Chapter 12
Coronation
Goten moved first again, barreling forward with his fist drawn back in anticipation of another physical exchange. Trunks set his feet and threw his right arm forward, extending his pointer finger.
"DODON!" He yelled, as a thin ray of red light fired from his fingertip directly at Goten's forehead.
Goten started to swat the beam away, but thought better of it at the last moment, throwing his body sideways and allowing the beam to pass by harmlessly, but stopping his forward momentum.
The beam carried on toward the crowd, where Piccolo stepped in to stop it. He soon realized the danger of his effort, however, when he sensed the intensity of the energy in the ray. He bared his teeth and dug in his heels as he prepared to attempt to deflect it, but before he had the chance, Gohan phased in front of him and backhanded it high into the sky.
"Thanks, Gohan." Piccolo said, "He put something extra into that one."
"Don't mention it." Gohan said with a smile, before returning his attention to the ring.
With Goten off course, Trunks shot out his arms and quickly sprouted two new ones out of his shoulder blades, but didn't press an attack. Goten redirected his trajectory and charged again, bound and determined to land another devastating blow on his opponent.
Trunks didn't engage openly, instead opting to go into a backpedal and, after Goten closed in enough to launch into another flurry of punches and kicks, levitated into the air. By using all four arms for defense and maintaining as much distance as possible, Trunks did everything in his power to avoid taking damage from his stronger, faster opponent. For his part, Goten continued to press forward, launching punches and kicks with vicious ferocity, determined to find a hole in the defense.
Slowly but surely, Trunks's plan fell into place. Goten pressed forward harder and harder, but thanks to Trunks's new arms and defensive mindset, he was able to avoid any serious damage. The new arms had cost him energy to create, but not nearly as much as the effort of the assault was causing Goten.
Finally, satisfied that his opponent was sufficiently slowed, Trunks countered. Goten fired a massive uppercut, but Trunks, by using both of his left arms, was able to swat it off course and across his body, opening Goten's chin. Trunks took advantage of the moment and caught Goten with a stiff jab with his natural right arm, followed by a hard elbow to the back of Goten's neck with his new one.
Goten went crashing toward the ground, and Trunks gave chase, catching him on his way down and driving him down even faster by grasping each of Goten's triceps with his new arms and placing his natural ones in the center of Goten's back, intent on slamming him through the tile floor below.
Goten, with no way to change direction and no use of his arms, realized he would once again have to find a creative way to stop his momentum. His mouth blast, he knew, would not be nearly enough. Instead, he forced his hips below his body until he was in a seated position with his feet pointing toward the ring, and desperately yelled:
"KAMEHAMEHA!"
The familiar blue light shot out from his feet and crashed through the arena floor below, destroying the right half of it on impact. The two fighters hung in the air, Goten firing vigourously to stop his momentum, and Trunks, still pushing him from behind, trying to drive him into the teeth of his own blast. The result was a mid-air stalemate, both fighters struggling and driving their bodies through gritted teeth.
Finally, Trunks saw the futility of his effort and opted for another path. He grabbed Goten and spun him upside down, dive-bombing both their bodies toward the ground, head first. Out of shock, Goten stopped the blast, but managed to slip his left arm loose in the process. He used it to lock around Trunks's neck, intent on making sure his assailant would share any damage he took in the crash.
Trunks was caught off guard by the grasp, however, and took one of his arms off of Goten's back to remove the lock. He succeeded, but felt himself quickly losing control of Goten's momentum, as Goten began to wriggle free from his grasp. Out of desperation, he quickly grabbed Goten as best he could, and hurled him toward the ground headfirst some fifty feet below.
Goten landed on the left, undamaged side of the arena and covered his head with his arms. He fired through the ring like a diver through the water, creating a massive hole in the concrete floor and disappearing from sight. Tile and dust exploded around the crater as Trunks landed safely on the ring and waited to see if his opponent would reappear, his two new arms dispersing as he settled.
