Makoto ran after a group of the Chibi Cells as they ran away from her, not wanting to meet their deaths before they grew to full size. They knew that their father had created so many of them because most would not survive, but each wanted to stay alive as long as possible. Makoto wasn't about to let any of them go. She was hot on their tails when the yelling of her friends behind her. She immediately stopped, hoping that they weren't being under attack. "What is it you guys?" She asked as she turned around. To her relief, they were not under attack, but Rei was still on the ground by with her head in Usagi's lap. "Gees don't scare me like that. I thought you were in trouble. So what's up? I want to start digging into these guys and get as many of them killed as soon as possible before they grow."


Ami sat kneeled down next to Rei and put her hand over her heart. She wanted to make sure that it wasn't beating faster than it should. There wasn't anything that they could do to really help her if she got into medical trouble. To her liking, Rei was fine. "Wait a minute Makoto. Rei, are you all right?" It was at times like these that she was glad her mother had begun teaching her about medicine and what to do in case of emergencies.

Rei nodded as she sat up, very dizzy from the overwhelming voices that filled her head. "I'll be ok. I just sensed something from those guys."

Usagi pulled herself away from Rei and sat on her knees. "What? What was it? What did you sense?" Usagi knew that it had to be something bad. It was the same thing that had happened back at the tournament when she and Rei had first met.

Rei turned to Usagi as her arms began to regain feeling in them. "It's those stupid Chibi Cells. As soon as they started to run away I heard their thoughts. It was words that the original Cell put into the minds of these guys right before he spit the egg out. He's planning on stealing your power, Usagi, and not giving it up to his queen. He's going to overthrow even her."

"What? Why? He seemed so devoted to his queen. That's why he wanted my power so badly was so he could give it to her." Usagi stood to her feet as she brushed off some of the sand that was on her Gi.

"It's the power. He wants to be the most powerful being around. I think he thinks with your power he can become that. His power has gone to his head. I've seen it before. Remember how I went to that martial arts school before I met you guys? Well, believe it or not Haruka and Michiru used to be kind of nice before then. They were still kind of bullies before that class, but not as bad as they are now. Once they started learning a lot, they got really bad. Power goes to your head and turns you evil if you let it."

Usagi was still somewhat confused even after listening to what Makoto had to say. "But wait. Why wouldn't Cell just take dad's power? I mean, he's stronger than me now. Why does he still want me?"

Makoto slowly shook her head from side to side in puzzlement. "Who knows. Maybe he's just stupid or something. But that's not exactly important. What is, is getting rid of those Chibi Cells." Makoto crouched back into her fighting stance as she was about to run towards a cluster of Cells.

"Wait, Makoto. We need a plan first. We can't just go and jump in without a plan." Ami rose to her feet as did Rei. She began to think of a plan that would work to rid themselves of all the Cells in less than the time they were going to have to stay in there.

"Ami's right. We can't afford to do that. We would end up loosing. And if it's one thing I've learned, it's to never underestimate your enemy, like I did with Cell."

Makoto and Minako turned and looked at each and nod with agreement. Usagi was right. Something bad would probably happen to them if they didn't have a plan. "What did you have in mind?"

"Well…" Ami didn't even give Usagi a moment to speak, not that she had anything to say anyways. Ami had a small idea of what to do. "We have to stop them all. That much we know. As for keeping ourselves safe, that may be a bit harder to do. We have to fight thousands of them. But we have to do it strategically.

"Meaning…?" Rei was beginning to think of all the things that had taken place in the past few weeks that they had a been in that room. She was thinking about all the times she had heard her friends in her head without them even being around her.

"Their power level is really low right now. But there are so many of them and they've all ran way away from here already. And in all directions. Who knows where they could be now. This place is huge. But maybe that's a good thing. That will give us time to think of something." Minako tried to scope out, in her mind by using her senses, where they could all be. There were so many readings coming in that she could barely keep it up.

