Training: Loren's Place

[Xandor Tik'Roth]

OOC: This is going to be my character's (Loren "Blackblade" Haze) personal training/house thread. Feel free to pop in any time (in character, of course) and chat it up with Loren. Please try to keep in mind though that Loren is by nature very careful... Well, careful for a Saiyan anyway... So... have fun!

IC:

Loren Haze awoke with a start. Not that he usually woke like this, but it was unusual for him to awaken this early. He sat up and swung his legs over the side of his bed, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He reached over to the small side table next to his bed and grabbed his eyepatch. Putting it on, he realized the sweet irony. Taking of an eyepatch to go to sleep. He chuckled and drew back the curtain to reveal the pre-dawn gray sky, stars still twinkling up in the sky. Loren turned away from the beautiful sight to get in the shower.

He got out and dressed quickly in his typical fare; black shirt and pants. Black steel-toed boots and a knee-length completed his attire for the day. He smiled wearily as he made some coffee for himself. Today was finally the day. At long last, he had a reason to begin training in earnest. He was both looking forward to it and dreading it at the same time. As much as he wanted to involve himself in the trouble to the West, he still had a healthy fear for it. He shook his head as he reminded himself that he was a Saiyan. His blood heated as he thought about those epic struggles to the death. Besides, he was half Kai... so he didn't think it would really matter either way.

Sipping at his coffee, he idly pondered his current situation. It had been 9 years since his village had been destroyed by a stray power blast from one of the Z fighters. There was a time that merely the thought of them made his blood boil and the edges of his vision go red. There was a time that he would have given anything and everything to see Goku broken before him, begging forgiveness for his transgressions. Loren would have granted it, of course, but not before pulling out Goku's intestines inch by painful inch. Only then would Loren feel like Goku had experienced the proper amount of pain and let him fade into the peaceful arms of death.

But then Loren had seen a fight between Goku and Vegeta, his true rival, escalate to epic proportions. As he watched the two warriors do battle, to struggle to survive, Loren finally realized that he would never be powerful enough to make Goku kneel before him, so he gave up on that. Never again after that day did Loren feel the need to shred everything around him when he thought of the Z fighters. Neither did he go out of his way to support them, but he hung in the shadows, silently supporting Goku and the rest of them.

He finished off his coffee and rinsed out his cup, setting it on the counter to dry. He grabbed his cane and stepped outside into the early dawn. Locking the door, he quickly probed the area for any power signatures of note. Finding none, he breathed a little easier and started off with the help of his cane, silently making note to buy a scouter in the next few days. His destination was a grassy field about a mile and a half away from his house. Keeping his power level as low as possible, a white aura snapped up around him as he took off, heading to the East. He looked back on the house that he had built with his own two hands. He always felt a sense of pride and accomplishment when he remembered the months that he had toiled, working day and night on that house. But he never gave up. He had to remember that resolve in the coming days.

Finally he arrived at the clearing and settled down gently in the middle. He thrust his cane into the still-moist earth. He gently took off his trench coat, hung it neatly over the head of the cane, and took a few steps away. He surveyed the surroundings for several long minutes. He took it all in. There were grasslands as far as the eye could see. A few flower patches dotted the landscape here and there, giving a strange glow of color amongst the endless sea of green.

Loren Haze looked up at the sky, turning his back to the rising sun, and set his target as an imaginary point about two miles above the earth's surface. Taking a calming breath, he begun. Spreading his feet to just over a shoulders width apart, he raised his forearms to parallel with the ground and began to power up. A white aura snapped to attention around his body, clinging closely to it as he powered up as quickly as possible without it going out of control. He did this to exercise his restraint. A gentle breeze began to caress the plains as ever-widening circles spread from his feet. A few seconds later, he had reached his maximum.

Well, his usual maximum. With a scream, his white aura changed to a red one and his muscles bulged. He shouted, "Kaioken times two!" The aura completed its transition as his muscles corded and knotted with the power running through them. He also had an almost undeniable need to move. But he held steady as he allowed the power to wash over and through him. A half smirk crossed his lips as he concentrated heavily for a moment, trying to remember each and every movement. After he had gone over them enough times in his head, he knew he was ready. It was now or never.

