FanFiction.Net - unleash your imagination 
mobile edition|
Author of 25 Stories |
Before I go on, a few shout-outs…
Marauder: Yay, Doop likes it. 'Fraid I suck at the whole "update soon" bit, but you should know that by now, brother of mine. :P
Anorake: I'm glad you think so. I've been told that description is my forte, probably due to the fact that I used to be so awful at it. -winces- Triple thanks and lots of nice food for reviewing!
Jill: Thank you. I'm sorry it took so long, but at long last I can present you with the next chapter…
Bleeding Stars: Wow, I'm honoured that such a talented author likes my story. I can't express how happy I am to hear that it's got you interested, so, er, here's a chapter. Feel free to throw rocks at me if I take this long to update next time, since you've been encouraging people to do the same to you for Black Sunrise.
Siara the Black-Winged one: Which Pokémon one? I have a few of 'em, y'know. And maybe I did kill Vegeta… but maybe I didn't. I guess you'll just have to read on and see. :P
Garowyn: Yay, PG-13 is my friend. :D And I have no intention of writing a lemon, being kinda allergic to the things (yeah, I'm one of those people who nearly gets blinded while reading some of the good fics around here and scrolls down crazily to try and avoid being scarred mentally as well), so I'm glad you think the fic's fine without one. Thanks for the review and being the only one who reassured me about the whole rating thing!
Acalanthis: Uh-oh -has been tracked down and harassed- I really need to get better at posting chapters faster. I'm just going to post this chapter on F.F.U.M.P. too, and I hope you like it… keeping in mind that grief is difficult to portray and introductions suck. vv' Despite the fact that I now have six different people harassing me about various fics of mine, I'm happy that you liked the fic enough to do that. Thank you for reviewing!
Summary: After a raid attack leaves many dead, Bulma, a woman good at calming the dead, is called into a village far into the forest. But her task is much harder than she expected and, with the introduction of the tyrant Frieza to the picture, things are really getting out of hand! B/V with some K/18, G/CC and maybe L/T
Rating: PG for death & character death
Disclaimer: Do I look rich to you?
Ethereal Fantasy
By Obsidian Blade
Chapter One - Casualties
Pages: 8
The woman, who looked to be about twenty-five, had a slightly worried expression on her pale-skinned face as she tightened one of the back wheels to the axel. Dressed in a plain white dress, black riding gloves and long, black cloak, she cursed the mud repeatedly as she stood up and dusted herself off.
"Yamcha, is she okay?" she called to a rustling patch of bushes, brushing a lock of shoulder-length cerulean hair out of her bright blue eyes.
"Yeah," came the response, " 'M just untying her."
Pushing through the undergrowth, the blue-haired woman peered down at a tall, wiry man as he crouched behind a kneeling female to untie her chafed wrists. The standing woman frowned, "I'll help," before bending down to remove the gag from the girl's mouth.
"They didn't do anything, did they Marron?" she asked tactlessly, tossing the removed cloth to the ground.
Marron shook her head vigorously as Yamcha produced a short knife to work on the bindings.
"They just… just bound me a-and left m-m-me," she hiccupped, wiping her streaming blue eyes with a hand Yamcha had just freed, "S-said they'd… come back for m-me after they'd r-r-raided a village to… to…"
She trailed off, hanging her head and allowing her hair - a darker shade of blue than the other woman's and longer too - to obscure her face from view.
Standing with her hands on her hips, the other female watched distantly as their male companion got to work on the burlap binding Marron's ankles together.
"That means they'll probably be back…" she murmured thoughtfully as Yamcha helped the sobbing girl to her feet.
"So we should keep moving," sighed the dark-haired man, not looking pleased about the fact.
"Didn't expect this much work from the job, did you?" the woman commented once Marron was loaded into the back once again and Dolly the pony had been convinced to move, "Thought it'd be some easy money, I s'pose, and you got to travel with two women too."
Yamcha did his best not to scowl, instead training his attention on the road.
"Anything for you, Bulma babe."
Internally he added, 'As long as it doesn't involve being chased by bloody bandits.'
Bulma simply rolled her eyes and turned away to watch the repetitive scenery roll past. Although she enjoyed Yamcha's company and, admittedly, his flirting too, now was not the time.
'Neither was yesterday,' she reflected with a barely-smothered sigh.
Memories of digging mud out from around the wheels earlier that morning as well as the bandits' random capture of Marron the night before settled uncomfortably in her mind as they rumbled along. It seemed strange to her that they'd steal only one of three people if they were going to nab anyone… and what about the money and food the "Orikal" caravan was carrying? Bandits were supposedly falling on hard times, or so her father had said months ago, so why on earth had they missed some as-good-as-free resources?
