Year 659
This wasn't the way it was suppose to be. Everything was wrong, just so wrong.
Piccolo stood at the edge of a cliff, the sea crashing against the rocks below. The sky was overcast, preparing itself for the storm that would surely break at any moment. He cared not a wit for it.
His house had fallen. He should have known the other houses would have reacted much more violently than had been planned for. Instead of awaiting word from them on how to retrieve the stolen Monkey child, they had launched an all-out assault on what was left of the Demon House. His father, his comrades, all of them were either dead or in captivity. Lord Piccolo I had been executed like a dog at the Grand Plaza of the capital only a few days ago. To be honest though, he had figured that would be his father's fate one of these days, yet it didn't stop the hurt he felt at his loss. Everything that he had known and cared for was gone; just a wisp of smoke that drifted towards the heavens from the charred remains.
So now what would he do? Better yet, what could he do? He had no home to go to, no allies to call upon for assistance. All he had was that stupid brat who wouldn't stop crying unless it was sleeping. What he wouldn't give to shut that brat up permanently. At least then his ears wouldn't feel like they were exploding in his head.
Wait, that wasn't quite a bad idea. His home had been demolished not once, but twice because of those infernal Higher Houses. In fact, they deserved to feel his pain and suffering. The brat would feel his fury, a painful reminder to all those looking for him that no one would be spared his wrath.
Looking behind him, Piccolo saw the child nestled beneath a blanket. Stalking towards it, he grabbed the kid by the back of its shirt and lifted it up into the air. Incredibly enough, the kid didn't wake up, sleeping as it swung gently and subtly from side to side. In fact, a small sleep bubble expanded and contracted with each breath it took. Piccolo sneered at the sight; what a waste of an offspring. Walking back to the cliff's edge, Piccolo held the brat over the edge, facing away from him as it hovered over the roaring sea below.
Seconds ticked by as he held that stance, waiting until the moment was right to release his hold and watch the child fall to its doom. A bolt of lightning flashed into the air, the roar of thunder following soon after; a fitting atmosphere for such an act.
Yet, he still held onto the boy. As seconds turned into minutes, the demon lord began to feel puzzled. Why hadn't he dropped the kid already? This should've been a cakewalk considering the things he had been trained to do. Was he such a coward that he couldn't go through with what was suppose to be a simple task? He was a demon lord for crying out loud!
And that was when the child slowly twisted around to face him. Though still asleep, the look of innocence was causing unknown emotions to appear in his head. He couldn't help but feel this wasn't right, that he shouldn't be doing this. As the hand that held the child's shirt tightened, he pulled the child from the cliff's edge and walked back to its blanket. Laying the youngling down, he placed the blanket back on it and walked off. He needed to clear his head of all that was corrupting it. He'd figure out what to do with the brat later.
Gohan had no idea hair could weigh so much. Seriously, despite the seeming weightlessness of it, a huge mass of it in his arms was surprisingly heavy.
As he and Sharpner climb the stairs of this tower, he had to wonder what the two of them were in for. The Princess had seemed really ticked off with them for forcing her to cut off all of this hair. Reaching the door, Sharpner was the one to open it, being as he had taken the upstairs-side while Gohan had elected for the downstairs part. The moment the door opened, an arrow imbedded itself into the wooden door, causing Sharpner to let out a shrill scream.
Wow, Gohan had no idea the blond guy could scream like a girl.
"That's for my hair," he heard the Princess growl. With the mass of locks in front of his face, Gohan wasn't able to see what she looked like, though perhaps that was for the best. He hadn't been the best when encountering angry people.
"Lady, you almost gave me a heart attack!" Sharpner shouted, his voice returning to its natural octave. "Were you trying to kill me?"
"Oh, quit being such a baby. I missed on purpose. Now put my hair at the foot of my bed. Surely you can handle that much."
