Shu didn’t know what he was expecting after firing a blast like that, but he did very nearly fall over. He had managed to hit the creature and as Takeshi suspected it was sent into oblivion instead. Trying to stabilise himself he waved his arms around after, staring forward before squeaking when Takeshi came over and gave him a pat on the back. He didn’t really know what to say to that, he had managed to take it out after all. Looking to Takeshi quickly before looking away again he raised his shoulders, pressing his fingers together nervously as it felt like a whole load of pressure was suddenly piling onto him to always perform that way from now on. “I-I guess no! I guess no…” he spoke quickly, looking around for the other creatures that were left, “I-I don’t wanna kick too much butt! Maybe a little…but no wanna try be all proud just in case…” If it turned out to be a onetime thing with those hits then running in with confidence would be a bad idea. He really needed to be careful, it was Takeshi who helped him with those hits after all with even Vegeta helping to finish the tough one off. Letting out a groan he grew anxious, looking to Takeshi quickly. “One more! Got to…hit real hard again…”

T’charrl was just getting mad at what Haku was saying, especially when he had managed to take out that creature without any real struggle and was still making himself out to be weak and tiny. It was just making him feel much worse for being absolutely terrible at fighting without his abilities if Haku saw what he could do himself as terrible. Clicking through his teeth he looked over in the direction of the rest of the creatures, frowning as he was simply given the expectation that he was absolutely going to win because he was a ‘natural fighter’. What he was was not that at all, he was barely a soldier when they decided to pick him up and take him on their adventures. Not feeling confident at all anymore he groaned at the mention of his parents, feeling as if a whole load of pressure was suddenly being placed on him again to succeed.

Holding his arms up again to ready himself for fighting he tried to prepare for the next monster which Haku felt the need to practically shove the monster at him, watching it stumble before its attention went straight to him. Throwing his arms up to try and stab it he managed to get one blade into its chest and the other slicing into its arm, but it wasn’t enough. The weight of the creature sent him down to the ground, his claws hastily trying to fight against the beast as it tried to snap at his face and limbs. Kicking at it he soon started to panic, trying to keep it away from him as it lashed out furiously. He truly wasn’t strong enough to fight without using his energy, he had spent so long trying to contain it that without it he was simply too weak to fight like them. Panicking, he ended up releasing a ball of his own energy, it appearing tiny compared to the creature but the moment it touched the monster it suddenly combusted into a ball of T’charrl’s energy, exploding the monster into ash.

Viral was keeping calm and steady, making sure to hold the shield straight as to not harm the others in return. When the beam hit the shield he was pushed back only slightly but kept his stance, growling lowly under the pressure before immediately taking his shield down to fight against the monster again. The beast was angry now, hearing the noise it made, and was probably going to be a whole lot more reckless than before. He was prepared, he was going to keep on top of this battle and not fall into a rage like this monster had. Throwing his arms up to block the swings being delivered he tried hard to hold his own, the swings heavy on Enki’s arms as he was forced to take a slight step back. He couldn’t go too far back, he had to protect the others who were holding their own quite well. Focusing on the beast’s movements he soon started to throw his own in retaliation, trying to force his way forward instead as the creature seemed set on going berserk on him. “You’ll regret picking a fight with me!” The crown of Enki had been gathering energy since the start of the brawl and was starting to give off a fair bright sparkle before suddenly it fired a massive sun beam, the area turning red for the moment the sun beam blasted its way towards the monster.

"Nothing wrong with being proud of yourself buddy, you know? Just... Don't take it too far, that's all. Take it from me, that's bad." Seriously though Shu had just blown that thing out of existence, he should feel good about that. With the monsters more or less taken care of now it wasn't like they had much more chance to fight, now it would be a waiting game for the others to get back. Sizing up one of the last creatures he kicked up a rock before pelting it at the monster's head, grinning as it roared and charged him down for it. Crouching down he jumped over as it barreled beneath him, landing behind it and giving it a swift kick in the rear, laughing as it tumbled across the ground. If Shu wasn't wanting to fight then fine, he'd handle the last one for him. Watching as the creature got back onto its feet and charged him again he drifted back away from it slowly, keeping just out of reach as it kept lashing out at him. He was getting arrogant again and he knew it, old habits died hard. Landing back on his feet Takeshi went as far to slip his hands in his pockets and back pedal away, smirking as the monster kept on missing. Not minding his footing he stepped back into a dip and tripped from it, gasping as he fell onto his back with a thud. The monster let out a furious roar and pounced, its claws poised to tear into him in a second.

A powerful Ki blast ripped through the air and slammed into the creatures side, knocking it away and a bit closer to Shu. Appearing on the beasts side as it landed was Vegeta, frowning down at the writhing creature beneath his feet. "Caution is good Shu, it keeps you from making mistakes," he explained, slamming his foot down on the creature's head and holding it while its jaws snapped angrily, "But inaction is dangerous. You know what happened earlier when your brother did nothing, Viral was hurt. If you want to prevent that then you have to fight, even if you're afraid." With the creature still snarling at him Vegeta clicked his tongue in annoyance before driving the heel of his boot into the creature's throat, aiming down at it and blasting its head off with another blast. "Same goes for you, Takeshi. If you keep goofing around and being arrogant you're liable to end up in a mess again. Both of you need to understand that, your actions, or lack thereof, have consequences." But then he wasn't here to give a lecture to these two now was he? Besides he doubted his words would be taken for much, Shu likely didn't understand the implications and Takeshi would be too ignorant to. Stepping off of the corpse as it turned to smoke he glanced over to Haku and T'charrl, seeing the pair contending with the last beast. "We have the easy job here, just think of Viral and the others right now."

Haku didn't know what more he could do, he'd gotten lucky and killed two creatures but felt like he'd not be able to get a third. Good news was only one remained, bad news was that last one fell to him or T'charrl to kill. Hoping to at least make an effort he drove himself hard against the monster's side, knocking it off its feet and nearly winding himself in the process. He'd not meant to throw it his friend's way and seeing them go to the ground made him panic, gasping and trying to fire a Ki blast to get the creature off. Before he'd even released his attack another blast struck the beast from below, small at first until a bright light engulfed its entire being, exploding and turning it to dust. Astonished he gawked in confusion for a moment before scrambling over to where T'charrl lay, kneeling at his side and looking him over worriedly. "A-Are you okay!? Oh crap, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to!" Haku stammered, giving T'charrl as thorough a check as he could before slumping slightly, exhaling with relief at no injuries. "Oh thank goodness... S-Sorry about that, really..."

Kill. Kill. Kill! It was the singular thought propelling the beast forward, its what its Master wanted from it. Tear these intruders to shreds, limb from limb, tarnish any hope of their ever returning home. With each blow of its massive arms it felt like it was making headway, Enki's own body moving with every strike. It had this, there was no way it could lose to some machine. Snarling with delight as it felt like it was winning the creature failed to notice the glow of the crown, taking note only once the light shone in its eyes and distracted it. Far too close to do anything about the blast it let out a roar of defiance before its torso and head were engulfed in the beam, incinerating immediately and burning away within seconds. When the attack finally ceased only its lower body remained, a blackened stump connected at the top with blood puddling out. With one last shudder the remains of the beast fell to the ground, crushing several of the smaller ones in the process on impact. All of the creatures within the vicinity seemed to pause at the felling of the giant one, looking in Viral's direction as though in disbelief. It almost appeared as though they might retreat, backing off and away from Yumi and the others before stopping in their tracks. An eerily similar roar shook the area, and quickly a similar call responded, and a third.

Three of the massive beasts peaked from every which direction, climbing over small hills and smashing through piles of rock, all heading for Viral. They were of different colors and had minor variations, some had spines on their back, another still had a sleeker, pitch black body and a more narrow torso, and the third was almost avian in appearance, bearing a beak and feathers along its body. Each emitted its own roar as they moved on Viral, six eyes trained on him with the utmost malicious intent. The spined beast reared up on its legs before preparing a blast to try and take out Enki, its head instead snapping back as something struck it hard in its face, making it reel back and stumble. Orion had made a leap and smashed his fists into its skull, and which the beast was larger than him he still could pack a punch.

"He's not your only foe! We're here as well!" Orion shouted at the beast, jumping away as the creature tried to smash its hand against its own face to crush him.

Below Eris had darted over and let out a howl of her own, her body flashing briefly as her hair grew out, her nails elongating into claws and her eyes narrowing, slits appearing in her pupils. With a toothy grin she jumped up and her left hand took on a glow before she slashed at the beast's leg, creating a large gash to try and stunt its movement. Following up her attack was Orion who also had changed, his body growling nearly half a meter taller and his muscles expanding quite heavily to the point where one might wonder how he was so agile. Again with a smash of his fists he struck the beast hard in the head, drawing blood this time as it tried to fend off both him and Eris.

