Aliens and Dragons
The fourth chapter. Kind of great, don't you think? This story is not exactly top of my priorities in the long list of stories, both current work and future ones. But still something to pass time and let some fans enjoy a nice reading.
And as of this precise moment, the story begins!
Chapter 4: First Team
Life on Planet Earth returned back to normal just a few weeks after the Dark Thursday. Of course, 'normal' on these days was a word that had plenty of meanings to go by. And what could be considered less than 'normal' than a farm in Smallville, where two aliens were living at plain sight, yet at the same time hidden from the world? Sometimes secrets were slapping at your face and no one could be the wiser in finding them.
"So, did you hear the news about our Zod vessel?" Chloë walked in the Kent's kitchen, carrying a fresh newspaper. Goku was already eating as much as always, though not paying a lot of attention to Chloe's comment because he didn't know anything about Zod or the 'vessel' as she was saying.
The blonde girl's boyfriend snickered, not in the mood for a morning Luthor doses.
"What Lex does is not longer of my concern Chloë" Clark replied, after reading and dropping the paper without a second glance. Goku turned his eyes from his food to the news. Though the paper had a lot of words, and even though the warrior knew how to read, he only had to simply look at the tittle's worlds to find out one that higlighted for his brain.
" 'Plant Murder?' " Goku asked/said, reading at one of the paper's many titles on the front page. The picture described men impaled by tree branches. But the most gruesome part was that the branches weren't in a tree. They protruded from the man's inside out. Like they had crawled like animals out of the innocent dead people.
"At least someone here knows how to read in detail" Chloë said approvingly to Goku, who only rubbed his head and smiled innocently "As I was saying before you lashed, apparently Lex is coincidentally giving a sudden charity for the last Dark Thursday, at the same time these new dead corps are found" Clark's eyes widen in some serious realization.
"You think Lex might have let loose some of the meteor freaks?" The farm alien asked "Maybe he's infected by one of the Zoners" The farm alien kept on, look of worryness in his face.
"Zoner?" Goku asked by the awry term. Clark was mostly eager to enlighten his alien pal.
"Phantoms. They are bodiless aliens my biological father sent to another dimension to punish them" The kryptonian explained.
"Kind of harsh but why should I judge?" The palm-haired Saiyan replied, eating again.
"And as I'm the closest reporter Lex has, I'm invited" The blonde reporter smiled, taking the invitation out of her pocket. The Kryptonian wasn't jumping in delight by the news though.
"Chloë, if you are going near Lex then be careful. Who knows what he might try to do" Clark said worried.
"Clark, I know what Luthors can and can't do just like if I were one" The reporter smirked, suddenly rubbing her skin by the chills that traveled down her spine "Forget about what I just said, like forever"
"Agreed" Clark answered. The blonde shook her head before keeping her talk.
"Besides, getting near Lex computers might give me the right push to discover the secret pictures of Dark Thursday" The reporter, and also expert computer hacker, commented with barely hidden glee.
"You think Lex will simply let you waltz in, have some wine and then grant you access into his ultra-secret computer without a second thought?" Clark said, his tone obviously concerned "That's being plain reckless"
"That's why it will work" She stole a quick kiss from her boyfriend "Meanwhile, you two shall be investigating this new park homicides"
"Two referring to whom exactly?" The farm alien asked with an eyebrow corked. Chloë looked now at the eating Saiyan. The weird-haired warrior stopped his morning feasting, suddenly two pair of eyes on him.
"Me?" The palm-haired fighter asked in utter confusion "No offense Chloë, but I've never been a detective myself"
"What a better time to start than now?" The blonde reporter replied with a small smile, leaving the house back to her work. Goku gave a slight growl when the female left ear-shot.
"She is not my girlfriend. Why is she bossing me?" The alien from another dimension asked towards the solar-absorbing alien.
"Because then she wouldn't be Chloë" Clark replied with a knowing smirk. Oh, he did know a lot.
The two secret aliens of Earth walked into the Smallville's Park, covered in a flush green forest. Both were casually dressed, Clark in his typical red jacket and blue shirt and jeans, Goku following dressed in a black sleeveless t-shirt with dark blue pants.
