Day Two: Morning

[Android 17]

As the android slept, night quickly fled beneath the wrath of the rising sun. Despite all of the action occurring around the campsite, Seventeen?s slumber remained unmolested. Perhaps it was a bad thing that he wasn?t a light sleeper, because the dream he was experiencing was anything but comforting for the battered mind of the cyborg.

Seventeen wandered down the twisted path, occasionally glancing over the multitude of naked, gnarled trees that bordered his walkway. He was lost in what apparently seemed to be some monochromatic region of the island. What should have been vibrant and alive was now devoid of all life. Even the rising sun cast dull, gray rays over the island. The android was lost and alone; the wound in his abdomen was dripping blood at an alarming rate. Nevertheless, the raven-haired man trudged on, one hand on his stained shirt and the other groping forward as his vision slowly failed. Suddenly, he heard the sound of splintering wood, and with his breathing becoming more and more strained, Seventeen turned around to face the sound. What the android say sent shivers down his spine: Amassed behind the android was the remainder of the competitors. Chief among them were people that the machine-hybrid considered to be some of his closest allies.

Like a wild animal, the group descended upon the cybernetic warrior. All Seventeen saw was a crazed blur, and then he began to hear his skin tear. Sparks shot up, charring the android?s eyes and robbing him of his site just as his attackers managed to tear their way down to his bones. The last sight Seventeen saw was his own friends tearing into his entrails like crazed hyenas. The machine-hybrid tried to cry out, but his throat had long since been ripped out.

Screaming out, the android shot up into an upright position as the last visual vestiges of the dream faded from his mind. He raised his slightly trembling hands up to his face and realized that he had worked up a sweat due to the dream. That revelation elicited a sigh from the android, who was actually disappointed that he had got so worked up over a rather placid nightmare. In the early days, his dreams had been enough to cause him to descend into violent seizures while still asleep. The placid panorama he had just experienced paled in comparison to what he was used to.

?Fuck nightmares,? the android groaned, tenderly placing a hand over his wound as he located his rocket launcher. With the handle of the weapon firmly clutched in his free hand to the extent that his knuckles were whiter than usual, Seventeen scanned the camp scene. The numbers had grown, and with a relieved smile, the cyborg noticed that the Konat Minoshia had joined their ranks while he had been asleep. Alongside Minoshia was what seemed to be another Konat?probably a relative based on the similarity of their physical appearance. Super Buu and Goku Junior were standing near the mohawked duo, their tired complexions raising a multitude of questions about what they had been up to whilst the android had been napping.

Reaching for his supplies bag, the cybernetic warrior?still feeling a tad bit groggy from what was probably oversleeping?pulled a small chunk of bread out of the satchel and shoveled it into his mouth. Seventeen was never someone with a huge appetite, so the minute piece of bread and the swig of water he swallowed would be enough to tide him over for a few hours. Kid Buu appeared to still be napping a few feet away, and the last member of the little ragtag group, Violet, appeared to be diligently slaving away at some carcass. The cyborg diverted his attention away from the woman?s work and turned his attention to the sky above. From the position of the sun, it seemed to be around midnight, and that meant that the group would have to move on quickly or attract some more unneeded attention.

[Belle Hibiki]

Child...

The voice struck like a gong and reverberated through him as if he were some sort of galactic tuning fork, its vibrations numbing through his skin and into the pit of his empty stomach. Floating, Buu turned his head towards the source of the sound. He saw nothing but an endless void of stars, each pinpoint of distant candlelight steadily burning and unflickering in the cold blackness of an empty sea. He turned around and around as he tried to find purchase on something, but the ability to direct his course was as alienated from him as the source of that bell-like, disembodied voice. Instead he seemed to be being pulled towards something inevitable and unknowable, and like a sailor to a siren he was drawn inexorably towards it without rhyme or reason, without his say or his will. Here, however, he would not have the fortune to run aground or to capsize and sink. Instead he would forever spin, spin just as he had after Bibidi had finished with him, spiraling into the vast oblivion beyond...

Nearby, a strangely familiar blue sun hummed quietly, arcs of shining light rising and falling across its surface. The massive solar flares expended their potent fury before, exhausted, crumpling back to their home in a heap.

Do you remember?

Blacker than black, a shadow descended across the stars, each one flaring brightly before winking one one by one. As if God had his finger on his dimmer switch, the universe slowly faded into nothing...

And then Buu woke up. He didn't awake with a start or a scream, which was the typical response for a child who had witnessed a particularly portentious dream. Instead, he slowly came back to the world, his return to reality only slightly disturbed by the sound of an impromptu belching contest between Super Buu and Goku Jr. That idiot, Kid Buu thought, is going to get himself killed one of these days competing to see who can die the fastest.

Stranger things, after all, had happened.

Hauling himself off of his mat, preoccupied, Kid Buu prepared himself for another long day.