A leg whirled in the air to the left. Piccolo jerked his head to the right just in time. He gritted his teeth as his student tried to hit him in the chest. He grabbed the fist and took the impact. His feet slid across the brown earth as they dugged into the ground, leaving a trail before him. The fist left his hands and he went to a hault. He moved his hand away from the front of him to look at his student. She was wearing the orange outfit she had received on the first day of her training. It was now worn, and tattered on the ends. She also had a little dirt on her face that she had gotten on it earlier that day. Piccolo smirked after he had taken the last hit. Her power and strength had increased substantially within the past few months. Her skin now tightly lined her new and more developed muscles.
Kristy's teacher jumped forward and began to punch down at her. His right fist went down to a place along the shoulder line. She dodged to her left. He then punched in slanted lines, inwardly at her. She dodged the hits then jumped towards Piccolo's left side. She brought back her arm then punched him in the side of the head. He flew through the air a bit but then back flipped then landed on his right knee and foot in a crouching position. She ran at him like she had been instructed to do many times in the past months of training. She yelled then jumped with her leg in front of her. She went for his ribs but he caught it easily. He let go of her foot and stood up. He easily towered over the girl. He threw off his turban near where his cape had been lying at during the training session. He crossed his arms.
"Go ahead," he told her. She simply stood there with her arms at her side. She then prepared to punch him in the stomach. She jumped at him with her right arm craned back, ready to hit. Piccolo jumped at her, preparing to attack head on. Then his student disappeared. Then he felt a pain in the center of his back. He looked over his shoulder to see her with her left foot dug into his back. He smirked slightly.
"Not bad, kid."
His student glanced at him then smirked. "You can call me Kristy, you know."
Piccolo smirked again. "I like calling you kid."
"Why IS that?" Kristy asked, standing on the ground now. Piccolo just crossed his arms.
"I just feel like it."
Kristy rolled her eyes with her hands on her hips.
"Would you rather have me call you the Sleeping Warrior?"
"The what???"
"Forget it. Let's get back to training."
She nodded and got into a fighting stance again.
A wind blew across the floating palace. The guardian of the Planet Earth stared down upon it. He was sweating intensely. His servant, Popo, looked upon him from behind.
"Dende..?"
Dende looked up at the sound of his friend's voice. He didn't even realize he was outside.
"Is something wrong?"
Just then a familiar sound interrupted their conversation. Goku jumped off Nimbus and landed gracefully on the white floor tile of the structure. He smiled that famous smile of his at the two.
"Hi!"
Dende smiled slightly.
"Hello Goku, I haven't seen you in awhile."
Goku walked up to him.
"Yeah."
"What brings you here?"
Goku's face turned serious.
"Us on Earth have been a little worried about what that alien that attacked us said a few months ago.."
Dende nodded.
Goku looked at his friend's face. It had sweat beads running down it and Dende looked worried about something. Dende turned around to look over the edge at Earth.
"So something IS wrong.."
"Yes, Goku.. I've been aware of it for awhile now."
He looked up at the blue sky.
"New evil will be arriving at Earth very soon... They're also much stronger than Ushi, the alien that came here months earlier... And the thing is.."
He looked straight ahead again.
"...I don't know if we'll be able to survive."
Goku's face didn't change.
"How long do we have until they come?"
Dende looked over his shoulder then turned around to face him.
"The next ones will appear very soon..."
A muscle on the side of his forehead twitched.
"Those aren't the ones I'm worried about though..."
Goku waited for him to continue. Dende then looked at the Saiyan right in the eye.
"All I know is that darkness is in our future... And I'm afraid there is nothing we can do to change it.."
Goku gritted his teeth and shaked slightly while looking at the ground. He then looked Dende in the eye again.
"Well, I'm not going to let that happen. There's still a chance that we can win this," he said balling his left hand into a tight fist.
He turned his head to the left and called out, "NIMBUUUSS!!!"
The yellow cloud flew out of nowhere and floated to a stop along side the palace. Goku jumped on it and flew off. Dende watched his friend disappear into the sky.
"For our sake...." The Namek turned around, faced the building, and walked inside. ".....I hope you're right."
Piccolo stood there with crossed arms.
"Now concentrate," he instructed.
"I really don't know about this..."
"Just trust me."
"Okay."
She closed her eyes and relaxed her muscles. She twitched her eyebrow began to lift off the ground. As she got higher, her body turned to face the ground that was growing farther away. She then shot open her eyes. She was shocked to find herself floating 10 feet in the air.
"I did it! I did it!"
She then was beginning to loose her balance. She shook wobbly from side to side with her arms spread out. She regained herself and floated steadily. She then lowered herself slowly down. When she was just above the ground, she waved her legs slightly to land upright. Her feet gently touched the ground again. She looked up at Piccolo excitedly.
"I did it, I did it!"
"Yes, you did," Piccolo said with a small smirk.
She floated off the ground again. She looked down at him and smiled.
"What?"
"Nothing."
"Then why are you smiling?"
".... Because during these past few months I've realized that you're actually a pretty nice person."
Piccolo lifted an eyebrow (or whatever that thing is called).
"What?"
"I mean...on the outside you act like you don't care about anything but on the inside you're not that bad at all."
Piccolo felt uncomfortable with this conversation. He didn't like it when people told him that he wasn't the tough guy that he wanted people to see him as. He scowled.
"Practice lifting that mountain telepathically," he told her.
He had just taught her how to use her mind to lift objects herself. Kristy blinked then nodded and did what he told her to do.
Night had come. The usual fire was burning a bright mixture of yellow and orange before the teacher and his student. Both were exhausted from that day's training session. Piccolo carefully took the small brown bag from his dark blue belt. He then opened it, took a bean out, and placed it in his mouth. He chewed it and swallowed. He then glanced at his student.
She had seen that he had had a senzu bean. She simply lied down to the one side and got ready to sleep. When her right shoulder had had pressure on it, she gritted her teeth and turned to the other side.
"Good night," she said, drifting off.
She slowly closed her eyes and within minutes, fell asleep. Piccolo crossed his arms and sat Indian style. He remembered what had happened earlier that day.
"On the outside you act like you don't care about anything but on the inside you're not that bad at all."
It kept running through his head as if the memory was a tape being rewound and played constantly. He looked off into the dark surroundings. Beyond the light of the fire he couldn't see anything but black. He then looked at his student who was fast asleep.
A sudden gust of wind blew and put out the small fire that had been there seconds earlier. Piccolo stood up and tried to decide what to do in this situation. The wood was already burnt out and it was too dark to go out looking for more. Kristy then shivered because of the sudden coldness. Piccolo could handle being in the dark for a night but the girl was getting cold. Piccolo looked around suspiciously first then slowly took off his white cape and carefully placed it around her. He sat down again. He forced himself not to see it as an act of kindness to loan her his cape but a way to ensure that she would be healthy enough to participate in the upcoming Tentakachi Bodokai. He sat with crossed arms and looked off on his left. He glanced at the girl and saw some grass sticking out of her long tied back hair. Not that he would care or anything but he was a little bored. He extended his hand out slowly, hesitant. He watched her carefully first to see if she would suddenly wake up and have to explain why he was reaching out for her hair. Seeing that she wasn't going to wake up any time soon, he gently put his hand through her long brownish blond hair. Running his fingers through the soft strands, he smiled. The same memory as before ran through his head.
"You're not bad either," he whispered.
She then rustled slightly under his hand. He was worried she would all of a sudden wake up so he lifted his hand. She fell back into a calm deep sleep once more. He rested his hand on her head once more. He smiled again.
"Not bad at all.."