Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Perfection ❯ Chapter 7 ( Chapter 7 )
[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
By: Todesengel_ 
"I think we see only a monster because we're too afraid to see a man."
Anime/Manga: Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Hentai / Horror / Psychological | Type: Yaoi | Uploaded On: 04.14.2006 | Updated On: 04.14.2006 | Pages: 4 | Words: 4.5K | Visits: 450 | Status: Completed
"I think we see only a monster because we're too afraid to see a man."
Anime/Manga: Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Hentai / Horror / Psychological | Type: Yaoi | Uploaded On: 04.14.2006 | Updated On: 04.14.2006 | Pages: 4 | Words: 4.5K | Visits: 450 | Status: Completed
Standing there after he left, I began to convulse painfully, my body and mind coming to screeching haults in their path together. My eyes had seen one thing, that much I knew, but my mind was kicking that backs of my eyes for apparently lying to it.
It was just too weird.
I flew forward, emptying out the contents of my stomach and sulking against the tree. My head was whirling as I held myself in a crouching position, hanging onto the bits of bark on the tree just to keep myself from landing in my vomit. Stars and patches of black flew into my vision and I shook my head, willing them away. Someone was standing over me, asking the cliche "are you ok's" when it was painfully obvious, that uhh, hell no, I wasn't.
"You gonna make it there pal?" A voice asked me, my eyes glancing upwards to catch sight of the brown-haired man from earlier. "Not much for the sight of blood are ya?"
I just shook my head, trying to steady myself.
"Guess not," He answered for me, patting my back in a kind gesture. I weakly smiled up at him, a nod of my head in appreciation.
I slowly climbed to my feet, thankful that he was doing his utmost to help, which might have been difficult considering I was twice his size. I took him in for a moment, his face drawn with age, mouth set in a rather ugly line and stature positively shrieking the word "troll". Still, a set of divine green eyes stared up at me from the cracks of his lids, making me steady myself again. For all his seemingly unattractive features, I realized very quickly, he must have been positively beautiful in his youth.
"You're a big fella'." He told me, smiling a little wider as he let me go.
"Uhh...Thanks." I faltered. "I guess."
"Say, you're REALLY not from around here are you?" He asked, gazing at my whole frame with no apologies. I realized rather quickly that I was much taller than anyone else here, my Saiyan features (alight as they were with the transformation) causing most of the humans to regard me with suspicion. Sets of eyes took me into account and then went back to work, apparently deciding that the drastic demonstration was enough incentive to keep going at their harsh pace.
"Who..." I looked over towards the brown-haired man. "Who WAS that?!"
He looked at me skeptically, as if he thought I was making a joke or something.
"Are you kidding me?" He asked seriously. "Where have you BEEN the last ten years?!"
I blinked, not having thought about this as much as I figured now that I should have.
"Uhh..." I swallowed, squinting in concentration. "A.... Comma?"
"Heh," He looked at me with the skeptical glance again, shaking his head. "Ok."
I figured he didn't believed me but in a world as chaotic as this, I'm sure he doubted very much that I was any sort of threat. He gestured for me to follow him, pulling out his wrist from under his shirt and placing it over a metallic, technical piece of equipment. A strange sound was heard and he winced, pulling back his hand and rubbing his wrist slightly.
"Mine is one of the older models," He told me. "They didn't have the painless cards like they do now back then. Just a slight sting sometimes is all."
I looked at him blankly, staring at the small patch of metal embedded beneath the soft skin of his flesh.
"My time card," He informed. "My 14 hours is up. Time to go home."
"Oh," I nodded, hanging my head slightly. I hadn't thought about that part either, but something told me that barging into ChiChi's home wasn't the greatest idea seens how her present husband seemed to be a deranged, sadistic psychopath. A lonely feeling weld into my gut and, not for the first time that day, I regretted the wish. I hadn't been so confused for so many hours in my entire life and it only seemed to be getting weirder.
"Say," Brown-hair interrupted my thinking. "You got a place to go? At least for this evening?"
"No," I admitted. "I.... I guess I don't."
He looked me over, apparently trying to size up whether or not I was "deranged, sadistic psychopath" material or not. I swallowed hard under his scrutiny, looking anywhere but him.
"Meh," He finally said, gesturing with a sweep of his arm. "You seem harmless enough, despite the fact that you look like you just crawled out of a glacier in Iceland. Follow me."
I nodded gratefully, following behind him. We trudged on a path for a while, our pace comfortable as we gazed around through the darkness.
"You hungry?" He asked me. "Didn't seem you kept much of your lunch intact back there."
I blushed a little, smiling.
"Actually," I said thoughtfully, looking up. "I'm starving!"
He laughed a little, a nice sound considering the others I'd heard today. I was learning that I liked him very quickly, admiring his easy-going, devil-may-care attitude despite his circumstances. I wondered at the change ten years ago had made, or maybe, who he was before then. A banker, I decided within myself. A kind, 9 to 5 office prankster.