His right hand shot straight up as he yelled, "KA!" Moving downwards in a clockwise motion with his right hand, his left began to move as it's counter. "ME!" he yelled, halfway through the motion. Finally his hands reached the opposite of what they started at. His left was straight up in the air, his right pointed at the earth beneath him. Strange, though, that he didn't feel anything. Well, that wasn't really true... he could feel something, kind of like a word just on the tip of his tongue, energy all around him, but not settling where it needed to go. He would soon remedy that problem. His hands snapped down, straight in front of his body as he shouted "HA!" Ah! There it was, just the beginning of the power being tapped. Nothing had formed yet, but Loren knew that he was doing things right. As he pulled more and more energy towards himself, the muscles in his arms rippled and corded with strain. With some amount of effort, he pulled his cupped hands to his right hip, screaming, "ME!" A small ball of energy appeared in between his hands, no bigger than the size of a nickel. But it grew quickly as Loren gathered all the energy that he had been feeling earlier into that ball. It grew to completely engulf his hands, but strangely didn't hurt at all. Unable to hold the power there any longer, he finally released it with a mighty scream, "HAA!!"

The power surged from his now outstretched hands. The force of the power leaving after having been pent up for that long nearly tore Loren's arms from their sockets, and drove him backwards several yards. He maintained his balance, however, needing to concentrate on the blast. He had almost made it too powerful. He knew that the Kaioken was unnecessary, but he had to see if it was possible. With great difficulty, he altered the course of the powerful blast, diverting it to the right of his imaginary target. Suddenly, he diverted it once more, cutting it back sharply to the left, rocketing towards its original destination. Only after it "hit" the target did Loren allow his thoughts to turn to a new idea, bringing the blast back directly towards him. He brought his hands up to his chest, his fingers spread and tried out another tactic he had heard of. Except nothing happened.

Loren's heart skipped a beat and his blood froze in his veins. His eye widened as the Kamehameha was getting ever closer, and now seemed to be picking up speed. In that instant, he would have laughed at the irony of being killed by your own blast, but he instead devoted that time to regaining his concentration. He closed his eye and the portal popped open. He widened it to something that he felt was big enough to absorb that blast. A few seconds later, the roar that he heard of his impending doom had vanished, as had the portal.

Loren walked over to his cane on shaky legs, sitting down when he realized that continuing to stand was pointless. He idly realized that at some point, he had pulled himself out of Kaioken. Probably for the better, since he didn't want to burn himself out staying in that silly transformation. He had been feeling something... a kind of stirring, a longing of something that has long been lost and missed, but he never could put his finger on it. Regaining some of his strength, he stood, again probing the area for power signatures. Finding none, and breathing a sigh of relief that he hadn't been noticed, he pulled his sword and began practicing his forms.

As he started doing his forms faster and faster, he mentally ticked off all the things that had just happened, analyzing them, remembering them, realizing what he did wrong, what he could do better, and what he did correctly. It had been a long time since he had trained, but he already felt stronger, like he could take on the world. But he still had a long way to go to get to Goku's level.

After making his final series of blinding slashes with his sword, he sheathed it in one smooth motion. Putting his trench coat back on and grabbing his cane, the took off towards his home. He had enough time to figure out a few more strategies that would likely surprise an unlucky opponent. He would have to take care of a hit tomorrow, but the target was a blundering fool of a man anyway, so he couldn't imagine that it would be too difficult for him. Besides, the pay was pretty good.

Probing for a final time after he landed, he unlocked the door and headed into his house. Making some tea, he sat down in front of the TV, intending to spend a few hours watching the news, keeping in touch with the world around him.

