Right. One year later….
Disclaimer: Roany, Roany, my good pony! Don't you dare say I do owny!
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Beyond the Cloudy Dawn
By Phoenix Cubed
Chapter 4
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Videl, being of a sturdy nature and a strong warrior background, was no stranger to challenges, welcoming them even with a dangerous glint and a cocky smile as she beckoned them closer with a crooked finger. The only child in a single parent family, she and her father had worked tooth and nail for every crust of bread and every drop of water that had passed down their throats since before she could remember. And Videl, being of such stout mind and body, could remember quite a bit.
Her memories began in a rundown one-bedroom shack that doubled as a dojo during the day. Videl's first bed was a mothball-smelling sleeping bag beneath a hole in the ceiling that she jokingly referred to as her skylight; and her clothes were so large but so definitely feminine that she wondered if they had not at one point belonged to the mysterious and shadowy figure of her past known as Mom. Her father, an up and coming martial artist by the name of Satan Hercule, taught a few classes during the sunlit hours before working the night shift as a security guard at a factory down the road. The money wasn't much, but it did pay for two adequate meals a day and the entry fees to weekend tournaments that her father had started to win regularly. Soon the local tourneys gave way to regional contests, and from there it hadn't been long until odds had been drawn for rising star, Mr. Satan, at the World's Martial Arts Tournament.
But despite his slow rise to fame, Mr. Satan was first and foremost a father to his only child, and for that he earned undying love and devotion from his daughter. The pride that he felt for her rivaled nothing, and he boasted about her at every turn and tournament. There were few reporters who had interviewed Mr. Satan that hadn't been treated to the story of Videl's first steps into her daddy's arms at the tender age of six months, or her first attempts at katas that had sent her tumbling to the floor time after time. When they had moved into a new home on a nicer side of town than the gang ruled slum of her youth, pictures began lining the walls to accompany his stories. Her first steps, her first colored belt, their father/daughter successes—later to become known as the Satan Sweep when he would win the adult division and she would walk away with the youth title—every moment of triumph and tribulation became a moment on the wall.
Every moment, but any that involved another parent. Mr. Satan may have loved his daughter, but the feelings and events associated with his former wife were as unknown to Videl as truth to the existence of living planets beyond her own. Videl might have been found in a cabbage patch for all that she knew about her mother, but she had come to accept the fact that a vegetable garden was probably preferable in her father's eyes. Anything that reminded the Champ of his former wife had been removed from the Satan household, and questions about her from his daughter would always bring a closed, half sad, half angry look to Mr. Satan's face. The expression was terrible and his personality afterward even worse, falling into a quiet and often drunken stupor for the remainder of the day. So Videl had learned not to ask; and after so many years without a mother in her life it had ceased to matter. She had her father, and that's all that did.
But now, she didn't even have that anymore.
"So let me get this straight," the dark eyed man said to her, "you were on that cliff because your father put you there."
"No," she scowled at him, tearing off another bite the cold meat crepe he had given her, "he put me in a cave about thee quarters the way up. But I've been in there for two weeks and I ran out of food—"
"So you thought you'd just climb down the cliff face and go foraging." He shook his head again, handing her another crepe as he watched her stuff the remaining of her last into her mouth. "Don't you think it a little dangerous to be rock climbing without equipment?"
"I was handling it just fine before you came along," she replied smartly, accepting the last of the meat crepes. After their little introduction, her "rescuer" had proceeded to offer her the strange dinner cakes as a further peace offering. She'd been wary at first, but after the initial bite she hadn't cared if they were poisoned or not—after having no food in three days, Videl would be content to die in the Heaven the taste of the food had sent her to.
"Why were you in that cave, anyway?" Gohan asked in an attempt to deter yet another argument. The girl certainly liked to pick them.
"I told you, because my father put me there." Videl replied, her voice carefully articulated as if talking to a mental invalid.
"Is he still up in the cave then?" Gohan pressed, wanting to have a word with the man who would let his child try to scale a thousand foot cliff face.
But Videl shook her head, causing Gohan to sigh.
"There wouldn't be anyone else up there with you then, like a village?"
"Don't be stupid, its hardly big enough for two as it is," Videl replied. "Why a village, though?"
"I'm looking for one, or at least, its people," Gohan said, "there used to be a village not too far from here…you wouldn't happen to be from it, would you?"
