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The Devil's Grin
A DBZ Fan Fiction
By Egg Emperor
Chapter 2: A Mirror Darkly
-Mirror, Mirror on the wall who is truest of them all?
He who fights for all that lost?
Or he who gains at any cost? –
Hello everyone, this is the second chapter of my DBZ fanfic, The Devil's Grin. For those of you who have read the prologue and the 1st chapter, Reflections, I have news for you. I've edited both to make them easier to read. Not much has changed in the Prologue, but Chapter 1 has had a few major additions, so you might want to re-read the story from the beginning. I'm going to try to be more careful with editing so you won't have to do this again…. I hope. Nothing plot wise changed so if you want to just start reading this chapter then go right ahead.
Note: Independent internal thoughts are in "Italics".
December 18th Year 789 CA 7:34 AM –Son Family Home- Mt. Paozu
Chi-Chi's POV:
Cooking, cleaning; homemaking, a wife and mother's job is never done is it? Sure perhaps if Goku wasn't an alien I'd have an easier time of it, but my family has been so rewarding; the troubles never seem to make that much of a difference. It's a great life and it's been a peaceful one for years. Still…. I have one big hurdle left to jump.
"Where is that boy?"
"I swear, coming home so late that I don't see him, missing dinner for some party. He should be minding his studies; and working to control that strength of his."
I fear I was too soft on him as a child. Doesn't he understand that he needs to hone all his skills, especially those that will get him a job?
"Training the mind and the body, either he neglects his mind or he forgets them both. Gohan begged me to let him train; Goten trains too much for weeks on end. Then he just quits to visit with those delinquent "friends" of his."
"He was so much like Goku, when he was little, such a kind and sweet child. I still don't understand what went wrong."
"I always thought I would have an easier time with him. Goten was always so willing to please. I thought I could use that to steer him onto the right course. But it turned out to be harder than ever; why can't he be more like his brother.
This is my fault though, I know it. When he was younger I trained him taught him martial arts, something I swore I would never do. I as much as I love Goku, he isn't the ideal husband. He has no skills outside of combat, for me that's fine, but other girls are not like me.
"Look at Gohan, he is a successful consultant, has a lovely wife and beautiful little daughter, neither training his body nor associating with hooligans got him to where he is. Doesn't Goten realize that being the strongest does nothing when it comes to feeding and caring for a family?"
I want my sons to have a happy productive life and be good husbands to loving wives. I promised myself that my children would not be like their father in that regard. They would be able to provide for their families, I broke my own word and look where it's gotten me.
"Goku's death made me too lenient on him. Now he's paying the price of my negligence."
One thing is for certain, he has slept long enough. I've made a huge breakfast and I'm not going to let my labor of love go cold. Besides he needs to work on his studies, his grades are poor enough that no advanced school would even give him a second look.
As I walk up the steps I notice a few boards are loose, I can have him look at that after he eats, then I'm going to have him prepare for school. There will be no slacking in this house, there has never been and it's not going to start now.
Knocking on his door I call his name "Goten! GOTEN! GOTEN! GET UP! BREAKFAST IS READY IT'S GOING TO GET COLD."
From inside, the room I can hear moaning and groaning…
"Mo—om! It's – too early to …. Oh' my aching head!"
"Well whose fault is it that you stayed out all night?! It is certainly not mine!"
"Be down in five minutes or you won't be getting ANY food, you hear me!"
Under my breath I mutter "I wish you could more like Gohan, he never was this much trouble."
Goten's POV:
I'm floating gently in liquid darkness, cool and snug, not a care in the world. It's blissful really. I could stay like this forever…
BANG, BANG, BANG!
"Or not, I muse."
I'm catapulted back into consciousness, by what might well be the LOUDEST sound I've ever had the horror of hearing. My head feels like someone drove a spike through it. Light brighter than any I've witness burns my eyes, even though they are closed and buried in my pillow.
"Goten! GOTEN! GOTEN! GET UP! BREAKFAST IS READY IT'S GOING TO GET COLD."
"Joy, mom made breakfast."
