Chapter 29: The Variables
The deep hum of the ship vibrated through the mountain, a sound that meant only one thing. The outside world had not forgotten this place. The fragile peace of the cavern shattered.
Kakarot froze. His sparring stance fell away. Every muscle in his body went tight, not with fear, but with a cold, furious understanding. His head tilted up, as if he could see through the rock to the metal beast in the sky.
Moori lowered his hands. "They have come."
Kakarot did not look at him. His eyes were fixed on the ceiling, his mind moving faster than any scouter. A Lodestar class survey ship. A crew of technicians. Their job was to scan, to poke, to find any little thing that did not belong. Their scouters would be sweeping the planet right now. Looking for life signs. For anomalies.
His eyes snapped down. They swept across the cavern. He saw Kael gripping her spear, her face pale. He saw Lyra and Shera and the other women, their eyes wide with a fear they knew too well. He saw the hide curtain twitch where the children were hidden.
They were not allies. They were not his people. They were variables. They were loose ends. They were a cluster of life signs that did not belong on a cleansed world. Their very existence was a beacon. A risk.
The equation in his head was simple and brutal. The ship was a threat because it could report what it found. What it would find was them. Therefore, they were the threat. Eliminate the evidence, and you eliminate the threat.
The decision was made in a heartbeat. The deal was over.
Kael took a step forward. "What do we..."
She never finished.
Kakarot moved. There was no yell, no warning. One moment he was standing still. The next he was a blur of motion.
His hand shot out, not in a fist, but with fingers held stiff and straight like a blade. It punched through Kael's leather armor, through her ribs, and into her heart with a wet, tearing crunch. Her eyes bulged, shock and pain wiping away all other thought. He ripped his hand free, and she crumpled to the ground, a fountain of dark red blood spraying from the hole in her chest.
The cavern erupted into chaos. Lyra screamed, a raw sound of pure horror. Shera roared and charged him with a heavy rock held high.
Kakarot pivoted. He did not block the rock. He flowed under the swing, his body moving with the new, terrible grace Moori had taught him. His palm, glowing faintly with contained energy, slammed into Shera's stomach. There was no explosion. The force was focused, internal. Shera's eyes went wide. A mist of blood sprayed from her mouth as the shockwave liquefied her organs. She dropped like a sack of meat.
Lyra was scrambling backward, fumbling for her bow. "No! Please!"
A thin, precise beam of ki, no thicker than a needle, shot from Kakarot's fingertip. It pierced her forehead between the eyes. The back of her skull exploded outward in a shower of bone and brain matter. Her body went stiff and then collapsed.
The other women broke. They ran. They screamed. It was useless.
Kakarot became death itself. He was everywhere at once. He grabbed one woman by the arm and used her own momentum to slam her into the cavern wall. The impact was sickening, bones snapping, her body going limp. He backhanded another, his enhanced strength caving in the side of her face. He did not use big, wasteful blasts. He used focused, brutal, efficient kills. A ki blade sliced a woman in half at the waist. A punch to the chest left a smoking crater.
The children. The thought was cold in his mind. Loose ends. Future threats.
He tore the hide curtain down. The children huddled together, crying, screaming. He showed no hesitation. No mercy. A small ki blast incinerated two of them where they stood. He grabbed a young boy by the head and crushed it between his hands with a single, brutal squeeze. It was over in seconds. A final, silent stillness fell over the cavern, broken only by the drip of blood and the low hum from the sky.
Moori had not moved. He stood frozen, his green skin ashen. He watched the genocide of the people he had sworn to protect. His body began to tremble, not with fear, but with a rage so deep and pure it was silent. His hands clenched into fists, and a green aura, brighter and fiercer than any he had ever shown, flickered to life around him.
"You monster," he whispered, his voice shaking with a hatred that filled the room. "You soullless animal!"
He launched himself at Kakarot, not with technique, but with pure, grieving fury. He moved faster than he ever had, his fists glowing with green energy.
Kakarot was ready. He met the charge not with avoidance, but with a contemptuous defense. He blocked Moori's wild blows, the impacts ringing through the cavern.
"You are a fool," Kakarot snarled, shoving the Namekian back. "They were a risk. Their lives meant nothing. Their deaths mean my safety. It is a simple calculation."
"They were people!" Moori screamed, attacking again. A wild kick was caught and redirected, sending Moori stumbling.
"They were weak!" Kakarot roared back. "And weakness gets you killed! You taught me that! You taught me to be efficient! To remove obstacles! They were an obstacle!"
Moori's attacks grew more desperate, more furious. But his grief made him sloppy. Kakarot, cold and logical, saw every opening. He ducked under a swing and drove a Spiral Hammer fist into Moori's side. The Namekian grunted in pain, stumbling away, clutching his ribs.
Kakarot did not press the attack. He stood there, chest heaving, splattered in the blood of the people he had just murdered.
"I am letting you live," Kakarot stated, his voice flat and hard. "You are still useful. You will continue to teach me. Their deaths have simplified our deal. There is no one else to protect. There is only the training. You will do it. Or you can die here with your precious people. The choice is yours."
He turned his back on Moori, a gesture of utter disdain. He walked toward the hole in the cavern wall, his boots leaving bloody prints on the stone.
"The ship is still up there," he said without looking back. "I have to go clean up your mess. When I return, you will have your answer."
Then he was gone, a dark streak shooting into the sky, leaving Moori alone in the silent tomb. The Namekian fell to his knees amidst the carnage, the bodies of the women and children surrounding him. The green aura around him died. The only sound was the hum of the ship, and the low, broken sob that finally escaped his lips. He was alone. The last elder of a dead people, in a chamber of horrors, his purpose now the service of the devil himself.
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