by DoraMouse
Dragonball Z characters, settings and items are all registered trademarks of at least Bird Studios.
--quote from the Pepper by BHS.
The afterlife was not all vast gold-tinted cloudscapes and peaceful feelings. It was quite possible to experience frustration and anxiety while dead. Even moreso when you were sitting on a personalized planet in the presence of a strange blue god.
King Kai wasn't an entirely bad host but somewhere between his being a humanoid catfish over a million years old and his need to make a joke out of everything, he was just hard to understand most the time. It had been seven months now and Tenshinhan doubted that he'd said more than fifteen words to the god. He'd never really been one for conversation though. This was why Chaozu had always been such an ideal friend, sometimes it was a saving grace to have someone around who could just read your mind.
Sure, Tenshinhan would occasionally wonder why King Kai had a vintage car - and one of the old ones too, a car with wheels instead of a hover vehicle - on the planet but why bother asking? He wasn't actually all that interested in hearing about cars and in the grand scheme of things, it just didn't matter. Why shouldn't King Kai have a car? The blue god had an entire planet. Might as well put something on it. The car, the house, the planet - they were probably just status symbols anyway. Solid proof that even gods had vanity. Not details that were going to affect mortals very much in the end.
His own personal training, though. Tenshinhan liked to think that maybe his efforts to defend Earth made a difference. He wasn't optimistic about the odds of that idea being true but it was nice illusion to have.
More than once over the years, he'd felt as if he were inadvertantly the strongest of the humans. Well... No. Not exactly the strongest. That wasn't the right word. More like the most predatory. That was it. Krillen, Yamucha, Chaozu, Yajirobe - they were all very strong but as far Tenshin knew, none of them had the inclination to kill things. Even Goku tended to avoid killing things and already young Gohan was promising to follow in his fathers footsteps. They were all warriors by trade but none of the others were assassins. So none of them believed in the same code of ethics that an assassin would. Murder was wrong in their eyes. Maybe he was wrong in their eyes - it wouldn't be the first time.
Tenshinhan didn't enjoy murder but he'd done it before. He wasn't going to avoid killing things if it seemed sensible. Most of others were light-hearted personality wise which was fine but it had always made Tenshinhan wonder if they really understood the circumstances. The others seemed to rely on him to remind them of how real their troubles were. There were days when the triclops felt as if he were the only warrior on Earth that could take bad situations seriously.
The first thing that had come to Tenshins mind upon hearing that Vegeta was alive was that he wouldn't have allowed such a thing to happen. Although, if it had been up to Tenshinhan then Piccolo Junior wouldn't have lived long enough to hatch from his egg ten years ago. It hadn't been up to Tenshinhan. It had been up to Goku and for some reason Goku always wanted to give evil things a second chance - so Piccolo and now Vegeta were both still alive. And maybe in the long run that was okay but ... Freezia. If the Freezia monster was half as evil and dangerous as King Kai had made it out to be then Freezia had to die. That was all there was to it.
Seven months ago, Tenshinhan had hoped that he would be reincarnated for the battle. Because he didn't trust Goku to do the killing and he didn't want Freezia showing up on Earth later for revenge purposes. That battle had ended without Tenshinhan being revived for it. Obviously. But planet Namek had blown up and hopefully the cosmic disaster had put an end to any evil things Goku hadn't had the heart to kill.
What if it hadn't? What if, perhaps even now, Freezia was stronger than ever and heading for Earth?
It was a worrying prospect and a rather horrible burden to have to deal with, made all the worse because Tenshin frequently doubted his own abilities. What if - as with Nappa - he wasn't strong enough to kill the enemy on his own? If he didn't, who would? That was his main concern.
Well. That was one of his main concerns. He had an entire list of them. Vegeta could too easily change sides again. Piccolo as well. And if going Super Saiyan had torched Gokus memory then heaven help them all.
Not for the first time in his life, Tenshinhan wished that all the aliens would have just stayed in space. While Goku had proven himself to be a decent guy, his friendship was hardly worth the trouble that it inevitably brought to Earth. Especially not to Tenshin. He'd briefly admired the kids battle skill - back before any of them had known what a Saiyan was - and they'd had a couple decent fights. Yet even though Goku had saved his life both directly and indirectly, Tenshin'd never quite been able to think of Goku as a friend. Goku was more of an acquaintance.
Tenshinhan had been age twenty back when he'd first met Goku. That had been ten years ago and Tenshinhan could still count the number of times that he'd spoken to Goku on one hand.
Which was fine. The less news from Goku, the better apparently. News from - or even just about - Goku tended to mean that the world was facing yet another crisis which the natives of Earth could rarely do anything about.
A major problem with being a human warrior surrounded by stronger alien warriors was that the stronger alien warriors made everything look easy. And it wasn't, at least not for humans. The human warriors had to work much harder for their strength - training for years instead of just months or days. And they still weren't able to keep pace with the warriors of Saiyan or Namekian blood.
