Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Slumber Party! ❯ Difficult Decisions ( Chapter 31 )

"No! What's happening?!" Piccolo cried, his hands curled into fists at his sides, looking slightly upwards; "Tori! Bulma!"

"Why hasn't the little fool used the dragonballs?!" Vegeta asked, floating next to Piccolo, "Bulma knows how for kami's sake! Are they going to just wait until they're both dead?!"

"It would do them no good then, Vegeta," Piccolo said, eyes wide as he gazed upwards, trying to regain his previous communication with Tori.

** Can you hear me, Tori? ** He tried, unsure as to why their connection was suddenly severed, only he could still feel a slight sense as to what was going on, it felt similar to a blind person stumbling around in the darkness, he could still use other senses to feel things around her, but did not know exactly what those things were, ** Please, answer me! **

~*~*~

"I...I can't believe what's happening," Terra murmured, arms wrapped about herself, her powerful staff fallen onto the floor, the orb's pulsing light dimmed drastically, "This is all my doing..."

She, Chi Chi, and Goku had gone back to the house Bulma and Vegeta were sharing with them. The children, Goten and Trunks, had been sent to bed, much to their disliking, by Chi Chi and Goku.

"Don't say that!" Goku said firmly, sitting on the sofa, his arm around his wife's shoulder, Chi Chi nodded, "Don't even think that! If it wasn't for you, we wouldn't have been able to even control your brother half-way!"

"Without me, none of this would have ever taken place!" Terra cried, "It was a grave error in coming here, allowing my brother, always so...unsatisfied with what fate had dealt him...,to be temped by the power that is here..."

"All is not lost, Terra!" Chi Chi stood up and walked over to the green-tinted woman, brushing her hair with her hand, "Don't despair! Remember, There are always the dragonballs!"

"That's right!" Goku said, smiling his famous takes-over-his-entire-face smile, "If Tori can somehow manage to wrest control away from Cyclone, Bulma can use the Dragonballs to wish them back home!"

Terra's eyes twinkled a bit as an emotion known to many creatures as hope danced across them. She took Chi Chi's hand in her own and turned it over, placing a kiss upon the palm, "You are very kind, Chi Chi," She said, sighing wearily, "But, I am tired...and ill...I need..."

"You need to lay down!" Chi Chi cried, helping Terra to her feet, "I just wish we could do something to help you, too!"

"I...I know, but..." Terra gasped, recent events having had their way with her dying body, she stumbled, with Chi Chi's help, back into the bedroom, "The dragonballs..."

Before she could say more, the woman was asleep on her feet. Chi Chi put her to bed and tucked the blankets in around her chin, staring down at her for a long moment.

It's just not fair! She thought, Use the dragonballs to wish our loved ones home safe or to save the life of this stranger...? Though we don't know her very well, and truth being, we hardly know Tori, both of them have shown themselves to be beautiful in their own way...

How can we choice between them? She turned and shut the door as she left the room, not wanting to disturb Terra's fitful rest, wishing she could ease the pain of her leaving the fleshly world. How can the gods expect that of us?

"You have to have hope, Chi Chi," Goku said, reading his wife's expression with little effort, hugging her tightly, "It'll all work out!"

"Oh, Goku!" She cried, "What do you always have to be...so...optimistic!"

~*~*~

Tori, feeling Piccolo's desperation for her to respond to him lurking at the corners of her mind, turned to Bulma as the ship was pulled closer and closer to it's certain doom, "Bulma! Where are the dragonballs?!"

Looking around, she quickly spied them under the captain's, what used to be Cyclone's, chair, still in the backpack, which was glowing with the power inside, "There they are!"

She grabbed the backpack up by it's handles and opened it, dropping the balls onto the floor of the side, they gathered together like magnets and attached to each other, all seven, glowing brightly. Bulma looked at Tori, who looked at the monster of the ship they were being sucked into.

"Are you sure...?" Bulma asked, hesitating over the balls, her hands over-stretched over them, "We...only get one wish...with these..."

"Yes!" Tori cried, "We have no choice! Do it, Bulma! Get us out of here!"

Taking a deep breath, Bulma began the solemn chant which would bring the mystical, powerful, wish-granting dragon forth...

~*~*~

"I...I can't believe it!" Piccolo cried, realizing what was happening, "She...she's actually doing it! They're calling the dragon!"

"What?" Vegeta asked, eyebrows raised into his widow's peak, "It's about feakin' time!"

"But...if they use the dragonballs now, then Terra..." Piccolo began, "...will die.."

