Macabre Innuendo
"Death is nothing to us, since when we are, death has not come, and when death has come, we are not."
-Epicurus (341 BC - 270 BC)
Son Gohan hadn't enjoyed the past week as much as he should have had, in fact, he was being increasingly convinced that he wouldn't be able to do so for a considerable amount of time to come. Tact, it seemed, was not a genetic trait prevalent in his family, nor was improvisation. Everything was going awry, wrong things were happening, and circumstance was fast becoming his worst enemy. Some things were inevitable, he wasn't denying that fact, but perhaps it wouldn't be too much to ask to delay the inevitable? She would know it all, eventually, but at the rate things were going she would know it all by the eight o'clock news.
As it was their custom—a newly adopted custom—she was already on the roof of the school building, awaiting his arrival. Employing intense caution, "Saiya-Man" swooped downwards, scanning for ki signatures on his makeshift landing site. There was only one ki present, on the terrace, and it was that one ki that he had been dreading to meet ever since Goten's generous display of their family quirks. He had, much to his own surprise, provided somewhat satisfactory answers to most of her inquiries, and the ones he hadn't, were put on hold till today.
He landed, and after assuring himself that they were the only two up there, he activated the suit mechanism and reverted back to his school clothes. He walked up to Videl slowly, who was calmly seated on the terrace wall, glaring at him. That glare nearly compelled the semi Saiya-jin to screw any and all plausible explanations he spent the night thinking up, and high tail it out of there. It was rather hard to believe that someone who had been subjugated numerous times to glares, and all its different renditions, hadn't developed a sort of immunity to it, or at least a defense mechanism to counter its effect. On the contrary, the fierce glare that Videl was directing at him nearly made whimper in fear.
"H…Hi Videl," he murmured, as he refused to make direct eye contact with the raving mad teen. Had the dawn of apocalypse arrived? To think, Gohan was instrumental in the prevention of apocalypse just seven years ago. History certainly has a bizarre way to repeat itself.
"Sit." Gohan didn't like the feeling of that, not that sitting was a bad thing per se, but the demeanor in which she had said it made it all the more frightening. He would think that an angry stream of accusations and insults would have been a much more attractive proposition.
"Look, Videl. I…I was going to tell you sooner or later, but…" He stuttered to find the right words, and glanced up at her, immediately regretting the move. She was absolutely livid, and she made every possible effort to have it be known.
"But what?" She snapped, irritated at his new silence.
"I…I didn't…" Where in the world did all his rehearsed lines disappear to? He spent most of the night formulating plausible excuses for his reluctance to reveal his secret, and thought he had come up with some pretty convincing answers. If only he could stop shaking so much, then maybe he can scour his memory once more.
"How did he fly? How can you fly? How can anyone possibly fly?!"
Those were interesting questions, and to the average human being concepts deemed impossible. No one can fly, that fact was well documented. Nobody could fly without the assistance of mechanical devices. Videl, though, wasn't so sure anymore.
"Um, it's a simple concept, really." A mental struggle ensued, as his rational mind tried to reason with his irrational heart. He couldn't reveal to her everything in one long explanation. It would overwhelm her and quite possibly scare her, so at the moment she was on a need-to-know basis. He had to reveal to her things that she suspected, not so much so to share with her his deep suppressed emotions, but to quell any more inquisitiveness that may have emerged in her.
"You know, in the ancient arts, there were martial arts masters with phenomenal skill. They were, in essence, the true masters of the arts and understood both the spiritual and physical aspects of it." Videl nodded in affirmation, and shifted her body weight to get comfortable. It was evident that she was settling in for the long haul, and there was no other way out. Sighing, Gohan reluctantly continued his narrative.
"Well, what their modern contemporaries state is that those masters innovated some parts of the arts, which they concluded were physically impossible to do. Have you ever heard, or read, about those Sensei's experiences? In it, they state that they can rouse their inner spiritual strength and manifest it into a light-heat energy. In a crude way, it's like saying they could throw balls of energy."
"I remember reading something like that, but always after, in the explanatory notes, they state that such things were notions that were only achieved by the masters in hallucinations. And that through deep meditation they achieved a fantastic level of inner peace from where they thought they had enough command of ki that they could throw energy beams."
"Do you believe in ki manipulation?"
She looked at him a little confused, what kind of question was that? "Of course not. I think that to say you can use your inner strength in the outer world is like transgressing spiritual boundaries. I don't think they can mix, that is why the masters only achieved it in a state of deep meditation."
