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Buying Radditz, by Talon and Manawolf	By : theonlytalonsage Category: Dragon Ball Z > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 2029 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I don't own or profit from DBZ. However Sage belongs to me. Hands off. He bites.

Chapter List
- 2
- 3
- 4
by Talon and Manawolf

~~ See Chapter 1 for Warnings and Words to Know :-) !!~~

More fantastic art by salomesensei here: http://fav.me/d3884ad !!

His breath catches as Mama touches him, brushes his hair aside.  He doesn't even see him move from the bed, not really, he's just there.  And the smell of everything changes and Mama's arms are tight around him and he's clutching his sebba, heedless of his wounds, though his body automatically is careful of his tail.  And he's crying, really crying, sobbing, over and over, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," and he can't stop even if he's punished for the rest of his life.

The stab of pain through his brain is entirely unexpected and it's enough to shock the sobs silent for several seconds.  "OH!!  The collar!!  Mama...Mama are you okay?  I'm sorry, I'll get it off you, I promise!!"

He's purring, hard.  The pain doesn't matter; now that he realizes there's a blocked kin-bond, he pulls back that part of his mind; he's had lots of practice with half-breed cubs, born and sold without ever knowing the touch of their sebba's mind.

"Shhh," he soothes.  Sage has no need to promise him anything.  And there's nothing to be sorry for, why would he be sorry?  Radditz inclines his big head and starts to do what he should have done the moment he laid eyes on Chibi - lick the living daylights out of him.  Rumbling with a weighty purr, his rough tongue scrapes across Sage's forehead and mane.  The bond aches now and then, but it's nothing.  At this point it would take the loss of a major limb to distract him from getting Sage's scent and taste back into his nose.

He thought he would never see him again.

"You DO remember me!"  Oh lickies!!  Trunks lickies were good and Bardock lickies and 'les and Kakkarott and even Vegeta gave him an occasional swipe, but MAMA lickies.  His own purr thrums happily as he does his best to lick back and remember to keep his bond to himself until he can get his tools out and get that damned collar off Mama.

His fingers move on their own, stroking and patiently untangling random clumps of mane and he can smell Trunks outside the door, but then he goes away again, leaving a satisfied smell he can barely get in his nose because everything is full of Mama, and himself and himself with Mama and and and and...can they just stay here forever like this please?  It's been so hard, he hadn't realized until he wasn't doing it anymore, just how hard it had been to keep his distance, the moment he saw Mama on the auction block.

How could he have DONE that?  How could he have waited until now for this?

He remembers - of COURSE he remembers, how could he not remember.  As he's licking, Radditz remembers Chibi; it all makes sense now.  He goes at it for a while yet before speaking.  The scent of another Saiyajin hits his nose briefly, but he doesn't recognize it , and it leaves.

"Good disguise."  Lick, lick.  "Couldn' smell you."  Liiiick.  And finally... "Yer big."

It's true.  Sage is HUGE compared to Radditz' memory.  He's not actually sure how many years have passed - sometimes he gets a glance at a calendar, but it's not very high on his priority list.  Maybe he was small for his age, but to Radditz the growth is on the edge of incomprehensible.

Somewhere along the line he'll ask what happened.  Maybe.  Licking was considerably more important.

He has to smile at that.  Everyone had said that at first.  Except his father.  And he grew a'course.  He was still real little when they took him from his Mama.  "Bardock sez I'm gettin' ready t'grow," he says between licks.  "Can't be THAT big yet."

He grips Mama's hair tight in his hands for a moment, remembering how long and hard he'd clung and how long they'd fought to separate them.  He remembers.  Everything up until the drugs kicking in and waking up in a different cage in a different place.  He tips his head back and lets the memory fade in favor of the present.

"I could smell you," is what he says finally.  "An' you look th' same t'me."  He does, really.  In the way that doesn't notice how thin and battered and dirty Radditz is, he'd been in much the same shape when they were separated.  The wounds were fresher then, and more of the scars were from battle than from slavery, but..."'m sorry I had t'wait so long," he says.  "Hadda..." oh lickies..."do it th' right way."

