Even as I witnessed the fight between my un-known protector and Triono, I saw it as if I was watching it on TV. I'd never seen such power or speed in a single entity before, but this bald headed man possessed skill far beyond either Triono's range or mine. I found it incredibly hard to believe how strong the man was, single punches had left Triono badly beaten and hanging onto life. Even a Kamehameha from me wouldn't have put a dent in Triono while he was transformed like that.
I looked at my defender, he was holding over the naked and used up body of Triono, looking over it like a mother protecting its young. Pain rocketed through my left shoulder and arm, causing me to clasp them with my right arm and grimace. My vision was becoming blurry, so before I slipped into sleep, I gimped over to my nemesis' body. The bald fighter had landed back on the ground when I arrived and was now checking Triono's pulse.
I came up from behind him, but right before I reached him, he turned his head and looked at me. "How are you?" He asked. I didn't reply, I was still in awe of the way he dispatched transformed Triono. When I didn't respond he completely turned and questioned me again. "Well, you ok?"
His voice, somewhat high pitched, set me off even more. I looked at him through squinting eyes, summing him up even more, before finally I replied, "I'll be ok, I just need to get to a hospital."
"Don't have time for that." He flatly stated. I would've shown the surprise I felt from his remark, but a wave of pain placed a frame of agony on my face. I'd run out of energy, completely, I suddenly had trouble standing, and I almost collapsed into the ground when the man caught me by my injured arm. I screamed out as ripples of pain that dulled my mind shot from my arm, his hand was like a vice-grip.
"Oh shit, sorry." He said, but still held onto my arm, supporting me. "Let me see what's the problem." He then took his free hand and passed it slowly over my arm, from shoulder to wrist, and I felt a sort tingling sensation through the arm, replacing the pain for a short while.
When he finished with whatever he was doing, he released my arm, and the tingling disappeared. The pain came back, quite a bit duller though. "Broken fore-arm, bone chips in elbow, dislocated shoulder." He said it like a doctor reading a chart. Then continued in a sympathetic voice "This could hurt a little."
He then grabbed my fore-arm and without a second thought, shoved it back into place, the pain that he'd help to go away came back with a vengeance, and I screamed again, but it would only get worse, as he then moved up to my elbow and with a single hand, crushed my elbow, I clamped a fist with my right hand and almost swung it at him, but then I remembered Triono's beating and thought better of it.
After what seemed like an eternity crushing bone fragments in my elbow, he moved up to my shoulder and using both hands crammed my arm back into it's socket. When he finished he let go of me and I fell to the ground in a heap of pain.
My new MD then proceeded to drop a small green bean in front of me. "Eat that, it'll help, I promise." He said. My adopted momma didn't raise no fool though, I didn't take food from a stranger.
"What is it?" I asked as I stared up at him.
He looked at me like I was a kid who had just said no to his parents for the first time. "They call it a senzu bean, it'll give you your strength back and speed up the recovery process quite a bit."
I picked up the small bean, and felt its smooth, hard surface before I popped it in my mouth. It was much harder than expected, like a small candy, but I'd finished it off in a few seconds.
At first nothing happened, the pain remained in my arm, and I still felt weak as a puppy, but then there was a huge rush of energy, like I'd just gotten my second wind. My muscles regained their strength; my arm stopped throbbing with pain, reducing to soreness. I hopped to my feet; eyes wide open, and asked him "What are in those things?"
"Don't know." He replied, then shrugged and grinned slightly "I don't grow them, just eat them."
"Right." I nodded and looked down at my doctor. Indeed he was short, maybe 5 feet at the most, I was 5'11", so I was towering over him, he didn't mind though, I was sure he was used to being the short one. He was still focusing on Triono, shaking his head and mumbling to himself. "What happened to him, how did he transform like that?" I asked.
"He's a saiyan, they all have the ability to transform, as long as they have a tail." Hold on a second, I remember thinking, a saiyan, what the hell was that? Triono was different, I knew that, but how did this guy know this about Triono?
"What's a saiyan? Plus who are you anyways?" I sternly questioned.
He turned to face me, and stuck out his short, stubby arm. "Name's Krillin, glad to meet you." I shook his hand tentatively, and then introduced myself. "I'm Cris, and he," I said, looking down at my lifeless opponent, "is Triono."
