A year is a long damn time in the middle of nowhere while having an existential crisis. When the door clicks shut behind me I close my eyes and breathe deeply.

"Be strong," I whisper to myself. "Be strong for him."

The air feels heavy and hard to breathe, like its coating my throat in tar, the gravity is certainly bracing, if not overwhelming. My body feels like lead making it difficult to even walk properly, and I wonder how the hell I'm gonna train in here. The temperature changes so frequently I can't even get used to it before it alters. One minute I'm sweating buckets and the next I'm shivering.

I let my tail swish behind me and wonder if this is one of many things my warrior race bestowed upon me. Im curious why I was left on earth and what the other Saiyans are doing there now. Did my people not want me? Did they somehow sense the destruction of the planet and send me away for my safety? Did I have parents and if so did they care for me?

I shake my head and look around trying to find some semblance of calm, I take note of the small area for dining and and a couple of beds lie next to each other opposite the dining area. A refrigerator lies next to a small counter with plenty of food for the year lying in cupboards and on shelves, along it sits a small table with chairs. I wander and see a room with a tub for bathing.

I return to the area with the beds and reach my hand, gently caressing the sheets. They're soft, like silk.

I walk barefoot to the edge of the platform and look around, finding nothing but a white void. No wonder Mr. Kami never let me in here, the place could drive the most battle hardened soldier mad. I want to return, I really am desperate to, but know that to leave this room would be admitting defeat, just proving to Kami I'm too weak to help him and Piccolo fight. That he was right about my inability.

I clench my hands into fists and prepare for a year of solitude, turning my body into the weapon it needs to be. I need to strengthen myself so I can prove to Kami I can be a warrior too.

I'll be useful Mr. Kami, I promise I can help.

Training by yourself can be both a good and bad thing, there are pros and cons.

First pro: nobody is there to weigh you down.

First con: nobody's there to pick you up when you fall.

As the days go by my muscles, though sore, are getting more defined as well as much more strong. But it seems as though it's getting harder to get out of bed everyday, it's harder to remember who I am and what I'm doing this for, the solitude presses into my heart and makes me ache. The hardest part of this has been having to get through my grief alone, not having Mr. Popo here to comfort me and I would do the same in return. I wonder how the poor genie's doing, if he's holding up ok.

Pro: no distractions when I need to meditate or train.

Con: nobody to talk to or laugh with around the dinner table.

I sigh while I pick at my food and look around myself, as if expecting somebody to be there. Suddenly footsteps sound in the void. I jump up, spilling my food to the floor and knocking my chair over with a loud thud.

I rush out to find them, find whoever is in here with me. I want, no need, to find the one who can help keep me from madness.

Running onto the white emptiness, the temperature skyrockets and sweat pours down my face. Flames dance around my body, twisting as I shift my position.

I listen intensely, the only sound is my heavy breathing. I scream and the fire encloses itself around my body, and never have I been closer to the breaking point than I was then.

Pro: plenty of time to grow stronger, to defend the world Mr. Kami loved so much.

Con: what's the point?

As I push myself up from where I collapsed, my legs shake and muscles scream out in protest. I ask myself the same question daily, why am I even trying to do this? And I have to constantly remind myself that Kami gave himself up for this world, damnit. He believed in everything the people of it could accomplish. He lived for them, their dreams and aspirations as well as their pain and fears were his own.

That's what gives me the strength to get myself up out of bed everyday, not for me or even Kami, but for them. For the people he believed in, and now I must believe in them too.

And so I think, as I lift myself up on one arm and lower myself down slowly, that they'd better be damn worth it. And I smile because they are.