Dragonball
FT, The Black Thorn Saga
Chapter 13: A Natural
Xavier found himself standing on the beach once again. He looked around and, as
expected, Dende, who moments ago had been standing beside him, was now nowhere
in sight. Knowing where he was, Xavier ascended the steps to the little house
for the second time in as many days. He rang the doorbell and was greeted a few
seconds later by the now familiar white moustache and beard, sunglasses, and
bald head.
"Be with you in a second." Roshi said before he vanished from the doorway.
Xavier waited patiently on the porch for a minute before Roshi came bursting
through the door. As he walked right past Xavier, Roshi said in a preoccupied
voice, "you might want to step off the porch."
What is that crazy old man up to now? Xavier thought as he followed
Roshi around the corner of the house. What is so interesting about that
wall? Xavier asked himself as he silently observed Roshi's actions.
Roshi was indeed acting strangely. He paced up and down the beach, as if he was
studying the side of the house.
"Now where is that thing?" Roshi asked no one in particular.
By this time, Xavier had also started to scrutinize the wall, even though he
had no clue what he was looking for. Suddenly, and much to Xavier's surprise,
Roshi jumped to his feet (he had been crouched down, pulling back the tall
grass that grew along the bottom of the wall) and shouted "Aha! No wonder I
couldn't find it!"
Without a word of explanation, Roshi scurried off to the back of the house.
Xavier, now fully intrigued by Roshi's behavior, followed suit and once again
saw Roshi studying the wall. This time, however, Roshi's attention was focused
on one spot. Xavier walked up behind Roshi and peered over the aged man's
shoulder. There, Xavier saw a small silver rectangle with a glass covering. It
was roughly 5cm tall and 3cm wide. In the center of the rectangle was a small
red button labeled "DO NOT TOUCH!" Xavier had a feeling he knew what Roshi was
about to do and he took a few steps back as Roshi lifted the hinged glass cover
and pressed the button. The small house was immediately engulfed by a puff of
white smoke. When the smoke cleared a few seconds later, the house had
vanished.
"Umm...where'd your house go?" Xavier asked uneasily.
"Right here," Roshi replied as he picked up a small metallic object. After
doing so, Roshi reached into his pocket and pulled out a small blue box,
slightly larger than a wallet. He opened the box, placed the object inside and
pulled out a similar red object. Roshi pressed a button on the top of the
object and threw in three meters in front of him. Once again, a white cloud of
smoke appeared and when it disappeared, Xavier could only stare at the
jet-copter that stood in front of him. It was almost 3 meters tall and twice as
long. The sun shone off the silver exterior of the craft and created a dull
sheen as it hit the black leather interior, which was visible through the large
glass bubble that surrounded the cockpit.
Roshi began to walk towards the aircraft. When he was halfway to it, he stopped
and turned to Xavier, asking "Well, are you coming?"
"Right." was all that Xavier said as he hurried across the sand where the house
had stood just minutes ago. When he and Roshi were in their seats, Xavier
asked, "How did you do that?"
"You mean this? And the house?" Roshi asked.
Xavier nodded and the turtle hermit replied, "Haven't you ever heard of Capsule
Corp.?"
"Oh yeah," Xavier replied. He had seen the commercials for their products on
TV. But they were considered playthings for the rich and luxuries for the
upper-middle class. As the craft lifted off the ground, Xavier asked the old
man, "How did you manage to pay for this?"
The bearded face turned to Xavier with a wide grin on his face as he charged up
the jet-copters engines and said "Connections, my boy! Connections! Now hold on
to your lunch!" Roshi replied with a laugh in is voice as he gunned the
throttle before doing a series of corkscrews, after which he set out on a
straight course to a destination unknown to Xavier.
- - - - -
- - - - - - - - -
A few minutes later, the craft touched down on a small, grassy cliff. Before
the craft had started to land, from his seat Xavier could see a small village
in the distance and trees as far as the eye could see. Xavier and Roshi exited
the copter and Roshi pressed a button on the side of the ship, similar to that
on the back of his house. A moment later, he was placed the capsule back in the
case. He then took out the metallic capsule, pressed the detonator, and threw it
on the ground, close to the edge of the cliff. After the smoke had cleared, the
little house had an excellent view of the ocean below.
"So, what are we doing here?" Xavier asked.
"This is the area at which I train my students." Roshi replied.
"Alright, then," Xavier started. "Shall we begin?"
"Sure thing, kid," Roshi said. "But first, I need you to do me a favor."
"And that is?" the teen asked.
"You see that big rock over there?" Roshi asked while pointing to a boulder as
big as his house and about eight meters away from it.
"Yeah," Xavier replied hesitantly, unsure of where Roshi was going with all
this.
"I need you to move it another five meters away from the house. I fear that it
might get in the way during the training." Roshi told Xavier in a serious tone.