"I'm uhh...." I glanced down. "I'm afraid I eat a great deal though."
He laughed again, waving off my admittance.
"Not a big problem there. We have an over abundance of food," He shrugged. "Especially considering that famine was entirely wiped off the map about the first three years of his reign."
I was caught off guard by this.
"So," I asked him. "That man back there, that... crazy psycho rules this world?"
He laughed a little, eyes darting around.
"Yeah," He answered me. "But I don't think I'd go around referring to Kakarot that way. Despite your looks, I doubt he'd keep your head welded to your body if he heard you say so."
I frowned at that, trudging onwards.
"You still don't know a lot of things huh?" He asked me, trying to keep pace with me despite the fact that I was supposed to be following him. "I'll bet you're confused as hell huh?"
I grinned.
"I don't even think that could sum it up." I laughed. "I've never been so exasperated and confused in all my life. I feel like the whole world has gone completely and certifiably insane."
He chuckled a little, bobbing his brown head of hair about.
"It has my friend," He said soberly. "It really really has."
We continued on in silence, my stomach growling in protest at how long this was taking. I wanted to just grab up the man, fly through the air and have him point out where abouts we were going, but figured against that idea. So I just trudged on beside him, my eyes darting along the trees that seemed almost too thick as they swayed around us.
"So," He broke the silence. "Do you have a name or should I just call you Albino?"
I felt my face break into a grin again and I shrugged, weighing my options.
"You know," I sighed. "I guess Albino will have to do."
He looked at me oddly before shrugging and moving on.
"I'm Sam." He said simply. It was a perfect name for him.
The home was as Yamcha's had been, down to the wheat for a ceiling, mud walls and the eerie, regular glass windows. Still, a candle had been set inside, welcoming us as we entered to the sound of Sam's adorable wife prattling around the "kitchen" and ushering us inside. I took in the surroundings, figuring the word "simple" didn't quite do it justice.
A plain set of chairs and a small dinning table sat in the expanse of the room, a tiny stove currently being waited on by Sam's wife, and two other chairs in the corner of the room. That was it. Two other rooms resided, one being a bathroom and the other, from what I could see, occupied by one, medium-sized mattress on the floor.
"Ohhh!" A lovely, bell-like voice broke my concentration, two little hands wrapping around my cheeks. "And who is THIS beautiful young man? My goodness, get in here and let me look at you!"
My eyes widened as she pulled my head down to her level, her small, beady eyes gazing at me from behind thick glasses.
"My goodness!" She pronounced. "Why Sam, he's just the most beautiful thing! Can you believe it!? This white hair is just marvelous!"
Her little hand was in my strands of hair, sifting through them as she giggled delightfully. As much as I knew I liked Sam, I was falling pretty quickly in love with his wife.
"Oh Lord Jessie," Sam groaned. "Next you'll be asking if we can keep him. I swear, people are like pets to you."
"You better believe I'm gonna be keeping him," She snapped in a sassy way that I loved and distinctly reminded me of Bulma. Her eyes turned back to me and she tapped the side of my face playfully. "My my my, I've never seen anyone quite like you."
"Thank you," I said softly, blushing a little as I looked down.
"Please please," she pulled out a chair from the dinning table. "Have a seat young man. You look positively famished!"
Before I could decline the one of two chairs, she was grabbing another one from the "living room" and nearly throwing Sam into it.
"Sorry," he whispered to me with a smile in his green eyes. "She gets so riled up when I have company over."
I just smiled, waving it off. I didn't want to tell him that I more or less wanted to sweep her up and steal her away. Food was piled up in front of me, my stomach roaring with satisfaction as I, as politely as possible, began to gorge myself with it. Whenever one plate was even close to empty, another was tossed, heaping full in front of me. Oh yes, yes, I wanted to steal Jessie away more than ever!
"So what's you're name, beautiful stranger?" She asked me, a permanent smile on her lovely features.
"Uhh.." I glanced at Sam, swallowing my mouthful of food. "Albino I guess."
She made a quick scoffing sound, slapping Sam's shoulder.
"You gave him that didn't you!?" She accused, grinning madly. "Sam Gunther, you're an absolute beast!"
He smiled all the wider, winking over towards me.
"Well geez Jessie," he taunted. "he's your new pet, give em' a name if you want."
I watched the two of them, laughing as I shook my head. For a small second, I wondered if me and ChiChi would have ever become like these two, the sobering thought calming my smile. Sure, they'd probably had fights, undoubtedly went through some hardships; but looking at them now, it was like two best friends choosing to take a road of life together and having fun along the way. They were what marriage was supposed to be, I guessed.
"Castor," She said, waking me from my somber thoughts. "That's what we'll call him."
I raised a pale eyebrow at that.
"That's pretty random," I said softly, liking the name either way.
"No it's not." Sam said, looking oddly at his wife and then returning to his food.
I looked to her for an explanation, taking in her features that looked, for once, a little forlorn.
