Skyborn

Far Across The Eastern Sea

Prologue

Indra Patre (Planet Earth): Year XR737

It was the eyes that scared him. The eyes held him locked in, pulling him further into the cold abyss below — which was the heart of that child.

He didn't know that something so small could be so vicious. Had not known that a single look could freeze the soul. There was something wicked about the child, a violence within. What a brutal, strange existence it had. There was something so alien about it. An oddity. An aberration.

And eyes that wouldn't quit.

Son Gohan looked at the child with both fear and admiration. He had so many questions. It looked like a regular baby should look when it was asleep, but when it was awake, it would watch him back with those eyes like ice, as if it hid tangible thoughts of its own.

It was unnerving.

It never made any noise, as a child this age should do, and it never asked for anything. It required very little, as if needing Gohan's assistance was somehow degrading to it. It didn't like to be touched either, but it understood when spoken to because its eyes would grow wider and smarter, listening hard, picking up information and storing it in some secret place. 

Oh and it had a tail.

Gohan had decided not to dwell much on that.

But it had been quite the shock when he first found the child. The warm winter day. A cloudy blue sky. The clear air of Mount Paozu. A hike, some fishing, maybe a book later paired with a cup of tea.

Following came the crater, a huge crack on the land, the big kaboom. The child's first act of destruction. Nature broke apart. Birth as a weapon.

Son Gohan had never been curious; neither was he a fool. He knew he had stumbled upon something unheard of — and of value so rare that nobody was privy to its name.

The great... orb. An iron sphere, the size of a small car. Idle for all effects. 

A spaceship.

A technology unseen, unknown. 

And he too old and stupid to understand what it meant or where it had come from.

The world had changed, yes. With the advancement of the hoi poi capsules came many changes. The invention of vehicles moved by vapor and pressure. The living world turning into a machine. Yet he could tell this thing had not been made by human hands.

It had come from out of this world. 

Gohan had placed a hand on the white metallic surface and felt that the object was still warm. And then a noise and the thing had opened apart revealing what was inside. The hairs on the back of his neck rose. A child. 

The child.

And odd. So odd.

Very small and strong. Its hands closed into fists as it slept. It looked angry even in this state. A fighter. But why abandoned? Left behind? Sent away? Why unloved? Why alone?

These questions plagued him until it occurred to Gohan that it was those eyes to blame. The mean blank stare. It had probably scared its parents and it got sent away.

Perhaps that was what Gohan should do as well. 

He considered the option, debating how best to handle the situation. He didn't want the child.  Hadn't asked for it. He knew what Master Roshi would say, Greatness is thrust upon, not asked for.