Bardock...  Sage was talking to his grandfather.  Which meant he was in contact with his family, which probably meant he was back on Vejita-sei...  The implications - freedom, family, reunion, independance - are too big for Radditz to confront right now.

Sage, however, is not too big.  He's huge, but that's different.  "Yuh-huh," he refutes.  Making out as if Sage's weight is almost too much for him to handle, he lifts his son against him, then falls back against the wall.  "Oof!!  Who's been feedin' you?!"  Because clearly, they had been feeding him building materials.  Radditz remembered a tiny little thing - when Sage was born he couldn't even fit his fingers around one of Radditz' own.  Now he rested atop his sebba's ribcage, practically full-grown.

He'd missed so much.  But that loss was little compared to being reunited, when he'd thought Sage gone forever.

"Do what th'right way?" he idly asked during a moment when his son's hair wasn't caught in his tongue.

He grins.  "Everyone's always feedin' me.  I didn't eat alot at first, or I ate too much, then threw up an' stuff." He snuggles and purrs, and feels Mama's purr against his.  "Th' right way.  Gettin' you when I saw it was you for sure.  Hadda wait for Trunks t'buy you an' stay disguised an' stuff until we were in space.  An'...I just can't see how I did it."  He clings to his sebba tightly for a moment.  "Not tellin' you who I was.  An' I know how come we had to do it like tha'.  But I know why.  But then I didn' have this an' now I have it an' Mama..."  He turns his face up and smiles.  "I won't never let you go."

Everyone fed him?  Good.  That's good.  Sage wasn't anywhere near as skinny as Radditz.  He doesn't want to stop licking, but he's not used to it and tires quickly; active grooming is abandoned in favor of holding his son, back resting against the bulkhead.

"Knew who y'were.  Just took me a lil' while to figure it out."  But he knew.

"Trunks?"  That had to be his new owner.  It was too risky, too strange, to assume he didn't belong to someone anymore.  He would just... take each thing one at a time.  Radditz had never adjusted to slavery, per se, but he had reconciled himself to the fact that there was no way out.  The prospect that this was no longer the case was daunting, to say the least.

He hesitates.  That's right.  Vegeta-sama hadn't come out with the alien woman he claimed and had a much older son with when they were kidnapped yet.  And Mama doesn't know he knows who his father is.  He hadn't cared, when they were last together.  He also hesitates because in some ways he still considers Trunks his owner.  Trunks bought him.  Took him home.  And there was a whole lot of complicated stuff that happened after that.

"Trunks...he's my brother.  Vegeta-sama's heir.  He doesn't really have red hair an' green eyes though."  He looks up at Mama worriedly.  Bardock said Mama never ever said who Sage's father was, not to anyone, not even to him.

".... Huh."  That was a twist all right.  Sage knew Vegeta's heir was his brother, and that meant he knew Vegeta was his father.

Better yet, Sage's lineage was known, and he was still alive.  Trunks' position as heir must be solid.  Any number of factors could be involved, really.  Radditz was too out-of-touch with homeworld politics to figure out why.

"So.  Y'know your papa, then."  His hand stroked Sage's tousled mane.  Radditz had never allowed himself to miss Vegeta.  He was third-class; that ecstasy wasn't for him to have.  The rut that led to his son was enough, and all he could be allowed.

Except now, he might actually see him again.

"Sorta.  It's kinda skived."  "Skived" is a particular word of his, a combination of a word that meant complex or confusing in the language of the first master he had with his own...touches.  "Vegeta-sama can't recg'nize me legally as his."  He shrugs.  "I'm kinda screwed up still."  He says it matter of factly, not knowing how else to explain how things happened.  "Bardock wanted t'take me home when Trunks brung me home, but I kinda fixated on Trunks an' Bardock an' Vegeta-sama had a huge fight.  Just yellin' though."  The first of many, though he doesn't say as much.

