Back in the dark depths of the lab, in a different wing that had been passed by by the survivors eager to escape, more occupants of the lab began to stir. A namekian surveyed the rows of closed pods... the status screens read that some were deceased, so he passed those until he came to a live occupant. A young human by the looks of it, though, augmented... Sangen couldn't figure out yet why this place was the way it was, but he could feel a growing power outside, and had already heard the explosions of battle. Chances were, they were more occupants of this lab, if the appearances of some of the individuals inside these tubes were anything to go by... releasing more could be a gamble, but, by the power signatures outside, it would seem he'd need all the help he could get. He quit hesitating and pressed the release buttons on the panels beside the pods with the man and the woman inside, and stepped back, letting them open and drain. It seemed like both were coming to, thankfully.
The low hum of the pod droned on and on into her subconscious. Closed eyes narrowed, her brow furrowed, and her fists clenched as she swam through the stream of a growing consciousness. These intense surges of energy...she wasn't sure how exactly she knew what that was, but it concerned her. Suddenly and without warning, a new sound hit her ears as the pod opened, the fluid draining from the machine while her body fell forward.
With a grunt of effort, the pink skinned woman caught herself on her hands and knees, coughing for a moment before glancing up at the figure before her, dark chocolate colored eyes scanning the form through the colorful mask adorning her delicate youthful features.
"Not the worst face I've woken up to..." The woman muttered to herself in an effort to steel her nerves.
Something about them seemed vaguely familiar. She couldn't place it, though.
"Hmph, good morning to you too.", the namekian replied curtly, before looking over to the other pod occupant, who had come to full attention much quicker than the kai had. "Don't expect a thanks for this. In fact, you might regret this later.", the strange man told the Namekian with a smirk. "So, seems like they finally abandoned this place. I'll have a bone to pick later with whoever left me with these rejects.", he scoffed, shaking his head as he looked around at the deceased pod occupants, some altered like he was, others mutated in various ways, and of course, the namekian who'd woke him up, and the Kai who'd just gained her footing.
A loud rumble echoed through the facility, and the dim emergency lights flickered as a powerful attack was unleashed outside. "Ohhh, a fight... what familiar ki... don't mind if I do!", he remarked, sprinting off down the hall and leaving the namekian and the kai behind. Sangen looked to the Kai. "Should have known the only people down here would be freaks. Seems like this place might not be safe for much longer... well, whatever. You coming, or what?", the namekian grumbled, before walking ahead after the strange Saiyan.
"Hmph. You're no fun." Chika groaned as she rose to full height.
She looked to the other man, the one who resembled...Earthlings? Was that the right term? Ugh, all these words swirling around inside her head was driving her crazy. While she didn't appreciate being referred to as a freak, it was apparent that all three of them here were at least odd. Still...
The man took off, muttering about a fight and a familiar ki. Typical mortal, rushing off to another fight. So shortsighted. Huh, where did that thought come from? Whatever. Chika shrugged at the green skinned man. There was another word that kept pushing at her brain whenever she looked at him. Namekian. What did that even mean? No matter, no time to worry about vocabulary.
"Yeah...yeah, I'm coming. Keep your pants on." Chika muttered in reply, hiking up her dress as she moved after him.
The Saiyan had all but disappeared into the darkness of the lab, and the Namekian, Sangen, guided Chika steadily towards the elevator shaft down the hall... considering how the sound was bouncing around here, and the smells from up ahead, he had a vague idea of where they were headed and guided them accurately to the empty elevator shaft. It looked like two humans were sitting at the entrance of the elevator... both women by the looks of it, and the black haired one was coming to.
"Ugh, my head is pounding... what's going on here?", the Namekian glanced down at her and shrugged. "You're in a lab somewhere. There, you know about as much as us. Looks like there's fighting going on outside. What you do next is up to you.", he remarked, before taking off ahead, and flying up the elevator shaft to where light was flooding into the ruined lobby, leaving Chika behind with one confused and freshly awake human, and one unconscious one.
Chika narrowed her eyes again, casting Sangen something of an accusatory glare that she doubted he noticed before crouching down to gently put a hand on the awakening brunette's shoulder.
"There there. We're all confused. Let's worry about getting out of here before we worry about solving mysteries."
The pink skinned Chika offered the Earthling woman as much of a smile of confidence as she could manage, given the circumstances. A feeling in her gut told her that she should try and look after these people. Even the ones that shunned her like the man before.
Chika spared a glance to the still unmoving human, moving to put their arm over her shoulder. She wasn't a big person, by any means, but she felt she was plenty strong enough to carry this person.