[Xandor Tik'Roth]

Loren trudged into his house. He was tired today. Not that the job had been very difficult, he had been training hard the past few weeks. Just some punk that was getting on someone else's nerves. Been happening quite often of late, he noticed. He shrugged out of his coat, but decided against turning in for the night. Instead, he propped his cane up against the stand by his bed and removed the straps holding his sword in place. With a flourish, he popped it up on the stand that he had specially ordered. He changed quickly into his training clothes. As he lifted up the trap door to the lower part of his house, he thought of how good it felt to be back in his training clothes. Weighted so as to provide greater training results, it made him slower and stronger. He wound his way down the steep staircase to the lower levels.

He thought back to building his house. True, he had built it with his own two hands, but he had installed a very special room in the bottom. A few dozen yards beneath the earth was a massive training room he had constructed. Using a unique design layout, he had angled the special tiles at odd angles to help deflect and diffuse any power that he might put out, effectively making it untrackable. Unless of course the person knew what they were looking for. But Loren seriously doubted that.

He finished the descent and strode into the middle of the room. Powering up to the maximum, he decided to try out his latest form. Concentrating and breathing heavily, he shouted “Multi Form!” His body blurred out of focus as a bright beacon of light flooded the room. When the light was extinguished, there were four of him. Well, rather, there was one of him and three copies. The real Loren faced the three clones of himself, all giving off the same power as he. Loren smiled as he set himself in a fighting stance.

All three came at once. One went high, the other two went low. Loren jumped up slightly and countered the high attack, sending a weighted boot crashing heavily into one of the clones' face, sending him reeling. He crashed into the wall and slumped heavily. He turned his attention to the other two, who began an all-out assault, punching and kicking at him, trying to find a weak point. Loren knew the risks of doing this, of course. His clones knew everything that he did, knew every thought, every move. Countering them would be difficult. But then it wouldn't be training if it was easy.

Suddenly the two leaped aside as the third fired a huge Kamehameha. “Oh shi--” Loren began, quickly crossing his arms in front of him, taking the brunt of the attack. Luckily, it was only a quarter as strong as it should have been, otherwise he would have been in trouble. But he still was, he realized, as he felt a sharp pain in the side of his ribs, right where the heavy boot had landed. He flew towards the wall, but never reached it. Two other clones were there, arms cocked back, landing heavy punches against his chest, taking his breath away. Both raised their hands again, blue energy forming in their palms.

Loren found himself on the other side of the little room, clothing singed and smoking, pain wracking his body. He gave himself a moment to catch his breath as he studied his prey. The three clones were standing a little ways away, arms crossed, waiting for his next move. That was their mistake. Loren disappeared, rematerializing just behind the center clone, driving his elbow into the back of his neck with enough force to render the clone unconscious. He drove his leg at the one standing to the right and made a solid connection, but the clone grabbed his leg, causing Loren to lose balance just long enough to receive a blow to the stomach even as the clone he kicked landed with a sickening thud against the other side of the room.

Loren and the remaining clone fought fiercely for a few seconds before jumping back. “Kaioken times two!” they both screamed in unison. Red auras snapped up around them, launching them into a new attack. Punches and kicks flew. The weighted clothes slowed Loren down a little bit, but whoever slipped up first was definitely going to feel it. The clone slipped up first, a crippling blow to the chest was his reward. The clone clutched at his chest, eye wide with surprise and pain as he staggered back a step. Loren spun, landing a solid kick to the side of his head, sending him to another corner in a heap. Breathing heavily, he looked around to be sure that he had indeed knocked out his clones, finding, to his satisfaction, that the three were slumped against the walls unconscious.

He sat heavily, knowing that when he did recombine his body, he wasn't going to be up for much of anything for the next few days. He already hurt from the blows that he received. He shook his head and cleared his mind. As he began to meditate, the thing that had been at the back of his mind came forward. It irritated him... just like a thought out of reach, the harder Loren would concentrate on it, the more elusive it became. He sighed and rejoined his body, pain wracking him in waves. He embraced the pain like a sweet lover, riding its highs and lows, savoring it, learning from it. He ran over the battle in his mind, seeing it from all perspectives.

Wait... where did he learn that from?