"Castor is what I wanted to name my boy," she said gently. "if I ever had one."
I mouthed an 'oh', finishing up my last plate of food.
"You look like a Castor," She told me, sitting in front of me and waving her little fingers through the silvery locks of my hair. "My, but those eyes of yours."
I tried not to look down in embarrassment, since she was obviously gazing at my eyes, wondering if I ought to keep my odd features more concealed and then deciding against it.
"So pale," She said it sweetly. "So blue. Castor, you can make even an old woman's heart beat a little bit faster."
I laughed a little at that, watching as she left to start washing the dishes. I looked over seriously at Sam though, moving a bit closer.
"I need to know some things." I told him. "I need to know what happened ten years ago. I need to understand things."
He nodded, standing from the table and taking his chair with us to the 'living room'. I gave a quick but enthused 'thank you' to Jessie, being waved off with a smile as I joined him.
"Start from the beginning if you will," I told him.
He leaned back in his chair, preparing for the long explanation ahead.
"It started as oddly as it exists now," He told me, hands folded in his lap. "Ten world leaders were kidnapped, all within one day. Everyone thought it was some sort of terrorist conspiracy, I mean how, how in one day could all these world leaders be taken captive? But it was just one man. Just one. Soon, a television company picked up a signal being launched towards them. They broadcasted it, the face of ...." He faltered. "Of Kakarot right in front of the screen. "Show them," is what he said. "Show the whole world."
He shook his head, expression hardened.
"We all watched for 15 days as he broadcasted every world leader, altogether in one room, dying off."
My breath hitched at that, Sam's head nodding along with me.
"Guess he released Ebola on them," he told me. "made every person capable of seeing television watch as their own leaders and others were slowly coughing up blood," He cringed. "Puking it, crying it, shitting it out. Just dying off in the worst way, right for everyone to see."
He paused, breathing a pent up sigh.
"It worked though." He spoke. "It worked marvelously for him. Everyone was terrified, trying to trace the signal, to find out where these men were. By the 15th day, most of them were dead anyways and by the 16th, Kakarot had introduced himself to the world in the only way he knew how: shockingly. He would display horrific feights of strength against the United States Military, taking entire bombs and cannons and everything head on, coming back with more fire power than any of them. Right out of his hands, like.... like he was God or something. Just blowing away every military operation they could send to him.
"He was also merciless, making sure people saw that he wouldn't hold back from killing women, kids, anyone. Eventually, he had the whole world scared shitless of him, some countries even erecting enormous statues of him, just to show their allegiance. He told people to leave the cities, those that didn't listen, killed in enormous blasts as he took out the largest cities first. He didn't think that people were created to live like that, the rich prospering and the poor just scrapping by. He balanced everything out, put everyone on everyone else's level. No rich, no poor.
"The countries that absolutely refused to bow down, he unleashed amazing amounts of the Ebola virus on them, though how he did it, I'm not even sure. Rats carried it to the poor and the rich, he unleashed it in their water systems. Took out entire countries that way and then burned what was left of them. He made public killings to spook the populace of countries into obedience, disemboweling emperors and spraying their guts out all over their palaces.
"When finally, people stopped fighting and rebel groups were taken out, he wiped out all religion from the face of the earth. He told us that religion had been the cause for more deaths and wars than he ever had and thus, we would be united when it was forgotten. He was the only thing worth worshipping he said.
"Eventually, he arranged "cities" by separating the remaining humans into two hundred person groups, giving out assignments. We weren't to live as we had before. There were no secular jobs or schools or computer technology. Scientific establishments were basically wiped out, save for Capsule Corp."
"What happened to Capsule Corp?" I asked him, my heart beating wildly.
"It still stands," He shrugged. "Bulma Briefs, the president, was the first to help him with all of this, the main reason his techniques made such an impact. He was the brute strength and she was the technology."
I tried to sort out this information, shaking my head from the confusion.
"Is she still alive?" I asked, my heart beating in my ears.
"Sure," he said, staring at me oddly and taking in my reaction to all this. "She's still around, last I heard. Doesn't make many public appearances, that's for sure."
I nodded, gesturing for him to continue.
"As I told you," He said. "Famine was completely none-existent by the first three years, every human's part in rebuilding the planet magnificently efficient. There are those that make the clothing for the workers, those that make the food, those that ship it off, those that oversee everything. But you won't find an occupation based or set with any other goal besides rebuilding the earth. As he said, we spent our entire lives up until that point polluting, overpopulating, sucking away the natural goodness of the earth. So, we'll spend the remainder of our time here regrowing what we'd taken.
"He's big on family though, you saw that yourself. He never separated families when combining the "cities". They all were to stay together, never to be put asunder, or so he words it. But the idea of that is only too horrific, as you witnessed today, when people make mistakes. He doesn't just kill the offending member; he kills them all."
"But why?" I pleaded, shaking my head in disgust. "Why be such a monster?"