"Goten!" Chi Chi screamed, lurching forward. The entire cast of Kame House wrestled her back into her seat, as 18 assured her Goten was all right.
The Announcer was unsure of what to do. By now, he knew better than to assume a fighter of Goten's caliber was dead after the crash, so there would be no disqualification of Trunks, he reasoned. Technically, Goten was outside of the ring, but that was the fault of the Tournament for not creating a stronger floor, despite their best efforts; as competitive as the fight had been thus far, he wasn't about to end it on a technicality like that. That left only one option:
"Ladies and Gentlemen, Goten is down!" He yelled, "I'll begin the count! 1! 2! 3!..."
"You can go ahead and stop counting." Trunks said.
"What?" The Announcer asked.
"Goten's fine, I didn't throw him near as hard as I meant to. He'll be up in a second."
As if on cue, Goten fired back up out of the hole and landed across from Trunks, covered in dirt and fresh cuts. "Nearly got me that time." He said between deep panting breaths.
"Almost, but I will get you next time." Trunks said flatly, "Like I said, you're strong, but you waste too much energy. You might still have more power now, but you're already getting tired and starting to telegraph your moves. It's just a matter of time 'til I'm stronger, and when that happens, the fight's over. I'm not bragging, it's just the truth."
"We'll see." Goten said, still struggling to catch his breath. He examined Trunks, who was clearly weakened from the energy he had used in the exchange, but was holding up well, all things considered. Most of all, Goten felt his energy; how despite his Super Saiyan form, it flowed out so smoothly, and even in combat remained controlled and measured, only spiking at the exact moment of his attacks. "If he can do that, so can I." he thought to himself.
Trunks, seeing Goten's struggle to regain his stamina, quickly ran through another round of strategy options. He briefly considered the multiform technique, but remembered Tien telling him about Krillin's scatter blast. That could prove troublesome, and the energy it would take for a special technique could prove costly. Instead, he opted for simplicity and charged forward. This time, it was Goten on the defensive, backpedaling and blocking every blow Trunks threw his way. Trunks pressed forward, looking to take control of the match, while Goten tried desperately to keep his composure. Trunks's pursuit went on for the better part of a minute, registering several blows of moderate damage, particularly to Goten's core, but nothing that stood to drastically change the battle.
Trunks was still pressing on, when he noticed something strange. Goten's energy was fading much slower than it had been before, and he was faring better the longer the exchange went on. He even felt some of his opponent's energy appearing to return to him, even as he pressed his assault. "No way." Trunks thought to himself.
As the thought crossed Trunks's mind, Goten landed his first counterpunch of the exchange, a stiff hook to Trunks's kidney, causing him to wince in pain. Trunks thrust both hands forward, firing a powerful Kiai into Goten's chest to force him away. Goten crossed his arms and blocked the attack, and went into a powerful slide across the arena floor, stopping his momentum well short of the edge. The two stood and examined one another again, and Trunks's face fell into a furious grimace as his suspicions were confirmed. Upon relaxing, Goten's aura disappeared, and his hair settled from it's golden glow into a calm white blonde hue.
"No way!" Trunks yelled in disbelief, "That's impossible! It took me months to get that down, now you just come out and do it!?"
"Do what?" Goten asked, genuinely confused at the outburst. After all, he had lost the majority of the exchange.
"Hey, Goten!" Gohan yelled from beside the ring, "That's what being a Super Saiyan's supposed to look like! Great job!"
"Huh?" Goten asked, "All I did was make my energy like Trunks's, I don't know what you guys are talking about."
Piccolo raised his brow in disbelief. "Did he just perfect the form mid-battle?" he said, struggling to believe his eyes.
"I'm not gonna take this!" Trunks yelled again, unable to stop himself from slipping into rage this time, "If I can't wear you down, fine! I'll just blow you away! This ends now!"