Fighting the large creatures wasn't something Yumi felt she could do, not just yet. There were plenty of the smaller creatures still around and they needed to be dealt with as well. Being left on her own she was surrounded by five, managing to keep level headed enough as her mind raced for a battle plan. Watching each and every one of them she jumped up into the air to avoid the first, nearly being knocked out of the air as the second jumped up, managing to kick it back before falling back towards the ground, one of the beasts waiting for her. With no Ki to evade she couldn't fly away and so instead she plummeted towards its waiting claws, waiting until it swung at her before throwing out her own punch. It felt like her arm might snap from the impact and she grit her teeth to avoid yelling, landing on her feet and promptly rolling away from its claws as it tried to catch her. They weren't giving her room to breath as she flipped backwards to avoid a third, spinning on her heel and catching one behind her in the jaw with her foot, flipping again and kicking it on the underside of its jaw, breaking it before repeating a spinning kick and caving in the side of its head. It wouldn't be easy but she could manage, the others could handle the three large beasts.

Shu stared at Takeshi before slowly lowering his head, trying to understand how he could make it better for himself and allow himself to feel proud for once. He didn’t know how to be proud like Takeshi, it just wasn’t in him to feel like that. If Takeshi believed in his ability to fight then he must have it, but being by himself made him feel terribly vulnerable. Looking around again he gasped when Takeshi decided to bring a monster to his attention, raising his own fists to ready himself for any possible attack, but as Takeshi took control of the situation pretty quickly and started almost playing with the creature. He didn’t understand how he could be so confident in the face of that hideous creature, what with those large teeth and massive claws. He didn’t understand it, everyone was so confident except him. He was definitely the problem here and nobody was benefiting from it. Taking a step back he almost jumped when a sudden blast rammed the monster and sent it closer to him, staring at it only for a moment before seeing who fired that shot. Continuing his staring at the creature he squeaked lightly as Vegeta continued to drive his foot down, sounding like he was telling him off. When Vegeta finally finished off the creature he looked away, letting out a groan. “Ohhh…no good, no good at any of this. Shu been really bad…”

T’charrl didn’t want to use his powers against these creatures, he didn’t know what might happen to them if he did. In his desperation to stay alive he released a highly concentrated amount of energy from his only free hand, forcing it into the beast in hopes that it might force it to release him. While it did indeed release him, it also managed to combust completely and vanish into nothing but dust as if it was never really there in the first place. Coughing, he rolled over onto his side before slowly turning onto his front, gagging a little as Haku came over to apologise to him. Slowly but surely he pushed his torso off the ground, looking to Haku briefly as he remained on his palms, giving his face a brief wipe. “…I’m not physically strong. I’m not like any of you”, he spoke before sighing as he managed to sit up, “You can kill those things quickly if you tried, but I can’t…not like I am now. I’m not a Saiyan…”

Viral knew there was no way that thing could avoid the attack when it was so preoccupied with attacking him head on, that’s what made everything turn in his favour and cause the monster to ultimately lose. With a blast of immeasurable concentrated energy the beast was felled, Viral simply watching as the rest of it collapsed before slowly backing off to the side. That was it for that creature finally, but for now he had to make sure the others weren’t harmed by any of his actions. With one brief gaze over them they appeared fine, but from afar sounded another rather horrible noise he wished he hadn’t heard as he slowly turned back, his eyes immediately on the other monsters that were making their way towards him. It shouldn’t matter how many of these creatures there were, he had to keep the other safe and eliminate these creatures; it’s what he was made to do.

Changing his direction he faced these monsters without hesitation, reading himself for combat as one of the creatures started to charge energy; however, that blast was interrupted as Orion came out of the blue and damaged the creature followed soon by Eris. Looking to them momentarily he had to do a double-take on what was happening, not quite realising they were able to shift into higher energy combat forms. With them both flying into battle against the spined monster that meant Yumi had been left on her own, his attention quickly being taken to her instead. She was on her own against a fair number of the small creatures and with those two fighting off one of the large monsters by themselves she had no back up or any way to defend against surprise attacks. He couldn’t leave her on her own, he was supposed to keep them all safe as well. Becoming conflicted between the need to defend on all different fronts he found himself struggling to focus clearly and with that the other two beasts were quickly on the move to extract revenge on what he had done to their comrade, moving in for the double team for an easy takedown. Spinning around again Viral was forced to block the feathered one first before immediately throwing a punch at the sleek one, his other arm swinging around to throw hidden kunai but was immediately parried. He needed to focus and find time to grab his swords, he didn’t have the energy to fire off another sunbeam so soon. Growling in anger he swung his arms around again, managing to punch one square in the side of the head while grabbing the claws of the sleek one before they could hit, holding the monster back in a show of strength between the pair.

Takeshi was thoroughly embarrassed for tripping up like that, and even more so for Vegeta's chastising. He'd gone and done precisely what he'd been told not to do hadn't he? Add on to the fact he was making Shu feel worse and he'd messed up fairly well. Sitting up in the dirt he let out a sigh before climbing to his feet, trying to brush the grass stain from his back before returning to where Shu was. "I know, I know. I was just having some fun, it was basically the last one," the older boy argued, frowning when Vegeta gave him an unamused stare, putting his hands up in defeat. He wasn't going to argue it, whether he should or shouldn't have been doing that wasn't a big deal anyways, not now that it was dead. "You haven't been real bad buddy, alright? If anyone's been bad it was me for dicking around, you know? You were fine, no problems here," Takeshi tried in reassurance as he gave Shu's hair a gentle ruffle, "No one thinks you did bad except maybe Vegeta, and he's got a stick up his butt so he's thinking everyone did bad." If the guy wanted to stand there and critique them fine, he'd take it, but he'd turn it around on the jerk for upsetting Shu.

"I never said he did poorly, I merely pointed out what could be done differently," Vegeta said patiently, "It's simply a fact. You're too quick to get into the fight, Takeshi, and Shu is too cautious. I don't expect you two to change overnight but you need to understand what you have to work on." It was more of a suggestion really, just one which lacked... Tact. Still not his strong suit. "Anyways we've done our job and contained the beasts over here, which is good. Assuming no other rift opens up we're to just wait here for the others to finish and pray they find a means of reopening one themselves." Which could take some time given just how many unknowns there were. What was the passage of time like on the other side? What were the creatures like? Were they able to even breathe, never mind fight? Having all of these unknowns was such a bother and it infuriated Vegeta to no end but getting out of shape over it all wouldn't change it, best to keep a level head and try and think it through. "Tell me... When you killed the creatures did you notice how their essence seemed to move? It didn't just dissipate like you'd expect smoke to, it almost seemed to move," Vegeta muttered as he cast a glance away, "I have to wonder... Is there another rift nearby? Or perhaps... The beginnings of one."

What a relief to be done with the fighting now, Haku couldn't believe they had managed without really getting harmed. He'd be lying if he didn't think they would have ended up seriously injured so this was a really pleasant surprise for them. It became a bit harder to enjoy their victory when T'charrl had been sprawled out on his back fending off a beast, but after taking care of that he was able to relax a little again. "W-Well... It's not like physical strength is all that matters..." the Saiyan pointed out, smiling slightly as he sat down as well, "Y-You have your blades, those could kill them, once you f-figure it out. And you're fast, and you can f-fly, so... Maybe... Speed? That's your thing." Soldiers were pretty standard in terms of abilities yet once you got into the Elites and the commanders you began to see some serious changes; incredible speed, strange alien abilities, unique Ki attacks, all kinds of things that made them different. "There were a lot of powerful, high ranked people in the military who weren't really strong either, but they had other things that made them good fighters still. So... J-just because you might not be super strong doesn't mean anything."

Yumi wasn't too sure how she'd keep this up, having to dodge so often and essentially hit and run was proving to be taxing. She couldn't fault Eris and Orion for running off to fight either since it took pressure off of Viral, she just had to find a way to hold up things on her end. Knocking one out of the fight was of small relief as two more set on her within seconds, leaping away and onto a rocky outcrop to avoid being pinned by them. Her vantage point allowed her some respite if only for a brief moment as an armored beast charged it down, smashing headlong into the structure and causing it to collapse beneath her feet. In mid fall she cocked back a leg and swung it at a larger rock, sending it into the creatures head and stunning it briefly. Trying to take advantage of that she kicked off the moment she landed and grabbed hold of its neck, shouting as she hoisted it up off its legs and leaned back, slamming it on its shell with an audible crack that split some of it apart. Injured but not dead she raised a leg almost to eye level before bringing it down like a guillotine on the creature's throat, smashing it in the process and promptly killing it as the light faded from its eyes.

Her small victory was short lived and quickly Yumi found herself in a bad position. No sooner had her leg made contact did another of the creatures set upon her, barreling into her back and winding her as she was tossed away. Rolling across the rough terrain she coughed and struggled to get up, wincing as one of the creatures batted her away yet again with its paw, suffering cuts to her arm and side from the hit. Again she tumbled and stopped only when she collided with some rocks, trying to ignore the pain as she fought back to her feet. When the nearest beast lunged at her she dashed to the side to avoid being bitten, growling as she made a quick slice along its side, drawing blood before kicking as hard as she could into the wound. Her injuries were minor really and yet she was beginning to feel uneasy, her head swimming and her body unusually hot. Trying to ignore the odd sensations she set her sights on another, preparing to take it on before a sharp pain wracked her body. Falling to a knee she tried to fight through it, letting out a breathless yell as it consumed her. Seeing perhaps an opening the beast roared and jumped for her, only to be torn in two in the blink of an eye. Yumi was back on her feet again, her hair wild and her eyes equally so as she raced from the corpse to another creature, spinning her body in almost a corkscrew and slashing several times along the length of it, creating several deep gashes and leaving it for dead.

