I began this some time ago, but only recently decided I might like to write it after all. If there's any interest I'll see about pursuing it...
This follows the short story "One Fine Day"; all you really need to know is that it's three years after Buu; and the dragonballs were used recently for one wish, so are out of commission for the next few months.
"Fierce fire reveals true gold."
--Chinese proverb
In the middle of her analysis, Bulma found her thoughts wandering toward the matter of Gohan's wedding, as they had had a tendency of doing ever since she had heard the news two weeks before. While she was not related to the Son family by blood, Goku was one of her oldest and dearest friends, and she had always considered Gohan to be a nephew of sorts. That little Gohan-kun was grown up, was going to be married, even, frankly amazed her. Time truly did fly. At this rate Trunks would be graduating college tomorrow...
She shook her head, attempted to concentrate on her computer. The scanner was running diligently without her attention, feeding a endless stream of numbers across her monitor. The day before Son-kun had appeared with the object currently under investigation. He had found it on one of his frequent jaunts in the wilderness, in a small crater, so he had reported. Recognizing it to be unknown technology--understanding, of course, that Goku's knowledge of technology did not extend much further than coffee-makers--he had brought it to Bulma, assuming she would be able to get more out of it.
So far she hadn't had much success. Judging by the pocked and heat-scarred hull, and the crater, it was extraterrestrial. A small, metal ovoid approximately the size of a football, jammed full of nonsensical gadgets and tiny empty compartments, she guessed it was a probe of some kind, but for what and from where she couldn't say. There was a type of transmitter among its innards, but it seemed to be inactive. Microscopic inspection had yielded a couple of tiny nanite robots inside, possibly for maintenance, also inactive. Currently she was running it through the gamut of electromagnetic spectrographs in hopes of revealing more about its structure and hopefully its purpose.
Not that it was that important, most likely, but it was something to do. Bulma would be the last person to say things were boring; she hadn't any desire to see the world, her friends, or her family in jeopardy ever again. But she hadn't come up with any new inventions for a couple months, Capsule Corporation had just started a new fiscal year and was taking it slow, and everyone hadn't been available for a big party in a while.
The wedding was a welcome event; everyone would be there. Tienshinhan and Chaozu might even come down from whatever mountaintop they were training upon to see Gohan take his vows. She wondered if Piccolo might actually dress for the occasion, and stifled a snicker at the thought of the Namek in a tux. Maybe with a green bowtie.
Hmm, and would she be able to convince Vegeta to don something appropriate? The prince looked positively stunning in a suit...the one and a half times she had managed to get him into one...
The door of the lab slid open and, with perfect timing, the man himself strode in. Bulma smiled brightly at her husband. "I was just thinking of you!"
He glared back at her, suspicious. "Really."
"Oh, don't be that way." She swatted him on the shoulder, not lightly. Lightly and he wouldn't feel it. Actually he wouldn't feel a punch in the jaw from her, but at least she tried. "Would you rather I was thinking of Son-kun?"
Mentioning the only other member of his species was a sure-fire way to make Vegeta bristle. Bulma never tired of the reaction. Before he could explode--and more than figuratively--she said, "Never mind about that. I want you to take a look at this. Son-kun brought it to me yesterday. It's from outer space. Ever seen anything like it?"
Vegeta followed her gesture to the probe. His eyes widened.
Literally flying forward, he kicked the device into the air like the football it resembled. Before it could hit the wall, he raised his hands, palms out, and shouted, "Final Flash!"
A burst of energy shot from his hands, engulfing the probe and obliterating it entirely, along with a good portion of the wall behind it. Bulma blinked away afterimages from the brilliant blast, and lifted her hand to shield her eyes from the orange-tinged sunlight now streaming in from a formerly solid wall. "What the hell? You want to explain?"
Vegeta turned on her. In spite of herself, Bulma almost retreated a step under the intensity of his stare. "You said Kakarotto brought you that thing?" he demanded.
Bulma nodded. "He found it yesterday, out training in the woods somewhere--Vegeta, what the hell is it? Was it, I mean? Why--"
Vegeta was ignoring her. He clenched his teeth as he stood in place, fists closed and mind working furiously behind his lowered brows. "Did he bring it to his house?" he asked finally. "Did anyone else touch it before he brought it to you?"
"No--I don't know--he didn't say. Vegeta, I'm waiting for an explanation here."
