Hello!

A bit of a foreword here. I am aware that there are many fan fictions in which Bardock and Raditz are brought back to life. I have nothing to say for myself except for the fact these two characters happen to be my favourite ones. In case you are sick of seeing these two run around alive and well, I suggest you stop reading here.

This story was started way back in 2008, and will probably be continued through very slow progress as long as there is breath left in me. I am not a person who abandons her (main) fandoms, so you can always expect me to return to this story, even if it was on a 10-year-long hiatus.

This story takes place on Planet Yardrat, shortly after Goku's fight with Freeza. The current plan is to keep it around 40 chapters long.

I do not own Dragon Ball or Dragon Ball Z. The series was created by Akira Toriyama.

UPDATE 08/14/10! - Alright, you no longer have to suffer from the awkward English of this story. Lucillia kindly cleaned up and rewrote all the chapters so far and made some edits that made the story flow better, so big thanks goes to her if you now enjoy reading the story!

UPDATE 06/24/14! - It's been 4 long years! But believe me, I haven't forgotten about this story. Around a year ago, I wrote down a detailed synopsis of every chapter so that it would be easier for me to write in the future. Thus, I finally have the plot scripted down. Before I've pretty much improvised while trying to desperately follow an half-assed story line, which would later cause me inconveniencies with the earlier chapters as my plans for the story changed. This time around, the biggest fix I'm going to make in the earlier chapters is changing the week Bardock and Raditz were given into a month. Some other changes will probably come if I spot any inconsistencies later on. Oh, and I also revamped the foreword a bit.

PROLOGUE:

The place above Hell was an exceedingly busy one where none of its inhabitants could ever find a moment's rest. The scenery there was rather unusual with its pink skies and ground that consisted of a sea of yellow clouds that surrounded the gigantic palace that dominated the center of the landscape. Hundreds upon hundreds of souls belonging to the recently departed stood in a line that stretched a long distance away from the palace, waiting to be judged by Lord Enma. Afterward, they would go to either one of two places depending on how they had behaved in life. Those who had been evil and had committed a multitude of sins of which they had not repented were doomed to Hell whereas those who had led good and virtuous lives would be rewarded with an afterlife in Heaven. In various places, the employees of the afterlife would guide the newly arrived souls towards their destinations.

"This way Ladies and Gentlemen! Stay in line, everyone will get their turn!" yelled one of the employees of the afterlife as he pointed souls towards the correct path.

It didn't matter what kind of life you led or where you had lived it, this was the place you would end up after you died whether you wanted to or not. After you were judged, you would most likely remain either in Heaven or in Hell for all eternity unless you were cleaned of all memory and reincarnated as it was nearly impossible to return to the pages of the Book of Life as the exact same person you were when you left them. It was only nearly impossible because a small and select few had achieved this feat before. Oddly enough, despite their impressive achievement, none of them were very well known amongst the denizens of the afterlife.

A tall woman with black hair, observant wolflike eyes and a thoughtful expression on her face that was slightly marred by an evil smirk who was wearing a garnet colored kimono with a gold floral pattern embroidered on it walked past the line. She ignored the scenery around her while she did so, as her attention was focused on the palace ahead and her upcoming meeting with Lord Enma.

At first glance, the woman looked like an ordinary Earthling, but that impression would be highly inaccurate. There was absolutely nothing human in her ancestry. This was borne out by the fact that she behaved as if she had always belonged in this place, unlike the recently arrived souls that surrounded her who were extremely confused and rather uncertain as to exactly where they were. In truth, she had never been one of the dead, but instead was one of the more prestigious beings of the afterlife. She was one of the gods. She was the goddess Javece.

Javece was the Guardian God of Hell, and was tasked with keeping her eye on events down there and upholding what little peace was possible in such a place. She never left Hell without having a good reason for doing so, and very rarely did she visit Lord Enma. Based on her current bearing, today's visit wasn't just a social call.

The recently arrived souls around her didn't recognize her, and became irritated when she was allowed to cut in line without any consequences after others who had tried to do so had been harshly reprimanded before being pushed back into their prior positions. Knowing that there could possibly be a riot, those tasked with herding the souls to their judgment rushed in to start smoothing ruffled feathers and bruised egos before chaos could erupt.

"Excuse me, but why are you here?" one of the blue skinned employees asked when he reached Javece after wading through a mass of agitated souls. From his tone of voice, it was obvious that he did not approve of her disruptive behavior and didn't think she deserved special treatment even if she was a goddess.

The goddess smiled at the employee rather kindly as if he were a small child, but there was a certain coldness behind her expression.

"Could you please ask Lord Enma to take a break from judging for a while? There is something I would like to speak with him about." she said in a tone of voice one would use during a call when asking a child to get one of its parents on the line.

The blue skinned man looked as if he didn't want to cooperate, but found himself unable to refuse Javece's request.

"This had better be important, because..." the employee started, hoping that his job and therefore existence wouldn't be on the line for this. He didn't finish, because Javece had turned him around and started pushing him in the direction of Lord Enma's palace.

