Chapter 399 - My SI Stash #99 - Becoming A Monster [REWORK] by Bladedhc (DragonBallZ) (1/2)

-”When your at your lowest, when you have nothing left to lose, there's no place to go but up.” Man's just grinding back up with da rework, respect/

Synopsis: ???

Rated: M

Words: 37K

Posted on: forum.questionablequesting.com/threads/becoming-a-monster-dbz-the-rework.12643/#post-3575814 (Bladedhc)

PS: If you're not able to copy/paste the link, you have everything in here to find it, by simply searching the author and the story title. It sucks that you can't copy links on mobile (´ー｀)

-I'll be putting the chapter ones of all the fanfics/originals mentioned, to give you guys a sample if you wan't more please do go to the website and support the author! (And maybe even convince them to start uploading chapters in here as well!)

Chapter 1-3 (exceptional)

What is death? What happens when your heart finally gives out? When that blood stops flowing through your veins and throughout your body?

For most people its the end of the life they've lived. The unexpected departure from an existence we've grown accustomed to. Something to be feared, accepted only when you have nothing left to lose, or no more ability to fight it off. Even the religious, the spiritual, and the depressed tend to fight it when it comes to them. Especially when it comes unexpectedly.

I'd say in most ways death was the same to me. When it finally came I hadn't been expecting it, when I knew what was happening I was more afraid than I'd ever been in nearly twenty-six years of life, and I absolutely tried to fight it off. Even with the knowledge that it was far, far too late I struggled with an intensity and will I hadn't ever drawn upon.For a second I couldn't help but think that I'd be a lot farther ahead in my life if I had that same determination for everything else.

With teeth chattering against a sensation of cold I couldn't possibly begin to describe I grasped the sturdy wood laid out underneath me with enough force that I could have sworn I heard it crack over the commotion of my suffering. I pushed myself up and away from the source of my pain, desperately trying not to think about the sound that met my ears. The unsteady and heated whirring of metal struggling against bone and flesh.

I think it was the noise that bothered me the most. That damned saw buzzing away under me. For a few seconds the pain and the despair only grew, before, like the rest of my awareness, it began to fade. My sight, the feeling, even my regret, but somehow not the sound. It felt like I was listening for hours to that same whirring before even that finally faded away.

'Who would find me?' I couldn't help but wonder. Would it be my sister, coming home from school? My mother, returning from the store? The girlfriend who left me on uncertain terms not two weeks before, hoping to patch things up?

It doesn't really matter I suppose. Like it or not they aren't a part of my ”life” anymore.

I spent my afterlife as nothing more than a spirit whisping about darkness I couldn't pierce no matter how hard I tried, losing bits and pieces of my identity, my memory, and my soul as time went on. I didn't even notice at first, but with nothing but time on my hands and no clear task to take up I could only think back on the life I'd lived.

It started with names, places, emotions I attached to certain events. It wasn't long before I started to lose faces, and ambitions, things I could once say and know with the kind of certainty almost everyone has. Ironically it was the little things that stuck around. I remember the first time my grandfather showed me how to cook a steak, the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches I ate religiously in middle-school, even how to ride a bike, somewhat.

I don't know how long I spent dead before the situation eventually changed. I'm not certain what force pulled me away from the oblivion my soul had been slowly disappearing into. Perhaps it was the god my grandparents insisted I try and accept into my heart, maybe it was the devil, or possibly it was something else entirely. I only really know a few things about my ”saviour'.

It wasn't kind, it didn't do this out of the goodness of it's heart or any obligation it felt towards my death, and it almost certainly didn't care about what I wanted. The decision that would shape the rest of my days would likely be forgotten in an instant, nothing more than the passing fancy of a being I couldn't and likely wouldn't want to understand.

I was left with only a single message in the wake of a new life, one filled with danger far beyond my ken, danger that I had no choice but to face head on.

”Amuse me.” The creature said.

