-----DISCLAIMER-----
Nina © Capcom
Clint, Alex, Jason, Vernon, Devin, Dusty, Dan © Themselves
Goku, Radditz, Vegeta, Piccolo, Juuanagou/#17, Mr. Buu © Akira Toriyama
Heero Yuy © Sotsu Agency Co. Ltd
Steve Williams, Dwayne Johnson © Themselves (Their ring names are © WWE)
Paula © Shigesto Itoi
-----------------------------
Part 4 - Training Until Our Heads Fall Off
(September 3, 2001 A.D.; 10:34am EST; Canton, Ohio)
Ironically enough, Alex would not be the only one who had decided to train more rigorously. After Piccolo and #17 and returned from the training session, Vernon had basically asked the both of them to give him similar training as Goku and Vegeta. However, neither of the three were aware of Goku and Vegeta training Alex yet, and with that, the two rivals had unknowingly set themselves off into another battle for supremacy. Vernon had started to lift large weights, while wearing a smaller form of Piccolo's own training clothes.
#17 had pitched in by also sparring with Vernon once every 4 hours, while not doing much to give Vernon easy goings, allowed Vernon to grow stronger both from the recovery and from the fighting itself. Piccolo could now sense he was about 15-20 times stronger than when they first met, and easily surpassed Heero's original powerlevel from when Piccolo first encountered him. Although Piccolo thought back to his bet with Dan, and he was finding himself a bit surprised with Vernon's jump in power. Piccolo began to wonder if maybe the rules really had destroyed human power restrictions as he watched on.
(September 3, 2001 A.D.; 4:09pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Back at his own house, Dusty and Dan had been doing additional training with The Rock and Stone Cold. All four had realized that now with the ability to manipulate ki, that they had might as well go the full distance and become full blown fighters in the way both Vernon and Alex had planned, especially since Dusty, Steve and Dwayne had all heard that mysterious voice. The four of them were buffed up in heavy training weights that fit around the arms, legs, waist, neck and other places. The Rock's in particular looked quite bulky.
"Rock, you look like a Golem in those things." Steve replied, as he lifted weights in excess of 890 lbs.
Dusty was lifting about 430 lbs. at this point, Dan was lifting around 360 lbs, and the Rock was about even with Stone Cold, lifting about 890 lbs as well. With their 560 lbs handicap in weights on the body, it was giving them quite a boost. Dusty only had about 260 lbs on him, but with the extra 430 lbs, it was also helping. Dan had been wearing about 225 lbs on him also in addition to his 360 lbs he was lifting. By the end of the day, they would be almost 10 times their original strength.
(September 3, 2001 A.D.; 7:21pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Back at his house, Alex was also being trained to lift weights, and Goku had also found some of his old weighted clothing in one of his spare capsules, and gave it to Alex, and tell him to run several miles around the house, until he had calculated about 10 miles. Goku had noticed during this that while Alex didn't complain or try to give up, that he didn't seem to run as fast around the house as he had been expecting.
"Vegeta, something's strange about his speed. It seems... to be lacking somehow." Goku told his friend.
"I believe it has to do with the fact that only months before this, the kid was in worse physical shape than we realized. He was primarily running around in a wheelchair1, despite the fact he could walk, but he still had a hard time getting around, and his legs still have not yet gotten use to the fact. Hopefully it is just a phase." Vegeta replied.
Alex soon had completed his run, and Goku and Vegeta were a bit impressed. Alex had grown about 15 times in power already, and had been stronger than the Rock and Stone Cold when they had first sensed them.
(September 4, 2001 A.D.; 11:25am EST; Canton, Ohio)
Near his own trailer, Devin had decided to start his own training, having the same ideas as Alex, Vernon, Dusty, Dan, the Rock and Stone Cold had. He had made his way over to a clearing where he had asked Radditz to give him some starting pointers. Radditz, having really nothing else to do, and wanting to also get back into the old habit of training, decided to go and do this. Maybe he'd get Goku and Vegeta to trust him just a bit more if he did. Basically, Radditz had given Devin a spare crafted suit of weighted Saiya-jin armor, that would act somewhat like Piccolo and Goku's methods. It wouldn't be as effective as theirs, but still, it was a boost.
Radditz had made Devin pull rocks out of the ground, starting with small boulders, and then having him pick up larger rocks, and then making him run around with them on his back. After about 10 hours of this, Devin would grow about 10-15 times stronger than he was before. Also, Radditz had given him bonus training, and had taught him his "Eyes on the Birdie" attack, which he had found to his dismay was called "Saturday Crush" by Devin and the many other friends of his. When he asked Devin why so, Devin had taken Radditz to his own house, and showed him a video game called "Dragonball Z: Budokai".
