I do not own DBZ
A Father's Fate
The Story of Bardock
Parched orange ground reverberated as several loud booms echoed off of the large rock formation. The booms occurred faster and faster until a figure came into view. Bardock tumbled through the air, landing on the ground with a thud and slamming his hand downward, sending himself rocketing upward. As he reached the peak of his bound, Bardock punched and kicked in a sequence, following the same pattern as the last dozen times.
As Bardock began to drift downward he righted himself, gently landing on his feet. Sweat glistened on his skin, dripping off into the ground that greedily swallowed up any liquid. Bardock sighed in relief as he slipped off his arm weights, letting them fall heavily to the ground. As Bardock let the vest slide down his arms, he realized he'd been training for longer than he meant to. The cold air came racing in, threatening to send the Saiyan into shock.
It's been a week since Fasha nearly killed herself. The man thought. She's probably better now, but still. Bardock shook his head. No, she's a warrior too. She can fight with the best of them. Smirking, Bardock picked up all his weights and walked towards the cave. As he entered, Fasha sat up from against the wall.
"You ready?" Bardock asked as he walked in.
"Finally some action!" Fasha replied. Bardock walked past her and set his weights down a short ways into the cave. He cupped his hands and drank deeply from the pool of water. Fasha looked on eagerly. "When do we start?"
Bardock splashed water onto his face before turning towards Fasha, "Now is good," the man said before wiping his face.
"But you were just training."
"It was just a warmup," Bardock responded firmly. We should be even after that. "Let's go." The two Saiyans exited the cave, walking a short distance apart. As the cave left visible sight, the two waited for the temperature to reach its coldest.
"Shouldn't be too much longer now," Bardock said. Fasha nodded, squinting in the direction the wind came from. This is it Fasha! Time to show Bardock that we are here to fight. For father! Fasha thought, facing away from Bardock.
"Fasha let's do it!" Bardock said, raising his power level to its limits. Energy rotated around the duo, forcing the air against the wind and eventually backwards. The ground rumbled and loose rocks near Bardock raised into the air. The air itself became hazy and thick before turning back to normal. Fasha spun around, her aura wildly dancing about.
With a growl, Fasha brought all her power out, having similar effects as Bardock's power up. Fasha's white aura raced wildly, moving faster in more random directions while Bardock's was stable. In a quiet voice Fasha mumbled, "You need more power,"
Bardock saw Fasha's mouth move but didn't hear anything. Shrugging, the Saiyan kicked off of the ground flying at Fasha at full speed. Fasha smirked, spinning to the side and swinging her outside arm at Bardock. Bardock ducked his head and pushed Fasha in the stomach, knocking her off balance. As she fell, Bardock brought his knee up towards her face. Fasha pushed with both hands on his knee, sending her into the air and slowing Bardock down by a step.
Fasha slammed her foot down, aiming at Bardock's head. The male Saiyan blocked her kick with his right arm and grabbed her leg that rested upon it. Jumping upward, Bardock brought Fasha above himself and slammed downward. Fasha powered up an energy blast and fired at Bardock the second she flew past his face.
Fasha slammed into the ground, looking up at Bardock. The man had his head angled weird and his cheek was burnt a bit, but he seemed to be okay. Fasha pulled herself out of the rocks, smiling as she did so. Bardock smirked as he grabbed Fasha's head before she was finished standing and threw her behind himself. Fasha flipped around only to have Bardock right in front of her. Pushing herself backwards, Fasha fired a small blast at Bardock.
"Ha, that's it, Fasha?" Bardock said, catching the orb. "Not good enough!" the man said racing forward. Fasha raised her arm to block, causing Bardock to grab her arm and throw the energy ball at her exposed midsection.
Bardock landed a few paces away, hands at his sides. Fasha appeared in the dust just as Bardock finished powering up his attack. Fasha paused as she saw Bardock's hands glowing. The Saiyan smirked at her before throwing an energy wave at her. Fasha raised up both of her arms and took the blast. While she was forced back, Fasha angled herself so the wave slid off of her arm and away. As the wave left, it knocked her off balance, leaving an opening that Bardock couldn't miss.
