The Misfits (fanfic)

Nina: "Welcome, and have fun. :P"

Whatever you would make of it, a new era was beginning, and whether you want to participate in it or not, that will not stop it from coming. For the Misfits are about to emerge from their collective cocoons... As the greatest of all heroes to ever live...'

The Misfits is a Fan Fiction story by Jack Walker, also known as Lord Misfit in certain circles. It is a Mega Crossover, combining elements from Real Life circa 2001 and beyond, Dragon Ball, Gundam Wing, EarthBound, Breath of Fire 2, and many other media of various types, although the main focus is on Real Life mixed with the Dragonball elements. It was first developed in August-September of 2001, and although has been on hiatus for a number of years due to Walker's focus on other Game Mod-related projects, it has not been completely abandoned.

The story of The Misfits begins on August 29, 2001, in Shibuya-ku (ward) of Tokyo, Japan, where eight high-school students are on an all-expenses-paid vacation to Japan because their friend Clint Walker won an art contest sponsored by Toonami, allowing him to take seven of his friends with him. All but one of them are socially miffed goofballs. For example, one of them is a former Cerebral Palsy patient, cured through magical means, and has a large ego. Although the eight find some fun and adventure in the land of the rising sun, their lives (as well as the fate of the entire world) soon change when their presence causes a barrage of strange portals to open up around the world, dumping them temporarily into various places thought to be fictional, including the worlds of Dragon Ball and Gundam Wing, and even (supposedly) the realm of Hell briefly. They also meet various characters from said worlds or realms in their travels.

Upon being forcibly returned to their own world, the eight original "Misfits" learn the people and characters they met came back with them, in what is first believed to be just the Real World; however, it is soon learned that the previous events have merged the real world with the above-mentioned universes in some form or another, and the rules have been rewritten. Naturally, this opens the doors to the original eight characters getting the potential to start their own versions of My Kung Fu Is Stronger Than Yours, among other things.

Of course, the events of the merger have their downsides: a terrifying daemonlord from the center of Hell has set his sights on the merged universe and has plans to lay waste to the physical universe... somehow. All this is apparently to just get back at a 'brother' of his. Naturally, some of the daemonlord's minions, monitoring the events of the merger, see the Misfits and their aspirations to become more than ordinary as a possible threat. Additionally, one particular shapeshifting villain seems to have their eyes set on destroying the ragtag team before they establish themselves.

The current version of The Misfits contains 11 and a half parts, spanning three sagas, and is nearly 300,000 words long. The story contains elements of comedy, mixed with a healthy dose of serious action and drama.

Here is a link to Series 1 of The Misfits (with powerlevel pages and a link to characters bios).

Unmarked spoilers below.

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Tropes used in The Misfits (fanfic) include:

• Acrofatic:
  • Mr. Buu retains his pudgy/fat build from the Dragon Ball series, but is still one of the three strongest fighters in the story (only Goku and on rare occasions Vegeta are stronger than him).
  • Devin and Virgil are also examples of this trope, although Virgil is far less skilled at learning things and shows more of the "unexercised fat person" part, whereas Devin is particularly clever and sometimes Genre Savvy to a scary degree, not letting his weight discourage him (and, in fact, he working to lose some of his weight).
• Adaptation Expansion: Most notably done with some of the Dragonball elements in the story.
  • The Kaioken technique, an ability that canonically is no longer used after the Frieza saga of the original series, is not only revived, but is taught to most of the current cast (only Vegeta, Piccolo, Mr. Buu, #17 and #18 refuse to learn it). Additionally, North Kaio reveals more information about the technique: there are two parts to it, the first being an "upsurge" of energy experienced when activating the Kaioken or increasing it a level, and the second a "constant but lesser drain" which slowly weakens the user further. Only the "upsurge" can deal potentially fatal damage; the "constant drain" ceases when the user is on the brink of death and fades away automatically, to prevent causing death. Additional requirements to use the Kaioken include having extensive knowledge of how to both sense and mask one's ki energy, being able to sense one's own energy in order to judge when to stop cranking the power up, and knowing how to shove one's powerlevel beyond normal amounts consistently.
  • Goku explains how he was able to become a Super Saiya-jin 3 during the seven-year period between the Cell Saga and the Buu Saga.
• Adult Child: Son Goku is STILL a rare positive example of this trope, as in the original Dragonball series.
• Air Jousting: Just like in Dragonball, fights tend to take place both on the ground and up in the air via ki energy.
• Alternate Universe Fic:
  • The story disavows the actual events of Dragon Ball GT, while maintaining a couple of its concepts. Additionally, Uub has not appeared yet, although he would have by now in the canon Dragonball continuity.
  • Part 12 reveals a flashback communicated to Goku, Vegeta, and Paula by North Kaio that explains how Oyatsu got his hands on Goku's once-thought-destroyed spaceship on Namek: Zarbon somehow survives his fatal wound from Vegeta and escapes the dying planet in its final minutes using Goku's spaceship (left abandoned when everyone except Goku and Frieza was taken from Namek). Eventually, Zarbon meets with Oyatsu, under the alias of "Ryokucha", and sells the spaceship to him for a hefty sum.
• Ascended Extra:
  • Teresa showed up in Part 6 as a minor character, but ends up playing a critical role in defeating Oyatsu!Dan.
  • A segment in Part 11 indicates that Mr. (Christopher) Bergert, an art teacher previously seen only in Part 6, will have more appearances and might even become a more major character.
• As Long as There Is Evil: In Part 11, Paula explains to Clint that she believes Giygas, despite his apparent demise in EarthBound, will eventually regenerate from nothingness and attempt to send all into eternal darkness once again. She believes this because of Giygas's link to the corruption in the hearts of not just humans, but all creatures; their evil will always prevent his total and utter annihilation and will eventually revive him from a mindless and formless being into one capable of cognitively acting (even if in a mindless manner like before).
• Badass: Nina in Part 6: She dashes in from off-screen and GUTS an Al-Quaida operative who had downed and was trying to kill Paula, Dan, and Devin. Nina even takes the full brunt of a suicide-vest bomb from the dying operative at point blank range and only gets a couple of bruises and a few ruffled feathers.
  
  A few scenes later, she nearly kills Jackson McCarakins by smashing him against the wall and nearly strangulating him, as she yells in his face about the crap she had to endure in her life, and that, compared to her, he's gone through nothing. Luckily for him, Paula stops Nina from going too far, and she releases Jackson to run away in terror.
• Badass Longcoat: Oyatsu!Dan appears the morning after Dan's possession wearing a shiny longcoat.
• Beam-O-War: Part 5 has a minor version of this: A sparring session between Alex and Vernon becomes too serious. Both of them fire off Kamehamehas; however, both expend their remaining ki energy and the beams dissipate without either getting hit.
• Berserk Button:
  • Vernon does not like being called worthless. When #17 calls him that, Vernon gains his Super Saiya-jin form.
  • Nina does not appreciate those who insult the victims of the 9/11 attacks.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Nina is usually nice and modest, but becomes extremely violent if her temper is triggered.