Radditz was a little shocked to see himself, Vegeta, Goku, Piccolo, and other acquaintances in this game. He was not as aware of the DBZ franchise as Goku and Vegeta were. Due to this, Devin had to explain to him more about so, and after this, Radditz began to gain a slightly better understanding of the world around him, and then he headed back to his own home with Nina for the moment, having no where else to go at the time.
(September 4, 2001 A.D.; 5:16pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Back at Alex's house, further training had commenced. After a lot of the weights and running around in the day had been accomplished, Vegeta had started showing Alex how to actually fire his ki as energy. Alex had been able to fire short, weak blasts that left scorches in the ground, but nothing that was enough to melt it or make a hole just yet.
"Come on, boy! You need to start learning how to charge your ki to make your blasts stronger! You can't use those piddly ki-balls forever!" Vegeta coached.
"I know, Mr. Picky. I'm trying to, but it's draining my energy so fast!" Alex growled back.
"Channel your ki and funnel it through your soul. Find a way to lessen the drain on yourself. That'll make the blasts charge up better." Goku pep-talked him.
Alex closed his eyes and concentrated. He felt a burning light in his mind surge to the surface after a few minutes, and opened them almost as fast as a snake. He then zanzokened over about 20 feet and charged his ki aura to a healthy blue and fired a medium-sized blast into the ground, causing some of it to actually melt inward.
Vegeta looked impressed, "Good job, Kakarott, that must've knocked something loose in his head."
Alex growled, "I've got to get this down better. I need to form a larger attack."
"Well, don't worry about it today, you need to keep to your weight training, and your ki-charging stuff." Goku replied.
Alex grumbled back and went back to putting his weighted clothes on and running around, firing slightly charged blasts at the ground in front of him as he ran...
(September 4, 2001 A.D.; 6:24pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Dan grumbled as he wiped sweat off of his forehead. He had attended an extended training session with Dusty, Devin, Radditz, The Rock and Stone Cold, all over at Dusty's house. Apparently Devin had talked with Dusty the other night about his training, giving him the idea to call Radditz over to help them with their own training. Dan to his house earlier that morning about jumping up their training, to Dan's slight dismay. He was lifting 680 lbs weights now, while wearing a 350 lbs handicap with both the Rock and Stone Cold's weights, as well as wearing weighted armor like Radditz's. While he was lifting that, he was watching The Rock, Stone Cold and Dusty and Devin facing each other, while Radditz was coaching them from the sidelines.
The Rock had taught Dusty and Radditz the Rock Bottom that day, while Stone Cold had also learned the Saturday Crush. Devin had also learned how to do the Stone Cold Stunner properly, and now had the means to test it on Stone Cold himself as a part of his training.
After slamming him down into the grass properly, Steve grumbled, but replied, "You people learn fast, and I honor you for it."
Dan was now struggling to lift the same weights as before, except with Radditz now standing ON TOP of them. Radditz was having Dan do this for two reasons: one was to learn to balance others on top of him with accuracy, and other was for Dan to learn to deal with lifting addition weight that may add on during the normal session, as to teach him to expect the unexpected. After all the session was done, Dan was now 5-10 times stronger than when he started that session. Devin had also strengthened another 5-10 times, as had Dusty, the Rock and Stone Cold. Radditz had also slightly strengthened as well.
(September 4, 2001 A.D.; 7:32pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Vernon was also training with the ferocity of a tiger, darting around various stationary objects of little value in his own neighborhood and firing small blasts at them, leaving scorch marks on them, while all the way under the watchful eyes of Piccolo and #17. Vernon, unlike Alex, definitely had the advantage of speed when he attacked, and trained. Vernon would always rat on Alex about his leg problem, and tease him about being inferior to Vernon, and Alex would at times get annoyed with it, which is part of the reason their rivalry existed in the first place.
"He's still got a long way to go, #17." Piccolo said to the cyborg, "He might have speed, and he might be learning quick, but he still needs a real fight to test his mettle."
"Well, shall we 'test the mouse'?" asked #17, a bit eager to have some fun of his own.
"Not today. Maybe in a couple more days he'll be ready for a fight with us. Of course, we'll have to lessen our power before so, but we'll give him a couple of days." Piccolo replied, cutting off his friend's plans.
"Hey, what's he doing now?" #17 asked with curiosity.
He saw Vernon below a large apple tree, aiming what looked like energy coming our of his combined palms, which were outstretched over his head.
Piccolo scrutinized it for a moment, before his eyes went wide with shock, "Impossible! He shouldn't be able to do that yet! That attack took Gohan 2 full months to perfect, and he looks to have it down perfect as well!"
"What attack!" #17 asked in eagerness.
