Yet another ongoing commission fic for y'all!“Ah, where did he say it was again?” Goku scratched his head in thought as he floated high above Orange City. There were so many people down there; how was he supposed to find just one?
Nimbus purred underneath him and he crossed his arms, thinking hard and projecting his thoughts outwards. Hey, Kami! Can you tell me the address again? I sorta forgot.
A wizened voice answered the call, sounding somewhat exasperated. Just use your senses, Goku. She is bound to be the most powerful person in that entire city, or at the very least, stand out in some manner.
Good idea! Grinning, Goku closed his eyes and spread out his senses. Hundreds of thousands of tiny sources of ki lit up in his minds’ eye, but one of them was much larger than the rest.
“I think I found her!” He smiled and directed Nimbus down towards the city, flying high above the buildings as he followed the energy he sensed.
His search led him to a large house with an even larger yard just in the front. Just like the rest of the city, it was huge! What could anyone even do with all of that space? Maybe they had a big family?
As Goku hopped off of Nimbus, two sources of ki stood out to him. One was larger than average, while the other eclipsed that by at least three times. That must be the person Kami was talking about. Goku didn’t really know what all of this was about, but he knew it must be pretty important if Kami wanted him to come all the way over here just to get someone.
He knocked on the door, and the larger ki crossed the house almost immediately, pulling it open.
Goku blinked as he saw nobody there, until a cough pulled his eyes down. There was a little girl standing at eye level with his stomach, staring up at him with narrowed blue eyes.
“You’re late,” she said. “I was starting to wonder if I was just screaming into the void.”
Goku stared at the girl, wondering if his senses were deceiving him. He smiled widely. “Wow! You’re pretty strong for a kid!”
“And you’re taller in person,” she replied, a small smile tugging at the corner of her lips.
The lower power level approached and a head peeked around the corner, eying Goku. “I-is this the one you were talking about, sweetie?”
“Yeah, he’s one of them. I didn’t think it would be him but I’m glad it is.” The little girl held her hand out for a shake. “I’m Videl Satan! This is my dad, Hercule.”
Goku clasped the smaller hand, shaking it firmly. “It’s nice to meet you, I’m Goku!”
She smiled weirdly, “I know. Do you want to come inside, or just get going?”
Goku rubbed the back of his head. “We should probably just go. Kami is pretty worked up. I’m supposed to bring you to the Lookout as soon as possible.”
Hercule swallowed and tugged on his collar, sweaty. “A-and that’s the place up in the sky, right? The, uh, lookout?”
Videl looked up at him, her expression softening just a fraction. She reached out and patted his beefy arm. “It’s safe, Dad. Besides Goku is going to be with us. He’s the strongest man in the world.”
Hercule looked at the spiky-haired man, who was currently grinning like an idiot and scratching his head. “I want to believe you sweetie but this guy looks like a country bumpkin! Are you sure this is him?”
“He’s the real deal,” Videl nodded resolutely. She turned to Goku who felt like he was missing something. “We should go. I’ve been waiting for a while and the sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can start to prepare.”
Prepare for what? Goku wasn’t sure, but Kami would probably tell him so that was fine.
“Right!” Goku called Nimbus closer and climbed on. “Climb on! It holds people with good hearts, so you’ll be fine!”
“Uh.”
Videl’s voice was cut off by her dad’s grunt of pain as Hercule tried to sit on the Nimbus but immediately fell through it and hit the ground below. Goku winced as the man hit his head on the ground.
Videl crouched next to her dad, helping him up. “I should have warned you. Not many people can actually ride that thing. Are you okay?”
Hercule pushed himself up, brushing off his pants with a wince. “I’m fine, sweetie. Barely even hurt, haha!”
Videl stood and turned back to the Nimbus, extending one small hand. Her fingers passed straight through the golden cloud like it wasn’t there at all. She pulled her hand back and stared at it for a moment, then looked up at Goku with a hopeful expression.
“I don’t suppose you have a normal plane?”
Goku didn’t have a plane or anything like that, but he was more than strong enough to carry both of them.
The wind whipped past them as they soared through the sky, the city shrinking to a smudge of orange and grey far below. Hercule had his arms locked around Goku’s neck, his face pale and eyes squeezed shut. Videl was perched on Goku’s lap in the spot Gohan usually sat. She didn’t seem afraid of the height at all, watching the world go by with a soft smile.
Man, this girl just got weirder and weirder! If he didn’t know any better, he’d say she wasn’t a kid at all. Despite being as small as Gohan, she reminded him of someone much older somehow.
Goku looked down at her curiously. “You must have some pretty important stuff to tell Kami, huh? I had to climb all the way to the top of Korrin’s Tower just to get the chance to see him.”
“Very important,” she hummed over the whistling wind. She looked up at him, a grin on her childish face. “But I might still climb up anyway when everything is done. I hear it’s pretty good training, right?”
Goku laughed. He liked this kid! “I could barely feel my body when I was done the first time!”