• Big Bad: The mysterious (and still unnamed) daemonlord from Hell seen in the prologue.
• Big Damn Heroes: #18 in Part 10. She arrives just in time to save Nina and Teresa from Oyatsu!Dan's attempt to wipe them out completely. She easily knocks out Dan's body, forcing Oyatsu to flee Dan's unconscious form.
• Big Eater: All the Saiyans, including Alex and Jason. Seen specifically at the end of Part 9, for example.
• Big Good:
  • Goku, maintaining his mentor-like qualities from the end of Z, is this to Alex, Jason, and Vernon in particular, especially from Part 5 onwards.
  • Vegeta and Piccolo also fall in this category.
• But Your Wings Are Beautiful: In Part 11, Nina explains to Paula that Jackson seems to hate her and calls her a freak because of her wings. Paula then calls Nina's wing's beautiful, and Nina remarks that her friend Katt/Rinpoo (from Breath of Fire 2) said almost exactly the same thing to her once.
• Calling Your Attacks: The ki-based attacks. Nina also sometimes calls her Magic Attacks.
• Chunky Updraft: Not as frequently as in the original Dragonball series.
• Crazy Prepared: Oyatsu takes this and runs with it. He possess Dan to mask his presence, and has a Shrinking ray to reduce the powerlevels of the heroes, a Static Stun Gun to restrain and paralyze enemies, specialized "Overclocked Scouters" to gauge powerlevels ahead of time, a reflective overcoat to deflect attempts to redirect his shrinking ray back at him, sunglasses in case one of the heroes attempts the Taiyoken (Solar Flare) technique, a specialized curse that will seal the use of any Saiya-jin's Super Saiya-jin levels for 12 hours (confining them to their normal forms), a ton of knowledge about the heroes (including how to manipulate their feelings), and the Mafuba/Evil Containment Wave (to deal with Mr. Buu, who cannot be shrunken down or paralyzed by the above).
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Goku, the same as in Dragonball.
• Curse: In Part 10, Oyatsu!Dan creates a temporary curse known as the "Durty Durt Dur Curse", based off of one of Jason and Alex's joking prods at people in high school. The curse's effects are that any person that hears or speaks the words "Durty Durt Dur" during the duration of the curse are locked out of any Super Saiya-jin related forms they might have for 12 hours. If any Saiya-jin attains the original Super Saiya-jin transformation for the first time after the curse is invoked, they will be exempt from the effects of the curse.
• Cursed with Awesome:
  • Nina. Not only does she possess a pair of large, bird-like wings, but she's also very tall (6 ft, 6 in, or 200 cm) compared to most women and men in the Real Life version of Earth. This causes most normal people to see her as a mutant freak (although she is actually not human).
  • The "merger of worlds": Even though the merger rewrites certain rules of physics that make the normal Real World boring, it also introduces the possibility of serious, world-destroying threats.
• Cute Bruiser: Teresa.
• Dangerous Forbidden Technique:
  • The Mafuba from the original Dragonball shows up as one of Oyatsu's techniques. The move only tires Oyatsu!Dan out, instead of killing him.
  • In Part 11, Goku uses the Kaioken technique, which attracts the attention of Alex and Vegeta, leading to almost every available character learning the basics of the Kaioken.
• Demon Lords and Archdevils: The cloaked 'human'-like demon in both the prologue and Part 4 seems to be one of the main daemonlord's chief generals, or at the very least he's above most of the rest of the Legions of Hell that serve the daemonlord. It is also implied that the unnamed daemonlord might be a creature above the level of Satan himself and that Satan would piss himself in fear in the guy's presence.
• Demoted to Extra: Nina lampshades this in Part 8, noting that, because they're female, they might end at a disadvantage compared to the other characters over time, or at least be preceived to be at such a disadvantage. They're of course trying their hardest to not allow this to happen, though.
• Doppelganger Attack:
  • The first variation is seen in Part 12: Piccolo uses a Split-Form Technique to divide himself into seventeen selves, with the original Piccolo having half his usual Power Level while the other 16 divide the other half among themselves. The technique is used as a special type of multi-on-one training-exercise/punishment.
    
    In addition, Mr. Buu uses his strange, putty-like body to divide into two halves so that he can spar on both sides.
  • Teresa's "Spirit Body" ability allows her to summon ki-created Hard Light duplicates of herself, although the duplicates are slightly less powerful than her. These duplicates can appear as mere ki spirits (like the original Kamikaze Ghost Attack in the Buu Saga) or appear humanoid (although they have no innards, as shown in Part 10 when Oyatsu!Dan guts an energy clone). Once finished, the spirits return to energy form and Teresa re-absorbs them back into herself. A side effect of this is that right after she re-absorbs them, she receives a boost to her powerlevel.
• Emergency Energy Tank: Sensu Beans from Dragonball carry over into the story, and Radditz even tries to grow a sensu plant with a bean he had received. So far he has only had minimal success.
• The Force Is Strong with This One: Much like in DBZ, most characters can sense each others' ki energy levels.
  • However, Nina and Buu can additionally sense a character's magic energy level.
  • Paula can also sense a person's psychic energy level as well.
  • Some of the veteran characters [Goku, Vegeta, Piccolo, etc] can sense powerlevels and aura well enough at this point they can sometimes state a rough number of ki Power Level the target has.
  • Sometimes the author will write the rough numerical estimate when writing for the view point of one of these characters. It's possible the characters have gotten so used to these ranges of power they can give a rough estimate, even though it's never 100% accurate.
• Fanon Discontinuity:
  • GT does not occur in this story, as it begins (in Dragonball's time frame) about one month after the tournament that ends DBZ, but that Uub is strangely absent for some reason and that apparently according to Vegeta and Goku in Part 12, Mirai Trunks has returned to the main timeline and even can use the Super Saiya-jin 3 form, where the original series didn't even have him make it to SSJ2 prior. Also, the 'universe' from which the Z-Warriors came from in relevance to the Misfits universe seems to have other differences. Paula was (somehow) Goku's best childhood friend instead of Kuririn (who isn't acknowledged as having existed yet), among other things. Goku has been seen thinking that the original characters (most of whom watched the anime form of DBZ and think they know all there is to know about the DBZ characters) will be in for some rattling surprises down the road.
  • Also in Part 12, it's revealed that Zarbon survived his battle with Vegeta on Namek due to a unanticipated healing factor and manages to use Goku's abandoned space ship to escape Namek not long before it explodes. Due to this, it's assumed he's alive even now at this point in the story, out there somewhere. In fact, it's suggested Zarbon was the one who gave Oyatsu the space ship via a deal for money, not with any evil intent though, as Zarbon seemed to have throw aside his loyalty to Frieza after recovering from near death on Namek. In fact, the story seems to suggest Zarbon has a wife/mate of unknown origin out there as well.
• Fighting Series: Obviously.
• Frying Pan of Doom: Paula's melee weapon is one of these, taken straight out of EarthBound. However which type of frying pan from that game she wields at the current moment isn't specified (be it a normal Frying Pan or the rare-drop Magic Frying Pan). Sources seem to indicate it's one of the weaker variations.
