"Calzone, right? Pleasure to meet you."
That orange-skinned man, Calzone, picked a bone from out of his golden teeth and scratched it against the wooden desk at which he sat while gazing contemptuously at the one who stood across from him. He briefly glanced at the ceiling as the armor-clad one across from him took a seat. As if to show his indifference, he yawned theatrically before leaning back in his chair and folding his arms.
"So this is what Frieza's come to? He sends a kid to negotiate with me?" Calzone asked from his nasally voice. "Look at you; did ya balls drop while you were walkin' inside?"
"They're hanging a little lower these days, yes."
"A funny one, I see," Calzone replied with an insincere chuckle. He looked down at the long-haired boy's purple chest plate. It bore that insignia of a golden swords's sheath he'd become acquainted with. "But neither of us are here for jokes. So just tell me ya sissy little boss's demands this time so we can both be on our merry way."
"You might want to make sure Frieza never hears you say that word about him. Trust me," the boy said, wincing in regards to the "sissy" comment. Calzone scoffed. "But it's pretty simple. Unless you pay all of the units you've shorted on him the last 6 months, Frieza is going to withdraw our protection."
"Bullshit. That little cocksucker's been actin' like he's gonna play hardball with us for months, now." Calzone shook his head as he laughed. "What makes him or you think I'm gonna take him seriously this time? I pay him more than enough as it is."
"You and I both know Friea's the chatty type. Word comes out that we're not backing you up anymore, and the Galactic Patrol touches down on this planet a day later."
Calzone wildly swung his head back and laughed as if he were told the funniest joke of his life. "The Galactic Patrol? My boys and I have built ourselves up. We can take them."
"So then why are we both here right now?"
The smile on Calzone's face vanished in an instant. He curled his lips back, baring those sparkling, gold-plated teeth for the boy to see. He shed his blazer, revealing his veiny, muscular arms that bore a mural of tattoos. But if it was a gesture to intimidate the boy, it didn't work; his expression remained that blank, piercing stare.
Calzone narrowed his eyes. "Lose the scouter."
"It's bugged. Nobody will hear us unless I fix it."
"Lose it."
With a shrug, the boy did as instructed, removing the yellow scouter above his eye and brushing his bangs away from his vision. With a clearer view of his face, Calzone noticed the scar running down the boy's left eye.
"A scar, huh? How long have ya had it?"
After briefly raising the brow of that scarred eye, the boy answered. "About seven years."
"I take it ya don't want more."
In an instant, the boy dangerously narrowed his eyes, never one to suffer a fool's threat kindly. Calzone only laughed at the swift change in demeanor.
"Relax. It was merely an observation." Calzone clasped his colossal, calloused hands together and rested them against the desk as he leaned forward. His eyes bored deeply into the boys. "You're still a boy. You don't understand how grown men do business."
"I first killed a grown man when I was four years old. I know."
Calzone froze. The boy had said it so flatly, defying his age. Yet even as he spoke on such brutality, his eyes remained vacant.
"Am I supposed to be impressed?" he snorted, putting up a front. "You don't understand that when a man doesn't like how his end of a deal is going, he withdraws funds unless his demands are met."
Completely disregarding the imposing man before him, the boy yawned. Calzone snarled at the gesture and slammed his hand against the desk. Pencils, cups, and various pieces of paper flung off the desk from impact. The tightly-fastened wooden structure even wobbled for a few moments afterwards.
Still no reaction from the boy, however.
In case he didn't get the message, Calzone kept his fist pressed against the desk. "I'll tell ya what—I'll give you a one-time payment to get the hell out of my face and never show up here again."
"Sorry, I don't negotiate with those who are weaker than me."
Taken aback by the boy's brash rebuff, Calzone gasped and shook his head. He emphatically stood up, this time slamming both hands on the desk as he rose. "You don't negotiate with weaklings? Well let's see you-!"
With one hand, the boy fired a blast at the ceiling. With the other, he blasted the floor. An orange-skinned ogre with blue hair fell from the ceiling and destroyed the desk when he slammed into it; a deathly scream emanated from below the floor. Calzone's jaw collapsed.
