AN: So, interestingly, this chapter just appeared like a rogue. This is not the thing I planned for this chapter, but good lord did it write itself quickly.

The Next Dimension Over

Chapter Forty-six

At some point she'd been taken in by the claims that there really could be a wish granting dragon creature, and assumed that it probably wasn't directly Kaguya. It was hard to pinpoint exactly when she started believing it (even on a temporary basis), but for now...she simply hoped it was true for the sake of the burned village and the small boy without a family.

She leaned on the rails outside the upper part of the tower, staring down at the clouds far below. It wasn't all clouds, there was haze and other things that kept her from seeing the forest below. The entire thing could burn down and she wouldn't likely see much. If only that tiny settlement had burned, there was no way the cat could have known when it happened.

Her fingers tightened on the railing, and she closed her eyes a moment.

Was it irresponsible? She didn't even know if she could believe in a thing that could revive the dead without some sort of horrible catch. But, hadn't Naruto done something for Obito? If that man hadn't been completely broken by the jinchuuriki separation, was it possible he could have brought someone back to life? If he could do that, then could something else?

The world...

The world wasn't pleasant or peaceful. Even this one that seemed on the surface to be the sort of world she would have liked to live in (or anyone else in the Shinobi world who desired peace would) had things as horrible as this. Even if they brought it back, how many other people were killed by the army that they didn't know about? Was it her responsibility to bring them back instead of going home and helping her people?

Did it even matter to anyone at home if she did, anymore?

She bit her lip and frowned, forcibly shoving all of those thoughts away. Goku was still trying to get that water, and he was rapidly improving. If she sulked about at the edge of the tree-tower much longer, someone else watching his training would probably notice and come start asking questions.

She sighed, and released the railing. A moment later, something crashed between her shoulder blades at high speed. Something large and quite heavy.

She gave a shout of alarm at about the same moment she flipped right over the rail and fell from the top of the tower. Her fingers reached out a moment too late and uselessly swiped at air, instead of the bottom of the tower.

The missile that had knocked her off of her perch popped his head out from over the railing as well, expression horrified. "SAKURA!"

(*)

"So you're telling me, on the top of the tallest damn tower in the world there's a cat?" He...he honestly didn't know what to think, because he didn't even know what he expected to be on the top other than 'nothing' and possibly at some point 'the afterlife'.

A cat calling himself a cat god didn't really count as any kind of afterlife he was willing to acknowledge.

"It's a tree." Sakura said from the other side of the room.

"Well..." Bulma tapped her chin thoughtfully. "I guess it's made out of wood. That explains how it can be so tall but so intricately designed."

"I'm not just 'a cat'." The cat said. "I am Korin. I watch over this tower and my land, and-"

"A fine job you did of watching over them since they're all dead." Bulma cut in, expression about as unimpressed as he felt.

"I watch over this land. I didn't adopt the people."

"That's horrible!" Goku hissed, fists at his side.

The cat turned its attention to him. "Even if I tried to save them, there is no way I could have. The people who live there haven't contacted me in years, I have no idea what state they're in."

"Then...let me have the water so I can save them!"

Did...did Goku even need the water? They'd handled the army pretty well, for it being the Red Ribbon Army. But then again, maybe it was smart not to just turn down the opportunity to get stronger. He certainly needed to get stronger, if his performance over the past week had been any indication to himself.

The cat nodded suddenly. "Well then. If the both of you can work together to get the water, then the both of you can drink the water."

"Uh..." He frowned down at Goku. Well...it wasn't the first time they'd had to team up and fight something, right? "I guess I could help..."

Goku made an unconvinced sound. "...But I get to drink it first, because I started training first."

"Yeah...sure."

Honestly, it really couldn't be that bad if they both tried at the same time.

(*)

"The both of you are hopeless." Korin shook his head in annoyance. "If that's the best effort you can put forth, you should have taken my offer to go back home."

Bulma sighed from beside her. "Going right back down after all the effort of coming up here would be kind of depressing if we don't get anything out of it..."

She glanced over at the blue haired woman, before digging into her pocket and withdrawing the small bean the cat had tossed her the day before. "There's this."

Bulma frowned down at the bean in her hand. "What...? It just looks like a lima bean."

She rolled the bean between her thumb and forefinger. "It's called a senzu bean. When Goku was hungry, Korin gave this to him and it filled him up completely."

"Just that?" Bulma gave a shriek of surprise. Which immediately distracted Yamcha and resulted in the man landing face first on the ground.

"...Yeah." She nodded, and pocketed the bean again. "That was yesterday. He doesn't look hungry again yet. Korin said that it would last for ten days."

"That's...amazing." Bulma's gaze turned back to where the two boys struggled to break through Korin's defense. "How could a little bean be able to provide all that? Normally, it takes huge meals just to keep him happy for half a day when he's training this much."

"I've been meaning to ask him about it...but I'm not sure he'll give me a straight answer about it." He certainly hadn't offered any kind of explanation as to why the water improved someone's strength when she'd made indirect (and one direct) question as to why and how it did.