"He's doing a Masenko." Piccolo replied, a bit more calm down.
"MA...SENKO... HA!" Vernon growled, firing a large golden beam of energy into the upper branches of the tree, searing them off, and sending other branches flying off in different directions, scattering apples and wood everywhere. When Vernon had finished, the entire upper half of the tree was missing.
"Interesting. Maybe he'll be ready faster then we thought..." Piccolo mused to himself as Vernon panted to himself on the ground.
"Well Devin, it seems you're not the only one who can use a super blast now, are you?" he asked to himself, as Devin had also called Vernon to boast to him about his Saturday Crush the other night.
Content with himself, Vernon floated back to his house and closed the door behind him. Piccolo began to sweat a little to himself. He was quickly beginning to realize that perhaps his bet with Dan was a big mistake...
(September 5, 2001 A.D.; 8:24am EST; Canton, Ohio)
The next day, Alex had gone outside from getting some water, only to have an apple fall from the roof and hit him on the head. After wondering how the apple had suddenly gotten there, he had gone back to his training. He was now determined to fire off a larger blasts, now that he had better control over charging them.
Goku asked Vegeta, "How do you think he's doing now?"
"I'd say he's still chugging on, Kakarott. Nothing seems to deter him from getting it right. It's only a matter of time before he..." Vegeta replied, but..
"Haaa!" Alex had screamed suddenly, interrupting Vegeta's conversation.
As Goku and Vegeta turned, their eyes widened slightly as they saw Alex with some energy around his body that was flaring up. Alex suddenly cupped his hands to the side, in the shape of an open clam.
"Alex! Wait! You're not ready to do something like that yet!" Goku yelled.
Quiet Goku! I'm going to do this, one way or another! Alex growled back in his mind. "Ka... me..."
"Boy! If you overdo this and kill yourself, it's your life, not ours!" Vegeta screamed to him, trying to knock him out of it, but Alex stubbornly continued on.
"Ha... me..." Alex continued.
"Dammit! He's going to do it! He might not be able to go full output. Vegeta, get your sensu beans! I'll make sure he doesn't do anything stupid!" Goku ordered to his ally.
"No way, Kakarott! If he's going to try this, I might as well watch him!" Vegeta growled back.
"HA!" Alex screamed, shoving his hands outward and firing a medium sized Kamehameha towards a tree in his backyard.
The Kamehameha slammed into the tree, for about 5 seconds, until Alex abruptly let up on his blast and fell to his knees, gasping with lack of energy. Goku had only looked shortly at the kamehameha Alex had fired, and had gotten his bag of Sensu Beans, given to him by Korin over 5 years ago, and quickly shoved one into Alex's mouth.
"Quick, eat this, and shallow it. I can't believe you'd be dumb enough to try a Kamehameha with that much power, and that little experience! Were you trying to get yourself killed!" Goku scolded him.
Alex chomped the sensu bean, realizing what it would do, and sighed in relief as his energy returned to him, and he felt himself grow a little stronger.
He looked back to Goku with a naive-looking smile on his face, "Hahaha! Forgive my persistence, Goku, but I had to know if I was ready yet. You see, it appears Devin's been training a little with Radditz as well. He's already learned the Saturday Crush. Devin and his boasting made me realize that I had to learn how to fire a large scale blast of my own."
"Large scale! You call THAT large scale? That tree is barely singed! You're a marshmallow, Alex!" Vegeta laughed jokingly at the last part, and Alex had turned to find out Vegeta was right.
The tree was only singed by the attack. Alex grumbled, before recognizing the crack that ran down the middle. "Oh my god! That's the same damn tree Heero crashed into 2 days ago! How can that thing be still standing after that!" Alex growled.
"I don't know, but I'll let you have an hour break, since you had the guts to pull off a high-level move for your level of experience. But don't do it again for a while. At least not at that level of power. Baby-fart Kamehamehas are fine, but don't go overboard." Goku replied, giving him a slap on the back for good luck, but he had forgotten to pull back some of his power, and Alex almost went flying on his face.
"Watch the strength, 'Hercules'! I'm not that strong... YET." Alex grumbled and went back into his house. Vegeta shrugged as he waited for Alex to come back out to continue...
(September 5, 2001 A.D.; 1:04pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Unbeknownst to Alex, that very same day, Vernon was also trying to pull off some other big ki blasts. He had been able to do a few more Masenkos and later he was even able to pull off a small variation of Piccolo's 'Hellzone Grenade', as he called it in DBZ: Budokai'. The only differences was that Vernon was only able to fire 4 shots instead of almost 20 like Piccolo's. #17 grumbled, remembering Piccolo using that same move on him when they had fought over 17 years ago.