Goten jumped back into his stance, but to his surprise, Trunks didn't reach for an unusual technique or a reckless charge. Instead, he made the first move by levitating high into the air, creating as much space as possible between the two. Goten stayed planted on the arena floor, wary of any trap Trunks might be planning.
Trunks looked down and remembered the story Tien had told him about destroying the arena floor the year he won the tournament. A Super Saiyan-powered Kikoho would surely be enough to end the match in one blast, he thought.
"No Kikoho? Fine." He said to himself, "Doesn't mean I can't take this whole place out if I want to."
Goten, still with his light blonde hair, looked up into the sky and watched as Trunks arched his back and flexed his muscles. Trunks looked to be violently exerting himself, much to Goten's confusion, until he felt his power spike.
"Trunks! What're you doing?" Goten yelled up into the sky.
"There's still…one form…you don't know!" Trunks yelled back between grunts. Sweat poured down his face and his muscles stretched and bulged, turning his body into a massive, hulking figure. He pumped more and more energy into his muscles, until he looked for all the world like a monster, much to Goten's horror. Suddenly, his hair stiffened and blew outward, and his power erupted as he yelled:
"FULL POWER!"
"What?!" Goten yelled, and fired his own energy to it's height, his hair returning to it's golden color and his aura pulsating around him. He yelled loudly into the sky and flexed every muscle in his body as he attempted to match Trunks's power, but for all his effort, he found himself dwarfed by his opponent's newfound strength.
"Goten!" Gohan was yelling desperately from the ringside, his pretense of impartiality now completely thrown out the window, "He's too slow to fight you like this! Go get him before he fires!"
"Too late!" Trunks yelled down from the sky above the arena, "Get ready, Goten! This is it!" He thrust his hands downward to his hips in front of his body with his palms together, parallel to his shoulders, and yelled again:
"FI-NAL FLAAAAAAAAAAAASH!"
"Trunks stop!" Tien was screaming, "You're aiming at the planet! It's too much!"
It was to no avail. A massive flood of golden light exploded from Trunks's palms and careened like a freight train to the ring below. Goten set his feet and looked up, desperate for a way out. To his horror, he was too late; the blast was far larger than the dimensions of the ring, and his hesitation had cost him valuable time, as the blast was now nearly upon him. His only option was to return fire.
"KA-ME-HA-ME-HAAAAAAAAA!"
Goten fired with every ounce of energy he had, releasing a massive blue wave that met Trunk's blast some forty feet above the arena floor. The two massive beams crashed with a loud hiss and a loud roar as a blinding flash engulfed the stadium, as the two fighters poured everything they had into their attacks.
Soon, Trunks's blast had gained an advantage. It slowly began pressing down toward the arena around Goten, stopping only ten feet above the wild-haired fighter, where it was held for the moment by the source bulb of Goten's blast.
"It's over Goten! Give up! I don't wanna hurt you!" Trunks was yelling through laborious breaths, his massive arms shaking with the effort of the blast. Goten didn't respond, but gritted his teeth and held his arms aloft, trying desperately to overtake the struggle.
"I'm going in!" Gohan yelled from beside the ground behind Goten, where he had shot to intercept Trunks's blast had Goten been unable to hold it. He went to jump into the arena, only to be pulled back in by Piccolo. "What are you doing? Let me go!" he yelled.
"No! This is more important to their growth than anything they've ever done, let them finish their fight!" Piccolo barked back.
"Do you feel that blast?!" Gohan was screaming, completely devoid of the respectful tone he usually carried for Piccolo. "If Goten wasn't blocking it, it could blow through the whole planet! Goten can't hold out much longer, he could die under that thing!"
"That's not going to happen!"
"What if it does?!"
"Then we'll wish him back! He hasn't died yet!" Piccolo screamed, causing Gohan to completely drop his rage in favor of shock in the face of what he had just heard.