Bardock threw his second energy wave at Fasha, which she half blocked. The arm closest to Bardock was raised in an effort to stop the attack. Fasha grunted with effort, trying to regain her balance while still stopping the attack. After several seconds she managed to put her other hand on the wave and force the attack to pass over her head. Fasha looked at where Bardock was and gaped.
"It's over," Bardock said from right next to Fasha. Fasha turned her head slowly to see Bardock standing there with his cupped hands right next to herself. Fasha was about to say something when a quick flash of energy knocked her away. Bardock ran towards Fasha, wincing every time she tumbled on the ground.
Bardock ran past Fasha and scooped her up as she rolled to him. The man picked her up and gently carried her towards the cave. Wasn't much of a training experience. Soon she will be closer to my level. Bardock thought, walking towards their temporary home.
"Bardock, I can still fight. I'm okay." Fasha said strongly.
"Is that a fact?" the Bardock said, setting her down.
"Yeah, it can't end yet," Fasha said, managing a smile.
"Alright, I suppose we can go a while more. Loser makes dinner," Bardock smirked hopping backwards. Fasha rolled onto her feet. That was horrible Fasha! We can do so much better. Fasha dashed forward, throwing a punch towards Bardock, who dodged the attack and pushed Fasha's arm to the side, knocking her off balance again. Fasha growled and spun with her momentum, bringing her foot up into Bardock's face.
Bardock recoiled, stepping backwards. Fasha shot her foot out at Bardock's knee, in an attempt to trip him. The Saiyan jumped over Fasha's foot, landing perfectly in balance. Fasha spun herself and continued her kick, this time aiming at Bardock's midsection. Bardock ducked under the leg and moved in on Fasha as her back was facing him. Bardock grabbed Fasha from behind and flipped into the air, bringing Fasha's face close to the ground, but at the last minute he jumped, flipping quicker than Fasha could keep up with.
As Bardock's feet hit the ground, he released Fasha, sending her disoriented into the air. Bardock watched momentarily as Fasha spun awkwardly through the air. After a second, Bardock raced into the air, passing Fasha along the way. As he reached his destination, Bardock fired a blast downward, knocking Fasha out of her spin. Fasha turned, holding the energy that forced her downward and pushed it away. As the beam flew by, it slammed into the ground immediately after leaving Fasha's hands.
Fasha slammed into the ground, creating an indentation. Bardock landed nearby, concern on his face as the ground erupted in white light. Fasha stood up, energy exploding outward causing Bardock to cover his face, blocking out the light. Fasha scowled as she ran forward. Bardock lowered his arms in time for Fasha's fist to slam into his face.
Bardock tumbled away, righting himself on a rock he passed by. Grinning, the man charged forward, meeting Fasha's hand before it could reach him. Bardock held onto Fasha's fist using it as leverage as he moved Fasha to the side, messing up her balance yet again. Fasha yanked her fist free but lost her footing and fell backwards. Bardock kicked her in the side sending her flying away. Fasha fired a blast as she rocketed away, watching the blast intently.
The Saiyan slapped the attack away as he bounded into the after Fasha. Bardock led with his left hand, grabbing Fasha's arm. Fasha struggled to break free, but Bardock slipped his arms under her own and locked her arms in place, uncomfortably high. Fasha growled, straining against Bardock's muscular arms. Bardock raised his power level, topping Fasha's by a large amount.
Fasha struggled for a second before acting complacent. Bardock's grip didn't lessen at all for several seconds. Bardock sighed, spinning Fasha backwards over his head. He repeated this action several times, feeling Fasha begin to struggle again. Bardock spun faster preparing to throw Fasha to the ground again. The instant his arms loosened, Fasha moved of her own accord, spinning towards Bardock. Fasha's leading arm moved Bardock's arm out of the way while her trailing arm punched Bardock in the face.
Bardock tilted his head, causing Fasha's fist to slide off, leaving a slight mark. Bardock brought both of his hands down on Fasha's back, knocking her downwards. The Saiyan instantly burst forward touching the ground before Fasha. Bardock planted his hands on the ground, using his momentum to kick Fasha before she recovered. Fasha coughed as the kick caught her unaware, tumbling through the air. Bardock flipped forward onto his feet, crouching low before rushing forward again.
