Seed of doubt (Solo)

Natto was on his bed, on a very deep sleep and his mind was traveling back to the past, to a very distant memory, and that memory made him roll on his bed, restless, from one side to the other. Inside his mind, everything was clear.

Child Natto, 10 years old

Natto was a child on his memory dream. Only ten years old. A small saiyan kid, no taller than three feet and nine inches. He was inside his spacepod, holding his knees and copiously crying. On his mind, the memories of a devastated Felucia with his friends and foster family slaughtered like bugs. The planet was on fire when he woke up and saw the mayhem that fell upon the peaceful creatures that lived there. After a few days struggling with the ugly truth that he was the reaper of Felucia, as he became the monstrous Great Ape that the saiyans were, he had no other idea or choice than to go back to his home planet, Vegeta, the place he hadn’t been for the past seven years.

”I’m a monster… Dad, brother… I’m so sorry for killing you… You all loved me so much… Took such a good care of me, and I killed you all! I’m so sorry! You should’ve killed me when you found me! If you did that you all would still be alive! I’m a freaking monster! I don’t deserve to live! I’m sorry!!” he would keep on repeating the same sentence over and over again, as the tears kept on pouring down his face. He was holding his knees so tightly that it would bleed with the grip of his own fingers. He was haunted by the events, and he hated himself, and he also hated the saiyans. On his young mind, they were ruthless killers that had no place on the peaceful universe! They were threats to the likes of Sugoro and Sukogoro, his foster felucian family.

After a couple days his attack ball arrived on Vegeta, landing on Cacumber Capital, on one of the planet conquering headquarters. He woke up, with red eyes due to his constant crying over the past days and he was feeling rather weak and depressed. The moment his spacepod door opened, the only thing he could think of was to find his biological father, Douchi. He was the only caring figure he could remember, and he was longing for consolation and he knew of no other person who would be able to give him that. The child quickly stepped out of the spacepod and started running towards some random direction; he didn’t quite remember where he would be able to find his real father, but he had to find him quickly.

Two saiyans approached him, a male and a female. The male saiyan, a spiked hair slender saiyan with a pointy boned face named Coli, and a chubby female saiyan with short hair named Auli got near the kid. – You are Natto, right? I want you rep… - but, before Coli could finish his sentenced, Natto passed right beside him, ignoring him completely. He was deeply hurt and angry and wasn’t in the mood to speak to anyone now; he wanted to find his father and that was all. The male saiyan got angry when he was ignored, and vanished, reappearing in front of Natto. – Brat! Stop and obey! I want your goddamn report on the mission! – he shouted angrily, while Auli started laughing due to the fact that Coli was being ignored by the kid. Natto, in response, gritted his teeth and frowned his eyebrows. Tears started to show up on his eyes, and he clenched his right fist.

In a rather impressive movement, Natto, charged towards the adult male saiyan and landed a powerful haymaker to his face, sending him flying away, keeling over the floor as he felt back down. – LEAVE ME ALONE!!!! – he shouted with pure rage on his tone. Auli laughed even harder when he managed to hit the older saiyan. – Hahaha! Coli! I’ll tell everybody that a kid beat you down! And his power level is only eighteen hundreds! Hahahaha! – she teased her comrade, and that made him really angry as he got back to his feet. Natto was there, on his flawed fighting stance, glaring at his opponent with hatred. ”Damn you!!! I hate you saiyan!!! Saiyans are bad!!! I don’t want to be a saiyan!!!!” his thoughts were really hurting him deeply, as he couldn’t come to accept the actions he did on the other planet, nor the fact that he was on the same league as such repulsive people like the two saiyans that were standing near him.

Coli got back on his feet with a furious feature. – I’m gonna beat you, brat! I’m gonna start beating you now, and I don’t know when I will stop!! – he roared to Natto. – SHUT UP!!! LEVAE ME ALONE ALREADY!!! I HATE YOU ALL!!! I DON’T WANNA TALK TO YOU!!! LEAVE ME ALONE RIGHT NOW!!!! – he shouted again, rushing towards Coli, to throw another punch at him. However, this time the older saiyan was ready and grabbed his fist, grappling it so strongly that he broke Natto’s fist, making the young child to scream and cry in pain. But he wouldn’t let go. He brought the kid near him and started beating him, punching his face repeatedly. Blow after blow, Natto started bleeding like crazy, feeling the bones on his cheek to break. After a few moments of punishment, the adult saiyan hammered Natto to the ground, making him scream again as he spit quite a lot of blood and, following that, he jumped, landing with his knee on Natto’s gut. – AAARRRGHHH!!! – he shouted. – Fucking brat! This is the price you pay for punching me!!! – he growled. Auli approached, chuckling a bit and stared at the scene.

– I think that kid is Tamari’s son… It will be wise not to kill him. – she said. The mentioning of Tamari put some fear inside Coli’s eyes, making him stare towards Auli and then to Natto. He gritted his teeth and threw a few more punches into the kid’s face, making him faint. – I won’t kill him! Just teach him a lesson! And don’t go gossip to her, you hear me?! – he roared, staring at Auli with both fear for what she could do and also with a dose of threat. The chubby saiyan woman shrugged and chuckled again. – None of my damn business! Hahaha! – she said, before turning her back and leaving the place.

Natto wasn’t put into a healing pod. Instead, he was sent to a prison building on Cacumber Capital, where he stayed for a couple days, all alone. Both his body and mind were shattered to pieces, as he had to deal with the guilty over what he did, and the new hatred towards his attacker, Coli. He was also left to starve for the duration of these days, and started to think that it would be rather wise to cooperate with the saiyans than to fight against them; he wanted to meet his father, and being locked away wouldn’t help it, nor would it help to be beaten to death by Coli or any other damn saiyan. Why did they have to be so bad?! Natto couldn’t understand and those thoughts only made him miss Felucia even more, and he cried a lot.

