Chapter 3: Cabbage head
Raditz slowly flew back to his base of operations, his trusty waterfall cave mansion.
* Wooooosssh *
Landing on the rocky floor, Raditz raised a cloud of dust behind him from his return.
Looking at the huge stone bowl in his hands, he looked at the waterfall, then at the stone bowl in his hands again, Raditz murmured.
" I didn't think this through. "
Now he was in a bit of a pickle, he needed to travel through the water pool and the waterfall to get to his cave.
But he had a whole bunch of electronics in his hands, exposed circuit boards and a bunch of unidentified parts.
Going below a waterfall with a bowl holding all that was a death sentence for the parts.
" What a hassle.. "
Raditz scratched his head, if he had telekinesis this wouldn't matter.
He can't go in unless he wanted to create another entrance to his cave, which he didn't want to, he liked it nicely hidden behind the waterfall, one entrance is much easier to guard than two.
" Well, I am sure there is a better way, but let's just go the old fashioned Saiyan way. "
Holding the stone bowl up with one hand, Raditz charged up an energy wave.
Making sure to keep it to the minimum amount he figured was needed, he glanced at the river above creating the waterfall.
" Haaa! "
Purple energy blasted forth, the tranquil river water transitioned form cool liquid to boiling steam in a spilt second.
* Booossh *
A huge amount of steam was released making the whole area covered in fog, the waterfall which flowed gracefully for centuries was interrupted because of one creature's whims.
" Let's go! "
This waterfall was now but a steaming curtain for a few seconds, as gallons of water was evaporated, and using these few seconds Raditz rushed into his cave.
* Splash! *
And within the very next instant, more river water came in form behind and recreated the waterfall again.
" Safe, wasn't that big of an energy blimp either, hey they can't sense all of my energy, much less such a little blimp, this reminds me, I need to learn how to hide my energy and sense it for that matter.. "
Raditz thought as shook his head and his spiky mane was cleaned of any residual moisture.
* Boom *
Putting the spaceship components down, Raditz sat back down, but didn't immediately start working on his spaceship.
Sliding the bowl to a corner of his cave mansion, he took out two saibamen seeds from his spandex, he had hidden them between his armor and his body.
" Saibamen, they range from anywhere between 10 to 1300, depending on the soil and nutrition they can absorb when hatching. "
Raditz recounted what he knew about the Saibamen, orginal Raditz had been doing missions his entire life, he knew a lot of information, everything needed to survive outer space.
And Saibaman was a weapon widely used by Freeza force, so knowing about that was pretty essential stuff.
Looking at the two identical beans in his hand Raditz pondered for a while, then took out his leather pouch containing water.
" Nappa had planted you guys in a literal barren mountainous land, and you still achieved 1200, I wonder if you can go all the way up to 1300 here. "
Raditz talked to the bean, as if it could hear him, then dug a hole near the place he usually buried parts he couldn't eat.
" This should make a good fertilizer for you. Alright, get ready for a drink. "
Smiling lightly, Raditz put a bit of his ki in the seed, a mandatory step so that the hatched saibamen listened to him.
* Spread *
Then he gently covered the seed with soil and opened the leather pouch.
* Drip *
* Drip *
* Drip *
Raditz started to slowly drip water, Saibamen were a species that originated from an arid desert planet, so too much water might actually kill them instead.
* Drip *
When the fourth drop of fresh water fell, Raditz could see the mud beginning move, and then within the next few seconds a big cabbage slowly grew out of the mud.
But the ' cabbage ' wasn't a cabbage, it was infact, a head.
* Boosh *
The mud was spread apart and a Saibaman clawed his way out with a large grin on his face.
Raditz nodded while carefully looking at the specimen, yes, this one looks healthy.
" Let's see what power level you have. "
* Beep *
* Beep *
* Beep *
" 1300! Nice, you reached the maximum theoretical value your species can reach, good for you cabbage head. "
Said Raditz, and the Saibamen only grinned and made weird voices.
" Gaah. "
Raditz shook his head as he had a wry smile.
" What am I even doing, you are a plant, a simple defence mechanism, no matter what you look like, you don't even have a memory module, only inbuilt instincts to protect your ' host plant '. "
Said Raditz as the creature looked at Raditz for a while longer then it's instinct took over and it started to move around the cave area, looking for anything that might harm Raditz.
Because this wasn't where saibamen were supposed to be in the first place, the whole thing was out of it's natural living environment.
" Look at that, this is what happens if you bring a creature to a new environment, and this is a whole another planet altogether. "
Raditz said as he got up from his seat, he had half an hour more until his energy whithin the Saibamen starts to fade away, and the Saibamen takes him as an enemy and starts attacking.
" Come on Cabbage head, no that's too long, I'll call you Cabba, alright Cabba, come on buddy, we need to see what you are capable of. "
Cabba looked at Raditz with his red eyes and followed with a ferocious smile.
Well, Raditz didn't blame it, because that was what it was supposed to do, Saibamen were only supposed to be activated by their parent trees when predators were nearby.
That's right, Saibamen were just a kind of defence mechanism in one type of carnivorous plant, the Saibamen were biological machines modelled from the men of the species the plant fed on, wild stuff.
" It's okay Cabba, you don't have to worry your little cabbage head, you don't even have a memory module, only instincts, so everything is forgiven. "
Raditz patted Cabba's head with a reassuring tone, even if he didn't need to do it, but he would like to.
Saibamen are for all intents and purposes, a natural biological robot, and he was the parent plant, Saibamen were the soldier ants protecting his ant king.
That is their entire instinct, that is the type of lifeform they were, if they deem anything a threat to their parent plant, they would fight it to death.
' And if they can't fight it to death, they will sneak attack and blow themselves up, everything for a chance to take down the foe. Freeza army are a scary bunch, understanding how to use this creature for themselves. '
Raditz thought as he was now out of the cave with Cabba.
Pointing towards the water curtain, he told Cabba.
" Attack that, it's an enemy. "
" Gaaaah! "
Yelled the Saibamen ferociously, it's parent had identified a threat, and it's job was now on.
" Gaaaah! Gawah! "
* Splash *
* Splish *
The Saibamen used it's three finger claws to cut the water curtain again and again, but it was water so it failed miserably.
" Gaaah! "
Seeing the foe before him was very strong, the Saibamen was showing fear, this too was an instinctual thing, it didn't actually feel anything.
The expressions on it's face were also simulated, just to confuse the attacking foe into thinking the Saibamen guard was feeling fear.
Raditz knew, if the enemy really took them for scared or dead, they would be in for a nasty surprise.
" Yamcha could attest to that.. well, I think I have seen enough, he's not using energy attacks, only thing Saibamen know is how to use ki to blow themselves up. "
Understood Raditz, that was enough data about his strength, now he needed to make some more tests quickly, before his ki within the Saibamen runs out.
And it starts to realise that Raditz indeed, isn't it's parent plant. The last thing Raditz wanted to do was fight Cabbage head now.