The Destructivedisk Anthology/A Front

I remember the night that I came up with A Front. KidVegeta was bugging me through AOL IM, as he often does, to produce a new Dragon Ball story. Mostly out of spite, I told him that I would create a new story with Krillin as a superhero. It was created mostly in jest. He thought that it was a ridiculously stupid idea, and I frankly can't blame him for that.

Alas, I started to consider this idea more and more over the coming few weeks and started to think of potential plot ideas, concepts, and themes that I could incorporate into the story. The more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea for the story. After a little while, I ultimately decided to write this story.

The story's title, A Front, came from thesaurus.com, as a synonym for "fake". It has a similar meaning to saying "he put on a front". This is greatly important to the theme, which is essentially just that common society forces us to put on a front in order to survive.

The page was created on May 1, 2011. This would make it my third multi-chapter fanfiction and the second installment in my human tetralogy. Initially, Tien: Origins and A Front were not going to be interconnected; I came up with the idea to make them connected in chapter 4. The story took me a very long amount of time to finish, around 6 months.

=A Front= A Front is a fanfiction by Destructivedisk. It features Krillin as the main character and takes place during the seven-year gap between the Cell and Great Saiyaman sagas.

The theme for this story is Idioteque by Radiohead.

The secondary theme for this story is Hotel California by The Eagles

Flagpole Sitta
This is a story about a Triclops

who travels through space to find his family and

ultimately he finds himself.

Or maybe it's not.

Maybe not.

-D-Disk

The boxes were stacked upon Krillin’s shoulders as though he planned to start an empire upon his back, towering far above his head and rocketing seemingly into the sky above, their brown color interrupting the peaceful blue overhang. Despite this monolithic load, Krillin felt no burden; it would be uncharacteristic of him to feel any pressure at all, given his superhuman strength. To any other being, though, such weight would be wholly unbearable.

18 opened the door ahead of Krillin, and he agilely threw the boxes inside the small apartment. He walked inside, glancing around. It was a modest home, mainly because they couldn’t afford much more than that. One could classify their migration as urbanization, as they were moving from the rural area of Kame Island to the city. However, they sought not wealth, nor a job, but instead simply to escape.

“There is no way that our little girl is growing up in the same house as that pervert Roshi!” 18 had adamantly argued time and time again, despite Krillin’s wishes to stay on the pleasant island. After the long period of two and a half hours, Krillin had agreed, not wishing to get obliterated by the ironically hormonal 18. There was no question as to who wore the pants in the family, and 18 was fully aware of that.

“Y’know, baby, it’s a good thing that Gero left your, uh, special place working,” Krillin commented, realizing how awkward his joke was mid-way through the sentence.

“What?! What is that supposed to mean?” 18 furiously replied, her face showing clear signs of immense anger.

“Well, I just mean, it’s not like he planned on you making a baby or anything…” Utter silence filled the air. “I mean, unless he thought that you would continue his android army with Android 17 or something…” Krillin stammered out, unable to form a coherent explanation.

“Honey, why would you even say that?” 18 asked, genuinely befuddled.

“I-I don’t know, baby.” They continued unpacking in complete silence.

On a later dreary night, Krillin found himself flying to Korin Tower, where he would be meeting Korin and Yajirobe. He ascended to the top of the tower, before touching down.

“What do you want?” Korin grumpily asked. “It’s almost naptime for me, so if this isn’t something important you best get running.”

“Uh, I just want a few senzus, Master Korin,” Krillin said, scratching his head. “You know, in case something happens to the baby. I’ve got one on the way, and safety first and everything, right?”

Korin audibly groaned, probably at Krillin’s idiocy. “Gah, fine, just wait here and be quiet. I’ll be back in a few minutes,” Korin responded, angrily walking off with his cane and making a big huff and puff about it.

“How did ya get yourself a wife, baldie?” Yajirobe asked, in obvious disbelief.

“Oh, 18? Well, you could say that we were kinda made for each other, I guess,” Krillin stated, giggling at his own little pun.

“18? Yeah, only a girl named a number would marry you!” Yajirobe chortled.

“Hey, she’s an android! It wasn’t her choice to be named that!”

“Whatever ya say, Krillin. You mentioned havin’ a baby? Is it gonna grow up out on the islands, with Roshi and the whole gang?”

“Er, no, 18 wouldn’t stand for it. We moved into the city to raise her. It seemed like the best choice for all of us.”

Yajirobe, who was laughing nigh uncontrollably, responded with a hearty, “Ha! You? Living in a city? That’s ridiculous,” Yajirobe laughed obnoxiously, much to Krillin’s discontent. “What? You actually like it there?”

“Well, it’s fine, when I’m not in the office, I guess,” Krillin humbly responded, turning his head down so as to not have to see Yajirobe’s forthcoming cackling.

“You’re in an office, you wuss? Don’t you have any values at all?”

“It’s the responsible thing to do. I mean, I have a family to support, rent to pay, all sorts of things which I need money to do,” Krillin muttered, not being able to even state his own false sentiments. After a lengthy period of contemplation, he finally turned his head back up and admitted, “You’re right, Yajirobe. I hate it. I hate it so much. I shouldn’t be in an office. I don’t know what I’m doing there. I’m simply trying to be something that I’m not, because it’s who I’m supposed to be.”

“Pfft, you’re such a pushover,” Yajirobe stated, before digging into his quarters to find something. After but a moment of searching, he came back to Krillin with the mask he wore at the 23rd Budokai. “Here, take this. You might as well have it. You’re already living a lie,” Yajirobe commented, before tossing the mask at Krillin. Krillin eyed it, examining every seam on the delicate piece of clothing. He turned it over in his hands, the rough strands rubbing coarsely against his hands.

The mask was mainly red, the mass of it being a ruby color. However, around the mouth and around the eyes, there was a blue outline, adding some diversity to the mask. There was a small streak of sapphire going through the middle of the mask, which pierced into the forehead. He flipped it about in his hands, before saying, “Thanks, Yajirobe. Thank you for this.”

The two of them sat silently together until Korin returned with the Senzu Beans.

It was an average night. Krillin had already left work, his nice suit on and his tie wrapped tightly around his neck. He felt constrained, as though he was stuck within the teeth of an alligator, but he needed to do this for the good of his family. Work was a necessity, not an option. Granted, he was completely incompetent at his job, but once he got into the groove of things he was sure to be a splendid worker. He very well could’ve flown home and arrived at his house in minutes, but neither 18 nor him wanted to draw attention to themselves. He instead stepped into the contraption known as a car, slowly pressing down on the gas pedal and steering off.

The mask Yajirobe had given him sat in the seat beside him, seeming to glare at him, telling him how wrong he was to be doing all of this. But he drove ahead regardless, his headlights shining ahead, illuminating that which lay ahead. It was a late night for him, as was every night; he was a surprisingly diligent worker, staying most days until 8 or 9 pm. Such a value had been instilled into him by his training with Roshi, and it was perhaps the sole training that had carried over into his new life.

The city was dark, damp, and uninviting in the nighttime, until a point at which Krillin almost wanted to fly home as fast as he could just to get away from it. He nevertheless trudged onwards, hoping to eventually get home and forget about his hellish day. Seeing the pregnant 18 would make everything better… right?

Krillin was not a very fast driver, not at all. He was a nervous wreck on the road, mainly due to inexperience. He was going 40, yet even that was pushing it for him. He felt himself skid through puddles, each splash sending vibrations through his skin and disrupting his concentration. The careful eye would have seen him swerve, the intuitive mind would’ve thought him to be drunk. Of course, he was not intoxicated; he was simply completely out of his realm of comfort. He muttered encouragement to himself, now finding that he was barely moving at all.

His headlights shone forever forward. Their beams of light were so foreign to a simple Krillin that he scarcely saw the purpose in them. They irritated his eyes at night and were completely useless in the daytime. Why did they exist at all?

However, it was during this moment that he finally saw a purpose in them. They flashed their bright eyes upon a man, no, two men who had cornered a woman against a wall. One was scouring through her purse, while the other held a knife to her throat. Blood rushed down her chest, tears seeping down her face. She saw Krillin’s car pass by, and stared the car down, wondering why not a single automobile stopped to help her.

It was at this moment, this very moment, that the real Krillin came back. He saw her sorrowful eyes, even connecting with her, and he felt his hand reach into the passenger seat. He picked up the mask, sliding it over his face. It was a bit big on him, of course, but he could still see out of it and breathe well enough. He parked his car, ever so gently, before hopping out and flying over to the two criminals. With a swift punch he took one out, and he grabbed the other one by his neck.

“Why are you hurting this woman, you sick man?” Krillin asked, staring him deep into his eyes.

“I-I don’t know! I just wanted money. I just wanted money! Come on now, don’t kill me man, don’t do it- I don’t want to die!” the criminal replied hysterically, his own misdeeds coming to him.

Krillin had no interest in killing him, nor did he ever plan on it. However, the criminal’s pleading had made him realize something; they were people too. They were misguided, sure, but they were still people, with the same goals as the rest of us. He didn’t want to kill them, even if it might benefit the world.

He tossed the criminal to the side, before facing the woman. “Do you have a phone, miss?” Krillin asked. She gulped out a yes, nodding her head in synchronization. “Okay. Call the police, then. Have them arrest these two. They belong in jail,” Krillin instructed her, before striding back to the car, opening the door, and getting back in. He rode off on his steel horse as a cowboy, not an office worker.

Endnotes:

Thank Kai
Whenever Krillin felt that he had triumphed, that he had finally won, a new challenge inevitably arose, always harder than the last. This time, the conflict he was met with was mightier than ever before, one which could only be resolved by weeks of intense training and unlimited encouragement. This was greater than Cell, greater than Frieza, greater than anything else he had ever been met with in his many long years of fighting; where was the “K” key?

He sat, his back erect, staring blankly at the computer screen that sat in front of him. His finger traced each button on the keyboard, trying to remember where that stupid K key was. Alas, after a stern few minutes of complete concentration, he surrendered, turning his head down to face the keyboard. There it lay, in the position it always was, enjoying a nice chat with L while I sat rudely atop him. Krillin’s clumsy index finger came down on it, before the letter popped up simultaneously on the screen.

With this letter typed, he resumed his memo. Now that he was actually facing the keyboard, he was able to gracefully finish up the memorandum. He then accidentally sent it off to everyone in his contacts, despite the fact that only about 3 of them actually needed the document.

He glanced at the time - it was 5:00. On a normal day, he would remain in the office for another 4 hours, but today was no normal day. People had already begun shuffling out of the office, in a hurry to resume their lonesome personal lives. With haste he packed his supplies up, careful to avoid his boss’ imaginary glare. He stood up while hunched over, trying to hide his face from his superiors. He blended in, however, with all the other people leaving, thus meaning that this “stealth” only made him all the more conspicuous.

He had once more shown up in the early hours of the morn, and as such he received a prime parking spot. After but mere moments, he was in his sloppily parked car once more, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. He inserted his key into the ignition, shifted the gear into drive, and pressed down on the gas pedal. With a sputter and a vroom, the wheels began rotating. Krillin’s car was leaving the workplace.

18 wouldn’t be expecting him home so early; he usually would not return until 10 at night, when he would fall into a deep slumber. This gave him 5 hours. He had 5 hours to work with, and maybe that would be enough. Maybe not.

After many a near accident, he found a parking garage. Granted, it was damp, shady, and altogether pretty sketchy, but for Krillin’s needs it was perfect. He drove right in, before parking. He opened up the door of the car and began to step out, but then he quickly reentered the vehicle. Grabbing back into the passenger seat, he picked up his mask once more, before sliding it onto his face. Perfect.

He stood back up out of the car. Had he any sense, he would have surely realized that such a flashy mask would have alerted authorities. Of course, Krillin had no street sense, being nothing but a rural country man. He stepped about, trying to figure out where to go. After countless seconds of contemplation, he chose to ascend up the roof. From there, he would have a mighty fine view of the city, allowing him to begin his crime-fighting escapades. Yeah.

The parking garage had plenty enough open spaces on the exterior walls, so, with great haste, he jumped out of one. With grace he flew up, attracting a multitude of wandering eyes. Of course, they all came to accept it as special effects trickery, before quickly moving on with their busy lives. After all, amazement can wait.

Given his incredible speed, he found the roof quite quickly. He stood atop it, hoping to find some sorts of crimes going on down in the city, like maybe a rifleman going on a killing spree or maybe a postal worker stabbing people mercilessly. The fatal flaw in this impeccable plan was that Krillin couldn’t see worth half of a damn from atop the building, meaning that he might have to revise his idea a little bit.

He jumped off the building with finesse, before landing solidly on the ground. ''Think, Krillin, think! ''he pondered to himself. How can I find crime? The first solution he thought of was to follow the screams of victims, but that was no good. In the busy city afternoon, you couldn’t hear a thing outside of the beeping of horns and the sirens wailing.

Due to his lack of a panoramic view and the incessant cacophony of the area, Krillin was unable to track down any crime using his hearing or sight. Smelling, tasting, and touch were of course ridiculous senses to use here, meaning that all five senses were rendered useless. Heh… if only he had a sixth sense to use here, that one might be helpful.

That’s it! His sixth sense! His ability to sense ki! By scanning the area for evil ki, Krillin would be able to detect the areas of extreme evil and therefore find crime scenes. He closed his eyes, intensely focusing upon the rest of the city. There were innumerable sources of ki in the city, but in only a few of them could Krillin find intense evil ki.

