Dragon Ball Z: Dynasty
Written by: Feraligreater328 and StevenBodner
Edited by: StevenBodner and SparkerLightning
A/N: This is the "Avalon" chapter, by the way. I think you'd all be able to tell when the music is supposed to kick off, it's pretty obvious imo. But, I would still love to hear how you guys experience this when you read it. So, please, let me know when "Avalon - Taku Iwasaki" starts playing for you in this chapter.
Chapter 103: Gohan vs Cell
On the battlefield...
A harsh strike to the jaw sent Cell flying back off of Gohan's fist. The monster landed with a thud and crumpled as he crashed across the ground. Cell eventually laid still, face in the dirt, and listened as footsteps approached him with a leisurely pace. A vein bulged from Cell's forehead. Where did this boy find the nerve to treat him with such disregard?!
Cell pushed himself up, getting to his feet and healing the wound in his stomach. "Now listen here, Gohan, you might have powered-up, but-"
The monster turned to a leaping kick to the face. Gohan drove Cell's head down into the ground and bounced off of the monster. The boy leapt high above Cell and charged a ki bolt, firing down directly towards Cell's face. The monster sneered and jerked his head out of the way, just barely avoiding the blast as it sliced through the ground next to him. The monster shuddered as his acute hearing picked up the sound of the blast digging deeper and deeper into the ground.
Cell got to his feet and narrowed his eyes at Gohan. Gohan shot him back little more than a blank scowl. Cell sneered. "You certainly seem to think high of yourself, don't you boy?"
Gohan shrugged, his voice base and near emotionless. "Not particularly."
This only served to make Cell angrier. He snarled and gripped his fists tight, sending waves of energy shuddering out. "Don't be coy! You are strong, Gohan, but you are not the strongest person on this battlefield! I am! Me! Cell! The perfect being created to be the greatest warrior ever produced! You are nothing compared to me!"
Gohan stepped forward, his voice still perfectly calm. Unnervingly calm. "And who is it you're saying this to? Is it me? Or are you just trying to convince yourself?"
Cell sneered. He loomed over Gohan with an infuriated expression. Gohan stared up at him. "I've spent the past ten days trying to understand you. Trying to understand what you're about. How could a person constructed out of the best people in my life end up like you? And, now, I think I get it. I understand you, Cell."
The monster snarled, his power flaring. "What do you understand about me?! We've never met before today! You know nothing about me!"
Gohan spoke calmly and without emotion, as he if were speaking fact and nothing more. "I know enough about you to know that this fight will end with tears and bootlicking."
Cell flinched, his eyes going wide. Gohan stared emotionlessly at him. And then, Cell became very angry. Perhaps, angrier than he had ever been in his entire life prior. Cell snarled. "I WILL RIP IN HALF YOU PRESUMPTUOUS LITTLE SHIT!"
Cell swung his hands down at Gohan, but the boy simply caught both of them. He held Cell steady, not so much as trembling as Cell attempted to bare down on him. Gohan took a steady breath, and then he kneed Cell in the gut. All of Cell's aura came to an abrupt halt and his arms went numb. As Cell stumbled back, Gohan gently reached up and grabbed the monster by one of his teeth.
And then, with only a portion of his strength, Gohan tore out Cell's tooth and crushed it in his hand. Cell was stunned, unable to make himself respond. He stood there as a deafening silence filled the entire battlefield. Not even the wind was blowing. Gohan stepped forward and spoke in an unwavering tone. "Do you understand yet?"
Cell sneered, fire filling his eyes, and he shouted at the top of his lungs. "You think and simple punch will defeat me?!"
Gohan was, unmoved, as Cell's body began to grow to a massive size. The monster's muscles expanded and ballooned out as he grew taller and taller, eventually looming over Gohan. The boy stared up at Cell as a new confidence filled the monster's face. He was uncaring. "This is one of Piccolo's techniques, right? He told me about it before. He called it useless. I wonder why?"
Cell sneered. "Keep talking! I wonder how you'll sound under my foot?!"
The monster lifted his massive foot and stomped it down towards Gohan. Gohan watched, uncaring, as the massive extremity barreled down at him. And then, once it was close enough, he simply raised his hand and caught the foot. The massive Cell flinched. Gohan shook his head. "Oh, that's right. Piccolo stopped using this technique because it doesn't make him any stronger. It just makes him a bigger target."
Gohan charged two blasts in his palms and sent them shooting through the bottom of Cell's foot. The blasts pierced all the way through to the top and up at Cell's face. Before the monster could react, both ki blasts shot into his eyes and made them explode apart. Cell screeched in pain and doubled over. With ease, Gohan tossed the giant foot to the side. And then, he rushed up and delivered a hefty uppercut to the underside of Cell's jaw. The monster launched into the air from the sheer force of the blow and then landed in a heap onto his back.
As Cell writhed on the ground, Gohan landed on the tip of the monster's nose. "Hey, regenerate your eyes."
Cell went still, feeling the boy standing on his face. Gohan stared down at Cell. "Regenerate them. I want you to be able to look at me."
Cell snarled in frustration, rapidly lifting his massive arm and slamming it down towards the boy. Gohan sighed and shifted out of the way, watching as a fist the size of a city bus crashed into Cell's face and impacted hard. Several massive teeth went flying from Cell's mouth and a river of purple blood exploded from his nose. Gohan hovered over him, speaking in the same emotionless tone. "You should have just regenerated your eyes. Instead, you chose to punch yourself in the face. I really have figured you out down to the last little detail, Cell."
The monster growled under his breath, but that was still loud enough to make the ground subtly shake. Gohan looked down on Cell. "So, where do we go from here?"
Without answering, Cell began to shrink. Gohan was non-plussed, simply descending down to the ground below. He landed as the now shrunken Cell was getting back to his feet. Gohan watched Cell regrow his teeth and wipe blood from his nose and he spoke in a base tone. "Are we finished yet, Cell?"