"H-How did you…?!"
"I sensed them around the time you asked me about my scar," the boy replied with a smirk. "The real reason you made me take off my scouter, right? Too bad."
With sweat dripping down his forehead, Calzone lifted his arm and gathered energy to his palm, but the boy squeezed it all away with the grip of his gloved hand around his orange wrist. His amused smile twisted the proverbial knife.
"By the way, had Vegeta been sent here instead of me, you would've been dead as soon as you demanded he take the scouter off. I guess I just wanted to show off." The boy lifted his free hand and unleashed a shockwave that slammed Calzone through the wall and into the ground outside.
After grabbing his scouter from the desk and placing it back over his ear, the boy stepped out from the hole in the building and stalked towards the burly man cowering before him on the ground. Like what was attempted on him seconds ago, he lifted his hand and gathered his Ki.
"Nothing personal."
In only a blast, Calzone crumbled to dust. The boy hardly even reacted, absent-mindedly clicking his scouter back on as he looked up at the teal-shaded sky. "Zarbon? Calzone kept playing hardball, so I killed him."
"Good," answered Zarbon over the scouter. "Just purge the whole planet. We'll sell it off."
"Hn." The business didn't particularly matter to him. He was just glad the errand work was almost done with.
"Get it done in three days, Gohan."
Gohan yawned when he stepped out of his space pod a week later. The mission had been another in a long line of busywork he and the Saiyans had been tasked with. But like all of them, he finished them quickly and then wondered what the hell was even the point.
The boy had become a...well, older boy, really. But the half-Saiyan - twelve, possibly thirteen, by his own estimation - had lived a tumultuous enough life under Frieza to damn sure feel like a man. When he stepped inside the base, those that walked about certainly respected him like one. How could they not? He'd long separated himself from the pack.
He stepped inside a room with a gold sword-like logo above it - identical to the one on the left chest plate of his purple & gold armor. Inside the bright room that featured framed-cots and lockers, the elder Saiyan trio awaited.
"Back already, I see," Vegeta observed. His armor, too, bore the insignia. He hadn't aged a bit over the years. Neither did Raditz, though Nappa had grown his mustache into a salt-and-peppered beard. As the Prince had explained to Gohan once, the Saiyan aging process was a snail's pace that allowed the warrior-race to maintain their primes for as long as possible. Approaching 60, Nappa was finally on the back end but no less fearsome.
Vegeta made a snipping gesture with his fingers, and Gohan nodded. It was to confirm their scouters' signals were jammed.
"Anything interesting on your end?" Gohan asked, sitting down on his cot.
"Of course not," Vegeta answered with a momentary sneer. "We finally knocked off those idiots that were harassing Planet Ziti. That fight was about as difficult as you'd expect."
"So not difficult," Gohan replied, reaching for a shelf and grabbing a small, white box.
"You guessed it. The Zitians were grateful." Vegeta was unable to hide the disgust in his voice. "Though they were disappointed you weren't there. Said they prefer your politeness."
Gohan rolled his eyes. His politeness was more apathy, but he supposed an absence of caring kept him from ever building up enough impatience to behave rudely. He opened up the box and pulled a white stick out from it, perching the tip between his lips.
"Mostly because I can fix all of their shitty tech," Gohan said, keeping the stick tucked.
"That's why I'm pissed at Frieza and Zarbon for sending you off to do your own thing," Raditz said. "You always handle all of the business stuff. Without you we're all standing around with our thumbs up our asses."
"Wouldn't be a problem if we actually had our regular jobs again," Nappa said, irritably tugging at his beard. "I don't know when the hell we went from space pirates to businessmen, but it's sure as hell getting old."
"You know how it is," Vegeta said with bitterness. "Frieza and Zarbon have us by the tail with this job."
"Like you'd know anything about having a tail," Gohan quipped.
