Post by Samba on Mar 10, 2016 1:13:47 GMT
Chapter One: Enter, Samba!
A village filled with Wolf Zoans lived in a remote village deep within the mountains hidden by miles of wilderness. Its occupants, although of the same species they still varied greatly from their looks, body shape and profession; most of them preferred to help the village by farming and hunting for prey while the rest trained and honed their skills as warriors, the first line of defense of the village against anything that would wish them harm. They normally only had to deal with the animals prowling around their homes, from the smallest Sabertooth Tigers to the enormous Tyrannosaurus Rex, and then to the pathetic mountain thieves or even some of the Giras roaming the area.
One member forming the latter lot was a child Zoan named Samba. He was dressed in sparring Gi and almost seeming to vibrate in place, and why wouldn't he since today was a special day. He will finally learn to harness his Ki besides how to hit harder and stuff. Today he was going to learn how to fly and how to sense Ki!
Samba was, like the other children that chose to join, trained from an early age to be a part of the warriors that protected the village. One would think that such a child wouldn't know of compassion or kindness, but one look at the vibrant eyes of Samba and his carefree grin would tell you otherwise, although trained to kill and protect his village he was still a child at heart and not jaded by the harshness of the real world just yet.
Today Samba was up and early in front of two Zoan warriors for another training session, just one more of out a trillion many he had withstood for so long and will continue to do so for many years to come. The older male Wolf Zoan standing in front of him with his arms crossed over his chest was Samba's Father, a hulking wolf of a Zoan considered by many to be one of the strongest Warriors the village had to offer. He merely wore a pair of comfortable black pants while forgoing a shirt and shoes entirely.
Beside him stood a more petite but no less strong female Wolf Zoan, she was Samba's Mother and the mate of his Father. Instead of going for a Gi she chooses to wear a normal pair of pants, boots, and a shirt. Besides it wouldn't be necessary for her to wear one, since she would just watch over their training and of course as usual scold the two dumb 'pups' once they overexerted themselves.
"Come on, Dad~" Samba whined with lowered ears, his voice still in that place where it was perpetually high and squeaky because of his age. It normally drove the child nuts because once someone heard it they never took him seriously, but today his mood would not be dampened by this setback, no siree it won't be. "The sun is bright, not a cloud in sight and the birds are tweeting their annoying squawks. What better time to practice how to fly?" He figured that practicing how to sense Ki will come later, he first wanted to experience the wind in his fur and on his tail as he soared the skies and beyond.
"Besides, I bet you I can learn how to fly swimmingly by the end of the day!" Samba stated cockily while he smirked at the self-imposed challenge, drawing an amused chuckle from his parents. They might sometimes run their child to the ground and be very demanding in his training, but it were these moments were Samba could still smile and laugh that lifted their hearts and put a smile on their own faces.
"Aren't you forgetting something, my precious pup?" Samba's Mother asked with a knowing tone in her voice, and immediately Samba tried to look as innocent and cute as he possibly could. He didn't have to try hard enough but still this was his Mother and she always saw right through him.
"Um... no...?" Samba trailed off with a wince and a sigh, he was caught red-handed so he might as well save some dignity, however, small it was. "I also need to learn how to sense Ki." The child grumbled with a pout and under his breath, earning a belly laugh from the taller wolf Zoan.
Chapter Two: The Training Begins
"Indeed." Mijoren, Samba's Father said as the comfortable atmosphere changed drastically, the time for familiarity was officially over for the time being. "Now to be able to fly you need to concentrate Ki on the bottom of your feet and push it outward at a constant rate, as you get more experience with it; it will come so naturally to you that you won't notice it." As a demonstration Mijoren slowly started to float upward little by little until he stood three meters off the ground. The Zoan smirked at his son's awed expression and confident that he earned his son's full attention he continued the lesson.
