Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Lessons Of A Believer ❯ Lessons of a Believer ( One-Shot )

Lessons of a Believer

A Dragonball Z Fan-fiction

By Ami E. Bowen

(A/N: This story goes along with "Confessions of a Believer I and II" and "Waterfall")

Dragonball Z and all it's characters are (c) Akira Toriyama. I just enjoy traipsing through their world with fan-girlish glee!

I was asleep. Or at least I thought I was asleep. I remember that it felt too warm to me to go to sleep upstairs in the bed me and boyfriend, Shawn, normally share. I'm kinda odd in that I always have to sleep in a cool room with some type of air blowing on my face. Normally I keep a small fan next to my bed with the window open, even during the winter. But it was a warm night and no cool breeze issued through the window to make my fan do more than just swirl warm air around.

So, I had gathered one of my comforters, an old orange and white Garfeild one and a pillow and spread them out on my livingroom carpet right between the sectional sofa and the entertainment system. I smiled as I lay down and pulled the blanket to my shoulder, curling into myself, for I was laying directly on the spot where Vegeta and I had made love so many times. Was it really all that long ago? It had only been a year in my time. In alot of ways it seemed like it had been ages and ages ago since I saw him last and yet, It also seemed like it was just yesterday. Sometimes I question myself; Did it all really happen? Or was it just another one of my frenzied fantasies?

I was still thinking about this, drifting off, when it happened. A soft buzzing began in my ears. Imagine standing in a room with a blasting stereo for a few hours. Then, someone turns the stereo off. That buzzing feeling in your head, in your ears was exactly what I was feeling and hearing. It began louder and louder, forcing my eyes closed and my hands up to my head, I shook my head a few times in an effort to clear it of the annoying sensation. But it only grew louder.

Then, just when I thought it could get no louder and all the sounds around my livingroom had been drowned out; my cats crunching thier kibble on the table we never eat at but use to put our books on and other odds and ends, including the cat dish so the dog doesn't get into it, someone on t.v. yammering away about taxes and whatnot, even some kids outside playing ball in the street, I saw it. Or rather, I felt it. Pulling me downwards, turning me, spiraling almost of control. I felt myself being pulled into a darkness filled with shining stars, glittering and twinkling at me through the void. Helpless, I squeezed my eyes shut tight and curled myself into a fetal position, arms locked around my drawn up knees, head tucked down and waited for it to end.

I didn't feel myself land. It took awhile to realize that I was not longer plummeting and spinning. My head still spun. I felt the still air around me and opened my eyes, shoving my dark hair from my face and pulling my head up. I was still wearing the exact same thing I'd worn to bed. A pair of light blue flannel pajamas with latte mugs all over them. Rather cute and very comfortable. I had on a pair of white cotton socks and nothing else.

A movement to my right caught my eye. Blue and orange against the white void-like background I'd just began to notice. The area all around reminded me of how it was in the time chamber when I'd been pregnant with my son. It was a little different now, in that it reminded me more of the static ant-races on a television screen without a cable hookup.

"Hello?" I stood up and looked at the figure and then down at my feet, the ground felt kinda squashy and looked exactly like the 'walls' and 'ceiling'. I had no idea where I was but it was very, very odd and gave me an unsettling feeling. I felt like I didn't know which way was up! I turned back to the figure and saw him turn around to look at me and smile. I recognized him then. It was as if my brain had been clouded over by other sensations. Otherwise I would have known him instantly, even with his back turned to me.

"Goku?" I asked, confused, "Aren't you suppose to be training Uub?"

"I still am," He said, looking at me and giving me another one of his famous Son grins, "But I was asked to come here and be your guide for a bit...."

"What?" I looked at him, "My guide? What are you talking about...what's going on?"

Instead of answering me, he did something, I'm still not sure exactly what, and there was a rip in the fabric of the void in front of him. He tore it until it resembled a jagged picture frame. I took a few steps forward and peered through. I saw the anime world, the Dragonball Z world through that frame. It was at that moment that I realized....I was still in my real form and, I looked to my right at Goku and saw that his features were real and not anime. He still looked much the same...his wayward saiyan hair giving him a more punkish look.

His eyes weren't completely black either, but dark brown with black pupils that sparkled like starlight. If I looked closer at his upper arms and hands, I could see the scars from past battles marring his alabastor skin. He was still as muscular as ever, and he was tall. I'd never thought about how tall Goku was before. Granted, he was nowhere near as tall as Piccolo, but still, I had to look up. The top of my head came to about his shoulder.