"Did you see they way they ran from us? They seem to be afraid of us." Makoto still wished that she could get her hands on them and be tearing them apart by now.

"We have to find them as soon as possible. Preferably once we think of a plan. From what I got from their minds, they are going to be getting stronger each day. The more we destroy in their early stages, the better." Rei knew the horrors of what would happen if they were allowed to reach their full level of power. "I think I may have an idea."

"So do I." Ami added. "We need a place to stay and protection during the time that all of those Chibi Cells are here right?" Ami paused long enough to let her friends nod. She didn't want anything to ruin her concentration so she continued. "So let's make that building back there are base. You know. A place to rest at night since we obviously aren't going to be able to get rid of all of the Cells in one night."

"But what about a guard. Someone will always have to watch the door and warn the others of an attack. It can't be Usagi. You know what happened last time we put her in charge." Minako stated, as everyone turned their attention to their Saiyan friend.

Usagi, who was embarrassed by the fact that she had failed her friends, frowned. "Hey, that wasn't my fault you guys. You knew I was tired. I couldn't help going to sleep like that. It was quiet and I was bored. You can't tell me that you wouldn't have fallen asleep too."

Minako playfully rolled her eyes. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. We know your story. I know I probably would have gone to sleep too if I were you."

"We needn't talk about that right now. And Minako, you're right. We do need someone to watch the door. But I'm afraid that that isn't going to be enough. It will be for now, but that's because they Cells are afraid of us. Once they start overpowering us, they will make their attacks less sporadic and they will never give us time to rest. As of now, with so many of them out there, we are going to have to go separately to get most of them before they grow."

So far the plan sounded good. They were all strong enough to fight by themselves, but Makoto still had her doubts about the whole situation. "But they grow in power as they grow up. What will we do when we can't take them on by ourselves? They will be way too much for us."

"I think that's where my idea may be of some help." Everyone diverted their attention over to Rei, who now spoke. "Lately I've been sensing things from everyone here, hearing you speak but you weren't anywhere around me. But it wasn't just silly conversation I was hearing. It was all about Cell. The first time I really heard someone else was when we were first fighting Cell and Usagi called for help. It was strange. I was still on Kami's lookout when I heard it and Usagi was already on the battle field." She looked around to her friends' faces and could tell that something was bothering them. "What's wrong, guys?"

Usagi looked to the ground. "Well, something like that happened to me the other day. I heard you talking about wanting to get this deal with Cell over with as soon as you could. And that you wanted to go home as soon as it was over."

Rei wasn't surprised at that. She had a feeling that she wasn't the only one with this new ability that they had somehow acquired. "Have you guys experienced this too?" The other three of her friends nod. "I'm not sure , but I think when we helped Usagi when she first got her new power and lost control, we bonded. I remember felling quite strange myself that day. When I got really angry with Goku for hurting her I felt an even stronger connection to her. Like we were soul sisters. But not only Usagi, when we attacked Goku, I felt the same connection to you all."

"Wait a minute, remember when you tried to comfort me after I started freaking out? Well, I felt a strange power besides my own. It scared me, so I resisted it. I thought you were all in on it too because it was a big power. Larger than my own. What do you think it was?"

"Maybe it was a symbol of our friendship?"

"Not sure Minako, but I'm sure it had something to do with that. Kind of like severe passion for something. And at that point it was beating the enemy and saving Usagi. We were certain that our lives depended on the defeat of Goku." Rei looked over to Usagi, who seemed to be cringing at the memories that had been surfaced. They hadn't really spoken of that day since it happened. They didn't want to upset her anymore than she already had been. "I'm sorry Usagi. I know this is hard for you."

Usagi released her anger. "It's not that. Well…it is sort of. But not only that. It's just that…that…well…it's nothing. Never mind."

Rei could feel the mixed emotions of Usagi but decided not to say anything as she didn't want to offend her by doubting her. "I think that if we concentrate hard enough we can make this bond happen. If we join hands we may be able to communicate to each other through thoughts when we are in danger. That way, we can come to each other's aid when another is down."

