Challenges and Chores [Okra]

There were benefits to barely requiring oxygen to survive. One of those benefits were a phenomenal capability to hold her breath for untold amounts of time. To any who would check her breathing, she'd croaked out a long time ago. That, and with her reduced breathing even her heart rate was fainter- especially considering she wasn't exerting herself. Though it seems their little caravan had reached an obstacle. Carefully opening a single eye in a tiny squint to get a backwards sidelong glance at the guy that'd dropped in and stopped the group, she nearly rolled her eyes upon realizing her deception might've been effective to both bad and good guys. Maybe.

The droning chatter of the bandits had become pointless to listen to at this point, but the guy himself that'd come to her seemingly necessary rescue seemed to be doing the intimidate-y thing and talking proudly about his strength. Well, to be blunt if she was in a fight she wouldn't have it any other way either. Blinking as she saw the one guy suddenly go flying from the limited field of view she had and smack into the other guy like a bowling pin she figured the ruse was just about up. There was no way this guy was just gonna let these people regroup and walk to their home base. She'd at least gotten directional information on where these people might be. She started to wiggle, and suddenly already in a panic the bandit that was holding her screamed even louder.

"HOLY SHIT, GUYS I DON'T THINK SHE'S EVEN DEAD?! AAH!" He shouted, releasing her in pure fear. Landing on the ground with a soft thud, she patted down her clothes as puffs of dust flew into the sky. She imagined how cool she should've been, infiltrating enemy headquarters all sneaky like before walking away after taking their leader out! Their main leader, that was.

Angrily running both hands through her hair, the group was a mix between apprehensively terrified and stupid courageous. In fact, one of them stepped forward and raised their voice to a fever pitch to perhaps try to intimidate. "You might have fooled them, but I knew all along! I have just been playing along with our squad Leader all this time out of respect, you see! I am actually stronger than everyone else here combined!" He shouted, a hand coming to rest against his temple as he took on a slight pose. Three of the other Canyon Crooks turned towards him and all muttered a paraphrased version of 'What the heck man...'

Yet he carried on, "S-so I will with the power I have totally ac-acquired, strike with all of my might!" He shouted, psyching himself up for a full on charge at Safe. Some of the other Canyon Crooks gave confused looks between each other. Yet he charged forward with a fist drawn back while Safe just sort of blinked. No way, right? Why? When the fist came in, she started to move. Yet the way she moved was almost comical, it looked like she was playing with them as she in almost slow motion began to weave around his attacks, only slowly twisting her body to avoid the blows. Some actually hit her, but that didn't ruin her fun considering it didn't hurt one bit.

Spinning full circle, she slowly sent a punch towards him. It was so slow it was almost laughable. And he did in fact choose to laugh. "Bahaha! Such a puny attack! I'll stop it with my hands!" He shouted, bringing a hand forward to grab her fist and push against it. Yet he quickly discovered that despite putting everything he had into stopping the slow fist from pushing forward, it kept going unhindered in the slightest. Slowly getting closer and closer as he leaned back and tried to let go, he found himself unable to as some strange unknown force kept his hand tight to Safe's. To those who sense energy, she was just using the basic ability to manipulate her own energy that radiated from her body to push inwards on his hand to keep it from pulling away. As the fist closed in further and further, he fell to the ground and Safe leaned down with him. The fist slowly closed in as his panic rose, his screams and terror got louder, and then it connected. He had practically wet himself, tears in his eyes while whimpering uncontrollably and... Nothing came of a punch thrown that slowly, even for a normal Earthling on the receiving end. Blinking, Safe spoke.

"So, I was trying to use you guys to find your home base. Though considering this happened unfortunately it looks like you guys should quit Crooking while you're ahead. If you want to show us- me where it is you can. Otherwise you should probably just run off and figure something else to do for a living." She said, blinking again. "Though if you want to fight, I'd love to fight you!" She exclaimed. That resparked the terrified whimpering and horror of both fighters potential currently present. Needless to say they scrambled quick, taking to the winds like little babies.