On any other day I would be somewhat more agreeable to being awoken at what must be no more than eight in the morning. Somewhat, unlike my father and brother, I never held on to the childlike ability to awake refreshed at an ungodly early hour. By the time I was 14 my mother was lucky to get me up before noon. And that was only when she bribed me with a massive meal, to a Saiyan or (half-Saiyan) teenager the only thing more important that sleep is food.
That and exercise, the hormones flowing through my veins are a thousand times more potent than that of a normal human male. As a teen training myself to exhaustion was one way of coping with the intense sexual and physical frustration of my existence.
Right now, however I just want to die, I don't care how it happens. This horrible assault on my senses has to stop. My ears are ringing, my eyes burning; my sheets feel like sand paper.
"Gohan always said that our keen senses magnified the joys of a hangover, making them far worse than imaginable."
Considering how much I drunk last night, by human standards I must have a bad one. Thus by Saiyan standards, it's a nightmare.
I try to answer mom, but the best I can do at the moment is a series of unintelligible groans.
Trying again I manage, "Mo—om! It's – too early to …. Oh' my aching head!"
She duly responds in her normal shrill tone, which succeeds in furthering my pounding headache.
"Well whose fault is it that you stayed out all night?! It is certainly not mine!"
"Be down in five minutes or you won't be getting ANY food, you hear me!"
My eyes shoot open much to my regret as the light assaults my vision unimpeded. A threat like that could wake a Son from the dead. In my father's opinion mentioning such an agony would classify as cruel and unusual, along with anything sharp and pointy.
"How lame is it that the supposed "strongest" being in the universe is afraid of needles, not pink monsters that swallow you whole, nor intergalactic tyrants, but needles. I never took advantage of that when I was a kid … maybe it's time to change that."
My lips curl into a rather involuntary smile as I think about using a simple medical implement to put my all powerful father in his place.
"In his place? Kais what am I thinking, that's just cruel, more to the point, did I just think about torturing my own father?!"
I hear the stairs squeak as mother descends back to the kitchen, before she does, she says something under her breath. Something she would never had said had she thought I could hear her.
"I wish you could more like Gohan, he never was this much trouble." She states with a tinge of sorrow in her voice.
A moment passes as these words sink in, like nails into the coffin of our relationship.
My heart beat jumps through the ceiling, power and rage course through my blood like liquid fire sweeping aside the hangover. My vision nearly goes red.
I feel like destroying everything around me, reducing everything to flame and smoke; before I manage to get my power under control, a shockwave of energy rolls off me.
The white wave of heat and anger secedes in demolishing most of my bedroom. My dresser is knocked askew, my desk upended and the chair broken into wooden splinters. The keepsakes on my selves have been for the most part shattered. My bed which I'm currently laying on has been divested of its legs, the sheets and blanket reduced to burning scraps and dust.
"Well I seemed to have made a bit of a mess heheehe." I chuckle to myself while I walk to my closet to get dressed.
"I've gone and wreaked my entire room, good job Goten; mom's going to be pissed. Then again I really don't give a fuck; after what she just said she can take her "O' I work so hard" and stuff it."
"In fact I'm tired, tired of being compared to that workaholic insult to my blood. He could be the most powerful member of our dwindling race if he so much as tried. Yet he sits back at a desk all day, letting his body wither, he prefers acting like a boring, weak and pathetic human, rather than what he is. AND MOTHER wants me to be that! Fucking forget it, I would die before suffering that fate."
If I wasn't blinded by anger I would have wondered where these though were coming from. I had never really considered myself human that is true enough. By the same token I had never embraced myself as a Saiyan. If I was really cognizant I would have blanched at my thoughts, which would fit far more perfectly in the mouth of a certain Prince than my own.
But I was true I did resent Gohan. I had always looked up to him, he was my loving big brother; more of a father than Goku ever was. I thought him the greatest, or at least I did once, long ago.
I guess I got a bit jealous as I grew older. He was strong, strong enough that our father took notice of him. No, he wasn't just strong he was gifted. Gifted with so much power and potential, the kind I would literally do many unsavory things to have.
"He had the kind of potential that drew awe even from dad and begrudgingly Vegeta. And he WASTED IT; he let himself be tossed around like he wasn't one of the greatest forces in the universe, chained to a life of mediocrity."
As I dress I feel my anger solidify into a more permanent fixture, a seething in my bones that will likely last me well into the night.