  • According to the on-site bio for Paula, it supposed to be the "Holy Fry Pan" she's using at the moment, which has the strongest direct attack strength of all the Frying pans in the game, but lacks the high critical hit rate of the rare-drop "Magic Fry Pan".
  • She actually uses it on Clint in Part 1 when they first meet [while the portals are throwing the original characters around], literally throwing it at him and smacking him dead in the face for a one-hit KO. This was because people were panicking to her that Clint seemed to be a possible threat to them due to how he suddenly appears resembling how aliens from EarthBound appeared out of thin air. She apologizes to him later when everyone returns to Tokyo and he recovers, but Clint is still for a while left secretly afraid of her doing it to him again.
    • Unfortunately for Clint and Jason, Paula has to smack them over the heads as punishment for a prank they played on Alex, Vernon and Devin in early Part 5, leaving a voice-changing serum in their soft drinks, giving the latter three the voices of chipmunks for roughly an hour. Again she apologized to Clint and later Jason off-screen, but warned them not to get caught up in such stupid pranks anymore unless they have a damn good reason for it.
• Functional Magic: Nina is touted off as being the main "magic" user in the story thus far. She has an array of magic spells, but most of them are attack-based and elemental, while a couple are healing (Renew X used in Part 12 to bring back Clint and Devin to consciousness after a heated battle) her "Hokaku" spell, allowing her to temporarily shrink down people to minimize their PowerLevels or to put the fear of God into them. Then most recently is her "Gravity Wave", which allows Nina to set a gravity-aura in the vein of Dragon Ball's gravity chambers around an individual person, giving them more ability to train and grow stronger.
  • Additionally, In Part 9 Radditz learns a half-magic, half-ki ability called the Atomic Ray, which is a powerful blast which also has a honest-to-god Fire-elemental attribute [in Misfits, Ki Attacks on their own are considered Non-Elemental and tear enemies apart on a kill instead of burning them up].
  • Also in Part 9, Vernon learns a pure magic ability called the Willy Wisp, a Thunder-elemental orb of energy that shows potential to deal a good amount of damage, although it's yet to be used on an actual enemy to see it's effects.
• Gang-Bangers: Introduced in Part 11 are Rowan, Harry and Morgan, three members representing the Crips. A member of the Bloods is named [Jose] as well by Rowan. It turns out Oyatsu visited with Rowan long back at the beginning of the merger [between Part 2 and Part 3's timeframe] and revealed the implications of the merger and all the changes to the rules of physics and whatnot it brought. Due to this, Rowan reveals he can both use ki and some magic, thanks to a strange jade-gemmed ring that seems to grant him limited control of wind-elemental magic. Also, Part 11 reveals that the Crips are using various abandoned houses in Clint's original neighborhood, including his first house, to store away supplies and other things to assist them in what might be an incoming gang war. Items found in Clint's house include some money in a small metal case, the aforementioned jade ring Rowan obsessed over, and several bottles of a strange drug later identified by Vegeta in Part 12 as "Destronic Powder", a powder which can be converted into gas or vapor that can cut off most beings' access to ki-usage and cause their powerlevels to become erratic. Vegeta assumes this drug is meant to be used with the wind-elemental magic Rowan used to spread chaos in some form, but how it would be used is not yet known.
• Genre Savvy: Clint, Alex, Jason, Vernon, Devin, Dusty and Dan have in their original version of the Real World watched the Dragonball series on multiple occasions, with Clint and Alex [and sometimes Devin] vying for who knows the absolute most on the subject. Due to this, they tend to know what will come when the Z-characters do specific things in front of them. In one example, Devin lampshades the annoyance of various characters getting into a "constipated"-looking stance when powering up or transforming [much like when Virgil first tries to use his ki to fly in Part 8].
  • Other examples include that Clint actually learns how to sense ki by himself due to the knowledge he has from watching the Dragonball show [he and many other characters accidentally ran off before Goku and Vegeta could teach them how to in Part 3], however despite this, masking ki turns out to be an achilles' heel for him until Part 11 when Goku finally finishes teaching him and several other characters.
  • This also helps assist many of the original characters in learning how to replicate some of the older Z-warrior's attacks and techniques. By Part 7, most of them know how to use the Kamehameha in some form or another, while Vernon learns how to use the Masenko and the Big Bang Attack. Dan meanwhile learns how to use the Double Sunday [Radditz's 'eyes on the birdie' attack] and the Final Flash in Part 7 as well. Clint has even learnd to use the Kienzan/Destructo Disc by Part 10 to fight Oyatsu, and later uses it again against Rowan during a small battle.
• Glory Seeker: Alex, Vernon and Jason are the most common candidates of this. Alex wants to be viewed as a hero, loved by all, and at times be a rule-breaking hero to be exact. Vernon want's to both improve himself and become more available to the ladies, and Jason is more just seeking to be seen as a hero, not so much to get attention, or so he says. Their want for this is even told to Teresa by Radditz in Part 8 as a reason they took to the call as Misfits.
  • Dwayne and Steve might or might not show some minor signs of this in Part 12 while discussing their WWE event at the Gund Arena.
• Half-Human Hybrid: Alex, Vernon and Jason are believed to be half-saiya-jin, half human. However only time will tell if this is indeed true or if they're some how full-blooded saiya-jin.
• Hard Work Hardly Works: See Can't Catch Up above.
• Heel Face Turn: Radditz, a minor villain in the first saga of Dragonball Z [Goku's evil older brother], has chosen the path of redemption after 20 years of being dead and watching his brother and Vegeta pave a path to the future for the remaining Saiya-jin. Thanks to Nina's trip through the strange portals in Part 1 of the story, he is taken back to the living world by fluke of nature [or was it...?] and resurrected for free, giving him a chance to redeem himself for his mistakes. Thanks to Goku and even Vegeta, they give him that second chance. Ever since then, Radditz geniunely tries his best to help his brother and former prince train their new students/friends, and even gets a part-time job at a McDonalds in Canton Townshop in order to try to raise money to support their train efforts. Among other efforts is training Dan and then Teresa to be better fighters and also trying to plant a Sensu plant to stem off the problem of limited sensu beans, although the plan's been stagnated to a degree.
• Helium Speech: Although it can't be directly heard due to being in story form, Part 5 has Jason and Clint playing a practical joke on Alex [which then spreads to Devin and Vernon as well], where Jason develops [somehow] a "voice serum" which 'chipmunkifies' the voice of a person for 30 minutes to an hour, and slip it into some of their drinks. Cue Alex and Vernon having a half-verbal spat with their voices slowly increasing in pitch, and then Devin screaming "What the fuck?!" in a chipmunk voice. The chipmunkified voices also get Vegeta to almost bust a gut in laughter at them, something that doesn't happen too often for Vegeta [or so he probably wants us to think].
• Hell: In the prologue, Part 1 and Part 4 thus far, parts of Hell [or a dimension at least like it] are seen, varying from the 'center' of Hell [based off The Divine Comedy's interpretation of Hell], a random area with pools or lakes of blood, ala Dragon Ball's HFIL, and another unknown area on top of a very high alter.
