#18 watched Gohan's expression become unreadable for a few moments, raising an eyebrow at him.

"Was there something else you wanted to tell me?" She asked him.

He visibly struggled with himself, but finally took a deep breath.

"There was."

"Alright." #18, wondering what it could be, crossed her arms. "What is it?"

"You remember Trunks, right? The one that fought with a sword?"

#18 had to think about it for a few moments, but nodded, faintly remembering the time-traveling Saiyan.

"The one from the future, right?" She asked for clarification, pulling a loose strand of hair behind her ear as he nodded stiffly. "What about him?"

"That Trunks, he had come three years before you fought him, to warn us about Dr. Gero making the androids, about him making... YOU." Gohan explained, careful with his words. "When that happened, Bulma said it would be easier for everyone, if we just used the dragon balls to stop him from making them, or at least to let us know where to find him to stop him. But... We decided we didn't want to do that."

#18's eyebrows furrowed in surprise and confusion.

"What?" She asked.

"We knew exactly what would happen, how he would make you and #17 appear, and attack people."

"And ALL of you just did... NOTHING?" She exclaimed, eyes wide.

Her bafflement and shock at this knowledge was palpable, but seconds later, her body's programming kicked in, and her emotions were neutralized to the desired point.

The guilt in Gohan's expression remained clear, regardless, as he saw her expression mete out to become blank.

He sighed.

"At the time, my father and Vegeta both decided they wanted to fight you two. Vegeta even threatened to kill anyone who tried to get in the way of it, and Dad... He just wanted to fight you. After that, we trained for years so we could be strong enough to stop you, when you appeared."

#18 looked down, frustration at her programming growing as she held her head.

With the initial shock forcibly driven away, what began welling up inside her became outrage and anger.

"Everyone wanted to fight someone stronger, for their own reasons. So we decided to let it happen. We all trained as hard as we could from then on, but it wasn't enough when the time came. We could've prevented ALL of this, prevented you from being changed. And... I'm sorry that that's how it ended up being, #18. If I had known what was going to happen, how much this entire situation would escalate... I don't know what I would've done."

He looked down, thinking on how, when given to a group vote between all of them, the day Trunks had warned them, everyone collectively decided to let the androids be made, as opposed to preventing it outright.

Even Krillin had been on board with it, convincing Bulma that, given Vegeta's loyalties being nonexistent, it would be better to let the androids come to exist than have him around as a loose cannon.

"I still wish I had done SOMETHING to prevent all of this from happening. I'm sorry that I didn't do more, #18."

#18 looked to him, hands lowering to her lap, clenching them into fists.

"Gohan. You were SEVEN, when this happened." She told him firmly. "SEVEN. With a group of what I'm guessing is five grown men and Piccolo all voting to have us be made. The only reason this happened to me, ANY of the things happening now are happening, is on them."

"It's not just that." Gohan said, breathing a sigh. "Do you remember the people I mentored before? Those kids are involved in it too. They were targeted and turned into androids, just like you were. It's because I trained them in the first place - he targeted them because they were stronger than the average person, but not as strong as most of the others."

She gazed at him for a moment, before rubbing her forehead.

"Why did Gero have to start all this?" She muttered to herself, before looking to Gohan. "I'm glad you finally told me about this. But why wait until now?"

"I saw how much being an android hurt you. I /wanted/ to tell you the truth, but... I didn't know how to go about it. Knowing I could've prevented you from being turned into what you are now, I regret not doing more."

#18 looked to her hand, eyes narrowing as she concentrated energy into her palm, before letting it dissipate.

"And the fact that the dragon balls can't fix it just makes it worse." She sighed. "They could've used them to prevent us from being changed like this to begin with."

She looked to Gohan again.

"All the things you've been going through? It's not something anyone your age should care about." #18 told him. "Most people would be worried about the future, making a living for themselves. You had to grow up a lot faster than you should've. But even if that's the case, it's the kind of world we live in. The only bright side is that you're not alone in this."

"I know I'm not."