You see, every person has a source of inner ki. This ki reflects the temperament of the owner of the ki, meaning that, if one was to be in a state of neither morality nor immorality, his ki is completely neutral. When one performs a good deed or is kind to another person, his ki reflects this, becoming good ki. Alternately, if a person is to commit a crime or act meanly to another, his ki will become negative. Depending upon the severity of the person’s action, his ki will become more or less intense, in its respective dogma.

Krillin naturally found the area of the strongest evil ki, which was in the inner city, surprise surprise. With speed he flew over to the area, the wind bristling through the forming buds of his hair. People were now staring at him in unbelieving awe, their eyes wide and their chins resting on the floor. Krillin took no notice, instead continuing to fly in oblivion toward the area of intense evil. He whizzed about cars, flew over small buildings, and, for the first time since he had come to the city, he felt free.

He came to the source of the maleficent resonations within moments. Landing upon the ground, he surveyed the area. The source of the evil was immediately apparent; people were staring at a bank, pointing at it and screaming fearful nothings into the air. Two of the windows were broken, the front door completely pulverized. Demands erupted from the building; the demands were spoken with faux-arrogance, in an almost trembling voice.

“Give me - the money! Gimme all the money!” the crook’s voice hollered, his voice shaky, yet gaining confidence as it continued. Krillin stepped inside the building, drawing gasps from the onlookers. He found that the robber was holding a gun and a sack, one which was pointed at the clerk’s head and the other of which was accumulating money.

“Stop,” Krillin projected across the building, prompting the thief to turn back. He sniggered at Krillin’s silly mask, before asking the teller for more cash. Krillin zoomed up to him in but an instant, swatting the gun out of the crook’s hand. Krillin grabbed the stealer by the collar, before turning the criminal around to face him. “Why’d you do that?” Krillin asked, which was soon to become the question he always asked after apprehending a perpetrator.

“I… I wanted the bucks, man. I needed the bucks,” the law-breaker replied, short of words. “Please don’t kill me, bro! I don’t wanna die here!” he continued hysterically. Krillin, not bothering to utter a response to this, began to fly out of the bank with the criminal. He planned to take him to the police station, but he found police-bots to be waiting right outside of the building. Handing the crook over to them, he noticed a change in their appearance.

“Hey… y’all don’t look the same as you usually do. Were y’all upgraded?” Krillin asked, with an inquisitive expression. He then fully gave them the robber, allowing them to take full custody of the man. They cuffed him up and sat him down in the police car.

“We’re the new model of androids in this line. We’re the FurryBot 2.0!” a particularly perky cop responded. “For all intents and purposes, we are machines made again.” Krillin, satisfied with this answer, flew away, seeking out a new crime to stop.

Such a routine became the basis of Krillin’s life. 18 never knew the better of it, and Krillin’s boss never confronted him on his earlier departure time. He fought crime, handed the evil-doers into the cops, and became a hero of the city. Despite this crime-fighting, though, he still found time to work and spend time with his fiancée. Krillin was managing it all.

“Look! There goes KaiMan!” KaiMan was the city’s superhero name for Krillin, as he never sought to provide a name himself. To the public eye, Krillin was aloof, rarely sparing them even the slightest address. He fought crime; there was no need for publicity or popularity to Krillin. He did this because it felt right to him, not because he wanted the city to like him.

On this particular night, Krillin found himself to be atop a building, searching for bad ki around the city. Crime was coming to be harder to find nowadays; perhaps because of Krillin’s looming presence, the crime rates were down. But this was of no matter, for there was always the occasional crime or two going on. After scanning around for a moment or two, he did find a properly nasty ki at a shopping mart.

Surely it was just another robbery, so Krillin nose dived off of the building and swooped upwards, dashing through the obstacles in his way. He found himself able to easily break 120 miles per hour without breaking a sweat, meaning he moved faster than any police car could. As such, he always arrived at the scene first, meaning that no policeman ever had to risk himself while Krillin was on duty.

He arrived at the shopping mall in seconds. He peered inside the mart… nothing. Everything was proceeding as it did normally. It could have been a shoplifter… but that wouldn’t produce such powerful signals. And then he heard the screams. They were blood curdling hollers of fright, but not unlike anything that Krillin hadn’t heard before. Any other human (besides perhaps Tien) would have been horribly shocked, but it was almost commonplace for Krillin to hear such screams. He tracked down the source of the sound.

Hidden in a back alley was a gang of people, all of whom were circled around one man. Krillin hopped over to them, and, with a few small pushes, separated the group. Krillin took the target of their attacks and pulled him up, asking him, “Why’d they attack you?”

The man, with a timid demeanor, replied, “Uh, Mr. KaiMan, My name’s Mr. Michael Apachee. I don’t exactly know why they attacked me. They all just came rushing at me, calling me a terrorist. Then they stabbed me real good and hurt me. If you hadn’t gotten here right when you did, I probably would’ve died. I dunno if the cops have even been called yet.” Krillin stared into his eyes. His eyes were glassy, apathetic, and cold. They stared back into Krillin’s head without waver.

“Uh, okay. You got a phone? Call the police if you do. I’ll – I’ll hang around until they come.” With this, the man pulled out his portable phone, before alerting the police of the battery. However, Michael Apachee, bloody as he might have been, had accomplished something very important; he had figured “KaiMan” out.

King Furry was, as always, swamped with work. Sleep escaped him… it may have been days, perhaps a week, since he had last slept. A tower of paperwork stood beside his royal throne, seeming as though it were about to fall over every moment, but then deciding to balance itself out.

“More paperwork, sir,” spoke a loyal servant, as he entered the room. “Mainly just requests for permission this time. Not quite so much legislature this round.” The servant gently set the new stack of papers down atop the already monolithic skyscraper of papers.

“Hmph. Is the public situation is still fine?” Furry asked, more out of hollow responsibility than out of genuine interest.

“Yes, the public situation is fine, your highness. There is a new superhero out there, like the Golden Fighters a while back, named KaiMan ,” responded the servant, although even he knew not much of the state of the nation.

“I'm sure he'll soon leave too. What's he up to? Fighting aliens too?" Furry asked, stifling a laugh.

"Just fighting petty crime, sir. He's doing a great job at it, too. Crime rate's down quite a bit," the servant replied, hoping that Furry would not pry for any more information.

Catching on to his servant's hopes, Furry responded, "Thanks for the information. You may go now." The servant bowed and left, exiting the King’s domain. Now that he was once more on his own, Furry began to, with not but a glance at most of the documents, stamp away at the papers. He was just doing his job.

Endnotes:

Rage Against Machines
Crime had gone down drastically in the three months that Krillin had been fighting it. On a single night, Krillin was now able to find only two or three crimes, most of which were just menial robberies or minor thefts. This was not to say he didn’t stop them; whenever he found a crime, he stopped it. The importance of the crime held no matter to him; it was the sentiment of it. He held no tolerance for that which was cruel.

On this night, Krillin was standing atop yet another building. His eyes were pressed closed, sensing about the area for emerging evil ki. After a long bout of concentration, he found a new source of the ki, so he soared off the building accordingly. Cheers erupted from the townspeople as he sped past them, who had begun to see him as a figure of nationalism. He was, for all intents and purposes, a hero.

Swerving between cars, Krillin may have been showing off a little bit. However, one couldn’t blame him for this: in the midst of such a boring work life, why wouldn’t he want to have a little fun? Given his incredible speed, he found the scene of the crime within minutes. Touching down upon the ground, he glanced around the area. Looking down an alleyway between two buildings, there laid perhaps the most original crime of all time. Two men had stolen cash and were scurrying back to their car.

Krillin caught up to the two of them and swiftly. He looked the both of them right into the eyes, before, out of custom, asking, “Why’re ya taking the money?”

The crooks took a look back at him, before stammering out, “I – I gotta get some somewhere. I don’t – I don’t got a job, I ain’t got any other way of getting me money. I got debts that no honest man can pay… don’t hurt me, man!”

Krillin was not unused to this type of response. They weren’t bad people, at their hearts – they simply had holes they had dug themselves into. Of course, being ethically confused, they turned to crime to escape their miserable lives. This, strangely, did not yield positive results.

Krillin took them by the necks and applied pressure. They fell quickly to the floor, their bodies slinking into their own shadows. Projecting his voice, Krillin called out, “Hey! Can one of you workers take care of these perps for me?” A worker came bustling down from the store, phone in hand.

“Thanks for taking ‘em out, KaiMan. I’ve got the police on the phone. I’ll tell them you helped out!” People always treated Krillin like this. Perhaps out of amazement of how cool he was, the townspeople never uttered a word of cruelty in regards to Krillin. It was almost like a city-wide fan club.

“Er, thanks, sir. There’s not too much goin’ on right now, so I’ll wait with you ‘til the FurryBots come. Sound good?” The store person nodded in response, delighted to have Krillin’s acquaintance. Krillin chuckled under his breath, thinking that some of the people might want to get robbed just so that KaiMan would come rescue them.

As the two waited for the police to arrive, Krillin found himself wandering about the alley. Patience had never really been his strong suit. As he neared the other side of the alley, his feet found themselves to stumble over a particularly large piece of material. Shocked and disgraced, Krillin attempted to rebalance himself, flailing his arms about in a wild attempt at posture. In the end, though, his descent to the ground was inevitable, his face planting itself firmly onto the concrete beneath his feet. Shaking the pain off of himself, Krillin looked over to see what he had fallen over.

Laying there on the ground, in all its metallic glory, was the severed head of a FurryBot 1.0.

Several days later, Krillin’s workplace was holding a celebration of their first-year anniversary. It was employee exclusive, which meant that, sadly, Android 18 would not be coming with Krillin. They had only stooped so low as to hire Krillin, who had no experience whatsoever, because the business was so new, in only its formational stages. Krillin, however, was wholly oblivious to all of this. He was just happy to have a job.

Regardless, they were heading downtown to have a nice dinner at a restaurant. Although he was lagging quite a bit behind the other workers, due to his inadequacy with an automobile, Krillin was nevertheless interested in viewing the city from a normal perspective. It was quite different when he wasn’t zooming through it; the floors were grimier, the people more angry.

Were one to closely examine Krillin, they could probably tell him to have the exact same bodily build and size as KaiMan. Luckily for Krillin, though, no other being in the city cared for him. He was just another passerby, minding his own business. He would be fully ignored by all else, much to his advantage.

The group came to the restaurant within minutes. They had reserved a large table before coming to the diner. Parking their cars adjacently, they all entered the café in perfect synchronization – besides Krillin, who arrived several minutes later. He scrambled into the eating-place, taking a seat right next to a few co-workers whom he scarcely knew the names of.

“So, how ‘bout that weather?” Krillin awkwardly spoke, to which all the others ignored.

“We, as a company, really need to capitalize upon our specialty in low prices, rather than shifting our priorities…” a particularly sullen man droned. This type of jibber jabber bored Krillin, who had hoped to not spend this time discussing business politics with his colleagues. As his mind meandered, Krillin found his eyes naturally drawn to a window. After all, it was the area of the most activity, even if the other side showed nothing but the wall of the other building. Krillin found himself falling into a dream-like state, completely unaware of that which surrounded him.

And then he saw it.

It was there for only a brief moment, but it was there nevertheless. Two hands were locked in fierce battle. The digits of each hand were shockingly long and claw-like. They twisted out of the way of the window almost immediately as soon as it came into view, as though the struggle was trying to remain in private. Krillin was not, however, sensing any type of negative ki from the area; in fact, there was no ki in the area at all. What was going on?

Perhaps it was just a momentary daydream. Krillin was not one to be a daydream believer, of course, but that’s not to see it wasn’t worth investigation. With hopes that none of the others would notice him, Krillin stood up from his seat, sneaking away from the dinner table and out to his car. Not a soul noticed his departure. Opening the door, Krillin took his mask out of the glove compartment. After a quick glance to assure that nobody was watching, he slipped it onto his face. He then moved into the alley, ready to investigate.

There was a FurryBot 2.0, swiping furiously at the original FurryBot. The FurryBot 2.0’s cold fingers came into contact with the neck of the other robot, cutting through it. A few circuits now hung loose, sparks of electricity flying out. Krillin was utterly befuddled by this. Couldn’t the city just turn off all the FurryBots without actually destroying them?

Krillin, anxious to figure this mystery out, jumped in to intervene. Expertly placing himself in the middle of the two, he kept the two a distance away by extending his arms like a cross. He then held them both in place, before asking, “What’s going on?” He spoke softly, so as to not alert any of the people inside the restaurant.

The FurryBot 2.0 responded first, without even the slightest hesitation. “The city wasn’t able to deactivate the old model as they planned. Instead, the new line will be deactivating the old model. Thanks for the cooperation.” Krillin turned to face the victim of the attacks. The FurryBot 1.0 simply shook his head, as it lacked a voice module to clearly explain its thoughts.

In any other circumstance, Krillin would have assumed this shake of the head to be a gesture born out of cowardice. The FurryBot 1.0, along with its lack of a voice box, also lacked any emotion, thus meaning that what it indicated had to be true. Unfortunately for all, though, Krillin himself did not know this. He was torn between the two sides, not knowing which was true. His instincts told him to side with the newer model, which had the far more likely story, but neither side seemed particularly promising.