"Now you try it, but a word of advice." He quickly stopped his son who seemed ready to fly from excitement alone. "As you channel Ki to the bottom of your feet, remember these rules. Too little and you will merely raise a cloud of dust. Too much and you might find yourself shooting straight into the stratosphere. Finding a balance between the two might take a while, so don't be disheartened on not mastering it on the first try."
Samba's tail wagged so fast it was almost a blur, though his face was set into a determined expression as he nodded to his Father and started to practice, one would think that first practicing and getting a feel on how to read and sense Ki would be the first step to learning how to achieve Flight, but Mijoren was someone that believed in learning things the hard way. Besides once his son learned the necessary amount needed to achieve Flight, reading, sensing and locating Ki should be a cakewalk.
To say that Samba had a hard time, at first, would be an understatement. The first time he did it he raised a small cloud of dust, and the second he shoot upward like a bullet so fast that Mijoren had to quickly catch him when he eventually came back down, at least, he didn't scream his head off when he did so, though his hackles were raised in clear surprise.
Even with those small setbacks, Samba didn't let it get to him and just keep trying harder. It was well into the afternoon when Samba finally managed to fly for about ten seconds before he had to come back down because of how tired he was, his fur and clothes caked with dust showing the fruits of his training. To say that after that Rotija, Samba's Mother fussed over him would be another understatement. After a quick wash-up, change of clothes and a brief snack (which consisted of a whole serving of grilled meat that could feed a small army and green tea to wash it down with) Samba and Mijoren were ready for step two of their training.
"Now that you have a good grasp on how to flight, albeit a slightly shaky one, it's time to start the next part of your training," Mijoren smirked as he started to float higher and higher. "Now that you can fly, it's time for you to learn how to sense, read, and locate Ki. As you know already Ki sensing is the ability to sense the location, life force, and power level of anyone; the stronger and closer the being, the more powerful the sensation. Also, if a Ki is very powerful it can be sensed from afar by people who are trained to sense energy; like me and your Mother's and hopefully also you. Finding my Ki shouldn't be too difficult since I'll burst my energy at random intervals so you can find me, but every time you do I'll suppress my Ki until you can't feel it at all."
"..." Samba understood the general gist of this training, but he couldn't help but scrunch his nose up as he realized that this training sounded eerily like something else he would sometimes play with the other Zoan cubs when he had some free time. "So, like, Hide and Seek? This is the next step of my training?" He looked and sounded skeptical that such a thing would help him get stronger, but his parents never lead him astray and surely they wouldn't start doing that now.
"Heh. You would be surprised on how such a mundane thing can help you in strange ways." Mijoren shrugged his shoulders with a small chuckle. "Now get to the air and get ready, I'm going to hide deep in the mountains and once you cannot sense my Ki anymore you'll have until the sun sets completely to find me." Before Samba could even get into the air his Father already turned tail and with a small boom shoot off into the distance.
Samba grumbled as he looked at the dot that was his Father flying off somewhere. He looked at the sky and couldn't help but whine under his breath. "Before the sun sets?! That's like three hours away!" He turned around when he heard someone giggle, and looked up at his Mother ruffled his hair affectionately. "The longer you stay here complaining, the longer your Father has time to hide from you." Eyes widening at the sound reasoning of Rotija he quickly turned around and -shakily as he was still getting a grasp on how to fly- shot like a fired cannonball into the sky and towards the mountains.
"It's been almost two hours already, where the hell is he!?" Samba grumbled under his breath as he searched every nook and cranny for his Father's Ki signature. It has been bursting on and off and each time he found Mijoren the hulking Wolf Zoan would shoot off to a random direction and the whole process would begin anew. But this time, he couldn't get a reading on his Father's Ki anywhere, and he had been trying his damnedest for the past two hours. "And there's only an hour left!" The child grumbled again while crossing his arms.
