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The Chronicles of Faust
By: Nez

Part 3

(Click here to skip to the chapter beginning)

Author’s Note:  This was one our more run of the mill adventures that ran along general Dragonball Z rules:  Bad guy presents himself, the gang trains for a while, the gang goes and lays the smack down, or something to that effect.

Lexicon:

Shayla:  Another one of the party members that operated more from the background.  She was a human who specialized in computer operations and cybernetics/robotics.

Berserker:  A Protogean concept similar to Super Saiyan.  Dog gets big and bad, rather simple.

Zaru:  One of Jerani’s cohorts.  A dyslexic Namekian who has a fondness for alcohol (which isn’t really mentioned until later).  Is the older ‘brother’ of Zazzi.

Zazzi:  The younger brother of Zaru and playmate of Sprout.  Generally create harmless havoc which involves poking fun of Zaru whenever he gets drunk.

The Kreichek Saga

 Life aboard the station was briefly disrupted while the new residents disembarked.  Most of the Saiyan warriors that were recruited couldn't take their eyes off of Jerani.  Faust explained her "disgraced" status and many of them snapped out of it and gave her the proper treatment for one of her fallen standing.  Faust also offered Shayla, the afore mentioned hacker, the position of Chief Engineer (and a hefty salary), which she accepted.  Faust figured she wouldn't attempt to damage a station that she was working for.

 Jerani eventually tired of being shat upon by the crew and decided to challenge all takers in single combat.  Many of the crew accepted, including all of the squad captains.  Faust refused to participate in this foolery, but had no problems letting it happen.  Jerani beat seven of the warriors in combat (six being captains) before being beaten by the seventh.

 Her actions raised her status somewhat in the eyes of the crew, but she still had not been completely forgiven her heresy.  Even Faust at this point has granted her something akin to respect, but she was still a long way from redemption in his mind, especially now that her tail is completely missing.  As if a piercing wasn't bad enough, now it seemed that shortly before her battle of respect, she had it removed entirely.

 * (Earning Faust’s respect is one thing, earning honor in his eyes is entirely another…)

 Daily duties resumed onboard the station after the brief spectacle.  Upgrades and intelligence gathering operations also went on.  Kreichek was busy on the planet consolidating his power and moving into dominance over the other Warlords on the planet.  Since the station had lost its friendly status with the planet, the Saiyans were hard pressed to find shore leave.  A deal was cut with one of the warlords to remedy this problem.

 The whole time this had been going on, the station had been protected by its cloaking and stealth capabilities, but now Kreichek suspected that there was something in orbit where Jerani was hiding (perhaps he sensed the power levels…) and began to send Shadyk hound vessels to scour space and seek it out.  Their efforts were ultimately in vain and the forces onboard the station moved to counter the Shadyk Hounds.

 A Tsufarajin vessel with stealth capabilities and equipped with an EMP cannon was sent out with an assault team, including Jerani and the Namek, Zaru.  The team was successful in many raids and silently put many of the Shadyk ships out of service while preserving them for later use by the Saiyans. 

 The neutralized Shadyk hound ships were stored on an ice moon, which was being hollowed out on a continual basis by a team of Saiyan warriors and Tsufarajin engineers.  The eventual goal for the moon would be to turn it into an area to store large vessels, a space dock of sorts, and also to construct/repair the ships and their accompanying fighters.

 * (3 out of the five group members were science majors, so we have plenty of brainpower to figure crap like this out)

 During the course of one of these fights Zaru used a new spell called "Wither" which gave him an excess amount of negative power that regenerated, increased upon itself and was excessively difficult to keep under control.  After almost losing his control over this power, Zaru, Jerani, Zazzi and the Kison Master went down to the ice moon (the one with the hollowed out hangar) to try to somehow blow the energy off.

 The battle resulted in the destruction of the moon, its base (and station-based sensors) and the Kison Master (who we later found out went "Berserker class II") who ended up dying from the resulting energy release from Zaru.  Jerani, Zazzi and Zaru escaped just in time, along with the work crews, to run into an assault in progress on the station.

* (In my opinion, this whole “berserker” concept was just a rip off of Super Saiyans.)

 While the previously mentioned crew was on the moon, several Shadyk hound vessels managed to locate the station and began to bear down on it.  Faust led a team of Saiyans EVA to augment the station-based weaponry.  As the team was leaving the airlock, Laucon was granted his 24-hour reprieve (and a skin-tight space suit) from the afterlife.  While the initial wave of ships was being dealt with, a secondary wave of assault transports managed to dock with the station, cut through the airlock doors and disgorge their contents of shock troops.

