"Something the matter?" Celera asked.
"They called us back, we can't go Rigal 7."
Celera sudden snapped out of her usual apathetic facade, "Why the hell would they do that?"
"The damn full moon."
"They're calling all Saiyans back for the full moon?" she asked as she tried to imagine their planet literally swelling with Ozura. Although the Saiyans were not a numerous race, numbering only in the hundreds, the Ozura would easily overpower the planet.
"Iie, only our division."
Celera pushed herself off form the wall she had been leaning on in the Health Ward of the Saiyan compound. "Why would King Vegeta care about a division of third class warriors enough to give us a holiday?"
"Especially an unwanted one," Seripa growled. "I don't know and I don't want to stay here for some stupid celebration; I want to fight."
Celera nodded, "Well then let's go fight."
Seripa loosened a little at the offer, "It's not the same but it will do I suppose."
Both Celera and Seripa belonged to the same division of third class warriors. Theirs was one of the small divisions bearing only twenty or thirty Saiyan warriors, but this time they were going to be fighting with several other Saiyan forces on Rigal 7. There were forces there already and they needed their help as reinforcements. Celera could not imagine why King Vegeta would now call off the attack on the small blue planet and tell their forces already there to lay low.
Saiyans did not lay low, so there must be something far more important going on. Obviously this full moon was going to be a special one. Whether that was good or bad was unclear.
"Let's leave this match off the record," she said to Seripa.
"Why?"
"Because something more is going on here and I think giving the higher ups a look at our advancement may not turn to be beneficial."
Seripa nodded silently as they entered The Room. Celera winked at Drazil as the door to the third room slid silently and uneventfully open. He nodded back at her as he motioned to turn a machine off.
Immediately they prepared themselves for the fight, assuming defensive postures. Seripa launched at her first and Celera thought for a second she saw her veer to the right slightly. She discarded this observation and continued her defense. She was reluctant to hit Seripa for fear that her strength might reveal herself. Celera very carefully crafted her hits so that on their stage she could hold them without it becoming visibly noticeable. Seripa came at her ruthlessly, but always fell short of doing as much damage as it become apparent that she wished to. As Celera swatted her away she literary bounced off one of the smooth walls in their circular prison and came at her again. This time Celera was certain that Seripa veered to the right and she could not find an excuse to miss the obvious advantage it gave her.
She struck at her pelvic bone, hooking up just slightly to hit the diaphragm also. Seripa reared backwards, gasping, and in more pain than Celera expected she should be in. For a moment she thought that she had slipped up, but one look at Drazil told her differently. Seripa got up, sneering, sweating, and growling as she wiped the spittle that had attempted to escape from her mouth. Celera caught the look in her eye and suddenly it all made sense to her. She could not forget that look when she first saw it on her own face during the bouts of pain that were usual afterwards.
"I had met up with Seripa in the Health Ward," she noted.
Celera dropped her stance and retreated to the water bottle she had brought in to the room. "You should have told me they called you down there," she snapped angrily.
"I'm fine," Seripa shot back.
It was more than obvious that she was not. Her breath was still heavy, her muscles still tight in the grips of pain, she was sweating more than she should be. If she had been fine she would have recovered from Celera's punch by now; if she was fine she wouldn't have been veering to the right to begin with.
"We need to stop, I'm not going to fight you like this."
"I'm fine and you were holding back anyway."
"Fine you want me to kill you before your offspring develop?"
Seripa's growl grew heavier as she prepared what she had to continue.
Celera sighed and rolled her eyes as she slipped her water. "Fine, you're fine; I need a break." With that she sat down with her back resting on the curved white wall and her leg stretched out on the deep red titles that hid all those bloodstains nicely. Seripa reluctantly joined her after it became obvious that Celera was not at all interested in beating up on her today.
"I hear," she began. "That women have beaten it before and gone off to victorious battles afterwards."
"Bullshit," Celera snapped. "That's the opinion of how our brothers think it should be. I can't even conquer that without a days rest, nobody can."
A long silence followed as Seripa fascinated herself with the lining of her battle armor. "Well I had to try," she admitted finally.
"You're damn lucky that they are keeping us back or you would have died." She let that last thought hang off her breath before she asked, "so how many did they take?"
"Four, three will be female and one male."
"A reversal of the normal ratio," she thought. Usually it was three males to one female. "That's odd," she commented.