Turning towards Okra, Safe just tilted her head. "Well, not like you could've known the details of what was going on, it's fine. My name is Safe, and I was tasked to take down the Canyon Crooks from Crook Canyon. I didn't know where that was, but with them carrying me off in this direction..." She said, eyes following the direction they moved in, hand cupping her chin. "We- I should find it in due time."

Safe's right eye noticeably twitched as she stared at Okra. In but a few moments of seemingly nonsensical violence, her opinion at least as far as it was reflected on her expression had changed entirely. From an interesting encounter it turned into a grim confrontation. Not only was he just killing people that had no way to defend themselves with how large the power gap was, he was trying to instill fear more than was necessary. Not only that, but he was inadvertently including her in this disgusting display of his- as far as her thoughts were concerned. The heavy scowl over her face was only reinforced by her tensed jawline from gritted teeth. Yet, she mentally reset. Taking a deep breath, the Gray and Saiyan Hybrid exhaled slowly.

"Saiyan, Earthling, Okra, whatever. All you've managed to do is make yourself look pitiful. Someone with even a sliver of Pride wouldn't take any time out of their day to kill people that are too weak to do anything about it without extreme purpose." Her eye twitched again, a vein popped to the surface of her forehead.

"Yet here you are. Your words only serve to mask the story your actions have told. Are you scared if their leader finds out? You think that really matters? All we needed to know is where they were, it's not like this guy would be a problem with goons as weak as that. To think someone of your power is terrified of that possibility, enough to kill someone truly makes me wonder why you dropped in here and started firing off blasts and beams. Was it to mask your own insecurity by lording over the weaker? Don't answer, there's no point. They're getting away, if you even took a moment to think this through, there's no losing. Now that you've gone and murdered more of them, perhaps you just wound us up at the wrong end of the law, and while I could handle it I'd rather not make myself at odds with the government of Earth." She said, venomous in her tone as she clenched both fists. Taking in a deep breath, the tension in her shoulders faded somewhat.

"But if you want to fill your day by joining me for some training, then you're free to do so. Maybe you'll learn from example and act proper." She started to walk around him, squinting towards his butt to try and spot a tail. Then in a brilliance among her stupor she remembered what he had said before. Not to mention what the other group had noticed, they figured he was a Saiyan, so might as well go with that understanding instead of being weird and trying to find his tail. "I'm not even a full Saiyan, yet out of all of the Saiyan's I've met I am the one with the most Pride as a Saiyan. How this race must be deteriorating. It's almost pitiable. I have even been told of a Saiyan Kingdom upheld on these values, as time passes I'm starting to doubt that more and more. They're all just labels with no proper value, aren't they? It sure is easy to consider yourself Proud when you have the high ground, so of course this Saiyan Kingdom would call themselves that." She said, looking back towards the last bandit on the ground.

"You're free to go, by the way. If he tried to kill you, I'll get in the way. I am after all, half of the race he is. Seems like I need to pick up some slack on his behalf." Despite her words, the bandit had already been injured from the ki blast from before that'd knocked him over. At least he wasn't dead. Slowly trying to get up to his feet, the bandit began to limp off. She turned towards Okra again.

"We're moving. If you plan on having any outbursts in response to my lecture, leave it for five minutes until I'm gone. I'd rather not deal with this right now, it doesn't even feel true to the Spirit of Fighting to engage in battle with you. Though if you give me no choice, I will." She said, starting to lift up into the air as the bandits limped off.

"As for what I had been saying before, there's no losing. Either they walk off and turn a new leaf, or start a new group that can serve as later training, or they run to their leader and lead us right to him. If somehow they do neither, we can just keep going in the direction they were walking. It's not like it's easy to hide a base in these areas. They're from a place called Crook Canyon, so first canyon in this direction is our best bet." She said, pointing where the group had originally been walking before they'd been stopped.

"Also, you can ask your questions now and on our way. I enjoy talking, so why not."

Immediately, she just looked back towards him before starting to fly over the terrain. Keeping generally around Okra, her attention turned back forwards to scan the horizon for anything of interest. "Say what you will, give whatever reason you want, but at the end of the day it's just an excuse to justify cowardice- even if you believe it's just an extension of whatever training was drilled into you. If you were confident in your Pride, you wouldn't have gotten angry when I talked it down. You'd have known were your heart and mind rest, and wouldn't have needed to so aggressively try and tell me otherwise. I have a long history of my own insecurities, I know how it manifests. Even to this day I'm battling with my own problems." She said, watching tumbleweeds roll through the land below them.

