Chapter 38: The Last Battle Part II
So this is it? Trunks glanced around. Right below them a platter of drifting asteroids moved in tandem like a herd. The resonance of two powerful energies hung over the place like a bad smell to his senses. A fight had taken place here; that much was certain. With Alpha's planet destroyed though, there was now no way to tell this one apart from the countless other battle sites scattered over the world.
I'm sure of it, relayed Kibito-Kai. That's the exact spot where Alpha took Gogito to the other side.
Good, said Trunks, switching to his voice to address the others. "Alright let's get into position."
"Gotcha." From behind him Raditz suddenly swooped by, taking his place a few hundred metres opposite Trunks and steadying himself in a static flight against the void. As the half-saiyan yawned and stretched his arms Goten floated to his side.
Without even thinking the pair began to glide apart, to a formation precisely six steps away where they could fuse on command. Their plan relied on precise timing; they couldn't afford to waste a moment trying to merge. In silence the two Z-Fighters waited, eyes fixed and unblinking at the spot half-way between them and Raditz. Eventually Trunks checked the watch function on his device, lowering his voice to a whisper once he realised they'd been quiet for a whole fifteen minutes.
"Two fighters, waiting up high in the void of space, preparing to do a silly dance in the hopes of saving the entire universe. Doesn't any of this seem a little. . . I dunno, odd to you?"
Goten merely shrugged. "Eh, I always thought the dance was kinda cool."
The saiyan couldn't believe his ears. Trunks even took his eyes off the warp-point so he could give his friend a stare of obvious disbelief. ". . . You always were a weird one," he decided.
"I thought you liked it too!"
"And I did! When I was eight years old!"
"Aww don't be like that," said Goten. "It's saved us before in the past."
Trunks gave a grumble, wordlessly agreeing with his friend. "I still preferred the rings though."
"Alright fine, I guess we'll try and find another pair."
"There are no other pairs."
"Then we'll find another fusion method – a better one."
The saiyan laughed. "Better than the fist-bumping? But yeah, sure thing. Maybe my mom could help us out."
"Fusion, really?" Goten arched an eyebrow. "Nothing against Bulma but isn't that a bit advanced?"
"Capsules. . . Spaceships. . . Dragon Radar. . . These things." Trunks held up the gadget on his arm, at all times supplying him with oxygen and a stable atmosphere."Blutzwave Amplifier. . . Time Machine,"
"Hey that last one doesn't really count. Different Bulma."
"A different version of the same person!"
"Well that's a whole other argument right there."
"Ughh. . ." Moaning, Trunks buried his head in his hands. "It's like talking to a brick wall."
"So what do you think of my dimension Gogito?" Alpha taunted, hovering between two sharpened crystal stems as he looked down on the Final Super Saiyan. "Got a homely feel to it, wouldn't you say?"
"This won't save you. You know that, right?" said Gogito.
"We'll see about that."
"Have it your way then."
Gogito took off like he was shot from a silo, homing in on Alpha's stationary position as the dragon set his arms to a familiar pose. Red energy bounced from his palms with Vegeta's technique igniting itself. Gogito could only groan; the same old move again? He'd navigated through it twice already – this time would be no different.
"Ultima Barrage!"
Just as before the Super Saiyan span into a complex sequence of flips and rolls, warping left to right as a small fleet of Crimson Oblivions passed him by. When his path was blocked by an emerald crystal cluster Gogito punched straight through it. Shards of reflective gemstone erupted from his warpath, and as the saiyan bobbed and weaved closer he raised his arm for a punch.
He was ten feet from Alpha when the blast hit him; a solid beam blazing right up his back to halt the saiyan in his tracks. The dragon didn't waste opportunities. He rushed ahead and met Gogito with a powerful kick, sending him back into free-fall where he could see the error of his ways.
Behind him countless more Crimson Oblivions rose up from the invisible attacker. Shaking out the pain, Gogito swept back his body to avoid the first before a second passed between his legs, dangerously close to the crown jewels. Only with a closer look did the saiyan realise what was happening.