"You'd let my brother die, just for a training match?" Gohan asked softly, the battle still raging behind him.
"No." Piccolo said, clearly trying to recover from his outburst. "But as long as he's on his feet, we don't interfere. He's too important to coddle, Gohan. Stop treating him like he's a helpless child; he's a warrior. Have some faith in your brother! Let him finish his fight!"
Gohan was unsettled, but strangely calmed by the resoluteness in Piccolo's voice. He turned, and passively watched the struggle, his heart threatening to pound out of his chest.
Goten was barely hanging on, having dropped to one knee and barely holding his hands above his head. His roaring blast had been reduced to a wide shield, continuously pummeled by Trunks's incredible wave. His shoulders burned hot and tired from the strain of lifting and pushing his arms against the force for so long, and his energy was quickly dwindling from the pressure of contending with Trunks's incredible power.
"Goten…give…up!" Trunks was yelling again. He never relented on his wave, but pressed forward with everything he had, prepared to engulf his friend even as he desperately wished he would surrender.
"Dig deep, Goten!" Gohan was yelling, "There's more in you than this! You can find it! Come on!"
"Come on, Goten!" Krillin screamed, rushing to Gohan's side so Goten could hear him. "You're Goku's son! You've got it in you! Let it out!"
Goten braced himself as Trunks's wave lurched again, drawing in only inches above his hands as he pressed against it. He could feel the heat from beam hot on his palms and face, and his vision began to blacken around the edges until he could only see the blinding light from the blasts. He began to see flashes of the past three years: His father finally coming to meet him, and demonstrating more power than he had ever imagined possible; his time as Gotenks, when he, along with Trunks, had channeled that power himself; the monster, Buu, who had so mercilessly murdered his mother and friends, and the battle he had endured with that monster; Gohan's battle with Buu, when he had dwarfed all of those powers with such confident ease. Every lap, every sparring match, every ounce of sweat and drop of blood and pool of vomit he had shed the last three years only to end up caved beneath the power of the one man he had given it all to beat.
"No." he whispered, an eerie calm encasing his body.
Goten felt a heat deep in the pit of his stomach. A small knot at first, like the pit of a peach, then a larger orb. Suddenly it was running through his veins and encasing his entire body in it's warmth, pulsating and charging with power he'd never had before. His hair grew stiffer and shot taller, and lightning pulsated across his body. Finally, the heat reached up his arms and pooled in his hands, and waited to be released.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
Goten rose back to his feet and thrust his arms back to their full length as his blast found renewed strength, vigorously clashing with Trunks's massive beam before driving it back to it's source, slowly at first, but building speed with each passing second.
"WHAT?!" Trunks yelled, and poured everything he had to stop the newly turned momentum with a loud "YAHHHHHHHH!"
It was to no avail, though. The Kamehameha was slowed for a moment but quickly built speed again drawing into Trunks's hands until his blast, like Goten's before, was reduced to a widened shield.
"Goten...what...are you?" he asked through gritted teeth, well out of earshot of everyone. He felt the power in his body eclipsed, his vision began to close in, and he remembered his father. How he had pushed himself for all the years he had known him, and many years before that, beyond what even the world's greatest warriors could ever imagine, and how he was always, always, one step behind his greatest rival. How he had carried a mountain of a chip on his shoulder beneath an indomitable pride his entire life, and how he had given his life to save the world twice, to no avail, without fear or reservation. How he was remembered by so many who knew him as the one who was almost powerful enough. And how he, Trunks, the son of the Saiyan prince, had spent three long years giving everything he had to redeem that legacy, only to be overtaken by an inferior fighter with a flippant demeanor and unimaginable talent.
Trunks's energy failed as the Kamehameha Wave overtook him, engulfing his body and driving him high into the air. As he faded out of consciousness, Trunks spoke in his mind: "Father...was this your struggle?"
