Chapter Ten: Waking Chi-chi
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Dawn had not yet broke upon the Son house, but Videl was already wide awake. Careful not to wake Gohan, she climbed out of bed, threw on some clothes, and headed down stairs. She knew that Chi-chi was normally an early riser, so she thought she might enjoy an early morning cup of coffee with her mother-in-law before the reality of the previous days events settled over the house, but sadly, Chi-chi was not in the kitchen and the coffee pot was empty.
Videl frowned as she made a pot and glanced over her shoulder at the door to the guest bedroom. 'I really thought Chi-chi would be up by now...well, I guess she was probably up late thinking; Gohan sure was.'
In truth, they had all been up very late; too upset by the murders of their friends to find sleep. Videl had dropped off before Gohan, but her dreams were terrifying and disturbing, waking her much earlier than usual. She desperately wanted someone to wake up and give her some company. If Pan were home, Videl would have woken her, knowing that her daughter wouldn't mind too much, but she had gone to her apartment so her roommates could make sure she went to her final. Gohan had told her she didn't need to take it, but the young woman had said her grade was high enough to pass the class so long as she turned up for the test and handed something in. Videl thought about waking Gohan or Chi-chi, but figured they'd both need as much rest as they could get.
Several hours later, Gohan was awake, dressed, and sitting on the couch lost in thought; while Chi-chi had yet to make a sound.
"Do you think we should check on your mom?" Videl asked the Saiyan; waking him from his contemplations.
"What? Oh, uh yeah sure, go ahead..." he said as his eyes glazed over once again.
The dark haired woman walked to the door at the end of the hall and knocked softly, "Chi-chi, are you awake?"
There was no answer.
"Um...it's after ten, do you want some breakfast?"
Silence.
Videl began to feel slightly worried. Chi-chi was an incredibly light sleeper, as Videl and Gohan had learned when they started dating, and if Chi-chi didn't wasn't to be bothered she would have been yelling by now.
Videl took a deep breath and knocked loudly on the door, "Chi-chi, I'm coming in, okay?" She opened the door and walked through.
Chi-chi was lying in bed under a splotchy red blanket with her back to the door. Videl gently placed a hand on the older woman's shoulder.
"Wha—" she gasped as she pulled her blood covered hand away from the damp material and stared at it. Her eyes grew wide as they darted back and forth between the motionless Chi-chi and the crimson liquid running down her hand. "Go...Gohan! Oh, Kami...Gohan..."
Gohan rushed into the room with a confused expression on his face, he took one look at his wife's pale, horror-stricken face and then looked at his mother's unmoving form. A breeze brushed across his face and his eyes shifted to the window. He swallowed hard as he saw the melted hole in the glass; in that instant he knew what had happened, but his mind just couldn't accept it. Gohan steeled his nerves, walked across the room, and pulled back the covers; his breath caught in his throat.
Chi-chi's body had been split open from just under her collar bone to her belly button. Without muscle, bone, or skin to hold them in place, many of her organs had spilled out onto the bed during the night and the mattress and blanket where soaked in blood.
The Saiyan's blood boiled with anger and grief, his body shook for a moment and then golden ki exploded around him as he screamed in rage.
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Pan's pencil snapped in her hand as she felt her father's power level shoot up. Without hesitation she picked up her test and handed it in. She had only completed half of the questions, but the thought of her grade didn't even cross her mind, the only thing she cared about was getting to her father and finding out what was happening. She ran from the room and shot into the air the moment she was outside, not even bothering to make sure no one was around to see.
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Akira awoke with a start in the middle of the woods. He could feel several warriors heading for a very large one.
'Probably Gohan,' he realized as he closed his eyes and tried to focus on who the different power levels were coming from. One was definitely Pan, she was the farthest from the Gohan, another was probably Goten and the rest were probably Tien, Yamcha, and Krillin. Akira had trained with Trunks often enough to recognize his life force and he was in West Capital with Bra and presumably Icalla.
