Tourniquet Divine

Dragon Ball Z
Tourniquet Divine


Chapter Opening:

Welcome to the second installment of Tourniquet Divine. So now we know that Goku, Vegeta, Raditz and Napa are all dead, killed on earth at the hands of Frieza, and Chichi died later as a result of a terrible disease. So after going through all this crap at such a young age, what’s going to happen to Gohan now?

Chapter 2: Don’t Stay


3 Years Later…

Gohan and his friends, Haru, and Rowdy ran through the dark alleyways of the city. Far behind them the frustrated grunts of chasers who could not keep up could be heard. The three boys looked at each other and laughed as they made away with several bags of supplies. Enough to last everyone back home several days if they were lucky.

They stopped to hide until they were sure their pursuers gave up. Haru gave the all clear sign after about ten minutes passed. “Who would have thought the Moratzos would have such a big stash? They could feed the city with all that they got and now they’re pissed at us for taking six bags, ha!”

“Makes sense,” Rowdy nodded, “Every Moratzo I’ve ever met is a stingy galoot who won’t spend a cent on something if he could cheat you out of it instead!”

“Well we showed them it doesn’t pay to be greedy!” Gohan smirked.

The three checked to make sure no one was following or watching them one more time before slipping into another alleyway. There was a staircase that led down to a basement door. Haru knocked twice, paused, knocked five times, paused, and knocked once more. The door opened and the three greeted the door guard as they brought their supplies in.

Inside were a few more steps down, and then it opened into a huge room that resembled something of a warehouse. There was a smelly haze over the room, and a faint music playing in the background. The room was large, but there were dozens of people in it, mostly sprawled out on cots and sleeping bags set up along the greater part of the floor area. No one in the room looked to be older than early-twenties.

The three boys took their goods to somewhat of a gathering place in the center of the room where there was a table stand, and several seats. “We bring food!” Haru announced. Many heads perked up as they got up to investigate and huddle around the three, “Enough rice and grain for at least the next three days!” The crowd lightly cheered.

The three who brought the food took their bowls first and went to go sit as everyone was helped to their servings. Haru finished his plates and slid them back over to the stack by the food servers. He flashed them a smile as they glared at him before he lit up a cigarette. He offered one to Gohan and Rowdy who each took one appreciatively.

Gohan remembered when he first joined the Rogues how awful he thought it smelled down here, the overcrowded musky room with a constant cloud of smoked up lung hanging just under the dim lights. Now though, it was just a way to forget about the crappy outside world, or the crappy past…

An older boy took a seat next to Haru, “Pretty good work you guys.” He was smoking one of those “special” cigarettes.

“Thanks Kouji,” Haru exhaled as he waited for Kouji’s next statement. Kouji never came by to just congratulate them. After all, Gohan, Rowdy and himself were the elite of their group, they had the best success record of any other team in the Rouges.

“You know,” Kouji started, “The boys were talking, and seeing how we’re as settled in as we’re gonna need to be for the next week or so, we came up with the ultimate challenge! The break that could push you guys from the best to legendary!”

Haru shook his head, this was going to be interesting. Kouji and the others always got weird ideas when they were high. “So you gonna tell us?”

Kouji laughed a high pitched shriek sound, “Damn… OK check this out. What if you guys were to break into that Cold development plant! Steal some cool shit from them and bring it back!” Kouji broke into another fit of laughter.

“You mean the Capsule Corp?” Rowdy stared at Kouji wide eyed as Kouji was still laughing. “Dude that’s an official area! The Cold guards would slaughter our asses if they found us!” This only caused Kouji to laugh harder.

Haru was about to protest for Rowdy’s sake when Gohan spoke up, “I say we do it!” He finished his cigarette and stood, putting it out under his boot. “The normal stuff is starting to get stale,” he honestly felt the local gangs were becoming almost too easy for him. Something inside him craved the challenge.

Kouji laughed some more before leaving, “Break a leg you guys, we’ll be waiting to see some cool shit!”

After he left Rowdy stared at Gohan confused, “Do you really think we can pull this off?”

Gohan smirked and nodded, “We’ve proved we can outsmart just about everyone else, I don’t see why not.”

“The biggest problem is if we get caught… we’d have no chance in hell of outrunning those guys… I’ve seen those guards in action, they are fast!” Haru thought out loud.

