Can't update topic

So my dad went out and bought a nakasig/tilapia it's running Android 4.2.1 and bootloader is 4.13. Having just updated my razor/flo via fastboot everything was setup and working. "adb reboot bootloader" reboots the nakasig/tilapia into fastboot mode and "fastboot devices" shows the nakasig/tilapia serial number. Every other fastboot command just hangs there and does nothing. "fastboot oem unlock" does not prompt me to unlock bootloader. "fastboot reboot" doesn't even reboot the tablet. I use Linux so I figured I would try Windows following the thread sticky'd in this forum http://forum.xda-developers.com/show....php?t=2175086 same problem adb works fastboot will list the device but can't do anything with it. "fastboot getvar all" did give me an error however "FAILED (command write failed (Unknown error))" all the other commands just hang there doing nothing saying nothing. Having tried Windows and Linux setups which I have used on my other Nexus devices without issue I am starting to think its an issue with the bootloader maybe I need some older version of fastboot.

Is there a way to flash bootloader from inside Android or Recovery? I can use Towelroot to root the tablet then flash TWRP from Android and boot into TWRP but I don't think you can flash a bootloader from there or unlock the bootloader can you?