Out of cold malice, the FurryBot 2.0 ruined his chances of getting away from the situation without a scratch. Out of his hands he extended a sharp attachment to his arm, replacing his hand smoothly. A new knife came out in the stead, which he used to pierce into Krillin’s skin. Blood spurted out of Krillin’s back, and Krillin, in shock, twisted his body around to punch the FurryBot 2.0. This knocked him backwards, sending him skidding across the ground. “Get out of here!” Krillin whispered to the other FurryBot, standing behind him. The FurryBot did as asked, shooing away from the area. This left only Krillin and the FurryBot 2.0, who was standing back up as Krillin spoke. It was time for some one on one.

Krillin charged forward at him, head first. The FurryBot sidestepped his barge, only to fail to retaliate. Krillin turned back around, throwing his feet into the air. With suavity his foot collided with the android’s head, but the robot managed to keep his ground. Stading back up completely, Krillin threw several more punches at the robot, all of which made collision, yet had little knockback. He slugged him once, sending seething pains through his injured back. Luckily, the punch sent the android flying, given Krillin recuperative time.

The android was strong, that was certain; however, it also was not nearly so mighty as Gero’s androids. Krillin could compete with them, even if they weren’t exactly weak. Krillin actually outmatched the robot in almost all areas, yet he feared that powering up to his maximum would alert the others. There was no need to bring them unnecessary burden.

As the FurryBot stood back up, Krillin decided it was time to finish him off. He air-dashed at him, his fist extended, ready to penetrate right through the middle of the android. He sat there, a sitting duck, as Krillin charged. He could not dodge; that much was certain. In lieu of physical movement, however, he resorted to something far more devious: diplomacy.

“You probably shouldn’t do that.” His voice was calm, cold. Krillin was taken aback enough by the sudden speech that he stopped in his tracks, turning up to face the robot.

“Why’s that?”

“We both know you are against murder.”

“Well, you’re an android, so it doesn’t really count… does it?” Krillin asked, scratching his head?

The android gave no clear emotional response to this. “That’s not what I meant.” Utter silence filled the air, as Krillin stared at him, dumbfounded. The android continued, “If you destroy me, a trigger will go off in my body. This trigger will alert the headquarters of my demise, thus resulting in some collateral damage: the death of a woman we are holding captive. If I go, she goes with me.”

“Headquarters? Captive? What?” Krillin asked, completely befuddled. The android only stared back in response.

Krillin clenched his hands. He was strongly against the death of criminals to begin with, but the death of an innocent woman? Unthinkable! At much the same time, there was an android before him who had to be taken out. It could not be simply subdued, for it was cyber-kinetic – an unconscious function would serve no purpose.

His teeth gritted, Krillin thought fiercely of what to do. He was stuck between a rock and a hard place… unless he fled from the situation entirely. However, the android would certainly only track him down from there. Gah! So long as this muse of the FurryBot 2.0 was held up, Krillin had no chance at escape.

It was then that the jigsaw in Krillin’s mind fell into place. He found out a solution to all of this. Granted, it had a number of variables involving the FurryBot’s reaction, but it nevertheless was a possibility. “Follow me!” Krillin said, before jumping away. He flew out of the alley with moderate speed, just so the android could keep up. He heard the vroom of the android’s motor behind him, and so he continued flying away. With several sharp, unnecessary turns just to confuse the android, Krillin finally came to the area of town with the most activity. He was at the town square.

Touching down right in the middle of it, Krillin threw his hands up in surrender. He watched as the android came down next to him. He knew full well that the FurryBot wouldn’t kill him in front of all the people. They were trying to act like the police, after all. “Okay, you got me. C’mon, take me away in a car,” Krillin requested. The FurryBot glared at him, consideration showing on his face. In the end, though, he gave up; he did exactly as Krillin asked. He called for a car.

The FurryBot cuffed Krillin right up. Krillin showed no resistance whatsoever. The people watched in doubtful awe as their beloved hero was arrested right in front of him, but they all managed to continue their normal lives. They thought it might have been something for the media, or perhaps a film shooting, but they all managed to justify it in their minds. A car soon came, with Krillin hopping into the backseat while the robot took the passenger’s seat. It was just the same as a normal arrest. Nothing unusual at all.

They rode on in silence. Krillin once more noticed the cut in his back, until a point where he could concentrate on nothing else. The blood seeped out, staining the seat behind him, but he had taken far, far worse in the past. This was no more than a small irritation to him, but, due to lack of distraction, it grew to be a tempest to him. It was downright intolerable.

They drove for quite some time. It was safe to say that the destination was far away from the city, but that was completely expected. Eventually, they came to a desert plane. Slowing the vehicle to a halt, the two bots got out of the car, opened the backdoor, and jerked Krillin out of the car. He slid across the desert sand like dead weight, breaking out of his handcuffs by pure might.

The two FurryBots nodded at each other in silent agreement. They were going to execute the KaiMan by standard method. The two rose into the air, far above Krillin. “Any day now would be fine,” Krillin screamed up to them. He sat in the ground, patiently waiting for them to serve their dish. The bots, irritated by his insolence, expanded their rocket launcher attachment from their arms. They let the rockets go, both of which hit Krillin straight on. They then released a flurry of bullets and projectiles, all of which hit the same spot. Dust spun up into the air, generating enough loose dust for a massive sandstorm. This shrouded their view of Krillin, yet they continued firing nevertheless. They soon came to stop, allowing the dust to settle.

When the dust was gone, all that remained of KaiMan was a tattered, bloody shirt.

Michael Apachee walked about his room. A vast assortment of encyclopedia and engineering texts lined the walls, most of which he had thoroughly read. Some, unfortunately, he had given no more than a cursory glance before deciding them to be utter rubbish.

A helper robot burst into the door. “Sir, I have news!” he spoke out frantically, almost as if he would explode were he to not speak his announcements that moment.

“Oh, yes. What’s the news?” Michael responded, offering the robot a friendly smile.

“It’s – it’s very important this time! We found another Dragon Ball!” the robot spoke, nearly jumping out of his tail with his excitement.

“What’s that make?… Six of them now? My my, we’re really making quite a bit of progress on the collecting, aren’t we?”

“Yes sir! We are sir! We’ll have them all in no time at all!”

“Thank ya so much, son. Anything else?”

“Well, yes, indeed, there is more news! The KaiMan fellow! We got rid of him! It finally happened!”

Michael was skeptical of these claims. He had dealt with the KaiMan before; he was no easy target. However, he did not let this skepticism seep through to the exterior. “Really now? He was quite the dumb little bugger. I told the fool my name was Michael Apachee, and he didn’t have a shred of doubt. How naïve…”

“Yes, David, sir, very naïve indeed.” There was a silence again, during which the bot was expected to leave the room, yet he chose not to.

“Well, if that’s all you have for now, I suppose we should best get going to see the new Dragon Ball, huh?” David spoke, with impatience

“Yes sir, we must get going now. Can I – can I join you on your way over there?” the bot eagerly asked, wanting to spend time with his master; he simply wanted to please him.

“Uh, no, you can’t. It’s kind of a personal thing,” David responded. The bot scurried away disappointed, but David paid no mind. He walked out of his room, coming to the pride and joy of his headquarters: a massive satellite. It stood in the center of the building, grand and massive. He pranced down the stairs to come to the bottom of it, stopping at the hatch to enter the satellite.

“Hey, who has the Dragon Ball? I need it!” David yelled out. A FurryBot flew over to him, ball in hand, before shifting it off to David. David replied, pleased as punch, “Thank ya, sir. You’re free to go.”

David entered the small satellite. In the center of the satellite there laid a ring of the other five Dragon Balls. It was really quite spacious in the space craft, so he had plenty of room for walking. Tiptoeing over to the small ring of balls, he crouched, gently placing the 6th ball down. He smiled at his own collection, while cheers erupted around the headquarters from robots who were ready to take over the world.

Endnotes:

By His Left Hand
David walked back out of the satellite’s inner room. The six balls rest inside the space craft, patiently waiting for their other cousin to arrive. The balls were now being found at a rapid rate, given that David had nailed the technology necessary for a Dragon Radar. They could find the general location of the balls in mere minutes, and, generally speaking, could obtain a Dragon Ball in just over a day. Of course, there was the occasional difficulty; the third ball being located in the middle of a volcano made it no easy target. But, alas, they managed to get 6 of the mystical balls in just over 2 months. Everything was finally coming into fruition.

David glanced around the room at his wonderful robots. They all seemed to be functioning properly, like a well-oiled machine. Some of them were busy working on fine-tuning the satellite, while some of the others were making ammunition and weaponry. It was all necessary to take over the world, because, you know, that’s what David was planning to do.

“Hey, guys, keep me updated on the seventh one, okay? Tell me when the scouters get a read on it!” David instructed his bots, while heading back to his room. The response came in complete unison. A chorus of “yes!” bounced back from all around David, who smiled and carried on to the door.

David opened up his door, heading inside the small room. There was a bed in the center of it and numerous bookshelves lining the walls. It was daringly minimalistic, with no superfluous decoration. The walls were white, without even the slightest tint. The room was, on the whole, very plain, very modest.

The man walked through the room, tracing a bookshelf with his finger. After several moments of intent searching, his fingers stumbled across a minute black rectangle. Pulling it out of the stack of books, he fumbled it over in his hands, wiping a small bit of dust off of it. The object shined with the vibrancy of a shined car in the eyes of David, even if the color had faded many years ago. It was his most treasured possession, his tape recorder.

David sat down upon his bed, his legs crossed and his back straight. He found a small black button on the top of the tape, before gently pressing down on it. David released his finger from it, which was met with precipitate ticks and tocks. With a small bit of hesitation, David spoke into the recorder, with the clearest voice that he could muster.

''Journal Entry Number 47 on the date of May 17th, at the time of 4:26 PM. Log title: Glorious Day''

''It’s been quite some time since I last spoke into this, eh? Maybe a few years now, I’m not sure. It’s easy to lose track of time when you don’t have any clocks or calendars. That’s not to say that I haven’t made progress out here. I’ve made plenty enough progress, I think. I guess we’ll all know pretty soon. Let’s see, what I have gotten done since we last talked…''

''Well, I made some FurryBots. A lot of them, actually. They look pretty much the same as the original line of the FurryBots, just a bit more maroon. Their head is wide and their body’s rectangular, their arms are lankier and slinkier, it’s all very humanoid and very familiar. I doubt that most people could tell the difference between them and the normal FurryBot model, actually, were it not for the different color.''

''They’ve pretty much taken over the police force by now, I think. I’m not certain if a single normal FurryBot is left in the city, so I pretty much have control over all the police in the city. Granted, there are a few humans left in the police force, but I don’t think they’re very important at all.''

You see, with my army being composed of nothing but machines, the Maroon Militants Army is really able to surpass the Re- 

“Sir!” interjected a FurryBot, entering David’s sacred room. He saluted at David, as was standard protocol.

“Yeah, what is it?” David replied with borderline apathy. He couldn’t be bothered enough to fake excitement, especially in the middle of his all-important monologues.

“We have detected the 7th Dragon Ball on our radar. A group of soldiers has already been sent out to get it,” replied the FurryBot, with a typical robotic monodrone.

“Cool. Where’s it at?” David asked, interested enough to ask a question or two.

“It’s in a desert, sir. A very, very large desert,” the FurryBot replied.

“How long will the excavation take? I’m sick of waiting.”

“Sir, we have the exact position pinpointed. Yielding any catastrophes, we should have it within an hour or two.”

“Really? Nice. I take it that the assassin is in place and the fake will is planted?”

“Yes, captain. Do you wish to commence the operations?”

“Naah, mate, naah, let’s hold off on that. We’ve got plenty of time for all that political stuff. Now, please, leave me alone. I’m trying to record some tapes here,” David replied, shooing off the robot. The FurryBot promptly left, leaving David alone for his recordings.

''I’m glad to see that we have almost found the last mystical stone thing. It’s been only like one or two months since I made that radar and we’ve already gotten almost all of them. It’s like surprisingly super easy to find them when you know their exact location.''

''I remember the old man telling me about them, all those years ago. He showed me all the specs for their radar, but, well, it wasn’t very good. I remembered enough of it to remake it, but I think I improved it a lot in the end. It’s much more specific than the original design, and it has really helped us in finding all the stones. I’d say we’re doing pretty good.''

''The satellite’s nearing completion too. I think that we could launch it right now without any trouble, but it’s better to add a few more failsafes into it first before take-off. That’s really what I’m all about right now: failsafes. No matter what could go wrong, I try to have a back-up for it. KaiMan is able to defeat my bots? Killing a bot will kill a human. No matter what he tries to do, there’s always going to be something to stop him.''

''According to some sources, two of my robots killed KaiMan an hour or so ago. This I cannot believe. In our short meeting, I found out quite a bit about KaiMan; he was against killing, he chose to not call the cops himself, he was a generally good person, all that stuff. But most of all, I realized that he was strong; very, very strong. I doubt a few meager FurryBots could do him in.''

''It’s of no matter. Once the balls are in space, he won’t be able to do much of anything about them. From there, the whole game will be out of everyone’s control but mine. When that happens, I will finally be able to take charge. I will finally be able to make the world a better place for everyone. I will be able to free them.''

End log, 4:35 P.M, May 17th

He clicked the black off button. The ticking stopped, allowing David to place the recorder back into the bookshelf. Now that this was done, David could leave the room and check up on the other proceeds of the headquarters. He could help the FurryBots work on the satellite, guide the scouters in finding the last Dragon Ball, even check up on some world news now. Everything was working out well. It was a jigsaw falling into place.

He exited his room once more, reentering the base he had so delicately put together. “How are my favorite robots doing?” David called out, ever the jubilant one. Those rude busy bees didn’t bother with a response, instead just continuing the grind of work. He didn’t mind. Robots were, after all, stereotypically complacent.