He rests his cheek against Mama's chest and closes his eyes.  Oh this was home.  This was home, more than any other place.  "Anyway.  They worked stuff out.  Meanwhile Trunks looked after me.  I sorta bit him alot when he bought me, an' he let me, so there was some blood exchange.  Said he'd never done that with a rescued slave, even other cubs before.  He takes good care of me, an' we been lookin' for you for so long Mama."  It seems a long time to him.  It's not quite been a year and a half yet since his initial rescue.  He'd grown a lot very quickly with the removal of the ki-restraint and food and care, and he'd healed well.

Radditz smiles at the invented slang.  Sage would always be amazing to him.  Everything he did, without fail or exception - because he was a miracle, and doubly precious for being lost and found.   'Screwed up?'  He was perfect.

As for a yelling match between Bardock and Vegeta, Radditz didn't even want to think about that one.  Good to hear, though, that Sage couldn't and wouldn't be legally claimed.  As far as Radditz was concerned, that protected him.

There's a million things he wants to know - how's Bardock, what about his brothers, did Sage see Vegeta often, what was Trunks like, where did Sage stay with him - but it's all a bit much, and none of it urgent to the here and now.  The blocked bond scratches at the back of his head, but Radditz ignores it, nuzzling close to his son.

"Did good."

He leans up and licks Mama's face.  Licks it all over and even up under the collar, carefully before snuggling back down and winding his tail around Mama's wrist.  "Everyone tries t'take care 'f me.  Sometimes they can't.  Trunks can though.  Bardock moved into th' palace quarters for temporary t'be close t'me cause I kinda flipped out once when Trunks went away even though I promised I wouldn't."  He looks deeply ashamed of himself.  His bond with his brother was strong and had happened quickly.  It was still taking time with his family.  They wanted him to be over his slave mindset right now, and that included his father.

Trunks and Turles both knew better, but they were the ones who spent their time looking for Saiyajin slaves and helping rehabilitate them when possible.  And he was learning to be rehabilitated by helping rescue and rehabilitate himself.  He wouldn't know exactly how to put it, but that is what Trunks would say if asked.

"Will you stay with us Mama?  When we get home?"  He's afraid...suddenly that Mama will want to go Home, to where they used to live all together and he'll have to be away from Trunks or not be with Mama.

"Ah..."  The question blindsides Radditz.  He's not even sure this is real, yet.  Less than twenty-four hours ago he was up for auction, wondering if this next owner would be the one to finally kill him, and now he had a choice about which Saiyajin family to stay with??

"That - I think that's up to Vegeta no Ou," he points out.  If it was okay with Vegeta, he would stay, but it wasn't his place to say whether or not he could.  Sure, it'd be nice - if surreal - to go back home, but he didn't need to.  Not like Sage needed him.  He was an adult, he'd been separated from his family for a decade, it wouldn't kill him to continue living apart from his father and brothers.  Being on the same planet was a bona fide luxury in the first place.

Kami knows whether Vegeta would want him around.  Radditz didn't have a clue.  He knew what he wanted for himself, but that wasn't important.  He wasn't the king.

Sage buries his face in Mama's chest but doesn't cry.  He doesn't cry a whole lot, which made his sobbing earlier pretty spectacular.  It's one of those things they want him to do and he won't.  Or can't.  It doesn't matter because it doesn't happen.  Like raising his ki.  A year and a half and he's incapable of raising it to defend himself.  Fighting?  Oh he'll fight tooth and claw if provoked.  But his ki won't budge past that point his last collar had been set at.  It frustrates his father, which then makes Bardock make a point of not being frustrated with it.  He hadn't really thought about his father too much.  Officially he's not his father after all.

There comes a point in Sage's worry that Trunks just can't ignore.  The crying, the reuniting...all that was good.  He wouldn't interfere with that for ANYTHING.  But two things bother him right now.  Sage's worry, because he just can't help that, and Radditz's collar.  Sage was surprisingly deft at disarming ki collars.  It was strange because he'd been doing it for years, but not taking the advantage to raise his ki and fight.  They had standard keys for the usual suspects, but Trunks still rarely got a captive Saiyajin out of one without a shock or three.  Sage, with his little rolled pack of tools Turles had procured for him was much smoother.  But he'd never tried to take apart a Chirujin designed collar, and he'd confessed to Trunks that he was a little worried.