Eris and Orion were managing to hold their own against the spined beast, albeit not without their share of troubles. Lacking something like Enki they had to fight a beast several times their own size, making many of their usual tactics obsolete. While Orion kept the beast's focus by smashing away at its head Eris worked on crippling it, cutting at its legs in an effort to take away its mobility. It seemed to go rather well for a while, they were leaving some nasty looking wounds and thoroughly giving the monster a run for its money. As Eris poised herself to take a cut at the beast's left leg however she noticed something unusual, the spine on its knee quivered oddly at her presence and almost seemed to grow. Only thanks to her reaction time did she avoid being skewered as it shot out from the beasts flesh like a projectile, cutting her cheek but otherwise causing no harm.

"Hm, Orion, watch the spines! It can use them as weapons!" Eris yelled above, dashing in at the offending limb to prevent a second attack. Snarling as her energy again formed around her arm she took a swipe at the spot the spine was growing out of, causing its growth to halt and the beast to release a roar of pain. Pushing off the leg then she inhaled and opened her mouth before yelling quite loudly, a blast of energy escaping her body and slamming into the wound itself, blasting it even wider open and tearing quite a bit of flesh away. It hadn't taken the limb but the creature suffered notable damage as it staggered from the blow, losing blood now from the attack quite steadily.

Shu didn’t know what he was supposed to do. If he was supposed to try and be brave then he was going to have to throw himself into battle and risk everything just so he could show he was brave. He couldn’t change who he was that easily, but everybody wanted him to change for the good of everybody who fought alongside him. What if he changed and hurt someone? It was even worse when there was the immediate thought that he would possibly never be able to turn back one day. It made him worried and scared of himself, but he didn’t know how to express those worries properly to the others which probably made it even worse. They probably wouldn’t be able to understand anyway, they just ignored the problem and probably blamed it on his inability to fight properly. Maybe it was all of those factors and he was just trying to make it seem that he was just being underestimated, that he was definitely a coward and not worth more than that. He was feeling downright awful now, his confidence that he could be brave being near zero. Sighing lightly he looked up a little and around, seeing the others looking fairly okay but no portal in sight. “I-I no really look for those things…” he muttered, continuing his staring down the battlefield, “Maybe…maybe more…but Mister Viral, Miss Yumi and their friends…”

T’charrl hoped his energy was going to keep stable, at least until the warning phase was over. He always had a time after using his energy where he could feel if he was about to lose control and change into a monster, so he had to be careful about that. Even if it appeared small it was still a high concentration of energy since he couldn’t risk accidentally healing it or giving it energy instead. He had to make sure to overload it, but thankfully for now he wasn’t feeling too much of a disturbance for now. Feeling the need to bring up the fact that his race weren’t particularly strong as a reminder to Haku he frowned when Haku still seemed to assume that he was well equipped to take them out normally. “Those things didn’t care for wounds, even as I cut into them. I can fly fast, but that’s best for retreating…” he spoke before he sighed, “Those people probably had a lot of Ki behind them, but I can’t use Ki against these monsters all the time. My own power is effective against them, but then I would need to use it…unless I should use it. I could just try to embrace it, but then what would I become…probably no better than my people in the past…”

Viral knew he had to focus, he couldn’t lose it in the middle of battle. Unless he wanted to lose he was going to have to try and kill these creatures off and get back to Yumi to help her. He also had to help the other Beastmen if they ran into further trouble with those things, even if they appeared to be fine. Trying to hold off the beast he couldn’t help but think of his time as a commander, how it was his duty to make sure everyone was coordinated and protected, but this was just making him feel like everything was falling out of control and making him feel completely incompetent. He couldn’t let them fall, he had worked so hard to keep everything under control until now. Growling in anger he forced his way out of the hold in time to stop the other from ramming its beak into Enki’s face, pushing it back before throwing it down to the side as he immediately had to turn around and throw a punch at the other creature. He was on an absolute full lockdown between the pair, the fight turning into a brawl between beast and machine. He had to keep up with them, he needed to find some way to get them to back off so he could use his swords. Trying to toss them both back as much as he could he moved to take them away from its friend and Yumi’s own battle, his Enki taking several hits in return with one coming close to tearing one of Enki’s eyes out. “You think you have me just because you dare double-team me?? I’ll tear you both apart!!”

"Hey, whatever's going on they'll be fine, they can handle themselves," Takeshi beamed, putting an arm around Shu's shoulders, "Viral and Yumi know how to fight those things, all they gotta do is fight them and open the rift back up right? That's not too bad, they've got this." That wasn't to say he didn't worry a bit himself, no one knew what was on the other side save for those currently there. They were tough though, if anyone could handle being on the other side it would be them. Letting go of his brother he watched Vegeta wander off curiously, tilting his head before following their friend. "Hey... What's up? You looking for something?" he asked as he scanned the area, scratching his head at the silence. He'd mentioned something about a new rift or something but he didn't see anything, did he have an idea? When he didn't get an answer Takeshi frowned and reached out, prodding Vegeta's shoulder to get his attention. "Hey, what's up? Are we missing something?"

Vegeta closed his eyes and exhaled through his nose before calmly turning around, easing Takeshi's hand away from him. "Well... Yes, we may be. Think about it for a second: when we kill the beasts here they turn to smoke and vanish, yes? Well... Where does that smoke go to? It doesn't appear to remain in our world." It had to be going somewhere, and after seeing the beasts using rifts as a means of passage he had a theory; they passed through the portal and must assume this ethereal form of theirs in doing so, which meant if they were killed here they must return... But where? And how? To the other side of the rift was the only explanation, which meant... "If they don't die here they return to their own world, and in doing so they must be passing through something, meaning another rift. While I still don't fully understand it I theorize that there's another rift here somewhere, albeit a much smaller one. If we can somehow isolate that, find a means to open it..."

"Then the others can get back!" Takeshi finished, smiling as he came to the rather obvious conclusion, "Okay, so how do we do that? If there's a way to open it back up then we should do it. If they need help we can go over and help them."

"I don't know, without understanding the machinations behind it there's no way of us opening a portal ourselves. Just because we may know where they're going doesn't mean we can get there, not right yet." There had to be a way though, some condition that needed to be met in order for them to open the rift. Some kind of energy? A certain location? Vegeta's mind was a whirlwind of thought as he tried to come up with an explanation, knowing every second he took to think could be another second someone was in grave danger.

"But... You're fighting to protect people... Right? That's what we do here..." Haku argued back, smiling uncertainly as he rubbed at his neck, "Y-You know... We've got a lot of pretty strong people here, right? But I don't worry about them becoming bad, because they're all good, no matter how s-strong they get. I think the same way about you, even if you don't. So... If your own energy works I t-think you should try." Haku knew all too well what happened if things got out of hand for T'charrl of course, he'd been there and witnessed it during their first meeting, an event that for many reasons he'd just as soon forget. That had been a while ago and now he was optimistic as he could be that the power was more under control. "If more come then... Try using it? Your f-friends are here, if it gets bad..."

Yumi had lost most of her sense of self, perhaps her more primal being kicking in as a self defense. Whatever the case the manner in which she zipped about now was far less that of a graceful martial artist and more a wild beast. From leaping onto the creatures and tearing them apart to darting about on all fours she was managing to hold her own, even if she was only vaguely aware of it. Leaping from the back of one creature to the next she sank her claws into its neck, directing it with a powerful yank and sending it charging into one of its own, leaping off as they tumbled down a hill together in a bloody mess. Logically she should continue as she had been and keep fighting the smaller beasts, reduce their numbers and then move on. Yet when she spotted Viral contending with two on his own her priorities promptly shifted and, letting out a snarl she left her battlefield behind for his. The closest creature to her was the feathered beast and so she went for that first, leaping off the ground and landing on one of its legs, slashing at it furiously to try and make it back off. It worked, but now she found herself being shaken about violently as it tried to get her off of its limb. Refusing to give up so easily she clawed her way up to its torso, dodging a swiping claw as she got onto its back and made several quick cuts along its shoulders, scrambling aside as a hand came down to try and crush her.