"I feel a bit weird in these clothes" The spiky-haired warrior commented, tugging the collarbone of his shirt. The Kryptonian wanted to face-palm already.
"Goku, you materialized them" Clark retorted to his friend.
"I know. But it doesn't mean I will immediately like whatever I create" Goku shot back rubbing his head. The farm alien sighed, reading the text message his girlfriend sent to his cellphone.
"According to Chloë, some of the recent bodies were found a mile from here" The solar alien commented to Goku. The Earth-raised men looked around. There were many police cars parked in there, the officers looking for clues or any new evidence. With pin point precision, Clark and Goku easily avoided detection by using their alien speed. Just seconds later they run head on into a yellow police line, the ground where the bodies were found already unearthed.
"Well, that was easy" The Saiyan joked a bit. Clark paid no heed and used his multiple kinds of visions over the forest area. There were no weird traces left. Whoever did the job was good at covering the track.
"You are not supposed to be here" A female voice commented towards the two aliens in disguise. The two men looked towards the new presence. She was a tall woman, apparently on her late twenties. She was dressed in the park ranger outfit, a brown blouse with color-matching shorts. Her nubile figure could stop traffic anytime.
"We are from the search team" Clark quickly interfered, trying to not look flushed "Hi, I'm Clark Kent" He shook hands with her.
"I'm Goku" The Saiyan also introduced himself with a handshake. His ki senses, however, were scrutinizing the woman knowing something was wrong with her. Her energy was not human at all.
"Gloria" The ranger woman now introduced herself, her own out-of-the-world senses detecting the powerful odors from the two men. They both had power drool-worth. Almost out of this world. Her almond eyes remained on the also-aliens for a bit longer. Her eyebrows narrowed slightly.
They looked quite familiar.
"Tell me something Clark. Have we met before?" The ranger asked towards the solar-powered alien.
"I would definitely remember" The farm alien said with a small smirk.
"Chloë" Goku suddenly coughed/said, just a tad amused by raining on Clark's parade. Okay, more like very amused. The Kryptonian almost sent a death glare but he held back.
"Excuse my friend, we are only looking for clues about the recent murders" Goku explained looking around. While the Saiyan did that, Clark saw that the ranger looked... different after hearing the news. Maybe amused?
"You look happy" Clark asked the 'ranger'. She shook her head before answering.
"About the death men? No, they were innocent" Gloria said, her face amazingly stoic "It's just that I've lived so long here, that it tranquilizes me. Like if the forest talks to me"
"I know the feeling. The nature and yourself, side by side and living to see the next day" Goku commented, flashbacks of his days in the wild coming back to his memory. The park ranger looked towards the funky-hair style man with appraising eyes. She had to reluctantly hold her hormones down so to not snare the visitor into a drooling idiot.
For now.
"Well, I'll let you gentlemen do your job" She said now with a small smile, and a wink of eye towards Goku. She casually walked away from the scene.
"Clark, something's wrong here" The Saiyan said seriously as soon as the disguising female alien left ear-range.
"What do you mean?" The alien from this Earth asked. Maybe he had missed something.
"That woman... her energy didn't feel like human. Not even alien like yours" Goku explained.
"You can keep track of her?" Clark asked. The black-dressed fighter set his eyes into the middle of the forest.
"She hasn't moved that far away so, yes" The Saiyan confirmed, his ki energy detecting the park ranger still in tracking range.
"Here" The farm alien handed Goku a cellphone "If anything happens call me"
"Wait" Goku exclaimed but the Kryptonian had already sped away in blurring motion. Goku remained alone in the middle of the park "Perfect" He cursed to himself, looking at the small phone like if it was a miniature-sized nuclear bomb. Like if things couldn't get more difficult for him.
The alieness energy signal was followed and the now black-dressed Saiyan walked inside a greenhouse. It was all covered with a variety of green, brown and some red and blue exotic flowers. There was a powerful scent all over the place emanating from the
"Gloria!" Goku said out-loud knowing the alien stranger was nearby.
"Oh Goku. Why did it have to be you?" The ranger-dressed alien woman asked, sorry to have to kill such an amazing specimen of man.
"You know what you've done. Seven men murdered" The Saiyan stated with a dead-serious tone.
