"How's the foot?" was the first thing Seina said when the ferry docked back onto the mainland. When Matt heard her question, he winced. Truth be told, in all the excitement of struggling with Simone and dealing with the villagers, he'd forgotten about the foot. The pain was a distant memory to him in those moments, courtesy of adrenaline. But now, in his more relaxed state, the throbbing sting in his right foot recommenced, even worse this time. He got out of his car and bent down to look at it. The wound was so deep, he could almost see his Achilles tendon splitting.

"Not so good," replied Matt. "I guess I'm going to need to get this patched up somewhere. We need to get to a city."

"With your tire as bad as it is?" Seina said.

"No. I should have a spare in the trunk."

Seina exited the car and the two of them walked off the ferry. "Hold up," said the ferryman, jumping off of the boat after them. "I need to have a word with the two of yous."

"About what?" Matt asked. "We're kind of in a hurry, sir."

"I saw what happened. What y'all did."

Matt's stomach dropped precipitously and he could almost feel Seina freeze in place next to him. "What are you talking about?"

"You caved that feller's head in with a rock or something. I saw it while I was on the boat."

"And?"

"And?" The ferryman, whose tag on his shirt read "Hagar," repeated, laughing. "Shit, boy, I thought you'd understand. Here, lemme dumb it down. What are you two willin' to give me to keep my mouth shut on this?"

"We have so little as it is," Seina said. "Please, sir. The man on the island is alive, they're taking care of him."

"Aww, come on," Hagar guffawed in response. "You can't expect me to believe that shit! I saw blood spray off that bastard's noggin from all the way across the water! You'd have to get me up pretty darn early in the morning to get me to believe that guy's ever walkin' again!"

Matt felt naked. He'd left the dragon ball inside the car, so there was no bludgeoning this man as he'd done with Simone—something he was willing to do, if that's what it took to get him back on the road. The ferryman had a good 100-pound weight advantage over Matt as well.

"Tell you what," said Hagar," what's your name, girly?"

Seina shook at Hagar's sudden change in his tone of voice. "Seina."

"Shayna?"

"No, 'say-nuh,'" Matt said.

"Odd name. Tell you what, Seina—"

"You can stop right there," said Matt, looking the ferryman in the eyes for the first time in the conversation. "I know exactly what you're thinking. Forget it."

"Well, that puts you in a really tight spot, boy," Hagar replied. "The way I see it, either I get the chickie-poo for the day, or I'm going to have to appropriate that car of your'n."

"You bastard."

"Call me what you want. So what's it gonna be? My cellphone here is pretty good, it gets service all the way out here in the boonies. Cops are gonna have a hell of a time talking to all them witnesses out on the island."

Matt looked over at Seina. "Well? What should I do?"

Seina's face contorted with anger. "How can you even think about it?! Give him the car!" Seina marched over to the ferryman until she was right in his face. "You aren't going to be my first, you son of a bitch!"

Matt's jaw unhinged very slightly. When Hagar smiled at her—those wormy little lips of his curving beneath his graying mustache—her face grew hot. "We have a deal?" he asked, addressing Matt.

"I guess so. But I want to get all of my belongings out of there first."

"Fine with me."

The first thing Matt went for was the dragon ball and the radar sitting in his front seat. He was acutely aware of the presence of Hagar the ferryman right behind him, glaring over his shoulder. It made sense. After all, how was he to know Matt wasn't carrying a gun or a knife? "Hold up, isn't that what you used to kill that guy up there?"

Matt looked at the knapsack in his hand, stained with Simone's blood, and then sighed. "It's what I used to hit him."

"Pretty stupid of you to want to hold on to that."

"Even more stupid of you to want to keep it in your new car, asshole."

Hagar laughed. "I guess that's true enough. Get moving—I want to get the spare on this hunk of shit before noon. It'll be nice to be able to drive myself home for lunch. Yes, sir, no more getting rides from co-workers for me."

Matt could hear Seina loudly rustling through things in the trunk, and surmised that she was still very upset with what just happened to them both. Ever since Seina entered his life, Matt felt as though his luck had only worsened. He felt as though he should have just given her over to the ferryman. What was she to him, anyway? But then… what if she opted to let Hagar call the police? What if she went back to the island and somehow got the whole village to follow him to the ends of the earth, seeking revenge? Nothing seemed to have an easy answer. And now, without the car, he and Seina were stuck walking to the next city, where they would have to figure out how to get to the next dragon ball.

Within thirty minutes, the two of them departed, each carrying as much of Matt's supplies as they could carry. The rest of them were what Hagar considered his little "bonus." Matt swore to himself the first thing he'd do after getting all seven dragon balls would be to come back to this place and set his old car to fire in the dead of night. Or maybe even set fire to Hagar himself.

"Seina," Matt said, fighting to find his words through the fog of agony his right foot had caused to settle over him, "it's not too late to go back to your village, if this is too much for you. If there's anything I've learned from leaving my own home town, pieces of shit like that guy back there are all over the place. You can go back home and tell them I got turned in to the police or something. If you want."