"It's important enough. Just take me to that red ogre and be quick about it." Javece said impatiently.

"Could you please wait a moment?" the disgruntled employee asked as he freed himself from Javece's grip when they reached Enma's palace.

As soon as he was free, he stopped the line heading into Enma's throne room for judgment, shooting Javece annoyed looks the entire time he did so.

The pair soon arrived at the gigantic hall of judgment in which Lord Enma resided and stood facing an angry giant who was seated behind a massive desk in its center. The red skinned, black bearded giant who was clad in a purple uniform was the Lord Enma Judge of the Dead himself. The giant turned to the blue skinned employee who was now looking frightened rather than irritated and asked him why the souls of the dead had stopped arriving.

"Enma-sama, uh, the goddess Javece would like to speak with you." the blue skinned man said nervously. He was sweating and quaking in fear as he did so. The Lord Enma was an impressive sight when he was irritated. Lord Enma was an impressive sight period, but he was far moreso when there was something upsetting him. This had probably been why he had gotten his job, as there were very few who either had the courage or were stupid enough to challenge him.

After hearing the reason for the disruption of his routine, Enma turned his attention towards Javece. Despite being angry, he did not yell at the goddess as was expected. Javece was not the sort of person who dropped by merely to waste his time, and he understood that.

He sighed. Whatever this was, he probably wouldn't want to hear it but would have to listen nonetheless.

"Whatever it is, you had better say it quickly. Do you have any idea how bad it is when the line gets backed up like it is rapidly becoming right now?" he growled at the goddess whose arrival was an unwanted disruption to his routine rather than the small blessing it had been on prior occasions.

Javece apparently decided to ignore Lord Enma's irritation at her visit, because she smiled happily at his acknowledgment and eagerly jumped up onto the top of his desk with absolutely no difficulty despite the fact that it was several times her height. She then walked across the desk and seated herself on a book, delicately crossing her legs as she did so. The blue skinned employee attempted to follow, but found it more difficult and resorted to climbing up the side of the desk instead.

"Let's get straight to the point" she said, looking up at Lord Enma to be certain that he was actually listening. "As you know, there is a race of beings in Hell that are called Saiyans whose souls don't get completely cleansed in preparation for reincarnation as most evil souls do, but instead remain in Hell as they had been in life for all eternity so long as they keep and enforce the peace. I have been following them for a while mostly out of boredom, and have discovered the most interesting pair..."

Enma cut her off before she could continue. Apparently the begging puppy look she was trying to pull off had clued him in to what she wanted. The Judge of the Dead was pretty much immune to wide sad eyes and pleading gestures as he had seen them all of the time.

"Stop wasting my time Javece! You already know the rules. Nobody leaves your domain unless they have been cleansed of their sins and the memories that accompany them" he said, clenching a red skinned fist. He had already been having a bad day, and it was just his luck that Javece would decide to show up to waste his time for the first time ever.

Javece however, wasn't the sort who gave up easily. She tried persuasion rather than begging this time.

"I've studied those two souls extensively." she said. "One of them was born with what had to be absolutely the worst luck ever. He had never been given a chance to turn his life around, even though he actually has what it takes. The other one instead opposed Freeza – you know that evil tyrant from the living world – all alone. He was trying to save his people while he could have just run away. If that's not respectable good trait in a person then what is? I'm sure that both of the souls I have followed would walk the path of good if they were only given a chance away from certain...influences. After all, they're related to someone who has what has got to be the purest heart ever."

"You know full well that fighting and cold-bloodedness are practically cornerstones of the Saiyan culture. It was after all their skills in battle that convinced me to allow them to be Hell's main peacekeeping force. They are dangerous, and none of them should ever be released. You also know full well that in the last two million years nobody has been released from Hell without being cleansed and reincarnated. Some people who should be in hell have been wished back with those damnable Dragon Balls, but that was because they were still waiting in line for judgment at the time the wish was made." Enma said firmly, not about to budge on his position.

"Well then, it's about time you release someone now isn't it?" Javece replied almost flippantly, completely ignoring Lord Enma's worsening mood. "I'm only asking for the release of those two who I'm convinced would be a force for good, not the whole damn race."

"I'm not about to go breaking rules just because you were bored. If everyone who had good traits despite being mostly evil went to Heaven, Hell would be completely empty." Lord Enma replied.

"Please, just this once? Please, please, pretty please, pretty please with a cherry on top?" Javece pleaded, her face returning to that sad puppy expression that she'd abandoned earlier. "I've never asked you for anything before, and this is really important to me. Being the Guardian Goddess of Hell, I would know whether or not they would cause too much chaos and destruction, and they won't."

Enma frowned. He absolutely was not going to give into Javece's begging even though part of him wanted to. Before he could refuse her again however, he was interrupted by the arrival of a certain old woman who had floated into a position between him and Javece. Both he and the goddess turned their attention toward the black clad crone whose purple hair was topped with a conical black witch's hat. The crone who was seated in her customary position atop a floating crystal ball couldn't have interrupted the conversation any better if she'd popped out of a birthday cake stark naked.