”Dad… Big brother… I wish I was with you… I wish he could play on the caves and hunt some food… That we could train together again… And hear your stories by the campfire… Why did I have to kill you?! Why couldn’t I control myself?! Am I really such a ruthless beast? Why couldn’t my love for you guys be stronger than that thing that made me kill you all?... I guess it really means that I’m a monster…” he would thing during his stay on the prison cell. On the third day, when he was almost hallucinating, one bald man came. He had a big mustache and a serious expression on his face. – Kid, ready to cooperate? – he asked. Natto had to make a huge effort to stare at him, as he was completely week now. He wanted to eat, and, even though he was really mad at himself, he didn’t want to die just yet. He sighed and, with some effort, he nodded. – Very well… I’ll bring some food, so that you can have enough strength to speak up. If you make a fool out of me, this beating you had will seem like a walk in the park, you hear me? – he said and he meant it. Natto made some effort to nod again and the man left the cell.

After a few minutes, he came back with some sort of soup. Natto had lost most of his teeth on the beating Coli gave him so soup was pretty much all he could manage to eat. The kid jumped into the bowl and slurped it like crazy. It was the beast soup he ever had on his whole life, or at least it seemed like such. After he finished eating, he took a deep breath and feeling a little stronger, he leaned against the wall and stared at the man with the moustache. – Start speaking. I want the full report on the Felucia mission. – he said, crouching in front of Natto. – Well… Felucia had a full moon only once every twenty years… So, by the time I arrived at the planet it would still take seven years for it to come up… - he said, with tears coming up to his eyes as he remembered the scene. But he knew he couldn’t go on and cry, as it would show that he cared, and he was afraid he would get beaten again. Luckily his tears could easily be mistaken by the physical pain he was enduring, and the bald man even confirmed that thought. – Kid, I know you are injured, but you will be able to heal as soon as you finish your report, so do it quickly. I’m not a very patient man. – he said, making the child feel a little relieved that he didn’t suspect the true reason behind his tears.

– The planet was very dangerous too, with tons of strong creatures and plant-like things that could easily kill me and all… And the natives… - he gulped, with some tears running down his face. – I could only kill them when I managed to transform… Before that it would be impossible for me… - he said. Natto told him half-truths, since he didn’t want to lie about the felucians, but also couldn’t tell the whole truth, or it would get him into some serious trouble, and he wanted to go look for his family; he had to get out of his cell, and therefore, he had to cooperate. When he finished his report, the bald man seemed satisfied and got back up. – So… It seems like you attacked the official because of stress? – he asked at the end, to which Natto nodded, as it wasn’t actually a lie. With that, the man left the room, leaving the kid quite apprehensive for a while, but after less than ten minutes, a medical team got into the cell and took him to a healing pod.

It was his very first time into one of those machines and he felt really great. The liquid was really warm and welcoming, and made his body tickle as it healed him. He had plenty of bones to be healed and muscular damage. On top of that, he had plenty of teeth to grow back, and it made him stay on the healing chamber for a whole day before he was released. The bald saiyan told him that he was free to roam on the planet until further orders, with new assignments, and let him go. He was also given a new set of armor that was identical to the one he was wearing, because of the cracks it had. The child saiyan was now free to go look for his father and his family, but he had no clue on where to find them and that made him feel rather anxious and apprehensive. ”Where are you dad? I need to talk to you… I… I want to go away from here and never to come back!! I don’t like this place…” he thought, starting to cry again, but being quick to wipe it with the back of his fists.

Back into the present time, the adult Natto woke up. He was feeling heavy, like he had a huge burden held inside his heart. The young commander sits on his bad and stared at the floor of his room on the crew quarters of the Star Javelin. His dream touched deeply on his inner feelings. ”I’m feeling… Weird… Like… I don’t know… A little disgusted, maybe? Why? It’s so odd… I remember now… Once I hated us… And somehow I still have this feeling lingering inside my heart, but I can’t nourish it… We are victims of the aliens… That’s why we are like we are… And I’m becoming more of a saiyan as I grow up, and I think that’s the right thing to do. I have to become a true fierce warrior if I want to make sure we will be able to resist all of our enemies and thrive… But it feels somehow a little odd even still… Like it’s not completely right! Dammit… I can’t lose track of myself, but who am I now? What am I supposed to be… What am I supposed to do?” he sighed, feeling his eyes watering with tears. ”This responsibility… It changed me somehow… I grew stronger, I became a powerful super saiyan and a commander… But would the child me be proud of the saiyan I’m becoming? Somehow I don’t feel so sure and it is making me feel a sting inside my heart… No! I can’t allow myself to have such thoughts!” Natto gritted his teeth and grappled his blanked with quite a lot of strength, ripping it apart easily. ”I was too naïve back then, that’s why I had such a romantic view! My dad showed me that the felucians were an exception… I just have to look at the current scenery! The earthlings built this machine that could kill us… There’s that alien Reikiko that wouldn’t hasitate on killing us if it wasn’t for Kaula… The arcosians are also a threat and with them the brenchians and all… If I start doubting myself it will be their victory! Our way may be ruth, but it’s what’s necessary to be done! We have to make sure our race will survive and be able to prosper… And, when all threats are gone, we will be able to be at peace at last! And that’s something I’m willing to fight for!” he said, feeling his will power renewed.

Still, deep inside of Natto’s heart, a small and hidden seed of doubt had been resurrected. The outcome of that was yet to be seeing and it would depend on the future events.