He's taking this seriously. Fasha thought as she fought to find her bearings. Hearing Bardock rush forward, Fasha prepared an attack, gathering energy as she flipped about. She smirked as the man neared.
"Got you!" Fasha shouted as she faced Bardock, energy prepared in her hands. Bardock stopped dead, pupils contracting. Fasha grinned as she shot, everything still for a moment.
"That was good," Bardock said from behind her. This time Fasha froze, floating in shock. She's getting better. Bardock went through the last second in his mind. He approached Fasha running, an attack process in his mind when Fasha's energy appeared. He stopped only for a second, just long enough for the look of shock to sink into Fasha's mind before she fired. At that exact second Bardock dashed sideways, leaving an after-image. Fasha fired in hopes of stopping the fight of her own accord.
Fasha slowly turned towards Bardock, fear was the only thing her body language spoke. Before she finished turning, Bardock fired a small blast, knocking her out of the air and sending her sliding across the ground. Fasha rolled over, pushing herself up. The woman stood shakily, panting as fresh cuts bled into older ones. Her mind raced wildly, trying to understand what had happened.
"Fast. You're so fast," Fasha said in a quiet voice. Bardock looked on questioningly.
"What did you say?"
"Nothing. Let's end this for the day," she said barely loud enough for Bardock to hear.
"Not so quietly! I can't have a fight this real end so mundanely!" Bardock said, jumping into the air. The Saiyan brought all his power out, surrounding him in a massive aura that flickered around wildly. Slowly his aura came closer, becoming a dense orb that circled Bardock. The aura's waves flowed in random directions, every wave bringing a shift in wind. Fasha watched in awe as Bardock put his hands to his right side, energy appearing in his hands. The air in the area seemed to grow heavy, Fasha could barely stand it was so intense.
"Come Fasha! Let's end this fight," Bardock said, a grin written on his face.
"You asked for it!" Fasha countered, raising her arms in front of her. Slowly energy swirled into her hands, creating a ball of condensed energy that slowly spun. Fasha concentrated, bringing the rest of her energy outward, flowing into her palms. Bardock watched, keeping his pulsing energy contained. Fasha's arms began to tremble, power leaving them, exposing her arms to Bardock's high level of energy, the weight of which pressed down ever more.
Good, she's gotten serious as well. Bardock thought, smiling.
This isn't enough for him? My best effort doesn't even make him nervous? Fasha thought, a scowl weaving its way across her face. Fasha stabilized her arms, concentrating on this final moment so hard all other thoughts left her. Fasha fired her beam, causing the ground around her to shatter, sinking her into a crater. Holding the attack on course, she aimed directly at Bardock's aura.
Bardock's energy began to swirly in his hands, beams of light shooting outward. With a quick movement, Bardock slammed his hands forward, firing his beam outward. Bardock's aura slowly shifted, its waves now flowing towards the Saiyan's hands from every direction. Every wave seemed to join the beam and flood outward. Bardock steadily fired straight at Fasha's beam.
After a moment of traveling, the beams met in the center of the two Saiyans. Fasha's grey beam and Bardock's white beam slammed into each other with enough force to cause the ground and raised up rocks to explode around them. For a moment, the two beams seemed even, until the waves riding down Bardock's beam reached the tip. Every time a wave approached, Bardock's beam seemed to gain strength. Seconds into the clash, Bardock's beam had smashed through nearly all of Fasha's beam, picking up speed rather than slowing.
That's the gap in power. Ran through Fasha's mind. Not Frieza's power, but more than decisive to this fight. Fasha grunted, nearing her limit. Falling to one knee, the Saiyan poured in more energy, hoping to stem Bardock's attack.
Bardock watched his beam whittle down Fasha's until it was at her hands. Letting his aura die down, Bardock held the attack without feeding it anymore. Just enough to make her serious. When she is only focused on the fight will we both grow stronger. Training limits you from experience and only raises strength. Combat makes you stronger in every sense. Strength alone will mean nothing in the war. Bardock held onto his beam, intently watching Fasha's eyes.