Cell sneered. "Oh, you are indeed finished, boy. I will kill you. I swear I will kill you!"
Gohan was steely in the face of Cell's resurgent power. "You sound angry. That won't lead to any kind of victory."
Cell chuckled. "Oh, I am angry. I have never been more furious."
Gohan was unmoved. "Wasn't this what you wanted? You wanted me to become stronger. Were you expect that I stay beneath a certain, unstated limit. Or was your ego just that inflated from the off?"
Cell's power level was raging. He was putting out his absolute maximum. "Yes, yes. Keep talking. It will make the moment I rip out your throat all the sweeter."
Gohan nodded. "I see. Your attempts to talk yourself up have failed, so now you're simply trying to coast your way through this on pure rage. That's the strategy, right?"
Cell laughed, but it was quite clear that he wasn't happy. The smile on his face was quite forced. It looked like it hurt. Gohan looked unimpressed. "Another monologue, then?"
The monster laughed again. "You said I was made up of the best people you know, right?"
Gohan nodded. "I did."
Cell glared at him with pure malice. "Well...I AM ALSO MADE OF THE WORST!"
The monster thrust his hands forward and, in a flash, he encased Gohan in a solid cocoon of energy. "Frieza's Imprisonment Ball! Do you recognize-"
Gohan's eyes flashed and the Imprisonment Ball burst apart. The boy focused his gaze upon Cell and then he walked forward as if nothing had happened. Cell took a trepidatious step back. Then, he thrust his hands forward again. "King Cold's Gravity Bolts!"
The black-and-yellow lightning bolts shot towards Gohan. The boy simply smacked them away with the back of his fist. Cell's hands began to shake. "K-King Cold's Freezing Death Ball!"
An energy sphere swelled between Cell's hands and he fired it towards Gohan. The attack hit dead center on the boy's chest and froze him solid. Cell smirked, but then the ice rapidly began to crack. The glacier that contained Gohan burst apart and the boy walked out unscathed. He continued his march and Cell shuddered. "K-K-King Cold's Vacuum Mist!"
Gohan spoke. "Yeah. My Dad told me about that one. It's apparently highly explosive."
Cell gasped; the massive cloud of mist built between his hands. He had no time to disperse the deadly cloud as Gohan held up his finger and flicked a beam of energy into it. The cloud swelled in Cell's hands and burst, the explosion physically ripping him in half. As both halves of Cell splattered against the ground, Gohan continued to march forward. "Regrow your legs and stand up."
The monster shuddered, barely able to push his torso up off the ground. Gohan repeated himself in the exact same volume and tone, yet somehow more forceful. "Regrown your legs and stand up."
Cell could feel his hearts pounding away in his chest. He snarled. "Y-You...how...HOW DARE YOU-"
Gohan finished his sentence. "Presume that you can order me around. That's what you were going to say, right?"
Cell's voice hitched in his throat. Gohan glowered down at him. "Predictable."
The monster snarled again, pushing himself onto the bloody stump where his lower body once was. "LITTLE BASTARD!"
All at once, Cell's legs grew back and he rocketed towards Gohan. He reared his fist back and punched the boy hard across the face, following that up with a massive blow to the stomach that made Gohan buckle over. Before the boy could even lift his head, Cell kneed him in the face. And then, the monster grabbed a handful of Gohan's hair and hurled him into a nearby rockpile. This was followed up with a storm of ki bolts, fired from Cell's right hand, that homed in on their target and crashed hard into the rockpile. Not letting up, Cell rocketed into the air and pulled his hands to his side. "GALICK GUN! FIRE!"
The purple beam shot from Cell's hands and crashed into the ground, causing the rock below to dome up and eventually burst. Cell smiled wide and laughed. "Hahahahah! And now you're dead!"
The beam finished and Cell righted himself in the air. He stared down at the ground, a manic grin on his face. Gohan had been vanquished...is what Cell thought, until the smoke cleared. Once the view was clear once more, a horrifying sight came into Cell's view. Gohan was still standing there, looking entirely unaffected by Cell's vicious attack. The boy's shirt had been partially blown off, but he was otherwise uninjured. Gohan looked down at his outfit and then back up at Cell. "You damaged my shirt. It will take Piccolo five, maybe ten, seconds to fix this. I guess it depends on how much energy he has left after he kills your little brats."
Slowly, Gohan floated up into the air. Cell slowly moved back. "H-How?! You must have dodged or something! You must have-"
In an instant, Gohan unleashed his full speed and got right into Cell's face. "Are you ready to call it quits yet?"
Cell yelped in fear and then pressed his hand over Gohan's face. "GET AWAY FROM ME! GRAVITY IMPACT!"
The full-force of Cell's super-powered shockwave collided with Gohan's face and the boy was sent flying back a few feet. Cell watched with his shoulders tensed. Gohan was just floating there, his head thrown back. Cell was breathing heavy as he thought to himself. 'D-Did I kill him?!'
Gohan spoke in his emotionless voice. "No, you didn't."
Cell gasped and flinched back. Gohan lifted his head back up, revealing a trickle of blood leaking from one of his nostrils. "You thought to yourself 'Did I kill him?', right? You did not."
The monster's lower jaw quivered. Gohan approached him again, pressing a finger to Cell's forehead. "You did not kill me at all."
And then, Gohan unleashed a Kiai of his own. This shockwave was so powerful that it immediately made Cell's entire forehead crack like an egg. A frothing cloud of foam burst forth from Cell's mouth and he went flying backwards. Cell eventually came to a stop once he crashed into the side of a mountain, but was given no reprieve as Gohan came flying in to deliver a massive kick to the gut. Cell was immediately snapped back into consciousness, the foam from his mouth being replaced by a mixture of blood and bile. Gohan grabbed him by the throat. "I'm going to upfront with you, because I would like this to be over. I am still holding back. If only be a little, I haven't hit you as hard as I feel I'm able to yet."
