Babidi's Ship, Wasteland
"M-Mom...?" Erasa was staring, wide-eyed and stunned, at the familiar figure standing before her. Rivulets of blonde tresses fell down to the shoulder, and pale, tender blue eyes stared at her with a smile she recognized with a pain in her heart. This was the face she'd known for years; years, until she died five years ago. Two years after the time of the Cell Games. Two years after she'd met Gohan.
"I-It can't be...you died...you died five years ago!" Her voice was cracking now, but she wasn't paying any attention. This couldn't be happening. It simply could not be happening to her. "I saw you die! I was there in the hospital five years ago; I held your hand, Mom! You can't be here!"
"And she's officially lost her mind," Vegeta grumbled to himself. "I'm already losing my patience with this fight as it is; if this low-level show doesn't get itself on the road, I have half a mind to step in and end it myself!"
Piccolo scoffed, "Show some patience, Vegeta. This is a new kind of test for her. She's still learning; still but a fledgling. Physical strength is only half of a warrior's skills. You'll need mental fortitude if you're going to continue to win battles, and she'll find no better time to develop that than now, confronted with this visage of her mother." Looking at Gohan with his narrow black eyes, Piccolo added, "And that goes for you too, Gohan. I can feel your ki rising with every scream from her throat. Steel yourself and let her make it through this on her own."
Gohan replied with a noncomittal jerk of the head. He didn't want to admit that his teacher was correct, especially not that he'd been correct for the second time in only a few minutes. "As her teacher, I have to let her do this on her own. But...as myself I can't keep watching this. Damn it...what am I going to do!?"
Erasa was mulling over similar thoughts as she stared directly into her mother's face, her body quivering.
"What's going on? What do I do!?"
Papaya Island, Tenkaichi Budōkai
"So that man in the orange gi was Gohan's father...and he died seven years ago in the Cell Games?" Marque looked thoughtfully towards Master Rōshi, his eyes glistening under the brim of his hat. Rōshi had finished giving an abridged version of the pertinent information for Marque, and it was this particular bit of information that he latched onto. A dead man returning to life for a day. This was information most sane people would simply laugh off, or perhaps accuse Rōshi of having hit the spirits before the Tenkaichi Budōkai.
And yet to him it made perfect sense.
"If that's true...it would explain why my daughter latched onto Gohan so quickly," Marque mused, more to himself than to the others, but they heard regardless, and it was Chi-Chi who questioned the statement.
"What do you mean, Marque?" Her black eyes narrowed a bit. "Are you sayin' that Erasa only took my boy on out of pity!?" Whether she meant to be rude or not, accidental rudeness was alarmingly common and Marque caught onto her tone, faltering in his response.
"N-No, Chi-Chi, that isn't it at all," Marque replied quickly. "I meant no disrespect to your son; however, what I meant to say was that my daughter understands. She fully understands the pain he's going through perhaps — permit me to say — even more so." With a sigh, he removed the hat on his head, placing it to his chest. "This is a story that I do not fancy telling; it brings back memories I wish I could bury..."
"If it's something that difficult to discuss, then you don't need to—" began Bulma, but Marque cut her off.
"It might be simply the fact that I don't wish to tell it which means that I need to tell it," he explained. "Especially to you, friends and family of Gohan, who has brought my daughter so much happiness in these past few months." With a smile, mixing between happiness and bitterness, he continued. "You see, six years ago, my wife, my beloved Quille, had fallen ill. She'd contracted a disease, a virus, that attacked the lungs; we sought out a doctor, but there was no known cure, no treatment she could undergo...!"
There was a collective silence, followed by a shudder from several present. They could visualize this almost all too well; Goku himself had once contracted a fatal illness, a contagious heart virus, that threatened his life. However, thanks to the young man Trunks, he had been spared the fate of dying from natural causes — a death the Dragon Balls would never be able to undo.
"With nothing we could do, we were forced to make accommodations as the physicians told my wife she had only another year left to live..." Marque continued, his voice cracking, becoming hoarse. "The ordeal was terrible for Erasa; she was always close to her mother, they were inseparable...it was almost impossible to break the news to her. And then, a year later, two years after the conclusion of the Cell Games, Quille...passed away."
