Breaking Chaos

Disclaimer: I'm a seventeen-year-old girl who lives in Ohio. Take a wild guess.

IMPORTANT: Some AU-type concepts will be introduced in this chapter. If you review, please feel free to say if you liked (or didn't like) how I did it. Please do not comment on how that's not how it happened in the series. I know that. Well, I hope you do like what I've done, so enjoy!

Chapter four: Within

A small flock of birds flew over the forest, and the wind rustled the leaves gently back and forth. A stream not too far off could be heard if you listened carefully. None of this was able to get through to Gohan though. Where he was, it was silent. It was dead silent.

Gohan sat in the center of the gravity room, with the gravity set at the low level of 50. He sat Indian style while hovering in mid-air, and had a look of deep concentration on his face. The fifteen year old boy was in deep meditation, and had been for several hours now. As he had trained over the past four years, he had gradually been made known of some strange powers inside himself. Just recently, one of the forces had started making itself known to Gohan, very much so more than before.

Gohan was now immersed in the unfathomable depths of his mind. He could see the forces in his mind now. They had turned themselves in to a condensed shape, and were two glowing balls of power. One was an intense golden color, and the other was a more mundane soft blue. He could feel the energy radiating from them, and tried to determine just what these strange forces were.

Gohan seemed drawn to the gold one first, and approached it cautiously, yet with curiosity. He stood directly in front of the sphere, and out his hands up to it without touching. It gave off a strong Saiyan sense. Gohan walked around the energy, as if evaluating it. Yes, this one was definitely Saiyan. The most probable explanation was that it was yet another level of Super Saiyan, which explained why it was making itself known when he trained and exerted power.

Now with the other force, Gohan was stumped. He approached the blue sphere next, and immediately noticed that he felt more at peace than he did when near the gold force. He also placed his hands near this energy, and got a strange feeling. It was hard to explain, but the best he could describe it was that it was part Saiyan, and part Human at the same time, yet it wasn't really either of them. Gohan had absolutely no idea what this meant. Since he was the first half-Saiyan, half-Human, he doubted anyone else he knew would have the answers. The only thing he knew about this one was that it wasn't as aggressive, and therefore wasn't trying to force itself to surface as the gold power had been doing. In fact, Gohan surmised that if he hadn't done some light meditation a little over a month ago, he would not have known of it's existence at all. This one was most intriguing. While he could feel immense power from the gold one, this blue sphere didn't give off that on the surface. Now that he was exploring the force, he could feel that there was indeed a great power hidden deep within. The questions were, was it even greater than the gold one, and why did it seem to be less taxing on him?

Gohan broke out of his meditation, and went over to the control panel. He powered up to his maximum at Super Saiyan 2, and recklessly flung the dial around, until the gravity was higher than he had endured before. Gohan went back to the center of the room, and closed his eyes. He struggled to stay standing in the severity of the environment, and then tried to tap into one of those powers.

Which to choose, which to choose.

The gold one seemed to be drawn out, but it just wouldn't, or couldn't fully come out. Gohan was wracked with pain, and the transformation to what he assumed was the next level just would not come. He didn't know if it was because he was simply not strong enough to sustain it, or if his body was not ready to do it yet. He was only fifteen, and had not reached his prime yet. Try and try as he may, he could not level up. Another thought that suddenly occurred to him was that he could not go through the transformation because of his physiology. Since he was half, instead of full Saiyan, perhaps his body just couldn't handle it? Gohan let the power secede. This time, he tried to draw out the other, mysterious force. Nothing happened. He concentrated until he was in a state near that of meditation, but not quite there. He felt it deep within himself, and tried to pull it out. It was hard, but he could feel it coming closer and closer. Just when he thought he had it, the force suddenly receded. Perhaps he was just too young and not physically ready for these powers. He would continue to train, and eventually, he would be able to manifest one of the powers.

Gohan opened sleepy eyes, and tried to get his bearings. He was in his room, but something in the back of his mind was nagging him. He felt like he'd forgotten something important, but whatever it was, Gohan couldn't put his finger on it.

As he attempted to get out of bed, he failed to realize he was seriously tangled up in his sheets, and ended up sprawling all over the floor by his bed. That seemed to happen to him a lot though, so he was used to it. Gohan went over to his closet and picked out a new gi to change into. As he'd been growing rather rapidly, almost a whole new wardrobe had been needed. He showered quickly, and then changed, still having the strange feeling that he'd forgotten something.

The luscious scents of breakfast came wafting up to his room, and Gohan scurried down to the kitchen. When he got there, he skidded to a stop and looked in confusion. He could smell the food, but the room was pitch black.

"Uh…Mom?"

Suddenly, the lights flicked on, and a huge roar was let out, nearly giving him a heart attack.

"SURPRISE!"

"Ack! What? What's going on!"

