"Y-Yamcha! Yamcha! Y-" Before Krillin could cry his dead ally's name once more (or perhaps several times more), the king drunkenly spat a ki ball at the baldy's head. It killed him as well.
"N-No! What's taking them so long?!" Gohan cried out, desperately going full power in his Ultimate state. The rest of his friends powered up to their limits as well. In response, Ginyu and Shisami powered up, with the remaining soldiers (excluding Sorbet), charging at the warriors. "Tri-Beam!" Tien shouted. A large triangle-shaped energy blast shot forwards at the pathetic goons who, alas, did not train and were thereby obliterated.
As Tien gasped for a few moments, Shisami - who did, in fact, come prepared for this confrontation - flew out of the smoke and rammed his horn into Tien's left shoulder, piercing it. He then grabbed onto the Earthling's other shoulder with his left hand.
Before any of the other Z Fighters could aid him, Ginyu gave a sly little kick to Piccolo and sent him flying into the ocean. "Your fight is with me alone, Namekian!" he shouted.
Gohan, unable to decide whether to save Tien or Piccolo first, was bopped on the head by King Cold. Hit with a surprising amount of force, he was flung down, unmoving. "Whee hee, whoo hoo! This is fun for me, not you!"
Jaco, meanwhile, was hiding behind his ship with the utterly terrified Bulma. The woman glared at him furiously, "Go help them! Now!" The Galactic Patrol member was shaking in his special edition Mega Turbo Rocket Boots, not daring to fight the two most elite members of the regime of King Cold. He certainly didn't even consider the thought of attacking the king himself. That would be suicide! "Jaco!"
Thankfully before Bulma could toss him right in the middle of the battlefield, he caught a glimpse of a little midget skittling off to the king's ship. Sorbet. "I-I'll take out that guy going to the ship! M-Make sure he doesn't have any laser beams on the ship or anything. Yeah, yeah, he looks like a huge major threat that could surely turn the tides of this battle. Yessir, this is going to be a hard job for Jaco, but I'll-"
"Stop talking! Go! Now!" With that, Jaco was kicked right in front of the ship just as the muppet man scurried into the vehicle.
Shisami, meanwhile, held his grasp tightly on Tien, who couldn't push the soldier away. "Aw, what's wrong, Three-Eyes? Too weak for this?"
Now for any normal human, this is where they would give up. This would be their end. This would've been the finishing blow, with no way of escaping.
Thankfully, Tien was no mere human.
He smirked, surprising his opponent. "What's so funny?"
The martial artist then looked up at the elite, grew two extra arms, and put them together in a triangle shape. "Neo Tri-Beam!" The blast hit Shisami point-blank, but Tien's assault wasn't done yet. He fired blast after blast after blast at the red monster, each one shaking the ground beneath him. Finally, Tien stopped, exhausted, and writhing in pain. The energy was too much for poor Shisami and destroyed the upper half of his body. The Earthling, pleased to defeat his opponent, fell to the ground still smirking.
"While you surely aren't good at Smorkball, I'd like to applaud you for your strength!" Ginyu exclaimed, while his arms were tied up by the Namekian's left arm, stretched out to a length that would make even Lord Frieza blush. He began to shimmy a little. "It would be easier if you untied me, good sir."
"Cut the small talk." Piccolo raised his arm and fired a ki blast at the purple alien. As with all attacks of that caliber, it did nothing. Ginyu let out a chuckle.
"I'd rather cut something else, actually..." Energy flared within Ginyu's arm and with a slice of a purple blade, the soldier chopped off his opponent's arm.
Ginyu unwrapped the disconnected limb from his body. "Always wanted to try this thing. Ya ain't Salza, but eh, good enough for me."
"You mean that lackey of Cooler?"
"Yeah, yeah! That's the one! How do yo-"
A solid blow to the jaw was the unexpected answer to his question, knocking him off into the water. Piccolo could no longer locate his presence.
Hm…suppressing his energy...dangerous considering his prowess. He can try to attack at any time...
He put his remaining index and middle fingers on his head.
...but I have all the time in the world to wait.
Then there was a period of anticipation. Occasionally the Namekian saw a few bubbles and ripples in the ocean. Not concrete enough to fire just yet. Even with his enhanced hearing, the only noises he heard clearly were the buzzing of energy from his fingertips and the drunken slurs of the king in the distance.
Several dozen bodies rushed out of the water.
Afterimages.
