God Punting (Kiko)

---

Kiko was worried. She was worried and upset and sick and tired. Thoughts bounced around in her head miserably. The one that stood out above all the others was that she had to get better. She had to be better. Stronger. She needed to become someone ... someone more worthy of being Supreme Kai. All her worrying and fretting had brought her to the Castle of Namek. She wanted to figure out some things about Namekians, but also their history. Her schoolings in Otherworld had taught her a little, but not a lot. Not to mention Senny was… Kiko shook her head and sighed. No, that was too stressful to think about.

In all her worrying and fretting, Kiko didn’t notice foolish Typha and his even more foolish Ogre friend arrive. In fact, she bumped into them on the way to find another book on the Mazoku and their ties to the demon realm. The tower of books that she had been carrying all tumbled to the floor as she fell flat on her butt. Kiko hissed in pain, still vaguely bruised and battered from being tossed around by Senny in the whole battle. Looking up, she was surprised to see Typha. Hastily jumping to her feet and dusting herself off, she blushed a deep purple in embarrassment and gestures at the books strewn all over the floor.

“F-Foolish Typha! Look at what you’ve done now! You had better pick those up!”

Kiko paused and frowned, letting some traces of her earlier worry and being upset show through her bravado.

“Wait, what are you doing here? Don’t you have to chaperone that pop music loving, sword wielding weirdo of yours?”

Kiko was relieved when Typha stooped down to pick up the books. It gave her a spare moment to compose herself. She turned away and slapped her cheeks to get the blush out of them. When she turned back around, the Ogre assistant was mouthing off at her for some reason. Rather than respond with anger, Kiko just tilted her head to the side in utter confusion. When she saw the sword at his hip, things clicked into place. Wow, he liked pop music? He didn’t look the type. Kiko frowned and waved dismissively at him.

“Oh, no. I wasn’t talking about you, Mister Ogre. I was talking about the other Konatsian with the green hair and orange outfit. And the rudeness. The name’s Kiko Kai by the way.”

As she finished up clearing up that misunderstanding, Typha finished collecting all of her spilled books. With a huff, she leaned down and picked them up in both arms. She supposed he couldn’t be a gentleman like Tarch and just carry them for her. No, he was too rude and foolish. Seemed like all Typha wanted was to ask some questions. Turning on her heel, Kiko gestured with her head for them to follow. She supposed that it did look odd that a Shinjin had sided with a demon.

“Mm, yeah, they really have. It’s been rough… To be honest, I was paying Sensoa back for helping me. I wandered into the Demon Realm accidentally, and he saved me from some demons that were hunting me down. He even agreed to help me look for my disciples. It was really nice… totally not what I expected from a demon, you know? Plus… I wasn’t exactly feeling my divine self in that awful place. It was like my power was being sapped away all the time. Senny didn’t even get mad when I threw up on him! He really is nice… as weird as that sounds.”

Kiko reaches a table where she sat her books down and took a seat on some pillows scattered across the floor. She huffed and ran a hand through her silvery white hair.

“So, when he got wind of his student doing something stupid, we both rushed to stop her. We got there too late though… Ochra was already rampaging like a madman and… we didn’t get Kitiana out of there in time. Mmph! I would have laid down some divine punishment on her! But… I guess it’s over now… Senny… Senny’s not doing too good.”

Genuinely worried, Kiko curled up and rested her head on her knees. She really didn’t foresee anything good coming of this. Not at all. Hatred bred hatred. And Senny was really… really a nice demon at heart. She was worried about what he would do. He had given her this feeling like he was about to go somewhere really far away. She glanced up at Typha.

“I’m really worried, foolish Typha. I don’t think the way that ended was in anyone’s best interests.”

Kiko didn’t love Yudi’s tone. She felt like it was a little disrespectful to talk to a shinjin like that. Especially when she was trying her best! Well, he did call her Miss Kai, so she guessed that she could let it fly this time around. As Typha brought the topic back around to Sensoa, Kiko’s spirits fell again. “Mm… he got hurt when we were trying to leave the Demon Realm. This dumb ghost wouldn’t let us pass. I… couldn’t do much of anything to help him.”

Typha mentioned something about killing Senny, which made Kiko scowl at him, but not with the confidence that she’d once had. Something about the way Senny reacted after he had woken up… It gave her chills. Something bad was coming. She wasn’t sure killing him too would have made things right though. Seemed like super villain logic. She smiled wryly at Typha.

“Foolish Typha, what else would you have done? Killed the whole bloodline? That’s super villain talk, you know. Killing doesn’t fix things. It just creates more problems.”

Idly leafing through the pages of one of her books, Kiko was a little relieved when Typha admitted that things didn’t end the best of ways. She frowned at him when he said it ended the best it could for the greatest amount of people. To Kiko, even one hurt person was one too many. He did ask her about what she wanted to do about it. The answer came to Kiko faster than she thought.

“I want… to get stronger so I can protect this universe… and the people in it.”

She had to train. Not Brand. Not Bravo. Her. She had to do it. If she wanted to be Supreme Kai, she had to be stronger than she was then. She had to be able to change things herself. Not beg or rely on the mercy of others. She needed to be the one who was strong. So she could stop Sensoa if he went all crazy. So that she could protect the people that she needed to. The best place to do that… would be Otherworld. Once she got her followers back anyhow.

Jolting to her feet with newfound determination, Kiko walked past Typha and Yudi and toward the exit. “Thank you, foolish Typha! I know what I need to do now! I’m gonna go do it!” She whirled around and gave him a wave. She was tired of being helpless. She was tired of being all talk. She was going to do something about it.