Shu looked to Takeshi’s arm before he sighed, slowly nodding. He had confidence that they could handle the monsters on the other side, but he was still worried that it might prove near impossible to get them back. He hoped that wasn’t going to be the case and that they’d get back, but he was always going to have that doubt in the back of his mind. Frowning, he looked to Takeshi as he wandered over to Vegeta to talk about something Vegeta was noticing. Shu didn’t know if he should take interest in what he was seeing too, he was feeling awfully down and didn’t know if he could find interest in anything right now. It was probably something scientific anyway and everybody knew he wasn’t smart enough to understand many things anyway. He was very aware of his intelligence and compared to everyone else he was a very simple creature. Staring at Takeshi and Vegeta for a moment he soon sighed and slowly headed over to them, keeping a little away from them before looking around. He understood a little of it, something like where ever the smoke went when the monsters vanish they might find another portal, but that still sounded quite impossible anyway. He didn’t take note on what direction the smoke went, plus the portal appeared out of nowhere. “Ooh…maybe…maybe Friend T’charrl might know…? Friend good at energy a-and he got them thingys on his head that twitchy twitch and maybe they can help find?”

T’charrl frowned, raising his shoulders a little before dropping them lower than what they were originally. He could fight but he didn’t know if he was very good at protecting people, nevermind himself most of the time. “I was a pretty bad scout when I was found originally, I hadn’t even completed training with my father”, he spoke before he sighed, “I don’t particularly know how to use my blades other than trying to use them as a sword, but that doesn’t seem to be very effective…” He had a lot to learn, he was still very young. Everybody in the group probably thought he was a lot older than he actually was, most likely because they weren’t familiar with Kaesstrians so in return they seemed to treat him like a fully independent adult. He certainly wasn’t that, in fact Kaesstrians his age were still too young to get their own house. He was naturally completely dependent on others for social and protection but having to be completely independent made him feel useless and lonely. “Maybe…maybe I should just use it. I’m just scared of it, I guess. I’m an unknown even to my own people so nobody can help me…”

Viral was in desperation to try and keep up with the two creatures as his own mind grew disorientated with increased stress to succeed and protect. He was fighting a war all over again with these creatures where the likelihood of a casualty was growing ever higher. He couldn’t let failure happen again, not here. Despite Enki being something he was simply sitting inside and controlling the whole process was putting a lot of stress on his body with all his energy going into powering Enki. He was its battery essentially and if he had no power left Enki would just cease functioning. Sending his body into overdrive was just going to make things worse, but he had to destroy these creatures to save the others.

Despite the two Beastmen being powered up, they were still fighting something that was huge compared to them. Managing to essentially punch one of the beasts back his eyes were soon taken to a figure that suddenly jumped in at one of the beasts. “Yumi! No!!” Very quickly the other monster had dashed at him again and managed to drive its teeth into Enki’s shoulder, the bone against metal sounding out with a loud screech before a crunching sound sounded out as the monster drove its paw into Enki’s face. The shoulder mechanism was torn up as Viral was forced back, Enki’s face cracked and fair damaged but Viral was far from done. With a yell Viral was straight back in again, punching furiously at the beast before tossing it down. Raising a foot as if to aim a crushing blow to the monster’s head Viral’s attention was immediately taken to the beast Yumi had decided to take on, watching as she hastily made her way up the beast with it making an attempt to crush her. Holding his arm up instead of making the attempt he shot out kunai at the monster’s hand to force it to come to a halt; however, in his momentarily distraction he instead had the beast that was on the ground not end up crushed by his foot but instead ram his foot. Unable to stabilise Enki from the force Viral was tossed up before pinned down by the beast finishing its charge. Growling in anger he was very quickly retaliating, punching back its claws before immediately throwing a vicious kick up that landed right between the rear legs of the beast, tossing it clear over Enki.

"Well t-then it's not your fault, is it? If you didn't even complete your training no one can blame you..." Haku argued, smiling uncertainly at his own argument as he rubbed his hands together, "I mean... That's like a soldier being s-sent to fight without being trained, right? Good thing is we can t-train you, or... Someone can. I can't." He couldn't help with the blades, that was something entirely alien to a Saiyan and they didn't have anything remotely similar to that. Their biggest quirk were the tails which they were born with, albeit Haku like many others had theirs removed early on by one of the doctors. Without those they looked rightfully human which probably explained why he'd so easily melded into society back on Earth, even if he felt horribly out of place. "But someone has to know something... I mean... You s-said there were others like you before, right? That you didn't want to b-be like them," Haku pointed out, "So... We just n-need to learn more about them. And we already talked about going back to y-your home, so... That might work. Someone's got to know something right?"

How infuriating to have this theory and no solid evidence, it was enough to drive Vegeta mad. Unfortunately for his hypothesis as well neither Shu nor Takeshi had paid any mind to where the smoke itself had gone, and he'd only noticed a handful of wisps, hardly enough to be conclusive evidence. "That... Is actually a brilliant suggestion, Shu. I'm impressed," he muttered, looking over at their friend thoughtfully, "He was able to connect to Otherworld, I see no reason he can't repeat the same process here." Previously however it had something to do with spirits, hence the connection, and that wouldn't work unless someone had died on the other side. Barring that Vegeta was uncertain of what the parameters were but it was their best bet right now. Approaching T'charrl and Haku he waited until the latter finished speaking, clearing his throat to get T'charrl's attention. "If you're not feeling too worn down from the fighting there's something I'd like to test regarding the rifts," Vegeta explained with a nod towards the brothers, "We think that the vapors left behind by the monsters all moved towards one place, suggesting perhaps they're returning through that spot. I know you're capable of opening portals of your own, do you think you could try reopening one? It may help us reach the others."

"Hopefully T'charrl can do something, otherwise we're in a real mess here," Takeshi muttered as he scratched his head, "It's gotta suck being over there, you know? I wonder what the place is like. I mean looking at it through the portal was bad enough, but being there? I don't envy them..." Here they were already done on their end while Viral and the others were still probably duking it out with whatever lay beyond the rift. With little else to do for the time being Takeshi took a seat on the grass, motioning for Shu to join him. "Hey, relax buddy, we kicked butt and everyone's fine, there's nothing to worry about," he reassured with a pat on Shu's back, "You doing okay? Those things didn't hit you did they?"

Yumi had come so close to being squashed that she felt the air compressing around her, narrowly avoiding being smacked as Viral's kunai found its mark. Dashing up the creatures neck she stopped atop of its head and made another series of gashes along the length of it, drawing a fair bit of blood in the process. Far from done however she got atop the creature's head and grabbed hold of feathers for support, snarling as she freed one hand to smash a fist atop its skull, repeating the motion several times and causing the massive beast to yelp in pain. Figuring she could kill it this way she nearly toppled off when the creature suddenly spread wings from its sides, a fierce gust of wind almost uprooting her as it took to the air in one swift motion. Fighting to keep her grip Yumi held onto its flesh and smashed into its skull again, being yanked about in the process as it tried to shake her off. If she killed it then it would stop flying, and if it was dead it couldn't hurt Viral, these were the only two things she cared about.

T’charrl stared at Haku before he nodded slightly, letting out a sigh. “There might be some books I could look at for guidance…” He didn’t want to bug Viral about fighting with weapons, but it wasn’t as if he knew him in the first place. Viral kept to himself most of the time or had someone with him that T’charrl never really talked too much, at least not casually. “A lot of the history regarding what’s wrong with me was wiped. They don’t want history repeating itself with others who seek to control the spirits, even though that’s what the General tried to do before I stole his energy”, he spoke before he sighed, “The state I left him in when I took it from him, he looked like he aged centuries…” Feeling oddly regretful for his actions he gasped when Vegeta approached him, staring up at him as if he had done something wrong. With his shoulders raised and his claws near his face he listened to Vegeta before looking to Takeshi and Shu, frowning when the question was delivered to him. That very thing sounded rather difficult and something he was somewhat dreading, but it wasn’t as if he could avoid being asked since he had shown he could open portals. “Oh uhh…umm m-maybe. I’ve never tried another place other than the afterlife…” he spoke, slowly standing up, “I guess I’ve got the energy, maybe…and uhh, been around them more, maybe…so maybe I can try? What way did the smoke go? I guess I was too, uhh, distracted to look where…”

Shu stared at Vegeta as he was given praise for his suggestion, feeling confused over whether he should be feeling happy that he was basically complimented on some intelligence he might have or if it was nothing to think all that greatly about. He was certain it was just a passive comment because Vegeta didn’t think of it first because he didn’t spend much personal time with T’charrl other than teaching him the language some more. When Vegeta went over to talk to T’charrl he remained where he was, pressing his fingers together in a slight show of nerves before looking to Takeshi as he spoke. Giving a little nod in response he continued to press his fingers together, letting out a little sigh. “Friends…friends stuck in other world…that’s bad…” Staring down at the grass as Takeshi prompted him to sit with him he did decide to do so, squeaking when he landed his backside down on the spot. Staring at the grass as Takeshi patted his back he soon slowly looked up at him, staring for a moment before looking down again. “No…I’m okay. They no manage to hurt…” he sighed, going quiet for a moment before raising his shoulders, “Does…Takeshi think Shu smart? Or is Shu dumb scaredy animal…”

Viral was losing his composure and fast. He had very little energy and his body was under great stress. Yumi shouldn’t had been up on that beast herself, it was taking two powered up Beastmen to take on the other and she was just one person. His whole world was becoming torn apart as his team started to split more out of his control and if he couldn’t bring it back under his control he was going to lose someone. As he pulled Enki off the ground again the gunman stood slumped, Viral’s hands remaining off the controls as his hands pressed against his chest instead. He was having a hard time breathing at this point, his heart barely managing to catch up as his body felt skewered. Passed his fingers blood flowed freely down his body and onto the flooring of Enki, his old wounds reversed in their healing process. His body was losing it the longer he was being sapped of energy and mental stamina, he didn’t know how much longer he could keep functioning. When the sudden blast of wind nearly knocked his immobile Enki over Viral let out a growl of pain before he snatched Enki’s controls again and turned it around, observing the monster as it took to the air with Yumi too. “No! Yumi! Get off that thing!!” He needed to catch her, he couldn’t let her get hurt. With a sudden forceful jolt Viral was rammed from behind by the other beast, its claws being partially driven into Enki with its teeth coming down on its arm as it tried to tear it off. He had to shoot that thing out of the air, but he needed Yumi off it first before he could try and blast it. “Yumi!! Jump! I’ll catch you!!”