He stopped, for just a moment, to admire this fantastic operation. He could not, with all his genius, imagine a finer workplace. Everything worked in such perfect harmony, with no kinks in the software whatsoever. Only a mastermind so fine as David could design such a great system.

Boom.

There went the ceiling, crumbling down into debris and gravel. The sun, for the first time in years, shone into the palace, without obstruction. David squinted, covering his eyes. He generally kept it quite dark in there, so this sunlight was a major shock to him. Everything was so… bright. So maddeningly bright.

From the heavens descended a great figure. The rays touched upon his bald head with immaculate precision, causing it to shine in ways unforeseen. Such a great aura of definiteness surrounded him that all the FurryBots ceased their work, simply to stare at him. As his body slowly came lower, his feet eventually touched down upon the ground. He stood there, shirtless, face concealed, with nothing but confidence.

“Nice job, KaiMan. How’d ya find me here?” David asked, staring Krillin straight on.

Krillin, taken aback by his nonchalance, muttered back, “I – I followed the FurryBots back here after I faked my own death. They lead me straight here.”

“Ah, that makes sense. Yeah, they don’t really understand untruth, so it would be easy to fake your death like that. So whatcha doing here?”

“I’m here to stop you!” Krillin replied, with boldness. He raised his fist in the air with his might, ready to vanquish any foe who stepped into his way.

“Stop me from doing what? From freeing you have your own inhibitions and hedonism? From freeing you from your own miserable little life?”

“What? No, I’m going to stop you from killing millions of people, that’s what I’ll do!”

“I would consider that more a side-effect than an intention, mr. KaiMan. I think the end result will make it all worth it, honestly.”

Krillin was left without even the slightest bit of response. What was this man talking about? Why was he using so many big words? “Hey… I remember you! You were mugged by all those guys in the back alley!”

“No, no I wasn’t. I paid them off to attack me and you came and rescued me. I told you my name was Michael and whatnot. You ate up every word of it. My actual name’s David.”

“Oh… Why in the world would you do that?”

David no longer cared about KaiMan’s sudden appearance. “Look, man, you can either just get lost or I’ll kill a few people. I don’t care much either way.”

“You wouldn’t kill them for no reason like that. It’s not fair!” Krillin said, taking a firm stance. It was clear that he had no intentions of retreating.

David chuckled at Krillin’s naivety. “Hey, Number 244,” he began, nodding toward a free FurryBot, “could you take out one of the humans I’ve got in the back room for me? KaiMan here doesn’t believe I’ll do it.” The FurryBot complied, quickly rushing into another room and killing a human with but a simple bullet shot to the head. Krillin’s fury quickly grew; a wild aura grew about him, his veins emerged from below his skin, and he let out a loud, but ultimately unnecessary, grunt.

“You monster! How could you do that?” Krillin said, enraged. David shrugged in reply, before continuing.

“All right, so where do you wanna go from here? You could destroy the FurryBots, but for each one you kill a human will die simultaneously. I don’t think that you want that, do you?” Krillin shook his head in reply. “Good. So where does that leave us, exactly?”

“I knock you out and call the police. How’s that sound?” Krillin responded, teeth gritted.

David was seemingly unphased by this. “Sounds good, man. I’ve only got like 10% of the police under my control, so I’m sure the rest will arrest me without a problem.” Following this statement, Krillin rushed over to David and knocked him down with a punch to the face. He subsequently realized that he had no way of calling the police, excluding his own phone.

Calling them from his own mobile would mean revealing his identity; not calling them would mean that David would not be taken hostage. With minor reluctance, Krillin took out his phone and called in. “Hello there, sir, what is your emergency?”

“A madman is trying to destroy the world. Uh, basically, I think.” Krillin responded awkwardly, having no idea how to appropriately state the nature of the urgency,

“Okay. We don’t accept prank calls here, but thanks for calling in!” the policeman replied. Krillin was about to call back, but there was interference to be found before he could do so. The FurryBots, who had been surprisingly calm up to that point, all came flying at him in synchronization. This left Krillin no choice but to jump out of the way before they came into contact. Landing at a new spot a moment later, Krillin found a small device lying on the floor. Looks an awful lot like Bulma’s dragon radar he thought to himself, glancing over it.

Within seconds, though, his train of thought was once again interrupted by yet another bot coming flying at him, who calmly spoke, “Please set the radar down. We must use that to find the last Dragon Ball.”

Krillin dodged to the right once more, before turning around and taking up a flight. He flew straight backwards, before breaking through a wall and exiting the building. Turning his attention back to the Dragon Ball Radar, he thought to himself, I suppose I should go investigate this, huh?

Endnotes:

Found You, Faker
On any given day, Furry would sit behind his desk, solemnly stamping away at paperwork. It was all he knew – it was all he had ever known. Occasionally, he would have to slap on a friendly face for the public eye to see. During these interactions, he adopted southern mannerisms and friendly gestures just so that they would all feel comfortable and safe under his rule. In reality, of course, he was just a mindless puppet, filling out legalities without a thought to the repercussions.

On this day, he found himself on a stage. Standing in front of hundreds of people, he muttered some gibberish he didn’t understand. “Now, folks, even in these tough times, we have to remember that the most important things in life still matter, like family, having fun, and savin’ up your money,” he droned out, making elaborate hand gestures to accompany his speech. He prided himself on his ability to make a speech entertaining, one of the few things in his life that he could truly find himself engrossed in.

This speech was a highlight in the lives of every person attending. Given their normal days, this meaningless speech was a highlight; the fact that this was a high point showed that it was much the time for a disturbance. A change. A break from the monotony that enveloped every human in that city, from the putrid peacefulness that swallowed their lives whole. It was time for something new, something, dare I say, exciting.

Everyone could fulfill their roles in the little old city area. Furry could give his speeches; a doctor could diagnose a patient; a constructer worker could construct his buildings; a swimmer could swim; and, by the graces of god, a fanatic could shoot.

The man was disgruntled. One could tell that much simply by the look of him. His eyes were barely open, for one, and the stubble on his beard seemed to crawl up the rest of his face, attaching to the head like a symbiont. He did seem to be able to stand upright, or even speak, for that matter. But communication was not integral to his goal here today, no matter how important it might be to everyone else in the universe.

He didn’t have a political agenda here. He was a druggie, simply put, and he needed money to fund his addictions. They – he could not remember who they were, at that very moment – had promised him riches beyond his wildest dreams if he did this for him. They promised him protection, too. They promised everything to him, all of which was too good to be true.

As he slowly lifted his weapon out of the holster, he felt no regrets. He turned up to face the King, long live him, before lifting the gun up to face Furry. He pointed the barrel at him, aiming to stop his wild gesticulations about the stage, before pulling down on the trigger. And, with grandeur, the bullet flew swiftly through the air, spiraling toward the big dog in charge.

It collided within seconds. It him right on in the head, exploding his brain into gory chunks of blood and meat. The shooter himself tried to scurry away, hoping that he could muddle himself into the middle of the mess of the pandemonium. Everyone was, needless to say, completely freaked out by their leader’s blatant assassination in front of their eyes. Amidst the dust, the screaming, the panic, the vomit, the killer ran away.

He found his way out of the crowd. He looked both ways, hoping that nobody was paying attention to him. Where the hell were they? They had told him that they would meet him right outside of the crime scene, but now they were nowhere to be seen. He needed to run away. He wasn’t safe right next to the crime scene. Where were they?

“Stop right there!” called out a FurryBot, who had the handgun accessory out. He was more than ready to shoot.

The killer held his gun out with both hands. “Who’re you? You! I ‘member you!”

“You are a repeat offender. Please put your weapon down and your hands into the air!” the FurryBot responded, not giving the killer’s rambling any acknowledgement.

“Gi’ me my money first!” he shouted, shooting off a few rounds into the air. “Gi’ it to me!”

“Sir, stop with the reckless endangerment. We will not hesitate to fight back.”

“This wa’ n’t part o’ the deal! Whattarya doin with me?” the assassin spouted at, firing a round off once more. It was now directed at the FurryBot; although the small bullet was not enough to damage the bot, the shot was reason enough to fire back.

With haste the FurryBot shot him back. The aim was truly impeccable. It hit the killer right in the face, penetrating his skin and going into his brain. The lead itself was specialized to have a bit of an extra impact after entering through the skin, as was the bullet used to kill Furry. Shrapnel flittered through the killer’s brain, until his brain was thoroughly decimated. He had no chance of survival.

The final look on the druggie’s face still remained painted on. If the robot had any ability whatsoever to decipher facial expressions, he would have seen the message the face was sending clear as day.

This wasn’t part of the deal.

During the years that he had been using it, Krillin had become pretty much a total pro at using the Dragon Radar. He followed the readings on it with amazing precision and speed. Not a single FurryBot could follow Krillin when he was flying like this, and so he was left to soar freely through the air.

He noticed that his hair had begun to grow some. It was black and, surprisingly, quite wholesome. At the moment, of course, only the roots were sprouting up, but by choosing not to shave it all off he had allowed some hair to come up. It flowed gently in the breeze, moving it out of the way of Krillin’s eyes.

Krillin glanced back down at the Dragon Radar. He was nearing the area where it rested, to his delight. However, the ball was moving, albeit gradually, on the radar. This was, naturally, perturbing to Krillin; it did not seem to be moving in the direction of the base, but instead in the opposite direction entirely. It was likely just picked up by a wandering passerby who found it to be a shiny collector’s item, but what was a tourist doing in the middle of the desert?

Don’t worry about it, Krillin. You can just take it back when you get to it, Krillin thought to himself. He was not one to live in the future, but instead in the moment. As such, he would never voluntarily waste a second of his life – but that’s not to say that Android 18 didn’t make him waste his time.

As he started to come nearer to the Dragon Ball, he slowed down, scanning the area for the holder of the ball. He soon found his prey, who was walking leisurely about the expanse of sand, and dove down through the air to catch him. He landed right in front of him, sending up small clouds of dirt upon his impact on the ground, and Krillin faced him.

“Give me you orange ball! I really kind of need – Yamcha?” Krillin began, before realizing whom he was talking to. “Yamcha! Long time no see!”

“Um, hey? Who are you?” Yamcha asked, confused by Krillin’s mask.

“Uh, Yamcha, we’re like best friends.” Krillin responded, scratching his head. He threw his Dragon Radar off to the side, no longer needing it.

“Maybe it’s the mask? I dunno, it’s hard to see your face with that thing on. Are you, er, Yajirobe?”

“Oh, right,” Krillin replied, slipping his mask off. “Recognize me now?”

“Oi!” Yamcha replied, laughing. “Hey Krillin! Whatcha doin’ out here?”

“Well, this is kinda embarrassing, but I’ve sorta become a superhero in the last few months. I’m just trying to make sure that this bad guy doesn’t get your Dragon Ball.”

“Haha, have no worries about that, Krillin, I’m not letting anybody take this one away from me,” Yamcha said, taking out the Dragon Ball to show it to Krillin. “I found the ball a day or two ago, just layin’ in the middle of the desert. But what’s this about becoming a superhero?”

“Well, 18 and I moved into the city, so I got a job as a cubicle worker in an office. But crime’s pretty bad down there, so I thought I’d try and fight some of it. What ‘bout you? Why are you out here?”

“I like it out here in the desert. I come here during the baseball offseason so I can get some time alone. I come with Puar too… wonder where he is right now. Meh, I’m sure he’s fine. What are you doin’ out here?”

“Well, the whole crime fighting thing kind of got out of hand, so now I’m trying to stop a supervillain guy from taking over the world. I’m pretty sure he needs that Dragon Ball too, so if I get it he won’t be able to have it. I think it’s the best way to make sure he doesn’t win.”

“Trying to take over the world with the Dragon Balls?” Yamcha mused, once again chuckling. “Reminds me of Pilaf, back when it was just me, Goku, and Bulma. That guy had all this technology but wasn’t very strong, so Goku finally beat him by going Great Ape and…” Yamcha reminisced, rambling about the years before all that crazy Saiyan stuff happened.

A flash of maroon.

Krillin saw it. There was a small streak of maroon, floating in the air, for a second there. It was only momentary, but Krillin’s keen eyes still caught it. Under normal circumstances, Krillin would have been able to track the robot’s movements using ki sensing, but the lack of a ki resonance from the FurryBot left that trick inoperable.

“… and then Chaozu attacked you with his headbutt attack and,” Yamcha continued, before noticing Krillin’s frantic glances, “Hey, Krillin what are you looking for?” he asked, while Krillin stopped and took an urgent leap towards, try to push Yamcha out of the way.

“Yamcha! Look out!” Krillin ordered, as he jumped towards Yamcha. The bandit’s Dragon Ball was still in his hand – loose and vulnerable.

“Huh? What’s here?” Yamcha asked, clearly confused and shocked. It was then that the FurryBot barreled into Yamcha, hitting him straight on the side of his torso. Although Yamcha was far the stronger of the two, he was still completely powered down from his max. Couple that with the fact that he was caught completely off guard and you’re left with a stray Dragon Ball and an unconscious Yamcha.

The FurryBot and Krillin were united by a common goal here. They wanted that Dragon Ball. They really, really wanted it. From the second that it left Yamcha’s frozen hands, they were both chasing after it. This may very well have be the deciding moment in the war between David and Krillin.

