Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Ball Z or its related characters. All is the property of FUNamation, Toei Animation, Fuji TV, and Toriyama Akira. I'm just borrowing them for some light-hearted entertainment.

Water Sharing

Chapter Twelve: The Champion

The waters around Mount Paozu still ran clear and deep. Teaming with life. Reeds and water-dwelling insects, the fish that ate the insects, the birds that ate the fish. Gohan dipped his drinking vase in the water, submerging it completely and waiting for it to fill.

He thought about offering to share water with Dende. But the sorcerer always seemed to be to busy to help him. If he wasn't healing whatever little cuts and bruises people acquired from day to day -practicing his healing arts on humans and Animal-persons- then he was studying Earth's medicine and medical texts to learn how humans (and Animal-persons) healed themselves without magic. He said he came to Earth to help the rebels and healing the sick and wounded was the only way he could help since he wasn't a warrior. Gohan understood that, and after living a week with the group, he understood just how important it really was. But it still felt like his water-brother was avoiding him.

With a sigh, Gohan lifted the full water vase out of the river and made his way back to the hideout in Dragon Rock.

The path he took allowed the hansaiya to reach the main entrance without passing the Wall. The memorial wall with the names of their fallen inscribed across it. Seeing his own name listed among the dead gave him an eerily surreal feeling. But there was no way to avoid the posters of his father in the common area, just inside the main entrance.

Two old-looking Saiyan propaganda posters. Each sporting a picture of his father. Broken and dead, hanging limp between two pillars, held up only by the chains around his wrists. Gohan never witnessed his father's execution. He never saw how his father died. He only heard bits and pieces of it from Bulma. The bits and pieces a boy could be proud of. How he didn't cringe or shrink away. How he walked to his death strong and defiant. His head held high. They might kill him, but they would never defeat him. And, of course, his final words.

'I am Son Goku. I am an Earthling!'

The only word on the propaganda posters was 'Earthling'. That was all the Saiyans printed on their posters. It was most likely meant to crush their spirits. The image of a bloody, beaten, broken, and dead man. Chained and helpless. Labeled 'Earthling'.

But someone had crossed that word out on these two posters. Instead writing in the words 'Sacrifice' and 'Remember', respectively.

Remember Son Goku. He was our hero. He fought the Demon King Piccolo for us, saved the world from his domination. Defeated the Red Ribbon Army and removed their crime syndicate from power. Saved villages. Rescued women and old men. Defeated monsters and tyrants. Helped strangers. Always did what was right. Even if it seemed impossible. He achieved the impossible. Showed that it was possible. Helped others do the same. Son Goku. Remember him.

Sacrifice… Goku sacrificed himself so that others could live. Believing that doing so would save the life of his wife and son. That turning himself in, the deserter and criminal, would absolve the people of Earth of harboring a fugitive. That the Saiyans and the monarchy would leave them in peace. He gave his own life. And while time and events showed that that sacrifice was in vain, we should always remember that it was for Earth and her people that Son Goku gave his life.

Looking at those two posters gave Gohan a roiling mixture of emotions.

The most easy to identify of which was anger. Anger at the fact that his father's sacrifice helped nothing. Angry that his death was meaningless. Angry that he was robbed of the chance to get to know him as a man instead of the idealized figure his vague memories made him out to be.

Jealous, too. Jealous that these people -some of whom were complete strangers like Lunch and Pilaf- knew his father better than he did. Spent more time with his father than he had. Knew him longer. Actually had the chance to fight along side him (or against him, as the case may be).

Then, underneath the hot but potent surface anger, and the quiet but simmering jealousy, was a creeping, whispering sense of fear, or inadequacy. They brought him here because he was the son of their hero. Risked their lives to steal a ship. Crossed half the galaxy to an alien planet they knew very little about. All to bring him home. So that he could be their new savior. Their new hero. So that he could take up his father's mantle. Son Gohan, son of Son Goku. Hero and Champion of Earth. That was a high expectation to live up to. Gohan wasn't sure if he had it in him.