  • Additionally, it is implied by the daemonlord in the prologue and Part 4 that Hell was a prison dimension set up not for Satan, but the daemonlord himself, by an unknown brother of the daemonlord, and that he is equalivical to a Sealed Evil in a Can, with Hell being the massive "can".
• High School: 7 of the original 8 Misfits are high-school age, and actively attended their High School, a place called "Canton South High School", before the events of the story start. Nina is the only original Misfit who's not high-school aged [a bit older than such], but she still hangs around with them as a impromptu teacher's assistant to keep an eye on her friends.
  • Part 6 is in fact a combination of a 9/11-centric part and a high-school centric part, having the original characters plus a couple of extra members of the Misfits like Dwayne, Steve and Paula attending alongside Clint, Alex, Vernon, Dusty, Devin, Dan, Jason and Nina. Virgil is also revealed to attend Canton South as well in Part 6. Part 6 is the only part currently which seems to focus on the high-school lives of the main characters, as they seemed to have left school for the time being [unofficially before part 6, and then on official permission from the school's principal after part 6 until further notice], and we're not sure when or if another school-centric part will come up in the future.
  • Clint also shows to be friendly with a good number of teachers, and even the principal of the school, having been the only to tell the principal and two of his own guidance counselors about the events since August 29 and how it's affected at least his own life, and that things will be hectic for them for a while.
    • On an additional note, Part 11 has Clint accidentally bumping into his art teacher, Mr. (Christopher) Bergert, at a video store he would visit when he still lived in the main city of Canton. After a small conversation, Mr. Bergert tells Clint they'll probably meet up again in a couple of week from them, to Clint's delayed confusion, leading to the possibility Mr. Bergert might become an Ascended Extra or so.
• Huge Schoolgirl: First and formost is Nina, being 6'6" [6 feet, 6 inches, or exactly 200 centimeters tall], although part of her size can be explained that her species (is not fully human) and they are usually anywhere from 6 to 14 inches taller than a human. This is the smaller of the two reasons she's considered to be a freak in the main characters' high-school (besides the fact Jackson leads the charge here), her main being the more noticeably huge purple black bird-like wings on her back.
  • The most straight true-human example of this right now is Paula however. Standing at 6'1" (185.4 centimeters), towering over even her old childhood friend Goku [who in Misfits is 5'9"], she can be a bit intimidating to some of the characters, most of whom aren't used to a girl of her slender build being so tall.
• Human Aliens: This may or may not end up applying to Clint in the future. As of Part 6 of the story, he can attain Super Saiya-jin 1, and reaches the 2nd and 3rd levels later on. However the catch is that Clint is not indicated as a Saiya-jin by the DNA scanner of #17 [and #18 probably], who was able to see Saiya-jin DNA in Alex, Jason and Vernon, nor do Goku or Vegeta feel any wavelengths in Clint's ki aura/signature that resemble anything remotely Saiya-jin. There's also the fact his hair has a slight addition of a light-green color to the yellow in it when he's in any Super Saiya-jin form as well. Bottom line: Clint seems human, but his abilities put that into serious question, and no answer appears to be in sight right now to this mystery.
  • Nina is one of these, being also from a different where there's actually a few races of creatures that mostly resemble humans.
  • Goku and Vegeta, and also later Alex, Jason, Vernon and Dan, obviously being Saiya-jin or in some cases, part Saiya-jin, fall under this as well.
  • #17 and #18 are closer to being Artificial Humans though, being cyborgs (humans with a few technological enhancements to their biology).
• Incredible Shrinking Man: Nina possesses a spell called "Hokaku" which can shrink what it hits down to the size of a mouse. She's done this to Alex and Vernon twice [once in the Prologue, and once off-screen before the prologue].
  • In The Misfits, it's stated that being shrunken down decreases the victim's Power Level by a factor depending on size. Oyatsu builds a gun of sorts that shrinks it's targets even more effectively [further reducing powerlevel to about 1/1000th of it's normal amount for the victim], which he uses successfully to defeat almost all the major characters with exception to Mr. Buu, Nina, Teresa and #18 [the latter two of which finally help to bring down Oyatsu in that conflict].
    • Footnotes suggest the shrinking gun is based off Duke Nukem 3D's Shrinker weapon. Makes sense considering the author says he plays that particular game.
      • In fact, when Oyatsu attacks Clint, Devin, Dusty, Dwayne and Steve, Clint realizes the nature of the gun this way and tries to reflect the shrinking beam with a broken piece of mirror [the Duke Nukem 3D gun's shots will reflect off mirrors], unfortunately, Oyatsu is Crazy Prepared and his overcoat is made of a reflective material which re-reflects the shot back and shrinks Clint anyways. Bleh.
• Invisibility Cloak: In Part 10, Oyatsu!Dan learns of an ability buried in Dan's subconscious potential known as Sculptor Curtain that when used, heals him for about 30% of his HP and renders him invisible to both sight and normal ki-sensory [although Nina proves to him magic-sensory isn't masked during a later battle and gets him by surprise]. This ability allows him to get the drop of the majority of his enemies, except for Mr. Buu and as mentioned, Nina, both of whom can sense magic powerlevels and energy.
• Jerkass: Jackson McCarakins, nicknamed "Jackass" by most of the Original Misfits, is pretty much a neutral variant of this. Whether he's just a jerk or really more evil is unknown, but he has done many things that put him on this list. He was once Alex's good friend when both were children, but when Alex's Cerebral Palsy [which he was magically cured of a couple of months before the story started] reared it's head, Jackson turned on him and started making him out as a disabled freak, much to Alex's anger, also getting Vernon and Devin turned against Jackson as well. Later on, when Nina appearantly started going to the original characters' high school, Jackson targeted her for her wings, which by normal Real Life standards would label her a type of mutant [even though she's not even human to begin with], and she is frequently given trouble for it. Later, Nina is revealed to have healed Alex of his Cerebal Palsy by using her magic to cure various synaptics in his brain. When Alex flaunts the sudden change in Jackson's face, it increases the jerk's anger at both of them, Alex specifically because Jackson believed once you're deemed useless, you remain useless always and can never bounce back, and Nina because her healing of Alex destroyed a significant part of Jackson's credibility with his yesmen and mooks and made some of them defect from him. Even after Nina nearly comes to killing him out of rage for his disregard of the 9/11 victims and their losses, he still has the venom to accuse Nina of already being a murderer, to her shock.
• Ki Attacks: Duh, duh, and Ultra-Duh.
  • However, Magic exists as a separate form of power from Ki, used mainly by Nina and Buu, although Vernon and Radditz also prove to have at least one magically-powered attack later in Parts 8 and 9.
    • Also, Psychic Powers exist in the form of PK/PSI, although at this point in time only Paula can use them, although Clint is aware of their existence as well. Thes are also separate from both Ki and Magic.