"Would you believe me if I said that the ancient masters were able to charge light-heat energy from their ki. That is the sole reason why Goten and I can fly, and the average human can't." Well it wasn't the sole reason, but Gohan didn't think it was blatantly lying to Videl, it was just a matter of withholding extra information. He would only tell her if she suspected him of it, or else it is better that his ancestry remain shrouded in as much mystery as possible.
"You mean to say, that ki is real?" She asked him, but didn't want to believe. For some odd reason though, she found that her sub-conscious immediately accepted Gohan's explanation, it was like she was compelled to believe anything he said. She had this predominant feeling that whatever Gohan is, he sure as hell isn't a liar.
As if to answer her question, Gohan opened his palm and showed her his empty hand. She stared at it, which for sometime hadn't done anything, until suddenly a bright yellow ball materialized about two inches above it. The ball was small—actually, it was miniscule—but bright nevertheless. As if on cue, the ball started to enlarge, bloating itself to the size of a soccer ball, as a faint crackling sound emitted from it. Still skeptical, she tentatively reached her hand out making an obvious attempt to "touch" the object in question. She could feel the heat radiating out from that orb, it was unreal, but before her hand could get any closer the ball disappeared, and the intense heat gradually dispersed. She threw a questioning look at him, thankfully no longer in an irate state of mind.
"You don't want your hand to be singed now do you?" Gohan tried to lighten up the mood, so he deliberately attempted to sound a little sneaky.
She glared at him, but due to Gohan's prolonged exposure to her moods, he knew that this new glare was simply a masquerade to veil her amusement.
"Hmph. You're going to teach me to fly," and before Gohan could put up any sort of protest, "Or ELSE…" She left that statement unsaid. She left it to Gohan's proactive imagination to fill in the rest, hopefully inducing gruesome images of torture and death in him. She didn't even wait for any confirmation of his compliance, but rather, she spun around on her heals and marched back into the school, leaving a solemn Gohan in her wake.
Oh man, now I'm beginning to believe in that darned domino effect…To think, a stupid detention started all this…maybe Trunks can lend me his time machine?
Hey moron, have you already forgotten that time isn't linear? Or has your appalling cowardice for a mere human reduced you to a blubbering, weak, shell of a Saiya-jin?
The shrill ringing of a bell, signifying that five minutes were left until school started, interrupted his inner monologue. Sighing again, he walked gloomily back into Orange Star High, a palpable sense of dread overcoming him.
*******************************
"Gentlemen, welcome. You are all gathered here to witness the dawn of a new era, as we have become the most powerful crime syndicate ever to come into existence," the mysterious figure proclaimed, with all due grandeur, the future course of Satan City crime. In front of him, gathered around an elliptical table, were five of the most powerful crime lords in Satan City. Although they couldn't see the facial features of the mystery man, they knew with all certainty that he was beaming with pride, as his plans were gradually coming into fruition. But, even though their new temporary alliance was solely governed by the new crime-fighting menace, it did give all of them a sense of security and unity, for they now controlled every single crime organization in all of Satan City. Their power, and corresponding criminal jurisdiction, spanned the entire area of downtown, and numerous key municipalities around their base of operations.
"But what to do with that pesky green idiot? Although he portrays an image of idiocy, he is not to be underestimated. He is extremely powerful, and our firepower doesn't seem to dent him." Don Salvatore commented, amiably keeping his anger suppressed to an absolute minimum. The four other Don's nodded in agreement, considering that their very livelihoods were at stake here.
"Salvatore, patience my friend. We all know that to win the war, we must attack our opposition in strategic locations. We cannot take the capital with our first battle, it must be steady succession of battles until we can overwhelm the enemy defenses, and then that is when we strike." His cryptic answer did nothing to assuage the Don's concerns, and he made it known by glowering at the shrouded figure.
"We must attack his weaknesses, before we attack him."
The table burst into many different sets of whispers, as the Dons conversed with themselves about this new strategy.
Salvatore eventually brought order back into the proceedings, by booming in his stentorian voice, "And what, pray tell, are his weaknesses?"
The mystery figure didn't reply to Salvatore's legitimate question by words, but rather, he flipped out his cellular and punched in some numbers.
"Yes, I, the de facto leader of the New Mafia Crime Syndicate, am hereby issuing and executive order to your gang and its members to…"
*************************
"Hey, Videl." Gohan decided that there certainly was a truth to the age-old adage, 'There is no use in crying over spilt milk', and learned to live with Videl's new knowledge about himself. He was currently at his locker, thanking his lucky stars that the day had ended, stuffing homework materials in his bloated book bag.