Sometimes he would get a reading on his Father's location, but as soon as he approached it would disperse and left him feeling like an idiot when he searched everywhere and found nothing. Like right now he was done exploring a dark cave where he could have sworn Mijoren's signature lead him into, but there was nothing to be found inside except pieces of bones, dried blood and an acrid smell that made his nose sting and eyes water.
"Ugh, what even died in here." Samba gagged at the awful smell as he walked out of the cave, and almost got his head chopped off from his shoulders by a massive paw for his troubles. He had felt the Ki of the one that attacked him at the last second and that's how he was still alive instead of a bloody mess on the floor.
Still he didn't escape unscathed, he could feel a horrible pain in his right shoulder and down to his side, and a quick glance showed that he was bleeding quite a bit from a deep gash on the right side of his body. He could absently feel how his heart was beginning to speed up and a chilling sensation coursing through his body, but hearing a noise he sluggishly turned towards the sound of growling.
He paled from a different reason altogether.
Standing a few feet away from the downed cub was a large animal, its form imposing and muscular, a deadly predator in its own right for someone as defenseless as a cub could be. Samba, of course, wasn't a normal cub, but the wound on his arm and sides coupled with the blood loss was making him weak and easy picking for the sabertooth.
Chapter Three: Sabertooth Tiger
Scared, feeling lightheaded and lost, the child shivered against the threat to his life looming in front of him. "I-- I need to g-get away..." Samba stuttered as he took a step back, wincing at how those predatory eyes suddenly snapped onto him and shone with the promise of a chase. "But..." The child gritted his teeth as he held his injured arm securely and concentrated a large amount of Ki on the bottom of his feet. "Like hell, I'm making this easy for you!" Before the sabertooth could pounce on his 'prey' the child rocketed off into the distance with a loud boom, distorting a large amount of dust that smacked right into the tiger when he pounce to attack the child.
Samba yelped as he crashed into a nearby tree once he was finally done ascending and started to descend back to the ground, he might have covered a few miles or even just one kilometer for all he knew, but what he did knew was that he was relatively safe for the time being. Now he only needed to worry about his bleeding arm and finding his Father, which considering how hard it was on the latter this might be a problem for him.
"It's nearing sundown too..." Samba said between pants, his body feeling cold and clammy all of the sudden. "Ugh, I knew I shouldn't have skipped Mom's first aid lessons. Now it's coming back to bite me on the tail." The child heaved himself up to a standing position using the tree as a crutch, and once he was standing shakily back on two feet he concentrated hard deep within while expanding his senses. He needed to find that spark, that energy signature that belonged to no one but his Father.
There! He could feel it in the distance approaching rapidly towards his direction. But another signature was also moving towards him, and when he heard the enraged roar that couldn't belong to anyone but probably the sabertooth he pissed off with that stunt he did the only logical decision when faced with a beast that could crush you with its teeth.
He turned tail and ran with his tail between his legs.
He made some ground before the Tiger caught up to him, but the constant use of his Ki to fly all over the place coupled with his injuries and blood loss made Samba sluggish and weak. Running away wasn't helping stem the blood flow either, in fact, the longer he ran the more he felt dizzy and feeling like throwing up the meat he ate hours ago.
"SAMBA!" Hearing his Father's howl gave him a bit of energy to keep moving forward, as he ran he turned his head slightly as saw his Father speeding toward him from the air, and below and almost stepping on his heels was that damnable sabertooth tiger. Seeing that his prey was about to be rescued the tiger pounced once more with a great leap.
Seeing his impending doom, Samba did what any other child would do when they were in danger; he called for his Father's protection. "DADDY!" Samba yelped as he tripped and quickly curled into a ball while closing his eyes tightly, missing the light show that happened next.
"FULL MOON BLASTER!" With a roar filled with fatherly protectiveness, Mijoren quickly channeled his Ki into the back of his throat and with another roar he unleashed an energy wave at the threat against his son, and with an explosion that raised a large amount of dust and almost toppled trees the tiger was no more than dust into the wind.