Cell gurgled, trembling in Gohan's grip. Gohan spoke with conviction. "I want you to admit defeat, Cell. That's what I want from you. All of this can end the moment you admit that you are outmatched, you can't win, and you're ready to be finished with this fight."
Cell grimaced, a hateful fire still in his eyes. Gohan responded to this by immediately punching Cell across the face as hard as he possibly could. The sheer force of the punch made one of Cell's eyes bulge out of socket. His neck stretched to its physical limit and he went flying, crashing into the far-off ground like a skipping stone and eventually sliding to a bloody halt. Gohan landed, speaking in the same near-robotic tone. "Are we done yet?"
The monster immediately sprang up, screaming like a maddened animal. Shredded flesh hung from Cell's injured face and several parts of his body were cracked and dented and outright broken. He charged at Gohan like a creature possessed and began to punch and kick like a madman. There was no way to observe the pattern of Cell's attacks because there was no pattern. This wasn't martial arts, it was desperation and hatred. Cell was throwing all of his strength behind every attack as he swung at Gohan. Gohan responded to this shameless display with little more than a cool dodge around every strike.
Cell went for a wild leg sweep and Gohan leapt up. The monster howled with rage and went for another massive kick with the opposite leg. Gohan was barely whelmed. Instead of dodging this latest strike, the young warrior caught it. And then, with a quick elbow strike of his own, he broke Cell's leg at the shin. Cell howled in pain, but Gohan did not let up. He forced Cell's leg to the ground, making the monster stumble forward. And then, once Cell was in place, Gohan did a rapid spin in the middle of the air and landed a massive kick of his own on the back of Cell's head, smashing the monster face-first into the ground.
Cell was heaving with pain and rage. It took him a moment to gain his focus back, but he quickly regenerated himself once he did. The monster pushed himself up, growling and snarling as he did. The fluids of regeneration poured from Cell's mouth and face as he seethed. "This...this can't be real. He's just a brat. A brat! How can he be this much str-"
The monster slapped himself across the face. "No! No... he...he isn't. He can't be..."
Cell took a deep breath, his hatred and rage boiling through his normally cocky façade. He lifted his head and screamed at the top of his lungs for his opponent. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNN!"
Gohan responded with a base voice. "I'm right here."
Cell glared at his foe, sitting on a nearby rock. Gohan had shifted his focus from Cell, instead looking down at his own mangled knees. "I would need walking braces for the rest of my life if it weren't for Dende and Senzu Beans both existing."
The monster seethed. "When I get my hands on you, you'll need more than-"
Gohan stood and walked up to Cell. Cell gasped and fell silent. Emotionlessly, Gohan knelt down in front of the monster and grabbed him by the left wrist. He raised Cell's hand off of the ground and put it on his own shoulder. "Now what?"
Cell was completely caught off-guard. "H-Huh?"
Gohan nodded. "My mistakes. You said hands, plural."
The boy grabbed Cell's right hand and put it on his other shoulder. And then, he looked Cell in the eyes. Gohan's emerald irises were trained on Cell. But, unlike the normal eyes of a Super Saiyan, there was no rage here. There was only emotionless void. Like Gohan was on autopilot. He spoke to Cell was a tone that betrayed no emotion whatsoever. "You were making a threat involving having your hands on me. They're on me. Now what?"
Cell shivered. "Wh... what are you doing?"
Gohan sighed. And then, faster than Cell could follow, Gohan unleashed a hefty punt right to Cell's throat. The monster went flying into the air, but then harmlessly crashed back down to the ground. Cell held his injured neck, coughing and sputtering as he laid there on the ground. Gohan loomed over him. "You want to know what I'm doing? I thought I explained it already. But, perhaps, more depth would help you."
Cell trembled on the ground as Gohan stood with his back to the Sun. The only thing visible on the boy's face were his blank, green eyes. "I've said I want you to admit defeat. But, selfishly enough, it's more than that. And this all relates back to what I said earlier. You see, Cell, we were both right. You are made of the best and worst people that I have ever met."
The monster tried to slide away, but Gohan simply pressed his foot down atop Cell's left ankle. He looked down at the monster, his voice eerily calm. "You are all of those people's traits personified. Their worst traits, specifically. All of the ego and smarm, but with none of the backbone. In a lot of ways, Cell, you are exactly like me."
Gohan closed his eyes. "I just wanted to be like them. That's what my Mom said on Namek and, in a lot of ways, she was right. Mr. Piccolo trained me and it all exploded from there. So many strong, noble people in my life. Why wouldn't I want to be just like them?"
He shook his head. "But I am a pale imitation. I tried to step up and be my father in this situation. But, Son Goku would have never allowed what happened today to occur. I thought I could be him, I thought I could match him, but that just wasn't the case."
Gohan's eyes opened and, to Cell's shock and horror, the blank stare was gone. With the rest of his face cast in shadow and only his eyes visible to the monster, Gohan radiated a look of utter hatred and pure malice. "And then I let you murder my grandfather."
Cell wheezed in fear, his pupils going small. Gohan closed his eyes, his body trembling, and then he opened them again to reveal the emotionless, green voids. "But, that's something to be addressed later. Right now, I just want you to admit that you can't win. Then, I will kill you and this will all be over."
Cell snatched his foot away from Gohan and slid as far away as he could. "M-Monster!"
Gohan paused for a moment, briefly considering what had just been said to him. And then, he shrugged and continued to march forward. "I did say that we were exactly alike, Cell."
Cell gasped. He watched Gohan with a look of horror on his face. Gohan took another, single step forward, and then Cell immediately blasted off into the sky. "STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM ME!"
Gohan watched as Cell put some distance between them. Slowly, he left the ground and began to ascend. "This is getting embarrassing. Swallow your pride and admit this is finished."
Cell was trembling. Backed into a corner, he formed a diamond shape with his hands and-
"Tri-Beam. That's Tien's move."