Gohan shook off some of the thirst that had plagued him to accept earlier, “So you really think doing this would be a bad idea?”

“I didn’t say that…” Haru announced, “We just better not get caught.” Haru got up and lead the other two over to a table by his cot. He casually tossed everything from the small table onto the floor and took out a large sheet of paper and a pencil. “OK, First thing we need to do is gather info, best thing to do is probably take the Dome Train to West City. We’ll spend a day scoping the place out, figure out when guards shift, how long guard shifts are and so on.” Haru was a good planner; he drew out the basic idea first and left room for all the variables they would come across. “I’m sure they have to have pretty high tech security come on at night in the labs, so we’ll have to get in between the time people leave and the security comes on. That doesn’t leave us with a lot of time… and we have our identities to worry about too you know…”

The others looked at him confused, “What do you mean Haru?”

“Well think about it. Whenever we steal from other gangs, they know it’s us, but there’s still nothing they can really do about it. On the streets we take pride in acclaiming what gangs we’ve beaten. But this is different. If we steal from the Cold armies, and they pin it on us… They’ll hunt us down wherever we go. But! If we make it seem like industrial espionage from one of their rival developers, they’ll never know where to look…”

“Wow! That’s a good idea Haru!” Rowdy stared at Haru’s schematic for a moment, “And how do we do that?”

Haru chuckled, “We pull out all the stops, wear your clean gloves and boots, We don’t want to leave anything that could even link back to this city! The other thing we have to do is be careful to steal something only kinda important. If we take something worthless they’ll know it was petty theft, but if we take something too valuable they may even shut the dome train down and we’ll never make it back home.”

“So pretty much we make this a three day event,” Gohan punched a fist into the palm of his other hand.

“We hitch a ride tomorrow then, agreed?” The other two nodded to Haru’s question. “Alright then, we should take a train as early as possible to avoid suspicion right off the bat. It’s the shady characters who ride the later trains.” Haru grinned.

“You know… this was sounding like a lot of fun until the get up early part…” Rowdy pouted.

The three went to bed almost immediately after, even though they were hardly able to sleep. Haru’s alarm went off five hours later and he dragged Gohan and Rowdy out of their cots. “Come on you guys, you can sleep on the train if you’re that tired!” A couple people around them groaned for being woken up so early. The place was never as calm as it was at five in the morning.

The three boys waved through the door guard and left the Rogue’s shelter. It was nearly five thirty when they joined the line for the six o’clock dome train. The Dome Train was like any other electric train, except its entire track was enclosed in an airtight dome like structure that allowed the train to pass cargo and passengers through inhospitable areas of the planet still radiated from the war ten years ago. Fortunately travel by dome train was free, but usually very crowded.

As soon as they boarded the train, Rowdy climbed onto an open seat, pulled his hat over his eyes and dozed back to sleep. Haru and Gohan stared silently out the window as the train drove on. The land just miles outside the city was so barren, there were only twigs of what trees used to be there. It made Gohan wonder what this place used to look like before everything that had happened. He quickly changed his train of thought as he realized there was no smoking on the train so that wouldn’t be an option to pull himself out of a self imposed funk.

The ride between Cold Capitol and Old West City was a good five hours. Rowdy didn’t wake up till about another three hours into the trip. The train pulled in to the station on time, and the three boys blended into the departing crowd as best they could.

Haru already had a map of where the Capsule Corp was. The three leisurely walked in that direction to get their first glimpse of the building. A huge plot of land, surrounded by a tall wall… The building was a dull yellow, and had several large domed areas connected to it.

“Let’s see what else is in the area…” Haru lead the team off past Capsule Corp. The complex itself looked as if it used to be right in the middle of town, but a lot had happened over the last several years. Most of the surrounding buildings were all boarded up and abandoned… which suited them perfectly. They found the tallest nearby building, snuck around behind it, scaled the side, and broke into the attic area.

Rowdy immediately coughed from the dust they kicked up. “Get over it, this is home for the next few days,” Haru kicked a shutter out of place to get a better look at Capsule Corp.

Rowdy hacked, “I’d say this place hasn’t been home for at least three years!” he pinched his nose and waved his hand as he examined the covered stored goods. There was some old furniture, plenty of boxes of junk, all covered by several layers of a fine white dirt.