"Samba!" With no time to lose the adult Wolf Zoan stood beside his son and gingerly cradled him in his arms, being mindful of the injuries his son sustained. "Don't worry son, we're going to heal you. You'll be fine in no time. I'm sorry this happened to you." The Zoan nuzzled his Son's cheek as he flew up and high back to the village.
Samba wanted to speak up and say, "Not your fault, Dad." To his Father, but his eyelids felt like they were trying to lift the world, and in no time at all the child was fast asleep. Though at the back of his mind he made a promise to himself, that for as long as he could help it he wouldn't never be that helpless again. He didn't expect to always come out on top but he'd put one hell of a fight before crashing down.
Chapter Four: Rite of Passage?
"Ugh, let go of me, Dad!" Samba struggled against the binding around his legs and wrists. Hogtied like a damned pig send to the slaughter it wasn't a wonder that he wasn't on board with this situation, much less so when his Father sort of kidnapped him in the middle of the night and currently flying off to Kami knows where.
"Stop struggling or I'll drop you." That small threat did it, knowing that he wouldn't be able to work himself out of these binds; he quickly stopped struggling and just decided to lie there like a huge sack of potatoes throw over his Father's shoulders. Samba pouted for a full minute before he finally asked why he was being taken like this. "... So how's life?" Well, he didn't exactly ask that question directly but the meaning was quite clear, at least, to him.
"Life's good." Mijoren nodded slowly, being just as obtuse as his son, after all, Samba had to have got that from somewhere. "At the moment, I'm trying to take my son to his rite of passage so that he will finally be seen as a man to the rest of his peers. He's kinda making that difficult by acting quite childish." Both of them wisely ignored the fact that for all intents and purposes Samba was still just a child in age, barely a teenager to put it correctly.
"Oh." What else could you say to that? And besides, couldn't his Father just had come up upfront and told him this in the first place? Oh right, his Father wasn't exactly the paragon on doing things the right way. He shouldn't be as surprised as he was at that moment considering the circumstances.
So, his village had a rite of passage. Who would've thought?
He wasn't exactly the most interested one in his village's tradition if he was being honest with himself.
"Stupid Father..." Samba kicked a rock off a cliff, he was standing near the edge of it and looking down at the large drop back down. "Using flight is forbidden, using small energy blast against predators is also forbidden and trying to cheat my way through these rules is ALSO for-fucking-bidden." Looking around the Zoan adopted a deadpan expression at the situation he found himself in. "But did he really had to leave me stranded right on TOP OF THE HIGHEST MOUNTAIN HE COULD FIND!?" He said with an even tone at first before descending into an echoing yell that stretched vast and wide.
A roar sounded in the distance.
"Oh give me a break here, barely my first day and already gaining the attention of a predator." He could see how some trees crumbled and fell in the distance, so whatever it was was probably huge as hell and with a bad attitude. How nice. At least, he wasn't as defenseless as before and not bleeding to death like four years ago. "Welp, better make sure to never cross path with it." With a sigh the Zoan started his descent back to the ground, he almost tripped three times out of ten but in the end, he reached the ground safely before high tailing out of there.
Fighting on the first day before even finding a cave or something for himself to fix as a home, not to mention making supplies, fix a storage for food and then worry about the conditions of his future living arrangements?
No thank you World, no thank you.
Well, one thing was for sure, his life won't ever be dull now that he would be living and procuring for himself for three whole years.
Chapter Five: Three years
"How do I find myself in these situations again?" Samba wondered to himself for what felt like the umpteenth time. Currently, he smack dabbed in the middle of a pack of sabertooth tigers that were surrounding him. He didn't even knew how he had managed to get here. One moment he was minding his own business, searching for the kill of the day and the next he was suddenly surrounded on all sides by overgrown pussy-cats.