Cell's eye twitched. Gohan stared up at him as he continued to slowly approach. "You're welcome to fire that off, Cell. But, I can guarantee you I can counter and reverse it."
The monster gritted his teeth and formed an energy bolt with each hand. Gohan spoke again. "Scatter Shot Barrage into the Hellzone Grenade."
Cell yelped and drew his arm across his chest, charging a new attack. Gohan spoke. "That's your so-called 'Perfect Shot'. What good is a tracking attack against someone who isn't fleeing?"
The monster sputtered. He dispelled this latest attempt at an attack and tensed his muscles for another technique. Gohan spoke. "You're about to do the Four Witches technique."
Cell flinched. Gohan continued. "And then you're going to use the Rebellion's Edge to try and slice me to pieces. Right?"
Cell trembled, his eye twitching again. "How are you reading out my moves like this? How...?"
Gohan spoke to himself. "The Rebellion's Edge. That's the move my grand-"
Immediately, faster than Gohan's brain could even process, he buried his fist into Cell's face. The monster's nose caved deep into his facial structure and he went flying back again, crashing into the ground as he had done so many times before in this fight. Gohan looked down at the purple blood on his fist and then took a deep breath. "Calm. Gotta finish this first."
Gohan descended towards the ground below. But, instead of landing on the solid ground, he landed on another structure.
Pushing himself up off the ground once more, Cell flinched as he felt a familiar presence land and stand onto his back. Gohan crossed his arms over his chest. "Next you'll try the Multi-Form. And then you'll attempt a barrage of Special Beam Cannons, hoping that my connection to Piccolo will give me pause. And then you'd all rush me when that fails. After I vanquish you and your clones, you'd go for a sneak attack Death Beam."
Gohan sat cross-legged onto the stunned Cell's back. "Instant Warp. Solar Flare. Punches and Kicks. Death Saucers. Probably something asinine like the Kaioken Times 100."
Cell trembled as he was made to stay prostrate on the ground. It felt as it Gohan was getting heavier and heavier on his back by the second. Gohan shook his head. "I know you'll do this. You have access to all the techniques and you've seen actual skilled combatants use them. Why should you be able to do them even more effectively? That's your thought process, isn't it?"
Cell's fingers dug into the ground. Gohan placed his face into his palm. "We're the same person, Cell. Always have been. And you're just as pathetic as I am."
The boy closed his eyes. "You've deluded yourself into thinking that having Son Goku's genes makes you the next Son Goku. But, at the end of the day, you can't even save yourself when the chips are down. It's too bad you killed off your get-out-of-death-free card. I bet Dr. Gero would have done something to save you by now."
Gohan gingerly stepped off of Cell's back. He took a deep breath, and then he turned and booted Cell as hard as he could in the stomach, sending the monster flying high into the sky. The boy stood and kept his eyes trained on Cell as the monster flew higher and higher into the air. It wouldn't be long now before this fight was done.
Up in the air...
Cell wheezed as he flew higher and higher up. This couldn't be happening. Not to him. Not after all of the progress he had made. He glared down at the speck on the ground below, the glowing golden granule of life that was Son Gohan.
What options did Cell have here? He was high enough up that he could attempt to flee into space. Then, once he was far enough away, he could obliterate the Earth with a single blast. Or, he could even blow up the Sun and let all these little insects freeze to death. Cell snarled. "Dammit! No..."
While Cell truly did just want the win, he wanted so much more than that. He wanted to crush Gohan with his bare hands. He wanted to remind that boy of his place as a mere observer beneath the foot of the one, true perfect being. But...how?
Cell stopped his rapid ascent and sneered down at Gohan. As he tried to calculate just how he should act, however, a glimmer of something caught in Cell's eye. He turned to glare towards the source of this light and saw something that gave him pause. "Is that a Power Ball...?"
The monster observed the Power Ball, seeing that it was encased in a rather familiar green barrier. "I see. Android 17 is limiting the exposure of the Power Ball to give the Saiyans a boost without allowing them to lose their minds."
Cell glanced down at the fights happening below, watching as the tides shifted against the Cell Juniors. He snarled. "Worthless little vermin."
But then, as he seethed at his failures of children, an idea struck Cell. "Wait...the Power Ball~ Oh yes...perfect!"
On the ground...
Gohan watched as Cell descended towards the ground, slightly raising an eyebrow at the look on the monster's face. "Have you finally buckled under the pressure?"
Cell had a manic grin on his face, spreading wide from ear-to-ear. "Buckled under the pressure? No. Not yet~"
He chuckled. "I've just come to a realization, Gohan. I have one thing left in my arsenal that you haven't thought of. One thing left that you would not have even thought to prepare a strategy for..."
Gohan stood stalwart. "Okay then. Do it."
Cell let loose a manic giggle. And then he extended his tail out from his lower back. Gohan glared at the extending appendage. Cell held up a hand and summoned a sphere of energy into his palm. "Are you ready~?"
Gohan glared. "You're stalling again."
Cell laughed. "Forgive me! Now...take this!"
The monster pulled his hand back as if he was planning to toss the energy ball at Gohan. But then, to the boy's surprise, Cell instead directed the energy ball towards his own face. The monster opened his mouth wide and rammed both the energy sphere and his entire forearm down his throat. Cell manically laughed. "Are you ready, Gohan?!"
Gohan was taken aback by this. He genuinely had no clue what Cell hoped to gain by blasting his own innards. But then, Cell made his plan very clear. He ripped his arm from his gullet and used his hands to disconnect and pull down his jaw. And then, Cell shouted at the top of his lungs. "NOW! BURST OPEN AND MIX!"