"I'm Chika. Let's get out of here, huh? Can you fly?"
"Mysteries...? Huh...", she responded, looking down for a moment as she contemplated that sentence. Yes, she had been solving a sort of mystery before all this, hadn't she? That was her job, wasn't it? Well, she couldn't figure out anything like she was now... The gruff green fellow had mentioned there was a fight going on outside for whatever reason, and by the sound of it, that made this place unsafe. She looked up to the pink skinned woman, and rose to her feet. "Fly? Ah... I don't think so, sorry. Name's Sasha, by the way.", she peered up the elevator shaft at the opening where the light was flooding in. "I can handle this much though, don't worry.", she reassured the kai, before taking a leap. She came just short of the top floor, but caught onto a cross beam, and used it to get herself higher, getting up to the top, where she looked down at Chika. "Looks like this is the exit... yeah, there was definitely a fight here, this place is wrecked.", she called out to the kai, giving her assessment of the situation.
Chika watched the woman finesse her way up the shaft, a bit of a smile forming on her face before she willed herself to fly upward. It was definitely interesting to meet someone who couldn't fly. When Sasha, as she had introduced herself, mentioned the condition of the place, it just rose further questions. She rose over the ledge, setting the unconscious person down once she was on a stable footing.
"This place is definitely destroyed. What is going on here? What's with this ki? It feels so...odd." Chika added, her eyes scanning for any obvious signs.
"We should keep moving. I have a terrible feeling." Chika picked the person back up, moving onward in hopes of catching up with the Namekian fellow.
"You're right about that, I can see it all over the place over there.... it looks... dirty?", she pondered, crossing her arms as she looked in the direction ZERO had first appeared. She walked through the rubble with Chika, to the edge of the cliff where Emmett could be seen fighting Zero below. Sangen was standing to the side, his arms folded. "Whoever that is, it isn't looking good for them... Things seem to be wrapping up for him soon.", he stated, gesturing to Emmett, who was at the moment dodging Ki slashes from ZERO. "Looks like he's a goner. I wonder what he was thinking taking that thing on by himself.", he scoffed. It looked like Exe had just made his way down the cliff and could be seen below, but what he planned to do was anyone's guess.
Sasha looked at the two from up top as well, and nodded at Sangen's assessment. "That thing's ki is... otherworldly, unnatural... just looking at it puts my hair on end...", she said, folding her arms and shaking her head. "I can get down from here on my own... but I think it's too dangerous to do that right now. I don't think I'd stand a chance against that monster."
Chika observed the battle from on high. This feeling of observational helplessness stirred in her chest, roiling like a boiling lake. It was so familiar to her, but she couldn't place why. What's more, this feeling was also rage. At this creature and it's strange ki. What was it? Why did its very nature make her so angry?
"Whatever that...abomination is...it must be dealt with. I don't think anyone on this planet can deal with it alone." Chika's voice took on a more serious tone, her fists clenching as ki pooled in the palms of her hands.
"Sasha, maybe you should worry about getting somewhere safe and out of sight. We need to purge this creature, though I would prefer no one else get hurt."
"Hmph... you may be right, that thing is a threat to the very planet itself... Can't have it messing up things here, can we?", Sangen looked back to Chika. "The question is what we do about this...", he remarked, as the battle below seemed to be coming to it's conclusion. ZERO appeared right behind Emmett, and from there it was all over, Emmett lost his arm, and the creature was pointing a finger at him, no doubt charging up a beam to finish him. "Looks like we can cross that help off the table...", he said matter-of-factly, as he raised two fingers to his forehead and began to collect Ki. "Maybe if he just stands there like an idiot I can blow his head off... but there's no way we're saving that guy."
"Don't worry about me, I suppose I'm safe enough up here for now...", Sasha told Chika. "If the fighting stays outside, I'll probably be OK, so long as something like that doesn't emerge from this lab...", she sighed, looking back to the dark elevator shaft. Chances were, that thing came from this lab too...
Chika pondered the situation. She knew she could use her ki to hold people in place, and some of her more tricky techniques could catch people off guard, but that was mostly up close and/or ran to risk of hurting others. Best chance was a distraction.
"I'm guessing you need a minute to charge that technique up? I'll try to hold him in place. His best hope for survival is someone to reach him and get away. I'll hold him in place. If you can catch him before he dodges or when he dodges, we should be fine...here goes."
Chika knew that their only real hope here was surprise. She rose her hands up into the air, waving her fingers gently as her eyes glowed faintly. Then she threw her hands towards the monster, letting out a grunt of effort as she wrapped her ki invisibly around the monster's body. Telekinesis wasn't a particularly viable offensive technique, but with any luck, his confusion would buy them time.