Haru had already cleared some table space and was taking notes of the building layout across the street. Gohan finally yawned realizing he hadn’t slept much the night before, and stole one of Haru’s cigarettes as he helped him watch for anything interesting from their target.

Rowdy popped up from behind them looking through the space in the shutters with a huge pair of binoculars. Haru stared at him, “Where’d you get those?”

Rowdy looked up at him, “From one of those boxes, pretty cool huh? There’s a lot of cool stuff left up here!” The other two took a look behind them and noticed the mess Rowdy had already made going through the left over junk.

“Gimme that!” Haru said as he swiped the binoculars from Rowdy and looked through as well.

“Fine! Don’t say please!” Rowdy said as he used his pickpocket skills to snatch Haru’s cigarettes and lighter.

Haru’s face twitched in frustration, but he didn’t say anything. “Lot of people down there right now... Guards all look real stiff… and those scientist guys… a lot of those short ugly green warty frog lookin ones. I’ll keep watchin from here. Gohan, when it gets darker, I want you to scout the wall and see if you can find the easiest way into the grounds. Rowdy, till then I want you to go hit up some local markets and bring back some food.”

Rowdy groaned as he walked toward their exit, “Give me the shitty jobs, right…”

“You got fast hands, now get going!” Haru ordered. “And don’t forget to replace my stoges!”

Gohan chuckled at his friend’s antics as he puffed on the cigarette hanging from his mouth. He couldn’t help but keep staring at the Capsule Corp building across the distance. There was something ominous about the whole thing to him… a creepy feeling like a twinge that kept crawling up his spine.

Gohan felt things every now and then… But really couldn’t place this with any of his normal feelings. Like he had kind of a danger sense that would start somewhere in the pit of his stomach and work its way into pulling at his mind in the direction of trouble. But this was different, and he wasn’t sure what to make of it.

“You OK Gohan?” Haru asked without putting the binoculars down.

Gohan exhaled deeply, “Yeah.”

“You’re being unusually quiet, and I mean quieter than normal, what’s going on? You’re not having any doubts about this are you? Cause it’s not like it’d be a tragedy to turn back now.”

“No, it’s cool,” Gohan found something to put his cigarette out in, “I’m just thinking is all.”

“Try not to think too hard Gohan, you tend to get all funky whenever you do that.”

“Sorry, can’t help it sometimes.” Gohan wished he knew what was up himself. A part of him was actually calm, but another part was craving to finish and go home.

“Do you feel anything weird?” Haru had long since learned to trust the sixth sense Gohan had when it came to picking up danger.

“Not really… Well… nothing I can’t see down there with my eyes… but…”

Haru put the binoculars down and looked over to Gohan, “But what?”

“I just feel like… I don’t know it’s weird… I can’t recognize it… but this all feels familiar, but I’m not at ease… My head just feels weird,” Gohan rubbed his temple trying to sort out his senses.

“I want you to be extra careful Gohan, this isn’t worth anyone getting hurt over, so if you see anything unusual going on, just give the word and we’ll pull out.”

Gohan nodded and they continued their watch.

Once the sun was setting Gohan climbed down from the building and began his search around the complex for an easy wall to scale. The wall looked amazingly smooth all the way across, almost impossible to climb. After nearly an hour of snooping around the bushes and examining wall height at different intervals, Gohan found the edge he was looking for. It was nearly hidden behind a tall shrub, but Gohan’s eyes made it out. There was an indent in the wall almost at eyelevel. Gohan felt it; it seemed wide enough to jam his foot in for a little leverage. Gohan decided to give it a try and jumped at it, kicking up at it and pushing himself up to the top of the he was able to grab onto and slowly pull his head over the top.

Gohan noticed this side of the complex was dark at this time of night, practically no artificial light at all. What was more is he spotted a stack of empty wooden crates just a few meters away from where he was; the kind which could be easily stacked to make for their escape route back up the wall from the inside.

Gohan made a quick mental note of his position before dropping back into the shrubs below and snaking away from the building. On his way back, Gohan encountered their next problem, this area seemed to have strict martial law enforcers. Several hover tanks floated up and down the street. Gohan had to wait for nearly another hour before things cleared up enough for him to sneak back across to where he and the others were staying.