"Call him. Find out," her husband ordered imperiously, not paying her the slightest heed.
"Like hell. Not until you spill it."
"Dammit, Bulma, there's no time!"
Bulma's eyes widened. Her name. He must be serious. Without further protest she reached for the lab phone and dialed the Son house, got an answer after five rings. "Hello--"
She didn't get any further. "Bulma-san!" Chichi wailed. "Do you know what happened to him? How could this happen?"
"Chichi?" Bulma was accustomed to Goku's wife's bouts of hysteria, but there was a note in her voice now that she hadn't heard before, a true fear different from her furious panic attacks. "What's this, what happened? Is Son-kun there?"
Vegeta's head was cocked, listening intently to as much of the conversation as he could make out.
At her husband's name, Chichi sobbed incoherently. Bulma tried without success to calm her, until at last a new voice came over the line. "Bulma-san?"
"Goten-kun," Bulma replied with relief. "Can you tell me what's the matter?"
"It's...it's Otousan. He...he left. Before dinner was done. He flew away." There was a brief pause, then, "He broke the roof. And the table. 'Kaasan's really upset."
Bulma had noted as much already. She was starting to grasp the reasons. Goku leaving a meal unfinished...and breaking things. If he'd done so on purpose, that definitely was abnormal behavior. "Do you know where your otousan is now, Goten-kun?"
"No. He's not around here. I can't sense him."
He was frightened, too, Bulma heard in his voice. A kid who had faced down one of the original monsters of the universe with pure enthusiasm, but Goten was still a kid, all the same. Whatever Goku had done had scared his son. And that was even more out of character for Son-kun. "Goten, is your brother there?"
"He's with Videl. On a date." It was a measure of how upset Goten was that he didn't get so much as a disdainful tone at the mention of his brother's tryst.
"All right. If you can, contact him, tell him what's wrong. I'm going to come over and see what I can do."
She hung up, and looked up from the phone to find Vegeta watching her. "Be careful," he said.
"Oh, no, you're coming with me. If something's happened to Son-kun, we might need you."
"No." The refusal was flat, but his eyes on her were fiercely dark and full of import. "Be careful," he repeated, and cupped her cheek for an instant with one gloved hand. Just as swiftly he pulled away and threw back his head, rising into the air.
"Wait--" she began, but he shot through the hole in the domed wall and vanished into the twilit sky.
Bulma sighed. "Where are you going?" she asked the empty room. With a final look at the console where the now-obliterated probe had rested not half an hour before, she stuck her hands in her pockets in search of the capsule with her aircar.
High overhead, he hovered, watching, his ki lowered below the limits of perception, his body hidden within the cool, pale wisps of a cloud. In the bright moonlight he observed a silhouette slipping over the world, an arrow rushing in straight flight just over the treetops, swooping over the mountains, intent on its destination. It flamed with unconcealed power, too focused to slow down or control its strength. Desperation in that flight. Fear. Concern.
Familiarity in the aura. Kinship. Gohan.
Son. Mine.
A part of him wanted to fly down, join his flight, greet him.
Another part knew he should not, could not afford it. Danger. Too dangerous to try.
Attack. Preemptive strike, before he himself was attacked--
But he would not--they had fought. The memory pulsed through his limbs, strike him, struck in return, rhythm of combat, duel until one faltered, one fell--
Not duel, a spar--a game, not real. Was anything real? He couldn't tell. The world wavered like a heat mirage over a tar road. He could feel the stars burning overhead, small suns, fires casting off embers, stinging his skin. He beat at them, tiny prickles, bites of invisible insects. Sweat beaded on his forehead.
Control lost, he tumbled from the cloud. Gohan was gone over the horizon, air rippling in the wake of his speed. He caught himself on the wind and tried to think, staring over the dark mountains.
That way lay home. Follow him. Safety, love--danger. His danger, the danger in him. What was wrong with him?
Thoughts flitted, moth-like, alighting here and there and then gone once more. He could reach out and catch the world between his fingers, it was that small, but when he tried it towered over him, reached down to pluck him up instead.
He was spinning as he fell again, or maybe the land below was turning. Around and around, as Bulma had tried once to explain to him, why the sun set, because it was on one side and then the other. He hadn't really understood until he had gone up in space and seen the globe for what it was, a ball rolling half in sun and half in shadow, wrapped by a blanket of stars. The stars were at his feet now, and he was diving up, toward the peak of the black mountain hanging down from the ceiling of the earth. Like a stalactite, and the cavern was the land and sky, and the land called to him, pulled him to its bosom, mound of stone and tree.