That was it... the thought that had been eluding him for weeks was finally becoming clear... He was on another planet, staring down at bodies, bloodied and torn. Then he stood before a Saiyan, no... three Saiyans. They were speaking to him, but he couldn't understand the words. Then there was nothing but pain and black....

Loren's eye shot open. His body was covered in sweat and he was freezing. What the hell was that? None of it made sense. He'd never been anywhere else. Not on another planet anyway. And who were those Saiyans? And why was there that pain? He thought he recognized two of the bodies he had stood before. Deep within his heart, he felt a pang of regret and guilt... and pain...

Something had happened on that planet. Something in his past. Something... wait, what was he thinking about again? Bah... he thought scornfully. Nothing more than another daydream...

[Lazlo]

Max boost once more. I got really confused when I went to look for this, then I realized it was here. >_>

[Xandor Tik'Roth]

Yeah... I originally intended this to be Loren's "house" thread... but then it turned into his training thread. You can move it to Journey if you'd like... And thanks for the boost

[Xandor Tik'Roth]

Loren sat up, breathing hard. Another nightmare. Damn it... Loren thought irritably as he rose to greet the new day. These nightmares are getting the best of me. Another one, just like before. He had been having the same dream for the past week and a half. Always the same thing. Always him standing before three Saiyans, on a distant world with a green sky and red sun. All three wore armor, though curiously, he did not. On some level, he realized that he had never worn armor. Thought that it slowed you down. Why he thought that... now that was an interesting question.

Thoughts and feelings swarmed through his mind as he made his coffee. Things that he had heard, or rather, things he couldn't have possibly heard. But how did all this fit together? A question he had been trying to answer for the past week and a half, since the dreams began troubling him. All he knew is that there was something important there, some lesson needing to be learned, some part of his past to be reclaimed. Knew that if he didn't reach for it, the nightmares would persist. And become worse.

But again, he didn't know how he knew this. But it felt like this had happened once before. But there was something different now too... a power that had somehow always existed, but had been hidden from him somehow. But how could that happen? And more importantly, who could have done this to him.

He shook his head as if to ward away the demons that wandered in the dark corners of his mind. He smiled as he put on his weighted training clothes, resolving to wear them always. He had done some modifications to them, to fit his style more. A slim fitting shirt, nice baggy pants, heavy shoes and wristbands. He also added more weight. He was gaining power by the day, and felt he would be remiss if he kept the same weights as before. He was still just as fast though. Faster even. He had tested himself multiple times. Every few days he could feel himself getting stronger, faster, more focused. His body was preparing for something. What, he had no clue. But he liked the power for some reason. Must be the Saiyan blood...

He picked up his cane and left his house, locking the door behind him. He strode into the city with a purpose, for today, he had made enough money to get the deed. It was an old shop, a clothing store by the looks of it. But he finally decided to open a pawn shop. He had gathered a few things from the basement that he no longer needed, and a few things from the last battle that took place. He figured that there were people that wanted to help this planet, and that they should be properly outfitted. He didn't expect to make much money at it, but he didn't need to. His other chosen profession paid the bills quite adequately.

Later

Loren trudged into his house, wearily hanging his coat up with his cane. It had been a trying day. First, he had to convince the old owner that he wasn't totally out of his mind. "It was a bad location" the old man said. Loren didn't care. He was a breath away from using force on the old one to take the deed, but then one of the voices from the dream came drifting back to him, "Only take what you need in times of desperation. Otherwise, you'll just be wasting your energy, and I find this greatly displeasing." It sounded weird and kind of corny, but it worked. Step by mental step, Loren pulled himself back from the killing edge. The voice sounded commanding, but friendly somehow. It hadn't mattered anyway, though. The old man finally acquiesced the deed for a mere $10,000 Zeni, a full $5,000 below his asking cost. Must have been Loren's charming personality.

Not a lot needed to be done, but it was mind-numbing work, just the kind he liked. Using his muscles felt good. By sundown, he had remodeled the shop into something usable. All that was left was to stock it, but he had other matters to attend to. He made his way down to the basement. Several things had been troubling him all day. Like the final image he had been granted. He had a very quick glimpse at someone, a man by the look of it, long golden hair, down to the back of his knees. Then, like a breath, it was gone. That small glimpse troubled him. It had an uncanny likeness to himself. Which was odd. He always kept his hair short. Something about not giving an enemy a foothold, or a handful in this case.