"Shut the hell up," Vegeta spat, though he laughed as he did so. The shame of one of his lowest moments in battle had become another distant memory that fueled him. Nappa and Raditz laughed as well, though that didn't sit as well with him. He whipped his head at the two subordinates. "Hey! I didn't say you two could laugh, too" Raditz clammed up, though as soon as Vegeta turned around, Nappa snickered.
His frustration swelling, Vegeta slammed his foot against his cot. "We're going to waste with this nonsense. With every passing day I feel my skills growing rustier like these other asskissers running around."
"Pulling a Kabnet doesn't sound so crazy these days," Nappa said. "I'm gettin' too old for this shit."
"Hn. But I know what we should really do," Vegeta said, staring pointedly at Gohan. "Kid, you can knock scouters off the grid, you can disable the tracking in space pods, and you have Kiyomi and the old man to cover your tracks behind the scenes. We could easily find strong planets for ourselves and knock those off."
"There's just too many moving parts," Gohan said, though he'd given it thought himself. "Guys from other planets or in Cooler's army might notice good planets dying off. At that point, we'd be no different from Kabnet and get blown away." What he left unspoken was his fear that Earth would be among the first places Frieza would look if the Sayans ever disappeared.
"Whatever," Vegeta conceded. "I just don't know how much longer I can keep up with this bullshit."
"We'll get our due," Raditz said. "Giving everyone tough jobs they're not truly cut out for is gonna blow up in Frieza's face, and that's when he'll need us to clean up after these idiots."
Gohan nodded in agreement with his uncle, but fixated on the stick in his own mouth. "I'm taking a smoke. Call when you need me."
Leaving the room, Gohan headed down the hall for one of the backrooms. His ears picked up a loud thud from his right, followed by much barking and insults. When he turned his head to see the commotion, he saw a pair of green and purple lizard-like soldiers he didn't recognize accosting a pint-sized soldier who sat on the floor and trembled before them. Gohan's left eye twitched at the scene; he decided to see what was up.
It wasn't just a small soldier cowering before the two men - it was a child. Salmon-covered skin, black hair, and an innocent face. Gohan could see from the fear in his eyes that he was new. He turned his attention away from the boy and the two men apparent sources of the quarrel.
"Whaddaya want, kid?" asked the green lizard. "This ain't any of your business."
"That so?" Gohan asked, the stick in his mouth slurring his speech.
"Unless you want to end up like how this other runt will look in a minute, I'd suggest you move," the green lizard said, clenching his fist and flicking his sharp tongue at Gohan.
The purple lizard was about to back him up, until he looked closely at the insignia on Gohan's armor. His eyes trailed further down, stopping at the tail wrapped around his waist.
"Ah shit, this kid's one of those AnaBan goons," he observed. "Let's just back off."
The green lizard glanced at his comrade skeptically, but when he looked Gohan in his blank, detached eyes, he complied with a grunt. "Whatever." They both turned around and went about their business.
With them out of sight, Gohan folded his arms and looked down at the kid who stared at him in awe. "If I were you - and I was you, once - I'd stop looking so scared. Don't let any of these idiots around here push you around. Got it?"
The boy meekly nodded, studying the older adolescent as he stayed on the floor. His eyes became more confused as Gohan lingered above him.
"Well? Stand up."
Though he squawked, the child soldier did as commanded and got back to his feet, dusting himself off as well. Gohan's eye twitched again, but he ignored whatever reaction in his brain triggered it.
"Good. If you're not about to go on a mission, then get yourself to a training room."
Gohan spun around and left before the child could thank him. AnaBan - Frieza's "clever" title for the special designation he'd given the Saiyans as their exertion-free "promotion."
There were a lot of rooms in Frieza's halls that Gohan had gotten to know over the years, and one of them was the library. Granted, the idea of an army of murderous space pirates having any sort of educational wing was patently ridiculous, but he supposed the scientists did need reference material from which to continually expand their minds and improve the gadgets. Gohan had taken to the writings himself, and so he stepped inside the vast hall of shelves filled end-to-end with textbooks the size of Nappa's head.