"Happy birthday sweetie!" Chichi said, coming forward to greet him.

So that's what he had forgotten. Today was his sixteenth birthday.

"…" Gohan stared at everyone, with a priceless expression on his face. He was absolutely and completely shocked. All of their old group had showed up and crammed themselves into the kitchen just for him. Other than Piccolo, Bulma, Vegeta, and of course Trunks, he had seen none of these people for five years, and vice versa.

"Hi?" Gohan said, shock still evident in his voice.

"Whoa! Gohan! You're huge!" That was Krillin of course.

At sixteen years of age, Gohan was just a little over six feet tall, and still growing. His hair was now completely spiked up with the exception of a lock of hair in the front coming down over his forehead, and looked like what some people tried to do for hours with massive amounts of hair gel.

"I haven't seen you in forever bro! When did you get so tall!" Krillin commented again.

"Um. Gradually?"

"That was a rhetorical question you know Gohan." Krillin dead panned.

"He he. Yeah. You guys just surprised me so much, I guess I'm still a little out of it!"

Bulma interrupted the conversation with a gleeful yell. "So let's say we get this party started! We've got tons of breakfast, and then we're all gonna head out and do a special activity that I have planned!"

Chichi joined in too. "I made plenty of breakfast for everyone!" This statement was made obvious by the stacks and stacks of pancakes, waffles, and French toast, and the bottles of syrup, and tubs of butter. There was a full Saiyan, and three half-Saiyans to feed after all.

Everyone grabbed plates and silverware from the table, and made a line by the counters where all the food was set up.

"Birthday boy first!" Yamcha yelled as he was shoving Gohan towards the front of the line. "Make sure to save some for the rest of us!" Gohan just stood where Yamcha had stopped pushing him, and looked back at everyone blankly.

"Move already or I'm going to go!" Vegeta shouted.

Gohan looked back at the food, and suddenly seemed to snap back. He walked to the front, and was just about to start piling up on his first serving of food, when two colorful blurs attacked him full force, and attached themselves to his legs. Gohan looked down and smiled at a four and a half year old Goten and an almost six year old Trunks.

"You guys hungry too?" He asked, although the answer was obvious.

"Yeah!" They yelled in chorus.

"Well then let's get started, shall we?"

Goten and Trunks climbed up his legs, and eventually perched themselves on his shoulders. Goten handed down his plate, and Gohan filled it up, and repeated the process with Trunks. Then, he finally got some food for himself, and started walking to the table, and saw a scowling Vegeta. He was clearly ticked that he had to actually wait and be patient. Gohan just continued to smile, and set his plate down on the table top. He then proceeded to pick Trunks off of his shoulder and place him in the seat on his right side, and then lifted Goten from his other shoulder and put him in the seat to the left on the chair he'd chosen. Eventually, everyone was seated at either the main table, or one of the extra ones that had been set up for the special occasion.

Many many servings later, everyone had finished the wonderful breakfast, Piccolo excluded of course, and was thanking Chichi profusely. Bulma stepped in and ordered everyone outside. Once there, she pulled out a capsule and detonated it, revealing a huge air ship that could comfortably fit all of them. This apparently, would take them to their secret destination for Gohan's birthday party. If was fairly fast, so after a while, they were somewhere over Satan City, and quickly landing in a large parking lot.

"Woman what are we doing here!" Vegeta said in a gruff tone.

"Gohan looked up at the building to which the parking lot belonged to and smirked. This was going to be fun.

"Well guys, "Bulma announced. "I've rented this whole place out just for us for the next few hours, so enjoy! Oh, and try not to break anything." She said, with a special glare for Vegeta. Vegeta 'harrumphed' and then Bulma began to lead them all into the building.

Gohan was silently laughing. This was great! However Bulma had come up with the idea, he was sure glad she did, because with this group, it was sure to get crazy. They all reached to doors, with Bulma and Gohan in the lead. The two stopped for a moment and looked at each other, before taking another step forward, which activated the automatic doors. They walked inside, and were immediately greeted by a bright red sign announcing the name of the place they were at-Laser Quest.

Not everyone was happy with the idea, but with some convincing, mostly done by the birthday boy himself, the whole gang came up with their game names and went into the dark arena. Their equipments beeped for a few seconds once they entered the room, and then, the fun began.

-

Four games later, they got their last report sheets on how well they had done.

"Man oh man! Who the heck is 'Darth Vader'? They won every single game!" Krillin said. "Was it you Gohan?"

"Nope, I was 'Sparky'. I got second in the last two games. Was it you Piccolo?"

"No."

"Who were you then?"

"'Marty'"

"Ok. I'm not even sure I want to know about that one. Well who else could it be!" Krillin continued to fret.

Vegeta suddenly let out a harsh bark-like laugh.

