Age of the Empire
The Second Tale of Shukumei: Little Child Found
Chapter 7

They had a visitor bright and early the following morning. Goku was rummaging through the fridge for something to eat while Roshi was using the bathroom.

"Ohayo! Is anyone home?" a voice he didn't recognize called from the porch. Goku opened the door and stared at the small bald boy standing on the stoop.

"Who are you?"

The other boy frowned. "It's not very nice to question someone without at least greeting them first."

"Oh. Ohayo; who are you?"

"I'm Kuririn. Is the great Kamesennin Muten Roshi around? I want to train with him." the slightly smaller boy peered around Goku's body into the house. "I've also brought a gift."

He motioned for him to come inside. "He's busy, but you can wait for him." Goku shut the door and went back into the kitchen.

The toilet flushed, water ran, and Roshi emerged with a relieved look on his face. "Nothing like taking care of business first thing in the morning." He then turned and noticed the stranger sitting on his couch. "Er," he said, slightly embarrassed, "may I help you?"

"Are you Kamesennin Muten Roshi?" Kuririn asked. When the old man nodded, the boy leapt to his feet and practically ran over to shake his hand. "I am so very honored to meet you! It's my greatest desire that you train me in martial arts."

"Oh, I don't know," Roshi pretended to think. "I'm getting on in years and I don't have the energy that I used to..."

A cloth-wrapped parcel was nearly shoved in his face. "This gift is for you," he said as Roshi untied the knot. A lecherous grin spread across his face at the sight of the swimsuit magazines. "I hope these will encourage you to change your mind."

"Goku!" he called. "We'll be having another student from now on!"

After breakfast, Muten Roshi sent the boys off to a store several towns away. Goku had no idea what it was all about, but Kuririn knew perfectly. "He wants to be alone with his brand new goodies," the boy snickered. Still not understanding, Goku shrugged and called for his cloud.

"Kinto'un!"

"Uh, what is this?" Kuririn asked as he examined the puffy yellow cloud from all angles. "What is it for?"

"It's a flying cloud. We're gonna ride it over the ocean." Goku jumped up and sat cross-legged. "C'mon, Kuririn."

The other boy tentatively touched it and, finding nothing wrong, he climbed up to sit behind Goku. Unfortunately, Kinto'un would not let him ride and he fell straight through to the sand below. "What happened? What did I do wrong?"

Goku shook his head. "You don't have a pure heart. Are you hiding something?"

Sighing, he pulled two more magazines from underneath his yellow tunic and gave them to Roshi. "Since you were happy with what I gave you, I was going to take these back to the store and get a refund. Gomen nasai, Muten."

"You are forgiven," the old man said as he clutched them to his chest in glee. He felt as if both Christmas and his birthday had come early that year. "Can you find me a pretty lady for companionship? It's lonely sometimes without another adult human to talk to."

Smirking, Kuririn nodded. "Of course, Kamesennin. You deserve it." This time, when he hopped onto Kinto'un, the cloud stayed solid. He waved goodbye to his new sensei and found himself clutching Goku tightly when the cloud shot off at a very high speed.

"So," Goku shouted above the roaring of the wind, "how old are you? Where'd you come from?"

"I'm thirteen and I used to live in a monastery." Kuririn frowned as he remembered his life there. "The other monks used to pick on me all the time because I'm smaller and weaker than they are. I heard about Kamesennin and decided to go to his house and ask if he would train me. I want to be stronger than those bullies so they can't push me around anymore." He fell silent for a moment. "So, um, why is he training you?"

"He asked me."

When nothing more was forthcoming, Kuririn shrugged and fell silent.

In an hour's time they were nearing the small fishing town that Roshi had sent them to. The small dock was overly crowded with boats and people whose mass quantities of caught fish emanated an odor so strong that it permeated the air no matter where you went. Tiny one-or-two room huts sat too close upon the dusty ground, creating a twisty maze of narrow lanes. Goku landed expertly in the first available open area and the two boys looked over the shopping list. "I don't even know what most of this stuff is! How are we supposed to find it?"

"Pickled toadstools, snail slime, fish scales..." Kuririn shook his head. "It sounds like he's making some kind of weird potion."

A thought struck Goku. "Maybe this is for his sister. Baba's a little strange."

"What does she do?"

"Reads fortunes, but she dresses like a witch."

"Ah."

To finish their task sooner, the two boys split the list and went off in opposite directions. Kuririn went down to the docks, because a lot of the items listed were sea related, while Goku went off to the small open-air market. He was there for less than five minutes when a loud group of people made their presence known. Thinking quickly, he pressed himself behind the thick support column of a stall.

"Alright, this is how we're gonna do this," a blond woman said while pointing her gun at various shopkeepers. "If you hand over your money, no one will get hurt."

A man spoke up from his food cart and the men behind the woman laughed at his foolish bravery. "My family worked hard for this! I'm not giving anything I own over to thugs like you!" There was a crack of gunfire and his hand shot up to clutch at his arm.

"Did that change your mind?" she asked with a smirk on her face. The man nodded and told his terrified son to hand over the money from the cashbox. The head thief motioned for her people to go around collecting the life savings of the shopkeepers.

Goku frowned as the gang robbed all the innocent people, watching for the right moment to act. He waited until the majority of the thugs were walking past his hiding place before attacking them. Two were down before they'd realized what hit them, but the other six were more competent at defending themselves.

The woman frowned at the commotion and frowned even harder when she spotted the child. "You're holding me up," she said with annoyance. "Get out of my way."

"I can't let you do this to them," he told her. "It's not right. Why should you make money from their hard work?"

"I don't have time for this," she muttered to herself. The woman turned her back to him and told her underlings, "Kill him." The men smirked and all rushed him at once.

"None of you are the leader," he said as he punched one man in the jaw and kicked the other in the stomach. He slid aside as another tried to grab him and twined his tail around another's feet to trip him to the pavement. The one that stumbled fell into one of the others and they both went down in a tangle of arms and legs. The remaining two thugs exchanged glances and ran off in the direction their leader had gone.

"Lunch-sama! Lunch-sama!"

Goku debated chasing after them and decided against it. They were only subordinates, after all; no one special. He ran over to the man who'd been shot and examined his arm. "The bullet went straight through." He tore off a strip of fabric from the bottom of his gi top and tied it around his arm. "This'll stop the bleeding, but you need to see a doctor."

"Domo arigatou," he said gratefully. His son bowed in thanks and helped his father down the street.

Once the square was tidy, Goku promised the shopkeepers that he'd return their profits. He waved goodbye and ran off down the street in the direction that Lunch had gone.