"Yeah, but I'm warning you, if this shot misses, we're in trouble. It's going to use up most of my Ki. Sad thing is... I don't know if it'll even kill the thing if it lands dead on... my power isn't what it used to be.", he remarked bitterly. With that, he kept charging up the attack, and Sasha stepped back into the shadows of the lab as Chika began to do her work.
The telekinesis seemed to hardly affect the monster from this range. It seemed he noticed it, looking around for a moment for the source before shrugging off the grasp... he was either too powerful or the range had weakened the attack considerably. Either way, he only glanced away for a moment, and it appeared the man fighting him took that chance, hopping back and popping up some sort of barrier. However, the monster's attack fired off in short order, and the barrier only managed to redirect the lethal blow, not stop it, bending the beam to hit his other arm rather than his heart... The monster readied it's sword in response to the man's defense, and it seemed like next time he wouldn't be getting so lucky... the time to act was now.
Chika growled in frustration as the creature easily broke free from her grip. She had to get that thing away from him! She closed her eyes and thought hard, the first thing that came to her mind was that dark chamber she just awoke in. In a flurry of desperation and panic, she flashed out of existence, wrapped her arms around the wounded man, and disappeared again, reappering in the chamber below.
Chika's eyes slowly opened to the dark room, holding the injured man against her body before slowly sinking down to hold him so he didn't crash into the floor. Somehow, she was able to do it, triggering some distant memory in her mind. How did she do that?
"H-hey! You're okay...I got you away. Just stay with me. I've got you." Chika spoke softly and calmly, gingerly removing the mask from her face in hopes of offering some small semblance of comfort.
Some part of her felt bad removing the mask, but this was important.
Emmett was completely bewildered. One moment he was fractions of a second away from death, and now he was back in the lab again being held by a pink woman... He supposed he ought to thank her... he'd completely run out of options there, and wasn't sure what he'd do next with both arms disabled. Instead, he nodded to the pink woman. "Thanks for the save... I don't think things would have ended well if you weren't there...", he looked down at himself, his arm gone, a bloody mess, and the other pierced through with a ki beam... the blood loss was beginning to make him feel a bit faint, but thankfully he realized he could do something like that monster had.
He took a deep breath, and focused Ki into the damaged arm, regenerating one just like the monster outside had. It was incredibly painful, but better than letting himself bleed out here. He flexed the new hand, and looked at it, before addressing the wound on the other side, regenerating the hole that had pierced through it. Regenerating like that was incredibly tiresome though, and he found himself leaning more heavily on his savior, his body just too tired at the moment to support himself.
Chika audibly gasped when the man regenerated his limb. She was certain that she'd seen things like that before, but she was also quite confident that those who had didn't look like this man. When his weight seemed to intensify on her, his shoulder pressing into her chest she allowed it to being her into a sitting position, letting him rest against her.
"That's quite the ability you have there. Just rest now. I hope the others can take care of the monster. For now, just worry about recovering."
"Yeah, I guess so, hm? Dunno how I feel about being kinda like that thing.", he sighed, forcing himself to sit up a bit more and give the woman some breathing room. It wasn't all that polite to be all over her, was it? Instead, he lied back on the cool lab floor, looking up at her. "I suppose you're right, I'll take it easy here for a minute. You can get back to helping the others... there's a sword out there where that monster and I fought, it's alive. If it's in trouble, you should help it too.", he informed her, as he closed his eyes. "I guess I should tell you my name. I'm Emmett."
Chika stood upright, looking down at the injured man. It seemed like he would be okay here on his own for now.
"Nice to meet you, Emmet. I'm Chika. I'm sure we'll get more acquainted later while we aren't at risk of dying."
The pink skinned woman glanced at the door, noting where the energy signatures were. Perhaps if she could make her way back out there and assist. Then again, her ki was already draining. The idea of a living sword needing help was interesting. Maybe she could lock onto it. There was definitely another unique signature, aside from the monster.
Chika concentrated on that point, and in another blur, she disappeared, reappearing on the battlefield not far from the creature, with a disembodied hand clutching a sword. She looked at the creature, dropping down before grabbing the sword and prying it free from the limb, slowly pulling back to try and gain a little distance.
She could still feel the energy from the weapon, her eyes quickly darting down at the weapon. Was this thing really alive? Either way, still a weapon.
"I don't know what sort of abomination you are, creature, but you won't be hurting anyone else today."
Chika raised the sentient blade towards the creature, preparing to move to avoid any attacks.