He nodded again, and then looked back to Triono. I wish he paid me a bit more attention, but he healed me, what more could I ask for? Still, I wish he'd answer my question about saiyans. I was about to ask again when he cut me off with the answer. "You asked what saiyans were?" He asked rhetorically "They're a race. A race of warriors, unparalleled by most species of the universe, they strike fear into their enemies. They used to act as sort of planet brokers, clearing all sentient life off a planet to allow it to be used by their clients. They are all born with tails like Tri-ono," He sounded out the name. "Whenever there is a full moon, if they have a tail, they can look into the moon and they will transform into a beast like the one that attacked you." I tried to take this all in, but most of it was just bouncing off me, all I cared to hear was Triono was an alien. All the time I'd known him, he seemed completely normal (well, as normal as people as strong as us could get), but now it made sense. He never seemed to care much about talking out problems, just fighting to solve them, even if they didn't solve anything, like most of our fights. Krillin continued, but I didn't really pay much attention, I just stared at the motionless body of Triono, wondering why I'd never seen it earlier. "Triono must not have trained a whole lot, if he had, you wouldn't have stood a chance." I nodded absent-mindedly, and was about to say what Triono did to get stronger, fight, when Krillin said something that caught my ear. "Thing is, there've never been any saiyans in this dimension."
I wasn't sure I heard him right so I shot him a strange look and asked "This dimension?"
He nodded and then tried to explain. "This dimension, the one we're in right now, is just one of many. I come from a totally different dimension, where powers like yours, mine, and Triono's are common. I'm surprised to find powers as strong as yours in this dimension, I've been here five weeks, and not in all the galaxy have I sensed powers as strong as your guys'." He paused, and then took a look around the street, like he was looking at it for the first time. "I'm also amazed at how similar your planet is to the earth from my dimension."
He'd lost me again, "Hold on a minute. You mean to tell me that there are other dimensions parallel to this one?" Science always was my worst subject.
"Some are parallel, like yours and mine. They're nearly exactly the same, except something happened in this dimension," He said as he stared into the moon and stars "that changed it dramatically from mine. In my dimension there are literally millions of different sentient species, but here, it's limited to only a few hundred, something must have wiped the early stages of them out or something."
He breathed deeply, and a moan came from Triono beneath us. "He might wake up pretty soon." I stated.
"Yup, we better get a move on." With one hand he picked up Triono's body and slung it between his arm and torso. "If you want to come with me, I'll explain what I'm doing in your dimension and you can decide if you want to come with me." He stuck out his free hand, palm outstretched
I considered telling him no, just thanking him for the healing bean, and then catch a train back to Canada, see Seana for the first time in two months. It'd been hard to go that long without even talking to her, but something inside of me told me to just take his hand, and hope he wouldn't kill me.
After a few seconds I took a deep breath and then latched onto his arm. He smiled slightly, and then suddenly we were off. I'd flown before, but only in planes and helicopters, this was totally new. No engine, just his own power, which was increasing with each second, propelled him. My breath was gone in a few seconds, by that time we were at least five clicks above ground, and the apartments were suddenly small dots in the distance. A rush of adrenaline pulsed through me; I dug into his arm with my nails, and looked up at him. He turned to me and smiled. "Never flown before?"
"Not like this!" I replied, and to calm myself I closed my eyes and practised a relaxation technique I'd learnt as a kid. Trying to take long, deep breaths, I gradually pushed down the anxiety building inside me. The air rushed by us so fast it roared in my ears like I was standing next to a rack of stereo's going full blast. I opened my eyes again, and then looked to Krillin.
He was concentrated on, steering I guess is the best way to say it. I didn't want to interrupt him, so I tried to catch a glimpse of Triono across Krillin's body. He was still knocked out, his black hair covering his face, pushed by the wind. Millions of thoughts passed through my mind about Triono. Who were his parents? Why was he on earth if he was an alien? What was his child-hood like if he had a tail? All of these and many more whizzed through my head, and I suddenly felt sorrow and pity for my enemy. I wish I knew him a bit better, but I had a feeling we'd be getting to know each other very soon.
Suddenly Krillin's voice startled me. "So, what do you want to know?" He wondered.
I didn't know where to start, but since I had been thinking about Triono, I said "Tell me about saiyans."