I place my classic white shirt on, with my usual khaki pants and belt, black tennis shoes and for some reason today, my black windbreaker.
I turn to leave and happen to look at my rather cracked mirror. The face that stares back is a familiar one, not in the sense that it is me, but in which me it is. I look the same as that twisted reflection in the bathroom mirror from yesterday.
*Flash back*
I shift my head up out of the sink looking at the mirror, my face dripping with water. At that very moment the lights chose to flicker. In the milliseconds between the light and darkness the flickering lasting only a second, I saw something that chilled me to my core.
It was me and it wasn't me, same face same hair, but shadows fell across my face making it/me look creepy for lack of a better word. My eyes were narrowed in a deadly glare; a glint of red seemed to shine off them. My mouth was upturned in the most sinister, sadistic, smile I've ever seen. It was me but it was…. Evil.
*End Flash back*
If anything instead of being scared like a rightly should. I feel more … liberated than anything; that perhaps I shouldn't be fighting this at least not right now. I feel my lips curl into a sneer making the smile in the mirror even more twisted.
"I'll deal with my issues later, wearing a mask right now would only hide the very emotions I want to make clear. I'll work this out when I'm less angry and can think, right now I feel pretty good, and I've never gone wrong by going with the flow."
I get to the door and find that it's been warped into the jam by the force of my earlier outburst. A simple roundhouse kick splinters it and solves the problem of my exit.
As I walk down the stairs I begin to contemplate the real source of my anger, Mother.
"It is she who turned Gohan into the worthless mess that he is. I remember her constant nagging and screeching about study this and study that when I was a child and he a teen. His life must have been miserable."
"It's no excuse though his constant placation of her is what got me into this mess. She was able to break him so she thinks she can break me. Study this, do that, it's like she's replacing Dad and Gohan with me."
"Does she not realize I already have a complex when it comes to those two? How many bed time stories were about the fall of the Evil King Piccolo or the demise of the Dark Lord Frieza?"
"And Cell don't get me started on how my "PERFECT" older brother defeated the Diabolical Cell. From how I understood Vegeta's and Piccolo's tale of it, it was Gohan's fault that dad died. Vegeta said he was showing off and because of that Cell got the chance to kill Dad."
I think my blood pressure just tripled with that last thought. The last few rational bits of me are feeling sorry for Gohan, if he has the misfortune to run into me anytime soon.
As I clear the bottom steps, and the table comes into view, I am greeted with the sight of a mountain of different foods. Too bad that being this angry destroys one's appetite.
"Goten, What on Earth was all that noise, you better not have made a mess!" mother's voice rings out shrill and unpleasant as ever.
As I turn to face her, he peeved look slides from her face, replaced by one of … Shock? Fear? Uncertainty? From the murderous aura I'm giving off to the sneer on my face. I think she gets the message that something is rather amiss.
Keeping what's left of my cool, I turn my smile into a darkened neutral look and walk towards the table.
Chi-Chi's POV:
Whatever had happened it caused an enormous amount of noise. I'm going to have to clean something up, I just know it.
I watch Goten turn around; making sure my face show's my displeasure with him. That face disappears when I get a good look at my youngest.
His entire being seems to be radiating anger, on his face is a look that I've never seen; if I never see it again it will be too soon. I feel mixed emotions, fear and concern being the prominent ones. As if seeing my reaction his smile grows, before setting into a flat grimace.
He walks toward the table grabbing a piece of toast, and begins heading for the back door?
My voice finally finds me and I call out "Goten, sweetie is there anything wrong?"
He turns and smiles, that same cruel dark smile.
He speaks, but even though I can tell it is my son's voice, it seems … distorted, wrong or different, it's my baby but not as I have ever heard him before.
"Nothing is the matter mother… no that is a lie and a blatant one."
"There is something wrong, nothing big but… hehehh. Well you would think after living with us all the time you would have realized that Saiyans have a very acute sense of hearing."
"So, I'm going to set the record straight for you, once and for all."
What is going on, how dare he speak to his mother in that tone!
"I AM NOT NOR WILL I EVER BE GOHAN. I REFUSE TO BE LIKE HIM, WEAK AND FALLEN, PUSHED AROUND LIKE A DOG ON A LEASH."