He could fight for them. He enjoyed fighting. More than he preferred to let on, actually. It was woven into his blood. The desire for violence. But fighting for them and championing for them were two different things. A champion required a strength and conviction that he just didn't feel for their cause. He couldn't bring himself to sacrifice his own personal codes and morals for them. He would not kill for them. He loved to fight. But killing was something that Gohan, son of Goku, had no taste for. (Unless he was killing for food.)

Piccolo tried to explain to him that there were certain situations where killing was justifiable, even necessary, or unavoidable. Situations such as you or them. A kill or be killed scenario. Where the only way to finally stop an opponent from coming at you was to kill them. Rendering them unconscious would just provoke them further once they did awake. Physically disabling them would just prompt them to become more creative in their murderous endeavors. A scenario like that was very real and possible when fighting Saiyans. Forget real and possible. It was downright likely! Saiyans did not accept defeat graciously. Saiyans did not accept defeat at all.

Kuririn tried to make him understand that killing was okay if it was in the protection of your family, your home, or the people you cared for. That altruism sounded nice in theory, but that no man can ever be that pure. Not even Goku was in his life. Life was not a nice and neat division of black and white, good and bad, right and wrong. The world was a shifting sea in shades of gray.

Academically, Gohan understood all of that. But just because he understood did not mean he agreed. Because he did not agree, he could not give himself completely over to their cause. He could not be the hero they wanted him to be. Honestly, Dende was more devoted to their cause than he was and he had fewer connections to this world and these people than Gohan himself did.

Turning away from the posters, Gohan exited the common area and continued down a corridor to the hollowed-out rock chamber he was given as a room.

A few of the passages in the Dragon Rock cave system were natural. Existing long before the Saiyans arrived. Before the rebels found need and purpose for them as a hideout and base. But most of the caverns were new. Artificial. Man made. As their rag-tag group of guerrilla troops and freedom fighters grew, so did the demand for more space in the hideout. So, new tunnels were dug. More of the mountain hollowed out.

It was down one of these new man-made corridors that Gohan walked when he, quite literally, smacked into another person coming around a corner.

The scent of her long dark hair hit him and Gohan found himself digging his fingers into the rock of the wall to keep from falling off balance -both literally and figuratively.

Videl Satan had been a source of awkwardness and tension for him almost from the first moment he arrived at Dragon Rock.

Not because she continued to remain aloof and sometimes even slightly hostile to him, but because of the effect she had on him. The dark haired action-girl made his blood boil, but not in the same way that a challenging fight got him all fired up. The scent of her hair, the movements of her body, the sound of her laugh when she was with her friends… It did funny things to him, made him feel excited but also terrified all at the same time. It made it difficult to focus on his original reasons for coming to Earth in the first place.

"Watch where you're going!" She snapped up at him from their hight difference. Gohan stood a little over a head taller than her.

"Sorry." He muttered even though she wasn't listening. Videl just pushed past him, her backside brushing against his thighs as she did so. The scent of her hair wafting up to teas his senses. Gohan found himself suppressing a blush as his eyes lingered on her retreating form a moment to long to be a casual glance.

Swallowing a lump that had risen in his throat and doing his best to suppress or ignore the roaring in his blood, Gohan continued on his way.

He placed the water vase beside his cot and sat down, crossing his arms over his chest. Suddenly feeling uncomfortable or even a little claustrophobic in the small hollowed-out stone chamber. The hansaiya was suddenly craving motion and excitement. Movement. He just got back to his room, but Gohan found himself leaving it again. Stalking through the narrow stone corridors, passing the posters of his father in the common area, and back out of the cave.

Dragon Rock used to be a very familiar area to him when he was a child. Now almost a decade has passed since he last explored its fissures and canyons. He used to play here with Higher Dragon. Gohan never did learn what happened to him. Was the small but friendly and almost always cheerful winged dragon killed by the Saiyans as well? Or was he also hiding out somewhere among the rocks and the caves?

The others warned him that it was to risky to fly while near the base. That a Saiyan patrol might pick up flight-ki on their scouters. So, Gohan began a light jog instead. He had no real path or destination in mind. The paths and corridors were familiar to him, but just enough of the landscape had chanced in these past eight years to get him lost easily. So, rather than follow a path he thought he knew, or set a destination he no longer know how to get to, Gohan's objective was exploration. To reacquaint himself with his childhood playground.