As the two deposited their load, Gohan looked about the room until he found the princess. Once he found her, the young man couldn't help but blush at her. She really was beautiful, in spite of her new hairstyle, and the dress she was wearing did a very good job of showing off her…uhh, assets. Though at the moment, she didn't seem care that she was being admired. "Do you see what you've done? It took me years to get my hair that long, all of that work wasted!" Here her eyes watered up, on the verge of crying. "Do you know what it is like to have to lose everything you had because of a couple of idiots who could not figure out how to use a door?"
Gohan began scratching the back of his head. "I'm really sorry, ma'am. We didn't mean to hurt you like this. I wish we could do something to help you out."
Almost immediately, her watery look disappeared, a very predatory expression covering her face. "You want to make this better huh? Well, since you are here to rescue me from this tower, one of you two strapping lads must marry me. After all, it is custom for a princess to marry her rescuer."
Both Gohan and Sharpner froze at that, eventually turning to look at each other in disbelief. "W-were you aware of that rule?" Sharpner asked him hesitantly. When Gohan shook his head numbly, the blond gulped.
"Well, which on of you is it going to be? I do not have all day here."
As they both looked at the Princess again, they each began wondering if they should make the ultimate commitment. Though as Gohan began to wonder how she would take to traveling with him and Mr. Piccolo, Sharpner began to really notice her looks. Hmm, married to a woman like that would make for some very interesting fun in the bed chamber. In fact, he wouldn't mind coming home to someone of her beauty and ravaging her all night long. "Alright, since I am the hero here, I'll marry you," he said with built-up confidence.
"Perfect." The Princess immediately went into action, pulling out all kinds of luggage and began to pack them, much to the confusion of the two young men. "I have much to pack and since there are two of you, you should be able to carry it all without much fuss. I hope your castle is not too far away though, I am limited with my shoe choices and these heels hurt my feet if I walk too long in them. Since you will have your hands full, you will not be able to carry me like a proper prince should. Though, if you brought a horse, then it will not matter all that much."
"Uhhh, what do you mean castle?" Sharpner asked perplexed.
"You know, the castle you come from. You are a prince, right? One that has been raised to be a king and will pamper me with all of your wealth? And love?"
This time, it was Gohan's turn to speak. "Umm, neither of us are princes. In fact, we're here to rescue you so we can take you back—"
"What do you mean you're not princes?" the Princess shrieked. "Only princes rescue princesses from towers, not commoners!"
"But, we are commoners," Gohan replied.
The Princess stared at them for several silent moments, blinking every once in awhile. Finally, she broke down in tears, crying loudly as she slowly sank to her knees. "This isn't the way it was supposed to go!" she bawled, large pouts of tears shooting from her eyes and creating a puddle around her.
Once again, Gohan and Sharpner looked at each other dumbly, before Gohan asked "What do you mean?"
The Princess hiccupped as she said "I was waiting here for a prince to come and take me away to be his bride. That's how all the stories go. How else is a girl supposed to go up in the world? I found a tower that no one was using, I got myself a pretty dress, kept myself in shape, and now it's all ruined! All because of you two dolts!"
Sharpner narrowed his eyes at that. "Are you really a princess?"
"Me? No! I wish I was, but my mother decided she should marry for love and not that one guy who owned an estate at the edge of town. If only she had married for money..."
Gohan bowed his head. "I'm really sorry, but we were looking for a princess out here. You see, I have to find one to free a friend of mine from prison and we thought you might be the one we were told was out here."
The fake princess looked at him through her tears, hiccupping some more. "No, I'm not that princess. She's in the tower a mountain over."
Gohan barely managed to hide the grimace that was trying to appear on his face. They had caused this poor girl trouble for nothing. "Well, if there's anything we can do to help, we'll do it. If we run into a prince, we'll tell him to come to you," he said hoping to cheer her up.
It seemed to work as she gave a small smile. "You'll really do that for me? After all the insults and name-calling I've done to you?" She hiccupped again, sighing right after it. "You're so sweet."
And then Sharpner decided to speak up once more. "You know, I can be sweet too, especially in that very comfortable-looking bed of yours."
A vein began pulsing on the blonde's head. "Tell your 'friend' to keep his mouth shut. I've had enough of him for the day."