He shrugged and then said, "Well, I don't know a whole lot, just what I've picked up from my friends. You can read up on them if you come over." I didn't understand what he meant, but before I could ask him he said, "I guess I could give you an outline though. First off, their home planet was called Vegeta. It was a huge planet, almost three times as big as Earth, and it also had gravity 10 times that of Earth's. There were originally two races on this planet, I can't remember the name of the other one, but eventually a war broke out between the saiyans and the other race. The war was going evenly, until one night there was a full moon on Vegeta, and as you know now, when the saiyans look into the full moon they transform into those huge apes. The other race was over-run and the saiyans took over. They were stuck on Vegeta though, which was now damaged badly by the war, and in order to get technology and money, they struck an alliance with another race on a far off planet. This alliance called for the saiyans to take over planets that were suitable for habitation or farms and give them to their new allies.
"This mutually benefited both species, so the saiyans began taking other clients, garnering wide masses of riches and power from their clients. Eventually one client, an evil being named Freeza, monopolized the saiyans, and used them for his own personal wishes. Soon though, Freeza saw that the saiyans, and their ever growing numbers and strength, might pose a problem to his personal power, so he destroyed the planet Vegeta and with it almost all of the saiyans." I gasped when I heard this, a single being able to destroy an entire planet and its inhabitants, and if they were as strong as Triono, this Freeza must've been pretty damn strong. "Only seven saiyans were off the planet when it was destroyed. I guess eight though if you count Triono. And that was 200 years ago."
I absorbed all this data rather quickly, the history of Triono's people. "Eventually though, Freeza met his match. A saiyan, named Goku, defeated the murderer by turning into a Super Saiyan. In this form, Freeza was no match for Goku, and eventually he was defeated. That basically sums up the history of the saiyan race. No one has ever heard of a saiyan since the last of the race died. Triono might change everything, a saiyan that may very well be able to bring back the species. And if he's a full-blooded saiyan, it's even better.
"Anything else?" He asked as he continued looking onward. I began thinking, and looked around for some ideas. We were far out of the city now, in-fact when I looked back, I couldn't even see the lights from it, we must have been going at extremely high speeds. I remained silent for a while, searching for a question, when one popped in my head.
"Why are you here in this dimension at all?"
"Simply put, I came here to find people just like you. You see Cris, there's a war coming. And it doesn't involve you or Triono at all, but it will if my dimension loses this war. I've come to your dimension to bring new warriors back to my plane. All the greatest warriors of my time, the Z warriors we called them, have died of old age. Vegeta, Gohan, Piccolo, Trunks, Goten, the list goes on and on, I'm the only remaining Z warrior left, and soon I will have to pass on too. We were the protectors of our dimension; our universe relied on us to keep it free of evil. Without us to keep the peace in the universe, evil has risen again, and there are no fighters powerful enough to destroy the evil army heading towards Earth. In just a few years, they will arrive on Earth, the breeding ground of the most powerful combatants in the universe, and if no one stops them, they will have complete domination over all life in the universe. I was sent here by chance really, I was on my way to a planet called Namek, as I'd heard of a good fighter from there, when I hit some sort of rift in space and time. Don't ask me how, but I was sent here, to your dimension. So I did the job I was supposed to, find fighters with potential to be the next Z warriors. My search led me to Earth, where I found you and Triono."
Great, so Krillin was some scout from the major leagues coming down to my level to seek out new talent. "You said something about the upcoming war affecting my dimension. What do you mean?"
"We're pretty sure this army has a device that will allow them access to any dimension that is relatively similar to ours, that means yours. The problem they have is it requires power of more than a thousand stars combined. They have no way to harness this power, except if they wish for it with the dragon balls."
"What are dragon balls?" I asked, I felt like a stupid little kid who was learning his multiplication tables.
"Ah, the dragon balls, really the source of all our problems on earth. The dragon balls are a creation of our Kami, or god. They allow anyone who has all seven balls to make any wish they want, and it will come true. There are limits to the dragon balls power, but the harnessing of the power needed to work their machine could be wished for. So we can't let them get all seven dragon balls, if they do it would mean domination of every type of life everywhere, not just limited to our dimension."
I swallowed heavily, if I got the message right, Krillin would want me to come with him to his dimension, and fight this evil army. I wasn't afraid of any fight, especially not if it was for all the right reasons, but I had to know one thing. "Are these guys as powerful as Freeza?"
He looked at me solemnly and then almost whispered "Freeza's a pip-squeak compared to these guys." He saw the look of fear on my face, but instead of letting me voice my concerns he said, "We're here, my space pod's right down there."
I couldn't see anything now, the night was dark, and clouds had covered the moon where we were. Suddenly we dove, headfirst at suicidal speeds towards a farmer's field. All my blood rushed to my feet, and I almost passed out, but right before we hit the ground, we slowed to a nice slow glide before touching down.