"Books? Oh, books would be good. Anything you can get to help would be good," Haku said with a nod and hopeful smile. He just wanted T'charrl not to have to worry so much, he couldn't imagine it was too fun being so afraid of your own power. It was nice that there was some possibility for getting help and for a moment he was relaxed, until T'charrl brought up a big problem with it. "Oh... There might still be something? They couldn't have gotten rid of everything... Right?" Okay that was kind of terrifying to hear, and who was this General? This was something he didn't know anything about and he couldn't even begin to guess, should he ask? Maybe this General could give them some of the answers they needed, he must know a lot if he was messing around with spirits. Opening his mouth to ask he jumped slightly when Vegeta interrupted them, frowning as he clammed up for now and let the man speak. There had to be something at T'charrl's home that could help, they just had to go and look.

"Fantastic, right over here then." The spot he had seen the smoke travel do was roughly 10 meters away from where they stood, not terribly far from where the original rift had been either. As expected there was no sign of anything there now but Vegeta couldn't shake the suspicion he had. "We know the beasts travel through these portals, that much has been established. And for whatever reason while here they cannot be killed, at least not in the regular sense. If they vanish upon death they must be moving back to where they've come from, which means there must be a doorway for them to do so. Another rift," Vegeta explained, crossing his arms and knitting his brow briefly as he thought about it, "Which leads us to this... Do you think you could try seeking out energy and opening it again? If we can make our own link then we can cross and help if they need it, or get them back here if that's the case. It's only a theory and I'm not sure if it will even work but it's worth an attempt." If it did fail which it was liable to then it would be a disappointment but not the end of the world. There was a means of opening a rift for themselves, Vegeta was certain of it, they only had to find what the conditions were.

Listening to the conversation between T'charrl and Vegeta was confusing, he didn't get the talk of portals and rifts and all that. Sure he knew what they were, the sort of thing the monsters came through, but how they worked was well beyond him. Anyway he wasn't concerning himself with that right now, Shu was all bummed out and he had to try cheering the little guy up. "They'll come back, Viral and Yumi are strong and smart, they'll get out of it," Takeshi said with confidence, "Not the first time we've been in a situation right? Don't worry, they've got this." That being said he was worrying too, they had never gone into another world like this, or... Wherever the others had gone. He'd be lying if he said he didn't feel the least bit grateful he hadn't been sent over with them. The question posed through Takeshi through a loop a bit as it was unexpected, and he took a moment to consider before answering. "Well... You're like me buddy. We're not super book smart like Vegeta, not even close, you know? But that doesn't stop us from figuring things out and making things work," he said thoughtfully, grinning as he reached over and gave Shu a pat on the head, "We're both smart, just in different ways from Vegeta. I guess there's more than one kind of way people can be smart."

Staying on top of the monster now that it was airborne was proving to be quite the struggle. Pressure aside the sudden jolting movements of the creature threatened to throw Yumi off and yet she held on, determined as anything to bring down the beast. It had attacked and tried to hurt Viral so she wouldn't rest until it lay dead. Growling as it shook its body she could hear Viral down below yelling at her, knowing what he was saying but refusing to do as he asked. She couldn't, not when this monster was still around to harm him. Furious that it continued to try and shake her she moved across its back and towards a wing, snarling as she reached out with a claw and took a swing at the nearest one. With a good strong blow she managed to gouge out quite a lot of it, and the effects of her attack were immediate: with a monstrous roar the beast began to lose altitude quickly and drop towards the ground, barely able to keep from crashing now. Only now did Yumi leap from its back towards Viral, figuring as soon as she was caught she would go right back to killing the creature.

T’charrl was a little nervous, he didn’t know if he could actually make this portal but if there was this many people who were wanting to rely on him and everyone on the other side then he had to try. It was going to be difficult to even think about doing, it was a completely foreign type of portal and trying to open it was probably going to be the hardest task he’ll have to complete in a very long time. It was probably going to be risky on his life as well, but he didn’t know if Vegeta was quite aware of the risks. If he died it was his own fault, but then again if he died the spirit’s energy would become highly destructive and possibly engulf the area. It would be energy like what his planet funnels to keep stable and hidden, but in high concentrations it’s like a massive bomb. Feeling rather nervous he kind of wished he was still talking and sitting on the floor, shaking a little as Vegeta told him the basics. “A-Another rift…oh, that makes sense…” Maybe if he just lead them in the right direction he could slip out on trying to use his energy to open a rift, maybe that would be as far as he would need to go for now. “Find…a rift…I can try, maybe…I can…” He had to try, there was so many people counting on him to be able to do this. Raising his head he twitched his antennae, letting out a groan before he started walking off.

Shu didn’t know if Takeshi would want to tell him the truth or if he would really actually thought he was either smart of stupid. He just wanted to know what people really thought of him instead of them trying to mask the truth so that he might continue on his merry way not knowing any better. He didn’t really know if he would ever get the truth from the others, even if he tried. Keeping his gaze low as Takeshi spoke he sighed a little, pressing his fingers together as he slowly looked up to Takeshi again as he received a pat on the head. Takeshi didn’t really seem to understand what he meant, it seemed, and was comparing him and himself to Vegeta instead. “Umm…Mister Vegeta? But no that way, no like him…” he spoke lowly, looking over to Vegeta briefly before sighing, “I mean like…like other people! Is Shu okay in smarts? Are you giving truth? How is the smart?”

It was Enki that was taking the brunt of the damage right now, its sacrifice to keep Viral far away from death was the only advantage he was holding right now. The beast wasn’t making its way into Enki’s innards quite yet, its shell was tougher than that but those teeth were blocking some joints and blocking off its hidden weapons. Enki and Viral could last just a bit longer to kill these monsters, but first Viral had to save Yumi. If she could fly in this realm she would had done it by now, but evidence that Ki did not work here was just increasing and the situation was growing even dire by the second. Trying to force the monster back all while moving forward, keeping his eye on Yumi as he tried to guess when she might follow his instruction. Throwing a fist back to punch the monster he managed to get it square in the snout, causing it to back off before his attention was taken to Yumi once more. Without Viral’s help Yumi managed to take the monster out of the sky with a grievous injury, but she was still going to come crashing down with it. Throwing Enki forward he reached out its hand, barely managing to make it before Enki was rammed. With a loud crash Enki fell as the monster drove its body into it, but despite all this Enki had managed to catch Yumi. With a loud creaking Enki’s fingers unfurled, allowing Yumi to escape its grasp.

"All we need to know for now is that another exists for certain. It's highly possible we've no way of interacting with it, which wouldn't be unexpected." They had no part in opening the rifts prior to his knowledge and it was doubtful they had a means of doing so even if they wanted to. Still, nothing ventured nothing gained. Following behind T'charrl to see what he could find Vegeta glanced over his shoulder curiously hearing footsteps and was surprised to find Haku following as well, meeting the boy's gaze briefly before shrugging it off. No harm in his tagging along, he was skeptical anything would come of this anyway. "If you don't mind my asking, how are you feeling after the fighting? We were concerned that you and Shu may be at risk of transforming if I'm honest, and I'm rather relieved neither of you did so," Vegeta admitted, "That being said... Does anything feel off? We can postpone this for a short while if you feel the need to relax first."

So Shu just wanted to know if he was smart? He was, though maybe not in the way Shu was thinking of. None of them were really book smart like Vegeta was, and none of them could do any of the science stuff he or his dad could do either, but they were still smart in their own way. It was a sound argument to Takeshi yet his little brother had a hard time buying into it still. "Other people...? Uh... I mean yeah, you're smart buddy. Hell, if we talk about survival smarts then... You've got me beat by a mile, you know? I figured I was okay at it because I lived by myself but you're way better than I am, so you're even smarter than me there. And... You know stuff still, even if you don't know you do. I mean look, you were raised by monkeys and all that before you met those old people who raised you right? You learned how to talk like that, and then you've learned a lot since we met too. So... Yeah, you're smart. And that's the truth. I think you're smart enough that whatever you wanna learn you can, you're like a... Smart sponge... Or something."