"Maybe we don't know everything," he shrugged his shoulders, reminding me again that he was a very practical, logical man. "I was told once that he, in one of his infamous drug-sprees, informed all in attendance that it was a crueller thing to leave the family alive. That living in a world void of those you love is perhaps the cruelest fate a man can meet with. He sees it as a kindness to an extent, setting them 'all free from the face of the earth', quote un-quote. He is... as you said before, a psycho. He's completely deranged and drunk on power, in love with himself and a temperamental drug-addict."
"A drug addict?" I looked at him oddly, recalling the track-marks I'd seen on his arms and unable to believe it.
"Do you really think a sane man could sleep at night if he wasn't?" He told me. "You really think a sane, sober man could murder children and old people and not weep when he looked in a mirror? No. Kakarot needs those drugs, needs that chaotic release. Sometimes, I think everyone else on earth understands him more than he even understands himself. Othertimes though, I think we see only a monster because we're too afraid to see a man."
I sat in silence for a moment, contemplating this.
"I just cannot believe that Bulma Briefs would aid him in this," I finally spoke it, perhaps now more confused than even before. "I know her or.. well, I did know her. Some time ago, you imagine and..." I shook my head. "I just can't see it. I can't see someone like her, as kind and pure as her, aiding him to kill and enslave people."
"Well," He agreed. "Maybe you're right and maybe you're wrong. Maybe there's so much more to even that story that we don't rightly know. A beautiful girl like that, hiding from the world for years? I don't see it. Ten years before all this, that woman's face was on the cover of damn near every magazine and I doubt ten years short time would have really changed that so dramatically. If she wanted to be seen, she would be."
"What about her father?" I perked up suddenly.
"That's another mystery," He leaned back further, wiping his eyes with tiredness. I was grateful to him for taking the time he had, afraid I was wearing out my welcome with these incessant questions. "And don't get me wrong, from what I knew of the man, he was always something of a recluse but now? I've only ever been told that he literally works almost 24 hours out of the day, never even moving outside for weeks, working away for Kakarot."
I buried my face in my hands, exasperated.
"No one fights anymore?" I finally asked. "No one rebels, no one even tries?"
"Who is there to try?" He asked me. "Groups of two hundred people aren't enough to stop him. He was nearly flawless in his take-over, quick and efficient. We're hopeless now."
I sighed, leaning back finally.
We sat quietly for a moment, listening to the sounds of Jessie's hussle and bussle in the kitchen. I didn't even try to make sense of everything, tiredness taking away the incentive to mull over questions I wasn't going to get an answer for.
"I know I should sleep," Sam finally broke the silence, gazing at his wife. "But sometimes, I stay up all night just looking at her."
I smiled slightly, admiring his emotional attachment despite the fact that he was far from an eccentric person.
"She's beautiful." I told him honestly.
"She's mortal," he whispered.
I looked at him strangely, remarking within myself what an unusual thing it was for him, a human, a mortal himself, to say.
"Sometimes I think, we as humans, don't understand mortality," He explained himself. "At least, not until it's too late. I don't see myself as mortal because I'm not dying. I have another 10-15 years in me. Death doesn't really touch me the way that it does her."
I looked over, my heart seeming to sink as he went on.
"Is she sick?" I asked him.
"She's growing older," He answered. "We had wanted to start a family together, so long ago. Castor," He chuckled with little humor. "I nearly forgot that's what we named him. My son, that is."
I waited for him to go on, feeling heavy with tiredness and even some grief.
"A still born," he explained. "Born dead. I think he nearly took her with him.
"Sometimes, women are such an enigma to me, you know? Men will forever look to their ancestors for the key to ruling the world and woman, in one way or another, will still be in control. They're something so much more than us. Not just wires and veins and occasional ideas. They change everything they touch. Do you realize what a gift that is? To transform the entire world around you just by walking each day in it?
"When she lost Castor, I swore she'd leave me too. There's something about an unborn child dying that we as men will never understand. When she lay in that hospital bed, just staring off into nothing, she told me if felt like every day, God had made her a promise and then took it back. She felt cheated I guess, though it's a poor way to word it. She says now that if it weren't for me, she would have just drifted off to sleep and never woken up again. We live for each other, every day.
"My world consists of my 14 hours spent thinking of her, and the rest, spent being with her. She makes me the man I am. And I'm going to be losing her soon."
I swallowed hard, not understanding.
"Old age doesn't belong anywhere in this world," He looked at me. "Kakarot saw to that. The least amount of hours a person can work is 10 a day. And Jessie, though she never complains, struggles with those more than she'll ever let on. When she can't complete her 10, she's seen as unfit for work and then, unfit for life. 'A human life has no purpose if it cannot complete 10 hours of labor towards the earth that spawned it.' So they send them to factories."
"Factories?"
"They call them rest homes," he sighed. "but everyone knows what they are. The modern day concentration camps, except there is no labor there. Only death."
I caught my breath again, every gasp of my lungs feeling heavy.
