Disclaimer: I don't own dbz.

Hello everyone, and welcome to chapter 4 ) in this chapter, we take a little detour (or is it?) from the end of the story line in chapter three. We will revisit that chain of events in chapter 5. All of you will be pleased with the result, im sure.

Also, I'd like to again express my gratitude to my reviewers, and celebrate that this fic has received over 200 hits! Huzzah!

Let us be more silent now, for the hour is growing late…

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The fathomless ocean of the sky settled its warm bulk against the sleeping city. A slight wind stirred invisible boughs and brush, and it bore a secret rustle and the sweet scent of the growing raja blossoms into the open, arched stone windows of the palace. He kept his ears alert, catching only the faint, musical twittering of nightbirds and crickets on an early summer's eve.

What was responsible for waking him up? He rarely awoke out of a sound sleep without cause…he concentrated harder.

There were no creeping footsteps. No suppressed ki signatures anywhere around. No danger of any kind to sleeping mate and unborn babe. He relaxed somewhat, his eyelids gaining weight once again.

Blip!

'What?' He drug himself back from the fringes of a dream…

And suddenly he knew.

He sat up slowly, and gazed down at her…taking in every detail of her long, raven-black hair…her elegant, well-loved face…and finally her full, round belly. He watched…waiting patiently…excitedly…expectantly…because sooner or later—

Blip!

He smiled in the darkness…it was their baby…a tiny, little flicker of ki that was finally strong enough to be sensed by the world! It was the first ki! And it was even strong enough to wake him up!

As he watched, delighted, he saw the covers move just a little. The devastating effects of a well-placed, pre-natal kick. Seized by a sudden idea, he focused a minuscule amount of energy on his fingertip—the light from it wasn't even bright enough to read by—and reduced it by half. This was more or less how much ki the baby had shown.

He moved his finger a few inches over the covers, and then took it back. At first there was no reaction, but then…

Blip, blip! Kick! Blip!

They played this way for what felt like roughly ten minutes before the baby tired of the game. Beaming with pride, he settled back down beside her. She moved, seeking his warmth, and when she found it she relaxed against him with a contented sigh. He gently wrapped a powerful arm around her to hold her close.

And his dreams were so close to reality that he didn't even notice when he had fallen asleep again.

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She knows this place well, for this is the home of the People of the Mist, her family. The vast, hot rainforests of the southern wilds.

She is in full battle gear. Her light, leather and cloth armor is designed for quick movement rather then real protection. War paint is streaked across her face, as well as her armor, to serve as symbolic war paint for the baby. She carries no weapons. She has no need of any. She is the mightiest of all her people, unsurpassed in her intelligence and skill in wielding their ancient, mysterious arts. Legendary for her beauty and sheer ferocity. She is as a goddess, and none can stand against her

She walks south purposefully, and feels a familiar ki appear behind her. She turns, and she sees her mate, crouched on a moss covered log a few yards away. He is clad in the battle gear of his family—the people of the north-most isles, so he wears armor that is built for warmth, and protection rather then speed, and bracelets made of fangs and claws from the strongest creature he ever tracked and killed with his bare hands. He is the mightiest of all his people, unsurpassed in wisdom, courage, and strength. He is as a god, and none can stand against him.

He gives her a playful half-smile, and springs at her, covering most of the ground between them in an instant. She dodges around him like a serpent, shoves him off balance, and lobs a kick at the small of his back. He flops over on his side at the last second, takes hold of her outstretched ankle, and uses her momentum to spin her around quickly as he rises to his feet. Before she can regain her own balance, she is in his arms, his spiky brown hair is soft between her fingers, and the kiss is long and very, very good.

After they break the kiss at last, she cuddles against his broad, muscular chest a moment, rejoicing in the feel of his warm embrace and the rhythmic thumping of his heart. They are a pantheon, and the only thing they are truly powerless against is one another.

But then he tightens his grip on her, and he stands straight and stock-still. She looks up at him, and he is glaring at something directly behind her. His chiseled jaw is set, and with an effort he tears his gaze away and turns, his arm across her shoulders as if to steer her back the way they came. To take her away from the thing he saw.

But she will not be led away without seeing for herself. She stands her ground and turns to see…

The Barrier.