“I’ll bet,” Videl said, her eyes scanning the horizon. A pause. “How much did Kami actually tell you?”
“Not much,” Goku admitted. “Just that there was someone I needed to pick up who had something important to say. He said it was a big deal, but he didn’t say what.”
“Of course he didn’t.” Videl sighed. “Well, at least he listened. I’ve been praying to him for months. I was starting to think he was just ignoring me.”
“Kami ignores everybody,” Goku said cheerfully. “I think it’s just an old guy thing.”
Videl laughed. “Maybe.”
I wasn’t entirely sure how I ended up in this situation. If I was being honest, I half expected to wake up any day now to find out this was all some kind of drug-induced fever dream. Maybe someone spiked the town’s water supply and I was laid up in the hospital eating nutrients through a tube while my mind withered away on a cocktail of drugs. It made more sense that what I’d been through so far.
Still, deep inside, I knew that wasn’t true. This wasn’t a dream, I wasn’t in the hospital, and as much as it pained me to say or even think, the world I knew might as well not exist for all I could get back to it.
I don’t remember dying---heck, I still don’t even know if I did. My memories were separated into two distinct halves: the before, and the after, with the middle neatly sliced away to keep that distinction nice and neat. One day I was at home, and the next I woke up in the body of a little girl in a world torn straight out of an anime, with memories of her past and future swirling around my head.
I didn’t panic, though that could probably be attributed to the fact that I was pretty sure I was dreaming those first few days. As time went on and I didn’t wake up though, I began to realize that this wasn’t a dream at all. By then, things had become so normal that panic wasn’t even part of the equation.
This was my life now. Videl Satan’s life. Two souls, one in the same.
And honestly? Being in an anime was pretty damn cool, all things considered. I had knowledge of events that hadn’t happened yet, a father who loved me more than the tides love the moon, and I lived in a world where you could literally shoot energy from your hands if you trained hard enough. The kid in me thought that was the sickest thing ever.
But the adult in me could peel back that pretty film and see things for what they were. This universe was dangerous in ways that the show never really lingered on. The Dragon Balls were the equivalent of a magical undo button and with them constantly on hand, the stakes never really grew beyond what they were. But even with the reset button on hand, that didn’t change the fact that people still died. Planets were destroyed. Entire races were wiped out in the blink of an eye, and the only thing standing between Earth and annihilation was a ragtag group of fighters who barely scraped by each time.
All that senseless death and destruction... There was no way in hell I was just gonna sit by on the sidelines and just let it all play out when I could do something about it. That wasn’t Videl, and that wasn’t me.
Which brought us to the present. Goku touched down on the polished marble of the Lookout, my dad practically welded to his neck, and me perched comfortably on his lap like this was a Sunday stroll.
The Lookout was exactly as I remembered it from the show, a giant stage of white marble stretched out high above the earth, looking down upon it from on high. The air was thin but breathable, and this high above the clouds, the sky was so blue it almost looked like you could fall up into it.
Standing at the edge of the platform, was a familiar figure who was somehow more unnerving in real life. Dad’s eyes landed on him and went wide. He unwound one arm from Goku’s neck just long enough to point. “W-what the heck is that?!”
I slid off Goku’s lap without hesitation, wobbling slightly from the long flight. “That’s Mr. Popo. He’s Kami’s attendant.” I glanced back at my dad, who was still staring at Popo like he’d crawled out of a horror movie. “He’s harmless.”
“Good afternoon,” Popo greeted politely, as if to prove my point. “Welcome to the Lookout. We’ve been looking forward to meeting you.”
Dad opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again, then seemed to decide that some things were better left unexamined. He turned to me with a weak laugh. “Right. Harmless. Sure. So, uh, where’s this Kami guy?”
“That would be me.”
The voice came from the darkness of the building behind Popo, and all eyes turned to watch as a wizened figure stepped out of the shadows. A wrinkled green face was set into a stony expression, and I straightened somewhat as he stared me down. Though I knew Kami was anything but a fighter, at least compared to his other half, he was still extremely intimidating.
“You’ve been doing an admirable job of getting my attention, child,” he said as he slowly strode towards us, stopping just behind Popo with one hand resting on his cane. “For someone so young to possess such knowledge... Many might call that a curse, rather than a blessing” he said softly.
I swallowed a little under the intense gaze of the old guardian of Earth, but held my ground. “I’d rather have the knowledge and be able to do something about what’s coming than just live in ignorance until it arrives.”
Kami let out a short chuckle. “Spoken like someone far beyond their years. Come, we have much to talk about.”
Kami led us into the lookout and into a comfy room with a table surrounded by plush pillows clearly meant for sitting. We gathered around it, my dad and I on one side and the others across from us.
I glanced at my dad, watching as he fidgeted nervously. It was clear that he was completely out of his element, but I appreciated that he’d come anyway.
Goku settled onto his cushion with the casual ease of someone who’d done this a dozen times before, crossing his legs and leaning forward with bright eyes. “So! What’s this all about? I’m dying to know.”