Tenshinhan was painfully aware of this. He'd hit the proverbial wall around six years ago. He'd been 23 at the time and couldn't forget the sinking feeling. The realization that the stronger he became, the harder it would be to continue becoming stronger. Human bodies just weren't capable of supporting that much muscle mass. The human brain could only percieve so much ki at once without damaging itself.
It was dangerous to keep pushing the limits but what other choice was there? Ironic as it seemed, former assassin though he was, Tenshinhan wasn't about to stand by and let some evil thing destroy Earth on a whim. And lately the Earth had gotten into the habit of being seriously endangered at least twice every five years. So he just had to keep training because there would always be another fight.
That was precisely where the latest snag came in. It was called Kaioken. King Kai hadn't wanted to teach his prized technique to anyone since the last person he'd taught the move to - that had been Goku, of course - had ignored all of King Kais warnings. The blue god had told Goku to be careful with the technique because the health risks were severe. Simply because of what it did, the instant-powerup technique was capable of putting lethal amounts of strain on a warriors body.
King Kai had cautioned Goku repeatedly. Yet by the time the battle against Vegeta was over, Goku had not only used Kaioken for longer than was safe but at much higher levels than he'd ever been trained for. King Kai had been amazed. Then he'd been furious. How dare a mortal ignore his warnings! Thus Goku had essentially ruined it for the rest of them. King Kai had flat out refused to even mention the Kaioken while Piccolo had been on the planet, not wanting to be responsible for the actions of a demon.
Piccolo had been gone for seven months now and Yamucha had been back on Earth for two.
Tenshinhan had opted to stay behind. There were lots of reasons he'd made that choice. He felt that he didn't have much to go back to for starts. Plus nobody was sure that Chaozu could be wished back since Chaozu had died once before. And on top of that, the Kaioken.
People had talked about the technique like it was some kind of miracle. Tenshin had wanted to find out for himself. Chaozu was just psychic enough and King Kai was just absentminded enough to let his guard down. Kaioken wasn't so hard to figure out. Now Tenshinhans concern was with the side effects.
Most of Tenshinhans best attacks were as dangerous to him as they were to everyone else. He was used to that, a lifetime of practice had made him very careful.
With Kikouhou the hands were put together to form a triangle shape where all the fingertips were touching to form the upper corner and the thumbs were crossed to form the triangles bottom line. The powerful energy blast typically formed between the palms and was an absolute pain to control. It drained a significant amount of life energy just to direct the blast at its target rather than simply letting the blast explode before it had left the warriors hands.
ShinKikouhou was enough of a variation on the original attack to be counted separately. It could be fired from one hand and so consequently, it was easier to keep ShinKikouhou from backfiring. This improved attack still drained life energy but nowhere near as much.
A slightly more advanced technique was Shishinnoken, the twelve eyes attack. A warrior using this attack created three clones of themselves. So three clones plus the original warrior made four and each of these four had to operate on one-fourth of the warriors total energy. Thus while Shishinnoken could be a very effective attack technique, it was also quite devestating to the warriors life energy.
Tenshinhan had spent most of his life developing and perfecting these techniques as well as a handful of other moves that didn't drain his energy as much. They were his attacks - his very best and most powerful attacks - more than they were anyone elses. Tenshin was proud of his techniques and felt entitled to be. He'd earned those attacks, he'd worked for them.
While the others probably thought he was stupid for throwing his lifeforce aside with such techniques, Tenshinhan knew exactly how much discipline using his attacks required. That was what set him apart from the other defenders of Earth. Their energy blasts were all based on power and speed and angle of attack. His attacks were based on sheer discipline. The other warriors had been trained almost exclusively in endurance and stealth. Tenshinhan had trained most heavily in strategy. He knew for a fact that he could learn any of the other warriors attacks if he wanted to. But none of them had learned Kikouhou. They lacked the discipline for it.
Unfortunately discipline was not going to be enough to put Kikouhou and Kaioken together without killing Tenshin instantly. Powering up a life-draining technique was simply not a good idea.
So he was going to have to invent some new attacks. He didn't really want to. Kikouhou was his signature move. He'd invested too much of his life into creating the attack to just drop it. Besides - energy discs, energy beams, orbs of energy. Despite the fact that there were only a few other warriors on Earth who used energy attacks, it seemed like everything Tenshin thought of had already been done by someone else.
Two not-so-random words wandered through Tenshinhans mind. Super Saiyan.
What a concept. A transformation. If only he could transform into something that had higher tolerance to ki, maybe then he could raise his energy level without risking spontaneous combustion. And a Kaioken-Kikouhou might not kill him the first time he tried it.
Argh... Did the wretched Saiyans have any idea how much he envied them sometimes? Goku hadn't even been looking for his stupid transformation, it had just happened to him. How fair was that? Tenshinhan had been hunting for the human equivalent for the past six years.