"Great, now Piccolo's found another Gohan to train. This is going to be so fun." he said with a slight hint of sarcasm.
"Mind your manners, #17. It's not all the time I can find a student this devoted anymore. Especially after Gohan ran off and got married. At least he and his kid Pan were still doing some training at first when I last checked on them." Piccolo replied, as he also still weighed the stakes of he and Dan's little bet in his head.
"Let me ask you Piccolo. Do you ever feel jealous of that Videl girl? I mean, when she came into the picture, Gohan started down a different path, less of a warrior's path. Do you think either of you will ever live to regret that?" #17 asked, with curious intent.
Piccolo looked solemn at the question, "That is hard for me to think about now. I'm not sure if it was the best decision he could make, but we'll figure that out some other day. I think Vernon's about to pull another move out of his pocket."
Sure enough, Piccolo was right, #17 was now seeing Vernon do the Kamehameha as well. Vernon had decided to target the last of the tree he started on with the Masenko the day before. The kamehameha ripped into the tree somewhat, but it did not quite destroy the tree fully.
"Whatever..." Vernon grumbled, "That tree should be ashes by now."
"Not bad for only 3 days of training, Vernon." Piccolo said, "You are progressing fast, perhaps even faster than Alex's own training. I've been keeping contact with Goku and Vegeta, and they said that Alex did his first major blast only 4 hours ago, and it by ironic chance happened to be also a Kamehameha. This says that you seem to have a knack for learning things fast, at least."
"Wait! Did you just say ALEX is training as well!" Vernon asked in shock.
"Yes. I believe he's also mentioned that Devin, The Rock, Stone Cold, Dusty, Dan and Radditz have also been doing some smaller training lately. It looks like this generation is going to grow into warriors. Let's just hope the majority of them... shall I say... stays alive." Piccolo said with a smirk on his face at the end, for a moment not caring so much about his thoughts of human weakness, "But don't worry yourself Vernon. You're progressing fast enough to be better off than most of the others... for now."
Piccolo then floated up into the air, and flew off slowly to the south, leaving Vernon to think in this thoughts, and #17 to wonder about all that his ally had said...
(September 5, 2001 A.D.; 3:12pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Goku had taken off after Alex's little Kamehameha stunt a few hours back. He realized that Alex was quite headstrong. Perhaps a bit too headstrong. In that case, something might have to be done to help Alex get around that problem. He had mentally contacted Piccolo about 2 hours ago, asking him to come over to a secluded spot in a less populated area of the Canton South District. The two of them had met up half way, and then both landed at their intended destination, where Jason was waiting for them in the fields.
"Hey guys! Whassup?" Jason asked.
From the look of things, Jason had also been somehow training himself a little. He wasn't as strong as Alex yet, according to Goku's ki sense, but he would make a good second student, for both him and Piccolo. He might let Vegeta do a bit more of the training with Alex, while Piccolo might decide to let #17 handle more of Vernon's training, while the two of them trained Jason more. Jason revealed he could already fire some energy, but Goku had to teach him how to properly charge his energy, much like Alex did. Goku and Piccolo had also combined their weighted clothing methods, putting Jason in a combination of both types of outfits. In this new getup, Jason was slowly making his way over and across many of the roads and fields in the area, slowly, but surely picking up speed, much to Piccolo's amusement.
Dammit! I got the feeling Dan's gonna win this bet! But I'm not gonna try to stop it. If these people really CAN outpower Yamcha's gang in less than 3 months, I'll have something to rub in THEIR faces for once! Piccolo had thought to himself, a little contemplative with this development.
(September 6, 2001 A.D.; 7:24am EST; Canton, Ohio)
The next day, Vegeta had discovered that Radditz had found an intact scouter in the utility belt of his armor2. Calling him over, and asking him for the scouter, he used it to check Alex's powerlevel at it's best output. He chuckled low at it.
"Well, it seems you've improved about 1,000+ times. You know read out at 10,000 degrees on the mark." Vegeta said, "A remarkable improvement from the 8.4 that you began with."
"Feh! I still can't believe I was that weak, I was weaker than any of the others, even Dan and Clint!" Alex grumbled angrily.
"Alex, you don't easily recover from a leg disorder like the kind you had in the past." Goku replied.
"How the hell did you two know about that!" Alex growled in anger.
"Well, Devin and Vernon explained it to us. They said Nina was the one who healed you two or so months ago." Goku replied.
"Fine, but they better not have said anything stupid about me in the process." Alex grumbled, "So what do we do today?"
"For a while, we'll both train you in various old stuff of ours, but later Vegeta will be taking over the training. It's mainly up to him what you do after wards." Goku replied.
