Dragonball M, Chapter 3: In Blood, Bone, and Ash! The Way Forward Unlocked!

[Tami]

"My first plan was to just overload the nanites with energy. However, I realize that plan wouldn't be easy if impossible to execute. So the plan I'm currently thinking of is a way to bypass the nanites' absorption ability. A way to actually cancel out the nanites' absorption ability," Praxat said.

" I know trying to overload the nanites isn't the best method. Trying to get them to overuse the energy they store or under loading them might not work either?" Praxat said.

"Ah have a suggestion, Praxat." Dash stood up, "Work on the problem on your own. Jinzi wants us to be unpredictable, so use this problem as a way to be unpredictable, assuming you can figger out how to defuse the Doc's nanites."

[bruceleegreyhulk]

Parsley sighed heavily. "And what will you do when the Doctor throws something at you that causes your plans to fall apart at the seams almost immediately? Because that will happen, I promise you. It happens every time."

Praxat skin color turns a deep blue." Look I know my plan has a high chance of failing, I know this would likely turn into a suicide mission. I know the chances of any of us coming out alive is slim, but I want to prevent that from happen. I want to make sure we all get out of this alive, I don't want anyone to have to die, I want all of us to see a tomorrow," Praxat said.

[Tami]

" Look I know my plan has a high chance of failing, I know this would likely turn into a suicide mission. I know the chances of any of us coming out alive is slim, but I want to prevent that from happen. I want to make sure we all get out of this alive, I don't want anyone to have to die!" Praxat said.

"None of us do, being is scared is natural, for some of us." Dash glanced at Parsley and Sasheem, "Still, it's best to turn that nervous energy into somethin productive. For you, that means tryin to work out how to depower the Doctor."

[bruceleegreyhulk]

"None of us do, being is scared is natural, for some of us." Dash glanced at Parsley and Sasheem, "Still, it's best to turn that nervous energy into somethin productive. For you, that means tryin to work out how to depower the Doctor."

Praxat calms down." Jinzi is there a place on this ship I can work in private? I'm going to use this problem to be unpredictable. I'm going to work out a way to depower the doctor, and I'm going to do it in secret," Praxat said.

[Sub-Zero MKA]

Praxat skin color turns a deep blue." Look I know my plan has a high chance of failing, I know this would likely turn into a suicide mission. I know the chances of any of us coming out alive is slim, but I want to prevent that from happen. I want to make sure we all get out of this alive, I don't want anyone to have to die, I want all of us to see a tomorrow," Praxat said.

"Then I'd suggest you start trusting the other people on this ship, instead of wasting time planning to do it yourself," Parsley responded. She got up and left. Like Charco, she had had enough of this.

When she was clear of the command deck, she stopped, slid down the wall until she was sitting, and held her head in her hands. I just want to live so I can go home, she thought to herself. It had only been a week or so, but it felt like so much longer. She still hadn't been sleeping much, and was running on fumes. The only time she got a full night's rest was the only night she was with Avoca. Every other night had been only a few hours of fitful rest, followed by hours of thinking, analyzing, and recording her thoughts. The majority was just a stream of consciousness with no real frame or flow.

It had been a struggle to keep her composure. The looming threat of the doctor did wonders for keeping her focus, but the constant, never-ending idiocy she had been forced to endure had whittled away at her nerves to the point where there was very little left. She needed a reprieve from stupid people obsessing over pointless nonsense while distracting themselves and others from the more important facets of their journey.

Well, it wouldn't be much longer. Either they won and she could return to Vocado at last, or they lost and they would all die.

Either way, she would finally be free.

[Tami]

Praxat calms down." Jinzi is there a place on this ship I can work in private? I'm going to use this problem to be unpredictable. I'm going to work out a way to depower the doctor, and I'm going to do it in secret," Praxat said.

"Ah think I can help." Dash sat down at teh Scanner console, and used it to pull up an image of the interior of the ship. Point to a spot, "Ah think this room might do. No one is there an you can close the door for privacy."

[bruceleegreyhulk]

"Ah think I can help." Dash sat down at teh Scanner console, and used it to pull up an image of the interior of the ship. Point to a spot, "Ah think this room might do. No one is there an you can close the door for privacy."

" Thanks, Dash that will do. Also, I'm going to need your help and Jinzi, the help of everyone to pull this off," Praxat said.