There was a pronounced silence from the group at large — most especially Chi-Chi, who immediately regretted her accusation towards Erasa — and it persisted until Marque chose to speak again. "For nearly a year, she refused to associate with anyone; even Videl, whom she'd known since her early school days, couldn't snap her out of it. There was a point where she simply stopped going to school — I had to explain what happened to her teachers." With another heavy sigh, he continued. "I had to find a way to help her, and eventually, I suggested that she take up painting. Any form of self-expression would be better than keeping it bottled up, and I wanted her to find a way to let out her feelings, even if she couldn't talk to me or her friends.
I think this was part of what helped her improve. She took my advice, reluctantly at first, and began to take up painting. While her room remained untouched, she eventually had covered all of the walls and ceiling with patterns of waves and clouds," smiling, he added, "Quille and I used to take her to the beach when she was younger, and work didn't keep me away so much."
"But she seems so happy now!" Yamcha offered helpfully. "So she's made steps in the right direction, right?"
"It took awhile, but she has, and I'm very proud of her," Marque replied. "She was able to adopt a normal life as a teenager, but I knew she wasn't completely at peace with it. However, it all culminated when she met Gohan. That boy has done so much good for my girl...and I never want to see her go through something that again...!"
Babidi's Ship, Wasteland
"Stop this! You can't be my mother!" Erasa shouted, her expression wild.
"And what makes you say that?" The woman replied simply, her voice as soft as ever. "Because you were there in the hospital? Because you were the one holding my hand as the life slipped from my body? Tell me, dear, how has Marque been doing these past five years?"
"D-Dad...!?" Erasa gasped, horror flooding her body. "How...how do you know his name?"
Dol chuckled, her blue eyes staring directly into Erasa's mirror-matched pair. "I told you, dear, it's me. Quille. Do you truly believe it's impossible for Master Babidi to revive a corpse and call a Soul back from the Afterlife? With his powers, nothing is impossible."
Gohan looked at Shin, and the edge in his voice was apparent when he spoke. "Is what she's saying true, Kaiōshin? Can someone's magic actually revive a person from the dead?" He knew that the Dragon Balls were capable of such a feat, but could mortal magic actually accomplish the same as mystical artefacts?
Shin chose his words carefully as he replied to the half-Saiyan. "Theoretically, yes — reviving a person from the dead is not impossible. We have living proof walking with us right now; your father, Son Goku is that proof." Shin added in response to Gohan's confused expression. "However, reviving a person from the dead is typically against the very laws of nature; even the time Goku is running on is borrowed. To revive someone who died of natural causes for a prolonged period of time...yes, incredibly powerful Dark Magic can accomplish such a feat."
"Against the laws of nature...?" Gohan thought with a jolt. But they'd been using the Dragon Balls to revive their fallen comrades for years. But then he remembered — remembered something from years ago, when they were on Namek, and had summoned the Namekian Shénlóng, Polunga. "He was only able to bring one person back to life at a time back then...the Namekians as well must have considered it against the laws of nature to revive the dead in that way. At least until Freeza made them change their mind."
"Stop worrying so much, Gohan, and wipe that look off your face," Piccolo replied sternly, causing Gohan to look at his former teacher with astonishment.
"Were you reading my thoughts?"
"Not your thoughts, just your face," Piccolo replied; for the matter of telepathy, he was unable to invade minds as easily as Gohan thought. "The Dragon Balls are a unique case; we use them to bring back lives that were cut short, to give those who had lost their opportunities another chance. The Namekians believed that when one dies, their death should not be mourned; my culture's idea of the afterlife was a bit different." With a smile, he continued. "And so, Polunga was limited to reflect our beliefs. But Freeza changed that; the fact that someone could just arrive and blink out so many lights that once burned bright in seconds...I suppose my people had to come to terms with that, and we adjusted Polunga accordingly."
Gohan instinctively breathed a sigh of relief, but his worries were not over. Erasa still found herself unable to do more than splutter, and this was his primary concern. Mother or not, if this woman was sided with Babidi, and Erasa was to try and fight her in her current state...she would lose.