"No one understood me, Goku. I thought you did" The escaped alien stated in sorrow, rubbing her arms shuddering from the memories of her hellish prison "My own people banished me into a barren wasteland. No sunshine to glow with, no water to nurture and spread my roots"
"The Phantom Zone?" Goku asked, not really knowing a lot of that place. So far Clark hadn't gone into many details.
"How do you know that?" Gloria asked in shock. Her brain cells finally put the puzzle pieces together "Wait, that's why your friend Clark looked familiar. He was there. He's the son of Jor-El" The warrior's face remained mostly stoic.
"And you" The alien woman pointed towards Goku "You were there on that day too. I saw you falling from the same hole I did. But you aren't from the Zone, are you?"
"My Earth is long gone" The Saiyan briskly commented, keeping a cold demeanor on the outside. However, cold anger slowly crept inside him, his hands balling in fists.
"Don't you understand that?" Gloria asked, getting closer to Goku like a cat ready to jump over a delicious mouse. Her hands started to rome over Goku's physique. The Saiyan's senses detected a special sentient floating into his nose. Like pheromones trying to snare his mind and judgement. But a warrior's mind couldn't be swayed so easily "This is your second chance, as is mine. Together we can recover what we long lost. Our lives, a family, control over the unworthy"
"Sorry lady, but my friends are a bit more important than your weedy madness" Goku bellowed, his body shifted into a fighting stance. And by what the Saiyan could see, the fact her pheromones hadn't worked had pissed her off greatly.
"Fool! You could have been a king!" She bellowed, sudden vines popping from the ground and shackling Goku's wrists and ankles. The black-dressed man had to admit the plants were harder than steel "And now you shall be manure for my babies!" Vines sprouted around her and shot long thorns into the alien from another dimension. Goku's white aura bursted around him, quickly incinerating the shackling plants. He hastily and expertly somersaulted over the incoming projectiles landing gracefully behind the prisoner.
"Gloria, I really don't want to hurt you!" The Saiyan tried to reason with the flora villain. But something was telling Goku she wouldn't bend away so easily.
"But I do!" She shouted, running head on like a bull into her enemy. Her deadly fist went through Goku's guts.
No blood was spilled when the after image banished like a hologram. But it left something behind. A golden energy sphere, set it like a time bomb.
The real Goku was already outside his mind focusing and detonating his own ki energy boom. The entire place was leveled, the plants burnt and scorched down to ashes. Only dust on the floor remained from the former escaped Phantom.
"Well, that was it" The palm-haired fighter stated just a tad relieved. A tree branch fell hard on his head "Hey!" When he saved people, then plants got angry. Quite a weird irony in his crazy Saiyan life.
After walking for a couple of minutes, the Saiyan dropped on Smallville's lake's shore looking to the nearby forest and the concrete-made dam just a few meters away from him.
Something vibrated in Goku's pocket. He then realised he still had Clark's cellphone. But he still didn't know how to use it. Technology had always been Bulma's job.
But she wasn't around so better try and fail. The Saiyan pressed one button. Luckily for him it was the correct one.
"Em, Hello?" The ki fighter asked doubtfully.
"Goku?" The blonde reporter Chloë Sullivan asked back from the other side.
"Thank Kami, Chloë. I didn't know how the Hell to use this phone!" The Saiyan commented after a sigh of relief.
"Well, I guess you are the one needing some training now" The reporter snickered on the other end before going back to topic "Anyway, what happen with the forest issue?"
"Taken care off, It was one of those Phantom prisoner things" The alien responded.
"One down, and many others to go" Chloë said with a half joke. Her tone went serious though "Sorry Goku, I have to leave. Talk later"
"Yeah, See you later" Goku ended the call, pressing a button. The superhuman strength shattered the mobile into little pieces that fell to the sand shore "Oh great" The seasoned fighter cursed to no one in particular. Now he would have to pay it back to Clark.
Goku took a small green leaves out off his hair that remained from the battle, dropping them on the lake's surface. That was when the Saiyan widened his black eyes, looking down at the crystal surface of the water. Call him crazy but Goku could feel an energy signature from beneath the lake. For some very bizarre reason.