After grabbing one particular purple-covered book, Gohan left and headed outside. As he sat down atop a balcony, he let the chilly breeze brush against his face while he raised his left hand to the stick resting against his lips. With his Ki, he ignited a blue flame from his palm which he used to light the stick - a space cig, as he liked to call it. He inhaled the spicy aroma, allowing it to hit his nostrils and enter his brainwaves, filling him with both smoke and a calm. After he opened the book, he clicked his scouter; he'd configured it to translate space language into English.
Had Kiyomi never informed him of the leaves she frequently smoked, Gohan was sure he would have gone insane long ago. As it turned out, "not caring" was easier said than done. The blue vegetation, Digos, as Kiyomi called it, helped relieve Gohan of his perpetual stress and dulled the protests of his conscience. He liked smoking and reading scientific journals - the combination was the only thing that could redirect his mind from the constant violence.
As he flipped a page, he felt fingernails gently run down the back of his scalp; it sent a shiver down his spine. Not because it was painful, but the opposite—save for the Digos' smoke, it was the best sensation he'd felt all day. He turned around to see the owner of those magic fingers, though he already had a suspect at the top of his list.
"'Sup?"
She said it just before she spun around and sat down next to Gohan on the balcony, her back to the sky but her body positioned at an angle so she could face him. Brushing her ponytail, she smiled as Gohan impishly looked away from her.
"What do you want, Arepa?" Gohan tried not to look at her, largely out of embarrassment. Calzone's crass remarks hadn't been inaccurate; Gohan was at the age where the opposite sex was finding more real estate in his brain, specifically her. It certainly didn't help that she was a couple of years older than him and had opted to widdle her uniform down into just an armor and trunks.
"Once I smelled the smoke 'round here, I figured that meant Grouchy Gohan was back," she said with a coy smile.
Gohan rolled his eyes and directed them to his book. He wouldn't dare say it out loud, but he could never fight off the warmth that enraptured him whenever Arepa gave him her unsolicited attention. All those years ago, Vegeta had told him to stop caring about others, and so he shunned her. Then, Frieza's "Dream Team" forced them around each other again.
"My pops said the Saiyan he met back in the day used to smoke too," Arepa said. "Guess that's what all the cool ones do, huh?"
Gohan snickered as he flipped to another page. He could detect the sarcasm in her voice, but admittedly part of him did think the act looked cool enough. Of course, as far as substance abuse went, he was by far the tamest. Years of hanging around the premises exposed him to the rampant alcoholism plaguing the Frieza Force. It made sense that a brutal space empire would send people down the path of addiction.
Almost involuntarily, Gohan snuck a glance at Arepa's legs, but noticed a bandage wrapped around her thigh. "What happened to you?"
"Well, since you guys are takin' allllll the dirty work, that keeps puttin' the rest of us in more danger," Arepa observed, scratching at the uncomfortable tape. "Coulda damn near lost this leg."
With a sigh, Gohan looked straight ahead. Dirty work. That's what the "AnaBan" squad was about.
"I mean, don't get me wrong, I like a tough battle as much as the next space gal, but I wish they'd start givin' the roughest stuff to you Saiyans," Arepa grumbled. "Y'all can handle it. I mean, what do you guys even do now?"
"Lot of hits and extortions, pretty much," Gohan said, frustration rising in his tone. "We 'protect' some planets from outside forces, but it's really just Frieza's way of robbing them blind. On my planet, we had a name for people like us. The Yakuza; my mom used to worry about me growing up into one."
He closed his eyes and laughed a bitter man's laugh. "So much for that."
With his eyes closed, he didn't see Arepa's pitying frown towards his tone. After puffing blue smoke, he opened them back up to take in the stars, letting his contrition blow away with the wind. "But yeah, that's pretty much all we do."
Arepa shrugged. "Don't make a lick o' sense to have y'all doin' the easy stuff if ya ask me."
"That's my 'prize' for breaking 20,000, I guess," Gohan said. It was true - not until his and Vegeta's power levels crossed major thresholds did Frieza suddenly bestow that promotion upon them. Anything to keep them from getting stronger.
