"What the hell do you want Jerome?" Gohan asked the large man bluntly as soon as he entered the room. It was now almost midnight, and Gohan was tired. Sat beside him was Ezra, who also looked a little worse for wear. Gohan stared at the criminal's face. His size and large bushy hair always reminded him of someone. A man that he couldn't care less for but used to tolerate for the sake of another.

"I was expecting an apology first actually pal. I could sue you know."

"Yeah, and you could be going to prison for multiple assaults on police officers. The fact that the chick whose face you busted was in fact the love of Gohan's life doesn't help your case."

Jerome burst out laughing at this revelation, but Gohan remained stone faced. "Just tell us what you know before I put you back in that cell. Or worse yet I could just beat it out of you. The enormous man immediately stopped laughing. He didn't want the other side of his face caving in, and he had seen first hand just what Gohan was truly capable of, and it entailed far more than the punishment he had been dealt earlier in the evening.

"All right, just promise me one thing."

"And what would that be?" Ezra questioned.

"That you believe everything I tell you."

"We've never doubted you before, so why would we now?"

"Because this is some weird shit." The two detectives nodded their heads for him to continue. "OK, the first thing might not be too hard for you to follow. The guy that you're looking for is a woman."

"I knew it!" Gohan shouted.

"No you didn't." Ezra retorted. Gohan mumbled something else under his breath. Ezra continued. "So what else do you have for us?"

"Don't ask me to explain any of this, but I'm pretty sure that whoever is doing this is not doing it of their own free will. Somehow they are being controlled by someone else. I mean that doesn't actually sound that far fetched if you believe in hypnotism and all that crap. Does it?"

The two detectives sat there pondering for a few short moments before Gohan spoke up. "Are you saying that someone is controlling someone else to kill a bunch of criminals, just for the sake of the city?"

"Hell no, this guy is taking over and he doesn't want any interruptions from any competitors."

"Please tell me how the finest efforts of the Orange Star P.D come up with nothing but you stroll in here shouting your mouth off, not seeming to give a damn if anyone hears you. You could be killed for this."

The large man laughed a hearty laugh, free from worry. He leant forward and spoke quieter now. "I was sent here. By him, directly to you, detective. Not to the police, not to the task force assigned to this case, but to you. He wanted you to know Gohan."

"You've met him?" Gohan questioned.

"I thought that you were going to ask me why it was you, but..."

"That can come later. Have you met him or the woman."

"No, I met a subordinate of his. A bit of a freak actually, he was even bigger than me and he smelled like a dog. I mean literally like a big, stinking dog."

"And how did he get you to do this for you? You aren't one to be told what to do, especially if you aren't even working for them."

The giant of a man lifted his shirt up his body, to reveal a set of horrific wounds on his stomach and chest. Numerous bruises covered the skin and one set of gashes traversed a length of about 9 inches across his belly.

"What the hell...?"

"Like you say, I ain't one to do something for nothing. I didn't take too much persuading after this though." He allowed his shirt to fall back into place. "Right, that's all I have for you guys."

"You sure?"

"Definitely." He stated firmly.

"Are you going to be all right? Are you sure that these guys won't be coming after you after you've done your job?"

"I was told in no uncertain terms that I would be completely and utterly forgotten about as soon as my orders were carried out. I should neither expect any aid nor should I have to fear an attack on my life. To them I might as well not even exist after this moment. They won't waste their time and resources on me."

"All right then. We'll be seeing you Jerome. Thanks for everything." The two police men stood to show their 'guest' out. They didn't bother leaving the room with him, he had been here enough times. He knew where he was going.

Gohan and Ezra both slumped down into their chairs. "What the hell do we do now?" The younger man said.

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Videl crashed through her nicely painted, blue front door without worrying about waking whoever else might be home. Luckily all of her house mates were still wide awake and sat in the living room of the moderately sized house.

She dropped her duffel bag in the hallway, and her keys on the small table. Upon turning through the doorway on her right, she saw her long term best friend Erasa and her almost as long term boyfriend, Kaji. She was fond of him, that she knew. But despite almost two years together, in which she miraculously kept Gohan's knowledge of Kaji to an absolute minimum, the word love had never quite seemed appropriate. She had heard it many times off him, more times than she dared to count. But somehow she had never felt the urge to say the same thing back to him.

At first she had been worried he might suspect something was up, but now he seemed to be used to it. Maybe he realised that she wasn't that type of girl.

"Late again?" The blonde questioned. The dark haired girl fell into one of the large armchairs and felt her legs begin to heal almost instantly. "What happened to your face?" The two got up quickly to get a closer inspection but she shooed them away, much like she had when her fellow police officers had tried to assist her.

"Just some wacko in the station. It's nothing serious." Instantly she fell into a daydream, losing the ability to pay attention to her surroundings. Her friends noticed the glazed over look to her eyes, one that was returning more and more often these days. She seemed to be under stress, but they couldn't imagine what exactly it could be, crime hadn't risen for twenty years in this city.

"What's wrong Videl?" Erasa asked.

"Just someone at work pissing me off." She stood up to leave.

"Was it Gohan?" Videl looked at her friend. How was she so intuitive? Was she that easy to read?

"I'd rather not talk about it, I need some sleep." Without another word, she left the room and traipsed up the carpeted stairs.

A heavy silence fell upon the two still downstairs as they both mulled over thoughts that the name Gohan brought. The silence was broken by the male among the pair. "Erasa, how long exactly have you known Videl? I know that you've been best friends for years, but how long has it been."