Passing over a couple of crevices, she continued to speak. "The way I see a fight, their power is irrelevant to the respect they deserve. It's sometimes difficult to stand by my beliefs when I hear about people who want to wipe out entire races and see people suffer because it's fun, but killing them will only recycle tragedy, it won't end it. Ideally it won't be what you'll always do. My mother told me of her ancestors who frequently went to other planets and conquered them. The Saiyan's of the past seemed to hold something akin to pride as well, but it was a skewed type. They had to prove it by winning and killing their enemies so that their comrades would be proud of them. The only ones that were proud among Saiyans were the Saiyan responsible, and the other Saiyans that heard of their accomplishments. Nobody else cared, and if anything else were just scared. That to me seems warped. The Universe should be a place of adventure and opportunity. There will always be tragedy, I've been through much of that myself, but if you let it seep into every moment and reflect in your behavior, you just become another one; another tragedy."

Ascending a little higher to get a better view, she extended her arms outwards to feel the breeze against her palms. "The future you seem to envision is one where only the powerful exist. Have you considered who makes the food you survive off of? Maybe you're one in a thousand that hunts their own food, but I've tried food that the Earthlings make, and it's the best stuff I've ever eaten. Just because they don't have rippling muscles and impressive auras, doesn't make them any less important to the Universe at large. Their contributions have certainly helped me recently. I've been happier because of all the yummy food I've been trying, I've been able to train harder because of the gravity devices and weighted clothing they invented, and I've met Humans who are smart enough to make robots stronger than ninety percent of the Saiyan race. A 'nobody' as you might consider them is still not to be shrugged off." She said, following up with a sigh.

"But you're not entirely wrong. It's possible those guys will just keep doing the same thing, it's possible that they'll sew more grief than the tragedy of them all dying right then and there would've been. It's hard just to find villainy cut from villain cloth, doesn't work like that. Something makes them that way, and they're usually rough stories. You can only hope that by letting them go they learn their lesson, they learn how much they're missing out on and they turn a new leaf. At least with those guys back there. There's no cookie cutter way to address every problem. To be honest, I would be sad if I found out they killed more people. Yet I'd be happy to hear they're living better lives. Standing there imposingly, and murdering their friends isn't going to make them want to change for the better. In grim honesty, I doubt those people will really change now that you've killed multiple people they were close too. Sentient life always finds a way to get what it needs, and connections are one of those things. Even bad guys need company."

Scanning the horizon again, it seemed like they were still just flying above nothingness, not much in sight quite yet. "I doubt I will if you keep acting the same way. I only did the first time because I hoped I could influence you to change. If you can't, you'll just be another person that should you keep sewing destruction, need to be fought. Not in the grim sense you're thinking, I don't ever fight with lethal intention. I will fight you to prove there's a way to strength beyond just violence, and there's so much more potential in nurturing life instead of causing death. If it comes to that, but I'd hope you at least can swallow your own beliefs for a moment to logically think over some of the things I said."

Then she turned midair and flew with her body tilted sideways to face him fully.

"You said you wanted to ask me questions. Still want to hear those."

Continuing to fly forward, something was starting to appear far off on the horizon amidst the crack riddled terrain below. While they approached, Safe answered Okra and shared her thoughts.

"What cultures I am aware of or not is irrelevant. Perhaps the only application is that if 'Saiyan Pride' is that, my potential misinterpretation just means that Saiyan Pride is less than what it could be. As much as I wasn't in the mood to fight someone else, I wouldn't have turned you down either, and I still won't. I just can't tolerate ridiculous behaviour. It's like standing over a hill of Earth Bugs and poking dead them at random. Except even worse, because each of these people are relatable in some sense. I'm just about done talking to a brick wall in that sense, though." She said, continuing to fly forward.