"No," Videl licked the last of the meat juice off her fingers, "but I know about it. Dad went off to help them not long after we found the cave."
"Oh." Gohan became troubled, "how long ago was this?"
"'Bout a week ago."
Gohan frowned, that would put Videl's father in the mountains at the same time of the androids, but he hadn't seen any bodies. A week wasn't enough time for a corpse to decompose, not even enough for scavengers to lose interest. Something fishy was going on, but Gohan didn't have enough information to figure out just what. Well, first things first, he needed to drop his little adventurer off somewhere safer than the middle of nowhere.
"Something wrong?" The girl's voice cut through Gohan's thoughts, and he looked up to see her eyeing him suspiciously.
To ease her mind, he smiled at her; unconsciously slipping into the infamous trademark expression of his family. "No," he told her, "just thinking. But it's getting late and it wouldn't be right to just leave you out here by yourself. Is there anyplace I can drop you?"
"That offer isn't literal, I hope," Videl replied, still lacking any sort of trust.
"What? No, no!" Gohan held up his hands defensively, "I'm just trying to help! Really!"
"Hmph," Videl dusted off her cut-off jeans before asking, "can you take me to the village? I'd like to see my Dad again and maybe get some supplies."
"Uh," Gohan hesitated, "I'd like to but…"
"But what?" Videl glared at him, "don't tell me it's too far for that silly cloud of yours."
"No," he said, "Its just that…well, I can't find the village."
"Well I know where it is."
"So do I."
"Then what's the problem?" The scowl on the young woman's face was becoming perpetual, "take me to the village!"
"I can't!" Gohan tried hard to recap his patience. He took a deep breath and let the news out slowly, "the village… isn't there anymore."
It took a moment for the underlying meaning of his words to sink in. As it did, the thickness of the silence that hung in the air was enough to stopper the wind and let the dryness of the cliff base permeate Videl's mouth. Her eyes blinked in slow motion once or twice as she tried to focus on something, anything.
Gohan at once felt bad and tried to remedy the situation. "Hey," he said, somewhat gentle, "don't think of it like that. The village isn't there anymore, but neither is anything else. It looks like whoever lived there took it down themselves and went into hiding. Wherever they are, I'm sure your dad is safe with them."
"Yeah," Videl swallowed, trying to get her mouth to work again, "yeah. That' s probably it. Dad's clever like that, he probably got them to do it."
"Probably," Gohan avoided the matter of the vegetation being older than a mere few weeks; the girl could think what she wanted if it cheered her up for a bit. "So is there anywhere else I can take you? Other family? I know a couple people in West City—"
"Can you take me back up to the cave?" She asked, "Dad told me to wait for him there. He won't know where else to look when he comes back and I'm not there."
"But, you don't have any supplies—"
"Look," Videl turned on him, her glare in such a force that Gohan was forced to take a step back. "Either you let me borrow that cloud of yours or I start climbing myself, got it?"
"Ah, yes, ma'am," Gohan gave in, knowing better than to mess with a female with her mind made up.
From its perch a few feet away, the Nimbus cloud puttered over and bumped gently against Videl's hip, declaring itself ready for transport. Without a word, Videl hopped on and settled deep in its middle. She looked back to Gohan, "you're sure its not gonna drop me, right?"
Gohan smiled, "just think happy thoughts." And with that, he rose slowly in the air, beckoning Nimbus to follow after him at a sedate pace.
The ground fell away quickly despite Gohan's efforts to keep things slow. Keeping on eye on the girl while looking for the mysterious cave she claimed origin, Gohan noted the passive—if not curious—look that touched her face even while her hands gripped the Nimbus with white knuckles.
After a few minutes of rising, falling, and chin jerking, Gohan spotted a shadowed opening in the cliff face, hidden in an indenture behind two rocks and tucked safely in the folds of an adjoining cliff. There was no way anybody was finding this place unless they already knew about it.
The two rocks that hid the entrance also served as a sturdy ledge, allowing Videl to climb without problem from the Nimbus. Secure in her footing, she looked up to her hovering companion.
"I'd ask you to come in," she told him, "but I think that'd sound stupid."
"Its all right," he told her, but continued to hesitate over the entrance, "you sure you're going to be okay?"