Gohan quickly climbed back up to tell his friends of his discovery. Haru was still keeping watch over the Capsule Corp complex, while Rowdy sat in the corner eating a few of the fruits he’d brought back. Gohan pulled an apple out of Rowdy’s sack and sat by Haru, “I think I found something that will work.”

“Good,” Haru still didn’t look away from whatever had his attention, “Where is it?”

“Eastern side of the complex, there’s a dent in the wall that gives enough leverage to kick off of and grab the top of the wall. And it’s actually not to far from a dump site for their empty crates which we could use to get out.” Gohan reported.

With his eyes closed and his mouth stuffed Rowdy couldn’t help but comment, “You spent all that time and found a dent?”

Gohan glared at Rowdy, “Like I said, it was flat enough to use to climb the wall.”

“Great, that should work nicely then,” Haru put the binoculars down to pick up his pencil and write more on his notes.

Gohan looked them over and was surprised as to how much detail Haru was putting into this one, “OK Gohan, can you point out where it is you found a way in?”

Gohan pointed a spot on Haru’s map, “There, and right there is the crate dump. There’s hardly any light there either, while I was there you could hardly see anything in the yard at that end.”

Haru chuckled, “This is falling into place almost too well, eh guys?” Rowdy almost choked on a seed until he hit his chest a few times and forced his throat to swallow it.

“Don’t jinx us, please Haru!” Rowdy said after he cleared his throat.

Haru winked at him, “Nah, from the looks of things, you’d practically expect them to think that people are gonna be too scared to try what we’re doing. Cause if this is an example of their daily rituals and habits here, we should be able to plan around it fairly easily.”

“Well as long as you’re confident I guess,” Rowdy shrugged and finished a few more bits of food.

Gohan couldn’t help but continue to stare at the building. He could nearly swear he felt something coming from it, but at the same time he couldn’t sense anything from it… It was really confusing to him.

The next day went fairly similar. Haru finally slept after monitoring the building nearly the entire day before. The other two knew that he’d be at it all over again once he woke up later. Rowdy managed to get his hands on a few more supplies that morning and tore through a few boxes to find enough to have a suitable breakfast.

Once they were done eating, Gohan decided to grab the binoculars and have a look at the window. The hair on the back of his neck immediately stood on edge as he looked through a window in the Capsule Corp building. It was only for a brief moment, and Gohan wasn’t even sure if he really saw it… But he could have sworn he saw someone’s shadow. The only thing was the shadow was of a human like person with a tail, a tail like his own which he still kept well hidden around his waist.

Gohan rubbed his eyes and tried looking through the window again. He stared harder but didn’t see anything else. It was several minutes later when he was poked in the ribs and he actually jumped with a start, “What perked your interest?” Haru asked rubbing some sleep from his eyes.

“Nothing!” Gohan stuttered almost immediately, and regretted it for sounding so obvious.

“This is serious Gohan, what did you see?” Haru asked about to take the binoculars from him.

Gohan sighed as he looked out the window again, “I thought… I thought I saw someone in one of the windows over there…”

“Aaaaand?” Haru pushed.

“It looked for a second like the person had a tail…” Gohan passed the binoculars back to Haru.

“Yeah… some aliens have tails you know.” Rowdy chirped in.

Gohan shook his head, “No, it was a certain kind of tail… but you’re probably right… never mind about it.”

“A certain kind of tail?” Rowdy looked over to Haru and shrugged, “What’s the difference between one tail or another?”

“Nothing…” Gohan muttered and sat in the corner.

Hours passed by, and Haru slowed with his note taking apparently almost done. As the sun was setting Haru startled everyone with his sudden light shout, “Now!” Gohan and Rowdy looked at him funny, “Yes… yes… yes…” He kept watching through those binoculars. “Just like yesterday, it’s habit forming alright!” After another few minutes he turned back to his friends, “This is the time we move, tomorrow.”