"Xavier looked at Roshi with a dumbstruck expression for any sign that this was
the old man's idea of a joke. When he realized that Roshi was completely
serious in his request, Xavier shrugged his shoulders and approached the stone.
When he got beside it, Xavier stooped down and examined the ground at the base
of the stone.
"Never get a lever or anything under that," he said to himself as he stood up.
Seeing no other option, Xavier put his right shoulder and left hand to the side
of the boulder and tried with all his might to move it. After straining what
seemed like every muscle in his body for half a minute, Xavier gave up his
futile attempts and walked dejectedly back to Roshi who told him, "Don't
worry about that, just a little joke I play on all my students, heh heh. Your
training under me will finish when you can move that boulder."
"Okay, then, if that was a joke, when does the real training begin?" Xavier
asked.
"Right now!" Roshi answered as he quickly punched Xavier in the jaw with his
right fist.
"Owww! Damnit! That hurt!" Xavier yelled while rubbing his now sore face.
"Exactly," said Roshi.
"What do you mean 'exactly'?" Xavier asked exasperatedly.
"I mean you could get beaten up by an old man, such as myself, and I wouldn't
even break a sweat." cam the reply.
"And you felt it necessary to demonstrate this because...?" Xavier asked,
missing the inherent flaw in what Roshi had just said.
"Motivation," Roshi replied with a sly smirk.
"Crazy old man." Xavier muttered under his breath while shaking his head.
"WHAT WAS THAT?!" the old man shouted. "I MAY BE OLD, BUT THAT DOESN'T MEAN I'M
DEAF!"
"OK, ok," Xavier said while putting his hands in front of himself defensively
and taking a step back. "You're old and crazy, but not deaf. Got it."
"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that so we can get on with your training."
Roshi said in a dignified tone.
"Finally." Xavier muttered.
"Now, the first thing you should know is that Dende saved us a lot of time by
unlocking a small fraction of your latent power, you should thank him for that
the next time you see him." Roshi began. "As a result, we can skip a lot of the
initial physical conditioning needed for the average fighter to get to where
you are now. The only problem with this course of action, however, is that you
were never given chance to learn how to control your ki through necessity
during the aforementioned training." here Roshi paused to see if Xavier was
following him. Fighting was Roshi's area of expertise and he knew he could
easily confuse those less knowledgeable than himself.
Xavier
only nodded his head, since he thought he understood what Roshi was talking
about.
"The best way I can describe this," Roshi continued, "is that your power is
like water being held behind a dam. The power is there, but you have to free it
and learn to control it. The simplest way for you to do this is mentally.
First, I want you to close your eyes and concentrate on tensing every muscle
you can."
Xavier nodded again. He moved his feet so they were shoulder-width apart, arms
at his side and hands clenched in fists. One by one, Xavier concentrated on
tensing his muscles until, eventually, he had tensed as many as he could. As he
accomplished this, he heard Roshi talking, although it seemed like he was far
away. "Now, picture the dam, behind which lays your power. There are already a
few noticeable cracks in it, thanks to Dende. It is now up to you to break the
dam."
Xavier continued to concentrate on bringing the dam down with his mind, for it seemed
to him like he was no longer standing on the grassy clearing, but was floating
in front of the dam. The more he concentrated, the more cracks appeared in the
dam. As the cracks spider-webbed across the dam, Xavier began to feel stronger,
but he was growing weaker at the same time. When he was almost ready to
collapse from exhaustion, Xavier felt something break down inside him. As he
continued to concentrate on the mental dam, he noticed a small chunk of it fall
away. From that spot, a beam of pure light spewed forth. Knowing he was doing
something right, Xavier continued to concentrate. More and more chunks fell
away from the dam until there was nothing left, and Xavier's mental image was
bathed in a blinding light.
- - - -
Roshi looked on at his pupil who had been standing with his eyes closed for
almost five minutes now, when suddenly, Xavier's body lifted about twenty
centimeters off the ground. Roshi stumbled back in shock as a blinding aura
surrounded Xavier's body and disappeared again.
- - - -
As the light surrounded Xavier, he could feel an immense source of power and,
for a brief moment, Xavier felt like he was the strongest person in the world.
But as quickly as the feeling had arrived, it left him again an the light
vanished. When the light had completely gone, Xavier was left in the darkness
of his closed eyes. He unclenched his fists and opened his eyes to see Roshi
standing in front of him with a huge smile on his face. Xavier, understanding
that he had achieved what Roshi was rambling on about earlier, gave a slight
smile before falling backwards. As he sat on the grass, leaning back on his
hands, Roshi walked up beside Xavier and said,
"Congratulations! You've passed the first part of your training with flying
colors. To be honest, I expected this to take you days, maybe even weeks to
accomplish. Now that you've gained access to your power, you can learn to
control it, little by little, and then increase it." At this point Dende
materialized next to Roshi who kept talking. "Now go home and get some rest.
You've earned it."