The boy flinched, watching as his monstrous foe's chest expanded out due to the explosion of energy within. Cell psychotically laughed out loud and then he began to suck in hard, pulling in various atmospheric gases and allowing as much sunlight to shine down his throat as possible. Rapidly, Cell began to grow. His arms and legs swelled to a massive size. His hands and feet became as large as buildings. Cell's pristine, ivory skin began to wrinkle and warp, tufts of brown fur bursting from the top of his hands and from the purple markings on his face. In addition, the purple viscera that surround Cell's waist, knees, and elbow joints began to bristle with fur as well. The skin on the length of Cell's tail wrinkled and then became engulfed by fur. And finally, Cell's face warped. His handsome features stretched and expanded into a savage, snarling muzzle, his ear cups morphed into wicked, pointed Oozaru ears, and his pink eyes began glow blood red.
The massive, Oozaru Cell loomed over Gohan and the battlefield, his sneering muzzle baring its massive fangs. Cell let loose a primal roar and then slammed his fists against his chest. "THIS IS THE END FOR YOU, GOHAN!"
Gohan stared up at the hulking, genetic abomination. "Your trump card was becoming an Oozaru? Didn't we just discuss that you could have accessed Kaioken Times 100? That would have boosted you more than this."
Cell sneered. "Yes! But, unlike Kaioken Times 100, you have no counter for this! You can't destroy the Power Ball if it is within me!"
Gohan responded. "I never said I had a counter for Kaioken Times 100. I was simply pointing out how predictable you are as a fighter."
Cell gasped. "You...you don't have a counter for the Kaioken Times 100?"
Gohan responded bluntly. "I never said I didn't have a counter for it either."
Cell snarled. "Damn you with your double talk boy! Which is it?! Do you, or don't you?!"
Gohan's voice remained calm. "How stupid do you think I am to tell you that?"
Cell bared his fangs. Gohan continued. "And, more importantly, what difference does it make? Even if this Oozaru abomination is technically more powerful than me, you're still going to lose. You're going to lose hard, completely, and definitively. You can't win, Cell."
The monster screamed at the top of his lungs. "Try saying that when you're crushed flat, you insolent whelp!"
Cell went for a stomp, but Gohan easily side-stepped out of the way. The boy rose up into the air right next to Cell's face. The hot air blowing from Cell's nostrils made beads of sweat form on Gohan's brow, but he did not lose his cool. "This isn't like the Super-Giant Namekian form from before. This one made you stronger, but the added mass has cut your speed and agility. You're powerful, but you'll die of old age before you hit me."
Gohan crossed his arms over his chest. "Didn't you lecture Trunks and my brother about this?"
Cell screamed with rage and launched an Oozaru Mouth Blast directly at Gohan. Gohan quickly flew up to avoid the attack. Cell kept the beam going, chasing Gohan with it and trying to incinerate him, but Gohan was way too fast. He flew off into the distance with Cell giving chase from behind. Cell was growing angrier and angrier by the second, struggling to maintain his consciousness against the primal fury of the Oozaru. He continued his Mouth Blast, screaming a single directive in his head to keep himself focused. "KILL SON GOHAN! KILL SON GOHAN! KILL SON GOHAN!"
Gohan was focused as well. He continued to lead the hulking, enraged bio-Android. He had to make sure there was no way he would be able to avoid the next attack. Gohan continued to slowly build his own speed, allowing the massive ape-monster that was chasing him to increase his own speed in kind. And then, once Cell built up enough momentum that there would be no way for him to stop, Gohan increased to max speed.
Cell flinched in shock as, suddenly, Gohan vanished from sight. He continued to run forward, unable to make himself stop right away. And that was when Gohan took advantage. The boy had disappeared from Cell's sight because he had rapidly increased his speed to circle around to Cell's back. Gohan charged two blasts into his hands and calmly fired. "Double Masenko."
The two beams fired out from Gohan's hands and down to the ground below. Rather than striking Cell, the energy beams crashed into the ground at his feet. Cell was staggered and fell to the ground with his Mouth Blast still going. The blast exploded against Cell's face and the monster screamed in pain. Gohan immediately seized the advantage, grabbing Cell by his long, thick tail and using his forward momentum to easily swing him through the air.
As he went flying, Cell was able to regain his bearings. He stared at Gohan with pure, undiluted hatred and thrust one of his massive fingers forward, firing a Death Beam the size of a Final Flash towards the boy. Gohan remained calm. He drew his hands to the side and focused his energy into a tight, little ball in his palms. As the Death Beam approached, Gohan fired his attack in retaliation. "Piercing Kamehameha."
The attack shot forward and directly into Cell's Death Beam. However, instead of creating a beam clash, the focused nature of the ki allowed it to drill a hole through Cell's Death Beam and use it like a highway that led directly to the massive monster himself. Gohan quickly sidestepped the gigantic Death Beam, watching as it crashed and exploded in the distance. The Piercing Kamehameha, meanwhile, quickly made its way through the Death Beam and right into Cell's finger. The attack bouncing around in Cell's oversized arm, burning a path through his bones and muscle tissue, before shooting out of his shoulder.
Cell's arm was left dead, and this gave Gohan the blind spot he needed to rush in. The boy zipped up to Cell's unprotected face and launched a flurry of ki blasts into the monster's nostril. The attacks flew their way up into Cell's nasal sinus and exploded, disorienting the beast and leaving him with tears welling in his eyes. As Cell struggled to regain his senses, Gohan flew up next to his ear and landed on the earlobe. "Your eardrums must be the size of oil drums right now. So, this will probably hurt."
Gohan took a deep breath and stuck his head into Cell's ear and let loose the loudest, shrillest whistle that he could muster. Cell screeched in agony and drew back his remaining arm. He tried to punch at Gohan, but Gohan moved and simply allowed Cell to punch himself in the head. He backflipped off of the side of Cell's face and hovered right in front of the monster's eyes. Cell gasped and Gohan immediately went into action. He formed a Destructo-Disc over each hand and tossed them directly into Cell's eyes, shredding apart the massive, wet orbs and dodging as the humor within came shooting out.