Kami leaned back, laying his gnarled cane across his lap. “This young girl has been praying to me for several weeks, showing me concerning visions of the future. I asked you to bring her here for clarification on these visions, as I fear they are of dire importance to the fate of the earth.”
Goku leaned forward even further, his eyes practically sparkling. “You can see the future? That’s amazing! Hey, can you tell me what I’m gonna have for dinner tomorrow?”
I blinked. Of all the questions he could have asked, that was the one?
“It’s not quite that broad,” I said, shaking my head. “I can’t see everything. Just the big stuff... And there’s a lot of that coming.”
Dad shifted beside me, and I took a breath. This had been my number one priority since I woke up in this world but now that I was actually here, I wasn’t entirely sure where to start.
I guess the beginning would be best, I thought.
“Within the next several years, Earth and even the greater universe at large are going to face several threats that they simply aren’t prepared for.”
I turned to look directly at Goku. “The first threat coming our way is your brother.”
Goku seemed taken aback. “Huh? I don’t have a brother. I mean, I guess it’s possible, but I lived alone with Grandpa Gohan when I was a kid. He was the only family I had.”
“He found you in the woods and took you in; I know the story,” I nodded, causing him to blink. “I also know that he didn’t tell you the whole thing. Like how he didn’t just find a baby laying around abandoned in the woods, but rather pulled one out of a spaceship that crashed in his backyard.”
Goku stared at me, confusion written plain across his face. I decided to rip the bandaid off.
“You’re an alien, Goku,” I said. “A Saiyan, to be exact. A race of extremely powerful warriors that were once feared all across the galaxy.”
“An alien?” Goku repeated, and it was clear that he wasn’t entirely sure how to feel about that. Still, he didn’t seem like he was going to dismiss me out of hand, so that was good, I guess. I gave him a moment to come to terms with the revelation.
“I... huh.” He scratched the back of his head “I guess that explains the tail. But what was I doing on Earth, then?”
“Saiyans were planet conquerors. They had a tendency to send infants to planets they thought were suitable for sale so that they could do the dirty work before the bulk of them arrived.” I explained. “Your brother is on his way to check your progress, or at least he will eventually. And he won’t be happy when he finds a planet full of life instead of a barren wasteland. Even worse, he’s way stronger than anyone on Earth right now. There’s no way you’ll be able to beat him on your own”
Goku’s eyebrows rose. “He’s that powerful? Wow, that’s pretty cool!”
“He’s not someone you want to fight alone,” I stressed. “In the future I saw, you and Piccolo fought him together in order to save Gohan. Only Piccolo survived.”
Goku seemed pensive for a moment, before he leaned back on his hands, laughing at his grimm fate. “Man, he must be pretty nasty if Piccolo teamed up with me! I can’t even get that guy to say two nice words to me, let alone fight on the same side!”
I couldn’t help but smile at that. Here I was, telling the man he was going to die in a year’s time, and he was laughing about it.
Yeah, that tracks.
“But that’s exactly my point,” I said, pulling my smile back under control. “It doesn’t have to happen that way. That’s why I’m here.”
I turned to Kami, who had been watching the exchange with a guarded expression. “Goku’s brother is only the beginning. The threats that follow him are far worse. Some come from within the Earth itself, and some from beyond the stars. Each one would be enough to end civilization on its own, and they just keep coming, one after another, with barely any time to breathe between them.”
“Woah woah!” I blinked, taken aback as Goku waved his hands, indicating for me to stop. “Don’t tell us everything! I don’t want to know about every enemy I’m going to have to fight eventually! If we get too strong preparing for the later stuff, then the stuff coming soon won’t be hard at all.”
“That’s kind of the point,” I noted, and wasn’t really surprised when he grinned.
“Do we make it out in the end?”
I nodded slowly, “You do, but it’s not easy. Honestly, you barely scrape by every time, and lose a lot of friends along the way. The dragon balls are used liberally just to fix everything.”
Goku’s expression softened, and for a moment he looked older than his years. Then he grinned that wide, optimistic grin that I've seen a million times on television.
“Well with your help, we can change that! With you here to help us out, we’ll make it out even better than before; I’m sure of it!”
While Dad looked at him like he was crazy. “Are you insane? Shouldn’t you want to be as strong as possible for all of this?”
Ever the Saiyan, Goku just shook his head. “From the way she describes it, these are gonna be some tough fights. If we get too strong, it’ll just be too easy. It’s better to fight someone on your level,” he leaned back on his hands, grinning widely. “Besides, I trust Kami to help us through it. He’ll know what's best.”
While Dad facepalmed and Kami chuckled, I sighed. Of course. Why did I expect anything less coming from the guy who explicitly chose not to use the wish-granting balls to destroy the beings prophesied to be his death. This was just the Android Saga all over again.
That Saiyan pride… I thought, shaking my head. “In that case, Kami, could I speak with you privately for a moment?”
Kami studied me for a beat, then inclined his head.
“Of course. Popo, please show our guests to the garden.”