Bounty Run

Nero smiled and rolled his eyes. Yes, she definitely had that bite to her bark back. How insufferably endearing— Wait, what? At least Nero didn’t think or say that out loud! “I know.” Sure, he didn’t have to be even remotely helpful to this woman, but he didn’t care whether or not he ‘had to’ do anything, especially if it was a good thing. “I helped because I wanted to. Simple as that.”

Given her reaction, Nero’s assumption that she was largely unaware of the Wrathful state was proven correct, perhaps a bit more correct than he expected— she had literally no idea what it was at all! Anyway, she did make a statement that Nero found respectable; she wanted to fight to her fullest with proper autonomy, seeing no worth in not owning her power. “If you want to do that, then you will.” Nero smiled, of course in order to do so she had to gain control of that state— and her Oozaru state if she had access to that as well. “I can help you with the basics of controlling it if you’d like. That way the next match is even more fun.”

Furthermore, the way she took the news regarding her mask was surprisingly... Unsurprising. Their conversation about it earlier when talking about why she wore it replayed in Nero’s mind, and everything clicked. “It’ll be fine. Only the healers and some kids saw your face, when that mask gets back to you, nobody else will have seen it.”

Speaking of, a very short little Namekian child and one of the elder Namekian healers had entered the room just as Nero finished talking. The little Namekian was very carefully and gently carrying Gladiator’s mask, which, as promised, was fixed! “Go on young dragonsmith, deliver the cherished mask to it’s rightful owner.” The elder Namekian spoke in a wizened tone formed over many a century as he gently guided the little one. “Oh, Elder Nikella, hey. Thank you for your help.” When Nero gave his thanks the elder simply nodded. “Ah, think nothing of it, Nero. We were happy to assist. May I leave Dontoph with you? I must attend to other matters.” Nero nodded in response, and as Nikella left, the little Namekian shuffled forward, first looking up to Nero. “Hey Don, did you manage to add that little flair I asked about?” Dontoph gleefully nodded. “Mhm!” Happy to hear this, Nero gestured to Gladiator and Dontoph walked over to the side of the bed that he was just tall enough to look onto. “H-hi! Here you go miss, um... We worked really hard to fix your mask, we hope you like it...” Donotph shyly lifted the mask up with telekinesis and gently onto Gladiator’s lap before going back over to Nero and sitting on the floor.

“Anyway, I like your witty banter, it’s fun.” Of course he would say that, monkey man of mischief that he is! “Also, yes, you did. Just go through what you want answers for and I’ll tell you.” Hearing Nero be called ‘Mister Masenko’, Dontoph laughed, he had a childish little giggle! “Hehehe, I like her, she’s funny!” Nero found some comedy in it as well, he absolutely used that technique a lot in all fairness. “Hey, it’s a useful technique that I have a few versions of is that really a bad thing?” He snorted, very willingly making fun of himself without even a single hint of shame about it.

“You absolutely should have. From miles away.” Nero said with a smile, but it wasn’t one of his mischievous ones, he was showing proper jovial happiness weirdly enough. “The alternative was to just leave you out there. After a spirited fight like that, it would be disrespectful of me. Like I said, it was simple.” A straight answer? From Nero? Wild.

“I didn’t stutter, but I’ll say it again anyway— If you want to take control of it, you will.” Nero bluntly reiterated. Listening to her self assessment of the moment in question. She noted several ‘symptoms’ so to speak. “Hmm... Okay, I think I understand what might be going on.” Mentioning that it was ‘watered down’ compared to other times was interesting; and it sounded like Gladiator was having difficulties deeper than simply using the ‘Wrathful’ state. It drew from what was essentially the same well of power as Oozaru after all. “Pfft, how am I supposed to help? For one thing, I’ve got experience. I learned how to channel my own power, and I’ve been helping others do the same.” He rolled his eyes at her stubbornness in not needing any help, Nero was no stranger to this sort of person either. “Okay, well would you rather this power controls you and indirectly causes you to harm someone you care about? I doubt it. You don’t seem the type to let that slide.” Nero took this very seriously, even more so since Gladiator already made it clear that this unchecked and uncontrolled power frustrated her.

Another thing that frustrated her was her face being seen, she made that abundantly clear too. “Unless you tell me what the problem is, I don’t know what to tell you.” Nero shrugged. “I think you’re underestimating how well this village can keep secrets.” He added, tapping the side of his nose in a somewhat cheeky fashion.

Hearing Gladiator’s praise, little Dontoph pulled up their scarf and shyly hid behind it a little bit. “Uh-huh! They said, um, that I’ve earned the right to, um, forge my first item fully from scratch instead of just repairing broken stuff— oh, and lots of my favourite fruit!!” The little Namekian wiggled from side to side excitedly. “I still have heaps to learn but I love doing it, being a Dragonsmith is awesome! I wanna be as good as Mister Tambo, they say he’s the best and greatest Dragonsmith there is!”