"It looks like at the rate we're flying, we should be there in a couple minutes if that there in the distance is anything to go by." She said, pointing to what was more and more appearing to be a giant crack in the ground going down to who knows what from this distance. Lowering her arm back to flow at her side. "People choose their place, they are not expected to be in a particular one. I never assumed you hated any of these people, in fact it might be even better if you did. Just like I've come to the realization I'm talking to a brick wall, te sooner you realize that nothing you can say will change the bottom line, the easier it'll be to carry on." She said, continuing to move forward. In fact, getting closer she started to accelerate her speed to quicken their approach. It seemed like her patience for talking was running thin. Yet despite this, she humoured what he said with responses of varying seriousness.

"The worst thing is, I can empathize with your position. I could see myself in a mindset where I've been punished for sparing people so severely that I've become reclusive and brash in my judgements, and I'd label all of those that have done bad as the most irredeemable of scum. In fact, there might've even been a time I was in a mindset like that as a child. I never once said all of these people were redeemable, nor is that my point that I was trying to cross. I don't have any one single point, if I had to summarize all of this to one big topic it'd be Fighting Spirit. The pure joy of just fighting other people and treating them as fighters before any sort of moral baggage they might carry. It doesn't matter how evil or good they are once they're in a fight with me. I'll treat them the same, and I'll never take their life." She said, turning around to look back for a second before rotating back forward.

"The way I see it, the Universe has a natural order of things. People like us are rare and outliers, as much as it's easy to find each other. It's like being on a different plane of existence, because we're looking and always out there doing similar things, we bump into each other more frequently. The reason I'm saying this is that when it comes to evil, a lot of things like those bandits are just the natural order of worlds. What they bring to populations toughens the people and develops governments and police forces to keep them at bay. It makes civilizations more capable, if I happen to cross paths with them then I don't mind dealing with them in the slightest." She said, rubbing the back of her neck.

"The Villains that become something massive in the Universal scale are those that will be easy to get in a fight with. When you're evil and at the scale of us fighters, generally while they might in passing wreak havoc on some random civilians, their ultimate goal is usually planetary annihilation, genocide or universal extinction. It's rare for motivations to run deeper than that, unless it's just general angst from being wronged at some point, and they feel like everything other than them deserves to pay for it. It's all out there, as petty as it is." She considered his final scenario and that which she said before it. At this point the canyon was clearly visible as they were roughly twenty five seconds away.

"It really didn't. Not anything that couldn't have been gotten without murder. Your impatience just made you take the quickest route. That's even assuming we needed them to tell us where we're going. I would've found it eventually, and the journey is most of the reason I'm doing this." She said, pointing to her gravity belt. "You're presenting the worst possible scenario to try and corner me into an answer that sounds familiar to you. Making assumptions about circumstances that if I had my way wouldn't be a problem. Yet I'll humor your very... bold assumptions first and say I'd keep them locked away. However in reality, I'd be there when they were up to no good. I'd have learned to sense energy and discovered a way to get around fast. You see, I want to be the strongest in the Universe. I want to wish on the Dragon Balls for immortality, so I don't need to have my strength sapped away from old age. So no, my answer to this is I'd fight them and win every time they went to do something, forcing them to retreat to whatever corner of the universe it is they nest in to try and get stronger to overpower me in the next fight. I'd force myself through every evil attempt. Though I'd also fight good people just for fun too." She said, shrugging.

Pointing down, she'd come to a spot right above the massive canyon. Down below seemed to be the Canyon Crooks base, Crook Canyon. Bandits walked around like ants, piling across rope bridges laid out between one side to the other, about halfway down with an earthy slope leading downwards. Though, Safe and Okra could fly.

Looking towards the various pathways and bridges that bandits went around, her attention was pulled over towards the grouping that Okra pointed too. Squinting down towards it, she pondered. "I mean..." Reaching a hand to scratch the back of her head, she spoke. "I wasn't really intending to do this all strategically or anything. I just wanted to get my training in for today. So if we just go down there and deal with them I can move on with my routine." She then narrowed her eyes at some of the stumbling people. They were drunk? Uck, she hated anything that compromised peak mental efficiency - that was an exterior substance and not an internal issue.