Just after Gohan removed his space cig to exhale some more smoke, Arepa snatched it from his hand and took a drag for herself. He gave her the stink eye for it, but upon closer examination of her face, he noticed something sparkling against her lip.
"What's that?"
Arepa put the cig down and blew smoke while she looked down at the object of Gohan's curiosity - a ring, pierced into the right corner of her bottom lip. She smiled and ficked it with her fingers. "It's a lip ring. Ya like it, huh?"
"You have time to do stuff like that?" Gohan scoffed, snatching his cig back.
Arepa glunched at him for taking her new toy, but shrugged. "Shit happens when ya got a long deadline." She smirked mischievously. "Somebody got it for me."
Though he pretended to be indifferent, Gohan still asked. "Who?"
"A certain guy with a name like yours." She could hardly spit it out while giggling overtook her.
"Gomayn?"
She laughed even louder when Gohan swung around and hopped off the balcony. "C'mon, Gohan, where ya goin'?"
"I'm paying him a visit." Gohan marched back inside while Arepa giggled behind him.
Gomayn. What a stupid goddamn name. A kid around Gohan's age who was recruited from another planet and acted like he was hot shit despite being weak. After enough puns were made regarding their names, Gohan had the guy on his permanent shitlist. Sensing his Ki from the mess hall, Gohan set his sights there.
Arepa chose to stay in the doorway while Gohan stepped inside. Like a wolf closing in on its prey, Gohan circled around the table until he was facing him. Just the sight of his face made Gohan scowl - yellow skin and purple hair that stood up in spikes. A perpetually expression.
Gomayn scornfully glared at Gohan. "Is there a problem, monkey?"
The half-Saiyan didn't answer, instead folding his arms and scowling at the soldier. Part of him felt stupid for his behavior; hell, by the time he reached the room he'd already recognized his pettiness. So he was going to wait for Gomayn's obnoxiousness to initiate a conflict.
"What are you here to do, huh?" Gomayn said, an insufferable smirk on his face. "Fling shit at me?"
There it goes, Gohan thought as he whipped his tail from his waist and smacked it into Gomayn's tray; it flung into the wall, alerting the other warriors inside. Gomayn shot up from his seat and snarled at the surly Saiyan.
"You halfwits really can't help yourselves, huh?" Gomayn asked. Unlike many of the others in the Frieza Force, Gomayn didn't cower before the Saiyans - at his own peril.
"Do you really want to try me?" Gohan's voice was treacherously low.
Gomayn's smirk widened. "Try you? No, I want to embarass you." When Gohan squeezed his fists, Gomayn's eyes glowed with realization. "Ah wait, I see now. You like Arepa's lip ring, right?"
Gohan didn't answer, though his deepened scowl said what his voice couldn't. Gomayn cackled at Gohan's anger and pointed his thumb at his chest. "Unlike you, I'm a man of class and fists. The fairer sex naturally gravitates towards me."
Of course, he couldn't see Arepa standing a few feet behind him, rolling her eyes and lampooning him with chirping motions from her hands.
After taking a deep breath, Gohan brushed his flustered impulse off. "Just remember who's stronger around here." As he walked away, he and Gomayn kept their eyes on each other. Arepa inched away from the doorway to remove herself from view when Gomayn whipped his head around; when Gohan returned and Gomayn sat back down, she laughed.
"You're such a dork, Gohan," she teased, poking his chest plate as she leaned back against the wall. She laughed even more at the crimson overtaking Gohan's cheeks while he darted his eyes away from her. "You think you need to prove something to me?"
She leaned away from the wall until her face was only inches from Gohan's, smirking. "I know you're stronger than that twit."
The blue ice in her eyes and her smile bewitched Gohan. Those were the exact words he wanted to hear, and it felt specifically great coming from her voice. Unconsciously, he returned her smile.
"Arepa!"
Gohan and Arepa backed away from each other like they were caught in treasonous activity. It was Cui, scowling with his arms folded. "Stop dawdling around. We've gotta train for our next mission."
"Yeah, whatever," Arepa said before walking in his direction, flashing a peace sign at Gohan.