It felt good to be on land again, but I was disoriented and almost fell to the ground. Krillin looked at me funny and said "We'll teach you how to fly like that if you come with me." I didn't know who he meant by 'we' but the thought of moving that fast sent a thrill up my spine.
"If I go with you, when would I be able to come back?" I asked, the whole time the thought of moving at such amazing speeds held control over my mind.
"They'll arrive in three years, after it's all over, this dimension could use a good protector."
I looked at Triono, and wondered "What about Triono?"
"He doesn't belong here anyways, he must've somehow arrived in your dimension from ours, maybe in the same way I did."
I pondered the thought of going with him, the chance of a lifetime, go to save the universe from pure evil. I didn't know how I'd explain this to Seana, I'd have to talk to her, somehow. Let her know what was happening. "Could I go see someone, before we leave?"
"Sorry Cris, the dimensional warp or whatever it is I came through is disappearing as we speak, we might not even make it as it is, so we have to go now."
I didn't know if I could just leave her like that, but I'd be fighting for her, for everyone on my planet, for my universe itself. A kind of pride arose in my heart, but I quickly quelled it, no delusions of grandeur for me.
I stood there for maybe a minute, Krillin shifting impatiently from side to side, before I finally made up my mind. "Let's do it."
I'd made my choice, I didn't know if it was the right one, but it had been mine to make, and I'd done it. Now all that was left was to save the universe. More easily said than done of course, but I felt up to the challenge. A giddiness to begin crept up on me and I turned to Krillin and said "So where's your ship, I wanna get going."
He reached into his gi, and pulled out a small capsule, then stated, "Right here." He pushed the compressible top of the cylinder capsule, and then threw it at least 20 meters away. I didn't know what was going on, and I had turned to ask when a gigantic 'pop' sound rang through my ears. I whipped my body around to face the sound, and where my bald headed friend had thrown the capsule, a gigantic space ship was resting comfortably.
It was a large sphere like ship, with huge circle windows on each of its sides, and landing struts supporting the base of the ship, holding it a few meters above ground. Above the main front window, at least 20 meters in width the word CAPSULE was spelt in capital letters. "How'd you get that ship out of no-where?" I asked Krillin.
"Capsule of course." He looked at me oddly, but then nodded his head "Oh yeah, you guys don't have them here, our dimension must be a little ahead in the technology department."
"How do you fit an entire ship into a small little capsule like that?" I questioned, my voice was cracking slightly, which was pretty embarrassing at the time.
"Don't ask me, I have no idea. Kinda like the senzu beans, I just use them, don't know what makes them work."
"Ok." Not knowing things wasn't something new to me, but I didn't feel incredibly safe hopping into a space ship that came out of basically no where. The craft was huge, maybe 50 meters tall and 30 meters wide, but Krillin didn't seem to take much notice.
He walked up to the base of the ship and then floated up to a small beeping control panel near the large window. He punched in a few buttons, and there was a large pressurizing sound, followed by a small walkway being ejected from a space under the main window.
After a few seconds the walkway touched the ground just right in front of me. I began walking up the small ramp, and in a few seconds was at the main window, when I approached it, it split into five different sections and each shot away from me, creating a huge opening for me to walk inside the ship.
Krillin was right behind me, carrying Triono behind him. In a few seconds we were both inside the ship. It had red tiled floors, with red padded walls and a red tinted window-roof. There were two chairs placed in front of two control panels to my left, probably for the pilot(s) I assumed, and there were also four passenger seats behind those two. Right in the middle of the ship was a huge cylinder, reaching from the floor to the roof, with several buttons and control panels along the side of it. There was a small liquid crystal display screen that had the simple display of: 1 G on the cylinder. I didn't know what it meant, but at that time I didn't really care.
"Nice ship you got here." I told Krillin, while still admiring the sheer size of the craft.
"Thanks, if you don't mind, could you buckle Triono into one of those passenger seats?" He asked while he pointed to the seats behind the pilots' chairs.
"Sure." I said as I jogged over to Krillin who was near the cylinder in the center of the vessel. He handed me Triono's still limp body, and as I dragged him over to the near seat, I could hear his light breathing and the rising and falling of his chest. I knew he'd be good as new if he ever woke up and ate one of those senzu beans of Krillin's.
I plopped my saiyan buddies body into the chair, front wards facing, and then reached around him for the seatbelt, but couldn't find it. I continued searching for a few seconds before Krillin said, "You won't find it. Here look out." He walked up to the seat, and gently pulled me away. Then he cleared his throat and announced "Seatbelt on chair five."