Taking in a deep breath, she just sighed. "There's not much to look at. I wouldn't put so much focus on this, you're taking it too seriously. Just have some fun training, though I guess if you don't have something to artificially make this at least a little more straining, it won't really be that beneficial." She said, starting to lower down into the crevice. Looking towards the massive drill, a brow did raise up. "Uuuuh. I don't know, but good on them. That's quite the accomplishment, I'm not one for far fetched theories, but maybe they have friends in high places. I was told after all by my manager that this wouldn't be the only thing I needed to do out here. Apparently there's also another sub faction in the forest somewhere in this region. I'm probably going to go check that out after we're done with this." She said, lowering down further.

As she descended enough, the guards in that one particular opening- packed in there like sardines pointed up and shouted. It seems they'd been caught onto, not that Safe was ever trying to be discrete now that she believed she'd find the main source of her training. Raising her hand up, an open palm extended towards the sky as a gargantuan violet ball of energy began to form. Frankly, it seemed to be overkill for the purposes of this. It looked like if it impacted the opening, there would be nothing to tell of it ever existing besides a crater. However, the massive orb split into five beach ball sized orbs that relocated to hover as best they could over each finger splayed out in her palm. As she slowly gripped her fist to condense the energy, each of the orbs were forcefully crushed inwards into a tighter and tighter, more compact form until they became nothing more than the size of marbles; hyper packed with energy. Waving her hand lightly forward, each of the marble sized violet balls went flying towards the opponents. Each one seemed to erratically move through the air, as if being suddenly pushed by invisible forces until they connected with the temples of bandits. Yet there was no explosion, no gory piercing of skulls. Instead they just thunked into their heads and the unconscious bodies of the guards fell back and thudded against the ground beneath them. Though, she only had five fingers for this trick of hers; it appeared as if a single one of the guards suddenly became panicked and ran inside. He shouted.

"Alert Crook Commander Beat!" While running inside the opening he had been standing at the entrance too. With a mechanical clunk, a lever apparently was slammed down and sirens began to blare. The ground around the surface of the canyon began to shake and tremble as the eroded soil shook and started to vibrate off the edge to reveal a massive horizontal metallic gate that was slowly shutting as sirens went off erratically. Quickly lowering herself into the opening before it shut, she'd wait for Okra to get inside as well. Since the speed of the shutting metal doors was impressive, both arms shot out and she let out a grunt as she strained to hold it open for him to pass through.

"Lets go! Maybe this is more complicated than I was expecting! Kind of assumed my manager gave me a chump change training routine! Hahahahahaha!" She laughed, a bead of sweat forming at her forehead. She would immediately let out a sigh of relief as she let go and slipped within, the opening slamming shut with a massive thud to reveal flashing swirling red lights that'd turned on and started a back and forth pattern amidst the otherwise abyss black canyon without the natural light from above to aid with visibility. This seemed to be more than mere bandits. They might actually be in danger!

'THE INTRUDERS HAVE ENTERED THE FACILITY, DEFENSIVE SYSTEMS ETA 30 SECONDS UNTIL ACTIVATION, ALL PERSONNEL ARE ENCOURAGED TO RELOCATE TO LOWER LEVELS FOR SAFETY.'

A voice had blared over the rhythmic siren that had been to say the least, a little annoying on the ears. Especially for Safe, who's face was contorted in discomfort. With those larger box like ears of her, it was no surprise that she was more sensitive to sound, even if that was only on a minor level. In fact, to express this distaste the Gray and Saiyan hybrid reached an arm out towards one of the grated speakers just barely sticking out of the wall. Firing several energy blasts towards it, the small detonations dislodged the entire thing, causing it to fall and clatter throughout the entire canyon into the abyss below. The sound got a little quieter now that the closest speaker had been destroyed, alleviating some of the actually painful sound.

Considering Okra could take care of himself, Safe spoke. "Well, you pointed out that gigantic drill. If I had to guess, pretending to be mere bandits might be their idea of going under the radar. If they have that drill, who knows what the real purpose of this place could be. One of the things I was wondering was why instead of just leaving me where I was, they chose to pick me up and start carrying me here. I had intended to just follow them once they were done, but... Well, you saw what happened. Maybe this facility- not just some base, has a more... dangerous purpose than we were expecting." Unsurprisingly, as the clock continued to tick down and Okra beat up more henchmen before finally fully regrouping with her, more out of place technology made itself apparent.