"Not really," Seripa responded. "Lima died last week, I guess the pickings are getting rather slim."
Celera nodded, their planet turned so slowly that it was mostly desert. Little life survived, even Saiyan life, on this planet so their numbers had always been small. Even with the technology to control the climate in their compounds, and heal their bodies, the life span was fairly short. They were a brutal people who demanded blood for failure and the heads of the losers. "How'd she die?"
"Some baka wanted her to swear herself to him, she wouldn't so she died." Seripa's voice never wavered from its stoic torn. It was almost like she had been reporting the day's weather.
"Do you think you'd ever take a mate?" Celera wondered.
"Why would I? They already rip my part of the conception out of me and manufacture their Saiyans."
Celera agreed, recalling the pain of the procedure for herself. "I think about that sometimes," she admitted. "How our mothers are nameless figures in our lives; how I only know who my father is, but barely even know what he looked like. They say a nurtured warrior can be a fiercer fighter when it is taken away."
"Nonsense," Seripa said. "A natural born warrior is more unpredictable. Who knows what genetic problems may arise."
Celera nodded, "So you'd never mate?"
"I never said that, though mating for the purpose of conception may be unpractical now'ar days, I don't know. Who would you mate with had you been given a choice?"
Celera took a moment to consider her opinions, "I don't know, most third class warriors are uninteresting in that aspect. I suppose if I had to choose I go with someone like Toma."
Seripa snickered, "You're kidding right?"
"No actually I'm not, why?"
"I don't know it just seems like an odd choice, I think you'd get bored of someone like Toma after a while."
"Maybe I would," she conceded.
Yamee peered over the stack of papers that hid the small elfish like alien perfectly. He despised these aliens that scurried in and out of the holes of the Saiyan's compounds. They were trainers, technicians, spies, tactical workers, and analysts. King Vegeta had been wiser than his predecessors; he knew that the Saiyan business could not succeed with strength alone anymore. It used to be that all they needed to take a planet was a few well-bred warriors, but the times were changing. Technology was beginning to grow and supersede the Saiyan's natural might; even small out of the way planets were beginning to come into there own gold ages as far as machines went. Yamee had no use for paperwork, but apparently King Vegeta did. The Saiyan's were winning their planet booty with strength and science now. He as part of the Saiyan elite would have to adjust.
"King Vegeta would like a report," he snapped
The alien nodded from under his mountains of paper, climbing to their summits to peak his head over them and replied. "On what?"
"On whatever you're working on."
"Ah, well you see I'm working on several things for King Vegeta."
Yamee growled, "He said something about problems in The Room."
The elf nodded again, "Yes I have that right now." He handed Yamee the small stack of paper that had been carefully stuffed into a small folder. "I believe that's what he wants."
As he left he began reading over the file, knowing full well that this might not only threaten his position but also his life and also knowing that he would never understand a word in it. He looked over the strange arrangement of numbers and names that danced across his brain and refused to be read correctly. He also saw copies of the sign in sheet in The Room, this he recognized. Sadly he was not the slightest bit surprised when this was the only thing he understood.
"What did it read me as?" Celera asked half dreading the response.
"It didn't, I turned the machines off remember?" Drazil answered patiently.
"Right, I keep forgetting that," she sighed. Damn, she had wanted to ask him what it read Seripa as next. She was concerned that Seripa seemed to be taking the aftermath of the procedure worse than she usually did. Although that could quite possibly just have been because she was fighting when she should have been resting a little.
Celera reached again for the supply cabinet, taking from it a smooth green Scouter.
"Would you do the honors?"
Drazil mumbled something towards her in the form of an expletive but slid the Scouter over his ear contrary to his claims. He clicked the button on it with one of his four rounded smooth fingers and read the result off to her, "2800."
Celera took a step back, "2800?? That can't possibly be right, that's impossible."
"Yes it is and that's what it says, we've been through this before."
Celera nodded her head, she was extremely lucky that Saiyans could not sense ki to well or she would be in more trouble than she bargained for. Their Scouters would be a problem, she decided. "Is there anyway to fool the Scouters?"
"You mean hide your power? I suppose it may be, but I'm not the person to ask about these sort of things."
Celera smiled, she knew just who was the type of person to ask about these things. Hopefully he would still be working at this hour as it had grown quite late�
