?" Seltiss asked innocently.  She had a pretty good idea by now, but she needed him to say it.

"She said... she said that she was my mother," Xibuyas replied.

Seltiss pretended to be shocked, though in truth she had suspected this ever since the battle on Pflaume.  Xibuyas was born around the same time Luffa became a Super Saiyan, and his powers had a certain similarity.  Besides, it made no sense for Luffa to have defeated Xibuyas without killing him.  She knew little about Luffa, but Seltiss couldn't believe that Luffa would show mercy to such an implacable enemy.

"Your mother?" she asked with a gasp.  

"I couldn't believe it at first," Xibuyas said.  "I still don't, but... What if it's true?  What if she truly is an alien?  That would make me..."

It would make him unworthy of her father's breeding plans.  That was the missing piece.   Seltiss had known from the beginning that King Rehval never would have bothered with Xibuyas as an heir without first confirming his bloodline.  But Xibuyas didn't know how thorough her father was about these things, and being an orphan probably caused him to question his self-esteem from time to time.  

Well, that was easy enough to fix.  Seltiss could explain it to him.  If Luffa really was his mother, it only proved that Luffa was a genuine Saiyan herself.  Her father must have known all this.  

And that could work to her advantage.  If Rehval's goal was to marry Luffa's bloodline with his own, then he needed Xibuyas even more than she had ever imagined.  By comparison, Seltiss was somewhat expendable--one of her sisters would do in a pinch--but Xibuyas... he was irreplaceable.  

She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him passionately before he could push her away.    To her surprise, he returned her embrace.  It made sense.  Before, he had been worried that he wasn't worthy to of her intimacy, but now that he had told her...

"It doesn't matter," she said when she finally pulled away from his lips.  "You and I, what we have, it's more important than family or pedigrees."

She could have told him why it didn't matter, that it really was a non-issue, but she needed him to believe that she was being gracious instead of practical.  If Xibuyas really was indispensable to her father, then she needed to make herself indispensable to him.

"Seltiss--!" was all he could say.

"We'll figure something out," Seltiss said.  "If it turns out to be true, then we might be able to use it to our advantage, but it doesn't change what's between us.  Got it?"

"Of... of course, my lady," he stammered.  "You... you are the brains of this outfit, as you put it."

She smiled and kissed him again.  "Smart boy," she said.  "Now, let's go get some dinner, and then I want to go shopping one more time."

"Don't you have enough clothes already?" Xibuyas asked.

"Not for me, for you," Seltiss said.  "We're meeting the Prime Minister tomorrow to go over our ransom inventory, and I want you to look your best..."

*******

[17 June, 234 Before Age..  Planet Shenia.]

"You're welcome to check the manifest yourself, of course," the minister said.

The Prime Minister of Shenia had a rather spacious office, primarily to accommodate press events and conferences.  He rarely hosted diplomatic envoys, due to Shenia’s isolation from the rest of the galaxy, though there was enough furniture for about two dozen ambassadors.   In spite of this, Seltiss took a seat on the corner of his desk, while Xibuyas stood behind his chair, looming over him with a menacing glower.

"No need for that," Seltiss said.  She slapped the paperwork with the back of her hand and made a satisfied nod.  "This all looks to be in order.  You could forge a lot of these documents, but not the tonnage of the shipments themselves, and the ones Xibuyas and I spot-checked looked to be in order.  Besides, none of it's leaving Shenia anyway."

"I don't... what?" the minister asked.

"Xibuyas and I will just bury it in the desert.  Later on, we'll parcel it out to you and the other ministers as a reward for your compliance."

"Madam Saiyan, I don't understand," the minister said, trying to contain his growing panic.  "You said you would leave Shenia once we paid this ransom."

"That's what I want the rest of the galaxy to think," she explained.  "If anyone visits Shenia and sees the aftermath of our invasion, I want them to think it was a couple of Saiyan raiders who took off once they got their plunder.  That way, no one will know we're still here, ruling the planet in secret."

"But why?" the minister asked.  

"Because I need a base of operations," Seltiss said.  "And if I conquered a planet outright, certain parties might come along to try to stop me.  If my father knew I was here, doing this, he'd probably kill me.  Well maybe not kill me, but he'd totally flip out."

"This isn't what we agreed," the minister protested.

"Oh, it's close enough," Seltiss insisted.  "Xibuyas and I will keep a low profile.  Your government will still control the planet, but you'll be taking orders from us.  Don't worry, we'll try to stay out of your way.  I'd suggest a special task force to handle our needs, but if you'd rather meet with me directly, that's no problem."

The minister was sweating now.  "You can't just renege on our agreement!" he said.  "Our army can still fight--!"

"Oh, please," Seltiss said.  "Do you think I picked this place at random?  Your warriors gave us a good workout, but you Shenians are practical enough to know when you're beaten.  Xibuyas could have destroyed your entire military, but we need it to maintain this ruse of mine.  Your ancestors were realistic enough to cooperate with the Camelians, and you're sensible enough to cooperate with me."

"Then why didn't you just tell us all this when we asked for terms of surrender?" he asked.   "If you were so sure we'd capitulate, why bother having us assemble a ransom at all?"

"That's easy," Seltiss explained.  "I asked for the ransom to see if you'd actually follow my instructions."  She held up the manifest and waved it at him.  "This right here proves you're willing to play along, and that you're not foolish enough to try to call for help or rat me out to my father.  You know Xibuyas can destroy this planet, and it's worth putting up with us for a while to make sure that doesn't happen."

The minister lowered his head and groaned.  "What are you kids going to do with our planet?" he asked.

"Oh, not much, minister," Seltiss said.  "You've been gracious hosts to Xibuyas and me, so I thought we might invite over some friends..."