The floor he'd jumped from – the metallic black surface like tainted marble – was bouncing back every shot from the Ultima Barrage. It was a floor specifically designed to reflect energy. Just one rebound wasn't enough; before long at least a dozen copies of Vegeta's signature attack bounced from every angle of the dome-shaped structure, obliterating everything in their way whilst creating a crimson net of burning tripwires.
"Well, this makes things complicated," Gogito muttered to himself. Those Alpha fired first slowly began to dissipate into harmless energy, but most still ricocheted around the room like table tennis balls fired from a softball launcher. A noise of surprise lurched out of him as one from the side streamed towards his elbow; if he moved it any later the blast might've taken a chunk of him with it.
No choice but to attack, he told himself. The least I can do is make sure he doesn't fire another round.
Without another thought the saiyan set off again towards his foe. This time, after successfully plotting his way through the hectic maze of Crimson Oblivions, he came face to face with Alpha.
The dragon greeted him with a solid head-butt to the chin as Gogito arrived in an awkward, post-dodge stance, but as the saiyan gained his footing a simple sway sent the next blow wide.
Harnessing power, Gogito decided to try another move in his arsenal. Alpha's eyes went wide with fear as both the man's arms were coated in a sheen of golden ki, wreathed from knuckles to elbows by the golden impression of the Eternal Dragon Shenron. It was a move Gogito had felt in his bones since the two rings clashed, only now receiving an occasion to use it.
"Dragon Assault!" He roared, launching into a flurry of concurrent hooks, each of them spearheaded by a golden dragon bearing its fangs. As a combination of both Goku and Vegeta's attacks the technique's power knew no limits; the moment the first Shenron landed Alpha was out for the count. Craters the size of volleyballs sprang up over the dragon's dark exterior with every blow, with each punch the ferocity of a Dragon Fist.
Limp as a dead fish Alpha tumbled to the ground. Through a platform of slate and a pillar of emerald shards the dragon careered until he finally flopped to the black floor. A shine of crimson illuminated him, shining down like a blessing from above as Gogito moulded a massive globe of energy into his hands.
"Crimson Dragon! . ." he roared, shaping the beam to the figurehead of its namesake. "KAAAAA. . .MAAAAAY. . ."As the technique intensified the room became a blinding shade of red wherever one looked, reflective surfaces making the effect all the more poignant. Alpha rolled to his stomach and pushed himself to all fours; that beam would be the end of him.
"HAAAAA. . .MAAAAAAYYYY. . ."
In a desperate bid to stay alive the Shadow Dragon fired at the floor; all seven Dragon Balls glowed a violet hue before shooting each a razor-thin beam. A web of purple streaked to the clearing – seven jets of light on separate courses, reflecting off the ground like wayward bullets until one of them caught Gogito.
Pain lanced up Gogito's side as one of the rays hit him at the back of the arm, searing a smoking hole into his flesh before ending at the Kevlar-thick bone of the Final Super Saiyan. Gogito screamed in pain; in his hands the Kamehameha flashed a dangerous shade – he was beginning to lose control. Catching a whiff of his own burning flesh, Gogito used more force to get the beam under his command. Only then did a second of Alpha's jets punch into his kneecap.
Suddenly the pain was too great. The Crimson Dragon Kamehameha slipped through his fingers, his globe of volatile energy detonating prematurely.
The result was a spectacular misfire: blooming like an exploding star the beam went off in Gogito's face, filling the clearing until only smoke remained.
Charred and bruised, Gogito fell in a half-conscious state to the ground. Pain returned him to his senses as he felt his back barrel through one of the crystal clusters, with gems the size of fists stabbing his spine. Another hitting his ankles put the saiyan into flips and a third was there to slow him down before hitting the ground face-first.
This time Gogito did not get up right away. Instead the saiyan focused for a moment, blocking out the pain of Alpha's death-traps until finally he managed to stand. With practiced breaths – slow and heavy – he yanked out each piercing crystal fragment one by one, making no noise even as he dealt with a tricky shard protruding from the back of his neck. When all was done Gogito was a mess of wounds and energy burns, a smattering of blood staining his celestial white coat of fur.
