AN: *bowing up and down frantically* Gomen, gomen, gomen!!!! Actually, I had this one done before I posted Chapter Eighteen. Everyone once in a while, I get a little bit ahead. But then what do I do? I can't find my disk, so I can't post it. So don't blame me! But enough of my silly blabbering. We must proceed if we are ever to get to the end of the story! Yah, yah, yah…I mean, no, no, no, I don't own DBZ.
Chapter Nineteen—The Return of the Great Saiyaman
"Gohan!"
The chibi looked up from his textbook at the sound of his mother's voice calling his name. He jumped down from the chair at his desk and went to the door. "Yes?"
"I need you to do some shopping for me!" ChiChi hollered back.
"Okay, let me put my shoes on!" Gohan replied, though he could just barely keep himself from singing. A chance to get away from his house and his studies for a while? All right!
He skipped over to the bed and sat down on it to pull his shoes on. He had always loved going into the city! But as he jumped off the bed, ready to go, he bumped his nightstand, sending several objects falling to the floor. Muttering, he stooped to pick them up.
"Hey, my watch!" he said happily when he saw the piece of jewelry amidst the fallen odds and ends on the rug. This was no ordinary watch, though. This was a Capsule Corporation watch, built specially by Bulma Briefs herself. When the little button on the side of the watch was pushed, the wearer would suddenly find himself clad in the unmistakable outfit of the Great Saiyaman, hero of Satan City, protector of the weak, innocent, and defenseless, defender of truth and justice, blah blah blah…
"Gohan!" his mother called again.
"Coming!" he yelled back before looking back at his watch. "This is so cool!"
On his way down to the kitchen, he strapped the band around his wrist and took a second to admire it. He hadn't realized it, but he had missed that thing.
He scampered down to the kitchen where his mother was waiting with a long, narrow piece of paper in her hand. "Here's the grocery list and some money. Hurry home, all right?"
"Kay!" he chirped. "Thanks, Mom!" The chibi skipped outsite and took off, soaring through the sky towards Satan City. Finally, sweet freedom!
When he got closer to the city, he flew down and made a near-perfect landing, the kind of thing that would have made Videl start muttering about show offs and the like. The old gang had always tried to be careful with their abilities of flight, though; there was no telling how ordinary people might react to seeing people flying over their cities. The very best scenario had the witness putting the sighting off to imagination or exhaustion or the massive quantities of psychedelic drugs ingested half an hour before.
At worst, the person would start screaming and hollering that aliens were coming or that there was a bomb about to be dropped on the city, resulting in public panic, mass hysteria, cult suicide, the burning of Tokyo, London, Paris, and New York City, thus signalling the end of civilization as they knew it. Yes, the worst-case scenario could be summed up in one sentence.
It was because of that possible worst-case scenario that Gohan landed just outside the city and opted instead for the normal person's way of getting around: walking. He wandered around, heading in the general direction of the grocery store, though he wasn't really in any hurry. It was such a wonderful day. Such a nice, sunny, peaceful, wonderful day…
But not for long.
A high-pitched scream cut through Gohan's cheerful reverie, snapping him quickly and semi-painfully back to reality. He followed the shriek, and found himself looking at the First National Bank. There were police cars everywhere with lights a-flashing, and cops crawling all over the place, guns drawn. Gohan's intuition, combined with his past experiences, told him that this had all the earmarkings of a large scale robbery in progress.
But before Gohan could do anything, Videl arrived. She landed, and immediately went to the chief of police to be briefed on the situation. Gohan frowned as she disappeared into the building. He couldn't just stand there and watch this! He had to help!
The chibi ducked around a corner into a shadowed alley. No one was around to see him here. Good. He pushed the button and sure enough, like magic, the Saiyaman outfit appeared, perfectly fitted to his currently diminuitive state. He grinned. "All right!"
Thus disguised, he jumped out from his hiding place and flew into the air—it had been established long ago that Saiyaman was capable of flight, so he had no reserves about being airborne while so disguised. He went right over their heads. "Officer, perhaps I can be of assistance?" he called, trying to make his voice as deep as possible—quite a stretch, though, for his voice to jump from a soprano most opera singers would envy to a authority-laden, manly bass. It didn't quite work, but hey, he gave himself credit for trying at this point.
The police chief's eyes shot skyward, and when they focused on the incoming hero, his face lit up. "Hey, everybody, it's Saiya—" the superhero landed; he came up to the officer's waist. "—man?"
"Don't ask," Gohan groaned. Saiyaman was a kid now. Well, wasn't this just going to send some of the cities more gossipy tongues a-wagging! Not bothering to hang around for any more comments and/or wisecracks concerning his slightly smaller size, he ran into the building.
Inside, there were people everywhere, running around in a frantic panic. In the midst of all of this, right smack dab in the middle of the lobby, Videl was facing off against the bank robbers. The three heavily armed men, all smirking down at the young Miss Satan, reminded Gohan of Nappa: huge, ugly, stupid, and holding the majority of the cards.