He was interested at this power that seemed to be welling up inside of him. His body craved more. More power, more energy, more... life. No idea what this meant, he needed to know. Finally, he moved to the center of the room.

Well, it's now or never, Loren thought as he powered up. The panels along the walls and ceiling rattled. He would have to replace them soon. Then all was consumed as he powered up to the highest level he could.

"KAIOKEN TIMES TWO!" he screamed, the familiar red aura snapping up to greet him with his newfound power. He grinned wickedly as he began throwing punches at a lightning fast rate. Kicks came next, his legs a blur of red and dark blue. He then launched himself into an all-out assault against imaginary foes, not wanting to waste the energy to create a clone, wanting all the power to himself. He had to know what waited for him when he reached that.

Punch, kick, kick, block, counter. Grapple one opponent, send him flying into the other. Takes focus off him long enough to push a Ki-charged fist through one man's chest. Loren lost himself in his battle, letting the fury consume him. Finally he was there.

"KAIOKEN TIMES FOUR!" Loren thundered. The red aura blazed anew as his body was flooded with power. He stopped momentarily to consider what he had just done. The same effect as the previous Kaioken, but more potent somehow. He knew then that he had to be very careful with this transformation. Too much and his body wouldn't be able to take the influx of energy, so killing him would be the least of his worries. He would probably take out a good chunk of the planets surface with him.

He stared down at a clutched fist, dirtied with both dust and blood. His clothing was in tatters. He looked up and stood before the three Saiyans. One he knew well, Aiden, was his commander. An older, more experienced Saiyan, and had great honor. The other two were low level warriors, if they could be called that. Loren sneered at them, not even bothering to remember their names. They were less than dirt compared to him.

"Blackblade," Aiden said, his voice rough with age, but still cultured. Loren looked up. "It is finished, Blackblade. Your mission here on this planet is completed. Well done."

Loren smirked at executed a half bow, keeping his eyes locked on his commanders at all times. Aiden gave the smallest of nods in approval. Loren looked to his left. His sword was still there. He pulled it out of the poor sap who last dared to challenge him. A worthless specimen, if he'd ever seen one. Fool charged right at him, not even taking the time to assess the threat which stood before him. Loren stooped to clean his blade on the fool's shirt, then stood, noticing almost for the first time that the blade was black. A black blade. Blackblade.

Loren's eyes widened as he stood back in the chamber, red aura flaring heavily, agitated. He began to remember. It all came flowing back to him. Aiden had practically raised him, teaching him about the Saiyan race, about honor, fighting, stances, energy techniques, swordplay. How to kill, how to avoid being killed. How the greatest weapon against a man is not the fist or the sword, but rather the man's soul. He was taught how to inflict the greatest of pain. Pain brought to others. Others close to the man. Make him live through everything, then bring him down to the lowest point, grind him to dust.

Practically everything that Loren now knew came from Aiden. But strangely, he couldn't recall any of the techniques, on the vague ideas that they were once there, but now no longer. The memories faltered and then turned. Loren remembered two bodies. Broken. Bloodied. No Ki use was detected, but someone had ripped these two apart. The smaller one was ripped in half, viscera lying all around the body. The larger one though, Loren thought he recognized.

Without all the blood, Loren might have thought her attractive. Loren's eyes dilated. His blood pounded through his veins, an icy river compared to the heat of his anger. He did know her. He thought he recognized her now. He realized that he was screaming. Screaming in rage. He couldn't take it anymore. He opened his eye. The red aura was at war with another. A golden one.

A moment later, Loren's power left him, becoming too much for his body to take at a time. Loren gratefully accepted it as darkness pulled him in. His last conscious thought?

I will avenge you.

[Lazlo]

Same as usual. Good job.

[Xandor Tik'Roth]

Sweetness... thank you sir.