Goten felt the pressure release from the far end of his blast and knew it had reached it's mark. He fired for one more second to make sure the battle was won, and then released, desperately wanting to keep Trunks alive and wanting even more desperately to breathe. He dropped to his hands and knees and his hair drooped and darkened around him, as sweat flooded from every pore of his body and off the tips of his hair. His arms shook with the weight of his body, but he held there, and, with great effort, lifted his head to find Trunks in the sky.
He found him falling headfirst toward the ground, his hair purple and his muscles reduced to their natural proportions. His eyes were shut, his shirt had been completely blown off, and his pants were tattered and flailing in the wind. His body was covered in soot and scuffs from the burn of the blast, and his energy had been reduced to a trickle, in stark contrast to the incredible power he had displayed just moments before. Goten started to rise to his feet to meet him in the air, but found he lacked the strength to do little more than stagger to one knee.
Tien bolted from his position on the side of the ring and intercepted Trunks's path, catching him in both arms and slowly lowering him to the ground, where he gently laid him in what was left of the grass around the periphery of the arena. Trunks breathed in short, quick breaths without moving, and never opened his eyes.
Thirty seconds of stunned silence fell over the stadium. Neither the masters, nor the competitors, nor the Announcer, nor the crowd issued a word as they attempted to comprehend what they had just seen. And then, as if resuscitated back to life by a defibrillator, the crowd erupted. Chaos ensued as the crowd roared their approval. The Announcer tried to speak, attempting to restore order at first, then to declare a champion over the ruckus, but his microphone was too weak to be heard over the bustle. Finally, he dropped the microphone and stepped onto the stage, where Goten sat on one knee.
The Announcer took Goten's right wrist and raised it as high into the air as Goten could reach, sparking the crowd into hysteria. Goten smiled, fell forward, and lost consciousness, facedown on the arena floor.
Author's Note:
Hey, everyone. So if you've made it this far, you've made it to the conclusion of the first arc. Hopefully you've enjoyed reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it. I'm very new to this, so I don't really know what constitutes a successful story, but from what I've been able to gather, we're off to a pretty good start. I really appreciate that.
So let's take a second to talk about what's happened so far and where we're going. If you haven't figured it out, this is an AU that, basically, explores where Dragonball might have gone had Toriyama not opted to pull the rug out from under Goku and Vegeta's sons midway through the Buu arc. As such, this is probably the only strictly-original arc I'll write. I started with this one because I felt it was the best way to establish the changes in character that are happening (Gohan feeling responsible for the Earth's safety, Trunks becoming resentful, Piccolo becoming paranoid, etc.), but I think it's best that I stick to some form of Dragonball material going forward, at least from a premise perspective.
That does not mean that future arcs will be simple retellings of the source material with different heroes. I reserve the right, and fully intend, to deviate drastically from that material in terms of things like, but not limited to, the timing of events, character personalities, and perhaps most notably, "power levels". I intend to use the source material as a starting point and deviate from there according to how I want the story to go, what makes sense in this continuity, and, frankly, what keeps me interested, because I think that's what's going to create the best story possible. I promise to do my best to justify any and all changes I make in a way that makes logical, believable sense within the context of this story.
The last thing, some of you may have noticed, is the cover photo for this story. Goten and Trunks are both older than that now and Gohan, at this point in the story, at least, always has black hair, whether in or out of battle. So, while the picture does feature the three characters that I've focused on the most thus far, it's not really accurate. If anybody knows of a more appropriate one, or, hey, if anybody wants to draw one, please let me know. For whatever reason, it bothers me.
So that's it! The next chapter will be the aftermath of this arc/the beginning of the next one. I'm really excited about the potential of the story as I have it in my head, so hopefully I do it justice. Thanks for all the kind words in the comments, share the story anywhere you can if you're so inclined, and if there's any other questions/clarifications anyone needs addressed, feel free to comment or message me and I'll be happy to clear them up.
Thanks for reading!
- SlotT7
