AN: There are things I want to happen in the future of the fic, but they may be sad dreams that disappear because of butterflies. Much like Sakura vs Oozaru in the World Tournament. Maybe I'll make a side fic of what-if one shots for moments that could have happened but didn't.

The Next Dimension

Chapter Twenty-Four

She didn't scream, but in fairness she couldn't have if she wanted to. She'd taken the brunt of the force from the heavy weight right in her diaphragm. Goku did scream though. The energy that passed through her knocked him much further out from Muscle Tower. The difference was somewhat immaterial, given even she was too far to reach the tower wall.

For a moment, she glimpsed the triumphantly smirking face of the ninja behind the dead weight, and then she plummeted out of sight.

"Nimbus!" She craned her head toward him as he shouted in something of an understandable panic. "Please, help me!"

Five tall floors was far to fall. She'd probably survive if she activated her regeneration, but he was too far out of reach to grab, and much smaller than her. Five floors wasn't very far to fall waiting on something to catch them.

A golden blur sped into view over one of the nearby hills. From what she could tell (and her judgment was admittedly not the best at that moment), it moved more quickly than she'd ever seen it fly before. He crashed onto the cloud with a grunt, and the cloud dipped slightly to compensate for his landing.

"Sakura!" The cloud swooped down toward her, and he pulled out that staff of his again. "Power pole, extend! Quickly!"

She reached up as it fell toward her, and clasped to the bottom of it with one chakra-charged hand. She winced as her body swung violently from side to side...but her feet hung a few feet away from the snow below. Healing the damage from the quick stop would be easier than healing the impact of a sudden one.

The nimbus slowly began to climb again as the pole shrank and pulled her back up. "Are you okay?"

She nodded and frowned, swinging herself onto the golden...entity, and rubbed her shoulder. "Are you, Goku?"

"Uh huh." He nodded, and turned his gaze up to the hole they'd fallen through. "He cheats too much."

She bit her cheek in annoyance. "He does." It wasn't really that he cheated, though. Whatever it was he was doing, they were all somehow tricks. Even the one in which he seemed to simply replicate himself every time she defeated him on that floor. The problem was...she kept letting him do them. She knew better than to underestimate her opponent, or to play around instead of accomplish the mission. She'd spent so long hiding her skills from that hermit in fear that he was some sort of spy that she'd started making a habit of not using them when she should.

This would be the last time she did such a thing.

She stood as they approached the gap in the wall, pulling back her fist. the heavy stone they'd used to knock she and Goku out mostly blocked the way in. She'd start her comeback by fixing that.

"Take this!" She slammed her fist into the brick. Parts on the edges shattered and exploded outward. The inner section of the rock, reinforced by metal, managed to stay together. Instead, her punch caused it to flip back the way it came, and then smash through the wall above, spinning out through the air in a way not unlike they had.

The man stood in the middle of the room, halfway turned toward them, expression openly shocked.

Her knuckles cracked as she stepped over Goku to walk into the tower. She pressed one fist into her hand in front of herself and then the other, marching across the floor toward the man. "You know what...?"

"E-eh...?" He took a step back, as if to run, and she flickered across the room to him, grabbing him by his collar.

"You weren't wrong."

He struggled ineffectually against her grip, and then-as if only remembering right then-drew his sword.

She gave an angry scream and punched him in the face, releasing her grip as the blow contacted. He didn't even shout as he flew through the air and crashed into the metal cage on the other side of the room.

This time, he didn't reappear somewhere else on the floor.

Goku wandered up next to her, frowning slightly. "So...did he count as two turns?"

She blinked, and glanced down at him. "Huh...?" Well...they were on another floor. "Um."

On the other side of the room, metal creaked and scraped across stone.

...Ah.

"...I think he counts as one." She frowned into the gloom of the room. The question was...did this floor hold something dangerous like the third had, or would it be as easy to deal with as the second and fourth?

For a moment, Goku looked up at her in confusion, and then the heavy thumps of something against stone caught his ear. He immediately shifted to a defensive posture, and grinned off toward that mystery cell.

"Alright! I thought we wouldn't get another one on this floor!"

As with the third floor, the sound of heavy footsteps quickly led to the appearance of a huge, monstrous looking person. Wide eyes stared down at them, emotionless, as he approached them, and huge hands swung at his sides.

Goku crouched down slightly, and she took a step back. "Are you ready to fight me now?"

The man stopped moving and looked at him in silence for a moment, before finally speaking. "...No."

"Huh?" Goku blinked, and straightened slightly, staring up at the huge man. "What d'you mean you're not ready?"

"I will not fight you." The man stared at Goku, and then up at her. "You...oppose the Red Ribbon Army?"

She glanced between Goku, who also looked up at her, and the soft-spoken giant. "It seems so."

Goku nodded, more enthusiastic. "Yeah! We're gonna beat 'em all up!"

She didn't particularly remember agreeing to that...but at the same time, a military group after a wish...probably needed to be uprooted before it was too late. Especially given the way they'd acted so far.