As for the flair, Dontoph looked to Nero. “Mister Nero, could you um, demonstrate?” To which Nero nodded, slowly getting up from his seat and shuffling over. “Sure.” Nero held out his hand and gently placed it on the mask. With a little bit of focus, something on the mask began to glow a faint blue... It looked like the crack that seemingly wasn’t there had been filled in with some mystical material. “It reacts to Ki. I just thought you might like it.” He nodded to Gladiator.

Nero slightly rolled his eyes, but he smiled nonetheless. “Well duh.” He was fine with waiting to talk about his cryptic nuggets of wisdom, they could always talk about something else in the meantime. “Okay, next time I’ll have a lot of new tricks, you asked for it.” He said with a little snort of laughter. While looking over the mask for fractures, there wouldn’t be any, instead there was definitely a slightly different material present in certain places. While Gladiator was touching those portions of the mask directly, they would glow faintly to match her Ki.

Dontoph was soon asked about the work on the mask directly, they were a little surprised at first, but took it in stride in the end. “Oh, okay, I can do that! I think..” Twiddling their thumbs, the youngster gave it some extra thought. “Okay, so the mask came into the workshop, and it was um, not looking nice. Mister Nero said it was very very very important that it was fixed as soon as possible, he said it was important to you, and my teachers took that seriously; but they were really busy so only I could do it...” Dontoph glanced to the floor, clearly they were nervous at the time of being given the task. “I wanted to fix it and make it better than it was, so I had to use a thingy that makes stuff float in the air so we can look at it from all sorts of sides, um, and when I saw all the sides I imagined what it was like when not broken and went from there. I weaved some special magic to put in the flair Mister Nero asked for after I figured everything out. It should settle down and get used to your Ki soon.” Donotph gave a toothy smile to Gladiator after he was done explaining his side of the story.

“More than enough, I’d imagine.” Nero snickered and laughed a bit as well, taking some pride that he had one over those other jokers. Clearly they weren’t determined enough to not get caught— granted, Nero also thought they were more than likely not as innocent as he was. “Oh well, I have no regrets in doing what I did.” It was similarly clear that Nero had no qualms in giving people a chance, within reason.

Nero scoffed, doctor or not, he was pretty adamant in helping. “It doesn’t matter if my power is different, this isn’t an issue some regular doctor can help with. I have no doubt that you’ll work it out, all I’m saying is I’m more than happy to facilitate your ability to do so. You’ll be doing most of the work, if not all of it.” Nero chuckled and rolled his eyes. “Yeah, and? What if I do wanna see your dopey face more than one time, huh? What are you gonna do about it?” If nothing else, Nero would absolutely want a rematch sometime, that much was certain.

As for keeping Gladiator’s secrets, Nero understood that she didn’t want to divulge further with others around. If they didn’t actually know who exactly was under the mask any further than their face, so Nero simply gave a thumbs up to acknowledge this.

“There’s so many heaps of things, I dunno what to pick, it has to be something uh.... Whats the word?” Dontoph looked to Nero for guidance. “Significant.” Nero nodded, and the young Namekian quickly faced Gladiator once again. “Yeah, that one!! I want my first thing that I make on my own to say; ‘Dontoph made this’!” He giggled, praise and having his dream of being as good a Dragonsmith as Tambo supported? Dontoph felt like a winner already! “Im gonna do my best, and then more than my best! Yeah!”

Rolling his eyes, Nero made his retort. “You know what. Yes. Masenko two Electric Boogaloo, absolutely.” He said with a droll and monotone voice, but he ultimately couldn’t stop himself from having a bit of a laugh. “Lemme guess, you’ll go for Swing Axe Hard 3: Final Mix, right? It’s only fair.” Nero didn’t even try keeping himself together on that one and continued laughing.

“You’re welcome, miss! I’m glad I did it in the end.” Dontoph smiled, very much happy to have made a difference here. Nero quirked a brow in response to Gladiator’s request. “Sure? Just give it a bit longer, at least until Elder Nikella comes back. Y’could put your mask back on in the meantime I guess, though?” Nero suggested, which Dontoph seemed quite excited by. “Ya, ya, I wanna see you put the mask on!!”

“Pfft, I meant what I said.” Nero retorted, rolling his eyes in a similar way to how Gladiator did toward his own remark. “What? Are you nervous that I won’t or something? Well, rest assured, as I said, I won’t regret it. Nothing to be nervous about!” Okay, yeah, no he couldn’t stop himself there.

Nero raised an eyebrow quizzically “Stubbornly persistent, huh?” He smirked knowingly at Gladiator, silently pinning that trait on her. “Not necessarily a bad thing though you know.” That said, she wanted to be bested at something else apparently before entertaining a helpful offer. “Mmmm, okay, we’ll see how that goes then.” Nero briefly considered suggesting he could kick her ass at talking but he saw that as rude, even for a joke.

They had at least secured a rematch, if nothing else, that could be how Nero convinced her that she would benefit from help with this power control problem of hers. “Uhh, thats handsome stupid face, c’mon, get it right.” Nero snorted and blew a raspberry for good measure, otherwise leaving Dontoph to converse with Gladiator further.