"Vegeta?" Krillin yelled in shock. "You were 'Darth Vader'? B-but…how?"

Vegeta just smirked mysteriously, and then walked straight out of the building and into the bright sunlight, with everyone else soon following.

"So what are we doing now Bulma?" Gohan questioned.

"Well, I was thinkin' that we all head over to your house for a little while longer and have lunch and give gifts, and then the rest of us head home and give you some time to celebrate with just your family."

"Alright, sounds good to me!"

"Go go, open mine first!"

"No! He's gonna open mine first!"

"Nuh uhh! He's gonna open my present firster!"

"Yeah right! Mine's better, so he's gonna open mine before yours!"

Trunks and Goten argued over who's present Gohan would open first.

"Well," Gohan finally said, "how about I open them both at the same time?"

"Ok!" Both boys shouted.

Gohan took one gift in each hand and noticed that Goten and Trunks must have depleted the world's supply of tape severely in the wrapping of the gifts. Gohan searched for an un-taped spot in each, and then finally giving up, just tore through the tape, ripping the paper off of both at the same time. On each leg, he held a picture frame decorated with macaroni and paint, and all kinds of other things. One had a picture of Goten and Gohan in it, and the other had a picture of Trunks and Gohan.

"Wow! Thanks you guys! These are great! I can put these in my room!"

Goten and Trunks beamed, but two seconds later, they were arguing over who's picture frame Gohan liked better.

"Well, I guess I'll go next." Krillin said. He gave Gohan the present, and Gohan opened it to find a new novel that he had been wanting to get, by one of his favorite authors.

"Sweet! Thanks Krillin! How did you know I wanted this?"

"Oh, a little bird told me…I think it was called the Chichi bird or something like that."

Gohan smiled, and then went back to opening the rest of the presents. He was pleasantly surprised by all of them, until everyone but Bulma and Chichi had gone. Bulma handed him a tiny box, and then stepped away.

Gohan opened it to find a small tin with a single capsule inside. Gohan didn't see any label on it, so he looked at Bulma curiously.

"It's your own car. I know you can fly, but you never know when one of those might come in handy… Happy birthday Gohan!"

"Cool! Thanks Bulma! I'm sure it will be nice to have for whenever I'm in the city."

Bulma and Chichi exchanged a knowing glance that confused Gohan to no end. Then Chichi came up to give Gohan his final birthday present.

"Here you go sweetie!" She said, handing him yet another tiny package.

Gohan carefully tore the paper off of the thin gift, and found a stiff decorated piece of folded over paper. He opened the paper, to reveal several gift cards for clothing shops at the Satan City Mall.

"I just figured that, you know, some time soon, you might want a few more things to wear other than gi's.

"Thanks mom. Maybe people won't look at me so strange when I go to the city now!"

This time, Chichi looked at Bulma, and again they shared that confusing glance. What on earth was going on?

"Well everyone," Bulma announced, "I think it's about time we get going. See ya real soon Gohan! Bye guys!"

The rest of the friends quickly said their goodbyes as well, leaving a strangely silent Son household. Chichi quickly cleaned up from the- again- huge lunch she had prepared for the whole group, and began making dinner.

"I'll be done in a while, so you can go ahead and do whatever you want until then, ok Gohan?"

"Yep, see ya in a bit!" He answered, and left the house to go to train for a while.

-

"Ok Gohan, you can do this." He said to himself. "I'm thinking that today's the day. The day that you, Mr. Mystery Power, will come out!"

Gohan once again concentrated with all his might, as he had been trying quite often since that fateful day about a year ago, when he had first tried to figure out what those powers inside him were. As for the gold one, he could feel that it wanted to come out but couldn't, and he had been becoming more and more sure that it was his genetics preventing it. He could do Super Saiyan 1 and 2, but the way the genes had mixed, there must have been something that kept him from doing it. It was quite possible that the transformation was more of a drastic change than either of the previous levels, and therefore the human part of him could not allow for it.

The strange jumbled up force though, he could feel coming nearer and nearer with each time he meditated. It was clear that this one, whatever it was, held an immense amount of power that, with proper training once he attained it, could be even more powerful than the next level of Super Saiyan.

Gohan once again stood in the center, stopping his wandering thoughts, and concentrated solely on the task at hand.

It was close, oh so very close. He could practically taste it. He furrowed his brows, and began to power up to his maximum without going Super. He could feel that he was rapidly approaching that max point, and simultaneously, the strange power was coming forth.

He had finally reached as far as he could power up in normal state, but continued to try and power up more. Very very slowly, he did power up a tad further, and he felt that force just about to break out. Beads of sweat formed and one by one cascaded down his face, while his muscles quivered slightly. With a final burst, he shouted in a typical power-up way, and suddenly, it was as if he had broken the dam that was holding back the power, and it all came rushing forth. The power nearly overwhelmed him as he felt it rushing through his veins. It was extraordinary to say the least. The closest to anything similar he'd felt before was the breaking of the barriers for the two Super Saiyan levels. But even those were a far cry to what he felt now. It was like a vast well of power that he had been building up for years had suddenly been opened to him.