"They kill them swiftly," He said in a hard voice. "or so I'm told. But they put them down like dogs and then burn the bodies. Same with the terminally sick and the deformed. Two, maybe three years I have left with her, Castor. And then, they'll drag her away from me and that will be our goodbye. Get used to it son," He said, crawling to his feet. "The world you awoke in is just another living nightmare."
With that, he walked into the kitchen, kissing his wife and helping her with the dishes.
I didn't sleep a wink the whole night.
It was just too weird.
I flew forward, emptying out the contents of my stomach and sulking against the tree. My head was whirling as I held myself in a crouching position, hanging onto the bits of bark on the tree just to keep myself from landing in my vomit. Stars and patches of black flew into my vision and I shook my head, willing them away. Someone was standing over me, asking the cliche "are you ok's" when it was painfully obvious, that uhh, hell no, I wasn't.
"You gonna make it there pal?" A voice asked me, my eyes glancing upwards to catch sight of the brown-haired man from earlier. "Not much for the sight of blood are ya?"
I just shook my head, trying to steady myself.
"Guess not," He answered for me, patting my back in a kind gesture. I weakly smiled up at him, a nod of my head in appreciation.
I slowly climbed to my feet, thankful that he was doing his utmost to help, which might have been difficult considering I was twice his size. I took him in for a moment, his face drawn with age, mouth set in a rather ugly line and stature positively shrieking the word "troll". Still, a set of divine green eyes stared up at me from the cracks of his lids, making me steady myself again. For all his seemingly unattractive features, I realized very quickly, he must have been positively beautiful in his youth.
"You're a big fella'." He told me, smiling a little wider as he let me go.
"Uhh...Thanks." I faltered. "I guess."
"Say, you're REALLY not from around here are you?" He asked, gazing at my whole frame with no apologies. I realized rather quickly that I was much taller than anyone else here, my Saiyan features (alight as they were with the transformation) causing most of the humans to regard me with suspicion. Sets of eyes took me into account and then went back to work, apparently deciding that the drastic demonstration was enough incentive to keep going at their harsh pace.
"Who..." I looked over towards the brown-haired man. "Who WAS that?!"
He looked at me skeptically, as if he thought I was making a joke or something.
"Are you kidding me?" He asked seriously. "Where have you BEEN the last ten years?!"
I blinked, not having thought about this as much as I figured now that I should have.
"Uhh..." I swallowed, squinting in concentration. "A.... Comma?"
"Heh," He looked at me with the skeptical glance again, shaking his head. "Ok."
I figured he didn't believed me but in a world as chaotic as this, I'm sure he doubted very much that I was any sort of threat. He gestured for me to follow him, pulling out his wrist from under his shirt and placing it over a metallic, technical piece of equipment. A strange sound was heard and he winced, pulling back his hand and rubbing his wrist slightly.
"Mine is one of the older models," He told me. "They didn't have the painless cards like they do now back then. Just a slight sting sometimes is all."
I looked at him blankly, staring at the small patch of metal embedded beneath the soft skin of his flesh.
"My time card," He informed. "My 14 hours is up. Time to go home."
"Oh," I nodded, hanging my head slightly. I hadn't thought about that part either, but something told me that barging into ChiChi's home wasn't the greatest idea seens how her present husband seemed to be a deranged, sadistic psychopath. A lonely feeling weld into my gut and, not for the first time that day, I regretted the wish. I hadn't been so confused for so many hours in my entire life and it only seemed to be getting weirder.
"Say," Brown-hair interrupted my thinking. "You got a place to go? At least for this evening?"
"No," I admitted. "I.... I guess I don't."
He looked me over, apparently trying to size up whether or not I was "deranged, sadistic psychopath" material or not. I swallowed hard under his scrutiny, looking anywhere but him.
"Meh," He finally said, gesturing with a sweep of his arm. "You seem harmless enough, despite the fact that you look like you just crawled out of a glacier in Iceland. Follow me."
I nodded gratefully, following behind him. We trudged on a path for a while, our pace comfortable as we gazed around through the darkness.
"You hungry?" He asked me. "Didn't seem you kept much of your lunch intact back there."
I blushed a little, smiling.
"Actually," I said thoughtfully, looking up. "I'm starving!"
He laughed a little, a nice sound considering the others I'd heard today. I was learning that I liked him very quickly, admiring his easy-going, devil-may-care attitude despite his circumstances. I wondered at the change ten years ago had made, or maybe, who he was before then. A banker, I decided within myself. A kind, 9 to 5 office prankster.
"I'm uhh...." I glanced down. "I'm afraid I eat a great deal though."
He laughed again, waving off my admittance.
"Not a big problem there. We have an over abundance of food," He shrugged. "Especially considering that famine was entirely wiped off the map about the first three years of his reign."
I was caught off guard by this.
"So," I asked him. "That man back there, that... crazy psycho rules this world?"
He laughed a little, eyes darting around.
