Day One: Evening

[Belle Hibiki]

Buu swallowed, felt his throat ache in silent protest and silently cursed his luck. He raised his canteen to his lips and took a long draught from it, feeling the cool water prickle over his sore throat. The blonde in the attacking group had struck him across the neck and just above the collar in one of their many exchanges. Unluckily for her, such a devastating move didn't work on him. Unluckily for him, however, it still hurt like a bitch. He raised one of his hands and stroked across the pink puttyflesh of his throat, spidering his digits across the only slightly dented puttalin. The bomb-collars apparently didn't just inhibit regeneration, but was making even the simple act of rebounding his flesh into a semblance of normalcy a trick of hours rather than milliseconds.

The golden hair of the android whipped by as he charged, the nimble warrioress slipping in under his blind spot and hammering a Herculean blow into his gut. He gagged on air as pain raced through him, fire burning through his puttalin frame as ripples spread from his stomach and seared across his body in waves of pain. He remained frozen for the merest fraction of a second before he retaliated on instinct, snarling a brutal curse as he rotated and brought his elbow against the back of the woman's head. She grunted but did not yield. She was a tough one, he realized at the back of his mind, although he wasn't exactly going all out either.

How?! How did this happen?! he raged inwardly as the dance-like movements of his opponent carried her out of striking range with the elegance of a ballerina. How could they have found us? Was I right? Did Super Buu and Violet... betray me?! Buu felt his anger, ever present beneath the surface, leap into full flame and scorch across the surface of his mind.

The two warriors faced one another across the endless expanse of a scant three meters. As the war raged around them and screams and blood exploded from mouths, Buu's rage manifested in a bestial roar that seemed to shake the very atoms of the air, that cleaved and blasted through it as effectively as a bullet train tearing through a wet paper bag. He rushed at the androidess, throwing out one of his hard-as-cement boots in a return blow to her stomach...

Well, he thought miserably. At least I know they aren't traitors. He hissed as a sharp jolt of pain from his wound slithered up his back, prickling like a quilled snake and stabbing needles of pain into the already growing ache at the back of his skull. Super Buu, Violet and Seventeen... They had all come under fire from the ambush party, so Buu felt reasonably sure that they had been innocent - at least this time. Still, it wouldn't do for him to be taking chances. He turned down the offer of help with a stubbornness that he was glad to hear back in his voice. Yes, he was reduced, but he was still a majin.

Buu hissed and stretched his arms out before summoning up his mental focus. One day, he might have to teach Super Buu its intricacies, but for now it was his and his alone. As if they were xenomorphic chestbursters, two extra arms erupted from Buu's sides with a sound like squelching mud and fingers dragging across balloons. He flexed their mighty, slightly shorter fingers before he heaved himself upright and balanced himself. He was still a majin, damn it, and his lower arms stretched at his will. He placed his lower palms on the ground and pushed, pushed with them and grew his arms until he lifted himself off the ground and rose, arms spread as if in defiance to the powers above. A leg was nothing.

He turned to the others, his splayed fingers grounding deep tracks in the dirt. "Let's go."