Disclaimer: I don't own anything, not even this computer, so all the characters belong to someone else.

Deep in space, we see a tall man with long blue hair and yellow eyes standing in a room. The room was approximately the size of an average sized house on earth that would become popular in a millenniums time. Around the room were all sorts of bleeping machines and flashing lights, the purpose of which was unknown to all but a few people in the universe, the man being one of them. To his right against the smallest wall was a series of pods, and in one of them was seen a tall, very female figure with cyan hair in a punk-like hairstyle and wearing a red and black form fitting bodysuit. She had her eyes closed and obviously wouldn't be up any time soon. The man was looking down at an 8 by 3 foot box shaped pod with a clear crystal front, through which could be seen a small girl with a similar appearance to the other woman in the room, but the girl had red hair and was a bit shorter. The man had a smile on his face that showed signs of not having all their sanity attached, and it was directed at the small girl frozen in the pod. It was at this moment that he made himself heard.

"Hahahaha", Kagato was in a good mood today.

He had finally done it, for today he had not only gotten his own back on his annoying ex-master Washu, but he had captured her 'daughter' Ryoko while asleep, in the perfect position to have her brainwashed to do his bidding. Washu's ship the Sonja may have had some of the greatest security devices in existence, but it was no match to his genius, not when he already knew how to deactivate them from his time as the bitch's apprentice.

God, how he hated his time as Washu's apprentice. She may have been a genius, possible the only person greater in intelligence than himself, but she sure was annoying. All the tests she had him do/done on him humiliated him on every level imaginable. Washu called it character building, he called it getting her kicks off making him squirm.

Now however, he had everything he wanted. Revenge and Power. With Ryoko under his control he could have the entire galaxy under his control if he so wished (which he did), and the means to get the ultimate source of power in the galaxy, Tsunami's tree. With that under his control nothing could stop him.

But the part he liked the most was Washu's face when she realised what he was up to. The look of betrayal, surprise, but most of all fear was what made him so happy at the moment. He'd treasure that memory for the rest of his life, seeing the great Washu Hakubi feeling so helpless was probably the single greatest moment in his life.

Looking down at her frozen form in her new prison, he couldn't help but feel something lift off his chest. He had the feeling that the resentment at always being second best had caused more pain for him than he imagined. Now that was gone. He was second to nobody, Kagato had gone from apprentice to master in this moment and he planned to savour it in every act he had Ryoko do for him.

"Well Washu, I wish I could say that it's been nice knowing you, but I'm afraid that I would be lying. I hope you don't mind me using your 'daughter' for my own means, for you see, I plan to make her very useful to me. 'Ryoko the space pirate' has a nice ring to it don't you think?"

Chuckling to himself at the possibilities he reached to the portable consol that had could easily run most domestic functions on the ship, including garbage disposal.

"Now no matter how much I would like to continue gloating at your downfall, I believe it is time for you to depart. I do so hope you drift around for a few hundred centuries before crashing into some Super Nova; I imagine that must be an incredibly lonely way to go. Don't worry though, I'll take good care of your 'daughter' for you", and with those words he pressed a button on the consol and sent Washu on her way. He was determined to remember this moment for the rest of his life.

He was startled from his thoughts by some movement inside one of the pods to his right. He decided to check it out, he may have resented Washu with every fibre of his being, but he had to admit that she hadn't earned the title of 'the greatest scientific genius in the universe' by being idle. If this was some type of security system that he had overlooked then he may be in a bit of trouble, depending on what the bitch had come up with this time.

He slowly crept over to the pod in question, preparing himself and his sword for anything. It would be a cold day in hell before you found Kagato unprepared for anything, short of a cheerleader shooting out giant hearts with massive destructive power anyway.

Come on Kagato; keep your attention on the problem, not on scientific impossibilities.

In short order he had approached the anomaly, and once he recognised it he relaxed instantly. In a pod similar to Ryoko's was a small child in a foetal position. At a quick glance Kagato determined that the child would be at about one year old, and was also male, with very short black hair.

It seems that the bitch wanted to extend her 'family' by one. If that's the case then it is possible that the kid could grow as powerful as Ryoko is now.

Deciding to see if this new development could be of benefit to him, Kagato set about testing the possible power of the infant.

Later

It seemed that he would have to settle for just one of Washu's children. The child in front of him most definitely had Masu genes in him, but most of those genes had not activated yet, nor would they activate without the set of gems that Washu most probably had in her subspace lab somewhere. He knew that they were not on the ship, he'd wasted enough time looking for them to realise that. He almost regretted sending Washu into exile now, the access to those gems would have made a very useful solider into an unbeatable duo.

Sadly it was not to be, the child would be stronger than the average resident of the galaxy, but not even close to the power that he required. The child was useless to him. Now he had to figure out what to do with it. The child's pod was in fact feeding nutrients to the child to substitute normal food. He knew from looking into the computer's database that the food consumption for Washu's 'son' was massive. A surprisingly large amount of energy from the ship was going into the process of maintain and growing the child. It could almost be considered a waste if the child wasn't going to be useful.

Kagato grinned. He couldn't allow such a waste to continue in good conscience. He would just have to remove such a project that was wasting such a large amount of energy. Deciding upon his action he activated a button on his consol and watched as the pod containing the child was sent out into space. He could just imagine the look on the bitch's face when/if she found out that he had exiled her son, only in an unfrozen state. The child wouldn't last for more than a few hours until the pod ran out of nutrients. His last thoughts before starting the process of Ryoko's brainwashing were;

What's good enough for the mother is good enough for the 'son'.

Outside the ship the pod containing the child was studying the situation it was in.

-Location: 7.8456 miles outside of the Base and rising-

-Contents: project 812656, codename Infant Beta-

-Conclusion: ejection from ship with short term energy reserves-

-Risk level: Red priority-

-Time period before situation reaches critical: 2.456385 hours-

-Scanning programs for recommended action...-

-Scanning...-

-Scanning...-

-Scanning...Scanning complete-

-Action recommended: survival procedure 11.58-

-Implementing recommended action in T-3, 2, 1, 0-

Once the pod had decided what action it should take it started the procedure that would keep its cargo safe for the time being. Setting about its task it lowered the temperature of the container and the cargo until it reached optimum conditions for long-term cryogenic stasis. Satisfied that its cargo would survive for the foreseeable future, the pod set its computer to stand-by mode to conserve power, while optimising a constant low power scan in case its situation changed. It would awaken its cargo if the pod entered a planet's orbit or was picked up by a ship of some kind. Until then it waited.