      • In fact, Part 9 establishes that Ki, Magic and PK all have their own separate Power Levels from one another, and that in a theoretical battle, Nina can one-shot Goku with a well placed magic attack if she sneaks up on him since his "magicpowerlevel" is very low compared to Nina's, but that Goku could also one-shot Nina with most of his stronger ki attacks at that point if he's not holding back.
• Kiai
• Literary Agent Hypothesis: Main example: In the original Real World pre-merger, Dragon Ball was considered just a Intellectual Property of Akira Toriyama by both the original main characters and other people in that world, but once the merger happens and Goku, Vegeta, Piccolo, #17, Mr. Buu and Radditz show up, they are able to find means of learning of the IP of the Dragonball series and are in question about how it could exist. They come to [personally] determine that Akira Toriyama had written only a partial retelling of the events of their lives [some things in their universe are different from Toriyama's version of the story, including Paula appearantly being Goku's best childhood friend instead of Kuririn, Uub's current lack of existance, and etc]. Goku also warns the original characters not to expect everything they saw on the anime or read in the manga of Dragon Ball in their world is accurate to what they know actually happened.
  • Additionally in Part 12, Vegeta, using a computer given to him and Goku by Vernon as a welcoming present, he discovers of the Dragon Ball GT franchise, which is considered non-canon to the original characters, and it completely baffles Vegeta, since none of the events depicted in GT have even started happening to them yet, but it does raise alarm bells about some things [the possiblity that the "Black Star Dragonballs" exist, the possiblity of the original Dragonballs overloading on evil energy from the wishes, and especially of the Super Saiya-jin 4 transformation, which has not been attained officially by any of the actual characters yet]. With the knowledge of a possible future in his mind, Vegeta of all people doesn't want to take too many risks, and even more so believes the Super Saiya-jin 4 level is still possible despite thinking like most Real World fans of the series that most of GT is crap and not to be taken seriously.
  • In Part 11, it's also discovered that at least Clint seems to recognize both Nina and Paula as each having thought to have been just 'video-game characters', and accidentally blurts something in Paula's earshot that makes her eventually force him to tell her about the existance of the EarthBound video game, and of the events it depicts. Paula is at the least a bit surprised.
  • In Part 12 it's also believed Clint ends up revealing of a similar amount of knowledge on Nina, and tells her he had also seen her story somewhat told in a video game (Breath of Fire 2) as well. Nina is also pretty shocked to know about this.
    • This also means that Clint is now aware of the possibilty he and the others may or may not one day meet the other characters [or villains] of Paula and Nina's worlds/lives, and fears Giygas specfically will return and cause problems or worse for him and everyone else, even leading to him having a nightmarish vision of Alex being supposedly possessed by Giygas, leading him to almost become Super Saiya-jin 3 involuntarily in the process.
• Loads and Loads of Characters: In Part 12, it's suggested that the merger has combined hundreds of not thousands of universes into a single mega-universe, so the chances of seeing more popular characters from other mediums is basically all but guaranteed if the story continues anytime soon.
• Master Apprentice Chain: Goku/Vegeta/Piccolo/#17/Mr. Buu > Alex/Jason/Vernon, Radditz > Dan/Teresa, Nina ? Paula [goes either way depending on the situation].
• Mega Crossover: Real Life mixed with Dragon Ball, EarthBound, Gundam Wing, and Breath of Fire? Check.
  • There also seems to be suggestions in Part 12 that the merger has likely merged hundreds of not thousands of various realities and mediums into the same mega-universe, meaning it's likely the crossover-ness has yet to really begin.
• My Kung Fu Is Stronger Than Yours: Oh dear god, the cycle will continue as long as Dragon Ball has any form of impact on the story's direct [which seems to be indefinitely].
• Nakama: Goku, Vegeta, Piccolo, #17, Mr. Buu tend to quite often team up to help Alex, Jason and Vernon learn, being some of the strongest members of the newer Misfits so far.
• New Job Episode: In Part 9, Radditz find a job at a McDonalds not to far away from his current training spot in order to try and raise some money to support the team and their training efforts. It leads to a scene at the end of the part where the rest of the Misfits so far visit Radditz at the McDonalds on his first day, with a few humorous antics. This is placed under this trope name right now since it's unknown if Radditz will end up keeping his job, or discarding it at a latter time due to circumstances.
• Not So Harmless: Oyatsu. In frackin' spades, man. Although in Part 10 when he first appears as a cat, he seems harmless until Dan picks up him and Oyatsu possesses him via direct contact. It's then learned Oyatsu was not only shadowing most of the Misfits since Part 2, but that he's also sown other seeds of discourse, including somehow getting his hands on Goku's original space ship from the Dragonball series' Namek Saga, and starting Rowan on a path of My Kung Fu Is Stronger Than Yours as well, in order to possibly rival the Misfits later on.
• Only the Pure of Heart: The Nimbus or 'Kintoun', restricted to Only the Pure of Heart, as it would be properly called, shows up in Parts 1 and 2, but instead of Goku using it, Paula uses it, sitting on it perfectly, and indicating she is of pure intent [once she learns to finally fly, she stops using it], while Jason tries to get onto it and falls right through in comedic fasion. Alex s challenged to get on it, but Alex flat out admits he's probably not of pure heart or intent and doesn't bother to try.
• Original Character: Many of them. Some of them are Self Inserts of the author and some of his real-life friends, while others are made up altogether.
  • Clint, Alex, Jason, Devin, Vernon, Dusty, Dan and Virgil are the Self Inserts, with Clint being somewhat of an Author Avatar. However all of these characters have faults and are far from Gary Stus [at least at the moment]. In fact, some of them tend to get themselves in over their head in spars and fights at this point, needing to be bailed out by the veteran non-OC characters.
  • Teresa, Rowan, Harry, Morgan and Oyatsu/Ryokucha however are fully Original Characters with no real-life people of basis aside from some archtypes [Rowan, Harry and Morgan are based off types of gang members, Oyatsu is a scheming shapeshifter type, and Teresa is a good-hearted delivery-woman who just wants to help others out and joins the Misfits becauses of it].
• Power Floats: Like in Dragon Ball Ki energy can be used to allow characters to fly.
• Power Levels: Revived extensively in the story compared to DBZ, where Power Levels dropped off the map after the Frieza saga. This is also expanded on by having multiple types of powerlevels, one for ki, another for Magic, another for PK/PSI, and a fourth and unknown type that hasn't been indentified yet. See Ki Attacks above for more information.
  • Also, scouters make a return, first in the form of a scouter Radditz brought back to life with him, and later in the form of the upgraded "OverClocked Scouters", which allow powerlevels of even Super Saiya-jin 3 Goku or a "Kaioken x21" Goku to be accurately scanned [well, depending on the colored-lens and model anyways], and also do not explode like the ones on the original show.