The windows started to crack for the volume of Goten's outburst.
"YOU ALREADY HAVE THE SON YOU WANTED, AT THE EXPENSE OF ALL HE EVER STOOD FOR ALL HE EVER WAS TO ME AND EVERYONE ELSE. I WON'T BE LIKE HIM I REFUSE TO BOW ANY FURTHER TO YOU WHIMS, TO YOU IDEAS OF PERFECTION."
"YOU COMPLAIN THAT I AM TOO MUCH LIKE MY FATHER AND NOT ENOUGH LIKE MY BROTHER! WELL GUESS WHAT, I'VE NEITHER OF THEM. I NOT A HEARTLESS JACKASS WHO LEAVES HIS FAMILY FOR YEARS ON END. NOR AM I A PUSHOVER WHO WILL DO ANYTHING TO PLEASE OTHER."
"Goten… I … where did I go…" I manage to mumble
"Save it! I'm out of here."
I can't comprehend what has happened here. I … don't know what to do.
Goten's POV:
I storm from the house feeling better that I have in ages. Taking a leap I rocket into the sky, going fast enough that I trigger a sonic boom close to the ground. Likely breaking any windows still intact in both houses.
"Kami and Kais, that felt amazing, the rush and adrenaline, not to mention getting all that of my chest. Maybe it's time that Son Goten stopped being such a "Good" boy, because if being a bit bad feels this good, I could get used to it."
I head towards the falls at the far ends of the mountains, that's where I'll find Piccolo. Though I'm really only after the info for the Demon Wars, the meditation… I don't think I'll need it hehehe.
Beware the following is an
*EGG EMPEROR RANT*
1) I'm saying this right now as a warning because of the confrontation in the next chapter, as much as people like him I am not too fond of Gohan, Goku's eldest son. This may have to do with me really getting into (or back into) the DBZ in the Greater Buu Saga. I watched the Frieza Saga as a kid and then stopped (Due to issues with our cable at the time I was unable to watch the series for some time). I will be honest I loathe the Cell Saga, the idea that a pair of cyborgs could defeat super saiyans is something I could never stomach; even more there is not too much of the Buu Saga I "Love".
As such I will not be very kind to Gohan in this fic. Though neither will I be to Goku, Chichi or Trunks. The hate will be spread lovingly around. Remember this fic is about Goten and from his POV, thus the people who are responsible for his current state are going to be on the receiving end of SOME Nastiness.
2) GOKU is the strongest fighter there is followed by Vegeta end of story; I don't care about how much you fan boys (and girls, I will not be accused of sexism) whine about that "Mystic" bull crap I ain't buying it. Buu figured out how to fight Gohan after a bit and was doing well enough that Goku felt he needed to go and "rescue" his son. And then all he does is get eaten only making Buu even stronger forcing the "unthinkable" upon Vegeta and Goku. Plus in wrath of the Dragon it is shown that Goku is stronger that his son. Gohan as mystic is unable to do a thing and SSJ3 Goku ends up killing it. Adding Vegeta's near constant training and Gohan's lack of any thereof after time has passed; I feel Justified in putting in this placement.
1) Goku 2) Vegeta 3) Gohan 4) Trunks 5) Goten
3) The above will change later in the story; rage and madness are powerful things. They can bring out abilities that one would never use in a sane state, as well as things that remained hidden for good reason. If I can at all help it there will be no SSJ4 transformation on the part of Goten or anyone else in the story, it's not that I hate it, it's just a bitch to write and a bit of a Deus Ex Mechina.
*End Rant*
I will try to get the 3rd Chapter out by later tomorrow, if my muse holds up. I have Ideas through chapter 6.
Now on to something about Chapter 4, that is where the conflict with Trunks will occur, I've been PM about 6 times by a few people about something about that conflict and I decided I will let the readers decide what should happen. The poll is on my profile go there to vote, it basically discusses whether there was perhaps at least Goten's case stronger feelings than those of friendship involved. This Fic will not go into any detail the readers decide that, so it's not a real big thing. But Vote anyway so I know whether to add something like that or not.
Stay tuned for Chapter 3: Cracked.