"I apologize for my disrespectful behavior Lord Enma, but the current situation has compelled me to come and ask that you acquiesce to Javece's request." the crone said, before either party could start yelling at her.

Enma stared down at the woman in confusion. While demanding and somewhat rude at times, the old woman usually didn't interrupt his conversations, and it was also highly unusual for her to side with anyone against him as she was in his realm by his leave.

"Would you care to explain the reasoning behind your opinion Uranai Baba?" Enma asked in the rather controlled tone of voice a person uses at times when they are barely keeping themselves from exploding.

Uranai Baba cleared her throat and sat straighter on her crystal ball before explaining.

"I was gazing into the depths of my crystal ball recently and saw that there was a great danger which will threaten the whole of the universe, and that it will be arriving in the near future." she said.

"Great. Something else I don't need. This day just keeps getting better and better." Enma grumbled sarcastically.

"At the moment, the threat isn't very dangerous, but it shall soon gain strength and when it is at its strongest not even Kaioshin himself will be able to stop it. Son Goku is at this very moment heading towards this threat's home planet. At the moment, Goku is stronger than Freeza himself, but he will not be able to defeat this threat on his own. If you send the two Saiyans that Javece was talking about to aid him now, we won't have to bother the Kaios or the Kaioshin with this problem later." the crone continued.

Javece listened to the All Seeing Crone's explanation with interest. This had been just what she needed to win her argument. Enma would be forced to act when it came to a universe wide threat because the Living World was partially his responsibility.

"Son Goku you say?" Lord Enma said, brightening slightly. He'd come to like that particular brain damaged Saiyan during the short time he knew him. Rather than go straight to Heaven as was his right, Goku had risked an eternity in Hell to traverse the Snake Road in order to get training to defeat the Saiyans who were coming to harm those he had sworn to protect on his adopted homeworld.

"Well then, who were these Saiyans you were talking about then Javece?" Enma asked, turning to the goddess who was perched on one of his ledgers.

"Their names are Bardock and Raditz." Javece said calmly, barely suppressing her glee at her victory in case it caused Lord Enma to change his mind.

Enma flipped through one of the books on his desk for a few moments until he found what was apparently the entry he'd been looking for.

"Father and son, eh. And not only that, but they're Son Goku's father and older brother." Enma said after reading the entry.

"Well then, we have the perfect team right there, don't we?" Javece said, grinning widely.

Enma paused. For some strange reason this situation seemed just a little too good to be true. That many coincidences tended to add up to conspiracy. He couldn't think of what sort or why for the life of him though, and on the other hand he couldn't think of a way to deny Javece's request especially if the fate of the universe could be at stake if he did so.

"Fine then," he sighed, leaning back in his chair and looking up at the shadowed ceiling as if to ask a higher deity what he had done to deserve this.

"Javece, I will allow you to return Bardock and Raditz to the world of the living. But, it will only be for a month. They should be able to help Goku destroy this great danger in that amount of time. If they fail at their mission, or if they start unnecessarily destroying things and killing innocent people, they will return to Hell the instant the month is up. However, if they manage to behave themselves and complete this mission I will allow them to continue to live as you have requested." Enma said.

Javece jumped up happily and did a little victory dance.

"Thank you Lord Enma!" she said.

"Since I'm always busy, you will have to be the one to keep an eye on them. I don't want those two to just pretend to be all good and nice, so I must require that you do not appear before them or tell them of their mission until after the thirty days are up." Enma said, causing Javece's little victory dance to halt.

"I will do as you ask. Thank you again Lord Enma. I assure you that those two are worth all the trouble." Javece said, bowing.

"You're welcome. Now get out of here, I have work to do!" Enma said, shooing Javece off his desk.

Javece laughed as she turned to leave, bidding farewell to Uranai Baba before leaping from Lord Enma's desk with a catlike grace and landing silently on her feet, quite unlike Enma's blue skinned employee who had landed on his ass with a loud thud before he recovered and raced out ahead of her in order to get the line restarted since her business with Lord Enma was concluded.

Javece had always found Enma's realm entertaining. To her, was like one big comedy with Lord Enma playing the straight man in the center of it all. The office employees were always rushing about with a trail of paperwork flying behind them, and the souls of the recently departed were always either looking completely lost or gaping like tourists who were seeing skyscrapers for the first time. Today however, Javece found herself unable to stay and watch the chaos for a while since she herself was going to be busy and needed to return to hell ASAP. As she rather reluctantly departed, she consoled herself with the thought that she was soon going to be having the most amusing week she'd had in a long, long while.

As soon as she was outside of the hall of judgment, she broke into a less than dignified run in order to leave Enma's palace more quickly. The moment she was outside and atop the yellow clouds that marked the lower border of Enma's territory she dove beneath them and into the bleak land that was her home and domain, Hell.