Fasha's energy stopped flowing into her hands for only a second, but more than too long. Bardock's energy crashed into her, causing an explosion, doubling the size of the crater she created. Fasha cried out as the energy lacerated her flesh and crushed her into the ground. Fasha looked up to see that there was still more than half the energy left for her to endure as the end of it left Bardock's hands. Fasha closed her eyes and prepared herself.
Bardock watched Fasha falter and immediately stopped the attack. As Fasha cried out, Bardock moved forward as fast as he could, slamming into the ground next to Fasha. Bardock watched her close her eyes, swallowing the terror in his mind and moving in front of the beam. Bardock flinched as the energy rammed into his back, shredding his armor and leaving angry wounds.
Bardock picked up Fasha and jumped out the energy in a blink. The Saiyan appeared on the top of the crater, concern in his eyes as he stared at Fasha's face. That was too close and exactly what I was afraid of. I've barely overestimated...too much.
Fasha sat up, instantly clutching her chest. Looking down she saw bandages wrapped about her upper body up to her shoulders. Rubbing her face she felt something crusty tumble down. Looking at her fingers she saw a salve of some kind crumble. As she turned her legs off of the makeshift bed, thoughts flooded into Fasha's mind.
"That fight...was it real?" Fasha asked aloud.
"It was a good one," Bardock said from the doorway. Fasha turned to see him leaning against the wall, arms crossed and a smile written on his face.
"Mornin'," Bardock offered.
"How lo-" Fasha started.
"Not too long, only a day at most," the man said interrupting her. Bardock walked over to Fasha and sat on the bed next to her. "How's your chest?"
Fasha looked down at the bandages for a moment. "Alright, nothing a Saiyan can't survive, no?"
"Haha you're right. Well, the well in her has become warm, actually. It's not so good for drinking but I took care of that."
"What are you getting at?" Fasha asked, thoroughly confused.
"Hmm, well I took a several empty containers and filled them with water, enough to last us quite some time, and I put them in a cold part of the cave."
"So?"
"I think the warm water would be good to soak in is all," Bardock said, walking over to the well. "It's actually quite warm." Fasha nodded and climbed out of bed, her body protesting. Stiffly, Fasha walked up to the well and slowly lowered her foot in. The warm water gently swirled around, somehow comforting Fasha. Bardock took off his armor and boots and hopped in, splashing Fasha on the ledge.
"What are you waiting for?" Bardock teased. Fasha nodded and slid into the water, instantly relaxing.
"Wow, this is really nice. My cuts don't hurt nearly as bad as in the air," Fasha stated, looking around the well. The well looked more like a deep puddle, part of it running under the wall that hung over it.
"It's not too bad, I think our fight must have thinned the ground a bit. During the day this water is much warmer. But before everything changes outside this well is the perfect temperature. It will get just a bit warmer as we sit here, and after that the temperature will drop again."
"Bardock, the scrapes on my arm!" Fasha said excitedly. "Their thinning."
"Really?" Bardock said, sliding his finger on a cut on his face. It's closing faster than normal. At this rate it will only be a scratch tomorrow.
"This is unreal," Fasha said, looking at both of her arms. Lifting her bandages, Fasha watched as the wider cuts on her arms slowly close.
This water? What's different now? At this rate it will only take several hours to heal rather than several days. That's assuming we are always in here at the right time. Bardock thought.
"Fasha, this water must be healing us. I don't know what it is, but it's going to hasten our training. Only a day of downtime instead of a week," Bardock said enthusiastically. Fasha nodded, looking down at her bandages. Slowly she peeled back the very top one wincing as she pulled the salve out of her cuts.
Bardock moved next to her, staring at the wound. In awe he watched as the angry red burn above her bandage slowly returned to normal skin color. Staring, Bardock saw the deep cut on the inside. The bleeding stopped and very slowly Bardock could hardly see the skin began to close. For several minutes Bardock watched as bit by bit Fasha slowly began to heal.