"Gohan," Cui said, tightening his prominent eyes.
"Cui."
The terse greeting out of the way, Cui followed Arepa out of the hall. As it had turned out, the "Dream Team'' had actually been more than Frieza's way of annoying the Saiyans. He'd long grown tired of Cui's cowardice-first leadership and needed to weed out the weaker elements of his crew. After Beari's death at the hands of Kabnet's remnants and a few more incidents, Frieza's point was made. The crews split back up, and Arepa quickly passed Stroh as Cui's right-hand. She still wasn't anywhere close to Gohan, but by non-Saiyan standards she was impressive.
"Gohan, Frieza would like an audience with you in his throne room."
Zarbon's message alerted all of Gohan's senses. He'd had enough meetings with Frieza go wrong over the years to always stay weary of them. His biggest fear was Frieza learning of his scouter trickery - how he built a chip that could mask the frequencies of his own scouter and any other within range. In the four years since its creation, nobody seemed to suspect anything; but he could never be too sure.
It was easier to just get on with the misery, however, and so Gohan made his way to the metallic doors that opened automatically. In that vast hallway, illuminated by pink light, Frieza hovered in his chair alone. Of course he'd tell Zarbon to summon him when he wasn't even in the room; anything Frieza could pawn off on others, he would.
As Gohan entered, Frieza studied every step he took until he got down on one knee. "Greetings, Lord Frieza," he said, his tone masterfully measured.
"I see you've finally disposed of Calzone and his miserable lot," Frieza began. "I never cared for that fool. Always so crass and ill-mannered...much like your own ilk, now that I think about it."
Gohan swallowed. Business as usual.
Frieza could see Gohan's discomfort just from the way his eyes twitched, and laughed. "But in all seriousness young lad, good work. I knew pivoting the Saiyans' duties would go a long way in relieving me of the day-to-day monotony of running an empire, and I'm glad to see I was correct."
Bullshit, Gohan thought, though he wisely kept that to himself.
"How long have you been under my wing now, Gohan? Seven, eight years? Never have I seen someone rise so quickly at such a young age. Not only have you become among the most powerful of warriors below the elite ranks, but you display a level of intellectual curiosity that defies your simian heritage."
Every backhanded compliment from his lordship served to remind Gohan of his purpose. Frieza and just about every member of his army save for Arepa, Lemo and Kiyomi felt an unjust superiority towards his people; even when the lower ranks cowered in their presence, Frieza emboldened them to chirp behind their backs. He salivated the day it would blow up in his face.
Frieza took a customary swig of his wine. "Should you ever go back to frontline combat, you'd be on track to becoming perhaps the greatest warrior in the history of my ranks."
But I won't, Gohan thought, his jaw flexing. Frieza tortured his ears by chuckling at his soured demeanor.
"Such dismay, my young lad!" He cackled. "Believe me, I understand what it's like to constantly chomp at the bit for some action. In fact, that's why I've brought you before me."
Gohan's brows raised at the cryptic nature of Frieza's tone. He lifted his head to face the lizard, trying to decode the enigma that was his countenance.
"Son Gohan, what if you split off from the Saiyans and became captain of your own crew?"
Gohan opened his mouth to speak, but only flummoxed air escaped. He tried to stutter a few words, but Frieza chuckled and cut him off.
"Think about it. You Saiyans aren't completely absent in common sense; you know why I do the things I do. Though it pains every fiber of my being, I know that my benevolent nature has not been reciprocated by you four." As if to illustrate his "anguish", Frieza moaned and raised his hand to his head. "To especially receive such harsh rebuke from Vegeta, whom I see as a son."
Just as Gohan fought off his urge to roll his eyes, Frieza's demeanor took a radical shift into darkness as his eyes narrowed.
"But do you know why your prince loathes me so, Gohan? Because at the end of the day, he's still the same spoiled brat from when I first took him in." There was no fondness or nostalgia in Frieza's voice, only a razor-sharp resentment, like the day he addressed Boysen's betrayal. "Being born into Saiyan royalty poisoned his mind with the vials of entitlement, leaving him loathe to accept any form of authority."