"We haven't even begun the next round and already you're weak in the knees," Dol replied, looking disappointed. "I can see you shaking, dear. Come now..." With a single fluid step, Dol crossed the distance between herself and Erasa, manifesting close enough to run her hand down the girl's face.
Erasa blinked. "Impossible...did she get faster?"
Dol pushed the girl backwards with strength she hadn't expected based off of their first skirmish, and Erasa felt herself stumble. An amateur mistake she hadn't anticipated, she glanced at her feet to try and stabilise herself — this was her second mistake, and she felt a thin leg collide with her ribs, kicking her to the side of the building.
"Your feet aren't something you should have to confirm with your eyes," Dol lectured, watching Erasa stumble to her feet. "I'm disappointed. Perhaps Videl would be more of a sporting match than my own daughter?" With a wave of the hand, Dol gestured towards Videl, who started. "You've been awfully quiet, Videl, even though it's been five years. Don't you have anything to say to me?"
It was true that Videl had been uncharacteristically silent, and even now, she surveyed Dol with a mixture of horror and mistrust. This was the woman who had been like a second mother to her, but had died. How else was she supposed to react when someone claiming to be her stood standing before all of them. Her sapphire orbs narrowed, and when she spoke, it was carefully measured.
"What would I have to say about any of this?" She replied quickly. "I know for a fact Erasa's mother died; I saw her fall ill, I attended the funeral. I saw that face in a casket." Decided she hadn't said enough, she added stubbornly, "I don't know what game you're playing, and I don't understand all this talk of dark magic, but if Erasa's going to fall for such a cheap trick as yours, then I have my goals set a little too low!"
"Videl..." Gohan intervened warning.
"No, Gohan!" Videl snapped. "Do you think I want the girl who saved my life — when I didn't even ask for it, mind you — to be this weak? I thought she was better than that!"
As Erasa stumbled to her feet, Videl's words thundered through her ears along with the blood. How could Videl say that? What did she expect? Her mother was standing in front of her, wearing the mark of a demon and attacking her with the intent to kill. "What if it was Miguel standing there?" Erasa's breath was haggard, but the question formed perfectly, and it hit Videl harder than any physical blow.
Looking at her friend with a shocked expression — if only because she wasn't used to Erasa firing back like this — and she was legitimately silenced for the first time.
"What am I supposed to do when someone wearing my mother's face is standing there when she's been dead for six years!?" Erasa continued, more loudly still, towards Videl. "I can't...I can't bring myself to do it..."
With the flicker of movement, Dol launched herself forward, landing a powerful blow to Erasa's chest and knocking her into the wall of the domed room, pulling her hand back with a flourish. "And that, dear, is your problem." Dol replied, flashing a smile across her gentle face that did not reach her eyes. "Pray tell...what reason did you take up fighting, if not to strike down those in front of you?"
"W-What?"
"Your reason," Dol pressed, pushing forward and thrusting a kick towards Erasa that was only blocked by the girl placing her arms in a cross formation in front of her body. The general impact was instead focused on these arms, and she winced slightly as the strength was pushing her back. The woman's speed was still so overwhelming, despite the fact that Erasa and she had been equal before she revealed her face.
"If you don't have the strength to strike down your own mother, just because I'm standing in your way, do you really think you're going to be able to accomplish anything? To protect anyone?" Her words stung like ice, and Erasa's expression betrayed everything to Dol. "Such noble intentions are sweet, and so very like you. You were always a friendly child, and would go out of your way to even help a stranger.
You're too kind. Kindness isn't needed on the battlefield! If you want to become a fighter, then harden your heart and kill with impunity!" Dol's voice had become shrill as she cocked her fist back, thrusting it forward for another crushing blow. To her surprise, however, the blow was parried; and not, as she expected it to be, from intervention by the spectators outside, but instead, from Erasa's own hand.
"Those words...are not the ones my mother would say..." She replied through gritted teeth, staring Dol down with glistening eyes. "And yet...I think they may have been just what I needed to hear." Erasa's fist tightened around Dol's own, and the woman found herself unable to wrench her fist out of the vice-grip Erasa had on her. "I wanted to believe it...I knew it was stupid, but I wanted so badly to believe you were real...that my mother was alive again."
