Chapter 3
The next day, the spaceship was all set for blastoff, and everyone was packed and ready to go. Although Bulma and Kuririn had packed rather lightly, Chichi had brought all kinds of unnecessary items for Gohan. On top of that, he was sporting a brand new bowl-haircut, and was dressed in the most humiliating outfit Bulma had ever seen. And boy was he embarrassed!
After they had packed all of Gohan's luggage onto the entry deck, they all said their last farewells.
"Be careful, Gohan," Chichi sad, trying to hold the tears back. "Always remember that I love you very much."
"I know, Mom," Gohan said. "And please don't worry. I'm going to be just fine."
"I'm going to hold you to that," she said, straightening a loose strand of his hair.
Bulma shuffled her feet uncomfortably. She hated goodbyes, and she had a bad feeling about the possibility of this being their last. She didn't want to rush Gohan and Kuririn, but she was anxious to get going.
Good luck, Kuririn," Roshi said, shaking Kuririn's hand firmly. "You three be careful. And don't do anything I wouldn't do. It's not good for you to take to many risks, you know."
"Don't worry," Kuririn said. "We'll be fine, sensei. Besides, we'll have a good head start on Vegita when we get there. He was way worse off than we were when he took off."
"Well, I guess you should get going, then," Roshi said, adjusting his shades and glancing at Bulma. "I wish all of you the best of luck, and Goku said to tell you he'll catch up with you as soon as he can get out of that hospital."
"I'm sure my dad will have Goku's ship ready in a jiffy," Bulma said, glancing back toward their own craft. The discoveries we've made from the rebuilding of this ship have really improved his design, too. He should have it finished within a couple of weeks if he takes off from work."
"Take care of Gohan for me, okay, Bulma? And you too, Kuririn?" Chichi said, kissing her son one last time.
"Don't worry," Bulma said, patting Gohan on the head. "We'll watch him. But we'll need him to watch us too. Believe me, Chichi, Gohan can take care of himself."
They all waved goodbye as they began rising into the ship. When they were finally inside, Kuririn lost it.
"Ho boy, Gohan!" He laughed hysterically. "Where'd your mom buy those clothes? Or no, wait, let me guess! The store paid her to take them, didn't they? Hwa ha ha!"
Bulma glared angrily at Kuririn. She had wanted to be tactful in case Gohan was sensitive about his dorky garb, but instead of being hurt, he just laughed with Kuririn.
"I don't know," he chuckled, "but they would have had to break the bank to make me take these awful things! But I had to wear them, anyway. My mom was so dead-set against my going in the first place, so I guess I kind of owed her something for giving in and finally letting me go. But hey, just because I'm wearing it now doesn't mean I can't change it later. I have a much better outfit that I'll put on once we escape the earth's gravity.
"I hope you aren't expecting to experience weightlessness," Bulma warned. The effects of that would weaken our bodies too much. My dad and I invented a machine that simulates Earth's gravity. We have one on the ship and as soon as we've escaped the Earth's atmosphere I'm going to switch it on with the rest of the ship's instruments. Anyway," she added, buckling herself into her seat, "you two had better get strapped in. I'm about to take off."
Kuririn and Gohan got into their seats and fastened their restraint harnesses. "All right! We're ready for blastoff, Captain Briefs," Kuririn said, with a brisk salute and a silly grin.
"Knock it off," Bulma said, laughing. "Now hold on. This could get really intense." She called out the Namek command for blastoff and instantly the ship began to ascend at an incredible rate of speed. They were roughly pressed down into their seats by the awesome force of their velocity. Bulma grit her teeth and kept her eyes on the controls. So far so good. They were leaving the Earth's gravitational field now. She pulled the ship into its preprogrammed flight path, switched on the gravity machine, and put the ship on autopilot.
"There," she said, unfastening her restraint harness. "Now all I have to do is check our coordinates every eight hours to make sure our periodic error corrector is functioning properly, and we should reach Namek in about two and a half weeks."