Vegeta looked at Goku with an odd glare. /Kakarott! What are you doing/
Goku replied back, /You'll understand soon enough, Vegeta. I won't divulge too much information to you about it now./
After all of that had gone on, Radditz had taken back his scouter and left off for parts unknown.
(September 6, 2001 A.D.; 2:31pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Radditz however was later called over to Vernon's place by Piccolo and #17, having learned of the scouter from a call Goku made to him 90 minutes ago. Piccolo wanted apparently to see Vernon's powerlevel after all these days. His reading was surprising.
"Interesting. He's already at 10,300, and that's from the 11 he had back when we first met him." Piccolo mused.
"Well, that's only a little better than Alex apparently. Vegeta said he was at 10,000 even, so I guess these two are quite the competitive little shits." Radditz replied.
"Yes, that is interesting. May I borrow this for a while, Radditz?" Piccolo replied, thinking the scouter would allow him to keep better tabs on Vernon to see his progress.
"Well, yes, but don't use on anyone over 240,000 powerlevel, or it'll probably explode. I got lucky to find this scouter, so take care of it green man." Radditz replied, as he flew off again, apparently to head for Dusty's house again.
Piccolo smirked, "So, it seems Vernon and Alex are going to keep their path of rivalry for a while. Almost reminds me of a certain two Saiya-jin I've come to know well."
Vernon walked up to Piccolo, "So, I saw you scanning me with that scouter. What was my level?"
"10,300, in 3 days. From a mere 11, that's impressive. Also, I know Alex's level now. It's 10,000 even. Radditz was over there earlier as well." Piccolo replied.
Vernon smirked inwardly, Yeah Alex... I'm sweet, and you're not. Heh.
Vernon then went off back to train with #17 a bit, as they had decided to bump up the difficulty of the training a decent amount.
Soon Piccolo lifted into the air and flew off back towards the Canton South District, thinking to himself, It's not even been a full week since we met him, and he's already about 1/4 of the way to 45,000! At this rate, he'll be at around 450,000 when 3 months passes!
(September 6, 2001 A.D.; 3:04pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Goku and Piccolo met again in the clear fields on the Canton South Area, meeting with Jason. Piccolo decided to scan him with the scouter, and got a 7,830 powerlevel reading out of him.
"Jason's close to 8,000 on the scouter, so we need to continue training him. I think we should try to get him to fire large scale blasts today. Do you think he could get that same boost that you said Alex did?" Piccolo asked.
"Perhaps I could push him to, but I'll have to see what I can do with him." Goku replied.
He went over and asked, "Jason, are you any good with large-scale blasts just yet?"
"Well, I can do a small Soukidan3 like Yamcha and control it, but it's not terribly powerful yet." Jason replied.
"Alright, do you think you could fire a kamehameha yet?" asked Goku.
"I'll try it if you want. Not sure what'll come from it though." Jason then cupped his hands to the side, "Ka... me... ha..."
Goku frowned... he didn't see any energy forming in his hands yet. Perhaps he wasn't ready just yet.
"Me..."
"Jason, don't worry about it. It can wait a..."
"HA!" Jason screamed almost like Dusty, and shot a large-sized Kamehameha with plenty of ki on the side at a diagonal angle into the air.
Goku's eyes almost bugged out in shock, "Wow! That's bigger than Alex's from a day back! How did you do that so... suddenly?" Goku asked. J
ason looked down at Goku, and scratched his head a bit, "You know, I don't actually know too well how I did that."
"Waa...!" Goku urked as he sweatdropped at him.
"Just kidding. I think it was the fact that this was meant to be a more fake-out kamehameha. I didn't actually put a lot of power into it, despite the size of it." Jason replied, chuckling.
"Well, that Kamehameha registered at 18,400 on the Scouter, so it was more than double your own strength, Jason!" Piccolo said to him, getting his second major surprise of the day.
"WHAT? Impossible! I know didn't put that... much power into... argh..." Jason said, as he fell to his knees in fatigue.
Goku grumbled, "You and Alex both... why do you guys suggest of OVERDOING everything so much?" Goku growled, almost wanting to bop him on the head for that, and giving him a sensu bean, healing Jason to full health, and making him a bit stronger.
"Sorry. I really didn't mean to overpower it like that." Jason replied.
Piccolo's reading now appeared to be 10,210 on the Scouter, a remarkable improvement from moments ago. He wasn't going to tell Jason that though. These people for one were already getting really strong so fast, and he wasn't about to let Dan find out just how much he was regretting making that bet right now...
(September 7, 2001 A.D.; 12:06pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
The next day, Piccolo had still been holding onto Radditz's scouter. He had primarily left #17 to training Vernon the other day. So when he returned and scanned Vernon, he had gotten a major surprise. Vernon's powerlevel output now read 17,400, which was a good 7,100 gain in one day.