Tears began to spill from Erasa's eyes, and her voice was brittle, croaky even. "It was stupid to think that, and an insult to my mother's memory for believing an impostor like you could ever be her!" With no further hesitation, Erasa thrust her fist forward; the blow landed solidly with Dol's face, heavily impacting the woman and sending her flying when Erasa finally released her hand. "The loving woman my mother was...was nothing like you!"
Dol spun herself into a standing position, before adopting a fighting pose. "So the little bird is finally ready to leave the nest now, are we?" She replied in a honeyed voice, her crystal blue eyes narrowing. "How much it hurts to be struck by your own daughter; Erasa, I thought I taught you better!"
Erasa didn't falter; the words that slipped from Dol's mouth were ignored, and she kept her expression stony as she moved swiftly towards Dol. The woman moved in to strike, but Erasa's timing was perfect; sliding out of the way, she responded with a powerful kick, satisfied to see that the speed situation was a non-issue. "She hadn't gotten faster...it was me...I'd gotten slower when I didn't know how to react!"
The blonde-haired woman was surprised, to put it mildly. She had been on the upper hand for the past few minutes, but to see the young girl turn the tables so soon...she hadn't expected it. And yet, somehow, she felt something resembling pride for Erasa. Regardless, those feelings were distracting now, and the distraction cost as Erasa hadn't stopped pursuing her.
On the sidelines, the group was watching the fight with a myriad of different expressions and reacts. While Vegeta and Videl were either indifferent or pretending to be, Gohan and Piccolo were watching Erasa's comeback with their own pride. For Goku, Tenshinhan, and 18, they were more or less the simple spectators they appeared to be, and Shin was ever wary.
Mixed in with Gohan's pride was relief; relief that Erasa could handle herself, relief that she was no longer in danger.
"I've been at this for long enough, Gohan," Piccolo told his student, a satisfied smirk on his face. "Have some faith in me, and have some faith in her as well."
Feeling slightly sheepish, the half-Saiyan nodded. "Sorry, Piccolo."
Beginning to grow frustrated, Dol began to rapidly release spheres of ki towards Erasa. In response, the girl stood her ground, deflecting each and every sphere with the backside of her palms. The orbs collided with the ship, causing the room to shake; the walls remained undamaged, protected by what appeared to be magic, but the sudden motion was noted regardless.
"Careful!" Shin stressed, reproaching Erasa for her recklessness. "The shell that encases Majin Bū is fragile; too much sudden rupturing and he could accidentally be released!"
"...which is information we could have used before we entered the ship," replied 18 dryly.
Regardless of Shin's words, the battle continued. With ki not working, Dol pushed back into her melee options, launching a heavy-fisted assault on the blonde-tressed girl. Moving across the room was speeds far more than brisk, Erasa and Dol exchanged blows. Erasa seemed to have the upper hand now, parrying each blow with fire in her eyes. While Dol was propelled by duty, Erasa was motivated by her emotions; guilt at falling for deceit, grief over her mother's memory, and fury at Babidi and Dol for putting on this charade.
When a warrior wields a weapon with no purpose, the blade is dulled. But when struck with intent, with purpose, the blade fortifies itself and becomes a weapon capable of cutting down any enemy. Right now, Erasa was that sharpened blade, and the turmoil in her soul was the whetstone; in contrast, Dol may as well have been a butter knife.
Striking violently, Erasa's fist crashed into Dol's stomach, winding the woman and causing her to stumble as she clutched her belly. Coughing and spluttering, she was almost deaf to Erasa's coming words.
"Ka..." Erasa cupped her hands to her sides, beginning to form the bright lights that would form the signature move of many. "Me...Ha...Me..." The glow intensified, and Erasa was cast into a blue outline before she thrust her palms forward, releasing a thin, powerful beam of ki.
"HA!"
The stream of plasma struck Dol head on, before fully overwhelming her; already stunned from Erasa's physical blow, she was unable to fend off the powerful ki technique, finding herself lifted off of the ground, and thrown directly into the wall. The impact of the crash, combined with the force of the beam, was all Erasa needed to finish the job, and Dol soon found herself losing consciousness.