"But what good would that do? We still need to rest but they wont let us." Makoto said as she continued to stay in her fighting stance just in case anything were to attack them at that moment.

Minako held out a small brown sack. "Well I have the Senzu beans that Chi-Chi gave me right before we ran to the egg, Usagi. She got them from your dad. But there are only five left."

Ami thought further about the situation that they were in. "That wont work. There are only five. That wont last very long once they become more powerful. Somehow, we need to make this place inaccessible to the Chibi Cells so we can sleep when our energy is low from fighting."

Makoto smiled as an idea hit her in the head. "I have an idea. I was trying like Usagi to make a new power, and thought of our KI aura. I thought maybe we could make that into a shield, you know harden it. I've been working on it, but I don't seem to be making any progress with it. It's just too hard. Hardening a Ki isn't the easiest thing in the world to do. I don't even know how to go about doing it. I was mainly experimenting with it."

"That sounds like a good idea. But it would take A LOT of energy to do. I mean, hardening a Ki aura is not your everyday thing. Plus, it would take all of your power just to make the shield strong enough to hold up to an enemy stronger than you. But if we got the bond to work, we can work on it together and maybe find a way to harden it into a permanent shield we can place around this place so we can actually get some sleep. All of our power put together should be strong enough to hold those things off until we can get rid of them." Rei couldn't wait to try and make the bond work. It would be something spectacular if they could. They would be able to know if the other was in trouble. Though even it would take up quite a bit of energy so sending random messages out to each other would be out of the question. They would have to wait until it was an emergency to do that. "I'm just not sure how we should go about trying to figure out how to make this bond thing work. If we can get it too work, then we can pass on all our knowledge of fighting to each other all at once, hopefully. This way Ami and I can catch up to you. Maybe not physically as you had training, but fighting knowledge will still be helpful."

"And I can teach you my school knowledge." Ami was interrupted by the groaning of her friends. She knew that would happen once she mentioned that. "And my strategies on fighting and analyzing. We will become better fighters in the long run. But like Rei said, who knows if it will even work. It would be nice if it did."

Usagi nodded. She couldn't wait to get started. "Right, but mostly we need the shields, so lets get started. We can't waste much more time. Follow me." She turned around and walked back to the building, which they all hoped would become their base, their only protection from the miniature Cells.

All of the girls soon followed Usagi with the same hopes that she had of making this work. When they were all at their destination, they faced each other and sat down in unison, forming a circle of friends. Each one looked as nervous as the next as they looked to Rei for directions.

Rei took a deep breath in as she cleared her mind, just as she would whenever she performed her ritual with fire. "Ok, now, clear your minds of everything except for Cell. We must concentrate on overpowering him. That seems to be the link between our bonding. The need to strike back to save ourselves." The girls did as they were told and cleared their minds of their thoughts and worries. Each put their hands out to their side, grabbing the hand that was on their left and right. They all began to raise their Ki levels as they thought that it may help.

They had much difficulty at first. They were having problems merging their thoughts together as they tired to do it with their own body power instead of their minds, instead of their friendship power. But they soon started to use some of the same techniques as when they merged their Ki attacks and a small aura, mixed with all of their colors, formed around their bodies. Though this was only the beginning. This was the easy part. The hard part would be how to figure out how they would harden this aura, which seemed to the same power that they all felt the day that Usagi had fallen from her power.

As their thoughts started wander into the minds of their friends, each and every one of them began to have doubts about what they were doing. They were becoming scared at the thought of finding out what the others really thought about them. They were afraid of what they may have seen in the others' thoughts.

Ami had been a little afraid that the bookworm remarks that Usagi had used when referring to her and Gohan might have been insults. But she soon realized that they were compliments. She found that Usagi only teased her and her brother because of the admiration that Usagi had for them. She wished that she could be as smart as Ami and Gohan, but knew it would never happen. She just didn't have the will to learn as they did.