"#17 must've done much with him while I was gone." He mused to himself.
"Do you have no faith in me, Piccolo?" #17 chuckled from above, sparring with Vernon at low power in mid-air.
"So, you're pushing him harder and harder I see. Well, just don't let him die up there, will you?" Piccolo asked.
"Fine by me, but I think we should increase his level of training, don't you think?" #17 replied back.
With that, Piccolo had given Vernon heavier weights on his body, at least 3 times heavier, not to mention weighted gloves and weighted shoes, like Goku and Vegeta's. This would hopefully give Vernon the advantage of attacking faster in battle if he needed. However Vernon would take a little time to get accustomed to it. Piccolo had finally realized that human or not, these people were definitely going to have potential to be powerful fighters.
(September 7, 2001 A.D.; 5:58pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Over these last few days, Clint had also been giving himself some training, however unlike many of the others, he was training all by himself. He was very knowledgeable about the many methods that Goku, Vegeta, Piccolo and Radditz had used, understanding about weighted clothing, lifting weights, running around a lot, which he done much of in the last 5 days in Fohl Village where he lived, as well as manipulating energy for blasts, which he joked made good weed-killers, and he had even figured out how to SENSE ki on his own, however masking it was not what he thought it was, and he was struggling with it.
He was not too terribly worried about his own strength at the moment, and the previous training was mainly to give him more energy to fly, and get himself more into shape again. Sitting around at your computer tended to make training a bit of a chore, and he wanted to break that habit a bit, but at least the computer had helped him with other ideas. He had made various training items, such as a weighted chain mace that he would swing to strengthen his arms, as well as other various items, such as a special bicycle that he would use to enhance his leg strength and a bit of his speed.
He soon found he could jump above the height of his roof at his house, about 15 feet. Of course, he figured Vernon would probably be able to do better, with his past record on track and jumping at school. Clint thought back to the whole merger incident. Perhaps he should take this just a bit more seriously? Yes... perhaps he should. With that, he went back into his house as dusk began to break...
(September 8, 2001 A.D.; 3:56pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Today was a big day for Alex. It was time...
"Okay, for the first true test, you must last as long as possible against me, Alex." Vegeta said, as this was one of his training exercises.
Alex smirked at the Saiya-jin, "Alright then, bucko! Come at me!" Vegeta lunged at Alex.
Alex tried to dodge, but was hit and sent into a tree, sending it over.
Alex was on his back in immense pain, "No... I will not give up! That was nothing, Vegeta..." Ow... SHIT THAT HURT. Alex had thought to himself, as he painfully flipped up.
Alex appeared behind Vegeta, and axehandled him over the head, but Vegeta barely budged.
"Don't try to hit me directly! With the difference in our powerlevels, it's fruitless right now." Vegeta said, kneeing Alex in the stomach, knocking him on his back again.
"Argh... I don't care if you're a higher powerlevel than me!" Alex growled, attempting to flip back up, but Vegeta had tripped him, and then kicked Alex in the back as he fell, sending him flying face first into a tree...
Ow... that sucked serious balls... Alex thought to himself as he painfully peeled himself out, and got up, looking at Vegeta. There must be someway to at least humilate him... Alex thought.
Vegeta charged again, and Alex barely got himself out of the way, only to be kicked once again into another tree. Alex laid on the ground, breathing heavily.
"You still have a long way to go before you're at our level, but that wasn't terrible." Vegeta said to Alex with a small smirk, "You did last more than 30 seconds."
However, that was not good enough for Alex. A deep anger began to well inside of him.
"Not terrible...? I'm not FINISHED YET!" Alex growled, gritting his teeth in anger, as his ki aura began to flare up with great intensity. Goku's eyes went wide as he sensed Alex's powerlevel almost multiply by 20 times as his hair began to spike up, his eyes turning turquoise, and his hair turning gold, and Alex had quickly flipped up and punched Vegeta in his face, knocking him back a few inches, but Vegeta had ignored Alex's attack and was staring at Alex in disbelief.
That hair! Those eyes! He can't be! "IM... IMPOSSIBLE! You're... you're a Saiya-jin too!" Vegeta stuttered.
"Wow, and a Super Saiya-jin at that!" Goku said from the sidelines.
Alex suddenly went wide eyed. He did feel a lot stronger and a little lighter. "Goku, go get me a mirror, would ya?" he asked.
"Uh, sure." Goku said and flew in the house and after a couple minutes, he came back out with a hand mirror, and give it to Alex.
Alex saw his reflection, and smirked and laughed loudly, "YES! I AM! I AM TRULY A SAIYA-JIN! THIS IS SWEET! I'M PART OF THE STRONGEST RACE ALIVE! I'M ALSO A SUPER SAIYA-JIN OF ALL FRICKIN' THINGS! OH YES, VERNON, WHO'S YOUR DADDY NOW!"