"Yeah," He answered me. "But I don't think I'd go around referring to Kakarot that way. Despite your looks, I doubt he'd keep your head welded to your body if he heard you say so."
I frowned at that, trudging onwards.
"You still don't know a lot of things huh?" He asked me, trying to keep pace with me despite the fact that I was supposed to be following him. "I'll bet you're confused as hell huh?"
I grinned.
"I don't even think that could sum it up." I laughed. "I've never been so exasperated and confused in all my life. I feel like the whole world has gone completely and certifiably insane."
He chuckled a little, bobbing his brown head of hair about.
"It has my friend," He said soberly. "It really really has."
We continued on in silence, my stomach growling in protest at how long this was taking. I wanted to just grab up the man, fly through the air and have him point out where abouts we were going, but figured against that idea. So I just trudged on beside him, my eyes darting along the trees that seemed almost too thick as they swayed around us.
"So," He broke the silence. "Do you have a name or should I just call you Albino?"
I felt my face break into a grin again and I shrugged, weighing my options.
"You know," I sighed. "I guess Albino will have to do."
He looked at me oddly before shrugging and moving on.
"I'm Sam." He said simply. It was a perfect name for him.
The home was as Yamcha's had been, down to the wheat for a ceiling, mud walls and the eerie, regular glass windows. Still, a candle had been set inside, welcoming us as we entered to the sound of Sam's adorable wife prattling around the "kitchen" and ushering us inside. I took in the surroundings, figuring the word "simple" didn't quite do it justice.
A plain set of chairs and a small dinning table sat in the expanse of the room, a tiny stove currently being waited on by Sam's wife, and two other chairs in the corner of the room. That was it. Two other rooms resided, one being a bathroom and the other, from what I could see, occupied by one, medium-sized mattress on the floor.
"Ohhh!" A lovely, bell-like voice broke my concentration, two little hands wrapping around my cheeks. "And who is THIS beautiful young man? My goodness, get in here and let me look at you!"
My eyes widened as she pulled my head down to her level, her small, beady eyes gazing at me from behind thick glasses.
"My goodness!" She pronounced. "Why Sam, he's just the most beautiful thing! Can you believe it!? This white hair is just marvelous!"
Her little hand was in my strands of hair, sifting through them as she giggled delightfully. As much as I knew I liked Sam, I was falling pretty quickly in love with his wife.
"Oh Lord Jessie," Sam groaned. "Next you'll be asking if we can keep him. I swear, people are like pets to you."
"You better believe I'm gonna be keeping him," She snapped in a sassy way that I loved and distinctly reminded me of Bulma. Her eyes turned back to me and she tapped the side of my face playfully. "My my my, I've never seen anyone quite like you."
"Thank you," I said softly, blushing a little as I looked down.
"Please please," she pulled out a chair from the dinning table. "Have a seat young man. You look positively famished!"
Before I could decline the one of two chairs, she was grabbing another one from the "living room" and nearly throwing Sam into it.
"Sorry," he whispered to me with a smile in his green eyes. "She gets so riled up when I have company over."
I just smiled, waving it off. I didn't want to tell him that I more or less wanted to sweep her up and steal her away. Food was piled up in front of me, my stomach roaring with satisfaction as I, as politely as possible, began to gorge myself with it. Whenever one plate was even close to empty, another was tossed, heaping full in front of me. Oh yes, yes, I wanted to steal Jessie away more than ever!
"So what's you're name, beautiful stranger?" She asked me, a permanent smile on her lovely features.
"Uhh.." I glanced at Sam, swallowing my mouthful of food. "Albino I guess."
She made a quick scoffing sound, slapping Sam's shoulder.
"You gave him that didn't you!?" She accused, grinning madly. "Sam Gunther, you're an absolute beast!"
He smiled all the wider, winking over towards me.
"Well geez Jessie," he taunted. "he's your new pet, give em' a name if you want."
I watched the two of them, laughing as I shook my head. For a small second, I wondered if me and ChiChi would have ever become like these two, the sobering thought calming my smile. Sure, they'd probably had fights, undoubtedly went through some hardships; but looking at them now, it was like two best friends choosing to take a road of life together and having fun along the way. They were what marriage was supposed to be, I guessed.
"Castor," She said, waking me from my somber thoughts. "That's what we'll call him."
I raised a pale eyebrow at that.
"That's pretty random," I said softly, liking the name either way.
"No it's not." Sam said, looking oddly at his wife and then returning to his food.
I looked to her for an explanation, taking in her features that looked, for once, a little forlorn.
"Castor is what I wanted to name my boy," she said gently. "if I ever had one."
I mouthed an 'oh', finishing up my last plate of food.
"You look like a Castor," She told me, sitting in front of me and waving her little fingers through the silvery locks of my hair. "My, but those eyes of yours."
I tried not to look down in embarrassment, since she was obviously gazing at my eyes, wondering if I ought to keep my odd features more concealed and then deciding against it.