He was close enough to see the grain of the mountain, ripples of dirt and pebbles like some fantastic thick pudding, and then he was stopped. Hands grabbing him from behind jerked him to a halt, his head only a few feet from the sharp-edged rock. He was roughly twisted over, until the sky was overhead and the ground at his feet.
He fought, furious but without direction, only flailing his limbs against the powerful grip until he broke free and whirled toward his assailant.
Who was no longer behind him. A rustle above alerted him. As a figure dropped with preternatural speed, he dodged to the side, then shot forward, his fist clipping his attacker across the jaw before he could block.
"K'so!" the shadowed one snarled, and he should have known that voice--but there was no ki to match, or almost none, power forced so low he seemed a hole, a blank space in the pattern of life.
He charged again, but this time his enemy swerved out of his path, spinning to kick him in the small of his back as he passed. Thrown down by the blow, it took him an instant to twist around, and then the dark attacker was upon him, locking his arms behind him.
"Stop fighting me, Kakarotto!" the familiar stranger commanded, and such was the force in his voice that he automatically obeyed, freezing.
The hold relaxed, ever so slightly, and before it could tighten again he bucked and threw his enemy off, followed with a wild punch that scored. The stranger flew back, then halted in midair, bruised jaw set in rage. "I should've let you break your damn-fool head," he growled, "saved me the trouble."
So saying, the man rocketed forward, and he soared forth to meet him. The fight boiled in his blood, the need, the liberation of battle clearing away the smoke and shadows in his mind. With his opponent to focus upon he could clarify himself, ignoring the world's confusion while he concentrated on the fight. The fire raged, hotter now, but internal, no longer blistering his skin but quickening his blood. He punched, kicked, the tempo of the impacts restoring some order. With every blow that smashed through his enemy's defenses, he heard a grunt of suppressed pain, and grinned.
"Too strong," he heard the other gasp, "too fast, chikusho, there's no choice--!"
Then the shadows were gone as the man's ki flamed, light like the sun's flooding the night. Crested hair became yellow fire, eyes blue coals. The attacks, already too quick to see, became too fast to perceive at all, and he was pummeled back, unable to counter, unable to even move, his arms crossed over his head in a vain shield against the assault.
He could not lose, not to him, not to any, could not lose ever, a mantra in his blood, his bones, deeper than any conscious thought. Enraged, he retaliated instinctively. His own ki shot up to match his attacker's power, transmuting iron to gold.
Then he screamed, and blacked out.
The agony faded slowly, waves of molten magma washing his nerves, slowly retreating. Air blew cool against his face, his arms. He opened his eyes to find himself flying, barren gray landscape passing beneath him, hanging in another's firm grasp.
But he sensed no ki, or almost none, that same strained concealment. He twisted up to see who supported him, felt the grip tighten painfully. No golden glow, hair and eyes black again. He should know that face glaring down at him.
Memories slipped, cartwheeled, leaves caught in a rapid brook. The earth below them was pocked like a rotted fruit, eaten away by maggots. He couldn't touch it, though it looked so close. He tensed to fight, to free himself from that fierce hold, to free his mind from the confusion bending all thought.
"Don't."
He hesitated, remembering torture...but he must fight, put the pain aside as the battle demanded.
"Don't fight now. Listen to me, Kakarotto. Even you cannot fight this. I will battle for you. Trust me."
Abandon a fight for another in his stead...rarely could he do so; there were so very few he could accept in his place, and know the fight would still be won. They were always so important, his fights, not the spars but the true battles. So much determined by success, so very much to protect.
Exhaustion dragged at him, carried on the pain still flooding him, diminished but yet powerful. In sleep there would be no pain, no fighting, no dreams...that didn't make sense. But he was awake, eyes open, and the land passing beneath him was a dreamscape, empty but mutable, changing color with the sky. If he dreamed when awake, perhaps in sleep he would have none.
He could break free, fight back; there was enough strength in him yet for that. But there was no need, not anymore. Not when he finally realized who held him, carried him with such brutal, determined strength.
Battle entrusted to another, he slept.
Shall I continue?