Seina paused to set the things in one of her hands down so she could wipe sweat from her forehead. "Sorry," she replied, "but you won't get rid of me that easily. I made my bed back at the village by rebelling against my father in front of God and everyone. Besides, I'm having more fun doing this than sitting in my hut, waiting for the day I marry a man I don't love."

"I wasn't trying to get rid of you," Matt said. "But I hope you understand a little bit just how crazy things are going to get now." A pause. "You do understand, right?"

"Do you?" Seina asked. "That guy back there blackmailed us out of your car."

"That's low, Seina. You and I both know I had no choice."

"Don't get me started. You didn't have to do what you did to Simone, okay? Don't start."

Now it was Matt's turn to put down his things. "Oh, I'm going to start! If—"

"Just drop it!"

Matt was ready to keep arguing, but he shook his head and picked his things back up. He realized Seina was still shaken after the encounter with Simone. In time, he hoped she would come to understand why he had to do what he did. But that wouldn't be today, or even tomorrow, or next week.

As the two of them walked together in the serene, empty valley between the city and the shore, Matt felt a strange, troubled peace settling over him. There was a feeling of "it can't get any worse," for lack of a better term, that made the rest of the trip for the dragon balls seem less daunting. He had ended a human life with his own two hands, and the only consequence was that he didn't have his car anymore. He even had his supplies still, including the radar and the dragon ball. In a way, he felt unstoppable, but only until he thought about all the things that could have went wrong.

"Stop," said Matt to Seina, who had been walking in front of him for the past few minutes, "I need to wrap my foot up or something."

"With what?"

"There should be some kind of cloth I can used to stop this thing from bleeding. I've been bleeding out for the past few minutes and haven't even done anything about it, I—I really should know better."

"Just calm down," Seina said, "sit still for a second. I think I saw a roll of paper towels in one of these bags."

"Probably not, I only got food."

"Really? No first aid things? Those were my first priority every time I left the village for a supply run."

"Don't rub it in."

"Whatever. Look—what about that sack you were using to carry the dragon ball?"

"The one with blood stains on it?"

Seina glared at Matt. "We can rip off those parts. Give me the sack."

Matt took out the dragon ball and tossed the sack at Seina's feet. She proceeded to yank and pull at it, with no results. "Damn thing…" Eventually, she resorted to biting until she managed to put a hole in it. From there, she was able to separate a large chunk of it away from the rest of the bag. "Here, we can tie this around your foot until we make it to the city."

"Okay…" Matt stared at the strip of cloth draped over the palm of his hand like a dead limb. All of his sense of feeling indestructible dissipated as he shrank at the minor task before him, not because he didn't know how, but because the color of the cloth made him remember the sick, snapping sound Simone's head made when the dragon ball connected against the side of it. It reminded him of a bunch of spaghetti being ripped in half, the sound of it.

"Matt, you're crying."

Seina knelt down to look closely at Matt's face as he looked up at her in surprise. A single tear was trailing down each side of his face. He still held the same stoic expression as always. He touched the skin beneath his eyes and found out she was right.

"I guess I am," grunted Matt. "I don't know how I didn't notice."

"You must be in a lot of pain."

"Yeah."

They sat there in silence until Seina was sure Matt wasn't going to break down entirely. Then she tied the cloth tightly around his foot and both of them moved onward.

()()()

By nightfall, the lights in the distance had come close enough to Matt and Seina that the two of them were illuminated. With bags hanging off of their arms where the elbow resided, they walked the sidewalks, not talking, unsure of what to do first.

"We need to find somewhere to stay," Seina said as they waited at a corner for the light to turn.

"There's probably a public park somewhere around here," Matt replied. "We can sleep on a bench, or a slide or something."

"Really?" Seina whined. "You won't even consider a room?"

"Seina, exactly how much money do you think I have right now? Because I'm pretty sure two days in a cheap hotel room would completely eat through my money."

"What?!"

"I was hoping you'd know more about the outside world than that."

"This is awful! How can you decide to do something like this when you barely have enough money to—"

"I expected to have my goddamn car to live in, you know!"

"Oh, now—"

"STOP!" Matt put his finger right up to Seina's face. "I'm not having the same argument with you. I told you earlier today, you can go back any time you feel like you don't want to do this anymore. This is my mission to see through to the end. Hell—you don't even have to go back to the village, if you'd rather just stake out on your own, that's okay, too. But you need to understand, this isn't some sight-seeing trip. From what I've been told, and the radar seems to back me up on this, these balls are spread out all over the world. We're in for months—maybe years—of searching, never staying in one place for too long, sleeping in uncomfortable spots almost every night… if you don't want to go through with all of that, now's the time to tell me."

Seina closed her eyes and turned away. Matt looked at how the bluish-white light invaded the woman's jet black hair, and was almost hypnotized when she finally spoke up. "I'm not having the same argument with you, either."