The young man considered using Instant Transmission to check on Gohan, but as he thought about it, he realized that the scholar wasn't moving the way he would if he were in a fight, he had just powered up for some reason.
Chi-chi's wide, terror filled eyes flashed into his mind; Akira knew recognized it from a dream, he thought. It seemed like he had been having difficulties recalling the nightmares once he was awake, or maybe it was just that the dreams and reality seemed to have merged into some sort of twisted world. He tried to remember what he'd dreamed about the night before and while he was sure that he'd had another dream of murdering people, he couldn't remember who or how...but it was definitely more than one...maybe.
Akira shook his head, trying to clear the image from his mind. He was definitely not going to check on Gohan unless he felt a significant drop off in power. He needed time to think over what was happening and it with Pan already headed there, he didn't want to make the situation between them any more awkward than it already was. He'd wait to hear from them, if it was something important, and he was pretty sure that it was, then they would call and let him know.
Akira crossed his legs and closed his eyes as he tried to clear his mind and meditate.
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The first thing Pan heard when she walked into her parents' house was, "Don't come in here Pan." So, of course, she immediately went into the guest bedroom.
The first thing she saw was her grandmother's mutilated corpse, followed by her father and uncle (both in Super Saiyan form) hugging each other and crying, while her mother was looking at her with tear soaked eyes.
"Pan, honey, I'm...I'm so sorry, but she's gone..." Videl choked out.
The young woman backed away from the doorway, her mother made a move to try and stop her, but Pan was already out the door and heading for the mountains.
She flew as fast and as far as she could before her emotions got the better of her. She landed in a sobbing heap and proceeded to pound a near by boulder into dust; still not satisfied, she charged a ki blast in her hand and launched it at a nearby mountain, reducing it to nothingness in an instant. A small twig snapped just behind her and she spun with another blast already charging, ready to kill anything that dared infringe upon her grief.
Akira caught her hand before she had a chance to fire and pulled her into a tight hug.
"Aki...Grandma, she's...she..." Pan couldn't even bring herself to say it.
"Shhh, I know. Your mom called a minute ago and told me," Akira whispered.
"Why...why would someone do something like that?"
Akira didn't have an answer, or perhaps more frighteningly he did, but refused to tell her. Akira knew that it had gotten to the point where he had to tell his friends about his dreams, but he simply couldn't bring himself to say it. Whether it was out of fear or something else, he wasn't completely sure, but he knew he had to do it.
The two Saiyans stood there for over an hour without letting each other go or saying much, they simply help one another and grieved until Akira's cell phone rang. Gohan was calling to let them know that all of the Z Fighters were going to meet at Kami House as soon as they could all get there. Akira hung up and told Pan what was happening, she took in the news without comment.
The young man started to levitate off the ground, but Pan grabbed his hand and pulled him back to the ground.
"I...I need to ask you, why don't you want to be with me?" she asked tentatively.
Akira closed his eyes and sighed, "I know this sounds lame, but...it's not you, it's me. It's, it's complicated." The young Saiyan was silent for a moment as he tried to put into words what was going through his head without saying anything about his nightmares.
"You said I should stay away from you for my own good..."
"Yeah, I know and I still believe that, but...I..." it was pointless, there was no way he could get her to see that he was right without saying something that he really didn't want to say. "Look, let's just get to Kami House, we'll talk about this later...I promise."
Pan didn't like his answer or the fact that he was obviously hiding something, but her mind was too mixed up with everything else that had happened in the past day and a half to fight about it any more. She simply nodded numbly and followed him as he shot into the air and headed south.
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A/N: Sorry this took so long to get out. I have only myself to blame...well, I guess I could blame Mr. Kashimoto for creating such a freaky addictive manga like Naruto which I spent most of my free time this week reading (229 chapters and I'd still be reading if there were more that had been translated into English). So, once again, sorry; now that I've read all that I guess I'll have more time to write while I await the next chapter.