• Practical Joke: Part 5 is devoted to these. First off is Jason and Clint's "voice serum" joke, which ends up giving Alex, Devin and Vernon a Helium Speech moment. Unfortunately for them, Paula is able to sense their location via ki sensory, and punished them via her Frying Pan of Doom for it. Later on in Part 5, it's revealed, Virgil [in his storyline debut] called Alex, Vernon, Devin, Radditz, Steve, Dwayne and Paula through phone-call and impersonated various random individuals, an ACME businessman, an ogre from HFIL, a WWE fan, and finally a newspaper reporter. Virgil is found by them and gets a decent beatdown from everyone with the exceptions of Vernon [who secretly admires Virgil's bravery and would rather kick the crap out of Alex instead of him anyday], and Paula [who actually telekeneticly places Virgil back on his couch at home and gives him half of a sensu bean, but warning him not to pull such a trick again.
  • Dan mentally references a past joke of his in Part 6, remincising on a prank where he put a loaded water-balloon Alex's wheelchair just as Alex is sitting in it, getting pants soaked. Note, this was the previous year before Alex was healed of his Cerebal Palsy when this happened.
• Professional Wrestling: Dwayne and Steve [aka "The Rock" and "Stone Cold Steve Austin" of WWE fame] appear as more main characters in Part 1, meeting Dusty when he's grabbed by the strange portals. The story tends to reference the two in their real-life personas for the most part, in which the two wrestlers are actually best friends, although Part 12 has an actual wrestling event in their honor which shows off some various Wrestling-related bravado on their part, and introduces the real-life counterparts of many other wrestlers. They too are techincally Real Life characters, but like the rest of the Real Life-based cast, learn most of the same Dragon Ball-equse abilities and fighting styles. However as always, they tend to incorporate their own styles into it. When Heero is dismissive of wrestling moves being used in real fights, the two of them as well as Dusty and Devin explain that wrestling moves used on a realistic basis can deal devastating damage to a real opponent [i.e. Dwayne performing a Rock Bottom on an airborne enemy can deal serious neck-damage and possible kill them in one move if used correctly].
  • Also, there's the fact most of the original characters are big-time wrestling fans, although Dusty and Dan are by far two of the biggest fans of the original eight starter characters, to the point Dusty is even seen training with Steve and Dwayne often.
  • Also of course, there's the Gund Arena event in Part 12, which also introduces the main characters to many other wrestlers and even Vince McMahon himself.
• Psychic Powers: In additional to the basic known abilities, there's also the PK/PSI attacks, which are considered psychic energy given form to attack enemies or help others. Paula is the only character right now who can use PK/PSI directly.
  • Additionally, Paula has a somewhat-empathic form of Mind Reading which is automatic and will pick up on the thoughts of various characters if fate deems it so. She cannot usually control this and the people in question are never usually aware she can even hear their thoughts since she is not actively trying to read them when this kicks in. It helps her initally avoid falling for one of Oyatsu's traps in Part 10.
  • Oyastu!Dan also shows some ability to use direct Mind Reading on Radditz in Part 10 as well. It's not known if Oyatsu can do it without possessing someone or not yet.
• Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: And how? So far the majority of the series is centered around the more veteran characters [Goku, Vegeta, Piccolo, etc] training the greenhorn, newer characters [Alex, Clint, Jason, Vernon, etc, etc] and trying to teach them to get along better with one-another, and to not hold back information from each other, and even the veteran characters are being exposed to things they're complete newbies at. The kicker is that according to The Voice in Part 1, a great evil is mobilizing and out to tear the universe itself asunder [or at least we assume], and it's looking likely the daemonlord from the prologue is said 'darkness' the voice is talking about.
  • Hell, the trope name is a near-direct reference to the story's title.
• Readings Are Off the Scale: Done once with Radditz's original scouter in Part 10 when Oyatsu!Dan powers up intentionally to overload it. Averted later in the above explaination under Power Levels with the OverClocked Scouters.
• Reincarnation: So far averted, as Uub [the reincarnation of Majin Buu at the end of DBZ] was suggested to have never appeared according to Goku's exposition of his life to Paula in Part 12. It's unknown if Uub's appearance is just delayed or another example of Fanon Discontinuity between the events of the original Dragon Ball series and the universe of it used in the story.
• Real Life / Real Life Writes the Plot: So far the majority of the story has taken place in the town of Canton, Ohio in the United States. [This is Clint, Alex, Jason, Vernon, Devin, Dusty and Dan's hometown, which is probably the main reason]. Many locations in Canton have been touched upon, including the homes of most of the native characters, and even all three of Clint's houses [the first which is now abandoned and used as a storage place for gangs, the second house which Paula has ironically moved into, and then his current house in the area called Fohl Village]. Also shown is Nina's house, Dan's house, Alex's house [who also has a house next door that Goku and Vegeta have rented out, owned by Alex's Dad], Vernon's house as well is shown.
  • Additionally, the Prologue puts the orginal eight starter characters on a plane bound from California which arrives in Tokyo, Japan [Shibuya-ku ward] which becomes the backdrop for Parts 1 and 2. The Shibuya-ku areas are not 100% accurate to the real life location, but the 4-way scramble crossing called the Shibuya Crossing is featured at the beginning of Part 1.
  • Only during the trips through the mysterious portals so far have characters ended up in non-Real Life locations, like the Dragon Ball universe, and possibly Hell itself to name two.
  • Most importantly to the current revision of the story in terms of real life and it's events, Part 6 of the story is centered around September 11, 2001, from the point of view of the Misfits themselves [the story chronologically started on August 29, 2001, before 9/11 happens]. The story explains how the events of the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and Flight 96 affect both the moral and the determination of the characters to strengthen themselves as to prevent successive disasters and terrorist attacks from happen again, be they from mere terrorists or full blown super-villains like Cell or Frieza alike. Additionally, the story does not try to have the main characters stop the main parts of the tragedy since they had already happened before the characters could try to react, however it adds an additional attack exclusive to the story where two Al-Queda operatives, using Teresa as a cover by threatening her family's lives at the end of explosives, have her try to kill Dan because Oyatsu appeared to them as a forseer, telling them that Dan would join the army in retailation for the main attacks and that with his powers learned from the other veteran fighters that he would singlehandedly bring Al-Queda down. Luckily with help from Paula, Nina, Devin, Dan and Radditz's help, both Al-Queda operatives are taken down, Teresa befriends the Misfits, her family is saved by Radditz and ultimate disaster averted.
• Ring of Power: Nina's "physical" weapon is one of these, called the "Immortal Ring" [according to the on-site bios]. These types of rings are her original type of weapon in Breath of Fire 2 and work by shooting a magic blast similar to a small-medium sized Ki Blast at the enemy. She uses it once in Part 10 to catch an otherwise cloaked Oyatsu!Dan by total surprise, as Nina could still feel Oyatsu!Dan's magicPower Level and he was unaware until then of that shortcoming. Unfortunately it doesn't alone help her escape Oyatsu's trap and only Teresa and #18's intervention save Nina from an ultimate fate a few scenes later.
• Satan: The daemonlord seen in both the Prologue and Part 4 is compared as a creature higher than Satan, and that the original fallen-angel probably does exist in some form, somewhere. Whether we'll ever see Satan, or if the main characters ever meet him is completely unknown at this point.