The others had similar fears, but were relieved that the friendship that they had was true. They each found that they had nothing to fear at all as not one of them hated another. There was only love in their hearts. This relief was the last obstacle that had been stalling the formation of the bond as they had all been holding back from their fears. Once their fears had disappeared, the bond went more smoothly and fast.

Once the bond was completely formed, the girls released hands and dropped to their backs, panting from all of the work that had just been fulfilled. Usagi closed her eyes as she thought about what just happened. She had seen into the minds of her friends and found not one temptation for them to ever make fun of her. While the other kids at school pretty much didn't say anything to make fun of her out of fear, her friends didn't say anything at all because that's what they were, friends. "You guys are the best." Yet, she also heard the doubts that everyone had about the Cell situation. Doubts that she had had too. "Can we see into each others minds like that without holding hands?" Her friends shrugged as she concentrated to search Minako's thoughts, but nothing happened. "I guess not. Why wont it work now?"

Rei sat up and looked to Usagi in confusion. "I don't understand. It work just a moment ago. Here just a minute." She put her hands to her temples as she closed her eyes and began to try and transmit a message to her friends. Her body was overtaken with a soft ruby red aura as she concentrated harder. 'Is this reaching anyone?'

Makoto was the first to answer as she performed the same movements as Rei. Only her body was taken up by a soft emerald aura. 'Yeah. But why does it hurt to do this?' She asked as an aching sensation made its way through her head and down into her torso. She pulled her hands away from her temple and opened her eyes to look at Rei, who seemed just as puzzled as she was.

"I'm not sure. Maybe because we aren't holding hands and we aren't all concentrating fully on the same thing. I know it worked when you had severe passion of what you were talking about. Maybe we just have to learn to master it."

Usagi sighed. "So much to do, so little time."

Rei let herself drop back to lay down. "Too true Usagi. Too true. But we can't stop here. Now we have to figure out how to make this thing a fort. You know what that means. We have to use more energy to do that though." She paused long enough to let her friends groan. "I know, I know. But hopefully we can get to the point where it doesn't use too much energy to make the shield." She turned to Usagi. "Go Super Saiyan so it has more power."

Usagi did as Rei told her and powered up in a blink of an eye. "How are we supposed to do this?"

"I have no idea." She turned to Makoto who appeared to be deep in thought. "How have you been trying?"

"Well, I've tried it a few different ways. The most effective way I've tried so far is this. Think of your Ki as an inner shell. Once that is done, try and move that energy outside your body. That's what the hard part is. I haven't figured that out yet."

"But wait a minute. How are we supposed to use this to barricade our little 'base'?" Minako asked as she tried to think of her Ki as a shield. Though it was proving to be harder than it sounded.

"Couldn't we just do what I did with my attack? Remember how that stunning attack started out as just something I could do with a touch? I changed it a little bit to make it into an attack that could be fired. Maybe if we could some how make the shield thing something to fire it would work." Usagi would probably end up being the one trying to figure out how to make it an attack that could be shot since she seemed to be the expert out of all of them on how to make attacks.

"How could that work, Usagi? Not that I'm trying to contradict you or anything, but if we did find a way to shoot it after we've hardened it, how could it convert itself onto its target? Wouldn't it bounce off or be destroyed since its already hard?" Sometimes Ami hated being smart. She hated to be the one always bringing down to hopes of others by pointing out flaws. Normally, she would try her hardest not to point things out to her friends as she didn't want to make them feel stupid, but with something like this, it was imperative that they did this exactly right.

Usagi thought for a moment. "Well maybe we could use the basic theme of my attack then. We could bring out these 'shields' directly onto our target instead of around our bodies. That way it would stay there, wouldn't it?"

"Getting those brain cells working in there aren't we Usagi?" Rei playfully giggled as she patted Usagi on the shoulder.

Usagi gave a quick glare over to Rei, but her glare quickly turned into a smile as she knew that she was only joking. "Hey, I'm not stupid all the time. I can be smart when I want to be."