Yumi had gained a big victory in crippling the winged beast, it meant now they would be fighting on even footing and it would have no advantage. There was a slight problem however now that it was falling and that was her lack of flight here, something even in her more rampant state she recognized. With little other recourse she did as Viral asked and took a literal leap of faith, aiming for Enki as best she could and flipping around onto her back to try and cushion the fall. When she hit his hand there was a slight pain and her breath was knocked from her but she was alive, taking a second before getting back onto her feet. Looking into Enki's eyes she wondered if Viral could see her now, managing a faint smile before her eyes darted away as one of the monsters let out a pained howl, wondering what in the world was going on beyond their own battle. Seeing the spined beast on its side and littered with wounds was unexpected and hugely relieving, that meant one less foe to deal with now.

They had taken away its mobility by crippling each leg, taken an eye from it to limit its eyesight and plenty of blood had been spilled now on both sides, yet Eris and Orion remained on top. Once they had felled the beast itself Eris wasted little time in trying to put it down for good by firing off an energy blast of her own aimed for its throat, annoyed when the creature released a blast of its own just quick enough to block hers. That did little good to stop Orion however as he went in for a more personal approach, and with him he had a rather large boulder he'd torn up from the battlefield. Leaning back on one leg he threw his entire body forward before releasing the stone into the creatures head, splitting the skull and fatally wounding it with the blow. Eris fell to his side in a heartbeat and her chest puffed up as she prepared and fired off another attack, her energy hitting the same spot Orion had. The resulting attack blew the creatures head clean off, or to be more exact blew it apart and incinerated what was left under the high heat of the blast. The body writhed for a brief moment following its decapitation before coming to a standstill, at last slain by their efforts. Both were injured moderately however and had spent a great deal of energy killing the one creature, and still two remained.

T’charrl looked back to Vegeta, frowning before looking away as he got an idea about something. “I could use the energy signatures of the others that went through as a means to tether myself to the other side…” He did that with their dead friend before to get in touch with Vegeta’s parents so it must be possible for people who were still alive on another plane of existence. It must work, especially if he was wanting to save energy and not end up going berserk. Contemplating it for a moment he gasped when Vegeta spoke to him, staring at him for a moment as he too contemplated on his chances of changing. Frowning, he slowly shook his head, staring at the ground as he walked. “I wouldn’t call it transforming, more like…uhh, just now I’m hiding my true self…” he spoke, moving his head to try and sense the energy, “O-Otherwise, I guess I feel okay for now. It can all happen suddenly, but I feel fine for now. I just-…this whole place is filled with energy, it’s hard to find it straight away. I-I’m sorry, I’m letting everyone down…and the others could be in trouble…”

Shu hoped he was going to be regarded as smart by someone and not seen as a dumb animal, especially with how he acted. He didn’t mean to act like a strange character, he was simply being normal or what he understood to be normal. It was everyone else who was acting strange to him, but he might end up appearing stupid to everyone else too which left him being the one who was the outcast. Him being scared of the beasts was strange to the others, something that was drilled in when Vegeta told him off for being so scared. Trying to narrow his question down some more he stared at him for a moment before letting out a groan, pressing his fingers together some more. “Smart sponge…? No really understand, no much at all…” he spoke as he tried to understand, “You say I smart at survive? Is that why I run even if strong? Not really know why I do what I do…but do you?”

Viral was barely holding onto Enki’s controls, very nearly falling off as he hung on by his claws. He was really starting to lose it now. If it wasn’t for Enki’s shell he would had been crushed by the great weight of the creature, but he was low on energy and injured badly despite Enki essentially being his protection. He was going to kill Takeshi if he got out of this alive, this probably would had been a lot simpler if he just had the energy. Seeing Yumi safe after that fall from the corner of his eye was all he needed to move again, at least before the beast decided to try and dig at Enki’s back. Throwing an arm around he elbowed the monster in the face, managing to get Enki’s other arm around as well as he made a grab for its claws. Trying to push the monster back he could only observe its mad snapping of its jaws, the rest of his strength going into trying to fend the creature off. All the strength was going into his arms and even as his vision felt like it was failing and his body was burning, he was still trying to charge up one last sunbeam to finish this thing off.

"That's... Ingenious, actually. I hadn't considered that. If you're able to do so then please, give it a try. They may need our assistance." Viral would hate him for interfering, and the Beastmen would likely take issue as well, but it was better than leaving them on their own. There was some risk with their tracking energy however and T'charrl knew it as well: he may change if exposed to too much energy. They had yet to have an incident where he attacked any of them but Vegeta would prefer not to test that just to be certain. "The real you, hm...? Funny, I thought the Kaesstrian we met before the incident was the real you, not what you turn into," he pointed out with a shrug, "If they are in trouble it's not your fault, don't apologize. We knew the risks going into this, they did too, it's not anyone's fault." Nor would it be T'charrl's fault if the worst should come to pass and they were unable to help the others. Vegeta knew this was a long shot, trying to open another portal, but it was all they had right now.

Takeshi knew what he wanted to tell Shu, he just had no idea how to say it. Seriously why was it being left to him? He wasn't the type of person to do this thing, that was supposed to be Vegeta's or Aito's job wasn't it? He was trying to tell Shu he was bright and failing miserably as he only seemed to be upsetting his brother with his words. "Yeah, you know... You soak up stuff and get smart, that's what I mean. You're good at that." Which he was, he'd learned a lot since they met and he remembered all of it, that was smart right? Again Shu pressed him for answers he didn't have and Takeshi almost didn't want to answer for risk of making him even more upset. Knitting his brow in thought he tried to come up with a good answer, sighing as he rubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah, well... You know. An idiot like me just fights, I don't think about if I can win or not, I just do it. That's dangerous and stupid right?" he asked with a small laugh, "But you're smarter than that, you know when to fight, and when to run. And you can still fight even if you're scared, which makes you brave. So yeah, you're smart and you're brave."

The winged beast was crippled but not slain, still a threat then to Viral. Yumi took solace in seeing Eris and Orion tackle the beast next which gave her an opportunity to help Viral fend off this one, and with luck kill it. Knowing she couldn't attack it on her own without risking him hitting her on accident she kept perched on his shoulder, fending off any attacks as best she could. With its maw snapping viciously at them she jumped out briefly and slammed her foot into its jaw, forcing it to fall back before dropping and lending on Enki's torso, grabbing a piece of its armor to keep herself up. Whatever frenzy she'd been stirred up into before was now slowly fading, some semblance of reason returning to her. Feeling a heat above her she craned her neck and saw energy growing at Enki's crown, putting two and two together to figure out what he was trying to do. Using the machine as leverage she pulled herself up before crouching against it and springing off, driving her frame into one of its legs and knocking it off center, causing it to stumble awkwardly before Viral. As soon as she hit the ground she ran back towards Enki, trying to make it clear for Viral to shoot.

Compared to the spined beast from before this one was far easier to deal with. It was obvious it made use of its wings, fighting on the ground it was awkward and clunky. While Orion took to its back and began working on severing the wing for good Eris darted between its legs, avoiding being crushed as she made cuts here and there, drawing as much blood from the wounds as she could. When it let out an ear-shattering howl it was fairly obvious Orion had succeeded in his task, and with a thunderous crash the wing was torn from its body and thrown to the ground, crushing several of the smaller creatures in the process. With a wing torn and its legs barely holding it each Beastman jumped back for a moment, moving to either side of the creature before charging back in towards its head. With a leap on each of their parts Orion threw two fists forward with enough force to shatter a mountain and Eris attacked with an energy, backed slice, the result twisting the creature's head a full 360 degrees before being severed, leaving it quite thoroughly dead.

T’charrl smiled lightly, sighing as he looked away again. “I will try to be fast, but I might need energy as well. It might help to have some since my spirit will not be in my body”. It was always worth giving him a little telling about his powers and the disadvantages of trying to make a portal. His own spirit wasn’t very strong right now so keeping a portal open where people could move through would be very difficult. Having a look around he grew unsure about where he might be heading, eventually coming to a stop where he thought might be where he would be able to open a portal. Frowning when Vegeta expressed his concern he looked back at him, rubbing his chest. “It’s more like a what I turned into…” he sighed, “I mean, if I just let everything go I would change so sometimes it’s hard to sleep…” He was a lot more tired than he used to be before all this happened, but he just got used to it. “Well…I’ll still try to. I can’t go slowly just in case we miss something vital…” Gathering his energy together he tried to focus, staring at the ground before moving his eyes to the sky. There must had been something there, the energy after the fight was still hanging around but he wasn’t completely sure if this was where it was in the highest concentration.