Alpha didn't have the same problem. As the smoke finally cleared Gogito realised he was gone, having got to his feet and concealed his energy during the saiyan's fall. No matter; Gogito had an idea of his own to try out – if the cretin wouldn't show his face he'd just have to scare him out.
Harnessing positive energy, the seven Dragon Balls across the saiyan's chest began to shine. All at once they released their own rapid beams of light, reflecting off the curved obsidian floor around him to wreak havoc on Porunga's twisted dimension. Whatever Alpha could do, he could try too.
The slightest glimmer of energy was all he needed. Like a bird of prey Gogito homed in the dragon's location, finding him cowering atop one of the many circular platforms. As shots of light bounced about them the two lost themselves to the instincts of close-quarters combat. Alpha charged in a rage, swinging left and right to hit nothing but air before turning into a kick that met only the five-star Dragon Ball.
As he skidded back from the force of the blow Gogito found himself right on the edge of the stand. Alpha ran at him once again. Spinning away, the saiyan evaded his first and only blow, reversing their positions so he could thrust forward both palms in a forceful, energy-augmented strike that pushed the dragon off the edge.
Alpha fell almost forty feet. Without bothering to expend energy he rolled to an expert landing on the next disc-like platform. He raised his arms, silently taunting Gogito into coming down to join him. The saiyan only pulled back his hands, charging his power to a sphere of the brightest azure for a timeless technique.
"Kamehameha!"
Alpha leapt to the next platform, escaping any damage before the Turtle Destruction Wave blew up his foothold. By the time he landed on the next isle Gogito had already arrived, forcing him onto the back-foot with a five-punch Goku combination before breaking his guard with a back-flipping bicycle kick from of Vegeta's moveset.
A swift boot to the back of the knee saw Alpha down on the other, and from there a high-powered slug across the jaw was all it took to put him on the deck.
"Get up!" ordered Gogito; a kick to the ribs made his argument more compelling. "On your feet Alpha! You don't get to stay down until you've felt the pain of everyone you've made suffer!" The saiyan kicked him again, this time so hard that the Alpha's body flew three feet into the air. Gogito caught him and held him aloft, just long enough for the dragon to understand his position before Gogito brought his spine down on his knee, breaking him like a twig.
Alpha Porunga was in too much pain to form a coherent sentence. From the wounds in his body black smoke billowed as his immortal form tried to regenerate quicker than the saiyan could maim him. Gogito carried him over to edge by the neck, tossing him off the platform to career through rock and diamond as the saiyan condensed his energy to a bursting green light from his hands. Only when Alpha hit the ground did he fire it off.
"Final Shine!"
Vegeta's technique struck true, quilting the dragon with an evergreen light in an explosion that demolished the obsidian surrounding him. When the smoke cleared Alpha emerged with a limp, coughing and spluttering darkness with a great chunk of his right side missing. At a closer look Gogito could even see the curvature in his flesh where the beam punched a clean hole through him, slowly forming itself back together in shadows.
Gogito! Gogito? Damn it, he's still not answering. I'll try again in another few minutes.
Scratching his head, Gogito suddenly found himself aware of the voice jabbering around his head. It was a presence that had snuck up on him during the fight, so quietly and without effort that he began to wonder how long the voice had been trying to contact him. The saiyan paused and opened his telepathic connection.
Kibito-Kai?
Finally! I've been trying to reach you for a quarter of an hour!
In spite of himself Gogito's stomach turned in embarrassment. He told himself to be alert – that he would respond the moment a Z-Fighter got in contact. During the thrill of the battle however he'd forgotten all of it; a foe like Alpha Porunga demanded every ounce of his concentration.
Yeah sorry about that, he apologised. I think the reception isn't great over here. Speaking of which, how did you reach me in this place?
We're tracking the fight through the Elder's crystal ball, said the Kai. I'm here with Gohan; everyone's in position – just get Alpha back here and give the word. We'll show him what real power is all about.
Leave it to me.