• Self Insert: In total so far, Clint, Alex, Jason, Vernon, Devin, Dusty, Dan, Virgil, Dwayne, Steve all the teachers and most of the NPC students at Canton South High School and Ted ElFaye are based on real-life versions of themselves, with Clint being additionally a type of Author Avatar, albiet one without Gary Stu qualities. In fact, none of the Self Inserts so far are of any kind of Gary Stu level, each of them having faults and in some characters' cases, rough childhoods or pasts, especially characters like Alex with his former Cerebal Palsy.
• Stat-O-Vision: Scouters and their upgraded "OverClocked" counterparts from Part 10 and beyond.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: According to the Prologue, the mysterious daemonlord in Hell might be this, with "Hell" being the can, but we're not 100% sure as of this point in the story.
• Sinister Silhouettes: The daemonlord first "seen" in the prologue, and later at the end of Part 4 is the main example so far, only his eyes, which completely glow a blood red, can be seen.
  • Additionally, accompanying the daemonlord in his appearance in Part 4 to Dodoria are two other sillhouettes, one of medium size, and one of smaller size. The smaller sized one speaks directly to Dodoria, indicating they know each other from the past, and it's assumed Dodoria can see who the small mystery person is just fine, and that only we can't really see them that well. Go figure.
• Static Stun Gun: One Al-Queda operative in Part 6 uses this to paralyze and restrain Dan, and then Devin a few moments later, rendering them helpless to stop him.
  • Later in Part 10, Oyatsu uses another copy of the same weapon to paralyze and overload #17's systems and knock him out during their fight, revealing #17's weakness to electricity. He also uses it to stun Nina when he can't use the Shrinker gun to shrinker her due to her constant movements to confuse him. She still manages to get a hit on him with a hidden magic blast from her magic ring afterwards though, but it doesn't really help her at that point.
• Super Mode: Super Saiya-jin 1/2/3.
  • Nina's "anger" mode when she nearly kills/strangles Jackson in Part 6, according to Piccolo [although Nina doesn't realize it at the time, and it's not known if Nina's form was just a one-time fluke or not].
  • Devin's "Shadow" powerup he first shows in Part 8, and then Part 10 against Oyatsu!Dan, and then again twice in Part 12, first against Heero, and then against Clint. Unfortunately, most of the time, he loses control of himself and Nina had to intervene once to stop him from almost killing Heero and Dan the first time, and Clint had to force himself to fully achieve Super Saiya-jin 3 to knock Devin out the second time.
• Supernatural Martial Arts: And how? Additionally, Nina and Paula have access to Ki and one other type of "form of power" [Nina = Magic, Paula = PK/PSI], allowing them to meld both into an interesting array of martial arts, although they haven't had many opportunities to use it yet.
• Super-Powered Evil Side: See Nina's mention in Super Mode and Badass above.
  • In Part 8, Devin begins to occasionally show the ability to tap into a strange, but brief mode of power almost like a high-level Kaioken which allows him to pull off a small miracle shot during a spar match with Clint. He still loses as the powerup drains the last of his stamina, but Clint has not missed the potential, especially when said powerup reemerges with more effectiveness in Part 10, and Dan, possessed by Oyatsu, ends up on the receiving end of a nasty shadowy-blade Ki/Magic attack that weakens him temporarily. In Part 12, Devin again falls under the influence of this mode, but this time is out of controll, injuring Heero pretty significantly with one of his attacks and also dealing some decent damage to Dan once again, with Nina having to knock him out from behind to revert him back to normal. He again taps into this power in another spar with Clint, but ends up losing control against when he combines the powerup with a Kaioken x3, forcing Clint to hold off a massive Kamehameha wave in which Clint is forced to fully acheive Super Saiya-jin 3 to ward off and then use to knock Devin out again, before passing out himself due to the limited experience with the new form. It's unknown if the form Devin occasionally slips into will ever be fully controllable, or if it might be a precursor to a major transformation, but Devin, being envious of Clint, Alex, Jason and Vernon for their powerups, is hoping he can still refine it to his ends.
• Team Chef: Dusty seems to be this, as he is often referenced as a good cook, and even works as his school's resturant, the Heritage Room as a job he's had for half his high-school tenure. The story has not actually had anyone eating his food specfically thus far [or identifying any foods he's made specfically], but still, the constant references by both the author and the other characters seem to not be lying.
• Team Title: The original 8 characters at the beginning of the story are sometimes called "The Misfits" in synch with the story title. The title also extends to the later characters who join the group [Goku, Vegeta, Paula, etc, etc]. The title's origin is actually Nina's suggestion for the original eight, since they in their own ways stand out in what seems to be a more 'normal' society in the Real World, Nina for her wings and abnormal height, Clint for his erratic bouts of knowledge, Alex for his former cerbal palsy [he's sometimes more remembered for having a wheelchair than as a normal person], Jason's tendacy to help Alex taunt random high-school students, and the other characters assumabily for other reasons that might not yet be specified.
• The Multiverse: To an extent utilized so far in that the story seems to center around the mergering of multiple universes, including the original real world we live in, the Dragon Ball universe, the Gundam Wing universe, the EarthBound universe, and possibly the Breath of Fire universe. Part 12 goes further and states that some characters think a lot more universes [hundreds to thousands more] might have merged together into one "Super-Universe" or sorts.
• The Reveal: In Part 4, Alex and then later Vernon discover that they are in fact at least part-Saiya-jin after each one achieves the basic Super Saiya-jin transformation, Alex while sparing realistically with Vegeta, and Vernon while sparring realisticly with #17.
  • Part 7 also has a reveal that not only is Jason ALSO at least part-Saiya-jin, but that #17, using his interal scouter/bio-scanner, knew the entire time from the moment he met them that Alex, Jason and Vernon had Saiya-jin DNA in them but chose not to tell them [or anyone else for that matter] for the lawls of everyone's reactions later.
  • Part 6 has a reveal of it's own for Clint, when he's trying to save his friends from the experimental Time Bomb Al-Queda made Teresa wear as a final measure for killing Dan. He unconsciously achieves Super Saiya-jin as well during his upward ascent into the outer atmosphere to throw the bomb harmlessly into space, but after the direct reveal is shown, it's also learned Clint is not Saiya-jin in any known or visible way. #17's scanners, which show the Saiya-jin DNA of Alex, Jason and Vernon, don't show any foreign DNA samples in Clint [aka he's still human as far as the characters are currently concerned], and Clint's hair as an SSJ also has a slight tinge of green. It's not yet known what the deal is with Clint's real heritage, except that he recalls seeing Alex and Vernon become SSJs in Part 5 while waiting with Jason to play their voice-serum prank.
  • Part 10 also does a reveal when Oyatsu possesses Dan's body, and reveals Dan has a small amount of Saiya-jin DNA as well, but not enough to be even a quarter-breed. Nonetheless, he can force Dan as high as Super Saiya-jin 3 (in the span of one Part, even) [as Oyatsu states his presense also works a bit like a Majin powerup or the Mystic Powerup and allows access to more of the person's potential]. On his own to this point, Dan can only comfortably hold SSJ1, and SSJ2 is a good bit strainful on him, and he can't go SSJ3 at all without Oyatsu yet.