Stepping around a corner from within another opening, a guy fully clad in Alien gear started waving around a blaster. Wearing some sort of armor similar but different than what the World Trade Federation might wear, as soon as he spotted Safe and Okra he began firing. What was most peculiar was that this wasn't some mere Earthling, they looked to be an alien of some type. As several blasts fired towards Safe and Okra generally, it was still to no surprise that with a single condensed energy blast - much easier to do than a bunch of them, Safe overpowered the attacks and the energy ball bonked the aliens forehead to knock them out.

"We might be looking at something a lot bigger than we were expecting. Just my luck!" She exclaimed, clapping her hands together. She wasn't actually being sarcastic, with a wide smile on her face it looked like her training had just become a lot more fruitful. While doing just about anything with twenty times the gravity of Earth pressing down on one being training, this was like an intense workout!

"I imagine they have some kind of generator or something? Looking at that guy over there." She said, lazily pointing towards the unconscious alien. "We might be dealing with a force from Outer Space that has been trying to blend in. There's only one way to find out for sure!" She shouted, starting to run into the top most opening. Getting through the doors, that guy was nowhere to be seen that'd tripped the alarm to begin with. Inside was what appeared to be a sealed shut metal door. Slowing in front of it, Safe gave it a small punch and it dented. Confirming it was a normal metal, she pulled herself back a few feet before leaping forward to kick the doors down. Crashing to the floor with a thud, it was revealed that inside was a massive communications hub. Huge monitors hung from the ceiling and consoles were lined up with what looked to be black plastic chairs sitting in front of them. This almost seemed like the command bridge for a ship, except there was no observation window to be seen- monitors in their place. Worst of all, everything had been turned off and upon further investigation it was readily apparent that the people stationed here had evacuated through two other exits on both the right and left sides of the room. They had entered from the back.

Whistling, Safe just folded her arms across her midriff. "Well, would you look at that. We're definitely dealing with more than bandits. Maybe we should actually expect a proper challenge. They were talking about some Commander Beat, could be a formidable opponent." She said, walking forward towards one of the consoles. Upon it seemed to be some sort of form, maybe something that didn't make it to the paper shredder in time. Lifting it up and squinting, she read some of the important bits off.

"NWTF Communications Protocol..." She started to skim, muttering bits and pieces. "Only activate at midnight for a period of ten to thirty minutes maximum to communicate with other cells... Okay... Uuuuh headsets must be sterilized daily... Okay, this is all just a bunch of random crap." She turned to look towards Okra.

"Do you know what the NWTF is? I know WTF is World Trade Federation, but they were dismantled or whatever." She said, bringing a hand up to cup her chin thoughtfully. "Regardless, those weapon sy-"

'ALERT, DEFENSIVE SYSTEMS ACTIVATED. ALL COLLATERAL IS AT FAULT BY THE EMPLOYEE, NOT ADMINISTRATION. INCINERATION WAVE IMMINENT.'

Blinking, Safe realized they might even be in over their head. Or perhaps, that was just an intimidating broadcast to scare them off. Though, in that instant the Gray and Saiyan Hybrid was hiding under a console table in a little ball, looking out as the count down went off.

"Get under the table! I hope this is enough!" She said, enthusiastic at least. "Wait actually I have a better idea!" Jumping out at the five second mark from the ten second countdown, Safe started to draw out her energy with an exerting growl.

As her arms flew to either side of her body, a barrier formed around her that seemed to only be held together by her fingers physically holding onto the edge of it from their barely outside position. Ideally, she would surround Okra with it too. Though, maybe he had his own answer to this particular dilemma.

'Three... Two... One...' Suddenly a roar of flame engulfed the facility, the main canyon being scorched to a black char as it exposed underlying metallic structures beneath. With this being the only unsealed room due to Safe's effort, the incineration wave flew into the room and eradicated everything ordinary; consoles, papers, the slightest amount of rock that was visible. Though with their power levels as high as they were, even without protection it was apparent this might only give minor burns at most. Still, one wouldn't know that until it was upon them.