"I'll be fine," she huffed, "I was before you came and I will be now that you're leaving. Good bye."
And with that definite ring of dismissal in her voice, she disappeared into the shadowy depths of the cave to leave Gohan alone and very much confused.
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It was well into the morning but long before sunrise when Gohan's fingers deftly slid the window to his bedroom door shut, shucked off his gi and heavy undershirt, and then collapsed onto his bed. Tired from a day's hard flying and the roller coaster of stress that dealing with the young woman had put him through, Gohan came home out of pure habit; one established long ago in his early days of training where after long days under Piccolo and his father's tutelage, he would wake up every morning in his room with only the vaguest of ideas how he came to be there.
Habit, the most damnable blessing ever that could be. Mechanical actions that the body went through that were created in the company of old and would continue long after the old became the dust of memory.
But tonight would be different. Tonight's actions of habit would not induce nightmares of better days; instead Gohan's thoughts would be occupied by new images. More specifically, those of a dark-haired demoness performing daring aerial acrobatics under the attentive net of the Nimbus cloud.
Honestly, what had that girl been thinking? Climbing down a cliff like that was dangerous! She could have been vulture food if he hadn't come along when he did. Still, it took a great deal of strength and determination to get in the pickle she'd brined herself in; he'd give her that.
But what puzzled him was why she'd want to return to the cave. She said her father would be waiting for her; but Gohan knew that even if her father weren't dead, it would certainly be a long time coming in his return. He wondered if that girl knew that as well, and the reason she had descended from her hideout in the first place. She'd starve up there soon enough, or try her fool stunt again. Either way, she was in a good situation to get killed. And being that he hadn't left her the Nimbus, Gohan couldn't have that; he'd feel tremendously guilty if he were to fly by again, only to see the dusty remains of hair and bones lying in a crumpled heap at the bottom of the cliff face.
Right. So seeing that he was obviously the only one who knew about the lone woman hiding in the Cliffs, it was even more so apparent that it was up to Gohan to relocate her somewhere safer, or at least help her out until her father could return.
Gohan the Selfless strikes again.
And with that, morning came quickly; so fast in fact that Gohan had to wonder where the night had gone. He could have sworn that just a moment ago he had been trying to find possible solutions to the conundrum of the missing village and stubborn attitude of the Cliffside girl, but now daylight peaked through his window and teased his sleep filled eyes into opening further. He yawned hugely and stretched, his hands brushing the headboard and his feet further messing the blankets he was tangled in and under.
Rolling out of bed, Gohan reached to find his discarded clothes, only to discover that they were absent form his tidy floor and that a neatly folded pair of shirts waited for him atop his dresser. The demi-saiyan quirked his lips slightly at his mother's antics and proceeded to oblige her hard work by grabbing the shirts and heading downstairs to breakfast.
The smell of toast and eggs permeated the air as he descended into the kitchen, a small mountain of assorted breakfast food towered precariously on his plate, waiting to be ignored by his non-existent appetite. Though this typical morning scene was punctuated by his usual refusal, Gohan surprised both himself and Chi Chi when he passed by his plate but grabbed a few pieces of toast; popping them into his mouth as he made his way to the fridge for some ice.
"Well good morning to you too, son," Chi Chi responded to Gohan's full mouth and wave of hello with pleasant surprise. "I take it yesterday was good?"
"Awful, actually," Gohan swallowed the toast, "didn't find the village anywhere. Gonna try again today after breakfast."
"And yet you seem happy about this," Chi Chi said, then swatted Gohan's hand, "don't you dare drink out of the bottle again, Mister!"
Gohan managed a sheepish grin and he took the juice bottle to the table and sat down. "Sorry, Mom."
Chi Chi snorted, "If you were really sorry, you wouldn't do it every morning. Now then, will you be needing anything today?"
"Actually," Gohan braced himself for the inevitable reaction, "I was wondering if you could pack me a lunch?"
"A lunch?" The question threw Chi Chi off balance; it was a request she had not heard from him in months if not years. She fumbled the spoon in her hand, but caught it and clutched it to her as she turned to stare at her son like she had not seen him before. "A lunch?" She repeated, a little slower this time, "you'd like some more meat crepes?"
"No," he replied, "I mean a real lunch, like what you packed Trunks yesterday."