The fighter looked around. There were no energies around so meddlers were already out of the way. Taking a deep breath the warrior from another dimension went diving into the water. Goku swam easily twenty feet below the surface, the coldness of the liquid not stopping him. He had experienced worse cold and hot temperatures before. And he could hold his breath for a few hours if he so wanted.
His eyes diverted into the concrete wall of Smallville Dam. The power was emanating from inside. A green thing was floating around Goku. The Saiyan saw many glowing stones all of them shinning with green hue under the water. The warrior frowned, the floating rocks annoying him. There were far too many of them. With an underwater dash, the Saiyan collected all the glowing minerals in one ki bubble. Concentrating more energy, he turned them into nothing but dust.
Now with that taken care off, the warrior thrusted his hands right through the solid concrete, cracks spreading the water-stopping construct. His fingers felt the cold sensation of metal on the other side. And whatever it was, it was something big.
Knowing he only had one chance to do it right, the warrior's red aura of Kaioken flared up at three times normal, the water boiling around him and expelling bubbles upwards.
Lex Luthor sat behind his desk, basking in his incomparable cunning. After all, old pal Oliver Queen never showed up for the party. And of course, only Lex knew the true reason behind that mysterious incident. The press could write all day that the party guy went for some booze and hookers and the bald Luthor would laugh his ass out by the ridiculousness. Because soon nobody will hear from Oliver Queen ever again.
The bald man kept his gaze into nothing in particular on the wall, thinking further into the future with a sip of his drink. While his security had detected a breach in the Internet's firewalls, he had let that happen. Whatever was taken wasn't from LuthorCorp, a fact that confused the CEO first and foremost, but he wasn't going to look for the teeth in this last gifted horse of Fate. Specially because the cracked firewalls were directed into those from Queen Interprises. With the computer hacking still fresh, the bald scion had been able to steal until the last piece of anything worth money of his Oliver 'pal'. Now the pretty boy was less than a homeless whore.
With the company just a few days from making a deal into LuthorCorp and the former CEO of Queen's suddenly gone AWOL, Lex would eventually become an even bigger billionaire.
Maybe a trillionaire, but who paid heed to such little details.
But there was something still bothering the bald businessman in the back of his head: his father.
For some miraculous reason, Lionel was lying low ever since the Dark Thursday. But Lex knew better. Always keep an eye on your enemy, even if he's doing nothing. But apparently that had been Lionel's breakfast for the last weeks. Like if he wasn't willing to show his face anytime soon. In fact, the former CEO had not gone into public campaigns or even visited the Kents.
Not that Lex kept an eye on that farm. Only his father thought the farm boy was worth something.
The Luthor scion finished his drink and walked away. For now, he had more pressing things to take care off. Like the monkey man that fell from the sky weeks ago. He knew there was a powerful weapon at his disposal there. But how to control it was the problem.
"Well, the campaign went fine and Goku said that the Zoner is gone" The pretty blonde reporter for the Daily Planet said with a smile, herself and Clark walking inside the Kent farm in the middle of the noon.
"Talking about that Saiyan, where is he?" Clark asked. Chloë shrugged her shoulders and turned on the Tv.
"Breaking news on Smallville central. Just moments ago, the local dam has bursted out, flooding the entire Smallville park for miles end. No casualties have been mentioned yet" The breaking-news man reported.
"Wow, what could have happen?" The reporter from the Planet asked worried. There was a sudden thud in the farm's backyard. Clark and Chloë met their eyes in concern and hurriedly walked outside.
"Hey guys, look what I found in the dam!" The Saiyan said out-loud smiling from outside the house, his body still soaking wet and carrying a giant red alien ship on his hands.
The couple face-palmed.
Notes from Chapter 4:
Goku is still a bit reckless, in the sense he does a few things without thinking.
And yes, Kara shows up already.
I know it sounds weird that Goku would let people die, but remember that he had no idea that taking the ship out of the dam would cause a collapse on itself. And he is also not as stupid as his cannon self. After all he just lost his entire family.
And Lionel is playing low for now. He has some plans regarding Clark.
So apparently our friends will have a new alien companion in their journey. Which gives us three good aliens and a super hacker human against the many other villains to come. See you when I see you!