Krillin had momentum on his side. He was already lunging forward towards the ball, although the FurryBot was as well. Krillin had speed on his side here. He was much faster than the robot – however, he was also further away from it. The FurryBot was mere inches from it; with a single stretch of his arm, he could likely get the ball. It was a race now. Maybe a small race, but a race nonetheless.

“King Furry is dead.”

Those four words were echoed on every news station across the world. He was their singular ruler, the glue that held everyone together. With him gone, everything was likely to descend into pure anarchy. After all, mankind cannot be expected to govern itself, can it?

OWNERSHIP OF THE THRONE LEFT UNCERTAIN

Furry had lived his life on his lonesome. He never bothered to find a mate, as he couldn’t find the time in his schedule to go through the process. He was an only child, so he had no brothers or sisters. He had no children, nor any nephews or nieces.

“Furry was shot dead by a drug addict earlier today during a press speech. The shooter was then killed by a policeman, after the killer also tried to shoot the cop. Medical reports show that the shooter had high levels of methamphetamine in his bloodstream. He was also reported to mutter gibberish after he shot the king.

Were fate to serve itself as expected, the government would have simply searched for the closest relative to Furry and put him or her in charge. However, fate cannot always have its way. Sometimes fate is interrupted, disturbed even, by the only man with enough ambition to completely disrupt the natural order of, well, everything. He was indeed the puppetmaster.

“As there is no clear recipient of the throne left,” spoke a female reporter, in a forced straight-edge voice, “we are left uncertain of who the next king of the world is going to be. Although individual sectors are trying to keep things together, the lack of an overarching ruler is causing the global kingdom to fall apart. We will keep you updated on all major news in the Furry case."

The FurryBots were scouring the office for some hint of whom Furry wanted to take control. They overturned papers and threw about chairs; they opened up cabinets and opened up doors. They looked at everything, every single thing that had writing on it, even though they didn’t bother to read a word of it. As far as they were concerned, it was all trash.

Soon enough, they came across a paper with Furry’s legitimate signature on it. It was stamped on, granted, but it was his signature nonetheless. The FurryBot who had come across it swiftly took into it into his hands, handing it to another bot in the room. This was not the normal cop model of FurryBot; it was, as David had affectionately named it, a ForgerBot.

This was signal enough for the rest of the bots to stop searching. The FurryBot quickly scanned the signature on the page, copying it into his database. He set the paper back down, as he had no more use for it.

A meager week ago, Furry’s room was subject to a routine checkup. It was no big deal, really. Just a group of cops would go into his room and search it for drugs, alcohol, tobacco, all the stuff that the king of the world most surely should not have. Of course Furry passed the test; he held no toxins, no poisons in his room. However, during this routine checkup, one of the FurryBots had slipped a small, typed up sheet of paper into a small interstice in the wall. It went on unnoticed, until Furry’s untimely death on this day.

The ForgerBot walked over to the wall, with clear intent. He traced the cracks with his finger, with a clear goal in mind. He soon found what he was looking for, as he came across the small piece of paper hidden in the wall. He slyly slipped it out of the crevice, folding it up within his hand. He took it back to the table, and then, with only a few intentional imperfections, he forged Furry’s signature onto the piece of paper.

This paper was Furry’s will. Or maybe it was a fake will. Either way, it was a will, and it had Furry’s signature on it.

“This just in: Furry’s will has been found!” exclaimed the aforementioned female reporter, ecstatic about this discover, “It was hidden beneath a tower of paperwork, but it was found nonetheless. This will calls for action unprecedented in the royal family; rather than asking for a family member to take over the throne, this will calls for whomever is deemed most capable by the remaining government to take control of the world. Who is this? We’ll be sure to keep you updated. This is Cartha Brookes, signing out.”

It was, in the end, not a battle of will, but instead a battle of distance. The both of them, the FurryBot and Krillin, had the endurance necessary to reach the ball; they both had the speed; they both had the charisma; but, when all was said and done, the FurryBot grabbed the ball first.

Krillin threw a right hook, to which the FurryBot dodged. Krillin gave an uppercut, but the FurryBot managed to evade it as well. These physical attacks were absolutely useless here. Krillin had a million Ki blasts here, which could blow his enemy away with the greatest of ease. This was not an option, to say the least. Krillin’s values were interfering with any type of success coming around. So long as he couldn’t destroy the FurryBot, he could not get that Dragon Ball. He was, frankly put, in a pickle.

Krillin knew this much: he could not lose his self-integrity and he needed that Dragon Ball. Now, these ideas would not cooperate in harmony – Krillin swerved to the right of a knife jab from the FurryBot. Perhaps his only option here was confusion; after all, the FurryBots didn’t understand lying.

Krillin stepped back from the FurryBot and formed a yellow ball of Ki in his hands. He smashed it down, creating a huge pocket of sand around him. He dashed to the FurryBot, with his right fist forward. The FurryBot could still clearly track him; he knew this much by watching the bot’s censors. Upon reaching the FurryBot’s immediate proximity, he afterimaged, reappearing behind the robot and swiftly jumped into the air. He sliced his leg through the air, before his knee made contact with the bot’s head.

The FurryBot fell down to the ground and then slid through the sand, leaving small tracks as he went. Krillin stepped over to them, the sand in the air beginning to settle. The FurryBot’s hands were still tightly wrapped around the Dragon Ball, but, as long as the bot was kept immobile, Krillin could pry it out of his hands.

Krillin knelt down to grab the ball. The FurryBot was still active, but Krillin managed to restrain him with one of arms. He quashed the bot’s knifing arm and reached over to the ball with his other hand.

Pain. A sharp, striking pain that surged through his bare back, blood spurting out like raindrops. The knife drew out of his back, leaving Krillin to spasm back in pain. A new FurryBot reopened the old wound; three more bots had just entered the scene. Krillin shut his eyes, letting out a bloodcurdling scream. He exhaled deeply, trying to regain his mind.

He opened his eyes back up, The sunlight glared his eyes, adding to the blurriness in his sight. He sat up, only to see a FurryBot rushing at him, the Dragon Ball in tow. Krillin commando rolled to the side, leaving the FurryBot to rush past him. He felt the mask under him, so he picked it up and slipped it onto his face. The mask did not get rid of the wounds, nor the blood, but somehow it made Krillin feel better. It was as if the mask allowed him to become a different person, a person who didn’t feel the same pain as Krillin. It made him feel stronger, like a superhero.



Krillin retook his stance. There were three FurryBots standing in front of him, with the one in the middle holding the Dragon Ball. Krillin rushed at him, with the speed of a tachyon warping through slipspace, and threw a wild hook at him. This left his left torso unprotected, so the FurryBot to the left swiftly kicked him there. Krillin was deterred by this, but managed a brief counterattack in the form of a punch. The FurryBot to the right approached him, but Krillin managed to afterimage behind the both of them and punch one and then the other. Both fell to the ground.

Krillin could already hear the engines of more approaching FurryBots. Two of the FurryBots present were subdued, meaning that he only had to get the ball and then leave. He rushed him, air-dashing forward and punching the FurryBot in the face. The bot crunched over, leaving him open for an elbow blow.

The motors were getting closer and closer. He needed to get the ball and run. He lifted the FurryBot by the head until he stood upright and then scanned him for the Dragon Ball.

“Where’s it?” Krillin asked frantically, patting the FurryBot down. The FurryBot’s red optical scanners looked over Krillin, before the FurryBot raised his left hand and threw the ball off, as far as he could.

Krillin threw the FurryBot away from him and began to run to the ball. He looked most elegant in his prance through the desert, one leg before the next. He was clearly running quite strenuously, putting every ounce of fiber and determination into this run. This was his chance at victory, his final chance to be the winner.

He reached the spot where the Dragon Ball should have laid.

The sand was tinted with small sprinkles of orange throughout.

No longer was the Dragon Ball all in one piece.

The ball was shattered.

Just one thing: Dragon Balls don’t break.

The events flashed through his mind. The one FurryBot flying past him, with the Dragon Ball in hand, while he lay on the ground unconscious. Three bots had come to the scene, and one of the FurryBots had left with the Dragon Ball, while another one held a fake.

Krillin had been tricked.

“Come one! Come all!” David stood atop a stage he had specifically rented for this occasion. He was speaking into a microphone, trying to attract as much attention as possible. He wasn’t at all interested in having a crowd, but it had to be done. It was all just a part of the plan.

“God himself has told me this!” David blatantly lied. He had never uttered a word to God, not that he believed in him to begin with. He only came up with this muse because people tended to prefer religious prophets over insane gypsies. He might not have liked people, but he surely understood them.

“Catastrophe will overtake us all tomorrow!” They all thought he was insane, but he didn’t mind. He had attracted an audience of a small number, who seemed to be listening for entertainment purposes only. David wouldn’t mind if a few people fled because of him, but it didn’t bother him that almost nobody would leave. It was the intention here, not the result.

“Flee! Flee the area! Leave as soon as you can!” he shouted out, preaching to the choir.

“Get the hell off, you religious bullshitter!” a clearly drunken man called out. A few of the others around the drunkard snickered at his banter.

“Listen to me not if you wish! You will feel the consequences tomorrow!” His words were large, bombastic, almighty. He had pretty much nailed the priest persona, as much as he would hate to admit. Perhaps in another universe, where he was not a cynical psycopath, David would have made a mighty fine preacher.

“Yeah, bro, I wish to not listen to you. What are you, from the 1600’s? Bahaha!” the drunken man rasped out. His friends drew a hearty laugh out of this, to which he felt proud.

“It is not my plight to turn a non-believer into a believer! Only those who wish to take a path of decency are deserving of this warning. Do ever what you want to do.” David was making elaborate gestures as he pranced across his stage. Perhaps he was having a bit too much fun with this act.

“Yeah, whatever, man. I don’t need to waste my time on you. Get off the stage, man, if you’re going to just be stupid like that,” the man droned out again. He and his friends left the scene, leaving David to speak more religious nonsense.

A smile crossed David’s face.

Part 1: Idealistic Fighting
Krillin’s mind was abuzz. A Dragon Ball was broken. No, it was a fake Dragon Ball. It had to be. The real Dragon Ball had silently slipped away into the far away, while the fake one came to be under pressure and cracked like a mirror assaulted by a drug-frenzied rapper. He had seen a FurryBot run off with it, he knew he had, but he just hadn’t been thinking clearly enough to make sense of it all. He was losing it. This was not good.

Krillin knew he needed to find it. If Mark Apache, no, David were to get his hands on all 7 who knows what he would do with it. Krillin scanned over the area, looking throughout the barren wasteland for a faint outline of a FurryBot moving out. Nothing. There were only 3 FurryBots and the unconscious body of Yamcha in sight. Everything was going awry.

Krillin could not, no, would not destroy any of the robots. By no means would he kill a human and certainly he would not kill an innocent one. David was quite the big bully for taking all those humans hostage, especially considering how much of a dilemma it was causing for Krillin. He would just have to get past the FurryBots… it would be easy.

But, after his grand escape, there would be nowhere to go! Krillin was a forward thinker. He wasn’t going to just dart past the FurryBots and hope for the best. He needed an actual plan. He took in a deep breath. Okay, he murmured to himself, trying to relax. He could kick them both down and force the location of the ball out of them. No, that was stupid. They couldn’t even feel pain.

Pain. Gah! His back ached. The wound was still sending out a searing pain, even moreso than before now that it had been reopened. He needed to stay focused on the issue here. “Concentrate!” he shrieked out with spontaneity, drawing the attention of the FurryBots back to him. Not good not good not good, he thought. I can’t fight them. I’ll destroy them if I do. What can I do?I can scare them off!

With a magnificent grunt, Krillin sent his aura exploding out from around him. His power level spiked, bordering upon the 250 thousands. He wasn’t at his max, but he was still at the highest he had been in nigh a year. Such fearsome might was hard to find on this planet, and as such most people would have ran in fright at the mere sight of this great power.

The FurryBots didn’t even flinch.

Krillin powered back down to his base. Why weren’t they scared? Hesitant? Startled, even? Their course of action had not been changed whatsoever. The three of them lined up, ready to rush Krillin like bulls on parade. One of them had a knife in hand; the other 2 had guns extended from their hands. He could take any bullets from afar without even feeling it, but pointblank? That could cause some damage, especially if it was aimed at the right place. And something told Krillin they were good aimers.

Krillin took stance. He threw his left hand out at the incoming enemies and put his right arm behind him. It was, shockingly, still second nature to him, despite all the time that had gone by without him using the form. Perhaps he just hadn’t let this ability slip away from him.

The attack then began. The three bots began their march toward him, flying forward on their engines. Krillin met their run, dashing toward the three of them. Seconds before reaching their proximity, he took a swift jump into the air, before coming up above a bot and spiking him into the ground. Plummets of sand rose up from the ground, shrouding the two other FurryBots from vision. Krillin saw this as an opportunity to get away and retreat, so he turned himself upside down and flew back to Yamcha’s body.

They’ll regain their footing any second now, Krillin thought, all serious-like. I have to figure something out quick! Krillin took a step backwards, but only stumbled over Yamcha’s limp shoulders, landing right across his back.

“Whassit? Puar, whassit?” Yamcha grumbled, shaken and stirred. He shook Krillin off of him, which, for all of Yamcha’s sleepy strength, sent Krillin floating back several feet. Krillin landed in some sand further back, and, with great clamor, his foot clinked into something. Krillin shuffled around, checking the area for whatever he had just hit. After but a singular moment, he found it; David’s dragon radar.

