Chapter 4

            I’d made my choice, I didn’t know if it was the right one, but it had been mine to make, and I’d done it.  Now all that was left was to save the universe.  More easily said than done of course, but I felt up to the challenge.  A giddiness to begin crept up on me and I turned to Krillin and said “So where’s your ship, I wanna get going.”

            He reached into his gi, and pulled out a small capsule, then stated, “Right here.”  He pushed the compressible top of the cylinder capsule, and then threw it at least 20 metres away.  I didn’t know what was going on, and I had turned to ask when a gigantic ‘pop’ sound rang through my ears.  I whipped my body around to face the sound, and where my bald headed friend had thrown the capsule, a gigantic space ship was resting comfortably.

            It was a large sphere like ship, with huge circle windows on each of its sides, and landing struts supporting the base of the ship, holding it a few metres above ground.  Above the main front window, at least 20 metres in width the word CAPSULE was spelt in capital letters.  “How’d you get that ship out of no-where?” I asked Krillin.

            “Capsule of course.”  He looked at me oddly, but then nodded his head “Oh yeah, you guys don’t have them here, our dimension must be a little ahead in the technology department.”

            “How do you fit an entire ship into a small little capsule like that?”  I questioned, my voice was cracking slightly, which was pretty embarrassing at the time.

            “Don’t ask me, I have no idea.  Kinda like the senzu beans, I just use them, don’t know what makes them work.”

            “Ok.”  Not knowing things wasn’t something new to me, but I didn’t feel incredibly safe hopping into a space ship that came out of basically no where.  The craft was huge, maybe 50 metres tall and 30 metres wide, but Krillin didn’t seem to take much notice.

            He walked up to the base of the ship and then floated up to a small beeping control panel near the large window.  He punched in a few buttons, and there was a large pressurizing sound, followed by a small walkway being ejected from a space under the main window.

            After a few seconds the walkway touched the ground just right in front of me.  I began walking up the small ramp, and in a few seconds was at the main window, when I approached it, it split into five different sections and each shot away from me, creating a huge opening for me to walk inside the ship.

            Krillin was right behind me, carrying Triono behind him.  In a few seconds we were both inside the ship.  It had red tiled floors, with red padded walls and a red tinted window-roof.  There were two chairs placed in front of two control panels to my left, probably for the pilot(s) I assumed, and there were also four passenger seats behind those two.  Right in the middle of the ship was a huge cylinder, reaching from the floor to the roof, with several buttons and control panels along the side of it.  There was a small liquid crystal display screen that had the simple display of:  1 G on the cylinder.  I didn’t know what it meant, but at that time I didn’t really care.

            “Nice ship you got here.”  I told Krillin, while still admiring the sheer size of the craft.

            “Thanks, if you don’t mind, could you buckle Triono into one of those passenger seats?”  He asked while he pointed to the seats behind the pilots’ chairs.

            “Sure.” I said as I jogged over to Krillin who was near the cylinder in the centre of the vessel.  He handed me Triono’s still limp body, and as I dragged him over to the near seat, I could hear his light breathing and the rising and falling of his chest.  I knew he’d be good as new if he ever woke up and ate one of those senzu beans of Krillin’s.

            I plopped my saiyan buddies body into the chair, front wards facing, and then reached around him for the seatbelt, but couldn’t find it.  I continued searching for a few seconds before Krillin said, “You won’t find it.  Here look out.”  He walked up to the seat, and gently pulled me away.  Then he cleared his throat and announced “Seatbelt on chair five.”

            Small holes appeared on the side of the chair, and then small seatbelts protruded from them, all told there were four belts and they all came together right over Triono’s chest.  “Pretty cool eh?” Krillin smirked afterwards.

            I nodded slightly and then turned to take one of the pilots’ seats.  Krillin hopped right over my head and into the left pilots seat before I even got close.  “Seatbelt on chair one.”  The seatbelt ejected itself on his chair as well.  “Cris, go take a seat, we have to get going.”

            Instead of taking the other pilots seat, as I desired, I settled for another passenger’s chair right behind Krillin.  I opened my mouth to ask him which chair it was I was in, but he beat me to it.  “Seatbelt on chair three.”  The seatbelt collapsed over me snugly, and I leaned back, looking upwards through the red roof.  “Ready to go?”  Krillin’s child like voice asked.