Shu just wanted to understand what people felt about him, especially when he had very little understanding of himself. He just wanted you know if he was just being complimented because he was his brother. “Good at that…? Good at that to get smart…” It was hard to tell when he had asked him that before and the answer was about the same, meaning he didn’t know if it was truthful unless it was different from what he said before. Trying to understand it by probing him further to understand what he meant he stared at him, his face fairly neutral before squeaking. “But Mister Vegeta got mad at me! I also made trouble, it was bad…” he spoke quickly, shaking his head, “Not good, but if Ki no really work it get really scary…like…like angry animal wanting to eat me…”

Viral was caught between trying to find the power to destroy this beast and controlling it, but maybe soon it won’t be of a concern. If he could kill this monster with what energy he had left maybe he could avoid losing control altogether, even if it meant he might end up dying instead. When it came down to it, dying was better than trying to tear up your teammates. Willing to give it one last shot he charged up one last sunbeam, trying to move the monster into its path as it also pushed down at him, trying to tear Enki’s face off with furious teeth. He wasn’t going to be able to make it, this was already looking useless even as he put as much strength into it as possible; however, as Yumi left the beast’s lost its footing and Viral was immediately given the advantage. Growling in anger he immediately threw the beast up towards Enki’s crown as he kept a grip on its claws, holding on tight to it before finally firing the sunbeam at an incredibly close range. The blast lit up the sky as it burned through the beast’s body, ash spraying high in the air as it disintegrated under the extreme heat. As the blast finished and the dazzling light disappeared, all that was left was the forearms of the beast and part of its tail. Slowly letting go of the beast’s claws he let Enki’s arms drop, his own paws releasing Enki’s controls as he let them fall.

"Well we scarcely used Ki during that encounter, so if you need any just ask. We'll be more than happy to provide it." They would have to moderate the amount of energy T'charrl took in however as they didn't want him to change unexpectedly. It was a sensitive topic with the boy but Vegeta felt it was prudent they acknowledge it, and his disconcerted reaction was about what he'd expect for the conversation. "I see... We should try and find a solution still, it's been a while and you've yet to have peace of mind. I'll mention it to father and between the two of us we may be able to help." Then again their knowledge was based on human and Saiyan anatomy, Kaesstrian anatomy was still alien to them. So was T'charrl's energy itself, until they got a better look it would be guesswork. "No need to rush, we've got time." Going silent while T'charrl began to try and focus he folded his arms across his chest, following his gaze skyward initially with a frown. There had to be a means of opening a rift on their own, otherwise they were completely helpless and would have to leave it to those on the other side, and that was provided they could do anything on their end.

Was that the sort of answer Shu was looking for? Takeshi really didn't know what he was supposed to say and just trying to tell Shu he was smart didn't work. "Yeah, it means you're a good learner, you know? Even if you don't know something you always pick it up pretty quick, you did with Ki and probably with talking too. Hell I could probably teach you other stuff too, or Vegeta or Yumi or someone else." He might talk like a little kid but Shu was much smarter than he appeared, he always had been awfully perceptive and no one had ever said much before. Raising an eyebrow when his brother squeaked the older boy sighed, smiling slightly before laying back in the grass. "Sure it gets scary but you still fought. Like I said you're brave, even if you don't think you are. And think about it... You lived in the jungle for years, you know? It's not like fighting angry animals is anything new for you, and you're even stronger and faster than you used to be. All you gotta remember is you're stronger than they are, and even without Ki, all you gotta do is remember that. Besides I don't think they would really want to eat you..." Takeshi added with a grin as he grabbed Shu's arm and gave it a playful nip, "You don't taste too good."

Yumi rushed from the creature and managed to take cover in a small dip in the ground, just in time for Viral to unleash his blast. Even from afar the heat emanating from the attack was palpable, not to mention the sound it made as the energy was released and tore through the monster. Shielding herself she waited until the attack ceased before looking over her cover, amazed to find there was next to nothing left of the creature they had just been fighting. Or any of the others for that matter, the battleground was not utterly devoid of life save for the four of them. Breathing a sigh of relief she quickly climbed from her spot and raced to where Enki had now ceased moving, climbing up it and to where Viral should be sat inside. He had done most of the fighting just now, nearly all of it, he must be utterly exhausted. She was too but she didn't care, she'd be fine after some rest. "Viral! Open up, let me in!" she called, smacking her hand on one of Enki's eyes, unsure of where to go to reach him. Was he fine after all of that? She knew that his changing like that took a lot out of him, would he be okay after all of this?

T’charrl nodded a little, feeling a little better that there wouldn’t be too much fuss over giving him energy or somebody disliking the thought of having to give away energy they couldn’t spare. “That’s good, I just hope I don’t need too much for this…” Feeling a little embarrassed when Vegeta mentioned finding him help he quickly shook his head, staring down at the ground as he kept his claws focused in front of himself. “He’s so busy, so best not to, I think”, he spoke quickly before sighing, “Plus I’m not even like you. It’s the, uhh, the consequences for taking forbidden energy…even if I didn’t mean to and just wanted to save the city…or maybe I just wanted to save myself and Takeshi’s friends, I don’t know…” Only feeling confused over himself he tried to focus again, hoping he was going to get it right. Focusing his energy he closed his eyes, trying to concentrate before slowly bending down to place his claws near the ground before dragging them up in a wave of blue fire. It appeared to be a portal but there was no destination yet, instead T’charrl kept his eyes closed and his palms facing forward, trying to pinpoint the energy of the others where ever they might be.

Shu stared at Takeshi with hope that he really was being truthful, but having to find explanations for a lot of what he was saying wasn’t giving him too much hope. Looking to T’charrl for a moment as he seemed to be doing that portal thing, he frowned and let out a sigh. “Learned then forgot Ki for long time, but no really remember much of last year, anyway…” he spoke, slowly shaking his head, “Maybe good at learning, but forget easy…” While finding out whether he was strong and being able to take it as truth or not was a little difficult, he definitely knew one thing and that was that he fled from everything that ever appeared similar to his experiences at home. Frowning, his eyes slowly drifted away before he squeaked as he was suddenly grabbed and attacked by Takeshi in a strange fashion. Wriggling, he tried to get Takeshi to let go. “Ohhhh! Meat taste good though! And Shu made of meat…” he spoke quickly, shaking his head, “It no easy to forget about bad animals and what they did! It like…like in head all the time…”

Despite Viral’s efforts to remain conscious he slipped into a state of stillness, his body unable to keep functioning the way it was with Enki taking his energy to function. Everything was silent and it seemed like he was now alone in this world, but through the darkness and silence a voice called out his name, the sentence growing louder until a banging was heard as if beating down a long hall. In the brief moment he heard this noise did he see a faded image of Yumi, however as that slowly came together it was soon changed into a blurry yet darkened set of panels not too far from him. He soon began to realise he had made it back into the world of the living again as he regained consciousness, but Yumi was nowhere to be seen. Lightly groaning, he slowly turned his head, everything feeling like a chore to do as he slowly reached a shaky paw to the control. Finding it to be a much harder action than it was supposed to be he eventually found it, touching the control only lightly which allowed Enki to return to life once again but only for a moment. The mouth of Enki opened up along with the jagged casing that was the cockpit’s doors, opening wide and temporarily blinding a weakened Viral with the change in light.

"Either way the intent was good, and what happened was unfortunate. You shouldn't feel poorly or like you made a mistake, it's possible you saved countless lives by doing what you did. Hold onto that instead of the 'what-ifs'." But then that was neither here nor there and discussing these matters would only be detrimental to trying and reopen a rift. Leaving it for now Vegeta stood by in silence in case energy was needed, resigned otherwise to simply observe what was being done. It was interesting to watch, this process, and the blue flames that T'charrl created begged so many questions that went without answer. Fascinated his eyes shifted slightly to the portal forming before them, or the beginnings of one; hazy and unfocused, it reminded Vegeta a lot of a television screen without a channel to tune to, static and all. If there was a way for them to reach Viral and Yumi then this would be it, and while he'd not place that weight on T'charrl he wondered if the boy knew it as well.

"Not like it's your fault though, and you're starting to pick it back up. If we practice some more I'm sure you'll get back everything you learned," Takeshi said to try and reassure Shu. Scratching at his head for a moment the older boy laid back and let out a sigh as he wondered where to go to from there. Seemed like the little guy was still all bent out of shape and uneasy about fighting the monsters, something that he had been doing without much of a second thought. Did he really get why Shu was upset? No, not until his brother laid it out anyways. Trying to get his brother to relax by acting like a fool he let go when Shu didn't react, sitting up again and shrugging his shoulders. "Well... Then let's teach you how to fly, so you can avoid bad animals from now on," Takeshi suggested, smiling as he gave Shu a thumbs up, "Or if Ki isn't your thing... You're already real fast, you know? Probably one of the fastest here, and we're all faster than animals. So if things can't even catch you then they can't eat you right? Plus you're really good at climbing, as long as we're not in the middle of some field its easy for you to get away. 'Course... You're super strong too, so it's easy for you to kill whatever is trying to snack on your butt too."

Pounding on the glass of Enki's eye for some response and getting none made Yumi grow worried. Was Viral okay in there? The fact Enki wasn't moving at all said he wasn't at the controls, had he passed out from the fighting? How hard would it be to break into the machine? Looking around for an access point she gasped in surprise when air was released and its mouth swung open, revealing a beleaguered Viral inside. What a huge relief it was to see him awake, though it was evident he was worn down. Smiling as she swung herself down into the cockpit itself she had to lower her stance to fit properly, reaching out and taking one of his arms to place over his shoulders. "See? I knew with you leading us we'd be fine," she laughed, resisting the urge to hug him and look over him like a fitful mother over their fallen child. Moving to the mouth of Enki she glanced down over the edge to figure out how best to get down, a bit surprised to find Eris and Orion standing below waiting for them. Everyone was alive after that, bloodied and bruised but alive.