• The Voice: In Part 1, when Dusty is thrown through the portals and ends up on Las Vegas and meets Dwayne and Steve, the three of them experience a blackout after a small conversation, and a mysterious voice speaks to them from all around. The voice tells them that the portals that were opening up around and taking most of the original characters to various locations where of a fated intervention, and that they and the people they meet during their trips are destined to become a group of 'heroes' to fend off the 'coming darkness'. The voice also explains the rules of their lives will change and that they can do much more than every imagined, but that also things from their greatest dreams or their worst nightmares might also emerge. After this, Dusty, Dwayne and Steve pass out.
  • Later, the same voice again shows up in a dream Radditz has in mid-Part 6, telling him he must save 'her' and her family, "her" ends up being Teresa, who is being used as a cover-hostage to kill Dan by Al-Queda by threatening to blow her kidnapped family to kingdom-come if she does not comply. Radditz manages to rescue her family and kill the operative guarding them due to the voice. However in the dream, Radditz states he does not just simply trust the voice, suspicious of it leading them into a trap, but the voice tells him about his dead-mother, having died giving birth to Goku/Kakarot, and telling him that he too was not always a good person in his past life. Radditz goes with it for now, but expect the voice will return later, possibly to speak to him or yet another character.
    • There's possible speculation the voice is trying to warn them of the daemonlord from the prologue and Part 4, and some think it could be the unknown brother of the daemonlord who sealed him in Hell trying to guide the characters to defeat or stop the daemonlord.
• Theme Naming: Played up additionally with Oyatsu [Japanese for "Afternoon Tea"], which is grouped in with Oolong and Puar's names [both were supposably Oyatsu's fellow students in their Shapeshifting academy.
  • Oyatsu's other names of "Agari" [a female form's name only mentioned by North Kaio and not yet seen] and "Ryokucha" [the form he used to bargain with Zarbon for Goku's space ship for in a flashback scene] are also puns on types of teas.
• Throwing Off the Disability: Alex lived the majority of his life before the story begins with Cerebal Palsy, a condition which can have a varying level of effect on the mind's capability to manipulate various limbs and also their muscular strengths. In Alex's case, it was his legs that were the most affected. It manifested uglily for him in grade school, causing former friend [now Jerkass] Jackson McCarakins to betray him and try to frame him as a freak, and additionally forcing him to use a wheelchair to get around on extended trips [he could still most of the time walk around (albeit a bunch hunched over) when at home, but got tired easily]. Later on in his life, after Nina arrives to his High-School, she discovers she possesses the curative ability to heal his synapses enough to break the crippling disability from Alex's life once and for all, even though Alex must rehabilite his legs himself in order to truly regain their strength. He is still somewhat in the middle of the rehabilitation process at the beginning of the story, causing his movement speed to be a bit lower than some characters expect, and Vegeta and Goku are aware of it, but they realize he could've been in a far worse situation where he might not have been able to train to fight at all.
• Time Bomb: In Part 6, the Al-Queda operative watching Teresa's forced attempt to kill Dan managed to arm a special experimental bomb attached to her as he kills himself with his own bomb. The bomb is supposed to have a power capable of hitting a 12 mile area with the explosion [a sort of nuke, but with no radiation effects]. Teresa rips it off in defeat, thinking everyone's screwed, but Clint decides to grab it and flies straight up into the sky like a rocket, to the protest of the others, intending to make a Heroic Sacrifice to save his friends. The bomb is armed to detonate in 30 seconds, and the final 10 or so seconds are shown ticking down in the story as Clint suddenly gets a boost to his power and it allows him to both throw the bomb to a safe spot where it won't hurt anyone, and him to clear the explosive radius in time, although it still knocks him out of flight mode and almost gets him killed anyways.
• Training from Hell: Of Course!
  • For an actual example: there's a section of Part 12 where Piccolo uses a Split-Form technique to divide himself into 17 people, 1 being the original with half of Piccolo's normal Power Level, and the other 16 being the other half of Piccolo's Power Level divided roughly among the 16 copies. He proceeds to send 6 of them after Alex, 5 of them after Vernon, and the last 5 after Jason, a training-excerise/punishment in order to test their skills again st multiple opponents of roughly-equal strength [the weakened Piccolo copies are told to put their powerlevels slightly weaker than the other three at their Super Saiya-jin 2 levels for a test]. Except one of the copies that's fighting Alex is extra cruel and mean, and is constantly raising its' power just enough to piss Alex off to the point it gets serious. The offending copy of Piccolo then goes rouge on them all, trying to kill Alex, Jason and Vernon for some unknown reason, forcing Piccolo to knock it out in one quick motion and reintergrate it and the other copies back into his body. So much for five/six-on-one fighting, Piccolo.
• Unstoppable Rage: See Nina's moments above with Jackson in Part 6. [under Badass, Super Mode and Super-Powered Evil Side]
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: Oyatsu exemplifies this trope. He first appears in Part 2 in the quise of a 17-year old boy, and then at the end of the same part turns into a 59-year old elderly woman. Later in Part 6, she again takes on the elderly lady persona, but additionally appears as a type of shadowy wolf/dog-like creature, which also appears in Part 7. In part 7 he also gains the ability to assume the form of one of the slain Al-Queda agents [the one Radditz kills in Part 6], and uses his form to begin a secret war to take out Al-Queda (who Oyatsu has deemed failures after they failed to kill Dan in Part 6, despite opening his eyes to Dan's potential). He later shows up as a Chihuahua in part 9, and also as a Buck in the same part. Then he finally appears as a Black Cat in Part 10, believe to be his true form to date. In all of the above forms [except the Al-queda operative], his eyes are always some glow of orange, although in his cat form, it's more of a yellow-orange glow. This still means he is able to blend in and shadow the main characters since he has an ability that prevents people from sensing any form of mystical energy he possesses, and that he can teleport with Kibitokai's Instanteous Movement ability allowing him to go nearly anywhere he wants. Luckily, his power is also abyssmal in combat unless he has possession of a person [like Dan in Part 10].
• Winged Humanoid: Nina is one of these, being from a different world than Earth, and in a Real Life-like environment, most normal people on the street consider Nina a freak of nature for her wings, and secondarily her height (Nina is 6 feet, 6 inches in the story, well taller than most other people on Earth). She get bonus scorn from most of the students at her friends high-school, the hate being directed by Jackson McCarakins, who has a special place in his black heart for hating her, for some unknown reason. Most of the main characters themselves think Nina's wings are actually pretty cool, and Paula thinks their beautiful.
• Wouldn't Hit a Girl: In part 10, Paula asks Alex if they want to have a small friendly spar to test each other's strength. Alex muses over in his head that he probably shouldn't because his mother drilled it into his head when he was young that he shouldn't physically fight with women. Luckily for him, the problem with Oyatsu diverts Paula's attention before he can answer her question, although there is a possiblity she might have unintentionally overheard his thoughts via her uncontrollable Mind Reading ability, but she hasn't said anything about it.