By the time the wagon had rumbled into the outskirts of a small village, Bulma had managed to calm her doubts about the bandits enough to take in what was going on around her. The settlement was, to put it quite simply, in ruins. A raven-haired woman could be seen sweeping broken glass out of her front door to the left; to the right a tearful young man carried the body of a five year old child out of a building suffering from severe fire damage. The distinct, sombre sound of a bell could be heard across the village: it was ringing in the slow and steady fashion of a mourning toll. People searched despairingly through the smouldering remains of their homes, pulling out scorched personal possessions and uncovering the bodies of their companions.
The sight made Bulma feel sick to her stomach: having lived in the relative safety of a huge city for the majority of her life she wasn't used to this sort of raid. She swallowed, noticing the way that none of the people even glanced up at the wagon as it rolled past, and attempted to avert her eyes by looking straight ahead, only to find herself staring at a massive funeral pyre.
The giant table of gathered firewood squatted in the centre of the village square, a lone man with wild black hair working silently as he piled body after body up into one towering pile. His face was drawn and pale, his lips a thin line as he lifted person after person onto the pyre, and his forearm was heavily bandaged.
"Are those…" Bulma started in a whisper, staring at the fallen.
"Bandits," Yamcha confirmed quietly with a curt nod of his head, "They'd rot and cause disease if they were just left lying around."
Bulma shook her head, "I know that… it's just… How on earth did a tiny village like this defeat practised rogues like those?"
Yamcha simply shrugged, watching through onyx eyes as the last body - a broad shouldered man with purple skin and sharp black horns protruding from the sides of his head - was lowered onto the top of the pile, a dark cape spread out around him. Pulling back on the reins to halt the wagon, he hopped from the front and approached the lone villager, leaving Bulma to sit speculating behind him. Although he didn't feel particularly confident clad in sweat-soaked travelling clothes of dark trousers, a scratchy beige shirt and a sleeveless brown leather jacket, Yamcha tapped into his charismatic confidence and held out a hand to the taller man.
"I'm sorry for your loss," he told the guy diplomatically, "We were just passing through, wondered if perhaps there was anything we could do to help?"
The other male appeared to be in a state of shock: he stared blankly at the offered hand for half a minute before finally giving it one half-hearted shake.
"Goku, snap out of it," a rough female voice demanded as a fierce looking blond stepped out from the door of her cottage, "We could do with all the help we can get, and your bloody grieving isn't helping any of us."
Dressed in leather shoes, a man's dark brown trousers and a light green, short sleeved shirt with a rope tied around her waist like a belt, the woman's intense green gaze showed no sympathy as they flicked over the piles of deceased bandits.
"They were our enemies, anyway. Go mourn someone more worthy."
Shunting him on his way with a flat-handed push against his shoulder blades, the woman put one hand on her hip and held the other out to Yamcha.
"Launch," she identified herself as, "And you are?"
"It's Yamcha," he responded, failing to restrain his eyes as they gave her body a quick up-down glance, "And we're just looking for work, y'know, the usual."
Catching the second look in his eyes as easily as if it were painted on his forehead in bright red, Launch said, "We can pay you, if that's what you're worried about. Krillin the blacksmith needs the most help, so let's get you working."
-
Bulma was nothing short of surprised when Yamcha told her that they were going to do some physical labour for a while, but it was when she saw the state of the smithy that she was truly shocked. Unlike the other burnt buildings, all of which had at least one blackened stone wall still standing, it had been absolutely flattened. It didn't take a genius to see that nothing had survived the blaze, and the fact was displayed all too clearly in the crumpled face of a small bald man who sat on the pile of wood and stone he had amassed that morning.
The blacksmith looked up as the wagon rolled to a stop nearby, his quick dark eyes darting from Yamcha to Bulma as they leapt off and walked over to meet him. He struck Bulma as the sort of man who'd normally be friendly and grinning, if the fine crinkles around his eyes were anything to go by, but at the moment he was as deflated as the wounded man loading bodies onto the pyre.
Although she felt inappropriately cheerful as she forced a smile onto her face and attempted to act like normal, the woman was equally certain that adding more depression to the brew was a big no-no.
"You look like you could do with some help," she pointed out, flopping down beside him on the heap and glancing sideways at him to catch any flicker of emotion.
The man sighed, "Yeah, I guess I do," his gaze moved past the pretty young woman and focused on something beyond.
"But not as much as some people do."
Bulma blinked at him, "But that woman—Launch—she said that you-"
She trailed off at the warning look Yamcha was sending her, seeing that even Marron had stopped her wailing to poke her head out of the wagon. Turning in the direction they were looking, almost afraid of what she might find, the girl took a quick intake of breath and turned to the blacksmith.