With Alpha Porunga finally recovered Gogito kept his sentence short, blocking out Kibito-Kai's voice the moment he finished speaking. The dragon had his full attention once again as he hollered up to him.
"Are you done spouting this compassionate crap or do you want to carry on?" he asked. "Please, no more! I'm going to throw up."
"Well at least we agree on one thing!" said Gogito.
Alpha looked puzzled; he crossed his arms and made a face. "What would that be?"
"That the time for words is over. Let's settle this!"
In a heartbeat Gogito was on him again, striking his armour with a dizzying combo before grabbing his arm and twisting it to a lock. From his one free hand the Super Saiyan made a pose with his fingers. He pressed them to his forehead and charged energy for a dimensional jump. Hurtling through the void, Gogito barely managed to warp three feet before an invisible wall slammed into his face.
As he returned in a daze to Alpha's hellish plain Gogito felt an elbow plunge into his stomach. The dragon allowed him a few moments experience the pain before twirling out of the arm-bar and throwing him headlong back into the maze of spikes and stone.
Gogito bounced to a stop, the soles of his shoes balanced carefully on a precarious cluster of jade crystals. Fingers of blood flowed a warm river down his temple like melting wax. Wiping it away, the saiyan shook his head and considered his options.
No good; why can't I get him across?
Alpha Porunga's childlike giggle made him seethe. Clearly the dragon knew something he didn't, and the only way to find out was to give it another go. With an unwavering shout Gogito took off again and closed in for the kill.
This time their exchange was much longer; Alpha kept up pace as the two traded blows, even landing a few glancing jabs during their scuffle across different altitudes. In the end the result was the same though. Seeing an opening, Gogito ducked beneath the dragon's swing and delivered a practiced, lethal chop right under the armpit – an oft-used pressure point that made the victim seize temporarily.
Throughout Alpha's momentary muscle lock the saiyan grabbed him again and activated the jump. Once more he found himself bounced away by an unseen barrier, and as they returned to reality the dragon took his turn to act. In a two-footed dropkick Alpha booted Gogito back into the air.
The last Shadow Dragon channelled energy to his arms and grinned. He waited as the saiyan travelled upwards, timing his movements so he could strike when Gogito flew by the dome's very centre – the ultimate death-zone his realm had to offer.
"Ultima Barrage!" Pumping his hands left and right like a shadow-boxing champion, Alpha sent his rapid armada Crimson Oblivions to every square inch of the floor around him. As the strings of a puppet-master they pulled towards Gogito, each nearly parallel to the beam beside it.
They didn't hit him all at once. Instead the Final Super Saiyan found himself suspended at the heart of the room by continuous beams blasting him in constant succession, juggling him aloft with compact explosions shaking him side to side as Gogito screamed in agony. Soon a smokescreen blanketed his body; Alpha carried on firing. The waterfall of blood dripping from the fog was evidence enough that he remained, so the dragon blasted away – cackling all the while – until his arms finally began to tire.
With a shrieking giggle of satisfaction Alpha watched as the lifeless body of the Final Saiyan dropped from the mist in a wreck, hitting five or so crystals on his way down before finally meeting the floor with a bone-shuddering crash. The dragon skipped over whistling in delight.
"Maybe you shouldn't have given that a second attempt," said Alpha. "Know what I mean?"
Craning his head, the saiyan looked up from flat on his stomach. Blood-loss robbed him of the power to stand as Alpha's raw energy burnt his throat raw. "H-How? . ."
"Any halfwit with a brain can train themselves to withstand dimensional warps. You should've done the same; then maybe this fight would've played out differently."
"I'll kill you. . ." Coughing up blood and spit, Gogito cleared his throat. "I swear it," he vowed.
"Oh come now Gogito, don't be a sore loser. Look around you – look at yourself! This is the end of our fight; why don't you just be a gracious opponent and meet your end with dignity?"
As he struggled to see through a swollen eye the Final Super Saiyan felt the roots of his white hair pulled as Alpha jerked him up. Looking closer, the dragon himself had seen better days. His breathing was heavy, his eyes were bloodshot and stains of an onyx powder faded his skin where his body had regenerated itself over and over again. In any case, Gogito knew his own condition was far worse.