Haru slid the table with his notes over between the three of them. “OK, at precisely seventeen minutes ago tomorrow, we will be waiting at the wall here that has the notch in the wall Gohan found to climb up.” Haru pointed to the spot on his schematic, “We will climb up, and as soon as we’re on the other side, Rowdy it will be your duty to grab some boxes to stack quickly to make our escape. Remember to work as fast but as quiet as possible. Once inside the complex, our easiest way in is probably going to be the window to the main building here on the eastern side,” Haru pointed to that on his drawing also. “Gohan, you’re in charge of breaking the window with as little force as possible. As long as we don’t draw any attention we should have nearly twenty minutes before the sensors come on. That should be plenty of time to get in, grab something, and get back out. Rowdy, once you’re done with boxing our escape route, you need to stand by at the window entrance, try removing excess glass from the window frame, especially from the bottom in case we need to use it as leverage to climb back out. You’ll also keep watch for any guards walking around the outside to make sure we don’t give ourselves away in running back to the fence.” Haru looked over his work, “That should just about do it, don’t you think?”

“Sure…” Rowdy looked at the plan dizzily.

“We don’t want to grab anything too important, so that shouldn’t take too long to find and drag back out,” Gohan pointed out, “It should be just the time we need…”

“With a little luck, should be,” Haru rolled his papers back up. “Just be ready for it tomorrow.”

The others nodded and soon went to bed.


The more Gohan thought about it the more eerie the whole thing was to him. The strange feelings his senses were picking up on just looking at that building, and then he kept replaying the image of the silhouette he saw through the window. He felt like he was going crazy since he wasn’t even sure if he saw it, yet it was haunting him so much. His own tail twitched. Was it the rounded tip that seemed to make it look so much like his own… It was only a shadow so how could he be sure it was a tail like his if it was a tail at all? Gohan shook it off as paranoia, he’d never seen anyone with a tail like his before. But then he always hid his… so who was to say there weren’t other people like him who hid their tails from sight also. Always one of those questions that plagued his mind, why was he special? Why did he have a tail when no one else did. He always had to be so careful when bathing that no one saw him or they’d see his tail. But at the same time, he’d seen enough people to realize having a tail was far from common. He tried shaking his head of the images that were keeping him from sleep, but it was hard sometimes.

Gohan also realized his tail was more like a symbol of his many differences from his friends. His mother had shown him long ago he was stronger and faster than most humans could ever hope to be, and he had to hide that as well. And of course he could sense things, like when alien guards were around. That little trick of his had saved he and his friends on more than one occasion. Haru at first called it Gohan’s “Spider Sense” since Gohan always seemed to be able to tell when danger was near, but even Haru had noticed there was more to it than that by now.

Rowdy and Haru were probably the only two people Gohan had even considered sharing some of his secrets with. They were after all the ones who got him into The Rogues in the first place. Rowdy used to have a big brother who was kind of a mentor to Haru, but he was gunned down by a rival gang about two years before Gohan joined. Haru being a year older than Rowdy took it upon himself to try and look after him in his brother’s place. Rowdy’s nickname suits him though, and he gets into a lot of trouble. He would have been dead that one day three years ago after getting caught stealing from the docks. Gohan had been the one to save him then. To show their gratitude both Rowdy and Haru pulled what strings they could to get Gohan initiated into The Rogues. Gohan was so grateful for it too. He knew for sure he would have starved to death by now if it wasn’t for them. The Rogues taught him how to survive on the streets.

Gohan sighed as his busy mind once again was keeping him from sleep. He tended to have a hard time calming his mind down enough to actually fall asleep anytime before three in the morning. Eventually Gohan drifted to sleep once he ran out of things to think about. Although asleep, the dreams Gohan wouldn’t even remember in the morning kept him tossing and turning and far from good rest.

The next day Haru started going over the plan again right after breakfast making sure he clarified any questions the other two might have. He also came up with a few backup plans for the “just in case” scenarios.

As the sun was setting, all three of the boys were huddled in the bushes beside the Capsule Corp wall. “Get ready…” Haru whispered.

The other two nodded, and Gohan got ready to jump first. Haru counted down the remaining time on his fingers, “Go!” he said and Gohan jumped the wall in a quick fluid motion, followed by Haru and Rowdy.
Haru followed Gohan to the building while Rowdy started setting up boxes by the wall. Gohan quietly ran to the window Haru had pointed out. Once Haru caught up, Gohan elbowed the glass. Instead of breaking though, Gohan’s arm bounced off and the window vibrated oddly.

Gohan stared at Haru wide eyed as Haru only shrugged. Gohan jumped back and spun kicked the window in this time. The window still didn’t shatter rather the entire pane of glass flew off the frame and bounced inside the building. Gohan shrugged that time and jumped inside.