"Excellent job, Commander. Not that I doubted our victory with you at the lead," Orion called up, smiling as he waved to the pair above.

"I knew you were the alpha, this proves it! You're much better than these other males they gave us!" Eris shouted, grinning as she motioned for them to come down, "Come, get down here so we can celebrate! You should see the battlefield, we did a number on this place."

"They seem happy, we probably shouldn't keep them waiting huh?" Yumi asked, chuckling before giving Viral a smile again, "Hang on, I'll get us down there." Minding her footing she stepped out onto Enki's leg, managing to maintain her balance while supporting Viral until they got down to the knee. Finding that the angle was much to steep to simply walk down she considered their options before wordlessly scooping Viral up into her arms, stepping off and dropping down to the ground and landing with ease, placing him back onto his feet again and keeping to his side for support. "There we are, sorry about the drop."

T’charrl really didn’t know what his motive behind taking all that energy was, but he had it now and he wasn’t going to be able to get rid of it. Sometimes he did wish he was like the others, he wished he was never born with this power in the first place. It was his fault that all this trouble was brought to his people, all because he existed. Of course it made him feel sad and regretful, he wasn’t supposed to be born with these abilities and the fact that he was meant he turned the General into the power-hungry man he became which ultimately created war and killed innocents. Feeling sorrowful probably wasn’t ideal just now anyway, but he didn’t know how else he should feel whenever he was reminded about it. Trying to concentrate his energy he continued his search, groaning lightly as it continued to grow more difficult. “I-I think there’s…something…but it’s very faint…” he muttered, holding his claws up a little higher, “I’ve never done this before…it’s really hard…”

Shu was finding it hard to chill out and forget about his weaknesses, but when it happened over and over again and people were getting annoyed at him he was finding it all starting to get to him. He didn’t know how much he had annoyed Takeshi overtime because he didn’t really say, at least not other than him having a rant to Vegeta yesterday. Trying to think about what Takeshi was saying to him he sighed a little, nodding at the offer. “Can try fly more. Still no really good at flying…” he spoke, staring down before looking back to Takeshi. Shu didn’t really know what he needed to combat these monsters, he figured he should act like he usually did but then they had those big teeth and ran around on all fours. Raising his shoulders he continued staring down, feeling a little embarrassed now that Takeshi was listing his strengths. “Ooh, fast? Climb? Strong? Maybe….maybe Shu can do these things…but how do not see them as real scary? It hard…really hard to see them as more than just animals…”

Viral didn’t need the light of the outside world on top of everything else that he was feeling, his body feeling like it could just shut down at any minute if he wasn’t careful. Feeling the pain of the foreign light was one thing, but when Yumi showed up and decided to pop into the cockpit with him his focus was broken from that and went to her. Instead of talking to him she instead decided to grab his arm and pull him out of his seat, only talking to him after she had him in a hold. He was hearing what she was saying, but he couldn’t really process it very well with how little energy he had to spare. He felt like he was going to die if he went to sleep or that his organs would fall out if he was bumped even slightly; just everything felt broken with the possibility of dying just being around the corner. As he was pulled up onto Enki’s face he heard the other Beastmen shouting up at him, his weary expression following the ground before meeting with them. He didn’t know if he deserved this praise, all he had done was get them trapped in this weird dimension while not actually fixing the problem of the planet losing people to portals.

While definitely not feeling like he wanted to confront the pair he was definitely feeling less like he wanted to get off Enki like Yumi was planning. Looking to her at the suggestion he grunted as he was moved along some more, holding on with what little strength he had as to not pass out again. Yumi was moving him way too enthusiastically, he really was at this point wondering if he was going to make this tiny trip with how quickly she insisted on getting him off Enki. Feeling quite exhausted both mentally and physically he stared tiredly at the ground, trying to catch what little breath he had before he was suddenly swept off his feet and was now in Yumi’s arms, his whole world feeling like it had just collapsed as he was suddenly falling through the air again. Once everything stopped falling before him and his feet were back on the ground he was back to doing everything he could to stop himself from collapsing, his paw slowly reaching up as he tried to will Enki back to him to convert it back into energy. “None of you…should be…praising me…” he gasped, struggling to form a proper sentence despite how he acted in the battle previously. As Enki soon turned to light its form broke up and whisked its way to Viral, becoming absorbed into his paw before he lowered his limb once more all while not looking at all better off. He could barely stand on his own, he was the weakest one here too which was just even more humiliating. “We’re stuck here…we’re stuck and-…I can’t do anything about it…”

"Be patient with it, I wouldn't expect it to be easy," Vegeta urged calmly, folding his hands behind his back as he glanced skyward again, "If you can feel something then that should mean there is a passage, right? You wouldn't be picking up their energy if there wasn't some way to connect to it. Would moving help?" There was reason for optimism now and with luck they would find that 'sweet spot' which allowed them to establish a connection. He'd prefer not to say it aloud but surely T'charrl knew it, if they wanted this method to work then it hinged entirely on his ability to find a link. Walking over to the boy he stood at T'charrl's back, reaching down and gently placing a hand on his shoulder. "Let me try to help. I know Yumi's energy anywhere, and if you can find Viral then between the two of us we're bound to locate them." Closing his own eyes he allowed his Ki to flow freely, should T'charrl have need of some, and began to attempt and sense out the energy of his friend. Not unsurprisingly there was no immediate trace and this frustrated Vegeta, but he took a breath and pressed on with the search.

"That's why you practice buddy. You think I was a natural at it when I first learned?" Takeshi asked rhetorically with a laugh, "You should have seen me, sticking up in a tree a couple of times because I'd get caught on branches, or the number of times I fell into water. I wasn't exactly an ace, you know? It takes practice." So that was another thing they would have to do later on top of all the other work they already had in store for them. At least the flying thing could be fun, he'd just have to ask Vegeta about a padded room or something so Shu didn't end up hurting himself. The little guy was having trouble being positive at all with all these things he couldn't do well so maybe... Bring up the things he could do? It was worth a shot, and Takeshi was happy to find his brother seemed a little embarrassed by it. "Well... I mean look at me and bugs, you're asking the wrong guy for that buddy," the older boy chuckled, smiling slightly as he rubbed his neck, "But if you ask me... Uh... I mean you gotta face it, you know? I used to be afraid of mountain lions when I was little, they were all over the place where I grew up and they scared the crap out of me. After I realized I'm faster and stronger though they're not so scary. So you kinda got to... Face your fear I guess. If you see its not so scary then its not a big problem."

Everyone was haggard after that fight but none more so than Viral, he barely looked able to stand. Yumi had figured he'd done a lot of the fighting so that was to be expected, he'd killed two of the giant beasts and protected them all in the process. "Of course you deserve praise, you saved us. And you didn't get us trapped here, it was a set up by them, not you. Don't be blaming yourself for what they did," she reassured, slowly crouching down to set Viral into a sitting position instead. "None of us can do anything... At least not yet, it's not just you. So please, stop saying this is on you, it's not. You saved me and we prevented more people from being hurt today, there's a lot to be proud of." Much as she'd like to have a new portal spring open and for them to just leave they couldn't quite yet, there was unfinished business here. Glancing around the area in hopes of finding some clue she let out a sigh, smiling sadly as she gave Viral a pat on the back. "We need to look for the people who were taken too. If they might still be alive then we can't leave them here, which means we'll need to get moving soon."

"We can handle the search, you two take a break," Orion interjected, "We've not worn out just yet, we'll handle it from here."

"We will? I don't want to be doing a search and rescue, the people are probably dead anyways," Eris grumbled with a roll of her eyes, "Do you think those things wouldn't just eat them? Seriously, you think they were stealing them to make friends? H-Hey!" Being grabbed by the back of her shirt by Orion she swung out at him and missed, snarling before resigning herself to be lifted.

"If this is where they originally came through then the prisoners may not be far, if there are any. Let us take a look, we'll report back as soon as we find something. Come along Eris." True, search and rescue wasn't generally their job, but they were capable of doing it. That had been part of this assignment as well, rescue anyone they could, and with the beasts in the area slain they now had a chance to try and do so. Setting Eris down he pushed the girl along before walking alongside her, waving to Yumi and Viral as they moved off to begin their search.

Yumi waited until the others were well out of view before leaning over and wrapping her arms around Viral, hugging him as she laid his head on her shoulder. "I know you hate this, just shut up and let me hug you," she whispered, closing her eyes and sighing before letting him back off. "I was so stressed about today, I could barely sleep last night and I was worried something might happen, one of us might get hurt or worse. You don't know how relieved I am things worked out. And how relieved I am that you're okay," she added, smiling as she sat down beside him. "And really... You were amazing today. There's no way we could have won without you, I'm glad you were here."