Gohan didn't comment, dismissing Frieza's grumblings for the feeble brainwashing effort they were.
"I have no doubt Vegeta's filled your head with nonsense about Saiyan pride to keep you on his side. But need I remind you that it is because of the Saiyans that you're here?"
Again, Gohan remained silent. But this time, Frieza had his full attention. With gaping eyes, he stared straight ahead as he tried reconciling thoughts he wasn't comfortable having around his oppressor.
"You're different from the other Saiyans. I could tell from the first day you were brought here," Frieza observed as he floated just a few inches closer to Gohan, his inescapable shadow broadening. Gohan winced at the memory; how he whimpered, and more importantly, how Frieza took it upon himself to humiliate him with only his tail. That was the reminder he needed to keep himself on track.
"These full-blooded Saiyans live for wanton destruction; this would be their life even if my father never crossed paths with their race. They love what they do. But you're not that way, are you Gohan?" A probing smile spread across Frieza's lips as a vein in Gohan's forehead throbbed. "I see a hollowness in your young eyes. As if you've dulled the sharpest corners of your mind in order to carry out your atrocities and still sleep at night. Small wonder you finish your assignments so quickly."
Hearing such a painfully accurate assessment of his mental state forced Gohan to glare at the floor and clench his teeth. Fractures formed in the foundations of his resolve.
"Such a bright young mind gone to waste," Frieza lamented with a smug smile. "Heaven knows what you'd be doing if you were allowed the life you once had in your former home. Instead, Vegeta plucked you away so you can be the perfect puppet to help relieve him of his decades-long temper tantrum."
Gohan could only shake his head in hopes that the gesture would fling away the darts flying towards him that all said, "He has a point."
His frazzled gestures gave Frieza plenty to laugh about. "I admit, my two assistants and I have not made things easy for you, though much of that was your own fault. The only reason you carry on is because you cling to the hope of ridding yourself of my presence."
Gohan whipped his head up. It wasn't just the fact that it sure sounded like he knew of his two brushes with escape or why he turned them down; that was improbable. It was seeing him so plainly state his goal. Was Frieza about to kill him where he stood...or worse…?
Gohan looked at his left hand. It was bluer than usual.
After a blink, its normal shade returned.
"Shocked? You're far from alone, boy. I could count on one hand how many people across my and my brother's empires work here with a smile on their face. People like Kabnet were just the rare fools to act on their resentment." For once, Frieza spoke without any of his theatrical pleasantries; straight-shooting, like Cooler, or Vegeta, did.
"Consider this, my young lad," Friza said, raising his finger. "If you pledged your unyielding loyalty to me and distanced yourself from the Saiyans and their more overt ambitions towards my demise, you'd finally be allowed to grow. To see the true fruits of your tremendous potential. No longer would your mind be anchored by the anguish of futility. Nobody would push you around, least of all Zarbon and Dodoria."
As flashes of those two sycophants' transgressions over the years pounded Gohan's thoughts, he stiffened. His fear of weakness informed every step he took. It was why he threw away his morals, why he allowed himself to take innocent lives.
And Frieza was right. The Saiyans introduced him to that feeling.
Frieza raised his other four fingers in a grand gesture, and then squeezed them shut into a powerful fist. "You would eventually be reawakened as a warrior second only to my clan in power, reaching the very edges of mortal capability and beyond! You don't have to like me; I don't even have to like you. But you will be respected. You're not all monkey, after all!"
You don't have to like me. More or less the same phrase Vegeta had given before Gohan willingly killed innocents. It was a mantra Gohan held close.
"I understand the weight of this decision. So let's say I give you 24 hours to think it over?"
Gohan stood there for a few more minutes, shuddering. The only words Frieza had ever spared him over the years were orders, condescension, and admonishment. He'd never been given true advice from the tyrant; never exposed to such salient, disarming wisdom. He recalled Vegeta mentioning how the lizard had served as his twisted mentor during his childhood.