The drop from the window was a good six or seven feet. Gohan and Haru landed inside, and immediately began their quick search. As they looked around the two quickly noticed there were more rooms and offices around this area than actual lab space.

As they ran through, something sparkled and caught Gohan’s eye. He waved Haru over and they both looked over at a strange looking receiver dish. The two looked over the item; it was some kind of communications receiver. Haru felt around the thing and pressed a switch on the side. The entire device began to glow and give off a strange hum. Once the light faded, in the place of the device was a small capsule with a switch at the end. Gohan pocketed it as he smirked to Haru and they ran out of the room.

The two were running back through the hall when a door in front of them opened. Startled the two skid to a halt, looking for anything they could hide behind to not get caught. Before they could find anything to hide behind, Rowdy walked out of the room while stuffing something into his own pockets. He looked over at his two friends surprised to see them on the floor glaring angrily at him.

The three were running back to their exit point when Gohan got that strange feeling again. First it was like a flash, then more of a ping to his senses. Gohan completely stopped and looked around.

“Gohan! Let’s go!” Haru whispered.

Gohan nodded and they continued running. They were running through the last big room before the hall with their exit point when Gohan felt another strong ping. The world around Gohan seemed to slow down as a silhouette set itself in the doorway in front of them.

“STOP!” it yelled.

Gohan pushed his two friends out of the way as he ran past them with a sudden burst of speed and tackled the body in front of them down. Whoever it was didn’t seem to be expecting that and was taken down easily.

Haru and Rowdy ran out of the room and were retreating back to the exit. As Gohan rolled off of the person he’d tackled, a hand grabbed his ankle. Haru looked back and saw Gohan practically captured and his eyes widened.

Gohan pulled the Capsule out of his pocket and threw it to Haru, “Get out of here!” Gohan yelled as Haru caught it.

Rowdy stopped a little ways ahead and looked back as Haru clenched the capsule tight and ran off, grabbing Rowdy in the dash and practically tossing him back out the window.

Haru and Rowdy made good use of their escape tactic and scaled the wall with ease, and jumped out of the complex. “What about Gohan?!” Rowdy cried.

“Gohan knows how to take care of himself, just don’t look back!” Haru ordered as the two kept running. Haru just prayed he was right.

Gohan twisted his foot out of the grasp he was in and jumped away. His attacker recovered and was on his feet faster than he thought he would be though and grabbed Gohan by the arm and tossed him back into the larger room. Gohan slid to a stop as the other one came in and pressed the control to lock the room down. Large doors sealed them in almost instantly, “Now it’s just you and me…” Gohan looked the other boy up and down, a couple years older than he was, maybe sixteen, seventeen at most… Human in appearance with purple hair and loose style fighting clothes.

Gohan dropped into a fighting stance as the boy charged him. The boy suddenly disappeared from Gohan’s sight range and a fist just materialized into his stomach sending him flying toward the wall. It was in that instance Gohan realized this was what he was just barely sensing over the last couple days. He could sense it perfectly now, a power different from just about anything he’d ever felt before.

The boy disappeared from Gohan’s sight again, but this time as a fist flew towards Gohan’s head, Gohan’s own hand came up and caught the blow. This was no time to be holding back. Gohan flipped himself up by the grip he had on the other boy’s hand and spun kicked him to the side of head, sending his body crashing into the wall.

“Not bad…” The boy said getting back up. This time Gohan disappeared from sight and punched the boy in the stomach. Although Gohan thought he got a real good hit in, the other boy recovered in an amazingly short time and placed both his open palms against Gohan’s Torso. A light emitted from his hands and then with a sudden burst, pain ripped through Gohan as he was flung the other way.

Gohan stopped himself in time to catch the boy’s next attack and throw a few punches back. The boy dodged his first three, but Gohan’s fourth punch landed square in the ribs and the boy slid back a few feet.

In the next instant both boys disappeared from sight, and their impact with each other vibrated the walls violently, and everything inside the room was pushed away from them by the force of the evacuating air.

The two punched, and kicked, and met each other with great force at remarkable speeds. The older boy sped behind Gohan and caught him in a choke lock. Gohan pulled forward as hard as he could but the other boy wouldn’t let go. With the muscle tightness Gohan built up pulling forward, he slammed his head back into the other boys face. The arms holding him still immediately let go and Gohan kicked the boy away.