And Trunks could understand that.  It was his sebba after all!!  If his mother were alive, he'd feel the same caution, he's sure.  Not that she had ki to work with, but that isn't the issue and he's derailing his thoughts on purpose.  He doesn't want to disturb Sage and Radditz.  But he's going to have to.  He's taken out his contacts, brushed most of the red out of his hair and changed into casual Saiyajin attire, boots, fitted pants, casual but expensively made shirt; foregoing the armor and body suit for the majority of the trip.  His tail, which matched his silvery purple mane like Sage's matched his third class coloring flicked, relaxed around his ankles, back and forth.  Slowly he makes his way to the door, and just as slowly begins to slide it open, further, calling out, "Chibi?  Can I come in?"

Radditz just soaks up the company of his long-separated child.  He wishes he had the bond open, but he remembers every other time - after his cub was ripped away from him - so many births, the bloody newborn squirming in his arms, and no way to feel their mind.

He would feel Sage again.  It had been years.  He could wait a little longer until they busted his collar.  A little longer...

When he senses Trunks, Radditz tenses, coiling ever so slightly around Sage before his conscious mind catches up.  Trunks isn't an owner - more importantly, isn't his owner.  He's Saiyajin.  Sage's brother.

He's also the prince, Vegeta's son and heir to the throne.  Unfortunately, as he's already on the floor and his son is in his lap, he can't kneel or bow.  How odd... gestures that an owner would have had to wring out of him would be gladly given to Saiyajin royalty.

With Trunks' identity in mind, he relaxes a little, but can't drop his guard entirely.  Radditz still doesn't properly know him, and somewhere in his mind the association as an owner lingers.

Sage looks up, but doesn't move from where he's sitting, clinging to his sebba.  "Yessir," he says automatically.  Mama isn't growling, even if he does tense up a little, and Trunks looks way better now.

Trunks doesn't sigh.  Or think about sighing at the "yessir."  He comes into the room and crouches down, but keeps his weight and hands back from Radditz.  He doesn't particularly want to provoke him, or let him feel threatened by his presence any more than he already is.  "I told you he knew you," he says softly.  He sees Sage nod his head against Radditz and gods he's waited so long for this.  "Radditz...welcome to your first leg of your trip Home."

He can see the third classer's conflicting instincts and he shakes his head.  "We'll work whatever out later.  Chibi...it's killing you.  Not literally," he hastens to assure Radditz.  He holds out the small roll of leather and cloth to Sage.  "The longer you wait, the more you'll fret, and you'll work yourself up and end up hiding if you don't deal with it now," he says firmly.  "You can do it.  Best now, when we have contained shielding."  Maybe Radditz's freed up ki and bond will help push Sage's ki up.  He can hope.  He watches the pair as Sage slowly takes his tools.

Radditz is put significantly more at ease when Trunks kneels.  Removing the height differential goes a long way towards equalizing any threat.  He unfolds to give Sage room to move and get his tools.

So this was it, huh?  He's impressed that Sage seems to be the one given the responsibility.  In retrospect, it's not that shocking, as his Chibi persona did plenty of independent tasks.  But that was before Radditz knew he was his chukra.

Reaching up, he tucks his mane to the side, revealing a sharp backbone crossed with so many lashes and scars it seems like an archaeological record of punishments, fresh over old over older.  Some are from last week.  Some were made today.

He lays forward on his stomach, giving Sage as much room to work as possible.  The back of his neck is safest; if there are any problems, they will affect the armor of his vertebrae rather than the jugular and veins in front.  Subconsciously, he keeps his tail on the far side from Trunks, protecting it.