Gohan tiptoed up behind two of the men. He pushed off and hovered a few feet in the air, at their shoulder level. He took a great amount of delight at the dramatic way his bright red cape fluttered behind him. It was so perfect! Thus positioned, he waited.
They both seemed to realize simoultaneously that there was someone behind them. Both turned, and were rewarded by a big grin from the Great Saiyaman before the hero grabbed their collars and smacked their heads together; the impact made a sound almost like two coconuts striking together. It was most delightful. Apparently, the two gunmen were exactly Nappa's intelligence. They fell to the ground in a nice disorderly heap.
The third gunman's attention was taken for a split second by the sudden and rather embarassing defeat of his criminal partners. But that split second was all Videl needed to do her thing; she saw her opportunity and seized it. She managed to flatten the third guy with a very well-place kick to his jaw.
With the threat of death out of the way, Videl called for the police backup to come in and arrest the SOBs. Not her exact words, though. That done, she turned her full attention to the Great Saiyaman, who appeared to have shrunk in the wash. Apparently, one was not supposed to put superheroes in the clothes dryer on tumble dry.
"Gohan?" she asked in a low voice so that no one else could over hear—not that there was much chance of being heard if she wanted to be heard, what with all the commotion going on around them. "Is…is that you?"
"Yeah," he gulped, bracing himself for her reaction. He didn't know quite what to expect.
"B-b-b-but," she actually stuttered. "You're a kid again!" This was the first time she had seen him since the night of prom, and it was definitely a shock to see him back in his seven year old state.
"Yeah, I know," he commented, biting back a lugh. She looked so funny with her jaw just dangling open like that! It wasn't often that one saw the great Satan Videl look so…stunned.
"B-b-b-but…" she started, but was cut off at the sound of three deep voices shouting obscenities at the top of their lungs. The three robbers were being taken away by police, but they were putting up one hell of a fight, resisting arrest every single step of the way. The two heroes took advantage of this distraction and snuck away, back into the alley where Gohan had first transformed into Saiyaman. Now, back in the safety of this hiding place, it was okay to change back. One little push of the button, and the Great Saiyaman changed back to his alter ego, Son Gohan, mild mannered student, brother, and alien halfling.
Once he was back to his normal self, Gohan looked up at Videl, waiting somewhat nervously. Inside the bank, she'd been in a state of semi-shock. Now that the surprise was starting to wear off and reality was starting to set in, all he could do was wait for her full reaction to finally hit.
It came.
"Oh, you are sooooooo cute!!!! AGAIN!!!!!" she actually squealed, throwing her arms around his neck and nearly squeezing all the air out of him. Had Gohan been able to breathe, he probably would have groaned. What was it with women and cute? Good grief!
"Son Gohan, where are my groceries?!?" the Voice of DOOM bellowed.
Haven't heard that for a while, Gohan thought dryly.
But Videl jumped a mile and looked around with wide eyes before asking what had become the standard response sentence to an appearance of the Voice of DOOM. "How does she do that?"
The chibi shrugged. "Dunno. But I'd better go."
A quick goodbye and another strangling hug later, Son Gohan was running for the grocery store, like a good little boy, to hurry and purchase the items his mother needed.
*~*~*~*
"So you really fought the bad guys?" Goten chirped.
"Yup!" Gohan said proudly. "The Great Saiyaman is back in action!" He accented this declaration by leaping from his desk chair into the middle of the room and striking a few poses that would have made the Ginyu Force roll over in their graves.
"Awesome!" Goten said in awe-struck admiration for his older, same-age brother. Gohan really was the coolest guy alive!
"I hope he's back in action on his calculus homework!" the Voice of DOOM rumbled so loudly that the walls shook and the windows rattled.
The two chibis stared at each other for a minute in total shock.
"How does she do that?" Gohan finally yelped. Then realization dawned, and he paused. "Wait…"
"What?" Goten cocked his head to one side. "What's wrong, brother?"
"Twice in one day?" Gohan murmured, recalling the earlier appearance of the Voice of DOOM.
"I took a couple days off," the Voice said, a little more softly than before. "I'm making up for the lost time now. SO DON'T ARGUE!!!"
AN: I love my Voice of DOOM! Notice that DOOM is now capitalized. Doom just doesn't have the same oomph as DOOM! *sigh* Life is good, eh? Sorry this chapter was a little shorter.
Anyhoo, someone told me that they thought this story was over. Not yet, it's not! We've still got a long way to go! Gohan's still got how much time left? Two months…ish? Something like that. And I've got a few more things to throw in here before I wrap up this little fable. *grinz* We're still in for a fairly long haul here, so don't quit on me now!!!
BTW, I am doing the whole mailing list thing, so if you want me to email you when I update next, leave your email addy in a review, and I'll let you know what's up when it's up. But pretty please put the address in the review or in an email or some such thing!!!!!!
Next time, on "Once Upon a Chibi," I haven't decided what's going to happen next! I think I know, but I'm not totally, one hundred percent sure, so I think it's better not to get your hopes up for something that might not come true. Just don't hold your breath or anything. I'd really hate to hear that someone died because of me. I'd feel kind of bad, I think, if that happened.