Piccolo did not move.
As the illusions closed in on Piccolo, many of them dispersed.
He flinched but still did not move.
There was only one form left after this waiting game. This was the moment. The man's arm shook for a second, then extended. "Special Beam Cannon!"
It went through, but...Ginyu's body wavered and waned. He only had a brief moment to realize his mistake.
"Wrong answer!"
Behind him appeared the being's true form, piercing the Namekian's chest with his shimmering blade. "Phew...well that was fun," Ginyu exclaimed, wiping his wettened brow and dissipating the blade. "So...can you tell me how you know Salz-"
Piccolo made an attempt to strike the soldier with his remaining arm, only to be clenched onto, halting its movement.
"No seriously" - the arm snapped - "I want to know."
A cough of blood, then a sigh of reluctance. "Cooler came to Earth to try to...regain his family's honor."
"Ooooooh. And he brought Salza with him?"
A nod.
"Ah. Since the planet is still here, I guess one of ya must've beaten my good ol' French rival, eh? A shame I couldn't kill him myself, but you know what they say-"
"No."
An arm ruptured from Piccolo's empty cavity, clocking the man in the skull. A flurry of blows followed with a burst of energy emanating from the guardian, the hole in his chest gushing a pronounced purple: a blend of blood and ki.
The push overwhelmed the soldier as the Namekian followed up with a swift kick to the jaw, hurtling Ginyu up into the air. Not letting up on this opportunity, Piccolo put his hand near his injury, flowing the ki leaking from his body into the palm of his functional hand. To reduce any more unnecessary damage afterwards, he quickly regenerated his chest.
There was a moment of silence as Piccolo took a deep breath. He once again extended his arm, the built-up ki erupting into a blast of yellow, engulfing Ginyu's body and punctuated by two words:
"Light Grenade!"
Gohan's head was flaring and his ears were ringing. Placing his hand on his head, he felt blood spurting.
Dammit...
Gohan tried to push his body up with his left hand. This attempt resulted in a thud on the ground, allowing the blood to drip around the Saiyan's ears.
One blow...that can't be the best I can do!
He pushed himself up once again, managing to bring himself to a knee. He looked up, seeing a blur of white.
Gohan lunged.
He suddenly felt a sharp pain in his chest. Another hit. The pain coursed throughout his entire body as he was launched into a boulder, a few hundred feet back. He tried to move, but he couldn't. All he could do was watch as his blurred vision became tinted red. The blur was approaching.
Videl...Pan...Dad…
As he strained to do something, anything, he felt something placed within his mouth. Realizing what was happening, he struggled to bite into the object. Each bite mended his broken body. Ki once again flowed throughout the Saiyan's body. His vision was now clear. He turned to see Master Roshi standing by his side, Senzu bag in hand.
"Thank you."
"Don't thank me yet, this fight is nowhere near done."
Gohan directed his attention towards the emperor. He was spinning around in circles, humming to himself.
"H-He's mocking us."
Roshi shook his head. "No, I don't think so. At least not entirely willingly."
Gohan tore one of his arms free from the boulder he was stuck in, contemplating the hermit's words. "What do you mean?", he questioned, as freed another arm, "Do you think he's being controlled by something?"
Roshi's glasses glistened.
"You could say that." He pointed at the king, still spinning about. "I utilized a similar technique against your father long ago. That, Gohan, is..."
The king fell on his rear.
"The Drunken Fist."
Gohan was freed from the boulder, wiping the still-warm blood off of his forehead, "'Drunken Fist'? You mean he's been drunk this entire time?"
Roshi nodded: "Such a technique coupled with raw power is a dangerous combination. The only way to counter such unpredictability is by using some of our own."
"What would you suggest?"
The hermit stroked his beard for a few moments. "Have you ever been drunk before?"
Gohan's face jutted forwards a bit as he nearly tripped on nothing. "No! No! Maybe some non-alcoholic champagne at meetings, but only as a formality!"
"I guess I should've known you wouldn't be a fan of the 'vulgar'," Roshi remarked with a chuckle. His brow furled back as he continued, "The best chance we would have had is if you were able to understand such a style and use that to counter him."
There was another pause as Gohan began to contemplate whether he should have partaken in some of his co-workers' "bar nights" just for this moment. Cold started to lift himself up in the air, staggering towards the two warriors. They took a stance holding one arm to the side of their chests, hand clenched, and the other arm lifted upwards.