She got out of her chair and turned around, beaming triumphantly at Kuririn and Gohan. She took one look at the two "warriors" and fell over laughing. Gohan was as white as a sheet and was dripping with sweat. He looked as if he were about to faint! Kuririn was hunched over in his seat, gripping the armrests. He was holding them so tightly, in fact, that even though they had been constructed out of solid, treated titanium, he had pressed large dents into them with his fingers. He looked up weakly at Bulma, who was still trying to regain her composure.
"Are we there yet?" He asked her woozily.
"No," she chuckled. "But don't worry. You won't go through anything like that again until we reach Namek."
Kuririn nodded and took a couple of deep breaths. Bulma glanced at Gohan again and noticed that he was beginning to get some of his color back.
"Are you okay?" She asked him.
"I guess so," he answered, unbuckling himself from his seat. "At least my stomach isn't in my feet anymore," he added, grinning at Bulma.
"How far away from Earth are we?" Kuririn asked, getting off his seat.
"Come on. I'll show you," Bulma said, leading them to the rear of the ship. She led them to a small window and pointed toward the middle of it.
"You see that really bright dot there?" She asked them.
"Yeah," they both replied.
"That's the sun," she explained. "D'you see that faint, bluish spot just to the right of it?"
"No," Kuririn said, squinting at it.
"I can just barely make it out, Bulma," Gohan said.
"Well, I can't see it anymore," she said, shrugging. "But that was Earth."
"Whoa!" Kuririn exclaimed. "We're going fast!"
"Yeah," Bulma said, as they walked back up to the front of the ship. We're past the solar system now, and in a few minutes we'll have exited the Milky Way galaxy's gravitational pull. Then we'll go REALLY fast."
"Wow!" Gohan breathed. "So what do we do now?"
"Anything you want," Bulma replied. "As for me, I'm going to work on learning more Namek phrases. I've gone through that entire notepad twice, but I want to keep it fresh on my mind, so I'll go over it some more."
"Hey, Bulma," Kuririn said, looking around. "Umm... do we have beds on this ship?"
"Oh! I'm sorry, guys!" She exclaimed, digging through her travel bag. "I completely forgot! Ah! Here they are!" She handed Gohan and Kuririn each a small booklet.
"What are these?" Kuririn asked her.
"These are detailed maps of the ship, telling you where to find what you want and the Namek command for each one. Since you two haven't studied Namek, I've written each Namek name beside each item in the book. They're spelled like they sound, so you'll probably get the hang of it with little difficulty. All you have to do is say the word and what you ask for will come to you by one way or another. I won't go into too much detail about that, though. Anyway, I'll sleep out here by the controls, and your beds are in the rear of the ship, as you'll see in those little booklets. Feel free to explore all you want, but don't ever touch any of these controls. They're the only things off limits to you."
"Thanks!" Kuririn said, amazed.
"This is sooo cool!" Gohan said, flipping through the pages of his booklet. "You've thought of everything, Bulma!"
"Well, Dad and I worked really hard on this ship, but since we rushed through it, the chances are pretty good that we forgot a few things. But hey, we've got all the necessities, at least," she said, giggling as Gohan got to the page with the instructions for the video game system. That had been her father's idea, but she still wasn't quite clear on his reasoning for it, though.
"Do you have any more questions?" She asked, pulling out her Namek study aid.
"I guess not!" Kuririn said, still amazed. He and Gohan turned and walked back down the hallway to go test out a few of the Namek commands.
Bulma sighed. She tried to begin studying again, but her mind wandered. What was Yamucha doing now? Did he know what she was doing? Was she ever going to see him again? She wished she knew the answers. She put Popo's notepad away and listened to Gohan and Kuririn laugh as they tried out each Namek command. They were depending on her to get them to Namek. She hoped she wouldn't fail them.
On to the next Chapter!