That night, they slept on two twin slides at a playground. They were woken up at 5 in the morning by a policeman and forced to go on their way.

()()()

"Goku!"

Chi-Chi called outside for her husband, who was playing around with Gohan and Icarus in the woods not far away. "What's up?!" he called back.

"Bulma called, she says she wants to talk to you!"

Goku raced home, Gohan sat atop his shoulder, and grabbed their antique of a phone from his wife's hand. "Hey, Bulma," he greeted in his usual cheerful way.

"Hey, Goku," Bulma replied, trying to match Goku's cheeriness and finding it impossible to do so as she stared thoughtfully at the half-finished piece of plastic and glass in her hand. "So, it's been a while since I heard from you about the dragon radar."

"Oh! I'm sorry, yeah, I went back to all the places you told me to look for it."

"Didn't find it?"

"No. I spent pretty much a whole day looking around, but I guess it wasn't enough. I'm real sorry about that."

Bulma pinched the bridge of her nose in irritation. Goku's cavalier attitude toward having dropped their only dragon radar had gotten on her nerves more than once since the day he'd done it. It was a simple favor she asked—once you're done looking for the four-star ball again, she said, bring that radar back. Well, he found the dragon ball, sure enough, but sometime between where he'd found it and West City, where Capsule Corp. was, he'd dropped it. By the sound of things, he dropped it from a height, so it would be a miracle if the thing even made it to the ground intact.

"Goku, I'm halfway done with another radar, and when it's finished, I'd like to bring it to your house so you can hold on to it," Bulma explained. "You need to promise me you'll be careful with this one. We don't want some weirdos like the Pilaf gang to grab it away from you and wish for world domination before we can even stop them."

"Bulma, come on," said Goku, half whining, "I beat King Piccolo AND his son! I can take care of anyone else who wants to use those balls to do evil!"

"Goku, not every single bad guy is some demon king," Bulma said. "Promise you'll be careful."

"Of course, Bulma, I promise."

()()()

"Have I ever told you why I'm looking around for these things?"

Seina shook her head, grinning a little. "I believe you told me it wasn't any of my goddamn business. That's how I remember it."

"Well. I guess it is now. Let's rest for a bit."

It was noon and they had reached the edge of the city, called Florenceville. It was a somewhat rich town, situated on the other side of the peninsula from where Seina's island was located. Their stop in the city netted them some much needed supplies, including a proper first-aid kit for Matt's foot and other future emergencies. All of their supplies were now in rolling suitcases or large backpacks. The two of them sat down beneath an overpass. Matt found himself speaking over the sounds of cars roaring past or driving over.

"The truth is, I was driving home one night a few months ago and I ran over a little girl." Matt tried to continue the story, but his breaths shook and he needed a second. He didn't want to look over at Seina, because he was afraid of what he might see on her face. "She went right out in front of my car. It was officially declared to be nothing but an accident, but… everyone in Gasket thinks I did it on purpose. Every one of them. I lived in that town my entire life, Seina, and I assumed when the trial started, everybody was going to see I was telling the truth. But the girl… Kathy… I lived in a small town, everyone knew who she was, and she was this angelic little girl. I was just the guy who ran her town. Cracked the windshield of his car against her face."

Matt felt his heart trying to beat its way through his ribs. "So I left Gasket," he continued, "having found this radar in the middle of a field somewhere outside of town. I didn't know what it meant, but when I saw it was a radar—I felt pulled. I felt like I was going to be told where to go by some sort of unseen force, that I didn't have to make that decision for myself. I wound up in East City. A woman there told me… Seina, are you listening?"

"Yes," she said, very quietly.

"You're not really going to believe me when I tell you this… I'm not sure I believe it myself… apparently, when you gather the seven dragon balls, you get a wish."

Matt waited for a response from Seina, something along the lines of either blatant laughter or anger at his naivety. Instead, all she said was, "a wish?"

"A wish. I know it sounds like a joke. Have you ever heard of the Red Ribbon Army?"

"Yes!" Seina gasped. "Yes, I have! A member of our village who went to the mainland for a supply run told us what he heard. They're supposed to be ruthless. Are—are they looking for them, too?!"

"No, no. Not anymore. There is no more Red Ribbon Army, they disbanded a few years ago. It was the balls they were looking for, though. This is from a former officer in the army, I met her in a bar the night I made it to East City. Seina… this is my chance to undo what I did to Kathy. This is my chance—just imagine, me walking back to Gasket with that girl alive, in my arms. I would be more than a hero to those people, I'd be a God. And the nightmares, they'd finally stop. I'd be able to sleep for longer than an hour at a stretch. I'd be able to stop… imagining… teeth stuck in the windshield of every car I step into."

Matt felt like he couldn't say anything else, so he lifted his head. Seina was standing in front of him, looking down at his hunched, sitting body. They stayed like that for a length of time that could have been 30 seconds or 5 minutes. "You're crying again, Matt."

He knew he was that time.