Fasha blushed when she realized Bardock was inches away from her chest staring. Bardock looked up and saw this, sitting back at his end of the pool, offering a hurried "Sorry," Bardock leaned against the side of the well, arms hanging over the edge.
"Bardock," Fasha started, breaking the awkward silence. "What was that attack you used to end the fight?"
"Oh, I hadn't thought of a name for it yet. It was only an idea until yesterday," Bardock explained, pausing to look at Fasha. As she nodded, Bardock took it as a sign to go on. "A normal attack uses your energy and is slow to power up. Your aura generally has little to do with that. If you were to fire a normal attack with your aura at full power you would see the aura slowly shrink as the attack went on. The aura is drained by your body to fuel the attack."
"With my attack, I expand about half of my energy into my aura making it so dense. As I reign in my energy, the aura becomes denser, like a shield really. While I'm at full power I start to power up an attack, drawing some of my aura into the attack, powering at twice the normal speed. With my aura and my body pouring energy into the attack, two sources overcomes the physical limit of the body to discharge energy. While in the end a normal attack will outlast my attack, it will certainly never achieve the power of it," Bardock finished, eyes closed as he remembered what he did.
"So it drains energy twice as fast?" Fasha asked, spellbound.
"No, not quite. While the power output is twice as much it efficiently converts my energy into the attack. Slowly the aura feeds the attack as it happens as well. While the attack is powering up it draws quite a bit more power, but once it's released, it takes little energy to hold the blast because my aura feeds it, power I already considered gone under normal circumstances."
"You have a lot going on in your head," Fasha stated, staring at Bardock.
"Yeah," Bardock grunted.
What is he thinking about now? Fasha wondered. How far do his plans reach? Am I being manipulated?
"The water is starting to get cold, come on," Bardock said, standing out of the well. Fasha shook her head and climbed out. "I had something ready to eat for when you woke up." Fasha nodded, following Bardock to where a flat rock had some food laid out. Together the Saiyans ate the easily prepared food.
"Think you can do that with a day in between bouts?" Bardock asked, dropping his fork onto the empty container.
"Yeah," Fasha said, taking a drink.
"Okay, well tomorrow is a day of rest, don't worry about that. For now, let me change the bandages, and remove the excess," Bardock said, crumpling up the empty container and tossing it into hole behind him. Fasha nodded and threw away what she had left and stood up. Bardock walked over to his bead and took out some scissors and a large bandage roll.
Bardock cut the bandages off of Fasha's arms, noting how little damage there was now. Bardock peeled one strip from her shoulder. He took a little bit of salve and rubbed it in the cut and applied a small bit of bandage to it.
"The more submerged the wounds are the faster they heal it looks like," Bardock said, cutting the side of the bandages across Fasha's chest. Looking at the cuts for a moment, Bardock applied salve in the deeper cuts and wrapped Fasha back up quickly. "Okay, you should be good now. There weren't any of the bruises I saw when I first treated you. After a few minutes tomorrow you should be able to take off the bandages on your chest," Bardock said, packing everything away.
"Okay," Fasha said, slipping a shirt on. "What about armor?"
"Oh, there's a few extra sets, but before long the armor won't matter anymore. Fasha, I hope you don't hold back anymore," Bardock blurted suddenly.
"What?"
"I don't want your feelings for me to get in the way. I want you to be able to grow as well."
"Oh, I won't hold back," Fasha said.
"Let's make a rule," Bardock said looking at Fasha who stared questioningly. "When we leave the cave, we leave our feelings too."
"Okay," Fasha sighed.
"What's wrong?"
"Well it seems you can do that a lot easier then I can," Fasha said looking down.
"Fasha, I do care for you. I don't see how you can think I don't. You're the person I wanted to be alone with."
"Yeah," Fasha leaned back.
"I do love you Fasha. But there is a lot more going on than just the two of us."
"That's true, and I love you too."
Bardock stood up and sat down next to Fasha. Raising her chin, Bardock kissed her. Fasha looked at him, not knowing what to do. "Get some sleep," Bardock said, walking towards his bed.