Dragon Ball Z: Dynasty – The Season of Dragon Ramen

Written by: Feraligreater328

Overseen by: StevenBodner and SparkerLightning

Chapter 3: The Monkey

In front of Goku and Chi-Chi's house...

Goku cocked his head, scratching roughly into his wild mane of hair. "Are you sure you don't want me to come along, Chi-Chi?"

Chi-Chi waved him off, adjusting her satchel on her back. "I'll only be gone four days. Two for the walk there and two for the walk back..."

Goku nodded. "Okay. But...why not fly?"

Chi-Chi stammered. "B-Because, uh, it would spoil the mushroom and ruin the richness of the flavors if I were to fly at high speeds through the air?"

Husband and wife stared at each other for a long, hard minute. Chi-Chi blushed. Goku coughed into his fist. Neither of them believed a word of that. Chi-Chi shook her head. "It's just...tradition. Okay, Goku? It's just a tradition..."

Goku nodded and spun on his heel. "Ooooooookay!"

Chi-Chi called after him as he walked into the house. "You and the kids just make the noodles! Okay? I'll be back in no time!"

Goku shot a thumbs up and Chi-Chi was left standing alone outside. She took a deep breath and turned away from her home and her entire body immediately screamed to go back. But, at this point, she couldn't do that. She was too far and too deep into this. She had made her husband a promise and she couldn't break it now.

Chi-Chi took a deep breath and, with great effort, forced one foot in front of the other. And then she forced the other foot to move as well. Left and right. Left and right. Left and right. And then she was walking on. Soon enough, her home was a cozy speck behind her and, sooner still, Mt. Paozu was a shrinking monolith in the distance. Chi-Chi turned and looked again, still longing to turn around. But she kept walking. "Gotta do this..."

Hours later...

For what it was worth, Chi-Chi was making great time. Dragon Rock was just shy of 300,000 meters of mountainous paths from her own front door. Nearly the same amount of distance as between Dragon Rock and Mt. Frying Pan. For any normal person, it would be a walk that would seem impossible. Who could make it that far in such a short time?

But Chi-Chi was just as superhuman as the rest of her family. There were stretches where she ran at top speed, ki pumping into her legs to make them less flesh and blood and more like well-oiled pistons. And then there were stretches where she walked at a leisurely pace, whether iit be to bask in the pleasantly hot Sun or the sublime shade.

Her outfit was nothing too fancy. A simple qipao with sensible pants and hiking boots. Her backpack was slung onto her shoulders containing a bit of easily ingested food and a few thermoses of crystal-clear water. She had a scarf tied around her head, blocking her horns from sight and allowing her waterfall of stygian locks to hang behind her. Chi-Chi was never the type to let her hair just...hang. But this was different from normal life. This felt more right.

As she walked, Chi-Chi found herself lost in her own mind. Her brain skipped from thought to thought to thought at a breakneck pace. She remembered her first meeting with Goku and smiled warmly. She remembered the first time she took a file to her horns, and she shuddered in pain. She randomly thought of her first meeting with Yamcha and she laughed out loud, speaking to no one that she owed him a punch for knocking her out like that. And then she remembered the warmth of her mother's arms and Chi-Chi fell silent again.

She swallowed a lump in her throat and sighed.

The bald-faced truth that neither Goku nor Chi-Chi addressed back in their yard was that Chi-Chi could have flown and gotten this silly errand done in less than an hour. Less than half an hour if she'd have simply allowed him to come along. But she couldn't do that, and she really didn't want to. Chi-Chi needed this walk. Chi-Chi needed time to think and to breath and to just...exist. Just be. Not wrapped in worries or panic or home life. Chi-Chi just needed to...exist.

And in this need to exist, Chi-Chi found herself totally lost in thought. She grumbled in angry thought. "I'll get that Mr. Satan bastard. I swear..."

And as Chi-Chi continued her walk, she didn't realize that she was being followed.

Later that evening...

The first sparkles of the stars began to twinkle in the night and Chi-Chi came to a stop, looking at a stretch of forest next to her. She opened her backpack and pulled out a massive sheet. "Now...tent or hammock? What do I do?"

After about ten minutes of intense deliberation, Chi-Chi decided that hammock would be more sensible. She could just lay down on this warm, warm evening and drift away as the occasional hot breeze rolled through. Chi-Chi nodded and stepped up to the tree on her right, securing the sheet in place with two falconer's knots. Just to be safe, she secured the end of the sheet upon two different, strong branches. Then she walked to the other end of the sheet to do the same.