He watches Mama move out of the corner of his eye as the rest of his eyes plead with his brother's.  "Onii-sama," he begins, but is cut off by Trunks' arms around him.

"Chibi.  Sage.  You're better at this than I am.  Neither of us have worked with this kind of collar before.  We discussed this already."  He takes Sage's face in his hands gently.  "I know this isn't like any of the other rescues, and you're doing so well, and I'm very proud of you."  He strokes Sage's cheek with his thumb.  There's a scar there, he knows it well, and his voice is firm, but more coaxing than commanding, more understanding than demanding.  "And our bond isn't closed off Sage.  I know how scared you are, and I know how much you're hurting, and I don't mind that it hurts me."  He makes Sage meet his eyes.  "I don't."  Bright blue focuses on bright black and purple twines gently with blue-shot black.  "But I know you, and you're very brave, but if you slip back into...before...I don't know if I can get you out.  Then what happens?"

Sage is quiet for several seconds, watching Mama's pulse throb in the blood vessels through his skin, watching scars, noting which ones were made with whips and which were likely made with appendages.    "I'llbelikeaslaveagainandscareyouandprollyMamatoo," he mumbles.

Trunks doesn't press him further.  He got enough pressure at home, and he put enough pressure on himself, trying to please everyone and punishing himself when he felt he failed.  "I trust you.  And so does your Mama, see?  And he's never even seen you deactivate a collar you were wearing yourself."  That brings a small smile from Sage and Trunks sits down, legs folded under him.

Sage looks at his roll of tools, then carefully unfastens it and unrolls it beside Mama's head.  In little loops are secured all manner of simple and complicated lock picks and electrical gizmos that only gave up their secrets for Sage.  He strokes Mama's hair a little further out of the way and bends his head to lick at the open mark from where Mama had been struck on the block today.  He takes a breath.  "Mama, 'f you rest your head on your arms, that'd be good."  He pulls his shorts off with a slave's (and a Saiyajin cub's) disregard for nudity.  "'f I sit on your back while I do this, it works better.  With collars I don't know.  Issit okay?"

Radditz doesn't know what 'before' refers to; he can't know, without the bond.  Trunks knows something he doesn't about his son.  He may even know more about Sage than his own sebba.

He wants this damn thing off now.

"'course," he replies, then glances over his shoulder with a wry expression.  "'ll be fine, chukra.  A little shock won' bother me."  He's been through worse.  Much worse.  It's not that he expects Sage to mess up, so much as he's saying it's okay no matter what happens.  It's a dodgy operation; Sage had to ask the make of the collar, so Kami knows what little surprises the Chirujin might have left for anyone trying to remove an operational collar.

It didn't matter to Radditz.  It was no big deal if he got a shock, or worse.  He'd had a newly-regenerated tail crushed and broken - this was small fry.

He wanted to hear his son.

Radditz lays his head down on his forearms and tilts his skull forward, giving Sage more room to work.  He's ready to bite into his own arm if needed.

"Ssssth," he says, not realizing he answered in another language.  He picked them up so easy, his head was a jumble of them, and in stressful situations he was never quite sure what would come out of his mouth.  That was responsible for several of his scars.  He takes a breath, then eases onto Mama's back, mindful of the wounds against his skin.  But skin on skin was better than with cloth between them.  This way, he could sometimes sense the biofeedback before it hit the loop, and re-direct it.  Sometimes.  It also gave him a clearer overview of the collar in question somehow.  And cloth would chafe when he moved, lots more than skin.  At least those shorts would.  They were regular shorts, not battle suit shorts.

He can hear everyone's breath in the room, everyone's heart beating.  After looking the collar over and touching it carefully in several places with a gentle finger, he selects his first tools and thinks of the Icejin collars he has worked with, and what he'd been able to find in the database about Chirujin technology, and what very little he had found about this technology specifically.  He's already decided his first and second steps, backing out now isn't even a thought in his mind as he begins.

