Videl and Gohan were holding hands. They were holding hands and whispering and smiling at each other. Videl’s long, glossy black hair was falling over her shoulders, and every once and awhile, Gohan would reach over and brush a few strands back, his dark eyes full of love.
Yamucha squinted. If he squinted hard enough, and used enough imagination, Videl could almost be her. And Gohan could almost be him. Was it possible that she could ever look at him that way? Was it? He had imagined it so many times, stealing away the looks that she gave to Gokuu, and pretending that they were given to him instead. The looks she actually gave him were no longer the softer, shyer ones that she had given him while Gokuu was still dead. She looked at him now as if she wanted to run away. Whenever the odd situation arose that the two of them would be in the same room together, she would politely attempt to make light conversation, all the while avoiding his eyes and busying her hands with some sort of cleaning or fussing.
A few weeks before she had been kidnapped, they had ended up alone together. Bulma had invited him over for the weekend (probably another lame attempt at trying to cheer him up) and the one night that their family left out to dinner, Yamucha had decided to stay at home. By an odd coincidence, ChiChi had arrived at the door then, looking for Goten. He remembered how stricken her pretty face looked when he opened that door, how absolutely sad she looked. There had been dark circles under her eyes, and her smile had disappeared to nothing. Opening that door, he had the strongest impulse to gather her up in his arms and hug her, make her smile again. Instead though, he had asked her, “what do you want?” in a cold voice, harsher than he had intended. She had just stared blankly at him, obviously shocked, and then tears shone in her eyes. He wished that he could have turned back the time and said something --- anything else. But it was too late. She left in a hurry, and that was the last time he had seen her.
What if she dies? He thought in a panic. He didn’t want anything to happen to her until he had a chance to apologize. Not just about what happened at Bulma’s that day, but….everything. All that had happened between them.
“I’m such an idiot.” He said out loud.
Now of course, was his chance to make it up to her. He knew that he wasn’t the strongest fighter, or even the smartest, but somehow, deep down in his heart that he would be the one to save her life. He wasn’t exactly sure how he knew, but he just did. It was one of those things where all doubt was rushed away with a blink, and you knew that in that instant, you were invincible, no matter what. He could picture her sweet face, he could feel her arms around his neck, hugging him in thanks. He would be the one to save her, he knew he would.
And after he had finished saving her, after he had done all that he could for her, he didn’t see much point and being around anymore. Once they got back to Earth and everything was settled, he would slip away quietly. Maybe no one would even notice him missing, and it would be just as if none of them had met him at all. He could be the tall, dark angel that changed their lives and slipped away, leaving them with no memories of him.
He had chickened out before, but that was in the past now. The next time he set out to accomplish something like that, he would follow through with it. After all, if there was nothing left to live for, and no one would remember him….It would be perfect.
That was the way he wanted it to be. If only he had the courage to go through with it, it would be beautiful. Poetic almost.
There was something wrong, and Piccolo wasn’t exactly sure what, but he was going to find out. Standing outside of the door to the cargo hold, he narrowed his eyes at it. He had been exploring the ship in his own, quiet way, but when he came down near the back of the ship, near the cargo hold, he began to hear snippets of voices. He stilled himself again, and strained his ears once more, listening for the voices that he had just heard.
He had heard so much over the years. He smiled, thinking about how much his ears had helped him out in the past. There was great deal of things in this world that he would have missed if he hadn’t had the hearing ability that he did. If he hadn’t possessed the excellent Namek hearing that he had, they wouldn’t even know where ChiChi was right now. He had been meditating as usual near the Son House when he heard the Saiya-jins, heard ChiChi, felt the anticipation of battle.
The battle still made him cringe. How could he have been so weak? He left the Saiya-jins get away without so much as a scratch. He let the entire Son family down that day, and he possibly could have gotten ChiChi killed. The guilt began chewing at him again, and he forced it out of his mind, concentrating on hearing the voices.
There! He thought, hearing them again. They were distinctly female voices, one young and soft and the other smooth and cultured. And they were definitely coming from the cargo hold. He narrowed his eyes. All of the females were near the front of the ship, he had seen all of them as he went exploring. So who could be in the cargo hold?
He pushed open the heavy door and entered a dimly lit hallway. The noise from the engines beneath was almost unbearable, a deep rumbling that seemed to echo in Piccolo’s sensitive ears like a earthquake. He reached the end of the hallway and came to a metal staircase, which led to the brightly-lit hold. He approached in silence, not wanting to scare off whomever was down there just yet.
When he peered into the room, he saw two girls, both of them quite young, standing around in the cargo hold, arguing. One of them, the one with pigtails, he recognized as Kuririn’s daughter. The other one, with her hands on her hips and an indignant look on her face, he wasn’t sure about, but assumed she was the girl that had been living with Bulma and Vejiita for some time now.
Without so much as a sound, he descended down the stairs, his eyes still locked on the girls. The must have sneaked aboard the ship, he thought. He knew that this meant trouble, and wasn’t very happy about it, but it really wasn’t his problem. Of course, the girls would put a serious cramp in the success of the mission, but again, that really wasn’t his problem. He could just lock the two of them in there and solve everything. After all, they could probably survive on the contents of the boxes and crates packed into the hold. But, sooner or later, someone would have to find out. He knew he should inform Bulma of this first, after all, Bulma was the pilot of the ship. She should be the first to know that there are stowaways.
Marron noticed him first, the eight-foot tall green alien that she had often seen hanging around various family/friend functions. She looked terrified. He almost chuckled. As much as people bothered him, he sure did have fun scaring the hell out of them. He did his best to look as threatening as possible, and just for good measure, he bared his gleaming white fangs in a snarl.
He eyes grew to saucer size and she clamed her tiny mouth shut instantly, backing away from him, hitting the other girl in the process.
“Picc…Piccolo-san!” Marron stuttered.
“Watch where you’re going, twit!” She cried, staring at Marron angrily. When she noticed Marron’s terrified expression, she followed her gaze and found Piccolo standing before her. Piccolo did his best to look terrifying again, but this girl just stared at him in disgust instead.
As shocked as he was that she didn’t look frightened of him, he hid it well, and continued down the stair case until he was standing right next to them. He stared at both of them with unblinking eyes, and then drew his mouth up into a smirk.
This was going to be interesting.
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