“I think I’ll avoid the Ox-King for now…” Hal floated over the inferno of Fire Mountain and peered through the layers of fire and stone. The castle in the centre was red hot, baked black from the heat. “But I’ll do a better job than Roshi of saving his house and whatever’s left of his fortune.”
Air rushed into Hal’s lungs, a steady flow that compressed inside his chest, before he reversed the flow. Icy winds enveloped the mountain, a hurricane that replaced the fiery landscape with frost kissed earth. A quick inspection of the treasure chamber located the seven star dragon ball.
“I wonder what’s going to happen between Goku and Chi-Chi, now that Goku will never come here with Bulma,” Hal shrugged as he slipped into the castle and pried open the treasure room door. He wasn’t the biggest fan of Goku’s future wife, so his concern was mostly academic. “Whatever… maybe it’s for the best.”
Goku deserved a partner that was capable of understanding the world they lived in. Chi-Chi’s focus on a ‘normal life,’ her constant efforts to undermine the rest of her family's training, had always rubbed Hal the wrong way. Her husband literally saves the Earth multiple times, yet she seemed to exist in her own reality. A private Earth where her superhuman husband’s efforts were best spent farming.
“This time around, Chi-Chi can be the one to get a real job and support herself,” Hal snatched up the dragon ball and sped from the Ox-King's castle, before the oversized man could make his way up the newly extinguished mountain. “Maybe I’ll dump Yamcha here at some point and the two most useless characters can get together…”
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“Ah-choo!” Yamcha’s nose rebelled against him, a sneeze that painted the back of Puar’s head. He gave the cat an apologetic shrug, while his companion struggled to clean the mess from her fur. “Sorry Puar… someone must be talking about how amazing I am!”
“Who would do that?” Puar finally resorted to her magic and the snotty mass vanished from existence. She turned innocent eyes to her longtime companion, ears perked up. “Do you think our reputation has finally begun to spread?”
“Of course!” Yamcha posed, hands on his hips as he stood in front of the sun. “The Desert Bandit Duo are the most infamous in all the land!”
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“So this is Aru village…” Hal floated over the town and peered into the various houses. He knew that the Elder of this village had the dragon ball, given to Goku after his defeat of the ‘demon’ Oolong. “I’ll just help myself and take care of their problem at the same time.”
The window of a large, well maintained home slipped up, silent under the touch of his biofield. He flashed through the house, in and out before the old woman inside noticed any change. Dragon ball in hand, Hal drifted toward Oolong’s mansion.
Just outside of the village proper, its red facing and prominent stonework made Hal shake his head. The smallest bit of magic had positioned the perverted pig as a local dictator. In a world of powerful martial arts, no small-time criminals like this should exist.
Hal squinted through the manor’s walls and found the pig-man asleep in bed. It would be easy to just heat vision Oolong and call it a job well done, but nostalgia was a powerful thing. He raised a fist and levelled the ceiling above the pig’s room, an explosion of wood and stone that roused the perverted fellow in a panic.
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“Who dares attack the house of the great Demon?” Voice unsteady, Oolong shifted into a portly, demonic form with a puff of smoke. He puffed himself up and gave Hal his best glare. “Bow down, and perhaps I’ll spare you from a miserable fate!”
“Not going to happen,” Hal snorted as he appeared behind the transformed pig. A single chop to the neck and Oolong returned to his small, pink self, unconscious on the ground. “I’ll drop you off at Roshi’s… in fact, I’m going to round up a few more people for the old man to train.”
Yamcha and Puar were both easy to find, and Krillin should be close to leaving the Orin Temple. With Goku already on the lookout, the original story had left them behind. If he still wanted these people involved in the plot, he would have to seek them out himself.
“We’ll get Yamcha and Puar first… at that point I’m going to have to take out the Capsule Plane,” Hal sighed. He COULD carry everyone, but it would be awkward to heft four people through the air. “Let’s go, pig… you better behave when you wake up.”
With Oolong dangled from his hand by a foot, Hal blitzed through the air. He aimed toward the hideout of the ‘Desert Bandits,’ ready to add to his collection of side characters.
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“Hey, noseless runt!” A senior brother of the Orin Temple leaned over him, a learish grin on his face. He gave Krillin a shove that sent the young boy to the ground and laughed. “We need groceries again, go to the kitchens and take stock… replace everything we need from your monthly allowance, the head elder will reimburse you later.”
“I don’t know if the allowance will be enough…” Krillan picked himself up and hung his head. He suppressed the spark of anger in his heart and remembered his goal, to become the world's strongest! If he couldn’t bear this burden while he slowly trained, what right did he have to even hunt such a title?
“Then use your savings,” The overweight monk shrugged as he dismissed Krillin by walking away. “I want that larder filled before supper, or there will be hell to pay!”
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“Looks like Yamcha is out…” Hal floated over the bandit’s mountainous hideout and scanned the interior. The stoney, hollow hill was devoid of life, its occupants likely out scavenging. “I might as well leave this piggy here while I search around.”
Hal flicked out a capsule and expanded a normal storage container to full size, just next to Yamcha’s house. He tossed Oolong inside and slammed shut the door, sealed with a pinch of his fingers. The pig-man would be fine for a few hours, long enough to find the rest of his targets.
“Now…” eyes focused, he dragged his gaze over the horizon. Yamcha and Puar never strayed too far from home, so it shouldn’t be difficult to find them. A dust cloud drew his attention, two different vehicles engaged in a chase. Hal blinked. “Is that…”
A yellow haired teen leaned out the driver's seat of the lead vehicle, a machine gun in hand. She levelled an indiscriminate spray of bullets toward her pursuers, one they answered in kind. The men on her tail had uniforms and badges, some local branch of the police. The woman wore civilian clothing, a simple tube top and shorts.
“It is!” Hal smiled as he raced between the two vehicles and intercepted the officers’ bullets. Two brief flashes of his heat vision left their car disabled, tires turned to molten tar. The girl gave him a shaken look, before she pushed her car to the limits and tried to flee.
“Who the heck are you!” She aimed blindly out her window and fired, harmless bullets Hal simply ignored. The skin on her face paled as the lead projectiles flattened against his chest like clay. “What kind of monster are you?”
“I’m not a monster,” Hal laughed as he snatched away her weapon with one hand and lifted the car into the air with the other. “You’re Launch, right?”
“Why would I tell some random freak who I am?” Launch scowled at Hal as she scampered to the opposite door. She rolled down the window and peered at the ground below, trees reduced to miniature figurines by their change in altitude. “Put me down!”
“Nevermind, I can find out easily enough…” Hal accelerated their flight, free hand extended to snatch a feather from a random bird. It squealed in annoyance and fled, but he had what he needed. “Sorry about this, but if you are Launch this will make everyone's lives easier.”
The feather flashed under Launch’s nose, a tickle that wrinkled her face in dismay. Before she could force another complaint from her lips, a sneeze erupted from her nose. Her hair shifted blue in an instant, the brash, aggressive attitude replaced by a confused young woman.
“...where am I?” Blue-Launch shook her head and looked out the window. She gasped and scampered to the centre of the vehicle, one glance at the distant ground enough to bring her close to tears “How are we flying?”
***Power Levels and other notes***
Hal: 2276 (7324 after the biofield/ki fusion)
Yamcha: 15
Puar: 10
Oolong: 10
Launch: 10 (30 after her blond transformation)