*FHWOOMP*

Chi-Chi turned around and was immediately pressed against the tree. A rope crashed across her chest, and she felt it continue to wind around and around until the two heavy metal bearings twisted around each other and securely bound her in place. Chi-Chi gave an easy-going tug to the bola and growled under her breath. "What does Bulma see in this sort of thing...?"

From the shadows, three wondering thieves stepped up and glowered down at Chi-Chi. One of them pulled a knife from his vest and licked the blade. The second had a moustache and a bazooka over one shoulder. The third was a massive tiger man wearing an army helmet. Knife boy cackled. "Hey, little lady. Those clothes looked awfully tight. Need some help with them~?"

Chi-Chi spoke bluntly. "I'm happily married."

Bazooka guy laughed. "Well, where's hubby then? Scared of the dark, is he? Or are you guys on the outs?!"

All three laughed. Chi-Chi sneered. "A said happily. Are you dumbasses deaf?"

All three of them snarled. Knife boy thrust the blade into Chi-Chi's face. "Looks like little lady doesn't realize the situation she's in! We'll have to make her aware, nice and slow~"

Chi-Chi was unmoved. "You have three seconds to cut this rope, apologize, and get on your merry way before I start breaking bones. One..."

They all laughed. Chi-Chi spoke calmly. "Two..."

One guy got close, pulling back the knife to slash Chi-Chi's face. "Say three, bitch!"

Chi-Chi sighed through her nose. "Three."

And then she flexed her muscles and made the ropes all snap at once, along with the trunk of the tree she was anchored two. Knife boy yelped. "What the-"

Chi-Chi smashed her fist into the side of his head hard enough to leave a knuckle-shaped dent. As he bounced, she sped at tiger man and kicked him hard enough in the gut that his ribs audibly splintered. He fell to the ground and gurgled. The bazooka guy cried in fear, watching from behind as Chi-Chi downed his larger companion in a single hit. In a panic, he levied his bazooka into firing position and aimed it at the back of Chi-Chi's head. She turned and glared at him and he pulled the trigger.

Chi-Chi was not scared in the slightest. She could handle a silly rocket. But then, from the bushes, another fighter leaped out and kicked the rocket high into the air where it exploded without incident. Bazooka guy's jaw dropped in horror as he stared at his new foe: a 3-year-old girl with a pissy look on her face.

He yelped. "What the hell?!"

She cried out. "You meanies leave my Mama alone!"

And then, Son Chika launched forward and delivered the slap of all slaps to the theif's face, sending him flying over the treetops to land with a dull thud in the distance. Witnessing this terrifying display, Knife Boy and Tiger Man limped away with a story that would haunt them for the rest of their miserable, scummy lives.

Once they were gone, Chi-Chi and Chika turned and stared at one another. Chi-Chi stammered. "Ch-Chika...what are y-you...what are you...?"

Chika lunged into her mother's bosom. "MAMA!"

Chi-Chi easily caught her daughter, feeling the girl's little arms wrap a half-moon around her waist and her little hands each grabbed a handful of her dress. Chika smiled warmly. "I've been following you since you left the house! I told Papa that I was going with you, and he smiled and gave me a thumbs up~"

Chi-Chi bit her lower lip. "Goku..."

Chika looked up at her. "I'm sorry, Mama. Don't be mad at Papa, please..."

She buried her face in Chi-Chi's tummy. "I just didn't want you to be alone. I know that you cry sometimes, and you always hug me when I cry, so if Papa couldn't come with you, I just wanted to be there..."

She smiled up at Chi-Chi again. "Because I love you~"

Chi-Chi could feel the tears welling up, but she quickly suppressed them. "Oh Chika..."

And so, mother and daughter quickly finished setting up their hammock, finding a new set of trees to properly anchor it onto. Chi-Chi made sure her little girl at dinner, even if it wasn't much beyond cold rice and water, and then they laid down together. Chika pulled the hair bun coverings from her horns and then was asleep in less than three minutes. Her monkey-lilke tail wrapped gently and firmly around her mother's leg.

Chi-Chi stroked her daughter's hair and spoke in a gentle whisper. "She's half-Saiyan. That couldn't have been enough supper. I'll need to wake up and hunt her something bigger to eat..."

Without thinking, Chi-Chi caressed her thumb over Chika's little stubs of horns and thought back to when her mother showed her how to care for her own. Chika's felt like bone, dry and slightly coarse. Chi-Chi couldn't think of a time when she was little when hers didn't feel as smooth as porcelain.

Chi-Chi laid her head back and looked up at the moon. For a moment, she entertained the thought of pulling off her headscarf and letting her own horns breathe, but that thought quickly died. As Chi-Chi's eyes slipped shut, she mumbled to herself. "How did horn care go again...?"