Krillen could have been searching for it as well but he had chosen not to. In the first place, Krillens attacks didn't drain his own energy as much - so a transformation wasn't as needed to help ensure his survival. In the second place, Krillen had figured that any kind of transformation meant becoming less human. And he valued his humanity too much to just let it slide.
"The whole reason we fight is to defend humanity." Krillen had said during one of the countless sparring sessions that taken place last year at Kamis Lookout. "So if we have to give up our own humanity just to keep fighting then we lose. Even if we win the fight, we'd lose. It's the principle."
Within the last couple years, Yamucha and Yajirobe had each also hit the proverbial wall in their training - apparently it was at a little different range for everyone - and they'd both backed out of going further for the same basic reasons as Krillen. While Tenshin respected their decisions, he'd privately felt that they were all looking at the world through rose-tinted glasses.
Less human. Not Saiyan. Not Namekian. Just less human.
Maybe I'm already there. Tenshinhan reflected bitterly, recalling the negative reactions that he usually got in public. It wasn't as if he'd chosen to be a seven foot tall triclops. He hadn't even been born with the third eye. But that was a long story by itself and one that Tenshin avoided telling. The details of his life were nobody elses business.
His parents had both been human and as far as Tenshinhan knew, so had the rest of his ancestors. Thus he was very definitely human. But people had always looked at him like they saw something else. Even before the third eye. Of course, maybe regular people looked at all assassins that way.
If other peoples reactions were any indication though then Chaozu had probably been born transformed. That was another reason they were best friends - Chaozu could relate. He knew what it was like to be shunned and mocked. The judgemental general public had never been terribly kind to Chaozu.
They'd never been very kind to Lunch either.
Tenshin found himself thinking of her. He couldn't help it. Lunch might have been a gun-toting schizophrenic kleptomaniac but she'd also been the only woman who'd ever taken one look at him and fallen in love. Her reaction had been such a complete opposite from what usually happened that it had taken Tenshinhan a few years to realize that she hadn't been kidding.
He hadn't seen Lunch for nearly two years now, due to the training at Kamis Lookout and then being dead. Tenshin sincerely hoped - yet doubted - that she had turned herself in somewhere. Out of concern for her health, he'd asked Lunch to turn herself in. Lunch wasn't safe on her own. She had to be around other people. Because if someone didn't remind Lunch to take her medicine, she'd forget. And if she didn't take the medicine in the right amounts and at the right intervals then she'd eventually die.
Two years. It might even be too late to wish her back. Tenshin tried not to think about it but he'd been bracing himself for the worst. He would have already asked to be reincarnated if he'd been expecting to find Lunch alive. And he wouldn't have left her behind at all if it had been anything less than the Earth at stake. But there wasn't much point in saving anyone on Earth if you didn't save the Earth first, you had to have somewhere to go.
At least in heaven, nobody will ever be able to hurt her again.
Lunch hadn't been born crazy. Five years of living around her had allowed Chaozu to get past most of her mental barriers. So Tenshin had become aware that Lunch had a history even darker than his own. She'd been the victim of other peoples anger.
Less human. That idea had more appeal every time Tenshin thought about it. Humans had made his life miserable. They'd made Chaozu insecure and they'd made Lunch insane. All things considered - how bad could less human be? And yes, maybe the transformation would further alter his appearance. But why should he care what other people thought? He'd never been up to other peoples standards of normal anyway. Other people had always viewed him as a freak, an outsider, a -
And therein was the heart of the issue. The one thing holding Tenshin back. If he ever found the human transformation - what would prevent him from becoming the monster that the rest of world had always seen?
Krillen might be fighting to save humanity but Tenshinhan really didn't have any reason to defend the general public. Historically Tenshins reasons for fighting had always been more personal. Against Piccolo Daimio, he'd acted out of injured pride. Against Nappa and Vegeta, he'd acted on behalf of honor - as if repaying a debt by trying to defend the world. Sure, Tenshin had trained hard to be at that last battle but it had always been fairly clear that everyone would basically be stalling for Goku. Not simply because Goku was their strongest fighter but because Goku had more reasons for wanting to save the world.
If in fact Lunch was dead and if Chaozu had to stay dead then Tenshinhan didn't have any reason to fight anymore. Not as a hero, anyway.
It had been seven months. Eight, if you counted the month spent traveling down Snakes Way just to get to King Kais world. And it would be two more months before anyone on Earth could try to wish him back to life with the dragonballs. Two more long months of waiting. Yet Tenshinhan hadn't been able to train or eat or sleep very much the past few weeks. The anxiety had become too much of a distraction.
He closed his eyes and leaned back against the only remaining tree on King Kais small planet. He found the halo that hovered above his head an incredible irony. Tenshin had been killed at the young age of 30. And he might just choose to stay dead. Not an easy decision to make but perhaps the most sensible option he had. The world has enough problems without adding me to the list.