⇾ PROTEA

Patient and far-thinking, Protea was slated to be the next leader of the Saiyajin people, alongside her partner, Atropa. The two of them were well-respected by their peers and lived happily together, raising a son—actually, he's Protea's nephew, but she took him in as her own after the death of her sister. Despite everyday hardships, they were a loving family that relied on each other.

Atropa changed that.

On the night everything changed, Atropa comes home to Protea, bloodied and incoherent—frantic and desperate. She tells Protea to bar the windows and the door, and to not even look outside; she tells her to protect their family with her life. Torn between the desire to help Atropa, and the need to protect their son, Protea ends up doing as she's told, despite her fear—or perhaps because of it.

She didn't know it then, but this decision would be the one to haunt her for the rest of her life. She could see Atropa was hurting—physically and mentally—and yet she felt helpless to act. She did as she was told, and protected her son—their son—while Atropa took the fate of all Saiyajin into her own hands.

The schism that forms in the Saiyajin people is represented best by their divided leaders: Atropa and Protea. Although Protea understands and sympathizes with Atropa, and it kills her inside to know how much Atropa was hurt, she also cannot abide by Atropa's actions. She believes it was wrong of Atropa to rob their people of their free will, to take away their right to choose—to make them pawns in an extinction event where they would slaughter not only hundreds of civilians, but fellow Saiyajin.

Furthermore, Protea holds far more attachment to their city. She believes that their home and their traditional culture are still important; that they are shaped by their story, but need to regain agency within it after what was done to them by the Tsufurujin and by Atropa. Protea believes that the people can be healed, just as the place can; that the earth has not been irreparably poisoned by the blood spilled on it. Those that agree with her—or who simply cannot swallow Atropa's pill—stay behind on Planet Plant, watching half of their people leave for interstellar space, watching their wounded planet despair around them.

Under the leadership of Protea, the Saiyajin that stayed focus on exploration, nurturing, and companionship. They develop their agriculture further, clean and nourish the fields, and raise crops. They explore the ruins of the Tsufurujin city, and then further beyond, cutting into the wastes and mapping their planet. They learn to repurpose and use what scarce technology is still in working order after the cataclysm.

About a decade after that terrible night, a Saiyajin exploring party encounters Dr. Mulberry, a Tsufurujin researcher who was working on that horrific project. They bring Protea in to ask what they should do; Protea, seeing the condition Mulberry is in, takes her in. Using Dr. Mulberry's knowledge to their advantage, the Saiyajin are able to repair and develop more of the tech, bringing further advancements to agriculture and transportation. Although the decision to bring Mulberry to their home was not a popular one, the people respect and trust Protea enough to believe in her decisions.

Protea, for her part, feels that after all this time there is no point in killing each other; she is weary of bloodshed. The institutions and systems that were leveraged against the Saiyajin no longer exist. The people that sought to harm and control them are long dead. Killing Dr. Mulberry now might be cathartic, but has no point or meaning. She would rather extract what knowledge and use she can from her, so that she may lead her people with an even hand in the future. Although Protea and her people will never forgive Mulberry, the woman is a wreck, barely alive, suffocating under the weight of her guilt and trauma—she poses no threat.

To Protea, who wants to believe better days are coming, whether to let Dr. Mulberry live wasn't ever in question at all. She resents the doctor, but she also offers her the chance to change herself: it's up to her to put in the work and make something new of herself, and Protea will allow her that much. That's who she is as a person: when the chips are down and there's no longer a reason to fight, she will not fight. She will instead turn her focus to productive, practical solutions.

Of course, despite all her pragmatism and apparent calm, Protea has fractures in her. She finds it very difficult to open up about her own suffering; she prioritizes that of others to the point where her own emotions may as well not exist. It is breaking her, bit by bit, but she pretends not to notice and has weird personal breakdowns in her room alone about it instead. For all her messages about healing and striving to live on and build a bright future, Protea is haunted by one very specific thing: Atropa.

Even now, some 60+ years after the schism, Protea sees Atropa as her own responsibility. She is haunted by the helplessness she felt that night, and her failure to stop Atropa—her failure to help her, to save her. Protea has a bit of a "saving people thing" after her percieved failure to "save" Atropa; if she had convinced her to stay, to patch up her wounds and think rationally, if she had begged Atropa not to walk out that door, maybe everything would be different.

She is haunted by Atropa, in ways she can't shake. Out of every eventuality Protea can predict, she fears most that Atropa will one day return—while the chance feels slim, it is the one that frightens her the most. Because, even if the chance is slim, Protea feels that if it actually happens, there's no way it won't come to blows. She can't predict Atropa anymore—her lovely, kind Atropa—and she has no idea what Atropa will do, but somehow, deeply knows that it will be a fight to the death.

Protea keeps these fears a secret from her people, isolating herself mentally while devoting herself entirely to everyone else's wellbeing. Secretly, she is preparing for that possible day, when she will have to confront her failures and stop Atropa like she failed to do more than six decades ago—even if stopping her means one of them has to die.

• Helping others
• Kids
• Meeting new people
• Bitter food

• Herself?
• Stubborn people
• Being alone/stuck indoors
• Feeling helpless

• Culture & development
• Governing
• Species relations
• Yes she is a nerd

Big and buff like most Saiyajin. She has short black hair with a stupid ahoge.

She has a scar over her left eye. Also, she's usually smiling or taking you very seriously. Mocking isn't in her expression vocabulary.

Her wardrobe is a mix of traditional Saiyajin styles and adopted Tsufurujin attire. She usually wears a suit jacket draped over her shoulders.

Perhaps the most powerful tool in Protea's arsenal is her compassion. She's someone who can understand anyone's pain, regardless of the past. Because Protea believes that anyone deserves to recover from their pain, she has become adept at healing others. She is diplomatic to a fault, and plays her cards without bias; she believes in people's hearts and wills above all else. Because she is able to understand multiple sides of most issues, she has a very nuanced grasp of her own situation.

As a Saiyajin, Protea also has great physical strength and ability.

The Saiyajin that stayed on Planet Plant do not unlock any Super Saiyajin forms. However, because they've retained their tails, they will still transform into their giant forms when the two moons align. Protea is in possession of a small device that will let her trigger this transformation in herself at will; in trial by fire, she is able to achieve the golden monkey transformation as well as SSJ4.