Speaking of time, three years had clearly done wonders for the once small boy. Now a teenager and sixty years old he was starting to look like his Father in looks though he was leaner and not as bulky as Mijoren quite yet. He was steadily getting there, though, the once small cub longed to become as imposing and strong as his Father one day.
But back to the moment at hand.
"Please don't tell me you guys were with that other tiger some eight years ago?" Samba arched a brow in a clear show of judgment of their time. He also wondered if they were waiting just for this day to get him cornered and exact revenge. Judging by their growls, snarls and roars in response he hit the nail on the head with that shot in the dark.
"Well then..." Taking a battle stance, Samba made a 'come hither' sign to the tiger prowling in front of him. "Come at me bro." With a confidence smirk fixed on his face, the Wolf Zoan was soon swarmed by overlarge cats on all sides.
To say it was a 'slaughter' on the tiger's part was an understatement.
"And don't come back!" Samba called after the retreating tails of the overgrown cats. He sustained a few injuries from that 'small' scuffle but nothing that he couldn't just ignore and then heal up later on anyway. "Geez, and I was afraid of one of them when I was a cub? I wonder what was wrong with me." Samba chuckled as he brushed the sweat out of his forehead.
"Perhaps someone has become quite cocky." The voice that he had longed to hear for so long sounded behind him, and wildly turning around he found the proud yet stern visage of his Father staring back at him. "I wonder if I need to break that out of you again."
"You can try, pops." Samba's face relaxed into a true smile as Father and Son shared a tight hug with each other. "How's Mom holding on?" If his voice was a little shaky, his Father thankfully didn't point it out. "She's fine though she fussed about your well being every day." Leaning back Mijoren grinned at his son. "I did as well, but it seems that you could take care of yourself just fine."
"It wasn't easy, to be honest." Samba looked aside as some stuff that he endured those three years flashed briefly through his mind. "I learned that trusting blindly was naive. And that there was strength in numbers. I learned how to take care of myself and how to make the best of a bad situation. Basically... I grew up."
Mijoren smiled proudly at his son as he drew him back into another hug. "You might have grown up, but you always be that small cub that wanted to learn everything and become strong." Samba felt his shoulder become wet, and immediately his own eyes began to sting with unshed tears. "Yeah, and you will always be my foolish fool of a Dad."
"You cheeky brat." Finally parting apart, the larger male cleared his throat before becoming serious. "Seeing as you endured the last three years and became a man of your own, you have officially passed the rite of passage. Congratulations." The Zoan winked cheekily. "Son."
Samba snorted. "Come on Dad." The smaller Zoan started to ascend into the air while aiming a grin down at his Father. "I bet Mom's getting crazy waiting for me to finally come back, let's not keep her waiting. Besides you have no idea how much I missed her cooking."
"She always had quite the hand in the battlefield, and also the kitchen." Chuckling merrily Mijoren took flight and with a silent challenge both flying off towards their home.
Feeling the wind caress his fur and cool off his body, Samba closed his eyes and enjoyed the moment. With a whoop of joy, he accelerated his speed. If someone asked Samba how he felt at that moment, he would gladly tell them that he felt like he was on top of the world.
As it was, for Samba life couldn't be sweeter.
Chapter Six: Life was Hell
Screams. Fire. Laughter. Death.
This was all that Samba could hear echoing all around him. The moment that the Saiyans found their little home it became a fight for survival. None of his people were sparred, and those that tried to run after sustaining life-threatening injuries were swiftly shot down without mercy or compassion. Even the cubs weren't sparred by these two Saiyans, and in fact, they seemed to take great pleasure in killing them off one by one.
It pissed him off how callous they were about taking a life, especially his town's villager's lives with no concern for anything but destruction in their eyes. He could see in the distance how his Father, Mother and a select few were fighting tooth and nail with one Saiyan while the rest kept the second one busy. It was a tactic they normally used when dealing with more than one enemy or trespasser than threatened their homes in the past. Break one assailant from the rest, quickly subjugate them with no chance of backing off, and once they either died or ran away they'd rinse and repeat until there was no more left or they decided that attacking their town wasn't worth the effort.