The first thing he notices is the differences in material.  It's much more similar to the kinds of materials Zen'renthjin use, though the way it's wired is completely different, and about seven minutes in, he jerks one pick out and without even looking at his tools grabs one of the electronic looking things and pushes it against the collar just in time to pull the first shock out before it hits the loop.

That was close and it's got every hair on his tail floofed and his mane too.  But no shock, just a little movement.  Any shock his Mama gets, he'll get, either through his tools, or through Mama's body.  It's better that way.  He takes another electronic-looking thing and hooks the first one into it somehow and sets them aside.  That will be able to tell him something, but in time to use?  He's not sure.

He selects two more tools, and holding the one still in the collar still with his tail, he carefully works the other two in response to the first warning.

Trunks watches patiently, but his tail betrays him a bit, moving to coil around his waist, then loosening.  Usually Sage didn't get a shock so soon.  He keeps quiet though.  Ripping the collar off is a last resort.  Even several shocks were worth it to avoid that.  Before Sage was even found, he'd accidentally put a rescued slave into a week long coma by doing just that.

You'd never guess that he, Trunks was the one raised in part by a brilliant scientist mother, and Sage had been the one to spend most of his life in slavery.  His little brother was really good with locks somehow.  Turles assured Trunks that the cub came by it naturally.

Radditz doesn't budge at the near-miss.  When he said he'd been through worse, he meant it.  A week-long coma would be okay - it was better than being incapacitated for a month, feverish and half-conscious from trauma to his tail.  At least here, if something happened, there would be reasonable medical treatment.

The sounds behind his head are foreign and alien - instruments he doesn't know and wouldn't recognize if he could see them.  But it's Sage back there, and even though Radditz has no idea how good he is - even though the last time he saw his firstborn, he wasn't old enough to handle a writing pen, let alone a complex lock pick - he knows Sage wouldn't possibly take this on unless he could do it.

So he believes that Sage can do it.

A build of energy from the collar, drawing on its own self-sustaining power and that of Radditz' blocked ki to form a devastating backlash.  It's engineered to bounce straight back into his aura, his muscles and neurons, with more energy than he could block even if he had defenses to raise.

Fuck, fuck FUCK!!  And lots more cursing in languages more colorful, but his father's favorite word rings in his head over and over again.  Another one's coming, and this time, he doesn't think he can stop it.  He can't stop what he's doing, not exactly, he's getting too close to almost disarming it.  In what he considers a shove in this process he pushes the wedge shaped tool in deeper where it is and turns it in the hope that it will work and help draw out some of the feedback because in this split second he has no time to do much of anything else except open himself and brace for the shock he knows is coming.

All this happens in less than a heartbeat and when the jolt comes, even he's surprised by the intensity of it.  He grits his teeth, but oh FUCK it's been a long time since something hurt that much!!  He can't see, he can't hear, all he knows is pain until the jolt, not being confined to an infinite loop anymore plays itself out.

And Trunks...shit he hadn't been able to warn Trunks.  As soon as he can get his head off of Mama's where it's slumped over onto, (his tools still very carefully in place however) he'll tell him.

Trunks doesn't need telling.  He's felt feedback through Sage before, and from other ki collars, but this...FUCK.  Between the shock of the pain and Sage's reaction, he's ascended before he can put his finger on the trigger or threat.  On his feet and panting and shaking his now blonde head to try and clear it and he KNOWS he's gotten the least of the jolt.  MotherFUCKER!!

He, like Sage has no idea if he's given voice to any of this, but the blood rush to his head and pain through the bond fade considerably faster than anyone else's in the room and when his vision clears he smells blood and sees Sage slumped over Radditz.  He's quick to kneel back down to check the both of them.  "Chibi?  Hey..."  He's gentle but worried.  "Radditz?  Are you okay?"

Radditz will tell you as soon as he figures out whether he's still alive or not.  There's blood in his nose again; his own.  Maybe because he bit himself.  It was hard to tell.