"Ami," He said, getting my attention, I blushed since I'd been staring, but I couldn't help it, seeing an anime character in real form was too interesting not to want to gawk. I'd done the same thing to Vegeta all those months ago. I wanted to look and study and compare to my heart's content. "This is important. Look...."

I followed his gaze towards the sqaure he'd made in the 'wall' and looked out. I saw Capsule Corp...well, the outside of it at least. As I watched, I noticed that if I focused on an object or a person I could zoom my vision in and out. I could also will my eyes to see things from another direction. Wild! I thought, using a word I'd haden't uttered since I was twelve years old. I saw Goku glance at me and wink, as if he knew exactly what I was thinking. Then his face fell serious and he turned to watch with me.

I looked down and saw that the light was blinking on in the gravity room. My eyes zoomed in and I found that I could see through the door, as if it weren't even there and then, it was as if I were inside the gravity room. Everything outside dissapeared and walls closed around me. I knew I wasn't really inside the room because I glanced over and saw the gravity was up to fifty percent and I didn't feel any heavier than I normally did.

I saw Vegeta and my son, Chikara in the midst of thier training. They didn't even seem to notice me and in fact, when Vegeta landed a blow that sent the boy flying, I gasped as he passed right through me! It was then that I realized Goku was standing beside and slightly behind me for as I stumbled back, he caught me and lifted me back to my feet. We watched Vegeta and Chikara for awhile and I didn't know, what exactly I was suppose to be seeing.

I looked away and to Goku for a moment and turned back just in time to see Chikara being thrown against the wall. I cringed with a mother's pain to see my baby injured and would have rushed to him if I could. The scene suddenly shifted, without warning and sent my senses reeling. I was back in the nexus-like area with my guide beside me, peering through the rip in the 'wall'. I saw Chikara a little older, maybe twelve or so, he was leaving and walking away from Capsule Corp. He was dressed in jeans and black t-shirt. His hair was like Vegeta's still and his face was also like his father's, only younger. I saw him scowling as Bunny Breifs kissed his cheek and his hand coming up to swipe the back of it across his face.

He was carrying a pile of textbooks in one hand and as I watched, they dropped to the ground. Glaring at them for a moment, he bent to retrieve them, gathering them up before walking off. I shook my head at Goku, not understanding. "So, he's going to school." I said, "He should, he needs an education, not just fighting skills..."

"Your not looking close enough, Ami," Goku said, and when I turned my eyes back to the view below I saw my son was yet older, almost a man and so like his father that I nearly choked for the need to touch him and embrace him and rain a million kisses down on his brow and tell him that I'm so sorry that I couldn't be there to watch him grow up. My heart ached to mother him and love him. He was standing against a tree, arms folded and one leg bent up against the trunk, eyes closed in repose. "What do you see?"

"Chikara..." I answered readily, tears in my eyes for the son I hardly knew, now. "Why are you showing me this?" I swiped at my tears and sniffed, "It's not fair! I never got to be there for him...to watch him grow....and now....."

"He was always with you," Goku said to me, softly, "We all are....if you keep believing in us....remember when you were walking home from your friend's house last weekend....?"

I looked up at him and my brown eyes must have shown the shock I felt. I had walked my friend home from my house last weekend and it was really late.... "...and I was scared because it was so late and dark out, but then..."

"You stopped being afraid." Goku flashed me a grin, "Because you felt us with you, watching over you. You believed strong enough that one of us was able to walk with you and protect you until you arrived safe at your house..." He blushed slightly and went on, "I know, because it was me who saw you home that night."

I merely stared at him, not surprised. Not really. He drew my attention back to the setting we could see and asked me again what I saw. I looked but didn't see anything out of the ordinary. Again he told me that I wasn't looking hard enough. "See with more than just your eyes, Ami...now look again!"

"You don't have to yell at me..." I pouted, but he grabbed my shoulders and forced me to face him, the bright smile gone from his face, replaced with a grim look of determination I'd seen so many times on my televsion screen while watching the anime, "This is important. Pay attention and tell me what you see."

He turned me gently back to the view and I looked. For a long time I merely stared. The scenes were shifting dramatically while my eyes and heart tried to see what Goku was talking about. I kept seeing Chikara at different stages, training as a little boy with his father, a little older and heading to school, older still and leaning against a tree. I saw him training once more as an adult, sweat pouring into his eyes as he flew above the ground, his father throwing ki blasts at him that he was dodging and then firing his own back.