"I'm so sorry, I didn't…"
Beyond the burnt remains of the house the dead villagers were being laid out on the grass in ranks by family and friends. Three unhurt men hurled the blades of their shovels into the rain-softened earth with the bitter ferocity of humans weighed down from guilt; Bulma accurately guessed that these were the ones who had slept through the majority of the raid. The sight of those bodies and of the people weeping all around them sent a shiver up her spine: it looked like her real talents were going to be wanted here fairly soon…
"Excuse me…"
Marron's voice, still hoarse from the gag and two hours' worth of non-stop sobbing, brought Bulma out of her thoughts to find the other woman offering some of her rare intelligent advice to the blacksmith.
"Shouldn't you be there too?" she inquired sincerely, "Don't you know at least some of them?"
"I would be but…" he waved despairingly at the debris, further explanation understandably unnecessary.
"But nothing." Bulma decided stubbornly, getting to her feet, "Krillin, right? Well, with our help your house'll be finished in no time. The funeral has to come first."
Tired from the previous night's ordeal and the emotional trauma of seeing his neighbours carried, dead, from their homes, Krillin found resistance too draining to keep up, especially against this headstrong woman. A relenting nod was all it took to send the four of them towards the patch of ground that would soon become a graveyard.
The sallow faces of his neighbours were enough to shove the blacksmith's gaze to the ground but that was nothing compared to the sight of the ranks of dead villagers. Their settlement was a small community, where everyone knew everyone else, and yet even he couldn't make out who was who from some of the bodies. They were too badly burnt.
With a shuddering sigh he joined the mass of onlookers, barely conscious of the presence of the three newcomers behind him, and aimed his gaze at the other men as they reverently lowered the bodies into the crude coffins the carpenter had struggled to produce with only one working arm and on such short notice. Although definitely not the epitome of beautiful, painstaking craftsmanship, the coffins were sturdy and just the right size for each of the dead. It made proportioning easier when you knew each of the dead, Krillin suspected sorrowfully.
When each body was in its coffin, he stepped out with the rest of the crowd to walk among the rows and say his last goodbyes. Bulma, Marron and Yamcha hung back as the little man struggled with his grief, staring at those he recognised and shuffling shamefully past those too distorted to be named by sight. There was Sarah, the sharp witted blonde who served as Launch's right hand woman in the shop; Josh, the ambitious miller who so often found his hopes dashed against the rocks of his own poverty. Passing through the rows, the blacksmith felt that his heart would burst when the familiarly deep voice of Nappa suddenly reached his ears. To Krillin's surprise, the sturdy man's speech was strangely strained, as though his chest were tense with…
"No way…" was all he could say as he spun around.
Utterances of a similar nature stirred up from the other mourners as the huge man made his way between the boxes of the dead and towards the stunned form of the carpenter. In his arms he carried the limp body of a much smaller man. Although the other human's weight should have been easy for the giant bodyguard to bear, Nappa seemed to be fighting to hold him up.
Standing on the sidelines, Bulma didn't miss the bewildered response of the villagers as this giant of a man passed her.
"You'll need to build another goddamned coffin," his gravely voice informed the person she'd identified as the carpenter and, much to the incredulity of the other villagers, he dropped the corpse he held onto the moist ground, depositing a sheathed sword at its feet with the same lack of respect.
The man spun on his heel, his face contorted monstrously, and strode off back into the remains of the village.
The response of the people was delayed as everyone stared at the departing figure, until the wild haired man of earlier stepped out of line.
"Nappa!" he called after the other man, but a small hand stopped him from going after him.
His pale son gazed up at him with wide black eyes, "I think he wants to be left alone, dad."
Although the look of concern never left his face, Goku let himself be drawn back, only to join everyone else as they amassed around the abandoned body. Even Bulma felt herself being sucked in with them all and soon found herself peering over the shoulder of an old man with creaking joints as she attempted to catch a glimpse of the corpse's face.
Her task wasn't actually all that difficult; almost as though an invisible barrier were holding them back, the villagers had formed a ring around the body rather than crowd in close, leaving Bulma with a good view of the dead. He was male, that much was obvious, and his chiselled chest was bare aside from a thick swath of bloodied bandages covering wounds that appeared to have ceased to bleed only minutes previously, if the glistening red that remained was anything to go by. Although pale, his skin retained a bronze hue and his hair, which swept upwards from a fierce widow's peak, seemed to simply swallow light. Any sheen it might have once possessed had been stolen by death.
'He would have been handsome,' she speculated as she took in the firm set of his jaw, 'In a regal sort of way.'
Despite the fact that her observation really should have been complete, Bulma found it impossibly difficult to remove her stare from the deceased man. While her eyes looked on her ears reached out, catching snatches of hushed conversation from the people surrounding her. They were worried, several comments confirmed, and someone was going on about how he was sure "their kind" were cursed.
'Their kind?' she pondered in confusion, 'What on earth…?'
Before she could really get her teeth into the mystery, Bulma found herself distracted by the carpenter as he and his son got to work created yet another coffin. They had reached a level of numb disbelief, she realised as they systematically hammered lengths of pine together. It was as though they'd managed to achieve the sort of professional distance doctors and nurses require.