"So pale," She said it sweetly. "So blue. Castor, you can make even an old woman's heart beat a little bit faster."
I laughed a little at that, watching as she left to start washing the dishes. I looked over seriously at Sam though, moving a bit closer.
"I need to know some things." I told him. "I need to know what happened ten years ago. I need to understand things."
He nodded, standing from the table and taking his chair with us to the 'living room'. I gave a quick but enthused 'thank you' to Jessie, being waved off with a smile as I joined him.
"Start from the beginning if you will," I told him.
He leaned back in his chair, preparing for the long explanation ahead.
"It started as oddly as it exists now," He told me, hands folded in his lap. "Ten world leaders were kidnapped, all within one day. Everyone thought it was some sort of terrorist conspiracy, I mean how, how in one day could all these world leaders be taken captive? But it was just one man. Just one. Soon, a television company picked up a signal being launched towards them. They broadcasted it, the face of ...." He faltered. "Of Kakarot right in front of the screen. "Show them," is what he said. "Show the whole world."
He shook his head, expression hardened.
"We all watched for 15 days as he broadcasted every world leader, altogether in one room, dying off."
My breath hitched at that, Sam's head nodding along with me.
"Guess he released Ebola on them," he told me. "made every person capable of seeing television watch as their own leaders and others were slowly coughing up blood," He cringed. "Puking it, crying it, shitting it out. Just dying off in the worst way, right for everyone to see."
He paused, breathing a pent up sigh.
"It worked though." He spoke. "It worked marvelously for him. Everyone was terrified, trying to trace the signal, to find out where these men were. By the 15th day, most of them were dead anyways and by the 16th, Kakarot had introduced himself to the world in the only way he knew how: shockingly. He would display horrific feights of strength against the United States Military, taking entire bombs and cannons and everything head on, coming back with more fire power than any of them. Right out of his hands, like.... like he was God or something. Just blowing away every military operation they could send to him.
"He was also merciless, making sure people saw that he wouldn't hold back from killing women, kids, anyone. Eventually, he had the whole world scared shitless of him, some countries even erecting enormous statues of him, just to show their allegiance. He told people to leave the cities, those that didn't listen, killed in enormous blasts as he took out the largest cities first. He didn't think that people were created to live like that, the rich prospering and the poor just scrapping by. He balanced everything out, put everyone on everyone else's level. No rich, no poor.
"The countries that absolutely refused to bow down, he unleashed amazing amounts of the Ebola virus on them, though how he did it, I'm not even sure. Rats carried it to the poor and the rich, he unleashed it in their water systems. Took out entire countries that way and then burned what was left of them. He made public killings to spook the populace of countries into obedience, disemboweling emperors and spraying their guts out all over their palaces.
"When finally, people stopped fighting and rebel groups were taken out, he wiped out all religion from the face of the earth. He told us that religion had been the cause for more deaths and wars than he ever had and thus, we would be united when it was forgotten. He was the only thing worth worshipping he said.
"Eventually, he arranged "cities" by separating the remaining humans into two hundred person groups, giving out assignments. We weren't to live as we had before. There were no secular jobs or schools or computer technology. Scientific establishments were basically wiped out, save for Capsule Corp."
"What happened to Capsule Corp?" I asked him, my heart beating wildly.
"It still stands," He shrugged. "Bulma Briefs, the president, was the first to help him with all of this, the main reason his techniques made such an impact. He was the brute strength and she was the technology."
I tried to sort out this information, shaking my head from the confusion.
"Is she still alive?" I asked, my heart beating in my ears.
"Sure," he said, staring at me oddly and taking in my reaction to all this. "She's still around, last I heard. Doesn't make many public appearances, that's for sure."
I nodded, gesturing for him to continue.
"As I told you," He said. "Famine was completely none-existent by the first three years, every human's part in rebuilding the planet magnificently efficient. There are those that make the clothing for the workers, those that make the food, those that ship it off, those that oversee everything. But you won't find an occupation based or set with any other goal besides rebuilding the earth. As he said, we spent our entire lives up until that point polluting, overpopulating, sucking away the natural goodness of the earth. So, we'll spend the remainder of our time here regrowing what we'd taken.
"He's big on family though, you saw that yourself. He never separated families when combining the "cities". They all were to stay together, never to be put asunder, or so he words it. But the idea of that is only too horrific, as you witnessed today, when people make mistakes. He doesn't just kill the offending member; he kills them all."
"But why?" I pleaded, shaking my head in disgust. "Why be such a monster?"
"Maybe we don't know everything," he shrugged his shoulders, reminding me again that he was a very practical, logical man. "I was told once that he, in one of his infamous drug-sprees, informed all in attendance that it was a crueller thing to leave the family alive. That living in a world void of those you love is perhaps the cruelest fate a man can meet with. He sees it as a kindness to an extent, setting them 'all free from the face of the earth', quote un-quote. He is... as you said before, a psycho. He's completely deranged and drunk on power, in love with himself and a temperamental drug-addict."
