DBGT: Time of My Life
By: Jodi Lynn Barrett
© 2004 Original Author of Dragon Ball GT: Akira Toriyama
Bulma was in her private laboratory in the Capsule Corporations building. She was working very intently on a white object on a desk. It slightly resembled a satellite dish. She had a magnifying monocle over her left eye. It made her left eye look ten times larger that it really is. She was biting her tongue unknowingly and delicately tapping a small metal tool to some wires on the dish. She was nearly finished when Goku entered the room. He walked over to Bulma and spoke to her.
"Hey Bulma,"
She jumped and hit the tool to all four wires that she was working on. There was a bright flash, an explosion, and a bang. Bulma jumped away from the machine and stumbled into the table behind her. The dish gave off a charging noise and began to glow. The noise grew louder and louder.
"Oh no!" Bulma said and she jumped to hit the 'power' button on the machine, but she was too late. A bright purple beam shot out of the protruding end of the dish and struck Goku square in the chest. His whole body was tingling, there was another blinding flash, then he passed out.
Goku opened his eyes and saw that he was laying face down on the floor. He pushed himself up to his knees. His body was still tingling. He looked around but didn't see Bulma. The room was now dark and dank. Goku realized the floor was covered in dust. What? Bulma keeps this place spotless… He stood up and walked over to the machine, but before he could get a good look at it a voice stopped him.
"What are you doing in here? Who are you? How did you get in here undetected? Speak up!" A strangely familiar voice called out.
"It's just me." Goku replied turning around to face the silhouette of a tall, buff man.
"Goku? This can't be…" The figure said stepping into the light. He had had his hand out stretched, ready to fire an energy blast, with his thumb folded toward the palm of his hand. He lowered his arm. "It's good to see you again." His lavender hair was long and partially pulled back into a ponytail, like the way he would pull it back after he would train in the Hyperbolic Time Chamber. He wore a Capsule Corp. jacket over the Saiyan armor. His face looked aged, at least twenty years or so. Goku could see a scar under a shattered portion of his armor on his chest. He smiled at Goku.
Goku looked confused and disoriented. He had no idea what was going on. "Trunks? What happened to your hair? And this place." Goku asked.
With a slight laugh, Trunks responded. "Goku, that's what happens after roughly twenty years. People change."
Goku's confused expression was replaced with shock. "What! Twenty years? I've been unconscious for twenty years! Why didn't anyone wake me up!" Goku exclaimed.
"No Goku. After the accident in my mother's lab," Trunks gestured around the room. "You just disappeared. No one has been able to figure out what happened. After that, my mother stopped working on the Trans-Dimensional Communicator." Trunks pointed to the small satellite looking machine. "As a matter of fact, she never entered this room again."
After Trunks had finished a slender woman entered the room. She had pail purplish-pink skin and silky white hair. Her hair was cut about the same length as Trunks's, a little past her shoulders. Her eyes were a deep purple with shades of lighter purple and lavender. She clearly was not human. Her name was Mikua.
"Trunks, one legion of our rebel forces has just been wiped out." Mikua reported.
"My father?" Trunks asked worriedly.
"No. He was back at base when it happened. He is furious." Mikua said.
Trunks nodded and returned his attention to Goku. With a smile he said, "Mikua, do you know who this is? No, of course you don't." He corrected himself. "This is the great Goku that you have heard so much about. The man who has won more great battles that I have even fought. The man who disappeared twenty years ago."
"But Trunks, I thought he…" Mikua was cut short by Trunks.
"Despite his size he is a mightier warrior than all of us." Trunks said admirably.
A beeping noise broke the conversation. Goku then realized that the woman, Mikua, was wearing a scouter with a Capsule Corp. logo on it. She pressed a button on the side of it and answered. "Go ahead." A man's face appeared on the eyepiece. He was discolored by the fuchsia color of the transparent eyepiece.
"Ma'am, we are under heavy attack. We are just outside South Cit…" Static flooded the channel.
Mikua tapped the scouter a few times and then shook her head. Then she ended the communication channel. "We have most likely lost another legion. We have to stop this before we are wiped out completely." She said angrily.
"Hey, what's going on? What's happening?" Goku asked.
"I'll tell you everything on our way to the base. My father will want to see you Goku." Trunks said. He beckoned for Goku and Mikua to follow him as he exited the room and into the hallway. "Goku after you disappeared we were easy pickings for Yoshimi and his band. One by one we fell. He killed Krillen, Pan, Gohan, and my mother. Then we decided it was best to hide and get stronger before we tried to defeat him. Well, he got tired of trying to find us and left this planet, but not after he did quite a bit of damage to it. Then a year later he returned with a ship full of prisoners." He gestured to Mikua. "He had gone to Mikua's planet and conquered it. He took the few living people as slaves and destroyed the planet. He then conquered Earth. He now rules as a dictator over the entire planet. He has millions of men from different worlds at his side. Men that would follow his every whim. My father and the rest of us formed a rebel group of almost over a thousand people. We liberated a large portion of the enslaved alien races. And many of them, including Mikua, joined our ranks. We now rank over three thousand men and women. But that still is not enough. Yoshimi's men are well-trained fighters, and most of the liberated rebels are of non-warrior races. Some have trained well and learn quickly, and others, well… Let's just say they are not as adequate in this line of work. Our numbers are diminishing quickly." Trunks concluded. "Goku we could really use your help."