Small holes appeared on the side of the chair, and then small seatbelts protruded from them, all told there were four belts and they all came together right over Triono's chest. "Pretty cool eh?" Krillin smirked afterwards.
I nodded slightly and then turned to take one of the pilots' seats. Krillin hopped right over my head and into the left pilots seat before I even got close. "Seatbelt on chair one." The seatbelt ejected itself on his chair as well. "Cris, go take a seat, we have to get going."
Instead of taking the other pilots seat, as I desired, I settled for another passenger's chair right behind Krillin. I opened my mouth to ask him which chair it was I was in, but he beat me to it. "Seatbelt on chair three." The seatbelt collapsed over me snugly, and I leaned back, looking upwards through the red roof. "Ready to go?" Krillin's child like voice asked.
"Yeah, let's do it." I stated as he pushed a few buttons.
"Here goes." He then grabbed onto the sides of his chair for all he was worth. Not wanting to be left out, I did the same, not knowing fully what to expect. At first there was no feeling, but I saw fire coming out from under the ship. Then a slight rumbling came over the craft, just a little rocking really, and then we started to go upwards. Slowly at first, soon the ship built up speed, and a loud whining sound was heard throughout. The rocking that had been so tame at the start was now becoming ferocious, and soon I was being thrown around like a paperweight. If not for my seatbelt, I would've been plastered against the wall. I didn't know why, but as we continued upwards with such incredible speed, anxiety began pushing itself upwards through me. All the blood was rushing to my toes and it felt like a ton of bricks was being placed on my neck, only the fear moved upwards. The whine was getting louder too, like something was about to max out.
I tried everything to relax, but nothing worked, not my breathing techniques, not even meditation worked, as the whine overpowered my ability to hear myself think. I tried to take deep calming breaths, but they came out short and un-coordinated, and suddenly, I was hyperventilating. Then I remembered a little something in my back pocket.
Fire had encompassed the ship, it was bathed in red, and inside it was getting extremely hot, but even through all the rumblings of the ship, I was able to reach back and pull out a picture from my back pocket. I always kept it there, and it always put my mind at ease. Her beautiful face always made put my heart at rest. Her hair, long dark and flowing, her eyes, dark and penetrating, her smile, joyful and invigorating. I then realized how lucky I was to have her, I really didn't know how she could put up with me some times, hell I was hardly ever in Windsor, but when I was, I made sure we were together. I just stared at her picture, and soon, I was completely calm, nothing else in the world mattered. I took a deep breath, and then put the picture back in its rightful spot. Just as I did, Krillin said, "You ok back there?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine." I sort of whispered it, as my voice had been cut off in my throat, a large lump had collected there.
He obviously didn't hear me but said "Sorry about the bumpy ride, your atmosphere's a little different then the one on my earth." I was about to ask what the point of having a spaceship that couldn't land or leave planets with different atmospheres was, but I stopped myself.
We sat there for a few seconds and then the rumbling of the ship stopped. I looked around, and then Krillin announced "That should be the worst of it, I'll set a course for the anomaly that brought me here, hopefully it'll be able to send us back to my dimension."
He then proceeded to turn off the seatbelts for both his and my chairs. I was astounded to find that even in space we had regular gravity. I stood up, and then hopped a little, still amazed. "How do we have gravity up here?" I asked eventually.
He walked by me to the tall pillar in the center of the ship, and tapped the controls "This baby right here. It can create a gravity field anywhere from 0 to 100 gravities that covers the entire inside of the ship."
Something didn't seem quite right about that "What's the use of having a gravity field 100 times normal?"
"You'll see." He slyly replied, then he turned to the main window and said "You might want to take a last look, you might not see it again in a while."
I turned to the large window, and there was the Earth. In space it looked amazing, from thousands of kilometers away, it was more beautiful than anything I'd ever seen. I slowly walked to the window, peering out, taking in the tremendous sight. The giant clouds drifted lazily across the rich green landmasses, while the seas were crystal clear and blue. I fell in a trance, as the splendor of my world suddenly hit me. That image, of the planet, as it eventually got smaller and smaller, was burned into my mind. That was what I was going to be fighting for. I continued to stare, even as I could see less and less of it with each passing second, and for the thirty seconds I could see it, a feel of responsibility came over me, and right then and there, I knew I wasn't coming back until I was able to protect that planet by myself.