Wind buffering and sand-spray had smoothed a rock face that the hansaiya could have sworn was rough and course eight years ago. A mudslide had taken out one of his mother's nature trails. A rock slide had diverted a small stream down a narrower path. Gohan follower it. Heading up river, out of Dragon Rock and up into Mount Paozu proper.

For the most part, the woods and forests of Mount Paozu looked as they should. Lush and green. Not touched by the Saiyans. But every here and there Gohan could see signs that this was not always the case. The forest seemed to have many more clearings than the young hansaiya remembered. Wide open areas that, while still covered in greenery, ground shrubs, grass, moss, even wild flowers, still didn't seem quite right. The soil beneath the grass while rich and dark looking was just a bit to dark, more like ash than soil. The moss, while thick and lush, a healthy bright green, grew in the forms and shaped of broken trees and fallen branches. Even in the thicker parts of the woods, not near a clearing, Gohan would come across a burnt or broken part of a tree that did not belong.

Perhaps the Saiyans had ravaged Mount Paozu, but in the past eight years the forest grew back. That was good news. That meant that there was a chance for the rest of the Earth, if the rebels could defeat the Saiyans and push them back off planet.

That thought gave the hansaiya pause.

That was the reason why they brought him here. To defeat the Saiyans and push them off planet. Be their champion. Be their hero. Be like his father. Gohan didn't quite know if he could do that. Yeah, he was a decent fighter. But save the world? That was a bit to big for him. He only came here to protect Dende and make sure his water-brother didn't get himself killed. He could be a strong and protective big brother. Goodness knew he got plenty of practice being big brother to the kids. But champion and hero…? That was just to much. He was no hero. He was just a guy trying to get by in the universe without losing anymore of the people he cared about to the monarchy.

Gohan's thoughts came careening to a halt, however, when he looked up and realized exactly where his feet had carried him.

A circle of broken stone and crumbling drywall. The wooden frame already rotted away. Broken glass on the ground that might have been to a window. A pile of bricks where the chimney used to be. Well and septic tank covers exposed. It was the remains of a house.

It was the remains of his house.

Gohan didn't know if he wanted to stay or to go. Part of him wanted to just run away from the ruins of his parents' house. Hide from the reminder of a calmer, happier time in his life. Before the Saiyans, before the monarchy, before his father was taken from him and he and his mother were ripped from their home and forced to live in hiding because the monarchy would kill him and his brother otherwise. Kill them for no other crime than simply existing. The monarchy did not suffer a hansaiya to live.

But another part of him, that same slightly morbid part of him that also wanted to learn all the details of his father's execution, wanted to stay. To walked through that empty foundation, where the halls and rooms of his house used to be. Wanted to see and to memorize every last spec of crumbling drywall. Every line to every crack. Map out how the vines, and the weeds, and the shrubs of the forest chose to grow over and claim what was left of his first home.

Paralyzed by his warring desires. To stay. To go. Gohan did nothing. Only stood there. Staring.

The sound of cicada and crickets told him that it was getting late, but the thing that finally snapped the hansaiya out of his emotional paralysis was the sound of a voice.

An older sounding voice, but hiding ancient strength. "I was wondering when you'd finally make your way here."

Gohan turned to see Muten Roshi, the Turtle Hermit, standing behind him. Leaning on his staff as if he actually needed the support, which they both knew he did not.

"Ah, good evening, Roshi-san." Because his mother made damn sure he was polite, even during times of emotional shock.

"There's nothing here now." Roshi told him.

Those words were like a lance that pierced right down to Gohan's heart. There was nothing here. His old home was gone. Destroyed by the Saiyans when they took him and his mother and then reclaimed by the woods and forests of the mountain when things settled enough for them to grow again. "I… uh, I see that."

"I mean, Oolong and I moved your father's things as soon as it was safe to do so. You won't find them here."

"Oh?" Gohan wasn't really sure what the old man was talking about. He hadn't exactly come here looking for anything from his father. His feet just carried him in whatever direction felt natural to them and he wound up here.