The group halted next to a door that Goku didn't recognize. They were two steel doors, like elevator doors. They opened to reveal an elevator compartment. Trunks stepped inside followed by Mikua and then Goku. Trunks pushed the second of four buttons. The elevator began to descend then abruptly halted. Goku looked worried, but Trunks and Mikua acted as if this were natural. A keypad ejected from under the first one. This keypad had nine buttons and an 'enter' key. Trunks lifted his right hand and swiftly keyed a six-digit code on the keypad. Then he pressed the 'enter' key. The keypad withdrew back into the panel. Shortly after that, a square speaker lowered its self out of the ceiling. It leveled its self with Trunks's chin. A feminine, monotonous voice echoed through the small shaft.
"Command code acknowledged. Require voice recognition. Please state your identity." It said startling Goku.
Trunks leaned forward and spoke into the speaker. "Trunks Briefs." He leaned back again and waited for the computer to acknowledge his identity.
"Voice and command code confirmed. Welcome Trunks. My internal sensors detect two additional bodies present." The computer said with a little more pitch than before.
"Yes, that is correct." Trunks replied warmly.
"Are you in any danger?" The computer asked.
Trunks smiled. "No. They are good friends. No need for alarm."
"Verifying scouter profile. Mikua Szich. Commander of the Forth Legion. Female. Race: Litallian. Age…" The computer began to recite all the data it had on Mikua but was cut short by Trunks.
"Identity confirmed. That's enough." Trunks said.
Silence filled the shaft. Then the computer spoke once again. "Proceeding to the last level of the Capsule Corporations building." The elevator began to move again.
Trunks turned to Goku who was looking amazed. "My mother built this before she…" Trunks stopped. He couldn't say it again. He swallowed.
After a short while, the elevator stopped and the doors opened. They all stepped over the threshold. Trunks began to walk down a long corridor. The walls looked newer than the walls upstairs, but they still looked old at the same time. There weren't many lights. Just enough to see the ground, walls, and others around you. The corridor was cold and the air was dry. They came to a big door with a keypad on it. Trunks keyed the same six-digit code into it and pushed the 'enter' key. A light flashed and the door slid open slowly. They walked into a large room full of people rushing around doing different tasks. They looked like ants scurrying around. They pushed forward through the crowd. It took about ten minutes to cross the large room. When they did they encountered another door, but this one was not as big and it didn't have a keypad. Trunks knocked twice, he didn't wait for a reply, turned the knob, and pushed open the door. Trunks entered the small office. It was brightly light with yellowish lights. A wooden desk was in the corner to the left of the door with a vacant black leather chair behind it. There was a man standing in front of the desk looking nervous and blocking their view of another man. He was standing behind the desk, next to the chair. His hands were palm down on the desk; his head and body were bent over the desk. He wasn't looking at anything; he had his eyes shut as if he had just heard bad news. He lifted his head up when Trunks entered the room.
"Trunks," The man behind the desk said. It was Vegeta. His features hadn't changed much. He didn't look much older than he looked in Goku's time, but he looked worn down and tired. It was clear in his eyes. Vegeta's fiery, arrogant, proud appeal was gone.
"Father," Trunks said as he stepped aside allowing Mikua and Goku to enter the easily crowded room. "Look who I found in mother's lab."
Goku walked into the room and Vegeta's expression quickly changed. Vegeta's eyes widened, his mouth gaped slightly as he stared in awe. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. All these years of being worn down and all he had been through had changed him considerably. Normally he would not have allowed Goku to see his emotions, but at this point, he didn't care.
"Kakarot…" Vegeta said slowly still in awe. Saying the name sounded strange to him. He hadn't said it in so long.
Another man, he was human, approached the door and said, "Vegeta, Trunks, we have just regained contact with Goten's legion. A good portion of his men have been captured. He doesn't think he can get out of the territory with out being captured. He wants to speak to you two privately."
"Reroute it to my office." Vegeta said.
"Mikua, Don, if you don't mind I need you to leave please." Trunks said.
Just as the door shut behind Mikua, the view screen on the wall to the right of the door lit up and Goten's face filled the screen. He looked like a mature adult, twenty years older. His hair was still the same though. He had a small cut above and parallel to his left eyebrow. Blood trickled down his forehead from the cut. He looked worried and strangely at ease at the same time. Goten couldn't see Goku, he could only see Trunks and Vegeta. Goku was next to the door, out of the camera view screen's sight.
"Hey, I'm sorry for the bad news." Goten began. "We are down to four guys and my self over here. We managed to take out about two of their guys, but… It's thirty to five and they are looking for us." He looked down then back at the screen. "I just wanted to say, thanks for taking care of me. Since dad disappeared, you two have been even more like family to me. And I really appreciate it. I'm sure Gohan would have thought the same thing…"
"Goten," Trunks spoke up beckoning Goku in front of the screen. "Goku is here. You've gotta make it back. Please Goten."
Goten stared at Goku. He felt his throat close up making it hard to swallow. He could hardly speak. Then he managed to say one word. "Dad?"
"Goten you can make it out of there." Goku said confidently.
"You've always been such an optimist dad." Goten smiled. "I'm just glad I got to see your face again. But I'll try to get out of here. If you believe in me…" Goten said. He stood up, picked up his scouter, and put it on. He flipped it on and looked back down to the view screen at Goku, Vegeta, and Trunks. "Ok, let's do this!" Goten said, he turned the view screen off. "Can you hear me?" He asked through the scouter.
"We can hear you Goten." Vegeta responded.