Cell screeched in pain, his eyes, ears, and nose all disabled. He crossed his arms to defend himself from further attacks, but none came to his surprise. Gohan, having done damage, simply stopped and let the rest play out in real time, watching as the disoriented Cell landed with all of his hulking, Oozaru weight directly onto his head. Cell's neck and skull both crackled and then crumpled down. His head was forced deep into the ground and he was left sticking up, like a massive, ripe vegetable.
Gohan descended down and he took in the sight of Cell, stunned, upside-down, head buried, and wrapped into a defensive, fetal position. And then, wordlessly, the boy simply reached out and gave Cell's massive form a harsh shove. Cell's body creaked and tumbled over like a gigantic tree, ripping his bloodied head out of the ground, and crashed flat onto its back with a massive thud.
The boy landed onto the ground, no worse for wear, and walked up to Cell's immense, prostrate form with a non-plussed look on his face.
Gohan stood there, next to a gigantic yellow foot so large that it dwarfed his house. The boy's face was blank and emotionless. He stared unfeelingly at his fallen, gigantic foe and spoke in a bland, almost robotic tone. "This is your limit, Cell. You lose."
Cell laid on the ground, heaving breaths in and out as he felt Gohan's presence near his feet. He began to lift his tail to try and crush the boy, but then something happened that genuinely rocked Cell to his core. He pictured in his head the image of Gohan dodging and counterattacking. He twitched his leg, thinking that he could stomp the boy, but then a similar scenario played out in his mind. Cell went through dozens, maybe even hundreds, of scenarios in his head for how he could attack and kill Gohan, but every single one of them ended in the exact same way: Cell embarrassed and laying prostrate before his foe.
The monster's jaw trembled as he finally started to speak a sentence. "I can't beat-"
Cell's eyes went wide and then-
*POP*
-he was gone.
Gohan immediately turned his attention to the sky. "I heard what you were about to say. Even you can't hold onto denial much longer."
Up in the air...
Cell pounded his fists against his face and head, screaming in a furious rage at what he had nearly just admitted to himself. The force of Cell's blows was enough to split skin and crack carapace. His fur became damp and matted against his face as he screamed louder and louder. "NO! NONONONONONO! THIS CAN'T BE HOW THIS ENDS! HE CAN'T JUST BE STRONGER! HE CAN'T! HE CAN'T! HE CAN'T! HE CAN'T! HE CAN'T! HE CAN'T!"
Cell grinded his palms against his face as his eyes regenerated. "There must be some way to win this...even if my own strength isn't enough..."
The monster thought hard. "Think...there must be one attack left. One that doesn't...require...my own strength..."
And then, as Cell's eyes grew back, a devious smirk spread across his gigantic, wrinkled snout. "Perfect~"
Cell's tail pulsated; the monster gathered all of his focus into the stinger hanging off of the tip. He closed his eyes and thought hard, activated Forced Spirit Fission. And then, like a strike of lightning, Cell sent his tail stinger piercing into the Earth's crust. The force of the tail strike, combined with the Forced Spirit Fission, sent ripples across the entire Earth's surface and Cell sneered. "Yes..."
And then, as Cell's tail began to suckle and draw from the very planet itself, the monster raised his hands above his head and roared so loud it made the atmosphere shake. "PLANET EARTH! YOUR PERFECT SON DEMANDS YOUR ENERGY!"
Above Cell's hands, a massive blue sphere began to form: The Spirit Bomb. But then, as if a disease were somehow filling the sacred attack, the entire thing began to turn a rancid, sickly green. And the glow from that slowly covered the entire area.
Cell laughed out loud as he felt the energy held above his massive head become heavier and heavier. "DO YOU HAVE A COUNTER FOR THIS, GOHAN?! DO YOU?!"
On the sidelines...
The conscious Z-Fighters all stared up at the massive, Oozaru Cell and his even bigger Dirty Spirit Bomb. The attack was swelling to such proportions that it was rapidly becoming clear there was no way to halt it. Yamcha, even after having gained so much of his self-confidence, couldn't help but voice what everyone else was clearly thinking. "W-We can't stop that. We can't stop that! What are we going to do?!"
On the battlefield...
Android 16 stared up in horror at the Spirit Bomb. The nanotech Android had made his way down to the battlefield to recover the bag of Senzu Beans that Gohan had exhumed from Cell's gut. Now, he was knelt in horror beneath the massive shadow cast by Oozaru Cell. 16 gripped the bag of beans in his hand as his scanners went wild. "Even if we were to get Goku back to his feet, this is..."
Gohan appeared in front of 16. "Impossible."
Android 16 flinched. "Gohan..."
Gohan spoke robotically. "Two things are clear here from the off. As an Oozaru, Cell is stronger than me. His only weakness is that he is slower and he seems to have found a way around that. The Spirit Bomb he's making is unstable. Even if I were to dodge it, the explosion would be big enough that it would crack the Earth open like an egg. If that attack is allowed to go off, Cell would kill all of us."
Android 16 was chilled at the utter void of emotion in Gohan's voice. He reached out to him. "Do not lose hope Gohan. There is a way to get around this. Surely so. We must simply band together and-"
Gohan cut him off. "16..."
Android 16 fell silent. Gohan seemed to struggle with his words, but then he spoke. "My Dad, Mr. Piccolo, Krillin, and everyone else...are they all still alive?"
The Android was taken aback at first, but then he nodded. "The battles between our forces and the Cell Juniors resulted in a total loss for the Cell Juniors with no casualties on our end. Everyone, up to and including Goku, is still in living condition."
16 could not see Gohan's face, but he watched as if the boy's body briefly shuddered. For just a moment, emotion returned to Gohan's voice. "Thank goodness. Th-Thank goodness..."
But then, the emotion drained from Gohan's voice once more and he returned to the personality of a newly born Super Saiyan 2. "16. Take the Senzu Beans and get everyone healed. And don't worry. I might not be able to block that Dirty Spirit Bomb, but that doesn't mean I can't stop it."