It stretches roughly thirty feet high, and it looks at first glance to be a gigantic hedge. But she knows its really made up of all manner of plant life and stones from the mighty forest, for it has been maintained by the careful effort of her people since time out of mind. Since the last time Ophelia walked among them in Her garden.

She walks toward it, and is forced to skip and duck around his attempts to stop her. Her people have made it so no ordinary saiyan can approach the Barrier without sensing the terrible danger waiting within. She knows it isn't his fault. He doesn't understand that she has done this her whole life. He doesn't understand the true depths of her power, having never been able to witness it. She knows he only wants her to be safe. When she stops short of it by several feet, having no need to go closer, she can feel his relief.

She senses that something is wrong with the Barrier. She can feel something coming through, and it feels like a dark, evil wind. She sweeps her sharp gaze across it, and finds the breach. It isn't anything terribly serious—yet. It looks like it only needs a patch, and nothing on the other side has discovered the weakness yet.

She turns back for a moment, only to throw him a reassuring, yet mischievous look. He calls her back with a tone of urgency in his deep, booming voice. She ignores him with a flippant wave of her tail, and begins her work. Today he will finally see her true power unveiled.

She stands with her feet together and her arms at her sides, and concentrates on the soil. She concentrates on the water and the air within it. She extends her energy to the ground through her feet, and feels the forest floor fill her with strength in return. She raises her arms slowly, drawing the strange energy and power up through her whole body. She becomes an extension of the forest. She now has power over it.

The emerald canopy of leaves high above them begins to shake violently, and a storm of brightly colored birds erupt into the heavens. Great roots like bullwhips tear loose from deep underground to slither in the soil and flail aimlessly around her in the air. For a moment they blot out the sky, for the trees are mighty and as old as the forest itself. Only she among all her people can influence them so greatly.

Finally, several of the trees give one last shudder as they pull free altogether, and they walk and pull themselves along by their mighty roots until they meet the Barrier. They climb upon it and over each other. They weave their branches and bend their trunks until nothing is left of the breach, then as one they shoot their roots back into the ground. They arrange their leaves to catch the sun once more, and then all is silent. All traces of evil are gone.

It is done. And for the first time in a millennium, sunlight shines on the forest floor.

She turns back to him proudly, and to her surprise he is directly behind her again. He has overcome his natural instincts to stay away to come for her. His expression is full of wonder, and when he puts an arm across her shoulders to guide her away again, she doesn't protest.

They cross the now-sunny clearing, and as she takes what would have been her first step back into the shade of the forest…

It vanishes.

They freeze in shock, for they are left in the middle of a bare, blasted wasteland. There isn't a single blade of grass or growing thing. There isn't the scent of water or even of soil. A sour, sickly, odor permeates the stale air. It is as if the very wind has given up hope and refused its right to pass through. The sandy ground has a disgusting kind of greasy sheen to it, rather like dung, and it feels unpleasant under their feet.

He wildly scans the empty horizon in alarm, but if he is alarmed, she is terrified. Because she knows where they are…

They are behind the Barrier.

She doesn't understand how they got there. She doesn't know how to get back, because in all directions it's the same tangible emptiness, the same indescribable wrongness surrounding them. The Barrier has disappeared behind them, and the things that she only sensed coming out of the breach in it before are now washing over them in noxious waves.

Suddenly she feels something change. The hairs on her neck and tail bristle out with the power of it, and then she is pulling him back as the horrid, cursed land shifts beneath them. As if something indescribable is trying to burrow out. She screams at him to move, and he picks her up and leaps away just as the demon bursts forth in a spray of foul rubble. A shroud of darkness bleeds across the weak, gray sky like a blot of watercolor paint, and somehow in the middle of all of it, she is glad that part of its hulking, monstrous form is covered up, because demons are so unnatural that the sight of an especially powerful one is enough to drive some people into madness.

The vile thing pins them to the spot with a glare of unholy interest, and ropes of saliva run down its unspeakably sharp fangs to drip unhindered to the ground far below. Its jaws are large enough to swallow a whale, and as they watch, stricken, it takes one purposeful, slouching step toward them.