Krillin allowed me to stare to my hearts content, before finally snapping me out of it. "Uh.. Cris?" He asked slowly.
I turned to him and my eyes were somewhat watery, so I blinked a few times before I could see him clearly. "Yeah."
"You o.k.?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine."
"You hungry at all?" Krillin asked once I'd finally backed away from the window.
"Not at all actually." I shook my head, I hadn't eaten in almost a day, but I really wasn't hungry. "Even though I haven't eaten for a long time. Weird."
"Not really, that senzu bean that you ate, it'll keep you full for almost a week." A week? That sounded nice, but I found it a little hard to believe. It was a strange day though, so I didn't bother to ask if he was serious. The ship was now speeding past another planet, mars I assumed, and I wondered how long it would be till we got to where we needed to go.
I studied Krillin silently, as he rummaged through a backpack bag leaned against the wall. His power was mind boggling, but now he seemed near normal. He pulled his head out of the bag and exclaimed "Ah, that's where I put it!" He shot up off the floor and raced to the pilots' controls. There he rummaged around a bit more, and as I moved to get a better view of him, he pulled a small object from under the desk-like control panel.
"Here it is." He turned to face me, and I stopped in my tracks. In his hand was what looked like a phone headset with a few altercations. It had a white earpiece with a small blue screen attached. He put the white part on his left ear so the screen covered his eye. He then pushed a small button on the white part and suddenly the screen sprang to life, emitting beeping sounds and showing yellow figures and numbers all across it.
"What's that?" I questioned.
He replied after pressing the button a few more times "It's called a scouter. It'll let me see your power expressed as a number. It's just a way to find an approximation of your power level." He then pressed the button a final time, and then dropped his hand. I couldn't make out the number on the screen, so I asked him "What does it say?"
He bit his lip slightly and then replied "304."
I hesitantly asked, "Is that good?"
He looked at me sideways faced and then replied "Compared to a normal human being, you'd be incredibly strong, but the people we're fighting have power levels anywhere from ten thousand to a six hundred million." I gasped when he said that, and I didn't know exactly what to say. I stood there in stunned silence, and doing some thumbnail calculations, figured out how much I'd have to improve to reach even the weakest of them.
"You mean I'll have to get 30 times stronger than I am now to be able to take one of these guys?"
He nodded slightly, and then turned to face the unconscious Triono. "Let's see what his power level is at." He pushed the button again, and then after a few seconds said "270. Probably a bit low because he's unconscious."
In order to get an idea of how powerful these guys were I asked "What's your power level at?"
"Last time I checked, it was near 50,000,000."
I didn't know how to take that, but I knew what it meant. It meant that Krillin was a weakling compared to the more powerful guys coming towards Krillin's Earth. If I'd known what I was getting into, I might not have been so eager to volunteer. "Please tell me Triono and I aren't the only guys going to fight these guys."
He responded quickly enough to put my mind at ease "No, don't worry, there were at least four humans that were training for the androids on earth when I left. Plus if they got the fighter I was going to find on Namek that makes a total of seven."
Even with the answer he seemed a little off set. "What's wrong?"
"Well, see they've been training for a while already, when I left, the human's power levels were around 3,000 each."
I smacked my lips and said "Great, so ten times stronger than me?"
"Basically yeah. But all that means is that you and Triono are going to have to train a whole lot harder to catch up to them."
"Well I know I'll try my best, but I can't speak for Triono. He despises training of any kind, he just fights."
Krillin grinned slightly, showing off his sparkling white teeth "That's because he's a saiyan, it's in their blood to fight and do nothing else, but even Vegeta learned that training can help you out a lot more than fighting sometimes."
A voice startled both of us, causing me to almost jump onto the roof. "What the hell are you guys talking about?" It was Triono, who was now out of his seat, the restraints thrown askew across the ship's floor. "What the hell is this?"
We both turned to Triono, then looked at each other, both wanting the other to explain. "Well? Where am I? Cris what are you doing here? How did you survive?" He was focused on me for a little while, and I could see his shoulders heaving, his blood rushing quickly, but then he spotted Krillin and turned to him.
"You!" He rushed full force at Krillin, and attempted to spear my newfound friend.
I yelled hoping to stop Triono "Wait Triono, we can explain everything." And it seemed to work, he pulled up just feet from Krillin, and suddenly his breathing was shallower, and I could sense the anger leaving him. Then I saw Krillin in front of him, his palm was out-stretched towards Triono, and I could hear Krillin whispering softly "It's ok, no one's here to hurt you. Just take a seat, and the answers will come."