Android 16 was horrified. His sensors were quickly able to pick up on everything going on with Gohan. The roiling torrent of emotions and pain all sealed behind a blank mask. The Android extended his hand out, as if he were planning to console the boy. But, 16 stopped his hand just short of touching Gohan's shoulder. He knew that, logically speaking, now wasn't the time to force the boy to confront his emotions. 16 retracted his hand and nodded. "Understood."
And then, as Android 16 went away, Gohan glared up at Cell and the impending doom literally hanging over the Earth's head. The boy closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
In the air...
Cell smiled wide as he watched Gohan shoot up towards him. "So, boy, are you facing your death head on?! Fine! THEN DIE!"
The monster threw his arms downward and sent the Dirty Spirit Bomb shooting towards Gohan. Cell let loose a truly psychotic laugh as the attack descended towards the Earth. He had done it! He had won!
Gohan, meanwhile, stared up towards the attack. He knew that he couldn't block it, or send it flying back. But, that didn't stop the boy from coming up with a strategy on the spot. Gohan's power flared, forming a massive cushion between the Dirty Spirit Bomb and the Earth. The attack pressed against Gohan's aura and made it buckle inward. Gohan gritted his teeth and slowly approached.
The sheer force of the blast was enough that any weaker warrior would have been blown away, but Gohan was able to withstand. He got right up next to the Dirty Spirit Bomb and then, to Cell's surprise, the boy shoved his hands into it.
Gohan cringed, the energy within the Dirty Spirit Bomb clearly eating away at him. Cell laughed. "Are you a fool?! Do you really think you can simply touch this devastating attack of mine?!"
The young warrior steeled his gaze. And then, with all of his strength, he ripped a large chunk out of the Dirty Spirit Bomb. Cell flinched in shock, watching as the toxic, green energy in Gohan's hands quickly shifted to a pure blue and then was tossed aside. Gohan nodded, he had done it. And now, he would continue to do it.
To Cell's horror, the boy scooped his hands into the Dirty Spirit Bomb again, ripping away and purifying energy and then slinging it to the side. Gohan continued this process over and over, somehow ripping away more and more energy each time before purifying it and tossing it aside. Cell was at a loss. "No! This shouldn't be possible! Stop, damn you! Stop!"
Rapidly, the Dirty Spirit Bomb deflated. It got smaller and smaller and smaller still until it was but a single energy ball that Gohan was able to quash between his two hands. Gohan stared down at his palms, finding them to be damaged and bloody. But then, he looked up at Cell. "And now, this is over. Did you really think an attack that couldn't kill Frieza or even Vegeta would have really helped you here?"
Cell snarled. "Over?! It's not over until I say it's over! It would be nothing for me to make another Dirty Spirit Bomb! And then we'll see just how confident you are! Those hands sure are looking mangled~"
Gohan nodded. "My hands are shot. So are my knees. I feel like I'm going to buckle if a slight wind even blows through. But that doesn't matter. This is still over. And you still lose."
A vein popped out of the freakish Oozaru's head. "And just what makes you say-"
Without another word, Gohan splayed his arms out wide. Cell flinched, recognizing the stance. "Piccolo's Hellzone Grenade?! But what..."
Cell went very quiet as he started to look around, his feral jaw dropping in shock. As the monster looked around, countless blue beacons reflected in his eyes like stars in the night sky. There was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide as Cell quickly came to the horrifying realization of what had happened. When Gohan was dismantling the Dirty Spirit Bomb, he wasn't just tossing the energy away. Rather, Cell found himself surrounded by hundreds of miniature Spirit Bombs. Cell raised his hands up. "No...no stop..."
Gohan stared up at Cell with bored antipathy, his emotionless façade still quite intact. He spoke in his monotone voice to the monster. "My father taught me about this technqiue. He explained how it works. You don't steal from the Earth to make a Spirit Bomb, Cell. You ask, and then if you are worthy the energy is granted to you. That's how the technique works."
Finally, Gohan adopted just a small smirk. "But I suppose that your method worked in a sense. You'll get all of the energy at once Cell. After all, you asked for this."
Gohan's smirk faded and he pulled his arms inward, making all of the Spirit Bomb rush towards the helpless Oozaru all at once. "Hellzone Grenade: Spirit Rapture."
Cell yelped in fear at all of the Spirit Bombs crashed towards him all at once.
On the sidelines...
The Z-Fighters, now rejoined by Android 16, all watched in awe as they ate their Senzu Beans. Even Krillin and Raditz, as they manually fed Goku and Future Ranch, watched in utter disbelief as the multitude of Spirit Bombs crashed into Cell all at once.
And the resulting explosion was large enough that it briefly blew a hole in Earth's atmosphere, revealing the twinkling, starry sky that would have otherwise been hidden by a veil of daytime blue.
On the ground...
Cell's blasted and beaten body slammed against the ground hard. The force of being struck by that many Spirit Bombs at once not only shredded his massive body down quite a bit, but it had also destabilized and burst the Power Ball within him. Once Cell's massive, ape body splattered against the ground, it rapidly began to shrink down.
Like a popped balloon, Cell's body was left shredded on the ground. He was struggling to breathe as he laid there in disbelief. Even after stealing energy from the Earth itself, Cell was still bested. His tricks and schemes had failed. Cell had ultimately, definitively lost.
Using the last bit of his energy, Cell regenerated his destroyed body and started to drag himself across the battlefield. "No! I...won't die like this! I won't! Because...because...because I am-"
A single footstep echoed behind Cell and he screamed in fear, rolling over wide-eyed and frightened to see Gohan standing over him once more. Cell trembled, all of his bravado and pride gone. His ego shattered. All that was left of Cell was a single creature, quite small in the grand scheme, staring up at certain death.
Gohan's face was blank as he loomed over Cell. He stared at the monster and spoke. "It's just like I said, you're the worst parts of everyone I know. All of the pride and overconfidence, none of the charm or brains. You call yourself the ultimate lifeform, but you're little more than an amalgamation of the parts every wishes they could rid themselves of."