"Oh," she said, finally understanding. "The Briefs need more food," she turned back to the counter and pulled over a basket, "why didn't you say so earlier?"
"Mom, no!" Gohan said again. He stood up and hurried over to the counter to lean over it and peer at his mother directly with his open, earnest face. "I meant for me."
"For you?" Chi Chi's face furrowed, "but you never eat at midday anymore."
"I know, but I'd like to today." He continued to stare up at her with his wide, honest face; willing the lie beneath his earnesty to smooth away the lines of age and sadness.
He half got his wish. The sadness was swept away by suspicion as Chi Chi looked at him sideways. "You won't eat breakfast, but you want a lunch."
"I'm not hungry right now."
"But you will be later?"
"Mom! Please?" Gohan begged, doing his best to resemble a pleading Icarus.
"Well, I, uh, well...yes…yes, of course!" Chi Chi finally snapped out, her body managing to shake off the halting effects induced only by the familiarity of strangeness being flung violently away by the sudden and unexpected return of the once repetitive. She flew into action; grabbing food, making food, preparing it, all while scolding her only son. "Honestly Gohan, asking if you can have lunch. Do you think I would starve you? You're too skinny as it is! And eating breakfast wouldn't hurt you at all…."
His mother worked up her rant as Gohan carefully tuned it out, listening only enough to know when to agree out loud and make promises he could never keep. But he smiled as he watched his mother zip about the kitchen just as she did when he was seven and trying to stay out of her way while Dad laughed from his chair—
"And there!" Chi Chi's happy exclamation slapped Gohan back to the kitchen as Chi Chi handed him a laden pack that was still warm on the bottom. "That should keep even your stomach satisfied for a few hours. And here's another one for Trunks—" she hefted him another pack only slightly smaller than his own— "since you're going that direction anyhow." Chi Chi paused for a moment, "maybe I should give you one for Dad, too."
That, in Gohan's mind, was pushing it. The Ox King was nowhere near the mountains he was heading to. In fact, a person would be hard pressed to find anything the Ox King's domain could be considered "near."
"Uh, I gotta go, Mom." Gohan managed to get out between the older woman's musings.
"What? Oh, fine." Chi Chi conceded. "But will you be back for dinner?"
The hopeful look in her eye almost made Gohan say yes. But the toast that already sat like lead in his stomach and the long flights between destinations forced his head sideways. "Breakfast, tomorrow, Mom. I promise."
"All right, then." Chi Chi smiled and waved her son out the door. Wondering if he'd last, "until tomorrow, Gohan."
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"Nothing, you say?" Bulma frowned as she tightened a screw in her line of sight, "are you sure?"
"Absolutely," Gohan sighed in response, leaning against the worktable he had found Bulma by once more. By the looks of it, she'd been in there a while. He'd arrived at the ruins of the Capsule Corporation as he usually did, but had only been greeted by Trunks. At least this time, however, Trunks's cough was absent and the flush to his face much healthier looking, even though it was covered in smudges and his clothes more tattered than usual. By the looks of it, he'd been avoiding his mom; and by the warning glint in his eye, it was best left unsaid that Gohan would be better off leaving her alone as well. Important information to relay however, letting Bulma be was an impossibility. The events at the Eastern Mountains needed to be discussed. "I was up and down every foot of those rocks, and all I found was a pole and a rusted chain."
"Really," Bulma said shortly and frowned deeper as she tightened to the screw to the point where the wood began to crack, "I haven't heard anything about anyone trying to hide or relocate cities, and I'd like to think of myself as well-informed."
Well-informed would be a way of putting it. Since the slow decimation of the human race had begun, Bulma had strived day and night to keep Capsule Corporations up and running, as well as provide numerous safe havens for homeless victims. In exchange for her philanthropy and dino caps, Bulma found that information came in at a steady trickle from important leaders and organizations that still managed to operate. It was possible that Bulma was one of the most "well-informed" people on the planet; and by default, Gohan, who used what he could from Bulma to eck out an existence in the continuing misery of their world.
"I don't think it's a wide-spread effort," Gohan eyed the protesting wood, "probably just a mountain thing."
"Hm, maybe," Bulma replied, setting down her screwdriver to stare at Gohan in an accusing way, "so what will you do now? Stay around for a few days? Trunks has missed you."