"You keep telling yourself that, Usagi, and it may just come true." Rei wrapped her arm around Usagi's neck and laughed harder. She could see the annoyance in her fellow fighter's eyes. "I'm sorry. I just couldn't resist that one."

"Uh-huh. You just watch yourself Rei and one of these days I'll think of something to say back to you."

"Yeah, sure you will Usagi. Let's not get into this right now though. We need to get back to business. I think we should try that shield thing."

"Together? While holding hands to do the bonding thing?"

"Yes, Usagi. Kind of like how we do the combi…" Rei stopped to think about what she was going to say and got a brilliant idea. "This is perfect girls. I forgot all about the combined attack. If we use that now, we can beat Cell in a heart beat."

Usagi's face was consumed by a gleaming smile. "That's right. Now that we can send messages to each other, we should be able to do it."

Ami shook her head back and forth in a gentle disagreeing manner. "That may not work right now. Remember, right now it takes energy to send messages. We don't know if it's because we aren't used to it or what, but it still takes energy none the less. The point to doing it in different areas of the battle field was to make it unobvious to the enemy what we were doing. But with the energy being raised, they will know for sure what we are doing and where we are. So scratch that. As for performing the shield thing like the original combined attack, that could actually work. I think we should try it." Ami proceeded to walk to the door of their so called base that would soon be theirs.

~*~*~

Once the girls were at their destination, they stood close together, hand in hand with one another with Usagi on the left outer edge, and Minako and the right outer edge. Those would transmit their friend's energy into the attack through their own bodies, which was the reason why they were hand in hand in the first place. They would be able to freely send thoughts and power through their bond. Sort of like Goku had done with Krillin when Vejita and Nappa were attacking the earth.

Usagi, still Super Saiyan, held her hand to their new base and closed her eyes. "Ready, everyone try to harden your Ki like Makoto said." Usagi did this along the same lines in which her brother had taught her to use Ki. He taught her to build it up in one part of her body and then try and concentrate it around. Well, this time she concentrated it in her body, as usual, and changed it a bit. Instead of it moving within her, she tried to make it into a block, basically, freeze it in its place. She found it to be quite difficult as it didn't want to cooperate with her. It didn't help that she also had the power of Makoto and Ami pulsing into her body. Luckily Minako had Rei's power. But Usagi pressed on, unwilling to give up. Soon her persistence was rewarded with success of a sort. She had gotten it to turn rubbery, not completely hard, but good enough for the time being. Cell's offspring would not be strong enough to penetrate this shield. They would have to keep practicing and perfect it later when the Cells grew stronger.

With Usagi figuring out how to do this, she was ready to place the power onto their fort. But she needed to transmit the information to Minako before she did that. So that's precisely what she did. She told her what to do and how to do it. She then proceeded to tell her how to make it come out of her body. As she had said before, Usagi was just going to use the same technique that she had used when making her own attack. She hoped it would work. 'They have to be placed on at the same time or else it wont work. Just like we found out when we were practicing with mom. Ready? On three. One…two…three." Two large auras of all different colors formed in Minako and Usagi's hands. Without wasting time, for if they had the Ki's would have hardened before used, the two fighters began to submit their energy onto their fort. 'It's working.'

The five girls stood in awe as they pulled away and watched their power work. The now pure pink energy made its way around the building without any further interruption from Usagi and Minako. It reached from top to bottom with no holes in it. It was a power stronger than even Goku's power. Much like their combined attack was. It covered every inch of the building so nothing could penetrate it.

Minako took a step back and gawked over their creation. She had never thought that it would work. She had tried so many times on her own to do this, yet, when they all worked together it worked. "Teamwork is the best way to go. I don't care what your dad says Usagi. We are going to find a way to make the combined attack work. This is going to be great. Cell will pay and so will his children."

"Speaking of the little devils, where are they? I believe it's time for play now that we have the work done." Makoto hopped into the air and tried sensing for any Cells that may be around. 'I think I've found you, you little buggers.' "See you later. I'm off to fight some stupid little black bug wanna be's. Call if you need anything." She grinned as she flew off to her fight, which she had been waiting for, for weeks now.