I was...cold. My breath misted in front of me, emphasized by the flickering fluorescent light above me, not quite illuminating the room enough to reveal everything, but giving me an idea of where I could be, and a chance to look myself over. My clothes were torn and smeared with long dried blood, mostly around the center of my c_h_e_s_t, just to the left of my heart.

Flakes of dried blood covered my exposed c_h_e_s_t and arms, clashing against the pallor of my skin, now a few shades lighter than what I thought was normal.

”D-did they take you too?” My head whipped to my right in an instant, and my eyes fell upon the trembling form of a bloodied and beaten man, his light purple skin barely covered by what seemed to be a toga. A single horn jutted from the center of his brow, as clear a sign as any that he wasn't human. The pang of surprise I felt at his appearance was distant, muted by the sheer oddity of my situation and the fact that I couldn't really bring myself to care about something so trivial compared to my sudden ability to breath.

”...Yeah. They did.” Something tells me that I was speaking a lie. Maybe it was selfish of me to believe but I had a feeling my circ_u_mstances where far different than this man's own. I looked around the room once more, this time catching sight of a number of huddled forms shivering in every corner, hiding just outside of the light covering the center of our current accommodations. I spoke up, addressing everyone in the room with a kind of confidence that I once didn't have. ”Does anyone know who they are? What they want with us?”

For a long moment I was met with silence, and I almost thought my question would go unanswered. Many of the individuals I could see only blankly stared into space, remembering whatever horror came to them before they arrived here. Most of them resembled the purple man who first spoke, likely sharing a species with him. Eventually one of the occupants of the room answered. An alien with rough blue skin looked up at me from where it sat, his voice sounding almost like an avalanche. ”It's only been a few months since my own capture, but I have an idea about what they are.”

I took a moment to find an open space, before sitting and leaning against the wall as the creature moved forward slightly, revealing a gorilla-like body, and what was once two sets of eyes, one of which was missing. ”They travel from world to world, slaughtering the population in a matter of days with strength beyond anything that should be natural to a mortal being.” He paused for a moment, swallowing bile that had been building in his throat.

”To them we are nothing more than easy targets, they come and kill our friends and loved ones, only to sell the world we call home to whatever monsters would be willing to buy them. They value strength above all, and they take from whatever they believe is weaker and more vulnerable than themselves.” Many of the people in the room drew into themselves in some attempt to appear smaller than they where, hiding from the enemy his words showed them.

”So they sell us? They sell our worlds?” A dangerously thin woman, one of the horned people, managed to shakingly speak out.

He nodded. ”From what they say whenever they tolerate our presence enough to speak among each other, many sh_i_p_s just like this one travel the stars with the same purpose. Some have crews weaker than this one, and some stronger. I don't know by how much, but whatever standards monsters like these have for strength are far above anything we can imagine. They have some means of measuring our own strength compared to theirs, and if we don't meet the standards they set for quality slaves they use us at their leisure. If you don't have a talent or skill of some value to them you could be used as nothing more than fodder.”

He huffed, settling down further into his corner. ”Those without power or value are used however the crew wants. I've seen people eaten, r_a_p_ed, burned, and even strapped with weapons and forced to fight for nothing more than entertainment or training. Seeing as most of you have only recently been taken I'll give you some advice that might just save your lives. Find a use, a purpose. If you don't they'll kill you.”

He grinned morbidly. ”Welcome to Freeza force. Hopefully some of you might live for a while.”

For a moment I stopped breathing, my eyes widening at the man's words. That name sounded familiar. It brought up a feeling of nostalgia I normally connected with the simple p_l_e_a_s_u_r_e of Saturday morning cartoons, quickly followed by fear as I processed just what that meant for me.

Dragon Ball. It had pushed me into Dragon Ball. I was now so deeply at the bottom of the food-chain I might as well have been a gnat brushing up against giants. A spark of that same fear I felt as I died brushed my heart, accompanied by something I almost couldn't recognize. I couldn't help but laugh once I did, only to be cut off as the wall behind me suddenly disappeared into the ceiling, and I collapsed at the boots of a bug-like alien in familiar armor.