"Uh…" Gohan realized he was suddenly treading on thin ice, though he couldn't think of what for. "I think I'll go back and try again." He replied, picking up a trinket on Bulma's workbench and fiddling with it, trying to will away his second mom's accusing eyes.
"That's a lot of flying to do in just a few days," Bulma told him, "a little risky for a village that's obviously either safe or dead, don't you think?"
"Everything I do has risk."
"Most of it needless."
"Look, is there a point to this interrogation, or do I get to guess?" Gohan finally snapped, slamming down the gadget in his hand. Small splinters flew into the air to create an ark before raining down onto the table. Bulma's instruments rattled.
"Be careful, would you?" Bulma stormed, pushing him away from the table and frantically checking the bench. "And this isn't an interrogation!"
"Well it certainly feels like it," he stated, cross.
"That's because you're edgy and looking for a fight." Bulma snipped, picking up the more delicate of her toys and storing them away.
"I'm edgy?" He asked, incredulous. "I'm looking for a fight?"
"Don't be stupid. You're a Saiyan; you're all looking to fight!"
"All—" Gohan's eyes widened as the truth suddenly dawned on him. "How'd you find out?"
"Subtlety is a trait none of you seem to possess," Bulma ground out, unconsciously picking up the screwdriver again and gripping it hard. "Trunks was practicing his speed in the field behind the garage. How could you, Gohan, after I specifically asked you not to teach him!"
"Trunks was already figuring it out, Bulma," Gohan said with tried patience. "All I did was finish—"
"Finish? This is in no way finished!" Bulma screeched, "First flight, then what's next? Sparring? Fighting? Leading him to war against the Androids? Go off and die together so I can find your bodies half buried in some rubble of a building like his father's?"
"Bulma…" Gohan was caught off guard by Bulma even indirectly mentioning Vegeta; it took the wind from his sails completely and left him in the Horse Latitudes.
"Don't start," Bulma cut him off, her back firmly turned from his astonishment. "If you're going to go, then go. I can't stop you, I couldn't stop any of you. So there's no point in trying now."
"Bulma, I'm—"
"Didn't I just say leave?" Bulma whipped about so fast the tears were flung from her eyes to splatter against his gi and across his face. "Go!"
He went. His head bowed, Gohan quietly made for the exit and shut the door as soft as he could manage. Standing in the mid morning light, the demi-human sighed and brushed imaginary dust from his legs and lower shirt. Until the tears dried, he'd not touch his neckline.
"Sorry 'bout that, Gohan."
Gohan looked up to see Trunks tucked in the shadows of one of the buildings on the grounds; picnic basket to his left and broken window to Bulma's shop where he'd just escaped on his right.
Gohan gave the younger boy a quirky smile. "It's okay, Trunks. She'd have found out eventually."
"She shouldn't have yelled at you, though. I'm the one she told not to do any of that stuff to."
"And I'm the one she made promise not to teach you any of 'that stuff.'" Gohan let his smile broaden as he crouched down next to Trunks and ruffled the young boy's hair. "But I did. We'll just have to lay low for a while, right? No more lessons for a few days, and keep your feet on the ground."
"Yeah, okay." Trunks nodded glumly as he glanced at the window before looking back to his mentor. "So you going back to the Eastern Mountains, then?"
Gohan nodded, "one more time, at least."
"I'll tell Mom then, when she settles down a bit."
"Thanks Trunks, though I doubt that's news she'll be happy
to hear."
"She wasn't happy when she heard about you teaching me to fly, either, but she
got over it."
Gohan winced, "that's over it?"
Trunks shrugged, stuffing a chicken leg into his mouth at the same time. "You're still alive, right?"
"Barely." Gohan pretended to check his vitals before chuckling a bit and standing up. "Well, I'm off."
"Gohan," Trunks interrupted his good-bye. "One last thing. When Mom said that stuff about… forbidding me and stopping Dad—"
"Later," Gohan promised, rising into sky. "Ask me that after I get back."
"Okay," Trunks nodded, knowing better to press the issue. "Good bye then, Gohan!" He called out, waving to the sky and the shrinking dot that was Gohan. "Don't forget to come back and play sometime!"
Gohan might have waved, but he was too far gone to tell, but Trunks kept waving anyway until the last vapors of his mentor's energy disintegrated.
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