Usagi didn't take her eyes off of the shield, which had just been produced. "I wonder if this will stand up to those things' power." She put her hand out in front of her chest and began forming a small Ki blast. "Let's see if it works or if we just wasted all of our time." Minako, Rei, and Ami all jumped out of the way as they didn't want to be hit with any of the shield's power if it were to fail when Usagi's energy ball made contact with it.

"Here goes nothing." She released her energy attack with great speed and power. She wanted to use her full power so she would know just WHAT it could stand up to and how long it would last. She watched as the silver attack spiraled towards the target. "Look, it's about to hit." She smiled as the attack hit the pink shield. It made a ripple of waves in it and stayed there for a few seconds, appearing to be doing nothing at all. But then all of a sudden it came rushing back at Usagi with a greater force than she had fired it with. "Whoa!" She jumped into the air to barely dodge being hit by it. She swiftly turned her head behind her to look at where it was going. It didn't look like it was going to stop anytime soon. "That was awesome." She looked to her friends, who stood with their mouths opened and looked completely shocked. "I hope it hits a bunch of those stupid Cells. That would be so cool." She giggled at the thought of that. In her mind, she imagined a group of them just walking around and minding their own business when all of a sudden, out of no where, a giant silver Ki blast came tumbling at them with greater speed than they could dodge and they were hit as if they were just a bunch of bowling pins. "I hope that happens." She lowered herself to the ground, as did her other three friends.

Minako tried to locate the energy ball that was on the run, but it was even moving too fast for her to detect. She would catch it in her senses every now and then, but it would quickly disappear again. "Looks like it's still going." She smiled when Usagi did. "So how are WE supposed to get in?"

Ami actually had an answer for that. She thought of it before they had even created the shield. "Simple. We teleport." She pressed her fingers to her forehead and was soon inside their new shelter.

Minako hit herself on the side of the head as she felt dumb. "Duh. I should have known that."

~*~*~

Makoto flew as fast as she could to a group of Cells. They seemed to be resting for something. They were probably resting so they could attack her and her friends while they weren't watching. Well, they would learn what would happen when that happened. They wouldn't be able to touch them now that they had a shield. She looked to her left and to her right. There had to be at least 300 of the little critters in the area. 'Time to meet your doom.' She rubbed her hands together as she thought of ways to rid herself of the nuisances. 'He, he, he.' She lowered herself to the ground, knowing full well that they would all see her if she did. But she wasn't worried. She was sitting at a higher power level than them at the moment. "Hey boys. Wanna play with me? I'm really bored and I need something to do."

With their numbers as high as they were, not a single one of her foes were afraid of her. She was one, they were many. She would not be able to do any harm to them. She would go down, just as their father had instructed them to do. "We will not fail." They all said in unison, which completely freaked Makoto out.

"Yeah right." She took a small step backwards as they walked towards her with their arms extended out in front of them. 'Wait a minute, why am I backing down? They can't hurt me unless I make a mistake. So, I wont make a mistake. At least, I'll try not to.' "Bring it on." She crouched to a fighting stance. Just as she did though, Usagi's Silver Ki attack came crashing over her head straight on into the crowd of Cells, immediately killing all of the 100 that lay in its path and injuring many of the others.

Makoto stood up in confusion as she rubbed her wrists. "What was that?" She looked onto the dead enemies that SHE was supposed to kill. Not anyone else. Though she had recognized the energy signature of the attack. "USAGI YOU KILLED A THIRD OF THE CELLS I WAS SUPPOSED TO!"

(Ok, there's that part. What'd ya think? Good or bad? Anyways, guess what, guess what, guess what? I just finished my LAST homework assignment of the year. You know what that means right? Right? I think you do. So now I'm officially retiring myself from school for the summer, except I still have to go tomorrow and Monday, but oh well. Well gotta go. Ja. ^_^ )