"You're a fast learner, right?"
Gohan nodded, a drop of sweat dripping down his face.
"Try to cover me. As he attacks, you'll see two Drunken Fists in action...though I'll likely last only a few seconds at most. And that's pushing it."
"But...you'll die!"
"Nothing I haven't faced before," Roshi said chuckling as he tossed the bag of Senzu to the Saiyan. "There are four beans left. Use the time they'll give you to try to understand his movements. With some luck, Goku and Vegeta will arrive in time."
Sweat dripped along the fabric of the bean bag. "I trust your judgment, Master."
"As I trust in your strength."
With two kicks at the ground pushing the brave warriors forward, they delved into the frosty abyss.
It was never Jaco's day, was it? Always ignored by his king, always getting into these kinds of messes, always in the midst of others' accomplishments. Despite this, Jaco knew he had to bring these criminals to justice. If he could just bring the commander - or rather the former commander - of the PTO remnants in, it would all be worth it. He would finally be given a raise.
As the patrolman stepped into the ship, gun tightly gripped in his hands, he made note of its layout, looking left and right and up and down. Pretty big. Circular floor. Walls that weren't cleaned in years. Yup, this was certainly a ship from Cold's army, that was for sure.
The control room would be a good place to start, considering flying away from this place would be the most logical course of action in this scenario. To be honest, the thought had crossed Jaco's mind. Okay, truthfully, it was still in his mind. Duty comes first, though.
Carefully stepping so as not to alert Sorbet of his presence, Jaco shuffled to his destination. After a few seconds (let's say 26 to be specific) he reached the room. There, he saw Sorbet frantically tapping buttons and mumbling to himself. Continuing his shuffle, Jaco slowly approached the former leader. Sadly for him, the commander turned around to see his enemy. He slammed his fist on the board while lifting his ring to face Jaco. "Of course, the Galactic Patrol had to show up here!" Sweat was pouring down his face.
"I mean, that's kinda been our job for the past few millennia. To stop bad guys like you. Shouldn't that be obvious?"
Sorbet threw his free hand up in the air as he shouted, "Who knows anymore? Maybe you killed the Galactic King and just want to take my territory now!"
This certainly caught the patrolman off guard. "Kill the King, what are you on about? I'm all for monarchies, especially those with leaders of such beautiful physique."
"Yeah, tell that to him, I'm sure he'll have a good laugh about it as he kills your best soldier and replaces him with some washed-up Smorkball player who died decades ago!"
Jaco was now thoroughly offended. "I'll have you know, the king would never kill me for the sake of Chondrich and especially wouldn't laugh in his presence! That man smelt so bad that even being near him would have you feel that stench for weeks! I should know! I was with him on the planet-"
"I'm talking about myself, you idiot!" the former commander punctuated with one more slam on the board, breaking a few buttons off. He then started to laugh hysterically. "I'm surrounded by utter lunatics! A king that's more concerned about whether the wine shop is open than running an empire and a man who listens to his own theme song on loop! Every day! For months! Can you imagine it?"
Despite never hearing this song referenced to, Jaco felt a strong desire to defend this music. Perhaps he felt a kinship as he listened to his self-made mixtape similarly. "There is nothing wrong with having a song you can listen to over and over again!"
"I don't care! My empire is in shambles, my soldiers are dead, and all I have left is that idiot Shisami to keep me any sort of sane!"
"Red guy? Horns? Spandex that showed off too much of his butt?"
"Yeah, what's it to you?"
The patrolman leaned his head a bit to get a better view outside the bubble-shaped glass. From that position, he was able to see the pronounced posterior of the soldier next to that three-eyed human guy, both lying on the ground. "Uh...high priority capture," Jaco stuttered, as he directed his attention back to Sorbet. "Uhm...just like you are! By the name of the Galactic King, I'm stopping you here!"
The former leader of the PTO, now reduced to this. Corned in a standoff against another crazy person in a backwater world he never should have come to. He couldn't help but give a chuckle out of the sheer stupidity of it all. "I should have revived Frieza. Maybe even Cooler! Maybe they wouldn't have made the same mistake twice!" Sorbet screamed.
Two shots fired, one blue and one red. The red grazed its target's cheek. The blue hit dead in its target's skull. As the lazer short-circuited the control panel behind him, blood spurted out from the muppet man's forehead. For a few seconds the blood alone dripped before the body itself fell. Sorbet was dead.