The giant stared down at his feet. "Fighting...is dangerous."

"But sometimes it's necessary!" Goku puffed out his chest.

"Is it...?" The man looked up at Goku, expression...concerned? Sad? Either way...it...reminded her of Naruto. Well, Goku reminded her of the Naruto she'd known when she was younger. This one...was starting to remind her of the hero who somehow managed to change the hearts and minds of everyone he touched, and save everyone in Konoha just by being him.

"I don't know."

Both of them looked up at her in surprise. The bigger one seemed to have a bit of hope in his gaze. Goku just...seemed surprised.

Well...she wasn't Naruto. She was pretty sure there were times that fighting really was the only option. But he'd probably say...something.

She crossed her arms and looked away, at the ground. "Maybe...maybe not. We won't know until we're there. Sometimes fighting's the easiest way, though. Even if it's not the only way." She shrugged slightly, brushing away the memories that struggled to fill her consciousness and overwhelm her. "An old friend of mine would say that. But I'm not him. You can choose not to fight, if you don't want to...but you might die if you don't."

The man was quiet for a few moments, and Goku slowly looked between them.

"...I...do not want to fight." The man rumbled softly.

"Then you will die, traitor!" And there was that disembodied voice again, the one that followed them from floor to floor.

"Oh yeah?!" Goku shouted up into the air. "Well, I won't let you hurt him even if you try!"

The voice was quiet for a surprisingly long amount of time, and when it spoke, there was a waver in it that she couldn't quite identify. "If you plan to stop me, you'll need to find me first."

The tall man was quiet for a moment, expression sad once more. "Attempting to protect me...would be dangerous."

"We don't care!" He glanced back at her. "Right?"

She nodded after a moment. So far, the danger might have been real, but not...particularly...steep. "I'm not afraid of what I've seen from this army so far."

"So then...you are here to save the village elder?"

She looked to Goku again, whose expression was as confused as her own must have been.

The both of them spoke at the same time. "Village elder?"

The giant stared at them for a moment, and then shook his head. "It is...the old man that General White captured..."

The shop owner hadn't actually mentioned that. Though, it was possible she simply hadn't because they had interrupted her a fair bit when she was speaking. But, that did explain the implied 'or else'. And made her all the more willing to take the army down.

But not the tower. It was a good thing after all she hadn't opted for that.

"...Do you know where he is?"

The man nodded. "I can show you the way."

Goku nodded, finally responding. "Okay! We'll rescue the village elder, too!"

He probably didn't need to make it sound like quite so much of an after thought.

"The next floor is confusing, so please follow me closely." The lumbering man turned around in place, and then slowly made his way toward the stairs. As they passed, she spared a glance into the cell (whose bars had been twisted and warped away from the cell itself by the impact of the ninja and...probably the strength of the large man ahead of her). It was some small reassurance to see the form of the would-be ninja still crumpled inside it, not mysteriously vanished and waiting somewhere else.

She'd really been starting to get sick of that one.

'Confusing' apparently meant 'labyrinth', as the floor above opened up into a maze. But...it wouldn't have been all that difficult. The floors were relatively small...and they were both rather good at smashing holes through the walls themselves.

"The both of you..." The large man spoke thoughtfully as he walked. "What...are your names?"

"I'm Goku! What's yours?" Unsurprisingly, he spoke before she had a chance to, voice energetic and curious.

"They called me Android number Eight."

Number eight? Was he some sort of test subject, then? It would explain his odd shape, and the earlier version of his' incredible strength (and...strangeness). It would also explain keeping him prisoner in the place that seemed to be his own home.

"...That's too much to remember." Goku huffed. "Can I just call you 'Eight'?"

The man looked over his shoulder briefly, and then nodded. "It...is okay."

She followed after the other two with a hand on her hip, glancing along the alternate paths as they walked. "My name's Sakura."

"Like cherries..." The man rumbled, barely audible. He pointed ahead, a moment later. "This is the stairs to the elder."

She walked up to them and glanced over at him. "Do you want to come with us? There might be more enemies up above."

The man, Eight, looked down at the ground for a few moments, and then finally nodded. "I will...follow you."

Perhaps it was due to being an enclosed corridor, rather than an open path where she could track her height by watching the floor below, but the stairs felt...unnaturally long. For one floor, it seemed as if they climbed far too many stairs. Perhaps they were made differently as well to discourage those who actually made it through the maze, and leave them disoriented?

Perhaps.

At the very top of the stairs stood a metal door. "Behind there is the command room. The village elder is trapped in there."

Goku huffed, cheeks puffing out. "I hope there's someone to fight in there. It's not fair that I didn't get another turn."

As the tall man swung the door inward and they stepped inside the room, a wide-shouldered man stood from a chair next to the floor's especially wide window. "How very kind of the three of you to come to me. I've been waiting."

AN: We've had four chapters of action, I wonder what that means.

Maybe three and a half chapters.