So thats where the door was.

Disgust rose up along the puke green of his chitinous face, and a lazy kick sent me back into the room with enough force to strike the opposite wall, and bowl into gorilla-like man I had just spoken with.

”It's time for processing, meat-bags! Those of you who haven't been tested for potential use are to line up and follow me!” Out of sheer surprise no one moved, or even breathed at the aliens words, aside from me gasping and coughing on the floor. He growled, before he slammed his fist into the nearest face in the room, causing the unfortunate alien's head to explode into gore against the wall behind it.

”Now!” He boomed. Everyone was up in an instant, gathering single file as he stomped off at an uncomfortable pace. I gathered myself, clutching my broken ribs as we were lead down a blindingly bright hallway, its only feature the single red stripe running across the walls. Passing by soldiers just like the one leading us, each of them grinning smugly at us as we passed by.

Soon we meet up with dozens of other crowds just like us as we were filed onto one side of a single large room. The white, blank surfaces of the room and the distant smell of disinfectant ironically reminded me of a hospital, except it obviously held none of the familiar safety such a place might have brought me. Aside from a few outliers like myself the people who waited alongside me were all the same species of horned alien. Six objects that look almost like airport metal detectors jutted out from the floor in the middle of the room, clearly ready for our use.

It wasn't long before the last of us had been corralled inside. A few hundred remaining members of a dying people, and a handful of aliens that had likely never even heard of each others species. There was almost no noise as they waited for whatever was to come next, only the sound of a few broken sobs from those who couldn't help themselves filling the chamber. Soon even that faded, and our new master spoke to us for the first time.

A sonorous voice met my ears, the gentle rasp of a woman I could only assume was beautiful sounding over an intercom and cutting through the relative silence of my current company. ”The Geressian people. A species with an average power-level of eighteen and a seriously overfed sense of importance. Under the watchful eyes of lord Freeza you have been weighed, measured, and found wanting. Those of you in this room represent the last of your people alive today, and when our time is up here your once billions strong race will be reduced even further.”

The machines in the center of the room hummed as they powered on, several lights at their underside glowing blue. ”The machines you see at the center of this chamber will likely be what decides your fate. If your power level measures above thirty we will be willing to allow you to remain on our ship as slaves and prisoners of labor. You'll soon be sold to the inhabitants of Freeza world 892 or 'Dornessa' as its informally called.”

She hummed, before letting out a laugh. ”And for those of you who fail to meet our expectations? You had better hope you have some value as a p_l_e_a_s_u_r_e slave or a conscript, or else I fear your fate is at the discretion of the kind members of my crew.” A number of the soldiers guarding over us chuckled, and one of them even cracked his knuckles.

I didn't react as the horror on my fellow slaves grew. I already knew what was going to happen. I'm not certain what a humans power level is, but I know its not thirty. Still, I couldn't help but grit my teeth in half a grimace, and half a grin. I had wasted my life, only finding my will to live after I had died. I had failed every expectation I set for myself and been left as nothing but a husk with a ghost of his old memories. I was at the precipice of a horrible death, at the edge of the same oblivion I had faced once before. I was excited beyond belief.

If I could make it past this I could make something of myself. Reforge an identity from the shattered piece I could grasp at. I could stand among and above the monsters that seemed to dominate my life. I had never wanted to live, to survive so much as I did right now.

I ignored the weeping man ahead of me, crying as he was informed his power lay just below the threshold at 27. The machine beeped at me, before a robotic voice sounded from within.

”Designation?”

I mulled over its words for a moment. What was my name? For a terrifying second I couldn't remember, before it slammed into me like a punch to the gut.

”Dennis.”

”Species?”

”Human.”

The machine hummed, before beeping at me. ”Confirmed. Slave #4561. Dennis. Approximate power level- three.”