"Well, Gohan, you seem unusually chipper for someone who just…"
"Ha ha, Videl!" Gohan exclaimed, quickly interrupting her sentence.
Both Sharpener and Erasa stared at them both warily, "Someone who just, what?" Erasa added, still training her suspicious stare at them both.
Videl glared a little at Gohan, and then turned to Erasa, "I was about to say for someone who just was involved in a crash."
Videl was a master at improvisation, as years of experience could tell, and used that talent to alleviate any suspicion that both Sharpener and Erasa retained, "Oh, yeah. So, what was the problem with the aircraft anyway?" Sharpener asked, all pretense of distrust vanishing.
"I don't know yet, they still have to pick up its mangled remains from the lake."
"Must have been so SCARY! Gohan, did you get hurt?" Erasa exclaimed.
"Uh…um…not really," he squeaked. He still didn't trust Erasa's intentions completely, and was constantly wary of her antics.
"Oh you poor thing, it must have been scary!" Erasa persisted, much to the chagrin of the already distraught demi Saiya-jin.
"Come on Erasa, I'm leaving. If you wanna freeload a ride, then make it quick." Sharpener said, getting rather irritated at her constant fretting over Gohan, and every other thing that related to him.
"Geez, Sharpener, chill. No need to be jealous or anything."
Sharpener stiffened, and he gaped at her with some vehemence. Just what was she insinuating? That he was jealous of nerd boy over there? What the hell did he have to be jealous of? Apart from his intelligence, his magnetic appeal to women, his dark, secretive nature…wait a minute, just what are we contemplating here? He himself was also intelligent, and had an irresistible appeal to women, and could be dark, and mysterious, if he wanted to, right? Right? Most of his self-confidence was innately destroyed by philosophizing too much about the comparison of his own abilities, with that of Gohan's.
"Hey Sharpie, you still there?" Erasa asked, a little concerned.
"Processing, processing…loading time, approximately two days, five hours, seventeen minutes, and twenty seconds," Videl said in a monotone voice—one that resembled a robot—making an unflattering estimate at Sharpener's mental proficiency.
Gohan stifled a laugh, as Videl started snickering, trying his hardest not to be insensitive. But Videl was making that objective much harder than it seemed to be.
"Overload, Overload…self destruction sequence activated. Five, four, three, two, one," and then, 'Whack'.
She smacked him hard on the back of his head, snapping him out of his own self-pity, rather harshly at that too.
"Ouch, what the hell was that for Videl?"
"Well, when my computer starts acting up, all it needs is a good smack to fix it right up. I figured that it'd be the same with you."
He looked at her a little hurt, but rather then break down and cry, he stalked off towards the exit.
"Bye you guys!" Erasa quipped, as she hurried to keep up with the seething blonde, a free trip home her sole inspiration.
"Bye Erasa," Videl replied, and then turned to Gohan, who was trying to sneak off as well.
She tapped him on the shoulder, making him jump up with surprise. Slowly turning around, he faced the girl of his dreams once more. At that moment, though, he wasn't thinking of her in that same context.
She smiled sweetly at him, nearly making him melt into a puddle, "I'll see you tomorrow, Gohan. My flight lessons begin at precisely two o' clock," then, as if enforcing that statement, she narrowed her eyes at him and said, "Is that convenient for you?"
Gohan wished that the theory of spontaneous combustion were really a reality, then he would have a great escape route at hand, but, just as his current spell would dictate, he would have no such luck. "Uh, sure! No problem, Videl."
"Good." They walked up to the terrace in silence, and Videl decapsulated her yellow mode of transport. She had opted to pick out the same color for her new chopper, since it had become a beacon of hope for the innocents, and a symbol of pain for the criminals. "Well, Saiya-Man, I'll see you later. Don't do anything illegal while I'm gone," she quipped, a smile encroaching her lips.
"Oh I won't mommy, I'll be a good boy!" Gohan drawled, contorting his face into a perfect rendition of the "goody two-shoe" look.
She laughed, and after giving him a short wave, took off towards her mansion. Gohan watched her go, probably just to make sure of her safety, and after her aircraft had shrunk to a blackened dot against the horizon, he switched into Saiya-Man, and took off as well. He decided that a relaxing flight would calm his anxiety for tomorrow, and besides, he had to make his usual round of Satan City. His usual afternoon search for society's unwanted miscreants awaited him.
************************
Videl was, contrary to what Gohan thought, very nervous about attempting to fly. Anyone would be, if they had been in her situation. What if she fell? She knew that those anxieties were largely unfounded, for right now in her jet plane, she could fall as well, like what had happened before. But still, this was in an enclosed area, while flying on her ki would be open, too open. She wasn't the least bit agoraphobic, but flying around, with no mechanical help, in such a vast expanse of blue would really be unnerving for even the most composed individuals.
