Gohan was soaring several hundred meters above an ice floe when the communicator on his wrist squealed. A couple of the penguins below craned their necks up at him while he halted mid-air to answer. "Yes?"
"Gohan!" Videl's voice was sharp. "Where have you been? I've been trying to raise you for the last hour. Some lunatic just tried to assassinate the CEO of Oz Electronics."
"What? Is she okay? Are you okay?"
"She's fine, I'm fine--like I said, he was a nut. His weapon was a bucket of water...something about melting witches...anyway, it wouldn't have been a problem except the soap suds shorted out the new travel computer they were just bringing online, so West City is now one giant traffic jam--where have you been? I kept getting a no signal error!"
"Er...I guess satellite coverage isn't complete over Antarctica."
"Antarctica? Why the heck are you--"
"Videl, can the Great Saiyaman 2 handle things on her own for the next few days? Something's come up."
There was a pause, and Gohan flinched, anticipating his fiancée's outrage. But Videl's reply was soft. "Gohan-kun, what's wrong?"
"It's my dad." Gohan explained quickly, ending with, "So now everybody's searching for him. And Vegeta-san."
"He's been gone since the night before last? Why didn't you tell me before? You didn't say why Goten had called."
"I'm sorry," Gohan said hastily. "I had to find Piccolo-san to tell him what's going on, and then I went back to see if Okaasan and Bulma-san had learned anything, and then I thought I felt Otousan but when I flew to where I thought he was there wasn't anything, and then--"
"Gohan-kun," Videl said, patiently, "when did you sleep?"
"I, um." Gohan thought for a moment. "I didn't."
"Since two nights ago? Do you know how late it is?"
"Well, it's still daytime here. And Saiyajin don't need regular sleep--Videl, no one can sense either of them. And Piccolo-san is pretty sure they didn't leave the planet, either by space or...going to another dimension. Unless Otousan teleported, but I don't think Vegeta-san would go with him, usually. Except Bulma-san said that Vegeta-san was upset about something..."
"Gohan-kun. Gohan-kun! Slow down. Look, your dad is strong. And so is Vegeta-san. I don't think there's anything on Earth that could stand up to them, and besides, you'd feel something that powerful. So if no one can sense them, maybe they're hiding their ki for some reason?"
"Yes, that's what I thought," Gohan agreed. "But why? Otousan likes to go into the wilderness sometimes, but he's never tried to hide from me before. And Vegeta-san--"
"Wouldn't care. Gohan, what aren't you telling me?"
"Eh?"
"You're panicking. It's not like you."
"I...am?" Thinking back, he considered how fast he had been speaking, how rapidly his heart was thudding in his chest. There was sweat on his brow, even in the freezing wind. It did seem quite a bit like panic. He had seen it before--Videl's father exhibited it a good deal of the time. But it wasn't something he could recall experiencing personally. Saiyajin tended to be happy, proud, or angry, to the exclusion of most other emotions. Fear he had felt before, if rarely. This was similar, but different.
Piccolo-san had noticed, too, he realized, thinking of the Namek's parting words to him the previous night. "Keep cool." At the time he had thought it a suggestion to search the ice caps...
"I guess it's...we don't know anything. There's nothing to fight. Videl, I don't want to lose Otousan again."
"You'll find him." Videl's tone was all supreme confidence, inherited from her famous father. "You can do it."
It warmed him, in a way that had nothing to do with the ice below. "Videl, if you do need me, just call."
"Hai. And if you need me--you call, promise?"
"Promise," Gohan assented, and closed the connection. Buoyed by her certainty, he took off in the direction of the Capsule Corporation. Perhaps Bulma had figured something out by now.
Piccolo was no longer Kamisama, but after several centuries as Chikyuu's deity, he had connections. He heard things during the time he spent on Kami's Lookout; Dende would talk, and Mr. Popo dropped occasional tidbits. Moreover, he still had links with the earth itself. His was not the most powerful ki on the planet, but he was arguably the most sensitive to the undercurrents of life and energy. Therefore it is unsurprising that of all the worldwide searches, Piccolo was the one who found them.
In all honesty, it took a fair amount of luck as well, being in the right place at the right moment. Then again, since he was on an errand for Dende at the time, it might not have been luck at all. Fate--and deities--leave little up to chance.
At any rate, Piccolo was flying over a second largest desert in the world when he felt a ki flare up--a violent conflagration, almost explosive in both its sudden rise and its immediate disappearance. It was barely long enough for him to pinpoint its direction, but there was no mistaking that pattern of energy, nor its sheer power. Goku.
The Namek considered alerting Gohan, decided against it. Useless to get the boy's hopes up if it had been a momentary lapse of his perceptions...which he knew it wasn't. But there had been an element to that ki-flash that he didn't care for. Something different, something unusual, which he wanted to investigate before he let the others know. Just in case...
They might be in even worse trouble than they had thought, if his reading was accurate. Because the ki he had sensed, Goku's ki, while unseemingly powerful as ever, was also undeniably, unmistakably, completely insane.
Bulma wondered where Vegeta was.
She knew she shouldn't be worried. The Saiyajin no ouji was eminently self-sufficient, perfectly able of taking care of himself, if no one else. And Son-kun, on the other hand...Goku should be her concern now.
Still, she couldn't stop wondering.
"Have you found anything yet, Bulma-san?"
Besides, Goku had enough people worrying for him. She met Gohan's anxious dark eyes and shook her head regretfully. "I haven't figured out where that probe came down, even. You sure you don't know, Gohan-kun?"
He shook his head. "Otousan didn't--" Mid-sentence he stopped, looking upward with a questioning 'hn?'
Before Bulma could ask what he had sensed, the skylight burst in with a shower of glass. She threw up her arms to shield her eyes, imagining what kind of threat Gohan would have taken so long to notice. When cautiously she lowered her arms, she saw...
Her son, who was apparently picking up his father's flair for making an entrance. Goten was in his arms. "Trunks--" she began, taking a step forward.
"I didn't do it!" Trunks wailed, sounding half his age and not a little hysterical. "We were flying, looking for Papa and Goten's tousan, and then I didn't do anything, and he fell--"
Gohan knelt by Trunks and took his brother, shook him gently. "Goten? Goten? It's niichan. Goten?" The boy's black-haired head lolled back and Gohan cradled it in one hand, looking to Bulma with a worry that made him look the child he had been, not the young man he was now.
Bulma put her hand to Goten's forehead and frowned. "He's burning up, even for you guys. We should put him to bed, bring him here." She put her arm around her son's shoulders and squeezed, then lead them to the medical bay of the Capsule Co. offices. Trunks watched apprehensively as Gohan laid his brother on one of the beds and drew up the covers. Bulma watched as well, brow furrowing deeper when Goten didn't move. Then she hurried to call a doctor, hoping as she dialed that one could do any good with Saiyajin physiology. Maybe it was just the flu; he was half-human, after all.
Dammit, Son-kun, dammit, Vegeta, she thought as she argued with the hospital's receptionist, you guys better be as indestructible as you act like you are...
Next chapter - what *did* happen to Goku and Vegeta?
Hope this part was a bit more exciting. I'm a follower of old-school style drama - "Start small, and build." I do know where I'm going with this, but I admit I enjoy character interaction more than fistfights between all-powerful villains and world saviors. Maybe I shouldn't be writing DBZ... ^^;; Thanks for your comments, Debido, as well as molly jean, Dreamwraith, and Vegito044.