I've lost too much blood. Can't fight like this.
"You're beaten. We're all alone in my house. No one can enter to fly in and save you and you can't even stand – this isn't the kind of situation where some last minute comeback is going to save you." Alpha released him, letting the saiyan's jaw smack the ground hard.
Just hearing those words made Gogito's skin crawl. His entire being was based around having the power to do more; to endure where others gave in and to carry the weight of an entire universe upon his shoulders. He wasn't about to give up here, not when they had the chance to do so much more. With a snarl the saiyan clenched his fists and pressed them to the floor.
Alpha could only watch – half bemused and half awestruck – as Gogito pushed against the ground. His arms bulged and trembled under the pressure, with his own weight now requiring all his focus to lift. Soon a knee was raised, and then a second, putting the saiyan on all fours so he could take a deep breath and channel energy.
"You wanna bet?" he put to Alpha.
As the dragon allowed himself another chuckle he slowly came to notice the luminous golden ki swathed around Gogito's arms. Alpha aimed a kick to be on the safe side, already too late to stop the hurricane of the Final Super Saiyan.
"DRAGON ASSAULT!"
Gogito pounced, going from all fours to a jumping left hook in the blink of an eye as ethereal twin dragons became his gauntlets for attack. Each blow was an ordeal for the saiyan, slow and deliberate, but the first knocked Alpha too senseless to form any defence. The saiyan would sink into a hunch as the dragon prayed he was done before launching another haymaker, every one knocking Porunga back a whole two steps.
In the end the dragon finally regained mobility as the saiyan sank back to one knee, his breath ragged and wheezing. Alpha pitched back an arm and prepared to clobber him back down; Gogito reacted with a jumping uppercut, a golden dragon spiralling about his forearm for a final showstopper to complete his combination.
"DRAGON FIST!"
The punch sent Alpha headlong into a small crater as his skull hit the roof. Gogito steadied himself and regained his posture, using what little time he had to consider his options.
I have to get him to the other side. Think Gogito! In his mind's eye the saiyan flipped through all his memories to date – of Goku and Vegeta's shared experiences and all the battles they fought alone. Combining the two, the saiyan had over a century of combat knowledge; he must have come across something that let him bypass the usual methods.
Majin Buu. . . Majin Buu - it's got something to do with Majin Buu! Gogito froze for a moment. Something jumped out at him: a story Goten told him long ago about their battle two decades ago in the Room of Spirit and Time. That's it!
Gogito wasted no time filling his lungs with air, stretching back his chest like a cat as he took an enormous inhale that made him light-headed.
"AALLPHAAAAAA!" The room quaked from the force of his shout, shaking the dragon free of his crater to plummet back down and hit the ground before him. With a growl of malcontent Alpha glared his way, but it was the thing behind him that caught Gogito's attention.
A crack in space, like a series of intersecting lightning bolts cutting at air, had appeared from the noise he made. Gogito smiled, knowing just one more scream would split the gap between their dimensions like a melon. Focusing hard, he reopened the link between him and Kibito-Kai for a single command.
GO!
From spread eagle on the ground Alpha managed his way back up, enraged and still blissfully unaware of the tear between realms opening up like a wound just five metres behind him. Gogito drew in air one more time, roaring again before the dragon could react.
"THIS IS THE END!" On his last word the saiyan forced out every mote of oxygen his lungs could hold, elongating his speech to a thunderous scream as the crack in space broadened like immense pressure on a window. Only when he'd screamed his throat dry did it shatter; the void of space ripped into focus, stars and suns twinkling as a backdrop to Alpha's nightmarish domain.
The endless abyss howled at them, a whistling sound like the echo of a forlorn banshee. Alpha finally noticed. The dragon felt the pull of the other dimension along with two distinct powers. Turning, he noticed both Gotenks and Raditz in the faraway distance, charging their energy to its absolute maximum.
"What the. . ?" The dragon turned back – straight into the path of Gogito's flying kick.