Limply he dislodged himself from the wall he was almost hallway into. He touched his jaw and heard a crack as he fixed it back into place. Moving it to help the ache go away he decided that he did not want to get hit with one of those punches again. Shaking his head he quickly jumped back into the fray to help his people take out the trash, so to speak.
"Hey you! Monkey boy!" The Saiyan turned with enraged eyes at the insult being throw at him and swiftly earned a fist to the face that send him flying off into an almost collapsing home. Which soon enough broke down on top of him with all the punishment that it took so far. "Take this! Full Moon Cannon!" With an angry yell, Samba threw a large sphere of Ki at the Saiyan once he was in reach, and not taking the chance for granted the ones battling the Saiyan quickly did the same.
There was a large explosion, and judging by the cry of the last Saiyan remaining, the other one was thankfully gone for good. One would think that their luck would have turned out for the better, but their hopes were soon dashed. There was one vital part that they forgot about when confronting a Saiyan, and it was to never do it when there is a Full Moon out.
And it just so happened that today there was a Full Moon on and about, and once the Saiyan looked up with a savage grin on his face, it was clear that shit was about to hit the fan at full speed.
Watching with dread as the form of the Saiyan changed drastically and became a giant ape, amiss the screams of fright from those that saw it and couldn't help themselves, Samba couldn't help but have one thought run through his mind as the great ape loomed above them all.
Life was Hell.
Chapter Seven: A New Beginning
He did not remember when he passed out, but judging by the cut on his forehead and the multiple aches all over his body, he'd put it on good authority that he was probably send flying off quite hard into one of the last remaining houses that still stood firm against the onslaught of the invading race. Feeling like he weighted half the world he slowly extracted himself from the dead trap that was the collapsed home he was under, and took in his surroundings with despairing clarity.
Corpses upon corpses lined the streets, some of them were on top of fallen structures, others were throws half-inside some buildings, and everywhere you looked seemed like a huge child had an explosive temper tantrum. Under different circumstances, he might have laughed at his own joke but right now all he could feel was a hollowness in his heart.
He liked to believe that he wasn't the only survivor from his hometown, he didn't want to become some sort of wannabe last of his kind thing or whatever. But clearing those thoughts out of his head, for now, Samba set forth onto the greatest and more arduous task he would ever do in his life and something that he wouldn't wish on anyone.
Burying his family, friends, and neighbors.
---
Samba took a deep breath as he affixed his current garments and made sure that everything he would need was safely secure inside a duffel bag that he found somewhere in the wreckage. There were not many things that he could salvage from all the destruction and chaos, but thankfully he found a set of clean clothes that managed to fit him and some Zenni that was laying out and about. It wasn't much, certainly not enough to last him the month but it would serve him for at least a week, two if he was hopeful and sparingly used it.
"I'm going now. Mother. Father. Everyone." Samba bowed to the multiple gravestones aligned in a somewhat neat row in front of him. He had searched far and wide and if he was confident of his skills, then everyone that had perished in the village and still left a body behind was buried and finally put to a proper rest.
"Please, watch over me, wherever you are." Without another minute to spare, Samba turned around and walked away and out of his hometown, feeling like something was breaking with every step and like he was leaving something precious behind. But with every step he took the broken pieces molded and shaped into something else. The pieces were a bit broken, and some didn't fit together like they used to, but it still formed a jaded foundation for him to stand upon.
He might have wanted this to had been different, and certainly with the blessing of his parents behind his back. But he couldn't change the past, and he wasn't sure if he would be able to, or even carry it out if he could. But he could make the best of out a disastrous situation. Oh he wasn't totally fine, far from it in fact, but he promised himself that he would cry and let it all out when he could, but right now he needed to move on.
Look out World, Samba is ready to tackle you head on.