He stared into the purple and gold that colored Frieza's armor. They were a more saturated shade than the more muted rendition Gohan bore on his own clothes. The colors of power that Gohan desperately sought; power now being invited towards him openly.
After swallowing heavily in his dry throat, Gohan turned on his heel and walked away, stepping like the heavy padding from Cooler's boot camp had been applied to his feet.
"And just remember, boy," Frieza called just as Gohan reached the door. The boy froze and turned around to face him.
Frieza's face broadened into a smile that dropped Gohan's body temperature to an absolute zero.
"No pressure."
Gohan whipped himself back around and stormed out, desperate to escape the range of that frigid gaze as quickly as possible. Once back in the hallway, Gohan stood still, his fists gripped tightly at his sides.
His mind traveled back to that day seven years prior, when he sent that boy, Kobe, off to live the life he once yearned for himself. And how after that, Vegeta finally managed to talk him into completely crossing over into the dark side.
Why was he even thinking about Frieza's offer? He was the enemy. The man had even plainly stated it himself! Then again, he was an enemy that the Saiyans had thrust him towards.
But this was all bigger than him, right? It was just as Vegeta said - no matter where he was, it was the Cold world and he just lived in it. As long as he had Saiyan blood and was the son of one of the few remaining full-bloods alive, his destiny was always going to lead him to Frieza. The bastard's system was the reason he was even born.
Even so, his progress had long stalled. Was the path to escaping the Cold world really with a group Frieza didn't trust?
Gohan looked down at his arm. On the purple fabric, a drop of ice blue formed. No, not this again! Gohan said to himself, but his brain's voice couldn't stop his brain's vision from spreading the ice through his entire arm until it looked just like Boysen's seven years earlier. And then, the cracks.
"Gohan!"
His head whipped up. It was Raditz, standing across from him. Green scouter, long, spiky hair like his own, and a…
...Frightening smirk as he dangled Gohan by the back of his yellow collar and hauled him closer towards him. Gohan dad was supposed to be invincible, the strongest man ever, but this guy just kicked him and left him crying in agony.
What did he want with him?!
Gohan couldn't stop himself from crying his tiny, four-year-old vocal cords out. He could hear Raditz say something about one hundred bodies and reluctance for killing his own nephew, but none of it was clear over his wails. All he knew was, his invincible father was writing in the grass, the scary Saiyan had him in his grip, and there was nothing his dad's nice friends could do about it.
"For your son's sake, you shouldn't try to fight back," Raditz warned.
And then he rose into the air. The funny old man, the short guy, the blue-haired woman, and his father all drifted further and further away. Gohan tried to reach out, tried to escape from the iron-tight grip, but was powerless to do so.
"Your power is nothing compared to a real Saiyan's. And you're definitely no match for your older brother!"
"DADDY!" Gohan cried out
"I'll be looking forward to tomorrow, Kakarot! See you then!"
Raditz turned around and took off - the last thing Gohan saw of his father was him helplessly reaching out, screaming his name.
Minutes later, after being carelessly tossed into the space pod and locked inside, Gohan banged against the glass in a feeble attempt to break it. It wouldn't budge no matter how hard his hands slammed into it. There was no escape.
And then, the man came back - Raditz. But this time, he wasn't smug and boastful; his face was pale and his eyes were bugged, like he'd just seen a ghost. He stared at Gohan as if he were some kind of gremlin. After he opened the pod, he hauled Gohan up by the collar of his tunic - and the last thing Gohan felt was a chop to the back of his neck before everything went black.
Gohan blinked. He wasn't on Roshi's island, or those grasslands, anymore. He was in Frieza's home base, as he'd usually been since that day. And that same face was looking at him, snickering like he did before he hauled him away from his injured father.
"The hell's got you all wound up? Figured out how to train in your head or something?"
The sound of his voice tightly furrowed Gohan's brows. His fingers curled into fists that threatened to tear the fabric of his gloves. His black eyes - hollow, as Frieza described - burned with a corrosive intensity that perplexed his uncle.
"Get the fuck out of my face."
Gohan turned around and marched off, leaving Raditz to wonder what the hell had gotten into him.