[KingofPie]

Praxat skin color turns a deep blue." Look I know my plan has a high chance of failing, I know this would likely turn into a suicide mission. I know the chances of any of us coming out alive is slim, but I want to prevent that from happen. I want to make sure we all get out of this alive, I don't want anyone to have to die, I want all of us to see a tomorrow," Praxat said.

"Sasheem sure doesn't. Some of y'all would look better dead! AHAHAHA!' The Majin stated, his belly laugh echoing throughout the hallway as he left the flight deck.

[Tami]

" Thanks, Dash that will do. Also, I'm going to need your help and Jinzi, the help of everyone to pull this off," Praxat said.

"Ah'd say wait on that. The element o surprise is bout all we have on our side, an the few who know what you're up to, the better."Dash stodo up and placed a hand on her shoulder, "Ah trust you'll figger this out on your own. When the time comes, if you need us we'll be here. Ain't gonna be anyplace else, after all."

[grampagen]

Ever since Ochazuke had presented the knowledge of Adam for Praxat to factor in to her plan, he had grown silent as the cacophany of noise washed over the bridge.

Plan after faulty plan, based on incomplete information, now twist to suit a thread of lies as if it would absolve foolishness. As if this desperate reach to be heard would somehow render expertise.

All from the refusal to admit a simple mistake.

The Toadians never blink, yet somehow they never see anything at all.

"Who gives a **** on what the dude can do?" Charco grumbled from his seat, "************ can also get his ass beat, which is what we're fixing to do."

Although necessary considering the message he had sent all of his contacts, the boy regretted destroying his communicator at the moment. He could have distracted himself with his music, but now the only sounds he had were people trying to formulate plans with technical garbage speak.

"Hey, guys!" He suddenly said, his voice mockingly cheerful and dripping with sarcasm, "Did you know that Jagam can shift his vital organs?" The aural facade dropped and he resumed his previous tone, "He can't anymore because he's fucking dead. Which is what might happen to us if we focus on useless bullshit."

When Charco voiced his thoughts on the matter, like the Terrible Claws they cut right to the quick of the matter. Brusquely after his own manner, sharp as it was brief.

He among all of them knew they had no time to waste. Among the last few words they had in confidence, it was clear the young man had little time left to spare.

Countless lives had already been lost, among this timeline and the myriad possibilities of what could have been. They had fought and got this far, and the wounds many of them had borne showed the length of their sacrifice on the outside. Ytt it was less simple to account for the toll taken within.

A band of warriors always stood ready to fight for the sake of each other, if nothing else; He who stood alone over the abyss had nothing, only the darkness before him and a cruel howl at his back.

Yet even now his spirit burned. If there were any other way, Ochazuke could not rule out the possibility that the yoke of the past could be shed for him. Rest assured it shall not be the end for either of you.

Parsley sighed heavily. "And what will you do when the Doctor throws something at you that causes your plans to fall apart at the seams almost immediately? Because that will happen, I promise you. It happens every time."

Before Parsley left the bridge, Ochazuke called out after her.

"Even if we should face something we do not comprehend, then I suppose we shall have to accept it," amid the summit of desperate theory-crafting and furor, he extended her a nod in weary solidarity. "Like the past conflicts, observe the matter for what it is and work together to assert our position."

Slowly, he turned back to the task of navigating their course, echoing the Doctor's words. "Dare we challenge his resolve, indeed?"

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

Parsley nodded and took over the station. "Attention. Whatever you're doing, drop it. I have information on The Doctor that we all need to know before our battle with the rest of his forces begins. To begin, I will describe the six videos and the audio file that I viewed in his home when we traveled to AT6.

Well, alright. Ishtar thought, quirking an eyebrow.

And while she wasn't particularly interested in what Parsley had to say about the Doctor, considering her own opinion of things -- that he needed to die, and soon -- when Parsley started dispersing the information she had amassed over the intercom ... Ishtar offered an ear.

"... Not sure why she left me this. Punishment, perhaps. But that doesn’t seem right. Not cruelty, but curiosity then. Yes, that seems more accurate. I’m an experiment. She wants to see what I’ll do ..."

As the information-sharing began in earnest, the alternate Jinzi's voice coming through the intercom after a short delay, Ishtar soon found herself paying more attention than she intended; especially as she seemingly understood the man in one small aspect ... and how he might have felt: He realized in the end, he was little more than a puppet being made to dance for an unseen audience. Realized too perhaps, that the loss suffered was nothing more than a step in this clandestine 'performance'. If the death of a loved one had hollowed him out ... this truth merely made him ...