He powers up, and she reaches out and clenches his arm with her fingernails to make him quit. Demons are attracted by ki attacks. And are immune to them in turn. They were designed with only vengeance in the heart of their Creator, and so their sole purpose is to relentlessly pursue and devour any and all saiyans unlucky or foolish enough to cross their path. Body, and ki. Spirit, and all.

She knows that she and the baby are the only ones who stand even the slightest chance of victory. Being pregnant always increases a demon queller's strength, for that more than anything else can help the warrior truly connect with all things having to do with life and growth and survival. It is well that she is, because without being able to focus on that precious life growing within her, she would nearly be as powerless here as her mate. Nothing in this cursed land would be willing to help her at need. Nothing at all, for none of it is part of Ophelia's garden. Not anymore.

She begins to focus, but she hears a soft cry, and realizes that she is holding something close. She looks down to see a baby in her arms, completely wrapped in a soft blue and white blanket. In spite of the situation, her heart gives a leap of joy.

But then she realizes that she can't stand against the terrible abomination bearing down upon them after all. Even though her instincts are screaming at her to fight until the last draw and release of her breath.

His hand falls on her shoulder, and he leaves it there for a long moment. She wants to look up at him, yet she is almost fearful of whatever is written on his face.

He takes off one of his bracelets, takes one of her hands, and places it on her arm. He tells her that he will distract the fell thing while they get away, and then follow them. He tells her to go. Immediately. But she can see the lie in his deep brown eyes. She starts to cry. She begs him not to do it. This terrible thing that she knows is coming.

He growls at her to take him out of there. And at first she is confused at his meaning, but then she remembers that their son is in her arms. Completely helpless and depending on at least one of them to survive. She cries harder, but this time she is crying out that she is sorry. That she never should have stayed to fix the Barrier. That she loves him terribly, and yet she never would have gotten involved with him had she thought for a second…

The terrible reality of what she just said crashes down on her, and she gasps and cries that she didn't mean it that way. Never that way. He tilts her chin up with his hand, and rumbles that he knows, but never to say anything like that ever again…

In that world or the next.

One last sweet kiss, far too brief for either of their liking. Then he is in the air. Powered up to full strength. Speeding straight toward the wretched thing that she knows will take his life. When he reaches the demon, he lands on the ground before it. He takes off his other bracelet, and throws it to the ground. She recognizes this threat display. It's a promise that the fangs and claws of the demon will become his next bracelet. It throws the demon into a snarling frenzy. She can see him tense from all that way away. Getting ready to leap to one side…

With a sob, she turns and runs. She isn't strong enough to see it happen. And she knows that the only solace she can offer him is the sight of her fleeing back as she and their precious son escape from hell.

For a few moments she can sense his ki burning brightly—flickering as he dodges and fights and stalls for them. She has just enough time to think that if by some miracle she can find the hidden Barrier and cross back safely, he can follow them after all.

In an instant, his ki is gone. A moment later, she smells his blood.

The baby cries.

Horribly the blood-smell grows stronger. The world shakes underfoot as the demon gives chase and grows close.

She clutches the baby close to her. She is his mother. He is all that is left of his father. She will always protect him. No harm will ever befall him.

A gigantic, clawed forepaw smashes down on her back, pinning her down like a field mouse. She instinctively throws her arms out directly in front of her so the baby wont be crushed beneath her and the monster. The fall and awkward landing rattle her grip. She feels the foul dirt lurch beneath her, and then a wind finally does blow. It blows with the gale force of a dozen hurricanes. It blows tons of sour, dead ground, blackening out the already dark world.

She frantically tries to get a better hold of the baby, but its too late. Still wrapped up warmly in his blanket, he is carried away by the wind. She can hear his terrified cries and hiccups drifting away. She sends her own screams after him, and fights like an Oozarong to break free.

And then the ground gives one last, unlovely heave as the demon leaves, its paw coming off her back at last. The debris settles down, the darkness disperses somewhat, and the poisoned world returns to its own mad definition of normalcy.

Somehow she gets up, and she is screaming for her son. She is running drunkenly toward the last place she heard his desperate cries for help, for her. She only finds a small, irregular looking mound. She digs into it with her fingers…

But all she finds is…

The soft, blue and white blanket.

Embroidered with the star and ki blast of the royal family.