“Mhm! It’s kind of exciting, when everything you get taught builds into it.” Dontoph smiled and nodded, and once Gladiator further explained her connection to her groovy helmet, Dontoph fell silent in awe. Seconds later, his eyes started widening and sparkling as he began to squeak in delight, this seemed to take a sudden surplus of Nero’s attention— he too was in awe, but for a different unknown reason. “For real life?! This wonderful helmet is your first thing?! That’s brilliant, fantastic, amazing!!” The little guy started hopping on the spot with glee before eventually calming himself and clearing his throat. He gave a bow to Gladiator after he was properly re-centered. “It is a great great greaaaat biiiig honour to have helped restore your first thing, miss!”

Nero’s attention was drawn back to Gladiator on the topic of techniques. “Well, you might not believe in this sort of thing, buuuut, the Masenko is special. It gains power from its name, much like the Kamehameha of Earth’s Turtle School.” Of course there were others, but listing them all would be somewhat absurd. Dontoph spoke up once more after nodding in agreement. “It’s true, they are both chants of power that draw out your energy, mhm!”

Soon after, Gladiator put her repaired helmet back on wherein she activated its new mystical feature, and it worked like a treat! Dontoph gave an energetic thumbs up. “Looks great!” Nero nodded in approval. “It’s excellent, in fact.”

“Hmhm, indeed, it truly is.” Walking into the room, Elder Nikella returned from his errands. “I have squared away what I needed to, if Dontoph is ready, I can walk him back to the forge.” The little Namekian smiled at the elder. “I can’t wait to do more, I’m ready!!”

“Very well.” Nikella smiled and bowed as Dontoph also bowed and waved to the two Saiyans. “I thank you for keeping an eye on him. You two take care, okay?” Soon enough, the two Namekians would make their way out, leaving the two Saiyans to themselves for now.

As soon as they were both out of sight (and earshot), Nero now couldn’t help but smile brightly with his eyes on the exit to the room that they were in, and he stayed like that for a few seconds before looking at Gladiator with the same radiant happy expression, as if he was excited to tell her something. “Hey, just before— when you told Don about the helmet— I’ve only ever heard him speak that confidently once before— it’s when he’s with his dad.”

Gladiator was correct to expect that Nero had heard her sigh, but he chose not to comment on it or mention it. He simply guessed she had mixed feelings about the situation that she had found herself in, or mainly just general confusion.

“Yeah, really.” Nero nodded, he wasn’t going to let this slide, go by unnoticed or forgotten— he was going to make it abundantly clear how meaningful the momentary change in Dontoph’s manner of speech was. First, Nero waited for Gladiator to readjust herself; as it seemed she was putting on a brave face of sorts. “Nope.” Nero said bluntly. “Not a coincidence whatsoever. Not a chance.” he confidently shook his head. “Trust me, I know a lot about what a voice conveys. Sure I concede that he was excited about his craft because why wouldn’t he be, bless him. However; there is something about you that brings out a bit of his confidence, of that I have no doubts whatsoever.”

There were still other matters to attend to soon, so Nero chose not to dwell on this for much longer, he was happy to continue with other topics since they were the only two remaining here. “Oh, soon, soon— I just think that it’s important to get your bearings. Have some rest and relax for a bit; there’s no point in going anywhere if you can’t comfortably walk, yanno?” Nero smiled, a bit more mischievous in tone when he spoke further. “Surely you soo^ooo_oo^ooo^oooo totally don’t want to strain yourself, get even more injured and see my handsome stupid face for even longer?” He snickered lightly, he was only teasing. “Seriously though; no point in healing if you immediately get injured right after.”

“Haha, oh don’t you worry, you won’t stop me from believing the truth that I witnessed.” Nero said, partially snarky but also very genuinely. If Gladiator didn’t believe what he said about Dontoph’s reaction, that was fine— it was her choice after all. So, Nero would simply leave it be

Of course, Gladiator still had rather persistent objections to resting and recovering. Nero shook his head slightly accompanied by a small nearly inaudible sigh. “Well, I can tell you that you don’t have any broken bones, torn ligaments or anything severe of that nature, I’m not worried per se.” That much should be obvious of course, he didn’t attempt to cause severe injury during their battle anyway. No doubt a rather bizarre course of action against someone sent to capture him, but he didn’t care. “You’re fine ultimately, but— you can do better. Isn’t that kinda our thing? Yanno, that ‘Saiyan nature to do better’ deal?” Nero suggested. Sure, it was a strange time to bring it up, but he was confident in the statement’s relevance.

Eventually, Gladiator, or rather; Zhalla revealed her real name to him. Nero raised a brow for a moment. He knew what he heard, he didn’t mishear what she said, he basically couldn’t. Still, something about the name surprised him, had he heard it before..? The moment of Nero’s befuddlement was fleeting, and he quickly snapped out of it. “A fiery name to match the rest of you I see!” He said with a soft yet hearty laugh. “I’m alright— could be better obviously, though it is to be expected from a good battle. Anyway; I was cleared to move earlier so I just sat here waiting for you. Besides, leaving you here in a place unfamiliar to you would have been an exceptionally shitty thing to do.”