Vegeta was grumbling, proud of Alex, yet feeling bested, as Alex had taken little effort to transformed where as it had taken him years of harsh training to do it. He was also surprised at the fact Alex really WAS a Saiya-jin. There was no way any normal human could do that.
"Fine, the match is a draw, Alex. You have a new power, so I might as well let you bask in your pride for a while. But don't think you're stronger than me yet by any means. You have a long way to go." Vegeta grumbled.
Alex simply ignored him, and flew back into his house, admiring his hair and petting it often. Goku and Vegeta followed after him, and upon seeing him do this, merely sweatdropped.
A couple of minutes later, he came back over to them, "I'm going to have to consult my parents about this, you two. I'll talk to you later, or something, but I must get to the bottom of all of this."
Alex went over and picked up the phone, and began to dial numbers...
(September 9, 2001 A.D.; 3:47pm EST; Canton, Ohio)
Vernon was in pain... much pain. Apparently he had done so well in the recent days that #17 had convinced Piccolo to let Vernon spar on slightly more realistic terms. For Vernon, that meant he barely stood much of a chance of winning directly, and that the match had been more about outlasting him as long as possible. Unfortunately, #17 was no slowpoke, and at a high powerlevel like his, it was very hard to dodge him. Vernon suddenly slammed through a tree, and was now flipping sideways with a twisted position. He had to, in order to dodge the 7 different ki blasts that had been aimed at his head, arms, and feet, and one at his stomach.
However despite Vernon's fancy dodge, #17 appeared behind him and slammed into his spine, sending Vernon careening forward, and smashing through a nearby fence in his neighborhood. Some of his neighbors were watching, but despite the scene, they had been given heads up by Piccolo about Vernon's training, and that this was only a more "serious spar" as he put it, and that Vernon was in no real danger of dying here. #17 was a little impressed that someone below a 20,000 powerlevel was standing up to him at even a small fraction of his own power, which was approximately 465,000 at this point, according to Piccolo's own senses.
"Good going, you're somewhat good at lasting against a superior opponent, but I think we need to take things up a notch!" #17 replied, and started shooting blasts towards Vernon in near rapid fire succession.
Vernon knew those blasts could be moving much faster, but this was a spar, not a fight to the death, and #17 was only telling him: "You must keep your will and endurance up at all times, even against a superior opponent." Vernon growled, he was appreciative of the teaching, but he was not too keen on getting his butt kicked so easily. He was beginning to lose his cool a little, and started charging up his own Kamehameha, as he darted forward at #17, decided to dodge each of his individual blasts as well as he could. After about 30 seconds of dodging, he appeared in #17's face and unleashed his Kamehameha right in his face.
#17 was blasted back in surprise for a couple seconds, but then recovered and jumped THROUGH the kamehameha and end it by slugging Vernon right in the face and sending him flying back like spinning missile. He went crashing into the fence one more time and stopped, barely twitching from all the damage.
#17 smirked and walked over to him, as Piccolo watched in silent watch. Vernon's vision was blurred, and he could barely make out simple colors in his current state. He was barely able to recognize #17 as he stood over Vernon's hurt form.
"You did well, Vernon. But perhaps we should up the ante just one more time. Perhaps Piccolo and I should just finish you off now and end it all."
Vernon's mind reeled in shock, What!
Piccolo raised his eyes at #17... What the hell are you doing, #17? he thought to himself.
"I had high hopes for you. I trained you and all, and yet you fail us in our time of need." #17 continued on, not really intent on doing what he said. He figured, with Vernon down, and dazed as he was, that the cyborg could have a little fun toying with his mind, since he couldn't fight Vernon now with how injured he was.
Piccolo saw the playful smirk on his face and calmed down. He's only messing with him. I was hoping that was the case, else I'd have to intervene.
Vernon on the other hand, was beginning to believe #17's words, No... #17, you lied to me! You betrayed me! Vernon thought to himself. Had be been able to move his mouth, he would've said it out loud.
#17 begin to form what appeared to the casual onlooker as a large ball of energy, but in truth, even if it hit Vernon, it would barely damage a tree. Vernon saw the blinding light through his blurred eyes, and began to growl. #17 had not heard the growl at first, due to the whine of his trick ki blast, but he did began to see Vernon's energy flare up to a healthy blue.
Piccolo's eyes went wide, "What? His powerlevel's vastly increasing!" He then began to see a flicker of... "GOLD?" Piccolo shouted.
#17 had saw the gold flicker, and had seen Vernon's eyes turning turquoise. "Uh... oh..."