"Ooh, I don't know...I think that we met when we first started school together. We would have been about five then. That's over twenty years. Wow, that's a pretty long time."

Kaji prevented her from stating any more painfully obvious facts and continued. "So, you know almost everything about her, about her childhood, school life and all that?"

"Pretty much."

"Does that name mean anything to you."

"Which name? You mean Gohan?"

"Yes."

"It sure does. Why, don't you know who he is?"

The man mumbled under his breath, "So it is a man..."

"Huh? Hasn't Videl told you about him."

"Not a word. Well, not voluntarily. Sometimes she just seems to let it slip out."

"As in, she says his name...in bed?"

He chuckled dryly. "We don't seem to do that much more anyway. Yeah, she has done that but she didn't even notice what she said. It isn't just that though. Sometimes she just says it when she's calling me over or whatever, if she isn't really paying attention. Or maybe she'll mumble his name while she's asleep."

Erasa turned her head slightly to see if Videl was listening at the door, then got up and closed it. She wasn't sure if Videl wanted him to know about this, but he did deserve to be told. She looked at Videl's current boyfriend. He did sort of look like Gohan. He was tall, dark hair, dark eyes and pretty handsome. But the whole package just seemed to add up to less. He wasn't quite as good looking as Gohan was, and his hair didn't stick up. She always liked that about him.

"I'll tell you about Gohan. But you have to promise that you will never tell her that you learned all of this from me. Videl has obviously kept this from you for a reason."

"OK fine. Just tell me."

"Are you comfortable? Because this is a long story."

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Videl Satan hated Son Gohan. Son Gohan hated Videl Satan. This was no mutual dislike between the two borne from being members of two very different social sects, it was a fierce hatred that actually worried some of the teaching staff at Orange Star Junior High. Two fourteen year olds should not even be able to experience feelings like that. What made it worse was that there was no feasible explanation. There were rumours, of course there were rumours, this was a school after all.

Everyone knew it, but no one actually knew why such a malicious loathing existed between the two. Each of their circle of friends were enemies, but no one within the the two groups shared such a relationship.

Some people even thought that Videl had asked him out when he joined a year late, but he had knocked her back and actually laughed at her. But anyone that knew Gohan knew that he would never go as far as to laugh at someone like that.

So the mystery went unsolved, and school life went on as it always had done. Currently, Videl was waking from a rather less than peaceful sleep. She reached a hand from out underneath the covers, bringing it down harshly on top of a poor unsuspecting alarm clock that was simply doing what she had told it to do the night before. Sitting up while untangling the covers from around her legs, she felt how flushed her face was.

She had been dreaming again, dreaming about that bastard. She was only fourteen. She did not need dreams quite like that tormenting her mind. Why did he have to go around school acting as though butter wouldn't melt, hanging around with his loser friends. He could be a somebody right now, if only he had taken her up on her more than generous offer.

The boy in question was also having trouble with his reflection in the mirror. A recent growth spurt had sent him head and shoulders above the rest of his classmates. Only that simpleton Sharpener was anywhere near the dark haired boy, but of course the arrogant blonde thought that he himself was the taller of the two. Gohan couldn't care less, he just wanted to fit in.

Having barely entered your teenage years whilst having the body of an almost fully grown man did not allow you to fit in well. It didn't really help that he had to get to school on a flying yellow cloud either. He ran his hand through his pitch black hair, ruffling up the spikes.

Having a sudden upsurge was a double edged sword to Gohan. It made him look far older than he actually was, so he was able to get a part time job, charming his way past the attractive female manager at a fast food restaurant in Orange Star. Usually he was clueless to things like that and beautiful women made him nervous, but when he was in dire need he just sat back and it all flowed out.

Unfortunately however, the majority of the money that he earned, originally meant to help out his mother, had to be used on new clothes as his old ones didn't fit him any more. At least he had an excuse to get rid of the horrific ones that his mother got him.

He wasn't the type to follow trends too closely, but even his friends, who were hardly those considered 'cool' among the school populace, had some sense of normality in their dress sense. With a final resigned look to his reflection, he turned and strode off in search of breakfast.

Later that Friday morning, Gohan was wandering along the hallways with a girl that he had known for years, even before he had started at the school, having met her in one of the small villages near his home. You could say that Lime was his best friend in a sense.

He peered over the top of the other students' heads and saw a familiar head of black hair approaching him. As she came closer his mouth curled into a sneer and his usual temperament went straight out of the window. As she saw him she did the same letting out an exaggerated groan at seeing him.

"Look at those losers Erasa. Dungarees on a fourteen year old? What is she thinking?" Videl commented on Lime's usual choice of attire.

Gohan was about to open his mouth in reply but was halted by his friend dragging him swiftly off. "Just ignore her. If she sent her friends after you, or even her father you'd be a dead man. Gohan had yet to reveal to anyone that he had been trained by his father rather a lot as a youngster, and training after his death, her mother saying that she didn't want his skills inherited from his father to vanish completely. This mystified him, he had always expected her throw him into his studies one hundred per cent, but luckily she had given a small respite in his youth to train.

That girl knew just how to push his buttons. She had learned a long time ago that insults about the boy himself had little or no effect on his mind, only those directed at his friends or family did any damage, and she knew that the tension was building up inside him and pretty soon he would snap. She couldn't wait to see what happened then.