"Who cares, you moron!?" Vegeta said, jumping in the air, "At least your little girlfriend and my mate will survive! That's what's important!"

"One life...for another..." Piccolo mused, turning from Vegeta, "Is this really the right thing after all?"

"What's the matter with you, Namekian?!" Vegeta cried, grabbing him by his cape and spinning him around, "You've never shirked hard decisions before! So what if the bitch and her brother bite it, at least..."

A disgusted look crossed over the green warrior's face and, without warning, he landed a forceful punch to the proud, yet obnoxious siayan prince's jaw, sending him backwards in the air. Rubbing his face, Vegeta glared at Piccolo, muttered something under his breath and flew off.

"He will never understand..." Piccolo murmured, watching Vegeta's form flying swiftly away, "I..can't let her do this...!"

Closing his eyes, poured all his will into breaking though the barriers Tori had built up inside her mind and the distance between in order to gain her attention...

Sweat beaded his brow and he reached up, taking hold of his turban and the weight it concealed, throwing both to the ground, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand, his antennae trembling. ** Tori! Listen to me! You must stop and listen! **

~*~*~

"P-Piccolo...?" Tori gasped, the sound of his voice seemed like a healing beacon to her hurt and weary soul, she wished he were with her in the flesh so she could... Suddenly, the bombardment of his desperation to get through to her sent her reeling, "W-what...?"

She sank to the floor, her hands over her eyes, head pounding. Bulma continued the chant as if she hadn't noticed her friend's sudden loss of energy. She knew she could not pause or the spell would not take...they were getting closer and closer to the other ship...she must not stop!

** Tori! Listen to me! Bulma has to stop!** Piccolo's voice inside her head, practically screaming at her, ** Tell her to stop! You must not call the dragon! Terra will die! **

I...I know, Tori thought to herself, tears in her eyes, I...don't know what's right anymore!

** This isn't the way, Tori! ** Piccolo said, his voice calming down somewhat, but not by much, Bulma was halfway through with the chant, ** Maybe you can reason with the other beings...We need to keep the dragonballs wish for saving Terra, I've felt her strength and know she will not last long enough to locate their famed Crystal..."

The Crystal that can heal her...

"Yes, that one, but it's too late...I mean, it will be too late for that," Piccolo said, "She'll be dead in a matter of days, Tori, but you can use the wish to save her!"

But...what if... Tori didn't want to think it, much less say it, They don't wish to see reason...?

It's not fair! Tori thought, feeling like a spoiled child who can't get her way, she knew the right thing to do was to use the dragonballs to wish for Terra to be healed of whatever consumed her, but what about herself and Bulma? There was so much she would never be able to do...so much she would never be able to...

Piccolo followed her thoughts and felt her sadness as if it were his own, his did not what to say so he said nothing.

But who am I to deny another living being her chance at all that and more...? She thought, her strength of resolve growing brighter within her, like a pulsing golden star, even amidst her sorrow at what she knew she must do, I...can't let Terra die...not when I have the means to her survival at my fingertips...

Piccolo didn't respond, he couldn't, his mind was too full of anguish to function properly. Choking back a cry of pain, Tori felt him as he closed his mind to her, and all she felt when she reached was an emptiness that made midnight bright by comparison...

She reached out to still Bulma's chant on the second to last word. Pausing, Bulma closed her mouth and looked at Tori, fear in her eyes as she realized what the younger girl had just decided. She opened her mouth to protest but Tori's hands crackled with her fire magic and her eyes glared with her strength of purpose, backing the blue-haired woman up a few paces.

"Tori, are you crazy?!" Bulma cried at last, "Look! We're halfway inside their hangar all ready!"

"I'm sorry, Bulma..." Tori said, "We have to do this...put the dragonballs in an escape pod, program it for Earth..."

"But..."

"Don't argue with me! Would you be able to live with yourself knowing that if you hadn't used the wish to get out of this mess a friend would still be alive?" And Tori quickly explained about what she'd just learned from Piccolo about Terra.

Bulma shook her head, sighing, "No," She said, "You know I couldn't."

"Neither could I," Tori said, turning to look at the inside of the other ship, "I just hope they're...willing to talk..."

Piccolo...She cried inside her mind, a desperate child seeking in the darkness, I'll...never forget...

A/N: Is this the end?! Stay tuned to find out in the next exciting installment of... "Slumber Party!"

Maybe I should think of different title to this tale, what do you think, it's gone far beyond the initial Slumber Party, hasn't it? lol.

~Ami