And now she lies broken and alone in the mad realm, the demon realm. The mate of a dead god, and mother to a precious baby son she never even got to look upon, who went to Ophelia much, much too soon. She buries her face in the blanket and weeps for her lost men. She has no interest in running. No interest in leaving the dead land, for now she is dead inside. She will stay and become poor sport for the next thing to pass her by.

She was once the great Queen Dynasty. The greatest demon queller who ever lived.

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Not an hour after he sensed the baby's ki, he snapped instantly awake. Her ki had changed. It became more difficult to sense, yet still as strong as ever. He heard a rustling beneath the windows, and he saw that she was using her strange powers to bring in assorted rubbish from outside. Old, dried up weeds, thick green blades of grass, feathers, and clumps of dirt, flower petals, leaves and even the odd dead bug or two.

Before his eyes, all the rubbish began to mold together and change shape into miniature versions of themselves, the dead land, and the monster. Held only by her concentration, fueled by the vividness of the terrible visions that whirled unbidden through her heart, he saw a silent replay of everything that took place in her nightmare from the time they were stranded, and on.

He watched it all, transfixed with horror, and when it came to the part where she was left utterly alone and undone, she was stricken in real life, still asleep, by great, heartbroken sobs that shook her whole body.

He tried to wake her up, but she didn't react. She was too upset to even notice. So he did the best he could do to assure her that she wasn't alone. He lay back down beside her and held her much as he did before, then he gradually funneled some ki into his aura. Surrounding her with it. Before long, he felt some of her ki come back to him, and knew that he was getting his point across. Her features smoothed, her breathing became deep and regular again, and she released her mysterious hold on the rubbish beneath the window, letting it drift to the floor.

"Saints preserve us." His whisper was hoarse. What could have possibly happened to cause such dark thoughts to torment her so?

It was symbolic…it had to be, because nothing of the world could be so dark and horrible, and nothing was capable of harming either of them at any time.

He set about analyzing the dream. First of all, they had been in an unknown place, where there wasn't anything familiar looking. It was difficult to tell anything else about the place, since it had been shown to him out of jumbled up junk.

They had been alone, and a huge monstrous thing had come out of the ground and attacked them. Leaving only her as a survivor.

So whatever they had faced was most likely something she felt that no one else was capable of facing, and the monstrous thing represented some titanic challenge or unlooked-for threat. But why would it only destroy him and the baby?

Then it slowly dawned on him.

It had to be growing fear of the tuffle situation. She had seen the horrific pictures from the lab investigations, and the worst things often took place many stories underground. Science was the only power that neither of them understood. And according to what the investigators and the science guild had uncovered thus far, it was growing clearer every day that the purpose was to find the "true" cause behind an average saiyan's power.

Also, tuffle society was nearly completely devoid of plant and animal life. It was all concrete and metal and glass.

Hence, the unfamiliar surroundings the whole ordeal took place in.

Satisfied with this explanation, he decided that from that day forward, he would try his best to keep certain bits of information from her. Such as the newly-discovered storage units full of severed tails. She didn't need to know about those awful things…especially in her condition.

And at the first safe opportunity, they would take a trip north to Ganymede. He would hunt a splendid sea tortoise and take the shell for the bassinet they would need before too long. It would get them away from the palace for a time…

Besides…

It was often said in his home villages that when used as a bassinet, it guaranteed good health and long life for the babe.

He relaxed, but stayed wakeful, even in that dark hour. There would be no further sleep that night…not after all that…

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Cool radiance flowed from the very air itself, heralding the coming sun, and sending all the insects and birds to meet it in celebration. The dim, glistening morning stars winked out and drifted down to shimmer upon every leaf, blade of grass and rooftop. A few flyers could be seen, far off, beginning their daily errands and training, perhaps knowing that soon the honest heat of the day would set in, and drive them to the shade and cool stone, the rivers, the lakes, and perhaps even the faraway sea.

She slept on peacefully, and the baby gave a little kick.

He stifled a yawn, and continued his watch.

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I'd really appreciate more reviews please—it would really be nice if you could spare the time )

I hoped you enjoyed yourself, and stay on board for chapter 5—coming soon in a week or so!

Stay out of the heat!