The boy stepped forward. "Earlier, I mentioned that I had seen you once before today. And I wasn't lying. In the woods, near the Time Machine that you murdered Trunks for. I found you there. I was the first person to find you. A blank-eyed, empty, stomach-dragging, oversized pest that represented nothing but ill omens and dread. And now, after millions of people and two Androids...you haven't evolved in the slightest. You're always going to be that insect desperately hiding from everyone else in the shadows, that is the essence of being Cell."
Cell was hyperventilating as Gohan stood over him. Genuine tears of fear were building in the monster's eyes. Gohan spoke again. "I know how the afterlife works in Hell, Cell. I've been told about that too. Your soul is sent down below, you repent, and then you are reincarnated. So, I'm going to give you some advice..."
Gohan held out his hand, aiming it squarely at the trembling Cell. "When you die and you go through that process, reincarnate anywhere but Earth. Because if I even sense even a hint of you again, I'll rip your soul into pieces."
Cell was breathing even more heavily. In a panic, he tried every trick he had up his sleeve to throw Gohan off his game. "B-Big talk for a pathetic little brat! Aren't you worried about the chest wound I dealt Goku?!"
Gohan said nothing. Cell continued. "What about the grizzly murder I dealt to Bardock?!"
No response. The last fragments of Cell's ego began to crumble. His voice became shrill. "I-I'll skin Piccolo alive! I'll torture Chi-Chi to death! I'll eat those newborns feet first!"
All of Gohan's emotions were simply absent. He stared down at Cell as clinically as one would a frog they were about to dissect. Nothing was distracting Gohan from what he knew needed to be done. Cell was going to die right here, right now.
As reality began to set in, Cell could visualize the last of the sand in his timer trickling away. None of his taunts were working. Nothing was working! In a desperate frenzy, Cell lunged forward at Gohan's feet. And, quite rapidly, all of the shame flooded out of Cell's body. "Don't kill me! I'm begging you, don't kill me!"
Cell hugged Gohan's leg, licking the boy's boot. "I can't die like this! Not like this! A perfect being like myself can die such an uneventful death!"
Gohan remorselessly kicked Cell off of him, sending the monster tumbling back. Cell shivered, a genuine look of terror on his face. "Has it all been an act up to this point, Cell? Is this really what you're like once you peel back all of the layers? That's too bad."
As the blast ballooned in Gohan's hand, the tears finally poured from Cell's eyes. Helpless, he curled up into a defensive curl and begged in a hoarse voice. "P-Please...p-p-please...don't do this...please stop..."
And then Gohan's arm fell, the blast dissipating. Cell looked up, seeing the boy's head bowed over. The monster was confused, not realizing what he had just said. Gohan, meanwhile, was still for just a few moments. But then, a small chuckle reverberated from the boy's throat.
Mere minutes earlier...
Gohan suddenly cried out. "WAIT!"
Cell stopped. He looked down at Gohan again and several veins popped out of Cell's face. He was livid. Kneeling before him, his mask twisted into a sobbing grimace, was Gohan. Tears poured down the boy's face and he could barely speak as he heaved for air. "P-Please...p-p-please...don't do this..."
Gohan sobbed. "Please stop..."
The Cell Junior present exploded into mocking laughter, pointing at Gohan and ridiculing his with loud, obnoxious guffaws. Cell's face, meanwhile, was utterly humorless. He rolled his eyes at Gohan once again showing his age, and then he cast Bardock's crippled body at the boy. Bardock skidded across the ground on his knees and was left in a position where he and Gohan could look one another right in the eye.
Between the two, their entire life together flashed before Gohan's eyes. The fight against Vegeta, the adventures on Namek, training together, living together, getting to know one another and growing to genuinely love one another, and all of their time in the Time Chamber. Gohan remembered it all. Bardock, meanwhile, simply closed his eyes and thought back to that day that he had jumped between Gohan and the blast that Nappa had thrown.
"Ten."
A blast came bursting through Bardock's chest that made it pop open like a balloon. Blood splattered everywhere. All across the ground, onto the camera lens, and even across Gohan's face. The boy fell silent and his pupils shrank to the size of pinpricks.
A manic grin spread across Cell's face. "So, how about now? Are you angry yet~?"
Back in the present...
Gohan was laughing himself silly now. The boy threw his head back so hard that his neck audibly cracked. His laughter was so loud, so uproarious that it caught the attention of everyone across the battlefield. On the ground, Cell nervously started to laugh along as well. Gohan's attack that was meant to kill him had been dissipated, so now Cell was attempting to find some method of escape as his foe laughed.
But, quickly enough, even Cell was able to notice that something was wrong. Gohan's laugh quickly went from jovial, to hoarse and crackly. It sounded less like someone finding something funny, and more like someone trying to force all of the air out of their lungs all at once. The laughter quickly turned into wheezing guffaws, Gohan's lips spreading out so far that they cracked and began to leak blood.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! AHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAH! HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHHHHHHHHHH!"
Gohan through his head back forward and Cell's eyes went wide. He shuddered hard, as if a frozen lightning bolt had been rammed directly to his spine. Gohan's eyes, once green, dull, and full of antipathy, were now utterly blank. Empty white voids that served to do little more than reflect Cell's own terrified gasp right back at him.
The horrific, sickening laughter continued and, as it did, Gohan's aura began to change. The golden yellow quickly turned a dark, ebony black. The electricity sparking through it dissipated and was replaced with wretched, blood red flames.
Gohan pounded his fists against his forehead so hard that it split open, ruby-red drippings sailing down his face, into his eyes, and out of his tear ducts in rapid succession. Gohan loomed over Cell, having fully lost himself to all of the emotions that he had been trying to force down.
The Super Saiyan 2 was gone...and now the Alpha Saiyan was here.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