Alpha sailed through the opening in a daze, tumbling wildly as he went with the sudden drop in gravity sending him into flips as Gogito paused to watch.
When he finally stopped and steadied to a hover Alpha's face lit up with jubilant mania. The dragon flicked away a breath of dark vapour from his cheek and proceeded to laugh like a madman.
"Three weaklings are just as easy to kill as one!" he stated. Alpha came to eat those words in a storm of fists and dark power as another fighter streaked into view, blindsiding him from below with an aura as fearsome and menacing as his own.
Gohan had arrived.
Assuming his last transformation the saiyan exploded in a rage-fuelled blitz of crazed, non-stop attacks. So ruthless and savage were his punches that Gogito wondered whether it truly was Gohan. He showed Alpha no quarter in which to retaliate, bombarding him at every moment with a fist or a kick or some combination of the two – he moved too fast to tell from afar.
So mesmerised was the Final Super Saiyan by Gohan's assault that he scarcely noticed Novus flying into position opposite Raditz and Gotenks. Together the three of them channelled their ki, with Raditz's triple Kaio-Ken blazing in a vortex around him.
When his arms were spent the half-saiyan grabbed Alpha by the ears and jerked him into a head-butt so skull-crushing that Gogito couldn't help but cringe. With Alpha stunned Gohan looked as if he was about to carry on beating him to a bloody pulp. In the end the saiyan held his nerve, soaring away in a burst of power until he assumed his place in the diamond formation.
With the four of them together the beams began to charge. Searching rays of colour formed a stunning aurora across the dark void of space as four lights began to shine in a diamond around Alpha. The energy flowing from that tiny zone was larger than anything Gogito had felt before, with each warrior putting out godly levels of ki to saturate the place with raw power. Blue, gold, red and black fired at once, aimed towards the exact same spot at the centre of their formation: Alpha Porunga.
"Kamehameha!" screamed Gotenks.
"Divine Blaster!" Novus said.
"Kaio-Cannon!" was Raditz's call.
"Void Kamehameha!"
As Gohan's beam rocketed into play their plan became complete. Four colours raged at Alpha with no weak link in sight, pillars of solidified power normally made for wiping freaks off the map; today they served another purpose.
Alpha returned to consciousness, registering his situation only as the four beams converged on him in a colourful x-shape of energy with no way out. Struck at once by so much power, Alpha threw out his arms to hold them at bay, using eons of power saved up inside the Namekian Dragon Balls to keep away the blasts that should've ended him.
Stuck now, the dragon could only hold his ground as the fighters pushed more and more energy behind the beams. They were too strong to repel; Alpha held the weight of several worlds beneath his aura, crashing like four never-ending waves against his shaky defences, splaying ki left and right. He couldn't push them away and he couldn't escape, such was their combined force; the last Shadow Dragon found himself trapped beneath the might of four ultimate attacks, completely exposed for the one fighter who could defeat him.
Taking wing, Gogito finally soared through the dimensional opening to confront Alpha. He stopped at just ten metres away, savouring the look of terror on the villain's face before his fingers curled into Goku's immortal pose.
"Let's see you dodge this one," he said. "CRIMSON DRAGON! . ."
"W-w-wait! Stop! You'll kill us both!" insisted Alpha, but the saiyan wasn't listening.
"KAAAAAA. . ." Manifesting as a swirling mass of crimson particles, the energy frothed and struggled in his grasp as Gogito fought to keep it under control. He wouldn't fail this time; too much rode on his shoulders to falter now.
"You won't survive from that far away! Don't be an idiot!"
"MAAAAAYYYYY. . ." As the rumble of power howled in his ears Gogito pushed even more into his hands. Just to be safe he made sure every last scrap of energy from the Dragon Balls went into it, an enormous influx that the Son Goku by himself could never hope to channel all at once. Gogito felt his face ripple and hair flap from side to side with the screaming force of energy opposite him; his clothes began to tear and his muscles bulged so tightly they began to bleed. Disregarding it, the saiyan drawled the third syllable.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. . ."