#17 suddenly powered down the blast as Vernon let out a monstrous scream of rage, "RRRRRAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!" Vernon screamed, his injuries healing a little from the vast increase in power, as his hair faded to gold, and stood up on end.
"IMPOSSIBLE!" Piccolo screamed, "He's... a SUPER SAIYA-JIN!" he stated in shock, and now realized that even though Vernon might not be considered human anymore, that he still had to worry about his bet with Dan.
Vernon had not heard anything that Piccolo had said, and he looked at #17 with what looked to be bared fangs now among his teeth. Piccolo realized he looked like a Quasi-Oozaru.
"#17, I think those comments of yours pushed him too much!" Piccolo said to him, and then cringed, as he saw Vernon deck #17 with a large fist, sending #17 flying backwards a couple of feet.
#17 actually felt a slight bit of damage, and yelled, "Woah! Woah! Vernon, CALM DOWN! I was joking about all of that!"
Vernon growled, half enraptured by his newly-found Saiya-jin side, "You... betrayed... me!" and he jumped at #17 again, only to be apprehended by Piccolo in mid-air.
"No... Vernon... calm down! He was joking with you!" but Vernon smashed his head against Piccolo's, which while it barely damaged the Namekian, caused him to let up on Vernon, and he went charging at #17.
However just as he was about to hit him again, he felt something smash down on his head. It wasn't the same force as either #17 or Piccolo, but it was strong enough to knock sense into him. Vernon's vision returned to a normal hue, and he was still Super Saiya-jin, but he was no longer enraptured with anger.
"What... who... what's going on?" he asked out loud, feeling the strain on his power, and then he realized it... "I... I just went Super Saiya-jin! Thank you #17. All that "you suck" talk must've slapped some kind of anger into my head."
"You can thank ME for snapping you to your senses, too." Nina's voice said from just above them, as they looked up to see her floating them with energy charged around her hand. "You knocked him back to normal?" #17 asked.
"Yes, Vernon's not THAT strong yet. He's around a 300,000 powerlevel, but Nina's a little over 1,000,000 as I can tell." Piccolo replied.
"Yeah. Anyways, I'm off to find Radditz and Dan. I came over here because I figured you needed to know that I going to see them about a special type of training. I'll be off, and don't be getting in over your head, Vernon." Nina said as she quickly flew off in the direction of Dusty's house.
Vernon grinned at himself, "Now I know I can slam Alex down a few notches with this."
"Well, at least you're still in the game again. You see Vernon, I wasn't going to bring it up to you yet, but yesterday Vegeta and Goku told me that Alex learned how to go Super Saiya-jin as well. Apparently Vegeta was sparring with him a bit like we were today and it ended up in a similar result."
"Aw shit..." Vernon grumbled, "I'm back to being even with 'crutches' again. Oh well. Gives me more competitive flair. The two of us will settle it later, but I want to rest now. I think I've deserved it consider the hell #17 put me through to get it."
"Very well, but we train 2 more hours tomorrow, you got that kid?" Piccolo asked.
"Fine by me, Piccolo." Vernon said as he sighed to himself and walked into his house to go to bed for a nap. Piccolo sighed to himself, finding himself surprised that Nina was still able to knock Vernon back to normal, even as a Super Saiya-jin.
It was then he realized he had already lost the bet with Dan before he had even made it. He remembered suddenly of Paula's own powerlevel, which had been around 1 million, a little less than Nina. Maybe Dan still wouldn't count her against him though, he thought to himself...
Footnotes:
1 Although I'm sure he'll complain about me putting this here, I wanna fairly inform people that before the time of Misfits, Alex used to have a form of cerebral palsy, which limited his standing ability during certain phases in his life. In the series, Nina healed him of this some time after they met, although Alex is still trying to get fully used to the change in early Series 1. He is going to overcome it, but it makes him slower for a while then many expect of him.
2 To understand why Radditz has a scouter, I must explain that in the Misfits series, I handle the after realm differently from how Toriyama did it. All people who die have a spiritual body, instead of just looking like clouds. They can still train themselves when dead, if they really wish to, this is also why Nina saw both Radditz and Dodoria as they really were when she got sent to Hell by the portal. As for the scouter itself, any kind of articles or objects the person was wearing when they die also get copied over. With all the different people who died in the past, some scouters ended up being taken with them, and Radditz managed to get his hands on one of them before be got sent back.
3 Soukidan "Spinning Energy Bullet", or "Spirit Bomb", the REAL Spirit Bomb. The one Goku uses is misnamed in the dub, and is actually called "Genki Dama" or "Energy Ball". The Soukidan is the controllable ki ball that Yamcha used at the 23rd Tenkaichi Budokai against Kami in the body of Shen. :P