Breathing heavily, Erasa fell to her knees, exhausted. She could feel that her ki was depleted, but beyond this, she felt both physically and mentally drained. There was only a second's delay before the tears started to flow from her face for a final time, as the emotion flooded from her body. Her mother was dead; this was irrefutable. But for a single, solitary moment, she had thought her mother was back among the living — like Goku — only to find out it was an impostor, and then have to kill the effigy of her mother with her own hands.
Lost in her grief, she felt something warm and reassuring, and found that she was wrapped in Gohan's arms. With her eyes blinded by tears, and her ability to feel forki dulled by the depletion of her own, she hadn't felt him come over. Regardless, underneath the conflicting storm of emotions, she felt relief, and buried her head into his shoulders, her crying only growing, but muffled to the rest of the room.
There was a whirring sound in the middle of the room, as the circular platform opened for them to proceed. Level One had been cleared,
Babidi's Conference Room; Final Level of Babidi's Ship
"Impossible!" Babidi trilled, furious. "Dol was defeated!?"
Dābura glanced towards his Master, a surprised etched onto the face of the Demon King. He felt a new sense of respect for the fighters that had entered their ship; Dol was far from their strongest fighter, but it was the abilities that strange being possessed that made it a difficult opponent to fight on a psychological level. A member of the Jinūlings from the planet Kufu, they excelled in a strange technique that allowed them to mold memories from their targets — gathered by piercing the body of the opponent — and take a shape of what the target loved most in their life.
The form they chose would also be the form they would be stuck in for the remainder of their lives; even when they were killed, the disguise did not falter. This gave them use as tactical agents in several galactic military organizations, but the planet of Kufu was so far off in the Milky Way galaxy that they were hardly recruited. Because they were so rarely seen in their regular forms, Dābura had doubted that even the Kaiōshin would have recognized Dol for what it was, especially with its body concealed as it was.
But this girl had managed to topple a being meant to manipulate and take advantage of that pathetic mortal emotion known as "love". To harden their hearts against that... a truly remarkable feat.
But Babidi's fury interrupted Dābura's thoughts. "I will not have this; the best laid plans will not be going to waste, I've spent millions of years waiting for this day! Dābura!"
"Y-Yes, Master!?" The Demon King faltered at the mage's intimidating fury.
His bulbous green eyes dilating slightly, Babidi pointed dramatically at his demonic servant. "Contact Pocus and send him to Level Two! We're cutting these intruders off at the gate!"
A/N: And here it is! After a month and two days, I bring you all the twenty-sixth chapter of the Erased Chronicles. This was one chapter I didn't mind waiting on, since after that cliffhanger of a last chapter ending, I kind of wanted you guys to marinate over it for a bit. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure you all have come up with far more fantastical ideas of what Dol was than what I said it was. However, I was planning this for a few months at this point, so don't get me wrong, my ideas had been set for awhile. This was a chapter I really liked, and wish it had been longer, but I wasn't able to properly extend the chapter length past the 4,000 word mark; to people who prefer my longer chapters, I'm sorry for that. It's not often I get to delve into Erasa's past, especially through someone else; I think this is the most Marque has ever said in the entirety of the story, and I tried really hard with him as Erasa's father. This is the first time the entire family has been present in a chapter, even if Quille was a clone. I like to see this was one of the building chapters for Erasa; a difficult step that will turn her into a stronger person down the line.
So, to explain the names as I always do. Dol is directly from doppelgänger, or a look-alike or double of a living person. Granted, Quille is dead, but the name worked for what I needed it to do, so...don't stress the semantics. The race that Dol is from, the Jinūling race, also comes from doppelgänger; this time, the Japanese word for doppelgänger, nijūshin (二重身). Kufu comes from the Japanese word for duplicate; fuku (副). There's a bit more to the Jinūling's form copying that I had Dābura explain; paying attention to Dol as it fought Erasa would actually clue you in to that, so I'll leave it to all of my wonderful readers.
With this chapter, Erasa can now fully begin to move on from her mother's death. Gohan was the start she needed, but I think this was the final push. If I needed an analogy, he was only helping her swim through the pool; she needed something to push her right into the deep end and say "kick or drown".
As always, let's give a thanks to my friend Demod20 for helping to proofread this chapter. I will see you guys very soon with chapter 27 of the Erased Chronicles!