“Yamcha! Yamcha! I found it!” Krillin exclaimed, with the unaware excitement of an infant. The nearly comatose Yamcha didn’t manage to cough up a response, but Krillin didn’t much mind. He himself had left the radar there, but had simply been too thick to remember his placement of it. It was the answer to all his problems, his new favorite possession.

Krillin dusted the sand off of it, examining the item once more. He clicked a button on its upper ridge, giving off a reading of the Dragon Ball’s location. Krillin gazed upon it intently, oblivious to his surroundings. The radar was zeroing in on the ball’s location. It was taking some time, though, due to the extreme velocity the Dragon Ball was moving at. Krillin zoomed it in by pressing a button up on the top, and as such the Dragon Ball finally started to take sha-

“Give bayck masteer’s deevyce!” squawked out a FurryBot, who was clearly not programmed to speak like a normal human. The FurryBot took a swipe at Krillin, but Krillin managed to take a step back in order to dodge the knife that was thrust at him. Luckily, due to this quick evasion, the furious attack resulted in just a small scratch across Krilin torso. However, for all his expertful dodging, Krillin’s fingers lost grip on the radar, the device slipping out of his hands. This gave the FurryBot leeway to take his other hand and grab the small radar, leaving Krillin empty-handed.

Krillin needed it back, badly. He threw a punch – it was dodged. He threw another punch - also dodged. He tried a sidekick, but it yielded the same result. Out of instinct, he started to form a small ball of ki in his hand, but relinquished it, knowing that it could very well cause the destruction of the bot.

Without warning, the bot swung his arm upwards, releasing the radar as he went. The radar soared up into the air, giving Krillin the chance to rise up and grab it. Without any thought as to why the FurryBot threw the radar, Krillin jumped up there, taking flight. He reached his hand up, moving his fingers about in desire.

As Krillin grew close, the radar disappeared in a majestic explosion of lead and shrapnel. Krillin was left grabbing for smoke, his hand moving right through the gas. There were only a few remains of the Dragon Ball Radar, all of which were useless at best and annoying at worst. A few of the remains stuck into the arm he had tried to use to grab it, pricking him. Such bitter irony.

What had just happened, for Kai’s sake? Krillin took survey of the area. The FurryBot who had thrown it stood still below him, while one of the other FurryBots stood with a gun poking out of his hand. One FurryBot had thrown it. Another FurryBot had shot it. That makes two FurryBots. Where was the third?

With a startle that consisted of a nightmarish twist of déjà vu and pain, Krillin felt yet another knife poke into his back. Luckily, this one misses his open wound on his lower back - instead, it managed to strike his upper back, just below the shoulders, instead.

They called it the shriek heard around the world.

''I have sent a few FurryBots to stop KaiMan’s search for the Dragon Ball. The soldiers out there have told me via radio that one of them got away with the last ball. He must be on the return now. I suppose the fake dragon ball ploy must have worked… can’t believe the bugger fell for it.''

''I apologize for the formality today, mr. Tape Recorder. It is - it is unavoidable in such tense conditions. I am going to kill millions; I - I don’t know how I will be to deal with such foul genocide. All for the greater good, it is. It has to be. No harm, no foul. No harm, no foul, that’s right.''

''I went to the city yesterday and talked about catastrophe coming today. I spoke of comets hurling down and a new ice age coming. They dismissed me as a nut, a loony… can’t blame ‘em, really. I would have done the same.''

''But that’s not of the concern. Today, my prophecy will be fulfilled, by me, myself. A self-fulfilling prophecy of the most literal sorts, heh. Once I’m right about all of it, they’ll see me as a prophet. Someone chosen by god to lead them. They’ll deem me most capable. I’ll be put into power.''

''It’s all coming together at long last. I planted the will. I foretold the catastrophe. And now, I’ll be able to cause the catastrophe. Once that Dragon Ball gets here, everything will be in its right place. I’ll have to send the Dragon Balls up there, into space, and then I’ll just have to wait until it comes up over West City. My throne will descend; so will everything else. It will be beautiful.''

''From there, I will rule the world with a iron fist - or titanium fist, if need be. It will all be for the good of everyone. I’ll free them all from their silly little lives and make the world a better place. Everyone will be happy. They’ll be happy.''

This is David, signing off… no time for any other salutations.

He slipped the recorder into his pocket. Today was going to require more or less constant commentary and it would need to be done in many different places, so it would make little sense to put the recorder away. He walked out of his room, step by deliberate step, opening the door with a forced steadiness and calmness. He could not let this get the best of him. He was in control of everything. Everything was in the palm of his hands.

He walked out into the open station. The FurryBots were tending the satellite in the manner of nanomolecular repairmen, swarming about it and fixing small bits and pieces of it. For David to go out to space in something like that, the specifications had to be absolutely perfect. There could be no flaws, no matter how minor, in this celestial vessel.

The satellite was one of the few designs David made entirely from scratch. He had no Red Ribbon Army blueprint to base it off of, which meant that he had to create everything, from the smallest memory cards to the largest engines, entirely from new. Putting the architecture into fruition made David feel so good about himself.

“Everything going good?” David shouted out, to no FurryBot in particular.

“Well, sir, we’re having some trouble with the thrusters on the-” responded a FurryBot, who was cut off by David with surprising agility.

“Yeah, whatever, I’m sure you can fix it. Best o’ luck with that.” David continued his jaunt around his palace, before coming to a FurryBot of considerably smaller size. He stood by a module, watching a screen with a vast number of blinking and moving dots.

“Where’s the FurryBot with the Dragon Ball?” David asked simply, with a tone of impatience unmistakable. The FurryBot at the module, who was clearly unable to speak by design, pointed at a singular dot on the screen. It was not too far away from the secret hideout, as David could tell. By his estimates, it would arrive within mere minutes. Perfect.

“Got that thruster problem fixed?”

“Um, no, master, we’re fixing it-”

“What could possibly be taking so long? We don’t have time!”

“It hasn’t been very long, master, only a few-”

“Fix it or off with your head!”

David took in a deep breath. The stress was getting to him. Was he ready for this? Of course he was. There was no need for such petty frustrations and empty threats. The FurryBot was doing the best he could. The thruster would surely get fixed. The plan was not going to fail now, by some minor technical difficulty.

David looked out the window. The sun was beginning to set, and it was accompanied by a brilliant pinkish hue. He had specifically hoped for the plan to be executed during the night; it would give the whole event a sort of ambience. David liked that.

It came with a gush of wind, a crack of locks, and a twist of hinges. With such noise it came in that many of the FurryBots almost stopped working, and David himself was shocked out of his thoughtful introspect. David’s head rolled backwards, to see the source of this great commotion. And understandably so, David was pleased.

“Throw it on over.”

Within seconds, the FurryBot who had just entered tossed the ball on over to David. He caught it with a grin. Now that he had the actual ball in his possession, he felt fully confident. Nothing could get in his way. He was unstoppable. Invincible.

“Are the thrusters fixed?” A critical question. If the FurryBot were to answer yes, everything would be just fine. David could take over the world with ease and the whole world would be under his control. If the FurryBot said no, though, everything would be thrown into utter cacophony and the balance of the universe would likely rip into two, shattering the very existence we all live off of.

“Yes, it’s ready, master.”

Shew.

David smiled and nodded. He pranced on over to the satellite, walking through the hatch on the exterior. He entered the small vessel, and, at long last, placed the 7th ball down. They began to glow with luminosity, amazing David. He widened his eyes in awe and all that too. He made no effort to summon the Dragon, though. That was to wait.

“Ready for take-off, sirs,” David announced, sitting down in the center of the ring of Dragon Balls. He was at peace with the universe, at long last. All his blood and sweat (no tears, because real men don’t cry), had paid off at long last. The culmination of all the planning and engineering was here. It was coming together.

“10,” replied another FurryBot, “9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2… 1.”

Blastoff.

This sharp blow to Krillin’s back from the Furrybot crippled him over in pain, his back bending down and his legs jutting out; with a convulsive twist, he punched the attacking FurryBot against his metallic face, sending the bot flying down into the sand below. Rendered irrational by his anger, Krillin sent a magnificent ball of orange ki spiraling down to the FurryBot. Upon impact, the sphere exploded, obliterating all that it had touched.

Krillin descended down to the charred remains of the sand and the FurryBot. It was almost completely gone, with only a few remnants of scrap metal remaining. Krillin found solace in the destruction of this killing machine, but, even moreso than that, he felt guilt. He had just killed a human being, one with flesh and blood. He had, with his own strength, done away with the life of a person. In a bare moment of anger and hatred, he had killed.

The physical pain meant nothing now. His back may have ached like nothing else, but the emotional liquid metal flowing through his veins overwhelmed anything he may have felt on the outside. He felt like a terrible person, and felt nothing more than that. No matter how primitive this emotion may seem, it struck strong in a simple-minded person like Krillin, who allowed himself to be overcome by it all. He simply stared down at the ground, watching the little particles of sand blow away with the wind.

The other FurryBots David had sent were arriving. They were storming in by the hundreds, all in an oxymoronic mass of cacophonous order. Krillin heard them fly in, but he ceased to move from his position. They could take him on. They could kill him, for all he cared. Maybe it would make everything equal.

The two remaining FurryBots he had fought with earlier came rushing at him. They didn’t have any type of emotional fear, which meant that they were completely non-hesitant to attack Krillin mere moments after he killed a comrade. The FurryBots knocked Krillin down, sliding him across the sand. He merely laid there, face covered in it all.

Ring, ring, ring.

Krillin’s cell phone was going off. It was amazing that, after all this time and all this abuse, the cellular device was still intact. The phone sat in his pocket, untouched. Krillin moved his hand right into the pocket, taking the small phone out. Without a glance at the caller, Krillin flipped the phone open. He placed it against his face, but did not speak a single word.

An eerie silence filled the air. There was nothing to be found in terms of voice. These three seconds, the three moments of complete silence, might as well have defined the course of Krillin’s life. In these three miniscule seconds, Krillin realized how ridiculous it all was; his working in an office, moonlighting as a superhero, fighting against some type of crazy supervillain, and, more importantly than all of it, the fact that he was just laying down on the ground, letting himself get beat to death by a few mindless robots.

“Where are you?” It was 18 on the phone. She was, naturally, very very mad; it was midnight in West City, hours later than when he usually got home. “Still at the office, honey.” Krillin managed to pick himself up, regaining his feet. A FurryBot shot a bullet at him, but he managed to catch it with the greatest of ease and throw it to the side.

“Why haven’t you called me?” 18 was confused more than anything else. Krillin should have called her to tell her that he would be getting home late. That was to be expected.

“I’ve – I’ve been in meetings for a long time now.” Krillin was lying blatantly and directly, something he was unaccustomed to. It made him feel uneasy, to speak to his lover like that. “I haven’t had a chance, sweetie.”

“Is this going to become like a regular thing? We can’t have this going on, with a baby on the way!” 18 was, without warning, furious. Krillin was used to it at this point, given her irregular hormones. She was pregnant, after all.

“No, honey, this is a one-time thing. I’m sorry!” Krillin was just going through the motions. He had more pressing matters at hand. “It won’t happen again.” A FurryBot threw a punch at Krillin, and he caught the punch with his open hand. With this catch, he let out a fairly audible grunt.

“What was that?!” Android 18 yelled out, responding to his grunt.

“I – I,” Krillin stuttered, looking for a suitable lie, “I can’t find the F key! Ugh!” He threw another punch at a FurryBot, sending that one flying as well.

“What?! What are you talking about?!”

“The F Key on the keyboard! I can’t find it anywhere! Where could it be?” Krillin tripped the other FurryBot, before sending him off with a kick. He then left those two bots, looking off to face the incoming bots. They were flying in next to the setting sun; it was quite the majestic army. He was going to take them all on.

“Wait… what? You still can’t type?”

“Sorry, honey, ‘nother meeting. I’ll be home in a few hours or so. See you then!”

Krillin took stance. The robots could all take him on – and he was going to take them right back on.

David was in a satellite. He had the seven Dragon Balls with him, which he had gathered together after months of searching. He was currently headed to West City, the residence of the former king of the world, King Furry. It was by no means a friendly rendez-vous; it was a devilish plot for domination and power.

Perhaps I should clarify for a moment here. It is of course a long and twisted tale, one of ridiculous plotting and a twisted sense of idealism. In order to truly explain it all, I must start in the very beginning, before his days of true evilry began.

He started off rather normal. He was a good student, but by no means an extraordinary one. However, he had a knack for engineering, which he utilized to the fullest. It eventually landed him a spot as an intern at the world’s greatest military, the Red Ribbon Army. He worked as a scientist under Dr. Gero, at the time the world’s greatest scientist.

While he may have entered the force an excellent scientist, he left an exceptional one. The knowledge he gained from being Gero’s protégé was immense and equipped with an acute sense for mechanics and robotics. However, at much the same time, he was brainwashed by the army’s ideals. He truly convinced himself that their dictatorial plan was the best one; that no human could be happy unless someone else helped them on their way. With this, David decided that he would take over everyone. He would control them until they were truly happy.

On the day of the army’s demise, he watched it all get decimated by the boy with the monkey tail. He watched as soldiers were killed before his eyes, yet he did little to stop any of them. David was selfish enough to not want to sacrifice himself for the betterment of his alliance. Sneakily, he managed his way out, taking some of Gero’s schematics and devices with him.

It was through this that the basic idea of the FurryBots came into fruition. While they were aesthetically modeled after King Furry’s robots, their internal workings were entirely distinct. They were equipped with far more weaponry and power, all the while having a nice new maroon coat of paint. After getting a piece of documentation signed by the king himself, he managed to get his FurryBot 2.0s into the police force. They began a silent genocide of the original model, and now only his inventions were left.