Gohan went over to the control panel, and started digging through the drawers. He had collected some junk in here, and was currently searching for a mirror. He finally found one, although it was broken, and held it up in front of him.

He looked at his refection strangely, trying to find any differences at all. As far as he could tell, he looked pretty much the same. His hair was a little different, slightly spiker, maybe a teeny bit longer, but that was all. Gohan now knew he had been right in his analysis of this power a year ago when he guessed it was something between human and Saiyan. It had the power of the Saiyans, but with no transformation, like a human. Pretty much all he had to do to access it was power up like the human way, but he also had to concentrate on it just slightly, the same way you would level up. It also felt like some sort of level due to the quick and radical increase of power,

If it was a level, should he call it something then? Just to refer to it? It was a mysterious power that had happened like magic. The magic level? No, that sounded lame. The enchanted level? No, that sounded like a children's book. The mystic level? Hmmm, that didn't sound so bad. Mystic…yeah, that would suffice.

Gohan sat across the table from Goten that evening stuffing his face, although neater than the younger boy. Chichi had already eaten her small portion, and was just sitting there watching her two sons.

"Gohan? I have something to tell you."

Gohan looked up at her from his food, but didn't stop eating.

"Well, since you are sixteen and there aren't very many people around here, Bulma and I came up with this idea a while ago."

This peaked Gohan's interest, and he kept looking at her in a manner that asked her to continue, but he still kept eating.

"I'm enrolling you at Orange Star High School."

Gohan spit out spaghetti across the table at Goten. That was definitely not something he'd been expecting. Goten looked down at his pasta-smattered chest for a second, before happily diving back into his food as if nothing had happened.

"You whaa! Huh? Why did? You enrolled! …WHAT!"

"Public school Gohan. I'm taking you there tomorrow to take the entrance exams, and if all goes well, you start in a week.

Gohan looked at the ceiling thoughtfully.

"And don't you even think about failing those exams on purpose!"

Gohan scowled, his plans dashed.

"I expect you to do very well on those in fact. I also expect you to use those gift cards I gave you to buy some normal school clothes, and to use the car that Bulma gave you. After all, someone will wonder how you get to school everyday no doubt, and you can't say you fly! That's why I keep bugging you to get your license."

So this is what she and Bulma kept looking at each other for. "But mom! Do I really have to go to school? I study here don't I?"

"Yeah, but I want you to go to college someday, and I want you to have a real degree from high school, especially from one as prestigious and Orange Star!"

"And what about training?"

"Oh, you can do that after you finish you homework! I'm sure you'll have plenty of time! I really don't think you need to do that as much as you do everyday anyways. Besides, this will give you the chance to make friends!"

"I have friends!"

"That are twice your age or more!"

"But-"

"No buts! I have made up my mind about this, and you know perfectly well that you can't change it!"

Well that was certainly true.

Gohan scowled again. "Fine. I will try going to this school. Just don't expect me to like it."

"It's my impression that most teens don't enjoy school."

"Ugh. Fine." Gohan stomped- lightly of course, didn't need to be putting holes in the floor- up to his room and flopped backwards onto his bed. "Great. My dream come true." He told the ceiling sarcastically.

And that's another chapter down! Yes! I LOVE writing this story! It's so much fun!

Review Responses!

-Hmmm. It seems like a lot of people want me to make this a Gohan/Videl. I don't know about that yet though! Ehhh! If I go through with that, then I'll have to find someway of integrating that into the basic plot I have. (I have a plot! Whoo!)

-Chris- Oo …are you secretly a mind reader? He he. I was planning on it! (both things actually. Weird huh?)

-Eternal Light/Fire Dragon- you got it! And the longer he keeps blaming himself, the harder it will be for him to stop and get over it!

-Mutou Yasu-Thanks! I couldn't manage to fit very many brotherly moments in this chapter. Poo! They're so cute!

-Miroku-has-darkness-I updated all my stories!

-And finally, for you people who want Gohan strong- like it? I never like the third SS level, cuz it's freaky. It's like a mix between a Neanderthal and a porcupine. Yick! So ya know what? It's my story, so I'm a-chuckin' it out the window for Gohan! He can be strong and not ugly! Ar har. And I did it without getting that weird old perverted kai, and the other creepy one that looks like he's wearing eye-liner involved! Ha!

Thanks you to all the reviewers!

Next time: Between entrance exams, driving, training, and starting high school, what's a teenaged boy to do? Fight crime of course! (I hear it's a great way to relieve stress!)

Review pleeeeze! Toodlez and Noodlez!