"You won't get the chance to make another one," Jaco stated firmly. He paused for a few seconds before looking around. No one was there to hear his one-liner. As always, he supposed.
From there his mind was directed to find out if there was anyone else in the ship. Before he went to explore the rest of the ship, he saw out of the corner of his eye another flash of yellow coming off from the ocean through the window. A big attack no doubt. He once again considered leaving Earth, obviously in his own ship now that this one's controls were fried. The thought grew ever stronger now that he had Sorbet's corpse. However, he eventually decided against the cowardly approach.
After all, he was Super Elite.
Shockwaves filled the godly realm within Whis' staff. Goku and Vegeta clashed, as they had done many times before. Despite how similar each match they had was, the two Saiyans always felt a rush when they fought; whether it was a blast of ki or a strike in the jaw, both couldn't help but smile. They once again flew towards each other, readying to punch their opponent in the jaw.
However, the two's surroundings shifted from a world of blankness to the familiar greens, blues and purples of Beerus' world as Whis halted each of his students with one finger each.
"Hey, what's the big idea?" Vegeta exclaimed, pulling back his fist from Whis.
"We were just about to get to the good part!" Goku added, similarly pulling back from his master.
"Come now, you both train every day. Surely having a break a few minutes earlier wouldn't hurt things," Whis retorted.
"Yeah, I guess so. Gramps always said breaks were helpful, but I guess I forget that sometimes" Goku responded with a chuckle. Vegeta simply nodded, knowing by this point that Whis' judgments were usually correct.
"By 'Gramps', you refer to your previous master, correct? If I recall correctly, his name was 'Roshi'?"
"Yep, that's his name!"
Silently, Whis placed his staff in front of Goku's face, which instinctively froze up. Roshi was dead. Vegeta expressed less surprise considering his lack of connection with the man, leading to him speaking first.
"How exactly did that happen? Did someone attack Earth?"
"Correct," Whis answered. "To be more specific, it was the emperor of the Planet Trade Organization, King Cold, brought back by your Earth's Dragon Balls."
Vegeta was about to give an exclamation when Goku interrupted, extending his hand towards his ally, two of his fingers from his other hand placed on his forehead, sensing the immense power that Cold emitted. "Come on!"
Understanding the message, the Prince of Saiyans hastily grabbed onto Kakarot's hand. Just as soon as he did so, the pair were gone.
Certainly, this was going to be a great learning experience. Whis thought to himself as he too started to travel to Earth. All they needed was a set of circumstances like this to unleash more of their potential.
A fish that could tell the future and a slumbering God of Destruction were all that remained on the planet.
As Goku arrived, he saw a white fist barrelling towards him. In an instant his hair shifted to a bright red and responded to the punch with one of his own. A burst of air erupted as the two collided: equals.
Cold was about to speak before Vegeta, hair also red, decked the king in the face and flung him into the sea.
"D-Dad!" Goku looked behind him to see his son bloodied and barely able to stand. He began to fall as Goku caught him.
"Dad...I'm sorry I couldn't do more…"
"You did great, Gohan, don't worry, " he said, letting go of his son and looking around the battlefield. Roshi. Yamcha. Krillin. All dead. Goku winced, feeling a strong desire to delve into the sea and kill that monster now. To make him feel the pain he dealt to his friends. However, he knew it wouldn't be that easy - that one punch Cold dealt still left lingering pain within his entire arm. Even with Vegeta's help, victory was uncertain. He needed reassurance. He needed to stay calm.
He first looked at Tien's body. His ki still shone brightly. Still alive.
Goku's aura dimmed.
He sensed Bulma, who looked out from behind her rock and developed a wide smile as she ran to embrace Vegeta.
Goku's aura dimmed.
Finally, he turned back to face his son. "Are the Dragon Balls on Namek still working?"
"Yes."
He took a deep breath. He exhaled.
Goku's aura now shone blue.
Gohan looked up and down at his father's body, mesmerized. Despite being unable to sense his ki, he felt a blend of power and tranquillity emanating from his father's body, like the waves crashing and subsiding in the ocean below him. Finally he spoke: "What do you call it?"
"Blue."
Cold's body burst forth from the water. He attempted to speak but was once again interrupted, this time being roundhouse kicked in the face by Goku. As the emperor's body crashed through several boulders from the force of the blow, the Saiyan turned to his son once again. A smile was clear on his face.
"Super Saiyan Blue."