This type of control left him virtually invulnerable. Even if he were to be caught for his coming actions, the remaining police would be able to do nothing about it. His robots were in control now, and therefore he was in control. However, in order to gain public approval, he needed to go even further.

This is why he had gathered the Dragon Balls. He had first heard of the balls during his tenure in the Red Ribbon Army, when everybody had been looking for them. They quickly became a staple in his plans, and he sought to use them to their utmost potential. Once he created a radar based on Gero’s schematics, it was all easy.

The night before, he had gone into the city, preaching about how catastrophe would overtake the world the following day. He talked about how god had sent him a message, how god was going to kill all of them. Now, in this statement, he was effectively God; he had sent the message, and he was going to kill them all. This was not by simple virtue of killing people, of course. He wanted to take over the world, and destroying the world’s infrastructure would be the most effective way of doing so. As long as he foretold the catastrophe he was going to cause, they would think him a prophet. They would never know that he had caused it.

By this point, David had reached West City. He was still above the Earth by about 74 miles, which meant he was in space. A certain feeling of anxiety and nervousness overwhelmed him. This was perhaps the ultimate moment in his life, and whatever he did would define who he was forever. Would he be the grand ruler of the world – or just another nutjob who made an army of robots and predicted the world’s end?

David gathered the Dragon Balls together and summoned the dragon up. Its green body rose into the black space above. And, most importantly, David made his wish.

Endnotes:

The One Where They Fight Idealistically
Dende abruptly tilted his head up. He had been lost in a trance of deep meditation for hours at this point, and his awakening had come in the form of Shenron being summoned. As the dragon’s keeper, he knew automatically whenever it was brought forth. Naturally, this did not happen very often, as Shenron only came forth once every year at the most, meaning that it was quite the occasion when the dragon was summoned. However, there was something peculiar about this occurrence; the dragon was in space. Far above the Earth, far above Dende, even, Shenron arose, leering his majestic head over the entirety of Earth.

What happened henceforth was out of Dende’s control. He and the dragon were separate, if symbiotic, entities. Upon creating the new Shenron, Dende had lost his control over the creature, meaning that, whenever the Dragon was summoned, it would grant whatever wish it could. Dende could not stop it.

Of course, Dende had no interest in stopping Shenron. He knew not of the devilish wish David was about to make. Dende made the assumption that one of the Z Fighters had raised Shenron, perhaps to wish for a three-foot hoagie or a new pair of tennis shoes. Dende paid it no mind.

Vegeta was training furiously. He had already entered the Hyperbolic Time Chamber twice, which meant that he could enter it no more. He was hungry for intense training, though, which he could find none of on earth. As such, he had entered the pendulum room, a room where he could find any number of challenges. Within it, he was presently fighting an army of Cell Jrs., thrashing about and punching and kicking at them. He had not yet achieved Super Saiyan 2, but he had plenty of time before the next World Martial Arts Tournament.

It is worth returning to Shenron here, as he’s rather important to, you know, the story. David was still in his ship at this point, but he was speaking to Shenron from within it. With as loud a voice as he could, he yelled out, “Dragon, allow me one wish! Rain down comets upon this Earth!”

This was, naturally, not David’s usual dialog orientation. He felt a sense of grandness at the moment, given that he was about to perform partial genocide on the human race. But Shenron was unfazed by this, as he, without any morality or alignment, responded back,

“Your wish… has been granted.”

The comets rained down slowly enough at first. As they gained speed, they descended down through the atmosphere, a fiery ring gathering around them all. From every corner of the Earth they came down, covering every mile of ground and every continent. No area was spared of their wrath. It was as though every catastrophe had been combined into one massive, destructive event.

In this meteoric hailstorm, not even Dende’s lookout was allowed peace. Dende was left with no choice but stare up in fear. He knew that the comets would not cause the Lookout to crumble; it was held up in invariable levitation, and no amount of force could cause it to crash down. However, the buildings (and people) which stood atop the lookout were indeed perishable.

There were 4 comets which were coming down upon the Lookout alone. While there were spaces between them, they still did cover most of the tower’s area. One was surely going to crush the Pendulum Room.

Dende ran away. Even though the comets were coming down fast, he managed to get to a clear space. Popo was met with similar luck, as he came to a different clear spot. The comets met the top of the lookout with a resounding boom. The surrounding buildings were shattered into shambles. The door inside the Hyperbolic Time Chamber disappeared. Vegeta, while met with no aesthetic change, found out after time that he could no longer leave the Pendulum Room and return to the lookout. Vegeta was trapped in oblivion. -- Krillin was surrounded by Furrybots on all sides. He was battling them effectively enough, outpowering all of them but nevertheless struggling to keep up with the twenty-something robots. His power level was climbing up into the low thiry-thousands, the highest it had been besides in his outrage against the singular Furrybot earlier. He did not want to alert the other Z Fighters by raising his ki too high; how they would come and laugh at him for wearing such a silly mask and then blow all the bots up. If they did this, they would kill countless humans back at David’s base, and, more importantly, Krillin would feel very stupid.

Because of this, Krillin kept his power level at a reasonable amount. It was enough for him to keep up with the others, but not enough to actually destroy them. He threw a punch at one of the bots, before dodging another Furrybot, and then kicking it out of the way. Three or so jabbed at him with their knives, and a couple others shot at him with their guns. He avoided all of this by taking a leap into the air, after which he landed in the sand a solid 50 feet away. He hurled a small, explosive ki ball at all of them, using it solely as a method by which to disperse them. While it did not make contact with a one of them, it caused them all to dodge away in different directions, allowing Krillin the opportunity to attack each of them individually. He could not handle them all at once much longer.

Krillin took a moment to regain stance. He tried to decide upon a plan of action, scanning across the bots. And then – it happened. They all, in perfect synchronization, turned upside down and drilled down in the ground. As they dug further down beneath ground level, they upturned the soil under them, using it to fill up the holes. This left them without a trace, and the ground was completely solid.

Krillin was very confused. This was unlike anything he had seen them do beforehand. What were they going to do? Spurt out of the ground and attack him? He looked around him hesitantly, waiting for something bad to happen. He closed his eyes, concentrating on his senses of smell and hearing. The first thing he heard was a loud rumble, which was slowly gaining prominence. However, it was not coming from underneath him; it was actually coming from above him. Had some of the Furrybots taken air and were about to come down on him?

Krillin opened his eyes and looked up. He saw them all then. The comets. They were pouring down in mass onslaught, ready to crush anything below them. Krillin focussed. How could he avoid the coming objects? With haste, he powered up a powerful energy beam, shooting it above him to evaporate the incoming comet. He was going to be fine.

He looked around. With that threat eliminated for the moment, he had to prepare for the Furrybots to erupt back out of the ground. Off in the distance, though, he spotted Yamcha, laying in the shadow of a comet, a sitting duck. Krillin went back over there and grabbed Yamcha, throwing him over his shoulder. He ran back to his safezone and laid Yamcha down, plugging his ears and waiting for the comets to make contact with the Earth.

Krillin thought to himself. Why did a random storm of comets come down like that? It was inexplicable to any rational-minded person. The former monk racked his brain for an explanation, eventually settling upon one; David had wished for it with the Dragon Balls. It made sense. David was after the Dragon Balls, and he was apparently a psychopath. But Krillin was still oblivious to his overall plan. He was fighting against that which he did not yet understand.

Krillin was brought back into reality when the comets struck the Earth. They sent huge plumes of sand rising into the air, obscuring the sky and the sun. However, the sand showed no signs of coming down. It is also worth noting that the comets were reduced into rubble as they hit the ground, collapsing in on themselves and scattering the ground with their minerals.

They struck the ground with a booming percussion, one which was heard all across the Earth. Even Yamcha was brought forth from his deepest subconscious by it, sitting up sharply with eyes wide. “Krillin, Krillin, what’s going on?!?!??!!?” he blurted out in fear, jumping up into fighting stance.

“I dunno, Yamcha. But I don’t think it’s good.” Krillin retook fighting stance. He needed to concentrate on fighting them, despite all the chaos around him. “A bunch of robots will come out of the ground soon, Yamcha. Fight them, but don’t kill them.” Yamcha nodded in uneasy affirmation, taking on his own stance.

The Furrybots popped out of the ground like whales popping out of the water for a breath of air. Once out, they immediately lunged at Yamcha and Krillin from all directions. The two warriors fought back, punching and kicking, but they had little to do without destroying them. They held them off appropriately, but Krillin naturally had a blindspot behind his back which he was not aware of. As he jumped up to launch a sideways kick at an incoming Furrybot, another bot rushed up behind him and shot him, point blank, with a small bullet. It penetrated his wound, causing Krillin immense pain. He powered up in anger, and, unwilling to repeat his past mistake, swung at the one behind him. While it did send the robot flying, it nevertheless did not destroy the villain. Krillin lashed out at a few of the bots around him, giving him and Yamcha some space.

After this outburst, Krillin calmed back down. He landed back down in the ground, calming down. He closed his eyes for a brief moment of rest, as he was starting to get rather tired, and, upon reopening his eyes, was met with an assault from all the Furrybots coming at him. Krillin was unprepared for this.

He managed to dodge the first oncoming attacker, but the second one got in a small cut on Krillin’s forehead, penetrating his mask. Krillin yelled out an audible “ow!”, but was too shocked to properly react. Yamcha tried to battle his way through the hoard of Furrybots and protect Krillin, but was stopped from doing so because the crowd was so thick. Krillin was left in the middle of this violent gangbang, unable to move properly as he was tortured by the robots.

Suddenly, yellow energy attacks rained down upon him. They crusaded down, crashing upon the hoard of enemies with a level of sauvity that was really quite cool. All the Furrybots were simply destroyed by this, and Krillin himself was crumpled down to the ground amidst a pile of ashes and mechanical parts. He was revealed to be covered in bruises, marks, and was just generally unaesthetically pleasing.

He tilted his head up. Standing far away from him, the root cause of this attack was revealed. Piccolo had unleashed a Hellzone grenade upon the Furrybots. He had killed the bots – and he had killed their corresponding humans. -- The Dragon Balls were floating around David, who was horribly confused. The army had never told him about this; how they would glow and, with gradually increasing rapidity, spin around. It was an eerie sight, one for which David had not planned. He did not like it when things did not go according to his plans.

Much to David’s glee, though, they rocks all lost their colour after a few moments. They turned into grey rocks without even dispersing first, before dropping down to the ground in a loud thump. This is what David had been anticipated, that they would lose their color after a few moments and then become stagnant. They would come back in one year, ready for another wish. David had plenty of time to consider what he would do then. As for the moment, he had to focus on reentering the atmosphere.

David sat back for a moment of contemplation. In order to maximize the effects of his reappearance, he would have to time his descent so that it matched up with the comets. Imagine it - the cities devastated by comets, only a few sparse people scattered about, and down comes David, in his extraterrestrial object. It would be such an amazing sight.

He waited for the comets to settle. He wanted to come immediately after the last few comets had landed, so that all the chaos was just beginning to set in. Naturally, there was no exact way to gauge when they would finish assaulting the Earth, but he could make a decent estimate. Regardless, the time to go down was approaching. David shifted a few gears, and he took in a deep breath as he felt himself lower.

He experienced a bit of turbulence as he went through the upper atmosphere. It was nothing too major, though, as he had built the ship specifically to withstand this type of resistance. David had placed himself directly above West City, which is where this vertical drop was taking him. With hesitance, he readied himself to put on his best acting face and talk about how God must have chosen him.

While he was lost in this deep thought, he knew he was coming closer to ground level. The man opened his eyes, prepared to face the people. His hypothesis was correct: people were swarming around in small numbers, gazing up at his slowly incoming vessel. He had made it aesthetically obvious that his spaceship was not a comet, so as to assure that they would not be frightened by it (besides the fact that the populace might think it to come from aliens).

The spaceship, at long last, came into contact with the ground. The hatch on the exterior opened up, leaving the world to look in at David. He put on his best face of shock, trying his hardest to get into character.

“Where… where am I? What’s going on?” David uttered out in mock confusion. “Last thing I remember I was telling people to run away… and now I’m here!” The people all stared at him silently, hoping for some sort of explanation. Several seconds passed, yet no one spoke a word.

Finally, someone from the audience broke the silence. “Are you responsible for this, dumbass?”

“M-me? No sir, no sir! I mean, I knew this was coming - I even tried to get people to leave town! Nobody listened to me, though.” After another moment of nothingness, David decided to try to break the silence by saying, “Guess that god really did pick me to help out everyone, huh?” He ended this with a slightly ironic chuckle; nobody else found this funny.

It is worth noting here that everything in these people’s lives had just fallen apart. Their houses had been destroyed, some of their family was probably killed, and everything they had ever stood for had been annihilated. Everyone was too shocked to have a genuine emotional reaction to any of it; yet, paradoxically, they were too emotionally devastated to make a logical decision. Everything they thought was a byproduct of their, largely numbed, emotions.

“God must have picked you to lead us,” an awed bystander in the group spoke out.

Murmurs of agreement erupted from without the crowd. What he was supposing was a rather big deal. To pick a ruler based solely on a theological hunch was something most irrational and ridiculous; however, one must remember that this is a world in which men with monkey tails destroy planets and little mimes float about while trying to head butt monks. -- As Krillin looked over the crowd of rubble left behind from the FurryBots, everything occurred to him at once. What Krillin had wanted to do for so long, but hadn’t been able to do, had just been done for him; and yet it all felt so wrong. So many people had just been killed, all at once, for no crime other than existing. This was something Krillin could excuse for no reason. He turned his head at Piccolo, eying his large green body.