That was designed to kill him.  With no access to his own ki in defense, it should have ravaged his nervous and cellular systems; only Sage's wedge provided enough bleed-off to prevent a fatality.  On the "plus" side, he can feel very little at all now, the shock of the hit pushing him to the edge of consciousness.  It hurts and he's sore, but it's all wrapped in cotton, to the degree that he's only mostly sure he's actually breathing.

He's dimly aware of a massive ki signature, close by.  Reminds him of Vegeta.  His name filters through, and Radditz manages a slight movement, just a little shift of position to say that he's still among the living.

If Trunks wants a verbal reply, he'll have to hold on a minute.  Radditz' eyes crack open, then closed; he can't see anything yet.  Gathering his strength, he tries again, and the signal makes it to his brain this time.

He coughs, lungs feeling like they were put through a wood-chipper and pressed back into pulp to re-form the organs.  ".... Ow."

Sage is dazed and disoriented after dancing with unconsciousness and he's surprised to smell so much blood.  His face is sticky.  Because his nose is bleeding.  Oh.  He feels Mama move, and Trunks' power and hears Trunks' voice and okay everyone's alive.  That...that was designed to kill.  He is DEFINITELY taking this thing apart when he gets it off.  That would have killed him, or Mama if it hadn't been spread out.  And Mama didn't sound so good.  "Mama," he manages to gasp as he tries to pull his head up from Mama's mane.  He has to finish.  And finish fast.  He's not sure what would happen if he trips up another one of those traps, but the longer he waits the more likely he is to run into another one.  Designers don't expect people to keep on when they're nearly killed, or supposed to be dead. He must be close.

He feels Trunks help him raise his head and vaguely hears him wanting to stop, he's bleeding...things aren't getting through so well.  He's still focused on the collar and somehow he manages to convey his intentions to Trunks.  Oh right.  Bond.  His fingers still keep the tools in the collar in place as his other hand fumbles for another one.  He discards two before finding what he's looking for.  He can't see, but he doesn't need to see to disarm a ki restraint.  His hands and brain work on auto even as his chest burns with each breath.  There's a residual zap now and again, but he knows he's close.  With a barely audible hiss, something clicks and the collar opens neatly.  Harmlessly.  He puts his tools on the roll as he eases the collar out from under Mama's neck and puts it to the side before collapsing beside his sebba.

Holy FUCK Sage is bleeding!!  And not just a little.  Radditz is bleeding too, and neither of them look or sound good.  He tries to convince Sage to stop, try again later, but through the muzzy, still pain filled bond he can sense the single focus and the vague certainty that his brother was close and stopping now would be a Bad Thing.  All he can do is try to help Sage stay upright; he has no idea what pulling him off Radditz and moving those tools would do to the collar...to them.  Sage seems to think...well it's not exactly thinking, he's just doing.  And he does it.  And then collapses.

Fuck.

Okay, he's not dead.  But damnit, Trunks could cry.  Sage'll be okay, Radditz'll be okay, he knows this, as he gently moves them both to the bed, then fetches water to clean them up.  But Sage hadn't raised his ki to defend against that attack from the collar.  Still.  That's what worries him most.  He keeps his ascension.  A large power signature will give them both something to focus on.  Radditz is conscious, Sage isn't quite.  He notices they're both bleeding from the nose, ears, Radditz managed to bite himself as well.

Knowing Sage will come around soon enough, he focuses on the rescued sebba.  "It's all right.  He'll be okay.  Just relax."  He clears up blood, then remembers the oxygen.  Radditz's breathing is ragged, it's something Sage would have pointed out and he opens one of the handy hidden compartments in the wall at the head of the bed and slips a mask over Radditz's nose and mouth.  "That'll help.  Just focus on breathing for now.  Can you see me?"

Conscious.  Sure.  Yes.  He can't move and can barely think, but that qualifies as conscious.

Yet somehow, he isn't worried about Sage.  He knows his cub is okay.  The knowledge is there, certain in the back of his mind, far more concrete than his own perceptions of where he is or what's going on.

Because for the first time in ten years, he can feel his son.

to be continued...
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Buying Radditz, by Talon and Manawolf