Though as the tapes continued, Ishtar paying rapt attention now; this burgeoning understanding became ... uncomfortable.

"... I can’t even remember the last thing I ate or drank. I can’t even recall what either thing tasted like."

The 'lesson' was different ... desperation serving as the catalyst over an equipoise ... and yet to go without food for so long, Ishtar thought now wholly transfixed on the tapes. The first year was the hardest, once the process had begun ... the pain. By the time a century had passed that had faded, but it had taken with it all memory of taste. As Ishtar recalled her 'Second Lesson', the second tape ended and the third began.

“... I don’t sleep well. Or much anymore."

Ishtar heard it immediately in his voice. This one was ... different.

The years spent in isolation weighed heavily on him -- fourteen, nearly if her memory of 'galactic standard years' was accurate -- had aided in his efforts to strip away everything deemed 'non-essential'; and to do that ... divest one's self of memories, and desires all for the pursuit of a goal that was largely predicated on a surreptitious hope ... Ishtar knew it well. Still found herself at times recalling things she had shut-off thousands, even tens of thousands of years prior ... and while those stretches of time were little more than eye-blinks for someone of her 'condition'. For Jinzi ?

I am beginning to understand ...

“Day 5,635. Attempt Three hundred and seventy partially successful. Release of unknown Ghetti-Adam nanites from my own system created an artificial relay in the atmosphere. Lasted twenty minutes but long enough to scan the entire planet. There is nothing left. Not one sign of human life, not one building, not one iota of anything. I understand now. She said this was to be a new Genesis, a new beginning, but I understand what she’s really is. Desolation. But I can effect things now. The nanites proved I can build even through her tech rot. Before the relay went down, I did get a blip of something....odd. A temporal energy. Will investigate further.[/I]'

It was only a span of two years, between the third and the fourth ... but already Ishtar heard it.

The onset of mania ...

A thing Ishtar had never suffered, herself, and yet one she understood intimately. How many times, after all, had she seen the onset of such when a civilization fell; and many times had it precipitated that fall ? Far too many to recall ... Already, Jinzi's voice had been stripped near completely of anything resembling his former self. A state shared to a lesser degree when one stripped away everything non-essential, and yet ... there was a cadence reserved only for the freshly mad.

... and for the first time since this all began, Ishtar felt a twinge of pity for the man; and yet these glimpses into a shared past had more to offer.

He starts laughing, a low and mad sound.

The sound ... so similar to the tittering creature Ishtar had encountered -- that was simply herself, if only more bestial -- first in the Vide Blanc, and then again during her foray into the White-Gold Room. Little more than an aspect of her troubled psyche no doubt; and yet the timbre of the laugh was nearly ... pitch perfect.

It cut deeper than anything had, yet.

“This planet will never house life again. I finished what she started with the desolation, I just made it permanent. The sun is dimmed forever, and I have the beginnings of what is necessary. I’ll travel back and stop this all. I’ll.......”

He stops, clutching his head and breathing heavily.[/I]'

And when he spoke, Ishtar understood that the one speaking now, was no more Jinzi than the Beast she became when Sekhmet died, had been Ishtar ... and what he had done was very similar to what she had done, but on a grander scale. Killed a world ... and the system that surrounded the life-giving star. Was it a night to remember, I wonder. Or protracted ? Yet if Ishtar felt that the man she heard in the penultimate video was Jinzi no longer ... the last left nothing to interpretation.

“Good luck. Forgive me, please.”

In the end however, there was a final, dying gasp of the man Jinzi had once been ... and Ishtar drew in a ragged breath.

"..."

What had happened to this Jinzi. What had been done to him, and what he had done to himself in order to become 'The Doctor'. It was a process Ishtar had cared little for, before it had been shoved into her face and been made to be unavoidable. Now that it had been ? The chill that ran down her spine, and the way she shifted uncomfortably in her seat was enough to show that she understood the man in a way she was uncomfortable with.

And that she had considered this man -- and Asha'rah by familiarity of their ultimate aim -- to be nothing more than wanton monsters ...

Am ... am I ...

"That's all I have. If you have any questions, find myself or Ochazuke."

A cold sweat breaking on her forehead, and the bond she shared with Sarada offering now only chaos. Ishtar shot out of her seat, and left out of the room toward the Bridge. Not now ... please ... not now.

" Since my body constantly needs solar energy to regulate its body temperature. I would basically be a smorgasbord for those nanites. I can't have those nanites absorbing the store solar energy in my body," Praxat said.