Krillin rushed at him, fists outstretched. Once he got to him, he swung some punches at him. He couldn’t hit him, and he knew that, but Krillin was being controlled by his emotions. He was plagued by despair, grief, anger, and, perhaps, buried beneath all of his ego and morals and ethics, a small tinge of inadequacy,

Piccolo grabbed his arm and pinned him down to the ground on his side. “What are you doing?” Krillin squirmed out from underneath him, before putting up his fighting stance once again. This time, however, he made no action other than to yell back.

“Don’t you realize what you just did? Don’t you?” Krillin spoke back, enraged. He raised his fists up in his vast fury, prepared to strike again in a fit of nonsensical anger. He dived at Piccolo, who nonchalantly sidestepped him. Krillin was left falling into the sand, his face being lightly covered in the powder.

“What do you mean by that? I sensed your power level and came here, only to find you getting destroyed out there. I saved you!”

Krillin pushed himself up from the ground. He had been so clumsy lately, in all his anger and spontaneity. Krillin managed to reflect slightly for just a moment, realizing what he was doing. He needed to be calm for just a moment, to explain the situation to Piccolo.

“Piccolo… there were people connected to each of those FurryBots. You just killed a bunch of people with those grenades. That was - that was no good.”

Piccolo seemed taken aback “What, Krillin, what? How did that happen?”

“There’s this human named David, he’s real bad. He kidnapped a bunch of humans and made a bunch of robots and then connected them and everything. He’s also got all the Dragon Balls too… and… and I guess that I just don’t know. He might have caused the comets to come down, too, but I don’t know how.”

“Argghh,” Piccolo loosely growled, frustrated. “I knew these comets were a sign of something evil. Is that all you know?”

“Uh, yeah, Piccolo, that’s all. I’ve been chasing David around for a while now and he seems to have some big plan in mind. Probably a world power grab, I dunno.” Krillin once again felt a little ping of incompetence as he realized just how little he knew. Maybe it was that the whole superhero ruse was finally getting to him, but, for perhaps the first time ever, Krillin wanted to be the hero. The only hero.

“Ugh. Is there any way we could find out where this David is? Like an unusual power signature or something?”

“No, Piccolo, nothing. His power level’s only 5, I don’t think there’s a way to pick him out very well, from this far away. David didn’t even have an evil power signature. We should just go separate ways and see if we can find him anywhere.” Both were silent for a moment, and then Krillin continued. “I’ll go left, you can go right. We might be able to stop him sometime soon.”

Piccolo nodded in response, before taking off in the direction Krillin had told him to. Time was of the essence. Krillin motioned to Yamcha to come with him. Yamcha had, throughout this conversation, been silent, trying to piece everything together in his mind. He was, after all, the most knowledgeable person in the group.

Krillin knew that going left was going to lead him to David. He came right to find the Dragon Ball, so going left would obviously bring him right back to David’s base. And, although he would never admit it to anyone, he didn’t want Piccolo to succeed.

Endnotes:

Cuomo
(author’s note: there is a noticeable gap in the story progression between the last chapter and this one; this will be explained in, oh 10 chapters or so. pls no complain!)



Krillin was in the air, bursting through faster than a cannonball. He could already note the soot forming in the sky; it would soon block out the sun. There was an ice age coming. This was really happening. Everything was turning straight to shit.

Krillin, though, was making a conscious effort to ignore this abysmal situation. He needed to focus on the current situation to assure that what needed to immediately accomplished would immediately be accomplished. Everything would work itself out in the end, as long as Krillin was able to take down David right now and put an end to his scheme.

West City was in the distance. It was barely noticeable amidst all the dust, but it was apparent due to the fact that it was a tiny city made of ashes, whereas most of the ground was completely flat, aside from the comets scattered about. They were smaller than the standard 6-mile one, and a picky scientist might even categorize them as a meteorite; but Krillin was a simple man of simple times who had no interest in such nitpicky categorization but was instead wholly satisfied with the general idea of big rocks colliding with Earth being transferred even though it may not be completely scientifically correct. After all, this is real life, so everything must be completely correct in order for it to be even remotely passable as a chronology of events.

A fleeting thought occurred to Krillin. If he had left before fighting the FurryBots, he definitely could have gotten David prior to his escape. It was very much like him to ignore everyone in his presence and up and leave in the middle of a fight, just in the interest of time. The reason why he didn’t leave is clearly a brain teaser that will puzzle the people for generations to come. It would have made for such good reading, too!

Krillin descended down to West City. He had deduced that David was hiding out there, after a few very deliberate hints from Yamcha, and so he had gone there. It was a logical process which, in terms of natural sequence, surpassed most of the nonsense I’ve pumped out recently. In fact, I would say it was only like 78% forced.

Once Krillin touched down on the ground, he almost immediately spotted David. He was tottering about, dusting around his little space pod which the citizens of West City, which David planned to rename “Space Town” simply because he really liked the way that space looked. He was kinda a fanatic about it. Other potential names for it included “Kitty Cat Ville” and “Moonville and Antarctica”. In the end, however, he settled for Space Town, simply because he didn’t give a damn about you or this town no more.

Now now, before I devolve into mindless babbling, I should likely continue the plot in one form or another. As I was saying, David was dusting about around his satellite, and when Krillin finally touched the ground he turned around on his hind legs and shrieked out, “You? Not you! The FurryBots should have gotten you!” Krillin merely grinned back at him.

“They were no match for me. A friend of mine took them all out for me, so I was able to catch up with you. Time to put a stop to your dastardly deeds!”

“Why won’t you die? Darn diddly do dat, time to proceed into plan B.”

“You’ve got another back-up plan?!” Krillin was mad, because David had already gone through like 6 different plans so far. He had really hoped that this would be straightforward and he could just beat up David and get it over with. Unfortunately, he couldn’t, because that would be way too clichéd to be enjoyable in any way.

“Look, now, Kai-Man, I just want to leave here. I’ve already killed like 5 and a half billion people today, so if we could go to an uninhabited area to fight where nobody else would get hurt that would be wonderful. I don’t want to scare any of my underlings,” David said, jestering to the people inside his pod.

“Shew, I thought you were going to do something complicated, David! That was a close one. Let’s go!”

“You can fly through the air to the fight. I’ll take my pod.” With this in mind, David jumped into a small little space pod he had attached to his sattelite and began to fly off. Krillin took off soon afterwards, flying through the air like Superman.

It is worth duly noting that the dialog featured above was absolutely awful.

--

Once the two came to an area completely uninhabited by humans, they mutually agreed to go down there. David did this by shaking his escape pod about in a way that screamed, “Is this a good place to fight?” and Krillin responded by happily nodding his head. When David’s pod came into contact with the dense ground, it created a small little puff of dirt that only served to add to the awful air pollution the onslaught of comets had caused.

David hopped out of his pod, his fists raised in all powerful competitiveness. Krillin decided to counter his well-trained, heavily articulated form by taking on his own unique posture that only other members of the Turtle Clan could use, like Yamcha and Goku and Master Roshi and Grandpa Gohan and Ox-King.

Krillin tried to figure out what to do as his first move. He then remembered that he was dealing with a normal human being, so he could beat him up in basically any way he pleased. While he briefly considered stuffing him with M’N’M’s until he begged for mercy, he ultimately came up with the idea of something a bit more conventional: punching him once or twice so that he couldn’t get back up. Without a seconds hesitation, he rushed right at David, and with nothing but a single swing of his fist, sent him flying across the lightly falling snow. Krillin had just put him right into submission.

Krillin was rightfully shocked at how well this had gone. He had a sneaking suspicion in the back of his mind this whole time that David had some secret plan going on that would put Krillin into a spot of weakness so that David could win and probably kill everyone too. It didn’t seem much like David to just enter a fight like that, but he was the one laying in the snow so it was pretty much futile to wonder why. From here, Krillin just had to clean up the mess David had caused.

Krillin’s first objective would be to go talk to Dende and see if he could get the Dragon Balls restored. From there, he would just have to gather up all the Dragon Balls and see if he could get Shenron to reverse all the damage he had caused. It would be a very simple process, overall.



Krillin wished, at the very back of his mind, that he had known what David was up to. Perhaps what he was doing really was beneficial for everyone, but only in a twisted sort of way. Perhaps, throughout all his efforts to make a utopian society, David had managed to not create a dystopian society but instead a society in which everyone genuinely was equal, free, and, even, happy.

Krillin, though, was not interested in these possibility. He was perfectly okay with keeping everything exactly as it had been, as the simple idea of a tyrannical man controlling everyone was too much for him to bare. He just wanted to return to his cubicle, wherein he could have very exciting challenges like searching for an F key and running out of coffee. A comfortable, controlled life like that was all that he could ask for, not a life in which somebody acted like a boss and controlled his life. He just wanted to fit into his role in society and that was all. Maybe fight a criminal or two along the way too. Krillin turned into the sun so that he could fly away, toward Dende. After a hit like that, David should be out for quite some time, so Krillin would handle him after handling everything else. There was a FUCKING COMET in his way, which he promptly blasted into oblivion to allow for an easy exit. Everything was going well.

Krillin turned around, to look at the once-menace who was laying behind him now. He had been subdued so easily, so quickly, that Krillin should have thought of it sooner. Simple, physical contact was always the answer to every problem, he thought to himself, with a smug smirk. It was then that Krillin experienced the most painful moment that he would ever experience in his life.

With a flash the length of a blink of an eye, Krillin felt himself fall down to the ground. Hot blood poured over his skin, coating him in a crimson puddle of glaze which seeped into his skin and stung like the devil. He clutched at his stomach, feeling nothing but blood and guts. What was once there was no longer; there was no skin, just oozing blood and a emptiness. He felt little claw marks around the wound, like someone had just pushed through his skin then retracted back out of it in an instant.

This was precisely what David had done. While Krillin was turned around, David had lunged at him with amazing speed, punching through his stomach and out the back, where the FurryBots had cut up Krillin so well. Krillin was ultimately left delirious by this, shaking around on the ground, coughing up blood and losing vision. David laughed from behind him, finally having the upper hand against Krillin.

Krillin turned himself around, laying on his back. He dry heaved up at the sky, unable to form a breath. In between his many breaths, he managed to cough out the words, “What… what was - that?”

David stopped laughing for a moment of silent contemplation. After some thought, he responded with a quote of his own, “I will rule the world with a iron fist - or titanium fist, if need be.”

Krillin couldn’t figure out what this meant. He was dreary from blood loss, unable to comprehend any of what was going on around him. “What-what-what does that… mean?” he managed to sigh out.

“I made myself an android, you twit. That was the point of me boarding the escape pod - the entire operation into a cyborg took place in there. I’m stronger now, strong enough to attack you like that. You never even saw it coming, either.”



Krillin was still conscious enough to know this was no good. He had to end the David threat here and there, before it spread even further. Krillin pushed himself up onto two wobbly feet, trying to focus on what was going on. He was barely able to make out anything amidst the blood covering his eyes and his delirious vision, to the point, where David was just a shadowy figure in the distance, despite the fact that he was naught but five feet away. Everything was indistinguishable to Krillin amongst the strong purple haze.

He made an effort to steady himself. He tried running towards David, but within seconds David had slung him off to the side. Krillin found it hard to concentrate, even while on the ground, on anything. He had felt pain before, and so much pain too, but this was entirely different from it all. What he had experienced beforehand was just fleeting pain, which was remedied either by death or healing; this was lasting.

Krillin stood back up, this time making a conscious effort to focus in on David. He managed to figure out David’s relative location, but the world was still turning around and around. Krillin couldn’t even consider an attack in conditions like this.

“You’re not… you’re not gonna get away with this,” Krillin slurred out, trying desperately to retain his normal KaiMan figure. However, Krillin and David both knew that KaiMan was long gone at this point. He was just a ruse to keep Krillin from losing his sanity.

Krillin blinked for what felt like a second, but very well may have been a millennium. When he reopened his eyes, David was standing next to him, glaring down at Krillin’s minute stature. “You’re just living a lie, KaiMan. You’re nothing that you claim to be. It’s funny that I have to soak you in blood and pummel you into the ground before you realize that you’re just lying to yourself.” David took this moment to pull off Krillin’s red mask, which he tossed over to the side. “You’re just putting on a front to make it through life, just like the rest of us. You’re nothing but a front man.”

With this, Krillin fell down to the ground one last time. The blood loss was irreparable at this point, so much so that he could no longer stay conscious. The blood seeping out of his body formed a small little tributary, creating a stream of crimson ooze over to Krillin’s old mask. The blood tarnished the mask, soaking every inch of it in the red water. After just a moment, the mask was unrecognizable; it was nothing but a remnant of what it once was.

Krillin was left staring up at the sky, feeling the blood leave his body. The last thing he saw was David flying away on his built-in jetpacks, his robotic figure taunting Krillin. “You’re not gonna get away wit…” Krillin muttered, his voice trailing off as he entered the sanctum of his own mind. The exterior world was no longer in existence to him, as the only thing left was his mind's recreation of Yajirobe’s plump figure throwing the mask at him and chanting, “Here, take this. You might as well have it. You’re already living a lie.”

Before very long, Yajirobe went away. Only the mask was left, sitting there, taunting him; and then, that too vanished.

Endnotes:

=Final Endnotes=