"A drug addict?" I looked at him oddly, recalling the track-marks I'd seen on his arms and unable to believe it.
"Do you really think a sane man could sleep at night if he wasn't?" He told me. "You really think a sane, sober man could murder children and old people and not weep when he looked in a mirror? No. Kakarot needs those drugs, needs that chaotic release. Sometimes, I think everyone else on earth understands him more than he even understands himself. Othertimes though, I think we see only a monster because we're too afraid to see a man."
I sat in silence for a moment, contemplating this.
"I just cannot believe that Bulma Briefs would aid him in this," I finally spoke it, perhaps now more confused than even before. "I know her or.. well, I did know her. Some time ago, you imagine and..." I shook my head. "I just can't see it. I can't see someone like her, as kind and pure as her, aiding him to kill and enslave people."
"Well," He agreed. "Maybe you're right and maybe you're wrong. Maybe there's so much more to even that story that we don't rightly know. A beautiful girl like that, hiding from the world for years? I don't see it. Ten years before all this, that woman's face was on the cover of damn near every magazine and I doubt ten years short time would have really changed that so dramatically. If she wanted to be seen, she would be."
"What about her father?" I perked up suddenly.
"That's another mystery," He leaned back further, wiping his eyes with tiredness. I was grateful to him for taking the time he had, afraid I was wearing out my welcome with these incessant questions. "And don't get me wrong, from what I knew of the man, he was always something of a recluse but now? I've only ever been told that he literally works almost 24 hours out of the day, never even moving outside for weeks, working away for Kakarot."
I buried my face in my hands, exasperated.
"No one fights anymore?" I finally asked. "No one rebels, no one even tries?"
"Who is there to try?" He asked me. "Groups of two hundred people aren't enough to stop him. He was nearly flawless in his take-over, quick and efficient. We're hopeless now."
I sighed, leaning back finally.
We sat quietly for a moment, listening to the sounds of Jessie's hussle and bussle in the kitchen. I didn't even try to make sense of everything, tiredness taking away the incentive to mull over questions I wasn't going to get an answer for.
"I know I should sleep," Sam finally broke the silence, gazing at his wife. "But sometimes, I stay up all night just looking at her."
I smiled slightly, admiring his emotional attachment despite the fact that he was far from an eccentric person.
"She's beautiful." I told him honestly.
"She's mortal," he whispered.
I looked at him strangely, remarking within myself what an unusual thing it was for him, a human, a mortal himself, to say.
"Sometimes I think, we as humans, don't understand mortality," He explained himself. "At least, not until it's too late. I don't see myself as mortal because I'm not dying. I have another 10-15 years in me. Death doesn't really touch me the way that it does her."
I looked over, my heart seeming to sink as he went on.
"Is she sick?" I asked him.
"She's growing older," He answered. "We had wanted to start a family together, so long ago. Castor," He chuckled with little humor. "I nearly forgot that's what we named him. My son, that is."
I waited for him to go on, feeling heavy with tiredness and even some grief.
"A still born," he explained. "Born dead. I think he nearly took her with him.
"Sometimes, women are such an enigma to me, you know? Men will forever look to their ancestors for the key to ruling the world and woman, in one way or another, will still be in control. They're something so much more than us. Not just wires and veins and occasional ideas. They change everything they touch. Do you realize what a gift that is? To transform the entire world around you just by walking each day in it?
"When she lost Castor, I swore she'd leave me too. There's something about an unborn child dying that we as men will never understand. When she lay in that hospital bed, just staring off into nothing, she told me if felt like every day, God had made her a promise and then took it back. She felt cheated I guess, though it's a poor way to word it. She says now that if it weren't for me, she would have just drifted off to sleep and never woken up again. We live for each other, every day.
"My world consists of my 14 hours spent thinking of her, and the rest, spent being with her. She makes me the man I am. And I'm going to be losing her soon."
I swallowed hard, not understanding.
"Old age doesn't belong anywhere in this world," He looked at me. "Kakarot saw to that. The least amount of hours a person can work is 10 a day. And Jessie, though she never complains, struggles with those more than she'll ever let on. When she can't complete her 10, she's seen as unfit for work and then, unfit for life. 'A human life has no purpose if it cannot complete 10 hours of labor towards the earth that spawned it.' So they send them to factories."
"Factories?"
"They call them rest homes," he sighed. "but everyone knows what they are. The modern day concentration camps, except there is no labor there. Only death."
I caught my breath again, every gasp of my lungs feeling heavy.
"They kill them swiftly," He said in a hard voice. "or so I'm told. But they put them down like dogs and then burn the bodies. Same with the terminally sick and the deformed. Two, maybe three years I have left with her, Castor. And then, they'll drag her away from me and that will be our goodbye. Get used to it son," He said, crawling to his feet. "The world you awoke in is just another living nightmare."
With that, he walked into the kitchen, kissing his wife and helping her with the dishes.
I didn't sleep a wink the whole night.