Despite her nervousness, there was also that immense excitement associated with flying, on your own merit of course, that compelled her to force Gohan in teaching her to fly. She imagined the thrill of flying, feeling the wind whip through her hair, the scenery being observed not through a pane of glass, but through her very own eyes. It would be great; she was positive.
Before she could envisage any more details of flying, her watch emitted a loud beep. Sighing, she pressed the appropriate buttons and snapped, "What is it this time?"
"Quick Videl, go to Yonge and Finch. Near there, you will see an alleyway, that's where you need to go! Hurry!" There was a lot of static, and she just barely made out the words.
"What's the problem Chief?" She had already changed her flight course, directing it towards that particular junction.
"It's…" All she could hear was static, and the loud crackling sound was quickly getting her annoyed, "the…fight…come…quick…" The adjoining words between them were drowned out with the static, and thus were not heard. The broken sentence though, carried with it a sense of urgency, causing Videl to step on the gas pedal.
She reached the alley in question in about three minutes of flight, and landing her chopper on top of a building, she proceeded to race towards the alleyway. Climbing down the fire escape routes, she made it to the bottom, and gave a thorough search of the alleyway.
Odd, there's no one here. I hope nothing happened to them.
She tapped her wristwatch again, trying to establish communication between her and the Chief once more, "Chief, you there? Chief! I'm here, but where are you guys? Chief!"
Heavy static was her reply, until after a few moments of silence came a muffled voice, "Be…hind…you…" She scrunched up her face, frustrated and confused. Obviously there was nobody behind her, she had just checked that a few minutes ago. Something, though, was nagging at her consciousness, persuading her to turn around. A man stood there, perhaps a member of a gang as his loose fitting garb betrayed, holding a communicator in his hand. He clicked the button, and whispered into it, "Right behind you."
A slight notion of fear gripped her, but she managed to quickly overcome it and rear back into her fighting stance. She didn't know who this guy was, or what he wanted, but he'd have to go through hell and back before he got whatever it is he was after.
"Where's you're freaky friend Saiya-Man?" The guy asked, his voice heavily laden with sarcasm.
"I don't need him to do everything for me! I'm can kick your ass just as well!" She retorted, letting her intense pride take over.
"Well, since I can't find him. Be sure you convey this message to him."
"And what is that?" She snapped irritably.
"That Don Salvatore doesn't take being jailed too lightly."
"That loser? He IS in jail."
"That's what you think pretty lady." He sneered, showing a row of crooked teeth.
"What the hell do you want?!" She called out angrily, not at all flattered by the attention this man gave her.
"You…"
She didn't give him time to complete the sentence however, as she charged at him full throttle. Closing the gap between them in no less than two seconds, she jumped and thrust her left leg out, hitting the astonished gangster square in the chest. He flew back about four feet upon impact, skidding painfully to a halt by the garbage dumpster.
"Still want me?" She jeered, casting a menacing glare at the pathetic fool.
He smiled at her, even though it was obvious he was in pain, causing that gripping fear she had felt earlier to emerge full force. Still trying to retain some of her composure, she kept her glare trained on him.
All he did, though, was point behind her. Fear was now overwhelming her, and she started to shake slightly, as she turned around to face it. Before she could fixate her gaze on whatever it was that lurked behind her, a deafening boom shattered the eerie silence. The bullet seared through her abdomen, and although she didn't know it at the time, lodged itself in the complex maze of intestines that were concealed inside. She stared in utter shock, not so much at the shooter, but at everything. She tried to keep her eyes focused, but the pain was too much, burning her insides. Her eyes glazed over and she slumped to the floor unconscious.
**********************
Gohan was in an utter state of panic. While performing his self-imposed police duty, he had felt drastic ki fluctuations from Videl. Those fluctuations however, were just in sporadic bursts, probably signifying that she was called to apprehend some criminals. But a little while later, he felt her ki signature drastically drop. It was so low, that he had to forcibly concentrate on it to ascertain that she was still alive. She was, barely. Not caring about anything, he quickly ascended to super Saiya-jin, his blonde locks concealed under his helmet, and dashed full speed towards her ailing ki.
(I don't think anyone is suspense after the ending of this, but to assuage any culpable doubts about my own writing prowess, this new plot device is merely the tip of the iceberg. Now, we laugh. But if we snore, we sleep alone, as our good friend Anthony Burgess highlighted earlier.)
"There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up."
-Oscar Wilde