The boy landed on a pile of debris that consisted items which used to be set up in the room they were fighting in. Gohan stopped dead in his tracks as the boy got up from where he was thrown and a purple tail slowly uncoiled from around his waist.

“He’s the one… with a tail too…” Gohan whispered to himself.

The boy hurled himself back to Gohan, and with his fists clasped into each other he pounded Gohan into the floor. The ground cracked as Gohan made impact. Gohan was a little shaky pulling himself up from that attack when he was kicked from his imprint on the ground and launched into the nearest wall. Gohan slowly slid to the ground as a light from the boy caught his attention. The boy threw more of that energy at him.

Gohan yelled as he was hit. Several other blasts followed. The energy was hot and intense. Gohan tried to block his face with his arms, and the energy burned the clothes off of where it hit. After several more blasts, his entire upper torso was exposed and taking the full force of the attack. When it finally stopped Gohan sank to his knees, his breathing labored. His concentration in keeping his tail secure was lost to him, and his tail uncurled itself from around his waist as well.

The other boy stopped his attack for a moment. He seemed to be staring intently at Gohan’s black tail. Gohan slowly pushed himself back up to his feet, still breathing hard. The older boy became unsure of what was going on suddenly. Gohan decided to use the break to his advantage.

Gohan’s hands clasped to his side as his knees bent. It’d been a long time since he did this; he just hoped he still remembered how it worked. “KA-ME” Gohan said through gritted teeth as a ball of energy formed in his hands.

The other boy noticed what Gohan was doing and moved to a stance with his hands clasped nearly behind his back. A deep purple energy gathered in his fists.

One of the entrances to the room started beeping and the door opened, “What’s going on in here?!” a female voice demanded.

“HA-ME!” Gohan powered up the attack, not caring about the interruption.

“Goku…?” the same female voice spoke barely audible over the sounds of the energy in the room crackling.

Gohan stopped and looked over at the woman who had just barged in the room speaking his father’s name. She looked to be in her mid to late thirties, and had short blue hair.

“Mom, watch out!” Gohan looked back over to the boy he was fighting and was tackled to the ground. He completely lost the power he was gathering for his attack and felt badly drained from it. The boy pinned Gohan’s arms tight behind his back, and though Gohan struggled as hard as he could, he didn’t have the strength to break free from the grip.

“LET ME GO!” Gohan screamed.

“Who are you, and who are you with?!” the boy on top of him demanded.

The woman with blue hair approached them and kneeled down in front of Gohan. She looked at Gohan’s face, and into his eyes. Those black pools were so familiar to her, “It can’t be… Gohan?”

The boy on top of him looked over at the woman as she mentioned that name. “Mother?”

“It is! It’s Gohan! I’d recognize Goku’s son anywhere!” The woman stared at Gohan in awe.

Gohan’s eyes widened, “How… how do you know my name… how do you know who my father is?”

The woman smiled, “Let him go Trunks.” Trunks let go of Gohan’s arms and got off of him. “I can hardly believe it… Once I lost touch with Chichi… I didn’t even think the two of you were alive,” tears welled up in the woman’s eyes, “The house in the mountains was destroyed, and there was no sign of either of you.”

Gohan could almost remember… a place in the mountains… his mother was there, and life was good. “The last time I saw you… you were only four years old Gohan, no wonder you don’t remember…” Bulma smiled as another tear rolled down her face.

“Trunks, we need to move him before anyone comes to investigate!” the woman practically ordered. “Get him to the treatment center in the basement, and get the guys up here, I want this break in to look like industrial espionage!”

“Right!” Trunks nodded. He grabbed Gohan’s arm and pulled it around his shoulder before putting his other arm around Gohan’s waist and hoisting him up. Gohan hissed a little as his skin was still a little burnt and really sensitive. “You’ll be OK,” Trunks smiled.

Gohan couldn’t help but be completely confused now, but as he had no energy left to resist, he didn’t. Something about them really did strike a chord somewhere in his memory. As he was limped away his mind began to click on a few things. Could this be why he took the challenge in the first place? Did Capsule Corp mean something to him somewhere in his subconscious? Before he could piece things together any better in his head, he practically passed out in Trunks arms.


End Chapter