"N-no. . . No please!" Alpha's voice was a whimper. Gogito saw the moment when all the hoped faded from his eyes. Gone was the merciless dictator; here was a pathetic creature begging for his life.
Looking down at his brewing blast, a wave of terror suddenly swept over Gogito. Under the strain of so much energy the orange ring on his middle finger began to crack. Starting off as a hairline split, the more energy he used the more the crack widened. Panic gripped him as he spoke once more, fearing it would break before he finished his ultimate technique.
"MAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYY. . ." The fractures widened again, this time splitting so wide Gogito could see the inside of the golden alloy. The rings would break, that much was certain, but not before he got his last Kamehameha. What worried the saiyan more was Goku and Vegeta; they would come back into this world powerless and without oxygen in the void, winning their battle only to die moments later.
I should've held onto those gadgets! He cursed himself. There was only one thing for it. Channelling energy around his body, Gogito diverted a good chunk of his life force to cloak himself entirely in the orange and blue aura of the Final Super Saiyan. This is all I can do for now. Goku, Vegeta – stay alive.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
What happened next was hard to follow. Gotenks watched as in one moment a compressed supernova spilled from the palms of the Final Super Saiyan – the roaring crimson image of the dragon Shenron. Baring its fangs, the dragon devoured Alpha like a serpent swallowing its prey, birthing an explosion that shook the universe to its very core.
In the next moment Gotenks found himself fleeing. Z-Fighters from every corner of the diamond turned tail to run as the shimmering crimson light flared as a red dawn over the void of space, spreading out and engulfing everything in its path like a nuclear blast.
With raw power stinging at his heels the fusion warrior hurtled headlong into an asteroid field. Gotenks ploughed through the few that caught him unawares with his face before ducking into a complex weave, bobbing through the rocks like a professional as his speed slowed dramatically.
As the aftermath of the Crimson Dragon Kamehameha began to catch up with him Gotenks thought up another plan. Throwing out all the energy he could spare the saiyan released a small legion of Kamikaze Ghosts to send through the field. Streaming ahead, they spaced themselves out and detonated on the asteroids, clearing the way for Gotenks to gear up to his top speed and leave the storm in a flaming bloom of fireworks.
Behind him the eruption finally reached its end. Still hurtling at breakneck speeds, Gotenks banked towards a nearby moon and descended to the nearest side. He skidded upon landing, grinding stone with his shoes to slow himself down. In the moment before he halted the fusion split with a humorous pop into two fighters.
"WOOO!" Goten whooped, immediately meeting Trunks with a practiced high-five before pumping his fist in ecstasy. "That was awesome! Did you see that?"
Trunks couldn't help but smile. "Yeah alright, that was pretty amazing."
Looking out over the curve of the moon, the saiyans watched as the last glimmers of Gogito's attack flashed across the now-featureless landscape. The two of them collapsed to the ground, exhausted and thirsty. As the void bustled with ki before their eyes they waited for their energy to slowly recover.
"Well, there's no trace left of Alpha. That's definitely the end of him," said Trunks.
"Of course it is," offered Goten. "I don't think anything could've survived that blast."
"Yeah, that's what worries me."
Goku's son turned, a blank stare telling Trunks he didn't understand.
"You see the distance Gogito fired it from? That was almost point-blank. . ."
Before they could discuss the matter further a warp behind them made Goten jump out of his skin. The second, third and fourth corners of the diamond materialised out of thin air, with Novus still fixed in the pose of the Instant Transmission. Gohan and Raditz removed their hands from her shoulder.
Goten grinned and gave a mocking tut. "Gohan! Novus! And here we thought you were going to be late to the party! Scared us to death! Isn't that right Raditz?"
"We? Nah, I was solid as a rock the whole time," Raditz boasted. "But when Alpha tumbled out of that window you should've seen you – whiter than those ghosts of yours."
"Funny, those just saved our bacon," mused Trunks. He glanced around; there should've been more of them – Gogito was still nowhere to be seen. Fearing the idea he'd started on before, Trunks asked away. "Where are Goku and Vegeta?"