Triono did exactly as he said, and that's when I felt some sort of ki stream coming from Krillin straight towards Triono. Krillin must have had the ability to calm people's minds, or something along those lines, because Triono's previously tense body relaxed and he sat back down in his chair. His angered expression was replaced by one of restlessness.
Krillin walked up to him, and placed his hand on Triono's forehead. "I'll pass over my memories now, the ones that will clarify everything." He then closed his eyes and Triono did the same. I stood there dumbfounded at how easily Krillin had settled the saiyan down. Within a few seconds, Krillin slowly took his hand away and they both opened their eyes in unison.
Triono calmly asked "So are we almost there yet?" I was amazed at how coherent he seemed, but whatever Krillin had done had kept him calm and alert at the same time.
"We're almost there." Krillin replied, as he sat back down in the pilot's chair. I looked out the window, and we were going past Uranus and I was still astounded at the speed of the ship, like something out of Star Trek or something. When I turned back to the ship, I caught Triono staring at me. He didn't say anything, just looked me up and then down. I returned the favor, not one to let him get the best of me, as I examined him thoroughly, he was nicked up, but looked none the worse for ware considering the beating he took from Krillin. Something wasn't right though, and then I realized he was clothed again, this time in a tunic and loose fitting pants. After the transformation he was as naked as a Donald Duck, but now he was clothed, as he was when he got up from his seat, I'd just never noticed it before.
"Where'd you get those?" I wondered aloud.
"I put them on him, right after take-off, you were looking out the window still." Ah, that was probably it, but back then Triono was still buckled up. I was going to ask how Krillin got them on him, but he cut me off. "We're almost there, just around the corner basically. You guys wanna come up here and take a look?"
Triono and I both walked towards where Krillin was seated. He was busy fidgeting with the controls, but Triono and I both looked out towards the scenery. Without looking up, Krillin asked, "Can you see it?"
We both stared, squinting into the starlit darkness. I was scanning the proverbial horizon, when suddenly one of the brighter stars seemingly dimmed out of view. I quickly pointed and wondered aloud, "Is that it?"
Krillin looked up and grinned, then nodded and hunched back over the controls. "Very good Cris, it has about the same effect as a black hole, only a bit less powerful, you can see through the gate to my dimension, but not very well."
"So are we gonna make it?" Triono asked with a slight hint of tension in his voice.
"We should get to it in time, the problem may be piloting this bulky ship through the narrow gate-way, it's getting smaller every second." I sighed, there wasn't anything I could do. We continued to move onward, to where Pluto was even getting small in the rear view window. The "gate" was now dimming more and more stars as we came closer to it and it took up more of the front window. Soon it was completely encompassing the view outside, and I began feeling a lot of tension coming from Krillin, I directed my attention to him. He was sweating heavily, his fingers racing across the controls at light speed, literally I couldn't see his hands move they were going so fast, they just appeared as sort of a blur. I blinked a few times to make sure I was seeing it correctly, then I tapped the nearby Triono on the shoulder, and nodded towards the pilot. Triono's jaw dropped when he saw Krillin at work, as we both stared at his amazing hand speed. He then broke our concentration by saying; "Hold on," tension was straining his already squeaky voice "almost there!"
Suddenly a sort of gray wave went through the ship, and for a split second my whole life flashed before my eyes, like if I was going to die, only I was very much alive. As we passed through the gate, I turned away to my left and looked out the window, across from us, not ten meters away was another ship, almost identical to the one we were in, only it was slightly smaller. I could see right through its side window, and I could see its occupants. There was only one, a tall, youthful looking man. He was extremely muscular, but not to an extent that limited his movement, he was clothed in a gi much like Krillin's, his hair was red and springy, kind of like Triono's, except it was less symmetrical and even taller. His eyes were a light tint of green, and then I realized he was staring at me, his mouth hung open in disbelief, he just stared at me, and I stared back. Our eyes locked, but only for a moment, for as soon as I saw him and his ship, we were through the gate, and into the other dimension. I didn't tell either Krillin or Triono what I saw; I almost didn't believe it myself.
After we had passed through the gate, and the gray tint that had engulfed the ship faded away, leaving the yellowish color from the on-board strobe lights. Krillin fell back onto his seat, almost exhausted, and then looked to the both of us before saying "We made it, not by much, but we did it. Now we just gotta head back to earth, and then you guys can get started."