When she arrived on the Bridge however, she found Parsley, Ochazuke, and several others in an exchange bordering on 'heated', with a ... Toad ... person, she'd never noticed before. And when Ishtar heard fully what was being discussed, it seemed to be nothing more than ...

"Inane drivel ? Now ?" Ishtar asked, voice hoarse. "ahem ... No one here has the time to tell you why what you are offering is not useful, dangerously witless I would even go so far as to say, even with what little I have gleaned in standing here. So ... if you are only going to continue on with that ... shut up." The Oni rubbed her temples idly, before exhaling. "Just ... shut up." Of course ... silence was not meant to reign here, where a Pegasus dare to tread; and when Dash followed up with her own comment on the matter it took a good few seconds for Ishtar to fully process what she just heard.

... and given her current state ? There was little preventing Ishtar from truly speaking her mind.

Without looking up from the console, "If Meagan were here she could block those nanite things from getting any energy, or maybe drain them or somethin. Only, ah think it's be hard on her, seein as how the Doctor is an alt of Jinzi." Dash then looks up, "Anyway those nanites can be controlled by somethin outside of the Doctor?"

"... Who cares ?" The Oni said calmly, as she turned to look at the girl.

"Who actually cares what Meagan would do were she here ?" She asked again, now facing Dash. "As I understand it, she believed it better to return to Chroma: the petty squabbles of a weak-willed civilization deemed to be more important than the literal End of All Things. She did not even see fit to stay for the sake of her mate ... and now, standing here, I cannot help but wonder if the ceremony I was forced to sit through was merely for the spectacle of it. To say nothing of just how little she has seemingly offered on this task of ours. Her most notable achievement before turning tail, coming in the form of a disqualification for cheating."

The golden-eyed Oni resisted the urge to spit in disgust -- a habit picked up from the Saiyans -- and simply shook her head instead. "even the Majin had the presence of mind to help stop The Doctor: and the Majin is ultimately after the same thing. So please. Save the words spent on attempting to prop Meagan up for more of those lackluster attempts at saving face. Her actions speak louder than any words offered by her ... mouthpiece and that she is not present says even more." Turning away then, the Oni made ready to walk over to Parsley, before stopping.

"Before you even attempt to ... save whatever lackluster offering you might use as a retort. I do not care."

With that, the Oni focused her attention on Parsley.

"I have corrections, if you would care to hear them ..."

[Sion Reaver]

Aleka personally wasn't sure half of what was going on anymore.

Patience had always been something of a strong point, any decent parent had to have at least a little bit of it and doubly so when dealing with children while teaching even if most hadn't been all that bad. Even with all that said, in times like these and with the amount going on even her nerves could get fried. She really didn't know what the Toadian was going on about and she kind of zoned out after a bit of them speaking.

Since they lacked much of any Intel at the moment it was just a matter of whatever will be, will be.

Ask me some months ago and this is the last place I thought I'd ever be...

[Tami]

Dash raised an eyebrow at the Oni's strange outburst, then she shook her head and said nothing. Dropping her hand from Praxat's shoulder, she returned to the seat by the scanner console.her attention now focused on the controls.

[bruceleegreyhulk]

Dash raised an eyebrow at the Oni's strange outburst, then she shook her head and said nothing. Dropping her hand from Praxat's shoulder, she returned to the seat by the scanner console.her attention now focused on the controls.

Praxat thinks about her actions for a second and comes to a realization. "Dash, Ochazuke is right I been basing my plans to take down the Doctor on incomplete information. I know jack **** about Adam expect that his nanites can absorb energy. My fear of the unknown is making me irrational," Praxat said.

So I admit I made a mistake. Jinzi, please tell me all you know about Adam. I need complete information on him," Praxat said.

[Sub-Zero MKA]

Before Parsley left the bridge, Ochazuke called out after her.

"Even if we should face something we do not comprehend, then I suppose we shall have to accept it," amid the summit of desperate theory-crafting and furor, he extended her a nod in weary solidarity. "Like the past conflicts, observe the matter for what it is and work together to assert our position."

Slowly, he turned back to the task of navigating their course, echoing the Doctor's words. "Dare we challenge his resolve, indeed?"

Parsley nodded. Amid the inanity, at least one other person understood. The other, funnily, was Charco. She supposed without his music, he had no choice but to pay attention and give insight, even insight as refreshingly biting and precise.

With that, the Oni focused her attention on Parsley.

"I have corrections, if you would care to hear them ..."

"Yes," was all she said before retreating to the hall.