"We didn't know what to do with them, so we kept them safe." Continued the old master. "But I think they should be passed to you."

"To me?" Heirlooms from his father? "Show me?"

Roshi smiled and lead the hansaiya back through the forrest. Down the mountain and back to the rebellion's hideout at Dragon Rock.

At first, Gohan thought the old man was gonna take him to the kitchens. Where else would an heirloom of his father's be stored but close to his favorite thing aside from fighting. But he did not. Then Gohan thought they might be going to the old Master's own room, perhaps he kept Goku's heirloom with his own things. But they did not venture near the base's dormitories. Finally, they stopped at a conference room.

Lunch -the brunette Lunch- and Emperor Pilaf were poring over what looked like a map while the cat-sage Korin threw in a comment or two.

It was Lunch who noticed him first. Looking up when they entered. A wide, welcoming smile spread over her face. "Hello there, Gohan. Are you settling on okay? Is everyone being nice to you? I know some people could be a little more polite."

His mind instantly jumped to Videl Satan. The young warrior in training around his own age whom refused to say two polite words to him together. He wasn't quite sure what her issue with him was, but the fact that she seemed to detest him so much did bother him more than he liked to admit. Especially since she affected him so strongly in other ways. It was very frustrating.

"We're in the middle of something here." Pilaf interrupted before the hansaiya could answer. "Did the boy need something, Roshi?"

The Turtle Hermit ignored the diminutive self-proclaimed Emperor and instead focused his attention on Korin. The sagely old cat nodded his head as if reading the old man's thoughts. He padded over to a cabinet in the back of the conference room and pulled out a small locked box.

"What's that?"

Lunch rolled up their map to make space for Korin to set it down while Roshi pulled a key from behind his beard to unlock it. The box lid was lifted and Gohan saw three items. A sphere-shaped rock, a red stick, and an orange dogi. The dogi he recognized instantly. It was the same orange dogi his father worse in every single memory Gohan had of him. The uniform of the Kame-ryu school.

The stick took him a moment longer. Gohan lifted the red pole from the box to examine it more closely. Noting it fine sheen, not quite lacquer, not quite polish, more like the sheen of enchantment. A magic stick? Then it hit him. "Nyoi-bo."

Roshi nodded. His father's legendary weapon of choice.

Gohan lifted the final item from the box. The round rock. It was a perfect sphere. Perfect. Rocks this round and smooth didn't exist naturally. Another magical item then? But what was it? He couldn't remember his father ever keeping or using a rock. Not even to throw at an enemy. "But what's this supposed to be?"

"That," began Korin, "is -or rather was- the Four Star Dragon Ball. Goku's keepsake from his Grandpa Gohan. Your namesake."

"Oh." He replied. "That's right. After Piccolo fused with Kami, the Earth's Dragon Balls reverted back to rock." Gohan gathered up his father's heirlooms and packed them back into their box. "Uh, thanks, guys. I'm gonna go put these away now."

"Gohan, wait!" Lunch stopped him before he could leave. "There's one other thing. Since I don't think your father's dogi will fit you quite right. Wait right here."

The cheerfully sweet brunette dashed out of the room and returned again several minutes later holing another orange dogi. "I borrowed one of your extra Namekian tunics to get the measurements right. A dogi just like the one your father used to wear! Except I put Demon King Jr.'s symbol in the place of the Kame symbol, since he was the one that trained you, not Roshi-sama."

"Oh." Gohan took the offered dogi. Just one more way they wanted him to become like his father. Not that that was a particularly bad thing. Son Goku was a great man who helped a lot of people and touched a lot of lives. But, Gohan barely remembered him. He barely knew these people whom were his friends and they barely knew him. And when they looked at him, Gohan felt like they didn't actually see him, but rather just a younger version of his father. "Thank you, Lunch. That was very kind of you."

"I'm glad you like it." She smiled.

Pilaf gave a huff of irritation and unfurled the rolled map with a snap. "If you're all done exchanging Goku memorabilia, maybe we can get back to planning the next strike! Now that we've got him-" the diminutive Emperor jabbed a finger at Gohan "-I think we should be more aggressive."