The look passing between the three older fighters confirmed what Trunks suspected. He couldn't sense their energy anywhere – for lightyears in every direction the cosmos was empty.
"We don't know," muttered Gohan, avoiding the logical conclusion. "We can't seem to find them."
Just then the entire group twitched in discomfort; the queasy sensation of a Kai hacking his way into their neural networks. In an instant they were joined in telepathy, opening with Kibito-Kai's nervous voice addressing one fighter in particular.
I know you're all celebrating but I just called Gohan to say you've got maybe thirty seconds left. Might want to hurry with the goodbyes.
"Gotcha." Gohan's expression dropped; clearly he hated leaving them with such a huge matter unresolved, but the whole thing was out of his hands. He was dead after all, and the afterlife could only keep him back in the mortal world for so long.
With so little time Gohan rushed around the Z-Fighters in turn, saving Goten for last. "Novus, it was great meeting you. Uncle Raditz, you stay a good guy. And Trunks, keep my little brother out of trouble."
"No promises there."
"And Goten – wait. . . Hang on a sec!" Gohan paused as an obvious thought came to him. Something didn't add up. Switching back to his mental voice, the saiyan addressed Kibito-Kai.
Supreme Kai, you're still in Otherworld right? At the Check-in Station with Piccolo?
Yeah, why?
Looks of confusion passed between the Z-Fighters before Raditz interjected. So. . . No unexpected visitors?
Like who?
Goku and Vegeta, said Trunks. We can't find either of them. For a minute there we figured the worst.
Huh. . . For once in his life Kibito-Kai sounded just as puzzled as the rest of them. Well they're not dead, I can tell you that for a fact.
"YES!" Goten jeered. Whoops of joy and sighs of relief claimed the group.
"Alright guys, looks like you'll have at least one more mystery to solve while I'm away," said Gohan. "I'll see you all soon enough. The moment I get back we're taking on Hyperion's road." Finally the saiyan moved over to his brother, resting a hand on Goten's shoulder for some final words of encouragement. "Goten, make sure you-"
A whirring sound of teleportation cut the saiyan off midsentence as his body vanished against his will. His time ran out at the worst possible moment. In just a few blurry lines Gohan was gone, back to the afterlife where the rest of the fallen fighters awaited.
Goten held out his arms and whined in dismay. "Oh come on! Seriously? They couldn't give him like ten more seconds!?"
.
Author's Notes: Well that's that! Alpha is dead! Gone! Obliterated! . . Finally!
You know as much as I've loved writing this story, I have to admit I'm a little relieved I'll never have to write a full Dragon Ball Z action sequence again. After a certain point it's just an exorcise in synonyms. There are only so many different ways you can say 'X punched Y really hard' and so on, and after 70+ chapters of this the creativity really starts to wear thin; thinking up new metaphors and ways to phrase things that you haven't already used becomes something you dread.
We still have two chapters remaining though! I want one to wrap everything up and give some closure and then another for a final epilogue. I'll try and post those two simultaneously as well – or at least really close together.
As for the battle itself, there's not much that I can really comment on except for the whole 'plan' thing that I built up involving all the main characters pinning Alpha down. Not sure if anyone remembers, but I tried to establish that they could do that in the five against one battle with Alpha. A good few of you have suggested to me that the secondary characters should have some input on the defeat of the main villain, since in most sagas they have little to no effect on them. So yeah, took that on board :D
Also, brought back the whole 'loud noises breaks dimensions' from the Majin Buu saga. It made a nice little final resolution to the fight. On the downside though, it did alert me to one huge problem with the Room of Spirit and Time Saga: Why didn't they just do that to escape the room!? Trunks was there from day one and he's literally done it before! I guess we can deduce that since the Room teleported its victims back to the lobby with every jump it probably wouldn't have worked anyway. . . But no one even tried it!
Only two parts of the story are left to be addressed, two questions that always crop up in a Dragon Ball Z arc: 1. What's going to happen to the people of Earth? 2. Where the hell are Goku and Vegeta? Find out both next time!