            “Yeah, let’s do it.”  I stated as he pushed a few buttons.

            “Here goes.”  He then grabbed onto the sides of his chair for all he was worth.  Not wanting to be left out, I did the same, not knowing fully what to expect.  At first there was no feeling, but I saw fire coming out from under the ship.  Then a slight rumbling came over the craft, just a little rocking really, and then we started to go upwards.  Slowly at first, soon the ship built up speed, and a loud whining sound was heard throughout.  The rocking that had been so tame at the start was now becoming ferocious, and soon I was being thrown around like a paperweight.  If not for my seatbelt, I would’ve been plastered against the wall.  I didn’t know why, but as we continued upwards with such incredible speed, anxiety began pushing itself upwards through me.  All the blood was rushing to my toes and it felt like a ton of bricks was being placed on my neck, only the fear moved upwards.  The whine was getting louder too, like something was about to max out.

            I tried everything to relax, but nothing worked, not my breathing techniques, not even meditation worked, as the whine overpowered my ability to hear myself think.  I tried to take deep calming breaths, but they came out short and un-coordinated, and suddenly, I was hyperventilating.  Then I remembered a little something in my back pocket.

            Fire had encompassed the ship, it was bathed in red, and inside it was getting extremely hot, but even through all the rumblings of the ship, I was able to reach back and pull out a picture from my back pocket.  I always kept it there, and it always put my mind at ease.  Her beautiful face always made put my heart at rest.  Her hair, long dark and flowing, her eyes, dark and penetrating, her smile, joyful and invigorating.  I then realized how lucky I was to have her, I really didn’t know how she could put up with me some times, hell I was hardly ever in Windsor, but when I was, I made sure we were together.  I just stared at her picture, and soon, I was completely calm, nothing else in the world mattered.  I took a deep breath, and then put the picture back in its rightful spot.  Just as I did, Krillin said, “You ok back there?”

            “Yeah, I’ll be fine.”  I sort of whispered it, as my voice had been cut off in my throat, a large lump had collected there.

            He obviously didn’t hear me but said “Sorry about the bumpy ride, your atmosphere’s a little different then the one on my earth.” I was about to ask what the point of having a spaceship that couldn’t land or leave planets with different atmospheres was, but I stopped myself.

            We sat there for a few seconds and then the rumbling of the ship stopped.  I looked around, and then Krillin announced “That should be the worst of it, I’ll set a course for the anomaly that brought me here, hopefully it’ll be able to send us back to my dimension.”

            He then proceeded to turn off the seatbelts for both his and my chairs.  I was astounded to find that even in space we had regular gravity.  I stood up, and then hopped a little, still amazed.  “How do we have gravity up here?”  I asked eventually.

            He walked by me to the tall pillar in the centre of the ship, and tapped the controls “This baby right here.  It can create a gravity field anywhere from 0 to 100 gravities that covers the entire inside of the ship.”

            Something didn’t seem quite right about that “What’s the use of having a gravity field 100 times normal?”

            “You’ll see.”  He slyly replied, then he turned to the main window and said “You might want to take a last look, you might not see it again in a while.”

            I turned to the large window, and there was the Earth.  In space it looked amazing, from thousands of kilometres away, it was more beautiful than anything I’d ever seen.  I slowly walked to the window, peering out, taking in the tremendous sight.  The giant clouds drifted lazily across the rich green landmasses, while the seas were crystal clear and blue.  I fell in a trance, as the splendour of my world suddenly hit me.  That image, of the planet, as it eventually got smaller and smaller, was burned into my mind.  That was what I was going to be fighting for.  I continued to stare, even as I could see less and less of it with each passing second, and for the thirty seconds I could see it, a feel of responsibility came over me, and right then and there, I knew I wasn’t coming back until I was able to protect that planet by myself.

            Krillin allowed me to stare to my hearts content, before finally snapping me out of it.  “Uh.. Cris?”  He asked slowly.

            I turned to him and my eyes were somewhat watery, so I blinked a few times before I could see him clearly.  “Yeah.”

            “You o.k?”

            “Yeah, I’ll be fine.”