increase his strength.
<br />
Popo tried a few new varieties of porridge in the kitchen and Dende was chewing on his pen in his room while he pondered a tricky equation.
<br />
<br />
Unnoticed by the three of them, a fragment of the heavy vase still lay on the tile. As this was reduced by a fraction of a millimeter, the door to the other dimension was a tiny, paper-thin gap open.<br />
<br />
In the other dimension, a creature that had been awakened from its deep sleep by Piccolo's and Goten's arrival crawled inch by inch towards the gap, pressing its face to the place where the exit appeared once a day, sending its arm of power through this gap, felt the opening mechanism and ... then withdrew again. Satisfied, the creature sat on the ground, waiting in front of the spot. It would be a mistake to open the door now. When the time came for the exit to appear, it would be ready ...
<br />
<br />
..............
<br />
<br />
Meanwhile, Goten threw the soft ball through the air into the other corner of the playpen. Then he crawled over, sat down again, took the ball in his little hands and tossed it back into the other corner. It was fun three or four times in a row, then got boring again.
<br />
<br />
It was much funnier if there was someone to toss the ball back to him.The only one nearby, as Goten could see through the bars, was the green uncle, who was floating above the ground.
<br />
<br />
"Ball," said Goten and spontaneously threw it over the grille so that it rolled in Piccolo's direction. Unfortunately, one of the palm trees was in the way, so that Bald got stuck there. Frustrated, Goten crawled to the bars on this side and said loudly "Ball!" in Piccolo's direction. Piccolo was so absorbed in his meditation that he did not take the ball as a request and therefore did not react to it. Annoyed, Goten grabbed the metal bars with both hands and shook them. "Ball!"
<br />
<br />
Vain. Now Goten got seriously angry and took out that anger on the obstacle between him and the ball - the bars. A little tugging, a little bending and with his Saiyan heritage succeeded, which neither Piccolo nor Dende would have thought possible, the metal bars gave way and a hole was created, just big enough for Goths to squeeze through and crawl towards the ball.Before Goten reached the ball, however, a colorful butterfly fluttered past him towards the flowers Popo had set between the palm trees. The colorful, moving thing was more interesting than the ball, so Goten took a different crawling course.
<br />
<br />
The butterfly fluttered to a flower, unrolled its proboscis and plunged it into the deep calyx when a huge shadow with ominously shining eyes appeared behind it. Confused by the lack of sunlight, it fluttered away from the flower and to the next. But the shadow followed him until the butterfly had had enough of it and set out to find a less disturbed source of food under the clouds on the earth.
<br />
For Goten, who was not misled by this, there was only one problem. Beyond the edge of that twisted-domed platform there was nothing to crawl on. Gravity did its job. Goths fell.
<br />
<br />
<br />
.........................<br />
<br />
“Cursed!” Chichi stumbled against the kitchen table and dropped the glass she had been holding in her hands. It hit the soft floor and shattered with a bright clang.
<br />
<br />
"Have you hurt yourself?" Asked Bulma worried.
<br />
"No, it's just a shame about your glass. I broke a handle." Chichi bends down and threaded the rest of the shoelace differently in order to have a better hold. "That this has to happen to me right now."
<br />
<br />
"It's only glass," said Bulma and took a handheld vacuum cleaner from the storage room next to the kitchen. "We just have to be careful that we don't overlook any broken pieces. Our men are capable of walking barefoot through the kitchen at night just because they imagine that there's still something to eat in the fridge."
<br />
"Thanks." Chichi sucked up the broken pieces very carefully. "We are lucky that you are almost as sleepy as Goku was with his heart disease. Somehow I always hope that after a good night's sleep, the ghost is over."<br />
<br />
"Unfortunately measles isn't a thing for a day or two," sighed Bulma. "We'll have to serve the three of them for another week or two."
<br />
"But after that we deserved a vacation," joked Chichi.
<br />
"Don't pretend!" Laughed Bulma. "You can't wait to hug Goten again as soon as the risk of infection is over. Am I right?"
<br />
"You are rarely wrong," Chichi had to admit. "I just hope Dende doesn't spoil him too much."
<br />
<br />
"Oh well, Dende and Piccolo complement each other perfectly as nannies. What Piccolo is too strict, Dende is too mild. This is how Goten gets the right mix. You couldn't have chosen a better place for him."
<br />
<br />
Chichi's face lit up. "Although, sometimes I think that maybe I should have written you a longer letter after all, so that you know that Goten is not just about his hairstyle and hunger for his father ..."<br />
<br />
........
<br />
<br />
It's been a long way down. Goten, who had long overtaken the butterfly, sensed a sense of real danger, sensed that it was no longer a game. Inside, the Saiyan instincts sounded the alarm and the survival program anchored in his genes came into effect.
<br />
<br />
.....
<br />
<br />
Piccolo startled from his meditation. The burst of energy, that aura ... It wasn't Gohan, but it couldn't be Goku either, so just stayed ...
<br />
The icy shock went into his limbs when he noticed the bent sticks. "Goten !! Goten, where are you?"
<br />
<br />
Where did this power come from again? Not from the right or the left, but from below. BELOW?!!!
<br />
Piccolo had never shot over the edge of the platform so quickly in his life. He dived through the clouds and searched for Goten's aura with his intuition. But there was nothing. Not a trace. The cold sweat broke out on him.<br />
It was his fault, all his own. Didn't he give the little one a "ball!" hear call? You couldn't leave a child like him alone to play, you had to keep an eye on him, every breath ...
<br />
<br />
Piccolo broke the cloud cover and shot lower and lower. Icy fear spread through him, if he saw the small, shattered body lying down at the foot of the tower, there was only one thing left to do. He swallowed. But ... even for that he would need Bulma's help and going to Bulma would be Chichi and ... to look Gohan in the eyes and tell them what he had done ...
<br />
<br />
Piccolo closed his eyes to gather the strength he needed for the gruesome sight. If Goten wanted to hold him accountable, he wouldn't fight back. No torment could match the pain that ate deep in his soul. The most important person in this world would hate him from now on and rightly so.His mistake was unforgivable.
<br />
<br />
The lower part of the quince tower hissed past him and just before the ground Piccolo slowed his mad flight. Where was Goten? No small, shattered body lay at the base of the tower. Had he been driven further by the headwind in the fall. Piccolo searched the surrounding area. No trace of Goths. A spark of hope began to glow in his heart. Maybe ... maybe Goten's Saiyan blood had made a miracle possible ... but to be sure, he had to have found Goten first.
<br />
....
<br />
<br />
Master Quince enjoyed the sunshine. He had made himself comfortable in his favorite place and was dozing happily as only cats can. The sudden burst of energy in his vicinity only startle him briefly, then Piccolo shot past him as if a horde of cells were after him.
<br />
Master Quince frowned and tried to pinpoint the source of the burst of energy, but the energy was already gone.<br />
Probably one of Piccolo's experiments and not his most successful one, if he had correctly read the horrified expression on the Namek's face.
<br />
With a shrug, Master Quince curled up like a cat and fell asleep.
<br />
<br />
...........
<br />
<br />
The quince tower was endlessly high. Piccolo had started his search at the bottom, hoping that an outbreak of fludium would catapult the little one to the tower and cling to it. After all, the tower was built for climbing and so it had enough protrusions, indentations, niches and holes where you could put your feet and hands. However, Goten was still too small to climb himself. And at some point he would run out of strength to hold on. Piccolo prayed to the forces of fate that he would find him first ...
<br />
<br />
End of the third part
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