She blinked, suddenly aware that she shouldn't really be here, and stepped out of the crowd to rejoin Yamcha and Marron. The three of them stood in silence as the villagers placed the body of the man into its coffin and started burying every last one of their deceased neighbours. That done, the mournful crowd dispersed, some back to their homes, some to the aid of neighbours, some to the graves of their friends and family.
Krillin drifted over to them, his eyes downcast, and sighed deeply. He gathered himself and did his utmost best to raise back that smile he normally wore. It was a watered down version, but it would have to do.
"Okay guys, I guess we have to get back to work."
-
Although they failed to raise a house out of the debris in one day like Bulma had naively expected them to do, together the three foreigners and one villager had succeeded at clearing the area of rubble and creating the beginnings of a few walls by nightfall. Dirty and tired in a way she had not believed possible, the blue haired woman shivered in the cold night air as she stood on the doorstep of what Krillin had labelled as "friendly lodgings".
Only seconds after they had knocked, the door creaked open to reveal a pale skinned woman. Her ebony hair was sagging from what would have been a severe bun, her red-rimmed eyes squinting into the night as she tried to place names to faces for the three newcomers and failed. Her attention drifted over to the diminutive form of the blacksmith.
"Krillin? What are you doing here?" she inquired in a surprisingly steady voice. The man was too tired to look sheepish, "My house burnt down," he informed her, "These three are helping me to rebuild but-"
He was cut off when the woman stepped out of their way, holding back the door and gesturing for them to come in.
"My name's ChiChi," she told Bulma, Yamcha and Marron as she led her new houseguests through into a quaint wooden kitchen.
A sturdy wooden countertop line the wall with the window, an iron stove with a pile of timber in the far corner and a pale wood table sitting in the middle of the room.
"And this is my family, my husband Goku and son Gohan," the woman continued, gesturing to the two people who sat in the plain wicker chairs that were drawn up to the table.
Bulma instantly recognised the older man as Goku, the one they had seen stacking the massive pyre with bandits. Although his brow was still folded in sadness he seemed to have shaken off the worst of the shock that had desensitised him earlier and he looked up as they entered, going so far as to offer them a welcoming smile. Even when his eyes were so full with anguish the expression seemed much more natural on his face, and Bulma was aware of Krillin loosing some of the tension in his shoulders at the sight of it.
The boy, Gohan, sat across from Goku and kept shooting the strangers curious looks, as though he was too shy to talk and too polite to stare. His black hair was cut short but displayed some of his father's tenacity against the brush even when wet and his dark eyes peered out from beneath a stray lock of damp charcoal black. A towel around his shoulders protected his modest peasant's clothing from getting wet; from the iron tub of cooling water beside the stove it was easy to deduce that he had just spent some time cleaning up.
"They'll be staying with us for a while," ChiChi informed the two briskly, disappearing into a side room only to return with four more chairs to add to the big table, "If you could lay out some sheets on the spare beds, Gohan, I'd be very grateful."
The boy instantly jumped to his feet and hurried upstairs, happy to be of use and wanting to make a good impression on the people from out of the village. The adults could hear his feet padding about on the floor above as they all took their seats.
"Introductions might be nice," ChiChi suggested after a minute of sitting in silence, tracking the whereabouts of her son through the ceiling.
"Oh yeah, where're our manners," Yamcha exclaimed, giving the woman his charmer look which she promptly ignored, "I'm Yamcha, leader of our little group and owner of the caravan, and this is Marron," he gestured to the darker haired and more air headed girl before continuing on vaguely, "She does stuff with flowers to make people feel better, and this is Bulma. She, er, well, she…"
He trailed off, cursing himself silently as he realised he had given away the game too soon.
"She talks with dead people," he finished finally, his shoulders sagging slightly in defeat.
"Really?" Goku, who had formerly remained mute, seemed thoroughly intrigued, "How?"
Bulma felt that unfamiliar feeling of discomfort settle over her at the question and quickly donned the know-it-all arrogance that had guided her through most of her life.
"Well, it's just a talent. People who are murdered or die too soon tend to hang around so I talk to them to stop them from making pains of themselves," she gave an apologetic shrug, inwardly hoping that they were not judging her as a freak like others before them had done at this information, "I don't know how it works."
The group once again dipped into silence, the villagers processing this information as ChiChi got up to stir a huge pot of something simmering on the stove.
"That could be pretty useful, y'know," Krillin commented eventually, "Especially right now with… everything and… y'know," he finished lamely.
"Only if some of our dead decide to be obstinate," ChiChi responded smoothly, "As for those bandits, well, forget talking to them," her movements as she turned the spoon became more vigorous, "You can just kick their murderous souls to kingdom come."
