Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Through A Mirror Darkly ❯ Through Narrowed Eyes ( Chapter 15 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Mara sighed. She floated in the air next to Piccolo, long legs folded beneath her, her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands. She sighed again, louder, looking askance at her twin-soul. She gritted her teeth and sighed again. Finally, unable to concentrate, Piccolo opened one eye, looked over at her in annoyance.

"Must you keep doing that?" He asked as she shifted in place, "Your making it very hard to concentrate…"

"I can't help it!" She said, looking up, "I've never been so bored in my entire life!"

"You need to center yourself…" He said, looking across the way at the river they could barely glimpse through the trees, a sparkle of silver glint of the sun off the ripples, If you stared to long you could get very dizzy, "Meditate…"

"That's what we've been doing for the last five hours, Piccolo!" Mara said, "Don't you think this is pretty much overkill? I want to do something different…besides, my legs are getting cramped…!"

With that, Mara stood up and lowered herself to the ground. As her feet touched the earth she thought of something. "I want to go visit Toshi and Vegeta…I wonder how she'd doing…"

"She's not with him." Piccolo said, his other eye open as well now, "Can you feel it? Their ki is much weaker when they are apart."

She cocked her head to one side, waited, listened and felt all around her. Opening all her senses. Finally she grinned and exclaimed; "I do feel it! Your right! But I can feel all kinds of things!"

"Yes, be careful." Piccolo cautioned, "There are a lot of living creatures with energy of their own around and you could be overloaded with input if you…"

Suddenly Mara grabbed her head and cried out. It felt like a thousand bolts of lightning crashed into her brain at once. The sensation was horrifing! She automatically began building up mental walls to block the effect of sensing all the ki in the area and slowly raised her head, her dark hair hanging like a green curtain over her eyes.

"Whew!" She said, her voice barely above a whisper, "Overload is right! That hurt like hell!"

"Just focus on whoever you're trying to sense and block out the others," He advised, nodding.

"Thanks." She said, and saw him close his eyes once more, preparing to go back to his meditation. She reached up and yanked on his cape, jerking him out of his near-reverie, "Not so fast! You're coming with me!"

"Mara!" He said, "I don't have time to…"

"Oh come on!" She laughed, still holding two ends of his cape in her hands, looking up at him, "You had five hours to fill by doing absolutely nothing…"

"Meditating!"

"…Nothing," She went on as if he hadn't spoken, "So don't tell me you don't have time to go visit a friend! Come on!"

Piccolo sighed, but decided to accompany her. How could he not when she was so persausive.

"Besides," She said, "You need to see people once in a while…"

"I like being alone."

"Your not alone," She reminded him, "I'm with you, now."

He actually smiled at that! She reached over in mid flight and grabbed his hand, holding it tightly in her own.

"She's over at Goku's." Piccolo said out of the blue and Mara, knowing what he meant, just nodded.

They arrived in record time and landed softly together on the patio outside the back door. Piccolo didn't bother with knocking on the door, he simply placed two fingers to his brow and teleported himself inside. Mara took the more mundane route. She opened the door and walked in.

"Toshi!" Mara cried, her hands cupping her mouth as she shouted for her friend, "Toshi! Where are you, girl!?"

"You sound like you calling a dog." Piccolo observed, "Just sense where she is!"

"It's more fun this way," She said, and got ready to yell again. At which Toshi appeared in the doorway to the living room and said; "Shut up! Dammit! I just got Bra down for a nap! Chi Chi hasn't gotten back from the store and the boys are out training or whatever…If you wake her up, Mara, I swear I'll kill you and feed your innards to my cat!"

"You don't have a cat." Mara said, Toshi shook her head, and Mara caught sight of something glittering behind her, "Oh! Aubria's here! That explains the terribly powerful ki I sensed here as we approuched! How are ya, Little one?"

Aubria was sitting on the sofa, her legs tucked under her and her wings folded against her back. She smiled and waved before turning back to the television set which Toshi had put on low volume for the girl, who's ears were keen anyhow, too watch. She seemed enthralled by it. Mara looked at Toshi with questioning eyes.

"She'd never seen a t.v. before." Toshi shrugged, "I had no choice but to remedy the situation."

"With her capabilities she should be training," Piccolo said sternly, "Not wasting her time with television!"

"She doesn't want to learn to fight." Toshi told them, as Aubria pretended not to hear them talk about as if she weren't there and couldn't hear them, "But there is this prophecy, see, from her planet about a girl who will be born that will lead them onto war…"

"But, then…" Mara began but her friend interrupted her;

"She can't even stand to see others' fight." She went on, "She told me that the very thought of anyone inflicting purposeful harm on another was unthinkable to her."

"So how is she suppose to be able to lead her people onto war?" Piccolo mused, as Aubria shifted in her seat, "Very strange."

"Maybe it means when she grows up." Mara offered but one look at the gentle little girl and she knew that couldn't be true. She would not change her mind or her ways once she was of full size, somehow Mara just knew this, though she had no idea how she knew.

"I've already gone through my larval stage," Aubria offered, finally joining the conversation, "I gained my wings during my sleeptime, and I have one more sleeptime coming up in which I'll get bigger and gain my adult wings."

"Will they look the same as the ones you have now, Butterfly?" Toshi asked, curious. She didn't know this about the little sprite, "Or will they be different?"

"Only bigger," Aubria said, "Adult sized wings are much bigger than child sized ones."

"I would think so," Mara said, "Still, this doesn't answer the question of how you can doing anything war-like if you hate the very idea of combat."

"Some prophecies must be looked at through narrowed eyes." They all turned to see Chi Chi standing there, gorchery bags in her arms, her purse over her shoulder and her hair a mess.

It looked like she'd just been run through the ringer and hung out to dry, but she smiled as she placed the sacks on the table and counter before turning back to them; "You can't take them literally. Perhaps it won't even be Aubria who will lead them to war…it may be an offspring of her's or someone from a future generation."

"I never thought of that!" Aubria cried, coming through the archway to help Chi Chi with the gorcheries, "Thank you so much!"

"Anytime, dear." Chi Chi said in her normal motherly tone, "The bananas go in the hanging basket over the sink…"