 The troops that were on the station were isolated and exterminated in a quick and efficient manner.  As the last Shadyk hound mage fell, Kreichek himself boarded the station.  After several minutes of inane hero-antihero exchange, a fight commenced.  After several miraculous power-ups and hits Kreichek was forced to assume his third form and wreak hell with the station.

 At this point no one was left with enough power to stop Kreichek, so Kreichek abducted Zazzi for his ability to make Dragon balls and returned to the planet leaving carnage and massive amounts of damage in his wake, killing many Saiyans and Tsufarajins who got in his way.

 When Faust and the rest of the team managed to regain their feet, they found the station in critical condition following the Shadyk hound assault and Kreichek's attack.  Faust immediately organized the few remaining Tsufarajins to repair what they could of the station and heal those who could be saved.

 After a few days, and with the assistance of Shayla, the station was operating at about 30% capacity and 5 of the six healing pods were active.  Faust immediately began to form a plan to remove Kreichek from the equation and prevent the critically damaged station from falling into the wrong hands. 

 He decided that it would be best to crash the station into Kreichek's palace, simultaneously destroying the station and Kreichek.  Faust ordered an evacuation and with a bit of help from Capsule Corp. capsules (courtesy of Shayla) many of the important parts of the station were put onboard transports.  The transports were launched and the maneuvering jets of the station were set on their final course.

* (Shayla happens to be a human computer nerd, and as a result, had several capsules that the Tsufarajins managed to duplicate.)

 A few moments after the plan was set into motion, it came to Faust's attention that Zazzi was missing, and that he was still on the planet with Kreichek!  Jerani and company volunteered to go rescue the child.  Faust followed them to provide "backup."  While entering the planetary atmosphere, Faust used the pod's sensors to locate the primary Shadyk hound barracks and set the landing point for there.

 The resulting impact of the space pod killed an estimated 3 thousand Shadyk hounds and left a huge crater.  Faust exited the space pod, and flew to the palace, blasting a few guards and gaining entrance.  Faust went through the palace, killing guards as they stood in his way and searching for Kreichek, ever working his way toward the center of the palace and the throne room.

 Eventually, after smashing a few heavily reinforced doors, Faust gained entrance to the center portion of the palace and met up with Jerani, Laucon, Sprout and Zaru.  The group proceeded to the dungeons, where they rescued Laucon's servant, Chernoble, from the prisons and many other innocents, unjustly imprisoned by Kreichek.

 The group then proceeded to the throne room (which was past the prisons for some reason) and there confronted a group of stoic samurai and a few marksmen.  The marksmen were easily dispatched while the samurai took no part.  As soon as the group made to pass their line, the samurai parted into two groups at the direction of an undercover Kariel, one of Jerani's people, and one group of samurai attacked the other.

* (This part confused me as well, all of the samurai just stood their as we ripped apart the marksmen who were less than a meter away from them.)

 As the group was moving past the samurai, an incredibly Zazzi-like scream and scuffle were heard from beyond the doors, and a small orange ball rolled out.  Faust quickly picked it up and, after quickly inspecting it, pocketed it, continuing on to the room beyond.

 In the room was an angered Kreichek beating on Zazzi (the source of the screaming, Zazzi that is).  The group faced off Kreichek after the usual niceties and taunting.  A long, worthy, battle ensued in which Jerani got the last strike on Kreichek.  Fair enough, the damage done to her kingdom was greater than that done to the station.  After the battle, both Jerani and Laucon were spent and barely conscious.  Faust walked over to a pedestal in the center of the room and picked up a small black velvet bag. 

* (Final strikes/Take downs seem to be rather important to Saiyans with regard to honor and such things.)

 The bag contained six orange spheres, also marble sized, like the one that rolled out of the room.  Faust put all of the spheres together, at which they began to softly glow, and tucked them behind his armor.  He then realized that the station was on a collision course toward his very point.  Faust called Joe and had him abort the process and move the station back into its normal orbit.  Shortly after this, Laucon returned to the Hero's planet, as his 24 hours (plus an extension) were up.

 * (Most DBZ fans should be aware that the after-life and real-life interact an awful lot in the DBZ series.  An event that occurred, that Faust wasn’t aware of, (hence why it isn’t mentioned) is that Urani-baba, the witch, developed a crush on Laucon and when he “rejected” her, she decided to cause him no small amount of annoyance as we’ll see later.)
 

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