He'd probably just insist it was magical.

"If I can get it back to my lab..." Bulma hummed softly. "Maybe I can figure out how it works. If nothing else, it'll drastically drop the food bill if I can just give Goku one of these whenever he comes for a visit..."

It might just be the only thing they did bring back, however. While Goku and Yamcha both fought hard, and Yamcha was doing quite well anticipating Korin's movements...they were the worst team she'd ever seen. Probably worse than Team 7 back in the bell test. Goku and Yamcha's moves would actively get in each other's way. Yamcha would trip over Goku, and Goku would accidentally step in the way of one of Yamcha's decisive blows and then complain and bicker at Yamcha.

Ever since getting the both of them to fight him at once, she had the impression Korin had to try even less than before. It was starting to make her feel just a little embarrassed for them.

It was starting to remind her of Naruto and Sasuke more than she wanted it to.

(*)

Two good things came of the day: he didn't spend it climbing, and he actually felt full. Somehow.

He reclined on the bed Korin had set up for him, and looked around the room, not quite yet ready to go to sleep. Pu'ar curled in a ball on one of the bins of water in the tree house (he'd taken an experimental sip of the water when no one was looking to see if maybe it was extra water the vase kept, but to no effect). Bulma slept on one of the blankets near him. Across the room, Goku curled up against Sakura's leg and hip, while she sat against the wall and...appeared to sleep.

Probably actually slept. It wouldn't be as weird to be sleeping so high up in the air if she'd been doing it as long as she had, probably. She also slept further away from those open things. Honestly, he was kind of worried somehow himself or someone else might go and roll off of the place while they were sleeping.

He huffed and rolled onto his side.

He felt sore. Much less sore than he expected to feel the night after climbing the damn t...ree, but sore. That was probably a good sign that he was at least training himself again and whipping himself back into shape. Getting into teamwork with Goku was...weirdly difficult.

Maybe he was just worried the problem was that Goku outpaced him so far he dragged Goku down. Then again, the problem might have been he'd gotten too distracted worrying about that, and couldn't anticipate his friend's moves, let alone Korin's. He needed to...keep his head clearer in battle, instead of worrying about whether he was good enough for the battle or not. He knew that.

He needed to pull himself together already, and stop worrying so much about something that didn't happen. Near-miss brushes with death and tragedy were just a part of living the life he chose. It'd been a while because he'd started living with Bulma in the middle of a peaceful city having a life without all the risk and violence he was used to. But he knew better than to let his thoughts get the better of him when it was important.

He needed to stop thinking so damn much and just go to sleep already.

He groaned softly, and buried his face in his hands.

If he pretended it was just too bright in the room because of the moon, then probably he could get to sleep without thinking about anything else. He had a hell of a lot of sleep to catch up on...and they still had four dragonballs to get after they got their hands on that water.

The sooner they got their way past the cat, the better.

(*)

Wind whistled past her, as Goku's face quickly shrank away, arm thrown uselessly over the edge.

In this situation, there were many things a shinobi could do to escape. With the right summoning scroll, or with the right summoning contract, she could simply bring an escape to her. With the right jutsu, she could (apparently) make herself float on air. There were many things a shinobi could do in her situation.

None of them were things she was currently capable of.

Strength isn't everything.

She'd told Goku that only the night before last. She had more than strength, but it wasn't much that could help from falling at such a tremendous height.

If she focused and summoned her chakra properly, accessed the regeneration she'd only just mastered...when she impacted, she'd probably survive. If barely. Stripes of her seal wove around her arms and down her sides, curled around fingertips lifted up and buffeted by the wind.

"Sakura!"

She turned her head, startled out of her thoughts, and spotted Goku climbing down the tower at a speed desperate enough to just about keep pace with her. The edge of the structure up top was so much further out from the trunk of the tree, though, that she couldn't reach out and grab his hand.

But she wouldn't, if she could. At their speed, at his position, if she grabbed hold of him, she'd only rip him off of the tower and into the air as well. Saving someone else would be difficult. She'd have to share her healing with him when they crashed into the ground, and he was...smaller. She was only fairly certain she'd survive it herself.

"Goku, what the hell do you think you're doing?" She shouted over the wind. Hopefully, despite the way their rapid descent drowned out her words, her anger would carry anyway. At the speed he moved, with his focus on her instead of his handholds, he could easily fall off. Out of reach. "Stop it!"

Of course he didn't listen to her. He must have heard her. She shrieked at him. He had to have heard her. And he outright refused to listen.

Instead, for some horrible, awful reason, he jumped off of the tower toward her.

Why?

Did he plan to call his cloud when it could have been anywhere? That was too much risk without an actual summoning contract! Surely, it must have been some attempt to catch her and get her to the nimbus cloud...but..

Her arms wrapped around him protectively the moment she made contact with him, hastily connecting her chakra network with him to afford some small amount of protection.

A moment after that, her back crashed through the top of a tree.