"Good. Then you'd understand when I say I'm getting involved in this as well. You've already fought today." #18 said, gaze trailing over the bruises covering his body, and his broken nose. "For now, you can leave it to us."

"But... Should I really...?"

"Rest for now." #18 told him. "All of us, you included, have been living with shunting responsibility on you. But we have powers too. It's about time we used them. You try to recover for now. I need some time to myself anyways, to clear my head."

Gohan gave a surprised look, but understood nonetheless.

"I'll head up to the Lookout for now, see if there's anything that I can do about this." #18 rose to her feet. "I need to get ready first though."

Gohan looked as she stepped to his side, grasping his shoulder, looking at her.

"I'm not angry at you for this." She shook her head. "I'm angry at so many people being hurt and killed over an old man's grudge, and even more so at the others for letting it happen. So I'm going to take a page from your book: I'm going to put that anger to good use."

"Okay. Just... Don't let the anger blind you." Gohan replied.

She managed a smile.

"Of course I won't." She rubbed his shoulder, then walked off to their room.

There was a general sense of hardened purpose in #18's mind as she went about getting into proper clothing for a fight.

A roll of binding cloth in hand, she wrapped it around her bust to flatten it, though the residual pains inside them remained, her soon going about putting on a track suit, zipping it up and breathing a sigh.

"Now to deal with this nonsense." #18 turned, walking out of the room, looking to Gohan as she walked by. "I'll see you later on. I'll be going to the Lookout for now."

"If you're sure." Gohan nodded.

She stepped closer, giving him a brief hug, then pulling away, the android soon stepping outside and flying off into the night sky.

Videl sat on a bench inside the department as she looked out the window, at all of the news feeds covering the aftermath of the attack on the police department.

There was the cacophonous cluster of ambulance and fire truck sirens out there, the rapidly flashing lights making it all a cluster of bright red.

The injured, but still breathing, policemen were taken off to go to the hospital at that moment, while a forensics group went about surveying the damage.

It was something she was all too used to, though the fact that there wasn't anyone questioning her on what happened was something that made her feel off, as she looked at the people around her.

It was only when she suddenly felt an energy appear, seemingly out of thin air, that she found herself looking up in surprise towards the cells.

She was unsure if it was a gut feeling or something else that warned her, but she waved for the EMTs' attention.

"There might be another one in the back." Videl warned. "I need all of you to hurry, if you can."

As she said this, she suddenly felt the energy starting to rise, and she looked in the energy's direction, hesitating, before running towards the back, concentrating her ki into her body as she neared the cells.

She stopped immediately upon finding the sight that would greet her.

"W-What?!" She asked, baffled.

A humanoid blue bug with black armor platings around its chest, upper stomach and shins stood before her, the creature standing over the corpses of the gang members she'd spent so long fighting.

"Energy readings were unsatisfactory for evolution." He said, glancing towards Videl.

The spitting image of Cell, the one key difference, beyond the color scheme, was the large tail protruding out of its waist, sucking up the organs of the ki-using youths and draining them to a husk.

It stared at her blankly for but a moment, before its purple eyes narrowed.

"Specimen: Videl Satan. Power Level is satisfactory. Physical endurance is sufficient."

"Who are you?" She asked, taking up a fighting position, only for the creature to be before her in the time it took for her to blink.

"New Objective created." It said, before grasping her roughly by the shoulders, disappearing from the room, leaving only the drained corpses it left in its wake.

A/N: Finally updated this after so many months... I hate writer's block.

Hopefully I still have all of your interest in this.

I'll try abstaining from long paused in updating this thing, though I have college, so that's a thing.

Now that the Broly movie's finally out, I'll just explain Broly's appearance this way: It's established in the game Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 that the movies of the Z era generally took place in alternate timelines than the main ones.

While things like GT get to still be canon, from that explanation, by conveniently undercutting any arguments over whether GT can count as canon or not, this being an AU, I take it to be that this is an alternate timeline as well, wherein Z Broly was the one that existed in this universe as opposed to Super Broly.

Super Broly did not deserve the fate this story's Broly got.

It also conveniently gives me breathing room to not have to change the entire backstory of this current arc to fit canon better.