I swallowed deeply, as the ship banked to the right, and shot straight around this universe's Pluto. I was amazed that they had a Pluto here; in fact I was stunned, which brought up an interesting point. "So when are we going to be able to learn the history of yo—" I stopped myself short "of our dimension."
Krillin stood from his chair, as Triono and I rose to our full heights, Triono being slightly shorter than me still towered over Krillin. "When we get to earth, you guys can have a few days to read up on our history, on the Z warriors, on the dragon balls, on everything. Once you're finished that your training can begin."
Triono didn't try to hide the disgusted look on his face, I didn't know if he'd ever agree to train. If he did though, I had a feeling not many people would be able to match up to him. I looked forward to the challenge of preparing for these incoming aliens, even if we were a little behind everyone else power wise.
"You two should try and relax, it's going to be a hectic first few days before you get into the routine of it." Ah, routine the trademark of long days of training, just routine and repetition, the same things over and over, but to get us up to even Krillin's level, we'd have to go beyond just repetition.
Suddenly a thought popped in my head "Who are we going to train with?" I asked.
Krillin was going to answer, but Triono cut him off with a stern voice "Kami."
I then retorted by asking, "Who's Kami?" the whole time wondering how Triono knew that, probably through the link he and Krillin had made.
Triono turned to me, arms crossed, a firm look on his face "He's the guardian of their, of our, earth. Kind of like god, except here they know he isn't all-powerful, now and days his only job is to train warriors like us for the battle ahead."
"That's right," Krillin continued "he was originally a sort of Z-warrior, he helped us fight against Frieza, afterwards, he went with the rest of his species to their new home world, when our Kami fused with a warrior named Piccolo, we called on him to come and be the next Kami of earth."
"Ok, so how long will we train under him?" I asked.
"Probably until they arrive at earth. You'll probably gravitron train for a while, I don't know how well your bodies will be able to stand up against the higher settings, but if we prepare you well enough, you should do fine." I didn't fully understand what he meant, but I kept my mouth shut.
Suddenly I was getting very tired, so I through myself into one of the chairs closed my eyes and relaxed. I tried replaying the day's events in my head, but I couldn't, the order was all screwed up, so I ditched the idea and picture Seana again. I was instantly calm, and for several minutes I just sat there, her face a vigilant reminder of what I was doing on this ship, hell, in this dimension.
Krillin suddenly snapped me out of my serenity, calling for seatbelts on all seats to be activated, suddenly my restraints wrapped themselves around me, and I opened my eyes, Earth, a brand new one, with a number of different land masses, took up the whole front view, and again my breath was taken away. This Earth was unlike mine, there was virtually no hint of pollution or anything like that, just the greens, blues and whites it was supposed to be, not a hint of gray.
"We're going in!" Krillin exclaimed, and no sooner did flames begin to dance across the front window, and in just a few seconds, we were covered in flames, doing a nosedive through the atmosphere. The ship remained cool even as we passed through the intense, metal smelting heat of the Earth's atmosphere. The flames now took up the entire view, and the inside of the ship was tinted red from the flames, and I was sure we'd blow up. Technology proved me wrong though, and in just a while we were clear of the intense heat, and coming down towards earth at a suicidal speed.
"Can't you slow this thing down?" I yelled to Krillin over the roaring of the engines, which were now struggling against gravity. Krillin tried saying something but I couldn't hear him. We continued going full speed towards the earth, and a little piece of green, an island towards the top of the planet, was suddenly becoming very big in the front window. I asked again "We gonna slow down anytime soon?"
No sooner did I yell it out then we began to slow down, but there was no time for just slowing down, we had to stop now, the island was all I could see, and the ground couldn't have been more than five kilometers down, and we were still moving at 500 m.p.h. I didn't think we'd survive the crash landing. One time I'd been on a ride at a carnival with Seana, where you rise about 200 feet and then come plummeting to the ground just to be stopped a few feet from the ground, she was screaming so loud I got scared, I still had a bit of a scar where she dug her nails into my hand. Anyways that landing reminded me so much of that ride I almost pissed my pants, I could've sworn we weren't more than five feet from the ground when we slowed to a crawl and then silently touched down on the ground.
My seatbelt came off, and then I took another deep breath (I seemed to be having a lot of them), before I got up and headed for the doorway. Triono and Krillin quickly came behind me, and Krillin moved to a control pad to the side, punched a few buttons, and then the doorway to a brand new life opened in front of me.