"Hey, this bed is really bouncy! Hey princess-babe! I could show you things on this that no prince could dream of doing!"
At that point, the woman had had enough. Letting out a frustrated cry, she reached under her dress, pulled out a loaded crossbow, and aimed it right at Sharpner. Staring at it comically, it wasn't until the fake princess fired the bolt that he got a brain signal to move, the arrow embedding itself on headboard of the bed instead of his head. Letting out a high-pitched shriek, Sharpner took off for the door, grabbing Gohan by the arm and dragging him behind him and down the staircase. The last either of them saw of the fake princess was her pulling out another crossbow from underneath her dress.
"Okay, you need to stay still," Gohan said.
Sharpner's face twisted into a comical cross between crying and pain. The two had managed escape the pissed-off fake princess, at least for the most part. Neither of them had known that she had a sharp eye for long distance shooting. As they escaped the tower, the blonde woman had poked her latest crossbow and had made a direct hit on one of them.
She had hit Sharpner in the ass.
She had screamed at them soon after; that they would always be in her crosshairs for what they did to her hair, even as the blond manage to limp his wounded bottom away, his sidekick following him. The two only stopped when they felt certain that they were out of the blonde's firing range and decided it was time to remove that arrow.
Lying face down on the ground, Sharpner felt a grave injustice had been done unto him. Why did he have to be the one with the arrow in his ass? Why not Gohan the sidekick? The guy whose job it was to take such painful punishment. He had just as big of an ass as he did! It would've hurt way less for him had that happened! Just as he was making a name for himself in the world, the world had to push him back down.
They were all jealous of the greatness of Sharpner.
Feeling the arrow shift a bit, Sharpner hissed as he whipped his head around to glare at the dark-haired idiot. Seeing him with his hands on the arrow, Sharpner berated "Be careful with that! I'm very sensitive! If I so much as get a bruise out of this, you're a dead man, Sidekick!"
Gohan blinked at him. "Uhh, I'm pretty sure you can't get a bruise from an arrow in…you."
Turning back around, the blond said "Just shut up and get it out! My perfect butt, ruined by some crazed woman's stupid jealously. I was just too good for her, wasn't I?"
"How could she be jealous of—?"
"Why are you still talking? Get to work! I can't have the real princess see me like this!"
Gohan just hung his head. "Alright Sharpner, what ever you say. I'll pull this arrow out on the count of three, okay?"
"What ever; just do it!"
"Okay," Gohan nodded his head before he put all of his focus on the arrow. "One."
And right then, the dark-haired youth pulled the arrow out, causing Sharpner to scream girlishly again. "I thought you said three!" Sharpner screeched at him, only turning his head to look at him, not wanting to feel any more pain by rolling his buttocks every which way.
Gohan twirled the arrow around as he looked at the blond. "But had I gotten to three, you would've clenched your butt muscles, making the whole thing harder on you. I just thought it would be easier to pull it out when you were more relaxed."
"Well you thought wrong! Bah, why was I cursed with such a bumbling idiot for a sidekick? My butt will never be the same again!"
Without answering him, Gohan moved to their packs. Originally, they had forgotten them by the tower, so the young man had to go back and retrieved them. Fortunately, the fake princess was doing something else in her chamber and wasn't on the lookout for his return. After picking up the packs, Gohan returned with them and set them down nearby before turning to remove the arrow from Sharpner backside.
"It's a good thing that you put bandages in here," the young man said as he pulled out a roll of white cloth.
When he got near the blond, Sharpner snatched the bandage roll away, glaring at him. "I'll put this one, thank you very much. You might decide to break my hips while you're about it and I can't let that happen. The princess depends on having these hips in good condition."
Gohan stared at him for a bit before sighing and turning away. Okay, now all he had to do was figure out the best way to wrap these around him. It shouldn't be too hard; women did it all the time and anything a woman could do, Sharpner could do better.
Such was the greatness of Sharpner.
RyRy tested; MaMa approved.