All of these different scenes kept changing and spinning and altering until I grew dizzy from the blur of motion. I wanted to turn away, sick. But I didn't. I couldn't. I stayed and kept watching, trying to see something I had been missing....something...what? What?! Suddenly, I saw it. I saw what I been missing before. It was so obvious I wondered how I could have been so blind!

My son, training in the gravity room. Vegeta's fist, flying towards him and going right through! Chikara holding his textbooks. I watched as they slipped through his hands....not out of...through and fell to the ground. I saw him leaning against the tree and watched him raise his hands and turn them over, looking at him, they appeared to be transparent. Older now, training again, one of Vegeta's ki blasts hit him but didn't go off...there was no explosion...it passed into him and exited behind him as through he wasn't even there. It went off against a tree in the distance, fire flashed as it exploded and sent wood everywhre.

"Chikara!" I cried, "No! Goku, what's happening to him!?"

"You've stopped believing, Ami." He said, simply and sadly, I turned to look at him and shook my head.

"No..." I cried, "I...no...never...I would never stop...."

"No?" He looked at him as if he knew my heart and mind and I found I could not meet his penetrating gaze. "How long has it been since you've thought about our world...about Chikara? A year has come and gone since you went back through the mirror, right?"

I nodded. He was right. A lot of time had passed.

"You've been forgetting little things every day," He went on, "Every day it's gotten hard and harder for you to call up the details of your son's face, his voice, his mannerisms...."

"I don't mean to!" I cried, "I swear....I don't mean to..."

"You've been failing to believe...slowly....but surely." He said, continueing on as though I'd never inturrpted, "There are enough Believers out there in your world to give us the strength and energy to keep our realm from fading. But your son, Chikara, he's different...."

"I know..." I said, turning to look at my son again, "He's not of your world nor of mine..."

"He's of both...and also of neither." Goku said, "The Believer's power cannot not help him...only you can do that. Only your belief in him keeps him here, in tact. Since you've stopped believing, he's slowly been fading away."

I looked at him in horror and then back to my son. I felt the tears that wanted to fall. I blinked a few times and peered over the edge into the scene. I was't going to let my son just fade away into nothingness! I wasn't! I still believed! I did! I swear I did. Then suddenly I was no longer in the nexus area and, when I glanced around, Goku was gone. I was in the anime world, my features had changed over to anime once more and I was standing next to Capsule Corp.

I heard a rustling in the bushes and turned and saw Chikara leaping out of them and rushing over to me. He looked about five years old. He tugged on my pant leg and gazed up at me with huge, black eyes. A streak of dirt smeared his features and gave his innocent, baby-face a playful look. I bent down and gathered him into my arms. "Hey, Mom, don't cry." He said, patting my shoulder as I wept against him, "It's gonna be okay, you'll see....I'm getting stronger everyday!"

"I know you are..." I sniffed and pulled away so that I could look at him, "Will you do something for me, Chikara?"

He nodded, smiling innocently, "Sure, Mom."

"Will you remember me and never forget that I believe in you?" I asked, serious and he must have realized how serious I was for his childish face changed to match my solemn expression. He patted my shoulder again with his small hand and said; "I won't forget, Mom."

I hugged him one last time before I felt myself and the area around me spinning and abruptly I was back in the void with Goku beside me. We were still looking out at the scene below. I saw Chikara push himself away from the tree, his hands were solid once more and he closed them into fists in front of his face, turning them over. Then as I watehced, he looked up. His eyes met mine and just for an instant I thought he could see me. Really see me. But that was impossibe, wasn't it? No, it was not. I realized. If I believed hard enough, nothing was impossible. He opened his mouth as he looked up at me and I heard as well as felt his words.

"Thank you, mother..."

I felt Goku's hand on my shoulder then and turned away from the sight. "It's time for you to go back now, Ami." He said, "You have learned something here, haven't you?"

I nodded. Yes I had. I had learned to keep believing, no matter what, keep believing. Goku smiled at me and suddenly I felt the buzzing in my ears and felt myself spinning downwards once more. I knew I was going back. I was going back to my own world once more. The last thing I saw before I opened my eyes to find myself back on my livingroom floor with my comforter and pillow was Goku's winning smile as he flashed me a peace sign and laughed.

I shook my head and sat up, shoving my hair out of my eyes. "Thank you, Goku."

I won't stop believing. Ever.

~ End ~